#WHAT ID DO FOR A CRUMB....JUST A CRUMB

[ilovemesomevincentprice]

I love this photo so much.

[deus-ex-mona]

scrolled a little too far back on mogetwt and found pure gold:

[thesimulacrumb]

Q!mouse content drought has me seeing hallucinations I can hear the "Mrouse" in my walls rn

[aria0fgold]

Thinking more about the kind of story The Cursing of Château Castle is. I forgot to add in that post I made the description of the "general story" of it but I think the bookcases in the Castle-Loving One's house is lined with that book and Siffrin describes it as "a story where bad things happen to good people" when he originally thought it was romance because of Mirabelle being a big romance fan.

I'm specifically thinking about the fact that Issue #48 is the most hated one out of 87. If we think about this some more, the book's length per issue is possibly short, estimatedly around a 1 hour to 2 hours read. Considering how Mira was able to read Issue #87 in ten minutes, it could be that she's a fast reader or it could also be that she skimmed through some parts of it. Either way, it was possible to read it in ten minutes and still be able to get the gist of it, so each issue isn't very long.

Pierre-Jacques-Erneste betrayed the party in Issue #51, it's only just two issues After whatever happened in 48, so it's very possible that some Heavy stuff happened in #48 that could be where some foreshadowing about his betrayal in the future took place. There might've even be a big argument that happened in it, or someone's life got endangered and it was because of something that Pierre-Jacques-Erneste in a "innocent" manner but too innocently suspicious for the readers and some characters in that story to see that there's something wrong but not Too obviously shown for it to still be a "What a twist!" moment.

It also seems like whatever took place in Issue #51 could possibly be a tense moment from the "What a turn of events!!!" so stuff happening in it might've been a big event after another which makes it all the more exciting. Issue #48 might've set up some stuff for that which made it be the one and only issue out of 87 to have sucked so bad no one liked it.

[skunkes]

drawing yurself in profile is the most humbling thing ever u guys i feel like a caricature artist rn

[pixel-kingdom]

I’m literally about to combust

[valiantponds]

[ID: Image 1: A shutterstock image of a priest in a confessional, looking shocked.

Image 2: tags that say: “# thinking abt how i was reading how they just kinda stopped doing phonics in american gradeschool at some point # smiling serenely.” End ID]

learning that apparently several hundred people have been pronouncing 'miette' as 'mighty' has actively worsened my day

[corneille-moisie]

like all im asking in our mariage is too feel loved but every time i bring it up, he turns it into a whataboutme imunhappyinourmariagetoo imnotgoodenoughforyousoistopdoingthethingbecauseidontdoitwellenoughtoyourtaste

my man.

that

IS

the problem.

[snekdood]

anyways even if a bunch of hindus ended up hating me i dont think thats gonna stop my connection with shiva. i think im a lil in too deep at this point folks.

[ilovemesomevincentprice]

Vincent Price - Brigham Young (1940)

[lustlovehart]

scara has been the boy of the month for so long now i am just so desperate for sfw scara content id kill for any crumbs

A/n: Wasnt sure if you meant Wanderer or Scaramouche, so I sorta assumed you meant Scaramouche.

Summary: The ballader has quite the habit, and you're curious as to how deep into it he is, so you take it upon yourself to find out.

Warnings: I don’t think there’s anything?

Scaramouche has always had this odd habit of... Staring at you. At the begining you found it quite odd, but as time went on you didn't seem to be bothered too much by it, in fact, it'd be unnerving if he wasn't staring at you for once.

When you're not around for him to look at, his eyes will always fall on to something that reminds him of you, whether it be a book you had an acute interest in, or a mess you had left in his room because you had went out in a hurry. To him, if you're not there by his side, perhaps the next big thing is to cling onto whatever remnants you had left behind for him.

Whenever you walked through the streets of Snezhnaya, you ears can't help but pick up on his subordinates whispers, the cold wind carrying them through to you.

"Are you sure Lord Scaramouche and [Name] aren’t... You know... Seeing eachother...?"

"Whenever they're together, his eyes never leave them! It's like his pupils are physically attached to them!"

"The Lord even has a picture of [Name] in his pocket, though it changes everyday… I can't tell if he switches the photo out or if he just has multiple photos of them on hand..."

“Lord Scaramouche will surely kill us if he hears what we’re saying of him! Quiet down!”

Their discussions make you pause, you’re sure most of them are just exaggerations, but nonetheless you continue with your day, it's not like you could confirm or deny these accusations, considering you yourself dont even know that status between you two.

Though, you are quite curious as to what these photos he has of you are... Perhaps you can find out, a rare harbinger meeting had been issued as of today, so maybe now is your chance.

Your shoes click against his office, the cold from outside still being felt but not too much.

Your fingers slide open the drawer of Scaras desk, while not too neat, it’s not horrendous either. Your eyes immediately catch on to a little picture book, one he had always held on to but has never let you seen through, well almost always, he never trusted bringing any valuables to meetings, lest they be discreetly taken from him by a certain banker.

When opened it seemed to be photos of you, and some trinkets and hobbies you had mentioned to him about enjoying. Coincidentally enough, they were all photos you took awhile back with a kamera you had in possession before it had broken down. Each photo has a tiny date written in the corner, as well as a little descriptions of the events that had happened.

“[Name] and me walking through Snezhnya”

“[Name] looking at flowers”

“A butterfly [Name] took a picture of, it reminds me of them”

They all weren’t too descriptive, but they warmed your heart to see anyway. Your fingers flipped one more time before you were greeted by a photo you didn’t take yourself.

“Everything I want to give [Name]”

In the photo, several items you had expressed a liking towards were in frame, some expensive and others cheaper. This time, the description had been on the back of the film, neat handwriting engraved into the back.

“If I look at them long enough, they’ll be engraved into my memory, and I won’t have to be left with nothing again.”

You’re not too sure on what he meant by it, sometimes he seems to say something cryptic to you and then never explain it ever after that.

The more you think about it, that seemed too short to be something of his that he wrote. You put the photo book back into the drawer, moving your hand to open the next one before the door swings open at an immaculate speed.

