#as long as its not like. arguing with people who have read comics about what is or isn’t canon

[hmslusitania]

Something that just made me a lot more chill about seeing other peoples questionable takes in the depths of comics fandoms here is that, you know, with like tv shows or movies when there’s differing takes, you can ask yourself with great despair “did we even watch the same thing?” and you DID but people are people.

Whereas with comics, particularly character analysis as opposed to like. Event review. You sit there looking at some wild (to you) conclusion someone else has drawn and you ask, “did we even read the same comics?!” And like.

Honestly?

Chances are pretty good that… no. You didn’t. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[elixirfromthestars]

Usual

Pairing: Biker!Bucky x Florist!Reader

Summary: Bucky keeps to his usual routine every week. On Mondays, it includes you.

Word Count: ~700

Warning(s): none. fluffy goodness <3 established nickname ⟶ tulip

a/n: This Bucky has been swimming in my head for a while, so this little drabble came out as a result. Hope you enjoyed reading! Feedback is always appreciated 🤍 Also I'm hosting a little writing challenge if you want to check it out. 🤍

the whole collection ♡

The bells above your shop door chimed a short melody as it opened. The steady thud of heavy boots followed suit. You turn to face the entrance with your usual welcoming demeanor. 

It was Monday. He always comes on Monday. 

“ Hey, Bucky. Here for the usual?” You ask like clockwork, already knowing the answer. 

“ ‘Course, Tulip,” he replies, smiling at you with that usual twinkle in his eyes. The one that only shows up when he talks to you. You can’t help the way your heart skips a beat when he uses that nickname he gave you months ago. 

“ Coming right up,” you respond, turning to the small shelves behind the counter. The ones lined up with your homemade jams and honeys. Every Monday he buys three of each to serve at his bar in a mix of different snack dishes. 

His favorite happens to be the one he named after you—Tulip’s Sweet Special.  

Bucky strolls over to the flowers that align the walls adjacent to the front counter. Rows upon rows of an array of colors and different-sized petals. A rainbow of the prettiest blooms nature has to offer. 

Meanwhile, you’re putting the mason jars of sweet spreads in a small wicker basket. Glancing at him briefly to stare at his side profile and the way he looks at the flowers intently. Almost as if waiting for them to speak to him. 

You wonder what flowers he’ll choose today. 

You don’t have to wonder for long as he walks over to the counter with a bouquet of white and pink daises, adorned with a touch of lavender. You look at them with a knowing smile on your face. The rugged biker almost looks comical—in the sweetest way—with the bouquet in hand. 

“ Will that be all?” You ask him, motioning to the flowers and the goods in the basket. Bucky nods, lightly scratching at the stubble on his face,“ That’s all, Tulip. And I’ll get ya that basket of yours later. Forgot it back at the bar,” he mentions the basket he borrowed a week ago to transport last week’s items on his bike. 

Of course, he forgot it. He always does. 

“ No need. I’ll just come by the bar later and get it,” you say to him—this little forgetful exchange an excuse to see each other again. It's about the fifth time you’ve done this little rendezvous in the last two months. 

Bucky grins in a way that would make any woman swoon,“ I’ll be waitin’ on ya then.” You can’t help the warmth that finds its way to your face. 

You ring him up, and as you’re getting his change ready he places the flowers in the empty vase on the counter. The one you leave for whatever flowers he buys for you that week. You look at them and the way he delicately places them inside, with a tender care you were one of a handful of people who’s ever seen him dawn. The action envelopes you with a doting affection.

“ Thank you for the flowers, Bucky,” you say with a soft sincerity. No matter how many times he buys you flowers the action still causes your heart to flutter.

“ No need for the thanks—or the change,” he says, lightly closing your fingers around the change in your hand with his calloused one. The slight touch is electric and it makes you both yearn for more. 

You give him that look. That usual look that says you’re doing this again and he replies with a look that conveys hell yeah I am.

You know better than to argue with that look. 

“ Come spend it at my bar later instead,” he suggests shrugging nonchalantly—but his eyes and grin reflect everything but nonchalance. There’s a deep rooted sentiment there that is desperate to be freed and brought to the surface.

You hum, pretending to think about it,“ Alright, deal.” Bucky responds to your agreement by giving you a pleased nod.

Bucky grabs the basket of goods. The rough exterior of his hands contrasted with the gentle almost tender way he held the basket. He was always delicate and careful with anything that belonged to you.

The basket looked so much smaller when he held it. 

Bucky sends you a farewell wink,“ See ya later, Tulip,” and then he turns to leave with a small wave of his hand.

“ See you later, Bucky,” you reply before leaning on the counter, hands resting in your palms. You watch him walk back out to his motorcycle with a longing stare. 

When he was out of sight, you listened intently to the revving of his engine bike, anticipating the day you two would go past the usual.

Until then you’d cherish this routine affair.

[linkspooky]

If there's a next time, maybe I'll change how I live...

Sukuna's last moment in the manga ends with him accepting that his loss, and showing even the strongest of all time Sukuna, someone powerful enough to do what he wants, when he wants, could not only lose but he could be wrong. This is something considering that you could make an argument that the entire manga, and sorcerer society as a whole is shaped around Sukuna's morality of the pursuit of selfish desire and strength of all else. In fact someone else argues it right here.

What led to this journey of the most irredeemable character in the comics who lived only for selfish pleasure acknowledging the love he rejected in the end? Well, we'll cover that under the cut.

The Cycle

Before analyzing Shinjuku as a whole, I want to start with its conclusion. I'll first break down the final moment in Sukuna's character arc, and then go back to the start and analyze how we got there. That being said, let's get on with it.

Sukuna loss begins with him contradicting his own nature. I'll explain what I mean by this. If you read the thread above, detective_critics observes characters like Sukuna who live for themselves and characters who embody Sukuna's ideals like Gojo are rewarded in the manga whereas characters like Yuji who fight primarily for others are punished relentlessly.

This is well supported by Yuji's continual losses throughout the manga. Yuji swallows Sukuna's fingers in order to permanently execute Sukuna and stop future people from being harmed by curses, but because of Yuji's decision to swallow the finger thousands die in Shibuya. Yuji's desire to save others only seems to backfire and he's continually presented with those he can't save, Junpei, Nanami, Nobara. He's even robbed of his own purpose of being Sukuna's vessel when Sukuna takes Megumi's body instead.

I mostly agree with this idea that the manga rewards people more true to their desires like Sukuna and Gojo, but I'd like to add an addendum that the manga doesn't specifically reward selfishness, but rather self-actualization.

To backtrack slightly, Sukuna observes that many sorcerers in the past have faced him but they didn't truly believe in their ideals the way that Yuji did. Yuji is punished by the narrative yes, but he's not unceremoniously killed off the way that Toji, and Mahito are. Rather, Yuji's durability, his ability to cling to life instead of just dying off like Sukuna suggests weak people should do comes from the fact that his ideal is unshakable.

Let's look at Sukuna's words a little more closely. He says that many sorcerers killed him in the past and they all had different ideals, but none of them truly believed in their ideals. Because Sukuna could so easily point out how their idealism was false he came to think of all ideals as worthless. This is shown in the way that he easily picks apart both Gojo and Hajime, two characters who lose because they ultimately don't believe in their own ideals. Sukuna is very easily able to point out the hypocrisy in both of them.

Sukuna basically points out that Kashimo and Gojo were both happy to bully anyone who came near them, they'll throw around their power all they like and revel in their own superiority and then go back and complain about being lonely. A classic case of wanting to have your cake and eat it too, or as Sukuna said they were being greedy. They were the ones who rejected everyone around them, they were the ones who rejected the love they were shown, and yet they put the blame on everyone else.

Gojo even in death acts like everyone else is a flower, an inferior being incapable of understanding him. Yet, a few panels later he says that the fight with Sukuna the only person who rivaled him in strength and therefore shouldn't be able to understand him didn't satisfy him, and he would only have been satisfied if Geto were there.

These two statements contradict each other. The thing is, Gojo has at this point long surpassed Geto in strength. People often clown Geto on the fact that he never had a domain expansion, and that Kenjaku seemed to use his cursed technique far better than he ever could. Geto is someone who's far behind Gojo in strength, and yet he's the one who could satisfiy Gojo, not Sukuna. Which means Gojo was the one who was wrong. Gojo was betraying his ideals. He believed he was living to be the strongest, that he was satisfied being the strongest while all along wanting something else and it's that contradiction that killed him.

Let me make a brief comparison to another manga. Aizen from Bleach is a character with a god complex to rival Gojo's, and just like Gojo exists on a different level of power than everyone else. He is not only the strongest soul reaper, but one of the smartest, and has been isolated by that strength since he was a child. Aizen then believes that he needs to become god, because it's his right as a naturally superior being, but Aizen is a fraud.

Aizen loses becuase the hogyoku the source of his power rejected him right as he seemed to be at the peak of his power. However, Ichigo reflects that maybe the Hogyoku didn't reject him. The Hogyoku is in plot, a wish granting macguffin, that grants your subconscious desire. Ichigo speculates that maybe Aizen didn't truly want to ascend to godhood, but rather he wanted someone like Ichigo to defeat him. That he wanted an equal like Ichigo so he wouldn't have to be alone on the top anymore. Aizen not being fully aware of this desire and clinging to his sense of superiority instead, the very thing that makes him lonely is what causes him to lose. Aizen is cut down by Ichigo, and instead of becoming a god he becomes just another soul reaper.

Sukuna cuts through Gojo by cutting through the world, bypassing the infinity, and therefore making him just like everyone else. Just as Aizen wished to be just another soul reaper, Gojo becomes just another sorcerer now that his position of the strongest has been taken by Sukuna.

So Gojo's loss came when he betrayed his ideals. His stated ideal of "I am the strongest", but this was contradicted by what he really wanted which was the time of his life when him and Geto together said "We are the Strongest." Strength didn't satisfy him, but rather it was Geto and Gojo's inability to realize the real reason he was fighting leads to his loss.

The manga doesn't reward selfishness, but rather self-actualization. Characters with a strong sense of self are just more likely to be self-actualized, because they possess a deep sense of self awareness.

Sukuna at least is self-aware. He knows you can't be the strongest, to relentlessly bully others with your power and yet want to be close to other people too. He knows that's wanting to have your cake and eat it too, so he rejects love. Sukuna knows you can't have it both ways, so he decides I don't need love, love won't satisfy me, I'll live only to be the strongest.

My main example of a character betraying their ideals is Toji though.

Toji moves to face a newly awakened Gojo. He has not only a solid plan to fight him, curse tools that can penetrate his infinity, but he's also got inside knowledge of the Limitless. Toji believes he can win, and yet at the same time he feels uneasy.

As he died, Toji reflects that the reason he died is because he deviated from his true self. He believed that he was jumping from job to job, just working for money. That he didn't care about the sorcerer world. He killed sorcerers, got paid, and then gambled it all away.

Yet, when he was faced with the pinnacle of Jujutsu his motivation changed from living to fulfill his own selfish desires, to revenge. Toji wasn't as over the way the Zen'in Clan rejected him as he thought he was. He needed to defeat Gojo in order to affirm himself, and the moment he betrayed his own ideals like that he lost.

Now this moment can be directly paralleled back to Sukuna, who feels a similiar unease the entire time that he's fighting Yuji, an unease that makes him more and more irrational over the course of the fight.

