#anyways this is terrible but i have no motivation and work might kill me

[bonefall]

Better Bones Profile: Houndleap

"The horrifying eldritch fallen angel likes ME best because I'm hot"

[ID: The Better Bones AU version of Houndleap from Warrior Cats. He is a black-and-white tom with ginger flecks in his black parts, and a fluffy white tail tuft. His ears are burned away, and he has orange, swirly keloid scars. He also has a heart-shaped paw pad.]

Here by popular request! Holy MOLY you all jumped on the offhanded manwhore comment lmao.

Houndleap's a great example of cats who are in the Dark Forest for breaking non-violent commandments. The only thing he's killing is the gene pool, with his 6 known mates and the 16 kittens between them all. No, he wasn't in love with them all either, he just liked to play the game.

He is as close to the ideal Clan cat as one can get, and he knows it, and flaunts it. Tri-colored with beautiful ginger flecks, he fell victim to a terrible moor fire and came out with severe burns. His surviving was already a great mark of strength, but then he became even luckier when his shiny scars raised, and slightly spread from the initial injury.

Clan cats didn't have a word for keloids, they only knew it was gorgeous. As if StarClan had given him a scar that dances and shimmers.

Houndleap "abused" this gift, seeing as many cats as possible and cheating on his 'official' mate back home. In the modern era, he might have just been a very popular Honor Sire, but this was before the Queen's Rights and the Aftergathering. He was eventually caught, and after his death, he was banished to the Dark Forest for violating the Law of Loyalty on more than 5 counts.

Yes. More than 5 counts. StarClan was able to see that he had even more than 5 halfclan mates (and they're not even counting the wife he cheated on) but only 5 got pregnant.

Alignment: Dark Forest, ex-WindClan

Time Period: Skyfall Era

Relations: Too fucking many

Houndleap's addition to the Dark Forest is Lover's Beck, a twisted, romantic version of a spot in the Gorge where he used to meet with his secret lovers. It's his worst memory because he planned poorly and two of them showed up at the same time and that's how he got caught.

More trivia below!

Canon said he's solid-colored and I said no. Pretty boy.

There are several minor features in his design that will be seen in modern family lines. I won't point them out but there's 3 total (so far.)

I decided to use him as an example of nearly ideal beauty standards in BB, since I famously overhauled them from canon. He is brightly colored with complicated patterns, slightly chunky, and has a HUGE scar on the face.

Personality is slut. He just wants to flirt, man. Theme song is Mambo #5 he's just like that.

He works with Tigerstar in OotS mostly because it's not like there's anything better to do. Plus some of the trainees are hot, "hellooooo Ratscar"

When Antpelt dies, Houndleap is one of the cats who needs the most convincing to come back into the alliance. It's one thing when it's funny haha Attack And Dethrone God or whatever, but PERMAdeath??

Thankfully, Hawkfrost is a fantastic diplomat.

Generally, Houndleap is motivated by whatever's fun. He was one of the first to fall in line under Ashfur and will do basically anything if he's bored.

"We're teaching people how to kill? sure lmao. Oh we're attacking the living? Ok cool. Guard the prisoners? Not like I had plans anyway. Anyway wanna get evil dinner later, handsome <3 ?"

Likes drama, tea, stories, games, anything that brings him a little excitement really.

He can usually be counted on to join whatever silly project the group's up to this time, like catching Shrewpaw's Pheasant.

I cannot stress enough how much of a normal Crummy Dude he is. He's just some standard jerkwad guy. The Dark Forest in Better Bones contains several people like him, who might be sleazeballs or jackasses, but we would generally agree don't deserve Hell.

When canon comes up with a Houndleap backstory, I'll consider what to do with it. But for now we only know that Hound came from WindClan, which I've included.

[l0t4n]

WHAT IF THEY WERE. WALTER WHITE

a/n I have many wips and I am struggling to finish any of them so you get this for now. Also keep in mind I never actually finished the show and I didn't like it anyways I just think the idea is funny. Posting as a buffer for everyone who did not follow for nsfw bc I'm posting it 2nite regardless watch out

Contains TW drugs, references to violence. What it says. Would they do the shit Walter White did in Breaking Bad? The brothers + dateables. Gn mc mentioned once

LUCIFER

-Yeah.

-He would do absolutely all of it step by step, word for word

-Maybe he would not be as mean as Walter is, but he would absolutely give that “I AM. The danger, Skylar” speech

-Just to MC instead

-And Mammon is Jesse

MAMMON

-I think in his head he would like to think he would/could

-Definitely fucking can't though

-Doesn't understand the chemistry even if someone guided him, would definitely fuck up really bad

-Would be in it for the money, would brag about how he'd make an excellent drug kingpin, is lying

-The moment he needs to shoot someone he's running away

LEVIATHAN

-Not a chance bro

-The closest he would get would be filling in the role of Gale

-Even then, that's a stretch

-It's too scary :(( what if all the drug mules think he's cringe

-Yeah sure he did all those illegal things but the police probably wouldn't care so much if he was cooler

-Absolutely not suited for the meth-making lifestyle

SATAN

-Wouldn't do it if it was his life on the line. Would only do it to get back at someone else

-Ruining Lucifer’s reputation by selling illicit substances out of the HoL

-Probably the most suitable for drug manufacturing. Not anything else though

-Would be the most likely to be despised by everyone else in the distribution chain

-It's a high-stress environment and he takes out his anger on all of them

ASMODEUS

-Personal protective equipment is ugly and the meth business is a thankless one. There is no possibility for him to gain fame and attention doing that unless he also wants to go to prison

-Probably finds it kind of gross and messy too

-There are a number of illegal activities that are far better suited for a demon like him and he knows it

BEELZEBUB

-Eats the meth

-The end

BELPHEGOR

-Perhaps unsurprisingly, would likely have both the intelligence and personality to make it work

-But the meth-making process takes forever, and there are so many points where you can accidentally die, so I think he knows better

-Would accidentally fall asleep and melt his skin off his body

-Also has virtually no reason to do it in the first place; isn't hurting for cash like Mammon and doesn't really care about his reputation like Lucifer

DIAVOLO

-Would have trouble grasping the severity of drug manufacturing and dealing

-Might only get into the scheme if coaxed by the promise of friendship

-I do not put it above him to realize that it is also illegal, however

-Albeit he has had his moments of considering himself above the law, which, if anyone is, it's him, so maybe not

-Will bail the moment someone yells at him or pulls a gun on him, whatever happens first

BARBATOS

-Gus

-His moral alignment and motivations are too vague. Either his moral compass is too strong or he would be the best drug kingpin the devildom has ever seen. Maybe both at the same time

-Would get suitably angry if anyone else got involved though

-Money laundering pro. If nothing else is true I know this is canon

SIMEON

-Oh good heavens

-Deary me

-Maybe with his skills in baking he would do well, but you'd need to lie to him about what you're making

-Shocked and appalled when he finds out

-Most everyone else is nice to him though

SOLOMON

-Probably makes illicit substances for his funny evil wizard experiments

-Since it's a form of cooking though the batches always end up terrible

-Meth that makes all your bones turn to jelly and kills you in five days

-Since he is far removed from human matters of mortality and injury, he probably thinks it's funny

-Evil ass

[skylinx2o]

Admittedly, I've been feeling terrible lately. I didn't even finish my weekly drawing and broke my now months long streak. I thought I would be able to do it, but my emotions weighted me down too much. I might go back to drawing one art every two weeks.

Anyway, I feel like I should do more fun things. I mean, drawing is fun, and I love creating stories for my OCs, but I do have a lot of other interests. And tho I'm sticking to talking about LEGO today, I want to talk more and get out of my shell. And maybe give you more insight into me as a person.

So today I'm going to talk about my favourite LEGO themes and why I love the series, plus how I personally got i to all of them. It's not a normal review whatsoever, just an excuse to ramble about my interests freely. Just remember this is my experience and my feelings.

(And it's not at all like I'm making this post because I need all of this to prepare for a speaking class and the only way to motivate myself is by making a post about it o _o Come on, I'm killing two birds with one stone here!)

Okay, so, my all-time favourite themes are (in chronological order to when I found them):

1. Bionicle

Honourable mention: Hero Factory

2. Ninjago

3. Legends of Chima

4. Monkie Kid

5. Dreamzzz

1. So. Bionicle. I have a weird history with Bionicle. My dad's friends used to get movies for us, and one day it just happened that my dad's friends gave us a pen drive with Bionicle: Legend Reborn on it. I think I would be around... Seven or eight when I watched it I've seen fans say that it was a pretty weak film, but I didn't know Bionicle back then, and I really enjoyed it! That movie was a soft reboot of the series, and as someone who started their Bionicle obsession with that movie, in my opinion it worked really well as a standalone supposed to capture new audiences. I really loved the sense of mystery that was probably lost on new fans. It wasn't exactly explained what or who Mata Nui was, besides him being a warrior who lost his people. And the ending... I really thought there would be a sequel to it, and was really intrigued by whom the great beings were, and what happened to the world, why Mata Nui knew them, what the giant ahh robots were supposed to do.

Of course, when a few years later in middle school I looked for the sequel, I didn't find it. And to be honest, the ending was disappointing to me. However, there was a whole other storyline in Bionicle to catch up on! And so one faithful summer was spent reading all the comics I could find, reading wiki pages one after another, playing Mata Nui online game obsessively, refusing to use a walkthrough. Believe me when I say I was obsessed!

And then out of nowhere in 2015 g2 came out, and I was stoked since I missed out on practically the whole g1 as it was being made. (I mean, it's understandable, I was born the same year the first Bionicle movie came out.) I mean, can you blame me for being excited? A dead franchise that I just started becoming a devoted fan of is suddenly revived from the grave. I felt like the luckiest person on earth that day. Honestly, g2 was a lot simpler than g1, but I really like it, even if most people said it sucked. Sure, it wasn't exactly like g1, and even I cringed a few times when watching the g2 show, but for what it was, it was cool in my eyes, and loved finding all the g1 references. And there were quite a few of them! The story of g2 was simpler, but for little kids I think it would've been fine. But alas, LEGO did a crap job promoting it, and it died early, with an ending that was so bad even I can't defend it. It just didn't make sense, and it was rushed as hell. But I still wished it would've continued.

I love both generations for different things, and I'm sad I didn't get any g2 sets when they were out (Lewa was my favourite one). But years later I managed to get a promotional anniversary set of Tahu and Takua, and you wouldn't believe my happiness when I was building it. It's strange being a relatively new fan compared to others I see online, but I still remember seeing Bionicle commercials, and even have a very vague memory of seeing a Phantoka commercial on our ancient TV. I mean come on, I was so into it, I even learned the Matoran alphabet! My mom had to listen to my countless rambling, and if I ask her about Bionicle today, she still remembers some answers, that's how much into it I was. Hell, this blog started as a Bionicle blog before I moved fully to Monkie Kid content.

