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overnightheartbeats · 1 month ago

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"Yeah, year-end bonuses, but we usually just get luckier with people wanting to become sponsors for the museum and such. We always see an uptick of donors enrolling or those anonymous donations to the museum. Holiday spirit, I think." He smiled at her understanding, it was refreshing. Then again, he wondered if she understood because she fell in a similar category - working during the holidays. "I try to, reminds me of my tour guide days. Sometimes, if I'm not too swamped, I do tag along on a tour. It's fun to kind of...see the work we do through a curious kid's eyes or a fascinated tourist. You should visit, maybe we'll have new exhibits for you. And another private tour, that can be arranged," he agreed with an eager smile. "A support group, why had no one told me before?" He shook his head, processing these life-changing news.

Hands went up in surrender, she wasn't wrong. His group of humans were not...the smartest. Him included, probably. Well, definitely including him. "I think we're just built to be wrong, to be honest. Then, add insecurity. Yeah, you're right. Jumping to those conclusions is easy with insecurity around." He thought of her words, and honestly was finding that she had some unique wisdom going. Matt could only smile, her mention of friendships felt relatable enough. "Okay yes, I'll give you that. All relationships are complicated, even friendships. Just gotta find your people to take the plunge with. Have you found people like that along the way?"

Matt felt a momentary breeze near him, and he did look around for a second, fearing he was losing his marbles. Maybe the late nights were getting to him. Though, instead of giving it too much thought, he quickly attributed to an air draft in her apartment, probably the same air draft that moved the wind chimes just a moment ago. "Smart does it for you then?" He asked with a knowing smirk, thinking back to their earlier encounters. "It's a fun one, I really like the songs in that movie. Eh, no one watches Disney movies for their issues," he commented with a shrug. He definitely didn't. On occasion when he did tune it, they were movies for him to just disconnect for a while. "Used to? What happened, not friends anymore?"

His laughter echoed in her dining area, finding the nose scrunch adorable (if only for a second). "Ship and a crew? Lucky me." To the aquarium? He hadn't considered, Wait, was this a date? Frankly, a bit too scared to ask. "The aquarium could be fun. Are you going to give me a tour this time? Honestly, it's been years since I've gone."

"I'd have to agree that you're full of surprises, you're keeping me on my toes here. It's pretty fun." Which was funny, because Matt could easily find this stressful. Part of him probably did find it stressful but the fun part took over or the majority of it. "Hm, haven't heard it but if it's that catchy maybe that's for the best. Indie girl, you'll need to send me your recommendations later. I'm curious to know what else gets stuck in your head." Matt felt odd just sitting around and not doing anything, but she seemed to be pretty set on doing this on her own. This was not his house, he reminded himself. He stood up from the table, handing her the empty plate. "Well, okay if you're sure. Still on break? Wow you're keeping me on a tight leash," he joked before retreating to the living room. Matt knew that she had offered for him to turn the tv on, but still didn't feel comfortable enough. So, instead, he scrolled on his phone. Aimless scrolling, really. He could hear muffled noise coming from her kitchen, the kind that made him wonder if she had a dog or cat around here somewhere that she was scolding. Odd girl, could he really expect more?

After a few minutes, the aimless scrolling got to him, and he called out to her. "You okay over there? Are you sure I can't help?"

"Is that when you get your bonuses? I'd say that's a good time as ever to be generous." Nodding along she understood why he'd love the work during the holidays. "I can see why that'd be an incentive to get up for work during the very spirited holiday season. Do you always hang out when its tourist season? Maybe I should come around during my holiday break. A second private tour," a smirk crossed over her features as she remembered that date not date museum tour. "You've got the insane gene with the sales alert. Welcome to our club. We've got a support group." she laughed. "That's also smart shopping. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise."

She shrugged and sighed. "I do understand it in a way but also men are always so quick to jump to conclusions without thinking. Sorry to your group of humans but, men brain sometimes doesn't rattle as it should. Some are very insecure though so that in itself makes it hard not to think late nights equals booty calls. That is tricky and messy especially when people develop feelings and then you have an added layer of complicated. Relationships even friendships are complicated and hard to navigate. You just need to learn by falling down together." That reminded her of her best friend which made her go quiet. The one she lost and one who coincidentally was annoying her at this very moment. Jax needed to get her into the light she had been hanging around and she knew why. She wanted Jax to find someone who would take care of her like she would them. "Lips are sealed," she smiled softly and rubbed her eye with her elbow.

A blow of air was felt as ghost girl sat beside Matt and leaned on her elbow. He's pretty smart. Listen to him since you don't wanna listen to me. That's what I've been trying to tell her but thick head for Jacqueline.

Jax smiled and laughed nodding her head. "Definitely the glasses and the tussled hair. But not a bad thing. Smart is sexy as you know." she nodded. "That's the prince in little mermaid that is correct. It is my favorite movie. I know it has a lot of issues but sometimes you need a little magic. It was a Friday night movie I used to watch with my best friend." Still do.

Her nose scrunched up like she was amused. "I can get you that ship and maybe a crew. I think we should go down to the aquarium one of these days you have off. It should prove to be pretty fun." Take her! Ghost girl blew air into his ear and smiled.

A nervous laugh escaped her and sighed. "I am just full of surprises. You don't even know the half of it. Have you heard of Cinderella Snapped? That song has been in my head forever. I heard it at a coffeehouse two weeks ago and haven't gotten rid of it. It's a little more indie than pop but I'm an indie girl." That caught her off guard. He liked being here. She smiled and grabbed her plate. "No. Don't worry just make yourself comfortable please. I'll be out shortly I promise. Turn the TV on. You're still on break." And quickly went to the kitchen where she opened the fridge and finally acknowledged her dead best friend. "You've got to stop doing that please. He doesn't know and I hate to have him think I'm crazy and not be my friend at least."

He wouldn't be here if he wasn't interested. Trust me. As for your gift it IS a gift. You can't keep hiding behind your bio parents bullshit. You don't know how he will react and I think you owe it to him to let him decide how he feels. I just don't want you to hide who you are anymore. You need someone to give your love to. Give that Disney Prince the benefit of the doubt. Try. Otherwise I'll haunt him.

"No! Don't." Jax smacked her head and laughed. "God. Okay. Okay. But please come back later."

#hahah ghost girl is helping speed this along because these two are just dancing around flirting!#send him home to wally to get some sense smacked in him

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puyoconfessions · 5 years ago

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Tbh I would love to see all the hot takes you have on this series! They would defiantly be interesting considering your background around the series!

*deep breath* Hoo boy anon, you asked for it-

- I’ve said it before but my favorite, odd recurring character in Skeleton-T. Not for any deep character reason, the little guy is just adorable and his appearance is always a joy! A shame his only mainline appearance was in 7 as of late, I would have gladly traded Draco over him due to her lack of contribution to anything and increasingly irritating presence.

- Madou ARS trio is the best ARS trio. I appreciate what SEGA tried to initially do with the Fever ARS, but they have no actual dynamic and any interesting backstory or further characterization was dropped.

- On that note, I find Sig to be incredibly overrated and I kinda do get tired of hearing about him above all other characters. This doesn’t mean I think Sig fans are bad, it’s just one of those things you get exhausted with after a while. Tee is an infinitely more interesting male protagonist imo.

- Suketoudara is a great character.

- Late-era Compile is just as bad with writing as current SEGA is, and people need to acknowledge it. The Madou Saturn game was mostly rather mean-spirited, Satan was getting increasingly creepy, and in the Quest mode of Puyo Puyo Box, Arle is a straight-up jerk. When she sees a famished/starved Schezo passed out on the bridge in exhaustion, she thinks it’s a good idea to pour hot tea on him. Yeah, I would rather have the flanderized SEGA cast over this.

- Satan is a wonderful character that I adore, but I actually prefer how SEGA handled him over the mid-to-late era Compile.

- We need WAY more love and appreciation for the MadouMono final bosses…… like, Phantom God? Dark Matter? The Count? Fudoushi? Devil? My absolute lads. I love them. No one likes Rune Lord lol.

- Actually, in general, where is the nightmare core aesthetic fan-art for Fudoushi!? Can you tell who my fav Madou character is yet?

- I know I’ve talked about SEGA’s flanderization a lot, but look on the bright side. At least Puyo Puyo didn’t get stuck with Compile Heart… sure, Puyo Puyo could possibly get a more serious story, but then the obnoxious clichés and lack of development would be cranked up to 11.

- I’m still sad that Puyo Puyo made no appearance in the Archie Sonic/Mega Man Worlds Collide comic. :(

- Apparently, there’s a hate blog for Schezo floating around right now? I mean, you do you, you’re allowed to dislike a character, but I hope this doesn’t become the same as the hate for Ally or the Quest characters a couple years back.

- I don’t ship too much in Puyo Puyo/MadouMono, but I have some (a few obscure) ships that I like to play with, in my mind? Here are some:

Ringo x Ecolo

Doppelganger Arle x Rulue (I wrote about this one.. multiple times)

Dark Matter x Wish (I wrote about this one too lol)

alternatively, Dark Matter x Sleeping Princess if I want him to move on

Camus x Lala

Phantom God x Arle??

… Before I get yelled at for that last one, I view it as platonic. I think Phantom God struggles with the concept of loss and can’t figure out why they act strongly in regards to Lilith. They do not understand emotions, which is why they’re confused upon Arle being upset over Phantom God wounding Schezo.

But uh, that’s purely headcanon material for Phantom God. I can return to that maybe if people ask about it.. ;;

So those are my takes regarding Puyo Puyo, lol.

#puyo puyo #Madou Monogatari #this is long!! I'm sorry!#I wanted to include more in the shipping category but… eh??#I don't wanna list BROTPs

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eolewyn1010 · 3 years ago

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Warning: This is a rant.

So, there’s someone in the Charité fandom with a few, eh, interesting(?) ships. Namely, Anni/de Crinis as a romantic ship or, more recently, Anni/Christel. Which, whatever. I don’t shit on your ship, you leave my boats alone and all that; I guess the person in question is just into villain/protagonist ships. You do you. But I do have an opinion and I’m gonna elaborate on it now. (It’s a history- and canon-oriented breakdown; feel free to ignore.)

First of all, Max de Crinis was a Nazi. I’m not sure inhowfar the person in question is aware of that because they only ever seem to be talking about the character de Crinis in the Charité show (more on that later) and I don’t think they’re German; thus they might not have the cultural background to take this with the same queasy feeling I do, but yes, we’re talking a real-life Nazi who gave his expert reports on which people were to be “sorted out” in Aktion T4. Meaning, he actively participated in the mass murder of disabled people, adults and children alike. And no one can tell me he didn’t know what he was having part in. That man was influencial, way up in the hierarchy. He lived the superiority ideology of the Nazis, he preached it. We are shown that in the series. We hear the way he talks about people, about the Dohnanyis, about a traumatized woman who thinks she has lost her child, about homosexuals, and I think it’s not far-off from what we know of historical de Crinis. He was a monster, responsible for the deaths of hundreds or thousands and not sorry about it. He’s not shown as a redeemable antagonist in the series, and I don’t see him at all with Anni, a character who is very much shown to be redeemable. Anni is passive and complacent, which is another category of bad, but she is, to some degree, unaware. It is at least partially a willful unawareness, admittedly, but she is young enough to have been raised unaware. And once she overcomes this, she realizes that what happens around her, what her highly adored mentor preaches and practices, is nothing she can morally justify. That’s when her redemption begins. With her breaking down crying eventually as she can’t cling to her worldview anymore, we know it’s a painful process, and it’s supposed to be.

