#OH and also I just read on twitter that all the original OF characters will make an appearance in season 2???? HELL YEAH

[gunsatthaphan]

their little jubi jubs 🥺🫶🏻💫

[cressidagrey]

She Wasn’t a Secret

Pairing: Oscar Piastri x Felicity Leong-Piastri (Original Character)

Summary:  When Oscar casually mentions his wife during a fan Q&A, Lando Norris combusts on stage, the internet loses its mind, Nicole Piastri wonders why her son can’t tell people basic facts about his life—like the fact he’s been married for five years and Mark Webber is quietly regretting his life choices. 

Notes: Big thanks to @llirawolf , who listens to me ramble 😂

(divider thanks to @saradika-graphics )

It started with a ping.

Nicole Piastri was elbow-deep in a tray of Lamingtons when her phone buzzed across the counter. Then again. Then again. Then seven more times.

She wiped her hands, checked the screen, and frowned.

17 notifications. 5 mentions. 2 DMs. One group chat blowing up.

And all of them pointed to the same thing: A tagged video. Captioned: “Lando Norris finding out Oscar Piastri has been married for five years. In real-time. On stage. Live. Absolute scenes.”

Nicole clicked the video, already sighing.

It was exactly what she expected—and somehow so much worse.

Oscar, calm and collected, casually admitting he was married. Lando Norris having an actual breakdown beside him. The interviewer making it her life’s mission to extract every crumb of intel. And Oscar? Completely unbothered. Like he was discussing a weather forecast.

Nicole watched Lando choke, scream, stand up, flail, and nearly combust.

And Oscar? “I thought you knew.” Nicole actually laughed out loud. It was either that or cry.

From the kitchen doorway, Edie poked his head in. “Why do I hear cackling?”

Nicole turned the volume up and played the “I thought you knew” line again.

Edie winced. “Oh. That’s going viral, isn’t it.”

Oscar. Her darling, chronically-understated son. Calm as ever. Dry as toast. Casually dropping “Well, I already did one of those things,” in response to a marriage or tattoo question. Watching poor Lando Norris implode on stage like a wet firework.

Nicole paused the video on Lando’s face in real-time breakdown.

Then sighed.

Deeply.

Because this? This wasn’t even surprising.

The real kicker wasn’t that the media didn’t know.

It was that Lando didn’t know.

Nicole had assumed at the very least Lando was in the loop. He and Oscar were joined at the hip during race weeks. Surely a small, minor detail like, say, being legally wed for half a decade would’ve come up between sim sessions.

But no.

Apparently not.

Because her son, in his infinite, baffling wisdom, had once again forgotten to share anything important about his personal life with anyone outside of a 20-meter radius of his home and maybe Mark Webber.

She muttered to herself as she scrolled through replies.

“Didn’t tell me he had a girlfriend… Didn’t tell me they got married… Didn’t tell me they were having a baby until she was three months pregnant and then only on accident…”

Now the whole world was catching up five years late.

She set her tea down. Reached for her reading glasses. Opened Twitter.

And, with the calm authority of a woman who had lived through every one of her son’s emotional plot twists, typed:

@nicolepiastri: I see the internet is discovering my son is married. Welcome to the club. I, too, found out after the fact 5 years ago. 👍

She hit “post.”

The post went instantly viral.

***

Group Chat: Piastri Fam ❤️

Nicole: Oscar. Darling. You forgot to mention you had a WIFE?

Chris: Bold strategy, son. Just casually let the global media find out you’ve been married for five years via a “would you rather get married or get a tattoo?” question. Stunning PR planning.

Edie: To be fair, he also forgot to mention it to Lando. Who he is teammates with. Who he shares planes with. Who he trains with. Who he considers a “close friend.” So. Not just the media.

Oscar: I didn’t forget. I just didn’t think it was news???

Hattie: YOU’RE A CELEBRITY. EVERYTHING IS NEWS. My friends thought I was lying when I said you were married. They thought I made it up. I had to show them our family group chat as proof.

Edie: You’re lucky Felicity’s cool. If I was married to you and you never told the world, I would’ve changed the locks 💅 AND I would’ve posted a dramatic black-and-white photo with a Taylor Swift lyric as the caption.

Mae: Can I be flower girl for your next wedding? (Only if it’s to Felicity again. Otherwise I’m not coming.)

Oscar: …I’m not having another wedding, Mae. Still married to the same wife. Still in love with her. Still feeding her sourdough obsession.

Nicole: Honestly, this is so you. I shouldn’t even be surprised. You didn’t even tell us you had a girlfriend. 

Chris: Let’s not forget the registry office call:  “Hey, we got married.”  So romantic. Really moved me to tears.

Nicole: YEAH, let’s not forget that you got MARRIED WITHOUT TELLING YOUR FAMILY!

Oscar: Everyone’s being very dramatic about this.

Hattie: BRO. YOU’VE BEEN MARRIED FOR FIVE. YEARS. AND LANDO JUST FOUND OUT. LIVE. IN FRONT OF CAMERAS. HE SPIT WATER.

Edie: I’ve watched the video 19 times now. It lives in my brain like a Shakespearean tragedy. The betrayal. The disbelief. The squeaky voice crack. Art.

Mae: He screamed so loud a kid in the front row CRIED.

Nicole: Also… since we’re all here… When are you going to mention the other secret? 😏

Oscar: …What secret?

Nicole: Oscar.

Chris: We mean the tiny human one, son.

Mae: BEE!!!! 🐝💛

Oscar: Bee is not a secret.

Hattie: She’s not a secret, no. But she’s also not in your driver bio, not on your Instagram, and not in any single interview you’ve ever done.

Edie: You talk about tire degradation more than your own child. Let that sink in.

Oscar: She’s our daughter. Not a marketing tool.

Nicole: We love that you’re private, sweetheart. But maybe next time you could… I don’t know… mention that you have a wife and daughter?

Chris: Not asking for a billboard, Oscar. Just a family Christmas card. Or, I don’t know, ONE social post that doesn’t feature suspension settings or protein shakes.

Hattie: Just wait till Lando finds out about Bee. You are going to have to physically restrain him.

Edie: His brain barely survived the “I’m married” part. He’s going to go into full reboot mode.

Nicole: He’s going to walk around muttering “He has a wife AND a child?!” for days.

Mae: We should film it. Make a documentary. “Lando Finds Out: The Sequel.”

Oscar: I would like to go one day without a Norris-induced disaster, please.

Chris:

Can’t wait for the Netflix edit. Drive to Survive, Season 7, Episode 3: The Secret Wife (and Daughter???) of Oscar Piastri

Oscar: …Traitors. All of you.

Nicole: No, darling. Just a family who loves you enough to roast you mercilessly.

Hattie: And maybe gently suggest that your entire online presence looks like a robot who eats chicken breast and drives fast.

Edie: We just want the world to know you’re more than carbon fiber and rehydration tablets. You have chickens. A wife. A kid. And still somehow come across as the most emotionally neutral man on the grid.

Mae: You’re like a secret cinnamon roll. With downforce.

Hattie: Oscar Piastri: Calm. Composed. Married with poultry.

Nicole: We love you, darling. But maybe consider letting people in a little next time?

Oscar: …Noted.

***

Mark Webber’s phone buzzed once. Then again. Then five more times in the span of a minute.

He looked at the screen, saw the names of three journalists he hadn’t spoken to in months, and immediately thought: What did Oscar do.

He hadn’t crashed. There hadn’t been any mid-race scandals. No random DNS. No sudden tire blowouts.

So Mark did the rational thing.

He ignored the calls and opened Twitter.

The first thing he saw was a video clip with the caption: “OSCAR PIASTRI DROPS MARRIAGE BOMBSHELL. LANDO NORRIS DIES LIVE ON STAGE.”

Mark blinked. Pressed play.

Thirty seconds in, he was already groaning.

By the time Oscar casually said, “We got married when I was eighteen,” Mark had his face in his hands.

And by the time Lando screamed “YOU HAVE A WIFE?!” in what could only be described as an operatic shriek, Mark was laughing. Because of course.

Of course Oscar had managed to soft-launch a five-year marriage via fan Q&A and thought that was completely normal.

He hadn’t even texted Mark to give him a heads-up. Typical.

Mark took a long sip of his coffee and shook his head with fond exasperation. Then his phone rang again. Another journalist. This one he had to answer.

“Yeah?” Mark said, not bothering with a hello.

“Did you know Oscar was married?” came the breathless voice on the other end. “Like—legally? For five years? Who is she?”

Mark rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Yes, I knew.”

A beat of stunned silence.

“You did?!”

Mark leaned back in his chair. “Her name’s Felicity. She’s smarter than all of us combined and makes a lemon slice that could end wars, and rebuilt an engine while eight months pregnant. What else do you want to know?”

“Wait—rebuilt an engine?!”

Mark grinned. “Yeah.”

“But she’s not on his social media! She’s not even in interviews!”

“She doesn’t want to be,” Mark said simply. “She’s his wife, not his brand.”

The journalist let out a choked laugh. “God. She’s going to be a nightmare to research.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Mark said. 

***

Text Messages – Mark Webber & Oscar Piastri

Mark: Mate. You broke the internet.

Mark: Also. You made Lando scream on stage. Twice.

Mark: I’ve had three different journalists call me asking if I “always knew.”

Oscar: I didn’t think it would be a big deal??

Mark: You are insanely lucky that Felicity is brilliant and terrifying and the entire internet is now in love with her. Otherwise, PR would’ve had you doing apology interviews until Abu Dhabi.

Oscar:  She is brilliant. And terrifying. In the best way.

Also, I didn’t hide her.

Mark:  No, you just forgot to mention her to your employer, your teammate, the media, and most of the paddock. Tiny oversight.

Oscar:  I thought it was obvious.

Mark:  She hasn’t been on your socials once. You don’t even post photos of her shoes in the background like a normal soft-launching F1 driver.

Oscar:  Didn’t realize I needed to soft launch my marriage.

Mark:  I’ve also had three different journalists lose their minds when I told them I’ve met your wife. 

I told them that she’s smarter than all of us combined and makes a mean lemon slice.

You married up.

Oscar: I know.

Mark:  You really are whipped, huh?

Oscar:  Didn’t you know that already?

Mark: Yes, but it’s nice to see it confirmed in front of millions.

Oscar: I’m still not sure how Zak knew though.

Mark: Because I told him. After you signed your contract. He wanted to poach your lawyer. I told him that your “lawyer” was your very smart, very spite driven wife. You should probably tell people things yourself from now on.

Oscar: Noted.

Mark: Anyway. Tell Felicity we owe her a thank-you for soft-launching you into public affection. You’re officially not just “the calm one.” You’re “the poetic husband who tucks love notes into his racing gloves and married his high school sweetheart.”

Oscar: …That’s better than “emotionless robot,” I guess.

Mark: Way better. And hey— Proud of you, kid. Even if you forgot to tell the entire grid you had a wife. 

Oscar: Thanks, Mark. Means a lot.

Mark: …you should probably tell people about Bee one of these days though. 

Oscar: Will do.

***

Meanwhile on Twitter: 

@/gridinvestigator:   🚨 THREAD: What we (the internet) know about the elusive, brilliant, chaotic Felicity Piastri , aka the Mysterious Mrs. Piastri, aka Oscar Piastri’s wife, aka the woman who accidentally became a legend overnight. 🧵👇

@/gridinvestigator: 1. First of all, yes—Oscar Piastri has been married for FIVE YEARS. No one knew. Not Lando. Not McLaren. Not us. He dropped it during a “Would you rather get married or get a tattoo?” question. He said: “Well, I already did one of those.”

Cue the meltdown.

@/gridinvestigator: 2. We then found out he married his high school sweetheart three weeks after graduation. Her name is Felicity. They met when they were 14. She let him borrow her pen. He never recovered. A literal Wattpad story.

@/gridinvestigator: 3. Oscar described her as “his best friend,” and “10/10, would always marry her again.” Meanwhile, Felicity said, “We were inevitable.” Honestly? Nicholas Sparks is shaking.

@/gridinvestigator: 4. Felicity Piastri didn’t soft-launch herself. She hard-launched via complete internet domination. Her Instagram is a mix of: 🧠 Academic papers 🛠️ Vintage car rebuilds 🍞 Artisan bread 🐔 Chickens in tiny sweaters 🔧 Engine grease 📐 Chaos

@/gridinvestigator: 5. Now. Here’s where things get ✨interesting✨ You know that quote Oscar made about “meeting her in school”? I FOUND THE YEARBOOK. Yep. Their boarding school published the 2019 edition online.

Sidenote: I think they both graduated a year early in 2019 and not 2020?!

@/gridinvestigator: 6. I clearly have too much time, because I went through both the 2020 and the 2019 Year Books until I found a girl named Felicity:  Felicity Leong - Dance, Science Club President, Mandarin Club,  Technology Club and concertmaster aka first violin in the orchestra. 

@/gridinvestigator: 7. Oh and if that aren’t enough extra curriculars activities: Guess who took 17 GCSEs (10 +/- are considered “normal”) and cleared them all with a 9, which is the highest grade you can get? Felicity. She also had the highest A- Level grades of the whole school in the maximum of 5 subjects you are allowed to take one year later. 

@/gridinvestigator: 8. The yearbook also mentions her getting a perfect math score and  winning a physics prize

@/gridinvestigator: 9. She graduated 2 (?!) years later in 2021 with a Master in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College London. Don’t ask me how in the world she did that. 

@/gridinvestigator:  10. Felicity is basically the anti-WAG. No brand deals. No champagne yacht pics. Just her, an angle grinder, a loaf of bread, and a whiteboard full of math.

And somehow Oscar managed to keep this whole goddess-level woman a secret for five YEARS. 

@/gridinvestigator: 12. TLDR: – Her name is Felicity Leong – She was Oscar’s classmate

 – She’s terrifyingly smart – They eloped at 18 and told no one – She is now the internet’s most beloved mystery wife – Oscar is obsessed with her

 – she restores vintage cars, bakes like a god and solves equations for fun

***

The chickens were louder than usual this morning.

Felicity didn’t blame them. She felt a little off-kilter herself—though not because the global internet had decided to collectively lose its mind over the fact that she was married to a Formula 1 driver.

(Okay. Fine. That was probably part of it.)

She stepped into the coop in gumboots and a hoodie stolen from Oscar, hair still in a haphazard braid Bee had done the night before. She was met with indignant clucks and flapping wings.

“Alright, alright,” she muttered, scattering feed like a benevolent rural god. “You’re dramatic. We get it.”

Rosie, the scraggly rescue hen who thought she was a rooster, pecked at her ankle with all the fury of someone deeply offended by late breakfast.

“Take it up with the PR team,” Felicity muttered.

She dropped Bee off at kindergarten wearing old jeans with a patch on the knee and a t-shirt that said Math is not a spectator sport. One of the other mums stared a little too long at her before whispering something to a friend.

Felicity smiled and waved.

Felicity wasn’t surprised by the chaos. She had told Oscar it would happen eventually. Told him people would find out. That one day, he’d make some offhanded comment and the fandom would explode like Mentos in Coke.

What she hadn’t expected was for it to be over a “Would you rather” question. Or for it to involve Lando Norris nearly choking on his own spit on stage.

She’d watched the clip exactly once. With toast. And coffee.

Then she opened the garage.

Her current project sat like a sleeping beast under the suspended work lights: a 1969 Alfa Romeo Spider, stripped down to its bones. Half-sanded, one door missing, the kind of restoration that most people would call madness.