Okay, this Bionicle ramble is getting a tad long, so I'll wrap this up. Would I recommend Bionicle to anyone? Well... Not really, unless you like long lore researching adventures. The story is so convoluted, with many sides stories, and it went on for so many years, that despite my obsession I still probably missed like, 40% of the lore. G1 at least, wouldn't vibe with casual audience probably. G2 might be easier on the brain, despite it having some deeper lore too. Plus, there's the cultural appropriation issue, that I'm not qualified to talk about, but others already made pages long blogs and articles about. Plus the weird gender situation. But, it's still a good story in my eyes, despite its many faults. But that's just me, and if you didn't catch on yet, I'm already deep in this hole and there's no getting out of here now.

Honourable mention: This brings us to Hero Factory. I watched the first few episodes at around the same time as the first Bionicle movie. Came from the same source as before. I think it deserves a mention, because I still loved it, and did some lore digging, but I wasn't as obsessed with it as the other positions on the list. I didn't like the later stuff as much, tho some concepts were really cool too. But the story of the first episodes was really well done, and worked great as a movie. The fights were tense, and when watching it for the first time, I couldn't really know if the characters would be okay. Honestly, it got me really excited and invested. A factory of heroes is a unique concept, and I always found it intriguing how they made the robot society work. But, I don't think it needed more time than it needed, unlike Bionicle, where I didn't like the ending of either generation. I think it wrapped things up quite well with the first episodes, and the later ones just feel like cool side stories, and it works in my opinion.

This one I would definitely recommend, because I feel like it's underrated, and it's not long. Like I said, the version I got was just a one movie like compilation. I checked and there's just 11 episodes. It would probably take 1–2 hours to watch it, not counting the later movies and all.

2. Next one is Ninjago! I started watching it almost from the start. I must have been around ten or so... The episodes aired on TV, so I had easy access to it! I almost never missed an episode, and watched even the reruns. And believe me, I was hypnotised when watching it. Tho, starting from rebooted I watched the episodes online, first in my native language, then in English since I started getting too impatient to wait. This was my first obsession. For the longest time, when people asked me what I wanted to do, I said I wanted to be a ninja. One of my oldest OCs is Mika, and she grew up with me. Whenever a new season was to come, I would design a new suit for her. I have a whole dedicated blog to her, I wonder if you all can find it lol. Anyway, for a kid's show, the first seasons were really well written, and the show could be dark when it wanted, but it didn't lack jokes, and most were very funny. And honestly, Ninjago had a really big impact on my life. It taught me not to give up, and it made me want to make the world a better place. Grade school was a horrible time for me, and Ninjago was like my escape. Tho, I might have daydreamed about it too much at one point...

I started distancing myself from Ninjago around hands of time. I didn't watch the show as regularly, catching up on seasons long after they aired. I think that's also where the writing quality started dropping… I just didn't like it as much any more. But it should've been expected with a series that went on for so long. I'm not one of the people who think old Ninjago was better than anything. It wasn't perfect at all. But I didn't like the short format of newer seasons. But then secrets of forbidden spinjitzu dropped, and i as a person started getting better too, so I went back to Ninjago, and while it wasn't still the best and people had a lot of issues I loved those few next seasons. I mean, they somehow hit right into my interests with those seasons. First the adventure movies like atmosphere with the Egyptian like tomb, then they get sucked into a video game, then the very DnD like feeling Shintaro. It was right up my alley. My love for Ninjago was back in full force by then. So you can imagine how sad I was when the word that Ninjago was ending started going around. The series has been with me for half my life. My friends even knew how much I liked it, my best IRL friend even bought me a Ninjago set for Christmas one time. But you know, I thought it was probably Ninjago's time. Nothing can last forever after all, and it had a very good run. Why not end it when the story was still quite alright? And then… Crystallized happened. I didn't watch Crystallized. I heard the spoilers, and I wasn't… thrilled. Especially with Harumi. And people hated that season. It left a bitter taste in my mouth. It didn't feel like a send-off Ninjago deserved.

So you can imagine how damn happy I was about Dragon Rising! And surprise, it's the best Ninjago has been in a while! I absolutely loved the first season. The new characters are wonderful, and that change was certainly what Ninjago needed. And the fact that it's merged with one of other of my beloved LEGO series only makes it better. And that's probably my cue to move to it hehe

So, would I recommend Ninjago? Yeah. Its story is easy to follow, you just need to watch the show. If you're ready to watch sixteen+ seasons that it! Even the worse seasons have some value to them I'd argue. But I may be biased with how close to my heart that series is.

3. Yeah boy, Legends of Chima! I started watching Chima around the same time I started watching Ninjago, and I was equally hooked. And yes, my mom remembers this one as well, I watched it every time it was on too. Actually, I think the first fanfiction I've ever written was about Chima. With a pencil on paper. I think that, while the other series captivated me because of magic or the setting or the action, in Chima it was the characters and their dynamics mostly, despite there being plenty of magic powers and action too, plus a unique setting. The main characters all have distinct personalities, and it's fun to see how their personalities clash or work together. I think it's cool because the conflict between lions and crocodiles takes the main stage in the first season. Later seasons are great too, and they shake things up to make things interesting quite well. The lore isn't as broad as in other series, but it's pretty cool and interesting either way. There were some unique concepts there. I can't explain my love for this theme as well as with other series, because I don't think there was anything big that made me like it. It's just a cool show. I think what there was has been satisfying, tho young me was really sad and angry it ended anyway. But it's great for what it was. But I can't say I'm not happy that Chima is now merged with Ninjago, and it works so well together, and I absolutely love Lord Ras.

I would absolutely recommend it. It's a fun show, and only three seasons long. It can be both fun and serious, and I definitely had a blast watching it.

4. Now one of my newer obsessions! Monkie Kid! I watched the pilot in Chinese when it came out, then I promptly forgot about the series and binge-watched it all when season 3 came out. I was reading about Journey to the West long before the series was announced, since I have a liking for old stories and legends and myths and stuff. And Asian cultures fascinate me. I blame Ninjago with its Japanese influence and all the martial arts movies that were on the TV all the time. Plus Mulan and Kung Fu Panda. Anyway, I can't say much about how accurate it is or anything since I'm not Chinese, but I think the show is great. I noticed a lot of references to Journey To The West. No shocker here, it's inspired by it. But being in this fandom made me learn a lot of new things about China, tho I still have a bunch of things to learn. I'm no expert yet. Tho, I try my best to be respectful.

Umm... Like I said, not much to say about how accurate the story is. But I really liked Journey to the West, so naturally I like Monkie Kid too. Plus, MK i really relatable to me. I feel like my personality is really similar to his, tho I'm more introverted. For some reason, I relate to this portrayal of Macaque and Wukong as well.

I dare to say that from all the series so far, I find this one to be the most well written. I just find the writing to be the most impactful. Plus, the artstyle is very different from other LEGO shows. Action scenes are really fun. The artstyle definitely works in its favour. And yeah, I would recommend this show 100%.

5. And finally, the newest addition to the LEGO series, Dreamzzz! The show is really new and just starting, but I love the concept and the writing! Plus again, I really relate to Mateo. The characters feel like real people you would meet, and how they interact feels realistic. And I found myself liking even the characters that annoyed me, because their personalities were the realistic type of annoying, one that you might find out in the wild. And the concept of a dream world just really speaks to me. And it gives the creators a lot of creative freedom. All wacky things can happen in a dream after all. One thing I didn't expect in the show was the secret agency, and I think it's a clever addition to the story.

I would recommend this series. I hope it'll have a bright future, and that the writing will stay this good.

Well, time to wrap all of this up. Whoever suffered through this whole ramble deserves a juice and a cookie 🍪🧃 For a few finishing thoughts... I noticed a lot of the series I like blend magic powers and technology together. I just thought it's interesting. And I wanted to mention that the songs for Bionicle, Ninjago and Chima absolutely slap. I used to listen to them on repeat all the time lol Even my mom really enjoyed those songs

Yeah, I don't know what this post was for, I just felt like writing all that :v

[princeescaluswords]

ur addition to ur post about scott being forced to treat derek terribly reminded me of the way ppl react to alina killing the darkling. like yeah her killing him was the only way to resolve the situation she'd been put in (by darkles himself). yet ppl keep doing rewrites where alina is meant to 'fix' him or joins his side like. Huh?????

(I must preface this with the reminder that I have only seen the Shadow and Bone television series. I know nothing of any differences that might be in the novels.)

There's nothing wrong with rewriting a story; that's what fanfiction is for, after all. But if someone wishes to write an ending where Alina Starkov chooses Aleksander Morozova, they have their work cut out for them. It requires them to alter the characters and histories of either the Sun Summoner or the Darkling (or both) so much that they literally become different characters. My concern (and I think you share in this) is that people believe that Alina, as portrayed, could easily have chose to be with Aleksander, as portrayed, and they could have a happily ever after.

I can't possibly see any scenario where this can be true. Let us propose, for example, that we vanish Mal Orestev. Poof! He never existed. Alina's early life would still have been dominated by oppression and prejudice, oppression and prejudice that exists in part because of Aleksander's choices, no matter how noble the motivations for those choices were at the beginning. While grisha have always faced oppression, Alina's youth was shaped by fear and disenfranchisement; her life was defined by either her race, her poverty (exacerbated by the Fold), or her potential as the Sun Summoner. This world, in turn, was shaped by Aleksander's actions. No matter how charming and passionate the Darkling is, Alina's history and her character would propel her to question her own feelings for him and his feelings for her. Alina would be betraying every part of herself if she chose the life promised by Aleksander, and I think the story, as portrayed, makes that very clear.

But let's say she did it anyway; with her strength of will, she decided that she would join with the Darkling and accept the injustice done to her (and everyone else) as insufficient to prevent her from being with him. There still can be no happy ending in sight. Nothing in the history or character of Aleksander Morozova indicates that he would be content or even able to treat Alina as an equal, as a real partner. He certainly didn't respect her when she defied him. Everything we see and know about him indicates a pattern of dominating everyone around him, from his loyal followers to his own mother. I don't feel that the fact that Alina is his equal in magical power would help their relationship in any way. Aleksander would see in the Sun Summoner a danger if he could not control her, and Alina would have to become submissive.

Again, fanfiction has great powers of transformation, but there is a limit to how far a writer can stretch plot, setting, and most importantly characterization before it must be questioned if there is still a meaningful connection to the original material. Once that point is breached, readers like you and me have to question if the writer is actually not a fan but only insincerely passing themselves off as one.

