#anyway that's what I call *character development*
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'this monstrous St Michael'
I doubt the TROP writers and showrunners meant anything in particular by setting Halbrand up as St Michael the Archangel in this shot beyond "looks cool :)", but bear with me okay because I was talking to @wyrd-syster about Les Miserables recently and it reminded me of something.
So first of all the St Michael comparison is because St Michael is very commonly portrayed in art as a figure in armour, standing over a conquered Satan in the form of a dragon or serpent, holding a long lance. e.g. this is Raphael's Saint Michael Vanquishing Satan (1516):
TROP Sauron is really not St Michael (the closest in Tolkien would be Manwë or Eönwë I suppose; the Ainur don't really correlate directly to angels). But at this point he thinks he is, or at least thinks he should be.
Which is what brings me back to Les Miserables. Here's Javert:
Javert was at that moment in seventh heaven. Without being fully aware of it, yet with a confused intuition of his own indispensible status and of his success, he personified—he, Javert—justice, enlightenment, and truth in their heavenly function of crushing evil. He had behind him and around him, at infinite depth, authority, reason, precedent, the conscience of the law, the vengeance of the law, all the stars in the firmament; he protected order, he called forth the thunder of the law, he avenged society, he came to the aid of the absolute; he stood erect in a blaze of glory; there was in his victory a trace of defiance and of combat; standing tall, arrogant, resplendent, he displayed, out in the open, for all the world to see, the superhuman bestiality of a bloodthirsty archangel, the fearful shadow of the act he was performing made visible in his clenched fist with the dull flashing of the social sword; happy and outraged, he held crime, vice, revolt, perdition, hell, pinned beneath his heel; he shone, he exterminated, he smiled … and there was an incontestable grandeur in this monstrous Saint Michael. Javert, though horrifying, had nothing of the ignoble about him. Probity, sincerity, candor, conviction, a sense of duty, are things that, when they go wrong, can become hideous, but that, even hideous, remain grand; their majesty, peculiar to the human conscience, persists even in horror.
Overall I think Galadriel is more of a Javert figure in s1 of TROP than Sauron is; she's the one whose fixation on justice has become something so all-consuming it leaves no room for weakness or redemption. (Whether Sauron is in any sense repentant is a whole other question, but her answer to even the suggestion of it is isn't "you're lying" but to tell him it wouldn't matter anyway: "no penance could ever erase the evil you have done.") But this particular Javert moment is very much Sauron.
From Morgoth's Ring:
And Letters:
One of the things I don't like about the time compression in TROP is that it speeds up this gradual 'relapse' so much that it's hard to trace it as the development of the character, vs. a brief dalliance with the idea of Doing Good followed by a "fine then" tantrum, but! TROP Sauron is still very much informed by what Tolkien said about 2nd Age Sauron and his motives and I do love it for that.
and: I especially love, when Tolkien talks about Sauron's corruption by Morgoth, the idea that this was part of the corruption; that it wasn't just Morgoth running Evil Bootcamp, but that Morgoth flattered him and praised him and fed into his pride so much so that anything 'good' he believed he was doing was misdirected from the start, because Mairon the Admirable couldn't conceive of any good outcome or plans that didn't feature him as the most special perfect talented brilliant centre of everything.
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Lewis being / staying alive has so many AU stories potentially waiting! I love the idea that they hiked in the cave without any security. And warnings signs were outside of the cave! People were supposed to stay outside! They saw there was danger, and yet they went inside anyway.
Vivi as the leader should've made the call to say, "No, this is too dangerous. Let us get proper gear first."
Which opens the question:
Why was the entrance open and not boarded up?
Which again leads back to Vivi, but also Lewis, maybe Mystery. (More difficult to tell with Arthur what he exactly through except for his unease.) A dangerous cave, with plenty of warnings, but the cave is accessible? That's so suspicious??
Even more so if they assumed that the local officials hadn't come around to close the entrance. Either they wanted a little thrill (young adults) or they believed the warnings were exaggerated.
So, plenty of opportunities for things to go wrong without any possessiong going on.
And opportunities for Vivi angst and character development without the amnesia!
Used to be gung-ho about any spooky location despite the possible dangers? Didn't think about the dangers inside the save? Or disregarded them? Went deeper inside than the immediate entrance, with only some torches? No gear, and no information to people where they were?
Now both Arthur and Lewis, or only Arthur get hurt, while Lewis nearly did.
The doctor at the closest hospital they go to tears into them for their reckless behavior, revealing that the cave is indeed dangerous, and-
I also love the idea that, even if Lewis doesn't (consciously) blame Vivi, the cave's events puts a strain on their relationship. (More Vivi angst is always good.)
Ya know what I find interesting. There are almost no "Lewis lives/is resurrected" fics. Fics where he doesnt die, just swap him dying for someone else dying.