She called it Monday.

She put on her gloves, tied her hair back, and picked up the angle grinder.

Around noon, she stopped for coffee and opened Instagram. Her notifications were, unsurprisingly, a mess.

There was a fan edit of her baking sourdough while wielding a torque wrench. Someone had made a Twitter thread comparing her to various Marvel characters (Shuri with a sourdough starter was trending). Another post showed a blurry screenshot of her academic transcript with the caption “Oscar Piastri’s wife could do your homework, restore your car, out-bake your grandma and defeat you in hand-to-hand combat”.

She took a sip of coffee and muttered, “Dramatic.”

At 2:30 p.m., she washed the grease off her hands, swapped the engine oil scent for something vaguely lavender, and went to pick up Bee.

Bee ran out clutching a glittery rock and a half-drawn picture of Oscar holding a steering wheel and a loaf of bread. Felicity accepted both like priceless relics.

“Mama, can we bake today?” Bee asked as they walked to the car.

“Only if you promise not to eat half the cookie dough before we’re done.”

Bee grinned. “No promises.”

By 5 p.m., the kitchen smelled like vanilla and warm sugar. Bee was elbow-deep in flour. Senna had wandered inside again. Felicity didn’t bother kicking her out.

She kneaded the dough slowly, rhythmically. Felt the tension leave her shoulders.

Fame was fine. Chaos was familiar.

But this—flour under her nails, Bee humming beside her, a project waiting in the garage and a husband texting her to say he loved her between media obligations—this was the life she chose.

That night, after Bee was asleep—cuddled up with Button the frog and a bedtime story half-finished—Felicity sat on the back porch with a cup of tea and looked up at the sky.

So, the internet knew now. Fine.

She hadn’t done any of it for them.

She had fallen in love with a boy who drove like silence and calm, and kissed like he already knew how the future would feel. They’d built a life in soft corners and early mornings, in engine grease and sourdough, in whispered bedtime promises and braids and “Every lap”.

Let the world look.

This part wasn’t theirs anyway.

It was hers.

***

Transcript: Post-Race Media Pen – Chinese Grand Prix

Journalist: Oscar, first of all—great drive today. P8 in tricky conditions, well done.

Oscar: Thanks. Yeah, it was a bit chaotic out there, but we managed it well. Happy with the result.

Journalist: Okay, we have to ask—your name has been trending non-stop since last weekend. Not because of your race… but because of your wife. The internet’s gone absolutely feral.

Oscar: (blinks slowly)  Right.

Journalist #2: Felicity. Married five years. High school sweetheart. Literally no one knew. You didn’t mention her until a fan Q&A. Everyone’s calling it “the soft launch of the century.” Any comment?

Oscar: (shrugs slightly) She wasn’t a secret.

Journalist: (incredulous) But you never posted about her! Never talked about her! Lando said he didn’t know!

Oscar: I mean… I didn’t realize it was something I had to announce. We’ve been married for five years. It’s not new.

Journalist: So why didn’t you ever bring her up?

Oscar: My wife’s just… mine. She’s been there since before Formula 1, before most of this. We weren’t hiding anything. We just didn’t post about it. That’s all.

Journalist: So no regrets about how it came out?

Oscar:  Not really. People know now. That doesn’t change anything. She’s still my best friend. Still the smartest person I’ve ever met. Still the reason I’m able to do what I do and come home happy. 

***

Meanwhile on Twitter: 

@/formulafemmes “My wife’s just… mine.” Oscar Piastri said that with his whole chest. Softly. Calmly. Casually. And now I’m lying face down on the kitchen floor.

@/gridgossip the way oscar said “she’s still my best friend” with zero hesitation??? sir. we’re just trying to survive here. you didn’t have to be poetic at a media pen.

@/wifeloversanonymous “we weren’t hiding anything. we just didn’t post about it.” that’s the most mature, emotionally grounded response I’ve ever heard. I am so sorry for calling you a robot for three seasons.

@/felicitynation the way he said “she’s been there since before Formula 1” like she’s his origin story and not just his spouse. I’m not crying, you’re crying.

@/lan_doughnut Lando finding out Oscar has a wife: 😱😱😱 Oscar, two days later, sipping water like it’s no big deal: “she wasn’t a secret.” this man is unshakable.

@/piastrirealupdates “Still the reason I’m able to do what I do and come home happy.” Oscar Piastri you have exactly 2 seconds to stop or I will start writing poetry about you and your wife and your chickens.

@/drive_to_thirst oscar: “she’s mine. not mclaren’s. not the internet’s.” me: 💍🥺🥖🛐🧪🧡📐 (this is now the official felicity piastri emoji combo, don’t @ me)

@/chaoticwagtracker imagine being felicity piastri. you’re just out here baking bread, rebuilding carburetors, feeding chickens, and your husband is on global TV being like “she’s mine. she makes me happy. she’s my best friend.” like WHAT DO YOU DO WITH THAT???

@/softpitstops someone check on every F1 PR manager. because oscar just made 90% of the grid look emotionally underdeveloped in 20 seconds.

@/felicityfanaccount it’s the shrug. it’s the “she wasn’t a secret” shrug. like he genuinely didn’t think we’d care. like he genuinely thought this was normal. the bar is now in another galaxy.

@/oscarupdates “my wife’s just… mine.” Sir?? You can’t just say that and walk off like you didn’t emotionally rupture 2 million people??

@/felicitybrainrot oscar calling felicity “his best friend” and “the reason he comes home happy” after casually revealing she’s smarter than him??? i am lying face down on the floor. do not disturb.

@/gridchaosadmin “we weren’t hiding anything, we just didn’t post about it” is SO MUCH more romantic than any soft-launch story I’ve ever heard. he didn’t even try to curate it. he just lived it.

@/burners4felicity oscar: she’s mine. me: i am normal. i am rational. i am going feral in the parking lot. i am

@/lan_doughnut lando: “he never even mentioned her!” oscar: “she’s still the reason i’m able to do what i do and come home happy.” we are living through a modern shakespearean drama and its name is “The Piastri Marriage Reveal”

@/formula1romance he said “she’s still my best friend” and i felt that in my bloodstream. like. she’s not his aesthetic. she’s not his PR move. she’s his person. i’m crying and baking bread in her honor.

@/piastriwifeupdates “my wife’s just mine” is the kind of phrase that gets etched into a wedding ring or tattooed in tiny script on someone's ribs. you don’t recover from that.

@/felicitypiastrifanclub “we didn’t post about it, that’s all.” you’re telling me these two eloped at 18, never once posted each other, built a life with chickens and vintage cars, and just EXISTED while being soulmates?????@/drivetosurvivepls Netflix watching Oscar Piastri go viral for being emotionally devastating in 8 words or less and frantically rewriting their entire season outline

[stardustizuku]

So, Gushing Over Magical Girls Is The Best Thing To Happen to Magical Girls

Gushing Over Magical Girls get this bad rep. For all the wrong reasons. I’ve seen it be called an insult to Magical Girls, I’ve seen it be called “gooner bait” a term I absolutely despise but that’s a thing for another day. I’ve seen it insulted for everything and anything under the sun.

I first got acquainted with it when I was scrolling through Twitter and I saw someone complain about the PV. However, as an avid Magical Girl Fan, I wasn’t disgusted. I was intrigued.

I decided to read the manga, and oh god.

This is one of the best things I’ve read.

The story follows Utena, a shy girl that loves Magical Girls, tricked to become the evil general that will defeat the Magical Girl team “Tres Magia”.

And it’s a delight.

I binged all the episodes available to me in the manga, and had fun in each and every chapter.

The same, however, couldn’t be said by half the people who watched the anime. And I was extremely baffled. As a queer woman, this was the first time in my life, in which I had seen something so deliberately catered towards me. I saw tell-tale signs of someone who genuinely admires the genre, and is simply using it as an outlet for exploring deeper and more interesting topics that a SFW version of it would not be able to.

Yet, I turn around and I see people calling it the most horrendous stuff, and accusing everyone who likes it of being monsters or men.

Genuinely, I’ve had enough.

Gushing Over Magical Girl is not the Devil. In fact, I think it’s the best thing to come don’t even like Magical Girls AND IT SHOWS.

PART 1: “Magical girls are for little girls!”.

The first criticism you’ll see aimed at “Gushing over Magical girl” is the amount of sexually charged content it has. And it is true. It borders on straight up porn in many instances and it just gets wilder as you go on. By chapter 30, we’re way past PantyShots. Like, I’ve seen some of these girls’ vaginas, and I’m not joking.

Personally, I don’t see anything wrong with it, but there’s people who might disagree.

“Magical Girls are for little girls” some people say “and you’re corrupting it!”

Which genuinely makes me laugh.

This is because this type of argument could only be done by someone with no real concept of Magical Girls aside from maybe Sailor Moon and Sakura Card Captor.

out of the Magical Girl genre in a WHILE (Ignoring Precure, because they just gave us a magical boy and that’s my win of the decade).

People are just, you know, stupid. And reactionary. Enough that they see a boob and lose their minds like a Karen at a Christmas Eve Mall.

My point is, I love this manga. And I’m willing to risk my reputation to defend it. Cause genuinely, half the people who are clutching their pearls over this show - Magical Girl Anime haven’t always been PG, or aimed at girls.

Cutie Honey is a great example. It’s one of the most famous Magical Girl Anime you will find - and it’s a shonen. With the protagonist, Honey, being constantly naked, groped, put in suggestive situations and have outfits that show her cleavage.

And it’s one of the most famous, most popular takes on Magical Girl there is. Yet, I never see any amount of outrage towards it. (Part of me wonders if it’s because the fan service is aimed at men, rather than involving yuri).

There’s also Lyrical Nanoha, one of the most popular serial franchises there is. It spans several seasons and spinoffs, and it’s beloved by many.

And it’s aimed at older men. Yes, it’s a Seinen.

In fact, its origins are far from PG. It’s actually a Spin-off of an erotic game named “Triangle Heart”. It was most definitely not created with little girls in mind, and themes it tackles reflect as much.

There’s Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya too, a spinoff of the Fate/Stay Night VN, very obviously aimed at older men, it’s a Seinen. It has a lot of fanservice and scenes where the characters are half naked.

Day Break Illusion is also a Shonen.

And as much as I adora Madoka - I’ve been stating for years now that it isn’t a show meant for little girls. You could argue it’s for everyone, regardless of gender, who’s a little older. But it most definitely wasn’t for little girls.

So, no. This was never an “only girls” club. Trying to paint it as such, is not only wrong but ignorant.

Magical Girl shows can be for anyone. Men, boys, girls, women and I find it infantilizing to consider it “only for little girls”.

No one says “super heroes are ONLY for little boys”

Well, some do. But they’re, you know, bigots. Who don’t want girls playing or adults o have fun.

So no, Gushing Over Magical Girls being a sexually charged anime in the Seinen category isn’t “corrupting the genre”. In fact, I would argue it’s doing exactly what the genre has done in the OVA shadows for a while.

Not to mention, many people have screamed from the rooftop how they want “more mature Magical Girl shows” referring to the success of Madoka. But as soon as an actually mature take on Magical Girls shows up, tackling issues of sexuality and love, you all don’t want it anymore.

(We all know why, though. Americans, and western culture in general, considers mature themes, only that which involves violence. Anything close to discussing issues of sex is no longer “mature” but “Pornographic” and deserving of being shoved into a corner. With all queer themes, gender studies, and any nuance that could be had regarding these issues).

And speaking of sexually charged, have you watched so called “wholesome” magical girls? They’re still very much sexy. Not in the “on the nose” ecchi way Seinen and Shonen are - but they still are.

You’ll find transformations were the girls are naked, zoom in to their breasts, you’ll have panty shots every now and then. Even themes of growing up, having crushes, and innuendos about sex. Inappropriate relationships, taboo romance, and the likes.

Sakura had Rita and a professor’s relationship (mutual in the manga), Sailor Moon had Chibiusa and Elliot’s romance, Sugar Sugar Rune even having an element for ‘lust’ and other different types of love, and let’s not forget Mermaid Melody which has several instances of the girls naked, in compromising positions with other men. And I’m pretty sure Tokyo Mew Mew likely opened a whole bunch of doors for girls to be into CNC.

This is, by the way, normal.

Completely so.

These stories often talk about the girlhood experience. And girls and teenage girls are interested in all of these things. They’re interested in sex, romance, their bodies growing up, their own sexuality and the likes. It’s no wonder same-sex relationships and romance get included, they’re part of what experiencing the world through the eyes of a young girl is like.

And subsequently, it stands to reason that as people who engaged with MG grow up - they find comfort in exploring their sexuality through Magical Girl themselves. There’s a reason why there’s a growing section of “Magical Girl” in your local hentai site.

“Men get off on corrupting this wholesome girl targeted genre” is actually TERF rhetoric sneaking through the mainstream. It ignores AFAB ppl and gender nonconforming people, who grew up with Magical Girls, simply using a medium that originally started their journey of sexual identity, to explore more “grown up” aspects of that same identity.

In particular, I’m a Cis AroAce Woman. I wrote a lot of Magical Girl NSFW when I first started writing NSFW Twitter threads. They’re bad and they’re cringey. But it was something I needed.

Magical Girls were a huge part of my childhood and early teens. When I was mentally in the space to want to engage with NSFW content: it was obvious I would turn to what first sparked excitement.

So this idea that “men are corrupting Magical Girls with their sick fantasies” is nothing more than TERF-lite propaganda. People, including women and men, have been doing this for ages; for a variety of reasons. And doing so, doesn’t rob children of their spaces - but the gentrification of the internet is a story of another day.

The other argument I have heard is that GOMG is a mockery of the genre. Which is even more laughable in my opinion.

PART 2: Parodies and why I hate Earth Defender’s Club.

Gushing Over Magical Girls loves Magical Girls. It’s a parody, in a way, but it knows very well what it parodies. It’s not surface level in the slightest. And it absolutely is not mean spirited about it.

A lot of the time, shows that reference and parody the Magical Girl genre, do so in ways that feel like they view it as a lesser genre. They take generic images of cute girls in frilly outfits, swap the colors around, and have them chant over-the-top spells. You’re meant to laugh, not only at how silly they look, but people who would love it. Especially if they’re grown ups.

I do not like “Cute High Earth Defense Club LOVE!” For this exact reason - even tho many people praise it to all heavens.

Because

1) It feels surface level in its commentary and depiction of Magical Girls and

2) More mocking towards the genre than paying homage or doing anything with it.

The continuous use of the word “Love” is a very obvious jab at Magical Girls using these words, which feels mean spirited just for the sake of it. Their outfits are almost exactly the same, save for the colors. And they all use the same sticks as weapon, with no thematic link for the shapes of the scepters. The mascot too (a wombat for god knows what reason), I think it’s meant to be a joke of some sort for how ridiculous some of the mascots for the girls get, which rubs me the wrong way.

In general, it feels shallow and mean spirited. But no one calls this an insult to Magical Girls. Because people who like it don't actually care about Magical Girls. They see cute boys doing silly things and love it. Which is kinda sad.

Now, Gushing Over Magical girls has sort of that same problem on the Tres Magias…But they’re not the protagonists. And even then, in later chapters, they get power ups that are different in design, and thematically linked.

The protagonist, and the ones we follow, are Utena and the girls. And they all have very distinct outfits, all with motifs that are tangentially thematically linked, and speak of each character’s personalities in interesting ways.

Utena in particular has THIS outfit. Which a lot of people don’t like, but I actually do.