“What do you think you’re doing [Name]”

“Uhm… Waiting, for you…?” The expression his face shifts into obviously tells you he doesn’t believe it, but all he can really do is walk towards you and grab your wrist, swiftly pulling you away from his desk. “Where are we going Kuni?” The both of you quickly dash out the door, a loud thud echoing through the halls with how hard the man closed it.

“We’re getting dinner of course, having to meet with those bastards has given me a headache.”

“I don’t have money on me right now…”

“What? I’m paying for you obviously, now hurry up.”

He doesn’t need to tell you about how he knew you were looking at his belongings of you, he just thinks of how lucky he made it before you could find the drawers, filled to the brim with letters he wants to give you, all of them in which, if someone else had laid eyes upon them, would have no doubt every single page is a love letter.

You don’t need to know how weak for you he truly is, and he’d like to keep it that way.

“So, do you really keep photos of me with you all the time-“

“Stop speaking.”

———-

Scara who is super in love with reader but never wants them to know that>>

[wannaeatramyeon]

Adventures of YOUR part time job in the Lookismverse

G/N. You work the graveyard shift in a convenience store. You meet bizarre characters on different nights. Part 1 | Part 2

The customers can usually be separated into 3 categories.

Drunks, students, and weirdos.

Unfortunately for you, lately the weirdos have turned into regulars. But fortunately the weirdos aren't so weird.

The one that made it a habit to check in on you, with the scars and the cheesy wink wasn't so bad. Jack, was it? You can't remember and it's been too long for you to ask. You awkwardly address him as 'you' and avoid any situation where you need to use his name.

He likes to ask how you are, tell a few jokes. Spirit undeterred even when you look at him with a blank face because bless his soul, he's not funny at all but at least he tries and he's a lot less weird than first impression.

He hangs around at odd times, then again you do only work at odd times. Telling you stories about this and that. Something about Big Deal, something about a guy called Sinu and something about another guy called Samuel.

It's difficult to keep track. It's like he wants to talk but he's cryptic and god, it's 4am who can blame you if your eyes are glazing over.

John, or is it Jerry, is waffling again. He seems to always be talking about Samuel. Who he apparently misses and wonders where it's gone wrong and hang on, he's never been explicit but you just had to know.

When he takes a breath to munch on a cookie, you ask, "Hold on, is Samuel your ex?"

Wait no his name is Jason, definitely Jason- freezes mid-chew, "Why would you say that? He's my friend!"

Joshua sprays crumbs all over you but you note how he doesn't say no.

(You think you see this Samuel one early morning. You’re pretty sure you’ve seen him before and man, he really looks like shit.

Looks like the breakup is getting to him too.

Poor Samuel and Poor Jim.)

.

.

But sometimes weirdos are just weirdos. 

It's ok. It comes with the territory so long as they're not in the habit of hurling abuse or whatever, you can deal with it.

In recent memory, there's only been two people that you have had to almost chase out with a broomstick.

You should have known they would be weirdos when one of them walks in in surprisingly teeny tiny purple camo shorts. Not that you're a pearl clutcher, but you're worried that one wrong move and he could be dangling out.

Besides. Purple. Camo. Shorts. Those words should never follow one after the other, and you repress a shudder at this guy's hideous dress sense when he comes up to you.

You thought the other one was alright, at least there's no hideous purple camo shorts in sight and his hair is nice (huh, this style must be popular, you’ve seen a lot of guys with this hair)-

But then he opens his mouth and asks for snakes and you think it's karma for judging camo-guy for his appearance when his friend is equally odd.

"We usually keep the snakes next to the ramen," you deadpan and the two men actually go to seek out the supposed snake (meat or pet purposes?) only to return moments later, empty-handed and looking confused.

"I think the snake is all sold out," Non-camo guy says as camo-guy glances around as if you might have hidden your snake stock elsewhere.

They must have thought you were stupid as you stood there opening and closing your mouth like a fish (or maybe a snake, do snake do these things), because come on, how are you even supposed to formulate a response to that?

Then you look at their eyes and also notice them looking snakey and surmise it must be some weird fetish thing. Pretending to be snakes and eating snakes and having pet snakes.

You want no part of this and tell them to get out.

.

.

"I'm Baek Hangyeol," a new face says, pointing to his ID badge pinned to the white coat. 

"Doctor Baek Hangyeol." He stresses Doctor and Hangyeol and you wonder if he is waiting for a round of applause.

You don't say anything but you do notice he looks like a teenager and what idiot would let a teenager operate on them. (Drunk, student, weirdo. He could be all three.) Doctor Baek Hangyeol must be bluffing.

You decide not to call him on his bullshit. 

"Cool," is all you respond with because you don't want another complaint for being too mouthy. You are half tempted to tell him you're not a doctor, that you just work here but that seemed kinda redundant so you keep your mouth shut.

"Do you believe in true beauty?" he asks when you finish bagging up his goods (a plain water with added minerals, a bottle of multivitamins and a protein shake) and you think what sort of question is that.

You give a halfhearted shrug and say "Sure" and he hands his business card over.

"If you're ever considering it," he tells you with a wild smile. After he has left you look down at the lettering, eyes zeroing in on ‘Plastic Surgery’.

Excuse me?! What is he trying to say?

You thought he was a weirdo but now he has firmly shifted over to asshole. You regret not telling him to go fuck himself while you had the chance. The complaint would 100% be worth it. Zero regrets.

On your break, you burn the card and feel a small sense of satisfaction.

.

.

A tall blonde guy with a creepy vibe (hold on, have you seen him before, he seems familiar. Then again, creepy blonde guys seem to be quite common around here-) walks in with the most billowing coat you have ever seen.

The entrance is kinda cool but the actual coat is kinda tragic with the cheesy red lettering and you wonder if you can pull it off any better than him.

You're still wondering about his coat when he's paying you, and hang on you have definitely seen him before because he says arigatou and hands over yen and you tell him no. Won only.

The idea of the coat, which has evolved into you fantasising about having a full blown cape, quickly loses its charm however, when the blonde gets caught in the automatic doors and you have to wrestle them open to free him.

