#and yet i have basically this entire scene memorized

[gottaeattolivegottastealtoeat]

@thedoctornumber11

"You're only in trouble if you get caught." He grinned at Abu before being grabbed by one of the palace guards, who gazed at him with a sneer and a growl of pleasure at having finally caught his prey.

"I'm in trouble." Only for Abu to jump down on the head of the guard, who was forced to release him, then he and Abu ran for the hills. When he finally slipped free, he grinned and ripped the loaf of bread that he'd stolen for breakfast apart! "And now, esteemed effendi, we feast!" he claimed, grinning just before leaning in to take a bite of the bread, only for him to lose his smile as he noticed the two kids picking at the dust and sand settled on a vase that held nothing. Orphans, just like him, looking for a meal to sate their little bodies. A sad smile slipped onto his lips and he stood up, moving to the two little ones and leaning down, one hand on his knee as he offered out his half of the loaf of bread.

"Here. Go on, take it." He insisted, smiling when the little girl finally did and walking away without another word. Abu wasn't long after, handing over his half of the loaf, albeit with a small bite taken out of it, to the little ones, as well. At least Abu had gotten something in his stomach. Al sighed to himself, and then joined the crowd watching a new potential Prince Consort show up in a long parade, his heart hanging heavy. Just another day in the life of a street rat.

Of course, it wasn't long before Al's chest constricted as the little boy from earlier ran out, giggling, his sister chasing him to try and stop him. Obviously, the boy had seen the horse of the potential prince consort and just wanted to pet it. But the horse was having none of it, startling and rearing back. When it finally settled, the potential prince consort pulled up a whip, and was about to give the children the punishment of a lifetime, only to be interrupted by Al, catching the whip. With stinging palm and teeth gritted, he glared up at the other man.

"If I were as rich as you, I could afford some manners!!" he spat, only to be pushed down into a puddle of mud, his expression continuing to darken as the prince insulted him, to the point that Aladdin rushed the palace gates as they were closing, only to have to slam his still stinging palm against the gate in a manner that spoke the bitterness of a life lived in nothing more than pain and suffering. He let out a sigh, not having noticed the man who had been watching this whole encounter. It was disheartening, to be treated like this, day in and day out. Sometimes Al wished that he could have a better life... maybe that his life had never begun at all. What if his parents had never had him at all? A sigh left his lips shortly after as he started to head home in the light of a setting sun.

[edgeray]

*presses my face against your tank* HELLO RAY !!! :D I AM FINALLY HERE !! MY BRAINCELLS HAVE COLLIDED AND PRODUCED A THOUGHT !!

or, er, sort of? more like a vague vibe, but i digress. basically, consider: pining arle. how does she realize her feelings for you? how does she cope? how does her behaviour around you change? does it? what is she thinking the whole time? when would she consider making a move? essentially i would like to see you psychologically pick apart this woman. go as in depth into her brain or inner monologue as you want !!! the set dressing can be canon or an au, i’ll eat it up regardless :)) and as a professional angst writer i know you can write some absolutely monstrous (/pos) yearning and i’m frothing at the mouth thinking about it 🤤🤤🤤 lookin forward to your thoughts but also take your time with it !!! godspeed 🫡🫡🫡

An Unfit Role 

(Arlecchino x GN! Reader)

A/N - Oh sev… you spoil me too much. You truly do. Somehow this turned into very ‘Arlecchino is a person'-esque and I don't know how but oh well. I don't know if this answered your questions very well, but hopefully this is what you mean by psychologically picking apart her! Was this enough pining? Content warnings / info - uhh none I think. just a lil bit of angst, 1.4k words

Arlecchino is many things. The Fourth Fatui Harbinger, a Snezynayan diplomat, the head of the House of the Hearth, and simply ‘'Father.’ She takes on many roles, and enforces them with an iron fist, every facade meticulously practiced and rationalized. Perfected as if she were an actor on a stage, every action and step is calculated beforehand. And if external factors or unpredictable variables crop up in the midst of her play? Well, a good actor knows how to improvise. Arlecchino is well aware of her roles, has memorized the lines and drilled through every movement. The Knave has many feats from each character she plays. A flawless performer, in those aspects.

A lover is not a character she can play. Someone who loves. It is a role that she cannot hope to touch, one she cannot imagine assigning herself too. She is far too inexperienced in what it pertains to. Her perception would grossly mischaracterize it, painting a rather crude display of what she knows of but doesn't know. After all, how could one act without an adequate example? No actor would want to showcase a poor impression of an original source material, an actor presents only their most remarkable qualities. A good actor knows what they cannot act, and it is this where her talents reach their limit. It is what her role as a ‘Father’ stems from; this inability to express something far too fragile and flimsy for her to hold. 

Of the few showcases of others playing the role, Arlecchino is knowledgeable enough that they are simply inept showcases. The Tsaritsa, who has shown the capability to act, and yet chooses to conceal her abilities from her audience. Crucabena, an unqualified actor, whose words dripped with far too much venom for the soft-spoken voice that she used. Perhaps Clervie was the only accurate and genuine actor able to play the part, but one cannot appreciate the traits of an unfinished story. And the naive Peruere, who could hardly imitate her counterpart, was maimed by Arlecchino’s own hands. It is here that she learns that the role of a lover earns no applause, because it adds little to the plot, and so it lacks a function in her story.  

Despite this, she finds herself in this scene, where she plays a character unlike her usual, an entirely new character involuntarily thrusted into her by the cruel machinations of her mind. 

It is a subtle thing. First, she was just the Knave to you. But somehow, among your presence, her facade slips, and she dons another character. 

She becomes a character who knows of nothing but the way her sight is captured by a singular person, a character whose dead heart begins to beat, daring to flutter back to life after it was painfully wrenched out of her chest by her favorite story's ending. She becomes acutely aware of this role when her eyes linger on you a moment longer than need be, when she indulges your empty but no less engaging conversations, when she familarizes herself with the particular fauna scent you carry. When she closes her eyes, your smile flashes through her mind, she knows she's fallen. 

An actor knows when to quit, when they misfit the character they're performing. And yet her mind remains stubborn. Acting a role one does not fit will only damage the actor's reputation, and she intends on abandoning it. But it is difficult for her to dismiss how much she yearns for a warmth that the blood flames in her veins cannot bring. It is difficult to deny that she is not momentarily blinded and stunned by your beaming expression, even when you are not looking at her. It is increasingly more difficult to control the pulsing underneath her skin. This is a character she cannot control, instead, it often feels that the character controls her. 

It is an unseemly, disgusting appearance for her. If it were physically possible, she would plunge her very own cursed, clawed hands into her chest, to grasp onto this fickle, volatile organ and crush it just to exhaust the remaining embers of a futile hope. If only it were as simple as that. Love is far too much of a complicated role for her, and yet it is somehow inescapable. Some sort of torment placed onto her by the archons. 

She can long, she can reach, she can prance around you, but never can she touch. For love imprints its scorch marks deeper than any weapon or assault. One of the lessons her story has concluded to. 

So, instead, she reduces its role to a minor character. She lets her stares remain, but she observes you from a distance. She does not dawdle a second longer besides you if she needn't be. She dresses the role of a lover as an observer. Everything she touches with these wretched, blackened hands soon turns into nothing but embers and ashes, and so the only way that you will remain is away from her.

On her desk, sits a vase with a single flower. It is your favorite flower, the flower that you smell of. It does not move from its place, nothing is done to it besides being watered. Its stem is so brittle, and the petals are far too easy to wither away.

(It is a reminder, every time she sits at her desk. Oh, how'd she like to stroke the patels with as much tenderness as she could muster. How'd she like to cradle it in her hands, this source of life, despite being so delicate, is so beautiful. How'd she like to be able to wake up everyday, and view upon this blossoming flower. But she is not a gardener. She knows nothing of how to make a flower bloom.) 

Humans are the only viable actors for the role of a lover. A curse is not. 

(In her dreams, sometimes you are in place of Clervie. Yet, like Clervie, the only moment she is able to cradle you is when her sword impales you. She will not let another flower wilt, she will not burn another flower.)

It is why you baffle her. Why do you gaze upon her with that expression, as if her claws are not one one more inch from piercing your skin and ripping into your flesh? How do you take her hands in yours, somehow slotting them as if they were always meant to, when they’re soiled with vulgar blood? Her cutting words and sharp tongue, how do they not dissuade you? How do you see her blackened skin, and not be driven away by such a mark of impurity and depravity? 

How could you not tell that she is improper for the role that you seek?

She wonders if a flower is a poor description of you. She wonders if you are instead a Sundew ensnaring a spider, unwilling to let it escape. No, perhaps that is not fitting for you, because you are unaware how effortlessly she can char you–unaware of the imminent danger that comes with keeping such a venomous creature.

Arlecchino is many things. She is a coward, if only for you. She cannot abandon her role, but she cannot perform better, floating in the state of inadequacy that she so despises. Playing a lover makes her foolish, and it is a compromising role. 

She is foolish, but she is despicable. She is selfish. And though she is perfect actor, even performers must fail to succeed. One day, her mental will and patience crumbles. She requests you into her office, your doe-eyed expression widens when she gives you the flower that sits lone in a glass vase on her desk. She tells you that you plague her thoughts, every feeling and emotion is muddied when they concern you, a culmination of things not within her grasp, not within her control. 

It is your performance that finally teaches her what she lacked before: playing the role of a lover requires another. It is a role dependent on another character, otherwise it cannot succeed. It matters not how experienced one is with the other, as long as the characters are committed to it.

There is another lesson that she learned from you.

“I cannot act as a lover.”

“Why must you act to love me?”

Love is a fickle, unpredictable thing. There is no words to be practiced, no actions to be scripted. 

Arlecchino is many things. A lover may be one of them. 

[aimseytv]

please rant about bubbline, i need a win

the brilliance of bubbline has been vastly misunderstood for years and i’ll explain. people see bubbline as your standard sapphic couple with no real depth, people see the pairing and go ‘gfs’ and move on HOWEVER they are so much more than just girlfriends. they are two immortal beings who for years have been wrapped around the other fingers and have had a relationship based on miscommunication until wrapping that up during the stakes era (varmints s7 is what confirms this but we get into that later)

so the entirety of bubbline is based on miscommunication and you may be wondering: aimsey, how? well that’s because of the fact both of the pair believed the other was in the wrong. but, for us to discuss this, i must explain their relationship in its entirety. we understand how long their relationship has truly been going on for when there is a clip in obsidian distant lands (ODS) where bubblegum catches marcys rock tshirt, both when the pairing are younger or well “a longer time ago” - this shows how long they’ve truly been in each others lives. now, fast forward to the scene we get in ODS where marceline and bubblegum argue over the sense of power, as well as immaturity. we see marceline wanting to just hang with her girlfriend, while in a disruptive manner, meant no harm, and we see bubblegum attempting to focus on work while accidentally shutting marceline down in the process. that quickly escalates into a full blown argument, and quotes like “you’re acting like monster trash” is thrown at marceline which, marcy being an angsty little half demon, didn’t take too lightly in which she responded to the comment with a song that basically says “nvm. you’re not cool. i’m glad i woke up. fuck you and your candy kingdom” and it ends with bubblegum breaking up with marcy. sad right? you haven’t seen anything yet

so now we move on to the tv show. the first we see of the two is the episode ‘go with it’ where marcy is asked to help finn in his adventure to try and ask out the princess. you may be wondering “huh? but if bubblegum is her ex why would she help-“ WRONG! because she doesn’t help! she gives finn completely wrong advice which ends in finn getting thrown out of the candy kingdom. the interaction between the two during this episode is bitter, where we see marceline speak in a high pitched tone and say ‘hello bonnibel’ almost mockingly, in response to bubblegums ‘hey marceline..’ which is incredibly stand offifish. from the get go, we know something happened between them (and with obvious clues now we know the timeline but as a first time viewer, this random episode in s1 can confuse everyone because why do these two characters have beef we don’t know about?)

now, moving onto an important core episode in their timeline which is ‘what was missing’ in season 3. one of the most popular adventure time episodes, and one of the most popular bubbline moments where we see bubblegum and marcy being forced to be together due to finn and jake attempting to take down a “door lord” that includes all of the teams prized possessions. (tldr: little gremlin dude stole jake, finn, bubblegum and marcelines* top favourite and most memorable items.. we will get back to this shortly). anyway, they have to sing a song of truth to get passed and with a failed attempt, marceline tries and lets say she just unleashes all the resentment and anger she’s had towards bubblegum in the form of a song! she says stuff like “i wanna drink the red from your pretty pink face”, “sorry i don’t treat you like a goddess”, and “why should i be the one to make up with you.. so why do i want to?” - indicating she WANTS to. which is probably the first time bubblegum has heard this, because bubblegums reaction is very much just “:O” the entire time. anyway, song goes on, marcy blames bubblegum for her messing up (in reality marcy only messed up because she began saying she wants to bury bubblegum but that isn’t true so the door didn’t accept it. L). anyway, they make up soon enough when finn does his little finn thing and everything is fine.. until bubblegum tries to go against the door lord with a “calculation” which appears to be false and it messes everything up - marcy uses this failure of hers to kinda rub it in her face, watching the princess fail was a positive in marcelines eyes as she was used to seeing bubblegum put work before her so of course she will use any moment of bonnie messing up as a win. she says “looks like you aren’t as perfect as you thought..” which has bonnie respond with “i never said you had to be perfect!” .. OUCHIE!! this leads to them getting upset, finn doing a little sing song which actually opens the door, and them getting their stuff back.. YIPPEE! now, you may be wondering “what was the stuff bubbline had stolen from them?” WELLLL LEMME TELL YOU. bubblegums most prized possession was THE ROCK T-SHIRT that MARCY GAVE HER years ago. marceline blushes as she says “you.. kept the shirt i gave you?” and bubblegum replies “yeah it uh.. means a lot to me” and marcy asks why because bonnie never wears it, to which bonnie replies “i wear it all the time. as panama’s.” .. NOTHING MORE GAY THAN SLEEPING IN YOUR EXES SHIRT THEY GAVE YOU THERE IS NO HETEROSEXUAL EXPLANATION FOR THIS!!!! anyway, marcy didn’t actually *have* an item stolen from her and instead it seems she just wanted to hang out with the team, more importantly wanted to hang out with her pink haired ex girlfriend. good stuff!

