#ITS LIKE CRACK TO ME IDK WHY

[tyrianluda]

I got that brainrot bad. Listened to one of Kendrick's unreleased tracks from 2013 five times today. AND it's still stuck in my head HELP ME-

[sulfies]

Atlas, when the heavens get too heavy, I hope you finally allow yourself to put them down.

Originally uncencored and tbh it isnt sexual at all but idk tumblrs policy on nudity sooo have random bullshit to hide away… If you want the uncencored, Imma make a ao3 work for it I think :p

[animangalover-writes]

I got bored.

For those occasions when the straights can't fathom why you ship The Gays™

[empyreansentinel]

never understood why jack had a portrait of moxxi up in his casino. the place went under after BL2, and at that point they hadnt been together for years. and its not like what they had together was particularly happy or long lasting, either. they were together for maybe a month before breaking up pre-TPS, and thats not even mentioning what happens between them during the game itself, so... maybe its a trophy? it doesnt feel like one when theres also one of angel. but its all i really got because presumably hes been in a much happier relationship with nisha for years, even though the portrait does feel too sentimental for a woman hes hated for the past Forever. speaking of nisha, there's no portrait of her or his wives. which is doubly weird because surely theyd be here too if moxxi is. idk, moxxi and angel are just a strange pair to have it just be them. by themselves is fine, moxxi alone is easily a trophy. and imo its just weird for a portrait of angel to be in the casino in the first place. some secret siren, huh? but together? idk. it gives mixed messages.

[purrvaire]

black sails + tumblr text posts I have on my phone (pt.3/?)

2

[hexxter]

What if Luxu and Player encounter each other with each of the player’s reincarnation

Luxu who is stealing bodies vs the kid that keeps coming back to life

[sneeb-canons]

mind can rarely crack his joints bc his bones are metal and whatever and usually run pretty smoothly. but on the rare occasion that he can crack them. it sounds like the entire house is being torn apart by fireworks and violent explosions. his back snaps like a godsamn whip and his neck cracks so hard it's a surprise he didn't break his own spine. every single joint in his body will pop louder than anyone in the house has ever yelled, without fail.

he'll always make sure to do this in direct vicinity of both heart and soul because as he rearranges his internal structures they will stare on in sheer, absolute horror, especially considering that once he's done, he just continues on with his task as if it never happened and as if every atom in his body hasn't been split in two

Headcanon #632

[wildaboutchu2000]

why would you EVER want him that do that back (prev(.

THIS SHIT DID NOT HAPPEN NOR WILL EVER HAPPEN!!! HE DOESN'T HAVE A LICK OF THE CONFIDENCE NEEDED TO PERFORM A KABEDON WITH SUCH OVERTLY DISGUSTING ENERGY!!!!!! BE SERIOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!! but a girl can dream. i can dream................i jst wanted 2 draw him being the pushy tryhard he didn't want 2 be from s1e2........................

[purplepixel]

Hi I saw in your pinned post that you've read over 1,000 TMNT fics. Do you have a few really good ones you would recommend?

(don't feel any pressure to respond if you don't want to)

Oh boy this is...quite an ask. Especially bc fanfic recs are so personal? What I think is a good fic will be vastly different from other people. I have a really high angst tolerance, so please double check tags with these. Also keep in mind that I mainly read donnie-centric fics.

Here are my personal favorites! My hand slipped and I have more than just a few to recommend...what can I say there are so many good fics.

CRACK BUT READS LIKE CANON

Back To School by Em_H | 10,965 [FINISHED]

Donnie enrolls in April’s school and tries to juggle his packed schedule. A shrek play is included. Do I need to say more?