Afterwards, you ask if he's ok, if he is harmed and can’t resist asking if the coat is ok too. You really don't want a lawsuit on your watch especially when the malfunctioning doors are not your fault.

Your kindness is repaid by him telling you he's not interested (what the fuck) and that his heart will not stray (again, what the fuck).

.

.

You accidentally eavesdrop on a couple of students lamenting about missing out on school work. You didn’t mean to eavesdrop ok, the aisles are tight and cramped, it’s a small space. 

You peek over, and the one with big ears (seriously, they are huge) is telling the one with his back to you (goodness, his back is huge too) that school is important and he’s got notes the other one can use. 

It’s sweet, you think. School is important and it’s good they recognise that. Nice of them to help each other out too.

When they both come to pay (holy shit, that’s a fuckton of chocolate milk), you’re surprised to find Big Ear’s friend, Big Back, looks anywhere between late 20s and early 40s but it’s never too late to catch up on education, you suppose.

You spend the rest of your shift feeling motivated.

.

.

“Going camping?” you ask the guy with the sandy blonde hair, chuckling nervously and ringing his items through. 

Either he’s going camping or he’s gonna kill and hide a dead body in the forest.

He’s pretty stoic, only giving you a curt nod. You can’t help but probe him a bit more. You’ve got a feeling that if or when the dead body turns up, you want to at least clear your conscience that you’ve tried your best so you make some more idle small talk.

You mention how you haven’t been camping for ages, not since you nearly burned your tent down and singed your hair after you tried to cook some marshmallows over a fire that turned out to be more of a raging bonfire (and might have awoken your pyromaniac streak, but you keep that to yourself).

The blonde guy actually pipes up and says “Master Taesoo would never do that.” 

You almost apologise out of principle due to how earnest he sounds, then he mentions something about how good this Master Taesoo is at catching and cooking snake and you wonder what the fuck is up with people and the snake obsession.

Either way, it doesn’t sound like someone is getting murdered. Only a snake (poor snake) so at least you can sleep easy later that day.

.

.

“Oh hi DG,” you say, “Sorry about your cryptocurrency falling through. Diegocoin was it?”

He blinks at you a few times in surprise and heavens above. What’s that saying, fool me once, shame on me; fool me twice, shame on you? This guy has fooled you exactly no times with his shitty disguises and his effort has substantially dwindled too. 

He has only put his hood up and you did think you might get mugged at one point-

It’s an empty store, for crying out loud. Who comes into an empty store in the asscrack of night with their hood up, not wanting to draw attention to themselves.

Then you notice the pink hair and shifty glance and duh.

“Is it the-?” he asks, putting his hood down and signalling to his hair.

“Yeah, it’s the-” you signal to your own head of hair. “Dude you really need to dye it if you’re going for subtle.” You pause, consider something, “Hold on.”

You walk over to the beauty aisle and grab the black hair dye.

“On the house,” you tell DG because this guy really has no self awareness.

.

.

“What do you mean no?”

“No." Your boyfriend peers down at you, arms crossed and at the end of his patience with you.

You open your mouth to argue- 

“No. You know nothing about Taekwondo. How can you work here?”

You look around helplessly at the studio. He’s not exactly wrong but you’re sick of dealing with the weirdos and the snakes and the creepy blondes. “But your dad-”

“I don’t care what that stupid old man says,”

“Taehoon!” Hansu scolds from the other side of the room, and Hansu's class of toddlers all whirl their head around to stare.

“I can learn?” you offer and Taehoon raises one skeptical brow.

“So you’re going to be a student?” You nod enthusiastically, “And we’re going to pay you for that?”

Oh. Damn. 

He’s got you there.

[linkspooky]

The Death of Kenjaku

So I was planning to write this meta the week that Kenjaku died, but decided to delay until we got full confirmation of his death. Something I didn't believe in even after Kenjaku passed the merger onto Sukuna. However, watching this video about death in Jujutsu Kaisen inspired me to finish this post. Not because I disagree with anything the YouTuber is saying, but because they can speculate on the meaning of so many deaths in Jujutsu Kaisen but can't find the meaning in Kenjaku's sudden death. This has led me to speculate why Gege made the choice to kill Kenjaku in the way that he did. What meaning is there in Kenjaku's abrupt and unsatisfying death?

Who is Kenjaku?

The first step in understanding Kenjaku's death is of course understanding how he lived. We actually know incredibly little about Kenjaku's character by design. Despite the fact he's literally in Geto's body, he's not meant to have sympathetic or human motivations to his actions (though hold onto that "human motivation" in your head for a moment). No flashback sequence shows the audience why this guy is the way he is, no single event seems to have driven him to do what he did.

This is what we know about Kenjaku in brief. He is a sorcerer who is over a thousand years old who was around in Sukuna's day. He once had a friendship with Tengen, but found her original self boring and unambitious. He also contrasts heavily with Tengen, who lives outside of humanity, because he has lived among humanity for 1,000 years. One of those lifetimes was Noritoshi Kamo who violated a woman and conducted heinous experiments. He produced ten children in his one thousand years, the nine death painting siblings and Yuji Itadori. He considers the first children boring, because human and curse hybrids turned out too normal.

He also partially blames himself for how boring they are, because he can't create anything that will exceed his expectations, the only thing that can exceed his expectations is born in chaos. He spent a thousand years organizing the culling games, and wants to use the games to create a merger, because he thinks creating a merger between Tengen and Humanity will create something entirely new and interesting. He also believes the way towards the future lies in further optimizing cursed energy, not in breaking away from it the way Yuki Tsukumo tried to do and Maki has.

The only people whose word we have on Kenjaku's motivations are Kenjaku himself, and Tengen's word and Tengen themselves who claims to not know what goes on in the human heart.

