#This theory nuts but that's not going to keep me from seeing it as canon until proven otherwise

[pianokantzart]

My Theory on Pachacamac and The Iblis Trigger

There is talk about how much they changed Pachacamac from a warmongering, power hungry tribal leader, to a goofy grandpa figure, but I think the truth of Pachacamac's nature might be somewhere between the two interpretations. Despite his friendliness, you can't forget he did lead a clan that wiped out the owls with a singleminded focus on capturing Sonic and reclaiming The Master Emerald. Pachacamac, now a ghost, has visited Knuckles to tell him he needs to expand his tribe. There are no other echidnas left, so he asks the sole survivor to take on an apprentice. "Show him our customs, teach him our traditions, and soon our tribe will grow once again."

There is no acceptance or acknowledgement of the fact that the clan's current situation is the result of a bloody feud and the destruction of an entire race besides their own. There is also, unsettlingly, no acknowledgement of Tails, Sonic, or The Wachowskis as members of Knuckles' clan.

While there are questionable elements to Pachacamac's approach, his motivations are at least understandable. Knuckles is a minority– the last of his tribe and the only surviving member of his species, so of course his old chief wants to see their traditions and culture preserved.

Things only get really weird when Pachacamac takes hold of Wade– Knuckles' apprentice and the soon-to-be new addition to their clan–and rewrites history. Rather than the tale of a lone owl that the echidnas hunted down in a quest for power, the story is instead of an entire flock of owls that were the aggressors, killing off Knuckles' tribe and burning down his village for no reason other than for the sake of the slaughter.

Similarly, Knuckles isn't described as a lost child left behind, but a fellow warrior who battled alongside his father until the bitter end.

So, knowing that Pachacamac's version of events is wrought with lies leads to one very serious question: What is the true story of Knuckles' battle with Iblis? If there's one thing we know about The Echidna Clan, it's that they are fixated on raw power. They're a warrior-focused society where the best fighter gets the highest honor and the most privileges. They were the ones who crafted The Master Emerald from the seven chaos emeralds. They were the ones who tracked down Sonic when he was a child with the intention of obtaining his power, before Long Claw wiped them out in her final struggle.

And who else do we know that was accidentally unleashed in a reckless pursuit of power?

Iblis, the raw power of the sun god Solaris. Iblis, who was sealed away within a child using the power of the chaos emeralds.

Now, there's no doubt that "The Flames of Disaster" in the SCU are very different from "The Flames of Disaster" in Sonic 06. In the movie universe the flames are merely a type of wieldable power rather than the name of an apocalyptic event. However... what better way to rewrite the fact that the echidna tribe nearly caused the end of the world and locked an immortal fire demon within an echidna child, than by pretending that The Flames of Disaster is just an inherent ability Knuckles unlocked through an epic battle?

What if "The Flames of Disaster" wasn't a power he obtained through a magnificent fight, but a power he survived after it was thrusted upon him by his elders? ... What if one of the many, many reasons reasons his father didn't let him join the fight was out of fear of what would happen if he cried?

[kimbapkimbapp]

Why do I think bakudeku is possible to become canon and why Horikoshi is an amazing writer.

Let's be honest, I also thought it was a toxic ship and I didn't like it at all at first. When I saw the first two seasons for the very first time I shipped Izuku and Uraraka, but as I deepened into the series, something made me realise that what Katsuki and Izuku had between them had way more potential.

Horikoshi traps us from the very beginning, with a funny story but with a big and emotional main plot. I'm a person that gets bored really easily, however I managed to finish bnha in less than a week.

I've been a fan for three years, and I used to hate Katsuki (don't come after me lol, I had my reasons). He was a cool and strong character, but an absolute jerk. However, that vision that I used to have changed as I advanced in the story.

The first hint of the weird relationship they had was at the summer camp. We know Izuku, we know that he would do anything that was on his hands to help anyone, so it's not surprising that even when he wasn't friends with Bakugou at all, he wanted to save him.

But the thing turns strange when Izuku is talking to Mr. Compress. He demands him to give Katsuki back to him, as it was his possession. Mr. Compress is surprised by those words so he tells him that he is not anyone's property.

But that's okay, doesn't have to be romantic. But then Izuku yells like a maniac when Katsuki is kidnapped. Like, why?? That makes us wonder, is Izuku going nuts or is he more than enemies with him? It doesn't really make sense.

We see during all the series that Izuku openly admires Katsuki, we can see it by how he looks at him. Example of the fifth season:

(seems fruity to me *ahem*)

And you might think, it's not that deep, he even got sparkly eyes when he saw Tokoyami doing something great.

And yeah that's true. But we got a whole panel on Izuku's glare. Like Horikoshi telling us that that look is very important. But it doesn't have to be necessarily romantic.

After that, we see Izuku fighting with Monoma. And Izuku loses total control of himself when he insults Katsuki, he even develops a whole new quirk. But there's nothing weird about that, Izuku is prone to care for other people and it might have been an excuse for Horikoshi to introduce a new quirk.

What doesn't make sense is something I saw in another theory. And that is Izuku hidding the fact that he developed his quirk because of Katsuki to Bakugou and All Might.

And that makes us think about 3 possibilities:

1) Izuku didn't want Katsuki to think about that again, because Monoma insulted him by saying he was the end of All Might. But that doesn't really makes sense because he could have just told All Might in private that Monoma insulted Katsuki, and that would make perfectly sense, because it's well known that Midoriya admires Bakugou and that he would defend him. And he didn't have to tell him exactly the reason why if he wanted to keep Katsuki's confession in private.

2)Izuku wasn't really aware of what made him trigger like that. But it's unlikely because that would be very dumb of him. Like I know Izuku sucks at emotions, like apart from everyone else's feelings or feelings related to hero work, he sucks at them, he sucks at his own. But I think that he realised why he exploded.

3)Izuku realised it was because of Katsuki and he is confused of what he is feeling, or maybe he is not and he just doesn't want anyone to find out.

That's the first time we got something subtly romantic from them.

We see Izuku's rage rise again when Katsuki is stabbed by Shigaraki and he talks bad of him. A coincidence? I don't think so, Horikoshi is making us aware that the trigger of Izuku is Katsuki himself.

He does it again when Katsuki apologises. Izuku, who was not gonna come back to UA suddenly gives up by hearing Katsuki's apologies. You might think, it was because he was tired. Izuku? Izuku Midoriya? Nah, he never gives up, even when he is fainting, if he wanted to he would have escaped from them till he passed out.

But the reason why he couldn't escape was because Katsuki made him completely crash. He was the only one that using his words could make izuku finally surrender. Because let's be honest, all of the class told him sweet words to come back, but none of them made such an effect on him. It was Katsuki's who made him go back to UA.

We see that Bakugou is Izuku's weakness again when he fights with Shigaraki. We all know that is probably a fake death and that Bakugou is going to survive, so why did he die? Many people believe that that's when Horikoshi is going to lose respect as a writer. But I find it a power move.

Maybe with this, Izuku finally realises what he truly felt for him. Maybe Katsuki already did realise. But I find it completely crucial in the story, because Izuku also evolves. Mirio tells him to control his heart, not to go insane again because of Katsuki. And Izuku finally is able to control his temper which is something that made him improve as a character.

So I don't find the fake death as a stupid thing or that Horikoshi is just afraid of killing Katsuki, I think it really makes sense if you analyse it deeply.

Summing up, there are many reasons why bakudeku could become canon and it would be a very interesting ending to the bnha story. As well as a huge plotwist! Since everyone that isn't a bakudeku shipper is not expecting that at all. And yep, Horikoshi supports LGBTQ community so it's not impossible. There are queer characters in the story like Toga who is bisexual.

And after all their progress and how they make each other improve just proves that it wouldn't be a toxic relationship. I mean, if it was the same two idiots from middle school (one for thinking he was superior to anyone else and the other for thinking he was so much inferior) it would have been hell! But rn I would find their relationship so cute.

[wibble-wobbegong]

Mike Wheeler and Jonathan Harker: Being Trapped in the Mindscape

OKAY very very very excited to talk about this one!!! When I say everything just keeps pointing towards the hostage theory, I’m so fucking serious. Dracula takes it to another level, and reinforces the sub-theory that Mike is going to be exploring parts of Henry’s mind while he’s there. I don’t wanna say too much, so just come on a journey with me as I go absolutely nuts.

There is a section in here that discusses Henry’s perversion and CSA, which I’ll mark with orange lines like this -> —————————

It isn’t the meat of the analysis though, so skipping it won’t be detrimental to any understanding!! It’s rather iffy as to how strong the parallels are

‘Theoretical’ Parallels

Normally, I’d open with an establishment of parallels, but Jonathan is mostly figured to be Mike’s parallel because of the circumstances he’s been placed in and his romantic relationship with Mina. There’s nothing as outright as the parallels between Henry and Dracula or Will and Mina, but the situation that Jonathan is placed into makes no sense for anybody but Mike. The lack of direct canonical parallels is easily overruled by the blatant parallels that can be made to theories that, at this point, are less theories and more a study of very basic storytelling.

For example, look at these images.

The reason Jonathan is visiting Dracula is because Dracula is looking to invest in properties in London, and Jonathan is a realtor working for the Hawkins and Thompkins firm as a replacement for RM Renfield, his teacher who’d gone mad because of Dracula. These moments are from Jonathan getting on the cart to get to Dracula’s castle and Dracula approaching him in greeting. Jonathan has the mark of a target before he even meets Dracula, before Dracula even discovers his photo of Mina (which becomes his primary reason for his hatred of Jonathan).

There are already key elements at play here. Jonathan being a representative of a firm called Hawkins reinforces Mike’s influence over the safety and security of Hawkins. It’s obvious when looking at how successful the defeat of the antagonist each season aligns with Mike’s internal conflicts; as the UD’s attacks gain strength and become harder to control and prevent, Mike’s internal conflicts grow stronger and harder to control. Where we see most characters fluctuating in their mental health status, seeing them grow as people and become stronger even against the struggles of the UD, we don’t really see that with Mike. As the UD gets worse, so does Mike. He doesn’t grow like the other characters because no one gives him the opportunity to do so.

I know an argument can easily be made that the UD is representing Will’s struggles, and both can be true, but Mike is being directly reflected in the status of Hawkins. He’s not a direct victim like Will is, but his struggles correlate with the safety of Hawkins. The end of S3, for example, ends with the meat monster being defeated supposedly, but we later learn that the Mind Flayer was somehow present in Russia. There’s no way for the Russians to have gotten ahold of the Mind Flayer unless they extracted it from the meat monster somehow. In the same way, the end of S3 supposedly resolves Mike’s conflicts with El and Will but we’re given shots that tell us that something is lingering. Mike’s struggles weren’t entirely resolved like they were in the first two seasons. Which, the little piece of the Mind Flayer that existed despite its technical defeat indicates an inactive conflict in Mike, but that’s for another post.

An example that’s very short and to the point is that, when we end S4 we see the complete destruction that occurred in Hawkins as an indirect result of Mike’s lie. There’s multiple meanings here, but one of them is that Mike is probably at the lowest point we’ve ever seen him; “realizing” that he misunderstood Will in the van, being forced back into a relationship with El, feeling like he has to lie to her just to keep her alive. At this point, he makes the actual realization that there’s no one he can really turn to. Not even Will, who insists on his relationship with El.

Long story short, Jonathan being representative of Hawkins correlates with Mike being representative of Hawkins. Where Will is reflected in the status of the supernatural, Mike is reflected in the status of Hawkins.

Alongside this reinforcement, we see him given the status of target before anyone is even aware of it; even Dracula himself. I find this to be similar to the way Mike has the signatures of an ideal victim for Henry before we even know who Henry is. Starting way back in S1, it’s established that Mike is prone to suicidal tendencies and has very deep rooted insecurities. He isn’t isolated then like he is now, but he’s showing signs of being a target long before anyone else. It’s rooted into his character.

This is all before we get into the meat of this post. Even though these parallels aren’t technically canon, they’re so strong they may as well be. Mike isn’t canonically a representation of Hawkins, but the tie is so strong it’s hard to argue against it. Mike isn’t canonically a victim of Henry, but it’s basic story telling that tells us he will be.

The Castle and The Creel House

We have more parallels to establish first. Sorry, but one; it’s interesting and two; I am nothing if not creditable.

As I explained in the first part of this analysis, Henry and Dracula are very much so parallels. In the same way, their homes are parallels too. Not only are they intrinsically attached to these places by grief (Dracula of Elisabeta and Henry of his family (Max directly shows us how grief occurs even for those who hurt you)), but they remain there to gain their strength.

In order for Dracula to maintain his powers, he must sleep in the boxes of his home. This is a direct statement made in the movie;

“Now, all these things Dracula can do, but he is not free. He must rest in the sacred earth of his homeland to gain his evil power.”

Similarly, Henry rests in the Creel house during his attacks to strengthen his powers. The vines he attaches himself to are in the Creel house for a reason, though the necessity of remaining in their homes is different. Dracula’s is physical: he literally has to remain there for his power, as his power is tied to the blood of the castle. Henry’s is mental: those vines could give him strength regardless of his choice of remaining in the attic, but he has a deep attachment to that place of comfort and it likely makes him stronger by virtue of mentality. Henry forms his childhood home in his mind to show us that it’s a mental link. Both Dracula and Henry require their homes to gain their strength regardless.

Dracula’s castle is only a physical place, technically. There is no mindscape home for Dracula like there is for Henry. So how do I know that the parallels are being made between the Creel house in the mindscape and the Castle? Without even getting into the weird gravity of the Castle, there’s an even stronger connection. Dracula isn’t alone in his Castle.

Dracula has 3 brides in his castle. That sound familiar?

In the movie, Dracula technically has four victims. He has his 3 brides and Lucy Westenra, but only the 3 brides live in his castle. I’m sure I don’t have to point out the obvious, but the parallel here is to the three dead victims and Max. Lucy doesn’t have any incredibly strong parallels to Max, but she is a victim and a redhead. We see Lucy experience something similar to the effects of Will’s possession, but Will’s possession and the curse have some similar symptoms. There’s an argument to be made that Lucy is also meant to represent Max as the living victim. I’m gonna offer both interpretations because they both work!!

Either way, it’s important to note the 3 brides. In the actual Creel house, at this point, Henry is alone. In the Creel house in the mindscape, however, there are three other people. Or there are at least three other victims.

The castle also holds a strange relationship with gravity just like the mindscape’s Creel house, albeit the relationship is different. I’ll get into that later!

Entrapment

NOW we get to the fun part. This section is my daring sweetheart, the apple of my eye, the blooming flowers of a plant I have watered for so long. After establishing those parallels, when you consider the way these two pieces interact it creates a very interesting, very exciting, image for anyone who’s looking forward to Mike’s suffering in S5.

Earlier we dropped off after Jonathan meets Dracula, so let’s pick the timeline back up.

After discovering Jonathan’s picture of Mina and recognizing her similarities to Elisabeta, Dracula demands Jonathan stay with him for a month. He will take no refusal, in his words. He has Jonathan write three final letters; one to his firm, one to his family, and one to his fiancé (Mina). These letters are written impersonally, and when Mina later receives this letter she comments on how out of character Jonathan sounds. Dracula has Jonathan stay in one singular room and tells him not to go exploring the rest of the castle as it holds old and bad memories.

So, for starters, Dracula demands Jonathan stay with him. This is Dracula’s attempt at getting Jonathan away from Mina and out of the picture, and he does threaten him, but he doesn’t kill him. He leaves Jonathan alive in the castle, delegating him to one room so he won’t stumble upon old memories. Knowing that the castle is the equivalent of the mindscape, this paints an odd picture.

Obviously this is indicative of the hostage theory, in which Henry won’t actually kill Mike but rather keep him alive for some reason. I’d say this is rather supportive of the premise that Mike tries to make a deal with Henry and it goes badly, seeing as Dracula’s violence towards Jonathan is rather minimal compared to what we see him do later on. He hardly hurts Jonathan, instead keeping him. Jonathan is aware that he’s in danger, but he isn’t sure how or why. He merely witnesses Dracula’s lack of a reflection as his first sign something is seriously wrong. This would translate to Mike bargaining with Henry somehow, only to be forced into Henry’s hands and controlled. At first, Jonathan wasn’t aware that Dracula is a dangerous being: in the same way, I don’t think Mike is going to be aware of Henry’s danger at first, but lured into a place in which Henry can capture him. How this happens is undemonstrated by the film, but based on other evidence supporting the hostage theory, there are heavy signs of Eddie’s corpse being used as a lure.

