#WHAT KIND OF SYSTEM DOES THIS WOMAN HAVE TO ACHIEVE THIS

[dovahtomes]

Bethesda romance: Hello, dear. Welcome back. The store is doing well. Until next time.

Mod authors:

[gulfiya007]

On lukola fandom

Here’s some venting about the lukola fandom, and its ways, and consequences, from an ordinary polin, Bridgerton and Luke fan.

Starting from the way Luke’s loved ones and friends are treated by its adherents. Especially his girlfriend. The hate towards her is visceral. The whole phenomenon of bullying and stalking someone just for existing and posting on their SM account from time to time probably needs to be studied by social studies scholars and parasocial relationship specialists, cause it’s new heights apparently.

So, what if she’s proud of Luke as her boyfriend and wants to show it? What if she wants to mark her territory sometimes, to which she has a right btw? What if she trolls haters and delusional IRL shippers occasionally? Hers is probably the most relatable behavior. I myself, as an introvert millennial who doesn’t run one single SM account and cringe from the exhibitionist nature of current SM posting practices, still recognize that there’s nothing unusual about that kind of posting per se. Why was Luke’s former gf, Jade, allowed to post him all the time (which is totally alright btw), but Antonia hinting at having, say, a dinner with Luke is shady, attention-seeking, desperate, needy and despicable?

It's not that I care particularly about her. In fact, I couldn’t care less if she’s replaced by Luke with some other woman in a couple of months or if she is his future wife and mother to his kids. I still believe, regardless of her status in the relationship, she deserves basic respect and decent treatment as a human being that we know pretty much nothing about. She does not deserve the vilification and demonization that she gets.

Luke too, has a right to privacy and respect for his personal choices that are nobody’s business. He owes no one anything in terms of disclosing his dating life and confirming his relationships. If for someone, Luke bringing the girl to almost all his travels and events with himself, is not a proof or statement in and of itself about her being his girlfriend, then that’s on them. No amount of intentional misreading and skewed takes on photos will trump this simple fact.

Also please don’t bring up virtue signaling and other cancel culture stupidities, such as moral judgements passed on Luke and his close ones for political or other values purportedly held by them, of which we in fact know zilch. It’s clear that this is just another useful tool in a shipping crusade.

Nicola too, deserves, for a change, to have her numerous statements taken seriously. Let alone, privacy. She’s being stalked by her so-called fans to insanity. I am sure she, to put it mildly, is uncomfortable about her “queen” and “goddess” status among the cultists, and being a projection vessel for a myriad of sad women. Cause she knows very well this type of passionate idolatry is an inch away from hate, and the plus sign switches to a minus sign the minute she does something not to their liking, a wrong brand or person supported, or not enough disciplining of Luke is exercised. The most delusional thing about lukolas is them truly believing themselves to be Nic’s or Luke’s fans.

Which brings us to the crux of the matter. That IRL shipping is bad, period. Some lukola bloggers on tumblr, TT and IG half-heartedly try to reign in and admonish the more unhinged segment of the fandom by telling them to behave and not bring their bul..t to the actors' feet. However, this is what the lukola discourse platforms, by simply existing, still do - breed crazy fan behavior. Because the problem lies in the belief system itself. No amount of reservations, house-keeping and discipline by lukola discourse 'leaders' will do away with the tenets and premises of this religion that seep through and twist every discussion and speculation about the figures involved (Luke, Nic, etc). Since every reasoning should work towards a certain end goal, all means and distortions are good to achieve it. Finding faults with Luke's character and behavior and demanding a 'redemption' from him, hating and criticizing Luke's friends and family, attributing motivations to the actors and their loved ones that best suit theories, online stalking etc. A myth about Luke ever publicly stating he was single during promo, a ridiculous myth about Bridgerton cast and showrunners shipping lukola (news flash – nobody in the cast cares about their co-stars’ private lives, stop the kindergarten), or the “papgate” affecting in any way Luke’s job prospects. Myths upon myths that build the house of cards of the lukola dogma. I myself wouldn’t care a damn about this fandom if it really contained itself to its close corners and group chats, however, unsurprisingly, they spill over in a grand fashion and permeate all discourse.

You really believe the innocent delulu fangirling has no by-products? These are the staple manifestations of the lukola and of any IRL shipping fandom, and popular lukola theorists are pretty successful in justifying and reinforcing them. And it should not be surprising that some followers, the most zealous and stupid ones, take it too far and actually harass people and be annoying in SM.

As a Luke and polin fan, I am annoyed by this, but I am 100% sure this sh*t is affecting the actors, and you all can kiss goodbye to the chemistry between Luke and Nic naturally displayed during promo. I am sure polin will not be affected, for L and N are excellent actors and friends, but you all soon will look sadly back to S3 promo tour as magic that will never come back.

[fivewantscoffee]

So, Five x Lila. I need to get this out of my system so I can maybe finally move on:

I don't like the ship.

I don't like the characters together. I find the pairing a baffling one, and I don't like what it does to the show (and characters) either.

First of all, that wasn't Lila. I don't know who it was, but it wasn't the woman we saw off at the end of S3, or even the one we started off S4 with.

It just wasn't her.

You can blame trauma, or six years of being on the move. That's going to change a person, for sure, but this wasn't about giving Lila any character development.

It was about giving Five a love interest.

Because that life? Yeah. I could see it for Five. I could see him deciding to settle down and take life slow, I could see him being sweet and domestic with a partner should he have one. After he's had some time to heal, now that he's finally free of the apocalypse, I could see that for Five.

But Lila? She was unhappy in her marriage, at least partly because the domestic, stay-at-home-mum life has proven to be something that doesn't fulfil her. She wants more out of life, which is why "bookclub" happened, which is why she ended up in the subway with Five in the first place.

And okay. For the sake of argument, let's go with this. Let's say Five x Lila happened so they could cope with their situation. It was survival, like Lila said. If we were going to have to endure this bad, messy plot point anyway, (which we didn't, we really, really didn't), it should at least have been treated with the seriousness it deserves.

Because, Five? The complete, callous lack of remorse on his part? What the fuck was that?

Even if you pick through the crumbs and try to make it make sense, this wasn't a romance. At best it was survival, and coping, and kind of a tragedy all at once. Five shouldn't be picking fights with Diego. He shouldn't be acting like a spurned twenty-something-year-old.

And yeah, characters can be flawed and in the wrong, but why like this? This didn't feel like Five to me. He is brusque and, when looked at it from a certain angle, I can see why some would call him selfish (which I don't necessarily agree with, but that's a different conversation), but under all his layers, he does love his family. To me, that's the core of his character and has been since S1. Everything he's done, he's done to ensure their survival, then when he agreed to give up in S3, he was content to simply die by their sides.

So, you're telling that this Five, the one we've known and followed for three seasons, had a fling with Lila and didn't even feel guilty or conflicted about it? You're telling me loved this woman, yet was willing to keep her from her family, her children?

"Five is selfish" "Five is tired" "Five is finally moving on"

No. Not like that. To me, the Five from previous seasons (S2 specifically, because that's where a lot of it goes wrong) is only "selfish" in that he wants his family to survive and is willing to go to any lengths to achieve that. He's not exactly compassionate about Allison and Viktor having to leave Ray and Sissy behind. And yeah, he leaves Diego in the asylum because he doesn't want him messing with the timeline.

Is he in the wrong for that? Answer this any way you want, but I don't think it matters to Five. Does he want his siblings to be happy? In my opinion, of course he does, but they're not going to be happy if they're dead.

That's not the same as what S4 does. Not by a long shot. Five cares deeply about those he loves, and granted, he is pretty bad at showing it, but he does care.

He nearly worked himself into the grave trying to solve the first two apocalypses, with little regard for his own well-being. When he realised a third apocalypse was happening, he didn't say fuck it and continue his Pennsylvania retirement road trip... he immediately dropped everything to try and fix it.

So how did we get to S4 Five, who got with his brother's wife, found a way home, didn't tell Lila, AND THEN, after he finally gave her the notebook and they went back, he acts like that?

Yeah, no. That's not my Five.

Also, five x lila happening isn't Five moving on. If anything, it's how he copes with the situation they're in. That's just his Delores 2.0.

Anyway, all of this is moot because the fact of the matter is, they chose to make this happen. Five and Lila getting stuck in the subway together for seven years didn't have to happen.

I don't know.

This used to be a show about family. It also used to be a show about the effects of child abuse on this group of siblings. This started to fall to the wayside after S1, but the family aspect of it still remained.

At its core, tua has always been about family, so what was the point of making S4 at all if this is what they were going to give us?

It's not just Five x Lila. They messed this up across the board, with how flippantly the absence of Sloane and Ray was treated, how shallow and surface-level all of the rest was. They gave us some crumbs with Klaus and Allison, but they couldn't even do that without retconning their entire relationship. That's not even mentioning the ending. The Hargreeves all sacrificing themselves in the end could have worked, but this was not the way to do it.

Anyway, this rant is over. S1 Five, you'll always be famous to me.

[tragantia]

I've been thinking about the 2nd part to my 'Severen during your period' headcanons, aaand the gremlin man himself has taken possession of my mind and won't leave me alone until I write this. Will I succeed at purging Severen from my system? I don't think so.

Also, I know people normally post warnings and stuff, but Severen is his own warning imo.

Severen Van Sickle – NSFW headcanons

As a bi woman, I have the authoritas to say: yes, he´s a bi king. Big bi energy. Doesn´t actually care about what's what, if he likes it, he's gonna get it. Does it have a penis? Great. A vagina? Cute. Both? Fangggtastic. Count him in, darlin'.

That being said, he loves tits. Could spend hours biting, licking, sucking. Play with his too, he likes it and can cum just from that if you're good.

In the same line as Lestat during TVL, I do think in the past he would have found men to be more appealing than women, simply because he would have had more of a common ground with them, and would have found them more interesting. He would still have had sex with women and gone to brothels regularly. But a real emotional and sexual connection? It would have taken a really unusual lady to achieve that.

Which brings me to... Being from the Wild West, he most likely lost his virginity in a brothel, or at least with a prostitute. Unless you count those times when he was still on his early teens and he and another guy would play with each other, almost innocently, trying to see what's what and how it feels, but knowing very well they can't get caught.

He's got a nice dick, not massive but long and thick. Definitely knows how to use it. Has nice big balls too, loves it if you play with them, he himself will caress them if you're giving him head.

He's hairy, it's sexy, and he knows it. Doesn't wash himself much, he likes his natural smell, and likes to smell himself on his partners as a way of showing ownership. He prefers his partners soft and freshly shaved – may even shave you himself and then eat you out.

He knows what he's doing. He's a pro. Even before being turned, he was nothing but an hedonist, and pretty much lived to do risky shit, drink, gamble and fuck. He's easy to sleep with, but difficult to keep. He can fuck you so hard and good that you'll cry, both from pain and pleasure.

He has no shame. I can think of very few things he wouldn't do when it comes to sex, and even then he may try them once to see what it's like. Also he has like, 1000 kinks. I think if he likes you, everything has the potential of becoming a kink. Pretty feet? He's suddenly into feet.

Also really into dirty talking: if he's so crude on a regular basis, you can imagine the kind of filth that comes out of his mouth in the bedroom. Also LOUD.

BLOOD KINK. I don't think I need to explain. He loves to bite his partners, but this leads to them turning... so he is sure to kill all of them afterwards. The other ones have susprised him in more than one occasion naked and completely covered in blood after his last date got out of hand – again.

If he's turned you, this escalates to a whole new level. He's constantly biting you and drinking from you, even when you're not having sex. He loves it too much, and it makes him feel close to you. It's also a sign of ownership – no one else can bite you like he does. So, sadistic: pain is pleasure.

Also a masochist. If you drink from him, get ready for the most pornographic moan you've ever heard – he's gonna cum hard.

PERIOD KINK. Again, no comments needed, but how can he resist when he catches the sweet smell coming from your pussy? Smells like delicious Christmas dinner to him.

He's a dom through and through. He likes to chase, flirt and seduce, and once he's got you trapped between his body and the mattress (or in the nearest surface) he's gonna let you know who's calling the shots.

Saying this, he does have a very playful side, and you could easily seduce him into letting you do all sorts of naughty things to him. If it feels good and it's depraved, he's all for it.

He will be his asshole self and taint you, mock you and bully you through the entire thing though. It's part of his charm. If you manage to shut him up and make him a moaning mess, he would find it sooo hot.

Will fuck you everywhere and anywhere. If there's an itch to scratch, there's a way.

If you don't have a penis, he may let you use a strap on him. Plus points if he rides you making cowboy noises. You know he would make yeehaw noises during sex. C'mon. You ride him? Yee. He rides you? Haw. 100% would refer to himself as a bronco, and to his partner as a mare etc as if already seen in other fics.

He's very dominant, but I think he has the ability of being very silly during sex and still make it really fucking hot. He would make you laugh and two seconds later you're crying and screaming from how hard he's ruining you. The only time when he'll be completely serious is if he's hate-fucking you or marking territory. Also, spanking? Yes, please?

Why can I see him fucking with his sunglasses on?

Loves to eat you out: he eats pussy, dick and ass like a boss. It's not just how experienced he is, he genuinely likes it so much he's simply really good. The way he moves his mouth and tongue is absolutely sinful. 69? Say no more.

Adores it when you give him head. Easily his favourite thing alongside with drinking blood. He will let you get comfortable and then grab your head and face-fuck you. Will take his dick out and slap your face with it, then spit on you, calling you names and making you carry on. Please swallow his cum and kiss him, he loves to taste himself in your mouth.

Filthy. Loves cum swapping. Will make you squirt if you can, then cum inside you, then lick it all up as he eats you out, moaning like the sex crazed maniac that he is. Loves to cum all over you, and doesn't like it when you wipe it off.

A bit of a breeding kink, even if he's unable to get you pregnant. Loves to cum deep inside you and tell you how he's filling you up, how good your pussy or asshole is milking him, what a good girl/boy you are for him.

Won't. Leave you. Alone. Always trying to rile you up for another round. If he's not having sex, he's thinking about it most of the time (like that Buffy episode when she reads Xander's mind lol).

Unashamedly likes porn. He's mostly into dark BDSM material, the kind of thing that was hard to come across in the 80s. Still, if one day you're in a city with an adult cinema, he's dragging you in and you end up giving each other a handjob as you watch the film. He loves it if you're shy about it, he's gonna ruin that innocence.

Exhibitionist. He loves people to see him having sex. He's good and he's hot, he likes to put on a good show. He would also like to take pictures and make short films with you if you're up for it. He once took a video of his partner jerking him off from behind until he came all over his chest and balls, he genuinely thinks it's the hottest thing ever and would soooo post it online if he could.

I think he had a threesome with the pick-up truck ladies before killing them. So yeah, into threesomes and orgies, and will love giving orders to his partners and having them horny for him, answering to whatever he wants them to do. It's all about the power dynamics. Very territorial with his partner if he has one, though. Won't like anyone else to touch them.

But, nothing beats the blood. Vampires are of course sexual creatures, but Severen legit gets hard every single time he feeds.

Loves to watch you being aggressive and brutal. If he watches you feed, get ready because he's gonna show you just how much he's enjoyed the show.

Very touchy and cuddly. If there is an emotional connection, he will pull you to his chest and cuddle you as he smokes until you fall asleep. Can get very soft after sex, but ooonly if he has a partner. If that's not the case, it's feeding time.

He's basically terrible and so much fun. Would be the best sex in your life – if you survive, of course.

I need Holy Water after this. Was this too long? It probably was too long. Now I'm gonna go and cry myself to sleep because I can't have him in this life 😌

[bobbyfiend]

I'm a little high so now is the perfect time to write shit.

TW: mention of violence and (briefly) of suicide

Today's shit is: Stop saying Fragile Masculinity unless you know what the fuck you're talking about.

I feel the boldface above is perhaps too aggressive, but whatever. Moving on.

The interwebs seem to think Fragile Masculinity means a man who is fragile. Or a guy who is a douchebag. Or something. IDK. What does it really mean?

Fragile Masculinity (a.k.a. Precarious Manhood) is an academic theory about the nature of "masculinity" in patriarchal societies. From here on out, I'm talking like the theory, so I don't have to say "according to..." 100 times.

Masculinity isn't an innate aspect of a person in this conception; it's a status or identity conferred on certain people (i.e., people who look like "men") by their culture or community.

Your culture gave you masculinity, and it can take it away. Easily. "Fragile Masculinity" means that masculinity, as a concept or identity or social status is hard to achieve and easy to lose. It's fragile, get it?

