#anyways this was long and off topic

[abd-illustrates]

I might’ve spoiled the plot of Natlan | Genshin Impact THEORY

In which I read so much lore that I gained the power to see the future (maybe) This ended up being a real challenge to make - but it was also really fun! Please do lemme know what you reckon of these ideas, and whether y’all wanna see me pattern-recognition my way into several corkboards worth of theories about any other topics sometime down the line! (^^)/

(also: HAPPY NEW YEAR! 🥳🎉 Here's wishing y'all every good thing for 2024)

[mossy-paws]

some doodles! (PHIGHTING!)

A collection of recent subspace and Medkit doodles! The final thing is actually a remake of a really silly meme I made like. God how long back in August of 2023? Geez I’ve been in the fandom for awhile,,, it’s crazy how my art has evolved since then for real!

also… these, no, no I am not giving ANY sort of explanation for them

[wosemi-sama]

bestfriend! asmodeus, who begs you to tell him who you have a crush on. hes just curious!!

bestfriend! asmodeus, who upon finding out who you like, has frown on his face. but before you realize, he smiles, as if the disappointment was never there.

bestfriend! asmodeus, who will wingman for you, giving you confession ideas and drawing hearts on fogged up windows with yours and your crushs first initial just to fluster you.

bestfriend! asmodeus, who helps you write a confession letter and quietly watches as you slip it on your crushs seat, wishing it was him.

bestfriend! asmodeus, who painfully watches as your crush accepts your letter.

bestfriend! asmodeus, who slowly begins to distance himself from you, unsure of what to do.

[the-bi-space-ace]

There’s been some discussion recently about the subplot of bullying in The Bad Batch and I had some thoughts so I decided to write them out to discuss them.

I wanted to bring up some things that maybe can put together this disconnect we seem to see between the show The Bad Batch and the show The Clone Wars and maybe explains a bit about this whole bullied versus bully concept.

To me The Clone Wars paints a very different picture than The Bad Batch in a way that only serves to make the lines blurry and make the viewer think (perhaps not their intention but I think maybe they fell into this more on accident). The Clone Wars batch rolls in with a reputation that’s already not too great. Jesse even says it: it’s not that they win. It’s how they win. The batch is known for dangerous stunts that put other people at risk. They don’t always think through their decisions outside of themselves. Then we get this scene of them walking off of the ship and they are very arrogant. They show off, they talk big, they don’t exactly give off ‘approachable’.

We get into the mission and Jesse, in particular, is not a fan but it isn’t very aggressive yet. Crosshair is being confrontational - staring Jesse down, making snippy comments, and being an overall ass (I love Crosshair, don’t get me wrong, I’m just talking about what I observe in this introduction). I think it’s because he senses Jesse’s dislike of them and wants to poke at it.

We’re not off to a good start.

Where I think the batch fails in this episode is letting Crosshair insult Rex and further goad Jesse. Crosshair shouldn’t have said half the stuff he did and Jesse (and later, Rex) are justified in hitting back at him.

They’re soldiers. They’re going to get in each other’s faces if someone starts talking shit.

When Jesse scolds Crosshair - I think Kix is somewhere standing in the background but not directly involved- Wrecker steps in and turns things violent.

It’s not a moment I’m most proud of them. It’s actually one of the moments I’m least proud of them. Crosshair and Kix get into it when Crosshair shoves him for trying to help Jesse and Rex is attempting to get Wrecker to let Jesse go. This escalated quickly and I’m not sure I can say that this was justified. It seems like a big jump to me (but maybe someone disagrees, feel free to, I’d like to know someone else’s thoughts).

In this episode we’re really led down one path that says the batch and other clones don’t get along and from this limited perspective in this episode it seems like the batch are instigators. They roll in, avoid consequences for themselves, and roll out without giving anyone else a second thought.

The Bad Batch tv show paints an entirely different picture and it is definitely to make them more likable and relatable to a young audience. Every kids show has the character that’s an underdog, it’s who we want to root for. It makes the people in The Bad Batch’s age range connect with them more and I can’t exactly blame them for writing it this way - although after seeing the batch in the clone wars it does make me sigh a bit, I won’t lie.

I was bullied as a child. Quite severely, actually, so I find myself justifying the disconnect with a few things. Perhaps the batch puts up a front so they push other clones away before it can happen to them. I’ve done this. I put on a really abrasive attitude to keep people away when I was in high school and I regret it. However, I got over myself as I got older and worked through my own issues rather than blaming other people. Because you have to. It’s not alright to continue to hurt other people because you were hurt and I remind myself of that every single day. It’s the only way to move forward. I never have to forgive people who have hurt me but I can’t start using it as an excuse.