De Crinis is at no point unaware. He is a Nazi, and we’re never shown at any time that he wants to change that. We’re never shown him in pain, up until it’s about his own life. Because there was never any indication for that in the historical person and this is a historical show.

Secondly, the character we are shown in the series. He’s married, y’know? Admittedly, his wife is extremely non-present, showing up only to die by his side, but it’s one of the things that make de Crinis behave in that condescending mentorly way toward Anni instead of being actually flirty with her. So, the ship would have to do away with the wife. Then, it’d have to away with Artur because - oh, right, Anni already has an irredeemable Nazi asshole she’s married to. From what we’re shown, she and Artur are very much in love initially. It’s not an easy separation for her. Easiest solution? Make them both single from the get-go, I guess, have de Crinis be Karin’s father; he’d conveniently be protective of his own child and stuff... and wind up as Artur, basically. Who’s all, “yeah, other people’s children, but not mine, of course”. To overcome that, de Crinis would have to realize that all human life has inherent value. Which means, he’d have to renounce his work, his loyalty to the Nazi realm, everything his life and ego consists of. All the things he’s built his reputation on, might I note. There are others who watch him. He’d be dead in no time. And if we say he was like that from the get-go, then he never gets into a position of power in the first place. Scientist? Even several of his contemporaries thought his work was worthless. (We’re shown that in series-canon, too, with Sauerbruch and Jung grinning at his self-adulation.) His hostility with the Dohnanyis / Bonhoeffers? Wouldn’t be there; he’d be fighting for their cause. His psychological torture and persecution of Martin and Otto? Why would he hunt down homosexuals if he had internalized that all human life has value and Nazi ideology is wrong?

There would be nothing left of his character. What point is there in shipping Anni with de Crinis when the latter isn’t de Crinis anymore? Just make a new character then?

Third, his points of redemption potential? ...there are none. His favorism of Anni? Based on her being a good little sheep who looks up at him with her wide, Aryan eyes and admires him. His soft spot for kids, shown in his disgust with Magda Goebbels’ planned murder of her children? He’s appalled that the virtuous paragon of the Nazi model family is shredding yet another bit of his pretty, pretty worldview; that’s all. He doesn’t give a shit about children. He doesn’t try to stop her or talk her out if it. He tells her where she can get poison to go through with it. When Anni mentions that “Karin has been evacuated”, he doesn’t even blink. And he knows what “evacuating” means for a disabled child. He doesn’t care. He has the point of view of Nurse Käthe, of Prof. Bessau: That child’s no good; make new ones. His taking flight, knowing that he has committed crimes he will be prosecuted for? Yeah - but he doesn’t seem to suffer from it. When Anni acknowledges herself as guilty, she breaks down and lashes out, realizing what she might have been and was capable of. De Crinis? Takes flight. He’s not a bit shaken, not a bit surprised by what he has been up to. He has always known that what he participated in is wrong; he just didn’t care so long as there were no consequences for him personally. The one and only thing that made de Crinis watch-worthy in the series is that Lukas Miko is a damn fine actor who gives one hell of a chilling performance. That doesn’t make his character any less of a piece of shit, nor does it diminish my urge to go take a shower after the de Crinis scenes. I wouldn’t mind watching Miko play a de Crinis anthithesis, but that definitely wouldn’t be de Crinis.

To make this ship work, there are exactly two possibilities: Give up all of de Crinis’ character - or roll with him being the evil bastard that he is and that we are shown he is, and give up all of Anni’s character. That’s it. Just... don’t act like there’s canonically anything good about de Crinis.

Same goes for the Anni/Christel ship, btw. “Everything is the same, but Christel is not in love with Otto but with Anni”. That... means nothing is the same. It means everything changes thoroughly. Christel was always the only real threat for Otto and Martin - if she isn’t, there’s not much for them to fear in their own ranks. They’re careful; they wouldn’t have been found out without a denunciation. Means, they don’t get arrested, Otto doesn’t have to save Martin, Otto goes out to war, Otto dies before the war is over because those last months of battling were desperate and ugly (even more so than the earlier, I mean). So, we’d get a new gay at the cost of killing another? Eh. A Nazi accepting homosexuality, coming to terms with herself as an adversary of her own creeds and abandoning Nazi ideology to Do The Right Thing is not “missing dramatic content”, either. It’s Anni’s arc. And it’s a character arc that Christel, with the way she’s written, with “too much compassion is a sign of weakness”, is not capable of.

The scenario doesn’t only include Christel accepting herself as a lesbian; it also includes her helping Anni with Karin. Which brings us back to the same problem as with de Crinis: She’d have to abandon everything she’s convinced of. Accept the value of all human life. And I think her definition of a “worthy life” is even narrower than that of de Crinis; that’s why he recruits her in the first place: Because Christel is a very passionate Nazi. Much more so than de Crinis. She has a backbone, he’s an opportunistic chickenshit. He takes flight. She fights. To the very last second, she clings to her idea of the Nazi realm. When she breaks down, it isn’t for realizing that what she believes in is wrong; it is because what she believes in is lost. That’s one of the things that make me be more shaken with her than with de Crinis, even more in awe of Frida-Lovisa Hamann than of Lukas Miko: Christel never knows that she’s in the wrong. Like Anni, she’s young enough to have been raised unaware, and different than Anni, she very decidedly declines the chance to break out of this. If she’d been brought to court for her deeds, she wouldn’t have been able to defend herself, and she wouldn’t have denied anything, because in her worldview, she never did anything wrong. Realizing that would be, again, an extremely painful process and, again, it wouldn’t leave anything of her character. Why would she go on a date with Otto and propose to him? Why would she tattle on little Emil? On Hans von Dohnanyi? On Martin? Why would she be in conflict with the Sauerbruchs? Why would she lead Volkssturm kids into the hospital if she wants to protect Anni? Why are there any conflicts at all instead of all of the Charité staff being morally upright and good and a united front against the Nazis?

They aren’t. There’s a story being told, and if they’d change out these chilling, well-written antagonists for lukewarm knock-off protagonists, they’d have to make up new antagonists to make any of the story work. It’s a historical series, dealing with living amidst Nazis; inside this framework, the characters won’t function as theirselves if their core values are flipped.

Conclusion? There’s only one legit ship in there, and it’s de Crinis/Christel. I can totally see that; it’d leave both their characters intact. He could rush back to tragically die by her side - BAM, there you’ve got your Nazi-apologetic drama. Or make it Magda Goebbels/Christel, if one wants to go for psycho lesbians. Personally, I don’t care much for finding a happy end for obvious Nazis that were written as Nazis and have absolutely nothing that would turn them away from being Nazis. And I don’t see Anni being either’s romantic partner. Why on earth would she want to? Isn’t Artur punishment enough?

#Charité #Charité at War #got this out of my system #I'm a CHARACTER writer okay?#so this is the character-driven take #but the apologetic take on a historical Nazi still pisses me off

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recurring-polynya · 4 years ago

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Do you have like some top renruki fics based on theme? Like top 5 saddest that make you sob or top 5 that made you laugh or too 5 nsfw? 😳

I love doing fanfic recs, and everyone can feel free to send me a theme like this at any time. I do fear that I talk about my favs too much, but on the other hand, can I ever really talk up my favs too much?

Sad

1. Everyone better know this by now, but that which cannot be seen by @gizkasparadise is my go-to “get emotionally wrecked” fic. I will never stop talking about it. Fuck I am thinking about Rukia and Byakuya in that giant house thinking about their dead spouses again f u c k

2. Metaesthesia by @lucymonster is another heart-ripper-outer. It’s a little hard to explain, but Renji and Byakuya swap bodies, and it’s about Renji sort of... turning into Byakuya and it is an amazing exploration of character and also amazingly sad.

3. Is The Curse of the Zanpakuto by c2t2 sad or is it just horrifying? It’s both. It’s a (much) darker take on Rukia and Renji’s time in Inuzuri and it is indelibly printed on my headcanons and I don’t like to say it’s my favorite, but it might be my more important fanfic. [contains sex]

4. The primary reason I can never really get behind IchiRuki as a ship is because I get too sad thinking about Renji and Orihime. But sometimes, I feel like feeling sad about Renji and Orihime and then I read this wild abandoned star: a romance in twenty by the genius paperiuni (who also wrote The Roots of Heaven one of all-time Great Works of Fanfiction)

5. I don’t know if The Red Devil of Inuzuri by @junko222 is actually sad, but it makes me sad. It’s a what-if where Renji gets all fucked-up after Rukia’s adoption and ruins his life, which I think is only a thin hair away from canon and I am constantly thinking about this.

Funny

For some reason, this category was really hard for me? None of these are straight-up screwball comedy, they are just fics where I really like the writer’s sense of humor.

1. Look, I assume you wanted Bleach recs, but the actual funniest fanfic in existence is Bruce Wayne Banned from Walmart by @unpretty this is not up for debate.

2. “Mildly bad things happen to Byakuya and he gets upset about it” is one of my favorite categories of comedy, and @thegreenfaery is one of my favorite practitioners of it. Saturday 7th November 1987: The Wedding Party is my favorite example of her humor. In the interest of full disclosure, she wrote it for me, but also, it’s really funny. I have been meaning to re-read this for months; I probably should.

3. Not So Easy A by apearlinmyhead a GrimmIchi college AU. It has great banter and really great use of side characters, and it’s really, really funny. Every single interaction between Renji and Ichigo is comedy gold. It’s unfinished, which is a shame, because she indicated she only had one more chapter to go. I have faith that she will come back and finish it someday.

4. I don’t talk about @murderlight a lot, because she’s already super-famous and doesn’t need my help, but among other things, her fics are hilarious (when they are being hilarious, less so when they they are slamming you over the head with a baseball bat of feels). Both Cat Scratch Fever 🐈 and A Demon in the Rough 💎 are tremendously good, and I am really excited that she has said she’ll be picking up the latter again soon.

5. I have read Become a Ghost by @hardlyfatal several times, and it always makes me laugh a lot, but more in a “Skeletor cackles and shakes his fists at the sky” way, because it has so many great Extremely Fanfiction plot twists. It is also very funny-- it’s got a great humorous narration style, and there are a bunch of turns of phrase in it that stick with me to this day.

NSFW

I always feels goofy about revealing my Tastes in Pornography, but, eh, whatever. I’m putting this under a cut, and by clicking it, you are Legally Agreeing Not to Judge Polynya Too Much. Suffice it to say, these all include explicit sex.

1. The best RenRuki porn is IchiRenRuki porn and the best IchiRenRuki porn is written by thekurosakiconundrum. I refuse to choose between Eighteen and I Like It , Solutions for the Three Body Problem , and I Get By , but the last one includes Orihime, which is a selling point in my book.

2. Rukia Gives Renji a Haircut by Nicole4211 is the perfect Renruki porno. It is unapologetically horny. It is heartfelt. It is long, and yet every time they Do It, there’s some new little twist.

3. Leaving Inuzuri by @sillier-things is about a story about Rukia and Renji’s feelings for each other right before they, um, leave Inuzuri (as the title would imply). This one is more of a “story that has sex in it” than straight-up smut, but it is sweet and thoughtful and another one of those “invades and shapes your headcanons” and it’s one of my all-time favs.

