#OF THE MANGA. AND MAIN CANON. SO THAT'S. UM. SOMETHING. TO ME

[crehador]

brother crab's fall 2024 first impressions: maou 2099

i think i forgot to make a post after the first ep because my first impressions of it were just. not that deep. i do remember going in with zero expectations and thinking hey this is actually better and more interesting than what i'd imagined! but it still wasn't That interesting

HOWEVER

SECOND EPISODE ELEVATED EVERYTHING

first of all peak bishounen demon lord design here. nothing revolutionary but a solid classic. 10/10 no notes

and like okay so the premise of a ye olden fantasy times demon lord being defeated then resurrected into a far future sci-fi world sounded really fun with the potential to be super funny. it made me think of paripi koumei which was basically incredible

the first ep was a little higher on the drama than the humor imo, but the second ep? second ep, the humor really hit

i'm absolutely loving the demon lord's extremely loyal, faithful follower who worked for centuries to resurrect him and is also his number one simp. like this poor girl almost got outed as a demon king otome doujinshi otaku. right in front of her demon king

demon lord's job hunt and the outcome of it is also just. i won't even spoil it because. hilarious. truly

the worldbuilding is also reasonably interesting, i think that was one of the things that impressed me most in the first episode

overall, really pleasantly surprised by this one and looking forward to more!

[nefastnefertiti]

WHY CHAPTER 431 OF MY HERO ACADEMIA SCREAMS CENSORSHIP

First let's start by the "afterword", the note Horikoshi left after 430 and before the extras, chapter 431.

Original japanese for those who understand.

The best traslation I found and most people are agreeing with.

Key sentences are:

1.The real final chapter is 429, 430 is more like a curtain call.

2. PS: For chapter 431, I turn off the cameras and free the characters from their dramas.

This note being left after 430 and before the extras is so important. . The clarification of "the real final chapter is 429" and 430 is the curtain call is screaming: the show has ended here. This is further stated by "i turn the cameras off" by the man who use to refer himself as the camera man, I leave you with an example.

(They're talking about Vol 37 cover)

And back to point number 2: "and free the characters from their dramas", which could perfectly be understood as "the characters are no longer tied to their previous plots and drama" no longer connected to the main story.

It may seem like a reach until here, we're just trying to convince ourselves that's not canon, right? They´re delusions, right?

The problem is how far away everything about 431 antagonizes the whole story, the characters doesn't feel like themselves, they even regress back all their development, the drawing style looks totally different and there are many irregularities that call for our attention.

Dabi, 431 and by Horikoshi

Toga and Ochaco in 431:

Toga and Ochaco by Horikoshi:

All Might's signature for Katsuki (Horikoshi would never mess this up):

Kirishima with 6 fingers lol, Horikoshi loves drawing hands, he would never.

Katsuki's odd teeth what the fuck. (His hand looks good to me)

Ochaco and Shoto just look, weird. It's clearly not Horikoshi's art style.

And this awful background (center) was the main giveaway.

Horikoshi's backgrounds are so professional:

At this point I'm getting tired since the difference is astounding, don't believe me, just check the manga.

I don't think Horikoshi would've allowed those mistakes had he have a role in the making, maybe he did, there's no saying about that, but clearly if he did his involvement was very low.

Character's development wise now.

Seriously? "Deku"? And Katsuki complaining for picking him up. He cried his eyes out when Izuku lost his quirk and now he's back at season 1?

Izuku would never in a million years turn down that offer. And if he did, it would never be like this, so devoid of emotion and empathy.

430 showed us an Izuku aiming for his dreams again and at 431 this Izuku ¿? It's okay with being a teacher? Ok. And if that's not the problem, why he outright rejects Katsuki out of nowhere? When their rivalry was one of the main points of the plots for 430 chapters and now just um over? Without justification? Ok.

Ok.

Now specifically about that ship canonization and bkdk.

Horikoshi has been doing this for 10 years. The choices he took the whole manga were incredibly intentional, all those romantic tropes given to bkdk, his interviews, all stand in direct opposition to what happened in this last chapter.

I, myself, don't know much about Jump but what I've heard is they end lot of shonens with the same heterosexual formula. I don't think all of this is a coincidence.

Something really important that needs to be adressed to is what happened back in June (I think), when suddenly MHA announced it was ending in 5 chapters could've something to do with this. The manga was suddenly rushed to its ends with unsatisfying resolutions and as if that was not enough, one month later (at most) the same happened to JJK and all of this came accompanied by a switch of one of the heads of Jump.

About 431 again though.

I was just thinking what would I do if I was pressured to write something that ruins the biggest project of my life and goes against everything I was hoping for? Refuse. Tell them to write it themselves. If I can't do anything to stop it and it'll be there, alright, but I WON'T DO IT.

And I think this could be Horikoshi's case.

I've never seen a shonen manga come so close to implying his male protagonist and his male deuteragonist are in love before. Yes, it was not EXPLICIT but it was so fucking clear if you knew how to read, all the way up to 430. All those cliches tropes he gave them, he knew, we know.

I thought I'll die trying to explaineverything that seems wrong with this with nothing to back me up but the fact that he added that note is clear for me. I'm surprised they allowed him to publish it, I thought we wouldn't even have that.

PS:

It's interesting this being posted the same day 431 comes out. Also "heroaca is pretty dark, huh?"

I'll not go into this anyways because it's kind of a reach but the conclusion is: I think it's a "soft" censorship and Horikoshi did his best to relay his message given what he had.

Thanks for reading!

[pumpkinmetaphor]

um hello !!! i've never written an ask thingy before (chronic lurker) or seen much of tumblr(chronic following page lurker), so apologies in advance if i break some scary invisible asking rule. i just wanted to tell you how much i loved (am loving??) okay cupid. it's on the level of those pieces of media where the author is so skilled they are basically an enigma; made by the kinds of authors you can only learn information about through hard-to-access (and usually poorly translated) interviews. the idea that i could fanmail(???) someone of this caliber in the flesh(???) forced me to type this out (thank you parasites). i just wanted to say thank you for single-handedly inspiring me to get back into reading + writing after years of literary abstinence! genuinely, i'm shell-shocked by both your masterful use of language and how well you captured the essence of both canons in almost every single facet of the story. it really reads like something that could come from the mind of hatori herself, so all hats off to you! however, please take my "this is canon" yappings with a grain of salt because i lost my pirated pdf of the entire manga a year or so ago (and have not had the time to hunt down a new one, scrimp and save for the box set, or even read it if i had it). consequently, my handle on the canon is not what it once was and i could not remember the new year's party moment that's characterized as the kyokao inciter (kyoya gets a second pair of glasses) for the life of me. the kyokao focus seemed distinctly not-canon to me, but it could have been pulled out of an actual moment in the canon (the overall moment being very plausible). tldr (getting to the point woohoo!), was that inciting new years sequence real? was it a moment i somehow snubbed from my brain or a comment made in passing? i don't want to end an ask with a downright creepy interrogation, so i want to thank you again for putting such an incredible display of creativity on this earth. i'm telling you, hatori would be super flattered if she ever read this!!!

No worries at all! You're not breaking any sort of rule, thank you for sending me an ask! I'm glad you've been enjoying my fic so far and I'm so happy to have encouraged you to write and read again. Writing is so rewarding for me, and I hope it's rewarding for you too.

If you're looking for the manga if you do have time to reread at any point, this is all (to the best of my knowledge) scans from the official Viz Media translation: https://mangatoto.com/title/82197-ouran-koukou-host-bu-official/1583428-ch_1

(I have the box set, and anything I've cross checked is identical at least!)

The inciting NYE sequence is not canon though, that's from my brain! I wish it was, if even just for the kyokaoness of it all, but alas. That's me I'm afraid. There's such a big time gap from the last chapter of the manga (November 2007~) to Okay, Cupid! (2012) so I'm always falling for the urge to include a load of flashbacks haha.

Thank you so much for your praise though, I'm really glad you're enjoying the fic and finding it ic. My main intent with this fic was to grasp something as close to a continuation of canon as I could, within the limitations of it being a much shorter arc with no visuals. I'm glad that I'm apparently doing it justice. Thanks for reading! Feel free to send asks whenever you like!

[m1ckeyb3rry]

LMAO I just saw all the master lists on my feed and they look CLEAN im crying the Karasu one being filled is so funny but also talk about a blessing to Karasu nation

SHREK AND FIONA LMFAOOOOOO WAIT SO REAL I’ve also never watched shrek in its entirety I’ve only watched like clips of it in passing?? Never took the time to actively sit down and watch the whole movie oops that would actually be hilarious though and LMAOO SATOSUGU COSTUME wait nagi Lowk is perfect as Gojo though soooo

Manifesting we both return to normal too this is not fun LMAO it’s ok once the sickness goes away the inspiration will be back x10 stronger trust….

FRRR wait also speaking of im just realizing they skipped over the entire fight scene between Rin and Shidou after the first match????? Not that I care THAT much abt those two but I WANTED TO SEE OTOYA AND KARASUS REACTIONS????? Maybe they cut it there and decided to add that extra scene in ep1 but I’m lowk not happy about that but it is what it is I guess….

KIDNEY BEANS LMFOAJS that’s too funny and now that you mention it I see the vision…but fr maybe they just said Barous special like that so he gets his own color LMAO

Anything next to Karasu bfb looks small LOLLL ok but the kiyora fic was fr so cute…the fact that you basically hit all his main personality traits before pwc and the egoist bible drop though is CRAZY

frrr you can really feel the quality over quantity with kyoani it’s just >>>> also FR also the reason why I basically never watch the isekai genre too (I also just don’t enjoy the one piece art style on top of the way the women are drawn like…)

LMAAOOAA no because it’s actually such an entertaining dynamic but it’s funny cause we see like Karasu and yuki like high giving or something mid match too like canonically we don’t see beef but the dynamic matches their characters so well but wait the subgroups you’re making are cooking omg imagine tabishoken….thats just my lineup of gentlemen like hello??? Also YEAH I am surprised we don’t see much interaction with yuki and Karasu or others in general tbh (maybe it had something to do with his one track mind mindset from the ln because of his eye issues?) wish we had more I need more filler eps honestly also otoya bachira Shidou would probably cause property damage they’d be so out of pocket and chaotic LMAOO

YUKI AGENDA FULLY IN MOTION he was just too beautiful I WAS JUST GONNA BRING UP IGAGURIS FANTASY BECAUSE I FORGOT TO LAST TIME LFMOAAOAAOOAOAIAHSIAOAOAA THAT WAS SO FUNNY FR LIKE WTF the way he imagined Rin smiling and standing all proud like igaguri was his right hand man had me SENDING Shidou as a wingman would be an experience itself like the lead up of prepping for the date would be insane (imagine rseu after oaeu jkjk unless….)