If you go to the "lewis lives" tag on ao3 there are 11 works. All except 2 are actually precave, lewis hasnt died yet or the kind where someone else died instead.
and there are 2 resurrection fics and of those one still involves someone else dying (arthur killing himself specifically)
And yeah, Lewis' death is the inciting incident to the series, but I certainly dont think there are no stories to tell there. I think there could be very interesting character drama there. Especially when you dont have the amnesia thing to make it so no one has to deal with the aftermath
With no ghost induced amnesia, Vivi has to deal with the fact that being the leader, Arthur getting hurt was on her. Lewis getting hurt/almost getting hurt is on her. They went cave exploring with no safety gear. In street clothes (chucks for hiking in a wet cave??). They didnt even have a flashlight. And its seems that no one knew they were going into this cave (since it seems like Lewis' corpse is still there) So they broke every basic rule of caving safety https://www.fs.usda.gov/visit/know-before-you-go/cave-safety
Like even if you dont blame her, I think she would blame herself. And its another thing I dont think I saw explored much. I'd see it get mentioned but usually it would immediately get brushed aside, usually by one of the boys.
But with how unsafe there were being....Lewis could have just died from slipping. No possession required. (obviously the doylist reason is because it would be a pain to design whole new outfits for one scene that was added last minute. They would look super cute in little themed caving outfits tho.)
This started out with just me thinking about "Lewis lives" But now its more about how I kinda want more Vivi angst......
Imagine if Lewis knew Arthur was possessed. If Arthur hadnt been clear he didnt want to go in the cave. Imagine if Lewis blamed Vivi.
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Musical Touken Ranbu: Michinooku ~ Hitotsu Hachisu (Michinooku ~ A Single Lotus)
Here we go! Only a few days after the archive release and toumyu's ninth anniversary (congratulations!)
Michioku, or Michihasu, is a myu I have many conflicting feelings about, both positive and negative. However, I do believe that with the right amount of care in the next Mika-related story myu, the negative can still be cleared. Plus, I'm glad about a lot of things being re-established. The writer does need to step up her game a little on the plot-writing side of things, as well as the understanding-and-respecting-past-myu side of things, but as long as she does, this can still be given a proper place within what was already established.
Keep in mind that these are only the subtitle files, timed and tled to the DMM senshuuraku and the bluray respectively. The archive version will have a talk at the start, so the starting times of the subs will have to be delayed accordingly.
You can find the subtitles and my TL notes document here!
#touken ranbu#toumyu#water's translations#michioku#michihasu#how do I put this#seeing as myu's director Kayano has said in an interview right before Michioku that Kogi and Mika have a special bond#different from other swords-- and then they try to speedrun *Tsuru* and Mika having a what feels like it was intended to be#even greater relationship using a song called Kage Futatsu where KOGI'S signature song from Utaawase was Futatsu no Kage???#I SINCERELY want to believe it's incompetence rather than the writer deliberately pulling the rug from under Kogi's feet#bc the alternative is just cruel#I don't particularly mind the relationship Mika and Tsuru have in this play but I feel that not for a moment Kogi and kara respectively#were considered in the writing#anyway my final verdict is that this myu is what too many people think tsuwa is: the divorce myu (between Mika and Tsuru this time)#in all cases I hope myu can bring Shirakawa Yuki in again like with Datemyu just to offload myu's already deathly busy writer (she's done#5 myus in a month before which is just insane) because I feel this just isn't sustainable with the amount of carefulness a long-running#franchise like myu demands and the *writing* quality (not the production quality AT ALL Michioku's is great) is suffering for it.#like sure Michioku is loaded with references but they're references that either don't serve *Michioku's own* plot or their treatment shows#a lack of understanding of the work it's referencing-- for example Kashuu calling upon atsu's “This is how the shinsengumi fights!” actuall#goes completely contrary to the lesson he's supposed to have learned from atsuibun: that swords aren't disposable and that he has duties as#both soldier (captain in atsu) and as COMRADE and he makes the (already highlighted in Michioku!) dumb decision of butting in without#thinking-- and with that framed against manba's breaking trauma as well! He's supposed to have learned to stay rational and consider both#duties yet here he is ---BECAUSE of the reference--- completely leaning on the pre-atsu-development side of the scale#as if Ishi's words went one ear in one ear out. And yes the scene by itself could've worked as a subversion to show Kashuu makes the#'irrational' decision against what Ishi taught him to consider precisely because he cares for the people he's protecting but there is NO#groundwork laid at all for that in the rest of Michioku! This is what I mean with the carelessness of the references and the lack of#consideration for what prior myus were trying to SAY and ACHIEVE which is insane because she was the lyricist for those#it's more a collage of feelings provided through a set of characters calling back to the scripts of prior myu rather than#a story that evokes feelings bc the humans in it walk forward and act upon-- interact with-- the scenery on the road as left by prior human
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the doctor isnt neurodivergent or autistic or adhd or nonbinary or genderqueer or asexual. what the doctor is, is Not From Here
