#as they use up more and more plots they have to escalate and make cases more dramatic and so house follows suit and i get it

[housepilled]

season 1 isn't my favorite season or anything, but it has my absolute favorite portrayal of house by far. he goes to patients' lacrosse games, does their prenatal care, talks with and follows up with them when it's completely narratively unnecessary (but in a good way; i just couldn't think of a less pejorative description). he's even kinder to his team. and best of all, he explains things — takes the time to argue for a risky treatment and has a clear basis for treating rather than testing. he's more grounded. he still does all this later in the series, of course, but as the seasons go on he seems more and more ashamed of his kindness and humanity. i think as the show progresses, it gets too used to itself, used to the fact that house just says rude things and does risky treatments because that's just "who he is". i am totally willing to make the argument that he gets flanderized in a way.

while i love later-seasons house, don't get me wrong, my favorite is always going to be the house who is the most grounded in reality. he's still scared of it, but he acts like a human. and that is who house really is to me — not the layers of sarcasm, bigotry, outlandish subplots and unrealistic procedure, but the guy who grumbles and groans about doing his job but secretly loves it and has the show making efforts to expose that secret. so yeah season 1 house supremacy

[rynwritesreid]

Sold my Soul | Spencer Reid

Summary: You’re out celebrating with your friends after a recent work accomplishment. Where you bump into Spencer Reid who is working on a case in your city. fem!reader. This is my first time writing smut outside of an overall story, so there is a plot. I hope you enjoy it:)

Content: Dom! Spencer . Sub! reader. Use of nicknames (good girl). Smut (with a plot). Overstimulation. Oral (M and F receiving) Fingering (F receiving) MDNI. 18+

words: 5.3k

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You like to have things under control, but I mean who doesn’t? You could be relaxed on the surface, all calm and collected, all your friends said you had a calming presence. But if one thing went wrong in your daily routine you would be stressed thinking your whole day had gone wrong.

 

But today was a big, you had an important meeting with your editor. You took a deep breath and tried to calm yourself as you checked the time once again. You were running five minutes late, and now all you could think about is how unprofessional this would look and how unprepared you felt. You had spent countless hours working on your latest novel, and the idea of someone finding a fault in your writing was making you beyond anxious.

You rushed out of your apartment, taking the stairs two at a time. You reached the street just in time to see your uber pulling up to the curb. The driver gave you a nod and a smile as you climbed into the back seat. You smiled back politely but couldn’t find it in you to make small talk. Your mind was solely focused on your meeting ahead. You had been working on your latest novel for months, pouring your heart and soul into every word.

 

But as the meeting drew closer, you began to second-guess yourself. What if your editor hates your work? What if they find plot holes or inconsistencies that you have missed? The thoughts swirled around in your head like a tornado, and you couldn’t shake them off.

 

As the car pulled up to the publishing house, you took a deep breath and stepped out onto the street. You smoothed out your clothes and adjusted your bag, trying to regain some semblance of control. But as soon as you walked through the glass door, your anxiety escalated.

 

The meeting was difficult, but you felt it was successful. Your editor had a handful of constructive criticisms, but all in all, they loved your work. You let out a sigh of relief as you left the publishing house, feeling like a weight had been lifted of your shoulders.

 

You had decided to call your closest friends to go out and celebrate afterwards. They were always down to go drinking, for celebrations or to commiserate. As you walked towards the nearest bar in the city, your mind was still racing from the meeting. You couldn’t believe that your editor had loved your work, and you couldn’t wait to celebrate with your friends. You pushed open the door to the bar, the sound of laughter and music hitting you as you stepped inside.

 

Your friends were already there, waving to you from the corner of the room. You made your way over, taking a seat beside them. You could feel the nervous energy draining from your body as your ordered a round of drinks for the table.

 

As the night went on, the drinks kept coming. You let yourself relax completely, enjoying the company of your friends and the new sense of freedom that came with having your novel approved. The bar kept getting louder and more crowded as the night went on.

 

Your friends went to get some drinks, as you just wanted to sit and enjoy the atmosphere for a moment. As you were people watching, you saw a group of about five/six people all sitting together. Each one of them was more attractive than the next. But one specifically caught your eye. He was fairly tall, around 6-foot, mediumish brown curly hair, hazel brown eyes and a face sent straight from the Greek gods. You looked at him and you just couldn’t look away. As he caught you looking, he flashed you a smile that made your heart race. You quickly looked away, feeling embarrassed that you had been caught staring. But you couldn’t help but glance back, and you found that he was still looking at you, a playful smirk on his lips.

 

Suddenly, your friends were back at the table, loudly chatting and laughing as they set down their drinks. You tried to focus on their conversation, but you found yourself stealing glances at the handsome stranger across the room.

 

You turned back to your friends and as asked, “do you guys see that group of people? Do you think they are all like models or something?”

 

Both of your friends turned to look at the group of strangers, looking, more like judging, each one.

 

Lucy was the first to say something, “I think they are. Or whatever job they are in, requires them to look as beautiful as possible.”

 

Alice than spoke, “it almost feels like I’m dreaming. The two older guys are making me question myself.”

 

You chuckled at Alice’s comment. “What about the guy with the brown curly hair? He’s like the most attractive man I have ever seen.” You already knew their answers already, they would tell you how they agreed with you, but he wasn’t their type.

 

“He’s really hot, but the guy sitting next to him is my cup of tea.” Lucy said with a giggle.

 

Alice elbowed her and went “I thought you’d more go for the woman with the black hair. I’ve seen you flirt with women like her all the time.”

 

Lucy looked mildly offended, but in a jokey way.

 

You all laughed together, while still staring at the random group of strangers. You must have looked like a group of weirdos. You all returned to your drinks, and conversation about each of your days. But your attention kept drifting towards the beautiful stranger across the room, and you couldn’t help but wonder if he was interested in you too.

 

After some time, you excused yourself from the table, making your way to the bar. You ordered a drink and leaned against the counter, trying to act cool and collected. But as you turned around, you found the handsome stranger was standing right beside you.

 

“Do you make it a habit of staring at strangers and then, obviously, talking about those strangers?” He jokingly asked.

 

“Not really. Only when they all look like models but stand around like they work for the FBI or something.” You replied with a smile, and the feeling of your cheeks flushing with embarrassment. You couldn’t help but think that he was more even more attractive up close.

 

“Well, you guessed one of them right. We aren’t all models, but we do work for the FBI. So, were you and your friends all comparing us, seeing which one is more attractive?” He asked in a teasing tone, with a small smirk plastered across his lips.

 

“Woah, you work for the FBI? That’s so cool, I’ve written books about you guys. And yeah, maybe we were seeing which one of you is more attractive. But we all have different tastes, so we weren’t necessarily comparing, more saying which one we find attractive.” You replied, feeling a smile tug at the corners of your lips. You couldn’t resist the charm of the handsome stranger.

 

“Well, I hope you found someone to your liking,” he said turning to look at you fully. “Because I think I might have found someone of mine.”

 

“You have? Who is it? Is it one of my friends, because if it is, I have disappointing news. Also, I’m Y/N. I don’t normally introduce myself to strangers, but I am kinda drunk right now.”

 

“It’s not one of your friends,” he said, with a chuckle. “And it’s nice to meet you, Y/N. I’m Spencer. You’re smart for not giving out your last name, would be easy to track you down.”

 

“Is that a threat, Spencer? But don’t worry, I only give my last name out on like the second date with someone.” You say with some confidence.

 

“Not a threat, just a warning. You never know who you’ll meet in a bar,” he said, his eyes sparkling with humour. “So, Y/N, what brings you out tonight? Celebrating something?”