It’s very obvious it’s taking inspo from other iconic Bad Girls in the genre. Namely, Utau, Kraehe and Devil Homura. All “Enemy characters” that have unhealthy obsessions with other characters. In particular, I think the wings and the feathers resemble Homura - THE character known to have a massive obsession with a Magical Girl (Madoka), to the point of insanity.

There’s also Magia Azure. Who’s a clear reference to the Mean Tsundere girl that is iconic to the genre. She’s also a Miko. Which is a callback to Sailor Mars, arguably THE girl who popularized this archetype.

I also love what they do with the mascots. Unlike Earth Defenders, where the mascot is you know, a mockery of the archetype of a mascot - useless, only there to give power ups, and obsessed with food - the mascots of GOMG is taking a book from Madoka.

It considers the mascots both all-too-powerful and yet limited in their reach. Which is exactly what the mascots have always been in Magical Girls. Beings so powerful they can give mythical powers to girls, yet helpless to do anything on their own. So, they use magical girls as a vehicle to achieve their goals. Most Magical girls try to paint this as a good thing, but newer genres shine light on how dangerous that can be too.

Madoka tackles it with Kyubey as the main initial mascot, only later to turn out to be the villain of the series.

And in a Post-Madoka world, trusting the mascots is just the slightest bit more difficult. That’s why, from the get go, GOMG portrays their mascots as morally corrupt. He’s not a good character, he’s malicious and doing more harm than good. But for the majority of the series, he’s painted more as a useless harmless evil than anything genuinely terrifying or worthy of concern. The attention is focused on other things.

But I love the way that it’s heavily implied that they’re not good. It’s a very interesting take on the mascot and it helps with the themes of the series. Which yes, by the way. Gushing Over Magical Girls has themes.

Which lead me to-

Part 3: Yeah, uhm, Gushing Over Magical Girl has themes.

There’s this idea that Sex is an inherently violent act. In which a man humiliates and sodomizes a woman, and therefore the woman is exploited in some way. And 10x worse is any act that involves BDSM. It’s violence; born out of hatred.

This is TERF rhetoric. I’m not joking. This line of thought leads directly to TERF ideas.

Many on the internet have pointed out as much, and BDSM members have gone to be very vocal about it. In particular, people on the role of the submissive (or the bottoms) are loudly trying to explain the contrary. How they like the act of sex, like the idea of being vulnerable, or being humiliated. There’s also plenty of LGBT+ stories that talk about it, both in western and eastern spaces. Just jump into the section of dom/sub verse at your local manga browsing website, and you’ll find something.

That said, the same is not as common for people who like to “dominate”.

I can only think of two pieces of media that argue that, whoever is the dominant or the sadist, is also a human being. That whatever they’re doing is done, not out of hatred for the submissive or an act of violence, but love.

One, is the husky and the white cat. In which Mo Ran, among other things, has to come to terms that his love isn’t “pure”. That he cannot love someone without the want to have sex, and to completely dominate that someone.

The second one is Gushing Over Magical Girls.

It’s very clear to me that Utena’s sadism isn’t a violent act. It’s an act born out of love. She genuinely loves the Magical Girls, and most girls for that matter, and whenever she is inflicting pain and fighting with them - what she wants is to ultimately help them in some way.

She wants them to “be the cutest version they can be” and wants them to shine brighter than ever.

There’s this one scene I love, around chapter 20, in which Baiser (Utena) is fighting Magia Azura. And due to Baiser going a bit too far, Azura ends up being Mind-broken. She crawls towards her, calls her “mistress” and begs to become her servant.

In any normal Hentai you’ll find, this is a good thing. This would be the ideal outcome. A character being turned into nothing but a sex slave for the enjoyment of the dominant.

Which is why I found it breathtaking when that didn’t happen.

Baiser is horrified by this. She does not want to break the girls, she wants them to be powerful. She wants them to win. With her, the evil one, being nothing more than a vehicle for them to be even stronger than before.

This is the first time I’ve ever seen dominant or sadist characters being presented both sexually, and in such a positive light. Much less a queer woman in the same position.

It doesn’t treat BDSM sex as a disgusting taboo act, but something born out of genuine love - and a want to see the other person be or feel better.

This is reinforced around chapter 25 where Leberblume and Loco Mùsica are fighting Baiser. For context, Loco Musica wanted to be an Idol, but had terrible singing. She uses her evil power to basically force everyone to listen to her sing (which is so reminiscent of Mermaid Melody btw). When they fight, Baiser wins, and is then set to use her new found power to “punish” Loco Musica.

Originally, Loco Musica points out how Baiser’s sadistic tendencies are “the same” as Lord Enorme, who we’ve seen uses sadism as a genuine form of punishment. Something to avoid. You behave well, because you don’t want to get hurt or humiliated by her.

However, when Baiser uses her own unique type of sadism on Loco Musica, something happens. Instead of causing her physical pain by beating her or using violence, she forces her to get naked and perform her idol song like that. This causes her to get extremely embarrassed. And in the process, she actually starts to sing really well.

This is important for two reasons

1) Baiser is actually taking into account who Musica is. It’s later revealed that Musica wanted a more frilly idol-like outfit but Lord Enorme shut it down, for the sake of a more ‘unified’ aesthetic. Baiser is not just throwing around the same treatment and punishment for all girls - what one might like, the other might hate.

2) At the end of the day, while she did the punishment, it was both embarrassing, but ultimately something that helped Musica and made her feel better.

And that’s really the key here, and why I love the series.

Sadism, sex and kinks in general are not tools of degeneracy. They’re treated as part of our experience.

Also, it’s just fun?

Part 4: Gushing Over Magical Girls is just extremely fun when you don’t have a dumb bitch yapping abt how unholy it is to see tiddies on a screen

Yeah, GOMG just has one of the most creative depictions of the most insane of kinks you’ll see - I could spent hour gushing over Nero Alice.

Seeing all these different kinks being depicted as powers and abilities that these characters have - and seeing how they interact with other people is just interesting.

The sex scenes are both hilarious and kinda sexy. Specially if you do like to see women all hot and bothered. Personally I’m not into girls (or anyone for that matter) but I have to admit the scenes were pretty hot. And there is no shame in admitting as much. No matter what the puritanical Christian on Twitter crying abt “god honoring lesbian sex” Will tell you.

I cannot begin to explain just how hype and relatable it was to see Magia Baiser defeat Lord Enorme with the power of straight up delusion, we STAN.

So, yeah.

It’s been a while since I last saw a Magical Girl Show so unashamed of being a Magical Girl Show. Unashamed of being weird, of praising the genre and just enjoying it.

My essay is titled, in part, as a joking reference to my much more popular series “MLB is the worst thing to happen to the magical girl series”. Which I still think is true.

And while, yeah, maybe GOMG isn’t the best thing to come out of the genre…I still think it’s good that it came out.

A lot of people say they want a more “mature” take on Magical Girls but - this proved to me that just isn’t the case.

Gushing over magical girls proves that the Magical Girl Genre Can Be so much more than what people think. More than glitter and sparkles, more than vapid action scenes, or what little girls want.

Much like any other genre, it can be raunchy, it can be messy, it can explore things outside of the status quo. But it can still deeply respect the source material, and the origins of it.

GOMG proves Magical Girls can be fun. Just. Straight up fun. Regardless of your age. They can serve and connect you to parts of yourself you didn’t realize you could connect to.

I hope it proves to more people that the genre can be so much more than “just for little girls” that parodies can be more than pointing and laughing, and that it can have themes beyond just, “friendship”.

Magical Girls can be so much more. You just, have to have an open mind about it.

[once-upon-an-animation]

There are many things that frustrate me with the writing of Annabeth in the PJO TV Show, but I think one thing that I haven’t seen people talk much about is the mini-arc of Percy needing to help Annabeth with her sense of fun/humanity.

Just so we’re clear, I absolutely hate this arc.

Prior to the show’s premiere, I believe there was a quote from Rick discussing new-ish things that we’d see in the show, and one of those things was Percy helping Annabeth “tap into her humanity”. I can’t find the exact quote, but it should be on the series update Twitter account if you search it.

When I first read this quote, I wasn’t exactly sure what it meant, but I thought maybe we’d get an expansion of the theme of forgiveness that we got in the original books, or maybe we’d get an arc about Annabeth’s pride and how that gets in the way of her relationships with others. Or maybe they’d try and break down the ways in which Annabeth helps to uphold the gods’ ways of doing things, and align her more with the mortal point of view (which they essentially did, but not the overall point).

What I certainly wasn’t expecting was for them to strip Annabeth of most, if not, all of her smaller/softer traits, and give her this unusually stoic and stiff personality, where she suddenly has no familiarity with casual aspects of the mortal world (movies, Disney world, common idioms), and needs Percy to introduce these concepts to her in an effort to “unlock” her humanity.

What.

The.

Fuck.

Words cannot emphasize enough how much I despise this arc. Not only is it entirely nonsensical for Annabeth not to be familiar with these things (she was with her dad at least until the age of 7 and she goes to a camp full of other children who are regularly in contact with the mortal world; do you seriously expect me to believe that at no point in her 12 years of life, she never saw a single film, heard of Disneyworld, or heard common idioms and slang terms from her camp-mates? Seriously???)

But ALSO!

Book!Annabeth had PLENTY of humanity to go around! Even with her pride and initial coldness towards Percy, she plays hackeysack with him and Grover on the first day of their quest! She has a cute silly crush/admiration/infatuation on Luke. She nerds out big time over the St. Louis Arch! She’s the first to steal clothing from Waterland! She screams and cries when she encounters the mechanical spiders! She has an expression of sadness when she shares her backstory about Thalia and Luke! She gets lost in her little construction game at the Lotus, so much so that Percy has to use her phobia to pull her out of the trance! She grabs Percy’s hand when they first enter the Underworld because she’s scared! She tears up when it’s time to leave Cerberus!

And you stripped her of all these things, because you’re so desperate to overemphasize the Percabeth romance, and you felt that it was absolutely necessary to have Percy educate Annabeth on “unlocking humanity”??? Why!!!!

Not only did Book!Percy help Annabeth discuss things about bad parents and approaching forgiveness, but Book!Percy already had something important to offer Annabeth: loyalty, trustworthiness, and reliability. You didn’t need to take away her already-present traits and wits to convince us that Percy was the type of person she needed in her life, because we can already see what he offers her in the books. So why oh why did you feel the need to give us the silly “tap into your humanity” arc? Why did you turn her personality into something that it wasn’t? Why did you take away her depth just so her character could better serve Percabeth?

I don’t even necessarily agree with the criticism that this version of Annabeth feels like it prioritizes Percabeth more, but I can see why people made that complaint. Y’all took away so much of what made this character endearing, because you felt like it was a much bigger priority to have Percy help her unlock humanity than to let her be human prior to meeting him and outside of him. Not only does her personality get shafted, but her relationships with other people get shafted too! Her interactions with Luke are affection-less, she sent Grover off on his own in the Lotus so she could go off with Percy, and I don’t even think that she and Chiron interacted once this season; I don’t even think she mentioned the part about her calling him to come pick her up after she attempted living at home again!

But don’t worry; we’ll get plenty of scenes doubling down and tripling down on how Percy is the center of her world now! Yay!

[quibbs126]

Yesterday I saw someone on Twitter mentioning the babyfication of Bumblebee in the fandom, and that's been somewhat of a thought in my mind before, so I figured "eh, might as well write my own thoughts on the matter myself". Though in a tumblr post, since Twitter has a character limit and I don't feel like doing a thread

So yeah, that's what this is

Why does Bumblebee get babyfied so much in the Transformers fandom?

Disclaimer though: I'm only really touching on the shows and movies and how they might contribute to the issue, and only the ones I've seen, so no Unicron Trilogy or RID 2015. And probably not much on the live action movies either since I remember them very little, just design things. I've also not read any of the comics, so they aren't weighing in either

I'm also not claiming I have the definitive answers, just some guesses based on my own understandings. I'm very socially inept, so I could be completely wrong. It's also why I'm not touching on the fandom side much

My friend told me to put a "read more" tab on this after showing her what I was doing, and yeah I probably should. Take note that this is an absolute monster of a post, this took me hours to write. So be warned

But yeah anyways, let's start this

Oh right, I should probably start with what I mean by "babyfied", so we all are on the same page here. The biggest things I think are making Bumblebee a teenager or child, whether in interpretations of canon material, AUs of official series, or people's own versions of the Transformers (though note the most damning one here is the first one, seeing a canon Bee as a kid, specifically when it is not shown that he is one. The third one is completely fine, it just is a symptom I think), and then also basically just making Bumblebee Optimus' son, or Elita's, or Megatron's, or a combination of characters; basically, just making Bumblebee someone's kid

I'll be tackling it in a general order of the shows/movies and how they contribute to the issue, starting with:

G1 cartoon

So in g1, I will admit, I think I can see Bee and Optimus having some sort of father-son relationship, at least in moments; like Attack of the Autobots which is where Optimus and Bumblebee have that iconic little hug

But I mean also, Optimus just kind of generally has paternal vibes in g1, he feels like everyone's dad. I think it might just get magnified with Bumblebee because Bumblebee is small and probably has the "cutest" personality of the Minicars, so it's just him from that group. And also, he's got a cute little Beetle car as his alt, which factors into it

He also does seem to have been written with the idea of him being younger, at least that's how the toy description feels to me

He was also Spike's best Autobot friend, and as I'm pretty sure Spike was supposed to be the young teenage human for the kids to relate to more, that probably helps with his youth factor

Though he is still functionally an adult. But I don't think the problem is as bad here, since let's be real, people mostly remember g1 for the nostalgia, iconic moments, and being the origins of the franchise; people aren't really making g1 AUs outside of that one person with the Orion Pax and Megatron knowing each other AU

So from the start, he's always had this, but I don't think we can call it an issue at this point. But it does bring in some of the main factors in the babyfication of Bee, namely:

He's small, which can give the impression of younger

He generally is one of the younger bots, even if he's still an adult

He tends to be the main friend of a human protagonist, who generally tend to be kids or teenagers

These will show up again, so keep them in mind. Now, let's move onto our next show, 23 years later

Animated

So in Animated, Bumblebee is yet again, one of the youngest members of the main cast, though this is specifically told to us, like how Sentinel, one of Optimus' contemporaries (and TFA OP is meant to be on the younger side of his variations too), was Bee's drill sergeant, as well as just Bee's general behavior

He is also the smallest member of the main cast, which can contribute to the feeling of him being younger

He is also friends with the human protagonist Sari, who is an 8-year-old at the start of the show, and the two of them tend to go along with each other's crazy schemes, rather than Bee trying to be responsible with Sari; that's more Optimus' job.