#which necessarily of course says something abt their (non)whiteness#(i had all these words in quotation marks first so mentally add those to whiteness too)#but we've them be black for all of 1.5 episode now so#lets see how that develops you know#also i dont think i understand the politics of that part well enough to say much abt it#not that i probably understand the politics of these parts better but#im annoyed enough abt this Thing happening these years. in these 20s i guess. the 'representation' thing#to complain abt it anyway#the dsm isnt real and it isnt gonna fuck you buddy#maybe i'll read some books and then one day i'll write an essay driven by spite and pettiness#i wonder if i can make the thesis statement about the tension between their status of main character#in a 60 year running family adventure show vs this therapy thing we're doing now#like. you cant do that. in terms of like. what story is and does. what a character is and does. it strains#in an interesting way. like im not saying they Shouldnt have done it. im just observing. that you cant do that really. i think#or maybe you can! but i'll find that out#i also dont know shit abt narratology or whatever so. need to read books first. sigh#always have to pause my thoughts to read myself in first its so annoying. esp bc i rarely really do#bc then new thoughts new things to do you cant do EVERYTHING. you can do almost nothing. bane of my existence really#but like you might even be able to say smth interesting here about whether you can call them traumatised at all#remember that article i saw around on tumblr a few years ago i think that was abt like. some scholar in the middle east maybe#saying that ptsd is a western thing bc it necessitates a Post#all of this is western. psychiatry is western. its all stories. how you conceptualise trauma is a story#whos Other is story#where youre from is a story what you stand for is a story who you are is a story#ah. checked the article. dr samah jabr. palestinian. i'll start with her book maybe
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someone on the bodies production team you have to release more layout/bts pictures of charles whiteman's flat please. this is a great start but i need to know him better. particularly if it's got about as much mould as a second year uni house and if he owns as many chairs as it seems LOL
#ok the joke is at his expense but im already romanticising this shit#20-something loser karl weissman moves into the worst flat of all time and makes it a home#hangs a picture of his parents' wedding against the worst wallpaper you've ever seen#just buys what he likes and calls it decor#how else can you explain the fucking model boat next to the fucking telephone. AND YOU MAY TELL ME 'oh thats just random set stuff'#NOT TO ME!#and it stays until he's in his mid 30s. develops a habit of not cleaning up along the way#the shot where he seems to have taken off his shirt/tie/jacket and then dropped them off on various pieces of furniture. HE LIVES LIKE THIS#also entertaining the idea that its his parents' old stuff that he can't bring himself to throw out ..#i will created a fully fleshed out character using 8 episodes and fever dream visions if i have to#karl weissman#bodies netflix#edit: the original tags are above but since then i joined the discord and got to add these pictures LOL#saved this post as a draft bc i was like. i cant annoy people on the tag any more than i already have#doesnt matter. forcing this into the tag like a week after i made it anyway#im still so interested in the fact that it seems like there are more rooms that we never see#outside this bedroom and living space (and the bedroom isnt clear in the show either)#like. i rly need a 360 house tour NOW.#ALSO I FEEL LIKE A TOWN CRIER NO I DONT THINK HE HAS MOULD BUT IT WOULD BE FUNNY!!!!#the chair next to the liquor rly is something. hes MY babygirl
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there are two wolves inside of you
#bnha#mha#bnha shitpost#bnha 409#mha 409#kacchan#bnha spoilers#mha spoilers#katsuki bakugou#bakugou katsuki#katsuki bakugo#mha shitpost#bakugo katsuki#naruto#really stupid but anyway#this is what the kiddos call character development#i acknowledge the absurdism here#don't think too hard about it#tangentially related: i wonder what izuku's up to lately
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when i say i am obsessed with him
#'indescribable insolence' <3333#dumas writing aramis in '20 years after':#i am going to create a character that is so egdy sarcastic provocative and irritating to everyone around him#and im gonna make stirring shit being an asshole and gruesome murder his favourite hobbies#and he did just as he said. bless him.#most character ever#and what makes him even better is the contrast between 20YA!aramis and t3M!aramis. its hilarious.#my man really went feral. midlife crisis some call it. i call it character development of all time. i call it serving cunt.#aramis as a musketeer a soldier a man in a profession where you're literally paid for killing people:#sweetness and mildness personified writes poetry and theology essays in his free time never gambles dreams about dedicating his life to god#aramis as a priest: whooo boy i hope i get to fUCKING KILL A PERSON TODAY >:D#anyway. i love him a normal amount or something.#the three musketeers#alexandre dumas#anyway. i reread this scene and the charenton battle today because it's definitely in my top 3 aramis moments#also the english translation on the gutenberg page omits two lines of dialogue that i remembered from my polish translation#and it goes something like#de Chatillon says 'i think you're looking for a fight sir' to which Aramis basically responds with 'oh nooo you *think*? Imao'. iconic.#(and its even funnier cause that makes athos immediately go 'aramis stfu plz' and aramis just goes 'no <3' im obsessed with them)#vingt ans apres#do i have a#twenty years after#tag?? not sure tbh i think i dont but tagging just in case ig
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ok now that you've said it, im gonna ask for it. Azul X Cater, either friendship or romantic could be fun. Cater helping Azul relax without the stuffy business stuff and raising his confidence levels callin him cute or w/e? And Azul helping Cater with getting him super cool items to post on his magicam / putting spicy menu items in the monstro lounge for him to eat (not for like the art idea but like just in general on how the ship might play out)
HEHEHEHE THAT'S REALLY CUTE :3 they could be a power couple, i can see it in my mind's eye...