Sukuna betrays his ideals in two ways, one that he's never once cared what other sorcerers think and say and lives only for himself and two that he is merely killing time before he dies. The first leads to his breakdown over the fight as he tries to crush Yuji, but finds himself unable to. The second is as I said above the final nail in the coffin.

When faced with a stronger opponent, or rather opponents as the sorcerers of the modern era all work together to trump the sorcerer of the golden age of sorcerery Sukuna doesn't accept his death. In his last moments he's clinging desperately to Megumi, trying to keep living in his body. At which point Megumi remarks that even someone like Sukuna must fear death too.

You could connect this to Mahito too. Many people even said that Sukuna got the Mahito treatment. Both characters lived freely slaughtering everyone else, and yet when they are about to be killed they try and run away from it. This is obviously deliberate as not only do the words "You are Me' parallel "I am you" but Sukuna's last moment in the manga is a conversation with Mahito.

Mahito also betrayed his ideal. Number one curses don't truly die, Jogo and Hanami and Dagan all accept their deaths because they'll be reborn as different curses but they'll always come back. However, Mahito clings to his own existence. Mahito is also not true to his nature, because he longs to be a true curse, but Mahito is also the most human curse. He's the representative of the fear and hate humans have for one another, and he spends his last moments terrified of the human being known as Yuji Itadori.

Which is why Mahito is appropriate to have this final conversation with Sukuna. Mahito calls out the way Sukuna betrayed his ideals. Sukuna always believed he was only living to satisfy himself and he didn't care what others thought, but Mahito points out that he was really living for revenge towards the people who rejected that unlovable wretch. Sukuna wasn't rejecting people because he was a god towering far above others, but because he had been rejected and hated in the past and then decided to hate them in turn.

However, unlike Mahito Sukuna is able to grow up so to speak. Mahito doesn't want to be anything else but Sukuna comes to the realization that you can choose your nature. That the decision to hate and reject everyone was a choice, and that he can choose a different path in another life.

You define who you are, that is the literal definition of self actualization. So we see Sukuna having become enlightened about himself escape the cycle, whereas Mahito who's still a curse is still trapped in that cycle. Something that Mahito complains about, that he's just a child unable to grow up while even Sukuna has changed.

Escaping the Cycle

Now that I've shown you how Sukuna has changed, I'm going to go over all of Shinjuku to describe the events that led to this change. This change is brought about everyone, but most of all by Yuji Itadori someone who unlike Sukuna reached self-realization. Yuji is the one who remains true to himself, whereas Sukuna who has only lived for himself is the one who betrays himsellf in the end.

The first hint that Sukuna may not entirely believe his own words comes in his conversation with Kashimo. Sukuna lives for his own self-satisfaction, other people exist for him to amuse himself until he dies. Since he's a complete being who doesn't need anyone else to satisfy him, since he's satisfied then why did he need to divide himself into twenty parts and keep living after death.

Sukuna doesn't answer this quesiton, but rather just continues on with his monologue. If life to Sukuna is just killing time until he dies then why does he go above and beyond to prolong his life? Why not accept his natural death?

Then after quickly dispatching Higuruma, Sukuna finds himself unsatisfied. Even though he was doing exactly what Kashimo told him, he was tasting an interesting sorcerer and swallowing him whole.

Sukuna doesn't feel satisfied in his victory. At first he thinks it's just because Higuruma lost too early, and then he realizes that his current disatisfaction comes from Yuji. Sukuna doesn't care what others think, he hates the concept of ideals themselves, at yet the same time Yuji holding an unbreakable ideal bothers him. If Sukuna is being true to himself, then he shouldn't care what Yuji believes in.

Yet, Sukuna changes for the first time in a thousand years. He acquires a new ideal and that's killing every sorcerer present and then initating the merger. Something that Kusakabe even notes is out of character for Sukuna. He thought Sukuna wouldn't have a need to start the merger, he doesn't care about big picture things like Kenjaku he just wants to strong opponent.

Sukuna begins to drift further and further from his nature because of Yuji over the course of the fight. As I said Sukuna shouldn't have to fight Yuji to prove that Yuji's ideal is wrong. If he rejects all ideologies then he shouldn't even care. Yet the things that set Sukuna off the most in the fight, the things that motivate him to fight the hardest to crush his enemy are people like Yuji and Maki who challenge his beliefs. Yuji by fighting for others instead of himself, and Maki by rejecting cursed energy entirely and instead having a strong body to fight.

Sukuna who is supposed to be completely satisfied with himself, has something to prove when fighting against these opponents. We learn that Yuji isn't just some boring child like Sukuna suggested. He's actually made from the other half of Sukuna's soul. Rather, Sukuna rejected his twin and ate him in the womb. All of his superiority as a sorcerer, his four arms, the mouth on his stomach comes from this. However, that twin didn't disappear, he reincarnated and mated with Kenjaku to produce Yuji.

So Sukuna is Yuji's uncle technically, but symbolically, Yuji is the other half of his soul. The half that Sukuna rejected. How can Sukuna be someone at peace with all of himself, if he rejects half of himself? It goes along with what Mahito said, Sukuna didn't reject others because he was compeltely satisfied with living alone, but because of revenge. He was born a malformed retch and never shown love so he rejected all forms of love.

Sukuna is not at ease with himself because he's not whole. Yuji represents the love that Sukuna rejectected. Rejecting yourself doesn't work though, because one he tried to reject his twin and his twin's soul reincarnted, and two rejecting yourself is completely at odds with the complete self-acceptance that Sukuna preaches is the source of his strength.

Sukuna's incessant need to reject Yuji, to prove that Yuji is wrong, that he's inferior is what leads to his demise. Not only that, but Sukuna's rejection of Yuji's method of fighting, relying on his allies leaves him blind to several elements of Yuta's strategy. He falls for the copy technique bluff twice, because Sukuna didn't factor that both the original users Angel and Toge could still use their techniques too. He's beaten by the cooperation that Yuta uses in his strategy, because Sukuna rejects that same kind of cooperation and sees it as a weakness.

Sukuna's proven to be wrong. He told Jogo that working with others limits your individual strength and he should have tried fighting on his own, but Sukuna is continually outfoxed by Yuta's strategy which relies entirely on team coordination.

It's also a direct parallel to the way that Gojo lost in Shibuya. Gojo was absolutely infuriated that the curses would work together to fight him and they'd rely on a strategy instead of just overpowering him with brute strength. But Gojo lost, precisely because they made a strategy around Gojo's exact weakness, that he's strongest when he's alone.

If Sukuna didn't feel the need to reject the others, then he wouldn't be so blind to Yuta's way of fighting with strategy and cooperation. If he could accept other ways of thinking other than his own he wouldn't have been hoodwinked multiple times in the fight. Yet, it isn't just Sukuna rejecting them on principle, he has to reject companionship otherwise the curses and hatred churning inside of him would burn him up inside. So Sukuna isn't really choosing his nature as he believes, but rather he's a slave to it.

There's also parts where Sukuna just straight up lies. He says he feels nothing, and yet two panels later he's completely enraged.

You could say that Sukuna is just saying he feels nothing about Yuji's attempts to empathize with him, but that's not the case. He definitely feels something, because that empathy, or rather pity as Sukuna frames it compeltely infuriates him.

if Sukuna lived entirely according to his own desires and didn't care about the opinions of others, as he stated a hundred times above why does Yuji's pity infuriate him? If he was so confident in his godlike superiority to others, why does he feel the need to prove it, by ripping apart all of Yuji's friends right in front of it in a gesture of revenge for being pitied.

This leads to what is the greatest moment of growth for Yuji, and the greatest moment of stagnation for Sukuna. Yuji's moment of growth isn't just in rejecting the cog mentality, but also in accepting Megumi. Specifically, he accepts the fact that Megumi is different than him, that it's alright if Megumi's not strong enough to keep living.

Sukuna is compelled by his own nature, his desire for revenge to reject everything around him, but the conclusion of Yuji's character arc is defined by acceptance. Not only does he accept that Megumi's own feelings are different than his, but he's willing to accept Sukuna back into his soul.

I don't think Yuji empathizes with Sukuna. He still doesn't understand him. However, in spite of that lack of understanding, he's willing to accept Sukuna into his soul and keep living with him, because as I said above Yuji and Sukuna are two halves of the same soul. Sukuna is the embodiment of everything he hates, someone who carelessly disregards life and hurts others with a thought, and yet Yuji is willing to give a second chance to that person.

In that moment Yuji lives true to his ideal of saving people, whereas by clinging to life Sukuna was betraying his ideal. I think it's important that Yuji didn't empathize with Sukuna though because Yuji and Sukuna might be two halves but they're meant to represent opposites.

Sukuna also had to learn to accept that Yuji was different than him. He spent the entire story trying to reject him and step on him like a bug. If Sukuna were truly confident in his ideals he wouldn't care that other people had different thoughts, but no Yuji had to be wrong.

Yuji doesn't empathize with Sukuna but he does change him. He alters Sukuna's fundamental nature "You are me" by showing Sukuna there was a different path he could have taken all along. That Sukuna wasn't the strongest he could be, that someone could have compeltely different ideals and be stronger.

Uraume says that the main characters didn't win because they were stronger, but because Sukuna was in Megumi's body a thousand years later instead of his own original body. Which basically means that Sukuna being a parasite in the modern era, pointlessly extending his life is exactly what led to his defeat because he couldn't accept his own death.

I think it's significant that it's not Yorozu or Yuji who Sukuna finally decides to accept as someone he can love, but Uraume. Sukuna even references there were people who tried to teach him about love in life. Assuming the one on the right in Yorozu, the way both uraume and Yorozu approach their relationship with Sukuna is compelte opposites.

Yorozu in the end seemed to recognize Sukuna's isolation, but she projected her desires onto him entirely like everyone else in the manga. Yorozu, Gojo, Kashimo, they don't seek to understand Sukuna but rather to make him understand then. They're in the end kind of self-serving in their love, making Sukuna into a symbol. Specifically Gojo and Kashimo project their loneliness onto Sukuna when Sukuna never asked for it. I mean if you want an example Gojo says this in his dying dream.

Yet, moments later Sukuna declares that Gojo Satoru cleared his skies. That he would never forget his name. Sukuna was completely satisfied with the fight, Gojo just didn't understand him.

Ironically, the one who Sukuna finally shows love to is the one who never bothered to try teaching love to Sukuna in the first place. Ura Ume spends the entire time at Sukuna's side, and while they seem to have more of a servant master relationship I'd argue that Ura Ume has a better read on Sukuna than anyone else. They can tell when Sukuna is enjoying himself, they can tell when Sukuna is holding back, they don't ever try to make Sukuna into something he's not they just stay by his side and accept them.

Sukuna's final scene in the manga is a deliberate callback to this scene. Jogo begins to cry and Sukuna says he doesn't undertand the reason why Jogo is crying. Immediately afterwards, UraUme appears in front of him.

Then, in their final scene together Sukuna is shown musing on how two people showed him there were different ways of living, Uraume and Yorozu. As he decides to go north, and become someone new as Mei Mei once put it in the going north and going south metaphor, he holds Ura Ume's hand and comforts him as he cries.

There are two people in the manga who showed Sukuna unconditional acceptance, Yuji and Uraume. Through them Sukuna was finally able to accept his own humanity.

So in conclusion: Sukume canon!

[oneverydelululemon]

SXF MANGA SPOILERS, READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!

Hi! It's me again!

