#Standpoint if that’s what it’s all about

[moghedien]

I think that Popular works really well in the movie, because for one thing the comedic timing is great and it low key pulls off the unvocalized "why isn't Galinda unpacking her trunks" joke so well by having her open them all during Popular to reveal increasingly ridiculous and impossible things inside

but also I feel like it does Elphaba soooo much better when you sort of remove the audience being literally present in front of the performers.

because I wouldn't say that Popular is inherently always a mean spirited song on stage, but it is to some extend a joke a between the audience and Galinda at Elphaba's expense. like not entirely not even purposely from a character standpoint so don't start getting defensive, but on stage, with basically every song, they're performing to and looking at the audience when delivering these lines. if you remove that, then its exclusively between Galinda and Elphaba, and it just feels so different that way

For one thing, even before the song starts, the build up to it feels much more personal when they're sharing secrets and bonding and it is for the first time literally only them there during this scene. You see that Galinda hasn't really changed all that much in how she acts, she's just nicer now, but it feels like Elphaba might have.

Elphaba's guard is completely down for the first time and she's sooo much softer and letting herself smile, and you can see what she's smiling at a lot is specifically how Galinda is acting and reacting to her. like even when Galinda throws a tantrum at Elphaba not telling her a secret, you see that Elphaba's reaction is to smile and let her guard slip again and she just looks so fucking fond of Galinda even when she's being like that.

And Elphaba tells her something incredibly vulnerable and something that she has never told anyone, which is that she thinks she's responsible for Nessarose's disability and her mother's death and that her father hating her is deserved. This is the first time she's ever told anyone she feels like this, and Galinda's response is to tell her that she's wrong, that none of it is her fault and she doesn't deserve to be hated or have to live in guilt over it??? like hello?? can we actually talk about this more in general?

and like yes, all of this happens on stage, but without the audience literally being there, these little moments, these reassurances, these playful actions and kindnesses are literally only for the two of them and it isn't being played off for a literal punchline where they pause for a reaction before continuing. it just feels so much more intimate

Then you get into Popular itself, which I said always is a little bit of a joke at Elphaba's expense and I wouldn't say its entirely free of that in the movie. But if you have it so that literally the only person that Galinda is playing off of and getting reactions from IS Elphaba, it feels sooo different.

Like its built up because you have these moments where you can visibly see how much Elphaba is actually fond of Galinda and her silliness. And it makes so much sense that after that and after Galinda was the only person that basically said "you don't deserve to be hated" for something she genuinely blames herself for, that Elphaba would just sit there and let Galinda play dress up with her. And on Galinda's part, it is so much clearer that it IS something she's trying to do to help Elphaba (and we can discuss how fucked her worldview is for thinking this is the best way help Elphaba because Popular is basically Galinda also showing how deeply unwell she is) and not just a joke she's having with the audience.

Because like during the song, she's directing it all to Elphaba and all of the things they try on and do are only seen between the two of them because the audience isn't literally there. like its so much clearer that Elphaba wants to be there (even when she thinks its silly and ridiculous and is clearly questioning everything on the floor while Galinda swims around her like a gay little fish) and that she's enjoying it and letting herself enjoy it, and is specifically enjoying it because Galinda is the one there with her.

I think the movie just does it so well and it just feels much kinder than it sometimes does on stage

[tarvek-sturmvoraus]

srsly i'd love to see tim come face to face with the same crises dick has faced when it comes to damian. the same ones we keep judging dick for (yeah me too, i'm guilty). we keep going on about how tim would've been a great mentor to damian and i have a lot of fun thinking about this too but when you think about it, would he really? can he really do better than dick? if the angry child decided to hurt someone and was successful, would tim be able to handle it with grace? i think he'd also be vulnerable to the temptation of bias. would he be able to keep on top of damian WHILE being batman? what if damian comes later on, and he ends up going after duke? wouldn't the same criticisms against dick apply to tim too?

guess i'm just curious about how you see tim reacting to the things dick has had to deal with.

i actually know very little about what dick had to deal with while he and damian were batman and robin and im only saying i think tim would have been a better mentor for damian based on personality vibes, probably a healthy dose of fanon, and also the fact that after like a year of dick mentoring him damian still tried to kill tim by cutting his grappling line. so apparently he didn't do that great a job!

maybe tim couldn't have done better, but he would have definitely done differently. first of all, i think he would have been more likely to reach damian on a logical level rather than emotional - explaining things like parts of the social contract from a strictly utilitarian standpoint on why he should adhere to those rules when damian doesn't or can't understand emotionally because he's a brainwashed child with no context in which to assign these things value.

