#Time for mindfuckery

[muchanmocha]

My hot take is that Luka didn't actually impersonate Sua

And here's why.

Ok let's start by making this clear — Luka canonically knew about Sua and has analyzed Mizi and Sua's relationship to hell and back based on their My Clematis performance before Round 5.

"In the interview, Luka responded as if he had no interest in Mizi, but in reality he had thoroughly analyzed everything about her after watching her duet stage with Sua. In her confusion, Mizi becomes a mere plaything for Luka."

— Director's Commentary, ALNST Artbook

He precision-designed Round 5 to systematically push Mizi to her breaking point by using Sua and her death in Round 1 — everything from the performance, his expressions, his intonations, his timing, the choreography, down to the very song choice (he presumably didn't pull out ROMH for Round 4, and he didn't save it for the finals/Round 7 as he may have intended).

However, what wasn't on that list, was impersonating Sua.

Let's take a look at what happened on stage:

Luka opens up the sequence by catcalling her right off the bat, abruptly intruding her personal space in the first of many moments to come.

"You're the perfect subject, with the whole world in your sad eyes."

"My savior, beautiful soul..."

He proceeds to condescendingly give praise to how beautiful she is in her broken state, glorifying the trauma that made her perfect.

"I don't believe. You're a liar."

All the admiration of which, they both know is just a pretense.

Then comes the most important part.

Sua's hallucination appears.

You tell me, is that a Sua expression?

No! In fact! Sua resembles Luka here.

So what's actually happening in this scene?

Well if you look at the lyrics when she appears, you'll find this:

"When our darknesses overlap, let me take it all away."

Sua appears because Luka is directly addressing Mizi's "darkness" here, aka her trauma aka Sua, and offers to take it away. Therefore, Mizi is the one doing all the heavy lifting of hallucinating her.

Again, is this an expression that would remind you of Sua?

What he DOES do here, is continue to invade her space and touch her intimately like a lover would, which he had been doing since minute one.

Remember: the theme of Round 5 is contract marriage.

He touches her not as Sua would, but as a lover would, because that would be the easiest way to provoke Mizi, who had just lost the love of her life and is now "tied" to him.

If you check the timing of Sua's hallucination's appearances, you'd find them not when Luka "admires" Mizi for her beauty, or when they sing "ruler of my heart" as you'd expect if he was actually trying to echo Sua, but when the lyrics address the despair and trauma Mizi is facing.

Ironically, the only times in this performance that Luka plausibly resembles Sua, is when he adopts his blank doll face away from audience eyes.

Yet you can see that Sua never appears in any of these shots because that's not how Mizi would've remembered her. We can confirm that with which real memories appear in Round 5, specifically behind Luka in the theater scene and during Mizi's breakdown.

(Can you tell I've long reached my photo limit and had to make cuts)

Mizi remembers Sua at her happiest, because Sua was always her happiest when she was with Mizi.

And this is exactly the loss Luka effectively spits on.

Mizi: My world is collapsing

Luka: Lol yeah whatever

There is such a purposeful, derisive mockery embedded in how Luka treats the subject of her loss.

"Make me your god, I can give you everything."

Not, "I am your god," but "replace your god with me."

You'll notice that what he offers here isn't a new "replacement Sua," but the audience.

Catcalling, smirking, manhandling her like a ragdoll, condescendingly looking down at her, overt mockery, revelling in the cheers of an audience that's crazy for him. There is nothing he does in Round 5 that even remotely resembles Sua or is meant to resemble Sua.

Where would the resemblance be? His pretty face and white clothes? White was, and has always been his signature outfit color. Round 5 wasn't a special occasion for that.

So.

Tl;dr Luka did not actively impersonate Sua. But he did commit mindfuckery on several levels.

-

Bonus:

Luka -> Mizi [Intimacy 0%, -]

It's stupid and foolish to not be able to control even one of your emotions.

[becauseimanicequeen]

Yesterday, I wrote that I might expand on my "dream world" theory in 4 Minutes (which I've had since I reacted to the trailer and teaser) and here I am doing just that because I can't seem to get it out of my head (and I need to get this out of my head so I can focus on the Olympics, lol).

I also mentioned yesterday that I should've called it something better than "dream world" because it doesn't really encapsulate what I mean by it.

