#and he's gonna b like ??? dany who??

[radiaking]

i'm just not sure i see the point in trying to demonstrate how good of a man/person cooper howard was before the war and then deliberately parallel that story w/lucy's and have him invite her along to find answers after she saved his life w/an incredibly kind and undeserved gesture if they are not trying to have the ghoul find his way back to some semblance of the good man/person that cooper howard was

[catpriciousmarjara]

DP X DC: Dani Does Things and Leaves, Explains Nothing

Heavily inspired by this dp x dc prompt and the comments and reblogs under it:

Please go check it out and @stealingyourbones entire page. They have some great dp x dc content and meta.

Local Ghost Princess Decides to Help Out Fellow Clone, Leaves Chaos Behind, Heroes Left Concerned and Very Confused, More at 10.

Now Dani knew that this world had superheroes. She knew they had an organization of sorts that had a hate-hate relationship with various government entities and a love-hate relationship with the public, depending on who you asked. However she had no intention of being involved with them. She was on vacation after all. Besides this world was just a stopover anyway. Why bother when she wasn't here on official business? But it seemed that while she didn't want anything to do with the heroes, they, however inadvertently, wanted something to do with her. How else will you explain one of the worst cloning results she had ever seen crash into a tree right in front of her while she was enjoying a nice cup of litchi boba tea in the park?

The botched clone job slid down the branches and hit the ground with a thud. She raised an eyebrow at the the rampant malevolent magical lines running through the body exacerbating the overall instability of the clone's anatomy. Clearly this individual had run into an irate mage who cast some sort of destabilizing curse and shot them right out of the sky. Dani was thankful this was an isolated section of the park and that she had put a rudimentary avoidance ward over the area. Otherwise, a superhero crashing into a tree would've caused quite the ruckus and interrupted her boba time.

She took a sip of her boba and crouched down to examine the conked out hero. This one was the one they called Superboy wasn't he? She grimaced at the state of his engineering. Whoever did his cloning did not know what they were dealing with. Her own cloning went better and she was ectoplasmic goop half the time. And Vlad was dealing with halfa DNA! Probably the most complicated genetic material in existence. Superboy over here was constructed from actual tangible genetic sources and yet...ugh.

Honestly speaking beings of this plane probably wouldn't have noticed anything wrong. A level down in power scale compared to the individual who acted as genetic donor, most likely that Superman guy, and random instances of destabilization would most likely be the extend of their knowledge regarding their faulty cloning. And when those instances of instability gradually ironed themselves out they probably patted themselves on the back and thought all was well. She should cut them some slack.

Dani hummed as she chewed on her boba pearls. Unfortunately she wasn't known to be the most merciful when it came to ensuring the well-being of clones.

Suckers probably didn't pick up the fact they unleashed a possible catastrophe upon their world. Superboy was obviously fashioned from Kryptonian DNA. A species known for becoming near godlike upon absorbing solar energy from a yellow sun. That means that their bodies have mechanisms at play beyond simple biology. Specifically energy pathways and an energy processing core. Superboy wasn't a level down in power from Superman because of some biological imperfection, he was weaker because of flawed energy absorption and storage. And that meant that his energy core was unbalanced, and once it reached a particular threshold...well its gonna be a spectacular light show this side of the galaxy that's for sure. Of course it was just a possibility. There was no guarantee he would reach that threshold in his lifetime. Unless he ran into a white mage who was vicious enough to cast a juiced up imbalance curse that is. And what do you know! Turns out you can organically be that unlucky!

She put down her cup and ran a simple diagnostics. Sure enough the magic had intensified the issue. This man needed help, the kind of help that wasn't usually available in this part of the omniverse. But she just so happened to pass by and just so happened to have expertise in this field so today was somehow simultaneously Superboy's lucky and unlucky day. He really was going through it.

As to why she would interfere that's easy. She was the Guardian of Cloned Beings after all. She can't have a fellow clone suffer could she? And plus, what were the chances that he would end up like this right in front of one of the only beings that would know how to fix the issue? Dani grinned in glee. Truly the laws of causality worked in intriguing ways.

She stood up and let her talons manifest, plucking the strings of SuperboyConnerKon-el's make and striking them one by one in the tune of an old Krytonian melody. Shame what happened to them really, but all things had their fate. It truly was great to see some of them survive and make a home elsewhere. Dani wished them the best.

As she worked, untangling knots, and straightening out blockages, the hero finally began to stir. His eyes opened and they were understandably unfocused. Disoriented and confused, he looked kinda like a bamboozled Cujo and Dani felt her lips twitch up in a toothy smile. For some reason that seemed to startle him. She mentally frowned. Did he expect her not to smile at him? That would've been rude of her. Dani might be a gremlin but she was never impolite.

"I'm just about done with the curse", she told him. "Leaching out the corrosive magic was easy but I need to repair your energy coils and that's tricky. Don't worry though. Everything's on the house. Always did have a soft spot for the House of El ever since my aunt married into it for a short while."

Dani pulled a particularly stubborn power node open. "I would like your permission before doing that through. Body autonomy, informed decisions and and all! So yes or no? You'd detonate like a bomb if I didn't though."

The young hero's eyes widened. He still didn't seem to know what was going on so she hit him with a short term clarity spell. And a small information spell to cover her bases. That got him to gather his wits enough and she watched as he processed the influx of information. His complexion was ashen when he got through the bundle and he finally managed a shaky nod. Good enough.

Dani smiled at the Kryptonian. "Great! Now this would take like twenty minutes give or take five. You can sleep now." She promptly knocked him out cold and cancelled the spells so as to not overload his brain.

And just as she predicted, twenty minutes later, she plucked the last string with a flick of her wrist and surveyed her handiwork. Exemplary if she said so herself. One of her best work! Cheerfully she shot an awakening spell at Kon-el and crouched down again, patting his head.

"You might need to be careful for a few days while your body adjusts to its new energy capacity and conductivity. Your overall system has been optimized as well so be careful", she told the groggy young man.

She paused. "And don't worry. I didn't access your mind. This was all strictly physical repair aimed at preventing you from exploding like a supernova and taking the planet with you."

And once again that part made his eyes widen. Good. He truly understood the urgency. Or that could just be him being loopy after solar energy overload. It was a bright, sunny day after all.

She stood up, creating a portal to the next world on her itinerary. She looked back at the most likely high as a kite Kryptonian. "You kinda owe me for all that extra work hero! I might just come to collect one of these days!", she joked as the portal swallowed her body and she was lost to the spaces between spaces.

She'd already told him it was all on the house so Dani didn't think that anyone would take that last part seriously. However she forgot the fact that one Conner Kent was in her own words 'high as a kite' and hence might miss some crucial details.

She also forgot to leave behind an explanation packet.

And thus she was utterly unaware of the chaos she left in her wake, happily traveling through the multiverse.

..............................................................................................................................

"So you're telling me that not only did someone find me when I was out cold and get rid of the spell, but they also rearranged my guts and gave me an upgrade?"

"...Yeah."

"What the fuck?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Conner, do you remember anything? Anything at all? Whatever they did required some serious magical power. We don't know why they did it or how. For all we know they could've done something dangerous that we can't detect yet."

"Litchi boba tea".

"Kon what the hell?"

..............................................................................................................................

"...Its in bits and pieces...but I'm pretty sure there was a woman?...white hair, green eyes...something something on the house...something about an aunt and the House of El?...and there was this strange white symbol on her chest and this really soft music was playing that went something like this...(confused humming noises)...and something about me owing her?"

"Kara? Why are you looking at me like that? What's wrong?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Let me get this straight, Superboy was healed by the Kryptonian primordial goddess of portals, messengers, travelers and other such domains, and not only did she save him but also gave him a tune up? And explicitly said that he owes her now? And this powerful divine being, who is also supposed to be the daughter of Krypton's Death God according to legends mind you, is most likely still on earth with motives unknown? Plus your entire House is descended from her family?"

"...Yeah that about sums it up."

"..."

..............................................................................................................................

"Oh man why did this happen just when I was going to go on vacation? Why couldn't the Death God or whatever reschedule?"

"Death gods notoriously don't reschedule, they're death gods. Also she's the daughter of a death god, not one herself. Most death gods are also famously fair. If not fair by our standards, fair by theirs".

"...That's good to know?"

"I confess I don't know about the fairness of children of death gods however".

"...great. Thanks anyway J'onn".

"You're welcome".

..............................................................................................................................

"You okay there man? Someone just rifled through your body and did who knows what...that's gotta be terrifying. You want to talk? We're all here for you, you know that right?"

" Thanks guys. And yeah it was freaky. But apparently I would've exploded and blown up the planet with me if she didn't do that so I guess I'm more grateful than scared."

"...Explode and blown up the what now?"

..............................................................................................................................

"Is there anything more we should know about Clark?"

"Legends say she has a brother and he's associated with great calamities?"

"...."

"Bruce? You alright?"

..............................................................................................................................

DPXDC refuses to be done with me. Leave me be accursed crossover! Leave me be!

(Btw Kon didn't make the connection because he was really out of it, and not because Clark and Kara didn't introduce him to Kryptonian culture.)

Thoughts and suggestions are welcome!

[jamiesfootball]

The Dick String Incident

“Right, new plan for training today! For the awareness bit, we’re gonna tie you fucking knobheads together. Get dressed, tie up, and be out on the pitch in five.” Roy dropped the spools of red string on the bench in the center of the room. He walked out of the room before they could say a word. Jeff was halfway through tying the string around his waist when Colin asked, “Did he say ‘you’ or ‘your’?”