I want to thank all of you wonderful people who have read the first fic I did, The Conversation. I love and appreciate every single one of you! <3

Since that post gained a bit of traction, I decided to write down the prequel, aka how Damian even realised Anya can read minds. (Un)fortunately, this fic got a bit long so I'll be posting the first part for now. I hope you enjoy!

The Revelation - part 1

Damian was sitting on his bed in the dorms, his legs crossed. He had spent almost the entire day studying in the library, his nose in the books until Ewen and Emile dragged him out. After forcing Damian into the dorm, the boys went to get something to eat. Since Damian wasn't hungry, he chose to go to their room instead and have some well deserved rest. However, once he snuggled into his bed, he couldn't fall asleep.

Damian had been struggling with insomnia for a while, and the causes of his lack of sleep were always one of two things. If he wasn't stressing about his academic status, his mind liked to drive him crazy with all the memories he has about that shimp-haired commoner. The latter frustrated Damian to no end. He hated his own mind for toying with his heart in such a manner, for having chosen to give so much of its precious attention to someone so undeserving of it. If he'd paid as much attention to his studies as he did to Forger, he'd have already become an Imperial Scholar. A part of him wished he would come to his senses, but a small part of him hoped it could be like this forever.

So Damian did what he always does when he needs to relax and stop thinking about that girl - he took one of the many "The Serpent's Orb" comics he owns and began rereading it.

"The Serpent's Orb". Oh, how he adored that comic. He started reading it during the Dark Preschool Ages. He would read it whenever the halls of his mansion felt too empty and the rooms too big. Damian cringed thinking about the time he spent reading and reenacting the story to Jeeves. He cringed even harder when he remembered he would sometimes tell the same story to his old plushie whenever he'd be too scared to sleep at night, believing there were monsters in his closet. By the time he moved into the boys' dorm at Eden, he already knew every line in all the volumes, every episode of the show. Damian was ecstatic to hear Ewen and Emile were fans of the show like him, but they were never as enthusiastic about it as he was. He never blamed them for not loving it as much, though. For them it was just another cool show, but for Damian, "The Serpent's Orb" was a lifeline.

He took one of his favorite volumes from underneath his bed and began reading the first page. He usually reads through an entire volume in the matter of minutes, but he found it hard to concentrate during school break. His mind had been too occupied reliving the last time he saw that peanut-obsessed stalker. He did his best to call the night of the gala anything but magical, even if he did spend a good portion of it arguing with her.

Damian rubbed his eyes in hopes of erasing images of Anya dancing with him. He reread the page he stopped on. The main character read the mind of his best friend to find out what happened on the planet he visited. Damian hadn't really found this scene as interesting as many other fighting scenes up until that moment.

Mind reading, huh? - he pondered. It reminded him of the joke that dummy made at the gala. Damian knew better than to believe such an ability exists. This is the real world, not some cartoon or a comic.

I mean, imagine what life would look like if telepathy was real. You would know exactly what the other person thinks. If i could read minds, I'd have perfect grades! I would win every game of Old Maid and excel in every quiz! There's no one I wouldn't beat in every single football match! Bazooka Bill would fear me!

He kept daydreaming, chuckling to himself.

Until it hit him. He felt his stomach sink.

Didn't Anya make Bill cry when she dodged his every single throw, as if she knew what he was about to do? Didn't she know about some of the most embarrasing moments in Damian's life, like when Max pushed him into a pond on accident? Wasn't it Anya who won the first round of Old Maid, before she agreed to play another round because it seemed like she cheated? Didn't she somehow find out the bombs around their necks were fake in that damned bus, despite nobody ever hearing any of the terrorists say it?

Damian's mind was racing, going over every single interaction he's ever had with Forger. He stared wide-eyed at the pages in his lap, his face turning paler by the second. He dropped the comic from his hands as they were too shaky to hold it anymore.

In that moment, he was rethinking his entire existence. Is this life real? Is Anya real? Is he real? Is this all just a bad dream or some sort of a fictional simulation? Does he live in an actual cartoon?!

Damian didn't sleep that night. He barely managed to sleep every other night after that, counting the days before the beginning of the second semester.

He had some investigating to do.

And that's it for this one! I heard somewhere Damian imagined he's on a planet in Dragon Ball Z when he was "training" for the dodgeball match, so I took that fun fact and ran with it. That being said, I've never watched the anime or read the manga, I just searched up if it involves any telepathy. It's why I tried to keep it vague. I hope I didn't get anything wrong but let me know if I did!

I'll make a part two that will revolve around Anya finding out he knows.

Let me know what you think! Any feedback is appreciated! And thank you once again for reading my delulu little stories! Love you to the moon and back!

Byeeee <3

[hyenafu]

I know this might seem like a bit of a random question, but what are some criticisms of Slightly Damned you can't stand, and what are some you think are at least somewhat valid? I only ask because I do have a few problems with the comic (not really gonna go into here because I don't want to come off as too critical obviously) but I feel like some of the more noteworthy ones have been too long established to just change it altogether, and the best one can do is make something better from its foundation (which I must say, you've done a really good job at ^^)

The complaints that I think are the most unfair are by bigots who think my comic is only getting more inclusive because I'm pandering to wokeness or whatever. These people are also the most likely to misgender me and have no idea what they're talking about. They just can't stand the bare minimum of gay and are often hypocritical, using fallacies as the basis of their arguments. It's tempting to want to argue back, but when has that ever worked on the internet? I think the most valid complaint is that the pacing of the comic is too slow. Sure. Not much I can do about that one. My comic alone doesn't pay all my bills. If I focus exclusively on work, I get depressed, so I have to goof off sometimes. I'm just one person. I don't have a team. I'm doing the best I can already. Another valid complaint is that people don't like my blend of humor and drama. Sometimes readers find it inappropriate or jarring. It's valid because I recognize it as a difference of opinion and understand why they feel that way. But I don't care. I like my weird mix of goofy faces and drama. I sometimes make jokes during periods of great stress in real life. I love all the wacky faces and over-the-top cartoon action among dire circumstances in comics like One Piece and Usagi Yojimbo. Like, it's just my style, man I don't seek out unsolicited advice about my comic. Some people may think that's snobbish of me, but the truth is, very little of what you find that way is actually valuable.

"And as to those critics, she said that she’s managed to do something that might make us all better off- she doesn’t read the comment sections. In perhaps the most roundabout poignant part of the talk, she likened receiving feedback about her work as being like consuming food. She would take a pie from someone she knew and trusted but compared taking unsolicited barbs from strangers as “licking a handle on the subway.” She used to pay very close attention to that kind of critique because she felt that it somehow would make her a better creator but ultimately decided that it was only toxic." - I HAVE SEEN OLIVIA JAIMES, THE CARTOONIST BEHIND THE NEW NANCY, by Rocko Jerome (2018)

Besides the outright hateful sentiments, a lot of unsolicited criticism can be categorized as "I don't like this story because it didn't do what I wanted it to do." Which is fine. I do the same thing when I try to process stories and talk to my friends about them.

But I don't get in the author's face to tell them I think they did a bad job. At the end of the day, no matter how crap I think someone's story might be, I'm not psychic. I don't really know if they did exactly what they set out to do. For example, people have never stopped giving me crap about the death of certain characters. But their whining has only made my convictions stronger. I don't like when other stories don't take deaths seriously, with a real sense of permanence and grief that is not easily solved. To someone else, seeing that character be alive might have solved all sorts of problems they had-- but that's not my story. I've had someone tell me that the focus on Buwaro and Kieri's mushy romance is too distracting to the main story. I don't think that person knew that a large part of why I started making this comic in the first place was as a vehicle for my OTP. I also want to make said vehicle entertaining and worthwhile. If I didn't succeed for that person, that's fine. But don't tell me that half the reason I made the comic is distracting from it. What do they know about what I want? What do you really know about what the author wanted to achieve? That isn't to say that my comic is immune to scrutiny. Of course it has problems; every story has problems, depending on your perspective and the basis by which it's getting judged. I've solicited and received thoughtful criticism and helpful advice from teachers, my advisor, my friends, and from reading/watching tutorials. Some I agreed with, others I chose to ignore. Sometimes it just took a while for me to come around. I hope I never stop learning and improving. Like you said, I have to keep working with the foundation I already set. But I don't feel trapped by it; my creativity is being challenged in new ways. I have a lot of playing pieces and now I get to see what kinds of connections I can make between them with my older, more experienced (both good and bad) mind. Since Slightly Damned is a story serialized over a long period of time, a certain amount of it is made up as I go along. I do have plans and goals, of course, but I'm also discovering this world alongside my readers.

[bitterrobin]

Let's talk about Damian, the League of Assassins and the al Ghuls. A.K.A things to keep in mind when writing them.

You don't have to force yourself to comply with this, but there are some important facts you need to know and things you absolutely SHOULDNT do (be racist or orientalist).

Read on for a long post about Damian and the League and his family - giving context, some research and comic storylines, and characterization.

There are basically three different backstories for Damian.

Batman: Son of the Demon - technically, this baby is unnamed and not completely Damian. But the writer of that comic does still (sorta) resent that Morrison was able to write Damian in current comics while he wasn't. This baby was given up for adoption by Talia and we never see him again. Fans vastly prefer taking this backstory (me) because Damian is NOT a product of rape and Talia is written like herself.

Morrison's canon/the 2006-2011 era - the Damian we know and love. Kinda-sorta. So, in Morrison's whole run - Damian was raised in the League and trained as an assassin. One key point here: Talia DID NOT raise him. Morrison instead wrote that Talia only first met Damian when he was eight years old, and she was out of his life before then. Morrison also completely fucked up by writing Talia as a rapist who assaulted Bruce in Son of the Demon rather than the actual consensual sex they had. While it gave us the character, its not the complete version that many like. (and also its pretty racist)

Tomasi/Gleason's canon in Batman and Robin/Robin: Son of Batman - almost the same Damian as before, with one key difference: we actually get see what his training and life in the League entailed. Additionally, Talia in this version raised him from an infant, thus making his connection with her much stronger. A win/lose situation there. Talia would never raise her son under her father, but we do get a stronger mother/child bond than we ever had before. (Still fucked, but insanely better than Morrison).

From these three versions, only two utilize the League of Assassins in Damian's origin.

The League, then, is very important to his character. By extension, so should Ras right?

In Morrison's canon/the 2009 era - no, apparently. As per Resurrection of Ras al Ghul, he only sees Damian as a vessel for his soul. To stay eternally youthful and does not care for him as grandson in any way. This...is a lot. You could use it for angst. But it's also not in line with Ras' characterization. You could argue that this version of him and Damian have never interacted before but still.

Here's what you need to know about Ras al Ghul. He was and still is: a doctor. A man of science. He loves and wants to save the beauty of nature. Ras is an eco-terrorist. Not a generic assassin. He believes in the life of nature, animals, but he despises humanity for what they've done to the world. He has seen it all, and he canonically laments of loss of endangered species, of ruined habitats and long-gone animals he once cared for.

He also loves his family. A lot. The entire reason he becomes the Demon's Head is because his first wife, Sora, was killed by someone he treated, and then he was imprisoned and forced to co-habit with her corpse. Of course, over the centuries he's been alive, she's become only one reason for his existence, as we see how jaded he sees humanity and how little he trusts people. He latches onto Talia, his surviving daughter, because he loves her and he grieves her mother. He degrades Dusan, the White Ghost, because he cannot bring himself to love him. He was murdered by Nyssa because she felt betrayed and began to despise his love (and inaction). In current canon, Damian is his grandson and he loves him, despite everything.