anyway, next important interaction i’m highlighting comes from the season 5 episode ‘sky witch’ (there is a lot of smaller key moments but i’m jumping to this one okay moving on) anyway, there is a huge moment at the start of sky witch where bubblegum begins by.. sniffing the shirt marceline gave her.. as she wakes up, to then opening her closet to get ready for the day and we see a polaroid of the pairing IN THE CLOSET… you get my drift? anyway, it slowly moves on to marcy asking PB for help with something (in reality she needs PB to help her recover a teddy bear that was stolen from her that was given to her by her literal father figure during the mushroom war.. so it has a lot of significance. remember that). anyway, PB agrees after the tiniest of convincing and on they go! they go on this adventure, but we will skip to the end where PB magically gets the teddy back.. how? well, we don’t find out until the end of the episode where bubblegum actually traded the rock shirt marcy gave her all those years ago. why did that work you ask? because the sky witch works from the value of items, and not money value, but emotional significance.. SO IT MEANS THE ROCK SHIRT MARCY GAVE HER HAD MORE EMOTIONAL ATTACHMENT AND SIGNIFICANCE THAN THE LITERAL TEDDY GIVEN TO MARCY DURING A LITERAL WAR FROM HER OWN FATHER FIGURE THAT ABANDONED HER!!!!!! MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!

okay okay, need more information? i’ve got you! we will quickly move onto VARMINTS my favourite episode of all time. “why aimsey?” because it gives us all the answers and clues we were waiting for when it comes to PB and marcys relationship. we learn that bonnie was unaware of the reason as to why marcy believed they stopped talking and broke up, we see bonnie apologise for hurting marcy and shutting her out, and we see marceline accept her apology as the pair can finally move on and accept the past. after seven whole seasons we get closure baby! the episode is brilliant in millions of ways, as we see bonnie be vulnerable around marceline regarding her loss of the candy kingdom, we see marcy reconciling with bonnie as they travel through the tunnels the pair used to explore years and years before, and it’s just a very nice episode. we are hit with the infamous quote “bonnibel bubblegum, always so prepared.” to which bonnie replies in a stern tone “yeah, i have to be always so prepared, we can’t all just wing it!” which is almost a dig at marcelines free spirit nature, but not out of malice, out of jealousy. bonnie wishes she had that, and not the huge amount of responsibility she has been burdened with since she was barely old enough to understand what it means to be mature. marcy saying the words “is that why you stopped talking to me?” after hearing bonnie go on a rant about how responsibility is difficult always hits me in my heart because it proves marcy to this day, although being bitter about it, believes the reason bonnie shut her out was because bonnie preferred work over her and that was marcelines biggest fear (as we know from getting shut out from her mother, her father and being abandoned by simon). bonnie going “no?!” because she genuinely just didn’t even think to see that may have been the reason the two fell out; both of the pair believing it was the other that lead to the fallout and bonnie not realising it may have involved her a lot more than she thought and it wasn’t just down to marceline being immature. anyway, episode ends with bonnie apologising, marcy accepts it, and we get a very sweet moment where bonnie is vulnerable and explains she is exhausted and marcy allows her to sleep on her shoulder as she rests. very cute :)

okay now stakes the mini series is a whole new realm for stuff regarding the pairs relationship. the stakes mini series is highlighting marcelines relationship with vampirism, and is a very beautiful series i recommend everyone watches. it begins with marceline burning in the sun, and slowly moves on to her asking bonnie to help her with the procedure of turning her into a human because she no longer wants to be a vampire - huge thing to ask, and bonnie ensures she is sure, and they do the procedure. a moment from this i think about a lot is where bonnie says this while doing the procedure regarding the fact marcy will no longer be immortal: “and when you die, i’ll be the one who puts you in the ground”. i think it’s just a nice quote. anyway, there are so many key moments from stakes but i’ll highlight important ones because it’s 5 episodes jam packed of bubbline but another moment is where they are searching for one of the vampires to hunt (this’ll make more sense if you watch it but TLDR: the procedure also unleashed all the vampires marcy has defeated in her years of growing up). PB and marcy are doing jumping jacks, and marcy is explaining a dream she had where in the dream marcy was all old, but PB was still “nice and pink” - meaning marcy was dreaming of her immortality being taken away, and dreaming about how in her future when she’s old, she’s with PB and she’s grown old with her (aww). bubblegum replies “you think i’m nice?” and it’s a very sweet moment where the pair blush. marcy then explains she has a weird feeling in her stomach, and PB asks if it’s just fear and marcy explains she knows what fear feels like already, and then goes “maybe it’s.. love?” regarding what the feeling is while looking at bubblegum and ITS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL MOMENT THAT DRIVES ME INSANE BECAUSE HOLY!!!! MOLY!!!!!!!! she was just hungry (lmao) and we move on! another scene is where marceline gets hurt badly, and bonnie is begging for her to wake up as she holds marcys lifeless body in her arms and it’s just a very emotional scene of bonnie begging her to wake up when she thinks marcy is about to die and it’s just very sad and beautiful. i’m gonna quickly move on towards the end of stakes as we have more to cover but during the end, marcy gets turned back into a vampire but explains she has learned a lot and she thanks bubblegum, and says the beautiful quote “thanks for helping me grow up. now i guess we get to hang out together forever” and bonnie blushes in return and it’s just such an AAHHHHH scene!!!!!

now, we are rushing towards the finale (i’m missing some very key moments but i’ve been writing this for an hour straight without stopping i will fill in the blanks later) but basically during the final episode, marcy stops bonnie and begs her not to go to war - bonnie replies she has to, and in this moment you can see marcy more so terrified that this will result in her losing bonnie for the second time due to work and she doesn’t want this. its canon at this point the pair are dating again, and we see them chit chat before moving on as the battle starts. fast forward to bonnie getting really injured, and in result of this marceline loses her literal shit and punts the monster that killed bonnie after believing her girlfriend just got smothered and really badly injured - after this, marcy is out of breath and we see bonnie sit up and whisper ‘marcy?’ in a soft tone and marcy flies over just overjoyed she is okay. marcy says “even when we weren’t talking i was scared something bad would happen to you and i wouldn’t be there to protect you” and it’s such a raw line where it’s just obvious throughout all these years marceline never truly moved on from her. marcy and her giggle and then bubbline share their first on screen kiss that made thousands of gays across the globe pass away!!!

then, we have the beautiful obsidian distant lands that gives us insight into their very healthy relationship as we learn a lot more about the pair, and we just get some beautiful shared moments between them and even them canonically calling each other girlfriends which will never not be engraved in my brain!

this was everything from the top of my head (they will be my number one hyperfixation whether i like it or not until i pass away) but yeah! tldr: miscommunication lead to them not speaking for a very long time when the pair both just wanted to be loved but didn’t know how to balance their own stuff on top of loving the other. the miscommunication lied with bonnie throwing herself into her work instead of giving marceline attention, ultimately losing marcys trust in the process, and where marceline being a free spirit lead to bonnie just not being able to work like that as she “isn’t built like that” (her own quote “people get built different. we don’t need to figure it out, we just gotta accept it”. despite it being about her brother, i like to apply it to her also here). and marceline not giving PB the credit of her being a literal ruler burdened with responsibility. both were too young i’d say, but them growing up together and allowing the other to heal in their own ways lead them to each other again :)

THAT IS THE HISTORY OF BUBBLINE BY AIMSEYTV

[endiness]

Debunking misinformation about Netflix's The Witcher (Part 6)

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5]

"Henry Cavill is the only one out of the cast and crew that knows anything about the source material and cares about it."

Joey Batey has read the books more times than Henry Cavill has. (3 times as of 2023 vs once in 2018.)

Henry Cavill himself has basically admitted that he wouldn't want to go up against Joey when it comes to knowledge of the books and both Freya Allan and Kim Bodnia have praised Joey for how knowledgeable he is and that he could "give Henry a run for his money."

Henry Cavill also hadn't even read the books and had likely only ever really played TW3 (and not even the DLC for it) when he first met with Lauren and, given that he thought that the books were based off the games, it's likely that he never bothered to google or wiki or research the franchise in any way (despite proclaiming himself to be a lore buff) as surely he would've found out that the games were actually based off the books if he had (or, y'know, if he had just been paying attention to the game credits as the books are the first thing in the credits.) Yet despite all of that, he's said this:

"I didn't even have the need to prepare myself for the role. Because I breathe, I live this universe every day. I already got numerous opportunities to think about this character while I was playing the games. My preparation was already made before the casting started!"

Meanwhile Therica Wilson-Read had played the games, she set out to read the books as soon as she had the opportunity to audition, she goes back and reads bits of the books if not the full series before each season, and she even goes on the wiki and watches youtube videos to refresh herself on the universe.

Therica's book collection (with color coded notes!), btw:

Mecia Simson also jumped straight into the books and read them all as soon as she was cast and will go on the wiki to research things.

Cassie Clare on her preparation as Philippa.

Btw, Joey had less than 24 hours to prepare for his audition and in that time he memorized 2-3 scenes, wrote an entire song, and showed up in costume to audition.

Therica is also so knowledgeable about the books and the franchise that MyAnna Buring will go to her for advice on her character and understanding what's happening when she needs things explained to her.

Mahesh Jadu also went to Joey for advice on his character when he was first cast because Joey's known to be so knowledgeable about the books.

Joey's also the one who's gotten book scenes and characters written into the show, btw.

Freya talking about getting things from the books into the show, too:

Anya talking about book moments she's a fan of:

Also Anya making a book reference to BoF:

Joey making a book reference to what a diary by Jaskier would look like:

Lauren's talked about her hiring process for the writers which obviously includes having read the books.

Tomek Baginski, who worked on all three games btw, has talked about growing up with the books as a teenager in Poland.

There's loads more examples than this, but this argument is quite obviously complete and utter bullshit anyway and I don't really want to look up every little example proving that, so. I'll just let the post end on this note:

[chaifootsteps]

that tweet anon shared with the analysis clip - the guy's not entirely wrong that if Stolas said 'what can I do to prove [his love] to Blitz', Blitz wouldn't know what it would take

but here's the thing - Stolas doesn't even ask. He doesn't even make a commitment that he wants to prove it to Blitz no matter what, he doesn't promise to be better to prove it, he doesn't even give Blitz a minute to process his own feelings

Look My Way Stolas had the dramatic turning point that he was going to try to make amends for how he'd made Blitz 'a means to an end' (probably because Paranoid DJ wrote it, not Viv, and removing that moment wrecks the impetus of the whole song). Even When I See Him Stolas recognized he had behaved monstrously

but when it comes to the moment of truth Stolas wasn't interested in doing much more than ending the deal, then expecting Blitz's love immediately in return. There's such a disconnect here where in both songs Stolas is concerned he's treated Blitz badly, yet he doesn't consider maybe Blitz needs time to trust he means what he says and that he (Stolas) needs to be the one to put the effort in this time

but he just doesn't do that. It doesn't matter to Stolas that Blitz is the one who's bent over backwards to please him in bed all this time in order to keep his business going and the most effort Stolas has put in has been wishy-washy texts where he won't come out and say what he actually wants and is incapable of connecting with Blitz on any real level because he doesn't recognize the power imbalance and fails to take much real accountability for it

in Stolas' head Blitz may have been hurt but it doesn't matter that much, because ultimately the relationship he wants isn't that difference than the one he had. he wants Blitz putting in all the work to make him feel wanted and to validate his feelings. in his head Blitz's feelings are just confusing and inscrutable (and ultimately they don't matter that much) even though he's had several opportunities now where he could have conversed with him. Blitz gave him that on a silver platter in apology tour and Stolas bungled it again. like yes he was drunk but ditching to make out with another guy is really the sign of where his priorities lie

saying 'oh Blitz is too traumatized anyway to accept it if Stolas treated him well' or 'it's Blitz's fault for not indicating what he needs to hear to believe it' is shifting the blame again, because Stolas never asked about what Blitz needs or showed any signs of caring.

they have Stolas say 'we really must converse' in the duet but when the scene comes, he makes no attempt at doing that. he freaks Blitz out taking the book back, does a big grandstanding romantic gesture where he just talks at Blitz and then when Blitz doesn't immediately trust it's genuine (understandable) Stolas avoids the opening to converse with him and instead immediately shuts down because in his own words, he's got his 'answer'

that's not a conversation, that's a binary 'do you want me or not' proposition that Blitz clearly wasn't expecting or ready for

and after that Stolas just jumps right into 'I feel hurt therefore I'm the one who's been wronged', gaslights Blitz horrifically then still rejects him when there was yet another opportunity to talk

tl:dr but Stolas was never interested in proving anything to Blitz. He treats him like a slot machine where he assumes treating him with the basic respect of ending the deal entitles him to Blitz's love, immediately as he wants it and how he wants it

To sum it all up, here's a quote that Stolas and this fandom could both stand to memorize.

