#and then if we try to extrapolate meaning out of the stuff that happens he's like 'I guess :I'

[blujayonthewing]

hand on me face sometimes I really can't believe elyss's campaign has had so many situations where some unseen entity was manipulating the party behind the scenes and/or surveilling us and judging us against some inscrutable standard and/or there was An Enemy Disguised As A Friend AND YET not only are themes like fate vs free will, agency, surveillance, and paranoia clearly not being intentionally explored, the DM gets not-explicitly but nonetheless almost tangibly annoyed when our characters attempt to engage with any of those themes in a meaningful way

[fumifooms]

do you happen to have that page that talks about the beauty standards of each race?

Yeah sure. While scavenging pics for this I found this neat reddit compilation & chart & theory talk too. I had um, way more to say than I anticipated (I know you only wanted the one page. I have nothing to say for myself. Like most topics in Dunmeshi things snowball because they’re so interconnected. Mercy…) so, many races and observations are only mentioned near the bottom.

Beauty standards and race in Dungeon Meshi

Not pictured there’s also how elven society is harsh on visibly disabled people, and how the demon took away Mithrun’s silver eyes and ears to take away his pride. There’s also how Senshi might have fit in with the orcs more easily because of the dwarven wide body shape, and how they tend to have more body hair too I suppose. In the extra on orcs we see Senshi living with the orcs and he gets judged because of the hierarchy rather than his looks.

What is fashionable also differs from culture to culture, and there’s how tattoos only seem common with elves, though dwarves and others do also sometimes have some. They seem to not raise much brows, which makes sense since for many essentially they’re for professional (magical) purposes especially with elves. Gender roles also differ in type and importance, but generally they are similar to irl ones for the races we see. Elven society seems to be the least gendered, which would be an unsurprising logical outcome of having lesser sexual dimorphism aka they look more androgynous. Comparing fashions and gender roles and how they affect beauty standards would be a whole other compilation and conversation. Kui has great worldbuilding partially because she’s got such a good grasp on sociopolitics and geopolitics. History affects cultures and beauty standards greatly. Kui’s oneshot Distant Utopia was very eye opening on her way to worldbuild and the consideration she gives these things, I do really recommend reading it.

Out of the big 5, we know the least about gnomes, but their sheet does say both culture and region are similar to dwarves’ and they end up being confused together often, so we can imagine the beauty standards are similar to dwarves’ as well.

I wanted to touch on this in a post eventually, but how one daydream hour page said half-foots tended to be curvaceous like in the artwork below puzzled me for a long time, all the half-foot characters we see during canon are rather slender and lanky after all, Chil’s succubi also being more curvy than plump. Economics are for sure a factor in that I imagine, the half-foots characters we see are all implied to be some flavor of poor or malnourished, as are half-foots depicted as empoverished oppressed minorities in general. Even comparing the artwork with the half-foot sheet’s depicted average half-foot, the ones on the left seem bigger. Wouldn’t it make sense though, if unlike dwarves half-foots don’t have similar naturally wide bodies, yet due to idolizing dwarves they work towards having a similar body shape/type to emulate them?

It’s said half-foots tend to stick to pretty ethnically homogeneous regions (aka half-foots-only communities) unless they move to the big city with ambition to try and make it big (like Chilchuck and his wife & kids did), and that’s interesting imo because then that would mean that in a ton of half-foot communities, they rarely see or interact with dwarves whom they try to emulate. Of course, one thing about beauty standards is that when they get adopted, at one point it stops being "this is how dwarves look and so this is how half-foots should look" and just becomes "this is how half-foots should look", most people feel as though beauty standards aren’t learned but innate, so I figure the half-foots wouldn’t have any problem still seeking dwarvish traits when there are no dwarves around.

There’s also stuff you can glean here and there if you want to extrapolate more. Like how in the race swap artworks, Mickbell is only smiling in the dwarf portrait, and Rin’s elven portrait looks very close to her elven one- Rin who is stated to be beautiful in her profile blurb. Benichidori’s extra does teach us tallmen can definitely have harsh beauty standards, but also since the text portrays her as very dysmorphic that’s likely reflected in her thoughts to a much more intense degree than is common, not an accurate strict baseline to go off. Ah, Kabru’s blue eyes are also why he and his mother lived a rough life in Kabru’s hometown, but that seems to be regional. Good post here on the topic of Kabru’s blue eyes and ties to irl history. There’s a lot to be said about Kabru being a man that in many ways is close to elven beauty standards, and how that might have affected or been affected by his upbringing with elves + his persona as someone that can effortlessly charm most people. Marcille’s section here in this essay also goes into Marcille’s struggles to fit in with the ideal image of an elf.

Looking human

Also notable are beastkins and demihumans: Demihumans are all dehumanized which makes people treat them worse. So if you differ from the visual idea of "human" (an in-world subjective categorizatiom just as much as demihuman is) most people do judge you negatively. Elves and dwarves get to fight about which type of human is considered the prettiest, but demihumans are below tallmen and half-foots, they are considered as simply below the beauty contest, incompatible with it.

Onis are perhaps the demihuman people we know of with the least cultural influence on the dunmeshi world, and with less intensely different appearances than other demihumans, but even them are treated as lesser than human, treated as beasts to slain for reputation points or useful strength to have around and command. It’s said their "magnificient horns" and fangs are often shaven off when the oni lives in tallman towns, so you could easily make the argument that onis are denied the right to have their own beauty standards, having to conform to other people’s and going through mutilation to take away features they might otherwise have taken pride in. Inutade was bought by the Nakamotos from a dangerous sumo fighting ring that got one of Inutade’s tooth broken on her first and only fight. Remember when I said different fashions existed in dunmeshi and how those could also affect beauty standatds? Like the elves, if you look at the portraits pages that include a lot of characters that aren’t in the story you can see distinct cultures within the same races, for example one young elf is bald which is in sharp contrast with usual elven long luscious hairstyles, and that’s especially true for onis I think. Maybe not only from different regions but different eras as well… They have a bit of population in the very north of the western continent, so I like to think some of the ogres live in very cold, maybe even subarctic conditions. The point I’m getting at here is that within a race, culture/ethnicity like with Kabru as well will also influence them, different communities will have differing beauty standards. The oni history blurb and third row first collumn portrait remind me of Mongolia (which historically was a lot of different nomadic communities with different cultural identities as well. Something something, the oni empire experienced a decline and then tallmen overpowered them, and now they’re governed and split apart by stronger social classes & slavers and the richness of culture was hurt for it), but obviously many of them are dressed and look rather japanese, makes sense considering living in/close to Wa, and first row second collumn portrait reminds me of ainus which again would be logical considering geographical placement, though I’m far from an expert. Interestingly, ainus are indigenous people both in Japan and Russia- Perhaps the northern western continent ogres are meant to be closer to Russia than Canada like I imagined? Ok tangent over.

The kobold sheet says they’re especially sought after as slaves because they’re "adorable", but locally in the western continent they’re repeatedly said to be seen more as ferocious and dangerous. The dehumanization is most apparent in the first comic below. The language barrier and conflicts no doubt worsen this by a lot, but I think it’d be hard to deny that their canine appearance makes the dehumanization worse. "They’re ferocious beasts, they’re demihumans, they can’t be communicated with". Most characters in Dungeon Meshi’s world are desensitized to slavery and most characters are prejudiced one way or another. Point being, kobolds are fully removed from human beauty standards, but no doubt for kobolds, other kobolds are more beautiful than humans are. They’re assumed to be an uncivilized bunch, but just like any other people they like to aforn themselves with nice clothes and jewelry and keep themselves clean and groomed; they too take care of their appearance and take pride in it.

And the orcs! This one we have the most contact with in canon, with not only there being foreigner characters from the ethnicity or hearsay of their homelands and culture but full on contact with a community. We get to see up close what they’re like and what they think, and of course in turn they’re our introduction to how demihumans are harshly looked down upon and seen as inferior, less human and thus less worth valuing and less dignified. It’s text that orcs are ugly to most humans and humans are ugly to most orcs. Since I judged they didn’t need accompanying explanation the pictures showing this are in the pictures dump at the top.

God forbid you sell vegetables to orcs my god- but then again they do basically mandate adventurers to kill any orcs they come across so yeah the world isn’t above that even a bit.

So yes, my main point here is simply that orcs are yet another evidence of the physical ideal of "human" being an important beauty standard for human societies globally.

Izutsumi is our glimpse at how beastkins are treated in the world, and in Wa at least that’s ending up being caged and mistreated as part of a freak show. Izutsumi hates her appearance and wishes she could leave the feline part of herself behind to only be human. Interestingly, not that we have a lot of info on them so this is very much a take with a grain of salt situation, but there seems to be less stigma around artificial beastmen, those who can shapeshift at will. The main difference is of course appearance, that most of the time they simply look like average tattooed humans. Artificially creating humans is an illegal practice, and no doubt it’s not well regarded, but being able to hide that makes them less likely to be discriminated at any moment, or even just discriminated less intensely. Again, looking human is important, not only for belonging but for safety’s sake. Beauty standards rule the world with harsh hands.

Mermaids and fishmen

Ok we’re done now right? Right-! But wait… Wait…! Mermaids and fishmen are said to be demihumans too, special separate cases to the main three demihuman species however, which is also represented by how mermaids and fishmen both are in the Adventurer’s Bible chapter Monsters meanwhile ogres, kobolds and orcs are in the chapter World. They’re an interesting topic because they directly tackle this topic, not only in a meta way for the readers but also making characters themselves struggle to quantify their humanity with the goal of knowing wether they should be eaten or not, especially Chilchuck. Chilchuck’s "is it really just a matter of feelings?" mini arc.

The party asking themselves "Should we eat this?" is very common, and often they end up playing a little loose on morality, like eating the red dragon’s meat despite it having digested Falin. Not unsimilarly Marcille freaks out a little over the vegetables they harvested having been grown with fertilizer, aka largely human poo. Half of the motivation of "should we eat this perhaps sentient creature" is out of consideration and compassion, but more strongly and more often, the characters struggle with a sense of taboo at eating something too closely related to humans. Even, feel uncomfortable because of the deepseated impression that eating it would dirty them in some way. Cannibalism is an interesting and relevant topic in many ways, but what I want to mention is how there’s the more or less universal belief that committing cannibalism inherently taints you as a person and turns you more monstrous, morally but also literally depending on some myths such as w*ndigos and onis in some cases, like in Touge Oni. Marcille and Izutsumi both express a fear of eating monsters turning them monstrous. Maybe this is part of what Laios was hoping for, honestly. There are two fears here, if eating a demihuman monster constitutes as cannibalism or not, and so, will eating it taint you because it’s a human, or will eating it taint you because it’s a monster? You are what you eat, until it’s a little too literal. You morally are the means by which you get your food, and you physically are the result of your nutrition. Dungeon meshi manages to mix an exploration of humanity with the theme of food because our relationship to food is very deep and complex, psychological as much as physiological.

In the end, the characters sort of shrug and accept that they’ll never quite understand the world of mermaids and fishmen and how they operate, and what that means about them. Laios is the one always challenging these notions other characters take for granted, it’s not obvious to Laios why people are softer on mammals than other animals and plants, it’s not obvious to Laios why people would be afraid of eating a monster just because it’s a monster, it’s not obvious to Laios why some food is gross to Marcille but not fish testicles, it’s not obvious to Laios why you should immediately regard orcs and kobolds badly.