Femininity or Womanhood, by contrast, is not thought to work the same way, usually. The theory isn't really about women, but writers/theorists comment on the contrast, sometimes: Women in patriarchal societies aren't potential people in charge, or even particularly agentive; they're resources to be utilized. Those resources need to be available at any time, and how they feel about that, or what they've done in their lives to be good resources are less important than mere existence and availability. Women become women, generally, just by growing up and having the "right" biological bits. Even bad women are still women. Even women declared good for nothing but sexual or domestic use are still women. By contrast, men become men (i.e. masculine) by doing the right things, and not doing the wrong ones, and they stay masculine the same way. Masculinity can be lost easily.

How do you lose masculinity? You fuck up. You fail to do the things the culture thinks men should do. You fail to retaliate when another man insults you. Or compliments your girlfriend. Or makes out with your wife. You fail to commit the situation-specific violence your society requires of men. You fail ?o dominate others--especially men--in social interactions. You get dominated--much worse if by a woman. You show insufficient physical strength, or (worse) you show fear of being hurt.

I'll stop with that, now. I think you get the picture.

Or you do things the culture says men should not do: you listen to your gf or wife's thoughts a little too much. You play a sissy sport or no sport at all. You hang with gay people. You are gay people. You are (or seem to be) trans--and yes, the system seems to be rigged so that both MtF and FtM trans people will generally be seen as insufficiently manly.

Getting the picture? You don't become a man just because you get physically older; you have to do things, and you have to not do other things. Otherwise, you're not a man, not really.

And every damn day there will be at least one (and maybe a hundred) tests of your manhood. If you fail to meet any one of them, your "man" status can be damaged or revoked.

Why is that so bad? Because non-men have no place in patriarchal society. Men have a place, weak-ass men sort of have a place, women have a place (most of them, most of the time); non-men do not have a place. Non-men do not receive or deserve anyone's respect or even kindness. Non-men are homo sacer. Hurting them is a great pastime because it both harms someone who should should be ashamed to exist and gives you status points with your buddies (this includes both men and women). "Hurt the outsider" is one of the most reliable methods for bonding with your tribal group. It's even better if the outsider is a traitor, someone who used to be one of you. Outsiders can be hurt because they're outsiders. Traitors should be hurt because they have committed one of the worst possible moral wrongs: they were good group members and then they chose to not be. It's disloyalty to the group. Non-men are traitors so fuck 'em up.

What is a man to do who has been declared "non-man", or just lost some of his man status, or is just worried he might? Maybe he gets the most manly job ever: cop, soldier, WWE wrestler. Maybe he makes sure to commit some extra amounts of culture-sanctioned violence or domination. Maybe he kills himself.

I hope you're getting this. Fragile Masculinity is not a description of some men's insecurities or overcompensation (though it's not totally separate from that). It's a sociological/critical theory about the concept of masculinity itself, and how it works within patriarchal cultures. Masculinity in such a culture is fragile. It's hard to achieve and easy to lose. That has a lot of really bad consequences.

[mswyrr]

reasons i genuinely enjoy criston as a character

-deconstruction of ideas of the nobility of warfare: he was all amped up to fight! he'd trained his entire life for battle. of any man drawn into this civil war, he should have been the most able to meet that challenge... and one battle breaks him - as happens irl to so many people, not because they are "weak," but because war is inherently destructive and traumatizing. the glory is all a lie.

-the deconstruction of chivalric love. he wanted a lady to be his chaste beacon and he got... a seemingly exclusively homoromantic woman lol. so for decades he thought they had THAT, the thing his culture valorizes in stories and song, love held in check by vows and honor. but it was actually because she's just not that into you man. (i think she has love for him, but not romantic). and once her husband kicked it she was like "actually, i need to work out some issues and find out what an orgasm is, so let's fuck." a thing which he (because he buys all this shit) feels deep shame over. the rules of the system just don't work.

(not only does the lady he's devoted to not like him back the same way but he knows it and his culture has given him no tools to understand sexuality so he tries to tell himself--and HER SON, because her obvious homoromantic love for their enemy is so obvious he and HER SON have whole conversations about it!--that somehow Rhaenyra "intoxicated" her, like a siren singing Alicent to the shores of the Isle of Lesbos lol.)

(and let's not even go into all the complexities of power, class, and gender at play in what went down with Rhaenyra and him that's a whole essay itself)

-shining a light on this corrupt class hierarchy. he thought he was rising in the world but this system, at core, is all about using people up for a very small few to have ultimate power (not even all the nobles! not even all the royal family - it's a damn pyramid scheme at every level). that is IT. no matter how high he rises, that's all it ever is or will be.

no matter how high he climbs, it's a layer cake of shit. through him the story shows what becomes of believing in all the lies this society tells itself (when you're not born at the top; the Targ kids show us what believing does to people at the top: it's a pyramid scheme, through and through). and it's gorgeous. it's ugly and heartbreaking. he's not an original thinker, he just wants to achieve within what his society tells him, he works so hard at it!! he wakes up every morning trying to live up to the lies. and that makes him the perfect man through whom to dismantle how these things work: he's just trying to do what he's told is honorable and just. and it's all shit.

his whole story came together for me in his despairing speech to gwayne in the s2 finale and it hit so well for me. particularly the touch where the high born man, gwayne, cannot contradict what criston has just said and so lowers his sword and sits beside him as an equal. made me like the whole character arc in retrospect, knowing where they were headed.

i love it. he reminds me of film noir and hardboiled detective novels i've loved, where you draw out the corruption and brokenness of a system through characters who relate to it in different ways. and the most agonizing way for someone to relate to a broken system is truly *believing* in it. they keep trying desperately to love it. but it doesn't love them back.

and major credit to fabian frankel who knows the kind of character he's playing and fully commits to it - he doesn't try to make the character look cool or undercut the deeper themes. he goes with it, and that is great, "story is king" acting.

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #2 – He Who Drowned the World by Shelley Parker-Chan

I’ve had this sitting on my bookshelf since it came out but, as so often happens, having it just laying around meant it faded to the background whenever I was deciding what to read next. Not the worst case of that (there’s a lovely of Cyteen that’s been sitting on my dresser and shaming me for at least a year now), but certainly long enough for me to regret it.

The story is a direct sequel to She Who Became The Sun, a low fantasy retelling of the fall of the Yuan Dynasty and the ascension of Zhu Yuanzhang to the imperial throne – though in this universe the ‘real’ Zhu Yuanzhang died a starving peasant child, and his sister assumed his identity and his destiny of greatness, willing to do anything and everything it takes to force the world into alignment with it. The book starts with her having lost her right hand, and only gets more emphatic about making her prove it from there.

Aside from Zhu, the narration’s split between several different points of view that fill out the struggle for the future of China. The book honestly does a better job with multiple POVs than the vast majority of epic fantasy I’ve read – every one is a thematic mirror of Zhu on one level or another, and every one has an arc dedicated to the book’s twin fascinations of what it means to be willing to do anything to achieve what you want on one hand, and gender nonconformity and queerness in an intensely patriarchal traditional society on the other.

The actual plot of the story is almost episodic – Zhu encounters some new obstacle on her way to victoriously marching to the Mongol capital at Dadu that can’t be defeated with the blunt force she has available, and she and some collection of the supporting cast goes on an insane adventure to snatch victory regardless. Then every so often there’s a cutaway to Wang Baoxiang (who, among all the other POVs, is easily the one that comes closest to deuteragonist status) scheming his way through imperial court politics in Dadu in his incredibly operatic and self-degrading scheme for revenge on his dead brother. The plots start affecting each other quite early, but I’m pretty sure it’s only in the last twenty pages or so that the two of them actually meet face to face (it is in fact a minor plot point that Wang can’t recognize Zhu when he sees her). It all manages to feel like it’s capturing a whole swathe of political intrigue beyond any one person’s understanding and feel fairly well plotted and cohesive as it comes together. Not that there aren’t plenty of points where you have to just run with it and not push back at what the book’s telling you but nowhere where it’s serious or blatant enough to actually be an issue.

I’m not sure it’s a complaint per se, but one thing that did take some adjusting to is just how, melodramatic I suppose? All the POVs in the book feel very profoundly and effusively, and also have absolutely zero awareness or understanding of their own emotions. This is particularly acute with Wang and Madame Zhang, but in every case there’s just a lot of characters being driven by emotions too large to be contained within them. It kind of feels like a musical, in that respect (but absolutely no other, to be clear).

Anyways, this is a book with absolutely massive amounts of Gender in it. With like, literally one exception, every POV is to some great extent defined by struggling against their position in the gender system of medieval China, and all the issues doing so their entire lives has left them with (Zhu is far and away the most healthy and well-adjusted about this.) Importantly, being oppressed and marginalized for being a woman/effeminate man/eunuch is in no way edifying or ennobling – it’s mostly left everyone involved deeply damaged and full of coping mechanisms that serve them poorly and everyone around them far worse. There’s basically no mention of even the idea of solidarity among the oppressed here – Madame Zhang tortures, mutilates and kills her own maids and her husbands’ consorts whenever necessary, Wang operatic revenge plot involves befriending and seducing a queer prince knowing it will get him killed in the end, Ouyang hates how effeminate his body is and deals with this by becoming a pathological misogynist – even Zhu doesn’t spare much to think about the cause of woman’s liberation beyond herself and her wife.Given the state of a lot of modern genre lit I honestly found this rather refreshing.

As both cause and consequence of the choice of POVs, the book has a rather interesting relationship with normative masculinity. There’s, as far as I can tell, exactly two examples of successful heroic/virtuous normative masculinity in the book – General Zhang and the Grand Councillor of the Yuan – and despite both being really incredibly competent and fearsome on the battlefield and legitimately selfless and honorable, both end up condemned as traitors to their respective lieges (both indolent, vicious, and generally contemptible men without anything in the way of redeeming features, themselves) and dying unpleasantly after being outmanoeuvred in court intrigue. Victory in the end goes not to those who are cherished by their society but the ones who are overlooked and brutalized by it but are willing and able to do whatever it takes and use anything and everything they can to claw their way to the top despite it.

Speaking of – the overriding throughline of the story is what it means to be willing to do anything to achieve your life’s ambition. Being willing to endure pain and suffering goes without saying, and while the book does put its leads through the physical ringer, that’s not really what it’s interested in. Are you willing to spend the lives of those who trust and rely upon you? Sacrifice those you love, or ask them to die for you? Betray those who have only ever shown you kindness? Are you willing to degrade and humiliate yourself, or lie and betray your own hard-won and precarious identity? And once you’ve done all that, and finally achieved your heart’s desire – well, are you really sure it was all worth it? Three cases out of four in the book, at least, ended up regretting it in the end.

This is a book that’s very concerned with sex and sexuality but, like, very nearly exclusively in offputting or unpleasant ways. There’s something like a dozen sex scenes (okay, ‘scenes with sex in them’ is probably the less misleading description. If you come looking for porn you’ll be disappointed) in the book and of them I believe exactly one that you could characterize as enthusiastically consensual and mutually enjoyable. Maybe three, if you count the incredibly toxic relationship which boils down to asking for help dong self-harm and it turns into a sadomasochist thing. Which never becomes/is never understood as sexual by the people engaging in it but describing it is definitely the closest the book gets to erotica. In any event, just somewhat surprising to see so much sex paired with so little romance, relative to most modern stuff I’ve read. Ties into how alienated literally everyone is from their bodies, I suppose.

Also I really don’t know enough about the historical memory of the early Ming dynasty to know whether all the stuff about how Zhu knows what it’s like to be nothing and how she’ll reorder the world to care for everyone is supposed to read as really darkly ironic or not.

[mschimdt]

special (NSFW)

lyle wainfleet x human!mechanic!reader

2400 words

summary: you appear as a innocent mechanic, until lyle starts gaining interest in you after seeing a porn video that was posted by you back on earth, he immediatley recognised your face and his only goal now is to make you his

warnings:over simulation, embarassment, p to v, sex (obv), size difference, human x navi and many more

- - - - - - - - - -

as a mechanic on pandora, you were incharge of fixing and organising helicopters and fighter jets, you were also incharge of oxygen masks and anything that involved mechanical work, it was weird to be the only female on the mechanical team but you got used to it, you worked really hard to get this job and you werent ever going to give it up

in the past you were a known pornstar, put you kind of just disappeared off the internet after deciding to make yourself a better person, because you knew porn was wrong but it was your only source of income at the time

you worked your ass off and got into college to achieve your dream of working on cars and airplanes, you studied day and night and practiced to make yourself perfect

a few weeks after you graduated, something caught your eyes in the street, a poster advertising a program in a planet called pandora, you heard of this project and how they were able to transport humans a few hundered light years out of the solar system in just 6 years

you considered it, knowing you could get a spot in the mechanical feild on pandora excited you, you immediatley signed up and you were accepted

your flight to pandora was just 3 months away, you had no family here anyways, so throwing yourself on a different planet knowing you might never come back wasnt too hard because there was no one to worry about here on earth

now you work as a mechanic, one of the top mechanics in pandora, your work never failed to impress everyone, you could fix anything even if it was considered ‘unfixable’ by others

you heard of the phoneix project, it was probably a bad idea after the jake sully shit but oh well, it was intriuging how they could bring souls back to life ad huge blue giants

Reader POV

i was walking in bridgehead trying to get to the plane room as quickly as possible, ardmore needed something fixed ASAP.

but on the way there something caught your eye.. a blue figure walking through bridgehead… NOT ONE but a few, almost around 8, they looked navi and you immediatley got scared, you thought they were some navi savages coming to destroy bridgehead, they walked a but closer and you noticed they were dressed in military clothing.. this was probably the phoenix project that you heard ardmore speaking about

that was confirmed when you saw ardmore walking next to one of them, talking, the rest of them were walking behind both ardmore and the blue guy, you suspected he was quaritch, one of the most known men out here

ardmore spotted you and pointed at you, motioning for you to come over, both ardmore and the guy you thought was quaritch stood still waiting for you to make your way to them

your neck was slowly breaking while looking up at him, “y/n please come with us, i need you to explain new equipment to the colonel here” “yes ma’am” you said following her through the busy building, you all made your way to the building that had all the guns and weapons that were made for navis

ardmore started speaking: “this is y/n, shes one of our best mechanics and i wanted to assign her to any problems you and your team may have with equipment and veichles, shes good at what she does and she’ll make sure nothing happens to you regarding mechanical stuff.” you were having a hard time looking up at quaritch, you were really tall for a woman, you were 5’11 but you only reached up to his waist

“alright y/n ill leave this to you” now you were oficially left alone with about 9 blue fiants that could crush you with their fingers

“okay uhmm” you said clapping your hands turning around to face the wall woth everything on it, you grabbed a “sniper” but this sniper was automatic

“okay so this is a auto sniper, they created this while you were all dead- that sounds weird but anyways, it basically shoots for you, you just gotta aim it, the bullets have technology where theyll hit the target almost every time, you just click this button to mark the target and you could be looking into a completley different direction and itll still hit the target” you handed the gun over to the guy that was standing infront of you, a bald guy with shades, and he help it up “oh wow this shits crazy, if i wasnt told ive been dead for 15 years i woulda thought its been 50!” he said holding the gun up

fast forward that day, you and the “bald guy” whos called lyle got along pretty well, sure his ideas were insane but he was fun to talk to

lyle recognised your face from somewhere, and he asked you when you came to pandora and you said that it was around 7 years ago, which meant that he couldnt have seen you in person when he was human

he kept thinking about where hes seen you day and night, he needed to know and he wasnt going to give up anytime soon, he did think you were a porn star but he quickly got rid of that thought knowing you werent someone that would film themselves having sex

until he was having a conversation with you where you asked about your past, so he did the same, “by the way, y/n since you graduated at 25 years old, that means you went to college late right?” “yea, dont know why youre asking because its pretty obvious” “ya had no family on earth though, how’d ya’ make money with no one back there?” he asked wanting to confirm the theory of you being a porn star, he knew it was probably nothing but he was sure that hes seen you somewhere involving porn or some shit “its complicated, lets just say i filmed… things” lyles eyes went wide and he said “KNEW IT! knew ive seen ya’ somewhere before ya’ looked familiar as hellll”

your face went red as you realised that lyle has seen your videos “o-ohh youve seen them…” you said trying to force a smile “ah dont worry they were good if thas wa’s botherin’ ya” you stared at lyle shocked he would even say that “you know this isnt gow you speak to a colleague right?” he made a fake-sad expression “i thoughttt weee were friendsssss” followed by fake sobs “alright alright, just dont mention this to anyone okay lyle?” you said hoping that he wouldnt tell anyone “dont worry i wont, anyways i gotta get going, i need to go train with the team” “alright have fun”

you were no doubt catching feelings for lyle, his funny personality and the way he spoke to you, he was sweet, hes never sweet to anyone but you, sure you both only met 3 months ago but you couldnt stop yourself from fantasizing about him

lyle went to train and you made your way to the weapon room because ardmore said one of the weapons needed fixing, you were tired of ardmore, she called you at the weirdest times asking you to come fix things, you wont lie though, the pay was really good, we’re talking around 8k for each veichle repair, and 2k for each weapon, you fix around 15 veichles and 30 weapons monthly which brings your pay up to almost 200k each month

you were pretty wealthy, you just save your money because theres nothing to spend it on here, you have almost 50 million in your bank account and inflation didnt exist here YET so your money was worth what it was worth 7 years ago

you fixed up whatever ardmore wanted you to fix and you headed to your room, drenched in sweat because of the lack of air conditioning, you took your tanktop and shorts off and hopped into the shower longing the feeling of cold water on your skin

just a few moments later theres a knocking on your door, you were still in the shower so you hurridley grabbed a shower robe and rushed over to the door because whoever was knocking was getting really impatient

you opened the door your head just peaking through, it was lyle “hey y/n have you seen my phone? i must have forgotten it here yesterday and i really need it because apparently ardmores been spamming me with shit and i wasnt replying” he said

not even bothering to ask if he could come in, quickly rushing over to your couch where he sat yesterday, he found it there and grabbed it “alright thank-“ he cut himself off when he stared at you, you were barely clothed and confused. he cursed under his breath, he didnt notice you werent wearing anything but a light robe

lyle just stopped speaking and shamelessly stared at your cleavage, “uhmm” you spat out because it was getting really awkward, lyle walked over to you pressing you against a wall, his hand wrapping around your neck

you didnt complain, you just stared at him with wide eyes “god damn.. look at you” he said, your face flushed red

lyle realized what he was doing and took a step back removing his hand from your neck apologising “sorry, sorry y/n i couldnt control myself, that probably made you uncomfortable so uhm sorry” he said awkwardly turning around to leave not waiting for a reply to save himself some embarassment