From all of the above Kenjaku seems to be a shallow character who's motivations can be summed up as "because I can" and "I want to see what happens." This shallowness is intentional however, as Gege who once praised the minimalist storytelling of Nasu and Evangelion likes to pick and choose what crumbs of backstory he gives out for his characters. We've never gotten any exposition on the Gojo clan, but we have an entire chapter about Takaba's failed career as a stand-up comic. This isn't a judgement of good or bad writing, this is just how Gege writes as minimalist as possible. This is in line with how Gege writes the ancient sorcerers as well, they are all much more shallow driven by instinct or Freudian Id (I desire) rather than the higher reasoning of modern-day sorcerers. Takaba uses comedy as a means of communication and bridging the gaps between people, Higuruma's backstory is the critique of the modern day justice system. Ishigori apparently lived a satisfying life where he was succesful and had good women, but that wasn't enough so he wants to get into a fight with Yuta to satisfy his hunger and feel like he's eaten desert.

It sounds shallow when I summarize it in text, but in the context of the fight with Yuta, it's a challenge for Yuta who for the most part only cares about his loved ones and sees the world through his love goggles to be more selfish and fight for his own desires. It's also reflective of a more basic and instinctual kind of thinking, as opposed to the higher reasoning and logic that modern-day sorcerers apply.

I'm keeping most of this first part to text for this reason, like go back and read the fight with Ishigori and Yuta. If I summarize Ishigori's character reasoning out of context it sounds stupid, but read the fight and it works because it's ID (I Desire) vs. Yuta's superego in not only having to collect points to help rescue Tsumiki, find a way to protect all the innocent people in the Culling Games, and also collect enough points to take on Kenjaku himself so Gojo won't have to. Meanwhile Ishigori's just fighting to get some of that sweet desert, the shallow works in contrast to the more layered motivations of our heroes.

Kenjaku is a shallow archetype fighting to satisfy his baser impulses (in his case curiosity) in comparison to the main characters who are fighting for more complicated reasons and often people besides themselves.

The question then becomes what archetype is Kenjaku. In that case answering who Kenjaku is is quite simple.

Kenjaku is a clown.

It might be more accurate to say that Kenjaku embodies what's commonly known as the "trickster archetype" but I'mma go with clown.

The most obvious example of a clown villain is what most consider the joker to be, that is a silly little clown man who challenges the straight faced and grim batman and sews chaos where Batman attempts to establish law and order in Gotham and make the city into a better place.

From the book Batman and Psychology:

More than any other villains, the Joker and Two-face reflect Batman himself as funhouse distortions, converses of who and what he is. The laughing, jesting, brightly colored Joker contrasts with grim, dark Batman. The Joker is the Joker. No alter ego. The film's opening bank robbery shows him wearing a clown mask over clown makeup, Under the surface there's only more Joker. He gives no history except inconsistent lies. When he finally considers the impact of his demand Batman unmask, he retracts the threat and demands that Batman's identity remain undisclosed. He wants a batman who has no other self, a Dark Knight whose only deeper layer is further darkness.

Is there a better descriptor for Kenjaku then these words?

Kenjaku is Kenjaku. No alter ego. A clown mask over clown makeup., Under the surface there's only more Kenjaku.

In other words, what you see is what you get.

Kenjaku even mirrors Joker's opinion of Batman, he thinks people should be more like him, not the other way around. He's not the outlier, he's being true to humanity's basic impulses of curiousity and discovery.

A more apt comparison as a clown though would probably be Loki, one of the most classic examples of clowning in the shared mythology of humanity. The character who challenges the common wisdom of gods like Odin who suspended themselves from the world tree for eleven days in order to gain wisdom. Loki, who through his trickery manages to bring about the events of Ragnarok for no deeper reason than because he can. Everyone swore not to harm Balder and Loki goes to find something that can harm him because BET.

Mythological Loki doesn't need a deeper motivation because what he represents in the mythology is someone who challenges authority and brings about a change, because in Norse Mythology nothing lasts forever and no era is permanent. Jujutsu Kaisen is also a story about how things should not in fact stay the same and tradition is bad sometimes.

When Kenjaku finds Tengen's true body he's curled up in a tree root in the fetal position, and he killed what is basically the all-knowing, all-seeing supposedly immortal sorcerer that maintains the status quo of japan, it's not exactly subtle.

Kenjaku is a clown, and clown's gotta clown. We don't need any more explanation that, it's more about what he does for the story. However, what he represents, the deep intellectual curiosity, and also a drive to disrupt the status quo in an attempt to see something more interesting can also be analyzed more deeply because they are human emotions that motivate us as well. The same way that Mahito is an inhuman monster, but he's created and motivated by the fear of other humans, something all of us have. '

Before moving onto his death though, I wanna hammer in how Kenjaku really is just motivated by these two things, a desire to see something interesting, and intellectual curiosity by comparing him to other characters.

The Clown in Fiction

I've already compared Kenjaku to Loki and the Joker, but when it comes to someone who wants to disrupt the entire order of the world simply because they're bored we've got to go to the original girlboss.

So there are plenty of villains who go "I'm evil because I'm bored" but they usually tend to be pretty shallow, either shallowly written for the lulz evil characters who just exist for shock value or just kinda dull. No one has ever done it as good as Junko Enoshima and no one ever will again.

For those who need context DanganRonpa is a death game series where the main villain basically has caused the apocalypse, wiped out most of humanity, and then induces survivors in a bunker to kill each other in a death game, where if someone commits a succesful murder they can escape the bunker, but if they're caught in a trial they're executed. Also, if they're not convicted in the trial everyone else is killed, motivating the jury to find and execute the guilty murderer.

Junko Enoshima the main villain and orchestrator of this death game ended the world because despair. She wants to inflict despair on everyone because despair. Because hope sucks and despair is where it's at.

It sounds shallow and it is and Kodaka has said in interview he wrote Junko to be a villain character with zero redeeming character traits, and no sympathetic backstory to describe why she is the way she is, but there is still something motivating her.

If you go a bit deeper into the lore and read Dangan Ronpa Zero, there is an entire book which explains the lengths which Junko goes to feel normal human emotions. The thing is much like Kenjaku Junko is too smart for her own good, everything is predictable and therefore everything bores her. Once in an attempt to live normally, she literally lobotomizes herself, makes it so that she can't remember anything and has continual amnesia constantly forgetting what just happened to her, because that's the only way she can live without knowing everything that's going to happen and constantly predicting everyone's actions.