The team froze. As one, the team turned to Jamie, who had stopped lacing up his boots to take the roll from Jeff. Freshly awoken from his between-training nap, he did not look like like a paragon of answers; he looked like someone who was trying to transition from ‘tie boots’ to ‘tie self’ and coming up short. When he realized he was being stared at, he blinked blearily under the attention. “What? Don’t look at me,” he complained. “I’ve been up since four. I wasn’t paying any attention.” Sam rubbed his hands together nervously. “I didn’t want to be the one to say it, but I heard ‘your.’” “He said ‘get dressed’ first. That implies an order of events he’d like to happen,” Jan argued. “Why would he tell us to get dressed and then tie our penises together?” Moe looked at him shrewdly. “So you admit you heard ‘your’ too.” “You’re all being mental. Why would coach have us do that?” Isaac turned to Jamie. “Back me up, man.” His brow furrowed like he was doing some complicated maths in his head. Finally, he shrugged. “I mean, he tied me to a bike this morning and had me pull him around, so maybe?” Colin snapped his fingers. “Like Rocky?” “Eh?” “Rocky Balboa?” Dani perked up excitedly. “Oh, that is the guy who goes--?” He mimed throwing his arms up and shouting. “That’s the one, boyo.” “Hah! I wish to be like Rocky!” Dani announced, eagerly grabbing the offered string from Jamie. Van Damme nodded beside him in agreement. “Hold on, now, Rocky didn’t go around tying dicks together, bruv.” “That we know of,” Moe retorted.

"Yeah, I haven't seen any of the new ones," said Colin. “Creed was dope,” said Declan. “Michael B. Jordan pulled a plane in that one.” Jan scoffed. “You mean his stuntman pulled it.”

“I don’t like Rocky,” Richard added, though no one had asked. “Guys, we do not have time to argue,” Sam implored. He worried the spool between his hands, turning it about like a puzzle. “We have to be on the pitch soon.” “Sam’s right. We got to make a decision,” Isaac said authoritatively. “What do we think? And it has to be unanimous, it can’t just be a few of us out there with strings tied to our willies.” Everyone looked around the room, waiting for someone to speak first. Jan spoke first by dropping his shorts. “I do not wish to be tied to a bike if we are wrong. It is better to be safe than sorry. Hand me the string.”

---

Beard lowered his sunglasses. “Uh, Coach? You seeing what I’m seeing?” Ted watched in confused awe as the team marched out to the pitch like a clustered, confused, delicate group of tadpoles with red string hanging out of their shorts. “Roy, what the hell did you tell them?” “What?” Roy turned around. He stilled. His body tensed all at once, and every trace of an expression left his face except for his eyes. His eyes blazed with mirth. “The plan,” he answered. He walked away to give himself a moment by the water cooler. The HR write-up better be worth it. Ted turned to Beard. “Am I having a seizure? Was that in the plan?” The world’s carefullest procession was almost upon them. Beard pushed his sunglasses back up. “Best not to ask, Coach.”

---

The HR write-up was worth it.

[sameschmidtdiffname]

Hi! Kind of random, but I'm having trouble picturing something in one of your fics. I have read this fic multiple times (it's sooo good) and I cannot wrap my brain around it, either bc I'm a loser virgin or bc I'm an idiot 😭

It's in "Easy Money" where you say "He forces me to my side, turning me onto my stomach and hiking my ankles onto his shoulders." I feel like such a cringefail loser not being able to picture that LMAO

im also a little lost on the part where you say "[...] I throw my leg onto the back on the couch, giving him better access to fuck me."

If you're not able to explain it further that's totally fine lol. I'll just visualize it differently whenever I go back to read it. Either way, love your writing!

OKAY class, let's do some ~visualization ~ for 'Easy Money.'

Okay, so position number one:

So you're straddling Derek's lap, right? Now what he's gonna do is place his hands on your waist and he's gonna reposition (read: borderline body slam) you from straddling his lap to now laying flat on your side on the couch very quickly, basically like some wrestling shit. Motherfucker is manhandling. This is not gentle. Go from sitting, to side laying, like THAT. Now he's gonna turn you from laying on your side to laying flat on your stomach, (again, manhandling <3) so basically now you're in doggy style but you're laying down instead of on your knees. Now this is already fun and dandy, but what you're gonna imagine is Derek now grabbing your ankles and yanking them fuckers up, placing them on top of his phat ass shoulders while he fucks you from behind. So. Basically, your body is now contorted like a wheelbarrow. Kinda. Which may sound strange, but I promise you, you gotta try it some time. You'll go braindead.

Position number two! (Technically one since it happens in the story first, but-) :

So what that one is is you've got two people, Person A (Derek) sitting on the couch, dong out and actively penetrating Person B (you, pookie <3). Again, awesome, wow. But if you like some deep, gut fucking, uterus migraine inducing, you're questioning if you have to take a shit or if something has ruptured type jackhammering dick downing going on in your pooni, what you're now gonna do is while still straddling Derek, you're gonna take one of your legs and reposition it so that the foot of that leg is now resting of the backrest of the couch, spread eagle basically. So just a recap. You're bouncing on your knees, you move one leg (stay on one knee) to plant on the back of the couch, so you're basically keeping the shop open while he is just DOGGIN your shit, it's gonna HURT when you get off that climax high. But if he knows what he's doing, it's worth it! (Get ibuprofen on hand before you try this.)

Anyways, I hope this helped! And incase you're now sitting here, the positions clarified, thinking "Jesus Dani, who would willingly do this?"

Me.

Don't look surprised, I wrote the fucken donut fic. I have done so much worse sex wise. Just get a good partner and you're golden 🤌

Thanks for asking!! See y'all next time on America's favorite gameshow "Jesus Christ, Dani, what the fuck" the show where you degenerates keep cumming back! 💗

Visual reference for those who need it :)

[double-hoe-seven]

AFC Richmond as dads

Should all of them be dads? Probably not, but that won’t stop me from indulging myself.

Jan Maas

He is over the moon excited about it.

He’s almost as happy as he is scared shitless (but you’d never know he was scared).

As soon as he’s able to, he’s bringing that baby to Nelson Road to introduce them to everyone.

He even brought everyone the traditional beschuit met Muisjes to announce your baby.

He’s a pretty goofy dad, very playful and amusing for them.

Thanks to his height, your child misses nothing (but the same can’t be said for the people behind him.)

Jan has a very loose approach to parenting. He likes to let them make mistakes so they can learn from them.

Of course he’s there when they need and want him but he isn’t going to be over protective. They’re gonna fall when learning to walk or riding a bike and they’re gonna make mistakes.

Jan doesn’t want a perfect kid, just his kid is good enough.

Isaac McAdoo

Fucking Isaac.

He’s the exact opposite of Jan in the sense that he’s very overly cautious but about the wrong things.

He’s a nervous wreck about them learning to walk and run because he worries about them getting hurt but he’s also not good at remembering to latch cabinets closed or even close doors all the way.

He loves the baby with every fiber of his being but once they learn to walk it’s game over.

That child and any others are going to run laps around him.

He really thought he’d be able to keep up.

Bribes with Rolos.

He lives to see the two of you at the games.

Twins with the baby every so often and he had a special onesie made that looks like his jersey.

Sam Obisanya

He’s gentle.

He’s the parent who has full on conversations with the babbling infant.

Bedtime stories every night.

He doesn’t enjoy putting the baby down, his favorite thing is when he’s relaxing and the baby is just on his chest/in his lap.

Sam is all about the bonding experiences, he wants to have as good of a relationship with his child(ren) as he does with his own father. He wants to be the best father he can be.

His face really lights up when someone, anyone, asks about how you and the baby are doing and there is no off button for that.

Richard Montlaur

Another parent who has full-blown conversations with the baby.

He’s about halfway on the strictness spectrum.

Richard really wants them to be able to do things and learn on their own within reason, like he was raised.

But that being said, the second they’re old enough, he is taking them to his parents farm to show them everything.

He can be a goofy dad but he prefers to do it in the privacy of your flat.

In all honesty, he gets a solid B/B+ for his parenting skills.

He does have to call his parents a lot for advice because when it’s just him and the baby, he doubts himself.

Jamie Tartt

Scared. Shitless.

Jamie would rather jump off the London bridge than risk doing something to mess up the kid so he’s incredibly overly cautious.

He calls his dad for advice.

I’m just fucking around. He’d rather move to Texas than call his father for parenting advice. He actually calls Ted.

And side note, Ted answers every single time. He answers all of Jamie’s questions no matter how stupid they may or may not be.

Jamie holds the baby as they’re made of glass because for the longest time he’s afraid just breathing wrong will make the baby hate him or mess them up.

He has so much love for the child but for the longest time its overshadowed by his anxiety.

Once he gets a hold on the anxiety though, he’s just the ultimate girl dad. 

He excels whether or not he thinks so and that baby loves him.

Dani Rojas

Dani is the most fun parent.

There’s no crying fit he can’t stop.

And thank god for it.

He’s more than happy to take the night shift unless he has a game the next day, which is fair.

He really enjoys singing the songs his mother sang to him when he was a growing up.

He gets a little lost sometimes, but his hearts always in the right place. 

He has high hopes they’ll like football and want to be around it, he really wants to bond over it but he won’t force it.

Thierry Zoreaux

He's kind of nervous because he’s so far from home and he always thought he’d raise his children around where he was raised so they can have the same experiences he did growing up.

He’s the one who reads parenting books and goes to the preparation classes.

This man is ready for everything.

He takes a logical approach when it comes to making decisions about the baby.

The most illogical thing he does is buy baby yeezys. Multiple pairs of tiny little yeezy shoes that he can match with his own.

Moe Bumbercatch

First of all, Moe knits so many blankets and booties and little toys for the baby its unreal.

He spends the entire pregnancy knitting things, including a little miniature version of his jersey to put on the baby’s teddy bear.

He likes to take the baby out and about to show them the city. 

Moe isn’t the best at keeping a schedule because he’s so easily distracted but he tries his best, he’s gotten a little better.

He truly enjoys playing with the baby and bonding and being a dad.

He loves being a footballer, he loves being a partner, and he loves being a dad. 

He’s good at keeping calm when things get hectic, and they do sometimes, but he always manages a level head. 

Colin Hughes

He’s not allowed to put the baby in the Lamborghini. It’s too much car for him.

He’s very fun, very active, very present overall.

He’s good at making the baby laugh and his camera roll proves as much.

Colin has the time of his life with the baby around.

He’s a good lad, great with any child you give him.

A+ in child rearing with a D in driving.

