#Template my beloved people never understand you...... but I DO!!!!!!!

[tetraandtheapples]

Quickie Template doodle?????? Got bored halfway so his clothes don't have the same colouring style as his face/hair LMAO

This was my attempt at drawing cornrows first time.......... Ehgh???? Ehh?????????? My issue halfway was that he looked kinda bald but now I'm a bit.... he looks too hairy HEHAHAHA

Based on my discussion with @fishfrypi about Template's hair....... He was the one to first bring up Cornrows and I fell in love guh...... Template's whole deal is that he tries way too hard to NOT be like Error so I think while Error would have wild and crazy afro-ish/dreads maybe (undecided) (hobo core) Template would have this to keep his hair somewhat contained.... (I like to imagine especially whenever Errors get mad/emotionally strong their hair puffs up like static electricity..... This is also a way for Template to keep his hair tucked down LMAO)

Guhhhgh I have a lot more to say so guhhh below the cut.......

Oh yeah. Oh yeah that's right you pressed READ MORE I guess somepony wants to hear about my hair head canons. Head. Like head of hair? Haha geddit??? anyways

INK

Erm so I did actually draw him but I'm not very confident in bald people yet. Anyways spoiler alert he's bald..... More specifically Alopecia Universalis

Yeagh guh..... I think he would wear out a lot of wigs because of this and draw on eyebrows and such. He's never wearing the same wig two days in a row and is always experimenting..... Little creature. They're my favourite.

I think he would wear all kinds of wigs!!! Bright & Bold vs Normal and inconspicuous... depends on how he's feeling!!! Hair is very much an expression of oneself, and Ink has some issues with that I think..... He's a bit disconnected from reality in a way, literally viewing everyone around him as "fictional characters." (I am NOT letting people forget this factoid it's literally my favourite thing about him. I love you Ink)

I think he changes a lot about himself depending on who he's talking to, minus possibly Error who he goes and harasses with all of his weirdness LMAO. And I think the wigs are a way of representing that almost!!! He's an ever changing ball of goo.

Also. The reason why Alopecia Universalis and not just general baldness.... His eyebrows. No hair. He has to draw them on. Eyebrows are probably the main visual way we communicate emotions. Ink has emotion issues. Yeah. I want to kill him too.

DREAMTALE TWINS

Yeah this is going in no particular order just how they pop up in my mind. Also lumping these two together for reasons that shall be explored in a minute.....

These two! My favourites. Twins twins twins..... I love to see them as identical so their hair shall be, too.

I imagine their hair would be brown and a bit curly/wavy..... Trust the process gamers.....

These queens make it seem like their hair is much more clean than it is but no it's probably very dirty covered in twigs and shit. Tree boys.

I'm stuck between how long it should be.... Since they're very young I imagine not that long... But as they get older and Dream and Nightmare drift apart, maybe their hair length changes/differs?

Dream with the villagers gets imposed with male hair standards so it gets cut short, meanwhile Nightmare is neglected (nobody touching stinky demon hair!) and his hair is left to grow long........ More difference in their hair shows their widening relationship oooooooh writing!!!!! Metaphor alert! Metaphor alert! SOS! SOS!

DREAM & SWAN

So yeah uh blatantly stealing the hair apple magic thing from This Post. Because it's a cool concept!!!!!!!!! What the hell!!!!!!!!!! They're my favourites!!!!!!!!

So I think Dream and Swan's hair would look very similar.... With possibly streaks of golden blonde/black respectively. Maybe if you were to really, really compare Swan's hair would be a bit more straight and Dream's more bouncy/curly. (I know I've drawn Swan with total pitch black hair before. But. That was then.... This is the Future....)

And length is where I stumble a bit again!!!!! Because I am. Quite literally obsessed with the idea of Positivity representing stasis/tranquility vs Negativity representing momentum/drive towards change (Both of which are important for a healthy individual!!! I think I should say this.)

However I really really want Swan to have long hair vs Dream having shorter hair. Remnants from their upbringing maybe?

But for Swan is seems less practical to be running around with a whole set of hair... I imagine it would be especially easy for Swad to swoop in and nap him by it, which makes even less sense for him to have it around.... guh

When I do draw him with longer hair I love to image he plats it like so. Keeps it all tucked away under his hood so no Bird man can come in and yoink him away (and leave an obvious patch of burnt hair where he touched it LMAO)

Dream having shorter hair at least makes a little sense in my view.... He keeps it short because its what he's used to... But I also really love the idea of him growing it longer in remembrance of Nightmare and their shared history. He's definitely not as crazy as Swad is about living Dreamtale again! And knows logically that he would never want to subject Night to the abuse that went on behind the scenes..... But he would still like to have his brother back to reconnect and to try and make up for all of it.

Probably something like this?? But more messy?????? Dream to me would seem like a very clean guy but actually is very disorganised and messy. He would roll around in dirt for fun if he could.

So I'm very stuck on their length..... Need to think about it some more. As for facial hair, I do like to think of the twins as generally clean shaven? Not that they shave per say but just don't grow facial hair LOL..... I am definitely not opposed to bearded twins though, I just need to see a beard design I actually like for them before I go fluffing them up HEHAHA.

Hmmm now that I'm actually seeing the hair styles I can actually see Swan wearing the short hair vs Dream with the long...... Maybe I just needed an image guh HEHEHEHE

SWAD

Swad..... My beloved...... My precious..... YOU'RE MY FAVOURITE did you know.

Swad hair I imagine is long as...... However in contrast to Dream's brown-golden hair it's just straight up pure blonde.... Glowing a little, too!!! Hell, I imagine it even floats a little around his shoulders like an aura, or halo of some kind.... ethereal LMAO (I could imagine him maybe with a few brown tips like his original hair colour, but they'd be very unnoticeable..... Maybe when the hair falls out it turns back into it's original colour gehehe)

This is where the twins' hair texture comes in a bit. Because I imagine apple transformative character design magic not just altering the hair colour, but also texture.... Where his hair was once maybe wavy, it's now fully curly.

I also like to imagine his hair is very very frizzy and heat damaged due to his general core temperature being off the charts.... It all curls around him, framing his face (egotist i hate him)

I don't view Swad as somebody who takes care of himself very well. He cares about his appearance, sure, but when actually practicing self care, he's kinda actually the worst.... HEHAHA. He lets his hair grow all long but that's okay because it all floats around him anyway. He doesn't wash it, but that's okay too because any bugs that try to inhabit his scalp instantly combust upon entering a 1m radius HEHAHA. I would be a little worried about sebum, but it's hard to tell.......

Reddit says not to try and evaporate the oils but only because it'll cause heat damage to your hair and skin.... Which wouldn't affect Sol in the first place HEHAHA (hottie!!) So it's hard to say really. Even if his hair was really oily I don't think it would be that noticeable, his hair already shines with or without oil HEHEHE.

NIGHTMARE

Nightmare. Now THIS One. He's my favourite.

Opposite of Swad time baby...... Where the twins' hair was kinda wavy, Swad's is more curly, Nightmare is dead straight..... Like a cloak.

I don't think it even behaves like hair anymore really. You could separate it, but it acts more like a cloak or window blind than actual hair. It sticks all together because of the slime.... Slimey man... His hair is literally "depressed" and flat lol

Like these two images, but DEFINITELY not as shiny...... It's very dull/matte, could definitely camouflage into the darkness/shadows if you didn't know what to expect. As dark and black as you can get with hair.

It's always Dreamtale where I get stuck on long vs short..... On one hand I think long would come a lot more naturally to Nightmare's whole design.... It makes him look less humanoid almost, hiding his form... On the other though, character-wise I could see him cutting it shorter.

I always thought of Nightmare Dreamtale to be a lot more.... royalty oriented than the others. Swad perceives himself as a God, sure, but Nightmare I think need to do little things to make himself feel better/"prove" he is in control of his life.... Him actually cutting it shorter in contrast to how he had his hair longer when he was younger (more weak and pathetic)..... I think it would be neat!!!! But sigh. ilu nightmare

KILLER (Honourable Mention)

Killer. My favourite of them all!!!!!

Okay this one is an honourable mention because I had. absolutely zero opinions about Killer's hair. Until. UNTIL.

Cowsmilkzz's design. Oh my god.

Oh my god

OH MY GOD

Absolute no notes. This is stunning. Killer skinhead was not something I knew I needed until I saw it....... I feel like if I saw Killer walking down the street coming in my direction I SHOULD feel the need to cross to the other side. Please go away. I don't wanna be mugged/murdered. Especially the face tattoo there are absolute no notes. A+++++

They seem to be more active on Insta so like please please pretty please. Go to their Insta and follow them there........ They post other humanoid skeleton art I'm absolutely in love with it's so cool. (I'm decently certain they've got one slot open for a commission!!!!! Wink wink nudge nudge) https://www.instagram.com/cowsmilkzz/ https://www.instagram.com/cowsmilkzz/ https://www.instagram.com/cowsmilkzz/

And yeagh guh. That's all folks........

By the by if you love hair (autism) as much as I do please consider checking out "Sister, dear" by honey_bubbletea33 on Ao3!!! Fem human versions of the characters and it's amazing. I loved it. 10/10 read absolutely worth your time

[juvnvalen]

♡Lilya Yandere Profile♡

I love lilya shes up there on my favorite list, writing this as a tribute to her because i just booted her off my team for regulus. ALSO THE ART OF DESTREZA SKIN???? MEOW (please someone notice my lilya likes being callled a good girl head canon) yandere lilya aka wife beater my beloved Also! added a few new r1999 character to my list <3 Pairing: Lilya x GN Darling; FxGN TW: Yandere themes, mentions of nonconsensual touching, Nsfw mentions, and physical violence. Credit for template: @/Cinnamonest

♡What are they generally like? Lucid, aware? Obsessive? How do they behave? Lilya has never experienced feelings like this before, and she doesn’t quite understand how to approach you. At first glance you’d think she hated you, the way she glares, insults you, and it almost seems like she’s trying to make your life a little more miserable all together. She likes to keep you around, and as unbelievable as it is she does like you. Lilya’s doubtful of your ability to take care of yourself, and she's adamant about how pathetic you are. She’s not trying to be cruel, she just knows you need someone strong to protect you, like her. At some point she becomes aware that this isn’t how people typically approach relationships and maybe she’ll even try to court you in a more civil way for a little while, but it won't last very long at all.

♡How likely are they to kidnap their darling? How quickly will they do so? Lilya is very quick to take her darling, for her there are just more benefits from taking her darling than simply courting them. Whether it be from her darling avoiding her, getting into danger, or simply not reciprocating her feelings they can expect her to act quickly in their capture.

♡How difficult is it to escape from them? How do they keep you restrained? How do they deal with attempted escape? Escape from Lilya is almost completely off the table, with the help of her trusty Su-01ве, there is simply no way you could outrun her. There is a chance to escape with the help of Lilya’s drinking, she’s easy to manipulate and a heavy sleeper when she's intoxicated. For the most part you can expect to be restrained to some extent, but of course when she's around to watch you she’s happy to let you roam free a little while. When it comes to drunk Lilya, it's easy to convince her to loosen the ropes for a little while. After an escape attempt her darling can expect any privileges to be revoked. She has no leniency to a newly captured darling either, she expects them to adapt to her rules quickly.

♡How easy are they to trick, deceive, or manipulate? Lilya is decently easy to trick, especially so when she's intoxicated. It's easy to appeal to her ego, and she absolutely melts when receiving any praise. With a few loving words she’s easy to fool the first time, but as soon as she learns your tactics you can’t expect her to be deceived so easily the next time.

♡How lenient are they? What privileges can you have, and what will you be denied? She doesn’t let the rules slide for the most part, but if drunk she’ll let her darling get away with more things than usual. Lilya will allow her darling to have small freedoms such as walks outside with Lilya, highly supervised trips to town, and less restraints while she’s away. She refuses to provide her darling with most non-necessities, not wanting them to draw her darling’s attention away.

♡What kind of rules do they have? What kind of punishment would they use? Lilya is very strict about her rules being followed, and she’ll make sure you remember when you break one. She is adamant about you not mentioning absolutely anything about wanting to leave, or showing intentions of doing so. Any physical violence or verbal beratement from you will be met with immediate punishment. She’s more physical with her punishments, Lilya believes her darling learns better that way. Punishment can range from simply increasing restraints or revoking privileges, to physical beatings.

♡How do they deal with rivals, or perceived rivals? Will they get rid of them? Will they kill them themselves, or find another way? Lilya simply kills them, it's more effective than just threats and she doesn’t want to worry about consequences from letting them live later on.

♡How easy is it to make them mad? What does their anger look like? Lilya is extremely easy to anger, and her darling gets the brunt of her wrath. When she’s angered she tends to get physically violent from destroying furniture to hurting her darling, it's best just not to set her off.

♡Do they see you as above them, beneath them, or equal to them? She sees you as below her without a doubt, it's not just her darling though Lilya sees most lesser capable beings as beneath her.

♡How determined are they for you to love them? How hard will they try to make it happen? Or are they content just having you? Lilya wants a loving relationship, and she expects her darling to provide that for her. She doesn’t expect it right away, but makes sure her darling learns eventually. Just having her darling present can only hold her off for so long. 

♡General perverseness: how sexual of a person are they? What’s their drive like? How touchy do they get? Do they have any reservations about sexuality? Lilya is fine going without sexual contact for long periods, it's not something she needs for a happy relationship. She does let her touches linger lower than they should when she's intoxicated, but it never goes any further than a curious touch. She enjoys softer physical affection more than she does actual sex, Lilya just wants her darling there to hold.

♡How forceful are they? Do they care about your willingness? Lilya has no intentions of forcing anything sexual on her darling, her hands might linger in places they shouldn’t occasionally but it never goes any further. If sex occurs it needs to be initiated by her darling, she won’t engage it, not that she likes to admit it but she’s nervous to go that far with her darling. 

♡What sort of kinks or fetishes do they have, or would they fill? She only has one, and it's not even totally sexual, she adores praise from her darling. Lilya melts at any positive compliments her darling is willing to give. 

♡What kind of (nsfw) punishments would they use? Lilya wouldn’t use any sexual punishments.♡What body parts of their darling do they like the most? Lilya loves her darling’s thighs, she can’t get enough of touching them. Loves laying her head in her darling’s lap if they’re willing to offer.

♡♡

[aphroditestummyrolls]

B, D, N, Y!

B - A pairing–platonic, romantic or sexual–that you initially didn’t consider, but someone changed your mind.

I have a couple for these! For The Old Guard, I was really not into Book of Nile at first, but now I kinda love the idea. Them having a slow burn romance and learning to grow together??? That’s a vibe.

And for my darling Crows, I didn’t (platonically) know how to fit Matthias into the group for a very long time. This is less something that other people changed my mind on, and more just me digging around in my own little brain. Now, Jesper and Matthias are a couple of my favourite buddies! And Matthias, Jesper and Wylan as buddies. I mostly just think that Matthias Helvar is criminally underrated in the fandom, and I hope we get a spin-off/season 3– just to see all the crows together, if for no other reason.

D - A pairing you wish you liked but just can’t.