[inkren]

Metroid dread has consumed my life for the past 2 days. Its now one of my favourite games ever made. There's a few problems with it mainly the world not being as memorable and easy to navigate as tallon IV in metroid prime but it doesn't matter given how amazing the game is.

I could rant about it for ages but I'll just talk about my 3 favourite things. Massive spoilers for merroid dread.

1. Whoever came up with the idea of letting Samus smack the shit out of your enemies and parrying them didn't get paid enough. Once you learn how to parry basic enemies basically become energy and missile dispensaries. Its so satisfying to parry something especially emmi's since its so hard to parry them. Its also extremely cathartic to parry a boss and start a cutscene where you can just pump missiles into them. Which conveniently leads into.

2. Spectacle. Most bossfights are so cool especially when you parry them and get a bunch of free shots in as samus in the curscene that plays does a bunch of cool flips or rides a massive monster and holds her blaster to their forehead to pump endless missiles into them while they writhe around trying to toss her off. The only thing that could make it better is if the music was more hype like metal gear rising revengeance (which is another game I have to get around to)

And how could I not mention the final bossfight too. The fight with Ravenbeak is so damn cool with it being like a dance with samus and him doing cool flips around each other. He summons black holes and stars and the climax as.... this actually goes with point 3 as well so we'll get to that.

3. Samus is portrayed so well in this game and conveys so much personality even though she says like one sentence in chozo near the middle of the game and at the end of the game she starts screaming madly.

When she meets kraid she is so clearly sick of him that as soon as he roars she shoots him in the mouth. Basically just saying "let's get this over with"

Her conversation with the friendly chozo in the middle of the game as we get a hell of a lore dump and the only words she says in the entire game being "don't worry I'll finish it" pretty sure i paraphrased that but it conveys so much. By having no other words in the game spoken by samus it gives these words so much power. She is legitimately concerned for this chozo and when he is killed she is genuinely sad but it has to wait. Because she has a job to do....and an annoying enemy to kill. (Seriously those chozo bots that jump you are so annoying. )

There's so much more I could say about her characterization in the game and that one scene alone but I wanna talk about the final fight again.

My jaw dropped when she was nearly dead as Ravenbeak choked the life out of her and then she just started screaming like a mad woman and drained the power from the flying fortress making it crash down onto the ground as she beat him up and continued to scream. It was so badass and yet so funny and I was just saying holy shit the entire time. Peak character.

And then the final bit against raven beak where he gets infected with the x parasite. And samus has her new metroid suit which looks freaky and organic and thats the point. She was pushed to this point and now she's basically an energy vampire. Also nothing quite like obliterating your foe with a massive fucking laser to the face.

Of course the cool escape sequence where I barely got back to my ship on time with like 10 seconds to spare. (BTW samus keeps hitting the self destruct button every planet has for some reason. Isnt this like the 6th planet she's destroyed? Why do they keep having to be destroyed and by what?)

Samus gets control of her metroid powers again before escaping and this actually brings me to a point i like about the game. It doesn't reveal there was actually more metroids because they're the series namesake. They stay extinct. All except for samus. And its revealed that metroid means ultimate warrior in chozo. So samus is the metroid now in all meanings of the word. She had metroid dna and is the ultimate warrior of the chozo. Taking the name if the franchise for herself. So next time your grandma sees you playing metroid and points to samus saying "that man's metroid isn't he?" She's half right now.

Anyway my three simple points ballooned way out of my control. Go play metroid dread. Go play every metroid game you can. Which isn't much if you only have a switch but the two metroid games it has are peak.

[sneakyboythingz]

Best Digital Circus character designs in my opinion

1- Jax (10.5/10)

I genuinely think hes the best one not because hes the pretty and hot bad boy or wathever. But because he genuinely have multiple points on his design that make him the best character design to me.

The rubber-rose cartoon inspiration, the shapes, the eyes with square pupils, the smile, the character animation and expressions. He feels familiar but at the same time you never saw a character as unique as him yet.

You look at him and alredy know whats hes supposed to be. Even people who dont watch the show can look at his design drawn in the most basic way ever and know what he is.

My School teacher looked at the drawing i made of him and alredy knew he wans't good. An desigh that is so simple but even so, extremely appealing, hes absolute perfection (in my eyes)

Jax being extremely easy to draw and very recognizable from far away by a bunch of people is Simply genius. Also, his design can easily make him look genuinely scary at times.

2- Pomni (10/10)

Alright, like, just look at her, her colorfull beach ball eyes that becomes sketchy doodles when shes in panic, the eyelashes in opposite directions, the black eyelids and black mouth gums, the hair made of basic square-ish shapes, the primary colors on her entire design, the shapes of the jester outfit

Very unique,appealing and eye-candy design. I dont think her design reflects her personality as much Jax's design does BUT thats defenitely because Its suppose to represent the fact that shes the most recent human that arrived who got stuck in a cartoon character, wich gives the design concept some plus points.

Shes defenitely the top 2 compared to the other ones for me. She ins't extremely popular for no reason, Extremely recognizable and iconic alredy

3- Caine (9/10)

Even If i dont have much feelings for Caine as a character that much, i can say that his design is one of the best ones.

Him not having exactly a face really adds to the uncanny vibes he has, dont doubt we will see some real uncomfortable and kinda scary scene of his "face" one day if given the opportunity. And his eyes being such a big focus really adds to the concept of "computer watching everything and everyone "

And the overall "weird obscure cartoon character from the early 2000's" vibes too. And maybe thats just me but the three simple colors on his design makes Caine really nice to look at and his expressions are real good.

Overall, really good design. not as much as Pomni and Jax but still above the others

4- Zooble (8.5/10)

Even thought Zooble is a bunch of random and weird shapes attached toghether, theyre somehow still extremely eye candy and not cloying to look at and in a character design stand point thats not something easy to achieve in my opinion. So yeah fourth place for me

5- Gangle (7.5/10)

Not much to say about her besides that Its Just another really good design, simple but appealing, even thought i think she is really hard to draw without looking weir at times. But she gets some plus points cuz she is really creative

6- Ragatha (7/10)

She is cute and pretty and her design concept fits her character as well buut compared to the others i dont think shes that impressive. Shes Just memorable and has a good concept wich all of the characters are

7- Kinger (7/10)

Not really much to say about him beside what i alredy say about the others. A memorable and funny design overall.

[raayllum]

also cause I'm not there yet in my 5x08 liveblog but because even just a whiff of "Callum gave Finnegrin the spell" made the fandom troll come running into my inbox to say otherwise, just wanna clear up a few things for peace of mind before we get there

The first is that I know it was the fandom troll because of the timing & presentation, not necessarily because the now deleted/blocked ask had the "Callum purposefully gave Finnegrin the wrong spell" take. While that was an indication to me that this was probably the fandom troll since they seem to take issue with my characterization of Callum in particular, perfectly smart reasonable people have also proposed that possibility of the spell ingredients being not entirely accurate as purposeful; it's not exclusive to crappy people by any measure.

With all that in mind, I want to discuss how I view the scene (and indeed how I think it's meant to be interpreted per a casual viewer reading) as well as why I think Callum giving Finnegrin a not word-for-word accurate actually kind of makes his choice more morally questionable, not less

So let's begin

1) I don't think the scene's intended takeaway is that Callum gave Finnegrin the wrong spell

I think Callum panicked, and he folded, and he would've told Finnegrin anything the pirate had asked for in that moment to try and spare Rayla's life. While TDP is an immensely detailed show in many ways (hell I have a tag dedicated to just those details), every scene still has to ultimately work for a casual viewer. I don't think this scene is any exception. One of the first things in the series that we learn is that humans took down the King of the Dragons with dark magic and it's a repeated fact throughout most of the first season, and into the third when we see the events that transpired exactly.

So when Finnegrin mentions it, we're probably going to remember that was a thing that happened and it involved Harrow and Viren, but we're probably not going to remember the specific ingredients. Therefore, like Finnegrin, most audience members are going to take Callum at his word, especially since throughout most of his conversation with Finnegrin, Callum is arguably far more honest than he needs to be (fessing up that he did dark magic at all, mentioning that he studies all the primals, that he did the spell to save a friend at all - which is exactly why Finnegrin sets him the hand cutting test to try and break him, etc). The scene - again, for the audience's benefit - even as Callum clarify for those that wouldn't remember why he was spouting things about dying breaths and unicorn horns, because again, I do think this is the Intended Takeaway:

Part of the reason I think Callum panicked (other than Jack de Sena's wonderful voice acting and uneven breaths) is because, if Callum was thinking clearly enough to withhold information purposefully, he could've considered 1) that Finnegrin is bluffing about threatening Rayla (Callum cannot see her or any of the others, so that could be the case) and 2) Finnegrin would have limited means to know that Callum was lying if Callum said exclusively the wrong ingredients and sent him on a wild goose chase. To give as much as he did accurately was dangerous (but we'll talk more about that in a second).

We also know from instances in the previous seasons and just the prior episode that Callum doesn't have all sky spells (ones that he can do whenever he wants basically) memorized either, and that it's not out of the realm of possibility that Viren would've fudged a little to Harrow about some components of the spell (such as emphasizing love and hatred) because he was actively trying to convince - somewhat guilt-trip and manipulate - Harrow into doing something didn't really want to do, but ultimately couldn't say no to.

However, one of the things that's the most fun meta is reading into things deeply, looking at various character interpretations, and seeing what we can find below the surface level / casual viewership read. Just because something may not be the 'intended takeaway' (which can already be hard to define) doesn't mean it's not a real possibility, especially if enough dots connect, and doesn't mean it's not worthwhile and or without merit.

So let's look at the scene from the assumption that Callum is giving Finnegrin a not totally accurate spell On Purpose - what does he omit, what does that tell us, and where does that leave us from a character standpoint?

2) Haha, jk, unless...?

First things first, let's look at what Callum says vs what Viren says

No, no, wait! A dying breath. Blood filled with hatred. And a unicorn horn. That's the dark magic you want.

In her final moments, I captured something that I hoped we could use later. It contains her dying breath. [...] Claudia captured a unicorn and brought me its horn. The dying breath. The unicorn's pure horn. There's one last component I need. The undying hatred of one who loved the victim. Your blood.

Now, even Viren's stance and the circumstances of the spell isn't entirely clear. We don't know if any dying breath would do, or if it had to be Sarai's (and had to go her killer, as opposed to someone else). We don't know if the spell requires the unicorn's horn to be 'pure' (I'm assuming not already corrupted somehow with dark magic) or if it would work regardless. And we don't know whether the hatred or love is more important, or just one, or if they're equally important. It's quite a list, after all.

Which is why I think in some ways Callum's lack of specificity actually makes what Callum told Finnegrin more dangerous, whether you read the minor omissions as intentional or not.

Cause think of it this way, you're a pirate lord and you want to kill your enemy. You heard from this mage kid that any dying breath would do. What's your next move going to be? You're probably going to murder a random member of your crew and collect the breath because you were never told it had to be your loved one's final breath (which would make the spell impossible).

So that's one murder down, bare minimum. Then you're going to either send people out or word that you're looking for a unicorn horn at a port where people already canonically smuggle dark magic supplies (Chasing Shadows, TDP reflection). This will either lead to you hiring people to eliminate one of the - it appears to be - few remaining unicorns that still exist to bring you the horn, or if you've put out a reward, multiple dark mages / mercenaries may try their hand at killing one and bringing the horn to you. That's probably 1-5 unicorn murders as a result, if the mages are working not in communication with each other and all vying for the reward. This is also assuming that none of the mercenaries or mages come back empty handed and get harmed or killed because of Finnegrin's anger at their failures.

You also might torment and torture someone else to get them to hate you before you drain them of blood / take their blood for the spell, again not realizing that 'love' has to be a facet of it. At best, that would maybe be what you do to the crew member before you kill them for their final breath.

Then, once he has all the ingredients (and he'd need some sort of incantation, because dark magic is a lot of steps and processes) there's two main avenues.

Either these all work and he successfully has his weapon of vengeance needed to kill Domina Profundis, because what was given was enough. This would mean Callum's actions led to about 2-3 successful murders of mostly innocent people and possibly more political upheaval at the death of another archdragon (the ocean would certainly be out of whack, but it's not clear how much, if any, political power Domina still holds).

It doesn't work and Finnegrin, stubborn as he is about control and loathe to admit he can't commandeer something (magic and wills included), figures that something went wrong and tries again, having to collect the ingredients all over again. Depending on how many times he'd try (I feel like maybe 2-3 max), this could put those murders up to maybe nine innocent individuals, assuming Finnegrin's worsening temper over his failures doesn't increase the tally.

