#THEN the idea of the Ambiguous Shitty Situation and then i had the whole story right there | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

0risha · 4 years ago

Text

“BONES.”

✰ PAIRING ⤷ dabi x fem!reader

SUMMARY ⤷ It took him over a decade to muddle his brain with different memories to overshadow his past ones, not wanting for the abstained shadows of remembrance to embrace him.

It’s not that he doesn’t trust you.

Dabi doesn’t trust himself.

He doesn’t trust the color of his mind to stay in the now state it’s in. If Touya Todoroki were to unwrap the gauze that clung to his very being, he’d fall apart. And he couldn’t have that. This unforgiving life of his had finally unfolded its palms and given him a gift and he’d stay sane for as long as he could to enjoy it.

✰ WC ⤷ 6.6k?

✰ TAGS ⤷ major angst, there is fluff though pinky promise, there’s a suggestive line, please don’t cancel me, it was detrimental to the story manga spoilers, a few curse words, character death, very, very soft dabi, shigaraki is an ass

NOTES ⤷ this is, indeed, the longest thing I've written that wasn't for school. and the summary is just a blurb because i had no idea what to write there. lol, I'm sitting at my laptop while crying my eyes out...... but uh.... I hope you like it ༎ຶ‿༎ຶ

You smoke, Dabi takes that into account on the first day he sees you. Dabi hates cigarettes, despises them. He hates that itchy feeling his lungs get whenever he takes a drag, hates the way it makes him feel abyssal, co-dependent. And if there's one thing that Dabi hates, it's relying on something else that wasn't him self.

With that into consideration, he’s not entirely sure why you catch his eye, you’re not typically the type he goes for. He usually chose the dainty ones, the ones that were so eager to experience a jive of thrill, they don’t realize that they’ve encountered a person who played an important role in one of the most powerful villain organizations.

You're in the corner of a dingy bar, the dim lights somehow doing your angelic features justice. The light catches the glint of your name tag and the pastel blue of your scrubs. You look tired. Even from a far distance, he can see the sunken tent of your cheeks. The cigarette stick which hangs from in between your index finger and middle is halfway from becoming a stub. The plastic platter of pretzels that sit across from your chest is untouched as you grumble out replies to the bartender who's trying to make conversation with —a very uninterested— you.

When the clock hits eleven, your bar stool is scraping the ground as you attempt to leave. The relentless bartender grabs your arm with one last plea. His voice raising when you deny the idea that you should give him your number because you're too pretty to be by yourself. With one last pull, you stomp away towards the exit. Dabi doesn't know if it's because he's a villain too, but he follows after you. His senses telling him that there’s no way the bartender who you’d just rejected would let his wounded pride stay unbandaged.

He’s careful not to make any noises with the soles of his boots. The absence of street lights concealing his figure. Unbeknownst to him, his body enforces the skills he uses while stalking his next prey. His languid motions flowing with the same transverse as the cold, biting wind.

And you don’t notice a thing, your hands stuffed into the pockets of your thick silver jacket. But when your walking comes to a stop, Dabi’s heart nearly tumbles out from his chest. Not a second later, you pull out a pack of cigarettes and place one to your lips, lighting it in one go. When you resume walking, Dabi’s body internally holds a jubilee with jeers of relief. He’s not exactly sure why he’s helping you but what type of person would he be if he let a pretty lady like you get hurt?

At the thought, his throat tickles with the hope to let out a laugh.

When Dabi hears the crunch of leaves that bounce off the cracked concrete, for the second time that night he nearly breaks into a fit of laughter. The culprit’s first step is to trap you behind the fenced wall and his burly figure. What an amateur.

A part of Dabi wants to wait and see what you do. Are you a regular civilian? Do you have a strong quirk that would fight him off? His trail of thought evaporates when you hiccup out a laugh, smoke from the corner of your lips flowing into the man’s face. Dabi’s eyebrows quirking up with interest. What’s your next act?

After several hitches of breath, nothing comes and Dabi finally decides to step in as he feels the waves of anger emitting from the balding, middle-aged man who has you cornered.

The confrontation is brief —when the bartender turns to glance at an approaching lean, scarred figure, he scurries off without a word.

“Didn’t have to help me, I had it in the bag.” You squint at your savior as your cigarette bobs with the movement of your full lips. His stature towers over yours but you don’t seem the little bit phased.

“You weren’t scared,” he says and it’s more of a question than a statement. His cool voice sends a frosty layer through each stack of your vertebrae. Though, it slowly ebbs away as you study his features and realize how pretty he is —his eyes a pool of melted lapis. Sharp cheekbones molded to accustom to scars and silver staples that do nothing but add to your thinking connotation of him being ambiguity personified.

“Yeah, even if he did... you know.” You wave your hand. “He would’ve died sooner or later.” Dabi’s eyes narrow in confusion as he catches the way your eyelashes flutter prettily against your skin.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh.. uh- he had heart issues, the kind you can’t recover from.” You remove the lit stick from your lips and give him a full-toothed smile. “Thank you, Mr. Stranger.” And with that, you turn away and resume your lethargic walk down an empty alleyway.

Must be your quirk. Dabi thinks as he watches your figure disappear into the grasping shadows of the night. When he returns to the battered LOV hideout, he goes out of his way to avoid any interaction with the League. Refusing to taint his memory of your pretty smile and pretty face.

The next time Dabi sees you, you’re in the same place. This time you’re not wearing scrubs, opting for a more casual look with a baby blue top that contrasts nicely with your skin and jeans that accentuate your figure. You don't have a pack of cigarettes either.

Unlike before, you notice his stare and you bathe in it. The bartender from the other day all but glances at you. Amusingly, you turn to glance at the brooding figure in the corner of the bar with a knowing look.

After two beers and spinning courage, you walk towards Dabi with sway in your step. His eyes follow your movement until you decide to situate yourself next to him in the booth. His low lids focus on you as you fidget with your manicured fingers. Cute. He thinks. You’re too cute for your own good.

“What’s your name?” You break the silence. Teeth gnawing into the plush dent of your bottom lip.

Dabi takes his time to mull over his answer, he doesn’t notice the way his body temperature flares nor the tiny blue flames that threaten to dance on his scabbed knuckles. A grasp —an unfamiliar cloak, wraps its fabric around his shoulders. Prickles of his being push with urgency to ease it away but it’s all in vain.

“Touya.”

Touya, from the corner of his eye, watches your eyes light up with interest. Bright and wide with swirling specks of gaiety— joy. Which Dabi guesses are because of him. He turns his attention away from you, not wanting to get warped into your pretty eyes that sparkle just from hearing his name.

“S’ a pretty name,” you whisper. Sporting a subtle grin, one that blows wide when you see all four chambers of his heart pumping wildly with blood.

“Can you walk me home, Touya?”

It goes on like this, again and again —conversations with Touya at the back of the bar, sitting next to him in the grimy booth. His replies are quip ones but you know he’s listening to your idle chatter because you feel the way his eyes bore into your skull.

The night always comes to a close with both of you walking shoulder to shoulder, the plans of your upcoming day echoing off the bounds of the night sky. You live in an apartment building, a shitty one. He remembers you complaining about the squeaky floorboards, your loud neighbors, and the pervy, greasy-haired landlord that barges through your door at the most unreasonable times of the day. Touya raises his eyebrow at that.

“I’ll take care of him for you.” The words fly past his lips before he can stop them.

Your response is a peal of robust laughter that comes to a halt when you pull out a cigarette. “I’ll be sure to come to you,” you say. Today marked the thirtieth time you both engaged in subtle conversation. He takes note in the fact that you only smoke when you wear scrubs —the rope of curiosity gets the best of him.

“I have to keep up with the appearance of my two personalities, duh.” Touya has no clue what you mean but your clipped tone tells him that he shouldn't pry.

Meanwhile, your eyes flit to his sapphire ones than to his lips.

“Touya?”

“Mhm?”

“Can I kiss you?” You watch the way his eyes widen with a low giggle.

But before he can answer, your lips are already on his. He’s quick to take action as he cups the underside of your jaw, your breath minty even though you just had a smoke. His head’s a mess, there’s a jumble of terms that fail to come together and form coherent ones. The only thing his brain can commit is the pillowy softness of your lips. Sadly, he can’t enjoy the whole experience. His bottom lip erased with the tissue needed to feel, only leaving a purpled patch in its wake.

For a second, his chest tides over with a tinge of shame but it’s quickly washed away as you pull him even closer. Your small, gentle fingers carding through his soft, inky tresses.

The kiss ends when you pull away with a breathless sigh. You stay close to him, noses nearly touching as once shared breaths mingle. His hands are on your hips now, slowly kneading the soft flesh. A couple of seconds dart by as your dark eyes stare into his bright ones. The low-lighted area giving them a fascinating glow.

You want to tell him how pretty he looks at this moment. His flustered expression causing your gut to simmer with heat.

You need to tell him how nicely entrapped his presence always makes you feel but something in you decides against it, choosing to save it for another time. So you search for an alternative, breath growing unsteady as you stumble across one.

“Can you....walk me home, Touya?” This time it's different from the first night you asked him.

This time your voice trails off with a much different undertone.

››››››››››››››››››››› ~★~ ›››››››››››››››››››››

Touya wakes up before you do. Peeks of the sun squeeze through your bedroom blinds, casting a shining glow on your skin. As he studies your peaceful features, he encounters a divulgence. One that causes his skin to crawl with parasites that immediately beg him to keep up with this facade. To derive a little longer and enjoy this bliss at his own expense. However, Touya decides against it. It’s quite obvious that he’s not the safest person to be around, his appearance giving that thought away.

It might be better if he tells you first, he thinks.

It might be better if he lets a precious thing like you go before he builds a stockpile of lies that’ll eventually come crashing down when the realization finally hits.

“I’m a villain, you know,” he murmurs as he watches your eyelids flutter open. He grimaces as he tries to think of what your reaction may be. The first words you woke up to would have to be that you’d let a criminal into your home —into your bed.

He sits up to place his back on your cool headboard. The bell of anxiousness that sits at the pit of his stomach rings after a few beats of silence. You turn to stare at his upright figure with two arms tucked underneath your satin pillow. “I know, m’ not stupid, Touya.” You grumble, turning your head to return to sleep.

“What?” His eyebrows knit has his chest shutters with disbelief.

You ignore his bewilderment. “Since we’re confessing our deepest, darkest secrets can I tell you what could’ve been my villain origin story?” Touya stares at your face before bursting into laughter, one that nearly causes the staples around his jaw to unhinge. Though, this laughter is one of relief.

A part of him doesn’t believe it.

He doesn’t think he’s ever done a deed so right, so pure, that had earned him someone like you. The only thing his reeling mind can suffice is that he had killed a scum in some random, dirty alley that ended up being the lowest of the low. At the random thought, he laughs some more.

“What?” You can’t help but giggle, his laughter —which was a rare entity— made you giddy with joy. “I’m serious!” You pout, turning away from him to feign anger, your ears stay perked up as his smooth, rich laughter fills your bedroom with warmth.

“Okay, fine I won’t tell you.” His laughter trails off as he moves from the headboard to lie directly across from you.

“Alright, tell me.” His abnormal body heat causes you to shuffle closer until you rest your head on his chest.

When your story is done, he can’t help but stare at the ceiling in cerebrate silence.

At the age of fifteen, a program introduced by the hero association had recruited kids with abilities related to the medical field. Yours being an x-ray like quirk that allowed you to detect diseases, broken bones, and infections. Ones even normal x-ray’s couldn’t see. Forced to drop out of high school to take nursing classes and discard your latest stage of childhood life, you’d already become a registered nurse before the ripe age of nineteen. You worked in a special division, one where you only dealt with pro-heroes. You tell Touya about your worst encounter, one where you diagnosed a collection of broken ribs and the incapability to do hero work for several weeks and got shoved so hard that your ankle had twisted. Fortunately, the program had been discarded when you were twenty. With your inability to do other things that weren’t related to nursing you decided to stay one.

“Where were your parents?” It takes you a second to answer, chest deflating in the worst kind of way as you remember your father and mother’s shame-ridden faces staring back at your own —your's ridden with disbelief.

“They got money, so it didn’t really matter what happened to me.” You whisper, using the soft pad of your index finger to trace his scarred skin.

“Wanted to be a writer, Touya.” You try your best to hold in your cries but to no avail. “Wanted to write a best-seller,” You laugh, but it’s overshadowed by the watery sob that follows.

And with that, he finally understands. You’re two personas, a writer and a nurse. His chest tides up with pride once he realizes that he’s probably the first person to see and understand what they both mean to you.

“You can still be one,” he says. But it’s a promise of his own in disguise. I’ll change the world for you, make it so you can do anything you want to. It echoes from his every syllable and trails off with a familiar lilt.

And you see it too —hope-filled eyes flit to glittering ones. His, a bright pair of blue gems that shine with raw, unfiltered passion- yet to be completely polished. Against your will, every tendril of your being untwines and wraps itself around his words- you believe him. Unconsciously, your lips blow into a wide smile. “I’ll hold you to it, Touya.”

The stagnant air diffuses once you ask him a question, “when’s your birthday?”

Internally, you kick yourself in the shin as Touya shoots you a whimsical look. You’re not sure why this is the first personal question you decide to ask him.

But to you, Touya’s painted in grey, moral wise. You’ve only known him for less than a month, his background revealed the same night you met him. When you were with Touya, he didn’t seem like a villain. Villains were supposed to be vile, viscous people that didn’t dissolve properly into the troughs of today’s society.

His touch was gentle, handling you with nothing other than care. But you’re sure he’s used those same nimble fingers to inflict pain on whomsoever he chose. To you, Touya’s a jigsaw. You’re prepared —at least you think you are— to solve it. Prepared to start with the small pieces. And when those gradually come together, you’d use them as a guide. Treading carefully to work from known to unknown.

However, Touya prays to the gods that you don’t use your quirk to see the way his heart pumps wildly and the way his breath hitches. It took him over a decade to muddle his brain with different memories to overshadow his past ones not wanting for the abstained shadows of remembrance to embrace him. It’s not that he doesn’t trust you.

Dabi doesn’t trust himself.

“December 15th.” Your eyes widen when you realize the day was when you both had met. “I was your birthday gift then, huh.” You giggle, pressing closer to his body to feel the erratic thump of his heart.

“Guess so.” A good lie is always better than the truth.

That’s what he tells himself when Tomura asks where he’s been for the past couple of months. Vehement, crimson eyes digging into Dabi’s skull. He scoffs in annoyance, opting to tell the blue-haired man that he’d been out of town to scout for new members. Rummaging through underground areas where the average of villains was the thickest.

And yes, they’re all lies. He’s happy that Tomura is as dumb as he looks. Though it may be because Dabi has mastered the art of weaving intricate webs of lies- he’s grateful, nonetheless.

When Dabi turns away from him, Tomura’s eyes narrow.

Shigaraki Tomura isn’t as dumb as he looks. But Dabi didn’t know that -at least, not yet.

Here in the LOV hideout, where Dabi’s just a ruthless flame kindler, he finds no self-content, only impatience. Sometimes, taking part in Toga’s antics as a source of entertainment, her bloodlust too damn thick to ignore.

Impatience, a contagious drug that filters through Dabi’s veins and causes his blood to sear whenever he thinks about the overturn he wants hero society to so badly face. It’s the only way this ache of his can be soothed.

At first, it was just for him to bask in -for him to enjoy. For him to see a part of his past, burn. To see a rage of flames that -in time, turned to a cinder, his memories with it.

But now, he wants you to see it too. He wants to keep you tucked by his side as everything unfolds. Knowing this, he waits. Dabi’s not naive, this dream of his isn’t a one-man act.

Though, the biggest step closer to glory comes earlier than expected…

He’s a hero, the number two pro hero in all of Japan. His speed and the aid of his wings being his strongest suit. The information he provides is what still causes the Leauge to thrive. And the reason that Shigaraki now knows of the Meta Liberation Army. A powerful villain organization that rivaled Tomura’s very own. Led by a man named Destro, a name that every villain’s supposed to know. Kuriogi tells him this in his usual monotone voice, he’s the founder and now his son currently leads the army. The thing is, Dabi does know but for other reasons. His father was a hero after all.

Shigaraki orders Dabi to keep watch over Hawks. Sure, Dabi has his suspicions too, but he couldn’t differentiate if it’s the hostility he feels after he learns Hawks’ friendly relationship with Endeavor or for the fact that several missions had been deemed as errors because of the red-winged man’s mistakes.

Though, his stress dissipates when he comes home to you. It didn’t take a lot of time for Touya to get accustomed to your apartment. He’s used to living in shitty places, the League had been -and still is- living in one for months.

Fortunately, your landlord never comes around. You think it’s because of Touya’s intimidating presence but it stretches farther than that. Farther into the territory of what makes Touya into the fearful villain he is. But, you didn’t have to know that. Touya deliberates. You were stressed enough as it is.

Sometimes you’re not even home, late shift reminders overtaking your flimsy calendar. On those days, when you return, you’re so tired that Touya has to undress and bathe you himself. It’s never a toll, he enjoys listening to your barely decipherable recaps of your day, ones that sometimes turn into angry speeches of frustration that he’s sure to soothe with soft kisses to your pursed lips.

“Touya,” you whisper. Head in the crook of his neck while he lathers your body with body wash. Your head’s cloudy, exhaustion taking its home in your body.

“Mhmm.”

“Love you, like.. a lot.” The words bleed together with little to no pauses. It’s so slurred that Touya has to mull over it.

When he finally separates them in his head, he pauses. Eyes going wide as the grip on the pink loofah loosens.

Those words had never been emitted between you two. They were the three forbidden syllables that hung still, frozen in mid-air. It should’ve been easy to say. So easy to confess if push ever came to shove and the tides of adoration ever became too much to bear.

Despite that - in Touya’s head, his sole belief was that he was a package of damaged goods. What solace could you find if he ever told you that he loved you? Would it bring you happiness- fear?

Months had passed between the two of you, the light of winter and spring passing with intertwined hands. But what if- what if- you didn’t love Touya as much as he thought? What if you stayed by his side because you took pity on him? Took pity on a man who had no efficiency, no worth, no value, and used it to your heart’s content to mend yourself together.

