#Literal ball of trauma and identity issues

[altocat]

Write as if you don’t know a THING about ff7

PSHHH Cloud's just a generic anime edgelord. I mean he's just there to be stoic and have the women fight over him. What, does he shed a TEAR at some point in the story? Does he learn the meaning of friendship? Big deal, so does Kirito from Sword Art Online. Cloud's just the sword guy. AND he's a mary sue since he's a First Class soldier. He's probably the chosen one of some dumb prophecy. He's so boringgggggggggggggggg

[crumpet-doodles]

Hey! Umm, can y'all give me your headcanons for Solar from the Sun and Moon show? I'd just like to see them, no matter how weird you think they might be! Here are a few of mine:

☆ Solar might have claustrophobia

I honestly do think that he might have some sort of claustrophobia. I'm basing this off of two things that happened in the lore vids:

In "Eclipse MOVES IN in VRCHAT," when Moon says that he could convert one of the party rooms into a temporary living space for Solar, Solar says "I'm more uh... I don't really like rooms." I know this was probably a bit overlooked, but on my second re-watch I noticed it, and an idea started forming in my brain-

Another example is in "Eclipse has a NEW IDENTITY!? in VRCHAT," where as he and Moon walk through this long, horrendously yellowish-orange hallway, Solar says "I hate this room. This hallway." This could be taken as to how empty the hallway is (As Moon comments) or to how it reminds him of a Half Life 2 map. (I think that's what he said-) Again, this could be easily ignored, but it just adds to my little theory~

One more thing is just something I speculate- he might have claustrophobia from some kind of trauma from his old dimension, specifically from the Moon that he lived with. I think that his Moon was highly abusive to him, and I can imagine him being put into a similar situation as Sun, where his Moon trapped him in a magical barrier, and left him there alone for an unspecified period of time. I can also imagine Solar just generally being trapped in a room/isolated, because Moon didn't know what else to do when Solar first... appeared? I guess? In his Sun.

Also, he'd probably try to hide it because he thinks it's stupid.

☆ Solar is an insomniac

I honestly think that he just has a hard time sleeping, his brain is just running around everywhere 24/7- (Damn he's pretty relatable)

He will literally run himself into the ground before taking a break/resting. In "Eclipse has a NEW IDENTITY!? in VRCHAT," Moon calls him an "insane motherfucker" when he admits that he fixed the Daycare, Theater, Gift Shop, and more, in a week. A WEEK. Then after a tour and some talk, he passes out from running out of battery, due to being on 1% charge. He's overworking himself. He needs sleep.

HE SOUNDS ABSOLUTELY EXHAUSTED IN "Lunar and Earth's GROUP THERAPY in VRCHAT," LIKE BRO- He said he was working on 2 separate things, both for 5 hours straight- He really needs to sleep- get him a beanbag or something-

Also, this could be another trauma-related thing, where he just doesn't feel safe sleeping, or he has nightmares. However, this is probably just me overthinking and reading too much into this situation.

When he DOES fall asleep, it's usually in the most arbitrary places ever. At the desk in the daycare, in one of the play structures, etc. I... have a feeling that he's probably fallen asleep on that green little mat/platform thing in the ball pit before. Or just literally in the ball pit itself.

☆ Solar's just generally insecure about his looks

Looking like the OG Eclipse model, he probably has some issues with what he looks like, and is most likely frustrated about how people keep mistaking him for Eclipse.

Also, coming back to the whole "his dimension's Moon giving him trauma" thing. His Moon probably called him a lot of things, all of them horrible. Solar keeps mentioning how aggressive and angry his Moon was, so again, it would fit the profile.

In "Lunar and Earth's GROUP THERAPY in VRCHAT," When Solar talks about him working, Earth says "That might have something to do with you not feeling like you fit in." Please, he needs comfort and more therapy-

☆Solar is touch starved

Do I even have to explain?

Also, I feel like even though he IS touch starved, he doesn't... realize it, exactly. He has really closed off body language (For some reason I can imagine that his idle pose/stance is having his arms crossed) and is just generally unsure about how he should properly show physical affection.

Do you know what I mean? Like, you think you just don't like physical touch, but it just turns out you were full of anxiety on how to properly show it that when somebody DOES end up giving you a hug or something similar that the realization just... hits you? Really hard? (Dear Stars this is over-specific am I ok???) Solar might also be comfortable with one person/small group of people actually touching him. Or if people ask. (Ok I need to shut up, now I'm just projecting my personal experiences into my headcanons for him-)

This could also be attributed to the insecure thing but eh.

Quick thing I'd also like to say, his model, (or "suit," as they call it in the show) is slightly different from the other's, because as his dimension's Moon stated, it was an older model that never got used. I think it's just lankier, skinnier, and maybe has a tail, as these features were being experimented with for the newer daycare attendants, the ones who actually got used (Solar's dimension's Sun and Moon.)

(Note: I might edit this post as things change/lore vids drop!)

(Damn, this turned into a whole-ass essay-) So yeah! If you've made it this far, thank you, and if you have any headcanons of your own that you're willing to share, please do! I'd be delighted to see them!

[fellthemarvelous]

A heaping spoonful of religious trauma...

What falling feels like.

You want to know what gets to me the most about "Before the Beginning"?

I remember being in first grade (6-years-old) and sitting through a religion class that I hated (to be honest, I despised every religion class I was forced to sit through in school) because the indoctrination process is not even fun. I just got to sit there for like twelve years listening to them tell me lies about Christianity (my world religions teacher in high school was like being forced to sit through a teacher say "Bueller, Bueller" for about an hour 4-5 days per week for an entire semester).

But I digress as this story started off relevant.

I remember sitting through my first grade religion class and (this was 1987-ish, mind you) and thinking "but how do we know that our religion is right and everyone else's is wrong?" By that time, they had made it clear that not believing blindly in Catholicism was worthy of getting into trouble over, so I already knew better than to ask that question because I knew I would be sent to the principal's office. I didn't ask because I was terrified of the punishment when I was only 6-years-old. I already knew there was a price to pay for asking questions. And I can't even remember why I was already so terrified by that point.

Crowley paid a price for asking questions.

It's not like falling is easy. I fully denounced the Catholic church and now consider myself an atheist (mostly), but I will never allow an organized religion to try and define who I am ever again.

There is not a lot of support for this.

Falling is more than just fire and brimstone (so far that's the most appealing part). The worst part of "falling" is the fact that at the age of almost 43, I have NO idea who I am. None at all. I'm falling at a speed and trajectory I can no longer control, and it's been absolutely terrifying. It's been lonely.

I've spent my adult life putting the needs of everyone else above my own. Now I'm trying to find a job within a career I actually want (writing), but that's going to take time. I was traumatized by the Catholic church in so many ways, and I have a lot to say about it.

"How do we know that our religion is right and everyone else's is wrong?"

I wasn't prepared to deal with the consequences of asking that question to the wrong person at 6-years-old. Now I'm wishing I had an adult who was better at being an adult than me to guide me through all of this because I'm currently a giant ball of jobless anxiety wondering if I'm ever going to amount to anything more than what the church told me I would if I dared to lead a life without a husband and children.

I am not responsible enough to deal with "my disaster" (also known as "my life") all on my own. It's an issue of motivation because I have no idea who I am or what I want from life. My identity was decided for me by the church, and I still don't even know what that means.

I just know I'm trying to survive in a literal dystopian world and trying to figure out who and what I am in the middle of everything else. It's confusing and exhausting and so frustrating.

"How much trouble can I get into just for asking a few questions?"

Once the spell is broken, there is no going back, and most of us end up making this journey on our own.

[intertexts]

SHAKING U BY THE SHOULDERS. TELL ME ABOUT UR P5 HEART PLAYERS YOU KNOW I LOVE THOSE !!!!!!

HHHSDFHBGHDFG HDFHGDHBBBBJFGJ <- BEING SHAKEN NOISES.

OK. ok. my p5r heart players... god. so there r three of them & they all are character foiling each other & all mirroring each other in like, notably similar ways. (a LOT of the character work in p5 IS based around like,,, characters mirroring each other, their trauma echoing or having common roots, similar issues, etc. but these three + another guy r all specifically parallel 2 me.) heart as an aspect is all about... identity, right? who you are + who you pretend to be + the tension btwn those, & also yr relationships + how u interact with others... (which is SUPER fucking p5 coded in general-- like... the entire crux of the game is 50% identity shit + 50% the way u form bonds with others changes ur life)

anyway the one i'm thinking about most rn is called kasumi yoshizawa! she is a very nice cute pleasant high school freshman who's very good at gymnastics & wants to pursue it professionally, and she's dedicated her art to her dead younger sister, sumire, who unfortunately passed in an accident about a year ago and who she really misses...

... except it turns out that she's actually her dead sister :) she's sumire, and she was... brainwashed? by the antagonist of the arc into believing that she's kasumi-- because the antagonist really just wants the world to be a kinder, better place; he wants everyone's wishes to come true :) and sumire's wish is that she (inadvertently responsible for her sister's death)'s more like her sister, because her sister was perfect and amazing and better than her in every way. which is fucking horrifying-- everyone else just,,, knew she was sumire, but she just. Went around the world dressing in her dead sister's clothes and fixing her hair like her dead sister and using her same mannerisms and believing she was her!!! for a year! genuinely a nightmare scenario. do you think she slept in her dead sister's bedroom. do u think it made her parents sick. anyway her conflict between "i literally NEED to be anyone else i CANNOT be myself i cannot live in my own fucking skin i can't do it vs. what. should i just live out a lie? keep living in her dead skin?? drag her corpse around after me because i'm too selfish to let her rest?" insane to me. good lord.

the next guy, goro akechi (MY LITTLE GUY!!!!!!!!!! THE ONE IM BONKERS ABOUT!!!) is ALSO a nice pleasant boy hes also very charming and such :) he's a famous cute celebrity also!! hes super popular as a genius cute boy detective >:3c he. ummm. god. where do i even begin. well. he's also clinging to ghosts & dead bodies & such. he spent his formative years entirely alone and being bounced around the system. he literally fucking genuinely like no shit has a god out there making his life as fucking miserable as possible. like im being dead serious here theres a whole ass god up there making his life the worst it could be. so. well. he's so fucking desperate (like, sickeningly desperate. the kind that's really kind of offputting like you know that's not gonna get you anywhere man.) to be loved or even appreciated he becomes a mass murderer about it. his seven year plan is

-kill my dad

-fake my whole personality so im lovable because theres no way thats happening otherwise

-fuck it we ball.

guy with the most fragile and convincing veneer of pleasant charm possible and under it is this seething morass of hatred and shame and jealousy and anger. anyway he's a heart player because 1. he's a 1 for 1 foil of akira (the next heart player) & 2. because his whole. Deal is being insanely fucking conflicted about himself. he genuinely believes in justice and like. Morality and such, he always keeps his deals and repays his debts. and he's often just a vicious bitch & also a hitman working for one of the worst people on the planet! i'm not explaining it very well but he mirrors sumire so heavily in like... conflict btwn his self + who he wants to be + how he's perceived + what he Wants + what he thinks he wants + the way he interacts with the world... aughghghhhh. their partitioning off of Different Selves for different things is very. well. & they both also heavily parallel each other re: being VERY different than they appear to be initially & being so hard 2 Know. etc.

speaking of partitioning off different selves-- the third guy!!! akira kurusu!! the protag of the game!!!!!! his whole DEAL is that he has a hundred different masks he sifts through & wears for every different occasion, he's a different guy to his friends & his mentor figures & his enemies & the world in general!!!! not that any of them are Fake, just that they are... not the whole thing, you know. absolutely key to his character also is that he's Very sharp and observent when it comes to dynamics btwn people & very good at making connections btwn people (he could Also be a blood player. but like... he Literally Steals Hearts. it feels too on the nose to pass up.) anyway. auugjfjfjfgghkbgh they r all SO DEAR 2 me they r all such good characters.... all of them have such an interesting dynamic together!! three massive liars with insane relationships to selfhood. etc.

