#LAST MINUTE THEORIES

[litfeathers]

In all the excitement over the HD Hollow Mind paintings getting released, and in the resulting discussion and theorizing of the Wittebane story, I haven’t seen anyone bring up something that is potentially a HUGE part of the puzzle. Which makes sense, because it only appears for a split second in Yesterday’s Lie:

Hopkins shows this picture, says “disaster struck”, and then tells us a bit about the Wittebane brothers, namely that they met a witch and were lured into another world.

There are two options here.

1) The meetinghouse caught fire and started the witch hunt that we see in the HM paintings. The same one that ended with this:

…and it’s entirely possible that Evelyn is the one who blew up the meetinghouse. Why? *shrugs* The witch hunters pissed her off? In any case, that sequence of events would track what Hopkins said (meetinghouse catches fire, witch hunt is called, Caleb and Philip are separated from the pack, and they find Evelyn).

But if this sequence of events is slightly off? He says exactly this:

We know that Caleb was sneaking around with Evelyn for a while before he left. Look at Philip’s hair here vs his hair in the above painting. Time has definitely passed. He even has his ponytail and adult hair noodle.

Further evidence that time has passed? Masha says “they used codes to travel between worlds.” Which I take to mean that the lovebirds traveled back and forth a bunch.

This is where theory two comes in.

Hopkins said the brothers were lured into the BI. We know Caleb left with Evelyn first, and some time later Philip followed them. We don’t know the exact details, but keeping in mind that the fire could have happened at any point before the “luring” (ie Caleb leaving)…

What if this is our scenario instead:

2) Caleb got caught hanging out with a witch, and was arrested. Evelyn blew up the meetinghouse to save him, spiriting him away in front of the whole town. Philip spends years trying to find a natural portal and finally succeeds, entering the BI at Eclipse Lake. He tracks down his brother and the witch.

We know what happens next.

And here’s the kicker: in that new painting, we see Philip watching his brother leave through the portal all happy and carefree.

This seems like just one of many trips. Caleb might or might not know Philip is there. But in any case, it is probably not what Caleb expects to be his last trip. He doesn’t have any possessions with him. He’s not under any sort of duress. And unless he was a MASSIVE jerk, he does not seem to be concerned that he is leaving his little brother forever.

But. What if this is an important memory because it’s the memory of Philip finally catching Caleb in the act?

What if this is the moment that led to Caleb getting caught (perhaps the next day when he returned home), setting into motion the events that required a rescue from his cell in the meetinghouse and for him to escape to the BI permanently?

I mean…what if Philip rattted out Caleb?

[welcometogrouchland]

(ID in alt) I literally said I was gonna post this month's ago and then never had the wherewithal to describe it and so I didn't Lmao (said with pain). But since I'm thinking of opening my commissions I figured I should remind ppl that I. Yknow. Can draw.

Lots of Steph here (I had major art block making all of these and my brain worms for her kept me going) + some sprinkles of stephcass for Cass nation to enjoy!

[myname1sca1]

I can not get over the fact that in almost EVERY Byler scene, someone *cough cough* Jonathan *cough cough* HAS to interrupt it.

They have to because in almost every one, it would otherwise end in them confessing.

Like, our boys have never had a scene end with "Well! Guess that's all we had to say! See you later!" No. Someone always have to find some reason to pull them apart.

CAUSE THE DUFFERS KNOW THAT IF WE JUST LET THEM TALK FOR LIKE 20 MINUTES, IT WOULD END WITH THEM DATING

[unnecessary-dinosaurs]

listen kenji is one of my favorite characters ever and i am so excited to see him again but they did him dirty with that haircut

day one of @campbenji ‘s chaos theory countdown!

day 1- favorite character

[kickbutts-singsongs]

This is kind of a crack thought, but I’d love it if Horikoshi made DFO canon

but in the most anticlimactic way possible.

Like, we don’t see it during Bakugou’s fight, we don’t see it during Midoriya’s fight (and Shigaraki’s memories), but instead it’s after everything is over.

