#also one of my first genuine attempts to write for other dai characters which was Neat

[rollinouttahere]

Joyride

Yandere Strawhats + Ace x Isekai Reader

2.2k words

Part 2

Yet again, this fic is inspired by @lovelybrooke ‘s Isekai reader stories.

I also want to say thank you for all the support and kind comments on the last story I wrote! I’ve actually been working on my own yandere one piece fic that I’m hoping to start posting in a few days give or take, so if you like what I’ve written so far, keep an eye out for that! All future writings are gonna be posted on my writing blog @rollinouttahere-writes​ so go follow that blog if you’re interested!

Trying to act normal and inconspicuous in the One Piece universe was a far from easy task. Being the massive fan of the series that you were, it was damn hard to not give away that you knew all about the crew that was so generously letting you stay with them after appearing on their ship with zero explanation.

It became even harder to stay lowkey when Ace temporarily joined up with the Strawhats. All you wanted was to hug that man and tell him how loved he is and that he deserves to live just as much as anyone else, but you really couldn’t say or do any of that without looking weird. You’ll just have to settle for being extremely nice to him, which was very easy.

Ace himself was already an easy guy to get along with (now at least), but he was noticeably very interested in you. You couldn’t blame him, what with Luffy almost immediately outing your insane situation to him. He seemed incredulous at first, but warmed up to and accepted the story way faster than you expected. It didn’t take long for his questions to go from feeling like an interrogation to being genuine.

You were so busy soaking up the attention from such a beloved character that you almost missed how jealous your crewmates were getting. Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper were taking it the best. Chopper probably because he was still so new to the crew that he wasn’t all that bothered by one of them not paying as much attention to him. Usopp was too busy building Nami’s weapon to concern himself with it too much. Meanwhile, Luffy was just so happy to see Ace again that he didn’t really notice that you were spending a lot of time with him. That, and he would usually be hanging out with both of you anyways. 

The others though, oh boy did they not like this. Nami was the most blatant about it, straight up glowering at you and Ace whenever you two were too close for her liking. You’re pretty sure the only thing keeping her from up and dragging you away from him is Luffy dismissing her complaints and telling her to stop fretting over it. You love being a part of their crew, so she should quit worrying!

Sanji and Zoro were both vying for your attention in their own ways as well. Sanji suddenly wanted more help around the kitchen, insisting that he needed an extra pair of hands now that there was another mouth to feed. Given that Ace’s appetite was on par with Luffy’s, you could understand the desire for help. Zoro’s attempts were considerably less convincing. One time he wanted you to spot him while he was working out, making you laugh right in his face at the mere idea that you would be able to help him with the ridiculous weights he lifts. His face had gone bright red after you pointed it out to him, prompting him to walk away immediately, much to your amusement.

Right now, though, you weren’t with Ace. Him and Luffy were busy doing something and you didn’t want to butt in on all their time together. Instead, you were ogling Ace’s boat that was currently tied to the side of the Going Merry.

You absolutely loved the design of his ship, it was such a clever idea to use his devil fruit ability to power a steam engine and make what looks like a tiny sailboat function like a jet ski. It didn’t appear in the anime too many times but everytime it was on screen it looked so cool. 

“I wonder what it’d be like to ride that,” you quietly mused to yourself.

“Wanna find out?”

You almost jumped out of your skin at the sudden arrival of Ace. He laughed at your reaction, not a care in the world for the near heart attack he just gave you.

“Oh my God, Ace, you scared the hell out of me!” You lightly slapped at his shoulder, your other hand resting over your now racing heart.

He laughed some more, “I could tell, and I’m sorry about that.” He didn’t sound even vaguely sorry. Ace elbowed your side, “But seriously, do you want to go for a ride?”

The offer had you staring wide-eyed at him. Then the boat. Then back at him again. “Really? Are you sure?” You were desperately trying to keep your cool and not show how insanely excited you were about the idea.

“Of course! I wouldn’t have offered it if I wasn’t. Come on,” he hopped up onto the railing and held his hand out to you. You didn’t need to mull it over, eagerly taking hold and stepping up with him. As soon as you did, he wrapped an arm around you and was ready to jump down onto his boat when Nami started yelling.

“Woah, woah, woah, what the hell are you two doing???” Nami, who was previously pruning her trees, had abandoned the activity entirely in favor of sprinting over to where you were and grabbing onto your leg.

“(Y/N) wanted to try riding my boat, so we’re going for a little joyride, that’s all,” Ace flashed Nami a dazzling smile, not at all deterred by her interruption.

“No way! What if they fall off? That thing doesn’t look safe at all!” Nami was now pulling on you, trying to get you down from the railing.

Ace held on tighter in response, “It’s perfectly safe, it has to be. I’m a devil fruit user, remember? (Y/N) isn’t, so really, I’m in more danger on that than they are. It’s fine.”

You could tell Nami was ready to argue more, but thankfully Luffy piped up, “Don’t worry about it Nami! If Ace says it’s safe then it’s safe!” Luffy, who was perched on his special seat at the bow, came bounding over, “But I wanna go next!”

“Sure thing, Luffy, we’ll be back in a bit,” Ace was quick to jump down with you in tow, not wanting to give any of the other Strawhats a chance to object. After untying it from the Going Merry, he knelt down slightly, “Hop on my back, you’re not gonna want to have your feet down there when we get going.”

Not wanting to get set on fire, you obliged. If you weighed anything to him, he didn’t show it, simply standing up straight as soon as you were on. “Ready?”

You excitedly nod your head, holding on tight to Ace in preparation. It was a good thing too, because he decided to immediately start at the leisurely speed of what felt like mach 7. A shriek emits from your throat as you take off. You think you can hear Nami yelling something again, but couldn’t make it out over your own screaming and the noise of the steam engine roaring to life.

Ace laughed loudly at your reaction, but did slow down slightly, “Sorry about that, I just wanted to get some distance before anyone else tried to stop us.” One of his arms let go of your leg and tugged at your arms around his neck, “But would you mind easing up a bit? I won’t be able to take us back if you choke me out.” 

“Oh oops, I’m sorry!” You immediately loosened your arms and readjusted them. Accidentally strangling Ace was not something you wanted to do today. Or any day really.

He simply shrugged it off, telling you not to worry about it. It’s not like you could really hurt him. “I’m gonna speed up again, you ready for it this time?”

The second you confirm that you are, the boat lurches forward, cutting through the waves like nothing. Now that you weren’t panicking, you could properly take in the experience and thoroughly enjoy it. 

The wind was whipping through your hair and sea water misted the air, droplets clinging to both yours and Ace’s hair. He hit a particularly big wave causing the boat to go airborne for a moment before crashing back down. You found yourself laughing and cheering as Ace continued to show off, which only egged him on more.

After a while, Ace slowed to a stop and let you down from his back. “C’mere, step up on this,” he stepped to the side and motioned for you to step up onto the front of his boat. His hands rested on your hips to keep you steady, presumably not wanting to get chewed out by Nami if you came back sopping wet. 

“This is one of the best parts of being at sea,” he was staring straight ahead. “Sunsets out here are something else, you don’t get a view like this on land.”

He was completely correct, it was beautiful. Orange, red, and pink hues colored the sky and reflected gorgeously in the ocean. It was a breathtaking view, one you would remember forever.

The two of you fell into a comfortable silence, quietly admiring the view with nothing but the natural sounds of the ocean around you. It was nice, very peaceful. 

“What do you think about staying here?”

You tense at Ace suddenly speaking. “Like staying out here a little longer?” As lovely as this was, the others were bound to get antsy if you stayed out after dark.

“No, I mean staying here in this world,” he stepped closer to you, wrapping his arms fully around you and resting his head on your shoulder to be able to see your face. “It’s nice here, right? Why not stick around? I know Luffy wants you to. Hell, I’m sure the rest of the crew does, too.”

You were taken aback by this statement, and weren’t really sure how to respond. Sure, it could be nice here when you all weren’t being hunted for sport by marines, but this wasn’t a place you could see yourself staying long term. That, and you had a life back home, you couldn’t just throw your friends and family to the wind like that.

Sucking in a breath, you searched for the nicest way to say all that. “It is nice here, but I have to go back.” You could feel his posture stiffen behind you, “Don’t get me wrong, you all have been super nice to me! It’s just that I’ve got all my friends and family back home and I miss them terribly.”

“Your family?” Ace said this so quietly that you weren’t even sure he was saying that to you. Abruptly, he straightened up, “I know! If you want a family so bad you can join the Whitebeard pirates!”

What? You joining the Whitebeard pirates? You already feel inadequate enough around the Strawhats, you can’t imagine how pathetic you would feel around those people. Of course, it would be awesome to get to meet them, but you want to keep to yourself as much as possible since you will eventually have to go back home.

While you were thinking, Ace kept going, “Pops would love you, I just know it. We haven’t gotten another sibling in a while, everyone would be psyched to meet you.” His once comforting hug was growing tighter by the second. Suffocating even.

“Ace-”

“And you already have friends with my brother’s crew, so that’s all taken care of!”

“Ace, ple-”

“Of course, I’m your friend too, but after you join I’ll be your big brother!”

“ACE!” Your yell startled him, mercifully making him let go of you. You take the opportunity to inch forward and create some distance, however minute.  “That’s,” oh, how to put this without hurting his feelings, “that’s very kind of you to offer, but I’d rather stay with the Strawhats for now.”

“Oh…” You don’t even need to turn around to know how disappointed he was by this declaration. He chuckled awkwardly, “I’m sorry about that, looks like I got a little carried away there.”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” frankly, you just wanted to go back to the ship after that. The atmosphere was uncomfortable now.

After a few more seconds of silence, Ace cleared his throat and spoke again, “We should probably head back now, it’s gonna be dark soon.”

You were quick to agree and clambered onto his back, “Yeah that’s a good idea, Nami would throw a fit if we stay out much longer.” She’ll probably be mad regardless, but still.

Ace got his boat going and began the trip back. The Going Merry was a lot further away than you’d realized, it was so small that you could just barely make it out in the distance. You internally cringe, your crewmates are no doubt unhappy about you being this far away.

Despite the distance, you couldn’t help but notice how slow Ace was going compared to earlier. It’s like he wanted to drag this out for as long as possible. You decided not to call him out on it, not deeming it worth it.

“I’m not giving up, you know.”

“What?” 

“I’ll drop it for now, but I’m not giving up on you joining Whitebeard’s crew. Just… think about it, okay?” Ace’s voice was quiet, just barely loud enough to hear over the engine. 

The rest of the ride back remained dead silent, giving you plenty of time to mull over what just happened. It felt so… Weird. Out of character, really. He’s known you for, what? 24 hours? If that. Yet he’s trying to talk you out of going home and seems dead set on replacing your family with his own. Granted, everyone’s been more clingy than you thought normal, but this was downright bizarre. 

You really need to find a way home, and fast.

[deathbxnny]

Can i request for JJK HCs of Yuta, Yuji, and Megumi with a Huohuo (from HSR) like reader? I was inspired by Huohuo trailer where she gets possessed by Tail and exorcised a spirit with a technique that reminds me of the Domain Expansion from JJK.

Context:

So the reader accidentally became a vessel for a powerful cursed spirit (which is tail) when they were 6 years old. Immediately, they were taken in custody by the Tokyo Jujutsu High. Like Yuji and Yuta, they were at first planned to be executed but thankfully Gojo stepped in and ensure they do not receive that fate (they're a child for God sake) and put them under his care.

Now they are 13 years old and are now beginning to go to the field because of their abilities which are the same ones Huohuo has in game and also they can exorcise cursed spirits when Tail possess them (with consent) like during Huohuo's trailer

Now how do those three react to meeting the reader and realized they are a crybaby and pretty young and why the hell is a child is on the field rn??? (The elders forced it, despite Gojo doing everything he could)

How do those three react that despite being young and a scaredy cat, the reader is actually pretty strong?

How do those three react to seeing Tail being mean to the reader and it being crystal clear that he does care for them like a father?

I remembered you saying that despite not doing any HSR request, readers who are based on HSR characters for request on other fandoms were still acceptable. If i remembered wrong, sorry 😅, you can just ignore this request or put it in the pending waitlist. Hope you have a good day/night though

- Flower Anon 🌸

Hello flower Anon!! Sorry that this took so long to complete. Work has been torturing me as usual, so yeah, please forgive me. I really love this request, though, especially as it has Yuta in it, who's one of my favorites, lol.

Also, these are technically not headcanons and just small stories for the characters, but I've been desperate to write more, so I hope that's okay with you and that you'll like them!!<33

Content: Platonic relationships, preteen reader, mentions of battles, cursing, kinda unserious, sfw

Reader has no mentioned pronouns!

((Not proofread))

》YUTA OKKOTSU

Yuta was a little bewildered at first when he saw a kid shakily appear onto the battlefield, clearly scared and terrified of the curses that surrounded them. He opened his mouth to tell you to get away and hide, when suddenly a curse in the form of a tail swished into view behind you, clearly annoyed at how you were acting.

"They're not going to exorcize themselves, you know? Get it together and attack them already!" It hissed, making you whimper and quickly wave your flag in terror when a curse attempted to injure you. The tail curse then suddenly posessed you quicker than Yuta could move to save you. Its energy was so strong, however, that it made the teen freeze in surprise. One swipe of your hand essentially disintegrated the curse on the spot.

"Just... who are you?" Yuta asked carefully, arms crossed patiently for answer, when you two got out of the danger zone. You nervously fidgeted under his gaze and went to speak when Mr. Tail beat you to it quite rudely. "Why does it matter to you? The kid got enough to deal with because of you weirdos, so give them a break." He said, making the older boy raise a brow in interest. It seemed like you two had something in common, even if Rika's care for Yuta was alot... kinder, if you could say that.

On your walk back to the school, you told him all about your origins and what got you here in the first place. At the sound of the elders having a hand in this, he couldn't help but sigh. That wasn't all too surprising somehow. He was just glad that the curse you were posessed by seemed to genuinely care for you, despite his uncaring and rude attitude.

"Well... if you want, I can help train you-" "-Absolutely not!-" "-Mr. Taillll!" At your exasperated, teary eyed plea, the curse couldn't help but roll his eyes and give in anyways. "Fine... but no funny business, got it?" Yuta gave you a playful and amused smile as he raised his arms in faux defeat.

"I wouldn't dare to."

》YUJI ITADORI

Yuji tried dragging you off the battlefield before you could even show off your abilities, thinking you were simply a lost child, until Mr. Tail eventually was sick of your one-sided arguing in which you were just nervously trying to stutter out the reason for your appearance, whilst the pink haired sorcerer attempted to "scold" you for being there. "Ey you! Let the damned kid go!" He yelled out, making both of you pause.

Shivering in fear, you quickly tried to make up excuses, considering that you've heard more than enough from Yuji and the curse he was a vessel for. But Mr. Tail clearly didn't care enough. "Huh?? Woah, your tail can speak?? Wait, you have a tail-" "-I'm a curse, dumbass!" Yuji blinked before a bright grin crossed his face. "Oh wow! So we're both possessed by a rude curse? Haha, we have so much in common already!" You attempt to smile back shakily but were clearly too anxious to keep it up for long. Especially when you were still surrounded by evil curses practically waiting to attack you.

"Well, anyways, you look pretty young, so you can't be the backup Gojo talked about..." "U-uhm... actually, we are the backup..." "Oh... that's cool then! Show me what you got!" Mr. Tail deadpanned in annoyance, absolutely over this already, as he simply possessed you and took care of the enemy curses himself.

Once he was done doing so, and he finally let you return to normal, Yuji clapped his hand with a determined and proud nod. "Man, we're such a good team, you know?" Mr. Tail felt a vaij pop then as he narrowed his eyes in agitation. "You didn't even do anything!" "Yes, I did! You just weren't looking-" "Oh you little-" The rest of the walk was filled with the two bickering with a teary-eyed and trembling you stuck in the middle.

At least you gained an unlikely friend who was just like you... kind of-

》MEGUMI FUSHIGURO

Megumi already knew and heard about you long before you entered the battle zone. Gojo had been the one who told him of you, asking him to keep an eye out in case you couldn't handle it anymore due to your rather anxious nature. But what he didn't except was how young you actually were. Raising a brow and crossing his arms, he looked at your shaky form in front of him, which was clearly doing everything it could to not look him in the eyes.

"So... You're the backup?" "Uhm... yes...?" "Hm." Despite knowing that the elders forced you to come here, he still didn't feel too confident or good about this. Sending a child onto a suicide mission was on brand for them, however, so he supposed that being very surprised would be wrong too. It was unfortunately expected.