"Cows are probably closer to humans [aka closer to being human] than fishmen, though they’re clearly intelligent", dehumanization to lessen empathy towards them to be able to eat them. Meanwhile, mermaids seemingly have a less noticeable "civilization" or intelligence, they hunt in groups like fishmen, but they don’t use tools and such, they feel more primal and similarly instinct driven, and yet… Do they attract sympathy more? Mammals, humans, is it because of their nature or because of their appearance?

Both the nature and appearance of fish are ones people don’t typically sympathize with. "Fish don’t feel pain", "goldfish only have 5 seconds of memory", "it’s okay to keep fish in completely empty bowls too small for them until they die from it", so many lies and misconceptions exist that make people less considerate of them. The average lifespan of a goldfish is 10-15 years, the record is 43, but they’re not seen as lives that really matter, so a lot of goldfish die in a few weeks of bad aquarium conditions. There’s a lot of research on animals evolving to look cute and appealing to make some predators want to kill them less and parents want to care for them more, including humans. First good google research result gave me this credible short article on the topic. In Chilchuck’s weighing wether a fishman is far enough from being human or not to eat, "face is 100% fish" is his biggest argument for it being more acceptable. The face, the most important thing for empathy and recognition. The face, the decapitated fishman one that falls into his hands next chapter.

To quote @room-surprise: "Chilchuck can't explain why it's wrong to eat the merpeople, even though it's NOT complicated. But the problem is Chilchuck would have to accept and acknowledge that the merpeople might be people? And that's outside of the worldview he passively believes, so he can't just say that, because he doesn't think that's true. But that IS why he "feels" it's wrong. And it's all you'd need to say for Laios to understand! But it would require acknowledging that maybe the way they're treating and talking about the merpeople is wrong."

The idea of Chil not being able to grapple with how maybe some monsters are more humans than they seem, him who had been an advocate of half-foots rights, half-foots who get undermined and treated as inconsequential sacrifices… Grappling with how he could relate to the merpeople’s situation almost, and pulling away because it’s so existentially horrifying. I do not want to see myself into an hostile fish-faced warrior I can’t communicate with. In a way this also relates to Chilchuck being the only party member who doesn’t see Izutsumi as a cat in the relationship chart, the only one to treat her with full human dignity. He knows the struggle to be taken seriously, he knows being infantilized and he knows what it’s like to be treated as less than human.

Below, you will see Chilchuck draws the line of where they become not okay to eat as when "they already look like mermaids". Above, there’s speculation that the algae hair is partly to mimic "the mermaids’ beautiful female form". Is it because mermaids are their enemies and the ambiguity might give them extra seconds to attack or flee? Is it to trick adventurers instead? It’s striking to me that this is what works, with the adventurers. Sure the fishmen are intelligent, but explicitly here, what makes them no longer acceptable prey to Chilchuck is that they look close enough to a mermaid, close enough to human. Mermaids who of course themselves have this form to entice and seduce and charm the adventurers they prey on. Chilchuck considers the intelligence due to the tridents, but most of his internal debate centers around their appearance, and the image of a fishman skewered sickens him. The power of mimicry… Mimic being a beautiful human woman. Mimic being cute, babies being wired to make us feel protective and softened. Half-foots, sometimes pretending to be children for scams or help or avoiding trouble.

The mermaids are only concerned by their differences and not their similarities, and have no trouble treating the fishmen as food rather than peers. To an outside perspective like us, the audience, all these categorization of "more human" and "less human" between onis and orcs and elves and tallmen etc seem stupid and unfounded, but to the people living in Dungeon Meshi’s world, elves may as well be mermaids while onis are fishmen, not alike at all, unworthy of empathy and thus fine to eat.

Ultimately, Dungeon Meshi promotes unity. It’s about seeking to understand the unknown and the misunderstood, the dehumanized and the inhuman. It shows the good that comes from seeking to understand what you do not, even when that’s one another.

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

was in the process of starting writing an eridan centric no sburb au and the more i write the more i’m like goddamnit pale erikar is happening without me even trying you’ve 100% gotten me invested

YEAH. Even if you just go purely by canon, their personalities just wind up meshing so well.

Like how Karkat gives Eridan special treatment and is extra nice to him because he knows how rough it is to be in Eridan's thinkpan.

Or how Eridan is willing to immediately shelve his own problems whenever he hears that Karkat isn't doing well emotionally and basically demands to give him emotional support.

Or how Karkat lies to Vriska that nobody listens to him talk about quadrant stuff when we've seen them talk to each other and we know they gossip about that shit all the time.

Or how Eridan is basically the only person who's ever succeeded in getting Karkat to calm the fuck down, by virtue of his incredible obtuseness, like, he doesn't even need to try.

Or how Karkat makes a bunch of death threats to Eridan and Eridan takes it as "ironic repartee," meaning that Karkat's usual problem with mixed signals is not a problem to Eridan, because Eridan is honestly just happy for the attention.

Or how they're so in sync with each other that Karkat telling Past!Eridan that their pact is over led to Eridan assuming they have a pact, and Past!Karkat hears about it and just rolls with it, because apparently it makes sense that they have a pact or something with a caveat that they be nice to each other. Of course.

Or how they talk so often that Feferi outright laments how it leaves Eridan with nothing left to talk to her about.

Or how, even before he knows that Karkat is a mutant, Karkat is still one of his best friends, and their relationship doesn't change after Eridan finds out - in fact, unlike Vriska or Equius or Gamzee, who make comments about his blood color (Gamzee calls him a punchline blooded motherfucker), Eridan never even bothers to mention it. (Because he doesn't actually give a shit about the hemocaste, it's basically all performative).

Or how Eridan knows Karkat well enough to know that Gamzee's advice to just be chill and w/e doesn't work for Karkat.

Or how Karkat's response to Gamzee going murderous is "oh god oh fuck oh man oh fuck" and his message to Past!Gamzee is "get out of here, this barely even concerns you," but his response to Eridan going murderous is a very personal "fuck you, BACKSTABBER, HOW COULD YOU???"

Or how Karkat has a double-v typo once and there's a point where Eridan drops his double-letters and yells at Feferi in capslock 👉👈

And that's all JUST CANON. That's all stuff we've SEEN them do. If you start making some extrapolations, there's so much more.

Karkat's dream has always been to become a threshecutioner - a member of the Empress's strongest troops - seeking to find some sort of acceptance within the society that outcasted him if he could prove his worth that way. However, Karkat's the weakest fighter on the team, and given that Eridan's pissed off angels scared everybody else off his planet, it's likely he's one of the best fighters, if not THE best. Combined with his noble status, Eridan was on the fast track to, if not becoming a threshecutioner, then otherwise achieving some great rank or prestige within the Condesce's army. (Even Dualscar, laughable as he was, was still Mindfang's superior).

Karkat would think Eridan is badass.

Meanwhile, Eridan's problems nearly all stem from the pressure he feels to live up to the expectations on his shoulders, as a highblood, as the orphaner, as the person keeping his friends alive, and as a sea dweller. His is a world of constant anxiety and anguish, not helped by his innate troll/highblood volatility and his own knowledge of how dangerous he is. And Karkat is their self-described "fearless leader," who will happily tell everyone what to do.

Eridan would be relieved that the pressure is off his shoulders.

Karkat's had to live in fear for his life for nearly all of it; when Eridan got added to the group chat, Karkat was probably fucking terrified, especially when Feferi got added right after. Like, oh, fuck, it's a sea dweller (noted as being so hostile that even GAMZEE is nervous about being by the water for too long), oh fuck, he knows the heir apparent, oh fuck, he's an insane murderer.

And then... the sea dweller respects his authority. The sea dweller takes him completely seriously, once he gets past all the slurs and talk of genocide, which the sea dweller obviously doesn't actually mean (Eridan's contradictions are REALLY obvious, which is part of why nobody else takes him seriously). The sea dweller doesn't give a shit WHAT his blood color is.

Like, I think Karkat finds a weird sense of safety in having a violet-blood friend that he can make death threats to. Their last memo together implies that such "ironic repartee" is completely normal for the two of them, and I personally like the idea that Karkat at one point took issue with one of the insane shitty things that Eridan likes to say, went off on a classic Karkat Rant, and then went "oh wait. shit. fuck. im so dead," only for Eridan to completely laugh it off and treat it like casual joking around.

And Eridan just craves attention, positive or negative. He desperately wants people to take him seriously and care about him. Kanaya, Vriska, and Feferi don't, because frankly, they don't really get why he's got so many problems - they're all privileged and they like it! - and Terezi is like "yikes. wow. glad that's not my problem," while Gamzee just tells him to chill out (he can't, that's his entire issue) and Equius avoids (void joke ha ha) him. He doesn't really talk to the lowbloods, but given he doesn't express any casteist anti-lowblood sentiment specifically until he's mad at Sollux (and has totally caste-neutral opinions on Sollux before that), it's not even because he doesn't like lowbloods; one has to assume he's got a different reason for avoiding them - like his canonical guilt over all the murders, or an extrapolation of his general anxieties in that he doesn't like talking to people who are going to be dead before he's even 1/100 of a way through his own life, or that the lowbloods tend to avoid him because... yknow, -gestures to all of Eridan-.

But he always had plausible deniability when it came to Karkat, because Karkat was always anonblood; even if he assumes Karkat's an "assblood," he had no way to know for sure 'til he found out Karkat was an off-spec. And Karkat DOES take him seriously, or at least more seriously than anybody else, by a longshot. He's even willing to outright tell Eridan that it's not Eridan's fault Nepeta doesn't reciprocate his feelings. WHO ELSE WOULD DO SUCH A THING???

And on that topic is pity. They both extend to each other a pity that they don't really afford anyone else, and Karkat - with his uncanny romantic acumen - outright says that pity is the driving force for all non-pitch relationships. Because he's the only person who even acknowledges that Eridan's probelms are PROBLEMS, it's clear he feels pity for Eridan's utterly fried thinkpan. Meanwhile, Eridan seems to recognize how sensitive Karkat really is, IMMEDIATELY putting everything else on pause to try to provide Karkat emotional support whenever it's brought up that Karkat is sad.

Eridan never extends this kind of consideration toward anyone else, too busy grandstanding and putting on the Big Bad Sea Dweller act; Karkat never even extends this much sympathy to Gamzee, never once bothering to understand his religion, or comment on his shitty lusus or crisis of faith. Even when he tries to cheer Terezi up, it's not really with outright sympathy - he tries to build up how awesome he thinks she is, or take on the blame for the situation. But with Eridan, he just goes, yeah, okay, shut up. I know it's tough being you.

I think it's also pretty notable that although Eridan comments about how HYPOTHETICALLY Future!Karkat can't reject him because he's not Eridan's Current!Karkat, he has never actually hit on Karkat in any quadrant, as far as we've seen. And I'm even willing to believe that he never has - when he met Karkat, his pale and pitch quadrants were filled, and he was always pining after Feferi in flushed; it probably never even crossed his mind to see Karkat as a viable dating partner, and I think he likes their unofficial moirallegiance friendship exactly the aay it is - when he thinks Karkat is hitting on him pitchwise, his reaction isn't "yes let's date," it's a surprised "whoa, coming on kinda strong, there."

And just. Just. The way that Karkat took Eridan's murder spree so fucking personally, especially compared to Gamzee in the same memo. You BACKSTABBER. I HATE you (not enough to not talk to you for an extended period of time but still). How COULD you. I thought you loved her...