Mmm yuki fic…ok but wait that cast is kinda dangerous wdym Barou as a guard and Karasu taking over yutas role um….that looks like prime swerve material…/j LMAO wait I’m ngl I actually kinda forgot about hollyhock and peregrine while listing that out (clearly) SHDGSHSHS my bad but also wait your workload/plans are kinda insane

ME TOO no because I never would’ve imagined all of our twin moments either like this is insane…Karasu really bringing people together LMAO

- Karasu anon

HAHAHA OMG YAYY i’m glad you like them!! i didn’t want to do smth too complicated given how many characters i’ve written for and probably am still yet to write for…like i know for a fact i’ll need to make barou, yukimiya, and noel noa ones in the future so i didn’t want smth that would waste a ton of time but this is just a simple divider + recolored manga panel (plus unicode for the masterlist label) so it’s really easy to make while still looking nice!!

HAHAH no me too i feel like i generally know what happens in it because of pop culture but when i was younger i didn’t really watch a lot of movies or anything so i never actually watched it!! but omg i just think a shrek and fiona costume for miraeita would eat so hard he would definitely think it’s hilarious (bonus points if we make karasu come with us as the donkey) and HELP satosugu costume with nagi is actually too fire i fear he’s literally the same height as gojo too and he has the pale hair and he’d probably be chill with wearing the outfit becuase it’s just black clothes LMAOAOAO stroke of genius right there

we can only hope 😭🙏🏻 this weekend is halloween weekend so i know for a fact i will be offline because i will be #partyingitup…developing lore most likely 😩 if any guys bother me i’m telling them i have a boyfriend and showing them yukimiya though i am not in the mood after the last time i went out ended up being the basis for the kiyora oneshot 😓

yeahhh i noticed that too i wanted to see karasu being salty and otoya making fun of them…it does feel like they replaced it w the scene in episode one but also i feel like it does a disservice to shidou’s character?? because in the manga they get in a fight because they can’t agree on scoring goals whereas in the show shidou just randomly jumped rin for like no reason SDKFHJS

IT’S LITERALLY THE SAME SHADE AS UNCOOKED KIDNEY BEANS i can’t stop laughing sae slander is so funny but yeah ig barou is just that guy no one can top him or copy him or even that close 😤 speaking of barou i cannot wait for his goal in the u20 match they better put every single drop of their budget into that idc about isagi’s goal or the rin v sae showdown or shidou or whatever just give me five seconds of absolute glory from barou and do justice to the celebration with him nagi karasu (and ig isagi is there too but idc abt him) and i will be happy

HAHAH it’s funny because compared to most of my stories for other fandoms (anything from aot, pomegranate ink, hurricanes/hummingbirds, my one atla fic) karasu bfb is pretty short?? like back in the day i could’ve finished that in a week MAX LMAO i’m getting unproductive 😓 it’s the fall slump happens every year but trust once winter hits i’ll be hit with insane inspiration and write something soul crushing and life changing like pomegranate ink again

yeah the op art style is not for me idk how people simp for characters from it SDKLFJH on the whole i’m more picky about art styles than animation because that’s what matters to me more than the quality of the animation hence why i would rather watch smth like bllk than op even if the animation for op is technically better LMAOOO and yeah i have literally never watched an isekai anime all of my isekai knowledge for the aegislash arc/hollyhock rin is based on those korean villainess manhwas where i’m also really picky about the art style but there’s so many of them that it’s possible to do that

THAT’S WHAT I’M SAYING like we have a lot of canon evidence of karasu messing with other guys (apparently he was yelling at bachira for being naked and making fun of tokimitsu for not being confident during the day before u20) i think yukimiya is like. the ONLY character we actually never see him slandering or saying anything mean to actually?? probably because there’s nothing TO make fun of SKJDHF but yeah so basically the beef is actually just entirely made up by me but it just always ends up making so much sense that i can’t stop adding it in

LMAO no because karasu barou yukimiya are like the responsible cool adults of bllk (barou = strict father that lowkey also spoils his kids, karasu = problematic fun uncle, yukimiya = role model rich uncle) they would get along so well meanwhile bachira shidou and otoya would be insanely problematic it would just be shidou and bachira randomly getting into beef with strangers and otoya cheering them or like it would otoya trying to teach shidou how to rizz people or smth and bachira critiquing even though he has ZERO experience with which to be critiquing KSLDJFH

SHIDOU IS LIKE AN ANTIWINGMAN TBH LMAOAOA like imagine him introducing a girl to karasu…karasu’s already like bro i am not hearing you out whoever you’ve brought for me is going to be insane if they willingly talk to you 😭 omg wait rseu where it’s the opposite of oaeu and shidou WANTS to set his teammates up with girls and be involved with their love lives but no one trusts him so they’re like “GO AWAY” and he’s like “NO SHE’S PERFECT FOR YOU HEAR ME OUT PLSPLSPLS” and somehow he’s actually right?? like he guess their perfect types every time but no one wants to admit it…wait and instead of aiku + niko we have charles as shidou’s sidekick and instead of being an unpaid intern charles actively makes things more difficult for shidou by ruining his reputation with the bllkers further and making them even less inclined to listen to him

THAT’S LOWKEY WHAT I WAS SAYING like as much as i love yukimiya having karasu and barou also being royal guards would have me SWERVING SO FAST for literally both of them 😭 like serious but gentle guard barou and sassy but talented guard karasu who likes to joke around to make reader feel better when she’s upset??? HOW CAN YOU EXPECT ME NOT TO FALL FOR HIM i think atp if i’m writing for any other character i need to just not even include karasu or nagi in the stories because i WILL swerve for them 100% of the time…barou’s on thin ice i think if it’s just him though i could stay loyal to yukimiya 🤔 wait ykw maybe we should just make the side characters opps so there’s no chance of swerving SLDKJFH change of plans yuta’s role is now going to be isagi and barou is going to be gagamaru (not an OPP per se but irrelevant to the miraverse) /hj okay maybe barou can stay but karasu has got to GO alright wait and instead of otoya as inumaki i’m throwing hiori in because he kinda fits better tbh (he’s not QUITE as mischievous as inumaki but giving hiori a joking side is more believable than giving otoya a serious diplomatic side yk)

HELPP i haven’t even updated peregrine since june and hollyhock since july so i don’t blame you for forgetting abt them anyways yeah the workload is a bit crazy rn hence why i’m trying to not have too many new ideas 😭 also side note ever since posting my masterlists i’ve gotten so many new followers i guess because they probably showed up in the character x reader tags?? so all of my older one shots from the summer are getting revivals (ex fwtkac) which is kinda funny…yk what’s truly insane actually is how popular OTOYA’S bfb is?? i thought the karasu version would be the one that more people read but i think besides seabird the otoya version of bfb might be my bllk fic with the most notes (i’d have to go through and check for sure but yeah) lowkey insane but no complaints ig

REAL i still think it’s crazy how we’re always syncing up…anyways i know i sent you a bazillion tik tok links in the second ask i responded to yesterday (which actually i posted that right as you sent this so ig we were online at the same time LMAO) but here are a few more because the edits are going crazy atm

BAROU EDITTTT bro i feel like i NEVER talk about him outside of our convos but i love him sooo much he’s so fine i don’t understand how he doesn’t have so many more fans

this is fr the audio that plays in my mind when yukimiya comes on the screen LMAOO

THE WAY THEY MADE YUKI SMIRK AGHSHHDSJKSJDNDD thank you 8bit THANK YOU 8BIT 🤩🤩🤩

[jin-zixun]

The List of Glee Character and What Starter Pokemon They Would Have I Kind of Referenced in So Did You Hear About Team Star? (that are also canon to that fic)

I'm putting it under a cut because oops its long

Rachel Berry + Popplio : I mean that's kind of the obvious one, right? The sparkling aria? I mean all the Glee kids sing but Rachel is the main character

Finn + Pikachu : He's the everyman all American boy next door and it's Pikachu. Perfect pair.

Quinn + Eevee : The counterpart to the Pikachu, cute and seemingly unassuming but holds hidden potential.

Kurt + Fennekin : Like Eevee, Fennekin is also cute, I just think Kurt belongs with an adorable fluffly little fox that will eventually be able to Psyshock everything in sight.

Mercedes + Oshawott : Really between this one and Piplup, but Samurott has that cool Hisuian Regional form so... Another water type to like, foil Rachel, but more of a cool vibe, and with more obvious fight to it. More masculine, so it could have gone to a boy, but Oshawott and Dewott are really cute also and would look good battling beside Mercedes...

Artie + Rowlet : Hmm something about the sneaky, quiet unassuming presence of the simple owl that becomes a ghostly archer really does it for this pairing. I'm not the biggest Artie fan, but I think if I was, that's what I'd want to highlight, the sleeper talents.

Tina + Grookey : I'd choose Toxel if that was a starter. Tina can have Grookey and Toxel. Get the whole band together Grookey is a cute little drummer that goes hard, especially as Rillaboom, and despite the shy exterior, so does Tina.

Puck + Totodile : Totodile is cool, he's an active little croc and he's pure power and I think Puck would appreciate that when choosing a starter. Also gives him a chance to be the mature one.

Santana + Charmander : Fire power, lonely little lizard, who hits so hard it'll make you ignore it's obvious vulnerabilities. I think they'd lay on the beach together and Santana would hold a parasol above it, just in case it ever rained

Brittany + Chikorita : Sweet, simple, but is one of the best when it comes to taking a hit. The punches just roll right off that one.

Mike + Quaxly : Apart from the obvious, that y'know. It dances, it's flashy in all the right ways and I think Mike would help him with his perfectly coiffed hair (I might be a little biased by Shadowhunters here) ...and yes, the latter point does also make me want to give it to Blaine as well. But... Well, it does dance.