Even more, we’d see Henry try and lock Mike in a specific part of his mind. I imagine this is the equivalent of showing Mike his own grief and memories and those things Dracula tells Jonathan to avoid (old and bad memories) would be equivocal to Mike pushing into Henry’s mind even further than what we saw with Max. If they’re inside Henry’s mind, there’s no way the only piece of him present is the broken Creel house. There are memories inside of him, things he omissed in his monologues.

Alongside this, we have the 3 letters; the firm, the family, the fiancé. This is interesting for multiple reasons!! If this were to be directly translated to the show, we’d be seeing a message sent to Hawkins, the Wheelers, and Will. This could happen if Mike were to somehow make contact with the outside world somehow, but there is a much more likely possibility here. The thing about the letters is the only one of them actually plays a role in the story: the letter to Mina. Her letter is the only one we read, and it’s the one sign we get to the outside world that something is wrong with Jonathan. There’s concern to be had because of that letter, and it raises Mina’s suspicion despite Jonathan assuring her of his safety in the letter.

On one hand, this could play into lettergate if the letter Mike wrote to Will holds cause for concern, but that doesn’t really hold indication for where Mike is and that he should be worried beyond thinking about what Mike’s mental state was. An important part of the hostage theory is that Mike is perceived as dead and people give up looking for him. If people are aware Mike is alive, they wouldn’t stop searching for him until they found him. It’s important that people think he’s dead, but the letter is supposedly to be the trigger for concern. If this is meant to play into lettergate, I’m not really sure how that would work because it doesn’t provide the concern as the letter would be given before Mike’s ‘death’. Or, at least, it would be obvious he wrote it before he died, so there’s no reason to worry about his safety status.

On the other hand, this could be a sign that Mike somehow communicates with the outside world. I have no clue how he would manage it, but it definitely isn’t impossible. If he can discover alternate dimensions and gain deep understanding of how supernatural creatures function under high stress situations with only about a week to figure things out, I imagine having years to study Henry’s mind would lead to him somehow gathering the knowledge to communicate. If Max is there, she could also be his way out.

Personally I think that, no matter what, Mike and Max are going to reveal the other’s being alive. If they rescue Mike first, then he’ll be able to reveal that Max’s consciousness is trapped inside Henry’s. If they wake Max first, she could do the same for him.

In this scenario, it would be Will receiving the message first and foremost. There’s also the possibility that this could be foreshadowing the role reversal, in which Will is the only one who never gives up on Mike. Even after years, he’d be the one holding onto hope that Mike is out there.

There are a lot of possibilities when it comes to the three letters, but that isn’t the only thing Jonathan writes. On May 30th, Jonathan writes in his journal;

“I think strange things which I dare not confess to my own soul. The Count… The way he looked at Mina’s picture fills me with dread, as if I have a part to play in a story that is not known to me.”

This is written the same day as the events I talked about previously, where Dracula warns him not to leave and such.

“I think strange things I dare not confess to my own soul.” The most Mike Wheeler sentence ever written in the entire world. This would mostly pertain to Mike’s only mental status, likely regarding the visions he’s forced to endure under Henry’s control as well.

The second sentence is intriguing because Jonathan specifies himself as having a role to play in a story he has not been told. His concern is for Mina, and very rightfully so, and that already aligns with canon as Mike already expresses concern for the way Henry treats Will. That makes sense. It’s odd that he’s curious as to his own role rather than Mina’s, seeing as he doesn’t know why Dracula is fascinated with Mina either.

The story, by implication, is the story of Elisabeta and Dracula’s love. Jonathan is unaware of this story at the moment, but he feels as though he has a part to play. The thing is, he’s right! Mina and Jonathan’s story is somewhat of a modern version of Elisabeta and Dracula’s. I touched on this in the first part of this analysis, but I wanna bring your attention back to the fact that Elisabeta and Mina aren’t parallels. There’s nothing to indicate that Mina and Elisabeta are alike story-wise other than their looks. Jonathan is the one who parallels Elisabeta. Despite Mina being Dracula’s love interest, she is not the Elisabeta in this modern story; Jonathan is.

I’ve explained before that Peter is meant to be the Elisabeta of this story, and that the 5 Peter’s tell us that Will looks like Peter, but Will himself is paralleled to Henry despite the interest Henry has taken in him. In the same way, Mike is the actual parallel to Peter. In everything but looks, Mike fills the role of being Will’s Peter. Both Peter and Mike have predictive tendencies, both are the ones showing the utmost kindness and love to their respective lovers (Will and Henry), and they both potentially have matching suicidal tendencies. Peter may have actually killed himself.

In the same fashion that locking Jonathan in the castle is meant to create an opportunity for Dracula to go after Mina, Henry locking Mike in a trance creates an opportunity for him to go after Will. From all the different perspectives that’ll be shared of the knowledge they have of Henry, as well as Mike possibly peering into Henry’s memories, I don’t find it to be too much of a stretch that he realizes there is more to Henry’s story and that somehow he’s become part of Henry’s plan. Mike’s inferiority complex may be overruled by his logic, determine that there’s a reason he was chosen and that it lies somewhere in the story he doesn’t know. Maybe. Just food for thought.

Anyway,

Eventually Dracula leaves the castle and goes to sleep in his boxes (which he needs to maintain his dark power) and Jonathan explores the castle. As he goes lower, he comes across rooms in which we start to see the distorted gravity. There are rats on the ceiling and odd liquids that drip upside down, but Jonathan is unaffected by this shift in gravity.

Taking another pause here because I wanna look at two other instances of gravitational distortion in the show, because this moment is combining them when we apply the parallels.

1. The Creel house in the mindscape. Gravity clearly is not normal there, as we see bits of the house floating all over the place.

2. There’s a poster in Mike’s room called ‘Relativity’.

The BYU Museum of Art describes it as such:

In one of Escher's most beloved, most copied, and most parodied images, a series of staircases crisscross in a labyrinth-like interior. At first, the staircases seem to occupy a believable illusionistic space, but upon closer inspection viewers realize that they meet each other at impossible angles. In fact, the shape defined by the three main staircases is a famous 'impossible shape' called a Penrose triangle. What makes this print so mesmerizing is how Escher takes that geometric curiosity as a starting point to create not only one impossible shape but a completely impossible world with multiple simultaneous orientations of gravity. He has not only imaged what the inside of such an unusual building would look like, but has also provided glimpses of an idyllic outside world through the archways at the top of each stairway. Every way is up in this charming world, but so too every way is down as is always the case with Escher, 'reality' changes completely, depending on how you look at it.

The description of, “…multiple simultaneous orientations of gravity,” much more aligns with what we see in Castle Dracula, as Jonathan exists within the same spaces as the rats and the liquid, yet they experience different pulls of gravity.

The stairs and the archway don’t apply at the castle. This set up does exists, however, in the mindscape!

The archway and the stars aren’t perfectly connected, but the way it’s set up gives the illusion of connection, creating cohesion where there technically isn’t any. It’s not just the fact that the set up is present, though. When Nancy finally makes her way to the lair, she stands at the top of the stairs. The illusion presents itself in a way that you could imagine her having come through that archway and coming into the lair, thus aligning with the description of an idyllic world being beyond the arch.

The drawing connects directly to both the castle and the mindscape, but there’s also a connection to all three of these characters (Mike, Dracula, and Henry) in that last line. Reality changes completely based on how you observe the drawing. In a very similar manner, all three of these characters’ stories are different based on perspective. Henry’s is very blatant, as the differing perspectives are literally how his story is told. With Dracula, he comes off as creepy and obsessive for no reason until Mina’s perspective is shifted by gaining Elisabeta’s memories. As for Mike, our perspective of him is hidden entirely because if we were to look at him from a different angle we would have an entirely different story than what was shown on screen.

This take of perspective is important and a heavy indicator, once again, that Mike is going to the mindscape. It also provides the unique tie of unstable gravity, which could come into play during Mike’s time in the mindscape, seeing as gravitational pull is how they located the original gate in the first place.

ALSO, another little note, is that the rats on the metal is very reminiscent of the rats in the Iron Works building from S3. It’s possible we’ll see memories from Henry telling us that he was behind all of it, in a very direct manner that cannot be ignored. Or this is simply a cool coincidence or intentional reference on the Duffers’ part!

———————————————————————

After Jonathan’s exploration begins, he starts to hear the call of a woman. He follows her voice behind a curtain and it reveals a large, empty bed where he’s encouraged to lay. Once he lays there, one of Dracula’s brides appears from under the covers and begins seducing him. As this continues, the two other brides join her. This is done so they can lure him into weakness and security, which allows them to feed on him. Before they can do so, Dracula returns with a baby and stops them, claiming that Jonathan belongs to him. In exchange, he offers his brides the baby to feed on.

And we’re back with the sexual assault! I hate it here. Again, the nature of attack by vampires in this movie is done sexually as the weakness and vulnerability of the victim is necessary for the attack. It is odd that the brides are the one doing this, not in the movie but in terms of the parallels. The brides are representative of the dead victims of Henry already, and Henry’s victims don’t become like him. This scene is a bit of an odd man out, and I’m not sure if we’ll see this specific part translated into the show. If we do, it’ll most likely appear very differently than this seeing as they couldn’t utilize Henry’s victims. To go the route of distraction and vulnerability by lust, we’d most likely get a scene with Will or someone else he finds attractive. Possibly Eddie, and that would feed in the predatory nature of Henry’s attacks because of the age difference. I’m not sure if they’d be that blatant with it though, seeing at the assault rarely appears beyond allegories, and when it does become subtextual we still don’t see the most normalized version of assault. I’m sitting on the fence post with this scene.

The claim that Jonathan belongs to Dracula, by Dracula, is also kinda unfitting. I don’t really see this being translated into the show unless it’s used as a taunt towards Will and/or El, which I could see happening. It doesn’t necessarily align with the movie, but that line could make a comeback. I don’t expect the parallels to be 1:1 in S5, so if they were to brush over this I wouldn’t be too surprised.

———————————————————————

Once Dracula finally leaves for England in search of Mina (after turning Lucy), he leaves Mike with his brides who keep him weak by feeding off his blood. He hardly has the strength to escape due to this, but he creates a plan. He uses the odd gravity to his advantage and eventually makes his way to the same window Elisabeta jumped out of to kill herself. Unlike her, Jonathan survives and makes a break for a nearby covenant which takes care of him.

My absolute favorite part of all this is that this movie is very directly supporting the things I’ve been saying about how Henry will likely drain the life from Mike to heal himself and keep Mike weak!! In the mindscape, Mike will simultaneously be losing his life force as it’s drained from him. Although the brides are the ones doing this in film, it only really makes sense for this to be done by Henry in the show. I have close to zero doubts that this’ll happen.

Also!!! Comeback of plan guy Mike being an incredibly strong person. This ties into what I had been theorizing with the Overkill-DND Board theory as well — that Mike’s trance will end once he returns to the cliff. In my opinion, it’s approaching this cliff and the choice not to jump as a portal opens that will play out to show Mike’s suicidiality but that he prioritizes his friends over his own wants. Jonathan jumps to save/return to Mina, as he has learned things about Dracula which can be used against him to finally end his terror. It’s how he parallels Elisabeta, as she jumped to return to Dracula (who she was led to believe died). Mike fulfills this parallel in S1, but his return to the cliff is highly supported. It’s the act of jumping that I doubt will occur again. He’s going to return to Will with newly acquired knowledge that may help, as is his typical role in the story. The leader.

Jonathan figures out how to prevent Dracula from continuing to draw his evil power. Seems pretty much up Mike’s alley.

Jonathan’s story doesn’t end here, but this analysis does. The other aspects of Jonathan that need to be discussed will come in a later part which goes into detail about Dracula’s death.

[legolasghosty]

Okay but if I go into your inbox and ask for more zombie apocalypse au would that work??? ;D

Alright, but you quite literally asked for it, so don't blame me if this gets crazy!

For those of you who have been politely ignoring my madness, this is in reference to a post canon type zombie apocalypse au. You can read part 1 and part 2 of me spewing randomness about it on those links if you're interested! I blame Inny and whoever that anon was for enabling me.

Soooo I thought we might start this one by looking at the bit that started this whole tangent: Julie and the guys finding zombies of the boy's bodies.

Listen, they don't really see the apocalypse coming, no one does. So, a couple of months after the Orpheum, following many long conversations and stuff, Julie finds where the guys are buried and they all go to visit. It feels both very right, to pay their respects and all, and very wrong, cause visiting your own grave is just creepy, okay?!

Flynn is driving(cause there's no way Julie was up to learning to drive while struggling with losing her mom, even if she has turned 16 by this point), and the ghosts are being antsy in the back seat. Julie turns on the radio, but all the stations keep getting interrupted by some news people yelling about whatever crisis is happening now. Weird. So they just switch to the aux and Julie starts playing old 90s music. The boys appreciate it. Flynn is less of a fan.

They get to the graveyard just as the music gets cut off by Ray calling Julie. That's... not normal. Usually he texts unless it's urgent. Well, once his kids actually taught him how to actually write text messages, not whole emails in a text bubble.

Ray is like, COME HOME NOW, STUFF IS WEIRD AND THERE'S ZOMBIES!!! Julie thinks he's messing with her, cause like... zombies? Really? Everyone knows those aren't real. Flynn points out that everyone thinks ghosts aren't real either while googling it. And oh frick... maybe they should have paid more attention to those breaking news reports.

Look, I don't know how zombie infections start, okay? Haven't really figured that one out yet. But my general theory for this AU is that whatever chemical does it got into some kind of groundwater supply, and thus is in the dirt. It latches on to forms that still harbor some level of organic matter. Or something. I don't know. It's too late to be doing the science of zombies. Regardless, it's infecting dead bodies and the graveyard they are at is much closer to the source than home.

Reggie screams when the first one scrambles out of the ground behind him. Those first few are the newly dead ones, cause they still have the most organic matter attached and the dirt on top of them isn't as packed down from decades of being stepped on.

Alex panics and summons part of his drum kit right on top of it, crushing and killing it. They all kinda stare at it for a second, and then everything gets nuts. More zombies start climbing up from the ground. Flynn may or may not light a couple of them on fire with her mom's lighter. Look, she doesn't really smoke much anymore, but having the lighter around makes her feel better for whatever reason. Flynn doesn't get it but she also doesn't question it.

It's a small graveyard so they manage to take out most of the zombies fairly quickly, once they get over their initial shock... but then they see another zombie forcing its way up. It has a tattered beanie and they can see bones sticking out of its flesh where it has rotted away. And it's not Luke. They all know it's not. But even Luke himself is a bit stunned by the appearance of his own dead body.

Reggie and Alex zombies are coming up behind Luke. Figures that Luke would be the first one up. And none of them really know what to do. Cause, yeah they're zombies, but also, they're the guys???

But then Luke gets between zombie him and Julie and she realizes that, regardless of what the zombie looks like or who the body used to belong to, it's not him. Cause, ghost or not, Luke is standing right there, dead and breathing and trembling a bit in his beat up vans. So she does what any logical person would do: She grabs a big stick(or a shovel lying nearby or something, I don't know) and smacks zombie Luke over the head with it. Hard.

They take out the zombie boys and get in the car. (Reggie may or may not beat up zombie him with his bass.) They take off towards home just as fast as they can. Cause...what else do you do when zombies are suddenly real?

But it does make them sure of one thing: Zombies aren't people. Their souls aren't tied to their corpses, even though said corpses are moving again.

OKAY TIME FOR SOME FLUFFIER STUFF NOW THAT WE HAVE THAT OUT OF THE WAY!!!

The ghosts all start leaving notes and writing stuff down for the non-Julie lifers when she's not around to translate. However, none of them really expected both Carlos and Ray to start leaving notes back. Carlos's are mainly for Reggie, asking random ghost questions and making dumb jokes. Ray leaves notes for all three of them(plus Willie when they find them), usually asking apocalypse type questions or asking if they can get some supply item on their next run, but sometimes it's just random questions about themselves. And all of them get a note at least once a week or so that just says, "Thank you for taking care of my little girl."

Julie figures out how to get zombie guts out of clothing mainly for Alex, who got set off into a full on panic attack when some got on his hoodie. It wasn't really about the hoodie of course, but still. It wasn't that much more complicated than getting blood out of clothes, thank goodness. Alex hugged Julie for like a full five minutes when she gave it back to him, mostly gut free.

The ghosts struggle to actually make physical contact with the zombies, similar to other life or life adjacent forms. Thus they're not the best in a physical fight. However, Reggie gets really good at finding heavy stuff to drop on top of them. Hey, when you're not a living being, you don't have to worry so much about little things like how heavy that box is.

The gang develops a point system for zombie killing. It's mostly the ghosts and kids doing it, in an attempt to bring some humor into a terrifying situation. Bigger zombies are worth more, as are taking out a bunch at once, combo kills, or a takedown that's just objectively cool. Points can be cashed in for random stuff like first dibs on food or specific coveted positions in the cuddle piles they fall into at night.

