#and an original storyline
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In the past, people in the Animal Crossing community would make fun of Tom Nook as a sleazy landlord. Since then, he's really rehabilitated his image as this 'heart of gold' businessman (he's the one who puts bells and furniture in trees for you to find! he adopted orphans! he donates to charity!), but New Horizons genuinely paints the most devious version of him.
He's successfully privatized settler colonialism: you pay HIM to move to a "deserted island" (which apparently the oceans in the AC world are just full of) and start a colony that he is directly invested in. At best he's running a weird vacation package scam (you arrive on the island with no money and in debt for "using his services"). At worst, he's using you to set up company towns. For god's sake, he literally has his own fake currency that he forces you to use to pay off your debt. But don't worry, he's repackaged it in a way that definitely doesn't sound like an MLM scam: the Nook Mileage Program!
You're no longer just his tenant or his temporary part-timer, you're his business lackey. The entire tutorial section of the game has you spending actual weeks running around completing tasks and doing hard labor to set up his colony. You're even tasked with preparing his properties and finding buyers for them. No, you aren't a tenant anymore. You work for the landlord. You are directly responsible for finding tenants for him. And he doesn't even fucking pay you. Not for setting up town hall and museum, or his nephew's shop –– which is the ONLY store on the entire island that sells necessities –– or bringing KK Slider to town, or helping populate his town. Not a single cent. No, actually, you have to pay HIM to BUY infrastructure like bridges and stairs and park benches. And all the while, he's telling you're the "resident representative"; you get to call the shots! That the reward is the community's progress. That what you're doing is in everyone's best interest (but most importantly, his).
Since NH's release, people have done a lot of legwork to say that Tom Nook isn't a capitalist while the game shows him at his very worst. He owns the only general store in town. You're forced to use a phone that he modified and branded as his own. Buy Nook-branded furniture and merchandise at the self-serve kiosk in the town hall, a governmental building! There's no conflict of interest here!
But hey, if you're tired of being the landlord/business mogul's goon, you can also find work as a deluxe resort home designer for a company that also pays you in their special company currency that can only be used to buy their products instead of a real salary! Because that's what the Animal Crossing franchise needs! More vacation homes!!!
#this is a really long winded way to say i really really really really hate new horizon's storyline and player role#i really hate that not only your house but the entire TOWN. the whole COMMUNITY you're a part of is owed to tom nook's business#i really hate the “vacation getaway package” angle because it shows just how commercialized the entire premise of nh is#and how lost the game is in its original core concept#animal crossing is about the experience of moving to a new town and becoming a part of that community#just to compare: all past ac games have a similar opening#you're on a bus or train or taxi to someplace new. a stranger strikes up a conversation and you get to know them before arriving#new horizons opens with you at customer service desk filling out an client application before a flight.#in prev games working for nook in the tutorial is meant to be demeaning. you want it to be over with so you can actually start living life#but in new horizons working for tom nook IS your life. and it's so rewarding! don't you feel rewarded?#you aren't a person. you aren't a new neighbor. you're tom nook's client. and then his unpaid employee. and the game insists it's fun to be#that's how void the game is#because it's bad enough that a rpg life sim got turned into a sandbox game where you have to build the town yourself#but the only reason why you're building it is because the landlord who you're in debt to TOLD you to build it.#everything is a rewards program! everything is a tour service! be sure to do your daily tasks to earn nook bucks to spend on nook merch!#that really sucks imo.#i mean. the entire game is based around the vacationing industry. of course it all feels fake and temporary. it's only a vacation.#long post#rant#not art#god the fact that your starter villagers can't even decide where to live you have to decide for them#i've never played a game that does the opposite of handholding#where instead it's the PLAYER who has to handhold the npcs through everything. and newsflash!! it's really exhausting and boring
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-crack me open and all that's left inside is what's been done to me-
#byler#will byers#will byers art#stranger things#stranger things fanart#st#based off that one photo that's been circulating the art side of tiktok#original art is from an album cover by the band NewDad as I've just found out*#don't want to be claiming ideas as my own lol i just applied the concept to Will's storyline#just had to listen to an hour long hateful rant and I think u can see my anguish in Will’s eyes
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Mercy waiting for me to give him any sort of story that doesn’t involve him lingering naked in an invisible background
#when ur oc is so boring u draw him sleeping to have fun#I’m sorry I’m spamming him so much but I kinda figured out his design…not the clothing part yet tho#art#my art#artists on tumblr#original art#my characters#oc#Mercy#to be honest he had a story but I erased it cuz the oc is old as hell so it was very angsty and edgy and I don’t like it anymore#to be honest I only imagine a very mundane and calm type of storyline? not that interesting#the ultímate self insert. only wants to be on bed and do nothing
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(OC Lore and design time!)