Like. Man. I think it would require a third party to point it out in order to get them together - Karkat seems to be kind of embarrassed by how often he talks to Eridan (because it's, y'know, ERIDAN), and has convinced himself that Eridan is SUCH a pathetic dumbass that OF COURSE it would never work out between them (keep telling yourself that, buddy, you're the one who started thinking about that in a conversation where Eridan literally was not hitting on you), and Eridan is, uh, a dumbass.

But even that's kind of tricky, because Karkat's mixed signals make their friendship read as weirdly pitch-coded (I don't think you're normally supposed to threaten death upon your moirail and call them slurs), and also, nobody really wants to imagine Eridan being in a happy, loving relationship. You run into this problem sometimes even in real life.

But he's kind of basically in one?????

Literally, society if Eridan and Karkat made it official -

[theplatypusblue]

Okokok dragons rising s2p2 REWATCH thingy it’s mostly me noticing small details and shit I missed the first time. Ramble-y at points lol

Many many big spoilers below (also it’s long)

Ok so like….. first episode it gets established that all the dragon tribes fall under the jurisdiction of each of the source dragons…. Neato. More world building shenanigans

WYLDFYRE PEAK YIPPEE. Nya said Lloyd was helping her with her precision, and there’s this really cute animation moment where’s she’s firing her flames like she’s shooting a gun lol

Ok so like Frak taught Arin how to make Merlopian Berry Crème pie…. Frak is merlopian question mark(?) (I don’t think it makes sense timeline wise lol don’t listen to me)

I like the scene of Zane training it reminds me a little bit of that scene from all the back in s1 where’s he’s just tuning everybody out

So like the tournament thingy takes place at the same spot as that flashback with Wu and Bonzle in season 1 (maybe?) I wonder why Wu was hanging out there so long ago lol. (I mean lily might have been at the last one too but like who knows)

ROBY PEAK!!!! My only issue with him and Bleckt is that I wish the writers would’ve really hammed up the comedy between the two. Made them just completely unserious. Would’ve made Bleckts betrayal a little more impactful maybe. (Imagine a bunch of goofy cartoony gags between the two, only for the eventual reveal that bleckt actually genuinely wants roby dead. Woulda been crazier)

Ok so seven headed source dragon thingy. It’s either symbolism like roby said or we are eventually gonna build up to an ultra-dragon adjacent situation. Somehow. Idk how. But maybe it would be cool

Ok random thought. I think it’s pretty clear at this point that elemental powers come from and are associated w the source dragons. You can extrapolate the connections (fire and heat come from motion, plants is probably from life, etc). I think you can remedy the whole “the new elemental powers are stupid” thing by thinking about them more as the elements of the source they are associated with , rather than elemental powers in the traditional sense of our world (If that distinction makes sense lol idk how to explain it non-stupidly. It’s just a matter of framing)

That being said, I really like zant-tanz lol I think it’s his voice teehee. Silly whimsical snail man. Shame he had to get kicked out but then again…. He had some rock stacking to do at home

Ok ok ok I think some parts of the Jay fight are kinda lame (“and I will always hate you” 🙄) but things make more sense from jays perspective I think. Imagine you’re coming from a place where everyone devalued ur individuality and didn’t care abt you as a person, and then you come to this tournament where ur opponent (who ur literally fighting against in this ~tournament~) suddenly starts telling you you’re the love of their life n stuff (and ur also being manipulated but besides that even). I would also just assume that they’re being weird and try to kick their ass.

“Not sure I can pull it off… it’s arriving too soon” what exactly was Wu trying to pull off lol? crazy theory time 100% NOT real NOT going to happen: Wu is trying to bring someone (I’m betting his dad) back from the dead, cuz like departed realm shenanigans and the merge maybe. But we also don’t really know how departed realm stuff works yet, so there’s not much we can extrapolate from there. Idk.

I’m sorry but I always think it’s really cool when cinder bounces people around like a basketball teehee. He’s a very fun character to watch during fights.

Similar-ish point to my Jay spiel from 2 seconds ago but like. Arin’s convo w Frak abt how shatterspin is super evil actually makes me laugh a little bit. Cuz Arins going on about like “oh dude it ~~shatters your goodness~~ you can’t ever do shatterspin” and internally Frak is like “is this guy actually fr” lmao. On my first watch through I was literally like “Arin stop you sound so fucking brainwashed rn” shfjfjjfkfkgkgla

Ok ok so Ras wanted all the elemental powers so he could get a dragon icon somehow…. Lloyd just got his gifted to him tho. (Might be another matter of force vs harmony — you can either do all the hard work to get all the powers and make ur own icon, or the source dragons will just like. Give you an icon. If ur cool enough or whatever)

Dragon Ivory stores powers, dragon horns can give u power but then they make u angry or smthn… dragon ivory can also be used to communicate w the nether space….... hhhrrrnnngg dragon lore im trying to make it make sense in my brain hrrrnngg

Frak is so nice and respectful he’s such a good guy lol (I have to DRAW HIM. Being COOL. Because he IS. I’ll get to it eventually)

Small nitpick but like. The way the tournament is organized kinda makes no sense….. cuz all the plot relevant fights involving the ninja happen at the beginning, so they’ve been in multiple fights and get multiple powers. Then there’s a montage of them fighting other elemental masters who only have one power. So the whole thing is actually completely unbalanced and unfair. Turns out Roby does suck at organizing tournaments lol

God that one shot of nokt running at the camera hunting the arc dragon is so fucking perfect the colors are just mmmmmmhhhh so good I gotta redraw it I gotta redraw it so baddddddddhhhhhhhhhh

Ohhhhh the final couple of fights the composition and the coreography were sooooo good we are backkkkkk we are soooooooooo backkkkkkkkkkk

TLDR: I remember it being good and then I rewatched it and it was still good. Yayyyyyyyy

[trans-leek-cookie]

listen I'm not gonna be a Curly apologist he did Fucked Up as captain but I genuinely recommend ppl watch a playthru that goes thru the game in chronological order. It kinda helps clear up the events and gaps between them, bc even tho u See the times, you still experience it out of order.

The stuff Anya says definitely sets off alarm bells but it doesn't seem like he Fully Understands what she means, and I'm going to be 100% honest I think she was trying to repress it herself. This isn't to say that she is AT ALL "at fault" for what happened after and she should've gotten help even if she wasn't ready to fully discuss the issue but I genuinely think she herself was still coming to terms with things, so she didn't necessarily process the full impact before talking to Curly, and a lot of what happens occurs after they're laid off- like this delves into personal interpretation but I genuinely think Anya only registered Jimmy as a serious danger after his outburst towards Curly. Ofc my interpretation is limited bc of the limited pov in game and not having gone through what she has, but it personally reads more akin to coercion over time than a singular Obviously Violent incident (like. Not to say that Sexual Assault isnt violent in nature, just that coercion often specifically works to obfuscate the fact it is a form of violence.) The layoff is a Massive catalyst for her bc of Jimmy, in that she now has a very clear understanding of his capacity for aggression.

To extrapolate a little from the "Dead Pixel" conversation, she starts by saying she Likes The Screen (even though it's fake). While Curly has his quotes about the pixel "not ruining the illusion" which. Y'know is Symbolic Of His Flaws. She doesn't say the pixel ruins it, just that she can't get it out of her mind.

If we take the pixel to represent her Or jimmy, either way the way she talks about it kind of downplays things, like it's a Minor Thing that's Slightly Upsetting, but she's still okay with the big picture. Idk I could be 100% wrong but that is my take

Besides that, Anya tells curly she's pregnant 2 days before the crash, and it isn't until she outright states it that he starts Putting The Pieces Together. I want to note, he says "I'd do anything" and "this doesn't have to go on our performance evals" 1. Before he knows shes pregnant 2. Under the assumption she might attempt suicide, and I doubt he even thought about her using the gun on anyone else before she brings that up. He says literally before the line where she tells him she's pregnant that "being laid off isnt a reason to hurt [herself]". Like I've seen ppl talk about the performance evaluation thing like it's about her and jimmy, but I think he's referring to (his belief) that she might attempt suicide or similar which might genuinely be a consistent thing he's seen her struggle with, given she's able to go through with it. Also just to note: assuming their society is like ours (hellish) reassuring her he won't blab Abt her mental health is like. Genuine reassurance- lots of mentally ill ppl will Not Open Up bc it could have long term consequences (like. For example. On employment) ANYWAYS I hope it doesn't come off like "Curly never failed Anya" but rather "Curly approached this specific situation without the context of why Anya is panicking and (possibly validly) assuming she's dealing with a very different issue"

Also let me say again the time frame is 2 days. We don't Really see what happens, but we know Anya tells Jimmy without Curly knowing. I genuinely believe he maybe didn't do a Great Job in those two days (the fact he says Anya should've talked to Him before telling Jimmy is uhhh. Mm. 1. Your job to create an environment where she comes to you my man 2. Weird to tell her what she should do with HER OWN PERSONAL INFORMATION) but like.

I get a lot of ppl want immediate consequences but consider that they can't really get rid of Jimmy (co pilot. Which is. Y'know it's Own Problems) but also like. Curly knows Jimmy, and we know that Jimmy tends to lash out. Curly should probably Not Confront Jimmy Unless He Knows Exactly How To Keep Him From Hurting Anya. Like I'm not an expert but this is something genuinely important- when confronting an abuser you NEED to take into account the impact it can have on their victim, and sometimes for the victims safety you need to wait until you have a Solid Plan. It sucks but it's important.

And theres discussion to be had about Curly kinda going along with Jimmy saying "well what if we all died" and like. I do believe he Didn't Realize What Jimmy Said. Like he was just processing/trying to keep the situation under control (and failing because he underestimated how willing Jimmy was to hurt everyone including himself).

Like he's definitely an enabler but I would say his problems are mostly before he understands the gravity of the situation, in that he's friends with Jimmy and assumes the best of a man with abusive tendencies, and fails to create an environment that can keep Anya and the others safe. Like, he definitely doesn't handle in game events perfectly (psych evaluation for one- he does do it instead of Anya which is actually helpful, but he still treats it like. Weirdly.)

Idk I have a lot of thoughts about this game and I don't necessarily want to defend Curly but more like. Anya's situation is very delicate (and light on details) so sometimes the way ppl talk Abt it feels like they aren't actually focused on what she wants and what it means to prioritize her safety y'know?

Edit bc I just now figured out kinda how I want to word it: curly is an enabler and making things worse bc he doesn't put a stop to Jimmy's BS, but in the specific scenario we see in game I think he's trying to use his Skillset of like, people pleasing not for Jimmy's sake but for the crews (like "if I nod my head and say I sympathize he won't lash out and hurt them") which like. There are situations which that is unfortunately the safest option (on an individual level yes, but sometimes it's also necessary to prevent abusers lashing out in response toward ppl who are more vulnerable) but it was the Wrong Choice.

It's like. I think Curly was trying and had good intentions, and understood that he needed to protect the crew, but he didn't have the toolset/experience to realize he can't Just go along with things and that he needs to be able to set hard limits, even for ppl he likes and trusts. Like he failed but the failure was "for want of a nail", where it began way before what we see (for want of an understanding of power dynamics I guess.) Again, don't think this makes curly more forgivable or whatever, I just think he's a good example of trying to make the right choices when you never realized you'd have to make these kinds of decisions and therefore are unprepared and/or unaware

Second edit: personally I don't think you can really incapacitate jimmy without there being serious risk (again he's the copilot) but curly should've given Anya the gun when she told him Abt the pregnancy

[moononmyfloor]

My Year End C-drama Review (2023)

Last year, I did two Cdrama Wrapped posts for each half of the year. This year, I watched so much stuff right away I got arrogant and was about to do a January-February summary. And then life happened and handed me my entire ass, so here we are right back on the ground zero.