Junko has whatever her universe's version of the six-eyes is, but instead of lording it over other people like Gojo and basking in her superiority she wants to feel normal, and connected to the world. If she can't have that she tries to make the world as unpredictable place as possible so she can experience it the same way that everyone else does.

Hope is harmony. A just heart, moving toward the light. That is all. Despair is hope's polar opposite. It is messy and confusing. It swallows up love, hatred, and everything else. Because not knowing where you will end up is despair. Despair is even what you cannot predict. Only despair's unpredictability can save you from a boring future.

I'm still not describing it properly because I don't want to go into a Danganronpa essay in this post about Jujutsu Kaisen, but one example I always use is two characters from American Dragon Jake Long. They're a pair of twins who see the future, one always sees happy things, and one always sees sad things. The one who has happy visions is a goth who's very depressed and the one who sees disaster is an incredibly peppy girl.

Jake is so confused as to why the twin who always sees good visions is so depressed, and she basically tells him to imagine having every good thing, every small little surprise, every pleasure taken out of life.

Kara: When you only see good things, nothing's special anymore. All the pleasant surprises are taken out of life. Sara: But, when you only see bad stuff, even the smallest bit of good news makes you happy!

All of this to say what Junko feels isn't just boredom, or a desire to commit evil for evil's sake, but also a full on existential crisis where she's simply too smart so she doesn't feel any connection to other people or the world around her. In order to feel that connection, that connection that everyone else has, to feel like she is actually a participant in her life not an observer she's willing to go to extremes to make the world a more interesting place, to therefore make her own life feel satisfying.

Kenjaku vs. The World (Kenjaku Pilgrim's sad little life)

To connect all this back to Kenjaku imagine the profound existential despair of a person who's lived for a thousand years, and felt bored all that time. Sukuna is at least a hedonist, he gets his fun by getting into fights, humans might be bugs to him but they're tasty bugs.

Kenjaku goes to similiar motivations and has similiar extremes, he's uninvested in the world around him, he's lived a thousand years but has no attachment to the world, to life, to the people around him. I said that Junko wants to be a participant in life not an all seeing observer and that was purposeful language because to bring back an old post. I rambled on this post about Gojo that part of Gojo's problem is that he only experiences observer-to-object relationships or I to it.

Ich and Du, translated as I and Thou is a book by philosopher Martin Buber. His two main porositions is that we may address existence in two ways:

The attitude of the “I” towards “it” towards an object that is separate in itself, which we either use or experience.

The attitude of “I” towards “Thou” in a relationship in which the other is not separated by discrete bounds.

In Buber's terms, those who only experience the first type of relationships are only observing the world around them not relating to them. Kenjaku doesn't relate to other human beings because they are objects, he only experiences subject -> object relationships and never subject -> subject.

Buber also goes on to theorize that meaning in our lives comes from subject -> subject relationships we form with other people.

Kenjaku jokingly says that to be his friend you have to never bore him and be his equal, but there's no one considers his equal because he's the subject and everyone else are just objects.

He regrets he can't sit down and talk theories with Tsukumo Yuki because she's one of the few people who think like him.

Kenjaku is a paradox of an incredibly brilliant man who is also shallow as a puddle that you can stand in and not get your socks wet. However, he tragically can't really form a more complex identity because our identities are formed by our relationships to other people and Kenjaku doesn't relate to anybody.

That's basically the theme of the whole Choso and Kenjaku fight, Choso is a weird aborted fetus of a curse who still has a strong identity and is able to feel unconditional love for Yuji because of the connection of family and the ideas of brotherhood that binds the two. Kenjaku is a bad father who abandoned Choso because they were "boring" but also never really gave them a chance to grow up or be interesting, he just dismissed them offhand and moved on to the next weird science project.

However, his reason for dismissing Choso isn't Choso's fault but rather a case of Psychological projection. It's not Choso who is boring, but rather Kenjaku himself, he said so earlier.

"What I can create, does not exceed the bounds of my own potential. The answer is always flickering darkly in chaos."

Kenjaku cannot look within to find anything satisfying abput his life because there's nothing inside of him. He doesn't have a fully formed identiy he's just ID, and because he tramples all over other people to form his desires he also cannot ever form a full ego. Just like Sukuna and most of the ancient sorcerers he's a paradox of being all ego, and yet having an underdeveloped ego with shallow motivators.

Kenjaku cannot look within because he's a boring person, and he cannot look for other people to find worth in his life because they're just objects, so instead he looks into the void, he tries to change the world around him by spreading more chaos hoping that it will make something unpredictable happen in front of his eyes - and that will give him the meaning and investment in his life he's deprived himself of because he refuses to form relationships with other people.

It's the Gojo problem. It's the Kashimo problem. It's not the Sukuna problem, because Sukuna admits he doesn't care about and rejects things like love and meaning.

If Kenjaku makes the world around him a more interesting place, he will be able to live in it. It's the same as Gojo trying to raise people up to his level by creating stronger students.

So after going to great length to demonstrate how powerful and all-consuming Kenjaku's boredom is, and how cut off he is from his own humanity, here's the part where I sort of defend his death.

Wouldn't it be funny if the joke character killed the main villain?

Let's be honest it was Takaba's kill here, Yuta just camped and killstole. I think part of the problem with people not understanding the meaning behind Kenjaku's sudden and unexpected death is attributing the death to Yuta cutting his head off out of nowhere, and not Takaba's thematic victory over Kenjaku.

Takaba represents a blindspot for Kenjaku which is why the main characters use him as a weapon against him, and he also calls out in a fashion Kenjaku's hypocrisy. First and foremost, Kenjaku presents himself as an agent of change, but he actually has no interest in many of the modern sorcerers and holds a bias towards the heian era as the peak of sorcery. He even says that he's going to bring back the Heian Golden Age to Sukuna at the end of Shibuya arc.

Because that's what Chaos is Kenjaku, things being the same as they were 1,000 years ago. Kenjaku is an agent of change and chaos and somehow his definition of change is... resetting things back to the past because the sorcerers of the past were so much better than today.

