#anyway her character is so important to me

[strangesmallbard]

i do think it’s interesting that severance fans often default to discussing the outties and innies as two separate people—like yes, functionally, they are right now. lumon does its best in-universe to separate outties and innies. for example: banning contact between outties and their innies’ coworkers, banning contact between outties and innies themselves. they create that distance and the fantastic acting also helps create that distance. it’s fundamentally important to the show that we acknowledge that difference.

and like. yes it’s a philosophy question: at what point do outties and innies become truly different people? is a person stored in their memories, their upbringing, or their instincts? etc. as we’ve seen so far, this separation creates some of the most fucked up consent issues you’ve ever seen. but also, and this is so easy to forget, there is also no separation. mark scout is mark s, helena eagan is helly r, and visa-versa. one is just missing necessary history and context to be the other person, but the vestiges remain. essentially: i don’t think they can truly become two different people and therein lies some tension.

for example: mark s has mark scout’s frankly impressive ability to repress any and all grief-related emotions. (i was wondering yesterday, actually, whether an innie who experiences some of the same life events as their outtie will eventually morph into them. like a manual reintegration.) another example someone else brought up: helly r has helena eagan’s entitlement and strong belief in her own personhood.

the outtie vs innie conception is particularly interesting when it comes to how fans discuss helly r/helena eagan. many people love helly and hate helena and it has me going “huh!” because, like. that could be the same gal! in different fonts. they both want to believe they’re completely different and want everyone else to believe that too. but we’ve been shown differently.

i’ve also seen some cognitive dissonance in discussing helly r/helena’s actions, which is also very interesting. there’s a very human urge to paint one as evil, the other good. but that’s never how it goes. yeah irving says “helly was never cruel” but he’s biased! (which is a good thing! i love when characters are biased). helly tried to kill helena last season (i know i just said they’re not separate people, but helly doesn’t agree with me). in season 2, helena stole her body and assaulted mark s. again, absolutely insane consent issues inherent in the severance process. (maybe it doesn’t come down to the good/evil dichotomy at all but rather: power. who has the power and when are they justified to wield or fight it)

anyway! no tl;dr. just food for thought. please try to enjoy each sentence equally etc

[iamhereinthebg]

Heya Anon!

Tbh I don't really know, Akane is a character who has been dealing with a thousand death flags leading to nothing since his most serious appareance in the manga. And this new timeline is not an exception.

Especially since we know that Kako and Mirai gave him 'You have to try to stay alive' rule as one of his duties

Implying that it is dangerous to altern the past and be the Clock Keeper of the Present, that they have to stay alive to make sure everything goes according to plan.

It also ties to my theory that Akane is the first human clock keeper of the present; Because after all if Kako and Mirai have been asleep since they changed the past in this new timeline, they couldn't have chosen anyone during 1968 and the current events in the manga (2015).

Akane is the only person who is directly coming from a different timeline even compared to Nene and Teru who just remember the stuff from the previous one, being on a time limit before their memories are erased. Akane brought along with him the fact that he is a clock keepers and mystery n°1, something he couldn't be in this new timeline in the first place since both of them don't exist.

But I digress.

Akane has been a little bit different since they came back from the boundary closest to the far shore. It's not that surprising with how much the previous arc must have taken a toll on him. Understanding that Aoi wanted to die, losing her, being impaled, having Teru confirming that he will lose years of his lifespan by turning back human too soon, being beaten up twice by number 6, etc...

Akane is like Kou and Nene on this point, a character who wants to do a lot, but is always a step behind when it comes to supernaturals. And like the other two, it is starting to show in his attitude.

Akane has been shown more unsure of his choices and of his opinions when it's something that never posed him a problem before. He is more scared of Teru (when he knows the exorcist by now) and of being hurt in general,. Something he hasn't showed as much before, liking and enjoying life of course, but never being afraid to be in the first line even if it meant being hurt; Now he acts like he is truly scared of dying.

And he lets things involving Aoi not being his first priority. Refusing to listen to Natsuhiko plan to even try to heal her. Akane has always been showed to be really proactive anyways, that's one of his main character trait. So seeing that he is putting something for a later date and it involves Aoi can be seen as a little bit strange. Akane still loves her deeply and all but he seems to have other plans now, which we learn later in the clock keeper arc. He is not even looking at her directly, having an air of melancholy when he announces he will heal her but not now

That's more of a stretch now, but I think it's pretty safe to assume that Akane has known since a long time what it meant to be the clock keeper of the present, that they had the power to change the timeline. But nothing special has been happening to make the clock keepers take this drastic decision, especially since we know that nothing has been ever changed since the Yugi Twins 4th birthday at least. Which is why he probably never thought about it before. But now that he knows the school mysteries are more important, not just dangerous supernaturals but are protecting the land, and that Hanako has been destroying the yorishiros (which to me, seem to be the seals to keep away the God from the pit/the God Sumire was supposed to marry) he seems to be more aware of this duty in general.