☆ In Volvunt: a RotTMNT Fanfiction ☆ by kittylittersmoothie | 27,082 [FINISHED]

In which the rest of the bros continuously try and fail to rick roll donnie. A war is started, alliances are made, betrayals occur, this is a hilarious feel good fic. It’s very in line with the show tonal wise and the dialogue is very rise

Mikey's Jam-Packed, Guaranteed to Get Donnie's Memory Back, Friendship Tour! By Eyse | 92,972 [ON-GOING]

Donnie wakes up with no memory of anyone including himself. Que his brothers trying to find ways to get his memory back. Has some of the most wacky adventures and scenarios I’ve ever encountered in a rise fic. Feels like you’re reading the actual show

YOU WILL BE EMOTIONALLY DESTROYED

Quiet Your Mind by daedelweiss | 18,081 [FINISHED]

Fusion Au with the disaster twins set in the bad future timeline. I don’t cry. This one made me cry. Bittersweet ending.

Telepathy (of a Twin Variety) by vosian_nightmare | 24,423 [FINISHED] 

My personal favorite twin telepathy fic. Character study on the disaster twins.

Something Borrowed, Something Blue by Cass_Phoenix | 31,963 [FINISHED]

A Donnie from an alternate reality kidnaps Leo. Or is he bringing him home? This one will fuck with your mind. One of my bookmark notes is “Reality existentialism” 

Firefight by remrose | 94,480 [ON-GOING]

What if donnie gets trapped in the prison dimension with leo? I’m usually not a fan of changing plot points in the rise movie or suicidal leo, but this fic is the exception. It is VERY well written and has some of the best exchanges between the disaster twins. You WILL be scared for the characters and your heart WILL be crushed. Proud to say I was here for this fic since chapter 1 bc that NEVER happens with me

THE CROSSOVERS

Familiar Places, Foreign Faces by Petra4President | 36,434 [ON-GOING]

Rise/2012 Crossover Fic. The Rise Donnie & 2012 Raph fic I didn’t ask for (I read this before watching 2012) but didn’t realize I NEEDED. Donnie gets sent to the 2012 universe and must find a way home. 

A Tale of Spirits by unorthodoxx | 168,344 [ON-GOING]

Rise/Avatar the Last Airbender AU. This one is pretty popular so I won't say anything else except its really good.

I WOULD BOOK BIND THESE

All I have to say about these fics is that they’re REALLY good and BOOK WORTHY

Monsters Among Us by DanzinoraSwitch | 86,136 [FINISHED]

Violet Hues and Holy Blue by SibillaScribbles08 | 115,752 [FINISHED]

I May Be Invisible, but I Still Look Good by Dandy | 124,862 [FINISHED]

MY PERSONAL COMFORT FICS

Things will never be the same (but that's okay) by Petra4President | 14,493 [FINISHED]

Post movie aftermath fic that focuses on the changes created by the events of the movie. Idk what specifically has me rereading this occasionally, but its really well written and a little different than most aftermath fics I've read.

Corrupted Upgrade by Dandy | 25,898 [FINISHED]

Donnie Villain AU with a twist. He really gives off megamind vibes. DO NOT BE FOOLED. THERE’S A REASON EVERYONE IS OUT OF CHARACTER IN THE BEGINNING. I almost slept on this fic and it became one of my favorites. It’s the type of fic that I can read over and over and over.

Turning Purple by Lizardstuff | 48,123 [ON-GOING]

Donnie slowly gets more and more sick post rise movie and the rest of the characters must find out what’s wrong and find a cure. THIS ONE’S FOR YOU, MEDICAL NERDS. Author has done research and any inaccuracies have gone over this EMT’s head. I reread this one every chapter update and every time I’m haunted by “the blueberry french toast paragraph” No I will not explain further, go read it.

MY TOP FIC RECOMMENDATION

Spider's Web with Strings Attached by CurlySwirly | 125,661 [ON-GOING]

Donnie and Leo get kidnapped and are forced to fight in the battle nexus. This is my pick for the most well written fanfic and most in canon characterization with ALL the characters. You will HEAR the characters not just through the dialogue but also through the writing itself. As the reader, you will be beaten down and have your heart crushed mercilessly which makes the pay off the most rewarding, satisfying experience that I've personally ever felt with a fanfic. This fic lives in my head rent free and I think about it at least once a day. It is my all time favorite rise fic and I highly recommend it.

