#anyways fucked up that vanitas is like the only good thing xehanort did for me is tell me to kys

[aethergate]

Hey Vanitas talk about Xehanort

"And why should I? I can't stand him - he's the whole reason I'm here. The only good thing he's ever done for me was telling me how to become the χ-blade, and how to put an end to all of it. There's the training for all of it too, I guess - Ventus is lucky he won the first time around. I could've wiped the floor compared to how babied he got. He wouldn't have survived for two days on his own! Anyways, that's about all the good stuff I can say about him - he's the one who messed the entire thing up afterwards. So much for all his talk about me getting stronger and not doing enough - at least I actually stuck to what I wanted."

[transrikuu]

I wanna talk about the tiny bit of Vanitas lore we got in KHDR, spoilers under cut

All screenshots are taken from damo279’s stream

Vanitas was there at the Land of Departure when Xehanort delivered Ventus, going against Xehanort’s orders to stay in the Keyblade Graveyard

He asks how Ventus was, implying that he came to the Land of Departure out of some form of concern for him? Maybe just curiosity? Which is interesting.

Xehanort doesn’t answer so Vanitas just goes “Whatever. Good riddance.”

Xehanort then tells Vanitas that he did this for Ventus, not him, and Vanitas asks what he means by that. “What do you mean, old man? Switching sides on me now?”

fuck Xehanort. Don’t like how he is the only person Vanitas is afraid of. If I remember correctly he did really horrible things to Vanitas in the BBS novel so. That’s probably why. Vanitas :(

Xehanort then explains the Thirteen Ancient Darknesses to Vanitas, and how they were trapped in different people and/or destroyed.

He’s trying to get Vanitas to reveal himself as one of these Darknesses, I’m assuming. He already knows that Vanitas is one of them (in some way).

Vanitas says that he’s his own being and that he has nothing to do with the Thirteen Darknesses.

Now this. This line is fun. Because it both refers to the Darknesses and to Ventus. He’s Vanitas, but he used to be a part of Ventus. They were whole. And he used to be one of the Darknesses, a shared hive mind, but now he’s separate from them.

Xehanort then goes on to talk about how if one of the surviving Thirteen Darknesses is alive and with them in the current time period, why would it hide away in another person? He says that it would hide because it was afraid of something— of light.

Basically, Xehanort’s constantly talking as “if you, hypothetically, are one of the 13 Darknesses, then, hypothetically, that would mean this and this” and neither of them directly state that Vanitas is one of those ancient Darknesses but it’s pretty clear that. he is. Vanitas himself seems to really not be comfortable with the fact that he’s one of the Darknesses? At least at this point in time.

Now I personally think that Vanitas is a funky mash-up of both Ventus’ natural darkness and Darkness itself but this is not talked about or directly confirmed in any way!

Also this means that during the entirety of BBS Vanitas was aware that he wasn’t really just Ventus’ darkness/other half. But he still wanted to join with him to forge the x-blade and end his own pain (as stated in the bbs novel) so. yeah.

Anyways, I’m really really hoping this means Vanitas will be involved in KH4 in some way because he is related to the ancient Darknesses and it would be really weird if he just never showed up again after KH3.

If anyone has other thoughts they wanna add on to this post go ahead! I’m interested to hear what others think since this is just my own interpretation of what happened ^^

[paybackraid]

Someone’s First Snow

Summary: It snows in the Land of Departure for the first time in a long time and, well, Vanitas has never seen snow before.

Genfic, post KH3, following Vanitas’ inevitable redemption (I promise).

Ambiguous POV.  AO3

--------

“Fuck,” Ventus chanted, rubbing his forearms as he shook his way toward the kitchen. The castle was freezing, he could feel it in his toes. It was rarely toasty, but it only ever got cold, when…

One glance out of the window confirmed it. Snow. 

Ventus hated snow. He wasn’t a cold weather person. He could handle fifty degrees at minimum, and even that was pushing it. When it was cold enough to snow, then it was just too fucking cold. 

“When the fuck did this happen?”

“Ventus,” Aqua scolded from her place at the table, hand curled around a mug of coffee. “Language.”

“It’s below freezing, I’ll say what I want.”

Terra snorted from the kitchen counter where he steeped a cup of tea. “Amen to that. This fluffy white bullshit negates all manners. Hope no one important was coming.”

Aqua laughed and shook her head. “No, not today. Thankfully. I have to go out and see if I can salvage my garden. This came out of nowhere.”

Terra turned to lean against the counter, nursing his mug in one hand and holding out another to Ventus. Yet another sat on the mug warmer, but it would probably be there for a while. 

Ventus extended his hand for his mug and melted into the warmth in his hands. It was too hot to drink yet, but this felt too nice anyway. 

“So,” he said after a long moment of just existing in something warm, “what’s the plan for today then?”

“Lessons are off,” Aqua immediately said. 

“Shoveling,” Terra said with a grimace Ventus could hear. Terra hated shoveling—apparently it messed with his back. Ventus should probably consider helping him.

“You should continue your studies, if you have any bookwork left.”

Ventus grimaced himself, but nodded. He hated bookwork, but Aqua was the Master around here. He didn’t ask about Kairi, assuming Aqua had already told her not to come. “I’ll help shovel, and the—“

Before he could get out his sentence, there was a commotion from the stairwell that instantly had all three of them on edge. Ventus took three steps back to peer out of the kitchen toward the front door, which now stood wide open letting in the cold. That had been closed when he passed it. 

Two more steps and much wider vision outside confirmed it. A black mass stood outside in the front yard, surrounded by twirling blue emotions. 

What was Vanitas doing up already…?

“What was that?” Aqua asked, coming around to see. Vanitas normally stayed up late and awoke late, favoring the dark. So it was no wonder if she wasn’t expecting him already. Nevermind that he was normally significantly quieter…

“Uh… I guess Vanitas is up.”

Aqua and Terra split a look, but Ventus was too busy watching his other half. Vanitas had been living with them for almost two years now, studying alongside him and Kairi to be a Master. He had mellowed out significantly since being released from Master Xehanort’s control, finding comfort in sullen silences and snarky one liners. He acted aloof most of the time—sometimes he’d show some positive emotion, and he spent enough time with Ventus that he knew what his laugh and amusement and smile was like, but little else.

And this?

This was none of that. 

Starkly black against the white falling snow, Vanitas stood out like a sore thumb. His head was pitched to the sky, and when Ventus got closer, he saw his mouth hanging open. He looked entirely astounded. By what? The snow?

“Whatcha doin’, Van?” Terra asked when he squeezed past Ventus, leaning against the door frame. 

“Snow,” Vanitas said. 

Aqua hummed and stopped just in front of Terra, leaning back against him. “Yeah. We don’t see it often, so this was a surprise. Came out of nowhere.”

“Snow.”

“I see.”

Apparently realizing that he looked like an idiot, Vanitas closed his mouth and dropped his head to the white stuff at his feet. Aqua had gotten him a nice pair of slippers for his last birthday, which were covering his feet then. “I, uh…” he said, scratching at the place that used to be covered by the chin and headguard, in his hair. “Once we were split, I lived in a desert my whole life, and I don’t remember seeing any before that either. Closest I ever got to—“ he put out his hand to catch falling snowflakes, watching them melt in his palm. “Snow, was a Blizzard spell. But now it’s just happening. ‘S like magic.”

“Distinctly not magic.”

Vanitas shot all three of them a soured look. “You know what I mean.”

Terra and Aqua laughed. Ventus stepped inside to slip into his boots and follow his other half. Annoying as it was, there was nothing quite like someone experiencing their first snow. He stopped several feet away from him, knowing Vanitas would get up to shenanigans as soon as he realized what snowy options were available. 

Vanitas took a step away, not the recoil it used to be so much as taking back his space. However, his roly poly Unversed, the two Blue Sea Salts having a good old fashioned time in their element, did not expect the movement. One had apparently been having the time of its life, and rolled under his feet in just the wrong moment. 

Vanitas tripped and landed in a small snowdrift, his back immediately going rigid and hands flying out of the snow. “C-cold!” 

The other three all laughed again, and since Ventus was closer, he neared and extended his hand. The darker boy took his hand and was hauled to his feet, but the shivering didn’t stop. The Blue Sea Salt at his feet crooned, looking ready for death, but Vanitas’ annoyance with the creatures had drained years ago, and he merely tapped his ankle against it as some sort of reprimand, and left it at that. 

“Hey, Van,” Terra called from his place by the door. “Wanna know what the best thing about snow is?”

Vanitas turned to him, eyes huge with wonder at the clearly far wiser and much more knowledgeable Master. He shoved his hands into his fluffy pajama pockets to try to warm them.

“Terr—“

Ventus glanced over too late. A snowball pelted him in the face and knocked him off his feet, and instantly Vanitas and Terra were bent double, wheezing with laughter at his misfortune. To Ventus’ mortification, he even heard Aqua’s familiar breathy laughter shortly after scolding Terra. 

Helpfully, Vanitas came over and offered his hand, and he didn’t even shove Ventus face-first back into the snow after he helped him up. Instead, the dark-haired teen leaned over and whispered conspiratorially into his ear. 

Ventus’ face split into an ear-to-ear grin. He gathered snow and packed it together, handed it to his other half, and watched him vanish. 

Seconds later, Vanitas appeared above Terra’s head. Rather than smashing it onto his head, though, Vanitas yanked the back of Terra’s shirt from his neck, and shoved the entire mound of snow down it. Terra yelped and danced away, and Vanitas dodge-rolled away from flailing, frantic limbs.

When even Aqua burst into laughter right away, citing Ventus’ attack as “well-deserved retaliation”, it was war. 

Ventus and Vanitas arguably teamed up, packing snowballs and hiding behind heavy bushes, although they spent as much time pelting each other as they did Aqua and Terra. Terra hid behind the banister, collecting his snowballs, and Aqua used her magic to build up a fort of her own. 

Aqua won. Naturally. Or at least, she came out of it covered in less snow than the other three. Ventus surrendered to her warp magic pelting him with snowballs on all sides, all while Vanitas valiantly declared, “you’ll have to kill me, I’ll never give in!” Typical Vanitas. A drift of snow had fallen off the roof and coated poor Terra halfway through the game, which gave him more ammo but also set the cold in that much faster. He had been first to fold. 

Then, the shivers and sniffles set in, and they decided as a collective to head in. Aqua was pretty sure she saw Vanitas dunk Ventus’ head in snow one more time before running in, but she didn’t comment. They were having fun, and she’d never seen Vanitas have so much fun and act so carefree. 

Terra, bless his soul, dumped out all of their chilled mugs of coffee and tea and started on hot chocolate. Aqua went to set a fire in the fireplace, and sent the boys running off to find wool socks and blankets. 

“Well,” Terra asked once they were all bundled in. Ventus was sat between he and Aqua, cradling his mug, while Vanitas was wrapped up in no less than three blankets, chin propped on the coffee table. “How was your first snow? Hate it yet?”

Vanitas turned his face to the side and considered it, squashed against the table. He flexed stiff fingers and toes, then looked out the window. The snow was still falling. “Fun. I think.”

“Great. Then you’re going to love the part where we have to shovel out all of the walking paths and the gummi pad. It’s a thrill.”

Ventus groaned, having totally forgotten about the work that came with it. Vanitas groaned in solidarity and flopped back against the couch. 

“Great. Can’t wait.”

[minijenn]

“Where is he/she? Tell me!” - when the Lights realize that Sora has been taken (maybe Vanitas approaches them and they demand answers?)

93. “Where is he/she? Tell me!”

Vanitas watches from his unseen perch, as the fractured remains of the guardians of light venture forward into the empty graveyard. The fact that Naminé is among them is the only thing that really piques his interest, though he does lean forward when he sees that they found it. The small, simple, sea-shell charm the Organization’s newest vessel left behind before he was taken into their ranks. 

He rolls his eyes, knowing that the group gathered before him will never figure it out on their own. Naminé might, and the king’s pair of servants could also probably deduce it. The puppet also seems distraught enough to put the pieces together, but Terra and that redhead whose name escapes him are useless. Still, as much as he’d love to leave and not get involved, he knows he owes that much to Naminé if no one else. Besides, he’s all for watching the old man’s stupid plans fall apart at the seems. 

So he ventures down to their level, deciding to approach them from a safe distance given his less than stellar history with more than a few of them. “If you’re looking for your friends,” he begins, his tone dull and disinterested as he catches their attention. “You won’t find them here.”

“Vanitas!” Naminé gasps, turning to face him first. He feels that strange, bewildering sensation pulse through his heart at the sight of her face again, but he’s quick to push it away as the others turn much more warily. 

“What are you doing here?” Terra scowls as he takes a defensive step before the smaller girl, his Keyblade already flashing into his grip. Likewise, Donald and Goofy also tense up and call upon their weapons, though for their part, the most Axel and Xion can do is exchange a confused glance, unfamiliar with this boy and baffled as to why he looks so very much like Sora. 

“Relax, I’m not here for a fight,” Vantas rebuffs haughtily. “I just thought you’d like to know what happened since you’re all incredibly late to the party.”

“W-what happened… to the others?” Naminé asks apprehensively. While she wants to know, she’s not entirely sure she’ll like the answer they might receive. 

“To your fellow guardians of light, yes,” he nods, his expression darkening as he glances away from the group. “And to the Organization’s thirteenth vessel.”

“Sora!” Donald and Goofy cry, distraught by the very implication alone. 

Xion steps forward, the Kingdom Key in her hand in an instant as she points it at him squarely. She doesn’t know him, doesn’t even care that she doesn’t, but she refuses to let him slip away without telling them what he knows about Sora. Not after all Sora went through to free herself and Roxas before. “Where is he?!” she demanded with a ferocity that surprised even Axel. “Tell us!” 

“He’s where he belongs,” Vanitas shrugs, largely unconcerned with his twin’s fate. “He’s accepted his place in Xehanort’s ranks. He’s one of them now.”

A ripple of incredible grief tears through the group at this, strong enough that Vanitas could easily use it to bring forth a whole wave of Unversed if he really wanted to. But his rather smug demeanor falls apart as soon as he spots Naminé. The king’s servants are torn between despair and fury, the puppet is screaming as she wails into the redhead’s embrace, and Terra is angrily gripping his Keyblade like a vice as he glares deeper into the graveyard. But Naminé cries soft, silent tears, her hands pressed against her heart as she mourns for a fallen friend. 

He’s never seen her cry before, never really cared when anyone cried before either. But now… he finds himself strangely compelled to do what he can to make her tears, and her tears alone, stop. 

“I… can’t tell you if it’s too late to save him,” Vanitas admits, acting like he doesn’t care. And he doesn’t, for Sora. At least that’s what he intends to keep telling himself. “But, when it comes to the guardians of light…” Naminé perks up upon hearing this, her bright blue eyes settling squarely on his. His heart swells under her gaze in a way he still doesn’t understand as he crosses his arms and accepts what he has to do. However annoying it might be. “It might not be too late for you to help them.”

(Hhhhhh I’m craving that eventual Vanitas redemption arc in Keys its gonna be the good stuff look at this fucking emo idiot falling in love with an absolute sweet pure angel its the aesthetic I crave. Anyway this is spoiler I suppose for Keys stuff way down the line but ahhhhh well its ok, that’s why I stopped where I did, to leave things open to speculation ... ;) 

Prompts are open send away!