Everybody’s healing and getting better, and then Izuku and Katsuki, bored out of their minds, just decide to watch the footage of all the fights.

Squished together on a hospital bed, they’re watching Bakugou’s footage first (cuz Kacchan sugoi) and then Izuku’s like “hmmm hold on why does AFO look familiar?”

and then when they’re done, they watch All Might’s footage and Izuku’s eyes bug out of his head and goes “HOLY SHIT WAIT THATS MY DAD”

And then Katsuki just goes “huh. no wonder the fucker wasn’t around.”

and they just. move on.

[mllenugget]

I mean I’m just saying I’m surprised Baghera didn’t do a Baghera on this one

[its-dean]

I’m personally not involved with FNAF or the community, but I wanted to give a super big congratulations to a close friend of mine!

@birdsareblooming and @whencartoonsruletheworld You guys did such an awesome job with your first video, and the way it's immediately been sending shockwaves across the FNAF community is just insane!!!

Keep on climbing! ヾ( ˃ᴗ˂ )◞ • *✰

[chirpsythismorning]

We never really left

[strixcattus]

Right. Here we are.

I kind of switch between you/us/the player, but they all mean the same thing. I tried to have at least one square for each affected chapter—the expanded chapters, the new chapters, and the chapters that lead to the new chapters. "But some of these contradict each other—" They might, yeah. That's why I've tried not to put them in the same row. "The blade gives you more options" means that in Spectre/Prisoner/Damsel, more Chapter IIIs will be accessible when taking the blade than when not. "Nontraditional stairs" just means we get something other than a staircase, like the EotN's cliff. Or a ladder. I'm still hoping for a ladder.

[artem1sc0re]

Idk who’d want this or would want to see this in their day

But Aiden Pearce with banana bread

Also do you guys like edits if so I’ll just serve this on the side

[batsplat]

greetings professor batsplat,

i recently heard somewhere about valentino having kicked someone else off the bike before the whole. sepang rosquez situation.

and i was wondering if you had any info on that / could shed light on the context? how it happened, what motivated him to do it perhaps etc.

thanks a lot <33

yeah I know why this gets brought up quite regularly, but tbh there's not much of a story behind it. valentino kicked someone, did not kick said someone 'off' the bike, didn't have complex motivations beyond venting some frustration. just the habitual problem of getting pissy about someone coasting on the racing line (x):

At the end of the 250 class qualifying, Italian Valentino Rossi, annoyed by a move by Yasu Hatakeyama, decided to practice kickboxing. Rossi "pressed" the Japanese rider against the edge of the track with his Aprilia and, bike to bike, threw a kick at the Japanese rider's thigh. The Italian, who had already hit his colleague's helmet at the Dutch GP, did not show the slightest remorse: "Every time I meet Hatakeyama, he closes me down. Today I was on the last lap and I could lower my time, and when I was going to pass him, he crossed the track and slowed down. I had to brake suddenly and I was very nervous. But I think that the next time I am about to pass him, he will not close me down." There were no penalties for Rossi, although both he and the Japanese rider received a verbal warning.

this was at argentina 1998 - here's the kick itself, courtesy of teenage valentino:

here's a HD clip of the kick as well as valentino's gesturing afterwards:

it's basically the exact same thing as casey kicking checa in 2007 or punching de puniet in 2011 (see here) for exactly the same reasons. or for a more recent example, take aleix slapping franky last year. riders are hotheads, they REALLY hate someone getting in their way when they're trying to do a lap, sometimes they lash out. this obviously does not mean it's a good idea and really should warrant some kind of penalty. neither valentino nor casey got penalties, but aleix got a six place grid drop. which, good! it's irresponsible and stupid, even if it's also admittedly kinda funny. still, it'd be pushing it to suggest there's much similarity between that and sepang 2015. although his description of the incident is fun (from oxley's vr files):