(it got longer again ... sorry ... idk how to make things short, i just need to talk, but i guess if you can read the written stuff in the pic thats the barest bare bones of what i wrote here)
i was asked what new lore story stuff i had thought about that made me sad which i mentioned a bit ago, and while that is too hard to explain given all the missing context i thought i could at least talk about lore having to do with it :D
so, (Lord) Eadrya is one of my fav OCs (big blue lad, here a rough sketch in humanoid form) they are both one of if not THE most powerful demon alive and the most battle trained;
at the mid point of the story the demon world gets invaded by the celestials (the angel inspired things i talked about in the previous lore post with Xaror) and Shargon, as the king, should be their first and only frontline, but at this point his life is only being sustained by maschinery after being mortally wounded, he cannot fight (he realizes what is going on, rips himself off the maschinery to get at least his youngest child to safety, barely managing it before dying- the guardian, the demons god, takes over his body to attempt to fight against the celestials but cant keep itself alive long enough since its host is already dead) Eadrya takes the role of the frontline fighter (despite being very full of themselves and aggressive they care about their 'job' of protecting their own, also giving them the chance to show off just how strong they are); the fight was going well for them all things considered, but when the guardian activates it drains the power of all elemental lords (which Eadrya is one of, and since they have the most strength it also takes the most from them), so much so that they lose the fight and suffer deadly wounds (the worst being a spear through the chest made of a material that grows hard, root-like formations when in contact with demonic blood like a fungus but worse, also stopping any self healing processes) after the guardian falls apart it creates a huge shockwave of energy that stuns every living thing within a certain distance and possibly more-
Eadrya (in true demon form, so like a blue whale in size at least) was likely taken through an active gateway to the human world in a large tidal wave also created by the guardians fall; they wash up in the harbor of a small secluded village, the head of which is 'lady 13'; although never having seen a demon before and everyone being afraid (largely thinking its a strange hurt animal, only she suspected otherwise), they still gather all villagers to pull out the celestial spear, which is diffcult and brutal given that its already taken root, but the village lacked both knowledge and means to help any other way- doing so damaged their heart which is how they were able to collect samples of all three demonic blood types ('normal' -red like humans-, energy -essentially purely magic- and heartblood -highly concentrated energy only found within the heart of a demon and the only one to contain genetic material) (this is the start of Eadryas character arc, having to deal with the fact that their world is likely destroyed, them failing what they didnt think they could fail, having lost a battle so badly (even if not really their fault) for the first time and not knowing if literally anyone else has survived .. also being now stuck in the human world, which they dont like)
Lady 13 (placeholder name? stands for experiment 13) is a human that was tricked by demon hunters to enroll into a series of experiments trying to create hybrids of demons and humans, which they hoped would be powerful and easily controllable tools for their endeavours, though the two are inherently not compatible, they tried grafting body parts of demons on humans to make them compatible- all experiments failed except for her, more or less, though she never got to see the hybrid she carried and was then told it had died too, they threw her out believing she wouldnt survive much longer either and all such experiments were cancelled due to the high cost of human life, research material (demons are still rare) and upkeep with no successful results Lady 13 survived though (perhaps even via the pirates picking her up?) and she ended up living in said small village far away, hiding her half demonic body, though most know there soemthing 'wrong' with her (her being this tall when it doesnt fit the rest for one), only few know the full extent; she enjoys the life she has now, perhaps on the more poor side but safer and more loved than ever before; she largely lead the efforts to try and help Eadrya when they ended up in the harbor, though there wasnt that much anyone could do it was still enough- they leave immediately after waking up, but return after really having nowhere to go and struggling to deal with everything that has happened; over time (probably years) they start to open up towards the people there (though not .. very much) enough to get rather close with Lady 13 too- she actually falls madly in love but after Eadrya (extremely aro/ace) rejects all her attempts quite clearly she respects their boundaries