[fiendishartist2]

guess who just watched this years fourth of footwerk

[peachyfnaf]

I'm sorry but "MY BEAUTIFUL PRINCESS WITH A DISORDER<3" really made my day and I needed you to know

🤣🤣🤣

I can't believe Nexus is bullying peepaw war criminal.

Do you think Nexus is going to be stopped by big bro Sun or do you think the lil guy is going beyond the point of no return?

(Please talk about baby cringe Lord Nexus, I want to hear about your blorbo 🙏)

That's because Nexus IS my beautiful princess with a disorder, I'll have you know <3 they're diseased but it's okay I can give them their tetanus and flu shots and it'll all be better I GOT THIS

But. ahem, okay, blorbo yapping time. I'm not even gonna say "I'll try to keep this short" because I know it wont end up that way HAHAHAHAHA

"Do you think Nexus is going to be stopped by big bro Sun or do you think the lil guy is going beyond the point of no return?"

I... have absolutely no idea!!!1! (and also it took me an embarrassingly long amount of time to realize peepaw war criminal was Ruin KJDFHSDF)

The most frustrating thing about canon Nexus is how his morals, motivations, and goals seem to see-saw back and forth all the time. at first, he became how he is now due to Solar's death. he spiraled in his grief, identity-issues, and abandonment. but... now his motivation is to become an all powerful god??? while it's most likely that NSP is at play and affecting his thought process, it's... well, it's really hard to take him seriously as a villain because of it, lol. for an audience to enjoy, and even sympathize in some cases, with a villain, their goals and motivations have to be concrete. they have to be relatable, or at least understandable, but Nexus' whole thing is... not, Imho. and I know I'm not the only person who feels this way!!!

I see a lot of people calling Nexus "cringe", and the thing is, when it comes to canon Nexus, they're not really... wrong??? The worst thing Nexus has done so far is make Old Moon see his past victims, which is fucked up of him to do, but.. so far, that's kind of it??? other than that, his "villainy" consists of saying empty threats and cheesy evil one-liners. hell, he was supposed to kidnap Sun yesterday but instead spent the whole episode yapping and venting to him, chasing Sun around in the worlds darkest game of tag before getting some lead right in the face dkfjhsdfsd

Also, notice how he's only targeted Old Moon when it comes to actual physical violence? not Lunar, Earth, Solar, or Sun, but Old Moon? yeah, I did too. we already know that Nexus does everything because he's lashing out, but as of rn the only target he's gotten his hands on physically being O.M...? well. I think it says a lot. cause' yeah, he sure as shit scared the life out of the other Celestials, but he's never put his hands on them!! the only other one of them he harmed physically was Earth- and not only was he not aiming for her, she was just in the way- he felt immediate regret for his actions once in space, and has yet to even see Earth ever since that day.

So, I really have no idea if he's going to be "redeemed" or not. one second he's showing signs he might be, and the next he's falling further down the "pretty badly written villain" rabbit-hole. if he does get something akin to a redemption arc, he'll prolly mostly be accepted in the eyes of the viewers, considering a lot of peeps sympathize or at least understand where he's coming from, but I seriously doubt the other Celestials would take him back. the only one's who might see him as family/a close friend again are Sun and Solar, but even then, nothing would ever be the same.

I hope he gets redeemed, or at least freed from the hold Dark Sun has on him and he's able to live his own life, I really do. at his core, Nexus is a good person. a good person who was crushed under the weight of the shadow of the man he was born under. and we know this because he used to be New Moon. sweet, dorky New Moon.

New Moon, who made inventions like sentient knives and whoopee cushions. New Moon, who had matching My Little Pony stickers with his best friend. New Moon, who bought a whole ass island-luxury-house for Sun because he wanted to make him feel better and give him the proper space to heal. and New Moon- the poor freshly-baked A.I who gave his all to make sure he could do everything that Old Moon could, but it just wasn't enough. he tried and tried and tried, but it wasn't enough.

So yeah, idk if he's getting one in canon, but to me, he more than deserves a good ending, for the life he was given. let him be at peace.