“whyd you stop” he was shocked when he heard you ask him why he stopped, he turned around

“i wasnt controlling myself, didnt want to make you uncomfortable”

“you didnt make me uncomfortable i liked it” you said smirking

“oh shit then-“ he walked over to you roughly slamming you against the wall wrapping his hands around your neck once again, “ya’ like that dont’cha”

you nodded, he then lifted you and threw you onto your bed, your bed was navi size so it could fit you and lyle easily

nefore lyle joined you on the bed he took his shirt off, you stared at his muscles admiring the sculpture of a mad you had infront of you, you wanted to worship his body goddamn

he threw himself ontop of you, connecting your lips, what was a innocent kiss turned into a heated makeout session really quickly and soon enough his tongue was exploring your mouth

you reached your arms down not breaking the kiss and you unwrapped your robe, lyle could feel you unwrapping it against his stomache

he reached his arm down to cup your tits, massaging them with his hands, you moaned into the kiss and you felt lyles cock harden against your leg

he squeezed your neck making you choke, still not breaking the kiss

finally, lyle broke the kiss first sitting up to stare at you, your chest was exposed and so was your cunt

he reached his hand down running his fingers theough your folds while his face dipped down to mark and suck on your chest

you were a moaning mess, lyle was rubbing your clit and sucking your nipples

you felt him glide his fingers around your cunt when sufdenly with no warning, he pressed a finger all the way inside of you

you tried to suppress your moans to make sure nobody would hear you, but lyle didnt want that, he started punping his finger in and out of you trying to get some noises out of you

you were nearing your release “l-lyle im about to c-cum” you said whimpering, “yea thas right, cum on my fingers there ya’ go” you started grinding yourself onto your fingers and you reached your orgasm with a loud scream like moan.

he helped you ride out your high over simulating you a little bit before pulling his fingers out of your cunt, putting them in his mouth sucking up any cum that was left on his fingers

his other hand reached down to unbuckle his belt, it unbuckled and he pulled his pants and boxers down at once revealing his painfully hard cock, it was larger than you expected but you couldnt do anything more than take it

“sure ya can take my dick, considering how many people you probably fucked huh?” “m-mhm” you mumbled not being able to let out complete words because of how fucked dumb you are, just from his fingers

he grabbed your knees spreading your legs even wider and pulling you to the edge of the bed, he had to go on his knees because you were too short, he glided his dick through your folds, covering the tip with your slick

then slowly he started pushing himself into you, he knew you werent gonna be able to take his entire length and he was okay with that, considering you were half his size

he pushed his cock a bit more than halfway, then he felt your cervix stop him from going any further “youre so fucking tight mm” he said giving you time to adjust to his size, a few minutes later the stinging pain went away and now you were just filled with need

“m-move please” thats all it took lyle to start thrusting into you, he started off slow then he built up the pace and now was pounding into you, you let out loud moans while lyle was groaning

“i-im close” you said followed by many more moans and whimpers, “c’mon cum fr’me” and thats all you needed to cum all over his huge cock, he was nearing his orgasm too

it was over simulating, he kept going even after you came, finally, he released his own load into you thrusting into you a few more times before stopping, his hands were on both your sides holding himself up inorder not to fall ontop of your fragile body

“you were so good fr’e me hm” he said praising you

“dont think ill be able to walk for a few days because of you” you said followed by a light giggle

lyle pulled out and layed himself next to you

it was already pretty late and lyle didnt have any intentions of returning to the team tonight, so he cleaned you up and stayed in your room with you

you both fell asleep cuddling, you didnt know lyle enjoyed cuddling this much, but i guess hes just a softie on the inside

[delaware-lemme-smash]

Ochako with an insecure female s/o who feels bad about themselves? You’re headcanons and writings put a smile on my face!

I hope you all enjoy these Ochako headcanons! I love her so much, it's about time I had more of her on this blog. ❤️

Characters: Uraraka Ochaka/Uravity

Contents: f!reader, negative self-talk, insecurity

Uraraka Ochako/Uravity

It's true that Ochako comes off as quite the gung-ho, positive, confident young woman, but she's no stranger to low self-esteem and anxiety. She usually covers it with a smile and a can-do attitude, but her life certainly hasn't been a bed of roses. 

She negatively compares herself to her fellow Pro Heroes. Sometimes it gives her the motivation she needs to keep improving, but sometimes it seems like there's an enormous gap between her and the likes and Deku and Bakugou, no matter how much they respect her.

As quite a sensitive person, she's highly tuned to the emotions of those around her, especially the people she's close to. This is especially true of negative emotions. When she was a child, it was her parents and their financial situation—enough so that she vowed to become a Pro Hero in order to ease their burden. In a relationship, she'll be keyed into how you're feeling at almost all times.

Her first instinct is to try and fix it for you. Whether it's your career, your body image, your personality, or just generalised anxiety. She wants to do what she did with her parents, she wants to help you in any way she can. That's what a real hero does, right?

Well, not quite. 

She doesn't have a Quirk where she can magically wave her hand and erase all your problems. But that doesn't mean she won't try. It can reach the point of frustration for you, because sometimes you just want her to listen and not try to find solutions for everything. You want to feel heard, not like a project she's trying to fix. 

It's not coming from a place of malice, not at all. She just feels a heavy sense of responsibility for everyone around her. To fix their problems and manage their emotions for them. Just look at how much she worries about her family, friends, and colleagues. 

Once you absolve her of that responsibility, she's actually a fantastic listener and support system. She'll listen to your worries and insecurities, help to soothe them, and help you to manage your own growth and development. 

She's your #1 cheerleader, no matter what your goals are. No matter how big or small your achievement might be, she's right there with a huge grin on her face, eyes shining, striking a silly little power pose. She's a fist-pump afficionado.

This is healthy for Ochako too, since it gives her the bandwidth to look after herself as well. Overall, the two of you reach a kind of equilibrium of support and self-care that makes for a warm, healthy relationship.

[euniexenoblade]

hey, on your old blog you had a list of your favorite books. Do you think you could make another post like that?

Yeah totes, so if we just stick specifically to novels and no comics or manga, here ya go:

The Alchemists of Loom (trilogy) by Elise Kova: It's a weird story that I can only describe as a traditional fantasy and steampunk combine. The exposition is there was this world of people called the Fenthri who achieve achieve steampunk level of tech, finally inventing a flying machine and going beyond the clouds that surround their planet, to find floating patches of land where they discover a race of people that call themselves Dragons, who have magic. The dragons invade the planet and oppress its people. The main character is this woman known as The White Wraith, a Fenthri who is known for killing Dragons and harvesting their organs (source of their magic), her lesbian protege that leads a revolution, and a Dragon royal that betrays his people to help attempt dethrone the king. Shit's great. I love it. Please read it. That first book is outstanding.

Goth by Otsuichi: A Japanese horror novel about a boy who has impulses to kill and a girl who is suicidal. Both of them are attracted to death and interested in the grotesque and macabre. Endless trigger warnings for this, from animal abuse to obvi murder. It's one of my favorite horror novels, if not my absolute favorite horror novel. The story is unique, and uniquely Japanese in it's telling. I reread it every October.

Another by Yukito Ayatsuji: The other horror novel I reread every October, another uniquely Japanese story about a class that's cursed, where a dead kid ends up in the class every year, but no one can identify who it is that's dead. And, the more they interact with the dead student, the more likely everyone is to die. There's an anime adaptation of this, it's pretty decent though it feels more like "Final Destination: The Anime" than the novel does. There's also a manga, I know nothing about the manga. But yeah, read the novel, it's fun.

Mordred, Bastard Son by Douglas Clegg: One of my favorite Arthurian stories, it retells the King Arthur story from a perspective of Mordred, who in this rendition is a very kind hearted gay man. I don't like the portrayal of King Arthur in it really, but that's all of like, 5 sentences. The story really hovers on our protag Gay Mordred and the shit he goes through. Pretty sure it won an award for gay literature. The downside is it's a cliff hanger ending an the author never released the follow up (it's been almost two decades, idk if we're getting it). Book is like, 40% of where my name comes from.

Pretty much any Nisioisin book. He just has a really clever wit, and a story telling style that feels very fun and vibrant. My favorite of his books is probably Kizumonogatari, which is a prequel of Bakemonogatari, follows Koyomi Araragi saving a vampire and in turn becoming a vampire himself. I additionally love his book Zaregoto, which is a locked room mystery, and his books Katanagatari, martial artist goes on a journey to collect mystical swords. He's a fantastic writer, look into a book from him.

Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron by Jasper Fforde: I haven't read this in over a decade, but I've claimed it to be my favorite book since. I really should reread it. It takes place in a post apocalyptic world where humans eye sight has devolved and a caste system has formed around what colors people can see.

Some other novels I really like are Insomnia and The Dead Zone by Stephen King, Phantoms by Dean Koontz, Feed by M.T. Anderson, I Want to Eat Your Pancreas by Yoru Sumino, and the Spice & Wolf series by Isuna Hasekura.

[purplespacekitty]

Magnifying Glass: "The Outcast"

Episode: "The Outcast"

Series: Star Trek: The Next Generation

Season 5, Episode 17

Original Air Date: March 16, 1992

Screenwriter: Jeri Taylor

Director: Robert Scheerer

I feel like Star Trek as a fandom doesn’t really talk about this episode enough. I find this episode extremely fascinating and have a lot of thoughts about it, but I don’t want to subject anyone who isn’t willing to my (VERY LONG) ramblings, so please, keep reading at your own discretion.

First, a quick synopsis: an alien planet called J'naii enlists the Enterprise-D to help them find a lost shuttlecraft in their star system. First Officer Commander Riker is paired up with Soren, a member of the J'naii, to devise a rescue mission for this shuttlecraft and along the way, the two catch romantic feelings for one another. However, the J'naii are a majority androgynous, aromantic and asexual race and those who deviate from this norm are persecuted and forced to undergo a kind of conversion therapy to "cure" their "condition". Soren confides in Riker her feelings towards him and her identity as a woman, things she could not share with her own people for fear of the violence she has seen others like her face. Understanding the risks, the two pursue a relationship with one another, but eventually the other J'naii find out and Soren is put on trial, where she makes an impassioned speech to stand up for herself and others like her. After the trial, Riker tries to fight for Soren's right to seek asylum with the Federation, but his support and efforts are in vain. Unfortunately, by the end of the episode, Soren has been subjected to psychological treatment and no longer feels any attraction to Riker. The Enterprise leaves, having finished their business with the J'naii and Riker is left to pick up the pieces of his broken heart.

I could go on and on about the "bury your gays"/"queer and trans people must suffer" trope this episode and others like it within the franchise fall into (i.e. DS9's "Rejoined" and ENT's "Cogenitor"). And while I will be criticizing the casting and writing decisions this episode's creators made, I think it's important to recognize the ways in which this episode does achieve some level of success with Star Trek's most favored format for addressing social and political issues; allegorical storytelling. However, I will be dragging this episode before I compliment it, so bear with me.

I’ll be honest…I’m not super jazzed about the way they handled sexuality in this episode. The J’naii reproduce asexually and it is not socially acceptable to have sex or procreate sexually in J’naii society. Which is in an of itself mostly fine, except that the writers portray the agender, aromantic and asexual J’naii as largely dispassionate, cold and close-minded, unable to connect with each other or other beings in meaningful ways which, hey, right off the bat, not a great depiction of aspen folks. The J’naii are supposed to be an antithesis of (‘90s) Earth conventions of gender and sexuality, but in their creation as one of the very few sets of characters up until this point that are generally androgynous, aromantic and asexual, they fall in line with a kind of alienation not uncommon in Star Trek: ‘look at this species, they do things differently from the majority of humans! isn’t that neat? but it’s just unique to them, so what sets us apart from them must be what makes us fundamentally human’. Take Spock, Data, Seven of Nine and Odo for instance, all characters who on some level struggle with human/humanoid conceptions of sexuality and all characters who have a complicated relationship to humanity as they themselves are not (just) human. Each of them are generally received by human characters as cold, calculating and are purposely shown to have difficulty connecting with others intimately because they are not (just) human. The often-used trope is that if only they were human, they would understand what love is (queue Foreigner’s “I Wanna Know What Love Is”). This more broadly implies that romance and sex are essential to humanity and human intimacy, which they are not. Creating a species that is predominantly agender, aromantic and asexual and because of this, predominantly operates in this cold and stagnant way creates a monolith of aromantic and asexual people and ignores the complexities of the aromantic and asexual spectrums, especially against the backdrop of a central star-crossed lovers plot.

Riker's actor Jonathan Frakes insisted that it would have been more impactful to cast Soren with a male actor rather than a cisgender actress. Indeed, because this episode originally was made to challenge viewer attitudes towards homosexuality, such a decision surely would have shaken people’s foundations a bit more and would have actually better-achieved what the writers were going for. Maybe this episode would have been as beloved as “Rejoined” if it had featured Star Trek’s first kiss between two men. However, if they had had Soren still identify as a woman when played by a male actor, we would still have someone who does not live our stories telling our stories for us. A truly meaningful representation of trans people would have seen Soren cast with a trans actress. But as I mentioned, an allegory for trans people wasn’t really what the writers were going for and they probably didn’t see hiring actual trans people as a viable option in the first place. If you look on Memory Alpha, you will see that none of the writers in the room for “The Outcast” were trans or queer themselves. Jeri Taylor herself says that while she is not gay, she wanted to do this story because homosexuality is such a controversial issue and "as a woman [she does] consider [herself] in a particular minority; [she knows] what it feels like to be disenfranchised – not in that precise way – and [she] felt like [she] had a touchstone to some of the feelings that must be involved" (Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages, p. 240). I think it's admirable that she wanted to head a project like this and to give the issue a great deal more compassion than others would have in her place, but the fact still remains that she herself is not queer or trans, meaning that, again, people who do not live our stories and were mostly just fishing for clout were trying to tell our stories for us.

All this to say, I do think this episode has some things going for it that I would like to outline below. Because regardless of the casting decisions and the way the writers actually ended up handling conventions of gender and sexuality, functionally, Soren is a trans woman: she identifies as a gender different from the gender she was assigned at birth. And Riker falls for her and gives her his love with an open ease that Soren’s own people do not.

When I watched “The Outcast” for the first time, I hadn’t come out yet and I hadn’t even begun to delve into the world of my own gender or sexuality. So it wasn’t my trans awakening or anything, but it certainly is one of the things I ruminate on when I think back to, as we LGBTQIA+ people are wont to do, all the times when perhaps I could have realized it.

Yeah, I know this episode gives us just another of many Riker romances, but it is not at all flippant or without depth in the way it unfolds. The focal romance of this episode is part of what makes it all the more heartbreaking. Riker falls fast and hard for Soren in an era of American TV where trans characters were routinely played for laughs (I’m looking at you, Frasier). Popular cis male characters of the 1990s are vastly insecure about their masculinity and sexuality in interactions with trans people, particularly with trans women. If TNG teaches us nothing else, it certainly teaches us that Riker is admirably comfortable in both his masculinity and sexuality. Of course, Star Trek takes place lightyears ahead of the eras it’s filmed in. This episode was written in the 1990s and is therefore restrained in its exploration of gender by mainstream, Western ‘90s understandings of gender. But by the 24th century, humanity is supposed to have addressed and healed the wounds of its prejudices. So by the time the Enterprise sidles up to J’naii, humanity has had plenty of time to learn about and understand the multitudes of gender, not just in their own cultures but in those of other species (I’m thinking here of Star Trek’s tendency to favor Western cultural values over others). There are no mentions in this episode of the many genders that have been recognized by various Earth cultures throughout history and the writers did not anticipate the way in which gender identities and definitions have now been recovered and expanded, a process one might assume will only continue as we move forward.