Andy and Bookerrrrrr. It’s a no for me. I think he’s been in and out of infatuation with her multiple times, but it’s a headcanon, not a ship to me.

And anything having to do with Kuwei. I don’t understand the hate he gets, but I also don’t really care about him (that sounds mean— I can sympathise with him as a character, and appreciate the role he serves throughout the books, I’m just not interested in fandomising him at all). He is a plot device that I continually forget about, and when I am reminded of his existence, especially through a pairing, I’m confused and blindsided. I wish I could enjoy/appreciate him more, but unlike the crows, who I can see as young twenty-somethings, Kuwei is firmly planted in “young teenager” energy. He’s un-shippable to me.

N - Name three things you wish you saw more of in your main fandom (or a fandom of choice).

GIVE ME COLM FAHEY. GIVE ME ALL THE COLM FAHEY. IF YOU DONT, I WILL DO IT MYSELF AND YOULL ALL BE FLOODED WITH MY BACKSTORY AND MY AUS AND MY SUPER REPETITIVE “KETTERDAM LIFE REVEAL” STORIES.

Y - What are your secondhand fandoms (i.e., fandoms you aren’t in personally but are tangentially familiar with because your friends/people on your dash are in them)?

Ummm. I don’t really know. I feel like the second season of good omens applies— I haven’t seen the second season, and have little interest in watching it, but I see my mutuals having a grand time with it. And that’s fun!

In a similar vein, Sandman! And more specifically Dreamling! I love this pairing, but have never watched the show because Tom Sturridge makes my eating disorder very loud. But I LOVE the idea of Dream and Hob Gadling, and I still read fic and see it on my dash a bunch.

Also Red, White, and Royal Blue. It was cute, and I enjoyed watching it, but there’s A LOT I really didn’t like about it, and I enjoy it much more for its potential as an au template (👀 I am Looking at You, my friend👀). For fake countries/kingdoms, and different characters. I love how much a lot of my mutuals enjoy it, though, and I see it on my dash a lot! And I’m always happy for us queers to have a frothy and fun little romcom.

Thank you so much for playing, my beloved friend! ❤️ I love these questions!

[ortelassa-goldstein]

THIS IS ALL COMPLICATED (except Gale lol)

Another shitpost about my beloved tav Haltyrr. Now about her relationship with companions. More details under the cut.

template by @raysoffrost, thank you!

(Please note - everything below is written on behalf of my oc. My own opinion may be different! I find all the characters charming, but from Hal's point of view it's a little more complicated) (oh and pls ignore my bad english, i try my best, thank you)

Shadowheart. This girl is harmed. She bleeds painfully right front of me and pretend to be fine, pretend no one sees her weakness. She NEEDS something. Protection, maybe? I dont understand. She is so funny in her pathetic rudeness. When I look at her, I feel my own weakness, and it's sucks. I should stay away. Lae'zel. I never seen githyanki before, and this woman was mystery… For some time. She's annoying, she's predictable, and… amazing in her faith. I adore her directness and urgency to fight to the death for her ideals, but also this is a blindness. She always follows the line of least resistance. People like Laezel are good on battlefield. I need these type in our journey, but she and i will never be an equal and never understand each other. Maybe one day she'll try to kill me, or, maybe I'll kill her first. Karlach. A simple woman, maybe too simple for me, but, in any case, she knows how to prioritize correctly and live in the present moment. She is very sensitive and perfectly defuses the situation if tense raises because of someone else's sick ego. We need her. Actually, I think, everyone needs a woman like Karlach. Jaheira. I don't know how to treat her. Sometimes she looks so much like me and this is pisses me off. But sometimes I find sweet how she grumbles and looks at everyone like at stupid children. I'm sure she sees it too - we are quite similar, and it's better for us to keep a respectful distance from each other, otherwise one day well fight to death, and then we both regret it. Halsin. Well, he's huge, a druid and an elf at the same time. It's a terrible mix in my opinion. Sometimes I'm just freaking SCARED of him. Druids are strange af. Elven druids?! Please don't. Part of me despises Halsin for just running away from his beloved grove when it needs a competent guidance more than anything else, but at least my weirdos like him. (or I'm too soft-hearted). Gale. If someone hurts Gale, it will be the last thing they will do in their lives ever. (I wish I could beat the shit out of his ex, but it's hard with goddesses.) Perhaps this man is the only one from all over the upper world who really understands and accepts me. I don`t know how he did it, but my trust in him is unshakable. Magic, probably. Astarion. I don't blame him for trying to survive. I blame him for doing it ridiculously. Sometimes he tires me so much that I want to tie him up and throw into the river. Next to Astarion, I feel like a babysitter, and this is the last thing I would like to do in our situation. I think sooner or later this pathetic elf will get angry because of a something Very Important For Him in a teenager way and leave, and it would be noble of me not to stick a dagger in his back. If you want to be respected, respect in return, darling. Wyll. I don't understand what he's still doing in my camp at all. I mean, I've heard so many rude things from him about how unreasonably cruel I am that it's even funny. I behave quite decently and don't even point out to Wyll that he seems to be much more interested in wine, pretentious speeches and condemning everyone in a row (me in particular), instead of doing, you know, things. He also brought this annoying devil with him. Oh, spider queen, give me strength.

[zubi-arts]

I saw this wonderful ship meme template by gibb_arts on twitter and decided to do it for one of my most beloved rarepair OTPs, ItaKabu! I hope this gives you some insight into why I love this ship so much <3

More detailed headcanon descriptions below the cut!

Age/Height: Canon, actually! I think it's really funny that they're almost the same height but Itachi is juuuust a little bit taller.

Gender: I see both of these characters as cisgender male, but while Itachi hasn't questioned things much, I feel like Kabuto went through an entire roller coaster about his gender identity at one point in his life. He eventually settled back where he started, but it's now that purposeful cis perspective that only comes with intense questioning. (I'd also consider Kabuto nonbinary male, but he probably prefers to be called a man)

Sexuality: Itachi demisexual, Kabuto bisexual. Not much additional detail here!

Big/Little Spoon: I think they're both pretty cuddly but Itachi is gentle and passive and Kabuto is happy for any kind of attention, so Itachi probably meets him halfway and they trade spoons back and forth. Kabuto's horns might make it hard to have your face behind his head lol.

Lends Clothes/Borrows Clothes: They mostly have their own stuff but Kabuto is slightly smaller, so he fits in Itachi's things better.

Uses Pet Names: Kabuto is incredibly respectful and feels very weird calling Itachi by anything but his actual name. Itachi doesn't tend toward pet names but might call Kabuto "honey" just to see how red his face goes.

Introverted/Extroverted: Kabuto is generally shy but wants to have connections with people. Itachi likes having company but is low energy--I'd classify him as more of an ambivert.

Affection through Words/Actions: Kabuto does try to make deliberate gestures, but he feels like it doesn't come across well, so he's constantly telling Itachi how wonderful he is and making sure he understands exactly how he feels. Itachi of course reminds Kabuto that he really does love him, though a lot of his affection comes in warm gestures like bringing him tea when he's working or covering him up with a blanket when he falls asleep.

Confesses First/Waits: Kabuto would never imagine anyone could possibly have a crush on him, so only at the very last minute would he even consider telling Itachi how he feels. Itachi is slow to get attached but once he's in deep he realizes exactly how resistant Kabuto is to making the first move, so he does it for him.

Screams about Bugs/Squashes: Neither of them are afraid of bugs. Kabuto goes to swiftly whack it with a rolled-up newspaper, but Itachi stops him and scoops the bug up to put it outside. As long as it's not a mosquito. No mercy for mosquitoes.

Drives the Car: If they had a car, Kabuto would do the handling and maintenance. Itachi can drive but often doesn't because they usually travel together.

Can't Cook/Cooks: Kabuto can functionally feed himself and it tastes alright. Itachi enjoys cooking as a hobby and is happy to make dinner basically every night.

PDA: Itachi is a bit shy but doesn't care much if people see him being sweet with his S/O. For Kabuto, the idea of someone proudly showing their affection for him in public makes his bones turn to jelly. Itachi often humors him by taking his hand when he's not expecting it and kissing his cheek.

Overprotective: Both previously dealt with narcissistic control complexes and are prone to trying to solve problems by themselves. They are also both aware that their boyfriend has disaster tendencies and do their best to look out for each other.

Relationship Experience: Itachi might possibly have dated someone when he was very young but he doesn't really count that. At the very least he loves his brother and does have friends like Kisame. Kabuto has not had a single human interaction that did not devolve into terminal backstabbing disorder and/or brutal death. He is starting from entry-level and Itachi is prepared to tell him as often as he needs to hear it that he loves him and isn't going anywhere.

Horny Level: Kabuto is way too awkward to be thirsty 95% of the time. Itachi is more relaxed and thinks it's funny when Kabuto gets flustered, so he'd probably make the first move. That being said, as soon as Itachi made it clear what his intentions were, Kabuto's meter would shoot through the roof.

Awkwardness Level: Itachi is a resurrected undead paper mache lantern man who feels like everything is borrowed time, so as long as people can be okay with some of his past mistakes he's pretty chill about most stuff. Kabuto has only recently come down off his tirade of unchecked terrorism and mass murder, and is largely of the opinion that while he really really wants people to like him, he completely understands if they just want to lock him in prison forever.

Jealousy Level: Itachi is not the jealous type at all and would let Kabuto do his own thing. Kabuto also respects Itachi's choices, though he is a bit envious of the people who seem closer to him.

--- That's it for this! Feel free to add any headcanons in the tags or let me know if you want to hear more of mine! :D

[twdmusicboxmystery]

Hints of Beth and the CRM War in 5x09

So, after I re-watched 6x08 and 6x09, which I posted last week, I also decided to re-watch 5x09. I did so for various reasons, including a comment I received on an old theory. But mostly, I’d been wanting to rewatch this episode for a while. I had a hunch that there might be hints toward the CRM war in it that we couldn’t possibly have known about or recognized back in S5. I was not disappointed.

Tyreese, Lizzie & Mica:

So, in this new comment I got, this commenter said she thought Ty was likening the twin boys to Lizzie and Mica. And I’m sure this has been discussed in some iteration, but I sat and thought about it in a way I hadn’t before. I know I’ve discussed that it seems, from the photos, that there seemed to be a “good” and “evil” twin, and obviously that has ties to Lizzie and Mica. But just think about it this way. Ty was obviously present for the Lizzie/Mica tragedy. Then, he’s killed by one of these twins as a walker.

A random line from 5x04, 4 Walls and a Roof, came to my mind. After Abe and co get on the short bus to go to D.C., Ty is digging graves (for the Termites they killed) and Rick goes to help him. Rick asks him something about what happened on his way to Terminus or something like that (can’t remember the exact question) and Ty answers that what happened ���killed me.” Rick, looking a little annoyed, says, “No, it didn’t.” And that’s it.

 But it occurred to me that Ty’s line is a foreshadow. He was speaking about Lizzie and Mica, saying that their deaths killed him (emotionally) but it was a foreshadow that another set of siblings would actually kill him a few episodes later. I don’t have a whole lot more to say about this particular thing, though I’m going to talk more about Ty in a minute.  

The thing is, I really don’t think we understand the point of Lizzie and Mica, yet. We’ve had lots of theories, talked about how they impacted Carol, the ways in which they could be Beth proxies. But I don’t think we understand their significance in the grand scheme of things, and I’ve never quite known what to do with them symbolically. But given that they’re in Ty’s hallucination WITH BETH tells me we will probably figure it out when she returns.

Hints of the CRM in 5x09:

Several years back (like during S6) I tried so hard to figure out what the radio messages in 5x09 pointed to, and couldn’t really come to any solid conclusion about them. Of course, back then we knew absolutely nothing of the helicopter people, so how could I?

We’ve definitely seen some of the things they talk about come to pass, both before and after this episode. They mention prisons (prison fell before this) and setting people on fire (Carol did that both in S9 and also to Karen and David in S4) and of course they mention machetes (Red Machete). All important symbols.

But these messages also tell a story. Look at what they say:

“At least 68 citizens of the Republic have been killed in four deadly attacks along the main coastal district. The group has continued their campaign of random violence, moving across the countryside unfettered, with the Republic’s military forces in disarray.”

Okay, so I’m assuming the “republic” is the CRM. This suggests a different group performing guerilla warfare against them. Think about all the symbols these lines encompass. We have a group of rebels attacking the CRM, the COASTAL district, and of course the CRM itself. So it’s talking about some rebel group that will be fighting against the CRM.

I think that’s super significant, especially because of the TWB template. Remember that we saw a group of rebels, perhaps led by Will, though it’s a little unclear as yet, who is Beth’s proxy in that template. And they’re outside the CRM and, presumably, because they saw the slaughter at the college, going to fight against it. So I’m seeing this as a huge hint for Beth’s return.

The other thing to bring into the mix here is the Wolves. Because all of this in 5x09 definitely foreshadowed the wolves, and it’s where we first saw their “WOLVES NOT FAR” signs. And where did we see TONS of Beth symbolism: around the wolves.

Second message: “…then terrorizing the village by night, carrying out revenge attacks which include hacking innocents with machetes, and in some cases setting them on fire.”

Okay, so I get that this isn’t flattering for Beth or her group if she’s with the rebels, but it is really hard to know what they’re talking about here, since we don’t get the full sentence. The point is, these are acts of war, and even if this is talking about the rebel group doing this (and I think it probably is, given that wolves did all of these things a few episodes later in 6x02) it’s no worse than what we’ve already seen the CRM do.

But I can also see that if Beth is with or leading this group, this is a very Grady-like issue to be dealing with. Are we killing these people for the greater good, because the war needs to be won? You can see how Grady could easily have been a setup for what she’d be dealing with later on. And maybe she’s the “new sheriff” because she has to police her own people and not let them get too blood thirsty. Or maybe I’m reading into this WAY too much and the point is simply that there will be a violent war. ;D

There’s only one more message that comes out of the radio. So we had the first one, talking about the CRM war and a rebel group attacking the CRM. Then talk of wartime violence.

The third message is Beth singing her song. That’s super on-the-nose, if you ask me. No more clear way to say that Beth will be part of the conflict the radio voice was just talking about. See why that made me happy?

Tyreese…Again:

I’m gonna make a sweeping claim, here. I think the themes around Ty’s death are pretty much the point of the entire series. Yes, I know that’s a tall order. Let me explain. It does tie heavily into Beth’s return, but it encompasses other things as well, and I think it’s a huge part of the current Negan/Maggie/forgiveness story line.

So, when I first went to watch 5x09, I pulled up S5 on Amazon and it shows all the episodes, the first one, of course, being 5x01. And the little picture it had for that episode was Ty in the cabin with baby Judith. I sat and thought about that and that there’s the picture of a cabin in 5x09 that gets blood on it and it occurred to me that those two things are probably related.