8/10 times he falls asleep with the baby on his chest but 100% of the time he will wake up if you take the baby to put in their bassinet 

Tag Team: @bdffkierenwalker​ @anarchistbeauty​​ @tsundere-cherry-girl​

[atopvisenyashill]

do u remember the characters who were complimented the most by their beauty in the books?

off the top of my head (and keeping in mind i’m still on asos and haven’t reread feastdance at least since the show ended so like 3-4 years) characters who get complimented most often for beauty are -

cersei

sansa

dany

margaery

jaime (not joking, he doesn’t get called handsome, he gets called beautiful. think more brad pitt and less george clooney)

joffrey (similar to jaime, altho tbf most of the comments on his beauty come from sansa)

loras

characters who are less complimented mostly due to them not being in every book but still notable beauties include-

arianne

catelyn & lysa - i’m like 80% sure people comment on lysa being beautiful when she’s younger & less so now, but don’t quote me there. i know people comment on cat being hot af when she’s younger, and multiple people remark on her hair so she clearly still Has It, she’s just not in a position where men are throwing themselves at her feet in the series given, ya kno, the war

melisandre

roslin frey

margaery’s lady’s court - her girls, taena, and alerie are all described at some point or another as being beautiful

taena of myr - wanted to mention her specifically, people tend to think of her as striking

val the wildling

ygritte the wildling - notable that this is incredibly conditional bc jon only starts referring to her as beautiful after they start sleeping together BUT the wildlings consider her beautiful bc of her hair

rohanne webber

characters noted to be beautiful by people who are clearly fishing for a compliment to pay her (aka, She Is Beautiful To Me, I Understand Her)-

jeyne westerling - i want to add her bc you have cat, robb, and jaime all acknowledge she’s “pretty enough” but are won over by her after talking to her, which probably speaks more to how she carries herself than her actual looks. but as a westerling stan, it’s notable To Me haha

brienne - i need to include this bc the “she could almost be a lady she could almost be a knight” is one of my favorite lines in the series, it makes me crazy and i think any post about beauty that doesn’t include brienne isn’t complete. that brienne gets the “brienne the beauty” moniker bc she’s ugly even as jaime keeps thinking about how she’s beautiful in some way or another is, imo, notable in how george sees & defines beauty (very much in the eye of the beholder, and that love can make you search for beauty in someone who is objectively not beautiful according to The Societal Standards)

arya - ned compares her to lyanna (and obviously ned isn’t gonna tell his daughter “you’re an uggo my sister was hot as fuck tho”) & gendry & edric both get a lil flustered over her

ellaria sand - noted that she’s not strictly beautiful but “something draws the eye” which seems like jeyne it’s about how she carries herself than her actual looks

jeyne poole - i mean. lots of comments about how she’s pretty ish and they’re clearly meant cruelly, almost as a way of tormenting her (no fancy last name, no wolf’s blood, not even pretty enough to get someone to rescue her)

pre-asoiaf mentioned in the main series for their beauty include-

lyanna stark

ashara dayne

missy blackwood

barba bracken

rhaegar targaryen

and pre-asoiaf characters noted to be beautiful in twoiaf or f&b-

rhaenys targaryen (the conqueror)

nymeria of ny sar

rhaena the lesbian

alyssa velaryon

jocelyn baratheon

viserra targaryen

rhaenys velaryon

rhaenyra targaryen - notable that she’s considered beautiful as a child but less so as an adult (bc westeros is full of fucking weirdos)

helaena targaryen - described as being more beautiful than alicent and that’s really it

daenaera velaryon - ditto on westeros being full of weirdos lol

jaehaera targaryen - again. she is like 12 when she dies but half the realm is commenting on this beautiful child. i hate these people so much.

baela targaryen

lady sam hightower

something that’s notable is that george makes a continued distinction between “pretty” and beautiful - alysanne targaryen is considered pretty but not beautiful, for example. so there’s people like jeyne westerling who are “pretty enough” as in, not ugly, not plain, but not, as jaime puts it “beautiful enough to lose a kingdom over” as in they are drop dead, model, helen of troy type gorgeous.

that’s also why i wanted to include the “fishing for compliments” type girls bc these women are very aware that they’re not pretty enough and often wind up carrying themselves differently as a response to this - if they can’t be gorgeous they’ll be so disarming, so striking, that people will spin back around to beautiful. ygritte is the biggest example of this imo because how jon perceives her beauty is very tied to how his relationship with her develops - he purposefully conflates her beauty with her violence bc he wants to find her violence beautiful bc that would make his life infinitely easier, and after she dies he’s very clear headed that she isn’t that pretty but she is TO HIM, she is beautiful in his memory because of his feelings for her. it makes him very wary of melisandre & val as a result - because he conflates beauty and violence in ygritte, it makes him wary of other harsh & beautiful women. or take lyanna, who is remembered often as being beautiful yet in ned’s memory, this beauty is part of what dooms her and he is outwardly hostile whenever people mention her beauty - to ned, that beauty brought only horror so he doesn’t dwell on it.

there’s lots of commentary here on what “beautiful” actually means from person to person, so while i would say the first group are more objectively beautiful, it’s also important to think about context - who is thinking they’re beautiful, why they’re thinking this, and what their relationship is.

[horizon-verizon]

https://www.tumblr.com/forgotten-fossilised/755642012938747904/the-h0td-writing-is-so-bad-how-can-they-go-on-and?source=share

I really can't understand why someone hates the targ so much that you just want to see them muddied, forgotten and destroyed and watch a show centered on them as protagonists while they get offended because *checks notes* They are treated as protagonists 🙃

These people realize that Arya being "AA" was a hole the size of the sun, right? Do they realize that Arya's girl boss moment was great on screen but it was done for shock value?

Martin can play and subvert tropes but he never breaks with the meaning and structure he is building 🙄

this stupid prophecy pissed me off on so many levels. "he called it the song of ICE and FIRE" ok but why tho. did it change its meaning over the years or what. I wonder if it's gonna be explained at all or did they just throw it in bc its the lazy convenient way to justify Rhaenyra's actions.

"Song" refers to war...as "dance" does. It's poetic language about the movement of swords in the air "singing" used almost like a metonym for war. And it refers to that final war b/t dragons/Dany/Westerosi against the unnatural figures that are the Others, or that person may know them as the "whitewalkers". This is something that has been known for literal YEARS before either show popped up from what I learned. This is what ASoIaF has always been about and what it's leading up to, ya dunce!

And Rhaenyra's actions? Why not Aemond, who was the one to truly end all possible means of peace by killing his own nephew...HER SON. For God's sake, he's known as the Kinslayer for all time in Westeros just as Cole is known pejoratively as the Kingmaker! Aegon is known as "grasping" by a highly respected and agreed-with Grand Maester in his tome called Lives of Four Kings. Aegon dies poisoned by his own council members, wanted a "better" Sunfyre, raped at least one girl, etc. PREWAR. He was always going to be bad locally and "nationwide". Meanwhile, what has Rhaenyra actually done to others unprovoked pre-war? Give it a rest, already!

The greens collectively, not her, triggered & enabled this war so they can disrupt the already established transfer of power. This is not a lie, but what happened.

if they really wanted to include it the great way would be to tie it with Cregan and Jace somehow? (their alliance being literally called Pact of ice and fire...) but nah apparently they just cut out the whole northern storyline.

...The Pact of Ice and Fire only exists and can exist bc the Song of Ice and Fire exists...it's meant to refer back to the Song and say the Starks and their northern MAGIC (direwolves, warging, greenseeing) will all be instrumental in the fight against the Others. No, the Starks are still not the main protagonist of this series even if they appear first and are focused on as one of the houses that has enjoyed the most privileges that now is divided and split due to bad decision making internally and out. The "whole northern stroyline" only matters within THIS context...otherwise GRRM is writing them to writer them. F&B is meant to contextualize Dany and her dragons; that includes all the Targs' purposes.

on a side note, as far as I remember the prince that was promised prophecy isn't inherently tied to the targaryens at all, and it definitely doesn't originate from Aegon, so I wonder if they changed that in the show canon (like Dany's dragon eggs coming from Syrax) or do the targs just believe that bc of course who else would be the chosen one if not them.

Already noted how this was a stupid ass take. Where else would the Song of Ice and Fire originated when it's been constantly tied to various Targs from Dany to Aemon the Maester to Aegon V to Brynden Rivers to the Dance to DRAGONS?! Who has dragons? The Targs.

Aegon is said to be the only source of this Song through his motivation to conquer Westeros, where does that person think elsewise the Song came from?

People really be sacrificing their already-paltry literacy skills for sexism, classism, etc.

[bisexualfemalemess]

*HSMTMTS SEASON 4 SPOILERS*

Final episode. Oh, this is gonna kill me. Let’s go.