Speaking of cuddle piles, they become very common, cause with everything going on, Julie, Flynn, and Carlos all start having a really hard time falling asleep alone. The ghosts do as well, but they tend to brush it off more since sleep isn't a biological necessity for them. Thus, cuddle piles become a pretty normal thing to help them all fall asleep.

Okayyyy it's after midnight and this is kinda long, so I'm gonna call that good for now and attempt slumber. Hope y'all enjoyed, or at least are not annoyed at me for once again talking too much about a random AU idea.

(Send me an AU and I'll give you 5+ headcanons about it!)

[bardock1991]

My thoughts about the Penny Revival Theory... & Why i don't see it happening.

Before i begin, I'd like to make one thing clear. This is not a personal attack on anyone who likes these theories & wishes them to be true, nor is this me telling any of them or some of you for that matter that you're wrong for thinking this way. I just wish to express my OWN thoughts in the matter & why they don't sit well with ME personally & why I don't see it happening in the canon story.

I'm begging you guys to keep the discussions in both the comments & reblogs civil, I'm not here to pick any fights. Moreover, do NOT go & attack people who follow this theory, i do NOT want them getting harassed for this. If i see any of you do that, I'm going to block you.

Also, a quick trigger warning: there's gonna be a few mentions about death in this post, including suicide. I tried my best to make sure there's not too many mentions of it, but i wanna make it clear since i know how sensitive that topic can be for people. Okay? Here we go!

So! RWBY Volume 9! My personal favorite RWBY volume to date & one of my favorite seasons of anime in recent memory. I'm serious, we're talking top 3 material here. With an amazing new world to explore, gorgeous animation, tons of great characterization (for the most part), incredible pay offs for stuff that was being set up for years at this point, all concluding in a (albeit a bit rushed) very satisfying conclusion that really resonated with me personally. Now with almost one week away from the finale, i can safely say that this volume is my personal favorite RWBY volume... So now i think it's time to discuss something that I've been neglecting to talk about since the Volume began... Heck, since V8 ENDED!... & That matter... Is Penny!

As a huge Nuts N'Dolts shipper myself (although I'll admit i haven't truly appreciate the shit until somewhere around mid to late 2021 to early 2022), it's safe to say that i really love Penny. She's a really adorable character with a pretty interesting arc about choice & how she's not a thing others can just use. I don't think it was executed the best though, since if you wanna be technical, Penny DID made her own choices in the story. Like her choice to actually be honest with Ruby in V2, going with the heroes instead of Ironwood in the end of V7 & holding up Amity in V8 despite the risks just to name a few. So the whole idea of her only really having a choice when she committed assisted you know what (it wasn't a choice, it was an ultimatum) doesn't really hit as hard as the story wanted it to hit... THAT + the fact that the one who was there with her in the end wasn't Ruby... But Jaune... Yeah, I'm still not over that... But despite all of that, i still love this character & is tragic to see her go the way she did... Yet... Unlike most NND fans... I kinda want Penny to stay dead...

HEAR ME OUT!!! Now yes, Penny has indeed came back from the dead once, that is true... So most people think why couldn't that happen again & moreover, in the words of some people said it themselves on Tumblr put it "Why would the writers give such an unsatisfying & cruel fate if they weren't gonna do something with it? Like bring her back?" (Sidenote, if any of you attack these people, I'm gonna be VERY pissed because like i said earlier, I'm NOT here to start pointless flame wars & fights!)... But for both a LOGICAL standpoint, as well as a STORY & CHARACTER standpoint... Not only would this not make a lot of sense, but it'd also be rather... Disrespectful... Let me explain.

Why the Penny Revival theory wouldn't work from a LOGICAL standpoint

Option 1: Ascension/Ever After Loopholes.

So for those unaware, Penny died in V3 by being cut in half by Pyrrha, albeit because of Emerald's Semblance messing with their heads. But in V7, we learned that she was able to not ONLY come back to life, but also come back with her memories & experiences from her LAST life intact... Why?... Because her CORE wasn't all that damaged in Beacon. (Actually, IDT it was damaged at all cause Penny's core is essentially her heart & she wasn't cut in half from the chest, it was from the waist.) Keep this factor in mind cause it's gonna be the main factor as to why this theory cannot become a reality from a logical standpoint.

Now let's go to the end of Volume 8, where the heroes manage to save Penny... Until they didn't. They were able to save her from the virus by tricking Ambrosius into making her into a human without ACTUALLY asking him to do it. There's a great video explaining this in greater detail that was made by the amazing Murder of Birds, which I'll link over here: https://youtu.be/ovd_jcdvbL0

Anyways, Cinder catches everyone off guard, the writers take a dump on Ruby, Penny gets capped off & Solitas goes to shit!... Where does V9 take place? The Ever After, which we NOW know is the center of the entire RWBYverse. Think of the Ever After (more specifically, the TREE of Ever After) as the Tree of Yggdrassill in Norse Mythology.

In Ever After, when a person dies, they're essentially sent into The Tutorial Realm of Kingdom Hearts. But instead of picking your weapons & stats, you pick who you wanna become in the next life. In simpler terms, death in ever after works like reincarnation. You die & get the choice of either come back as yourself (which doesn't happen very often) or the choice of being erased from existence & be replaced by someone else who just so happen to look like your previous self... Oh & there's some bullshit about how "the heart always remembers", but that makes no fucking sense, so i don't count that.

So a lot of fans, especially as the Volume was reaching its conclusion where we learn more & more about Ever After began thinking "Oh, then that must mean Penny will come back"... So a few things why this doesn't really work... & It starts with easily the biggest counterpoint... Did Penny die in the Ever After?... No, she didn't... She died in The World of Void... Which is NOT the same thing! Meaning that Penny wouldn't be able to come back as either herself or as a "reincarnation" that replaces her very existence. That's not possible unless she specifically died in Ever After, which wasn't the case. So that's already off the table... & Those who said "Oh, when Little dies, they'll be reborn as Penny & they'll finally give Ruby hope again"...

2 problems with this... 1: Replacing a character that was introduced specifically for this season... & Then replace them with someone who just died on the season before this one... For arguably no reason other than fanservice... Do i need to explain the problem here?! Do i need to explain why this wouldn't have been a good writing decision?!... Not to mention how little sense it'd actually make sense Little doesn't know Penny, so WHY would they ascend as her?!

2: & This is more personal for ME specifically, but i really... REALLY do not like having someone's character arc be arbitrarily resolved because of someone else as a way to "cure them" or "help them"... In this context, it'd be Penny being the "cure" that Ruby needs to regain her hope again... Again, i ask you... Do i need to explain why this wouldn't have been a good thing?!

If that actually happened, Ruby wouldn't learn anything in the end! She wouldn't learn that being herself was good enough, she'd instead learn that in reality, there IS no consequence! People can die & come back if the world suddenly decides it had enough of you moping around all depressed, which is not only bad writing, but also VERY insulting to those who were/are in a similar position as Ruby did in V9!... That is not the lesson you wanna teach to your main character when she's in that state of depression, let alone your AUDIENCE!

While i will be the first to admit that they fucked over the way Ruby ascended in the first place by essentially mimicking you know what & then make such a jarring tone shift in the very next chapter (Jesus Christ, that was awful), the end result was beautiful! It wasn't perfect & it happened a bit too quickly for my taste, but it was STILL beautiful! Ruby eventually realizing that she doesn't HAVE to be someone else & moreover, she doesn't HAVE to be perfect... Just being herself is good enough & even if she doesn't know who she is deep down, she won't be able to find that out unless she CHOOSES to he herself, which was the POINT of Volume 9's finale from Ruby's PoV... Bringing Penny back in this instance would completely go against this message, cause Ruby wouldn't be able to fully appreciate herself as a person.

Option 2: Pietro creates a THIRD Body for Penny, just like he did for Penny 2.0.

Ok, now with THAT out of the way, let's talk about the SECOND possibility for Penny coming back... Pietro either MAKES a Penny 3.0 or has already MADE one by the time RWBYJ returned to Remnant... Remember when i said that the only reason Penny was able to come back in the first place was because her core/heart was intact, thus allowing Pietro to actually MAKE a second body for Penny while still letting her keep her memories?... Yeah, that's not possible here anymore. Why?... Because not only did Penny die in The World of Void... She died as a HUMAN!... Meaning that her core... Her HEART... Is gone for GOOD!

Nobody managed to retrieved Penny's body from the world of void before the portals closed, (nor did we ever see it in Ever After, which was a MASSIVE missopportunity if you ask me. Along with the fact that we never see the reactions of the others learning how Penny ACTUALLY died which... WHY didn't we get that in V9?...) So it wouldn't have been possible for Pietro or anyone for that matter to take her heart back, even IF Penny died as a robot again.

Moreover, Atlas is gone! Their TECHNOLOGY & MATERIALS are gone! Sure, Amity & some stuff from Argus are still around as we saw in the final shot of V9, but most of it is gone... Pietro wouldn't be able to create a THIRD Penny Robot with the resources he has. But even then, let's say that he did. Let's say that Pietro WAS able to create a THIRD Penny Robot... There's still a huge problem here, it WOULDN'T be the same Penny. Why?... Because the CORE would be different, the HEART would be different.

Pietro wouldn't be able to create a THIRD Penny Robot so he can add her core in there BECAUSE HER ORIGINAL CORE IS GONE! Pietro & the others managed to RETRIEVE the core after the events of V3, but that wasn't the case for V8. The Penny we grew to know & love is GONE! She will NEVER be able to come back in a way that doesn't make sense & doesn't feel like a total asspull, it's NOT gonna happen. If we ever get a THIRD Penny (& that's a REALLY BIG if), it's gonna be a completely different Penny instead of the one WE know, a completely different Penny from the one RUBY knows... & Loves... Let me ask you people... Would you WANT that? Would you want this "Penny 3.0" to essentially replace the Penny we grew to know & love?... Do you guys ACTUALLY want that?!... Personally, i DON'T!

If it were up to me between keeping her dead & essentially replacing her either through ascension or through a third model that's completely unrecognizable, I'd go with the FIRST option!

So yeah, those are the reason why Penny coming back wouldn't work from a LOGICAL standpoint, so now it's time for the one that's gonna be VERY controversial... Why Penny coming back wouldn't work from a STORY & CHARACTER standpoint...

Why the Penny Revival theory wouldn't work from a STORY & CHARACTER standpoint

Okay, this is where i have to put up some flame shields, cause this is the point of the discussion where I'm gonna make A LOT of people mad at me... Okay, here we go...

Reason 1: It'd undo Penny's sacrifice, which would be a very disrespectful thing to do.

Now even though the whole "only choice Penny had was how she chose her death" thing is actually bullshit because it wasn't a choice, nor was it her only one... It'd still feel very disrespectful for the heroes to just... UNDO the sacrifice she made to make sure Cinder doesn't get any stronger.

Think about this from Penny's perspective. You decide to ask one of your few remaining allies to essentially help you commit assisted you know what so you can make sure your inherited magical power doesn't fall into the wrong hands... Then a while later, those same allies undo your efforts by bringing you back to life...

That would feel like a slap to the face if you ask me. Regardless of intentions, they would essentially undo the hard work i did to make sure THEY got to live... I'd feel REALLY insulted if that happened to me & I'm pretty sure Penny would feel that way too. So right off the bat, there's a problem.

Not to mention, how did this entire story start again? How did this entire SERIES started again?... Let me think for a moment... Oh yeah, it's because a spiteful, self-righteous woman tried to play god & get her fallen fiancee back despite being told by LITERAL GOD that this was wrong & then pay the price for it by becoming immortal until she truly understands the meaning of life... (spoilers, she'll never do so willingly because it's Salem. She's the f-ing worst)

So why the FUCK would you want the heroes to do the exact damn thing?! Why the hell would you want them to essentially do the same thing the main villain did?! The same thing that put these kids in this mess in the first place?!... Why the hell would you want that?! It just makes no sense to me.

That's like if Byleth from Fire Emblem tried to bring back Jeralt by doing the exact same fucked up experiments Rhea did in the attempt to resurrect Sothis, all the while Byleth has complete understanding of the consequences her actions will have because she literally experienced the consequences of Rhea's actions when she did that to Byleth herself!...

Do you see where I'm going with here? By trying to play god in bringing Penny back, Ruby & co. would essentially be proving Salem & in a way, the Gods right in saying that mankind at its core is worthless & beyond salvation.

& Before i move on to my next point, let me bring up a scenario for you guys. Imagine if you were Ruby, imagine if you - as Ruby Rose - met up with Dr. Pietro Polendina in Vácuo & he tells you that he may (keyword: MAY!...) have found a way to bring Penny back... But in turn, it'd cost him his life. In Volume 7, we learn that Penny's soul isn't actually artificial, but actually a fragment of Pietro's soul... His life force.

While what I'm about to say isn't confirmed as of the writing of this essay, i wouldn't be surprised if this whole "taking away my soul & putting it on something else" thing Pietro did took a huge toll in his lifespan... IE: it might've made his life span much shorter & maybe even age faster. In that same scene, he also says that if Penny dies again, he doesn't know if he will have enough life force to bring her back a second time.

So with ALL of that in mind, would YOU - Ruby Rose - accept Pietro's offer? Better yet, would you let him actually DO IT?!... Personally, i wouldn't... I'm sorry, but I'm not the kind of person who could bring himself to bring someone back to life by either killing someone else or letting said someone else die. Especially if the person I'm trying to bring back is the daughter of the person I'm killing in exchange!

Imagine how devastated Penny would feel if that happened?! Imagine how she would feel of her own father died in order to bring her back to life again... Do you think she'd be able to live with that reality?! Do you think she'd be able to forgive herself for that?! Let alone forgive Ruby for either telling Pietro to do that or worse, letting him do that & not stop him?! Do you think Penny would want that?! Do you want this poor innocent girl to come back at the cost of her father's life?!...

How could Ruby ask that of Pietro, how could you ask that of him? How could I ask that of him?! What kind of person do you have to be in order to ask someone's parent to essentially sacrifice the remaining years of their life in order to bring THEIR child back?! Not YOUR child, THEIRS!... Do i need to go any further on how cruel & messed up this scenario would be?!...

I can't fucking believe some people actually say this unironically, but they freaking do! Like- guys!... You can't bring somebody back to life by having their parent literally exchange their life for them! You can't just DO that! That's like if i was asking the Mom of my best friend who just died to sacrifice her life to bring back my friend... How the hell am I supposed to ask that of somebody?!

Reason 2: Sometimes, people just die.

Okay, THIS is where I'm gonna sound very controversial. Cause what I'm about to say will make people very upset... So for those who somehow are still reading this, but don't feel like finishing it... Out... Now!...

This is the most overused talking point I've heard when i hear people talking about Penny's death in Volume 8. How it was needlessly cruel, unfair & unsatisfying, as well as asking themselves why the writers would do this if they didn't plan on bringing her back in the future?... Here's the problem with this line of thinking... Sometimes, bad things just happen...

There are times where bad things happen out of our control, there are times when even after being prepared for the worst, we still lose & most of all, there are times where people just... Die... & There's nothing we can really do about it... The point I'm trying to make here is this: People don't often die in order to make a big sacrifice for the greater good or to save their loved ones... People don't often die to achieve a greater purpose in life or to motivate someone else... Sometimes... People just die... & That's what happened to Penny...

Despite everyone's best efforts, she died... Despite everything Penny went through to get as far as she did, she died... Despite all the love, care & affection the people around her showed her & proving to the world that her life did indeed had meaning... She died... & There was nothing the heroes could do about it. Jaune wouldn't have been able to heal Penny in time before she either bled out or before Cinder finished the job herself, there's no Senzu Bean equivalent in RWBY for Penny to take for her to suddenly heal all of her fatal wounds, there's no legitimate healing spells in RWBY as far as we know... & Most important of all, there was nothing the heroes could do to stop Cinder.

Now before some of you say "Oh, but Emerald knew & could've told them!" & To that i say YES, you're right... Except not really... Thing is, Emerald didn't know Cinder would do what she did. She didn't know she'd ally with Watts & Neo, create this very elaborate scheme in order to kill everyone in The World of Void. There was no way in hell Emerald could ever find out about that, nobody could. Heck, they didn't even know who was holding the missing Lamp at the time! Making the heroes counter Cinder's plan even MORE unlikely.

Now is this death unfair?... Yes!... Is it very cruel? Yes!... Is it rather unsatisfying?... Very!... But that's the whole point! It's supposed to be a very cruel twist of fate, it's supposed to be this horrible, tragic ending to a character who deserved better & ya'know why? Because that's what death actually feels like to people!