However, after hearing news of potential demon sightings Eadrya decides to leave in hopes of not being the last demon left after all; Lady 13 then decides to reveal her secret to them (though hearing and seeing what lengths hunters would go to for their experiments makes them absolutely seething with rage- she insists on not being out for revenge) and asks if they would be willing to donate a small amount of heartblood; shes always wanted to be a mother but is now incompatible with humans too- through things she picked up back at the experiments facillity, hers and her doctors research she is sure that is all that is needed, she dares to ask since she does not know when, if ever, she will meet another demon, much less one she could actually trust enough for this though Eadrya hesitates (why would she want to go through the same thing again that didnt work and threatened her life, if it does work, do they want to be involved with any of this? what if hunters find out it worked after all?) but after her ensuring that they would have no part in it other than giving up a little blood and would not be considered a parent in any way, nor made responsible for anything that might happen to her, but considering it all in the end they agree to it
only for her to reveal shes had a small bottle of it already, along with multiple samples of the other types, which she collected when Eadrya was bleeding out into the harbor not knowing if they will survive, though not wanting to make use of it without their consent either way (they are actuallly rather touched by this)
alot later the main group returns here and it turns out to have worked (though she is unable to walk/bedridden for a long while bc it did alot of damage to her body, which can heal since its demons parts, but only really slowly bc she does not have a full functioning system and no demonic blood of her own -she uses the other samples for the healing process-) though its a little awkward to explain, especially considering that 13.1 took alot after Eadrya xD (their theory as to why it worked so "well" that time is that even though the sample was already taken, them giving their consent for it still made it less likely to be rejected; demons dont need partners to have offspring, and all can do it, they just have to decide to- so them agreeing to it, even though its long been outside their body, still had an effect on the blood sample)
#ganondoodles#art#ocs#original art#oc lore#demons#monsters#WHY does writing things liek this take me so long#i spent two hours again on this and im falling asleep as we speak bc its almost 2 am#ANYWAY this was alot again ... sorry#but its a relatively new storyline that i have been afraid of telling#since it touches on things im afraid might come across wrong and uses themes im a lil uncomfy with#but i found it interesting ... and works well with eadrya as a character bc it challenges alot about them#yes im wrote and mean this genuinely#i would have made the cut from her human body to the demon parts more smooth ... but this hard cut is the point#so that she looks rather normal on the upper part and can hide the rest#thoguh im unsure about the color scheme and if maybe i should be more creative with the demons parts#then again its largely just legs lol#if anyone actually reads this ........ i hope it comes across correctly#i like to use darker and more mature themes but am riddled with anxiety over how it will be understood#im gonna work on zelda comic stuff again now .. sorry for all the oc spam#but if there are questions PLEASE feel free to ask im pretty sure i have answers to almosst anything?#also i havent thought of a name for her or the kid .. though im starting to like lady 13#13.1 wont do as a name though poor kid deserves a proper name after already being a weird hybrid that shouldnt exist#either way ... going to bed now GOODNIGHT q-q#(any typos are excused by me being deadly tired ok)
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Quinlan and Aayla are the original Anakin and Ahsoka. Quinlan being Obi-Wan's age, and Aayla being seven years older than Anakin, Quinlan is only NINE years older than her. Legends Wookieepedia says he took her as his padawan when she was 10, which is patently ridiculous. Even if we age her up to a more new-canon-consistent age, that still gives us 23yo Quinlan and his 14yo padawan. Disaster duo. Terrifying gremlin pair.
#I SAID WHAT I SAID#star wars#quinlan#aayla secura#grace for ts#OBI WAN IS STILL A PADAWAN AT THIS POINT#everyone makes constant jokes nonstop but Quinlan is THE greatest master he can possibly be#everyone else is surprised. impressed. who knew quinlan 'I Have Never Been Serious In My Life' vos had this in him?#tholme been knew#he walked straight out of his knighting to go ask Aayla to be his padawan#she crossed her arms unimpressed and said 'well it took you long enough!'#i cant believe he found her and brought her to the temple as a child. i cannot believe that storyline was allowed to exist in star wars#ITS SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO#the original 'the team' prototype#you cant tell me all the initiates didnt follow their latest adventures#hoping to one day be That Cool
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I limited options to regular cast members, before nutrek. From there I tried to think who got the least character development / fewest story lines from each series. But it’s all subjective, you could want to see more of any character!!
For bonus points tell us what you wanted to know about that character or what stories you wanted about them. I always thought it was unfair that we only saw Geordi’s parents on a zoom call, and Beverly’s grandmother as a corpse. Every other tng character got at least one episode featuring their parents.
Also, we never even learned if Chakotay is mononymous, or if he’s not, if Chakotay is his first or last name. (*Side eyes prodigy season 2 👀* I got high hopes for you kid.)