Poor ricky worrying about gina. HE WAS NOT HAVING DANI TRYNA JUMP IN LMAO. Ooh, there’s my babygirl G. Ricky being a supportive boyfriend, awww. EJ AS BOLTON, yasss. Gina wanted ricky to ask her to stay and he didn’t want to make the same mistake he did with nini, miscommunication trope, i hate it here. RICKY BOWEN IS A FUCKING MENACE. “hey, by the way, who the fuck are you guys?” Been asking myself this question for four years, we still don’t know. Awww, Ricky, baby. Ah, Monique coleman giving kourtney advice, aww cute. WISH WE WOULD HAVE GOTTEN AN ACTUAL THE BOYS ARE BACK SCENE. TIM, I’M UNDER YOUR BED. Ooh, rina paralleling troyella, babies. Why is everyone going to ej for advice lmao, even miss jenn. That boy is a freshman in college. Maddox is so pissed that ash and red could be back together. Madison knew hahha. MADLYN CONFESSION AND KISS, LET’S GO LESBIANS/ SAPPHICS! Also, the fact that ej carved their names into a tree, he knew since the beginning and was a supporter, 😂 Terri back off, gina’s already hesitant. Jealous ricky, awww. GINA JUST WALK AWAY, SHE’S SO GOOD, My gabriella fr. “Be good to her. Just please take care of her in New Zealand.” My boy loves her so much 😭😭😭😭😭😭. JENNZZARA ARE SO CUTE. NOT THE RINA LOOK EXCHANGE BEFORE MY BOY RICKY SINGS SCREAM. THEY’RE SO TROYELLA RN. Antoine is me. Aww not Benjamin touching his heart while watching miss jenn perform. JETNEY SCENE. MADDOX IS GOING TO NEW ZEALAND TOO WTF??? Aww, big red worrying about Ricky, such a good friendship. Ricky worrying about his future now that gina’s leaving. Rina right here, right now reprise version?! It work so well for them at this point in their story. My poor children, tim istg if they don’t get their happy end i’m suing. THE LOOK EXCHANGE AND GINAS SMILE AFTER THE SONG, DON’T MIND ME DYING ON THE FLOOR. HAHA MRS POTTER DID NOT LIKE THAT. WAIT ANTOINE IS ANDY??? WAIT ANDY AND RED???? ANOTHER RINA LOOK EXCHANGE DURING CURTAIN CALL, ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! andy screaming is me. DEWEY IS A SOFTIE OMG. AND A RINA CHEEK KISS! Seb 😭😭😭. Gina, my movie star baby. Ooof ricky’s speech hit me where it hurts. I hate it here. ITS OVER KOURTNEY SHUT UP 😭😭😭😭. G OH SHE LOOKS GORGEOUS AND THE WAY RICKY LOOKED AT HER AND MOUTHED ‘wow’. He’s in such awe of her, my otp. Oof, gina’s speech also hit me where it hurts. Not her calling jet out when it comes to kourtney haha. THE WAY SHE WENT THROUGH THE PEOPLE ONE BY ONE OH AND WHAT SHE SAID TO RICKY OMG 😭😭😭 “But with you I feel so seen, and so understood and so known.” THATS SO MUCH BETTER THAN ANY I LOVE YOU, OH THEY DESTROY ME. I MEAN SHE LITERALLY SAID “this one is gonna kill me.” The way the camera couldn’t find ej 😂😂😂. MISS JENN IS THEIR MOTHER, GINA CONFIRMED. THE RINA HUG AFTER HER SPEECH TO HIM PLS I’M ON THE FLOOR. NOT ASHLYN FINDING OUT MADDOX HAS TO LEAVE TOO. I HATE IT HERE. RINA AND MADLYN ENDGAME PLS. OH THE WAY RICKY’S VOICR BROKE WHEN HE SAID “I DIDN’T SAY I LOVR YOU.” OOH GO FIND THAT GUITAR RICKY. Ooh mack’s not doing Romeo and Juliette, ha. GO TELL YOUR GIRL YOU LOVR HER RICKY, GET THE GIRL. OMG RICKY! “Am i too late?” Some things never change. RICKY. CONFESSING. HIS. LOVE. TO. GINA. WITH. A. SONG. IN. FRONT. OF. REPORTERS. HER MOM. ALL THEIR FRIENDS. THEIR TEACHERS. HER BOSS. DON’T MIND ME ON THE FLOOR SOBBING HYSTERICALLY. THE LYRICS??? ‘Cause i love you fells a lot like high school and forever after that.”STFU. EVERYONE JOINING IN 😭😭😭 RINA ENDGAME OMG. RINI LOVE CONFESSION COULD NEVER. ITS HIS FAVORITE HAT SHUT UP. STFU STFU STFU THE EMBROIDERY ON THE TAG STFU. “Just like me.” RINA ENDGAME. OMG GINA MOVED THE MOVIE TO SALT LAKE BEFORE RICKY EVER EVEN SHOWED UP, RINA ENDGAME FR. AWW MISS JENNS STAYING TOO. RINA FOREHEAD KISS SHUT UP! Ricky is such a good boyfriend, helping her down. Terri finally approves! Ha. MISS JENN AND MR MAZZARA FINALLY. GINA WEARING RICKYS JACKET AHHH, cuties. BORN TO BE BRAVE NAWW. LAST RINA CHEEK KISS, IM FINE 😭😭😭😭 AWW THEY WENT TO DENNY’S. What a nice nod to nini. Omg the post credit scene STOP IT RN.

Seblos endgame ✅

Jetney endgame ✅ (kinda)

Madlyn endgame ✅

Jennzzara endgame ✅

MOST IMPORTANTLY RINA ENDGAME ✅✅✅ THEY CALLED US DELUSIONAL BUT WE MADE IT RINAS. THIS SEASON WAS FOR US. THIS IS THE BEST DISNEY SHIP THEY WERE SO INSANE FOR A DISNEY SHIP, OMG. OTP FOREVER, Golden retriever boyfriend and black cat girlfriend fr.

Question; Are we all in agreement that ricky definitely took over as Romeo after mack left the movie???

[redbelles]

twenty questions for fic writers

tagged by: the wonderful @carry-the-sky 💖

1. how many works do you have on ao3?

51

2. what's your total ao3 word count?

245,595

3. what fandoms do you write for?

i don't ever really abandon old fandoms, but so far 2024 has been all berserk (nothing posted yet, unforch) and masters of the air

4. top five fics by kudos

like a heartbeat drives you mad

the dreadful need in the devotee

and my body found the wind

stuck in colder weather

all the love you need

5. do you respond to comments?

yes! it may take me a hundred million years, but i appreciate each and every comment i get, and i often go back to them for a little jolt of "hey, people actually like your writing!" motivation when i'm stuck

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

lmao uh. known angst goblin meg redbelles here, but i honestly didn't have to do much work to the canon endings of robert baratheon (the clouds will form a crown) or judas iscariot (in the violence of our dreams) to make them even more horrifically angsty, so. one of those, probably!

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

i don't tend to go for out and out happy endings—i prefer bittersweet—but i feel like the answer is either the mercy wheel, which fixes dany’s gabarge season eight character arc, or tongue’s talkin’ riddles (sticky sweet), which gives chrissy and eddie a mostly happy future together instead of horrible deaths in deeply cursed hawkins

and! for what it's worth! the chimneys hardly ever fall down is going to end on a happy note! they're just going to have to Suffer a lot to get there! it's fine!

8. do you get hate on fics?

nope

9. do you write smut?

me, currently 3k into a m/m/f threesome scene:

10. craziest crossover:

i enjoy spitballing about crossovers, but i doubt very seriously that i'll ever write one

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i'm aware of, no

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

i've had offers before, but i've declined every time; they all wanted to host the translations outside of AO3, which is not something i'm comfortable with

13. have you ever co-written a fic before?

yep! keep calling me home is a really fun little round robin fic i wrote with three other authors a couple years ago

14. all time favorite ship?

i can't read suddenly.gif

15. what's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

shUT UP!!!!! I'M GONNA FINISH ALL MY WIPS!!!!!! SHUT UP!!!!! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!!

16. what are your writing strengths?

imagery, emotion, themes, dialogue

17. what are your writing weaknesses?

plot? never heard of her. also, i feel like i still suck at writing humor

18. thoughts on dialogue in another language?

to crib from a previous answer: unless you speak the language, it gets real dicey real fast. i personally avoid it unless a) it’s a canonical term/phrase, like all the faux-russian bullshit in the grisha trilogy, or b) i can check the grammar/usage with a native speaker or someone who is solidly fluent

19. first fandom you wrote in?

[redacted] way back ages ago on [redacted]

20. favorite fic you've written?

recency bias talking here, but i am so, so, so fond of the chimneys hardly ever fall down; i challenged myself to write the first chapter as one continuous scene (i feel like i sometimes abuse scene breaks to heighten tension), and honestly i think i nailed it. also, this sequence:

Maybe he is drunk. That would make sense. He’s going to wake up and find himself alone at the bottom of a bottle. Back in the cold blue, Fort shot to shit and tumbling from the sky like a wounded bird, trailing fire and screaming as she falls. Maybe he won’t wake up at all— maybe he’s dead in a potato field, a ghost who never made it back in the first place. His heart can’t fucking take it.

like, i'm sorry, but that's brutal! and i am so proud of it!

tagging: @sluttyhenley @littlelindentree @oatflatwhite @meyerlansky @ladywaffles

@charmtion @anthropologicalhands @jacyevans @thatworldinverted @thatgirlnevershutsup

and anyone elso who wants a go ✨

[vivianbernadetteaurora]

It was this person before she met Johnny Depp her life must have been so different, some People said that she was a chancellor and an opportunity, and with Capricorn in your chart, I’m not gonna deny this., because at the end of the day, don’t we all want to get to the top? Maybe I don’t because I like lounging in bed most of the time I’m writing to you guys. Nothing beats sleep right now. But my younger mind. Like he was this person, what did she do, when did she live, where did she say? How did that passwoRd, and how come he married her? Didn’t marry his wife who’s worked for so long

She is a firework and a live work of a person; I imagine her walking into the female strip club. She looks as hot 🔥 as she is, that she'll just have a couple of pills pop them up; Entyg with 🔮 Item .these rocks b banging, anddEads just daNi but with her girlbelievenot her girls, her best FriEnd’s girls, not too into it, and not having people you truly gel. Maybe he walks in some beautiful evening fated evening, and something in the stars has aligned up ..something dark mysterious, and beautiful. It’s not like they both wanted to party and they let met in the party world. Well, that’s how I know it. She is big on the lesbian scene, and in Spain Hollywood, you do need to be pansexual; by Mr Blind Item himself said he called her dead back then, but don’t always believe. Blinds but take them on. Don’t always believe something true happens in these ways, and the same stories come up.

,So in the beginning this sOrt of relationship starts with a bang and it ends in a series that’s Bangs, let’s say all court cases with these two. They start exciting, But you get told that they’re not real.

This makes it slow because you think that one person might truly feel something for that person whom I could tell everything from wasn’t real and wasn’t true.? Have I been lied to you the whole time.?

This is why it takes so long for people to walk away, and I usually think it takes two abusive people in a relationship; not always you’ll have somebody who just loses respect which sucks; u don’t need to feel like that around anyone, and sad in state affairs.

[arsenic-catnep]

I can’t wait for season two of HotD. I just want people to see that Rhaenyra is a muppet who really doesn’t do anything important and Jace, Daemon and Mysaria literally carry all the wins on their backs. Like home girl just sat there throwing out orders and taxing people for nothing but to pay for her big feasts.