Well, not exactly. I watched lots of dramas I liked this year and would like to give nods to as many as possible, and before I start forgetting details I thought I better go ahead with the entrees that I'm sure of the answers.

My initial Cdrama reviews were inspired by anniedelavoye's this post 2 years ago, I've extrapolated a lot from there but some entrees remain same.

Part 2

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1. First drama I finished in 2023

Hi Venus. Modern workplace romcom isn't my go-to-genre, least of all if the ML is a CEO. If not for the unusual-for-the-genre setup of initial few eps and the strong recommendations of my friends, I might not have pressed play at all. And I'm so glad I did because it turned out to be one of the most refreshing takes of the genre, it was funny, the pacing nor the dialogues were ever draggy, the characters were intelligent and pleasant, and down to earth. It never leaned to the tropes of helpless/badass FL or tsundere/beta ML extremes, there was no dramatic villain arcs, down to the supporting characters everyone were so reasonable and mature and simply had the nicest time ever together. Now I put it like that, it sounds boring but trust me, it wasn't. Do give it a try. Your time won't be wasted.

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2. An actor who took my breath away

Jing Boran as Lan Jue/Peizhi from The League of Nobleman

I mean

Look at him. Instant KO.

I remember watching this scene (and every scene that followed after, especially when he had his hair down) and being in disbelief about how he's real. He's literally glowing out the screen! His performance as a model scholarly minister, the way he conducted his glance, his steps, his speech and temperament were nothing but enchanting and... look, I can write poetry about him for ages lol.

And then I watched every single work I could find of him and ended up even more in love, because his resume was nothing but diverse. A measured scholar, a bubbling-out-of-his-skin social butterfly, a ballerina in a tutu, a man pregnant with the cutest radish monster ever, there's nothing he cannot play. I'm definitely going to check out every single work of him that'll be coming out in the future as well. Even if the plot fails, his character will surely be interesting.

(Also, I was FINALLY lured into DMBJ fandom thanks to going down his profile as well, and now I'm here to stay🤭)

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3. Most relatable character

Bai Moxi from Gone With the Rain

She was street-smart and sassy, but never foolhardy. She wasn't a damsel nor was overly clever. She had her moments of daydreaming, but she knew what was and wasn't reasonable. She had a high sense of self-worth, she also knew when to make herself scarce. Despite being the most outgoing and energetic personality in the room, she didn't make everything to be about herself. In fact, she couldn't have been happier to be a background supporting character of the story, quietly minding her own business in her corner. In summary, she just felt very real, and exactly like how I love my FLs. Every decision she took felt like what I'd also have done in her situation. (Btw I hope noone messages me about loving Moxi but hating her sister because I don't. I think her character also made a lot of sense based on her circumstances even though she was bit more difficult to love than Moxi.)

Most of all, she was played to a tee by Zhang Nan, the young actress was allowed to shine to her true potential in this role, as she used to be quite stereotyped in either bubbly or petty mean girl roles. The drama horribly fell apart in the latter quarter (I'd like to pretend it all ended before that Great Seperation Scene), but I'm going to remember her charaacter for a long time to come.

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4. Most inspiring character

Li Lianhua from Mysterious Lotus Casebook

The tumblr tag for MLC is already filled with Grade A+ poetry, prose and analysis dedicated to him and I'm not capable of wording it any better than them. All I can say is he really touched a vulnerable corner of my heart, and gave it strength. He's just so very admirable and represents all I ever want to be, and his entire character design and all its metaphors and philosophy especially resonate with me as a Buddhist. Like Cheng Yi said at the end of MLC concert, "At the end of the day, if you have a lotus flower in your heart that you can call your own, that's what matters."

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5. Best Couple of the Year

Lu Zhaoxi and Ye Shilan (Zeng Shunxi and Liang Jie) in Hi Venus, Zhao Jian and Yuan Zhongxin (Zhou Yutong and Zhang Xincheng) in Young Blood 2

Here are two couples who were each others' equal match in every big, small and miscellaneous ways possible. Where their roles in their partnership did not have anything to do with society-determined gender or power dynamics, not about conforming to them nor about beating them. Everything about their relationships simply had to do with what they meant to each other their admiration, respect and love towards the other person, from beginning to end. In Hi Venus, it was never uncomfortable to watch Shilan being Zhaoxi's subordinate, for he always treated her like any good superior should in any healthy professional relationship. In Young Blood 2, Zhongxin would fully trust Zhao Jian with everyone else's and his own life, not because his head was in wishful romantic clouds but because he was 100% confident in her capabilities and would never disrespect her with "girls should be protected, you stay back and let me take the sword for you" nonsense.

I may check out like 50 dramas per year and may never come by such Het pairing dynamics in some years, yknow? I do not hate on any other kind of dynamic (plus I'd have next to nothing to watch in that case lol) but, THIS... this is so rare -for me to not be icked out by not even a single second of a fictional het couple's screentime lol- hence the gushing! (Though I know I'm not doing the greatest job of phrasing what I feel😆).

Following that note, though not a couple, honorable mentions to Chufeng (Bi Wenjun) and Robin (Zhu Zhengting) from Silence of the Monster who took Sui Yi (Sun Yihan) into their home not because they thought it'd be chivalrous to help a girl, but because it's the nice thing to do as a fellow human. For continuing onto integrating her into their world with ease and enthusiasm not because any of them had feelings for her but because they simply found her a good friend to hang out with.

Suffice to say I DIG ANY relationship where gender does not come into play, like, at all (or barely, if you must).

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6. Best harem of the year

Orchid and Lotus harems (from League of Nobleman and Mysterious Lotus Casebook)

(Only sharing the pics of Orchid Harem because it was from the earlier quarter of this year, whereas pics of Lotus Harem will be everywhere in the Cdrama scene for quite a while to come lol)

The support group of devout puppies, zhijis, friends-with-benefits and all sorts of other polycule postions, all centered around one precious babygirl enigma of a man is just my jam, and I love it when it happens because it brings forth the fandom's most unhinged high-art. 😌😌😌

(ALSO ME AND WHO WHEN!😭)

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7. Best ensemble of the year

Young Blood 2, I Am Nobody

For me a perfect ensemble is where the supporting characters are just or almost nearly as engaging and thoroughly written as the main leads, you'd love every second spent on any character just as much as you love that of any other. The ultimate relaxing experience where your brain doesn't have to pick favorites and you don't have to speed watch or fast forward or be antsy about who's going to appear next because you know it's gonna be enjoyable no matter whom.

And this year, it's Young Blood 2- with its Class 7 members who were all so different but all so compelling and equally contributing to the plot, complimented by the Class 8 and the unnervingly captivating villains.

And I Am Nobody- with its extensive spread of young and old heroes/antiheroes alike, all with dramatic backstories and individual charisma that were not second to another.

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8. Favorite posters/promos of the year

Mysterious Lotus Casebook, Young Blood 2, Sunshine By My Side

Really liked what MLC did with positioning the characters on various spots of the titular Lianhua Lou, the wind-sway choices for the wisps of hair and the skirts... idk the exact angles of it all were just right for each character and their vibes and appealed to me a lot.

The blending-into-painting style poster of Young Blood was so pretty too, plus these Suoyi raincoat posters.

The comic strip posters for Sunshine were also super cute, unique and perfect for the drama's themes.

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9. Best opening credit sequence

Love You Seven Times

The drama itself was a hot mess but the opening sequence was entirely worthy of being a parallelish-universe story to Love Between Fairy and Devil without a debate. IF ONLY they put the same effort to the story itself.

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10. Favorite Prop/Set designs

A League of Nobleman- Lan Jue's Tea Pavilion, Mysterious Lotus Casebook- Lotus House

I wish I could install a fixture in my home where me and my imaginary homies can chat over tea while being seductively separated by an active stream of freshwater, while my not so elegant period-style caravan is waiting outside in the yard for more cozily cramped get-together times. 🤧

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11. Favorite lighting/color grading of the year

The Forbidden Flower, My Journey to You

The former, a kaleidoscopic explosion of colors, a celebration of fleeting life, youth, summer and nostalgia. It was a daring drama on so many fronts and nailed each of them as well, and the use of colors represented its bold soul perfectly.

The latter, a marvelous combination of mountains shrouded by mist, dark-toned wood pavilions and fur-lined robes, pale, dusty makeup with rosy lips and plump cheeks; all combined together on screen to bring a palpable ambience of a secluded glamorous hideout in a dystopian world and its ethereal residents. Seriously, how I especially loved to stare at the bride candidates in their white getups, it was like the light bounced off of the fabric to shine on their faces even more, and the skin and hair looked non-oily and baby soft. And it didn't feel over the top but convincing because the camerawork and editing conjured a believable image of an upcountry with dense and dewy forests, waterfalls and rivers, there's no sun, no heat no sweat, only cold air and pregnant humidity. OF COURSE you are going to look like THAT.

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12. A drama that taught me new things

Hi Producer

The infuriating thing about Yu Zheng's show-off genre of costume dramas is that the story may be a hit-or-miss, the "historical facts" provided in them may need to be taken with a grain of salt, but they almost always provide me with great entry points to do my own research 🥲. Most niche facts that take me by surprise and things I'd never have thought to look up on my own are randomly sprinkled all over the place and I run around like a headless chicken trying to collect them all.

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13. Most exhilarating drama/scene

Three-Body

That scene in ep 5. The entire buildup to it and the resolution. The phenomenal acting bringing forth the exact emotion and exact tension required. The moment you start to understand at least a sliver of why exactly all the characters are making this much of a fuss about what's happening to them.

I cannot spoil, not even a bit. You'd have to see for yourself.

I Am Nobody

(lol Three Body and I Am Nobody. I swear that was an unintentional coincidence!)

The great V-match between certain two characters, I can't elaborate. (See the thing about exhilarating scenes is that you have to see it for yourself what's the big deal is about lol.) I really liked how both their biggest vulnerabilities and yearnings were pulled out mercilessly in public, how they both fought themselves through each other before actualizing the philosophy of what it was all about. It was beautiful to watch visually as well.

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14. A drama location I'd love to visit

Yunnan province

I've seen glimpses of the prosperous and both naturally and culturally diverse Yunnan province through Bite of China Documentaries and Dianxi Xiaoge's vlogs, the beautiful bucolic backdrop of Meet Yourself only heightened the wish to experience it all in person.

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15. A drama that was a pleasant surprise

I Am Nobody

Perfect casting job, earnest effort from everyone involved to bring out the 2D to live action in the bestest way possible, it was like a dream come true to see a genre that was previously limited into written media like comics and fanfics (modern cultivation) as a drama even if it meant labelling all the cultivators as aliens lol

It had a lil bit of a flavor of western coming-of-age/"teen gets powers and goes on an adventure in search of their origins" stories, a bit of Japanese anime presenting style and the chaotic-gaggle-of-youth-and-veterans-with-different-extreme-powers genre vibe. And then they incorporated Chinese wuxia philosophy into it and made it their own thing. I hope to see more of this in future, and definitely a season 2!

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16. An old drama I watched in 2023

Shaolin Wendao (2017)

This is one of the best period dramas I have ever seen, but I don't recommend it unless you have a strong tolerance for angst. Like, worse than Royal Nirvana and Heroes (2022) level of angst.

