#add mastermind

[its-ezraaa]

he's a wine mom cat lady

[vvenuspng]

starboy ･:*₊‧✩

[valahelart]

“...can't live life without you by my side...”

[nyxofdemons]

don't get on that train

[toadslug]

Got bored so I drew my WoF old man yaoi (Mastermind and Chameleon). I don't know if either of them are even that old?? But they just have that energy.

Sometime in the future, I imagine Chameleon gets imprisoned by the RainWings for his crimes. He and Mastermind—who is also still imprisoned—bond over being awful single dads and maybe start to like each other. And then maybe they can learn to be better (or learn to be worse). Still thinking it through, idk.

Also, Peril and Starflight get to deal with suddenly maybe being siblings and complain about their awful dads. They can complain about Kestrel, too.

[blitzobuckzofuckzo]

Granted its been a minute since I've gone through the tags, but I'm surprised that I haven't seen anyone talk about this bit in mastermind.

This is their first real interaction in??? weeks??.?? Since the fuck you blitzo party. Idk if I can be coherent about this, and it's such a short moment, but AHHH look at Blitzø's FACE! Stolas is calling him a little wretch with this whole mastermind evil persona, but what were they both thinking in this moment!?? It consumes me

[hildegardladyofbones]

all the yt film snobs were kinda right about saltburn being a tumblr movie since apparently everyone on all other platforms thinks it's an "eat the rich" movie?? like girl did we watch the same movie

[cleo-serotonin]

hear me out, since emma had to give up swimming she decided to take up ice skating ! i feel like it suits her super well, it takes a lot of discipline and grace (classic emma traits) and it could have actually given her development. instead the show shoves *sh d*ve down our throats <\3 also if the ice was uneven/melty she’d just slyly freeze it. she’s a super athletic person she would definitely need something to fill the void and this way she could stay active and sweat wouldn’t be a problem

[tackletofset]

My wishlist for Dark Rise #3

(more to be added/ subject to change)

Anharion POV chapters

James dressing himself in Red

James aragases Will's "magic door"

Will regains Sarcean's memories (and finds out that the Collar doesn't take away James's free will)

Violet betrays Cyprian to serve Will (foreshadowed by Devon in book 1)

Will and James visiting Sarcean and Anharion’s tomb

Flashback on Sarharion pseudo-wedding (ft. the Collar) (just like the cuff exchange in Captive Prince)

The Returners and white death were revealed to be coming from the Lady/ the Sun King, not Sarcean

Cyprian, Visander and Elizabeth GROVEL at Will's feet for forgiveness

Will goes on full Dark King but using his powers to save everyone

Visander and Philip consummating their marriage honeymoon

[king-lears-fool]

After getting to stew on it for a week, I have some Mastermind thoughts. Crucially, I was SHOCKED in the Mastermind song when Stolitz became canon. Like, so soon?!

I think it's been interesting to see the portrayal of Stolitz from both perspectives over time, now that it's (semi-)canon. Frankly, my first draft of this post was just shitting on the portrayal of Blitzø falling in love with Stolas. And while I do think my initial views still hold merit, I did manage to talk my way out of it.

For Stolas, we have been really clearly able to see how and why he fell for Blitzø. He was his first friend, who then gave him an orgasm so good it caused him to grow a spine. Initially, it was just about sex, with the book as payment (because why would Blitzø come of his own accord?). But Stolas' admiration for Blitzø showed him he has the power to take agency over his own fate.

But for Blitzø, most of the moments showing Blitzø being into Stolas have been pretty blink-and-you’ll-miss-it (e.g. in Truth Seekers and Seeing Stars). The best exception is in Oops, where he literally lists everything that he likes about him as though they're bad things. Of course, it’s because of his self-hatred and all that, but I don’t think it was established well enough at all.

From my perspective, Apology Tour and (especially) Ghostfuckers was important for Blitzø to realise that he does actually love Stolas, and would have wanted a relationship with him. He seriously had not thought about it before the events of Full Moon. He could only admit he had fallen for Stolas when it was already too late.