4. I just really like Stay by eosdawnaurora? It’s just like...what you’re looking for in a Renruki porno? I mean, it’s got a lot of framing story of them being at a party and they have some verbal sparring and fancy outfits and stuff and I just like it.

5. Meant to Be by valentineninja is a PWP based on ~an omake~ and I respect that so, so much.

#fanfic recs #maybe someone should recommend some funny fics to ME #i would actually love it if people would add their own suggestions #it's been a while since i went digging down in the bowels of ff.net but maybe it is time again #i honestly wish i were into grimmichi because they got so much talent over in that part of the fandom #but you don't get to pick your otps

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ckret2 · 4 years ago

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Heal Our Wounds

Long after the titan fight in Boston, Serizawa wakes up in a hospital bed, recovering unusually fast from radiation burns he only vaguely remembers receiving. Monarch immediately drowns him in love and attention.

Mark and Madison drop by to share a gift—and some of their post-Boston worries.

Has it really been two and a half months since the last fic, wtf. Anyway this is part of an ongoing series of post-KOTM almost-everybody-lives AU oneshots. If you don’t wanna read the others, all you need to know is that Serizawa survived and nobody knows how/why (answer: because I wanted him to), and Ghidorah's been chilling with Rodan and possibly dating him. Links to the other fics are in the source at the bottom of this post.

###

The first thing Serizawa noticed as Mark and Madison came into the hospital room was that they both had dark rings under their eyes. Serizawa was getting used to seeing his friends and colleagues like that. But they both smiled and their tired eyes lit up when they saw him.

He returned the smiles. "So! You've finally made time to visit me, eh?" he said chidingly, as if they'd just dropped in on him and not as if Mark had scheduled this visit a week earlier.

Madison immediately ran up to him for a hug. Mark reached out for her, mouth opened to warn her back; but Serizawa held up a hand to prevent Mark's protests. "It's fine," he mouthed to Mark over Madison's shoulder as he hugged her back.

"Wow," Mark said. "You're looking better already. A lot better."

Serizawa nodded and shrugged at the same time. "The doctors say I've been very fortunate," he said. "I think Gojira had a hand in it."

He wasn't sure Mark bought that, but Mark had the grace to keep his mouth shut and just tilt his head indecisively.

"How are you feeling?" Madison asked as she stood up.

"A little sore," Serizawa said. "But mostly tired. I've been recovering well, though."

Madison circled to the other side of Serizawa's bed so she could sit in the guest chair next to him. Mark followed her, but leaned against the bedside table. Serizawa really did have to ask the nurses if they could bring some more chairs into the room. Since he'd been cleared to receive visitors, his room had become a nonstop parade during visiting hours: Monarch staff and their families, government officials and sometimes their translators looking for advice on how to deal with their respective nations' new gigantic residents, various journalists and reporters interviewing him on current events and his involvement in the mass awakening of the titans...

And everyone seemed to start out with the same question: "I know you've told everyone that you don't remember how you made it from the bottom of the ocean all the way to Boston," Mark said hesitantly, "but...?" He shrugged questioningly. "I mean—anything? Weird dreams? Things you heard while you were unconscious...?"

Serizawa shook his head. "Nothing. I don't even remember the bomb going off. The last thing I recall is getting out of the submarine and seeing Gojira. And then waking up in a hospital, burning."

"Huh." Mark let out a long sigh, mouth twisted in confusion. "Well—whatever happened down there—and whatever's making you recover from your burns so well—we're all glad for it.”

"Gojira," Serizawa said again firmly.

"He's probably right, Dad," Madison piped up. "I've been reading about the effects of titan radiation. It starts out like radiation burns, but something about it makes organic matter heal a lot faster instead of just... breaking it down."

"Really," Mark said skeptically.

"Really! It's the same thing that makes plants grow back so fast in the cities that titans have been through! The research has been out for like three years, Dad," Madison said, rolling her eyes.

"There's a great deal we don't understand yet, but—what Madison says is true," Serizawa said, trying not to smile too broadly. Madison had always been such a precocious child, always talking about whatever interested her. For the longest time it had been insects; recently it had been camping and survival techniques—something that only in retrospect Serizawa realized was so worrisome. He was glad to hear her talking about science again.

"But we're not here to talk about that," Madison said quickly, practically squirming in her chair with obvious eagerness to move on to the next topic. She gave her dad a pointed look.

"Right!" Mark took off a satchel he'd slung across his body and opened the flap. "We—'we' meaning Monarch, basically—wanted to give you a 'get well soon' gift. Rick mostly put it together, but we all contributed the pictures."

"Pictures?" Serizawa asked.

"Of your new friends," Mark said, suppressing a smile. He pulled out a tablet, scrolled through it a moment, and offered it to Serizawa. "From all over the world. I'll email it to you, but we wanted to show it to you in person."

Serizawa took the tablet. When he noticed Madison leaning over the bed to watch too, he held it out farther to allow her and Mark to watch. It was a slideshow, the first slide of which said in large letters, "GET WELL SOON!!" and in smaller text, "from Monarch and the titans."

He swiped to the next slide.

Godzilla stared back at him with eyes crossed and snout smooshed up to the window of Castle Bravo.

Serizawa laughed.

He swiped through the notes and images, pausing to read the well-wishing messages from Monarch agents and their allies—some close friends, some he'd only spoken to once or twice—and to examine the pictures and clips they'd put together for him.

A video of Rodan dramatically bobbing and headbanging in time to a Spanish song. An attached caption mentioned that after recording Rodan bobbing to over twenty different songs and sending them to a comparative psychologist in California, they could definitively say that Rodan was actually meeting the official definition for "dancing"—deliberately moving in sync with the beat of the music—and he was better at keeping the beat than parrots, one of the few other categories of non-human dancers.

Several pictures showed Kraken hanging out next to various Monarch ships, mimicking the ships' paint jobs. In some of the pictures, he even displayed unintelligible lines across his head that looked like attempts to copy the text and symbols printed on the ships' sides.

The Chen twins included a selfie of themselves and Mothra, as well as a message they said was translated directly from Mothra herself: a sincere wish for Serizawa to either get well soon or have a smooth reincarnation if he didn't, and a thank you from both her and Godzilla for saving Godzilla. Apparently Godzilla thought of Serizawa as "the flashy human." (Serizawa had to pause to wipe his eyes before continuing to the next slide.)

Pictures of Behemoth moving heavy objects around for humans with patient amusement. A photo of "Quetzalcoatl" half obscured by the sea with a brief message informing Serizawa that, in action, Quetzalcoatl appeared to more closely resembled myths about a creature called "Manda." Poems, with an apologetic note that they were better in Arabic, that one of the Monarch agents at Outpost 75-B had written about Mokele-Mbembe.

A short note from Admiral Stenz that wryly said, "Even the Navy is having to adjust to your new friends," followed by an image of Ghidorah reclined on an aircraft carrier like a vacationer on an inflatable pool lounge.

From the corner of his eye, Serizawa saw Madison flinch. He looked up at her; her face had gone blank, but there was a terrible fear in her eyes. Mark put a hand on her shoulder.

Serizawa turned off the tablet and set it down on the bed. "Perhaps I should look at these when I don't have visitors."

Madison's gaze dropped. "I'm gonna..." She slipped out of her father's hand and circled around Serizawa's bed. "Gonna get a soda. M'thirsty."

Mark reached out for her. "Maddie..." But she'd already disappeared down the hallway. He sighed, sank down into the seat she'd vacated, and ran his fingers through his hair.

Serizawa let the silence settle for a moment before he quietly said, "She's been through a great deal."

"Has anyone told you that she got up close and personal with the Three Stooges? They saw each other. They interacted."

Serizawa shook his head, sitting up a little straighter. He'd heard that she'd made herself quite the hero—sneaking away from Jonah's terrorist gang with the ORCA; single-handedly breaking whatever control Ghidorah had over the titans; luring Ghidorah, Godzilla, Mothra, and Rodan to Boston where they could settle their differences. It had been clear just how much danger she'd been in; but he'd never imagined that danger.

"She says she was as close to him as..." Mark looked out the window and pointed, "as that tree." The tree was near enough that Serizawa could see how the surfaces of individual leaves curved and rippled. "He looked directly at her—all three heads. He tried to kill her. Blasted..." Mark tried to pantomime with his hand in front of his mouth. "Blasted that lightning of his."

A chill ran down Serizawa's back. He'd known Madison since she was born. The thought of her ending like that, incinerated by an enraged titan...

"She's changed so much," Mark went on. "She's having trouble sleeping. She's sullen, she's so serious... Even the sound of the air conditioning coming on makes her jump. And I don't know how much of that is everything she went through, how much of it is whatever—whatever eco-fascist brainwashing Jonah put her and Emma through, how much of it's just her being a teenager..." Mark trailed off helplessly.

There was frustration in his voice and guilt in his eyes.

"I—maybe I'd know if I'd—been around. If I'd seen her often enough to know what she's like."

"You're around her now," Serizawa pointed out. "You cannot change your past actions, but you can support her now when she needs you."

Mark nodded reluctantly. "I just... wish I knew how."

That was where Serizawa's sage advice ran out. His child rearing experience capped out at entertaining agents' kids with titan stories and pocket watch jokes in fifteen-minute bursts of babysitting. "Have you... looked into therapy?"

"I'm her father. I should be able to help her through this myself," Mark insisted. He shifted his position uncomfortably. "And everyone's booked up."

Serizawa tisked.

"But Maddie's... she's strong." Mark sounded like he was repeating something someone else had told him, not something he quite believed himself. "She'll pull through this."

Serizawa could remember all the times over the past couple of years that Emma had boasted about what a strong young woman Maddie was developing into—a boast that, knowing what he knew now about what Emma had been training Madison for, was more chilling in hindsight. He wondered if Mark had been visiting Emma in jail to talk to her about Maddie.

Strong or not, though, facing down a titan attack and being responsible for saving the world was an astounding weight to put on anyone's shoulders, much less a twelve-year-old's. Pile enough weight on even the strongest structure, and eventually it buckles.

Mark muttered, "I can't believe he's still running around."

Serizawa didn't have to ask who. Mark's gaze was aimed at the tablet's black screen.

"If that thing was dead, maybe... I don't know, maybe Maddie wouldn't constantly feel like she has to watch her back. Like she's afraid he'll come back and finish the job."

Serizawa shifted to sit up higher. "I understand how your daughter's pain must pain you too," he said. "But that's no reason to condemn a living creature to death."

"It's not just that. He's dangerous, you know he is." Mark held up a hand before Serizawa could say anything else. "I know, I know—I should be making peace with the titans. I have with most of them. I don't think I'm at the point where I'd invite Godzilla to my birthday party, but he's on my Christmas card list."

From what Serizawa understood about American Christmas card customs, he was pretty sure that making someone's list was faint praise.

"But Ghidorah? He's not like the others. The others just... accidentally flatten human cities. To them it's like stepping on an anthill without looking. Ghidorah is that sick kid who holds a magnifying glass over an anthill. He's evil. Even you've felt it!"

Serizawa couldn't argue with that. He had seen Ghidorah up close in Antarctica—seen the way his eyes darted about, picking out humans across the ice so he could crush them. He'd seen the malice in Ghidorah's gaze. He'd seen the rage, too—a fury that had smoldered for eons, a fury that was older than the human race. He'd seen the light flashing off Ghidorah's eyes and teeth as he'd singled out Vivienne and devoured her.

