#although i dont want to kill any of them. well that is to say. Yet. ofc. i mean i will if i have to anyway

[imabiscuitinthousandworlds]

playing a ttrpg you completely made up from scratch when literally none of us know the first thing about playing ttrpgs is literally the best thing ever and it's so funny

[tgirl-swagless]

Making a Perfect Date

Tags: big sister, little sister, sisters, incest, underage sex, OC, highschool, smut, porn, masturbation, trans female character

Summary: Astrid, a cisgender older sister, makes sure her transgender little sister Emily has a good first date. Although it is tough on them as they know what they really want.

Word count: 3858

AO3 link

Chapter 2

Chapter 1: Preparing for a Date

Emily finally got her first date, not that she was too interested in dating to begin with.  She is only really doing it to satisfy her highschool friends.  I mean, she's 17 and still hasn't went on a single date, so her friends felt the need to pressure her to get out there and find someone.  Deep down though, Emily has someone she wants, and it's none of her classmates.  She might not realize it's what she wants right now, but her big sister Astrid is all she thinks about.

Emily and Astrid are inseperable, or... at least they were.  Astrid graduated just last year, leaving Emily to fend for herself while at school.  They used to meet up every lunch period to hang out and joke around with each other.  As long as they weren't in any of their classes, they'd always be seen together.  But since Astrid graduated, Emily has gotten noticably distant and lonely when at school.  Her friends are only trying to help her.  They care about her.

Astrid hasn't bothered leaving home yet.  Nothing has really called to her.  She got a job at the corner store in order to give back to her parents at least a little, which they are very appreciative of.  She got today off work due to some schedule mix-up, but that is no bad thing to Astrid; she gets to see her baby sister come home from school!  To her dismay, Astrid doesn't get the chance to see Emily too often anymore.

Emily walks through the door, letting out a big sigh, her bookbag falling off her shoulder to the floor right by the front door.  Astrid is just sitting on the couch, half waiting for Emily, half just killing time watching TV.  As soon as Emily notices her though, her entire expression changes.

Her eyes light up and she lets out a high pitch, "Oh, Astrid!  Hi big sis!"

Without a care for her belongings left at the door, Emily rushes to the couch and bounces onto it right beside Astrid.  "I wasn't expecting to see you so soon today," Emily exclaims with a big smile across her face.

Astrid can't help but get a little giddy at the sight of her little sister being so excited to see her.  "Yeah, work had a mix-up and I dont work today.  How was school," Astrid asks.

Emily rests herself on the couch facing Astrid.  "It was ok, nothing special."  Astrid is about to reply, but Emily cuts her off saying, "but... my friends kinda pushed me to ask someone out, so I guess I have a date tomorrow."

A rush of gloom flows through Astrid.  Why would she feel so bad at the thought of her little sister seeing someone?  She should be happy for Emily.  She knows her little sister has been feeling down while at school for some time, she should be happy that Emily is finally getting out there some.  It's not like she would be able to be there with Emily forever.

The unenthused statement definitely reaches Astrid, though.  She teases Emily saying, "What's with that, not excited for your first ever date?"  Astrid has been on tons of dates, had a couple boyfriends and girlfriends at different points through highschool as well, but she too has been in a slump of sorts since graduating.

Emily sits facing forward now.  She can tell Astrid is still looking at her in her peripheral.  "Well... like I said, my friends kinda just pushed me to do it.  They have been for a while now, and I guess I just caved because I was getting annoyed with them.  So I asked out one of the first girls I saw.  She must have been into me because she was really excited when I asked."

Throughout Emily's reply, Astrid could tell she was not interested in this one bit.  She hates to see her little sister so unhappy though, she has to think of something to help cheer her up.  Astrid gives an acknowledging hum after Emily finishes, and looks off into the distance, thinking of anything she could do.  An idea comes to mind, she lets out an "Aha!"

Astrid turns towards Emily again, and Emily towards her.  Astrid takes her little sister's hand and says, "What if we go out and get you a brand new outfit for the date, something cool and you.  Maybe you'll feel more into it if you get something nice for it."

Emily thinks on it a moment.  She couldn't possibly deny going out shopping with her big sister, even if it wasn't for Astrid or for them.  "That's a great idea," Emily says with a big smile on her face, trying to hide the dread of a date with someone she honestly doesn't really care about.

The two sisters get in Astrids old, beat up Subaru and head to the mall.  Astrid prefers stores like Hot Topic and Zumie's, but Emily hasn't really had a preference.  She always was happy to follow her big sister through stores and seeing what she would pick out.  She usually just got Astrid's hand-me-downs anyway.

Once they arrive, as the sisters jump out of the car and start walking for the entrance, Astrid asks, "So... who is your date?"

Emily looks down at the ground as they walk to the entrance.  "Eh, it's just Jocelyn Danials." 

Astrid audibly gasps.  "Damn little sis, you scored a baddie," Astrid exclaims.  "I remember her pretty well still.  She always had killer style, and I was a little jealous she got her hair colored pastel before mom and dad would let me even cut mine this way."  Astrid lifts the hair on the side of her head, revealing a large part that is shaved down to the skin.  The way it was cut and styled made Astrid look a little wild, or feral.  Either way, when she initially styled it that way, Emily was in awe of how cool she looked.  She isn't nearly as brave to do something so crazy with her hair right now, but is envious of her big sister's raw style.

Now inside the mall, they gotta decide where to go.  Astrid asks, "Where is your date gonna be at, by the way?  Should help us decide what kinda clothes you want to get."

Astrid takes Emily's hand again and Emily can't help but blush a little and look around to see if anyone is staring.  It embarses her a little when her big sister is so physical like this.  She manages to get out, "I-it's actually the theater here, we were gonna go see [redacted] right after school."

Astrid ponders a moment, then replies saying, "Ok, ok... so something a little warm.  Although, the theaters here tend to run a little hot.  Made that mistake one too many times... uh, anyway, so maybe something light with a jacket?"

Emily looks up to her sister and says, "I like that idea!  Where should we go for that?" 

Astrid starts pulling her little sis by the hand off to the store she has in mind without bothering to say where.

They enter a Hot Topic, typical Astrid.  "Around the sides and back you can find most of the clothes.  They have a ton of cute dresses.  You go pick one out, on me."  Astrid pushes Emily in as she goes elsewhere in the store.  Just a little confused, Emily follows Astrid's direction and goes to look at the dresses.

There's frilly ones, long and short ones, a few really bland ones, and also some fandom ones that Emily has no context for.  Eventually, Emily spots a cute little thing that draws her in.  It's like a dress, but the top is connected to the skirt bottom by a couple straps on each side.  She rushes to the changing room to give it a whirl.  Once changed, she pops out to show her big sister what she found.  To Emily's surprise, Astrid was right there holding a very punk looking leather jacket, complete with sharp studs on the shoulders and a few metal loops at the elbows and down the sides.

But as soon as Emily notices her big sis standing there, she instinctively does a little twirl to show off all the angles of the dress she picked out.

Astrid blushes bright red at the sight.  Her little sister's curves are perfectly captured.  The top of the dress is basically a croptop, showing the world her soft belly, her cruvy sides, and her lower back.  Plus its just tight enough to make her perky little nipples poke through.  Astrid tries hard to hide her sudden arousal.  Emily notices the reddening face of her big sister and gets aroused thinking of what could be getting her big sis all red.  Did she really get turned on by her little sis?  It's not like she was trying to. Why did that thought make her little estrogenized dick leak a little?  She can't help but blush as well now, thinking of how the skirt of her dress would be tenting if it wasn't for her panties she has on.  Now tight around her hips with her bulging dick.

After a moment of silent staring at each other, Emily pipes up with, "S-so uhhm... what do you think, big sis...?"  Emily looks so innocent standing there, hands held together in front of her to try and hide any semblence of her being turned on.

Astrid stumbles over her words, feeling like she is in free fall as she tries to speak.  "I-it uh um y-you are p-pretty, yeah, uh y-you I mean the dress is i-its good.  Yeah." God , Astrid thinks to herself, how dare I have these thoughts of my little sister?!  She must be doing this on purpose.  Her eyes are clearly pleading for me.   This is so wrong, I need to distract myself.   Her mind is flooded with images of her little sister barely clothed, beckoning to her.  "H-here try on this jacket.  Maybe not quite your style, b-but it looks pretty cool in my opinion."  Astrid thrusts the jacket towards Emily, nearly smacking her face with a sleeve, making sure her face stays blocked from Emily's view.

Emily takes the jacket from her big sister and tries it on.  Astrid was right, definitely not her style, even though she looked very cool with it.  In the end, she decides to just get the dress.  She has a couple of jackets she could wear with it, anyway.  She thought it was alright, but the way her sister reacted to seeing her made her need to have the dress.  Does she actually want to make her big sister lust for her?  It sounds so wrong to think about, but she can't help herself.  The thought of her big sister going crazy at the sight of her little sister's body in turn drives Emily crazy.  She tries her best to brush all these thoughts aside as she changes back into her clothes, but her buldge is still so obvious through her shorts at this point.  She has to take a few extra minutes to calm herself so she can tuck her dick back in place.

The two sisters checkout the dress and head for the exit.  They start to pass by the theater when Emily slows.  She stares into the theater, thinking of her date tomorrow.

Astrid notices her lagging behind, so she asks, "Are you alright, sis?"  She walks back to Emily, radiating comfort for her little sister, cheeks still a little red.

Still staring into the theater area, Emily replies, "I'm just... nervous.  It's my first date, and I'm just... yeah, nervous."  Emily doesn't want to do this, but she already fell to the pressure.  No going back from that now.  She doesn't have it in her to turn Jocelyn down at this point.

"Well," Astrid says after a moment, "we could go see a movie.  You can pretend it is a date too, like, to practice for what you'd do tomorrow."  Emily's face lights up red again thinking about going on a date with her big sister.  It's not like they've never seen a movie together before, but the way her big sister worded it makes her feel so elated.

Emily's eyes twinkling with glee, barely hiding her enthusiasm, "yes, please.  I mean, uhm, I really like that idea." 

Astrid replies, "I'm full of those today," and shoots her little sis a wink, instantly making Emily blush and want to hide her face again.

It doesn't even matter to them what movie they see.  Emily is just excited to go on her first, albeit technically fake, date with her big sister.  Astrid is trying hard to hide it, but she is also ecstatic that Emily said yes.  Astrid just wants to cheer up her little sister.  A smile on her face is all she needs.  They get a couple tickets to see a random movie, grab a bag of popcorn, and find their seats.

A ways into the movie, as the sisters are intently watching the movie, Astrid goes to grab some popcorn from the bag sitting in Emily's lap.  She completly misses the bag and lands her hand on her little sister's bare leg, just above the knee.  She prodes for just a moment until she realizes what she's done.  Astrid whips her head to the side to see what she just did and whispers to Emily, "oh my god, I-I'm sorry, sis."

Astrid yanks her hand away, ashamed of having touched her little sister, even just on accident.  She has been so on edge today with everything going on.  Emily whispers back to her, "I-it's alright, sis.  Think nothing of it."  Although, Emily herself is unable to stop thinking about it.  She froze as soon as she felt her big sister's hand on her.  It felt good, even just a very momentary touch.  And now her dick is begging to be free again.  Luckily she has the bag of popcorn to hide her bulge, she thinks to herself.

"Here, uh, I'll hold the bag," whispers Astrid, as to not make the same mistake again.  Even in the dim light of the movie screen, she can see how turned on her little sister is.

Emily goes bright red and excuses herself saying, "I need to use the bathroom.  I'll be right back."  She then hurries down to the exit of the room and to the bathroom.