What I didn't pick up until way later than I probably should have was that Bulkhead is around the same age as Bumblebee, thus making him also one of the youngest members of the cast. Which honestly in retrospect, makes a lot of sense with how he's written, and him also being one of Sari's closest friends. I think why I didn't pick up on it while watching however comes from two things: 1, he's like the biggest member of the main cast, which doesn't immediately make me think he's one of the younger members, even though younger people being big is something they can be (I mean my brother's like 6 feet tall and he's not even 15 yet), and then 2: Transformers Prime Bulkhead, aka the one from the show that might be more popular than TFA, is very much an adult, and that was the Bulkhead I knew. So I didn't know he was supposed to be younger

We'll swing back around to Prime later, I think it's one of the main contributors to the issue, but keep in mind that interpretations from popular series tend to stay in mind and bleed over into other shows and their versions, even if that's not how they are

But back to Bumblebee, things generally aren't super different between this and g1, other than the fact that he and Optimus don't have much of a parent-child dynamic, and that this Bee definitely is on the younger side in canon, though probably still an adult? I'm not sure, but he can't mentally be more than like, very early 20s. But it happening again does reinforce these ideas of Bumblebee as a younger bot

In fanon, I don't know if the TFA side has this much of an issue, at least nowadays? I see him get shipped with Blitzwing and Prowl plenty, and I don't see him as Optimus' kid, other than like one time with the "9 months in my womb" meme, and him being an oplita kid, which might have just been for the joke and also TFA Elita was yellow, so eh. But I'm also not too big on the TFA side of the fandom anyways, so I could be wrong

So before we get to Prime, I just want to sidestep into the movies that were also coming out at the time

Bayverse/live-action movies

Now I can't say much on the writing front with Bee, since I have not seen any of these movies in a hot minute, outside of the first hour and a half of the 2007 movie. I will say though, based on what I saw of Bee there (aka mostly his car shenanigans), that is not a child, that is a sassy little bastard man. Though that could be because Bay was trying to market more to like, teenage boys and trying to make him "cooler"

But anyways, what I wanted to talk about was his design, and how it contributes to the babyfication issue

The Bay movies gave Bumblebee a redesign, looking pretty different from his original design (though that goes for pretty much everyone except Optimus)

The thing I notice most with these movie designs is how round they make him, specifically with his eyes, being so big and round, especially later. While it was probably originally just a reference to bug eyes, it makes him cuter looking, more innocent. I think by Bumblebee, they were trying to capitalize on that in the movie, making him seem cute and non-threatening in certain scenes so Charlie knows he's not a danger. Which makes sense, but it does contribute to the problem here

And in general, he's a lot rounder I think in his design. And while I'm not expert on shape language, I think I can gather that more round shapes leads to him looking more friendly and less threatening and cuter in our minds, and "cuter" leads to "younger". That's why I keep bringing up "cute" by the way, forgot to say earlier. Cuteness tends to be associated with youthfulness and thus younger characters more

And in general with Bumblebee, him being yellow, a bright color more associated with joy and optimism, and thus youth, and generally having a more optimistic and extroverted personality (though not necessarily in the Bay movies, though I can't say for sure) again leads into him being younger. Now it probably came from the fact that bees are yellow, thus he's yellow (and also black), and his personality came from that bright color. Actually the name probably also comes from the yellow color scheme, but you get it. His color scheme and personality lends Bee to being a younger character

Back to Bayverse, it did change Bumblebee's alt mode from a Beetle to a Camaro (again probably to make him "cooler"), and I think since then, Bumblebee's basically always been a sports car, outside of explicitly g1 referencing things. So it does tend to take away the "smaller" aspect of what makes him seem so young, as he's more average sized now. But the youthful connotations don't necessarily go away

This is also (I think) what started the trend of Bumblebee losing his voice, being replaced with either radio/movie clips, or just beeps that the characters can understand. Now while I'm not too sure how this affects him in Bayverse, as I haven't seen much of Bee proper in the movies in a long time (the first half of the first movie is pretty much just car Bee), and since I know he can still talk in some way, it does mean you focus less on his dialogue and how that characterizes him, and more on his appearance and actions (at least in robot mode). Or he just doesn't talk, and you can have your own interpretations of what he's saying. And as mentioned prior, his design tends to make him look cuter, adding to the issue. I'll get more into this in Prime, since I am familiar with Prime, and he doesn't talk at all there

He's also again, I'm pretty sure one of the younger bots, despite probably being an adult. We'll go over that more in Prime

I don't think I have much else to say on these movies, so to go over the general points, this seemed to cause a bit of a shift in Bumblebee's portrayals. He got a bigger alt mode, so he's not tiny anymore, but he got big round eyes that make him seem cuter, rounder features, and he lost his voice, which means you can fill in the gaps in what he's saying in your head

Now, let's get to the real meat of this, and I think the biggest cause of this all:

Prime

I hope I didn't hype this section up too much. But I think this is where all the things conglomerate into the main factors of Bee's babyfication

Bumblebee is not the smallest bot, but the smallest is the female motorcycle bot, as opposed to his sports car, so. He is the youngest Autobot, and bot in general outside of I guess the Predacons, until Smokescreen comes in in Season 2, who is also considered young. He and Optimus have a close relationship, that given their age differences, could be read as paternal. He's got the big round eyes of Bayverse and a generally round design, which we've already discussed as to how it contributes to the problem. He also does not speak at all, only using beeps that we the audience cannot understand, until the finale. His designated human friend is the youngest human companion here, and the most child of them, being only 12. All these factors combine to create the most "baby" Bumblebee so far

(I just added a picture since I felt like I needed to. But there's not much to talk about design-wise that wasn't in the Bay section)

First up, the age thing. I keep saying that Bumblebee is one of the youngest bots in the casts, even though he's technically an adult. This is true, in part because as far as we can see in canon, Transformers don't really have "child" stages, they're just born adults. And they don't really age; or well, they do, it just takes millions and millions of years to do so, so they're functionally immortal. So, they don't really age like us humans, physically and probably mentally too, given they skip the young child years. So I mean like, technically speaking, Bee's an adult, it's not really clear where that translates into our perception, so maybe he's more mentally a child? I don't think I'm making sense here, maybe ignore this section

But he is younger, and particularly in Prime, he's in a team of bots all much older than him. If I were to put them in mental human years, I'd say he and Smokescreen are probably somewhere in their early 20s, while everyone else is probably like, 35+. Bee is notably younger than his peers, and we are made aware of this fact. And this makes him appear even younger than he is

If I were to make a comparison, and maybe this is a bit random, but take Mouthwashing for example. I may never have been super knowledgeable of the fandom, but I am aware that Daisuke is like, 22, while everyone else on the Tulpar is 35+, and that makes him feel so much younger by comparison. He's only just started his adult life, compared to the far more experienced adults around him. And while I didn't see it, I do think I remember seeing people talk about how people kept portraying Daisuke as younger and more innocent than he is when he's a 22-year-old man. I also remember someone comparing the portrayals of Daisuke in the fandom with another character from another series (I think it was Omori?), who was the same age as Daisuke, but because that character is the oldest of the protagonist group, everyone else being children or teenagers, he was portrayed super differently to Daisuke. The other character had to be responsible and make mature decisions, while Daisuke is allowed to be silly and reckless. The point I'm trying to make here is that age, and how a character is portrayed and interpreted, is relative to the characters surrounding them, with the characters on the extremes sometimes getting exacerbated because of it. This is true in real life too, but for the sake of analysis

Bumblebee is the youngest member of the Autobot team (at least until Smokescreen), and thus, he feels even younger as a result. This is probably also helped by the fact that there's no Decepticons around his age either, everyone around Bumblebee is a full-grown adult by comparison. And his close relationship with Optimus, who is meant to be one of the older bots in the group, feels very paternal, which serves to make Bee feel again younger, like he's Optimus' son. Which I like here, but it furthers the issue

And on the topic of him just feeling younger, let's bring up Raf. Bumblebee is again a friend of a human protagonist, but in Prime we have 3 main humans, ranging in ages but all in grade school, and each one has an Autobot they're paired with. And Bumblebee gets Raf, the youngest member at around 12. Due to Raf's youngest member status and technically not being a teenager, he is, as I said before, the most "child" of the group, even if they're all technically children still. I thought he was 10 until I double checked and saw he was 12, and honestly, I feel like he feels younger than Sari did, who was only 8 when we met her. Probably because unlike Sari who had no human friends, Raf does, both of whom are older than him and treat him as such. It's the relative age thing again

But back to Bee, unlike with the other humans and bots, Bee doesn't act as the responsible adult, but more of a friend for Raf, though not nearly as chaotic as TFA Bee and Sari. They aren't causing trouble; they're just having fun and cute moments. There's again, the cuteness factor that probably contributes to the young feeling he brings, but it also serves to make Bumblebee not feel as much as an adult. Arcee is definitely an adult with Jack, and Bulkhead particularly gives me responsible adult vibes with Miko, at least on some occasions where they aren't indulging in fun, reckless behavior and Bulkhead has to get serious with her. They're responsible with the kids, even if they slip up at times, and help them learn things. But Bee doesn't have that with Raf, probably because Bee can't talk and give him the lesson. Raf also doesn't cause much trouble on his own and has Ratchet for that

Which segues me nicely into Bumblebee's lack of voice in this show. This was a carryover from Bayverse, since Hasbro was still trying to have synergy with the movies at that point. But instead of radio clips, he just beeps, with the other bots and Raf just being able to understand him, even though we the audience don't. And because of this, we never know what he's saying, and he also just straight up doesn't have a voice for us to gauge his age with. Thus, it's up to us the audience to fill in the blanks in our imaginations. But with all of the discussed factors of him being cute and young, we can just end up interpreting him as younger because of it. It's also again, probably because he doesn't talk. It's like R2D2 and BB-8, who only speak in beeps, but because they're cute, we see them probably as much cuter than they would be if we knew what they were actually saying (R2 especially)

To maybe go off on a weird tangent, I think child characters tend to be seen more as objects than people, or I guess objectified more, since they don't have fully developed brains and personalities and are less likely to be able to hold their own in a fight. They're things to be protected and loved and angst over, while all they need to do is be there and be cute. I think the lack of voice ties into this in a way, I just don't know how to explain it, other than like, because they took away his voice, we can see him as even cuter and child-like instead of the grown adult he is. Infantalization, that's what I'm trying to say. I think that's term for all of this, but you get what I mean by "babyfication"

Especially because at least for me, when Bumblebee did get his voice back, I started seeing him more as an adult, because he could actually talk and had an adult voice. Yes, him learning to take more of a leadership role in Predacons Rising is also a factor, but him having a voice now is part of it too. But he only got it back in the finale and the movie, so you spend pretty much the entire show with voiceless Bumblebee, and what comes with that

I think that wraps up everything about Prime Bee's portrayal, but now let me get into why I think overall, it was what really caused this baby Bee thing to stick

Like I said prior in the Animated section, the more something's repeated, the more it sticks, and these traits of Bumblebee being the youngest have been consistent throughout the series we've covered. Not to mention, I just think personality wise, this Bee feels the youngest/child-like, though again, it probably has to do with his company and lack of voice. And also, the fact that he's well-behaved, like how people want children to be

So, by this point, this interpretation of Bumblebee is stuck in our minds as how he is, younger than the rest of the team

But I think another big thing is that Transfomers Prime is probably the biggest series in the fandom, at least show-wise. G1 was influential and Animated is still popular, but no show comes close to the amount of popularity I see for Prime stuff, particularly their brand of megop or for their Decepticons in general. The only thing I've seen come close is Transformers One, which is also the newest one and what brought new people in during this wave, so who knows if it'll stick forever. I'm not sure where IDW stands though, because I know that was big too

If I had to attribute Prime's success in the fandom to things, I'd say it's because plenty of people around my age (20s-ish?), who are definitely online and on social media, grew up with Prime (though I will note that Transformers tends to have an older fandom than I'm used to), the fact that for a long time, Prime was easily accessible in its entirety on Netflix, long before the streaming wars (and this is how I watched the show), it generally has good writing and animation, it feels like it had a complete story, unlike Animated which had Season 4 cancelled, and Frank Welker and Peter Cullen were back as Megatron and Optimus, making them feel more "definitive". Among probably other things I'm missing

But the point is, Prime is big, and it'll take a lot to dethrone it, outside of possibly some TF One sequels sticking the landing after the first movie. But that's not certain at the moment

And like I said before, popular interpretations tend to bleed into other series and interpretations, even when they don't entirely fit. There's a reason when people want Knock Out in another show, they basically want more TFP Knock Out, design and character wise, or why Breakdown was in Earthspark without the other Stunticons. Or why people basically try to recreate the g1 backstory when making Skyfire and skystar for their stories, even when I'm not really sure versions of Starscreams would ever be scientists. Why Functionism will show up in fanfics despite something like TF One not really having a place for it outside of the cogless thing. Why people will instinctively ship megop across continuities despite it not working as well in some (*cough cough TFA cough*). Why Megatron and Optimus have largely had the same backstories for ~15 years, with One being probably the most different, but still the same general beats. It happens both in canon and fanon, but it definitely happens

So when Prime Bumblebee is portrayed as young, and probably intentionally, it sticks in our minds that Bumblebee is very young and usually will be. He's like Optimus' son here, especially since he explicitly is younger than him. He's cute and friendly, even if he can get into trouble sometimes. He's just a little guy

And by this point, the franchise was like, 30 years old. There's been a number of series, and a lot of the general staples of the series had been set and remain today. I'd argue Prime is the last of the "foundational" series in this franchise, at least where we are now with it; we could end up going in another direction in the future. So it's gonna be hard to just change how we see the characters here

The shows after

I won't go into each one in detail after this, because let's be real, this is long enough already. And again, I don't think at this stage, anything other than One has left as much of an impact on the fandom/series

We're skipping over RID 2015 since I haven't watched it, but I do think it's one of the shows with the least of this problem. Probably because he is at least initially surrounded by characters his age or younger, so the age relativity isn't a factor

Cyberverse actually has Bumblebee around the same age as Optimus here, not being notably younger, but that holds true for everyone in that series; basically everyone here is the same age, outside of like, Cheetor. I don't interact with the Cyberverse fandom enough to know how it fares with Bee there, but given he's a main character, probably more than Optimus, he's probably doing fine?

Though I have to admit I personally find it weird when Bee gets shipped, because surprise, I too have some amount of the babybee influence on me too. I mention it here because there's genuinely nothing wrong with shipping Bumblebee and Windblade here, if anything it makes so much sense; it's just that I can't get out of my head that Bee is supposed to be younger, and thus, shouldn't be shipped

I know nothing about the War for Cybertron trilogy

Earthspark Bumblebee is another case of being hit with the baby beam the least, which I think is attributed to his role as the Terrans' mentor. Once again, he is put as an older character instead of younger, and even more so than RID because he's the main adult teaching our young child protagonists. The age relativity is working in his favor this time. Most you're gonna get is him being called megop's child of divorce, but those two are old anyways

So far, canon wise, it doesn't seem that bad

But then we get to One, which is where I think the problem is really rearing its ugly head. See, B-127 is never said to be younger than the rest of the quartet, he's assumed to be the same age as them. Heck, you could maybe even see him as a bit older, given his odd knowledge and having been in Sublevel 50 so long. But B is constantly portrayed as younger than the rest, being the child of divorce, but actually more "child" this time, him basically being Optimus and/or Elita's son (Megatron is another parent too), despite no indication of such a bond in the movie outside of just being friends (even less so with Elita, whom he has the least screen time with of the group), or just straight up being made into a child or baby for the rest of the group to parent, despite it taking out a member of the group, especially when again, he is not said to be younger

But it keeps happening to him because it's the new popular series and some are coming in with prior expectations and knowledge of B and his relationships, that Bee must always be baby, and probably because he's very energetic and hyper and probably neurodivergent, which has a history of getting characters infantalized. Not saying everyone who sees him as younger is problematic or ableist for doing so, just that this probably contributes on some level to why it's so widespread

I think I've covered all my points at this rate. Are we finally done? Can I go do my schoolwork? Sorry, just random, I've been here for a while

So, to summarize, why does Bumblebee get babyfied so much?