Rattling off the accurate spell ingredients could've actually minimized the damage, because any of the specifics might've stopped Finnegrin in his tracks. If Finnegrin just needed hatred of one who loved the victim, he could've fulfilled that on his own with some of his own blood ("I loved that crab" and her definitely hates Domina Profundis). The one that could've entirely halted his plan is if the dying breath had to come from the victim, in which case the chance to avenge his beloved crab is long gone. Finnegrin could've heard the list of very specific ingredients, deduced that he would not be capable of carrying out the spell, and been on his merry way to use Rayla as revenge fish bait.

But by giving Finnegrin an 'imperfect' list, Callum made the pirate captain more likely to engage in the violence required to get there, without an actual textual guarantee to the audience that what was given wouldn't have worked, either (aka we have two ingredients list and without a third to tip the scales, it'll always be a technical 50-50, maybe 60-40 read in favour of Viren).

So where does that leave us?

With these two readings in mind, you have two options:

Callum is willing to sacrifice Domina Profundis', and a few unnamed innocent lives/creatures, to save Rayla and thereby gave Finnegrin a dangerous in its own way, if not more dangerous because of potential increased collateral damage, list of spell ingredients, because he acted entirely out of emotionally fuelled panic where he wasn't totally thinking clearly

OR

Callum is willing to sacrifice unnamed innocent lives and creatures, but not Domina Profundis', in order save Rayla, because he decided on purpose to give Finnegrin a more achievable sounding list of ingredients that would increase collateral damage, but not let him kill the dragon, because he made a calculated decision on purpose that those lives were worth less than Rayla's and Domina's to him (for some reason, as she's a stranger to him)

To be clear, I would love the second option as an interpretation because I do think Callum can be calculating and I do think that's the far more Viren-like option - choosing what to sacrifice for other people in the mindset of harm mitigation ("A thousand men and women are prepared to fall protecting you tonight, but you won't let one sacrifice their lives for you?" / "If you must choose, choose the egg").

But again, given the framing of the scene I think the first reading is 1) more sympathetic and speaks to Callum's more compassionate emotional nature and 2) is the intended takeaway, but if people want to read it as Callum strategically deciding that certain lives - other than Rayla's - were worth sacrificing that so she and Domina Profundis wouldn't be killed, that is absolutely a valid prerogative.

It's just not mine

[monkey-network]

The Beauty of 12 Angry Men

I remembered in 6th grade lit reading Franz Kafka's The Trial, a story about everything judicial being set in stone for someone completely out of the loop. The bureaucracy behind Josef K.'s fate is never given a cause, no method helps him, and after a year he's at the mercy of a situation nobody said would be fair to him. It was a striking story to me, and lead me into recognizing Sidney Lumet and Reginald Rose's 12 Angry Men as a similar yet antithetical story. The film keeps everything in the dark except for the titular jurors trying to piece the case together for a boy expected to get the death penalty. The matter though, is that the defendant's fate was clear from the start and the journey is about getting to that thread's end. What follows is one of the most well written, performed, and staged movies I watched in my entire life and I just wanted to finally talk about it. So, let's talk.

Setting the Stage

It takes three minutes almost exactly for the title to appear. You get the mission statement from the judge, a good scan of the main characters, and a single moment of the defendant's face, basically the only time you ever get to see said defendant for the whole movie. After that, we the audience are locked in the deliberation room where the film starts to shine after the credits role.

For the longest time watching movies, I was so used to big colorful settings, the characters going places even if it's just another place to talk, where it's a gamble if you can memorize those places. Oppenheimer last year became the widely regarded movie that consisted of next to nothing but conferencing in rooms. Even in older movies, things were never shot in the same spot for long. This film was the first instance where they stripped everything and worked with bare bones staging. All it is are the men in that one room. No flashbacks, no cuts to anything beyond the group speaking. The only other places you get are the adjacent men's restroom and the courthouse steps at the film's very end, scenes of which add to less than 4 minutes. And you would think it gets boring, but 'focus' is the keyword behind everything. The fact there's next to no music adds to it having an actually engaging script that doesn't manipulate or go to unnecessary places to get the point across.

12 Angry Men is what I'd call a "dynamic stage play" where you could imagine yourself seeing this in a live theater, but it wouldn't have worked as well without the secret main character that is the camera. This film knows how to prevent things from getting too static; the cinematography is... well-paced in laments terms. Again, in that one room, you're engaged in where it's focused, how it moves with the characters, when it cuts especially when it closes in on the jurors at their most serious. From a technical perspective, it's immersive at its simplest. No juror feels left out even when out of frame and nothing distracts you from the brilliant acting everyone brings to the literal table. After seeing this, I felt like this was the kind of movie I'd want to make. One that can work with so little but feel as tightly coordinated as any other similar to this. Then again, I wouldn't have concerned about this movie on technicalities alone. Let's get to the story.

The Stakes of Uncertainty

The trial is a first degree murder charge where if unanimously found guilty, the defendant would be sentenced to the electric chair. Everything surrounding this film hinges on the one person who votes not guilty, juror 8. Number Eight makes it clear that his vote is not about bias, there's never a hint at him or anyone having a relation to the defendant outside the case. His vote is the biggest gamble dependent of everyone retracing their steps of the details surrounding the trial, and what I love most about this is the fairness.

Eight doesn't know if the boy's not guilty, he never forces anybody to side with him, but recognizes that the defendant's life is a serious matter and shouldn't be as open shut as everyone else makes it in the beginning. The film shows within reason that the trial wasn't as clean cut as it seemed. And I know the movie isn't judicially accurate and everything's circumstantial, assumptive, and so on. If there's any real issue the film has for me is that they never indict Eight for sneaking in the switchblade even though that scene is still a goddamn show stealer.

Henry Fonda excellently portrayed a man who knew how to play the cards right

Then again, the increased flimsiness of the trial made with the uncertainty of the outcome is the point. We never get the sentencing after the men leave that room, it's all about Eight showing the others that the boy's life deserved more deliberation than the others were willing to give him. Hell, it discusses that trials like this can and have existed where measures of the outcome are made beyond the defendant's control. Breaking through the easy decision every other juror had was more valuable, and Juror 8 did that responsibly while never trying to be above anyone. That in turn is what makes this ensemble cast nearly flawless.

The Angry Men

Before ever seeing it, I've seen a couple jokes of this movie's premise of how it was nothing but said 12 men who sure were angry. Having now seen it myself, it's amazing how much we get to know about the jurors yet only two are ever given names. You'd think the film would give them simple archetypes and gimmicks, but even if you disregarded the acting chops everyone brings, the writing was able to balance who they each are relative to the case and each other. You can memorize which juror is which yet that never makes them just a number on the table.

To me, the best part about this film is how the group is able to collectively debate about the trial with individual motives and understandings. Jurors Eight and Three are the focal characters, they're the most opposing, but I don't consider them the main characters. A Youtube video I watched explores this better than I ever could, but everyone is in this together, regardless of how present they are in the movie and you notice this in their behavior. The character writing made with the simple staging does so much while explaining so little.

Juror Four, who reveals himself to be a stock broker, is the most clinical about the details. He does his best in retracing the trial as factual as possible, discussing the evidence in a way not even Eight is able to fight. What makes him crack though is when it came to jurors Eight, Five, and Nine bringing up certain conditions of the defendant and witnesses that he didn't care to notice. Juror Nine is the opposite, concerning about the witnesses' conditions and probable influences which helped reveal factual doubts in their testimonies.

Juror Seven from the getgo is made the most detached of the group. By the way he's dressed, constantly checking the time, while capable of paying attention Seven is the most dismissive of the case for the simple reason of just wanting to leave for baseball. This is where he comes into conflict with jurors Two and Eleven especially. Eleven is expressively respectful toward the judicial due process, mentioning himself being an immigrant, which makes him eventually fed up with Seven's disinterest. He's not somebody who changed his vote easily nor adds a lot to the debate himself, but recognizes Eight's efforts of a fair discussion and naturally confronts Seven about his constant snide attitude towards the case.

One of the film's strongest moments, where the build up was genuine even if you felt it was unexpected

Everyone makes sense with is established about them in the beginning and I could go on about the little things. Juror Nine, being the first to switch his vote, is the only one who meets with Eight outside in the film's end. You can tell by Juror Twelve fiddling with his glasses and concerned of having the info laid out sequentially is the most flippant about his vote. Juror Five being more likely to change his vote out of sympathy, having grown up and is more knowledgeable of the slums given that's the defendant's home. Nothing about this movie or ensemble is complicated, but the through-line behind everyone's choices in this gets to be more complex than realized. Everything about this is encapsulated in my favorite scene of the whole movie.

Pulling It All Back

Juror Ten is the most openly bigoted of the ensemble. From the start he is racially motivated in his vote, but that's not expressed until a little later. Of that point, he's certain of himself like juror Three about the vote being clear while scoffing at Eight's opposition. When the cracks of the case start to show, Ten's arrogance starts to show and his words become charged. He becomes the most hostile toward everyone and especially gets a rise out of Juror Five when talking about "these people". Everything comes to ahead when the vote is 9 to 3 for not guilty. Ten finally has his outburst, his racial rant unspecified but striking all the checkmarks of a man that stuck in his ways. Then it happens.

Everyone put up with his remarks up to that point, but here they finally step away and we get the most striking moment of a man finally alone with his thoughts. After Juror Four tells him off, Ten goes to the corner desk and basically shuts down for the remainder of the movie. This was the film's strongest payoff in every sense. It wouldn't have worked without the buildup just as much as the civility that came with everyone involved. Nobody had to throw a punch or challenge his beliefs, you never know if this changed Ten as a person, all that matters was that Ten knew he exasperated any goodwill from the jury and finally checked out the conversation. 12 Angry Men knew how to make the characters see their errors naturally, never feeling like they played up the drama for everyone to get their moment.

Conclusion

To me, I'm reminded of when in 6th grade, my literature teacher would have these Socratic seminars discussing the books we'd read. You could say it was the most involved I was in that class. This film knew how to capture that feeling, how towrite a roundtable where the stakes are high from the start but doesn't make it sanctimonious. Again, Juror Eight doesn't force or manipulate the others to see things his way. They try to convince him initially, adding up to a tangled but mutual engagement and it always feels like you're with them in the moment. You feel Eight's uncertainty is as sincere as his conviction, the same going for everyone else involved. The fact they're all sitting in sequential, helping you naturally follow who is who, is the cherry on top.

Before watching this, I didn't presume much beyond a simple courtroom drama which I enjoy ever since Ace Attorney. What followed after was just being more than impressed by how concise and thoughtful this was made. No second felt wasted, no detail felt trivial, ALL THIS and not even mentioning it being like a "bottle episode". Believe me, this post is long enough fanboying about a film from the 50s. It earned being the most ergonomic and engaging movies I've ever seen. If this essay wasn't enough, I recommend it at least once in your life as it's free to watch. What else is there to say?

It's the Best

[destinygoldenstar]

Is Screen Time An Issue For A Character?

That’s a tough one.

I see quite a few arguments about some shows I’ve watched that ‘oh, this character is bad because they have too much screen time’. Or ‘I wish this character had more screen time to be interesting.’

Basically, too much screen time is now a valid critique to describe why a character is bad or doesn’t work for you. And to that I say…

Uh… no?

I’ll give some examples where I see this critique, but for now I want to state a case of examples where I expected to see this critique online, but didn’t, and I wondered why.

SPOILERS BELOW FOR THE SPIDERVERSE SEQUEL:

The main character of the Spiderverse movies is Miles Morales. Clear as day if you see ANY promotional concept art. The movies nail that home and give you a solid POV character among the Multiverse chaos.

The sequel begins with an over twenty minute backstory sequence involving Gwen Stacy, a side character in the first movie.

(Fun fact: When me and my dad went to see it in theaters together, he said that backstory was over twenty minutes long and that he thought they could've trimmed it down. Animated-phobia gives you weird opinions. He didn't watch Arcane with me and thought nothing of it because 'it was an animated show'. Not kidding.) (Both of my parents are like this, sadly.)

Now, in the context of the movie, it makes sense to include this to understand the full POV of her character going forward. As she is pretty vital to the story.

I tried imagining a version of the movie where we DIDN'T get this intro, went straight to Miles, and we just had to put the pieces together involving Gwen and her actions. And I don't think the movie would've worked nearly as well.

This brings me to another point involving Gwen Stacy in this movie: She's kind of become a protagonist as well, next to Miles.

Is this screen time theft? Under the screen time critique, it probably would seem that way.

And yet nobody I've seen complains. If anything, this solidified her as one of the best movie adaptations of Gwen Stacy out there. In my opinion.

Unlike the first movie, this one is not driven by the narrative of the main character, but rather multiple.

This is not uncommon. And it's an even bigger case with Arcane.

Yeah, this show is phenomenal everyone who says so is right Jinx is an icon Vi is my cartoon crush next to Petra I was crying so hard at the ending and for that alone this show deserves every ounce of praise it gets and I'm kind of an Arcane stan-

*Inhales*

I think I just have a thing for dystopian stories where characters walk through hell.

(Yes I consider TD a dystopian setting, that'd be a nice hot take to tackle one day.)