Alone in a stall, she pulls down her shorts and panties, freeing her rock hard cock.  "Ahh... Astrid... why...?"  Emily grabs her little dick and starts to slowly stroke it, her glands already soaked with precum.  She can't help but question why it turns her on so much, but her mind is too hazy to think straight right now.  She continues stroking herself off to the thought of her big sister.  She imagines Astrid pushing the bag of popcorn away and undoing her button and zipper, pulling out her little sister's cock right in the movie theater.  She imagines her big sister's hands stroking her dick, making her feel like the prettiest little sister anyone could have.  She imagines her big sister whispering in her ear, "I didn't realize how much my baby sis wanted me, wanted this.  You're so dirty, Emmy."  She lets out a whimper at the thoughts flooding her mind.  Luckily she's aline in the bathroom right now.  Emily continues to stroke her dick until she finally orgasms, leaking a few drops of cum into the toilet and down her shaft.

Just as Emily is cleaning herself up, Astrid enters the bathroom and calls out for her.  "Emily, you still in here?  The movie just ended."  She spots the familiar shoes of her little sis underneath one of the stall doors and waits near the entenace to the bathroom for her.  Astrid's entrance makes Emily scurry to finish cleaning up.  She exits the stall to see her big sister with a worried expression on her face.  "Are you feeling alright, sis," Astrid asks.  Emily's face is flushed after having just orgasmed.

Making her way to the sink, she replies, "Y-yeah.  I-I'm alright, sis."

The way she walks, the flushed face, the dazed words coming out of her mouth; Astrid knows exactly what her little sis was just doing.  And it makes her mind go wild.  She notices she's starting to get wet as she tries hard to push the thought away, but it lingers still.

Astrid waits for her little sis to finish up as she steps out of the bathroom.  They walk to the car in silence, keeping a gap between them.  The tension is so palpable.

In the car, as Astrid is starting it up, Emily's stomach growls.  It catches Astrid's attention.  "Sounds like you're hungry."  Not a moment later, Astrids stomach also grumbles.

Emily giggles.  "You're one to talk."

Astrid lets out a small laugh.  "We should go get some food on the way home.  That alright?"

Emily gives her big sis a smile and says, "You're right again.  Lets."

The sisters can feel the tension loosening as they drive towards home.  They stop at a local borito joint, a favorite of Emily's.  They order and sit down.  Emily stops a moment and notices her sister's face.  Nothing has changed, other than the little bit of guac on the side of her mouth.  She giggles at the sight of it.

Astrid stops, too.  With food still in her mouth, she teasingly says, "hey, what're you laughing at?" 

Emily can't help but smile.  She feels so warm, just her big sister and her at one of her favorite places.  "It's just... thank you for today.  It means a lot to me you want to help with my first date."

Astrid gulps down what was in her mouth, a little surprised to hear Emily so grateful.  She replies, "Oh, well, of course Em.  I know you haven't had a great time lately, and I wanted to be sure you were prepared for your first date.  It just eats at me to see you so unhappy."  Only now does she bring a napkin up to wipe her face clean.

Emily let's out another giggle.  Full of her little sister brattiness, she says, "yeah, and I can't believe you would steal my first date from me, too," while grinning the whole time.

Astrid scoffs at Emily's remark and her cheeks lightly glow red.  "What?!  I-it was just to test it out!  For you!  I mean, it was like, uh, I was just trying to make sure you would have a perfect first date.  I mean the real one!  Not the one we just did."

Emily can't help but laugh at how embarrassed her big sister got from her little teasing.  "Aww, come on now, sis.  You know I joke," Emily says and sticks out her tongue.

Astrid gives a little chuckle and continues eating her borito.

Once the sisters finish eating, they head home, listening to their favorite radio station the whole way.  It is pretty late by now, so they both retire to their rooms and ready themselves for bed.

Astrid lays on her bed, contemplating the weird day she just spent with her little sis.  She really enjoyed it, but her mind kept getting flooded by thoughts of her Emmy.  That dress she chose looked so perfect on her.  Her skin was so soft when she accidentally touched it.  Her flushed face right after having orgasmed.  God, her face.  There's no doubt she thought of me when she left to use the bathroom , she thought.

Astrid's hand starts to drift down her body, feeling the goosebumps on her skin as she goes lower.  I could clearly see her buldge in the theater.  God, I want to see her.  I want to see her little dick.  I want to feel her soft skin.  She continues down until she reaches her panties, slowly rubbing her clit over her underwear to the thought of her little sister.

Astrid lets out a small moan.  "Ahh, Emily..." she whispers to herself.  Again, and again she calls her baby sisters name as she picks up the pace, rubbing her clit until she can't take it any more.  Astrid pulls down her underwear revealing her wet lips to the open air.  She spreads her labia as she moans, a little louder this time.  Astrid penetrates her pussy with her middle and ring fingers as she moans and writhes for her sister.

Emily lays in her bed, about to drift off to sleep when she faintly hears her name be called.  It sounded kind of like Astrid calling to me , she thought.  She brushes it off and closes her eyes, but hears her name called again.  That's definitely Astrid's voice.   Emily decides to get up and drearily walk towards Astrid's room.  The house is otherwise quiet.  All the lights are off except for a dim light peeking out the bottom of Astrid's door.  Emily turns the door handle and opens the door just to the point she can see into her big sister's room.

But as soon as she does, Astrid lets out another moan, "ffffuck~ Emily, ahh, ahh."  Emily freezes with the door slightly ajar as she stares in astonishment at the sight of her big sister fingering herself while moaning her name.  "Mmm, Emmy, ahh, Emmy..." Astrid breathily cries out, completely oblivious to the fact her little sister is watching her now.  Emily can't help but turn bright red as the buldge in her silky-soft panties grows bigger.  She cant fight her urge.  Her hand drifts down to stimulate her little dick as she intently watches her big sister pleasure herself.  Emily's breathing starts to pick up as she feels herself up, her other hand groping her tender breast.

It only takes a few more moments for Astrid to climax, spraying her juice all over her hand as she falls limp.  Emily decides to scurry away before she can be noticed.  Astrid turns her head to her door and notices its open.  She could have sworn it was closed.  She shakily gets up and peeks out into the dark hallway.  Nothing.  She shrugs it off, closes her door, and gets herself ready for sleep.

Emily back in her room is now furiously stroking her cock.  Big sis, you really want me, Emily thinks to herself.  Sheets out a small whimper as her fingers go over her glands.  But, no, it's not right, this is so wrong, I cant do this.  Wrought with shame and anxiety, her hand slows and her little cock slowly goes limp.  Now she lay in the darkness of midnight on her bed, contemplating her emotions.  So much shame.  What if mom and dad found out, she thinks.  They would make Astrid move away, no doubt.  They may even disown her.  Or maybe they would blame me!  She holds one of her plushies tight.  Emily silently weeps as the anxiety spirals in her mind.  Until she has worn herself out so much she drifts off to sleep.

[octagava]

bsd anon back at it again to say that i also really want your opinions on akutagawa because i heavily typecast him and want angles i haven't considered. my brain, comically, likes to contrast him against chuuya. i think he recognizes his power could have been used to protect others but he's heavily defined by how unfair the world was to him since birth. what kid deserves to be impoverished and starving and when he failed to protect what he could, rather than focus on what was left, he raged against the world because it wasn't fair at all. but i think it deeply impacted him and he shuts off people because he *was* strong and failed to keep those under him safe. i think he ends up following dazai because he sees this guy who managed to effortlessly achieve what he could not yet. i think what's worse is that dazai doesn't have a drive to live and is going with the flow, and akutagawa who lost his life's drive (not that he would get one after fulfilling his revenge which is probably why beast!dazai took his sister) was drawn to what could be beyond him actually, a meaning to his life. but he couldn't get past dazai, which is why he substituites dazai's approval his meaning to life, which is merely the strength to inflict the same harm the world did to him back. i think it might be why atsushi contrasts with him too. i know he roasts atsushi for not appreciating what he has and being too caught up in the past, but akutagawa is also kind of not grounded. i mean, if he was worried about protecting what he had left (gin), then he would be completely different. he's just very loudly and blindly trying to leave an impression on the world before his end but because all his tethers are so vague, he still doesn't have a meaning to live other than the hand that elevated him to where he is. although, akutagawa is honestly... a little fucking crazy too. i think he also runs into battle to die on his own terms. that rather than die to weakness beyond his control, he will die as a warrior within his control (which is to an opponent he can't handle). maybe surpassing atsushi is also important to him, beyond just mere strength, because he hopes it can give him a purpose beyond what he has right now. maybe because he doesn't kill, he is forced to treat things as less of a life or death battle and that allows him to mellow out just a tad bit more. idk though, the guy is just... so interesting as well... i don't fully understand him but he's like also the guy i'm rooting for in character development for bsd. i still dont quite know what i'm rooting for in him but i think it will ultimately involve cutting off dazai from his life. no need for any acknowledgement of strength or seeking remorse for the hell inflicted onto him but a simple "i don't need you anymore."

I'm not going to even lie, I had to sit down for a while and think about what I wanted to say, since when it comes to me and Akutagawa I feel like I can say a lot but it ultimately being nothing, devoid facts of actual meaning.

Mind you, I’m about to go on a rant, so I might not fully answer your ask, haha.

But since I have a problem deciding how I want to tackle this, I’ll start from the angle I’m most comfortable with. Akutagawa being both the foil and the other half of Atsushi. More than anything, the way they mirror each other’s journeys is what makes them so compelling.

Akutagawa and Atsushi have eerily similar backstories, and BEAST straight-up confirms just how much they have in common. More than anyone else in the entire story, these two are the closest to being the same. They were both raised in hell, but the key difference lies in how they process the value of life.

Atsushi grew up in an abusive orphanage where he was conditioned to believe his life had no worth, unless he could prove it by saving others. His entire struggle revolves around trying to justify his own existence. I won’t go into detail about Atsushi here since this isn’t about him.

Akutagawa, meanwhile, grew up in the slums, where life didn’t have meaning in the first place. He wasn’t just dehumanized, he was raised in a world where survival meant killing, where his life and the lives of those around him were worth nothing. A piece of bread had more value than a human life. But despite that, he still had people, his sister, Gin, and his friends.

And then they were slaughtered. The moment he failed to protect them, everything snapped. He didn’t just want revenge, he wanted to rage against a world that had already discarded him. He was willing to throw away his life to do it. And that’s when Dazai stepped in.

Dazai’s Influence: Making It Worse

Meeting Dazai didn’t save Akutagawa. If anything, it ruined him further. Before, at the very least, he could still see life beyond just feeding himself and keeping others alive. But under Dazai and the Mafia, that tiny sliver of perspective got completely erased.

Dazai drilled into him that if he wasn’t strong, he didn’t deserve to live. And Akutagawa learned that lesson the hard way by having his weaknesses constantly thrown back in his face. Before, he saw weak people as insignificant at best. Now, he saw them as undeserving of life. The Mafia shaped him into someone who saw power as the only thing that mattered, and because of that, he became obsessed with proving himself.

But the problem was that Dazai never actually gave him that validation. Dazai, who had no real will to live, no personal ambitions, no deep attachment to anything, became the one thing Akutagawa revolved his existence around. And that’s what made it so much worse. Akutagawa devoted himself to earning Dazai’s approval, to proving he was strong, but Dazai couldn’t care less. And because of that, Akutagawa kept spiraling.

This is why his drive feels so hollow. He isn’t fighting for something, he’s fighting because he doesn’t know what else there is. He throws himself into battles not just to win, but because dying in a fight he chose would be better than dying helpless. And that’s where his obsession with Atsushi comes in.