"The Outcast" aired in 1992, when the term “nonbinary” had not yet made its way into mainstream English vernacular. But as pointed out above, it is not unaccompanied by other episodes in the franchise addressing gender politics: “The Offspring” showcases Data’s relationship to gender and his determination to let his android child decide their own gender; DS9 has an entire character whose gender and sexuality are fluid depending on their host and the symbiont Dax’s gender is never confirmed; the wormhole Prophets’ genders are never confirmed; there are many episodes in both TNG and DS9 which examine Ferengi gender politics; one episode shows us Sisko and Bashir excitedly discussing a male lieutenant’s pregnancy and upcoming baby shower; etc. However, while it's easy to argue that it would have been plausible for the human officers aboard Enterprise-D to easily grasp the concept of a species where androgyny is the norm, it is precisely the incongruity of a mainstream Western '90s understanding of gender paired with the supposed utopian Earth of the 24th century that makes this episode resonate with me (as I'm sure it has with others) in particular. Science fiction is more about the past than the future, after all. “The Outcast” approaches genderqueerness and pronouns with the compassion and curiosity expected of Starfleet. And because of this, we get to see multiple characters grow in this episode, particularly Riker and Worf, both of whom initially struggle with the idea of gender neutrality.

Now, getting into the romantic plot. Riker’s love for Soren is unconditional, a hopeful light in the face of two different worlds (Earth from our side of the screen and J’naii from the other) that constantly deny trans people our right to exist, which paint us as sick, demented, perverted, monstrous and disgusting. When Soren confides in Riker about her identity, he is not deterred. He is curious and kind, glad to have been shown this part of her truth, even as he struggles to understand J’naii’s general attitude towards gender. Furthermore, there are no reservations on Riker’s part about Soren’s appearance. Although Soren is played by a cisgender actress, binarism in our society pressures many trans people to transition medically in a way that Soren has not, an issue that is of no concern to Riker who is simply in love with her as she is. Which is cool, considering that the majority of Riker’s romantic interests are hyper-feminine. What this shows us is that Riker is not so shallow as to be concerned solely with a person’s appearance when it comes to who he's attracted to and does not so deeply equate gender presentation with gender identity that he is unable to see Soren as the woman she is. He is already attracted to Soren before she confides her gender identity to him.

Soren does not mention anyone who has felt similar feelings for her or for whom she has felt similar feelings and explains that the concept of gender is highly “offensive” to the J’naii. She has spent the majority of her life in fear of her truth being exposed, but in Riker’s company, feels safe to share it with him as he is an outsider who has shown an honest interest in learning. He comes to understand her in a way that she has not been allowed to let others understand her before, in a way that has not been safe before, which is the door that opens them both to their care and love for one another. Though we don’t get to see them learn all that much about each other personally, they do learn that they share an interest in exobotany and get to spent some truly heart-melting moments together.

Back on the Enterprise, Riker has a significant conversation with Deanna about Soren, expressing his deep love for her and letting Deanna know that he wants to continue to pursue a relationship with Soren. Again, this demonstrates that Riker is not only head over heels for Soren but also that he is secure in his masculinity and sexuality, nowhere near ashamed of the feelings he feels for Soren, but simply concerned for the stability of his friendship with his ex. We love a respectful, communicative guy.

We don’t get to see Soren express her feelings for Riker or any potential shame she might harbor about them to anyone but him, which we know would lead to her persecution if she tried to share it with another J’naii. Which leads us to the end of this episode.

The tragedy, of course, is that the other J’naii do find out and do not respond with compassion or respect. Even after Soren has given everything to valiantly make her case, to stand up for herself and others who share her experiences of gender-based oppression, Riker and Worf return to J’naii one last time to rescue her only to find out that they are too late; Soren has already been forced to undergo psychotectic treatment (i.e. conversion therapy). Riker makes one last desperate attempt to get Soren to recall her true self but…she doesn’t. She can’t. And that clipped connection, that final tear in the string that bound them together in an inextricable truth, is what haunts Riker as Ensign Gates takes the Enterprise-D out of J’naii’s orbit.

Obviously, I would have loved to see Riker and Worf succeed in their rescue attempt, have our intrepid heroes break the Prime Directive to save Soren and help forge the first steps to liberating the trans people of J’naii. Unfortunately, for this episode to work, for it to resonate with its viewers as a meaningful commentary on the way our society treats queer and trans people, the screenwriters obviously felt that the tragedy of losing Soren in the end would garner more sympathy. We see a similar take with episodes like DS9's aforementioned “Rejoined”, where Jadzia Dax’s resolve to live the rest of her life with Lenara Kahn is ultimately in vain. She can only watch helplessly from the balcony above the Promenade as Kahn leaves, having chosen instead to favor the life of her symbiont and its future hosts over spending what time she can with the love of her life. Homophobia and transphobia tear people apart - real, living, breathing, loving, caring people. To deny someone their right to stand in their own truth is to deny them their existence. The screenwriters for “The Outcast” made the conscious decision to have us witness this violence, to make us sit with it and understand that Soren's experience represents the real experiences of real people. That the violence committed against queer and trans people harms both them and those who love them. Because Soren was loved. Is loved. She was held and shown a humility she for so long had no access to. And for a brief moment, she felt that love.

Absolutely, this episode could have been done better and I really, really wish they had hired actual trans people to tell Soren’s story or at least cast an actual trans actress to play her. But I do think there is something to be said for the episode’s fundamental, albeit accidental message which is that trans people are not broken or sick in the head. We are whole, vibrant beings entirely deserving of love, respect, support, happiness, care and, above all, life.

[fostersffff]

The Big Gundam Watch, Part 14: Mobile Suit Victory Gundam

What a mistake it would have been for me to skip this series.

I observed in my last post that opinions on Victory Gundam seem more volatile than ZZ, and now I understand why. Like F91 before it, Victory Gundam is an attempt at soft rebooting the Universal Century, but obviously unlike F91, it had the chance to be a full, ~50 episode TV series. I can say with confidence now that this is the format in which Yoshiyuki Tomino is at his most powerful.

For better and for worse, Victory Gundam takes the essence of nearly everything that came before and refines it into a more pure, undiluted version of itself. I'm of the opinion that this works brilliantly for the most part, although when it does fall flat, it really hits with an echoing thud. Even so, Victory Gundam has usurped ZZ when it comes to my opinion on "the true successor" to 0079. A lot of that is down to executing on a most of ZZ's plot beats and character archetypes better, but it also adds some new elements that improve upon it as well. With that said, I can think of no better element to start with than with the belle of the ball herself, Katejina Loos.

CATEGORY 5 WHITE WOMAN

I have been thoroughly enchanted by the story of Katejina Loos. I knew, via osmosis, that she was a Bad Woman who does Bad Things, but I wasn't exactly sure what that really meant. That descriptor applies to characters like Haman Karn- who I love- Reccoa Londe- who I hate (affectionate)- and Michele Luio- who I hate (derogatory). She has a little bit in common with all three, because she's all the most stereotypical "evil woman" traits wrapped into a single character, but what makes that so engaging is watching how those traits get worse and worse and fucking worse over time, in a way that is kind of disturbingly mundane.

Katejina starts out as what I can most succinctly describe as a Privileged White Liberal; she's from money, but because she hates most of the wealthy people around her- including her own dad- she considers herself wholly different from them. Because of how they shuffled the first few episodes, her introduction is literally "I'm glad all those rich assholes died", glazing over both the grotesque cruelty of the situation because she thought they were bad people who deserved to die anyway and also that she is, in fact, one of those rich assholes.

At first she goes along with the League Militaire, mainly because there's nowhere else to go anyway, but she often bristles against most of the other members. This is because they pretty willing to point out that she's a rich asshole, but also more importantly because she disagrees with them using Uso as a pilot for the Victory. It's entirely possible this may have been amicably resolved- especially considering her initial attitude towards the Zanscare Empire is "they're obviously bad guys"- if not for her abduction by Cronicle Asher (who, by the way, may have The Most Tomino Name).

At this point I need to take a detour to talk about him, and how one of the other smartest things Tomino did was make Victory's Char completely unlike Char. While he is scheming against the Zanscare Empire's military dictatorship, he's a genuine believer in Mariaism- a matriarchal doctrine advocating for peace in space- and wants to elevate his sister (the titular Maria from Mariaism and Queen of the Zanscare Empire) from merely being a figurehead to the actual ruler of the empire. However, instead of subterfuge and betrayals, he's trying to change the system from within, doing his duty as a soldier with the utmost diligence so he can rise through the ranks, which will allow him to achieve his goals while not inadvertently destabilizing the empire (and thus Maria's access to power). He's maybe the most Straight-Edge Good Boy I've seen in a Gundam series, but unfortunately, all of that Good Boy Energy is being used in service of the genocidal military dictatorship. He regularly expresses distaste for the methods Zanscare's military regularly employs, but he carries out those cruel tasks anyway, because ultimately, the end will justify the means.

With all that in mind, Cronicle being the one to abduct Katejina is legitimately the point of no return for her. That genuine Straight-Edge Good Boyness of his endears her to him immediately, which leads her to reconsider what she thought of the Zanscare Empire; after all, Cronicle treats her with such a great deal of kindness and respect, so surely they can't all be bad. That one commanding officer even shot the subordinate who tried to feel her up, even! Combine that with the fact that the members of the League Militaire were mean to her, and that they have to use an innocent little baby boy like Uso to fight for them... maybe she was wrong about who the bad guys were.

I'll speed it along here, but what is essentially a corruption arc is on full display from this point forward. Slowly, she starts to integrate herself more and more within the Zanscare Empire's military, halfheartedly trying to justify what she's doing as "spying" to Uso and company until she doesn't even care to bother with that anymore, more and more convinced that Cronicle is just, and his plan to elevate Maria as the true ruler is for the greater good. The last act of kindness she musters for Uso is letting him know Shahkti and the others are safe, but the next time we see her after that is in a Zanscare dress uniform, and then later in the same episode, in a Zanscare mobile suit.

And once that threshold has been crossed, she continues to sink lower, going from "maybe we can just... capture Uso, and bring him over to our side" to "he's gotta go". And then she starts employing increasingly depraved methods of "he's gotta go", sliding from simply killing him in combat, to ordering the all-female imperial guard to fight him on foot and naked (or as naked as early 90's Japanese TV would allow) to try to fuck with his head, to finally faking a surrender after she's already lost everything so she can stab him, because fuck him.

If the League Militaire (and Uso as its spearhead) had just fucked off and let Zanscare achieve their goals, Cronicle would have eventually usurped the military dictatorship, given Maria the freedom to enact her will, and everything would have been perfect. It would've been like a fairy tale: she's swept off her feet by a handsome prince who enlists her aid to rescue to queen, and in saving her, they save the whole kingdom, and then they live happily ever after. The only minor caveat was the mountains of innocent corpses it was all built upon.

Uso- the innocent little baby boy no more- took all that away from her- the prince was dead, the queen was dead, and the kingdom had fallen apart- and rather than actually admit defeat or commit suicide, she instead continues to try to kill him, until her brain basically poisons itself as a self-preservation tactic- it's not the V2's Wings of Light that blind her, it's literally her own rage.

And, shockingly, that's where she ends up. Still alive, but unable to see the world around her anymore and with no memory of anything but where she lived. Karlmann's name evokes a memory she can't access anymore, which makes her cry for reasons she can't understand. Shahkti gives her a replacement compass so she can make her way back to Uwig and continue to live, and presumably just live... assuming Uwig has even been rebuilt, considering this series seems to take place within the span of a year (if Marbet's pregnancy is anything to go by). It's honestly a much crueler fate than I was expecting, but it's hard to argue it's not one she earned.

All of this is to say: it's possible I may change my opinion once recency bias wears off, but I think Katejina Loos is maybe my favorite single character in a Gundam show to date. A perfectly executed villainess, top to bottom.

And, you know, nice thick eyebrows, which is terrific.

Now that I've finished gushing, let's get to the normal segments:

THE STUFF I LIKED

This series is just ripe with Tomino names. Cronicle Asher, Maria Pure Armonia, Karlmann Dukatus, Junko Jenka, Duker Iq... and I would be remiss not to mention that while not explicitly said in the series, Marbet's last name is Fingerhat.

I adore the technology level of UC 0153. We've advanced forward from F91 and now goddamn near everything is beam-based; even things that aren't mobile suits use beams because the technology is so normalized. I'm also of the opinion that it's enhanced further by Tomino's obvious appreciation of the aesthetic of Pastoral European Landscapes and 20th Century European Cities; the visual clash of super futuristic robots and old-timey environments worked in F91, it worked better here, and I imagine it'll continue to be just as strong- if not stronger- in Turn A and Reconguista in G

I know on a meta level that Victory Gundam was pushed even harder than previous Gundams in the direction of MAKE TOY, which sounds like a nightmare creatively, but fuck if they didn't make it work. The in-universe justification for most of the wheel-based weapons is goofy, but damned if they don't make the Einerad (The Tire) one of the most devastatingly effective support units in the franchise. And, to be honest, if I had access to a toy as a kid that was just a cool robot inside of a wheel, it would've been, like, my favorite toy.

Plus, despite my noted dislike of the Zakrello from 0079 for being a Goofy Snake Ship, having most of the Zanscare's mobile suits have the dogu statue eyes that open into vertical slits is a great unifying aspect that is also super different from Zeon's monoeyes.

One of the coolest things about this series is how it flips the formula from 0079, Zeta, and ZZ with regards to setting. It starts on Earth, which frames space and the colonies as different and scary. Like, it was fascinating in 0079 to see the White Base crew react the way they did to a thunderstorm and other Earth phenomena we obviously take for granted, but here's it's like: hey man, space is fucking scary! I was genuinely anxious watching Shahkti and Suzy trying to get Karl and Flanders into normal suits.

This also extends to the finale taking place on Earth, which is a genuine first for the franchise. You'd think this would make things slightly less deadly overall, but man Cronicle goes out in a bad fuckin' way.

Following up on that: I love Angel Halo as the ultimate threat (with one caveat I'll mention that in the next section). "Total Human Regression as performed by Warhammer 40k's Golden Throne" is much more horrifying than what I was expecting (which was A Super Duper Space Laser), especially considering they showed what happens if everyone in an arbitrary area suddenly falls asleep, and that every time someone blew up a section of Angel Halo, civilian bodies would just FLOOD out.

I also really liked how the memories Angel Ring was evoking when Maria was trying to pacify Uso were just ever so slightly wrong, in terms of what the characters are saying. That's a very tiny detail to address in such a long series, where most people wouldn't even remember what was actually said as it was airing, but it's appreciated.

At this point I consider Tomino to be pretty masterful at a lot of things, but I think one of his strongest abilities is writing mascot characters who are good. Victory Gundam has a baby, a dog, and the most talkative Haro yet, and all three of them are great. Karl and Flanders are just a normal baby and dog who primarily either enhance hijinks or raise stakes, and Haro earns the extra lines it has by constantly being in MVP in bad situations.

THE STUFF I LIKED LESS:

It was dumb that they arbitrarily had Episode 4 as the first episode so they could show the completed Victory Gundam right away, and then spend the next three episodes framed with Shahkti going "well Karl, as you know...". I know this ties back to toys, but surely it could've just been written differently in the first place.

While I did like Zanscare's refusal to acknowledge the Victory, Hexa, and V2 as Gundams, I'm so mad they were mainly referred to as "the white ones" instead of "white devils". "The White Devil" is my favorite name for the RX-78-2 and I hate that it doesn't get used more referencing Gundams, especially in contexts like this.

So obviously from a series composition point of view it was never going to be the case, but I was bummed out that in-universe, Marbet was intended to be the League Militaire's ace and got sidelined due to her injury. This isn't such a big deal, because she contributes regularly and actually lives through to the end in what I would consider to be the best possible circumstances (Oliver is dead and instead she has Uso, Shahkti, Karl, and Flanders as a family), but it's was just like "aw no you're so much cooler than this dumb kid with a bowl cut!"

I straight-up don't like Oliver. He just shows up randomly but everyone knows who he is, he's revealed to be the commander of the Shrike Team (who actually are foreshadowed in an earlier episode!) but arrives without them for some reason, he has a strained romantic history with Marbet, and he gets a completely unearned Bright Slap shortly after showing up, which is already something I hate outside of its original context in 0079. Then despite denying it, it really seems like he shacks up with Marbet because Junko died and she wins by default, and then after nutting inside he just killed himself in spectacular fashion, achieving nothing. Fuckin'... bad vibes, all around.

