#and its hard trying to balance it

[kagooleo]

here's a finished belated bday comm for @wyvernity of their soulsilvershipping :D!!! I was honestly really happy with the turnout for the piece so I did go a lil ham on their faves (～￣▽￣)～

i've still got 2 commission slots open on my kofi for both chibi and sketch pieces if anyone is interested :V

[dirtytransmasc]

his ears (and tail in the few scenes it's really visible) help see through his facade of confidence and apathy. it helps us see when he's scared or angry or happy. it helps us understand that he really does love spider, that he is questioning his morals and actions, that he feels fear no matter how strong he attempts to look. the way his ears dip when he smiles at spider compared to just staying sorta neutral when he's just smiling to look charming. the way his ears flick fully back when Neytiri threatens spider and how he immediately relaxes when she lets him go. I could go on forever. his ears add so much complexity to his character.

his whole body language around spider make any heart hurt, he is looser, brighter, visibly happier (and showing off in the way only awkward and embarrassing 'cool' dad's can show off). his smiles are genuine, his whole face is smiling. He is naturally protective of the boy and genuinely enjoys his presence. his instinct to father is all over his face and it makes me so happy, cause all spider wants is a present father. I need to see him say 'I see you' to his boy or I'll riot.

then there's the sad part of this; he looks so conflicted when spider yells at him and when he leaves him after saving him, but he never goes after him (cause he respects spiders space and choice to leave, cause that's what love really is, wanting the best for someone). the whole time his ears are kinda tilted or sagged back, not pointed, like he's both stressed and defeated.

also I'm all for Quaritch redeeming himself, I think it could be in the way of like, he redeems himself enough to not be a villain/antagonist but not enough to really be one of the 'Good Guys'. I want him to connect with Eywa, and find that he's done trying to be the old Quaritch, to be what the RDA wants him to be (especially if it's for spiders sake). I need some sort of moral redemption plot out of this man and I don't care what it takes to get it (If I eat my words on this, I'll lose it)

I’m still here sobbing over Quaritch’s cute little kitty ears and how they lay flat at different times when he speaks or does literally anything at all 😭❤️‍🩹

Like kudos to JC and Co for making them more animal(?) and giving their ears/tails MORE movement like they naturally would 😭❤️‍🩹👌🏽

[mewniemoon]

Any cotl fandom pet peeves?

OoOoooo a question, lets see!

I think my biggest one is people who baby Leshy too much, especially those who headcanon him as autistic and give him the "He's just a shy owo cinnamon roll baby!!" treatment. He's a god of chaos guys cmon ;0; why are you characterizing him like he's a twelve yr old soft boy??

Do whatever you want, if it makes ya happy im not gonna stop ya! But it is most certainly not my cup of tea, and as someone who gets infantilized a lot (for multiple reasons) it can feel a bit cringe seeing someone headcanon him as autistic and then portray him like that

[vigilskeep]

the thing about dao is that the other origins are so, so good but not playing a mage is fucking unbearable

[accioepiphany]

So the third season really Killed The Bear’s momentum huh

[starry-bi-sky]

im pouring one out for every SVSSS fanfic writer out there who includes the system in their fics. this motherfucker is ANNOYING to write. and also im doing double for every writer capable of coming up with funny and quippy quest names, as someone who is neither quippy or witty unless the stars are all aligned and shining at 98.5 degrees east. that shit HARD

[puppyeared]

i feel like. theres designing a character with certain themes and motifs in mind, and then theres making a gijinka for the water bottle on my nightstand

[hellofastudysession]

am i rlly going to write a death note literary analysis when i could be doing other things

about the discourse going on in the tag abt "death note is acab and thats why the characters couldnt better the world with the note (/written in somewhat jokey matter)" vs "death note is trying to say we all have potential for evil, especially if you get a chance to insta-hurt ppl without repercussions, and it doesnt matter if youre a cop or not", i personally feel like it ignores the things that i like abt death note, which is "both of these things are true", and simultaneously "both of these things do not matter". the first part of this is dedicated to the first point, the latter to the last.