"What the hell are you looking at them like that for?" The curse that you introduced as Mr. Tail hissed out harshly, obviously very unamused by the entire situation himself. Shrugging, Megumi simply shoved his hands into his pockets before turning to enter the building your mission would take place in. "Nothing. I just don't think they should join, if they're scared." He said, referencing the tears that were about to spill from your eyes, including the clear trembling of your body in fear. You absolutely didn't want to be here. Not that he could blame you.

"But... I have to. Otherwise, the elders will..." You trailed off, head hanging low as you found yourself unable to finish that grimm sentence. Megumi paused in his step, head turning slightly to look back at your defeated form. You were strong, far stronger than most were at your age. And your predicament reminded him of a certain friend of his.

Sighing, he scratched his head in speaking up again and continuing on his way. "Fine. Come with me, but stay close and only use your cursed technique when I tell you to." You looked up in surprise and followed after him quickly, feeling somewhat grateful despite the terror that he gave you and Mr. Tail a chance after all.

[sweet-as-an-angel]

Hello there! I've been a fan of your work for a while now and let me just say, your original works and characters have me absolutely captivated! (Your yandere outlaw is one of my top favorite fictional characters! And your yandere cult leader is rapidly rising in the ranks 👀) You put so much detail into all your writing and you really delve deep into the psychology and personality of every one of them so beautifully, not to mention how diverse they all are from one another. Each and every one has such dimension and they're so believable in their actions and reactions! (And can I just say I think it's very clever that your yandere!Milf/Dilf's names start with the acronym's initial)

And your MCs are also quite vibrant and while they remain easily relatable they still have distinct traits that the characters get attached to. Thank you for making and sharing these amazing stories and characters with us, it really makes my day whenever I see you've posted something new.

Now, I know this ask is getting pretty lengthy (sorry about that ^^" I tend to ramble) but I was going through your Yan!Dilf works again and I wanted to ask, how would Dominic react if his darling was someone who's maybe dealt with manipulative people in the past or is highly emotionally intelligent and observant who could tell he wasn't being entirely genuine? But instead of pulling away from him they try to understand what he wants from them and was open about it? Would he ever even become obsessed with someone like that or allow that kind of situation to happen or is he too cautious for it to be possible?

I know you've had a lot of asks so please don't feel obligated to answer this! But in any case thank you again for sharing your works and I hope you have a wonderful wonderful day! 💖💫

My Lovely, you have positively touched my soul with your endearing sentiments ! Truly, you have made my day and I cannot thank you enough for being such a loyal enthusiast of my work, your time is valued more than I can ever hope to express <3.

Your question is an incredibly fascinating one, my Dear; thank you for sharing it with us ! I wish you the happiest and most prosperous of days, Sweetie ^^

TW: Manipulation, Dominic Being Dominic, Vulnerability, No Pronouns Used For Reader Except 'You'.

♡ Dominic is, as you suggested, initially extremely cautious around you. However, he knows he can't just drop you like a sack of potatoes; it would be far too obvious to the people around him, which would surely cause others to find him out as the serpent he is if they ever went digging around his character.

♡ But, when you show him, gradually, like a keeper feeding a feral animal, that your endeavour is not to oust him as an un-human but rather to understand what made him like this in the first place (and all the lace and frills that come with such a monumental task), he regards you...differently than he did before.

♡ Sure, he thought you were very attractive and that you could offer him something other than the resplendence his life is steeped in, but now...

♡ He feels exposed. Seen. Vulnerable.

♡ All things he tries to push back against. Things he tries to bury beneath a grandiose tale of a childhood spent in the most accommodating of educational establishments, lavish mansions and the lap of luxury.

♡ He tries to lead you a merry dance down a version of his life that he wants you to see, rebuttaling your attempts at making him crack.

♡ You tell him you can see past that. He, feeling his eye twitch, believes you.

♡ It will take a long, long time to get Dominic even close to admitting a scintilla of how his psyche works. Or, rather, doesn't work.

♡ And it's only if you manage to grind away at his need to hide his most precious secret - the parasite that wears his skin and controls his mind - that he'll open up.

♡ Fractionally. Piecemeal. But he opens up, nonetheless.

♡ He'll grow to love you in ways unfathomable even to him.

♡ If you thought he was bad without having a background in combatting the manipulation of others, he is insidious now.

♡ You become to him what he could never be for himself; a safe haven. The only person from which he does not hide.

♡ Sure, he keeps the more...dangerous aspects of his personality hidden for a lot longer than others, but you can topple these columns, can shake Dominic from his perch forged from the ivory of a devil's horns.

♡ You can tame him in ways unimaginable. You have only to see him for who - what - he truly is.

Reblog for more content like this! It helps creators like myself tremendously and it is greatly appreciated :-)

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[purpleserpents]

insane ramblings

trying not to lose too much sleep over the latest leaks (and failing).

genuinely miserable thinking about alicent’s potential suicide attempt. the only thing that would make it even worse if she does it during some sort of random journey with criston outside of kings landing. there is speculation that this scene is somewhere in the crownlands. at the same time there is speculation that criston is not present in this scene because fabien wasn't on set with olivia.

my only sliver of hope is the rhaenicent end of season reunion, which i would say it's almost guaranteed. i'm guessing that they'll probably parallel the sept scene fairly heavily. i would love to see the inversion of roles taken to the fullest extent. in 2x03 alicent looks so regal in the sept, and rhaenyra meets her as a septa, dressed as a common servant of the realm. it would be crazy to now see dragonstone rhaenyra in her best dragon scale dress meeting alicent at her lowest point of the season, disheveled and suicidal, begging for some semblance of peace. i would probably cry but it would make for great storytelling.

my fear is that they’ll take the parallel too far because they can’t write for shit and alicent will leave somewhere that will make the story worse. olivia has mentioned alicent finding freedom in the final arc of this season, and this is really what's eating at my brain. the places alicent could go longterm:

dragonstone: if the rhaenicent reunion happens, she will have to stop at dragonstone regardless. some possible theories: 1) alicent could be taken prisoner here, but the fandom consensus seems to be that it's too early for that. this would also be the complete opposite of alicent finding her freedom, as olivia has implied. so i think this one is unlikely. 2) alicent stays in dragonstone with some sort of agency. i think the best possible version of this would be a full alicent turncloak arc. this would obviously be another huge deviation from the books, but i've seen some really interesting speculation about how if alicent had switched sides, TB could have spun it as alicent being taken captive, which would look a lot less bad. this would be so good -- it would call into question the way that history has been written, which is the best space for the show to exist in imo. there is also the snippet of rhaenyra saying "history will paint you as a villain" in a teaser, with the word "villain" being possibly dubbed in another language in the feminine form (i haven't confirmed this myself). this line could be definitely be said to alicent during their reunion, and, in my wildest dreams, could be part of the turncloak arc. the main thing that stands in the way of alicent turncloak actually happening (besides bad writing and the centuries long oppression of lesbians) is helaena. i don't think alicent could leave helaena and jaehaera alone. one day i will write about alicent, helaena, and jaehaera flying to dragonstone with dreamfyre, because i am insane. (but, seriously, if you were to write a turncloak alicent arc, it would be genius for alicent to bring her clairvoyant daughter - the enemy queen - and aegon's only heir over to the other side). they will never write this because they hate me.

oldtown: it would be an insane amount of traveling, especially if she has to meet rhaenyra first, but the leaks suggest she's going to oldtown. on one hand, they might be able to do something cool with daeron (thought he hasn't been cast). on the other hand, i think it would take some really good writing to paint alicent going back to her shitty father in oldtown as her "finding her freedom." to me, alicent going to her home town to be lady hightower would be a major character set back. it would be a different scenery, she would be far from her royal sons, but she would still be stuck in duty, just in a new font. i honestly don't want them to add oldtown scenes to the show. it will be another location, another story thread to follow. hopefully they don't do that, but they might choose to for some new season 3 terrain

nowhere?: alicent is clearly starting some sort of spiritual journey in kings landing in the last episode alone. hitting her breaking point, even leaving kings landing for the suicide attempt + rhaenicent reunion could be a freedom arc for a while, even if she comes back. i think it is possible that she will just come back to kings landing, and that we are associating freedom too much with alicent's physical location.

no matter what happens, the leaks feel insane but fairly plausible. the most unrealistic thing i see is the amount of fast traveling. having alicent do a continental tour of westeros feels like a really dumb way to attract similar criticism to later seasons of got.

i have to laugh, i could be living my life like a normal person if i had never started this show

[jackravenblood]

Akane Aoi's yandere gag, how first impression and early writing defined a character in Fandom eyes

Dedicated to Rai, Grapesoda, Null, and Magim on Discord, for all their efforts including editing/proofreading this post as well as keeping an open mind about my late-night TBHK yaps. This analysis wouldn't have been possible without the consistent editing and corrections by Rai and Null.

Disclaimer: This post is not a complete Akane character analysis, but rather an attempt to analyze the reason why a section of the TBHK community interprets his character through a very specific view. 

For the longest time within the Fandom, people have viewed Akane through various angles and have crafted many views of him throughout the years. A ‘’yandere freak’, an innocent kid who just wants to protect his childhood friend, or maybe a flawed person trying to do the best given his circumstances. Whether you hate him, love him, or are neutral about his character, there is no denying the way people interpret Akane, which defines how they will feel about him as a character and his development since his debut. For most fans, Akane has become their favorite character; an endearing sassy boy with high moral upstanding but willing to do anything for his love. For other fans, he’s still a creepy, unreliable, obsessive person; just like how he was initially introduced. In this sort of analysis, I want to present my case on why there are people who remain distrustful and dislike him and the interpretation that places itself heavily through the view of his ‘yandere’ gag.

I. The introduction of Akane and the ‘yandere’ gag

Akane’s introduction is straightforward: He fiercely loves Aoi Akane. Akane has had a crush on Aoi since their pre-school days. He constantly praises her, he asks her out every day only to be ‘rejected’ by Aoi, yet he continues to love her all the same. Akane would do anything for her, even if it meant it pushed him to his absolute limit. Akane also tends to get physical to “protect” Aoi, which causes some fans to interpret his character as yandere-like.

Most characters in TBHK have a certain gag attributed to their characters; Hanako is a pervert, Teru is bad at cooking, Mitsuba with his cute/feminine appearance contrasting his blunt personality, etc. Akane’s obsession with Aoi is his gag; Aidairo spends a decent amount of time highlighting this trait in the Clock Keepers Arc. This arc is one of the manga series’ earliest ones, it leaves an impression that will last on most readers. Although Akane’s obsession is played off as a gag — we don’t see Akane acting like this post-severance/present TBHK, as we will see near the end of this analysis.

However, Akane's expressive way of loving Aoi is not out of nowhere with Aoi consistently, throughout the story, giving him "points" for his effort when we see them together. Akane’s obsession with Aoi is also not shallow, nor only exaggerated for comedy purposes. It’s shown throughout TBHK that Akane’s adoration for Aoi is genuine.

But the impression of Akane being a ‘‘yandere’’ has sunk into almost everyone's by the point “The Three Clock Keepers” Arc ended. While his character is heavily intertwined with his ‘yandere’ gag, this trait is not meant to be taken seriously, given that Akane often acts like an unreliable narrator. For some fans, it might be hard to reconcile the image of a sincere, devoted Akane with his ‘yandere’ gag constantly shown throughout the manga before the Grim Reaper arc.

This isn’t a great lasting impression of Akane, as we will see later in the story. 

From The Hell of Mirrors arc to the Picture Perfect arc (29 chapters), we focus solely on Mitsuba, Kou, Nene, and Hanako. His appearance during these arcs usually reinforces the fact that his love for Aoi is solid. After the Clock Keepers arc, (and leading up to the Grim Reaper Arc) there is little to no new information about Akane, nor any character development from him.

While these bonuses and scenes are for strictly comedic purposes, they still push his heavy obsession with Aoi deeper into the reader's mind. After the clock keepers arc, Akane disappears from our radar completely. During his brief absence, we, the readers, have time to digest Akane's current character until the Grim Reaper arc. In the meantime, we also had HSHK and this page in particular:

Here, Akane is portrayed as an actual ‘yandere’ (compared to his tame obsession in the main manga series); someone who will hurt others for the sake of their love. But we must remember that HSHK is a light-hearted spinoff, and its stories are supposed to be comedic to lighten the tension of the main manga. The canonicity of AHSK can also be debated; but in any case, it further reinforces that Akane’s gag isn’t meant to be taken seriously, nor is he an actual ‘yandere’. However, it also has the opposite effect, that it is much more visible, which reinforces the image of Akane as a ‘yandere’ character in the readers’ minds.

Keeping all of this in mind, we went straight into the Grim Reaper arc with these conclusions. The arc initially started normally, with Akane doing everything he could to outmatch Teru — trying his best to prevent him from confessing to Aoi. His adoration for Aoi is shown further in the camp preparation scenes during chapters 59 and 60. All and all, these are expected behaviors from him. 

However, when Aoi gets abducted by Hakubo, Akane completely drops his ‘yandere’ gag. He becomes solemn, his only goal being to rescue Aoi as he reluctantly works with Nene to help her. We even get to see him fight Aoi head-on (something the audience would never expect before this chapter) — which brings us to the “Aoikane Chapter”: Chapter 69.

Chapter 69’s (haha nice) purpose is to be very emotional. A conversation between two broken people, trying to make sense of their love for each other and the world around them again. We get to see Aoi’s true nature and feelings behind the scenes, and yet Akane wholeheartedly confesses his love to Aoi, saying that he’s always known of her facade and that he’s always loved her, nonetheless.  In short, it is not just a very pivotal moment for Aoi’s and Akane's relationship, it is also important for them as characters.

 It would have been perfect if we ignored the entire section of what I explained about the writing of Akane before the Grim Reaper Arc.

Up to that point, there are subtle hints about Akane’s true nature but it’s never big nor consistent enough and is overshadowed by the constant joke about his expressive love for Aoi.

We’re also hit with this bonus after Chapter 70

Even after the rollercoaster of chapter 69 and the effort to drop the Aoi-crazed ‘yandere’ gag of Akane, the comedy of Akane's expressive love for Aoi remains.

II. Interpretation through a ‘yandere’ view

   For many readers, this is a very contradictory image of Akane. One side of Akane is a serious childhood friend who loves Aoi unconditionally, understands all her flaws, and wants to be there for her. The other side of Akane is that the character is still being used as an extension of the old ‘yandere’ gag.

The two sides of his character's development are incompatible with each other and make what is supposed to be a step-up of developing Akane’s personality into a confusing image of Akane; riddled with contradictions within his character and jokes over how he expresses his love to Aoi. 

For most, this is the way they perceive Akane, especially people who have already disliked Akane for a long time. This gag had become an integral part of his character. The lack of a proper background story and constant gags at the expense of one of the most important traits of his character (His love for Aoi) has deepened the image of an unreliable narrator that most would go as far as seeing his actions as manipulative, hypocritical, and more. 

Unlike Hanako's “pervert gag” and his ‘obsessiveness’ with Nene (in which said gag was not played as Hanako’s entire character and we get a thorough view of why he acts like that in the manga), Akane hadn’t gotten any near the amount of screen time that could’ve been used to explain his actions and build up an understanding of his character to anticipate for something like chapter 69. This has to do with the limitation of space for building his characters (A problem that characters like Teru and Aoi also face) and AidaIro mostly writing him out of the story during and after the Three Clock Keepers (who was still at the time presented as a secondary character) to focus on the main cast. His screen time after The Three Clock Keepers arc (minus the brief exam prep chapter before the Grim Reaper arc) had been continually used for a cheap comedic effect instead of deepening his motive and expanding his relationships with the world around him, especially the one with Aoi.

The impact of his ‘yandere’ gag is damaging his character because it overplayed itself to highlight a big part of his character. His love for Aoi has been genuine, but the way it has been portrayed has led many to doubt it, it makes Akane's early characterization to be solely dependent on his crush on Aoi instead of being on his own. This has favored an approach that explores Akane that considers his ‘yandere’ gag, and sometimes, turns it into his entire personality. For most simply run with this: Akane is only a ‘yandere’, his love for Aoi is his whole personality and his character is just terribly executed. This flawed way of viewing Akane that has been debunked repeatedly, whether it’s canon or by other fans (examples are analyses of his character written by @MusicalMoritz and @mari-lair on Tumblr). It’s also important to note that unlike actual yanderes portrayed in other manga (think of characters such as Yuno Gasai, Himiko Toga, or Yamai Ren), Akane’s gag is much, much tamer in comparison.

Other, more sympathetic, interpretations painted Akane in a more nuanced light, dating back to the time he was tricked into the service of the Clock Keepers and how his love for Aoi has turned from genuine feelings for her, into something to clung on under this fate, to make sense of the twist of fate that has pushed him into where he is now. There are other views with each on various degrees of trying to analyze Akane through his ‘yandere’ gag. III. Post-chapter 69 and the character development/expansion of Akane.