Does it include Great's dreams? Yes. His visions too. And perhaps everything else going on as well.

As I wrote in my post yesterday, the visions Great has at the end of the first episode (the visions of Tyme and himself together) are his future self's memories. The reason he has those visions (which are clearly more than 4 minutes into the future), is because he's been sent back in time. Not in a time-travel kind of way, but perhaps an out-of-body experience kind of way as he experiences a cardiac arrest in the present time (the patient at the beginning of the episode).

(That 4 above his bed is deliciously placed, btw. And the flashing red lights mean things, which I might expand on in a separate post. But, you know, the Olympics...)

This also ties in with my theory that Great has gained his precognitive ability to redeem himself from a past mistake/transgression (the past being the events we see play out throughout most of the first episode). The cardiac arrest is the root cause of it, but the things he sees and can change are the things he needs to change to have a different outcome in the future. Perhaps to save Tyme from being killed. Perhaps to save himself from dying. Perhaps both. Perhaps more.

If this is true, I think we'll see a mix of "the 4-minutes phenomenon" (which it said on Den's board) and Great's other visions from his future self.

I don't know about you, but I'm excited to get more of this mindfuckery from Sammon. Thank you, queen!

Is it Friday, yet?

[welcometogrouchland]

I just think Hunter was obsessed with Willow and didn't even know it during the period from any sport in a storm to labyrinth runners. They maybe don't talk as often as they could, they're both busy and have conflicting schedules, so when they do talk, Hunter absorbs everything she says.

After roughly 3 weeks of texting (hexting? I feel like the kids would call it hexting), He knows that her favorite colour is orange, she likes her tea with extra milk and a bit of honey during winter, she likes working out to the noisiest angriest music in her playlist, her dad Gilbert is a construction witch who specialises in pottery, she used to listen to breakup songs and think about her childhood best friend (Hunter doesn't know it's Amity) and she actually has a mild pollen allergy despite being a plant witch and has to take potions for it.

He casually drops all this info piece by piece during their stay in the human realm and willows like. Well I can't not marry him. It'll have to be a winter or fall wedding to account for her allergies </3

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

What are some instances of retconning in animorphs that you have noticed? (aside from the first book)

Honestly, Animorphs is not bad. Compared to Sherlock Holmes or Percy Jackson, there's hardly any retconning at all. Compared to series like Dune or X-Men that built in-story retcon mechanisms because of the infinite overlapping retcons, Animorphs is practically airtight. Not Harry Potter or Mistborn airtight, sure, but better than any other multi-authored 20+ book series I know.

However, there are some. Ax's mention in #8 of occasional hork-bajir wars doesn't fit with Hork-Bajir Chronicles showing they have no concept of violence before andalites arrive. Cassie's line about "my niece" in #37 is not in line with her saying her parents are her only family in #49. Rachel suspects at times that Jordan's a controller (#12, #22) but in #49 Jordan's dismissed as even a potential threat.

And then there's the absolute clusterfuck of Tobias's parentage.

In #3, he says "my parents died." In #13, it's "both my folks left a long time ago." In Andalite Chronicles, when Elfangor asks about Loren: "She disappeared. When I was just little... I guess she died." In #23, he says "both my parents are dead." But also DeGroot says "Your father... who died? That may not have been your real father" implying a stepfather we never meet. After Elfangor's will it kinda falls into place, but even then...

Elfangor says he and Loren were ~14 mentally, ~18 physically, when they got to Earth, and that "when she was ready by human standards, I married her." He mentions getting multiple college degrees, but that it's only "three years later" that the Ellimist abducts him back to space. No one apparently notices he was gone — Ax has no idea Elfangor lived on Earth, and didn't notice him missing (#8), so... he time-traveled back and lived those three years twice? And no one noticed him being seven years older because... Ellimist fuckery? There's mention of Loren dating someone else after Al's "death", so at least the random step-dad is consistent. But Loren doesn't mention him in #49, so I guess she got remarried and rewidowed between Tobias's birth and his third birthday, and then she forgot him.

Anywhoo, it kind of lines up sorta if you squint, but I'm 99.9% sure that there was some degree of retcon somewhere in there.

[rubiesintherough]

.