Atsushi vs. Akutagawa: The Other Half of the Picture

Atsushi is everything Akutagawa can’t understand but also can’t ignore. He sees value in life, in people, in things Akutagawa long discarded as meaningless. And yet, Atsushi is strong, stronger than Akutagawa in ways that aren’t just about combat. That infuriates him.

Akutagawa constantly roasts Atsushi for not appreciating what he has, for being stuck in his past, but Akutagawa is just as stuck. He’s so caught up in proving himself that he never stops to think about what comes after. If he truly cared about protecting what he had left, Gin, his entire approach to life would be different. But he doesn’t think that way. His rage, his need to make an impact before he dies, his obsession with leaving a mark on the world, it all overrides any real sense of grounding.

And that’s where Atsushi messes him up. Because Atsushi forces him to see things differently. Because Atsushi refuses to kill, Akutagawa is forced to treat their fights as something other than a life-or-death battle. And because of that, something shifts. Not much, but enough. Enough that, over time, he starts to change.

The idea of selfishness Akutagawa and Atsushi are both selfish in their own ways, shaped by how they survived their childhoods. Atsushi believes his life only has value if he saves others. Akutagawa, on the other hand, was taught that survival means being the strongest, and strength is the only thing that makes him worth anything. If he isn’t strong, he might as well be dead.

But that’s the thing. Akutagawa criticizes Atsushi for relying on others to find meaning in his life, yet he does the exact same thing. He defines his worth through the people he fights, the people he kills, and most of all, through Dazai’s approval. Atsushi risks his life trying to save others, but Akutagawa does the same, throwing himself into battles with no regard for his own survival just to prove his strength.

When he fights Hawthorne, he’s already injured, but instead of retreating, he practically begs his opponent to take the fight seriously, to go in with the intent to kill. Because in his mind, if he’s going to die, it has to be by someone stronger, on his own terms. He’s not just reckless. He’s looking for a way to validate his existence, even if it means losing it.

And that’s why this cycle can’t continue forever. Akutagawa kills because that’s all he’s ever known, but if there’s a way out for him, it’s going to start with breaking that mindset. He and Atsushi both need to find balance between selfishness and selflessness, to learn that survival isn’t just about proving something to the world. If Akutagawa has a future beyond this, it won’t be through strength or destruction. It’ll be through realizing he has the right to live for himself.

What Akutagawa Needs to Do

At the end of the day, the biggest thing Akutagawa needs isn’t power or validation. It’s to let go of Dazai. To stop seeking his approval, he has to stop chasing a ghost that was never going to give him what he needed in the first place. The real moment of growth for him won’t be some grand act of strength, but the simple realization of I don’t need you anymore.

Because that’s when he’ll actually be able to be happy with himself.

So yeah, those are my thoughts on Akutagawa, but I’m not an expert on his character in the slightest.

[freakinator]

question about uu if that’s okay! I saw your post on how to get into the content and figured you’d be pretty knowledgeable, since you had talked about stuff about the character’s inner story and stuff like that. Hopefully this doesn’t sound too demanding—so answer only if you want! I appreciate it a ton!!

I know it’s heinous to read a wiki instead of watching the source material, but dude I simply do not have time to sit through 20+ hours of content just to find characterization references for my fic writing. (And even then, the UU wiki doesn’t have much yet.) Though I’m almost caught up with the second arc—kill me, I know—I still can’t seem to place Wemmbu’s motives. He clearly wants to get stronger, and doesn’t particularly care about mafia dealings, but why? Why does he do any of the things he does? What on earth is going on with this guy 😭

I know the answer is in the previous episodes, but I have adhd and I cannot stay present long enough to pick out the details I need lol

its okay dw! i have. very low standards as to who i answer cause i dont like ignoring ppl unless im taking a long time to answer lol

i havent caught up with any episode beyond wemmbus sky civ one so if this is in regard to anything past that then idk but wemmbus motivations for eps 1 & 2 was to catch and kill spoke because wemmbu thinks hes an existential threat after listening in on a conversation he had with jamatoP

for ep 3 it was to return a favor to zam cause he thought he owed her at least until he figured out for sure that zam was planning to betray him

for eps 4 & 5 he wanted to get richer and stronger so he can destroy zam's life just as she destroyed his even if it meant destroying his own in the process as well which he managed to do at the end of ep 5 but then he and zam both got captured by clown

in ep 6 he went back and forth between wanting to be friendly and hostile to zam (and pangi somewhat) while they tried to escape clowns prison, they ended on a hostile note and everyone who got imprisoned, including egg, got taken by the invis mafia (tho at this point wemmbu had No idea who the invis mafia actually were as he did not have any real direct contact with them before this and they were essentially framed as just regular guards who happened to be invis)

in ep 7 for some reason wemmbu and zam became buddy-buddy and also got captured together so his motivation was to get out of the escape room together with him so that he can go find egg, at the end of it clown threatened wemmbu by threatening egg

in ep 8 wemmbu was actually planning to retire at a lil skyblock island at spawn before some invis mafia members accosted him, this was the first time he ever made direct contact with invis mafia members and was naturally confused about what they were up to so he decided to follow them. unfortunately for him he found sky civ instead, at the end of it is when he actually had any real idea what an actual threat the invis mafia really were although he still didnt get to witness it

so yeah ep 8 was when he started really figuring out what a threat the invis mafia actually were so naturally he didnt really care about them until that point, well that plus he doesnt really care about the server in general that much -- thats not to say he Only cares about his direct interests, he isnt really appreciative of things he deems overly cruel for example even if he tolerates them at first (disapproving of zam preferring prisons over executions, stepping in when ro fighting for his civilization even if he knows it would kill him when it became overtly clear he was gonna die, keeping jarons secret despite the fact he despises him), but if it doesnt concern him or his interests (the prison breakers going missing, spokes wherabouts after he started hard focusing on zam, what the treasure hunters do for a living) generally speaking he doesnt care about it but if it does then he'll take action to solve it even if it kills him (revenge against zam, going against clown) and he will Always prioritize his direct interests (was supposed to blow up rek's tree in ep 4 for a job that would get him a fuckton of money and didnt care about the fact that rek was missing or any of parrot and wifies' reasonings and pleas until parrot pointed out that doing so will make him just like zam, switched his plan of attack on the pze after egg got captured, works with ppl he hates and tries to get on their good side for as long as he needs them, has stated that he has a history of betraying ppl if its in his best interest)

tldr:

his motivation boils down to 4 things: revenge, safety, the ppl he cares about, and his own principles

while hes not Completely self-interested he does tend to value his own priorities over everything else and the reason he didnt really care about the invis mafia until way later in the show is cause they just straight up werent relevant to him until after the princezam arc aka the first 7 eps

[lizaluvsthis]

Will you ever do that hyperfixation thing again?

No yes no yes no

Y e s .

(Spoilers incoming)

So we see in this movie brought everyone to their high expectations and parts where they get to see the dad of three. More importantly when it came to Mr. WPNZ himself trying to get the 'act of dad' and have a father-kids bonding moment spent the rest of those minutes or two.

For what completely shocked everyone is the triplets finally activating their weapons that we thought they would never have. It is to expect the least due to them being Mr. WPNZ's kids, it is possible to gain genetics coming from their bio father.

These kids are unfortunately too young to know how the real world works, so all Karen like any other mother to keep her children safe. Is to protect them from harm. Thats the reason why she covered alot from mr. WPNZ's story about all the bad stuff in order to avoid the real truth that she was an assasin. (For a code name to reveal was Katana)

And ofcourse the kids would choose a dumb decision over their mother, because they're kids. Kids are yet to be developed by any knowledge, although to this point, we can't exactly blame them for that. Karen is the only single parent who runs the house and a job on her own to pay debts and bills. She atleast did everything to provide for her kids without monitoring them from time to time due to her being busy at work. Its also the reason how we see her working in several jobs at each other episodes explaining that later on its all for the hardwork.

And I dont think Mr. WPNZ thought much about what he did after being gone for years and not being around the kids, but he'd gone through his job thinking all he did was for THEM. But WPNZ didn't know anything about it, if I had to say somethings I could say he's a good father. In some ways he's really good at making his kids happy and good at parenting.

Theres just times when he's really irritated he'd get to the point of snapping out over something immature, thats because he doesn't KNOW how to maintain emotions. To the point he got so emotionally torn apart after hearing katie call him Dad the very first time.

He knew he wasn't even there when the first time the kids were born, he was never present from all the life spent and only he'd been watching them from afar.

It's the only thing we mightve thought is either:

A - Mr. WPNZ wanted to go for the job with killing people.

B - he never thought that having kids would make his relationship with karen confusing or nonetheless, unprepared.

We thought from that moment on, Mr. WPNZ is just misunderstood. He was partners in crime with Katana (Karen) from the very first, a form of their relationship worked pretty fine. What Mr. WPNZ placed into his own hands were to prioritize the mission and Katana.

But he let Katana slip off, maybe something happened? Maybe he didn't want to lose the job he'd been dying for? Could be possible, Katana was pregnant and having labor at the most possible cases, WPNZ is supposed to be with her side. But the mission mattered more.

Karen had every right to be angry for WPNZ not being there. And even after, he was never around she continued to live a good and better life raising her kids WITHOUT him, thinking it was a good thing that he left.

Mr. WPNZ thinks that kids of his own can be tools or to be used by something simple as that. It's because he never developed a bond with a kid before, if we get to recall one thing and its about them being on missions. With all the bussiest stuff, mr. WPNZ never engaged to social interractions but more further into commiting mass murder and/or arson around their block. I do not think he had any time to get to know to himself nor even get to know what the actual HIM even wanted for once in his life.

Sure, he went off to missions and he enjoyed that part with all the killing. But had he ever thought about what he actually wanted? He looks like he's the one to act before even thinking. That surely turned out well for him. To say the least, he still has to respect the kids decisions its not his own choice eitherway its the kids they were talking about.

Without any further more yapping session in this post, I suppose WPNZ can be good at parenting, he can be forgiven by karen at somethings. But he needs time to adjust whaytever the pissy things he's dealing with.

Also hey, Mario just foreshadowed mr. Puzzles appearing out of nowhere in the final seconds of the movie! (actually, why would mario try eating an oven-)

Gay gay yaoi - mr wpnz x mr puzzles is getting popular and I love it XD they're two villains being a silly bean. I can't wait to see how mr puzzles and mr WPNZ'S friendship dynamic in the other episode after this.

I want to strangle them guys, refrain me from tdoing so or I will go rampage.