The Hunger Games is my favorite dystopian setting that I've seen, just because it's very memorable and inspiring. But Arcane is objectively the best dystopian story out there. If I fade out of my Total Drama obsession, this show might be my next target.

Cupcakes. El fin.

I could stop there, but lets talk about why we're here.

Arcane does not focus on the two main characters only as the driving force of its narrative.

Advertisement tell you that our main characters are the two growing war machines who go around calling each other sisters, Vi and Powder (Jinx. Idk how mad people get for which name I use for her. Sorry if I offend you). In fact, there's evidence to back that up. Other than they're the people with dyed hair, that's instant main character. They're the first characters we meet in the entire show. They're the characters with the final scene that closes off the season. EVERY ending to an act is with them. They're the main characters. Boom.

But wait. Nearly TWO THIRDS of this show doesn't even focus on them!

We have all the Piltover characters we keep switching back to. Jayce, Viktor, Mel, Caitlyn for Act 2 pretty much, Silco kind of becomes his own protagonist in Act 3. Really, the only people who remain consistent side characters are Ekko, and the two boys that get blown to pieces by Powder. And... some other people I'm forgetting the names of. (Sorry, I only had two watch throughs of this show so far and I know nothing about League other than the sisters become enemies.)

Now, why?

Why is this the case? I'm not saying characters other than our mains don't get fleshed out at all, but to the point where they're basically major enough to carry their own show? That SOUNDS like a detriment to the story if anything, especially how unfocused it kind of all gets until the end where everyone's in the same room.

Had Vi or Jinx interact with these characters, their fleshing out makes sense, and you definitely see that with characters like Caitlyn and Silco, who kind of need them to function.

But the Piltover gang? Jinx doesn't meet them at all, neither of the sisters meet Viktor, and Vi does meet Jayce, but in Episode 8 of 9.

Why does nobody complain about this? If anything, these guys are stealing screen time.

Well, it turns out, this is all done in Arcane's benefit, rather than fault. We are all the protagonist of our own story, and there are multiple POVs regarding the world.

It's basically if Hunger Games was third person instead of first, and we actually got a chance to flesh out the other rebels/children.

Me personally, and I know I'm not the only one out there, but the sisters were the most interesting thing about the show, and other characters that talk to them were how they caught my attention. That in no way means I don't care for anyone though, and it's COMPLETELY a PERSONAL thing.

So whenever we DO focus on the sisters and their story, not only do we get these other POVS on the scene that could clash with our view of them, but it makes it so that EVERY. SCENE. MATTERS.

No scene is wasted in fleshing out the sister's story. Everything has a purpose and drives it all to one heartbreaking simulation. There's no wasted space, there's no lack of attention to a certain detail, darn it, it's just right.

(I mean, I guess I would've liked to see what they went through in that time skip, like how Jinx was raised by Silco and processed her new identity, or better yet how tf Vi survived prison when it's heavily implied she beat people to a pulp and got solitary multiple times. But I think Season 2 is gonna cover it.)

Seriously, imagine a version of this show real quick.

Imagine a version of the show that took the Hunger Games approach, and used first person POV on one of the two sisters, doesn't matter which one, they'd both work. Cut out scenes not involving that sister. The other characters that appear revolve around scenes they're in with that sister.

Would that work nearly as well?

I don't think so.

Now First Person POV isn't necessarily a bad thing. Danganronpa is first person. Minecraft Story Mode is first person. Those are probably not great examples, but it can work. (TDDRI, a fic of mine, is first person, and I had to work around that to flesh out everyone else. It can work.)

This show is very hot topic and weirdly paced than what I'm used to. So take everything with a grain of salt as I am nowhere near an expert with this show. The show's story doesn't even get started until Episode 4, as the first three episodes are all flashback to explain where our characters are and why they're motivated to do what they do.

Again, I tried imagining a version of this show where we DIDN'T get those first three episodes, we started with Episode 4, and we just had to ASSUME all the backstory involving the sisters and the titular arcane and put the pieces together through Vi's words and Jinx's hallucinations. I don't think we would have been nearly as invested.

So with these two examples, WHY does nobody complain about screen time involving a character?

Is it because they're just really good pieces of media? Or is there a reason for this?

After all, Spiderverse and Arcane fall under the category of an 'ensemble cast'. A cast of characters in a story where there is no titular main character to drive the narrative, and everyone does instead. It's like if Harry Potter was 'Hogwarts' instead, or some title like that.

But lets take a look at some examples of ensemble casts where there's been a complaint of some sort with screen time:

Total Drama and RWBY.

Now I only like one of these two shows, so I'm gonna put that aside for now.

Total Drama. It has an ensemble cast. The show is about teenagers suffering-I mean competing for a prize, eliminating each other bit by bit as it goes along. Naturally with that setup, early boots are left to dry. But that doesn't stop people from complaining.

Ezekiel gets the most flack for too little screen time, and major fanboys say he should've had more focus. Personally I don't get that based on what role he's deigned to play. Caleb is a more recent example. I thought he was gonna have a bigger role and character than he ended up having, and him being a first boot gag makes even less sense than Zeke. Dawn is a fan favorite who isn't even in that many episodes. Axel is a ripoff of Shawn because of her lack of screen time. Scary Girl is... Scary Girl, who I don't see the fuss about her little screen time as she's comic relief, but the complaint is there. There is SO MUCH bashing about Noah's lack of screen time it is not even funny. So much so that he's sharing screen time with another person.

And who is to blame for this: Well, the characters who make it really far into the game, or course! How dare they steal screen time away from these guys!

I feel like Ripper is the most recent example of this. His character arc was about him breaking a world record. He broke it. It's Episode 5. Now he can leave the show, right-

Nope. He's around till Episode 8. Out of 13. And even then, in Episode 13, he's Millie's partner, which means screen time.

It sounds unjustified because it is. I'm not the biggest Ripper hater, but I definitely see the complaints. (Ripper and Damien swapping places are the only part of the elimination order I would change. Everything else is pretty spot on.)

We already have MK as a pre-merge antagonist and Julia as a post merge antagonist, we don't need this rando bully character as well as it adds nothing. Maybe Ripper would've been better liked if he wasn't a bully and just some morally average comic relief guy, but also... probably not.

But he's not the only fart based character in this show that gets complaints about screen time. Here's where I talk about the first gen.

For what I have seen, the ones with the biggest screen time complaints are Owen, Duncan, and Beth. I don't count Heather cause it's on purpose. I count Sierra because it's a personal gripe I have.

Owen was the original winner of TDI, came back on the show in the second season for a mole subplot nobody likes, and merged season three. He and Noah also got a spinoff.

Beth was the finalist of TDA.

And everyone hates it, including myself.

Then there's Duncan. Easily the character the show focuses on the most. Season 1? 4th place. Season 2? Winner. Season 3? Gone half the season so he's only in 8 episodes not counting what he didn't compete in, but he scored 5th overall. Season 5? Weakest performance, but he still merged. That's 8th place by the way.

By far, THIS is the character in this show that gets the MOST horrendous flack for his screen time. And from what I've learned, if you think this, you probably hate Duncan as a character.

Like, I haven't watched Winx, but I saw videos on YouTube that made fun of Bloom for getting too much screen time.

Somebody do those but with Duncan! I'm not a Duncan hater, but I would like to get a laugh!

So it'd just be easy to say the writers played favorites, it was an issue, and be done with it, right?

Except no.

My GF watched World Tour just recently. (And she was mixed on it.) Her comments regarding Duncan and Gwen were that she wished they had more interactions to sell them (she was routing AGAINST Duncney, basically) and it didn't help that Duncan was gone half the season. She said that it would've helped all the characters involved if he stayed to flesh that out.

To that I went: "Huh. That's interesting how you take no issue with this character's screen time."

But why though? She's not a stan of him, she's a casual viewer, so that can't be it.

And that's when it hit me.

Beth and Sierra. These two make it through an entire season each. And we both collectively hate them as characters. And we hate seeing them on screen.

That's because it's what the characters DO with their screen time.

See what I'm talking about:

Season 1: Duncan is an established character that develops relationships and friendships and learns to open up to people outside of his comfort bad boy zone.

Trent spends 16 episodes sitting still and looking pretty with a guitar. (Okay that's probably not a great example, and I don't hate Trent, but you kinda get it)

Season 2: Duncan is dealing with revenge on Harold for his spoiled relationship with Courtney where he gets abused by her, fights to hold his own, and dumps her.

Beth spends the entire season talking about a fake boyfriend and cheating on it.

Season 3: Duncan, again, is only competing in 8 episodes out of 26, but what does he do? He establishes a new relationship with Gwen, gets her cancelled, forms a friendship with Alejandro, and gets played.

Sierra is there the entire season sexually harassing Cody and passing it off as quirky. We hate to see it. (Seriously, you guys think the love triangle is worse than this? My GF and I agreed we would rather watch the love triangle ten times again, over Sierra being on screen at all.)

What's the difference here? STORY.

Certain characters have story to follow, that NEEDS that screen time to work. Ironically, the plotline of Duncan's that comes across the least genuine, is the season where he's on screen the least. (Not counting All Stars, but they're kind of equal in episodes Duncan's in.)

Again, imagine if we never had that backstory sequence of Gwen Stacy. Yes it eats up screen time, but without it? She would come across as an ingenuine traitor who supposedly ditched her dad for some cool spider society. We NEEDED that sequence.

Duncan is always doing something when the screen is focused on him.

The reason Beth and Sierra don't work despite having all the screen time in the world is that they do NOTHING with the screen time they get. Nothing of value at least. We could've learned a lot about their origins, Beth's underdog status, or Sierra's fanclub, flesh them out as dynamic characters to route for, with different sides of them that slip through time to time that gets the audience thinking.

Nope. Sexual harassment makes up for all of that. (I question why I put up with this show sometimes.)

That would be the case and that's the answer, just do something with your screen time and you're free to have as much as you want.

Except there's ANOTHER key to the puzzle here.

Duncan is in the top 4 of the TD cast for a reason.

He's a main character.

Something Jaune Arc is not.

Hello nemesis my old friend.

Look, I respect people who like RWBY. People can feel any way they want to about a show. Opinions are valid.

If you think Arcane is the worst show ever made, that's valid.

If you think Velma is the best show ever made, that's valid.

It's all VALID.

With that said I think this show is an absolute trainwreck when it comes to writing characters.

Now hold on before you say I hate everything about it, I don't. This show does have SOME merits to it. The music is stellar and I actually listen to the soundtrack from time to time. For a limited budget animation, it's impressive. The choreo is neat. I want these weapons. I actually like quite a few of the side characters. Keep in mind I said side.

But what I look for in a good show is a compelling story and interesting characters to follow.

Something this show just does not have in my opinion.

I keep saying I'll do an analysis post on why Team RWBY are awful protagonists, but I've been busy and my plate has not emptied. But one of my main points regarding them is screen time.

Keep in mind, I've only seen fully up to Season 8. I've only seen clips of Season 9, so whatever I say about 9 may not be accurate.

Team RWBY are the main characters of the show, and yet they have not done a single main character thing throughout EIGHT SEASONS. It's kind of incredible.

If I didn't know the name of the show but saw a clip, I'd assume the main character was Jaune, or Oscar, more on them later.

What have these girls contributed in the battle of Salem's forces?

Season 1: Blake helped stop a robbery. Not even all four of them, just Blake. (So did Sun and Penny.)

Season 2: They broke into the White Fang's secret operation and busted a train into the city to fight off some Grim, in time for Team CFVY to wipe them out. (Those characters appear TWICE in the ENTIRE show, this is the first time. Just to speak my point.)

Season 3: Yang got framed for assault which helped the bad guys. Ruby watched Pyyra die and she blasted an eyeball off Cinder.

Season 4: UH...

Season 5: They housed Oscar, they met Raven, and they took place in the battle of Haven where Yang got the relic. (So did Oscar, JNR, Qrow)

Season 6: They took the relic to Atlas. (So did Oscar, JNR, Qrow)

Season 7: They lied to the general about vital information that could've helped them get one on Salem, and doomed all of Atlas.

Season 8: They caused the death of a kingdom and fell through a hole.

Season 9: UH... (That's not me not knowing what happened in 9, they just climbed out of the hole, basically, as the season has nothing to do with Salem's forces.)

Now, because the main characters are not involved with the main plot very much, does that make them bad?

No. There ARE ways to utilize them outside of driving the external plot.

Some stories are Character vs Self, Internal Conflict. The basis of this show's story is that these kids who grew up to be military soldiers are learning that their lives and the world is not a fairy tale, and they're not the good guys. That SOUNDS like the show is all about internal conflict, right?

Well it's not.

I mean, they DO realize this and make a morally questionable choice with consequences they regret.

In Season SEVEN.

And even THEN, they're treated by gods themselves like they've done nothing wrong!

If you ask me, it should have happened a LONG time ago.

What internal conflicts do these girls have?

Ruby is a naive prodigy who wants to be a huntress and live out a fairy tale reality. And she lives out that dream. Then Pyyra dies and she loses that home. And then she's back to fairy tale land, just doing more crimes and hating authority. And I GUESS she learned a lesson in 9...? I just saw her as depressed.

Weiss is an heiress of a rich company trying to overthrow rule of her father, who hates her. She hates Faunus. She learns not to hate Faunus. And she gains a lot of powers.