 

You hesitated for a moment, unsure if you wanted to share the news of your novel being approved with a stranger. But something in the way Spencer was looking at you made you feel like you could trust him.

 

“Actually, I just got my novel approved by my editor. It’s been a long time coming, and I needed to celebrate with my friends,” you said, feeling a little proud of yourself. “What about you, Spencer? What brings you out tonight?”

 

“Oh, just blowing off some steam with my colleagues. We’ve been working on a tough case for a while. I think we are all missing home.” His voice seemed to have some hurt behind it.

 

“Oh no. I’m so sorry. But you’ve come to probably one of the worst bars in the city to do that.” You were trying to lighten the mood again.

 

“Maybe you’re right. But this bar led me to you.” He said with a little chuckle.

 

Spencer’s words sent a shiver of excitement down your spine. You couldn’t help but feel drawn to him, despite knowing almost nothing about him. His hazel eyes sparkled with amusement as he watched you, and you found yourself smiling in response.

 

“Am I really that interesting, Spencer?” You asked, unable to resist teasing him a little bit.

 

“Of course, you are, Y/N. You’re smart, beautiful, and you’ve just had a major accomplishment. What’s not to find interesting?” he replied, his voice low and smooth.

 

As the night wore on, you found yourself constantly drawn back to Spencer. Your conversations flowed easily, and you couldn’t help but feel like you’d known him for years.

 

As the bar closed, your friends began to leave, but Spencer was still standing beside you. You could tell he was hesitant to leave, but you couldn’t tell if that because of you or something else entirely.

 

“Hey, do you want to go for a walk? It’s a nice night out,” you suggested, hoping he would say yes.

 

Spencer’s eyes sparkled with interest as he replied, “Sure, I’d love to. But I just need to make a call first. I’ll meet you outside in ten minutes?”

 

You nodded, feeling your heart race with anticipation. As you walked outside, the cool night air hit you, and you shivered in response. You wrapped your arms around yourself, trying to keep warm as you waited for Spencer.

 

When he finally emerged from the bar, you felt your heart skip a beat. He looked even more striking in the moonlight, and you couldn’t resist the urge to stare.

 

Spencer caught your gaze and smirked before walking up to you. “Ready to go?”

 

You nodded, still feeling a little nervous and excited at the same time. As you walked, you talked about everything and anything, from your favourite book to your childhood memories. You found yourself sharing things with Spencer that you had never told anyone before, and you couldn’t deny the connection you felt with him.

 

Spencer was different from anyone you had ever met. He was smart, funny, and kind, but also mysterious in a way that made you want to know more. You couldn’t help but feel a little intimidated by him, but also drawn to him like a moth to a flame.

 

“Did I hear you correctly earlier, saying that you’ve written books about the FBI?”

 

“I have. But I’ve never gone to get them published. They are always murder mystery books. But that’s not really what I write.”

 

Spencer’s eyes lit up with interest. “Really? What do you mean that’s not what you write?”

 

“I write typical romance novels. People tend to like them; I mean I’m not famous but I’m not unknown.”

 

Spencer looked at you with a newfound interest. “Romance novels, huh? That’s interesting. What inspired you make the switch from murder mysteries to romance?”

 

You shrugged, feeling a little embarrassed. “I guess it was just a personal preference. I wanted to write about love, and the idea of giving characters happy endings was really appealing to me.”

 

Spencer nodded, seeming to understand. “I can see why that would be appealing. It’s nice to have control over what happens in your own little world, even if it’s just in your writing.”

 

You smiled, feeling grateful for Spencer’s understanding. “Exactly. Plus, I love the idea of creating characters that people can fall in love with. It’s kind of like bring people together in a way, even if it’s just fiction.”

 

Spencer nodded thoughtfully. “I understand that you can’t control love or your own love story in real life. It takes a lot of skill to create characters that people can connect with on that level.”

 

“It takes a lot of skill to work for the FBI.” You say with a giggle.

 

Spencer chuckled, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “I suppose it does. But I’m just doing my job, like anyone else.”

 

You shook your head, feeling a sense of admiration for Spencer. “No, what you do is amazing. You and your colleague risk your lives every day to keep people safe. That’s something truly special.”

 

Spencer looked at you, his eyes softening. “Thank you, Y/N. That means a lot coming from you.”

 

As you continued to walk, you couldn’t help but feel a sense of closeness with Spencer that you had never felt with anyone before. It was as if he could see right through you, past all your insecurities and doubts, and still accept you for who you were.

 

As the night wore on, you found yourself slowing down, wanting to savour every moment with Spencer. You were afraid that once the night ended, you would never see him again.

 

“I’m guessing the case isn’t over yet, so you should probably get back to your hotel so you can get a rest.”

 

Spencer nodded, seeming to understand. “Yeah, we still have a lot of work to do tomorrow. But I don’t want this night to end just yet.”

 

You looked up at him, feeling a little shy. “Me neither.”

Spencer smiled, “Then let’s keep walking. I don’t want to say goodbye to you just yet, Y/N.”

 

Your heart fluttered at his words, and you couldn’t deny the attraction you felt towards his. As you continued to walk, you felt Spencer’s gaze on you, and you couldn’t help but feel a little self-conscious. “Is everything okay, Spencer?”

 

He nodded, his eyes never leaving your face. “Yeah, I’m just trying to figure something out.”

 

You looked at him, feeling a little confused. “What do you mean?”

 

“My friends, the people you saw at the bar, said I should try and not talk about work, and find someone who doesn’t work with us. I thought it was going to be difficult. But then I met you.” Spencer’s voice was low and intense, and you could feel his hot breath on your cheek.

 

You blushed, feeling a little overwhelmed by his sudden confession. “What are you trying to figure out, Spencer?”

 

“What this means. I mean I know what it means, kind off. But how someone so perfect, could just be sitting in a bar that I just so happened to go into. I mean I know the chances, it’s just so strange.”

 

You looked at Spencer, feeling the same way he did. It was as if fate had brought the two of you together, and you couldn’t help but feel grateful for it.

 

“I know what you mean,” you said softly. “It’s like we were meant to meet each other.”

 

Spencer nodded, looking at you with a mixture of awe and admiration. “I don’t want to let this chance slip away.”

 

You felt a surge of desire at his words, and without thinking, you leaned in and kissed him. Spencer responded immediately, his lips moving hungrily against yours.

 

You didn’t want to be cliché, you’re a writer, you’re good with words, but this kiss was magical. It was as though the world around you disappeared, leaving only you and Spencer in your own little bubble of passion and desire. You ran your fingers through his hair, pulling him closer to you as he deepened the kiss.

 

As the kiss ended, you looked into Spencer’s eyes, feeling a sense of contentment wash over you. You knew that this was just the beginning of something special, and you couldn’t wait to see where it would take you.

 

“I don’t want this night to end,” you said softly, feeling a little breathless.

 

Spencer smiled at you, his eyes shining with affection.  “Me neither, Y/N. Let’s not end it just yet then. Also, did you know you actually share less germs with someone if you kiss them, rather than shaking their hands?”

 

You chuckled, feeling a sense of ease with Spencer. “I guess that makes sense. But I don’t think we need an excuse to kiss each other, do we?”

 

Spencer leaned in, his lips brushing against your ear. “No, Y/N. We don’t need an excuse.”

 

“You know for been a member of the FBI and been in a place where you are having a practically rough case, you are pretty trusting.”

 

“Ahh. You see I work with the BAU, which is the behaviour analysis unit, so I read body language and such. I basically profile people, and you don’t seem like you’d murder or kidnap me. So, yes, I am pretty trusting when I can read someone so well.”

 

You smiled at Spencer, feeling a sense of jealousy and admiration for his skills. “That’s really cool. I wish I had your ability to read people like that.”