first point. i think its an important part of the message and themes (unintentional or not, and i lean on the former because... come on, can you really say the author intended you to not think of the cops as good people, at least compared to light and l) that light is a cops son, and that almost everyone who gets the death note is cop adjacent/thinks like a cop and is already corrupt/powerful when they get it (mello raised to think hed be just like l, yotsuba group is self explanatory; you cannot look me in the eyes and tell me teru "churchill" mikami, who was hand selected by light out of a bunch of rabid kira supporters, is a normal citizen). i appreciated the cop post bc its rlly important to not gloss over that aspect.

all of this would be an argument for "only someone like them would do something like this, and i am not like them, so im above them and immune to thinking about what id do with it", but... misa is the MOST important outlier in all of this bc her murders are solely selfish in nature and shes not doing any of this for "the greater good"!!! her nature of being an exception and still a very very bad person is really really important...

or it would be if death note gave a shit about her character at all!!! im not talking about her tragic side, im talking about exploring the ramifications of her killing people the way lights murders are (somewhat) explored. that would strengthen the message greatly! but shes dismissed and that weakens it overall. firstly, she's dismissed by the characters when l only sees her as a way to get to kira and basically shelves her the rest of the time. secondly, shes dismissed by the narrative when her character is gradually ground down to a stump and (not to sound perilously close to the bad takes ppl meme about) she never faces repercussions for her actions. every other character using the death note is treated relatively seriously, but misa just dies bc her love is dead. im not saying this isnt a... fitting punishment or that it isnt in character, but it doesnt fit snugly into the theme other people are talking about of "you reap what you sow" at all.

we do have something of an equivalent to misa's grayscale motives. surprise surprise, its light yagami. first is light's characterization in the musical (i will also note that misa never kills anyone in the musical). light's thinking is coplike, yes — he literally starts his first song by talking about "throw[ing] away the key" — but also, oddly enough, could be read as progressive and therefore sympathetic to tumblr ("let the corporations make the regulations / and hold no one accountable when everything gets wrong / let the rich and famous get away with murder / every time a high-priced mouthpiece starts to talk, his client gets to walk"). compare to the anime and manga, where his bigotry and pride and disgust come from a place of lukewarm dissatisfaction and boredom. the musical has much less time to play around with lights character, so it gives the audience something to immediately hook on. more on how that actually plays out later.

in the animanga, none of this is justified from the start. animanga light could say he was just killing people to make humanity way, way worse, and that wouldnt matter, because at the root of it, it was always his boredom that made him pick up the note. of course he actually believes in justice and believes hes doing the right thing (no, he believes he's doing the wrong thing, for the sake of the world... the right thing, because he is god...), but it was boredom at the start. all animanga light says about justice and righteousness and the law is a front in the end, bc he is exactly like l and misa — amoral. selfish. searching for entertainment. hedonistic. we know this. he kills naomi misora*. he kills lind l. turner. everything hes saying deserves to be dismissed from the beginning.

"but doesnt that mean you agree with the discourse post you wrote this post to argue against?" like i said, i agree with both of them! but i... still think its not right to reduce death note to the message of "the power to kill people is bad". because that is not exactly what the story is saying, even though that's literally its whole plot and therefore reaching that conclusion is self explanatory (lmao). let's look at the concept of mu. nothingness. "there's no heaven or hell". The Real Slay The Princess (Death Note Essay) Starts Here.

in light's final moments in the death note manga, while screaming about not wanting to die, he remembers that the first day they met, ryuk told light that "there's no heaven or hell. no matter what they do in life, all people go to the same place. all humans are equal in death". it is retroactively revealed that light knew this the whole time, operated under this knowledge for all the years we watched him — the knowledge that nothing he does is actually bad, that nothing any human does is actually bad, that shinigami are not "evil", that the universe does not care. that no one cares except humans. this oblivion absolutely terrifies him more than anything anyone could ever do to him. its what he thinks of before anything else as he flails there, screaming, dying. one could say everything he does after that day is him trying to escape that fact, or wrest control over it. but it doesnt work.

