#Their meta is so fuckin bad

[chewysgummies]

Thank God Brawl Stars will never be like Cookie run when it comes to collaboration cause as a former ovenbreak player, I still remember the hello kitty event and how it the most grindy & a fucking disaster of a event. ESPECIALLY for anyone who didn't get hello kitty for that one mission. Basically soft locking everyone until they actually pay/get her through a Gacha. (The chances of getting her was low btw.)

[benbamboozled]

Jason Todd DGAF that Bruce Wayne doesn’t like guns.

That has never been a part of his beef with Bruce, I stg, how are people on this website SO CONFIDENT and yet SO WRONG???

Oh yeah also you goobers, Jason designed his Red Hood persona in part to TORMENT BRUCE SPECIFICALLY. Do you…not understand…that using guns…was a part of that???

I stg I complain about narration in comics being SO on the nose but apparently some people need information spoon fed into their brains or else they literally cannot comprehend it.

[imwritesometimes]

my brother put on OG law and order. cutter rubirosa mccoy lupo green van buren years. I can already. feel. the brain worms. goddddddd.

[doctortonytchopper]

But see the thing is -

If that was the mushroom the 20 MDs were looking for -- maybe Blackbeard went to Drum because they were researching devil fruits.

Because there is a clear distinction of science in the setup of the story - the robotic style, and the medical style. Arguably Chopper is just as advanced of a scientist as Franky is, but their knowledge has barely any overlap. And it seems like generally - medical knowledge seems maybe a bit more frequently disseminated.

I mean at least - where Queen was a top scientist in both those areas. He was competing with Judge and working with Vegapunk, but he was also fucking around with diseases. If the assumption is that he was about as good at both - Franky maybe could compete with him in the field of robotics, maybe even best him, but that's not something I would feel confident asserting one way or another without a more deep dive.

But chopper utterly FUCKED him, I mean absolutely destroyed his "super advanced" disease AND THEN SOME, in like 20 mins with his Chopperphage. I mean lbr inventing a disease isn't even half as hard as inventing a cure, and Chopper did that in a way that our world's medicine is barely starting to figure out how to do.

So say the 20 MDs were like, just about as good at medicine as Kureha and Chopper, and Chopper's a fucking BEAST at medical science probs at least on par with if not surpassing Franky in his own field (im biased bc uhh check the url. Im sorry...i own up to it at least lol) and Franky's keeping up with Vegapunk enough to be using his ideas and inventions. So the 20 MDs are probably doing some crazy stuff.

"So who cares? I thought Vegapunk was doing all the most advanced devil fruit stuff?"

Yes...in the realm of robotics. What about the medical science realm?

Why was Blackbeard on Drum Island? Why was he there immediately after getting the dark dark fruit, with Ace on his tail? It was just a couple of months before the strawhats land. Then they grab chopper and carry on, and meet up with Ace in Alabasta a few days later.

A few days after that, Ace catches up to Blackbeard - who is already planning to capture Luffy and turn him in so he can become a warlord.

And I'm starting to understand what the fuck Wapol is doing back in the story, why his Wapometal has been interwoven so much throughout the story.

Wapol specialized in consuming two things, and then combining them without destroying either, making the resultant thing a stronger, more durable, more versatile combination of both things. Using his devil fruit.

And say his team of 20 highly expert scientists were furiously dedicated to a single focus: devil fruits; specifically one that could "cure all diseases", which Kureha helps us understand is only possible by being a doctor good enough to be able to know *many* different skills and be able to apply them as needed; and say these doctors got a chance to study how Wapol's fruit worked. And say they used that chance to see if there was a way to combine devil fruits - to give someone versatile skills to use when needed.

And say someone stole that research, as of yet untested, and tried it out on themself. What was it Shiryu said at Marineford while Blackbeard was under that cloth with Whitebeard's body? "What happens if this doesn't work? Do we disband?"

And I mean. Why is Wapol where he is right now? He's literally in the PERFECT narrative location to be able to give us exposition on all of this, I mean he's literally in big news Morgan's blimp with fuckin vivi. Cmon. His presence is BEGGING to be asked about it. An accidental overhearing some news about BB and a like "oh oough that guy that stole my devil fruit combo research >:(" from Wapol and then a "HE FUCKING WHAT?? YOUR FUCKING WHAT??????" from literally anyone in proximity and we're off to the fucking races, just SAYING

And what was it Luffy to Sanji said while carrying Nami up the mountain? "I heard at a bar in my hometown that people from snowy places don't sleep". Obviously Teach was rumored not to sleep since at least that time when Oden joined the Roger pirates. But Hiriluk saw his cherry tree around the time of the God Valley incident, so I don't think it's impossible that there was some sort of connection there.

Idk man I was just tossing jokes out abt this arc but I'm buggin out about drum arc more and more every time I think about it or watch it lmfao

[sailorsunspot]

this is the season that makes me give up on rwby i think

[waitmyturtles]

If you haven’t watched She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat (TsukuTabe), season 2, please extradite yourself to my general location so I can either

a) have you arrested, and/or

b) kidnap you and force you to watch this

perfectly-paced

perfectly-shot

perfectly-written

show about two women discovering their sexualities unto themselves and with each other in like

THE MOST EMPATHIC WAYS I JUST CANNNNNNNOTTTTTTTTTTTT

I AM BLUBBERING

THEIR COMMUNITY OF FRIENDS

THE WORK THEY HAVE TO DO TO FIND SAFETY FOR THEMSELVES AND EACH OTHER

HOW THEY MANAGE THE LITERAL THREATS TO THEIR HAPPINESS TOGETHER

HOW THEY MAKE COMPROMISES FOR EACH OTHER VIS À VIS THAT SAFETY

HOW THEY CREATE A HOME AND FAMILY TOGETHER THROUGH THE FOOD THEY LOVE

HOW THEY USE THOSE SAME LOVING TACTICS WITH THEIR FRIENDS TO CREATE THEIR CHOSEN FAMILLLLLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

HOW THEY COMMUNICATE!!!!!!!

HOW THEY’RE BOTH AWARE OF WHERE THEY MIGHT BE SLIGHTLY STUMBLING ON THEIR COMMUNICATION AND HOW THEY GET THROUGH THOSE OBSTACLES TOGETHER WITH JUST BEAUTIFUL OPENNESS AND AWARENESS

HOW THEY PACE THEIR INTIMACY!!!!!!!