 

Spencer shrugged, looking a little embarrassed. “It’s just something that comes with the job, I guess. But it can be a double-edged sword sometimes. You start to see the worst in people, and it can be hard to trust anyone.”

 

You looked at him, feeling a sense of sadness at his words. “I’m sorry, Spencer. I can’t imagine how hard that must be.”

 

Spencer smiled at you, his eyes softening. “It’s okay, Y/N. I have good people around me, like you, who remind me that there’s still good in the world.”

 

“You think I’m a good person? You’ve only known me for around 2 hours, and you think I’m a good person. Well, I’m glad I’ve made a good impression on you.”

 

Spencer chuckled, his eyes crinkling in the corners. “Y/N, it doesn’t take long to recognise a good person. And you, my dear, are definitely a good person. I can tell by the way you carry yourself, the way you treat others, and the way you make me feel.”

 

You blushed, feeling a sense of warmth spread throughout your body. “Thank you, Spencer. That means a lot to me.”

 

Spencer leaned in, his lips hovering over yours. “And I want to you feel even better.”

 

He kissed you deeply, his hands caressing your body as he pushed you up against the wall. Spencer’s lips trailed down your neck, leaving a trail of heat and arousal in their wake. You gasped, feeling a sense of pleasure as he nipped and sucked at your skin.

 

“I’m sure someone who works with the FBI cannot get public indecency on their record. Do you want to continue this somewhere else, like your hotel room or my apartment?”

 

Spencer looked up at you, his eyes shining with desire. “My hotel room.”

 

You nodded, realising that the hotel was only two blocks down. You could feel the lust burning between the two of you, and you couldn’t wait to feel his hands on your body.

 

You made it to the hotel in no time at all, your hands already exploring each other’s bodies. Spencer’s lips trailed a burning trail of fire down your neck, and you could yourself shudder in his arms.

 

You pulled open the door to Spencer’s hotel room, turning the lights on as you walked through the doorway. Spencer followed suit; he pulled you closer to him, your hands never leaving your body.

 

Spencer pulled off your clothes slowly, exploring your body with his eyes. You felt a wave of desire wash over you as he looked at your body, and you wanted nothing more than to feel his hands on you.

 

Spencer’s lips were basically attached to your neck, and you could feel desire coursing through your body. You could feel his heartbeat thumping against yours, echoing the same rhythm that was currently coursing through your body.

 

“Do you know people who want to control every aspect of their life, often seek ways to lose control, for other people to control them? A lot of CEOs and bosses will go to professional dominatrixes to help them.”

 

“What are you saying, Spencer? Are you saying you like to be dominated?” You said in a teasing tone.

 

He kind of laughed at your comment.

 

“That’s not what I’m saying at all here. I think you would like to lose control.”

 

“Is that right?”

 

Spencer nodded, looking at you with a devilish smirk. “I think you would like to lose control. To know that you are completely at my mercy.”

 

You gave a short laugh, rolling your eyes. “Yeah, right. Spencer, I don’t think you know me at all.”

 

“I’m good at reading people. You’re a writer, and I bet that you like to control every aspect of your life. You write the plots, you decide the endings, and you feel that you have complete control over your life.”

 

You laughed, “You’re right, that’s me.”

 

“There’s nothing wrong with that, Y/N. And I’m not saying you are wrong for being that way. It’s just that I wonder what you would do if you were completely at the mercy of someone else. Seeing how you like to control everything, I bet you would love for someone to take that control.”

 

You smirked, biting your lip as you stared at him. “Hmmm, I think you might be on to something there.”

 

Spencer shook his head, a wolfish grin spreading across his face. “I wonder what you would do if I took control of you.”

 

“Try me.”

 

“I would love to try you, Y/N.”

 

Spencer’s lips claimed yours, and he pushed you down on the bed, his hands roaming over your body greedily. You moaned into his mouth, your body responding to his touch.

 

You could feel him hardening against you, and you wanted nothing more than to feel him inside of you. He pulled of panties, his mouth trailing a line down your body.”

 

“I want you to know that I’m going to be in control of you, Y/N. And you’re going to like it.”

 

He paused, “Do you want me to control you?”

 

You looked at him, your eyes glinting with desire. “Yes.”

 

Spencer’s eyes were dark with lust, and you could feel yourself getting wetter just from his gaze.

 

“I want you to know I’m going to do whatever I want to you.” He bit you hard on the neck, and you could feel your body tense with desire.

 

“And you’re going to let me.”

 

You nodded, wanting nothing more than his hands on you. He kissed you hard, his hands gripping your hips tightly. You could feel him crawling up your body, his erection rubbing against your wetness.

 

“You’re going to let me, because you’re going to love it.”

 

“I will.”

 

“You’re going to do everything I tell you to.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“You’re going to beg me to fuck you.”

 

“I am?”

 

“Uh huh. And I am going to make you cum over and over, until you’re begging me to stop.”

 

“Please, Spencer.”

 

You gasped as his fingers found your wetness. He pushed two of them inside of you, slowly pumping them in and out. You could feel yourself tightening around him, your hips bucking in sync with his fingers.

 

His lips trailing a burning trail down your body. He could tell how badly you wanted to cum, he was reading you like a book.

 

“Beg me.” Spencer’s eyes were dark with lust.

 

“Please, Spencer. I want to cum”.

 

“I know you can do better than that. Be a good girl, and tell me how badly you want to cum.”

 

“I want to come so fucking badly, please. Please, Spencer, let me cum.”

 

His pace fastened, you moaned at Spencer’s actions and his words. He moved his thumb towards your clit, he pressed down hard. He could feel you tightening even more around him.

 

You were so close to cuming, the anticipation of your orgasm was almost painful. Your pussy was dripping wet, and you could feel the juices flowing down your legs.

 

“I want you to cum for me.”

 

Your mouth dropped open, a loud and crude moan leaving your lips. Spencer’s name followed; you were almost singing it. Spencer couldn’t get enough of this. You looked so beautiful like this; this was all for him and he couldn’t believe he was so lucky to get to see you like this.

 

“That’s it, let it all go.”

 

Your orgasm hit hard. His kept nursing you through it, showering you with praises. His eyes kept looking over every inch of your body. The orgasm shook through you, your body shaking with desire. You felt him slide his fingers out of you, and you could feel your body shaking with desire.

 

He leaned over you, his lips brushing a kiss against your neck. He stood up, he was still fully clothed, and you felt exposed. You lay there, watching him take all his clothes off. It gave you the opportunity to look at his body, which you had already known was amazing, but you could appreciate it even more as you watched him in the dim light. He kicked his pants off and walked towards you.

 

“Spencer” You panted.

 

“I love the way you say my name.” He smirked. “Can you stand up for me?”

 

You gently nodded your head, even though your legs felt a little bit like jelly, you wanted to stand for him. You pushed yourself up off the bed, you stood there, looking at him, your eyebrows shot up when you saw the look on his face. He looked at you like he was going to eat you alive, and that sent a shiver down your spine.

 

“That was only one of many, but I feel like I deserve a reward. Don’t you?”

 

You nodded your head once again.

 

“Okay, I’m glad. Now I want you to be a good girl and get on your knees for me, is that okay?”

 

You nodded your head, your breath quickening.

 

“Good girl, now I want you to take my cock out, but don’t touch it.”

 

You slowly sank to your knees in front of him, watching as his eyes roamed over your body.

 

He felt himself get harder, the look in your eyes made him feel like the king of the world.  

“Take it out.”

 

You heard him moan in appreciation. You slowly pulled down his boxers, watching as he carefully stepped out. You reached out your hand, wrapping your fingers around him.

 

“I didn’t say you could touch it just yet, did I?”

 

“No, sorry.”