Kenjaku goes out of his way to awaken hundreds of modern day sorcerers, and then dismisses literally off of them except for Hiromi because they don't have enough potential for him compared to ancient sorcerers. He essentially did the same with the Death Painting Bros, he went through all of the trouble to create them, then dismissed them as not having enough potential BEFORE THEY EVEN GOT THE CHANCE TO GROW UP.

Kenjaku has a habit of just going BORED NOW and leaving before he even gives things the time to impress him. He does the same with the Culling Game, he set up the death game to push sorcerers to fight each other and bring out their powers, but he never actually intended to watch the sorcerers evolve. He just wanted to slaughter everyone inside to start the merger.

He goes through a lot of potential to set up these situations and then abandons them before they have the chance to even evolve, because they do not have enough "potential" in his opinion, but like his opinion is often shown to be wrong. Takaba represents that blindspot because he was one of the modern sorcerers that Kenjaku underestimated and dismissed offhand as boring without giving him a chance to shine.

That is the joke that Takaba introduces himself with "Wouldn't it be funny if a random comic relief side character suddenly defeated the big bad?"

He's immediately pointing out a blindspot, because Kenjaku automatically believes himself to be an important character, he underestimates Takaba because he's a side character, one of the people Kenjaku has dismissed as boring and uninteresting (before they even had a chance to evolve into something else). Like that's the other thing Kenjaku wants things to evolve but he doesn't... let them. He abandoned Choso and the rest before they even grew up, they were literally fetuses and he threw them away. Kenjaku is the protagonist of reality, and Takaba is a side character, and therefore Takaba couldn't possibly harm him because Kenjaku and his boundless curiosity are the center of the world.

It's not just about subverting the audience's expectations to have the main villain die in such an anti-climactic way before the final act even starts, but it's pointing out how narrow Kenjaku's viewpoints really were all along. He wants everything to be surprised but he never lets anything surprise him, because either he gets bored right away, or he looks down on others before giving them the chance to evolve, or the third thing he just straight up has to control everything. He can't let the culling game evolve naturally he's going to slaughter all the players by hand so he can move onto the next part.

It's the contradiction between a schemer who needs to control everything and everyone to bring about his intended result and everything needs to be a part of his big plans, to someone who wants to be surprised by others and have things go off the rails. You can't have both of these things at once, Kenjaku cannot have things surprise him if he rigs everything to go his way with his overly elaborate schemes and his tight-fisted control of everyone in the story.

Like, in comparison to Kenjaku the joker just blows things up and sprays people with laughing gas. They're both playing the same game but the joker is having fun and Kenjaku isn't.

Kenjaku wants an unexpected future, but he doesn't care about any of the modern sorcerers and has a bias towards the heiean era that he considers the height and wants to reset things to bring back the heian era. He wants to be surprised but won't give up control.

Kenjaku's boast is that unlike Tengen he's spent a thousand years living on the ground instead of lording up on them from above like some deity, but is that true? Has Kenjaku lived? Has he engaged with the world? Formed relationships with people? Or does he just sit in the corner rubbing his hands together menacingly and scheming his schemes.

Takaba unironically gives Kenjaku what he wants, something he's never seen before in a thousand years, and it's from a place Kenjaku never expected. Some random guy, who he dismissed as one of the boring modern sorcerers with no potential like Higuruma.

Takaba not only exists in Kenjaku's blindspot, he almost immediately points out Kenjaku's second hypocrisy. If he's willing to resort to mass murder just to feel entertained, then if he found something else to entertain him there'd be no reason to get violent and scheme his schemes.

In other words Kenjaku hasn't really gone looking for other places to try to find what makes life worth living, or at least enertaining, he hasn't really tried any alternatives to finding joy in life because Jujutsu is all he cares about. Takaba says that if he found something else even more entertaining than the merger there'd be no need to go through with the merger, and he turns out to be right. Kenjaku could have found meaning and entertainment with the world someplace else, he was just too narrow minded and never looked anywhere else.

As I said from the beginning Kenjaku's existential crisis comes from his inability to relate to other people and viewing them all as objects, but in Kenjaku's mind of course he can't relate to others they're too boring, so therefore it's the world's fault, and the fault of others and not himself.

However, right away one of those boring people starts relating to Kenjaku.

I joked about how we know nothing about the Gojo clan but Takaba gets an entire backstory chapter about his failed comedy career, but this chapter is plot important because jokes are the way that Takaba relates to and forms relationships with other people. Takaba makes jokes to relate to others but has a fallout with a comedy partner and has never been able to form a lasting relationship with a comedic partner because comedy doesn't mean the same to them as it does to him - because to Takaba comedy is about forming relationships with people. Which is why he thinks he's failed if he's failed to make everyone in the audience laugh because he wants to make comedy that will make other people relate to him and understand him.

However, he almost gives up on comedy because he's afraid that he might fail on that endeavor. He gives up on striving to make everybody in the audience laugh, because of self-affirmation and a desire to protect himself. He didn't want to fail so he started distancing himself from the audience under the excuse "Well, I can't make everyone laugh so it's okay if not everyone understands me."

Takaba at some point gave up on trying to use comedy as a means of understanding and relating to others, because of his fear of failure and at that point he nearly lost - but he rallies himself by saying that he won't give up on making someone like Kenjaku laugh. If his comedy is about connecting to others, about understanding others and having others understand him then he can't just give up on Kenjaku and say it's Kenjaku's fault that Kenjaku can't relate to his sense of humor. He's got to try even harder to make Kenjaku laugh.

This is also pretty much the opposite of Kenjaku's point of view. For Kenjaku it's everyone else's fault for being so boring that's why he can't relate to them. Wheras, Takaba takes personal responsibility, he wasn't funny enough, he has to try harder, he's the one who's going to make Kenjaku laugh by improving himself. Takaba looks inward, and Kenjaku looks outwards because there's nothing inside Kenjaku.

This is a parallel to this.

The difference however, is that Sukuna did not betray his ideology. Sukuna lives for the kicks that battle provides him and wants to face strong opponents so he can eventually devoured them and be momentarily entertained.