Lupe Cineau, huh? My complaint here isn't that she's a weird pedophile, bur rather that she really shouldn't have been? Her introduction is that she's a Stone Cold Bitch, murdering the guys in the bar she just got information from when she first shows up. And her tactic to try to seduce Uso into joining up with Zanscare seemed less like "oh my, a cute little boy, I know exactly what to do..." and more of a dismissive "he's like 12, all I need to do is show hole and he'll be in our pockets forever". Like, 'she fails at seducing a 12 year old because she's too much of a Stone Cold Bitch' is the point of that entire scene! Statistically, not every antagonist could be a quality one, but it felt like they just scrambled to figure out how to reintroduce and get rid of her, and the bath scene was the most memorable thing about her, so: pedophile.

There sure is a lot of biology in this series! Most of it has to do with Karlmann, naturally, but I was taken aback at the scene of Shahkti washing the diapers in the river and you see his poop get washed away. Odelo pissing himself and it filling up the bottom of his normal suit was gross but like... kind of informative on how that works? But then the scene where Cronicle redirects Suzy to the bathroom when she sleepwalks to pee in the hallways was just... eugh.

I don't know why they felt compelled to allude to the threat of Angel Halo's psycommu physically degenerating people as well. "Everyone on Earth will mentally become an infant, and if they don't die in the initial collapse of infrastructure that causes, they'll eventually starve to death because they lack the capacity for self-preservation" is scary enough!

I can't really begrudge Tomino for reusing it, because it's a powerful scene, and Karl was much more important to this story, but the fact that Karl has the same origin story as the F91 baby was just like "you can't just do that again, man". It's not even as good a moment because the pilot intentionally shoots down Karl's mother, versus F91 baby's mom just accidentally getting brained by a spent shell. They're even wearing similar outfits!

OTHER OBSERVATIONS

I've read that this is, or was at the time, Hideaki Anno's favorite Gundam series, and lines up with when he would've been making Evangelion- and I definitely think he cribbed some things. As soon as I saw the episode title "Beneath the Ultra-High Altitude Attack" my eyes narrowed, and I can't be convinced that Arael wasn't inspired by the Zanneck and Fuala's mental instability. Also: Angel Ring and Human Instrumentality and the associated Christian imagery.

Speaking of Fuala Griffon, she is Victory Gundam's winner of the "fucking insane fit" award, wearing an oversized suit and porkpie hat while riding a dirtbike with the biggest case of resting bitchface I've seen since Monsly in Future Boy Conan.

I kind of regret learning about trigger discipline (keeping your trigger finger extended along the side of the barrel of a gun until you're actually going to fire) because now it's one of those things I look for everywhere, but in this case I do think it's the second most telling detail about Cronicle's character. The other being the fact that Flanders is cool with him.

Speaking of Cronicle and guns, for however out of character it may have been I was hootin' and hollerin' when Shahkti stole his gun and shot him.

Final note on Cronicle: My favorite thing about his mask that I only realized in writing this post is that it's the inverse of Char's, covering everything but his eyes and hair.

I really like the Eyecatch Flipbook they must have made to include as an extra for the laserdisc release of the series, but it does kinda... disrupt some things. Most notably in the last episode where you get the very violently abrupt shot Cronicle slamming into a piece of Angel Halo before cutting to HARO WORLDWIDE with the cute little jingle.

I legitimately thought Maria's demonstration where she healed the sick was staged. Like, it would be revealed that Maria was a low-level Newtype with some genuine power, but all the people who claimed to have been healed during that demonstration were crisis actors designed to make the public fall in line. In hindsight, I don't even know if "crisis actors" was a concept anyone had ever thought of before the turn of the century.

I alluded to it in another post, but due to the scant few memes that have circulated about this series, I was shocked to learn the Shrike Team were protagonist-aligned. I thought that they were the ones who did the Bikini Bazooka Attack, because a second faction made up entirely of beautiful women just seemed unlikely, and I kept trying to figure out at one point they were going to turn on Uso, especially considering most of them are dead before the halfway point.

I'm really proud of the image I used for the header, and was initially planning on doing a full video of the clip, but video editing is hard. Then I was going to photoshop in more characters' faces but I didn't want to hunt for images of the right angle for that many characters. But that was a really good Shahkti face, so I left it in.

IN CONCLUSION

Victory Gundam is without a doubt my favorite of the Tomino-directed TV shows thus far, and in the upper eschelon of favorite Gundam shows. For however much he hated doing the series and may still hate it in hindsight, it's not like he just phoned it in. It's got a good cast, good conflict, good mobile suit designs, and despite a massive kill count and some really fucked up parts, it doesn't strike me as being particularly edgy or even mean-spirited. It's absolutely not going to hit the same for everyone, but I think if Tomino's other Gundams clicked with you, it's more than worth a shot.

Next up: considering I've already watched the next two entries in chronological order, I'll be moving ahead to the third Gundam OVA series, The 08th MS Team, notable for being the first new entry in the Universal Century timeline following G Gundam and Gundam Wing and for often being recommended in the same breath as War in the Pocket. Considering how that turned out, I'm optimistic that this will also be good, and if nothing else, it's sure to have that 90's Anime OVA budget going for it, much like Stardust Memory.

[danganronpasurvivoraskblog]

Akane Owari VS Chie Satonaka [Danganronpa Survivor VS Persona 4]

Hifumi: Akane Owari, the energetic Ultimate Gymnast with a Fiery Temper!

Leona: Chie Satonaka, the Spunky Dragon with Deadly Legs!

Hifumi: Both had an appetite for juicy meat, but both have MORE of an appetite for a hella-good scrap! But the question is which one of them is gonna come out on top!?

Leona: He's Hifumi and I'm Leona!

Hifumi: And it's our job to analyze their weapons, talents and skills, to see who will win a DEATH BATTLE!

Leona: Ok, let's just get this over with...Blah blah blah Ultimate Talents blah blah blah Hope's Peak blah blah-

Hifumi: Hey! I know we end up having to repeat the same things, but you need to get used to it! Besides, you're not the one who has to say it.

Leona: Well, just get on with it. Give us the quick version.

Hifumi: I'm afraid I can't do that. See, there are actually a few differences with this combatant than with our last two. But as for what you already know, Hope's Peak Academy was a prestigious school that only allowed the best to enroll in it. But in an attempt to use these students to create Ultimate Hope for the Future, the academy and it's student body were infiltrated by the Ultimate Despair, Junko Enoshima, and her sister Mukuro Ikusaba.

Leona: Yeah, we know all this. Revolutions, violence, war, destruction, ever horrible thing you could ever possibly imagined followed Enoshima's plot. 

Hifumi: But what we HAVEN'T mentioned up until now, is that besides Mukuro Ikusaba, Junko Enoshima didn't act alone in achieving her world-level destruction. By brainwashing the 77th Class of Ultimate Students, and showing them the tragic death of their most beloved classmate, Junko turned them into the group that we now know as the Remnants of Despair.

Leona: If I remember correctly, the Remnants went about causing destruction and despair of all kinds, making life a hellish nightmare for everyone until they were all captured by the Future Foundation. Then they were put in some kind of...virtual reality or whatever?

Hifumi: A virtual realm known as the Neo World Program, designed from the basis of Mr Fujisaki's research. A replica of the previously famous resort location, Jabberwock Island, was created, and the 77th Class were placed inside this virtual realm, with their memories being reset. The goal was to rehabilitate them; to reset them to how they were before Junko took their lives away. However, things took a drastic turn for the worst when Junko Enoshima herself returned, hacked the program, and kickstarted her twisted Killing Game all over again!

Leona: Didn't Junko...die though?

Hifumi: Yes. It was actually an AI copy of Junko Enoshima that was hacked into the program, infiltrated the code, and once again, took the form of Monokuma to host her second Killing Game. If things had gone to plan, she would have been able to take over the bodies of her old Remnant allies and turn them into her. "Operation Junko-fy All Mankind" as she called it.

Leona: It just gets worse! 

Hifumi: That it does. Of course, the one who put her in the system was Izuru Kamukura, and that same Kamukura, after remembering his previous life as Hajime Hinata, was able to boot her out again! Alongside Mr Hinata though, there were four others who were able to survive the deadly game right until the end. Sonia Nevermind, Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu, Kazuichi Soda and...

Leona: Akane Owari!

Hifumi: Ms Owari is, to be frank, a little thick-headed. She lives life on passion alone, doesn't really think about things, nor really does she understand most basic principles. However, she's a thoroughly charming woman with headstrong morals and a kind heart!

Leona: And she has MASSIVE TITS!

Hifumi: I...won't comment on that...

Leona: Aw, c'mon Fumi! I've seen those cutouts in your room! You've got a thing for knockers, don't you!

Hifumi: Not if they're bouncing in my face in 3D form! Behind a screen is fine!

Leona: Alright, well, anyway, due to her fiery personality and love for strength and fighting, Akane quickly established herself as one of the muscles of the group, besides the likes of her classmates, Nekomaru Nidai and Peko Pekoyama.

Hifumi: This is most likely due to her fairly rough upbringing. It's widely unknown even to the Future Foundation where her family lived originally, but Ms Owari's family includes multiple younger and older brothers and sisters and they're not very well off. In her own words, it wasn't uncommon to wake up and find a dead body in the trash, and due to her lack of prior education, she struggles to learn basic things like names and numbers. Despite all that, Ms Owari caught the attention of Hope's Peak Academy for her skills with parkour, and her overall incredible agility.

Leona: Akane was inducted into the 77th Class as the Ultimate Gymnast. But...when I usually think of gymnasts, I usually think of people who dance gracefully around a stage with ribbons...Not whatever this battle hungry maniac is supposed to be.

Hifumi: It is indeed true that Ms Owari might be the furthest thing from your standard gymnast, but her skills speak for themselves. She's certainly agile and possesses enough stamina to pull complicated moves and techniques off. So much so that she's capable of sparring with overpowered people like Nekomaru Nidai, who also trained her to be a better fighter, as well as Sakura Ogami.

Leona: Wait, that happened in Danganronpa Summer Camp! Are we allowed to count that? It's not canon!

Hifumi: True, but it doesn't really matter at the end of the day. There aren't really any dramatic changes in power between the spinoff and the main series, so Ms Owari, Mr Nidai and Ms Ogami would be the relative strength they were during their academic years. Plus, Danganronpa S also reveals that the program doesn't change a person's physical condition, strength or speed, and assuming this fits in line with the program of Danganronpa 2, it's important to keep this in mind.

Leona: Fair enough...In that case, Sakura actually states in that game that if she were to ever stop training, it wouldn't be long before Akane surpassed her. And given that Akane shares a feat with Sakura in being able to survive an encounter with Monokuma and match him blow for blow, this might very well be the case.

Hifumi: Well...Yes and no. There are a few caveats we need to keep in mind with that feat.

Leona: Like what?

Hifumi: First of all, it's unclear what the strength difference is between Hope's Peak Monokuma and Jabberwock Island Monokuma, but it's heavily implied due to the nature of the digital world, the latter is stronger, and the only reason Ms Owari survived that encounter is because Monokuma was toying with her and her hotheadedness that made her want to challenge him in the first place. However, the fact that she survived relatively unscathed is indeed an accomplishment, even though it's implied that she was injured.

Leona: In fact, most of Akane's feats are exactly this. Despite how she's a relatively skinny thing and not packing nearly as much muscle as Sakura, Akane's biggest asset, besides her...y'know...is her abnormal defense!

Hifumi: Right! Not only did Ms Owari survive that encounter with Monokuma, her introduction scene in Danganronpa 3 paints this defense in a bright light. Nekomaru Nidai attacks her with enough force that it causes 3 explosions the SIZE OF THE ACADEMY BUILDING!

Leona: So let's do a couple calculations here. The main campus of Hope's Peak Academy is stated to be " approximately the size of four regular high-schools." The average size of a public high school is around 129,000 cubic feet, though these are just averages, and actual school building sizes can vary greatly.

Hifumi: But assuming the average is correct, that would give Hope's Peak's building a total measure of around 516,000 cubic feet. With our calculations, taking the power of one explosion then multiplying it by three, the total power of these explosions is, in the very least, around 12 Kilograms of TNT.

Leona: Speaking of Nekomaru, he and Akane have a pretty strong bond, and it's thanks to him that Akane knows a fair few techniques for fighting...even if they are fairly limited. They've sparred with one another on multiple occasions, and every time Nekomaru beats her up, Akane gets back up again real quick, raring to go another round!

Hifumi: Besides the incredible strength we mentioned just now, Mr Nidai is also, supposedly according to Mr Hanamura, able to kill a cow with his bare hands, tore the head off a giant robot, and took a bazooka head on just to protect the Gymnast. Yes, that killed him, but his body was only slightly bleeding, instead of having been blown to smithereens.

Leona: In what matches we've seen from then, one of them had them fight with so much force that it completely demolished the 77th Class's homeroom, and blew a giant hole in the wall, and Akane was also cratered into the wall and just got right back up again. In the other, Nekomaru lands a deadly punch straight to Akane's stomach, and it downs her for a minute at most.

Hifumi: Ms Owari, as she is now, is also more than capable of dishing out damage just as much as she can take it. If we scale her with other characters in the DR universe, she's most assuredly on the same level of strength as the likes of Mr Nidai, and in most materials, she's capable of launching people into the air with her punches, and in the Comic Anthology, accidentally breaks Ms Hiyoko Saionji's spine by simply pulling on the sash of her kimono.

Leona: And due to her gymnastics, stamina and athletic ability, is possibly faster than people like Genocide Jill, who is capable of dodging lightning. She climbed the Hope's Peak school building in a matter of seconds, ran so fast past Teruteru it created a force that spun him around, and then proceeded to catch knives in her teeth! In addition, her vitality and inner strength is so strong, as a Remnant of Despair, she didn't eat for what we assume is between 2-3 years and DIDN'T DIE OF STARVATION!(based on the supposed timeline of the Killing Games, with Danganronpa 2 taking place 1 year after Danganronpa 1, by which point the tragedy and the Remnants would have been around for 2 or so years) 

Hifumi: Plus, Mr Nidai states that Ms Owari is faster than any athlete he's ever seen. And as the  Ultimate Team Manager, he's has trained countless sports teams and track athletes, so a claim like this from him is a big deal! And this isn't even mentioning what is arguably her most impressive display of power so far...Her fight with Nagito Komaeda.

Leona: Now I know what you're all thinking... "Nagito's a frail wimp! And Akane almost strangled him to death in DR2! Of course she would win a fight against him!" But we're not talking about THAT Nagito Komaeda. We're talking about Nagito Komaeda from SURVIVOR, who thanks to Organization Zetsubou, took the Hope Serum and became a monster with unlimited talents, becoming an Ultimate Hope himself.

Hifumi: Granted, Ms Owari ended up losing that fight and her spine along with it, since Komaeda hadn't really awoken to his true latent abilities until that fight reached it's conclusion. However, even if we assume that Nagito Komaeda fought at around half the power of Hajime Hinata at that time, it's still an INCREDIBLE feat, especially since she was able to do significant damage AND outpace him!

Leona: AMD Especially since Hajime DID lost to Nagito in the fight they had just before that arc, even if he was massively holding back. Assuming Izuru Kamukura can reach the same relativistic speed as the likes of Mukuro Ikusaba, and Nagito at that time was half that, that's still speeds of around Mach 10! 

Hifumi: And she was able to punch his sickly body so hard, he hurtled and smashed through several stone pillars! This feat most certainly puts her on the same level as Mr Nidai's explosion feat. In fact, if we scale this feat similarly to Mr Naegi's concrete wall punching feats from our first battle, the energy required to smash Komaeda through one of these pillars is around 31.572 grams of TNT. And based on the number of crashes, we can surmise that he flew through a total of 12 pillars, effectively increasing that feat of strength to 378.864 grams of TNT, or at least a little under it!

Leona: In addition to all these amazing abilities, Akane herself possesses some traits unique to herself. It may have to do with her upbringing, but Akane has some very animal-like abilities, including sensitive ears, a bloodhound's sense of smell, and a natural danger instinct that allows her to sniff out powerful opponents. In fact, since we apparently are counting DRS and UTDP, she very almost figured out Mukuro Ikusaba's true identity by sniffing out her dangerous soldier aura...Too bad she rarely ever knows what to do with that information.

Hifumi: It's no secret that Ms Owari isn't very smart. As I mentioned before, she lives almost entirely off of passion and relies on her gut instinct. Because of this, she rarely ever has a plan and jumps into fights that she really can't win, and rarely does she think things through, come up with calculated battle plans, and she doesn't really have a unique fighting style, even with the one's Nekomaru taught her. It's part of this reason why she has such a terrible win : lose ratio compared to every other capable fighter we know.