Unbeknownst to him, those thoughts had run aimlessly across your mind as well. Both of you were damaged goods. Both of you unfamiliar with the thrum of the common melody.

When you feel his movements halt, a part of you feels victorious.

Oh, how lucky you were for being high on delirium. This was a chance pulled out of luck’s pocket.

“Don’t gotta say it, I see it.” He lowers his gaze to see you staring intensely at his chest. Which no doubt encases an organ that beats wildly because of your words. For the first time in a long time, he grows embarrassed. A streak of red blossoms from under his scarred cheeks as he chooses to hide his head in your neck, inhaling the strong citrusy scent of your body wash.

Hesitantly, you brush your fingers across the expanse of his back. Careful to avoid rough skin. Hoping that with your touch, you can convey a message of understanding.

I love you Touya and I know you love me.

››››››››››››››››››››› ~★~ ›››››››››››››››››››››

On a week that you’re finally off from work, you choose to spend it with Touya. He‘s barely out anyways. When you ask him why he’s never out doing villainy things. He answers with, “to spend time with you, princess.” A chortle at the end of his sentence when he sees you duck your head in embarrassment.

“Wanna go dress shopping with me tomorrow?” You ask, taking a handful of potato chips in your palm, focus still on your tv show -which Touya believes is the most boring thing he’s ever come across.

He turns to glance at you, eyebrows knitted as he contemplates.

He knows he shouldn’t, situations where his identity might be discovered, wouldn’t be good for the both of you.

And if Tomura were to find out…. the possibilities were too endless and Touya would keel over before he put your life in jeopardy.

But he still says yes- he’s never actually seen you wear a dress, he tells you. A subtle smile adorning his lips when he sees yours. He doesn’t ask why you want to buy a dress all of a sudden but he doesn’t mind.

The next day, you dress him up in a big burly coat that you had found at a thrift store years ago. Touya scrunches up his nose in disdain as you pull it up to cover his purple-hued scars, the fabric smelling oddly like sulfur. If it weren’t for the way you seemed so focused on hiding his identity he would’ve discarded the clothing a long time ago. He thinks the last straw is when you plop a pair of dark sunglasses on his nose.

“Don’t look at me like that!” you fuss. “I tried my best.”

“Was your best option really a combination of coat and sunglasses?” He exasperates, voice coming out muffled.

“What... I can’t hear you?” You cup the back of your ear, feigning curiosity.

He rolls his eyes at your comment. “Whatever, let’s go.”

You grab your silver coat from your rack and walk outside, both of you making it to your beat-down Honda. As Touya shuffles in the passenger seat you can’t help but giggle at his uncomfortable posture, they turn louder when he turns to glare at you but fails miserably, his intimidating face shrouded by the coat and glasses.

When you enter the boutique a small ding of a bell hits your ear. You smile in victory once you realize the vacancy. A short lady with gray hair waddles towards you and Touya. “Well, hello there!” She exclaims her soft voice matching with the appearance of her shop. Sweet and adorable. “What are you two looking for today.” She walks closer to you two, her motherly aura shrouding you in contentment.

“Well… I’m not entirely too sure,” you say, clasping your hands behind your back. “But something blue and flowy.” You hum.

“Blue and flowy, you say?” She turns. “Follow me.”

You turn to glance at Touya, whose attention is already on you. You grab his hand and follow behind. She leads you to a wide room, the smell of laundry detergent filtering through the air. Your eyes widen once you see the rows of dresses adorned in plastic.

“These are all my babies.” She waves and turns to you with an expectant look, eyes crinkling as she gives you a warm smile.

“They’re real pretty, aren't they?” You nod. “Well, the dressing rooms are back there.” She points to the far right. “If you need anything just come to me, I’ll be at the front desk.”

You walk towards the small corridor of dressing rooms and pick the first one you see. Pushing Touya into the stall, you place your hands on your hip after clicking the door shut. He takes his sunglasses off and shoots you a quizzical look.

“Show me your flames,” you breathe out, palms growing clammy as nervousness starts to set in.

You wring your hands as you watch his adam's apple bob, his stare turning hard. “No.”

You cross your arms and plead. “Please Touya, I wanna find a dress that matches your flames. They’re probably really pretty… don’t know why you won’t show me.” Your voice trails off.

He had an idea that this would happen sooner or later. There were times where you did see his flames but those were accidents. He always made sure to quickly extinguish them when he caught your peering eyes.

His chest floods with guilt once he sees your disappointed expression. He didn’t think his flames were pretty. He’d melted too many flays of flesh to count. The last thing he wanted to do was show you the bright-tinged spirit responsible for his grave sins.

But one dilemma Touya has is that he can’t ever seem to jump over the weak spot he has for you. So, he gives a meek - fine.

He watches your features light up with glee, only hoping that you wouldn’t regret asking him for this. “Can I take the coat off, first?” You hum, scrambling to do it for him. Revealing his plain white tee and his dark black jeans.

“Step back for me,” he whispers, gnawing at the bottom of his scarred lip. He opens the palm of his hand- to first, show a tiny blue flame that sways languidly. Progressively, he increases the flame until it engulfs his hand and upper wrist. When he looks up from his palm to your face, he’s surprised to see that your eyes aren't menacingly calculating or searching for release from fear. Instead, you look on in astonishment.

He sees the reflection of his flames in your eyes and from that circled mirror, a tiny nibble of his conscience starts to ebb with pride of his quirk.

After gushing about how pretty his flames look, you commit the color to memory. Dashing out of the stall to search for a dress, humming a tune when you envision his reaction to seeing you in such a nice, quaint dress on such a special day.

He perks up once you unlock the door, expecting you to change and show him what you’ve found. But instead, he’s met with your smiling face and what seems to be a dress -shrouded in a velvet coverup. “Don’t look so disappointed.” You wag your finger in front of his face. “You’ll see it soon.”

When December rolls by with chilly air as company, you start to see Touya less and less. He never does tell you what exactly it is he does while out doing villain work. Though, he did tell you that his absences would occur more and more since he and his league were working hard to take down a villain organization.

Your eyebrows had furrowed at that. “I thought villains were supposed to band together,” you asked, head resting on his thigh as you stared up at his face. “Not ones with different philosophies,” he had said, hand suspiciously inching closer and closer to your chest. You hummed, still confused.

It might sound naive, but you couldn’t find it in you to care. Hero society didn’t interest you. You couldn’t say villains did either but Touya was one. One of the bigshots.

Once, when you’d seen him on the little tv in the corner of your break room, it took a lot in you to not crack a smile. Though the idea of bringing chaos into the world with wide arms made your nerves rack with trepidation, you had Touya, and that seemed like enough.

Fortunately, Touya not being home was a benefit to your plan. You’d already scheduled your days off for work and booked the reservations for the fancy restaurant that was at least an hour’s drive from your apartment building. It was hard work, but for Touya’s birthday, it was all worth it.

››››››››››››››››››››› ~★~ ›››››››››››››››››››››

Shigaraki Tomura does not like to be lied to.

If he had written commandments for the people he came across, that would be his first line, golden engraved. It’s an unexplainable feeling he gets. If he could, he’d describe it as an itchy, hot coil that warps across his skin. It’s not painful, it’s simply annoying. And he feels it nearly every day. The scars that mar his neck being a result of it.

Why does the world have to be riddled with so many liars?

Dabi’s a liar, he knows that much. Hawks, that red-winged hero may be one too, but he’d deal with that when things finally came into play.

Now, he focuses on the man Dabi truly is. Villains lie. Shigaraki knows this, he’s a villain too. But- he tells the truth when it comes to his goals.

He tells the truth with what he wants.

What he wants LOV to bring.

What he wants society to flood with.

So why couldn’t Touya Todoroki do the same?

Shigaraki Tomura’s smart and Dabi is a fool to not see this. Who came up with the plans? The missions? The very concept of LOV? Sure, AFO had shaped him into who he was today but he was the same man locked in Tartarus, not Tomura.

When Tomura finds the roots of Dabi’s lies through Kurogiri’s peering eyes. It takes an hour of pleading for the ghastly man to convince Tomura not to find Dabi and disintegrate him into a fine pile of dust.

“Why should I!” Tomura shouts, his ruby eyes glaring into Kurogiri’s yellow ones. “He lied to me.” Shigaraki spits out the word so hastily and it’s as if saying the word itself was a sin of its own. Kurogiri nods, silently transmitting his words of understanding, not wanting to raise his temper even higher.

“But Dabi’s an important member of the League, Tomura.” Kurogiri coaxes. “In a week or so, we’ll be off to fight with M.L.A. If anything give him a warning, a threat. Just don’t kill the boy.” Shigaraki takes a second to glare at Kurogiri but eventually, his shoulders sag with defeat.

Even though Dabi had committed the gravest sin, he’d show mercy.

Begrudgingly, he grabs the cup of orange juice from Kurogiri’s hand, his thoughts flying at a fast pace, anger refusing to subside. All until his thinking cogs get stuck on one idea, one thought.

The thought crawls out from his mind and paints his expression with one of sickening glee. His smile so wide, that rivulets of blood dribble down from his cracked lips. His tongue darts out to lap up the tangy liquid as he gets high on this idea, on this revelation.

Shigaraki Tomura needs Dabi but Shigaraki Tomura does not need you.

Tomura knows everything about you, your background, your parents, the countless homes you had to reside in, where you live as of now- where you and Dabi live as of now. Where you work and what exactly you’re planning to do on the 15th day of December. It’s terrifyingly easy to uncover reservation logs.

You’re a pretty woman, Tomura could admit that. But you were a stain in his perfect, webbed canvas of the future. Those countless months where he had expected Dabi to be his righteous subordinate and listen to his demands were spent with you. Cooped up at your run-down apartment doing god knows what.

Tomura’s teeth grit as he digs into the flesh of his neck, specks of blood underneath his fingernails while he fervently scratches the already scabbed skin. Kurogiri glances over at him, seemingly reading his mind.

“I’m leaving.” Shigaraki swipes up from his dusty seat. Oh, how he missed the elegance of his LOV’s old hideout.

“Don’t forget AFO’s orders concerning Gigantomachia.”

Tomura blinks once, twice. “That thing has way too much HP.” He breathes out.

“For now, I need to do something else.” He whispers, bringing his embalmed hand to rest on his face.

››››››››››››››››››››› ~★~ ›››››››››››››››››››››

Whenever Touya thought of coincidences he thought of the word luck. It was a coincidence that Touya had been at the same bar as you, a coincidence that because of your lack of care for hero society that you’d glossed over the fact that he was a villain. But as Touya stood in your empty apartment, bloody and bruised from his prior fight, his connotation of coincidences slowly turned sour. A bitter taste sat on his tastebuds as he read over your note.

Happy Birthday Touya, my love.

meet me at the Burqoues Restaurant!

Take an uber…. I don’t have any money for one

(using it on the restaurant money)

so I’ll just take my car.

p.s. you’ll get to see my dress.

It was a coincidence that the day he told you was his birthday was the very day the League of Villians had merged with the Meta Liberation Army. Touya didn’t know what this grappling hook of fear was, but as he saw that your Honda was still idly parked in that weird angle you always had a habit of doing -it came to take its hold around his neck.

Maybe you’d actually found a couple of bucks and took an uber instead. Right?

You were probably in the restaurant, ordering that expensive champagne you really wanted to try. Ready to show that pretty, wide smile you always gave Touya when you saw him.

Right?

Touya couldn’t think- couldn’t breathe as he sped down the street. His grip on the wheel was so tight that his staples were close to popping. The loud ringing in his ears drowned out the persistent honking of cars that he nearly collided with.

What should’ve taken an hour took a measly twenty minutes. Without a second thought, Touya was already out of the car.

Upon entering, he received perturbed glances. He didn’t blame them, his clothes were bloodied, several staples unhinged from the skin.

“S-sir?” a tiny voice squeaked. He glanced at the receptionist desk, the bright chandeliers illuminating her meek stare that looked borderline terrified. He probably looked like a villain.

“D-do you have a reservation.”

“Yes.” He answered gruffly, head craning to see if he could catch sight of you.

“Your name please.”

“Touya.” He gritted, eyes focusing back on the receptionist who didn’t seem to believe him. She ducked her head to check, eyes scanning frantically.

“Oh, yes!” She smiled, it was too wide to be real but, frankly, Touya didn’t care. All he needed to know was that you were here.

“Table 15.” She pointed. “You won’t miss it.”

Touya didn’t bother to reply, legs already scrambling towards what he hoped would be you. Ignoring the stares that followed behind him.

Table 12

Table 13

Table 14

Table 15-

Touya's heart nearly stops, vision tinging with black as his knees nearly crumble beneath him.

You weren’t there.

››››››››››››››››››››› ~★~ ›››››››››››››››››››››

When Touya returned to the now, Paranormal Liberation Army hideout, Shigaraki had given him a smile so sweet that it had caused Touya's blood to run cold.

However, Touya did not pry, choosing to ignore the guilty glances the rest of the league sent his way. And he hated himself for it, hated the coward he'd grown to be in such a short period of time.

Later on that night, he returned to your desolate apartment, choosing to take a cigarette from your half- empty pack.

Yes, Touya despised cigarettes but at that moment they'd never tasted so sweet. His lungs didn't itch, he didn't feel abyssal. He just felt— soothed. As he took several drags, Touya silently pleaded for the nicotine to somehow make every fiber of his being believe that you had decided to finally leave.

That you had finally realized that a villain like him was no good and would only put your life at risk.

However, his façade had cracked when he'd found multiple files on your desolate laptop, drafts of your story in the making. The first page dedicated to your love for giving you the motivation to publish your first ever book.

And at that moment, for the first time in his godforsaken life, Touya wished he could cry. To show you, somehow that he was grateful for everything you had given him. That he was thankful and sorry for letting his mirror that reflected thousands of moments with you -your arms cradling him, him cradling you- shatter into fractured pieces.

As Touya Todoroki sat on a velvet sofa, arms wide and camera ready, a piece of his brain fabricated the image of you next to him --adorned in a sapphire blue dress, showing him that pretty, pretty smile that he’d grown to love, he told you —and told the world the story he never had the chance to.

To simply, atone.

#dabi x reader #dabi angst #dabi fluff #mha x reader #mha fluff #mha angst

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thedreadvampy · 4 years ago

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I'm a big fan of your georgie meta about how setting boundaries is incredibly hard but also completely necessary. if i can add, the fact that this is such a messy situation with no answer that's not gonna end up with someone hurt (who's doing the hurting is irrelevant here), is why it's such good horror. I love how the horror of the more interpersonal kind works alongside the clearly supernatural. It's so tragic that Georgie even had to make that choice, it's horrifying to see Jon 1/2

2/2 struggle with this addiction to hurting other people (maybe against his will? that's really the question isn't it). like i also believe georgie made the right choice but even if circumstances were different and she really cast jon off like that, she wouldn't be Problematique because this shit isn't supposed to be neat or happy

--------

Right? I really do struggle with the idea that we’re meant to view anyone as a Pure Victim or Pure Abuser in this show but particularly with this situation...like I’m not gonna speak for Jonny but just based on how many people my age or older have experienced something similar, and particularly given that he’s mentioned his own past experiences with addiction and self-destructive behaviour, like the. uh. the real visceral emotive horror of this horror podcast is the degree to which you can do everything you can and still not have a good answer. like. Georgie is trying to do right by everyone and Jon is trying to stop something awful happening and Martin is trying to save the world and none of them are acting maliciously or blindly, they can all see the harm that their actions are causing and isn’t that the absolute root of horror? to see it coming and not to be able to stop yourself becoming part of it?

like I don’t actually take issue with the idea that having pushed everyone away, being alone is the reason Jon can’t get out. this is very effective horror and it’s something I have watched happen time and again. I don’t take issue with the idea that Georgie made a choice which hurt Jon, knowing it would hurt him. again, that’s a horror that rings really, really true with my own experiences. it’s the same fundamental horror as when someone stays hiding in silence while a monster kills their friend - screaming or trying to fight it won’t help and will just get you both killed, but there’s a horrible emotional complicity in knowing someone will suffer and choosing not to try to save them, even when trying will only hurt everyone. that’s some Good Fuckin Storytelling

but what I do take issue with is the idea that this means that you are doing something wrong. and sorry this isn’t really a reply to you any more I’ve just been stewing on it. I really, really am very angry that people are framing “saying that Jon is acting self-destructively” as victim-blaming when the whole framework of “Georgie didn’t save him which means she’s a Bad Person” is so...implying that the reason this really painful and traumatic thing happened is because You Weren’t Strong Enough To Prevent It so it’s Your Fault (or in the case of that meta I was sent, Your Failure To Handle This Perfectly Means You Must Be Maliciously Causing Your Own Pain In Order To Hurt Others). which. assfnjghduifghduighuighdfi siri what is victim blaming

(to clarify - on distancing and reflection while I still do disagree with the original post I was responding to, I don’t actually think the intent of that post was to put fault on Georgie. the subsequent messages I got and other posts in this discourse I read, though, very much did take the position They’re All Flawed Characters Who Do Shitty Things, Here’s Why What Georgie Did Was Flawed And Shitty which. like. ok. the horror comes from the inability to respond perfectly. but the horror in that situation really is that there’s no good response, and that the way Georgie acted, bar a couple of relatively minor missteps, is literally the textbook example of How You Should Respond in this situation. the horror and the impact of that in the story is that it demonstrates that you can do everything right and still not escape causing harm to yourself and others. There simply Is No Painless Way Out. and to interpret that as saying ‘this was Malicious and Unkind and I am justifying that by pointing out that Nobody Is Perfect This Is A Horror Podcast’ misses the point in a colossal way. YES people fuck up and act thoughtlessly or maliciously in TMA but the most effective horror is when they act with compassion and thought and the best possible intentions and still cause harm because the situation is too tangled and too impossible)

...

also on a different note I am really interested by your aside about “against his will” because I think with addiction (using addiction in the broad sense that includes eg self harm, anger, self-destructive or risk-taking behaviour, and paranoia/conspiratorial thinking as well as like, substance abuse) that concept is so muddy as to be meaningless and again I think that’s where the horror lies and one of the things I increasingly really like about TMA is that, as someone who’s been surrounded by a lot of those things all my life, I reckon it does a really good job of drawing out those question marks. the question of where good intentions meet bad actions, and which intentions and wants define you, and whether these addictions are imposing something on you or exposing something in you, and to what degree you control your wants and to what degree they control you. and what it means to want something you don’t want. and to choose something you’d never choose. and to be stuck in your body while you’re simultaneously sure you want something and it’s a good idea and screaming at yourself to stop. and I love the way that’s manifested in Jon’s fear of the Web and the ambiguity about to what degree the Web is the fear that everything is a manipulation and to what degree the Web is the fear that you don’t know which bits are just you. and also like. the degree that the fear of being controlled by something outside you can very readily lead you to lose all control of yourself whether or not it’s real. this is another big tangent but ARGH the WEB it’s such a GOOD DEPICTION OF COMPULSIVE PROBLEMS!!!!!!!!!!