i also think tim might have done better based on past experience with bruce, whose behavior while out of control after jason wasn't too dissimilar to how damian acts in the field, with a lack of impulse control and general recklessness on top of excessive force. from what i have seen of dick's run as batman, he tended to throw his hands up in exasperation and let damian do what he wanted a lot. maybe i'm wrong about the frequency of that, but we have a significant body of evidence that suggests if he were to take damian on as a responsibility, tim would never relent like that.

as far as all of this happening while tim is also batman instead of dick, i...don't see a major difference? if anything that might go more smoothly since if tim got the cowl, unless we're also swapping which character is going on brucequest (personally i like sending jason in tim's stead rather than dick), he'd have nightwing by his side to help with protecting the city, even if tim is taking charge of damian's training - which they might not have initially realized would also mean becoming damian's primary carer, just based on how that kid understands training/caretaking dynamics.

[jekinabox]

some rambles on my takes on Curly from Mouthwashing

I understand that a lot of people see Curly’s reaction to Anya telling him about her SA and what he did after as him ignoring it for Jimmy’s sake- and maybe that’s true, the point could very well be that people (especially those close to the abuser, especially men) will just set that kind of thing aside because the abuser “wouldn’t do that” or “will be better” or whatever, especially because Swansea ends up doing the same thing when Anya tells him, as well as the consistent theming of responsibility and trying to fix things.

But I think that maybe there’s more to it? If you don’t, feel free to look away, this is just my thoughts and take. But I think If the story is about SA and the consequences of not rooting the people out, I don’t understand what Diasuke’s role in it could be, so that just isn’t the moral of the story that I see. Of course, if this is how you see the story, that’s ok! People can have different views on media, and art is as much about people’s different responses to it as it is about what the creators meant.

Onto my little ramblings about the guy!

1- I think it’s very probable that Curly’s been manipulated by Jimmy, and for a long time. They’re “best friends,” and Curly believes Jimmy “won’t try that bullshit with me” even though he clearly does. Even at the birthday party, Jimmy is uncaring to his “best friend,” and during the confrontation near the cockpit, Jimmy outright twists what Curly’s said in the past. (Not to mention what he does to Curly afterward, but that doesn’t exactly count since it’s afterward.) I also wouldn’t be surprised if Jimmy helped Curly out of some situation in the past due to his savior complex and Curly now feels like he owes Jimmy something. It’d be easy for him to overlook Jimmy’s smaller problems if he feels he owes Jimmy something, especially if it’s something bigger, and he seems more of the “deal with it” kind of person anyways, so he’d obviously toss any grievances aside since he thinks everyone needs multiple chances. At first, Jimmy probably unsettled him. But he got used to it, just like his job. He deals with it for the last day, then another, then another.

2- Curly seems legitimately concerned when Anya tells him about everything, at least when he gets confirmation. We don’t see much after the she asks him about the locks on the doors, and we don’t see how much he actually learns, and thus no clue as to how bad he believes the situation may be (Harassment is nothing to scoff at, but if he just believes someone’s being a creep or annoying her, he’s obviously going to try to learn more and deescalate before anything else.) We also never see how much or what they say when she asks for the gun, but what we know is that Curly is freaking out when he thinks she has it, and actually believes it at first to be that she wants to kill herself due to the recent termination of their jobs. He’s first confused, then after her few words of explanation says he’ll talk to Jimmy. We never see an actual talk, but he learns definitively of what happened only “1 day before the crash,” and it takes time to sort through emotions, plans, and decisions, let alone when someone you thought was good did something like that and if you realize that they were a shitty person all along. Curly also then needs to decide what they’re going to do with Jimmy (they can’t lock him in the cockpit or medical because they need those, nor the hold because he would obviously mess up whatever they’re shipping as a hissy fit against them, and considering you get pay docked for complaining, using the cryopod or the gun would probably make this whole deal worthless for practically everyone.) Even if he did decide to just get rid of Jimmy, he’s not going to tell anyone that in case Jimmy finds out, and especially not Anya, since she seems forgiving enough and in a bad enough spot he has no clue what she may try to do if he tells her “I’m going to go kill Jimmy.”