Or if he was made aware of it recently anyways, it's something that the clock keepers must have brought up before the fall festival, being something that even someone as 'Carpe Diem, it is what it is' Aoi Akane may not be able to entirely ignore.

He has been forced A LOT in his role lately too and he clearly doesn't really like it, even if he is good at it.

He finally say 'we' when talking about the clock keepers, and consider even himself as the biggest threat of the school. He doesn't know what to think directly of the supernaturals or seven mysteries now. Knowing that they have an important role to fulfill but still not trusting them at all, knowing of their dangerous tendencies to hurt humans. He can't even look Teru in the eyes when he asks him if the clock keepers are planning to change the timeline over and over again. His feelings for the clock keepers being clearly a difficult case for him to tackle down even if he pretends it's not.

I always said this kinda as a joke, that Akane had the role of a Chosen One but went 'fck no' with it. But I think that it really is this kind of stuff now. Like for Nene who is 'the Kannagi' of the current time and get to make choices and stuff she doesn't want to do. Akane is the same with his role as the clock keeper of the present. Because no matter what he says, he kinda has accepted this fate now, preferring to know what is happening (since he realizes how ignorant he was in the "to the far shore" arc), and having a way to be able to change things. Sacrifying his chance to be 'a normal student'.

But he is not happy with any of it, being the one on the front row to endure all of the supernaturals choices, even knowing that if they don't change back the timeline, he will be the last one to remember. And as said previously, he is now a part of it! He is of course still more human than supernatural but he still acknowledges his role way more than before. Akane hates the way supernaturals work and now what he is doing? Being one of the reason the world is in this state. Of course it's taking a toll on him.

Of course, he doesn't accept everything right away, like Aoi's engagement, it's at first played for jokes but even then, it's understandable with how far their relationship evolved in the previous timeline. He is now thrown into the role of 'the childhood friend who never stood a chance in the first place'. I do think he has a right to be a little bit upset

But after understanding that technically, it's not that much of a big deals in the current events of everything else, since at first most people seems okay, he goes right away to do what the clock keepers asked him to do. Even going to go ask for Teru's help when he knows how much he destroyed his trust.

To finish this long stuff, I think the real big ''death flags' for what is happening right now is of course the fact that he got cursed by the red house (which is a supernatural who has already tried to fool him in the og timeline btw) .

And that there is a chance, like said earlier, that there is only one Akane like him for now, and that he could get stuck here or at least not coming back entirely as the Aoi Akane we knew in the manga (a chance for him to become a full supernatural for example, to be forever now the clock keeper of the present) But for this tbh we don't know a lot it's really more speculation because we know nothing of what could happen to him particulary.

My fav 'suspicious af thing he said' for now in the new timeline is this.

The official translation goes " .. And will love my whole life to the day I die and even beyond that."

When he starts the manga with this.

With the same belief than Hanako that 'death is the end' and now he is considering the After Death, with everything he saw of course, but specifically for him in this case.

Bonus: a thing that is apparently confirmed to be a lie, or he can bend the rules, but he didn't say this in front of Teru and Nene the first time.

And something that I truly think he doesn't know anything about too (my brain truly think Kako and Mirai choose him, and I have some delulu proofs but I digress) Akane do not know sht about the clock keepers and especially doesn't see when people show clear interest in him

[rottenpumpkin13]

I'm miserable today so I'll be casting my period cramps upon AGSZC and the Turks. How does that go?

Sephiroth: *curled in fetal position on the floor* "This is manageable. The spasms occur at precise 4.7-minute intervals, meaning I can anticipate and prepare—" *Suddenly, a period cramp electrocutes him like a bolt from Zeus himself. His entire body convulses, limbs flailing as he flops helplessly against the floor like a fish out of water*

Genesis: *sprawled dramatically across the couch, one arm draped over his forehead like a dying opera singer* "Even in the throes of agony, my elegance remains untarnished. My composure, unshaken. This pain—this merciless, soul-rending torment—threatens my very being, a cruel reminder of life's fleeting—" *he gets a cramp* "FUUUUUUUUUUUCK—HOLY SHIT. I AM PERISHING. I AM BEING SMITED BY THE GODDESS HERSELF. THIS IS HOW I DIE. CALL A PRIEST, CALL A SUMMON, CALL MY FUCKING LAWYER—"

Angeal: *pacing the room like a man with somewhere very important to be but no idea where that is, visibly sweating* "I'm fine. Totally fine. This is nothing. This is...just a different kind of honor. Builds character. Toughens the spirit."