azul acts all confident but i think if a cute boy got close and batted his eyelashes at him he'd get flustered and fold in an instant lol
#also the fact that theyre both the same height fucks me up still. i feel like cater should be taller but hes NOT!!!!!!!!!!#twst#azul ashengrotto#cater diamond#twisted wonderland#cereal tries to draw#ummm idk what 2 tag them as#caterazul#azulcater#cayzul#hwat ever#should i be adding like#shipping#asks#to my more specifically shippy posts#i saw a post a while ago that said ppl should do that so ppl that dont like shippiing can blacklist#i get stressed sometimes bc. i feel like there is a lot of overlap sometimes for platonic and shippy! but sure why not#here was pretty clearly shippy LOL anyway. anyway hi. jfksdljfklsdhgkldjsfdsjfksdjgklsdjf#they could be cute#that bit u said about helping azul relax from the stuffy business stuff is paralelling an oc x oc [not twst related] thing my friend#and i have w/our boyos lol#to be fair. the stuffy business guy was initially a joke character based on azul that turned into a real oc with lore and development LOL#but anyway. we had a whole arc where my guy was like 'turn off the little business pilot in your brain 😒' helping him relax lol#anyway point is i can see it with cayzul#takin azul by the hand like 'LETS GO TO A TRENDY CAFE~' 'we could just eat at the lounge-' 'umm call it market research 😉'#silly. hehe
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ohhh, da fandom, how i've not fucking missed you lmaooo the new game's release is still a month away but already i'm reminded exactly why i became convinced i'd never want anything to do with that franchise again. jesus christ. except this time im 30 and hopefully better at tailoring my online experience to not exhaust me & make me pissed and anxious (even if half of da tumblr is like. already laser-focused on making this a shit experience for everyone who stumbles upon their fuckass posts huh hfgjhjhjd)
anyway i'm listening & learning & blocking even MORE tags & not looking at SHIT until i play the game myself <3 For Real this time. "oh but surely it's just an innocent opinion and not a spoiler or anything--" that is the devil talking. all posts abt veilguard rn are full of shit, on account of The Game Isn't Fucking Out Yet How Are You Guys Already Having Novel-Length Opinions (TM)!!!! anyway i simply don't need that kind of energy in my life
i enjoy these games too much to be chased outta here by deranged drama i'm not even a part of again 😭 get fucked & god unbless
#don't mind this both the readmore and the tags are just one long rant on the topic of Bitching About The Dragon Age Fandom <3#personal blah#sdjhfjkj that one post making fun of this fandom and its drama and callouts.... it really is LITERALLY like that no exaggeration#y'all are so fuckin stupid god bless! idk what's funnier#the people who already formed a full comprehensive opinion abt the game based on the spoilers and scraps of news we've been given#(the opinion is of course that it's All Bad!! what else!! 'veilguard will NEVER be origins idk why i even bothered' it's so dark in here)#OR the people who full ass expected some masterpiece of storytelling that will tie in EVERY single loose strand of story together#and that will bring ALL of the previous playable characters and ALL the companions back (or at least SURELY the ones they like!! duh!!)#be so fr rn 😭 it's a new game!! new story!! for the love of god can we move on long enough to experience something new#& also you guys KEEP getting big mad disappointed by EVERY new bioware game. Why Did You Think This Would Be Different.#we've BEEN here before. how have we not learned anything#you hated da2 and inquisition too like jhjhgjgfhh at this point maybe Adjust Your Expectations at least a little? Just A Thought#shoutout also to the people who are mad about how much the game seems--key word SEEMS mind you--to be focused on solas#i'm super not crazy about him either but the game was literally called dreadwolf for most of it's development like. what did you EXPECT#ANYWAY. fjghfhjkd#dav#<- that's for my blog navigation. potentially. i might start tagging all the games for myself again idk we'll see#god i needed to get this off my chest fjghjhjk i feel so light now. emptied all my annoyance into the void and now i'm all 😌😇
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5C
#inanimate insanity#ii mephone5#ii mephone5c#my art#listen man. these two (+ 5S) are like inherently connected in my mind. even though they've never met canonically#created by a man who does not truly care about them or their well-being and only values them bc they are still new and useful to him#& died trying to kill their predecessor. but their efforts wouldn't have mattered anyway because they would've been replaced in like a year#did they know they would be replaced? did they just have to live with the knowledge that they would one day no longer matter to cobs?#these tags r only tangentially related to the artwork. i'm losing it i fear#anyway a headcanon that's actually kinda related to this art:#i imagine that cobs gave more preferential treatment to 5S because he had more advanced tech nd stuff#and 5C developed like a weird relationship w her self-esteem where she (like the other mephones) kind of has an inflated ego#she readily compliments herself (literally called herself “the most colorful beauty in existence”)#(partially bc she's kinda compensating for not getting as much praise from cobs as 5S)#(i also think she tends to seek validation from others (e.g. “i'm made of plastic. neat huh?”) because of that)#but she doesn't talk up how advanced her tech is because it's from Last Year#you don't understand how long this headcanon has been microwaving in my mind. it's been YEARS. i've never unleashed it until now#it's probably stupid but WHATEVER MAN. i'll overanalyze these phones as much as i want#this is what happens when your favorite characters show up in like 1 episode and die. you go insane
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decided i will remain neutral on the combat until i actually play it but realising all the people comparing it to ac odyssey were doing so favourably made me go ohhh. perhaps this one just isn't designed for me.