[roxasboxas]

An Exhaustive Post About WHY I Hate Eraqus So Fucking Much

*back on my bullshit voice* so the thing about Eraqus, right

We don’t see a lot of him, so when analyzing him we have to focus on his impact on other characters. And the first thing to note is how a lot of people in canon consider him pretty great, for whatever reason. But, again, we don’t see him being much of anything. So, his lasting effects on other characters are where it’s at.

Terra

Terra doesn’t display any actual skill when it comes to being able to tell who’s trustworthy.

Some of it comes from him not having grown up on Disney movies like we have, but even then a lot of the people he falls in with over the course of BBS are pretty blatantly suspicious. A lot of people put this on him as a personal failing, but I’d argue that a good deal of that falls on Eraqus, his fucking teacher-dad who was supposed to help keep him safe and know how to keep himself safe.

Although, in all fairness, this may be a skill Eraqus lacks, too, as he hangs out with Xehanort.

Still, though, Terra seems to trust people (especially authority figures) with an almost unnatural absoluteness in most circumstances (ie, any time outside of that scene where he saves Ven from Eraqus), which plays into my next point.

Terra is ridiculously hard on himself.

Terra: *makes one mistake while acting in self defense* Terra, literally: “I can never go home” (in the scene it’s a bit more obvious, but it’s implied that his thought process is that Eraqus would never accept him home after, yknow, him making a literal mistake)

Xehanort kills Eraqus, but who does Terra blame? His own damn self, to the point of telling Aqua that he Terra killed Eraqus, rather than that Xehanort who literally killed Eraqus did it.

Where did Terra’s darkness come from, anyways?

We don’t really have a solid idea of how hearts and light and darkness work in Kingdom Hearts (despite how often they’re brought up) but darkness at least seems to be pretty heavily sourced from negative emotions (Ansem SOD possessing Riku via him being upset about Sora not needing him, Vanitas’ entire character, etc.)

So. Terra’s darkness. Terra has enough negative emotion for it to apparently be a palpable problem that we are concerned about. Like, does he have a genetic predisposition to depression or anxiety or something? Are there any therapists in the Land of Departure? What’s going on there

Terra has so much going on emotionally that he literally gets possessed. He needs some milk therapy

Aqua

Aqua is the golden child and the eldest daughter and it. fucks. her. up.

She’s two years younger than Terra but she’s taking the Mark of Mastery at the same time as him. Did she just start at the same time as him? Why did she start so young? this is ridiculous

She absolutely puts herself in a caretaker role (definitely to a higher degree with Ven, but also with Terra at times). Her fellow apprentices are almost more her responsibility than Eraqus’ at times, which should absolutely not be the case. My girl is 18 in BBS she is too young to be raising a 16y/o boy and a 20y/o man.

What parental stuff does Eraqus do on screen? “Terra, you are like a son to me” fuckin act like it then

If anything Eraqus encourages this thought process and behavior when he tells her to keep an eye on Terra as he sends the two of them off to punch monsters. This aint healthy man. shut up

Even when she’s hanging out in the realm of darkness for a hot decade her focus is less on taking care of herself and more on getting back to Terra and Ventus because she feels so obligated to take care of them

She’s only IN the realm of darkness in the first place because she hopped in to save Terra, who was kind of. hella possessed and evil at the time.

I feel like this actually shows up in her game mechanics as well. She’s a glass cannon. She’s out here solving other peoples problems and killing monsters like a champ but shes got no health bc shes not taking care of her own needs.

All of Aqua’s problems really fall under that one category but hoo boy it is a doozy huh

Ventus

im going back and getting the exact dialogue for this part because holy shit

Eraqus: “Ventus, you’re alone? I thought Aqua would-- Well, what matters is that you’re home. You don’t belong outside this world yet. You need to stay here, where you can learn--” Ventus: “In your prison?” Eraqus: “What?” Ventus: “That’s your excuse... for keeping me imprisoned here, isn’t it?” Eraqus: “What did you hear?” Ventus: “That I’m supposed to be some weapon... Some kind of... ‘X-blade”!” Eraqus: “I knew it. Xehanort-- He could never let it go.” [pause for flashback] Eraqus: “I failed. I had the chance to stop him and couldn’t do it. But I will not fail again.” [Eraqus summons his fucking keyblade to kill a child] Ventus: “Master! What are you...” Eraqus: “The X-Blade has no place in this or any world. Xehanort has made his purpose clear... and I am left with no choice. Forgive me... But you must exist no more.” [Terra steps in and saves Ventus.] Eraqus: “What?” Terra: “Master, have you gone mad?” Eraqus: “Terra! I command you-- step aside!” Terra: “No!” Eraqus: “You will not heed your Master?” Terra: “I won’t!” Eraqus: “Why do all my attempts to reach you fail?” [side note: this is its own fuckin loaded statement but its in terms of his effect on Terra’s own self doubt rather than what Ventus is up to] “If you don’t have it in your heart to obey... then you will have to share Ventus’s fate.” [Terra and Eraqus begin to fight] Ventus: “Enough, Terra! He’s right...”

Or, tl;dr, Ven literally believes he should fuckin die just bc Eraqus said so. What the FUCK

Ventus: hey did you know about this Eraqus: yes. die Ventus: shit ok

Things to keep in mind:

Ventus has about 4 years of cumulative memory due to magic heart shenanigan induced amnesia

Eraqus was technically responsible for him this whole time, and claimed to Ventus (getting Terra and Aqua to lie about this, BY THE WAY) that this had been the arrangement since forever.

Xehanort and Yen Sid

Xehanort

Okay, we can’t blame Eraqus for Xehanort being evil as shit and we’re probably gonna get more info on that in the new Xehanort game, but. Eraqus fucking cheats at fantasy chess. Probably didn’t contribute that much to Xehanort’s darkness problem, sure, but probably didn’t help at all, either.

Yen Sid

Dude just lives in his tower. doing jack shit. making Sora and Riku teach themselves during their final exam. Making Merlin teach Kairi and Lea. do something my guy you’re irrevocably caught up anime drama anyways

this is the joke section. to lighten the mood after talking about the whole child murder thing

And then Eraqus had literally no direct effect on anyone else in the whole ass series. His entire impact was literally negative. I hate him

[zephyrises]

{ re:mind thoughts & feelings!

i’m absolutely not gonna run through every single detail, especially when it comes to things i’m solidly neutral about, but i live to write about my impressions, so here they are!

**WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS!!! please be cautious!!!**

negatives:

my biggest concern going in was how they’d handle kairi, and while having her be playable for the duration of a major battle is a huge step forward and you can tell they put a lot of effort into her moveset and animations, everything else felt like two steps back and i’m not very optimistic for her future. despite the entire premise of the dlc revolving around her, she says and does so little. most of her lines, if you can even call them that, are just Sounds. affirmative hums or confused, “huh?”s. which is a huge nonverbal mood, but doesn’t work as a mood for HER seeing as she’s a very talkative and forward individual. it’s almost like she was only there to be rescued, look pretty and nod along with whatever sora says! reaaaally don’t like that they put her into a coma for an entire year, either. everyone else’s roles in sora’s search seem so proactive and hers is completely idle, like usual. they could spin this around and have her traverse the sleeping worlds while she’s unconscious, but i’m not willing to give the team that much credit until i see it for myself.

we’re retconning vanitas being the wholehearted manifestation of ven’s negativity and darkness now, huh?? he was his own entity beforehand, you say?? they’re not halves of a whole anymore?? okay. cool! absolutely detest that with every fiber of my being and it makes zero sense, but great! canon is only established to be rewritten on a whim, after all! (it’s NOT! not like THAT! what the ever living HECK!)

plot holes, awkwardness and rushed nature of the climax and ending is still grossly present. there’s nothing anyone could have possibly done to remedy that short of reworking all of it entirely, so i wasn’t expecting it to be remedied, but it sucks to relive it for the 358th time.

the ~20 minute segment where it’s all base game gameplay and unaltered cutscenes is torture.

when you consider the price of the base game and the fact that the ~4-5 hour long story campaign was so thoroughly padded with re-used content, $30 is kinda steep.

not to be mean, or anything........ but............ all of the story content in particular.............. probably should have been in base game kh3 in the first place.........................

positives:

terra and riku recognized and talked to each other! ven and roxas shared compliments! those are DREAM interactions, right there.

exploring scala was amazing! everything was expansive, detailed and beautiful and it was very nice to receive explicit confirmation that it was built up from the ruins of daybreak town, even if that was pretty obvious.

visuals and aesthetics were gorgeous in general. kh is always really good about that.

for as many issues as i had with kairi’s writing and presentation, her and sora were ADORABLE. that floaty, twirly hug! their finisher! their added cameos in the ending sequence! PRECIOUS....

battling as an op version of roxas filled me with carnal energies i haven’t experienced since i was 16 years old and i’m honestly living for it.

voice acting was prime! i had some beefs with base game deliveries but everyone really brought their A game for the dlc, however little or much they spoke. naminé, vanitas, yozora, yuffie and cid sounded the best, imo. master xehanort’s new voice actor also did such a wonderful and standout job even though he had two massive pairs of shoes to fill. rest in peace.

it has lots of limitations and there are a couple of design decisions i don’t agree with, but photo mode is a PARTY and i’m gonna be going absolutely feral with it when i have more time/energy.

the uncontested BEST PART was the guardians of light working together to battle off the xehanort replicas. it screamed personality and charm and left room for cute little character interactions that the cutscenes didn’t. i’m super impressed with how well they pulled it off from a technical standpoint and would adore seeing more segments like it in future installments.

Little Ven Things(tm):

really appreciated sora lunging to try and catch ven when he was flung through the air because that’s probably as close to a canon hug as i’m ever gonna get.

not sure what to make of the “Darkness” lurking in his heart because i don’t ux outside of what i hear from friends, but i’m so ridiculously interested to see where it goes. his arc’s not over yet, kids!

hearing ven say, “vanitas. you’re coming home too,” destroyed me on the spot. that’s gonna be playing on loop in my brain nonstop to infinity and beyond.

i like my vans and vens with a healthy dose of banter and to have vanitas go on a contrary monologue in response to ven’s extension of kindness, then see ven turn around and say, “okay! fine! fuck you, actually! go away, then!” was RIVETING. ripped straight out of my soul. 10/10. absolutely do not endorse the retcon nonsense that prompted it, but i’ll take what little i can get.

he and aqua were such a good combo in battle and i never got tired of watching their limit. i’ve complained before about how limits were one of the biggest things missing from bbs and this really made it up to me.

HE WORE HIS CAPE!! it was only for a split second but HE WORE IT!! AND HIS ARMOR!! my son is off to the realm of darkness to find his crush and he’s gonna look dashing as hell the whole time he’s there.

ven and riku are the oldest of the minors and their heights are still so wildly different. i eat seeing them next to each other up and re:mind did it at two different instances. god bless.

i’m sure i’m forgetting a subject or two, but that’s definitely the gist of it!

all in all, i went in with pretty low expectations since base game kh3 let me down so badly. re:mind disappointed me too. i’m just not gonna let it bother me much! regardless of the path canon takes, doing the things with ven that i wanna see done is still my MO. that’s why i roleplay in the first place!

anyway, i wanna end on a good note, but i’m honestly unsure of what else to say since i’ve rambled on for so long, so here’s some snaps from the very first scene i made in photo mode! }

[melodiiousnocturne]

(  dylan  wang  ,  cismale  ,  he  /  him  ,  kingdom  hearts  )  *  &.  i  know  it  must  be  scary  for  you  ,  demyx  ,  after  surviving  the  takeover  .  to  turn  into  someone  like  myde  lu  ,  a  twenty-one  year-old  part  time  clerk  at  the  hq  and  part  time  instructor  at  the  record  scratch  ,  right  here  in  castle  town  .  just  remember  that  you  are  as  easygoing  as  you  are  indolent  ,  and  to  be  wary  ,  be  safe  ,  be  true  to  who  you  are  :  neutral  through  and  through  .

hi  as  i  said  in  gc  ,  this  is  one  big  tl;dr  i’m  a  demyx  stan  !

BEFORE  CASTLE  TOWN.

where  do  i  begin

demyx  —  number  ix  in  organization  xiii  (  demyx  vc  :  are  we  still  gonna  call  ourselves  organization  xiii  now  that  there’s  14  of  us  ?  )  he  is  ...  lazy  .  arguably  the  most  cowardly  of  the  bunch  ,  doesn’t  like  fighting  ,  and  would  rather  nap  or  play  music  .

that  being  said  ...  despite  his  very  emotional  exterior  in  comparison  ,  we  have  seen  that  he  can  get  just  as  serious  /  dark  like  the  rest  of  them  if  he  really  needs  to  ...  

idk  i  have  a  lot  of  feelings  .

he’s  very  ??  idk  how  to  explain  it  bt  like  .  “  what’s  in  it  for  me  ?  ”  (  as  we  really  see  in  kh3  )  &  like  .  i  wld  say  he  is  a  mix  of  ravenclaw  /  slytherin  just  .  minus  the  whole  cutthroat  ambition  of  slytherin  etc  bc  tbh  that  isn’t  him  .  he’s  kinda  just  along  for  the  ride  .  i  am  rejecting  those  MoM  theories  and  i’m  not  sorry  ab  it  idc  if  they  say  it’s  true  ,  i  REFUSE  .

i  feel  like  since  demyx  allegedly  never  remembered  his  somebody  life  ,  he  probably  didn’t  care  as  much  ab  the  whole  kingdom  hearts  thing  because  he  didn’t  drink  the  kool-aid  because  like  why  would  he  want  a  life  that  he  doesn’t  even  remember  you  know  ??  plus  it’s  —  he  already  knew  xemnas  &  saïx  were  fucken  lying  when  they  said  the  nobodies  didn’t  have  hearts  JKDWJHSNS  why  did  he  need  to  be  a  somebody  to  regain  a  heart  when  he  believed  he  already  had  one  !!!

whatever  ....  lmao

anyway  demyx  in  the  manga  was  honestly  a  mood  and  a  half  i  adore  him

when  he  was  brought  back  to  the  organization  for  kh3  ,  he  was  made  into  a  seeker  of  darkness  —  meaning  baby  water  boy  got  NORTED  .  his  ears  didn’t  appear  to  be  pointed  in  some  way  (  like  the  others  )  so  it’s  safe  to  say  he  didn’t  get  as  much  of  xehanort’s  heart  placed  inside  of  him  .  bt  it  was  enough  to  turn  his  pretty  blue  eyes  into  that  ominous  gold  .

regardless  ,  he  was  benched  despite  going  through  that  whole  process  which  like  i  HIGHLY  doubt  is  an  easy  one  to  even  do  (  so  good  on  demyx  for  being  strong  enough  to  withstand  it  ,,,  )  bt  it’s  !  to  be  noted  !  because  he  felt  bitter  ab  being  demoted  after  ,  and  ofc  with  a  mystery  incentive  from  vexen  ,  demyx  finally  took  the  offer  of  backstabbing  the  organization  (  read  :  it  goes  back  to  what  i  said  ab  him  being  like  well  what’s  in  it  for  me  .....  since  before  he  got  apparently  satisfied  enough  ,  he’s  like  uhhhh  sorry  bt  have  u  seen  what  happens  to  idiots  who  betray  these  guys  lol  like  idk  ab  all  that  )

so  basically  self-preservation  of  a  slytherin  .  there  i  said  it  !  plot  twist  he  isn’t  a  coward  ,  he’s  just  smart  enough  to  not  throw  himself  head  first  into  danger  .  go  figure  ,  right  ?  like  look  alright  he  may  be  comedic  relief  bt  ...  he  is  also  more  than  that  !

in  the  organization  he  was  known  to  kinda  be  a  bully  /  play  pranks  /  manipulate  others  into  doing  his  work  for  him  bt  at  the  end  of  the  day  he  ??  isn’t  like  .  REALLY  a  bad  guy  or  whatever  .  saying  it  was  the  pressure  of  the  organization  is  dulling  everything  down  ,  because  he  still  actively  chose  to  do  what  he  did  and  didn’t  do  and  i  will  hold  him  responsible  for  it  ,  bt  .  u  know  .  shit  happens  !

like  we  have  canon  evidence  he  wld  join  in  xigbar  when  it  comes  to  the  more  like  .  idk  i  guess  harsher  teasing  ?  and  all  ?  and  like  again  demyx  made  the  conscious  choice  to  go  along  w  it  so  he  isn’t  innocent  bt  ,  i  firmly  stand  by  saying  demyx  unintentionally  looked  up  to  xigbar  despite  even  ‘  fighting  ’  with  him  ,  bc  ..  well  .  i  stan  them  being  a  That  duo  .  because  to  me  ,  he’s  just  a  prankster  who  wants  a  laugh  ..  even  at  the  expense  of  another  ..  which  yea  idk  still  yikes  ...  bt  it  isn’t  like  ,  malicious  ..  when  he  is  on  his  own  ..  imo .  i  mean  take  the  days  manga  ,  he  puts  a  whoopee  cushion  on  axel’s  chair  ?  bitch  pls  ..