 

“Don’t apologize, just tell me you won’t do it again.”

 

“I won’t do it again.”

 

“Good girl.” He smirked. “Now I want you to put my dick into your mouth.”

 

You heard him hiss as you took him into your mouth. He kept looking down at you and you could see the lust in his eyes.

 

You could feel yourself getting wetter, just hearing him moan was enough to drive you wild. He fucked your mouth, and the way he moved in and out, would make anyone cum.

 

“That’s it baby,” he moaned. “I want you to suck my cock until I cum in your mouth.”

Your heart was racing. You could feel his dick twitching in your mouth.

 

You ran your tongue over the head and feeling him shudder under your touch.

 

 “Oh yes, just like that.”

 

“You’re doing so good.” He panted. “I’m so fucking close.”

 

You tried to take him deeper into your mouth, but it was hard.

 

“I’m going to cum.” He moaned.

 

Your mouth filled with his sticky cum. He moaned out loudly, before he pulled himself out of your mouth. You looked up at him, and he smiled down at you.

 

“You look so beautiful like this. I’m so lucky that I will be able to relive this image over and over again.”

 

“I want you to lay on the bed. But do not touch yourself.”

 

You did as you were told. You can’t believe a man this hot was having sex with you, you could barely believe that he knew exactly what to do to you.

 

He climbed on the bed, his kissed you, his tongue fighting for dominance in your mouth. He started to kiss you all the way down your body, your body felt like it was on fire. His mouth finally landed on your clit, his fingers found their way back to your pussy.

 

“I love how wet you are.” He moaned. You could feel the vibrations from his mouth against your clit, making the pleasure even more intense.

 

You were moaning uncontrollably. Your hips were rocking against his face and fingers. You knew you were getting close.

 

“Fuck, I’m going to cum.” You moaned.

 

He kept working his mouth against your clit, and his fingers against your pussy. He knew exactly what you needed.

 

“Come for me baby.” He moaned.

 

Your back arched, you moaned out his name. He moaned against you, the vibrations adding more to your orgasm. He slowed down as your orgasm slowed down. He gently blew on your clit, causing you to squirm.

 

He pulled himself up, kissing you passionately on the lips, his tongue exploring your mouth. His hands glided down your body. You were in total bliss, everything about this man was perfect.

As you thought you were actually in heaven, you heard a phone ringing and Spencer got off the bed. He grabbed his phone and walked into his bathroom. He was in there for a few minutes. He walked out with a sombre look on his face.

 

“I’m so sorry, there’s been a lead in the case, I have to go. You can stay here for the night if you want to, but if you don’t, please leave your number. This can’t be the last time I see you.”

 

You nodded; you felt a wave of sadness wash over your body.

 

“I’ll give you my number, I think I’ll head home. I don’t want this to be the last time I see you either.”

 

You read your number out to Spencer and started to get dressed. He gave you a quick kiss on your cheek and left. You felt hopeful you’d see Spencer again, but it still hurt that you wouldn’t be falling asleep in his arms today.

————————————————————————

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[illovehaileesteinfeld]

Watcher

Cw: restraints, ellabs x reader, dom!ellie, porn with plot, switch!abby, sub!reader, abby tied up 🤭, nsfw, no use of y/n, hella teasy, use of pet names, no virus au, weed used, probably alot more :3

req from pookie!! (basically girlfriend!abby watching best friend!ellie fuck the brains out of you)

@joel-girl here you go !!!

It started with a late night facetime call between you and your girlfriend, abby, eventually inviting you best friend ellie to join. Ellie had given the idea of all three of you going to her house after you finished work the next day, and your plans were in order.

you busied yourself with making drinks at the counter, the evening rush suiting as a distraction for later. You noticed when abby walked into the coffee shop, smiling at you and leaning against the wall as your shift closed out.

taking off your apron, you pocketed your tips, clocking out and immediately kissing abby's cheek as she led you out to her car.

Texting ellie the two of you were on the way, you wore a smile.

"els told me she visited her dealer, got us something for if the movie got too boring"

"mm, so like every time you two hang out?" Abby smirked, her hands resting on your thigh as she drove.

"well.. yes, but it'll be fun if you decide to smoke with us" you smiled, looking up at your girlfriend with the eyes she always said yet too.

"..fine, love, only a little though. I still gotta get you hole safe" she said, squeezing your thigh as you now wore a wide smile.

"yay! You're the best baby" you smiled. Abby looked intimidating, but she was a total fucking softie.

the drive to ellies house only had a little conversation, most of it being you humming along to Abby's music.

watching your girlfriend pull into ellies driveway, you wore a smile, unbuckling your seatbelt and attempting to open your door before abby could do it for you, though she beat you and opened it with a smirk.

"Mm, what are you trying to do pretty girl? Maybe i'll have to cut the movie short and fuck you until you-" she was cut off by ellie exiting the house, now sporting a slight grimace.

ellie walked towards you both, smiling and side hugging you as abby pettily held onto you. You kissed her cheek, ellie laughing softly as your girlfriend glared down at her. Ellie and abby had been friends, and most of the anger between them was for shits and giggles.

following ellie inside, you glanced around her living room, a few rolled joints and a lighter on the coffee table and a guitar sat on the couch, a few movie disks arranged on the floor.

"so, what do you guys wanna watch?" She asked, moving the guitar back into its case before flopping down on the couch.

you looked up at abby, waiting for her answer as you grabbed a joint and lit it, deeply inhaling as you zoned out for her answer. She took the joint from your lips, inhaling before blowing the smoke in ellies face. Tonight would be long.

somehow it had escalated further than ever before. The three of you were always flirty, but it changed when ellie had cuffed your fucking girlfriend to a chair.

the effects of the weed had done so much to all of you, abby didnt even complain when ellie had grazed her hand all over you, simply watching with a smirk.

ellie had looked down at you, quietly whispering in your ear and asking if it was okay to continue what she was doing. She had already marked the fuck out of your neck, and made your lips beyond swollen. You desperately nodded, a needy whine escaping your lips as ellie crawled over you.

She turned you around, making sure abby could see you as she smirked down at you on the floor, tearing your underwear down to your ankles and sitting herself on your waist.

ellie looked up at abby with teasing eyes, making sure your girlfriend was watching when she ducker her head between your legs, holding eye contact as she licked your soaking pussy.

you held tight onto ellies hips, a whine escaping your lips as you felt your best friend's hot tongue on your heat. Abby was conflicted, not quite mad but hoping she would get a chance with both of you.

ellie laughed down at you, snickering as abby watched.

"Hm, love, wanna give your girl a little show? Make her watch while i make you cum?" She laughed, pissing abby off while making you grow even wetter. You let out a small, desperate whine, only pushing ellie further as she leaned back down.

her hands rested on your thighs, her eyes piercing into abby's as she licked across your clit, kissing you gently before taking the soft bud between her lips, looking down and focusing on you. She sucked hard at your clit, earning moans from you as she rubbed her tongue along your wet pussy.

digging her face further between your legs, she kissed your leaking hole, pushing her tongue in and out while placing kissed along your pussy. She glanced up at abby, smirking as she moved her lips from your pussy and pushed two fingers easily in, earning a deep moan from you.

abby let out a groan, pulling at the cuffs around her wrists as an attempt to fuck either you or ellie senseless. Ellie just laughed, digging her fingers deeper into you as you moaned against the floor, only making ellies smirk widen and abby try harder to be freed from her restraints.

ellie pushed a third finger into you, once again a sharp moan escaping your lips as she fucked in and out of you at an ungodly pace, your legs threatening to close around her hand. Abby watched as she fucked you, nearly escaping the cuffs as ellie leaned her head down against, sucking on your clit while still moving her fingers. Your moans were gurgled, biting down on your lip as your muscles clenched around her fingers.

all that did was make her go faster, fucking you so aggressively as your voice broke, your legs shutting around her face and hand as your built up tension broke, cumming against her as she just fucking laughed again. abby grew angry when you came, beyond pissed it was on another womans fingers. She managed to break the cuffs, immediately getting out of the chair, preparing herself for a long night.