Of course, it doesn't justify what he's done. But it's a crucial part of his character: the twisted love that cages. The love that binds and says it knows best for you - "I only want the best for you, I want to protect you, I want the world for you. Can't you see that? I can bring you something better." The fact that he's an ancient immortal only adds to the superiority he believes he's giving to his family.

We return to the League of Assassins. SO, the League was canonically created to further his ultimate goal: saving the planet. Again, eco-terrorism. The League exists to cull the human population. Ras believes in utopia, a world without any humans (even himself and his family). Ras is willing to die, eventually, like a really long time from now, if he gets to complete his goal. Thus, the League wholeheartedly believes in him, for the betterment of the world with their savior at the head. Exactly how the League treats their mission and Ras depends on the writer - but it's common to write them as a cult. Almost a religion.

We don't really get a lot about they operate. There are figures like Dr. Darrk and the White Ghost and all the stuff that comes up in Red Robin. We get some interesting ideas and characters in Robin: Son of Batman. But we don't get how the League works. There's no comic that does a step by step breakdown of their finances, operations, assassins, employees, what Ras actually does to lead and impart his vision to his followers.

We go the cult route, then. Here's something that I'm currently exploring and that I think others should too: The League is a global cult that believes in the holiness of death and the end of humanity in order to save nature/the planet. The League is far-reaching. It is eternal. It has existed for centuries, just as long as Ras al Ghul has.

Damian was part of a cult. Depending in your version of events, he was either taken from his adoptive parents or born into the League. Either way, he was indoctrinated. He believes in his grandfather's ideas. His training, canonically, began when he was very young. It was fast paced, trainer after teacher after teacher. He didn't grow attached to them, but he retained the skills. He is raised not just as an assassin. He is raised as an heir. A leader. An overachievement of talent and privileges. He embodies Ras' beliefs.

He is worshipped. A symbol of the cult. A prince. He is dehumanized. He is a figurehead, a piece of Ras that the common folk can touch and see. Damian believes in this superiority, misguidedly thinks they respect him and not the word of Ras. And there begins the struggle.

He grows up arrogant. Manipulated by his loving grandfather into something he really shouldn't be. But there is still Talia.

Either she only met him later in life when he was eight years old, or she was there from the beginning. In both cases, she would NOT stand for her son being treated this way.

Talia is not a completely non-violent character. She has killed before, and does not have the strict rules of Bruce. But she's not an assassin (at least , she didn't used to be). She can cry over a soul lost. She can shoot a gun but with a trembling heart. Talia was raised by her father with affection. She was sheltered, spoiled. She was educated and trained, yes, but she was not made into a weapon. She was taught martial arts for skills, protection, for Ras' paranoid benefit.

She was loved, but Ras has canonically hit her in moments in rage. He has canonically manipulated/threatened her to try and kill Bruce. I fully believe that she would want to protect Damian from as much abuse as possible even if they're both in the League.

You can interpret her split from her father as many things: her love for Bruce, her love for the world, her own love for her father and seeing in horror how twisted he'd become, her need for independence, to be her own woman without Bruce or Ras in her life, an abused child becoming an adult, etc.

Talia also canonically studied medicine (in Cairo). She believes in life. She would impart this onto her son. She wouldn't want him to grow up sheltered as she was, nor would she want him to become a weapon to be wielded. Talia would advocate for him to be taught arts and literature and respect for nature, and to try and give him some sense of normalcy. She was the one who let him keep Goliath. She would never kill Damian's pets (Morrison you have three days what were you thinking?!).

(EDIT: adding some more context to the Talia section of this post!)

After Talia healed Jason using the Pit and sent him to be trained, she left the League in entirety. For several comics, she was entirely independent and drifting - enjoying her life apart from Ras as her own woman.

For a brief moment in comics when Lex Luthor was the US President (yes that happened), he chose Talia to oversee LexCorp. Talia does not like Lex, but she agreed anyway in order to secretly change his company from the inside. While she put on a front to the public and Superman as another cruel businesswoman, in reality she was draining Lex's finances, shifting LexCorp into a more ethical direction, and digging up as much dirt as possible on Lex in order to take him down. She secretly gave Superman information on all of Lex's evil plans as she could, but didn't directly work with him. She wasn't LexCorp CEO for very long, but it was pretty much all she was doing until the events of Death and the Maidens. It can be assumed that while she was a CEO, Damian was being trained in the League in secret.

In Batman: Death and the Maidens, Talia was kidnapped and repeatedly tortured/resurrected in a Lazarus Pit by Nyssa Raatko (her half-sister) in order to brainwash her. She was killed, over and over and over again, then resurrected every single time afterwards in immense pain until she was filled with nothing but primal rage. Nyssa's goal was to use Talia as her own pawn against Ras in a revenge plot. The brainwashing made her a loyal follower of Nyssa, hate Bruce, and made her kill Ras without a second thought. Eventually, they succeeded in taking over the League - leading to the eventual storylines in Robin: One Year Later and Infinite Crisis where Nyssa is shown leading the League (before her unceremonious death). Ras eventually returns in the Batman: Resurrection of Ras al Ghul storyline that precedes Final Crisis/Bruce's death.

Some fans use this Pit event to explain Talia's butchered character in later appearances - making her abusive and cold to Damian and a full villain towards Bruce - as a consequence of this horrific brainwashing. It's definitely a far better explanation for her actions in Batman and Robin (2009) and Batman Incorporated than her sudden heel turn under Morrison. Unless you're completely re-writing her actions in the 2009-2011 era to be more in line with her original characterization, then this explanation is an easy add-in to explain her dynamic with Damian in your fic if you want.

You could take the complicated family dynamics of the al Ghuls and write some seriously heavy stuff on love and abuse and the cycles of trauma and violence. From Rúh to Ras down to Talia/Nyssa/Dusan down to Damian and Mara. It's one big circle.

Speaking of which, here's a list of all known al Ghuls for your convenience.

Rúh al Ghul - AKA Mother Soul. Ras' mother. She's fairly recent, but I think she's interesting enough to include. Unlike Ras' hard beliefs in science, Rúh is very spiritual and a practitioner of magic. Through her, it can be implied that every al Ghul has the possibility of learning magic. She believes in a figure called the Demon. Led the League of Lazarus on Lazarus Island, where she was basically imprisoned for centuries.

Ras al Ghul - real name unknown. The originator.

Sora - his first wife. Deceased. Killed by a raging prince who was healed by the Pit, as Ras did not know what it did back then.

Melisande - his second wife. Talia's mother. Half-Arab, half-Chinese. Deceased. Ras canonically met her at Woodstock (lol). She was murdered by Qayin, the antagonist of Son of the Demon. In some depictions (basically only Morrison) she was revealed to be alive and a fortune teller who hid her identity from Talia. (I think her being dead makes more sense for how Ras treats Talia, and her issues/love for her father).

Nyssa Raatko - I believe she's Ras' oldest child. Technically, she's been dead since Infinite Crisis and has not appeared in comics ever since. Canonically tortured and brainwashed Talia. Led the League for at least a couple months to a year. Half-Russian, part Arab and Chinese. Jewish ?, it's complicated. Canonically survived the Holocaust. Is immortal.

Dusan al Ghul - the first White Ghost. Albino. The forgotten and despised son. Still very loyal to Ras, does not call him father and instead calls him the Demon's Head. Mara's father. Is not immortal.

Talia al Ghul - the younger child. The beloved one. Damian's mother. Is not immortal.

Damian al Ghul-Wayne - you know already.

Mara al Ghul - Dusan's daughter. Damian's cousin. I think they're pretty much the same age. Raised in the League, led the Demon's Fist. Can be assumed to have been trained in the same subjects as Damian at the same time.

Compiling all of this, here's the things to NOT DO when writing the al Ghuls and the League:

Making them animal abusers, encouraging Damian to kill animals or showing him their deaths. The League stands for nature. They would not kill them unless its for food or mercy. It's insanely racist, even, to imply that a group of Arab-based people or Ras or Talia would gleefully brutally murder a puppy in order to teach Damian a "lesson."

Making Ras or Talia comically abusive. Ras would be hard on Damian and manipulate him. He's smart. He knows what he's doing all the time. He'd rather keep Damian's loyalty than turn him against him using physical violence. That doesn't mean he wouldn't ever threaten him, just..idk show some restraint when you write them interacting. On the other hand, Talia WOULD NEVER ABUSE HER SON. You could make an argument for Ras, but Talia would never ever hit her son unless she was forced to.

This is just common sense. DO NOT write the League or al Ghuls as racist, orientalist tropes. Research before you write? Use your brain. Please, I'm begging you. If you think of a concept you think might be problematic, look it up, try and find sources, ask around.

Make Ras weirdly obsessed with/in love with Tim. Seriously. What the fuck. This also weird and racist. I've seen horrendous tik-toks making shitty jokes over this. ITS NOT TRUE. STOP MAKING HIM A PEDO BC YOU THINK ITS FUNNY OR EVEN REMOTELY INTERESTING. Never once has Ras expressed a desire as making Tim "his bride" or some fucked shit like that. I'm going to beat you with hammers.

Having everyone take a dip in the Lazarus Pits/using them extensively to become immortal. As far as I know, only Rúh and Ras have used them frequently. Only they are the immortal ones, the ones arguably driven slowly mad by the unknown sciences of the pit. Talia is not immortal, she's not even that old, and she doesn't have the desire to be ageless. She has to be at least near Bruce's age, maybe younger than him depending on the timeline/your interpretation. Damian did not ever become exposed to the Pits until after he was killed in Batman Inc, and even then- he was NOT resurrected by it. (Actually I don't think he's ever been put into one.)

Having Talia hate Bruce. Like, No? Currently, they have more of a "we are Divorced but still care another but also we don't agree" dynamic. But they were once really in love, star-crossed even, they were married. But Ras and circumstances and even Damian pulled them apart. (I do think writing Damian as a child of divorce is both accurate and kind of funny).

Finally, demonizing all of the al Ghuls and making Bruce's half of the family Damian's saviors. THIS is racist. Full stop. Making his majority white family the "good ones" and "saving" him from his evil brown family is an insanely bad thing to write. We have to see it enough in comics, please don't write it into your fic. There can be redeeming things about the al Ghuls, about his life prior to meeting Bruce. Keep in mind, always, that Damian is part Arab/Chinese, that the al Ghuls are all a mix of Arab/Chinese ancestry and that they should/would be imparting their culture onto him. The League was where he was taught art, to appreciate animals. You could write Talia imparting certain tea preferences onto him, favorite cultural foods, practices, numerous languages. Ras is immensely proud of his own heritage, muddled by age it may be, there's no way he didn't let Damian express himself this way. I fully believe Damian is fluent in various Arabic languages and Chinese, and that his first language is not English.

My final message: think before you write. Consider the actual comics, in fact, I'll put one here for Ras.

Ras al Ghul: One Bad Day. Published 2023. Unfortunately written by Tom Taylor (sigh). Its still good though.

Ras kills some rich guys for facilitating the extinction of the wolf species you see. Of course, Bruce investigates.

Ras kills Bruce, keeps him dead for three months before resurrecting him in the Pit. Damian stays by Bruce's side. There's a lot more, but I implore you to read this comic for yourself to get the full experience.