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raguna-blade · 4 years ago

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So thinking bout persona, which as far as this blog is concerned is basically all I do, and I got to thinking.

So the Metaverse/Mementos, Shadow Time/Tartarus and The World in the Tv/Midnight Channel are all basically the same thing right? Not PRECISELY the same thing, but the overlap is immense and real. I'd be willing to bet that the various spinoff games Including Q and such would also count towards this in that they're kinda worlds in the sea of the Unconscious (and with at least Two Users of the Universe Arcana sleeping to keep the world secure right now, who knows what weird funky things are going on there.)

But they're generally the same thing, and part of the rules that are generally established have to deal with perception and one and all seem to exist as a rule in weird liminal spaces.

Forgive for innaccuracies it's been a while for P3 and P4, but with that out of the way.

Tartarus is a transformation of a school, and has strict limitations on how long it is active (not unlike a school really) and not only that is made up of discretely aesthetic but also very uniform locations. The Persona Users only have their one Extra Hour to make their way through (or at least in story that should be the case) and reach their final destination.

Tartarus is, without question, one of the most confusing nosense places because of course it extends up and up and up some 300 floors (apparently) which is weird, but what's perhaps weirder, at least in context of the Persona 3-5 Series of games is that there isn't really an effect upon the users precisely. Oh to be sure it effects people, it changes them into coffins which, considering the Tower's Purpose and all makes sense. The place is all about death and that great change, and the way that persona are summoned via Evoker I suppose would explain their not being coffins. There's an awareness of death there I suppose, and so an additional awareness of this special time given.

Ok. Cool.

The Midnight Channel though, it's a world more or less made up of the endless distorting fog, which alters shape to take the form of those who fall into it's greatest fears and concerns writ large and obnoxious, seemingly in an effort to have them confront themselves. At least, in theory, once the fog lifts, but formed in such a way that almost seems tailor made to have people freak the absolute hell out.

And of course, the place it exists/accessed is a television, turned off at midnight which, frankly is a pretty strange space if you're expecting anything to show up on it, or rather expecting NOTHING to show up on it right?

Everything blown up the way that it is, it makes sense that the world is endlessly foggy, not as stable as it initially appears, and all that, but as to the persona users themselves, they're...more or less just as they are. They're granted glasses by Teddie that allow them to see better, but they are otherwise not fundamentally changed.

Which...Leads us to Mementos. A Place that is explained as not only a direct connect to the sea of the unconscious, a rather different statement from the other major locales even if they too are a direct connection, but it also...changes the persona users.

The liminal space (and this is, I think admittedly, somewhat of a stretch) is more or less just any old random place, but you, distinctly, not a part of it. Well, that's the metaverse as a whole, but Mementos itself is a train station, which tracks as far as I understand the subject. It's a place of coming going, and just an endless sea of people who you really are just kind of one of.

But...Why does it change them so much? It's explained that the form that the phantom thieves take is their form of rebellion against the world. Very literally, the manifestation of their Rebellion (Of which Their Transformed Selves are paired with their Persona's with whom they made a contract).

Alright, that tracks, it's consistent to an extent, but this raises the question of why don't we see that in the other shadow worlds? Part of that, I've said before, is Because I think the Phantom Thieves are more or less playing at their Shadows as opposed to the other Persona Teams. The Shadows that We see in Persona 4 seem to be in line with what we're seeing in the Phantom Thieves, in that they are the version of their relevant person pushed to their extremes and distorted, pushed into a state of otherness for one reason or another.

Not all of them get fancy duds of course, and certainly that's at least as much because of the circumstances of their Shadow's formation (with them being dropped into the situation fully conscious as opposed to just kinda dropped int), as well as the nature and degree of their alienation. I expect that for those who didn't quite get the full transformation, they didn't quite feel that degree of alienation that you see in everyone else that develops a Full Dramatic Shadow.

Or perhaps another way to say it is, their personal view of themselves had yet to become distorted in any major way just yet.

Now the Investigation team get's to reintegrate into the world so their degree of isolation never get's to develop but it's worth pointing out that in the case of the Thieves that...doesn't actually happen.

Without fail, they're still outcasts one and all, if now outcasts that now cling together in friendship love and understanding of their circumstances.

But...

I don't know how to phrase this, but I suppose by the line of logic that I'm following here, the Phantom Thieves never quite Cohere as a group.

Like I recall hearing some folks talking about how the games seem to kinda abandon some of the character's personal plot points in rapid succession to focus on different issues, especially seen in their social links. Like the one that immediately pops to mind is Anne and Shiho and the hot nonsense that happens to them early on. Her social link instead of dealing with that at all beyond briefly touching on it as a thing that did happen, focuses instead on her modeling career, and a degree of taking that more seriously.

Which I agree is kinda bullshit. I'd love to know more about how Haru is dealing with the fallout of her dad beyond the lightish touch it gets, or more about Yusuke's relationship with his shitty dad, or more about Makoto's relationship with her sister and her parents and the like.

See, these things aren't NOT touched on, by no means. Haru's entire social link DOES deal with the fallout of her dad's death...In relation to the Company that she now holds a massive share of and not precisely related to her personally.

But they aren't really a thing that the Thieves, as a group, actually touch on. It's not a thing that get's directly dealt with constantly in the storyline as opposed to what goes down in Sees which is damnably intimate despite their initial desires. They do after all live together, and their job has just thoroughly run in and kicked them in the teeth on every front.

Hell, despite how uh...well badly(?) but definitely at least clumsily and obnoxiously (I am assuming, for a moment it's supposed to be awkward and kinda just...not great, for effect. It probably wasn't, but it's what we got, and at the very least I think it deserves an examination in that light.) The Issues that plague the Investigation squad one and all come up constantly. Kanji's issues with masculinity/homosexuality, Naoto's problems with gender/gender roles, Yukiko's princess status, Teddies Emptiness and attempts to fill that void, etc etc. It get's played with, rather directly, it get's shouted from the mountain tops, and for all that people very definitely fuck up and say some shit (Yosuke) this stuff comes up, and frequently I think.

But not with the Phantom Thieves. They're in fact, extremely guarded with each other, despite being on the same side and all that jazz.

Which leads me to Maruki, and the True End antics.

Cause see, Maruki also get's a Rebellion outift. It's not thief themed, no, it's more a kind of messiah. Or rather, A torch bearer. Whatever his means, his objective is and always was to lead people to being happier and better versions of themselves, although It's plainly obvious that he loses sight of doing that well with the method he chooses given how it's a thing that applies the same cure to every single person when that obviously wouldn't be a good idea.

Sumire says it herself, If not for him there's a good chance that she wouldn't have lasted long enough to make friends as is. And I don't think she's wrong considering how....well absolutely fucking done she was. That was not a healthy mental state that she was in BEFORE her sister died, and it wasn't much better after.

More importantly though, is what happens during that Third Semester. With the Third Persona's that everyone gained, every single one, WITHOUT FAIL, addresses the major concerns, the major events that they've all been staunchly ignoring and refusing to talk about. Ryuji's track desires, Haru's dad pain, Morgana's still burning desire to be human, all of it.

And he fixes it, and he makes, at least for a little bit, better. And in doing so, he absolutely changes the course of their lives, let's them see the way things COULD be, actually sit down and acknowledge one more part of themselves that they want to achieve, and in doing so unmasks, without fail, literally every single one of their persona's.

Well, I say unmask, but they also obviously have face coverings still going on or a degree of inorganic/ambiguous heads and faces, but the degree of difference is stark I think between that and their second persona's or their first.

Also, at least, if you actually bother to max out the social links, and just let someone actually IN, such as it is.

But back to Maruki, it's actually rather interesting that his Metaverse Outfit arguably makes him the HARDEST to identify of everyone. Yeah it's a big golden outfit with an obnoxiously huge helmet and cloak but...

The Helmet is far more interesting to look at than the person wearing it, and even looking at his face it's only really recognizable as him if you can get a clean side view. The Outfits is bright and Golden, but is otherwise unidentfiable if someone else were to be wearing it. The Cloak further makes it harder to see anything between being huge, fluttery, and covering basically anything of note body wise (and potentially facially since it again just flutters all over) In addition to his staff/torch it's...

If we're going through the Shadow Cosplay as looking at the person in questions distorted view of themselves, It's interesting that Maruki's distortion basically does everything in it's power to make him a non entity. Which, I suppose makes sense given his ultimately goal.

#Persona 5r #Persona 3 #Persona 4 #Spoilers #sumire yoshizawa #Maruki #Ramblings

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nichester · 5 years ago

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Review: Extracurricular

Media Type: Korean Drama

Genre: Teen drama/Crime/Noir

Summary: Ji Soo, a diligent but poor high school student is saving for college and paying rent by moonlighting as a pimp. His precarious balance of school and work begins to fall apart when another student, Gyu-ri, discovers the truth about his job and wants in. Things spiral quickly out of their control.

Why you might care: If you enjoy watching teenagers do crime and get realistically in over their heads; if you are interested in dark shows with Really Good performances (in particular from the leads, who have enough chemistry for us to buy their toxic but unbreakable bond) or if you are interested in any of the themes of crime and class struggle.

Why you might not care: Give this one a pass if you don't like your shows dark and/or are looking for a happy ending. Importantly, pay attention to potential triggers in this show! (Suicidal ideation, self harm, violence against women, sexual assault, hallucinations, and torture all occur, although not always explicitly, on this show. Feel free to message me if you need more detailed warnings!)

Trope Bingo! Partners in crime/Bonnie and Clyde; enemies to sorta? lovers, literally I have no idea how to categorize their relationship

If you liked _______, try ______!

Can't say I've watched much in this vein! I've heard that School 2013 or Sky Castle are both excellent dramas about struggling high schoolers, but which have less grim endings. The Get Down is a great netflix show also about marginalized teenagers struggling to pursue their dreams despite the crime and violence they're surrounded by.

~Spoilers (not anything detailed but just to be safe) and overall thoughts under the cut~

Plot: I'll be honest, I'm not a big plot girl. Unless there's something stand-out about a story's plot, I tend to consider it more as a vehicle for character development than anything else. In this show's case, I was on the edge of my seat in horror for most episodes. The plot unfolds in a seemingly inevitable negative spiral that takes all of our characters down and leaves them far worse off than when they started. This show did rely a lot on coincidence, both positive and negative. Usually I would consider this a flaw, but I think it worked well here as a way to portray a random, unfeeling world around the characters and to emphasize the precarious nature of their situation.

Central character(s): I was really attached to both of the leads. They had the convincing contradictions and vulnerabilities of deeply troubled teenagers, and their different traumas and personalities played off of each other well. For all of Ji Soo's smarts and skill, he has a startling naivete and a tendency to panic when things don't go according to plan. Gyu-ri is equally smart, but loud and manipulative in contrast to Ji Soo's awkwardness and isolation. Gyu-ri pushes Ji Soo to try to expand his business to make up for his unexpected losses (decisions that drive the plot), but this goes against his every cautious instinct. Ji Soo tends to focus on maintaining what little he has, while Gyu-ri fully embraces the philosophy "the best defense is a good offense." Indeed, Gyu-ri is reckless to the point of suicidal, but the later episodes reveal a protective instinct that seems to be as unexpected to her as it is to the audience, an instinct which continually drives her to throw herself into harms way in defense of Ji Soo. The strongest development that both characters had was in their relationship with each other, which led them to be both braver and more open than they had ever been in their lives. But their involvement with each other and their reluctance to cut ties is part of how they got to where the show leaves them--cornered and bloody.

Romance: Technically this show has no romance, but I think it's fair to say that the leads develop an obsessive, Bonnie and Clyde-style relationship that is partially romantic in nature. Ji Soo has a distant crush on Gyu-ri at the beginning of the show, which she exploits. Honestly, some of the funniest moments in the show come from the contradiction between Ji Soo's side-hustle as a pimp and his complete and total inability to speak normally in Gyu-ri's presence. His disillusionment with her is genuinely painful, but necessary for their relationship to become one of equals. Their grudging partnership is abrasive, but their bond feels very convincing. No matter how much they resent each other, they're more strongly drawn to each other. (Watching Ji Soo pack up her discarded chip bags to bring with him on the run is just….. Its so….. Kids make me cry ok!) It's clear for both of these lonely and deeply messed up kids that simply having a partner--someone who they can reveal their ugly sides to and depend on--is an intoxicating feeling. By the end of the show, they'd kill for each other and probably die for each other. The show smartly doesn't ever "consummate" the romance--they don't really have enough downtime when they're not actively fighting to make it convincing, and despite everything they've done both characters are still very young. If there is a second season, this is a ship that is likely to sail (but possibly crash and burn).

Side Characters/Side plots: In a show like this one, which depicts a marginalized and frequently abused group of women, the presence of sympathetic characters who are also members of that group is crucial, or the drama would feel exploitative. This show's most prominent side plot depicts an underage sex worker, her post-traumatic stress response to a violent client, her struggle over whether or not to speak to the police, and her desire to find genuine human connection, whether it is with her shitty boyfriend or with her pimp. (Their odd father/daughter relationship was one of the most moving parts of the show!) While I thought the writing was sympathetic to Minhee's situation, she is frequently used as a reminder of the human consequences of the other character's actions. This is both good and bad--it's important to remind the characters and the viewer of how damaging their behavior is, but it also risks treating her as a more of a tool for the lead's development than a thoroughly explored character. Up until the last episode I think the writers gave her a distinct enough arc to avoid this pitfall, but depending on her ultimate fate (in a theoretical season 2) I could change my mind.

Tone: The tone is dark, tense, and constantly on the verge of slipping into chaos. Hallucinatory sequences play out as Ji Soo and Gyu-ri imagine themselves killing people, destroying things, or being buried alive. These sequences emphasize the character's instability, while also establishing the camera as an unreliable narrator of events in a way that pays off in the ambiguous final moments. The fantastic acting is buoyed by the directing to depict the precarious state of the leads' minds as their situation spirals further out of their control. Ji Soo's scenes feel claustrophobic and paralyzing--when he ventures out of his apartment to talk to Gyu-ri or to go to the café you get the blinking, shuffling sense of something emerging from a cave. Gyu-ri, on the other hand, is a loose cannon, and her scenes have a jittery, dangerous edge to them. As a whole, the show is excruciatingly tense and frustratingly unresolved.

Theme: This show is a full-fledged tragedy. It is a brilliant example of a negative change arc, with all of the characters taking more and more drastic actions while still managing to retain our loyalty. I think the writer's are clear that although none of these kids have made good choices, the real tragedy lies in how they have been abandoned, used, or neglected by the adults in their lives. The few adults who show any care for them are either relatively powerless themselves (like Mr. Lee and their teacher) or too late to avert disaster (like the prosecutor). Extracurricular is a grim look at how we fail vulnerable children to the point that even a boring, average life seems like an impossible dream.

#reviews #extracurricular #extracurricular netflix #i really liked this show guys!#but it is definitely dark and was a p upsetting watch #with that in mind #please more people watch this! im going nuts over here like like 5 other people!#yeah im going nutty over this show please interact #watch me post this wholeass review and it doesnt even show up in the tag

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murasaki-murasame · 4 years ago

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Thoughts on Fruits Basket 2019 2nd Season Ep16 [”Ask Him For Me”]:

This week on Fruits Basket, Momiji’s whole storyline continues being super sad, and Tohru basically spends 20 minutes having a prolonged emotional breakdown because she’s juggling like five different types of trauma at the moment, and most of them aren’t even directly related to her. Fun times! :)

Thoughts under the cut.

Like I said last week, this episode adapted chapters 74 and 75, so we’re back on track with following the manga’s pacing in a pretty 1:1 way for a while. The next two volumes or so of the manga are pretty neatly divided into two-chapter story arcs, and this episode is a good example of how neatly that translates to the anime’s pacing.

At first I thought that the scene at the start with Momiji and his dad was anime-original, but after double-checking it actually isn’t, lol. I think in general this episode was a super straightforward adaptation that didn’t really leave anything out or add anything, but it didn’t really need to.

Anyway, I think as a whole this was a really good episode that’s gonna make lots of people cry, and for the most part I liked it, but I think it ended up feeling a little too melodramatic, in a way. Like it was trying a bit too hard to make the viewer feel sad. But honestly a lot of that just has to do with how this episode focused on some of the plot points that I don’t care as much about, so I wasn’t really as invested in what was going on in the first place.

This whole episode’s pretty much focused on the two threads of Uo and Kureno’s whole deal, and Momiji’s family situation. I’ve already gone over why the Uo and Kureno stuff just doesn’t work for me, and how it just feels kinda over the top, but I also have kinda mixed feelings on these sorts of parts with Momiji. I like him a lot as a character, but in these sorts of dramatic moments he almost feels unrealistic in a way that’s kinda hard to describe.

I do appreciate that as a whole this episode served as a reminder of how shitty his whole situation is, and how much he’s been having to hold himself back from his true feelings and desires for basically his whole life.

Which is basically the whole theme of this episode. That for all sorts of complicated reasons, everyone ends up holding themselves back or being held back from pursuing their wishes. Which can be particularly painful when those things are perfectly achievable, and the reasons why they’re being held back are relatively flimsy and arbitrary.

But on the other hand you also have cases like Tohru where the wish that she’s unhealthily clinging to is one that fundamentally can’t be fulfilled because she wants to be with someone who’s already dead. And that’s a big part of why she’s so empathetic toward these people who want to be with others who are still alive.