But was what he saw in Ghidorah's eyes so different from the rage he'd seen in Mark's eyes when Mark had set foot in a Monarch facility for the first time in years, when Mark had snarled that all titans must be executed? Or the cold malice in Emma's eyes when she'd declared from the safety of a terrorist's bunker that human civilization had to be scoured from the Earth? If either of them had been Ghidorah's size, would Mark have been any kinder to Godzilla or would Emma have to Boston? Serizawa had his doubts.

There was no anger that wasn't somehow inspired by pain, by suffering, by fear. Even though Serizawa could still see Vivienne disappearing into Ghidorah's jaws over and over when he closed his eyes, there was some part of him that wondered what it was Ghidorah feared so deeply. And for that, Serizawa pitied him.

"You yourself called Ghidorah a false king," Mark went on. "You know he doesn't belong on this world."

"That is true," Serizawa said. "But he could belong. There is room enough on our world for him to find a place he fits."

"Wh—" Mark leaned away from Serizawa, blinking in disbelief. "How does a false king fit in on Earth?!"

"By learning to act like a citizen, instead of a conqueror."

"I—Wh—You don't think he's going to just do that, do you? Out of the goodness of his big, lightning-spewing heart? Before he floods the planet, or—or challenges Godzilla for leadership again?"

"What has he been doing since Boston?" Serizawa thought he already knew—although he wasn't currently working, he was receiving regular reports from several outposts, mainly from people who thought he'd enjoy hearing them—but he wanted to hear the answer in Mark's own words.

"Well, he—he's been skulking near Rodan's volcano, mostly. Throwing any trailers or tech we try to so much as get on the edge of the volcanic rock back into the village. He's been learning Rodan's language—did you know Rodan has a language—?"

Serizawa nodded. "I'm subscribed to Dr. Flores Rosales's YouTube channel."

That almost got a smile out of Mark. "Of course," he said. "Rodan's even been teaching him... more complicated calls. So the next time he tries to take over, he's going to be able to give the other titans direct orders. And he's been exploring the planet. Learning the landscape. Playing with our weather—he diverts entire hurricanes like they're nothing. He turns over tanks like they're toys. Experimenting with human technology—our technology. Studying how we work."

Serizawa nodded again, absorbing that analysis.

"Getting a better understanding of our planet," Mark concluded. "He's going to be better prepared the next time he attacks it. The longer we wait, the more prepared he gets."

Serizawa took a moment to process that, collect his words, and then reply carefully. "I can understand how his actions appear to you," he said. "And perhaps that is what Ghidorah is doing—studying us, toying with us. But when I look at those same things, here's what I see. Ghidorah has found a home—perhaps a temporary one, perhaps more permanent. He's established the borders of what he feels like is his territory, and when we respect his boundaries, he has respected ours. He's learning to communicate with his neighbors through words instead of through violence. He's shown us that his species sings—that he understands art. He's shown us he has a sense of humor. He's discovering that the earth is covered in unique, fascinating places, and that humans aren't playthings to torture and kill but inventors and engineers. He's made a friend—a friend whose lessons and advice he will sit and listen to, a friend whom he goes to great lengths to protect from discomfort, and a friend who he seems to care for."

Mark also took a long moment to think over Serizawa's words. He was growing a little bit, Serizawa thought. If they'd had this conversation before Boston, Mark would more than likely have steamrolled over Serizawa's interpretation and clung to his own—as he had with so many other opinions he'd had for so many years. Maybe discovering he was wrong about Godzilla had made him a more thoughtful person. Or maybe he was just working to be more respectful because Serizawa was in the hospital—time would tell.

Finally, Mark said, "A 'friend' who he fights with. All the time. Rodan clawed his wing up pretty good in Antarctica."

"And then kept him warm through the night, stayed near him for the next few days, and reactivated a volcano that's been dormant for four thousand years to give him a place to rest. I don't think it was a fight fueled by hatred," Serizawa said. "Have you been watching Rodan's language lessons as well?"

"A few. Not as many as I should," Mark admitted. "It's hard to look at—I mean—Ghidorah tried to kill me and my daughter."

Serizawa nodded understandingly. He had just about gotten used to the sight of Ghidorah curiously ask Rodan to clarify what the word "many" meant, and even at that Serizawa still sometimes instead flashed to a memory of Vivienne's last moments. "You should ask Xochitl if she has transcripts," Serizawa said. "Ghidorah and Rodan squabble over which fights 'count' and 'don't count' like two children trying to cheat at a board game. They see their battles as play."

"Huh," Mark said. "Like...?" He didn't finish the question.

Serizawa gestured encouragingly at Mark to continue. He had a feeling he knew where Mark had been heading.

"Well." Shrugging self-consciously, Mark said, "You know the joke theory that Outpost 56-B's been putting forward."

An amused smile broke out across Serizawa's face. "That Rodan and Ghidorah might be...?"

"Courting," Mark mumbled, shaking his head in disbelief. "That what we're seeing is courting behavior. Or—or dating, are they intelligent enough to date? I mean, Ghidorah's building radios..."

"I think there's some potential to the theory," Serizawa said, still grinning. "Outpost 56-B has collected some very compelling evidence. It's not conclusive, but it's certainly suggestive."

"Suggestive." Mark shook his head again and rubbed his eyes. "There's no way they're reproductively compatible."

"Not all couples are. Either in the animal kingdom, or in our own species."

"So, is that the bet you're wagering?" Mark asked. "You think we shouldn't try to kill Ghidorah while we still have a chance because if he decides to settle down and make a big fiery nest with Rodan, he won't destroy our planet?"

Serizawa sobered up. "No," he said. "I think we shouldn't try to kill Ghidorah because his behavior suggests he no longer wants to kill us. It suggests that he is trying to leave conquering behind and trying to behave like a fellow citizen of our planet—cooperative, respectful of the other species he shares the world with, communicative with his neighbors despite the massive language barriers. If that changes, through Mothra we can call Gojira for help. If it doesn't change... then if Ghidorah is seeking redemption, I think we should let him seek it. Whatever his motive may be."

Mark thought that over, lips pursed. Finally, he said, "I hope you're right. You've been right about a lot of other things, but..." He sighed.

It would take Mark some time to accept. That was understandable; Serizawa saw no need to rush him. Ghidorah had directly threatened Mark's family, after all. But Godzilla had ultimately helped cause far greater harm to the Russell family—harm that couldn't be healed with time—and Mark had made peace with him. If Ghidorah's recent behavior really was indicative of a change, Serizawa was sure Mark could eventually make peace with Ghidorah, too.

For now, though, Serizawa should probably lighten the mood. A bit of humor creeping back into his voice, Serizawa said, "But, if it does turn out that what we've been observing on Isla de Mara is courting..."

Mark gave Serizawa a wary look. "What?"

"Do you remember what you said when we were trying to figure out why Ghidorah was heading toward Isla de Mara?" Serizawa asked.

"Oh no." Mark buried his face in a hand, but not before Serizawa got a glimpse of him fighting back a smile. "Not you, too. Nobody's let me live it down."

"You said he wanted a food, a fight, or a..."

"I know! What about it?"

"Well, then." Serizawa sat back, shrugged permissively, and said, "Let them fuck."

Mark huffed.

The conversation drifted to how their respective extended families had weathered the attacks and the corresponding changes to their daily lives, to Mark's tentative plans to balance getting back into Monarch against keeping Madison away from any active outposts, and to Serizawa's goals for once he was back on duty. Serizawa planned to return to work as soon as he was allowed out of the hospital.

"And to visit all of them," he said firmly, "the moment the doctors allow me on an airplane. If I can't take a plane, I'll ride a boat."

Mark chuckled. "All of them? Even the mean ones?"

"No such thing," Serizawa said confidently. "Maybe hurting, maybe distrustful of humans—or maybe so far removed from our cultures that they don't yet recognize humans as feeling people—but not mean."

"So you gonna go open up diplomacy with the titans on behalf of humanity?" Mark asked. "Go say 'hi' and have a little chat like you did with Godzilla?"

Serizawa smiled. "If they'll let me."

Madison finally came back in the room, smiling shakily but clearly calmer than when she'd left. She didn't have anything from the vending machine. Neither Serizawa nor Mark commented on it.

"Afraid this is leaving with me," Mark said, picking up his tablet from the bed. "But I'll email you the slideshow. They let you have your phone in here, right?"

"I have a new one." His old one had been with him during his meeting with Godzilla. It hadn't shared Serizawa's miraculous survival. Rick Stanton had helped him get all his old data out of "the cloud" onto his new phone, and once he had his photos back he liked his new phone better. It was bigger.

"We'll come back as soon as we can," Maddie said as she leaned in for a hug, then looked to her dad for confirmation.

"Of course," Mark said, nodding, "unless you manage to talk your way out of here before we find time to come by again."

Serizawa grinned. As much as he might want to, he probably needed to be able to walk out the door by himself before he could go. "If you don't come see me before I get out, I'll come see you." He had a whole list of people he needed to visit.

The last thing Mark said before he left was, "Get some rest. You've still got a lot of recovering to do."

On more than one level. "I will." Glancing between Mark and Maddie's tired faces, Serizawa said, "So do you."

###

(Do you guys know how long I've been waiting to write Serizawa saying "let them fuck"? Like half a year. Anyway so the “titan radiation heals injuries instead of making them worse” is, obviously, a lot of BS and Not How Radiation Works, but it’s consistent with KOTM’s “titan radiation heals nature and grows plants!!” and with Legendaryverse’s overall lack of people getting severe radiation burns from being so close to confirmed-radioactive kaiju all the time. If canon’s gonna act like kaiju have some made up form of Magical Healthy Radiation, okay, I’ll roll with that.)

(Replies/reblogs are welcome and greatly appreciated! Check the “source” link below for my masterlist of KOTM and Rodorah fics, as well as my AO3 and Ko-fi links.)

#serizawa ishiro #madison russell #mark russell #godzilla #kotm #fanfic #my writing

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syncopatedid · 4 years ago

Note

Hi! I've read some of your Kazetsuyo posts and I've wanted to ask you, how do you feel about the Kakehai dynamic in the anime vs. the novel? It seems like the production team tried really hard to conceal any feelings Kakeru had for Hana in the novel, and instead focused all the "romantic aura" on Kakeru and Haiji. I don't believe it is for fanservice purposes but I find it odd. I understood from your answers that in the novel Kakeru's feelings toward Hana were quite serious, so why ? Thank you.

Hello and how do you do! Time for the Tl;DR that nobody asked for again, ahah (sweats) This is all my personal opinion, but I feel that despite the obvious Hana shaft, Production IG really did not exclude Hana-chan with the specific intention of getting onboard with the Kakehai ship, and I’ll get to the why in a bit.