HOWEVER, unlike those two, Shaolin Wendao will leave you feeling rewarded for your suffering. This drama achieved a number of things that very few other have managed to do, especially for a story with such a heavy and dark premise.

The characters remained true to their selves from beginning to the end. They grew up in various ways, at the same time remained consistent. The story made sure to make all the characters aware of their individual faults and address them.

The characters were put through immense wringer but also provided viewer with the resolution they deserved. It was SO exhilarating at times, I cried. It felt like a detox, sometimes.

They prioritized telling a realistic story about the changing nature of humans. The ending was blissful but not in the idolized, wrapped-in-a-bow-tie way one would imagine. They wanted to tell a story about tribulations and letting go, and did exactly that.

It will ignite the pain but will also make sure to thoroughly quench it. So there's that.

Oh and also, respect to all the actors. All those characters were so layered and had some quite difficult scenes. I do not understand how Guo Xiaoting didn't get any good roles matching of her caliber for years after this. She was magnificent.

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More Posts by Me

[emblemxeno]

Something ironic is that even though 3H is a massive game with a very strong and consistent creative fandom, I have had no creative spark with that game beyond discourse lol.

Of course, my type of creative output is different from most people's; I like reading into things, analyzing dialogue to recontextualize characters as a whole, look for real world analogies, hypothesize potential non-canon interactions, etc.

E.g., the Nohr siblings and their relationships with their father, with each other, or the court is never explicitly laid out in detail as to what happened. At best, you get basic extrapolations such as "we were told not to talk to Azura" or "our mothers used us as tools to curry favor and to sabotage/hurt one another."

Put those backstories and character traits against events in the story? It makes you think. Elise, Leo, and Camilla are stressed tf out and panicking over Xander and Corrin's fight during chapter 2, cuz siblings hurting each other = one's gonna die to them. Corrin choosing Hoshido or even siding with neither kingdom is a strike against Xander's ego and his built up sense of normalcy as a stoic fraternal unit trying to hold together the last remnants of his family. Camilla intertwines violence and love because she was raised receiving love and affection from her mother only after being subservient to her mom's terrible actions towards the other concubines and royal children. Leo is on Forrest's case at first because he has his on warped sense of "bringing shame and dishonor" to his family, an amalgamation of his loneliness when the other sibs focus on Corrin despite his own accomplishments and his mom most likely drilling it into his head that he has to be talented to be an honorable prince; it's little wonder he lets up on Forrest when he sees his son doing something noble and selfless like healing and attending to an entire town. Elise is an outlier because she's so young, and that either manifests as reckless, well-meaning bravery, or blubbering, immature outbursts draped in ignorance; she knows nothing beyond her supposedly good family unit other than what's been told to her second-hand, so how is she supposed to react when the rug is pulled from under her?

With 3H I don't get that kind of stuff, partly because the game is just that packed with dialogue and auxiliary comments from characters (IMO, a big reason why things seem bloated), and partly because of the way the story is delivered; since Byleth is a silent protagonist, character dialogue seesaws between having a conversation and telling/expositing at you, which results in a restrictive writing style that's actively harmful to implicit writing or subtext. There's nothing to scratch your brain about, because the game pretty much does that for you. And while many think having characters comment on story events each chapter in Garreg Mach is a positive to world building and narrative depth, I actually think the opposite, because the medium in which this dialogue and insights are given-talking to them with a silent protag who can't ever have an actual conversation-feels like I'm a scientist putting variables against each other and extracting data and information from the results, rather than a story with believable characters with lives, dreams, and relationships.

...Though, writing this out, maybe that's why it's appealing to other creatives. Maybe it's the equivalent to getting a 2,000 piece lego set, and switching only a few things around without dismantling the entire base project. The product itself is seen as art that can be altered in specific, minute ways that inspire curiosity and creative reaction.

I, on the other hand, get the most fun out of thinking about why the pieces fit together in the first place and how well they do in practice. Different strokes, I guess.

[lazzarella]

Back again with my Wandee Goodday weekly rambling! I will say that, while I'm still adoring it, the editing is starting to feel weird? Like, I know there's not a cut and an uncut version but sometimes it feels like it.

But! I'm also the kind of person who can nitpick something I love to death, so I'm not going to do that because I'm trying to ~ac-cen-tchu-ate the positive as Mr Mercer wrote. And, like, I'm just here to see two beautiful idiots fall in love XD Anyway! Here we go:

- Dee going straight for the necklace! XD

- HAND HOLDING SHOT!!! Will never get enough of those!

- Love that they don't talk >:) (No, really, I'm not being sarcastic lol I love it haha)

- Aww, I want to know what the souvenir is!!

- Love their apologies! I especially love that he said he'd have let Yak beat Ter up if he wasn't a doctor 🤣

- Seriously, though, his apology made sense! I'm totally extrapolating(?) here but I almost feel like he didn't know why he acted the way he did in the moment

- Okay, kissing only once is silly 🤣 but I'm here for silly! And he did say Yak has to learn to wait, which must mean he does plan on kissing him again. At some point. I can just FEEL Kao's long suffering BFF senses tingling however many apartments away haha

- (I weirdly love being frustrated by shows I love??? Just me??)

- Awww! Love the scene with Yak and Yei <33

- Dee didn't feed him?? Tut tut, doctor! Not taking proper care of your boxer guy

- "Let's pound" uh, sure... But right in front of everyone? 🤣

- Lmaooooo, Cher! I love him! Telling Dee the necklace suits him better haha. I love the way that he and Yei have just accepted Dee into the fold and omg they don't know it's "fake" do they??? I would love to see their reactions

- I loved the whole som tam scene

- Hm. I guess Taem *does* like Yak then? Not really keen on that, but I'll just go wherever the show takes me, IDC

- Yak getting horny watching the others get oil massages lmao love that they used that 'o yeah' sound bite

- (actually, there's a bit in one of the songs that sounds like part of O Yeah by Yello)

- but he got his oil massage!! Dee is doing a thorough job

- Ahhh, Yak asking Yei about the consequences of him losing the fight!!! He looks so young there D: and I'm glad Dee asked some stuff, too!

- Okay, but what is UP with the Nazgûl dude???

- Dee knows Yak's lying!!

- ...wait, how does Dee know about the hallucinations to tell Kao? (Is it really a hallucination when you're asleep? Is that not just a dream? I'm guessing this is a translation thing though) Like, I can infer Yak told him at some point, but it feels like a weird choice to not show that. Whatever, I'm not going to think too hard about it

- Boo, Ter!!

- "No because I must bring my special someone" is the best response to Kwan asking if Dee was asking Ter out! Lmaooo (I paraphrased a bit I think)

- Okay, it's so funny that Dee knows Yak is his special someone and that's why he's asking him, and he's happy to let Kwan and Ter and whoever assume that, but he won't tell Yak 🤣

- "Just one more time" ??? One more time for what? Maybe I should stop watching this when it drops because I'm always half asleep by then lol

- Whatever Yak says about it would be nice to have someone cook for him every day and Dee's desperate 'oh pleeeease let it be meeeee' kinda look lol

- Costume time!!! They looked soooo good in the first ones (I don't know if they're specific characters or just traditional)

- I love how grandma describes dancing but I didn't note it down. Oops! It was lovely, though! And very true—you have to be in sync with your dance partner and you have to give and take equally, otherwise it's not going to work and you may hurt yourself or the other person

- Lmao, they're still pretending! So silly after the kiss and I LOVE IT! XD this is what happens when you don't talk. Please keep it up! lolll

- Tbh, I think Dee's equally afraid if he tells Yak how he feels he'll disappear now (he probably has abandonment issues, I get it! He said that thing about presents making him feel like he hadn't been forgotten about a child, so yeah...)

- Product placement time! There hasn't been much though

- Ooh, they're gonna get married :D

- Aww, that was a really sweet proposal!

- Thor is so much bigger than Fluke... Just needed to make a note of that lol

- More product placement!

- Dee! How are you going to feed your boxer man every day when you only have neatly arranged cartons of soy milk and a bowl of apples in your fridge??

- YAY ANOTHER HAIR DRYING SCENE!!! But this time with a hairdryer!!

- I knew Taem would be the reason Yak wasn't at the ball in the previews!

- gee, there aren't many people at the ball

- FUCK. OFF. TER!!

- Yak is going to rock up at the very last second...

- ngl, I thought Taem was into Ohm as well!

- Just say no, Dee! Just say no!

- I mean, that's a pretty good speech, pity who it's coming from lol

- Phew! He pushed him away! I knew he would, but still

- Yesssss! I actually fist pumped at Dee telling Ter he wouldn't be a good dance partner and that HE'S TOO VANILLA bahahahaha

- He was very gracious about it, too, which makes it even better

- Ooh, Ter's crying! Tbh, I'd feel bad for him if he wasn't a manipulative jerk XD he cries pretty, though

- Poor Dr Kwan!

- Dee waiting for Yak is breaking my heart!! Come onnnnn, Yak!

- YES!!! THERE HE IS! Cinderelly, you shall go to the ball! (IDK...)

- "My prince!" (x 2) Ahhhhhh!!!!!!! MY HEART!

- This is the most awkward dance routine lmao I kinda love it

- Ooh! Slow dance time!

- I THINK I LOVE YOU!

- (So what am I so afraid of, I'm afraid that there's no cure for, a love that I'm not sure of... Uh, ahem, where was I?)

- I think my whole heart leapt into my throat!! That was NOT what I was expecting at all and ahhhhhhhhh it was perfect! And Dee's happy little face!!!!! He's so amazed and happy and ahhhhh I don't want to wait seven days to see what happens next!!

-Also was that a new sing playing in that scene or something that already exists? Kinda sounded like Inn singing but idk

- Okay, but I am SO here for Yak trying to woo Dee next week lol like, he so doesn't have to, but I would definitely want to let the handsome man woo me for a little while too XD

- (I bet when Dee says enough and Yak's little face drops, it's going to be when he says the thing about loving Yak for who he is maybe, but IDK, I could be very wrong)

- Anyway. I THINK I LOVE YOU! Yesssss! Yak was so brave!! <333

[penig]

a question of power, Pt 1

"Hastur was a Duke of Hell. Crowley wasn't even a local counsellor." Good Omens, the Book, 1990, p. 186 of my (apparently 1st edition, 1st printing, sweet; too bad the dust jacket's so torn up) hardback copy.

This is probably the only definitive statement concerning Crowley and Aziraphale's power levels we will ever get. Between Gaiman and Pratchett's cavalier attitude toward worldbuilding and the ineffable accounting of supernatural powers that human minds can't properly conceive, we're on our own quantifying this stuff. Certainly anything we figure out now may be confirmed or contradicted or cast in an entirely new light when we finally have the entire story in front of us.

Will this stop us from trying before we get all the data in hand? No, of course not.

Personally, I only care insofar as it relates to characterization, but to some people it matters a lot. And Crowley looks a lot more powerful than a local counsellor, on the face of it, in the video adaptation. (Which is where the "Crowley was Raphael" headcanon comes from. Personally, I despise that headcanon, but you do you.) Whereas Aziraphale often comes across as barely powerful at all, and reluctant to use what power he has.

This is unsatisfactory for those of us who want equality between partners. And we want to be satisfied with the story, don't we? So let's look at what we've got and examine the ways we can justify seeing them as equals, and where that gets us.