THIS IS ME (thanks @lurkingshan)

ME RIGHT NOW

OH MY FUCKING GODDDDDDDDDDD

And this is how I feel AT THE END of the season! Click the link above, this season has easily one of my top 5 episodes EVER, TsukuTabe episode 8, it hangs with Bad Buddy episodes 5 and 10, and Extraordinary Attorney Woo episode 11, and What Did You Eat Yesterday season 1 finale, watch ‘em!

I LOVE THESE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE SO FUCKING MUCH

MONSTER GL!!!!!!!!!!!!! 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆

AND ALL OF THIS IN A SERIES THAT WAS LITERALLY ONLY FOUR HOURS LONG. MY FUCKING GOD.

I might have to write some real meta when I calm the fuck down, but. The entire TsukuTabe franchise is a MUST WATCH of the very highest order. If you haven’t watched it, watch it now, drop everything. That was Asian queer media at its UTTER finest. Damn, NHK, you fuckin’ won the GL battle, homes.

[deripmaver]

Which is worse, rape or murder? - Or, should Casca have died during the Eclipse?

Unlike most of my meta posts, this is one I'm making as a direct critique of a specific take I've seen. It's similar to my meta about apostle Casca in that regard, where I want to look at a specific idea and why I dislike it, as opposed to wanting to explore my thoughts on an aspect of canon. To be clear, this is only something I do if I've seen a take a bunch of times, enough so I know it's not a one-off. It's also not something I do because I want to engage in discussion with the people who've said whatever the take is, it's something I do in case other people who agree with me might be interested in a meta post that's more in line with their viewpoint.

I provide this disclaimer because, as I've said a few times now, the idea that it's the better choice to have Casca die during the eclipse is one that I just really dislike, and I make that preeeeetty fuckin clear. I can't control who sees this or who comments, but I did think I should make my stance explicit.

Berserk fandom is an absolute treasure trove of bad takes about rape and sexual assault. Considering the seriousness with which the manga takes rape, despite it's sometimes quite dodgy framing and portrayal, the fact that the fandom is Like That is fully a testament to cishet men's inability to consume media without turning into a brainless amoeba of toxicity.

I have to say, though, what shocked me the most was that this particular take, that Casca should have just died during the eclipse, was not from the dudebro side of fandom ('cause if she had they couldn't make their silly little "casca enjoyed it" jokes).

I'm coming right out of the gate with my opinion, which is a firm no, Casca should not have died during the eclipse, and the story would be weaker if she had. I'm going to presume during this analysis that the people who say this assume that her death would be instead of her rape, as opposed to her being raped and then dying, which would be... Horrific. Even more horrific than canon, lol.

I do have sympathy for some of the people who wish she had died, and in a way I understand, though I vehemently disagree. Some of the posts with this POV sound almost traumatized as they proclaim I wish she would have died, it would have been better. As this is something I've only noticed in the tumblr fandom side of things, where most people are women, I think this comes from women readers feeling furious and sick about one of the most vile rape scenes out there. In some ways its intentionally vile, in others - ie how grotesquely sexualized it is - it's unintentional. Then, of course, she continues to suffer in her disabled, infantilized trauma state. I hear these readers wanting to shout at Miura that he should have just killed her off rather than force her, and us, through reading that. It would have been kinder.

I have... Far less sympathy for others. There's a side of fandom that simply does not care about Casca (in a different way than the dudebros who don't care about her despite gushing about how she's peak tomboy waifu). It's amazing the veneer of progressivism these people put on as they say that Casca should have died, because she did not contribute to the narrative before the eclipse, and she certainly hasn't after. Going to get even spicier for a second and point out fandom's long history of wanting female characters dead because they get in the way of mlm ships, and how I think this is SOMETIMES simply another manifestation of it.

To be fully fucking clear, I do NOT think that being a grffgts shipper (censored so this doesn't show up in the tag LOLLLLL) precludes being shitty about Casca. I think tumblr's demographics, and those demographics' typical shipping preferences, mean that grffgts is naturally going to dominate. By simple statistics, most of the people whose opinions I hate are going to be grffgts shippers. Same with most of the people's opinions I like on tumblr tbh. I do, however, think it's prudent to point out old school fandom misogyny, and how I personally feel it's showing up in the fandom, and also point out that it pisses me off that Casca dying during the eclipse is at all presented as the least misogynistic outcome.

I'm also going to say now that this is firmly being kept in the realm of fiction. In real life, there are horrific discussions about how being a victim of rape defiles you for life, and that it's better to die without the "shame" of being raped than live with it. While I have to be blunt it's difficult for me to separate some of the discussion of Casca dying during the eclipse from that anti-survivor bias I see in real life just because ~we live in a society~, I in general think this sentiment is coming from a place of simply analyzing, narratively, which outcome is less misogynistic given how the rape in canon is portrayed.

Would it narratively have been better for Casca to have died? What about the impact of her death versus her current storyline?

First, I think I need to outline my interpretation of the eclipse rape. I don't think that the decision to have Griffith rape Casca was Miura simply being a misogynistic cishet dude who threw in rape for the hell of it. I also don't think it's OOC. Again, there's much to critique in how it's drawn, but not in the fact that it happened. Griffith, in his moments of feeling out of control and powerless, uses sexual advances to reassert his control over the situation - see Charlotte, or the wagon scene with Casca. A distaste for sexual violence committed by his enemies doesn't mean Griffith is incapable of wielding sexual violence as a weapon himself. In real life, there's a paradox where rape committed by political or social enemies is seen as the worst crime one could ever commit, while the mundane rape committed as a consequence of patriarchy is excusable and the victims should be blamed and shamed. Did Miura have the gender studies acumen to think about that when writing? I dunno, but neither does anyone who thinks he didn't.

I also think it's supposed to establish his actions during the eclipse as fully over the moral event horizon. Without it, it's easy to ask if ultimately, Griffith's decision to sacrifice his followers to a cruel death is justified to create a perfect utopia. With it, it establishes Griffith as acting fully on cruel, malicious impulse in moments of emotional turmoil, which puts his future utopia in jeopardy. I can't be the only one who sees Falconia as a ticking time bomb. Of course, this doesn't mean he needed to rape Casca, but simply that I think it was necessary to his character to do something that crossed that moral line. He could have raped Guts I suppose. Killerbambi has entered the chat.

While I think this might sound strange, I actually think it's immensely validating to have a character who is a victim not just of rape, but of rape committed by someone she already knew. That's genuinely unique in media on the whole, which plays into that paradox I mentioned earlier - in real life, the vast majority of assaults are committed by someone the victim knew. Having the story surround the continual, horrific trauma of betrayal, of having to watch the person who hurt you move on while trauma keeps you in horrible stasis is almost so realistic it's... uncomfortable. Painful. Hard to read.