Chapter 69 has always been the defining moment of how people look at Akane as a character. Most readers love this climax of Akane’s character (and Aokane’s relationship), while others do not buy it. Regardless, after this chapter, we received more and more information about Akane and his true feelings.

As Aoi and Akane try to leave the far shore in chapter 70, Aoi apologizes for what she has done in previous chapters, while Akane tries to reassure her that it is not her fault. He still shows that he knows how she feels and is always willing to be there for her. 

Many have taken this as Akane trying to ignore Aoi’s problems, but taken in the context of what they were doing, it was an attempt to calm her down after the traumatic situation both of them went through, and to show his support for her to apologize and explain herself to the others after they return to the real world.

After that, we also see Aoi wishing to go to a zoo and see giraffes when she returns. Despite Akane being surprised by the topic, He still supports her endeavor to live as her real self again.

But when they finally reach back to the real world, Akane turns around and realizes that Aoi is not there.

After hearing Teru's words, Akane’s usually calm demeanor broke apart immediately. The horror in his eyes, his instant rage, his overwhelming fear when he realized that Aoi was stuck at the far shore. That he feels like he has failed to protect Aoi, again.

Trying to seek an answer, any answer, he asks Teru this:

Akane can’t accept that he is seemingly alive, but Aoi is gone. Of all the people who needed to be saved, it was him that Teru chose. 

However, he didn’t let his rage blind him and instead used it to understand Teru's reasons for his choices, instead of trying to kill Teru or even be hostile toward him. Akane has already used his experiences and observation skills to realize how Teru never does anything without a backup plan. While he does love Aoi tremendously, he’s still smart enough to understand Teru's plan. 

During the shrine visit with Teru, Akane even shows further detachment from the gag that has defined his early characterization. 

Akane’s expression here is strangely calm and genuine, unlike his hostility in the earlier chapters when he tried to stop Teru from confessing to Aoi. Unlike the Teru “threatening” situation that made Akane feel that Teru was just toying with Aoi to mess with his feelings, Akane here is very respectful and curious about Teru's feelings toward Aoi, as he starts to understand that Teru does genuinely care for Aoi. Even though he is suspicious of Teru after the exorcist's answers are very cryptic, he still smiles and even pokes fun at Teru's situation.

In the current Alteration arc, we have seen how Akane refused to turn back into the old timeline despite the prospect of an arranged marriage between Teru and Aoi within the current timeline. All of this would have been unthinkable during Akane's early development. Although this comes too late to change the readers’ views of Akane before chapter 69, it is still a part of the journey, and it shows how far our little sassy half-supernatural Clock Keeper has gone as a character and should be treated fairly when we analyze him. IV. Conclusion

In conclusion, the development of Akane as a character has been a difficult journey to make sense of due to the limitations of the manga, AidaIro’s writing direction, and more (though going more in-depth warrants another analysis of AidaIro’s writing choices). This has led to a failure in building up his character early on, leaning too heavily into gags and jokes about his love for Aoi. 

This interpretation of Akane through his ‘yandere’ gag persists but has changed to account for new additions to his lore, however, there are still readers who remain dismissive of his character development after the Grim Reaper arc. I believe that despite the opinions on the execution of his character, it is important for us to keep an open mind and consider the current canon as well as the multiple viewing across the fandom in future understanding of Akane in discussion or fan works made of him. P/S: This is my first ever analysis of a media I love. I want to thank everyone who’s read this far (you just wasted 15-30 minutes of your life!) I would like to personally thank the friends that I have made through our sheer obsession with TBHK and its characters: 

Grapesoda for being the first person willing to talk extensively about my TBHK ideas with me, be it AUs, HCs, or interpretations. It has been a pleasure to yap about Aoinene with her. I wouldn’t have started writing TBHK fan content without her early support for it. Rai for having constant strokes (/j) while editing the initial dumpster fire of a draft and our uncountable nights of constant debate around the TBHK characters. She has given me many insights about Akane as a character and without those talks these thoughts would have never crossed my mind. She has taught me a lot about how to broaden my views. It was a lesson in a way that culminated in this analysis. Null for editing to make this more readable, I hope that this analysis is much better than my early rambling about Akane with you. Magim for being one of the finest TBHK theorists I ever have had the pleasure to talk to, our late-night talks have pushed my ideas about TBHK characters to a limit I never thought was possible. 

Without them and Rai, I wouldn't have the courage or the knowledge to write this analysis.

[achillesisnotcomingdown]

I finished ToA not long ago and I wanted to write down some thoughts/scenes that stick with me

(in chronological (ish) order, watch out for spoilers)

Theres an italian girl at camp ! It means Nico gets to practice and speak italian ! (which probably haven't happened in about 70 years)

Will introducing Nico as "my boyfriend". I already knew they would be canon, but reading that line felt weird /pos

Apollo sees Solangelo and think of himself and Hyacinth

That night when Kayla and Austin disappeared and Apollo left to look for them, it probably was the first night Will ever spent alone in his cabin

Apollo's insane body dysmorphia. He's a god, he can always take the physical form he is the most comfortable and confident in... Until now. He is stuck in a body that isn't his, he feels ashamed, when he sees certain traits in others he find them charming or pretty, but when it's on him then it's disgusting. He complain that everything is this body's fault (ex. he wouldn't have been touched by the Eurynomos if it wasn't for his chub.)(I could go on for hours)

Lityerses ! I love that guy. Idk why i love him that much. He is my best guy.

Apollo's reaction to Commodus' name. His flashback of him. So painful he was physically sick.

Apollo talking Helios out of killing them, because he just want to be free, not to hurt them.

APOLLO ATTEMPT TO KHS TO STOP THEM ?? IM A SUCKER FOR SOME GOOD PAINFUL SELF SACRIFICE.

Jason. I'm not talking about Jason. I can't speak about Jason.

Frank and Apollo ! They are so fond of each other !!!

Apollo heard all of Frank's prayers when he was unclaimed and wished he could've adopted him.

And Frank respecting Apollo as a god although he is *vaguely gesture at Apollo/Lester*

Reyna saying aloud that she doesn't want nor needs romance. It's so rare to see aromantic representation and Rick did it so well.

Literally Apollo singing his way out of situations.

FRANK'S SELF SACRIFICE!!! (He already had one of my favorite character development before that)

APOLLO KILLING COMMODUS ??? why do never talk about that it's one of the best deaths I've ever seen that was BADASS AND FULL OF EMOTIONS.

Apollo slowly dying out of poison and the Dodona Arrow doing everything it can to keep him conscious.

I hope Dakota didn't get killed off just to give Lavinia the role of Centurion. I love my boy Dakota, and his death felt kind of meaningless, except for her rank up :/ also i feel like it doesn't suit Lavinia. Some ppl are strong and good and trustable but just not made to order others. (ill prop make a full post about that)

Dionysos confirmed to be an annoying little brother!

Nico. How does Rick manage to always give him more issues. Leave the kid alone.

When Will glows, Apollo is genuinely impressed and tells him how proud he is.

Nico destroying Nero's door with his giant zombie bull. That was cool.

When Apollo gets stabbed in Nero's tower and think it's the end, he prays "Zeus, Artemis, Leto, anyone"

And in general the few parts he talks about Leto, he's such a momma's boy and I love it.

When Apollo left for Delphi... I was fully expecting Meg to go with him. I was so worried that he went alone while already feeling that weakened from the previous events.

DODONA ARROW. FOREVER IN MY HEART.

Artemis is here when Apollo wakes up. She's by his side, she's the first person to tell him he succeeded, she hold him while he sobs...

The first thing he does is to greet his horses :) and then to see his friends.

When he gets back to the Dodona bush ! To tell them all how brave and heroic the Arrow have been !

I could spend hours talking about the character developments of Apollo, Meg and the Dodona Arrow (i love the arrow so much you have no idea) but its for another day

There's many things I didn't talk about, but the post is already long enough. I love those 5 books, and Apollo is an amazing narrator.

I love the Arrow of Dodona with all my heart.

[moonspirit]

Hi! I'm the same Anon who asked about the hypothetical situation of Annie NOT crystalising herself and the other possible set of events occurring. I read your thoughts and I honestly never even thought about another Kenny and Annie reunion and just.. talking, quite interesting! (Not to mention Pam's own idea that they wrote - I like it!) Including another mentioning a fic where Annie sees her Dad as a Titan during the second Colossal Titan attack and.. I may had a pretty devious idea. So, let's say Annie did in some way join the Scouts (or just is betraying the Warriors,) so during the mission to retake Shinganshina and there's the scene where Zeke & the mindless Titan's appear, what if one of those mindless creatures was her Dad? (This next part, I'm somewhat iffy since it really feels I mis-characterised her since I tend to mess up, so my apologies!) I'm not sure HOW it could play out then, maybe Annie in some desperate attempt to hold her Dad down so it's not mauled by Levi or Zeke. Though, one thing is clear, she sees the Colossal Titan going down and realises that in some selfish way.. she could bring her Dad back, it'll be a curse he'll bare too but at least she'll see him. And oh.. That's Armin. Completely charred, yet still breathing. With the Scouts debating whenever to save Erwin or Armin. This is all I have before I genuinely write more nonsense, I appreciate taking your time to answer my previous question. Please, have a lovely day! (AND I'M SO SORRY FOR HOW WORDY THIS IS)

Oohhhh hello again anon! I'm honestly so relieved you saw my answer because you sent me the ask on sept 19th and... I took nearly a month to answer - very sorry T^T But I enjoyed it so much and yes, the variety of thoughts on it have been incredibly interesting!

Some quick things first tho 1. you don't have to apologise for a long-ask, they are genuinely enjoyable xD 2. I don't think there's such a thing as mis-characterization especially when we talk about a completely new what-if scenario because there's soooooo many little things influencing a person's thoughts and actions and the resultant outcomes. So nope, there are only headcanons, they are all valid, and you don't need to worry about anything else :>

Now to your ask!

🙃

How dare you now bring THREE contenders for the serum with Annie in the mess? Erwin, I don't see her caring for, but now it's Armin vs. her Dad?

What in the gut-wrenching angst is this, holy shit anon 🥲

But no, genuinely I don't think Annie trying to protect her father from Levi's attacks is out of character for her. That is her DAD. She may have joined the Scouts as you say, but maybe that's because it's her best chance for survival. Betraying the warriors isn't Annie's concern, it's betraying her dad. At any cost, even by joining the scouts, she must return to him.

Only, she probably didn't expect to see him in Paradis, and as a titan no less.

Of course she's abandoning everything else (let's say she doesn't know of Armin's plan) and rushing to protect her father and get him out of the line of fire - perhaps by taking him down in her titan form and dragging him to safety, using her scream to summon other pure titans to whoever is attacking and using the time to do so.

(wait... now I suddenly have the mental picture of Annie and Zeke engaging in a screaming match 🥲)

Her sudden switch in priorities isn't likely to bode well with the others, especially when so much is happening and the Scouts find themselves in a dangerously cornered pinch.

Annie's very good at analyzing a situation and quickly making problem-solving decisions, given two options, she chooses the one in which she has a greater chance of survival (yet sometimes she also willingly walks in to dead ends thanks to her heart, but that's canon). Like leaving Marco on the roof vs saving him, but now..... now we have an extreme situation.

Say she thought immediately crosses her mind - of feeding her father the colossal once she learns it's been taken down. She may not have become attached to Bertholdt as much as she considered him a companion in their mission and someone from home, but he's still... a companion. A fellow warrior.

How do you feed such a person to your father?

And then of course:

That's Armin. Completely charred, yet still breathing.

How do you save your father at the cost of losing the one boy who makes your heart beat faster than the wind?

The one boy you swore you'd protect, as long as you wore the wings of freedom by his side.

The one boy who's looked you in the eyes and said I love you.

Nothing makes sense anymore.

[kaleaido]

In your opinion how do you think/how do you want Taco’s apology to Mic & Pickle to go?

In Brian’s livestream he said “an attempt will be made” which makes me nervous it will go badly :,)

I was gonna answer this way earlier but after watching the trailer a bit of my original answer had changed, oh boy get ready!!! sorry if some part doesnt make sense, this is literally just word vomit

I'm not quite sure whether Pickle fully moved on from what happened, cause if I remember correctly, Brain confirmed in a tweet that Pickle was depressed and also he refuses to read the letters Taco sent him I'm pretty sure. That being said, he could've been doing far better off now but I DONT KNOW HONESTLY!!! Like I know he's a chill guy but it's hard to predict his reaction to her apology.. cause like, Taco was just EVIL to him - If she were to apologize to him, he might believe that she was tricking him again. It wasn't personal for her but it was for him. I get that he might not forgive her, but I do hope he accepts her apology in some ways. I'm also predicting that he could be the first person she apologize to just cause like.. They haven't seen each other in a long time and so the tension isn't that deadly??? and Taco is probably under the impression that he did read the letters she sent him but yeah

As for Mic, LETME TELL YOU I'M ABSOLUTELY MENTAL OVER THIS!!!!! I spend my free time imagining the different way this will go down AND NONE OF THEM SEEMS RIGHT I TELL YOU!!!! i feel like Mic is just an extremely scary hurdle to get over because of the stuff that happened recently. seeing how it was implied that Taco died from stress cause she thought Mic was coming makes me extremely worried that she wouldn't even have the guts to meet Mic face to face - having the possibility of her COMPLETELY messing the apology up. but the thing is, I don't think Mic is necessarily mad at Taco, she was just done with everything and cutting ties for her own good. If Taco were to appear back in her life out of nowhere I'm assuming that Mic will just be extremely uncomfortable, but I also believe that she would want to hear Taco apologise. The difference between Mic and Pickle is that, Mic had the additional context of who Taco really is - They saw her vulnerable side, albeit rarely, but Mic clearly knew Taco was struggling with something and wanted her to open up more (e.g. them asking her why she reached for the portal in hatching the plan) I'm hoping to GOD that Mic can see that Taco is being genuine if she were to apologise or talk about stuff, and I reallyreallyreally hope she listens but like. this is such a thin line to walk and I can see it going really badlyGAH quick thing but I'm assuming that Mepad will be accompanying Taco in whatever her next step is (like yeah did you really expect her to do this alone CMON) i'm just curious on whether he'll be there when she's apologizing to Mic & Pickle. like would he stand there in the corner of the room like an emotional support dog. regardless, I think Mepad being there is a game changer cause he's a generally trustworthy fellow, and he can CONVINCE Mic & Pickle that Taco is actually sorry. this is just my theory don't mind me lalalalala

at the end of the day, ii is a stupid little show (/aff) but the writers know what they're doing when it comes to character relationships. like they KNOW how to write realistic and nuisance dynamics and I'm really interested in how everything will pan out.. ALSO I KNOW WHAT BRAIN MEANT BY "an attempt will be made" BUT PLEASE I CAN'T BE THE ONLY ONE WHO THINKS THAT'S OMINOUS AS HELL!!! it is such a neutral statement that it makes me fear for the worse...please....you can't do this to me....