In a lot of ways, I think Tohru’s basically projecting her own trauma onto everyone around her, and watching all of these other personal struggles is just reminding her of her mother. On top of her just being a fundamentally nice person, I think part of why she’s pushing herself so hard to help everyone deal with their issues is so she can indirectly fix her own problems, in a sense. Which she basically acknowledged to Momiji, about how she’s doing this because she wants to, even if it’s also about helping others.

Even though I already said that this episode felt a little too melodramatic for me, I think that it makes a lot of sense that Tohru is reacting so severely to all the stuff around her. I’ve seen a fair amount of other people being a bit confused about why she’s breaking down so much, but I think it’s just a mix of what I said about her projecting her own issues onto everyone else, and also her just slowly breaking down under the weight of all the different things she’s been dealing with in general. It’s less that Momiji and Momi’s situation in and of itself is enough to send her into this much of a spiral, but more that she’s already been getting more and more aware of the struggles everyone’s facing, and how the curse is binding them. Which has also been making her confront her own repressed trauma more, which has just made her more mentally unsteady. So it’s just a whole lot of things going on at once that are making her one giant emotional wreck, lol.

Anyway, aside from all that, we also got the scene that first properly teases at Ren, and I was curious to see how they’d handle it. It’s mostly the same as in the manga, but I think they changed it a bit so that instead of having Tohru straight up think it’s Akito at first, they were a bit more ambiguous about what her reaction to it was. I think they had to figure out a way to alter it because of how Ren has a notably female voice, so having Tohru assume it’s Akito would be kinda awkward. Whereas in the manga there’s no voice-acting so there’s more room for ambiguity.

It’s not a huge issue, but I think it really just highlights how awkward that whole scene is the more you think about it. And in a broader sense, it’s yet another example of how the story keeps awkwardly having to sidestep around the fact that Akito’s a woman. And because of that mix of ambiguous writing, and them giving Ren a notably different voice to Akito, I can already tell that it’s giving anime-only people the wrong idea, and making them think that Tohru knows who Ren is when she actually doesn’t.

But anyway, that’s about it for this episode. There’s more I could go over, but I already ended up saying more than I thought I would, lol.

I’m assuming that the next episode is going to cover the field trip arc, since that’s what happens next in the manga, but I don’t remember what scene the episode title is based on.

#murasaki rambles #fruits basket #Momiji's a good bean who doesn't deserve the shit he deals with :(

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those-pink-specs · 5 years ago

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So, um, yeah … I finally finished my great long rave about the Klámstrákur video … make of it what you will …

Maybe this is a load of hot garbage, but my starting point was what they’ve said about self-image and toxic masculinity.

But I reckon that if your toxic masculinity shows up in a latex crop-top and corset, there’s probably something interesting going on.

I had a quiet Sunday a couple of weeks ago, so I watched it really, really slowly and overthought the hell out of it.

Sssooo … tl;dr (because the bit after the cut is really long).

What if ..

· the lighting and colours (and costumes) have consistent meaning, and are part of the storytelling?

· it’s basically all an attack of angst in a bathroom: an internal power struggle with no clear winner?

· everyone who appears is part of that person’s own psyche (except Einar, who is a memory)?

I’m definitely not saying that any of my thoughts are a ‘right’ interpretation, or especially original for that matter. It was just fun to fit all the bits into a nice pattern that makes sense – at least to me.

[Even I’m quite surprised by how much I had to say about this in the end...]

Klámstrákur

The toxic-masculinity-in-a-corset interpretation

*TW: low key for discussion about anxiety and gender angst. Nothing heavy, but, hey, I know how easy they can be to set off at times …*

So, this thing is Art and it can mean basically anything you want it to.

Most people see a narrative around sex work. The lyrics make it hard to get away from, in fact (though could be a metaphor for queerness – but never mind that). Anyhow, while I agree that sex work is the background, in my overthinky way, I don’t think the song is about that, precisely.

I like to overlay it with the idea that the two voices are the same person, and we’re mostly having a tour through his angst. This works okayish for the song on its own, but it’s much better in the video (or so I think).

Anyhow, we start in the bathroom. The scene is saturated in a deep, velvety red light. (I’m going to talk about lighting a lot.) A choir hums gently in the background. Our lad stumbles in, washes his face and has one of those ‘is that really me?’ moments in the mirror.

He shakes his head, as though trying to dispel bad thoughts – and that’s where we immediately go … and stay.

Bad thoughts.

We get a flash of Einar alone in a theatre. Then three nearly subliminal flashes of Matthías as we see him at the end. Only with his head in hands like this:

(Sorry for the shitty screen shot. Perfect gifs of this bit do exist, just not here.)

This has got to mean something, surely. It’s not there by accident. I pause to mention it now, but I’ll come back to it later…

00:25 – … on stage…

A curtain brushes aside and we’re on stage. My interpretation is that the stage is his perception of the outside world and/or memory of the recent past.

Why? Because that’s where Einar is – and it’s the only place we see him. Einar is the only ‘outside’ person we see. So he’s being recalled and thought about as an audience. It’s a perfect metaphor for playing a role, as the outside world looks on. As I flippantly said on another post – Einar is the ‘male gaze’ on this rather ambiguous body. (I wrote it as a weird academic joke [‘male gaze’ is a feminist art theory thing], then went … oh wait … what if he is?)

And then … there’s that red light bathing everything in the theatre. I think the red represents (or reinforces) a concept. Possibly desire … for sex, sexuality, submission, androgynous or feminine expression … money, whatever – anything except the accepted norm for a nice cis-het bloke, basically.

We’re just 26 seconds in at this point – and our lad is recalling stripping off and dancing on his pole for Male Gaze Einar. But the recollection is starting to make him feel guilty, ashamed, anxious and sick (or just more so than he already was). He starts to panic, and think he’s dying – as you do. But he’s not really dying: it’s anxiety.

His thoughts start to circle. There’s a nightmarish hospital trolley – that he’s literally chained into (perhaps by the anxiety if we want to really push the metaphor – or at least by those serious-looking girls in catsuits). And then there’s the theatre where he’s dancing like the sinful, slinky mink he accuses himself of being.

The first time we see the trolley (at 0:59), it’s in a blue corridor –the first real change from the red – but as the other three in the scene approach, the trolley swings slowly back into a red corridor. Then, just as we get to the end of the intro … ég sé að deya (1:16)… back onto stage.

Don’t worry – I’m not going through the whole thing this slowly. In fact, for the first verse – where we’re hearing about what a degraded, weak little smut addict he considers himself to be – it’s mostly visual escalation. We cut between him being strapped tighter into the trolley in the red corridor, the stage, and a few shots of Male Gaze Einar starting to look … frisky…

At the end of the verse, it’s crisis time, because we get our first, momentous: Þú ert klámstrákur!!! … and so enters Matthías properly.

He’s mostly lit with blue. He’s wearing some very important pink specs (ahem) and a lab coat. And he is most certainly playing the part of ‘toxic masculinity’ as in internalised shame, guilt, and a self-hating need to conform to society’s expectations of maleness. He’s a part of our pole dancer’s psyche, though. Not someone else shouting at him: just his own desire to be someone else, to be another way. To be in control of himself. To not be gay or gender-bendy or a pole dancer … or whatever.

So I see something implied in the settings and lighting: red scenes, desire and immersion in the klámstrákur lifestyle; blue scenes, self-loathing and a need to control, purify and conform. And it’s a real tussle with … I think … no clear winner.

01:45 … The spin out

I particularly like the next little bit.

Don’t look now, but between one bellow from Matthías and the next, we’re back on stage. And Einar has got a bit over-excited and is clambering over the seats. As in a dream, the pole has transformed into a chair full of pole dancer, and in one of the most memorable snippets, we get fingers tenderly/sexily making their way down Klemens’s chest.

Let’s enjoy a crappy screen shot of that for no reason at all:

[… oh my …]

And then that fabulous chair spin from the red stage to the blue clinic room (screen shots do not do it justice, so please just replay that bit in your head … I’ll wait …)

… Now how about this?

When he stumbled into the bathroom at the start – he was just starting to get anxious. And that bit with Einar was what set him off. Desire for some stranger. A touch. Something too gay or too … something … for his self-loathing part to handle. He panics, spins out and goes into cold self-hatred (blue clinic) needing to regain control, and to conform and purify.

And from the two minute mark – right through the next bit of verse where he lists all the things that ‘sometimes’ happen – that’s what’s going on. The list maybe be factual, or his fantasies, or angsty exaggeration, or some of each. It doesn’t matter, he seems to think he needs or deserves the treatment he’s getting, and submits to it wholly, like a góður drengur.

But – as I said at the start, that toxic masculinity in control of the situation is dressed a wee bit less masculine than you might expect. I mean – when you think about gender-panicky homophobes IRL, you don’t usually think latex crop-top and corset. But maybe it’s more about domination and control. This is the part of the psyche that seeks and exerts those things – so dominatrix chic may be just the ticket.

Anyhow, he’s bathed in the purity of that blue light, busily head-massaging away the gay, while screaming at himself for being filthy and disgusting.

[This is so fucking camp … why am I like this?]

02:30 – ambiguity – or who’s the anxious one here anyhow?

From here on, things get really ambiguous and therefore really interesting.

New setting: this is a chamber with a nice pole in it, and windows so the Matthías character (now in a nice fluffy red coat that just screams ‘pimp’) and the serious girls in catsuits can watch at a safe distance.

And our pole-dancing boy is released from captivity for observation. And what happens then?

This …

Followed by this …

This little backward glance. An implied moment of eye contact.

What do you see? Is porn boy anxious? Unsure? Obedient?

Well, maybe.

But I like my queer boys a bit bolshy, so I see defiance. A look that says: ‘Think you can control me? Well game on, bitch.’

Because he really goes for it on the pole after that. Surely that lightning-quick crotch grab at 02:43, when he’s being called ógeðslegur karlmaður is a very clear ‘fuck you’!

[Really though?

Well why not?]

It’s easy to listen to the Eurosonic version and hear the Klemens voice suffer and panic, and just assume that he’s a victim. There’s no real story line to the lyrics, but the Matthías voice gets the last word, so we naturally suppose that our poor little filthy boy is somehow lost, or fighting a losing battle for survival.

But to me, the video evens things up a lot.

One of the reasons that I thought that both voices might be the one person even just in the live versions, was that the name-calling is so over-the top it seems kinda panicky. The video reinforces that – with the shouty voice being so obviously controlling. And the need to control is an anxious need. Internalised homophobia as a fear. So, Mr Shouty in the crop-top is as much an embodiment of anxiety as the filthy boy. Maybe more.

Because if they’re both inside the head of a lad having a panic attack in a bathroom, then it’s Mr Shouty who has caused it. He (Matthías) desperately needs to control his impulses (Klemens), maybe because he’s afraid of what will happen if he doesn’t.

[Does that make sense? I hope that makes sense to someone besides me.]

Anyhow … back to the action … it’s game on, and the next bit (02:45 to 03:00) is a lot of shouting about filth and a whole lot of arse.

Uhm …

[well … quite …]

The battle pushes to-and-fro until we’re suddenly back here:

What is this? Opening his pores? Who knows, but it’s a very cool effect. It definitely looks like punishment/purification (so very like opening one’s pores). The light is blue – just as hard and bright as before. No red in sight (there was a lot of red in the observation chamber – such was the power of the filthy boy’s wiggles). So control is seriously asserting itself again.

The struggle is real.

Now, from 3:02 – the really difficult bit – the couch:

The couch is long and low, lit blue and red at opposite ends with a homoerotic / bondage picture partly obscured by curtains. What does it signify?

The messages are really mixed, even just with Mr Shouty. He’s in his pimp coat screaming about his disgust, sometimes lit blue sometimes red – but he’s got filthy boy by the leash now.

So what is it? He hates himself, but he kinda gets off on being a slinky-mink pole dancer? It’s the same mixed message as the clinic outfit: ‘I’m your need to be a normal bloke – but I’m rocking this crop-top and corset look.’

Well … at risk of overdoing it by trying to fit everything together too neatly – what if the couch bits are about balance? Getting over the attack with a little give and take between the warring selves. Or something like that.

In the last minute, the war between clinic and pole is fierce – with interludes of couch.

When we see the couch we also see:

Porn boy’s leash being held, him dancing obediently and wearing more clothes. So less impulsive – under some control. The purifying ‘treatment’ has worked a bit. Pores cleansed.

Control freak still shouting but, as I said, he’s not looking like a dominatrix anymore – more like a pimp. So arguably, he’s secretly enjoying porn boy’s show while calling it filthy and disgusting. I think that’s the point – which I guess means that toxic masculinity also makes one a moralising hypocrite (‘that type: making a scene’ – though that’s not the official translation, sadly!). However, for now he seems comfortable watching – and he’s no longer trying so hard to control his filthy-boy self.

But, of course, the war isn’t over. How could it ever be, for an androgynous pole dancer with internalised homophobia and gender panic?

[Sounds horrible and I don’t recommend it. Just be a happy slinky mink and a cheeky sinful seal, that’s my advice.]

So lastly …

This whole emotional-breakdown-in-a-bathroom theory would have been greatly assisted if we had even the tiniest throwback to the bathroom right at the end. But we (probably) don’t.

What we have instead, however, is a throw forward from those flashes of Matthías on the couch at 0:24 (I said I’d come back to that!). If I’m even vaguely right, then those flashes show the balance breaking down. The visual is of Matthías’s shouty half of the psyche – head in hands. What’s he feeling?

Our pole-dancing lad is staring at himself in the mirror at that moment, thinking of that excited audience member. His inner control freak, who had been moderately at ease with the dancing, and sitting on his comfy couch, is suddenly overwhelmed by guilt and flickers into breakdown … and it begins where it ends.

So it’s a cycle. Maybe.

Or maybe this is a load of hot garbage.

#endless rumination on music videos #hatari #also i enjoy overthinking things so this is basically catnip to me #seriously this is how i enjoy myself with good content #klámstrákur #i've been threatening to do this for a while haven't i?#well i finally when and did it #hot garbage #with sprinkles

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ladylilithium · 6 years ago

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Hans’ possible Redemption Arc PART 1: Deconstructing Hans' character

Hey, guys! So this is my first post analysis, meta, observation, whatever you wanna call it, so if it’s seems incomplete or lacks of depth please add your opinions as well! Also English is not my first language but argentine Spanish, papá, so don’t judge me plz. I don’t want to encounter with any anti or hater, and if you have the necessity to speak your mind anyways, do it but in a cordial way.

I’m going to divide this post in 3 parts I think, since is very long, and I have a lot to say for my favorite Jerk redhead Prince 😆

Ok, let’s start, shall we?

_________________________________________

1) Is he really a sociopath?

You know, this is something that upsets me quite a bit. The fact that you can just say “Oh well, he’s a sociopath so he’s manipulative and lacks of empathy” is something that annoys me a little, or at the very least, disappoints me. TBH, you don’t need to be a sociopath (a psychological and mental condition) to be manipulative, apathetic or cruel. I’m trying not to rationalize his actions in Frozen, because he still was wrong by harming two innocent women, but by saying that he’s a sociopath it makes his character a little more… shallow? Simpler? My point is, that a shitty toxic person can be anyone, and it simplifies the complexity that they brought on the table on the first place.

But the questions still remains, is he truly a sociopath?

Is tricky, since we know nothing except that his family is shit, and that he is a chameleon, a mirror to other people. By the end of the movie, and by the interviews that Jennifer Lee gave to us, it seems to me that he does have sociopathic traits, but he is not a sociopath per se. Hans can be a sociopath, as much as he could be not, if it’s given a proper character in-depth and backstory.

I think that by calling Hans a sociopath is an easy way to make the GA and the Frozen Fandom to disconnect with him since statistically we have normal-functioning brain, and because people with ASPD diagnose have a negative -though justified most of the time- stigma surrounding them.

2) Grey Morality: The line between good and bad, where we all fall.

“All it takes is one bad day to reduce the sanest man alive to lunacy. That's how far the world is from where I am. Just one bad day.” ― Alan Moore, Batman: The Killing Joke.

As I said before, I like the idea of a morally questionable prince. A more grounded, realistic, game of throne-like character as Hans is. What I don’t like, is the seemingly automatic white to black view that we have for Hans, while at the same time, we have one of our protagonist letting almost die a whole kingdom, and her sister, to escape her duties and crippling fears –unintentionally, but still-. An empath or normal person can commit crime or bad things given in extremes situations of distress, anger, etc. And we see that with our own eyes in Elsa. She almost gets tempted to kill two men, you can see the fury in her eyes, in her face.

It is self defense, yes. But regardless of that, her people knew nothing about her powers and they just knew that she cursed them and ran away. No matter how morally wrong Hans was by trying to kill Elsa, or letting Anna die, he also helped her. He helped them both.

If she indeed killed those men here, I don’t think anyone whould’ve ever trusted her. Not even her own men, whom remember, they witnessed her actions and they were attacked too.

A normal person lies. A normal person manipulates. Heck, we even can choose to not feel empathy if it is inconvenient for ourselves. How many times did you pretend to feel empathy for someone just to make them feel comfortable? How many times did you see a homeless person asking for a money and you just walked away?

Again, I’m not trying to normalize these negative traits, but to be sincere about it. And is something that makes us very complex as human beings, we are true neutrals, and we can be good or bad, depending of the actions taken at certain moments, and how it impacts to others.

Yes, some people are irredeemable monsters, but I don’t think that’s Hans’ case. And so he does have redeemable qualities as well, even if it might be for personal gain, or perhaps some of his actions were genuine, we don’t know for sure.

When did we not see an ambiguous morality in Frozen? Or when did we not see ambiguous morality in some Disney characters, in general? Is hard to find, but we do certainly have our morally wrong characters redeemed. Here are a few:

- Abused both physically and psychologically Cinderella. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Imprisoned Belle. -Verbally violent towards his subjects and Belle. -Almost harms physically Belle. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Killed a bear out of vengeance. -Let motherless a bear cub, that after he would befriend. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Almost kill a bear out of vengeance too. On top of that, was his own brother (though he didn’t know). CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Tried to kill Simba and take his pride. -(invoked) Forced mating with Kiara. -Almost attacks Simba. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Tried to kill Simba. -Attacked the lionesses of his pride. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-He was an asshole to everyone. -He ordered a guard to throw an old man through a window (still lol). -He tried to let homeless a whole village for his selfish desires. -He betrayed Pacha’s trust. -He let Pacha on his own fate (probably to die). CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-Along with Syndrome, she plotted the death of many superheros, including Mr. Incredible. -Almost kill Mr. Incredible. -She almost kill a whole family, including the children. CURRENT STATE: Redeemed.