[anendoandfriendo]

Seriously though people do not know what it is like to be Autistic.

As in, it IS fun and cute and quirky for us. It also means we're working two jobs at once and are constantly at our fucking limit for anything that isn't strictly being in our bed fucking around with our stuff. A neighbor knocked on our door just now and gave us FOOD! For FREE! The fruit is going to rot in the next few weeks if he doesn't give it away because he has so much of it! And this one interaction basically has made it so we went back and promptly sat down on our bed again in exhaustion, after doing a people-oriented job in product support, and we never never get a day off because our "day off" work working fucking retail at walmart. We do not get enough hours recover much less enough days and it will start causing actual physical fatigue no matter how much we like our job.

Now, like. If we successfully survive our promotion then we can just quit walmart and we won't have to worry about that, but like ????????

Nobody talks about Autistics who don't mask, never did mask, and never felt the desire to mask but they still could mask. Like. People talk about it like it's a privilege but it's more like a double-edged sword. It's fucking stupid to us, pardon the ableist language there — but it's like everyone fucking assumes that masking one's autism is a fundamental part of the Autistic experience. And that is bullshit not because we are trying to dismiss something that has obviously, very tragically, touched so many Autistic people, but it's just assumed by default that masking 100% of the time is a thing everyone who is Autistic does, and if they do not, it's because the do not know how. That's simply not true because for as long as there is an Autistic person alive that is not like that, and does not fit that narrative, it is not a universal experience.

Welp, good thing we are several of those in a trenchcoat!!!

No, like, what we do as hardline no-mask Autistics is use our massive fucking energy reservoirs to go on and on for months and months before we have a full fucking breakdown. We actually would not be surprised if the present-day folks who we say are just "quirky" were literally just the same iteration of this post about autsitic boomer optics by @echofromtheabyss but we all ignore that it still happens because, like, everyone assumes everything that is about identity is either:

Medical

Medical but sure I'll go with your spirituality for funsies

Spirituality

From trauma

Secretly from trauma but I'll go with your theory for funsies

No matter which category it is, it is always officially-sanctioned by whatever hell government you currently belong to and MUST have an explanation that is rooted in pain, or suffering, strict categories of function and dysfunction to the point we reinvented (in our personal opinions) the same LF/HF labels but decided to call them support labels instead of just. Stating what the individuals need.

And not like, we dunno, maybe there isn't always something to medicalize here 100% of the time, and maybe we're really off the ball here but we REALLY need to reclaim the idea of non-disordered autism back from those asshole aspie supremacists. Like. Stop letting them ruin everything! Just because our issue is no social supports does not negate that some Autistic people will always need caregivers 24 hours of the day does not negate someone whose main problem is wandering off randomly/elopement does not negate the Autistic who is usually perfectly fine but actually does have the communication issues defined in the disorder in the DSM does not negate the savant dies not negate the manic pixie girl like — how did we all learn this for everything else but not for neurotypes?

Like, the past was shit for Autistic people but so is the present and we think that like, our generation was onto something but so were other generations even if the words did not exist yet.

Wdk, we know a lotta this is more loosely structured than we would personally like as well but HOPEFULLY something about our point will make sense to SOMEONE.

We're really just sick of "autism isn't just a cute and quirky thing!!!" okay and...so what if it was. So what. We were confirmed as autistic when we were two and we are telling you so what. We just. We have a very hard time caring because we sincerely believe cute/quirky girls and somewhat isolated strange boys who are quiet and slowish but very very smart and highly sensitive people are often what you get when autism is non-disordered.

We don't. We don't know what else to say. There is an in-between or blurring of the lines here that everyone is missing the same way there is an in-between or blurring of the lines when it comes to guesses on why plurality and/or multiplicity exist and the same way there is an in-between or blurring of the lines when we talk about the queer community. If we tried to summarize more than that it wouldn't be doing this justice because the point here is to ultimately expand our (Rusanya, us, not necessarily Random Tumblr User ImAnAsshole69420 who happens to be reading this post) idea of autism we guess. Or to at least synthesize something we've been thinking about for years in a somewhat more clear fashion than we have before.

[greensaplinggrace]

do you have any darklina fic recs?

I certainly have a few! But first I want to clarify that I don’t really read fic when I’m writing it, and since I have so many fics in the works right now, I haven’t really been reading a lot of fanfiction. So this list probably won’t be as extensive as it could be.

Here are some other great fic recommendation posts, however:

DARKLINA FIC RECS by @vicioux

DARKLINA FIC RECS // part ii by @vicioux

Darklina Ruling the World Together Fic Recs by @clubofthestarlesssaint

Tumblr Ficlets

Aleksander’s First Memory by @kestrafagnor

Fivan Talk About Darklina by @jomiddlemarch

a little light in the great, big dark by @valkyrhys

Alina tells Mal she’s with Aleksander by @lorsanbitch

Darklina week day 5: intimacy & touch by @starlesscne

AO3 Fanfiction

if it ain’t me by larry_hystereks (Incomplete - 10/13 Chapters)

alina’s in her second year at Yale when she meets aleksander at one of his frat parties.

a hookup with the potential for more, only if alina wasn’t still struggling to piece herself together from last year’s breakup.

or: alina, zoya, their trust issues, and the men that fall for them

---

I’m only at about chapter 6 of this fic currently, but so far it’s one of my all time favorite Modern AUs. The characterization for Alina and Aleksander is incredibly well done, and the entire fic itself is so feminist and queer in such a refreshing way. Aleksander and Alina are bisexual as fuck, both with their own separate complex lives, and much of Alina’s own traumas and relationships are explored outside of Aleksander.

There’s some Zoyalina, with Nikolina friendship and endgame Zoyalai. There’s some mystery and some tension, but nothing too extreme, and a lot of the fic is merely an exploration in growth and overcoming one’s history and learning how to move on in healthy ways. I love it.

She Wears a Collar (With My Name) by Ceris_Malfoy (Complete)

She is immortal, and whatever lingering hints of humanity she may have once had have long been bleached from her heart.

I will grant you one wish, boy, if it is in my power to do so. What does a Shadow Smith most want?

"You," he answers.

Written for Darklina Week 2021 - Day 2: Role Reversal

---

This piece is just exquisite. This author’s writing style is one that I particularly enjoy. Their stuff is always so uniquely composed and crafted, and this one especially is a work of art. The way Darklina as a relationship is portrayed in particular is fascinating to me because it’s a role reversal but it’s still so complex. Aleksander’s character is nailed.

the bright sun was extinguish’d by athousandwinds (Complete)

Somewhere, deep in the dark forests of Ravka, a boy grows up on stories of Sankta Alina of the Wastes, the Sun-Scorched Saint.

---

This fic is just straight up magnificent. It’s so engaging and I love love love the way a role reversed Aleksander who joins the army is portrayed. He reminds me so much of Demon in the Woods Aleksander, as if he’s exactly what a grown version of that young boy would be. When I say I adore his characterization in this I’m not lying.

If I wanted any completed fic I’ve read to have a second chapter, it would be this one.

Winter in the Little Palace by redisxwing (Complete)

Written for Yuletide 2020.

Baghra and Alina's wildly different perspectives on the Darkling, and how things could have gone if nobody listened to Baghra.

Warning: Baghra is written as a harsh and arguably abusive parent, and this is darkfic about that relationship, with a side of shipping. Everything is terrible (except the parts that are pretty much okay).

Canon divergence pretty much as soon as Alina gets lessons in summoning.

This fic is likely not compatible with King of Scars (or any subsequent work).

---

As is said in the summary, this one makes Baghra a bit more extreme. If you’re a fan of Baghra, this fic probably isn’t for you. But since I’m not a fan of Baghra, I had no problems with it.

My biggest praise for this fic is in regards to the character interactions and the POVs. There’s a brilliant grasp of unique perspective and how to convey it, and that talent is carried over into the way character interactions are brought to life in the text. Also, there’s a scene where Alina gets kind of protective of the Darkling, which is one of my biggest weaknesses when it comes to Darklina.

Good Ideas by FelixRivers (Complete)

Alina Starkov had a very good idea. Aleksander Morozova would definitely agree. (or: Alina wants to go camping and Aleksander won't complain)

---

This fic is just straight up adorable and hilarious. They’re such a cute couple and Alina’s POV is great. It’s just pure fluff and humor 💕

I’m not a bad girl, but I do bad things with you by SanktaJenya - @sankta-arya (Complete)

Winter had been hard on Old Baghra and Ana Kuya was worried about her, so she decided that Alina should make the trip to her cottage on the other side of the woods to bring her some food and kvas. On her way there, Alina meets a stranger...

Darklina Red Riding Hood/Company of Wolves AU

Darklina Week, Day 4, Fairytales

---

This fic has a splendid grasp of tension and atmosphere. It’s very enchanting and dark and intriguing, and it nails those aspects with absolute precision. I love the style and the way the fairytale is incorporated into the narrative. It’s truly a masterpiece.

The Wretched by @aceofnowhere (Complete)

“We are strangers, but I want to help.” He growls at her, mocking and mistrustful. “I understand,” she said. “You think I am one of them. I certainly look like one of them. But I want to help you. Will you let me?” Prompt: fairytale. Alina saves a dragon.