I got into a bit of trouble on Saturday for kicking the Japanese rider Yasu Hatakeyama at the end of the final qualifying session. I like to kick arse! I've had a lot of trouble with him all season - you go to pass him in practice and he shuts the door on you, even though he's going slow. I've spoken to him about it a few times and he always says "Sorry, sorry, sorry!" then goes and does it again at another race. It's very dangerous. On Saturday he took a short cut round the back of the circuit, and was going through this corner at about 20kph when I arrived on a very fast lap. It was really frightening, so I paid him back by kicking him as we returned to the pits.

how very casey of him

if you ARE looking for something a bit more relevant in terms of valentino using his body in the heat of battle, an even younger version of valentino might be able to help. this is all the way back in his rookie 1996 season - where he was known for his wild riding, especially in the early races that year, and on occasion did actually elbow AND knee his competitors in his determination to beat them. feral thing. in general, to my eyes valentino seems like he's quite good at using spatial awareness in w2w combat, of using the physical dimensions of his body to fight other riders... take for instance the finely judged knee retraction pass at catalunya 2009, how he immediately sticks his knee out again in front of jorge's line once he's past, that sort of thing

the most obvious example has to be the doctor's dangle - motogp urban legend ofc holds that it started in jerez 2005, where valentino wasn't actually using his leg to block sete, but since then? in popularising the habit of motogp riders of dangling their legs into corners, valentino also gave himself another nifty way of defending against opponents. sometimes it does look like he's using the dangled leg to quite literally block his rivals from passing... perhaps the most blatant examples of that come in motegi 2010, where he's willing to do whatever it takes to beat jorge. he does admittedly have plausible deniability in this race - the possibility that he was dangling his leg more excessively in order to help mitigate the shoulder injury. still, it's pretty comical at times

"When he does go through - if he does go through that corner, he's going to have to take Rossi's leg off!" "He is! Drag him along, I think."

I mean. come on. what is this. you cannot tell me this is ergonomically efficient. valentino did do this to some extent when he was behind jorge too, so I don't think the shoulder explanation is complete bullshit - but it does also feel like a bit of an opportunistic method of making his bike as broad as possible. jorge repeatedly almost rides into valentino's leg, including when he's finally had enough and makes the overtake that sets off the late battle between them. so yeah, valentino's definitely not a stranger in using his physicality to his advantage in conducting his wheel to wheel battles. one of the things that makes him so fun to watch

[siobhanbooks]

Another people don't have basic reading comprehension rant:

Why have I just seen a tiktok saying that brennan being gay is something that everyone's missed??? Is it not very clear that Brennan and Naolin were a thing??

Their evidence was Violet wondering if naolin and brennan meant more to each other (obviously, they were in love). And in response to Vi asking if he was married, Brennan said 'no partner'. Which is not conclusive because straight people use partner all the time (eg Remi and Xaden in Basigaith Remi's version by @skyfallscotland) .

But, like, did other people question whether naolin and brennan were in love, or am I going crazy?

[aria0fgold]

Seared like a songbird flying to the sun

A belated birthday gift for @misty-wisp ! Tried to combine references for both Swan Lake and Cendrillon >:3 (Linked the English cover I took the lyrics from for the title!)

[tokiro07]

Undead Unluck ch.231 thoughts

[Do You Remember~ The 17th Night of November~]

(Topics: criticism - pacing/narrative focus, character analysis - Gina/Feng/Julia/Billy, speculation - Soul/Ruin)

Juggling Glass and Rubber

Damn, Tozuka, you weren't lyin', that Unjustice can sweep the Master Rules!

I'll admit I am a little disappointed by this turn of events because, like I was saying the last several weeks, I expected there to be an extra wrinkle that kept Unjustice from trivializing all of the MR fights, especially the ones that hadn't actually happened yet!