Because Bee has a long history as being young, he's put around older characters who make him feel younger by comparison, he's got a design that lends him to be seen as cute and young, especially in the most well-known depictions (I mostly mean g1, Bayverse and Prime here), the fact that the show were all of these traits are at their biggest is also the most popular show, and thus influencing people's minds going forward that this is how he should be, even when it doesn't fit so well

And I don't think this mentality around Bee is going away anytime soon, and it isn't necessarily wrong to make Bee a young bot, but I think we should acknowledge that sometimes it's trying to fit a square in a round hole, it just doesn't fit as well, and we need to be mindful of that

[devotedlydeepeststrawberry]

Please someone explain to me what exactly is the Voice Actor Hoyo drama and how exactly is a Chinese company at fault for a (mainly) USA strike?

SAG-AFTRA goes to war against AI and starts the strike. All union members are meant to be on strike and not promote the video games from the companies who didn't sign the interim bargaining agreement. Now, Hoyo is a Chinese company and outsources its eng VA to other studios. Each of its games are in different studios. Why does Hoyo have to sign the agreement and not just the eng Studios?

Would Genshin and other non-union projects have to become union projects? Is it not allowed for non-union members to work on union projects in the voice acting industry? Would this greatly affect the non-union VAs? I like sources with these answers and not just anecdotal evidence or 'I'm a VA trust me, bro' without proof that you actually are a VA. Just like I'd like to see a true source about the 3000$+ yearly fees to join the union.

Zenless Zone Zero recently had some drama for replacing two voice actors without prior notice. The game is under Sound Candence Studios which, while not under the agreement, has in fact a clause about AI-protection in their contracts. And ZZZ and the studio are not 'struck' by the strike. But 2 VAs decided to strike anyway. One was confirmed to not even be part of the union. I think the biggest issue here was 'without prior notice' as there was no reason to strike a company that essentially doesn't have much to do with the strike anyway.

And Hoyo is changing Genshin's studio to SIDE studio, probably to bypass the strike but also to ensure that they won't have this problem in the future as they don't only use USA based VAs. In fact, they replaced a character's VA with a VA based in Japan. With a Japanese agency. In SIDE's Tokyo branch. And not only are fans mad but also the USA voice actors bullied the poor guy on twitter/x. Now, Kinich was only voiced in ONE patch. Why such drama? Because he lost a job he isn't doing? USA is not the only english speaking country in the world, and I'm sure that a lot of people in Europe, Africa and South America also play Genshin in English. People who may not be aware of the strike and complain to Hoyo about the voiceless characters. Hoyo never made a contract with the original VA, Formosa did, so they have no responsibilities towards him. And Hoyo has no moral reason to continue to employ USA citizens. Not their country, not their strike. If an American company did this, I wouldn't like it and it would be easy to sway me on SAG-AFTR's side. But since it's a Chinese company with an intended worldwide audience I'm more on their side. They waited for more than half a year for the US to get it together and come to a conclusion and it's their right as a foreign company to act upon the complaints of the consumers. (Hopefully, they also take the complaints of diversity and story telling in Natlan to heart as well). And honestly, I would like to have more VA's outside the US in general. I dislike the overexposure of USA media and licensing groups.(Hated it since 4kids got the rights for Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh for all of the 'western world' and countries like Germany had to take the USA versions of the shows, instead the original Japanese like they did with Digimon and One Piece. Seriously, same channel one after another you would hear Brock say in german: 'jelly filled donut' for rice ball and then hear Zorro say onigiri or riceball later)

Anyway. I do have a bias, but I'm still on the fence since TikTok, Reddit and Youtube all have different sentiments and opinions depending on the information, misinformation, and rumors they heard. I just want clarity. I would even read the entire interim bargaining agreement to properly understand what is happening. Except the bullying. There is no reason to attack an American born Japanese person who has a wife and a child in Japan for taking a job his Japanese agency probably told him to take. The moment the audition started the old VA lost the job. He didn't betray anyone.

There is also the fact that it seems Wriothlessly's VA isn't om strike anymore since he does promote Genshin on his YouTube again.

[aipurjopa]

i went on a rant on twitter earlier about the whole director stuff and im lowkey crashing out about it again but don't want to subject my poor twitter priv moots to me again so...

i know originally (read: after spoke's first s2 episode) i was yapping about how spoke could be working for the director/is the director, but the more we get into s2 the more i think the director is not at all relevant to both spoke and wemmbu, at least not in the way that the director is to parrot.

and also, the constant explaining away of character's actions as just "the director" has gotten really, really boring, and really really annoying. things like eggchan's actions during eggpire being "oh the director is doing this to him!" is, lowkey, the boring option that also just completely gets rid of egg's own agency. egg isn't just "wemmbu's sidekick" he has his own feelings and motivations and everything, yk? why not look at his actions in the context of that or whatever. idk. or like, spoke's attitude in 100 days being explained away as just "the director is controlling spoke!" is just so boring. like. c'mon.

the moment spoke's 2nd episode this season was in the same format as the first and did not even hint towards the director at all, that's when i sort of decided that yeah, spoke and wemm's povs will not involve the director the way parrot's does. i think that maybe the addition of more narration done in post and the newer formats are for... yt meta reasons? or for the sake of making unstable videos feel more like smp content from unscripted servers? or maybe there is an in character reason but if there is i don't think it's the director.

and like, i think the director is a cool villain! but i don't think it's spoke or wemmbu's villain. yk? and i think it's real fucking annoying when every character's actions is just written off as them being mind controlled (which, btw, there is like no proof the director has mind control powers ? for all we know bro is just paying off everyone who works with him.). yeah. um. anyways just rambling here so ignore me. also watch the next spoke/wemm video just completely disprove me. ok. bye.

[thecoolerliauditore]

Pls tell me about Scott's views on women in general pls I'm begging you

o7 and I'm sorry

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

fyi, the post itself isn't NSFW, but I'll be getting all gender theory in this bitch so I'll be referencing a lot of things and putting in pictures of naked ppl sometimes. maybe skip this one if you don't like that

(long post)

Disclaimers

An explanation for the tweet up there

I usually don't write these because I assume the people on my blog have enough sense to realise when I'm talking about the characters vs the CCs or are comfortable enough being a little confused, but I feel the need to extra-clarify here and expand on how I specifically view C vs CC because I think it differs a little from the average person.

To me, C and CC are two separate entities but not entirely disconnected. What differs (e.g. the exclusion of irl relationships -- their wives, kids, etc.) is poignant enough to severely detach them from the people they originated from, at least in my eyes, but there's also the fact that these are not scripted characters, just creators being themselves with a hint of behind the scenes drama-adding and improv thrown in.

For example, CC Pearl is a car nerd. So I assume her character is too.

This is where I state very clearly that yes, a lot of these thoughts come from things I've seen on Scott's twitter, which is undoubtedly the CC and not the C. However I, to me, am still talking about the C because any observations/judgments I could make on actual irl youtuber CC guy Scott Major would be tabloid at best and slightly invasive at worst. I'm seeing these statements within the context of "the death game guy would say this too and I'm writing this based on that", not "this is the inner psychological workings of the youtuber because I, as a fan, can totally tell".

TLDR I don't consider this post RPF but you might. This is a little more RPF-y than my usual stuff. If you don't rock with it we cool.

Everyone is weird about women, and that's okay

One short-hand I've used in the past to talk about Scott and women is just by saying that he's "weird about women" which I'm sure isn't exclusive to him.

(shitpost I made awhile back)

I see a lot of people now who love "villains" and "evil" but when it comes to any traits resembling real life evil (e.g. misogyny in this case) they suddenly become insecure. Just a couple of days back a saw a post on twitter essentially asking for permission to continue liking CC Scott in spite of the "bad things" he did.

And I think, in order to present an analysis like this, I must address that mindset first.

This is not a judgment on Scott's morality, nor is it trying to dissuade you from liking him. This is not saying that he is any more misogynistic than any other player in the series. This is just me pointing out Scott's attitude towards women and what I read it as, nothing less or more.

The feelings that me pointing these things out - be they apathy, disgust, anger or, what I would hope to see most, interest - are your own. I'm not here to tell anyone how to feel and never will try to police that on my blog.

Scott's Relationships with Women

aka. oh yeah this is about minecraft.

Scott and Cleo || "Yeah, you can kill me."

Scott and Cleo's alliance is arguably the strongest in the entire series, spanning through all five seasons and remaining unbroken with no (serious) drama attached. You'd expect from this that they two have a very settled and stable understanding of eachother, yet this isn't a case.

Their power dynamic shifts dramatically from one season to the next.

3L's initial Widows Alliance began on fairly equal footing, built on the mutual agreement that they were waiting for their respective partners to die. Both understood they were eachothers' "plan B" and felt comfortable in that arrangement.

Come LL, Cleo does what she couldn't in 3L, and initiates that plan, going to Scott after her last alliance, the fairy fort, fell apart. Scott requests nothing from her in return.

DL is the longest the two spent as eachothers main ally. Cleo is the one who initially proposes teaming up to spite their "cheating" soulmates and Scott agrees. Cleo admits to Martyn in private that she's aware she's taking advantage of Scott (which I've always interpreted as her talking about all seasons, not just DL). Due to the time they spend together, it's here where it becomes apparent that their initial assumptions during 3L were not entirely accurate, as Scott shows a level of gameplay competency much higher than Cleo's (e.g. teaching her how to axe-crit) but despite this Scott never berates her or thinks any less of her value as his ally.

LimL is probably this pairing at their most unhinged, as Scott, despite once again asking for nothing (or very little -- I'll be honest I'm a bit fuzzy on this) in return from Cleo, allows them and their allies to butcher him repeatedly for time. He gives more time to the Clockers than he does to Martyn, his closest ally that season. Despite this, Scott is never ever considered as a "family member" by the Clockers, despite them giving that title to even temporary allies (like the Bad Boys being their cousins) -- even Martyn gets a title with Scott completely unattached.

SL is relatively more chill, but shows that the two inevitably end up teaming together even despite their oath to avoid eachother that season.

The point being -- again and again, we see Scott literally and metaphorically making sacrifices for Cleo, with the only real transaction he requires from her being that she continues having his back when times get rough. This is despite that he's aware she isn't any more capable than he is and the fact that so far it has only been Cleo in rough times (LL, LimL and SL) and never Scott.

Speaking from a purely transactional perspective, Scott is not getting a bargain here -- and even Cleo seems acutely aware of it, judging by her comment during DL as well as the way she tends to speak of her survival capabilities very lowly in general ("rubbish pvp skills and spiffy one-liners"). I'm speaking in this sense because I've seen discussions in the past about the transactional way Scott views relationships but rarely does Cleo get brought up.

This is at stark contrast to how he treats Jimmy, whose predicted death was what spurred on Scott and Cleo's alliance in the first place.

Scott assumes Jimmy is "incompetent", where he assumes Cleo is capable. When Jimmy messes up, he reprimands him, when Cleo struggles to crit him, he patiently teaches her. When LL begins, Scott's first instinct was to look at Jimmy's lives and note that he was "useless to (him)", but holds no objections to Cleo joining his alliance despite her already having enemies being a potential liability. In SL, he jokes about how Cleo and him being allied is a given and pretty much expected of them, whereas in LimL he explicitly requests from Jimmy a recognition that he still cares ("say love you back!") before he will help him.

Scott and Gem || "You HAVE TO kill me, Gem,"

In SL, Gem settles in very easily in a leadership position within Gem and the Scotts due to her trying to live up to her reputation but also due to Scott and Impulse's more laid back, passive playstyles.

Both Scott and Impulse let Gem kill them for extra health this season, although Scott is arguably much more subservient than Impulse is, with him not only insisting that she kill him in the final episode but also not fighting back (and only yelling for her to stop) when she starts hitting him with a sword during the episode where her task was to literally kill everyone on the server.

Once again comparing her to Jimmy, Scott in 3L had a tendency to brush aside Jimmy's concerns over alliances (e.g. Jimmy questioning if they could trust Cleo) while in SL Scott runs his plans by Gem (and Pearl and Impulse) in terms of who he wanted to team up with (specifically excluding Joel from the potential mounders alliance) implying he held her opinion in some form of regard.

Before this becomes less of an analysis of Scott's treatment of men vs women and more of Scott's treatment of Jimmy vs everyone else, I think it's notable enough to mention that he and Martyn also lacked this sort of communication in LimL. He would inform Martyn of his plans, but rarely was it ever framed as a request.

SL almost feels as if Scott has slid Gem into the slot he had previously designated for Cleo in 3L (his girlboss ally) as he provides her and pretty much forces onto her by the end the acts of service he'd become accustomed to performing for Cleo.

Scott and Lizzie || "You killed her! I don't.. I don't know what to even say!"

Relatively shorter section because this is the one woman he hasn't teamed with, but there's still some interesting stuff I wanted to touch on.

In LL, one of the first thing Scott does is yell at Pearl to revenge-kill Joel for boogey-killing him. Pearl does as she's told and Joel's wet miserable pathetic LL life gets worse from there.

Several episodes later, the roles are reversed -- Lizzie lies to both of them and manages to isolate and boogey-kill Pearl. Scott, instead of reacting with the anger he had for Joel, is almost in a state of shock as he asks Lizzie to let him down so he could collect Pearl's belongings. He doesn't act aggressively towards Lizzie at all, with his most antagonizing act against her being to lie about his intentions when giving her a wither skull.

In SL, he's the only one aware of her early permadeath, but keeps quiet about it almost as if he's in a state of shock akin to when he saw Lizzie kill Pearl in LL. It's not until the others have noticed when he finally brings it up.

Scott and Pearl || "Tilly death do us 'part"

I wrote a whole post just for their relationship alone so for the sake of my sanity I'll be leaving this here.

So now I get to dedicate this section to the meat of this post -- how the way Scott treats women in general impacts his relationship with Pearl and how I view his heel-turn on her as seeping with relevance to Pearl's perceived gender.

In all three of the previous sections, the running theme is that Scott is 1. kinder and more patient with women, regardless of their competency and 2. someone who likes to be in a supporting role to women, occasionally aiding them more than he aids himself and his closer male allies (e.g. Jimmy and Martyn). As shown with Cleo, he assumes that girls have it together, but even if they don't it's not a big deal. When a girl's actions are truly disastrous, such as with Lizzie's, he goes into a state of shock and doesn't really react, preferring to swallow it down and not acknowledge it.

With the amount of times he sacrifices himself, I don't think it's a reach to say that Scott values his own life less than he values the lives of his (female) allies. This specific point actually does extend to his male allies too, shown when he's happy when Martyn literally backstabs him in LimL, but just as with the Martyn post where I point out his victim status-ing doesn't end at only women but includes all the women, Scott has pedastal-ed all the women he's teamed with.

Lizzie is, once again, the exception here due to his limited interactions with her. However that's actually somewhat patched over if you look at adjacent series (such as x-life) where he definitely shows her a level of admiration and respect.

Back to Scott and Pearl.

Their relationship during LL is very standard of how Scott treats women. While the power dynamic between them is obviously more caused by the initial life trade agreement, I don't think it's a far reach to say that Scott is somewhat comfortable in the arrangement.

However, this is also the first thing that sets their relationship apart from Scott with Cleo or Gem -- Pearl is the one making sacrifices, not Scott. She is the one "sacrificing" her lives to him, just in a more non-violent way as allowed by the season's mechanics.