First, and most obviously: Crowley can stop time. That seems really powerful, and we don't see anyone else do it - which doesn't mean nobody else can. The way we see it used, however, implies that it's not something other angels and demons are accustomed to. Crowley stops time as Satan comes up through the ground, even though Satan is presumably more powerful than he and Aziraphale put together by several factors. So either he expects Satan not to notice it's happening, or he expects the effect to stop when Satan notices and acts to end it. Crowley also stops time when they swap bodies and checks to see whether anyone's looking, the implication being that it's not a showy power, that unless someone in the know is looking straight at the phenomenon, they aren't likely to notice it.

What if stopping time is a specialist skill? What if it's a power routinely used only by starmakers? In fact -

In the S2E1 teaser, we see Crowley crank up the new nebula to start it running. What if what he's doing there is not just powering the nebula itself, but initiating time in that area of space, to give all the processes the room they need to happen? What if that's his role, or part of his role, among starmakers - not building stars, directly, but starting time for them, or switching them over from the outside-of-time angelic workshop to the material plane where time runs? What if he's one of the few angels ever made who ever learned that skill? And what if, being the curious heedless little bugger he is, he extrapolated from that skill and taught himself how to do the reverse, and stop time in a localized area?

That's a lot of what ifs, but it would also explain a lot, reasonably parsimoniously, including the question of why nobody else is hanging around the nebula ready to hold the scroll for him and he has to call in Aziraphale to lend a hand. Everybody else had finished up their part of the job, and gone home. I am open to other suggestions, but I quite like this one.

Second, in the second series he easily accesses a file which should only be available to thrones, dominions, or above. When the archivist goggles at him he shrugs it off - he used to work with those guys, and they never change their passwords. But why did he have their passwords? Was he their supervisor? Was he a higher rank and security clearance? This, and Saroquel's recognition of him, are the best evidence the Raphael people have gotten to date.

Okay, sure if that floats your boat - but I've worked in a lot of offices. I've never had a supervisor who was any good at system security (or the work itself, not the work I was doing). Even when I was temping, I generally knew more passwords than the boss did. In my offices, the person who knew all the passwords was the snoopy little clerk who a) had legitimate reasons to get into everybody's workstations, b) read over people's shoulders, and c) liked to know what was going on and be one up on everybody else, including playing pranks on them. What's more likely, that somebody put Crowley in charge of other angels, or that his coworkers were the kinds of people who set passwords like "password" and Crowley was a nosy bastard? I rest my case.

Third, he drove the Bentley through hellfire and on to Tadfield, still burning - but we know, because God said so directly in the show, and the authors implied it in the book, that this is because Crowley had developed what, for a demon, was basically a superpower: he could imagine things, including that he and his car were getting through the fire, and shape the world with it. If we adopt the popular fanon that the Bentley is sentient and supernatural in itself (possibly as a result of prolonged contact with Crowley and Aziraphale) he even had help there. It's a power that doesn't originate with his demonic nature, but with his acclimatization to Earth.

Fourth, he can detect things that are obscure to others, including to Aziraphale. He "smells" when the hellhound finds the Antichrist. He can tell when someone's looking. He clearly has finely-honed senses. The only other character who seems able to do anything unusual with the sense of smell is (of all angels!) Sandalphon, who can "smell evil" in the bookshop, but apparently can't tell the lingering scent of a demon who sat all night in the space drinking from Jeffery Archer books. This seems more subtle than we are accustomed to think of power, and it may in fact have been developed out of relative helplessness, a skill honed by hypervigilance, rather than an innate trait. Or it could be innate and individual, or tied to the type of angel he originally was, or related to his beast aspect - we simply don't have enough information on the point.

All the other powers we see him use - shapeshifting, size change, transformation of objects, passing unnoticed, influencing living people (and plants, and rats, and cars), transportation along the telephone lines, mending his car - are things that seem to be routinely available to angels and demons of all ranks. He calls fire to sign the invoice for the Antichrist, but it's a modest amount of fire compared to what Hastur lights a cigarette with, and seems to hurt him. Driving 70 miles per hour in central London must involve superhuman reflexes and a capacity to clear people and cars out of his way. It's all treated in story, and can easily be assumed by the reader, as bog-standard demonic factory settings that anyone can do.

This is probably as long as anybody wants to read through, so I'll have to make another post about Aziraphale and the relative power levels between them.

[wandringaesthetic]

Let's try to talk about Baten Kaitos some more (i think I'm near the end of it):

I'm tempted to say the plot is bad, or simple, or that it feels like it would have been brilliant in the 16 bit era but is made ridiculous with a lot more text and voice acting than it can support (and the fact the voice acting is Notably Bad doesn't help).

And I guess that's true.

But there is also some Really Interesting Stuff here. Take Magnus, the gameplay concept, the cards. When you are attacking a monster you are not hitting them with a sword but with a copy of the core idea of a sword, do you understand? (It's okay if you don't, I don't really)

We could leave this as a gameplay abstraction and it might be best to do so and not worry how or if this idea interacts with the universe of the game. But we don't. It turns out the protagonist's parental figure, his grandfather, was a researcher of these Magnus. It was thought that one couldn't capture the Magnus of a person (though you can apparently do it with an animal. one of your cards is a chicken don't think about it too hard), but he was trying to find a way. He didn't manage it, but he did create a Magnus, and from one of those Magnus he created the protagonist. Kalas was born from the idea of a person. He was supposed to be An Ideal, but he kind of sucks, actually. He's emotional and immature and impulsive. He sells his soul to the evil god for revenge or something. For a little bit he leaves your party and you have to kick his ass and save his soul with a magic mirror. In a world where people have two wings that are supposed to be some kind of reflection of their soul, he's just got one. (WE'LL COME BACK TO THIS) He was Too Much. Too Human. But grandpa took care of his little Frankenstein's monster accidental son anyway, until his past with the empire came back to bite him.

I can't talk about this game too much without talking about Chrono Cross. Masato Kato directed that game and wrote this one. (He also worked on Xenogears and Final Fantasy VII--this is about to be relevant) The games share some other personnel, but without going down a rabbit hole of interviews and game credits and writing some fanfiction about Squeenix and tri crescendo and MonolithSoft in the early oughts I'm not going to know who else to lay all this at the feet of, so Kato is going to be the assigned face.

Both games are both nearly perfect in presentation. Colorful and evocative in setting and music. They both have gameplay that is Probably Good But Weird Ideas that needed a few more iterations of refinement. They both have Very Lofty ambitions that they Do Not attain most of but still attain a pretty impressive number of.

Must a game be good? Can it not be a series of beautiful and evocative locations?

Both games also make a plot point of their gameplay abstractions. Chrono Cross in terms of FATE/records of FATE, i.e. save points (Xenogears does a similar thing), Baten Kaitos in the form of the aforementioned Magnus and the fact that you, yes YOU, the person playing the game, are a character in it, a sort of spirit that is accompanying the heroes on their journey and whispering in Kalas' ear.

And about those wings. Xenogears has IIRC an in universe creation myth where mankind originally had wings, but only one each, so that in order to fly they had to cling to one another. And then there's Final Fantasy fucking Seven, where, idk whether to lay "One Winged Angel" at the feet of Kato or not, (that probably has more to do with Nobuo Uematsu and Tetsuya Nomura). But Kato was probably in the room where Angel Wings But Just One happened at least three times now. That has to mean something. That has to be significant.

When it comes to boss design of the antagonist's super-powered monstrous form, much has been said and extrapolated about Safer Sephiroth and maybe it would be better to say less. Both "try to create a perfect being with imperfect hands and imperfect ideas of perfection and you create something useless and monstrous," and "we are made cracked and flawed and that's where the love gets in."

Just like this game! (Just like this transition!) Both this game and Chrono Cross have a sense of the unattainable about them. Chrono Cross deals with alternate timelines and the things that happen in some future or past that will never be. Beyond that it seems somehow yearning for something it can't depict. Gorgeous as it is it doesn't look like that opening FMV attract reel. Nothing in its story reaches the heights of "Time's Scar." With Baten Kaitos it's mostly in the strangeness and beauty of its world. People have soul wings that look like a peacock's or a dragonfly's or a hawk's. They live in islands in the sky. One of your characters is a simple fisherman--of a river that flows out of a pocket dimension and through the clouds. Another of your characters attacks with what looks like a futuristic gun, but are actually Magnus of brass instruments, and the structures of the imperial city he hails from recall the tubes and valves of the same. Villages look like storybook pages, or ice cream. But the lofty settings are pinned down by a pedestrian plot. The evil emperor is resurrecting the evil god with five macguffins because of.... Reasons. You must take revenge on your evil half brother.

But again. Must a game be good? Don't we need flaws for the light to get in? Maybe Kalas is perfect with his one mechanical wing and his mangled soul. Maybe that's the point.

[clericofkelemvor]

so sil joined the church of kelemvor roughly fifteen years before the game. now in the comics we DO get a little bit of a glimpse at kelemvor's church in the gate. theres a chapel dedicated to him, managed by father alby and nerys kathon, as well as other unnamed (and i think not shown, but like, its not just the two of them ofc) clergy.

some canon info and a lot of conjecture under the cut abt the way the church of kelemvor works, but tldr: over fifteen ish years, sil first works in the city then travels to places in need of a death priest, and they get kidnapped for illithid purposes while theyre on the road.

some time after 1485DR, likely still during the 1480s, thieves get their hands on the relics kept at the chapel and nerys, through circumstances, becomes and adventurer. with minsc!! and other people. the next significant thing is in 1492, after elturel is restored to the prime material plane, this particular group of adventurers comes back to baldurs gate and encounters the cult of the absolute. father alby at that point has been infected by a parasite and he has an ominous conversation with nerys, fights her and her companions that night after they prevent a ritual from completion, and dies by nerys's hand shortly after at the chapel - a mercy kill, before he fully turns. nerys also notes when she comes back to the chapel that it is in a state of disrepair and kind of falling apart.

what this means for sil is that 1) they very likely knew both nerys and father alby, and its totally possible that theyd heard of minsc specifically as nerys' friend/adventure companion! i dont think the inverse would be true though, they didnt hold a very high position and weren't a fixture at the gate at that point, but thats a fun bit. 2) i think they would have heard of the cult of the absolute. even if the mindflayer bit was kept secret, there had to have been an explanation given for father alby's death, and the cult was already somewhat known, though not the illithid part. we dont see what happens there, so im assuming nerys handled or took part in alby's burial before leaving again like three days later (only 2 of which were not filled with adventuring stuff. busy life.).

thats kind of it in terms of canon, although im gonna try to read the comics and see if i find anything else or can get more precise timelines.

now members of the death clergy seem to have somewhat varied roles. im pulling this from the forgotten realms wiki and a 3rd edition i believe book on deities (but seemed like very little had changed between 3rd and 5th edition for this).

i think sil started as a novitiate in the city and helped mostly with burials and administrative matters around those. considering their disposition at that time, they definitely avoided being the person consoling the grieving (or were kept away from it by other clergy), so they prob ended up doing more things like giving last rites, assisting with then later on leading funerals, and helping out with matters related to the deceased's wills or last wishes.