here are the lyrics of requiem, the musical's final song, sung over the bodies of l and musical light, a light who was at least somewhat good-intentioned at first: "sleep now, here among your choices / then fade away / hear how the world rejoices / shades of gray / gone who was right or wrong / who was weak or strong / nothing left to learn". this is the final message the death note musical and the manga chose to leave us with. there is no judgement. even after all that acknowledged hurt, after all the damage done, there is no judgement.

in the manga and anime alike, the world is just as fucked when light picks up the death note as when he dies. sure, we as readers can guess otherwise logically (and be optimistic, believing the world was never fucked regardless), but that's not what death note wants you to think. it ends with matsuda and another member of the task force noting how the world is worse again even though they killed kira (matsuda is clearly much worse for wear, but still determined), we see the shitty motorcycle band again, it ends with misa and a whole kira cult on a mountain even though kira died a long time ago...

its extremely important that light is never killed by any human or any aspect of the law. he is always killed by ryuk: a chaotic force completely detached from human sensibilities, one that does not care about good and evil. same with l; in the anime, manga, and musical, he is always killed by rems senseless, morally gray love (and you could argue in the kdrama that hes killed by love there too lol). justice is just a set dressing.

this is not just because death note is a tragedy, because good and evil can still matter in a tragedy. the theme of "nothingness" and "good and evil doesnt matter here" is also shown in a situation relatively unrelated to light winning or losing, or being good or bad. and its in fucking lawlight of all things. we all know ls not a good person. we know lights not a good person. this is tip of the iceberg death note knowledge. but the moment they start to interact, none of that starts to matter. textually, their relationship becomes more important than the people theyve killed and hurt. and the thing is? the thing is? THAT WORKS STORY-WISE. THAT'S ENTERTAINING. AND IT'S NEVER TEXTUALLY CALLED OUT IN A LASTING WAY. l and lights relationship, no matter how much i meme it, is genuinely important to the themes and "mu" because it makes it clear that despite all the pretensions, despite everything, this was never about good and evil. and it still works in the story. this is why death note is simultaneously a comedy — isn't the battle of good and evil supposed to matter more? well, fine, i'll keep watching this anyway. that suspension of disbelief comes crashing down the moment l dies, though, and a relationship built on nothingness (the "mu" sort, meaninglessness, not "character development" nothingness, theres plenty of character development) gives way to just nothingness (again, "mu", not light's post-l depression nothingness), forever.

(an aside: there is no one to root for in death note, and the only things to root for are either interesting character relationships, convoluted plots, or complete and total destruction: for everything to end so no more damage is done.)

not to say that death note does not encourage its readers to consider what damage they might do with the death note (obviously.), or that its characters never do. look at matsuda, a much easier heroic figure to latch on to than soichiro because of his unique place in the cast dynamic and because he's willing to consider both sides of the situation and kill light instantly for all he's done. its just that the story's own stance on the subject is... complicated by the existence of shinigami worldviews and by its own insistence that the world cannot change for the better.

also, this is not to say that this is executed well by the death note manga at all. it is a very strong tool, artistically, to establish and then violently remove any emotional connections between characters and make your story only about the exceedingly convoluted lengths characters go to to survive and catch each other so the reader can realize how ultimately pointless all of this is, but like... is that a good story choice if that's all you do? i would say not really. add in a good dollop of misogyny that destroys the second-to-last character who might actually be an interesting contrast to the rest of the cast's dull one-track focus on winning and justice, and youve got yourself a shitty story that... honestly still achieves what it went out to do, just not in a way id ever want to replicate.

anyway, back to the parts death note's actually trying to say. no matter what any human does in their life, no matter how they try to hurt or help the world, they all die in the end. hey, light, they all die in the end. once dead, they can never come back to life. and the seasons turn. and the world rejoices. and you say "goodbye"...