[lunatic-fandom-space]

You know what its past midnight Im gonna make a post critisising acotar despite never having the read the series, the only book of SJMs ive actually read was crescent city but I spend a lot of time in anti acotar circles bc its fun being a little hater sometimes and I think I know enough by now to atleast critise some of the themes. I definitely know more about this series than I should, like I know about that immortal horse whose horse wife tragically died in horse childbirth and then Im pretty sure he died of horse sadness. And yet, despite cari can read being pretty good at explaining magic shit, I still dont know what the hell syphons are or why illyrians have them or why they matter so you really never stop learning huh

Anyway, I wanted to talk about the misogyny within the universe of acotar because its really bad, both in the sense that its just annoying and insufferable to read about even second-hand and in the sense that its badly written. The thing that inspired this was this short piece of flashfiction by @feynessupremacy about an unnamed girl from the hewn city being married off and having a horrible time living in this endless cycle of misogynistic abuse that her mom is still in and that her dauggters will end up in, all powerless to do anything against this kind of systemic sexism. I thought it was good and made its intended point pretty well but it also made me once again realize how borderline comical this series portrayal of misogyny is

Like, okay, once again, I have not read these books myself but it very much seems like the sexism in this world just materialized in the second book, from the summaries Ive watched it straightup seems like it was just not there in the first book. I mean hell, the entire plot hinges on the fact that Tamlin was sending all these fae disguised as fucked up creatures out so that they would hopefully be killed by a woman so she could break the curse, which implies that women being hunters was pretty normal. (Also, dont come at me with any kind of "oh, it doesnt specify the gender of the person who needs to break the curse a guy couldve done it as well", sjm is too insufferably heteronormative to consider that)

So basically what Im saying is, from my perspective it very much seems like sjm put not only systemic misogyny but like, incredibly violent systemic misogyny to the point where women being brutalized is basically completely normal, in her fantasy series for the sake of making a man look good because hes a wittle sad :( about it sometimes which is honestly pretty funny to me

But it gets even funnier because it doesnt even seem like sexism is really a widespread thing ? Like, i have never seen anyone else directly address this but its all I can think about: in the Nightcourt, the misogyny and institutionalized violence against women is literally the worst it possibly can be with genital mutilation and everything and then in the rest of Prythian its just like, not there. There are plenty of women with political power, the queen of adriada comes to mind first, Im pretty sure I read something about a woman from the wintercourt who was in a similar position of power, its unclear to me what all these fuckin priestesses do because theres no focus on the religion at all much less the institution(s) behind that religion, but they have to have some kind of power if theyre anything like priests in our world (although tbh they seem more like nuns to me functionally just with a diffrent name), especially Ianthe who was like a high priestess and directly in charge of Feyre, who shouldve been the most powerful woman in the springcourt by virtue of being with the high lord, Amren and Mor seem to be well respected outside of the NightCourt, their only deity is the MOTHER. Sure, there arent any "official" High Ladies but if being a High Lord entails being chosen by the magic of the land or The Cauldron or The Mother or whatever other kind of magic bullshit and women just dont get to have it for some reason, is that really indicative of the broader culture being sexist, or is that just God, Who Canonically Exists being sexist? Idk about you, but Im leaning towards the latter option

Thats not even mentioning the mortal lands which seem to be ruled by queens exclusively at the time of the story taking place, or Hybern which had Amarantha and I think her sister as well be these high-ranking generals and it wasnt presented as anything unusual. Like, are you telling me that the kingdom whose only value is "we love slavery, we would like to have slavery back" is more progressive than the court of fuckin Feminist King Rhysand?? I Am Going To Turn Into The Joker

Anyway, I think thats all I have to say, please correct me if I got any of this information wrong I cannot stress enough that I have not read these books and dont plan on reading them anytime soon, atleast not in english because reading the term mate a 1000 times sounds like too much for me to bear, atleast in german theyll probably use a term like "Gefährte/in" which doesnt make me think of actual animals

[undeniablereckoningart]

Number 4 and 10

Character: one from each oc world bcs im curious :3

4. Deepest fears?

10. Worst things they've had to do to survive?

hrrmmm who would i go with,,,i feel many fears are pretty obvious in my ocs,, lets also add subcategories!!

long post ahead!!

Deahon (original) goes first

Fawn (heightenedcompliancy):

4. losing his new life, losing modify, his past life qnd returning to it,.,.she is deeply terrified of losing something it sacrificed so much for, being forced to let go of her cherished quadmate and return to the empire could probably kill him just with stress alone

ADDITIONALLY his ancestor's matesprit (aka his dad) for reasons id have to tw. bastard man i need to kill with bricks

10. worst thing would probably be betraying his old group, and then betraying most quadrants she gathers, luring them in for Modify

lets add Modify into this, theyre a two in one deal!!:

4. obviously their ex-owner - horrible troll eith horrible ideals,,,they still have nightmares of when they were a young teen

accidentally killing fawn, which is probably pretty obvious,,even if theyre putting his body through a lot, losing her would be the end of the road for them

they're also very, very terrified of small spaces - tied to their ex-owner's mistreatment

10. they had to eat a raw piece of a troll they were (how do you. taxidermy-ing idk) because they were literally starving, something i have 100% never mentioned i think??

Stray!Deahon

"Hunter" (uncurbedretribution), as he was nicknamed (very fitting i love the nickname):

i'd say he doesnt really have many fears, let alone deepest fears,,,he doesnt care that much, she has felt the fear it needed

although, i guess hurting the only friend he has left (

10. the whole killing a close (fuschia) friend without giving him a chance to fight back, prolly!

Star pawn!Deahon

SP!Fawn (cataclysmicrupture - hasn't been used yet, but im planning to use it soon!):

4. hooh,,this one's difficult to pin down without any spoilers,,,i'll reblog with HHHEAVY spoilers

Deahon2

lets go with the obvious pick, Arzkit (gullibleanimism):

4. medical settings and medical stuff in general on first place definitely!! its something i havent really spoken about i think, that guy isnt having a jolly time after their lil spree

being alone is really high on that list 100% - that's pretty much why they dont listen to anyone warning him about mr fishie

a smaller one, which idk if you can call it a fear, is not being able to make her own choices - again why he doesnt listen to the warnings. it wants to choose something in her life!!

10. hrmm,, well, i could say the killing spree but thats an easy way out

connected to that - and connected to mr. niceguy - after mutilating his already barely functioning gills, xe held him under water until he passed out

but on its own, im not sure if theres anything all that bad theyve done that would deserve a place in here

Exriatt

Pascal (terminalcalamity):

4. lets get "corny"; himself! they're terrified of what they do, what he's capable of and what he became. additionally, evem of it doesn't show he's scared of mutants - not of mutants themselves, but what he might do. aka he's scared of his lack of control

10. idk if i went into depth here,,,when he was younger, he killed the closest person she has ever had - only because they were a mutant, and in a panicked frenzy induced by dormant trauma, he went at them only with his claws and teeth

EMC&R foundation

the one behind the screen (chimericalabsurdism) :

4. water! when they were a grub, they were already terrified of it, but after an incident with a different subject, it got way, way worse

10. bashed a researcher's head in, not too bad id say

Tirtiaan

someone i think i dont use that much in these, "snake boy" (arrogantantipathy)

4. going into the open,,now not to make him sound terminally online, it's because he IS an obvious mutant, and he truly believes there's no way he could survive a single day being outside of that dark basement

10. erm. well, he had to kill his original caretaker (NOT an asshole, a parent figure) when he was barely a teenager, they were already at death's door, and dying to their injuries would be long and painful. still pretty bad in his eyes!

between worlds

the only one that has an account (triflingcollusion):

4. a specific place within their world. the looming buildings tilted into the foggy roads of that place fill them with dread, just being in the surrounding area, they feel death lurking

afterlife

10. i dont think theyve done too many bad things, actually

Ereall (abyssopelagiccalamity):

4. the fear that has come to life was failing his empire and his siblings, he knows he was terribly sick, but he'll never forgive himself for not protecting them

10. he had to sacrifice a lot to fight off the danger threathening all of the life on his planet - he had to ignore the deaths of many, leave many to die without batting an eye, send out people even if he knew they wouldn't come back - mostly justifiable, it was either thousands of lives ended, or every life ended

????

Narshi (discordantwordsmit)

these are spoilers i dont wanna spoil 💔💔

i wont do the aus and such, but here's a weird ass lamprey as a treat bc idk bei on my mind

Bei (enviousannihilation)

10. they have manipulated their group, messing with their memories and all until things broke apart and they all went after eachother's throats - causing all of them to die and ruin the sgrub session!

4. loss of all control over stuff, including their powers! Lu having their own mind fucks with them so bad

additionally, something they will deny and ignore, is facing their past and the fact that they are all alone just because of their actions

on top of that, they manipulated their friends and quadmates even after death. after they got out of the limbo, and into the new game, they made their moirail believe that they were corrupted and had to be left behind, before later corrupting him and turning him into their minion (shout-out r0dard u deserved better bbg)

[xamaxenta]

Hi Xam! This is knight/prince AU anon~ Currently stuck inside due to bad weather so I started workshopping an older scenario. Any thoughts or additions I will just consider bonus, because truly I just wanted to share :) Hope you are having a good day!

Roger sends Sabo deep into the wilderness of the kingdom on a task requested by a member of high court. He tells Sabo the task is yet another way someone in power is trying to test his skill, and the best way to shut them down is to return successful. Sabo isn't impressed by this, and the goal to retrieve some old sword isn't very exciting, but Roger manages to pique his interest by promising a (once in a lifetime) reward.

An ancient relic is, according to legend, said to dwell deep within the thickness of the sprawling forests up north. Sabo gets huffy about being forced to go after something that may not even be real, but Roger says all their kingdom's legends stem from truth. It's just that the tales are so old that there is no way to prove what is true and what has become hearsay over time.

He mentions that the relic is a stone sword (And Sabo makes a witty remark about them being up too far north for it to possibly be that legendary sword, which Roger denies, this being a different sword than King Arthur's) that is possibly been imbued with magical power. This magic enchantment is the reason not a single person aside from the sword's original creator has ever laid claim to it. (Maybe Roger says this with such certainty that it's hinted he's gone after the same sword himself? But while he was unable to use it, he believes Sabo with his significant magical prowess will be able to wield it with ease.)

The reward of completing this harrowing quest is the mystical sword itself, so Sabo takes up the challenge and departs with Ace immediately. But, like many of their tasks they have to take up outside of the capital and far out in the wilderness, it's all a ruse to set up an assassination. The two reach the place where the sword is, and Sabo returns from where the weapon rests carrying the hilt of a broken stone blade. It might be an actual "stone" sword but the missing portion of the blade is channeled through imbuing it with mana, or something. It sounds cool in my head for the sharp tip to be a glowing, raw form of mana instead of physical stone the entire way through. So although the stone has eroded over the years, the sword can still be "intact" and at full power when magic is applied.

This is one of those few pivotal times that the script flips and Sabo ends up using the sword's power to protect Ace after they get ambushed. (Well, that, or he could pick up Ace's discarded enchanted sword and show Ace what the power of it is like with the hilt in the hands of a true mage.) Either while Sabo is getting the relic, or after coming back with it (So the ones ambushing them see the proof Sabo has succeeded and plot to take the sword for themselves after killing the two) Ace is overwhelmed, and Sabo steps past him with one of the swords in hand, and says to Ace while Ace can only look up at his back “I told you I was the strongest person in this kingdom, and I intend to prove that as fact.”