Up until that point, he had been insisting on calling Stolas nothing but a "rich asshole" who looks down on imps. Recall, the “transactional fucking” line in Western Energy, that scene in Oops again. Like, anyone who knows him can tell that it’s bullshit, but from a writing perspective I really don’t think that was enough.

And I think that’s what’s gonna be interesting to see next season. Only in the last 3 episodes have we seen Blitzø openly caring for Stolas. Blitzø has historically fumbled every opportunity to show real interest in him, and while he is trying to change, that doesn’t happen overnight. I’m not sure if Stolas will be ready to believe/accept Blitzø’s feelings, and Blitzø doesn’t really know how to do relationships. The turnaround from the breakup was pretty fast. We saw how badly both of them took it, and they’ve addressed two of its causes (Stolas putting Blitzø on a pedestal, and Blitzø refusing to let others get too close)… to the audience. WE know they’ve each grown, but the other doesn’t.

I doubt their relationship will go smoothly at all. They still don’t really know how to communicate, they haven’t addressed what went wrong before, and Blitzø will have to see Stolas’ depression now that they live together (etc etc). I’m not sure if they’re ready for this at all, and rather circumstances thrust them into this situation. And honestly? I’m really excited to see how the show handles it!

[addcests]

TOP THREE GOING TO FINALS:

Mastermind, Mad Paradox, and Doom Bringer!

poor Time Tracer did not stand a chance ;;; meanwhile dom got trashed against MP. as for our last pair, LP and MM had a close battle but MM pulled out as the victor!!! as for the path victors...

OUR PATH PLACEMENTS AS OUR FOLLOWS:

SECOND PATH (AT, MM, Dom)

THIRD PATH (TTr/TiT, DiE, MP)

FIRST PATH (PT, LP, DBr)

FOURTH PATH (AFt, DiS, OM)

once again OM and co getting trounced and trampled over. better luck next year o7 congrats to 2nd path for winning!

same three day duration poll! no reblogs to look out for this time our final poll is as listed:

most votes wins 1st and second most votes win 2nd!

may the best tracer win !!!

[blitzwhore]

Okay, here they are! My Stolitz Spotify playlists 🎶

[serashalala]

Generation Loss's Mind Manipulation; A theory by a tired college student

OK. GENERATION LOSS. That was a ride and it’s not even done!

Fuckin loved it, by the way. It was so good. I loved everyone's acting and Sneeg's realization part gave me literal fucking chills as well as Slime screaming and Austin freaking out while Ranboo n Sneeg were just chill.

FUCK that was cool. Thank you @ranboolivesaysstuff for sharing this with us.

Anyway, here’s a nerd dump on the entire mind control thing. I’m not exactly a genius but I’m studying neurosci as one of my college units and this is basically the gist of how I understand the mind control aspect that this is showing.

SO. 

You recognize this? This is the device that we think is controlling Ranboo’s mind. It’s at the back part of the brain, and easily this leads to two possible structures that it can influence: the occipital lobe of the cerebrum and the cerebellum. However, we don’t really know HOW deep this device goes considering Ranboo’s lucious locks of hair covering the rest of the mask and the fact that we don’t know if this is the only thing penetrating the brain.

Anyway, let’s discuss what we know which is that it’s likely latched onto the back part and thus likely embedded onto the cerebral occipital lobe and/or the cerebellum

The occipital lobe is at the back part of the head, and as you see on the picture below, it’s the visual area (mostly).

To make me sound more professional and shit let me introduce to you the brodmann areas. Brodmann areas divide the cerebrum by its function.

Area 17, 18, and 19.

Area 17 is the primary visual area. This is where you see shit. If the device’s influence is only as deep as area 17 then Ranboo is either literally blinded by the device OR the device intercepts what his eyes are really seeing. Damage to this area will lead to literal blindness or difficulty to see.