(  also  quick  going  back  to  him  being  strong  enough  to  accept  getting  norted  —  please  just  remember  ....  nobodies  aren’t  even  supposed  to  exist  !  they  only  technically  form  when  the  person  who  lost  their  heart  is  strong-willed  &  tbh  ?  i  think  it  speaks  volumes  for  demyx  bc  despite  the  show  he  puts  on  ,.....  he  is  there  .  )

alright  so  look  i  know  i  sound  like  i  am  in  denial  of  the  MoM  stuff  and  that  mayhaps  be  so  .  however  there’s  definitely  smthin  off  .  like  we  KNOW  he  can  be  uhhhh  a  pos  like  the  remark  he  has  in  days  ab  how  the  castle  that  never  was  is  quieter  without  everyone  who  was  eliminated  at  castle  oblivion  ,  bt  —  it  was  always  a  really  weird  line  to  me  because  he’s  always  been  branded  as  the  most  emotional  of  the  organization  /  the  one  who  adamantly  believed  they  had  hearts  the  whole  time  ?  which  .  inch  resting  !  i  wld  like  to  formally  say  ONE  OF  THESE  is  a  fucken  coping  mechanism  of  sorts  or  smthin  bc  it’s  really  ...  a  lot  and  nothing  makes  sense  and  like  that’s  the  entirety  of  kh  lore  in  a  nutshell  bt  ya  .  like  i  think  it  ties  into  the  whole  self-preservation  thing  bc  it’s  like  ,  wow  they  really  went  and  got  themselves  fucken  murked  ...  how  dumb  ...  bt  at  the  same  time  bc  like  again  the  biggest  pusher  for  #nobodieshavehearts  ,  it’s  like  “  oh  that’s  depressing  ”  &  like  .  a  mess  .

idk  what  else  to  say  for  this  besides  he  was  really  great  at  recon  &  apparently  was  a  keyblade  wielder  in  the  past  !  which  subsequently  makes  me  emo  on  main  bc  he’s  really  out  here  like  lmao  nah  that’s  ...  it’s  cool  bt  like  hm  idk  sounds  like  kinda  fake  u  know

again  fuck  canon  if  it  does  u  know  what

AFTER  CASTLE  TOWN.

where  do  i  begin  ,  chapter  2

now  myde  is  actually  my  hc  somebody  name  for  demyx  so  like  going  off  that  it  technically  is  his  real  first  name  ....  he  just  doesn’t  know  that  bc  although  he  survived  this  ,  he  didn’t  uh  really  remember  his  old  somebody  life  so  like  lmao  fuck  all  honestly  this  life  could  be  his  real  life  for  all  he  knows

except  he  does  know  it  isn’t

so  like  he’s  ??  more  of  a  somebody  in  castle  town  opposed  to  a  nobody  meaning  he  !  has  a  whole  fucken  heart  now  !  although  because  his  eyes  are  still  indeed  gold  ,  he’s  kinda  like  well  shit  is  old  man  xehanort  still  in  there  too

anyway  myde  lu  ..  my  son  ...  the  memories  of  castle  town  life  are  .  something  else  .  he  grew  up  with  a  single  mother  who  worked  odd  jobs  here  and  there  struggling  to  make  money  to  provide  .  so  while  demyx  is  like  ah  fuck  working  i  don’t  wanna  fucken  do  this  ,  he  got  two  part  time  jobs  the  moment  he  could  to  help  her  out  .  because  even  if  she  isn’t  his  real  mother  ,  it’s  ???  really  nice  to  have  someone  caring  ab  him  :/

he  rooms  with  neko  /  noriko  now  because  an  ad  on  craigslist  bt  he  still  sends  some  of  his  paychecks  &  like  whatever  money  cut  he  gets  from  the  troubvdours  (  also  ,  ironically  from  a  fucken  craigslist  ad  !  )  etc  to  castle  town  mom  bc  honestly  life  in  castle  town  has  kinda  uh  .  made  him  like  .  wow  wait  fuck  haha  oh  man  i  actually  ????  i  can’t  just  nap  and  play  music  and  do  whatever  i  want  ??????  like  i  mean  he  still  does  bt  castle  town  memories  /  the  life  he  was  forced  into  here  made  him  arguably  more  responsible  even  though  he  is  still  a  little  shit  and  completely  at  the  same  time  not  that  responsible  in  the  slightest

it’s  like  .  fake  getting  ur  life  together

idk  he  doesn’t  like  all  the  work  like  he’s  exhausted  bt  it’s  paired  simultaneously  with  he  ?  kinda  also  doesn’t  mind  it  solely  bc  there’s  like  ,,  a  benefit  from  it  ?  like  with  the  two  part  time  jobs  (  which  one  is  being  a  music  instructor  like  i  feel  as  if  he  doesn’t  consider  that  one  much  of  a  job  bc  he  gets  to  play  music  !!  )  it’s  being  able  to  help  the  poor  soul  who  got  stuck  as  his  ‘  caretaker  ’  KKDKWJSJSJ  and  with  the  band  it’s  .  bc  he  is  passionate  ab  music  and  again  although  exhausting  he  loves  to  do  it

boy’s  chaotic  neutral  as  always  bt  i  suppose  castle  town  is  bringing  out  those  hidden  good  tendencies

hmm  he  is  forever  bitter  ab  the  fact  he  didn’t  get  his  sitar  tho  ....  what  the  fuck  is  he  gonna  do  w  his  stupid  organization  cloak  huh  ?  my  god  

so  he  picked  up  rhythm  guitar  bc  it’s  like  .  the  closest  thing  without  getting  an  ACTUAL  sitar  ,  because  !  arpeggios  is  actually  a  rhythm  technique  &  that’s  what  his  sitar  is  named  so  ....  food  for  thought  i  suppose  .  plus  this  world’s  sitar  isn’t  the  same  anyway  :/

despite  being  natural  blond  in  game  etc  i’m  making  the  executive  decision  to  say  he  was  given  naturally  dark  hair  in  CT  &  now  has  to  keep  bleaching  /  dying  his  hair  blond  bc  ....  he  does  not  think  he  suits  black  hair  .  nor  does  he  want  to  .  it  reminds  him  too  much  of  like  idk  xigbar  or  vanitas  or  whatever  with  the  dark  hair  +  gold  eye  combo  u  feel  JDWJJSJSNS

he  dated  isolde  in  CT  &  honestly  i  suggested  it  to  bloom  as  a  crackship  bc  haha  different  bt  then  it  got  really  soft  and  really  emo  so  here  we  are  .  they  close  tho  now  still  &  she’s  the  only  person  he’s  opened  up  to  ab  his  real  life  /  the  organization  so  far  !!

he  is  bi  :/  and  sad  :/  bt  honestly  mood  ,  i  say  as  i’m  pan  not  bi  bt  whatever  :/  

anyway  part  500000  ,  he  sleeps  at  the  library  sometimes  bc  big  gay  still  for  ienzo  and  likes  to  really  just  hang  around  them  bc  he  wants  them  to  remember  being  zexion  ....  &  well  .  more  selfishly  he  wants  them  to  remember  him  bt  like  y  a  h

+  for  the  fact  i  have  not  really  mentioned  it  :  he  still  loves  water  iskaksns  catch  him  like  .  chillin  in  his  bathtub  for  hours  like  bitch  stop  wasting  water  and  the  water  is  FREEZING  by  the  time  he  does  decide  he  is  finished  .  he  misses  his  water  abilities  ok  .  he  can  probably  like  move  stuff  a  little  bit  here  and  there  bt  it’s  Nothing  like  before  :/  yeah  .

idk  what  else  this  is  a  mess  !!  please  plot  with  me  tho  uwu  xoxo

[echodrops]

My KH3 Fix-It Dream

(Warning, long post is long because part way through I just started writing bits of the actual fic, oops.)

There’s a lot of people complaining about this and that with the KH3 plot, but I honestly don’t have too many complaints because the story we were given was about what I expected (did anyone realllyyy believe that Kairi was going to become a badass Keyblade wielder? Search your heart, you know you saw this travesty coming), except on one front: Vanitas was tragically under-utilized. After being hyped up so much in the trailers, you’d think that he would have at least had a go in the game that was worthy of his character. But KH3′s Vanitas was little more than a shadow of BBS’s, and that’s a darn shame.

So, I present to you: a fix-it fic plot bunny that fixes several things at once:

1) Vanitas doesn’t die. Okay, actually, it still works fine if he does die, but we’ll take his “I’m always with you” suggestion literally--Vanitas is a heart of Darkness wrapped in a body made of bad feelings, and that final battle was one brutal attack on the feels after another. The fear, anxiety, horror, and desperation the Lights, especially Sora upon witnessing what happens to Kairi, manifests as so much accumulated negativity that Vanitas--even though he actually wants to!!--can’t stay dead, and his heart, which naturally lingered with Sora and Ventus even after his defeat, gets shoved back into another body made entirely of other people’s suffering and pain, now even more unstable and dysfunctional than before.

2) The final battle happens. Kairi is saved, but Sora disappears. While the finally-reunited good-guy crew are busy coming out of shock planning how they’ll inevitably rescue Sora, they’re also struggling with another major issue: what to do about Vanitas, who is as comatose as Ven was at the beginning of BBS, a broken heart in a broken body.

3) Nobody wants to say “mercy kill”... The idea is there, but none of the gang is really willing to do it barring maybe Roxas, whose practicality is actually alarming (”You’re not going to be feeling so sympathetic when he wakes up and stabs somebody, you know. Don’t say I didn’t warn you”). Even Aqua, who knows as well as Ven how much of a danger Vanitas is, can’t really convince herself to attack someone who's completely helpless. But what to do, if not that? He isn’t waking up, and anywhere they leave him, he’ll have to be guarded around the clock--he still, technically, has the ability to trigger the apocalypse if left unattended to chase hearts of light, you know.

4) It’s Ven’s idea to take him to Destiny Islands. That was Master Xehanort’s plan for Ven, after all, when they were first separated: let Ven’s empty body waste away, forgotten, in a backwater world. Instead he’d made contact with Sora--and nobody wants to say that either, that maybe there’s the tiniest bit of hope: somehow, some way, maybe Sora can still be reached, maybe the call of yet another heart in need will be irresistible enough to make the unfailing hero claw his own way back from the brink...

5) What really happens is this: Sora’s mother has had MORE THAN ENOUGH. Spaceships start dropping out of the sky, the deserted play island is somehow brimming with grown men and women running around, she sees Kairi of all people wandering right back into town as if she hasn’t been inexplicably absent for months... So where is Sora? Where is Sora and why is he not coming home? Finally, after three days of radio silence from Kairi and Riku (Riku’s been gone for years, and now he’s suddenly here, without Sora? When has there ever been a such thing as Riku without Sora?), Sora’s mother prepares a scolding on the level of God casting humans out of the Garden of Eden and indignantly rows her way out to the play island. It seems there’s a whole crowd gathered at a bonfire down the beach, but she never makes it there. Because there’s Sora right there on the paopu island, there’s Sora, only everything’s wrong--who let him dye his hair like that, what is he wearing, why won’t he wake up--”Sora? SORA!”

6) It’s Riku who tells her the truth. That Sora is gone, in the wind, not even a body to bury except this one, this boy who’s wearing the face of the son she hasn’t held in her arms in ages--maybe never will again. This is what he looks like now, Riku says, but this isn’t him. (How? How is this not her son? Under his bangs there’s the same freckle at the edge of his forehead she used to give good night kisses to--)

7) They make several attempts to stop her (”Ma’am,” the man with brown hair and guilty eyes says, “Ma’am, you really can’t--he’s a danger to--”) but none of them stopped her son either and if they’ll stand by and let the light of all the worlds extinguish itself, let’s be honest, they’re just not that good of guardians. She takes Sora the boy named Vanitas home. In Sora’s old bed he looks comical, the only time, maybe, that he’ll ever look tall, and the shadow of the toys and clutter she hadn’t had the heart to clean (not after the day she remembered that the room up the stairs wasn’t just sealed up storage, that a boy had lived there, that his worn clothes were still strewn across the floor, that she’d had a son at all, Sora, for a whole year she’d forgotten the name, the sound, the jut of his lip in a pout--) falls over his face. They say he’s not her son.

8) Well, she thinks, we’ll see about that.

And lol I know that was a million words but like that was the prologue and the actual rest of the fic goes like this:

Sora’s mom takes care of Vanitas’ comatose body because hey, she’s a pediatric nurse, that kind of thing is literally her job. Riku and Kairi try to bodyguard her for a couple weeks, but the longer Vanitas stays asleep, the less and less often they come around--they’ve got to find Sora, after all.

The longer she takes care of Vanitas-not-Sora though, the worse her loneliness gets, until the deep vein of Darkness sadness (she lost her son not once, not twice, but three times) resonates with the shattered remnants of Vanitas’ heart and she forcefully because Sora got his busybodiness from somewhere generously connects with him enough to wake him up.

(“Go away,” answers a voice without speaking.

“Why?”

“You’re annoying me. I’m tired.”

“You’re hurt.”

“That’s what I said.”

No it isn’t.