#probably too early to make the call that dai trying to be skyrim = veilguard trying to be god of war#but that is the vibe im getting. and my issue is i love skyrim in a junk food kind of way but cannot stand god of war / similar arpgs#oh well dao is the only game whose combat i really would say i enjoy anyway so it's not make or break for me. just complaining#i'm also really surprised by how much ive been enjoying elden ring so maybe if it controls well it'll surprise me#what i really disliked about ac / gow is how solid and heavy the characters felt. a rogue or mage might feel more fluid#sad! <3 ah well at least there's the incoming million crpg knockoffs that are probably being developed in the wake of bg3's success#stardew valley farming sim boom style
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Man I wonder where the leader of the fear realm could've gone, it's alMOST LIKE NEVIN HAS AN
#had to re-edit the image real quick because the original edit was from a post I made about Drew years ago#and while the Drew thing is becoming less and less likely. Nevin havinv one has basically been canon since#someone mentioned Greg's (was it Britney's) aura being familiar in s2ch1. ive been putting together a list of every line#that points to Nevin's aura throughout the whole thing (most from s2ch1 but then s2ch10 came out and it was really canon at that point)#but clearly i'm running out of time to say ''i fucking called it'' before it's explicitly stated and i dont want to be in another situation#where somebody else will beat me to a theory and me posting anything about it will seem like copying them. sorry about that btw i had#thought i had already mentioned theorizing that nevin was possessed by a demon in that old theory i made but i had forgotten that one was#super old and was about sigma. so no copying there i just got extremely paranoid there was a mention of a cult and i was like ''nuh uh#that's way too specific and out there of a detail to end up in both our theories'' and i forgot the rest of my super old post was outdated#as hell. and echos had gone ''yeah they're so similar!'' and i took their word for it but now i'm realizing they were probably just trying#to be supportive. so yeah no copying there i was just beaten to the punch of saying something. but i will NOT back down from the aura shit#because i have been calling that shit FROM THE START or at least since i started reading ibvs back when ch20 came out.#also not backing down from saying chris was the worse friend because these past few chapters are the first time isaac has done anything tha#could knowingly upset chris meanwhile chris has. let edward drag isaac to the lair after isaac said edward would beat him up. chose not to#believe edward was holding the secrets over their heads because 'it was something isaac had said' and then immediately distrusted edward in#the next chapter because a random person he didn't know said to steal a book (might i mention how that entire scene proves chris' lack of#development and refusal to take responsibility because it perfectly alludes to when chris had brought those fireworks into his old school#and makes me wonder if charlie has actually gotten him in trouble with his past schools or if he's still just not taking responsibility#and if him following nevin to the woods to test out their powers is an extension of ''if something bad happens its not my fault''#like seriously this man would bring a mysterious suitcase onto a plane if he's told to). uh what was i talking about agai#anyway on a related note my mental state has only gotten worse since i left tumblr and the habit of thinking about chris instead of sleepin#or doing schoolwork has not stopped. so i was still failing for a while and might graduate now but am still staying away from tumblr.#so yeah this was a little update and im not going to linger this time im just going to leave tumblr again right after hitting post#addendum because i just can't let things go. and was thinking about chris again. i don't think his lack of development is because of bad#writing (anymore. i used to.). instead i'm certain his character arc is going to continue into him following someone (nevin probably) into#doing something really bad. and then he'll finally get actual consequences and go 'oh shit i fucked up real bad this time'#if you think that theory is reaching too far into the future you should hear mine about isaac dying at the end lmao
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Do we realize that we just saw Din Djarin riding a droid into battle against bigger droids?
#do they count as droids or more like battle vehicles?#meh it's droid enough for me#anyway that's what I call *character development*#coming from the guy who refused to just get into a taxi driven by a droid at the very beginning#din djarin you sweet sweet batshit crazy man#din djarin#the mandalorian#the mandalorian & grogu
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In Defense of Chloe Bourgeois Part 3: Why Thomas, WHY?
Hello everyone! In case it wasn't obvious by the title, this is a part 3 to this post right there! I'd sincerely recommend reading it since you'll need the context. Anyhow, moving right onto where I left off! Yes I copied the message too, it's 2am leave me alone.
[...]
Mind you, I'm not saying that there shouldn't be one at all, but that Miracle Queen was absolutely not the right time to go for it. Assuming that Chloe's fall was planned from the start, then I'll admit that it was the right call from Astruc and Co. Why? Because Seasons 2 and 3 give us an excellent analysis of Chloe as a character, and a lot of time for her to try and acclimate herself to the new circumstances of actually belonging somewhere. But...they also don't provide Chloe with the oppurtunity to figure herself out that much. She's preoccupied with Akuma fights whenever she's Queen Bee, and doesn't get much time to actually talk to her would-be friends as herself, at least outside the context of beating up this week's fashion atrocity, courtesy of the local Butterfly Man. And to be honest? The only reason I don't love Miracle Queen as an episode is because Chloe's fall didn't get proper buildup. If Astruc had devoted time to show us what was happening, then I'd be head over heels for the sheer amount of potential doors this storyline was opening!
Unfortunately...Thomas decided to double down on a terrible writing mistake...with Queen Banana. Dear Nooroo, the sheer amount of hate I have for this episode is almost as bad as my seething rage for Ephemeral! I'll talk about that disasterous stew of rotten eggs and horrendous writing some other time, but Queen Banana nearly takes the cake for my least favorite episode in Season 4! Would you like to know why? Because I was inhaling one thousand cubic meters of copium when I predicted that Astruc would actually bother doing something worthwhile with Chloe! And I'll admit, I do see what they were going for here. Make Chloe as bad as possible to replace her with Zoe. But that just ended up undermining both of them so badly that it actually hurts me to watch Queen Banana and Sole Crusher! I honestly don't think it was 100% intentional to make it look like Zoe was her half-sister's replacement, but the fact that it even looks that way from what I believe to be a decently unbiased point of view...is a problem. Don't get me wrong, I love Zoe! She's amazing, and Season 5 made her even better! But her introduction was so poorly written that it feels that way.