The thing about the anime vs novel is, even with Novel!Kakeru telling Joji he likes Hana-chan, it did not in any way muddy the bond between Kakeru and Haiji. In fact, I actually feel that the Kakehai ship is way STRONGER in the novel than the anime, simply because half the story is told from Kakeru’s POV, and… well, he interacts with Haiji the most. There is no denying in the novel that they have this special connection about them that one could definitely interpret as “romantic aura”… you know, soulmatey things that keep me awake at 1am in the morning, but I digress. (That said, interpreting Kakehai as family or brotherly love is also not wrong, and I would also agree with those who read their aura that way because context is important and goggles are subject to cultural bias, plus the nuance of skinship is often swept aside in fandom, but that’s another wall of text for another time). Back to Production IG. If you ask me, I feel their real intention was to remove anything that is overtly romantic or “too fan servicey”, that’s why Kakeru telling Joji he likes Hana was written out. Also, if pushing for Kakehai romantically had really been on the agenda, it would have been a gross oversight for them to have excluded not one but three obvious “ship-worthy” scenes from the novel: The part where Haiji “molested” Kakeru’s legs the first night they met; the part where Kakeru held Haiji in his arms when Haiji collapsed; and the exchange between Haiji and Kakeru on the train where Haiji shared something deeply personal about his dad. I also derived this conclusion based on my impression of the studio that worked on this anime and the stuff they churn out in general. From my observation, Production IG caters to a much wider audience demographic, including casual anime watchers who don’t appreciate excessive fan service. Or, if there is service, most of the time it would be geared towards male rather than female fans, given that they animate a lot of series from Shonen Jump, and even then their fan service is often tame compared to the obvious "offender” that is Kyoani. It seems more apparent to me that if there were intended romance to be had in the anime, it would specifically be the "romance” each character has with RUNNING. Because aside from Kakeru and Haiji, the other members were less developed until Production IG came along and built a story around them, taking whatever little crumbs that were written about the other eight and giving them more “meat”. Examples I remember would be like a single throwaway line that Nico was dieting, and also that Shindo had a girlfriend. Ouji in the novel hardly even interacted one-on-one with Kakeru. Kakeru never asked to read his manga nor was he the one who taught Ouji the proper way to run, and there was none of that “FORWARD!” character growth goodness. And that to me was a clear sign that Production IG wanted to make it about everyone in Aotake, not just the two main protagonists. The novel was more generous on the Kakehai service than the anime but the anime did so much better with all the others. That is not to say I don’t have fandom ship goggles on when I talk about Kakehai because I have been crying about them since March 14 2019, but I allow a lot of wiggle room for what category of love their love falls under. But eh, love is love, and all love is good love. (°◡°♡) Thanks for listening! p.s: Since we’re talking about Kazetsuyo anyway psst can I interest you in the Kazetsuyo stage play I swear it’ll grow on you, ( •̀ᴗ•́ )و ̑̑

#Kaze novel things #Kazetsuyo #Kaze ga tsuyoku fuiteiru #Run with the wind #Thanks for stopping by my humble blog!#It's been awhile since I've had a reason to wall of text about Kazetsuyo so thanks for the indulgence!

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vedj-f-bekuesu · 5 years ago

Text

Ninjago Unpopular Opinions

Following on from my watch of the entire old series (combined with already having seen the last two series), I have enough material to work with to make a sort of unpopular opinion list. Some of these are lightweight, some of these are...uh, not so much.

These aren’t in any particular order, this is more of a “I’ll just put them down as I remember them” sort of deal. That’ll be why they appear so messy.

-Even after all this I prefer the newest seasons to the older stuff. There have been a surprising number of good to great older seasons, but I just love that hit of S1/S2 campiness with the more developed writing of later seasons.

-Cole sucked as a leader, aside from in the pilot episodes. In the series proper he varied from complete meathead I hated (first part of S1), to having the same mentoring personality as everyone else (S1 - S2), to being consumed by the love triangle which made him pull a really shitty move (I don’t need to tell you what that refers to). He eventually gets ironed out in season 4, but Lloyd had already taken over as leader at this point. And rightfully so, even if Lloyd’s material got knocked from season 3 as a result.

-I couldn’t really warm up to Ronin that much for some reason. I get the reason why he’s popular, since it was pretty obvious he was supposed to be like an off-beat mentor figure to Nya, but...I dunno, unlike with Dareth, it felt like his skeevy moments were more off-kilter, plus I didn’t really like his arc in Skybound (even if that was written out of reality). That being said, his was strong in Possession even with said moments. Maybe I just need a future appearance to see how I ultimately swing with him.

-I mentioned this in my Hunted overview, but I think Skylor’s just bland. Part of the problem is that she’s mainly just wedged in as an action girl and doesn’t have too many moments to interact outside of that. That’s mostly reserved for moments where she acts as Agony Aunt (which is fine, that shows that being supportive is in her nature), but she needs more to work with. And as an obvious offshoot, if Kailor is the intended endgame it sucks in its current form. They don’t have chemistry or a decent dynamic.

-The other Ninjago ship I don’t particularly like out of all of them is...actually Geode. Yeah, Rebooted obviously wasn’t good for it considering the love triangle, but what actually did more damage to it for me was Skybound. It went so far in trying to oversteer back that it beat you over the head with the fact they were making Cole and Jay best friends after said love triangle (made really obvious when Jay is worried about Cole’s reaction to him seeing Nya in his reflection in both Possession and Skybound, when Cole isn’t even phased when he’s told). It was just really off-putting.

-Jay is a better big brother figure to Lloyd than Kai. Yeah, Kai’s true potential moment in Rise of the Serpentine hinged on realising he (and the others, mind) were supposed to protect Lloyd, they all spent Legacy of the Green Ninja’s first half being Lloyd’s proper mentors, Zane’s death prompted Kai to hover with thoughts of the Green Ninja again (which seemed to me for different reasons to being envious of power at the start, although its handling was very clunky after that), and he had the first episode in Possession which was arguably the strongest showing of a dynamic with Lloyd, but Possession didn’t have much about it outside of said episode, and the show seemed to just forget it from that point beyond some very, very fleeting and sparse bits. In the more modern seasons, it feels like Jay’s stepped up to be more supportive of Lloyd on a more consistent basis (which would make sense with the common fanon that Jay is the youngest of the original Ninja, he’d be closer to Lloyd’s age). It’s something I kind of want tapped into in a proper way at some point.

-Sensei Garmadon is a bit overrated. Just a smidge. When he’s good, he’s good, but most of the time he’s no more interesting than Wu would be in the same position. And I feel like they didn’t really develop his fatherly bond with Lloyd too well despite that being what his character was there for. Again, aside from moments where he was really good.

-Most underrated season of the old batch for me was the last minute shock, March of the Oni. I did enjoy Day of the Departed (which has a worse reputation), but I can understand why someone wouldn’t like it considering how bare it was. March of the Oni is far from my favourite season but I thought it came together really well, so the fact it’s generally panned legitimately confuses me. I guess Hands of Time would be a contender too, but I think opinion on that has swayed in its favour after the new seasons came out (and Secrets of the Forbidden Spinjutsu would be here if I included the new batch) so that’s why it’s edged out.

-Most overrated season for me was undeniably Tournament of Elements. It’s not my least favourite season, but Rebooted and Hunted are pretty maligned to begin with, while Tournament of Elements is usually considered one of the top ones. It starts strong, has an interesting premise and there are ideas that are executed well. The thing is that the elements that people tend to praise the season for are ones I actually think the writers dropped the ball on, hence why this ended up the toughest season to get to the end of, even more than Hunted. It’s a shame, but it’s just not for me.

-Best ninja suits...honestly, I don’t really notice the suits unless they’re really bad, because I’m used to franchises where costume changes mark radical permanent redesigns, and are not just par for the course of the brand (it makes perfect sense with a toy brand who want to sell you the same characters over and over again but still). Not counting the S11 suits since they weren’t part of the old batch, I guess I’d honestly say the ZX suits, maybe? They’re simple, but they’re cute and very distinct. Also Sons of Garmadon Cole channelling the Movie costume was a very good move (and arguably looks even better ripped up in Hunted aethetically), and Kai’s suit was bleh in Sons of Garmadon but its overhaul in Hunted was way better. Also, just as a wildcard, Rebooted Lloyd looks like a more finely tuned ZX suit. Actually, just one last bit on a tangent to note a difference the show makes to the figures that demonstrates the figures’ limitations. For Kai and Jay’s S11 suits, their figures invoke similar feels (because underneath the accessories they do have a lot in common), whereas they feel very different in the show because while Jay sticks to the figure and looks snug, Kai has a lot exposed around the neckline, as if his gi is hanging loosely on the shoulders and should join Cole in the “For fucks sake it’s an ice realm wear a jacket please” club.

-Worst ninja sui--what the hell happened to Cole and Nya in Hands of Time?! Nya’s main issue is that it’s trying to work too many colours and they just don’t mesh well. I think this was the time they were partially adapting the movie’s change, but they were clinging onto her having red to both represent Samurai X and her ties to her brother, but they should have just picked one or the other because it just doesn’t work the way it did in Skybound. And Cole’s outfit is just hideous. Its balance of colours and accents is all off-kilter, and to top it off the shoes just don’t work and somehow look like socks with sandals. I didn’t know that was doable with a whole suit. Finally, on a general note, I’m not a fan of when the suits are all very similar bar some very, very minor differences. One could argue that it makes them look more like a team, but I prefer the individual personality to come out.

-It’s hard to judge the best and worst episodes, honestly. The seasons from Tournament of Elements onwards are done so tied to each other that picking an episode is rather difficult outside of designated finales (or the odd Jay-focused/Zane-focused episodes that happened in seasons 7, 8 and 9). I guess for best I’d say stuff like The Quiet One, or The Fall, or Grave Danger, or stuff like that would be up there. Worst episodes in those seasons are even harder, because usually it’s how arcs over episodes are written that get to me, not individual episodes. This all being said, it’s much easier to do this with the more episodic first three seasons, and to that end I would still say that Tick Tock is my favourite standalone episode still, and Home is still my least favourite. For all the times the writing has dropped the ball, nothing has legitimately pissed me off more than what this episode did because it’s in its own category of bad writing.

-There have been some concepts thrown in that, while they definitely wouldn’t work out in the long term, make for interesting snippets of what-ifs. Like, I loved the bit where Jay was a show host and got around the stage using his lightning powers. That seems like such a natural fit outside of his ninja identity I wish I’d thought of it. Imagine Bradley Walsh using lightning to get around the studio, that would be metal as fuck.

-On the other side of that coin, the bizarro Ninja are the single most overrated concept in the show. I don’t like Scourge the Hedgehog to begin with, but he at least had some efforts to make him unique (that fell flat, but eh). The bizarro Ninja are the equivalent of Evil Sonic; cliche and undeveloped. They’re not even useful for the cliche idea of framing the actual Ninja since even though they’re seen doing delinquent behaviour, this is never addressed. Heck Nadakhan was more effective with this idea. Thing is that I can’t blame the show at all for this. While the concept is naff, the show itself treats them as they actually were; Garmadon’s puppets and the scheme of the episode. Aside from bizarro Jay’s behaviour to Nya being full of unfortunate implications, there is no greater purpose for their existence, and the show never tries to do it again. It’s really the fans that have inflated their appearance in this case because I guess the idea of “take this nice character and give them an evil version” is just so appealing to the teenage demographic. Screw that, corruption is way more fun and interesting.

-What I can blame the show for is the single worst execution of an idea, because to this point I still consider Kai’s green ninja “arc” in Tournament of Elements to be the single worst executed arc (yeah, even worse than the love triangle, but that one is still bad). The sad thing is it managed to convince me that it wasn’t such a bad concept when they explained it by being an offshoot of his depression following Zane’s death (before that I was very sceptical it could fit it in naturally after the last three seasons). But then it was used once when Skylor tried to get Kai to stab Lloyd in the back during the skating match (which Kai completely rebuffed and seemed over his depression-rooted negative vibes on Lloyd), and once more when he was overcome by the power of the staff. The latter is especially infuriating since this would have been the perfect opportunity for a character moment. Like, Lloyd and/or Skylor could have fought to get Kai out of the trance of the staff and see that his friends mean more to him than having power. It practically writes itself and is a perfect set-up. What happens instead is that Cole is technically the one to save Kai from himself as he rams the Roto Jet into the chamber and makes the rocky serpentine structure come crashing down on Kai. Maybe interesting to read into if you want a Lava reading of the show, but in that moment is just a wasted opportunity. Come on!