Many people (myself included) don't see death as this great ending to a story or a final goodbye or anything like that. It's usually seen as this cruel, unfair & very painful thing people go through. Whether it be through an accident, a murder, an illness or just old age... Dealing with the death of loved ones suck! It's not supposed to be seen as something that could have benefits to the world or something that could/should be undone.

& That's essentially what happened to Penny. I don't know about you guys, but i am just so tired of people saying that she had to have died for a cause, there has to be a reason the writers killed her off the way they did & that it must be the story telling us that she'll come back somehow... Here's the problem with all of these takes... There IS no reason for her death, there IS no big cause for her death... She just died... That's it...

Like i said a few moments ago... Sometimes, bad things just happen that are out of our control & there's nothing we can do about it. There doesn't have to be a reason for everything, that's not how the world works. Penny's death is no different... Neither is Pyrrha's, neither is Summer's supposed death... That was the whole point of Volume 9. It wasn't about doing the impossible or undoing the past, it was about accepting what happened & trying to find a new reason to live, as well as accepting that the person you are now is good enough.

Does the world suck sometimes? Yes. Does the people in it ruin your reason to live sometimes? Yes. Can reality be the cruelest, sadistic & unforgiving asshole you've ever met in your life sometimes?... Absolutely!... All of what i just said is true, there's no ifs, ands or buts about it. Sometimes, life is one merciless & unforgiving bitch!... But ya'know what's also true?... Ya'know what's also reality?... You have a choice to make... You get to choose how you will properly deal with that reality.

You can either choose the path Salem, Cinder, Neo, Watts, Ironwood, Adam & all of the RWBY villains/antagonists took, where you're so spiteful & resentful towards the world that you wanna give the same pain you just went through back at the world. Because in your mind, it's justified. Why shouldn't the world suffer the same pain you've suffered. It's not fair for you to go through literal hell while everyone else is all happy & cheerful, living their lives without a care in the world... That doesn't sound fair to you, does it?...

If you make this choice, you're essentially letting your pain & suffering do the talking for you. You're letting it control your life & make all of the decisions for you... You could do that... But you can also choose to take a different path, one that's more benevolent & hopeful... The path that people like Ruby, like Summer, like Yang & the rest of the team good guys have chosen to take.

A path where instead of using your pain & suffering to make the world worse, you use it to make it better. You use your own painful experiences to help others, to make sure they don't go through the same pain you did. It might seem like it's too much for you to handle & sometimes, it might even feel like a waste of time. Hell! You might even get to a point where you ask yourself "Where's my help? Where's my source of comfort? Why can't someone pick me up for once?" But if you stick to your guts & if you don't lose sight of yourself, you'll eventually realize 2 things.

1: The person you are now is good enough. It's not perfect, this person makes many mistakes & has maybe done some terrible things in the past... But the good that person did can't be denied & maybe... Just maybe, that person you are right now is good enough, even if you don't realize it right away.

2: Your actions, no matter how small they may seem, CAN leave a positive impact on others. Eventually, you come to realize that despite your many failures in life, the good you did accomplish cannot be understated. Whether it be on a single person or maybe even a whole group of people, they're only where they are now because of you.

You were the one who gave them the drive to keep living despite the hardships the world can bring at them, you were the one who showed them that their lives actually mean something! & You should take pride in that, no matter how small it may seem to you.

So yes, the world can be very cruel... But it can also be very beautiful... & You can choose whether or not you embrace its cruelty, or show the people how beautiful the world can be... That's the entire point of not only Ruby's arc in volume 9, not only the entire point of Volume 9 as a whole... But the point of RWBY as a whole. It's a story about how the world can affect different people, a story where its cruelty can either make people very spiteful & resentful or make them empathetic & kind. Because that's how things are in our world too... & I'm really happy to see RWBY both understanding this theme... & Embracing it.

3: "If Penny's death is meant to be unfair & cruel... Then what was the point of it"?

& You might ask me "What, did Penny just die for nothing then?"... Well... Yes & no... While it is very cruel & unsatisfying - which again, was the point - i wouldn't say she died for "nothing." If Penny didn't do what she did, Winter would've died against Ironwood (remember, she was at death's door when Penny gave her the Winter Maiden Magic. Ironwood was this close to finishing her off.), Weiss would've died against Cinder, Jaune probably would've died against Cinder as well & worse of all, the Winter Maiden Magic would go to someone else random. Why is this a problem?... Oh, nothing much... It's nothing too serious, except for the part that all of the escapees are getting killed off in the desert & there was nobody powerful enough to complete subdue & protect them at the time! Are we seriously forgetting about that?!

It doesn't matter if it was either Penny or Winter, if neither of them went through that portal, i can guarantee you that everyone on the other side of that portal would've died by the Vacuan Grimm. (You can mostly thank Weiss [The Writers] for not being more specific about the exit of the portals, but i already wrote & sang that song many times in the past, so i don't wanna get too sidetracked here.) I can guarantee you that the only reason Ren, Nora, Oscar, Emerald, Klein, Willow, Whitley, the Happy Huntresses & everyone else who made it there didn't all fucking die in that desert is because of Winter coming when she did as a Maiden, which wouldn't have happened if Penny didn't do what she did.

So uh... Yeah, Penny making sure the Winter Maiden Powers went to someone she could trust was kind of a big deal. You can't call that "dying for nothing", because despite losing the 2 relics, Penny's death essentially gave the survivors of Solitas a chance to even make it through Vácuo alive & by extension, having an entire unified armada ready to go as we see in the final shot of V9. (Most of that is thanks to Ruby & her message, but i still need to give Penny some credit for this since i doubt there were enough people to properly lead this unified armada). Once again, sharing a great video from Murder of Birds that puts things into perspective better than i ever could: https://youtu.be/k3i8kS5i4qw

Final thoughts

So overall, i think these Penny Revival theories aren't really worth making it a reality. I think it'd be best to just let Penny rest in peace & let Ruby & co. carry on her memory & will, even if her actually death is very cruel & painful. By bringing Penny back, you don't just undo her sacrifice, but also go against the core themes of the show, in more ways than one... So as much as it pains me to say this both as a Penny fan & as a huge Nuts N'Dolts shipper... I think it'd be best for Penny NOT to come back for a second time.

I once again ask everyone to keep things civil in both the comments, as well as in the reblogs & to NOT attack anyone who follow these theories. I do not want that & if i see anybody do that, I'm going to block you... & I really don't wanna do that, especially since my block list is getting kinda full with these annoying as hell pornbots (hate those jerks.)

But that's it for me. This has been Remnant Bardock & until our next meeting, have a wonderful day, my friends!

@asm5129, @iamafanofcartoons, @tumblingxelian, @frisk863, thoughts?

[chibishortdeath]

i absolutely love your tags on my post about the mysterious woman, it's nice seeing someone who's as passionate about her as me ❤️

Hehehe, thank u, I’m pacing around all happy about it rn (>.< ). I love Simon’s Quest and how genuinely odd everything that happens in it is.

And the Mysterious Woman doesn’t get talked about very much and y’all are missing out!!! She’s so so so fun to speculate about!

I ran into I think it might have been an old conversation on like Gamefaqs or some other comment section somewhere and there were a surprisingly large amount of people in the conversation who said that when the game came out they assumed that she was meant to be Selena, and that’s just aaaaaa so so interesting to me. And it wasn’t just American fans either, there was someone from Japan who assumed the same. It’s so awesome getting to see the perspectives of people who were there when the game was new and this theory has me going nuts sometimes lol. On one hand it makes sense for the ghost woman in the Belmont family graveyard to be someone from the family, but on the other hand is she really “mysterious” anymore if it’s someone Simon would know?

And why did the Mysterious Woman not mention the Tooth of Vlad and only the other five pieces that she knew would partially summon Dracula instead of the intended burning, burying, and breaking of the curse? Especially if she’s meant to be Selena/Simon’s wife or if you interpret her as Sara? Simon’s Quest really went for the twist of having the call to action character and the one to get Simon out of whatever rut he was in for 6 years in the first place be the first person to lie to him. Which is just so!!!! Aaaa!!!!!!!!!!! This also raises the question: is the Mysterious Woman actually a force of good? Or did she just know that Simon was desperate enough to believe what she was saying to him? I’ve seen some people theorize that she was some kind of Dracula cultist or even a possible form of Death because of this.

Or was she completely right that summoning and killing Dracula is the only way to break the curse? After all a lot of other games in the series that revolve around curses end in Dracula being brought back and defeated. But this is also a strange option as usually when Dracula is resurrected it’s by cultists or Death or whoever else and it’s not a good thing and is just for the purpose of having the evil dark lord do evil things. So that would make this game one of the few scenarios in which Dracula’s resurrection is justified which is so weird I just— thinking about Simon’s Quest to hard is gonna kill me one day lol X,,,,,D.

She also says that one line of “within your own heart, you might be able to defeat the evil if you wager your own life” and thinking about that along with the ominous vagueness of the endings all having different eulogies so similar that you could genuinely make an argument for any of them being the canon ending and the fact that almost all of Simon’s symbolism is related to self sacrifice and martyrdom is uh… interesting. Also a lot of people forget that the area around Castlevania is also cursed, not just Simon. The swamps are messed up, the towns get less saturated in color more empty the closer you get to the castle, and there’s monsters everywhere, this wasn’t entirely a selfish endeavor to save himself.

Anyway, the Japanese manual also talks about the Mysterious Woman in specific ways, appearing and disappearing with the mist. And maybe this is a way to keep her as mysterious as possible, but it’s an interesting choice of words. They could’ve said she walked away into the mist, but they specifically said “disappear”, which is an awfully ghostly thing to do. And it’s also weird cause we kinda do see another character suddenly appear out of thin air in a graveyard in who I like to call the Garlic Guy. The Garlic Guy is also massively under appreciated like what the heck is up with that whole interaction 💀💀💀. Go to the graveyard, only at night, and some hooded figure will suddenly begin to exist in front of you if you lay garlic on the ground and then give you a bag. And then like most things it’s completely unexplained and you just have to keep moving on. I’m thoroughly convinced Simon is just as confused as we are lol. And in a way she is also treated the same way as any other NPC: she does something unexplainable and is never mentioned or important again. The way the game is written I swear it’s designed to make you feel anxious and rushed, ya know like a guy who is actively dying would feel.

And the fact that none of this is ever explained is just so ominous. It adds to the tension of the game and themes of not being able to trust anyone. Nobody trusts Simon, Simon can’t determine who’s trustworthy, there’s NPCs that you don’t even get to know who or what they are, sometimes even the hint books aren’t particularly helpful, things happen and you just have to keep going as to not waste any time.

Hopefully any of this makes sense lol I ain’t reading all that again to check cause I gotta go have lunch cause I forgor about it whoops. Anyway I am very normal about Simon’s Quest and every character in it, please everyone play this game it’s good I promise— (;w; )

Edit: oh my god I did not realize how long this ended up oopsie—

[fountainpenguin]

Hate That I Love You 12,5,4,3

[Current Ask game]

130 Prompts #22 - Hate That I Love You - Read on AO3

#ridspoilers

12: What do you like least about this fic?

I don't think there's anything I dislike about this 'fic. It's one of my pride & joys <3 There are several tweaks I would make to H.P.'s family tree if it weren't set in stone, but other than that, I like it.

I think it's one of my most creative character and plot ideas and contains one of my best argument scenes. I love Ambrosine. Something is so very wrong with him and you really get to see that in this piece in a way you don't for any other he appears in. My man did all of it and I care (about him).

My main "issue" with it is that it's backstory for an unpopular character, who is a toddler in this scene when he's an old man in the canon (Bigger investment and learning curve for readers), and the lore here is woven in with my longfic, which makes this piece difficult to recommend to others.

If anything else, since it's 5 years old I'm sure it could use a polish to bring it up to my current writing style. There are places that read choppier to my ear than they used to. But then, I'm literally millions of words deep in my FOP content now, so getting sucked into nitpicking it wouldn't go over well. Every now and then on a reread I stumble across a line written in a style I've outgrown and I do change it, but mostly I leave my stuff intact.

Overall, I'm happy with this piece. Like I said, I love Ambrosine. Hands down one of my best OCs. Absolutely not in a morally way, but in his twisted, anxiety-induced haze.

3: What's your favorite line of narration?

That leads well into the next question about narration I like, because I still love this unhinged exchange between two parents who just threw their crying son off a balcony:

Ambrosine sighed and reached into his pocket. Holding the forget-a-cin canister in front of his son's eyes, he pushed down the top and flashed the light. The pre-bottled magic jumped like a spark from the canister to his forehead. Fergus staggered backwards, rubbing his face with both palms, and went over the edge of the balcony again. His square wings snapped out, desperately beating to no avail. Both parents watched his tumble with lips pressed together hard. Solara nudged Ambrosine with her shoulder. "See, that wasn't so bad. How many doses do you have left?" Ambrosine checked the label on the canister. "Eight. And I sh-should be taking notes for class tomorrow."

Specifically, what makes this scene for me is the way Ambrosine checks how many doses are left on that can. It's just haunting and perfect to me. It simultaneously conveys how little concern he has and implies he's willing to keep this up until the end... even though his infant son is screaming and pleading at him to stop.

Also, the idea that this is all for a school project on central test theory is just... yeah (Central test theory is something I had to learn formulas for while getting my psych major, and the whole thing drove me nuts because, I kid you not, the basic explanation of central test theory is that if you had the ability to erase someone's memories a lot of times, you could have them perform a test over and over and whatever the average of their test scores is, that's their true score. I was not the biggest fan of that class).

Ambrosine living in a world where central test theory is real is just. awful, with the implication that he doesn't really see what he's doing as wrong, because hey... It's part of his major!

I can see a lack of polish in this scene that I'd tweak if I were writing this piece now, but the "checking the label" bit would definitely remain untouched.

Later in this piece (as well as in Origin), Ambrosine does some pretty messed up stuff. These little moments are a core part of his character to me, because the big stuff - like getting one of his grandkids literally addicted to shapeshifting on purpose - IS messed up, but that's nothing new for Ambrosine. He's always been "off." It's why he goes and does things like name his daughter after the name H.P specifically told him he might want for his own kid someday.

You can see Ambrosine's weird behavior in the way his filter breaks, even from the very first chapter of Origin of the Pixies, when he slips out of his prim and proper character long enough to tell Mr. Thimble, "Well, you're super annoying and I don't like you at all," which is far more juvenile than most of his dialogue (In itself a nod to H.P.'s bizarrely casual dialogue in FOP canon).

You also see this part of his character in the way Ambrosine disrespects Anti-Fairy culture (Everything from avoiding certain phrases around Anti-Cosmo in Frayed Knots to straight-up confronting H.P. in Origin and telling him his ancestors would be disappointed that he would dare form a friendship with Anti-Bryndin).

I like Ambrosine because I think he fits well in the FOP world, which is populated by ambiguously bad parents who aren't easy to cut ties with. He's a pleasant, chill guy who runs an honest business. He spared his teen son's life after a duel to the death. He took his adult child in when he showed up with baby Sanderson in tow.

He gave H.P. a decent childhood, even taking him to sports games. But that's the point. He's this blurry figure that H.P. has incredibly mixed feelings about and can't cut out of his life, especially when he ends up raising dozens and hundreds of pixies and needs all the help he could get.

Ambrosine's always been a nervous character, and his behavior stems from a background of abuse, tough expectations in his youth, having a kid while at the Fairy Academy, a war he was forced into, the burden of suddenly becoming his cruel father's sole surviving heir... yeah. Ambrosine, my beloved...

[Cnt'd under the cut]

5: What part was hardest to write?

Mmm... This piece contains some early character studies I did (which I tweaked and put in the italicized sections). I actually enjoy writing romantic / steamy scenes for character study purposes because I feel like it helps me strip a character down to their raw state and evaluate them better.

I have a few Ambrosine and Solara scenes that I've never posted and never intended to (because... OC parents of a character who's elderly in show canon; we don't need to put that on the fanfic website). I actually have them formatted nicely on a separate site because I've debated sharing them over the years, but it never felt right to me. They're vanilla fade to black scenes, but there are lines in there I love.

If people are interested then I might post them on AO3, but again, they're OCs and the FOP fandom is pretty quiet these days, so probably not. Maybe if I build my confidence with other pieces first.

Anyway, I genuinely like those early character studies, so taking those and trying to reformat them in a way that fit this piece was difficult. I think I'd do it differently or not include them at all if I were to redo it now, but I wanted to share those scenes because I had them and I liked them.

4: What's your favorite line of dialogue?