And Thomas certainly didn't help matters with the way Chloe was portrayed in those episodes. People have said that "she was being nice to Zoe at the start" and that "Chloe was trying to help with the movie, she had a really cool idea!" and both of those are true, yes, but look at the way that she goes about it. Chloe cranks up her "Audrey-ness" from the 8.5 we see on a good day, to the 10 of Style Queen...to a good ol' 27. Mind you, this could have been very well done! It could have been made obvious that Chloe is intentionally falling back into old habits as a defense machanism or a way to cope by deluding herself into thinking she doesn't need anyone because she's a Bourgeois! Would have made for a wonderful plotline, especially since she broke off her and Adrien's friendship. If I recall correctly, he told her she's being unreasonable, which Chloe absolutely was the entire episode, at least in the way she went about interacting with people. Naturally, Chloe insists otherwise, and decides that she doesn't need him either! This would be a wonderful moment to have her cry in the limousine, or maybe we could have gotten a scene where she's regretting cutting him off in Sole Crusher! Even at some later point in the Season! It would have been great! It would have given Chloe proper depth and made the approach of her fall in Miracle Queen have actual consequence in regards to her character! It would have severely complicated Chloe's relationship with the now only positive influence in her life, Zoe!
Speaking of Zoe, there's a huge theme hanging between her and Andre about breaking cycles of abuse. I won't talk about it here since it fits into a future post, but there's already a lot of analysis posts out there, especially about their relationship, which I personally find fundementally flawed. Andre is in general a really shitty person who I don't think ever should gotten a redemption arc, especially one that amounts to "Oh well, the problem child (that I am responsible for failing to raise) is gone now, time to receive zero consequences and enjoy my life after being a corrupt politician for almost a decade!" Can you tell I do not like that by the way? Can you tell? I swear I am giving this man a downfall arc to end all downfalls in a fic one of these days...
Anyway, point is that Chloe and Zoe are both screwed over by their incredibly horrible parents! And to anyone who says "but Zoe isn't a bad person, she's just different", kindly think about why that is. Chloe spent her entire childhood begging for her mother's attention and then being taught how to bribe, extort, blackmail and bully people into submission by Andre. Which is canon by the way! Meanwhile Zoe spent a significant amount of time with Audrey, and therefore doesn't idolize the mom she never knew.
Now, I'm not going to speculate on Zoe's childhood, but it seems pretty logical that Zoe was at the very least witness to a frankly ludicrous amount of Audrey's "you're ridiculous, utterly ridiculous" moments, to the point where she's sick of it. Like c'mon, if you had anybody in your house firing their unpaid intern 27 consecutive times in the span of maybe an hour, you'd quickly get used to it, get annoyed by it, and then promptly decide the behavior isn't worth emulating. Especially if you're sick of their shit by that point, which we can logically Zoe is. Therefore, she doesn't act like Audrey. Considering Andre didn't know she existed, he never poisoned her with his slimy politician ways, Zoe's behavior is different from Chloe's. As an aside, she still does try to emulate her actions when she first arrives at Dupont, if only for a couple minutes. Zoe wants to fit in, and even if she doesn't like what Chloe does, she's willing to play the part at least for a moment to get close to her sister. Fits really well with her wanting to be an actress, so I wanted to highlight it!
Anyway, the point is that there is some great foundational material here! Regardless of whether or not Chloe "fell" in Miracle Queen, there's amazing potential for a proper conflict between these two! Because as a reminder, we deduced earlier that Chloe was jealous of Marinette because of the latter having what she didn't! Zoe presumably had Audrey's love (in Chloe's mind at least), hence she would treat her differently. Be it either with seething hatred or jealousy is up to whomever writes the story. Alternatively, Chloe could (in the scenario where Miracle Queen didn't happen) believe that Zoe is a similarly abusive situation as she, and we go from there for a plotline between the two. Irrespectively of which route they wanted or could have taken this, any potential for character development between these two is utterly ruined from the very moment they first interact on screen.
This because Chloe is now reduced to a one-dimensional "school bully" character, which would have made logical sense if the writers explained it as a self-defense mechanism, but without any context or exploration of her mental state post Season 3, it can only be seen as character regression, which is never a good idea! Not to mention that Lila Rossi exists specifically to fulfil the role of antagonist for Marinette's personal life now! I know as well as everyne else how much Lila gets ignored and underused in this show, but the fact that Thomas and Co. took time to forcefully shove Chloe back in a role that no longer fits her instead of using the villain they spent three Season Finales hanging in front of us like a carrot on a stick is ridiculous to me! Therefore, Chloe's entire character development, which I would have been completely fine with if anybody bothered to treat her downfall with even the minimum amount of respect it deserves, if solely from the perspective of not leaving a gaping plothole bigger than the cavern in Gabriel's basement in the middle of their storyline! I know I already brought up me having an aneurysm once because of these crappy writing decisions, but we are well past the point of a mental breakdown and headed directly to a freakin' heart attack!