Like Sukuna is not bored the way Kenjaku is. The world is his playground. He may refer to living as just killing time until you die, but he also says that there's an infinite variety of humans to entertain yourself with. The world is Sukuna's toybox and he's satisfied with just that. In fact he doesn't even care about the merger, until his frustration with Yuji makes him think a little deeper about himself.

Kenjaku is not the Sukuna in this scene, he's the Gojo. He believed he was above others, only to be reminded suddenly that he was just the same as everyone else and brought back down to humanity. I mean, they even die off panel the same anticlimactic way. Gojo's infinity meant nothing in the face of one surprise attack a world-cleaving slash Gojo didn't see coming. All of Kenjaku's backup plans meant nothing in the face of Yuta camping and kill-stealing.

Kenjaku didn't lose because Yuta's plan of camping and killstealing was simply too brilliant for him to prepare for however, we're given the exact reason kenjaku lost - because he was having too much fun with Takaba.

Which meant what Takaba said earlier was true, if Kenjaku found something funnier, something other than the merger that could make him laugh there'd be no need to go through with the merger to begin with.

Kenjaku loses because all along he could have related to people, formed meaningful relationships with others, looked for meaning in life outside of Jujutsu but just chose not to. Which is also a parallel to this.

Sukuna says that Kashimo and Gojo both lost because they were greedy. They already received love in a way, they had the love of everyone who regarded them as the strongest, they had people who earnestly wanted to challenge them and respected them - which Sukuna sees as a form of love, and yet they still wanted more.

They were the ones who put themselves up on that pedestal and decided to stand above all of humanity, they don't get to whine about being lonely on top of that.

To add my interpretation to Sukuna's speech, what he's outlining is a general conflict in Jujutsu Kaisen, you can choose to be all ego to put personal development above everything else but it comes at the cost of not being able to form relationships. Maki's as powerful as Toji now, but the sister she always wanted to protect is dead and basically committed suicide. Meanwhile Noritoshi Kamo didn't participate in the final battle, but he reconnected with his mother and half-brother.

There are plenty of characters who die and suffer in jujutsu kaisen because they chose to value other people above themselves, because Jujutsu Kaisen rewards selfishness and punishes selflessness / having an underdeveloped sense of self.

I'll pick Mechamaru as my biggest example, he lived to protect Miwa, and not only does he die an unsatisfying death, he also breaks her heart.

However, at least Mechamaru experienced love. His desire to protect Miwa is granted, because Miwa is also out of the final conflict. Mechamaru is one of the most miserable characters in the manga, and yet he experienced love in his life for someone else that made his brief life meaningful. The characters who choose love, and other people over strength tend to get stepped on, but they at least had that love in their life to begin with.

It's a having your cake and eating it too situation. Kashimo chose strength over love, and he got to be so strong he was unbeatable and lived to old age, but not only is he unfulfilled but he whines about being unable to relate to the people around him - you're the one who chose to step on everyone like bugs.

Characters in Jujutsu Kaisen don't just experience death when they try to be selfless however, like yeah there's a disproportionate amont of selfless minor characters who die, but like Yuji is the most selfless character in the manga and he's continually punished for it and yet he's the one referred to as a person with an unbreakable will.

Rather instead of Jujutsu Kiasen preferring the selfish side on the scale of selfishness / selflessness, the kind of messy, deaths that get handed out to people like Mechamaru happen when you betray the ideals you were living for. Whether they were selfish or selfless.

It goes back to Toji's internal monologue. You lose when you lose sight of yourself - like there's some deaths that don't fit the mould but for the most part, Gojo, Kashimo, Toji's and then Kenjaku's deaths all follow this pattern. By coincidence they also all take place offscreen for the most part (I suppose we see Yuta cut off Kenjaku's head but it's quick and unsatisfying compared to all the rest).

Kenjaku died because he betrayed what he was living for and he temporarily lost sight of himself. As I said Kenjaku's airtight principles were that everyone was boring and people weren't worth relating too so the only way to find enertainment in life is to cause chaos - but he found himself relating to some nobody he wrote off as a minor character Takaba and having fun with him. Which meant the belief he was false, he could have tried relating to other people all along he just didn't.

He warped his sense of self to reaffirm his identity. Takaba almost did that too, he tried to blame other people for not finding him funny to protect himself, but he moved past that and redoubled his efforts to make Kenjaku laugh.

There's also the added layer of irony that Kenjaku's sudden death brings about, the person who spent a thousand years trying to make the merger happen doesn't get to see it.

However, here's my assertion on why Kenjaku's death before the merger always had to happen.

Because, even if Kenjaku had seen the merger he still would have been bored.

Literally everything about Kenjaku's character and previous actions shows that even if he made his big scheme come true, he would have gone "meh" and moved onto the next scheme because that's how he always reacts.

He got bored of the death painting siblings, he presumably got bored of Yuji, he got bored of all the ancient sorcerers and new sorcerers he made for the culling game, he worked with the disaster curses and got bored of them and dismissed them as inferior primitive curses, he goes out of the way to engineer these chaotic situations and then never feels any satisfaction from them so why would the Merger be any different?

Not only did Kenjaku die before he saw the merger, he was basically doomed to never see the merger, because it would not have fixed whatever is wrong inside of him.

Because it's not the world that's boring, it's Kenjaku himself.

He gets a brief glimpse of what he could have done in life, that he could have tried to forge connections with the people around him and related to them on a personal level - and then he dies the way he lived, in a kind of boring and unsatisfying way.

It's the narrative punishing him in a way, the same way it punished Gojo, and Kashimo, by not letting him see the big explosion after he went to all the trouble rigging the bombs. It's punishing him for the same reason too - by deviating from his true self and showing what he thought were his reasons were shallow all along. Gojo could have always related to people he just chose to stand on his pedestal alone, and Kenjaku could have always found the world to be more enertaining he was the one dismissing other people as boring without giving them a chance to grow.

Takaba confronted his beliefs and then stayed true to his ideology of making everyone, 100% of the people in the crowd laugh. Kenjaku didn't confront his beliefs, he strayed from them because he didn't have the strength of character to evaluate himself the way Takaba did.