[presiding]

a doctor turned serial killer turned doctor again, an actor who paints, a gang leader, a mining baron, and a vice overseer walk into the room.

oh yeah and they lead karnaca now.

dishonored 2 is my fav game but i think it's mid, story-wise. here's why dh1 works and why dh2's overarching story sorta misses

tl;dr: story integration is critical for gameplay that offers audience payoff, but emily's personal arc from dishonor to honor is inconsistently demonstrated in the story, and is not an interactive part of the gameplay.

essay/long version under cut >

recap: what's dishonored's deal

[skip if you want] dh1 is an underdog story: corvo is an honorable man swept up in the machinations of a callous city, so his canonical ending being 'this child will rule over an empire' isn't about the child's rule but rather about corvo's reputation being restored in a more hopeful city, due to his & the player's rejection of the violent connotations of the tagline 'revenge solves everything.'

similarly, in dh1 DLCs, daud's story arc is that of an anti-hero: a dishonorable man who realises too late he has done irreparable harm. he sees the error of his ways after a single monumental death, and eventually a single life redeems him when he/the player stepped in to circumvent a terrible fate for a child, enabling her to rule unfettered.

daud & corvo come to a satisfying conclusion within the extent of their narrative arcs. it doesn't matter that a child on a throne isn't really a fix for a decaying empire - the player's actions throughout the city of dunwall was what mattered - and these stories could be framed as parables. in that sense, young emily as a ruler is a metaphor for a hopeful future for the city & empire.

dishonored 1 & its DLCs are also great examples of storytelling with perfectly integrated gameplay - you, the player, worked towards the outcome that redeemed the protagonists.

in your efforts to save young emily, you either achieved a good outcome (corvo) or prevented a worse outcome (daud).

bringing us to dh2 -

what's emily's arc

emily's arc is a coming of age: we're introduced to a reigning empress who questions her role & skillset ("am i the empress my mother wanted me to be?"), then her titular fall from grace occurs. from there, she learns to reject the violent, selfish connotations in 'take back whats yours' tagline (a la daud & corvo!) while rediscovering why her rule is critical to the empire.

emily's rule is no longer metaphorical, but:

a literal thing for audience assessment (is emily a good ruler?) AND

the crux of her storyline.

at the beginning of dh2, emily is introduced as a disengaged leader ("i wish i could just run away from all this;" "i dont know if whether i should sail to the opposite side of the world, or have everyone around me executed"). the antihero has a precedent for the dishonored series in daud, so it's not at first glance an issue*, however, the fact that emily has ruled poorly reframes corvo & daud's endings as being less than ideal (a moralistic retcon) *we could talk here about how ready an audience was in 2016 for a flawed women as a protagonist, hell, even in 2023,,,

throwback to the beginning of this essay when i said:

'this child will rule over an empire' isn't about the child's rule but rather about corvo's reputation

emily's story arc, unlike for daud & corvo, is literally about the quality of her rule. we're no longer in metaphor territory (ironic phrase): a parable-style ending doesn't work.

does emily become a good ruler

we know she becomes a good ruler because the game says so. it is narrated to the audience via a (literal) word of god in the space of 30 seconds, after the final boss. the outsider tells us that emily becomes known as Just & Clever.

drawing a distinction here - this narration is not the same as the player actively being involved.

the player does not throughout the game become aware that emily has made political allies. during the game, she doesn't talk to these characters about saving karnaca or being a better ruler to the empire (there's a few lines might imply it, but you need to be actively looking and being careful to wait for every voice line. it's a far cry from daud & corvo's fight to save emily being unmissable - even though daud doesn't know at the beginning that's the goal).

how does the game show it

you can coincidentally not kill most of your subjects and never be aware that emily is looking to restore karnaca by means of instating a council - it's never brought up. it *couldn't* be brought up, because that council serves under the fake duke (armando), who is the last person she speaks to before she leaves for dunwall. its her suggestion that he rules karnaca, but armando's condition is that he will rule as he sees fit.