Area 18 and 19 however are the secondary visual area, otherwise known as the visual association area. This is where you recognize the things that you see. Damage to this leads to dyschromatopsia (color blindness), and visual agnosia (inability to perceive visual stimuli.). 

Basically to explain, as an example you see an apple. That’s the job of area 17. However, you don’t really know yet that it’s an apple. To know that an apple is an apple, you tap into area 18 and 19– the visual association area.

The device LIKELY reaches into this area because the entire time, Ranboo doesn’t recognize that he’s on a show set and he doesn’t see the people on the set like the directors and the staff. What he does see is a 4th wall.

Upon deactivation of the device, only then does he recognize that oh shit, that isn’t a wall. 

Does it stop there? Ok, why not go deeper?

Next to Area 19 is area 37. This is the Facial Recognition area. It's self explanatory if Ranboo's mind control device goes that deep.

How about Area 39 and 7? They're both Someasthetic areas. 39 and 40 specifically have a lot to do with memory, emotion, behavior, sex. rage, fear, and pain.

Area 7 integrates sensory inputs-- it draws upon stored memories of past sensory experiences. This area aint that deep tho ngl, it's basically the part that goes: yo, this fire thing burns you, maybe don't touch it. This can be as deep as you want to interpret it being.

Edit: I WAS RIGHT ABOUT THIS. Ranboo's stream confirms it SCREAMING RIGHT NOW. THEY SAID. "Change someone's perception of reality, and they will act how you want." SCREAMING CRYING WAILING SOBBING. I KNEW IT. The next parts of the theory will be further discussing the things that MAY still apply, alongside the things that Ranboo almost confirmed.

Next suspected area:

The cerebellum. 

The cerebellum is mostly responsible for a lot of important things (as are the rest of the brain but let me get into it)

The cerebellum has 3 main functions: maintenance of posture and balance; maintenance of muscle tone; and coordination of voluntary motor activity. 

You see where I’m going for here?

The cerebellum is a likely attachment site of the device because it is gunning for that motor activity and posture and balance. It controls the agonist and antagonist coordination of the muscles to make sure that there’s no jerky movements going on. As for posture and balance, it can affect your movements so that you don’t look robotic, and so that you don’t have to voluntarily maintain your posture. Maintenance of muscle tone has the same idea.

It is also the best bet because it has its lapses.

While it controls a lot of motor function, it isn’t the only site of motor control in the body. There’s other areas, like the Basal Nuclei, the motor area of the cerebrum (brodmann area 4 and 6) and the spinalcord (though this is more on reactionary shit).

It makes the device fallible where the fine motor movements (such as in the fingertips, where the cerebellum controls less of) is less prone to influence by the device, leading to this nifty clip right here:

And this here too:

They're able to do morse code with his hands, the fingers.

And, chances are, the reason they have a mask in the first place is because it’s significantly more difficult to reach the area that controls the facial expressions since that is a direct connection from the brain to the face via the Facial Nerve that stems anteriorly to from the brainstem. It’d be hard to reach from behind especially. (unless the device yanknow, snuck around the spine or something idk)

So if the connection is posterior, they’d have difficulty reaching that (to a safe extent, at least. We have no idea how deep it goes.

Then again, we don’t know the function of the rest of the mask.

Now for some close competitors of where the mind control device is attached/penetrating!

"But sera, what if it influences at a lower level than the occipital lobe or the cerebellum?"

Cervical spine C1 Level

Difficult to defend. That leaves the problem of Ranboo's speech control. The lower the level the less things it's able to influence. At C1 level, a person's speech, which is something Ranboo's clearly being influenced over, can't be damaged from this level.

"How are we so sure that it's at the back??"

Because it's the clearest shot we've got with that weird circle thing.

Frontal Lobe

This one is a good contender. The Frontal Lobe has the Decision and / or Judgement Center of the brain (area 10, more to be mentioned about this later), as well as the motor areas (areas 4 and 6), and twisting that could lead to being able to change what a person does when faced with a stimuli as well as a bigger portion of voluntary movement.