“Well Aegon did such a good job fighting. Permanence disfigured and infertile.” He still fought… this is the guy who wanted fuck all to do with the throne and literally had tears streaming down his face walking towards it. He still fought for his family, he may not have been good and he knew that, he knew he couldn’t fight, he stopped training to drink and fuck whores but he still fought for the throne and his family. That must tell you on it’s own how much he actually cares for them, Rhaenyra say on her arse and did nothing, she had a dragon you’re telling me she couldn’t of blew some fucking fire on them?

And having people refer to Rhaenyra as Maegor and Daenerys is literally insulting towards them. Maegor was a mean son of a bitch, he did everything, he did it, he went out and did he was cruel and did not care for consequences but he did everything for his throne, he wouldn’t sit there and let other people rule it hoping they respect his right. He’s just go out and make sure people respect his right. Daenerys saved multiple people and freed a lot, everyone saying she’s mad but she had to build her family from the ground up and gain everything, nothing was handed to her she earned it, she went mad in the end and honestly, so would I if I went through what she has. They’d both be fuming being put on the same level as her.

Anyway, rant over, how’s the new job been lovely? X

Yes! The new job has been great! Thank you.

Yeah unfortunately I think they're gonna have Nyra be a girlboss in season 2 which on the one hand is great bc Emma will slay but not great bc it will just divide people.

Like you can really tell the people who read the book before HotD was out and the people who only got into F&B after the show aired.

I get it. I love Rhaenyra and I want her to be a badass but that's just not who she is. She's a spoiled lazy ass brat.

The only similarities between her and Dany are their last name, hair color, and the fact that they both had deformed stillbirths.

That's it.

I also hate when people say that Dany and her dragons are Nyra and her strong boys reincarnated.

Like bitch no. Dany is Aegon the Conqueror reincarnated and Drogon is Balerion reborn. It's also suggested that Rhaegal and Viserion are Meraxes and Vhagar reborn respectively. Which would mean that Jon could possibly represent Visenya, and perhaps Young Griff could come into play as Rhaenys but that's a huge stretch

Dany is also azor ahai but that's an entire different rant/conversation

[finitefall]

Rhaenyra, tyranny and misogyny

I’ve got a few messages after talking with nonnie here and here. Instead of answering multiple times, I’m gonna answer in this post and say what I personally think about Rhaenyra, calling her a tyrant, and how people see it as misogyny. The following messages are from four different anons:

Anon #1: The thing about Rhaenyra “being a tyrant” is also that we’re literally being given the story as told by the “victors” and I don’t think we’re intended to take the words of Fire and Blood as unbiased documentation. She’s framed that way because of how Westerosi nobles view women (and targaryens) not because of how George views women. There’s *clearly* a deliberate POV being employed there

Anon #2: Different anon but I've also got issue with the word "tyrant" being thrown around for Rhaenyra. While it may fall in line with some limited official definition in like literally 1-2 of her latest actions, it is kind of tasteless to ascribe the term that fits actual Hitler in RL or at least the actual Maegor in ASOIAF, and all the intentionally, unrepentant cruel and inhuman actions they entail.... with a woman tragically described as mistreated and betrayed so much that assuming the worst and lashing out has become more natural to her than otherwise.

Anon #3: I admit I also agree a little bit with that anon,the way George wrote Rhaenyra feel a bit misogynistic,specially the Nettles thing and the implications,it’s something many people have said since F&B launched, and also how he favored Daemon to an extreme,for example he was the instigator of a heinous crime,killing a child,but the text never punished him in the slightest,on the contrary,he got the girl,had a last honorable deed and died a hero,he was definitely George’s favorite lol in comparison to Rhaenyra’s end the favoritism is staggering and I can’t help to think it’s a bit sexist.

Anon #4: It’s a disappointing you can’t see how GRRM was/is misogynistic in some aspects,and Rhaenyra was clearly an example of it. The man is an old dude it’s not very difficult to see where he is coming from,the story is misogynistic against Rhaenyra is not a woke point?is the truth, George felt more comfortable giving everything to Daemon and humiliating the female protagonist till the end,so feminist! He is probably gonna do the same to Dany.

Rhaenyra started as a good person, as far as we can tell. Known as The Realm’s Delight, she was described as proud, stubborn, quick to anger and never forgetting a slight. None of this made her a bad person: there’s absolutely nothing wrong with those traits and there are far worse people to deal with. She didn’t do anything wrong before the Dance: the story is literally about her being usurped because she was a woman. Alicent and all the Greens commited treason because of misogyny, and GRRM is very clear about this both during the Dance and in the ASOIAF novels (where Stannis calls Rhaenyra the usurper while Arianne knows she was the usurped). He’s not being very subtle about the fact that Rhaenyra was usurped because of the Greens' ambition, their greed, and of course their misogyny.

“She was my only daughter, and they killed her. They stole my crown and murdered my daughter, and they shall answer for it.”

Rhaenyra and the Blacks had every reason to not accept this treason. The Greens started the war, not them. The only right side in the Dance of the Dragons is the Blacks, not because of who our favorite characters are. Because it’s not a “who’s your favorite war criminal?” story, it’s the story of a woman who was usurped because she was a woman. I’m not sure we’ve read the same books from GRRM if you didn’t see the misogyny being pointed out. Rhaenyra’s line survived, while Aegon’s line didn’t. The message is pretty clear here too. GRRM didn’t make the Green’s line go extinct without reason while having Daenerys, a heroine in the ASOIAF novels, being Rhaenyra’s descendant.

Rhaenyra lost all her children except her two sons with Daemon. She could have been a good Queen, but her traumatic experiences led her down the wrong path. Can anyone say they would have been better, done better than her after what happened? Unless it happened to us, we can’t. Rhaenyra isn’t an example of what happens when a woman gets to power and let it destroy her, she’s an example of how someone can be destroyed and become a tyrant after going through too much. They didn’t exactly have therapy back then.

What’s a tyrant? Let’s just look at the definition. According to the Cambridge dictionary, a tyrant is a ruler who has unlimited power over people, and uses it unfairly and cruelly. According to the Oxford dictionary, a tyrant is a person who has complete power in a country and uses it in a cruel and unfair way. The other dictionaries all have a similar definition. Did Rhaenyra, as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, can be considered as the one having the most power over people and in her Kingdoms? I’d say yes. Was she cruel and unfair during her reign? I’d also say yes. Unless, of course, we decide that no, the taxes and fees making the people of KL suffering, the executions and feeding corpses to dragons, the heads upon the spikes above the city gates, ordering the murders of Addam and Nettles without proof of treason, is neither cruel or unfair. Or was entirely made up, in which case we can’t criticize HOTD writers for saying the events in the books aren’t reliable and that’s why they changed so much about, say, Alicent.

GRRM made no secret of Daemon being his favorite character, but he’s not framed as a villain for the simple reason that we already know he can do awful things. Rhaenyra was a good person at first while Daemon has always been a morally grey character. Literally no one is surprised by Blood & Cheese. We know what Daemon is capable of, especially when it comes to avenging his family. Note also that while his death is seen as heroic because he finally avenged Luke, he also dies as a kinslayer. I’m not gonna shed a single tear on Aemond, but being a kinslayer is literally the worst thing one can possibly be in Westeros. Who else is a kinslayer? Aemond and Aegon II. Not exactly good guys.

Rhaenyra’s story is a tragedy. I love her. She’s an interesting character as well as someone you still feel for no matter what she's done during her reign. She could have taken a bath with the blood of her enemies and it wouldn’t change the fact that we have absolutely no reason to believe she would have become a tyrant if not for the Greens’ treason. She could have decided to eat with corpses at her table and I would still feel for her and curse her half-brother for killing her, especially in this atrocious way. She could have done literally every cruel, atrocious thing you can think about: she’s still the usurped, Aegon II is still the usurper, the Greens are still greedy, misogynistic traitors, meaning the Blacks are still the right side of the Dance of the Dragons.

Now, if you believe GRRM is gonna write Daenerys the same way... it would mean throwing the previous ASOIAF novels out the window. Daenerys has already proven that even after all she’s endured, she would not become a tyrant. Her story is the exact opposite of a heroine turned villain: she could have, but she didn’t. And besides both of them being Targaryen Queens, Dany and Nyra just don’t have much in common at all. Daenerys Targaryen is literally one of the characters GRRM loves to write about the most (the first one is Tyrion, then it’s a tie between Dany and Arya).

[stormcloudrising]

So sansa is gonna be the villain as a corpse queen with night king jon? they probably will d*e then since every story needs that. i always had the idea of arya having this type of legend love for the songs simply because no one expects it out of her and bc she is like known dead and no one knows KNOWS her which it serves the town folk legend when the story changes everytime and it’s like almost non believable because no one really knew her. but gendry and arya is literally the most normal and healthy relationship ever so Arya’s story could be more grounded and realistic since her character is more practical. so she would probably be continuing the stark line giving how she looks like a traditional stark and be in the end one of the smart minds getting through the world after the others and the winter and everything. we also have that huge pack of direwolves with nymeria as the queen. I think you mentioned a love triangle between two sisters which isn’t something I didn’t think before. Especially since arya says how sansa has everything. Jon returning and being darker, dying bc of Arya who turned out to not even be Arya, Arya being with another (Gendry), having Winterfell and being queen could be the sansa corpse queen and Jon Night King actually being together because of Arya.( maybe Sansa won’t have everything because Jon always loved Arya more sort of the Cat/Petyr/Lysa dynamic but reversed. And I can see Sansa giving everything for a love for the songs. Meanwhile Arya is more realistic and more into doing her duty. Kind of reverse with how we started where Arya is the wicked one who is always in the wrong and is alone meanwhile sansa is the good dutiful one who is almost to having everything friends loved be a queen etc. And it works in my opinon. Sansa is no queen or leader. She can be the beautiful tragical lady of the love songs just how she always wanted. And arya can be the queen of wolves who will also make history and be written in the books. She can be a leader most definitely. I also predicted how it’s only probably arya is gonna be alive by the end. like dany, cersei, sansa, are probably gonna be dead and only arya be the one alive. This is so long. Anyway byee~~

Hi Nonny,

Thanks for reading the essay and for the ask.