Zack: *writhing on the floor* "MAKE IT STOP! HOW DO PEOPLE LIVE LIKE THIS!?" *He reaches for Cloud like he's the holy light at the end of the tunnel* "Cloud, buddy, I'm dying. Tell my mom I fought bravely. Tell Genesis he can have my cool jacket. Tell Kunsel—" *he gasps, clutching at his chest like a tragic protagonist* "—actually, don't tell him anything, he still owes me 500 gil fuck him—"

Cloud: *frantically mixing things in a bowl while doubled over* "Mom always said when the gods curse your gut, you mix honey with hot sauce and vinegar, but it HAS to be bought with your own hard earned money. Then add exactly three and a half crushed potato chips—regular chips summon bad luck, has to be the rippled ones—stir it with a fork that's NEVER touched eggs, and then you—" *Cloud suddenly doubles over, clutching his stomach as the wrath of the gods strike him down* "Oh no. Oh no, they saw me hesitate!"

Reno: *draped over his desk* "This is worse than that time Cissnei tasered me 'cause she thought I was checking out her ass—when really, I was just picking up a gil coin she dropped. Which, now that I think about it, means I technically stole from her. So honestly? She should've tasered me anyway. Yo, Rude! Carry me to the break room! I need like... fifty painkillers and that bottle of sake Tseng thinks we don't know about!"

Tseng: *sits at his desk, spine straight as a ruler, expression unreadable, the very picture of composure—if you ignore the faint sheen of sweat on his forehead and the barely perceptible tremor in his hand as he sips his tea* This is the same man who once reviewed mission reports with both legs in casts. Who attended a board meeting while actively bleeding from a bullet wound. Who once politely asked an enemy combatant to "wait a moment" so he could finish signing off on supply requisitions before engaging in a life-or-death fight.

Rufus: *sprawled out on his office floor like a fallen king* "Cancel all my meetings. Actually, cancel the whole damn week. No, cancel existence. This is worse than getting shot. Worse than the attempted coup. Worse than that time I had to shake hands with that sweaty politician from Junon. Someone bring me the most expensive chocolate money can buy. And fire whoever invented cramps." *A long silence. Then, he turns his head slightly to stare at Tseng* "Why don't you love me?"

[ephemeralinstance]

Lavellan in Veilguard

The scenes with the Solas-romancing Lavellan in Veilguard are, for me, one of the writing highlights of the game. Of course there are limitations with her being an NPC, but I think that subject to the constraints of the structure of the game, the writer did a really great job of a very difficult piece of writing - creating a depiction of the character that fits with thousands of different versions of Lavellan.

First of all, Lavellan's dialogue is elegant and lyrical, matching the cadence in which Solas speaks and thus showing how in-tune they are even after all these years. One thing I loved about Inquisition was that the language was often really beautiful, so I enjoyed seeing that kind of poetic language return here, and I think the writer understood and captured the heart of what a lot of people loved about the Solas romance - the poetry and beauty of it.

In addition, we get a range of different emotions. Lavellan expresses sadness ('He meant that much'), passion ('You've felt the power of that mind'), anger ('He left me to clean up his mess'), self-doubt ('Am I the prideful one?'). Whatever reaction you personally envision your character as having, you can find it represented in what she says here. I know some people wished Lavellan could have more of an angry confrontation with Solas, but that probably wouldn't have been possible without just allowing us to directly control Lavellan; I think the writer achieved a good compromise by showing us her anger and hurt in this conversation. 

At the same time, she's shown to be mature, self-aware, and reflective. We see her questioning herself, asking 'Am I the prideful one, imagining his broken heart so I'd never have to face my folly?' Lavellan isn't deluded; she's not romanticizing what happened. If she chooses to go with him, it's clear that she isn't naive or being manipulated. She's making this choice in a fully aware, thoughtful manner. And although Lavellan loves Solas deeply, he isn't her first priority. It's important that when Rook asks her if she'd be willing to leave with Solas, she states, 'No. We have to save the world first.' We're shown very clearly that she has a life outside of Solas, and she prioritizes her duty to the people of Thedas: only once her task is done is she able to put herself first, and finally choose her own desires over her duty for once. It's also impressive how clearly she understands Solas, as evident in her speculation that he's left clues because part of him wants to be stopped. I particularly liked the fact that she's shown to have a deeper understanding of him than Rook, as seen in their exchange about 'lies of the heart.' Rook just sees one superficial version of Solas as 'god of lies,' whereas Lavellan understands that although Solas did lie to her, at a deeper level he isn't good at concealing what he really feels. Lavellan absolutely knows and understand Solas' flaws and the 'bad' side of him that Rook has seen, but she also knows a different side of him that no one else has seen. If Lavellan chooses to go with him, it's because she understands him completely: she sees all the good and all the bad in him, and she chooses him anyway.

Finally, sometimes I see people critiquing Lavellan for being passive or not having much going on apart from her connection with Solas. Now first off, this clearly isn't true, since she spends the whole game mustering the armies of the south and sending detailed missives about her military operations - no one in Thedas has more going on than this woman! 