---

Okay so I’ve mentioned this one before as one of my Top 5 fics of all time and I still stand by that. I can’t even describe why I love this fic so much except that the pacing is amazing and the prose is stunning and the story is beautiful. Aleksander is a dragon and Alina is a witch, and their relationship is just so...interesting and fascinating and lovely. I would literally kill for this fic. There’s such a softness to it as well. Such a tenderness. Idk, I just really love it.

Show Me Who You Are (I Want To Know) by Ceris_Malfoy (Incomplete - 12/?)

Alina takes her future in her own hands and makes her own decisions.

---

This is a great “what if Alina had stuck around after the reveal” rewrite. It doesn’t have Mal bashing and in fact still writes them as close friends, which is something I’m fond of in Darklina fics. Aleksander is allowed to be soft and Alina is allowed to be powerful, and I really enjoyed the take on their dynamics as a power couple wherein Alina is given a lot of control.

There’s something to be said for the way Aleksander is written in the scenes where he must be honest and earnest with Alina. I really enjoy the way they both come to equal ground, and I’m even more fond of the way Alina is allowed to grow darker without losing her light. She also engages a lot with quite a few other characters, developing tons of friendships and alliances on her own that help strengthen her as an individual character.

on this bridge between starshine and clay by @rhea-imagined (Complete)

"His breath narrows for a moment, his fist clenched tight before he forces himself to loosen it. She is his only opportunity for salvation, but vulnerability is not a cape he wears easily. “In those days, there was less prejudice against Shadow Summoners. But everyone fears the dark, in one way or another.” He does not look at her as he waits for the penny to drop, half-hoping it stays suspended in the air."

In which Alexander comes clean to Alina and tells her about his true identity in hopes that this will help convince her to take down the Fold.

A rewrite of the fountain scene in episode four, with a good!Darkling that is trying to make amends.

---

This is my all-time favorite good!Aleksander AU. He’s kept in character despite the major changes made to his motivations, and Alina is given a lot more agency in her own story. It’s the first fic in what might become a series, but it can stand alone beautifully.

I love how Aleksander and Alina’s relationship is allowed to grow tense without breaking, and how it’s a clear sign of change but not abandonment. I love how both characters are able to think for themselves and become self-aware and are given the chance to think critically. I love the character interaction so much because it’s honest and fresh and engaging. Everything from the smallest action to the most off-hand thought is in character and meaningful and incorporated with an amazing style of writing. It’s a very refreshing piece, and the writing only makes it that much better.

Bunnies of a Feather Stitch Together by Ill_Ratte (Complete)

"Just as Alina called to the light, gathering and twisting it into a ball in her hands, the door swung open.

Kirigan blacked out the door frame. His appearance enough would have surprised Alina, but there was something clutched in his arm, something dark and floppy. It almost looked like the stuffed toys that had been passed around to the younger Orphans." - Alina and The Darkling bond over a love of soft things

---

Soft stuffed animal shenanigans. Bits of trans!Aleksander, which I’m very fond of, as well as just a lot of fluff with a bit of something bittersweet and sad in a good way.

Half Lie by Ill_Ratte (Complete)

"Baghra always talked of the demon that had stolen her daughter." Or, Alina learns the hard way that the Darkling isn't the only one who deals in half-truths

---

This one is trans!Aleksander, and it handles it in a very interesting way. It’s quite sad, and deals a lot with Baghra & Aleksander’s relationship through Alina’s POV. I want to give a warning for transphobia, because it does center around that a lot as the premise, but it really is worth the read if that isn’t a trigger for you. This is one of my favorite trans!Aleksander fics, and the way it handles emotion and grief and pain is quite extraordinary.

The CEO and Helioseismologist by mrthology (Complete)

Aleksander Morozova doesn't get sick. He's the CEO of one of the most successful companies in the world, one that he had built from the ground up with blood, sweat, and tears. He exercised daily (usually), maintained a healthy diet, and kept himself fit.

He wasn’t sick.

Too bad no one believed him. And too bad Genya decided to call Ivan to take him home before also calling Alina to take care of him.

Maybe, just maybe, being sick wasn't so bad. Especially not when he has such a wonderful girlfriend.

---

Both of the fics in this series are great, but I love this one in particular because I’m an absolute sucker for hurt/comfort. Anyone who’s been on my blog for a while knows that it’s my all time favorite trope to read, and this fic fits the hurt/comfort trope to a T in the best of ways. It’s very tender and in character, and Aleksander and Alina are so soft with each other. It’s adorable and really makes you feel for Aleksander, and the caretaking is done perfectly.

All the different layers of dark (thousand little suns) by Anuna (Complete)

One month after the Winter Fete, Aleksander returns to the Little Palace, and Alina has been missing him.

Or

Episode five canon divergence in which Alina had never left Os Alta.

---

This one is soft emotional hurt/comfort smut. They’re both so open and vulnerable with each other, and it’s so beautiful to read. I love the writing style and the emotion in this one. It makes my heart ache in the best way.

An Honourable Man by liviy695 (Complete)

A reimagining of the scene after the winter fete. Alina catches a glimpse of a caring Darkling after he returns from integrating the Conductor. Plus, no Baghra interference.

---

This one is what it says on the tin, in that Baghra doesn’t interfere and they’re allowed to talk after the Darkling interrogates the Conductor. But more than that, it’s a great imagining of how a scene where Aleksander reveals Marie’s death would have gone. There’s a sort of quiet to it that I appreciate, with grief and solemnity weighed against care and vulnerability.

I see the real you (even if you don’t, I do) by Anonymous (Incomplete - 8/?)

A series of questionable decisions lead Alina to meet the Black General a bit earlier. Butterfly effect ensues.

---

I’ve only read half so far (I hadn’t realized it had updated!! 👀👀) but I’m already in love with this fic. Alina’s dialogue and perspective is perfect, her relationship with Mal and the other cartographers is great, and I really enjoy how much personality she has. Aleksander is so smitten, but more than that, his characterization is soft but not weak. It feels almost as if he’s swept up by Alina, instead of the other way around, and I quite like that.

Of parenting by Anuna (Complete)

Alina finds out how her husband handled yet another parenting situation.

---

This is pure adorable Darklina parenting fluff and I live for it. Yet it doesn’t lack depth and in fact explored Alina and Aleksander’s relationship with parenting quite well.

i have a longing by LRCee - @ladylyannastark (Complete)

“So, Alina Starkov, risk-taker, how did you end up being editing’s newest wunderkind?”

Alina Starkov is rising in the publishing world. Singlehandedly responsible for editing (see: rewriting) the hottest book of the year, she lands a coveted spot at Morovoz Publishers. It's the position she's always wanted, at the biggest publishing house in the country. Life is perfect. That crush on her boss though, that's gotta go.

---

OKAY! I LOVE THIS ONE SO MUCH!! Let me tell you, as someone who is not too fond of Boss/Employee dynamics, I was very wary going into this fic. But boy did it deliver in a way that was perfect for me.

The relationship that develops between Aleksander and Alina is complex but healthy, and it never feels as if there’s too much of a power imbalance or anything that would make Alina feel forced or unhappy. The tension lies purely in how she fears others will perceive her, and not in how unhealthy her relationship with Aleksander is. For somebody who’s often attracted to unhealthy ships, I have to say that my favorite fics are usually ones that don’t have that type of dynamic between the characters. This fic delivers on that.

Also, Aleksander’s POV surrounding his struggle with his Russian heritage and his feelings for Alina is amazing, and has some of the best writing and characterization I’ve seen.

You receive: an evil demon; I receive: human souls by @aceofnowhere (Complete)

The next morning while she tried to tell herself it was a dream, that of course there wasn’t a fucking demon in her house, she found a note taped to her fridge.

“You might eat this shit,” it had written, “but I would like some fucking souls please.”

Darkling Week Prompt 7: free choice. Alina has a demon in her house.

This is absolute crack, and I have no idea what the fuck is wrong with me.

---

May I just say that this is the most fun I’ve ever had when reading a fic. It’s interesting with a bit of mystery, and Aleksander as a little shit of a demon is hilarious. Alina in this fic is great too. It’s such a unique take on her POV, especially when you reread it after knowing the ending. 10000/10, this fic is brilliant in every way and I love it.

I had been lost to you, Sunlight by BrytteMystere (Complete)

A Girl became a Woman, became a Sankta, became a Goddess.

Or: An Immortal Alina calls upon merzost to reunite with the Prince of Shadows she lost long ago. She may have lost herself in the process.

But then again, maybe time and endless wars did that instead.

---

You really just have to read this one to get it. It is utterly haunting and fascinating in the best of ways. The writing style is strange and novel and fits so well with the story being told. The composition of the fic as a whole is genius.

I Look Inside Myself (And See My Heart Is Black) by Ceris_Malfoy (Complete)

"When is a monster not a monster? Why, when you love it, of course."

Written for Darklina Week 2021 - Day 6: Favorite Quote • King & Queen • Monster

---

Once more, this author comes through with an absolutely breathtaking writing style and story. The imagery is elegant yet brutal, simultaneously horrifying and glorious. There’s a certain way these stories are written, like fairytales, where the beautiful becomes the macabre and becomes ever more stunning because of it. It’s very dark but in a good way - an almost bewitching way.

Afterlife by @aceofnowhere (Complete)

“You are asking me to leave?”

“Not asking, shadow,” she said. “Telling. Time to get unlost, loser.”

Day 3 Darklina Week prompt: Modern AU (I mean, barely)

Alina expels ghosts from purgatory.

---

@aceofnowhere once again bringing the best of the paranormal to the Grishaverse. Literally everything you write is amazing idk why I’m even pointing out individual fics when I could just rec your whole page. But anyways!! This is fun and interesting and Alina is a badass. Aleksander is, of course, compelling and dark and kind of a little shit, and it’s all incorporated seamlessly into an existential paranormal narrative.

Once Upon a Shooting Star by Ceris_Malfoy (Complete)

"But most of all, she was drawn to a vast darkness that reached out above all of them, a void so hungry for companionship that she knew she could fulfill."

---

Let. Alina. Be. Feral!! Anyways, I clearly have a type when it comes to storytelling, and it’s whatever the fuck this person has got going on. Feral!Star!Alina is literally the light of my life. Her interactions with not only other people but the world in general are so well done, but my favorite parts about this fic are the numerous ways her relationship with Aleksander is described and depicted.

I love the dark and light imagery, especially with how it’s portrayed as them filling in the gaps of each other’s lives and supporting each other instead of trying to block each other out. There’s such clear passion and joy and love and devotion between them. The central focus of this fic is on her and Aleksander’s relationship, the interplay between them and their powers and the way her light fills his loneliness, the passing of adoration and trust and reliance between them. It’s very beautiful and I love it.