[jeeaark]

in a timeline where the illithid invasion never happen, a world where the absolute never existed, what would greygold's life be like? or maybe even lae'zel's? a world where they stumble upon each other without all the destruction around them.

The funny thing is.

Without squids trying to ruin their life, Greygold would have never discovered the power of friendship

Worse even, they'd still be a dispassionate lone ranger with questionable bird ethics surviving the wilderness and living off raw eggs like a weirdo.

Meanwhile, Lae'zel is still a Vlaakith devotee and if they stumble upon each other without a plot to drive them to work together and get to know each other... Bad things would happen! Someone would probably die. Most likely Greygold. But! Lets say. A plot did happen.

Buckle up buckaroos. This train thought went off the rails enough that I had to draw pics. Faster than writing out a 13k+ fic (for me anyway).

Let's say Greygold got the 'steal the githyanki egg ' job from Esther. Let's say they succeeded in sneaking in and out without too much of a fuss (mostly involving cat familiar distractions). And something Unfortunate happens before Greygold could complete the quest, leaving Greygold with an egg that eventually hatches:

And the githyanki child is not your average run-of-the-mill space lad either (Who loves eating raw eggs now too. It's fine. Builds character. Probably) But uh yeah, that whoosh accidentally cosmos-signaled all the githyankis and Vlaakith to which she reacts with a 'Wtf? Did anybody just get Prince of the Comet vibes from that? With a "I love egg" aftertaste? No? Just me? Hrm.... I do currently have a lot of free time on my hands....Fetch me that child. I want to study him like a bug. I'm suddenly feeling... Creatively ambitious with a side case of nefarious today. Might bury an old big secret if that kid is replacement-viable.' Thus search patrols investigate-

And never return.

After the first surprise patrol disaster, Greygold has been putting their danger ranger skills to good use via setting up counter-ambushes for all the constant surprise attacks. Classic "who is hunting who?" ordeal.

Nonetheless, there is more of them than there is of Greygold, so they resort to hiding in the Underdark after realizing the githyankis don't have dark vision and it's more environmentally dangerous than the surface. It is also a fun learning experience for the kid. Search patrols continue to never return. Until-

Lae'zel can't help but notice her mission orders do not add up and her rationality has a mighty need to make sense of it before solving problems with immediate hostility. Meanwhile this has been Greygold's first super tiny dose of kindness involving people interactions in years. Instant crush. Chase Shenanigans Ensue. Until child makes their first hunting trap. Instead of catching food, Lae'zel is captured. It also turns out the over-the-top trap involves sinking sand and a nest of Ankhegs (giant burrowing man-eating bugs). Greygold tries to help Lae'zel. For Reasons.

Something akin to mutual respect is formed. Stuck working together. Get to know each other. Discuss contradictions with mission. Verdigris worms his way into Lae'zel's heart (as much as she loathes his name). Escape the Ankheg nest which had terribly escalated because a giant fire ant invasion decided to overrun the ankheg nest at the same time.

Everyone is covered in bug guts after this.

Something something bond over experience enough to trust and listen to each other's opinions. Short Rest. Negotiate. Discuss plans to investigate Da Truth together. Shenanigans Ensue. Then Bad Shenanigans Ensue. Argument Ensues, resulting in Lae'zel Splitting Off. Verdigris disagrees with this approach and chases Lae'zel in order to bring back. Unanticipated Ambush happens at most inopportune moment. Greygold is Captured.

But they escape. Not before confronting Vlaakith's projection and discovering her plans and secrets thanks to one extremely curious Verdigrisgold (Verdi for short omg so long) with ridiculous super psionic powers.

And then they coincidentally interwovenly meet/save/recruit their bg3 companions anyway because there are no mindflayer abduction to stall certain ill-fated situations from happening to certain Companions-to-be and I need for them to be OKAY. So. Greygold discovers the power of friendship again. But is also now co-parenting a fate-of-the-githyanki-freedom child with Ex-Vlaakith-devotee Lae'zel. How's that for an AU timeline?

[kyuteflesh]

price / soap / f!reader

・❥・・❥・・❥・・❥・

* soap wants u real bad + being prices property = threesome

this is just a little unfinished thought. plotting up a storm rn. unprofessional for them but let me live my fantasy pls.

⚠️: degradation, slight smut, mainly just price yapping, +18

you were the captains bitch. everyone knew that.

from the way you came out of his office stumbling, new hickeys showing up every other day.

soap had been plotting on you since day 1. unlucky for him, price got to you first. he just had the charm soap lacked ig.

was that really the case tho???? or did price just ask you out sooner?

here you were, pinned up against the wall of johnnys room. his brawny arms keeping you restricted. tonguing your mouth, wanting more.

“we can’t be doing this, johnny. if he finds out, we’re both as good as dead”

“if you would just keep it down, then he wouldn’t possi—“

that’s when a fuming price burst through the door, materials clanging so loudly against each other you were sure the knob left a hole in the wall.

soap quickly backed away from you. temperature dropping, hands clammy. looks of panic coming from both of you.

“forget to lock the door eh, mactavish? ‘m sure you won’t make that mistake again. not after i have a fuckin’ bullet going through your thick, idiotic skull.”

price approached you, you were cowering under his much taller and intimidating stature. “please don’t kill him, john. he must’ve had too much to drink- i don’t know just please!”

scowling at you, inches away from your face. you could feel the steam radiating off of him.

“don’t hurt ‘em, ey? why should i listen to a whore who can’t keep her legs closed for any man? that’s all i’m gathering out of this.” price slid his hand down your pants, running a finger between your folds.

pulling it back out, he let out a measly laugh.

soap could do nothing but nervously fiddle with his thumbs.

quite the dumbass he was, trying to enter someone else’s property. he was stuck regretting every single decision leading up to this moment.

“look at this, johnny. look at how wet youve got my little cum dump. isn’t that something?” smiling, he wiped his finger off on johnnys neck.

gulping, he finally was able to muster out a few words. “i’m so so sorry captain, sir. it won’t ever happen again i—“

“pfft, johnny, lad, you’re such a pushover. grow a pair. you wanna fuck my girl? at least let me show you how it’s done first.”

WHAT DID HE SAAAYYYY??!!!!

“what?!” you both gasped in unison.

“you heard me. now y/n,” having a seat on the bed, price started to take his dick out. it was still soft.

“make me hard. let’s put that filthy mouth of yours to good use.” he patted his lap.

you were too stunned to speak, nervously sweating, blushing.

“are you deaf all of a sudden?” price spat out. he was losing his patience.

you quickly complied, not wanting the situation to escalate any further.

you lowered down to your knees, giving his tip a soft kitten lick. you began to take his whole length in your mouth. hollowing your cheeks as you let your tongue roam.

it was only a matter of time before you could feel him stiffening, hitting the back of your throat.

price took his attention away from you, looking up to johnny. “you want this?” he beckoned, running his hands through your hair.

johnny just nodded. ashamed of the growing erection in his pants. “come take my place then”

you were in doggy, face full of johnnys cock. pussy soon to be full of john’s cock. funny!

price gave your ass a firm smack. you were nervous. this was the first thing you’ve indulged in anything of the sort (a 3sum, that is).

johnny squeezed his eyes shut. not believing what was going on. the woman of his dreams giving him the blowjob of his life. his higher up fucking you from behind.

teetering back and forth between the two, you barely needed to put any effort in.

price was fucking you hard enough to where you didn’t need to bob your head for johnny.

it would be foolish to think that none of you were enjoying this.

you got to be used as a fuck doll by these insanely hot military men. dream come true.