this next part is definitely more me extrapolating but what is dnd if not a beautiful sandbox. anyway. there are a few special statuses in the death clergy, but sil isnt an actual cleric until the game starts, and they were much too despondent to take on a more warrior role before then anyway. i think they stayed a regular acolyte for all these years, but specialized in travelling to communities that needed the services of a death priest. this could include small settlements that simply dont have anyone to perform burials, but also diseased or ravaged areas with a lot of death, in need of care for both the dead and the living. the wiki indicates that followers of kelemvor opposed the lengthening of ones life through necromancy or magic and despise undead (:^)), but also that they tried to ensure people didnt meet their end before they were supposed to. i interpret that as caring for the living as well as the dead; the grieving or abandoned who might take their own lives, and the injured and sick who might succumb too early. so i think for a good decade sil mostly traveled, at first with others but then gradually more often alone - due both to gaining enough experience to handle their duties by themselves and their very taciturn demeanor not making them a particularly sought out travel companion - to either remote settlement or places that had suffered/were suffering some sort of calamity, like hostile raiders, natural disasters, or fast spreading illnesses. they developed an affinity for medicine and treating people, a good sense of whats needed to handle inhospitable environments (say, mountains in winter, flooded villages, stuff like that), and eventually scripts they can fall back on when interacting with the distressed people they would inevitably encounter.

theyd be back in the city when the stuff with father alby happens, and help with restructuring the clergy there, and at that point start having a more important role within the church in the gate. theyve been around for a while, theyve fulfilled their duties well, and theyre in the right place at the right time to have a say. they're still very detached, but theyre dedicating whatever's left of their life to the church of kelemvor and they want it to run well. i dont think theyd get a higher rank necessarily, but theyre listened to when they say something, and just have more weight. i think that means theyd be targeted for tadpoling; as a fairly unremarkable and easy to disappear for a bit person who still has some connection to the rest of the church, and can thus be a gateway to infecting more people in an organisation that the cult has tried (and managed!) to take over before. they go back to travelling a couple months after the father alby stuff so i figure they got abducted on the road pretty easily.

the church of kelemvor presence in the gate doesnt seem huge, and doesnt seem actually particularly concentrated in one location. the chapel is presented as the seat of it in the gate and is situated in the lower city, but it seems pretty small, and while kelemvor isnt a widely followed deity it still makes more sense to me that the chapel seems so small because most members if the clergy are spread out across the city in smaller offices, either attached to cemeteries or legal offices and maybe even with the fists and guards. something thats also mentioned in the wiki is the "most solemn order of the silent shroud", composed mainly of workers, artisans and crafters whose activities are related either directly or peripherally to death (embalmers, gravediggers, etc). their task is to "inform the church of gravesite desecration and undead sighting", but i figure theres also just logistics that ties them to, if not the church, then their local clergy, and specifically death clergy. so i think itd make sense that theyd work closely together and that youd have scattered members of the church; their role in general doesnt particularly benefit from them being all in the same place, and esp in a city as big and frankly fucking messy as baldurs gate theres prob need of them in plenty of places. plus, like sil, i figure a fair amount of them operate outwith city boundaries as well.

i think thats most of the thoughts i have on this so far. i like thinking abt it bc this is actually such a huge part of their life, not just in terms of amount of time but bc they genuinely believe in the work and in kelemvor's guidance of souls. for backstory reasons :^) that im sure ill expand in eventually

[ectogeo-art]

^_^ okay so I am sure I'm not the first to think of it but basically:

instead of their conversation getting interrupted, after the "Mr. Garak, I never knew we thought so much alike." "Life is full of surprises, Commander." exchange, they hook up, and only after that we hit unpause on the plot. (Plot~~ Sim!Garak seems to betray them, saves them, dies, Sisko sees Bashir's reaction to Garak dying, the rest of the simulation happens and they wake up in the cave). Now only Sisko (and the founders) knows he slept with Garak and he is going to pretend that never happened, especially because he realizes that Julian has deep feelings for Garak. But Sisko can't help but look at real Garak differently after that, there is probably some awkwardness or tension and Garak notices and tries to figure out the source for that, maybe he ramps up the flirting and Sisko tries to forget even more how good sim!Garak was. (Garashir are probably in the pining idiots stage of the relationship or in a friends with benefits while pining for each other situation). Sisko may try to be supportive to Julian and make sure Garak isn't just playing with Julian's feelings. I am not sure where to go from here, I think Jadzia may also notice Sisko is acting off and try to talk to him about it. There is also the question of how the founders knew to simulate sex with Garak and the options I thought of are 1) Julian's memories 2) your idea about pre-canon on Romulus siskarak 3) changelings already did some hands-on research on ds9 and that included sex with Garak

Another question is if Garak finds out, how would he feel about it? I figured he would be delighted at first, but I'm not sure about his reaction further

Sorry if I rambled too much this ask was shorter in my head 😅

Haha, omg, this is INSANE, thank you for sharing, I LOVE it! ^_^ Especially Sisko seeing Julian holding Garak as he died and feeling extra weird about his hookup with Garak after that. Peak comedy!! <3 (Though it would work well with an angsty tone too haha)

Hmmm, if the simulation's pulling stuff from ALL of their minds then maybe the simulation saw memories of Garak flirting with Sisko in Profit and Loss and just extrapolated from there hehe ("Oh, and if you'd like, stop by the shop one day. I have a number of suits that would look quite flattering on you." - like, we all know what THAT means!!! lol). Or maybe the Dominion just assigned the simulated Garak to be the confidant/honeypot of the simulation, the character meant to draw information out of the actual people and observe their reactions. Maybe they picked him based on his reputation as a spy and/or as a flirt, or maybe it was just at random lolll.

And real!Garak flirting with Sisko to try to find out why he's acting weird post-The Search is great! XD Like, I imagine Sisko is just like. Being extra nice to him or something but in a weird awkward way, bc he feels bad both for mistaking a simulation for the real him and for almost maybe accidentally being a homewrecker and breaking up garashir/preventing them from getting together. But Garak finds his aimless vague niceness disconcerting because he is used to Sisko being clear and firm with what he wants from him and where they stand. So maybe Garak is like hmmm I'm gonna drop innuendos until he either bends me over his desk or tells me what's really going on (win-win). lol

And I think it should end with Garak and Sisko hooking up for real. Like, Garak finally wears Sisko down and gets him to spill the beans about the simulation. He tells him about sleeping with simulated!Garak and also about his observations about Julian's obvious feelings for Garak. And Garak's just standing there with his mouth hanging open because he's shocked to learn that he's desired by either one of them, let alone both of them. Sisko expects Garak to feel used or disgusted, but Garak just steps into his personal space and kisses him with tongue, so grateful to learn he has a chance with Julian... and he's also not uninterested in the fact that Sisko's clearly into him too. And then!!! Well, then he and Sisko fuck, obviously. <3 Just once. <3 Garak initiates this by saying that it's only fair that, since Sisko has been with Garak, Garak should get to be with Sisko. And then afterwards Garak just leaves, armed with a new understanding of Julian's feelings... and Sisko is just left in a daze thinking like, "Man. That was hot but what the fuck WAS that." But luckily a lot of the tension was released between them, in such a way that they can maybe (MAYBE) be normal about each other for a few years. The end! I hope you like my thoughts on how your AU would play out, and thank you for letting me share my vision. XD

As for your followup ask:

wait the thought "what if /no/ garashir" just went through my mind for the first time ever, what if in this au they really are just good friends (with benefits) and Sisko was reading too much into it, maybe something makes Julian try to play matchmaker for them (hopefully the first ask reaches you before this one so there is context)

Okay I gotta admit, I'm such a Garashir=endgame girlie that I'm not really interested in thinking through/brainstorming a true no Garashir scenario, it just doesn't compute for me, sorry (but that of course def doesn't mean you can't explore it!). That said, I can buy something like Garashir not yet realizing/acknowledging their feelings at that point, or them trying to distance themselves from their feelings for each other or thinking it's unrequited. Like, it makes more sense to me if Garashir just hasn't happened yet, than if it actually is just platonic/FWB between Garak and Bashir.

[nellie-elizabeth]

The Legend of Vox Machina: The Sunken Tomb (2x03)

Liam O'Brien, how dare you...

Cons:

This isn't really a con, so much as a point of confusion... where did Kash and Zahra go at the end of the episode? They seemed to find Purvan's tomb and wander down it, but then Percy also found the tomb? So they're in the wrong place? It just felt strange that they ended up somewhere else with no resolution or cliffhanger for those characters. I guess we'll find out in episode four?

Pros:

Such a good blend of tone in this episode. So many funny moments, and then mixed with such abject tragedy... the basic structure of the plot is just that the gang goes on a journey to find the Deathwalker's Ward, which is the first Vestige of Divergence they've been told about. Along the way they banter, they fight weird fish people monsters, they have a not-so-friendly rivalry going with Zahra and Kash...

There are lot of moments I could shout out here, but a few of my favorite comedy beats include when Kash tells them about Purvan, they all start laughing and making stupid jokes, and then Kash just says "wow, you guys suck." In that same scene, I loved Grog celebrating his new beard, and when Kash is dismissive of it, Grog gets furious and in his face. Kash... immediately backs down and says it's really cool.

Zahra and Vex... perfection. This vibe between them started up in episode two, but this episode we really got to see it in action. They're totally playing it like they're bitter exes who still find each other sexy and I am living for it. Such good energy, and a natural extrapolation from the vibe they had on the original stream. I  loved when they were fighting over who got to be the hero and save the other one. And Vex's exasperation when she realized Zahra had run off was so funny.

The whole fight sequence was good fun, everyone teaming up and being bad-ass. Kash falling off of Scanlan's hand made me laugh too. The only hint of real worry in these scenes is Grog, whose bloodlust seems to be a little more intense than it should be, as he's using that hungry, hungry talking sword... Pike seems to pick up that something isn't quite right, but she can't figure out what's up just yet. Also, as I said, we finally got our bearded Grog! I've been waiting for that guy to turn up.

A couple other details: Pike has a vision to check in on Emon, and sees Thordak ruling the roost, demanding tribute and burning humans alive when they run out of shiny things to give him. So that's not great. Also, in Trinket news, he actually got to be useful in a fight for once, which was exciting to see!

And then there's the stuff with the twins. I mean. Where to even begin with all of this. It was so good. Pitch perfect. Liam and Laura fucking knocked it out of the park. The episode has flashbacks showing them younger, during an incident in which their father yelled at Vex for breaking a tiara, calling them worthless because of their status as half human. Vax decides they should storm off, and they do, but it's clear Vex didn't really want to leave. She gets mad at him for always trying to protect her and tell her what to do, and then we cut to later, where Vax is sobbing because his sister has left him. Vax says that it's not that Vex needs him, it's that he needs her.

Just. If you know where this is going it's just... just... the perfect distillation of the whole thing with the twins. They were so cute and squishy as little baby half-elves, and their dad sucks so hard.

The episode also cleverly builds up the fact that the Matron of Ravens' temple is full of traps. We see Grog discover one, we see Vax checking ahead to be sure, we see Trinket sniffing out a hidden latch in the floor that raises up a tomb... it's all very treacherous. Obviously I knew this was coming, so every time Vax insisted that everyone wait and be cautious, I was getting more and more tense. It happens so suddenly, so unceremoniously. Percy reaches in to take the Deathwalker's Ward, and it sets off a trap. Vex is caught in it. She falls to the ground. Dead.

Again, just... LIAM. With the full on SOBBING. I cannot deal. It's so raw and real and I'm beyond excited for the consequences of this one moment to follow us through to the very end of the show. It's gonna hurt so good.

So yeah. This episode was fantastic. I'm eagerly awaiting more, and can't believe I have to wait a full week to see it resolved. Even knowing how it all turns out isn't enough to calm me down. This was excellent TV; I continue to be so happy and so blown away by what these folks have managed to pull off with this adaptation. Can't wait for more!