#don’t get me started on how underutilized jadzia was#she got barely any lines in the season before she left and it kills me#it’s 100 fair if ezri is your choice but i didn’t prioritize her as a choice because for her one season she actually got a lot of storyline#star trek#poll#star trek poll#trekkie polls#tos#star trek the original series#tas#star trek the animated series#tng#star trek the next generation#ds9#star trek deep space nine#voy#star trek voyager#ent#star trek enterprise#christine chapel#hikaru sulu#beverly crusher#geordi la forge#wesley crusher#jadzia dax#tuvok#harry kim#Chakotay#hoshi sato#travis mayweather
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sugar daddy!bruce wayne hcs
warnings: lowkey smutty
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who brings you to all the galas as arm candy and loves showing you off whenever he gets the chance
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who enjoys spoiling you with random gifts that probably cost a fortune (you think it's influenced by his desire to put you on display)
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who knows all your sweet spots, who can practically play you like an instrument with all the little moans you let out for him
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who never rushes you to leave and actually encourages you to stay the night
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who's greedy and will gladly take anything you give him, whether it be seductive glances across the room or teasing pics throughout the day
Sugar Daddy!Bruce would be the type to let you freely use his money as you please. Often times he'll wake up in the middle of the night to find you next to him shopping online with his card
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who loves seeing you in beachwear. He often finds himself taking you on vacation trips or boat rides on his yacht just to see how pretty you’ll dress up for him
Sugar Daddy!Bruce is most definitely a munch and will literally go down on you every time you two are together (it's secretly because of the ego boost he gets from the way you cum for him)
Sugar Daddy!Bruce who more often than not finds himself staring at you in the mirror as you put your earrings on, a part of him wondering what it would be like if you just stayed…
a/n: the first version of this was actually way longer and in-depth, but i was unsatisfied with the direction it was going in... anyways i ended up scrapping it and i started over with this💀
#the original one had more of a storyline#and im lowkey pissed that it didn't workout bcs i liked the header i made for it too#ノ彡☆ [read all about it] — my writing#dc#dc fanfic#dc headcanon#bruce wayne#bruce wayne hcs#bruce wayne headcanon#bruce wayne fanfiction#bruce wayne fanfic#bruce wayne smut#bruce wayne x reader#bruce wayne x gn!reader#sugar daddy!bruce wayne#batman x reader#batman hcs#batman headcanon#batman x gn!reader#batman fanfiction
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OGHREN KONDRAT • DRAGON AGE: AWAKENING
Came here thinkin' I'd try my hand at becoming a bona fide Grey Warden.
#dragonageedit#daedit#dragon age origins#dragon age awakening#oghren kondrat#oghren#*dao#harper.gif#userzahrahydris#katewalker#useransburg#usermactir#userophe#oghren is such a glaring example of missed potential who could've had a really compelling storyline in this essay i will -#the pathetic little meow meow
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i'll be interested to see if this holds true for WOT s3 since the s1 finale had so many extenuating circumstances and can't really be included in the comparison, but based off of the s2 finale, i believe that season finales tend to bear the brunt of "It's Different From The Books!" ire because they are the culmination of all the smaller changes made throughout the season.
this turned into a bigger analysis post than i expected lmao par for the course with my blog! read on for exploration of how the 2x08 conclusion of each season-long arc is the the most emotionally satisfying conclusion and/or the most thematically appropriate conclusion possible based on the show's particular version of the story, plus a bonus tangent on the nature of adaptation.
for a finale episode, the writers' prime concern 100% has to be "wrapping up all the season's arcs in a way that feels satisfying with everything that's happened in the first 7 episodes, using the book version of the finale event as the framework" rather than "recreating the book version of the finale event exactly as it is with all the same scenes and themes". the nature of storytelling inherently means that every single person who tells the same story will focus on different themes (just think of how many versions of the hades & persephone story there are), and a good adaptation knows that being internally consistent with its own Emphasized Themes is more important than copying-and-pasting scenes from the source material without making any changes to account for the specific way this adaptation is telling the story.
(but a lot of people can't even get past this first point because they don't understand that this is how adaptations - how storytelling in general - work. like, person B literally cannot tell the exact same story that person A told without putting their own spin on it. it's not possible! unless they're simply reading out the exact words that person A wrote, which can't be done when putting 14 massive books into maximum 64 hours of tv. so many readers like to meet this point with "but why does the books' version of the story need to be changed at all?" which is just a non-starter because a) medium differences require a ton of changes, and b) even if no changes were *required*, they would happen anyway because that is human nature when it comes to storytelling. when it comes to story-listening too! ask a hundred different book fans what WOT is about and you'll get a hundred different answers. rafe & co can't possibly make an adaptation that captures every single reader's idea of What WOT Is About, and nobody in the world could ever re-tell the story of WOT in the exact same way that RJ told it, not even the most die-hard book fan; all rafe & co can do is focus on making sure the show honors the core of the books' story while also telling a good story in its own right, independent of the source material.)
i was a classics major, okay? it gets to me! anyway, corralling myself back on topic.