Thus ends this post. Read this comic for yourself! Have fun writing them, just take these things into mind.

[fae-morrigan]

hi! could you elaborate on the "jon beefs w batman" thing?? id love to read it, but i don't know much about comics so i wouldn't know where to look :(

IM SO GLAD YOU ASKED ABOUT THIS BECAUSE ITS LITERALLY THE FUNNIEST THING IN THE WORLD TO ME.

So, the series that introduces this is largely Son Of Kal El. It's Jon's big 18 issue solo book, its super fun, there are gay people, there is dismantling a colonialist government. More specifically the Beef Inciting Incident begins issue 10, takes up most of issue 11.

So, Jon's dating Jay Nakamura. Cool guy, refugee from Gamorra (place that is colonized that theyre trying to fix), independent journalist known as The Truth. He works closely with this group named the Revolutionaries.

Super cool, right? Jon's having a golden time.

Then, Lois pisses off Lex (long story but its equally hilarious), bad enough they're worried about the family's safety. So, Batman shows up to whisk them to the safe house.... but Jay's not allowed to come.

Jon's pretty miffed about this, and then Batman decides to be Batman and drops THIS bombshell:

We get his reasoning the next chapter: Jay's buddies, the Revolutionaries? Yeah, well, lets say they believe in DIRECT action. They've killed a lot of people (Pssst, you can read more about it in Suicide Squad: Bad Blood, which is one of my favorite books).

Jon does not buy what Bruce is selling. He argues with Batman about it, DESPITE NOT KNOWING WHETHER OR NOT BATMAN IS WRONG, because the idea of BRUCE telling him who and who not to make out with is SO EXISTENTIALLY INFURIATING that he just. Straight up runs off.

Now, this gets resolved pretty quickly. Pa tells Bruce to knock it off because he's not exactly better in love, in a great scene that is one of my favorites from the book. Jon talks to Nightwing, then talks to Jay, and Jay is like, "yeah. They are kind of violent extremists, but they were also the only people who helped me when I was fleeing systematic medical torture and ethnic cleansing, so." We don't really get Jon's thoughts on this, but he ACTIVELY works with them in the finale with the stipulation they don't kill anyone, so we can kind of assume that even if he's not down with them murdering people, he's DOWN down with their Liberation politics. Which is neat!

... But Jon holds a grudge against Batman. Big time. Like, seriously. We really see it up close in Adventures of Superman: Jon Kent, where he's just... Dude. This isn't even YOUR batman.

^ Like, I think we all know he's referencing what happened with Jay here. Its VERY on the nose.

Even Injustice!Bruce is like "Dude, I literally just met you".

Like, seriously. Not even his Batman. Just batman-shaped. And he's catching CONSTANT strays from Jon. Its a whole thing. Before that moment, Jon and Bruce were actually quite chill: Jon even made him tea during the SOKE annual! Up until that point, Bruce was kind of just "damian's scary dad". Ever since That Exact Moment where Bruce was like, 'your boyfriend is a terrorist,' Jon has been like:

[hobiebrownismygod]

What if Hobie Brown's Police Captain Canon Event was losing Captain Anarchy?

I'M BACK ON THE ANALYSES GUYS - CREATIVITY HAS FOUND ME

Every Spider-man loses a police captain who tries to save a child and ends up getting killed. We saw it almost happen to Pav and we see different Peter Parkers' and various other Spider-man variants looking at the holograms of themselves holding their police captain in the scene where Miguel is explaining everything to Miles.

We see Peter B. Parker looking at his captain's death and we see Andrew Garfield's Spider-man doing the same.

*sorry for the crappy quality*

Keep this in mind as you continue reading.

Hobie Brown hates cops.

He kills them. He calls them pigs. He calls them fascists. In his comic book cover entrance, the cops are literally depicted as pigs with snouts and everything. We see him fighting and beating up cops, we see him openly talking about hating the government and even more. Comic Hobie is notoriously ACAB and hates police officers with every fiber of his being.

But if losing a Police Captain is a canon event...

Hobie must have lost a police captain too, right?

Except he doesn't like cops. He would never befriend a cop, it just doesn't make sense for his character. If he befriended a cop it would go against his entire agenda of how all cops are pigs.

So what if he didn't lost a police captain?

What if Hobie's canon event was losing his long-time friend, Captain Anarchy?

Look back at the images I showed you in the beginning. We see the Spider-people mourning over the loss of their captain. We also see the Captain's faces. We see that they are in fact all variants of Captain Stacy.

But we don't see Hobie's canon event.

We see him looking down, obviously at his canon event, and then looking back up and trying to play it off.

We don't see his universe's version of Captain Stacy. All we see is him. We don't know who died during his canon event because they were never shown.

This is why I think Hobie didn't lose a police captain. I think he lost his best friend. Because if he lost a cop, it wouldn't have an impact on his character, and thats what canon events are supposed to be. Canon events are the events that shape every Spider-man's journey, but losing a cop wouldn't have changed anything about him because Hobie hates cops. But losing his best friend...

That would be a life-changing event. Which is what its supposed to be.

Note: You can always argue that Hobie wasn't sad about his canon event because he doesn't look sad in the gif provided and because these are headcanons, I can't say anything against it. However, you have to note that him losing a cop would not have impacted him and Miguel says in the movie that canon events have to have an impact on the person they're affecting.

Hopefully this made sense. I didn't really do that much research on it besides figuring out who Captain Anarchy was and finding the gifs online, so if anything looks or reads inaccurately please let me know!

[magpod-confessions]

I know there's been a few similar posts here already, but man, I saw something and now I'm annoyed.

I'm so so so so tired of a discussion surrounding character's genders, sexualities, the way they dress or look as if there was an actual canon version of them. (And FUCK - when did Tumblr cared about canon anyway??) Now, don't get me wrong. I adore long analysis of every single detail presented in TMA on those topics. But when it comes to hcs? Let people have nice things and relate to characters in the ways they want to. So many people use it as a way to cope with their own identities! It's a very important thing when enjoying media! Stop crushing their souls!

Just remember the one simple rule of - fanon is fanon, it's not written in stone and you can adjust it or even (I know, for some people it sounds impossible) enjoy multiple versions of it!!

The Martin I have in my head when I'm listening to TMA is completely different than the most popular fanon, but it doesn't matter - I still love the fluffy, comfy, cute boy (or any other gender people assign them) that people seem to settle on. I also imagine Tim in a severely different way than most, but guess what - I love the arts, comics, and animations with him done by other people.

It's like reading a book and then getting an adaptation. Not everything is how your mind's eye saw it, but it's still pretty cool to see it.

Also, let's be for fucking real, fandom IS the space for it. Don't waste the creativity of others to boost your own ego by arguing that your depiction is "the right version", just scroll past the content you don't like. It's quite literally not targeted towards you.

It's disappointing to see those discouraging posts, especially in this fandom that actually finally has its source in a creation made by people who care about diversity and treat everything with utmost respect. Alex wouldn't be happy about some sad fuck yelling at someone for drawing black!Jon or trans!Martin. Imagine he saw some shit like that.

tl;dr: don't be a dick, let people enjoy the characters the way they want to, imagine the disappointment on the faces of Alex and Jonny every time you try to waste your time on being an asshole

AGREE idc much what ppl do with fanon. I have preferences which is 100% fine but oh my god going after someone for not sharing that is so stupid and wrong - rosette

heavy agree because yeah . it's fanon . let people make what they want to make . - deceit

[emycantconsentrate]

solitaire Ranttttt

I love this book and I've read it at least 30 times. i just want to say before I start that these are my personal opinions about the book.

I know i said I've read it a lot but i still don't know everything so please don't get mad if i get any facts incorrect.

Solitaire starts as Victoria (tori) Spring is starting school after x-mas or winter break. Tori lives with her mom, dad, and two brothers, Charlie and Oliver. Charlie, who is also in the heartstopper comics, struggles with an ED. I truly think that this effects Tori's life a lot. I know its not Charlies fault but I'm sure tori is almost constantly worrying about him. Tori and her mother don't get along very well. I'm not entirely sure why they don't but i think they touch more on that fact in This Winter. I've read it but it was a long time ago and i really need a reread.

on a different note. I've been needed to talk about this but none of my friends care enough. This is a controversial opinion but i hate Becky. she is such a bitch to tori and i just can't stand her. i know most of the time when tori and her would fight it would be when Becky is drunk but that doesn't make anything she has done right. she dated Ben Hope, one of the worst people in the universe of solitaire. i guess i don't really have a true reason to hate her accept for the fact that i have had friends like Becky. its all fine and its a beautiful friendship, then out of nowhere they go behind you and become friends or start dating someone that isn't a good person. they don't know they are a bad person and you do. and if you try to tell them that they are a bad person they either don't care or they don't believe you. I truly don't get why people like Becky. this is way too much but I'm going to do it any way. I'm going to analyze one of their fights.

pages 226-228 Solitaire

Becky was kissing Ben Hope after 100% knowing how awful of a person he was and still is to her best friends little brother. Tori sees this happening at the Solitaire party and is furious. which is completely reasonable because of how actually nasty he is.

after ben walks off Becky asks tori what she's looking at. in the next bit tori just goes off on her saying stuff like "you are a nasty bitch," and "you just don't care, do you?"

"that's it isn't it? I'm you naive little friend whose sad little life makes you feel better about yourself. well, you're absolutely spot-on there. I haven't got a single clue about anything. But you know what i do know? I know when someone is being a nasty bitch. Go ahead and cry your little crocodile tears if you want to. You don't fucking care at all do you?" this is a rant Tori goes on while arguing. This leaves Becky absolutely speechless.

"well- you- you're the one being a nasty bitch! Jesus Christ just calm down." After Becky says this Tori tells the reader that, i quote, "this is bad. I need to stop. I can't" Tori is now aware that she can't help was she says anymore. She no longer trust Becky. She no longer has a "BFF". Becky has betrayed her.

Tori continues to yell at Becky. "I'm sorry - do you have any comprehension of the level of betrayal you have just reached? Do you have any concept of friendship? I didn't think it was possible for someone to be that selfish, but clearly i've been wrong all this time" Tori is very very upset now and then says " You've killed me. You've literally killed me."

Becky has single handedly DESTORYED Tori. Becky is awful, and of course she just tells her to calm down. she literally was just making out with a boy that SA'd HER BEST FRIENDS BROTHER! and she knew he did it. which is ACTUALLY INSANE!!!!!

just the amount of betrayal and shit she caused makes be fucking sick to my stomach. yeah i do know that its a fake story and they aren't real people. it's just the fact that people like Becky do really do shit like this. I can't believe people are actually capable of stuff like this.

i really need to shut up but i have two more quotes from Tori then I'll stop.

"You have solidly proven that everyone and everything is shit. well done. Gold star. please delete yourself from my life."