-He tried to kill Elsa, and let Anna die alone for personal gain. -Deceived Anna, Elsa and everyone else. -Plotted the death of Elsa at some point in the movie (unclear when exactly). -Degraded verbaly Anna. -He tried to break Elsa’s heart to make her give up her life. Redeemable Qualities: -He took care of Arendelle while Elsa and Anna were gone (though, it still can be interpreted as gaining popularity). -He went off to look out for Anna. -He ordered the Arendelle guards and the Merchant’s not to harm Elsa. -He calmed Elsa’s rage, avoiding her to kill. -He tried to reason with her.

Elsa is shown that suffers of guilt and insecurities, yet throughout the majority of the movie, she still rejects Anna and her responsibilities as Queen. Even to a point where she witnesses hurting Anna with her magic,

yet she just casts her away from her Ice Castle. Or after the misery that she caused -and she’s visibly hurt by that- she’s still thinking of running away, instead of trying to change things. Hans pleaded her to stop the winter and bring back summer, but she said that she couldn’t.

My goal here is not victim-blaming. I’m not blaming Elsa for her insecurities or self-defense actions. But her character at the end of the film, has a lazy realization, and for me, an unsatisfactory conclusion in terms of story-telling, because we never she her develop for herself, or working hard to balance her bad actions throughout the end of the movie, but anyway.

I’m not trying to rationalize morally questionable/wrong actions either. A good action doesn’t cancel the bad one, but my main interest is to analyze the human psyche, character growth and development.

3) Love and Fear: a constant subject in Frozen, and a constant subject for a “Prince”.

So cut through the heart, cold and clear Strike for love and strike for fear See the beauty, sharp and sheer Split the ice apart, and break the frozen heart.

—Disney’s Frozen “Heart”

DID HANS ACT ONLY OUT OF COLD AMBITION, OR HE WAS ALSO AFRAID?

For what we know from A Frozen Heart, interviews and extra information, is that Hans is abused so much by his brothers, that he just accepted their behavior and doesn’t fight back, is something normal for him. Nor he tries to improve his relationship with them. His relationship with his father is also painfully cold and toxic, and their dynamics are comparable to Zuko and Ozai, Tyrion and Tywin, or Theon and Balon. Hans seems to have an inferiority-superiority complex, and so, his pride is fragile and as well (just as previous Zuko, Theon and Tyrion).

But how? He’s very charming, and his body language never shows signals of insecurity (though that’s debatable). Or when he confesses his true intentions to Anna he has a sexy smug smile in his face, and his voice is soft and low, cruel and never trembling. How is that I believe that he was afraid or scared? Well, the movie itself states that he does have a terrible relationship with his brothers, the novelizations extends this to his father.

So by knowing this, a person copes with the pain and abuse in different ways: Elsa’s fear is hurting her loved ones, so she forced herself to an emotional -and literal- isolation towards them, specially with Anna. In Hans’ case, his fears are being trapped forever in his “home”, and being rejected by his father. So his way to acclimatizing himself in such negative environment, is to avoid his true feelings and morality. Avoiding his true identity, in essence. Thus, becoming into the Mirror Hans (more on that later), allowing him to become the very thing that he actively tried to avoid for years.

I think that here’s the point where he started to panic; where the fear of going back to his depressive life, and the taste of power that Anna gave him when she left him in charge, took him over completely, forcing himself to toss apart any bit of true morality and compassion that he had for Anna and Elsa. Where his mind started to realize that executing Elsa was the only way to bring things back to normal.

But is also the fact that Anna dissapeared, and Elsa was the only rightful heir to Arendelle, so his conflict was “What do I do? What’s next?” If Hans decided at the moment to execute her, and Anna was dissapeared, he wouldn’t get to be King of Arendelle, and he would back to his hell home. His conflict is both emotional and materialistic, and fear started to get under his skin too. Some might argue that he’s just reflecting Elsa’s emotions, which is valid, but keep in mind his goals, his backstory; try to read him beyond what the movie told you. Link the dots to picture his mind.

Some other might point out this scene.

[SIDENOTE: To me, it seems like another atempt to make us dislike him more. In my eyes, is like that the creators tried to manipulate us to hate him, but anyway don’t mind my defensiveness towards him LOL. He’s a terrible person Angie! Stop it, goddamit!]

It interpreted this part as Hans joy of finally seeing the chance of escaping his prisonic home, dehumanizing Elsa completly. WHICH IS BAD regardless. Is he a sadist? The book implies that he takes pleasure in feeling physical pain, but he does not take pleasure on harming others.

So to me, is a smile of almost getting to win a big bad in a videogame, or well... that’s the type of face when I’m about to eat a pizza so, IDK :v 🤷‍♀️

THE MACHIAVELLIAN KING VS THE MACHIAVELLIAN PRINCE: The Lion and the Fox.

One of the reasons that Hans didn’t fit his family -besides being the smaller and weaker member of them-, is that his morale and philosophy clashed with the imposing, hard power that his father values. Being flexible and benevolent to the common people is a sign of weakness for Hans’ father and brothers. The king sees himself and his other sons as strong and powerful as lions, and he compares Hans to a mouse because he doesn’t fight back, nor shares his value of hard power. The King’s philosophy is kinda like Darwinism with Machiavellian shades. So in one side, we have the cruel side of the Machiavellian philosophy, the one that values fear over love:

“From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved rather than feared, or feared rather than loved. It might perhaps be answered that we should wish to be both: but since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved.”

“One can say this in general of men: they are ungrateful, disloyal, insincere and deceitful, timid of danger and avid of profit...Love is a bond of obligation that these miserable creatures break whenever it suits them to do so; but fear holds them fast by a dread of punishment that never passes.”

But in Hans’ side, he believes (or puts in practice, at least) that appearances and benevolent acts are better way to influence people, to gain more popularity. This is the softer side of power, the more deceitful and diplomatic Machiavellian route:

“Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.”

“Never attempt to win by force what can be won by deception.”

“Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them. And I shall dare to say this also, that to have them and always to observe them is injurious, and that to appear to have them is useful; to appear merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright, and to be so, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite.”

So we see the two opposing sides of the Machiavellian philosophy, one relies on hard power, and the other in subtle power. In essence, Hans’ father rejects the soft power because of his imposing pride and ego. But both characters share the same Machiavellian influence in their beliefs, the only difference is that Hans takes no joy in being cruel and tyrannical, thus preferring the softer, more subtle side of power.

Yet at the end of the day, he embraces the cruelty, and fails to become the hero he expected to become, and by the time he realizes his mistakes and regains his morality, is too late.

What I’d like to see in Hans’ Redemption Arc, is a discussion between the characters (mainly Hans and Elsa) about this matter. An intellectual battle, and him realizing that his father was wrong. Not so in-your-face, because I can see people getting bored over political philosophy, but in a metaphorical way. And Hans coming in terms that deceitfulness and fear, aren’t the only way to gain trust, but love and true friendship as well.

He can be a fox, and a lion too.

“The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.”

― Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince

Part 2 Here

#disney #disney meta #frozen #frozen meta #frozen fandom #prince hans #hans #redeem hans #niccolo machiavelli #the prince #elsa #anna #disney villains #disney princes #redeemed villains

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rametarin · 2 years ago

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“Yes I told a wittle wie, but at weast I stawted a convuhsayshun uwu”

Back in the day when “conversations” started more from oral correspondence, conversations were more ambiguous. And if you’re the sort of person that believes in manipulating the truth and the ritual of communication for your own idea of, “positive social change,” the ends justified the means when it came to he-said she-said, ambiguities, and telling little lies in order to provoke feeling and reaction to get them on your side. Manipulating peoples trust in that what you said with fervor and zeal was the truth and that you weren’t just speaking out of your ass out of ignorance. Because the consequences of if what you said were true were correct, it was outrageous and wrong.

And if it ever was shown that you spoke out of turn, back in the day, you could always use the excuse, “well I guess I did overreact but I didn’t know the truth either, I was duped, same as you.” And you could deflect ever deliberately using outrage and lies to forwards an agenda.

So why do I bring up this phenomenon and how the internet removing ambiguity as to its source has laid bare the machinations of socialist types when they lie like this?

Oh, it just has to do with the original VA for Bayonetta deciding to lie about how much she was paid per recording session (she said it was totally for that one game.) And this interaction was TEXTBOOK, “I’ll tell a little lie and let the outraged start rumor milling for me.” All leading up to “the conversation” of unionizing voice acting and increasing VA pay to ludicrous amounts not based on any previous conversations but new ones riding waves of public ignorance and anger. All of this based on a shitty false outrage that absolutely lied about how dire the situation was to make it seem like a virtual crime VAs aren’t paid six figures for one job.

And always, always, always, when it gets laid bare that someone wasn’t just jumping the gun, mistaken and repeating ignorance, but outright lying to provoke, this coy, “Yes I lied but at least we started a conversation!” ploy tries to excuse the whole fucking facade as justified in the face of injustice. Ignoring the fact the injustice does not exist and was always an exaggeration. Trying to capitalize and base the conversation on the outrage that never happened.

Usually it has more time to culturally penetrate as a bit of just-so ignorance that no one engaging in the conversation has any time or opportunity to research for themselves, so they just take it as a given based on association and trust to the people making snide “jokey-jokes” repeating and perpetuating these things. The way night time talkshows would perpetuate the “woman burns her crotch with hot McDonalds coffee and stupid people sue businesses for their own stupidity” meme. Where people latch onto it and repeat it as real, with a hint of self-aware ironic disgust when they do it.

But this is the internet age. The lie about only being paid $4,000 total didn’t have time to become a mean spirited set of jokes perpetuating that false story as truth, before the truth came out and managed to be disseminated with a minimum of effort to correct the record.

Pre-internet age, do you know how long it would’ve taken for the truth to come out before the lies and propaganda spread around the world? A whole fuckload of time. And partially spurned on by the sort of people that are ideologically geared to take every opportunity that seems to badmouth businesses or things that aren’t locked up and unionized for the sake of arguing everything requires a union boss to function. From voice action, to Steam. They argue you shouldn’t even be allowed to have a business without a union dictating everything you do and how much that business has to devote of its earnings to the union.

“Oopsy sowwy I wied and ouw convuhsayshun was on false pwetenses. :3″

You love to see it. It barely had time to ruminate and metastasize before being debunked.

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hisband · 6 years ago

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guys... i’m really starting to think that pha.se 5 will be The Game Changer that canon desperately needed. after seeing those new images of stu and muds that debuted at the latest show tonight, i actually... feel more optimistic about gor.illaz than i have in a long time, and here’s why.

gor.illaz has been doing tons of throwbacks to old phases already, in that first video alone (with stu doing one of mur.doc’s dance moves from r.ock the house, noo.dle sporting stu’s he.llo ki.nky shirt, the pazuzu reference; all things from pha.se 1). nostalgia’s already been confirmed by both dam.on and jam.ie to be a huge theme in pha.se 5, which makes me feel like everything is finally coming to a head.

i know den.holm claimed on instagram that stu isn’t possessed - that his eyes turned white due to intense happiness and nothing supernatural - but i just don’t buy that. even if stu’s eyes were white in the past (see: pha.se 3) due to intense emotions, and even if some of his happiness is genuine (and fully deserved)... there’s definitely something else going on with him. he hasn’t just been more confident; according to the interview that was just released, he’s been cocky. one could say he’s being kind of obnoxious. while we could initially write that off as stu finally regaining his confidence, much like he did after he and mur.doc severed ties in pha.se 2... things still aren’t adding up. if you look at the recent character interview, there’s a notable scene between russ and stu right at the very beginning. stu is described to be in a trance-like state, and doesn’t come out of it until russ removes his earphones. some fans are also pointing out how the changes in his wardrobe are starting to mirror mur.doc’s, such a striped sweater similar to the one muds wore in saturn.z bar.z. on top of that strangeness, this post was made on the official gorill.az instagram. like, guys... that’s a creepy picture. straight up. you can’t deny it. not to mention the fact one of the songs on the new album is called ‘tran.z’... which might very well means trance.

i think russ.el may be starting to reach a point where he’s worried about stu. he’s very supportive in the interview, sure, but in the video itself? something had bothered him enough to trip stu, which snapped stu out of his white-eyed, euphoric state. what was up with that? does russ think stu is getting out of control somehow (even if his rollerblading seems pretty harmless)? does he feel like he created a monster by trying to offer stu the guidance that he did, or is he starting to catch on that something’s just... wrong? russ has handled stu roughly in the past, sure, but something about the encounter felt very strange and ambiguous.

another picture was posted earlier tonight, this time by den.holm - one of stu wearing a cap that looks like it could belong to muds. russ stands next to him, which could be either completely coincidental, or it could represent the fact russ is worried about him, and will be spending a lot of time with stu throughout the phase - trying to reason with him, but ultimately feeling like whatever’s going on with stu is beyond his control. also... what’s up with the cut on stu’s cheek here?

and then... we have mur.doc himself. there are... a lot of things to mull over. number one? the expression on his face. he looks exhausted. he looks deeply angry. this is a far cry from the muds who was drawn throughout pha.se 4, who was typically depicted as very mischievous or playful-looking, or the frightened, flustered muds in the video shown at the BR.IT awards. though given his situation, who can blame him? the one time he didn’t do something wrong, he gets framed and thrown back into prison, then replaced within his own band (something he seems to have accepted, albeit begrudgingly, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t sting). his red eye is back for the first time since pha.se 1. his hair’s grown so it covers his eyebrows again, making him look more like his younger self, and he’s grown whiskers on his chin. he looks scruffy and unkempt. he looks fed up.

but what really catches my attention is mur.doc’s bruised, bloodshot eye. that’s a detail that didn’t have to be here, but it is. you know how nostalgia is going to be a theme throughout this phase? well... which other major character was pushed into the background of the narrative for a while, only to return a very changed person with a damaged eye? you guessed it - noo.dle, back in pha.se 3. like i said, loose ends are being tied. callbacks are being made. in the interview, mur.doc isn’t seem different from his usual self at first glance, but - much like with stu - you get the sense something is off about him. he still says and does ridiculous things, as he’s prone to do, but he’s less receptive to humour than usual (i.e. the interviewer making a joke and muds failing to laugh). he’s learned that showing weakness in prison leads to victimization, and so he refuses to do it anymore. but you also get the sense that under his bravado, he’s steadily being worn down; he’s even described as having bloodshot eyes when he walks into the room.

as much as i hate that mur.doc is back in a place that traumatized him, and that he’s being held unfairly... this... might actually be the kick in the ass he needs to actually start bettering himself. both fans of gor.illaz who love mur.doc and fans who hate mur.doc have been putting pressure on jam.ie to do something about his character, especially within the past year or so. i’ve only been in the fandom for 6 - 7 months, but i don’t doubt people have been wanting some sort of redemption for him far longer than that. (i do have some theories about potential redemption stories that were written and then scrapped, but that’s a whole other story.) they would never write him out permanently because he’s far too popular (and jam.ie clearly likes him a lot), but with the way the world going? assuming they hadn’t been planning to redeem mur.doc for a long time and just never got around to it, they’ve probably (hopefully) realized it isn’t a good idea to have one of your protagonists (arguably your main protagonist) be someone who repeatedly does abusive and shitty things to people, especially his friends. it isn’t funny anymore, and it was in bad taste to begin with. surely jam.ie has either realized by now that there’s only so much bad shit mur.doc can pull before his character starts driving audience members away, or that he’s eventually going to get tired of writing the same scenarios over and over again. another theme of this phase appears to be growth and evolution. what better way to depict that than by mur.doc finally getting a reality check and realizing he can’t keep going on like this - especially if it’s tied in with some symbolism via throwback to another phase (re: the damaged eye)?

let’s also consider that mur.doc is the one who permanently damaged stu’s eyes, and that getting one of his own eyes all fucked up (whether temporarily or permanently) might force him to truly look and think about what he’s done to stu. and if stu continues going down this path he’s going down and gets progressively worse over the phase, and mur.doc returns in time to see what his (former?) best friend has become? that might be the thing that truly wakes him up. he’ll finally realize, much too late, the extent of the damage he’s caused to an innocent person. that he’s turned stu into himself - and that by doing such a thing, he’s also mirroring his abusive father. it’ll be a horrible, devastating realization to come to, but you know the old saying. things usually get worse before they get better, and you know for a damn fact they’ll find a way to bring the old stu back. they wouldn’t dare keep him like that forever. somehow, things are gonna work out. in order for this band continuing existing with the presence of these four characters, things have to work out.

to make a very, very long and convoluted story short? no matter what’s going on and how the story is going to be spun, something is going to change with the characters of mur.doc and stu, and their relationship. realistically, it has to. from a storytelling perspective, you’d be doing your audience a terrible disservice to have all this development happen (the development is already starting, after all!) and then revert things to the way they used to be. i truly don’t believe anything or anyone will be the same by the end pha.se 5 - and i really want to believe that mur.doc, stu, nood.le and russ.el will be better off because of it, and that the events that transpire will bring them all back together.