3- Inaction and not taking responsibility doesn’t feel like Curly’s issue. Curly has the responsibility of everything on the ship, even baking a cake, and even when told not to tell his crew about the loss of their jobs, he still does. He even takes roles that aren’t his, like doing Jimmy’s psych evaluation when he sees Anya’s uncomfortable. This is why he and Jimmy are the two characters we play as, and are seen as opposites and each other’s foils. Jimmy’s whole thing is unreliable narration. By the end of the game, he’s convinced himself Curly crashed the ship and he’s the better man for leaving Curly alive after what he “did.” Jimmy’s an aggressive man who uses people for just what they can give him, and he causes problems for the express purpose of trying to fix him so people worship him, but messes up even with all the time in the world to “fix” things. Curly’s the one blamed, but he’s a genuine guy who tried his best and gave people the benefit of the doubt until he couldn’t anymore, but didn’t have the time to fix anything because Jimmy broke that chance.

4- My main bit is over, but another piece of his psychology- Curly probably hates himself, considering how Jimmy talks about him seeming like he’s at the edge of a bridge with cinderblocks on his feet, and if he hates himself, a way he may try to cope is by insisting everyone isn’t tied to their worst moments! Just like how he talks about how pain is a symbol one’s alive, which sounds like another coping mechanism. Jimmy isn’t the only one who hopes it hurts.

5- And Curly was right, most of the time, about how bad things don’t define people. Swansea’s rude and abrasive at times, but a pretty good man in a bad life. Diasuke was unplanned for the journey, but he’s a good intern who’s trying his best. Anya may have only completed the Pony Express medical course, but she keeps Curly alive for four months, even despite his quadruple amputations and missing skin and the complete lack of a lot of medical equipment that she could’ve used. The unfortunate thing is- his kind nature let bad things in, and it was so slow and manipulative he didn’t even necessarily know, consciously, how bad it was, until Jimmy crashed the ship, got everyone killed, and fed him his own leg. 99.9% indeed.

[mikakuna]

are we ready to face the truth that is bruce did not love jason as much as jason loved bruce?

[boobchuy]

hell yeah

[myrkulitescourge]

imo karlach’s soul coin usage seems like it should have been a little more significant than it was.

she only ever really stops to consider the magnitude of burning through a person’s soul for power during an origin playthrough—otherwise she rationalizes to the player that they’re doomed anyway, and if using them gives her an edge in combat, why not use them for good instead of leaving them to be used by evil? the dialogue with lann tarv in act 2, where he tells the story of each soul he's handing over to her, tries to humanize each soul coin, and still she doesn’t really budge and disapproves pretty heavily if she's told no in regards to using them.

it just seems like something that could have caused some kind of conflict between her and wyll, given he sold his soul to a devil in dire circumstances and takes issue with the player for sleeping with mizora, because she 1) is mizora, and 2) similarly expends tormented souls during her romance scene, even if for a different purpose. but it just... never really comes up?

i love karlach. but that seems like it should have gone Somewhere, from a writing standpoint? karlach values wyll as a person but is willing to use currency forged from souls like his for the sake of a temporary power up. she knows the soul is consumed when she uses them. that whole exchange with lann tarv is there to emphasize that every soul coin she destroys was a person once. but it all kind of loses narrative purpose if this combination of factors doesn't mean anything? karlach doesn't change at all in her willingness to use soul coins, no matter what the player says or how much she cares for wyll.

idk. missed opportunity that wyll doesn't have any dialogue about this, of all things.

[mohntilyet]

not to mention the entire antaam fleet like 😭 that was the PERFECT moment to show off what the lords could do!!! The antaam fucked over rivain, theyve been a thorn in the whole nations side for a long time now, they would not pass up a chance for payback via full scale naval warfare so that the veilguard can do what they need to!! Sure dreadnoughts are dangerous but at this point they probably have tricks up their sleeve, thats one of the few things they have!

also wouldn't it be personal because does solas not try to blow up kont-aar because he's trying to 5d chess tevinter and the qunari into destroying each other. like. i know technically this would not be incredible widespread news because the attack was stopped, but i don't think the wonderful citizens of kont-aar would have missed the tsunami that nearly hit them and the shockwave that actually hit them. rumors go around. and i assume irian/vadis tell varric. who i think would tell isabela. who would tell the group she leads. who would care because ofc, they LIVE IN RIVAIN, and now know that solas and his followers thinks they can trade rivaini lives* to further his plans.