Sam + Froakie : because um. because it's a frog. Also Sam is a nerd and would be so hype over getting a ninja pokemon are you kidding me? Also also, if you're a Samcedes fan... A Samurai and a Ninja, like, it kind of goes together, y'know. Connecting the dots?

Sugar + Scorbunny : It's a bunny! Adorable! A little hyperactive bunny that plays soccer! She'd go to all it's little pokemon games too I bet

Rory + Sobble : idk he just seems like a sobble guy to me.

Dave + Tepig : David is my baby and he's definitely got one of those fire/fighting starters. I think he's primarily a fighting type trainer, because y'know, gotta keep up that tough guy act. He's also got fire type to match with Kurt + Santana. Because of course he does. Plus Kurt calls him Hamhock, so... y'know. Tepig.

Blaine + Snivy : If you've read the pokemon manga there's a scene there where Bianca picks up Snivy immediately and goes "Here's your Snivy ^^" To Cheren, and that's how I feel assigning Snivy to Blaine. Here's your Snivy! (Although Quaxly very close. Especially with the messy hair)

Lauren + Litten : Its a cat that wrestles. There's no... There's no contest here.

Becky + Torchic : It's a chicken that fights. Literal cockfighting. Again. No contest.

Matt + Cubone : Cubone is only a starter in Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, but it is the lonely pokemon, I think it's the perfect partner for poor Matt who has almost no lines and is written out and completely forgotten. Poor Matt.

Joe + Bulbasaur : Bulbasaur just seems like a chill little guy, y'know?

Jesse + Chimchar : Doesn't he just seem like the type to have a Chimchar? Or more to the point a Monferno or Infernape, all style, a flaming monkey.

Jacob + Meowth : Another Pokemon Mystery Dungeon starter. Specifically the evil Meowth I think. The one that talks. It gives Jacob bad advice and talks him into morally questionable things.

Sebastian + Piplup : No I won't explain the joke

[discotenny]

DW DWWWW TAKE YOUR TIMEEEEE

Right like I feel so petty for being so mad abt it but the amount of people who get into hypmic strictly through the anime. and don't enjoy manga/want to listen to the drama tracks drive me insane because so many of them are ramuda stans who don't know half of who he IS AND LIKE WHY HE EXISTSSSS GRRRRRRRRR WOOF IT SCRATCHES MY BRAIN WRONG TO KNOW THIXSSSSSS

no hate btw to anyone who does just enjoy hpmi through the anime!!! I see you and it's all good!!! but the concept had me seething sometimes LOL

I think this is so much beyyer if they really can't make rhyme anima a retelling os canon, do something else fun haha

um. there are also like a huge group of people that think the events of arb are canon like the meeting dinosaurs and the bodyswap events and that is different than the anime situation but also funny

hope you have a good day and drink water and gets lots of rest! 💗 don't stress too hard on requests because you are very kind to do them and owe nothing to nobody 💗

AGAIN ITS JAKURAI ANON NAFKNWKFFJRKRR I HOPE THAT SENT ANON BECAUSE I THINK I CLICKRD ANON OFF BY MISTAKE AGH

NO NO ITS OK UR ON ANON FOR BOTH AKWBEKSHDKFNFMFKFJ DW DW LOL

People who r Rhyme Anima only and actually stuck around for the next season sometimes confuse me (no offense to those who do enjoy it) just because looking at the anime away from the source material- it really doesn’t make sense ?? Or at least it’s not properly structured, paced, etc etc.

It still has enjoyable moments but I just didn’t like how they butchered the plot w the drb by trying to fit so much. It’s like they didn’t know whether to leave it open ended or conclude the whole chuoke rebellion stuff so they just… tried to do both. Like it was in question whether they would get a season 2 or not &-&

Like the manga is legit SO GOOD !!! And it’s kind of sucky we won’t ever see those really amazing heartfelt moments, silly interactions, angst, and plot animated in a proper way.

The entire Dawn of Divisions manga is my favorite piece of hypmic material ever. And sure some of it can fit inside some spin off episodes maybe or whatever but that can’t be said for most of the manga content :((

I am disappointed Rhyme Anima doesn’t follow the main plot just cause Hypmic is so inaccessible to a wider audience. But, I much prefer the way they’re handling the second season as opposedthe way they handled the first. Like, instead of a silly mess mushing og content with canon compliance I muuuuch prefer them doing a strong og story. Ynno ynno?

I enjoyed some parts of s1 and I’m glad anime onlys enjoyed it enough to stick around to s2 tbh tbh. Hypmic needs more eyes on it esp from outside jp so as long as they’re staying lolol.

Also I think it’s hilarious how they’re seeming to pretend the events of s1 never happened LOL. Like where is Tom Whisper Weathercock and his epic return smh smh smh

ALSO THATS SO FUNNY TO ME KDBDKEHEKDBKEHEJDJ. People legit thinking the arb events canon omg XDDD

My personal interpretation is that ARB as a whole is a fanfic written by Gentaro and I will not take questions on that lolol

[scuffle-with-spirals]

OH MAN I totally forgot to update y’all. I finished rereading BR Angel’s Border the other day, like, the same day I started and unfortunately um, I feel I was kinda disappointed? The story just kinda ended with a wholesome last illustration of Shinji and Chisato and I really didn’t feel like the Slice of Life bits really added anything to the characters (even if the story was upfront on how separated it was from canon) and I was just like “well. man”

The two different artists that drew one episode each still brought some good visuals to the table, and I’ll admit Shinji and Chisato’s conversation in Episode 2 did get me a little interested in their potential dynamic, but like, I dunno. I can understand this was probably supposed to lean more into a character study of the lighthouse crew and those around them a bit before they were brought onto the Program but nothing really clicked with me. And honestly, Episode 2 really doesn’t even feel like it’s related to the crew, making the main selling point of the book moreso confined to one part.

 And I think that’s unfortunate, because in Episode 1, I totally forgot Haruka straight up had a crush on Yukie unique to this manga, and I was like “damn ok I can vibe with this” but then it’s not really explored all that much before. Y’know.

Like, I understand that the idea these girls all succumb to paranoia and fear, all dying trying to kill one or escape through a series of misunderstandings despite having such a strong initial friendship is why the lighthouse section of the original novel became one of the most popular side-stories, and of course the fact they died despite wanting to escape and still be friends does add to the hollowness and dark irony I think the original BR was aiming for, but the thing is: With BR: Angel’s Border being a non-canonical side story that seems to be mostly about the characters before that incident or before they even made it to the island at all, I was hoping to see more of that, y’know?

I’m not saying have Haruka confess to Yukie or have Chisato get to see Shinji again or whatever, nonono. You can keep all the open-endedness that made that section as tragic as it was, of course. It’s just, when it came to the interactions, I just wish I read something more memorable than what I got, y’know? I can see now why I forgot so much of my first read. ;;

All in all, I’m really glad I still own this manga though. For all it’s flaws, it was nice to read it again. While disappointing, it was by no means badly written; just not up to expectations, I guess, which kinda soured the experience. I still had a nice time. :0c Honestly, I’m surprised how I was somehow able to keep my copy in such good condition over the years, lol. In fact, I think my Battle Royale mangas are probably the most high quality stuff I still own. Save for a dog ear on one page in Angel’s Border I think younger me just sheltered these books with her damn life or smth and that’s honestly kinda funny LMAOOOO

[wherefancytakesme]

Salty Ask List

What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?* /W/anDom! It just feels really heteronormative to me, and the art I’ve seen looks far too lovey-dovey for those two.

Are there any popular fandom OTPs you only BroTP?* /S/ylander. Wander and Sylvia are one of the very few male/female duos that are really close purely as friends. It should honestly stay that way, if not just to show how close you can be to your friends too. Also /S/keleton Dance. Wander is asexual af to me.

Have you ever unfollowed someone over a fandom opinion? Nope, I only follow crew and art blogs. But I’ve defs blocked artists who were homophobic.

Do you have a NoTP in your fandom? Are they a popular OTP?* /B/lack Eye. I just think of those two as they gayest of all 5 mains, so there’s no way I could possibly be comfortable imagining them together.

Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?* I almost had Sylava ruined for me. Almost. Because of... uh... a certain someone I think we all remember.

Has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated?* I started coming around to Tumblesquid. It counteracts with my headcanon, but I love the idea of Wander being subtly married to Jeff the whole time.

Is there anything you used to like but can’t stand now?* I didn’t mind WOY nsfw before, but now all it ever is is Dominator or one of the female characters made to look sexier than they are. People who think Dominator’s hot should actually take a look at the series as a whole, dammit. It’s good.

Have you received anon hate? What about?* Nope! I don’t allow asks.

Most disliked character(s)? Why? Lil’ Bits maybe? She’s a little gimmicky for me as a villain. At least Awesome is fun to hate... Sort of, lol.

Most disliked arc? Why? The arc that got teased in The Robomechabotatron, but ONLY because we never got a 3rd season to develop it. Now it just looks like, “Haha jk we’ll never team up again, we learned nothing.”

Is there an unpopular character you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why? The only I can think of are the sexy princesses from The Hot Shot. I think it’s funny that the staff wanted to joke about Disney princesses who are conventionally attractive and look nothing like their cartoony fathers.

Is there an unpopular arc that you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why? I guess no one’s a big fan of Hater crushing on Dominator, but while it IS a little typical, I really loved watching Hater be a dork when we know that Dominator WILL NEVER LOVE HIM.

Unpopular opinion about XXX character? Dominator’s not that hot? Just because she has an hourglass figure doesn’t make her automatically attractive. That said though, I’m not usually into those types anyway. Goth OR femme fatale.

Unpopular opinion about your fandom? Are there any opinions on us at all? We’re so small, haha. Um, I guess that we’re more determined than some think. I bet Disney’s like, “Look, see? They’re quiet now, they forgot about #SaveWOY just like we thought”. Bitch nah.

Unpopular opinion about the manga/show? Um, the old dA beta comics? Um, I guess I don’t like beta Sylvia. Maybe everybody didn’t like what a buzzkill she was, but I also found her super ugly.

If you could change anything in the show, what would you change? I’D GIVE IT A THIRD SEASON, OF COURSE.