#( META. )#tbd.#this... took.... hours... but it was worth it #if i end up being wrong about any of this then gor.illaz will have completely let me down

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oflgtfol · 6 years ago

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passengers (2016) had the potential to be such a good movie but it was written in such a wrong way and it just wound up being shitty and gross........

im in such a ranty mood lately so yeah. this is long and probably incoherent so its under a read more

like if they wrote it from aurora’s perspective it couldve been such a cool space horror film. im not a big film buff so idk but i rarely see space horror moves? i see it more often in literature. but even then most space horror stories are all like, aliens and shit, but space is so vast and interesting, space horror has the capacity to be so unique and different from normal horror... aliens are basically just the demons and monsters on earth just in a different setting

space horror stories that really get me - the ones that really fucking chill me to the bone, that actually succeed in creeping me out - are always the ones that focus on being alone. space is so isolating, its so completely different from earth, like out there you are the loneliest you will ever be. you can be lonely in your bedroom but ultimately you’re on a planet with 7 billion other people, but in space, there is no one around for millions, billions, trillions of miles, hundreds and thousands of light years. you cannot get to safety. you are stuck in your situation whether you like it or not and nobody will come to help you. nobody will even know.

if your situation takes the wrong turn, then you will well and truly die alone in a way that nobody else has ever experienced before. its such a chilling concept and its completely realistic too, like i will always come back to the first moon landing when discussing this. nobody knew whether they could get the astronauts back to earth. they went down to the surface with no certainty that this place wouldnt be their deathbeds. they were the first 2 people to ever step foot on the moon, to ever step foot on a surface that wasn’t earth. if they couldnt get back up, then they would also be the first 2 people to die there, to die on a place that wasnt earth. it fucks me up so bad. so space horror is also so chilling because its plausible, this is the unknown we’re exploring and everything is new. everything in space is so far apart, its so lonely, and that fact remains true whether you’re talking about real life space travel or an event in fiction, which makes it feel way more genuine that regular horror. horror that deals with the supernatural loses that realism and it feels fake, like that wont happen to me because monsters and demons just dont exist

so you could take this conflict, one between humans, and put it into space? it becomes even more horrifying

with a horror movie set on earth dealing with a kidnapping, you root for the protagonist, for them to escape, for them to kill their captor if they must, and no matter how helpless the situation may seem you root for them because all they need to do is have access to phone to call 911, or grab that hammer and their problems are over, or kick their captor in the groin and make a break for the street. the helplessness from this story is that freedom is so close, yet so far

a horror movie set in space dealing with a kidnapping? the victim is stuck there no matter what. they can kill their captor. they could send a distress call. they could reach an escape pod and make a break for it. but no matter what, they are still stuck in space. you are so utterly isolated that a distress call could take years upon years upon eons to reach anyone who could possibly answer, and an escape pod would take even longer unless it can go at light speed

so the horror of the situation with space horror is that everything is up to you, and if you fail? its over.

with passengers though, its not that simple. because there its not just “up to you,” it is just utterly futile. jim took aurora out of her pod and no matter what she does will change that. her situation is irreversible

(i havent seen it in a while but i know towards the end there was that emergency pod, but uhm. did she even know about it until jim told her about it? yeah. that adds to the horror of it)

the film however. is written from jim’s perspective. the film deals with this isolation a bit at the beginning which i had actually enjoyed in that kinda sick oh no feeling that space horror like this always gives me. it was interesting to actually see it depicted in a movie! i’ve only read about this kinda situation in a written story in only one book, but im sure theres more out there, but either way it was novel for me

and the temptation of opening aurora’s pod is what adds to it. its either you go fucking insane because you live out the next few decades with no other human contact, you kill yourself, or you open up someone else and suffer with someone else by your side, but thats the BAD route and now you’re a horrible person. its a serious moral question! you go a whole year of being utterly, completely alone with absolutely zero human contact, but you are surrounded by other humans. its fucking painful. i cant even imagine that

i respect that portion of the film! i do! but then he opens up aurora’s pod. and it suddenly becomes a romance movie, and continues to be framed in jim’s perspective. bad move.

if we took out jim’s spiraling descent to opening up aurora’s pod, and started the film with her waking up, frame it as a romance movie, it could be really good. the reveal where she found out he is the reason shes awake, he’s the one who robbed her of life, her potential, her everything she ever knew. he’s stranded her in the middle of nowhere for the sole reason of keeping him company

the sheer impact of this revelation is lost because the movie is in jim’s perspective. we already sympathize with him due to the beginning. he was introduced first, and his suffering was obvious, so we look at aurora and its almost like we should think well thats all well and good but poor jim! but jim had the comfort that at least him waking up was just a random event. aurora was woken up because he was awake. if he was still asleep, then so would she, and she would still have her life and future. and even if someone was still randomly woken up, if it wasnt jim of all people, then she would most likely still be awake too. its all the horrible circumstances intersecting and she got caught in the crossfires due to him succumbing to his situation.

now i’m not saying that jim is evil. no one has ever been in this situation before. i really don’t know what the fuck i’d do and i don’t think anybody knows what they would do either until they were in his shoes. it’s all morally ambiguous and it’s just shitty all around - but ultimately, it was a horrible horrible decision that ruined another person’s life. he was directly responsible for her losing everything. and the fact that he hides this from her? is even fucking worse. it’s understandable, but my god is it BAD

and in making this a romance movie. the horror of aurora’s situation is just lost! because our goal is to see them kiss and fall in love by the end of the movie, so the audience isn’t meant to look to harshly at jim. he suffers no real consequences for his actions. and ultimately it is a romance, because jim ~sacrifices himself~ and aurora realizes that hey we’re gonna be here for the rest of our fucking lives, i might as well enjoy it. which is a shit attitude to have in a relationship of any kind by the way!

but by framing this as a horror movie, aurora could be wayy more sympathetic to the audience. the romantic angle when she first wakes up would feel insidious, and we would feel the betrayal when it’s revealed that jim is the reason she woke up. jim would be the villain obviously, and the moral ambiguity of his decision to wake her up would make him a relatable villain, but it would still hold him accountable for what he’s done. i just think the end product would be a lot more poignant than it was as a romance movie

and now to wrap it up, here’s my ideas on how to do it: film starts with aurora on earth before she’s about to leave, talking to all her friends and talking about how much she wants to go to this other planet, how great of an opportunity it would be. she boards the ship and goes under. and then within a few seconds, she’s waking up. the waking up scene is framed the same way jim’s was, and not from the side from jim’s perspective like it was in the actual movie. we get to see all her confusion and exhaustion from her perspective. once she’s acclimated or whatever, she’s futzing around the ship when jim stumbles upon her, acting all confused and excited to see another person, and its so genuine that nobody, including aurora, is any wiser that he’s the cause of it. then its all the romance shit, and falling in love, its fun, she’s like “oh my god it sucks that we’re stuck like this and we’re gonna die alone” and they comfort each other, yadda yadda, its meant to build trust between them and between the audience and jim. maybe theres a few scenes peppered in that build suspense like, wtf is going on, but ultimately the Jim Trust scenes kinda turn us/her away from that. but then its aurora talking to the robot guy and the robot guy lets it slip that jim was the one to wake her. it zooms into her face, and in the background you can see jim, all dark and blurred, looming over her. she goes to cry in her room or whatever, like she did in the movie, and its like flashes on previous scenes but now all the little hints to it make sense

anyway i dont have many more ideas just that at the end jim tells her about the extra pod and she goes in, and jim... hm.. maybe its vague.. maybe he lives out the rest of his days and he’s the one to leave the plants behind, maybe he died while sacrificing himself, idk. im not a horror writer. something to humanize jim, that this could’ve been anyone making this shitty decision while emotionally compromised, but still makes it clear that he was in the wrong, very in the wrong

the romance in the actual movie felt, like, poisoned because of what he did, and it rubbed me very wrong that they picked it back up all bc he was willing to die at the end to fix the spaceship. if anything, they should’ve only been friends. idk. actually focusing on aurora and her perspective feels like it could’ve taken the film in a much more interesting turn than just “standard het couple gets together in the end despite the girl being hurt by the guy” like every. fucking. movie.

#is the guy's name even jim . idk. i only know their names bc i was watching a video essay on abduction leading to romance and passengers #was an example lmfao. and then it got me tihnking abt this #delete soon

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moodboardinthecloud · 4 years ago

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Your ‘Surge Capacity’ Is Depleted — It’s Why You Feel Awful

Here’s how to pull yourself out of despair and live your life

Tara Haelle

Aug 16·13 min read

Itwas the end of the world as we knew it, and I felt fine. That’s almost exactly what I told my psychiatrist at my March 16 appointment, a few days after our children’s school district extended spring break because of the coronavirus. I said the same at my April 27 appointment, several weeks after our state’s stay-at-home order.

Yes, it was exhausting having a kindergartener and fourth grader doing impromptu distance learning while I was barely keeping up with work. And it was frustrating to be stuck home nonstop, scrambling to get in grocery delivery orders before slots filled up, and tracking down toilet paper. But I was still doing well because I thrive in high-stress emergency situations. It’s exhilarating for my ADHD brain. As just one example, when my husband and I were stranded in Peru during an 8.0-magnitude earthquake that killed thousands, we walked around with a first aid kit helping who we could and tracking down water and food. Then I went out with my camera to document the devastation as a photojournalist and interview Peruvians in my broken Spanish for my hometown paper.

Now we were in a pandemic, and I’m a science journalist who has written about infectious disease and medical research for nearly a decade. I was on fire, cranking out stories, explaining epidemiological concepts in my social networks, trying to help everyone around me make sense of the frightening circumstances of a pandemic and the anxiety surrounding the virus.

I knew it wouldn’t last. It never does. But even knowing I would eventually crash, I didn’t appreciate how hard the crash would be, or how long it would last, or how hard it would be to try to get back up over and over again, or what getting up even looked like.

Psychiatrist and habit change specialist Dr. Jud Brewer explains how anxiety masquerades as helpfulelemental.medium.com

How to Live When Your Mind Is Governed by Fear

In those early months, I, along with most of the rest of the country, was using “surge capacity” to operate, as Ann Masten, PhD, a psychologist and professor of child development at the University of Minnesota, calls it. Surge capacity is a collection of adaptive systems — mental and physical — that humans draw on for short-term survival in acutely stressful situations, such as natural disasters. But natural disasters occur over a short period, even if recovery is long. Pandemics are different — the disaster itself stretches out indefinitely.

“The pandemic has demonstrated both what we can do with surge capacity and the limits of surge capacity,” says Masten. When it’s depleted, it has to be renewed. But what happens when you struggle to renew it because the emergency phase has now become chronic?

By my May 26 psychiatrist appointment, I wasn’t doing so hot. I couldn’t get any work done. I’d grown sick of Zoom meetups. It was exhausting and impossible to think with the kids around all day. I felt trapped in a home that felt as much a prison as a haven. I tried to conjure the motivation to check email, outline a story, or review interview notes, but I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t make myself do anything — work, housework, exercise, play with the kids — for that whole week.

Or the next.

I know depression, but this wasn’t quite that. It was, as I’d soon describe in an emotional post in a social media group of professional colleagues, an “anxiety-tainted depression mixed with ennui that I can’t kick,” along with a complete inability to concentrate. I spoke with my therapist, tweaked medication dosages, went outside daily for fresh air and sunlight, tried to force myself to do some physical activity, and even gave myself permission to mope for a few weeks. We were in a pandemic, after all, and I had already accepted in March that life would not be “normal” for at least a year or two. But I still couldn’t work, couldn’t focus, hadn’t adjusted. Shouldn’t I be used to this by now?

“Why do you think you should be used to this by now? We’re all beginners at this,” Masten told me. “This is a once in a lifetime experience. It’s expecting a lot to think we’d be managing this really well.”

It wasn’t until my social media post elicited similar responses from dozens of high-achieving, competent, impressive women I professionally admire that I realized I wasn’t in the minority. My experience was a universal and deeply human one.

An unprecedented disaster

While the phrase “adjusting to the new normal” has been repeated endlessly since March, it’s easier said than done. How do you adjust to an ever-changing situation where the “new normal” is indefinite uncertainty?

“This is an unprecedented disaster for most of us that is profound in its impact on our daily lives,” says Masten. But it’s different from a hurricane or tornado where you can look outside and see the damage. The destruction is, for most people, invisible and ongoing. So many systems aren’t working as they normally do right now, which means radical shifts in work, school, and home life that almost none of us have experience with. Even those who have worked in disaster recovery or served in the military are facing a different kind of uncertainty right now.

Americans are faced with more risk than ever. Understanding how the brain navigates this new reality can build…elemental.medium.com

Life Is Now a Game of Risk. Here’s How Your Brain Is Processing It.

“I think we maybe underestimate how severe the adversity is and that people may be experiencing a normal reaction to a pretty severe and ongoing, unfolding, cascading disaster,” Masten says. “It’s important to recognize that it’s normal in a situation of great uncertainty and chronic stress to get exhausted and to feel ups and downs, to feel like you’re depleted or experience periods of burnout.”

Research on disaster and trauma focuses primarily on what’s helpful for people during the recovery period, but we’re not close to recovery yet. People can use their surge capacity for acute periods, but when dire circumstances drag on, Masten says, “you have to adopt a different style of coping.”

“How do you adjust to an ever-changing situation where the ‘new normal’ is indefinite uncertainty?”

Understanding ambiguous loss

It’s not surprising that, as a lifelong overachiever, I’ve felt particularly despondent and adrift as the months have dragged on, says Pauline Boss, PhD, a family therapist and professor emeritus of social sciences at the University of Minnesota who specializes in “ambiguous loss.”

“It’s harder for high achievers,” she says. “The more accustomed you are to solving problems, to getting things done, to having a routine, the harder it will be on you because none of that is possible right now. You get feelings of hopelessness and helplessness, and those aren’t good.”

That’s similar to how Michael Maddaus, MD, a professor of thoracic surgery at the University of Minnesota, felt when he became addicted to prescription narcotics after undergoing several surgeries. Now recovered and a motivational speaker who promotes the idea of a “resilience bank account,” Maddaus had always been a fast-moving high achiever — until he couldn’t be.

“I realized that my personal operating system, though it had led to tremendous success, had failed me on a more personal level,” he says. “I had to figure out a different way of contending with life.”

That mindset is an especially American one, Boss says.

“Our culture is very solution-oriented, which is a good way of thinking for many things,” she says. “It’s partly responsible for getting a man on the moon and a rover on Mars and all the things we’ve done in this country that are wonderful. But it’s a very destructive way of thinking when you’re faced with a problem that has no solution, at least for a while.”

That means reckoning with what’s called ambiguous loss: any loss that’s unclear and lacks a resolution. It can be physical, such as a missing person or the loss of a limb or organ, or psychological, such as a family member with dementia or a serious addiction.

“In this case, it is a loss of a way of life, of the ability to meet up with your friends and extended family,” Boss says. “It is perhaps a loss of trust in our government. It’s the loss of our freedom to move about in our daily life as we used to.” It’s also the loss of high-quality education, or the overall educational experience we’re used to, given school closures, modified openings and virtual schooling. It’s the loss of rituals, such weddings, graduations, and funerals, and even lesser “rituals,” such as going to gym. One of the toughest losses for me to adapt to is no longer doing my research and writing in coffee shops as I’ve done for most of my life, dating back to junior high.

“These were all things we were attached to and fond of, and they’re gone right now, so the loss is ambiguous. It’s not a death, but it’s a major, major loss,” says Boss. “What we used to have has been taken away from us.”

Just as painful are losses that may result from the intersection of the pandemic and the already tense political division in the country. For many people, issues related to Covid-19 have become the last straw in ending relationships, whether it’s a family member refusing to wear a mask, a friend promoting the latest conspiracy theory, or a co-worker insisting Covid-19 deaths are exaggerated.

Ambiguous loss elicits the same experiences of grief as a more tangible loss — denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance — but managing it often requires a bit of creativity.

A winding, uncharted path to coping in a pandemic

While there isn’t a handbook for functioning during a pandemic, Masten, Boss, and Maddaus offered some wisdom for meandering our way through this.

Accept that life is different right now

Maddaus’ approach involves radical acceptance. “It’s a shitty time, it’s hard,” he says. “You have to accept that in your bones and be okay with this as a tough day, with ‘that’s the way it is,’ and accept that as a baseline.”

But that acceptance doesn’t mean giving up, he says. It means not resisting or fighting reality so that you can apply your energy elsewhere. “It allows you to step into a more spacious mental space that allows you to do things that are constructive instead of being mired in a state of psychological self torment.”

Expect less from yourself

Most of us have heard for most of our lives to expect more from ourselves in some way or another. Now we must give ourselves permission to do the opposite. “We have to expect less of ourselves, and we have to replenish more,” Masten says. “I think we’re in a period of a lot of self discovery: Where do I get my energy? What kind of down time do I need? That’s all shifted right now, and it may take some reflection and self discovery to find out what rhythms of life do I need right now?”

She says people are having to live their lives without the support of so many systems that have partly or fully broken down, whether it’s schools, hospitals, churches, family support, or other systems that we relied on. We need to recognize that we’re grieving multiple losses while managing the ongoing impact of trauma and uncertainty. The malaise so many of us feel, a sort of disinterested boredom, is common in research on burnout, Masten says. But other emotions accompany it: disappointment, anger, grief, sadness, exhaustion, stress, fear, anxiety — and no one can function at full capacity with all that going on.

Recognize the different aspects of grief

The familiar “stages” of grief don’t actually occur in linear stages, Boss says, but denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance are all major concepts in facing loss. Plenty of people are in denial: denying the virus is real, or that the numbers of cases or deaths are as high as reported, or that masks really help reduce disease transmission.

Anger is evident everywhere: anger at those in denial, anger in the race demonstrations, anger at those not physically distancing or wearing masks, and even anger at those who wear masks or require them. The bargaining, Boss says, is mostly with scientists we hope will develop a vaccine quickly. The depression is obvious, but acceptance… “I haven’t accepted any of this,” Boss says. “I don’t know about you.”

Sometimes acceptance means “saying we’re going to have a good time in spite of this,” Boss says, such as when my family drove an hour outside the city to get far enough from light pollution to look for the comet NEOWISE. But it can also mean accepting that we cannot change the situation right now.

“We can kick and scream and be angry, or we can feel the other side of it, with no motivation, difficulty focusing, lethargy,” Boss says, “or we can take the middle way and just have a couple days where you feel like doing nothing and you embrace the losses and sadness you’re feeling right now, and then the next day, do something that has an element of achievement to it.”

“Our new normal is always feeling a little off balance, like trying to stand in a dinghy on rough seas, and not knowing when the storm will pass.”

Experiment with “both-and” thinking

This approach may not work for everyone, but Boss says there’s an alternative to binary thinking that many people find helpful in dealing with ambiguous loss. She calls it “both-and” thinking, and sometimes it means embracing a bit of the irrational.