There’s a certain sort of sadness only people who’ve lived through losing the light of their lives will ever know. There’s a kind of kinship in surviving separation. Her heart aches, goes out of her all at once, reaching--

“I made my decision. Leave me alone.”

"Did you make that decision because you were alone?”)

Only, you know, Vanitas doesn’t want to be awake or even alive now that he has absolutely no purpose, no master, no X-blade, no mission, nowhere to go, and no chance of ever reuniting with Ven--so fuck off, he’s not going to eat those home-made muffins and he’s not going to go take a bath even if he does stink, and he’s not going to talk, and he’s not coming out from under the covers for anything less than the sweet release of a swift execution.

...But that’s so boring.

So he insults her instead. And threatens her and mocks her and knocks over the water glasses she brings and lets the Unversed chase her out of the room and picks out all the stitches on this ugly hand-sewn quilt and asks her why she’s got a room full of toys but no kid to go in it.

No sell: she’s a pediatric nurse and dealing with sick, miserable, screaming children is what she does every day. And anyway, from seven to eight Sora threw a year of temper tantrums that make this boy look positively mild.

There’s one more thing working in her favor: he’s still curious. She learns: he’s never had a fruit smoothie, read a comic book, or slept in sheets fresh from the dryer. Sora’s old action figures aren’t played with so much as dismembered in effigy (is it that Vanitas is vindictive or that he’s jealous?), but the new electric toothbrush somehow wins grudging approval. The vacuum cleaner startles him the first time she turns it on, but one night when she goes for a drink at 3am, she discovers he’s been teaching himself to use the TV. Finding out the water can come out of the taps already hot buys her a whole seven minutes of intrigued silence, but the existence of ice cube trays might as well be a mortal offense. (”Don’t tell me you people actually wait for the water to--?” Given that he then summons a block of ice longer than the dining room table out of thin air, she thinks on this occasion he might be right though when he leaves said ice block to melt, her charitable feelings dry up.) He has to watch her pick herbs from the garden and cook with them before he can be convinced that the “weeds” are food. In short, he’s barely half way back from feral, and if the man who made him wasn’t already dead, she’d happily go kill that piece of shit herself.

It turns out, with spit, polish, and proper motivation (read as: bribes, read as: hot pot and honey castella), he’ll do the things she asks (sometimes). When he actually commits himself to a task, he’s focused to an alarming degree, meticulous and self-critical, and he stubbornly refuses to give up until he’s content with the results, which means that sometimes on her way to work she finds him where she left him the night before, still glaring, bleary-eyed and bratty, at the broken stand-mixer or mantle clock or book spine that she hoped he could fix with magic. If he spitefully tracks mud all over the house after he relentlessly weeds the whole garden, well, she’d say the benefits still outweigh the costs.

The hoard of creatures that follow him around (”They’re my feelings,” he says, and kicks one without the slightest hesitation) take getting used to, but it’s easier to share space when they make themselves so useful--sometimes even when he can’t be badgered into work, he’s willing the boss the underlings into action: the crooked door on the backyard shed finally gets rehung thanks to a towering brute with a banana peel on its head, and once she opens a jar in the kitchen she doesn’t remember buying and finds it full of rich, warm apple pie.

He gets... better. It’s not linear. They have bad days, days when he breaks things without warning and won’t talk except through stinging barbs, one day so bad he let a flock of his worst feelings pound enormous holes in the living room walls, burns up her favorite rose bush--but they have good days too. Some days he laughs and it isn’t malicious at all; some days he eats with her at the table without even being asked; some days she comes home late to find he’s still awake, ready to poke fun at the tired way she toes off her shoes, and it takes everything she has to keep from saying You really didn’t have to wait up for me.

One day he smiles for no reason at all, and she thinks: The boy’s going to be okay.

(But how in the world is she going to explain all this to Sora?)

And there’s sooo much else I want to write but I can’ttttttt, I don’t have time, so here’s a bullet list of “also featuring:”

Vanitas being a natural Heartless deterrent because none of them want to mess with the biggest Darkness on the block.

Ven, Terra, and Aqua sniffing around trying to figure out whether they need to take Vanitas back (just to make sure he’s properly under watch, of course); Sora’s mom giving them the politest “Fuck you” this side of the universe.

Kairi and Vanitas friendship. Vanitas doesn’t even know it’s happening. Kairi is devious. Vanitas taking over Kairi’s training even though they can’t physically spar because they’ll literally end the world if they fight lol. Kairi taking advantage of Vanitas’ lack of interest in social cues to get him to do things none of the other boys will do with her like clothes shopping.

Kairi and Axel friendship with Roxas being the weird middle man who doesn’t know why they can’t just text each other instead of sending handwritten letters back and forth through him of all people.

Vanitas and Roxas reaching grudging levels of respect because sarcastic bitches gotta support each other.

Roxas and Sora’s mom being hilariously awkward because Sora’s mom doesn’t know if she should also be claiming responsibility for this child too and Roxas is absolutely clueless about the concept of having parents in the first place.

After many chapters of redemption arc, Sora’s mom taking Vanitas with her to work at the hospital so he can turn the sick children’s negative feelings into Unversed and then defeat them. She doesn’t know this hurts him and he sure as fuck isn’t going to tell her.

Everything going to shit when Chirithy shows up, insisting Vanitas is its master and calling him “Ven.” Vanitas was getting better--he was getting over the fact that he’d never be “Ventus” again--

Discovering memories of Daybreak Town and the first Keyblade War with Chirithy’s (and Namine’s!) help. Remembering the existence of old friends--Ephemer, Skuld, the other Union leaders--and the realization that they might still be alive, trapped in a timeless world of sleep.

Vanitas and Riku teaming up after someone (Mickey? Yen Sid?) suggests that Sora’s heart may have returned to the place where all hearts eventually go--the core of light that lies sleeping in the deepest depths of the realm of Darkness. Realm of Darkness road trip! (This is just my excuse to wax philosophical about how being made of Darkness doesn’t actually make anyone evil.)

Finding out that saving Sora will mean finally, actually opening the door to the true Kingdom Hearts, which can only be accessed via Scala Ad Caelum, or, more specifically, the ruins of Daybreak Town that lie beneath it.

Insert some Nomura-esque convoluted plot here about how the clock of Daybreak Town isn’t actually a bell tower but the mechanism for protecting the original X-blade and the door to Kingdom Hearts, and Daybreak!Ventus’ very existence was somehow tied to this clock tower--that’s why Ventus’ and Vanitas’ Keyblades form the two halves of a broken gear: they’re maybe literally the gear that turns the hands of time in the world that once lay closest to the heart of all things. The bell, the sword, the door--they’re all linked, and the only way to save Sora--to save everyone, including the sleeping Dandelions--is to reunite (to wake) their fractured dream of Daybreak with reality, restore the X-blade, and retrieve Sora’s wandering self with the power of Kingdom Hearts’ connection to all worlds and all hearts.

In short, like Nomura, I don’t actually know how I’d ever make it make sense, but the X-blade would get forged by Ven and Vanitas in a safe and sane way (this is just my excuse to give Vanitas a scene where he finally recognizes that he is content to be a separate being from Ventus; that he wants to stay his own person)... Kairi wields the X-blade because fuck you KH3, and everyone gets the damn happy ending they deserve--but most especially Vanitas, who gets to be the big damn hero to finally bring Sora home safe to their mother.

Like guys, I just need Vanitas’ narrative arc to feel coherent and complete. I need to know why he and Ven have a gear motif. How they’re connected to the Dandelions. Whether or not Ventus and Vanitas could ever both simultaneously be at peace despite remaining separate people. Whether Chirithy would have recognized Vanitas. Why Ventus alone had the power to forge the X-blade by reuniting with his other half when it would otherwise have taken 13 Darknesses and 7 Lights. What Sora’s mother would say finding out her son has like five clones now. If anyone would ever recognize that Vanitas had never been shown basic fucking human kindness.

Nomura. Plz.

[bluerosesburnblue]

This very nearly became a Kingdom Key Only run because I like challenge runs like that but honestly I never felt like sticking to the Kingdom Key was ever really a hindrance

...so let’s talk about that ending, from the start of the Keyblade Graveyard to the credits, yeah?

I cannot BELIEVE that Nomura gave us the Beach Party Ending we were all hoping for just to rip Sora away at the last second. Good GOD, man, who spit in your coffee?

So I guess we should get the elephant in the room out of the way, first. I’m actually not... that upset by the ending? Like, yes, I find it extremely ironic that the game that made me love Sora more than any other character in the game would essentially kill him off, but... okay, when Nomura said that the ending would be “hard to swallow” I had two worst case scenarios in mind. And I mean “worst case” in the “Nonononono he’d better not do that if he does I’m done” way

Scenario 1: Xehanort unlocks Kingdom Hearts. Either he’s stopped or he succeeds, but either way the damage is done and he’s too far along to stop and the universe is reset. All of the heroes are alright, they survive the ending, but the world of the game is changed irreversibly, forever. It’s all one World again, the Disney worlds are gone, or they’re there but they’ve been forced together in a weird jigsaw-puzzle way. The details don’t really matter, I just didn’t want a status-quo shakeup like that that gets passed off as a happy/bittersweet ending because the heroes survived

Scenario 2: Xehanort unlocks Kingdom Hearts. Either he’s defeated but whatever he started can’t be stopped, or Kingdom Hearts is the only thing that can defeat him. Either way, Sora has to use the power of Kingdom Hearts. He keeps the world exactly as it was, but has to give up his own physical existence to do so. After all, he who opens the door will become a god in the next world. Maybe he persists as a “force” that watches over his friends, but Sora is gone for good

What we ended up getting was... very similar to that second scenario, but it differs just enough to save it for me. At the very least, knowing that Sora and Kairi are connected and that Sora’s in Shibuya in the Secret Movie gives me enough hope that he can and will come back. Which, when compared to what I was afraid we were gonna get, leaves me weirdly optimistic. I still cried a lot (NOMURA I AM TAKING CUSTODY OF YOUR SON THAT’S MY SWEET BABY BROTHER NOW FIGHT ME) but I’m nowhere near as emotionally devastated as I could’ve been

And here’s the big thing, I liked most of the scenes in the Final Battle sequence. As scenes they were (mostly) fine. The reunions were heartwrenching (even if Sora is just kind of... there for most of them), the KHUx stuff was incredible (Ephemeeeeeer <3<3<3), the locales and concepts were all interesting. My problem was actually the order events happen in

So, first off, everyone dies way too fast. WAY too fast. It’s one of the two scenes I have a problem with. Everyone arrives at the Graveyard and fights a swarm of Heartless. They walk down a crevice and see Terra. A surprising amount of people get knocked out or injured trying to take care of just Terra-Xehanort? Then another big wave of Heartless shows up and everyone just... dies? Like, the second big scene in what is a very long finale and everyone dies? Hell, Aqua just gives up!

They also blew the KHUx Union X attack WAY too early. A set piece like that (it’s SUCH A GOOD CONCEPT AND THE SCENE WAS BEAUTIFUL) and you waste it on a big cloud of Heartless at the start of the final battle? Guys... guys that’s some last minute “all hope is lost, so here’s unexpected help” stuff, you shouldn’t just have that happen that soon

And the thing is... both of those scenes would be so much more impactful if they had happened later in the finale. Ideally, picture this:

The team takes care of the first swarm of Heartless. (You could have moments in that fight where you get a different guest Keyblade wielder, one at a time, in a callback to the KH2 Battle of 1000 Heartless with the FF characters). They’re feeling pretty good about it. They just all worked as a team for the first time together and they did alright. Maybe a little shaky. After all, most of them don’t really know each other that well. They can’t know each other’s styles or predict each others’ moves. Their teamwork is shaky, but they managed and that gives them some confidence. Maybe they can do this if they work together

Then Xehanort shows up. We can’t be having any of this “friendship” and “teamwork” nonsense. He throws up the labyrinth to try and separate everybody and pair off the Darknesses each to 1-2 Lights so that they clash, but the Darknesses are at a clear advantage. Unlike in the actual game, the labyrinth is crawling with Heartless to break up the tedium of the boss rush a bit. (I liked the idea of having to choose who to rescue first in the actual game, but it didn’t actually effect anything except which order you took the fights in.) While running through the Labyrinth you encounter different friends in different sections to help you fight off Heartless, and their boss fight is at the end of their section. That would give everyone just a bit more time to bond with each other. Maybe put in a few puzzles or something that make use of them creatively, like Ven and Aqua using wind and barriers to traverse their section of the Labyrinth. Just... everyone needs more time together. Some things about the fights and reunions would need to be changed, though. I wouldn’t be adverse to changing it up just slightly so that Lingering Will shows up as a guest for the Terranort + Vanitas fight, and it takes both Lingering Will and The Guardian to wrest Terra’s body back (instead of having Lingering Will only show up for Attempt 2 of the Terranort and Heartless Tornado Kill Everyone scene and then fuck off somewhere? Never seen again?) The Saix and Xion fight is also changed up. Roxas doesn’t just... appear from nowhere, and while this seems to be Xion... something’s off. It’s not really Xion, just a puppet made to look like her using data from the finale of 358/2 Days that had, miraculously, survived. This Xion is like the second Replica Riku (and can I just say thank GOD it’s not the “Riku from the past when he was controlled by Ansem” like they thought for the longest time because that was SILLY. Though I’m slightly disappointed that it wasn’t Data-Riku’s digital heart shoved into a Replica body like I’d theorized based on the trailers). This Replica gets purged, too, leaving two Replica bodies conveniently wearing Organization coats behind at the Keyblade Graveyard. We’ll get back to that

(Also, and this is just me, but I actually like how unrepentant Vanitas is. I think a lot of people forget that his sympathetic traits and background of abuse were novel-only things and the novel canon isn’t game canon in the same way that the Harry Potter movies aren’t book canon. Game!Vanitas has never been anything other than a completely unrepentant jackass, and Sora and Ven still gave him a chance to redeem himself. He just refused to take it, and I like that. It’s refreshing to have a character in KH not even try to justify their evil. He’s evil because he wants to be. It’s as simple as that.)

So, anyway, we have the labyrinth stuff. The team is worn down. NOW is where you place everyone dying. I don’t care if you keep it the same, or the Heartless Tornado is controlled by Ansem, or even just Ansem, Xemnas, and Young Nort pick everyone off because they’re all the same person, so of course their teamwork is stronger. You all weren’t good enough friends. You couldn’t have won, because none of you had fought together before, so your friendship was a detriment as you stumbled over each other and just assumed you’d be okay. Sora is left alone. And then he’s gone, too.