[bonzos-number-1-fan]

TMAGP 30 Thoughts: Concrete Evidence

Our finale is upon us. Albeit more of a slightly extended episode than it is double-length. It's more like 10 minutes longer than a standard episode and while I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing I do think it sort of sucks to set expectations and then not deliver on it. Especially when it was a Kickstarter stretch goal. I worry the epilogue is going to feel like the last 10 minutes sliced off of this one too. Either way it was a great episode all in all.

Spoilers for episode 30 below the cut.

This episode follows the classic late in a season episode formula. By which I mean lots of it is really explicit about what it means but some bits are the sort of thing I like to pull out and analyse. So a lot of the plot beats aren't things I need to cover but there are lots of quotes I do want to dig into. Starting with Sam and Celia on the train, which is a real culmination of Celia's general game plan so far. While it's made abundantly clear by the end of this episode her manipulation of the characters has been a fairly constant part of her characterisation so far.

CELIA It sounded like you’d have gone anyway. At least this way I can make sure it all goes to plan. SAM (small laugh) There’s a plan? CELIA Besides, you’re not the only one who’s curious.

That quote really sums up her whole deal this season IMO. She's always been pushing characters to do one thing or another. As soon as her intentions are brought up she'll avoid the question and move the conversation on to something else. It's been happening basically since she was introduced and I'm really glad to see it built up into something satisfying.

Man, poor Colin. I was hoping we'd get some sort of escalation of his storyline this episode but it looks like that'll be more of a season 2 affair. Similarly that looks to be where Gwen is headed too. She's finally got the job she's after but as Lena warns, and as we're all well aware, she's woefully unprepared for it. Mr. Bonzo, Ink5oul, Lady Mowbray, and Needles will all likely play larger roles in season 2 because of it.

I'm not going to get into the details much but I did really enjoy the Custodian's statement. Lots of fun vibes and little details with his character all around. I would've liked to see him stick around in all honestly and crop up again. His fate is quite interesting though because it's showing a lot more from [Error]'s abilities than has previously been showcased. She made Drowning Victim drown but her statement was all about drowning so that's not too crazy, this is much more tangentially related and a far more extreme effect on the victim. Hard to know how much that means but it might be worth pointing out.

The Hilltop Centre is a lot different to what I was expecting. It seems much more like a supernatural hub than the prior incidents concerning it let on. I'm wondering if this is unique to this universe or a constant throughout them. Without getting too much into the details it could be fallout from TMA's ending but this wound that Celia talks about strikes me as a little odd in that context. There was seemingly only one of them at Hilltop. Unless the world Celia came from is also where Darrien 3 came from, as he arrived from that point, then that wound is drawing in everyone from other realities. However if that's the case then there are some fairly major questions about the metaphysical underpinnings of it. It got "better" when Sam was thrown in but there are also clearly a lot of other people coming through as the Custodian mentions.

It wasn’t all death though. Sometimes people… arrived. Not often, but every now and then you’d find some thin, emaciated soul wandering around, lost and confused.

It wasn't just Darrien 3 that came through, multiple people arrived in the same manner. A manner we know isn't how Celia got here because her reaction to that incident was that it wasn't the same. So is this wound just an amalgamation of all the imbalances from all the various universes? We know why Celia wants to "balance" this because it's trying to pull her back, hence the "sleepwalking", and it would eventually win out. How it works on a larger scale is sort of hard to say. It seems like it will just be there forever until everyone who's not meant to be in this universe has left. That seems like a very tall order based on what we've seen. Speaking of balance.

The institute, alchemy, all of it. It’s all about balance. Dua prima, four elements, seven planets, it’s all the same. You’ve got to keep things balanced.

This is a very interesting quote. There are two possible interpretations for this and I'm not sure it's intended to be seen that way. Each of the things Celia lists here is either correctly numbered or off by one. So she might be saying that these are things for which balance is important, or she's saying these are unbalanced things and need correcting. Either works well with her point here.

Dua prima is not really actually a thing as such and is both the biggest indicator she's talking in terms of them being off by one, but also the biggest indicator she's not. Paracelsus' tria prima is a fairly important concept in alchemy as a whole and if you've read more than a few of my posts you'll have seen me mention it. In short sulphur, salt, and mercury are representative of three fundamental properties. Combustibility, permanence, and fluidity respectively and in addition represent the body, the soul, and the spirit. Paracelsus didn't arrive at this idea on his own however and it's largely an addition to Jābir ibn Ḥayyān's work. Jābir, or Geber as he's sometimes known, had this theory of metals that stated all metals were a mix of sulphur and mercury. Additionally sulphur is associated with masculine qualities and the sun, while mercury is associated with feminine ones and the moon. It's not ever called dua prima so far as I'm aware but you could reasonably make that argument.

This same logic can be applied to her mention of the four elements in which fire, air, earth, and water would make up a classical set of four but can also be considered off by one as aether is a later yet—still classical—addition. Alchemy has seven "planets" each with a corresponding metal but our modern definition puts seven off by one as we would say there are eight. However with all that being said I'm more inclined to believe she meant these things were balanced as they are. I said that the dua prima was also the best indicator of that and for the reason why we've got to go back to episode 19.

Doing mummy and daddy Stasi proud, I’m sure. Not that anyone cares as long as it all balances, right? Not too much mercury or the world ends, not too much sulfur or we all go mad…

At the time I said this was two of the three primes of tria prima, which it is, but in this context it doesn't appear that the lack of salt was an omission. Salt just might not be a part of it at all. It's fairly hard to say exactly how important this will be though. It certainly seems quite relevant but it's also something they might be making up rather than anything more firmly rooted in existing alchemic lore.

I don’t- when I first awoke I knew nothing, nothing but the dream of things that sliced my who from me with claws like scalpels… They would hunt me and toy with what it meant to be me peeling away my layers first my name, then my memory and then… …and then the fearless one reached in and grasped me, tore me out, leaving my story to fall away like autumn leaves…

I think Celia's statement has very little to get into really, I just wanted to mention that it was a nice detail. Another if you know you know and not a topic I get into here. [Error] also has a line here I think is interesting but it requires getting more into TMA than I care for so I'm going to leave it. I'm not 100% sure what to make of it either as of yet.

And there we have it. Season 1 is wrapped. Well other than the epilogue, What If?, fluff episode, and trailer. I don't have much of a bow to tie on this really other than to say I've really enjoyed this season and I'm excited for where it's going to go next.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Prediction Follow Up

Celia is going to get [Error]ed and exposition dump about her whole deal. - That happened but the exposition relevant to the show's plot didn't occur via that.

Alice gets got and she's got some secret twisty trauma. - Didn't happen.

Teddy can give her a lift and we'll hear what was on his mind. - Also didn't happen.

Speaking of [Error] it seems likely that Celia is going to reveal at least what she knows about Archivists. - This didn't not happen but also didn't really happen exactly.

With [Error] being this season's antagonist it's likely that she's going to get defeated in the finale. - Kinda sorta maybe.

It could be a gaping maw in realities that sucks our cast off to someplace new. - Got some of our cast at least, so lets say 3.

Hilltop is likely to play some role in defeating [Error] and if I had to hazard a guess I think it's likely we'll see some of the great cosmology at play here - Kinda sorta.

I think we're also going to see a good bit of Gwen going behind Lena's back too... I don't think we'll necessarily see anything major happen but I do think it's a pretty likely hook for season 2. - Yeah, that all basically happened.