When viewed through this lens, Scott trying to make it up to her and wanting his effort acknowledged makes even more sense. This is suddenly uncharted waters for him. His assuming that Pearl doesn't value him as a person goes hand in hand with him valuing himself less than her.

What Scott has with Cleo or Gem, situations where the other party is clearly uncomfortable with how he treats himself (Gem) or actively aware they are taking advantage of him (Cleo), is equalized to him because he is inherently worth less. What he has with Pearl, on the other hand, looks more equal to most people (lives vs labour) but is wildly imbalanced to him.

It's one of the many factors I see going into Scott's weird decision to abandon her in DL.

An Interlude, Before We Get to DL

La Pieta, Michelangelo

So this has been a lot of words so far and some of you might be wondering at this point: why say Scott is "weird" about women when so far this has been describing how he values women more, is kinder to them, is more patient with them, etc.? How is any of this behaviour remotely misogynistic?

And I would feel horrible if I forced you to read through all of my DL thoughts before I clarified this -- Scott is not your classic wifebeater "women are lesser" misogynist, Scott is someone who subscribes to misogynistic schools of thought and probably considers himself an ally to women, when in reality his beliefs are still rooted in dehumanizing them and these beliefs end up harming the women around him as well as himself.

After all, seeing women are your superiors is still not seeing them as your equals.

I know it's a bit of a meme on this blog at this point. But. Sigmund Freud identified what we know refer to as the "madonna/whore complex", which he described as a pattern of behaviour in men who separated women into being madonnas (pure, holy and admirable) and whores (debased, sexual, deviant). We'll be focusing on the former, the madonna, as it is more relevant to Scott's character.

Freud proposed that the madonna figure was something men projected onto women as a replacement for maternal love. These women are sacred and untouchable, literally as the projection of the maternal role onto them also makes it so that the sufferer cannot feel any sexual attraction towards her (keep this in mind for later).

Scott projects the madonna figure onto his female compatriots -- they are to be protected, served and supported. They are goddesses, queens, but they are never human. The madonna role in of itself is not inherently harmful to the woman, as seen with Cleo who takes control and advantage of it. However, it is enforced, as seen with Gem who at first revels in the superiority but almost breaks down when Scott offers him up as her sacrificial lamb one last time.

I linked this Utena AMV awhile back when vaguely talking about Scott and women, and this was the point I was alluding to.

Girls are beautiful and pure. They don't spit on the street, they don't piss on the street, they don't build hierarchies -- they subvert all the expectations of masculinity that I hate having to deal with. They are my escape.

But what about the girls who do spit on the street? The girls who piss on seats? Who build social hierarchies, who size up their competition?

The girls Scott interacts with are all painfully human. Cleo weaponizes his beliefs and take advantage of him. Scott is smart enough to know and accept this. Gem's playing into a role she has been assigned into by not only Scott but everyone around her. Scott supports the character she plays. Lizzie reflects traits he hates in Joel and Jimmy, but for her, he looks the other way.

Are they "demons", as the song says, or are they no longer girls at all?

(demons, gods, but never humans)

Weaponized Femininity and Women In Total Control of Themselves ;)

Hylas and the Nymphs, John William Waterhouse

Historically, weaponized femininity I'd argue is one of the oldest tropes in storytelling. Whether it's nymphs or sirens or witches or succubi or even more roundabout cases like Helen of Troy, there's countless stories of men's sexual attraction to women leading them to disaster.

One way to view these stories is to see them as warnings, don't let womens allure be the end of you.

There's a lot of good writing done on the femme fatale trope both in the context of weaponizing femininity and as a sexist way to argue against victims of sexual assault, as these stories often say that men who experience attraction to these "evil" women no longer have agency over their own actions.

Look at the painting above, for example - is it the nymphs who are responsible for drowning Hylas, or is Hylas climbing into the lake of his own accord?

Despite the fact we all know sirens, nymphs and succubi aren't real, the belief that men will simply lose control of themselves when encountering a particularly alluring woman persists to the modern consciousness. That there's something inherently dangerous about women and attraction to them.

(this is not 100% applicable to Ninja saying he won't stream with women, but it's the real life example I felt most comfortable putting in here)

Now, let's combine this with what's been said so far -- let's say you don't hate women. You love women, in fact, and you hate the way men treat women. You hate men, in fact.

Yet, you still believe in this inherent power women hold by being female and the loss of agency that men experience when attracted to them -- how disgusting.

It quickly becomes easily to not only demonize men for sullying the holiness of women, but also men, masculinity and attraction to women as a whole.

(apologies for using twt discourse in the meta post but this flew by my TL and i had to grab the irl example of mens non-violent attraction to women being used to frame them as misogynistic before the stupid app refreshed and i lose everything forever)

"To Venner" is a student film exploring a world set within this belief, where all the women have vanished and the men have become monstrous figures as a result of their pent up sexual frustration. fyi this is one of my favourite student films (and ive watched a bunch), but I do think its messaging is worth breaking down (especially its juxtaposition of dirty horrible monstrous sexuality vs pure and beautiful romantic love)

NOTE: this film is super graphic, lots of violence and nudity. have fun. or not

I admit this section is a bit hard to gauge as everyone in the series is gay as fuck. The closest in-series example I can think of is Scott reacting to Martyn's antics in DL with a sort of indigence but otherwise I can't really think of an example of a man expressing attraction to a woman at all, let alone one Scott reacted to. However, I do think it's still worth talking about because it opens up some interesting trains of thought in regard to Scott and Pearl.

For Scott, he himself has never been part of the picture. He's gay, after all, which gives him an edge over the bad straight men who objectify and assault women. Likewise, there's little evidence to suggest he finds the expectations of masculinity frustrating, but I don't think it's too far a reach considering how common of an experience that is for gay men and his adapting of more feminine mannerisms.

Double Life and Corruption

As mentioned in my previously linked post about Scott and Pearl's relationship, I do think Scott experiences what he would name as attraction towards Pearl, so my writing will reflect that.

Pearl is. ahem. not like other girls.

Not actually. But to Scott, she probably isn't like other girls.

She remains unaware of his different standards for her (how could she when she had nothing to compare them to), she acts out, sometimes violently, against Scott's urging (such as when she stole from Scar's wagon). She maintains their already irregular dynamic, and while she appreciates his care for her, she never quite falls into seeing him as a source of subservience the way Cleo or Gem do.

At the end of LL, right before the 1v1v1v1, she monologues to herself that she no longer has to feel bad for killing Scott. Which, in turn, implies she expected Scott to give it his all against her as well.

She entirely fails to embody the madonna with her immature naivete and her questionable morals. She is unpredictable, she doesn't take what she is owed, she is a monster in a lot of ways.

Scott, too, is a monster, to himself, for how he feels about her.

The very foundations of your understanding of yourself being ripped apart aside, let's rewind to the madonna/whore complex. To sexualise the madonna is to corrupt her and make a monster of yourself. Suddenly, you are no better than the men around you, the ones you've grown to hate. Suddenly, you are the grotesque figures in films like To Venner. You are Hylas and she is the nymph. And you are so stupid. Your worldview crumbles around its flawed foundations.

Scott is, however, immune to this corruption. This is a theme that appears in Empires as well, but throughout the traffic series he's prided himself on being loyal and kind and good. His monologue leading up to LL's 1v1v1v1 summarizes it quite well.

He can't let himself or anyone else see this side of him, but the energy needs to go somewhere. To defy fate, abandon your soulmate, is to admit you had a fate in the first place, is to acknowledge that she was your soulmate in the first place.

I've previously talked about how fate and romance are very ingrained in Scott's belief system, if it was anyone else it would've been amazing. He could've been like Bdubs and Impulse or Ren and Bigb, diving into domestic life and performative romance with a stranger. Or the world could've made his happy ending from 3L real, as he got to be Jimmy's husband all over again. I think it says something that he accepts Cleo as a "soulmate" before Pearl.

So what do you do with all that energy and tension, clearly apparent to yourself and everyone else, when you can't let them observe your feelings?

You project them.

Shout-outs to @/legally-allowed-to-slime for pointing out Pearl's comment early on in DL that she "feels like (she's) been broken up with" confirms she never saw Scott in a romantic sense. The "crazy ex-girlfriend" and "this is why I'm gay" comments really did come out of thin air, or perhaps insecurity.

Pearl is the crazy one. She's insane, because she wants me. She wants to be with me, so she does all this crazy stuff. She's lost control of herself because she wants me. She's disgusting.

I mentioned before that Scott is not your classic misogynist, but this is where the gears start turning. Scott's views of Pearl echo that of other players, most prominently Ren and Martyn, that Pearl has been overcome with some sort of corruption. She has become the witch, the demoness, the whore, in their eyes. Scott does not want to be the same as these men and I think his overcorrecting his behaviour in SL makes sense when you view it from this angle, but for now he has to rely on more traditional misogyny in order to navigate this new obstacle.

"Corruption" also implies that she had to have been pure (or at least pure-er) beforehand, something Scott personally knows is not true, but it falls in line with defaulting women to being "madonnas".

This is a Scott post but. shout outs to Ren for being all of this about Pearl but without the complexity of Scott like he literally accuses Pearl of seducing Bigb what the fuck man.

Pearl is, of course, none of that. But she plays into the role of being the witch much better than she fared playing into the role of the madonna.

Sidenote: I know I'm looking at this from a Scott/Pearl POV but I do feel like you can omit Scott's attraction if you look at it from a purely "pearl not performing to standards of femininity I expect and she makes me realise I don't view women as a whole as human which makes me feel weird so now we have to do this" POV. Like idk I think the exact reason he abandoned Pearl is going to be lost on everyone forever so any analysis I could perform is going to suffer at least a little bit of making-shit-up-itis.

I do also think there's something to be said about Pearl being pushed until she performed a role, any role and generally failing at Being A Girl tm but that's another post i think. yknow shes um. a bit. 🏳️‍⚧️ (but also very much not at the same time idk that's gonna need its own post)

anyway yeah uh the minecraft movie looks crazy huh

[sidsinning]

the movie aint better ya goofs (don't read if you don't wanna hear my slander lol,,,)

"Movie!Gabriel is better than show!Gabriel because he actually cares for his son and gets redeemed"

istg this fandom's obsession with redemption needs to END

Morally better character ≠ better writing

Can I just get a piece of media that tells kids "hey, ur abusive parent was an asshole, and even if they had humanity you do not need to reconcile and forgive them in the end" bc I feel like that's what show!Gabriel leans towards which is great

Gabriel barely talks to Adrien in the movie and suddenly when he sees him under CN's mask his entire reign of terror, his determination to see his dead wife again ends in a tearful hug lmao come on now

("but the ending where Adrien suddenly loves his dad again???"- Astruc has been pretty blunt on Twitter that this perfect society you see in S5's ending is built off of a lie, so Adrien is def not gonna just keep that view)

"Adrien actually stands up to his dad in the movie!"

Movie!Adrien is legit a normal human boy, not a sentimonster who is literally physically incapable of fighting back against whoever has his amok

He DOES fight back (even in S1 as CN!), but people like to remember the show only up to S3. Guess what, he learns to fight back and stand up for himself through his growing bonds and relationships with those around him through character development ✨✨✨

Also, he is an abused kid??? In the show?? How can you knock him down a peg for not fighting back,,, 😭 Adrien's lesson isn't that he needs to learn how to fight back, it's that Nathalie shoulda called cps sooner!!! In the movie they are much more of an estranged father-son pair than anything abusive. So obviously the back talk is much easier too. Movie!Adrien gets to go out alone and with friends unless his dad has specifically planted an enemy where he is. Show!Adrien has been beaten, mind controlled, forced to hurt Marinette, isolated and locked up, etc.- he has been TERRIFIED of his dad multiple times.

"Marinette isn't an obsessive stalker in this!"

SIGH.

Man I am so sick of this complaint- the show has never rewarded Marinette for her obsessive behavior. BC IT IS A CHARACTER FLAW. One they use for cringe comedic purposes, but a flaw nonetheless. Every time she has done anything that hurts others in pursuit of Adrien she is punished by the writers. And bc the show has an episodic monster-of-the-week format, this plot is recycled a lot (which is its own complaint). And guess what? SHE STOPS BEING OBSESSIVE. YEAH. SHE STOPS DOING THAT SHIT- so what do you want now??? She grew out of it after it costs her the miraculous so why tf are yalls still hurling this at her like its a L,,,,

This Marinette is just a watered down boring version of show!Marinette. She's just a girl who gets insecure at times but grows confident bc she's Ladybug. Ok. So is our Marinette but MORE. Our Marinette is super smart, creative, resourceful, an overthinker, extremely kind and selfless to others, gets jealous and reckless when her emotions get the better of her, etc. She is fully formed even after watching just 3 episodes of S1.

Like the fact that they didn't even bother to include the oh so important hook of the show- her lucky charm power- shows they didn't care about doing this story justice- its so transparently lazy writing 💀 (miraculous of creation where??? CN gets cataclysm for destruction but what is movie!LB bringing to the yin yang table,,,)

Legitimately all the comparisons I'm hearing from people saying the movie is better are from those who just aren't caught up with the show where Marinette is no longer toxically obsessive with Adrien, where the plot/lore is insane but 10000000x better and more creative than what the movie gave us, the love square was much better developed EVEN FROM JUST THE ORIGINS EPISODES, etc. Istg these people stopped at S3 where the show was at its worst (if I were to pinpoint it)

Everything is so watered down or changed for the worse

Adrienette bonding was 1 conversation and 2 seconds about his mom in a voiceless montage. Marinette didn't fall for him bc of his kindness after a misunderstanding, it was bc he looked handsome in the library's light lol. He called her weird and didn't think twice about putting on his earphones to listen to more alpha podcasts. You really do wonder why she likes this dude over her partner CN bc they have no connection at all.

Movie!Adrien was an asshole don't you dare do show!Adrien dirty by comparing him to this ellen degeneres alien lookin mf

When movie!Adrien is crying after Mari reveals herself as LB, unlike the show, here you're like "yeah no you only like her now bc she's LB lol"

Anyways feel free to enjoy what you enjoy but uuuuuhhhh this movie getting a 3/10 for me would not rewatch

Oh wait the good things

-Visuals

-Some Ladynoir scenes were cute, like them playfully fighting with the accidental wall pin

-I liked Ladybug moving away from CN's kiss- nice hint of angst

-Chloe's coffee stain scene

-Luka cameos were cute

songs were bad or mid

ya das it

I guess feel free to talk to me in my inbox about your own thoughts if you wish (respectfully plz)

[nalyra-dreaming]

Hi and thanks so much for answering my last ask, don't mean to spam! but i have some follow up questions based on your answer, so is the audience generally meant to operate like the majority of season 1 and 2 was false?

What i mean is if none of the most "incriminating" for a lack of a better word scenes never get revisited, drop scene, train scene, murder scene tower scene, trial, even antoinette with the finger thing, which I think unlikely surely we will receive some additional information for maybe a couple of these, but if we don't, the audience should still not take the events of season 1 and 2 at full face value? Doesn't that sort of invalidate the story itself? If it can all be questioned and disputed the impact for the watcher who was invested time and feelings for two seasons sort of becomes less? If that makes sense ?

And it would sort of be a cop out, for me personally I think either the series has taken a huge gamble taking 6 years to show the audience the complete story and it must land to pay off or it may remain with answers left unanswered and plot holes up to questioning in perpetuity and up to everyone's interpretation for better (or if you go on Twitter 😬) for worse?

Sorry for talking your ear off about this, promise I won't bother you anymore with this, thanks for reading 😊 😀!