Leona: Who cares? Neither does Kuripa, and we know how busted he is.

Hifumi: A very valid point! We will talk more about that when we get to his episode in a future season!

Leona: However, even if she is one to just fight with her fists and think with them to, it's not like Akane doesn't have her own unique equipment she can use to give herself the edge.

Hifumi: Indeed. Danganronpa 3 implies that eating food, specifically freshly prepared meat, not only increases Ms Owari's strength but restores her vitality too. Kind of like how food in RPG's does. And failing that, she also possesses a secret weapon...A Special Enhancement drug developed by Ms Seiko Kimura and Mr Teruteru Hanamura.

Leona: You're telling me she's got a final form!?

Hifumi: That she does! This is what's known as Doping Corn Soup. Granted, she's only used it twice, and both times have proved the serum puts her strength on a level either equal or above that of Mr Nidai's. Now, keeping in mind that Ms Owari DIDN'T use this during her scrap with Komaeda, and pulled off her multiple pillar feat without it. If we were to add that sort of power to the feats that she's already shown, can you imagine just how capable she could be?

Leona: Nekomaru, as a reminder, ALSO battled Nagito AFTER Akane, when he was at a higher level of power, and was able to hold out for a similar length of time. See what we were saying about him earlier for other feats of strength that Akane can now not only match, but possibly overpower. As a side effect, the soup also clearly heats up her bodies base temperature, as when she uses it for the first time in DR3, steam comes off her body in room temperature.

Hifumi: So yes...While Akane Owari may be a meat-loving meathead who's hungry for battle, and reckless to a fault, she indeed has the sheer power and capability to back up her bold claims. While once an enemy of the Future Foundation, one thing is clear now more than ever. We're happy to have her!

Leona: Shadows. According to Jungian psychological studies, they are innermost thoughts of man; specifically parts one would keep to themselves, and personalities one would wear as a mask to hide their true self. 

Hifumi: That was oddly inquisitive of you...

Leona: Well, I know this because of the importance of these studies in Shin Megami Tensei: Persona.

Hifumi: You know, I think that might be the first time I've heard someone call Persona a Shin Megami Tensei game in a while. 

Leona: It ain't what it used to be. But back in the days of Persona 4, we were riding that hype train baby! But anyway, in the world of Persona, there are certain people who can take the power of these dark sides of themselves, and use them to help them fight in other worlds, combating the evil Shadows and upholding truth and justice in their universe! One of these groups is the Inaba Investigation Team!

Hifumi: In order to more properly become stronger, one must identify their own weaknesses and improve upon them. For the Investigation Team, this was taken into a very literal sense, by confronting beings made of the worst parts of themselves, and accepting them for who they are. Alongside those like the clumsy Yosuke Hanamura and the elegant Yukiko Amagi, one of the roughest and toughest members of this quirky group, is Ms Chie Satonaka!

Leona: At face value, Chie is your average short-haired, hyperactive tomboy. She watches kung-fu movies, chows down meat like a hungry lion, and regularly kicks delinquents in the balls for bothering her bestie...and Yosuke...a lot actually...For no real reason...

Hifumi: Living in the laid-back and easygoing town of Inaba, her life was fairly uneventful and with not much excitement...That is until Yu showed up.

Leona: Me?

Hifumi: No, not YOU! Yu, as in Y-U Narukami.

Leona: What a confusing name.

Hifumi: Anyone else could easily say the same thing about Hifumi or Leona.

Leona: Persona has a Hifumi too! And she's way hotter than you!

Hifumi: First of all...rude...Secondly...true?

Leona: On Yu's first day at Yasogami High, he was on a tour of the town with Chie and Yukiko, when the trio suddenly came across the scene of a crime, where a dead body had been found hanging from some telephone poles!

Hifumi: At the same time, rumors were going round about a mysterious phenomenon called the Midnight Channel, in which staring into a TV while it was turned off at midnight while it was raining would allow one to see one's soulmate. Narukami quickly found out that this was...partly true.

Leona: It wasn't your soulmate that appeared on the other side of the screen, but as Yu and co. discovered, it showed the image of whoever it was that was going to die next. Like when the channel showed the figure of Saki Konishi, and she turned up dead soon after. Just before this, Yu, Chie and Yosuke learned that Yu had the power to enter another world by traveling through a TV screen, filled with dangerous beings, which were these Shadows.

Hifumi: Fortunately, after they entered the TV for the second time in hopes of finding out the truth behind Konishi's death, Narukami and Hanamura, along with their new companion Teddie, a strange bear that lived in that other world, discovered they could wield the powers of Personas. Things unfortunately took a turn for the worst for Satonaka, when they found out that the next person to appear on the midnight channel was none other than her best friend, Yukiko Amagi.

Leona: Chie was...to put bluntly, a little upset, and ended up charging headfirst into the TV realm. This led to an encounter with her own Shadow, which she initially rejected, but then accepted after some soul searching, and once she did, she gained the power of the Persona herself, awakening to her spiritual guardian, Tomoe! Now, since we've gotten to this point, I have to ask. Throughout the course of the game, Chie's power evolves overtime, and as it does, her Persona gains new strength and new forms. So which one of Chie's Persona's are we going to be using for this fight?

Hifumi: Excellent question! As is the case with most party members in Persona 4 and 5, Satonaka's Persona has three evolutionary stages. The initial form is Tomoe, then that ascends into Suzuka-Gongen, and finally, Haraedo-no-Okami. For this battle, we will be giving Satonaka her initial Persona, Tomoe.

Leona: Aw, really!? We're gonna nerf her so heavily!? For shame Hifumi!

Hifumi: Now hold on a moment, there IS a good reason for this. Unlike the Persona 3 characters, such as Mitsuru Kirijo or Akihiko Sanada, Suzuka-Gongen and Haraedo-no-Okami are OPTIONAL forms that are unlocked by completing Satonaka's social link, whereas for those two, it was a mandatory evolution that carries on throughout the games. Additionally, the only iteration of Persona 4's franchise where Chie's Persona ascends to the level above is Persona 4 The Animation, and she doesn't do so until the fight with Ameno-Sagiri. In sequel chapters/games like Arena and Dancing, Satonaka continues to use Tomoe as her primary Persona, so we do have to take that into account. However, as to not dumb down her abilities, even if her Persona takes base form we WILL be giving her all of her ascended Persona's abilities, like the immunity to ice and Dragon Hustle.

Leona: Ok good. At least we got that cleared up. Anyway, now that she had the power to fight, Chie used her newfound abilities to help Yukiko do the same as she did; come to terms with her own Shadow, and together, they, as well as Yu and Yosuke, formed the Investigation Team with the goal of tracking down the dirty bastard that was killing everyone and kicking plenty of Shadow ass along the way...Huh...You know, it was on the tip of my tongue the whole time, but she really reminds me of Maya.

Hifumi: She really is similar to Ms Canzanilla now that you mention it...in the good AND the bad way...

Leona: What's that supposed to mean?

Hifumi: N-Never mind...Forget I said anything. What sets Ms Satonaka apart from the other members of her team is she's the only one who doesn't really use any sort of weapon, not even a steel chair like Tatsumi or a fan like Amagi. Instead, she relies on her own raw strength, and her mighty, and fine legs.

Leona: Don't be simping on main Fumi.

Hifumi: I'm just quoting the show!

Leona: Yeah, but seriously, from watching all those action-packed kung-fu movies, Chie learned how to really stick it to the Shadows, mostly with her powerful kicking abilities. For some extra oomph, she can also equip special kinds of boots to increase her attack power; the most powerful of which are the Moses Sandals, which also raises her critical hit rate.

Hifumi: As for her Persona, Tomoe is armed with a double-ended polearm, which allows her to skewer and slice Satonaka's enemies. And not only that, because of the magical power of her Persona, Satonaka is also capable of cryokinesis...However, her own brand of this power is limited compared to other ice users like Kirijo, Teddie and Kitagawa.

Leona: Chie does start off as the party's resident ice user, but as time goes on, she starts to drift away from those kinds of attacks as Teddie ends up taking that spot, choosing instead to specialize in raw physical power. This includes moves such as God's Hand, which summons a super powerful fist strong enough to pound a Shadow so hard, it obliterates the ground beneath it, Agneyastra, which is kind of a less-powerful meteor shower but STILL a freaking meteor shower, and Mind Slice, which can fuck with an opponents mind and cause them to panic.

Hifumi: If the need arises, she also has access to light skills that allow her to instantly KO opponents, though this doesn't work on particularly powerful opponents like bosses. And even in the case these powerful physical blows aren't enough to take her opponent down, Satonaka can use abilities like Tarukaja, which raises her attack power, Rebellion, which increases her critical hit rate, and Counterstrike, which can reflect strong physical blows right back at her opponent. 

Leona: And as we said before, at her max power, Chie can use her own signature move Dragon Hustle, which raises all of her stats, like her power, defense and speed. However, it should be noted that this doesn't last for very long. Three attacking turns at least. 

Hifumi: And assuming that a turn in combat is equal to a minute in real time, that would mean each effect lasts only 3 minutes. 

Leona: The Persona has a few other weaknesses as well. For example, even though it is a spirit, it can still be hurt by regular attacks, and if it takes too much damage, it can break, and thus becomes unusable for a short time. Also, since Tomoe is a part of Chie's soul, any damage done to the Persona is reflected back on Chie herself as mental damage. 

Hifumi: Also, using a Persona for too long induces this same break effect, and can tire out the user. Physical attacks drain health while magic attacks drain stamina. These can be replenished with spells and items.

Leona: However, these buffs would definitely last long enough to allow Chie to pull off her most extraordinary ability...the GALACTIC PUNT! A kick so powerful, it can send any opponent into the stratosphere!

Hifumi: That...might be a bit of an exaggeration. Given how little is explained about the move, it's only been shown to send enemies flying off into the horizon. It's never outright stated that Satonaka's kick can send enemies to space. Even so, a kick like that must have a power level equal to or around 770,000 Newtons, or 166 Grams of TNT. 

Leona: Ok, but what about bigger opponents that she's used the Punt on? Like Iron Tager or Blitztank?

Hifumi: Those, unfortunately, don't count. BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle may feature Ms Satonaka's moves from the Arena games, but it's not canon to Persona 4's storyline. If it's canon anywhere, it's the BlazBlue storyline specifically, so we can't take that into account. She HAS launched Shadows bigger than her into the horizon, but it's hard to lock down an exact weight for some of these Shadows. Even then, they can't be that much heaver or durable than the Investigation Team are themselves for this to be possible, and it's not like she can use the Galactic Punt on Boss Shadows like the Reaper.

Leona: But she's beaten the Reaper, right?

Hifumi: Yes, and opponents just as strong, if not stronger, like Izanami or Ameno-Sagiri. However, we need to make it perfectly clear here that Satonaka did not defeat these foes by herself. Frankly, due to her own set of weaknesses, it's very unlikely that she could. For example, she lacks any definitive way to heal herself, and given her focus on physical attacks which drain her vitality, this isn't an ideal scenario.

Leona: Also, Chie may be one of the physically strongest members of her team, but that's really the only leg she has up on her teammates...pun surprisingly not intended. She is blindingly fast, being able to dodge fire and lightning attacks from Shadows and Personas alike, but she's nowhere near the fastest member of her team, as Yosuke and Yu have been show to outspeed most of her attacks. But her biggest flaw in her overall stat pool is her defense.

Hifumi: Satonaka is what we call a "glass cannon", a term used in roleplaying games, board games or video games to describe a character or unit with strong offensive power but weak defensive capabilities. Her most impressive feat of survival is being able to directly withstand flaming attacks from Shadow Yukiko, despite her and her Persona having a crippling weakness to fire, but aside from that, she hasn't shown to be very physically durable, and can be taken down easily by a strong enough enemy.

Leona: But defense or no defense, Chie's got more than enough firepower and willpower to take her opponents down one at a time. And with the aid of Yu, Yosuke, Yukiko and everyone else, she was able to become the hero the quiet town of Inaba needed, solving the murderous mystery, and living the rest of her life with her head held high...And it turns out she found her calling in dancing not soon after!

Hifumi: I still shudder to accept that Dancing All Night is canon...

Hifumi: Alright, the combatants are set! Let's see which of our fighters comes out on top this time!

Leona: IT'S TIME FOR A DEEAAATH BAAATTLLLLLLEEE!

The scene opens to a peaceful day on a quiet street. A young adult Chie Satonaka walks down the street with her hands in her pockets, minding her own business.

Chie: {Hums to the tune of I'll face myself} Hm HM hm~ Hm HM hm~ Hm HM hm-HMMMGH!?

She freezes, her eyes widen, and her body tenses up as something within the window catches her eye. Inside the butchers, a perfectly prepared cut of juicy meet lies on display. Her tongue sticks out and she starts drooling on the glass like a dog.

Chie: Oh my gosh...! So thick...! So fresh...! Oh I can almost taste it from here! I gotta have it...! Wait...

She checks her pocket to see how much cash she has in her wallet. Her eyes light up when she realizes she has spare change.

Chie: Yes!

She brazenly barges into the store with a sunlight smile on her face.

Chie: Hey, Boss! I'll be taking that-HUH!?

As Chie reaches out to grab the fresh meat, a girl of taller stature than her and long brown messy hair reaches out for it at the same time. They stare at each other, their hands twitching as they reach out for their shared prize.

Chie: Excuse me...But this is mine, thanks...

Akane: Hey, I was here first, shrimp...Wait in line.

Chie: Grrrgh! WAATCHAH!

Akane: GUHUGH!

Akane snatches the meat from Chie, who responds in kind by karate kicking Akane through the butchers window. With some of the meat still in hand, Akane crawls to her feet and glares the girl down, as Chie adopts a fighting stance.

Chie: How about this!? We battle, right here and now! Whoever wins gets that meat!

Akane: Oh buddy...You don't know what you just started...HRGH!

*RIP!*

Akane tears off her shirt and skirt to show her training outfit underneath it, and pounds her chest competitively.

Chie: ...

For a moment, Chie looks embarrassed down at her own lacking chest, but shakes off that shame and goes in for the first attack.

Chie: HYATCHA! WATATATATATATATATATATATATA!

Akane: MUDADADADADADADADADADADA!

Or rather the first several...Chie opens with a flurry of kicks, which Akane does her best to parry, though the speed of the girls attacks make it fairly difficult. Chie then lands and goes for more precise kicks, which slowly overwhelm the Ultimate Gymnast.

Chie: Aw, what's wrong big girl!? Can't keep up!?

Akane: Hrgh...Cut it out, you damn pest! 

Chie: WAAGH!?

Akane grabs Chie's leg during one of her kicks and flings her over her shoulder, sending her flying back through the air. Chie skids along the ground, trying to retain her balance, and looks up fearfully as Akane rushes toward her at a superhuman speed, reeling up for a punch. However, a blue glowing tarot card appears in front of Chie in this dire moment, and knowing immediately what to do, she kicks it and breaks it.

Chie: Grr...TOMOE!

Tomoe appears above Chie and spins it's polearm, creating a blast of icy wind that hits Akane dead on. Her body slowly freezes over, slowing her down.

Akane: Gah...What the hell!?

Chie: Haha! Score 1 for...W-Wait!?

She suddenly whirls around to look up at Tomoe.

Chie: How am I doing that!? This is the real world, why is my Persona-?

Akane: HYAGH!

Chie: CHII! HAMAON!

Akane: Huh!? YAGH!

Having dropped her guard for a second, Chie is unprepared as Akane catches up to her, brushing off the ice and ramming into her head-first! Chie tries to activate her insta-kill bless skill, but Akane dodges it.

Chie: RAAGH!

Akane: Gegh! Agh! AHOOGH! OW! AGCCH! YAHOOO!

*SMAAASH!*

Chie quickly recovers despite the heavy blow, and chooses not to question things, as she and Tomoe start to combo Akane. Despite being able to hold a defensive stance until now, the duo of Persona and user overwhelm her pretty quickly. Tomoe spins it's weapon and smacks Akane so hard, she flies back and gets cratered into the side of a building.

Akane: Urgh...Not again...! H-Huh!?

Chie: Haha! HOPE YOU'RE READY! 

Akane shakes off her fatigue quickly and looks up to see Tomoe and Chie readying an attack. A huge golden fist appears propelled by rocket fire, and flies straight towards her.

Akane: Ggrrgh...OMPH!

Akane takes the cuts of meat she was able to pull off earlier and stuffs them in her mouth. As soon as she swallows them, her eyes twinkle with excitement.

Akane: Hell yeah! LET'S GO!

*KABOOOOOOOOM!*

Akane: EAT THIS!

*SHATTER!*

Chie: Aaaagh! 

Akane: DORYAAGH!

Chie: DAAGH!? OOF OOH ACK!