Final Score 10/10 - Being incorrect does not impact my self-worth.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Season 2 Predictions

Honestly, I don't have much to say for this. It's probably going to be still follow the same characters, Sam will deal with whatever new universe he's in, Celia will play dumb but Alice won't buy it, Gwen will fail to deal with her new responsibilities, Teddy will reveal some awful secret, Colin will go further into the deep end, and there will probably be some sort of Magnus-based twist.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Incident/CAT#R#DPHW Master Sheet and Terminology Sheet

DPHW Theory: 3366 is a very pleasing set of numbers. This one matches episode 8's Architecture (Liminal) -/- Hunger too which I mention for the thematic symmetry. They're quite different incidents but has some similar elements. Which I think is a good indication of my theory's strength. You'd expect some sort of parallels to be able to be drawn if these numbers were ratings in categories as I've laid out. It's not definitive proof but it's more than I've had to talk about here for a while.

CAT# Theory: CAT2 is another obviously "wrong" one for the Person/Place/Object theory IMO. Hilltop is a place but Hilltop didn't cause it and it didn't happen to Hilltop. [Error] made a dude turn into concrete. Fairly useless to pin that one on the location. I think there are more than enough of these obviously faulty ones that I can stop mentioning it come season 2. Hopefully I'll have my own theory to talk about by then too.

R# Theory: We've finally got our first S. It's been long awaited if only by myself. Generally, I'm very pleased with this. An S on this case is some of the best evidence I've had that I'm correct about the general purpose of Ranks. A still living concrete man is undeniable evidence of the supernatural. No amount of explaining it away changes the fact a man turned into concrete and lived to tell the tale. It's still not 100% certain if Rank is purely about evidence or more about urgency in general but I do think now it's fairly clear that if I'm not entirely correct it's the right path.

Header talk: Transmutation (Human) -/- Isolation (Urban). Very little to talk about on that one but it's interesting to see the continued difference between transformation and transmutation.

[wishful-thinking64]

One Hell of an Unpopular Opinion #08

Two out of the three Hispanic characters in Hazbin Hotel are deeply rooted damaging stereotypes within Spanish & Latin American cultures and the one that isn't a blatant stereotype is misused. ___________

With Spanish Heritage Month right around the corner and being a Latina myself, I think it's more than fair for me to give my thoughts on the Latinos (in Spanish, it doesn't matter if there's only one guy in a primarily female group, you have to put Latinos) in HH. Let's start off with the least offensive out of the group, Carmilla Carmine.

We're introduced to her in Scrambled Eggs which is Episode #03 of HH. She invited each of the Overlords to a meeting to speak about how brutal this year's Extermination was and what they could do going forward. During said meeting, Velvette throws the head of a decapitated Exorcist on the table for her to try and take control of the conversation. Things before and during the song Respectless (why this song wasn't called Disrespect or Diss-respect is something I'll never understand) escalate as Velvette figures out that Carmilla is the one behind the dead Exorcist based on her body language and when she asks, "You know why this angel's headless? Do you have a disclosure?" Carmilla immediately ends the meeting thereafter, confirming her suspicions were correct. People have already criticized the mystery of the dead Exorcist being solved way too soon, though I haven't seen as many people criticize why the other Overlords didn't look or immediately question Carmilla the SECOND that Exorcist's head rolled on the table? Like, you guys know that she's Hell's top ANGELIC arms dealer, why wouldn't any of you suspect her from the start? Even if she had ended up being a red herring, I would've seen it as the Overlords using the process of elimination and common sense cause why wouldn't the ANGELIC arms dealer kill an Exorcist??? In any case, the reason behind Carmilla killing the Exorcist was to protect her daughters and thus someone we should sympathize with. Except that, we don't know anything about her daughters and we still don't know her. So why should I care? I have no attachment and therefore no proper reason to care for a character I JUST met. And don't get me started on her daughters as they're nothing more than minor plot devices who could've been replaced by Vaggie. Speaking of which...

Vaggie is based on two harmful Latina tropes and one harmful LGBTQ+ trope with these being the "Feisty" Latina, the Crazed Latina, and the Man Hating Lesbian. Whenever the "feisty" Latina is done in media, she's almost never actually feisty but rather plain bitchy. The word feisty is used because the show runners tend to want the audience to like this character as, to them, she's (somehow), "a woman who knows what she wants and how to take charge." We see this several times when Vaggie isn't interacting with Charlie though I would say the times that this backfired the most was in Episode #01 and Episode #04. Back in Episode #01 when Vaggie was working on the hotel's commercial she wants Alastor to help out with it. Mind you, she previously slandered the advertisement he had originally made for the hotel so I don't know why she wants his help with making a new one in the first place but nonetheless Alastor basically says, "Yeah. No. I'm not gonna help you cause you already know I hate modern media and you clearly didn't like what I had planned so figure it out." Now, instead of ending the conversation and leaving the man who wants no part in this alone, she holds up the camera that she has in her hands and not only films him but actively mocks him too. This isn't a "bold move" like I've seen people claim it to be, it was simply moronic since she already knew he was an Overlord that's killed and fought people over MINOR INCONVENIENCES. After this the two strike a deal which is another plain stupid move on Vaggie's part as that's only going to come back and bite her in the ass later on in the series. Meanwhile, in Episode #04, she told Husk to go after Angel Dust even though... A.) Going after the residents isn't in his job description. B.) If ANYONE is going after the residents it should probably be THE MANAGER since it's their job to make sure that everything between the staff AND customers is good. C.) She KNOWS that Husk has been sexually and physically harassed by Angel in the past as not only has she SEEN it but she's TOLD Angel to stop harassing the staff. I guess the safety of your co-workers doesn't matter though if Charlie's sad. D.) Lastly, I swear that there was a rule that was established early on about NOT FORCING RESIDENTS TO STAY AT THE HOTEL. Like, am I tripping or did the series retcon that super fast??? Anyway, the point is that the series has Vaggie acting like a snide bitch when she's interacting with anyone other than Charlie. This "feisty" Latina stereotype goes hand in hand with the crazed Latina. The crazed Latina trope is when a Latina will throw hands for the dumbest of reasons or for little to no reason at all. It makes it seem that Latina's are overly aggressive which is how the series portrays Vaggie. She's always seen wielding an angelic spear 24/7 knowing that she can kill any resident or staff member who steps out of line with her, constantly seen threatening to hurt others with it. Out of the two racial stereotypes this one has been called out the most as it's paired with the man hating Lesbian trope because every time Vaggie's threatened to kill someone with said angelic spear, it has ALWAYS been a MALE character. Okay, now it's time to end this off by addressing the elephant in the room that is Valentino.

