#I'd probably believe you

[sherdnerd]

I am so fed up with hard binaries. A think must be wholly one way or wholly another. There is no grey. There is no "sorta". There is nothing in between. I fucking hate it. Things are complicated, you're not going to be able to look at anything meaningfully until you accept that

[thespineoftherighteous]

watch tsc be Nora's revenge. like she's just leading us on and then she's going to absolutely wreck everything, take a sledgehammer to all the things that everyone loves, as retaliation for people being so shitty to her online for so many years. it's all a ruse, she's biding her time, being nice to us online while quietly pouring gasoline over everything and then we crack open tsc1 and boom. Andrew and Neil broken up. Kevin with a career-ending injury, will never play exy again. Coach ditched the Foxes to go get married to some fling and now lives in Mexico. Dan and Matt both cheated on each other with Jeremy and the exy tabloids are losing their minds. Renee ditched the Foxes to join a sorority. Matt died. I'm not saying it's what she will do I'm saying maybe it's what she SHOULD do (and also what I would probably do)

[mollysunder]

The fact that Jinx killed Silco, or that he was specifically killed at all, is so irrelevant to s2 (for everyone including Sevika) is so weird to me. If I never watched Arcane and randomly started from s2, or if some marathon came on and I made it to the start of s2, I wouldn't even remember that Jinx killed him.

To be fair, Jinx did straight up tell Smeech and they included Silco's death in that awkward black and white clip show recap of silco in s1, but it's just so completely inconsequential to the plot. Actually, it's also a bit confusing because despite knowing Silco's dead, Caitlyn still lists one of her objectives as neutralizing "agents still loyal to Silco". Do these supposed loyal "agents" even know he's dead? Do they know Jinx killed him? Why didn't Caitlyn mention any of this to the general public?

Tldr: In s2 it's easy to forget that Jinx killed Silco because it doesn't matter to anyone, not her allies or enemies. If I was a casual viewer, like I watched it s1 during the premiere and came back post-hiatus to watch s2 without a rewatch and you quizzed about how Silco died, I'd probably get that answer wrong.

[bluespiritshonour]

here's 18-19 year old aang sketches. been hearing aang is ugly discourse—no he ain't. he was just 12.

[claitea]

quickly scribbled some redraws of a few pokemas stickers bc oh my God he is so cute in them

[dredgesnails]

wild life is almost over so here are my placement predictions for everyone left (yes, half of these are my own personal desires and the other half are because i think they would be funny):

gem

joel

etho

lizzie

impulse

jimmy

grian

cleo

scar

pearl

bdubs

ren

bigb

scott

tango

if i have to justify any of these i will and i can but some of those justifications do just come down to "i just want it to happen"

[revvethasmythh]

So I went and watched all the possible endings, and it confirmed something I had been thinking, which is that the redemption ending choice is, perhaps, the most immediately regretful one--but that they all come with some form of regret. In the redemption ending, Rook has to knowingly deny themselves the catharsis of retribution (should they desire it, which, at least for me it felt difficult not to) in order to offer Solas one last, painful chance to do the right thing. That willful denial of your own catharsis feels like an immediate regret. Giving Solas the opportunity to pursue atonement might very well be the best choice all around, but it is also incredibly painful to offer that to someone who has done so many terrible things (not a small amount to you personally). Why does he deserve another chance? Especially when so many dead (including a beloved mentor) lie in his wake? Which, I suppose, is the point: he doesn't. But you offer it anyway and it SUCKS ASS, because how could it not?

I don't know how this plays with other story choices (a sacrificed Davrin or a Harding who embraced her anger, for example), but within the context of my own choices, I can imagine an immediate satisfaction to either tricking or fighting him--especially the trick ending, where you can actively name drop Varric--but it feels like the sort of thing that would feel worse as more time passes. Once you've calmed down and are able to ask yourself if that's what the people you've lost really wanted. Varric, in Regret Superhell, didn't want vengeance. He just wanted his friend to walk a better path. And Harding always believed there was another chance for anyone, so long as you kept reaching a hand out for them--even when it sucked ass. So the redemption ending feels like a sort of indignance, an instant regret for not doing worse, for not getting comeuppance, for being forced to eschew satisfaction (related: I wonder if the Inquisitor feels those things as well coming out of this ending, considering how long they've lived under the shadow of Solas' actions). Conversely, the other two endings feel like an immediate satisfaction, because you got to trick the trickster with all the wits Varric taught you, or because you finally got to punch him in the face and it felt really good. But I feel like those endings would come with a creeping regret, something that sneaks up on you later, especially when remembering the fallen and what they would have wanted you to do. Ultimately, because of that, it feels like no ending is devoid of regret. Which I suppose, is rather thematic.

[front-facing-pokemon]

[kitkatsgalore]

you have my soul, you have my heart ♡

[blistering-typhoons]

still not over simon's performance in the finale, because as much as I adore the Captain, and Ben's portrayal of him, it's always Julian that resonated uncomfortably close for me. Alongside Pat, I think he was the one person where emotions are concerned that I always wince and go, yikes, ok that's me sometimes. The way it all hits him in an instant and his movements fail, the breath he takes when he looks to Alison and realizes the enormity of the past five years. Simon nailed that desperation and love so, so fucking well and i don't know why i'm still surprised because the man can fucking ACT.