But also, it's important to keep in mind that Lavellan isn't supposed to be a fully-fleshed out character: she's specifically left vague enough so that you can fill in the details with your own Lavellan. For example, we're not told much about what she's been up to in the last ten years, but of course that's not because she's done nothing but pine for Solas: it's simply left unspecified so it can be compatible with different headcanons. Lavellan is specifically written to allow us to fill in the details, and the measure of success is not whether she comes off as a fully-developed character to people who don't have their own Solas-romancing Lavellan (honestly, those people shouldn't even be commenting, this writing isn't for them); the measure of success is whether she works as a stand-in for all of our individual versions of Lavellan. And although of course it's never going to be possible to please everyone, I think the writer did a great job within the limitations of what was possible in the plot.

[ohmygoly]

Facts. I needed that so bad, I even almost wrote a oneshot about it a few months back. The way that ending was handled makes me scared for the book ending, because wdym a compelling bridge between Vespera and Biana wasn't developed more and concluded in a satisfying way. You know all those Harry Potter enthusiasts that have connections between the Marauders characters and Golden era characters (Remus=Hermione, Ron=Sirius, Harry=James, Luna=Snape, etc)? Imagine something like that but its Biana and Vespera and obviously way cooler because it would be intentionally written into the story LOL.

Even if they didn't get that parallel, Biana having an arc where she gets to take the spotlight and take action against the enemy that wronged her, effectively making her the most important in that subplot, navigate her ability to act on what is right even against her own reputation, AND in the end become a full-fledged ruthless badass queen she was meant to be since the beginning by idk, stabbing Vespera through the heart or something would still be great for her character development anyways.

Still tweaking over the fact that Biana never got to kill Vespera.

[nerdy-chocomallow]

This is me getting my angry out of my chest, I despise when people use Zoé just to developed Chloé and have her be a glorified babysitter and therapist to her own sister. Basically using as sacrifice just so Chloé can get redeem.

I hate it, it makes me go against Chloé’s redemption arc a lot than it was before. It also goes against Zoé’s character development to me, she shouldn’t be use to build someone else and be there their support and I’m not saying that the show doesn’t do that, it definitely does. It doesn’t mean you people who have done this, do the same thing.

Because Chloé wants to better herself, she shouldn’t rely on others as that, she should go to a therapist as very least. It’s why I like some of moments where Zoé stands her ground against Chloé, it makes me a lot more happy, knowing she doesn’t want to take crap from her own sister because she should be. Why she should be loyal to the sister that wanted to change her and didn’t care! And Chloé had done this shit anyway, thinking she really happy, are we forgetting origins when she almost did the same thing with Adrien?! She shouldn’t have to deal and help others deal with their problems and make them feel better when she had that same problem back at home. Playing a role to make others happy and make them feel important while she gets nothing out of it; and I hate how the fanon and show doesn’t this to her.

Now, enjoy this picture of her if you are like me and are Zoé fan!

[vadersangel]

Skittles and Ghosts - Roman Godfrey x Reader - Chapter 1

Synopsis: A colorful happy go lucky girl comes to disrupt the life of the brooding school heart-throb Roman Godfrey. With her kindness and bluntness, she crept into his heart. But in the small town of Hemlock Grove, something eerie is about to happen; when Brooke Bluebell dies on school grounds, Roman, Peter and the new girl form an unlikely bond to unveil what really happened. A love story flourishes amidst the chaos raised by a vengeful ghost.

Genre: humor, fluff, smut (later chapters), horror, angst, enemies to lovers, slow burn.

Trigger Warnings: blood, drugs, alcohol, death, sex, foul language.

Word count: 1460

Special thanks to @kingkat12 , @mentallyscreamingsincebirth , @carmillavalentine and @peachesinto —you inspired me in many ways, and I’m glad our paths have crossed. 💕

( @roman-godfrey , such an inspiring character! Mwah! )

I still need a proofreader... Also, it starts from Roman's pov, then switches to reader's pov.

⊹ ₊  ⁺‧₊˚ ♡ ପ(๑•ᴗ•๑)ଓ ♡˚₊‧⁺ ₊ ⊹

There’s a rainbow in Pandora's Box. Isn’t that the worst kind of chaos to be unleashed?

⊹ ₊  ⁺‧₊˚ ♡ ପ(๑•ᴗ•๑)ଓ ♡˚₊‧⁺ ₊ ⊹

Not that any of my days were exactly peaceful, but that day in particular seemed uneventful. Miraculously I woke up and Olivia was not hovering over me. That alone was a relief! I made breakfast for Shelley and I, because mommy dearest never tended to us, and couldn’t be bothered to hire someone. Buying another Birkin was more important than having her children taken care of, I guess. Shelley seemed happy… That was all that mattered. In fact, there were only four people in the world I cared about: Shelley, Peter, Letha, and myself. The rest of the world could be set on fire for all I cared! Other people be damned!