And here’s where you place the Final World. I think there was a big opportunity missed here. We get Namine separated from Kairi here. So here’s what I propose: remember all the talk throughout the game about the hearts within Sora’s melding with his, but they might be able to be saved if their memories and the parts of themselves were placed in the right boxes? Fffffffuckingggg... HAVE NAMINE AS A GUEST HERE and have it be just as much about putting Sora back together as it is separating the pieces of Roxas and Xion from him. Once you meet up with Namine’s star (or just have her have a physical form, too, since she’d be tethered to Kairi, too?) she helps out because now that Sora’s in pieces, it’s just a simple matter of sorting those pieces. Putting the scattered links in the chains of memories in different chains, back where they belong. Two hearts are released, now to find everyone else’s. Chirithy is still there, just give Nami some more time

(Also, add a colored tint to the stars or something that goes away after talking to them they were so hard to see)

Anyway. Dives. Lich. I don’t hate this section, I just think the Lich fights could’ve been a little more interesting? Also uhh... maybe have the characters hearts be found in worlds that actually, like... mean something to the character thematically? I guess Aqua in the Caribbean makes sense because water but it would make more sense to have her in Arendelle because ice is also water and she’s basically Ven’s big sis and there are quite a few parallels between the two relationships? The hell does Axel have to do with San Fransokyo? And since Terra would theoretically be there in the rewrite, we’ll need an extra world so place Axel in Twilight Town. Then I dunno. Donald in the Caribbean because he’s canonically a sailor. Ven in Corona because his isolation by Eraqus has parallels to Rapunzel only a bit less evil in intent. Terra in Olympus because that was the world he learned he could be a true hero and beat the darkness. Goofy in Monstropolis because out of all the characters he’s the funniest and they use laugh energy. Mickey in Toy Box because he’s the face of a major franchise and has so many toys based off of him you have no idea. That would place Riku in San Fransokyo where his Norted Replica counterpart was and also poetically make him and Kairi the last ones saved

SO EVERYONE’S ALIVE. We return to the land of the living. There’s no weird... like, time repeats or anything. The last four Norts are... kind of shocked! But also laughing it up because Sora just abused the Power of Waking to hell and back and they know what that means. Also, the lights are still at exactly the same disadvantage they were before they got revived. Or so they think until two bright lights emerge from the labyrinth behind them. That’s right, Roxas and Xion are here, having had their hearts freed from Sora’s in The Final World and taking the abandoned Replica bodies from the Labyrinth. Now we have the Sea-Salt reunion, sans the stuff with Isa because why the hell should Roxas and Xion just be sympathetic to Saix? Save that for a scene in the finale. Doesn’t even have to be spoken, just make it seem like Saix, Roxas, and Xion are trying to come to an understanding but still awkward around each other

After that I’m a little shakier, admittedly. I know you leave Ephemer’s appearance to summon the ancient Keyblades until the very end. I’d also have given him some line like “You remind me of an old friend” or something. Just... slight reference to Player

I have no idea how to work around the Kairi getting killed stuff and still get the ending Nomura wants! That’s the second scene I have a problem with. Sora doesn’t “need” motivation, he’s already prepped to bash the old man’s face in. I dunno... maybe opening Kingdom Hearts messes up Kairi’s light or something and that’s why she disappears? I dunno, there were better ways to do that if you HAD to kill Kairi, and better scenes if you didn’t, tbh

So in summary, I like the pieces of the ending, just not how they were put together. There was a lot of cool stuff in theory, it just wasn’t executed as well as it could’ve been for a more satisfying and emotional finale. The ending’s fine, and I honestly expected it to be a bit rushed considering how much they had to wrap up in this game, but I think it was a low point in what was otherwise a really fun and enjoyable finale to the story arc

I mean... I think that’s all I have to say about the ending, so here’s some assorted thoughts:

I think it was a missed opportunity to not have a Max Goof cameo at the end when the Disney trio is reunited with their loved ones and Goofy just stands there with Jiminy. Max wouldn’t even have been voiced. Just let him show up

I’m torn as to characters’ outfits in the Final Battle. On the one hand, I like how in the end all of the trios are wearing outfits that match the other members of their respective trios. On the other hand, I would’ve killed for EVERYONE to have had a new outfit with the black and plaid/gingham theme to show that they’re not just disjointed trios that happened to come together, but a big group of companions. Everyone is a Team, it’s not just a Team made of Everyone. They made excuses for Mickey’s shirt and Lingering Will’s cape. They could totally have done some “oh weird I guess getting brought back from the dead changed our clothes isn’t that convenient” thing

Why did they “break” Lea’s Keyblade only to have it be just fine when they needed to lock Kingdom Hearts? Why was that there?

I heard someone once say that KH3 was an “obligation.” And I can see where they’re coming from. While I loved the game overall and can feel the work and love put into it, between the sheer amount of sequel hooks and the rushed resolution, it does feel like Nomura just wanted to move on to the stuff he’d thought of in KHUx but had to wrap up the ongoing arc first. I’ve been spoiled on SOME of the Secret Reports, not all of them, but the Subject X stuff and Luxu’s true role with the box could’ve easily been put elsewhere. Maybe in a game in the next arc. That would’ve freed up some time in this game for a few more things, like giving Dark Aqua more screentime (she’s defeated in the same scene she’s introduced? Really?) and just in general spread the original plot stuff out more. As it is now, I feel the sequel hooks just distract from the current plot arc

I appreciate that they tried to give reasons for the Organization members to be in different worlds, but I don’t think it was executed that well. Yeah, we get explanations, like in some they’re performing more experiments on the heart and in others they’re searching for the New Lights, but they never do anything with what they accomplish in them. I was so sure they were going to do something with Data-Sora or Data-Riku because of the “digital heart” stuff in San Fransokyo, and NOTHING came of it. Here’s an idea: Data-Sora in Xion’s place among the Norts and Data-Riku in the Riku Replica’s place. Have Data-Sora look like Xion or act like her before the reveal. I dunno, just do SOMETHING with them. Have the Norts reference the Lights they found in the final battle or something. Just don’t drop them once the world is done

That being said, the worlds themselves were amazing, I really liked the original plots in Toy Box, Monstropolis, and San Fransokyo. The character interactions in Corona and Arendelle were delightful. I also loved the design for the Ice Labyrinth in Arendelle and Galaxy Toys in Toy Box. Would’ve loved to have seen more of the town in Corona but loved what we did get to see of it. The Caribbean was... alright, but did contain my favorite party member: a shambling pile of crabs that were gifted sapience by an ocean goddess so that Sora could free her, only for her to get freed by someone else offscreen

Funny enough I actually didn’t care much for The Caribbean and San Fransokyo, but for opposite reasons. The Caribbean was FAR too open for its own good (I am NOT an open-world person and bad at navigating, so the ship, while interesting in concept, was a nightmare) and San Fransokyo was too scripted (I felt like I was locked in Hiro’s garage). I didn’t hate them, but I also 100% completed every other world and decided that with those two, it just wasn’t worth doing before beating the game. I didn’t hate either of them, and my feelings may change when I go back for treasures and lucky emblems

I absolutely killed Davy Jones with the Pirate Ship attraction. Pass up the opportunity to summon a neon pirate ship on top of a hyper-realistic pirate ship during a climactic battle? Who do you think I am?

I love how Ephemer’s name in the journal is just “???” because that’s an accurate representation of Sora’s reaction. “Who is this guy? Why is he here? Huh???” But I know. I know who the best dandelion boy is. So typical of him to swoop in at the last minute to save you and then disappear to who knows where

I ADORE that the final battle is Sora, Donald, and Goofy together and that the final attack is Trinity Limit. Sora coming back on his own from no health just for Trinity Limit was AWESOME and such a perfect end to the series, gameplay-wise

And finally, I am a little sad that the one theory I had throughout the game was wrong. I’d thought that, since Young Xehanort and Eraqus are always shown in in Scala ad Caelum, that it wasn’t a flashback but simply their spirits playing a metaphorical chess game in the afterlife. Their dialogue after the final battle seems to indicate that that isn’t the case

Also, and this is just for me, but my final death count was 5

Once to the Tornado Titan due to having a poor grasp of Airstepping and NO grasp of Rage Form, killed myself thanks to spamming Riskcharge

TWICE to the electric arena trap in Verum Rex because I am SO BAD at shooters and ejected myself directly into the Death Pit twice

Once during the ship battle portion of the Zombie Kraken fight

Once during the Union X Keyblade summoning because I was too busy reading the list of names to notice the text on the screen that said “HEY IDIOT DODGE ATTACKS DON’T JUST SIT THERE WHAT ARE YOU DOING”

But for now, I think I’m out of stuff to say about KH3. I’m sure I’ll find more once I’ve processed everything, but for now...

now we’ve just got to wait for Sora to come home

[star-shapedfruit]

A sort of KH3 review.. thing

Well dang that was a wild ride wasn’t it? It’s been about 2/3 weeks since I finished the game (took me 5 days which is record time for me considering it was a pretty big game) so I’ll try my best to condense my thoughts on it below

Please note this is my opinion so you may agree or disagree with me on some parts and that’s totally fine!

And it’s gonna be long

Alright let’s get the bad out of the way:

-The pacing

I’m not the first and I definitely won’t be the last to complain about the goddamn pacing. Kingdom Hearts in general is pretty bad when it comes to a well balanced pace and this was the same. Everything felt rushed and crammed towards the end with it feeling like ‘quick let’s wrap this up ASAP!’.

It was literally Disney world after world with bits of important story in between and then the actual plot of saving everyone kicked in and probably made up of about 3 hours of the whole game. It could have been better if we’d have rescued Aqua and Ven earlier then towards the end save Roxas, Xion and Terra (and Namine) but nah.

Even the ending itself felt rushed and half assed at times. We didn’t get to see Sora save Kairi it was just Keyblade Graveyard ending- everyone being happy at the beach- credits. That was... kinda dumb? Also when you’re wrapping up a 17 year old saga you don’t tend to end it like that. You know what I’m talking about.

-Characters

They gone did Kairi dirty again. AGAIN. How many times are we gonna do this? My poor girl got shafted right at the end just to fuel Sora’s anger and then didn’t explain how she got back to the islands anyway but who fucking cares y’know.

She was hyped up after being confirmed to be a guardian of light and in training with Lea and they did fuck all with it. It’s like you’re so excited to see Santa and you get up on his knee to ask what present you want this Christmas only for Santa to laugh and smack you in the face.

I could go on and on about Kairi but I’d probably be saying what everyone else has already said. I was expecting more character interactions ie the famous Roxas and Ven one we’ve been looking forward to for years but we got a funny glance and that’s it. Again, probably due to pacing but there was so much potential for some great new friendships to blossom and they just... didn’t.

-Worlds

Ok this is mainly Twilight Town being so teenie weenie. Come on, in KH2 we had TT, Hollow Bastion, TWTNW, Yen Sid’s Tower but for 3? Two sections of TT that’ll do. ??? Why??? It looked gorgeous and I couldn’t wait to explore the whole town but for some reason we were reduced to it being two rooms. Also missed out a good opportunity to have RG playable again but nah.

I get the feeling Disney we’re very pushy with this title? Like they had more input than usual and Square couldn’t really argue with them which would explain why the OG worlds were kinda dull? Idk I hope they learn to butt out a little and let Square do their thing. I’m not saying get rid of Disney god no. I just think there needs to be less Disney and more OG in the next title.

Alright the good stuff now!

- The graphics

Holy shit this game was BEAUTIFUL

Everything was gorgeous to look at and Unreal Engine made all the worlds look unique and specific to their Disney world. Like o can’t fault how this game looks it’s just that pretty

-Voice acting

Hayley, Hayley my man you did fantastic. I was getting worried that he’d sound off like in DDD but the man delivered. Everything was spot on and his emotions came across so much better? That scream? The crying?? The joy?? Beautiful. And Vanitas sounded so goddamn evil and Hayley sounded like he was having a blast voicing him 👌

Jesse did amazing as always with Roxas and Ven making them sound different. Just wish they coulda talked to each other xD I really liked Alyson’s Kairi too! I miss Hayden but for the most part Alyson pulled it off great along with Xion.

Like everyone sounded so much better I could go on and on. Can’t really fault much of the voice acting tbh. Xehanort grew on me but Nimoy will always be the better Nort

-Minigames/side quests

I absolutely SUCK at the cooking mini game but I still found it loads of fun. The only one I could do properly was the salt and pepper shaker one 😅 The 100 Acre Wood stuff was very samey samey but still cute and fun regardless.

I only did one flan mini game (the one in Toy Box) and that was awesome too! Hunting for ingredients and lucky emblems was tricky in parts but I loved the satisfaction when you finally find the damn thing! They were just a nice little touch and even though I only got 17 out of 90 I enjoyed looking for them.

Also that Tangled dancing game. My FAV IDK HOW MANY TIMES I’VE PLAYED THAT ITS JUST SO WHOLESOME AND GOOD

-Attraction Flow

LOVED this gimmick. What can I say I absolutely love Disneyland and being able to use the rides to fight in battle was a blast. I especially loved the mad tea cups (“Bring it in!”) and the pirate ship they were loads of fun :D shame I only got to use Thunder Mountain twice because it’s one of my favourite rides xD

-The gummi phone

Who doesn’t love this. Finally I can take selfies with Disney characters! It was so cute I’m glad they added it. I’m definitely gonna use it more on my next gameplay at inappropriate times during the final battles 🌚

-Final battles

Being able to fight alongside Riku, Mickey, Aqua, Ven, Kairi, Lea, Roxas and Xion was at the top of my wish list for 3 and it finally happened ;-; Ok we’re with Kairi and Lea for two minutes but I ENJOYED THOSE TWO MINUTES. Kairi actually does some decent damage too so she can fight. You did amazing sweetie. And how OP is Roxas? You can just sit back and let him do all the work while you and Xion chill out. Granted they weren’t difficult bosses but I don’t care I got to fight with my sons and daughters by my side <3

I’m nearly done now promise. Just wanna say my favourite worlds ❤️

Corona: Gorgeous and (mostly) tranquil. Rapunzel and Eugene make great partners and the hair swing thing was awesome to jump to different areas. Also the little quests with Rapunzel were adorable and made the world feel more alive.

Monstropolis: I think what made this world for me were the character interactions and the music. The world itself was just inside the factory but the way everyone played off each other and dealt with Vanitas at the end was amazing. And Sora doing his funny face again. You little treasure <3

Toy Box: YOU. ARE. A. TOYYYYYY. Everything was so gigantic and interactive and gsjsksksla it was just loads of fun! Loved Woody and Buzz as partners and the whole world was such a treat- nothing like we’ve ever had in a KH game before. Can we also talk about Woody absolutely wrecking Xehanort though? Iconic.

Well I think that’ll do me for now. Overall I’d give it an 8.5/10 with the major issues being plot pacing and lack of character development. Also the camera sometimes did this weird thing in attraction flow mode where it’d just zoom into a rock or a tree :/ I really enjoyed KH3 despite its flaws and what was done well was done really well

Maybe get some more new writers and let Square properly take the reins for the next one yeah? And let Kairi finally have her time to shine. You’ve set up a rescue mission after all, Square 👀

[thenonbinarydetective]

Kingdom Hearts 3-Holy shit I’m Crying

*spoilers*

I honestly am not as disappointed as some people that I’ve seen on here talk about it. It might have something to do with me starting in 2011 with BBS. KH1 came out when I was only two so there’s my excuse. I’ve played them all now. It really did lead me, however, to not feel as though we’ve been waiting as long as 12/13 years for Kingdom Hearts 3. Not to cause drama between anyone but KH3 pretty much would not be possible with all these side games. But whatever Don’t @ me about this lol

Also I know it’s not the end. They/Nomura have already confirmed that Kingdom Hearts 3 isn’t the end. There’s still a future.