that's all.

no analysis of death notes overarching theme would be complete without nears final monologue, the definitive roast of light, the "you're just a murderer" speech: "what is right from wrong? what is good from evil? nobody can truly distinguish between them. even if there is a god." if we take this as talking about the actual god in the room (ryuk) as well as light, then near admits that humans will never be able to withstand these overwhelming forces and that, using justice and happiness and selfishness, they are just scrabbling to find meaning in things they ultimately have no control over.

but of course, near does not stop there. "[...] even then i'd stop and think for myself. i'd decide for myself whether his teachings are right and wrong." nears alright with not having control over everything, because near can still control nears own actions. these forces can and do exist, but they have no sway over nears own humanity — unlike light, who caved.

one of the creators of death note said they believe its message is "life is short, so everyone should do their best". the first time i learned this, i was like, thats... nice and optimistic, but an awful reading of the story! "life is short, so everyone should be desperate and striving like light yagami", who literally cut off other ppls lives for his own life? what character in death note are we supposed to strive towards when we "do our best"? they all do awful things with their lives! honestly, maybe they shouldnt have tried their best, if this is what their best is!

but with the view of "mu"... it makes a bit more sense. just a little. maybe.

there is no good and evil. there is only what humans think, and no matter what we do, we all die in the end. it is easy to be crushed and terrified by this in the same way light is, but what is more important than justice and righteousness and finding meaning is... doing your best. not being a person that hurts others too much. not letting yourself get swallowed up by an ideal. not going too far. and simultaneously, trusting yourself.

it leaves a few questions, though... was the currently dead l even a little bit right about his blatantly amoral approach, then? was there a point to this pain, and me slogging through this dumbass manga, and all the people that have lost their lives to a selfish teenage cop's son and the whims of everyone chasing after him? was there a point to any of this...?

the manga** never answers this. it stays clinically impartial until the very end. the musical is anything but clinically impartial (and i love it so much for that), and its ryuk that has the last word.

"there's no point at all."

of course theres no point. none of this was ever supposed to happen. that is what matters more than all the hurt and the crimes and the pain.

and that's... actually okay, because it's over now.

yes, death note has many really important themes present in its story, but its viewpoint is nihilism first and foremost. thats why its so fun and easy to play around with all the other messages, because no matter what fun or torment or awful things or righteous justice or absolute nothingness or sentimentality happens in between, there is always an end.

there is always the end.

[fagkermit]

Im so fucking sick erughhh

[fruityumbrella]

writing sanjimisery is like oh there is always so so so much there that its overflowing its taking up every inch of his body and mind and carrying your writing on its own.

writing zoromisery is like oh its all negative space its almost as if theres nothing here bc the thing that IS here is so huge and singular that you cant see anything else at all and somehow you have to find words for it

[n0bluev]

@fushiglow hmm….wonder who i’d draw this for all of a sudden and why… 🤔🤔

[joybeantown]

Ven

[soadscrawl]

i feel very intensely about magnus and lucretia besties

i think they hang out and watch say yes to the dress on fantasy tv

commission me!

[ID:

Three drawings of Magnus Burnsides and Lucretia from The Adventure Zone: Balance.

The first drawing is colored and has black lineart. It is of Magnus and Lucretia from the story and song arc. Magnus is holding Lucretia up around the waist with one arm, and holds a combination of the Lesbian and Asexual flag over his shoulder with the other. He is grinning with his eyes closed. Lucretia is being held up by Magnus, and his holding onto his arm, looking back at him and laughing.

The second image is in black and white, and is of Magnus and Lucretia at their canon ages. Lucretia sits on the floor in front of a bed, with a dog sleeping beside her. She is sitting on her side with a mug resting in her hand on her hip. She is holding a hand back to Magnus, who is laying on his stomach on the bed. He is using both hands to paint her nails. A dog is alseep beside him. In a speech bubble he says "She should ignore her family and pick the mermaid cut- Its MADE for her." Lucretia says in a speech bubble underneath, "Yeah, if she picks the ballgown I'm going to throw up everywhere."