Yusai I was always pretty shaky on, and since she never got much characterization going in, I'm not exactly surprised, but the rest were definitely bummers

I've said before that I'm fine with skipping the Sick fight since Rip and Latla's climax already happened, but it's not like there was nothing to be done with it, like focusing on Sick's desire for revenge or having Rip look back on the mistakes he made in L100

Same thing with Billy and Tatiana's reunion - technically the climax of their joint arc was at the end of L100 when they promised to stay by each other's side until death, but I always thought of that as the setup to an upcoming payoff, not the payoff itself. It's definitely still salvageable here, but I think having Tatiana come in to save Billy when he's having trouble would have felt a lot more cathartic if it was focused on and analyzed rather than just...happening. Some insight as to why Billy was having trouble using Unjustice, like perhaps being overloaded with too many new Rules or reconciling with the choices he'd made, would have given Tatiana something internal to save him from as well as something external

I guess my issue here is that we're not really getting to see the effects that Remember is having on the cast as a whole, which I think would have better served as the focus here. I don't know if it's that Tozuka has been given a set number of chapters to work with by Jump or what, but it seems likely that Tozuka had ideas for how he wanted to execute everyone's arcs and fights but had to prioritize who to give the lion's share of the focus to for the sake of maximizing narrative impact

Case in point, the characters who he did manage to analyze here each had a pretty unique interaction with Remember

Remember Who You Are

Despite how brief their scenes are here, I do think that Gina and Feng's moments illustrate Remember's value remarkably well

Gina starts referring to everyone by the old nicknames she used for them in L100, only to amend "L'il Lucky" back to just "Fuuko," directly demonstrating the mental gap between the present and past. Gina naturally picks up her old habit, but isn't restricted by it. The respect and love she has for Fuuko goes beyond what can be expressed by a cute nickname, and those feelings were forged through L101 Gina's relationship with Fuuko. It's subtle, but it's a nice little cherry on top of Gina's arc

Feng, meanwhile, is noted to be getting stronger as Time ages him. This could be taken two ways: either he's stronger because of Remember and Time misread the situation, OR because Feng knows that he would have spent his time training and improving, his body, mind and soul are developing proportionally rather than being aged in a vacuum. The latter is thematically appropriate to countering Time's philosophy that age's function is to weed out those who have outlived their usefulness, while the former is a direct result of all of Feng's accumulated years across loops compounding simultaneously. Could be a little of both, honestly

What's even better about Feng's moment, though, is what he says in response to Julia's help: "I'm not deserving of your charity." In the past, Feng definitely would have been mad about getting help, resenting the idea that anyone thought he couldn't hack it on his own, but that's not what he said here. He believes he's done nothing to earn Julia's aid, that whatever Time was going to do to him, he had coming, and this is certainly because he remembers what he did. All of the people that he's ever killed, the lives that he ruined, especially his own son's, he now knows and can look back on from the perspective of having just abandoned the mentality he had back then

If Feng still believed in individual strength before receiving Remember, he probably would have looked back on the failures of his past as the results of his own physical weakness, not because of a flawed philosophy. Instead, Feng has already proven that he's stronger now after learning the true value of his age and legacy, so while he can still improve thanks to the lessons he can learn from his past self, the current Feng is able to retain his new outlook because he has an objective point of comparison that this was the farthest he ever made it

These are the sorts of subtle advancements I wanted to see from the whole cast, and again, while we still can see them, I think having a chapter dedicated to showing each little vignette would have been more effective than either breaking them up like this or showing such a notable imbalance between them

At the very least, though, even without being the primary focus of the chapter, Julia's interaction with Remember is far and away the most interesting one

Welcome Back, Juiz

Julia's behavior just before and after Fuuko actives Remember easily provides the most contrast of everyone and best demonstrates the tremendous growth rate that Remember allows

Prior to Remember, Julia was only able to use Unjustice involuntarily. To great effect, mind you, but still by accident: first when she stopped Soul's attack, and (seemingly) second, when she used it to reduce the damage of Soul's attack and ride it back to the surface. It's not explicitly stated that that's what happened here, but if Soul's intention was to kill Julia with that, he really dropped the ball, so I choose to believe that his bloodlust was negated by Unjustice

Afterwards, Julia was using Unjustice like a pro. She dropped War down a phase, got Time to bring Feng back to his prime, and even got Death to take out Luck, a feat that Fuuko objectively wouldn't have been able to accomplish with Unluck alone since Luck would have been able to avert Death's inadvertent attack with his good fortune. The most impressive part to me, though, is that she was able to channel Unjustice into her soul!