I drove us to school, and then went to find Peter at our usual spot. It was the first day of school after summer break, everyone around us seemed thrilled, and needless to say I found the whole ordeal burdensome to say the least. I lit up a cigarette and took a drag, inhaling deeply, allowing the smoke to fill my lungs… Would it help me die sooner? I hoped so. It was soothing. Peter was talking some nonsense and I wasn’t paying much attention, but I laughed anyway. Little did I know those were my last few moments of harmony, before the whole world collapsed under the abnormally tiny feet of none other than the devil’s spawn… There she was, like a walking box of crayons, as if someone had thrown up skittles all over her; she was wearing a yellow tank top, a pink skirt, red Converse sneakers, and a baby-blue cardigan over her shoulders. Each of her nails was painted with a different color and I’m pretty sure there was also glitter on top. Ironically, her makeup was soft, she wasn’t wearing anything too bright on her face… I realized how weird it was that I was paying so much attention to a girl’s outfit and makeup. I frowned, deep in my thoughts, and that was when the little cursed gremlin had the nerve to smile at me! Smile, mind you, with all her 385 teeth exposed, as if something on my face had amused her. Great! I must look like a clown!

Hell is a color explosion on two legs. I was sure of it. And she walked all over me with those bloody red Converse sneakers, crushing my hopes of normalcy. Of course she would be in my class… Every weird freak in Hemlock High was in my class. To my dismay, the teacher pointed her to the seat next to mine. I almost threw up. I caught myself staring at her face because, I swear, she had glitter all over her cheeks. My face was pure horror, but somehow she misread it, because she smiled again. So polite… I hate polite people! You can’t fool me, you little phony!

-*-

I would have to be an unlucky motherfucker to be paired up with the brand new colorful stroke for the Literature assignment. But again, of course that would be my fate. So now, after being dragged down to the library through the school hallways, I was sitting across this unhinged pastel color psycho. She was on and on about her seven thousand different ideas, making my head hurt. I pinched the bridge of my nose trying to gather my thoughts, but her chime-like voice was too disruptive. I need a smoke!

“Aw, don’t be upset! We’re gonna finish this in no time! It’s easy! You could come over to my place after school, we can have chocolate cake and finish this.” Again, that wide off-putting smile that made me sick. How many teeth does she have?

I rolled my eyes, leaned in closer to her, looking into those ridiculously big eyes, as I said: “Read my lips: we are not friends!”

She tilted her head like a kitten, narrowing her eyes for a brief second, and then, those marbles lit up like the Eiffel Tower as she averted her gaze to her backpack. She was looking for something and I had an inkling it would be bad. I flinched. She grabbed a sticker sheet, of all things, pinched a small purple sparkly star and glued it to my cheek! My stomach churned. I was dumbfounded, speechless at her cluelessness, and possibly traumatized.

She stood up as if nothing had happened, gathered her belongings, and headed towards the library’s door. But as she was about to leave, she turned on her heels and spoke cheerfully: 

“See you at 7?” 

It wasn’t a question. She was pretty positive that I would indulge in her nightmarish ideas.

Before I had time to utter the words ‘no way in hell’, the Beelzebub’s baby left.

-*-

Of course I didn’t go to her house! 

I would rather run a cheese grater over my skin than spend even five minutes with that girl! But when befriending me proved to be a dead end, she befriended Peter–the traitor! With that sly face, she occupied my smoking spot, with my best friend. The jerk was laughing at something she was saying in that annoying high-pitched voice. I wanted to smash something, but I was not about to give her the satisfaction. So I walked over to them, greeting Peter and blatantly ignoring her. But the girl can’t seem to take a hint; she nudged me to call my attention as I lit up my cigarette. I puffed smoke right on her face as I looked down at her, trying to convey the extent of my disgust, to no avail. She coughed, to my amusement, but the solace I found in her suffering didn’t last long… Smiling at me, in a way that made me feel nauseous, she began to talk to me… Something about dinosaurs… By the way Peter was laughing, I’m pretty sure the look on my face was priceless. Double homicide suddenly seemed like a valid option. My brain was chanting for her to just disappear already!

How could someone gesticulate so much–and be so flamboyant–was the question that echoed in my head as the three of us walked towards Math class. She wouldn't shut up about the damned dinosaurs. Forget double homicide, I will just disappear; being kidnapped can’t possibly be this bad. 

I begged, literally begged, Peter to ditch the next class with me. I needed a joint to ease the headache induced by the satan’s intern fashion choices.

As Peter rolled me a doobie, I lit another cigarette,

“What’s up with you and the human highlighter?” I asked, nonchalantly and Peter frowned at me. He bit the insides of his cheeks, scanning my face, as if trying to psychoanalyze me. 

“She’s ok… I guess? Why?” He responded after a few seconds, shrugging as he lit up the blunt, then puffed the smoke in circles. But his eyes still held that weird hint of something I couldn’t really pinpoint, but somehow I knew he was having fun with this.