I mention this only to say that maybe their behavior in The Clone Wars was a mask built from past hurt and that could make sense to me. You build up walls when you’ve been hurt and you create behaviors based on experience. However, I still don’t think their behavior should be excused. I still think they escalated that situation far before anyone else did. In the same way I think Jesse made a lot of snap judgements about the batch and just kept finding ways to reinforce that judgement based on what he’d heard about them prior. And this snap judgment isn’t the best way to go about working with new people. It’s not an excuse, just an explanation.

I even think the batch’s behavior in episode 1 of their own show kind of contradicts some of their behavior in TCW. Particularly Crosshair. Crosshair doesn’t engage in the cafeteria until he absolutely has to while in TCW he is the primary instigator. We can try to explain this by saying it’s because his chip activated and his personality shifted. I just think it’s something worth pointing out.

I’d also like to add that of course the batch are the primary instigators in The Clone Wars because the clones we knew and loved in that show are technically the heroes of the episode. Of course they’re portrayed in a better light. It’s the same as the batch in episode one of their own show. Of course they’re portrayed as the ‘good guys’. It’s their show. To me it’s less of a character moment and more of a way to get the viewers of the show to root for somebody, whoever they want us to root for in the moment. The Bad Batch is told from their perspective so they are going to be the underdogs while The Clone Wars brings the batch in as outsiders to the group and gives them a more aggressive interaction to further our already beloved character’s narratives.

This was a very long way to say, I’ve always been kinda meh about the whole ‘the batch is bullied’ subplot and I tend to avoid writing it in my own fics because I think there is inconsistency with the writing between the clone wars and the bad batch and this can possibly be boiled down to a few things like different writers on the creative teams, an uncertain future, and wanting to paint certain characters in certain lights because of the show they are on. Rather than actually being a truly defining character arc it is a tool, as most writing is, it’s just not a tool I particularly care for in this story. And while I do think there are inconsistencies I can piece together some things to explain it if I really want to. I don’t think one side is right and one side is wrong. I think there are a million explanations for hurt on both sides and we decide it for ourselves because neither show truly made it clear enough for me to draw any lines in the sand. (And if you’ve been reading my stories at all you know I love a good grey area so I probably wouldn’t draw lines at all.)

I always try to be fair to everyone when I write stuff like this so I hope I’ve covered all of my points well enough. There are plenty of things to say about this topic and it has been talked about a few times recently in other posts that you can read. Tagging 1 by @laughhardrunfastbekindsblog and 2 by @gars-technician because these two posts inspired me to write this.

I’d definitely encourage open discussion here if anyone wants to chime in 😊 while I know we might all have different opinions I’m certainly willing to hear them as long as everyone is respectful.

[singingcicadas]

The main thing I have against Spotlight: Hot Rod is that it portrays him as being constantly weighed down by past losses and guilt, to the extent that he even limits himself for fear of facing the potential negative consequences that his misjudgement might inflict onto others - the "prefer to go solo" line - when it contradicts the very essence of his character as established in MTMTE and the main comics (even Autocracy), which specifically presents him as the type of person who is unburdened by the past and for the most part consciously remains unaffected by the consequences of his actions. It's why he has a perpetual Peter Pan thing going on, because he moves on from one day to the next, one crisis to the next, for four million years without letting the experiences change him - which includes the experiences of deaths and sufferings of both himself and others - and maturity and growth cannot be achieved without change.

His impulsiveness and headstrong obstinacy is in part a compensation mechanism for insecurity and subconscious self-doubt but is also an intrinstic aspect of who he is, someone who plows onward while refusing to look back. He can feel sorry but he does not do regret, much less mire himself in it like his spotlight appears to suggest. As a matter of fact he doesn't mire himself in anything at all - be it politics, responsibility, or guilt. He doesn't regret Nyon, nor Ironhide, nor Optimus' resignation, nor leaving Cybertron, nor trusting Megatron. Not even the Overlord incident, since although he does feel bad for his poor decision getting a bunch of people killed, in the end the biggest issue that he has with it is the 89/101 voting result (which isn't even solely about Overlord).

It's obvious that he wants - expects - to stay as captain in spite of everything and having the vote cut so close got him hard because it's a blow to his ego. He practically admits to this when Optimus calles him out, which again is in direct contradiction to his spotlight monologue.