to back up a bit, emily's canonical method of restoring karnaca is by banding together key allies - hypatia, stilton, [byrne &or paolo], pastor, under a council beneath the duke's body double. they are passionate people who would each individually make worthwhile advisors, but if you think about those characters sitting at a table trying to reach an agreement, it feels like an assortment of people that emily didn't kill along the way and doesn't feel organic (up to interpretation). it's not stated if emily herself banded this council together, but logically she must have (worth a mention these are mostly characters that you as the player had reasonable rationale to kill during a high chaos run, except pastor). the underlying concept may be that karnaca's power is returned to its people - which is interesting given that the monarchy remains and armando's decision is final.

this overarching solution could also be taken as a critique to dh1's 'put your kid on the throne,' which is another reason its worthwhile looking at how emily was shown to be a better leader. obviously my point isn't that her solution was bad given the circumstance, but i mean she has very little agency here in all. if emily was shown to be more controlling as a leader, this could be interpreted as character growth, but that's not the case.

coming of age

how do you learn & grow when you can't specify your failings? emily doesn't really touch on her shortcomings as an empress. she non-specifically worries delilah makes a better empress than her. it's hard to argue her worries are meaningful when someone good at their job will still worry when lives are in the balance.

emily's best 'aha' moments (eg. crack in the slab comment about gaining perspective) are consistently undercut by a conversation with sokolov or meagan afterwards in which she demonstrates she hasn't learned anything (before the grand palace, emily condemns 'toadies sucking up to me' and is reminded by meagan that she's part of the problem). the story is confused about what it's trying to say about emily's progress, and when she's meant to show progress, if she was meant to show any progress at all. it could be argued that emily was never even a bad ruler, she had just been fed misinformation about the problems in karnaca and been the victim of slander by her political enemies. the game doesn't make this clear - it's easier to argue that the opposite is true given that her allies only have criticism.

worth a mention here that the heart quotes about armando - a fake ruler - interestingly mirror emily's character concerns. "see how he sighs? his life is a gilded cage." but this essay is already long.

while corvo & daud spend their games (and through the gameplay) 'earning' their redemption, emily is being led by the NPCs around her to a conclusion and a fix for the political mess in karnaca: meagan & sokolov guide emily to her missions, and there's no recurring quest for emily to investigate possible allies. she is able to gather the people she hasn't killed to herself by manner of... post-game narration. during the game, she's primarily concerned with getting her throne back.

an easy fix: if there had been less dialogue & narrative focus on emily's failings perhaps the ending would have felt more satisfying. it has the feel of cut content, but i don't know what was cut to be able to comment on it.

so what went wrong?

i can't help but wonder if arkane were worried they would lose a certain demographic if corvo wasn't playable (may have been deemed too much of a risk - 2013 was a different time), and so they had to take out story elements that were unique to emily's growth as a character/empress, because the usual storyline/gameplay integration had to work for both characters - in other words, gameplay that made sense for both corvo & emily was prioritised before emily's story & character development. which is a silly problem to have in a game that added character voices for the sake of improving characterisation - maybe emily's tale would have felt more akin to a parable if she had less lines that betrayed her ignorance (to the disdain of those around her).

i wish more care had been taken with emily's story. most players will never really notice the large variety of different endings - they're not particularly satisfying in and of themselves.

it's ironic that one of Emily's complaints is about her father/protector being overbearing, when his (parallel universe) presence in the gameplay may be one of the reasons her own narrative arc falls flat.

what are the upsides here

changing tune from what didn't work - don't you think the concept is fantastic? it's a great idea overall - can you imagine if the coming of age storyline was better integrated into the game?

it's valuable to talk about the integration of story and gameplay and characterisation from a craft perspective. dh2 genuinely is my favourite game - it's beautiful, the imm-sim design philosophy makes the world a delight to explore, the combat gives endless creative options for tackling any fight, there is a far greater diversity of cast in an in-text canonical way. there's loads to love!

i love emily as a dodgy leader, to me it adds interesting dimensionality to the outsider's narrations - of course in dunwall there's never a neat happily ever after! emily, like the outsider, both work well as characters who hold ultimate power but aren't necessarily worthy of it - and this makes perfect sense for the dishonored universe's morality & critiques of power. however, within this grey area there's still plenty of room for a satisfying ending, which isn't what we ended up with, whatever the true reason for that was. and also, damn, emily's a marked assassin empress, if she can't lead well then who can?

while dh1 was criticised for its narrative simplicity, dh2 in contrast and in hindsight shows us that simplicity isn't so bad - there's satisfaction in gameplay achieves a clear, simple narrative goal.