“No reason…” My answer ended the conversation about the subject.

-*-

“Hey, sunshine, did you buy your clothes at the flea market?”

I didn’t have to look to know who was talking to whom. That poor excuse of a dumbfuck, Ryan, was taunting the walking Skittles. His tone got to my bloodstream, making it seethe. He was voicing my opinions in a way, but I abhorred the guy even more than I loathed her. Involuntarily, my hands clenched into fists as I turned to face Ryan. I caught a glimpse of her, and it was more than enough for me to realize that she was about to cry. It made me unreasonably angrier. Peter’s eyes darted from me, to Ryan, to Skittles, and back to me.

“Hey, dipshit,” my voice was calculated. I closed the distance between me and them in two long strides. “Start apologizing.”

Ryan and his posse began to laugh, but their amusement didn’t last when I towered over them, my mouth turning into a wide grin as his eyes widened. I looked deep into his eyes and my next words were not a polite request:

“Kneel down and kiss her feet.”

Everyone around gasped as he did just as he was told, kneeling down in front of her and leaning in to kiss her shoes. His friends howled, not believing their eyes.

“Now, fuck off!” I barked, and again, they did as they were told.

I was pretty satisfied with the outcome, until I felt that familiar warmth dripping from my nose…

“You are bleeding!” She squealed. In seconds, she had a pink handkerchief pressed against my nose. Her flowery, fruity scent invaded my nostrils like a wrecking ball. Her eyes were wide in worry, her mouth agape in sheer horror.

Now she thinks I’m her friend.  Shee-it…

[tmasc-confessions]

it's so uncomfortable feeling like I have to walk on eggshells talking about patriarchy/misogyny with cis women while stealth.

(this came up in a discussion about a short story for a writing class, the story was about the father of a girl who was being pressured into conforming to gender roles and him wishing he could protect her from that.)

it's like this constant dance of explaining my interpretation of the story and the pressures the girl is facing without being too indepth so I dont seem like I'm 'mansplaining' or taking up all the space in a conversation that's supposed to be 'for women' (here just cis women, frankly I doubt trans womens' interpretations would be that welcome either if they weren't stealth). I have to pretend I'm not talking from experience and that I'm always looking to put the opinion of the cis women in the room above my own. just to be met with "yes, this character will never understand because he's a man" and not because it's a specific experience he hasn't had because of the way he was raised as a cis man and has lived the life of a cis man.

and like I get why people are generally weary of cis men being the ones to head discussions of patriarchy. trust me I do (even if I don't think it's always the most helpful, anyone's capable of having a bad take), but that doesn't mean it's not frustrating feeling like I'm walking on eggshells and that anything I say is given a lot less grace than if I were a cis woman (seriously doubt I'd be treated that much better if they knew I was trans, not about to out myself to find out)

anyways cis people understand experiences with patriarchy/social roles are different than gender identity challenge: difficulty level impossible

Oh yeah that must be hard. This is part of why i don't understand why people act like being stealth is some kind of massive male privilege because you still have to hide important aspects of your identity and experience, for your own safety.

It would be great if cis people could understand that, yes. I'm sorry man.

[loveandlegacy]

evolution's destination

so i have seen a few posts about how viktor's "evolution has a destination" line either doesn't make sense or is just a throwaway setup for him to say the fanbaity line of "the final, glorious evolution" – but i wanted to try to give viktor and by extension the writers some credit (however mad some of their choices made me) that that line isnt just incoherent nonsense.

part of my motivation for this is that i think the reading that all of viktor's actions in s2 are the result of him being a quasi-lobotomized shell for the hexcore's "will" is among the least interesting ways to interpret what was going on with his arc and probably does the greatest disservice to viktor as a character. i think we are supposed to understand him saying this as an important part of the broader context of his life and that he believes it for truly horrifying reasons.

so anyway. getting into this comes with the warning that the forthcoming reception requires me to take the overarching ableism of the metatext (not viktor's internalized ableism but the attitudes of the show itself) for what it is. i don't especially like it, but it is what it is and there's not much to say about it.

given that, i think it's better to receive the "evolution" scene as part of that deliberate choice to enable the narrative to lead up to and make possible viktor and jayce's love confession at the end.

so here we go.

viktor asserts that evolution has a destination in a philosophical debate with singed, and i would argue this is intended to make viktor's actual worldview as clear as possible to the audience before he decides to pop off and fembotify the world at large.

taking the argument with singed at face value: viktor opens the debate by asking if singed believes in fate and in their lives being guided by an invisible hand. it seems like a kind of weird question to ask considering they were at no point talking about destiny prior in the conversation – but i think on examination it makes sense.

viktor's encounter with singed begins with singed immediately violating viktor's personal space, which reveals to viktor the existence (or non-existence) of orianna.