Look this series is about hope so maybe a version of what we hoped would happen will still happen. For example, more than a nod of Ven and Roxas interacting. Or Terra and Riku having a special reunion. It may be too late for that but a heart-to-heart between the two of them could make up for it. I got excited hearing Riku mention him in the Realm of Darkness to Mickey(also still keeping there promise a secret between them. He probably could’ve told Mickey though).

Anyway I have hope that it will just get better. This game is phenomenal and possibly hit all the points I expected it to. There could be things that haven’t come right back to me yet. They’ll come back.

This game was a lot and it was emotional. Extremely. And there’s still more which brings a simultaneous better and worse feeling.

I’m probably forgetting things on both sides but here we go

What I Liked/Loved

Xemnas’ and Ansem’s endings: In the end they weren’t evil. Xemnas was alone. Ansem and Riku admitting they’d (almost) miss being apart from each other. They weren’t redeemed but changed.

Jason Dohring apparently saw the reviews that said his voice was flat and boring in BBS. My man went IN on those emotions. seriously amazing

The way Sora went OFF WHEN WILLIAM TURNER GOT STABBED

The fact the Eraqus literally came out of Terra to talk Xehanort down

Also the fact that that worked

Just anything involving Eraqus because I love him so much

Say what you want about Frozen I loved the Let it Go sequence in the game. Honestly it was like watched the movie and then fucking Goofy just appears. Iconic. Love it.

THE UNION CHI SCENE. Those were real names I recognized some of them

the second of Ephemer

and the Starlight Keyblade

Chirithy waiting for Ven

and then finding Ven

Vanitas being the cocky sack of shit that I love dearly

Vanitas getting repeatedly yeeted by Sully

 Terra cradling Ven

Xigbar/Braig being Luxu this whole time and finessing Xehanort to give him what he wanted

Terra chasing around Roxas and Riku in the end

Isa joining Lea, Roxas, and Xion

(almost) Everyone playing on Destiny Islands

Mother Gothel’s and Hans’ Heartless designs, although I don’t see why because they both already were heartless from the start

The fact that Olympus was more than just fighting in the Coliseum. It’s the first time I’ve actually liked going there.

Also seeing Zeus as much as I find him repulsive. It was nice seeing him 

 Hephaestus’ forge being a ‘secret’ location

The Final World 

Terra’s return was everything I wanted it to be. From the arrival of the Lingering Will and it’s clash with Terranort. The Guardian revealed to be Terra all along. Then the Guardian tearing off the bandages and kicking his own body’s ass. With a Sora assist

Terqua is actually canon now

The typically repeated worlds aren’t there

The combat is beautiful

I did not stop running about every wall I could

and then jumping off immediately after

The entire scene of Xemnas, Xion, Lea, and Roxas. Just it’s good.

Especially with Saix/Isa just standing in the background full berserk mode while everyone is having a somewhat casual conversation

Yen sid actually getting off his ass

Two Baymaxes

I know I said I liked the worlds for being different from usual but I liked how well Big Hero 6, Tangled, and Frozen fit in to the story with CGI

How beautiful the Land of Departure looked

and Scala Ad Caelum

The fact that Drake Bell was Eraqus blows me away for some reason

The Kingdom Dance in Corona was adorable

The selfies

The Instagram post

Everyone looked GORGEOUS

The end for the Organization members were meaningful. They were becoming human again. It had emotion and heart and all felt true to character. I can’t wait to play more games with Luxord’s somebody.

Specifically, I liked how they weren’t exactly villains we just need to fight in the end.

The number of worlds matching with our number of friends to save at the end

Defeating Xehanort with the Crystal Snow Keyblade was the greatest decision I made. Beating up this old fucker as Olaf mercilessly watches was an experience that cannot be repeated

What I disliked

The pacing and/or structure of the story was off. We spend forever exploring the worlds. Then five minutes before the final battle we rush off and get Aqua and Ven.

Also Sora apparently had the Power of Waking the whole damn time

and Ven waiting that long to tell him

And Yen Sid can’t see that

But he needed like 9 more life lessons before he realizes he has it

then he abuses the hell out of it(with good reason) after knowing he has it

The Heartless/Unversed/Nobody battle(s) before the battles with the Organization just take too damn long to get through

Like I would prefer just the first H/U/N battle and then the Union Chi one.

They both stood out more. All the monster we face are now brought together

We are also brought into the game with Ephemer

Also Kairi thing was just bull

really don’t have to say more everyone gets it

I don’t have much problem with Xehanort’s end but I do kinda understand that it’s weird how after fighting 2 dramatic battles he kinda just dies...and hands Sora the X-blade

Another thing is that his motivations have always been...experimental extremist I guess. But somehow it came off that he was trying to be....okay. A lot of ellipses yes but that’s emphasizing my confusion. He’s not...okay

Namine was thrown right in the end there wasn’t she?

I wish my beloved gremlin got a better ending. Vanitas could’ve been really interesting character to build up on if a being or abomination of pure darkness tried to gain his own light. Maybe he’s not over. Who knows?

As Kingdom Hearts 3 is the end of a part of the story. I wanted it feel more like the ending of a book rather than the ending of a chapter, right?

It’s conclusion perhaps shouldn’t have left people just waiting for the next one but waiting for the next one with more positive reasons

WHERE WAS MAXIE?? WHY WASN’T HE WAITING FOR GOOFY TO COME HOME????

Some of you shippers need to behave

As much as I loved the Tangled and Frozen worlds Sora was very much disconnected from the story. Mostly, Tangled. More than half the movie progresses without Sora being anywhere near Rapunzel or Flynn. Or that whole bit in the Ice Labyrinth in Frozen. Then far away from the castle as Elsa was arrested and Anna freezing

In other worlds(this game and in others) Sora was apart of the story but these two he showed up and interacted for a bit then left

A lot of the rescuing for the other characters happened off-screen with Riku and Mickey

Which brings me to the point that I kinda wanted everyone to be saved earlier on and maybe join Sora on some adventures

Everyone else just felt oddly unimportant

I get that Sora is the main character but saving the other technically main characters was believed to be a big part of the story just didn’t happen

The part with Terranort was just off. Although it is a bit of a common thing that to stop a death you can be set back in time before it happened to stop it. The second time Sora was aware and changed it. It doesn’t really make sense to why the Lingering Will appeared that other time. Did he appear the first time around but was too late? and did Sora give him the extra second he needed?

Did it even need to happen? who knows?

I still love the game regardless of it’s flaws. Nothing’s perfect and no matter what Square gave us people would’ve complained. I also really don’t think some of you should go as far to say that Square Enix can’t make good things anymore because it wasn’t 100% what you wanted. That’s just rude and kinda lame.

The game gives me hope above all things

[queen-ofsunflowers]

Queen Plays KH3 Pt. 3

TIME PLAYED: 28 hrs, 4 min.

CURRENT LEVEL: 40

DEATH COUNTER: 32

WORLDS COMPLETED:

Olympus

Twilight Town

Toy Box

Kingdom of Corona

Monstropolis

100 Acre Wood

Arendelle

The Carribean

San Fransokyo

The Final World

The rest is under the cut to avoid spoilers. Read at your own risk... though most of it is just keysmashin at the end.

Starting off with the Caribbean. And I like Jack, I really do. But I wanna smack him, he's such a jerk. And I think we died? We fell off the edge of the world and now Elizabeth is saying we ending up in Davy Jones's Locker. Great, but I'VE DIED 14 TIMES AT THIS POINT. It's just funny to me.

Should be noted I've never seen Pirates of the Caribbean. So I'm a little lost on all this.

Sora has a lil crown on his hat I love it.

Jack is a jerk to Will and Elizabeth. After KH2, I do not trust Barbossa. At all.

Something tells me I'm gonna fail A LOT at the ship driving thing.

Sora ain't afraid of no Kraken. He's faced worse. A lil Kraken ain't anything.

Vexen creeps me out a little right now. And what did Xemnas tell Luxord? Must have been something because I feel something is off. Anyway, there must be a reason Vexen wants to finish his work so bad. I wanna know it. I NEED TO KNOW IT.

It's so weird seeing Sora without gloves on. He has nice hands.

SORA BEING SO BADASS. JUST FLOWMOTIONING ON THE SMOKE AND RIDING THE HEARTLESS. SO CINMEATICALLY BEAUTIFUL.

I DIED THREE TIMES IN THAT BATTLE. THREE. TIMES.

And then Sora went splat.

Is that what Tia Dalma said to Sora? What is she talking about? Free her from what? Eh. We'll find out.

Something tells me, when Sora was a kid... he wanted to be a pirate. Very badly.

Jack may be a jerk, but he's a jerk who's not gonna leave a kid in a cavern.

Luxord calling parley and I'm like "not this shit again"

Jack Sparrow is such a DUMBASS.

Technically, Sora drives the Gummi Ship. He's the captain of it then, right?

Wait what. WAIT WHAT. OH MY GOD CRAB JACK EXPLODED.

The graphics in this world are so GOOD OH MY GOSH

IS ELIZABETH THE PIRATE KING? QUEEN? ... I need to watch these movies now.

When an encounter is cut off by a cutscene. Also, WTF is up with the way Sora pronounced Luxord? Like... "luke sword" is that how you're supposed to say it? I don't remember. I'm gonna continue to say Lux-ord. Say it like how spelled.

DEATH COUNT KEEPS GETTING HIGHER WITH THIS FIGHT. I'M UP TO 19. I'm gonna look up a walkthrough to help, hold on-- I gotta level up this fucking ship before I go any further. I don't want to die a bunch. Putting the story on hold for now. Gotta find crabs. That sounds so weird to say.

I love how the sounds underwater are muffled. It's a nice detail.

THIS BATTLE MAY COUNT FOR HALF OF MY DEATHS (27 so far) BUT I FINALLY BEAT THAT PIRATE GAMBLER WANNABE. OH SWEET LORD YES.

So Will and Co. Ddd our job for us. Or did they? Tia Dalma/Calypso... can she help us? She's a prisoner. But Sora's giving a protagonist speech, so I'm not complaining.

Sora joining in Elizabeth's speech, like... do you even know what "hoist the colors" means boy?!

The Organization are looking for hope. I can see the gears turning in Sora's head. Maybe they aren't so bad after all? Hmm.

"Then I invoke the right of parle--" Jack just comes up to Luxord, puts a finger to his mouth. Like... "No. No parley." Bitch finally learned.

RIP Luxord. Also, something tells me he was pirate before becoming a Nobody. I don't know, just a hunch.

Sora probably knows more about the heart than others. And Jack and I can agree on something.

Jones, stabs Will. SORA LITERALLY LOSES HIS SHIT AND TACKLES THE SQUIDMAN LIKE... YES BUT NO. RIP DAVY JONES. But seriously. THIS SCENE IS SO SAD OH MY GOD WYF JUST HAPPENED!? CAN SOMEONE EXPLAIN?!

WTF WILL?! HOW IS HE ALIVE?! Wait... And thank you for explaining it right after I figured it out.

Jack is a major mood right now.

MY SHIP WAS JUST A BUNCH OF FUCKING CRABS.

Back with our redheads, Axel's having emotional problems. Talk about them man. Just talk.

LEA REMEMBERS VENTUS. HE REMEMBERS VEN.

I REMMEMVER THIS PART FROM THE TRAILER. NO, MICKEY. SAVE HIM RIKU.

Cut to Ansem the wise, and Ansem SOB

YAS KIDS YAS. I LOVE HAYNER PENCE AND OLETTE RIGHT NIW. THESE KIDS OH MY GOSH.

Why did the Nobody protect him?!WHAT IS GOING ON?!

VEXEN GET OUT.

Wait what?! Um... WHAT?! AND THE SCENE CUTS OFF THERE LIKE WTF. IS HE A SPY?! IS EVEN JUST PLAYING VEXEN WTF?!

I love Sora's reactions in San Fransokyo. They're so dorky. SORA IS SUCH A DORK I LOVE HIM.

I wanna hug from Baymax.

Sora is a simple Island boy, he's so fascinated by tech.

It sounds like they're saying Yu-Gi-Oh. Is that just me? ITS TIME TO DUEL. THE HEARTLESS.

SORA DOESN'T KNOW WHAT A FIST BUMP IS. THAT WAS SO CUTE.

AHHH SORA AND ROXAS. THAT WAS... JUST... "I'M WITH YOU"... AHHH

What are those things? Are they from Coded? I'm not sure... and that ain't a good thing.

REPLICA. Oh wait, no... I don't think so anyway?

Goofy talking sense into Sora. It's the dad in him.

His eyes also look more hazel than gold.

BAYMAX. WHY MUST YOU DO THIS FAKE RIKU. WHY.

Just like the end of the movie, the end of this world is so freaking SAD. ... I TAKE IT BACK ITS SO FREAKING SWEET!!!! Its official. That is my favorite world now.

Now it's time for the beginning of the end.

RIKU MICKEY NO. Really hope Sora knows what he's doing.

OH MY GOD. THAT. OH MY GOD.

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. I KNOW THIS FROM THE TRAILER. NO THIS ISN'T GOOD. THIS CANT BE GOOD.

Can I say that Riku has grown so much since the first game? Because he has. It's good and I love AND NOW LETS SAVE AQUA

Sora is a... wha. SORA. BROS. SAVING THE DAY ONCE AGAIN. AHHHHH YESSS. AQUA IM SO SORRY I HAD TO DO THIS. PLEASE BE OKAY.

SHE'S OKAY. SORA SAVED HER SHE'S OKAY. TEN YEARS AND SHE'S OKAY I CANT STOP SMILING.

AHHH EVEN AND DEMYX. I knew that Demyx wasn't like... dark. Even had me going, that's for sure. BUT YES. EVERYTHING IS GOOD YES.

OH. I have a theory. And if right... Please let it be right...

THEY HAVE IT. YES DEMYX YES. THEY HAVE THE BODY.

OH MY GOD IENZO AND ANSEM... I COULDN'T STOP SMILING THAT WHOLE TIME JUST THE EMOTION IN THAT WHOLE SCENE--

THE LAND OF DEPATURE. SHE'S FIXING HER HOME. NOW LET'S GO GET VEN!!! AND VANITAS RUINS EVERYTHING. AND AQUA KICKS ASS. YAS QUEEN.

Wait what's going on??? VEN?! IS SORA GONNA HES WAKING HIM UP. HES WAKING HIM UP. VENTUS IS AWAKE. MY BBY BOY ISAWALE!!! "Good morning, Ven." MY HEART.

Lea is a MAJOR MOOD.

MY HEART. THEY STILL HAVE THEIR WAYFINDERS.

THE SCENE BETWEEN LEA AND SAIX. OH MY HEART. HE JUST WANTS HIS FRIENDS. AND HOW ARE THESE TWO NOT REALIZING YET THAT THE GIRL IS KAIRI?! I mean... I know it was ten years ago, but given all that you know so far... guys. Come on. Lea, you should at ke in st put the pieces together by now.

Though, it was nice to get an explantion on WHY Isa and Lea were turned into Nobodies. They just wanted to save Kairi. They were just... a little too late.

REPLICA RIKU. THE PRESENT DAY ONE I GUESS??? AHHH. It is only later that my dumbass realizes that this is Past!Riku, the one controlled by Ansem. Forgive me about this.