By putting Unjustice in her saber, Julia effectively injected Unjustice directly into Change's body, ensuring that she couldn't live by her own philosophy of constant change, even if Julia wasn't physically there to make visual contact. Juiz never learned soul manipulation, and Julia only just now mastered Unjustice thanks to her memories, so the fact that Julia was able to integrate those two abilities into such a high level technique is proof that her current self has in no way been overtaken by Juiz's memories, the most major worry that everyone had for Remember's use

That's not to say that none of Juiz's experiences made it to Julia, she still did remember Juiz's entire life after all. Beyond just Juiz's techniques and physical abilities, Julia went from panicking over Soul's attacks and Victor's injuries to calmly and confidently taking out the MRs one by one. She knows now what she's capable of and the weight that she carries, and she remembers what kind of relationships she had with everyone else. This is likely why she went to Billy first - both to give him access to Unjustice to make him stronger and to remind him that, despite their pasts, they aren't enemies anymore

The look of shock on Billy's face suggests that he was paralyzed by the realization of his past actions, and it's Julia's words that snap him back into the present and bring a smile back to his face. That's really what I was talking about earlier; giving Billy an internal conflict with his memories would have provided an angle that no one else really had while also allowing him a stronger character moment with both Julia and Tatiana

Still, even if it's a weaker moment than it could have been, I do appreciate Julia's direct acknowledgment of Billy as an ally, as it at least subtly harkens back to their previous encounter. Where previously Billy stole Unjustice and lost the ability to use it after Juiz had some time to think about his motivations as an enemy, this time Julia is willingly entrusting Unjustice to Billy as an ally

Actually, I wonder if perhaps that's why Tozuka had Billy fail to use Unjustice on Sick, because he is still fighting that internal conflict...for now, I'll choose to believe that Tozuka has that in his back pocket, but I won't be redacting any of my criticisms until he makes good on that, as this review is based on my immediate interpretations and I don't want to erase all of this and redo it...

Along the same lines, not only does Tozuka still have a backdoor for analyzing Billy, he also still has one for giving us some more cool moments for the rest of the Master Rules as well

Put Me Back in, Coach!

Despite one-shotting seven MRs all at once, Julia didn't actually manage to clear the field. The Union's gearing up to face Sun, but they seem to be forgetting: they didn't actually beat Soul. He's still in the Roundtable Room, and he's undoubtedly more pissed than ever

I'm not sure if I would have caught this on my own before seeing their post on this, but Webmantis on twitter pointed out that the MRs' souls must all have been sent to Subspace, the cosmic waiting room that all souls go too between loops. They note that, since Soul hasn't entered Phase 3 yet, he'll most likely be able to bring everyone back

However, they also note that doing so would be an odd narrative choice, as it would make Julia's steamrolling seem kinda pointless. Why bother killing off a bunch of characters just to revive them in the next chapter?

Fortunately, I think I've come up with the perfect answer to that very question!

Firstly, it's to show off Julia's post-Remember Unjustice; we were promised a sweep, and Tozuka made good on it in spectacular fashion. Second, and more importantly, their deaths are necessary for Soul to reach Phase 3

Fuel for the Fire

You may recall from a few weeks ago that I described the mechanism that the MRs use to reach Phase 3 is absorbing their Rule directly: Change absorbed the change in her shape when she was cut in half, Time absorbed Shen's lifespan, War absorbed Billy and Tella's violence, Justice absorbed Yusai's resolve, etc. This is why Death only just now reached Phase 3, because no one was dying the entire battle until she was forced to personally kill Luck, and Luck was likely being prevented from absorbing any fortune by Unluck

So now that all of the MRs other than Soul are dead, their souls are free of their vessels. I don't know if their vessels were actually preventing Soul from accessing their souls, but since he seems to consider the others his friends, he probably didn't want to resort to absorbing them either way, but now? It doesn't matter if he could or couldn't before, now he has to, otherwise it's all for nothing