entombed as she is in a glass sarcophagus, this dead little girl's stasis state recalls viktor's much beloved rio in her chemical tank. the blocking is interesting here – viktor and singed are on the same side of orianna's sarcophagus. for a moment, he and singed occupy a similar place in the universe: men of science. but in the present world, he and singed stand opposite each other.

they may both be men of science but they disagree about what ends science should be used towards and how it even works. viktor makes this clear when he tells singed "knowledge is a paradox. the more one understands, the more one realizes the vastness of his ignorance" as a rebuttal to singed saying he wishes he could know the world through viktor's eyes.

they then go on to disagree about even more. singed calls warwick a specimen, viktor says he's a man. singed wants to use warwick to save viktor from the deleterious effects of being connected to the arcane and viktor refuses, saying that it would be a pointless waste of warwick's life in service of ambessa's warmongering. singed refutes this and argues that the point of this blood sacrifice is to enable viktor to continue his work – "to save us from ourselves."

we are invited to doubt this motivation, viktor's visions showing us singed caressing not warwick but orianna's sarcophagus. there is no 'us' in this situation, there is only one particular person singed is interested in saving and it's orianna.

immediately following this vision, and immediately before viktor asks if singed believes in fate, singed says "you must survive, viktor". as many people before me have pointed out, this is a callback to his s1 statement that "the mutation must survive". this doesn't only tie viktor to rio, it also connects his story to orianna. singed does not want viktor to survive for his own good or for his work any more than he wanted rio to survive for her own good. viktor is another subject in question – another specimen in the long line of singed's various biomedical crimes, the same as rio.

genetic experimentation and selective breeding (and necromancy lol) aren't the same things as fate, but humans forcing a particular evolutionary direction onto other creatures can be read as a kind of 'invisible hand' if you think about it from the perspective of the test subjects in question.

given that viktor is the presumed 'mutation' in this conversation, we can understand him to also be the subject whose fate is guided or reoriented by this invisible hand via piltover's pollution of zaun, his own attempts at capturing magic through science being thwarted by powers greater than him, and eventually the hexcore yanking him back from death at the beginning of the season.

he even asks his question about fate while staring at the fractal patterns of the greenhouse glass! presenting us with ever-repeating patterns and cycles with no end.

in this light, viktor is asking singed if humans are in fact fated by forces outside of their control or if at least some humans can overcome those forces to reorient the total forward trajectory of the species.

singed says no and asserts that the only ruling force in nature is evolution, which is always in flux. this reveals something kind of interesting about singed imo and his relationship to death and his thoughts about orianna but that's a different post. for the purposes of this analysis he's saying what is true, which is that even genetic modification/manipulation and scientific interrogation – both things he has mastered in his own way – are still subject to engine of evolution well beyond whatever interventions humans are capable of.

this is the moment when viktor comes back with, "no, evolution has a destination – not to combat nature, but to supersede it. the final, glorious evolution".

much as i enjoy the funny dunks on this statement for its scientific incorrectness, i think there is something to the fact that viktor basically rejects singed's description of evolution and then turns around and treats evolution as the same thing as fate. he makes the 'evolution has a destination' statement while studying his hexcore-transformed hand.

i am struggling to remember the post that initially made this point click for me (i think it might have been this gifset but i will edit if i find something that made the argument more explicitly), but by studying his hand in this way, the visual language of the moment is telling us that viktor has come to see his own body as the evolutionary destination in question and the thing that supersedes nature/its unpredictable flux.

now comes the part where we dive into the idea that all of viktor's choices from the very beginning were shaped by having always been ashamed of his disability and that this shame is what guided him to his beautifying* eugenics project specifically. binomech has a thorough post explaining this reading of the text in depth and i recommend reading it through because it provides the foundation for what i'm about to say.

in the context of studying his own, violently transformed body – a process that required a traumatic death (or near-death, depending) and then the one man he loved and trusted most in all of piltover using the technology they created together to save his life despite viktor asking him to destroy the hexcore with the full knowledge that he was going to die anyway, even without the bombing – we can understand that the hexcore has granted viktor a kind of supremacy over his own former-fate. something horrible happened to him, but because of that horror, he was reborn not only free of the damage from the bombing, but also free of the things that fated him to an early death from birth.

exposure to toxic waste, piltover's ethnic discrimination against and industrial exploitation of zaun, the terminal illness for which he is repeatedly punished in season 1 for wanting to escape, his lifelong disability that marks him as even more of an outsider in piltover – these are all things completely outside of his control, all factors that determined how his life would be before he was even born. these things are the 'invisible hand' guiding the trajectory his life would follow, up to and including being in the council room when jinx's bomb hit. even jayce using the hexcore to save him could arguably be seen as part of this fate in which he had no say.

but the hexcore also "liberates" him.

it gives him a body he didn't ask for but it extends his life. it dissolves his disability and it gives him literal supernatural powers in its place. it allows him to build a commune verdant and overflowing with life in the basin of his home where people were thrown away like human trash. he was fated, but his fate also gave him a destination.