This is my problem with the many spiteful interpretations of Master Plan (2x12). For example, I often bring up that people rewriting that scene tend to ignore the immediate mortal danger Allison was in when Gerard demands Scott make Derek bite him. Their motivation is obvious. The know as well as I do that there is nothing in Scott's nature or history, as portrayed, would lead him to place place Derek's autonomy above saving Allison's life, especially when Scott knows that Derek's Bite will disable (if not kill) Gerard and thus save Derek, Allison, and Derek's pack as well? There is simply no alternative that makes sense.

Like Alina, Scott's decisions had been shaped by what he had endured for the previous twenty-four episodes. While, contrary to popular fandom interpretation, he didn't hate Derek, being honest with Derek would require him to ignore too much. Derek had concealed information from him (the alpha's very existence), manipulated him repeatedly ("It's not going to come for free"), disregarded his needs ("I can't let her live!"), and outright betrayed him three times (the locker room shower, the cure, Peter's resurrection). Derek had demonstrated that he would chose lethal violence repeatedly and -- what is arguably worse -- had been a spectacular failure every time he tried to do that. Gerard, on the other hand, had delivered on every single threat he had made. Peter himself made that point in Battlefield (2x11): "You weren't ready. Because of it, Gerard is winning." The wisest plan was the one Scott went with. The only possible counter argument -- Derek's terrible history with Kate -- was something that Scott did not know about. There's a reason Derek didn't hold Master Plan against Scott, and it wasn't bad writing.

I feel our dissatisfaction with particular fandom behaviors isn't about some insistence that canon is sacrosanct. To us, the transformation they are performing is incomplete and ill-wrought, like a badly Photoshopped picture where someone we appreciate ends up having three arms, because the writer/fandom isn't working with the whole subject but only the parts that they want to change, yet they try to pass it off as a real picture. For me, personally, this dissatisfaction also arises from the idea that there are not-so-hidden motivations for the transformation: racism, classism, decadence, and misogyny.

Fiction often portrays dark events as well as heroic events, and if it is quality fiction, all those events are clearly motivated and make sense according to the plot and within the setting. It's an organic whole. Alina would not choose the Darkling and be happy because it goes against everything we know about both of them; Scott created his Master Plan because it goes along with everything we've watched him experience. Different outcomes would require different stories.

[romeave]

Been thinking about Zane because ive seen your posts and asks so this might be word salad, but to me Zane's always been a very calculated guy, his instances of violence tend to come out of necessity (in regards to his evil ass plots). That probably isn't worded the best but stick with me here

The best couple examples I can think of are when we first meet him, he threatens Aphmau + her village multiple times because he needs garroth to come back with him, like in Molly's house and outside the baby shower, its not that he doesn't enjoy causing violence (he clearly does), but he'd rather avoid it if possible because it causes issues for him - hes a guy in power, particularly iirc he was representing okhasis which atp was becoming a quiet monarchy and political fuck ups could, well, fuck him up. Another instance of this "necessary" violence was with jeffery, another political murder. Again, he enjoyed it, but he probably wouldnt have done it if jeffery didnt fuck up his plans and let aphmau and the lords go.

All in all, he was a very threatening guy, yeah, but he didn't like. go out of his way to do violent or cruel things no matter how fun or easy he found it to do, he was very smart.

i think a lot of people misremember how he was because of the s1 finale, the whole threatening to rip Aphmau apart line really stuck with people, but the way i view it was a moment of desperation (plus we dont know how the relic forms fuck with the wielders emotions, but idk how I feel about that kinda theorizing). Like imagine; Zane, a man who's predispositioned to necessary violence, reaches what could be said is his end goal (or pre-end goal, I don't remember what he was planning on using the relic for? to become some kinda god? irrelevant to me rn) and suddenly its RIPPED from him in an instant - but, there's no witnesses, no potential consequences, if he kills this woman and gets that relic he's got whatever power his mind has come up with, or she kills him and he fucking dies and atp it wouldn't matter to him anyway (side note, still hate that he turns into a shadow knight). of COURSE he's going to lash out, threaten her, threaten to kill her and take what he believes to be rightfully his.

An interesting thing I also noticed, is that after this occurs, his motivations stay ultimately the same when he dies and comes back as a shadow knight - now without support of a whole kingdom, he works in the shadows (haha pun) to get something he wants, and threatens Emmalyn (iirc it was emmalyn???? I could be wrong, we're saying its emmalyn) for it, holding her hostage away from the village, not bringing her out as a display or a hostage to get what he wants from the people, it'd blow his cover.

tl;Dr - Zane's violence and cruelty throughout the series is very calculated, he doesn't act without knowing (or having a good idea of) what the outcome is, and is really only shown to be excessively or "needlessly" violent when he hits a moment of deep, deep desperation and even then I imagine he had a good idea of what would happen afterwards, and decided to go through with the action whether it succeeded or not.

terribly sorry for leaving this gem in inbox hell. go forth, and be fruitful

[hot-take-tournament]

HOT TAKE TOURNAMENT

PRE-PRELIMINARY #19

Submission 55

Tohru Adachi is a better character than Goro Akechi

[SUBMITTED JUSTIFICATION UNDER THE CUT]

Pre-preliminaries will be used to determine what qualifies as a hot take. Propaganda is encouraged!

Also, remember to reblog your favourite polls for exposure! (exposure like when your exposed to critical levels of radiation)

They're both terrible people but P4 doesn't try to justify Adachi's actions even if you pick the accomplice ending and side with him, meanwhile P5 constantly goes 'but he was sad tho :( his daddy doesn't love him so he's allowed to kill ppl' after the reveal that Akechi's the traitor. Also I did the math and in the cutscene where the train gets derailed alone Akechi killed at least 100x more people than Adachi did in the entire game. There's nothing wrong with liking evil characters (IMO) but acting like they're sweet innocent babies is lame

Adachi and Akechi have similar roles in the story. They’re both the subject of the main mystery of their respective games, the killer and the traitor, and in order to hide their involvement, they have fake detective personas (lowercase p personas not Personas). The issue is that while Adachi’s fake personality is a lovable dork who goofs off work by hanging out in the lobby of a department store, “accidentally” leaks critical information about the case to a bunch of teenagers, and has a weird friendship with an old lady who thinks he’s her son, Akechi's is just generic “crime bad, criminals bad” detective man with zero substance to any of his interactions with the main cast outside of literally all of them fucking hating him (the correct and morally right response to Akechi talking to you). But that’s just their fake personalities, right? It’s totally fine for a completely false, constructed persona to be a little shallow, right? Well Akechi’s real personality is just as bad. I already mentioned how his entire motivation is “Waah my dad doesn’t love me so I’m gonna help him achieve his goals then kill him” which is completely fucking stupid by the way just kill the dude and be done with it if thats what you’re gonna do anyway man, but his personality boils down to ‘generic angsty villain whos gonna get a completely undeserved redemption arc’ (thankfully cognitive Akechi killed him before that could happen, the one good thing he did and it wasn’t even really him). Adachi’s real personality is completely unhinged, his big motivation speech can be summed up as “ACAB!” “But you’re a cop!?” YEAH AND I’M A TOTAL BASTARD WHAT PART OF THAT DON’T YOU GET!?” You love to hate him, and that’s what makes a good antagonist, not feeling sorry for him because his dad doesn’t love him. Guess what Akechi, a lot of people's dads don’t love them and none of them became domestic terrorists to try to regain his love and respect!

And you might think that I’m exaggerating with how the player is supposed to sympathise and eventually forgive Akechi, but after he explains his awful motivation, the first person to extend a hand of sympathy is Haru, the girl who’s father Akechi murdered in front of her like two months prior. The second person is Futaba, who spent her entire adolescence traumatised because she thought she was such a shitty daughter that it drove her mother to suicide BECAUSE AKECHI KILLED HER MOTHER IN FRONT OF HER (the dude’s consistent I’ll give him that.)

[heres-to-all-that-is-mine]

zor and pheonix swap bodies. what happens?

(for a possibly less chaotic choice, its handler and zor)

I assume a race to dismantle their respective operations from inside either via wanton violence and arson, clever thought out strategies or just exposing each other's organisations, or some other equally devastating course of action.

(Okay this turned longer than I expected so I'm just gonna put the rest under a cut here.)

And I mean like depending on if it's long term or short term body swap there's a lotta stuff that could happen differently? The good doctor could certainly set up some... clever plan to unravel all of the Agency without risking their own exposure or whatever, but it would take time and resources to set up, so possibly they just collect vital intel for later use? Actually you could probably make an intriguing story out of "Phoenix and Zor wake up in each others' body - and they are forced to act as each other to avoid exposure" and whatnot. Like. Stepping into your greatest enemy's shoes...

Of course the fun part isn't that, like, they "learn how hard the other one has it" and "grow a new appreciation for each other" no those two would absolutely kill each other with Zero hesitation given the means motive and opportunity. Like yes Dr. Zor tends to not directly kill Phoenix, just. Death traps. I'm somewhat sure they even banned Juni from taking the Agent out while he had them unconscious? Don't quote me on that I have terrible memory abilities anyway what I was saying was they might prefer to toy with Phoenix but they still want them dead and if the Agent was right in front of them they would pull that trigger no hesitation, especially because the Agent would very likely be gunning for them, too. So. No hesitation there's no fondness between them. Or at least nothing to outweigh the desire to see the other dead.

Okay that ramble out of the way - the only reason they don't walk that borrowed body off a cliff is 1. It would kill them too, 2. They have the opportunity to royally screw the other's life up, annnd 3. The other guy (presumably) has their body and can royally screw them up, too. Which is a problem that they need to deal with. So what do they do? Consider it undercover work, I suppose. Plus, no better way to get to know your enemy than being your enemy, right?

Oh the wonderful chaos of "infamous secret agent forced to act as an evil mastermind" and vice versa. They might get a little lucky in that I assume the Doc has things set up to mostly flow smoothly without them, and Phoenix is already so strange that Zor being a lil weird might slip under the radar... problems arise in that Reg knows Phoenix, and Zor is still needed for resolving the petty conflicts and snags in the plans, of course - nothing can just be that easy...

Also, Zor and Reg swapping wouldn't necessarily be less chaotic. The Handler has just as much of a grudge against Zoraxis as Phoenix does, was definitely about as chaotic as them in his field days, and probably definitely wouldn't pass up the opportunity to tear Zoraxis down entirely from the very core. Then there's the issue of Reggie being a decently important Agency employee as we know, which means he might have some sway in the organisation - you think Zor wouldn't abuse the hell out of that?