Why? Why??? How do you even manage to disrespect your own character to the point where you ruin two villains simultaniously, and the new heroine you're introducing??? Thomas Astruc! Have you ever taken a Writing 101 class before? Do I need to borrow Nathalie's crossbow and force you into one? Yeah okay, we get you don't like Chloe, but I honestly cannot accept that her botched downfall would spiral into the utter butchering of two more characters with unlimited potential, one of whom is supposed to be the villainess for your protagonist's personal life and the new Hawkmoth! I am well aware that Thomas doesn't even know I exist, but the sheer amount of beef I have with this man solely for being incompetent it honestly starting to become too much! I'm sitting over here desperately trying to retcon and re-write his characters in my head to at least make logical sense! And he just adds even more steaming-hot garbage to the pile of inconsistency, insanity and bad writing decisions! Meanwhile, we're missing 100% of logical sense, character respect, or at the very least some kind of way for the audience to understand what you're trying to communicate! Just tell us in a twitter post at this point! Please, be clear with your writing!
Okay...I'm sorry, this post has gotten way too long. Ridiculously long. Including this paragraph, it's actually almost 7.5k words in total. Hence why I've split it into so many parts. I sincerely hope you got the point. To summarize, regardless of if Chloe was redeemed or not, there were incredible oppurtunities for storytelling, and Thomas missed the wide side of a barn with this one. If you ask me I can go into way more detail, and yes that's despite the 7.4 thousand words in this series of posts. Anyway, I am now going to cool off, and quite possibly (maybe) sleep. I'll see you all next time (when I wake up from my coma), but until then, Stay Miraculous everyone!
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#miraculous ladybug#chloe bourgeois#zoe lee#lila rossi#audrey bourgeois#andre bourgeois#those two pathetic excuses of parental meterial#managed to ruin not only their respective daughters#but also the villain for season 6#thomas...how do you screw up this badly?#there should be a documentary on the miraculous writer's room#i'm genuinely curious#morbidly#but nonetheless#genuinely#character analysis#god forbid we get development#what a show#goes up like a trashcan on fire!#drives me insane#up the wall#and spiralling#in every direction known to geometry#absolute insanity#losing braincells#i need a coma#pulling an emilie asap#like right now#somebody call me a therapist#anyway yeah
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me @ you calling Lucerys boring! 😆 come on, he's just a kid! cutting out aemond's eye was bad, i agree, but i don't think he was as bland as everyone says. his imposter syndrome in 8 and 10 was interesting to watch at least. he was a brave little boy.
I mean I don't really see anything brave about bringing a knife to a fight he not only had fuck all to do with but where he was clearly at fault (Aemond did nothing wrong, he tamed a free dragon, Baela and Rhaena get a pass because they're grieving but Jace and Luke had no business being involved and certainly no business escalating into 4 v 1 violence against the clear cut victim), trying to literally murder someone because I don't know what the fuck you're trying to do when you stab a knife at someone's face but it's certainly not a warning shot, showing zero remorse for it at all, and at worse acting like a little snot when in the same room with your victim. The fact that Luke got away with this scot free (didn't he literally say "I didn't do anything" you boring little asshole you stabbed out someone's eye that is the opposite of not doing anything!) is an absolute travesty of justice that stains everyone involved (mostly Viserys and Luke but I'm not letting Rhaenyra "pls torture the ten year old stabbing victim until he tells me how he figured out that these white dark haired children aren't the sons of my black platinum blond husband" Targaryen off the hook either). Aemond could have died, not only from the initial wound, but from the myriad of infections or other issues that could have plagued him during the healing process. For God's sake, Viserys nicks himself on the Iron Throne and they have to lop off his arm, his infected injuries and their treatment have already made him pretty firmly decrepit by Driftmark, the fact that Aemond healed without any serious and lifelong and further damaging complication is a goddamn miracle. And even kids know that murder is bad, I'm pretty sure that if I were Lucerys's age and I tried to commit homicide I'd have to deal with some consequences.
And I'm sorry, but I call him boring because he is! They wrote a boring character! That's not on me for picking up on it, that's on the writers and the myriad choices they made that led to them severely underdeveloping several characters, most prominently Lucerys (Jace and Baela and Rhaena at least get another season of life to develop further, Luke gets four episodes and they knew that going in). This is a song I've been singing literally since the show was airing and it's not gonna change, cuz he's dead and therefore stuck with his boring character and complete lack of characterization.
Him being a kid is not a character trait, and it certainly doesn't make him more interesting anymore than, say, his eye color would. The impostor syndrome thing they kinda tried didn't really work because 1) it's not impostor syndrome if it's true, he's not a Velaryon and Vaemond was 99% in the right in that entire thing (I don't like him throwing out misogynistic slurs, you can point out that these aren't Velaryons but Strong bastards without stooping to calling Rhaenyra a whore, I hate men sometimes) 2) in episode 8 it exists for one single line and is not a driving force for him at all for the remainder of the episode to the point that it could be cut out and mean nothing, especially since that scene was only there to introduce adult Aemond and 3) it doesn't even make sense because the person who was set up as having issues with his lack of Velaryon heritage and Harwin being his father was Jace. Jace is the one who hears the rumors and clocks it early on in childhood, Jace is the one who is deeply affected by it to the point of bitterness towards his own mother, Jace is the one who grieves Harwin but also feels angry that he can't express it. All of that was set up as part of Jace's arc, not at all Luke's, who is literally set dressing up until he decides to commit criminal offenses in the middle of the night. And then time skip, and suddenly Jace is A-OK and Luke, who has shown no issue before now (or any personality at all) is slightly concerned about it for one line in episode 8 before going back to being a piece of cardboard until episode 10.