With the meat restoring her vitality and getting her on her feet faster, Akane is able to dodge out of the way of the God's Hand as it obliterates the wall behind her. She lunges into the air towards Tomoe and with one powerful swing, takes the Persona out! Chie collapses to her knees, clutching her head as the damage is reflected back onto her. Akane then lunges towards Chie and punches her in the jaw so hard, she skips along the ground like a stone on the water.

Akane: Fight me one on one like a man, cheater!

Chie: I'm not a man, moron! And neither are you! But alright...you asked for it...! HYUAGH!

Akane: YAGH!

Chie: WATCHAGH!

Akane: UHUGH!

Akane swipes at Chie with a sideways karate chop as the spunky dragon flies at her. She jumps over the chop and elbows Akane in the neck.

Chie: OOPH!

Akane spins around and kicks Chie in the mouth.

Akane: BLUAGH!

Chie lands on the ground, bounces back and haymaker's Akane's jaw.

Chie: GHUAGH!

Akane backflips, lunges forward and headbutts Chie in the face.

Akane: PHOOGH!

Chie kicks Akane in the stomach.

Chie: LEAGH!

Akane slaps Chie around the face.

Akane: AUUGH!?

Chie punches Akane in the...um..."assets"

Akane: BAHAGH!

Chie: BAHAGH!

Akane: AAUGH!

Chie: AAUGH!

Akane: UHUAGH!

Chie: UHUAGH!

Akane: DOOGH!

Chie: DOOGH!

And thus the cycle continues...Until the two kick each other in the face and spin backwards, distance being put between each other. 

Akane: Man, Legs...You are hard to put down...!

Chie: Alright...That DOES it...! DRAGON'S FURY!

Akane: ...!?

Chie: AGNEYASTRA!

Akane: AGH! OOH! UHUGH! N-No fair! AGHCK!

Having now bought enough time for her Persona to reform, Chie summons Tomoe again, and the image of a long golden dragon surrounds Chie as she powers herself up with Dragon Hustle. The pressure emanating from her is immense to the point that Akane can feel it even from a distance, and is barely able to react in time as several small meteors come crashing down on top of her, destroying the road around her.

Chie: Hrugh!

Akane: Uh oh...!

Chie stretches out her legs, and Akane is unable to react in time when she rushes forward at an increased speed and drops down.

Chie: Galactic...PUNT!

Akane: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGH!

Akane is just about able to block Chie's ultimate move, but the force of the kick still rockets her up into the air. 

Chie: Ok Tomoe...Let's finish this!

Tomoe holds out it's polearm and Chie stands on one end of it, letting her Persona fling her up into the air like a shotput.

Akane: (Ugh...This is bad...There's gotta be something I can...Huh?)

Akane tries her best to think of some kind of tactic, but reaches into her pocket and pulls out a bottle. Inside the bottle is a strange green mixture, and her eyebrows raise as she recognizes it.

Akane: Oh...yeah...I forgot I had this...Welp, no time like the present!

Chie: Huh?

Chie, now running up the wall of the skyscraper she smashed Akane into earlier to catch up with her, looks to see her opponent drinking a strange green fluid. She starts to panic as Akane's body grows in size; her muscles and veins bulge out, and her body starts to emanate something fierce.

Akane: HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGHH!!!

Chie: Grr...TOMOE!

Tomoe blasts more ice at Akane with the intent of freezing her over, but this fails to do much due to the heat radiating off of Akane's bulky build. With an ear-to-ear smirk on her face, she crushes the bottle in her hands and smashes onto the side of the building, running back down it to clash with Chie.

Akane: This is it, coconut-head! YOU'RE GOIN' DOWN!

Chie: You mean YOU are, JERK! BEHOLD MY WRATH!

*BAM!* *WHACK!* *THUMP!* *POW!* *THUD!*

Akane: Agh! Dogh! Gagh! OHOGH! GRRGH!

Chie: Graggh! Ugh! Dagh! Gahagh! RAAAGH!

 *SLAP!* *BOP!* *BONK!* *BANG!* *PING!* *NUU-WOM!*

Chie: HOOOOOAAAAAAAAAGGH!

Akane: KURRAAAAAAAAAAAAGGH!

Akane and Chie: HA-CHAAAAAAAAAGGH!

*CRACK!* *BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!*

After repeatedly hitting each other with immensely powerful punches and kicks to the face and chest, scaling the building the whole time and destroying the area around them with the sheer force of their attacks, Chie and Akane reel back a kick and a punch respectively, and clash. The force of the clash causes the entire skyscraper to split completely in half! But then...

*Sizzle...*

*Crack!*

Akane and Chie: Huh!?

Simultaneously, both of them power down. Chie loses her stat buffs as Dragon Hustle wears off, and Akane's muscles slowly retract and her body begins to it's normal size and strength. The two are alarmed by their sudden power decrease, and then become unfortunately aware of just how high up they are, as well as the fact that they're suspended sideways in the air, and just destroyed their only footing

Chie: Oh...

Akane: Shit...

Akane and Chie: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHHHH!!!

And just like that, they PLUMMIT! Chie waves her arms wildly and Akane's eyes widen in horror as they fall a long, long, LONG way down!

Chie: Grrrgh! TOMOEEE!

Akane: !!??

Though running low on fuel, Chie summons Tomoe again to launch her just like before. Chie soars towards Akane and grabs her by the collar, reeling back for another powerful kick!

Chie: GALACTIC PUUUNNT!

Akane: NOT THIS TIME, KID!

Chie is horrified as Akane dodges her superpowered kick, and screams in agony as she elbows her knee and breaks her leg!

Akane: That ain't a punt...! THIS is a PUNT! HYAAAAAAAAGGHH!

Akane in turn, grabs Chie by the shirt, throws her upwards, and volleyball slams her back down to the ground with every ounce of strength she has! Chie flies so fast she smashes through the image of her own Persona and rockets to the ground like a meteor!

Chie: AAAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGH-

*KRAAAKOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!*

*SMASH!*

Akane: Hmph!

Akane steadies herself and safely lands on the ground, the road beneath her shattering apart. Behind her, a ginormous cloud of some erupts as a city block is destroyed from the impact of Chie's volleyballed body.

Akane: Haaagh...Haagh...Haah...Huh?

*SMACK!*

A severed arm slaps down in front of the Ultimate Gymnast, holding a wallet with slightly charred money poking out.

Akane: Haha! Yes! That meat is MINE! Come home to mamm-Hah!?

Akane snatches Chie's wallet and turns to head back to the butchers...only to realize that it, and the meat inside it, was enveloped by the explosion and burned to a crisp.

Akane: NOHOHOHOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!

Leona: Now I know what you all must be thinking...Ahem... "WHAT!? HOW!? WHY!? WHAAAAAATT!?"

Hifumi: I know it sounds ridiculous, but-!

Leona: "ARE YOU SERIOUS RIGHT NOW!?"

Hifumi: SHUSH! Hoo...Believe us, the results of this matchup were certainly a surprise! We all know Ms Akane Owari to be a rather foolhardy, not very delicate fighter, who flies headfirst into danger without really thinking about how outmatched she might be. And it's because of her mentality that she ends up falling short of victory more times than not...But THIS is NOT one of those times!

Leona: I think one of the main sources of confusion with the results is likely that people thought due to Chie's crazy mystical Persona-summoning powers, Tomoe was more than enough for her to score a victory, especially with it's ice powers and superpowered attacks, made stronger by how it can buff itself.

Hifumi: And that was indeed a legitimate possibility! If we were to run this match 100 times over, Satonaka would undoubtedly score quite a fair few victories, but based primarily on what the two fighters have been shown to be capable of, it's likely that Ms Owari can pull off the victory more times than not.

Leona: To start with, their respective stat pools were actually pretty even on most fronts. Chie is fast enough to dodge magical fire and lightning attacks from the likes of Akihiko Sanada or Shadows that use lightning abilities. However, given that Akane's base speed and agility has been confirmed to surpass most athletes trained and managed by Nekomaru, it's probable that she can match or even outspeed those like Toko Fukawa and Mukuro Ikusaba, who are capable of almost the exact same feat. Even if it is still likely that Chie is faster based on how SHE scales with speedy characters like Yosuke and Naoto, Akane would still be agile enough to keep pace with her. In the very least, she would be more than fast enough to dodge Chie's insta-kill light skills.

Hifumi: Ms Owari also had no definitive way to take down Chie's Persona, Tomoe. Sure, she was definitely tough enough to destroy it, which would have mentally damaged Satonaka and left her vulnerable, but the Persona wouldn't have stayed down for very long, certainly not long enough for Ms Owari to find an opening because...she doesn't really do that...

Leona: However, even though one of them actually has a proper education, the same is true for Chie. In truth, she's actually not that much smarter than Akane, and she also has a track history of jumping headfirst into dangerous situations, where she could easily end up outmatched. In that regard, these two are the exact same.

Hifumi: Another thing to consider is power. Satonaka did indeed have some powerful physical attacks from both herself, like the Galactic Punt, and even more from her Persona like God's Hand and Agneyastra. However, in the Persona 4 Arena Ultimax manga, Satonaka uses God's Hand on Hanamura, and he's able to dodge out of the way of it; causing the fist to smash into the floor and shatter apart the tiles underneath it. In contrast, Ms Owari has punched someone THROUGH multiple solid pillars, and she didn't even need to buff herself up to do that. Her feat of strength is undeniably stronger!

Leona: Even in their base levels of power, Chie could always use buffing spells to power herself up and increase her chance of landing a killing blow. But Akane had basically the same thing on an equal or even greater level. In Danganronpa Survivor, the effects of the Doping Corn Soup don't last for very long, but they most certainly last longer than any of Chie's damage and speed buffs, including Dragon Hustle. Also, as far as Chie's ice powers go, if Akane can break through solid stone like ice...well...then she can break through ice like it's paper! That, and given that the Corn Soup clearly heats up her body in some kind of way, she could probably just MELT the ice if she decided to use it.

Hifumi: But the real key to victory lied in one thing in particular...Defense and survivability!

Leona: That's two things...

Hifumi: But they fall under the same umbrella! The most potent feat of survival that Persona users have shown to exhibit in the core series is the...as Boomstick originally called it, the "Oh shit, we're dead!" explosion from Persona 3. However, given that Persona 3 and 4 are set in different realities and rely on different logic, the survival feats of the Investigation Team can't accurately be scaled with that of S.E.E.S, besides perhaps their Persona abilities in the Arena series.

Leona: Chie has beaten the likes of Akihiko in fights before but only in her own route of the P4A story, not really in any core canon material. To be frank, like we said before, Chie being a glass cannon means that her feats of survival simply DO NOT COMPARE, to Akane.

Hifumi: Ms Owari has survived being punched straight in the stomach by Mr Nidai, tanked a building-level explosion that completely blows Satonaka's Galactic Punt out of the water, got right back up after being cratered into a wall, and was able to sustain fighting against Nagito Komaeda while he was at half his power, who went onto completely obliterate her spine, which she later completely recovered from.

Leona: While it is true that Chie has aided in fights against literal gods, that feat can primarily be attributed to the team, not just her strength. To be honest, considering Chie lacks any sort of way to heal herself, unlike Akane who could somewhat restore her vitality and boost her strength just by eating meat, it's unlike she even COULD beat the likes of Izanami and the Reaper on her own. This is made even worse when you think about how Akane's stamina is godlike, and Chie's gets exponentially drained every time she uses her Persona to attack. And to top it all off, believe it or not with Akane's fairly lazy attitude; even if it is by only a few hairs, Akane IS the more experienced fighter of the two of them!

Hifumi: Since their Hope's Peak days, Ms Owari has continued to receive advice and training from Mr Nidai, who has most famously trained top athletes and fighters on an ABOVE professional level. Sure, she's a slow learning student, but by comparison, all of what Satonaka knows about fighting comes from simply watching action movies. An impressive enough feat on it's own to replicate those moves, sure, but not enough when compared to someone who has literally been trained by the greatest trainer in the WORLD.

Leona: And yeah, sure, Chie does technically get SOME advice from Akihiko, but this happens AFTER she's already defeated a god with her team, and even then, Akihiko is more of a life coach than a combat coach.

Hifumi: Chie Satonaka may have been immensely strong, had a much wider arsenal of abilities, and could definitely compete with Akane Owari, but in the end, the Ultimate Gymnast's feats of strength and durability sent the spunky dragon back where she came from!

Leona: It was nothing "Persona-l" Chie, just know Akane Owari is the strongest person you could ever hope to "meat!"

THE WINNER IS AKANE OWARI!

Next time:

You'd be hard strung to find a personal bodyguard better than these two, but will their personalities define your decision, or their strength? If it's the latter, then you'd best pay close attention!

[nicklloydnow]

“With Trump’s victory, the left reached its zero point.

Before we plunge into platitudes about “Trump’s triumph,” we should note some important details. First, that Trump didn’t get more votes than he did in the 2020 election—it was Kamala Harris who lost some 10 million votes compared to Joe Biden last time around. So it isn’t so much that “Trump won big” as it is Harris who lost big. It follows that all leftist critics of Trump should begin with radical self-criticism.

We must dispense with the racial-essentialist cant that came to dominate progressivism in recent decades. Trump’s victory should leave little room for the tendency to valorize certain groups based on their skin color. Among the points to be noted here, there is the unpleasant fact that immigrants, especially from Latin countries, are almost inherently conservative: They come to the United States not to change it, but to succeed in the system. Or as Todd McGowan has put it: “They want to create a better life for themselves and their family, not to better their social order.”

By the same token, we must reject the notion that Harris lost because she is a nonwhite woman. No, Harris lost because Trump stood for politics and political contestation, while she stood for nonpolitics or antipolitics. She took many progressive stances, on health care, abortion, and more. However, Trump and his partisans repeatedly made clear, “extreme” statements, while Harris exceeded in avoiding difficult choices, offering empty rhetoric. In this respect, Harris is similar to Britain’s Keir Starmer, who just happened to have the great good fortune of going up against an unpopular incumbent party that had been in power for a decade and a half. Like Starmer, Harris avoided taking a clear stance on the Gaza war, thus losing support not only from hard-line Zionists, but also Muslim imams and community leaders.

What Democrats failed to learn from Trump is that, in a political battle, “extremism” works. In her concession speech, Harris said: “To the young people who are watching, it is OK to feel sad and disappointed, but please know it’s going to be OK.” No, everything is not going to be OK. We should not trust that future history will somehow restore balance or harmony. With Trump’s victory, the trend that elevated the new populist right in many European countries reaches its climax.

(…)

Here again, we should begin with a critique of Trump’s opponents. The philosopher Boris Buden rejects the predominant interpretation that sees the rise of the new right-populism as a regression to quasi-religious fanaticism caused by the failure of modernization. For Buden, religion as a political force is instead an effect of the post-political disintegration of society, of the dissolution of traditional mechanisms that guaranteed stable communal links: Fundamentalist religion—of the kind that fuels part of Trump’s base (even as he abandons its social-conservative commitments)—is not only political, it is politics itself, i.e., it sustains the space for politics.

Even more poignantly, it is no longer just a social phenomenon, but the very texture of society, so that in a way society itself becomes a religious phenomenon. It is thus no longer possible to distinguish the purely spiritual aspect of religion from its politicization: In a post-political universe, religion is the predominant space in which antagonistic passions return. What happened recently in the guise of religious fundamentalism is thus not the return of religion in politics, but simply the return of the political as such. So the true question is: Why did the political—in the radical secular sense, the great achievement of European modernity—lose its formative power?

(…)

Here, ideology enters the scene—not just ideology in the sense of ideas and guiding principles, but ideology in a more basic sense of how political discourse functions as a social link. Aaron Schuster has observed that Trump is “an overpresent leader whose authority is based on his own will and who openly disdains knowledge—it is this rebellious, anti-systemic theater that serves as the point of identification for the people.” This is why Trump’s serial insults and outright lies—not to mention the fact that he is a convicted criminal—work for him: His ideological triumph resides in the fact that his followers experience their obedience to him as a form of subversive resistance.

Here we should mobilize the Freudian notion of the “theft of enjoyment”: an Other’s enjoyment inaccessible to us (as woman’s enjoyment is for men, or another ethnic group’s enjoyment is for our group), or our rightful enjoyment stolen from us by an Other or threatened by an Other. Russel Sbriglia noticed that the “theft of enjoyment” played a crucial role when Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021: What happened on Jan. 6 wasn’t a coup attempt, but a carnival, previously the model for progressive protest movements, suddenly appropriated by the right. The idea that carnivals represent a subversion of the status quo not only in their form and atmosphere (theatrical performances, humorous chants), but also in their non-centralized organization, is deeply problematic: Is capitalist social reality itself not already carnivalesque? Was the Kristallnacht of 1938 not a carnival if there ever was one? Furthermore, is “carnival” not also the name for the obscene underside of power, from gang rapes to mass lynchings? Let us not forget that Michail Bakhtin developed the notion of carnival in his book on Rabelais written in the 1930s, as a direct reply to the carnival of the Stalinist purges.