Hmm. Might add more later I need to collect my thoughts,, I woke up not even two hours ago

[valkyrieandstrangeridingaragorn]

I have watched Loki's second season, and I have so many feelings... I apologize for the rant ahead!!

This season feels like the writers listened to fan's critics. But somehow, they managed to get it wrong anyway... Take Loki's role: he is, without a doubt, the lead character this time. They even have him speak about his past (another big complaint about the first season) and they have him literally say what his motivations are (he doesn't want to be alone, he is searching for a place to belong), but it feels so damn wrong! Yes, it's true, belonging is a crucial point for Loki, and I would have been very happy to see him finally finding a place to call home, but.... the TVA 2.0?! Seriously?! And it's all so rushed. Almost overnight, the TVA becomes now a good thing, its new purpose is to protect all timelines and prevent Kang's variants to start another war - yes, there is a small group of people who still believe in pruning the other timelines, but the problem is easily and quickly contained and forgotten. I really have to believe that such a big and complex organization, with countless brainwhased "workers" and soldiers, just because Mobius (an obscure analyst), Loki (who for everyone is still a dangerous variant) and B15 (a rogue hunter, previously detained) say so, suddenly becomes the new Amnesty International. I mean. It could have been a great story of change and renewal, if only they would have taken the time to actually tell it...

Sylvie deserves a moment all for herself. I don't like her, and I didn't like her romance with Loki, but the writers put her in this show, they created big expectations on her role, and in this second season they just... forget about her, without a reason. They even have erased the romance between her and Loki, and again, I didn't like it, but if you want to erase a romance, then do it properly! Instead, it feels like it never happened. Loki was very clearly attached to her in the previous season - he wanted her to be okay, he even asked her to figure out their lives together, after everything, and sure, they had a big fight in the last episode, but... again, it's like it never happened. Now Loki doesn't particularly care about Sylvie (yes, she is in his group of "friends", but nothing more), he just feels somehow inexplicably guilty when she is around, and Sylvie seems like she has troubles remembering who he is... Not to mention her choices after she kills He Who Remains. Again, I really have to believe that after all her trauma and tragedy, after all the travels around worlds and apocalypses, apparently all a norse goddess might want is a job at a MacDonald. What a terrible lack of imagination... And I get the "I want to live a humble, simple life, to enjoy little pleasures", it's a beautiful concept, really, but I'm not exactly sure that working in a fast food chain is such a heavenly and simple life - ask real workers how beautiful and full of little pleasures that life really is. But no, here it is the new american dream. To sell hamburgers on a minimum wage.

And yes, the ending was good. To see Loki finally secure of himself, to see him finding his purpose and his powers, it was cathartic, even if bittersweet: we already knew he was capable of great things! And, at least to me, it didn't feel much like a sacrifice: he does not die, he does not suffer; yes he is alone (side note: at least Mobius has the decency of feeling sad to have lost his friend, Sylvie simply doesn't care, which is unlikely even for her, but they wrote her like that, so...), but he has the means to travel across time and space whenever he likes (he literally spent centuries studying physics! Who knows what else he could do!), he is not trapped inside the time branches. He becomes the most powerful being in the MCU so far, truly a God, and in that his ending is way better than Thor's ending (poor Thor...). But Loki gets here for all the wrong reasons, and the thing that I hated the most is that he needed Mobius advice. So, in the end, Mobius gets to say that he always felt like pruning timelines was a heavy burden, but a burden he chose to bear for a greater good in lack of better options. Seriously?! And we have to pause and think "oh, you see, he wasn't really a mindless killer, he had pity, empathy, especially for children, poor him, he was just trying to do the right thing..." and we have to accept that what Loki does in the end is inspired by him, can be compared to what TVA did for centuries. In fact, what Loki does is presented as an improvement: TVA's purpose was to avoid the multiversal war and to avoid the distruction of all timelines by protecting just one of them, they did it as best as they could given the impossible circumnstances, now thanks God (literal God: Loki) someone else can keep all the branches alive without the whole world collapsing, so they can focus on finding Kang's variants and avoiding the war, yay!

I have much more to say, but I ranted enough for now. Thanks for reading all this :)

Loved the rant! 😉

I'm glad to hear he wasn't sidelined in this one. It's crazy because I remember a review published before the series aired saying the exact opposite, so… I'm glad they were wrong.

No wonder it felt rushed, 6 eps are not enough to tell a good story, not when they pretend to take the lead character from point A to B with a completely different characterization/motivation. And I suppose it's made worse by the fact that Loki was always this complex character so trying to tell a story where he's hilariously basic just can't work out.

They're wasting an outrageous amount of money on these eps, making a longer series is unattainable, especially when everything I have read on the matter states these streaming services are not making huge numbers, if anything Disney+ is losing money.

I'm not surprised the TVA are shown as good though, Marvel thinks they're Shield. If they refused to acknowledge that Shield was corrupted in its core, they were never going to do it with the TVA.

Why does Loki feel guilty around Sylvie though? Are they still claiming he was in the wrong in the S1 finale? That's insane!

I couldn't agree more with you about flipping burgers at McD's. It screams of elitism that these execs are so stupid they think these jobs are what… humbling? A life lesson? If Sylvie wanted a simple life you can't give her a mid-life crisis or a break where she does something a human would do. She's not human, she's a goddess.

I feel bad that they ignored her though. It seems she didn't have as big a fanbase as we were led to believe but to write her as the main character in S1 only to push her aside in order to show more Loki/Mobius is just wrong. The problem with Sylvie is not that she exists, is that she was written only to take the spotlight from Loki and make him look bad, she never had a complex story of her own.

And with Mobius… the very same guy who said the TVA was his glorious purpose, the same guy who said he didn't waste time in questioning anything and he just accepted what was, the same guy who put Loki in a torture chamber for escaping them… we have to fall for that "I was doing it for the greater good"? Come on, now! 🤦‍♀️😂

[nerves-nebula]

Are you ever you ever insecure about your art? And could you explain you answer to that?

Venting to you now

Drawing has taken a lot of effort for me, more than usual recently. I started working on something I originally felt really passionate about. It's more common for me to very quickly give up or get bored so I was really excited to be able to post some artwork. But I ended up not liking the result and I'm not sure if I'm willing to try something else. I've given up on trying in a lot of parts of life to try and save energy to do something I thought I was passionate about (art) but I am still lacking the motivation. The reason I reason I really wanted to share it was because I'm terrible with self-motivation. If I can't make at least one person genuinely go 'oh, neat' even for just a second and even if they soon forgot later, I'd feel like I'd have a reason to keep living (to keep making art). If the only people who'd see it end up disappointed I'd want to disappear.

It's not what art should be. I know it's value is like a person's. It's worth more than how someone reacts to it, right? But I can't apply that rule to myself. I should seek support from the people who 'know' and actually care about me, but I don't want their appreciation. I want some imagery status of a 'good artist' because that's what seems to give me dopamine.

I also wanted to mention how much I admire how open you are with your struggles. I want to be the same but I'm scared of people thinking less of me. I know that's dumb but I don't know what I'm good for if I can't make people happy. If I'm not going to be content with myself I want to not be a nuisance at least. I like to think that if I stopped caring about my impression on people, I'd be better off. But I'm scared that I'd have to learn to like myself. I don't like myself and I have no interest in liking myself. I don't see the point.

oh boy, this is gonna be a long one. also, don't take anything i say too seriously, i don't know your situation and I'm barely an adult. anyway, response under the cut

soo lately I'm less insecure about my art and more frustrated when things don't come out well. but i still post that shit !!! I'm still insecure if i'm doing, say, a project for homework, and i don't think i did as well as I could have, but in my personal artistic endeavors it's more about getting it done than it being perfect (for example, my webcomic! my motto is any comic made is better than no comic made and if people don't like that then it wasn't for them in the first place)

the thing about me is that drawing and art and stories is all i've ever had. it's my main form of interacting with the world. these days i make art the same way I live, which is to say in spite of wanting to kill myself. I would LIKE if my art was perfect, and i would LIKE to not be in pain. but i AM in pain and i have to live anyway, and my art ISN'T perfect but i'll make it anyway.

and i like when other people's art isn't perfect either, when it isnt super polished. I think that definitely helped. seeing artists whose work i fell head over heels for when it's never been more than sketches and a bit of shading. it really cemented in my mind that it isn't art being technically perfect that makes it worth while.

i've gotten a lot of people saying kind things to me, saying how much they enjoy my art and my blog in general. and though it doesn't always help, it sometimes inspires me to imagine the number of people who appreciate my stuff who might never mention it to me. I myself am used to lurking and not interacting very much (a habit I'm trying to change since I know artists & creators love feedback most of the time) i know it sucks to not know if anyone gives a shit for sure, but you really can't make that your only reason for doing art, cuz half the time you prolly wont even know if your art deeply affects people or not. it's fine to want that attention but you gotta have something else goin on too, at least I do.

i also know the fear of worrying that you'll lock yourself into something you don't want to do, or something you'll lose passion for. for me, I generally rotate a cast of characters & interests around for years a time before making significant progress. There were spans of times where I'd go years without thinking about loose stitches, but none of that time developing other stories & characters was wasted. it gave loose stitches enough time to properly cook, and the story is still developing under my hands as i draw it, influenced by my other stories and other characters.

it's ok to abandon something and pick it up again years later, or to never pick it up again at all. it's ok to hate the way something turns out but to keep making it anyway because you have to move forward (at least, I do)

moving forward despite not liking the original product is the only way to progress, I think. I don't super like a lot of the first pages of loose stitches but I'm still grateful that past-me posted them because that means present me is at page 76 !!

If I can't make at least one person genuinely go 'oh, neat' even for just a second and even if they soon forgot later, I'd feel like I'd have a reason to keep living (to keep making art). If the only people who'd see it end up disappointed I'd want to disappear.

the problem with this mindset (in my opinion) is that some people aren't going to like your art and that's got nothing to do with the art itself. if you want to find people who go "oh, neat" then you have to keep posting until they see it. trust me, they're out there. like, i don't post for people who can't stand the idea of child abuse, i post to FIND people who want to interact with stories about child abuse the same way i do.

it would be insane to stop trying to find those people because someone else was disappointed or upset by my art. which isn't to say you gotta lock yourself into doing one thing, but that you gotta post what you care about, and people who also care will find it. posting fandom stuff with the same themes as your original art certainly doesn't hurt either, if you REALLY want to find those people faster.