Instead of XYZ happening, I would have made ABC happen… Instead of only getting queer rep past with little jokes, I’d put in as much blatant rep as possible. WOY’s in space, there’s no such thing as human sexuality/gender standards.

Does not shipping something ‘popular’ mean you’re in denial and/or biased? In denial, not really. Biased, it depends on the situation.

What is the one thing you hate most about your fandom? That it’s getting smaller and smaller.

What is the purest ship in the fandom? Demurra and Drake! That’s canon, but still. They are so healthy and wholesome and defy all expectations!

What are your thoughts on crack ships? They’re usually pretty fun, purely for the sake of messing around with characters that would never interact.

Popular character you hate? Awesome. I just... wanna friggin’ curb stomp him whenever he’s onscreen. (But I do like watching him get wrecked.)

Unpopular character you love? Was there ever anyone unpopular? Frederick the worm faded into obscurity pretty quick I guess, but I still love thinking about him and Ryder teaming up and the latter working out his issues through the former.

Would you recommend XXX to a friend? Why or why not? OF FUCKING COURSE I WOULD! Who the hell DOESN’T support SaveWOY?!

How would you end XXX/Would you change the ending of XXX? Oh no, I ain’t touchin’ that one. All I want is to know the intended ending. THEN I will tell you what I might have wanted.

Most shippable character? Wander, dude. He’s the fandom’s shipping bicycle. But for me personally, I ship Peepers with most everybody. Everyone male at least.

Least shippable character? Brad. He’s eventually happily married, but the dude did not deserve anyone before then. And I mean, now that he IS married, he’s off the market anyway.

[abybweisse]

am i the only one who feels that the reapers lost or don’t have any “humanity”??? like, with sebastian it’s different cause he’s a demon. he isn’t really supposed to have any but with the reapers, they used to be human. they killed them selves when they where human. and they “work” with them since they have to watch them die.

I doubt you are the only one, but I can only agree with you to an extent. I think it varies somewhat from reaper to reaper.

Grelle probably acts the least human, with those shark teeth, the change to a chainsaw for a death scythe (that’s one of William’s charges against Grelle — a new, unauthorized death scythe modification), the blood lust that led to extra human deaths, the ability to compare Campania’s maiden voyage to a rough “first time”. However, even the blood lust and the overly sexual jokes about death and destruction are not outside the range of human desires, emotions, and actions. They are all just rather negative. Grelle, particularly early on in the series, acts like a human with a personality disorder — a sociopath, perhaps even a psychopath. By the time you get to ch149, though, Grelle seems to show signs of self reflection and something outside of selfishness. Hard to tell what’s going on; it’s like Yana-san hasn’t settled on Grelle’s personality. Maybe neither has Grelle. Which really makes me wonder what punishments are actually like for reapers who break the codes of their realm and office. Somehow, I don’t think suspension from work is quite as simple and... uneventful... as not being on duty for a while.... (Tampering with their cinematic records might part of it??)

William tries to be as non-human as he can, making him seem almost mechanical. But I don’t think he is that way inside. I see him as having plenty of human feelings but trying his best to hide them — even deny them — because he thinks such things can only be a distraction at work. His reminders to Ronald to remain objective might be for his own “benefit”. What benefit there is. Being so objective with his decisions, he is unlikely to see any human as worthy of saving. And that could hinder his own salvation... if that’s even a real incentive. The promise of salvation could be a lie. I’m hoping his objectivity breaks, at some point.

Sascha clearly enjoys being a reaper, but they seem very new to the job, and we haven’t even seen their death scythe. Just a camera (that Yana-san implies isn’t a death scythe, though it could be one in disguise, like Undertaker’s main sotoba), the death list, and a dossier. After decades, let alone centuries, of this... day in and day out... Sascha should start to feel worn down by it all. Even now, Sascha understands why some reapers might desert their posts. Most of those reasons seem pretty “human” in nature, don’t they?

I don’t have much to say about Ludger/Rudgar, except that he isn’t into being a reaper nearly as much as Sascha, and he takes a rather practical approach to his work. He’s like William but less detached in his attitude. He is openly more human. Less interested in the work than Sascha, less excited about the prospects of humanity’s destructive behaviors, humans making history and technological advancements, and more work for reapers to do.

Othello strikes me as a wild card who flips back and forth between bored slacker and obsessed nut-job. He clearly likes what he does... which isn’t collecting souls. Even though Undertaker is being labeled as the mad scientist of the bunch, this label should definitely apply to Othello, too. What might have started out as curiosity for Undertaker has taken a dramatically personal and emotional turn, but Othello is the sort (I think) who will truly cut you open and poke around for the pure joy of it.

Yana-san officially did not create Eric or Alan’s personalities or write their storyline; she only created their visual designs. Therefore, she can only lay claim to their images. However, giving them a cameo in ch105 suggests she’s accepted the core of their story into manga canon. They are the only examples of deserters we have, besides Undertaker, and if anything from The Most Beautiful Death in the World is to be taken at face value, it’s that their personal reasons for deserting their posts are very human emotions of fear, pain, love, and a sense of loss.

The least “human” aspect of Ronald might be his gruesome and demeaning choice of a lawnmower for his death scythe. He’s the one William warns to be vigilant about objectivity, and, during the circus and Campania arcs, Ronald shows no problem doing that. Overtime and extra paperwork suck, after all. However, the latest chapter, as of this post (ch174), suggests he might be considering Ada for the first “shinigami pass” of the series. Too early to tell, but that could be where his latest activity at Athena Sanatorium is headed. If so, then he’s quite human in his behavior, after all.

I have nothing much to say about Lawrence “Pops” Anderson, since we haven’t seen him in the manga. Seems to me he is in the canon, and that’s about it. He makes the custom glasses for reapers. He’s been around as a reaper for a long time. I have a crack theory regarding those glasses, but I’ll let someone ask me for it in a 🤡 ask....

Undertaker is actually quite human in his emotional range, imho. Sure, he’s got that mad scientist vibe going, but he’s a naturally curious sort, laughs deeply, loves deeply, misses his loved ones deeply, and he’s willing to go to great lengths to hold onto what’s left. He’s what someone like William or Ronald could become... if they let themselves feel about humans. Let’s not forget Undertaker must have discovered something about the reaper organization that the other reapers we’ve been introduced to probably don’t (yet) have a clue about. It has changed him from the “epitome” of a reaper he used to be (136649) into someone willing to destroy the entire reaper organization.

Um, anyway.... My thoughts on the “humanity” of the reapers. 😬 ☺️

[alison-anonymous]

I Want to Write a Mikayuu Series

Okay.

So um.

If you're reading this, HELLO. All of you long time ONS fans probably don't know me, but I'm Alison and I'm a hardcore Mikayuu, Mitsunoa, Gureshin, etc shipper. I've been in the ONS fandom for almost a year and dear god. The amount of people telling me that Mikayuu is queerbait is just making me really sad 😅 I'm a writer, and I'm the type of person who honestly feels like the author of a series should have the ability to choose how a story ends without influence of their readers. I mean, if it's their story, then it should be their ending, right? However, I also do have some qualms when it comes to how this "love triangle" between Yu, Mika, and Shinoa is being portrayed. This is entirely my personal opinion, but I feel like Shinoa seems to be forcing herself to love Yu. I honestly don't think she cares for him in a romantic way, but more of a very deep-rooted admiration or even envy that she's trying to convince herself to be romantic love. And Yu has said multiple times that he values Mika's life above his own, that he doesn't know what he would do without him if he were to die again (I mean the fact that he suffered seeing his best friend and potential lover die a first time was definitely scarring enough, PLEASE STOP TORTURING OUR POOR BABIES). And it's basically confirmed by now that when Mika said I love you in the manga, it was in the romantic sense. Even though I wish, I hope, I dream, and I pray that Mikayuu will become canon, I honestly can't say for certain what I think will happen. I think it could sway any way, with Mikayuu becoming canon, Yu and Shinoa becoming canon, or it being one of those ambiguous endings where it's heavily implied but nothing actually happens. And in order to make myself feel better when stuff like this happens, I tend to rewrite the entire story with the ending that I would have liked to see ;)

You're probably wondering where the hell this stranger is going with this. Well, I want to write a book. A series, actually.

One that's inspired by Seraph of the End.

Now, if you're interested in hearing me out, then feel free to keep reading. But if not, continue on with your scrolling, no hard feelings. But if you do, and I really hope that you do, give me a chance to explain.

I want to write a series inspired by Seraph of the End called Bloodsucker (working title, obviously). And this series is going to be a reimagination of ONS with an ending that I would have loved to see in the anime and manga. I plan to have three main characters (please keep in mind that I'm going to have name changes): Yuichiro, Mikaela, and a brand new character, Epic.

Now, I would begin this series a bit before the anime and I'm assuming the manga begins. I'd start with introducing our main three characters as they meet in the orphanage (yes, Epic would be a part of this orphanage as well) and how Epic and Yu try to make moves to run away only to be stopped by Mika and Akane.

I plan to include a scene between Epic and Akane where Epic tries to run out in the middle of the night only to be stopped by Akane, and this is what caused Epic to develop a crush on her (Epic is a girl btw). Then I would begin the whole shit with the vampires and how they set the world on fire and shit, but instead of the apocolypse, I'd make it so that most of the adults died in the fire while the kids were taken alive (because young blood is better and whatnot). This includes our little Hyakuya family. The directors would have tried to trade the kids lives for their own, and due to their selfishness, the vamps killed them and took the kids anyway.

This would begin my first story arc: the prewar.

Epic, Akane, Mika, and Yu would all be living under the vampires at this point along with the rest of the kids in their orphanage. I plan to include lots of moments of bonding that heavily imply Epic loves Akane even though she doesn't know it yet and Mika loves Yu, but Yu is fucking oblivious. The four begin to plot their escape, but while Mika and Akane (yes Akane too) are making deals with the vampires to help out with their family, Epic is constantly finding herself getting dragged along to visit Queen Krul. The pink haired vamp has a soft spot for her for some reason and often tells her that Epic and her family are "special" or sum shit. And she's super confused and semi grossed out. But none of the vamps ever dare to hurt her so she thinks it's fine. Then one day they all plot their escape and it's much more planned out and lengthy and less rushed than it is in the anime. Things almost seem to work out until the vampires stop them

And Mika and Akane DIE.