She swallowed. Her hand moved up to the place where he had held the canister. She took her hair between her fingers and clenched it tight. "Amby, I'm sorry. I love you - the good you - but this isn't working, and it's not fair. Please." Her voice left spiderwebbing cracks across the word. "Please let me go." "I can't do that." "Please, Amby. I think it would be for the best if we just-" "I know what will make you stay." Before she could grab his hand, Ambrosine shoved the canister against his own temple and blasted it. He heard Solara screech his name before his eyes rolled back in his head. His arm went over the railing, his knees were falling, and the only thing left to see was white. … So, why was he in the hospital?

Top contender for one of my favorite scenes I've ever written. I hope it came across well to readers, but I really like it. The cutting off your girlfriend / mother of your child with "I know what will make you stay" before you blast yourself with a memory wipe is just... awful. Ambrosine is... I really like him.

Personally, I think this scene was done really well. It's not a morally good thing to do, but I think I built things up so you can understand Ambrosine's desperation. Also, I think Ambrosine turning the canister on himself (after repeatedly using it on his child and partner) was a good move that makes logical sense in the story flow and hopefully wasn't obvious before this moment.

I wanted it to really come across as this "blast" moment where the reader gets thrown into this horrible situation alongside Solara, and I think it worked. It's my favorite. I would've been tempted to use this scene in an original work, but FOP canon just lends itself much more neatly to "people carrying memory wiping stuff around," so there's that.

Thanks for asking!

[iellimau]

this overanalyzed rant is brought to you by my crazy freshman year of hs english teacher, who was a bitch and i hated her, but also taught me how not to be stupid and i will forever be grateful, even though now i’m an engineering major and will probably never have to close read again except by choice apparently.

shoving this under a readmore since other than @xandromedan, idk how many people actually care lmao, and this is a long fucking ride. it’s 3k words. enjoy?

my god, i cannot keep being silent at all the bullshit fugkinf takes i see about mr miguel spider-man 2099 o’hara. anyways there’s three main flavors of mischaracterizing him that i see: the horny flavor, the morally black/white flavor, and the what-the-fuck-fanon-taken-to-extremes-to-the-point-of-racism weirdness, or more simply the canon/fanon flavor. All of these are underscored by the fact that Miguel’s complete lore was not really introduced in the movie, meaning only people who really care would already know or bother to dig it up (i go into it in a fourth section, which is only really useful for people who don’t know it already). however, while i am upset at lower level mischaracterization (like claiming he’s a vampire), i only feel true rage towards people who claim to be theorycrafters or back up unreasonable claims with cherry-picked or just straight up bad evidence.

1. the horny flavor

firstly, hornyposting: i can cope with it, and i’d be a hypocrite not to, since i’m also rather horny for miguel. he’s objectively hot, and as occurs with any character that is sexually attractive, he will be misrepresented in the interest of people getting their rocks off. with miguel, this is sometimes compounded by some racism in the form of fetishizing hispanic or otherwise non-white men, but i don’t have the energy to get into that, and it’s not really horny mischaracterization that i’m upset about, since that variety is super common and happens to basically any visually appealing character (not that i enjoy it. i like my porn in character, thank you very much.).

this brings me to the second flavor:

2. morality

an inability to see fiction through a lense other than pure moral black/whiteness is usually supported by a lack of some combo of empathy and/or media literacy. miguel gets morally voided all the time and it drives me NUTS, so here’s a deep dive into spider morality:

in his first ever depiction, spider-man as a character was designed to NOT be a perfect, idealized hero figure. i heard this in an interview of some kind but don’t remember where, so instead i have some quotes from the wikipedia page for spider-man: “the flawed superhero with everyday problems”; “He's just a normal guy with girlfriend problems and money issues, so he's more relatable than playboy billionaire Iron Man”.

as such, spider-man and all later variants of him aren’t white knights. more specifically, as the superhero vigilante figure of is portrayed in the spider verse movies, spider-people are inherently morally grey due to their status as vigilantes, the damage and injuries/deaths caused by their actions (intentionally or not), and the inherent sacrifice required by their very existence (if miguel’s canon theory holds true). spider-people are upholders of justice that are defined and limited by their own experiences/mentalities- each one upholds what they personally believe to be justice, which is why you’ll have spiders who work with cops vs ones who oppose police (like spider-punk and to some extent, gwen), spiders with no-kill policies vs those who are willing to use lethal force (eg hobie, noir, miguel, etc), and all sorts of other contradictions/limitations between various types of spiders.

back to the point about miguel’s mischaracterization: a lot of people see miguel as a completely immoral “villain” because of his behavior towards miles. miguel, however, is not a purely evil figure, nor is he— or miles, for that matter— a perfect, noble, morally pure hero. they’re on the spectrum of grey morality, just like all of the spider-people are! of course, there is an extent to which you can determine someone to be less or more morally “good” than another— objectively, miles is a pretty nice kid, but miguel is an emotionally unregulated asshole, and i definitely don’t see enough people wondering about the fucked-up-ness of replacing himself in another universe and raising what is technically someone else’s child as his own— not to mention how that act resulted in the blood of billions, including said daughter, on his hands. also, on a smaller scale, he’s just unnecessarily rude and aggressive towards miles and even the damn machinery in his office, and has issues with physical aggression. overall, he’s clearly an antagonist in the film (NOT a “villain,” which i shouldn’t have to explain are different things).

he isn’t completely void of morality, though. in fact, his role as spider man stems from a desire to make up for past wrongs, as shown in this quote from his comic character: “I've spent the past few years trying to make up for what a shocking uncaring jerk I was for most of my life. Trying to help people I previously wouldn't have given a damn about… trying to lend a hand and sometimes getting it slapped down for my trouble… Occasionally I wonder if it's worth it…” (https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Miguel_O%27Hara_(Earth-928) ). his contrasting moral ideals to miles allows him to act as a character foil for miles, an opposite but adjacent image. miles wants to protect those close to him, miguel wants to protect the grand scheme of the universe (which includes miles and his own universe, even if miles is an “anomaly”). miles is going to try to have “both cakes,” miguel tried and failed to do that and wants to stop miles before he can make the same mistakes (whether or not the canon theory is right doesn’t factor into this intention). miles is a “good kid” who’s experienced comparatively little cruelty as miguel has, who in addition to having the blood of billions indirectly upon his hands, was also abused, experimented on, an addict, etc etc (comics lore stuff, all info from his fandom wiki page.). no, miguel isn’t a “good person,” and no, not all of his actions are justified by his past. but he isn’t “evil,” and despite everything, he still doesn’t wish harm upon anyone— miles included.

besides, it’s not like miguel fuckin kills anomalies with his bare hands or something.

it really makes me wonder if any of the people i see saying that miguel “hates” miles watched the same movie as me. he’s clearly trying to protect miles, even if he’s doing so in a callous and frankly not-at-all effective way (kinda ironic— he beat the kid up to try and protect him, resulting in the kid also needing to be protected FROM him).

aaaaand this acts as a great segue into the last main flavor of mischaracterization:

3. fanon diverging from canon flavor

anyone who’s spent enough time in fandom spaces knows the domino effect of how canon becomes fanon: a food the character likes or a logo seen one time is referenced so many times in fan works that it becomes synonymous with the character themself; an exaggerated joke is made so many times that people who either know or care less about the source material accept it as fact, etc (the most famous example i can think of is “oikawa’s knee injury” from haikyuu— if you haven’t heard of it, it’s kind of incredible). and thus a fanon interpretation of the character and media is born, sometimes only slightly off from canon and sometimes egregiously so; sometimes in ways that are inconsequential to the way the source media is consumed and other times completely rewrite how people see it.

miguel’s fanon is unfortunately the latter in both ways. thus, we have the two main sins of canon miguel o’hara: 1) he hates miles, and 2) he’s racist.

the first one i get how people arrive at said conclusion. miguel, be it out of stress or just his inherent abrasive nature, is rude to miles, fights him without pulling punches, tells him soul crushing things like that he’s a mistake and that it was his fault that there’s a hole in the multiverse, that original earth-1610 spider-man died, and that earth 42 doesn’t have one. but we already know that miguel has a really short temper and issues regulating his emotions— not just from how he says these things and uses excess force against miles, but also in how he’s quick to snap at peter, gwen, lyla, hobie, etc, and how he throws/breaks thing when he’s angry. also, miguel isn’t an idiot— he’s a geneticist/engineer by non-spider profession, and it’s his efforts that led to the development of multiversal travel and the creation of spider society. logically, he has to know that miles himself had no control over the spider being moved to his dimension or getting bit. as such, to me it seems more like he was overcome by his unregulated emotions (read: unaddressed mental health issues relating to various traumatic experiences) when he was yelling at miles on the moon train. i refuse to believe that not a single one of these people who see miguel as simply hating miles has never said something they didn’t mean in an argument, just out of anger or for pure impact’s sake.

admittedly there’s a little wiggle room in saying miguel didn’t really mean what he said to miles, but it’s more difficult to argue he 100% did mean it, considering what we know about miguel’s mannerisms and ideals. like i said before, he does not act with any intention of harming people, and tries to minimize harm done to them or others by making what he thinks to be “necessary sacrifices.”

the second sin of fanon miguel is so much more frustrating to witness.

i’ve seen a ton of jokes like “miguel hates miles because he’s black.” firstly, we’ve addressed how he doesn’t necessarily hate miles. secondly, the racism joke is a common one i’ve seen irl and on social media, and it’s one that stems from the obsession with race integrated into american culture and history, but that’s all it is— a joke. or at least that’s what my dumbass thought until i saw someone genuinely arguing that miguel is racist today on tiktok, which sparked this entire rant and the post that birthed it.

this person’s points, which i had to use some significant effort to unearth in the overall mess that was their video, was that miguel was racist because 1) he mocked miles’s spanish self intro by saying “que maravilla” and responding in english after that point, therefore supposedly insinuating that he considered himself above miles because miles is afro-latino and therefore not hispanic/latino enough, and 2) he didn’t accept the gift of the empanada and threw it down, somehow disrespecting miles via disrespecting food from his own organization’s cafeteria. and most of the hundreds of commenters were either agreeing with this or essentially saying “woah you must be right, let me blindly agree with unsubstantiated claims and then go on to spread more misinformation.”

i have no words.

firstly, the english and “que maravilla” point: miles does not speak perfectly fluent spanish. he has a bad grade in spanish class (possibly due to attendance based grading, but could also be attributed to missing the foundation necessary from class for homework/assessments), and his mom even criticized him for “spanglish” when he tells her “eso no es my fault.” another sneaky way the movie writers made it clear that 1610 miles’s primary language isn’t spanish is in how he pronounces his name different to miles 42, who in the absence of his father has more influence from his mother, including in his intonation.

i’m not saying miles doesn’t speak spanish fluently, but as another bilingual low-key girlfailure, i can tell you right now that it would be a stupid idea to try and tell me about the fate of the multiverse in my secondary language when english is an option. miles doesn’t speak spanish at school or with at least half of his family, so there’s no way he has the vocab necessary to talk about such high level concepts in spanish. this much obvious from the kinda clunky and accented way he offered miguel the empanada, which is likely why miguel would talk to him in english, not out of some “i’m more hispanic than you” or “you’re half black” superiority complex— ESPECIALLY BECAUSE MIGUEL HIMSELF IS ALSO ONLY HALF HISPANIC.

also. the movie is in english, for english audiences. guess what language the other spiders in hq all speak? english. i read an article which talks about how not subtitling spanish (or any other language, for that matter- notice how the sound effects in mumbhattan are in hindi?) was an immersion choice— so having a full, subbed or unsubbed conversation in spanish would just straight up make no sense, not to mention that the other spiders that were part of said conversation, eg peter b., gwen, jess, hobie, lab, etc etc would ALSO not understand (https://remezcla.com/features/film/miles-morales-spider-man-spider-verse-spanish-dialogue/).

as for “que maravilla,” that’s a standard issue dick move by miguel. the same effect would’ve been achieved with “wonderful” in english. the only argument i can make in favor of the other person’s theory is that by saying “que maravilla” instead of a similar comment in english, miguel was partially mocking miles’s not amazing spanish, which is again just a dick move, not a sign of racially aligned malice. just because miles is black does not make every action against him motivated by racism, and to insinuate so is in and of itself kind of racist! as much as characters exist in tandem with their backgrounds, culturally or ethnically or in whatever other way, they also exist despite them. not every not white character needs to have their central character conflict revolve around their race. saying that miles must be subjected to anti-black sentiment at every possible turn is reductionist, bad in a similar way to how pavitr is reduced to chai or how miguel is sometimes reduced to being sexy because he’s hispanic. all different flavors of racism— still racism.

the second half of the tiktoker’s theory is genuinely just bullshit. miles grabbed an empanada from the cafeteria because jess mentioned miguel liked them, and miles wanted to be nice. chances are he would’ve grabbed a burger if that’s what jess had said miguel preferred.

also, since i mentioned her— jess is black, if that even matters, and miguel has his complete trust in her. i won’t argue further on that point though because pointing out the individual character’s races and saying that characters behave in xyz way towards them exclusively because of it is a weird thing to do, especially in a movie that is just not centered on racism as a main source of conflict. aspects that could be related to race are touched on— miles’s college application process, rio telling him to not let the people at the fancy places tear him down, etc— but race isn’t the focal struggle miles is working with in the movies, his identity as spider-man is.

additionally, a huge point of spider-man as a whole is that anyone can wear the mask— in fact, some of the hero’s early successes are attributed to the fact that “since the costume completely covers Spider-Man's body, people of all races could visualize themselves inside the costume and thus more easily identify with the character” (again from wikipedia). itsv and atsv leaned into this pretty heavy with the whole “you can wear the mask, anyone can wear the mask” type dialogues. i know there are various comic series with much more social and political commentary, like noir and hobie’s series (also weirdly enough— miguel’s wiki said that when he traveled to the present day, he was most concerned about climate change and trump’s election??? another argument against the whole racist thing ig but like huh???), but for atsv in particular, it seems redundant to have a racial conflict between two spider people.

one last thing, since i brought up comic miguel a handful of times:

4. comics lore flavor

the lack of comic lore depth in the movie surrounding miguel’s past led a lot of people to arrive at slightly wrong conclusions about him. again, these ones don’t upset me too much unless people who refuse to dig into the lore try to falsely claim things that are straight up wrong.

firstly, miguel isn’t a vampire, and the fact that he uses claws isn’t as a reference to the prowler. (his theme is pretty similar to the prowler theme though from a compositional standpoint— potential for some other analysis? but not this one). miguel wasn’t bit by a spider, he was genetically engineered, and as such has a slightly different ability profile from classic spider people. he isn’t innately sticky (his claws are akin to the setules spiders use to stick to surfaces via electrostatic/van-der-waals forces, only miguel actually uses them like claws because that’s too bitty gritty with the physics), he doesn’t have a spidey-sense, he has fangs that inject venom, and rather than using the conventional web shooter device used by most spiders, he has natural web shooters in his physiology in the comics and seems to use some sort of technology to either replace or supplement that in the movies. (how spiders stick: https://physicsworld.com/a/spiders-get-a-grip/#:~:text=The%20scientists%20found%20that%20the,surfaces%20(see%20figure%202).)

secondly, miguel’s backstory: in atsv, he explained that he found “a universe where he was happy.” here’s a summary of miguel 928 (the movie ver is from earth 928B despite being listed as 928 in the movie bc comic and movie miguel aren’t the same guy): he was born of an affair, his mom’s husband was abusive to him and his mom/brother. he worked at alchemax when he grew up and killed a test subject for his genetic engineering project, and when he tried to leave, his bio father (his boss) forced him into an addiction to make him stay. he then tested the genetic engineering thing on himself to try and get rid of his addiction (because the addiction was also essentially genetic engineering and his ig dna was in the database), and then that went horribly wrong and that’s how his spider abilities came to be. it gets worse from there, particularly in how he does have a biological child in the comics, but the kid is hidden from him and then his home universe collapses or something like that. miguel’s comics are not known to be fantastic, and authoring issues have given rise to plot inconsistencies within his world’s storyline (https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Gabriel_O%27Hara_(Earth-928) ). there’s also a handful of other miguel variants from comic multiverse arcs who don’t seem to have much better histories, but they’re not all that well elaborated on. either way, lack of info on miguel’s deeply unfortunate backstory makes him look like he’s gratuitously an asshole for no reason other than to be mean. (he is an asshole, though. comics miguel is an ass too. they’re tortured, justice-upholding assholes, but assholes nonetheless.)

anyways, that about finished my rant about miguel’s mischaracterization. i could write essays similar in length or context about other spiders who get misrepresented in the fandom, especially hobie and pav, but i would need to see some interest in my doing so because i’m not fixated on them quite as much as i am miguel.

if there’s typos in this: no there ain’t

immensely distraught by the insane mischaracterization of miguel o’hara

[myshredda]

OKAY WAIT YOU REMINDING ME OF THE SPECIAL ONE- theory time again lets gooo: yellow is aro/ace to me and never wont be and its super weird to me that people glorify his partnership with his coworker because that just feels like a failure state unambiguously to me where you have a empty small talk lover- like remember the fucking retirement card where she repeats the same unfunny joke like. imagine a loveless marriage like that. i think i remember yellow saying something critical of the word "love" to that worm too so its not just in the cult episode where he "rejects love" BUT he wants community and family and basic human dignity. i have no idea how dhmis could keep making episodes but if they do i REALLY HOPE they expand on more non traditional relationships and all the diverse ways people can love each other and enrich their lives because FUCK thats so important and theres ENDLESS ways to do it ehehehe

So true so true so true. I've always found that a lot of emphasis has been placed on Yellow's relationship in the jobs episode as 'proof' of something, either his canon age, or sexuality or whatever. But there's a post floating around on here that I CANNOT find again about Yellow's 'relationships' always having hidden meanings behind them or being a type of manipulation from the simulation they're trapped in!