Hence, he's finished off by one of those boring people who used their power in a way he never expected. The main villain is defeated by the comic relief character and it's hilarious.

[pleasestayawayidonotlikeyou]

hihi!! would it be alright for u to do a small red x masc reader thing? idm if its romantic or platonic,, I'd just like some crumbs,, :") (if not thats super ok!! just thought id ask)

Heyy traveler!! I'm sorry if this isn't very good as I'm not a man but I did my best, hope you like it!

Featuring: Red

Masterlist

His way of "confessing" was, non ironically, saying "Ya know, I'd gladly let ya cuddle me while kissing me." while being drunk.

You didn't know what to do, if you should kiss him and say you feel the same or call Edge for him to take Red home.

He's very nervous after that day and swears to himself never to talk to you ever again.

But when he saw you standing at his doorway, he knew he couldn't avoid you anymore.

He squeezes both your hands as he tells you all he feels, how his soul skips a beat when you smile at him, how he feels his face heat up when you laugh at his jokes.. how he'd like to be able to hold you while you rest - how he loves every part of you.

When he feels your lips against his teeth, he doesn't even question and kisses back immediately, wrapping his arms around you while closing the door and pulling you inside.

This man has no shame in admitting he loves you, he will defend you from anyone who thinks men can't love other men.

If you ever want him to meet your parents, be prepared to see a very very nervous Red who tries his best to make good appearances, what if they don't like him? What if they think he's too aggressive? What if they disapprove of your relationship and want you to date another guy??

Please try to calm him down-

He loves loves loves cuddles and affection in private, especially when watching TV while being covered in blankets .

[mazzystar24]

actually the hospital wing joke is starting to bother me a lot more because buck actually fucking died 😭and he didnt even change clothes from being at the hospital all day why would you say that to someone. ik it was a fakeout but bobby looked like he was fr coding on the table. and like just a couple weeks before chimney almost died?? like im sorry i only accept those kinda jokes from people who have known me for years and even then they can be a little upsetting.

thats the thing though!!!! id be perfectly fine with buck and tommy if they gave us more than actual crumbs. 709 felt like buck had more chemistry with ravi in the same scene that tommy was in! they’re supposed to be dating so why do they feel like colleagues? and why are the more emotional and vulnerable scenes getting given to EDDIE if they want me to support buck and tommy as a couple? why wasnt tommy at the hospital with them considering he’s said multiple times he wishes he had a family like the 118 does? why are the only times hes on screen now only establishing his jealousy and that gerrard exists? is that the only reason why hes still here?

actually i wanna get back to 706. it wouldve been so easy to keep tommy there but they wrote him out of most of the episode 😭 he couldve said for the bachelor party! he couldve helped them find chimney! he couldve done literally ANYTHING. chimney was confused as hell as to why he even showed up at the wedding at all 😭 but no!!! they had him show up, ignore what buck wanted, then leave so we could have buck and eddie performing their drunk mating rituals or whatever 🤸‍♂️ but yeah buddie who?

also im never letting go of the wedding singer comment btw because what was that. why did they make tommy reference a movie where the two leads in the ROMANTIC COMEDY start the story dating the wrong people. i feel insane about it actually. also him calling buck evan will forever confuse me until we get an actual acknowledgement in canon because literally why

and the humor falls so flat but eddie has the same type of humor and it never does. he was making fun of buck in 706 (the making chimneys wedding about him line) but it never actually felt serious to me?

anyway sorry for yelling in your inbox i have a lot of mixed emotions about this season -birthmark anon

Yes totally get that like I’m the same like me and my best friend will be saying downright horrendous trauma jokes to eachother that make people around us clutch their pearls but I feel like it takes a certain level of rapport to get to trauma joke level - ig not everyone is the same when it comes to that but I think that again the writers absolutely failed to give us enough bucktommy scenes that justify having this kinda line

AGHSKF NOT THE BUCK /RAVI AHJDKFKF 😭😭😭 THIS IS ESPECIALLY FUNNY WHEN YOU SEE THE BUCKTOMMY SCENE AT THE CEREMONY VS THOSE BUCKLEY DIAZ FAMILY STILLS (still bitter the scene got cut) like someone explain to me why the actual couple is coming across less couple-y

ALSO FR THO THE SARDONIC ENERGY IS JUST NOT BEING BALANCED RIGHT like it’s coming across more 🧍

Like i can’t remember who I was talking to the other day but I was saying like this 🧍emoji just embodies Tommy to me

EXACTLYYYYY LIKE PURELY UNHINGED TO HAVE SUCH AN EMOTIONAL EPISODE AND MAKE NO EFFORT TO USE THOSE EMOTIONAL BEATS TO DEVELOP THEIR DYNAMIC BUT INSTEAD CONTRAST THAT WITH THE VULNERABILITY BETWEEN BUCK AND EDDIE THIS EPISODE

AHSJKF we going back to 7x06 and that’s so valid of us AGSJKF DRUNK MATING RITUALS AHJDKFKF STOP IM CACKLING

THE WEDDING SINGER COMMENT HAUNTS ME ISTG BECAUSE EVERY NOW AND THEN ILL REMEMBER THIS COSTUME DETAIL AND WAKE UP IN A COLD SWEAT:

THE CALLING HIM EVAN THING I LEGIT MADE LIKE THREE THEORIES ON RANGING FROM POSITIVITY TO NEGATIVITY

YES ABOUT THE HUMOUR like there just isn’t that balance or lightness to even the joke out, like I’m a big dry humour and sarcastic girlie but it’s just not being delivered right in a way idk if it’s the writing or the acting or just the fact its most his very small screentime but it’s just falling flat to me

Never apologise for yelling in my inbox babe and same for the mixed emotions

Love ya birthmark anon byee 🫶🫶

[fictionfixations]

book 6 spoilers

pspsps. yuu shippers come get your crumbs (idfk what the ship names are ive just been drowning myself in canon content but ik yall exist)

[Jamil: I say we make [MC] compensate us appropriately.]

(this is about them getting annoyed not finding the ID card. and they're doing it trying to search for grim.)

[Leona: Now THAT'S a good idea.]

(this is from the optional PTMs.)