I know. I'm horrid.

Epic is standing here in shock as she watches the love of her life die before her and Mika BEGS for Yu to take Epic and run while they can. So while in the series only Yu survives, he obeys Mika and both him and Epic survive this. They're found by Guren (a new character I haven't come up with yet lol) and Yu is super protective over Epic, not wanting anyone to take the only piece of his family he has left (he's a fucking mess without Mika let's just be honest) and Guren ends up taking them under his wing.

Now we hit the second arc. Still with me?

The War.

Hold onto your hats everyone because this is where shit is about to get complicated. So I do plan to have a bit of a time skip into the current spot where Yu and Epic are attending school with Guren as their father figure and they've become very close. So close that Yu refuses to work with anyone else but her. They end up getting onto Shinoa Squad (obviously going to be completely different in my version) and they get put onto the battlefield. But here's the catch. Well, two catches.

Yu and Epic do have demon weapons. I do plan to try to incorporate that into this. BUT the backstory is different. I plan to make it so that the vampires obviously see the humans as fies. Insignificant things that are more playthings than threats. And they didn't want to have to deal with killing all of them, so they sent demons in their place to handle it. But the humans were able to form deals or "contracts" with the demons and therefore turned the vampires' own secret weapon against them.

Now, catch no. 2

So, Epic, Mika, and Yu aren't seraphs in this. But they are something else. I'm going to try to explain this as simply as I can, but each of them (besides Mika since he doesn't have a demon) have 3 souls inside their body:

Soul 1 is their current soul, the one that identifies as Mika or Epic or Yu.

Soul 2 is their demon soul, like what Asuramaru is to Yu.

And soul 3 is their archangel soul (I might change that name later on).

So I'm just going to come right out and say it. In this series, Epic is the villain.

Yes.

You read that right.

Epic is the villain. But she doesn't know that she is. These Soul 3s were reincarnated into the current bodies of Mika, Epic, and Ari (and I know that's not exactly how it works but screw logic this is just a fucking concept) from their lives centuries ago.

These souls existed way before vampires existed and Epic (or Essie) was very close friends with Yu (or Aytigin). Aytigin was in love with Haru (Mika) but for one reason or another, they couldn't be together. Essie wanted to do something, willing to do anything to make the two of them happy. So she made a deal that brought the vampires into creation so that Haru and Aytigin could be happy. She was willing to sacrifice everything that they stood for so that the two of them could be in love together.

She had good intentions, but of course Haru and Aytigin were furious because now the vampires were turning against the humans and they all basically died. Until they were reborn respectively, but unknowingly.

Now picking back up in the present, Yu and Epic are fighting in one of the main battles and the two are very confused when the vampires make a very deliberate attempt not to hurt Epic. They're unsure as to why, but Guren tells them not to worry about it.

Suspicious bastard.

Anyway, it's revealed finally that MIKA IS ALIVE

BUT HE'S ALSO DEAD

Yes he is a vampire. And Yu falls in love all over again upon seeing him, and after a bunch of struggling, Epic gets kidnapped. At first she gets strangled by Lacus and then she gets kidnapped by Ferid who doesn't kill her surprisingly.

Oh and uh... Ferid is nice in this. He's still a fucking creep, but he's a lot nicer than he is in the series. I plan to make Queen Krul or whoever I turn her into be the villain.

Anyway, they take Epic back to the vampire palace or whatever and Queen Krul and Epic are reunited! And Krul is the one who reveals to Epic exactly who she, Mika, and Yu are and this is what sparks Epic's fall to insanity.

I mean, she's the killer. She's the one who brought them into this world. She's responsible for every death the vampires cause.

I would go crazy too.

So, she manages to escape (partially thanks to Mika) and the two join Yu and the others again and it's revealed a second time exactly what is going on. And while no one actually blames Epic on the Shinoa Squad, that doesn't stop people like Kureto and even herself from blaming.

And this causes her demon to go haywire.

She begins losing her marbles, almost killing her teammates and trying to kill herself, all while the three begin to experience dreams or visions of their Soul 3s.

While all this shit is going on, there's heavy romance between Mika and Yu because these two lovers just got reunited and FUCK did they have glow ups but yes -

Oh. And there is another spark for Epic, even though she doesn't think she's worthy of love.

Okay. I'm just gonna say it.

Lacus falls in love with Epic. Yes. You read that correctly too.

I plan to make the two of them get trapped together at some point and they have to work together to escape. It's during this time that Epic realizes he's not all that bad and has some form of self control and he realizes that she's the most interesting thing he's ever met in this disgusting and boring life and damn do her eyes look pretty-

But yes. She forms a permanent alliance with him that he jokes about as marriage and they meet on other occassions too, but lol yes.

Anyway, blah blah blah, more fall to insanity, the Soul 3s take over their bodies on multiple occasions and there's a lot of bonding and fighting and Epic and Mika somehow manage to get some of the vampires on the human side.

And in the end, Epic and Yu basically sacifice themselves to save the human race and kill Queen Krul. It's a very rough ending I haven't quite perfected yet, but Yu has a moment like he did with the King of Salt. But though he inflicted a lot of damage, it's not enough. So while the team is worried about him, Epic takes this opportunity to fix her and Essie's mistakes.

She allows both Essie and her demon to take control of her body and dies on the battlefield. Queen Krul is eliminated. Most of the vampires are gone. The humans won.

Horray.

Epic is dead.

Kinda. Yu and Mika take her back home and this is the preview to the last arc where everyone's in the hospital and Epic's in a coma. Mika and Yu barely ever leave her side and it's only when Lacus of all people comes to visit that she fucking wakes up.

Okay. Are you still with me? Now come with me to the final arc.

The Post-War.

No my friend. It doesn't end there. Because Mika and Lacus are still vamps and life still sucks and I drank too much coffee this morning.

No it's not over yet.

So flash forward a couple years and Kureto and Crew are working as the heads of this city. Stuff is being rebuilt, people are settling down in homes, Lacus and some of the other "good" vampires find jobs, and Mika, Yu, and Epic get a house together (in case I didn't mention before, Epic is pansexual. She loved Akane dearly and I plan to include scenes where she sees her in her mind and dreams like Mikayuu so she's never truly gone, but she falls for Lacus too when he's not being a sadistic asshole). Things are going strangely when

BAM. Epic and Yu come up with a cure for vampirism.

How, you may ask? I don't fucking know, I haven't read about it in the manga yet but before we come up with an idea for it, imma say they came up with it through a spell. They share their findings with Guren and soon all vampires are being cured, most notably Mika, Lacus, and even Rene.

BUT and there's always a but, Kureto passes a new law claiming all vampires to be property. That any vampire or previous vampire or even vampire supporter/owner that tries to disobey these new laws is to be killed immediately. Now Epic and Yu are in jeopardy because their ex-vampires are in danger (Epic and Lacus have been hanging out a lot more and he's proven himself to be a decent guy. Contrary to popular belief, I headcanon him as not really knowing what to do when he actually cares about someone since he's been a heartless vamp for so long. So when he turns to Mika and begrudgingly asks him for LOVE ADVICE of all fucking things, Mika is ready to die). So basically, Mika and Lacus end up getting locked up along with the other ex-vamps (including Ferid which was a pain in the ass) and did I forget to mention that there's a proposal?

Oh yeah, Yu proposes to Mika and the blond still has yet to give him an actual answer because poor baby is still having a hard time accepting that Yu can love a "monster" like him.

But anyways, now Epic and Yu are furious and SHINOA SQUAD IS BACK IN BUSINESS. With the help of Guren and Shinya and everyone, they form a sort of rebellion and blah blah blah they manage to get Mika and Lacus and everyone out and blah blah blah they all get separated and Lacus begins to get INSANELY protective of Epic and ends up confessing his feelings to her before he nearly dies and blah blah blah did I forget to mention that I'm making Mitsunnoa and Kimizuki x Yoichi canon and blah blah blah.

Epic kisses Lacus as an instinct. Lacus kisses her again. Mika accepts Yu's proposal then almost dies AGAIN. I kill off some characters for emotional tugs and after a ton of more fighting and revenge and psychological breakings later, Kureto is killed. And Guren (or someone else haven't decided yet) is the new head of their city.

Epic, Mika, and Yu finally let Akane and the kids go. There's a lot of Shinoa Squad bonding but this is a summary so I haven't included much besides the main three. Epic and Lacus becomes canon. Mika and Yu get married. Guren and Shinya get married. Shinoa gets pregnant.

And everyone gets the FUCKING HAPPY ENDING THAT THEY ALL FUCKING DESERVE BECAUSE FUCK

I do plan to be slightly ruthless like the creator and include a lot of heartbreaking scenes, but it's going to be much different than ONS but I still want it to hold on to some core relationships.

I just want them to be happy. And I just want to make other people happy because fuck I JUST WANT TO BE HAPPY

So. Yeah.

That's Bloodsucker...

So my question to you is... if I wrote this shit.

If I sat down and typed about 30 books roughly inspired by Seraph of the End and Mikayuu and Mitsunnoa and shit...

Would anyone read it?

♡ a.a.

[transsexualhamlet]

predictions for yuumori s2 (as a manga reader)

No matter what happens, this is probably gonna end up aging badly, but i’m hyperfixating and I’ve decided to make it everyone else’s problem so I’m going to predict where they’re gonna go with s2 of moriarty the patriot (keep in mind i’m writing this as of episode 2) and what I think would be the ideal scenario, in the likely situation that this is the last season.

So we can tell a lot about what they’re going to cut/include from the opening and ending, and the first two episodes. 

Observations/Conclusions:

-moneypenny and most likely von herder are gone, already evidenced by the first 2 episodes, which is :( but understandable bc there’s only so much space and they’re definitely cutting the arcs where they would be important

-so that means no moran backstory because duh, there’s a point in the backstory and i see value in it, moran slaps when he’s not being an ass lmao, but again, time constraints

-no matter what I can’t see them keeping in the like, child hunting thing 2 electric boogaloo, even tho it did further Fred’s and Louis’ characters, since they’ve previously cut out stuff considering them and. You know. That’s how it be.

-You can see they’re including jack the ripper arc (considering, jack is in the opening) and I have faith that they can downsize the arc without butchering it if they do it right. This is good that they’re keeping it in, considering it’s one of the... main arcs not involving milverton that advances the plot.