Oh, bother away :)

The thing is... this is how the books are as well.

And so I do NOT see this as a "cop out", I do NOT see it as something out of the... let's say ordinary.

The Vampire Chronicles are a series of books written by vampires. Most of them by Lestat, some by Louis, Armand, Marius, and others.

They are their stories.

These stories are written for an effect, for a reason. Louis' told his to Daniel after Claudia's death, still angry and yet still numb, mourning. Lestat wrote his in an answer to Louis'. Queen of the Damned is a collection of stories of various characters but written down by Lestat. And so on.

This format includes in and by itself and per default a point of view. And an intention.

Of course these characters hide some of the truth within the narrative. Of course Armand tries to soften the blow of what he did with Claudia in his own recount of the tale. For example. Of course of course of course :)

The show does the same, in its own way.

They have Louis tell the story to Daniel, and he does it again, for a reason. Daniel has been called Louis' lifeline for the second interview, meaning Louis tried to break himself free with it. Because Louis knew deep down that some things were not true. But Louis also presents Lestat as a monster because he's angry.

I said it before, I expect the end of 1x05 to be revisited, quite often, actually, and expanded with more context. Not "just" the drop, but the dragging and spoken parts as well - and the aftermath. None of that fits with what we saw in the revisit after all, and Sam's words and the "possessed" comment in 1x06 rang all the bells in my head wrt Amel.

The train scene cannot have happened as shown, they don't need to revisit that, they gave us all the clues already.

The hotel scene and Antoinette's finger cannot have happened as shown either, there, too, the clues are all there.

Murder night... well, we have the not-fitting diary already as a clue - the only other person who can give account of that - and, more importantly maybe, DOES so in his own book - will have his say in season 3. There I do expect a revisit, yes. Maybe only a short one. But I BET Lestat has a thing to say about that.

The trial will be revisited in some kind of way as well - Sam already mentioned that he has the "original" of that scene/script, and there was an extra back then, who mentioned they filmed more than made it into the season. There, too, I expect Lestat, the only other participant still living after all, to have a word to say about it. Again, which he also does in his book.

IWTV seasons one and two... are a tale. An influenced tale.

The discrepancies are riddled through it everywhere - all the dates are off(!), the stab wounds in Lestat's back in 1x01 disappear, Lestat cannot have talked to Louis' mind directly in 1x02, and I seriously doubt that he would have let his brand new fledgling run out into the sun. Seriously doubt it.

And so on.

They put clues in - like the hair styles, imho.

So no, you can not, in fact, take the story at face value.

But... forgive me, but that is the nature of a tale, isn't it?! Louis urges Daniel in 1x01: "Let the tale seduce you." He spins a tale, with what he knows and wants to tell. Louis does not lie per intention, not really, though he, too, lies ((Jacob literally says “not everything Louis says is a lie“ in this video)) ... but more to himself - and to shield Claudia... and to downplay his part in it. He literally says that in episode 2x07, that he "played down his role in it" (Claudia's turning)... he shields himself from the ugly truth and regret and pain, and that is... all too understandable I think.

This is not a "normal show", where you can take what you see as the absolute truth. For one - what exactly did we see? Louis' imagined scenes? Or Daniel's?? Probably Louis', but you get what I mean, right? Because it was a mix of memories and edited tale, not a neutral retelling! We do NOT have a neutral camera! We have a tale within a tale, and "supposedly" only the reunion scene had a neutral camera, according to Rolin!

For ME that is part of the attraction - and frustration :) - of the show.

Because I get what you mean, but it is a HUGE puzzle also, and we will never get a "this was the truth" mock-up.

All we will get are point of views and more tales, documentaries, and, if we're lucky, neutral cameras in the "present time". And hints.

Lots and lots of hints.

And, tbh, this is very much in line with the books, to come back to the beginning.

Lestat, in his book, literally says it to the "reader": "Read between the lines."

You have to.

You have to look at what's unsaid, and what does not fit. You have to note what is out of place, or what has reasons that character does not want to talk about. This holds for all of the chronicles.

And this plays into this vexing, ingenious and frustrating show :)

I ... feel quite confident though promising that the eventual rewatch value will probably be immense. :)))

Because if they continue like this????

Show of the fucking decade.

[peachi-blossom]

My thoughts on Hazbin Hotel as a non HH fan

Originally, I was just here to watch people criticizing Hazbin Hotel. But when the recent controversies came in, I feel like I have to step into the fandom rabbit hole.

As a non Hazbin Hotel fan, I've watched the pilot, read the prequel comics, watched the ADDICT music video, and finally the show itself. (I've watched the show on March 15th.)

NOTE: I didn't watch the show on TV so I watched it on a pirated website instead and read the transcript because no way am I watching this in front of my parents, my siblings, or Grandma. This is my personal opinion on the show.

Pilot: So Hell is basically Earth except it's painted red and inhabited by demons. The background has too much red, but not as bad that it makes my eyes bleed. I don't like how the female characters have the same color scheme except Vaggie and Niffty (pilot only). For example, Charlie, Katie Killjoy, and Cherri Bomb. The only two funny parts of the pilot is when the top hat demon says "Wow! That was s***!" after Charlie sings Inside of Every Demon is a Rainbow and when Angel pokes his head in as Vaggie is giving Alastor a warning. I didn't like the daddy joke. It just sounded bad. Also, why is there a joke about harlequin babies?

Prequel comics that are no longer canon: Basically the prequel comics focuses on Angel Dust and Alastor.

For Dirty Healings, it shows how Angel Dust first met Charlie and Vaggie. I knew that Vaggie's name was named after a uh, you know. Ugh… Why did Vivienne Medrano had to name her that? Also I hate Valentino.

As for A Day In The After Life, it just shows why Alastor is the most feared demon in Hell. Also he swears after seeing Vox.

ADDICT music video: I genuinely have no thoughts on this music video. I think this was just bait for the SA and CSA victims. Sorry for those who like the MV.

Episode 1: This is worse than the pilot. I did NOT like the beginning part. It's biblically inaccurate for multiple reasons, but I feel like a few people only talk about this one thing. Sin didn't exist until Adam and Eve ate the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Not only that, but it's also misogynistic too because it was just Eve who ate it. What makes it misogynistic is that it implies that all women would have to bear the sins of Eve ALONE. There's rampant swearing and sex jokes. Also, isn't Archangel Michael supposed to be the leader of the Army of God? Anyways I'm siding with the angels.

Episode 2: The red is so bright that it hurts my eyes. It doesn't help the fact that Alastor blends in the background. Oh yeah, when Vox tells Sir Pentious to kill himself, it made me feel sad because it reminded me of the Shay incident. The time when the stans drove Shay to kill themself because they were uncomfortable with the large age gap of HuskerDust.

Episode 3: Why? Why is there a BDSM sex dungeon?! I know that was Angel's idea, but still. Why?! I seriously have no words. When Zestial says "What troubles thou?" I was like "Huh?". It should be "What troubles thee?". I think his Old English has grammatical errors. The Egg Boiz, Carmilla, and Zestial are bearable because they never said a swear word. Off topic, but Velvette's swirl streaks on her hair makes me think of a swirl ice cream.

Episode 4: Before the show came out, I saw SlayQueenArt's post on Twitter (X) that says Vivienne Medrano hired Raphielle II, aka R2ninjaturtle, who has a rape fetish and isn't a SA victim. As someone who is formerly addicted to porn, this episode is insulting on so many levels. I didn't watch the whole Poison sequence because of that. And don't get me started on Loser Baby. I hate this song so much. It felt like it is blaming on SA and CSA victims for being SA'd. Like it is blaming me for being addicted to porn on and off when I was EIGHT. I know there are some victims who like episode 4 so I will leave them alone. I seriously hate how Charlie behaves like a toddler at the end. No grown adult should behave like a toddler like she did because being raped isn't a silly thing to cry over. Like, hello? She is the supposed to be the main character. Oh yeah, there was NO warning for the episode when the show premiered and it triggered the victims who watched it. SA and CSA victims are not losers. Former porn addicts are not losers. Nobody is a loser. I am NOT a loser.

Episode 5: Wow, Vivienne Medrano really turned Lucifer into King George from Veggietales. I guess this is what happens when King George gave in into his obsession with rubber ducks. I didn't like Hell's Greatest Dad because of the unnecessary rivalry between Lucifer and Alastor, but at least Mimzy ended the song. Oh boy, this is where I hate Alastor now. No really, he is Vivienne Medrano's first edgelord oc. He has gone full edgelord and is basically a Bill Cipher wannabe now. His full demon form is not even scary compared to Bill's final form. He no longer stands out from the main cast even if he rarely swears. Mimzy is basically the embodiment of the hooked nose stereotype. Wow, the embodiment of a Jew stereotype. How racist.

Episode 6: That was an absolute slap in the face at SA and CSA victims and me when Sir Pentious got SA'd! Seriously, Vivienne Medrano doesn't even care for the victims at this point! What's worse is that he is based off of her old ex-friend, DollCreep. Why did she whitewashed St. Peter?! I know there are white Jews, but he was born in ancient Israel so I wouldn't think he'll be looking like a white man with blonde hair and blue eyes. How come angels don't know how souls get to Heaven?! We got the Ten Commandments! We got Jesus Christ who took our place to die for our sins so we wouldn't have to bear these sins! Emily and Sera are bearable because you know. I hate how Niffty is being treated like a child when she's NOT. What's worse is that Niffty is supposed to be Japanese because of how people INFANTILIZED Asian people, especially women.

Episode 7: My issue with Out for Love is that when Carmilla tells Vaggie that she should fight for love and not for vengeance. Well, Vaggie always fight for love and never for vengeance. In Whatever it Takes, she literally says that she'll always protect Charlie. Where is the vengeance in that? That is poor character writing. Rosie is basically the blood libel stereotype where the Jews are cannibals. Again, that's just racist against Jews.

Episode 8: I thought the finale was pointless because there were no stakes and Sir Pentious' heroic sacrifice was comically anti-climatic. Like, why did Sir Pentious's so called friends cared about him when they didn't help him at ALL in episode 6?! I'm not a fan of the CherriSnake ship because Cherri only becomes interested in him because he has two "joysticks". Not to mention he kissed her without consent and she thinks it's hot after that. The problem with More Than Anything (Reprise) is that Vaggie reassures Charlie that she changed many lives, but she only changed one. I'm so glad Adam defeated Alastor first. There is absolutely no way Lucifer slept with Eve. Oof for Lute and Adam. You both fought well until the end.

The character designs are awful. Every male character basically looks like The Once-ler from The Lorax 2012 movie except for Adam (I know Alastor doesn't have a top hat, but still gives off the vibes. Zestial is more Burtonesque.). Not to mention they are all skinny twigs except for Adam (I think). The female characters in Hell have the same color scheme except Vaggie (again). For example, Charlie, Katie Killjoy, Mimzy (though her dress is a little darker), Cherri Bomb, and Niffty (show only). They have too much pinks, reds, yellows, whites, and blacks. I love pink, but this is too much. What's worse is that they blend in the background and again it hurts my eyes. There is NO color variety and I feel like my eyes are burning.

That's my thoughts on the show.

[yukirayu]

These I've also shared on Twitter, but I thought I'd share them here before someone tries any sort of libel.

You know what's funny about this whole discourse about the Slow Damage patch ? The whole discourse reminds me of game mods, in a way.

Game mods are made by fans, for free no less, for you to download, and only if you wanted, to help improve your experience with a game.

Whether it's improving the aesthetic (character or background design) or tweaking some of the gameplay elements itself. Or adding new elements, or even changing things purely for shits and giggles.

That way, mods are akin to patches. More often than not, mods are made because the base game had flaws in their design (technical or otherwise) that the mod intended to fix or improve.

But these mods are optional. And naturally, most mods are going to use preexisting assets from either the game they're modding or from another game, assets that they'll either refine or combine with other assets to make something better.

While some mods earn a raised brow, if the mod isn't to one's liking, most generally just ignore it.

Except in this specific instance, some don't like the mod that is the patch and feel that it doesn't sit right with them for whatever reason, believing that its existence would be "spitting" on the original game or because it no longer sounds as snarky as they themselves would like to read it as.

But instead of ignoring the patch, which they were explicitly advised to do if they take offense to it, they decide to make their dislike everyone else's problem, and by poisoning the well, no less.

And one quick way to ensure that is to accuse the patch of bigotry towards the LGBT community.

I'm already aware that this same accusation is spreading like wildfire, both in Reddit and especially in Twitter, and in some Discord spaces, most likely.

But did anyone, and this includes the accusers, even play at least 40% of the patched version, and intensively at that, before making that claim?

Oh, I'm all too aware that bigotry is a real, serious and widespread issue.

But in most online circles nowadays, accusing something of bigotry right off the gate is also one surefire method of turning people off of it before they can even check it out for themselves.

I mean, what better way of publicly dragging something you don't like through the mud than to spread accusations/misassumptions that are quick for others to believe before anyone can even try and personally fact-check anything?

Especially in a place like the internet itself.

The note stating the avoidance of using a specific pronoun for some characters to not assume their identity could've been phrased better, yes, and the patch team did clarify their stance on the matter. Alas, anything can still easily be misinterpreted and used as flame bait.

But what's odd is that the people who first touted this claim (either here or in other platforms) have one thing in common: they never checked out the patch (let alone played through one certain route in full) to personally confirm if that really is the case.

Taking all this into consideration, I think that no matter how the patch was presented, it'd get backlash.

Even long before any of us knew this patch was even going to be a thing, even giving constructive criticism about the localization and any mistakes/goofs it made already drew ire, and it's those same people who took offense that are spreading the hate about this patch.

It all really boils down to the matter of the patch even existing, since - as some detractors point out - it's what they call to be a disrespectful spit to the face, even without factoring the false accusations of transphobia and plagiarism.

Let's say they used the JP game files instead and have the patch work with that version. They'd get decried for copyright infringement and they risk a C&D order.

Use the EN files? We already get the claims that they barely did anything to the text, among other things. Why?

Because they didn't adjust every single syntax and change every single word in every single sentence… when English isn't exactly the most versatile language and there's only ways you can translate something, especially in the simpler sentences like "Who are you?".

Using a thesaurus on everything would make it sound weird. Heck, the patch being more verbose and detailed and impersonal (which is what's to be expected when it's third person and in a visual novel, no less) already got it accused of being no more than a fancy MTL.

And it doesn't help that many already assume that the statement that MTL can be a helpful tool is also the same as "MTL being the superior translator of all time", and people will find anything and I mean anything to hate on something and discredit it.

And as for the preferring 1st person over 3rd person and vice versa? It's a matter of preference, yes, and that can't be helped.

But let's get one fact out in the open: Out of N+C's 5 main VNs, only one is told in first person POV in the JP/original version, and that's DMMD.

The other game that used 1st person narration is Slow Damage's spinoff game, Clean Dishes, but not the main/parent game itself.

And even years before they got licensed, the fan patches followed the intended narration viewpoint of the first 4 VNs. Third person for Togainu no Chi, Lamento, and Sweet Pool, and first person for DMMD.

Their respective localized versions (except Lamento), also followed the intended narration viewpoint, and nobody complained because that was all they knew.

But because Slow Damage's localization took the creative liberty of changing the narration from third to first person, with people exposed to it, it's not really surprising some have gotten accustomed enough to end up preferring it.

Even when another version that retells the game in original narration comes up, for the past two years, the localization has been what they knew, and that is what many usually then decide to stick to.