" i am gone. I am gone. I guess everyone is like this. Smiles, hugs, years together, holidays, late night confessions, tears, phone calls, one million words - they don't mean anything. Becky doesn't care. No one really cares."

thank you for listening/reading

[hadesisonlyalad]

yk i dont post a lot on tumblr but we all saw that red flags post so im gonna take a moment of ur time to say something on each merc and the red flags listed for them. im doing a read more incase u havent seen the “mercs red flags” headcanon post and it does not flood ur page

both the medic and engie things with “not wanting to spend time with you/wont make time for you” is SUCH bullshit if that was the case they wouldnt even date you. and then ur telling me engie tf2, DELL CONAGHER, would NEVER want to take you on a date? like ever??? u are INSANE. And then sorry to tackle medic and engie in the same paragraph but they had a lot of common “””””red flags””””” that were listed. why would he yell at you. he hardly even yells in general (based off comics and voice lines) if anything hes just kinda a loud person 💀 AND YOU BRINGING UP ONE THING WONT MAKE HIM SUDDENLY IGNORE YOU FOR DAYS LIKE?? he KNOWS hes committing medical malpractice btw. he would not leave you for bringing that up he is WELL AWARE of what hes doing. and we see him CANONICALLY DISCIPLINE ARCHIMEDES IN MEET THE MEDIC, WHY WOULD HE TOLERATE HIS BIRDS ATTACKING YOU????

also why are we listing an addiction as a “red flag” what the fuck is wrong with you. i get not wanting to date someone with an addiction, its a valid concern, but thats SO much more serious than a “red flag” or “ick”??? LIKE ARE YOU OKAYYYY???????

AND THEN HEAVY’S RED FLAG IS “he has trauma” FUCKING. PACK IT UP GUYS IG IF YOU HAVE TRAUMA YOU CAN NEVER BE IN A RELATIONSHIP. (/s) WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU.

i’m fine with the miss pauling ones, at least two of them, because yeah, it’s canon that she doesn’t have the most time and i imagine if ur not a merc or work in that area a relationship might be a bit hard? but shes an honest person, i don’t think she’s gonna lie to you. idk im very neutral about the pauling ones, if anything theyre the most in character of this shithole list.

all i have to say for pyro is like. yk those people who hc pyro as aroace except theyre super weird about it? like theyre either infantilizing them or have weird ableist feelings about pyro? yeah thats the vibes im getting. actually wait where did u pull codependent pyro from actually wtf

i think the “tryna live like hes 20” thing for spy is really fucking funny 💀 like go girl go live through that middle age crisis!!/j no but seriously. hes dating you hes gonna think you’re a 10, and even then YOU’RE SAYING IF YOU AGE AT ALL HE’LL LEAVE YOU??? CANON MILF LOVER SPY. “OFF TO VISIT YOUR MOTHER!” SPY TF2. WILL LEAVE YOU IF YOU GET OLD AND AGE AT ALL…? HE LIKES HIS WOMEN LIKE HE LIKES HIS WINE MOTHERFUCKER: AGED. sorry bad joke lets keep going uh- i think the other hcs are garbage too i just really hate specifically this spy hc. just this one specifically.

im not a sniper connoisseur, my friend will is way better versed in sniper’s characterization, but even i know this isnt sniper. “thinks if he argues long enough he’ll win”…? “cannot support you in anything”?!!?! “IF YOU’RE HIS FRIEND AND YOU TWO GET INTO A BAD ARGUMENT PREPARE TO NEVER SEE HIM AGAIN” IM GENUINELY AT A LOSS FOR WORDS. I JUST. I DONT..? WHAT DO I EVEN SAY. I DONT K N O W WHAT TO SAY. BUT IF I DID KNOW WHAT TO SAY I’D BE SAYING VERY BAD THINGS.

i dont think scout is misogynistic- i see why people think that but me personally i just think he has no game and people mistake it as violent misogyny for some reason. but. listen we know scout is a dick we do okay but he loves women. why would he cheat on you.? bro he’d be glad u picked him 😭 AND THEN THE PERIOD THING?? he was raised by a SINGLE MOM do you REALLY think shes gonna raise him and let him think that way about a natural body function. im speaking entirely from the single mom experience and the answer is NO!!!! also how is loving your mother a red flag. being the youngest child is also a red flag, i guess. and having issues with his dad. (/s) also, second verse same as the first: IF HES DATING YOU HE THINKS YOU’RE A 10 WHAT IS SO HARD TO FUCKING GET ABOUT THISHXWHBVWBWBXvqvsbs?1?2!2’wndjwke

uhhh soldier wasnt. here for some reason. so nothing to say about him.

anyway leave ur opinions below. i rly dont wanna get into any tumblr drama or internet drama at all bc it scares me dearly and im always self conscious about leaving a bad digital footprint especially over something as petty as tf2 drama but i cannot stand for this slander I CANNOT‼️‼️‼️‼️ sorry if u also think im mischaracterizing anyone here i only put hours of studying into my fav mercs and thats. abt it,, listen im silly okay

[thalassomania]

what is “what happens next” about if you don’t mind me asking? :)

i've been sitting on this ask for a while now because WHERE! DO I! BEGIN!!!!

ok. so. what happens next is a currently ongoing webcomic by max graves, beginning late in 2021. it is a story told in multiple chapters about multiple characters, but one could argue that its protagonist is milo holliday. milo is a trans man, pastel blogger, toy customizer... and accomplice to a murder.

one of the first panels of the comic is a screenshot of the dni page on milo's tumblr, which got me IMMEDIATELY interested in the comic because it's such a unique way of storytelling:

[image description available for the above]

and we get a lot more pages like this that are screenshots of websites, social media profiles, and the like. the comic is a mixture of in-person interactions, online communication, and occasional flashbacks, all of which are important pieces of the story.

so when they were teenagers, milo's best friend griffin petty killed two people, and milo helped mutilate one of the bodies. while griffin was sent to prison, milo spent years in a psychiatric institution that stunted his emotional growth and forever altered his view of the world. a drawing he makes while institutionalized provides a window into milo's perceptions of the event:

[image description available for the above]

the whole comic is an uncomfortably accurate reflection of mid-2010s tumblr culture, right down to the sanrio traumacore and crytyping. milo's suffering is multifaceted: in reference to the people harassing him online, he says "it doesn't feel like they hate me for what i did... it feels like they hate me for the way i am," referring to his being an autistic trans man. and given that many of his detractors seem to come from sites like kiwifarms (notorious for its transphobia and ableism), he isn't entirely wrong! but at the same time, his relentless depictions of himself as the victim erase his contributions to haylie's death and the ways he's made himself and others' problems worse.

not every part of the comic is about milo, though! i'm only scratching the surface of it here: all of those pages and links are for the first part, titled "dog names." in the second part, "someone else," we're introduced to gage ludemann, a gore blogger and true crime fan who has entered a long-distance relationship with griffin, and once again, screenshots are used to masterful effect:

[image description available for the above]

but screenshots and characters' drawings are one thing, and max's art is another. starting in the third part, "no matter what," panels are shown in full color, and his color choices are great. what i really love, though, is the amount of detail max puts into character design and facial expressions. i could show you so many different panels that i think show off max's art, but i'll try to narrow it down to one:

[image description available for the above]

soooo yeah!! i have SO MANY THOUGHTS about this webcomic and i keep trying to get close friends to read it, haha. i've read a lot of webcomics and i can say with certainty that there is NOTHING out there quite like what happens next. it's a story about true crime fanaticism, psychological trauma, social media presences, existing as a transgender person, and so much more. the comic is currently on its fifth part, "you'll all be sorry," which seems to be about the characters vikki escamilla and xandra blumberg. if you decide to check it out please feel free to tell me all about it! i'm not connected to the comic at all, but i really love it and i think everything about it is just fascinating.

and max graves, if you're somehow reading this... hiiiiii i'm a huge fan!!! love your work!!! i hope i've represented it at least somewhat accurately here!

@kukai

[abysshare]

Normally i don't do this because like. While I'm well aware i can have my own opinions, i still don't want to make anyone feel bad for me being a disliker ( maybe hater? ).

Spoilers / talking about the new Venom movie below. If you liked it I'm glad you did! If you want to explain in why in comments, feel free! /genuine

I'll start with: i had a bad-ish day so maybe everything soured my mood and i wasn't ready i. The end. I also picked the wrong ticket and had to watch it in 3D < not a 3D fan due to being sensitive to flashing lights.

What i did like:

Implications of being bonded since v1

Knull ( surprisingly, i hate the comic story though I'm gonna be so real. But its been awhile since i looked up the plot/story ).

Agony and the Christmas themed Symbiote

Horse.

Dancing.

The blue symboite and that fire symbiote ( so pretty?? I loved the different powers and such. I want to draw both of them ).

The symbiote hunter, shes gorgeous.

What i Did NOT like:

Toxin being erased entirely.

They killed of Carnage and Cletus in 2 so this whole thing flopped without them IMO

You can see where Disney or Sony whoever wanted this or that but when Tom or whoever didn't want it, it got scrapped and had messy left overs.

Too much action and too much comedy ( the dancing was fine, but the hippie family deal went on a bit too long imo ).

Why was Agony introduced but not the other three? Specifically Scream at least?

Knull having his own thanos moment for sony, a spin off or whatever they're doing.

Eddie's ENTIRE attitude.

That Montage was ASS. Hate that song too.

Too much going on imo

I would have loved to have a genuine queer moment, a kiss, a "i love you", literally anything. I can MAYBE understand if they tried but Sony or Disney said no ( fuck them ) but still. And no i was one of the few that hope there wasn't fucking or kiss with HARD tongue ( i am ace and also these two are my dads to me, it would've been awkward ). Yeah i see some people saying "Its textual" !!!

Yea sure thats nice but aren't you tired? It doesn't have to be queer baiting but like. I'm so tired.

Even if you remove that um? Its not.. that great.

I'm WILLING to watch it again and read positive sides. Because my mood just may have soured.

i think my biggest issue if i take everything away what i just said, is Eddie just going back to being annoyed at every little thing Venom does or wants. ITS OKAY to be concerned about being found by the hunter, but even before then hes just so done. And even during? He should've been concerned. Or Yeah he CAN be annoyed / irritated, but it should be with care. This felt like he was back to thinking of Venom as a tumor, something he just needs to get rid of.

It was vastly upsetting as someone who has partners. Like.. it would be okay if this was the second or first- but it isn't!!!!! And yeah couples fight, but they didn't even do that. Couples have disagreements! But they didn't even talk it out or anything.

Also like? One of my things that bugged me was, when Eddie was complaining about his feet, and we knew Venom couldn't fully take over..... why didn't Venom just yk. Cover his feet for him and walk? That would have been a subtle sweet gesture while they could've still been bantering and so on.

If they had like. Argued, fought, had an emotional moment at the end, Eddie was upset he never got to apologize- i could see it. But thats another thing- he wasn't even THAT upset...

Its fine to not be a super empathetic person, fuck i dont always cry appropriately either. But he didn't show Nothing and not in a "i'm a no empathy person" way.

Idk!!!!!!!! My brain is scrambled.

People have said a lot of what i have problems with already but idk i just!!! Feel the need to put it out there.

Also i missed the second end credit scene :,)

Note: I'm not angry or completely a hater. More so neutral and not a huge fan of some things.

[lai-mar]

You know, I really appreciate that you’re out here defending this widely hated relationship. Maybe it’s because the anime-only fans are a very vocal majority right now, but I’ve seen people who ‘watched the anime then read the manga’ *still* shit on Laios and Marcille’s friendship. Like you don’t have to ship it but if you deny that they care about each other or deny that they have chemistry, did you even read the comic?? ‘Oh they’re just siblings/siblings-in-law!’ have you ever had a sibling. have you ever had a sibling-in-law. they do not act like siblings they act like *intimate* best friends. ‘Ridiculously comfortable around each other’ best friends. They have a relationship outside of Falin, that is what develops over the entire damn story. 90 chapters. What comic were you reading where you think Marcille can barely stand him.