There's no greater purpose to what happened to Casca. She didn't grow from it, instead she regressed.

Her general lack of agency post-eclipse is much critiqued in the fandom and like. Fucking yeah fair LOLLLLLL BUT ALSO... But also. Fandom on the whole can be so cruel about traumatized female characters, like there's no way they can do trauma "right." In Casca's case, her lack of agency is turned into a reason she should simply have been killed off instead, as though there aren't so many survivors who, while not as literally as she does, retreat into a shell of themselves and are frozen with trauma as the world begins to pass them by. Of course, the critique would be that she's not a real person, she's a female character written in a misogynistic way by a man, but I personally think this overstates Miura's issues with his portrayal of rape. To me, it presents what they think are his biases as justification for their own biases.

Time and time again, I see survivors discuss feeling validated by Casca's trauma response after being assaulted. Even the parts of the rape scene that I vehemently dislike, such as the hyper-focus on Casca's body and the physical reactions she's having, I've seen more than one person say they felt validated because they too had an unwanted arousal response during an assault. I'll still critique the scene, but regardless of if this was Miura's intention, its impact is clear.

I'll again plug this article by Jackson P. Brown, How Berserk’s Casca challenges the myth of the “Strong Black Woman.” Just to show a quote from it:

All of the action of the story after Conviction Arc is in service of restoring Casca's mind. During Conviction Arc and after, Casca has groups of women who love and protect her, with women as her source of safety. Guts is single mindedly focused on bringing her back, putting his body on the line again and again to protect her and restore her. I wondered about including Guts here because I'm sure I'll get some anon about the Beast of Darkness, which again fair LOL. I have complicated feelings on that, but mostly I think the importance the narrative puts on her mind and her protection is touching, and I think this outweighs how the negative things apparently mean that she should have died.

Her story and trauma, despite its flaws, is shockingly realistic and validating to so many people. She's also a key narrative component post-eclipse, and not just ~for Guts' manpain~ or as a helpless plot device, her story is her own. I've written about Elaine as a character and what she represents, but in brief, Casca doesn't disappear after the eclipse. Miura wrote Elaine with these moments where Casca comes to the surface, and while I wish we had more of her POV I think you can look at how she's coping from how Elaine reacts to the world around her.

I also think it's necessary to have Casca at the Hill of Swords. There's Guts, who Griffith torments in the way only a bitter ex can, and Rickert, who doesn't know what happened the day of the eclipse, but I think Casca is the key component in that scene that cuts through all of Griffith's posturing and Guts' anger. She is there, making the real, human cost of what Griffith did during the eclipse unignorable in a way that no other character could. It's one thing for Guts to be furious with him and Rickert ignorant, it's another to have someone who loved him so innocently and dearly trembling just at the sight of him. Let's not pretend that the depth of betrayal in this scene would be the same if you swapped her for, say, Judeau.

It's funny, Miura is quoted as saying that his initial reason for keeping Casca alive was to provide Guts an ever-burning flame of vengeance, an eternal reminder of everything that he lost during the eclipse. What's wound up happening, on a meta level, is that Casca provides the reader a constant reminder of what happened during the eclipse. As more and more focus is given to her PTSD with her revival, the cruelty with which Griffith acted (and continues to act) becomes harder and harder to ignore. It becomes more difficult to push it aside as just bad, misogynistic writing.

And also, quite simply, I like narratives about trauma recovery, and therefore I'll always find Casca's story worth telling despite my frustration with a lot of it. It's absolutely wild to me that for how often I see the fandom complain about her being "fridged" they think it would have been better to see her ACTUALLY fridged, no chance of coming back at all, just dead to fuel Guts' revenge arc. Would it really be better to have her be just another dead girlfriend? Really?

That's really what it comes down to. I like Casca as a character, and I want her to have lived. The people who wish she had died, many of them simply don't like her as a character. Not all, particularly in that first group I mentioned at the start, but many. Everyone has their preferences of course, but I don't think I need to respect when someone thinks a character has so little influence on the narrative that they should have just died, especially if that character is Casca.

If Casca had died during the eclipse, it would not have been a good death. It would not have been brave, or triumphant, or worth anything for her as a character. Judeau died to protect Casca, but even his death was not brave, it was just sad. That's the whole point of the eclipse.

To have Casca die that way would be a disservice to her as a character, far moreso than to have her struggle on as a traumatized victim of sexual violence. That's genuinely what I believe.

[fotibrit]

what's your opinion on steves 'ending' in endgame? i generally feel like it sort of goes against a character arc of his, and a bit conflicting how much he did to not lose bucky and then sorta ditched it all the second he could actually exist with him once more, kinda also feels like a plot hole in some scenarios for his character and the future but i'm probably talking with some form of bias, I'm not too sure!! so I wanted to know another persons perspective on it!!

opinion: Was Bad

credentials: My very first introduction to Marvel was my best friend (hardcore Steve Rogers fan, called me “her Bucky”, was as insane abt Steve as i currently am abt tony) bringing me to see Endgame, and then her talking MAD SHIT about the ending for the next few months. I have heard every criticism. I learned that the ending was character assassination before i even know what character was being assassinated.

So. i don’t think it’s good. Getting into the Meta of the MCU for a sec, the MCY movies are partially paid for by the USA military etc etc so they reflect some political targets of the country. You gotta watch for propoganda in the movies. and in endgame, it was the happy little family. There was the family together in Wakanda, Tony being all domestic with his wife and daughter, Clint finally got to be back with his family. The snap brought back other family members, including don’t remember enough but generally… they were pushing the happy family thing. The US birth rate is down, and i imagine that part of the funding included some sort of push for more family imagery, in order to influence people to settle down together.

And then there’s Steve. Who has always had a found family, he’s out of time, away from his legal family. He doesn’t have any way to be included in this push for a family. My guess for what happened in the writers room is that they assumed everyone would fall for it hook line and sinker. that people would start believing, somehow, that birth family and nuclear family structures are most important.

If you look at it from the framework of their imagined audience, who thinks a nucular familg reunited is the happiest structure of all, Steve got a happy ending! He got to be with a hetero romantic partner!

Where they went wrong, is that nobody fuckin fell for it. Because it wasn’t convincing in the slightest. They spent hours after hours showing how desperately Steve cares for Bucky, and then they betray Steve’s primary motivation (keeping friends safe) in order to fit into their Nuclear Family Initiative.

they accidentally created a character who was the perfect encapsulation of an audience member who would NOT care most about a nuclear family unit. They made a character who cares most about a non-romantic partner. And then, they had to try to convince us that it was the same guy, while actively betraying his core values.