if we understand that viktor has, from his childhood, developed a particular sense of internalized ableism and come to see his body as a weakness that he needs to overcome or reject, that he agrees with piltover's view of him, then it makes sense why he talks about 'superseding' nature. it's not a scientific concept or even a fact of nature that he's after now that he's been forcibly transformed.

he's talking specifically about the supernatural, about what the arcane has offered him as a way out of his circumstances. he not only gets the able body that presumably the whole world reminded him at every turn was the better body to the point that he'd be ashamed of his own, he gets to go beyond this assimilationist idea of becoming what piltover wanted. he forces a fullblown eugenics project on the world at large in which no one is ever disabled or sick or capable of exploitation because they just they are hollowed out expressions of his vision of perfection, made of porcelain and gold, the dazzling colors of piltover's wealth and prosperity otherwise known as the colors of progress. this vision he has of painlessness and perfection has been shaped in part by a lifetime of punishment for having the "wrong" kind of body and for experiencing any amount of grief or rage over having been treated unfairly by piltover's hegemonic culture.

he was remade by magic and magic in turn enables him to guide evolution beyond what nature would allow. a world remade as he was into something unbreakable because it's perfect and empty.

as binomech says, i don't especially like the metatextual politics of this storyline, but it's the story they chose to tell. it follows through on its thematic promises for viktor, who spends the whole season on a runway up to what singed told him in s1. love and legacy are worth sacrificing for progress. his evolution has its destination. because of his many violent collisions with death, he was, however briefly and grotesquely, the mutation that survived.

*i say 'beautifying' because there are other kinds of eugenics projects that one could undertake since 'eugenics' itself is a movable target/fallible concept that hinges entirely on what one person or one culture thinks counts as 'desirable' traits. viktor's eugenics project is very particular to him, where his cultists-and-eventual-pretty-borgbots are all flawless, elegant, and eventually completely featureless, non-reproductive, entities

[sentientsky]

Kristin Chang, "Churching"

on apotheosis. on rage that has nowhere to go

[mabbbish]

s9 noodles and leftovers

[bunnieswithknives]

Can we possibly get your version of osma? I'd be interested to see what you did with her

Here you go!! I was putting this off a bit cause, I'll be honest, the way the reveal/transition scene was handled was actually kinda upsetting for me.

I did read on her Wiki though that she's apparently a fairy which is awesome as hell. I haven't gotten to that part in the books yet but I'm glad to have something to chew on in my time of need.

[destructo-range]

'helen is so underdevelopped as a character!' 'helen's boring!' stfu u just don't like her bc she's a woc and because she doesn't behave exactly like michael. yall put so much effort into developping michael's character inside your minds and completely look over her because she's 'poorly written.' stop.

[autisticandroids]

FAMINE: That's one deep, dark nothing you've got there, Dean.

[youtube with closed captions]

dean and his father. dean and his family. dean and how bad it is.

(via @closetoyou1970)

[navree]

"rhaenys could have ended the war by dracarysing all the greens right there" yes because a distant relation to the throne deciding to barbecue an anointed and publicly positively hailed king and his entire family who is well loved within the city and in multiple other parts of the country for the sake of the succession of a far-away princess no one was ever on board with who hasn't been seen by the populace in literal years, her psycho husband, her three obvious bastards, and two toddlers from the psycho husband would go over super well with westeros and especially in king's landing where scores of the still-cheering population were killed for no reason by that same dragon who would do the barbecuing, because when targaryens act unilaterally without thinking of how the people would react there's never any problem, which is why the storming of the dragonpit and robert's rebellion were actually just collective delusions dreamed up by readers who hate rhaenyra and not key parts of the story and house targaryen's history that directly contributed to their demise and are intrinsic to the plot

truly team black stans are made up of only the most genius and media literate amongst us

[jacketpotatoo]

I'm stealing this from my lit teacher but he posed that something certain characters in arcane s2 missed were 'Zuko Alone' moments. Moments where characters took an extended amount of time to introspect, face the consequences of their actions, and connect with the wider world. This, to me, is why Caitlyn's arc wasn't as effective as it could've been. After a switch-up, after a big 180 like hers, it is simply necessary to track the progression of her arc. It's easy to say "In hating you, I've hated myself" and "no amount of good deeds can undo our crimes" but when you don't see her face the Zaunites or acknowledge the class-privileges she exploited, it all rings a little hollow. Arcane usually does a good job of tying the personal with the political and I think that's hidden in Cait's arc. She works as a character when you're understanding her actions in relation to her love for Vi and forgiveness of Jinx. She doesn't if you think of it on a wider socio-political scale. It's just a little odd when the show is such an arbiter of 'show don't tell'. That line has to do alot of heavy lifting. Alas, what time restraints does to an arc.