Thanks for the ask! Very cathartic to see this. About to go on another rant again lol (will be repeating some of my old points but yeah I need to get it out of my system)

"Defending widely hated relationship" + "anime-only fans are a very vocal majority"

Okay, let me play devil's advocate for a second here. Let's say I despise L/M as a ship and it squicks me out greatly and I think it's a boring ship of pairing the male lead and the female lead. What should I do? Obviously go into L/M posts and argue about it instead of blocking the tag and stating my stance my calmly when someone asks me like your average fan who knows how to curate their fandom experience.

Okay, more devil's advocating. I despise L/M as a ship but I have read the manga and engaged with it critically and understood its themes. Which means I like L+M as a friendship in the same way I like the themes of eating and life cycle and the friendship between the party and the worldbuilding. Because all of these are core parts of the story told. So what I do is to block all shippers and ship tag and look for platonic fics and fanart like Your Average Fan Who Curates Their Experience.

Like I'm sorry. I genuinely feel some people are so caught up in the intense fanonisation of DM that they start forgetting about canon. And I KNOW I am not the only one feeling this way because I read the notes on my posts and other people's posts and there's a lot of good thoughts on this. Plenty of people appreciate them. But to some people in the wider fandom, are we reading the same manga? Our male lead and female lead are friends who save each other. They are not together canonically. So canonically, they don't even get into the way of shipping?????? People can have important intimate friendships outside of romance??? And it's a canon well established friendship? I would say it's one of the most well developed dynamics in the series that we see? We get shown and not told? We see images and words and interpret them in our brains?

Devil's advocate level 3. Let's say mainstream fanonisation of DM is real. F/M is a canon ship and they get together and they get married in the end and L+M become sibling in laws. Maybe L/K is a thing. This still does not erase the entire journey L+M and co went on to save Falin. This still does not erase their friendship and chemistry.

"‘Oh they’re just siblings/siblings-in-law!’ have you ever had a sibling. have you ever had a sibling-in-law."

Okay. I do have a sibling. At this point I've long accepted this much be some sort of cultural difference and some weird American / Western thing I am not used to. And the hilarious thing about DM is that we do get canon siblings!!! It's the fucking premise! Falin and Laios!! And they're fun!

I'm sorry but this must be some cultural difference. Like no younger sibling is calling their older sibling by their GIVEN NAME. The sheer disrespect. I'll be scandalised. As a person with a sibling I don't understand the fandomisation of making non related people siblings in fanon? I'm calling my friends my friends, not siblings. My sibling is like a sibling to me. My friends are like friends to me. Idk. I've written the word sibling so many times that it doesn't seem like a word anymore.

Obviously these are just my personal thoughts but I feel like objectively, there has been a fandomwide trend of grabbing a canon friendship between a man and a woman and going "THEY ARE SO SIBLINGS CORE XD" (not siblings in canon) (not related) (don't even look similar) (they're friends). A lot of times this is valid and even fun but sometimes I get the feeling people sometimes push the fanon sibling thing to show they're squicky about them romantically. To which I can only say: a man and a woman can genuinely only be friends. If you need to magically make them related so you / other people won't see their friendship romantically... it feels like a step back. Why are we doing heteronormativity.

I think I'm the type of person who enjoys and mains man + woman friendships in fandoms (which are, unsurprisingly, unpopular as ships and even as friendships until I start spreading propaganda and pumping fics on Ao3), and I think one of the things that get me is. A man who could be attracted to women + a woman who could be attracted to men having great chemistry but staying friends. I want to stress this is different from a man who is not interested in women / romance + a woman who is not interested in men / romance because there is almost zero chance of a reciprocal romantic relationship going on. But for the first case, which I feel like many people dumb down to "straight people shipping", it's even more precious for them to stay friends and not give into the heternormative expectations despite one or both of them possibly (but not necessarily) being heterosexual. Like, here are two people who could date each other but they're like "nah we work better as friends, so we stay friends". To me, this is one fantastic argument for friendship. Not everything has to be romantic. Even better if they considered and thought about the logistics, but decide their relationship is more special non romantically. Having a taste of how their relationship could go and going "thanks, but no thanks". Is this not a great display of sincere and stable friendship compared to people going "lol they can't work as a ship because they simply physically cannot tolerate the thought of each other romantically". I'm rambling here but I feel like this is what I feel across various dynamics and fandoms. At this point, I think somehow non romantic relationships genuinely fascinate me more than ships. Save me QPR save me.

"They have a relationship outside of Falin"

I feel like some manga readers have missed the point so badly when it comes to this. It's hilarious. They have a relationship outside of Falin it's the whole fucking point about coming to terms with grief and death! You know, one of the core themes of this story that you finished!

And of course this doesn't erase the love they have for Falin. Falin is clearly beloved and their main motivation, but hilariously enough (for the L+M deniers), the manga shows Laios and Marcille's "true" innermost desires being granted and it's not about reviving Falin even though they both clearly want her back and it's at the forefront of their minds. Laios turns into a monster. His curse isn't about Falin not coming back (even though that was his immediate thought), it's about him not being able to interact with monsters ever again. Marcille was traumatised by what happened to Falin (nightmare chapter) but when she turns into a dungeon lord, she goes about trying to fix the lifespans, showing her fear of loneliness and all her loved ones (NOT just a single person!!!!!!!!) dying before her. You can argue they didn't revive Falin with magic lord powers because they don't trust the lion / trust their own plan of eating her, but I think the manga focuses enough on their desires for the interpretation of "the lion fulfills their innermost desires that define their existence" to work. Marcille is the one who finds Laios first after he turned back and Laios broke Marcille free from the lion's influence etc etc we know they play a part in each other's arcs. Laios says they wouldn't be on this journey if Falin hadn't been digested. Marcille says in the end she was okay with Falin not being brought back this time. Laios invites Marcille to stay with him. It's in the text.

"Boring straight ship" or whatever

This comes from what a friend said about my main duo of another fandom but it's like "why isn't [ship] more popular" "because it's easy to fall into the boring trope of pairing a man and a woman together".

And this is a thing that does happen! But not to pairings with strong canon foundation and chemistry sorry. Don't look at me, look at canon. A male/female ship with good canon support is a good ship. Why are you surprised. People like shipping characters who spend lots of time together saving each other and all that. Dare I say: sometimes (sometimes) shipping "straight people" is more respectful to their canon friendship than shoehorning them as siblings. Which I believe is true in the case of L+M.

Anyways. Well that was a nice angry rant. Sorry I had to get it out of my system. I've spend too much time writing this so I won't be doing much proofreading lol. If you've reached this point, thanks for reading <3

[pancake404]

Speed/Lazuli/Silvia: a Romantic Relationship that's not great...(1)

Alright, I said I might do this so here we go.

Speed the Jolteon and Lazuli the Glaceon, as probably everyone who has read the comic would know, are the main romantic pairing in Eeeveelution Squad. It’s a pretty big part of the reason why Eeveelution Squad got popular; due to this, people began wanting the relationship to happen eventually, and then came the shipping wars and all that with people arguing on who Speed in particular should be with as well as other characters but the focus is particularly on him. Then came Silvia which made things worse.

I’m not going to fully explain who these characters are because most likely, if you’re reading this then that means you're probably already aware of the characters so let’s just continue to this romantic relationship which I tend to describe as, “way too liked to the point it’s kind of concerning" as well as, "Speed's Bad Ending"

Now as the...two people who saw my drawings and opinions of the characters of Eeveelution Squad might guess, I’m not exactly in favor of Lazuli and Speed's relationship happening at all or the fact that it did happen in its weird way. To be blunt, I don’t like it whatsoever and I have several reasons why and a decent ton of examples proving them(this not only goes for Lazuli and Speed but also Silvia and Speed at the same time but the ladder might come a little later).

So before anyone that does ship these two or three assassinates me for whatever reason you feel like taking it this far because I say your ship is not good, do me at least the small favor and read through this before the assassination attempt…or just, scroll past this.

Also, I'm not holding it against EV for the writing and having to be forced to set them up together but I don't think enough people realize just how bad the relationship is written to be which I'll be showing a lot of examples for this.

This is will be the first post/part of my rant and it'll mainly focus on Lazuli's treatment of Speed from the start and onward. There are more I want to get to which I can't in this post because there are a few limitations like the amount of images but I'll get to them later.

Now, without further to do, let’s begin.

Starting with Speed/Lazuli:

Let’s start with the basic reason why I don’t like it which is shown in the comics pretty frequently and it’s the constant physical violence that Lazuli commits against Speed. For me, it’s problematic when the first thing that pops up in my mind when thinking about this relationship is just Lazuli hitting Speed and beating him up throughout the whole comic. I understand she has this tsundere trope but here’s the issue, or rather the issue I have with it, it doesn’t make sense nor do I support hurting others, especially those that you supposedly love which is where the trope is often found. But it goes a little further for Lazuli’s case where it’s confirmed that for the first few months(or at least a decently long time), Lazuli did hate Speed which also means that those punches were genuine either from embarrassment, pettiness, or just an argument that Lazuli 99% of the time turns physical.

Speaking of examples, here's a list of them:

I'm willing to give her an "out" for this one as it could be chalked up as accidental as Lazuli quickly apologizes for running over Speed, thinking he's just some random Pokémon in the way.

Lazuli insults him the first time they truly meet, keep this in mind.

Personally, Speed is in the right here, given what we see, Lazuli bumps into Speed, quickly says "sorry" and runs off. Then once Speed comments on it being "a bit late" and that he almost fainted, Lazuli insults him by calling him weak(she has no idea how wrong she is).

Afterward, her way of an apology to this new individual(Speed) is just demanding forgiveness and when Speed shoots back, Lazuli escalates it to a punch already starting their streak of Speed beatdowns which is going to be consistently happening throughout the comic to some degree.

Previous to this exact moment(Chapter 1), Speed calls her nasty but this time is more of muttering to himself as he doesn't yell it out, Leaf doesn't notice this leading me to assume that Speed didn't intend for it to be heard. Again, Lazuli escalated this to physical violence.

Despite it, this is the moment where the ship began in most heads I believe. However, if you look at it from the context and see what's being displayed here, Lazuli is embarrassed and Speed looks disgusted, and even if you count Lazuli's blush as flustered or a hint that she may have liked it, Speed's reaction does not at all show that at all.

Speaking of that moment previously, we see the aftermath and there are bandages wrapped around his ears, head, and sides of his head, and on other panels, we see his chest and possibly stomach. Keep these moments in mind.

Surprisingly, Lazuli makes an effort to apologize but then she demands an apology from Speed which he rightfully questions as it isn't his fault for anything that happened and he was also the one getting beaten up for it. Then Lazuli straight up threatens to take that apology back which hints that she might not be truly sorry or she's pretty good at giving a reason for Speed to not like her.

Not only that, a small thing to notice is that in the previous page, Lazuli gets up and close to Speed, Speed is on the ground and the ball hits Lazuli on the back of the head causing the damage Speed took. Although I would agree it's accidental, Lazuli is more or less the one that set them up like that.

Now imagine yourself in his position, someone that had beaten the crap out of you for them getting knocked into you, which led to you both kissing on accident(somehow), finally apologizing later that night. But then imagine they demand an apology from you even if you did nothing wrong and if you refuse, they raise an arm to beat you up again. Sounds like they're not truly sorry and just want forgiveness because, in reality, they don't truly care as much. Of course, some may make the argument that they don't know each other but that's the issue, this is how they started off and it'll continue on for longer which makes the ship problematic but let's continue.