Bad ending. Wrong ending. Betrayed the audience and the character.

And it’s due to propoganda.

(side note: as far as i can tell, they’ve moved from “family unit” to “parenting is important”. Most blatant example i saw of this was in the last GotG, but it’s all over. they’re making everyone parents.)

[its-your-mind]

A compilation of things we know:

the OIAR used to work with a security company called Rightforce International, previously called Diligence Security Systems

the Magnus Institute burned down 24 Dec 1999

the OIAR separated from a company called Starkwall Protection Services on 3 Jan 2000

Starkwall had something to do with a “magnus protocol,” and information related to this is above the level of access of the OIAR team members

Gerry Kaey was a Magnus kid

there is no evidence that there were files in the basement of The Magnus Institute when it burned

The basement of The Magnus Institute was the Archives in the TMA World Line

Also in the TMA World Line, Gertrude Robinson was the Archivist for ~40 years, starting in the 80s

She frequently worked with Adelard Decker to thwart the machinations of the Entities and their avatars

Later, she worked with Gerard Kaey, who had intentionally aligned himself with the Eye in order to see when people were being stalked by one of the Powers and help them

He was also a firebug

Also known firebug: Agnes Montague, who had been bonded to Gertrude via a ritual by followers of the Web - a bond Gertrude used to protect herself from the Cult of the Lightless Flame

An unnamed security company saved Dianne Margolis from a shop on Hilltop Road in Oxford that was filled with supernatural shit and subsequently set on fire

FR3-D1 should NOT work like this considering the technology it runs on

FR3-D1 appears to have complete access to any files transmitted via the Internet, no matter how secure or buried they are, for the sole purpose of categorization

there (is? used to be?) some sort of Response Department, that is still enough a part of the OIAR’s operations that Sam gets paperwork on his desk about it after checking a box marked “Response 121” on his onboarding paperwork

Klaus learned things that he believed put him in danger and subsequently disappeared via Lena’s intervention

Colin believes there is Something watching and/or listening via any technology with cameras or microphones

Lena answers to some sort of authority that none of the other workers know about

The Entities exist in this world, just in a different form than we’re used to (in-depth meta on this here)

okay those are all the relevant facts time for:

CRACK THEORY TIME

Gertrude and Decker are co-founders of Starkwall né Rightforce né Diligence

They kept changing the name to keep off the radar of any avatars

Gerry was Youngest Recruit In History

He was recruited while he was a Magnus kid to be their INSIDE OPERATIVE

He got to help set the fire

He swept the archives and stole all the relevant files because he is still an Eye-aligned bitch who wants to figure shit out

Agnes is also in on it

Bc she fuckin DESERVES IT

also look at all the fire shit

She and Gertrude are lovers

Bc I fuckin deserve it

that eldrich bond should be good for something and that something is LESBIANISM

(*speaking in a voice crushed with disappointment but with a Touch of hopefulness* here’s how agnes montague can still win?)

Anyway back to Starkwall

Their whole thing is basically scorched earth policy when it comes to Fears shit (see: MAGP 07 statement of fire at Hilltop Road)

Feeding the Desolation by ^ and the Eye by collecting info on the activities of other fears (whatever slightly warped version of the Fears exist in this world)

Used to work with? under? the OIAR as part of the “Response Department”

FR3-D1 is like EXPLICITLY Eye-based system set up to collect info for Starkwall to go after (Eye is a silly stupid entity who just wants to gobble up the fear and is bad at planning, so doesn’t notice/care how its people use the info gathered)

a significant part of Jon Martin and (probable) Jonah got schlorped up by FR3-D1 when they got here bc their voices reading out Statements for the Eye were the conduits for the Fears to travel, and FR3-D1 had INTENSE EYE GRAVITY that was Specifically Tuned to gulp up supernatural stories from the interwebs

unfortunately the Intense Eye Beams coming off him DOES tend to place FR3-D1’s IT workers directly into a position to get Eyed into intense paranoia and fear of being watched (rip Klaus, stay strong Colin)

this did not happen when Starkwell used to work with them bc they knew how to handle FR3-D1 but alas once the Eye folks all fucked off it left Klaus (and now Colin) open to both paranoia attacks and possible Consequences for asking too many questions

Speaking of which

the Web (or an analog (jonny and alex drop titles for entities in this world if smirke didn’t make up the same ones challenge)) took notice of what was goin on and got operatives into the OIAR

Lena is one, or else she works for one. (Insert here’s how annabelle caine can still win theories here)

Klaus figured out too much and got in the way of Machinations and thus the whole *gestures*

Gertrude and Decker noticed and separated from the OIAR as soon as they were able to bc they realized that shit had gone South but are still out there doin the good work

Alice ALSO done got recruited from out of the Magnus program as a child

The reason she keeps pushing people away from the sus stuff and seems to know more than she claims to is bc she is their PLANT still working for the OIAR

She got Sam hired bc he’s still got eldritch eyes (in general, but maybe also Eyes) on him and she wants him somewhere she can keep an eye on him AND keep him inside a spooky space so it’s less likely an unknown actor would come after him

[dapper-lil-arts]

Small question, what you opinions of wallflower x sunset as a ship?

Beacuse its one of my favoritos

You asked me at the right time, because a week ago I woulda had no thoughts on this ship, but recently I've actually gotten kinda into it! There's a few caveats regarding it, I imagine very few people dislike it it because Wallflower is such a personal antagonist, like, she hurt Sunset so personally, a lot of watchers probs would never get into it bc of it.

But! its only because Sunset hurt her first. the whole reason wallflower became an antagonist is because of eye for an eye. And the new Sunset, kinder and forgiving, would end that constant 'ruin me, i ruin you' cycle, and her newfound kindness and care for wallflower could lead to a very interesting and warm relationship. Big punk girl and soft small gardener is a wonderful dynamic, heh. Sunset's redeemed kinder nature would make her for a wonderful partner, and she would prove to wallflower every day that she has changed and is better. Through kisses.

But I will admit my favorite aspect of it is the tragedy. Because Wallflower could easily think that Sunset is only into her because she 'feels she needs to', because she pities wallflower. Especially because Sunset could be with any other character (She has so much chemistry with so many gals, including Twilight, another hero just like Sunset of who they're super close.) I imagined Wallflower, on a fit of self loathing, could use the memory stone to make Sunset forget her just so she doesn't 'get in the way' of Sunsets life, and goes back to being just friends, from square one. Tragedy!!