A Blaze of Light by Keira_63 (Complete)

They discover the Sun Summoner in the burnt-out remains of the Shu laboratory in which she has spent the last seven years of her life.

Or, the Darkling finds himself with a Sun Summoner whose greatest wish is to burn Shu Han to the ground. He is happy to oblige her.

---

👀👀 Badass Alina and Badass Aleksander. The ultimate power couple, and Alina burning a path through Shu Han before they both burn a path through the world together. The darkness and rage in this one are handled very well, and the way that rage turns to coldness and then resolve is done so well. This fic is very cathartic and also very furious, and reading it is certainly a trip down emotion lane.

One more for the Road by Rist (Complete)

He returns to the war room shaken, and finds an Alina that cannot leave without at least having tried.

---

This one hurts so much but its soooo gooood!!! Very smutty but also very tender and very bittersweet. Sad and soft all at once. I just... love the way Alina and Aleksander are written so much, and Alina’s complicated feelings for him are explored in such detail and depth. This one is truly worth the read.

[nonpracticinghumanbeing]

(Hey, guess which terrible little ball of anger I'm writing about yet again. Also, this is basically therapy for me. So tw for mental health issues, past trauma and a lot of self-loathing I guess? Lol.)

I write A LOT about Izzy. Both here and on Facebook. And I have very strong opinions about him, which causes really violent reactions from some people (including being called an abuse apologist for merely pointing out that he believed he was doing the right thing when he made a deal with Badminton and one person actually comparing him to a certain genocidal Austrian painter). I really DO understand why people hate him, he's a terrible abusive man and for many viewers his behaviour may be triggering. That's absolutely valid.

But. The more I think about it the more I understand why he's so important to me. And not just because we're both sad little masochistic boys, even though I don't think I'll ever get over getting proper representation when it comes to kink being an integral part of my identity. I also see something of myself in how terribly broken he is. As someone whose parents' treatment made them struggle with anxiety their whole adult life, I really sympathise with him even though I do realise he's a truly awful man.

You see, when you've been conditioned to believe there's something inherently wrong with you, it really changes you. You learn to hide who you really are and you create a person you present to the outside world that you only claim is you. You wear that as an armour meant to protect you from the world. You believe no one would ever accept the real you, so you spend all your energy on pretending to be what you think is acceptable. You learn not to talk about how you feel, because you can't risk exposing yourself. You take everything that hurts, lock it in a box, put that box under your bed, and throw away the key.

When every single day is a struggle, you become hyperfocused on staying alive in a hostile world. You have neither time nor energy for anything else when you're fighting for survival. Things like love or happiness are for other people, you can't pay them any mind 'cause if you slip up it may actually kill you.

So you find whatever it is that lets you get by and you cling to it for dear life, because your life may literally depend on it. (I have my routines that keep me stable, he has his lager-than-life legend of a captain who makes him feel safe.) And you become pathologically protective of it. If anyone threatens your source of stability, you put everything you have into making them go away, because however unhealthy your way of life is, you can't even imagine an alternative.

Years pass and nothing changes in your life, because you can't afford to let it change. You see people around you thrive and live their best lives and you just don't know how to do that. So you become angry, and you become frustrated, and you become violent. And sometimes you are violent towards those around you and sometimes you are violent towards yourself. And you come to hate your life, but at the same time you're too scared to do anything about it.

And then - if you take a second to stop and think, something I've been lucky enough to finally manage and that Izzy desperately needs - one day you realise just how hopeless it really is. That surviving is not living. That the armour you've been wearing all those years has long since become your skin and you don't know how to be yourself. And that if you want to start making things better you need to pull that old box from under the bed and deal with what's inside. And that is TERRIFYING, and it hurts like hell, which is why many people choose not to do it their entire lives.

So. What I wanna say is that I think I understand what he's going through. Yes, he's an abuser and a homophobe, and a racist. But I don't think he's inherently evil. As @internerdionality once wrote, both him and Ed are abusive because they are afraid and not because they take pleasure in hurting people. That doesn't make it alright by any means, but it makes me want to see Izzy get a redemption arc. Con saying that Izzy wants to be better but doesn't know how was like getting fucking stabbed for me, because that literally was me for years and years before I managed to get myself even a little bit together. That along with Daddy Jenkins' way of smashing cliches makes me want to believe he can get a happy ending. Because yes, I take this personally.

[dankovskaya]

Ohhh yeah this is when shit starts to get really weird. Garth’s frustration with Arthur’s abhorrent attitude and behavior is very reasonable. It makes sense that he would go off on him with his complaints this is very standard for their relationship. They have near identical traumas at this point that Garth has dealt with a hell of a lot better (and largely on his own) and Arthur seemingly refuses to truly address while getting worse and worse, and the responsibility of “fixing him” apparently falls on Garth with no one else around anymore to support him. Hence the annoyance. BUT he did not need to hit him especially not completely unprompted (on the page before this one.) BUT Arthur hit him back at least twice as hard and enough for him to curl into a ball in pain followed by this disturbing little “forced into submission” moment. But even THAT is made confusing by Arthur throwing back his own “yessir” towards Garth (and even the phrasing of “may I open this?”) which seems to imply a mutual standing rather than a hierarchy. Enforcing a due respect (albeit excessively violently--but Garth started it!) which he believes is equal to Garth’s hence the reciprocity? Am I going insane reading way too deep into one page from the literal first issue of this run? No I do not think I am.

[anwynb2003]

Um... I think I made a BatFam AU while half-asleep...

Ok so, I wake up, and it seems last night I wrote out a messy explanation of a story that I just might have to write now... but I've read literally one Batman comic (Death in the Family), and all my knowledge comes from either YouTube, Wikis, and stories on AO3...

Hyperfixation is fun, isn't it?

Anyway, here's a copy-paste of what I wrote in my half-asleep state at around 2:00 last night (note, the doc itself is simply titled "C'mon. You Know."):

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tireeeeed let’s do this

Okay so

AU: No superheroes. Bruce Wayne is just a rich dude who starts taking in orphans because reasons.

First up was Dick Grayson, who he adopted when he was 9.

7 years later, he added 13-year-old Jason Todd.

3 years later, 12-year-old Tim Drake.

2 years later, 14-year-old Cassie Cain.

And finally, 2 years after that, he learned of and gained custody of his only biological son: 10-year-old Damian Wayne.

Only a year after Damian joined the family though, Brucie boy died, presumably in a “tragic accident”, but it’s quickly revealed that someone’s altered his will, leaving his kids with none of the family’s fortune; not even their home.

Dick, who’d moved out a few years ago, now has custody of his 3 youngest siblings, and only a small, 2-bedroom house in Blüdhaven to care for them in.

Jason, who for a variety of reasons had run away at 15, and had stayed away for the most part, reluctantly agrees to move in Full House style to help Dick, while all the siblings work with their ex-butler/grandfather figure Alfred, and family-friends Jim and Babs Gordon to figure out the mystery of their father’s death and will.

Tensions run high, Dick’s having a breakdown, Jay’s struggling to Dad (verb), Tim’s gay and spiralling, Cass struggles with speech, and Dami’s emotionally stunted. Yay!

So we got:

Dick, 24-year-old officer of the BPD. Adopted at 9 years old after losing his parents in a circus act gone wrong, Dick stayed with Bruce until he was 18, when after a heated argument he left for college. He made up with his father over the next couple years and stayed in contact, often visiting him and his siblings.

Jason, 21-year-old, works part-time at a gym in Crime Alley, Gotham City. Adopted when he was 13, after several years of living on the streets after his step-mother’s death by overdose and his father’s “peace out” moment. Discovered the identity of his birth-mother, ran away to go find her because teen angst and increasing fights with Bruce, then she was found dead a week later (her ex was charged and found guilty) and while Jay couldn’t be found, much of the blood at the crime scene was his. Then, randomly, he contacted his family again 4 years later, at 19. Didn’t move back in, and things were quite tense between him and Bruce, but still hung out with his siblings outside the home (though he was angry at Tim at first, for being adopted less than a year after his “death” and "replacing" him).

Tim, 17-year-old honours student. Adopted when he was 12, but actually started hanging around the house a little before that, as Dick was tutoring him after school. This helped both Dick, and Bruce to discover how neglectful and emotionally abusive his parents were, and Bruce literally had to sue for custody for this kid. He won.

Cassie, another 17-year-old. Adopted at 14, she’d been on the streets much like Jason had, but of her own volition… to a point. She was scarred after seeing her father do… something, when she was only 8 years old (she’s repressed so hard that even she doesn’t remember exactly what), and so ran away. This thing traumatized her so much that she lost her ability to speak for years, and has only just started learning to talk again. Instead, she usually uses ASL.

And Damian, an 11-year-old ball of politeness, good manners, and pure, unadulterated rage. He was born nine-months after his mother date-raped his father, and was raised in quite an… odd way, by said mother and her father. Long and short of it: crime family, but not a close one. He rarely if ever actually saw his mother, and when he did she wasn’t overly affectionate. He spent most of his early days being groomed to be his grandfather’s heir, only for their entire organization to be captured by police when he was 10. It was now when the emotionally stunted, spoiled brat was put into his father’s custody.

Main issues:

-Dickie boy stressed ooooooouut, gotta be a breadwinner and keep his siblings together and safe

-Jaybird technically never made up with Bruce; they’d actually made plans to get together and talk things out, but then, y’know, death

-Timmy, poor thing, is balancing school, work at Wayne Enterprises, and investigating the case of his father’s death, and has seemingly forgotten what sleep is. Adding on the fact that Bruce being dead means his (granted, chosen) role as heir to the company seems much more real (even despite the fake will, he's confident he'll figure it out and find the real one), he’s not doing all that great

-Cassie, sweetheart, has been emotionally traumatized for years, and now just has more trauma to add to that with Bruce being dead. She’s getting better, but struggling

-Dami, baby bird, is filled with more rage than usual, and is endlessly worried about all the animals in his “zoo”; Alfred remains at the manor (though he has not met his new employer), for the sole purpose of making sure they stay fed, watered, bathed, and more or less cared for.

So, to sum up, Dick’s working to support them and trying his best, Jay’s Dad-ing while Dick���s at work since his hours are more flexible, Tim hasn’t slept in years, Cass needs therapy and hugs, and Damian has a growing army of stuffed animals to fill the gaping hole in his life where his zoo used to be (since he could only bring Titus and Alfred the Cat with him to Bludhaven).

Will they be able to figure out who had their father killed and get their family legacy back?

Hell if I know, I haven’t written it yet. Probably. Get off my back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, long story short, I seem to have issues, but this is happening now apparently.