If you are asking if I think that Sansa and Jon will be dead as in permanently at the end of the story, then my answer is no. I think that like on the show, they will survive. 

Specifically, regarding Sansa, if you are asking whether she will die, I can’t rule out that possibility. However, if she does, I believe that like Jon, she will return. Her death could also be symbolic, but I think that there is a good chance that it could be literal, and then she returns.

The reason that I can’t rule out the possibility of her dying is because as I’ve noted in various essays, the myth of Hades and Persephone is wrapped around the in-world myth of the Night’s King and his corpse queen, as well as the arcs of Jon and Sansa, and House Stark. Therefore, in some manner, Sansa needs to descend to the underworld. It could just be her descending to the lower levels of the crypt with Jon, which is something I think will happen, or it could be more.

Jon had to die to become NK/Hades, character…ruler of the underworld. The same could be true of Sansa, but as I said, it could be just a symbolic death like the one Persephone experienced in the Greek myth. Either way, she must return as Persephone did.

By the way, that’s why I predict that unlike on the show, Jon will never go down South to meet Dany. He’s never going to go to either KL or Dragonstone. The farthest south I expect Jon to make it is to the Trident when Ice does battle with Fire. I don’t even think that he will cross the river as he will symbolically be leaving his northern underworld demesne. 

Symbolically, that’s why Ned, Brandon and their father, Rickard died. Ned, the previous Lord of the Icy Underworld crossed the Trident and overstayed his welcome. Brandon and Rickard, crossed and went into the lands of the enemy without an invitation or an army behind them. 

On the other hand, Torhen, the Brandon who ruled after him, and Cregan all crossed at the invitation of the southern ruler and then promptly left. They didn't overstay their welcome. When Jon comes down with the northern army, he will be coming to do battle and thus will not be invited across. 

Funnily enough, even though Sansa represents the icy corpse queen of the underworld, she can cross the Trident because like Persephone, she is also of the South and the land of fertility. I would not be surprised if she is the one who crosses and parlays with Dany. She represents Winter and Spring. She’s balanced. In fact, that’s what the Starks represent. They are the balance that’s necessary to bring things full circle and reunified the realm and sort out the issue with the seasons.

If you’ve read any of my previous essays, you know that I repeat ad nauseum that George is always consistent with his symbolism. Some of his symbolism and mythology is just there for world building purposes, as is the case of much of what you find in TWOIAF. However, the symbolism heavy symbolism in the central books and Dunk & Egg generally have meaning in the story proper.

Last weekend, I discovered again how true that is. I was doing a little work on my Florian and Jonquil series, and I started wondering about all the fire and water symbolism in Jon and Sansa’s arcs respectively.

Jon is understandable for obvious reason with his dragon ancestry, and Hades has fiery symbolism with Cerberus, his fiery hell hounds. Sansa is heavily associated with water, which makes sense if as I’ve proposed, she’s a greenseer and the corpse queen as I've proposed. George uses water to represent the green sea or the weirwood net and of course ice is made of water.

I realized that as the myth of Hades and Persephone were so closely tied to that of Night’s King and corpse queen, if Jon had fiery symbolism that matched Hades, Sansa’s water symbolism should find a match in Persephone’s tale as well. However, in all my readings, I didn’t remember coming across anything about the Greek Goddess and water, but then again, I had never specifically searched for any association between her and water. This time I did, and up it popped.

It was there all along and I just overlooked it because I had never considered Persephone’s water connection before. One of her names is Nestis, which means water. It was given to her by the Greek philosopher Empedocles. His teachings influenced Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates among others. 

Empedocles is best known for originating the cosmogonic theory on the creation of the universe based on the four classical elements, Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. These elements were the stand-ins for Hera (earth), Zeus (air), Hades (fire) and Persephone (water).

"Now hear the fourfold roots of everything: Enlivening Hera, Hades, shining Zeus, and Nestis, moistening mortal springs with tears." 

Of the four deities of Empedocles' elements, it is the name of Persephone alone that is taboo – Nestis is a euphemistic cult title – for she was also the terrible Queen of the Dead, whose name was not safe to speak aloud, who was euphemistically named simply as Kore or "the Maiden", a vestige of her archaic role as the deity ruling the underworld. Nestis means "the Fasting One" in ancient Greek.

—Wikipedia

Thus, we can see that George is again consistent. The fiery symbolism of Jon/Hades/NK is balanced by water symbolism of Sansa/Persephone/Corpse Queen of the Dead. And it’s Sansa, not Arya that he’s linking with Jon/Hades/NK as Persephone/Corpse Queen.

Regarding Arya, I think that originally, George did plan to make her the Persephone character to Jon’s Hades. However, his meandering garden style of writing led him to assigning that role to Sansa. 

Will there be a triangle between the two sisters and Jon? No. I don’t think so. I wouldn’t call it a triangle per se, but I think that George is sticking to his original plan of conflict between Jon and Tyrion over a Stark sister, but in this case, it will be over Sansa. That’s why he married her to Tyrion instead of Joffrey as he originally planned. 

While he’s not totally sold on the idea, Tyrion also thinks that Sansa could have participated in Joff’s murder and in setting him up to take the fall. Once he finds out that she was with Littlefinger, he will for sure think that she was involved and will want revenge, which portends conflict with Jon.

I do think that another Stark will suffer a permanent death in the books, this time because of Dany and Drogon’s fire. Considering her story arc as a Faceless Man and representative of the god of death, it would make sense if it was Arya.  However, I think it will be Rickon. 

I think Rickon will be the one because the foreshadowing is that Dany will kill and eat a fish. Arya is of course a Tully fish as well, but as has been a theme throughout her arc, she’s more like the Starks. Thus, I think the fish Dany and Drogon kills has to be either Bran, Sansa or Rickon. I don't think the first two dies, and thus that leaves only Rickon. However, I also think that Arya will kill one of the dragons around the Trident area, and I don’t rule out it being Drogon…especially if he’s the one that kills Rickon.

As for Arya and Gendry, I think that they will meet again. Will there be something romantic between them down the road? Possibly, but I doubt it. I think Arya’s tale may end very similar to how it played out on the show with her spending a few years at home in the North recovering and possibly carrying out jobs for the FM before heading west of Westeros. She won’t rule Winterfell. She doesn’t want to be Lady of a great castle. As she told her father, “that’s Sansa,” not her. 

Sansa is the Lady of Winterfell. That’s the reason behind her direwolf’s name, and why Lady’s bones were returned to the north to Winterfell when she was killed. Sansa became Lady of Winterfell even before she has returned North.

There are many tragic aspects to Sansa’s story, but she’s without a doubt, a leader. We’re shown that over and over in the text from her saving Dontos from Joffrey to her calming the ladies and some of the men during the Battle of the Blackwater among other instances. I think that you are under the mistaken impression that to be a leader, you must be a fighter like Arya, but that’s as far from the truth as it possible to be.

I also put no value in the arguments that Sansa was mean to Arya. Yes. The sisters fought. Yes. Arya is jealous of Sansa and thinks that she is good at everything. Nonetheless, that is not Sansa’s fault, or because of anything she did. Arya is not interested in being like Sansa and doing what's expected of the Lady of the manor. That why try as she did, she never succeeded in being seamstress or learning the names and sigils of the various houses. That's not where her interest lies.

The sisters are different as the sun and the moon, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Most sisters are. Most sisters also fight and sometimes call each other horrible things in anger, but at the end of the day, they love each other. This is the case for both Arya and Sansa. We know this because we get their thoughts on the page. And when they reunite, because of what both have been through, they will understand each other a bit more, and love each other a whole lot more. They will be pack.

[navree]

Question for you, oh ASOIAF/F&B analysis queen: Do you think GRRM will ever actually finish ASOIAF? I feel like no, and like he should just hire his former assistant (half of James S.A. Corey) to finish it because GRRM clearly doesn't want to (or feels pressured from the reaction to the show idk). I know you appreciate Dany as a character - do you think that, if the books ever actually did continue (lol), she would've ended up like she does in GOT? (Also, side note: sometimes I think you interpret female characters in ASOIAF with more nuance than GRRM himself appreciated/intended, but maybe I'm just not giving him the benefit of the doubt.)

Unrelated: I don't watch HOTD (I just like Rhaenyra because Emma D'Arcy is a great actor), but sorry they did the B&C scene incorrectly. They should've owned up to the choices Team Black makes.

So, the thing to know about me is I am an eternal optimist. Not unrealistically so, but I am someone whose first instinct is that things are gonna work out in my favor, even if it takes a while. So I do think that GRRM is gonna at least finish The Winds of Winter, if only because he has been actively working on it for, like, ten million years. I'm a bit more iffy about A Dream of Spring, if only because George is not a particularly young man and I wouldn't be shocked if he ended up dying of old age before completing it, especially since the length of wait time seems to double with every new release. If TWOW gets finished this year, than we're supposed to expect ADOS by, what, 2044? By which time George while be in his mid-nineties? Winds also doesn't need to solve every dangling plot thread, since it's still not the last book, which is good because I think part of the issue and wait time, based on George's context clues, is that he's kinda written himself into a corner on at least one key thing and has been struggling to figure a way out of it (along with what I assume is more pressure due to the show's catastrophic ending).