MY KIDS. SO SWEET.

The day has finally come. I am ready. ... I am not ready.

AND THE CHOSEN KICK ASS. With a train. Woo woo.

What just happened. WHAT JUST HAPPENED?! I DIED?!

CHIRITHY. His voice sounds familiar...

Words cannot describe... how amazing the next few scenes are. Like... Sora... my man... I just... I want everything for you. Please let everyone survive this to the end.

THEKEYBLADES U ION CROSS HAS A REASON FOR EXISTING. AHHH MY BOY.

RIKU NO. HIW DO YOU NOT REMEMBER. Never mind answered my own question. Xehanort’s heart and shit. Nevermind. Time to kick heartless ass.

Also, just noticed that Lea's Keyblade glows. And he's holding it the same way he did his chakrams. Nice.

Yen Sid coming to save our asses. THA K YOU. And thank you, Donald. Goofy. Thanks.

And now... the final battle truly begins... tomorrow.

It's late now, and I'm a bit sad because I really wanted to beat this game today. I'm keeping my fingers crossed I can finish it before I have to go to work tomorrow, if not then on Sunday.

Guys... wish me luck. I'll take advice if anyone has any...

[asiryn]

so hey.......y’all remember when i said that sometimes, just for fun and the hell of it, i make lists of “endgame” ships in my fandoms? bc yeah, that’s a thing that i do sometimes. XD

having now finished kh3, i’ve finally finished my endgame ship list for kh, and i figured that it might be a fun thing to share!

the actual list i’m gonna put behind a cut, bc it’ll be hella long (bc seriously.....i put about 95% of the characters into ships, and this includes all of the humanoid-ish disney characters too (barring most of the villains, bc....well, those characters are dead)), but before that, i’ll give you some....idk, context behind this list. 

keep in mind, this entire affair is just like........gonna involve a fuck-ton of indulgence on my part. and most of this is fairly light-hearted. most importantly of all, this is pretty much a self-challenge: i paired up the majority of the characters just to see if i could, with the additional challenge that i could only pair them with characters that actually, canonically, have appeared in kh (this means that i couldn’t substitute in other final fantasy or disney characters); i did this to see how creative i could get with my ships, really. 

idk if i’ll ever actually get around to writing fanfic for this verse (tho i do have a lot of headcanons, and i’ve actually put (probably far too much) thought into how i think these ships would work/come about, and my long-suffering friend Ip, bless her, has been an incredibly good sport about being a sounding board for all this), but i tend to refer to it as my “Healing Vision”, and it’s basically a post-kh3 AU, that presumes that everyone but xehanort (and also eraqus) got to live happily ever after. and this verse is so named bc, apart from everyone being able to heal and be happy after the traumatic canon, i also wanted to do my absolute best to put them in.....idk, healthy ships, and not ones that i think would be more toxic. everyone had redemption arcs, is what i’m saying (even if they never did or would have gotten them in canon).

y’all don’t understand, at this point i probably have over a hundred pages in various word docs of notes about this verse, so please feel free to ask if you want to hear more about it, i need validation of my madness---

anyway, here we go!

just so that there isn’t just a massive wall of text, i’m gonna break this up into roughly 2 sections: square/original kh characters, and then the rest of the disney characters.

Square/original KH characters:

Olette/Xion/Namine/Sora/Riku [OXN, SoNami, & SoRiku], Shiki/Kairi/Selphie, Axel/Saix, Hayner/Roxas, Terra/Cinderella, Aqua/Larxene/Yuffie, Repliku/Vanitas, Ven/Beat [more friends w/ benefits], Xigbar/Luxord, Aeleus/Even, Ienzo/Demyx, Sora’s Mom/Dilan, (Cinderella’s) Prince Charming/Marluxia, Geppetto/Ansem, Tidus/Wakka, Zack/Cloud/Leon, Aerith/Tifa, Cid/Auron, Fuu/Tinker Bell, Seifer/Rai, Jack Sparrow/Setzer, Boo/Vivi [platonic], Rikku/Paine, Yuna/Elsa, Neku/Joshua, Rhyme/Snow White, Hiro/Pence, & Eraqus/Xehanort [together in death]

i have no idea what’s going on with the khux characters going forward, and atm they don’t really have anything to do this AU, but assuming they’re alive and they’re all their own characters, at least for the time being, those ships would be: Skuld/Strelitzia, Ava/Ephemer, Invi/Ira/Aced, Gula/Brain, and Sephiroth/Master of Masters (but again, these are more tentative, and i don’t actually care about these characters, really)

Disney characters:

(again, keep in mind that these are only the humanoid or really anthropomorphic characters; ones that are straight up animals, like simba for example, were not included)

Mickey/Minnie/Daisy/Donald/Goofy [M/M, D/D, MinDaisy, & qpt Donald/Goofy], Horace Horsecollar/Pete, Clarabelle Cow/Clara Cluck, Hercules/Meg, Tarzan/Jane, Aladdin/Jasmine, Ariel/Eric, Belle/Beast, Lumiere/Cogsworth, Will/Elizabeth, Quasimodo/Phoebus/Esmeralda, Kristoff/Anna/Rapunzel/Eugene, Maleficent/Aurora/Mulan/Shang/Phillip [Malora, Philora, Mulora, Mulan/Shang, Phillip/Shang], Alice/Wendy, Peter/Wendy [qpt], Peter/Tinker Bell [qpt], (BatB) Chip/Pinocchio, Anastasia/Chien Po, Yao/Prince (from Snow White), Ling/Drizella, Merlin/Yen Sid, Hades/Genie, Mrs. Potts/Flora, Merryweather/Triton, Hook/Smee, Doc/Grumpy, Blue Fairy/Dopey, Fairy Godmother/Happy, Fauna/Bashful, Slightly/Cubby [platonic], Calypso/Barbossa, Sam Flynn/Quorra, Queen of Hearts/Agrabah Merchant, (BatB) Wardrobe/Gibbs, Emperor/Sleepy [his cuddle-cubine, if you will], Grand Duke/Sneezy, Mike/Sulley, Woody/Buzz, Honey Lemon/Go Go, Wasabi/Fred, Baymax/Tron/Baymax, & Phil/Zeus

Assorted Notes:

- should probably mention that all the worlds are just vaguely All Connected Now

- ven and hercules dated in bbs (then the Plot happened, ven pretty much vanished, and eventually herc moved on. they’re a bit awkward with each other now, but they agreed it’d be too weird to even attempt to date now, bc herc outgrew ven while he was in a magic coma)

- zack’s alive bc they forced hades to resurrect him like he did with auron (my hc is that the deal he made with cloud in kh1 was to bring zack back to life, but hades reneged on this; when cloud finally shared this info with sora, a Quest was undertaken to get hades to honor the deal)

- repliku’s name in this verse is Kiru (he decided to go along with the Theme, minus the sigil); sora’s mom is named Hikari; and i’m going with henry and florian for the real names of prince charming and snow’s prince, respectively (marluxia will probably still call henry “charming” as a sort of affectionate and kind of joking nickname (bc in this verse, henry is the definition of a Disaster Gay))

- goofy and pete dated in the past, but broke up with goofy came out as aroace; pete’s still kinda bitter about it

- aqua/larxene/yuffie is 100% a thing bc i feel that aqua deserves to be able to have fun and not be the responsible mom friend for once; aqua and cinderella also have some playful flirting, but it’s never really serious

- terra’s getting a staycation with his girlfriend, and aqua’s getting a vacation with her girlfriends 

- olette/xion/namine/sora/riku is Peak indulgence for me; i love namixiolette, sonami, and soriku too much to want to choose between them? fuck it, they’re all smushed together in a poly pile now. this is my indulgence fic, i can do what i want, and none of you can stop me XP (the other sub-ship combos, riku with any of the girls, and sora with the other two girls, are more queerplatonic, ftr)

- there’s like a whole soap opera behind mickey/minnie/daisy/donald/goofy coming to their current arrangement, mostly bc the idea of giving all the Drama to these characters in particular amuses me; same with past goofy/pete

- a recurring Theme in this verse is that compulsory heterosexuality is the true darkness, and pretty much no one is straight (and so, light = gay) (this is how the final confrontation in kh3 truly went down: sora: kingdom hearts, is gay! / xehanort: shit...u right, bro. kk, lemme just fade into the light of gay with my bf then)

- sephiroth in this verse is mostly just a vehicle for me to be able to mildly punish terrible lightside mentors, so this ship with the MoM is kinda a cracky spite ship (before kh3 went all in on xehaqus, this was eraqus’s original fate XD)

- i will admit, gula/brain is mostly just me going, “you both really annoy me, and i don’t care to find you better ships, so you two can deserve each other”; to be fair to myself, this attitude was on the rarer side during this process

- hiro totally builds a robot body for tron to use to visit the outside world, tho he still chooses to live in the computer most of the time; tron’s besties with baymax 1 & 2

- i’ll be honest: scrooge, huey, dewey, louie, chip, dale, and possibly jiminy, by my rules, should have been put into ships. they’re not bc i couldn’t find any that worked for me *shrugs*

- phil is more like zeus’s on and off again boyfriend; he’s really fucking annoyed that he keeps having to train a lot of zeus’s offspring, and that he kinda, in a way, ends up doing more parenting for them than zeus does; currently phil is kinda claiming herc away from zeus (”i’m his dad now, so there”) (so at this point, their relationship is more of a hatemance than anything else) (i guess in my hc, zeus skews more towards being like his myth self than the disney version)

- the total number of ships, if you’re curious, is 75

- i’ve actually got queer headcanons for the square characters (excluding the khux squad), and some of the disney characters, figured out (as an example, namine is a demiromantic asexual)

okay, i think i’ll stop here for now, tho of course i might tweak or add things later XD

[akingdomtheorist]

KH Catch-Up: BBS FM Aqua

AQUA STORY START

"Aqua is like a mom friend and Terra is like the cool uncle."

-sees Dodge and Dodge Roll Cartwheel- "Aqus is so cool."

"Is that an outfit or does Vanitas just have glowing red abs?"

"I just realized they're all wearing X's. Xehanort knows where they are at all times!"

"Oh don't make promises-don't-MMMM..."

CASTLE OF DREAMS

"Are we gonna turn into a mouse? I'm gonna be upset if we turn into a mouse again."

"These are some ominous camera angles."

"Aw we have to deal with the evil step-bitches now?"

He is in love with Barrier Surge.

-looks in the shop- "We don't have it (Cure) yet???"

"Oh we are a mouse- god dammit."

"So Aqua is 'we're late to the party' campaign."

"Take off your super anime shoes."

"Grenades?! When did she get grenades?!"

DWARF WOODLANDS

"I like how they assume the girls aren't here to steal their shit."

"I like how theres no context to this for us. Magic Mirror is just like 'Theres another anime kid in the castle, better take care of this one too.'"

"Yep he (Ven) had to go to that great Keyblade in the sky, thats why he left."

ENCHANTED DOMINION

"Excuse me? You're not allowed to do that, that's cheating!"

"Wait was this the room with the Rainbow Rocket bullshit?"

-during Spellweaver- "I sporkle."

"Run run run run run."

"Ah, this is where we get dragon'd."

"Kay Phillip I kinda need you to do your shield thing."

"In reality throwing your sword is entirely impractical. This is why you should keep a bow on you."

RADIANT GARDEN

"I like how Radiant Garden's tower is entirely nonsensical even before Xehanort took over."

"KAIRI! THAT'S BABY KAIRI!"

"Hi Mickey, what's up?"

"I am SO POWERFUL. I AM SO POWERFUL but also squishy."

"We're not grown ups!"

"We aren't even spying on him!"

"SHE DID NOTHING WRONG! NOTHING! SHE'S BEEN CLEANING UP TERRA'S MESS THIS WHOLE DAMN TIME! SHE JUST WANTS YOU ALL TO BE FRIENDS AGAIN! I'm upset. I'm mad."

Then the grinding that was spent resulted in 32 Blizzard drops and the most op Command Deck he's ever made.

"Oh hi Vanitas. Oh we're going to destroy you."

"Oh hun I have grinded for six hours-you know let's see what Mega Flare does."

Mega Flare did nothing.

"I hate this."

"Alright, Haley Joel Osment Joker laughing was not what I expected."

OLYMPUS COLISEUM

"Can you please hold, I'm preparing your destruction."

"Is Phil hitting on me?"

"You don't want-you don't want me to do that (my best) Zack."

"I'm sorry to crush your dreams kid. I'm sorry to crush them in a giant nuclear explosion."

"OH MY GOD THIS FREEZES HIM!?"

"Look, kid you're- no you're just fighting an archmage."

-sees Hades- "Same haiiiiir."

"What rules? The rules you just made up? Well I mean you're Hades so yes the rules you just made up."

"I remember how to do this, I don't need Curaga."

"Aqua just be like 'I appreciate your enthusiasm'."

DISNEY TOWN

"-sigh- I'll go nuke 'em for ya."

"Are we playing tennis? Is this Kingdom Hearts Tennis?"

"I am not good at this mini game."

"Awww... to be fair, we all got one vote, out of three."

"Did you forget she was a princess, Pete? Did you forget she had guards?"

"Awww..."

"She dumped him in the fucking Shadow Realm!"

"Is that Malefi- of course that's Maleficent."

"I didn't realize Disney had a Shadow Realm."

DEEP SPACE

"This might be the only one Gantu gets along with. Oh wait, never mind, he had to go and ruin it."

"Alright lets go leave all these monsters so we can tell her we killed all the monsters."

"Am I high enough high jump to do this? Nope. -shuts off gravity-."

NEVERLAND

"I feel like Aqua's campaign can be summed up as "Sigh... boys."."

"I sproing."

"Man these worlds are short when you don't have to fight anything."

If you ask my opinion. "I DIDN'T."

"This is the battle of the fuckin' I-Frames here."

DESTINY ISLANDS

"Riku must just be like 'man, three weird people today'."

He's a spitting image of Ven. "AHEM. HMM."

"They still get Keyblades anyway."

KEYBLADE GRAVEYARD

"Yeah Kingdom Hearts blahdiblah things I don't understand."

"Hey Braig."

"Nope. This is gonna be the final boss isn't it."

"Now when you have I-Frames, that's cheating."

"I don't believe this is real. Okay maybe it's real."

THE SECRET MOVIE WE WATCHED OFF YOUTUBE

"Terra's SASSY."

"Oh this is where he meets Ansem."

"This is after KH2 isn't it?"

"Yeah you were kind of a dick."

"I'm so sad Aqua's gonna get Norted."

"Every time I see these three (Sea Salt Trio) I'm SAD."

"Crackpot Theory: Sora restores everybody in 3 and that's what that scene is."

"Puberty hit these kids like a truck, they went from looking twelve to seventeen like overnight."