Blake is part of a civil rights movement with Faunus and she likes assaulting her own kind and burning their homes. She also has an abusive boyfriend and kills him with a girlfriend by her side.

Yang lost her mommy and wants to find her. She loses her arm. She finds her mommy but doesn't give a s**t because plot. She also gets a girlfriend.

That's like Vi and Jinx's reunion, only they didn't care about seeing each other again after years, they just pointed fists and guns at each other and said, "Where's the arcane?! Where's Silco?! I'm not here for you, I have a police GF now!" "I'm not here for you, I just wanted an easy route to blast Piltover to pieces! Mwahaha!"

See where I'm going with that?

Internal conflict is a key to making characters screen time worth while.

But lets face it, Team RWBY not having very well established internal/relevance to the external conflict is not the full reason why this is a problem with their screen time.

It's their lack thereof.

Three quarters of every season, they're just sitting at some random place that's not even pretty to look at, and the SIDE CHARACTERS do all the plot relevant stuff.

See why I like the side characters better?

Lets look at that chart again:

Season 1: Sun and Penny stopped that robbery.

Season 2: Team CFVY stopped the Grim invasion.

Season 3: Pyyra's story and downward spiral to her death.

Season 4: Nora and Ren the season.

Season 5: Oscar. The tribe.

Season 6: Oscar again as he's responsible for the exposition involved in that season.

Season 7: Ironwood's descent into insanity AND Penny's descent into accidental heroism.

Season 8: Both those characters die. Everyone dies.

Season 9: ...okay, good point, there was no one else.

Okay so maybe Season 9 gets a pass, but the others? Can you really put Team RWBY in a plot summary?

And that's just external conflict talking, let's talk the MAIN CHARACTER with the INTERNAL conflicts throughout the ENTIRE show.

Jaune Arc.

A SIDE character, voiced by one of the writers, has some of the most plotlines to follow due to his internal struggle and conflict in this new war throughout the entire show.

He has something to do in MOST of the seasons of this show. Not unlike Duncan. The only time I think he didn't have anything going on was Season 7.

In the very first season, Jaune has an entire character arc surrounding him trying to find his inner strength with a one off bully character as an antagonist. That sounds fine, so what's the issue?

This character arc takes up FOUR episodes out of 16. A WHOLE QUARTER OF THE SEASON.

"Well, maybe those episodes cut away to other people at some points-"

No. They don't. It's all Jaune in all these episodes.

Season two is less so Jaune focused, but he has a little subplot surrounding letting go of his feelings for Weiss and finding another girl who would gladly take him. I guess it's priority respect because Neptune was into Weiss at the time? But those two wound up never being a thing, so...

The whole time I thought Weiss was just asexual, but then 9 came in to screw that idea.

Season three focuses on Pyyra, Jaune's love interest, and therefore he's vital to her story and her thought process, so much so that the big angst moment in the season is with him and their death kiss.

Season four and five are focused on Jaune's thirst for revenge on Cinder, a member of Salem's forces, for killing Pyyra. He learns about Salem's forces along the way, makes his own opinion about all this lore, and decides to help out due to his personal necessity.

Wow. He has an internal conflict going on, AND he's active with the external conflict. HMM...

Season six is him letting go of his grief after his moral failure from the Battle of Haven nearly getting Weiss killed. And also he pins Oscar to the wall because why not. It's brief but it's also a full on character arc.

Season eight, he kills Penny, a girl he has never interacted with before this point, and he's a grieving mess. So much so that season nine also includes Jaune dealing with MULTIPLE grieving instances and personal failures.

Everyone else got a seasonal break from the story, and yet Jaune could not.

Now, is this a screen time issue?

Yes.

But NOT for the reasons you might think.

Let's go off of Duncan again, a character with a major status in the show's story and conflict from day one. He was designed that way.

Jaune was not designed that way. BUT I don't actually hate his story for the screen time he gets. In fact, he's probably one of the most interesting characters in the show because there's so much time dedicated to his struggle and his story.

The elephant in the room isn't because Jaune has a story.

It's because the main characters don't have a story.

Again, Arcane, that show focuses on a LOT of characters that aren't Vi and Jinx. You could argue Jayce is the Jaune in their universe. But why does it work? Because there is NOT a neglect of characterization of the leads.

In RWBY, there's a serious neglect issue.

And it's not just Jaune. There are other side characters who've been stealing time away from the leads.

Oscar, ever since he debuted Season 4, has been devoted to screen time stealing, and stealing the main character status with a Chosen One narrative and a pretty offensive way of portraying Multiple Personality Disorder. He's the one with the chosen one story, he's the one who interacts with the bad guys, he's toe to toe with Ironwood, he's the one related to Salem, and he does all of it with the personality of a hollow pine tree.

I mean I guess he also has a crush on Ruby, but... I don't want to get into that.

Hell, CINDER, an ANTAGONIST of the show, has more conflict and screen time than the leads. And she's one of my least favorite characters in the entire show, isn't that sweet?!

On top of that, she's a VILLAIN. We shouldn't be routing for her!

Then there's the rest of JNPR. Nora and Ren have a season focused on them, that being season 4. Pyyra is the same case with season 3. Pyyra dies in that season, so she's obviously not getting screen time any further. But Ren and Nora are alive, AND they have a subplot in the Atlas arc. Having a subplot isn't a problem, it just becomes jarring when the main characters don't have an arc and they do.

Penny gets revived and dies in the Atlas arc. That's also a thing.

The fix here should be really simple! Swap roles! Have the side characters sit in the houses with their little arcs, and have Team RWBY on the fields reacting to everything. It wouldn't excuse their lack of inner struggle, but at least they'd be involved with the plot.

There are many ways you could fix this. Like Oscar's role of being related to Salem. Ruby's mom is dead, but like, what if her mom was Salem and was taken out in war and revived/corrupted into this monster figure? That'd be an interesting narrative.

And RWBY is not the only show, the previous season of Pretty Cure, Delicious Party, ALSO has this issue. And arguably they did it worse because I don't even care for the side characters there either. I'd be repeating myself with criticism there:

Yui, the supposed main character, has no character trait other than be a glutton and a stand in for her grandmother, the other Cures are also irrelevant to the plot and just spend their time eating. The boys of this magical girl show are the focus and have all the wishy washy plotlines, and none of them are even that interesting.

I will give RWBY this over Delicious Party to prove I can see its merits:

At least they only have ONE forth wall narration and do know boundaries to that stuff, as opposed to Delicious Party that thinks their viewers are IDIOTS, and needs a narrator to explain EVERYTHING. CONSTANTLY.

(What a new low for that franchise, am I right? At least we have Hirogaru Sky.)

So what have we learned here?

To answer the question: Is Screen Time An Issue For A Character?

No. It's not that simple.

It's what the character DOES with that screen time that matters. And their role in the story that warrants this screen time.

They need to have all the details of their story laid out for you to care about them.

They need every scene involving their story to matter.

They need to have a plotline that justifies the screen time, small role or big role.

They need to be involved with the main story if they are a major character.

They need an internal conflict to keep the time on them engaging.

They need to be doing something.

If they are a minor character, additional screen time is not a bad thing.

A minor character with a lot of screen time could be there to advance the world building, they could be heavily connected to major character, relationship or otherwise.

But the minor characters don't become favorites and neglect focus on the people the story is revolving around.

First Person POV is a difficult storytelling technique when it comes to screen time, but it's not a bad tool. It can be used as a certain perspective for every character involved if done properly.

And just... screen time alone isn't a valid criticism in my opinion. It's WAY more complicated than that.

What's your opinion? Reblog your thoughts, I'm very curious, especially with media with this issue I did not cover.

[cosmerelists]

Ranking Vin’s Kills by Level of Awesome

[Major Spoilers for Mistborn Era 1--all books!]

Previously, I ranked Kaladin’s Dramatic Entrances, for he is a boy who loves himself a dramatic entrance. Let’s now turn to a different series and a different character: Vin. Vin may not love killing--despite Zane’s best efforts to the contrary--but she sure does kill a lot, and often quite dramatically. So let’s rank those moments of death by how awesome I found them!

#10: The Wolf Dog :( 

TenSoon may be awesome, and Soonie Pups may be adorable, but everyone’s favorite big fluffy wolfdog kandra had a dark beginning. Vin buys a big wolf dog at market, and then kills it so that TenSoon can have the body. It’s just a little bit sad, you know? Definitely not my favorite Vin murder.

#9: All of Keep Hasting

On the one hand, there is something darkly impressive about Zane and Vin simply mowing down the entirety of Keep Hasting while trying to get to Cett--all 300 people. But in the end, it turns out that Cett isn’t an allomancer at all and Zane was just trying to get Vin to love killing more. So in the end, it was just a lot of death to no good purpose (although I suppose Cett does withdraw...).

#8: Inquisitors with Koloss Armies 

At the end of Book 1, Kelsier has an epic fight against an Inquisitor, whom he barely manages to defeat. The Inquisitors are presented as basically unkillable, and it is shocking that Kelsier is able to defeat even one. But by Book 3, Elend and Vin are able to go toe to toe with inquisitors, killing them and then taking control of the Koloss armies they commanded on a pretty regular basis. It definitely shows how extremely powerful they’ve become.

#7:  A Koloss Army 

In the climax of Book 2, Luthadel is under attack by some twenty-thousand koloss. At this point, Vin’s power has not yet reached the “almost casually kill inquisitors with my husband” levels, and there is a definite sense of horrible inevitability as the koloss gradually kill, well, everyone. But then Vin arrives--just in time to save Sazed’s life. She then uses the entire city gate as a club and just smashes the entire courtyard clear of koloss. I mean, there is some fridge horror here as we later learn that the koloss are just people, but still. It’s quite an epic moment.

#6: Twelve Inquisitors, All At Once

In the climax of Book 3, Vin is attacked by twelve inquisitors and also by Marsh. There’s a gut-wrenching scene of Marsh torturing her by systematically breaking her bones until he is able to wrest back just enough control to rip out her earring, finally freeing her from Ruin’s control. And then Vin is infused by the mists and manages to just...demolish all of inquisitors (other than Marsh) with ease. 

#5: Shan Elariel

All of those fights are pretty impressive, but they tend to be against unnamed groups of people (and one wolf puppy 😞). For me, the one-on-one fights aginst named characters are the most awesome. So let’s move into those memorable fights! First up is Shan, Elend’s first fiancee. This is, I believe, one of Vin’s first fights against another Mistborn, and one who also possesses Atium. Vin manages to win by tricking Shan into thinking that her own Atium ran out by extinguishing it early, giving her an edge. 

#4: Zane

Speaking of Vin doing interesting things when her opponent has Atium...there’s the Zane fight. Zane has Atium and Vin doesn’t. Vin manages to get a little bit thanks to TenSoon’s help...but it isn’t enough. In the end, Zane is the only one burning Atium, which usually means the other person is toast. But Vin manages to, like, fake out the Atium so that Zane’s own foresight works against him. I don’t 100% understand how she does this, but it is undeniably awesome. 

#3: Straff Venture

Listen, Straff is the worst. This fight isn’t epic in turns of being an exciting, blow-by-blow, who-will-win sort of affair. It’s awesome because by this point, I really, REALLY wanted Straff Venture to die already. And then Vin cuts him in half with a giant koloss blade. I mean. 

(A shame about the horse, though. 😞 When will Vin stop killing innocent animals?)

#2: The Lord Ruler

It doesn’t get much more impressive than killing the immortal god-king who has been ruling untouched for centuries. But Vin does it. In Book One. After the Lord Ruler rips out her earring, she is able to call upon the mists. She rips out all of his feruchemical bracelets and then just...kills him with a wooden spear. 

#1: Ati

But there is one thing more impressive than killing the immortal god-king who has been ruling untouched for centuries. And that’s killing a god--or at least his vessel. Vin becomes god herself when she takes up the shard of Preservation, and then attacks Ruin in a self-sacrificing attack that cancels out their powers, killing them both. I suppose that, ala Kaladin, the only person who could kill Vin was, well, Vin.

[lemonyinks]

thinks about how love and sacrifice are major themes of one piece thinks about how love and sacrifice are major themes of one piece thinks about how love and sacrifice are major themes of one piece thinks about how love and sacrifice are major themes of one piece

Okay, but seriously, it was something I never noticed when I was young and reading One Piece for the very first time. Back then the emotional scenes were just that, emotional scenes. I never seen the parallels or the way the themes would often reappear in different ways. Now that I'm an adult and I'm reading it once again, it has become a whole lot more apparent just how much of a reoccurring theme they both are, and how they go hand in hand together. I've also begun to realize just how much impact on the narrative these scenes have on future events.

Shank's sacrificing his arm for Luffy is literally one of the first things to happen in the manga, which he did because he obviously loved and cared for Luffy. He calls him a friend only a few pages earlier. He would gladly lose and arm if it meant Luffy would live. It was right after this event as well when Luffy finally stops asking Shank's to take him out to sea with him and vows to become a pirate on his own, just before Shanks gives him his straw hat.

And that wouldn't be the first time someone would sacrifice a limb for someone they cared about in this series. Zeff quite literally ate his own leg so that he could give all of the rations they had to Sanji, hoping that the kid would live long enough to carry out the dream that the both of them shared. The All Blue may have been the initial reason he had for saving Sanji's life, but he undoubtedly grew to love Sanji like a son and I don't doubt for a second he would make that sacrifice a million times over for him.