So I watched 5x01 after watching 5x09. I’ll admit I didn’t see tons of smoking guns that haven’t already been discussed at length in 5x01. The biggest thing is simply that it was a setup for Ty’s death themes in 5x09, and I definitely need to revisit my cabin theories. ;D

So, if we look at the people Ty hallucinated, there’s the Gov, Lizzie, Mica, Beth, Bob, and Martin, right? These are all obviously people and events Ty feels guilty about. Bob’s death, because he lied about Martin and that sent the Termites after them. He feels guilty about being duped by the Gov and not realizing what a bad guy he was. Lizzie and Mica for obvious reasons. And Beth.

I honestly don’t think Tyreese did anything to feel guilty about with Beth. Not in the same way we think Sasha might have (Sasha/Tyreese Theory). But based on what the Martin hallucination says, I think he’s just really broken up about it and wondering if he could have done anything to change it. Just my opinion, though.

So, if you listen carefully to who is saying what in the hallucination, we have two different representations of good and evil. There’s 1) Bob vs. Martin and 2) Beth/Lizzie/Mica vs. the Gov. In each case, they’re like good and evil angels sitting on Ty’s shoulder and they’re arguing.

So, for example, Martin says the thing about Ty lying about his death and how, maybe somehow, if Bob hadn’t died, it would have changed things with Beth. Domino shit. And then Bob says [paraphrasing] “No, that’s bullshit. I got bit at the food bank. It went the way it had to. The way it was always going to.”

And we have the same thing going on with the Gov. He’ll basically tell Tyreese what an idiot he is, and then one of the three (Beth/Lizzie/Mica) will say, “No. It’s all right. It’s better now.”

So, you can see that Ty is really at war with himself internally.

It’s important to note that one big thing that’s mentioned is that he forgave Carol for Karen’s death. The Gov actually says that Ty is weak and ridiculous because he sat across the table from a woman that murdered someone he loved, and he actually forgave her. The Gov really razzed him about that.

And this is one of the things I mean about over-arching themes. Carol killed Karen and David in S4, which we all know was one great big foreshadow of arcs to come, and Ty forgave her.

I really think this was probably meant to be a foreshadow of Negan. Negan’s story, killing Glenn, was a way bigger deal and way more front and center, mostly because no one really knew Karen except for an episode or two and Glenn was such a beloved character.

Now, we have this redemption arc for Negan and Maggie is going to have to decide if she’ll forgive him, moving forward. We could apply this to plenty of other story lines where Rick took the violent route or forgiveness wasn’t had, and it leads to trouble and death. So, I think this is pretty huge for the overall show.

And I really think it points to Negan doing something to save TF in some way. Because they forgive him and he’s allowed to live, that will save lives. We’ve talked about this with Daryl showing Dwight mercy as well.

My Biggest Beth Takeaway:

As the episode progresses, before Rick and Michonne come to get him, Tyreese does finally stand up to the Governor. He says that the Gov was a bad guy, and that wasn’t his (Ty’s) fault. He says what he talked about with Noah: that he never turned off the radio. He always faced it, and did what he could to help. He said he forgave Carol specifically because “it’s not over.” Which I take to mean that he has hope for the world’s future, and forgiveness is the only way forward. Being angry and holding a grudge only brings death.

And then he said the thing that jumped out at me most: 

“People like me CAN live.”

Okay, so what does he mean by ‘people like me?’ Because obviously Ty didn’t live, so this doesn’t apply to him directly. Or if it does, he means that he’ll die, but people like him CAN live under some circumstances.

To figure this out, we have to go back to his cabin in 5x01. During that entire scene in No Sanctuary, Martin was giving him crap about being a “good” guy. Ty answers, “you don’t know what I’ve done.” And Martin looks at baby Judith and says, “no, you’re a good guy. You save babies. That’s a little like saving an anchor when you’re without a boat in the middle of the ocean.” (Total boat/water reference.)

So, when Ty says “people like me,” he means those who choose to be good. Who choose to be hopeful and moral, rather than violent. There’s a long-running theme in the show that Chris Hardwick mentions a lot, that people who function as the moral compass of the group often die. And that’s true.

But here, Ty says, “people like me” (meaning the moral compasses) CAN live.

And Beth is in the room with him when he says that.

She’s looking at the clock radio that simultaneously reads 5:10 (music box) and also 8:22 (Resurrection).

The skeptic might argue that all these other people are in the room too, and how can we be sure he means her? Well, putting all the mountains of TD evidence aside, they do have a point. After all, all the “good” characters Ty hallucinates (Bob, Beth, Mica) are moral compasses and fit the criteria. There are plenty of others not represented here (Hershel, Dale, Glenn, Denise, even Abraham to an extent) but these are the ones Ty felt particularly guilty about.

But I would argue that we only heard one person’s voice come through the radio: Beth’s.

So once again, look at this from a bird’s eye view. Talk of the CRM and a coming war. Then Beth’s voice comes through that same radio, suggesting she’ll be part of it. And later on, “people like me CAN live.”

See what I mean? As I told my fellow theorists, this episode really had all we needed to predict Beth’s return. We just couldn’t have understood the meanings back then.

And honestly, this may be the explanation for the Lizzie/Mica thing I mentioned above. It’s a representation of the evil killing the good, which is super traumatizing and messes everyone up because as humans, we’re hard-wired to believe good will win out.

So, we had Lizzie/Mica, Noah’s brothers, and then the good vs evil hallucinations I already talked about. And we might even have a representation of this at Grady because of evil officer Bob.

We had good Bob who died in 5x04, and then Evil Officer Bob, who directly led to them only having two prisoners, which directly led to Beth getting shot. And I remember when it aired, the show brought a lot of attention to it by doing clickbait articles about why there were “two Bobs.”

So, it’s something they wanted us to notice. And then we see Bob in Ty’s hallucination here. I gotta think that Sasha and Ty’s sibling relationship plays into this in some way as well.

Okay, I’ll shut up, now. But re-watching this gave me tons of hope. We can’t say for sure that we’ll see her in the bonus episodes (though obviously I hope we will) but I’m more sure than ever that she’ll be part of the CRM war. And we’re kind of on the cusp of that. We just have to sit back and wait. ;D

[merrybandofmurderers]

Ship Meme: Yuo and Dorian

Love languages: Yuo is a person that rarely vocalizes his more vulnerable emotions; for him, action is more demonstrative. He enjoys being in his lover’s presence, sharing hobbies, and discussing interests. He gives gifts as a physical representation of his love: carvings, Dorian’s amulet, a special mount. He is also a very tactile person, always craving physical contact with his lover.

Dorian similarly enjoys quality time with his lover, especially given that in Tevinter, openly spending time with a man he had interest in could result in scandal. Understandably, Dorian initially shies away from open physical affection; Yuo’s physical demonstrativeness is something Dorian takes time to get used to. For him, acts of service are important; they can be a more subtle way of expressing affection: providing Yuo healing, making a glove for the Anchor with Vivienne and Dagna, learning Elvish.

Firsts: Yuo initiates most of their firsts: he confesses first, kisses Dorian first, is the first to say “I love you,” the first to introduce pet names. Obviously, this is because Dorian has been conditioned to hide his affection, whereas Yuo has had more freedom in that regard. Yuo is also the big spoon due to his protective nature, and Dorian relishes being cherished.

Habits: Dorian is better with money just by virtue of the fact that he.. understands it. The Dalish don’t use coin; when they go to cities, they trade. As Inquisitor, Yuo has more gold at his disposable than he knows what to do with, so he leaves that to Josephine. He does carry some coin in the field, but tends to give it away to anyone in need. As such, Dorian carries his own purse for when they need to purchase things. In Tevinter, Dorian was used to buying luxuries frequently, but after coming south into relative poverty, he’s learned the value of frugality.

They both worry about the other. For Yuo, it is a deeply ingrained habit; for Dorian, it’s because Yuo seems to throw his own physical well-being out the window simply for the sake of a good fight. Dorian always wakes up first; it’s a testament to anyone’s determination who can wake Yuo before noon. Neither needs to steal blankets because Yuo runs so hot; he exudes heat constantly and as such, they are more often inclined to remove blankets.

Yuo tends only to speak when he has something to say, and we all know how Dorian loves to hear his own voice. While Dorian certainly has experience in the bedroom, he has little in romance. Yuo has had many more sexual relationships and the confidence to experiment, and while he’s had fewer romantic relationships, it’s still more than Dorian. Both of them are people who can recognize when they’ve done their lover wrong, and so are always willing to apologize.

Yuo is the one who cooks, though not because he’s particularly skilled, he is just the one who knows how. Dorian complains of this frequently, but is certainly not inclined to learn himself. Dorian is the ticklish one and Yuo has great fun with this.

Pet names: Yuo prefers to call his lover by name, but he does use pet names occasionally: ‘vhenan’ most frequently, ‘my love’ when he’s being romantic, and ‘lover’ when he’s being playfully flirtatious. Dorian also likes calling Yuo by name, especially since it took him time to earn the right to use it. However, he most frequently calls Yuo by the endearment ‘amatus�� as he never really thought he’d have the opportunity. He also uses ‘my love’, as well as ‘beloved’ later on and ‘my heart and soul’ when they are especially intimate.

Expressing affection: As said, Yuo is very physically demonstrative, and it takes Dorian some time to acclimate and stop being paranoid about impending scandal. Dorian prefers to use words, though he is more reserved about it, largely due to his upbringing and having to unlearn his internalized shame and guilt.

Jealousy: Historically, Yuo has been partial to open, casual relationships, and as such, has never been inclined toward jealousy. He doesn’t mind Dorian flirting with others or expressing attraction towards other men, and he’s more than willing if Dorian ever desires to share their bed with a third (or fourth) party.

Given Dorian’s lack of relationship experience and the anticipation he would never have a true one, he is typically more insecure and thus prone to jealousy. Having to watch Yuo’s relationship with Bull was a particular struggle. He doesn’t doubt Yuo’s loyalty, but he knows Yuo’s personality and doesn’t wish to ask what Yuo may not be willing to give. He doesn’t complain when Yuo flirts with others or when his eye wanders, but it does bother him on a deeply repressed level.

Yuo does not require too much attention from his lover aside from spending time together. He does however appreciate spending time in silence, simply relishing the companionship, and does need his time alone. Dorian, of course, craves constant attention, partially out of vanity but also insecurity.

Attachment: Yuo is deeply attached to his loved ones and fiercely protective. That said, he is capable of trusting them to take care of themselves and attend to duties that may take him away, even if it pains him. Dorian is likewise protective, although not quite at Yuo’s level. He is also less able to put aside his anxiety of being separated, and being distant from Yuo, physically or emotionally, is hard on him.

Songs: Hearts A Mess - Gotye, The Last of the Real Ones - Fall Out Boy, Do I Wanna Know? - Arctic Monkeys

tagging @mrs-theirin, @thegingerjedi, @thegreatfoxking

original template by @kalidels

[twentiethcenturymoviesandtv]

The Wizard of Oz: The Story

At first glance, the plot of The Wizard of Oz seems pretty simple and chock full of clichés.  A girl from Kansas and her dog find themselves in a wonderful land, and meet a Cowardly Lion, a Tin Man, and a Scarecrow, traveling on a feel-good journey to find the titular Wizard of Oz, the only person who can send Dorothy home.

Pretty straightforward and obvious, right?

Well, there’s a bit more to it than that.  (Spoilers below, so on the off chance you haven’t seen the movie, go check it out and come back when you’ve seen it!)

Here’s the setup:

The film opens with Dorothy Gale (Judy Garland) and Toto running along a road in the dull, brown land of Kansas.  They are running just ahead of their bike-riding, witch-like neighbor, Ms. Gulch, who is trying to have Toto put down for biting her.

Dorothy, in an understandable panic, tries to tell her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry (who she lives with) about the situation, but they blow her off.  She turns for advice instead to three farm hands, who express sympathy and interest in the problem.  It is here where Aunt Em tells Dorothy to find somewhere where she won’t get into trouble, and here where Dorothy sings the most famous song in all of cinema.

Now, we’re already looking at quite a lot of setup that will be hugely important later.

First, the templates for the future characters of Oz.  Ms. Gulch and the three farmhands are introduced immediately with clear personality traits that will be echoed in their Oz counterparts later on.  Ms. Gulch is appropriately antagonistic and witch like.  The three farm hands quietly display the traits upon which their dopplegangers will be fixated: brains, heart, and courage.

Then there’s that song.  Somewhere Over the Rainbow, while being a song with seemingly little to do with the story has a lot to do with Dorothy’s character.  Feeling pushed aside, ignored, and helpless, Dorothy’s famous song is a window into her desires: leaving and finding a place where her dreams will come true.

Long story short, there’s a lot of foreshadowing in this scene.

Ms. Gulch (Margaret Hamilton) arrives on the scene with a sheriff’s order to put Toto down.  When her aunt and uncle do nothing to stop it, Dorothy takes Toto and attempts to run away from home.

She doesn’t get far.

She is stopped in her tracks by a kind, traveling con-artist fortune teller (Frank Morgan).  The fortune teller, by looking through Dorothy’s things to surmise enough about her situation, uses his crystal ball to cause Dorothy to believe that her aunt is in serious trouble.  Worried, Dorothy races home just in time for a cyclone to strike, knocking her on the head and carrying her, Toto, and the house, into the skies, along with Ms. Gulch, who transforms into a witch aboard a broomstick.

When the house lands, it’s in an entirely different place. Gone are the brown-grey tones of Kansas, replaced with bright color and vivid imagery of Munchkin land.  Dorothy emerges from the house to be greeted and hailed as a hero by both the Munchkins and Glinda, the Good Witch of the North. Dorothy has slain the Wicked Witch of the East when her house fell atop her, and freed the inhabitants of Munchkin land.  Cue song.

Dorothy is understandably confused, especially when the dead witch’s sister, the Wicked Witch of the West (Also Margaret Hamilton) turns up to claim the powerful ruby slippers that belonged to her sibling and are currently sticking out from underneath the house.  

Glinda transports the slippers onto Dorothy’s feet instead, enraging the Wicked Witch of the West, and causing her to swear vengeance for her sister.  Not powerful enough to hurt Dorothy in the presence of Glinda the Good, the Wicked Witch vanishes in a flash-bang of smoke.

All Dorothy wants is to get home.

Glinda assures her that she can get home by going to see the most Powerful Being in All of Oz: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz of the Emerald City.  She can do this, of course, by following the Yellow Brick Road.

Cue another song as Dorothy skips her way out of town, down the road, and towards her goal: getting home.

Already we’re seeing some irony here.  Not fifteen minutes ago, Dorothy’s goal was to get Somewhere Over the Rainbow, to be in a magical place. Oz is as magical as they come, and Dorothy was immediately beloved and befriended, and yet, worried for her family (especially her aunt) the goal seems to have flipped; now her desire is to return home.  This is unusual for both a fantasy movie and a coming of age story, and The Wizard of Oz is both.

Even stranger, throughout the story, Dorothy never wavers from this goal, leading directly to the lesson at the end.  But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Dorothy comes to a fork in the Yellow Brick Road by a cornfield, where she meets an unusual figure: a scarecrow (Ray Bolger), stuck on a pole. Dorothy immediately goes to his aid, helping him down and listening to his woes: he has no brain, which he explains through song.  (Aren’t musicals wonderful?)