THAT'S THE END OF BBS

[rxcusant]

Lol explain Kingdom hearts to me. Like all of it. Cause I'm confused as fk. Not KH3 tho cause I'm still going through it.

buckle up lads

so theres a buncha keyblade masters called foretellers and theyre all runnin round like headless chickens cause their master disappeared and nobodys telling each other anything so they all start fightin (except this one guy luxu voiced by max mittleman, he grabbed a box and high tailed it outta there) and then it sparks a keyblade war for all the light in kingdom hearts i think ??? and then i legit forget what happens from here because i hate ux with every fiber of my being but it made this cool place called a keyblade graveyard, its pretty dope.

fast forward 1000 years and we got the cool wayfinder trio all living in land of departure about to take their mark of mastery except terra doesnt pass because Mark Hamil Said Darkness Sucks. also we meet this old guy Xehanort he kinda sucks a lot. theres these enemies called unversed rolling around and mark hamil tells aqua and terra to go stop them but ventus said HEY IM COMING TO and ran after terra so aquas left to be the mom to bring them both home idk and its revealed ventus is made of pure light and xehanort literally split the darkness form his heart and it made vanitas-- hes responsible for all the unversed, he sucks, we dont like him but we love him-- in an effort to forge this thing called the X-Blade (PRONOUNCED LIKE KEY BLADE I HATE THIS SERIES) that will open the door to kingdom hearts, and the x-blade can only be made when pure light and darkness clash, and like... restart the keyblade war and bring about balance?? idk. And xehanort wants to live long enough to see this happen so he literally possesses terras body. Cool! Just what the poor guy needed. Ven and vanitas fight and ven sacrifices himself so he goes to take a Very Long Nap and vanitas just dies like the bitch he is. But ven’s heart finds his way to baby 5yo sora who decides HEY ILL HOARD YOU IN MY HEART FOR THE NEXT 11 YEARS and thats why roxas looks like ventus. Aqua yeets him in the land of departure and then like..locks the world up and it turns into castle oblivion.  meanwhile terra and aqua punch each other and terras about to fall into a darkness pit but aqua sacrifces heself to get him out and so she ends up trapped there for 11 years and terra??is now terranort and has amnesia and this old dude Ansem The Wise finds him and adopts him and an apprentice. yeah. bet he wont regret that decision ; )

10 years later kh1 happens and sora and riku and kairi are chilling on destiny islands until it explodes and riku fucks off to the darkness and kairi fucks off to soras hearts -- i hope she said hi to ventus in there-- and sora ends up in traverse town where he meets donald and goofy. YOU SEE king mickey of disney castle also fucked off because worlds are disappearing to darkness and he left donald and goofy a note to go find The Key cause thatll help. so they do and they journey around with sora and become good buddies i love the trinity trio so much. eventually they meet riku at hollow bastion again and hes been posssessed by this dude Ansem whos not Ansem the Wise but is actually Xehanort’s Heartless (i hate this fucking series) and they find kairis comatose body chillin in the corner and they have a fight scene thats engraved in the memory of Everyone whos ever played PS2 KH1 KAIRI! KAIRI! OPEN YOUR EYES! ITS NO USE. THAT GIRL HAS LOST HER HEART. SHE CANNOT WAKE UP. oh my god why didnt they add a skip scene button. anyway they punch the possession outta riku and sora stabs himself with the keyblade to release kairis heart BUT it also releases his own heart which created his nobody, Roxas, who got vens heart???who thats why he looks like ven?? and it created namine who is kairis nobody because??i honestly forget i hate this goddamn series. anyway soras a heartless for a few minutes but kairi got her heart and life back and wanted to get some sweet sweet screentime and so she saved sora and restored him Thank you kairi. so sora dumps kairi off at traverse town and goes to give Ansem / Xehanort’s Heartless a good ol ass whopping ad they win and restore the worlds but kairi and sora are separated again I’LL COME BACK TO YOU, I PROMISE! I KNOW YOU WILL! WHEN YOU WALK AWAY YOU DONT HEAR ME SAY PLEAAAAAAASE OH BABYYY DONT GO oh also riku and king mickey and sora closed the door to kingdom hearts and trapped riku and mickey in the realm of darkness, that was a thing.

and then chain of memories happened. theyre in castle oblivion!!! whoa!! we meet the organization for the first time! whoa!!! we meet namine!! whoa!!! so like namine has sora-memory powers and can tinker with his memories and the memories of everyone hes connected to (AND HOLY FUCK IS THAT BOY CONNECTED TO A LOTTA PEOPLE NAMINE IS VERY POWERFUL) and the organization is making namine rewrite soras memories as he progresses throuhg castle oblivion to turn him into marluxias pawn so he cna use sora to like..overhtrow the organization, i think?? i hate this seriees. but it all works out in the end except soras memories are so scrambled he decides to sleep for a year to get all the right ones back. MEANWHILE RIKUS IN THE BASEMENT OF CASTLE OBLIVION and hes fighting his own demons i mean darkness i mean ansem i mean xehanorts heartless and he meet up with mickey a few times and then he meets DiZ and he also meets a replica of himself--yeah by the way the organization is making replicas, That Sure Wont Ever Be Referenced Again : )-- and its this game that rikus like YEAH I CAN USE THE DARKNESS AS POWER AND STRENGTH and HES GONNA WALK THE ROAD TO DAWN and then every riku rper put dawn in their url and i got confused trying to keep them all straight lord please help me im a little ol sammi

then we have 358/2 days for the DS which i never replayed cause it was tedious af which is all about the organization and roxas’s time in the organization and meeting his best buds axel and xion and saix standing in the corner being a jealous little binch PLEASE SAIX JUST BE NICE THEYLL GIVE YOU ICE CREAM TOO IF YOU ASK POLITELY Xion is another replica except shes a replica of sora but something got messed up and she got his memories of kairi which is why she looks like her but with black hair for whatever reason, i think nomura just wanted a cool goth girl to add to the series and we all thank him for it, and she and roxas become so close they kinda start influencing that weird memory shit going on and xion keeps trying to leave the organization to set things right but axel always gets stuck with the icky jobs and we got the iconic GO ON YOU JUST KEEP RUNNIN BUT ILL ALWAYS BE THERE TO BRING YOU BACK and i think around this time roxas is also super fed up with the organization and decides FUCK YALL IM DONE and punches saix and leaves. but xion finds him and they have a cool boss battle sequence got i love you xion you are a POWERHOUSE but roxas defeats her and she dies and its the saddest thing in the world AND NOBODY REMEMBERS HER WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT ABOUT!!!! anyway roxas decides hes gonna punch kingdom hearts next cause it was xions last wish but riku, who is sporting a cool blindfold for edge, is like HEY WE NEED YOU TO WAKE UP SORA and roxas is all SORA THIS SORA THAT I DONT GIVE A FUCK and tey fight! and riku loses cause roxas has two keybladees! OBLIVION IS THE BEST KEYBLADE IT LOOKS SUPER COOL I LOVE IT SO MUCH WOW but riku rips off his blindfold and summons the darkness and he takes on ansems, xehanorts heartless, appearance and he squeezes roxas until he passes out and then they yeeted roxas into a data twilight town for a few days.

so enter kh2 with the 6 hours roxas tutorial in the data twilight town until he goes to find sora and returns to him. SO FINALLY AFTER AN ENTIRE YEAR sora wakes up with all his proper memories and so does donald and goofy and theyre like COOL LETS GO FIND RIKU AND KING MICKEY and they go journeying around the worlds again to stop the organization. meanwhile axels gettin desperate to see his best friend for life roxas again and kidnaps kairi but shes like HEY I AINT HAVING THAT and runs off and ends up in twilight town but axel finds her and kidnaps her anyway but then saix kidnaps her to the world that never was. and so soras like WE GOTTA GO SAVE KAIRI AND RIKU NOW cause by the way earlier like midpoint of the game maybe Mickey was like SAY FELLAS DID SOMEONE MENTION THE DOOR TO DARKNESS and its one of my favorite quotes in this hell franchise, so like THYE KNOW KING MICKEY IS OK that just leaves kairi and riku and stopping the organization. so they find kairi and they find riku and sora cries a bit and im just happy the destiny trio is together again. And DiZ showed up again, hes actually ansem the wise, and he talks about computers and hearts and research and xemnas, the organizations leader, is likeI WAS YOUR APPRENTICE! BUT YOU DIDNT LET ME DO ILLEGAL HUMAN EXPERIMENT SON HEARTS SO I KICKED YOU OUT AND RREMOVED MY OWN HEART AND THATS WHY THERES A HEARTLESS AND A NOBODY OF XEHANORT and ansem the wise is like YEAH BITCH and he explodes and riku turns back to normal but he also really needs a haircut. so they go punch xemnas in his zebra coat and riku and sora chill in the realm of darkness for about ten minute son the beach, i guess aqua was hanging out somewhere else, and they get a message form kairi in a bottle and the door to light opens and they go home and it was literally!!!!! a better fucking ending!!!! than kh3!!!!!!!!! thats my tea!!!!!!

so then we have KH3D, dream drop distance, which begins telling us ‘hey when you kill a heartless and a nobody that person is gonna be recompleted so uhhhhh xehanorts coming back Thats Not Good, make sora and riku do their mark of mastery test in the realm of sleep to get the power of waking’ and thats the whole game but its great because flowmotion! dream eaters!  TWEWY TWEWY TWEWY T W E W Y!!!!!! playable riku!!! fun worlds!!! soriku!!! except KH3D’s fatal flaw is THEY INTRODUCED TIME TRAVEL INTO THIS FUCKING COMPLEX HELL HOLE I WILL NEVER FORGIVE THEM FOR THAT. anyway rikus been doing a great hecking job!!!! except sora ended up in twtnw and kept chasing the dreams into the deepest pit of slumber and the organization broke his heart so they use him as one of xehanorts vessels [gesutres to my blog with will smith arms] yeeah babey. and riku is understandably like HEY GIVE ME MY FRIEND BACK and xehanort is like FUCK OFF TWINK and mickey and donald and goofy and axel, whos been recompleted as lea, arrive and steal comatose sora back form xehanort and xehanort monologues about the X-Blade split into 20 pieces- 7 of light, 13 of darkness- and so hes gonna make 13 vessels of darkness with his heart inside them and the guardians of light gotta gather 7 lights to clash and bringg about the keyblade war or bring about kingdom hearts, i-- i literally hate this series so much Why do you think i went on a year long hiatus??? i needed to calm the fuck down-- either way xehanort yeets off with his darknesses and soras STILL comatose and rikus like I WILL DIVE INTO HIS SLEEP AND SAVE HIM BECAUSE DEARLY BELOVED IS PLAYING AND if i continue this joke someones bound to get mad at me for ‘’’pushign a soriku agenda’’’ BUT YKNOW WHAT, RIKUS A REAL MVP AND PUNCHES A NIGHTMARE VEN AND SAVES SORA AND SORA HUGS HIM AND ITS GREAT AND I LOVE MY SONS SO MUCH and the kh3d ends with them saying ‘hey look kairis gonna do something!’ but Little Did We Know.

and thats your summary of what the fuck happened in kingdom hearts. i hate this game so much.

[psianabel]

KH3 thoughts under the cut. Spoilers for everything. Kinda got long, lol.

I’m used to make up happy stories about my favorite characters, think about them in happy situations, make up happy ending AUs. The more I proceeded in this game, the more I just ... recieved. Happy things. Over and over and over and my tears didn’t stop. 

This ending is e x a c t l y what i wished for in my life. Minus Sora but lets leave him out here They are all here. They got their hugs. All of them. Heck, even the wayfinder trio got to hug Eraqus, I’m goddamn living. I didn’t know I needed Riku, Roxas, and Terra racing on Destiny Island (and Terra being the slowest because he is, lmao). Isa getting welcomed into the friendship group y e s ... And Lea, Isa, Ven playing with Lea’s frisbee. And eating ice cream on the clock tower with the Twillight Town crew. Namine and Xion looking for seashells together. Ven’s Chirithy coming back to him????? ALL OF THEM OUT OF THEIR COATS AND HAVING ACTUAL CLOTHES. Holy goddamn this, this is what my heart was longing for.

khux not important my ass. I’m so glad the Age of Fairy Tales is one of my fave story arcs, I was screaming at that epilogue and it is very high up in my list of fave scenes of that game (only because i want that Foreteller content. AVA MY GIRL WHERE ARE YOU). Also that Luxu reveal? Wasn’t surprised but damn I’m so in for that ride.  Speaking of khux, all these hints, my h e a r t. Ven dreaming of the Foretellers, Ephemera being there for Sora (which makes me wonder about Sora’s involvement of the story there but lets see about that), the 300 keykids!!! I even recognized some names, that was so fucking cool. (I died there because I was so busy looking at the names....) And I guess we have to expect Demyx and Luxord in khux soon huh.  Sort of khux related, but thank the lord for giving me that Marluxia and Larxene fight together. Since Elrena’s reveal and knowing she knew Lauriam even back then, I wished for this so so much. And their interactions in battle, blessed. Perfect. Good. These two, I swear.

Insert something about the Secret Reports here. Love this cryptic stuff. Luxu you sly fox, my theory is he is gonna pass No Name onto Blaine, I also believe the girl there is Skuld, which would also be the girl Lea and Isa searched for, huh ... this is gonna get so wild. Even wilder with Blaine being Eraqus’ ancestor. God these reports are gving me so much im in love. Aqua. My girl, my love. My heart hurt so much at the Anti Aqua fight, but the whole setup was just perfect. (Not gonna lie, the name Aquanort is still close to my heart. And I probably continue calling her that, lmao.) I cried so fucking much when they were at the Destiny Islands then, hugging her. LIKE, YES, PLEASE SHE IS FREE. And fricking Land of Departure. The fight. THE F I G H T. I WAS READY FOR THIS god yes, playing her for one last time, wonderful, just wonderful. The whole scene there, Ventus waking up, Vanitas calling him brother, I wouldn’t have wanted it in any other way.  “Good morning, Ven.” KSDJFHDSF??? Y E S 

Something about Eraqus and Xehanort. Old husbands really cannot live without each other, and it showed. Together forever now huh. Please Eraqus, make sure he will never do something stupid again.

Uhhhh since this is a videogame I think I have to say something about the gameplay. I love it. The fighting feels so good, with all the triangle commands it makes things interesting. Sora’s mobility is great - the shotlock, the wall climbing, and he finally gets the double jump wooh. Lots to farm, but hey it’s KH, it’s okay.  I wish Donald and Goofy would shut up about ingredients lmao. ... fuck Gummiship tho, but this kind of stuff isnt my thing anyways, but I’ll manage, oh well lol.

RIGHT Disney/Pixar is a thing too. Can’t say much about it, since I don’t really care that much about it, but I looove how these character stand up to roast the evil KH characters lmaooo, go Woody and Sully. I was screaming. The did That.

What they also did is that goddamn secret ending, which I’m HMMM about, but hey it’s a Secret Ending and Nomura is really out there for blood. Good for him. All I can say is, well, see you in Shibuya.  Alright. There are still so many things, but. I just have to say.  I love this game. I enjoyed it so so much. I’m so grateful I was able to play it without seeing leaks or spoilers. If someone would have shown me a picture of the ending where they eat ice cream on the clocktower ... i wouldn’t have believed it. The game set it up for me perfectly. 

I treasure these characters. And I’m happy they found their happy ending. This is what I wanted. Thank you for that.

... until the next act opens. Can’t wait to see how Luxu takes the lead now.  Eraqus cheats at chess, part 2.

What have you planned, boy ...