If he's willing to apply this kind of introspection for a failed mission that can’t even be attributed to his fault, then a lot of his later screwups would never have happened.

Choosing to return the Matrix to Optimus is supposed to be a landmark incident of Rodimus' character growth, yet he regresses right back in MTMTE, in which he develops a recursive pattern of messing up, trying to do better by making amends, then returning to his old ways because he can't fully commit. There's no fundamental change going on. I would argue that the true pivotal moment of change to his character took place during his talk with the guiding hand in Mederi, when he first learns to look past himself to accept what's best for other people, how his decisions might affect them etc. - even if it clashes with his own desires.

And then he chooses to save Getaway, and the speech that gave everyone the confidence to open their matrices. There's change and growth and maturity, he learns to fully empathize and appreciate the people around him. But with this growth comes a double-edged sword: by opening himself to connect with other people he leaves himself open to be affected as well - he is irrevocably changed by his experiences aboard the Lost Light, by the people around him he's grown to care about, so that when the Lost Light lands for its inevitable end and everyone departs to pursue their own lives, he alone remains mired in place, with nothing but the past to cling to. After a lifetime of moving on and brushing horrors off without lasting issue he's suddenly unable to move on. The remainder of his life becomes defined by the weight of memories and loss (and the empty comfort of a parallel universe of which its existence he'll never know).

[pink-octopede64]

a rambley shirt i made in animal crossing new horizons!

tried to replicate the one from the game shown in the 2nd screenshot

[buckera]

okay not to be rude but i need people in this fandom to learn to enter discussions in good faith, learn to read and differentiate between fiction and reality and stop crying about heated reactions to their own heated comments... i don't think that'd be too much to ask for and yet here we are

[madaqueue]

have i been on here long enough to warrant an “about me” post or have i been sufficiently perceived 😛😛😛😛

[k-yujin]

read the tags !! // officially quit

[meat-wentz]

How do you think your thing for cannibalism started?

oh!! fun story time!! so i grew up with two really specific movies that started it: jennifer’s body which i saw opening day in theaters and i had a super gay hidden part of my room where i had all these magazine pages of megan fox spreads all taped up at an angle where i could see them but my parents couldn’t, anyways i was sixteen and had literally just friend broke up with my fuckedupgirlbestie which was a relationship i would describe as so intense and emotionally cannibalistic that jennifer’s body had just come out at like such a specific correct time for me that i just hold it so dear to myself. and the other movie is ginger snaps, which was very similarly about inseparable girls and the violence of becoming your own person and the terrible terrible ache of growing up and i was just obsessed!!! anyways ive spent most of my life holding cannibal girl movies near and dear and used my time in film school to write about them quite extensively, particularly about the subversion of female autonomy displayed in films like raw, teeth, daisies, pink flamingos, trouble everyday, we are what we are etc. for instance the common gender theory we can apply to weapons in horror films is that the weapon is a stand in for the phallus which is 1) not able to be controlled and 2) not physically a part of the body (think leatherface’s chainsaw, ghostface’s knife, jason’s machete, even freddy’s glove but i would pose it has a more complex reading which i would love to go into at some point). they’re weapons of sexual aggression and power. what i love about girl cannibals is that they negate the horror male weapon by using the opposite, rather than wield an external weapon, they use their mouths, the horror of their victims is all about the internal. it’s about what goes on inside, about the horror of the body that no one else sees, it’s a weapon that’s completely a part of their bodies and that they have complete control over. where the machete indicates a something independent from the aggressor, the mouth as weapon is completely dependent on its host. it becomes less about the fragility of aggression and more about the self empowerment of aggression, to take something in, to make it part of you, to establish your autonomy by feeding oneself, to devour everything in your path!!!! now this is just one way to look at it but it’s my usual cannibal spiel that i go on. i also have to give a big old shout out to hannibal and yellowjackets.

i think there’s also just this metaphor that ive always loved of wanting to be one with someone, to mesh yourselves together in a horrible twisted way, to never want to be apart, to do it until you disintegrate into the other, to acknowledge the horror of loving someone so deeply that you would make them yours forever forever.

[kingofthewilderwest]

Moral Orel hit me in a sweet spot. I think it’s beautiful seeing fans on different paths discussing how the show touched them. I’ve seen people who’ve left the church, agnostics, atheists, and Christians all say the show spoke deeply to them. Of course the show’s black humor on religion offended many, especially before its last season aired, but I think the show’s resulting legacy - connecting to people who’ve both left and who’ve stayed - demonstrates successful nuance to how Moral Orel was crafted.