-Major thing we can tell is that, yeah, Milverton is nowhere to be seen. It seems like this would fuck things up bad since he’s like, the only kind of “main villain” we get here. But honestly? I agree with that. Fuck Milverton. He has no character or motivation and is like my one and only bone to pick with the manga. He’s just there to suck ass and create plot convenience?? I don’t like him and he never needed to be there if he wasn’t at least going to do something interesting. I support the anime cutting him.

-That DOES fuck over their ability to do the white knight arc, since, well, milverton is the cause of all of that. And this is the one thing I really don’t know what they’re going to do with that to connect jack the ripper directly to the final problem. I can’t predict that, but I do think there are ways it can be done that won’t be Awful.

-So considering that, Mary’s arc is definitely axed, which doesn’t bother me that much since by that point i so impatient for gay people and really didn’t care about watson’s fiance even tho she is a lovely lady. For anime effect, she does not need an arc, though I could see them having her show up a few times so watson doesn’t seem too gay either lmao.

-They’re definitely shooting to end with the final problem, considering without it there’s no big culminating event between moriarty and sherlock, which is obviously the big sell. And well. It’s. Um. The final problem. 

The season says it’s slated to be 13 episodes, since s1 didn’t have enough time for 12. I honestly think they can manage it all, if they play their cards right. 

Outlook:

This whole potential situation does sound familiar, I’ll point out that I just arrived here after the shit show of the promised neverland’s second season. But I don’t think it will get bad like tpn did. Because in Moriarty, they could afford to cut things because there are many stand alone and disposable arcs, whereas tpn really shouldn’t have, since they pretty much all contributed later to Major Main Character Plot Things. And the important points of the arcs that they’ll probably cut can actually be written into existing ones without looking like plot convenience, in my vision of it.

Honestly, I’m pretty optimistic for moriarty, it works better for this kind of adaption than in a lot of other manga that end up getting these most likely two season adaptions. I’d love to get those arcs for the servant’s and other character’s developments of course, but trying to stick that in when there’s really only time to focus on the main characters would suck up time better spent on really getting deep into the main storyline. Even if there are less characters, in a situation like this a streamlined and nuanced story will look elegant, whereas shoving as much content as possible into a few short episodes makes everyone cringe.

The situation does end up looking like the promised neverland, but it has a chance to be significantly less fucked considering,,, well,,, tpn is an insanely low bar, and they will hopefully not make the promised neverland’s same mistakes of Shove Seventeen Plotlines Into One Episode After Realizing Belatedly They Actually Needed Those Parts.

Obviously I don’t know what will happen, and this will be outdated by sunday lmao, but my projection looks something like this for 13 episodes to conclude the show.

Predictions:

(Episodes 1+2: A Scandal in the British Empire)

Episode 3: I’m very anxious for 3 considering this will probably make or break my opinion on the anime. Ideally, this episode would wrap up the scandal arc and go over the whole James Bond thing, it could be pretty baller and fit well into an episode. But though there’s plenty of Irene in the opening, there’s no sight of Bond, so considering anime as a whole is fucking transphobic, they might try to change it, twist around bond’s words or just, gloss over it altogether. If they cut it, they might have time to squeeze in another arc but I don’t think they honestly need to? With what they seem to be keeping in, they’ll have ample time to get to everything, and it would be shorter anyway considering the smaller amount of servants. 

Here, we do definitely need to cover Sherlock’s “receiving the name of the lord of crime and deciding to burn it and find it out himself because he’s extra”, no matter the status of irene/bond’s gender. If they do that right and possibly change a few things so it’s more important, this could play into them moving forward his whole discovery of their secrets.

Episodes 4-7: These will most likely cover jack the ripper arc. There’s a lot to go over here, and I’m confident they can cut it down, because tbh Moriarty is pretty long winded for a manga and cutting things is good to an extent. This covers most of the major expansions on William’s ideas and plans, and definitely has the holes to stuff in more of the points made in the arcs that will be cut out. Though I have my reservations, they could plausibly take most points in white knight and integrate them into here.

Episodes 8-10: These are the ones that are going to take the most work and probably be the most changed. They should finish up the ripper arc in 7, give or take a few episodes, and then here, If Sherlock has a little more figured out from episode 3, he can look deeper. I think it’s honestly a good idea for the one to discover the Incriminating Records to be him, as it again gives them more connection. There needs to be some other reason Moriarty’s secrets are in danger of getting leaked to the paper, but I’m sure they can put something together with scotland yard or something, or even like, Mycroft. I see that. But if that happens, then we can spend an episode or so on the merchant of london, aka little liam commits girlboss, which can be woven into the idea of everything Coming Out.

Episodes 11-13: Final problem. I see this going mostly unchanged, up until 55. Truth is they’ll probably end up cutting something but hmm. I don’t know. They should keep the fred stuff in, since they’ll cut his other development. They should keep the squad asking sherlock for help, since they cut the other parts that highlight the crime squad’s care for him. But I think they could montage most of the William Goes French Revolution On You Hoes, even the part where the kids come in front of one of them, if you see what’s going on right. But everything can proceed as in the manga pretty smoothly, I think, it all makes sense if they put it together in 7-10. You know, you got somehow, the worst case happens, and boom, scandal, final problem enacted. Killing spree. William reveals he’s been emo this whole time but it’s too late now. Everyone scrambling to catch up with his damn plans. Gay boy knocking on 221B with a fucking love letter. Shit gets found out. And then... well, yuh.

Disclaimer I still don’t know everything about this, bc I cannot find a translation of 54, only the raw with no context, and I know there’s content after 55 but I can’t find that either. But I’m sure as hell an english major and can understand where things are probably going. I don’t know what’s involved at that point, and if there’s some plan detailed to save him or something. That’s the main thing I don’t know, and if there is one detailed of course that kind of changes everything, but for now I’m going on the assumption that 54 is “sherlock runs to the bridge and yells at liam to stop being a dramatic whore while london burns around them and the murder squad watches anxiously with mysterious intent, until it is chapter 55″. (IF Y’ALL HAVE THE ENGLISH PLEASE HMU) They better not TOUCH anything in 55 or so help me god.

But as to after 55, things are going to be different. Besties, I’m an optimist, but there’s no way they’ll make a season after this. It does appear that they’ve mostly wrapped up, and they’ve gotten through what Big Revals they plan on doing. The shit hinted from the beginning has happened, and there probably won’t be enough to create another, unless the author plans on fucking shit up again, which I don’t approve of. There are a few things still left unsaid, like, Liam’s real name and everything, but if it’s supposed to be important, things that small can 100 percent be written into this.

And as something that’s intending to finish up a story, depending on what manga canon really is (BESTIE I DO NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS) they might change it. There’s two options, a bittersweet/hopeful and a tragic one, but either one will end up open ended, because of my extensive knowledge of 2 season animes with significantly longer mangas. (done badly: tokyo ghoul and tpn, done well: owari no seraph and mob psycho) Either we have it like well, oh damn, everything was destined to be Sad but well you’re with him now you’re probably dead, but you know there’s something hinted at and you don’t know for sure so that’s the catch. So you get a vague and bittersweet but possibly hopeful ending. OR something that takes,,, whatever ends up happening in the manga or whatever the plan is and turning it into an epilogue infodump.

I can see either going well depending on how they handle the messages of the story. But yeah, as far as to my extent of the understanding of the show, that’s how it’ll probably go, and what my opinion of how it should is.

To What Extent Will The Gay:

You know, this is my ideal scenario within these time limits, but you know they could always go The Wrong Direction if the anime team took a look at some of the later chapters and went “holy shit this is a bit too gay” and try to axe some of the sherliam content, which I wouldn’t put past any corporation.

In the case that they do, I see lot of good shit going. They’re clearly trying to do the final problem, so they obviously can’t cut out 55, which is good :). But though 55 is clearly, uh, really fucking homosexual, the most romantic shit goes down in 53, as far as I can tell? (keeping in mind i still haven’t found 54′s english version, if anyone would like to direct me to a translation, that would be LOVELY.) I unfortunately can see them cutting Liam’s letter almost entirely, and that kind of scares me.

You know, even if i’d hate and slander them for it, cutting out james bond would be something i would understand. But messing with sherliam would fuck them over, not just cause that would be awful, but like, because it’s like... kind of the main point.

So I’m not really too worried about them messing with it, mostly because the content itself is holding them at gunpoint, sherliam holds the whole plot structure in place, especially if you’re shooting for final problem. And even in the manga they never, like, actually say they’re in love with each other even tho historically gay lovers would probably call each other “friends” lmao so it’s not like they have to greenlight gay sex or anything lmao it’s just Very Romantic (No Homo)

And apart from that, yuumori has actually been pretty decent to the gays so far?? Damn shawty, they certainly haven’t toned down the gay yet and it’s clearly their main source of fans, and what they’ve decided to emphasize in both openings and a significant portion of the s2 ending. We’re all here for it, and they’re catering to it, so I can at least give you that.

[chibistarlyte]

Todoroki and Tododeku for the ask game?

aaaaaaaa thank you for the ask, my friend!!!! i always love getting to gush about my kidssssss

.

Todoroki

How I feel about this character:

precious boy??? light of my life?? i love him with my entire heart and i must protect him at all costs.

All the people I ship romantically with this character:

oh god um. so many? i guess i'll just name all the ships i like/read for/write for: todobaku, tododeku, todokiri, todobakudeku, todokiribakudeku, todokiribaku, inatodo, todosero/seroroki, todoiida, todokami...those are the main ones. though i'm very much of the mind that todoroki deserves all the love and support ever in the world so i'll pretty much accept any ship with him as long as it's not like...the usual squicky ships or m*neta.

My non-romantic OTP for this character:

TODOMOMO. god i want them to be bffs forever! also todotoko. i just love any interaction between todoroki and tokoyami ;A;

My unpopular opinion about this character:

i...don't think i have any opinions about todoroki that would be unpopular? unless you count my thought that he's actually not horrible at cooking like everyone says he is?