[absolutesilly]

Tgcf fandom likes to talk about morals and such. We have folks who are the obvious clear good guys like xie lian and feng xin. And then we have hua cheng who is completely neutral. And then we get the morally grey like he Xuan and shi Wudu. And then we have mu Qing…. Which he’s not obliviously good like the other two xianle. But he’s never done an act that’s morally despicable… and he’s not like hua cheng either. What do you think of this topic? And what do you conclude on Mu Qing morality? lol sorry if this sounds like an exam question ☠️☠️☠️

hello there! :) i really appreciate the question!!

to start, i just wanna say that the tgcf fandom’s obsession with morals has always kinda driven me crazy, to be honest! in my opinion, flattening a whole bunch of very complicated characters into clear cut “good guys” and “bad guys” tends to feed into circular arguments about whose fave is the most morally pure and “right”—which isn’t very productive. having said that, though, mu qing’s specific morality really interests me, so let’s chat about it!

to me, mu qing is one of the most realistic characters in the novel, morality wise. he’s pragmatic and driven by self-preservation—which makes sense considering that he was born into extreme poverty with a sickly mother and an executed criminal for a father. he has to succeed and provide for himself and his mother, or they will starve. this is the reality he was born into! underlying all of his choices is the need to survive, at any cost.

but more than just being driven by self-preservation, he’s self-interested. mu qing is ambitious! he wants more for himself!! he isn’t satisfied just being someone’s servant, he wants to stand on his own as xie lian’s equal!!! (this is the crux of why they couldn’t actually be friends until the end of the novel… but that’s an essay for another day lmao)

anyway! mu qing protects himself first because he doesn’t trust anyone else to do it for him. he knows his worth and he leaves when he feels he isn’t being valued.

however, being self-interested does not mean that mu qing is selfish—though he’s often accused of it, both in-universe and out. i think many of the “selfish” accusations (from fans at least) come from the contrast between him and the rest of the xianle quartet, who are all nuts for self-sacrifice. feng xin is still struggling to break himself out of the “devoted bodyguard” mindset, 800 years after xie lian kicked him to the curb. hua cheng has LITERALLY died for his beloved, multiple times. and xie lian, of course, is Mr. Self-Sacrifice himself!

so naturally, a character like mu qing—who places a clear and high value on his own life—stands out a lot compared to them!

but it’s this very self-interest that makes his actions at the end of the novel SO powerful and so telling for who he is as a character. mu qing, THE self-preservation and self-interest guy, risks his life multiple times to save the people he cares about. he takes on a cursed shackle rather than betraying xie lian! he stays and tries to help everyone even though he fully believes that they all hate him and want him dead! he almost DIES just to buy xie lian a few more minutes of escape time! these are all acts of genuine love and selflessness.

of course, mu qing’s big self-sacrifice moments at the end aren’t the only time he does good!! he helps a lot throughout the novel—or at least attempts to help. many of his altruistic actions are either misconstrued by people’s assumptions about him/his own poor communication, or they blow up in his face. but he is very often trying to help!!

i think that’s the crux of mu qing for me: he’s trying. in spite of his cynicism, he KEEPS trying to be a good person! even though basically no one believes in him.

he’s not perfect. he’s mean and unpleasant (i say this with deep affection) and sometimes his pragmatism hurts the people he loves most. case in point: the 33 gods incident on the auspicious land. (though i could also write ANOTHER essay on how this was a complicated and unwinnable situation for both him and xl to be in, and ultimately i think his choice was sad but completely understandable… but i digress. essay for another time.)

anyway! if you’ve gotten this far! my overall verdict is: mu qing is complicated. he’s an imperfect person trying to be good, and i think that’s why i find him so interesting. he makes good choices and bad choices, as we all do!

i think a great many fans would do well to be a little more charitable in their assessment of him. when push comes to shove, many of us are more mu qing than we are xie lian. and there’s nothing wrong with that! ;)

[inkblackorchid]

What the hell happened with Crow: an autopsy (Part 4)

*Deep breath* Okay, everybody. Let's do this one more time.

First off, hello, or welcome back. Let's get the introductions and disclaimers out of the way, shall we?

This is the fourth and final instalment in my very, very long-winded attempt to analyse the character writing of Crow over the course of the entirety of yugioh 5Ds. For everyone who hasn't read the previous parts of the analysis, you can find part one here, part two here, and part three here.

This post, and my analysis as a whole, is neither meant as a Crow hate post, nor as a manifesto to convince people who don't like him that they're wrong. It's as genuine an attempt to simply look at and dissect what the show gives us about him as I can make, though I admit to personal bias because I do like Crow. That said, I'm trying to stay as neutral as possible, because the aim of this entire post tetralogy is to look at the writing decisions made for this character and how they impact him—and how they possibly influenced the audience's perception of him.

My previous three posts all reference this as well, but since I still see these things parroted all across the internet to this day: Please don't read this post under the assumption that any of the 5Ds production rumours are true, especially not the ones surrounding Crow. Because, to make this as short as possible, every popular theory as to why certain characters were mishandled during the later parts of the show fails to line up with the production timeline of said show. Chiefly among those theories, the idea that Crow was meant to be a dark signer and that his popularity correlated to his cards, and the idea that Aki, specifically, had to give up her screentime for him because her VA got pregnant, which both lack any basis in reality, as you can read in the posts I linked. (One final shoutout to @mbg159 here, who compiled these incredibly comprehensive posts and can also be found here on tumblr. Huge thanks.) So if you can do me one favour, please just let the 5Ds rumours die already and read this analysis without the hope of seeing any of them confirmed. I'm so sick of these crackpot theories at this point that I can hardly find the words for it. And while we're on the topic, I also don't want to see this post used as a means to pit Aki and Crow against each other in any way—both have good reasons to be well-liked and both deserve their spot in the narrative, all right? All right.

And now, at last, let's get down to business. The last time I got on a virtual soapbox and yelled about Crow, I covered the entire WRGP, murder-duel-robot induced break included. That means that for this, final stretch, we'll be looking at everything from episode 137 onwards—the Ark Cradle arc. (A side not for dub aficionados here: Episode 136 was the last episode that got an English dub. In other words, everything I talk about here never even made it into the English version. Because 4Kids, I guess.) As we've done before, we'll take a look at what exactly Crow gets up to during the final stretch of the show (and, notably, the epilogue), then see whether any of it needed improving, and if so, how it could have been improved.

You'll find all further yelling below the readmore, and I'll leave you with the other, usual warning here, as well: This will be long. Even if the Ark Cradle arc, relative to the rest of the show, isn't, this post most certainly will be. So get some snacks and perhaps don't start reading this late at night unless you're good at knowing when to stop and reading stuff in bursts. (I'm not.)

As I concluded at the end of my last post, the WRGP ended up being a bit of a mixed bag for Crow. He's there, he duels, but at the same time, despite being positioned as an equal third of a protagonist trio, he's notably less important and arguably also weaker than Yusei and Jack. Moreover, where the plot is concerned, he sure didn't get too much to do—not to speak of the fact that the writers didn't grace him with any meaningful interactions with a certain character who'll become very relevant here.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, the preamble.

With the end of the Team New World duel, the final arc of the show drops the by this point unexpected arrival of the Ark Cradle right on our heads. So, what does Crow do here, at the start, other than be shocked? Well, not much. A lot of the first episode that introduces the Ark Cradle focusses more on the imminent threat said structure poses to New Domino City, and we flash back to our protagonists mostly to ascertain that things are, in fact, going to shit. Even once that focus on the city evacuating shifts again, the episode concerns itself more with Yusei than with Crow. However, meagre as it is, we do get the first interaction between Crow and Sherry during the Ark Cradle arc in this episode.

(Uh.... at least they're technically talking to each other?)

And frankly... It's not much. Unfortunately, up until the duel where he faces her, the Ark Cradle arc continues a trend regarding interactions between Crow and Sherry that we already saw in the WRGP: They barely get to interact, and even when they do, they never have anything so much as resembling a meaningful conversation, mostly because Sherry basically never addresses Crow directly, nor seems very interested in him, while Crow is usually there only to react to what she's saying, rather than actually talk to her. While digging through my mountain of screenshots, I found that latter part to be especially interesting, because as it turns out, this is a trend not just in Crow's interactions with Sherry, specifically. Many moments that probably contribute to the nefarious "screentime" (I've explained my gripes with this term in part two) some people like to accuse Crow of hogging have him only be part of a scene so he can react to what happens in it, to the point of him sometimes feeling like a stand-in for the audience reaction the writers might be hoping for. The above is a perfect example, because as far as character writing is concerned, Crow's "interaction" with Sherry here is utterly devoid of meaning. He's just there to communicate his disbelief over the ominous prediction that Yusei is guaranteed to die if he goes to the Ark Cradle, which feels like exactly the kind of reaction the writers probably wanted from the audience. After all, it's a bold, shocking statement to make. The protagonist, dying? In a card game anime geared towards twelve year-olds? It's downright preposterous. And Crow seems to agree with that, if his dialogue is anything to go by.

This one and other scenes (mostly the kind that contain plot elements that Crow doesn't actually interact with) got me thinking, though, and after having gone through so much of the show with a fine-tooth comb now, I think I've come to a conclusion, so permit me a tangent here: I believe the choice to let Crow, specifically, be a character who often only reacts to events or interactions after the DS arc, rather than contributing much himself, is deliberate. Don't get me wrong, I don't think he's the only character who is frequently put in this position—Aki, the twins, and even Bruno, especially when they're on the sidelines in the WRGP, also often only seem to be there to react or comment on things, perhaps partially to remind us viewers that they still exist, despite not being in a position where they contribute anything to the plot. With how much the twins and Aki got pushed to the side after the pre-WRGP and the Unicorn duel, respectively, and with how toned-down Bruno's entire character is until the very end, as not to spoil his tragic antagonist status too much, Crow in particular ending up as an often reactive, rather than active character stands out a bit more, though. And I think this has everything to do with his personality, because it contrasts that of Jack and Yusei. Think of it. Sure, Crow is shown several times to be just as cool and competent as the other two, but what he has that the other two crucially lack is the ability to freak out like a normal person. I'm being hyperbolic here, of course, but I do genuinely believe this, because when I think back to the show, Jack and Yusei, due to their character writing, only ever seem to be allowed to lose their cool during pretty specific circumstances, and only in very specific ways. Jack, for example, only ever gets to freak out either when a scene paints him as the butt of the joke (like during his infamous, dramatic outburst over cup ramen), or when the freakout is caused by—and expressed as—righteous (or not so righteous) fury (like when he storms off angrily after catching everyone watching his old duel with Dragan). Meanwhile, Yusei is played so straight that we barely ever see him lose his composure at all, outside of intensely dramatic, high-stakes situations (think his dark signer duels with Kiryu, his confrontation with Roman, his initial failure to accel synchro). Hell, the closest we get to ever seeing him be mildly upset about something like a normal person, as far as I can recall, is when he gets embarrased by Martha calling him out on his perceived crush on Aki. That's it.

Crow, though. Crow's allowed to do something the other two aren't: He's allowed to react to the world around him like your average guy. Jack blows through their household money for expensive coffee. Crow gets upset. Understandable. Crow gets injured right before his big debut in a turbo duelling tournament and is upset to the point of snapping at his friends over it. Understandable. Seeing Yaeger's kid cheering his dad on and knowing that this kid will cry if his dad loses makes Crow relent and throw the match. Understandable. Sherry predicts Yusei's imminent death due to hocus pocus and Crow calls bullshit. Understandable.

Do you see what I'm driving at? With how the show treats the other two Satellite boys, I'd argue none of the moments above would have worked anywhere near as well if the writers had tried to make Jack or Yusei take Crow's place in any of them. Because while Yusei and Jack, I feel, were certainly written to be the coolest characters (at least to the target audience), Crow seems like he was written to be the most relatable. He's the guy who takes on a delivery job when they need money. He's the guy who complains about his cranky landlady. And he's the guy who reacts to insane nonsense happening around him a little more realistically than his defeated-an-ancient-devil-to-absorb-its-power brother, his shouldering-the-guilt-of-a-cataclysmic-event-decades-ago other brother, their mutual previously-violent-psychic-who-was-part-of-a-cult friend, and the one-of-us-can-see-spirits-and-we-share-a-weird-kind-of-magical-bond twins. As such, it doesn't feel too out there to me to claim that in many situations, they made Crow the stand-in for the audience, because he has a less iron composure than Jack and Yusei, is readily available in many scenes by virtue of living with the other two, and happens to be the guy who has the arguably most normal backstory out of the signers. (Save, perhaps, for Rua, but I've already addressed before why the writers barely ever pulled Rua centre stage for anything. And they certainly wouldn't have pulled him centre stage for this, either.)

Now, as far as character writing is concerned, assuming I'm at least halfway correct with my hunch above, I feel that whether or not this decision is good or a shot in the foot on the writers' part depends largely on every audience member's individual perception of Crow after the DS arc. If you liked seeing this scrappy guy introduced during the DS arc, of course you would have been happy to see more of him! Even if he's only present in scenes to comment on what's going on and doesn't actually get to do anything meaningful. If you didn't like Crow that much, though, I can see how him popping up so often only to yap a bit and contribute essentially nothing could have grated on you. And as I said, I think this is where the "screentime" discussion comes in again, because yeah, Crow is very much on screen in all these little-bit-of-nothing scenes. He doesn't get to do much and his character isn't fleshed out or reinforced in any way, but he sure is there. For better or for worse.

And this—this is where I can finally get back to him and Sherry. Because in his interactions specifically with her, it is for worse, due to the fact that all the scenes that contain both of them before the Ark Cradle duel are pretty much exclusively these kinds of little-bit-of-nothing, reactive scenes. Crow doesn't get to interact with Sherry meaningfully, and he never—and I need to empathise this—, not once gets to interact with her one on one, not until the end-of-series duel both of them take part in happens. What makes Crow's lack of meaningful interactions with Sherry even worse is that his later duelling partner against her is Aki, of all people, who by contrast gets to interact with Sherry a whole bunch, most notably during her duel against Yusei. Not only that, but Sherry is also shown to actually be interested in Aki, which cannot be said for Crow. Yet, still in the same episode I was describing above, while the Ark Cradle begins its descent, it's not Aki, but Crow who is entrusted with this card by Mizoguchi/Elsworth:

(I'd like to point out that the dialogue following this moment doesn't make it clear whether Crow even knows what Sherry's connection to this card is. For all we know, this could be the first time Crow sees it, without being aware of any of the context surrounding it.)

You know, the card that's essentially a symbol of Sherry's attachment to her parents and her commitment to revenge. The card that basically her entire character revolves around. For a single piece of cardboard, this thing comes with a lot of narrative baggage attached, yet canon doesn't even take the time to assure us that Crow knows what Z-ONE means, other than it being a memento of Sherry's parents, as Mizoguchi explains. And frankly, this all feels like a rather ham-fisted attempt to get some last-minute setup for the later confrontation between Crow and Sherry in. It's like the writers desperately wanted to feel the emotional moment in the duel later to feel earned; they wanted to have their cake and eat it, too. There's only one problem: They didn't even bake the damned thing, the ingredients are just sitting around, untouched, as if staring at them long enough will magically make a cake manifest.

But, well, since I'm already talking about this, I may as well get into the actual meat of the matter, because frankly, it's not like Crow gets much else to do at the start of the arc. Yusei takes off because he at first wants to go to the Ark Cradle alone (like an idiot), leading to the signers coming after him (and telling him he's an idiot). Joining this effort and assuring Yusei that they won't let him die alongside the others is as much as Crow gets to do before the inevitable three-way duel starts.

(That said, while it doesn't accomplish anything, I've always appreciated this little moment while Yusei still tries to pull his stupid kamikaze plan—Crow would know more shortcuts in the BAD area than he does. After all, he lived there for a good while!)

After that, everyone gets up to the Ark Cradle and, as we all know, the signer group is forcibly split up by Z-ONE before deciding to go to a Yusei gear each in order to shut down Ark Cradle's negative Moment. (Top ten sentences that wouldn't make a lick of sense to anyone who isn't up to their neck in 5Ds lore.) And the very first duel on the menu in this final stretch of episodes is also Crow's final duel in the entire show.

(Drumroll please.)

Here's the thing. I love this duel, actually. I get extremely hyped every time I rewatch it. BUT. But. I do not love it so blindly that I couldn't see that it has not one, but several issues. Not only that, but those issues don't just rest on Crow's shoulders, they sadly rest on the shoulders of all three participants in this duel, because frankly? Alongside the four-way Jack/Rua/Ruka/Aporia duel, this duel is one of the Ark Cradle arc's desperate attempts to tie up loose ends. Because as much as I enjoy this arc, that's exactly what it is: A race to the finish line, an attempt to tie as many loose ends as possible up in as little time as the show could get away with. To make clear why I think this, let me just list off all the things this arc resolves or at the very least tries to tie up with a neat bow:

It reintroduces Aki's psychic powers, which we were previously led to believe she'd lost. Notably, we didn't get a reason for why they disappeared and don't get a reason for why they reappear, either. It also turns them into healing powers in an attempt to establish a reason for why she later studies medicine.

It explains what happened to Sherry and what actually drives her revenge. Furthermore, it releases her from her narrative fridge-prison in order to actually let her duel Aki (yes, Aki, specifically), which is a confrontation that was subtextually implied several times previously.

It resolves the question of Bruno's identity by revealing him as an antagonist.

It finally reveals Life Stream Dragon, who was at this point teased over seventy episodes ago.

It also finally rewards Rua, who was teased to possibly become a signer during the DS arc, with an actual signer mark. (As short-lived as it may be.)

It actually explains Iliaster's real plan, which is Z-ONE's hope that the 5Ds gang can actually save the future.

Speaking of which, it actually explains who Z-ONE is and why he's a big deal. (Remember, this guy was first teased a good while ago at this point in time.)

Alongside Sherry, it dusts off several protagonists who didn't get an opportunity to duel on-screen and lets them duel one, final time. (Notably, Aki, Rua, and Ruka, who at this point haven't been seen duelling since the early WRGP or even pre-WRGP.)

You may notice that none of these bullet points contain Crow. They do, however, contain Aki and Sherry, both of whom went into this finale with several unanswered questions as to their characters. Crow, not so much. But let's just put a pin in that for now while we actually jump into the duel.

*Cracks knuckles* Aki & Crow VS Sherry. Here we go at last. Fair warning, the character writing of all three participants of this duel overlaps a fair bit here, so expect to hear a bit of a mishmash about our revenge trio.

So, how does this duel start? Firstly, with Sherry waxing poetic about why she's even opposing Team 5Ds now.

(A dramatic switch of sides that sadly doesn't hold a candle to Bruno turning out to be Antinomy. Which, funnily enough, might be why this duel is front-loaded and Bruno's comes later.)

I won't dig into this too much, but I just want to point out the one thing this moment gives us: It establishes character motivation. Sherry claims she can no longer get revenge and has thus lost her purpose. (The reason why she can no longer get revenge, if you're interested, is because Moment Express, her final lead, vanished in its entirety, as far as canon is concerned.) Thus, she took the bait when Z-ONE offered her a new purpose, and, more importantly, a reward. Now, Aki and Crow at this point in the episode don't get to hear what that reward is, but for our analysis, it's important to keep in mind: Z-ONE promised Sherry he'd alter the timeline so she would get her parents back if she helps him. And I think this is immensely important because this is not only Sherry's goal in the present, I think it's actually the core of her character from the very first moment we meet her. In classic, tragic-avenging-type character fashion, she claims to want revenge when what she's really doing is trying to numb the pain of the awareness that she'll never get her parents back. (Though I'll admit this may also be my generous read of her as a person who likes revenge-obsessed characters.) And then, Z-ONE dangles the actual thing she wanted all along before her. Of course she took the bait.

This brings us to the start of the duel itself. As we know, Sherry employs some tactics that feel quite different from what she previously did in this duel. First and foremost, she messes with the mechanics of the duel itself by using the field spell Ecole de Zone, creating an illusion that confuses Aki and Crow into duelling not her, but each other at first. Sherry, meanwhile, takes a very passive role, clearly intent on letting the two destroy each other while she sporadically activates card effects to accelerate this. What makes all this stand out as even more unusual for her is that she sets this up by lying. At the beginning of the duel, she tells Aki and Crow that there's two of her, and that each duellist will fight one copy of her on a seperate field each, but this is a misdirection to make the two signers duel each other instead of her. And, look. I don't need to tell you this is out of character for Sherry. Canon literally does that for me.

(Case in point.)

It's only after Crow and Aki catch onto the fact that something's wrong and after Aki destroys the field spell that Sherry uses her "real strategy", switching to Soul Binding Gate, which inflicts real damage every time a monster with less attack points than her life points is summoned, in order to whittle away at both other duellists' life points. This is also the point where she reveals to her opponents that she's doing all this to get her parents back. While she does that, we get a bit more back and forth in terms of cardplay, until Aki sets the field up just right so Crow can land a very high-damage hit with Black-Winged Dragon to end the duel. And that is pretty much the gist of it on the duelling side of things.

So what's going on on the narrative side of things, then? Well. Let me front-load something I've noticed on the narrative end: This duel heavily interacts with Crow's and Sherry's characterisation, but barely at all with Aki's. I'll make clear what I mean by that below. For now, let's just get an overview by going through the character moments as they occur in the duel. Why go through all of them? Because most either interact with Crow in some way, or set up a later interaction in the same duel that he's a part of, that's why. I'll get into the nitty-gritty of what this duel did well and what it didn't after that. (Mostly. You may have noticed I like tangents and rambling excessively.)

So.

The first moment belongs to Aki and Crow in equal measure, and happens just as Ecole de Zone is destroyed—which Aki accomplishes by using Crow's monster to synchro summon Black Rose Dragon, as well as prevent that synchro summon from being negated through the same monster's effect, so she can use her dragon's field wipe to get rid of Sherry's field spell. When Sherry is surprised by this, Aki and Crow explain that they memorised each other's cards as part of a strategic effort as a WRGP team.

(Friendship is, in fact, magic.)

Not only does this explanation make perfect sense, it's also an excellent little tidbit to tie Aki and Crow together as a tag-team here, as it strengthens the connection between them. The only gripe I could possibly see with this is that it feels like this didn't necessarily need to be a surprise, end-of-the-show reveal. Frankly, it could have been pretty cool to see this much earlier, to have members of Team 5Ds realise what their teammates were getting up to during the WRGP duels, for example. (Instead of so often having the other signers react just as shocked as the announcer to their teammates' plays—I'm side-eyeing the infamous "a trap from the graveyard"-moment in particular. Like, Aki, sweetie, if you memorised Crow's deck, why are you surprised that he has a trap he can activate from the graveyard? I digress.) Moreover, this could have built anticipation for this particular duel, as viewers would have been excited to see what Aki and Crow would come up with to defeat Sherry as a team. So this moment is not bad, really. Just a bit underutilised, at least to me. (The word "underutilised" might become a trend in this post.)

Every other character-driven moment from here on out is shoved into the second duel episode, 140. Speaking of which, this episode starts with Aki and Crow getting the reveal of why Sherry is helping Z-ONE, where she admits that she joined the bad guys because she wants her parents back. She even goes as far as stating that because Z-ONE showed her the future, she has no hope that it can be saved and thus at least wants her lovely past back so she can have some solace before everything goes to hell for humanity. But we already went over that above.

Next up, albeit this moment should probably be considered more of a running theme than just one self-contained thing, we have Crow's struggle with Soul Binding Gate. Remember, the effect of this field spell causes all players to take damage every time a monster with less ATK than Sherry's LP is summoned. And at this point in the duel, Aki is barely above 1000 life points, so Crow worries about triggering the field spell's effect and hurting her, which leads to him playing suboptimally because he's more concerned about his friend than about winning the duel. Notably, Aki calls him out on this.

(She has a point.)

Outside of providing an internal conflict for Crow to grapple with, this isn't much to write home about. (Side note: I do find it interesting that they introduce the fear of physically hurting someone in a duel specifically in connection to Aki here, though, given that through her psychic powers, she had to grapple with this exact issue many times in the past. I have no idea if this was intentional, though.)

Between this and the next moment, there's a nice bit of interplay between Crow and Aki again, where he activates a card to refill her life points just in time so she doesn't drop to zero through Soul Binding Gate, while Aki uses a defensive trap to protect Crow in return.

(This is just here because it's a money shot to me. The juxtaposition of their faces and their life points, showing that while Aki may have the lowest life points, she still has the coolest head in this duel, and while Sherry technically has the upper hand, she's beginning to falter because she didn't anticipate the other two to work so well together. It's chef's kiss. Mwah.)

What follows after this, is, of course, the Big Moment. Where Sherry tries to convince Crow to forfeit so she can win and have Z-ONE change the past. And this is the one I really need to dig into.

With Sherry's earlier admission that she's on Iliaster's side because she wants her parents back acting as setup, she begins her attempt to sway Crow by telling him that if he had the opportunity to change the past, he would do it, too. And while Crow initially protests, Sherry challenges this, then proceeds to show him what Z-ONE's power could accomplish, and we get a lengthy sequence where Sherry, through weird cyborg-techno-magic-shenanigans that are never explained, takes Aki and Crow to a dreamlike space where Crow sees the orphans he used to take care of being happily reunited with their parents. Sherry also ominously tells him that this is "what he desires deep in his psyche" before promising him that if he surrenders the duel, Z-ONE can give him a world where Zero Reverse never occurred and all the kids can have happy lives with their real families. (I wanted to post most of this sequence in screenshots, but while I have them, I've realised I'm only a few images short of tumblr's limit already, so forgive me because I will need those remaining image spots.) This moment proceeds to introduce some serious doubt on Crow's end. Aki, meanwhile, remains steadfast, telling him not to fall for Sherry's manipulation, which leads to her giving an almost Yusei-style speech. In a moment where Crow wavers, both because he's genuinely considering whether taking Sherry's offer might be the wiser choice, and because he doesn't want to hurt Aki by triggering Sherry's field spell effect, Aki calls out to him and tells him to snap out of it by reminding him of how Yusei reached out to her during their second duel. This speech is a bit, um. Clunky, I feel. (At least if the translation is correct. If it isn't, then that may be the issue.) See, she tells him that Yusei "saved her from the darkness of her psychic powers", that "he wasn't concerned about his own safety and risked his life to persuade her", that, because her psychic powers are now gone, she's "renewed" and that this somehow brought her to the epiphany that as long as she believes in her own potential, she can change the future. This is lifted almost verbatim from the scene, by the way. Leaving aside the fact that half of this feels like a mild to severe misrepresentation of Aki's character arc during the DS arc (don't talk about it, don't talk about it, I need to make this another post of its own, damn it), I, personally, can't exactly follow how she ended up with that final epiphany from the circumstances she listed. But lucky for us, Crow apparently gets what she's driving at, because he quickly echoes her statement and they both conclude that Crow's kids also believe in the future and fight to live, that they're not sad about their lives the way they are right now, even though they don't have parents. Thus, Crow catches himself, echoing Aki's sentiment and telling Sherry that he, too, believes in the future. And through the power of Friendship and Believing in the Future, he manages to use Aki's cards to land the final hit, nicely mirroring how she used his to destroy Ecole de Zone.

...Phew. Okay, look. First off, that above, large section is basically several character beats stacked on top of one another. On Sherry's end, we have the intriguing fact that she's specifically trying to manipulate Crow, not Aki. In fact, she doesn't so much as try to sway Aki, as though she knows it's no use. Then, on Aki's end, we've got her pulling a real Yusei, staying level-headed almost the entire duel and reaching out to make sure Crow stays on track. This moment also ties back to her own conflict with her powers again. (Which, unfortunately, I will talk about, and yes, I'll be chewing drywall the entire time I do it.) Finally, on Crow's end, we've got a nice, proper moment where he doubts himself and, by his own admission, nearly makes a terrible mistake because he wants nothing more than for the kids he used to take care of to have good lives.

Now, before I go over what worked about this moment and what didn't, let me just chew through the rest of the actual duel itself, too, then circle back too highlight some things. In other words, time for me to chew some drywall.

*Sigh*

At the very end of the duel, there are two more character moments that are noteworthy.

First, right before the final hit, we get Sherry desperately defending herself against Aki and Crow's newly strengthened belief that the future can, in fact, still be saved, which she does by (rather heartbreakingly) asking what's so wrong about wanting her parents back, about wanting their love and warmth back. It's at this point that Crow's allowed to get back at Sherry by challenging her beliefs, telling her that people "work hard to live because they only get one chance at life", and that there's no point in trying to go back to do things differently, that the only way to keep going is to believe in the future, regardless of whatever painful and sad events one has had to live through. I'd say this sentiment certainly fits Crow, character-wise, especially given his rough Satellite background. It does partially fall flat because it feels a bit weird for him, specifically, to now be acting like he knows Sherry inside and out, much like she did with him earlier, but again, this is simply a matter of setup and I'll try not to belabour that point again. The horse is already dead, no sense in beating it. It's after this speech and the final attack that Sherry finally realises her error.

Buuut this leads us right into the next character moment. Because as the duel ends, Sould Binding Gate physically falls apart, pelting all three of our duel participants in debris and threatening to crush them under it. While everyone does briefly fall over (and Sherry gets a moment to realise that her father wanted her to live strong, not accept seemingly inevitable doom and die weak), they soon realise they were not, in fact, buried under rubble, though. Because guess what! Black Rose Dragon to the rescue. Black Rose Dragon, who can suddenly physically affect her surroundings again. You know, that thing we were led to believe Aki could no longer make her monsters do because she lost her powers completely out of nowhere. And there's more! Because not only does Black Rose Dragon take care of the debris for the trio, as she disappears, she also heals all three of them, and in response, Crow gets a line that I unfortunately cannot for the life of me discuss without bias because it kills me every time.

(Crow. Crow, please. You're killing me. I beg you.)

This line out of Crow's mouth feels extremely weird to me, and in the process of typing up this post, I've been trying to find the reason why. Here's the conclusion I've come to: Firstly, it feels a bit out of place from him, somehow. A line hypothesising about what psychic powers can or can't do—this is something I would have expected out of Aki's mouth, but not out of Crow's. I believe what makes it feel so out of place, though, isn't necessarily that it seems a bit odd for him, specifically, to theorise about this, but that when I hear it, I don't feel like the character is saying it. Instead, in this moment, moreso than in some others that suffer from the same issue, I hear not Crow, but the writers speaking. I hear them telling me "look, we know we made it seem like Aki's powers are super gone and like they were super, irredeemably bad, and like she and you should be happy that they're gone, but here, see, this is what they're really like. Don't you think we came up with something clever here, to set her becoming a doctor later up nicely? No, this isn't because we needed to backpedal on our decision to make her lose them and be happy about it at the last second, why do you ask?". And yes, I concede this might just be me. (So feel free to disregard this in terms of analysis, I just have some weird kind of vendetta against this line.) But still, even without my personal issues hampering me, this line of dialogue out of Crow's mouth is just plain odd. After all, how would he know what "real" psychic powers are? Since when is he the expert, especially considering we've never so much as seen him comment on Aki's powers before? (And for the record, this line would have seemed just as weird had any other character other than Aki said it imo. It just has that unmistakable "writers trying to justify something at the last second"-tang to me.)

And do not. Do Not get me started on the fact that the writers, despite going to such great pains to paint Aki's psychic powers as an exclusively negative thing especially during the WRGP arc, decide to reintroduce them here, suddenly as a good thing that can also heal people, which directly contradicts every choice they've made when it came to Aki's relationship to her powers ever since the Team Catastrophe duel. While crucially also lacking the one thing this entire duel is practically begging for: Fucking. Setup. But at this point, the handling of Aki's powers, specifically, really needs its own post, so I'll hold off on any further comments here and come back to that another time. I feel like I'm beginning to talk in circles, anyhow. Setup. Setup, setup, setup. This duel wishes it had it, because then the ideas presented here—which, in a vacuum, are compelling—might have worked smoothly.

But, with that. We have finally made it through the duel itself. Sherry, at the very end, gets her change of heart and at last cements herself as a good guy, and that concludes the first duel in the finale, and also both Aki and Crow's last duel in the entire show.

And good lord, was this duel all over the place. Though I think my meandering scene-by-scene breakdown of it showed as much. Now, onto the proper evaluation of what worked and what didn't here. First, let's get the good these two episodes do out of the way, shall we. (Because there is a lot of Bad I need to yell about, unfortunately.)

By virtue of being one of the final duels, this is Aki and Crow's last chance to shine, and shine, they do. Both in the duelling department and in the character department. Aki makes two major plays that upend Sherry's strategy and Crow's perfectly in sync with her, showing that the two truly are teammates, and paying off all the character moments they had specifically in the Team Unicorn to Team Catastrophe section of the WRGP. Their friendship and cooperation is believable and entertaining to watch. Then on the character side, Aki's growth is (somewhat) paid off—where she used to be a character that doubted herself and was afraid of hurting people, she is now the one who can keep a level head and help others fight their self-doubt. Meanwhile, Crow gets to show off his unfailing dedication to community and family again, both by watching out for Aki and by selflessly desiring not for himself to have a better life, but for the kids he used to take care of. And Sherry, who was previously removed from the narrative in such an unsatisfactory way, finally gets to duel again, gets to explain why she actually does what she does, and gets to join the heroes at the end, permanently joining the ranks of the good guys instead of the villains. Happy endings all around.

Ehem. And this is where I'm gonna be less nice about this duel. Because the problem is, due to the specific constellation of characters involved in this duel and how they previously interacted in the show, there's a lot of stuff here that doesn't work nearly as well on a second watch as a first watch would like to make you believe.

First, a broader issue on the card game end of things: The way this duel feels, it's very much more Aki's duel than Crow's, which is also kind of confirmed in the card plays being made. Though it's Crow who's first shown to catch onto the fact that a third party is activating additional card effects out of nowhere, it's Aki who fully solves the mystery, uses Crow's monster to synchro summon Black Rose Dragon, then activates her dragon's effect to get rid of the illusion for good. And while Crow gets to land the final hit, it's Aki's setup and her trap, Synchro Stream, that make it possible for him to win for both of them. And yet. On the dialogue- and character-interaction side of things, this duel is made out to be much more Crow's than Aki's. Because, perhaps surprisingly to some, Aki doesn't waver one bit in this duel. She's got her head in the game the entire time. She's here to do business—that business being defeating Sherry—and by god, does she do it. Moreover, unlike Crow, she has much, much better setup to be duelling Sherry than he does. And this comes right back around to the main thing this duel suffers from, which I've already harped on about: Crow and Sherry, up until this point, have not interacted in a way that would make the connection between them seem in any way significant. Unfortunately for this duel, though, Aki and Sherry have.