And I'll be honest, the second that scene came out in episode 10, I immediately saw it for what it was, which was a very obvious patch job. The writers were clearly aware that they had not given the viewers any reason at all to care about Luke one way or another, so we weren't going to feel a lot when Vhagar (deservedly, imo) munches on him. So they hastily added in this really heavy-handed scene of poor uwu soft boy Lukey who is so concerned with doing right and needs to blink up tearfully at Mommy and be her sweet boy and get little kisses to assuage his worries, so that we'd feel some emotion and then be said when he becomes the Jonah to Vhagar's whale. It just doesn't work because there was nothing for him before then and therefore I don't care, I just feel bad Rhaenyra.
Luke is a bland and boring character. That's not an attack, that's just what the writers did. They tried to cram too much into a ten episode season, literally twenty years of history, and it caused a lot of characterization problems for a lot of characters, particularly for the Team Black ones. And a consequence of that is that the character with the least amount of time for development got not development and no personality. He's a plank of wood, he's a platonic version of the sexy lamp trope; there's nothing there and he exists only for us to feel bad when the lamp is smashed. Seriously, name me five individual character traits that Lucerys has. He's a momma's boy, even though I'm not really sure that's a character trait but I'll give it to him, and I guess he's devoid of empathy, considering that he doesn't appear to feel literally any remorse for mutilating Aemond (seriously, is it like the Dothraki and "thank you"? does the word "sorry" not exist in Valyrian languages? you can't even send an apology gift basket or a note?). But he's not brave, as there is no scene that shows any bravery or courage, and he's not noble or kind or thoughtful because there's nothing that shows any of that, or anything that shows him being the opposite, cruel or cowardly or weak, because he's a basically a character who could be played by sticking a wig on a mop and waving it around. And any characterization of insecurity exists as something hamfistedly crowbarred in at the last minute in his final episode to try to manipulate the audience's emotions with less sensitivity than D&D trying to tug at our heartstrings by having Drogon try to nudge Dany awake after she's killed.
But there is a character that I do consider to be a brave little boy, though I regret to inform y'all that it is Not a fourteen year old with no depth or personality or written characterization whose main claim to fame is maiming a person without apology and then dying. Nah, the brave little boy title goes to post-Driftmark Aemond. Aemond, at ten, is delivered a life altering injury whose recovery was likely very slow and very painful, involved a lot of worry about whether he'd have to deal with infection or further risk of death, and had to relearn how to do literally everything now that he was half blind, and he did all of it. He survived, and he thrived. He relearned how to walk, how to balance, his spatial awareness. He learned how to fought and even became incredibly good at it, and maintained his bond with Vhagar, as well as trying to keep himself mentally sharp as well. He did all of that, despite the huge setback he was dealt with at age ten. That's brave, go Aemond.
#personal#answered#anonymous#anti lucerys velaryon#the only thing about luke that even gets me remotely passionate is what he did to aemond#but that's because i like aemond and i feel things about aemond#who is a fully realized character#lucery is Not that#and yeah it's a writing issue and a massive writing issue#do baela and rhaena even have ANY character traits at all?#do their adult versions even have more then a dozen lines?#like at least they live through the dance so we can see more characterization develop in upcoming seasons#but honestly the only character more atrociously handled in terms of being made boring than luke are baela and rhaena#who could honestly be completely cut from the story of season 1 entirely and not have it make a lick of difference#like me calling luke boring isn't an attack on the character of luke (because it basically doesn't exist)#it's me taking the WRITERS to task#since it's impossible to set luke's lack of characterization apart from the out of universe creative decisions that led to it#and i've always thought he's boring and that's really not gonna change#there's four episodes of the boy and i've seen all four of them and they're the only four we're ever gonna get#they knew that they knew luke was gonna be set in unchanging stone once he died and they elected to do nothing with him anyway#so he's boring and bland#sucks but it's true
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wip
yup. it's a hound. in this blog. do you know i draw hound? because i do. in case you never knew that.
#gosh they are hard to draw#i mean probably harder to draw than some warframes wtf#especially dragonhound and velahound#did i get myself into some of the hardest to draw characters when i started this drawing thingy?#maybe my skill just haven't grown much at all idk#or im just half-assing all the warframes i've drawn. if i actually need to draw them properly down to the little bumps and details-#-i would end up copying a screenshot because that is way easier to do and my brain can't handle too much geometry anyways#maybe after i developed a way to draw houndy i just don't change much of that at all later on#and now i draw houndy like how i did a year ago#like literally#okay now im looking at my art from a year ago#idk how but i kinda draw them cuter now#(which is good i guess but i don't actually specifically aim and strive for this direction so hmmmmmm)#also the proportion is a little bit better now#like i can actually see what went wrong in those art. that's what i call progress#because i stared at them for like a week after i drew them and felt completely normal and didn't think anything went wrong#so that's a difference#okay that's all the ramble today i just haven't drawn them three properly for too long and idk what to think about this#oh well#my art#ramble
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