It's not what art should be. I know it's value is like a person's. It's worth more than how someone reacts to it, right? But I can't apply that rule to myself. I should seek support from the people who 'know' and actually care about me, but I don't want their appreciation. I want some imagery status of a 'good artist' because that's what seems to give me dopamine.

art should be literally whatever. it's worth is literally whatever you want, it can be a big deal or not. i'm not sure what part of being a "good artist" gives your brain the Good Feelings juice but I'd investigate that feeling more and try to figure out the roots of it, cuz then you might actually be able to figure out what it is that motivates you. approval is nice, yes, but i like approval for things i enjoyed making even more.

I also wanted to mention how much I admire how open you are with your struggles. I want to be the same but I'm scared of people thinking less of me. I know that's dumb but I don't know what I'm good for if I can't make people happy. If I'm not going to be content with myself I want to not be a nuisance at least. I like to think that if I stopped caring about my impression on people, I'd be better off. But I'm scared that I'd have to learn to like myself. I don't like myself and I have no interest in liking myself. I don't see the point.

i always find it amusing when people refer to my "struggles" if only because I don't really consider them that way. to me it's just like, a thing that happened that sucks. i don't consider myself "struggling" with it, even though I guess that's what's happening. also, let's be real here, it's not like I'm using my real name. this is an anonymous tumblr blog. though, my openess on here has actually lead to me making more art about it IRL so. eh.

anyway, lucky for you, you can stop caring about what other people think without necessarily liking yourself! for me, it's about spite (sort of). I don't like myself much more than I used to, I just decided I hated everyone else more haha. I still care what people think about me, and I'm still scared of what people might do to me, but I'm also not bending over backwards to please people i dislike. I just get annoyed at them instead.

i did this basically just by repeating it until it became true, lol. there's only so many times you can petulantly say "well fuck those guys anyway they suck" before it becomes your true first reaction.

at some point, i decided i needed to pick and choose who i wanted to please, because it can't be everyone. that's just literally not possible. so i looked at the kinds of people i liked and appreciated, and basically disregarded everyone else. it's the whole "don't take criticism from someone you wouldn't take advice from" thing (not sure where that comes from)

obviously you should probably try to internalize the idea that you even HAVE to be "good for something" but that's way easier said than done. i find it more useful to devote yourself to finding a few things (causes, people, philosophies, niche interests) instead of just general usefulness. because then you can form stronger relationships, be useful, AND not burn yourself out trying to please everyone.

take all this advice with a grain of salt though, I definitely need therapy and this Bitter Angry Defensive persona will probably need to be deconstructed soon... idk. i think it's outlived its usefulness to me but i'm not sure what to do next hahah.

sorry if none of this was helpful or the point. im not even sure why i wrote this much, i kind of just ramble sometimes. i hope you figure it out!

[cryptid-artha]

Something I hate in fantasy and Sci-fi is entire races/species that are evil. And when killing those creatures or subjecting them to terrible things is seen as a heroic act.

Things like orcs from a lot of fantasy media, or Drow from Dungeons and Dragons. Or the Wraith from Stargate: Atlantis, or in parasites whose name I can't pronounce from Stargate SG1 (There's a little nuance later in the series but not much).

I was watching Stargate Atlantis on Hulu, and kept wanting to learn more about the Wraith antagonists and hoping to see other sides to the species, but it never happened. And then the series of episodes around what was done to the Wraith referred to as Micheal. How they experimented on him and betrayed him, several times, used him and eventually killed him... And that episode ended on a triumphant note after the settlement him and many others were killed. They REALLY could have used that to really get into Wraith minds and the attempt to tackle the morality of their actions, and an attempt was made. And ruined the instant they ended killing them all on a triumphant note as if it was heroic. They tried to tackle the moral issues behind it all, but it was so surface level, and it still ended with feeling like the writers were saying "This race is pure evil and we are keeping it that way :)"

The thing that really honestly annoyed me the MOST was how the Wraith not being human was what was blamed for them being evil. How making them "not evil" was using a retrovirus to take out their non-human side. They were a race created for the show just to be evil, and nothing more. They weren't really given a chance to be anything else, when playing with the basic concept of what they were and how they worked could have been so interesting.

I would have LOVED to see some of the Wraith realize that their hunting and feeding on humans was snuffing out conscious minds and more exploration of what they must do to survive and how it effects their mind and society. It would have been so interesting without making them less threatening.

An entire species can't be pure evil. I would have LOVED to see more exploration of their minds, their societies, maybe some groups trying to find better ways to do things. But the way they were portrayed makes absolutely no sense to me, I just can't really figure out HOW they could have become space faring while basically being aggressive predators that barely even get along with eachother. But the shoddy worldbuilding behind them is a whole other subject.

Anyway, all rambling aside, show me nuance! Show me how orcs live and how their society works. Don't make them evil, make them different! Show how differences in beliefs and ways of life might make them clash with other species or within their own species. Show me individuals in the orc armies working under a warlike leader and how it effects them and their motivations and what they are taught. Show me inside their minds!

Show me an orc warrior who looks over the destruction the army they are a part of has done, and feels regret when he sees the bodies of innocents killed in their onslought, even if he ends up rationalizing it and his loyalty to his army doesn't waver. Show me the fight between the ideals he was raised with, and the reality of the actions of his army.

With races added in to be antagonistic, give me reasons why! Explore that race, their biology and psychology, their culture, their side of the story! Show outliers, show general society outside of the warriors fought by the heroes of the story. Show us civilians. Members of a race can absolutely be antagonists, but don't make the entire species evil because that's convenient for you!

Anyway, rambling aside. I haven't finished Stargate Atlantis yet, which spawned this ramble. Here's to hoping they DO actually show more nuance with the Wraith. If not.... I am very tempted to make an AU that actually makes the race actually make sense, even if just for brief exploration because the species has a lot of interesting potential.

[siriuslygay1981]

for the WIP tag, I just need to know,, what is Hear me out (Siri stabby stab)

OMG...I was just working on this, ok so basically I'm writing a no magic au

Sirius and regulus kill their parents because of the abuse. Siri kills their mom, reg and Siri poison their dad.

Sirius ends up going to prison/jail or whatever, regulus takes it to court (Effie and Monty are lawyers and James drags them into this) also ofc sirius takes all the blame, claims no one helped him.

Peter is the one who turns them in cuz he accidentally eavesdropped on reg and james. James knows about the murders ofc, he even helped cover it up. Remus and Peter are betrayed and kinda fuckin scared cuz they know nothing about the black brothers home life or any motives they think the brothers have gone insane or SMTHN. (Also wolfstar angst ofc)

The story is mostly Sirius being interrogated in the beginning and like...so much miscommunication and angst and feral protective black brothers.

I don't have everything mapped out but I have written a good amount, fr wrote it randomly and it kinda spiralled from there.

So regulus is going to kill their mom right, and it takes both him and Sirius to do it cuz she fights back and it's going horribly, it was supposed to be quick but y'know they did get their stubbornness from her. Anyways Sirius stabs her, and then regulus stabs her and they fuck her up and there's stabbing crying, laughing, and more stabbing and like gushing blood and I just hear dramatic opera/classical music in the background TBH anyways it's absolutely gory, bloody and overall terrible. The whole scene is just....I .....any words I try to use to describe it might make me sound insane. I'll just say it's....well it's definitely gonna get me sent to therapy (or a mental hospital) but honestly the scene is absolutely one of my favorites.

Literally the whole reason I came up with the idea was a bit of that true story of the two brothers being abused and killing their guardian, plus I saw fanart of Sirius all bloody and I kinda just imagined Sirius going insane because of the abuse and regulus being the one to calm him and get him back. And then I was like "but what if they both did it, Sirius takes the blame and ends up in prison. Regulus ofc is doing anything and everything he can to get him back"

That was such a long explanation mb, but anyways that's a small part of the story :)

Also hopefully no one steals this! I don't mind SMTHN being based off of it, like the black brothers killing their parents, but the rest is like...my ideas so no stealy please.

[leafened]

i've done emdr by myself a few times now, and it allows me to touch parts of my mind that were previously off limits- holes I had to shrink myself to slip around

but emdr lets me illuminate a hole. and i can actually 100% accept that [event or pattern] was fucked up, and finally get a deeper understanding of the parties involved, including myself. like i see the object for what it is, and can hold it/feel it

i'm terrible at integration usually. i have defense mechanisms, hardcoded in early childhood and upgraded over time ("nothing can hurt me unless i let it" "other people have had it worse" "i would have done that if i were them" (the latter in a predeterministic way, bc from pre-teen years onward i've mostly believed that free will is an illusion, so i *literally* would have done the same things if i were them)). thick layers that prevent me from interrogating pain

they're so thick that i didn't really realize my mom was abusive until i was 23. i was reading an old journal entry recently and it said "I hate to say this, but i think my mom might have been abusive." If she'd even done one one-hundredth of the things she's done, she would have been abusive lol. she was more horrible to me than i can understand, up to the point of once trying to kill me with a knife. but I'd had blinders on for so long i didn't know they were there. (the primary defense mechanism was "she was drunk when she did that", even though the contempt/jealousy/derision/sadism were still there sober)

Anyway with emdr a lot of the memories that i think will be horrible to revisit are resolved relatively painlessly (or maybe i'm just not ready idk). but last week i focused on an event that i thought had had little effect on me, and it was like a floodgate opened. i suddenly understood a cluster of beliefs and seemingly unrelated behaviors. i also finally understood the actor's motives, and they were disgusting. it was like i was split open. i cried so hard i threw up. but it's been a week now and i feel whole in a way I can't remember ever feeling.

i'm kind of skeptical of its use for non-trauma (practitioners use it for OCD, anxiety, grief, etc) since the positive results that get hyped so hard were mainly with hardcore PTSD cases. but it is REALLY REALLY really working for me