for 2x08, it's very telling just how far Minority Reader Opinion deviates from the general audience opinion. general audiences fucking LOVED this episode (it's the highest-rated on imdb out of the entire show, currently at a 9.0; most episodes are in the 7-8 range), but a bunch of readers call it disappointing and one of the worst episodes of the show. if it was actually a poor quality episode of television, the general audience ratings would reflect that too (as they do for 1x08, currently at a 6.4 (i personally think 1x08 gets way more hate than is deserved and i thoroughly enjoy that episode, but i accept that's just me)), but they don't.
so what does that mean? to me, it means that 2x08 is objectively a very good episode of television which general audiences found satisfying, but which some readers disliked because it prioritized the emotional & thematic needs of its own version of the story over the exact nature of the falme events in the source material. which is exactly what a good adaptation should do! if you forget the books and just look at the show (which the vast majority of viewers are doing), then every resolution that happens in 2x08 is the most satisfying resolution possible and/or the only resolution that was thematically permitted for that particular season storyline.
egwene: her season arc was about learning to stand on her own two feet and not cling onto her mentor figures or compare herself unfavorably to others. thus, her freeing herself from the a'dam is the most satisfying possible conclusion to her season arc. nynaeve and elayne freeing her in the books is nice, but in the show version, thematically, it would've undercut egwene's Overcoming Impostor Syndrome arc to go "yeah actually it's true that she's not good enough on her own and when it comes down to it she does always need nynaeve to help her out". that version worked in TGH where she didn't have an Overcming Impostor Syndrome arc, but it wouldn't have worked in the show where she did. (but, yes, egwene learning in 2x08 that she doesn't have to rely on others is a double-edged sword, which nicely sets up her later-series struggles with trying to shoulder too much herself and not letting even her friends or partner help her.)
rand: his season arc was about learning to lean on others and not isolate himself or try to protect his friends by withholding his burdens from them. thus, him failing to defeat ishamael until all his friends come to lend aid in various ways is the most satisfying possible conclusion to his season arc. rand defeating ishy singlehandedly in the books is nice, but in the show version, thematically, it would've undercut his Learning That Strength Is In Numbers arc to go "yeah actually it's true that rand is capable of winning his biggest battles all by himself and thus it's no problem for him to push his friends away". given the themes that s2 emphasized for rand, the only appropriate finale outcomes were either success with his friends' help or total failure on his own, and they chose the former. (that being said, rand pushing his friends away is a continuous issue for him throughout the series, so i doubt he's perfectly learned his lesson after 2x08; we shall see!)
interesting to note that rand and egwene have inverse arcs in a way (foils!) and that some elements of their book falme climaxes were swapped, and that the way the show has done it subverts the expected gender roles. typically, men are expected to be Lone Wolves and women to be Team Players, and the WOT books absolutely play into these stereotypes throughout the series (sometimes intentionally as social commentary, sometimes unconsciously as an accepted truth of the world), but 2x08 and s2 more broadly did the opposite with our yin-and-yang co-protagonists. it's egwene who has the arc about learning to be a Lone Wolf and rand who has the arc about learning to be a Team Player. and imo these subconscious gender role expectations are a part of why some readers (esp reddit) got SO heated about "how come egwene can succeed by herself but rand can't", because it feels Wrong to them and Not How Things Are Supposed To Work (they've never questioned why rand can succeed by himself but egwene needs her friends' help in TGH, or all the other times in the books when men succeed by themselves and women succeed by relying on each other). but it's a totally apples-to-oranges comparison because egwene and rand had totally different season arcs and focal themes (but many paralleling & foiling moments within that), and so they each get a conclusion tailor-made to their individual stories.
mat: his season arc was about realizing he's a good, worthy person, finding the inner strength to overcome his worst impulses and temptations, and coming through for his friends after leaving them at the waygate. thus, him getting his Big Damn Hero moment with the horn of valere, getting validation that he is literally a hero, and overall spending the episode doing all he can to support his friends is the most satisfying possible conclusion to his season arc. (but stabbing his bff just as he was flying on a confidence high and trying to save the day was a downer note to end on, so we've complicated his relationship with heroism and set up some more internal issues for him to wrestle with next season.)
perrin: his season arc was about learning to acknowledge his inner wolf but also coming to regard it with fear and to believe that wolf & human sides can't coexist and he must Choose One (.......suddenly being struck by the bisexuality metaphor of it all. nice!) thus, him giving into violence to murder a human to avenge a wolf is.....well, it's pretty upsetting for him and serves to reinforce his growing belief that his two sides can't coexist, but thematically, it's fascinating and sets him up for some really great internal (and external) conflicts in s3. he's just gotten what he thinks is pretty strong evidence to corroborate ishy's claim that embracing his wolf side means embracing the shadow, so he's set up for a season 3 of deep-diving into his relationship with violence and his inner wolf. it's also a neat parallel with 1x08: there perrin's avoidance of violence allowed fain to escape, whereas here his embracing of violence has traumatized him (again), so our poor guy is really feeling conflicted in the pacificism-or-violence question because both sides seem wrong to him right now. huh, i guess perrin's full-series arc is about finding a middle ground rather than one extreme (pacifism/tuatha'an/human) or the other (violence/aiel/wolf). i feel like i've just had an epiphany lmao this is why i love the show! it tells the same story as the books, but tells it in a different way that makes me think about it differently and gain new insights!
nynaeve: her season arc was about learning that she, on her own, as she is today, is not enough to protect her loved ones. this is a tough pill for both her and the audience to swallow! but it's needed for her character, and we see it in the books too. nynaeve has an incredible amount of power, but she's terrified of having that much power and wants to pretend it doesn't exist. she's resistant to change, she's used to being in charge, and she's very "my way or the highway". these are all things she needs to grow out of (or moderate, at least) in order to be able to step up and do her part for tarmon gai'don. she has to learn how to embrace her power instead of being afraid of it or being too stubborn to let other people guide her and teach her, so s2 shows her what happens if she doesn't, first hypothetically in the accepted test (everyone she loves dies because she's blocked and refused channeling training) and then for real in falme (she couldn't help elayne fully or rand at all because of her block). so her 2x08 conclusion being Total Failure is not emotionally satisfying, no, but it's thematically exactly what she needed and will goad her into facing her block head-on next season. thematically, like rand, nynaeve only had 2 options for falme: break her block and succeed, or retain her block and fail, and it was too soon for the former (we gotta let her cook a while longer, plus the story will become too easy if nynaeve, or rand, reaches supernova capability too soon), so it had to be the latter. if the show had gone with a third option of her succeeding without breaking her block, then that would've taught her and the audience that it's fine to leave the block in place and she doesn't need to challenge herself to grow as a person, because when it TRULY matters she can always get around the block.
other characters get appropriate resolutions too! moiraine and lan get to work together to succeed after being at odds and failing on their own all season (rand foils!). elayne gets validation that she is an essential and trusted part of the friend group after feeling like somewhat of an outsider earlier in the season. ishamael getting vanquished and lanfear betraying him only to be betrayed by him in turn is exactly where their mutual mistrust was leading them (and it shows us why it's so important that Team Light be able to work as a team rather than as self-interested individual operators; the contrast between ishy & lanfear looking at the seals together while plotting to betray each other vs. rand standing on the tower with all his friends behind him makes me cry your honor. imagine hating that ishy's defeat was a team effort, could not be me!)
(it's also worth noting that the characters who had the least individual success/victory in 2x08 (nynaeve, rand, perrin) are the ones who will have the biggest individual storylines in s3 (tanchico & moggy, waste arc, two rivers arc), whereas the characters who had the most individual success/victory (egwene, mat, moiraine, lan) are the ones who will be taking a bit more of a backseat (of course they all have their own stuff to do, but none of them is *the* lead character of their TSR/s3 traveling group). this is intentional!)
so there you have it. 2x08 is adored by the general audience, and it's because of this: it gives us some damn satisfying conclusions to all the season arcs (and some exciting and visually stunning battle sequences to boot), and all the viewers who AREN'T beleaguered by "But The Books!", which is most of them, recognize that for the good storytelling it is. i for one will always care far more about the show telling a good story within itself than the show being identical to the books, and rafe & co will too, as they should.
the only downside to the episode is that, yes, it is quite cramped for time because there are a lot of arcs to wrap up. this should be less of an issue in future seasons when the season finale isn't "every single major storyline converges in the same place at once". for example, judging by the "goldeneyes" episode title it seems s3 might split it up so that perrin's conclusion in the two rivers is in 3x07 while other conclusions in other locations are in 3x08, giving each more breathing room. whereas 2x08 had no choice but to stuff everything in that episode into that specific episode because it's not like perrin could just do his falme stuff an episode early and take a nap while everyone else was doing THEIR falme stuff in the next episode, nor could the full falme sequence have been split into 2 episodes since that would have disrupted the flow of the story. the only solution would be for 2x08 to be extra long, which is nice to imagine, but we all know that streaming shows almost never deviate from their set episode lengths and so there isn't much point sighing about "this episode should have been 90 minutes long!" because that just is not on the table, never has been, and never will be. the first step to being able to jive with an adaptation is making peace with the limits of its particular medium!
plus, the only things i might deem "missing" from 2x08 are non-essential (ingtar darkfriend reveal - that is NOT important fight me, it's only important in the books as our first example of a morally-gray shadow-aligned person but the show has already been doing that in spades) or will likely be included in 3x01 (the gang spending some time together to breathe and process and catch up). at the end of the day, the show is always going to need to be paced very very tightly with not as much breathing room as those of us accustomed to entire books dedicated to reacting to the previous book might expect. and 2x08 did manage to pack in a LOT of character work amidst all the action and did a good mix of resolving s2 arcs while leaving some unresolved to carry into s3 and introducing some new arcs/issues/conflicts, all within 70 minutes, which i find pretty impressive. in conclusion, 2x08 my fucking beloved <3
#saw some people discussing 2x08 in light of the wheel takes episode about it#i've never listened to that podcast because my brain doesn't function with podcasts#but seeing it mentioned got me thinking about 2x08 and how much i love it!#book fandom's hatred of that episode is my villain origin story it is genuinely SUCH a banger on so many fronts#character work themes stunts action adrenaline acting sets costumes music cinematography EVERYTHING is at the top of its game#i'm glad that general audiences give it the love it deserves#general audiences are way better judges of the objective quality of the show than readers are#wot#wot on prime#wot book spoilers#just for some vague mentions of future storylines & character arcs
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Wait wait, what the Loz sibling manga?
oh god i want to say it was one of the early NES promo mangas. iirc it was by mishouzaki?? it was legitimately batshit insane. they obviously hadnt figured out like. ANY lore whatsoever at that point and im not entirely sure that mishouzaki ever actually. played the game. or even read the manual. so the triforce functioned as like. a typical 80s manga space-weapon almost and zelda wore like a mech suit at one point and link experienced actual in-universe racism multiple times and at the end of the manga it's revealed that link and zelda are half-siblings because zelda's mother CHEATED ON HER HUSBAND
#'my daddy just HATES elves so he can never know that we're together' --zelda's mother in that manga genuinely for real#WHILE ACTIVELY MARRIED TO ANOTHER HUMAN MAN. BTW#link also got like kicked out of a hotel at one point for being a racial minority and then the daughter of the hotel owner like.#virgin mary-ed him and was like well you can sleep in. our stable. with the horses.#and anyway. link's dad/queen zelda's elven bootycall was named rune in the prologue of that and i liked it. so#i dont. remember where i read it actually because it's DEFINITELY never been officially translated#but it was definitely a part of the obscure zelda media research kick i got on like 1.5 years ago for the purposes of a slideshow#that ended up being over 2 hours long. it was one of the crazier manga that i found but i still think quark topp has gotta be the best#asks#update: i just googled this and the zelda wiki describes it as 'a manga following the original the legend of zelda storyline.'#which. may i be the first to say. no the fuck it does not#that manga is legend of zelda in that there are characters named link and zelda in it. it doesnt even PRETEND to follow the game plot
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HOBIE SIGHTING???
ACTUALLY SEEING THE SPOT???
GWENS BACKSTORY???
NWH REFERENCE???
HINTS AS TO WHY MILES IS BEING HUNTED FOR SPORT???
THE SPIDERMAN POINTING MEME????
#AAAAAAAAAAAA#across the spiderverse#spiderman: across the spiderverse#THE NEW TRAILER IS SO GOOD#omgomg#i have a guess as to what the storyline is gonna be#i think miles is gonna learn that as part of his ‘backstory’ his dad has to. yknow. but he wants to go back and change that obviously#thats why all of the ‘saving one person vs saving the spiderverse’ lines and miles saying ‘i can do both’#and idk exactly how it will play out but basically all the other spiders will be trying to stop him cause changing that part of his origin#could destroy the spiderverse or somethin#UGH IM SO HYPED I CANT WAIT
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look who is speaking…
#also the fact that in the scene with Robin Steve is wearing Billy’s jacket??#hell nah you can’t make this shit up#the fact that these two have literally two minutes of screentime together AND YET manage to have so many unintentional parallels#it drives me insane#and let’s not talk about Steve’s dream life#he literally wanted to go to California and learn how to surf#they were originally written as the same character#then they were supposed to have a storyline together#Steve and Billy are literally the definition of star-crossed lovers#‘but it’s about doomed love’ ‘that’s relatable’’precisely’#max mayfield#stranger things 3#billy Hargrove#Steve Harrington#harringrove#Dacre Montgomery#Steve x billy#Joe keery
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“I wish sansa were more aware and smart like the original outline sansa who was older and more conniving uwu” bestie, you can’t even handle alicent. sit down.