9.5/10

[aroaceleovaldez]

i’m not in this fandom like that so I didn’t know rick previously said he wasn’t going to write anymore. but is it you feel like he’s milking it? maybe it’s bc i’m more in anime/manga fandoms, but for example it’s common for mangaka to write light novels to accompany their story to add details to characters backgrounds or answer questions that aren’t in the manga, but I would never the concept of it bad writing or disrespectful….isn’t it just expanding the story? maybe I’m just not getting your point. i agree the audience shouldn’t be spoon fed, but nico still having nightmares & hearing voices & planning on going to tartarus seems too big of a plot point to be ignored. & chalice of the gods - that I agree with the spoon feeding, but it’s just simple fanservice, maybe rick missed writing those characters or maybe it’s money idk but I feel like a lot of the fandom looks forward to reading more about Percy, i dont think majority feel disrespected by it. (please also i’m not trying to berate you for not liking tsats and chalice im just curious!)

My problem isn’t that it feels like Rick is milking the series - though he absolutely is. He explicitly stated on his blog that Disney asked him to publish Chalice of the Gods as Percy promotion for the Disney+ show adaptation - but the fact that the way it’s being gone about feels cheap.

I get what you mean by comparing manga, but manga is ultimately a different media form. Manga and comics in general tend to lean more expositional by nature because that’s what’s required of the medium. This also means there’s a lot more room for those kinds of extra content series because the medium inherently provides space for them. That can also be a thing in novels as well - I was in Warrior Cats fandom. Warriors has tons of extra content books and novellas (and manga!). I read Animorphs, which also has lots of extra content books (and 52 books in the main series). I am very familiar with series that have a lot of books and bonus content and etc. But the thing with those extra content books is a.) it’s really easy for them to be bad in the exact same way i was mentioning, where details feel forcibly spoon-fed to you, and b.) they need to provide something new, otherwise they just feel like cheap additions that you’re better off skipping over, and if you do skip them you don’t loose anything. And this is 100% true for manga too! It’s a really common problem!

The point is these books don’t expand the story. We aren’t learning anything new that we wouldn’t be able to extrapolate anyways, and it is okay that we don’t know everything happening in the series. We don’t need to know the Exact Specifics of how Nico and Will got together, or how Percy did his college applications. And this has been true in the series before! We don’t know what happened on Clarisse’s quest in TTC. We don’t know what happened to Reyna and Hylla between Circe’s Island and Camp Jupiter, or even how they got to Circe’s Island in the first place. We still don’t know what happened in Albania. And all of that is fine. Nothing is lost as a result of us not knowing those answers. Heck, actually a great example - in TLO, Nico tells Percy he’s been exploring California looking for leads on his family. We’re told he has a new lead, and then he never brings it up again. We as the audience can presume this was relating to Hazel, but the important part is: We are never told what exactly Nico was doing. We know he was doing some very important personal stuff in California, and that’s it. Even if we presume it was relating to Hazel, there’s still huge gaps in that we don’t know about, like how Nico brought Hazel to Camp Jupiter, how Nico found out about Camp Jupiter in the first place, or how he discovered the Doors of Death were open at all. We know none of that. And that’s a good thing! Because we don’t need to! It’s completely irrelevant and adds nothing more to the story! We know everything we need to know about that and that’s it.

That’s how the end of TOA should have been. Yes, we get a cliffhanger that Nico has some personal destiny stuff, but we’re also explicitly not told the prophecy. That should have been the end of it, and it was SUPPOSED to be the end of it! We’re not gaining anything new by having Nico go to Tartarus again - we’ve seen a popular ship go to Tartarus already (Percy and Annabeth). We know what’s down there. We know what Nico experienced down there. We already know everything we need to know. There’s no point to this. Especially since there’s so many elements of the already established canon that emphasize that the alleged goal of their quest is pointless to begin with. We know what’s going to happen already. We can extrapolate. We don’t need a whole book or 3-book series to explain it to us - that’s the part that’s disrespectful to the audience. It’s saying that You Need To Be Told Exactly What Happens Because We Do Not Trust You To Be Able To Figure It Out On Your Own.

 You brought up a great word, actually - It feels like fan-service. And that’s a bad thing. Fan-service is not a good thing - it is almost always bad writing with no heart in it, just spoon-feeding the audience, and it’s disrespectful to the readers. TSATS just feels like solangelo fan-service by trying to make it Percabeth 2 and dancing Will and Nico around in front of the audience a bit more. We aren’t gaining anything new, and there’s no reason to bother with TSATS when you can get the exact same thing or more from fanworks. At best, TSATS could have maybe worked as a short story like Sword of Hades, or we could have gotten a Will short story like how The Stolen Chariot gave us more depth on Clarisse. But as it stands currently, it’s just cheap. It just feels like excuses for Rick to explicitly canonize random things because he doesn’t trust us to figure it out as being coded (this teeters dangerously on the JK Rowling approach), or shoehorn in myths he hasn’t used yet, which he was already doing in TOA and that turned out racist at worst and a mess at best.

There are absolutely extra content novellas I would love to see. Everybody’s been asking for a roman series for ages. A Reyna-POV 3 book Roman series would work perfectly and actually provide something for the collective series, because it’d actually give us some reasons to care about the Roman camp and maybe Jason’s backstory and further flesh him out as a character. I mentioned Clarisse’s quest from TTC earlier - do we lose anything by not knowing what happened on her quest? No. But she’s a major side character who’s been around since book one that we know very little about, and if we need more first-series content to promote the show adaptation, that feels like a great avenue, because we can use it to explore things that we don’t know much about! Like rogue demigods and the Titan Army (with Chris), the Ares cabin (quest members), or Clarisse herself and her backstory and fleshing her out more as a character and her relationships with other beloved first-series characters like Silena and Beckendorf. We can’t get that with Will because he only joined camp right before the Battle for Manhattan (and anything saying otherwise would be an outright retcon, which is even more annoying) and nearly his entire cabin immediately died. Everything we saw in TOA is basically all we’d be able to get from Will. And we already got it - we know where he’s from, when he came to camp, who his mom is, and his relationship with both his parents and his siblings and other campers. We saw who he as a character is in TOA. Yeah, it wasn’t much, but he’s only been around since TLO and barely existed in HoO - he’s a minor character, that’s expected. But all we’re gonna get is more of the same.

Tl;dr: My problem isn’t that it feels like beating a dead horse, my problem with TSATS and Chalice of the Gods is that they feel like cheap and pointless plot lines that are inherently insulting to the audience by refusing to allow any interpretation of the intentional free space left by the narrative and at best is a blatant shoehorning-in of more myths and canonizing random things that don’t add any actual merit to the story, they’re just there to be included.

[sing-you-fools]

i think one of my major Fandom Pet Peeves stems from this too, and that's the "this never happened!!!!!" that we see a lot. and i get it, i get that there are some things that you as the audience want to see, but a lot of the time those moments aren't really things that fit into the narrative.

it kind of brings up this point of tension between "these are not real people and anything that isn't on the page isn't canon" and "obviously there's stuff that needs to happen but can't get mentioned." some stuff has to just be implied or assumed. there's a reason you don't read about it every time a character goes to the bathroom, you know? as a writer, i can't describe every single thing that happens, and if my character who was last described as sitting down is suddenly opening all the windows, i need to trust that my readers will assume he stood up and walked over to them. and generally, yeah, people are pretty good at that.

but then you see stuff like - and i'm trying real hard not to tie this to the Encanto fandom but it's the easiest example - all the "No one ever apologized to Bruno!" comments. when he's not the main character, and while that wouldn’t have horrifically out of place in the movie, it also wasn't part of the narrative because it was Mirabel's story, despite what tumblr wants you to think.

and a lot of times it's stuff like, we never see them just having a nice time! and while i understand and also want to see the characters having a nice time, that doesn't make for a good story! again, there's a fine line - if there's a romantic relationship i'm supposed to be invested in i do actually want to see some evidence that these characters get along (this is a direct Buffy/Angel callout) - but i challenged myself to write a couple having a nice date once (the whoooole thing) and it was like 100 pages of just. chatting. and nothing happened. was it cute? maybe! would some people love to read it? maybe! did i have fun writing it? yeah! is it ever gonna be in a mainstream publication? no! i love slice of life but mainstream media does not!

so i'm begging people to remember that this is a narrative we construct and we can't include every moment. we can't even include every moment we'd like to include. as fans, we have to take cues from other parts of the story and extrapolate. fill in the gaps. i'm sure Bruno got a meaningful apology; it would go against the movie's theme for him not to. i'm much, much less sure Buffy and Angel got along.

and hey, if you like the way you've filled the gaps, go write fanfic about it. that's what it's for. but understand that it's not problematic for a story to have gaps in the first place or i will be forced to show you the meaning of TMI.

genuinely think that most bad takes on fiction online stem from the fact that people don't engage with fiction as a constructed art form and instead view it as somehow generated from the ether

[sporesgalaxy]

Workshopping a fic where hunter talks with a memory of the previous golden guard in Darius's mindscape and I'm debating using Thomas for the fic, what was thomas's relation to Darius in your canon?

Genuinely tried very hard to get into writing Thomas for ya twice and ended up having ideas for Carver instead both times. Soooo I can only give you my vague structural thoughts.

yeah I'm back after writing all this and I was sure hoping I'd have some breakthrough while I went through everything but it just didn't happen.

Siigggh. Feel free to name your GG Thomas if you want but I just don't really have a Guy Fully Made yet.

•••

For the moment my conception of him is that he has the same sort of chaotic good alignment as Darius "only the small ones will get eaten" Deamonne, seeing as how they got along so well, + Im sure such an outlook would be the most practical way to do any real good so close to the Emperor.

The other main thing we've got to go off of is the way that Darius treated hunter in Any Sport In A Storm. We can probably assume that the prev. GG similarly valued people who had the strength to oppose the Emperor when what he told them to do was wrong. This is also a practical outlook for someone to have when working very closely to the Emperor while still trying to Do Good. You can't actually trust or rely on anyone who would turn on you if the Emperor asked.

We also have Darius' word that prev. GG was an extremely strong witch-- my assumption here is that none of the GGs have ever had magic, but most have been better at keeping that a secret than Hunter. This just means that the previous GG was EXTREMELY skilled with whatever artificial magic he had, to the point of never letting himself be seen disarmed. This of course also tracks as practical for his role, assuming the GG has historically also been default head of the Emperor's Coven (which seems like what Belos would probably prefer, but may have forgone in Hunter's case because of his age).

From all this I can imagine the GG doing his job similarly to Darius as we know him now; using power and intimidation to make a show of being a strong, loyal Coven Head, while secretly doing good deeds under the Emperor's nose, although perhaps with a bit more collatoral damage than is strictly healthy as a consequence of being so immersed in the cutthroat culture of the Emperor's inner circle for so long.

As for how he interacted with Darius, it's difficult for me to write for because of how many unknowns there are. We don't really have a clear idea of what Darius was like before he was a Coven Head, so I don't feel confident trying to fill in the blanks about how his relationship to the previous GG developed & impacted both characters in detail. This isn't to say it can't be done, just that it's out of my comfort zone of having Lots Of Stuff To Extrapolate From.

Besides this vague conceptual stuff I really don't have much solidified in my mind about Thomas, besides sort of a vibe that I've had trouble congealing. Sorry!