[unproduciblesmackdown]

tonight's highlighted element of mitzi and mordecai's murder mystery is "fr why does mordecai Not just hate mitzi full throttle no caveats" like, seems like the reason he doesn't is: something we don't know at all surrounding something else we don't know at all, which is:: what specific reason atlas was killed when he specifically was (vs. like, more generally/thematically, like how it's introduced as "that's the business & an unsurprising inevitable fate for some in it")

mitzi mentions the "reassurance that it's still my fault" which leaves room to interpret it only as [she's framing this from mordecai's presumed perspective but doesn't herself think it was her fault] but i think it's more likely she agrees with that herself. wherein it's like....so why doesn't mordecai too begrudged about this to even speak to her, or later on not defend her at all (to someone who may die in 5 sec anyways but hey (gracie))

which, speaking of, i Know we did not see dramatic flashbacks ft. identical revolvers for mordecai to Not have been the one to shoot atlas....i Know mordecai was not: Not guaranteed to have quit lackadaisy afterwards, the only Employee we see at atlas's funeral (or identifiable character besides mitzi (widow) and asa (friend)), and currently going around never not describing his approach to his current "uniquely terrible" job as being one driven by Work Ethic and Professionalism to Not have shot atlas because atlas was in on that happening and requested/ordered it to happen such that mordecai can think of it as him having done it For His Boss, For His Job. i also know that regardless of dealing with it through a lens of professionalism(tm) and mere work ethic and etc there's no way a prominent character doesn't get to be in on all these emotional hangups and i doubt he got much of any [father figure] out of atlas for having a gun thrown at his head and then his self shoved into the line of fire Professionally(tm) but there's more room for him to simply be standing around like atlas's ferocious little gay ass shadow like oh so he's Competitive with atla's wife huh. well that is interesting. wherein like i'm not even sure that mordecai is helpfully expositing rn because he's (with very little interest) defending mitzi so much as he's like, actually protective of his own role in the murder mystery (and not just protective like, No One Can Know. i mean mordecai has how many murders that nobody's supposed to know about? that's not special) like excuse me the fact that SHE didn't shoot him and EYE did is actually important to me. whilest it's also like hang on, why was she not even living with him at the time (i extremely doubt that mordecai was instead, but. well, maybe not extremely. let's say Quite doubt. verily) why had things visibly deteriorated? mitzi seems to be entirely affectionate towards atlas's memory, and i don't think mordecai's lying about mitzi not shooting atlas or even being there (why would he be, anyways)

so it's like, what happened to deteriorate anything? it could've been for mitzi's safety or something, if what was deteriorating was atlas's handle on Not being murdered by nonrequest....which is leading back to that question of "what was her fault" which is alone a real [???] and then even more mysterious when it's like....the fact that mordecai's main deal is being aggrieved about atlas's death (and clearly more generally caught up in it such that For Some Reason he (but not really mitzi???) feels there's room for Important Things He Thought He Knew But Might Not and is now motivated to be riskily detectiving about it) and has whatever further emotional particulars surrounding that sure would Seem to point to like, yeah he Would just supercharged entirely hate mitzi now, right. and yet that doesn't seem to be the case, or else he has like, incredible restraint lol like Yes i feel that way No it actually doesn't affect what i do any more than this. but i Do extremely doubt that's the case, he's Not actually here to destroy what she has left or even bother backbiting in a situation wherein he has no reason Not to if he feels like it even a bit. it's also like, how could mitzi have such a role in things as to Be at fault for something that even indirectly got atlas killed? Maybe she was helping run things before he died, but that's pretty much the only idea i have since otherwise all we know is [she was his wife], which is unhelpfully vague, but [she was his wife who helped run his business] is Also unhelpfully vague.

mitzi's also this fairly isolated figure, despite us knowing how she connects to pretty much everyone currently. like, she showed up with a band (who's still around / we know what they're up to (probably Not: having played a role in atlas's death)) then she marries atlas, now she runs his speakeasy operation....but there are no figures involved here who atlas also wouldn't have been involved with. and, in fact, now mordecai is all riled about the possible unknown role that asa had in things (by potentially having something to warn atlas about by way of the mysterious thorn in marigold's side), with asa seemingly being someone more directly connected to atlas, while being a guy who mitzi and mordecai were previously just kind of Around Sometimes through their being wherever With atlas. it's like, okay, can't imagine mitzi up to something that involves herself and only herself that would make it her fault atlas died; But Whom Else could she have been involved in anything with whom atlas would not have been as, or more, directly involved with too....mordecai's a candidate there, of course, but if they were in cahoots about anything you might think they'd have Stayed in it (more than they have, i.e. by their sharing some secrets between themselves out here) rather than mordecai violencing out (this is a play on "peacing out," wherein you also shot at least one person)

(half-joking tangent about "maybe wick" wherein i'm mostly unserious like "lol maybe he's the mystery highest up at marigold" but i'm also forever like "well...yeah maybe" lol like maybe mining operations are his front and that's why he's also so busy with that. you'd think for all her involvement that lacy would have to know about something like that, but hey, maybe she does. maybe the only thing at risk re: wick being too nice to go seeking reprisals is, you know, ways of operating that mitzi didn't want to turn to, the potential loss or cooling of an alliance here....or maybe other people seek reprisals for him, what with that being the job of all the hired guns. i'm also just not so sure that lackadaisy really has any such Twists set up at all, even if there's things completely secret to us; but i'm also not sure what wick's role in things could be otherwise, if/when it comes to him taking any particularly active role at all. versus just being some kind upstanding (but not prohibitively. lol) citizen hanging out out here. being quietly robbed here and there)

finally for now, also a note wondering if simply The Feds alone are that thorn in marigold's side / what asa had to warn atlas about....i have to suppose that mordecai saying "i think i met your lawyer" to gracie is also the "c. trumble / no show" in drago's calendar book, is also the "local attorney and assistant missing" page beneath that book, is also that guy way back when (so like a day and a half or two back in the comic's timeline lol. eventful week out here) who got hatcheted up, truly f but hey man the savoys are calling mordecai their petit hache about it, so a small price to pay for the mostly postmortem mess....but fr like, is marigold running up against the problem of like, some more ambitious investigations, versus marigold having more room to focus on That rather than paltry competition, but wherein now the issue is just how far up the ladder of [informants] they can go? mordecai being tasked to take out gracie And his lawyer of yore seems to be a zany mission of killing these informants who drago's trying to meet with before he can do so....but it's also like, what's Necessarily new? gracie's Been meeting with this guy, they could maybe pay people off instead, and mordecai's saying an Ambitious agent (apparently like drago) could maybe shut a venue down for all of ten minutes. maybe drago specifically has some Particular information that makes it worth the risk and expense of Elevating Activity....marigold still seems concerned as well with potential competition, though maybe the Monitoring is all about seeing whether anyone else is reporting on operations. it's also sure possible that the total unknown of whoever runs marigold, for whomst asa can be no more than a messenger about these mysteries missions (like, if the marigold dream team triumvirate was trying to make sure people weren't being informants, couldn't they just be told as much?), has some kind of key context in their Motivation that isn't just peak straightforward cut & dry Business Matters. maybe they're like "wuhoh re: atlas dying. Could be me; what if i'm next." and is just making that everyone's problem by ramping up efforts to stamp out competition and informants, all while withholding info from everyone to be "safe"

not like Any Of [the mystery of what marigold's up to] theories necessarily illuminate "how does mordecai think there's some important things he could be wrong about? what would it be? why's mitzi seemingly know everything he knows, but is unfazed?" nor "how could mitzi be at fault for atlas's death, with atlas Probably being in on it, and mordecai definitely being in on it and mad at her but he Hasn't dedicated his life to destroying everything she has, as a hater, even though he could?" like hmm questions of the day. maybe atlas was being protective (of whom? in what situation would he think he could only protect them by himself dying? like, if he was warned by asa about the thorn in marigold's side being federal investigations....what else is new, and why would he die about that) maybe atlas thought his being killed was so unavoidable he was like well at least mordecai would certainly take me out as effectively as possible and where i can arrange my affairs and then not live my imminently numbered days in suspense (and why would it be so certain? did the head of marigold actually get like paranoid about shit Before atlas died such that asa could be like "they think you're too much of a liability and instead of initiating a war w/lackadaisy, marigold's ally atm, they're just gonna take you out to cut to the chase") in which case it's like, again, how would it be mitzi's fault. how would mordecai feel he has Enough information to have not previously suspected marigold (although he does specifically say there was no Overt reason to suspect, not that there was No reason to suspect at all) and feel that mitzi's culpability is Established and have shot atlas but not felt there was enough of a mystery there to investigate anything further if like, such a key piece of info was presumably unbeknownst to him before this brunch of disappointment just earlier.

(also, maybe mitzi and mordecai just have enough of a truce not based only on like, how they, in theoretical isolation, feel about each other, nor on sharing secrets about a murder mystery, but probably mostly based on this Understanding about their being the ones out here who had personal emotional ties to atlas (even if those were like, more unilateral in the cases of people in competition with atlas's wife. f) like, if mordecai's at the funeral then mitzi would know about that, not like viktor or any other loyal employees or affiliates were there, asa is also there presumably as that friend....atlas could also be like okay you have to shoot me but do Not kill my soon to be surviving wife, alright? thanks lol)

(wait also technically ivy's dad is kind of a mystery factor. but it seems most likely that he's just another lackadaisy affiliate who drew back when atlas died....hilarious if it's like "well my daughter who sees all of these goings on as Like A Movie is gonna keep hanging around this speakeasy, so i'll look out for her by taking atlas out so operations are greatly diminished and it's just Kinda dangerous" lol. the perfect plan. but he also does seem to have been involved in no tiny part in any of lackadaisy's more dangerous operations, see: that train depot funeral parlor smuggling gig, which had the proper slaughter at the lodge, the organ player shot, mordecai shot but he's fine thanks....risky business)

anyways i guess the theme is mostly like "what could be the basis of mitzi's culpability" and "mordecai gay. happy pride (and for the asexuality already as well)"

[islandfate]

me? finishing my s3 character recap only a day after completing the season? crazy. anyway, more of my thoughts!!! i don’t think i have anything very controversial in here, but this is almost 3k words of opinions so �� enjoy!

jack – starting off strong with mr jack shephard. surprisingly, i don’t think i hated jack this season. sure, he pissed me off every now and again, but as i’ve said before, that’s just standard with this character. i’ve begun to expect and accept that. otherwise, he was pretty okay? i don’t like the first seven episodes of this season at all, i just absolutely hate the surgery plot. and let’s not forget ‘stranger in a strange land,’ which might just be the worst episode of this entire show. i don’t like ‘fire + water’ any more than the next guy, but it was significantly better than whatever the fuck we got in episode 9. just terrible. anyway, i understood why jack wouldn’t do surgery on ben, and i thought his line, “i just wanted you to understand how you’re gonna die,” was kind of fire. made me laugh, that’s for sure. never thought i’d see the day! later on, i enjoyed his relationship with juliet and i didn’t hate him as much when he told the camp that he hadn’t told them anything because he hadn’t decided what to do about it yet. used to that made me soooo mad, but this time around i was kinda like … i mean, yeah, you guys are the ones that wanted him to be leader. if that’s the decision he made, i think it’s fine. overall, jack wasn’t intensely annoying and i didn’t really mind him that much.