Not right now though, Ima go play Minecraft.

[fooltomery]

hate the circumstances for ezri and her entire character. yes its because of all of the behind the scenes stuff but also the fact that the writers absolutely fumbled and dropped the ball with her.

ive said it once and i'll say it again ezri is a good stand alone character. the writers got really lucky that jadzia had to go bc there is so much potential for a character that is dax's new host, ESPECIALLY an inexperienced and under-trained trill. and then they kinda just tossed the idea around like they were playing catch. ezri never got the arc she deserved. look, i get under the circumstances of it being the final season theyve got a lot of loose ends to tie up. but that doesnt mean they cant nix the stupid ass romance between her and julian. that did not need to happen and julian and jadzia literally had no previous romantic chemistry it was clearly a friendship. it wouldve been more believable if ezri and quark got together lmao. its almost like the writers left ezri to develop in a few episodes, some of which contained B plots, and then just did basically nothing else after those episodes wrapped up except go "yup she did that and this happened"

i mean sure its good to see her develop into a more confident person and watch her become more sure of herself. but all in all it was rushed. they would have had more time to work with her as a character if they let her just be a character instead of a love interest.

it really is such a shame to see how they fucked up bc ezri is so intriguing by herself. first of all the entire thing with joran and unlocking those memories from him. it had some of her dealing with urges from another host and her learning to control them, which is something we should have seen more of with ezri. maybe even as a part of her healing journey with him we could see her start to learn how to play the piano to recontextualize how she feels about music and also work on healing that trauma. also not to mention it seems from the beginning she had identity issues and wasnt very sure of herself, and her joining only exacerbated those issues. that could have been so interesting seeing her cope with that in a more prolonged manner. like an episode where she keeps accidentally giving into other host's urges, and her nearly spiraling out of control only to realize more about herself in the end. this couldve been really enjoyable especially with urges coming from curzon. AND we could also cycle back to joran and his urges. that would create really good tension for the episode. (not to mention her questioning her gender and sexuality... which was kind of mentioned in a one off line -_-)

theres genuinely so much wasted potential with her because she was put with julian. i mean for fucks sake shes a therapist. let the audience see her fail and use her practice to help her get back up and cope with her issues.

all in all. she is a fine character. could have been so much better but i genuinely get why shes not given the circumstances. still a shame to see her potential wasted. :/

[subsystems]

So, I keep seeing this paper being passed around a lot in syscourse. I want to talk about it for a bit.

This one in particular:

Source: Regan McClure, 1994. “Towards a theoretical framework of the etiology and structures of multiple personality.” A Thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts, Graduate Department of Applied Psychology, in the University of Toronto.

Important things

I keep seeing people bring this old fart of an article up so much! Please, the first thing you should know about this is that it’s OLD. It’s almost 30 years old! All of the “current research” this paper evaluates? It’s all extremely outdated!

No, actually the most important thing you should know is that THIS IS A THESIS. A thesis is what a college student writes for their master’s degree. You evaluate research by others and come up with your own argument then write your thesis.

This is NOT a study. I’ve seen some people claiming that it is but, no, it’s not. It’s even in the title. “Towards a theoretical framework of the etiology and structures of multiple personality.” This is someone trying to argue their own views on the existence & cause of DID.

Let’s be thankful that it’s not a study! Their approach to DID is old as balls and it really shows.

Summary of her paper 

Keep in mind: Since this paper is old and dusty, it’s challenging equally old and now-debunked approaches to DID.

With her thesis, McClure was trying to argue that DID should be approached differently. This is because non-pathological experiences of many consciousnesses* exist in religious practices and even in our own understanding of the self (ego states, your inner child, etc.). She also described the differences in how cultures perceive dissociation. While western culture is quick to pathologize dissociation, it can be an important and healthy aspect of other cultures.

McClure argued that multiple consciousnesses, all the way from ego states to alters, are normal and not pathological. McClure suggested that DID should be reframed as “multiple identity response.” This is her own term for multiple identities that form as an adaptive response to abuse.

* It should be noted that she called ALL experiences of many consciousnesses “multiplicity” or “multiple personality”. We’re talking everything from ego states, to your unconscious instinct to breath and blink, to channeling dead loved ones, to the alters in DID.

Why I don’t like it

While I can appreciate the work she put on this paper, I don’t like it. I think it’s a good sign that I don’t like it, though! It just goes to show how good DID research has gotten! A lot of this stuff just wouldn’t hold its own against the present day research.

The biggest issue I have with this article is that it approaches DID as something that only forms from abuse and can form in adulthood. These stances have been debunked again and again. The current science considers DID a childhood-onset posttraumatic developmental disorder. That means it starts in childhood. Trauma isn’t always abuse, either.

(More info on current DID research here & here)

The other issue I have with McClure’s paper is her idea that because there’s an experience of feeling like separate people in DID, that this is somehow coming from the same place as what she describes “normative multiplicity”. Not only does this approach minimize the unique struggles that people with DID face, it just makes things way too confusing.

There’s been so many battles over how to define dissociation in the medical field. I just don’t believe describing normal experiences as dissociative is the right thing to do. When I tell someone I’m dissociating, it’s because I’m having symptoms of my dissociative disorder and I genuinely need help, not because I’m zoning out on a good book. I have the same sentiment about the language of multiplicity.

The last thing I just don’t agree with is this “multiple identity response”. I think it completely misses the mark on what DID is. Dissociation is an adaptive response, sure, but DID certainly isn’t. DID is the result of when that adaptive response gets used to such an overwhelming degree that it literally stunts the development of the brain. There’s biomarkers and neurobiological evidence of this!

I’m in no way discounting the possibility of non-disordered plurality being adaptive. Non-disordered plurality can be so many different things with so many different causations. Hey even this paper admits that, depending on what you consider plural, everyone might be non-disordered plural in some way. 

But DID? It’s just not the same.

Please understand that.

[nooneandeveryone]

Who wants kinky OC lore?

My boy Kadin, his full name is Kadin Brimmer. He's roughly 157 year-old demonic accident. Three demons melded together made him and as a by-product he's stuck with a soul. And no idea who or what he really is for the majority of his life.

So.... who were the demons, a fire demon, an earth demon and an incubus/succubus. He retains the powers of all three. Earth and fire are fairly obvious. But I've yet to talk about the incubus/succubus part here....

Let's begin (gonna talk a little about gender and gender identity too, while that's not kinky in itself it comes into play. via the whole sex demon thing)

incubus/succubus - I use some old lore for my basis here. That lore being that an incubus and a succubus are the same creature in two different forms. So what that means for Kadin is he can change his physical gender. He usually doesn't, partly because he didn't learn how to control it properly and partly because it's a self actualization power. This more or less makes him literally genderfluid and I'm jealous as fuck. But at the same time, he strongly identifies as male, even if he's changed completely down to having a working vagina. He still thinks of himself as he. His boobs, his vagina. He just tends to default to having a dick....

Kadin deeply hates himself. People he cared about have died directly because of him. Regardless of whether it was an accident, he blames himself. He's outlived people he cares about just by the nature of what he is. His self-hatred led him into various kinks. Most of which involve pain. This is his form of catharsis. So having a dick and balls enables him to see as well as feel the pain he's after.

AAAND my next point is purely because I'm a terrible person. Consuming seminal or vaginal fluid is addicting to him. It gets him a little high. He is orally fixated to high hell. He ain't down to fuck he's down to go down. Most of his sexual encounters default to oral in some way. So chances are, he enjoyed performing oral more than the person receiving it.

It must be consensual. He might even seem a little obsessed with making sure his activities are consensual. To the point a partner might get annoyed because he keeps double checking. Just shut up and fuck, Kadin.

Service Switch. While he gets a lot out of sexual and kinky activities, he's more interested in fulfilling his partner's desires. If they want something and he's able to do it, he'll do it. Provided they tell him.

Left to his own devices, Kadin will do casual hook-ups as a way to sate the physical addiction. He will run the fuck away from any meaningful relationship.

Back to his kinks. The list is so fucking long, my dudes. It's quicker to say what he's not into. But hey, I'll give his top ones: aftercare, D/s, oral, anal, toys, oversized toys, eletrosex, impact play, bloodplay, c&bt, temperature play, bondage, leather, denial/controlled orgasms, semi-public, tit torture/play, piercings, enemas, humiliation.... just everything on the menu.

While I originally created Kadin (when I was 18) solely as a character for sex and kink... he's morphed into something more complex. He became a comfort character. Through writing him and RPing him I've worked out some major issues, figured out my own gender identity, began to heal from trauma.

So, don't let anybody look down on you for this shit. Yes, he's a shitty trash character made for sex but he's changed my life for the better. So fuck modern puritans.

[countessofbiscuit]

What are your Bobasoka headcanons? I've already gone through all of the (criminally little) fic on ao3 and I especially loved Smothered and Covered, and I saw the majority of the fics in the tag were gifted to you so I'm assuming you're the OG shipper. Feel free to essay if you like!!

Thanks for the ask and kind words about that fic :3 

Oh, Bobasoka … where to begin? It’s a pairing that’s been bumping around in exchange requests for a few years — I figure it’d be easy for anyone invested in Ahsoka’s relationship with the clones to be compelled by the idea. Lledra used to draw Boba and Ahsoka interacting, and it was probably a few panels of their incredible Destinies comic that set my Bobasoka wheels turning. I’m also drawn to them because their journeys traverse so much canon; there’s not just a sandbox to play in, but a whole goddamn stretch of beach, stretching far out into the horizon ...  (#AhsokaLives #BobaSurvived :D)

I have to lead with the proviso that almost everything I write/daydream about/headcanon has a groundsheet of Rexsoka. Ahsoka’s interest in Boba, in my head, is intimately tied up with her attraction to and/or relationship with Rex — or, at the bare minimum, her intimate fellowship with the clones. She went through puberty (maybe with heats!) surrounded by a literal army of handsome, roughly college-aged dudes; that must’ve been a heady mix of heaven and hell. If she didn’t quench her thirst before war’s end and her (eventual) separation from Rex, she’d probably be pretty dehydrated when stumbling across Boba. As for Boba’s attraction to Ahsoka, well ... she’s very pretty, she’s potentially useful, she’s not likely to skewer him in his sleep (+2) on account of being a Jedi (-1), and now she’s the one down on her luck; if he falls in bed with anyone, why not this girl who isn’t afraid of him and stares a lot at his lips?                         

And Boba is like a hot shipping potato — satisfying, hard to fuck up, goes well (read: makes for an intriguing story) with almost everyone. And I think it has everything to do with his liminality, something he shares with Ahsoka and probably recognizes.          