He and Special One don't have any 'relationship' other than it being a cohesion from Shrignolds cult in an attempt to trap him in the religion with the promise of true love. Honestly it's not even clear if she 'exists' or not, she didn't show up in person, she was more of a hallucination/vision of a person that Yellow could potentially meet in the cult. So yeah, no go there.

As for him and Claire, I don't think Becky and Joe would really plop a healthy relationship dynamic down in the middle of an episode about the horrific nature of capitalism and how a job will suck the life out of you until you're too old to be useful and then you're tossed aside. Like. It was clearly commentary about all the wonderful potential jobs you could have and instead getting stuck in a mindlessly monotonous position that doesn't pay you enough, doesn't give you any free time, limits the relationships you can have, and basically wastes your life. Yellow and Claire (while being kind of cute I can't lie, I'd love them to be friends) are an example of the way people will settle for the easiest available option, after all it's easy to 'fall in love' with a person you see every day. And Claire/Andy/Dunkin really don't have personalities outside of their job! Like they're representation of those who make their jobs their lives, so of course Claires gonna echo the same phrase over and over, it's all she knows! (I also love that the workers that represent being lost to your job are like. sentient tools at a factory that makes nuts and bolts and things. Literally the job is PART OF THEM)

So yeah, I also see Yellow as being Aro/Ace, and the 'relationships' he has in the show really strike me as a manipulation tactic by whichever teacher they're dealing with on any given day, not something real!

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Mia Deserved Better: An Analysis of RE8's Themes/Symbolism

Foreword: I would like to thank @lepusrufus for posting about both Mia and Miranda, and at one point directly saying that Mia deserved better, which is a large part of what caused me to start examining her role in the canon story. Now, I will say that this post, like some of my previous explorations of Village (such as my attempt to determine Donna's age), will not be the best organized. My ADHD makes such things rather difficult for me. However, I have tried more than usual, and have broken up this "essay" into several distinct sections. Still, I am worried that my thoughts will not be as concise or coherent as they were inside my head.

Under read-more for length and spoilers for RE8: Village.

Introduction:

Village is, inarguably, about parenthood. Is it a horror game? Yes. Is it also science fiction? Also yes. But is it still, at its core, a story, and therefore contains imagery, symbolism, and themes? Yes. Now, you may be wondering what this has to do with Mia deserving better. My proposal is as follows: While Village is overall about parenthood, it is more about motherhood than fatherhood. Furthermore, Mia's background + actions from the previous game tie her story directly with Mother Miranda's, making their potential interactions massively important to the story... and could have served the theme beautifully. The missed potential in her involvement in the story is honestly a little bit absurd.

Now, let's examine each of the Four Lords + their sections, as the beginning of analyzing the game's theme.

Lady Dimitrescu + Castle:

Ah, perhaps the clearest (albeit unimportant) bits of theme within the whole game. We are immediately presented with another parent, with three daughters she loves very, very much. Initially they work as a team to capture Ethan, easily overpowering him. When they do split up, each still has dialogue regarding their family members. Each of the daughters expresses a desire to be like their mother/make their mother proud. Lady Dimitrescu herself gets very upset every time one of her daughters perishes, and delivers some important dialogue about this in her final confrontation with Ethan.

To paraphrase, Lady D says that Ethan has done something unforgiveable, caused damage that can never heal, and deserves to die before his daughter. That last part is interesting, in the sense that Lady D seems to believe that outlasting your own child is a fate so terrible that she would not wish it upon anyone, including the person who killed her daughters.

Throughout her dialogue and actions, Lady D serves as an important figure of a living mother. What do I mean by that? Well, the only other mothers we see in game are Mia and Miranda. The former doesn't show up until almost the end of the game (seeing as the "Mia" at the start is not actually the real Mia), while the latter does not have a living child, and her behavior has (presumably) changed quite a bit since that loss. As Ethan goes through Castle Dimitrescu, he watches (he causes) Lady D to go through what Miranda did all those decades ago. When we see her loss, when we experience her loss, it is something we connect with, even comparing it (as Lady D does) to Ethan's loss of Rose.

For the more visual side of symbolism, we can turn to Lady Dimitrescu herself. She is very tall, is visibly older than the majority of the Village cast, and has a fairly classic (old-school) motherly look. Everything about her reinforces her position as an example of a mother, especially when she's with her daughters and becomes such a strong figure of protection. Her height allows her to seem the caretaker for her children, even though they are scary/intimidating in their own right.

Donna Beneviento + Waterfall House:

Yes, the baby/fetus/monstrosity is part of this. No, it is not the only bit of thematic work in this section of the game.

To begin, you can find out that Donna is officially the adopted daughter of Mother Miranda. Her birth parents are dead, implied to be from especially tragic causes (more than is the norm when it comes to "orphan making"), and she has suffered greatly from it. We see that she has been seemingly neglected by Miranda, and is incredibly isolated. The tragedy of her loss, along with the consequences presented by it, are something to keep in mind further down the road, when we inevitably deal with Ethan's own death.

One of the consequences of the environment Donna was raised in is, arguably, her reliance on Angie. While interpretations of their exact relationship (aka how much control Donna actually has at any given point) vary, the two very clearly have something akin to a mother/daughter vibe. Alternatively an older sister/younger sister sort of thing. This shows in the way that Donna holds/carries Angie, as well as the contrast in their demeanors. Moreso, the fact that Donna gave a part of herself to create Angie is almost enough to make the symbolism nonnegotiable.

We also see that Donna has a strong understanding of family/family dynamics, through the way that she uses her powers to manipulate Ethan. She dissects his connections to Mia and Rose, taunts him with the lengths he's willing to go to save his child, then shows him a grotesque version of parenthood: The aforementioned fetus monster. Does the monster represent Ethan's fears, or Donna's?

What if the monster is how Donna sees herself, in some way, perhaps thinking that it's her fault her parents died? Bit of a stretch, but it's not a keystone of my theory, so I'm just throwing it out there. We could, however, go a step further and ask ourselves if Donna has noticed the way Miranda neglects her, and the fetus monster is how Donna thinks Miranda sees her. A baby, true, but grotesque, so terribly imperfect compared to her "real daughter" (Eva, obvs).

Regardless, the monster presents an ugly side of parenthood. It shows us the blood, the hunger (with the way it repeatedly attempts to swallow Ethan whole), the wailing. If Lady D shows us the love of parenthood, the bond, Donna in turn shows us the hate, the misery. Everything that one must endure to reap the rewards of family.

Lastly, we get one last bit of symbolism with Donna's death: We play a game with Angie. A childhood classic, hide and seek. Ethan chases her down repeatedly, stabbing away, seemingly only hurting the doll. But what happens when he kills Angie? It turns out that he killed Donna. You kill the child, you kill the parent. A reinforcement of the connection that comes with parenthood, along with another notch in Ethan's family-murdering belt (not saying that he's the "true antagonist" or anything, just keeping track for one of my later points).

Moreau + The Reservoir

Let's get the worst possibility out of the way: Moreau, weakest and sickest of the four lords, lives in a reservoir, where he is relatively safe. To defeat him, you have to drain the water, forcing him onto dry(ish) land. Paired with the main ideas of his section (which I will detail after this nightmare), one could theorize that he's meant to represent birth itself. Again, he's safe in his ("womb") water, and becomes vulnerable when he leaves (like a fragile newborn). Kinda gross, in my opinion, and also not a strong enough connection for me to care much about. It was merely an interesting (albeit horrifying) enough thought that I felt it warranted sharing.

Moving on to the big stuff with Moreau: He's a baby. Evidence: Whiny, has difficulty moving around, struggles to adapt to his growth, throws up a bunch, loves his mother very much, cries for his mother when he's in trouble, etc. Although Mother Miranda does not care for him, he clearly cares for her, and plays yet another role of an abandoned child (like Donna). Without Miranda there to protect him, he perishes terribly, crying out for someone who does not care to answer.

Hearing him cry out for Miranda, over and over, only for her to continue ignoring him is a key piece in the build-up to our confrontation between Ethan and Miranda. The game, in many ways, centers around the comparison between the two. In my humble opinion, Mia should have been involved in this comparison, as opposed to supplying the solution to the result of said comparison. Yes, I know that was a lot of words that don't mean much yet, but trust me, I'm getting there.

Heisenberg + The Factory

Ironically, of the four lords, Heisenberg is the most similar to Mother Miranda. In his massive factory, he is alone except for his numerous experiments, the results of decades of playing God. In comparison to Ethan + Mia, Heisenberg represents artificial parentage, or more accurately, the artificial creation of "life". While the others Lords also performed experiments, they used living subjects. Heisenberg instead chose to use corpses, which he then "brought back to life" with cybernetics + his powers, a somewhat futuristic version of Dr. Frankenstein.

Together, Miranda and him show a rotten side of parenthood (whereas Donna + Moreau showed us the uglier side of the children themselves). To put it simply, they are bad parents. They throw their "children"/experiments into the fray, uncaring, using them as pawns for their own greater gain. The most important part of this is that Heisenberg offers to "help" Ethan: By using Rose as a weapon. In his act of refusal, Ethan demonstrates one of several important distinctions between himself and Mother Miranda. Where she is willing to use her "children" (read: lives that she is responsible for) as tools, he is not.

Miscellaneous Symbolism/Imagery:

The old hag is one of my favorite parts of Village. She's seemingly nuts, has a crazy old lady laugh, wears bones that make soothing bone noises when she moves, and she draws lots of symbols in the dirt. If you look closely (I can provide screenshots if anyone desires, but it will take a bit of work to get them onto my computer), she's drawing one of the most iconic images in the titular village: The winged unborn. This symbol acts as the key you build up after every fight with a Lord, understandably called the Unborn Key (which turns into the Winged Unborn Key). Whether this counts as foreshadowing towards the hag's identity reveal is technically irrelevant, but I like to think it does.

In essence, you build up the key, this depiction of an infant, to progress in the game. The more wings it gains, the closer you are to your goal of rescuing your child.

The cadou itself is very clearly fetus-shaped. Furthermore, the only place within the human body that we know it ever gets implanted is in the "tummy" (thanks Moreau), aka roughly where someone's womb is/would be. Every infected person we see presumably had the Cadou implanted there (though I think it would be interesting if implanting it in different spots caused different mutations. of course, that is a discussion for another day). To become immortal, you have to "bear" a "child". Does it get more direct than that?

Mother Miranda gained her immortality in part for her grief at the loss of her child. She embodied the despair that Lady D spoke of, becoming an eternal source of anguish. Just as the loss of a child is a wound that lasts forever, so too would Miranda last forever (well, until Ethan comes along).

Mia is a loving mother, who puts up with the BSAA making her move across the world, deals with the complications of having a mold husband and mold baby, and has proved herself (see her section in RE7) to be an immense badass. Previously I had forgotten that, and even embarrassed myself in the comments of another person's post by implying she wasn't a tough, ass-kicking machine. Y'all remember feral Mia? People talk about "poor Ethan's arms", but sometimes we forget that Mia was one of the people who did a number on them. Furthermore, she's one of the only living people (from outside the village) to have any connections (pun intended) to Mother Miranda. They worked together, although possibly not directly, on Evelyn. If anyone in Village has a chance of really understanding Miranda's plight, or knowing the truth behind it, it would be Mia. Yet we don't see them interact a single time. Which leads me to the next section...

Conclusion On Theme + Missed Potential:

Okay, okay, so it's pretty obvious at this point that, as previously stated, the game's theme is parenthood. Every section has its symbolism, the story is very obviously about a man trying to rescue his daughter, etc, etc, but what's the point? Is there a lesson, or a more focused interpretation of the central theme? Let's take one last step back, and focus on something I've mentioned a few times now: The comparison between Ethan and Mother Miranda.

Recurring dialogue from Ethan, Alcina, and Mother Miranda all point towards the developers acknowledging that the characters are similar, but there's nowhere near as much conversation about it as I would like. Several times we have the antagonists ask Ethan how he's so willing to kill someone else's child, or prevent them from (essentially) doing what he's doing (aka saving his daughter). While Ethan responds with a mix of "well you started it" and "aghhh fuck-a-you, bitch", there's a much more solid, unspoken difference: Mother Miranda sends her underlings to kill, so that she may revive her daughter. Ethan kills (read: does the work himself) to get his daughter. The difference is much bigger, and more important, at the end of the game, when we realize just how far it goes. Ethan dies to save his daughter. Time and time again Mother Miranda has killed others for her work, but in the end she is stopped when someone willingly dies to stop her.

Where does Mia come in? Mia, the badass mother, the one who once worked alongside Mother Miranda, should have been the nail in the coffin. She is the one who survives, who lives on to raise Rose, she is the silent solution to Ethan's sacrifice. Miranda, you fool, what could you have accomplished if you had held onto your makeshift family? Through Mia (and Chris, to a lesser degree), his "loss" becomes a victory. There's a certain poetic justice that comes with Rose's full family being instrumental in saving her, when Miranda so readily spurned her own family.

Mia could have had an actual conversation with Miranda, their history giving the latter a reason to actually listen. I'm not saying that Miranda would have changed her mind/plans, but the conversation would have been a well-needed contrast to Ethan's "arggg what the fuck is happening, I only have two reactions to things. agg fuck you". Additionally, I feel that Mia (who was captured and had to endure who-knows-what) deserves the opportunity to be the one who points out Miranda's mistakes, who delivers the final "fuck you" to her. More than that, she's the one at the end who can say that hey, maybe she can understand some of what Miranda did. Was there anything her and Ethan wouldn't have done to save Rose? As much as Ethan is a foil to Miranda, Mia could (and should) have played a similar role.

When so much of the story and symbolism revolves around Miranda's experience as a mother, it only would have been fair to shine a light on her equivalent. Her better.

There's more I wanted to say/feel like I didn't properly get across, and I might add more to this at some point, but it's 5:40 AM right now, and I'm starting to feel like my brain is slowing down, so... Feel free to reblog/comment and add your own thoughts!

[cutie--q]

here we go, y’all, the part 2 that no one asked for!!! :D

AND WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE SEGMENT DESCRIPTIONS, you could make out a timeline of how pinky and the brain’s relationship progresses throughout the season.

(before i get into the next part, i feel the need to emphasize that is speculation, plain and simple. from my pov, i look like a nut but am having a lot of lighthearted fun! so if you read this crack theory, PLEASE be cautious and don’t hope too hard for this to be real in the chances that brinky doesn’t become canon, cause disappointment when it comes to 100% believing speculation sucks to all hell.)

so taking the last pinky and the brain segment of season 2 into account, the gang (pinky and the brain) are starting to feel sparks of something new for their relationship. brain is shocked by his own openness regarding his actions. he’s aware that he doesn’t know how to be “emotionally open” enough, so why was it so easy then to be out of all times? 🤔

WHATEVER!!! it was a weird, confusing moment! all that matters is that he and pinky are friends again.

…only for the first pinky and the brain segment of season 3 to be about them having friendship conflicts.