It's a fun meta narrative that uses plenty of the story structures against the characters, heheh. After all, a former bad guy, side character? She doesn't get to have a happy ending with the protagonist! Forgotten friendship isn't perfect, but its damn fuckin close to, and its my favorite piece of media on MLP, and its on no short order because of Wallflower, my second favorite antagonist in the whole series heheh (first is chrysalis by volume)

[monstersinthecosmos]

As a fellow Marius lover, I always find it kind of disheartening how most of the content/fandom talk about him (meta, fic, fanart, etc.) revolves around m/m ships (Marius/Armand in particular but I’d even go as far to include Marius/Daniel here) when, in my opinion, Marius is like the one male character in the VC universe whose relationships with women are far more interesting than his relationships with other men (the only other character might be Lestat but even then it’s pretty 50/50). They’re so monumental and so full of complexities and pain and so much love and they define him and inform his character in ways that I think, his relationships with men simply do not. Interesting/hot under the right circumstances? Sure but like ARE YOU GUYS SEEING THIS MAN??? AND HOW HE RELATES TO WOMEN??? It’s one of the best things Anne ever wrote and I can never get enough of it and it makes me sad how little content there is of it and I feel I can never say this out loud because I would never want to make people feel bad about what they ship (truly not my intention here) but ugh SO MUCH potential there for life changing discourse and meta about Marius and the women he’s loved and lost and have shaped who he is and there’s like… nothing.

Tl;dr the reason I’m sending this ask is because I’m a firm believer that you must be the change you want to see in this world and because YOU get it! And every time you post or write about Marius/Pandora (or Marius/Akasha! Or talk about Marius/Bianca) an angel gets its (black) wings. You are seen, you are loved and appreciated tysm <3

OKAY FIRST OF ALL THIS WAS SUCH A DELIGHT TO GET IN MY INBOX, SECOND IM GOING TO BE COMPLETELY HONEST AND ADMIT I FEEL TOO INCOHERENT TO TACKLE THIS TOPIC HAHA. I don’t feel articulate enough to do it justice. And I don’t say that to be obnoxious and self deprecating but like in all honesty idk how to synthesize it neatly but I think you’re sharing some GREAT IDEAS. 

I have to say this in bullet points because I don’t feel equipped to string this into a cohesive post:

Marius was based on Anne’s husband, and Marius/Pandora was based on their marriage!!!!! And I think it explains a lot about why their relationship feels so fuckin POTENT to me, like it’s so genuine!!!!!!! And like knowing that I think it makes sense why she wrote him so HOT lol. Like she’s just writing thirsty stuff about her husband right? LOL

Also like insofar as there’s a lot of genderfluidity in VC there’s also something vaguely misogynist about it at times. And Anne Rice was a mega feminist and her work had so much womens lib in it!!!!! So I don’t think it’s intended as misogyny at all vs. Anne having conversations about gender and maybe her own relationship to gender. I think enough characters have said vaguely misogynist stuff that it makes me think it’s an Anne Problem vs being Watsonian. (This is also a historical/time period issue and we can discuss another time if and when vampires are supposed to break out of that when they transcend humanity and social constructs even when they’re still saying weird sexist shit at their big ages.) But I say that to say all VC characters are a tad sexist, even if perhaps she was writing with the intention of her own male power fantasy/male superiority/penis envy. AND THAT MAKES MARIUS VERY INTERESTING. 

Cause like really the three main ladies in his life (Akasha, Pandora, Bianca) DO define him so much! And we don’t see him pine for Armand the way he did for any of them! Why!!!

Like there’s that aspect of sexism where women can be infantilized by men who don’t think they’re being unkind and it makes me wonder, especially when the author is a boomer, like where is that line between condescension and respect? I don’t have an answer here, this is too big-brained for me LOL but like he is SO devoted to the women in his life and I just wonder like if he sees them as creatures unlike himself, you know? 

This is headcanon territory but I bet he’s such a fucking sub to Pandora lol and it just thrills me that he spent 2000 years begging Akasha for affection and she ignored him the whole damn time wow. And he continued to simp!

AND ALSO LIKE, I think people DO NOT DISCUSS THIS OFTEN ENOUGH, but did we forget that he chose Armand because he needed a Bianca rebound? He was absolutely TORTURED by his love for Bianca and picked Armand because he didn’t want to kill her oh my god. Oh my god!!! HE KEPT HER LETTER IN HIS POCKET OVER HIS HEART OKAY??? HE DIDN’T WANT TO DRAG HER INTO HIS COLD AND FATAL DOMAIN????? Fuck lol

It’s so fucked up that he didn’t go after Armand but spent like actual fucking millennia trying to find Pandora. HE KNEW EXACTLY WHERE ARMAND WAS AND LEFT HIM THERE LOL BUT PANDORA HAUNTED HIM EVERY NIGHT OF HIS LIFE FOR CENTURIES.

After everything he wound up spending like 200 years with Bianca or something and ?????? CORRECT because Bianca was the fledgling he actually wanted!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But it’s odd, I know I’ve said this 337589235 times, but Marius like. Has an idea of the person he wants to be and he tries SO HARD to live by logic & reason and he just can’t reconcile with the fact that he has EMOTIONS. And so like part of the person he wants to be like, open/empathetic/wise and he begs his lovers/students/fledglings to CHALLENGE HIM when he’s not actually healed enough to be challenged? And to me there’s something kinda like, extra spicy about it when you’re in Rice World and you’re a lil sexist; how much that burns EXTRA when it’s Pandora or Bianca sticking up to you or AKASHA FUCKIN IGNORING YOU. 

Just really incredible that this person who is like the epitome of a patriarch has such fucked up relationships with all the women in his life. And like he underestimates these women, like the way he tries to manipulate Bianca and she leaves him! PANDORA AND AKASHA ARE UNAVAILABLE TO HIM AND BIANCA FUCKIN LEAVES.

akasSHA JUST IGNROING HIM!! JUST STRAIGHT UP FUCKIN IGNORING HIM FOR 2,000 YEARS!!!! HE'S OBSESSED WITH HER!

Anyway Enkil is ignoring him too but he doesn’t give a shit about that guy tbh lol 

Also the amount of space he gives Eudoxia and Zenobia in his book like there’s more here too but tbh it’s midnight and I can’t start unpacking. I just think like, in 2000 years it’s interesting how Eudoxia wound up having such a lasting impact on his life. 

I did just peek at the Eudoxia part and I’m dying, he goes “Her face was small, oval, and as close to perfection as anything I've ever beheld, even though she bore no resemblance to Pandora who was for me perfection itself.” CERTIFIED WIFE GUY.