Dorothy has a solution.  She suggests that he joins her, so that he may ask this Wonderful Wizard for some brains.  He agrees, and they continue along into a grove of apple-trees.  Dorothy, being hungry, goes to pick an apple, only to realize that the trees are alive, and aren’t happy about having their children ripped from them and eaten in front of them.

They don’t word it like that, but that’s the gist of it.

The Brainless Scarecrow takes action, enraging the trees to instead pelt them with the apples, no doubt breaking the hearts of several parents who witnessed their children used as ammunition.

Mission accomplished, Dorothy moves to collect the apples when she stumbles on something else interesting: a man made of tin, rusted nearly solid.

Sensing another opportunity to help, Dorothy uses an oilcan to restore mobility to the Tin-Man (Jack Haley), who thanks them and expresses his own problem: he has no heart, and this just about moves him to tears.

It moves him to song, anyway.

In the end, Dorothy suggests that the Tin Man join them in their journey to Oz, so that he may ask the Wizard for a heart, and he agrees.  The Wicked Witch appears again, this time as a more sincere threat, revealed through a demonstration of her fireball-hurling abilities.  She disappears in another puff of smoke, and the Scarecrow reveals that fire is his only fear, as it is the only thing that can truly destroy him.

The group continues on into a deep forest, full of ‘lions and tigers and bears’ (oh my!), and are suddenly jumped by a Lion (Bert Lahr). They scatter in terror before his might, all except for little Toto.  Faced with this challenge of a tiny dog, the Lion pounces after him, to the outrage of Dorothy, who viciously slaps the Lion on the nose and scolds him. The fierce Lion responds to this attack by bursting into tears.

The Lion explains, in a song, that what he wants most in life is courage, sealing out our rule of three.  He too joins the group in the desperate hope that the Wizard will give him the courage he desires, and the three emerge from the forest, across a field of poppies.  There is a brief and pointless attack by the Witch, deflected by Deux Ex Glinda, and the group merrily makes their way to the Emerald City.

The guy at the gate briefly stops them, but lets them in after seeing Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers and hearing that they know Glinda the Good.  Cue another song, this time describing the joy it is to live in Oz, however they are cut short by the main conflict kicking into high gear: The broomstick-riding Wicked Witch of the West blazes a smoke trail in the sky that says simply: Surrender Dorothy.

The lack of comma is a little confusing as to whether Dorothy is to surrender, or if the people of the Emerald City are supposed to surrender her, but either way, the idea comes across pretty clearly.  In the face of this danger, the message returns from the mighty and wise Wizard of Oz: he won’t see them, due to the danger Dorothy has brought.

In desperation, Dorothy starts to cry, mourning her situation, which, despite three new friends, is pretty bleak.  Her outburst convinces the Wizard’s guard to let them in, where they meet the famed Wizard.

He’s pretty scary, all right.  He insults the group for a few minutes as the group stutters out what they want (a brain, a heart, a home, the nerve), and then lays down his deal: He’ll give them what they want if they bring back the Wicked Witch of the West’s broomstick.  

Left with no other option, Dorothy and Co. head into the forest after the witch, and here I want us to pause for a moment and look at where we are in the story.

For one thing, this is kind of a weird structure for a movie. The setup is fine, a girl finding themselves in a magical world is a normal fantasy format.  The main antagonist was introduced quite some time ago, but she hasn’t really been too much of a threat until now.  We got a few reminders to let us know she’s still in the movie, but we’re really just now getting to see the main ‘conflict’, Dorothy vs. the Witch, and we’re really close to the end of the movie.

It almost seems like we’re just now entering third act climax after a very long first act of rising tension/inciting incident.  It feels as though we’ve skipped right over a second act. The quest to defeat the witch, which in other stories would be starting at the end of the first act, is at the beginning of the third.

The ‘quest’ wasn’t even for Dorothy’s own sake.  She’s doing this because the Wizard is giving her no other choice.  Dorothy isn’t a fantasy hero in the normal sense.  She just wants to get home, and there’s no sense of ‘good vs. evil’ struggle in this film.

So where are we in the story?  Where we are right now is a scared, but determined, little girl doing whatever it takes to get home, with three friends and her dog at her side, marching into the woods to kill the Wicked Witch of the West, a powerful woman who’s been trying to get at her this whole movie.

The Witch’s horde of flying monkeys arrives in the forest, carrying Dorothy and Toto off, mauling the Scarecrow, and subduing the Lion and Tin Man.

Once in the Witch’s castle, threatened with her dog’s death, Dorothy agrees to let the Witch have the slippers, but wouldn’t you know it, the slippers won’t come off her feet.  Enraged, the Witch locks Dorothy in a tower with an hourglass that is counting down time until the Witch kills her.  (The reason she didn’t do it right away is that ‘these things must be done delicately’.  Maybe she needed a spell or something to do it with the Ruby Slippers on her.)  During her imprisonment, she is shown images of her aunt, worriedly calling out for her.

Meanwhile, Toto gets away and rushes to fetch help: the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Lion.  After putting the Scarecrow back together and surmising what must have happened, the trio immediately decide to go rescue Dorothy.

In a display of brainlessness, heartlessness, and gutlessness, they sneak into the Witch’s castle to save their friend, beating up three guards and taking their uniforms in the process.  Seconds before the hourglass runs out, the Tin Man finally gets to use his axe and chops down the door to the room Dorothy is locked inside. Their reunion is cut short, however, by the Witch and her guards, who, after a brief chase, manage to corner them.

The Witch gleefully informs Dorothy that the Witch intends to kill them all, one by one, saving Dorothy for last.  Making good on her promise, she sets the Scarecrow on fire, which, as previously stated, is the one thing that can really kill him.

Horrified, Dorothy grabs a nearby Deus Ex Bucket of Water and douses the Scarecrow, putting him out and saving his life.  In the process, the Witch gets soaked too, and let’s be honest, you all know what happens next.

“You cursed brat! Look what you’ve done! I’m melting! Melting! Oh, what a world! What a world! Who would have thought a good little girl like you could destroy my beautiful wickedness…”

So the Witch vaporizes away, leaving Dorothy and Co. stunned and surrounded by the Witch’s guards, who thank Dorothy profusely for murdering their leader.  They gladly give them the broomstick they were sent after, and the gang immediately heads back to the Emerald City, full of joy and confidence.

Once they arrive back in the Wizard’s presence, however, he immediately begins wavering on his deal, telling them to come back tomorrow.

Dorothy, having recently (if accidently) vanquished the most feared person in all of Oz, is having none of it.  She stands up to the Wizard and is just setting in on giving him a piece of her mind before Toto rushes to an ignored corner of the room, pulling back a concealing fabric and revealing a scared little man behind the curtain, working frantically at his machinery in an attempt to draw their attention away from him.

The man (also Frank Morgan) admits the truth: he is the Wizard of Oz, and has no wonderful powers whatsoever, but he does stave off their anger with a few items from our world, where he is apparently from.  To the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion, he bestows gifts that officially grant them the traits they were ‘lacking’.

A diploma, medal, or clock won’t get Dorothy home, however, but the Wizard has an idea.  He arrived in Oz several years ago by a decidedly less fantastic way than Dorothy had: he had come by hot air balloon, and it just so happens that it is in perfect condition.  The Wizard decides that it is time for him to go home as well, and offers to take Dorothy with him.  Of course she accepts.

However, while the departure is taking place, there is a scuffle involving Toto and a cat, and the balloon takes off with the Wizard, but not Dorothy.  The girl is now in complete despair about ever getting back to Kansas, and even though she’d be welcome in the Emerald City, she’s coming to the realization that there’s no place like home.

Cue Deus Ex Glinda.

The Good Witch arrives in their midst and tells Dorothy something that probably would have been helpful before if not for The Plot: The Ruby Slippers that Dorothy has been wearing could have taken her home any time she wanted, simply by clicking her heels and saying ‘There’s no place like home’.

(I wish I had a pair of those.  That’d make social gatherings much less uncomfortable.)

Dorothy tearfully wishes her friends goodbye and with Toto in tow, follows Glinda’s instructions and wakes up in familiar, gray Kansas, surrounded by her aunt, uncle, farmhands, and Professor Marvel.  It was all Just A Dream.

Contrived?  Maybe. Or maybe not.

A lot of people have quite a few problems with the ending of the Wizard of Oz (besides the Scarecrow’s math slipup, which we aren’t addressing today).  For example, if Glinda knew the slippers did that this whole time, why send Dorothy on this dangerous adventure and have her murder a Witch?

(Or maybe it was Manslaughter.  It was accidental, after all.)

For a while, I subscribed to the theory of it just being an easy way to end the story.  In the original book, the Good Witch who sends Dorothy off and the Good Witch who helps her get home are two different people.  I just assumed that the scriptwriters just crammed them into one person, didn’t realize the Adaptation Induced Plothole, and just hoped no one would notice.  (I didn’t like this movie for much of my childhood, and I was rather cynical towards it.)

However, when I watched it again, I had another thought.

First off, this entire adventure was a dream, and if we can accept talking lions, scarecrows, and men made out of tin, we can sure as heck accept the fact that Dorothy’s subconscious wasn’t thinking of a plot-sensible way to get home.

Secondly, and more important thematically, this way home matters to Dorothy’s journey.  In the beginning of the first act, we see Dorothy’s desperation to be elsewhere, somewhere where her dreams come true, somewhere brighter and Better than Kansas. And then she gets her wish.

For any other fantasy hero, this would be amazing.  She immediately is hailed as a hero and makes three good friends, defeats a villain, and has the opportunity to stay behind in this magical land where she has learned so much.  But what does Dorothy say at the end?

“If I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, l won’t look any further than my own backyard, because if it isn’t there I never really lost it to begin with.”

Right from the beginning, as we’ve mentioned, all she wants is to go back home, to be with her family and friends, and to be content with the life she had.  Her ‘Hero’s Journey’ isn’t learning to strike out on her own and be Independent.  Her ‘Hero’s Journey’ is gaining the same things her friends did: brains, heart, and courage.

She proves her own intelligence, her own caring, and most importantly, her own bravery.  She learns agency.  In the beginning of the story, she is helpless, running away from her life because the adults in her life are unable to help her.  The story of Dorothy is of being able to affect where you are in life, not by escaping, but by dealing with your problems yourself.

By initially going to the Wizard to be sent home and finding out she had the ability to do it herself, Dorothy realizes that she has power and agency in her own life, and that she can’t, and shouldn’t, totally rely on others to fix her problems.  So in a way, it makes sense that she had to go through all of that before she could go home.

By the same token, she’s also learned that she belongs with her family at the moment.  Dorothy is still a child, and does spend a good deal of the movie worrying especially about her aunt.  Where she begins the movie feeling swept aside by her family, Dorothy realizes how much she cares about and needs family and friends in her life.  She has learned to be self-sufficient, but not alone.

That’s a pretty good message for a kid, and indeed, for people of all ages.  With that in mind, it makes a lot of sense that people have kept coming back to this film for its heartwarming story.  There’s a reason this movie is a classic, after all.

In the upcoming articles, we’ll be taking a look at some more of the fascinating facets that make up The Wizard of Oz, so please, stay tuned for next time!  Thank you all so much for reading and feel free to message me with your own thoughts. I hope to ‘see’ you in the next article!

[onegirllis]

Since Life is Strange 2 is finally fully released, I let myself to write a probably not-so-short review of the complete season. The momentum for such a summary is already gone I presume but it took me a moment to finally digest and find the proper words to describe what I think and feel about this production. Following the game from the start, I patiently waited to look at the story as a whole, hoping to find an explanation for tons of burning questions and satisfying outcomes to my choices and decisions. Unfortunately, most of those didn’t happen, therefore I present you with a piece that is not very favorable towards the newest Dontnod production, harsh in places but honest. Please, do not read if you really enjoyed the story of the two brothers and find it meaningful and important, not burdened with any fallacy. Life is way too short to read reviews that just leave you frustrated.

Remember the scene in Life is Strange season one (I still hate the fact that I have to separate different instances of the franchise calling them seasons), when Max summoned by an enormous plasma TV in Victoria’s room fantasizes about watching “Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within” on it? “I like this movie, I don’t care what everybody says,” getting protective about her preferences, the little freckle leaves the room soon after, never gifting us with any explanation as to why she indeed values this animation so much or why it was an important statement. It was never brought back again, it will never matter, becoming simply a meme material or a trigger for snarky comments from Twitch streamers and YouTubers. I watched the said movie a long time ago, recalling only two things about it: the breathtaking animation of hair at the beginning and the fact that the main male character looked like Ben Affleck. The rest of the story fell into obscurity before the end credits hit the screen. I reached for this title only because I was interested in anything video games related, and the name of the popular franchise was more than enough.

The same thing goes for Life is Strange 2.

Just like the mentioned FF: The Spirits Within, the second instance of the beloved series is more of an animation than an interactive experience. Recently, plenty of video games, overwhelmed by finally reachable technology of smooth mocaps, facial expressions, hyper-realistic locations, and scanned people as characters, turned into an alley dedicated to B-class movies. From adventures by David Cage to Death Stranding, video games started to flip their working template, replacing the actual action with long animations, not the other way around. With scattered gameplay, sometimes forced as if the developers reminded themselves at the last minute that this product is supposed to be interactive, they raise an eyebrow at best, and boil your blood with the lack of creativity at its worst. Life Is Strange 2 follows this trend with astonishing enthusiasm and to the core. Even regarding this particular genre that’s supposed to focus on narrative, it barely stands as a walking simulator becoming a hardly watchable TV series — a road trip story where walking is limited.

Well, shit.

The gameplay in Life is Strange 2 is nonexistent. To be frank, riveting action-packed sequences were never a trademark of the series, but a blatant lack of any didn’t make this experience any better. With the first one, the rewind power allowed the player to actually be part of the narrative. The second, where Sean just serves as a witness to his brother’s actions, plays more like a full motion picture. An enormous amount of un-skippable cut-scenes change LIS2 into a tedious, dragging journey straight from the worst selection of buy 1 get 3 free Z-class movies. The music and the mastery in creating an atmosphere that rose Dontnod to international fame due to widespread acclaim can’t save those sequences either. It almost feels like their own creation so enchanted the development team that they ignored all the red flags and clumsy solutions to immerse in the world themselves, treating the actual player as a lesser evil, throwing them a bone just to claim it is a video game format. To no surprise, most of the items the player interacts with don’t matter at all and don’t serve any purpose either to foreshadow an upcoming outcome, present exposition to the world, or be in any way helpful.

The lack of superpower is not an issue here though. Before the Storm met the expectations with way more grace, proving that a story doesn’t need a lot of strange in life to grip and hold its audience for hours. Watching a superhero growing up is an interesting premise, but a hell of a challenge to execute and execute well. Some stories like “Little Man Tate” translate to a brilliant film, but don’t necessarily work as games, after the planning stage or first Game Design Document. The references regarding the first game also remain scattered and uneven, tossed on the pile with a heap of faith that devoted fans would notice, but without a purpose in mind.