ben – ohhhhh ben. how could i ever not love you? we don’t get a lot from him during the surgery plot, or even after, but i think we start to really see who he is when locke blows up the submarine - all because ben manipulated him into doing it, which is just amazing to me. we especially see more of him in ‘the brig,’ how he so easily manipulates situations in his favor, and of course his centric episode which just … kills me. roger was a piece of shit and i stand by that!! of course, i don’t think the entire dharma initiative deserved to die, but it’s interesting to see someone who was in dharma eventually become the leader of the others. dharma’s very enemies! i also think it’s soooo ben to try and play up the whole jacob situation. the cabin scene did confuse me a lot - it could either be that ben was pretending to see someone, but that when shit started flying around and the fire started he just kind of rolled with the punches; OR ben was seeing someone there, and if so, it would’ve had to have been the man in black. which would make sense, if he was manipulating ben into being jealous of locke. as we know this works. however, ben seems to genuinely believe that jacob spoke to locke, and you can see in his face that he isn’t happy about it - enough to where i think he’s never spoken to or seen jacob at all. either way, i do believe the man in black was the one to say “help me,” and i lean more toward the idea that ben didn’t see anyone and was putting on a little show. but i love when ben is like, “well i certainly hope jacob helps you,” after he fucking shoots locke. hilarious. the one thing i hate is ben’s weird infatuation with juliet, but i’ll probably talk about that more in s4 when we get the dreaded flashback. also i think you can really see ben’s desperation at the end of this season, like for once he’s telling the truth - these people that are coming to the island are bad!! they’re gonna kill people!!! but no one listens. which, i can’t really blame them, ben is a known liar and manipulator, but i think it’s interesting how genuine ben’s motives are. he just wants to protect the island. seeing him get beat up again was also kind of funny not gonna lie. the writers really just want you to hate ben so bad ( like pretending he got sayid, jin, and bernard killed ) alongside other shit, but he’s just sooo likeable i don’t care about his crimes. and he really didn’t do anything that insane. anyway, ben was my man, and i cannot wait to see him be his best self in s4.

desmond – i adore desmond. i forgot how much i love him in this season, he’s seriously great in every scene he’s in. his plot with charlie is definitely s3’s most redeeming quality, and i find it insanely funny that the B Plot is more interesting than whatever the hell is going on with the others / jack, kate, and sawyer. ‘flashes before your eyes’ was nominated for an award and i think that’s telling to how fucking amazing that episode is. i got full body chills when eloise tells desmond that things have to play out as they were meant to, and especially when desmond tells charlie that he’ll have to die. it’s just amazing. he’s such a great guy and i think every single one of his centric episodes rock, he’s just an amazingly written character and the show wouldn’t be nearly the same without him.

charlie – charlie becomes one of my favorite characters in this season. he kinda drops down in s2 for obvious reasons, but he’s just SO great in s3. his plot is by far the most interesting and devastating. him coming to terms with the fact that he’s going to die, desmond saving him multiple times, ‘greatest hits’ … oh man that episode fucking destroyed me. i hadn’t seen it in a few years so i really got hit hard with his flashbacks and his interactions with everyone else - literally right before he’s knowingly going to his death. when he’s got tears in his eyes before he goes down to the looking glass??? i nearly died. it’s so fucking sad. and we also talked a bit about how so many of his other deaths have to do with water … foreshadowing or coincidence? no idea but i love it either way. obvs ‘not penny’s boat’ is iconic and for good reason too. his death just hurts. i love charlie and i’m sad to see him go, but his death does kick off major things for s4 so it is important, no matter how tragic it is.

hurley – i loved hurley this season. his interactions with the other survivors, especially sawyer, are just great - and him being the one to get all of this important information ( naomi telling him that flight 815 was found, finding out ethan wasn’t on the plane ) definitely hints at his future in the show. ‘tricia tanaka is dead’ is one of my favorite episodes in the entire series and hurley is just great in it. the fucking asteroid makes me die laughing every time. i really love him trying to fix up the van and that whole scene is just great. overall, i adore hurley in s3 and, as usual, i look forward to seeing more of him in the next one.

sawyer – he might just be at his funniest this season. i enjoyed his relationship with kate, a lot, and i just really love him in s3! ignoring the whole surgery plot, once sawyer makes it back to camp and has to act as a stand-in leader of sorts, being tricked by hurley into doing nice things - i just love when he does shit like that. and helping with the van, trying to solve the whole nikki and paulo fiasco … he’s just great. i have nothing bad to say about him ( ever ) and i think he can just be really sweet and does cute things and I LOVE HIM!!

nikki & paulo – oh, i bet you didn’t expect to see these two up here, did you? let’s be real, they were never going to go into honorable mentions because i have too much to talk about with them and ‘exposé.’ anyway, as surprising as it sounds, i really liked paulo. i genuinely felt bad for him - i mean, obviously not killing someone and stealing the guy’s diamonds - but, you know, for the way nikki treated him. more than anything, paulo wanted the diamonds to be gone so that he and nikki could just … be a normal couple, without that hanging over their heads forever. and to have nikki do what she did to him?! it’s sooo fucked up and it just made me feel awful for him. as for nikki, i did not like her, but i did love the scene at the beginning of the episode where she’s playing as a stripper. “razzle dazzle!” what a stupid yet iconic quote. that episode is just so fucking dumb and funny, i can’t not love it. another one of my favorites in the series. anyway, i think nikki got a good taste of karma for what she did to paulo, but their deaths were just absolutely horrific once you find out they’re paralyzed and are being buried alive!!! i swear i think about that shit all the time and it makes me shiver. anyway, love these random ass side characters and i think it’s funny they got killed off so quickly ( especially considering this was only done because fans hated them so much ). rip nikki and paulo you guys didn’t deserve that but you had a great flashback episode.

kate – kate was … meh? she didn’t annoy me, but nothing she did really stood out to me. i only enjoyed her scenes with sawyer, pretty much, as i think their relationship is really fun ( and better than whatever the fuck kate and jack have going on ). genuinely kinda hurt me tho that she blamed herself for jack not being able to get off the island. like girlie that was all ben and locke! not you!! the gays will be gay let them do their thing. anyway i can’t think of anything else interesting with her, sooo that’s about it.

locke – this is the start of the best relationship in the series, which would beeee you guessed it! locke and ben. at least to me. nothing lives up to these two and some of the shit they say to each other??? fucking insane. it’s so gay i can’t even fathom it, especially on ben’s side. i really love the ways they both affect each other, ben’s consuming jealousy of locke because of his relationship with the island, locke’s anger at ben because more than anything he wants to trust him - it just fucks me up. and, obviously, i love their slow burn friendship in s4 but i’ll talk about that more when we get there. anyway, i think locke did some crazy shit this season but i really liked him at the end, when walt tells him he has work to do and he kills naomi - putting him and ben on the same side of this situation. it’s interesting how devoted locke is to the island, but obviously he still has his morals and no matter how much he wants to, he can’t shoot jack. and i think that’s kind of the difference between him and ben - locke embraces his humanity despite the island’s commands, while ben completely foregoes his. for the rest of this season i didn’t hate locke but i didn’t necessarily love him either. he faded into the background a little bit for me, but i do love the episode where we see him get thrown out of the building. fucking crazy. he really just blew up a lot of shit this season and i’m here for it. makes me think of that meme from s6 of ben, richard, and miles and their moniger “team blow shit up.” i love it. embracing locke’s absolute insanity in the wake of MiB … anywho, yeah, locke on his own didn’t hit so much but alongside ben he really captures my attention. love when he tells ben that he’s the man behind the curtain, the wizard of oz. it’s so good!! locke’s delivery is always great and i think he’s just a phenomenal character ( and terry o’quinn kills it with the acting ). enough said from me.

sayid – i’m gonna be so honest, i didn’t give much of a shit about sayid this season. the only episode that hits for me is ‘enter 77,’ when sayid, kate, and locke first encounter mikhail and we get that flashback of sayid and the woman he tortured, as well as her cat. the whole story she tells about the cat as well as herself … it definitely made me a little emotional. otherwise, i didn’t care much for sayid but i didn’t have many qualms like i did with him in s2. he’s kind of just there.

claire – i wish i had more to say on claire but i really don’t. she literally did nothing for me this season, i didn’t care about her that much, but i did like her flashback episode and her thing with the birds ( not that it’s going to help anything ). aside from that, i have nothing else to talk about! moving on…

juliet – i do really enjoy juliet’s presence in this show, she’s one of my favorite characters and i love the way she’s written. her short-lived thing with jack is not really my thing, but we can move past that. oh and her flashbacks also don’t hit for me, ever, but that’s not really her fault. anyway, her hatred of ben is interesting ( which is for valid reasons, obviously ) and i think it’s cool to see an other who slowly merges with the survivors because it’s the first time that she can really get away. i think she’s definitely the beginning of these two groups coming together, which will be needed in s4 considering who’s coming to the island. juliet genuinely cares for people but carries out ben’s orders nonetheless - until she really has the option not to. and the little bits we get of her and sawyer are fun, i’m excited to see how they develop more in s5. overall she’s a great character aaaand i look forward to seeing her on screen again.

sun & jin – jin was fun this season, i liked his little friendship with hurley/charlie/sawyer with the van, and then later with hurley/charlie/desmond when they go camping. love the little scary story he tells, i just really enjoyed him. sun was alright, didn’t stand out to me too much, but i do really like the episode where she goes to the staff to get an ultrasound. she and juliet are interesting there, and i loved sun’s reaction to the baby being jin’s … it was just so human and kind of ripped my heart out, like she’s crying in joy but also she knows she’s going to die, but that’s okay because at least she didn’t betray jin in this terrible way. anyway, i can’t think of much more to do with these two, but i love their relationship as usual!

eko – we don’t get to see eko much in this season, but his centric episode is fucking great and i looooove his deal with the smoke monster. my thought has always been that eko was a candidate and the monster was testing him, looking through his memories to see what could be exploited - and most likely see how impressive of a candidate he would be, considering eko didn’t even flinch when he first saw the monster. then in s3 we get MiB leading him away, posing as his brother, and my assumption is that because eko doesn’t feel guilt for the things he’s done, because he doesn’t need the island or anyone else on it, he is no longer a candidate. so the smoke monster fucks him up because of it. this would also make sense because eko doesn’t move on with everyone else at the church, he moves on right then and there with yemi. i do adore eko’s quote, “i did not ask for the life that i was given, but it was given nonetheless. and with it, i did my best.” that fucking kills me. puts tears in my eyes just thinking about it. i was really sad to see him go but i do think his death is intriguing and leaves a lot to think about. rip eko tho </3

honorable mentions:

richard – didn’t get a lot from him this season, but i fucking love him. he’s one of my favs. enough said.

roger work man – i hope you fucking choke and die <3

ethan – a jumpscare every time he appeared on screen. surprisingly enjoyable to see again, i found myself liking his character. i think he just got cabin ( jungle? ) fever and went a little crazy, that’s all.

arzt – great little cameo and i loved his bug collection. so sad he exploded.

taller ghost walt – WALT I MISSED YOU!!! THERE’S MY BOY!