And then he swings the sword like a bat or a club and a ranged attack cuts down almost all of their attackers in one fell swoop. Maybe they leave one alive to tell the tale as a warning or maybe it takes little work to kill all of them. Either way, they head back to the capital and Sabo parades around with the relic and then obsessively shuts himself in his office to try and study how it works (It being such old, undocumented magic and all, piques his interest) the end! (:

my god i always have so much awe for the way you craft thoughts and narratives for this au

Its really lovely im

I dont have much to add right now bc i need to reread this about a billion times thank you

Sabo getting to protect Ace is so special 🥰 intending to prove that he’s the strongest in their kingdom and the absolutely brilliant starburst of mana and magic haloing him his hands and his thrumming instrument of channelling between them in the shape of a shattered sword

Its so illustrative and romantic ❤️

[jakowskis]

there r so many things torchwood doesnt bother to explain and i wonder about them. i could make a list but currently im thinking abt carys not killing owen. obvi they just couldnt kill him off but i wish there was an in-universe explanation of why, bc by all means within the context of the episode she shouldve. i once saw someone say its bc hes trans and yanno what ill take it but within what the writers were thinkin themselves i woulda loved an explanation. like maybe the alien in her sniffed him n went 'atrocious vibes No Thanks' FSHJKFD (although that wouldnt make sense bc some of the guys she kills had worse vibes than owen). or maybe an alien had recently splashed some goop on him and it threw his smell off and the sex alien was like 'u smell weird Ew'. or maybe it's tied to whatever shit he's got going on w the weevils??? like i wish there was some kind of canonical explanation. its crazy to me several of the torchwood members have weird shit going on with them and its never explained. gwen n ianto are both mildly psychic. ok, they grew up on the rift and theyre empaths, fine, whatever. wtf's going on w owen. shawty whats ur problem. besides the human mental illness like what are the aliens sensing thts scaring them / making them not want to be near him. maybe it is the mental illness maybe his unmedicated toxic ass is just that scary. the weevils can connect w him telepathically cuz hes been studying them or smth n close proximity n then theyre just scared shitless by all his inner angst bc weevils dont experience shit like that. like imagine being a kinda-animal living comfortably n then u get whammied with the inner turmoil of a dude who feels 500 emotions a minute. i'd whine and growl too. this turned into yet another 'whats the deal w owen n the weevils' rant but oh well. actually i would take that explanation like that one or a few weevils bonded with owen bc he studies them and spends more time with them than any other human n then bc they can all broadcast shit to each other hes familiar to all of them but they also cannot handle the shit hes got going on and then once the whole death thing happens its Worse. fucked up weevil jesus but hes accidentally nuking them w suffering the likes of which theyve never seen. oh i dont know i just dont know

[jackienautism]

hi again!! been a couple days with no update, time got away from me hahah. i've been playing a lot with my brother, playing a bit on my VW playthrough (although i think i'm like. really in it today and will probably play a lot more on my own). i also finally let myself start looking for fic and fanart and stuff a couple of days ago. so happy to say that linhardt finally clicked for me and i really like him now. i liked him before, and he's still somehow my least favorite eagle but. as i've definitely mentioned before i love all of them.

YEAH. idk it really just feels... wrong to pair ingrid with any guy romantically? idk beyond the fact that she is a lesbian To Me (for reasons similar to posts you've rbed and made) even if she weren't it's just like... uniquely nightmarish. especially considering i think the only options i had recruited on that run were. felix and sylvain. and while in spite of myself sylvain really grew on me, and felix is. idk he's fine. like i said her ending up with either of them is kinda.... the worst lol. i didn't even get to the b support with her and felix bc i ended up googling around and seeing general opinions on some potential paired endings i could've gotten on my last run and made the choice to keep ingrid single and intentionally kept her away from both of them lest i got their ending on accident lmao.

hmmm i definitely got the petra and bernie supports as well as the dorothea and bernie supports last playthrough! those two in particular i really wished had an a support. bernie and dorothea especially, their supports were some of my favorites! i only got one with ingrid and dorothea, and i think only one with bernie and ingrid? i know there were a handful with edelgard that i only got to b but that actually had an a support (which i'll def get on my next CF playthrough, if my brother doesn't get them. and probably if he does lol). definitely bernie i only got to b with her, and i think maybe the same with dorothea??? but that might be wrong. i would check but my brother is playing rn LMAO. marianne didn't really have like... any supports with girls who i had on that playthrough which was soooo annoying. i got lysithea after the timeskip but barely used her so i dont think i even got their c support that playthrough?

yeah i would love to recruit hilda but like. the desire to side with edie outweighs my desire to recruit her, especially since i just.... like all the eagles more on average than the lions and like hearing them talk during the story DFSKKF plus you don't have to kill hilda or claude who i also really like. i'll def try that with dedue because i do actually really like him despite like. barely interacting with him so far.

yeah by character perspective i do mean leveling from what like.. makes sense for their character to me! and for battle stuff, before i really knew how supports worked i would like put certain characters together bc i was like "oh this character probably likes being around this one" or "this one feels safer if another character is in front of them, and this one is probably more inclined to pick up on that and get in front of them" so that's how i usually try to play my battles lol. which works out pretty well in terms of supports, i'm just a little more conscious of that now.

update on my brother's playthrough!! he's recruited over half of the lions which is kind of funny to me like. okay dedue and dimitri are unrecruitable but LMFAO im picturing class for the blue lions now that it's just those two and ashe. he's also recruited some of the deer as well (marianne, lysithea and ignatz i think? and he's planning on recruiting leonie too lmao). win for both of us..... he likes bernie now!!!!! we haven't reached the timeskip yet but i think some of her b supports got her to grow on him. i have a feeling he's gonna side with edie, but the biggest thing that might stop him is that he REALLY likes hilda and wants to recruit her. but i think the fact that he likes edie might outweigh that?? here's hoping at least! he also really likes annette a lot. i made him make a tierlist and his favorites right now are annette, petra, edelgard, hilda, lysithea, and caspar, in that order.

this is getting SO long but. as for my playthrough! i finally decided who exactly i wanted to recruit (and recruited them all today!). i decided to get three from each other house, and ended up with caspar, petra and dorothea from the eagles, and sylvain, annette, and ashe from the lions. i was going to get mercedes but after watching my brother get their b support i thought to myself. wouldn't it just be awful if they got that b support and i only recruited one of them. and so that's my plan! i think i'm gonna do the opposite on my next CF playthrough and just get mercedes. i'm really undecided on which paired endings i'm going to get, because i'm enjoying so many of the supports.... almost everyone i have has multiple supports that i'm actually interested in with characters i really like this playthrough! which is great! last playthrough i barely had any interesting ones with marianne. now i've got a team that's basically evenly split by original house, which is really fun (i've been going with my six out of house recruits, hilda, marianne and claude, and byleth, and i've been really enjoying it).

i know i said i really wanted the dorothea and petra paired ending (and i still do), but i'm considering s ranking dorothea myself this playthrough? although i might save that for my next CF run, or if i ever choose to go through with silver snow. i don't really know how all of the paired endings turn out, and i haven't gotten super far into the supports, but i'm liking caspar and ashe's supports so far, and i liked hilda and caspar's first support. if i choose to s support dorothea, i might go with caspar and petra again though? although i've also heard her supports with ashe and claude are good. but if i don't s support dorothea, i'll probably s support claude.... and i might pair him and hilda if i don't?? i'm liking their dynamic so far. although i'm ALSO liking hilda and marianne's supports. i really like annette and lysithea's supports, but sadly those only go to b... once again a loss for a supports between girls everywhere.... sylvain is gonna end up alone this time around for sure because while i do want to get his supports with dorothea again because i enjoyed them, i have like. multiple preferred endings for her lol. and i think the only other person he can get to a with that i have recruited is. byleth. who i also have other options for lol. lorenz is gonna end up alone because i don't like him lol and i don't want a character. raphael and ignatz... idk i like them and so far their most interesting support to me is with each other! so that's probably the route i'm gonna go. although i am enjoying a lot of raphael's supports in general so he's kind of my wildcard rn. as for annette, there are three characters i like who she could potentially get paired endings with? but i haven't seen enough of their supports (or any in some cases) to like. have a solid plan yet. i could probably keep going on but this is already SO long omg!!! basically the point is. i like so many of these characters now and i'm enjoying a lot of the dynamics! hope you're having a good one :)

HIII SO SO SORRY FOR TAKING A WHILE TO RESPOND. I KEPT PUTTING IT OFF AND FORGETTING THAT IT WAS IN MY INBOX 😭😭 SO VERY SORRY AGAIN thats still so awesome that you get to play w/ your brother.... its sooo fun watching others play the game, especially if its a route you're particularly fond of. AND OOOO LOOKING FOR ANY SPECIFIC FICS OR FANART IN PARTICULAR? OR JUST GENERAL FE3H STUFF? either way, have fun w/ that!!! theres sooo much awesome stuff out there. AND YIPPEEE WIN FOR LINHARDT ENJOYERS!!!!!!!! GLAD THAT HES FINALLY CLICKED FOR YOUUUU hes just an autistic dude w/ chronic fatigue and i love him. hes my boy, lvoe him lots

NO FOR REAL!!!!! IM RLY GLAD THAT YOU AGREE AND THA TIM NOT BEING DRAMATIC OR W/E 😭 there's just... theres no way that girl DOESN'T like girls. its just. its so There yk. esp her being like 32234 feet inthe closet. i dont know her endings w/ either felix or sylvain but .... yeah. i dont think i could do either for personal reasons kfkdgg unless, like you said, i get it by chance. YEAH fair enough, in regards to ingrid and felix. their b support is jus t... idk. i know felix is an asshole like thats his whole thing but god. the shit he says to ingrid really infuriates me. i totally agree that it was better to leave ingrid single. the only way to get their endings is if you get their A supports i believe. the only time its random is if you have Multiple A supports from the same character. i could be wrong though

OH THEY DONT HAVE A SUPPORTS? i didnt realize that. i still think that its a waste of time if characters that can support dont have an A one........ its just dumb imo. esp if their C + B supports are rly good and fun, its just. grrrr it makes me so mad. theyall deserve supports post timeskip!!!!! good luck getting the rest of the supports w/ edie! i know off the top of my head that both bernadetta and dorothea have A supports w/ her, which is cool. and yeah ): i dont believe marianne has many supports w/ girls outside the golden deer? IF she even has any? but yeah. i know she has an A support w/ hilda but ofc you cant recruit hilda in CF. lysithea and marianne's supports are ok i guess, they couldve been a looot better. im actually currently writing a fic for like a mock A support between the 2 fdkndfg you said you spared lysithea during the bridge of myrrdin (?) battle right? makes sense why you didnt hav emuch time to get her supports

YEAAH fair enough, i def feel the same dfgndf in terms of wanting to side w/ edie more than anything else. the black eagles are so <3 theyre so fun. i totally agree w/ you there, i love listening to their conversations dgnjfdg they r very silly. andmm righr thats true. i totally forgot you could spare hilda, pretty sure my brother had marianne kill her 😭😭😭 and i like how you can spare claude as well. and yeah :D good luck w/ dedue!!! hopefully my memory serves me right

makes sense! esp since i know the characters do have a like canon path they go down in terms of classes, which im sure you already knew, but if you ever need ideas / inspiration id def check that out! and OOOO THATS A VERY INTERESTING WAY OF GOING ABT BATTLING.... i like that a lot! and like you said im sure thaat helped a bit w/ getting certain supports. thats def not a bad idea . plus its such a cute thing fr ): to think abt what the character would want and feel safer w/.... you are so cool for real

YEAAAAH it is really funny to think abt what the other classrooms look like dkffdg esp after recruiting like their entire class. must be so sad for them </3 happy that hes recruiting a bunch of the characters though... does he know that hes gonna have to most likely fight them in the later half of the game? or is he doing it just cause he likes them? either way, good for him. OOOO ANOTHER WIN FOR BERNIE ENJOYERS YAAAY makes sense that watching more of the supports helped her grow on him... since thats usually where you get the bulk of their personalities and development. I HOPE THATHIS LOVE FOR EDIE OUTWEIGHS THAT.... if it doesnt though i totally understand, he would prob enjoy azure moon since he'll be abl eto recruit hilda, but he also prob wouldnt like going against edelgard so hm. OOO ANNETTE HUH? def a good choice. thank you for making him make a tier list jdfgdg always interested in other ppl's faves. AND LYSITHEA!!!!! YIPPPEEE

NO WORRIES ON IT GETTIGN LONG!!!! I RLY ENJOY READING YOUR THOUGHTS! glad you were able to decide on how youre gonna recruit :D atleast that stress is gone for now. and whose b support did you get w/ mercedes? i assume all three of them? ashe sylvain and annette? regardless, YOURE SOOOO EVIL (lighthearted) FOR ONLY PURPOSELY RECRUITING ONE OF THEM FDKGDFG but then that means more angst and pain and angst an dpain can be super good. esp in this game. mercedes my beloved<3 makes sense that you just get her your next CF playthrough! and so even then you get to separate her from her blue lions (specifically annette) and ): pain. and yeaah it can be pretty difficult to choose which endings you wanna go with. i ended up just getting to A between all the golden deer and letting the game decide for me jfdgnjgd that way you get to enjoy all the supports without feeling pressure to choose just one A support :] but i also understand wanting to pick out the ending youd rather see more... so good luck deciding! and im glad that youve really been enjoying the supports! the supports are usually sooo much fun... and you get to learn more abt the characters which is just awesome. i assunme you mean youve been going out into battle w/ those characters right? thats so epic... have fun w/ them!!!!