Even if I sound harsh, I do believe that Dontnod wanted to deliver the best story possible, but Life is Strange 2 feels even too big to absorb or fill with details. Captain Spirit, not necessarily my cup of tea either, was in my opinion way more coherent, as the creative team felt more comfortable with such a small scope of a product. Everything falls into place after careful exploration, makes more sense with every minute. The mystery about the mother, an alumnus of Blackwell Academy, and an admirer of Jefferson’s work is a solid premise that didn’t raise expectations up the roof nor overpromise. The mystery of yet another mother, this time Life is Strange 2, played for over 3 and a half episodes, falls flat in comparison and ends in the disappointing question “that’s it?”

No, that’s not it. There’s more to it.

Life is Strange 1 was mocked as Tumblr: The Game, while the second instance could easily pass as Twitter: The Animated Series. The writers didn’t challenge themselves or the audience to answer the question of why certain people voted for Donald Trump, or why they would do it yet again. The only reason presented in the story is quite simplistic and obvious – because they are evil, deplorable people, not worth listening to. They are the worst. We are better. Issues of being harangued by foreigners about domestic policies and troubles of your own country are a brewing can of worms I wouldn’t like to touch at the moment. Still, this particular stance, which serves as painful generalization that every single republican voter in the US is foul, can be forged only by someone who either lives in a bubble or doesn’t live here at all. Simply because we all have parents, grandparents, relatives, friends, or co-workers who decided to elect the actual prescient to power. Some of them are racists, disgusting, and horrible personas, and some just belong to the scared of change, confused and manipulated crowd that don’t accept the fast-paced transformation nor the need for a revolution. We coexist together, arguing and fighting, especially during holiday breaks, but even if it costs me a headache, I wouldn’t call them evil. Millions of people voted for Trump, but only a few wouldn’t spit on a swastika if confronted with the Nazi banner.

It’s even more painful when you understand what kind of message was sewed into the stitches of a shattered story. There was no ill will, or at least I don’t think so, but an honest, genuine need to express the concern about modern America. Unfortunately, when executed, this concern changed into another yell or discourse by the family table during an argument with your racist uncle. An open discussion in a game community that unifies both left and right supporters equally by their love for this form of entertainment would be appreciated by many, just like after playing LIS1, a handful of people changed their views on LGBT issues.

Instead of a lesson that had to be experienced, we got a lecture about morality and tolerance, contradicting itself constantly and nonchalantly following the well-known tropes NOT in a sarcastic and admirable way known from Saturday Night Live, but in a lazy and sometimes even clumsy substitute of a dramatic format. The political landscape painted in LIS2 is caricatural, unforgiving, harsh like a deserted wasteland with a few peaceful oases to stop at, but shies over its own existence, not willing to thoroughly discuss the dreadful weather. Guess what? The sand won’t change into greener pastures only because you close your eyes, putting your imagination to work. Donald Trump might not be re-elected for a second term, but his supporters will stay in place, even more conflicted by the other side. It’s a brave decision to deliver such a punitive story but such a cowardice to break its pillars, hoping that the general public wouldn’t notice or get distracted when things get too heated up.

The lack of subtlety forced scene by scene is even more polarizing. There is no peaceful dialogue with the other side as if it couldn’t exist in this world. There is no change of heart or a path to do so. Sometimes it feels like the only message that LIS2 writers wanted to provide was to find your own, peaceful and liberal hermitage, either among hipsters in the Redwood forest, driving a car that your ‘family with money but no soul’ had bought you or move to a trailer park filled with artistic souls in Nowhere, Arizona. Any contact with the outside world can hurt you and your feelings. Drop off the grid or die. The end.

No discussion.

The efforts of trying to understand the motivation behind even the most dreadful character of the first game, got lost in preparation for the second. LIS2 builds a higher wall between two political sides, than any other game released after Trump became the president of the United States and desperately wants to keep it erected, ignoring the crumbling foundations of such. A proverbial river you shall not cross nor build bridges over since the only outcome would end up in death, destruction, or you and your young brother getting hurt.

I’m familiar with the discussion about LIS2, especially with a shouting match that if you do not like this instance, you are therefore a racist pig, a disgusting person without a soul, conscience, or working brain that doesn’t understand the situation and never will. On the contrary. In my humble opinion, we deserve a better discussion, better stories, better representation, not sticking to whatever is presented because it’s brave enough or was never approached before. I disagree with the stance that a Latino, bisexual main character is enough to close your eyes, omitting all problems that this title tries to shun, riding its high horse. No. Those topics are way too crucial to just walk past, setting for less with your head down, thanking for the game industry to take notice. You the player deserve better, even if you don’t struggle with specific issues on a daily basis. And after playing LIS2, you may feel so good about yourself, stating that an effort was made but it it wasn’t made enough.

I expected more. I wanted Dontnod to do more, and frankly, I feel silly putting so much faith in them and supporting their efforts. Armed with resources provided by Square Enix, I’m sure they are aware of the fact that most of their audience is quite young and wouldn’t mind a lesson or message about what to do amidst troubled times. Well, Dontnod doesn’t have any but warns you that voicing your opinion or being different may end up in disaster. Outraged, they just yell at the news, angry about what our reality has changed into, but nothing comes out of it. It’s all right, though. Our parents do the same thing. We started to do the same thing, but instead of complaining to family members, we have Twitter.

While Life is Strange 2 tries really hard to come across as a realistic and raw portrait of the US at the end of the decade, they didn’t have enough courage to show realistic obstacles two runaways would be faced with. The brothers do meet a handful of bigots and racists, but the rest of the fellow travelers help them beyond understanding or hidden agenda. Sean and Daniel never really struggle to find a place to stay or a warm meal, usually complaining on or off the screen just before the game mercifully provides them with a solution. There’s no trap they can fall into, no ambiguous characters that promise one thing and then demand something in return. It’s very honorable for Brody to pay for a place to stay, but if an adult man gave young kids a key to a motel room, I would consider a way more sinister outcome. It’s not even about Brody himself, since good people exist, just like the racist ones, but the boys not even once are put in a realistic, scary situation created by a supposed ally. If somebody is helpful, this person is always decent, offering them a job, a ride, some food or money. The bad people wear red hats and yell racist slurs. America by Dontnod is simple to navigate but raw and painful when not necessary and fairy-tale-like when it could teach an actual lesson. Running away from home is not so hazardous because of Trump supporters but because you can end up dead in a ravine, being robbed and raped. It’s not the first and surely not the last time when the developers feared to touch any topic of sexual abuse with a ten-foot pole, but then the journey plays more like a vacation than a desperate escape. Sean gets beaten-up a few times, loses his eye due to a brawl, but it doesn’t affect him at all in the long run. When Daniel finally gets kidnapped, it’s not an Epstein-like circle, dealing with human trafficking, but a religious cult that worships him. The first option, even if it feels like a stretch, is unfortunately way more realistic than the latter.

Preaching to the choir is not the biggest sin this game commits though. That brings me to the most discussed theme of the production, which is education.

With all due respect to the developers, writers, and designers, Life is Strange 2 in this aspect falls flat as a discovery of a Sunday father, who is responsible for taking his kid to the zoo and struggles to find any common ground with his offspring, either trying to crack jokes about famous pop-culture phenomena or talk about food discussing their next favorite meal. The said father is trying his best though, perfectly aware that it’s his only chance to teach his son a thing or two, but doesn’t know exactly where to start, torn apart between buying more ice cream and throwing a fit about a stain on the carpet. The father doesn’t even like kids that much and can’t translate his lessons into an engaging play that would be memorized forever, rolling his eyes and counting the days to his kid’s graduation so they could share a beer or two and talk about adult things. Now, any effort to explain how the world works seems to be in vain, therefore a waste of his precious time. Leaving the emotional approach aside, the father doesn’t have to cuddle with his kid when he’s scared, bullied, traumatized or asks millions of questions about the future or present, because the full-time mother is waiting at home willing to replace him in this duty. The mother, knowing that her ex-partner sucks big time at talking about feelings, will be the one who will hold the kid, patiently explaining that the boogieman does not exist, playing pirates, or stay late at night to distract his sorrows. The kid will never discuss his fears with his dad though, trying so hard to impress his male parent. He will never know, and it’s fine. The mother is going to do the job while he can deliver a once a week entertainment along with the lines of ultimate wisdom that most likely will be forgotten anyway.

This is not raising a kid, it’s nursing them like a fragile plant in a flowerpot, focusing on water, sun, and fertilizer, but discarding the emotional background, hoping that somebody else would take care of such issues if things go south.

Sean can’t raise his brother well, simply because he is immature and will stay immature for the rest of the game. There is no moment when he truly goes through a transformation changing from a boy to a man, a fully grown-up adult who takes responsibility for his actions and makes sacrifices for the sake of the greater good. No, surrendering in a fight in the church doesn’t serve as one, neither does the first sexual experience. He doesn’t wonder even once if the hastily constructed plan is benefiting Daniel, forcing it to the last minutes of the game, taking the separation as the worst thing that could happen. There’s no spark of a tragedy like in “The Road” when a father gives up his son to strangers for the sake of saving him. Sean doesn’t care, presenting no character development across the board, merely pushing forward. If there are doubts, they disappear in the blink of an eye when the next cut-scene takes place.

I understand that such a young lad as Sean wouldn’t know how to raise a kid, especially if having no model to rely on. However, a part of growing pains is developing the awareness that we know way less than we assumed. That said, Sean Diaz is always assuming he is right, not asking for advice regarding Daniel even once. Apparently, it’s not something that he’s interested in or ever will be. If Life is Strange 2 wants to pass as a coming of age story, it falls on its face before it even starts.

Moreover, locked in the auto-driven plot, Sean cannot grow up and gain a new perspective; otherwise, the story wouldn’t reach its big, explosion-packed finale of crossing the border. His desperate efforts of influencing his brother usually converge to order him around, feed him with half-truths or simply leave him in the dark when convenient. I didn’t see any difference or change in Sean’s approach from episode one when he scolded his brother, annoyed for his party plans being interrupted, and in episode three, when he reacts similarly, for the sake of spending time alone with the chosen love interest. There’s no deep thought, no wonder about his own wrongdoings expressed to his brother, no faults admitted, no fallacies explained, with one life-threating situation after another. From an illegal weed growing farm, to destroying police stations, Sean just follows the road, paved by the writers, oblivious to the harm done to his younger sibling, as if Daniel simply forgets the morally gray choices, growing his moral spine entirely on performing chores. Washing the dishes and peeling potatoes does not make us better people but understanding a perspective so different than our own does. Thanks to Sean, Daniel expands his world, but it’s a very one-sided perspective, focusing on always praised, hippie-style liberties, and disregarding every option that requires any code of conduct, as represented by the grandparents. While the older brother forces the younger one to keep up with the designed tasks, he never discusses the issues that really matter. In episode 3, the youngster gets involved in a heist, a robbery, but after it fails, costing Sean his eye and the possible death of some of their companions, this is never mentioned. Mexico, a plan that is hardly a plan at all, is supposed to be an answer to all the questions and doubts. El Dorado of knowledge.

This is not how you raise a dog, not to mention a child.

There is no emotional bond, no special ties between the brothers, except a few problematic moments that play mostly on simple connection forged by blood, not by circumstances. Sean worries about Daniel because he’s his brother, but the player starts to wonder quite quickly why and what for. Reminiscing about old times gets nailed down to a few lines about the comforts and amenities of a life long gone. The tough topics, such as grieving after personally witnessing their father’s death, are mentioned scarcely and without much emphasis, as if serving only as a reminder to the player, but not a poignant struggle. Same goes with the dog, their friends mutilated at the end of the weed farm chapter, Chris (aka captain spirit) who is mentioned just before the end credits of the second episode, and tons of others. On top of it, the scattered and not so often dialogue lines about putting people in danger refer only to the good folk, siding with the brothers, not to humankind in general. Killing a police officer or knocking down a gas station owner are just natural ways of how things work in America, honorable deeds since it’s apparently perfectly fine for a kid to attempt a homicide if people are mean.

What a brave story.

Chloe Price had been suffering for five years after William, her beloved father, died in a car crash. For Sean and Daniel, there is no grief to experience, but a memory to share with a plan to erect a monument in the future. Esteban Diaz is a plot device, a symbol of inequality, but not a family member. Even a dream sequence with his guest appearance lacks the impact of the subconscious conversations we’ve seen in Before the Storm. It just simply doesn’t matter.

I can’t believe I have to say this but the relatable part about LIS1 wasn’t the tornado, just like in LIS2 crossing the border is its weakest point, but it’s those small moments, gestures, quick smiles in passing, the atmosphere and a breath of fresh air when a line, sometimes silly, got dropped. In the most recent story, there is not a single line worth quoting, memorizing, or discussing. And please, don’t bring up “awesome possum” again. It’s literally taken from The Lego Movie song.

The brothers, just like Thelma and Louise, decide to leave everything behind, throwing away the life as they knew it and forging their own future despite all odds. Although, when the two desperate women drive off the cliff committing suicide, chased by the armed forces, there is nothing to explain as the audience fully understands their reasoning. Their will of life was strong, but the path they followed was too steep to return. Without any help or support, confronted with brutal honesty and the world’s cruelty around them, it is the best possible solution. The story of the two brothers, even if it tries to echo the iconic movie, couldn’t be more different. Despite resources at their disposal, family members that do care about their wellbeing, the whole community rising in protest in their hometown, they risk everything for the sake of getting back to the land they don’t even know. Their Mexican heritage is also mentioned just as an exposition, and, as we learn in the very last episode, just before the ending that Daniel doesn’t speak Spanish. So why do the stubborn Diaz brothers despite all odds travel to Mexico? Because.

Canada was too close, I guess.

Last but not least, let’s talk about sex, because why the hell not. A lot of fans or admirers of the previous instances howled across all social media about how much they miss Max and Chloe. I don’t really think it’s the case, but those two girls symbolize something that LIS2 has a tremendous problem with. There’s no emotional connection between the characters the brothers meet along the way, especially the ones that really should matter. Even the love interests feel more like nagging choices than anything else, an experiment during a camping trip, not something that would last or could be fantasized about. Instead of nerve-wracking decisions such as if you’re supposed to kiss Rachel, hold her hand, or the ecstatic discovery (for PriceFielders, but it was ecstatic, right?) that Chloe changed her phone’s background, we are instead presented with a lineup of sexual experiences, that maybe trail-blaze the road when it comes to topics tackled by a video game, but fall into obscurity as an emotional construction. There is no build-up between Sean and Finn as everything develops to a kiss in one conversation, and Cassidy has fewer lines than Victoria Chase before she invites Sean to her tent. We watch it as we watched it before, trying to get attached, feel something, but the only thing we remember was how much it touched us years ago when we played a different game but with a similar title. The sex scene, relatable or not, is stripped from the emotional intimacy and is as sensitively challenging as a dog being killed.

Character development doesn’t move an inch even if Sean, a surrogate father to his brother, lost his virginity to an older girl. There’s no single thought in his head that he might conceive his own offspring during this short but probably memorable experience. There’s not a single line except for the satisfaction of some female parts finally discovered. Oh, dashing explorer, will you ever learn?