-Actually, also talking about other bad concepts, I don’t miss those weird energy dragons they could summon starting from Tournament of Elements. The dragons in Rise of the Serpentine/Legacy of the Green Ninja were fine because they had a logical reason for being there and actually were integrated into the plot (so you got to watch them being maintained and having moments with the ninja). The energy dragons in Tournament of Elements existed for one character as a plot thing (Zane’s, because he always had the good plots in the earlier seasons), but then everyone else suddenly could do it too and they became convenient plot devices and nothing else. Airjutsu I was more okay with because it seems more like a tool they’d use and could be integrated better, but I can also see why that stopped being used (outside of that one bit in Prime Empire).

-The Elemental Masters are both over-hyped and underdeveloped. The normal civilian cast really got the shaft once the series decided it wanted to explore this lore, yet the only ones I really got interested in in any way were the villain EMs and Karlof. And even Karlof is overlooked by the fandom, by the looks of it.

-Jay actually came off the best in the Rebooted love triangle. He’s not entirely perfect, but he is essentially the biggest victim as a result of it in that season, and what Nya and Cole did either bordered on or was outright callous for different reasons. I think if people gave Jay the biggest shtick for Rebooted’s events, it’s influenced with how Skybound botched trying to patch it up.

-The movie was a net positive influence on the show. Aside from me preferring the designs of the movie anyway, it forced the characterisation to actually pick a lane for each character and stick to it, mitigating a lot of the haphazard characterisation issues. The inconsistency in later seasons is tone instead, which is maybe why people thought the characterisation was inconsistent between Sons of Garmadon/Hunted and March of the Oni/SotFS (when really, they weren’t that different if at all). The show also made a good call in ignoring movie Zane’s characterisation; as much as I enjoy it in the film, it really didn’t gel up with what the show had done with him, so trying to force it in would have been more of a characterisation jolt than any of the early season stuff.

-I’m generally fine with Jaya and Pixane. The former I can see why people would be off about it because there have been some badly written periods for them, but I think on the whole it manages to hold it together. The latter was written in surprisingly smoothly given the circumstances, so it’s no wonder I don’t see discourse about it.

-Oh yeah, I don’t get Wu/Faith as a ship. Like, she was the cool drill instructor/aunt to everyone, including Wu. This is a quick one because it’s just a very small aside.

-Also I can’t really get behind Polyninja either. If the characters had a fairly even spread of interaction and moments between each other I could, but the spread ends up like lots of moments between Cole and Kai varying from little moments to huge dollops, and Cole and Jay having a whole best friends affirmation arc due to the fallout of the love triangle, to Kai and Jay having barely anything to work with and anyone with Zane getting a couple of table scraps occasionally. It’s not even enough.

-Following on from that though, Zane feels the least integrated with the group dynamic in general. He’s has some of the best plots and stories in the show, but nearly all of them have been focusing on him solo. And not even SotFS or Prime Empire helped with this one. Hopefully MoM can smooth this one out a bit.

-Finally for this post, after going through all those seasons I still prefer Nya’s movie voice to her show voice by a significant margin. Sorry Kelly Metzger.

I think that’s it. I’ve actually been on this for a week but I’ve been allowing time for more thoughts to come to me, because there have been a lot of thoughts coming in batches. I think I’ll leave it at this though, because I think most of it is covered pretty well.

I have at least two more text posts like this planned, but they’re not strictly about the old seasons so I’ve left them for after. I’m looking forward to them though, because they’re on specific topics and that is my bread and butter pudding.

#ninjago #vedj-f talks #rambling is second nature to me #it's also my first nature

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airlock · 5 years ago

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alright folks, I’m back for more of those results from the anniversary poll; once again, I’ll be counting them as properly as I can because IS sure as hell can’t, and in the process, I will also judge whether the fans have spoken good choices

this time, we’ll be counting and criticizing the top 15 dancing duos! (disclaimer: I don’t dance. I still will attempt to comment on everyone else’s dancing)

#1: BERKUT & RINEA (9313 votes)

tumblr won’t let me simply put two images next to each other in a text post, and I can’t be fucked to put them together in such a way that doesn’t make them un-transparent, so I’ll be putting them together with a simple color background; it’s a spot uglier and I will probably fail to spot some wonky pixels, but c’est la vie

anyways, I don’t like it, but like Byleth before, this is a natural afk pick; they’re some of a very small subset of characters in the series that we actually see dancing with each other, in a proper cutscene. a cutscene that, in fact, basically exists to tell us that they look good dancing, so one’s not wrong to vote for them here, I suppose. there are, in fact, a lot of people in this world who are fantastic performers and also would throw their spouses in a fire if they figured it’d make them feel good about themselves again

#2: OLIVIA & INIGO (2474 votes, including Laslow)

this is actually sweet, though, mother-son dancing duo and all. one thing I do have to mention, though, is that you’d have to hope that our hypothetical dance-off was announced plenty of time in advance, there’s so much that could bring a performance between them crashing and burning if they don’t hash it all out for themselves first

#3: EDELGARD & DIMTIRI (1871 votes across all appearances, possibly with uncounted change)

they sure do look fantastic, dancing with other people with their backs completely to each other,

might as well stuff this strangely popular nothing-of-a-choice with a little additional note: these paired votes are going to be especially harrowing on the split vote front, because any combination of two characters who both have split votes means they can be combined with each other in 4 different ways. like, most people probably won’t combine, say, someone’s PoR self with someone else’s RD self, but properly unsplitting votes in this is going to be a lot more of a challenge. and that’s to say nothing of byleth; there is a whopping 16 different ways to combine Byleth and any one Three Houses character

ETA: I. completely forgot about the thing where edelgard tried to teach dimitri to dance when they were young. okay, that kind of tracks. but also like, whomst the fuck got the idea that whatever they were doing there was building up to elegance

#4: ELIWOOD & NINIAN (1495 votes)

I’m getting the lingering feeling that this fandom is a lot better at pointing out good dancers than good teachers-

this one’s another amazing pick; sure, not one you have to think a lot about, since they’re oft-shipped and one of them is an actual dancer -- but the beauty of it is that even the ostensible weak link still has much offer, between his flawless elegance and a love of dancing that we at the very least knows is in his lineage

let’s just hope eliwood would still prefer to keep the “special dances” private though-

#5: BYLETH & CLAUDE (1163 votes across all appearances, possibly with uncounted change)

speaking of the ballroom cutscene again, man, Claude sure has left an impression on us all back there-

still, we don’t actually see the dance, and it’s probably better that we don’t -- I wouldn’t bet that Byleth is any more expressive with their moves than they are with their face. there’s really not very much of a reason to vote for this other than wanting to insert yourself into a situation where one dances with Claude. and I mean, mood, but let’s focus, please-

#6: OLIVIA & AZURA (996 votes)

this is just a copout, though. this is like if I asked you about the best food in your town and you just told me that technically Gordon Ramsey was born there. ooo, hot take alert, two unrelated professional performers can probably put on a decent performance together!

at least their theme colors together make the trans flag, so I’ll give all 996 of you that much-

#7: ALM & CELICA (990 votes)

was there like an actual thing where they dance, or were people picking this just because they’re good-looking and married? because like, in the absence of evidence, I cannot and will not assume that Alm is a remotely passable dancer.

in fact, here’s the drill: for this section, I can’t actually blame people if they’re just hornyvoting -- being hot is kind of a point-plus for this -- but I can and will blame them if they’re voting for their ships with no regard as to whether they’d look good dancing. so, accusations of hornyvoting shall make way -- to accusations of shipvoting! I believe that’s also going to happen on the other paired category, even if that one is a lot less about the chemistry (presumably)

#8: NILS & NINIAN (884 votes)

this kind of a copout again, but it’s also a family dance again, BUT most importantly one of these two is not actually a dancer. like, sure, he plays the flute, but this isn’t a flute-and-dance duo poll, it’s a dance poll! although I mean, it does mean he must have a good notion of rhythm, and from the sprites we can definitely tell he’s got a spring in his step when he plays, and Ninian can teach him too, so... maybe? oh well, it’d be cute to see them try

#9: SIGURD & DEIRDRE (790 votes)

eh, I’m gonna call shipvoting on this one too. like, sure, they’re both hot and they’re in love with each other, but even if you leave aside the likelihood that Deirdre was raised too shelthered to have danced like ever, any dancing they’d know of would be totally incompatible, considering their entirely distinct backgrounds.

I suppose I will lend credence to the idea that Sigurd’s at least experienced as far as dancers go; it’s not like he was studying back at that academy,

#10: BYLETH & EDELGARD (735 votes across all appearances, possibly with uncounted change)

since most of the votes on this are for post-timeskip edelgard, this appears to be unrelated to the ballroom scene, for once

that said, I can’t think of anything to this other than regular shipvoting -- and not even shipvoting of much quality, because besides the above-mentioned on whether byleth can dance, I have a nagging feeling that the kind of dancing Edelgard would genuinely be interested in would be strictly for fun, without any sort of elegance or other things that an outside participant would enjoy watching

#11: TSUBASA & CAEDA & KIRIA & THARJA (687 votes)

don’t let the fact that I found a transparent tsubasa but not a transparent kiria distract you from the absolute trainwreck that resulted from the naming scheme used in FEH for TMS#FE characters crashing into the notation I’m using for the duos here- ahem, well, please be distracted from both of those things, anyway

assuming this is just between the two mirage users and we’re not talking about the most awkward foursome in history, well... I once again have not played TMS#FE, so uh, they sure are both pop idols and I think people ship them, I guess?

#12: MARTH & CAEDA (596 votes across all appearances)

I mean... there’s a lot that can be said about their individual qualities and their dynamics, but I have absolutely no idea how any of it would translate into a ballroom. and if we’re any inclined to believe that skill with words and skill with bodily expression tend to be opposite skillsets, then theyyyy are both screwed.

#13: PENT & LOUISE (508 votes)

I get it, I do. they both look sparkly beautiful and haute and classy and like everything around them is prettier for them being there. but let me categorically tell you that neither of these two dance.

neither of these two dance because one, Pent is an absolute potato, and two, Pent specifically chose Louise because she didn’t try to impress him with a dance.

#14: SAUL & DOROTHY (495 votes)

regardless of any merits they may or may not have, this is 100% just to get them into heroes, isn’t it. alright, I can respect that

but as for whether they can dance... sure, maybe? Dorothy is full of hidden talents, and Saul has probably tried to dance enough times to guide her along at least

#15: CORRIN & AZURA (476 votes across all genders)

alas, there’s no way this can work out, because we all know corrin has two left feet.

thank you, thank you! I’ll be here every night!