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

oh lord. i have to pick just one thing?? i guess out of all the things i wanna see in canon, the thing i want most is to get an on-screen hug between him and rei ;n; they both deserve it

my OTP:

TODOBAKU please and thank you.

my cross over ship:

uhhh................................idk? it's not necessarily a ship but kat and i have a free!/bnha fic in our drafts and at one point i would love to see todoroki interact with makoto, they're both such gentle boys;;;;;

a headcanon fact:

todoroki is a sleeby boi. he sleeps/naps all the time. and that is FACT.

.

TodoDeku

when I started shipping it if I did:

this is like every other answer under the sun but SPORTS FESTIVAL, BABEYYYYY. i think i started watching bnha right before tododeku week 2019 so i had only gotten through the stain arc before i wrote my very first tododeku fic lmao. i was smitten with this ship so fast!!!

my thoughts:

they used to be my otp but were eventually overtaken by tdbk, but i still have such a large part of my heart reserved for this ship. they're so incredibly sweet and soft and when i need something extremely fluffy, they're one of my go-tos.

What makes me happy about them:

how much they care about each other? like todoroki is always so hyperaware of midoriya and his needs? also the fact that neither one of them has a problem with calling each other out on their bullshit? i love that so much.

What makes me sad about them:

that we really don't have a ton of canon interaction with them lately, especially from midoriya's side of things. he's got so much shit going on that there hasn't really been much time for midoriya himself to address the hugely traumatic post-war shit on todoroki's side? at least the most recent manga chapter is a step in the right direction and their interactions made me so soft ;u;

things done in fanfic that annoys me:

i really don't like when people woobify either of them, it's so goddamn annoying because they're both so strong in their own right!!

things I look for in fanfic:

with this ship, i love domestic fluff and slow burns with mutual pining. uwu

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other:

for todoroki: bakugou. for midoriya: uraraka.

My happily ever after for them:

getting married and owning a home with a few cats and living their best pro-hero lives! alternatively, i would love to see them both leave the pro-hero scene and becoming quirk counselors!!

who is the big spoon/little spoon:

midoriya is the big spoon and todoroki is the little spoon, mostly. they can switch but todoroki loves to be held uwu

what is their favorite non-sexual activity:

watching all might documentaries!! (with midoriya lovingly ripping some of them apart because of factual inaccuracy and todoroki listening intently and loving on midoriya for being so smart and dedicated). alternatively, going out on dates to cat cafes.

[theshinsun]

KNB for the fandom ask thing if you’d like to!!

(sorry this took forever, work was crazy this week ;;-;;)

send me a fandom and i’ll tell you…

the first character i ever fell in love with:

Kagami. (I know, right?) I started watching the show when I saw the way he was drawn, and came to really love his character throughout seasons 1 and 2. 

Side note: I really only fell in love with Aomine once I saw how he looked in the manga, and got more into his backstory in late season 2/early season 3. 

a character that i used to love/like, but now do not:

Idk I used to like, unironically like Himuro, and subscribe to canon’s endgame portrayal of him as a harmless nice guy (with no personality to speak of). Now I like him, but like... only in the sense that he can be used narratively, and to comedic effect. I also still like his play style, but I don’t like him like, as a person.

a ship that i used to love/like, but now do not:

I don’t really wanna bash any ship in this show, since the characters are loose (read: underdeveloped) enough for their actual ship dynamics to kinda be up for interpretation. 

The one example I can think of, though, for a ship I used to enjoy that now kinda bothers me, is KiKasa. I just don’t see much genuine affection between these two, and yeah I get that people show their love in different ways and all that, and there is definitely something there to work with if you read between the lines, but still... I dunno in canon it mostly seems one-sided at best and antagonistic at worst to me.

my ultimate favorite character™:

...C’mon, you know who it is. The number one spot has to go to Aomine, every time. Someday I’ll write a whole in-depth character study to explain why, but if you want the thesis statement, it’s this: Aomine is the most interesting, developed and multi-faceted character in the entire series, and you can fight me on that.

prettiest character:

If we’re talking manga, then Aomine, but since he looks like a raisin in the anime, I have to give the award to Midorima, with Mibuchi coming in a close second.

my most hated character:

Heh. Uh... funny story, it used to be Hanamiya, or possibly Haizaki, but now I think my hatred for Akashi has actually surpassed them both, because we’re meant to dislike them so at least they serve their most basic function. Whereas Akashi’s arc is so forced and anticlimactic it’s infuriating, and that’s before even getting into his personality.  

my OTP:

You know what, it’s still AoKaga. After six fucking years, they still have my heart. If I can bend the rules and slip in an OT3, I’d say AoKagaKuro, but otherwise, if I had to pick one ship, it’s those two idiots with their rival dynamic, interesting chemistry and essential narrative function of pushing each other to get better. 

my NOTP:

Like I said, I don’t want to bash any ship, but if I have to pick one that just grinds my gears, it’s AkaKuro. I just... don’t get it. I mean, I get it, I know why it exists, but I don’t get it, you know? 

...I dunno, if that’s your cup of tea, more power to ya, but I personally don’t ship it and I don’t think I’m ever going to. 

favorite episode:

Episode 37: I Look Forward To It. 

Ah, the onsen episode... I know this one by heart. 

Okay, I guess I should explain myself, because on the surface this looks like pure empty fan-service (on both sides), but this episode actually has some really great character and plot-related moments. It’s the part I always jump back into when I re-read the manga, because it’s where things really start to kick off. Seirin’s been beaten down and hopeless and finally have their chance at revenge, and they find out in this episode that they’re going to be getting it right away. There’s some really great Seirin and Touou bonding, some more evidence of Momoi being a data-gathering badass (though her actual appearance in this ep bombs the Bechdel test and kinda just rubs me the wrong way). 

My favorite part, though, is Aomine and Kuroko’s confrontation in the bath house. I’ve heard someone say once (and I agree) that this episode shows a whole team of naked men (and two naked women) and yet the scene with the most sexual tension has everyone fully clothed. It’s also just a super emotionally-charged moment, full of saying things without saying them, and Kagami showing up to declare Seirin’s intentions of victory is the cherry on top. I love this episode, I’ve probably watched it about a hundred times, but I’d gladly watch it a hundred more and that tells me it’s my favorite.  

saddest death:

Himuro’s character development. I mean uh... Kiyoshi’s leg breaking, yeah, that’s totally it. Actually, him leaving at the end of season 3 is really sad, we don’t get many third years retiring in this show but that hit just as hard.

favorite season:

Season 2. It’s where the show kicks into high gear, and the plot really gets rolling. It’s well-paced and exciting up until the middle of the Yousen game, and shows so much awesome development for the characters it introduced in the previous season. Everyone gets some new abilities, but my favorite reveals have to be Kuroko’s Vanishing Drive and Overflow (that moment when Izuki gets “erased” in the Seirin/Touou game lives in my head rent free), and of course the Zone. Season 1 is nice and season 3 has some really iconic moments, but season 2 is great from start to (almost) finish, and that makes it the strongest of the bunch.

least favorite season:

As I said, it has some iconic moments, but KNB’s weakest season by far is its finale. For one thing, it focuses almost entirely on a single game, and so that game drags on forever, beyond the realm of enjoyment until it becomes tedious to get through. Besides that, though, it goes out of its way to introduce plot threads and characters that don’t really go anywhere (Haizaki and Ogiwara come to mind...) the animation budget takes a noticeable beating, and so do the trajectories of two of Season 2′s most interesting antagonists (Himuro and Akashi). The main saving grace of this season is the Teiko arc, but, enjoyable as it is, under a critical eye it’s still a lengthy, pretty unnecessary detour that stops the main narrative dead in its tracks and all but kills the tension for the final game.  

character that everyone else in the fandom loves, but i hate:

Would it be gratuitous to say Akashi, at this point? It’s funny, because I never really liked him, and didn’t understand why so many people did, but I never had any strong opinions about him until recently, when I started looking at his character up close bc I’ve run out of reasons not to. Again, if you like him, that’s totally fine, but I just can’t agree.

my ‘you’re piece of trash, but you’re still a fave’ fave:

Uhh... Imayoshi, I think. I don’t know what it is about this guy, but I love him so much. He’s a shit, and he knows it, but he’s also smart, and funny, and kind of just a big dork? Severely underrated character, with a really unique look (I don’t care if he doesn’t have eyes except when he’s pissed, it’s good character design, you guys are just mean). 

my ‘beautiful cinnamon roll who deserves better than this’ fave:

Oh, Kuroko... sidelined in your own damn show. I’ve heard people argue that Kuroko is not the protagonist of KNB, and in fact it’s Kagami, and just... whether that’s true or not technically, it just makes me sad for Kuroko bc once again he’s being overlooked in favor of other, more flashy characters on screen. Maybe that’s the point, but still, I don’t see this guy get nearly enough attention considering his name is in the fucking title. Kuroko is every bit as valid and interesting as the other GoM, and the other members of Seirin, often even more so, and he deserves all the love.

my ‘this ship is wrong, nasty, and makes me want to cleanse my soul, but i still love it’ ship:

Pretty much anything with Haizaki, but because this is me we’re talking about... AoHai. I used to be interested purely from a hatefucking standpoint, but recently I’ve seen some art and short little ficlets, and... have started to maybe ship it... unironically? Um. Yeah, so that happened.

my ‘they’re kind of cute, and i lowkey ship them, but i’m not too invested’ ship:

KiKuro. I don’t think I’ve really talked about them before, I love their backstory and dynamic, and I tend to write them together off on the sidelines, but I’m not very passionate about this one. Maybe because it is often used as a background ship, maybe because they both work better with other people (side tangent: their dynamic instantly becomes more interesting the second you throw a third person in the mix... doesn’t matter who it is either, KiKuroKaga? AoKiKuro? KiKuroMomo? I could go on) Idk. It’s sweet, but I don’t often give this pairing a whole lot of thought on its own, maybe I ought to...