It’s sad. I did want to like this game and gave it plenty of chances like no other titles ever. I’ve made excuses for the poor execution, technical problems, with the whiny voice acting that was driving me up the wall, plot twists written (I think) on a lunch break, and so on, but I couldn’t stand it. It’s a hard pass when it comes to a video game in general, not to mention the story, script, and everything else. Life is Strange season one; a low-budget production, was the first step to create a masterpiece that LIS2 might’ve been able to become. The second season didn’t learn much from LIS1’s mistakes, additionally exchanging the well-known beauty for a garbage fire, ignoring all the warning signs along the way. Delivering a story that tackles such important topics, it slides between the checkmarks on the board of issues, mentioning conversion therapy, religion, gayness, illegal immigration, and a spiral of crimes but never elaborating on any of them. There is no meat and potatoes presented on the plate of events, but just a sticky, sweet gravy with nothing underneath that leaves you not only hungry but frustrated, willing to call the chef and yell at the waiter. The trick is that unless you were living under a rock, there are tons of other productions in different media that give those themes justice, carefully unfolding all the aspects, giving voice to both sides. The fact that it’s the first video game having an affair with serious issues doesn’t matter. I don’t believe that anybody who consumes any kind of other media like decent books, movies, or TV shows can remain blind to the problems of Life is Strange 2, claiming it to be a good story. It’s not.

So here we are, girls, boys, and beyond. Life is Strange 2 with its broken mechanics, story, characters, and spirit slowly but surely will be forgotten. It’s Dontnod’s Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within that you might love to watch or play on your brand-new TV, despite what everybody else would say, omitting any valid or invalid criticism, but unfortunately, it won’t change the general optics about this particular piece of media. A lost chance or recklessness created a convoluted mess and with a heart beating in the wrong place. You might praise Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, get excited about it since it’s a free world, free country (and even if it’s not, no one will take this ersatz of such liberty) and don’t let anybody tell you what to love. The problem is, that most likely the only thing that people will remember about this production is that the main male character looked like Ben Affleck and the hair animation was dope. Everything else won’t matter.

The same thing goes, unfortunately, for Life is Strange 2, subtitle: The Spirits Without.

[abenignsmile]

Some Cielonica shipping meme I did! 

I was lazy so for the portraits I used the art I commissioned from my friend @toivoshi​! (Please check them, they do amazing art and has a super cool ongoing comic series!!)

Links to templates! First (originally posted by senaizuuchan) || Second || Third and Fourth

Note: I changed the second template’s “Screams at bugs” to “Scoops bugs and throws them away” and also added a horse into the driver part since this is Fire Emblem, baybee!!

Also, more talk about these memes under the cut!!

General Ship Meme Stuff

Height Ciela has already stopped growing for a long time. Her height capped at 158 cm/5'1" feet while Veronica keeps on growing. She will eventually outgrow Ciela (maybe she'd hit somewhere 170 or even 175).

Age I never decided on their age. All I know is just Brave!Veronica (I will write as Beronica from now on) is older than Princess Veronica (just Veronica if I write her more) because she seems more mature and more stable as a person. I HC-ed that Veronica is somewhere at 13~16 y.o. while Beronica is at 18 ~ early 20s y.o. and Thrasir is already at mid 20s (maybe 26~27). Ciela in my mind has always been the age of uni/college student, or a fresh graduate who's struggling to find jobs in the world. Her background is still very much vague so I never really thought much about her age.

Falling in love Ciela is very much easily attracted to people, esp those who makes her feel really good. Her romantic disposition usually doesn't stop at anyone w/ feminine tendencies, but she just feels far more comfortable around those who identifies as female, due to multiple reasons. She doesn't mind guys in general, but they just don't get her going. Anyway, she fell in love with Beronica literally at first sight.

Beronica, due to her position, lived a more isolated life, and also is more wary of people in general. There is a limited number of people who she trusts. I HC-ed that she doesn't have much great experience with males (cause iirc her dad was a bastard) except those who she viewed with more brotherly or platonic view like her own brother or Xander. She's most likely a lesbian but also a demiromantic at the same time. Took her a while to develop her feelings towards Ciela, but after that, she's like a car without brakes.

Relationship experience Ciela had been in relationship w/ some guys before she realized she's not really into them. She never really hooked up with any girls because of some prejudice about same sex relationship where she came from, so Beronica is literally her first lesbian partner.

As mentioned above, Beronica lived quite in more isolation so she never really had any romantic relationship experience beyond the formality. She’s not awkward at them however, due to all the manners and diplomatic lessons she received. (And Beronica does have that different streaks of confidence than Veronica. The way they talk is vastly different, with Beronica showing more confidence and is more demanding in tone compared to Veronica’s more flat and reserved tone).

Affections/PDA/Protectiveness Once Beronica enters a serious relationship with Ciela (post their support thing you can read here), Beronica shows Ciela tons of affections and lavishes her with love as she realizes how great of a person Ciela is, and is a bit in a way to repay her for everything she did. Bero doesn't hestitate to hold her hand, hugs her, or even treats potential Ciela courters with much cold or threatening gaze. She'd leave "marks" on Ciela's body but since Ciela dresses very modestly, there's just no room for that, lmao. Fortunately, Bero can show great degree of professionality as a hero first and foremost and not terribly possessive in "you can't interact with people but me" way, since she understands that Ciela is a very important person in the Order of Heroes. She also trusts Ciela enough because she knows Ciela isn't really attracted to anyone else but Bero really.

Ciela mostly have treated Vero the same since the beginning. She did show a great deal of attention towards Beronica to fight off the Embla curse and for everything else really (since she was the fool who fell in love first). She's more reserved in showing her affection since she's a little shyer at times, and a bit bad at words, but she can also be clingy to Beronica, and never minds the affectionate PDA thing Beronica do to her. She also knows that Beronica is rarely ever interested in anyone else but her so things are really bueno for them.

Pet Names They call each other "my beloved" or "dearly beloved". Ciela has a secret nickname for Bero that is "Ronnie", but she uses it more privately because some early heroes who knew about this often teases them about it. They don't have other "silly" pet names because they're just that type of straightforward couple hahah.

Bonus: an alternate versison of Ciela who used to be Thrasir's SO called Thrasironica with the nickname of "night charm" and "night sky". In return, Thrasir called her "thunder" or "paradise". Both pet names are references to some important symbols in their relationship (that are quite different from present Ciela and Beronica).

Smaller stuff/trivias

“Scoops bugs and throws them away” was changed from “screams at bugs” because both Ciela and Beronica thankfully aren't afraid at bugs. They have different level of fascination towards it and behaves really differently. However, Ciela is more pacifist in her approach when dealing with pests while Beronica is more straightforward to kill.

Beronica being a princess once made her very sloppy at doing chores and cookings (I'll talk about this in the food section). She's doing her best, but ultimately Ciela or other heroes prefer to do it on their own most of the time. Beronica is good at keeping her stuff organized at least. They’d still let her do polishing or weapon maintenance since she’s very meticulate and careful. They will also let her do the horse care duty since she’s good with them.

On driving - Beronica has a very loyal horse named Randgridr (whom I don't talk about enough) so she's very good at dealing with animals in general and has great mastery on working with them. In modern AU, this just means she'd get her license as early as she could and just go everywhere with the car she owns. She's also not a clumsy driver. - Ciela eventualy gets to have a falicorn of her own (a black falicorn named Benthe whom she and Bero found when they both ran away to the mountain when Anna declared beach day) so she'd get a mastery on working with mounted animals. In modern AU, she's probably that person who has driving license but doesn't really drive unless she really has to.

On sleeping habit - Ciela is very much a night owl and has hard time getting up in the morning. She often misses roll call and at this point most people in Order of Heroes already accepted this and can proceed business as usual without her.  - Veronica is also a night owl, but this derives from her often having nightmares due to the Curse of Embla. Once meeting Ciela, her sleep quality actually improves a lot - Sometimes they do a lot of “things” at night to tire themselves out and helps them falling asleep better. 

Food Meme Stuff

I imagined both of them aren't very picky eaters. Bero maybe so in the beginning, but being a royal, I imagined she has great palate and experience with foods, and was able to help improve the flavor of foods in the Order via her feedback. She generally eats anything as long as they're prepared properly. She also understand the importance of eating well being a soldier herself.

Ciela isn't picky because of her previous background not letting her eat as much as she wants so she's always eager on trying something new. She became good at cooking solely for the reason of feeding herself and some people who lived with her at some point.

Favorite Food/Drinks

Ciela likes food that tastes great both hot and cold, but she has more tongue to eat more "refreshing" food. Maybe she used to live in a tropical country...

Bero is a meat lover. She loves them anyhow they're cooked, but she mostly likes them roasted or made into meatballs and served with some juicy and sour berry sauce or jam to balance the fatty flavor.

I don't know how to describe "herbal soft drinks" better than it does, but basically soft drinks are sort of any drinks that is meant to be enjoyed lightly as opposed to alcoholic drinks, right? (though they are mostly being used to refer to carbonated drinks). So one day I had the chance to eat at an international restaurant in a hotel and for the local menu, they have these selection of "soft drinks" that are basically combination of herbs and fruits and woods that are just so??? good??? They're clear colored (some red, some green, depending on the ingredients) so maybe they're like infused drinks or filtered juice(?), and one of my favorite has peppermint, ginger, sappan wood, and lime in it. It is served cold and is also sweet (maybe they added sweetener to it). So I imagined Bero would like to drink these refreshing drinks because they taste great and possibly has great benefits for health too since they're mostly from natural ingredients.

On Cafe Drinks

I HC-ed that in Zenith, Askr grows tea while Embla grows coffee. This makes for the reason why Askrans like to drink tea a lot and Veronica in one of the FEH comic is clueless about tea brewing.

This reflects on Bero's choice of caffeine drink. She doesn't mind tea but more used to coffee. She usually takes them plain or just with milk or cream.

Ciela prefers tea because she just doesn't like the flavor of coffee. She prefers her tea chilled though. She drinks boba or jelly drink back in her world.

On Alcoholic Drinks

I think both Ciela and Bero are very modest drinker, as in they won't drink unless it's for someone else or for any important occassion.

Ciela is a moderate drinker. She holds herself very well and will definitely stop before she gets drunk and totally lose herself. When drunk however, she will get very "proper" and apologetic. She will get sad and apologize a lot, letting out much of her inner worries, and probably also auto pilots herself to properly tidy herself before she fell asleep. Some people enjoys her drunken state because finally they'll be able to find out more about her since Ciela keeps to herself most of the time.

Beronica if drunk gets on the pretty happy but sarcastic side like suddenly her words became much sharper (and honest) while she says it in very smiley face or her normal tone. She also gets far more daring. Her auto-pilot mode isn't as great as Ciela's however.

On Food

Living in Order of Heroes, everyone gets to eat properly and equally due to the strict living schedule, though Ciela gets to skimp on that sometimes since she often misses breakfast. The heroes often save an easy to eat breakfast for her so she can eat them during meetings or study or chores.

Ciela eats quite a lot. Nobody knows where all those extra calories goes. Most guesses it goes to her brain and her tiddies.

Veronica loves spicy food and Ciela can't stand them so much. She has a tongue that's pretty sensitive to the spice that'll numb her tongue and make her unable to taste anything else. It mostly saddens her because she thinks it's a great flavor and makes food exciting.

Ciela loves her sweets and bakes or cooks to feed herself. Veronica is more moderate on it, but she'd take some sweet-savory snack for herself.

That’s all for now?? If I missed anything, feel free to ask!! 

Thanks for reading uwu)b

[unsoundedcomic]

Btw what ares your fashion inperations wuth unsounded anyways? Is it historical? Fatasy media? People walking aroubd in general? Also im not a robot.

I’m pretty bad at fashion. I literally only ever wear jeans/shorts and teeshirts, with the latter usually featuring Samus Aran, a skull, or a design from Frightrags. Also I have a collection of beloved hoodies.

So my main clothing... muse? for Unsounded is Hayao Miyazaki, because I also feel he knows dick about fashion and yet he has never let this stop him.

Cresce and Alderode have their cultural norms, and those are a template for what I put characters in, but I don’t sweat over whether or not something looks super unique or stylish. Like, I know a huge proportion of comic and manga artists obsess over their character designs. Drawing after drawing of characters wearing different configurations of belts. Skin windows punched into various places in their spandex. Pauldrons so misshapen they’d have more blind spots than an SUV.

But, maybe because I’m the writer, too, I obsess much more about what’s inside the characters than what they’re wearing. As long as their attire’s appropriate to them and makes them stand out as individuals, I’m happy.

Like the twin sisters Sara and Siya, they were a fun challenge. All the girls are wearing the same shrine outfit, so I had to rely on body shape, hair, and their faces to differentiate them. But with Siya, I wanted to show how she’s not really fine with her life and her place in the world. So she’s the only girl at the shrine who’s tried to do something different with her uniform. She has the yellow tunic unbuttoned and open, and her tassels tied around her forehead. Honestly it’s dorky. She’s like that weird art girl in junior high that maybe got picked on because she wore three wrist watches or had drawn shit all over her sneakers in Sharpie. She’s not cool, but she’s not there to be cool. She’s just a dumb teenager who wants you to know she’s Different and Aware and Specifically Rejects All Of This.

Also ive asked you questions beforw and u disnent answer did u ever feel overwhelmed by the amount of people you dont know asking you queations? How does irt feel like to be a semi-celebrity? Im not. A robor.

Yeah, there’s no way I can answer even half of all the questions that come in daily! It would eat into comic-making time. I answer the ones that I feel I can respond to interestingly, or the ones where someone really obviously didn’t understand something and needs clarification. Also I’m like not even a semi-celebrity, I’m just a scribbling scrub doing her best to entertain y’all and tell a story :)

I was sober befire btw

I never doubted it.

[spiritmaiden23]

HANDY DANDY RP PLOTTING CHEAT-SHEET FOR ZELDA (skyward sword)!

Want new-and-exciting plots for your character? Long to reach out to more of your followers, but don’t know where to start? Fear not! Fill out this form and give your RP partners both present and future all the of juicy jumping off points they need to help you get your characters acquainted.

Be sure to tag the players whose characters YOU want more cues to interact with, and repost, don’t reblog! Feel free to add or remove sections as you see fit. Templatehere.

mun name: Amber! ooc contact: My DMs are always open for mutuals and non-mutuals alike! In case I’m not here you can always reach my personal which is over @sealilys annnd I do have a discord however that’s only for mutuals, I rarely do drops. That out of the way let’s get started! 

who the heck is my muse anyway?

Well, for those who never touched The Legend of Zelda in their lives, I’m sure it’s pretty dang confusing to see more than one design of both Zelda and Link, I’ll try my best to explain this! The series follows a very, very convoluted timeline filled with plotholes, as such the Links and Zeldas we see throughout different titles of the game are actually reincarnations (well Link is the only one reincarnating, Zelda reincarnates once... more on that later) who are destined to seal away whatever darkness may threaten the lands known as Hyrule. 