Their neither-this-nor-that-ness overlap in such interesting ways, and they each bring their identity issues to the table — Ahsoka as an on-again, off-again Jedi; Boba as a clone who isn’t a Clone™, a Mandalorian by birth and bearing, but not by the book. At different points in their stories, they identify as different things, and that would affect their headspace and color their view of the other. They wrestle with themselves and each other. Force-user and bounty hunter; privileged topsider and orphaned juvenile delinquent fugitive; GAR commander and outcast clone; Jedi and Mandalorian; Disillusioned veteran and disaffected army brat; Rebellion agent and Imperial contractor.

And as much conflict is baked into these dynamics, it also generates a certain magnetism; and I believe they recognize, on some level, their shared trauma and the symmetry in their experiences. Boba and Ahsoka both have happy childhoods with very little to distress or vex them (beyond the art, I do not jive with Age of Republic: Jango Fett, a Disney-canon comic that not only doubles-down on the Jango-wasn’t-Mando nonsense, but shows him being rather cavalier about Boba’s life); Geonosis happens and their adolescent lives are dominated by war (which is how they came to actively threaten each other as space!secondary-schoolers — whaaaaatf!); they are both dubiously (even wrongfully) imprisoned; and they both suffer alienation and incredible personal loss.  

Boba was set apart from the clones before he was even pulled him from the jar, othered and elevated from the beginning. He never bonded with brothers, he does not identify as a clone. And while there are examples of clones making overtures to him, canonically his relationship with them is fraught and probably made worse when he gets banged up in Republic Central at the tender age of eleven or twelve — and of course, Ahsoka is an accessory to this, the second chapter in his tragedy at the hands of the Jedi. He needed help (whether he wanted it or not), it was not given by clones or Jedi alike (hamstrung by bureaucracy, sure, but surely some other means of intervention might have been lobbied for?), and Boba becomes a right teenage disaster, well-balanced only in the sense that he has a chip on both shoulders.

(n.b. Putting my RepComm hat on for a second, I can’t help but sniffle-laugh at the idea that the Alphas watched him get thrown in a maximum-security slammer and were like “Ah, there he is, the feral vod’ika. First time, we’ll let the little snot earn his stripes. Second time, we’ll bust him out and send him on a tough love retreat with A’den or Jaing.”)

Ahsoka, meanwhile, is part-and-parcel of the institutions that Boba sets himself against, even after she too has been cast out by circumstances beyond her control. She grows up in a supportive Jedi community and then spends some seriously formative years with a whole slew of brothers — brothers that should have been Boba’s! 

Boba, on the other hand, is a great example of the proverb that a child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth. (As he tells Hondo, “Why should I help anybody? I’ve got no one.”) 

The resentment that must create! But also, later, the quiet empathy too — maybe when Boba’s having one of his better days and Ahsoka’s obviously not. 

And all of the above is interesting enough, without also touching upon the wildcard that is Mandalore.

Boba’s relationship with Mandalore .... well, that’s contested in- and out-of-universe and I won’t allow myself to essay overmuch. I subscribe firmly to a Mandalorian Fetts construction of canon, even though Boba must be someone who struggles mightily with Mandalorian identity. He’s raised by a bona fide Mando, a solicitous, loving father who’d have no reason not to pass on his language and beliefs; but at the same time, it takes that village, and when Boba’s clan of two is shattered, he has no one else. The loss of his dad unmoors him from his only anchor to Mandalorian culture and clan.

If Boba had been close to the Cuy’val Dar, one would think he’d have turned to them rather than fall in with Jango’s criminal acquaintances; or maybe the bounty hunters just scooped him up first, and troubled lil’ Boba was shepherded through bereavement by folks who enabled and encouraged him to externalize his anger in a way that gave him a (false) feeling of agency and strength. 

Whatever the reasons, Boba does not repatriate himself to Mandalore (much to Fenn Shysa’s melodramatic dismay). He strikes me as a lapsed Mandalorian; he doesn’t exactly follow the creed besides wearing the armor (scavenged? his dad’s sans helmet? canon is confused on this point, but he doesn’t go Mando until the unfinished arcs at the end of TCW, either for lack of stature, lack of armor, or lack of enthusiasm). I feel like if someone rocked up to Boba in a cantina and had the balls to ask “hey, so you a Mandalorian?” Boba would be like “<ominously slow helmet tilt> who’s asking” and never give you a straight answer.

Meanwhile, Ahsoka gets a crash course on Mandalore from none other than someone who, at one point, belonged to a sect that wanted to expunge Jaster’s legacy from the galaxy — and at the very least, had reason to dislike clones. This isn’t the place to explore my Boba/Bo-Katan feelings, but know that they are fathomless, and I would pay good money to be a fly on the wall of that Kom’rk when Bo-Katan gives Ahsoka Mando History 101 with her own special sauce. Ahsoka is probably more up-to-speed on Mandalore than Boba, and at one point, she may even own more beskar than him! (n.b. After the crash, I think one of the first places Rex and Ahsoka bounce is just inside Mando space, to scope out the Sundari situation and maybe try to scramble a signal to Bo-Katan; she’d have the goodwill to at least get them back on their feet if she can’t help them lay low herself. For a variety of reasons worth maybe ficcing down the line, they aren’t successful.)

I don’t really have a concluding statement except, I just think Bobasoka’s neat :) They hit all my depressed-Millennial buttons.

Headcanon by bullet-point isn’t really my style, but this is tumblr so ... tl;dr:

They recognize a lot in each other, even if they’re slow to admit it, if ever. Boba’s a cagey bastard and Ahsoka doesn’t ever like him enough to be emotionally honest.

They bump into each other during Ahsoka’s walkabout(s) ‘cause Coruscant’s Underworld ain’t big enough for the two of them. Without Slave-1, Boba couchsurfs at Nyx Okami’s garage, but he does his laundry at Rafa’s. He might even borrow the Martez’s new, useful friend for a job or two. 

Ahsoka eventually matures enough to be sensitive about her use of the Force on and around clones, and she definitely doesn’t use it around Boba. Definitely not during sex.

Boba is privately weirded out every time Ahsoka uses Mando slang she picked up off the clones or the Nite Owls.

Boba absolutely kills Cad Bane in that shoot-out, keeps the hat, and lets Ahsoka have it. She shoves it out the airlock and uses it for target practice. 

So many great smut flavours! Hatesex. Acquaintances with benefits. “You’re traumatized and touch-starved and you look just like him/them, and I know how to be gentle and what to do, so maybe we could … ?” They’re both privately comfortable with their bodies and sexuality, but Boba’s got trust issues a parsec long and Ahsoka’s lost confidence; it’s always an awkward affair, but desperation wins out.

They exchange comm codes every time they run into each other, which is kind of pointless because they both use burners.

Ahsoka hitches a ride on Slave-1 more than once. There really is only one bed, so it’s either sleep upright, sleep in a pokey prisoner hold, or sleep with him.

For a few years, Boba can pass as a last-generation clone — the ones that got sold off in bulk units to slavers before Kamino sunk another three years’ food, board, and training into them. Boba pretends he doesn’t notice, easy to really, since he tells himself his helmet is his face. But occasionally, when Ahsoka can convince him there’s profit in it, he agrees to play sleeper agent and assists in liberating a few here and there. 

They don’t talk about Aurra Sing.

When an Imp really crosses him, Boba passes on intel to Ahsoka to ruin their day.

Once, when they’re both super skint, Ahsoka volunteers to get handed in to some relatively minor and out-of-the-way Imperial garrison, so Boba can collect, bust her out, and split the pot with her. It’s the closest she ever comes to telling him “I trust you” — and when he brushes the idea aside, citing something about risk, it’s the closest he ever comes to telling her “I love you.”

Boba sees Inquisitors as muscling in on his game. There are so many lousy Force-users around nowadays, it should be easy pickings, but Inquisitors get privileged information. So he makes sport out of misdirecting them, especially from Ahsoka. 

When he pisses her off, Ahsoka fantasizes about Bo-Katan taking Boba down a peg or two while she watches :)))

Boba experienced Ahsoka’s heat once, secondhand through a cabin wall. He thought he was being clever by shooting Rex up with some Nevoota stim pollen, locking him in with Ahsoka, and hijacking their locked ships. Longest three days of his life, limping on broken hyperdrives and shared fuel stores to the nearest waystation to a soundtrack of violent lovemaking : \

Bounty hunters invariably bump into spies and agents because they work in the same areas. The agents pretend to be bounty hunters, eccentric business people, sex workers, or a range of other things. Sometimes each party knows all about the other, but it’s only polite not to mention it. This happens to Ahsoka and Boba A LOT, especially once she becomes Fulcrum; rebel cells and Imperials often want the same people. Occasionally they exchange fire. A couple times Boba gets imprisoned in Ahsoka’s own brig. Once, Boba blows her cover and definitely lives to regret it. 

(this essay was originally punctuated with pics, but replies with images won’t show up tumblr tags so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) 

[the-rawr-ster]

Words for Proheroes, UA staff, and All For One

Warning: lots of cursing, minor spoilers, mentions of abuse, harsh words, and lots of yelling, and also mentions of suicide, depression, ptsd, ect.

Any of the characters I mention, I say I hate but I don’t and understand they’re human so they make mistakes. I also know they already know that I’m right and probably feel super shitty. I still want to put my two sense in.

So I made a post and some comments on tik tok about hero society in MHA. I didn’t get everything I wanted to say so here’s just a ranting dump about several characters and groups.

The only heroes actually can respect are Miruko Hawks. Let me explain why. Hawks literally called out the heros on their BS speeches. Which I really admire. He’s blunt, which is an extremely respectable trait to me in most cases. And he’s very passionate about the work he does. He cares about people but unfortunately because of how he was brought up (manga spoilers here stop before you spoil it for yourselves). Just like many of 1-A, but also very different, he was quite literally raised to be a tool used by the military for their bullshit. And I think this might have changed based on who saved him. As many of you might know, Hawks grew up in an extremely toxic environment, I won’t get into the nitty gritty deets. The one that got him out of that was Endeavor, his favorite hero. He was his favorite hero growing up. But that only goes so far. Hawks respect for Endeavor (like many of his fans) was because he wasn’t fake, he didn’t pretend to like people, he didn’t pretend to smile. Endeavor was very different from many of the other heroes (horrible father and husband though (an okay hero though, which I think is part of why Stain hadn’t killed Endeavor even though he had plenty of opportunities)). Now we haven’t seen much of Miruko as far as I know, but just from her couple of minutes on screen in the anime, we can already guess that she respected Hawks. She likes how Hawks rolls. He’s confident, laid back, and he’s not a bullshitter. And just for that I can respect her. I also think Bakugō should be the number one hero but that’s a story for another time. I also have respect for Sir Night Eye and I’m sure I don’t have to tell you why because you can figure it out.