Now, the question may be how he'll be able to reach them. Webmantis' proposition was that reaching Phase 3 would give Soul access to Subspace, but I'm saying that he won't be able to reach Phase 3 without the souls that are there - that's a pretty clear logical paradox

Well, not to speculate too much, but I think we already have our answer to that one too: Soul's finally going to change

Another topic I've been going on and on about lately is the stagnation and inflexibility of the Rules, the most notable being Soul's rejection that souls are connected. However, Soul saw that new facet of his Rule be added in real time, by Negators that aren't even his vessel. The only one who should have control over his Rule is himself, and yet he's seen others interact with their souls through reinterpretation time and again (Andy vs. Ghost, Gina vs. Change, etc.). In other words, he should know full well by now that his Rule isn't as set in stone as he once thought, and if everyone else can control their souls through their perspective, then why couldn't Soul himself?

With the lesson that Julia just taught him about souls, Soul can connect himself to his fallen comrades and drag them back from Subspace (or prevent them from reaching it in the first place), and achieve Phase 3 by adding their souls to his own. Whether this would mean gaining power over their Rules or reviving them is another question, but at the very least it would show tremendous growth in his character

I'll go into more detail on this if it comes to pass, but Soul learning to change his perspective on his Rule would make him more like the Negators, more like a human. This would also make him the most well-rounded and developed UMA to date, which I think would more than make up for any loss of characterization among the rest of them

Now, I would definitely prefer that he brings back the MRs, if only so we can see Luck's Phase 3 (c'mon, he's Fuuko's foil for cryin' out loud!!!), but even if he just integrates them into himself, I think that would create the perfect parallel to give the final member of the Union a chance to demonstrate his growth

The Man Who Would be King

While fighting Soul, Sun and Luna are all clearly the most important boxes to check off right now, there's still one more that Tozuka alluded to in this chapter: Ruin's return

How Remember will affect him exactly, I won't speculate on, but I think it will give him the final push he needs to join the Union and help fight God. If my previous speculation about Soul comes to pass, then that would make Soul the ideal matchup for Ruin

Not only would they have the parallels of being "multiple souls in one body," it would also be the ultimate payoff to Ruin's designation as The King of Negators. If Soul is Master Rule #1, then it's Ruin's destiny as the Negator King to negate all of the Master Rules in his reformation and rebellion against the God he so thanklessly devoted his life to

This would also present the opportunity for Ruin to reform the MRs too and unify both Negator and UMA as I've speculated on before, but again, I don't want to go too far into it here. As it stands, this is just me making things up, and I don't want to either raise my hopes too high OR preemptively run out of things to say, but the parallel is so interesting that I can't help but get excited by the possibility

Conclusion

As always, it's entirely possible that I'm wrong about all of this. Maybe Soul's gonna try to go Phase 3 and self-destruct because of Unjustice; maybe Soul is gonna fuse with Sun in Phase 3 and they'll become "SOL;" maybe Kururu's going to use Unchaste to aggro Sun into shooting Soul dead. I don't know. There's always a chance that what we get isn't as interesting as what we envision; the best we can do is be open to what we do get rather than insisting it has to be the way we want

If there's one thing I hope I've gotten across with this review, it's that I don't want to get hung up on the negatives, but I also don't want to just ignore them either. I am disappointed that certain plot points are being glossed over, and that's a valid response for any of us to have, but I'm not going to go so far as to say this was a bad chapter because of it. Good things definitely still happened within this chapter, and there's plenty of chance that good things will come out of what this chapter set up

As I said, all there is to do now is be patient and open-minded. If this ends up just being a lull in an otherwise fantastic finale, so be it. If it ends up being the start of a rushed mess, so be it. The only way to know is to be there to see it

Until then, let's enjoy life!

[makorragal-312]

Manifesting Season 8 ending with Buddie's first kiss in the Diaz kitchen after Chris' graduation party

[frostluvrs]

the speed in which i’m going to exit out of the video if sand in any way gets in trouble trying to help ray on saturday i really don’t know if i have the mental strength to witness it