#The mortifying ordeal of being known but it's by a person who only loves and cares for what they see

[lesbianwyllravengard]

Nothing more gut wrenching than when one character either literally or metaphorically can't see themselves and another character says "I see you" that shit is breathtaking bro

[rootspiral]

Agatha All Along deep dive: episode 9 part 6

(Wandavision entries: [1][2][3])

(AAA entries: ep1 [1][2][3][4] ep2 [1][2][3][4] ep3 [1][2][3] ep4 [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][+1] ep5 [1][2][3][4][5] ep6 [1][2][3] ep7 [1][2][3][4][5][6] ep8 [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9] ep9 [1][2][3][4][5][6])

billy drives to westview again, I guess flying right now feels weird while he's so conflicted about his own witchy nature. and who boarded up agatha's door? were the neighbors afraid some other unspeakable horror was going to jump out of the house?

we get another good view of agatha's grave, with all the purple flowers and mushrooms rio grew for her

agnes' bike and señor scratchy's cage (I hope that fluffer bunny's okay somewhere)

NOT HELPING, AGATHA. did she just run down to the basement so she could do her 'it's britney bitch' face? (she does look like britney here)

sure, sure, you'll get your brooch back and then you'll be on your merry way doing ghostly shit with no regrets whatsoever. it's not like you've been following billy around like a lost puppy or anything

agatha sees billy drawing the circle and is all posture again, a big slice of "I'm cooler than you and you don't scare me little kid" with a side of "ooooh are we doing magic?? I love magic lemme see lemme see!"

she's truly embarrassing

you're the one with a buttload of black candles in your basement agatha who do you think you're mocking

a pentacle, the symbol of our coven surrounding him. wherever you are, a coven there shall be.

oooh book through the heart! we get it, symbolism.

agatha sees the brooch and gives a deep relieved sigh, immediately followed by more bullshit. JUST TELL HIM THAT'S YOUR SON'S BROOCH AND IT'S IMPORTANT, YOU USELESS DISASTER. JUST OPEN UP FOR ONCE.

the spell is vade (not valia) a lucem, relinque terram, noli esse phantasma. go to the light, leave the earth, don't be a ghost (bit on the nose.)

what's wrong agatha, not feeling so confident all of a sudden?

you know the drill by now, she won't go quietly. so she sneers.

ooh we're appealing to his better nature now? after your many 'never apologize for murder' lessons?

idk man, it's almost as if the people you keep pushing away will eventually get tired of your bullshit. it's almost as if billy here, the kid you supposedly care a lot about, just went through a terrible experience and could really need a wise mentor right now - instead of whatever you're doing.

and now we're begging. better make a decision there agatha, you're starting to fade away!

sure, that will help. great plan agatha, masterful gambit, turning into a ghost and losing even more of your agency

there you go. it only took this poor wretch nine episodes, killing three people, scaring away forever the love of her life, thoroughly traumatizing a kid and somehow losing her entire body to express ONE honest, uncensored feeling.

it's the little steps.

heartwarming: local 350 year old experiences for the first time the mortifying ordeal of being known.

another thing billy and agatha have in common is how good they are at reading people. with billy it's a natural talent (comes with being a mind reader) that he's still learning how to use, he can read people but doesn't know how to interpret what he finds yet, hence the whole trials fiasco.

with agatha, he's been trying to reconcile his instincts with facts and logic. on a surface level he shouldn't trust agatha at all, indeed she's the last person anyone should trust. but since he was that kid who liked hanging out at agnes' house, billy guessed something else in agatha, a vulnerability behind all the darkness that he's been (awkwardly) trying to bring to the surface.

why? I think it's for the same reason agatha has been reaching out to him: because they're so similar. billy wants to reconcile agatha's two natures because he wants to do the same for himself. he is the son of the witch who tortured westview, he has all this scary power. there is a darkness in him that he doesn't know how to deal with, but maybe, if agatha is redeemed, there is hope for himself too.

in other words, these two are kindred spirits (spiritual mother/son, mentor/mentee, whatever you want to call it) who recognize each other and instinctively want to stick to together, even though it's a bad, bad idea.

(I cannot believe it took agatha turning into a ghost to finally get a manicure for her nasty witchy nails)

and this is all it took to win billy over, that's how ready and eager he was to believe agatha has a heart! the moment he realizes that of course agatha loved nicholas! of course she's devastated after losing him! he steps back and dries a tear, moved. for the first time he sees agatha's pain and, the good kid he is, he's earnest to give her sympathy and comfort. he's still too young to fully understand what agatha has been trough, but he doesn't need to. he just needs to care and be there for her, and that's enough, that makes all the difference.

the salemites taught agatha that she cannot trust others, that if she shows who she really is people will hate her and hurt her. when nicky died she tried all she could to exorcise that devastating pain, except asking for help. she never allowed someone to give her even the most basic forms of comfort, no hugs, no crying on someone's shoulder, no 'I'm sorry this happened to you'. no 'I'm here for you, if you need anything'. no 'I know it feels like that, but I promise it wasn't your fault.'

agatha set out to mold and raise billy as another version of herself, but what she got instead is a kid who, just like nicky, is simply glad to love her back. yes, people will leave you if you keep pushing them away, but the opposite is also true: if you stick by and make an effort, no matter how many mistakes you make, most people will recognize what you're doing and respond in kind. it sucks that agatha can do that so rarely and with so much difficulty. but it happens sometimes, even to her.

I've talked about how a "coven two" is never sustainable on the long run, how you cannot just have one person be your whole world. humans, social animals we are, simply need a community. but for now it's a start, it's agatha cautiously letting herself be around another person again. and oh god she's going to be such a bad influence on this poor kid. I'm glad *he* has other people in his life, at least.

she's like, faIR WArNiNG

ookay drama llama. these two gays, I swear. already trying to outdrama each other.

she's all proud!! look at her boy paying homage to the dead and expressing his grief like a champ! meanwhile I'm sitting here like guys, guys, you cannot just write their names on the floor and call it a day, have you CHECKED if you have to break the news to their loved ones?! did sharon have children? did alice have friends or a partner that are looking for her right now?!?!!?!?! please make ONE phone call I beg you! is there an ADULTIER ADULT in the room, you CANNOT LEAVE THESE TWO IN CHARGE

and off they go, merrily causing chaos and mayhem. if I had to guess what happens next, agatha is going to love and help and teach that kid while making soooo many mistakes and causing soooo much emotional damage, and also very much try to manipulate him into giving her a new body, because lbr, this asshole didn't get herself close to the one person on earth who can do that by pure accident. all immaturity and ulterior motives aside, agatha is taking baby steps in the right direction and I'm SEATED for it.

AND WE'RE DONE. I cannot believe I got to the end of this?!!?! thank you from the bottom of my black heart to all the peeps who reached out and encouraged me, thank you for all your likes and reblogs and engagement, and special thanks to @idkbroletssee, @yodladi-yodlada, @aquaaquila, @onceuponalegendbg, @vinspiration-book, @sallysetonagathario, @2-the-moon-and-2-saturn, @yourlocalegotisticalqueerishere, @isagrimorie, @jojobobapalooza, @netellie, @nutella-icecream, @talysalankil, @ragnarockz, @misschanandlerbong25, @westviews-nosiest, @liminal-smith, @kendrysaneela, @whogirl42, @witchtwig, @nerdybeachbum299, @bogcrowe, @the-silence-in-between, @farminglesbian, @lazyreinelle @fantasticvoidnerdshoe, @ofutopia, I'm sure I'm forgetting many but I promise I see you all!

Last but not least, big, grateful thanks to @crybabyheathen for always messaging me and forcing me out of my shell and encouraging much needed human interaction 😉. And lots of love to @april-december, don't tell anyone but I look forward to your comments the most, it truly means the world that you appreciate and engage with my posts like you've been doing.

Happy new year, everybody!

[writing-for-life]

The Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known

Or: Does Morpheus really have commitment issues?

[Bear with me, I’ll get to this panel 🤣]

I’ve read many times that Morpheus supposedly has commitment issues, and it always has me scratching my head a bit…

I personally rather think he is desperate to commit. He so badly craves a serious relationship that he is prone to rush into it and build it on wonky foundations, but he has certainly no commitment issues as we would commonly understand them.

Is it in his nature though to be truly seen and understood when he is [a] Dream? And can dreams ever last? These are the much more interesting questions in my view. Let’s have a look at the romantic relationships we know of…

Killalla: Walked out on him. That wasn’t his lack of commitment. If anything, he came on a bit strong while she was still assessing her feelings for him.

Alianora: He fully committed to her despite basically being bullied into it by Desire. And they were happy for “a goodly while”. For those in doubt: “Goodly” doesn’t mean “a bit”. It means “great, large, long.” And the fact that Alianora couldn’t go back to her own plane because she had stayed in the Dreaming too long corroborates that they were together for a long time. Probably longer than any human relationship ever lasts, because I doubt “a long time” means “a couple of years” for someone who is 12 billion years old.

And now I’ll sandwich the relationship we hardly know anything about between some random (?) panels to also make a point why I think it might sit here in the timeline…

Titania: Who knows. Sounded like an affair, and as if they both had no intention of committing. He was clearly very fond of her though, and I can never shake the feeling that we should look a bit deeper into AMND and find the parallels between Auberon, Titania (not hard, and they are pretty much pictured as estranged) and Bottom. There are many ways to get confused with a jackass, you know? 🤣 Plus, Bottom is the one who gets to play Pyramus in “Pyramus and Thisbe”. That’s the ultimate blueprint for “Romeo and Juliet”: Ill-fated love of catastrophic proportions, people are dead by the end of it. That’s why I often wondered if the affair with Titania was actually pre-Nada, and the inspiration for Shakespeare wasn’t random (it wasn’t random for The Tempest either). I mean, it wasn’t random anyway because it was a parting gift, but I also don’t think it was entirely random with regard to their relationship. Wild head-canon of course, but maybe not that wild (he also says that Wendel’s Mound was already a theatre before humans walked the earth, so there’s that)? And even if he wasn’t committed (we quite frankly don’t know if he intended to but she didn’t or couldn’t), she and the Fae meant enough to him to give them a play as a parting gift.

Nada: Killed herself after one night, but that wasn’t down to lack of commitment on his part. Again: If anything, he came on far too strong, wanted to be with her and was far too pushy about it.

Calliope: We don’t know how long they were together before they had Orpheus. Could have been a while, could have been only a shortish time. But even if we assumed they had him fairly quickly—they were still together when Orpheus, who was mortal, got married to Eurydice, so even if he got married young, we’re still talking something in the realm of +/- 20 years, and that’s the absolute low-ball-estimate. And while they had started to drift apart (considering what we know from Calliope), they were still on good terms and had no intention of splitting up until the whole Orpheus drama caused a rift they couldn’t mend. Again: That’s not someone who has commitment issues. It’s a relationship breaking down over hurt, stubbornness and grief.

Thessaly: Again, she was the one who left him and caused his dramatic interlude in the rain. Were they ill suited? Yes. Did she feel neglected and went into a strop over it? Yes. Did he not get that she felt neglected? Also yes, but that’s not lack of commitment. That’s his not getting that people aren’t mind readers (must be hard if you’re probably one yourself 🤣) and, by and large, need assurances of love. He doesn’t get that these women don’t understand they have his love; he can’t grasp that line of thinking because it is all so clear to him when he loves someone: They have him, what’s the issue? Is that a not so great way of (not) communicating when you’re having a relationship to someone? Absolutely. Is it a commitment issue though? Absolutely not.

I think Morpheus doesn’t really have commitment issues in romantic relationships—wouldn’t that almost be antithetical to his nature? Rules and responsibilities. Yeah, about that one…

What I do think is that he struggles with the mortifying ordeal of being (not) known by his lovers. Because how could he? He is Dream. That is his problem. Dreams cannot be fully known or understood. He is very eloquent but at the same time a very… confusing communicator. I don’t want to say “bad”, because I feel that’s not getting to the bottom of it. Again, it is the nature of dreams to be confusing and strange, open to (mis)interpretation, hard to grasp and understand. And they also stop being dreams once they become real. All of that is true and hence makes relationships both hard for him and those involved. Is he truly not willing to commit though?

I still find that hard to believe…

[a-memory-a-distant-echo]

ok, you know what, fuck it, fic recs post. historically i try not to rec works in progress or things i haven't commented on and i'm throwing that fully out the window for this because honestly, fucking whatever.

if you're on this list and i haven't been fully unhinged at you in the comments, please know that it's because (1) i'm the worst and (2) i'm trying desperately to calibrate so i hit 'enthusiastic' and not 'kind of frightening, actually'. i swear that i have written at least several sentences of a comment for every fic on this list, it's just that i'm genuinely impossibly slow, sometimes. it's me, not you.

my previous rec post is here, in case you missed that. as a bonus, special for this rec list and as a concession to the horrors, i am attempting to guess how much any given fic will fuck up the average person. obviously this is a ymmv kind of situation, but i'm trying, at least?

everything else under a cut because i am longwinded.

and found by @dangerouscommiesubversive, explicit, every possible combination of di feisheng/fang duobing/li lianhua | li xiangyi; bless, but i am not typing all that out. starting off with a wip where i haven't left a comment in like four fuckin' chapters, breaking those rules real good. this fic is a fucking ride. i will admit that i wasn't entirely convinced by the premise when i saw the blurb, but i am nothing if not willing to admit when i was wrong, and i was—once again—totally wrong. this is the fic where i was like 'ok but…is anyone really, like, desperate for gen z li xiangyi?' and then i read it and i was like 'ohhhhhh fuck yeah, ok, i get it, i was actually fully desperate for gen z li xiangyi.' he is. such a little prick. i love him. there has been something unexpected and delightful in every single chapter of this so far, plus a number of impressively memorable one-liners. this fic is fun and distracting and at least as of chapter seven, i'm gonna say it's not even gonna fuck you up. (please note that this is only through chapter seven!)

and the days are bright red by @junemermaid, explicit, di feisheng/fang duobing/li lianhua. rip to my beloved tumblr mutual @junemermaid, because they're getting called out twice in this list, but: tough. this fic is so delightful. featuring: memories of slut era li lianhua, the mortifying ordeal of being known, an entire box of historically accurate sex toys, fang duobing and di feisheng communicating (sometimes silently) in a way that unsettles li lianhua (back from his months-long sojourn), some very hot sex that is both very much about sex and also about trust and being perceived, casual intimacy, and fledgling tenderness. there are Emotions in this, and they get moderately intense, but it's a very kind and surprisingly gentle feel-good fic.

a drink under a clear window by @momosandlemonsoda, explicit, di feisheng/fang duobing and fang duobing/qiao wanmian. a fic that tackles the dreaded v-shaped polycule and makes it work. it seems like perhaps it shouldn't: fang duobing as the hinge, with di feisheng and qiao wanmian on either side, but actually it works perfectly, and is a lovely little glimpse at who they could become and the relationships they could have. i love the thought of qiao wanmian having come into her own as a leader in her own right, as more than just the representative of the ghost of li xiangyi, and this does a wonderful job of letting her be her own person. also, yes, ok, passing fang duobing back and forth like a party favour. this is a post-canon fic in which li lianhua is dead, but the fic itself a straightforward delight that is not at all fucky uppy.

the floating clouds, no resting place, again by @junemermaid (not sorry), technically gen and no ship, but functionally pre-di feisheng/fang duobing/li lianhua. the hair-washing fic. ohhhhhh. i started jotting notes for this post the day that i finished this fic, and i really thought that they were in any way comprehensive, but instead, what i typed and left as a note to myself was this:

and honestly. you're right, hypothetical reader, that doesn't totally make sense, but i stand by it regardless, because i apparently had that thought in [checks date i last saved the file] fucking august, and i'm still nodding along with myself. that is that this is like. this fic is very beautiful and will make you ache and will leave you slightly better at the end of it than you were at the beginning. it may also make you cry; this seems to me a fair enough trade.

the floating lotus by @anndramarama, not rated, di feisheng/li xiangyi. pre-canon stuff doesn't always work super well for me, but i really enjoyed this one, featuring di feisheng and li xiangyi when they're both so young and arrogant and full of themselves—and stupid and naïve and young and almost hopeful in a way that they're often not, in fic, for all that they were barely but children at the point of the donghai fight. they just seem…vulnerable, i guess, in this, in a way that i find touching. seasonal bonus: a ghost story, of a sort. given that this is set pre-canon, i think it's hard to come in any softer than bittersweet, which this very much is.

from here one's hand could pluck the stars by @howlingmoonrise, explicit, di feisheng/fang duobing. sex pollen fic! also featuring, a little surprisingly, given the premise, incredibly explicit and enthusiastic consent. look, this does what it says on the tin. di feisheng gets sex pollened. fang duobing is left to stay with him. the obvious ensues. unfortunately, it is also devastatingly charming? fang duobing is earnest and sweet; di feisheng is suffering beautifully terribly and trying so hard not to impose on fang duobing. they're both trying so hard to be respectful of what the other person needs, but they're also still bratty and argumentative and exasperated/exasperating, and it's very entertaining. this will fuck you up none percent, and may even make you laugh.

my war is done by @orchisailsa, explicit, di feisheng/fang duobing/li lianhua. another wip, with the first of three chapters posted, but please understand that this chapter is nearly 15k and so fucking good and compelling. li lianhua lives! and returns to find that things have changed in his absence, and perhaps that he has also changed in his absence, and now wants things that he had told himself he didn't mind not even having to lose. bonus: road trip and—delight!—only one room at the inn. also some other stuff that i'm not spoiling, but that made me absolutely gleeful. this is definitely a work in progress, and while i don't think there's anything particularly upsetting in the chapter, it does end on something of a cliffhanger. i personally do not feel that this is an upsetting cliffhanger, given the information about the fic that's presented in the tags, but it is technically a cliffhanger.

awkward paragraph break, but it's also important, i think, to mention the absolutely stunning (and not at all safe for work) companion piece to my war is done, you'd be there calling my name, by saki the cup bearer, who i don't think is on tumblr. it's fucking incredible; i am very decidedly not an artist but i cannot begin to imagine how much effort went into this. just. holy shit.

not unlike him in shape and form by @philologicalbat, explicit, fang duobing/li lianhua. ok look. i fucking love when things are deeply emotionally messy, and this is so emotionally messy. li lianhua who's been attracted to fang duobing and not doing anything about it, then discovering that fang duobing is shan gudao's son and is very much going to do something about it. he wants in this, and he's cunty and manipulative and mean about it, and sometimes also almost sweet, almost tender, and i love that, because i feel like li lianhua is very often an object of desire and very rarely gets to desire. i love how human he gets to be in this fic. this is not a sweet or gentle fic, but it does end in a moderately tender place that is tentatively hopeful, i think.

unbecoming heir by @bettercostume, explicit, di feisheng/princess zhaoling. i am taking your hand in mine and begging you to trust me. i know what this fic looks like. it's noncon and a weird pairing and you might look at it and expect it to go in the obvious direction and: it does not. this fic is so good that it makes me angry. it makes me miserable and everyone in this fic is trying so miserably, miserably hard, and it's fucking devastating. i spent literally thirty minutes earlier today yelling at my wife about it. i cannot rec this fic strongly enough. this is not a happy fic, but it is a good fic. it will absolutely fuck you up. this is very complimentary but also you will be fucked up.

until you are its primary evidence by @ilgaksu, mature, di feisheng/fang duobing/li lianhua. the single most effective use of what is effectively a prologue that i've ever seen in fic, are you kidding me. this fic is nothing at all like what i expected it to be, and is something far better than what i could have imagined. it's fang duobing's point of view, which is a rarity already, and it's so well done, and it allows him so much humanity and so much anger and grace alike. there are so many tricky things about this fic—the prologue, the fact that it's set in the amnesia arc, fang duobing's pov, the fact that it actually addresses canonical disabilities and illnesses without being fucking weird about it, the tension between the three of them—and it's all balanced so well. this has some emotionally heavier moments but ends tentatively happily; tentative only because it's set during the amnesia arc, and, well. we know what comes next.

as a final note: if you wrote one of these fics and feel that i've wildly misinterpreted the emotional tenor of the ending, please message me in whatever way you prefer and i will correct it. i would not normally presume to guess how things are likely hit people, as i am in many ways not anyone's ideal reader, but today it seemed like it was kinder to at least try.

[auriidae]

PART 2 ‼️ me & my friends when we are stuck at life (pt 1) (pt 3)

character notes under the cut!!!!!

both in true hs canon and in this au, rage represents chaos. and lifeseries grian is so undoubtedly linked to chaos above all else — he thrives off it, subsists on it even. if it’s not something he can seek out it’s something he’ll initiate. but — make no mistake, the anarchy he initiates is very much limited to within the game. he doesn’t break the game system, he works within it and disrupts whatever system the players are trying to put in place… for the benefit of the game itself. and again, with heirs being played by their aspect, it only makes sense for him to be one. rather than jimi, though, he’s okay with this — being an agent of chaos ties him to it intrinsically, and that makes him feel so, so alive. he’s okay with being controlled, for the most part, because it also means he’s in control. at least at the beginning.

i wanted to make eethos a mind player so bad you don’t understand 😔 but i think he is closer to void in reality. either way he’s a thief — dealing in redistribution of his aspect only to himself, whether consciously or unconsciously. i think void makes sense for eethos because he’s such an unknown to many of the other players (and also to some extent probably himself). a thief of void — taking the mystery from others, knowing them and their secrets and cloaking yourself in them, making yourself an unknown. if void is an aspect more focused inward, also (i like the idea that the central struggle of void players’ character arcs are more personal than some of the other aspects), we could have eethos vs the mortifying ordeal of being known + choosing to stay. which comes back to his class, with thieves having to let others have their aspect as well in order to fully complete their character arc. with that being said eethos “wghats the deal wiht abtrhoom pesnis” mind player will always be real in my heart ok

beedub oh beedub my beloved rogue beedub. rogues typically have the problem, right, where they are capable of redistributing their aspect for the benefit of others but never for themselves. so they try to find others who can help them with it but really just have to learn to stand on their own (and end up finding a source of their aspect that way). this specifically throws beedub n eethos’s friendship into the saddest light because beedub is okay with giving everything to his friends + allies (esp eethos) while quietly hoping they will help him in return, but the thing beedub wants eethos (as a thief) is incapable of giving to him. he can only take, and that’s where their sort of falling out where eethos starts avoiding him and spending more time with others comes from. eethos needs to learn to give to others (not beedub) and beedub needs to learn to stand on his own. ethubs makes me sad. BUT ANYWAYS hope as the aspect of imagination, of being caught up in seeing what could be, of love and trust unconditionally without paying mind to the possible repercussions. that is pretty bdubs-coded i think. he’s a hope player and he’s going to be ok guys he’s going to be fine :)

again feel free to ask me questions abt them !!! lifestuck is in my brain

[ramblingsx-ofa-dreamer]

we live in a world obsessed with nonchalance and you wonder why i fell in love when you kissed me in the moonlight. just once in this world of one night stands and broken hearts, just once i want to be loved out loud and on purpose. holding hands in public, not embarrassed to kiss in front of your friends. to not be so damn afraid of being in love. fleeting glances across crowded rooms and holding me in your arms for all to see. we’re supposed to feel! to care! the universe is watching and returns the energy you put out, so embody love! kindness! joy! all the good things you want to see in the world, you have to become it! just because the world is a cruel and dark place doesn’t mean you have to be a cruel and dark person. it is okay to feel things. the good, the bad, the wonderful, and the unbearable. you are supposed to feel! to be! to exist!

no more do i want to live in a world where we are so afraid to say what we feel, or even to feel at all. so love me. love me out loud and with reckless abandon, unafraid of who might see. love is beauty, the way your hand fits into mine and the way my face rests in the crook of your neck, like we’re pieces carved from the same stone, meant to fit together. love me. outside opinions have no place in love, in the opening of our hearts to each other, in this beautiful vulnerability that is real love. to be loved is to open oneself up to the mortifying ordeal of being known. to truly love another is to truly know another. love and life and beauty are vulnerable. but that’s how it’s supposed to be. we can’t keep living in fear of being found out for simply feeling. closed off hearts - and minds - can never know love as love is intended to be known. i never want to live a life of such fear. we only have so much time on this earth, only so much time to see beautiful things and feel beautiful feelings. so love, feel, open yourself to the possibility of being known and the beauty of the world might just reveal itself to you.

[hanbindans]

NOT MY GOVERNMENT NAME??? 🎤🎤

zb1 as petnames a/n: hi my name is hanbindans and I have come to ruin you all 🤠 you saw the microphone emojis- you know what time it is. I've given this a lot of thought btw I love this concept

jiwoong

"darling" with added rizz. honestly all he wants is just to make you go insane and he will make sure to succeed. if he's in a silly goofy mood it's going to be more like "dalliwng <3" (YOU KNOW WHEN HE DOES THE VOICE???)

hao

you're his little babie cutie patootie munchkin pumpkin pie and he will only refer to you as such!! it's definitely a super cute one like "sunshine" because you will never not be the cutest person ever to hao.

hanbin

"sweetheart", but there's nuances depending on the situation. it's "🥰sweetheart" when you bring him lunch at work. "😀😀 sweetheart" is when you try to microwave leftovers in a metal container.

matthew

babygirl/boy and angel but ironically. if it infuriates you or makes you physically cringe that's just fuel on his fire. his goal is not to make you melt for him it's to embarrass you by letting EVERYONE in this coffee shop know that you are "angel".

taerae

definitely "darling", "honey", or "my love" vibes. it's going to be one of those super sweet ones that only old married couples call each other. he does it with so much ease too like he isn't making your heart skip several consecutive beats by calling you honey.

ricky

when texting? babygirl/boy and angel but unironically (in his mind calling you this makes him the hottest boyfriend on the planet). irl? he's [insert the new jeans song] and will only call you by your name- except for when he's sitting really close to you and no one else can hear him- and he'll let out a "baby" in the quietest voice possible (🥹)

gyubin

I just know he would call you something insane. it's definitely a pet name that he can NOT under ANY circumstance call you in public or people will look at you weird. I'm thinking "hey smelly toes" or something unhinged like that like he knows no limits. you're best friends who kiss there is no such thing as too far in his mind.

gunwook

no thanks!! he would rather crawl into a hole in the ground and decompose <33 actually he has like 24 pet names picked out but he's not about to reveal how much of a simp he is in case he accidentally quotes a full hozier lyric instead of calling you "babe". it's the mortifying ordeal of being known gunwook edition.

[brigdh]

Ed and the mortifying ordeal of being known

Ed does not like revealing his feelings. He is incredibly consistent about lying,

hiding

displacing,

distracting, or just outright denying what he's feeling instead of actually talking about it. This is a consistent pattern of behavior with him. There are a few exceptions – most significantly, I think, the bathtub scene where he confesses to Stede about killing his father – but they are a) rare, and b) occur under unusual circumstances, such as a PTSD flashback. In general Ed goes to great lengths to prevent people from recognizing the truth about him.

I don't really blame Ed for this habit, to be clear. He went through an abusive childhood, and though we don't see a lot of the exact dynamics in baby Ed's house, it's very common for abused children to become hyper vigilant of both their own and others' emotions. It's an attempt to exert some, any control they can over the situation, as though they can prevent setting off the abuser if they just always say and do the right thing.

Ed escaped into piracy, but in terms of talking about his feelings, I don't think it was much of an escape. Piracy in OFMD seems to be a place where the idea of having friends (though not the reality – I'd argue Ed might not use the word 'friend', but has had close relationships) is to be scoffed at. "We're all just in various stages of fucking each other over!" says Calico Jack, and being open about your emotions, plans, hopes, etc would just make it all the easier to be betrayed. On the other hand, lying, obfuscating, or just telling everyone about Plan A and then instead pulling off Plan B makes you look like a double-crossing genius who outthought everyone around you. So I'm not surprised that's Ed's learned to be manipulative and uncommunicative. I don't think he's ever been in a situation where emotional openness wouldn't be a disadvantage.

Regardless of why he does this, it's very clear that it's a pattern of behavior for him. This is one reason why I don't think Sad Robe Ed back in Episode 10 was healing – healing requires addressing and dealing with your feelings, and Ed was very much not doing that. I've already written a whole post going through that episode and laying out how Ed never once mentions Stede, or love, or heartbreak, or anything related to what he's going through, so I'm not going to do it again here. In brief, Ed's putting on a performance of sadness for the crew, but it's a generic, vague sort of sadness, without any connection to his personal, specific pain.

Who finally brings up Stede in Ep 10? It's sure not Ed. Izzy:

Which brings us to Season Two. How is Ed doing now?

He's once again making a performance of his pain, and once again keeping it vague, not letting any of his true, personal hurts be revealed.

These:

Are performances of his pain and sadness, but just like before, they're generic, unspecific. This is "Mad Devil Pyrate Blackbeard", not heartbroken, human Ed. Who is it that brings up the private reality of what's causing this toxic atmosphere? Once again, not Ed. It's Izzy, just like before. And this time he gets shot immediately for saying Stede's name, and Ed doesn't even look at him.

In all three episodes, Ed mentions Stede directly only once, and very pointedly, it's when he's alone:

I'm glad Ed has decided that he wants to live, but that's the beginning of a journey, not the end. What I really want to see in the next couple of episodes is Ed finally, for once, opening up. He doesn't want to be vulnerable, but the lack of emotional intimacy that constantly lying and performing has gotten him is, quite literally, killing him.

Ed can't get over his own, very real pain until he's willing to admit that it exists. I want to see him acknowledge where he hurts. He needs friends. He needs love. He can't get those without being honest.

I hope he does. I hope the show will have him do this work instead of skipping him ahead immediately to the happy ending, no behavioral change required. I think they will. It's kind of their motto, after all: talk it through as a crew.

Now if the co-captains would just follow their own advice...

[ponyboyssophie]

There's so many bangers in Sorry We're Closed but imo Matilda's song is possibly the most thematically interesting and basically functions as a Duchess theme ASWELL as Matilda's.

[Spoilers, obviously]

Lemme explain.

When Dream Eater asks michelle what she wants most, each of these options represents one of the Duchess' ex-love interests.

Jenny is personal gain. Her solution to the Duchess problem is to gain excessive amounts of wealth to try and bribe her way out of the Duchesses grasp.

Gabriella is destruction. She steals the Duchesses key to break into the crypt to release havoc on the inside that threatens to spill into the outside, taking revenge on her parents while also dooming herself to a life forever on a mantle. She's the only love interest who isn't a boss because she basically mummifies herself and turns the crypt into her own tomb.

Interestingly, Matilda's 'solution' is the most similar to the Duchess.

Matilda believes that if she finds someone to love her, the Duchess will leave her alone and she will be able to go back to "normal", back to the endless one-sided adoration of her fans. She doesn't want someone SHE will love, nor does it matter how the other person feels as long as they fill that space in her life. It's only natural that they will love her - there's no obligation for her to give them love or vulnerability in return.

There's a line in Matilda's theme that says, "we're similar, there's no rigid dichotomy, we're two souls that failed obviously." The song switches between talking about her relationship with the Duchess and addressing the fight with Michelle so I can't know for sure who this is meant to be in reference to, but my interpretation of this is that it's acknowledging that Matilda and the Duchess are mirrors, and why both of them fail to have love again and again. All of them represent a foil to one side of Michelle; Matilda is her foil in love. Failing where Michelle succeeds.

This is why I think Matilda is the most similar to Duchess out of all the love interests; which pretty much guarunteed they were never going to work out. They both expect love to serve their purposes without giving in to the mortifying ordeal of being known.

"The more I seem to change, the less I see myself" is so relevant to the story's entire thesis. It relates to the Duchess, but also brings back to Dream Eater and Chamuels conflict, while Dream Eaters' theme also has a stark similarity to the Duchess, it's less on the nose about it as it's meant to describe two characters specifically -some things don't line up.

I could write a whole separate post on that song, but to briefly summarise it; it's the difference between self-preservation and self-destruction. Dream Eaters' solution is to destroy his other half in order to protect him while the Duchess wants to avoid becoming entwined at all in the first place. They're both scared to deviate from the blueprint so to speak - but Dream Eater doesn't want Chamuel to become like him, who has already changed, whereas the Duchess wants to reclaim who they used to be but keep their heart closed to change.

I'm willing to bet that "take the pain my lovers given and I inflict it on everybody" can also relate to the Duchesses relationship with God, who cast them out presumably during the divide, because they didn't fit the mould that Heaven created. It would make sense if they got the idea that love is a weakness that should serve you or be cast away (and never be double-sided!) from somewhere.

I love how many little characterization lines are in each of the main songs; kudos to okumura music group for putting so much thought into the story/characters. No matter how many times I listen to them I feel like I always find something new.

[uhhhitsme]

-20- love language/way they show affection for Curt and Owen please 🙏

in terms of how curtwen expresses their love, i think the biggest thing has always been protecting one another.

i've talked about this before, but for curt, i think there's this small part of him that can't believe he's loved by/gets to love owen. a part of him that's terrified that one day, owen is going to look a little too hard at who curt really is---past the whole hypermasculine effortless hero thing that he tries really hard to maintain---and realise it's not worth it. that curt's isn't worthy of him. and so he tries (in some of the worst ways possible, at times) to be that person who deserves owen, to be the man that owen trusts and respects and cares for, who can protect owen, who can have his back. owen, to me, was the first person who trusted curt. who saw him as an equal. someone worthwhile. and i think that beneath all of that bravado and all of that (mostly genuine) confidence, he's afraid of letting owen down. he's terrified of losing him because of it.

for owen, i think he's been alone for a long time, and he isn't used to caring about others. he's spent a lot of his life having to look out for himself. he's spent of his life thinking that the only way to survive is looking out for yourself, and once you think past that---when you start loving others enough you try to look out for them, too---that's how you get hurt. but somehow, some way, curt managed to become someone owen started looking out for. someone he loves so much he would sacrifice his own safety if it meant curt would be okay. and there's a bit of trust in that, too. owen has spent his entire life shutting other people out in order to survive, and by loving curt---trying so desperately to keep him safe---he's endangering that safety he's spent his life preserving. but he tries to protect curt anyway. he starts to let himself believe that as long as they have each other, it'll be okay. that it'll always be worth it.

and there are other things, too. the whole mortifying ordeal of being known is a big thing for them. the fact that the other has grown close enough to know their quirks---small things like curt making owen tea just the way he likes it or owen helping curt with steps of his morning routine. knowing looks exchanged across the room, touches lingering just a little too long when they greet each other on missions. i think physical touch is really comforting, especially when they've been apart for a while. all things that suggest permanence. that prove to them it's not all in their head.

most of it, really, has always been about trust. the fact that despite the nature of their jobs, how they're trained to always be wary of deception, they have faith in each other. they will always have each others backs. that they will always be the other's home. they make me sick

[vaguely-concerned]

Happy Grace/Pan Vibes For The Soul

"How can I, with you in the way?"/"(Laughs) The floor is yours!"

First of all I'm honestly just so charmed by how genuinely delighted Pan seems to be at watching Grace finding her voice and learning to enjoy using her power, I think that's where I started to take a shine to him. (also seems quite central to his character/romance in general because it's a thing that recurs through their relationship -- he tells her "I'm enjoying it if you're enjoying it" straight out at one point and that's definitely always there in the subtext). He buys a music studio for her just in case she ever wants to return to making music again even when she's not the muse anymore just because he loves her singing and has seen it make her happy before, how is that not the sweetest goddamn thing in the world??? Pan and Oracle in shared first place as stans for Grace musically

For real though, 'I Can Teach You' is sooo... even when you don't join forces with him Pan teaches Grace so many things in that song, it's a thematic tutorial as well as a gameplay one in many ways. For me I think the most impactful subtexts are 'This is a tricky situation, change is here and it's difficult, but you have more control and agency here than you think' ("You're in control!" "It's your song!"), and this sense that, y'know... there can be joy and playfulness and discovery in setting out into the unknown, not just fear and uncertainty.

dude... I wanna be in cahoots with & sing playful duets with you for the rest of my life bro (amorous intent)

Pros: Hell yeah look at her go! 🥰

Cons: Uh-oh look at her go! 😬

I love that Grace can bring Pan's motif into 'Challenging A Queen' and be called the fuck out by Persephone btw. why u keepin' your guard up girl uwu

'you gave up the only thing worth having -- for your little mortal friend' he says, giving up everything for his little once-again-mortal friend literally the next day fhsdkjfhsad who are you fooling buddy? not even yourself at this point surely??? (dialogue for if you save Freddie by giving up the eidolon)

my observations on the grace/pan dynamic across the different personality traits (yes I've done a run of each romancing him I am normal about it):

Clever!Grace: Pan seems to set out to be a trickster mentor of sorts, and Clever!Grace flips the uno reverse card on him and goes ‘Not if I trickster mentor you first bitch be honest about your feelings or perish challenge engage’. Probably the most birds of a feather combination (and indeed it’s the Blue version of the soundtrack that shows off his romance — also his tie and glasses are on the cover for that one :) ). 

Charming!Grace: Performative puppy dog eyes-off whenever either of them wants to get their way. 🥺4🥺. Pan is provably a soft touch from the Charming option to find Persephone before Challenging A Queen so I feel he probably tends to buckle faster but it’s a close thing. Local trickster god completely disarmed by someone being nice to him.

Kickass!Grace: “Be real with me or Imma kick your ass”/”Promise? ;)”/"...>:)"

I am always thinking about the way he steps up in The Trial when romanced (and the way it's the only one where Athena is genuinely shocked and appalled fhskadj). there is something about him that's like... he keeps protesting against 'innocent' and he's probably right haha, but there is certainly an almost fundamental lack of any active malice there that he doesn't fully admit to himself or to grace until this moment. he is doing this for grace, but it is also a confession about something really deep in himself that seems to be very vulnerable for him in its sincerity -- that he really doesn't mean to or more importantly want to cause harm (I don't wanna dance/with blood on my hands). admitting to his own basically good heart finally seems to be the bigger, scarier thing for him, more than facing the prospect of dying. he's experiencing the mortifying ordeal of being known and I for one am so proud of him

"I'm just here for the dance"

the way he sings that just to her and completely changes the meaning of it from what he said with it before, from using it to keep her out to inviting her in...

also can you imagine how badly the kill bill sirens must be going off in Grace's head in all variations of this scene no matter who steps up, considering what happened to Freddie just days before....... oof!

*incensed whisper* are you fucking kidding me with this what am I supposed to do with myself here

love these too

I really like the visual repeats of crossing the pond to the tree and back as a metaphor for them getting closer (or rather, him letting her closer, it is very much His Space). he retreats back there towards the end of 'Share This Dance', and that's the point where Grace puts her foot down and essentially says 'no. you come meet me honestly in the middle this time or this isn't happening'. and in 'The Trial' he does and then some!

I meant what I sang. I'm not a good man. If Athena had taken me up on my offer, the Idols would have been better off But I can try to be better. You make me want to try.

fun fact: if you break up with him after The Trial (YEAH you can still break off the romances at that point! it's wild honestly fsjadk), Grace tells him he should try to be better ‘for himself’ not for her... and he calls that (i.e. himself) ‘not much of an incentive’. My guy don’t make me break out the ‘Have you tried therapy’ prompt again. He takes it very calmly and gracefully under the circumstances but he's also like. quietly resigned and subdued. I tried it once for Science and never will again but there you go I bring my knowledge to this altar of sadness lol

you see the thing is I would forgive him for just about anything too I understand why so many of the characters in-game can't stay mad at him for any length of time

he starts the game by asking her to take his hand and he ends it on asking her to take his hand (and she does)...

:') let's share this dance

[rusquared]

quick procrastination break and also thank u @what-ye-egg for allowing me to unlock my personal pandora's box:

orv spoilers under the cut <3

the creation of 49!kdj is just. 51!kdj looking at himself, all of himself, and saying "okay, i will give them the parts that they love". he creates a version of himself that he thinks they would love most.

this dokja isn't haunted by the past that led him towards WoS. this dokja doesn't hide in an office cubicle scrolling on a smartphone during lunchtime. this dokja doesn't jump headfirst into danger. this dokja wants to live.

its like this poem i wrote a while back: "today i woke up as the one you would love/ i knew what i did wrong, and so i knew what to do right"

this dokja plays with gilyoung and yoosung and buys them all the pizza they ask for. this dokja doesn't get hurt and lets heewon and seolhwa fuss over him. this dokja stays with them, and is happy. which is what they should want, right?

but this dokja doesn't read. he doesn't look at joonghyuk the same way. this dokja eats tomatoes and doesn't remember the novel and characters that saved his life. this dokja doesn't make that stupid, unlucky smile, when he's about to sacrifice himself out of love. he doesn't habitually reach for his phone in his pocket, or bicker with sooyoung about cliches in webnovels. this dokja doesn't read.

tim kreider (the dude from "the mortifying ordeal of being known") also wrote this fucking banger of a line:

But the things people love about you aren’t necessarily the things you want to be loved for. They decide they like you for reasons completely outside your control, of which you’re often not even conscious: it’s certainly not because of the big act you put on, all the charm and anecdotes you’ve calculated for effect.

49!kdj is what 51!kdj thinks kimcom should love. after all, who would want the loner who only knew how to read and doom 1864 worldlines over and over again?

he doesn't know that they love the things he doesn't even notice. his hatred of tomatoes. his eyes when he finds a new book to read. the way he always kept a portable power bank on hand.

so imagine his surprise when they overturn a whole new worldline, show him scenarios he couldn't have imagined, and then.

knock

[starcurtain]

Haikaveh Fanfics I Really Want to Read (Part 1)

Part 2. ->

1. A run-in with a cursed artifact on a research trip leaves Alhaitham intangible and invisible. He can't be seen, heard, or even open his precious books (which is the real tragedy here). Things go from bad to worse when it's discovered that the only person who can break the curse is someone who "knows Alhaitham by heart."

Problem is, nobody does. The only one who might even come close is Kaveh, and will he really be willing to go out of his way to research Alhaitham's deepest secrets just to bring his scathing roommate back?

Turns out the answer is yes, and Alhaitham is left invisibly watching over Kaveh's increasingly desperate attempts to learn more about the most private person in all of Sumeru.

Yeah... Alhaitham's probably doomed.

(Or: The Akademiya's erstwhile scribe has nothing better to do than stalk follow his roommate around unseen, gets a front row seat to Kaveh's tough life, undergoes the mortifying ordeal of being known, and realizes just how much his own cold nature has left him isolated from the world.)

Rest under the read more:

2. Another research trip gone wrong: While Kaveh's out of town on a job and without a shield this time, Alhaitham takes a nasty knock to the head during a fight. Although he wakes up all right, he doesn't have the faintest idea who or where he is. Quick-thinking nature intact, Alhaitham decides to fake his way through on context clues for a while. It's an interesting experiment, after all, to learn about his own life from an outsider's perspective.

Too bad a very silly series of coincidences occur (i.e. Kaveh took most of his work things with him for his trip, so his room is pretty bare; they wash their laundry together to save water; and everyone keeps asking Alhaitham why some mysterious "Kaveh" guy isn't with him), all of which lead Alhaitham to the absolutely incorrect assumption that this missing "Kaveh" person is his significant other. Imagine Kaveh's shock when he returns home to a very out-of-character greeting...

(But I mean, really, does Alhaitham need his memories back? This is kind of nice, you know...)

3. Requirements for a Desirable Life (According to Alhaitham):

1. Match your actions to your talents (read as: go with the flow) 2. Low stress, high paying job (read as: the balancing act between making oneself seem indispensable while underachieving as much as possible is a talent) 3. Nice home with a short commute (read as: at-home lunch hours every day) 4. Books (read as: soon as possible) 5. Kaveh (read as: the light of my life who I moved into my house through admittedly somewhat underhanded tactics just to keep him close to me, but what was I supposed to do--tell him I have actual feelings? Impossible, in the most literal of senses)

Or: Alhaitham pursues his plan for an ideal lifestyle in an utterly single-minded and undeterrable fashion... except when comes to his roommate, who--for someone so good at drawing up his own designs--also seems terribly good at ruining Alhaitham's.

Just fall in love with me already.

(Basically, I just want to see Alhaitham be the pining one for once. He is one checkmark away from his dream life, but he'd rather sell his soul to Lord Sangemah Bay than confess without knowing how Kaveh feels first.)

4. Alhaitham is preeminently capable. He's beyond a genius. His research could rewrite the laws of reality if he tried hard enough. But he's also... terrible with people. Actually, terrible is an understatement. If Alhaitham is murdered one day, it'll be because he finally committed one too many social faux pas and honestly the masses will probably say he had it coming. Thank the lesser lord that the Akademiya's scribe has someone as gregarious as Kaveh around to help him mend his obtuse ways, right?

Or: Five times Kaveh tried to lecture Alhaitham on social skills, and the one time Alhaitham put all those lessons into practice... on Kaveh.

5. The very silly comedy one: If someone were to ask Kaveh what the very worst thing about living with Alhaitham is, he'd say--well, first he'd say "Who told you?!", but after that, he'd say something that might come as a surprise. The worst thing about living with Alhaitham isn't their constant snarking and diametrically-opposed mindsets. It isn't the tacky, asymmetrical furniture Alhaitham keeps bringing home because it was "practical and inexpensive." (Kaveh's skin is crawling.) It isn't even the fact that his so-called "landlord" reminds Kaveh all too often about his unpaid rent while never lifting a finger himself to do the dishes.

Nope. The worst thing about living with Alhaitham is the experiments.

"How many books can I leave on top of Kaveh's sketches before he yells at me?"

"How angry will Kaveh get if I drink the expensive wine he brought home last night?"

"How many days will it take Kaveh to notice I keep rearranging all the stuff on his shelves while he's out?"

"How many times can I suggest he add Aranara statues to his designs before he tries to strangle me?"

It's bullying, is what it is! There's no limits to Alhaitham's behavior when his curiosity is piqued--the only thing that matters to him is the answer to whatever outrageous new question he's thought up in that thick head of his. And of course, the louder Kaveh shouts, the more "experiments" Alhaitham seems to dream up...

Honestly, someone ought to give him a taste of his own medicine!

(Or: Alhaitham and Kaveh end up in an exponentially escalating social experiment competition, pushing as hard as they can to find the other's boundaries. One of them has to break and give up soon, right?! Too bad Alhaitham's the god of stubbornness, and Kaveh's eternal peace of mind is on the line--if he can just win this, Alhaitham will finally give it up and quit bothering him! He can't chicken out first!

Because they're both very Normal™, it turns out there's not a single boundary to be found.

Well, at least answering the question "How many times can I walk in on him in the shower before he kicks me out of the house?" might save them some money on the water bill?

By the way, Kaveh wins. It turns out the answer to "How many dog ears can I fold into the pages of Alhaitham's books before he tries to kill me?" is 0.)

[buckybarnesss]

Lurker now follower here, hi hi, I love your blog and all your insights and thoughts on Teen Wolf and Sterek!! I just finished a rewatch and then immediately started over from the beginning because I am Unwell 😂😂😂

I’m on episode one and I gotta say it’s pretty hilarious how Stiles immediately recognizes Derek. Like, I can only imagine how obsessed he was with the fire and the Hale family, and now Derek is back!!

I don’t really have more coherent thoughts on this, just my brain going BRRRRR so yea lol 😂😂

hi! welcome!

i know we all joke about how stiles immediately knows it's derek hale that he and scott run into because it is funny. like stiles baby. honey. the signs were there.

i've always gotten the impression the fire is something stiles remembers very, very well.

the hale fire changed beacon hills. the hales had been there since the town's foundation. they were a well off, prominent family. there was reason to suspect arson. multiple children died and the only known survivors were two barely adult children and a severely burned, comatose man.

laura and derek were high schoolers. cora was eleven years old and presumed dead.

we're told the only thing left recognizable of talia hale were her claws.

it's the definition of a tragedy.

not to think of the supernatural repercussions to the vacuum left behind.

stiles would've been about 10 when the fire occurred which is young but old enough to understand the severity of such an event. especially as the child of the sheriff.

he probably saw how it weighed on his father and had a healthy dose of morbid curiosity. he may have even have knew cora hale in that passive way you know other kids in your school even if you don't know them personally. one day there and the next dead. for someone like stiles who gets hyper-focused on things and has a lot of anxiety stemming from the death of his mother i can easily imagine how his mind didn't let it go.

meeting derek in person created a hyperfixation so intense and so unhinged it led to him recognizing teen derek hale at 50 paces or less in a mexican desert several years later.

as he got to know derek he unlocked the layered tragic backstory stiles really became derek's secret keeper.

and it is only stiles that gets these pieces of the puzzle that is derek hale. he's the one who goes through the hale fire files, he's the one who pieced together that kate argent preyed on a young derek and he knows about paige.

i find it interesting choice to have only stiles know these things about derek. scott never learns of these things that could possibly make him more empathetic towards derek. the writers don't use it that way.

especially because stiles learning these things never goes anywhere overt. it's all in the subtext of the relationship between derek and stiles.

like, stiles learns about paige and he does nothing with this information but we do see him with tears in his eyes over it. he doesn't ever learn that paige's death gave power to the nemeton either. jennifer only tells derek that.

he knows all of this about derek and never tells anyone. he only ever alludes to knowing about kate one time and it's in the overlooked when he gets in derek's face. i'm unsure derek's even aware stiles knows about paige. stiles carries all these secrets about derek and he never uses it against him. instead he continues to keep coming back again and again and again for derek.

more importantly he understands derek and what is love but the mortifying ordeal of being known.

that all said stiles is absolutely unhinged about derek and derek does nothing to curb this by the way. if it bothered him he'd stop it but they are freak4freak so derek probably finds it charming even if he puts up a few token protests just to bait stiles.

[bubaboos]

due to popular demand (2 mutuals and me) i present to you my top ten movies watched in 2024!

i wanted to be fair and in the actual top 10 i've only included movies that premiered in 2024 in poland (with one exception) but i've also made a honorable mentions list and top short movies (because they deserve as much attention as feature films!). so, here it is! enjoy!☺

10. All Of Us Strangers (Andrew Haigh, 2023) 4/5 stars It's one of the rawest, most intimate films I've ever seen. It makes you feel like and intruder of someone's deepest thoughts and feelings, as if you were reaching directly into the main characters' minds, souls and hearts. It's uncomfortable in the best possible way and it's very very real. The dialouges are so honest and emotional and gave me chills, some of the shots are out of this world and made me feel like I was personally there, basking in the sunlight or smelling the smoke. AND Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal are a perfect duo, their acting was so believable it makes you forget you're watching something fictional. It has it's flaws yes, but it also made me think about it for days. It's like a healing fever dream in which you're trying to make things better.

9. Evil Does Not Exist (Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, 2023) 4/5 stars Damn. This one. You know, I wasn't really sure about it at first bc it is frustrating but then I think this film wants you to question it and that's a good thing about it. It's all about perspective and whether you actually believe that evil does not exist. It's a good reflection on grief, cruelty, humanity and how we choose to exist in this world. I wish it reflected more on nature and how we influence the envoirnment around us BUT I also understand why it didn't. It has a beautiful score from Eiko Ishibashi and some hypnotising, breathtaking cinematography. And it proves that evil does in fact exist and is stored in annoying glamping guys who disturb your routine and plan to destroy your envoirnment and community. Also, I'm impressed in Hamaguchi's ability to create a slow cinema film that's under 2 hours, that manages to actually give the story space it needs and resolves all important plot points.

8. Sometimes I Think About Dying (Rachel Lambert, 2023) 4/5 stars🖤 Touching and relatable in ways I wouldn't expect. It was a pretty personal watch for me so I might be biased but I think it's a very interesting take on mundanity, death (and fantasizing about it) and the mortifying ordeal of being known. The cinematography is beautiful, the story is written and told in such a gentle and understanding way, Daisy Ridley is simply great and the music score gives it all a nice touch and sets the mood perfectly - everything works together very well. Justice for boring girls who fantasize about death and live inside their heads!

7. The Beast (Bertrand Bonello, 2023) 4,5/5 stars It NEVER went the direction I expected it to go and that's a VERY good thing in this case. It crawls under your skin and feels a little haunted. It's unpredictible so it keeps you guessing and wondering all the time and it never gives you a simple answer (and trust me, you'll have a lot of questions watching this), even at the end of the movie. It's a very complex reflection on relationships and love, modern world and gender dynamics, technology and history. It's surreal and realistic at the same time. Yes, you need to be patient with this film but it's worth it. Everything shown, said and done in this movie has its' purpose. And I'm in awe of Seydoux's and MacKay's acting here, it's incredible how they managed to play multiple characters that are basically the same people in different timelines and yet I couldn't recognise them sometimes.

6. Perfect Days (Wim Wenders, 2023) 4,5/5 stars 🖤 Well, it turns out I'm a sucker for some slow cinema. Another film that demands patience from you but it was one of the most memorable watches for me this year. I could watch Hirayama-san go about his life for 10 more hours. Yes, it's a little cliche but it also works because it knows exactly what it wants to achieve. It shows the beauty and freedom in the mundane and it also shows the prettiest public bathrooms you could imagine ajkfgjsfjadsgfaj no, but seriously, I really appreciate this movie for showing that sometimes "a boring life" is just... a good one. You don't need to do great things, you don't need to kill your soul for labor, you don't have to be proud of every choice in your life but it's also not worth it to dwell on the past. It's about whether you're satisfied with how you live now and your life can just be... ordinary. What's important is - are you free and living in harmony and true to yourself? Some shots here are magical but what caught my attention the most was the sound design and how it adds to the story. I could talk about this movie for hours but I'll stop here.

5. How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies (Pat Boonnitipat, 2024) 4,5/5 🖤 Have you seen all the videos of people sobbing in theatres as the credits of this film play in the background? I'm happy to inform that all this videos are true and I sobbed like a baby. I have a strong loving relationship with my grandma so this film was a very personal watch for me and a bitter-sweet one too. Guys, this film is a warm hug on a cold day, it's a beautiful, touching story about appreciating your loved ones (even if you lie to yourself that you don't actually care about them) and saying goodbye to them, when you really really don't want to. But it also made me laugh a lot and this is just how life is right? It's bitter-sweet and there's never enough time with the ones you love but it's still worth it. Some beautiful shots, great acting and a simply lovely story.

4. Challengers (Luca Guadagnino, 2024) 4,5/5 stars 🖤 Oh, where do I even start. I must admit that I was sceptical at first with all the hype this movie had and then I regreted SO MUCH that I didn't manage to see this in cinema😭 I just know I would've had an out of body experience. This movie had me sitting on the edge of my seat, pacing around the room, gasping and cheering. The tension is incredible but the pacing is also really good so the story isn't rushed but keeps you intrigued the whole time. The soundtrack is crazy good and got me hooked from the start, the main characters are so interesting and the cast did an amazing job. The final 30 minutes of this movie?! OUT OF THIS WORLD, I'm so serious. Challengers is like watching a very intense match of tennis between a divorced couple and their lover. Literally! And you will have the best time ever watching them and you will get involved and take sides. It's very fun and the cast is incredible, brain goes brrrr!

3. Anatomy of a Fall (Justine Triet, 2023) 4,5/5 stars 🖤 This film has it all. COURT DRAMA, great cast, trilingual queen accused of killing her asshole husband, dog's acting that's better than half of film industry, amazing child acting as well, hot loser lawyer, great script that never lets you get bored and cinematography that makes you feel like you're a part of it all. What I love about Anatomy of a Fall is that it forces you to come to conclusions yourself, not giving you an actual answer. Whether the main character is guilty or not is actually up to you. There were moments where I was totally hypnotised and immersed in the story with my whole body. It's complex but executed very well, so there's no loose plot points and there are so many details too but you also have to decide yourself if they matter or not. And the multilingual part is done SO WELL, it shows the struggle of existing in a foreign country, being forced to use languages that are not yours to build an image of yourself that can never be really true because it's not in your mother tongue and how it affects you in a very honest way imo. I kind of can't wait to watch it again.

2. Wham! (Chris Smith, 2023) 4,5/5 stars 🖤 (Okay, hear me out. So technically I watched this in 2025 already BUT! It was in the first days of january so in my head it still counts as 2024, okay? Okay. And besides, I really want to put it on this list because it belongs here.) It's not easy to make a decent documentary and it's hard to make a good one. This one? It's very very good, great even. The editing and songs choices are excellent and the whole production feels like a conversation between George and Andrew, them recalling memories as if they were telling you their story at a cozy party. It made me miss Wham! and George a lot but it also made me appreciate Andrew a lot more and understand both of them better. It's lovely to see and hear their perspective on the whole phenomem that was Wham!. It's definitely my new comfort watch <3

1. Monster (Hirokazu Koreeda, 2023) 5/5 stars 🖤 AND THE WINNER IS... MONSTER!!! MOVIE OF THE YEAR, MOVIE OF THE DECADE, MOVIE OF THE CENTURY. TO ME! I've seen it several times, I've had the soundtrack on repeat for the whole year, it's my new comfort watch, I want to give it a whole chapter in my master's thesis, I can not shut up about it ever since I've seen it, it's serious. This film means so much to me at this point that it's hard to describe with words, but I'll try. If you've seen any Koreeda's films before, you know the drill. He likes to tell subtle stories about what makes us human but he's never idealistic about it, most of the time it's just brutal truths about our world shown in a beautiful way. But he never leaves viewers without hope. And that's what Monster is as well. It's about two boys, who become friends but we don't know that at first. The story is told from 3 perspectives - the mother's, the teacher's and finally the boys'. And it's an excellent choice because we get to learn everyone's motives behind their actions and then the actual course of events when it's time for the boys' perspective. It's not just "same story told from different POVs" - each POV brings something completely new and focuses on diffrent details. It's told beautifully, with so much understanding for each character and it's just so. gentle. You're waiting for the perspectives to collide, for bits and pieces to connect and show the whole picture and when they do... Let's just say, it's a rollercoaster of emotions. The story is simple but so complicated at the same time. It asks, who is the monster? Is being a monster actually a bad thing? Who decides about all that? I think it's an interesting choice of Koreeda's to answer these questions with this story and these characters. I love so many things about this movie. It's a story I didn't know I needed. It's like watching someone's distant memories, it's like watching something, that will happen soon. The soundtrack from Ryūichi Sakamoto is perfect and only adds to that feeling. Actors? 12/10, amazing job, especially from the kids and Sakura Ando. The cinematography? Excellent. I sobbed obnoxiously, I laughed, I was devastated, it was the most cathartic watch for me this year and in general. If you were to watch only one film from my list, I want it to be this one.

Honorable mentions: 1. The Matrix series (Wachowski duo, 1999-2021) 4,5/5 stars overall 2. When Harry Met Sally (Rob Reiner, 1989) 5/5 stars🖤 3. Shinjuku Boys (Jano Williams, Kim Longinotto, 1995) 5/5 stars🖤 4. Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (Hayao Miyazaki, 1984) 4,5/5 stars🖤 5. Tokyo Godfathers (Satoshi Kon, 2003) 5/5 stars🖤 +bonus: Utrata równowagi (Korek Bojanowski, 2024)

Top 5 short films: 1. Pussy (Renata Gąsiorowska, 2016) 5/5 stars🖤 2. Knight of Fortune (Lasse Lyskjær Noer, 2022) 5/5 stars🖤 3. Nun or Never! (Heta Jäälinoja, 2023) 5/5 stars🖤 4. Taniec w narożniku (Jan Bujnowski, 2024) 4,5/5 stars🖤 5. Sierra (Sander Joon, 2022) 5/5 stars🖤 + bonus: Invincible (Vincent René-Lortie, 2022), Left-Handed Pen (Adas Burkšaitis, 2024), Love, Dad (Diana Cam Van Nguyen, 2021)

letterboxd list with some bonus films: https://boxd.it/DmR84

[greenerteacups]

Would LOVE to hear more re: Lily Evans as the bolter of you want to share more about that idea

Ogh god I have So Many thoughts about Lily and the Marauders in general because I had to basically do a full outline of the Backstory in order to have context for the living Marauders' backstories, but here is my official Harry's Mom Was A Player dissertation:

I like the idea that Lily grows up with relatively few people around (we only see her with Petunia and Snape, which you could read as a function of Snape's perspective, but I prefer to read it as Lily and Snape being "those weirdos in the corner of the playground making Potion in the dirt" buddies). From that, she becomes pretty closed-off emotionally, and despite having general charisma and kindness, she's pretty hard to connect with. Nice, but a little brusque. She's glad to help you with your homework, but when you invite her to Hogsmeade, she'll smile and make a vague excuse, and you'll never hang out again.

This would also explain why she and Snape remain friends for five years, despite being in different houses and having a lot of political differences: he's one of the few people she's vulnerable with. So we're picturing this Lily who's beautiful, charismatic, clever, but also very closed-off and hard to find. I.e. 100% the kind of person who attracts a lot of admirers, but doesn't actually get close to any of them.

My headcanon for her is a long series of two-month relationships running from around fifth year through sixth, none of them very intense, and petering out around the time that the other person starts asking for labels or commitment. Because (a) she's Busy, but (b) she's not really comfortable with any of them. And so she gets a bit of a (slightly mistaken) reputation as an ice queen.

We know Lily and James started dating in seventh year, after he "stopped being an asshole." ACCORDING TO SIRIUS. This is his account of his best friend's love story. A lot of the read here turns on (1) how much you think James told Sirius about him and Lily, and (2) how much of that Sirius wants Harry to know, as someone trying to protect James's memory.

"He was a cad" is obvious big James energy, especially since we know (1) he's an unserious arrogant jock for most of his Hogwarts career, and (2) she would have absolutely no reason to take him seriously if he expressed interest in her, because — he's a dumb kid! And a bully, from her point of view.

Because they're not close, verging on antagonistic, I tend to think that his interest in her actually was superficial to start with — based on her looks or her reputation (or both). Which, of course, plays right into her issues with intimacy and not being really Seen by anyone. And the ritualized game of his pursuit only contributes to her disbelief in its sincerity.

So basically, by seventh year, you have these two incredibly desirable, successful, popular people who are both in fact really locked-up and struggle with sincerity, but have the beginning of real feelings for each other, and are freaking out about that.

And then you get a great Player4Player love story about intimacy and the mortifying ordeal of being known.