What kinda mommy issues are we dealing with here? HIS MOTHER WAS A SLAVE THAT DIED IN CHILDBIRTH AND HE INHERITED HER GENES AND LOOKED LIKE HER AND DIDN’T LOOK LIKE HIS FATHER & BROTHERS? AND HE’S SORT OF AN OUTCAST AS A HUMAN LIKE ? THE STIGMA HERE? AND THEN HE SPENDS 2000 YEARS WORSHIPPING HIS NEW MOTHER??? PERHAPS YOU COULD SAY ENSLAVED TO HER? IDK MAN. 

IS THIS ALSO WHY HE WAS SO OBSESSED WITH LOSING PANDORA?

The irony too, and something I think a lot of people miss, is that he DIDN’T WANT TO MARRY PANDORA LOL. He wanted to be betrothed to a child so that he could FUCK OFF and NOT get married because she wasn’t old enough to get married! He fucked off! He went exploring! He said this is not for me! 

AND TO GO OUT INTO THE WORLD AND BE MURDERED BY HIS MOTHERS PEOPLE???? IDK. 

I’m not sure how these last two points tie into anything but I just wanted to mention his complicated relationship with Pandora and his own heritage lol. And then Akasha like DELIVERS Pandora to him because she’s like “wow this guy needs somebody lol and I am not emotionally available” — Akasha who was famously a violent genocidal radfem and who would not approve of his relationship with Armand but explicitly allowed him to have Pandora and Bianca. IDK WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN! 

Did Akasha approve of these women because she knew Marius was completely pussywhipped and would worship them and she wanted to see someone mommydom the fuck out of him and she knew that Armand would never be that person? 🫢

And again I want to say like, taking the author into consideration!! Anne Rice had a HORRIFIC relationship with her mom so you see these themes pop up occasionally in her work. DESPITE ALL OF THAT SHE IS STILL A FEMINIST AND WRITES ABOUT MATRILINEAR FAMILIES like The Great Family or the Mayfairs. But thinking about Mothers in Anne Rice Works makes me think a lot about this like, the damage they can do and the voids they can leave even when you’re a feminist and love women! You see a TON of this with Gabrielle and I always think that Lestat & Marius are such similar characters that you can do a lot of extrapolating or backwards engineering to ask questions about them and how they work, since we get SO MUCH Lestat POV in this series to work with and how we can zoom out sometimes and ask like, what is common across her entire body of work and what is more specifically common between Lestat & Marius and WHAT EVEN MORE INTERESTINGLY is a result that they were both based on her husband in their inceptions. 

Like how much of this has to do with Marius’s actual feelings towards men vs women on purpose, or how much was subconscious author bias, how much was simply that Anne Rice based him on her husband and she was THIRSTY, idk. It’s always hard to say in VC because Anne was such an intuitive and self-indulgent author and the stories are so weird!!! So your mileage may vary!

But I agree with you that these are FASCINATING relationships!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I like Marius/Armand too (I recently made a post about how I didn’t “””””ship”””” them but then I spent 2 months working on a M/A fic every day and now I think I’ve corrupted and converted myself LMAO) but yeah like. There’s such a lack of substance between them in the end. He treats Armand like he’s temporary, fucks up and moves on, and it’s such a departure from how DEVOTED he was with all his other partners. 

Wow I didn’t think I had a lot to say, sorry about that. !!! EVERY TIME I BROUGHT A POINT UP I THOUGHT OF 5 MORE POINTS GOSH I COULD TALK ABOUT MARIUS ALL DAY.

[cloud-based-and-rainpilled]

Staged 2 thoughts!! (this will take a Year because I have a Lot of feelings)

tl; dr at the end

Hmmm I don’t see how it’s a love story yet

Staged 1 works well enough on its own but the second season is really essential as a companion piece upping the emotional ante (which is exactly how I feel about Good Omens 1 & 2 lol)

The opening scene mindfuck; The meta! We have reached levels of irony not previously seen possible

Who do I thank for the tacky Zoom interview show background? It deserves top billing

HE DOESN’T WANT THE GOLDFISH TO BE LONELY (metaphor) and then it FUCKING DIES

Celeb cameos in season 1 being all “hey! I like you!” in season 2 like “you are tearing them apart. I hate you. scum

Also the themeing of Michael Sheen and David Tennant being on their own “side” VS everyone else……….. Simon Mr. Writer Sir i see u and unfortunately i am in your walls

The writing feeling less theater-y works for the meta and I’m wondering whether they always had a second season in mind or if it’s just that well written

Was really hoping for a Colin Firth & Hugh Grant cameo ngl :/

The music didn’t annoy me as much this season since it was more of the horn oomp-pah-pah than the piano. Idk maybe my mind just changed

I didn’t know Whoopie Goldberg could be terrifying but here we are (also I forgot her name isn’t Whoopie)

“I think the wizard fucked your ass” ???

Setting up the awards and the baby was peak *pops P* comedy 🤌 Definitely needed since it gets Sad as it goes on

Welsh kink spotted!!! And so fucking blantant I was scandalized

“I’ll shove it up my ass where the rest of the excrement goes” Michael casually asking David to peg him. Nice

More bad magic. More pls and ty

Also moar Nina pls. T’was but a brief beautiful bluster in the wind

Tbh missed a lot of Michael & David’s back-and-forths VS season 1 but I get that’s… the point

Everyone agreeing David is whiney and annoying lmao get wreck’t

Also I forgot they don’t have air conditioning in Englandland ‘cause my man is sweating in every scene he’s in (unless that was intentional in which case… go on…)

The ladies!! That meta ending with the Bechdel test… I see you…

Still love Georgia and Simon’s sister (who I apparently don’t respect enough to google her name); I like Anna now too! She’s got this kinda quiet sarcastic edge I didn’t notice the first time. They all played off each other well in their 3 some (phrasing) scenes

Big amongus sus react that Anna has better chemistry with the two of them than with Michael of which there is literally zero chemistry. Compared to Georgia and David who are just electric with each other it’s honestly distracting

Actual torture watching them break down as other actors play them and drive their friendship apart, it’s fascinating to watch especially on top of it being themselves but, like, not we swear

“Am I your best friend” “No” Fuckin REJECTED !! looser!!!