The contrast between Trump’s official ideological message (conservative values, of a kind) and the style of his public performance (saying more or less whatever pops up in his head, insulting others and violating all rules of good manners) says a great deal about our predicament. What kind of world do we live in in which bombarding the public with indecent vulgarities presents itself as the last barrier to protect traditional values from the triumph of total permissiveness? Or as Alenka Zupančič put it, Trump isn’t a relic of the old moral-majority conservativism—rather, he is the caricatural inverted image of postmodern “permissive society” itself, a product of this society’s own antagonisms, contradictions, and inner limitations.

Adrian Johnston has proposed “a complementary twist on Jacques Lacan’s dictum according to which ‘repression is always the return of the repressed’: The return of the repressed sometimes is the most effective repression.” Is this not also a concise definition of the figure of Trump? As Freud said about perversion, in it, everything that was repressed, all repressed content, comes out in all its obscenity. But this return of the repressed only strengthens the repression. And this is also why there is nothing liberating in Trump’s obscenities: They merely strengthen social oppression and mystification. Trump’s obscene performances thus express the falsity of his populism: To put it with brutal simplicity, while acting as if he cares for the ordinary people, he promotes big capital.

How to account for the strange fact that Trump, lewd and the very opposite of Christian decency, can function as the chosen hero of the Christian conservatives? The explanation one usually hears is that, while Christian conservatives are well aware of the problematic character of Trump’s personality, they have resolved to ignore his seedy dimension, since what really matters to them is Trump’s agenda, especially his anti-abortion stance (though he played it down this time around). But are things as simple as that? What if the very duality of Trump’s personality—his ostensible support for traditional morality accompanied by personal lewdness and vulgarities—is precisely what makes him attractive to Christian conservatives? What if they secretly identify with this very duality? This, however, doesn’t mean that we should take too seriously the images that abound in our media of a typical Trumpian as an obscene fanatic. No, the vast majority of Trump voters are ordinary people who appear decent and talk in a normal, rational way. It is as if they externalize their madness and obscenity in Trump.

(…)

This coming-open of the obscene background of our ideological space in no way means that the time of mystification is over, that now ideology openly displays its cards. On the contrary, when obscenity penetrates the public scene, ideological mystification is at its strongest: The true political, economic, and ideological stakes are more invisible than ever. Public obscenity is always sustained by a concealed moralism. Its practitioners secretly believe they are fighting for a cause, and it is at this level that they should be attacked.

Recall the sheer number of times that liberal media outlets crowed that Trump was finally caught with pants down, that he had finally committed a public suicide (mocking POWs, boasting about pussy-grabbing, etc.). Arrogant liberal commentators were shocked at how their continuous attacks on Trump’s vulgar outbursts didn’t hurt him at all, but maybe even enhanced his popular appeal. They missed how identification works: We as a rule identify with the other’s weaknesses, not only or even not principally with his strengths. So the more Trump’s limitations were mocked, the more ordinary people identified with him and perceived attacks on him as condescending attacks on themselves.

The subliminal message to ordinary people of Trump’s vulgarities was: I am one of you! This, while ordinary Trump supporters felt constantly humiliated by the liberal elite’s patronizing attitude towards them. Or as Alenka Zupančič put it succinctly: “The extremely poor do the fighting for the extremely rich, as it was clear in the election of Trump. And the left does little else than scold and insult them.” Indeed, the left does what is even worse: It patronizingly “understands” the confusion and blindness of the poor. This left-liberal arrogance explodes at its purest in the political-comedy shows anchored by the likes of Jon Stewart and John Oliver.

(…)

The problem isn’t that Trump is a clown. The problem is that there is a program behind his provocations, a method in his madness. Trump’s (and others’) vulgar obscenities are part of their populist strategy to sell this program to ordinary people, a program that—in the long term, at least—works against ordinary people: lower taxes for the rich, shoddier health care and diminished bargaining power for workers. Unfortunately, people are ready to swallow many things if these are presented to them through obscene laughter and false solidarity.

The ultimate irony of Trump’s project is that MAGA effectively amounts to its opposite: Make the United States another local superpower interacting on equal footing with other new local superpowers (Russia, India, China). An EU diplomat was right to point out that, with Trump’s victory, Europe should no longer act as Washington’s “fragile little sister.” Will Europe find the strength to oppose MAGA with something that could be called MEGA—make Europe great again—by resuscitating its radical emancipatory legacy?

The lesson of Trump’s victory is the opposite of what many liberal leftists advocated: Whatever remains of the left should get rid of its fear that it will lose centrist voters if they are perceived as too “extreme.” The left should clearly distinguish itself from the “progressive” liberal center and its corporate-friendly woke-ism. To do this brings its own risks, of course: The state itself might be divided between three or more factions, with no big governing coalition capable of taking form. However, taking this risk is the only way forward.

Hegel wrote that through its repetition, a historical event asserts its necessity. When Napoleon lost in 1813 and was exiled to Elba, this defeat may have appeared as something contingent: With better military strategy, he might have won. But when he returned to power again and lost at Waterloo, it became clear that his time was over, that his defeat was grounded in a deeper historical necessity. The same goes for Trump: His first victory could still be attributed to tactical mistakes, but now that he has won again, it should become clear that Trumpian populism expresses a historical necessity.

A sad conclusion thus imposes itself. Many commentators expect that Trump’s reign will be marked by catastrophic events, but the worst option is that there will be no great shocks: Trump will try to finish the ongoing wars (not least by imposing a peace on Ukraine); the economy will remain stable and perhaps even thrive; tensions will be attenuated; life will go on…. However, a whole series of federal and local measures will continuously undermine the existing liberal-democratic social pact and change the basic texture that holds together the United States—unraveling what Hegel called Sittlichkeit, the set of unwritten customs and rules that underpin politeness, truthfulness, social solidarity, political rights, and so on. This new world will appear as a new normality, and in this sense, Trump’s second reign may well bring about the end of what was most precious in our civilization.”

“On Tuesday, American men showed that they weren’t buying what the Harris-Walz campaign was selling. Donald Trump, liberal America’s avatar of toxic masculinity, won male voters by a margin of 10 percentage points to 13 points, depending on the survey. Harris won women, but by a much smaller seven or eight points. Men without a college degree supported Trump by 22 points. White men supported him by 20 points to 23 points, again depending on the survey. And white men without a college degree, those the Harris campaign hoped would see themselves in “America’s coach,” favored Trump by an overwhelming 38 points to 40 points.

The most impressive gendered result of the election has to be the response of young men. According to The Wall Street Journal, men aged 18 to 29 supported Joe Biden in 2020 by 15 points. In 2024, they favored Donald Trump by 14 points, an astounding 29-point swing in a single election. CNN found a much smaller Trump lead among young men of two points, but even this is a significant transformation. Democrats long believed that young people were their electoral Superman, weakened only by the kryptonite of indifference. If they could get these young voters to the polls, victory would be assured. This election just cast those illusions onto the ash heap of history.

(…)

In the end, liberal women in the media had the better measure of Minnesota’s governor. Rebecca Traister lauded Walz as an example of the emergent “Democratic man newly confident in his equal-to-subsidiary status.” Karrin Vasby Andersen praised Walz for “stepping back” and playing “contented second fiddle.” Alyce Collins acclaimed his “positive masculinity” for “showing more traditionally feminine traits” and “letting women take center stage.” Judy Berman echoed this in complimenting Walz’s “gentle form of masculinity.” Joy Reid dubbed it downright “21st century.” American women seemed to admire Walz’s masculinity far more so than did American men. Like those in 2016 who described Donald Trump as a poor man’s idea of a rich man, Walz proved to be a professional-managerial-class woman’s idea of a working-class man.

Already by mid-October, Team Harris was running low on joy. Democrats started playing hardball to close the gender gap with men. Barack Obama scolded black men in Pennsylvania for their lack of enthusiasm for the Harris-Walz campaign, explicitly accusing “the brothers” of misogyny. In Michigan, Michelle Obama tried to shame men with abortion rights, rebuking those considering a vote for Trump for treating women as “just baby-making vessels” and turning them into “collateral damage to your rage.” In the waning days of the campaign, the Democratic super PAC Progress Action Fund targeted young men with ad buys on social media warning them—in graphic terms—that their consumption of pornography and emergency contraception was at stake. Democrats were right to be worried. White men increased their vote for Trump at most by one percentage point. Black men added around 12 points, doubling their support from 2020. Hispanic men shifted to the right by anywhere from nine points to a shocking 17 points.

(…)

Americans might be consoled by the fact that, on the female side, the gender gap has actually shrunk over the Trump era. According to Pew Research analysis of validated voters, Hillary Clinton enjoyed a 15-point advantage among women in 2016, compared to 11 points for Biden in 2020. As noted earlier, current surveys for the 2024 race show Harris’s advantage among women down to seven or eight points. Men were also becoming less polarized over time. In 2016, Trump enjoyed an 11-point advantage among them, compared to two points in 2020. Some Democrats interpret the 2024 election’s return to 2016 levels among men as an undoubtable sign of misogyny. They would do better to instead see it as a reaction against those same Democrats’ attempts to scold, shame, denigrate, and manipulate men on the grounds of being men. Democrats don’t get to decide who is allowed to play gender politics; sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Turning the temperature down—way down—on gender politics will not only help Democrats in the future. It will help America as a whole.”

[i-guess-i-got-genshin]

First things first, I'm somewhat bouncing off of the theory @crows-of-buckets posted about Neuvillette, mainly because they portray the imagery of the new Fontaine trailer so well and also, I feel like it's only right to mention them since it's their post that made me decide that I wanted to post my own theory. I should also note, their theory touches on Khaenria and Celestia. I will not as I'm not too familiar and this will just be focused and what I think the role he'll occupy will be, story-wise, and perhaps Fontaine's overall archon quest theme.

I'm going to recap some points made by crows-of-buckets first and then explain my view of the details given.

They mention that in the newest Fontaine trailer, Neuvillette during the scene where Neuvillette and Clorinde is walking down the hallway, he steps out of the shadows and the light reflecting onto him resembles prison bars.

There is also the scene of Furina/Focalors wanting to see a real twist while holding the burning remains of a photo's borders in a way that frames Neuvillette.

crows-of-buckets believe that Neuvillette will be imprisoned somehow. And I agree, but for different reasons.

I'm gonna take a step back before I continue. In every region we've visited so far in Teyvat, each archon had a right-hand in someway. What I mean by this, is there is a character who shares an element with the archon of their region, and helps the archon achieve their goals in one way or another. They also most likely have a high-ranking position of some kind.

So far there has been:

Venti - Jean

Zhongli - Ningguang

Ei - Yae Miko

Nahida - Alhaitham

Jean is of high status in the Knights of Favonius as the Acting Grand Master, and helped Venti calm Devalin.

Ningguang is the Tianquan of the Liyue Qixing, and assisted in protecting Liyue so Zhongli could fulfill his final contract. (Assuming she knows his real identity, which I believe she does).

Yae Miko is the Head Priestess of the Grand Narukami Shrine, and used every trick up her sleeve to help Ei and end the Vision Hunt Decree.

Alhaitham is the Scribe of the Akedemiya, and was once Acting Grand Sage, and assisted in rescuing Nahida from the previous Grand Sage.

They all also assisted the traveler in their journey, one way or another.

To bring this full circle, Neuvillette is the Chief Justice of Fontaine, he most likely has a hydro vision (look at him) and he very clearly values what Focalors stands for.

With him (most likely) checking off all the boxes, this makes him Focalors's right hand.

We know in every region the traveler becomes a criminal or wanted individual somehow, so he most likely will be here as well, so why would Neuvillette assist the traveler as each right-hand before him has done?

He doesn't agree with Fontaine's legal system.

All of this is just personal speculation at this point, but I believe the story of the archon quest will have to do with what is considered justice in the eyes of the law and in the eyes of moral individuality, if that makes sense.

An example to explain my point would be:

"A woman stole an item from the store."

Justice in the eyes of the law would see her as guilty, because she broke the law, thus she is a sinner/criminal. But that's only on the surface.

See that woman was actually a single mother, she just barely makes enough to keep her home and maybe buy groceries. She can't produce enough milk for her infant child, so out of desperation she steals baby formula.

In the eyes of an individual, her actions make her just. Is she committing a crime? Yes, but it's to provide for someone who cannot provide for themselves, thus it is a commendable action.

A lot of the time, the ones who commit a crime are the only desperate individuals trying to survive the shitty hand they've been dealt. Trying to survive poverty, illness, unsafe homes, abuse, etc.

That's why I think Neuvillette will help the traveler, because he saw how the legal system is fatally flawed. That it works in only black and white and not in the shades of grey it actually is. That the legal system is unjustly persecuting the poor, ill, weak, etc.

Focalors is the God of Justice, but if Fontaine is unjust, then the right-hand will need to make it just.

I think at some point Neuvillette may become an antagonist to Focalors like how Yae Miko was to Ei. I also think, to make it interesting, that at first he was oblivious in some way but had his world view shattered. That's why he steps out of darkness and into prison bars, he goes from being free but being part of the problem, to risking imprisonment -potentially even being actually imprisoned- while trying to fix his mistakes. That's why I think he'll help the traveler, and that's what I think his role in the story will be.

[pokefossilclub]

(@zoruascanbetrainerstoo) Hihi. I'm reallyreally scared. I met a reallyreally weird woman named Cara Liss on Galar Route 6 who said she could revive fossils if I gave her two of them, and I gave her a Plume fossil and a Sail fossil, but there's only one revived Pokemon, an Archen-Amaura, and they're in a lot of pain and I don't know how to help them. -Illanero

Oh dear! Such a shame she hasn't been caught or at least chased away in your universe yet! Of course she hasn't been caught in mine either, but one of these days-

Anyway you are clearly upset and now is not the time for my own vendettas!

I understand that this must have come as a great shock to you! It still comes as a shock to people, seeing the fossils as they are! But I want to assure you that all is not lost!

Your new friend may well be in a lot of pain right now, but odds are good they will not be forever! The initial revivification process can be a shock to the system even for normally revived fossils- after all, they are coming to life in a very different place and in a very brand-new body, and the adjustment can take them a while! For the chimerical fossils, it unsurprisingly can take their minds and bodies much longer to adjust to things!

The good news is that if they were not capable of living without severe medical intervention, this would have been obvious very quickly! They very likely would not have successfully revived at all!

I admit to have not worked with a Plume-Sail fossil chimera personally before- they do not occur naturally in Galar, and if anyone in my universe used out-of-region fossils in Liss' 'machine' they did not turn the resulting Pokemon in to any authorities or even register it properly (a great shame). However, I can try my best to give you some pointers regardless!

The most important aspect is to discover where your new friend's 'weak points' are, and act to solve those first! Many chimeras need attention to diet, as they are often revived from fossils which had different dietary needs; the Archen line are primarily insectivores and the Amaura line are primarily herbivores, so there may be conflict there, but the Archen line can also freely digest many kinds of fruits, so it may be easily resolved! They may also struggle with movement; while Archen can only glide, rather than fly, until they evolve, Amaura obvious cannot achieve the air at all and are therefore built very differently, which could result in difficulty getting around depending on which features are prominent in the chimera. Amaura also spend their lives entirely on the ground whereas Archen climb! Finding ways to balance these needs and requirements physically and-no less importantly- psychologically is why identifying them so early is so important!

These two problems are not the only ones that could crop up, of course, but they are the most common. Sometimes it can be very difficult to work out what is a major vs a minor problem, of course, especially when everything is emotionally overwhelming, so I advise trying to identify problems with the digestive system, the endocrine system (hormones!), or mobility first; these are places where unsolved problems can cause a lot of difficulty! Once you have identified and solved- to the best of your ability- the major problems, you can work on any minor ones. It may be that your new friend can solve their own minor problems if the major ones are worked out, even! Pokemon are very resourceful.

Remember: revived Pokemon are not the creatures who were fossilled millions of years ago, they are only their clones! Your new friend does not remember or mourn being two different creatures so long ago; this is the only body they have ever known, and they will get to know it far more intimately than you as an outsider ever will! If they are provided with the tools they require to have their biological and psychological needs met, they are as capable as any 'normal' fossil of living a long and fulfilling life! After all, even a perfectly averagely revived Archen will still be dealing with a world very different than the one they evolved to live in, and would require aid that a modern Pokemon does not.

It is also, I may add, counterproductive to blame yourself for their predicament! Liss offered a service that seemed appealing to many people, especially people without an in-depth knowledge of the fossil revival process, and you were not and could not be fully informed in your decisionmaking. You made a mistake; she made a career out of lying to people and wielding scientific knowledge in a way that was, at best, deeply irresponsible.