[aphroditestummyrolls]

🏅🌙 🧠

Hi 🥰 hello

🏅 What is something you recently felt proud of in regard to your writing (finished a fic, actually planned for once, etc).

I actually finished Keep You Safe! 🥹 I am so proud of that story! But, I’m also so proud of all of the stories I’ve written/started for Six of Crows. I still feel so compelled by my WIPs, and so motivated to write, even with the Focus Issues™️ I’ve been having. I’m really feeling good about my stories more frequently than I’m feeling self conscious, and that’s rare.

🌙  What time of day do you prefer to write? Why?

I used to be a morning writer— I just felt like my mind was clearest in the early hours. But now, I’m a mid morning to evening, equal opportunity writer, and I’m most likely to edit in the early morning.

🧠 What’s an idea you have that you can’t quite call a WIP yet?

I have ANOTHER “Colm discovers Jesper’s Ketterdam Life” fic in my brain, and it’s not outlined or written in any capacity, but it makes me INSANE.

So, let’s set the scene— this is a show verse story in which the ice court heist straight up doesn’t happen. Inej comes to visit fairly regularly. Nikolai’s pardon successfully got Matthias out of Hellgate and they are working their shit out. Wylan’s past came out shortly after they returned from Ravka when his father started sending letters to the Slat, and they became more genuinely threatening. Any animosity about his hiding his past has faded in the face of his life being threatened, and Jesper is just trying to keep him safe. They are so deeply in love.

The story starts about three months since Ravka and the Fold, and the crows are on high alert— recently, Jan sent someone to try to kill Wylan. It was a botched attempt, but Kaz is taking no chances. Wylan hates it, but he’s escorted by someone (usually jesper, because he would come hang out with him anyway) to and from his workshop. Kaz is taking this very seriously, and plotting the downfall of Jan Van Eck with each passing second. But in the meantime, they have to keep Wylan alive.

One morning, Rotty doesn’t meet him outside the workshop like they agreed. And Wylan is a little nervous, but decides to walk back to the slat alone.

Meanwhile, simultaneously, a man is wandering in from fifth harbour, trying his best to conduct his own search for his estranged son after the staadwatch proved useless. He’s starting to feel a bit hopeless, when he hears gunshots. He doesn’t even have time to wonder, because a young man is stumbling, running headlong into him, and when he grips the boy to help him stand, his hands come away bloody.

Colm is desperate to find Jesper, but he looks at this boy and he feels so terrible— he can’t be any older than Jes. He has to make sure he gets the help he needs, that he’ll be okay. But, when he tries to take him to the hospital, the boy insists that he take him to “the crow club— it’s closer. He, he might send someone to the hospital.”

So, colm takes this gravely wounded young man to the crow club. And finds more than he bargained for.

One day soon, maybe I’ll write this one out— it’s so fun, and juicy. I have so many ideas for it, as like, a slower, more angry and resentful “Colm and the Crows” story. One that really examines his dynamics with each of them. 👁️👁️

Thanks for playing!

[destielshippingnews]

Edvard's Supernatural Guide: 2x07 The Usual Suspects

This analysis is short because I have very little to say about this episode. It is not a bad one, but neither does it especially interest me nor give me much to talk about. It does nothing to advance the overall plot of the series and is not connected to the mythos in any way. My main take-away is wondering what a filler episode of The X-Files is doing in the middle of my Supernatural. I still do not care for a police presence or trouble-with-the-law storylines in my supernatural dramas (Charmed was terrible for that), and I honestly considered skipping this one because it simply does not do much for me. That said, I am glad I chose to watch it because there are some positive aspects to it.

To give a brief summary of the plot, Dean and Sam are arrested in Baltimore after Dean is found with a murdered woman while investigating her husband’s murder. The ghost of a dead woman keeps appearing to people who are soon murdered. One of the policemen leading the case is determined to pin the murder on Dean, while the policewoman has her doubts. Eventually, the policewoman and Sam find out that the real killer is the policeman who was involved with drug and murdered people to cover his tracks. Sam and the policewoman manage to save Dean from becoming the policeman’s scapegoat at the last minute, and the truth finally lets Dean go free.

One of the things I liked most about this episode was the fact that Dean and Sam were both shown as intelligent and competent, and managed to work together as a team to get themselves out of a predicament even though they were separated and had extremely limited means of communication. Furthermore, there was no snarking, bitching, or poisonous behaviour from Sam, and Dean’s jokes about Sam being the ‘red-headed woman’ did not seem like the abused partner in the brotherhood lashing out (although I am not quite sure what the relevance of Scully being a red-haired woman is, but it was probably an American writer’s attempt at a lame ginger joke. By which I mean the joke was lame AND ginger jokes are lame).

If this were the first and only episode of the show I ever watched, I could easily buy into the idea that Dean and Sam are a reasonably healthy, functioning duo who care about each other equally and have each other’s back. Sam’s sole motivation in finding the truth was to exonerate his brother, and in spite of the opportunities given to him, point-blank refused to even consider the notion of betraying Dean to the police. I actually liked Sam in this episode, and I have decided that 2x07!Sam is the only valid Sam.

Add to that the fact that Dean is not once demeaned, embarrassed, or misunderstood by the writer, and I am happy with this episode’s portrayal of the brothers. It gets no complaints from me whatsoever. Little things which some might have missed are the fact that Dean and Sam apparently discuss their alibis together before breaking into buildings, if Diana’s comment that ‘both their stories match’ is to be believed. They also have codes for communicating which take others a while to get if at all, such as Dean’s note to Sam referring to The Great Escape as a cue to escape.

Well done on those counts, Cathryn Humphries. It is just a shame I do not think this episode belongs in Supernatural.

Something worth remembering is that Dean’s rights have been taken away from him through no fault of his own. He was innocent of the killings he was blamed for in 1x06 Skin, being made into the fall-guy partially through a combination of Sam’s stupidity, Sam’s privileged upper-middle class university friend, and of course the shapeshifter. ...whom the police found dead whilst morphed into Dean. How could ‘Dean’ have faked his death when the police had his body? Anyway, because of this, Dean is cut off from participation in normal society due to being held accountable for other people’s actions (which Sam smirked at, remember), and he is at the policeman’s mercy. He is ‘just another scumbag’, another victim rendered powerless to save himself at the end. Being the sacrifice for other people is always Dean’s role, but at least this once he was saved before things got bad, and there was no Bad Ass snark from Sam after rescuing Dean, either. Well done, writer. Well done.

Some of the less good aspects of the episode were a few plot conveniences which stretched my suspension of disbelief. One of these is that Inspector Shady would give the same necklace to the woman he murdered as he did to Diana, especially since the necklace was a rare custom make. It was also strange that Dean did not hear the police enter the house and catch him with the woman’s dead body. The house was silent and Dean is trained to keep his wits about him, so this felt a bit too convenient, especially considering how well he managed to keep himself calm and collected at the sight of the body. He had clearly been in that situation before, so what was different that time?

Also worth pondering is why Claire (the death omen) did not appear to Dean in the van before Inspector Shady tried to kill him. She appeared to everybody Shady killed in advance to try warning them, but not to Dean. Is this a plot hole? I am not sure. Is there any way Claire could have known Dean would not die, and so did not need to warn him? Or was there iron in the van which she could not get through? That did not stop the Woman in White in 1x01 Pilot and it will not stop Tricia Helfer in 2x16 Roadkill, so why would it stop Claire?

That almost finishes things for this analysis (my shortest to date), but before then, there were two moments in this episode which set ADHD bells ringing in my head. The first was Dean making silly noises whilst sitting waiting for Sam to do his research on the computer...

and the second was his attempts at conversation with Inspector Shady in the van at the end. The way the writer intended it was likely Dean trying to be cocky or snarky in the face of death, perhaps to cover up his fear, but the way Jensen delivered his lines did not portray that. I got the nervousness and fear, but no sense of cockiness.

His comment ‘Another pee-break? You might want to get your prostate examined’ sounded like a little ADHD boy (or an autistic boy) who has so many thoughts in his head and is trying to have a conversation with somebody who just is not listening and does not care. The lack of ‘natural’ intonation in his voice while saying it also sounds like a person with ADHD or autism trying to make a joke and failing spectacularly.

As for the confession tape, it was better than any profile I have ever seen on Tinder, Grindr, Gaydar, or Planet Romeo. To be honest, that is a low bar, but praise where praise is due.

One final note before I finish: many have noted that Dean is frequently put in situations usually (or ‘traditionally’) reserved for female characters, i.e. helplessness, disarmed, and in need of being saved. Most of this is due to the fact that the show’s two leads are both male and one of them needs to be in danger sometimes for dramatic purposes, but it is Dean more frequently than Sam, e.g. being a sacrificial offering in 1x11 Scarecrow, being Max’s hostage in 1x14 Nightmare, being ‘bait’ for the vampires in 1x20 Dead Man’s Blood etc. Whilst I am sure more than one person has written several thousand words on ‘deconstructing concepts of masculinity’ or something else which talks about men as if we are animals to be observed in a zoo, I do not think it is much deeper than this: Sam has to be shown to be The HeroTM because he is The Protagonist, and the corollary is that Dean has to be the damsel.

Paula R. Stiles commented on this in her analysis of this same episode, and I quote:

We see again here the show’s tendency to place the macho, hypermasculine male lead in a role normally reserved for a female lead

The reason I raised this is because ‘hypermasculinity’ does not mean what some people seem to think it means, i.e. masculine. Hypermasculinity is an actual term used in sociology and psychology to refer to a certain set of traits in a certain kind of man. Think, for example, of gangsters. The Encyclopaedia Britannica gives the following definition:

hypermasculinity, sociological term denoting exaggerated forms of masculinity, virility, and physicality. Scholars have suggested that there are three distinct characteristics associated with the hypermasculine personality: (1) the view of violence as manly, (2) the perception of danger as exciting and sensational, and (3) callous behavior toward women and a regard toward emotional displays as feminine.

None of those criteria applies to Dean. Dean is not ‘hypermasculine’: he is adept at enacting violence, but he does not view it as ‘manly’; he does not find danger exciting, it is simply a necessary part of his life (except during his self-destructive episodes); he is not ‘callous’ towards women, and he does show emotions other than ‘anger’. ‘Hypermasculine’ is a bad descriptor of Dean: he is masculine. Using words which mean things to refer to things they do not mean. Hypermasculine is gangsters and thugs, it’s not a man acting like a masculine man. They are very different things and I wish people would stop conflating the two.

(For further discussion of Dean and masculinity, you can read my essay entitled Deancrits, don't @ me

Thus concludeth my analyis of 2x07 The Usual Suspects.

One final final thing: