#acotar critical

[bunnyshideawayy]

the way sjm justifies every negative or outright evil thing literally ANYONE else in her stories do with the “well they are mates” bandaid EXCEPT for Cassian will always anger me. like the whole point of the “fated mates” trope is to have a couple that will do anything, including telling off their “High Lord/found family”, for the sake of their mate. like the WHOLE point of this trope is to be able to justify horrible things characters do as long as it’s for the good of their MATE but Cassian does not get that exception. Rhysand would’ve killed the person who threatened Feyre’s life on the spot regardless of what she said or done, even if it was Az or Cassian just like he literally fist fought Cassian on the spot for jokingly hitting on Feyre, knowing it was a joke. and it would’ve been played off as a good thing to “protect feyre” but Nesta gets threatened, abused (not only by her own mate but his family as well), neglected, shamed, humiliated, the list goes on and not only does Cassian partake in it he literally SAYS nothing to defend her or reassure her. Feyre acts more like her mate than her own mate does because she actually loves her sister despite everything and everytime Nesta’s life was up for debate the answer was left in Feyre’s hand. not her so called “mate” who never stuck up for her. the Nessian everyone loves so much died in Acowar. idk who that man is in Acofas and Acosf.

One thing will always be clear to me: Rhys is way more invested in his mate bond than Cassian. Not that he’s a better mate (they both won the Olympics for the worst partner ever anyway), but in the sense that for whatever manipulative narcissistic reason, Rhys is genuinely glad he found Feyre. Cassian's vibe on the other hand…..He probably cries every night that his mate isn’t Feyre or Rhys or even Mor.

After 50 years of not seeing his family, Rhys cried when he was finally able to return to Velaris because he found his mate and can only think about his mate. Cassian? He couldn’t even bother to check on Nesta until she fainted on that hike from hell. And why? Because Nesta was "mean" to the actual loves of his life Feyre and Rhys?

You will never catch Rhysand tolerating Cassian berating Feyre, let alone letting Cassian leave without at least a broken jaw if he ever threatened Feyre’s life. Meanwhile, Cassian is just a dumbass statue, standing like an asshole while Nesta might get misted right in front of him. It’s wild that Cassian managed to make even ACOSF Rhysand seem like a more devoted partner (pregnancy plot madness and all) to his mate than Cassian is to his own.

Rhys to Nesta: YOU'RE A CUNT AND I WILL USE YOUR HEAD AS NYX'S BASKETBALL.

Cassian:

🧍🏾🤷🏾

[kataraavatara]

“obviously people in the modern day can recognize what nesta did as verbal abuse even if they didn’t have the words for it in univers-” well if we’re using modern day terms Rhysand and Feyre are segregationists who allow child soldiers and are enacting both collective and multigenerational punishment on an entire city of people. so why don’t you ruminate on that for a little bit.

[bookbitchx]

"There is no such thing as High Lady."

Call Tamlin a misogynistic sexist asshole or whatever else you want, but he's right.

High Lady is a title Rhysand gave to Feyre.

It's honorary.

It wasn't 'earned'. She wasn't 'blessed' with it, and she certainly wasn't chosen by the land and the magic.

If there was a title and it meant something, don't you think Viviane, of all women, would've been granted it by the lands for holding down the fort in Winter Court for 50 years while Kalias was stuck UTM?

Kalias could've also easily slapped the title on her like Rhysand did with Feyre, and yet he didn't. You know why? Because Viviane doesn't need it. She's already respected and seen as his equal by his court and the others for what she has done.

Feyre can't say the same, can she?

SJM sets it up as this badass moment of empowerment, but all I saw was Rhysand giving a baby (by Fae years) a title and letting her run loose with it as well as letting it go to her head.

The first thing she did after getting that title was go and get revenge on a whole ass court because she had issues with its High Lord which is insane in of itself but it brings me to my point, that there was no political repercussions where as if Rhysand had done it, it would've declared an internal war between Night and Spring.

It would've been a good ass arc if she had learned Prythian politics, history, diplomacy, the cultures, and customs of the other courts, including her own, so much as visited the other courts, slowly climbed the ranks and learned instead of Rhysand shoving that crown on her head and down everyone else's throats.

It's like taking me, a complete clueless, inadequate foreigner, and making me the Queen of England. Utterly ridiculous.

"You just hate Feyre being High Lady because you want Nesta to be one."

The same thing goes for Nesta, babe. NONE of the Archeron sisters are qualified to be High Ladies, honorary or not.

One of the hills I will die and kill on.

[bunnyshideawayy]

notice how cassian always has moral support and can go to the IC, one of which he has slept with and actively still keeps a joke that they sleep together, when Nesta upsets him meanwhile he can verbally berate her knowing she has no one and no where to go? even when Nesta does start to form her own little found family she never talks badly about cassian or tells them what he has said/done to her. she bottles it up because she has no support system she can truly relay on and has gaslighted herself into believing she has no right to speak out/tell others of the abuse she has and is still facing at the hands of the IC that it’s all her fault.

pretty wild that all of the jabs Cassian does to berate Nesta are behind closed doors and that she never defends herself. but oh if Nesta snaps at him, somehow Rhysand is made aware of it? weird!

[dippedinmelancholy]

This isn’t aimed at any one creator, but just a trend I’ve noticed, especially with the holiday art.

Often when all three of the sisters are drawn in ACOTAR art, I’m seeing both Elain and Feyre in the softest, most cottage core dresses/sweaters ever designed, and Nesta is in the sluttiest, high slit line, low neckline, titties out dress you’ve ever seen.

Words cannot tell you how much this infuriates me. Nesta, the one character whose modesty was SO FUCKING IMPORTANT TO HER. Nesta, who feels uncomfortable baring herself in such a way in any social setting. Nesta, the only sister described to have a large chest and yet finds comfort in high necklines and long dresses, hiding as much of her flesh as she can, who has been repeatedly SA’d ON PAGE, over and over and over again, is the one sister who is drawn this way? Why??????? why is such a core part of her stripped away even by the fandom? Against Feyre who is apparently free and uber Girl Boss as she consistently wears the sluttiest dresses ever made? but not in the fan art, no, it’s nesta who needs to dress that way, because how else could recognize it was her?

idk it just feels gross and wrong and horrible mischaracterization of her, especially if you’re trying to show her as healed and comfortable with her family. I promise, Nesta is never happy if her tits are out in public.

[spacerockfloater]

The way people switched on Tamlin the moment Rhys was introduced is diabolical.

“Tamlin never really loved Feyre, it was all a trick from the start”: It is stated that Tamlin was disgusted by the idea of forcing someone to fall in love with him and considered it slavery, but ended up being so in love with her that he ultimately lets her go and choses her freedom and safety over that of his own people. Rhys confirms that Tamlin loved Feyre too much. And he loved her truly. Not because he had to. Tamlin treated Feyre with dignity when she was engaged to him. He introduced her as his lady, to be respected and cherished by all. And she really was loved by his people, too. Rhysand uses her as his lap dog to scare Hewn City and parades her as his whore.

“Tamlin never did anything for Feyre, he just used her”: He improved her and her family’s life in every aspect and offered her everything he had.

“Tamlin had sex with someone else in Calanmai”: Out of duty and responsibility because he didn’t want to force Feyre, who still wasn’t sure about her feelings, into it. All of the High Lords perform the Calanmai. Lucien says so. How convenient that this is never brought up with Rhysand. He surely does perform it as well. All the theories in here, “Lucien doesn’t know what he’s talking about/ This is a SC ritual only/ He probably just passes the duty on to someone else” are just a way for people to villainise Tam and glorify Rhys again. All of them inaccurate. The Calanmai is canonically performed by every High Lord. There’s no evidence that proves otherwise. As the son of one High Lord and the ambassador of another, Lucien would know. He is 500 years old. It’s just more convenient for SJM to never bring this up again because it raises the question of “Who was Rhysand fucking all these years?” and it makes her favourite character look bad. And once he is engaged to her, Tamlin flat out refuses to do it. Let’s be real for a second.

“Tamlin didn’t help Feyre under the mountain”: He literally could not. He was bound by a curse. He was forced to be Amarantha’s consort and a consort cannot oppose you. His powers were bound. Alis warns Feyre that Tamlin will not be able to help her. Stop acting as if he didn’t want to help her. He decapitated Amarantha the moment he got his autonomy back. Claiming that there’s no proof that Tamlin was under the influence of a spell when he literally didn’t break the curse and Amarantha’s magic didn’t allow him to use his powers is crazy. And even if he tried, he could never provide actual help. We see this when he begs Amarantha for Feyre’s life. Him showing he cares about her would only make Amarantha more jealous and vicious towards Feyre.

“Tamlin made out with Feyre instead of helping her”: He couldn’t help her run away. No one could do that. She would never make it, Amarantha would find her. In fact, Tamlin specifically could not help her in any way. He could only assure her he still wants and loves her. And she wanted that just as much. Rhys abused her physically, mentally, verbally, drugged her and much worse. And he enjoyed all of it. If he didn’t want to raise suspicions, he wouldn’t have placed a bet in her favour. Rhys is a sadist, SJM just decided to mellow him down in the next book so that we’d all like him over Tamlin.

“Tamlin ignored Feyre’s wishes and only wanted her to be his bride, he didn’t let her be High Lady”: Both Tamlin and Feyre were bad communicators going though trauma and Tam had a whole court to care for. Tamlin was unaware of how Feyre felt because she barely spoke up once. Rhys knew because he literally lived inside her head and had all the time in the world to focus his attention on her since his court suffered zero consequences during Amarantha’s reign. And Tamlin simply told her the truth: there’s no such thing as High Lady. Even her current title is given to her by Rhys, the magic of Prythian has not actually chosen her to be High Lady. The title and its power are decorative. And she said she didn’t want that anyway.

“Tamlin locks Feyre up and uses his magic to harm her”: He locks her in his humongous palace to keep her safe, after she just came back from the dead and his worst enemy is kidnapping her every month, while he runs off to protect his borders. Rhysand locks Feyre in a fucking bubble. Tamlin loses control of his magic. He doesn’t want to harm her. That’s not abuse. Abuse is intentional. Feyre and Rhysand lock Lucien and Nesta up. They lock the people of the Hewn City up in a cave. Feyre loses control of her magic and harms Lucien’s mother. Double standards I guess.

“Tamlin is a bad and conservative ruler”: Tamlin is such a beloved ruler that his sentries literally begged to die for him. Feyre had to fuck with their minds to finally turn them against him. They were his friends. He was so progressive that the lords fled his court once he became their ruler because he wouldn’t put up with their bullshit like his father did. He loved all of his people. He is against slavery. The Tithe was just tax collection. Rhysand practically rules over just one city, while ignoring Hewn City and Illyria. He treats 2/3 of his realm like shit and everyone except the residents of Velaris hates him. He collects tax, too, but we conveniently never see this. He ranks the members of his inner circle (my 1st, my 2nd etc.) and reminds them every moment that they are his slaves first and anything else second, while Tamlin treats them equally and even gives Lucien an official title by naming him Ambassador.

“Tamlin conspired with Hybern”: He was a double agent and his short lived alliance, two weeks all in all, not only didn’t harm a single soul, but ultimately saved all of Prythian as he was the only one who brought valuable information to that meeting. He dragged Beron to battle. Rhysand’s alliance with Amarantha harmed thousands and only helped save one city, Velaris.

“Tamlin is responsible for turning Nesta and Elain into Fae”: No, that was Ianthe, who got the info from Feyre. Tamlin was fooled by her, just as Feyre obviously was, or she wouldn’t have trusted her. Tamlin was disgusted by that act.

“Tamlin is less powerful than Rhysand”: Rhysand himself says that a battle between them would turn mountains to dust. Tamlin killed Rhysand’s dad, the previous High Lord of the Night Court, in one blow. He is just as powerful as Rhysand. SJM again just wants us to believe otherwise. And he is smarter, too. He was the only one not to trust Amarantha. And he was a good spy for Prythian against Hybern.

All of these takes are cold as fuck. SJM was testing the waters with ACOTAR and she made sure the main love interest, Tamlin, was insanely likeable, so that the book could be a satisfactory standalone story in case she couldn’t land a trilogy deal. She didn’t know it would be such a big hit. But once she realised she could turn this into a franchise, she had to figure out a new story to tell. She may claim otherwise, but there’s just too many plothotes to convince me. And in order to make her new main love interest seem like the best choice, she had to character assassinate the old one. There was no other way. ACOTAR Rhys was too much of an evil monster to be loved by the majority of the audience. But Tamlin was introduced to us as such a heroic and passionate man that is literally impossible to turn him into someone despised by all. Feyre’s relationship with Rhysand reads too much like cheating on Tamlin. That’s why anyone with basic analytical skills is able to realise the flaws of the narration.

[b00kdiary]

Eris Vanserra is Rhysand if he didn’t have the Inner Circle.

Eris Vanserra is a dreamer with no stars. The Autumn Court is his Hewn City, it’s his Court of Nightmares.

Free my man 😭

[dippedinmelancholy]

This is the shit I’m talking about when I say weak world building. Your epic fantasy politics should have consequences!!!!! It shouldn’t be easy!!!!! There’s never a fucking surprise because you will always know Feyre and Rhysand will never face consequences from the other leaders. There is no question of what might happen to them, only who might bow and lick their boots.

Feyre what do you meeeeeaaaaannnnnnn calling another High Lord a baby compared to everyone else??????? Girlypop you are a FETUS, you just learned how to spell high lord. You have no concept of politics??????? What do you mean you destroyed an entire court, ruined and or killed an innumerable amount of innocent fae and then set the Lady of Autumn ON FIRE????????

let me get this straight, in the meeting at dawn other HLs can listen to rhysand and feyre words and try to believe them despite;

for 50 years rhysand was standing against them and help in kill people from their courts

afterwards has lied to other courts for various reasons and now wants to be honest

rhysand’s council member took feyre at the time tamlin’s lover from spring without permission

feyre destroyed a court which made people of the court refugees bc it allowed hybern a way in -btw it pushed tamlin into the corner more

feysand lied and stole from summer court and are still in possession of it doing gods know what what it

feysand offered no real remorse of what they did to spring court and summer court

feyre has powers of all courts and is rhysand’s mate making night court a threat bc she and rhysand can take over other courts and rule over all of them

has no idea if feyre is not being manipulated by rhysand who they don’t like nor trust

rhysand made feyre a high lady even though its magic that makes that choice

they have no idea if feysand version of events after the mountain are true

oh night court has 2 recently cauldron made high fae with gods know what powers

probably missing a few more but other HLs are choosing to give time the benefit of doubt after one tense exchange but arent willing to do that with tamlin who;

tried to break the curse, got feyre who did and was the one who killed amarantha

saved lucien life UtM

when he shows his angry for what feyre did to his people and how she lied to him others see it as a “lovers quarrel” -basically letting feyre get away with her crimes bc if other HLs wont hold her accountable as well and want her to be punished for it then who will

tamlin does not start war against night court for their trespassing and bc feyre came in his court as a high lady of night court under disguise so she can destroy it for revenge

and when tamlin provides proof of what he has learned they still dont believe him bc why should they?

look tamlin did step out of the line in that meeting and made some comments but the attitude he got vs rhysand and feyre got from other high lords had me kinda baffled

rhysand can control minds! ffs

there is very little reason for other HLs to even listen to NC but they do?? these people should not be in charge, not a single brain cell or a backbone in that group aside from tamlin

the fact not once there was ever a talk of feyre being punished for what she did to spring court, these people are dumb as hell bc she can do what she wants and rhysand will back her up & she proves it in the same meeting when she attacks beron with fire and hurts lady of autumn and even then not once someone says feyre you cant do that

azriel attacks eris, heir of autumn court and nothing happens. rhysand attacks tamlin, high lord of spring and nothing happens.

ridiculous. the whole meeting was biased and feysand sucking

its not lost on me the things rhysand did UtM being revealed in the meeting are never brought up again within ic, so much for a group that dream about a better world and acts superior in morals

[infiniteetcetera]

When I say the men of TOG all easily beat out the ACOTAR boys I am not just referring to Dorian Havilliard or Rowan Whitethorn (the obvious standards) but THE HUNTER WHO WAITED FOR ASTERIN??? NOX OWEN???? ILLIAS THE SILENT ASSASSIN???? Men at every level of TOG are serving looks, loyalty, and respect that is unmatched ESPECIALLY compared to ACOTAR and CC

[youareatragedy]

This is a fictional world right? Ink? At the end of the day, a book including the acotar series is all about how we interpret the ideas the author wants us to take from it.

So go ahead, defend the character who SA’d his partner and hid critical medical information that could’ve killed her instead of being disgusted by him just because the idea of him as your boyfriend excites you.

That’s what these stans are: supporters of the idea that even imaginary men, their comfort and reputation matter more as long as that said men are hot, dark haired, and said bullshit like "hello darling".

Go ahead. I beg these people to just own it. They care more about Rhysand’s reputation in a fictional world than acknowledging that Feyre was SA’d and that the pregnancy nonsense was absolute bullshit.

Rhysand and the IC mafiastancult should honestly print this out as a motivational poster and sell it among themselves.

Woman: "As long as they’re not mean to hot men and stay quiet and undemanding when abused = Good" Man = "As long as they’re hot in my mind = Perfect, I'll have your babies."

[herrinarte]

The ACOTAR fandom is so weird because what do you mean Tamsand isn’t one of the most popular ships 🤨 Tamlin is literally on Rhysand’s mind 24/7, either this man is massively insecure, gay as fuck for Tamlin or massively insecure about the fact that Tamlin ain’t fuckin him right now and could be with someone else so he has the uncontrollable urge to tell his ex-boyfriend to kill himself. How are people not saying this is gay????

And then there’s whatever the hell is going on with the bat boys. Fucking in the same room? What you just gonna stare at each other? go one step further and just do it with each other. Stop being a coward bro 😤✋

And Azriel choking Eris, uh it’s just floor play. Don’t worry it’s cool, they have a list of dos and don’t that they made when they got married.

How can you look at Lucien ‘fire in his blood’ Vanserra and Tamlin ‘literally a big ass beast’ and go no I don’t think they have had nasty passionate sex under under a cherry blossom tree 🤓 like huh????? They’re literally roommates. Lucien lost an eye for Tamlin. Tamlin felt more betrayal over loosing Lucien than Feyre. YOUR HONOUR THEY ARE IN LOVE

Then the Valkyries…um gay too. Lesbian throuple. Come on people get creative. The girls are kissing and cuddling and having beautiful sex and you are all boring.

I have never seen a fandom go so feral for dry ass ships in my life. Literally no other fandom would ignore the plethora of gay ships.

This is your sign to stop caring about what is canon and start being fun, cool and interesting xxx

[coffeebooksrain18]

Feyra isn't a true High Lady. There is nothing to it besides a pretty title Rhys gave her to make her feel special. Pyrithan decides who gets the magic. One high lord or lady could he the eldest of their siblings and another High Lord or Lady could be the sixth child.

It isn't anything besides the world deciding who is worthy.

So in the end they wouldn't care about Feyras words not because she is a female but because she isn't a High Lady and the world didn't choose her.

I hope this helps lol.

I have issues with only men being able to be High Lord, as it just doesn’t make sense as to why magic would be sexist, but if we follow this logic, why would anyone apart form the Night Court give a shit that Feyre is High Lady?

The magic didn’t choose her. It’s just a title that Rhysand gave her. The other High Lords don’t answer to Rhysand. So why should they care?

And let’s say (although I find this nearly impossible to happen) that Rhysand and Feyre disagree on an important political matter, who do the High Lords listen to? Rhysand, chosen by the magic or Feyre, a woman who was given the title by her husband?

“High Lady” is just a title that looks pretty but is ultimately worthless.

[motherrstorm]

elain: my entire world was turned upside down, my body was violated, and I'm really struggling to grasp this new lifestyle. Im not ready to face lucien or acknowledge the mate bond at all.

the ic: okay elain, that's absolutely okay. we'll let you have your space from everything + lucien and give you protection from him should you need it.

nesta: my entire world was turned upside down, my body was violated, and I'm really struggling to grasp this new lifestyle. Im not ready to face cassian or acknowledge the mate bond at all.

the ic: LMAOOO. you're going to stay with him in a house you can't leave, he's going to be your caretaker and have influence over your day to day tasks, he's going to take you on dangerous missions for us, and we don't gaf that he's fucking you when impulsively having sex is one of the reasons why we put you in the house.

ps: if you don't listen to him, we'll deport you. good luck babe💋!

[wallflowers-in-the-wind]

One thing I will never forget about Feyre is that she left a high lord who was true to his word and actually helping fae from other courts. Everyone was welcome and he was putting everyone else’s needs above his own. But because they weren’t good at communicating and were pushing their trauma to the side and refuses to find comfort in each other and talk they both got hurt. Tamlin took things too far in an effort to save her from herself and she left.

But Feyre chose to leave him for Rhysand. A high lord who doesn’t care about his people or anyone else he can’t manipulate. A liar who lives in dreams and can talk a big game but never follow through. Someone who commits SA and hides information without a single apology for his behavior. And wears a mask because it’s so important that no one knows who he really is instead of using his power and ability to help the people he refuses to help with the exception of one person.

She chose the worse possible option that got thousands of people, hurt or killed, and doesn’t care as long as she can have a fake title to throw around whenever she wants to feel important.

[yugen-ikigai]

sjm makes everyone so fucking dumb just to keep Rhysand looking good, and only the readers in equal standing believe Rhys is good 🫠

Kallias and Viviane let Rhysand off the hook a little too easy about the Winter Court children. They're just supposed to believe it was another Daemati when Rhysand was tormenting them all UtM and Rhysand couldn't even provide the name of this other Daemati? All this evidence against him and they just believe his word? just like that?

[bookbitchx]

Whoever's book is next, I want Rhysand to shut the fuck up throughout it, tyvm.