I think it's possible we'll see a version of what we saw in the show with book!Dany, because the issue most people had wasn't necessarily with how Dany's arc ended, but the steps taken to get there, which were rushed and sloppy and made no sense and grotesquely out of character. But I think it's going to look very different, because the show and the books literally cannot end in the same way. The choices made in changing character motivations, character storylines, and even straight up cutting arcs and plots and whole entire swaths of people means that ASOIAF is an entirely different narrative to GOT, and the stories cannot line up in their conclusion. That's part of what sunk GOT, David and Dan knew key beats of how the story ended, but had switched around so much in getting there that all these characters are functionally different people in a different plot, so trying to force them into book storylines didn't work. Like, the whole thing with "the bells". There is a character in the books, Jon Connington, who has a trauma response associated with the bells of King's Landing that could lead to him making dumb decisions that would eventually result in the destruction of the city. But the way that would go about in the books is nowhere near what we saw in that fuckass show. @turtle-paced has a post about how that would work that I cannot for the life of me find but the gist of it is that there will be some bells ringing to signify surrender during the conflict between Dany and Aegon/fAegon, but that Connington will likely ignore it and keep fighting because trauma response, Dany will then continue hostilities herself in the face of that, and at some point the fires involved, cuz she has dragons, are going to reach the cache of wildfire Aerys hid all over the city and blow everything sky high, because that wildfire has been given way too much significance to not matter. Very different from Dany seeing abject surrender and just deciding to become She-Hitler on a whim, because it involves characters that the books set up, like Jon Connington and Arianne Martell and Aegon/fAegon and the involvement of the Golden Company, who were literally all cut from the show. So Dany likely will have a moment where she causes mass destruction in King's Landing, she might even have a moment where she rules and might exhibit some darker tendencies, and she might die (I'm still on the fence on whether that'll happen or not), but it's not gonna be like we saw in the show, and the circumstances of any death on her part is going to be entirely different.

I probably do give more nuance to most characters, especially Fire&Blood characters, than GRRM intended, it's that eternal optimist in me that wants to believe that stuff is well written. But for F&B I at least allow that part of it is straight headcanoning because of how muddled and sparse the information is, especially when it relates to characters from the Conquest. Is there any evidence in the text for my firm belief that Visenya was a lesbian and the real "love triangle" was her and Aegon both super into Rhaenys? No, there is not, but I will go to my grave believing it.

God I wish Emma D'Arcy was in more stuff so I could see more of them, they're so good and I'd kill to have them act out scripts that are, like, well written. Honestly finding out the leaks about how they were doing Blood and Cheese really turned me off of watching season 2 even though I was tentatively back on board due to the Aegon dad stuff, because it's just badly written, and the cop-out excuse of "oh there's some stuff you can't legally do with kids involved" makes no sense because y'all are making a TV show, you're filming, you know editing and cuts and multiple takes and different angles exist. Do you actually think that D&D were having Lena Heady and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau simulate graphic sex, including elements of nudity, literally right in front of ten year old Isaac Hempstead-Wright? No, of course not, they edited that together from two separate takes, oh wow how novel that's never been done before. And they did that because Bran catching the Lannisters fucking is, like, important to the plot, and honestly Blood and Cheese doing what they did in the way that they did it is too. It turns the smallfolk hard against Rhaenyra and her faction, which is important because it's a smallfolk uprising that leads to her fleeing King's Landing and ultimately dying and losing the war, and it's part of a broader trend in ASOIAF about how monarchy is a bad system. Rhaenyra sanctioning Blood and Cheese and not punishing Daemon in the slightest for this egregious action shows that she is not, in fact, the right choice for the Iron Throne. And neither is Aegon. Because there's no right choice, because this war specifically was entirely useless and that's why, narratively, it's the beginning of the end for House Targaryen, and broadly because birthright monarchy is a scam and should not exist. There's a reason why all the kings who've sat the Iron Throne in ASOIAF are bad, that Tommen is a bad king, that Joffrey was a bad king, that Robert was a bad king, that Aerys was a bad king, that even a lot of claimants aren't really gonna be good kings (Renly was an idiot and Stannis, for all I love him, is too hard headed and rigid). And conversely, there's a reason why the rulers we see who are the best morally tend to be the ones who've come the closest to being democratically chosen, Robb was chosen by his bannermen by popular decree, Jon was elected by the Night's Watch in a democratic vote, Dany was willingly followed by free men and women who were given the option not to (and even all three of them have issues when it comes to ruling and are far from perfect monarchs). There's not really such a thing as a "good king", not firmly, because a monarchy is inherently unjust. Rhaenyra's claim is inherently as illegitimate as Aegon's, it rests on "Daddy said it's mine so it's mine" rather than "Mommy said it's mine so it's mine", because that's how hereditary monarchies work and that's bad. And having Rhaenyra allow acts of senseless brutality in her name due to personal hangups is a part of showcasing that. There's no good side in this civil war, there's no good and righteous claimant, and whitewashing so much of Team Black's actions weakens the overall story (but at least makes their stans look like the hypocrites they are, considering they were all about book purity when it came to, like, the concept of sapphics in Westeros but now all the people chanting "we support all of Team Black's war crimes after that boring ass plank of wood got eaten" have gone dead silent about the deviations when it comes to making Daemon and Rhaenyra not be monsters, shrug dot emoji).

Also, how are you, as a writer, gonna say that the core of the story is Rhaenyra and Alicent, and then not include Alicent in Blood and Cheese? Like, she was there, she was physically attacked, by this thing that happened as a result of Rhaenyra's wants and wishes! And you don't do anything with that? You don't want to give Emma D'Arcy the chance to perform that delusion conflict, that she wanted revenge but didn't even get it, and worse, someone she loved so dearly, still deep down loves so dearly, was assaulted and put in real danger as a result? If the leaks are true and Rhaenyra and Alicent are gonna have a secret meeting in the next couple episodes, imagine how wonderful it could be if Rhaenyra has to confront that not only has her side hurt Alicent emotionally in torturing her daughter and murdering her grandson, but physically as well. Imagine Rhaenyra, full of righteous "the throne is mine" crap but having to confront the still healing physical wounds on Alicent's body. It could be so good for Rhaenicent character interaction, even for Daemyra character interaction if they wanted to still whitewash Rhaenyra and have it be Daemon going off script against her wishes, but at this point I'm not entirely sure Ryan and Sara are good at their jobs.

[4rainynite]

Danny Phantom Enemies Headcanons

This headcanon is gonna be about the many characters from the series Danny Phantom and see what their relationship with Team Phantom would be in the series ranging from: ally, neutral, and enemy. Now, it’s time for the enemys, enjoy. Allies here and neutrals here!

P.S. Sorry this took so long to due, real life comes before making headcanons. Enjoy!

Warning : Some character explanations will be super long, mentions of death, and other things rated PG-13.

Enemies:

Skulker - He was one of Team Phantom's first villains and was obsessed with hunting Danny for his pelt (GROSS!) and for being a Halfa. Skulker obviously doesn't care about who or what he hunts especially if a child or an endangered animal is his target. Once it's revealed that Danny isn't the only Halfa around (Not just Vlad and Dani) I can see him giving Danny 'the reason you suck speech' about how Danny is no longer special or worth his time hunting, which is a relief for Danny, but they'll still fight each other. Skulker may over time have a villian's respect towards Danny and Team Phantom, but will never admit it. I have a theory that the only reason he never hunted Vlad is because Vlad bribed him with endless weapons if Skulker never hunts him and Vlad pays Skulker to hunt things for him. On the scale of villiany in the show Skulker is #4 seeing as he hunts for sport and how he has been dangerously close to killing Danny and others.

Nicolai Technus - As much as Technus is a mad scientist type guy, he didn't really have the drive to be evil until Danny planted the idea. Once the idea came to mind Technus went through without hesitation, he could've changed his mind anytime. He defiantly embraced his villainous role by manipulating Danny and Valerie's emotions to like each other knowing that Valerie likes Danny Fenton and hates Danny Phantom (a bold move, I must admit). Ans in the bad timeline he teamed up with Skulker forming an even bigger baddie. So, yeah, he's an enemy.

Walker - For a guy who's a warden and expects everyone to follow the rules he's a hypocrite. He makes his own rules for others to follow, kidnap children, putting that shock collar on Wulf and almost putting it on Sam, and framed Danny and made him public enemy number one in his own town! If the series continued like a court episode revealing that it was Walker who attacked the ex-mayor and his police ghost possessed many citizens. Thus, clearing Danny's name and some high council in the Ghost Zone (not the Observants one, but like a lower division council that handles the different ghost jails and domains) remove Walker from his position as a warden and he is a prisoner of his own jail. He'll obviously blame Danny and Team Phantom and wants revenge.

Penelope Spectra & Bertrand- Oh my gosh, where do I begin with her? After the trauma she caused during her first episode she's #3 on my DP deadliest villains chart. Before she even set foot in Caper High, Spectra has gone through many different schools sucking the students' of their misery/energy to make herself and Bertrand stay young by lying and humiliating them, it wouldn't surprise me one bit if those poor kids ended up committing suicide because of her. Heck, she tried to kill the students of Casper High in 'Doctor's Disorder' and Jazz during the pep rally in front of everyone to create more misery. She made Danny utterly miserable, tried to turn Danny against Jazz, and tried to vaporize Jazz, and made Danny question himself as a Halfa by calling him a freak. As for Bertrand he's basically her lap dog and has no problems resulting in killing to get what he and his boss want. I think we all can agree that these two need to stay away from everyone, but mostly children.

The Guys in White - Let's face it: Amity Park hates these guys! Every episode that they're threatening citizens and ghost. They seem to have no problem with collateral damage seeing how that tried to kill Gregor/Elliot thinking he was the ghost boy and destroyed the observation station. Unlike the Fenton's who'll pay for the damages they caused, the Guys in White refuse to pay a penny and use the excuse that they work for the government. The worst thing they ever committed was them trying to blow up the Ghost Zone which would destroy our world too. Overtime they'll waste too much money on ghost catching equipment and the citizens of Amity Park will get sick of them causing the organization to disband. With only Agents K, O, and the leader guy still around trying to capture Danny or any other ghost.

The Other Ghost Hunters - After, their encounter with Danny Phantom they most likely felt humiliated, and it only fueled their hatred towards ghost. But seeing how popular Danny Phantom is in Amity Park doing anything against him is a big no-no. So I can see them waiting for Danny to screw-up so they can catch him.

Control Freak and Lydia - Seeing as Team Phantom have ruined his circus and plan to take over the world it's a given that he's an enemy. He probably spent years going to every town with his circus stealing from banks, museums, and jewelry stores only to be stopped by a couple of teens would make anybody vengeful. I doubt he remembers that Phantom and Fenton are the same person after Danny erased everyone's memory, but he does remember the events. Seeing as Lydia and Control Freak are a couple she seems cool with whatever evil scheme he comes up with. I believe the two were dating before her death.