HONORABLE MENTIONS (highest vote in their continuity, without reaching top 15)

Ike & Soren (344 votes across all appearances): disappointingly, of the stark few Tellius pairs that got on this list, the best-ranked of them is 100% blatant shipvoting. I mean, sure, Ike’s got moves, but Soren?? at least vote Ike & Ranulf you cowards

Eirika & Ephraim (323 votes): first, we’d have to extensively train Ephraim on how to not make this experience entirely embarassing for Eirika, but that can be said of most anything they could do together in public-

Triandra & Plumeria (280 votes): yep, still unfunny. and now all of you 280 assholes are stretching it

Ferdinand & Lorenz (95 votes, possibly with uncounted change): I’m just mentioning them because I’m one of these 95 people. and so should more of you have been! don’t you know elegance when it’s right in front of you? huh? huhhh????

and that’s it, you’ve endured me attempting to talk about dancing for several minutes when I have no knowledge or experience on the subject! I eagerly await your input in my replies and reblogs, especially from those of you who do dance.

#anniversary poll critique series #my stupid text posts #Fire Emblem is tagged in this post #Fire Emblem Heroes is tagged in this post

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intheseautumnhands · 4 years ago

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Vanya! I really wanted to send Diego but I felt like that was too obvious XD

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff�� Specifically, I feel like baby “can I go play with the others?” “the one who always cried when we stepped on ants as kids” just wants to be included and feel special Vanya would’ve been a Hufflepuff at Hogwarts age. (In The Superior System [Sorting Hat Chats], Vanya is a Burnt Gryffindor Primary/Gryffindor Secondary and this has already been discussed longform, although I am attached to the idea of baby Vanya trying on the others’ houses and mirroring them badly back at them while her own are both pretty crispy on her.)

best quality: I want to say her stubbornness. I feel like compared to a lot of the others, she manages to be stubborn without going way over to the other side and being immovable. (Grudges aside, but even that doesn’t seem like she’s immovable -- like, she’s willing to reach out to Allison and try to make friends before Allison starts arguing with her and then things go haywire.) Even before she starts to get out of mouse mode in S1, I think she stands her ground and is less of a pushover than a lot of people give her credit for.

worst quality: Like, I love Vanya’s angry bitterness and grudge-holding, so I don’t mean worst as in “character traits I dislike”, but in the form of “flaws”, it’s probably that.

ship them with: Hargreeves poly pile is my OT7 and so are all the individual components so like. All six of them. Sometimes more than one at once.

brotp them with: Five and/or Allison, though not at the same time. Although like above, I also really just want her friendships with all the other six. (I also have a soft spot for Vanya, Diego, and Klaus awkwardly hanging out for a bit after all moving out but still living in the same area. There was a semi-AU that I’ll probably never write where they stumbled into each other, all somehow ended up commiserating over the fact that people keep referencing shit they didn’t understand, and started getting together every couple of weeks to watch pop culture touchstones and boggle at them. Which then eventually ran into the ground but for a while there, Hargreeves Pop Culture Club nights went surprisingly well and they were almost friends.)

needs to stay away from: Reginald needs to stay far away from all of them, really. Far, far away.

misc. thoughts: Season 2 fucked uuuuuup and I really want to see Vanya actually have to deal with her shit.

#this was fun! i'm sorry i break out into only tangential rambles a couple of times. XD #if anyone feels like sending me more asks for this or the meme before it that'd be cool #I am Bored #witchy--mama #asked and answered

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delightfullygrace · 5 years ago

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So, it can be a little weird 4 u to rate your own type, but... please ❤

Absotutely! I have a lot of ENFP friends, so this’ll be fun!!（＾∇＾）

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

best quality: Their ability to be genuine friends with everyone, hands down. They feel close to you right off the bat, reaching out more than friends you’ve had for years, but never being pushy. You can open up to them about anything and they won’t judge you, but will rather find a way to help. Even if they don’t like someone, they’re still really kind and make them feel included. From what I’ve seen, they know how to love everyone, and it’s been a huge inspiration to me. “If I’m ENFP too, maybe I can be like that one day.”

worst quality: We usually don’t get anything done... Some of us can; I have an ENFP friend in med school rn. He got tired of teaching anatomy at a college and astronomy at a high school, so he decided to just be a doctor. He’s only 25, pls explain. So, our types can get it together when we want to! The problem is, we usually lose motivation after awhile. We get too big picture oriented, start dreaming instead of doing, and get antsy over the little tasks that’ll get us there. We start to feel stuck on each stepping stone and yearn to just break free. The other 2 ENFPs I’m close to have big goals and a perfect stepping stone path to get there, but no desire to actually do it right now. Same goes for me. Trying to start a company, but I find I procrastinate more than work.

ship them with: Both INxJs. The INxJs provide an emotional support, work structure, and steady home the ENFPs need. Our brains are chaotic enough, we need someone to make sense of them and guide us into actually using the ideas we come up with. INxJs need their own emotional support, someone who can help them say what’s on their mind and will genuinely listen, and will help them have some variety and spice in their life. Plus, (my go to, I know I keep saying it, I’m sorry, but) they’re a couple that could grow old together well. Also, Ne x Ni, a classic pair ;)

brotp them with: ISTJs, ENTPs, INTPs.

•Us + INTPs = online chaos.

•Us + ENTPs = irl chaos.

•Us + ISTJs = verbal chaos.

(I know a lot of people think of ISTJs as boring sticklers, but they’re actually wild. Every time I’m around one, I make it a personal challenge to see how weird I can make the conversation before they drop out, and they just keep surprising me with how long they last.)

needs to stay away from: “Mean Girl” types; people who are fake, who use others as a stepping stone, and who will come back to you when you have something they want. I find the ENFPs have a tendency to let these people in again and again; stop that.

misc. thoughts: I feel like there are different sorts of ENFPs. I’m sure this applies to all the types, so I may sort it out and do a whole post later. For now, I’ll share what I’ve noticed:

•You have the really outgoing ones who definitely fit the “aggressive ball of sunshine” description; they’re sporty, they’re sweet, they’re going to love you whether you like it or not. They’re like the embodiment of summer.

•The really chill ones who embody summer nights. They’re gentle, warm, and smart as a whip. Their love surrounds them like the soft evening heat; easy, welcoming, the feeling of a memory you won’t forget. They’re just living their best life and they’re happy that you get to be apart of it. They just are Polaroid pictures, mmkay?

•The ones with a dark past, so to keep up the theme, I suppose they embody late winter/early spring. They’re always ready with a cold story to tell, something that would make anyone break down in tears, but they can tell it with a soft smile and a tone of hope. This is their testimony and it gives them strength to keep going, to see better sides of life, to create a better world where no one would have to cry like they did. They keep their eyes on what’s ahead; the joy that lies before them. They constantly reach out to remind others that they’re loved, even though they seldom feel loved themselves.

•The Manic Pixie DrENFP. The mind is their playground and they enjoy pushing the conventional. They like to ask “why” and encourage you to do things you’d like to do, even if people will think you’re stupid. They probably second guess themselves a lot more than you’d think, but they wouldn’t dare let you know that. They come off as really confident, like bold, bright flowers of spring that challenge the take of the ordinary green garden.

I’m sure there are more I’m missing, and every person is unique so they won’t fit entirely into these categories, but these are just little common factors I’ve noticed between my ENFP friends. I was always like, “I don’t feel like I’m actually this type... maybe I’m INFP or ENTP or ENTJ or something??” But then I realized all my friends, despite sharing a result, act really differently. So, maybe I can be an ENFP without being an aggressive ball of sunshine!!

Wow, who knew I had so much to say about this? Ahah Thank you for sending in this ask!! I’m sorry if it was a lot more than you bargained for lol. If you share your perspective, I’d love to hear it!! ♡

send me a character type!

#mbti #enfp #inxj #infj #intj #istj #intp #entp #those are the otps and brotps i believe?#mine #ask

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zutaralesbian · 5 years ago

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001: Euphoria, Black Sails. 002: Rue/Jules. 003: Eleanor Guthrie, Jules Vaughn.

Already answered Black Sails! :)

Euphoria:

Favorite character: Jules. This was initially born out of spite because of all the ridiculous hate she got but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that she really is my fave. Despite what a lot of people say, I think she's genuinely one of the nicer people on the show. But she just has a lot of her own issues and is still trying to find herself. I feel very protective of her lol. Rue is a close second fave though.

Least Favorite character: Probably Cal Jacobs

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Rue/Jules, Cassie/Maddy, and Kat/Ethan. That's it really.

Character I find most attractive: None of them really. I think Rue and Jules are both really pretty but they're minors. And Zendaya and Hunter are also both a little too young for me.

Character I would marry: None of them. They're kids.

Character I would be best friends with: Lexi is probably the one I'd get along with best, honestly. But I also kind of feel like Jules is one of those extroverts who would adopt introverts as her friends and that's how 99% of my school friendships started, including the one with my best friend lol.

a random thought: I can't believe they really made Zendaya read L*rry fanfiction out loud lmao

An unpopular opinion: Eh....I can't really think of anything other than loving Jules and believing that she isn't any more "toxic" than most of the other characters lol. But idk how unpopular that is. There are a lot of Jules haters but she also has a good amount of stans.

My Canon OTP: Rue/Jules. I just want them both happy :(

My Non-canon OTP: Cassie/Maddy. Maddy needs to ditch Nate and date her soulmate.

Most Badass Character: Rue. Her confrontation with Nate in the finale was iconic. I hope she wrecks his shit next season.

Most Epic Villain: "Epic" is a strong word but I actually do think Nate is kind of interesting as a villain. He falls into the "love to hate him" categories of villains for me. I think it's partly because I think Jacob Elordi is one of the strongest actors on the show. It probably helps that other than following certain blogs and venturing into the Jules Vaughn and Rue x Jules tags, I'm not too involved in the fandom. So idk how rampant Nate woobifying is other than the fact that there are some freaks who ship him with Jules.

Pairing I am not a fan of: Jules/Nate 🤢 Luckily I don't think it's THAT rampant yet

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): Kat's characterization got a little crazy for a while there but I don't think she was screwed up per se.

Favourite Friendship: I'd say Cassie/Maddy but I also ship it romantically lol. Um....I'll go with Rue/Fez even if I do find it kind of problematic considering he was her drug dealer.

Character I most identify with: Kat. I didn't really grow up as a fat girl (though I'm far from being skinny) but the whole thing with her getting lost in online fandoms and fictional worlds to cope with her loneliness is something that I think a lot of us can relate to.

Character I wish I could be: Eh....none really lol

Rue/Jules:

When I started shipping them: I think it was 1x02 that sold me on the ship. It was strange because they met, became friends, and started developing feelings really fast and I usually can't get into ships like that. But something about their chemistry and dynamic really speaks to me and makes me melt.

My thoughts: They are an unhealthy relationship but NOT an abusive one. And they have potential to become healthy if they both work out their own problems as individuals. It's clear that they both care about each other a lot and when things are good between them, it really is good. They have a lot of potential to make each other happy and give the other what they need. And their chemistry is so good and tender. They make me soft in both the best and worst ways.

What makes me happy about them: That they get so much screen time together, more so than any other pair.

What makes me sad about them: That they're both so lost and troubled atm :(

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: There isn't a ton of Euphoria fic yet and I've only read like two Rue/Jules fics lol. So nothing.

Things I look for in fanfic: I'd love to read some established relationship fics with the two of them that take place where they're both in healthier places. I have an idea in my head of one taking place during their college years where they're both juggling school, their mental health, and having a relationship with each other. Maybe one day I'll write it lol

My wishlist: For them to both grow and heal and characters and then eventually come back together stronger.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: I don't really ship either of them with anyone else. For Rue I might have said Lexi if the shippers didn't make me resent the pairing so much.