From the first episode where we're introduced to Sherry, she's shown to be interested in who Aki is and what she can do. During the duel between her and Yusei, she comments on Aki's powers. Later, when Aki is getting her turbo duelling license, Sherry watches on with interest. At some point while Aki's training, Sherry drops by to speak with her and Yusei again. My point here being, of course, that Aki, unlike Crow, got several scenes where she interacted with Sherry or had Sherry meaningfully take note of her existence before this point. Yet, whatever dynamic the writers may or may not have been aiming for between these two is, at best, underutilised in the final duel, if not completely ignored, at worst. Instead, the writers shift their focus to Crow and try to make us believe that Sherry, a character who has barely acknowledged his existence thus far, would know him well enough to consider him the better target for her attempt at manipulation. (And don't get me started on how the hell Z-ONE's weird robot magic is supposed to expose what Crow "desires deep in his psyche". That is simply a chasm the show expects us to suspend our disbelief over.) And look. The thing is, I don't think the Big Moment where Sherry tries to convince Crow to forfeit is terrible in isolation. Like, they could have made this work, had they given these two setup, had they given us, the audience, reason to believe Crow could be swayed like this (which they, notably, also didn't), and had they given us the impression that Sherry knows Crow well enough to pull something like this. What hurts the scene immensely, however, is that it's preceded by everything before, starting from the WRGP, where there is no setup between these two, no reason to believe Crow could be convinced to forfeit a duel against a major antagonist, and no meaningful interactions to support the belief that Sherry knows who Crow really is at all.

What also stands out to me is that Crow really doesn't feel like the best character to parallel Sherry, here, either. Parallel in the sense that she tries to get to him by expressing a desire she believes they both feel—getting a certain, nicer version of the past they never had back. Because the thing is, Sherry and Crow hardly feel like they have very much in common, and there's certainly no previous hints to make anyone believe they would have this in common. (So for all we know, Sherry could have just been taking a shot in the dark by trying to convince Crow.) You know who could have made for an excellent character to mirror Sherry, though? Yeah. The third person in the room during this scene. Aki.

See, here's the thing about these three as characters, in relation to what this scene tries to accomplish (getting a protagonist to waver by having the antagonist appeal to certain emotional similarities between them): While Crow may perhaps be more relatable to the audience, he isn't all that relatable to Sherry. He comes from dirt poor origins, she from rich ones. He doesn't even remember his parents, she defines herself by the memory of hers. She's a lone wolf, he's incredibly community-focussed. The only parallel you could have drawn between these two, up until this duel, is knowing what it feels like to want revenge. (Sherry with her parents, Crow with his kids back in the DS arc.) But guess what, unfortunately, Aki knows that too, what with her past as the Black Rose Witch and wanting to make people pay for ostracising her. And to make matters worse, she has a lot of other things going for her that parallel Sherry much, much better, too. They both come from well-off families, both have had major, traumatising events in their lives revolve around their parents, both left their initial family structure by way of drastic changes in their life, both are intimately familiar with the desire for vengeance, and, most damningly, Aki knows what it's like to stand on the side of the bad guys—like Sherry is doing in that very scene—because you feel like it's the only place that gives you hope/meaning. Not to speak of the fact that Aki, given her turbulent past with her psychic powers, would probably know exactly what it feels like to want a past you never had back. There would have been so much to work with there, and it makes whatever they were gunning for with Crow look... lacklustre, to put it mildly, by comparison.

The worst part is, I think, that the blame lies neither with the characters nor with the scene concept here. Solely with the execution. Because I truly think they could have made this work. They could have made the entire duel work, big character moments and all. But the keyword is and always has been setup. Setup, which the writers, at least in part, strangely gave to Aki, but not to Crow, which is what hurts particularly his portion of this duel, and, arguably, his character writing in general. Because—and this may be a small thing in the grand scheme of things, but permit me this—while Crow wanting a better future for the kids he used to take care of over a better future for himself feels perfectly on brand, the idea of him forfeiting a duel against a major antagonist, while the threat of the entire city being destroyed is hanging above his head... doesn't. Like, yes, I've talked about the fact that Crow is the only character in 5Ds who ever actually loses duels on purpose. What you may remember, though, is that both occasions we've seen him do this—against Lyndon and Yaeger, respectively—were much lower-stakes duels than this. Not to speak of the fact that it also feels a little odd that Crow, of all people, would buy into the idea that Z-ONE's genuinely powerful enough to just give those kids their parents back, given how liberally he called bullshit on pretty much any and all supernatural mumbo-jumbo claiming that fate is inevitable, or that the gods have this-and-that power, or what have you the entire show. (Also, doesn't he strike you as the guy who'd wonder why Z-ONE's not using his fancy powers for better things, if the extent of them is so great? Or is that just me?) It's a moment of character doubt that tries to sell itself as believable, even though we've never been given any hints that this kind of temptation, specifically, could work on Crow.

Ultimately, Crow & Aki VS Sherry feels like a very hot-and-cold duel. On the cardplay side, the teamwork between Aki and Crow is well done, yet the duel does feel like it skews more towards Aki than towards Crow. Sherry, meanwhile, plays tricky and mean like a proper antagonist, but does so at the expense of sacrificing all her previous tactics and monsters (and, arguably, some of her character, though this is probably on purpose, given her transformation into an antagonist). Then, on the character side, we've got Aki in an interestingly Yusei-ish role, which, while it feels like a good way to show how she's matured and learned, wastes her character dynamic with Sherry. On the other side, Crow and Sherry interact in several personal ways throughout the duel that leave you wondering when exactly these two got to know each other so well, because the show certainly didn't give us a visible progression of their dynamic. The only dynamic that leaves nothing to be desired is that between Aki and Crow (stilted speeches aside), because it excellently showcases their friendship and teamwork. Very weird decisions made in the writing here all around.

We'll get into the nitty-gritty of what changes I would have suggested to improve this duel below, but first: What happens after this duel? Well, two more Yusei gear duels, Aporia briefly standing up to Z-ONE, and then, the final, big clash between Yusei and Z-ONE.

Given that Crow isn't even present for two of these duels and then barely gets more to do than stand on the side and react during the final two, I will dare to skip all that, though. Because really, Crow's occasional comments and the play-by-play he sometimes joins the others in giving when spectating a duel don't exactly contribute anything to his character. They're just there so he gets something to do and doesn't fade into the background entirely when a duel that doesn't involve him is going on. This includes the moment where he, much like the other signers, gets to give Yusei Black-Winged Dragon for the final duel, as well as the later moment when Yusei uses it, chanting in tandem with Crow as BWD arrives. And other than that and the tear-jerking moment when he later reacts to Yusei returning despite all odds, he really doesn't get any noteworthy scenes.

In other words, we are skipping straight to the end. So, where do we find Crow there?

(Oh, y i k e s.)

There's a popular post circulating around this site that goes something like "the worst thing you can do to a character is make them a cop during a timeskip". And, look. I don't think I need to tell anyone that becoming a sector security officer is an extremely jarring character choice for Crow. Crow, of all people! The guy with the face full of markers, who used to be part of a duel gang, who was introduced in the show gleefully stealing from security Robin Hood-style, and who has every reason to despise law enforcement! (Leaving aside the obvious logistical issue that Crow in no country in the world could have completed his police training in the few months between the Ark Cradle debacle and this scene. But given that 5Ds generously brushes realistic concerns like this one aside on multiple occasions, this is, funnily enough, the thing I'm also more willing to overlook here. The character dissonance, however, less so.)

I'll try to be generous and guess that the writers were aiming to convey a message somewhere along the lines of "even someone who's done bad things in the past can become an example for others" or something like it. The problem is just that Crow didn't need any such message because he was already the good guy while he was still actively stealing from security. He was the lovable rogue to a T, damn it! But this, in particular, is a surface scratch hinting at a bigger issue, I think—namely, the issue of the show's complete pivot when it came to the depiction of law enforcement after the DS arc. Because when we think back to that part of 5Ds, good security officers were the exception, rather than the rule. And this is exactly what makes Crow of all characters becoming one even weirder. He would know, would remember how security used to treat him, his kids, his friends, his brothers. And if the idea here was that, well, he's trying to improve sector security by joining it and changing it from the inside, so to speak, then guess what was missing again: Our good, old friend setup. I'm starting to feel like a broken record. So yeah, I don't think a ton of people, whether they like or hate Crow, would disagree that this is a supremely weird position to put his character in.

As we find out through 5Ds' epilogue, however, his sector security job isn't quite what Crow actually wants, though. (And thank god, because that would have been such a bizarre position to leave him in.) Instead, we're shown fairly quickly that several duelling leagues are apparently trying to scout Crow out, and that he's tempted to accept one of the offers and go into pro duelling. This is at first shown in a short scene where something like a league scout follows Crow, then later, when the whole group—sans Jack, at first—is getting together and everyone starts discussing their futures. Aside from complaining a bit about his job and upsetting Aki without meaning to, Crow doesn't get much to do here, either. For what it's worth, at least him feeling tempted to ditch the security job feels more in line with the original Crow we got than with whatever strange twist the writers were going for after this shorter timeskip.

What follows is the very last duel of the show, the long-awaited Yusei VS Jack rematch, of course. And while he doesn't get to participate in this one, Crow, much like Aki and the twins, spectates the duel and ends up having an epiphany about what he wants to do. This epiphany ends up being that he does want to turn to pro duelling, and as a reasoning, canon provides us with this:

(As is known, intense card games are the only way to make children smile.)

Personally, I wouldn't say this is a terrible or out of character reason for Crow to decide to go pro. But there's more to that I'd like to discuss. First, though, let's take a quick look at where we find Crow after the second, bigger timeskip, which is inserted right in the middle of Yusei and Jack's final duel.

(Okay, yeah, I'm a sucker for the bullet earrings.)

The quick scene Crow gets here makes it unmistakably clear that he did go into pro duelling, just like he decided during the duel in the past, and not only that, he went into tag-team duelling and apparently managed to reach world champion status with his teammates. The above scene, however, is the exact same moment he decides to leave said team, so he can instead go solo and (presumably) try to beat Jack.

Now, we can discuss this in a bit more detail. Personally, I'm extremely in two minds about Crow being one of three characters, total, who ends up becoming a pro duellist after canon. Jack seems obvious, especially given the pivot back to his more Fortune Cup-esque persona the writers did around the Red Nova episodes. Rua also makes sense, given that Jack was his idol from the start. Crow, though, feels a little more complicated. The thing is, like so many things surrounding Crow in the Ark Cradle arc, the writers gave us no indication pro duelling is something he's really passionate about before this point. Worse, they didn't even really tell us what reason he saw to participate in the WRGP with his brothers beyond "could be fun". So there isn't really a connection here. The same thing goes for the fact that he specifically talks about teaching his teammates above, which is also something he wasn't associated with all that much previously. Though this one is admittedly less egregious, because at least Crow was seen briefly coaching Aki as she prepared to take his spot during the Unicorn duel. Still, while I wouldn't go as far as saying it's an out of character choice for Crow to go pro, it still feels a little odd that he went down the same route as Jack. Personally speaking, it feels like the writers didn't quite know what to do with him. Because as I said, Jack is obvious and Rua also makes sense, and I'd say the same goes for Yusei. Then there's Ruka, who is treated about as in-depth in the epilogue as she was throughout canon, and Aki, whose "setup" for her timeskip self was done extremely hasty and last-minute, but at least it was there. Between all of them, Crow occupies a weird spot where it doesn't so much feel like he ended up on the wrong trajectory for his life, as it simply feels like there were choices the writers could have made that would have fit him much better. What with his theme of legacy and community, trying to make Pearson's dream of a place where disenfranchised children can learn good life skills a reality would have been a good fit, for example. Especially considering his close ties to the Satellite orphans he used to take care of, which, funnily enough, are reinforced one more time as canon flips back to present day and Crow is seen bidding his kids goodbye.

("Come back"? When, precisely? And what part about "literally saved the world twice" doesn't qualify you as a hero to a bunch of kids ten times over already?)

Considering canon seems hellbent on making sure we know the signers went their separate ways and that they aren't anywhere near each other by the very end of the show, though, my guess is that Crow had to end up doing something like pro duelling, in order to get him out of New Domino City and away from the friend group whose shenanigans we were so accustomed to following by that point. Of course, there's also the argument to be made that Crow staying in NDC and getting a more community-focussed ending would have also been significantly less cool than making him a kickass pro duellist with bullet earrings, which circles back to how the writing interacts with its target audience.

The only thing that follows after this, then, is the big goodbye, and with that, ladies, gentlemen, and other lovely 5ds nerds, we have successfully followed bird boy's path throughout the entire show. And what a ride it was. (I did not think this analysis would end up stretching over a whole four posts.) Time for some closing thoughts before I do my thing and suggest some rewrites that could have made all this feel more coherent one more time.

Crow's character arc, if it can even be called that, feels about as hot and cold as his and Aki's final duel with Sherry over the course of the show. His introduction is fast-paced, he's made to be likable quickly, and his integration into the main protagonist group is as quick as everything else about his narrative. Between the way he shows up out of nowhere, briefly disappears without fanfare, and is then reintroduced with even more importance before slipping into the signer group like he's always been there, it truly feels like his entire inclusion in the narrative was a last-minute decision by the writers to include that one, additional character concept Kazuki Takahashi had originally created after all. If there was one way to describe his whole arc, it would be that it's a rush. At the start, the writers are in a hurry to make him likable, then they're in a hurry to make him a signer, then they're in a hurry to give us a whole backstory for him, then they're in a hurry to give him a believable character dynamic with Aki, and at the end, they're in a hurry to pay off a character dynamic with Sherry they didn't properly set up with him. You may notice that leaves significant gaps, and the lack of balance between those gaps and the rushes surrounding them, I believe, are part of why he's such a polarising character.

Crow is integrated so thoroughly into the signer group at the end of the DS arc that, much like Aki and the twins, he gets stuck in the position of being a character that cannot simply be removed from the narrative for a longer amount of time. And this, I think, ends up biting him in the ass, because in the gaps where the writers don't rush to do something big with him, it often feels like they don't quite know what to do with him at all. So, he instead gets relegated to small side tasks, like inane duels that don't affect the plot, or becomes the person who reacts to unfolding situations in whatever manner wouldn't fit Yusei or Jack. He feels like he's the third portion of the protagonist trifecta only in theory—the status of an equal third player seems to be what the writers had in mind, yet, looking at the show, it feels like an honorary title, at best, because the writing choices made for him don't convey anywhere near the same amount of thought and effort as those of Yusei and Jack. Crow's backstory doesn't intersect significantly with that of his brothers, his dragon is introduced way too late and never given an upgrade, he never gets to clash with Iliaster until the Team New World duel, and throughout the entire WRGP and Ark Cradle arc, there isn't a single duelling victory that's solely his. People who prefer other characters over Crow like to harp on about how much screentime he gets; I argue that this is exactly what showcases how poorly the writers took care of him in many instances. For as much as Crow is plastered onto the screen and given the aesthetics of an equal player in a protagonist trio, his many appearances are as much of a curse as they are a gift, because too many of them aren't spent setting up anything meaningful or developing his character in any way. Speaking of character development: There is none. Crow exits the show pretty much exactly the same as he entered it, brief security stint aside. And, look, this need not necesarily be a bad thing. Static characters exist and they have their place in stories. It's just that in Crow's case, his utter lack of development feels like another damning indicator of the writers' cluelessness when it came to utilising him, given his weird, sort-of-elevated-protagonist. Aki, who is so often weighed against him, gets significantly more development than he does. And though Jack also ends up in almost the same place at the end of the show as he was at the start, at least he had a dip in the middle where his character was somewhat malleable and not set in stone. Crow didn't.

What we end up with, then, is a character whose concept is perfectly fine on paper, but whose execution proceeded to turn him into the one and only favourite for some, and the embodiment of piss poor writing for others. Having now looked at pretty much his entire run in the show with a bloody microscope, I end up somewhere in the middle, myself. He's a good character and much of his writing is confusing at best, utter dogshit at worst. As for what decisions in the writing room led to him turning out like this, I'd still pay good money to know them. For what it's worth, I've tried my very best to make an educated guess as to all of them.

And now, for the final time, allow me to do my very best to suggest how the issues of the Ark Cradle arc could have been addressed in order to make Crow's part in it less messy.

In previous posts, I've split up my rewrite suggestions depending on one circumstance: Whether or not Crow stays a signer. However, this time, I will deliberately forgo this, for one, very simple reason—Crow's status as a signer doesn't matter one bit for the Ark Cradle arc. Regardless of whether he has a mark or not, his duel with Sherry remains unaffected, and so does his later timeskip-self. Thus, pick your favourite, both versions work for the Ark Cradle.