And then comes Bellemere an arc later. Nami and Nojiko were her reason to keep living, she dedicated her entire life to taking care of those girls and she loved them with her whole being. To her, it was an easy choice to give her own life so that her girls wouldn't have to leave the only home they'd ever known and possibly die all alone out on the sea.

Hiriluk is a bit of a different sacrifice, but a sacrifice nonetheless. His decision to commit suicide was ultimately due to him not wanting Chopper to feel guilt over his death. He loved Chopper, he knew that he was only ever trying to help and that he loved Hiriliuk in return. The doctor couldn't just let that love and desire to help turn into what caused his death. So he chose to take his own life instead so that none of the responsibility landed on Chopper's shoulders.

Once we reach Alabasta, there is of course the iconic Pell scene. He was willing to throw his life away, not only for Vivi, who he loved dearly, but also for the country he served and it's people. I know some say that this scene isn't as impactful as some of the other sacrifices since he didn't truly die in that moment, but in my opinion that doesn't matter. He did it because he loved them all. His feelings were just as strong as those who died or lost limbs, and the Vivi's reaction is equally as real as the other's reactions to the sacrifices made for them. His intentions were to save everyone, and he did just that.

In water 7/Enies Loby (an arc that is itself basically one big love letter) we are introduced to Saul, who had only know Robin for a very short amount of time before the navy showed up to kill the scholars. And yet, in that small period he grew to care about Robin and had a real desire to protect her and ensure that she would not only live, but end up happy one day. He was willing to give up his own life so that this little girl, who he barely even knew, could live on.

Thriller Bark is where we see on of the most memorable Zoro scenes. While this isn't the first time one of the protags has sacrificed themselves for their crewmates, it is one of the most notable. Zoro here takes on all of Luffy's pain, simply because he loves his captain and believes that his dream is worth living on for. He was willing to give up his health, as well as what he thought would be his life, if it meant that Luffy would be able to live longer and carry on with his journey.

And this of course leads us to Marineford, where Ace threw himself in front of Akainu's molten fist in order to save his baby brother with zero hesitation. Ace loved Luffy deeply, he would never have allowed harm to come to him. The two of them loved each other deeply and would rather die than allow the other to be hurt.

Now comes a sacrifice that really parallels Bellameres, even down to their last words to their kids and the way that the both of them died. Cora cared for Law, he really did. He couldn't stand to see a child so young talking about how they were going to die and he wanted to help him, so much so that he all but abandoned the mission he was with the Donquixote pirates for in the first place just so that he could find a cure for Law's sickness. He inevitably came to truly love and care for Law. He gives his life in the confrontation between him and his brother, even going so far as forcing himself to hold on longer in order to let Law escape silently, just so that the child he'd come to love could grow up and live his life.

While Pedro may have sacrificed himself so that the strawhats could go farther on their journey, he didn't really do it for them. He may have thought of them as friends, but in the end his sacrifice was for the people of Zou. He did it for his people, because he loved them and wanted to do everything in his power to help save them from the cruel fate they were being subjected to. He knew that the only way this would be achieved would be if the Strawhats made it out of Big Mom's territory, so he did what he thought he had to in order to help them escape.

Finally, in Wano we have Oden's sacrifice. He let himself be boiled alive in a pot of oil for an hour straight while holding up the weight of nine other people, simply because he believed it gave his retainers, his family, the people he loved, a chance to escape the same fate. But he didn't just do it for them, he gave his life so that his entire country may have the chance at a better future. To the very end, he loved his country and he loved the other samurai.

And these are just a few select examples that I could think of at the time and some of the most memorable ones to me This doesn't even account for Nami giving up her childhood and teen years to free her village, or Sanji saving Nami and Luffy from the avalanche, or Tom turning himself in so that Franky wouldn't be killer, or Robin giving herself up to cp-9 to promise the Strawhats passage, or Luffy letting himself be tortured by Porchemy to keep Sabo and Ace's secret, or the way Dadan stayed behind to fight Bluejam for Ace, or how the Whitebeards all put themselves on the line to try and save Ace, or Pound stopping Oven several times to save his daughter, or when Scarlet tried to feed her starving daughter, or Sanji freeing the crew from Bege, or Killer eating the SMILE and doing Orochi's bidding to give Kid a chance to live, or Law giving himself over to Hawkins to save Bepo, Sachi, and Penguin, or Momo giving up his childhood, or the two times Bon Clay gave themself up to give Luffy time to escape, or the Going Merry sailing on despite being in no condition to, or how the minks allowed themselves to be tortured, or how Rouge literally killed herself to bring Ace into the world. It doesn't even cover the more subtle sacrifices like Usopp lying that there was no pirates so that his village wouldn't have to be afraid, or even Luffy's hunger strike.

There are countless sacrifices within this series that I don't think I could ever really hope of covering them all, unless I were to spend several hours that I don't have on them. But one thing is certain about every single one of them; they are displays of love. I mean, who else do you make sacrifices for, if not for someone you love.

[seventeenlovesthree]

Quick thoughts on the Digimon Adventure 25th anniversary PV

First things first: It got me incredibly teary. It was beautifully nostalgic while still giving it a fresh paint to some degree. I feel like this is what Butterfly could have been if Toei decided to merge Digimon with One Piece - because just like it's the case with OP openings, there are always so many things going on that it takes numerous rewatches to see what's going on. So let's break it down, shall we?

So the PV was an overall homage to some of Adventure's most famous/prominent scenes - but instead of re-animating it 1:1, they merged several scenes that didn't happen in the exact same way. The only 1:1 shots could be seen when the 8 kids got their "sad moments montage" each. So, what's new, what's memorable, what does the PV tell us about the characters?

They animated the novel scene of the baby Digimon meeting their partners - which was absolutely adorable. If you didn't go "awww" at Tsunomon, Tanemon, Pyocomon, didn't chuckle at Pukamon and didn't melt at Koromon, I cannot help you!

Then we got the montage - and the amount of "low res shots" I will take in the next few weeks will be insane, because they were absolutely beautiful. But let's go step by step - I will not discuss every moment, just my favourites, since we got A LOT of group shots!

Here we already see a lot of common themes: First of all, Taichi is depicted to be incredibly curious, basically exploring the entire time. Of course he radiates happy MC energy overall, which I will always adore, but also seems more serious than we're used to. (Unless... he's bickering with Yamato. Which is a common theme for him after all, but I will get to that in a second.) The other theme is Mimi's >o< face, which I will never get tired of. They really hammer down the point that she is NOT happy with the situation they're on and finds something to complain about throughout the first few episodes;

We even get a merge of episode 5 and 10 here! Koushirou is usually seen thinking and theorizing (before he's being interrupted by something/someone). Sora's theme overall is... Being pretty chill, I'd say? We'll get to that in a minute as well. Yamato is the resident cook of the group (THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH EGGS THOUGH) and Takeru's job is just being adorable (meanwhile Hikari unfortunately suffers from a severe lack of screentime, but that was to be expected)...

But what about Jyou, you may ask? I feel like he'd deserve his very own post, because... Boy is straight up not having a good time and may or may not have several life crises in a row. Aside from Mimi, Palmon and Taichi, Jyou might provide the best low res screenshots and, like I said, I will have a blast looking for them.

I also really love the snowball fight there. Oh look, Takeru is attacked by snowballs again, where have I seen that again in the past 12 months??? Sora's helping Jyou to build up his safe space, meanwhile Koushirou has to play mediator between Taichi and Koushirou (welcome to your life for the next 30 years at least, my boy). Speaking of Yamataishirou...

You may have noticed that the scenes are out of order - and I also noticed a little mistake in this screenshot here! hile it is true that Taichi, Agumon, Yamato and Koushirou were missing from the group and the others were ordered to mediate - Patamon was not Patamon yet though, but still Tokomon!

Again, there are so many scenes to show, and I will just post a few more, but will only talk in more detail about two scenes here;

I absolutely ADORE the Gennai scene, oh my God. There was absolutely no need for these absolute dorks to collapse on top of each other, and yet here we are, 5/6 are, once again, not having a good time... And THEN THERE IS MIMI, who we saw complaining the whole time, and now she's having the time of her life falling on top of her found family pile (Sora and Koushirou in particular by the way). Meanwhile Takeru is just like... What the heck did I just look at. Absolutely amazing. 10/10, would watch again.

In case you haven't noticed, I feel like Mimi got pretty much the biggest piece of cake in this PV - and thus we were blessed by the most beautiful Jyoumi scene we've seen in a while. Wholesome. 10/10, would watch again. Also, Sora just enjoying her tea - GOOD FOR HER.

I just love all of this so much, I do love the following montages, the fight against Apocalymon, the ending got me teary again... I love them all so much.

[miloscat]

[Review] Even the Ocean (PS4)

A unique and soulful puzzle-platformer.

Anodyne 1 and 2 are really special games, so it's past time for me to catch up on the rest of the Analgesic catalogue from Melos Han-Tani and Marina Kittaka. This is their second game together, and takes on the puzzle-platformer genre but with a heavy emphasis on story.

Compared to the Anodyne games, the themes are a little more straightforward and the world more grounded than their abstract dreamlike spaces. The story deals with environmental and social issues, but with strong characters who feel very human and real through their dialogue. The story opens with the death of a minor character, but rather than exploiting it for dramatic stakes and moving on, the entire rest of the game sees you forming a friendship with her grieving partner, discussing deep topics with her and so on. As the game goes on and the stakes are further raised, it still takes the time for smaller moments and well-drawn minor characters.

This emotional content and social commentary is the strongest part of the game, not to say that the gameplay parts aren't also good. But the puzzle platforming can feel isolated or distinct from these aspects. The mechanics of it do tie into the worldbuilding which is linked to the themes though. In this sci-fi fantasy world, the main governing principle is the two energy types: light/green/vertical, and dark/purple/horizontal. Everything is built around this central idea.

Our protagonist Aliph has to balance the two energy types while blocking with a directional shield. She has a personal energy bar and when interacting with objects and obstacles this shifts between the two extremes. Charge yourself with dark and you walk faster, with light and you jump higher. But rather than a traditional health system, if you fill up completely on one or the other you die. Basically all interactable elements are aligned with either energy, and this leads to all sorts of clever puzzles along with the balancing act of managing your own tendency.

Progression through the puzzle spaces is mostly linear and I didn't find it very challenging for most of the runtime. There is a lot of customisation though, and you can choose if you want to just play the action parts or the story parts, as well as gameplay modifications to make it more manageable if you're having trouble. This makes the game very accessible, although oddly there is no option for button reassignment.

As I've come to expect with Analgesic games, there is also an extensive postgame although Even the Ocean takes it to extremes I haven't yet seen in their catalogue. You get new options to zoom around, warp, and display minimaps but most of all you get an entire new game world consisting of rough drafts and earlier versions of levels filled with developer commentary. This really opens the door on the development of the game and is really interesting from an archival perspective, having this behind the scenes content in playable form within the game itself. You get to see assets from when all the environment pixel art was made by hand (the final game uses art from larger images outside of the "dungeon" areas), as well as much more complex and difficult level design ideas.

These in-depth offerings are such a fascinating look at what the game could have been that I couldn't help but wish that some of it had made it to the final product, that we had more polished forms of these more challenging puzzles. On the other hand, the choices made to simplify the art production process I thought resulted in a fantastic end product, the interesting character designs coming through well in pixel form against the beautiful and moody backdrops.

Either way, these extras are remarkable, a candid conversation with the player on how the game was shaped and when you are directly told the rationales it's hard to argue that Melos and Marina made the right decisions to make the game memorable and accessible, and the game as a whole is much stronger and more interesting for having them. Please spend some time exploring the postgame if you give this a go! Anyway, although I have quibbles with the slow difficulty curve and the sometimes awkward menus, Even the Ocean ended up being another unique offering from Analgesic, packed full of ideas and heart.

[bomikalover]

What’s your favorite American Housewife episode? I can’t pick a favorite but I have a few fav episodes from every season.

I’ll do one a season because I love so many. And they might be less my favorite but more memorable to me (if you get what I’m saying)

⚠️SPOILERS FOR THOSE WHO HAVENT SEEN AMERICAN HOUSEWIFE!!⚠️

Season 1, is Episode 12 “Surprise!” Because it was Oliver’s bday which is already special but it was also the first episode where we actually see and meet cooper for the first time. Baby Cooliver really makes my heart warm and seeing Oliver and his dad share a moment was super sweet.

Season 2, is between episodes 17 “All Coupled Up” and episode 19 “It’s Hard To Say Goodbye.” Ep 17 showed more cooliver but also showed Gina (Oliver’s gf at the time) and how Gina was making Oliver someone he isn’t. It gave us some lovely Cooper and Katie moments and it was when Anna-Kat made it “official” with Franklin. Plus we got some Trip and Taylor too so all together a jam packed episode. Ep 19 was when Spencer passed on and we got to see a more emotional Oliver and a more caring Katie. Katie and Oliver’s relationship is very complex as they have the most distant relationship out of all the Otto kids imo and this really showcased how much she truly cares about Oliver and his emotions.