*while i also think there's probably a divide between kont-aar and the rest of the nation, it's one that the rivaini love to jump across and back over. an interesting comparison to be made here with most of rivain having similar sentiments towards dairsmuid and the chantry. like this is the country specifically mentioned to have a lot of citizens who follow the qun/are non-andrastian + it being MUCH more multicultural and accepting than other nations. any attack on rivain, even if it's a qunari settlement, would fan a lot of flames that solas cannot put out so the idea of trying to him taking multiple steps back because he didn't realise how intensely the qun/rivaini/lords would react is very fun for me. it would have been soo interesting for rivain to be a hub for efforts against solas because of how it's not influenced by andrastianism, how he (or his agents) specifically fucked them over, and (maddeningly for solas) also part of this resistance has spirits who willingly guide them against him. this could have even been a plot device where the door goes both ways and solas finds out rook's plans because he manages to eavesdrop through a seer or something.

and on the spirits. all the stuff where the mourn watch regularly communicates with spirits could have been done with rivain as well, and with different takes on being 'friendly' with spirits. iirc there's a spirit in the hall of valor which is so interesting but it's literally just there for flavour text. THERE'S A SPIRIT IN THE HALL OF VALOR THAT DOES NOTHING BESIDES LIKE. SAY HI. ??? bioware i would have liked to see more spirits and seers and the matriarchal pantheists you have talked about please. and also the idea of the peaceful qunari settlement being pushed to protect the country they are part of and what that means for them as qunari vs. rivaini. taash's storyline could have contributed to this . so A LOT less about choosing a side, more about how kont-aar has developed, changed, how rivain has influenced it and what it means to be qunari. not the qunari agents and fighters that we have seen, but their 'civillian' way of life in kont-aar.

complete waste not seeing any of established lore reflected in the lords of fortune or rivain because i stupidly actually thought we were going to see some kind of settlement and be introduced to a very different cultural norms.. in my beautiful mind i like to think taash is a little taken aback by how badly mages/elves/etc are treated. like they understood it was different outside of rivain (they would have been young when the dairsmuid circle annulment happened right? so they don't 'remember' it themself, they likely heard others talking about it when they're old enough to understand) but until they actually saw what was happening first hand, they had a weird dissonance about it. but what we got was a deserted beach, ties to another faction (wardens are fine!! they are great !!!! the fourth blight is interesting!!!! yet they are not the faction with a lack of info about them!!!!!) and also the hall of valor that exists as flavor text with nothing meaningful behind it besides a pub used in a few cutscenes and a minigame.

[nerdy-hyperfixations]

LET ME EXPLAIN! I started the playlist because I noticed a lot of songs used cannibalism in regards to love and relationships, and I wanted to collect the songs so I could analyze why!!! Its not weird guys I SWEAR ITS FOR RESEARCH

[undead-moth]

So The Bear ends season 2 with Carmy fucking up his pretty serious relationship with Claire. They spent an entire season developing this relationship between Carmy and Claire, and now it's over, and not just over, but abruptly and painfully over. Throughout this same season, they continue to develop Carmy and Syd's relationship, incorporating undeniable nods toward an eventual romance.

Then in season 3, they have Carmy dealing with the fallout of his painful fuckup, that ended a relationship that was, as I said, pretty serious, and was developed over the course of an entire season. They do this while continuing to develop Carmy and Syd's relationship, and while their interactions are mostly tense this season, they continue to incorporate blatant nods toward an eventual romance.

This is happening at the same time they have opened a restaurant, and Carmy is under enormous pressure, pressure that has been made worse by his breakup. Pressure to make the place a success, to live up to his potential, but also to make sure that Tina has an income, that he gives Marcus's mom what she wanted for Marcus, that Ebra, elderly and at the point where he really needs to be retiring, continues to have a job, that he doesn't endlessly waste his uncle's money, and crucially, so that the restaurant can earn that star Sydney is dreaming of, and that Carmy didn't even want.

And yet there are people genuinely criticizing The Bear for not canonizing SydCarmy this season, when...?

The man just went through a devastating breakup -

At the same time he opened a goddamn restaurant -

And is clearly going through the crisis of a lifetime -

And on top of that, he's just quit smoking.

Do you think, in real life, that it's realistic someone in that situation would immediately turn around and start seeing someone else? Do you think the writers would have spent a whole season developing Carmy's relationship with Claire, just for Carmy to shrug it off like it was nothing when it ends?

I'm even more baffled by the idea that SydCarmy not becoming canon this season is because the writers this whole time, have just been, what? Fucking with you? Straight-baiting you? Or do you think that just because they didn't canonize SydCarmy this season that this is indicative that they didn't intentionally allude to a future romance between Syd and Carmy?

I will tell you right now that The Bear is one of the most purposefully written shows I've ever seen. And while I will say that this season might be the weakest so far and wasn't what I was hoping for either - Nothing on that show is an accident. Nothing means nothing.