I'll be also doing these examples to try to put it in the perspective of Speed because this is what he would be thinking and experiencing if this was real life.

Special Chapter 8, before Lazuli had any feelings(doesn't change much regardless).

Kris straight up jumps on Speed to wake him up, however, the difference between instances with Lazuli and instances with Kris is that while Lazuli gives Speed injuries bad enough to give limbs wrapped with bandages, Kris at her worst seems to just give Speed a mean awakening but otherwise, he's completely fine.

Meanwhile Lazuli:

Another punch to the face hard enough to give Speed a nosebleed, all in front of Sunshine by the way.

She also quickly assumed that Speed was being a creep even though all he did(and he explained) was he was just waking her up. Also, Lazuli clearly did not notice Sunshine standing there as it would quickly disprove the likelihood of Speed planning something since his adopted daughter is standing right there.

That would be correct.

Alright then, some may argue that Lazuli didn't have a crush on Speed back then and that's why she was most aggressive with him/those moments don't count. Now, it's established she does now like him romantically or at least interested. You would think she would begin to change her ways as so far, she's been doing nothing but hurting him physically, right?

Let's see how she's doing after this reveal:

You are right about that alright.

If you look closely, Speed is tearing up, that is how hard he got hit in the head for just simply forgetting that he promised Lazuli to take her to the bookstore (which he does later that day with Silvia).

Because Speed is not aware that Lazuli has a crush on him(which is fair, why would he assume that when so far she continued to hurt him), in his perspective, Lazuli is going from hurting him throughout the months to now attacking others. This is also one of the only times Lazuli aims at someone else besides Speed...which I'll get to later.

Speed then apologizes for rightfully snapping at her and Lazuli turns down the flowers, which in his perspective, is just a decline of a apology gift which is way more effort than Lazuli had ever shown so far.

With more Speed abuse, he is getting cornered and integrated by Lazuli who is assuming too quickly, Silvia is messing with Speed with the "big brother thing", and now others are judging him for it because of these two.

Speed truly is just getting screwed over half the time and a lot of the times is from Lazuli or others which eventually lead to another beatdown.

Flashback to their earlier times, keep in mind, this is what Speed sees and remembers. One of them is a reference to chapter one and it's just showing Lazuli beating the crap out of him by...banging his head or more punches, either way, it's something that Speed will certainly remember.

Lazuli...complains that Speed didn't take the punch.

Also, it has apparently become so common for Speed to get hurt by Lazuli that everyone else including Speed's siblings is not even slightly bothered by it.

Besides one time with Silvia, so far in the comic, Lazuli had not attacked anyone else besides Speed. She feels bad because everyone else is being nice to her which could mean that nobody(but Leaf sort of) has directly called her out on it in these past months which also means Speed had been getting punched, beamed, etc. without anyone stepping in truly besides a few rare times.

Anyway, this is another thing that happened in Special Chapter 8, this is how they started off and continued to be after the first day. Also, once again, Lazuli escalates an argument to physical violence.

This is so far one of the more truly friendly interactions between the two and this is also around the moment where Lazuli develops feelings for him. A bit too bad that she didn't change her treatment afterward as much.

But I will give this moment some props as it shows that they don't have to be hate each other and that they can in fact get along if both sides want to. This also shows Speed's character as being this older brother/parent figure to most which I'll get to later.

One last punch...should've been done a while ago.

Now of course, others could argue that all of these times where Speed gets hit is because it's just a "funny gag", or since Speed is level 98, he'll be fine so it doesn't matter, or the fact that's it's not just straight up physical abuse(which it is).

But I disagree on all three of these reasonings, this "funny gag" that is presented happens so often where it doesn't become funny if it ever was and it just becomes uncomfortable to watch or read. Also, the fact that Lazuli later in the comic feels guilt and Speed in this exact panel yells about the abuse seems to already show that all of those punches were not forgotten about and it shouldn't be forgotten about. Not only that, for other shows or pieces of fiction that presents abusing the main character or...any character, a decent ton of them doesn't include injuries bad enough where bandages are needed and don't happen as often as it does in Eeveelution Squad. Seriously, until like the last four chapters, the only chapter that Lazuli does not hurt Speed in was like Chapter 3(Speed did expect a punch to come showing how that's his first response).

Secondly, the fact that he's level 98 or "should be fine" doesn't excuse on what Lazuli did throughout the whole comic. She still clearly was hurting him and he reacted to all of it negatively.

Even EV themself agreed and talked about how this sort of relationship would not ever work in real life and should not have worked even in the comic, that the only reason why Lazuli got her wish come true is that because the fans wanted it so badly.

Speaking about the fans, all I hope is that throughout the years that Eeveelution Squad was cut short and cancelled the reboot, there was time to think and mature(or maybe you just don't care anymore which is fair). Even if you support it the relationship or not, all I hope is that this gave you some other perspective to consider.

Although I have more to say like Speed's feelings later on, I'll say it in a different post but I will end this portion off like this(I still have Silvia and other examples in Eeveelution Squad to cook up as well as other thoughts), in the comic from Speed's perspective. They first meet on a bad start and they quickly despise each other, throughout the months in Speed's perspective, Lazuli mainly targets and physically hurts him for a variety of small reasons and assumptions. Nearly every interaction involves a punch to the face. This goes on for months straight and Speed of course would not think that Lazuli might have romantic feelings for him later on, because why would he? If she did, why does she keep trying to hurt him? If this was real life, if someone keeps hitting you for small reasons, the last thing you would think is that they have a crush on you.

I think it's fair to say that we should start normalizing being respectful and caring to those we might have romantic feelings for instead of being rude or be physically violent with and that is something EV had expressed when they discussed the issues with Lazuli and Speed.

All of this is not really about hating the writing and wished a different ending and all of that as I'm sure others already expressed that well enough but rather, I think not enough people understand and I also felt like expressing my opinions.

It could have worked sort of if Lazuli was aggressive toward everyone instead of primarily Speed in the comic and she began developing feelings for Speed as she realizes that despite all of her treatment toward him, he still tried to be respectful and caring because that's who he is unlike others who still don't like her. But also in the same time, her treatment of others and especially of Speed shows a lot more in the consequences. Like Speed might be able to forgive Lazuli but decides to not share her feelings because her actions still happened and he isn't going to forget months of that treatment quickly.

If I had to give a quick writing suggestion for anyone(and also myself), try to treat characters like humans, it's okay for it to be fictional but have some relatable real-life aspects that makes the audience be able to understand how or why a character is struggling or what challenges they face. It's okay to mess up in your first attempt in a story, or your second or third, as long as you use what you learned from the last one to improve the current one, then write till your content.

Now anyway, back to working on Silvia later as I said, there is a LOT more I can talk about.

[chattegeorgiana]

Hello Chatte,

How have you been doing?

I have this thing that's been pestering me for a while now. A lot of NH defenders/shippers swear on their life that there are strong parallels between her and Kushina and it's a hill these people are willing to die on.

They love to cite examples from that god forsaken series called Boruto, where they have comical moments of Hinata being the ''scary mommy'' trope and a ''hot headed wife'' just like Kushina. This doesn't sit well with me and I just see it as SP being SP, nothing more, nothing less; and for the NH fan to be like ''ohh..... look...... there are so many parallels between MK and NH. NH was planned from the beginning. yay...... '' Those sorta BS (pardon me my French).

Also, I'd like to point out that I'm an anti ender not because of the pairing reasons but because of how the ending happened. All thanks to each and every character being nothing more than a pairing fodder, the show has left many debates as to what it's messages and themes are.

I really have zero reasons to like female characters like Sakura and Hinata but this, this is beyond character assassination and also an insult to the fan base, especially those who gave common sense and aren't blinded by pairing choice. For me how the characters are treated is way more important than shipping.

Also, when is your next YT video on Boruto being Oro's genjutsu gonna be released?

Thank for reading my somewhat lame and a long comment and I wish you the best with Kaika Saisei

Cheers!

Hi there,

Well, for the whole NH thing, the reason why they insist is because the sequel did a 180 and changed her characteristics, so ofc they are willing to die on that hill.

But we all know if we look at the actual content from the manga that she has nothing in common with Kushina nor Minato like they like to say. Kushina is loud and passionate. Where have you seen Hinata display those qualities? Whereas Minato is calm & calculated, something that she isn't once again. She's quiet & shy but that doesn't equate the calmness Minato displays. Not to mention we've seen even in this one shot that Kishi wrote that Minato can also get super passionate from time to time, whereas Hinata has never displayed that feat.

All in all for this whole thing to work they had to turn her into Sakura. It's clear as daylight to anyone who isn't a NH. Even a neutral. So why consume your energy with what they're saying? It's not like it's true. The evidence to support that is those 15 years of serialization prior to the ending that holds all the weight.

We all know TL & the other products at the end were made so that they can retcon the pre-established narrative.

The show ending the way it did basically destroyed everything Naruto once as a story stood for. Sad, but true.

I always said I wouldn't have had any issue with the choice of pairings if done correctly. After all, I used to be a multishipper once. I saw the potential that all had in the beginning. It's just that when part 2 launched, the story was clear of its direction - of course, until they decided to retcon again and to hell with everything.

And sadly, the girls got the short end of the stick. Both Hinata & Sakura, if we're being true to ourselves. But these people are ready to die on a hill just because they're so attached to their opinions rather than seeing the story for what it is - a great emotional impact story, but with a lot of issues underneath it if you put aside the emotional impact.

It's the reason why it pulls so many people into it. Because it's filled with emotional manipulation, in a way. Look at the way the franchise also directs its marketing campaigns for other materials/products. They scan the internet, see what the talk is in the fandom & then bam, there they are with their products that just so happen to have the thematic of whatever talk is in the fandom - like when they are some sort of servants because at some point NH & SS were arguing about who's richer and who's the servant and who's the patron and all kind of BS like that.

Or when we in the NaruSaku fandom had an extensive talk about tarot and the symbolism that surrounds NS and 6 months later bam, there they are with products with tarot themes.

Or that game they have and I saw two of the concepts I had for Sakura combined into a third one.

They basically combined these two artwork concepts into the third one that is their image from the game.

So what can I say? As you can see, Pierrot be doing whatever it is to get their way, lol.

If you think about the girls - when they thought Hinata was more profitable, they pushed her in everybody's face so much so that it affected the story's ending.

Now that Sakura's more profitable, they discarded Hinata like a used toy and she barely makes any appearances outside her mom-like persona.

This only shows anyone with a little critical thinking that SP has no respect for any characters nor the story. It's just about the $$$ and that's it. Nothing more, nothing less.

But meh, anyway, at this point is more than funny lol. It's just Pierrot being Pierrot tbh... Nothing good can be expected of that studio.

As for my next video, I'm planning on getting back to work on these somewhere in March.

Last year I've been caught up with a major life event so it really hindered my capacity to take care of everything that I wanted to do, but as I said, I'm planning on getting back to these.

It's just that I'll need to edit some things since I initially envisioned it in a certain way and there are certain changes that happened in the meantime, that kind of rendered some of the things I worked on obsolete, so I'm trying to adjust to that. But yeah, as soon as I have everything up and running again, I'll definitely start working on it.

And aah dear, don't worry, your question was not lame! Thank you for dropping into my inbox and for your wishes regarding Kaika!