The show’s creators have said it’s not against religion per se, it’s against hypocrites. Even with the first season, I felt that and found appreciation (frankly, joy) for what was satirized. Here was a show speaking up, exaggerating, and lampooning the facets of Protestant American Christian culture I’ve vented about in confidence to relevant friends and family - without, like many modern shows which tackle this subject do, mocking followers themselves, faith itself, and suggesting to viewers one way of life is better than another, one group of people is (ex: intellectually) superior to another.

Some people have stepped away from Moral Orel and said, “This show comforted me when I left church,” or outright, “This show taught me there is no god.” And that’s not an unfair way to interact with Moral Orel because it doesn’t preach what you “should” do there (a sign of mature writing, really). I stepped away from Moral Orel and said, “This show comforted me in the areas I get frustrated,” which assuages my feelings and makes me more confident in my faith and place within culture.

I feel awkward in contemporary culture because I was raised with minimal secular exposure - daughter of a worship pastor, student at a private Christian school until high school. Meanwhile, in adulthood, I didn't attended church functions for over a dozen years. My group of friends have largely been non-Christians who hold negative opinions about the religion and don’t live remotely similar lifestyles to what I was raised with. I love what I've learned from them. Unfortunately, this also means the cultural building blocks that make me who I am seem shared by no one I'm around, which, even though I'm in my 30s, remains disorienting.

On the flipside, I'm the weirdo with the third eye in Christian spaces, too. I’m an ever-thirsty knowledge-seeker who strives to comprehend forbidden topics from all angles. I spent my twenties researching, questioning, rebuilding knowledge, and critically analyzing everything about the Bible. Church attendees and services feel painfully artificial, with mental blockers to topics I feel are critical to understand.

In either community I partake in, I feel “off.”

I’m grateful to have been raised by parents who didn’t pussyfoot around issues, with a father who deep-dives research. Discussions, delving, and digging into the hard stuff has always been fostered. My family spoke to pastors when we disagreed with their theology. I grew up around people who practiced passive acceptance, but my family was not that.

In the last year, I’ve returned more strongly to my faith and have been reintegrating with the Christian community. In some areas, my faith has grown and, humbly, I’ve learned much from peers. Despite stereotypes, I want to note that, in certain fields, the church community has always been deep and meticulous! And there are so many beautiful and uplifting areas in the church. But likewise there are those areas that get assumed, aren’t questioned, and aren’t… responded to well by questioning spirits. There have always been areas in the church culture I find disingenuous, foolish, illogical, limited, oversimplified, denialistic, or susceptible to hypocrisy and immorality. I’m not better than any person on this planet, but I’m rubbing shoulders with a community that has different blinders than I do, who don’t even consider asking the types of questions or seeking out the information I find necessary for a solidified faith.

Moral Orel disparages the toxic elements of Protestant culture, the misinterpretations, the artificial facades, the mindless assumptions, the poorly-hidden underbelly, all the areas Christian community can and does go wrong. It makes me feel justified feeling awkward in two worlds: someone for whom Christianity is deeply important, but someone whose mindset doesn’t jive with the rest of the town. Someone who can find and wants to find the best lessons outside of Christianity. Someone who believes in questioning, rethinking constantly, raising her eyebrows at common notions within church culture, and striving for the actual love, sincerity, dedication, and goodness our faith should be based on.

[geopsych]

I don’t usually quote celebrities on here but this is just what I like. It’s Michael Sheen and he was asked of all the fantasy creatures he has played over the years, which was his favorite. He talked a while about what fascinates him about vampires but then he said this:

“but in a way that challenge of playing an angel has been the one I enjoyed the most because I am sort of fascinated by goodness, what is it to be good and the concept of goodness and that we as a society tend sort of undervalue goodness, it's sort of seen as somehow weak and a bit nimby and 'oh it's nice' and, you know, not... and I think that to be good takes enormous reserves of courage and stamina, and... I mean, you have to look the dark in the face to be truly good and to be truly of the light and it takes such courage, and the most, the bravest people I've ever come across in my life are people who've gone through terrible tragedy and terrible pain and terrible grief, and have somehow managed to turn that into something positive, to make positive change for other people, and whenever I've met anyone who's done that I always think it's a miracle, it's an absolute miracle, and the idea that goodness is somehow lesser and less interesting and not as kind of muscular and as passionate and as fierce as evil somehow and darkness I think is nonsense. So the idea of being able to portray an angel, a being of love and... I loved seeing the things that people put online about angels being ferocious creatures and I love that, I think that's a really good representation of what goodness can be, what it should be I suppose. So, yes, so I'm gonna say: the angel.” Adding link to the post where I saw it, as requested by @sheepshapedfluff: https://www.tumblr.com/fuckyeahgoodomens/699640266444914688/michael-sheen-on-playing-fantasy-creatures-angels