[coniangray]

Whos watching life in Hawkins??

This hit me earlier when I realized all four stories of st4 had someone/ something being a know-it-all god or a heterodiagetic narrator watching and knowing everything all at once.

But not everywhere (pun intended)

All four storylines have both types of narrators:

A homodiegetic one, this being a character involved in the story and showing their prescription of things

A heterodiagetic one, aka the know-it-all god, recording and watching all the other characters.

Homodiegetic:

For the Hawkins plot it was max. For California it was Will and Mike. For the lab it was eleven, and for the prison it was Hopper (and I think Joyce on her way there, since the prison plot is somehow separate from Joyce and Yuri's plot).

I can tell, because we SEE all of those characters feelings displayed on screen in one way or another. Max was curious during the curse, therefore bringing the whole team together, Wills lingering in California was also shown through him only, Hopper's desparation and fear for joyce not making it safe ect.

The only one I'm on the fence about is Mike, since the last time we got a scene from his prospective was in s2 or at the rain fight in s3 I think. Aka, Mike's pov was not shown enough in s4, but it was there.

Heterodiagetic narrator:

This might sound tricky at first but it's not. Even though this narrator is not supposed to be a character at all: instead, they're just a messenger who convey the story from the writer to the reader (as all narrators do). They're a ghost, an entity, aka the camera of the characters.

But in this case, the narrator is in the show. Each plot has its own one, and that's what considered a god of their own nature.

I realized this from the security cameras and the memory storage of Brenner in Nina scenes. He was keeping and choosing which ones to show to El, aka choosing her path instead of her, which becomes clear in the show later on.

In Alaska, there was also security footage to which jopper had also access to later on.

As for California, they were also recorded/watched at some point. When? Right before the shooting.

The jokes about house arrest in this scene made me think the guards that were supposed to keep them same weren't just sitting, they were most likely recording the activity in the house due to protocol (at least i wanna believe it, considering Mike's house was anf might still be bugged since the end of s1 and the flashbacks in s2).

Also, in the van, they were most likely watched by El after she gained her powers.

And if all of these plots were watched by someone, then who was watching Hawkins?

Vecna.

I realized it from this video; vecna was legit searching for a source, another mind to curse in order to complete his plan.

The camera panning made me think he had access to anyone he wanted to. He could've chosen literally anyone in replacement of mike, but he went for Patrick instead.

Why? Because he knew he was in the same group with Lucas and Jason. As we saw, attacking Patrick triggered not just these two, but in total five people and the entire Hawkins team.

And became the wirters chose to plot wise.

My point is, the dynamics changed after his death, even in the slightest, bringing Lucas closer to max.

Now, because these gods are characters too, their own thoughts may interviene with what we see/ are shown, therefore leading everything back to homodiegetic or 1st person pov.

The main occupants here are Henry and of course, Brenner. Its like a domino effect, once brenner was watching one and now one is watching hawkins.

Their motives also beg to differ; Brenner was focusing more and only on logic, hence one disobeyed that rule and only relied on emotions, especially anger, to get his powers to their fullest potential, and thats what he also taught eleven.

But the main know it all god; The Mindflayer.

It literally watches everyone. Dustin said it himself:

A five star general that can open gates and watch. Tell us just His side of the story, messing with others memories, especially Wils, and everything related to him and el.

Aka, he can just change every detail he wants simply because he was watching.

Because his lenses were stronger than the other characters, and becuase he had and still has a devoted spy. A spy that can absorb information from inside.