Oh huh I can see how this is a love story, interesting

The David Tennant fanboy (he is a Real actor I just can’t think of his name) served juicy vomiting SFX realness

“So you’ve made love with him” BROTHER

It took me 87 years to realize warthog and mongoose were in reference to Timon and Pumbah lol <- I am not looking up how to spell this

The bannister being part of the bookshelf why did this make me laugh this hard

Ken Jeong actually reaching into the heart of everything and casually tearing into it Temple of Doom style and leaving everything to ruin lmao

I miss people getting too close to me (feral noises)

Ewan McGregor is cute and I am shallow 🥰

AU where Simon Pegg and Nick Frost did Staged and honestly it would still work aside from being dangerously heterosexual

Simon & Nick doing the Staged 1 back and forth but literally? mmmm that’s sum gud meta

Oh right I forgot the actual writer Simon’s in it too. He’s still good. I like his Zoom tantrum

Jim Parsons unconvincingly looking for his phone after he casually tells David that he and Michael are obviously in love and everyone sees it lmao

David Tennant has the unique ability to make this absolutely insane face reserved specifically for the emotion “oh shit I’m in love with Michael Sheen” which like

I could kill the Good Omens costume department rn I stg take off those fucking sunglasses I’m so mad

Ohhhhhhhh yeah this is a love story

The Frozen snowman being the big bad final boss of cunt, oof you gotta love a good villain

Michael’s monologue the only one not in the kitchen area just breaking down completely I mean *claps until my hands fall off* he put his whole pussy into it. The frustration? The despair? I mean it felt like an audition monologue (in a good way) he walked through the valley in the shadow and death and came back a broken man with a fuzzier beard

CATE BLANCHETT ZOOM SNIPE

Apparently people didn’t like Phoebe Waller Bridge in the new Indiana Jones movie which I haven’t seen but idk I thought she was pretty funny and hot here. *ding*

MOOMIN MUG SPOTTED

The use of travel as a metaphor for feeling stuck emotionally *clenches fist*

“I like silence” *screaming from the other room*

“It’s like gas filling a room” <- fascinating way to describe their dynamic, it’s specifically referring to aimless conversations that snowball and “fill up a room” but it could also refer to the palpable energy between them— like even through the abstraction of a computer screen there’s this magnetic force that’s just riveting, it’s hard to describe

“We haven’t talked about love” > Seen at 2:17 PM LMAO

Michael alone with the black frame lingering shot. Acting and editing and directing choices so simple and on point. everything hurts

Struggling to say goodbye on Zoom physically reaching out unable to leave the frame that whole scene was just. You can just feel the love through the screen, it’s so layered and intimate despite essentially being “No you hang up first”

Zoom wedding! He stayed!!

I wonder if that’s Michael Sheen’s actual best friend. That would be cute

Anna whispering and telling him “nah I know your bestie is literally an hour away but he can’t come over lol” like??? why? let them love each other I cannot handle this villain arc

“I have to bring that one otherwise my tits will explode” Wait wasn’t she drinking earlier though? #ShivRoyMoment

“I was standing outside your job for four hours because I love you” <- dog from Up moment

Yes he is legally a Hobbit

The car window as an abstraction like the Zoom boxes *continued feral noises*

The direction of David putting his hand on the window and Michael walking away only then revealing Anna and the baby far in the background? We’re in 3 dimensions and they are all painful!!

Okay yeah I get it it’s a love story but I thought this was a comedy haha right guys why does everything hurt

It ends on that meta moment between David and Georgia which I can only assume is to set up for the third season although I dunno if that was planned at the time as well. It’s ambiguous but not distracting if they didn’t make another one

tl; dr: Staged 2 is a unique and excellent addition to Staged 1. The added meta textual layer of the other celebrities breaking down their relationship based on Staged 1 allows for a lot of “hiding behind my hands so embarrassed” moments, but also by pitting them against each other, it reveals their actual love for each other through the bickering. Season 1 on its own is a nice vignette of its time but season 2 with it adds a tension and intimacy that really takes both over the top

Kinda dreading watching Staged 3 since it seems like people overwhelmingly like it less than the other two because of the loss of the Zoom format and constant arguing, but I’m already in this far deep so I’ll stick the landing

To wit— awwwwwww, they love each other!

[vaportea]

for real, fuck charles xavier, magneto was right, and this shit ain't changed since x-men's conception, periodt

for those who have watched the latest episode of X-Men '97 i feel Some Type of Way about what's about to happen and i gotta rant

oh my god this is SO predictable, the timing is too impeccable, maybe it's because i have always valued Erik and his perspective on mutantkind but i thoroughly believe that it is Erik with the mutants' best interests in mind. Has it been a little selfish? Perhaps, I'll even let you say it is sometimes heavyhanded, but it was always in the protection of mutants, he even said it himself, he acts hostile only as a retaliation, not instigation.

And so Charles is "dead' and Erik inherits the X-Men, right, okay. And now Erik "declares war" and who should appear but fuckin Charles Xavier--and you KNOW what's going to happen, he's going to immediately throw himself on the pyre of pacifism for the greater good, he's gonna BEG Erik to reconsider warning that going too far will destroy all the trust that mutants have built up to this point (which for the record has always been WAVERING at best), and Erik is going to look bad and extremist when his reaction to the current world events is completely valid as is his anger! Genosha is in ashes, a country of his people died, Erik has been through this before, you SAW the number on his arm, yall KNOW what that means!

Charles is gonna be so naive to it all, but the fact is Bastion has thrown down the gauntlet, that man is very 'get them before they get us' and hasn't been the only one to do that to mutants, the Mutant Replacement Theory (which...i can't help but look at that and shake my head, like, X-Men has always been meta but god DAMN, y'know?) rhetoric is rampant in this series. The LAST thing we need is Charles spouting the fragility of human-mutant relations and expecting mutantkind, specifically the X-Men, to take some sort of moral high ground when the villains we're dealing with in this series in particular have already shown that it will not work.

I guess it's easy to place myself in the narrative as someone represented by marginalized groups, it's easy to get...angry at this, because you see your own world in it with all it's flaws. But our world has taught us time and time again that no tyrant or oppressor will be convinced of our validity by a handshake, at so many points in history we have had to fight for liberty, dignity, and the freedom to just exist. I just don't want to see the rest of the series devolve into 'oooooo no stop you can fight that hard it'll make us look bad ooooooooo' because like..what would you have them do otherwise, y'know?