[licorishh]

OH YEAH ALSO finally watched the FNAF movie with the coolest person on Earth, 11/10 movie, Mike looked ready to curl up into a fetal position on the floor and burst into tears at all moments, he is so me, would watch again

[saturnniidae]

I want to know what Hiccups secret is. How does he not look like a lobster. What did he fucking invent viking sunscreen or some shit how is this guy not burnt????

[gelarshiesprofruitboarder]

WGAT IS TGE STORY BEHINDF YUOR USERNAME 🙏🙏

YAY OKAY this is gonna be long bc youve just let me talk ab and old hyperfix of mine so SORRY AB THAT

okay so homestar runner had this absolute freak of a character named Marshie

hes amazing i love him anyways hes a mascot for the in-universe (/maybe real i think but completely unrelated) marshmallow brand called Fluffy Puff Marshmallows,, hes fucking scary um. but yeah and when i started getting back into h*r i started to rlly like him bc hell yeah floating marshmallow that will probably kill you

Then in SBemail #187: winter pool, Strong bad uses Homestars lifetime supply of Red Flavored Fluffy Puff Translucent Dessert Related Substance he got to fill a pool, introducing Marshies alter ego(?) Gel-Arshie

(Normally he does not have legs or arms and instead floats, but all the pics of him normal are low quality. so.)

And i fucking LOVED gel-arshie he was even MORE of an absolute freak (to quote him, hes "AN ABOMINATION! (And (he's) comin' to your house after school")). His voice is all weird and distorted and he can like make stuff red and his brains all exposed and also hes rated NC-17 (Needlessly Creepy times 17). I love him still he has my heart forever

Anyways then h*r got a telltale series (rip) and in the fifth one he comes back in his new promotional game called Gel-Arshie's Pro Fruitboarder

Look at him in all his fruitboarding glory

Anyways i was looking to change my user to smth more fandom related, and everything i thought of was taken/wouldn't fit in tiktoks character limit, so i just figured if i was hyperfixing on Marshie/Gel-Arshie, and like no one else liked him, id just take the name of his game as my user bc it fit almost perfectly and i knew it would be original !!

(sad side effect tho is i guess sometimes when you look him up MY shit comes up so uhm. sorry to any homestar runner fans having to see some cringey ass teens dumb content while looking for info on a random character)

again sorry this was so long i havent had the chance to talk about him like ever soooooo yeah 🙏🙏

[basuralindo]

Hey do you think Jamil has trouble seeing people his age as peers?

Like, growing up having to be a caretaker to a guy literally a few months older than him, always expected to act like the adult in the situation, expected to work with adults and adopt their perspectives and pick up their slack. Do you think he just, forgets sometimes?

I mean we've seen him go into caretaker mode with other sophomores, and the only people I've seen him take seriously are juniors like Vil who also act much older than they should have to (his reactions to Leona look more like a trauma response and I don't wanna get into it here). People like Malleus and Cater still somewhat get the caretaker treatment. Like I just highly doubt that he subconsciously realizes he's actually part of his age group

Aaand that inevitably brings up Azul, who also acts like he thinks he's older than he is. Whether you're looking at it from a shipping angle or not, he reacts to Azul like an actual peer. With older students, he seems more in his element but there's still a status hierarchy which he compulsively reacts to. With Azul he doesn't acknowledge any status worth respecting or see him as someone who needs to be looked after. He just bickers like an equal, in a way that implies he actually does see Azul as a real peer, like subconsciously he's categorized this guy into the same group as himself, who was previously alone on that level (he gets like this more with the twins too, over time, but it seems to start with Azul).

And my favorite part about this is, while that response stems from them both acting more like adults in general, they elicit a pettiness from each other which drags them both down to actually acting their own age, and I just love that. Their characters are perfect foils for each other and it seems to make them both less isolated in a way.