THATS WHAY I DID DURING VERDANT WIND!!!!! I S SUPPORTED DOROTHEA AND OUHHHG I LOVE HER SO MUCH..... S supporting claude is ofc also a good choice.. good luck decided on what you wanna do! i suppose once you have that figured out everything else should fall into place in terms of endings and whatnot. i still gotta get those supports you mentioned... glad to hear that youve been enjoying them so far though! i cant say mcuh abt petras supports w/ ashe or claude unfortunately. ive only got petras c support w/ claude and i thought it was funny. but i know that almost all of ashes supports are very sweet, sinc ehes a very sweet guy. a claude and hilda pairing makes sense! their dynamic is certainly interesting fdjgndfg plus i think they complement each other well. hilda and mariannes supports are very good... since you get to see another side of marianne that you dont rly see anywhere else. in terms of clumsiness and whatnot! I HEARD LYSITHEA AND ANNETTE'S ONLG GO TO B!!!!! WHY DOES THIS GAME HATE THE GIRLIES SO MUCH!!!!!!! RIP<//3 yeah far enough for sylvain fdndfgg esp if youu have better ending plans for both dorothea and byleth. YEAH LMAO. LOWKEY FUCK LORENZ but you didnt hear that from me. the only support chain i didnt get of his (of the golden deer) is w/ claude.... and i wont lie going through his supports made me like him a TINY bitmore, but still, hes just. euugh. to me yk. raphael and ignatz def have good supports! i def liked them a lot, i esp enjoyed ignatz and marianne's. once again, good luck figuring out your paired ending plans!!!! i know its been a bit since you sent this in, but still! wish you the best of luck! dont stress yourself too much though :]

STILL SUPER HAPPY THAT YOUVE BEEN ENJOYING THE GAME AND THE CHARACTERS AND THE DYNAMICS SO MUCH HEHE GLAD THAT ME POSTING ABT IT GOT YOU TO GET THEGAME.... HOPE YOU HAVE A GREAT DAY AND WEEK!!! HOPE TO TALK TO YOU SOON

[tagapagsalaysay]

any of the devil thoughts 👀?

it's a great game. i dont play murder mystery as much because all of the classics are triple a. but i think its safe to say 2025 is the year of mystery.... since the game has depth im not gonna have shallow compliments. lets get into the meat directly

even if the reading aspect feels intimidating, the gameplay really contrasts in smoothness. im not gonna say its easy because card games are easy. the difficulty really is in the timing and the Preciseness of the argument. I was able to make personal conjectures easy but even if you have Perfect logic that doesnt mean a guaranteed win. Really enticing, but you can fall for a lot of traps when youre just thinking logically. you really need the Gambler mindset continued below... spoilers for ep 1

the world in of the devil is very grounded. i dont know the cyberpunk genre enough to determine just how much realism is the average, and noir... well, we know noir. the politics is clearly necessary for cyberpunk (or at least to make it engaging), but this one isnt afraid of material implications. even if it feels like a strawman argument to bring up the Anonymized Global South, they understand the hypocrisy. despite what the whole skeevy lawyers in a police state vibe tells you, these guys arent just namedropping mining for kicks

the best irony of all is that sketchy protagonist morgan is the one leading the moral discussion. yknow. the killer lawyer. to the point where even serra points it out and she barely knows shit. i dont wanna say she's a unabomber type of guy because she's willing to engage with the system like emma describes. we have yet to know her actual motive (although she does explicitly say shes in it for winning), but she refuses any argument for her actions. a true unrepentant killer who refuses the mythologizing of herself. reads like heavy denial. dont get me started on her killing people instead of admitting she's attached to emma, but even then i dont want them to be sweet lovers and whatnot. even emma shows her side on the whole lawyer thing, and is just as cold and calculating, determined to win. emma isnt just frustrating her romance-wise though. she taunts morgan as the heartbreak killer and theyre locked in an eternal battle of wits and whatnot. she also has her own yet to be known motivations with working for the state and entrenched in the system, having to reassure cops why them being disrespected ultimately does not matter lol technological mega corporations run the world, and this game is also not afraid of the implications of intellectual property in a world like that. dont go in this game if youre a reactionary artist because you'll just get mad. this game is perfectly happy nitpicking the differences between androids and AI, because they're absolutely terrified of the latter moving through a world that's dependent on tech. its funny to laugh at the flavor text highlighting how much fraud and ip law is treated as criminal offenses but also bleak lol. they successfully turned the LIS stuff around for corporate benefit, to the point where misinformation and conspiracy theories are penalized by the state. theres a quip about how it's a hate crime to talk shit about a corporation but its dead serious.

clearly im excited to see where this is going. so far its been an enjoyable experience thats not too technical for me to peruse although i might be biased since i technically code. but definitely a contender for a 2025 hit. PLEASE PLAY IT

[prismkat]

just out of curiosity are there any semi-noteworthy differences between SYB Dee and Canon Dee byond not being dead? :3

okay, SO, this is something you’ve already pointed out and is pretty obvious, but SYB Dee is a lot more naive and immature than Dee in games. The reason for this is obvious. She’s nowhere near as traumatised. Aside from the loss of Jack that maybe she hasn’t quite unpacked yet, especially with the unexplained puppet transformation that she doesn’t know the full extent of, both because of Arcade’s lies and meticulous question dodging and also not really having met the true Jack, she’s lived a comfortable life with her remaining family.

Right off the bat after her first encounter with William, it’s incredibly apparent that she is way too trusting in this AU, unlike her canon counterpart which is significantly less trusting (although, she’s naive at points. While her blind trust of Fredbear despite his only contribution to saving the kids is killing her brother points to her being too trusting, and the way she is mistrusting of Jack and Dave is super understandable, it’s still evident that SYB Dee is much more gullible than Dee in games.)

That was intentional. I wanted her to be super naive, so people can scream at the screen and go “DONT TRUST THEM WTF” she trusts Henry in the beginning, up until she actually interviews him and realises “hey! What the fuck”. And even though we’ve seen William’s POV and can understand he’s well intentioned, it doesn’t change that he is so obviously suspicious in the beginning, and Dee didn’t see it. Dee hasn’t even seen his interactions with Henry and his nightmares, and she still trusts him. It definitely wasn’t a wise choice when you put together their first few meetings, even though he really did want to help from the start, the red flags implying he knew more than he claimed should have had Dee walking right home.

I have SO much more I can say on the basis of differences between canon and this AU, but those are all for their own posts. I will say, though, that the entire point of this AU is to be different from canon. Dee is way too naive and much more childish than how she is as the puppet. William is a lot more closed off and wary. Arcade is classified, and Jack is always going through SOME sort of emotional turmoil whenever he shows up, despite his struggle to show emotions in game. That’s all intentional. I wanted to show that the truth of what happened to Jack, whatever it may be, has fundamentally changed the timeline down to its very foundations.

Anyway, inbox is always open for SYB!! (I am always repeating this, but i do love answering questions)

[hero-dwelling]

do you think MHA was inspired by Soul Eater? I dont have any direct proof, but the whole "you have a beautiful smile" thing between Toga and Ochako seemed like it was directly aping the Crona Maka scene from the anime sub, without getting why it works, turning it just into yuribait...

I received this question on October 1, 2024, before the finale of the Toga and Ochaco fight aired in the anime. 

And this wouldn’t be me answering a question without being late to the response, rambling in circles for about 25 pages without just getting to the point, and going off on tangents about ten other things bothering me in general instead of just answering the question I got. 

Shorter answer, before I go off on tangents: 

I don’t think Toga’s question to Ochaco about her smile was directly imitating the Crona and Maka scene--or, rather, scenes plural: when Maka offered her hand to Crona in the Kishin Resurrection Arc, when Maka hugged Crona in the desert pit in the anime, or when Maka was cradling a bleeding Crona in the fight against Medusa in the anime. 

I don’t think it’s imitation as I haven’t noticed obvious visual call-backs. As I will emphasize below, the staff are not the same even though Soul Eater and My Hero Academia are from the same studio.

As much as I enjoy Soul Eater, and although enough United States animated series invoke its visuals with obvious homages, I just don’t see much in that series ever being alluded to or imitated directly in Japanese animated series. 

I think any similarities between Maka and Crona and Ochaco and Toga owes to what we see as viewers and the fact that both relationships are pulling from the same general archetype, that being the hero identifying with the villain and reaching out to them, with all the romantic potential that has. 

And, as I’ll emphasize below, I’m not convinced it’s a great comparison as there is more different between the characters and relationships than there is anything in common: Maka is more self-assured and direct, Ochaco tends to waffle, Toga is acting out of self-determination even if she is denying how bad her choices are, Crona is largely without agency or at best so traumatized that they opt for inaction and have to be literally puppeteered by the antagonists because as they say they “can’t deal with this.” 

And I don’t think Ochaco and Toga is yuri-bait. Or, rather, I don’t think the relationship works in canon, and I think the potential is there but not really actualized very well (at least compared to better fan works). And I don’t think it can be “bait” when Toga is canonically attracted to girls and outright is attracted to Ochaco. 

The hinge to reading this as an LGBTQ+ relationship is what Ochaco thinks and wants--and I think her referring to Toga as having the most beautiful smile is so awkwardly placed that it disrupts the very relationship enough of us want to happen--it’s awkward, it’s messy in all the bad ways, it’s not even “tragic yuri” so much as “this really feels like you don’t want to commit to this relationship and are going to kill off Toga so that we don’t have to address what Ochaco meant by calling Toga’s smile ‘beautiful.’” 

It works for discourse, especially as it is Ochaco speaking to “beauty” as being honest with your own desires and what you want to achieve. 

You can definitely read Ochaco as attracted to girls. (Before I get remarks saying, “But she’s attracted to Izuku”: sexuality is fluid, bi and pan people exist, poly is an option, these are teenagers who are not dating yet and still trying to figure out who they are, being attracted to Izuku does not negate the potential for being attracted to anyone else whether with the idea of dating or a committed relationship or a sexual relationship or just the most superficial reaction of “this person is hot but I would never want to date them.”)

But her “beautiful smile” remark clashes with the fact that Ochaoc is not here to romance or date Toga but to first save her and second deal with all the other problems happening in this war and far, far, far down the list, like near the bottom, is being honest with her relationship with Izuku, and this story just hasn’t had it in it to explore poly relationships or even Izuku’s own regard, if any, for Ochaco. 

We’re in the middle of an allegory about what it means to find someone who accepts you, which obviously has romantic tinges to it--but instead of talking about that, we’re going to refer to this as, on the one hand, “yuri bait,” or, on the other hand, “and now kiss.” And I hate both reactions: I hate dismissing this as “yuri bait,” and I hate “and now kiss,” because both feel like it’s taking his complicated scene and reducing it down to having to be cynical about it or obtuse and obvious in shipping--and it doesn’t work for me. This is the start of a potential relationship--the kissing can come much later (and I say that as someone who isn’t big on the Ochaco and Toga ship--but some of you aren’t up for who I think, if anyone, you should pair Ochaco with). 