For the families of soldiers missing in action in Vietnam that Boss studied early in her career, or the family members of victims of plane crashes where the bodies aren’t recovered, this type of thinking means thinking: “He is both living and maybe not. She is probably dead but maybe not.”

“If you stay in the rational when nothing else is rational, like right now, then you’ll just stress yourself more,” she says. “What I say with ambiguous loss is the situation is crazy, not the person. The situation is pathological, not the person.”

An analogous approach during the pandemic might be, “This is terrible and many people are dying, and this is also a time for our families to come closer together,” Boss says. On a more personal level, “I’m highly competent, and right now I’m flowing with the tide day-to-day.”

It’s a bit of a Schrödinger’s existence, but when you can’t change the situation, “the only thing you can change is your perception of it,” she says.

Of course, that doesn’t mean denying the existence of the pandemic or the coronavirus. As Maddaus says, “You have to face reality.” But how we frame that reality mentally can help us cope with it.

Look for activities, new and old, that continue to fulfill you

Lots of coping advice has focused on “self-care,” but one of the frustrating ironies of the pandemic is that so many of our self-care activities have also been taken away: pedicures, massages, coffee with friends, a visit to the amusement park, a kickboxing class, swimming in the local pool — these activities remain unsafe in much of the country. So we have to get creative with self-care when we’re least motivated to get creative.

“When we’re forced to rethink our options and broaden out what we think of as self-care, sometimes that constraint opens new ways of living and thinking,” Masten says. “We don’t have a lot of control over the global pandemic but we do over our daily lives. You can focus on plans for the future and what’s meaningful in life.”

For me, since I missed eating in restaurants and was tired of our same old dinners, I began subscribing to a meal-kit service. I hate cooking, but the meal kits were easy, and I was motivated by the chance to eat something that tasted more like what I’d order in a restaurant without having to invest energy in looking through recipes or ordering the right ingredients.

Okay, I’ve also been playing a lot of Animal Crossing, but Maddaus explains why it makes sense that creative activities like cooking, gardening, painting, house projects — or even building your own imaginary island out of pixels — can be fulfilling right now. He references the book The Molecule of More, which explores how dopamine influences our experiences and happiness, in describing the types of activities most likely to bring us joy.

“There are two ways the brain deals with the world: the future and things we need to go after, and the here and now, seeing things and touching things,” Maddaus says. “Rather than being at the mercy of what’s going on, we can use the elements of our natural reward system and construct things to do that are good no matter what.”

Those kinds of activities have a planning element and a here-and-now experience element. For Maddaus, for example, it was simply replacing all the showerheads and lightbulbs in the house. “It’s a silly thing, but it made me feel good,” he says.

Focus on maintaining and strengthening important relationships

The biggest protective factors for facing adversity and building resilience are social support and remaining connected to people, Masten says. That includes helping others, even when we’re feeling depleted ourselves.

“Helping others is one of those win-win strategies of taking action because we’re all feeling a sense of helplessness and loss of control about what’s going on with this pandemic, but when you take action with other people, you can control what you’re doing,” she says. Helping others could include checking in on family friends or buying groceries for an elderly neighbor.

Begin slowly building your resilience bank account

Maddaus’ idea of a resilience bank account is gradually building into your life regular practices that promote resilience and provide a fallback when life gets tough. Though it would obviously be nice to have a fat account already, he says it’s never too late to start. The areas he specifically advocates focusing on are sleep, nutrition, exercise, meditation, self-compassion, gratitude, connection, and saying no.

“Start really small and work your way up,” he says. “If you do a little bit every day, it starts to add up and you get momentum, and even if you miss a day, then start again. We have to be gentle with ourselves and keep on, begin again.”

After spending an hour on the phone with each of these experts, I felt refreshed and inspired. I can do this! I was excited about writing this article and sharing what I’d learned.

And then it took me two weeks to start the article and another week to finish it — even though I wanted to write it. But now, I could cut myself a little more slack for taking so much longer than I might have a few months ago. I might have intellectually accepted back in March that the next two years (or more?) are going to be nothing like normal, and not even predictable in how they won’t be normal. But cognitively recognizing and accepting that fact and emotionally incorporating that reality into everyday life aren’t the same. Our new normal is always feeling a little off balance, like trying to stand in a dinghy on rough seas, and not knowing when the storm will pass. But humans can get better at anything with practice, so at least I now have some ideas for working on my sea legs.

This story has been translated into Portuguese, which you can read here.

WRITTEN BY

Tara Haelle

Tara Haelle is a science journalist, public speaker, and author of Vaccination Investigation and The Informed Parent. Follow her at @tarahaelle.

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emubop · 7 years ago

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Adding on to my post from yesterday, I’m just gonna list all the issues I have with Disco (a separate list of the things I love soon to come!)

Under a cut for length and for spoilers. Seriously. Major spoilers ahead. And tw for discussions of character death, if that bothers you.

With that in mind, let’s get to it! (This is in no particular order, btw.)

Starting with the last two episodes, since they’re pretty fresh in my mind - they felt very rushed. I’ve seen some people say that the season should have ended right when they got back from the mirrorverse, and I completely agree. The final arc felt like it needed at least two more episodes to be fleshed out. I wanted to see more of the characters actually dealing with what happened in the mirrorverse, and having time for development; and while we got a little bit of that between Michael and Ash, it wasn’t very much. And like, I get why. When you’ve only got two episodes to get the plot where you need it to go, of course character development is going to be sacrificed for time. Which is why I think they should have either a) added more episodes to the end of season one, or b) ended the season with the mirror arc, so that they’d have more time to explore the Klingon war thing at the beginning of season 2. Disco has some very wonderful characters who are very deserving of development and growth, and it’s unfortunate that they didn’t get it.

Culber’s death... This is the main point where I’m like “yeah, I don’t blame you for not liking the show anymore,” because I came very close to that too. In the end, I do still think I like the rest of the show overall, but this part... I just about stopped watching. In short - the way the show treated Dr. Culber was absolutely shitty. Sure, I’m like 99% certain they’ll end up bringing him back in season 2, but in the meantime, he’s still very much dead. And NOT ONLY did they use the “bury your gays” trope, but out of only TWO gay characters, they buried the man of color. Like... that’s just... what the fuck.

I’m expanding this into multiple points, bc it’s the biggest point I have. Culber’s death is legitimately the worst thing Disco has done. Not only just the fact that they killed him, but how they did it. His death was violent, sudden, and meaningless. The main characters barely even get to react to it before moving on. His killer doesn’t face trial or repercussions. (Note - I personally see Voq as being entirely the murderer and not Tyler, since Tyler had no agency in the killing and was if anything just a tool, but either way, no justice is served.) And then we, the audience, have to see the brutal killing scene AGAIN in the “previously on” section of the next episode or two, which makes it seem like they’re using this horrific event as mere shock value. I literally felt sick to my stomach watching it. What happened was disgusting, and I can’t blame anyone for not wanting to watch the show anymore because of it.

I trust Wilson Cruz. I trust Anthony Rapp. I trust them when they say that there’s a plan, that Culber will come back, that this will work out at some point. Their reassurances do help me personally to make some measure of peace with the situation. I don’t want to think that two openly gay actors would sign onto the script if this is how it ends between their characters. But right now, Culber is still dead, for no good reason that I can see, and it still stings. This is justifiably upsetting. And until I see him come back with my own two eyes, yeah, I’m not gonna be happy about it.

Aaaaand speaking of death, let’s talk about Georgiou. I just... that’s not a good way to start your show off, ngl. You take a very strong and deep character, played by Michelle Yeoh no less, and then just kill her? It’s bad writing. They could have easily had Michael transferred off the Shenzhou and arrested and kept Captain Georgiou alive. They could have even kept the whole “tragic backstory” thing in play, with Michael and Philippa no longer on speaking terms, and Michael mourning the loss of what was once such a close relationship. (I do appreciate that they brought her back as her mirror counterpart - and boy howdy the Emperor is a good character - so that does take a little bit of the sting out, but still. Not the best way to open the show.)

And then Landry dies in both universes?? I can accept mirror!Landry dying because of the whole “Lorca’s second hand” thing, but like... god, this show has got to stop killing off poc. Especially woc. I can understand that they’re trying to do a “raceblind” thing, and I understand their reasoning - the whole “it’s a utopian future and everyone is treated the same!” thing - but it doesn’t really work like that irl for the audience. Unless someone is actually literally colorblind and sees everything in greyscale, no one has any business saying they “don’t see color.” And no one should be casting with that mindset. The situation could certainly be a lot worse - they’ve got Michael, at least, and she’s fucking amazing - but it could also be better.

And yeah, it’s a warzone, and people are going to die. I get that. But just... do some critical thinking about who you’re killing, why, and if it can be avoided. If for no other reason, it makes the story a lot stronger in the long run.

It’s the year of our lord twenty-gayteen, can we stop having the makeup on white people playing Kingons being so hmmm questionable maybe?

(With regards to several of the above points, I’m white, so please let me know if I’m overstepping my bounds here. And like the point about Culber - I wouldn’t blame anyone for disliking/not supporting the show because of these reasons, and I’m not ever going to try to convince anyone that these things are okay. Because they aren’t. Just because I like certain elements enough to give the show a second chance with season two, doesn’t mean that anyone else will or should do the same. Continuing.)

Why the fuck is this show so obsessed with eating people? Stop it. Get some help.

The only explicitly bisexual/pansexual person we see is the Emperor, who sleeps with both a man and a woman and seems very satisfied with both parties afterwards. Which, okay, cool, except she was also trying to get information out of them, so whether or not she was even attracted to either one is debatable. I personally think she was - thanks to Michelle Yeoh’s acting, which is a goddamn gift - but that still leaves us with the only representation of bi/pan people being a murderous emperor from the mirror universe. And the “relationship” is entirely sex-based, as well as being with multiple people at once, which only furthers the stereotype of bi/pan being promiscuous, being only bi for a threesome, being untrustworthy. And to be clear, there’s nothing wrong with one night stands or poly relationships! Those things are perfectly fine! But when that’s all that bi/pan people are shown as, it can play into really damaging stereotypes - and as a bi/pan person, I’m frankly getting a little fucking sick of it.

(I mean, it’s better than DS9′s “mirrorverse=gay/bi/pan” thing, I’ll give it that, but I’m not going to give any show brownie points for reinforcing harmful stereotypes. You’ve improved slightly, Trek, but not nearly as much as you should have.)

I’m just making another point here for Dr. Culber’s death because seriously. Fucking seriously. What the fuck.

I would’ve liked to have seen more one-off episodes, like “Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad.” That was a fucking awesome episode. It’s fun! It’s got character development! I wanna see more of that!

The portrayal of Klingon culture is a bit inconsistent. And okay, to be entirely truthful, I’m really not that into Klingons in general? So having a plot centered around them wouldn’t be my first choice anyway. But if you’re going to do it, please do it right. It felt like the writers sometimes “forgot” important elements of Klingon culture for the sake of the plot, and just... come on. The Klingons are brutal warriors, yes. They’ve killed innocent civilians in the course of battle, sure. But they have a whole honor code, and going out of their way to murder thousands of helpless, defenseless people? Correct me if I’m wrong, but it just doesn’t quite seem to fit.

I really, really wanna see more of the bridge crew! I wanna get to know them! They seem so cool who are they please Disco I’m begging you

This is a very dumb, very tiny thing, but I was kinda hoping I’d see some Cardassian makeup in the crowd while we were in the Seedy Black Market on Qo’noS. Did appreciate the Trill lady tho!

I dunno, the ending almost felt... too neat? If that makes sense? I would have liked things more ambiguous, a few more loose ends. It felt like they threw in a happy ending out of nowhere; it didn’t really match the tone of the rest of the show.

Speaking of tone - it felt to me like Disco was trying to mix the upbeat, thoughtful, philosophical tone of classic Trek with the grittier, more critical, more heavy tone of DS9. I love both classic Trek and DS9, but they don’t exactly mix very well. Disco’s tone felt a bit confused and convoluted. And like, here’s the thing - classic Trek doesn’t preclude heavy subjects (”Conscience of the King” from TOS is a great example), and shows like DS9 don’t preclude fun and optimism (there’s episodes like “Explorers” that are uplifting, and “Take Me Out to the Holosuite” is a fucking delight). Star Trek at its best should always tackle difficult issues, should always have determination, should always have hope. DS9 had a more morally gray outlook, yes, and certainly questioned the idea that the Federation is utopian, but it was still underpinned by the main characters wanting to do good. Wanting to improve the world around them. It managed to do a very good job of adapting Trek’s message to its darker tone - whereas Disco feels like it’s flip-flopping between having a darker tone and trying to be like TOS. Like, buddy, just pick one. You just gotta pick one.

The more times Sarek shows up in Disco, the more he looks like a complete dick to Spock in TOS. This isn’t necessarily a complaint, because Sarek being a dick is certainly in character for him, but I’d like to see that disparity in how he treats his children addressed. By his wife. Specifically by his wife. Amanda is a national treasure and I need her to call her husband out.

idk I think there’s more but like, I’ve been working on this for hours - WAIT HANG ON

This has been bugging me since the beginning of the show, because while Michael’s mutiny was certainly a bad idea, she technically... didn’t really do much of anything before being taken to the brig? She almost has the ship fire on a Klingon vessel, but Georgiou shows up and stops her. Helm locked phasers on the vessel on Michael’s orders, yes, but earlier they locked phase cannons on the vessel for a short time, which Georgiou agreed to. Her actions during the mutiny didn’t really change their situation at all. So why does everyone blame her for starting the war?

“But she killed that Klingon during her spacewalk!” Yeah, she did, because he came charging at her with a bat’leth with the intention to kill. In that scenario, her actions were self-defense. She attempted to talk to him, he then proceeded to try to kill her, so she fought back to save her own life and ended up killing him in the process. And all this happened while she was investigating a foreign object in Federation territory. So while I can see why she was charged with mutiny and assaulting a fellow officer, I don’t think it’s fair to say that she started the war. The Klingons on the ship of the dead were planning to start shit before anyone even got there.

I can understand why Starfleet would have thought Michael started it, at least at first, because unlike the audience, they couldn’t see the Klingons planning beforehand. That’s fair. But then Ash Tyler shows up, and he’s revealed to be Voq - who was there! he knows what happened on that ship! - and eventually, he loses Voq’s consciousness but retains the guy’s memories. So Ash knows how the war started. Ash knows, or should know, that the Klingons on that ship were the instigators. Why wouldn’t he tell Starfleet before fucking off with L’Rell? He says he loves Michael, so why wouldn’t he want to set the record straight? And most importantly, why wasn’t Michael told any of this?! She’s been blaming herself for this whole war, she’s been suffering needlessly for it, let her fucking rest! Yeah, she was exonerated and accepted back into Starfleet, which is great, but it came across as “welp you basically cleaned up the mess of a war you started and saved Earth from annihilation, so I guess we’ll clear the slate for you.” It should have been more like “well given what we know now, we can say that you’re innocent of starting interstellar war; and as for the rest, stopping the destruction of Earth is a hell of a community service, so you know what? Welcome back.”

My point is, Michael Burnham has done nothing wrong, ever, in her life

Alright, at this point I think that about sums it up, and I’m tired of looking at this anyways because it’s been hours now, so uh, yeah. Thanks for coming to my ted talk

#star trek disco #star trek discovery #caps lock #death mention #violence mention #star trek discovery spoilers #star trek disco spoilers #long post #(like. really fucking long. this is not a drill)#anyway welcome to 'i love star trek - now let me tell you how i hate it'#a novel by me #star trek #i mean i guess this counts as #star trek discourse #sort of? idk man its more of a ramble than anything else #but i needed a place to put my complaints so here it is

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notesofarichlycolorednight · 7 years ago

Note

Fanfic Ask Meme: A: How did you come up with the title of It's the Perfect Story? J: Write or describe an alternative ending to It's the Perfect Story. P: Are you an 'architect' or a 'gardener'? X: A character you enjoy making suffer. Y: A character you want to protect.

A: How did you come up with the title of It’s the Perfect Story?

i wanna preface this answer with: i always like my titles to be symbolic. as much as i can. main titles of stories are a must. chapter titles not so much, but if inspiration strikes me, i’m there.

so i did the same for this story. another important note is that this was a rewrite. and the final important note is that i knew that luke was going to die in this rewrite (i.e., i knew that i wasn’t going to change too much of canon, i wanted the main storyline of the pjo series to pan out as it had in the books)

from there, i believe at the time i was thinking about this rewrite/beginning this rewrite, i was listening to dr. horrible. it’s a short musical (the full title is dr. horrible’s sing-along blog) and it has a song called “so they say.” in it is the line: “it’s the perfect story, so they say.” (emphasis mine)

you really gotta go listen to full song to get the depth of my reasoning, but the reason i chose that particular line in that particular song is because of the fact that this song is so upbeat and there are parts that are really funny. but if you listen to the lyrics it’s really, super cynical and actually quite sad (especially within the whole context of the musical–seriously it’s like an hr, go listen to it).

also i’m a hoe for irony (see also: the second to last chapter, the chapter in which luke dies, that i named “that famous happy end” from the song so close)

long story long, i like to take a phrase from something (a song, a quote, etc.) if it like really fits with the story/chapter, but the something that i took it from also provides context and gives a deeper meaning to the story/chapter. irony isn’t a must, but if it happens to fit and is ironic, i’m down 110%

the rest is under a cut bc it’s get hella long

J: Write or describe an alternative ending to It’s the Perfect Story.

um so…idk if this like actually counts as an alt. ending (this question is worded so ambiguously what)

update: this question was actually quite hard to answer. i had an idea but i didn’t want to go with that. and so i’ve been sifting through ideas all day. so here’s smth i finally felt i liked/could stick with

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Luke held Tori in his arms, squeezing her shoulder tighter than necessary, but Tori didn’t even notice. Not with the gaping hole in her chest from Luke’s sword, weilded by that dracaena, Kelli.

They were still in the suit from last night, after she’d just woken up from having been stabbed by her own sword, by none other than Kelli.

Tori was really starting to hate Kelli.

Luke’s beautiful blue eyes were filled with unshed tears. Tori could feel him trembling as he held her.