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀

like i said before on this blog, the crew seems to be setting the stage for an intimate focus on the mice’s relationship (and subsequently, what they mean to each other) with this being the first season 3 segment.

the next segment is “royal flush,” where, quote, “Brain plans to rig a high stakes poker game to become the new king of England,” end quote. nothing peculiar about this premise. however…

it appears from the leaked thumbnail of the segment that pinky and the brain are posing as a couple. so there could be some shippy moments?? i am Reaching here lmao

for the next few segments, i can’t see anything out of the ordinary there, so i have no choice but to assume they’re just typical pinky and the brain segments.

and THEN we get to season 3 episodes 5-6, which contains both parts of “groundmouse day.” refer to the theory above.

so does it really seem like a coincidence that after whatever tf happens in the two parter of “groundmouse day,” that brain suddenly creates a virtual reality machine, specifying that pinky cannot use it? that struck me as a bit odd!! to be fair, brain does that sometimes so pinky can’t mess up the machinery, but usually whatever invention brain creates is made with the intention that they’re both gonna use it. they’re a two for one type of deal.

and then we see in the leaked thumbnail that brain’s dating a fake julia in this virtual reality, so it’s like “ohhhhhh, okay, i see why brain forbid pinky from it, now” shkshdksjsjajs

off topic, but do you know when you’re questioning if you’re queer, and you can NOT stop thinking about it, and nearly every second of everyday keep retesting yourself because you really want to know this part of your identity, so you put yourself through made up scenarios and see how you feel about being seen as queer? because some part of me feels like this is EXACTLY what brain is doing here, but in a more visual way. (i am Projecting)

i’m guessing pinky becomes angry at something about brain’s virtual world (most likely having to do with brain excluding him from these fake scenarios, not even making a virtual pinky to be alongside him). overall, this segment will certainly be a brain character development episode.

noticeably, there’s no pinky and the brain segment next episode. maybe this is to represent that the mice are processing the events of the last segment?…

and then BLAM! the pinky and the brain christmas special: the squeakquel.

like. huh. what the FUCK is this!!!!!!!!!!! /positive

i’m gonna be real with y’all, it looks like they just pulled away from a kiss. 🥺🥺🥺

it would makes sense for them to confess their feelings for one another in a christmas special, considering that christmas holds a lot of significance for the two. and shit has been (at least in this crack ass theory) building UP recently. it would make sense for that to result in a kiss!!! (a mistletoe kiss, mayhaps?? 👀👀👀)

and the final segment of the season is “international mouse of mystery.” the description for this segment reads, “Pinky and Brain are the stars of a secret agent movie franchise.”

i will level with you and confess that i watched the austin powers movies because i thought that was gonna be the parody here, but it turns out that nope! it’s a parody of the original source material, not the parody that is austin powers. 🥲

but idfk, the main characters of most secret agent movies probably are a male and female spy, so insert that accordingly with how pinky is open to dressing gnc and… oh! they might be placed in a romantic role together! neat >:]c

(imagine in between takes they make out backstage dhskdhkshdkajs /joking)

but yeah! that was the end of my off the walls, 99% chance isn’t gonna happen brinky crack theory! i hope you guys had as much fun thinking about this as i did :D

ALRIGHT i only got three hours of sleep before my body decided that that was Enough, so it’s time to spew my confusing joke/crack theories (they are all ship related because i can understand and throw together stuff related to that vs the complexities of character dynamics)

[viridiave]

Daylight Prairie- Creatures of the Light (lore dump)

I've had a couple of theories and headcanons stirring around my head regarding Prairie for a while now- so right here we're gonna tie some of them together cuz I haven't lored in a good long while XD

Note- btw I'm not part of beta so this is purely just me- a crackhead- putting together a crackpot narrative. SOME spoilers for Eden are present.

<THE CEREMONIAL WORSHIPPERS>

okay these guys drive me fucking nuts

We barely know anything about these guys- and what little we do know is derived purely from their closed off uh... Worshipping space. Look at this freaking thing.

In the middle of nowhere. Surrounded by clouds for miles. Fairly advanced diamond technology. Altars with graves decked out in gold and candles. The mechanism for the entrance to the elevator to begin with is fairly complex as well- activated by butterflies and the butterflies don't even die in the process. And to top everything off, this place has a portal that leads directly to the Prairie Temple.

If this isn't sus I don't know what is- but I think I have an explanation.

There are six spaces for six more people that we are not aware of. The only people we DO know of is one bald person in the short garb and another bald person in the long garb. I propose that these six missing people are the Whisperers.

Which is... pretty out there, I know. Counting the 'voices' that we get in game, (including the ones from previous Seasons like Lightseekers and Sanctuary) we have one for Birds, Whales, Mantas, Memories, Crabs, and Jellyfish. For now, we're not counting either Butterflies or Krill- and I'll explain why in a bit.

As for the initial proposition that these Whisperers are the missing six, first we need to ask ourselves what exactly it was that the Worshippers were... worshipping. There is a possible god of which we see in game, and the name of this god is the Megabird.

Megabird here was heavily present in concepts, and in the final product we only ever get to see traces of her and heck to this day we're not sure if she's a canon entity in the final game at all. Megabird as an entity in the concepts is basically the god overseeing the world of Sky and is comprised entirely of light. It's unclear whether or not the Ancestors were aware of her existence after or even before the King rose to power. The Elders themselves are likely privy to this information, but somehow I doubt that it's something anyone wanting to assert control over their people would encourage.

There's certainly the possibility that these Worshippers were a religious sect dedicated to the Elders themselves- but since I'm here trying to propose that they're worshipping something tangential to the possible actual god, we're going to assume this isn't the case. On that note-

<THE WORSHIPPERS WERE DEVOUT TO LIGHT ITSELF>

I propose that the Ceremonial Worshippers valued the Light above all else- and this worship was extended towards the light creatures themselves.

'Oi. Vir. Crabs are DARK Creatures.'

Not all of them. Heck, a dark crab might not have been the norm back then, but that's a stretch and besides- the fact is that these crabs on the far end of Sanctuary are docile.

Keep in mind that these followers were stationed in Prairie, of all places. You know what else is in Prairie? Sanctuary Isles- home to several kinds of manta, butterflies, jellyfish, and even the elusive Elder Manta (yes that's what the big chonky boi that looks like a light krill is called- it's not a whale.).  Daylight Prairie is in no shortage of light creatures- and at the center of it all is its Elder.

Prairie Elder is implied to have responsibilities toward the light creatures as presented in the SkyShop poem featuring them:

'Fields of harvest, prairies of joy.

Farmer and fauna as one.

The Elder protects the creatures of light,

For darkened days to come.

Fly up, fly away,

For the Children of Light in need.

We shall recall our days of wonder,

And feel its air once more.'

-SkyShop Poem (Prairie Elder Pin)

In the greater context of the story, Daylight Prairie is the primary source of light energy in the form of the light creatures- it makes sense that the Elder of that realm would oversee the flow of light creatures from one realm to the other, and that the Ancestors in their domain would have a greater respect for the creatures than others. They're the ones working with them, and they're the ones that know them best.

Enter the Worshippers- who were likely serving directly under the Prairie Elder. I'm not confident that the Prairie Elder could have shared information about the Megabird- or if they even know the god existed. 'The Light itself' is pretty vague for something to be worshipped, and it's possible that the Prairie Elder instead encouraged people that the Light manifested itself into the various light creatures that we see.

In this world however- industrialization marches on, and eventually these light creatures became things to be harvested rather than worshipped. It's speculated that light creatures were used in the production of diamonds- we see signs of this scattered throughout Forest, and Wasteland by proxy. The mural under the bridge in Forest and the doors to the Temple seem to suggest as much at least. Eventually, this industrialization will grow out of hand. I have a few theories on what the Prairie Elder might have done to passively rebel against this.

<PRAIRIE ELDER AND THE BUTTERFLIES>

We learn in the Prairie Elder's cutscene that they are able to form- not summon- butterflies from fire. I'm not proposing that the Prairie Elder is single-handedly responsible for the existence of butterflies- rather I'm proposing through the Prairie Elder's abilities that light is able to be manipulated in such a way that one can create light creatures, should they know how.

It could just be the butterflies, honestly. And really it could just be the Prairie Elder that's capable of such a feat- and because of these holes in this theory it's the first to go.

And yes this is the reason why the Butterflies don't count. I think. That has holes too and I can make a case for the Butterfly Charmer technically being part of this... But I digress.

<SANCTUARY ISLES>

Sanctuary Islands could be a literal Sanctuary for the light creatures- there is an impressive variety of them present. It's also very out of the way, tucked away in a corner of Bird's Nest. The theory I'm proposing here is that the Prairie Elder and the Sanctuary Guide worked together to keep this place hidden from the rest of the Kingdom- and that it was the Sanctuary Guide that broke the bells that would have granted the Ancestors access to the light creatures.

<THE WORSHIPPERS DISBANDED>

This is... probably improbable, but my whole post was leading up to this so we're doing this. The missing six Worshippers are the Whisperers that we've encountered throughout the game- leaving in order to either develop their relationship with or protect their creatures of choice.

The Bird Whisperer stayed close and remained in Prairie- and is probably the reason why Bird's Nest exists at all. The Jellyfish Whisperer remained as well, opting to stay in Sanctuary- the natural habitat of the jellyfish.

The Whale Whisperer ventured to Forest- where there probably once was a small population of Whales, given the corpse we see in the Bridge Area and the live Whale in the Underground Cavern.

The Manta Whisperer went to Valley- I'm guessing to see how mantas were being used for labor and competitions? And Valley is right next to Wasteland so I might be reaching but they could have been monitoring that too.

The Crab Whisperer is a tricky one because we see them travelling with the Lightseekers, and yes I am proposing that this lady was formerly a Worshipper. But because we're dealing with a creature that we now know is more dark than light, maybe the Crab Whisperer joined the Lightseekers in order to observe that phenomenon more closely? Because she does refer to the crabs as friends in her SkyShop poem. Wasteland wasn't always a... wasteland, after all. Things could have been different, and the crabs could have been adapting in a time where they would be relatively dangerous but not so much that an Ancestor couldn't approach them.

And then there's the Memory Whisperer. For this one, I don't think a spirit manta actually exists- at least, not as an organic creature and moreso just an interactive holograph courtesy of the machinations of Vault. I'm actually not too sure on what this person could have been doing, but they have a call- and my best guess is that the Memory Whisperer is one who listens to the last vestiges of light leftover by a creature- because we do see skeletons in Vault, and one is of a creature that looks like an amalgamation of several spirit mantas.

<WHY DON'T THE KRILL COUNT?>

As far back as Prophecy, Krill don't appear to be aligned with the light. They aren't depicted as former light creatures, nor a corrupted variant of an elder manta or whale- they are presented as thenselves in that Prophecy mural. Though I'm sure we'll get a Krill call later on, I'm not going to count them until then.

<CONCLUSION...?>

This huge post is... full of holes and heavy speculation, I'm aware. Mostly I just wanted to dump a bunch of shower thoughts and leftover lore I came up in the Discord lore chat. Go check it out sometime, I've derived a few points in this from interacting with people there. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this matter, by the way- it's fun theorizing! I haven't done this seriously in a long while.

[professorspork]

That is such a black and white view of the world. Penny died with a flesh and blood body like fria. She repeated the words of frias death to show her death here was the same. It was sad but it was meant to show how people who die remain with us. Plus penny only came back last time because her robot body existed and only Atlas had aura transfer systems which need two living bodies to work.

I mean-- lol, I can’t argue with you for complaining that I’m taking a black and white view when I said “there are two options,” so fair enough. yes, there’s a lot more room for nuance than my other post implied; of course there is. my heat-of-the-moment rhetoric is hardly immutable truth. and I have no beef with folks who are satisfied with things as we left them! that’s uh, probably the best attitude to have right now all things considered. And I think CRWBY’s more than capable of writing a show where they spin Penny’s death exactly as-is and that’s all we get and I make peace with it. after all, they’ve done it before.

but BECAUSE they’ve done it before, it makes me all the more convinced that that’s not what’s happening here. we know that people who die remain with us-- JNR’s entire Mistral arc was about coming to terms with Pyrrha’s death, in a very grounded and literal way. (I mean, and a metaphorical way. Vol 4 ends with them straight-up fighting the physical manifestation their own PTSD. it was evocative and devastating and lovely.)

but to say we’re doing the same thing here is to say we jumped through all of those hoops in Creation, and established everything we did about Penny’s personhood and soul and the limits of Ambrosius’s powers... just so that her death could be permanent, after her only having a body for like fifteen minutes. and that seems like a different genre of sad than this show tends to barter in. not impossible! it would be capital-T-Tragic if her exchange with Pietro on Amity really is the last they ever speak to each other. but if so, why establish everything we did in The Greatest Kingdom and Worst Case Scenario about how Penny 2.0 was made?

like, the math you cite-- she only came back last time because of her old body and the specific rules of aura transfer machines-- is mutable. the limits of science are what the narrative demands them to be, and people are discovering new aspects of their aura all the time.

Penny 2.0 had three components: 

robot body (which may or may not have been mostly-new, but certainly wasn’t “living,” and yet the transfer worked) + 

memory (Pietro said they “recovered her core” from Amity) + 

Aura (Pietro’s). Which is why he said she couldn’t come back another time, because he’s run out of bits he can safely cut off from his own.

putting aside the fact that I think Winter would volunteer in a heartbeat to let Penny control her body Ratatouille-style from beyond the grave, I don’t think we have a shortage of options for [1]. Pietro could make yet another new robot body (harder without an Atlesian lab, surely, but not outside the bounds of what’s feasible). or Penny could manifest one exactly as she did in Creation, because she’s the one who made that body somehow, not Ambrosius. that’s text. so both Nuts and Guts are on the table as canon-compliant ways for her to have a vessel of her very own.

[2] is also on the table, because as Creation also established, Penny is not code, she’s a soul. Her memories and selfhood and essence, those are their own thing, and what’s left of them reside in Winter now. not a guarantee, but not impossible. not absurd. viable.

and as for [3]... Pietro’s not alone anymore. so many people love Penny. I think he’d still have to give a lil bit, because she’s his daughter and his contribution, to my mind, is both symbolically and practically required for a Penny 3.0, but he wouldn’t have to drain enough to hurt himself. not with Jaune helping by boosting everyone (and redeeming himself in his own mind for casting the killing blow); not with Ruby and Winter and all of their friends clamoring for the privilege of being allowed to put some aura on the pile. which means probably none of this will be resolved in Vol 9, but she didn’t come back immediately last time, either.

like. I can’t fault you for thinking I’m wrong when I’m the one having to be all charliedayconspiracyboard.jpg and you’re the one who’s like “I think the dead character is, in fact, dead.” that’s-- very valid! I also think I sound bonkers! But I also thought Summer Hound Theory was too out there and that no one would fall and go to superhell just because the opening credits implied it, so like. why not embrace the out-there theory and see how it goes? 

what I know is, here’s where Penny left things with the man who made her:

-I lost you before. Are you asking me to go through that again? No. No. I want the chance to watch you live your life. -But Dad... I am trying to.

every time she’s asked for death, asked to make the sacrifice play-- from Ruby, from Jaune, from Winter-- it has in fact been a bid for extended life. a way to carry on. she’s trying to.

I think she��s going to keep trying.

[palbabor-writes]

KDJDJSLSKS OK SO- ik it’s widely accepted for Tomura to be kind of an asshole to y/n, but what if 😌 he had the kinda “asshole to the world but never to your girl” thing going on? 😌😌😌😌 I live, I love 🥰

Hey, hi, hey ✨

So, I pretty much exclusively write Tomura with that idea in mind. For me, it’s just a...if I can say this, a canon compliant concept.

Moar under the cutttt + spoilers for post Overhaul arc & MVA arc.

You opened a can of worms nonnie. I’m going to answer the ask, but imma hop on my soap box first ✨

Tomura I would argue, is less of an asshole and more of a sassafras. He is snarky, snarky & I love his attitude.

I feel like early Tomura is the main font of this “asshole” misconception within the fandom. Horikoshi wrote him very differently in the beginning of BNHA. Pretty much everyone who met him called Tomura a “man child.” And he kinda is. He’s impatient and short tempered, but not once did he react to these slights with what I would classify as asshole behavior. Even when his life is threatened, he’s being a little sassy boi.

He’s annoyed in these panels. But he’s not like, hey, you fucking dick, get off my nuts before I kill you. If anything, he elaborates on his thoughts and is challenging Stain to pick up the crappy pieces of his own shoddy “theories.” To Tomura, killing heroes is only breeding MORE heroes. He feels Stain’s plan is flawed & he tells him so.

Tomura is also easily able to slip into different roles. He can fit in with others and make himself part of the crowd. He’s got mountains of self control. When he spies Izuku in the mall he doesn’t come at him with some angry outburst, instead he reverts to snark:

Look at his voice bubbles! They’re a little wavy, but they’re nothing like his usual bubbles. This man can modulate and control how he sounds. He’s going for something open and friendly, albeit, his general demeanor is creepy, but he still manages to get close to Izuku and catch him off guard.

This is the worst outburst we see from Tomura. He’s not spewing vitriol or degrading dialogue, if anything, he’s controlling himself. He’s not wanting to kill these guys anymore and he’s scratching out some space for himself. He needs time to process. He’s a little rude, I guess, but who hasn’t told someone to shut up? It’s a normal piece of conversation when you’re annoyed.

But ken, what about asshole behavior that is visible in the manga? I gotchu, don’t worry.