Season 3, is also between 2 episodes. Ep 13 “Mo Money, Mo Problems” and Ep 23 “A Mom’s Parade.” Ep 13, was a fav for me since we saw Katie and Greg get some alone time but we also saw Cooliver and got some Taylor being a great big sis to Oliver so all in all a good episode. Ep 23 is good because I love music and musicals lol. I literally have all the songs on my Spotify playlist, “You Can Do You” is a certified bop. Katie’s voice was amazing and i honestly wished for a 2 hour musical special after that 😂

Season 4, is between 4 episodes (I literally can’t pick one 😭) Ep 6 “ Girls night out”, Ep 14 “A very English scandal”, Episode 19 “Vacation!”, and Episode 20 “Prom.” I liked ep 6 since we saw Cooper and Trip basically become permanent members of the family and the adorable scene of them recreating the picture will also be in the back of my mind. Ep 14 was when Oliver “came out” lol and we got see to see Oliver be who he truly wants to be (he just doesn’t realize it yet) and I loved how everyone thought it made sense and that Cooper was his boyfriend 😂. Plus the love story between Greg and Viv made my heart happy. Ep 19 was a breath of fresh air as it was actually shot outside and in LA which was nice. We got a Cooliver side storyline which ended in them agreeing that with Oliver’s family and Cooper’s money that they work perfectly together which made me so happy. Anna-Kat and Taylor had some bonding going on and I love to see it. Episode 20 was great, I’ll always love a prom/dance episode. I was sad that Oliver went to prom with the teen help line girl and not Cooper (especially since the teen help line girl ignores him next season 🙄.) but the little dance scene at the end was cut and that was the last episode with OG Anna-Kat 😭.

Season 5, is Ep 1 “Graduation”, Ep 3 “Coupling”, and Ep 4 “Homeschool Sweet Homeschool.” Ep 1 was great as we say Taylor graduated but we also saw that Cooper was moving away. Oliver was so sad and lost that entire episode at the thought of loosing his Cooper. But it made me so happy that Oliver had a heart to heart with Katie and in the end Cooper moved in with Oliver and the family. Ep 3, was so full of Cooper and Oliver acting like an old married couple and I loved it. Katie and Greg even joked about making them a sex basket like they gave Trip and Taylor. (Side note: I love how supportive Greg and Katie are of Oliver’s sexuality. LGBTQ+ or not, they love their son and just want him happy 🫶🏾.) Ep 4, once again full of Cooliver moving in together and having those married couple vibes.

Basically anything with Cooliver I loved which was a lot of episodes lol. Trip and Anna-Kat’s relationship was so precious to me as he was a second older brother to her and it warmed my heart. But anyway tysmmmm for asking me stuff and don’t be shy to ask more. 🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾

[moonlightdancer26]

hi hello hey howdy *tips hat*

i have yet another Question for you (if im being annoying im sorry)

How does one write Severus Snape?????

in the fic im writing i want him to be somewhat snarky and majorly, majorly intelligent (his character arc depends upon it), but even with a lot of changes to his backstory, still retain a lot of the same characteristics otherwise?

for context: its a house of the dragon/dance of dragon's au. if your unfamiliar, think medieval-esque grimdark politically-driven fantasy with dragons and civil war. the big changes are that he never meets lily evans, and he is fostered/"adopted" by the malfoys and raised to be a steward from a young age. (abraxas malfoy spends half his introduction going LOOK AT HIM HE'S BRILLIANT and the other half snogging tom riddle while they discuss politics) he is the last surviving member of a ruined house with nothing but intelligence and the protection of the malfoy's to his name, until he meets Sirius (apologies now this isnt a sev/sirius fic, its wolfstar, but sev and sirius' relationship is important in later chapters.) they start on,,, bumpy terms, but they are both young teenagers - 14? - at the time, and sirius is The Crown Prince, so they don't see each other again, only hear of each other's exploits/achievements. eventually, once war breaks out, sirius asks severus to be a part of his council as 'master of war' aka head tactician. but that involves going directly against the malfoys. sev does accept this proposal.

im asking i guess about what his train of thought would be? what his motivations might become, how he would evolve, etc etc.

i will take literally any advice here i am Struggling

Howdy there partner

(and dw bud your questions are always a joy to answer)

(also omg that AU sounds legendary)

To be honest… I haven’t a goddamn clue. And I think that’s the best part about it. His character’s confusing as hell, we barely get any content of him when he’s not with Harry, who was basically a walking trigger for him (meaning he was pretty much at his worst whenever Harry was in the room 💀). It’s incredibly easy to mess up his character in fics, but it feels like winning the lottery when you finally nail it.

I think you should reread some of his most memorable moments in the books, especially the meaner ones (e.g. when he humiliates Hermione), since they can say a lot about his character. Whether said moment is good or bad. His canon interactions with Sirius and Remus (and even Dumbledore) can also speak volumes about him and how he deals with certain people in certain situations.

For example: when he delivered the Wolfsbane potion to Remus in front of Harry, he seemed paranoid and uncomfortable. [The door opened, and in came Snape. He was carrying a goblet, which was smoking faintly, and stopped at the sight of Harry, his black eyes narrowing. . . . Snape set down the smoking goblet, his eyes wandering between Harry and Lupin. . . . “Fascinating,” said Snape, without looking at it. “You should drink that directly, Lupin.” . . . “I made an entire cauldronful,” Snape continued. “If you need more.” . . . “Not at all,” said Snape, but there was a look in his eye that Harry didn’t like. He backed out of the room, unsmiling and watchful.] There was no insults, no snark (which is an important detail given that his snark is 90% of his personality), no snippy snappy attitude. When you reread it and keep in mind that Severus was almost killed by werewolf!Remus and genuinely thought he was working with Sirius, the scene simply reads as Snape desperately wanting Remus to just hurry and drink the potion because he’s worried Remus’ll turn into a psycho bloodthirsty werewolf who’ll gobble up all the kids in a split second. He was somewhat civil and wanted to keep their interactions as minimal as possible—this might suggest Snape was genuinely scared of Remus. Especially since he doesn’t have any of that behaviour when it comes to Sirius, mans did not hold back at ALL. I believe that has a lot to do with the fact that, unlike Remus, Sirius was direct and didn’t hesitate to openly display his loathing of Severus. Harry—our POV—can see the problem with him, Remus, on the other hand, is indirect and passive towards Severus. He acts polite despite knowing their history, he acts polite while still attempting to burnish his friends’ image to Harry by justifying their bullying of him [which is telling since he puts more effort into it than Sirius does. Sirius basically just said “yeah we bullied the git” when Harry confronted them while Remus tries hard to defend their actions, which arguably says a lot about their dynamic since Sirius was undoubtedly more involved in the bullying than Remus ever was]. Snape was willing to be civil with Remus, but he clearly had no respect for him. This isn’t to say Sev respected Sirius (he violated him every 2 seconds in OoTP so definitely not), but it can be said that Severus at least had some respect for Sirius’s directness. Sirius never tried to shift the dynamic between them in front of other people; their feelings towards each other was crystal clear, but with Sev and Remus it’s much more difficult to analyse.

I think that says a lot about what traits Severus prioritises; he hated Sirius, but he never treated him the same way he did with Remus, who he viewed as cowardly and weak. Severus took great offence to being called a coward and showed Gryffindor-level bravery many times throughout the series; he was a strong figure who mastered controlling and shutting down his emotions. Bravery was a big thing in his eyes. He said it himself that people who wore their hearts on their sleeves were fools and easy prey for the Dark Lord, so it certainly wouldn’t be a stretch to say he thinks extremely lowly of people who he believes are weak.

His intelligence is also a big part of his character, not only has he proven to be a brilliant wizard, but he (as I’ve mentioned above) was very emotionally intelligent. It’s no doubt that he takes pride in it, but a very important thing to remember is that he doesn’t brag about it. He’s literally one of the most powerful wizards in the Potterverse, yet he never even makes a remark about it in canon. There were a few moments in the series where we got to see his magical abilities, and it’s still extremely impressive. We know the guy legitimately invented spells and surpassed the curriculum at the mere age of 16, and he’s only gotten more talented over the years. So I think it’s very important that you keep in mind he doesn’t go displaying his brilliance 24/7 (I think that has a lot to do with the element of surprise, he’s a double-agent and likely wouldn’t want to draw attention to himself in that way), but when he does, you better make sure he displays it in more than one way—his emotional understanding can be conveyed through remarks and heated moments, his magical talent can be shown through occasional bursts of magic.

And keep in mind that even with people whose presence he seems to genuinely enjoy, he still has his snark. In his interactions with Minnie and Dumbledore, we see him make sassy and witty remarks (“Would you like me to do it now?” asked Snape, his voice heavy with irony. “Or would you like a few moments to compose an epitaph?” is always gonna be one of the best Snape quotes), and even with Lily, we see in his memories that he has an obvious soft spot for her, but he’s still very… Snapey. So his biting wit definitely isn’t just reserved for People Who Trigger And/Or Annoy Him.

the big changes are that he never meets lily evans, and he is fostered/"adopted" by the malfoys and raised to be a steward from a young age. (abraxas malfoy spends half his introduction going LOOK AT HIM HE'S BRILLIANT and the other half snogging tom riddle while they discuss politics)

ok first of all, goddamn I never thought I’d relate to Abraxas Malfoy this much (snogging Tommy and obsessing over baby!Snape? he just like me fr). Second of all, if he doesn’t meet Lily, who was basically the light who shone on his sad life (*sobs in platonic!Snily*), then is there anyone who takes on a similar role in Sev’s life? Will Lucius and Abraxas raise him like the family he’s never had? Will his life be even sadder than in canon? Because his experiences in his childhood shape out so many aspects of the rest of his life (the evidence is shown by both teen/baby!Snape and adult!Snape, in this essay I will- ), so with these changes it’ll be of great significance to keep this information in mind. (I believe a reread of SWM and TPT will definitely help with this, since those are the only times we’re actually able to see Sev as a young boy.)

(apologies now this isnt a sev/ sirius fic, its wolfstar, but sev and sirius" relationship is important in later chapters.)

*wipes tears* /j Dw lol, any interactions of Sirius and Severus are enough to satisfy me, especially when there’s character development. They’re both such loyal, snarky, headstrong assholes who’d watch the world burn for their loved ones, so seeing scenes of them together is always a blast. A whole lotta Good-cop-Bad-cop vibes.

+ the main thing in Wolfstar fanfics that make me hate them in the first place are its inaccurate portrayals of Sirius and Remus (other characters too, for that matter), but knowing you’re the author makes me confident you’ll make it enjoyable.

they start on,., bumpy terms, but they are both young teenagers - 14? - at the time, and sirius is The Crown Prince, so they don't see each other again, only hear of each other's exploits/ achievements.

eventually, once war breaks out, sirius asks severus to be a part of his council as 'master of war' aka head tactician. but that involves going directly against the malfoys. sev does accept this proposal.

*casually obsessing over this*

im asking i guess about what his train of thought would be? what his motivations might become, how he would evolve, etc etc.

I definitely understand why this requires a lot of thought 😭 However, it highly depends on how life treated him leading up to this moment. Was he still bullied, or was the Malfoy family name enough to protect him? Was he well-groomed, or was he still looked down upon? Did Lucius and Abraxas teach him about pureblood supremacy and raise him Draco-style? Did he still have the same personality? If he was raised like other Malfoys, then I really don’t know, because I think it would require some very big changes with Severus’s character. The only things I’m assuming will completely stay the same are his intelligence, loyalty, capacity for love, and humour.

I personally love a Snape with blurrier morals than in canon. The darker aspect of his character wasn’t as explored as much as I would’ve liked it to be, so this might be an opportunity for you to introduce a (slightly?) darker version of Snape. What usually helps me out with this is thinking about what he must’ve been like when he canonically joined the DEs—his humour, devotion, talents, etc, were all the same. But it was simply a matter of where his loyalties lie, he had always prioritised Lily’s life above all else (even over his own master), that was something that never changed about him. But the problem was it just took him a while to figure it out.

So if you’ll include a Lily-like figure in his life (be it Lucius or anyone else), then I think you should take a bit of inspo from canon. That point in his life where he joined the DEs was likely the lowest/darkest he’s ever been, but like I said, all those qualities we know of were in there somewhere. The moment when Voldemort was basically doomed to screw up was when Snape began to use said qualities to benefit the other side of the war.

The reason he defected from the DEs was because Lily—his loved one—was in danger, it was a personal reason and, to an extent, somewhat selfish. Lily’s safety was his initial motive, her being safe would “benefit” him (by benefit I mean make him not live the rest of his life in guilt and agony <3), so perhaps in this AU Snape’s motive could be one that merely serves his interests. He could think “in the end, this might give me a great opportunity for *this,* maybe agreeing won’t be too bad of an idea,” or something similar to that. If you want character growth, then, like in canon, you can make the initial motive not be the whole motive anymore. He might grow to fight for/believe in what the AU’s about, like he did with the Order’s cause (in the beginning he only did it for Lils, then we see that he genuinely believed in what the Order’s fighting for).

So yeah, I suppose that’s it lol. I seriously hope I helped you out with this because I’m honestly so honoured you came to me for this 😭 If you need help with anything related to Snape (or anything at all), you can always come to me. Have a great day!