Now let’s get down to why I fucking hate hero society. Let’s just start off with the fact that it’s almost identical to how it would be if superpowers existed. There would be quirk discrimination, there would be people that abused their powers, ect. Ect. But most of all, heros get away with anything (much like cops irl). They use violence to stop violence, which goes completely against what heroes say. And we see this with All might a lot. Heros with flashy powers get noticed more than others. YOU SENT CHILDREN TO WAR!!!! THAT IS IN NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM OKAY!!! THOSE CHILDREN ARE FOREVER GOING TO BE TRAUMATIZED BY THAT SHIT! And I understand that at some point they’d have experienced something, but when they chose to be heroes it was a time of piece, but then for whatever reason everything went south. Regardless, these kids brains are still developing, idk how but this will definitely change the way their brain develops. Honestly I’d be surprised if none of them ended up commiting. I don’t want them to but in their mental state they’d at least be thinking about it. I actually wrote a fic about a pro-hero commiting. I could write an essay on why heroes suck balls, but that’ll be done another time).

As much as I’d like to talk about each individual hero, I really want to talk about UA students and Staff, and why the staff sucks potato juice.

Let’s start with the obvious one, Nezu. HOW DO DOZENS OF VILLAINS INFILTRATE ONE OF THE MOST PRESTIGIOUS SCHOOLS? THAT DOESNT MAKE SENSE, obviously your security system fucking sucks. NOT ONLY THAT BUT YOU ONLY HIRED ALL MIGHT BECAUSE OF HIS STATUS AS A HERO!!!! HES A HORRIBLE TEACHER!!!! AND NOT ONLY THAT BUT YOU ALLOWED ALL OF YOUR STUDENTS TO BE PUT ON BLAST FOR MILLIONS TO SEE, talkin bout some “We HaVe SoMe Of ThE bEsT heRoeS.” THATS bullshit because y’all lost an entire child to a lizard, a magician that puts people in marbles, and a musty old man with blue flames. If y’all produce the best heroes, y’all wouldn’t have lost Bakugō in the first place. AND WHY DO YOU LET MIDNIGHT WALK AROUND WITH SEX TOYS????! And you put all of your students in one place for all the LoV to have access to them. Yes there’s security, BUT SERIOUSLY? WILL YOU EVER LEARN?????

Next, is Present Mike, I love you man but HOW DID YOU FEEL COMFORTABLE TELLING EVERYBODY AND THEY MAMA THE NAMES AND QUIRKS OF THE STUDENTS???!!!! Like Nezu may have enabled it but you could have chosen to not do it.

Aizawa, OH SIR DO I HAVE WORDS FOR YOU. I’m sure you might already know this, but you should know I know. You’re one of the worst teachers, coming to a close second to last place on my list of horrible UA staff. First of all, you hardly taught your students proper combat training. That’s one of the most basic skills every hero needs. You’re slacking dawg (sorry for the disrespect Hound dog). Secondly, HOW DO YOU CONSISTENTLY LOSE YOUR STUDENTS? HOW DO THEY ALWAYS END UP OUT OF YOUR SIGHT? Like you’re really good at hero’s stuff but you’re slacking as a teacher. And why? Why haven’t you punished Mineta yet? It’s literally as clear as a sunny day that he’s a pervert. He is consistently making inappropriate comments and sexually harassed/assaulted several of your other students, and this is outside the LoV attacks, while you were on duty. Oh and let’s not forget about you emotionally manipulating your students!!! YOUR STUDENTS!!!!!! Needless to say I have a hate love relationship because I know he cares for his students and is not prone to favoring, unlike some *cough cough* all might.

MIDNIGHT, I respect your drip and your feminism. I just hate how you were written. YOU LITERALLY WALK AROUND WITH SEX TOYS!!! What do you even do? Like what’s your job at UA? I see you so often but like, what is your purpose? I love you though, and I wish you’d step on me.

ALL MIGHT, OMG I HATE YOU ALMOST AS MUCH AS I HATE ENDEAVOR!! FAVORITISM FAVORITISM FAVORITISM!!!! OMG IT IS SO PREVELANT IN YOUR “teaching.” You treat Deku so differently from the way you treat Bakugō. And I understand that they’re different so they have to be taught differently, by HOLY HELL! You borderline cheered for Deku when he fought with Bakugō. AND YOURE A SHITTY HERO FOR THE WAY YOU TALKED TO DEKU WHEN YOU FIRST MET HIM!! What if he didn’t grab onto you? What if he did what Bakugō said and jumped? You’d be responsible for that in a sense, because you made him feel worse than he already did. I respect you for being upfront with him, and that’s not what the issue here is. Deku was clearly emotionally unstable!!! You didn’t even teach him how to use his quirk, HES BARELY EVEN 16, how does that make sense to you? Anyways moving on to my biggest pet peeve with you, YOU PUT MY BOY IN CHAINS AND A MUZZLE KNOWING DAMN WELL THAT HE WAS FUCKING TRAUMATIZE, WAY TO GOT MR.NO.1 HERO!!! WAY TO FUCKING GO!!! AND THEN EVERYONE JUST SAT THERE AND WATCHED!!!! YOU COULD HAVE HANDLED THE SITUATION BETTER!!!!! HE WAS CLEARLY NOT OKAY WITH IT!!!! DO BETTER! YOU HUMILIATED HIM IN FRONT OF MILLIONS OF VIEWERS!!! THE LoV treated him better and they didn’t even know about his trauma!!!! I have so much to say about all might, and some of them are positive too but I’ll probably do a post on that next Wednesday, but for now we’ll be critiquing. HOW DID YOU EVEN BECOME A TEACHER? I feel like there should be more qualifications than being a good hero. BUT ANYWAYS, YAK my whole deal with this man.

Those are all the UA staff I really have beef with, but I also love their characters and how they were written. Now onto my beef with some of these parents.

Mistuki: You’re really the only parent I hate. I understand Bakugō tried to hit you, but where the fuck do you think he got it from? He didn’t become violent and aggressive out of the blue. He got that shit from you. And will you please get your son some hearing aides, my ears bleed every time I have to listen to him scream. And you should’ve been more reluctant to let Bakugō stay in the dorms. And your yelling is not helping Bakugō. Ask yourself why he hates being around you? I understand that you care about him, but punishing your child by hitting them is not okay, period, wether it’s just a slap or not.

I ko: I LOVE YOU TO PIECES! I can’t hate you. I have so much respect for you, but you shouldn’t have let Deku stay in the dorms. I know you wanted him to be able to experience his dreams, and that you felt so guilty about him growing up without a quirk, but Inko, it’s not worth losing your baby over. You were right to be upset with All Might, PERIOD.

ALL FOR ONE!! I HATE YOU WITH EVERY FIBER OF MY BEING!!!! YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF SHIGIRAKI IN A VULNERABLY STATE AND GROOMED HIM TO BE A VILLAIN!!! AND YOU KILLED HIS GRANDMA!!!! HOW DARE YOU!!!! HOW DARE YOU!!!! HE WAS A CHILD!!! HE WAS GRIEVING!!!! HE WAS UNSTABLE AND YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THAT!!! YOU DISGUST ME!!!!

And a big Fuck you to hero society for turning children into soldiers. A big fuck you for letting these children experience traum on that scale! A big fuck you for not saving Shigiraki! A big fuck you for being so full of shit!!!! A big fuck you for making people feel less than for being without a quirk! A big fuck your for being an overall piece of shit society!!

If you’ve made it this far, I apologize for yelling and cursing. Thank you for reading.

[monkey-network]

The Fiasco Finale of Future [1/2]

So in the penultimate episode of Steven Universe 2, the climax of both the season and series as a whole... is a group hug. As I expected, plenty were not too pleased with this turnout. Some felt it was anti-climatic, some felt it was resonating, and others tried to own the critics by digging deep into the scene like they always do sucking this show’s co- Coming from nearly a month later, I’m... split. One hand, I didn’t mind the climax. On the other hand, it was pathetic compared to plenty of other finales I’ve seen in media. It’s like this show as a whole, I enjoy it, but I also enjoy smacking it upside the head cuz it made some Karen-esque, All Lives Matter type stupid shit that I just cannot get behind. So you know what, Perry the Platypus, let’s mix it up. I wanna express the good and bad of this climactic end to the show and see where we can go from there. You ready?

What’s Good:

You truly wanna know what makes that final hug a great scene? A real showstopper? I have the truth, the best truth behind this, you won’t believe me but here goes. The climax worked because A Hug Is Nice. That’s it, there’s nothing else to it beyond a hug being nice. “But Monkey, you incel troll, there’s should’ve been more to that. The episode shouldn’t have taken that long to get to that point.” Well, in typical fashion, let me put it this way by talking about Spider-Man 2 (better than Spiderverse, don’t @ me). The whole movie is centered around Peter’s life getting shat on. He’s getting fired left and right, his people are abandoning him, he even loses his powers, he’s just at his utter lowest. But at his apartment, while contemplating, in comes his landlord’s daughter, Ursula, who offers him some chocolate cake and a glass of milk.

We can say the scene comes out of nowhere and that this is all that happens, feeling pointless, but I say this is an important scene because after everything that happens to him before, this one gesture from somebody out of nowhere to be honest was one of the nicest things he’s received in a while. It’s the seedling of a scene that keeps Parker going before Doc Ock comes to make him truly spring back into action. Above everything, it was nice. Like a hug.

I don’t need to be philosophically deep with SU2′s meta to tell you that a hug can be a worthwhile thing to get more than anything. It doesn’t resolve all the baggage Steven has in his mind, but a group hug from the people closest to you (and the Diamonds) can be a gesture so nice, it can numb you out, if only for a moment. Only other times where Steven got a hug was when he felt everything could be okay. With Lars, Peridot, and Connie after her “rejection”, and it’s after that “rejection” where he slowly loses it in his attempts to shake off that harsh feeling of abandonment and that everything can be okay. It is something where he can turn to the others for help but the concern of their response makes him reasonably suffer in silence. That last part is a little dumb, but I’ll get to that later. He can’t really hug himself because it doesn’t work like that. The point being that Steven, at his lowest, just needed something nice to consider. And a hug from everyone who loves him (and the Diamonds) can be that piece of chocolate cake he needed to be at ease, again, if only for a moment.