The writers of The Bear are too good to have accidentally implied SydCarmy was a thing. They are also far too dedicated to their vision for The Bear for them to be throwing things in just to fuck with you.

Have some patience maybe? When was the last time you watched a show that didn't hand you something the moment it was hinted at? Aren't you tired of watching shows that skip to the good part? Which is, as a result, not as good as it would have been?

[lgbtlunaverse]

My baby sister has heard of bnha and apparently watched some clips but only some tidbits from the 6th season (mainly the fight with Nagant, who is her favorite) And she very confidently told me that she knows all about keigo, who is hawks. I asked if he knew who dabi has, and she rolled her eyes and told me that yes, she knows he's touya, and that he used to be friends with keigo as kids!

She was very confused when I told her that... no, they weren't. They didn't know each other until adulthood. She insisted that she'd seen a video of them as kids together. I told her it was probably a fan animation, because a lot of people thought Dabi and Hawks knew each other as kids, since Dabi was the only one who knew hawks' real name. But it turned out he just tracked his mom down in secret. She insists that this is stupid, once again confirming that the "dabihawks secret childhood friends/rivals" theory is the only time fanon has ever been better than canon.

[holmsister]

Kinda gets me when people age them down in AUs and stuff because to me those characters wouldn't be half as interesting if Chilchuck, Senshi and Mithrun were the tallman equivalent of in their twenties

[sforzesco]

Could I ask for your thoughts on why you say that Cassius should have been Crassus' political heir ?

so largely I’m half referencing this collection of quotes and the various attempts to fill in the space/grave with a body (like Cicero! Cicero was a contender for this!) and I’m sort of taking shots at Antony for fun and whimsy.

like in sports!! I gotta root for my man Cassius over Antony, especially because no one can actually fill the space left by Crassus after his death (literally, the political landscape makes this impossible), but Cassius assumes a command position due to everyone else (notably, Crassus) dying (so: inheriting Crassus’ leadership position) and wouldn’t be a bad follow up to Crassus in the realm of military command since they have a similar (strict, as opposed to friendly in a way is commonly associated with Antony) relationship with the men under their command.

& also bc Marcus Crassus jr seems to be disinterested in taking up space in the political spotlight on his return from the Gallic Wars otherwise I’d be advocating for him on the basis of family tragedy compounded. it’s time to fill the space/memory/grave of your father and brother, buddy!

[chialattea]

Nami WIP + some chibi doodles heheeee

[meadowsofmay]

it's really interesting how vax is the caretaker in his relationship with the sister — he, objectively, one of the most beaten up characters both by the fault of his own recklessness and the unfortunate roll of the dice. and yet, the moment he gets up and regains senses he goes to check on vex, braids her hair and watches her, following her very step.

all the while spending nights at her door and for a long time not allowing himself a comfort of keyleth's presence after the most traumatic events. i am on the episode 61 and i genuinely want to make everybody see how much he struggles all the while understanding why he doesn't do so himself being so closed off and having "and i walk away" as his default way out of the situations when emotional vulnerability is required.

[thegreatyin]

Man.

chat this scheme has horribly backfired. i feel really bad for the TLC now

[youngpettyqueen]

thinking about trans Julian again specifically thinking about the idea of Julian being trans but electing to not undergo any gender-affirming surgeries

like I was thinking about this the other day in the context of his line about him and Kira being the only other options for a womb when he had to transplant the baby from Keiko, because the implication that Julian has a womb also implies he's elected out of having a hysterectomy for gender-affirming purposes. I say that because we know gender-affirming surgeries- at least the more cosmetic ones- are very easy to undergo (see Profit and Lace, where they very quickly and easily turn Quark into a woman (yes I know it wasn't gender-affirming for him but its the easiest episode to use for my point)) so I feel like it wouldnt be a reach to say that a hysterectomy would be a fairly easy procedure to ask for and undergo

which as ive been thinking about it more I think this like. perfectly tracks with Julian as a character, that he would opt out of undergoing gender-affirming procedures. because I think, considering what his parents did to him and how strongly he resents it, that he would steer clear of anything he would view as "changing" himself. honestly so far in the future I think its safe to assume views of transitioning are very different, and I'd like to think that there wouldnt be nearly as much social pressure to physically transition at all, but even if there was I think Julian would be very resistant to the idea that he would "have" to change anything about himself. Julian is very unapologetically himself in every regard, so im pretty confident in saying that that would translate over to his gender identity and asserting that he is a man, and he doesnt need to change anything about himself or his body to be one