Prince Aragon - Let's see arrogant, was willing to marry a child (I'm aware that was a practice back then, but today absolutely not!), kept his kingdom imprisoned in time for hundreds of years, and was abusive towards his sister. I see him having more of a vendetta over Dora and Sam than Danny.

Hotep Ra - Was a backstabbing advisor who tried to takeover world.

Vortex , Undergrowth, Nocturn - All three are powerful elemental: weather (Vortex), earth (Undergrowth), and dreams (Nocturn) that connect not just the human world but the ghost world as well. In each of their appearance all three were able to takeout Amity Park in a short amount of time and gave Team Phantom a run for their money, until they learned a new skill to defeat them. Seeing how the Observants had Vortex on trial it's obvious he is super powerful! I wish there was a special episode where all three combined like Skulltech 9.9 to see what kind of damage they could do.

Pariah Dark - Guy was a tyrant king who ruled with an iron fist and was so powerful that a group of ancient ghosts had to imprison him in the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep to stop his reign of terror. He doesn't care if you're human, ghost, or halfa in his eyes he's above all. The guy transported Amity Park into the Ghost Zone and lead an army that could've destroy everyone and the world! Heck, Skulker didn't want to confront him, SKULKER, that really says something! Hopefully, no one will be stupid enough to wake him up again.

Dan Phantom/ Dark Danny - He has no humanity in him, destroyed most of Amity Park (and most of the world), committed two thousand evil deeds, and even tried to kill his family and friends. Dan Phantom has no redeeming qualities and seeing how the observants couldn't take him out without Clockworks assistance shows how powerful he is. Inever believed Danny's ghost side was bad; Danny is Danny whether he's Phantom of Fenton. I believe the guilt and stress of losing everyone he loved and the fusion with Vlad was what form Dan Phantom. Heck! If it were reversed and Danny killed his ghost half, he would've been Dan Fenton human serial killer. For everyone's sake he needs to stay in the Fenton Thermos forever!

Master's Blasters - Okay, we all know season three and the last episode were to put it lightly -something. But I have to ask: where did Vlad find these guys? I mean honestly, a trio of ghost hunters pop out of nowhere, are better hunters than Valerie and Danny, the second they arrive Amity Park just eats them up and are willing to pay for being saved despite how they feel about the GIW, seriously? If it weren't for the cancelation, I would've built them up that Vlad staged their hunting/ rescues to make them look better than Phantom. As Danny slowly doubts himself as a hero the Master Blasters start charging for the rescues. At this point of time Phantom and Red huntress are nowhere to be found so the citizens of Amity Park have no choice, but to pay. Skip forward to the ending (minus Danny and Vlad revealed to be halfas) where the Fentons, Phantom, and Red Huntress team up to protect Amity Park from both ghost and human threats it's revealed that Master's Blasters aren't as good as they appeared without Vlad's trickery. They most like vow revenge on Team Phantom and try to outdo them only to fall flat.

Vlad Masters/ Plasmius - Where to begin with, Vlad? Oh, wait, I know! Vlad had this whole scheme to keep Maddie to himself, make Danny and Jazz see him as their father, created clones to make a new family, take over Amity Park, and tried to kill/humiliate Jack on a number of occasions. Even in the alternate timeline when he finally marries Maddie he is crazy controlling of her. He's doomed Amity Park/ the world numerous times for power, attempted to kill Danny, Jazz, Sam, Tucker, and Dani who are children (would've killed Valerie too if he knew about her finding out his secret), has tried to discredit Danny, taken over Amity Park via cheating, used his ghost powers to gain his wealthy, the list goes on. Vlad does seem to have some regret which is something most of the villains of the show don't seem to grasp. His older self in 'The Ultimate Enemy' realized the error of his ways and helped Danny return to his timeline (Vlad did state that he could've killed Danny instead but choose to do the right thing). And judging from the end of 'Phantom Planet' and the cover of the book ' A Glitch in Time' he seemed remorseful. He's done many things that have endangered both ghost and human life just to mess with Team Phantom, only time can tell if he deserves redemption.

[wqintraining]

NEW MUTANTS: LETHAL LEGION #2 - THOUGHTS

I had so much fun covering the first issue, I thought, “Why Not?” and decided I’d do similar breakdowns for the rest of the series as it comes out. With its sapphic trans lead, Escapade, and writer, @charliejaneanders​, there’s no book I’m more eager to support and help spread awareness of right now. 

This issue sees multiple plots continuing here, with Escapade, Cerebella, Honey Badger (I’m still not calling her “Scout”), Morgan, and Wolfsbane still our leads as of this issue, but with the set-up and solicits we’ve gotten, it’s clear Dani and Karma will be getting more involved for the rest of the book. 

Starting with the A-Plot, probably my favorite thing about the previous three issues of New Mutants to star Shela, and this book so far, is how in nearly every scene, we get to see a new layer of her character. So often, fans will defend bland new characters by saying they “Just Need Time”, and my counterargument is always, “No, there are numerous modern characters who came out fully realized and captivating almost immediately.” 

We got a bit of this in the previous issue, but it’s made even more clear here that despite Shela often coming off as a typical quirky, goofy, teenage hero, she is an adult, she is an experienced veteran in her field, and she has lived a hard life with much more down-to-Earth trauma which has built responsibility. She may not like having to be all these things, and getting to act more like a kid is probably something she appreciates about Krakoa, but if she’s only teamed with less experienced heroes, this is gonna show. 

I’m unsure of what the writing is going for with Gabby so far. Gabby being excited and enthusiastic about beating up a bunch of villains? Nothing weird there. Being snarky? Right up her alley. But she has a weird mean streak throughout the issue that doesn’t feel right. Just a couple lines that don’t sound like things she’d say. 

I do like how she handled Nefaria’s tournament though. 

Sadly, Martha doesn’t get to do much this issue, and it’s to its detriment. While Shela and Gabby’s fights are fun, they take up so much of the A-plot that there’s no room for her. And with me not being particularly interested in Nefaria and his antics (mostly), sidelining the character who’s the whole reason this adventure is happening, and who’s emotional struggle is our hero’s primary motivator, hurts the issue. 

With that all said, now I get to talk about my favorite part of the A-plot, and the part that has me the most excited. 

To the shock of literally no one, it’s the part which involves Emma Frost. 

Not once, but twice in this issue, Shela directly compares Nefaria’s persuasive skills to Emma’s. Once is a joke. Twice tells me our young thief still has some unresolved issues regarding her former idol. 

In tandem with her other insecurities, it really is no wonder she allowed herself to get drunked-up by Nefaria. Against Emma’s speeches, she was able to bite back with bitterness. Against Nefaria’s, despite knowing what he’s doing, she still likes what he’s saying enough that she eases herself. 

Anders confirmed to me before this book started that Emma would not be appearing in it, BUT I really, really hope this is all going somewhere post-Lethal Legion. 

Onto the B-Plot, let’s start with the funny stuff because WOW did this get real dark, real quick. 

Of COURSE there are doomsday preppers for Mutants, of course there are.  Wonderful way to start the issue. 

 Cosmar basically realizing Shela has taken her place in the Lost Club’s main girl trio is sad, but also pretty funny in a meta sense. Hopefully Tashi can find another team to join. 

Also, Charlie, I know you read these, so I’m gonna ask one of the most common questions fans of these characters have: How old is Anole supposed to be? Shela and Martha are young adults, Gabby and Tashi are teenagers, and Rain Boy can go either way since it’s unclear if he died or not post M-Day, but no one really cares. Anole meanwhile is a longtime fan favorite, and between him simultaneously bartending at the Green Lagoon and hitting on Ahkiro, while also acting no older than Gabby and Tashi, and being referred to as a kid by one of his old classmates within the pages of New Mutants, fans have been deeply confused for years. 

I know writers sometimes aren’t allowed to speak on ages, so if that’s a thing here, I get it. If you can give an answer though, so many fans would love to know. 

Tangents aside, Dani and Karma’s entrance to the plot confuses me. I get Dani worrying about her kids, but are her and Xuan really freaking out because they don’t know where two grown women and their highly-deadly teenage friend are for more than a day? Hey, Dani, if you want to check on someone, how about your adopted son you haven’t spoken to in the last decade? If Josh has time to flirt with Gwenpool, he has time for you. 

Everything mentioned above is completely forgivable, however, because Dani and Xuan get the best damn panel in this issue.

Transitioning into the more dramatic stuff, we have Rahne. Wolfsbane has consistently been wonderful under Anders’ pen (really, she’s gotten consistently better writing in the past 3 years than she’d gotten in the prior 20), with so many great moments in this issue alone. I love how she helps calm down the sewer creature, wastes no time arguing with the doomsday prepper’s leader’s garbage, and is able to separate him from the rest of the mostly innocent people living in the sewers who need her help. 

Oh, Morgan, Morgan, Morgan. Since your first appearance, I have not liked you. I still don’t like you, even if you being Chinese, Jewish, and Asexual on top of being a trans man is pretty cool. 

However, progress may finally be getting made on making his less insufferable. At the start of this issue, he’s still his usual self, with 0 comprehension of what Mutants have been through (honestly though, man, with all your other identities, you shouldn’t be THIS blitheringly ignorant), but then...

...we get to the big “Oh shit” part of the book, as it seems like Rahne may be about to teach Morgan about The Massacre. 

This data page is amazing. I’m not sure if it actually fits the book tonally, but I love it. I’m not gonna go over the details of it just because it’s such strong prose, and you should really take it in for yourselves. It really makes you just imagine Jared walking through the woods on Krakoa, and seeing Greycrow, one of the people who brutally murdered him and his friends, making out with Kwannon, one of the War Captains charged with protecting everyone. Of course he wouldn’t believe he was safe on Krakoa (you know, along with all the OTHER reasons not to feel safe on Krakoa if you’re not one of the big, special Mutants)

Despite the various complains I had, I still loved this issue. With multiple issues now out I feel comfortable calling this my third favorite X-book right now. And when your competition includes Red and Immortal, third place is still a triumph. I can’t wait for the next issue, and I can only hope Marvel greenlights more just like this.