The last drawing is a comic in black and white with two panels and is during the Story and Song arc. In the first panel, Magnus has a hand on Lucretias shoulder and is shaking her awake. Lucretia is lifting her head up from a desk, with one eye closed and the other squinting. On the desk below ber head is a journal. Magnus says in a speech bubble, "Psst, Creesh, come on, its bedtime." Lucretia grunts in a smaller speech bubble. In the second panel, Magnus is carrying Lucretia on his back, and she is asleep again. To the side and in the background we see Taako and Barry. Taako is mixing something in front of the oven in a mixing bowl behind a counter. Barry is sitting on a stool in front of the counter and smiling. Taako says "She fell asleep at the table again?" and magnus replies, "You bet, heh!"

END ID]

[silverskye13]

For the first time throughout RnS, I have slightly shifted my opinion from "Tanguish needs to be protected at all costs" to "actually someone needs to talk some sense into this headless chicken of a self preserving punk" and I mean this with so much positivity. I live Tanguish as character a lot because he at a glance is harmless and kind, and while he is pretty sweet, he's also pretty self serving at his core. A survivalist who will use whatever tactics he can to make his life as comfortable as seems feasible. He's just a little guy whom I love, but also needs a bit of insight into other perspectives and I'm so excited for the next chapter.

He's just a little guy! He's just a little guy and he needs people! Needs-- like he needs-- like it's a problem he needs people.

But you're absolutely right! He is trying his best, that's evident. Everyone can sympathize with the idea of loneliness, and of not wanting other people to hurt themselves, and of needing companionship. The issue is when his need for companionship overrides both his ability to be comfortable alone, and everyone else's ability to live their own life. He's really good at figuring out how people work, why they do the stuff they do, and right now he's using it to feed his codependency problems.

But! He's learning.

[frenchy-and-the-sea]

There is a very exquisite agony in playing a game you love so so so so so much, and realizing that one of the other players is trying to play a totally different game than you.

[thatneoncrisis]

oh captain my captain i didn't know what league of legends game was when i watched arcane. so i thought the plot was alright since i didn't (still don't) know the game lore. if it wasn't basically a prequel story, trying to aim the characters at the way they are in canon, do u think the plot and character arcs would have held up alright? or does that actually make the arcane canon story worse since it wouldn't at least have the existing canon as something it needed to land at eventually as an excuse for any "out of character" decisions? thank u

i wouldnt even call it a prequel story? its like a very elaborate au in a sense, one that feels comfortable changing things to a certain extent- clothes, personality adjustments, motivations, but they still have to hit certain beats. vi has to be an enforcer, jinx has to be a wild card harley quinn type, ekkos time powers ect ect. idk WHAT it is maybe the show needed more time or tighter focus or less characters but i just felt that like, some of the story decisions directly relating to LoL lore werent outright bad but didnt have a lot of time to breathe. the standout example being ekkos time thing, where when i watched that scene i assumed it was both a stylistic representation of a fight and establishing his and jinx's prior relationship (which is kind of too little too late considering they did not fucking speak once as kids pre time skip), and then i had to get a friend to explain to me for SEVERAL MINUTES that he literally died during that fight and it was supposed to be showing his rewind thing. it just wasnt clear at all and his character would not change in the slightest if he didnt have it. but you cant NOT include it so. *

really i have no clue the full extent of the story the writers wanted to tell and how much LoL is binding their hands on story beats. and i REALLY dont want to be inflexible considering i still have a full season coming up that might make me more receptive to certain decisions. but considering how much of the cast i REALLY like just straight up are not in the game, i think they are fully capable of making a solid story completely divorced from league

*someone in the comments told me apparently that Wasnt his time thing and my original read of the scene was correct so im not gonna hold it against the show.