Now. Onto the elephant vengeful Frenchwoman in the room. Let me repeat my favourite word in this post one more time. What the dynamic between Crow and Sherry needed, more than anything else, in order to satisfyingly be paid off during their Ark Cradle duel, was setup. There was so much time Crow spent on screen doing fuck all, and some of that time could have so easily been allocated to him interacting with Sherry in a meaningful manner. (I'm side-eyeing especially his pre-WRGP duels. Those did nothing to add to his character and could have easily been replaced with episodes where he actually gets to talk to Sherry one on one.) And if not that, then the writers could at least have done themselves the favour of letting Aki talk to Crow about Sherry, which would have arguably set up their three-way clash even better. Moreover, show us how the hell these two characters parallel each other and how they differ, damn it! The main issue with the big moment Sherry and Crow had in the duel was that Crow's faltering and his sudden, deep understanding of Sherry came completely out of nowhere. So what if they had shown some of that earlier, then? What if they had shown where the lmits of Crow's resolve lie, what could get him to doubt himself? What if they had drawn the parallel of Sherry and Crow both supposedly being characters that sometimes wistfully think about a past they never had earlier? It would have done so much to make that duel hit exactly the way it was probably meant to. As a bonus, if we had gotten Aki and Crow talking about Sherry, too, the scene of talking Sherry out of helping Z-ONE could have been a team effort, just like their card playing was. Both of them would have reasons to know different aspects of Sherry each, and both could have brought up good arguments. And this is really all this duel woild have needed to be better on the story end, I think: A solid, narrative foundation to make it obvious to us why it has to be these three characters duelling, why it could have only been this setup, why it made the most sense to let these three bounce off each other. Crow only needs that extra step to slot in better with the girls here.

As for the epilogue, I don't think anyone will be surprised to read that I would have never made Crow a cop, not even temporarily. The depiction of law enforcement 5Ds gives us during the DS arc is too damning for that. However, given the way the ending is structured, he does need some sort of occupation that feels like it's not quite the right thing so he can later change his mind about it, of course. Here, though, is where I, purely in service of Crow's character, would suggest a change that probably doesn't work with the ending's final aim of separating the 5Ds gang by hundreds of kilometres each. I would let Crow go into pro duelling first, then let him figure out that's not what he actually wanted. Crow, to me, is a character who is so intrinsically tied to community and family that turning him into a solitary pro duellist—even if he claims to do it to make the kids back home smile—feels off to me. Thus, from a character standpoint, I would let him pivot back to wanting to take care of those kids. Either through what I suggested above, letting him carry on Pearson's dream, or, which also feels fitting to me, by letting him help out Martha again and setting him up as the guy who'll take over when she can no longer run the orphanage. It's not the cool, glamorous end the show gave him, but it's what feels more like the family-focussed guy we first met in the show. It doesn't gel with the idea of permanently separating him from the other signers, though, unfortunately. To do something like that while keeping his community theme, one would probably have to send him away to shack up with Brave or something, to help orphans in other countries. But this, I think, nicely showcases the dissonance between what Crow's character writing would suggest he might do at the end, and what the show demanded he needed to do so he'd no longer be close to the others. Because my focus, as always, is only on character here. And Crow, with his personality and his writing, feels like the character who chafes the most against the idea of striking out solo, abandoning his ties to the community he was so invested in previously. To that extent, the above suggestion is the best I can provide with what we were canonically given. If we wanted to keep the canon ending he gets and actually make it make sense why he suddenly wants to be a lone wolf pro, the only thing I could suggest would be more setup for that. (Ah, there it is again. One final time.) Show Crow having some actual competitive drive, show him enjoying the whole tournament thing more than he thought he would during the WRGP. Just give us something that shows why he would want to go down this path, and why some other things that were previously important to him might not be a priority anymore. It all comes back to setup.

*Deep breath*

So, here we are, then, and this is it. This is all I could make of Crow's character writing in the entire show. To everyone who read this post in its entirety, a heartfelt thank you. To everyone who read the whole series of posts in its entirety, I'm so glad you're as insane about this show as I am, it makes me feel incredibly appreciated. Hope you enjoyed the ride, more meta posts will come eventually, just about different topics. In the meantime, see ya.

[bibibbon]

Loved the idea of dabi having to coach Shig... except I can't see him helping Shig at all...they are frenemies, emphasis on the enemy part.

But jokes aside....this make me think how Izu doesn't fit in any group or in any arc. I know I started this with a silly joke but ...when it comes down to it...Izu is not important, not really. There no connection to him nor an attempt.

Shiga in MVA got an army and the entire arc felt smth fro ANOTHER MANGA. There no mention of Izu. "Oh you wanted people to talk his name in every conversation" not that, I wanted people, the villains in this case, to recognize how powerful Izu is as it seems only the villains give credit to Izu.... but it's like he doesn't exist.

Shiga got an army and does .... nothing!

Shiga got money and does.... Nothing!

What happened to Daika is glossed over. We don't even know if Izu saw what happened in Daika (by tv or internet)

And it's a pattern since day 1. Izu is not allowed to really have connections, to bond with people...to grow.

MHA is a story where the mc is sidelined in his own story for no reason and he still gets blame in the story and fandom.

Hey @mikeellee 👋

I see where you're coming from with the whole Dabi and shigaraki are enemies first and friends second but in a situation where shigaraki is well more developed and actually proves and earns his title as the league of villains leader while utilising the MVA resources I feel like he would help Dabi with his revenge.

Hmm the point you bring up about izuku is interesting for sure. To me him not fitting in or not making genuine connections with other characters feels like an unintentional writing mistakes by horikoshi.

In the earlier parts of the series it's evidently clear that shigaraki was really interested and amused by Izuku. The guy literally had a picture of izuku, watched the sports festival and went to izuku for advice (the mall scene) he also showed interest and regarded Izuku's opinion about why people listen to stain and not him. Before shigaraki got the league Izuku was the closest person he could talk to and that simply disappears after he gets the league which is weird because shigaraki doesn't ever get a proper arc that shows him and the league bonding or becoming close rather he just promises them that he won't take away things they like as long as they work for him. Shigaraki in my opinion also doesn't earn the role of leader in the league neither does he do much to earn their trust which is why his line of caring about the league felt so underwhelming to me.

In the earlier arcs izuku and shigaraki had some built up but that was sidelined and even when shigaraki had resources to conduct research on izuku and maybe even reach out he chose not to. The MVA had a lot of potential and it's a shame that horikoshi doesn't tie izuku into it especially because it's not only shigaraki that's interested in Izuku but also toga. The two of them could of looped and included Izuku and we also seem to forget that izuku strangely has a lot of parallels between the villains just in general!!

In my opinion the whole shigaraki and izuku sharing memories thing was a horrible plot point and was used to rush the build up between shig and izuku which was almost non existent at this point. One of my problems with it is that it really doesn't show much of anything from Izuku so all it did was have Izuku learn about shig and not shig also learning about izuku.

Outside of the league Izuku's relationships in general aren't really any better either in terms of development. Izuku could of had a great relationship with various characters but they were either sidelined, not developed enough or overall horribly built.

A lot of the time Izuku only receives recognition from loved ones when he does something for them as evident in the vigilante arc. Also due to the lack of academia and academic/ filler type arcs in the series there really isn't a huge bond with Izuku and the rest of 1A

[lostbrazilian]

Ok so, i've finished SotE a few days ago and i fucking LOVED IT and i need to talk about it, particularly about Miquella. Because the thing is, i really like what From has done with his character but also i've seen a lot of discourse about it and i need to get my 2 cents in before i explode

So uh, long ass essay and spoilers below

First things first:

Character assassination my ASS

Fromsoft actually did fucking character necromancy the way they added depth to otherwise one-note characters. Even if unexpected, what we learn in the dlc makes a disturbing amount of sense and ultimately elevates the game's lore in my "humble but objectively correct" opinion. That being said, while Miquella is undoubtedly a irredemable villain by the time we fight him, his character is also much more than just the "gay evil twink" ppl make him out to be

Elden Ring's demigods, while powerful and often monstrous, are also very clearly people: they have feelings, ambitions, ideals and tragic elements about them, which is why many of them are very likeable or at least compelling characters. And Miquella is a prime example of this, because the driving force behind his character, and ultimately the reason of his downfall, is his compassion

Miquella saw the flaws of the Golden Order from a young age, mainly how it oppressed others and was powerless to help his sister. And everything he has done since has been in an attempt to bring about a better, more compassionate world for all. And while the way he manipulates others and removes their free weill is a clearly nefarious aspect of his plans, that doesn't mean his kindness wasn't genuine, for two main reasons:

First, many of Miquella's followers go on to stand with him even after their charm has been broken, which makes clear that many are koyal to Miquella not just because of brainwashing, but also because they genuinely believe in his end goals. And while we'll never have confirmation of this, i don't think the denizens of the Haligtree, or Malenia for that matter, are all under Miquella's spell. At the very least the majority of them must've willingly chosen to remain loyal to him (plus, his charming powers must have a limit of some kind, otherwise he wouldn't need to become a god to rule the lands between)

Secondly, St Trina's very existence proves that Miquella's love and compassion is not only genuine, it's strong enough to manifest as a whole ass second being, which in turn makes her abandonment all the more tragic. It's possible that Miquella himself was always driven by ambition, and that he saw his other half as a "weakness" to be expunged; Or perhaps casting Trina away was a necessary evil, a selfless sacrifice in the name of a greater good. Regardless of the reason (i tend towards the latter), the end result is clear: It was grave mistake

For without love, there can be no Compassion. Miquella's Age of Compassion would be doomed to become an era of subjugation and endless war, where those who resist Miquella's charm would not be allowed to exist. It's an end result that Miquella himself would definitely NOT want, but it's the one he uwittingly locks himself into after he casts away his humanity. Hence why St Trina begs us to kill Miquella, as she understands his ascension would essentially result in a fate worse than death for him

So, TL;DR: I think Miquella genuinely wanted to create a better world, but in his quest to do so not only did he forcefully take away the free will of others, he also wound up becoming a heartless monster that, if unchecked, would bring about great suffering to the world and himself. It's classic "good intentions, bad outcome" tragic writing and ultimately it makes Miquella a very memorable and compelling character, even if he is ultimately a villain

[dokidokitsuna]

Slowly, I think I’m getting a handle on this…I tried studying the character art from my favorite dead MMORPG, Maple Story 2, and I think it helped me find a style for the shading and rendering that’s more dramatic but still sort of cartoony.

Plus, I’ve been doing a bit of script writing, which always helps me figure things out. ^^ So please enjoy the additional work I’ve done on these character concepts.

-Between these two, Magolor definitely needed the most work: you can tell because I basically drew a full character design sheet, which is something I almost never do because I don’t like repetition. XP But it doesn’t feel repetitive when I’m totally lost to begin with. ^^; I think I got a little too abstract that first time I drew him, so my focus here was to figure out the specific shape of his body and rebuild outward from there. In stark contrast to my usual Magolor designs, he’s very tall and muscular, with an imposing silhouette (especially with his cape on). Yes, he IS hiding something under all those purple bandages, but we won’t talk about it today. ;)

-I also like that his outfit gets darker the further inside you go, from the solid white cape and glittering chains, to the silver armor and gray scarves, to the skintight navy blue fit underneath. Symbolism??? Perhaps~

-Blade’s design was already pretty solid, so I just adjusted her cape a little, and then dove straight into the Rainbow Malady concept art. ^^ Phase 1 has her sprout a second eye and wings on one side of her face. Her head catches fire, as the power of the Rainbow Sword attempts to ‘burn away the darkness’. In this phase, Blade is already in a lot of pain, but remains fully conscious and can even speak, when she isn’t coughing up multicolored blood. She can recover from this on her own with a day of rest. Phase 2 is much more serious, forcing her organs outside of her body, and growing star-shaped welts over the rest of her skin. At this point, she can no longer recover without Magolor’s help-- essentially, he uses magic to shove all her organs back where they belong and stitch up the open wounds. It’s like setting a bone after it’s broken-- just as painful as the injury itself (if not more), but necessary for proper healing…which takes about a week.  Phase 3 is the last and worst, transforming her arms into elongated wings and her whole body into burning plasma, on top of all the issues from Phase 2. Thankfully, she can’t really remain conscious in this phase-- she’s usually delirious from fever, blood loss, and her brain literally burning away. ^^; Storywise, she needs about a month to recover from this, so she doesn’t use it too often…of course, as the 'player', you can put her through it as many times as you want. =T

-Fun fact, I guess: So the primary love language between these two characters is food. ^^ I was musing about what I could do with a protagonist arc centered around worsening illness (which is…surprisingly rare), and I thought, “so what do you do for sick people? You put them to bed, you manage their symptoms, you clean and comfort them…and most importantly, you feed them.” And then ^that little doodle basically came to me in a dream, and from there evolved the idea of Magolor showing kindness to Blade by cooking for her.

Most of the time, the little affection Magolor shows to Blade is…basically performative. Think of it like a hammy supervillain petting their cat-- it’s more of a character stim than anything else. ^^; The way Magolor talks to Blade (and especially the way he talks about her…) makes it clear that the hand-holding and headpats don’t mean much.

But on the other hand, giving Blade food and watching her cutely devour it, especially during the times when she’s bed-ridden and he doesn’t see her as often…I like to think that might genuinely endear her to him a little, enough to make it a sort of stand-out gesture. Like, if he strokes her forehead when she’s sick, that’s whatever; but when he spends 5 hours making a Maxim tomato consommé for her to eat, that’s him trying to say he cares. Maybe it’s just a tiny bit, maybe it’s just in that moment, but a small part of him truly wants her to be happy.

[humbledragon669]

S1E2 – The Book Write Up P2 – 11 years ago and The Present Day/Thursday (2 days to the end of the World) (up to Aziraphale and Crowleys’ arrival in Tadfield)

Alright, let’s get dug straight in, shall we? There’s a lot of background narrative being covered in this section, including the introduction of quite a few new characters.

Let’s start with Anathema. I don’t have a lot to say about her intro scene, but I do have two questions:

Why THE HELL is her mother allowing her to draw in that book? It’s the only copy of a 350-year-old book that contains prophecies that have all proven to be correct. In reality that book would genuinely be priceless, and we will see later in the series that the book is still considered valuable to the family. I don’t like writing notes in my cheap paperback books, so the idea of a child drawing IN COLOURED PENCIL in this book chills me to the bone, yet her mother just lets her do it without so much as a blink of an eye. Mad woman.

We know that the book contains prophecies up until the end of the world. We also know that at least one of the prophecies contains an actual year (1980 – the one with the Apple). Furthermore, we know that Anathema is named specifically in one of the prophecies. Just how many Anathemas did this family have in the hopes that one of them would be the one to save the world? Logically, only children born after 1980 would be eligible but that still leaves at least one generation of descendants prior to the one we see in the show. I suppose there could be another prophecy that states what year “the” Anathema was to be born but I like to believe that somewhere there’s a little group of related women called Anathema all fighting over who gets to save the world.

Next up – Newton. Again, not an awful lot to say here, other than the camera crashing into his bedroom window makes me laugh every time I watch it. I don’t know why this specific moment was chosen to break the fourth wall just as much as I don’t know why I find it so funny.

Having worked in IT for more than ten years, I can say without a doubt that there really are people like poor Newt who are cursed with breaking anything computer-related just by looking at it. They’re exasperating because they usually think the whole thing is one big joke and hold their technology incompatibility up to be some sort of prize. At least Newt has the decency to look abashed by his strange “gift”.

Newton’s home location is confirmed to be Dorking in his first present day scene when we see his mother shipping him off to a new job. We don’t know the location of the United Worldwide Holdings (Holdings) office in which he attempts to establish a hold as a wages clerk, but I can say for certainty that the location of his introduction to Shadwell is central London. For those whose UK geography is worse than my own, it would take over an hour to get to central London from Dorking, regardless of the transport mode of choice. This has always struck me as rather odd – it’s clear that Newt has difficulty holding down a job. The home that he apparently shares with his mother looks pretty run down from the outside, suggesting that money isn’t exactly a commodity in their household. So why would you take a clerical job, that likely doesn’t pay much, in a place that’s over an hour away? Perhaps Neil and Terry just chose Dorking as Newt’s hometown because it has a slightly funny sounding name…

Side note: the chances that the Hot Dog van that Newt and Shadwell get their drinks from would be allowed to park there, right behind the Houses of Parliament and directly in front of Westminster Abbey, are null. I would even go so far as to suggest that Shadwell himself would likely be moved on pretty sharpish from his chosen pulpit. Makes a pretty impressive backdrop though, hey?