However, this one is difficult to visually justify.

While it's true that we can't see much behind the mask, we also can't see it penetrate towards the frontal lobe. Let's say it penetrates through the mouth somehow-- how is Ranboo's diction so clear?

But the reason why it's a very good contender is that it could possibly go through the nose. Did you know that the cribriform plate, the part of the skull where the olfactory nerve goes through, is the easiest to break? and thus it's also the easiest to penetrate?

Issue with that though is that Ranboo has a working sense of smell. The Olfactory nerve (smelling nerve) is easy to disturb.

Anything deeper? More anterior?

Any deeper structures are likely too unimportant-- the diencephalon, pons are all mostly on the hormonal / nonvoluntary actions (breathing, sweat, thirst, hunger, etc). Those aren't too fun to control especially when what you want is a puppet.

The most likely candidate is the basal nuclei, which has a lot to do with movement. However it's mostly useless when you target it because it's goal is to make sure that when you want to raise a glass, you don't yeet it to the sky. It makes sure that you have the right amount of output to the muscle without overcompensating.

So what does the device control?

Both.

Well, not both. All-- err, mostly. Ding ding ding! They're all winners.

Only at its best, though, which was during Episode 1 (when undisturbed)-- NOT episode 2.

At its best, the mask is able to take full function of the brain-- most strongly at where it's sourced, though, which is at the posterior regions. Weaker control is evident when you see the finger taps that Ranboo is still able to do. Think of it as some sort of energy gradient-- most concentrated at the back of the head, and weakest at the front.

At its blinking state, influenced by the outsider, Ranboo regains Control of most of the more anterior parts of the brain, but you'd notice it's still blinking-- it never really fully released Ranboo. Its still got a strong influence at the back portion of the brain.

It takes a lot to rip away its influence from Ranboo, as you can see from what the weird shadowy figure from the TV says in the end where he had to do something to disable it fully before Ranboo breaks the fourth wall.

How do we know that? Let's go back to the clip where Ranboo FULLY 'wakes up':

It took some effort by the hacker to fully release Ranboo, but until that point Ranboo hadn't even seen the 4th wall despite being able to gain autonomy of most their function.

Then let's go back to the part where, when Ranboo's device was 'reset':

You notice how the showbizz person isn't someone they interact with? They don't SEE these people. The device is still on, because it's intercepting with Ranboo's perception.

Let's go back to the announcements then.

We don't get to choose a lot this episode, instead we're subjected to puzzles that have more to do with everyone else BUT Ranboo.

I present to you, Brodmann Area 10

This is the largest area in the frontal lobe, and is incharge of decision making (among other things). We, the audience, can't make decisions as flexibly anymore because they needed a stricter control of the device.

The hacker is able to intercept that flexibility and thus the showfall media reduced the extent of which we're able to control ranboo, taking all that control for themselves. It isn't interactive anymore.

Literally being gatekeeped from the audience, smh.

Now what?

A summary of course.

I suspect that when the lights are on (in the mask), it has a stronger pulse and thus influences a larger chunk of his head, ABLE (but not necessarily) to reach the frontal lobe.

It blinks, then it indicates that its pulse is weaker, but still present (the cerebellum is slightly further to reach than the occipital lobe) which is why his sight might still be influenced.

And lights being gone? That's Ranboo's full autonomy baybee. They're back in business!

As for the others' mind manipulation system, I'm not quite sure yet. Probably could reduce it to having already been subjected to being conditioned, not like our 'fresh' protagonist. I'll probably add onto this when something clicks in the future.

This ended up a lot longer than intended...

Anyway, that’s just a theory, a tired-college-student-from-an-allied-health-course theory. Thanks for reading.

[i-cry-everytime]

Mastermind Daiya design from @ask-mmdaiya / @tea0w0stache 's au!! Love this ask blog sm! All credits to them 😸👍

[llegato]

[puppppppppy]

holy shit the ethereal workshop is complete. when do they drop their soundcloud album