[moki-dokie]

how to make 19 year old boy who came of age during the pandemic and never had a real real job before now realize he needs to Chill The Fuck Out and be Less eagar about working for free holy shit he is impossible to wrangle

[quietwingsinthesky]

(Fobwatch anon) you take AS MUCH liberty as you want !! No one else sees this vision. Can you believe that

i really can’t, it’s brilliant. it’s exactly the kind of fun mindfuckery that i love to play with <3 i have Ideas. i have angst brewing. sexy angst.

[rottenseaweed]

so I started watching Bocchi the rock

if anything happened to this tiny pink haired bean I would kill everyone in this room and then myself

[chemdisaster]

scar and badtimes in your hotguy mindfuckery au remind me so much of the Stanley and Stanford Pines and I love it so much

HI SOULMATE

yeah, now that you mention it, they totally are like stan and ford. scar as the one who was more loved and badtimes as the disappointment of the family. also scar moving on and making a life for himself, while badtimes stays miserable and resentful.

the only difference is that unlike ford, scar was loved only because he pretended to be something he wasn't. also badtimes' feelings towards scar are way more fucked up than stan's feelings towards ford. but then, the whole au is fucked up lmao

[villain-in-love]

Ha... haha...

Hahahahaha!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

I'M BAAAAAAAAAAACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[abusivelittlebunny]

Baby Pierce being his stepdaddy's pretty little substitute wife and the rural middle of nowhere Texan town's favorite whore is at this point Canon in my mind. He was a fragile little doll that wanted to kill his past so bad he thought taking Transigen's offer was his chance to erase the weak little toy he used to be but his facade keeps cracking painfully and no matter how much he tries to hide it the people around him can practically smell what he is. And there's nothing that mortifies him more than the fact that deep down secretly his treacherous body and subconscious likes it.

The way I get so feral when I remember that this guy

is the same guy as this guy

[kirstythejetblackgoldfish]

🐟 Pollock, AKA coley, AKA saithe 🐟

[rofefetasprite]

fantroll art dump because i love her and i get to post about her a little

[candiid-caniine]

my favorite thing about denial is the opportunities for mindfuckery. gaslighting and emotional manipulation, in particular.

"if you want to cum so bad, why do you get so wet when you're denied?"

"you came just now. yes you did. are you such an edged-out slut that you don't remember what it feels like? i know you came, and i didn't give you permission, so now you're in big trouble."

"but your hole feels so much better when it's denied. don't you want to make me feel good?"

"if you could just stop touching yourself so much, maybe you'd be able to prove you deserve to cum."

"every time i tell you 'no,' you get wetter. i don't care if you don't believe me, i can feel it."

"your orgasms are so special for me, and i don't want them to lose their specialness. don't you want to save them for special occasions? if you just cum all the time, i'll get so bored of it..."

"if you won't give them up for me, you don't really respect me."

"only sluts cum every day. do you want to be a slut? because i have no problems treating you like one."

"when you stop being so pathetic, maybe i'll let you cum."

fuck. when they say shit like this to me,,

[kaesaaurelia]

I also think it's pretty common to read something that's intentionally fucked up, understand that it IS fucked up, but not realize the author meant it to come across as fucked up, especially if you don't have a lot of experience with nuance or are predisposed to think less of the author for one reason or another. It's something I've definitely done in the past -- the specific instance I can recall was when I was 15 or 16, I read an anthology of SF/F that included a really broad range of mostly stories from the '60s, '70s, and '80s. I have incredibly low expectations of male SF/F authors from that era writing women, so when a super creepy story focused on a heterosexual relationship had a happy-creepy ending I was like "Wow I can't believe he thought that was a good and happy ending! Wait, actually I can." It was an early GRRM story, and I had never heard of him at the time, so I wasn't aware that Well, That Was Fucked Up was his whole brand. (Also I was 15 or 16, and pretty dumb.)

It's harder to do that in good faith if you're reading fanfic that's thoroughly tagged, but a lot of people just fucking ignore tags and then are mad when there's something in the fic that was tagged for. (I frequently don't see tags and then go "oh wow that is not for me, I wish it was tagged," and then it absolutely was, I just missed it. But I'm not looking for a rage high. I'm trying to be better about looking at tags, and the tag limit AO3 imposed after the Sexy Times with Wangxian debacle is actually really helpful for me because there's fewer big walls of tags my eyes glaze over at.)