Let’s just take a moment to have a chortle at Shadwell’s ideas of what sort of activity would give the game away for any self-respecting witch:

Speaking as the last in the line of Welsh “wise women”, I can (pretty much categorically state) that none of my ancestors have done any of those things. Maybe apart from calling the cats funny names, though most of my maternal line had/have a strong dislike for animals of the feline variety. My cat is called Kishi, which is supposed to be Japanese for “love bound to Earth”. It’s a wholly inappropriate name for her, as she’s really just a massive prick, like every other cat there is.

Why does Newt stop to listen to Shadwell here? Why not just ignore the crazy man on the pedestal like every other person in London? Obviously that would cause a bit of a plot problem. Perhaps it’s his ancestral right driving him into the arms of the Witchfinder Army – there are certainly crazier things that happen in the GO universe! As it turns out, Newt’s recruitment is well-timed, what with there not being any soldiers of rank higher than sergeant, and only one of those at that.

Easter egg time!

This ridiculously quick shot of Shadwell’s newspaper gives us a veritable treasure trove of Easter eggs/nuggets of information for the keen eye:

Shadwell’s address is confirmed as located in Crouch End.

The reference numbers for the adverts begin with the letters “GO”.

There is an advert for a lost book, which we can just make out is one of Terry’s – “Colour of Magic”.

Save the best for last! The advert for a lost hat clearly describes Terry himself, and his signature hat and scarf. Not only that, but he apparently lost it in a book shop in Soho. I wonder which one that could be…

This fleeting glimpse of newspaper is a perfect representation for one of the main reasons I love this show so much. Most casual audience members will never see it. Some more interested parties will see it and think little of it. Others, like myself and likely anybody reading this waffle, will not only see it, but understand the references and then squeal with delight at the little present that was left for us to find. It makes me feel valued as a fan whilst at the same time as if I’m sharing in a secret that the creative team has left for me. This is great television making at its very best.

Quick Easter egg here in Jasmine Cottage: the image that Anathema has pinned on the wall to represent the Antichrist is the same as the one used on the playing cards from episode 1 (albeit in black and white):

When we find ourselves back with Crowley in his apartment, he’s clearly furious with himself about losing the Antichrist. We also learn that he discovered the joys of tending to houseplants in the early 1970s. I’d like to think he inserted them into his life after the event that takes place in 1967 between himself and Aziraphale (which we will see in the next episode) – perhaps he was looking for something that he could try to use as some sort of poor substitute for his true desires? The presence of the houseplants and the timeline for his discovering of them is included in the book, so in honesty I doubt this was the intention for their purpose, but I like the possibility nonetheless. The scene with the houseplants provides a little nugget of information that we can store for reference for later – Crowley’s houseplants actually shake when they’re frightened.

Once again, I don’t have much to say about the next scene: that of Newt’s arrival to the Witchfinder Army’s HQ. I will pause briefly to note the wording of the notice on Shadwell’s door:

This calls to mind the phrase used by Aziraphale to refer to Crowly in episode 1. I’m not sure there’s anything in this as “foul fiend” has often been used to refer to demonic or evil beings. That said, it’s difficult not to try and make some connection, given that the two uses of the phrase are so close together in the show. We will later find out that Shadwell is working for both Aziraphale and Crowley for the same purpose, so defying the “foul fiend” in this case becomes somewhat impossible.

Quick pause for a moment of appreciation for that strut that David pulls off in this next scene. Honestly, there are professional supermodels that couldn’t manage that sort of casual arrogance, even if somebody told them they could stay thin and eat whatever they wanted for the rest of their lives.

This is the first time we find out that Crowly has adopted a first name for himself. I’ll talk about it a little more in the write up(s) for episode 3, so for now this is another piece of information for us to store for later.

I quite enjoy just how awkward Aziraphale sounds leaving a message on the answerphone. Dealing with the unannounced arrival of two angels in his book shop he can handle, but having to leave a message instead of speaking to Crowley direct? Perish the thought. This seems to me a quite human attitude to have – when answerphones started to become commonplace, people (on the whole) hated leaving messages once they realised the person they wanted to speak to wasn’t going to pick up. What I find interesting about the conversation that they do have is that Aziraphale’s suggestion is actually incredibly obvious. In fact, it’s about the only possible scenario that would make any sense. Crowley’s disbelieving expression would suggest he doesn’t feel the same way:

Still, at least this conversation tells the audience that this pair haven’t given up on working together to try and stop Armageddon just yet (it would be a pretty short and disappointing show if they had, wouldn’t it?!).

At this point in the episode, we are introduced to Crowley’s driving style which could be described as suicidal dangerous. He seems pretty confident with it though, so it’s unlikely this is out of the ordinary for him, urgency of their mission notwithstanding. Aziraphale doesn’t actually seem that bothered by it initially, not until we hear the horns of other angry drivers, where it becomes apparent that he’s actually very uncomfortable indeed. We’ll see a fair amount of material on the theme of Crowley’s driving and its effects on Aziraphale in this episode, almost like we’re being set up for something…

Crowley is pretty insistent on the use of “we” in this scene, despite the fact that Aziraphale really didn’t have anything to do with losing the Antichrist (he just took Crowley’s lead on this one). The angel doesn’t really dispute it though, though perhaps he’s just too worried about being discorporated to argue.  What is pretty obvious is that Crowley does not appreciate being told how to drive, and it makes me wonder how many times they have had conversations exactly like this before.

I’m going to wrap this part up with a quick round-up of the “The Them” scenes in Tadfield, prior to the arrival Aziraphale and Crowley in the village. As with much of the other narrative-based scenes in this episode, I don’t have much to say about them, but I did make note of a couple of (potentially) interesting things:

Pepper’s middle name is Galadriel. For those people who have managed to live their lives without any sort of interaction with Lord of the Rings up to now, this is the name of an Elven queen in that universe. As much as it would be cool for there to be some sort of subtextual Clue hidden in her middle name, I think it’s more likely it was just picked because it was a fitting one for the daughter of a reformed hippy.

Anathema recites parts of an infamous speech from Shakespeare’s Macbeth here: Eye of newt and […] tongue of dog. What I find interesting about this is that there are two ingredients in the potion recipe that have been omitted (a frog’s toe and the wool of a bat), leaving only the two elements that can be found in the show – a Newt and a dog. Honestly, I’m not sure what to make of this, not least because I’m not even sure what relevance the rhyme has to what she’s doing at the time she recites it. Not to mention that she hasn’t actually met Newt at this point, so would have no knowledge of his name (to the best of our knowledge, he’s only referred to as “man” or “boy” in Agnes’s prophecies).

Wensleydale brings up the Spanish Inquisition when in the woods, which we know Crowley has claimed responsibility for (to his Hellish masters). I absolutely love the way that the religious reasoning for punishing people is so masterfully undermined by Brian’s earnest reasoning here. I should point out that in addition to being a hereditary Pagan, I am staunchly against organised religion (not faith; I consider that to be an entirely different concept and feel that it’s integral to the spiritual identity for pretty much everybody. I believe we should all have the right to follow our chosen faith without the overbearing interference of organised religion) so the satiric tones that people who were being executed would have been grateful for their persecution if they had understood the reasons behind it fully really strikes a chord with the religion-cynic in me.

There’s an interesting little set detail here in the Them’s den:

These look like old-school weighing scales to me. In the context of the conversation that the Them are having about torturing witches, these could be said to be a reference to the practice of weighing people accused of witchcraft against the weight of a bible to determine their guilt. Alternatively, it could be a reference to the scales we will see later in the series as the summoning object for Famine. Or it could be nothing. I doubt that last one though.

That brings us quite nicely to see Aziraphale and Crowley arriving in Tadfield, which feels to me like a good place to finish this part of the write up. I’m going to be tackling a couple of important moments in the next part (can we say “wall slam”?), which I’m aware have been discussed at length already, but I have things to say and I’m going to say them. They’ve probably all been said before, but they need to get out of my head and into a piece of writing so I’m going to say them anyway. Questions, comments and discussion on this part welcome as always!

[bleachbleachbleach]

Verisimilitude (long thoughts about writing)

Sometimes I get mailed random books to consider for course adoption. The first one I looked at the other day was so incredibly bad I could not make it past page 12--"oh my god I hate books" bad; "trees were wasted on this!!" bad. And then there's this one. I've made it to page 30-something and I could have told you 20 pages ago that Oliver Twist it would remain, but I am still reading it to read it, and maybe keep it to recommend extracurricularly. (The protagonist Alva is a weeb for American culture, whatever the word is for that, which I think could make for interesting study!) But that's all context to say,

AH YES THE INTERNET RABBIT HOLE OF NARUTO FAN FICTION, HENTAILORD. WE'VE ALL BEEN THERE.

SO...

BLEACH MENTION WHEN????

Based on the style of her screen name, the Naruto porn, and her listening to My Chemical Romance and Linkin Park, this girl is definitely living her teenage life in the mid-00s, in ways that are searingly obvious. Which feels like it should be a massive success in terms of using verisimilitude to pinpoint a particular time and place and, by extension, person. But I don't think it does?

In thinking about why this doesn't work for me as a reader:

1. As a general rule, I tend not to enjoy "fandom" subculture references like this in fiction, because they have never felt true to my experience of fandom, or even my experience of others' experiences of fandom. The specificity is there but not the verisimilitude. Whether this is because of an inability to articulate the breath of life that animates fandom spaces, or a feeling of needing to at least kind of translate it for the uninitiated general audience, I don't know. Not that Alva's narrative goes far enough to merit this discussion; she's just reading Naruto porn for one sentence, but it just doesn't land right for me. (Sidebar, this is probably also why I don't enjoy acafandom or fandom essays that aspire to acafandom; there's usually this attempted, manufactured critical/"objective" distance from the text that often feels performative, or at least the wrong [or less interesting] tool for the job. And even where 'in-group' positionality is addressed, the translation required to make these things legible to the out-group is just--well, not what I want in life, I guess!)

2. I am a great believer in drawing greatly from what you know and feel and all those random thoughts and behaviors and emotions and tics that make life interesting, and giving them to fiction. In fanfic especially, I am a great believer in seeing the author's hands in a text, making the story (and the original canon) unmistakably theirs. But I kind of always want them to be hands that are in the act of giving. By which I mean, I think there's a difference between all these things existing in a story and having been given to a character or a world or a story, and integrated genuinely into them.

Like, all I can think about while reading this book is how the author definitely lived through the mid-00s in a particular and very familiar way. Rather than create a richly immersive world, the details jump out of the page and leave the story behind. They don't feel like they belong to Alva (or perhaps Alva does not feel like a character with the depth to hold them and make them hers). They belong do the author, and to me, and to history, but Alva falls out of the equation. And if this is going to work, I feel like Alva can't fall out of the equation.

3. I was talking to a friend about something similar a few months ago. She was complaining about a historical fiction book she was reading with a book club she leads at the library she works at--how it was clearly very well-researched, but dry as hell. The information was not animated by the story itself. And I compared it to a fanfic I'd (not) read, where the author was very proud of all the research they'd done and how accurate-to-life its setting was. (To be clear, I'm not subtweeting Bleach fandom. Completely different fandom! Also this fanfic was published like 16 years ago.) The fic did bring in lots of specific details about trees and highways and city names--things I knew well, too, because it was set where my sister lives--but rather than be as exciting and, again, rich, as I feel like that familiarity could have been, it all felt dead. Because all these things were described specifically, but not true to how the narrating characters would describe them, or mentally catalogue them, or experience them.

And you might think, well, how would we possibly know how a character thinks about highways? It's not like he's explained this in canon. And I'd say, well, you definitely can. There are probably a lot of different ways a character could plausibly think about highways, depending on the specific shade and flavor of your characterization of them, all equally believable; but it's got to be part of the equation. There are a lot of ways to be right, and you know it when it's wrong. The wrong-est way it can be is for the way they think about highways to not factor into the way those dang highways are being described by them, in their POV.

4. I think about this both as a reader and as a writer--certainly more often as a writer, because I find that level of imagining a character's headspace the VERY best part of the process, and also because I am often concerned I am not doing it, or at least not well, lol. I'm positive I've done all the things I've just talked about not enjoying.

These concerns exist at the level of characterization work in general, but also at that level of, is the wizard behind the green curtain? Are his hands giving? Because while I do write fanfic because "it is fun" and because "this idea interests me," I am also usually writing it to work through deeply personal emotions/experiences. Which again, perhaps selfishly, I support that. But from a craft perspective I don't want it to feel, transparently, like "oh lol this author is going through it."

Moreover, from a relational perspective, I don't want that to be the relationship between me as author and the characters. Because one thing I am ALWAYS writing fanfic to do is to indulge my feelings about how much I am in complete, rapturous love with the characters and worlds in question. I don't want to just place things upon them, like a film or shroud; I want them to be given, integrated, arriving in the text wholly in their bodies and in their minds and entirely theirs. And I mean this for both the emotional arcs and conflicts and the random tics and details. I want them to have been given, and to belong, and to feel completely and inextricably theirs.

So, those are my thoughts about mid-00s Naruto porn!!!

I'd love to hear others' perspectives, as readers or writers or both. Have you had similar reactions, or quite different? Why do you write, and what do you want? What's your template for how you think about characterization, or your writerly relationship to canon/characters?

[londondziban]

I'll forever be confused over the writing of Steve's character in season 4. Like, what was the thought process behind the choices that were made for him?

In season 1, he was shown to have a change of behavior, felt remorse for his actions, attempted to apologize to not just Nancy but also Jonathan, and bought a camera for Jonathan to replace the one he had broken. Not only this, but he had turned back around to help Nancy and Jonathan–after having a gun pointed at him and nearly getting eaten by a creature he probably couldn't fully comprehend at the time–despite the fact he was scared shitless cuz, hey, that's his girl in there and a guy he may not know very well but he's not going to let them fight the monster alone.

In season 2, we watched him grieve his relationship with Nancy and form a bond with Dustin and the other kids. Though he was clearly upset about the breakup, he never once truly blamed Nancy for it. We saw him respect not only Nancy's feelings but her choice as well. He knew he wasn't the one she chose, he knew she was struggling and turned to Jonathan. He was heartbroken but he did his best to move forward and keep his mind on the mission at hand.

In season 3, we watch his bond with Dustin develop further and we see him make his first friend that's (close) to his age since he dropped his previous friends in season 1. He was actively looking for a new girl to date and developed feelings for Robin; We were led to believe he'd moved on from Nancy. In this season, though he was fairly removed from the other kids for most of it, we were once again shown he has a selfless nature when it comes to them, even Erica whom he barely knew. We saw that at the end of the day, he's simply a good friend through his instant support of Robin rather than lashing out over the rejection or being flat-out homophobic. He's selfless and loyal to those he cares about. His character in this season was wonderful (not talking about how his injuries were constantly played for laughs though, that's for a future post).

So in season 4...what happened? Yeah, I still loved him because he's Steve and I've become attached to his character over the years. But he just felt so off? I'm glad his friendship with Robin was still there and I loved them together throughout the season. But he's 1. suddenly in love with Nancy again, 2. doesn't seem to respect her actual feelings nor her relationship with Jonathan (because if he did he wouldn't be actively flirting with her and telling her he wants to have kids with her, hello?), 3. he complained about being with the kids despite being shown to deeply care for them over and over again (it could've been a joke of course but it just felt mean spirited when compared to his behaviors in prior seasons. Like he sighed when being paired with Dustin?), and 4. he just felt kind of weird and a little creepy at times.

It felt like they didn't know what to do with him this last season. It felt like all the development he'd gone through suddenly took a left turn and then backtracked out of nowhere. Instead of finding ways to discuss the way season 3 events affected him (and Robin) or maybe showing him form a genuine bond with Eddie (someone else his age that he never would've previously been friends with), they made him a little mean spirited, they made the other characters be meaner to him and treat him as if he's stupid (more than usual), and they made him be in love with Nancy again. They could've done so much with his character that wouldn't have contradicted all of his growth, and yet.

I say this all with good intentions, of course. I love Steve. He was one of my favorites when I first started watching the show. Which is why I was so upset about the way they wrote his character in season 4. He just didn't feel like the Steve I'd loved anymore. Was it a conscious decision? Is there a specific reason behind it we just haven't been shown yet? Or was it just poor writing? I hope whatever is going on with his character is either fixed or simply explained in season 5 (and I'm so excited to see he'll have at least one interaction with Jonathan!). I'm just a little worried they've run out of ideas for his character and are just going to kill him off next season without any explanation as to why his character took the turn it did.

TLDR: I love Steve but the way his character was written in season 4 confused me.