My happily ever after for them: The two of them finish high school and go to college while attending therapy. Somewhere down the line, they move to New York City and get their own apartment together. They also get a cat. (It's Jules' idea. Rue is initially kind of grumpy about it because cats could have fleas and they have to clean the litter box. But she eventually grows to love it just as much as Jules). And they're both happy.

Eleanor Guthrie:

How I feel about this character: I love Eleanor so, so much and I'm sad about her always. I loved her right from her very first appearance on the show and I so wish she had gotten a better ending.

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: Max. I don't know how I ended up loving a ship that broke up romantically in the second episode of the show so much but I do. And I loved that they became friends again before the end and that their importance to each other was never truly forgotten. I also dig Miranda/Eleanor as a crack ship. And Eleanor/Mrs. Hudson.

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: Flint. I loved how much respect they always had for each other, even when they were technically on different sides. I also really wish we had gotten some sort of Eleanor/Anne dynamic outside of those scenes in S1. Even if the dynamic ended up not being entirely positive, I wanted some more interaction between the two of them lol.

My unpopular opinion about this character: She was killed at least partly for manpain. People can argue all they want but they literally made her pregnant just to make her death more painful for Rogers.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: That she hadn't died. I also would have liked to see her with another woman if we couldn't get more Maxanor. It's unfair that after Max (which didn't last long) we only got to see her with two shitty men.

Favorite friendship for this character: I liked her scenes with Madi in late S4 and I wish we could've seen more of that dynamic. Eleanor died trying to save her :(

My crossover ship: I don't do crossovers. But I've seen the fandom pass off the idea of Eleanor/Elizabeth Swann from POTC a few times and I think that's sort of intriguing.

Jules Vaughn:

How I feel about this character: I love her a lot and I feel like she's very misunderstood. As I said before, I believe she's one of the genuinely nicer characters on the show but has a lot of her own shit and problems to deal with. I think some people are way harder on her than they are other characters and that annoys me.

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: Rue and that's it.

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: We don't see a lot of it but her friendship with Kat seems cute. I also like her dad.

My unpopular opinion about this character: Whenever people bring up Rue/Jules being unhealthy, they always cite Jules as the only reason it's unhealthy and I don't think that's fair. Rue literally makes herself dependant on Jules to stay sober and that's a lot of unfair pressure to put on a teenager, especially one that's dealing with her own problems.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: That she hadn't slept with Cal Jacobs. That scene was so gross and made me uncomfortable. I get that hooking up with married men is a by-product of a self esteem issue for her but at the very least, I didn't need to see it.

Favorite friendship for this character: Kat again.

My crossover ship: NA

Thanks! :)

#euphoria #rue x jules #rules #eleanor guthrie #answered #lylagarritysgf #long post /

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forestwater87 · 5 years ago

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Are you still doing the ship meme? Well, I have a challenge for you: (evil grin) DAVID, DANIEL AND GWEN IN A POLY RELATIONSHIP! :D

Oh, sweet Moses. I normally do these from oldest received to newest out of fairness, but … Christ.

Let’s do it, then:

So here’s the thing: if it includes dan//vid, I tend to be in the “hell no” category. If it has any Gwen whatsoever, the lowest I can possibly give it is “eh” because I love her beyond all reason. So I’m splitting the difference on this one.

and i’ll also tell you who:

proposes

Fucking … how would any of this even happen, though? There is no universe where I can get these three together that makes literally any sense. Fuck. Fucking. Goddamn it.

I mean, obviously it’s David, right? Who else would it be? Gwen isn’t gonna propose to Daniel and risk being humiliated – seriously, the closest I can see between them is some sort of kismeses kinda thing, where they both can’t stand each other but keep falling into bed (at least in part for that very reason). David is the glue that holds them together, if anything could. His heart is very full of love and it can sorta spackle over some of the rougher patches (maybe. Maaaaybe).

shops for groceries

Daniel’s presumably at least in part wanted by the cops, and not even Davey can be trusting enough to let Dan anywhere near food. And Gwen … she probably actually ends up doing it the most, even though I initially assumed it’d be David because he’s such a go-getter. But the thing is, David’s a real go-getter when it comes to things he’s actually interested in, but a lot of the times he leaves the grown-up stuff to Gwen to take care of, and I imagine this would be one of them.

kills the spiders

Daniel, hands-down. Gwen would, absolutely, but Dan gets there first and honestly … he probably wanted it more … Gwen just sorta retreats and thinks for a long, long time about why she’s in this goddamn nightmare of a relationship again.

And then David comes to her room and asks if she’ll say a few words about the dead spider, not really because he has any strong feelings about a dead bug but because it gives him a chance to compliment her talents with words and get her mind off their weird boyfriend-roommate-thing, and she remembers.

comes home drunk at 3am

That’s all of them, undoubtedly. Gwen, because she insists she has to be drunk to make Daniel’s presence bearable; Daniel, because he won’t be outdrunk by Gwen of all people (and if you think they’re gonna have sloppy blackout sex in the bar’s bathroom you’re wrong, but only because David will find them and herd them back to decency); and David, because he’s convinced he has a better tolerance than he does, and always gets distracted by the fruitiness of the drinks he favors and forgets how much alcohol they actually have.

makes breakfast

David. Gwen is still asleep, and while Daniel is awake, he’s probably off skulking around doing something cult-y and doesn’t remember to eat most of the time, anyway, so David has to cajole them both into getting some food in them before they stagger out to do their bullshit camp bullshit. (Dan and Gwen’s words, not David’s. Obviously.)

remembers to feed the fish

David is meticulous about feeding the fish – in theory. He does keep getting swept away by other things, so while he made a very careful and colorful feeding chart, he also usually doesn’t remember until late in the evening, at which point he panics and rushes back to the cabin. Where he finds out that Gwen’s already fed the fish, because she’s the goddamn grownup in this relationship and at the camp and just deserves the world (okay, got off track there, sorry).

I could actually kinda see Daniel picking up the slack with the fish, if Gwen was busy and David was off doing his David things. Very reluctantly, and only because he doesn’t want to have to deal with the guilt-grief David would collapse into if he let the fish die, but I also think Dan’s strict adherence to rules could lend a kinda OCD compulsion to it; like once he starts doing something, he keeps doing it because … well, that’s now a Thing he Does. (Gwen//vid could probably get him into a decent number of good – or at least less-bad – habits in that way, come to think of it.)

decorates the apartment

Oh, David. Gwen has a few items she will not part with, so they become part of the decor (if you think the Werewolf of the Month calendar is going anywhere you got another think coming), and Daniel probably would as well, but those things are cult things and are under no circumstances being displayed anywhere in the homestead. He probably has, like, a shed where he keeps his weird cult shit and David and Gwen try not to think about it.

Their place would be adorable and woodsy and absolutely only suit David’s tastes, but somehow the other two don’t mind. It’s … nice, being surrounded by David-ness all the time. It’s cozy.

initiates duets

Oh god, David and Daniel sing all the time. I refuse to think of it as anything too mushy because that makes me a tiny bit ill, but I feel like any duets would either start out or end up as lowkey competitions, because neither of them has any chill and both want to be the best at everything, ever, all the time.

As much as I love the idea of Daniel and Gwen having some sort of “Better Than You”-style song rivalry, I can’t see Gwen ever being up to singing in public and that makes me sadder than anything in the entire world. Because it’d be so fucking great and I want it so bad.

falls asleep first

Do David or Daniel sleep? Probably not, let’s be real. So Gwen falls asleep first by default, even though she often stays up til like 1am, because she’s the only one who really sleeps. David is too much of an insomniac, and Daniel is powered by cult juices that no longer require him to sleep or something.

(Or he’s a crazy fuck. Also a possibility.)

sends the most selfies

Oh, that’s a close call. Gwen takes selfies when she feels cute, David takes them when he remembers to actually be in the frame of whatever he’s taking a picture of/with, and Daniel avoids the camera at all costs because the last picture taken of him was a mug shot and he doesn’t need any updated documentation of his appearance, thank you.

So basically Gwen//vid are a normal couple and also Daniel’s there, Gollum-ing around in the background.

Kinda a good summary of how I see this poly ship working out, actually.

makes the first move

There are a couple interesting ways this could go – because I’m still stuck on the “how the fuck did we get here?” side of things. Gonna toss out some ideas as they occur to me, in no particular order. Pick your favorite:

David and Gwen were already a couple when Dan showed up, and David was having some Complicated Feelings™ about being attracted to their coworker (and some panic; I don’t feel like David would normally feel conflicted about his sexuality, but if he was already in a relationship it’d absolutely feel like cheating). He finally talks to Gwen – especially if Daniel’s flirting with him, which Daniel would because Daniel’s a dick – and she’s okay with letting him explore that side of himself (though she kinda wishes he’d picked someone who’s less the Absolute Fucking Worst; is he a cult serial killer in this version of events? I don’t know; I’m deliberately not thinking very hard about it because no Daniel-centric ship really works if you think about it). So it becomes something of a V with David in the middle, until at some point I imagine Gwen and Daniel get hammered, into a screaming argument, or both, and then do something they both regret and suddenly they’re kinda all a thing and neither Dan or Gwen are quite sure how to feel about it.

Gwen//vid aren’t together, but one or both of them has had feelings for a while; Daniel swans his way into camp and is all charming and a douchebag and a murdering piece of shit, like he is, and … I think David would be more easily won over, because he’s just so sweet and trusting, and so the two of them start something … I imagine David would keep it secret from Gwen, because he knows she’d disapprove, and it turns out she does but whoops she’s also kinda totally jealous as well because she knew him for way longer and he just … swooped in … And then it all comes out and they realize they’re in Love but hey, Daniel, and again I think the V makes the most sense until something triggers Gwen and Daniel to hook up, at which point it kinda closes into something resembling a triangle.

None of them are in a relationship, someone does something stupid and they end up in a weird “friends/frenemies with benefits” situation but David is too soft for that life so Dan//wen just kinda grit their teeth and get along because they both love David too much to let this go, even though they’d really prefer their current relationship of “hating each other (with occasional and regretted benefits,” which was much more their speed.

I half want to find a version of all this that is happier and fluffier but … I just can’t get there from here. David is maybe sweet enough to forgive Daniel for all the child-murdering stuff (again, don’t think too hard about it or it falls apart), but I think Gwen would see right through Dan’s crap and never reach a point of liking or trusting him, and Daniel would feel the same distaste because he really prefers people who fall for his shenanigans and feels unsafe around someone who so clearly isn’t buying any of what he’s selling.

plans spontaneous trips

Where the fuck are they going to go? Who is going to be in charge of that? How on earth do we get there from here?

Seriously, this ship makes no goddamn sense and I do not know what to do with any of this noise. How dare you, Anon.

How so very dare you?

#campcamp #camp camp roosterteeth #what the fuck even would this ship name be?#danvidwen #i guess it's danvidwen #ask forest #ship meme #oh my god kill me #this was insanely difficult and i hate all of it #i mean i will always love daniel and gwen sniping at each other because that's classic ddau fun #but adding romance to it?#and i made david wayyyy too sweet and sunshiny here but he'd have to be basically a saint to ever forgive daniel enough to date him #and since i don't think he's a 'sex without feelings' sort i don't see a kismeses thing working out for him #so it's gotta be genuine romance #which only works if david is kind and forgiving to the point of seeming brain damage #and you don't think too hard about all the heinous crimes daniel's committed #really it's just a very 'don't think about it' ship all around #so like #don't think about it #Anonymous

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