[laceymorganwrites]

I'm stuck with this acc now, so ~ what are your favorites fictional couples? canon or not

oh boy, that is a loaded question xD (okay but quick sidenote: how tf r things always going out of hand when it comes to shipping? u getting mad cause I think 2 drawings would be cute together? embarrassing)

anyways, I´ll put this under a cut since it´s gonna be a long list (multishipper struggles✌)

also while you´re here: make sure you drink enough and eat something <33

I´ll start with Black Clover:

I don´t actively ship anything there but Vanessa and Finral would be cute together imo because I really love their bond (that fight scene they had together in the beginning just had me go: just kiss babes)

thennn MHA:

I´m a basic bitch, so my first ship was Kiribaku

Then I also ship Dabi and Hawks

But also Dabi and Overhaul (I have a fic for that on ao3 but haven´t gotten around to finishing it yet)

then I also ship Shota and Hizashi because again: I´m basiccc

also the next ships are all in context of my planned happy au story (everyone is a pro hero or working smth else such as police or smth like that, their story lines r very different from canon)

Kiri x Tamaki

Shiggy x Shinsou (2 gamer boys what can I say xD, also in this AU Shiggy doesn´t have his quirk since he got it operated by Kai, so did Shinsou, they both met in the hospital)

also Hawks x Katsuki, just roomies and they´re both always running into each other at work. they´re always on patrol together 

okay next up is Hunter x Hunter!!

my most recent obsession skskskkssk

um yeah I think I only like actively ship Phinks x Feitan there

I like to read Hisoka x Illu fanfics tho

One Piece:

Zoro x Law is my otp. Just. yes

I also like Robin x Law and Yamato x Kiku

also Kiku x Zoro

again, just tell me 2 ppl and I´ll be like: oh yeah I can see that!

Nanatsu no taizai:

pls. Banlaine. Need I say more? I think that´s the first anime ship I shipped xD also still one of the few canon couples I actually ship ahahah

but also Meliodas x Ban cause u rlly get me w that bromance shit

I ship all the basic ships from Sk8

Enji x Ash from Banana Fish because I´m not blind and yes I´m still sad abt the anime as we all are

Haru x Legoshi from Beastars (I haven´t read the manga yet tho)

from Fruits Basket I ship Haru x Rin (like pls they make me believe in love again, I am always the most emotional abt their lil arc, I haven´t started season 3 yet though)

I also ship Honda x Kyo, Shigure x Ayame, Hatori x Mayu, Arisa x Kyo

from Gangsta I only have one main ship: Nic x Alex

Haikyuu time~ okay listen I ship a lot here (yes the same rule applies: tell me 2 ppl and I´ll be like: aw hell yeah)

Bokuto x Kuroo is my otp

Akaashi x Kenma

Tendou x Bokuto

Atsumu x Hinata

Hinata x Oikawa

Iwaizumi x Bokuto

Aot:

Sasha x Connie, Sasha x Nicolo, my otp is Erwin x Levi, I also like Erwin x Hange x Levi, Armin x Annie

[shimzus-a]

MISC. RE-READING COMMENTARY / THOUGHTS.

i ordered volume 26 ( the volume with kiyoko on the cover ) on her birthday two days ago & have been skimming through it to look at all her scenes again. a few things stood out to me that i might not have noticed before or that weren’t included in unofficial manga translations, so i wanted to address my thoughts here. 

these may influence my headcanons / portrayal a bit, but for the most part this post is just me talking about things i found interesting & wholesome.

KIYOKO’S ENGAGEMENT WITH TRACK & FIELD.

kiyoko tells hitoka-chan that she participated in track & field when she was in middle school. the details are pretty vague, but what she does mention is that her team was quite large ( so it was hard to grow close to anyone ), & her mindset seemed very linear in flashbacks. 

i previously headcanoned that kiyoko had some npc friends in high school outside of hitoka-chan, but kiyoko says that she didn’t grow close to anyone in middle school & that hitoka-chan is the first person she’s been able to talk to as close friends.

i’m therefore adjusting my headcanons under the assumption that kiyoko has not made any close friends in high school, just acquaintances & classmates.

during the third year shrine visit, she says that she has to buy some charms she’d been asked to get, so she breaks away from the group outside of the panels. again, i thought that she might’ve been buying them for friends, but i will now have to assume that she was buying them for family members, & she’d been asked by her parents to buy some for family friends / relatives.

that being said, this means that kiyoko’s relationship to her family is much stronger than her relationship with any classmates before hitoka-chan. she’s already close to her family & they love each other, but i may rework their dynamic a bit to have her be quite close with her grandmother, mother, or older brother. i haven’t decided yet.

HER MOTIVATION TO JOIN AS MANAGER.

in the panels, it looks like sawamura approaches her directly & she says yes immediately. he calls her shimizu, suggesting that they might already know each other ( or he at least knows her ) before the question arose. then, she says okay with the paper clearly in her hands, so it seems as if she agreed to the responsibility without thinking it over much.

i’m canon divergent here out of my own personal preference. kiyoko originally declined the offer, because she hadn’t planned on joining any clubs in high school, but then revisited it a day or two later after she had thought on the matter.

i think this better reflects her thoughtfulness as a character, along with her quiet nature. it would probably be easier for her to decline, think on it to herself without being watched, & then say yes on her own a day later. in this case, i think it shows some amount of curiosity / drive on her own part if she’s able to approach sawamura later to express her interest.

HER PROCESS OF BECOMING PART OF THE TEAM.

this quote is one that i really like : i decided to become the volleyball club manager on a whim. no one had held the post for years, so it wasn’t like i was filling any critical position. if i wasn’t there, i figured things would just go back to normal for the team. but... this deserved to continue-- it had to keep going. i needed to entrust this post to someone new.

kiyoko states in a monologue to herself that track & field ended very quickly for her, without much fanfare. due to it being a large athletic group & her admitted difficulty with hurdles, it seems as though she may not have participated in every meet. also, track & field is not known for being a team sport other than for relay events, so i’m sure any victory her team earned felt like an individual win rather than a team win. when junior high school ended, kiyoko probably didn’t feel any motivation to continue because it had ended quietly without a measurable lesson / win that she was able to take away.

what i like about the quote most is that kiyoko is drawing from her track & field experience & applying it to volleyball. track & field might have ended quickly without much fanfare, but kiyoko realizes she doesn’t want the same thing to happen to the volleyball club. that’s why she’s motivated to find a replacement for her to help support the team in the future.

this definitely draws into what i think are the main lessons kiyoko has taken away from being a manager : she learned to satiate her curiosity when joining the team, to become part of a community as she finally made her first close friend, to be disciplined & stick with something despite not knowing the rules of how it’s played, how to be selfless & support a team beyond her own graduation, & finally when to say goodbye.

HER REALISTIC VIEWPOINT.

this comes into play during both the shrine visit & as she’s bringing hinata his shoes, but kiyoko says something like “i don’t care about winning. it’s not that i want to lose, but i want to take on this challenge when it presents itself” & also “praying to the gods won’t help you win anything.” 

i say it a lot but kiyoko is definitely a realist before she is an optimist / pessimist. her viewpoint in comparison to the team is really unique in part because she’s always watched from the sidelines, unaffected by the emotion involved in playing the game. it lets her be more subjective, & allows her to be a realist where the rest of the team might be more hopeful for victories. 

i think that this also teaches her how to calm down her team, even if she might seem a bit blunt. her charm is in that she introduces a realistic perspective to a stressed team, like pouring a tray of ice into a pot of boiling water. 

finally, it says a lot about her maturity as a character. she’s not caught up in winning like many athletes are in sports manga. this is doubly impressive, because as i mentioned before, track & field is a sport that seems structured to reward individuals with wins before the team as a whole. she’s able to instead take a step back from what “victory” means & recognize that everything is just a CHALLENGE & AN OPPORTUNITY FOR GROWTH. thinking too hard about winning / losing makes you lose sight of the real lessons you can learn from participating in sports.

MINOR NOTES

furudate has commented that “she’s not very good with words” & when i read her dialogue in the manga, it definitely seems that way. i’m going to maintain my current choice of dialogue with fillers like “anou” ( um in japanese ) & lots of ellipses to convey slow, careful thinking over word choice.

MORE TBA as i think of them ?

[secret-tenderness]

You Anti’s Confuse Me

I can understand the disappointment over not getting the ending you wanted to Naruto when it first ended back in 2014. There are plenty of things that were rushed and not developed as well as they should have been so that’s completely up for civil debate. 

I can even understand the disappointment over which couples got together because some of them came completely out of nowhere from left field. But I know for a fact you already know that Naruto is a SHONEN JUMP SERIES. 

Shonen Jump is a magazine primarily tailored towards young men. Which means that romance is not always going to be the main focus point of the story. There are some series that can balance love in their narratives but not all of them will do the balance act properly. Which is why most Shonen Jump series don’t have any romance in them at all. 

But what I don’t understand is your need to be a bitter cold hearted bitch. 

Tagging your anti rhetoric in the main SasuSaku tag or NaruHina tag or any of the tags regarding the main canon couples is asking to get into a fight. You’re literally looking for someone to say “UM EXCUSE ME?!?!” 

Trolling is one thing. Being a complete insufferable bastard is another. 

Most of the time shippers will not go out looking for confrontation. We’ll stay in our bubbles and go about our business. We go into the tags to look for content to reblog and read and that’s it. Some of us want to debate with other fans but most of us want to chill out. 

If you don’t like a pairing or content of that pairing. YOU ARE NOT INCLINED TO INTERACT WITH THE SHIPPER OR THE CONTENT IN QUESTION! 

If you don’t like NaruHina you don’t have to comment your dislike for NaruHina every time something about it pops up. If you don’t like SasuSaku then you don’t have to comment your dislike for SasuSaku. 

Regardless of what you personally believe: The Light Novels are considered canon to the Naruto Universe timeline. All novels are green lit by Kishimoto & artwork for those novels are provided to them by Kishimoto. He has gone on statement that he allows the writers to help expand the universe & fill in the gaps where he couldn’t in the main story. That’s no different from any other writer that has gone mainstream. Examples? Rick Riordan & Stephen King. 

I’ve seen some of you producing that tweet saying that all the novels aren’t written by Kishimoto himself so therefore they aren’t technically canon but the same can be said for people who say that all the filler episodes in the anime series aren’t canon because they weren’t in the original manga series. 

The easiest way to get over this huge salt mountain you’re stuck on is by accepting the fact that no matter how hard you bitch about a couple being canon it will never become non canon. You can absolutely love whatever you want about the series & you can criticize the author all damn day if you want to. But being an absolute prick on the internet towards people who’re happy about new content for their ship coming out is not a healthy lifestyle. 

Like what you want to like & we’ll do the same. Just don’t start a ship war over it because you’re still salty.