[samaelwinchester]

i literally only know op for bad d*stiel meta and stealing/ ripping off other users posts, so i won't engage with them. also i can't believe even people on reddit can condemn dean for going behind sam's back, but deangirls on tumblr have such horse blinders on that anything but 'dean is the ultimate babygirl who did nothing wrong ever' is seen as a personal attack.

ahhh figures. yeah "not letting your sibling die even when they want to makes you a good sibling" is a crazy attempt to make it #relatable when a more fitting real-world comparison is if sam had explicit wishes to not be resuscitated or kept alive via life support and dean violated them anyway because he's a fuckin loser with no purpose in life without him

[jademickian]

oh man, haven't done tag games in a while, sorry friends 🥹 i've been passive the last few weeks because uni is really taking most of my time and energy, but i appreciate the tags and i love love reading your answers<3

ok enough blabbering, thank u @callivich, @lingy910y, and @mickeysgaymom for the totally optional, fun gallavich questions tag!

What’s a fic you’ve read more than once?

Stuck at Three for Days - delicious banter, laughed my ass off

another kiss is all it takes - so fuckin sweet, dude

Like Real People Do - just finished my reread last month:)) i needed the comfort

Cooperative Gameplay - currently rereading! i miss the feels

Sometimes I reread bits and pieces from ORFNSP and since we're alone because they changed my brain chemistry. I will eventually get around to actually rereading them.

2. What’s a gifset you always have to reblog?

You know the one... this legendary world heritage gifset

3. What’s a headcanon you can’t stop thinking about?

not sure if this is counted but i always like to think that once, ian got struck with grief about monica's death on her death anniversary. mickey asks him what's wrong and he opens up about it. ian will say it's stupid but mickey will truly handle it with grace and say nah man it's not. because yahknow, he gets it. and ian melts at it, because no one has acknowledged his grief like this before. mickey teases him about it a bit, sure, but deep down he held ian's mourning warmly, like petals on his palm. and they went together to the cemetery that day, simply sat in front of her grave and talked. the good things, the bad. and that despite it all "hey, tleast she popped out an alien lookin mfer i ended up marryin." they get pizza after.

4. What’s a fanart you love looking at?

Van kiss by @lingy910y

Prince Mononoke by @darthvaders-wife

Prison Boyfriends by @gallavichonly

Part of Our World by @steorie

It's Okay by WhatsaMattavich

This Kiss by @deathclassic

SO MANY others actually if i could fit them all here

5. What’s an idea you’d love to create if you had the time/inspiration?

i actually have a LIST lmao. one of those has something to do with art because i cannot take my mind away from human mickey and manananggal ian (manananggal is a Philippine myth creature with wings and can separate the upper half of its body from its lower half).

6. What’s something you’ve discovered since entering this fandom? A new trope you love? A different analysis of the show? Something else?

oh man. believe it or not, i was never into fics. i was in fandoms before, but i just couldn't get into fics within those fandoms (i tried). this is the only time i truly liked and LOVED reading fics. it really speaks volumes about the talent and dedication, and i'm glad i got to experience it.

it's also fun reading metas on the show and getting different perspectives, especially on characters. one of my favorites (just because i was so distressed about it the first time i watched it) are analyses on the city hall scene and ian's hesitation on marriage. after reading up others' thoughts on it explaining the why's, i totally felt some relief and was able to get some sleep. lol

7. What’s an underrated trope or concept you’d like to see more of?

apocalypse aus 👍

8. What’s your favourite season? And has this changed after multiple rewatches of the show?

The first five seasons are gems to me. but i truly love season 2 because it's so chill (at least compared to some of the heavier seasons after) and the gallaghers move as a unit. special mention for season 4 because it holds Emily and Lazarus.

9. What’s a plot hole you wish had been answered or resolved?

same qualms with @mickeysgaymom about mickey's mom. brain rotting over it.

10. What scene or moment do you feel isn’t discussed enough?

not gallavich related, and i'm sure people have already mentioned it, but sometimes it hits me how smart debbie is. like, i know she's smart, but people easily forget from all the chaos. at the heart of it, she's a fast learner and also would and have excelled academically.

11. What line/dialogue/description from something else (a poem, a book, a tv show, a movie, or something else) do you feel describes Ian and Mickey’s relationship?

aaaa @lingy910y beat me to it! it's totally "I'll take care of you. / It's rotten work. / Not to me. Not if it's you." but if i could pick another, maybe "I could recognize him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world."

12. What do you think is next for Ian and Mickey post-finale?

they'll grow old together and be just as in love, no matter what happens in between.

tagging @mybrainismelted, @scurvgirl, and @lupeloto if u wanna join!! raahh

[butmakeitgayblog]

Do you have any unpopular opinions about Clexa that you feel haven’t been well received in the fandom

Mine is that Lexa died at the right time, but only cos more screentime for her would’ve given the rotten one more time to screw up her character like they did with the rest of them

Ehhh idk. I do absolutely agree that it very well might've been a fucked up blessing in disguise considering just how unbelievably bad the writing on the show got and how terribly they skewed damn near everyone's characterization to fit plotlines that ended up being nonsense to the point they were almost unrecognizable, but I'll never be able to say flat out her death is something I support (which I know technically isn't really what you're saying either but ya know. I just can't). They could've done other things is my main point. But yeah, I get it.

Idk really if my opinions are unpopular tbh. I mean pm every meta post I've put up has gotten decent notes so I feel like the majority agree with me on a lot of things, or at least partially do 🤷‍♀️

Something tho that has always been A Thing in my mind is Lexa taking the deal with the mountain men. I was just talking about it the other week in the writer's discord and every time I think about it, it pisses me off because that literally made zero fucking sense from Lexa's pov.

She knew the MM were harvesting the skairats marrow. She knew the marrow made them able to walk freely in the world. She knew that the MM had no desire for any kind of longstanding peace with her people/the clans and that their ultimate goal was eradicating them. So whyyyyy in the goddamn fuck would she have ever entertained the notion of trading the MM the very weapon they needed - skairat hostages - to save a few hundred of her people??? When she would've known that the inevitable outcome would be eventual full on war on her own land with the MM and their tech that would lead to thousands more deaths of her people, if not total annihilation?

You're talking about Ms. Victory Stands On The Back Of Sacrifice herself. "Concede this battle to win the war" headed ass. Ain't no fuckin way someone as cunning and calculated and pragmatic as Lexa kom Trikru would've done that, logically speaking. Not from a leadership point, not from a tactical point, not from a militaristic point.

It made for a great devastating arc of betrayal between her and the girl she obviously already loved, sure, but on Clarke's titties and Costia's too, I call bullshit. The unbelievable part was not that Lexa betrayed Clarke, I think she would've done that if it truly meant the safety of her people, absolutely. The unbelievable part was the overall action and logic of it in and of itself. She was too smart for that and I don't believe she would've actually done that