And that spy is Will. even in season 4, even in the byler scenes, EVERYWHERE.

That kiiinda sounds like a hyperboly, but because the connection was there, it doesnt mean it was strong. The closer he got to hawkins, the stroger it got, thats why he felt him so intenesely at the cabin.

And here comes the unreliable narrator.

Most scenes are not shown excactly how things happen. Theyre not objective, theyre subjective, given how at least one persons pov is always involved.

This is also why there are a lot of variations of just one memory, why the void version of their timeline is slightly differrent, and why even though will saw mileven happy during the rinkomania skating scenes, an outsiders pov showed how they actually felt, dissapointed by everything.

One other thing id like to add, will MIGHT be playing the god role here too, taking in mind his ongoing connection with vecna and how this could eventually be displayed in vecnas mind if he wanted to. Hence the whole spy thing.

There was a post i read about El trading places with max and exchaging herself with a variant from another timeline, and that adds another layer to the unreliable narrator imo, thinking how the two days later el has different memories and knowledge than the el we knew from before and is now possibly dead.

The thing is, this unreliable narrator thing has SO many layers, and therfore shapes somewhat smalll plot holkes within scenes, especially in s1,2 and 4.

And it got even messier im 3 given hoe focusing solely on the mainstream 80's summer slasher movie vibe, some characters arcs were lost or outshined by others that had the chance to change their arcs for the better.

Yes, im talking about will who was sidelined a lot and then this was decided to be used as a weapon for the connection between him and the ud.

All the arcs are intertwined, but i CANT solve this untill we get s5. Its honestly frustrating like GIMME THE SOLUTION BRUHHHH

[itspileofgoodthings]

Accepting theories on why the beginning of Pride and Prejudice is so much harder to teach than the end.

[imadhatt3r]

I can't stop thinking about Koujaku's name and sparrow motif...

So his name means "red sparrow"; And I'd imagine that he was most likely named by his mother. I don't think his father had much of a presence in his early life, and besides, I feel like a violent yakuza leader would want his son to have a more "powerful" sounding name. So it was probably his mom's choice.

I feel like she must've loved sparrows if she named her son after them. I can see her going out to parks and gardens just to see them, and taking older Koujaku with her to feed them too. They were always so cute and cheerful, so they always managed to lift her spirits whenever she was worried about her pregnancy, her partner, or future in general, so she decided to name her son after them, because she wanted him to lead life with the same qualities she saw in these birds: She wanted him to be joyful, resiliant, adaptable, and always surrounded by loving and like-minded people (since sparrows live in large groups). He was her little birdie since birth... 😭

I think that Koujaku grew fond of sparrows too, through seeing how much his mother loved them. Maybe that's why he wears a kimono with sparrows and picked Beni (a sparrow) as his AllMate. I can see him putting out a small bowl with grains on his windowstill to get some sparrows to come, like he used to do with his mom when they went to feed them, but with mixed results (sometimes they come and sometimes they don't).

Aoba picks up on it too; Whenever he's out doing deliveries and he spots a flock of sparrows foraging in a patch of grass or drinking and bathing out of a puddle, he takes a photo on his coil and sends it over to Koujaku, usually with some silly caption he comes up with on the spot. He absent-mindedly picks up any sparrow-themed knicknacks to give to Koujaku, all of which are deeply treasured and loved- if they're something like post-it notes, there's a guarantee that they'll never be used, and they will be lovingly stored in a drawer untill the end of times. Aoba actually bought an extra set of post-it notes and a pen with a sparrow-themed topper to keep at his desk at Hum-Drum.

This is more of a sidenote, but I always imagined Koujaku's mother as a rather short and frail woman, probably a bit shorter than Aoba, so the height difference between them now would be really big. I guess I was just touched by the image of Koujaku's mom cradling his head in her hands to have him look at her as she wipes away his tears with her thumbs... Her birdie's all grown up, but he'll always remain her little sparrow...

[joelletwo]

giving up on going to bed proper tonight i am Not getting everything i need to do done in forty minutes [adjusted for time it took to write this post. 30 minutes]