But, nope, got to kill off Toga, can’t have that, heaven forbid we have any LGBTQ+ characters who survive (Toga, Magne) or are in relationships (seriously, can there be one LGBTQ+ couple in this fucking manga that isn’t just that pair of girls holding arms in the background when Mirio and Izuku are on patrol in the Eri arc?). 

*sigh* 

Okay, now onto the much longer rambling and ranting. 

I haven’t watched the episode Anon is referring to, and as I said another episode aired right after this question. Even though I haven’t watched the entire episodes, I can speak enough based on what little I have seen, what I read in the My Hero Academia manga, and what little I know about the production of Soul Eater and My Hero Academia. 

From what little I’ve seen, I haven’t seen deliberate and obvious visual call-backs to the Soul Eater manga or anime. While Soul Eater and My Hero Academia are both animated by Studio BONES, each one comes from a different studio division and set of directors and animators. 

The context in each case--Maka and Crona, and Toga and Ochaco--is different, if only because the characters and their relationships to each other are entirely different. 

Maka is typically more outgoing and honest with her thoughts than Ochaco. 

Toga, too, while suppressing a lot of what she actually thinks and feels, is definitely more explicit in saying something about why she does what she does, while Crona’s entire characterization initially is summarized by what they say, “I can’t deal with this”: Toga is taking an action, even if it’s not really helping her or what she really wants to do; Crona is about saying everything they don’t want to deal with and having to be compelled to act, or puppeteered by Medusa and Ragnarok to act. 

Maka reaching out to Crona is not because she is finally being honest with herself--that is Ochaco’s thing: reaching out to Toga is about her being honest with her feelings, not suppressing her crush on Izuku, not suppressing any potential or just read-into-by-the-audience attraction to Toga, not suppressing her legitimate worry for Toga despite her being a villain. 

No, Maka reaching out to Crona is all about overlooking what Crona did to her and Soul and trying to help another person. 

That is pretty much what Ochaco does to Toga, but I think it works better with Maka and Crona because it is not weighted down by hundreds of chapters of the story spinning its wheels. Crona stabbed Soul, infecting him with madness; Maka sees what happened to Crona in the past; Maka is not about forgiving Crona but about helping Crona with friendship. 

In contrast, we have to know all of this backstory about Toga, which is either awkwardly told at us or was going to be Curious’s tabloid story, and then have to wait another bunch of chapters for Toga to ask veiled questions to Ochaco that Ochaco is not going to understand, only to then have Toga repeat her life story to Ochaco and hence to the readers as well when we already know all of this, so we can then rush to have Ochaco tell Toga it is alright and that solves everything. 

I can’t believe I’m having to say Ohkubo once again succeeded in spite of himself, but keeping the actions simple and compact makes each action land better: the initial attack, the reversal of Maka’s regard for Crona, and the emotional release of crying with Crona works. 

By contrast, Horikoshi tends to think through every last detail of his story--and it overwhelms the emotional reaction. This is one reason why we have the worst people online screaming that Toga and Shigaraki don’t deserve forgiveness or redemption--because Horikoshi, intentionally or not, opens up those questions. 

Meanwhile, Ohkubo side-steps that reaction to having the debate be not whether Crona deserves forgiveness or redemption but just having Maka befriend them, Lord Death initiates a trial enrollment, and the story moving forward from there. Soul Eater was such a cartoony series that you can accept a silly guy like Lord Death just ignoring everything Crona did and moving on: he does so later ignoring that Maka took out the book she wasn’t supposed to and now Kid is captured by Noah. 

My Hero Academia wants to speak so directly about real-life issues that, despite good intentions, as is inherent with the structure of allegory, it’s hard to make that story still work both as fiction and as a treatise that will convince enough members of the audience. Soul Eater got to be goofy; My Hero Academia was trying to be poignant. 

(Ohkubo then screws all of this up in the manga by having Crona just get brainwashed back into being under Medusa’s thumb, but we’ll ignore that and just appreciate the anime handling that storyline better by still having Crona, by their own choice, commit to following Medusa’s orders before realizing how much they screwed up.)

With all of that rambling out of the way, I’m now going to ramble some context where I’m coming from. 

I haven’t sat through this season of My Hero Academia, if only because I already was disappointed with this final arc in manga format, so I have little interest in watching it animated just to again be disappointed with the same storytelling and characterization choices. 

I don’t want to ignore what I would probably enjoy if I watched: I thought the paneling and artwork was too messy to follow in the manga, whereas enough reviewers said the animation made it easier to follow Ochaco’s movements and Quirk Awakening. 

But I also don’t see much need to sit through an animated version of a storyline that I thought overall didn’t have the setup it needed, had a disappointing payoff, and did a fridging of an LGBTQ+ girl character--but I write all of that as a cishet man, whereas numerous LGBTQ+ viewers, for good reason, appreciate this story as an allegory about not being who you want to be and wishing that someone would reach out to you. 

I guess my complaint is as much about how Toga didn’t get the better ending she deserved, and I don’t think this storyline works as a way to show how things get better when you’re killing off the character who functions as both the allegorical LGBTQ+ character (her compulsion, whether from her Quirk or not, read as having to closet a part of herself) and a literal LGBTQ+ character. 

I’m taking forever writing this, so let me start to wrap things up by including earlier remarks I drafted and then delayed getting to:

It’s not impossible for the crew at My Hero Academia to have been inspired by the Maka and Crona scene, but I don’t see direct evidence to support that conclusion, or even commonality between the two anime in staff beyond both anime being made at the same studio. Episode 39 of Soul Eater, the one with Maka reaching out to Crona, was directed by Takefumi Anzai, written by Megumi Shimizu, and storyboarded by Takuya Igarashi. I haven’t seen any of them working on My Hero Academia. While both Soul Eater and My Hero Academia are made by Studio BONES, they are different crews, so unless I learn that the My Hero crew was inspired by that Crona and Maka moment, I don’t see evidence to suggest that inspiration beyond the similarities that you have identified but, given what you also say, not getting why it worked in Soul Eater and, yeah, I don’t think it works with Toga and Ochaco. 

I’ve been wanting to write about the Ochaco and Toga final encounter since that “cutest smile” moment. But I was waiting until the manga ended--and then I still can’t quite figure out my reaction to the moment. 

I don’t think it’s quite yuri-bait: Toga is already out, so the only bait is whether Ochaco is obviously identified as queer and whether they have a relationship. Seeing as Toga is dead, that throws a relationship out the window. Where I would be willing to call this bait is that the series overall has refused to commit to representing queer relationships. At best there were those two characters during Izuku and Mirio’s patrol that were holding arms that seemed to both be girls, a detail more emphasized in the anime adaptation. But if that is the best I can identify, then either I am missing all the more obvious examples, or this is just tossing bread crumbs to the audience. 

What would make this work is if there were any same sex couples. I get that this story, for a lot of reasons, was not going to have that happen, whether due to persistent homophobia in both Japan and the United States (except, you know, all the other same sex couples that are in notable manga that are in the same genre, have the same popularity, cater to the same age demographic) or because of the realities of superhero work (except there are Pro Heroes who are married and have families: Endeavor is not a good example but we do have Rock Lock). And these points are thrown out the window when the story keeps trying to make Izuku and Ochaco into a couple because, you know, these are high schoolers, of course they will date. And even then the story tries to give in-universe explanations, whether due to personalities (Izuku and Ochaco cannot be honest with themselves) or awkward if believable and even realistic worldbuilding (Camie mentions that her school forbids dating--but, again, between boys and girls, not between boys or between girls--and yeah, Camie probably did mean any dating while pointing out that right now she wants to date Todoroki, but the point still stands). As I said earlier, maybe My Hero Academia would have been better if some of this stuff wasn’t explained, but that’s a whole other discussion about certain comics and their creators who get too fanfic-y in trying to over-explain stuff that doesn’t need to be explained, leave it to the fanfic writers to explain it, not the creator. 

My point is, the yuri-bait accusation--which I think is a bullshit accusation--would be less prevalent if the anime itself had more and more LGBTQ+ relationships so that things don’t feel so straight. 

Speaking as a cishet man, this is my problem of constantly yelling, “Just have your characters be out, why is everything so coded, just let them be out as gay, bi, pan, trans, everything.” 

But my constant yelling is privileged; that take I just had, “add more relationships so things don’t feel so straight,” is not our reality. What I just was yelling is such bullshit to yell about because I’m ignoring that the reason these stories depend on coding is for the same reason people derisively call this stuff “yuri-bait”--it’s this pressure to perform a certain way or, more often, just stay closeted because of patriarchy, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, all kinds of discrimination and bigotry on the basis of sexuality, sex, and gender. 

It is easy for me, a cishet man, when engaging with this work for just entertainment: that is a lazy engagement. But it is irresponsible for me, a cishet man, to act that way because it makes me a poor ally; it ignores that these stories are speaking to people who are LGBTQ+.

Someone had to point out to me that the same storyline having Toga and Ochaco reaching out to each other in such a romantic or at least romantic-coded way also name-dropped the lesbian vampire story Carmilla. The thing is, while someone pointed that out to me to emphasize how queer this all was, I am still resisting because at the end Toga is still dead and the ending, or rather the fanbase’s reaction to the ending, something the manga cannot control, was fixated on whether Izuku and Ochaco would be a couple only to be disappointed that the confirmation is either vague (adult Ochaco wearing what looks like a version of Izuku’s Pro Hero mask around her neck; Ochaco and Izuku still in high school enjoying a winter evening stroll) or nonexistent (sorry, shippers, but I don’t think the manga ever confirms clearly that Ochaco and Izuku are a couple--this is worse than how badly Soul Eater trolled us who thought we were getting Maka and Soul confirmed explicitly as a couple rather than what we did get that confirms it to me but which is still so ham-fisted as to, again, just be trolling). 

So, at long last, after months of delays on my part, I finally manage to write something about my conflicting feelings about how My Hero Academia handled the Ochaco and Toga relationship, the “most beautiful smile” moment, and killing off Toga and, to top it off, leaving her future romances vaguely defined, which both upsets the shippers and upsets everyone because it reduces her character arc to just who she hooks up like this is a nightmare out of that Louisa May Alcott bio-pic--just fucking super. 

But I don’t want to end this ranting without offering how I would have fixed this. And as usual, I owe a lot of these ideas to getting to talk and plot out story ideas with elliotthezubat, so credit to them for a lot of what follows, both as someone who plotted this or who listened as I offered ideas and bounced them off: 

First, don’t kill Toga. The idea that we need to see how Pro Hero society reforms depends as much on what happens to Villains who are rehabilitated and do re-enter society. We do not have to go with a full “Truth and Reconciliation” approach, but it is silly that no Villains survived to be released from prison. (I guess Gentle and La Brava were supposed to be our example--which, again, just super: someone who was recording videos exposing price gouging and his partner who was editing the videos--yeah, real supervillain criminal behavior there. Come on, Horikoshi--be daring, show us how on Earth Toga and Spinner persist even after what they did.) 