I do also come across enough stuff that's got like 5 different "consent is sexy"-type tags that are clear-cut ravishment kink that I know sometimes fucked-up stuff IS in presented positively. I don't think this is malevolent, I think the author just doesn't know they have a kink and is tagging their fic with all the Good Wholesome Fic For Good Wholesome People tags, because they're a good person and would never write dubious consent and they've never heard of ravishment. (In this instance, as in all of them, the antis are not fucking helping.) I find this VERY annoying, but I just mark the fic as read with my kudosed/read plugin, never look at it again, and move on whine constantly about this specific problem without making it the author's problem, because I like a good kvetch.

Also, I think the way anti ideology categorizes most if not all people writing about fucked up scenarios as "trying to normalize incest/child molestation/rape/abuse" encourages a reliance on explicit "this is bad and unhealthy" markers to tell what the author is trying to do, as opposed to understanding from context that fic about a sexual/romantic relationship between two canonically fucked-up people who are canonically brothers is probably intended to show this incestuous relationship as fucked-up, even if they're taking surface-level comfort in the fucked-up relationship and no one does a speech about how brotherfucking is wrong.

But yeah, I think a lot of it is mental health issues and a lack of adequate mental support, which makes me sad. Happy people mostly don't keep engage in self-harm by reading things they find upsetting, nor do they go out of their way to harass people, and while I was never an anti I've definitely done the "self-medicating with a rage high" thing and a lot of the Argumentum Ad Trauma Dumping is unfortunately pretty familiar to me.

A common anti talking point is that "problematic" content is fine as long as it's portrayed in a bad light, and I know this is mostly a way for them to say "porn bad", but, like... if we exclude stupidity, is this even a common issue at all?

I try to think of what they could otherwise mean, because I read a lot of things they'd hate, but even the cutesy stuff has dark undertones, or is clearly done with the reader meant to understand that at least one character involved is a freak. Even with porn, I'm not sure I've seen many that didn't lean into how taboo it is. The closest trend I can think of is age gap romances where the protagonist is 16 and going for someone in their 30s, but even those make sure you're extremely aware of the age difference the entire time since that's the appeal. Or an anime where the siblings are REALLY close and no one comments, but as a viewer I can still clearly pick up that these are codependent freaks.

Is this a me thing? Do I just not see these swarms of insidious positive portrayals and they're actually everywhere? I don't doubt there are bad writers that fumble their stories, and I'm less likely to read those long enough to find out, so is that what they're referring to? Or is it really always just porn is evil?

--

No, people being dumb as a box of rocks and not grasping that weird internet porn is not a how-to manual is not that common a problem.

However, being traumatized and having zero useful mental health support is.

A lot of anti talking points are coming from a place of toxic coping. mechanisms where someone thinks that if they can just control everything around them The Bad Thing can't happen again, to them or to anyone else.

Blaming the influence of bad fiction is a very common step for people who haven't had enough time or safety to accept that, no, actually, the person they trusted hurt them on purpose because they felt like it, not because Media Made Them Do It.

Or that maybe their dumb teen self handled some situations badly, but it's because teens often do that and/or because no decent adult was around to ask them why they seemed upset, not because it was fiction's job to teach them boundaries. It's a lot easier to blame the concrete experience of reading something that modeled bad behavior than the highly amorphous negative space where good offline role models who paid attention and gave a fuck should have been.

--

Some people are self-medicating with a rage high. A few are nasty ringleaders trying to power trip. Lots are just scared dumbasses who haven't grasped that it's okay to have dark fantasies.

A lot of it is just people with the hubris to say "Well, I have decent reading comprehension and can spot subtext, but what if all these other people can't?"

[kazz-brekker]

truly think the worst thing about sauron's mindfuckery with celebrimbor is that he keeps making him choose, over and over again, to work with him. he manipulates celebrimbor into keeping the forge open, into making the nine rings despite his concerns, into continuing the work even when it's taking such a toll on him, and the whole time makes celebrimbor agree rather than intimidating or forcing him. he makes celebrimbor feel like this is the right and only thing to be doing. celebrimbor's being manipulated, of course, but when the moment finally comes when he realizes annatar's true nature and feels like he willingly agreed to everything that he was coerced into doing, the guilt is going to be HORRENDOUS