Like let me tell ya, as a deliriously depressed man that constantly wishes for death, a hug shouldn’t be spat on. Whether it be from your friends or mommy, a good hug can, at the very least, keep you sane and going. It isn’t medication, let’s not get it twisted, but a healthy remedy nonetheless, especially if you’ve ever felt touch-starved like I have before. It’s an affectionate gesture that for what it’s worth, should never be taken for granted. And while Steven could’ve well gotten this big type hug at almost any time he desired, I can at least appreciate the show for saving that at the right time. Whew. But, while the moment itself is nice, it’s predictably almost everything around it that unfortunately puts the moment in a vacuum and me with a bad taste in my mouth.

What’s Bad: 

Let’s get this out the way, because I’m such a literal bastard... *inhale*

Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis.

MUSHROOM! MUSHROOM!

Congrats on those with the corrupted!steven theories who no doubt had it hard on when this horned trunk ascended, hung its head high, and beat its meaty chest with blind rage, the crewniverse certainly had the balls to go with this design and a long discussion of utilizing Monster Steven’s full potential. And if you think I’m nasty about this, hoo boy, be glad that words are all you’re seeing right now because artists no doubt had a field day potentially ruining this design for you even more. I’m surprised Tumblr’s flagging system hasn’t taken down whole posts with this. HEHEHEHAAAAAAAA!

As you can probably tell, I’m not a fan of this Diamond Dinodildo’s design (say that 5x times fast). I mean Rebecca could be as horny as she pleased with this show, but this is next level, I tell you. But seriously, it honestly sucked that this is what they came up with when it served no purpose to Steven thematically other than him being a literal peen of a monster. Said this before, but what does becoming a corrupted looking amalgamation mean to him beyond “he’s a monster”? Corrupted gems weren’t the worst things in his world, they were products of a even worse thing. Turning into a diamond like figure would’ve said something about the cycle of abuse making you not feel like yourself, but a reflection of who you not only resent more than anyone, but were the indirect causes of your newfound issues. That would’ve took his struggle in the Diamonds Days arc to its next logical extreme, and brought most of Future’s episodes centered around Steven’s issues to a sensible turning point. Being a warped Diamond version of himself would’ve meant finally embracing inhumanity, and that would’ve conveyed the peak of Steven harshly feeling less like a human over the course of the season, especially when we had several episodes and new powers centering around him being inhuman. And a previous episode had him try to shatter a Pink version of White Diamond, two beings generally responsible for everything that’s happened to him. And it isn’t the design that made this a turn off.

What was Steven even gonna do as a monster? He does nothing to the town, he never even makes it pass the cliffside. He doesn’t even try to attack anybody, the only times he does is when he’s provoked by either the Cluster, the Diamonds, or any of the gems. Spinel raised more hell than Steven. So on the look back it’s insultingly sad they hyped up this big dick energy only to do... genuinely nothing. He already didn’t deserve turning into Pinky the Phallisaurus, but having him not even do anything as a monster left far more to be desired. Mob Psycho 100 did this nearly identical, but better. You can’t deny that it would’ve worked better with 22 minutes, actually give him something to do beyond screech and stomp like he’s Scrat from Ice Age. As much as I don’t like Change Your Mind, 45 minutes worked to its favor to do everything it did. Oh wait, this episode did make good use of time... with a fucking pity party.

They wasted my baby

This is. The WORST scene in the entire series and I’ll stand by that 100%. It’s one thing to show something offensive, but it’s another to have something be completely pointless. Yes, Connie talked some sense into them, but we didn’t need to waste time having White Diamond and the others bitch about something everyone who isn’t a toesucking simp should’ve figured out at that point. Not like it mattered, the Diamonds and Spinel never show up after this episode anyways, so good job making them count for something, I guess. This as well as minorly acknowledge the fact that the gems had a lot to do with Steven’s mental trauma because hey, we don’t have to hold these gems too accountable for child neglect. Speaking of which, where was Jasp- This plays well into my previous point, we aren’t shown what Steven was gonna do as a monster, so what else is the episode to do beyond holding him back in time to just make the characters go “All is lost” for one second before getting back up like this is Marvel’s Captain Driftwood?

Friendship is Magic had this type of moment in its penultimate finale but in that, more time was given to show the villains getting the upper hand, Twilight at her low point, her turnaround with her friends, and the lead in charge to defeat the villains. While some moments felt convenient and downright insulting, they made the most of their limit. The same can’t be said for this and it makes no sense. Speaking of things that make no sense:

Was this shapeshifting or corruption? Rushing or dragging? This personally bothers me because people are saying he shapeshifted even when they were also on board with him corrupting. But what was the point where monster Steven cums cries into the ocean turning it pink?

Now if Steven got himself corrupted, this would make sense since the three Diamonds are there with so fully turning him back to normal wouldn’t be an issue. Questions would arise about how corruption can happen to a human, then again this is Steven Universe, fans never really wanted you to ask questions. But if this was shapeshifting, then why have this permanent monster form? It would’ve made a little more sense of Steven changing his shape depending on his emotions, like what we’ve seen before. Additionally, Steven should have been capable of talking normally instead of roaring and growling like he switched brains with an actual animal. Just because he kinned Godzilla’s joystick doesn’t mean he was unable to speak to anybody, that is if he shapeshifted. Lastly, and this is more implicit than my previous points:

This season shouldn’t have tried tacking mental issues and trauma onto this dickslap of a climax. I’m on the side where we should’ve seen more from monster Steven, but what does this tell me for the topic of mental health? Nearly killing people on three separate occasions didn’t help, but having him transform into a near mindless beast is a backhanded way to convey post traumatic stress. Let me put it this way, if we didn’t get that episode where we learn Steven had held up trauma and stress from Doctor Priyanka, everything surrounding it afterward wouldn’t feel as fucked up as it did. Yes, understanding a root of a character’s problems is good, beneficial even, but having your character nearly, sporadically, commit MURDER THREE TIMES only to then have him become a wildin’ creature does nothing, if not disgust. It's disgusting when you talk about PTS one minute and have your main character be socially dangerous the next. You’d feel sorry for him, sure, but I gotta say nearly killing people is not something we should just hand wave. That is not a good or realistic depiction of depression and post traumatic stress; especially when you trying to discuss this with children. And don’t try to justify it by saying it was necessary for his downward spiral. Having to think and see death before my own eyes in real life, there should’ve been a better way to make Steven hit rock bottom without putting other’s lives on the line. It wasn’t compelling or resonating to see him become a witless creature after saying he could get away with anything, it felt jarringly hallow and teeth gritting sadistic to think this was acceptable. It took him turning into a literal creature to finally go to therapy or a throwaway line about therapy in this show’s case? Are you kidding me?

The hug is a nice moment on its own, but it took far too many kneecaps to get to this point and think it’s believably or justly earned. I can make fun of the monster design all I want, but what they put Steven through to get to this point is the most insulting writing I ever have to think about. Because you know what that hug told me, personally? It’s that you can commit near irrefutable atrocities, you can behave like a blithering rampaging beast all you wish, but that won’t matter. Because you’re valid and your people will love you. That is not only asinine, but it kinda pissed on what I went through growing up. Like, as idealistic as that felt, it didn’t add up because it made the mentally unstable come off as more unstable than they mostly are. You can disagree all you want with this, it won’t change the baffling fact that I came to this conclusion in the first place when I didn’t want to. “But the crew said in an interv-” NO, just nope. If the message the show gives is this polarizing for those that invested or were concerned with it, maybe the message wasn’t clear enough, who knows? I can believe Mr. Rogers never fucked this up when he made his show. I tried thinking of this differently, but I can’t excuse what they did and how they did it. Bojack Horseman never pulled this with its main lead and when it truly did, that was given more time to sort out; not an 11 minute epilogue in its final moments. The hug was nice, but this episode was trash.

Speaking of which, next time...

We Finally Look to the Future

Here’s Part 2, if you’re up.

[ywhiterain]

Here’s my NaruSasu cred. So I’m not an anti just because I’m about to critically discuss the darker parts of their relationship. In fact, Ima just say it. I don’t know why you’d ship this pairing if you’re not here for at least some dysfunction.

I often hear fans say that NaruSasu is ~different than SasuSaku because Naruto hits back at Sasuke’s most toxic behavior while Sakura just takes it (btws she doesn’t - Sakura has stood her ground with Sasuke since the forest of death). That’s really dumb because measuring a relationship on how much punishment you can take without crumbling is pretty fucked up.

(I’m also not gonna classify NaruSasu as abusive because my next post will gonna detail on how Naruto damages Sasuke himself.)

More to the point, Naruto takes Sasuke’s betrayals much worse than Sakura. This is hard to measure beverages relationships are complicated and Sakura is certainly hurting throughout part two because her team is incomplete. But, when push comes to shove, Sakura was able to put other people before Sasuke. She tried to kill him because it was dragging Naruto down so much and she didn’t want Kakashi to carry the guilt of killing the student left his only legacy to.

And Sasuke does drag Naruto down. The fact that Sasuke pushes him to greater heights doesn’t change the fact that Naruto literally had a panic attack at the threat of losing Sasuke. Or lost himself to the demon within him pre Kurama redemption more than once at the notion of losing Sasuke. Or that he let people beat him up in hopes they’ll change their mind about killing him.

Now, most of this isn’t Sasuke’s fault. Naruto ties his identity and self worth into keeping his promises and being there for his friends. Naruto’s a ball of trauma himself - it’s not until he was twelve that he ever felt genuinely loved and that impacts how he sees people and relationships. The unspoken connection he built with Sasuke before they became team seven helped keep him sane. Sasuke didn’t ask for this and wasn’t responsible for Naruto‘s mental health.

But Sasuke’s first attempt to kill Naruto was tied to Sasuke acknowledging how much Naruto meant to him more overtly than ever before. And that didn’t mix well with Naruto’s issues. Having the person who you want to acknowledge you more than anyone give it to you and then turn around and declare they’re gonna kill you is not going to do wonders for your mental health.

And it’s not like Naruto ever really deals with it. He just keeps pushing forward, declaring them bff4eva. He’d literally rather die with Sasuke than allow for any other outcome other than Sasuke coming back home with him.

And Sasuke returns that devotion by declaring he’ll kill Naruto and everything he stands for. Naruto “gets over that” by just ignoring the horrific implications there. But it does take a toll on him.

Because Naruto was a story of hope, the darker implications of their relationship aren’t touched upon as deeply as the positive parts. Naruto’s finally gets his best friend back, but there was always a dark thread running through their narrative because Kishimoto drilled home, again and again, that losing Sasuke would be the one thing Naruto couldn’t recover from while Sakura was shown as someone who could prioritize other people before Sasuke, which, lbr, is much healthier than Naruto’s devotion to Sasuke.

I don’t care what you ship, but ignoring what actually happens in canon is pretty frustrating.