Skyward Sword is the very beginning of that timeline, with Sky Zelda (this Zelda) being the first Zelda and she comes from a place outside of Hyrule, in fact high above the kingdom known as Skyloft. During her time, the kingdom of Hyrule was not yet established so the place below the clouds is known as The Surface to the Skyloftians. As such, unlike the other princesses we see throughout the series, she is not born a princess but is actually just your average, everyday girl who was studying to become a knight! Zelda is well-known for being charming and vivacious. She’s childhood friends with the sleepyheaded Link and the beloved daughter of the headmaster of the Knight Academy. Life was good and while she dreams of the lands below the islands, believing that there’s something down there instead of a barren wasteland like most seem to believe especially since she hears someone calling for her down there, she was content with spending her days with her best friend. Little did the two know that they both had a heavy destiny thrust upon them by the gods themselves. 

Zelda’s story is one that is about awakening. And she wouldn’t have that awakening until one faithful day where she was ripped from the skies by the self-proclaimed demon lord Ghirahim, with his magic spell that broke through the cloud barrier surrounding Skyloft, she falls and wakes up unharmed on The Surface. After being rescued by an old woman who then informs her of her shared destiny with Link to bring Skyloft back to The Surface while defeating the great demon Demise once and for all, this kickstarts her awakening and she begins her journey in purifying her body at the sacred temples on The Surface and praying to the goddess Hylia to retrieve memories of a time long ago. Along the way, she meets with a Sheikah warrior named Impa who acts as an escort and later treasured friend. 

In truth, Zelda is actually the goddess Hylia reborn as a mortal. In her past life, she knew the Gods of the Old, in fact they were the ones who had instructed Hylia to not only look after her people but to also look after the sacred power of the gods known as the Triforce. A golden artifact that can grant the wish of anyone. Gods can not use this power however mortals and even demons can, this would prompt for Demise to rise from the crack of the earth to obtain that power for selfish desires. As such, there was a great war on The Surface against the dark forces, her people were dying and the war greatly affected the lands. During her final battle against Demise, Hylia constructed a plan that would bring an end to his terror at the cost of her own death. The battle ended with her victory where she manages to seal away Demise while succumbing to her wounds from the battle, later she’d reincarnate as the spirit maiden Zelda. Once Zelda remembers her past, this only fuels her desire to end Demise once and for all with Link’s help. 

And sure enough, despite the bumps and heartache along the way, Link defeats Demise. Yet there was a catch. Before Demise passed away he placed a curse on all three of them where his grudge will bound them to the neverending destiny of Link and Zelda fighting off the incarnation of Demise’s hatred. The story ends with Zelda staying on The Surface to watch over the Triforce while helping colonize the lands. 

things you should know:

Zelda is not a princess. Nor does she become one after the events of the game. She remains as a guardian of sorts for the Triforce considering the fact that the Sacred Realm does not exist, therefore there’s no safe place to hide the Triforce someone has to look over it. Instead she’s a literal goddess, albeit human but she still has her divine powers despite it dwindling greatly compared to her form as Hylia. 

I PLAY LINK AND ZELDA’S RELATIONSHIP AS STRICTLY PLATONIC WITH HINTS OF ROMANCE. It is possible for her to develop feelings for Link but to avoid stepping on any toes, she’s happy with being his friend. 

Zelda does not have the Triforce of Wisdom. Considering the fact that the Triforce does not split, it’s whole in this era. While she can now use the power of it since she’s mortal she prefers not to honestly considering she still has her divine powers from Hylia, while weak when compared to her god form she’s far more powerful than the average human (speaking of humans are not yet known as Hylians during her time). 

She can hear the voices of the gods. Very minutely though but she can hear them. Considering her connection with them and the lore behind the pointed ears, I’d like to think she’d have moments where she can hear soft whispers of them. Rarely do they talk to her though. 

While Zelda is very capable of fighting, she cannot fight any of the beasts during her main verse where’s she’s traveling the Surface to find the temples to purify her body. Not only will they outnumber her, not only she is without a weapon, but the monsters let out this miasma when defeated and it’s possible for that miasma to affect her purification process. For the most part, you’ll see her sneak around monsters. If push comes to shove, she’ll use her harp as a bludging weapon...

what she’s been up to:

main verse: Which is during the events of Skyward Sword, as such she’s no longer in Skyloft nor does she have the full knowledge that she’s Hylia but Zelda is suspecting that there’s a connection there. She does not know how to wield her magic as it comes and goes in spurts. She’s seen throughout the Surface so she can be anywhere! Even in other timelines due to using the Gate of Time, we can just say that something screwed up causing for her to end up in another time period or even verse! LOZ series is pretty flexible in time travel. 

where to find her:

Faron Woods:  The place where it all started. Here the Sealed Temple along with Skyview Temple is located, so she can be either wondering throughout the woods or either of those places. She’s currently alone and is sneaking away from monsters yet is also enjoying the sights of the Surface while being mindful of her mission. 

Eldin Province: Neighboring Faron Woods and home to the infamous Death Mountain (known as Eldin Volcano). So what is she doing in a dangerous place? Why, praying at the Earth Temple of course! Here’s where she meets with a Sheikah warrior Impa, so chances of her showing up as an NPC in a thread is pretty high! 

Lanayru Province: Once a lush, green place now became a desert yet far from barren, hidden underneath the sands is a time long lost where hints of the past can be uncovered. There are many caverns throughout the desert. It is around here where she travels to find something known as the Gate of Time. Impa will most def show up as an NPC since she’s traveling with Zelda during this time. 

current plans:

Meet with Link and return Skyloft to the Surface while regaining all of her memories as Hylia.

desired interactions:

I would love for more wacky time shenanigans to happen where Zelda not only meets with LOZ muses from other timelines but also other muses from different universes all together since the LOZ community is pretty dang dead! This can work in post-game verse as well since she has more knowledge of timelines and the like! 

Muses joining Zelda’s journey while she uncovers her past, it’d be fun to do dungeon threads with potential of action happening since Ghirahim is hunting down Zelda along with the monsters that work under him. Protect tiny goddess at all costs!

I want her to make more friends but enemies would be fun too! 

Romance. I am a sucker for fluff and cuteness. 

This is very random but I want Zelda to interact with a Kina or even Kass so that they can do a jam session together! Actually any musically talented muse doing a jam session with Zelda is all I could ever ask for. 

things that bother me:

This doesn’t bother me too much but your muse insisting that she’s a princess despite her constant denial. I can understand this one considering her bloodline is royalty later on so it’s whatever.

Your muse magically knowing she’s Hylia. Yes, she has strong powers that can probably be sensed and yes she more than likely resembles her past life look but your muse shouldn’t make that connection easily on the spot unless she tells you herself and for the most part she keeps that knowledge away from outsiders. Insisting she’s just a humble spirit maiden should they feel something fishy with her.

YOUR MUSE BLAMING EVERYTHING EVER ON HER. This ties in with the one above, having your muse condemn Zelda for the choices she had made during her life spent as Hylia is a bad look dude. It’s hard to put into words and this happened long ago when the fandom was active but just... making Hylia/any Zelda out as the bad guy is just really annoying and just downplays her character. 

tagged by: i pirated it ;v; 

tagging: whomst ever! i recommend doing this since it’ll help a ton with those who still are unsure with your muse but feel too nervous to ask questions.

[brockupdate]

The way forward

There are so many "words", "Visions" of what the Lord is going to do in the next season of time. Most of the time when I hear them, my heart burns with a longing to see something of significance take place. What is the way forward?

For your consideration:

Sometimes we are asked what it was like to be part of a major move of the Spirit? I pause for a moment and realize we were not aware that we were part of something out of the ordinary.

When I was young, I pretty much was raised in a Christian environment. My family were Baptist and we attended church on a regular bases. I'm not sure when it happened but I somehow knew I was going to spend my life serving God. I think it was when I was baptized in the Holy Spirit when I was fourteen, not really sure. In the sixties, there was a move going on in the established church. Lutherans, Episcopal's and Catholics, along with a variety of other groups. The Pentecostal's up to that point were the "crazies" and were not given much credit for their obedience to the move of the Spirit. Well that's what I perceived viewing from my perspective, but they were doing things that we never even thought of. There was an awaking in the organized church, but at the same time there was a moving of the Spirit that was washing over a generation that was longing to see if the Word of God was true and active. There was no template, our worship consisted of putting old hymns to modern tunes {amazing grace/house of the rising sun....sorry} church was not for the young.

We had heroes of the day, Kathryn Kulman with signs and wonders, and David Wilkerson in seeing thousands come to Christ, and of course Billy Graham who was on a level that was beyond anyone. Definitely leaders who held a bar so high it seemed impossible to reach. We were left to be the footmen of the day. We were in the parks, malls, beaches, wherever the opportunity was to share our faith with folks that would listen.

We would lead many to Jesus and were blessed to serve the king. Funny enough {I think??} we would get flack from "religious" groups about our methods, mainly that we had no followup for those we prayed with. We didn't know what followup was, we just wanted people to meet Jesus. They would pray to receive the Lord, then we would pray for the infilling of the Spirit, along with that any healing or any deliverance the might be needed. We followed little form we just tried to be aware of what God was saying at the moment and meet the need. I can rememberer some pretty crazy things happening on the streets with healing and deliverance, but we tried to keep focused on the main event which was presenting Jesus to the lost.

We would drive about an hour to get to Hollywood, all the way down we would pray that the Lord would give us favor and bring those who needed him to us.

A sideline: we would sing on the street corners, and our "sign" that someone would meet Jesus would be if they stopped and listen to us {If you would have heard us you'd understand}, when they stopped we would go over and share with them the gospel and sure enough more times than not they would get saved.

After the evening, we would drive home and share the stories of the night. We would ask the Lord what we did right and what we did wrong and how we should adjust things to be more efficient for him. The focus was on talking to the Lord and hearing what he wanted to say. The more time we spent praying and seeking him the more we saw results.

Here's the truth, most of the time we would see over a hundred people pray with us to receive Jesus on the street, we would have several healings take place right in front of our eyes along with deliverance from drugs and other oppressing situations. We didn't know it was a movement, we thought it was the normal christian life if you were committed to following him.

I guess that's my point, many times we find ourselves looking to follow a form or a method, or for that matter people, and we forget it is a love relationship that is birthed from spending time with him. Shared experience creates intimacy is the phrase we repeat over and over.

It isn't the book on marriage that creates a good marriage its spending time with the one your heart loves that creates the passion that causes life. We freak out when we talk about spending time in prayer, and we make a ritual out of it, but the truth is it is just spending time talking to the Lord as you would your lover. Ephesians says when I speak of marriage I speak of Christ and His church Eph 5:22.

Not scripted but a natural response to being with the love of your heart.

It is the natural speaking to the invisible, I don't have to be with my wife, I want to be with her. I don't have to kiss her I want to kiss her. The more I'm with her the more we communicate the better our lives are together. I know what pleases her and I know how to disappoint her, its not a mystery it's knowing the one your heart loves, which only comes by investing time together. Or you can call it PRAYER.

This to me is the way forward, the more we focus on our "relationship, conversation, intimacy,PRAYER" the more we will see a release of life. A free flowing move of the Spirit with prophetic and healing leading the way. The natural fruit of a heathy relationship is life. And most of the time you don't have to talk anyone into that, "Come away with me my beloved" will produce its own fruit.

Don't chase after the signs and wonders, don't seek to find your answers in man. Turn your eyes on Jesus, let him whisper to your heart, he longs to be the lover of your soul.

[kyokosdiary]

Miu Kyoko

Hi there, its @sabaku-no-livna‘s BNHA account here ! 

I’m gonna introduce you my BNHA main OC, Miu Kyoko ! Template from Uunearthly on DA (https://www.deviantart.com/uunearthly/gallery/)

Name: Miu Kyoko 

Nicknames: None her first name is short enough 

Hero name : Black Mirror 

Age: 15 yo 

Gender: Female

Height: 154 cm 

Weight: 39 kg 

Birthdate: 20 of August

Nationality: Japanese and Kenyan

Blood Type: O+

Occupation: Student

School: Shiketsu high

Year and Class: 2-A 

Physical Appearance:

Miu Kyoko is tiny but quiet curvy ! She has a pronounced waist line and back arch and a big breast. She has thin bones and muscles, but those muscles are strong enough for the fight ! She has the skin ebony color and the white of the eye black. Her eye lashes are almost white, like the top of her hair. She’s got long straight blue hair, in a gradient from very light blue to a more intense one. A side of her head got shaved when she was able to go beyond her mother’s power on her, in a sign of rebellion and individuality ! Her eyes are yellow and seem to shine in the dark just like her hair. 

She has on her body some white symbols that appear when she uses her quirk. The more she gets powerful, strategic 

and get some moral values, the more these tatoos appear like a reward. Each one of them as a signification.

Those on the face are symbol of perspicacity, the ones of the suns she has on her shoulder and breast are marks of hope, tenderness and bravery. Those on her belly shows she was able to cut the bonds with her mother not to reproduce the same mistakes and means she will be able to be a loving mother herself when she would be older. The one around her arm is a symbol of strength ! The one around her tight of balance. The ones on her calf of determination. 

The firsts ones that appeared were on her face, then on her breast, her shoulder, her tight, her calf and finally her belly when she got rid of her mother-mother problems. 

Her hero costume is inspired by traditional wax and quiet show off. It was chosen by her mother again. At the beginning she did not feel comfortable with such an open costume but when she got better with herself she assumed it perfectly! 

In real life she wears wax and ties her hair in braids. She likes to wear more cloths and isn’t showing off. 

Personality:

Miu Kyoko is a very shy and discrete person. She can be very friendly, caring and sweet when you get to know her, but she is too shy to go herself meeting people. 

She’s been used being in her mother’s shadow, having no choice and decision to make so is kind of lost in her own personality. She sometimes doesn't really know what SHE likes and what her mother liked for her. She will progressively get to understand who she is and what she likes. 

Miu likes dancing, music, singing, playing piano, animals and cooking. Piano, dance and sining were things imposed by her mother, but she got the best of it, and finally could find her way in it. 

Miu has a poor self esteem because of how violent her mother was to her and how perfectionist she is. She thinks she isn’t suited to be a hero and would rather have a more traditional life and job than being a hero. She believes she is useless and her quirk would never help people but put them in danger because of her weakness. 

However, her mother’s expectations were so big she is always fighting against her own will and doing her best to always be n1 at school and in everything she does. She tries to learn from her mistakes, make the best of her advantages and compensate her weakness. She is still determined becoming the n°14 hero, like her mother was but will progressively abandon this dream that isn’t her just to wish to become a good and wise hero, and not an object of her mother’s projection. 

Quirk Information:

Quirk: Reverse 

Type: Activation

Description: She reverses the opponent’s quirk against themselves. She gets the protections of their quirk if the quirk provide some instead of the opponents. On mutant quirks she just erases them and trying to go over her quirk is extremely painful. If she is put next to mirror or something that allows reflexion such as glass or ice, the strength of her counter attack will increase ! She has to have an eye contact to use her quirk. She doesn't produce anything, she only uses opponents quirks. 

Strengths:

+ With opponents with emitter quirks her quirk is very efficient and difficult to go through. 

Her quirk is quiet disturbing and allows no counter attack. 