This guy? Dabi? Yeah, this guy is an example of an asshole. He’s abrasive and confrontational from the GET. Tomura only responses to his aggression, he doesn’t project his frustration until after Dabi has called him fucking GROSS. You talk a lotta shit when you look like THAT king. Like, the morgue called, and they want their burn victim BACK.

Again, Tomura is snarky, but he only calls Toga a freak after she spouts some nonsense about loving Stain so much she wants to kill him. These people are wild and he is not pleased. His ad in the paper asked for COMPETENT villains, not teens, tweens and anything in between.  

Plus, Mr. 3rd Degree Burns keeps ignoring his questions. I’d be peeved too, y’all.

Dabi is the asshole in the LOV. He goes out of his way to be nasty, especially to Spinner:

How does Tomura deal with Spinner? He treats him as an equal, even asks his opinion on battle strategy when they are in Deika City.

Tomura has changed a toooon over the course of this manga. Horikoshi has deepened his growth and created a very well rounded and complex character. He cares about his people and he hates being disrespected. Hell, he hates when his people are taken advantage of.

This man, if you are on his side, will fight for you.

So, I don’t write him as an asshole. To me, that is fanon and not canon. Now writing him as blunt, snarky and impatient? Sure. Because, to me, he IS all those things and we can see him being all those things.

ANYWAY. If you made it this far, here is the Drabble:

“They haven’t checked in for two days. Should I call them? I told Toga she needed to-“

“Don’t bother. If it exposes our hand, then this whole mission is a waste.”

“But if they-“

“Why do I need to repeat myself? Like I said, if our plan is revealed then Mange’s death, and your fucking arm, were sacrificed for no reason. Don’t call them, Compress.”

You’re perched on the edge of a large box, watching the tense exchange. Tomura has been quiet the last few days, even keeping you at an arms length. He’s upset, and he’s been brittle, jagged in his recent conversations and movements.

Compress tosses you a quick glance and shrugs, his light brown eyes darkening. “All right, I suppose we can go off of the old saying that: no news, is good news. However, I am going to ask Toga to maintain regular check in’s the next time she calls.”

“Fine,” Tomura grunts, following Compress’ line of sight, his eyes lingering over your seated form. “Is that all?”

“Yes, yes,” Compress nods, his gloved hand waving in the air beside his head. “That’s all from me. I’ll check on the van. Giran said it would be available this afternoon.”

Tomura continues his silent observation of you, barely lifting his chin to acknowledge Compress’ statement.

“I’ll be back this afternoon,” Compress continues, letting out a soft chuckle as he turns on his heel, closing the heavy door behind him.

“You think they’re ok?” You ask, your voice soft.

Tomura removes Father from his face, his long white hair falling around his cheeks. “I told them I trusted in their abilities. It’s not sending the right message if I pester them for intel and their whereabouts every few days. Don’t you start up, too.”

You laugh and hop off the crate, your feet padding you over to him. “I’m not, it’s just...it’s so soon after...I mean, Mange’s death was...”

“Yes. Chisaki is an idiot if he thinks one lackey of his is equal to our Mange. This has to work.”

You lift a hand, pressing your fingers across his jaw, cupping his warm skin. Tomura leans into your touch, his vermilion eyes slipping behind his hooded eyelids.

“It will,” you confirm, pulling him down to your lips.

∩(・ω・)∩

Sorry for the lecture. It was a fun ask to answer! 

Bonus!

[miskatonique]

HERBERT WEST CHEAT SHEET !

since my muses are not super well known in the contemporary rpc ( and i’m too lazy to do a full about page at this very moment ) i decided to put together little posts for them that give their general backgrounds, vibes, and plot possibilities !

this is a mix of canon and headcanon, and these are subject to change / adapt as i get more used to writing the characters

BACKGROUND:

Films: Re-Animator 1985, Bride of Re-Animator 1990, Beyond Re-Animator 2003

We don’t talk about Beyond Re-Animator......

Dr. Herbert West, 24 in the first movie, 27 in the second movie, idk like 40 in the third movie. Mad scientist to the MAX. In the novelization Herbert is an orphan who gets passed around in foster homes before eventually going to undergrad at NYU and pursuing his theory about the re-animation of dead tissue. Mostly people think he’s sort of crazy until one of his articles catches the eye of Dr. Hans Gruber at a university in Switzerland, and he invites Herbert to come work alongside him. Herbert eventually grows to respect Gruber as both a mentor and father-figure.

Herbert and Gruber develop a reagent that affects re-animation in dead animal tissue but they know that for their results to be taken seriously they need to do a human trial. Dr. Gruber volunteers but the dosage of the reagent is too large, and though it brings Gruber back to life it quickly overwhelms his system and he dies again. Herbert is taken into psychiatric custody in Switzerland but is eventually released.

Herbert returns to America and specifically sets his sights on Miskatonic Medical School in Arkham, Massachusetts because one of the staff, Dr. Carl Hill, used to work with Gruber years ago, and even went on to plagiarize some of Gruber’s work and publish it in America. Herbert makes it his secondary goal to absolutely terrorize Dr. Hill, and because he’s a chaotic gremlin in human form he’s very good at it.

Herbert continues working on perfecting the reagent, rooming with Dan Cain and eventually pulling Dan into the experiments as well when Dan’s cat dies and Herbert is able to prove his research by reanimating it. Herbert isn’t perturbed when Dan’s talk with Dean Halsey goes south, and just digs his heels in and insists that the only way to truly prove that the reagent works is to reanimate a human cadaver.

Results are just as bad as you’d expect. Sure, the cadaver reanimates but it also wrecks the morgue and kills Dean Halsey. RIP. Herbert insists that they reanimate him and the dean comes back less like himself and more animalistic, trying to kill both Herbert and Dan before his daughter Meg shows up and stops him. Despite it all, Herbert manages to wriggle his and Dan out of any suspicion from the police but Dr. Hill takes an interest in Herbert’s work once he does exploratory surgery of Dean Halsey and finds out he’s technically dead.

Dr. Hill confronts Herbert in his laboratory and threatens to steal Herbert’s work and take it for his own, offering Herbert the meager honour of being his assistant. Herbert promptly murders Hill via decapitation but decides not to let his fresh corpse go to waste and reanimates both Hill’s head and his body, which come back to life and knock Herbert out and steal all of his work.

Yada yada, Herbert gets Dan to help him go after Hill, the big climax happens. Herbert is able to prove his theory about overdose by shooting up Dr. Hill’s headless body with a bunch of reagent, which backfires and Herbert is left for dead all tangled up in Hill’s intestines, but not after he ensures that his research is safe with Dan.

They never explain how Herbert survives the first movie but he sure is alive in the second movie! It’s roughly 3ish years after the first film, so he’s got his doctorate now and he’s drug Dan all the way to Peru so they can be volunteer medics in a civil war. This obviously gives Herbert an unprecedented access to fresh bodies for his experiments.

Eventually he and Dan head back to Miskatonic Hospital, where they’re able to get jobs and a creepy cute little house that used to be a mortuary so they can continue the work. Herbert is now obsessed with the reanimation of separate parts and convinces Dan to help him build an entirely new life from parts. Dan’s not on board until Herbert shows him Megan Halsey’s heart and promises that they’ll build the body around it.

Dr. Hill’s head also somehow survived the first movie and it tries to terrorize Herbert, along with a cop who’s investigating Herbert for stealing corpses. Herbert eventually kills and reanimates the cop, and then gets into even more trouble when all of the other strange creatures he’s been reanimating start coming after him because they’re being mind controlled by Dr. Hill’s nasty head ( don’t ask me okay, this script was written in literally 6 weeks it makes no sense )

Anyway Herbert and Dan successfully bring their creation to life right before getting attacked by Dr. Hill and his army of weirdos, all while Dan is having a mental breakdown because he thinks the creation is his dead girlfriend Meg. In the chaos Dan and the creation escape separately while Herbert and Hill and co. get trapped under buried rubble and are left for dead ( AGAIN ).

But surprise! Herbert isn’t dead! We don’t know how he survived but we do know that at some point in time Dan turned over evidence to the authorities that led to Herbert’s arrest and imprisonment. The third movie picks up with Herbert who’s been in prison for 13 years and the dumbass new hospital doctor is a fanboy of Herbert and brings in some of his reagent. Herbert basically starts a prison riot, chaos ensues, this movie is Not Good, but the important thing is that Herbert escapes prison with his work and gets to walk off free and definitely alive into the night <3

VIBES / PERSONALITY:

His work is EVERYTHING to him -- there have been multiple times where Herbert has put his work above his own bodily safety or chance of survival, and I guarantee he would do it again, too. Herbert is mostly focused on being able to do the impossible simply because it’s “impossible.” He’s able to convince Dan to help him because he reasons the practical applications of his reagent, like saving lives by aiding in surgeries or helping with amputations, but at the end of the day Herbert is only concerned with discovery, acclaim, and giving classical science a big ‘ole middle finger.

He can be incredibly manipulative when looking for a specific action or behavior in the people close to him. This mostly is seen in how he treats Dan, often reeling him back in with promise of how much good their work will do in the world when Dan starts to get squeamish. Herbert is also really good at finding the sorest spots in someone and pressing on them, but usually only does this when he wants to prove a point or if he really hates someone.

He gains a lot of power by seeming like the more “level-headed” person in an altercation, but he can get extremely excitable or aggressive, especially when something goes well with his research or if it’s being threatened.

He’s genuinely a good doctor, doesn’t freak out under pressure, has neutral-good bedside manner, is very decisive and isn’t afraid to make difficult decisions when it comes to a patient’s life. However, Herbert considers himself a scientist first and a doctor second. The work on reanimation will always come before anything else.

He’s a HUGE fucking nerd, he loves making puns or little zingers whenever he can fit them into a conversation. He also likes playing practical jokes, though he doesn’t do it often. He’s got a great evil giggle.

Oh he’s terrible at taking care of himself. There’s a deleted scene from the first movie where Herbert is shown to be injecting himself with a weakened version of the reanimating reagent because it helps keep his brain sharp and makes it to where he doesn’t have to sleep. What a NUT. I think he probably weans off this habit, by force or choice. His sleeping and eating habits are still pretty bad, though. Definitely the kind of person who doesn’t eat/sleep/rest unless he’s genuinely about to collapse because of it.

Oh he’s also sooooooooooo gay. gay gay gay homo sexual.

There are very few people he outright respects or enjoys spending time around, and with everyone else he is absolutely so bitchy and rude. He doesn’t give a single shit about being polite. Also ACAB.

PLOT POSSIBILITIES:

Got any canonically dead muses? Want them to be alive again? Herbert can help with that! He’ll definitely want to make sure they stick around and observe them to see why the reagent worked so well, maybe do some extra tests, so he can also double as a really annoying, creepy roommate. Score!

Med student muses? I have a new classmate for you

Ever wondered what your muse would do if they saw someone graverobbing, or smuggling body parts into their house in the middle of the night? Do they stop him? Ask questions? Offer to help? Now’s the chance to find out!

He could always use a new assistant since Dan keeps abandoning him after every movie, jfc, loyalty is so hard to find these days

Meet-cute where one of his reanimated creations tries to murder you and he saves you from it <3

[pikapeppa]

Year-end Writer’s Round-Up: the 2020 edition

Tagged a million years ago by @mythicaitt​ and @lostinfantasies38​ - thanks friends! I have finally put aside a chunk of time for this, since I am a nerd who likes to get accurate calculations. 

I will preface this by saying it’s been an insane year, and I know many people’s creativity was sucked dry by, well, everything. I find my emotional escape/comfort in writing fic, so I just... I dunno, went nuts with writing this year. To that end, I’ll keep most of this post below a cut for those who don’t want to see my “stats”, but with an open invitation to participate for ANYONE who does want to share their writing achievements for the year, and a tag for those writers that I know for sure were active this year: @crackinglamb​ @barbex​ @solas-disapproves​ @elveny​ @alyssalenko​ @nug-juggler​ @musetta3​ @cartadwarfwithaheartofgold​ @iarollane​ @in-arlathan​ @charlatron​ @queen-kass-the-writer​ - NO PRESSURE TO PARTICIPATE OR TO READ THIS AT ALL, THOUGH.

Word count and smut count table (i.e. NERD ALERT):

(Here’s a masterlist of all my fic, if any of the fics in that list strike anyone’s fancy and they want to find and check ‘em out.)

There are a couple of things missing from this word count that I only posted on Tumblr, a couple of Solas/Nare drabbles and a piece of Orsino/Hawke smut, but I’m too lazy to track those down right now. And I have another unposted chapter of Inadvisable that’s about 10k words… ANYWAY, MOVING ON.

New things I tried this year:

I jumped headfirst into a few Dragon Age rarepairs this year! I’ve always loved rarepairs and have particularly enjoyed writing them for Horizon Zero Dawn in the past, so it was a pleasure to take on a few this year:

Felassan x Lavellan in The Love That Grows From Violence

Sten x Yara Mahariel in Fall Into The Tide

Samson x Roman Hawke for my soulmate @schoute​ - a ship that I never even saw coming and that hit me like a ton of bricks in the feels.

I also took the plunge into theorizing and sorting through Big Lore this year for Dragon Age — something I’ve avoided doing for years. I usually don’t like doing very deep dives because I’m a canon-compliant sort of girl, and the idea of getting attached to a theory that might end up being wrong makes me feel itchy. But when I started writing a Felassan-centered fic, I had no choice but to try and figure out the big lore since YA BARK-EATING BOYFRIEND KNOWS THINGS. I spent 10+ hours sorting through DA meta, both canon and fanon, to try and come up with something cohesive for that fic that feels as canon-compliant as possible, so that was definitely a cliff I didn’t mean to jump off of, LOL.

I also took a jump into writing a fic with three simultaneous and interconnected relationships in Inadvisable, my modern university AU with @elbenherzart​, which includes relationships for Solas, Abelas and Felassan. I was super excited but SCARED to do this: how to keep all three relationships interesting and exciting when the narrative keeps moving and flowing between the three relationships and the six characters who all know each other in different ways? Luckily, I had the wonderful Elbenherzart cheering me on and encouraging me with all the BEAUTIFUL ART she’s done for the fic, and I’ve been really enjoying it!

Fic I spent the most time on: 

Um, it’s probably a tie between two fics: The Love That Grows From Violence (Felassan x Lavellan) just because of that Big Lore deep dive, or Lovers In A Dangerous Time (Fenris the Inquisitor), which I finished earlier this year and took a long time just by virtue of the fic length and THE AMOUNT OF FEELINGS I HAVE FOR FENRIS AND RYNNE HAWKE.

Fic I spent the least time on: 

Wake Up, a quick oneshot featuring Varric and Solas, which I keysmashed in a couple of hours after the most recent DA4 trailer was released. 

Favourite thing I wrote:

Oh my god. Everything?? Writing is my escape and my pride and joy, so I love everything I write. All my rarepairs were absolute delights this year. Finishing Lovers In A Dangerous Time was bittersweet since I now kind of feel like I can’t write any further Fenris/Rynne until DA4 comes out. But Felassan has become my darling toward the end of this year and I’m thrilled to have brought a handful of wonderful readers down the Felassan rabbit hole with me. 

Favourite thing I read:

… I… have once again failed and read basically nothing this year. I started to read Pressure Point by 17734 on AO3 and really enjoyed it for a few chapters before I just… ran out of steam. Not because of the fic, because it genuinely was great —  the smut in the first chapter just about killed me, STG — but because I realized this year that, with very few exceptions, I don’t have enough emotional space to invest in fics with long intricate plots. I’m a fucking goblin who just likes to read smut, so I lose interest quickly if the fic isn’t strongly smut/romance-centered. 

TO THAT END, I do have a couple of smutfic recs:

Force of Nature, a Stenwarden oneshot by @minionripley: Maker save me, this was soOoOoO good and in-character for StennySten.

Provided It Tied You Down First by JadeLavellan on AO3: Solas and Trevelyan go to a Tevinter sex party for recon reasons. Oh my god, guys, IT’S SO GOOD.

Writing goals for next year:

Honestly? I’m not gonna make any. I’ll just go where the winds of inspiration take me, and where the winds of others’ whispered suggestions take me as well. 

To that end, I have to make a few shoutouts to people who have inspired me this year, either with their art or suggestions or encouragement (read: ENTHUSIASTIC SCREAMING): @schoute​ @elbenherzart​ @whatomen​, without whom a huge chunk of my fic this year would not exist; and @lethendralis-paints​​ @ashalle-art​ @slushrottweiler-blog​ who gifted me with beautiful fan art this year and made me want to weep. LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH. 

Wishing everyone a safe and happy new year filled with love, warmth, and most of all, with hope. If anyone else wants to join in and share their achivements, please do and tag me so I can see what you’ve been up to!

- Love from your friendly neighbourhood Pikapeppa xoxo