In the scenario where the localization - even if it would still be a mess - never changed the narration, would people still say "Oh but they should've changed it to 1st person since it would've enhanced the story"?

It's telling that it never happened with Togainu no Chi, Sweet Pool and DMMD, no?

And before anyone tells me that I just hate localizations overall, you don't hear me complaining about the official translation of any of the BLVNs that Mangagamer licensed, do you? I also have plenty of gripes with DMMD's fan translation over what it did to Mink.

[ilikekidsshows]

People really gotta stop sending tweets to TA about what happens in the show cause I swear he's usually lying, letting people do the thinking for him, or just straight up about to steal people's ideas/theories and later say that it was planned all along and the theorist were just really good at picking up what he was(n't) putting down

---

He loves when viewers who are smarter than him come up with stuff he can take the credit for. Like, there are even people who believe that the ending of season 5 wasn't originally based on the ending of ‘The Bubbler’, that that's just what he's saying now that some fan pointed out the similarities and he could swoop in and pat himself on the back for his “consistent characters”. Marinette didn't know Gabriel was an abusive dirtbag in ‘The Bubbler’, and she let Adrien believe a misunderstanding he first voiced. In the season 5 finale, she looked at the sensory deprivation chamber Adrien was put into and went: “Oh, I’m gonna gaslight this boy so hard people won't recognize me as the same character afterwards!” Very different situations even if the result was the same.

Like, it's obvious SentiAdrien was stolen from the fandom because, when you look at the show in isolation, it serves no purpose. But, if you also look at the fandom, you can see how the theory stans were following that “story” very keenly despite it amounting to nothing. An idea stolen from the fandom included only for the fandom. Same thing with the “reverse love square”. People complained it was too short, not that it was clearly an unsustainable story idea and how that's clearly the reason it shouldn't have been used. But Astruc had something popular to plagiarise, so he did what he does best.

Astruc’s favorite Twitter line is “all the information is in the episodes”, when everyone knows the episodes are inconsistent and full of retcons. The episodes are useless as a source of information, because they are unreliable and no one can know what parts are still considered canon by the writers. But, when Astruc uses that line, he can wait for the smarter than him fans to create an explanation that he can then point at like he came up with it and like that was the intended reading all along.

[n7punk]

"Hotel Couches & Other Hail Marys" Fic Notes

These aren't the traditional format but I have enough Hidden Little Things I wanna do very loose an informal fics notes

The "Hotel Couch" was Catra's Hail Mary, but the shared bed was Catradora's, and Catradora's reunion was the fans' Hail Mary.

The way I do tweets was invented back in DITM and "perfected" in SaD, when I also invented how I do Instagram posts/stories/reels/DMs. I wasn’t reinventing shit for the changes Twitter has made, it’s ~historically accurate~ to when Dashcon happened. The one change I made was not using the block quote indent for all the digital posts I usually do, but that entire fic was digital, so I only ended up using it for indented reply chains on Twitter (which worked out better tbh) and on the Instagram chapter to distinguish the posts and the descriptions of the images/videos.

Fake tumblr posts/alternate reality dashboard simulators are already a popular format on Tumblr so there really was very little for me to do there. I made some tweaks by adding in the comment/share/like icons I use for Twitter, but overall that part was easy. The hardest part was getting the follow button blue. On Tumblr that's easy, colored text is a built-in option, but for AO3 I had to use a work skin to include some CSS for the color code. I ended up modifying the Reddit skin I had made using this tutorial because I was planning to capstone with a Reddit post anyway so I could just add on the blue on. Normally I don’t consider using colored text for many reasons (hard to read, might look great on my site skin and be invisible on others, etc), but in the case of the follow buttons they could just as easily not be there and contribute nothing but realism, so I wanted to have them in their standard blue.

Normally I don’t even consider using Tumblr when doing social media posts in a fic but considering this was inspired by Dashcon which was literally a Tumblr convention, I had to for this one. As such, the first chapter is mostly set-dressing for the disaster the convention is itself so when people complain in future chapters it makes sense. The rough outline was: Tumblr (convention background) Twitter (reconnect and beef background) Instagram (bond) DMs/texts (get together) Reddit (retrospective epilogue wrapping up the story)

Most of the usernames are just like. Random shit I could come up with. The ones on Tumblr are supposed to be random stuff on the site and the ones on Twitter lean more towards fandom-associated stuff for the She-ra fandom since it’s transitioning from the pool of All Con Attendees to the microcosm of their fans affected. Most of these can be found in previous fics such as DITM. That said, here are the name(s) with inspo behind them:

🍕nnlftbf: none pizza left beef. And no vowels. I have always desperately wanted to eat the none pizza

🦉pewpew4gloria: Star Siblings fan (reference to Starla’s bird)

🐍nagashed: this is a reference to both the plethora of (human animal hybrid)(bodypart) tumblr usernames (ex: dragongirlsnort) and a manga that my friend is reading.

🎃pumpkakitty: reference to a really cute hat in Pokemon Go 🥺 (okay it’s supposed to be a pikachu but it looks like a kitty tbh)

🌈edgeofgloria: another Star Siblings fan

He-Ro in the Freak Zone @frightzest: He-Ro is an actual MOTU character, frightzest is from DITM

Aside: the “looki loo” thing is a reference to Razz’s good ol pal Looki, hence the fandom in-joke

praying mantis wife @nineten02: nineten is a reference to my Stardew Valley chickens <3

Katastrophe @viviviolence: Vi’s shoulders you mean so much to me

Oh yeah Zeni is Zine just. Flipped. Also the original She-ra artist was one of the two sponsors who pulled out and the entire reason they were there. I mean what?

When Adora called Catra aggravating on camera she was doing it in a horny way but with Real Beef between them it didn’t come across that way. She also said they wouldn’t work together as a factual thing rather than spiteful. There was no way the studio OR Catra would let them.

When Catra said she’s “finally suing” she’s referring to the long-standing rumor that the previous showrunner “stepped back” because Catra was threatening to sue for the wage/credit theft, or the discrimination, or the abusive work environment, or the-

The dates Adora reached out to Catra via DMs were all significant ones for the real series — season 1 debut for when they were nominated, prompting the thank you story, season 2 debut for when they won the award (I didn’t look up and don’t care when the actual GLAADs are lol), and season 3 debut when ZeniCon is actually taking place. Almost three years have passed since Catra’s ousting from the show back between seasons 3 and 4, tho.

Given the NDA and general threat-level from the studio, Adora didn’t think she could mention Catra on her main page without getting a talking to even with Weaver officially departed, so she tried to do it on her story, but Catra did NOT want the heat that could bring.

The foam She-ra crown from the Instagram reel is the same one they gave out at cons in 2018 and 2019.

Adora calling it the “season 5” rather than “season 4” wrap part led to fan speculation that season 5 really was written by Catra except for the weakest parts — some stuff needing to be condensed, the insertion of a new storyline — which like. Well they are right. But she said season 5 rather 4 (which was wholly Catra’s) because it’s the part she’s most proud of even after they took it from her. It’s what she was building to the whole time.

Catra and Adora lasted like ten minutes lying next to each other in bed before they ended up kissing and when it started progressing they snuck into the bathroom. It was obvious Bow was asleep and they were just hoping Glimmer was too. Glimmer, too, wishes she was asleep.

Glimmer refers to Catra being “at her worst” because she got really aggressive and disparaging of her old cast out of bitterness after they wouldn’t back her up in the press (to keep their jobs). They all understand why, but it is still frustrating.

Melendy is from my fic lore, she’s a magicat character I use sometimes who is named after Catra’s VA in the 80s. She plays a recurring character on the show, though on the minor side.

I linked the Ohio con video because 1) that video is the ONLY time I’ve heard of it and I love the drama 2) to hammer home all the shit I say in this isn’t just from Dashcon, I am not here to libel people and 3) because I like my secret little links, BUT if you want to see a good video on Dashcon, watch this one and literally never watch Internet Historian he’s a POS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAqy-KDJAUM

The behind the scenes shitshow for She-Ra itself was inspired by the TV show Lost (though Catra keeping her storylines secret was inspired by Real She-ra and ND Stevenson)

Like I said, I had been wanting to do a fic that was “just digital” for a while. The massive problem with that is getting across the shit people don’t post online because there is not a single trace of Catra and Adora potentially being a couple until after ZeniCon. Catra and Adora were basically wildly attracted to each other from the moment they met on the show but wouldn’t cross that barrier because they worked together (especially because of where they worked together). They ended up hooking up during some high-stress times for the show just to deal with how much they wanted each other. Catra felt really betrayed when the cast wouldn’t stick their necks out for her when she was ousted. Privately they were all on her side and told the studio so, but to publicly side with her was to lose their jobs, and the show was their entire life. They ultimately picked their passion & livelihood over showing public support they didn’t think would make a difference anyway and she cut all ties with them. They did what they felt they could, which was mostly never denying her version of events and deflecting questions when they had no other choice, but they all felt bad about it and tried to reach out to her privately. She didn’t want to hear it, but fans were right that the real beef was with the studio. She fell back into their arms eventually because she could see they were doing what they could while keeping their jobs, and she knew just how much being unemployed sucked. Adora was also telling the truth when she said they were fighting for her version of the story by staying on the show and no matter how much Catra calls it theft, that is what she wants for her characters. Being forced into the same room let them all remember what it was like to be friends, and that’s what led them to eventually giving their apologies.

I have no idea why, when presented with “lol dashcon au” my brain goes “rampant wage theft, behind the scenes abuse, disgrace and scandal, show extension hell a la supernatural, brrrrrrrrrr” but there we go

[nuri148]

My Take on Levi's Age

I originally wrote this as a rb addition to another post. I've been meaning to make it a stand alone post since then, and with all the talk about Levi's age since the publication of bad boy, here it is, finally.

If you ask me, Levi could not have been more that 4-5 years old at the time Kenny found him around 829.

Why?

He's severely malnourished, probably spent several days cloistered in the room with Kuchel with nothing to eat. So my guess is that, though he was old enough to speak and understand Kuchel was dead (even if he could not quite grasp the bigger concept of Death), he was too young to go out and procure himself and his mum some food, be it by stealing or begging. And for that, he's need to be very young.

I lived in Greater Buenos Aires more than half of my life (the infamous "conurbano"), and I've seen lots of very small kids, 4-5 years old, begging like pros for either change or food. It's unfortunately very common in impoverished areas. And I wasn't even in the bad ones. So, in that aspect, the Underground wouldn't be different from our villas or Brazil's favelas.

Kuchel was a prostitute. She wouldn't want Levi to witness her at work. It is fair to think that as soon as he was old enough to cross the street she'd let him roam and go play with other kids while mummy's busy. There, he'd quickly learn how to come by a piece of moldy bread to stave hunger.

So in order to just sit starving by his mother instead of going out looking for help, Levi must have been young enough that his mum could still keep him under wraps; too young to know his way about the Underground's streets, too much of a rookie in terms of using his charm or his cunning to get a bit of food.

Uri Reiss inherited the Founding Titan in 829. BUT, nowhere does it say that Kenny's encounter with Uri happens right after the latter became a titan. So Kenny might have joined Uri up to a couple of years after 829 (not many, as Rod Reiss still looks young in that flashback).

So Kenny finds Levi between 829 and 831; And Levi is 4-5 then, meaning he was born, at earliest, in 823 (considering his b-day is only one week before the year's end, that'd make him 5 in for most of 829) and latest in 825 (same if Kenny found him in 831). That makes him 10-12 years older than Eren and company. , ~20 when he joins the SC, ~26 during seasons 1-3, ~30 after the time skip, and ~33 in the epilogue.

"But Yams said he was thirty-somethiiiing!"

TLDR: I wouldn't consider canon some spur-of-the-moment answer given by Yams in a panel where he's probably tired, nervous, and doesn't have his timeline handy.

Allow me to speak here as a writer: the whims of your imagination often don't align with the logic of what needs to go on the page. So it is perfectly possible to imagine your character in a way that is inconsistent with your timeline. You see them with short hair and summer clothes fixing lunch in their sunny kitchen in a scene and, when they move to the dining room you see them with hair 4 inches longer and serving supper as a snowstorm rages outside. When you write it, you're going to have to pick up one, and go back to your notes often for continuity after, bc your brain keeps forever placing the kitchen in sunny summer and the living room in a winter night. Oh, and they're both simultaneously on the ground and the second floor. Escher pictures make more sense.

The story of AoT spans many years, so we don't know which year Levi is the default Levi in Yams' brain. It could even be the Levi from the time skip, or from a future after the last chapter that only exists in his imagination. Also, Yams has bungled up numbers before so, personally, I don't trust him much in that department.

In any case, Math is a hard science, so if Kenny found Levi with 4-5 years in 829, he can't be 30+ in 850. 5+21=26. No matter what Yams says.

Additional notes:

The original post. With additions. I recommend reading the quoted twitter thread.

Another, recent twitter thread on Levi's age

A lengthy post by an actual psychologist providing scientific foundation for Levi's age when Kenny finds him.

I saw yet another post on Levi's age recently, but I can't find the link rn and I have to make lunch. if/when I find it, I'll add it (and others I may come across)

[magiclyney]

Immortal characters are most interesting when their characteristics and traits (both positive and negative) intensify the longer they live. Especially when their positive traits eventually evolve into negative traits.

Character is a great fighter? Great! Now they have literally all the time in the world to train and they wouldn’t grow old. Oh- but that arrogance (no matter how little it was when they were mortal) is now amplified, because they are provably better than everyone else. It could also be something much smaller. An immortal character becoming so invested in perfecting something that they become obsessed and centuries pass without their notice. Or vice versa, where they keep procrastinating it for centuries, i mean they do have literally all the time in the world.

Doing this also helps with coming up with the conflict in the story you write for them. Maybe they overcome their obsession, or finally get to that thing they’ve procrastinated for so long, or overcome their arrogance and share their knowledge with others.

You can stop reading now- but if you’d like to hear about how I’m implementing this into my own stories for a more in-depth example, please stay :D

My OC is a huge people pleaser and he always has been. He spent a lot of his time and energy doing everything he could to please the adults around him, and when he gained immortality that didn’t change. He picked up the slack of others at work, he volunteered for the dangerous jobs. Because of this, he was assigned more work. There was no threat of death in his actions. He couldn’t work himself to death and no dangerous foe could kill him, so for the sake and lives of others he does it instead.

This (as stated at the beginning of the post) only intensifies with time.

The people around him grow worried for him. He gets barred from taking on dangerous missions, and every time someone dies on one of those missions he blames himself.

This is obviously not good for his mental health, so it increasingly worsens. The people who aren’t close to him appreciate him for taking on all the difficult and dangerous jobs, but he and all the people he is close to know that he’s about to completely spiral.

Oh- and did I mention that he’s a soldier who has open access to deadly weapons?

See? Someone who’s just an average people pleaser and helps others finish their work on time evolves into a workaholic going down a complete spiral of anxiety and depression.

Trapped between requesting less work and focusing on the work assigned to him. In fear of being seen as useless.

Or

his own crumbling mental state and his relationship with his loved ones.

This was originally posted to Twitter, but I decided to post it here as well to be more articulate because i will never pay for Twitter blue just to have that extra character limit.

Anyway If you liked this post and reached this point in it, please DO NOT go on my page and read my fanfic on Ao3 unless you really want to because I am in the process in rewriting like half of it lol.

Edit: ignore previous paragraph the new and improved version of my Fic is now up on Ao3 :]