Second, so much of the dialogue between Ochaco and Toga needed to be staged earlier. We needed these two interacting at least two more times--and no, Toga disguised as Camie and Izuku interacting with Ochaco don’t count. So much of Toga’s ranting after Compress died could have been cut and pasted to another fight we could have had earlier--but that would have required a whole new arc to this manga, and I appreciate that Horikoshi wanted to wrap up this manga already. And so much of what Toga says to Ochaco needed to be said earlier in this war arc. It bothers me, for how “grounded in realism” this manga tried to be, that we rush everything into two stupid wars: why did the Pro Heroes think storming the Doctor’s lab was a good idea when all it does is destroy a city and let Shigaraki lose instead of finding a more covert way of infiltration and immediate destruction of the lab, and why did the Pro Heroes think baiting All For One into one last stand was a good idea when that was going to wreck all of UA and let Dabi loose? We need this “war” to be an actual war--that means multiple battles, so have Ochaco face off against Toga between Shigaraki’s release from the Jaku lab and the final battle, then you can more of Ochaco and Toga’s talk be in this intermediary battle. No one is going to process everything these two are yelling at each other in the middle of a fight--that talk-heavy stuff goes in the middle, just structure a fight there for it. 

Third, commit to a Toga and Ochaco relationship or don’t--make up your mind. This is as bad as not committing to Izuku and Ochaco in a relationship: no one walks away happy, so just commit to it or establish that while Ochaco keeps helping Toga that the attraction is one-sided. 

[fairyofthehollow]

Hi i forgot to put the 🐙 emoji in my last anon LOL but it’s 🐙!!! (Not sure if u do emoji anons on this acct :p) my favourite classics are honestly ANYTHING by kafka. I am a kafka girl. I love kafka. And then jane austen!! Pride and prejudice 💋💋mr. darcy is the only man ever actually i love when they’re QUIET (emphasis)

I’m pretty open to honestly most classic literature, i’ve been wanting to get some recommendations that aren’t the same authors. Sylvia plath unfortunately doesn’t really do it for me because I’m probably not her target audience but some of her poems/proses are good! I’m currently reading dracula/frankenstein (at the same time lol) and have been loving it so far. The only con about frankenstein is that i bought a tinier version so the words are huddled together and although my ass CAN read it i’d rather the words to be spaced out :-( not sure if it’s a me thing… i’ll just finish the book and see if i would get another version of frankenstein hehe

i also have a little life on hand rn, that is the book I’m especially putting on hold because from what i’ve seen people were Not okay when reading it. Idk about me tho personally i’m not an outwardly emotional person but i’m not heartless so i’ll read it when i can…

I have SOOO many books on my TBR list but i’ve been putting them on hold because i still have a number of books at home that i need to finish…! I wish i could show u a photo because it’s on my notes app lol. This might be a very unpopular opinion but i enjoyed reading murakami’s killing commendatore even though his descriptions of women r nasty. I read his books in a more factual (?) way? If that makes sense. If you have any book/author recommendations do tell me!! Especially female authors 🐙🤍

hi my love 💛 i’m so sorry for the late response :(

omg kafka!! 🥺 i haven’t read any of his works in full yet but i’ve read snippets on pinterest and they’re so so beautiful :( i love the way he writes. do you have any favourite works of his? :O oooh yes pride & prejudice!! the most classic of the classics i feel like lol. YES EXACTLY LOL, men when they’re quiet and don’t talk > 😌

i haven’t read any sylvia plath and tbh i’m not sure if i’d ever pick any of her works up because i’ve lots of bad things about them :( i’m glad you’re enjoying those books though!! :D frankenstein is really great!! >< i think they’re making a live action of it (?) which i’m super excited for !! and ik this isn’t dracula lol but i’m soooooo losing my mind over the new nosferatu movie coming out rahhhh!! it looks amazing :P I TOTALLY GET YOU!! the frankenstein i read in hs was similar and it was seriously a pain to get thru 😭 like why are the letters and words so close together 💔

oh god yeah a little life … ive heard it’s so heartbreaking :( i dont think i’ll be reading it anytime soon lol life is sad enough!! 😞 but people say it’s v well written ! good luck if you ever do get around to reading it 😭💗

ME TOO HELP ☹️ i love buying books but then my tbr just grows and grows and then i don’t even wanna read anymore rip. i definitely know what you mean dw! >< i think something a lot of people tend to forget is that we can (and are supposed to) be critical of authors works, esp those from back in the day! i think the problem is when it’s marketed as something it’s not & people say a work is flawless and perfect when it’s like…not, and even hurts groups of people, etc etc. idk if that makes sense lol but yeah! 😭

hmmm off the top of my head, since you like classics i’m thinking of virginia woolf, toni morrison, and maya angelou! for woolf, i read mrs dalloway (which i LOVED) and a room of ones own for a school assignment. i def recommend those! and for morrison, i read song of solomon which i also really, really loved. beloved by her is also on my list! for maya angelou id definitely recommend and still i rise and letter to my daughter <3 her poems are beautiful too!

i mostly read fiction / fantasy at the moment 😭 if you’re interested in those genres i can give you recs as well ><

[hotdadlicense]

open blorbo season, answer for whoever 🩷💚💙💜💐🌸

loren i love you <3 okay im gonna do maybe daryl and eddie also gonna do jesse pinkman cos i'm currently rewatching breaking bad

🩷 why are they your favorite?

daryls my fav becos i dont even know. he's bitchy he's hotheaded he's a comedian without even trying he tries so fucking hard he's emotional as shit???? i just love him okay i can't even explain it's just how i exist as a person these days

eddie? he's soooooooooooooooooo. so fun. like he's got fucking emotions and he's like well obviously we bury those but then they explode out and he's like well. maybe i can be the most therapised bitch in the bar. he's literally comedy king and he's sooooo good. his heart!!!!! the love he has for his son and for his family and his team!!!!!!!

jesse!!!!!! jesse is literally like. heart of fucking GOLD okay he cares SO MUCH!!!!!!! like it doesn't matter how much walt's fucked him over, the way jesse was so fucking genuinely happy when walt told him he was in remission!!!!!! the way when jesses thinks he loses the drugs and knows that walt will literally kill him, he doesn't lie, doesn't try to hide it, doesn't even pretend for even a second that it's anyone elses fault, he literally calls mr white straight away and is like i fucked up!!!!! i lost it!!!!! it's on me!!!!!!!!! and god. the way literally everyones just like. fucking abandons him and tells him to get his fucking life together but the second he reaches out and asks for help they're like. no. but he never fucking stops trying!!!!!!! this rewatch it ruining me i havn't even reached s3 yet

💚 what are your favorite added rep headcanons for them?

bi daryl obviously. i was gonna be like tragic past but thats not even a headcanon.

eddie = gay. like what he had with shannon was real and he was big in love with her but also. gay.

jesse????? i don't even know. i'm too emotional to even think about that rn. bisexual is always fun though

💙 what's a popular headcanon for them that you adore?

feel like i have headcanons for all these peoiple but now that you're putting me on the spot im like. well my mind is Empty.

💜 'put that guy into situations' or 'take that guy out of situations'?

daryl and eddie = put that guy into situaltions.

jesse = take him out of situations for the love of god he's suffered enough

💐 what are your favorite poly ship(s) for them, if any?

daryl: there is like no fic for it but i do enjoy the idea of rick/daryl/michonne especially in 6.10 where rick and michonne are on the couch and michonnes like. where's daryl. i just think it wouldve been fun if that night went a little differently, although i adore rick/michonne as is ksfhks also ofcourse daryl/jesus/aaron. hell yeah.

eddie: i mean. now that tommy's on the scene....... eddie/buck/tommy lets Go also i've read a eddie/buck/taylor and i was like omg i love it here?

jesse: part of me wants to say jesse/skinny pete/badger but apart of me's like. do i? feel like they're more platonic for me than romantic but like. if someone linked me i would 100% read it.

🌸 what are your favorite mono ship(s) for them, if any?

daryl: daryl x rick, daryl x beth, daryl x connie, daryl x jesus, daryl x aaron, daryl x billy

eddie: eddie x buck

jesse: jesse x andrea

[gutsyjieun]

this is just for me so i'm not trying to fight people with this, i'm simply expressing myself. i am not even gonna tag this post because i'm scared people will just attack me for it. but i am gonna yap more about this because none of my friends are watching the show and i have so much to say, as an avid reylo dislike-r. i enjoy the trope and a lot of my ships have it and yes, some are problematic but never abusive.

that’s literally my issue with reylo. of course i understand how an abusive environment works and i try my best to emphatize with all sides of the story but sometimes a ship is just abusive and it stays that way no matter if we get the different perspectives or not. at least in my opinion.

unfortunately abusive ship has always been kind of associated with the enemies to lovers trope and i think that gave us enjoyers of the trope bad rep too because like, just 'cause i like this dynamic does not mean i am into abusive ships? somehow the dynamic always ends up incredibly toxic one way or another where person A ends up abusing person B whether it's emotionally or physically and people are like 'enemies to lovers!!!' when it's not that at all. it's abuser x victim, disguised as enemies because what else could they be? in my opinion there should always be respect in this relationship as well as understanding and although the chaos and messiness is a part of it too, which makes the whole thing lowkey problematic like 'why would you want two people who want to kill each other ending up together' it should stay balanced with respect and sympathy, maybe even compassion. that's what makes enemies to lovers really good. toxicity of the ship does not mean abuse! it is possible to write two people being toxic to each other without being abusive to each other like those are different things... yes, tension needs to be there but not necessarily 'all i want all the time is to torture you' tension because why would i ship something if one person straight up loathes the other one with no regard to their feelings or the connection between them? at least for me, it is like this! that's what i like about enemies to lovers.

i don't think reylo is that or at least it was meant to be that but executed badly, in my own personal opinion(!), and while we have not had that many oshamir moments yet, i think they are very different than reylo despite what I've seen being said online. like of course they will be compared, the themes are similar/exact but they're still different dynamics.

i think for me the problem was kylo's redemption arc. they only did that so they could explain his connection and “love” for rey which made no sense anyway because he wanted her dead since the start. the only reason he didn't kill her when they met was because he discarded her as just random scum. and then he kept doing that even when he learned how powerful she is. the only difference was he knew he shouldn't kill her bc he could use that power to his benefit.

and qimir obviously has some interest in osha for that reason but instead of, i dont know, torturing her the second she’s defenseless he shows her an act of kindness. at the end of E5. it follows the trope of “villain is the only person caring for the hero when they've been abandoned” which like... i think it shows the sympathy i was talking about lmao.

and for the new episode, all the monologue comparisons lol when kylo said “your parents threw you away like garbage,” key word here btw,  following up with things like “you're weak and no one ever wanted you bc you are worthless and useless and good for nothing” which was kind of the whole thing between them in the first two movies and they kind of tried to salvage it with the last movie but to me, personally, it made no sense because he just kept treating her with no respect or any empathy for what she's been through.

qimir was talking about how osha’s emotions made her stand out and how it made her more powerful and that the jedi felt threatened by her😭 “The Jedi saw that. And they threw you away.” he was building her up and showing understanding to how she feels and offering her a piece of himself, opening up to her. like yeah you can say it's his whole plan to get her on his side and use her for his advantage but the entire difference is in how he does this. he genuinely seems very aware of her power and respects her for it, literally giving her the option to just walk away from him. there's compassion and empathy from both sides.

sigh

really tired of twitter and the fandom there making it all about reylo when some of us just want to enjoy the show without it being credited to a completely other story.

every single scene so far has been quite the opposite of reylo’s scenes although similar in nature. the characters are completely different and they’re allowed to exist on their own terms and as its own thing without being always tied back to reylo. and some of us are allowed to dislike reylo while liking oshamir, so i don’t know why all the hate needs to happen in the first place?

we can argue about it for so long but it’s so exhausting ‘cause it’s just not the same ship. they have the same trope but so far the dynamic has been so different and i want to see content for oshamir alone but some reylos always insert their ship in it and then hate on you if you say they aren’t the same.