[seventh-district]

Sam: "Look at me. Hey- look at me a second. I know. I know you're tough. I know how strong you are. You have every right to be proud of that. But being able to handle somethin' doesn't mean you should have to. Least of all when I'm right here trying to help. Please let me help. If not for you then for me, because I don't like knowin' you're hurtin', especially when there's somethin' I can do about it."

Me, shaking my head, fighting back literal tears: "B-but it's gonna give you another headache!"

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

hihi! not to pressurize you into giving it away 😭😭 but I have my curiosity about how long of a fic is jadeite ginkgo exactly. ITS NOT LIKE IM READY FOR IT TO BE FINISHED ANY TIME LONGER!!! i absolutely love and adore that fic 🫶🏽 I'm just shooked by how you plan out these long fics oml

also I would love to draw something related to jg again soon if I get the chance and time !! <33

i can only give you a rough estimate honestly bc it is a known fact that I Do Not Control The Fic Length. it just happens. so uh- i'd say at the very least ten more chapters, probably more. most likely more. watch it be longer than cyanide. i don't know man (gn)

[rmbunnie]

Red Hood Characterization

This is really long so I'm putting a cut here, I've been thinking about Jason Todd's character motivations and the question of whether or not his actions are based in a Moral Code (I don't think so, not to say he's without any morality) and I talk about that in more depth here.

I saw someone say on here that Titans: Beast World: Gotham City was some of the best Jason Todd internal writing they'd seen in a while, and I've been a Red Hood fan for 8 years or so now? pretty much since I read comics for the first time, so I went and checked out and I thought it was good! The way the person I saw talking about it as if it was rare and unusual made me wonder though, because as well-written as i thought his stances on crime were, there wasn't really anything in it that went against the way I conceptualize Jason?

This kinda plays into a larger question I've been thinking about for a while with Jason though, which is that, do people think that the killing is part of a fundamental worldview that motivates him a la batman, and that worldview is the reason he does the things he does?? Because 8 years ago i was a middle schooler engaging with fiction on the level that a middle schooler does, so I simply did not put much thought into it beyond "poor guy :(" but ever since I actually started trying to understand consistent characterization, I don't really see Jason as someone who's motivated by a moral code in his actions the way batman or superman is!

tbh my personal read is that he's a very socially-motivated guy, his actions from resurrection to his Joker-Batman ultimatum in utrh always seemed to me like every choice made leading up to his identity reveal was either a. to give him the leverage and skill necessary to pull off his identity reveal successfully, or b. to twist the knife that little bit more when he does let Bruce find out who he is. Like iirc there's a Judd Winick tweet like "yeah tldr he chose Red Hood as his identity because it's the lowest blow he could think of." And I think that's awesome, I think character motivations rooted so deeply in character's relationships and emotions are really fun to read! I also think it's where the stagnation/flatness of his character comes from in certain comics, because if his main motivation is one event in one relationship that passes, and he is not particularly attached to anything in his life or the world by the time that comes to pass, it's a little harder to come up with a direction to go with the character after that, because there isn't much of a direction that aligns with something the character would reasonably want? But I do think solving this by saying "all of the morally-off emotionally driven cruelty he did on his way to spite Batman was actually reflective of his own version of Batman's stance that's exactly the same except he thinks it's GOOD to kill people" isn't ideal. To be fully honest, it seems to me like he never particularly cared one way or the other about killing people to "clean Gotham of crime," he just did everything he could to get the power necessary to pull off his personal plans, and took out any particularly heinous people he encountered along the way (like in Lost Days.) Not to say I think the fact he killed people keeps him up at night anymore than everything else in his life events, I just never really thought he was out there wholeheartedly kneecapping some dude selling weed or random guy robbing a tv store for justice.

Looping wayyy back to my question, Is this (^) contradictory to the way he's written/the overall average perception of the character? Because like I enjoyed his writing in Beast World i have zero significant issue with anything there, I just didn't believe it would be a hot take, like yeah, that is Jason. It's been a while since I've read utrh and lost days, but I don't think my takeaway directly contradicts either of those too bad iirc. Idk all this to say I think Jason killing and being alright with killing is an obvious and objective fact, but i guess i've always seen it as more of a practical tactic than a moral belief, and I think taking the actions made during the lowest points of a character's life where he is obsessively focused on this ONEEEE thing and trying to apply it as a Motivating Stance to everything he's done after that, doesn't really follow logically for me.

[ghastlyaffairs]

Strife! Strife! Shoot the freaking imp!!!!!

[anistarrose]

what I mean when I say I'm tired of people making found families into nuclear families:

among other things, it's kind of annoying when people act like the romantic couple are automatically the "most obvious" candidates to adopt a kid; or act like a pair of people in a romantic relationship can't happily co-parent a kid with people outside of that romance

what I don't mean when I say I'm tired of people making found families into nuclear families:

people using "siblings" or "parent and child" as a shorthand (or even non-shorthand) for characters' relationships sometimes

[nero-neptune]

shout out to this movie for teaching me how to spell words that i've never found the opportunity to use in real life lol