Is avoiding close combat but allows her to get closer easily and attack thanks to her agility and speed. 

Good to end a battle. 

Weaknesses:

Cannot start herself a combat with this quirk. 

Can only defend people and herself with her physical abilities.

Her quirk cannot defend her against people with physical strength and so in close combat her only advantage is her speed, agility and flexibility developed with dance. In other terms she has almost no chance to win against someone using only their physical strength. 

Her quirk isn’t flashy and impressive for the public. So not very interesting for the medias.

Combat with people with emitters quirk can last forever with her quirk and she will get quickly tired and loose power over them.  

Quirk Statistics:

 - Power: 2 /5 

 - Speed:  3 /5 

 - Technique: 1.5 /5 

 - Intelligence: 3 /5 

 - Cooperativeness: 3/5 

Background and History

Relationships

Family : 

 Mother: Aissata Kyoko 

Aissata used to be called Coal Queen, in her country (Kenya) she was the n°1 hero, and she was n°14 worldwide until she got severely injured in a fight in Japan with a villain. Miu was 8 at the time. She married the Japanese business man Ari Kyoko, it wasn’t a love marriage but an arranged one with the two families. Aissata was very young when she got engaged and was raised accepting she would be married to a man she doesn’t love. She doesn’t have real affection for Ari and shows no consideration for him. She is a very proud and egocentric woman. There was no space for a child unless her daughter was just a duplicate of herself. When she had to retire from her hero career she became even more strict and cold to her daughter and husband. She felt her incapacity as an humiliation and found a way to fix it : her daughter will replace her. She had always been a strict mother, but there she became a tyrant, imposing her activities, a school, a training … She wanted her daughter to be as good as she was and to look just like her. She was putting a lot of pressure on her daughter, and when she wasn’t good enough she was using very violent words toward her. Their relationship was toxic as Miu progressively lost all individuality. She pushed her so much she skip grades and finally entered Shakiest high (a school chosen by HER) at the age of 14. She controlled everything about her daughter’s life : her weight, her dressing, the choice of her friends, her love life … She wanted full control on everything and to do so she is calling her 4 times a day, and sometimes even going physically to Shiketsu hight to assist at the trainings. She is a very tall woman and was frustrated her daughter was so short. Also she never hided her disappointment with her daughter’s quirk, not powerful and flashy enough. 

 Father: Ari Kyoko 

Ari Kyoko is from a big family of business men in weapon industry. He did not get the choice of his wife, but immediately fell in love with the stunning African beauty Aissata. He did everything to please his wife, he would have given her the world, he treated her like a queen but it was never enough for the capricious Coal Queen. His quirk is to copy a quirk he already faced. He can use a quirk he learnt only once. When Miu was born he was the most happy man on hearth, unlike his wife who suffered from baby blues and couldn’t even hold the baby in her arms. He was a loving and caring father, full of humor and joy. He got truly affected by his wife’s accident, and the fact of her being more violent towards him and his daughter probably caused his decay. As months passed his migraine became stronger and stronger, he was loosing weight and strength progressively until he couldn’t even walk. His breath was harder and harder and his heart weaker and weaker. Nobody knew exactly what was killing him, but his agony last 2 years. These 2 years have been a torture for Miu. He was her only loving parent, her sun, she admired him for his intelligence, tolerance and capacity of judgment. She was relying on him to protect her from Aissata. But when he died he left her alone with her mother. He never wanted to give up the fight, because he loved his daughter and wife so much. Until the end he kept hoping for the best and his last words were written by the doctors and directed to his daughter « Dear Miu, I want you to remember me as your loving father, not as the living corps I’ve become. Please remember my smile, my voice, my laughter but not my tears and decay. And also one last thing. Never forget who you are Miu. You may look like your mother but you are nothing like her. You are my beloved daughter. I love you more than anything in this world. My sun. Daddy. » 

Friends : 

She gets along very well with those of other schools. She met some of UA high outside of exams in fact, during a villain attack. She got to interact with Bakugo, Kirishima, Midoriya, Ochako, Todoroki and Iida. 

She appreciates Ochako Uraraka a lot, she highly admires Izuku Midoriya for his wisdom, optimism and determination. She was able to meet him several times and they get along together very well. 

She also have a strong admiration for Shoto Todoroki, for his intelligence, self control and how he was able to get off Endeavor’s clutches. She saw him first on TV during the sport festival, then during the attack where she met the other of class 1-A. They got along well, surprisingly he showed interest for her because of her personal issues with her mother. He’s like a mentor for her because he showed esteemed and helped her realizing how much she was her mother’s puppet and that she could become herself. He used what Midoriya taught him to help her out. She’s got a crush on him.

Rivals : 

She doesn’t really have rivals. She got to fight with Katsuki Bakugo and was a disturbing opponent to him. Also because she was trying to make him chill insisting on « you should try Yoga. ». However she finds his anger quiet cute and funny and this makes him even more upset and willing to destroy her. 

Her only real challenge is her mother, but Todoroki by acting as a mentor keeps her motivated to always try to challenge him even if she doesn’t really want to win. She only wants to make him proud of her. 

Love interest : Shõto Todoroki

   Hobbies: Playing piano, dancing, singing, composing, cooking, horse riding, chess (all hobbies were chosen by her mother) 

Fears: Thunder, Mineta, disappointing the others, abandon, her mother

Habits: Miu is often making braids on her hair, she cooks cookies and pies for people she loves and she is always training her flexibility and moves with dance and music. She also does yoga in the morning. 

 Likes: Colors, sun, animals, humanity. 

   Dislikes:  Rain, cold, loneliness and informatics. 

Goal: First her goal was to be good enough for her mother to love her. Then her goal became being good for herself and being the best and the more fair hero as possible and making the persons she loves proud of her. 

Hair style before and after getting rid of her mother’s oppression 

[fuckyeahatwell]

When “Agent Carter” was canceled in May 2016, Hayley Atwell was fine. No shade intended, but she was ready to say goodbye to Peggy Carter and Marvel Studios when the TV show’s pink slip arrived.

“That was just a job to me,” Atwell told me during an afternoon at a New York City bar last month. “I put as much into her as I have into ‘Black Mirror’ or any kind of my stage work. It just happens to become special because, when you’re in a franchise like that, it has more commercial interest.”

The 36-year-old British-American actor, who got hooked on theater growing up in inner-city London, knows she’s more recognized for playing Peggy, the love interest to Captain America, than, say, for her recent, critically acclaimed performance on the BBC One-Starz collaboration “Howards End.”

“It was press attention and public attention I never had before,” she said of her Marvel experience, which crossed from TV into film. When I asked whether she might return to the cinematic universe ― in light of that shocking “Avengers: Infinity War” ending ― Atwell laughed and admitted she hasn’t seen the $2 billion worldwide box-office smash.

“Really,” she muttered when I told her about the multiple deaths and timeline tricks that could allow her character, Agent Carter, to come back.

“To get a call now would be like, ‘Oh, God!’” she said. “I’m sure anything could happen, but it’s this genre world that’s so multifaceted it’s like, will it ever die?”

Not that she’d want it to. “I really like them, and I love the way ... they made me feel safe and also empowered,” she said of Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige and his associates. “That’s the best thing to come out of it. It’s not this kind of ― from my experience ― scary, patriarchal, dominant, body-shaming Hollywood sphere machine. It was just really nerdy guys who love what they’re doing.”

Ultimately, Atwell, a self-professed “loner” kid, would rather talk about her historical rom-dram miniseries, which wrapped its arc on Starz at the end of April. “Howards End” follows 20th century Englishwoman Margaret Schlegel and her two siblings Helen (Philippa Coulthard) and Tibby (Alex Lawther), characters originally developed by beloved novelist E.M. Forster, as they navigate the social conventions of their time. To Atwell, portraying the dauntless, self-sufficient woman (crafted by Oscar-winning writer Kenneth Lonergan for the screen) was a thrill all its own.

In a time in the entertainment industry when actresses are expecting to play more fully developed characters than former eras afforded them, books of the past, like the socially driven adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale, can provide a compelling template, she said.

“There’s something to be learned from them.”

“Howards End” focuses on Margaret’s love affair with widower Henry Wilcox (Matthew Macfadyen), a powerful businessman whose morals don’t quite align with those of Margaret’s family. In Atwell’s eyes, their situation is relatable, reflective of “the constant roaring between opposing sides” happening today.

“It’s easy with the world that we live in to be righteous in your opinion or headlines or soundbites or memes of the extreme left or the extreme right,” she said. In “Howards End,” “you have opposing sides not using their differences against one another but using them to create interesting conversation, to exchange ideas and hone one’s own or be willing to be challenged and change or be changed. That is, I think, more human, more evolved and much more living in the gray area.”

“These are not characters who, within the limitations of being women at a time that they live in, are aggressively fighting anything. They’re seeking to understand and change the system from within.”

Atwell is not the first actress to bring Margaret’s character to life. Emma Thompson played the iconic role in the 1992 film version of “Howards End.” Following in her footsteps was surely intimidating, but when asked about it, Atwell was steadfast: Portraying someone like Margaret Schlegel, she said, or Jo March or Lady Macbeth should always be an option for actresses.

“I was speaking to Emma Thompson about it, that question of, ‘Do you feel scared?’” she said. “Just because Judi Dench played a great Macbeth in the ’70s with Sir Ian McKellen doesn’t mean now no one else should. Those stories should be retold because they’re dealing with very human ideas. As an actor, you want to feel the challenge of having to say those words and bring them to life and be enriched by them. That’s the exciting thing, being able to fully inhabit someone who asks you to not reduce her to who you are.”

On the heels of “Howards End,” Atwell has packed up one character and is on to the next. She’s set to appear in a gender-swapping version of Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure” in London’s West End this fall, which will see her and “Dunkirk” star Jack Lowden alternate the male and female roles of the Puritan Lord Angelo and Isabella in the tale set in a corrupt Vienna. She’ll also play Christopher Robin’s wife, Evelyn, alongside Ewan McGregor in a Winnie-the-Pooh live-action movie hitting theaters in August.

For Atwell, she took on both projects with the same goal in mind.

“What I’ve discovered is I’m searching for a connection, for a relationship between telling a story and experiencing that story and having the response of someone witnessing it in whatever capacity that is. I know what Marvel is and where it sits for people, and I equally know where some plays sit for people .... There’s space for everything to coexist and have its place.”

[shprka]

The way the Duffers write characters is so baffling to me. Like we clearly have Good characters (that no matter what they do, they're always remain Good, for example, Nancy cheating on Steve, Jonathan being creepy) and Bad characters (that no matter what they do, they will remain Bad, aka Billy.

It's not even actions of those characters, it's about everyone else's reaction and how it's written

- No one ever explicitly says Nancy was cheating (or emotionally cheating) on Steve and even Steve is hang up on her and never mentions how bad it was for him

- Steve calls Jonathan a creep for taking pics of Nancy in the woods but it's only specifically there to be "a bully". No one ever says anything about it being weird or creepy after that. Even the subject of those pics, aka Nancy

- Eleven killed a d hurt people multiple times and calls herself a monster but people around Eleven never even think that. We as the audience are never meant to think that

- Sorry yall, but Hopper was sometimes horrible to Joyce in s3. He was made out to be this toxic action 80s hero that yells at their love interest and tbh, my Hop would never, and also Joyce or any other character ever reacts negatively to that. Murray even sees it as romantic. Which we as the audience are meant to see it as well

- Nancy is hot for Steve suddenly in s4?? 2 seconds for cheating on her actual boyfriend with her ex?? And Eddie, Robin, Dustin, even Steve are written to see it as a positive

There are some things that could make out characters unsympathetic (maybe not as much the Eleven thing bc shes a kid and we have empathy but its the kids in the show could easily be like, hey murder is wrong, if they decided to write it that way) but because those characters are Good characters they're never treated this way by the writers. They are Good, so everything they do is Good

Then we have the Bad characters. Everything they so is Bad, no matter what it is. Or should I say Evil, even. Brenner, Russians, Vecna - aka literal villains. Jason, Billy and other "bullies". Written specifically as Bad characters.

The Duffers have something with "bully" characters, I'm telling you. They think they are born evil and their entire existence is evil

But we are never really shown why Billy is supposed to be Evil. It's just the entire assumption behind his character is that - Evil. As an audience member you should assume because he's Evil, all of his motivations and thoughts are for Evil Purposes.

He's written that way and it comes across like that. If you have a working brain you can figure out its not the case and you can sympathise with him and understand him. But he's literally written to be hated 😭😭

And it's a simple trick the Duffers use with every "bully" character in the show, like a template:

1) Fixating on and obsessively hating one of out protagonists (Billy-Max and Steve, Jason - Eddie, Angela - El, that kid in s1 - Mike and Will)

2) They are an annoying presence, a hindrance in our protagonists lives. Makes us the viewers be annoyed and just want them out of the way

3) The bully "forcing" a confrontation on our beloved protagonists don't start a fight (oh they would never)

4) The confrontation in question where our protagonist tryumphs

Bullies in ST are like mini bosses for the Duffers I suppose. Evil people you have to fight. And they're always jocks or girly girls, like that's such a stereotype, give me a break

Also the Bullies don't exist on their own. They are only relevant when they are useful for the plot and furthering the protagonists stories

And every day I'm so fucking sad Billy was never meant to be written as a person, just a Evil bully character, a mini-boss for others to fight

I want to say the Duffers learned their lesson in s3 but he's literally the same, except he's upgraded from mini-boss to Main Boss

There's something to say about being a writer. Never judge your characters. Well' the Duffers very much do.

Reminder that the DBs and Shawn Levy on Beyond Stranger Things called Billy, a 17 year old abusive victim, an irredeemable sociopath, and on another episode said that while his father's behavior MIGHT give a glimpse into Billy's behavior, it doesn't change the fact that he's (Billy) EVIL. And essentially something along the lines of he's the most evil human antagonist on the show. Yeah, they said that. Joe tried to defend Billy and say that even though he appeared popular and cool, he was actually hurting just like all the other characters and they brushed him off with "yes, sure" and proceeded to talk about how Steve was a popular jock. You're telling me a 17 year old abuse victim who, at worst (in season 2, this was before 3), bullied a few people and got in a couple fist fights is more evil and irredeemable than Dr. Brenner, a man who STOLE babies from their mothers and then (essentially) tortured them and experimented on them. Okay, sure. In what world does that make sense? In the words of Nancy Wheeler, it's bullshit.

Fuck anyone who ever perpetuates the idea that abuse victims are all abusers themselves who can't grow or learn, and fuck them for not redeeming Billy other than in death. He was a kid. Scared, lost, hurt, abused, misguided, and alone. One gentle touch and the reminder of the love and happiness of his mother and he threw off the control of an interdimensional monster and SAVED the whole fucking party. Fuck them for using him as a plot device for the party and to torture Max. Fuck them for having the party immediately trust and fill in Eddie, but not Billy. It's all bullshit and I'm pissed. He deserved a Steve Harrington level redemption arc. He deserved to learn, heal, and grow. I will never forget that they chose to write him out of the story in death instead of giving him true character growth.