#asoiaf#sansa stark#alicent hightower#it is not lost on me how most of original outline Sansa’s overarching storyline and theme#overlaps with alicent’s#and people still say they would like og outline sansa better because she was smart and self-preserving#then I look at their opinion on alicent#and yeah no#y’all are misogynistic hypocrites and nothing else#would’ve easily turned her character into a traitor only to hate on her more viciously#shut up chad#you’re so easy to uncover it’s hilarious
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i think there is a convo to be had about how chises dragon curse - for all of its confusing mechanics - functions less as a plot point and more of a physical manifestation of the character growth chise has yet to undertake, and an unwillingness to reckon with the person she is past the roles she serves in the lives of others
chise takes this curse on when she returns to the auction house, and location is everything here. at its core, this curse is anger, hatred, fear, pain, and a deep desire to return to comfort - destructive emotions that rip apart all it touches. when chise breaks down at the sight of the frightened dragon for sale, elias tells her that those are not her emotions, that she shouldnt let them overtake her - but they are her emotions, that dragon is her, and there was never a possibility that she wouldnt follow it on its flight over london. seeing as things have "worked out" for her til now, chise hasnt yet reckoned with the gravity of what it meant to sell her life away. she hasnt reckoned with the hatred and anger and pain that she still harbors - unfortunately, moving to a quaint little english cottage does not undo a lifetime of neglect. her attempts to fix those around her, philomela being a prime example, will only get her so far. eventually she will have to look within, and i dont think shes done more than dip her toes in. "this is my past, these sad things happened to me, now things are better" is not the end of her self-reflection. now that we know the past she carries with her, what does all of that mean for her? what kind of person is she? who will she become?
im thinking too about this recurring theme of "atavism." its a key feature in tambs dragons, who are able to evolve at will to suit their needs, and yori also mentions it when noting chises appearance. atavism is the reoccurrence of dormant or ancestral traits, and you could make the argument that its also functioning metaphorically here. evolving to suit the world around you, past burdens and trauma reemerging when its unexpected or inconvenient... my thoughts on this are loose right now
theres this concept that we've been getting, too, that chises dragon curse is something temporary. arc 1 left us with the idea that her two curses must remain in balance, in perpetuity, for her to survive. but theres this new interpretation of it being something that serves her for now, but she might shed it once it fulfills its purpose
continuing with the idea of the dragon curse as a sort of... idk, ptsd metaphor, what are these two examples from ch 98 implying? that her negative emotions will serve her when it comes time? that this sort of baggage cant be exorcised away? framing the dragon curse as temporary broaches the possibility of chise one day being cured of it, but what does that mean? and should she be?
(of course, the 'future chise' we see in ch 1 doesnt have a visible left hand, but is that meant to be a literal glimpse into the future, anyway? theres also a dragon made of vines behind her in that panel, didya notice it?)
i mentioned the auction house at the beginning because i feel that if chise sheds the dragon curse, it will be in much the same way she attained it. chise has been told that she is free, she is loved, she has told her "mother" that shes moving on with her life. but all of this is just the beginning - and lets be real, i dont think elias is putting her into therapy. joseph is the only character i can think of who is truly, earnestly pushing chise toward the difficult self-reflection she needs. im excited to see what he says when she taps into her "cursed fury"
this is why im so excited that we are being told explicitly, time and again, that things are about to go really bad for chise. tamb is such a masterwork of character writing, it is so incredibly emotionally intelligent and gives so much grace and patience to its characters. i have no doubt that chises character arc is going to go in such a spectacular direction
#original#chise#the ancient magus bride#wasnt gonna tag this but it got longer once i started typing#this is just spitballing. just jokes. yknow#i think the dragon curse is more of a metaphor because yamazaki really struggles with direct and compelling action-based plots#her expertise is in character writing and that is not a diss. if you read my webcomic you would know im the same way. what action? shut up#which is why i feel ghost and witch is a much weaker story. it doesnt know what it wants to do and the storyline is confused as a result#not confusing. confused.#i am content with tamb the way it is. fight scenes are boring to me. i want the characters to moosh their fingers in each others brains
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rewatching eah is not enough i need shannon to email me all her notes and drafts for the series
#ever after high#eah#shannon hale#what was your planned dizzie storyline before mattel decided to change it to what they wanted?#what was the original ever after x monster high crossover going to be like?#what would have an epilogue been like? who does everyone end up with?#was it casual between the evil queen and snow white?
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the people have spoken. meet beatrice everyone
she's my daughter btw. don't mind the blood, it's not hers
#me when the lesbian with catholic guilt#i love beatrice sm#lmk if you guys wanna see more of the other sillies#cos there's a LOT#i have two more ocs for her storyline#which is 80s religion-based horror#and then another set of sillies for another storyline#which is more fantasy based#anyways#lee's silly ocs#izel scribbles#artists on tumblr#art#sketchbook#drawing#traditional art#colored pencil#pen#oc#oc art#original character#lgbtq#sapphic#lesbian
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