“I’m sorry,” Luke managed, squeezing her tighter.

“It’s not your fault,” Tori managed. Her vision was already blurring, fading in and out. Luke’s voice sounded far away. Luke opened his mouth to say something but she cut him off, “Promise me something,” she whispered, reaching a shaking had up to caress his cheek.

Luke closed his eyes, his tears finally falling. Tori gently stroked her thumb under his eye as they opened again.

“Anything,” Luke whispered, sinking even closer to the floor. He’d been on his knees before, but now he was sitting with his legs underneath him.

“Don’t…” Tori took a hollow breath. “Don’t follow me.”

Luke shifted, cradling Tori. “I’d follow you anywhere,” he replied, a smile pulling at his lips as more tears filled his eyes. “Off of a cliff. To the ends of the earth.”

Tori smiled, too. “You can’t get rid of me that easily, Castellan.”

“Tori–”

“You can make this right,” she interrupted again, her smile dropping. “Please, make it right again, Luke.”

“Tori, please…” Tears were freely streaming from his eyes now.

“I’ll find my way back to you,” she said with such ferocity, it startled Luke. Then she started shifting, as if trying to sit up. Her hand moved from caressing his face to gripping the front of his shirt. Luke helped her, pressing his forehead to hers. “I promise.”

Her hand went slick and Luke felt her let out one last, small breath. He gripped her to him, silent sobs wracking his body. The only thoughts echoing through his mind: I’m sorry.

When Luke finally managed to get a handle on his grief, he stood, Tori still in his arms, and gently laid her on the bed. Her eyes were closed, skin ashen. He took her hand into his. It was still warm.

“Luke–” Kelli tried, but Luke looked at her over his shoulder, his eyes as sharp and cold as ice.

“Let me have my grief,” he snarled. “You owe me that much.”

Kelli didn’t look happy about it, and the bear brothers shifted, looking oddly uncomfortable. Luke turned back to look at Tori.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed, thoughts racing through his mind the whole time. Of what he should do, what he could do to keep his promise to Tori. He hated that she knew him so well. He would’ve taken his sword and run himself through the moment Tori had taken her last breath, but her words had sunken into his mind and taken root.

“We should go now,” Kelli said, in a harder voice. Luke didn’t turn to look at her this time, only stared at Tori’s peaceful face. Her hand had turned stone-cold.

Make it right.

Luke almost turned to tell Kelli, “No.” and face the consequences. Or maybe start negotiations he could do that.

But then a thought struck him like lightening.

He’d never been proud to be a son of Hermes. It wasn’t just that his father was a shitty at being a father, it was also that anyone unclaimed was crammed in the Hermes cabin. Anyone in there was miserable, Hermes kid or not.

The first that usually came to most people’s minds when thinking about Hermes was that he was a messenger of the gods, sometimes god of thieves, which was dangerous.

Hermes, god of thieves–cunning, silver-tongued, highly intelligent.

Whether he liked it or not, Luke was his father’s son.

And he would use those skills his father had granted him to keep Tori’s promise: he would use his cunning, his silver-tongue, and his intelligence to gain Kronos’s trust. And just when Kronos thought he’d have it all, rip it away from him, like he’d done to Luke.

Only for her. Only for Tori.

“Luke.” Kelli said with force to catch his attention. Luke raised his head, steeling his resolve. “Having second thoughts?”

Luke gritted his teeth for a moment before unclenching his jaw and turning, letting go of Tori’s hand.

“Not at all. Let’s go.”

so uh, apparently i can’t let them be happy. moral of the story. sorry fam, the powers that be have spoken. i am unable to come up with like an actual happy ending for them haha that’s not entirely true, i have smth planned for them that you could call happy, all things considered

i’m not sure it’s exactly what the question is asking, but it does end differently??? luke ends up playing double-agent, working for Kronos, but feeding chb information. this is a great au, like fuck, i’m saving this for later

extra: i almost had luke jump heroically in front of tori and take the sword for her, and die. and then she would become the double-agent if only bc, uh, burial at sea? fuck yeah. and with tori’s impeccable aim, she’d land that flaming arrow right on target. luke? not so much. but then i was like…nah, luke’s heritage makes more sense.

bonus: i’d been tossing the idea of tori taking the curse of achilles and being kronos’ vessel for the longest time for itps before i finally decided on smth else

P: Are you an ‘architect’ or a ‘gardener’?

i’m, what we in the professional business call, a landscaper.

in all seriousness though, for all my stories i’m both. i’ll have certain plot points (big or small) planned out–they need, must be in the story, no exceptions. then i need to get from point a to point b, and the path isn’t always straight/linear. it’s in those moments that i’m really more of a gardener, where i let the characters tell me where to go.

sometimes i’ll spend fucking weeks imagining every single detail in 1080p high-def imax surround sound for a certain scene and/or plot point so when i sit down i’m like

but when i’m on the path between point a and point b, where i may have some vague sense of where i’m going/how to get to point b (or sometimes no sense at all) i’m more like

(this is most often a weird hybrid where i’ll have an idea, but i won’t have a clear vision, and so i’ll sit down and write it and let the characters and the context of the scene take me where it will. the moments when i don’t have any idea of where i’m going are very rare)

but for the past few months *cough*since i’ve started grad school*cough* it’s been more like

when will my muse return from war

(to be fair to myself, i hit serious writer’s block. i’m having trouble coming up with ideas to move the story forward in the direction that i’d like it to go.)

bonus: the whole, “tori became the very thing she was trying to save luke from” was totally a “gardener” moment. didn’t plan it, was just writing and my brain was like wait a minute–perfect

X: A character you enjoy making suffer.

i’m so much better at writing ocs than i am actual characters, just bc i’m so nervous abt mischaracterizing them. whoo boy, can ppl get so mean abt mischaracterization.

and look i understand, but getting all up in ppl’s business is rude and really uncalled for. what happened to being civil? guess ppl don’t know her.

anyway, i mean honestly apollo from the pjo series??? like yeah i write tori in some pretty harrowing situations…heh, but it’s really more so i can explore her character and keep the reader interested, as well as seeing my reader’s reactions (those are the best)

but anyway, whenever she interacts with apollo i always enjoy having her get underneath his skin (he’s very fun to write from an outsider’s perspective and when annoyed)

wait until she meets him as a mortal. he may look sixteen, but he’s like 4 centuries old so you bet your ass tori is gonna tear him to shreds

Y: A character you want to protect.

dude

bruh

this is jumping way far away from pjo-verse, but uh any female character in ffxv deserved better fam like

ya’ll can fucking fight me on this

okay, but also, like actually protect: adrien agreste (my sweet sunshine child) from his manipulative, abusive father (fuck you gabriel, go burn in hell), and promoto argentum (my other sweet sunshine boy) from life’s hardships in general bc he deserves all the good things

♪ ♫“The use of words expressing something other than their literal intention.”♪ ♫

#oh god for shame! i do not even know your name #notesofananonymousnight #asked and answered #finally finished!#and am pleased with my responses

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coldalbion · 7 years ago

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Any advice for someone who's god has left them? (Due to said persons own stupidity and stubbornness)

First, I’m terribly sorry you feel you’ve been left. That’s a really shitty thing to have to feel, whether from a human or otherwise. Second, sometimes, what feels to us like leaving may sometimes be when we’re being given room to work through things on our own terms, rather than having them to refer to.I don’t know what your situation is, though it sounds like you’re blaming yourself. I could say definitively that it isn’t your fault, but that may be somewhat disingenuous so, instead, let’s acknowledge the fact that gods aren’t like us, shall we? After all, if they were like us, what would the difference be? We might as well be gods, mightn’t we?

Sure, many stories and sacred texts tell tales of the gods acting in ways we recognize as humans, but that doesn’t change what they are. They’re still gods, are they not? Even if they might once have been human, as is the case in some traditions, now they’re not.

A god is a god, even if you’re not sure what a god is It’s that difference, that sacredness which trips something in the human mind makes you go Bugger me, that’s a god, that is!

sacred (adj.) late 14c., past participle adjective from obsolete verb sacren "to make holy" (c. 1200), from Old French sacrer "consecrate, anoint, dedicate" (12c.) or directly from Latin sacrare "to make sacred, consecrate; hold sacred; immortalize; set apart, dedicate," from sacer (genitive sacri) "sacred, dedicated, holy, accursed," from Old Latin saceres, from PIE root *sak- "to sanctify." Buck groups it with Oscan sakrim, Umbrian sacra and calls it "a distinctive Italic group, without any clear outside connections." Related: Sacredness.

See that the quote above includes accursed? That which gods do is, to quote a certain German philosopher Beyond good and evil. Sure, gods can do things which might offend common morality, but that doesn’t make it good or evil in an absolute sense. It just makes it a thing a god does. Hell, I’m an Odinsman and my god baldly introduces himself as Bolverk, which translates as: worker/doer of harm, injury, ruin, evil, mischief, wickedness.

Does what it says on the tin, right? To human morality, killing nine thralls, tricking people, obtaining things by deception, are not OK. Yet here’s Odin, tipping his hat and giving us the proverbial wink.

Why this crash-course. this reminder of the ambiguous that comes with practical theology?Because each god has an individual character, because they are persons and not people. You believe your god has left you? I assume you mean that you can’t/haven’t felt their presence? Or maybe they’ve told you goodbye?I don’t know. I don’t know who you are, either. Shall I tell you what I do know?

I know you’re not the first to behave stupidly. You’re not the first to behave stubbornly. You’re not the first person to have felt their god have left them. Even Christians have a name for it - The Dark Night of the Soul.Do you think that, in the course of an immortal being’s existence, you are the first one to fuck things up? Do you think a being who’s lasted generation after generation actually picked just you to walk away from, completely and utterly?Nah. They’ve done it before, right? They have to have, otherwise, frankly, you’re disturbingly special. Are you, the one who behaved stupidly, and stubbornly, that special? Are you something and someone so special that, in another age, they’d compose a poem, an epic tale - The Saga of Anon the Stubbornly Stupid?

Think about it, seriously.Because if you’re not that freakishly special, then you either belong to a select group of people from whom your god walked away, and you’re not as alone as you think. Or, the departure isn’t what you think it is.It’s the old chestnut - when things pass beyond our ability to experience them with our senses, do they still exist? Only idiots and philosophers would question whether a person or a building might pop out of existence when they pass beyond our senses, Now, as a philosopher, I’d refine the question:Does our felt sense or image of a thing cease to exist when that thing passes beyond our ability to sense them?

Obviously, the answer is yes, right? Except, sometimes the obvious is just a surface reading. Because much of we sense uses memory to fill in the gaps. When we are able to sense a thing, think of it as a live update to the memory, recorded for later recall.(And let’s not even get into the delay between things actually happening and us sensing them, because that’s a whole other story.)

Memory works on triggers - we recognize someone by their face, their posture, their speech, their clothes etc. But there are times when something changes that doesn’t jive with our memory. How many times have we had to say: I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there, or I didn’t recognize you with you new haircut/glasses - you look so different?

We rely on how things were rather than how they are now. The relationship you had with your god is over, done and dusted. Now, there, is only you and the kosmos, the All-That-Is. Mourn, grieve if you wish, there’s nowt wrong with that. Then dry your eyes, and take a look at the world.

You’ve probably been here before, and, back then, certain things happened which led to a relationship with your god. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, that things like that happen. That gods and spirits abound, and if you want them to be part of your world, you have to think and act in a way that isn’t exactly ordinary. You have to be observant (in all its senses) open to the rich and strange variety of the kosmos.

And you have to realize, deep within, that contact with gods leaves you different. You cannot be near them, or they you, without change:

Being a god is the quality of being able to be yourself to such an extent that your passions correspond with the forces of the universe, so that those who look upon you know this without hearing your name spoken. Some ancient poet said that the world is full of echoes and correspondences. Another wrote a long poem of an inferno, wherein each man suffered a torture which coincided in nature with those forces which had ruled his life.

Being a god is being able to recognize within one's self these things that are important, and then to strike the single note that brings them into alignment with everything else that exists. Then, beyond morals or logic or esthetics, one is wind or fire, the sea, the mountains, rain, the sun or the stars, the flight of an arrow, the end of a day, the clasp of love. One rules through one's ruling passions.

Those who look upon gods then say, without even knowing their names, 'He is Fire. She is Dance. He is Destruction. She is Love.' So, to reply to your statement, they do not call themselves gods. Everyone else does, though, everyone who beholds them. - Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny

Even by their supposed absence, the god influences you. Drives you to ask a question of me, makes you ask for advice, because there is a gap, a space-between, a difference between what was and what is.

Now, I’m no oracle, no prophet. Just some bearded frothing madman on the internet. You might read this post, and disagree with everything I’m saying, every secret, subconscious implications that the hidden part of your consciousness picks up without you noticing. Not because I’m a crippled Gandalf, casting spells on those who read my words, but because that’s the way language works.

Because language works, for good or ill. It conceals and reveals, guides the mind - and if it’s worked well, perhaps the soul as well.So you ask my advice, seek my view. You ask of a man who’s had his own counselling session today, whose counsellor wondered at certain events and how to interpret them. You ask me what I see, what I sense, from your question; where it meets my experience and what it conjures up to type, to post here.And, if you’ve read this far, I’ll let you into a secret: I stepped aside long ago, and let the conjuring bring these words forth. This is coming from a place that is different to an ordinary consciousness. I’m no oracle, no prophet. Just a man with a mission of words, to answer every question I can. So, here’s the deal, laid out on the table, like blackjack. Just how much do want to remain as you are?How much are you willing to protect the idea you have of the you-that-was? How much do you want safety? Because, let me tell you, it’s gone, Even if you’ve noticed some changes, I wonder how long it’s going to take you to notice the ones you’ve not noticed, until now?

I wonder, how long until you remember that everything is connected? How the difference between a blessing and a curse is merely a point of view? How distance and space are always filled with something - whether that something be something else, or your very own self?

Agree with this, or disagree because I don’t know you or your situation, because I’m just firing words at a page, and because things became richer and stranger than you supposed, maybe?And also maybe, because it hurts, and you’re not sure what to do, or where to turn. Because what you thought you knew and trusted, is no longer so. Because I’m telling you what you already know - stimulating action and reaction. Each word, in each context, has meaning. Change the context, the meaning changes also. The cues, the triggers, connect to different memories, conjure different things.I wonder what conjures you? What calls-you-forth in spite of yourself?

Because we can talk about summoning gods and spirits ‘til we’re blue in the face, but humans surely are not the exception. We too are spirits, wights amongst the vast thronging conclave of the Pandaemonic All.

One of Many, and so we might suppose that change is constant, and what we see as singular is in fact complex, multiple and interconnected.

Your situation is subject to multiple influences; your feelings, your reading of my words - how you interpret their flow, directed with a particular purpose by me - your background, your actions, inactions, and your relationship with your god.

As I’ve said, perceived absence exerts an influence, just like the spaces between and within the glyphs we call letters, which represent pieces of language, all put together with a particular aim.

An aim that loops and repeats, that comes again and again, like sea washing against stubborn stones, all roar and hiss and spray on the surface, all dark pulsing current below, infinite benthic patience. An ocean of time, composed of an obscene number of individual droplets, each moving into and out of each other.

Rocks erode, barriers dissolve.

Such are the actions of the gods.

As the Moon pulls the waters, so the salty tides ebb and flow and rise; water kisses skin as we swim, surrounded by the same. The lunar influence directs us, its gravity dictating, moving with the changes in temperature, Sun and Earth bringing conjoined influences to bear.Are we not mostly water? Is our blood not salty as the sea?And yet, do we not think ourselves free from such influences, with our lighted streets, our taps and faucets, our climate change and Prime Ministers and Presidents?

But still the gods cross into the sphere of our senses, interface with our bodies and minds, coil themselves in our blood, steal our breath and replace it with their own?Still, the sheer madness of their existence in the 21st century, passed from tongue to text to television, brought forth from books and bodies. From the voices on the wind, the mounds of earth, the whispering leaves, the roar of traffic, the light-laden threads of fibre-optics, the sewer-swelling. From the cracks and the edges, from ancient statues held in climate controlled prisons-cum-museums.(And lo, I do not recall typing prisons, but there it is. Statues of lion-headed goddesses, all properly open-mouthed. The falcon’s scream, all cold and seeking soaring thermals, full of cruel, sharp-taloned knowing.)

You, who feel bereft? Who feel a hole within your heart? Take a breath, and hold it. Bear down upon that random passing divinity, all unspoken, all unknown. Feel it surge, the blood pound in your ears, and then, when you can no longer bear the weight, and then let go.

Take another.Then another.

Again and again; so you breathe. so you live. Influenced and influencer, deep behind the skin of your mind, down deep and deeper still, is that which you do not know. That which changes, alters itself on the unseen altars. Believe me or not, all this, going fore and back, is true.

It is as true as your tongue, your teeth, your nails that grow and hair that pushes from skin and scalp.

By now, we’re lost, you and I, dear reader, in a labyrinth of words, as one without Ariadne. The unseen monster at the centre of the maze is a portal, a passage to divinity. It lives, it breathes, it shits, it drinks, it eats, it pisses.

It lives, just as you do. It has been at the centre of things since just after the Beginning, when Mother wove a cradle from the entrails of Father. Dwells in darkness, so it does, for all things have long since burnt out in competition with its starry shine.It led Magi to Bethlehem, burning in the hollowed heavens, bringing offerings to a King amongst them, things that the Anointed would use to rise as premier Magus above all.

And there, standing at the crossroads, we find the sacred heart of All, blood flung in all directions - hallowing the world entire.

Signs and wonders, anon, portals and portents, things that happen, are happening. Symbols rise and fall, are seen and unseen, coming together with us when we are in the right time, place, and state of mind to receive these Strangers, these visiting dignitaries and potentates from Behind-and-Within-and-Through.

It is not about you. You have have been touched, changing even now as I write, You are becoming. When the change arranges for you to receive, then and only then does the unknown become known, the familiar become strange.You wanted advice, and this is it. Serve yourself, and realize that it was never was, what you think it was. And neither are you who you thought you were.Stop thinking, and allow yourself to become.Perhaps then, you might see things...

...Differently.

#black bird magic #polytheism #pagan #magick #occult #Anonymous

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