Oh, God. Where do I start with this failure of a character? I suppose, I'll start with the Casanova aka the Enticing Latin Lover archetype. This involves a strong suave man who's tall, dark (or I guess light purple in Val's case), and handsome (I wouldn't call him that but that's how he's portrayed in the series) as well as being full of ulterior motives! He's the sultry hypersexual Hispanic seducer that everybody can't seem to get enough of. I wouldn't have nearly as much of an issue with this as he's the Overlord of Lust but with how the stans either absolve him of or make LIGHT of his crimes solely because they think how he looks, sounds, and acts is hot (brother eugh), with the show runners encouraging stuff like that on social media (yes, I'm referring to when people were comparing Val's personality to Karen Smith from Mean Girls with Viv agreeing with it cause he's so dumb), his sole purpose is being a plot device for Angel Dust and being fetish fuel. Which really bothers me considering that a good chunk of Hazbin Hotel stans are LITERAL CHILDREN! Continuing on, we have ill tempered and idiotic Machismo/Macho Man. The show can't seem to make up its mind whether or not they want us to take Valentino seriously or not. I get what they're trying to do by making Val intimidating and cunning at one point and a "charming" himbo the next but it's done in such a jarring way that could've been easily fixed had they shown him being more creepy towards lower class demons and Sinners but have him be "charming" towards Overlords and other members of Hell's high society. Like in the show, he's openly verbally violent towards Angel Dust while Charlie is in his presence (I also hate the fact that show Charlie didn't actually do anything when she noticed that Val had hit Angel cause pilot Charlie would've thrown hands regardless of what Angel told her) and doesn't give a flying fuck when she's turning into her demon form RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM! Then there's the fact that the Hellaverse doesn't take violence seriously until it HAS to and then these moments can come across as unintentionally comedic. Case and point, when I initially saw Valentino backhand Angel Dust in Episode #04, I AUDIBLY LAUGHED. That shit SHOULD NOT have been nearly as funny as it was! It was meant to be a serious moment where the show segues into how Angel is abused at his job but there I was laughing my ass off in my room for a solid thirty seconds before I was able to regain my composure. Next up is point three about the Cholo or gangster archetype in which a Latino will wear stylish street wear clothes (similar to the outfit Val wears in Episode #04) and commit violent crimes. My previous points indirectly had me go into depth about the violent crimes part so let's move onto point four which is Val being a drug addict and drug maker. Latin characters (specifically men) have been depicted as drug dealers and druggies since AT LEAST the 1970s (it only makes it worse that Valentino supposedly died in this time period.) It's been heavily implied that the smoke from his cigarettes acts as an aphrodisiac which is why he blows it in other peoples faces so much. We see him smoking cigarettes (which contain so much God damn chemicals in them but especially nicotine) throughout the show like its nothing meaning he's gotta have a high nicotine intake (logically, he would've gotten lung cancer by now.) The last racial stereotype that they gave him is the raging alcoholic and I know that anyone can become a raging alcoholic however alcoholism is actually a very common problem among Latinos as more than 33% of them suffer from issues related to an alcohol dependency. It's an ongoing problem that many Hispanics face and seeing how Val is already shown to be a violent individual WITHOUT alcohol in his system, that's only going to make him worse and we saw that in Episode #02 when Val got more irritable and threw his drink in Vox's direction upon knowing Angel Dust was staying at the HH.

___________ People of the jury, I rest my case and I hope you all liked reading my thoughts and I'll see you later!

[inbarfink]

The interpersonal conflicts between the two Membrane siblings is an incredibly important part of Invader Zim’s comedy, and also its emotional core and the characterization of these two kids. With Gaz, this tends to be, like, the primary way she interacts with episode plots. For Dib, his interactions with Gaz tend to bring out his more Zim-like traits and are the main refutation for his Terminal Case of Main Character Syndrome. 

But, also, I see a lot of assertions about their dynamic in the show that are often… kinda not very accurate? Anything from ‘Gaz beats up Dib on a regular basis’, to ‘all of Gaz’s actions are Perfectly Reasonable' to 'Gaz used to be Perfectly Reasonable and then Season 2 Flanderized her'. So, I think I want to do something a bit more… comprehensive for them.

So here is...

My Big Overview of Dib and Gaz!!

I’m going to try and go over each and every one of their conflicts in the show, go over who was most likely (the most) in the wrong, how the other reacted to it, if there’s an escalation, if it feels consistent with other episodes, how I personally see their motivations… obviously like every analysis of a piece of media it’s going to be at least kinda subjective, so I would love to hear how your view of The Siblings differ from my own - but I’m going to try and be as comprehensive and well-reasoned and balanced as I can be. 

"The Nightmare Begins"

Gaz doesn’t get a lot in the first IZ episode, but she does get this!

Gaz: Dib drank the last soda. He will pay!

So, okay, it’s not entirely clear if Gaz has a good reason to be mad at Dib or not. Like, yeah, as we’re going to get to with other episodes - Dib might have a Problem of eating things that belong to Gaz. But the implication here is that this was everyone’s Soda, and she’s just mad that Dib finished it. But like, someone had to drink that last soda at some point, right? 

Gaz’s anger could be justified, if, for example, she explicitly asked Dib to leave one last soda for her or if Dib already drank the majority of it… but that's all speculation. From what actually exists in canon (which is just this one line), it seems rather unfair.

But also it doesn’t matter that much, because while Gaz expresses frustration and, like, a desire for horrible vengeance - she (as far as we know, at least) doesn’t really do anything about it. She just gets herself a juice and once Dib comes home she’s just talking to him like normal (that is to say, somewhat derisively, but not openly hostile).

So really, regardless of whether drinking the last soda is a legitimate grievance or not - all Gaz did was express a minor and petty frustration in a kinda melodramatic way without doing anything about it. She didn't even do it to Dib's face!

"Nanozim"

The first proper Gaz episode! And with it, a lot more Dib-Gaz interactions! And the introduction of one of Gaz’s major grievances with her brother… that she finds him annoying. 

Dib: Maybe they'll let me host the show. My own episode! Gaz: I'm only 13 levels away from finishing this game so I either finish the game or make you wish I was never born.

Now, Dib should have the right to be as Weird as he damn pleases. Buuut… Gaz also should have the right to be left alone and Not be Bothered by people she finds grating. So while getting mad at Dib for just existing and doing his thing near her would be unfair, Dib is explicitly trying to talk to her - and she’s got the right to not want to participate in the conversation. Especially if she’s also trying to do her own Thing at the same time. 

Note that she only really speaks out when the conversation really turns into stroking Dib’s own ego, that’s when she decides that talking to him is not worth risking her Gamer Time. And, much like with ‘the Nightmare Begins’, despite the harshness of her words - she doesn’t really do anything and Dib doesn’t really react. Making it seem like Gaz is prone to over-dramatic proclamations of vengeance but she doesn’t have much bite.

Hell, when Dib starts shoving his hands in her face while she plays. She’s not aware, or at least she doesn't acknowledge, that his behavior is legitimately out of his control. But all that leads too is… another empty threat and her leaving the living room to get away from him. 

Gaz: I'm letting you live this time, Dib, but only because I'm still getting through this last level.

And when she shows up again, we have a bit of a Turnabout! This time, Gaz is the one trying to initiate a conversation and Dib is the one brushing her off so he can focus. 

Gaz: Is that Zim? Is this an online game? Dib: Gaz, please. I need to concentrate.

And actually, in that case, both of them were more ‘justified’. In the sense that at least Gaz was trying to talk to Dib on what she thought was a shared interest - a game he likes and she thinks looks interesting. In contrast to Dib only wanting to talk about something only he is interested in and how great he is and all the praise he’s going to get. And Dib obviously had very good reasons to take the ‘game’ very seriously and choosing to focus over small-talk with his sister.

The problem being that Dib's pride blinds him to the obvious solution of letting his über-gamer sister who can’t be hurt from the inside by Zim take the wheel. From Gaz’s perspective he is actually more reasonable than reality, because she thinks he’s not sharing a cool game he found with her because he want to play it, rather than risking his own life because he feels the need to be the one who best Zim.

And she’s being a bit of a pushy backseat gamer herself, but not really, like, more than standards for lil gaming kids. And she doesn’t actually do anything but ask to play up until Dib is literally unable too. Although she does push him aside.

Then she unknowingly saved his life, and knowingly helped him humiliate Zim. And… should we count Gaz calling the game ‘stupid’ when she thought it was actually very important to Dib as another example of her insulting him? I dunno, all-in-all both Membrane Siblings acted relatively grounded and reasonable in IZ Character Standards. Like, this is pretty standard Mildly Jerkish Sibling Behavior from both of them.

"Parent Teacher Night"

Gaz laughed at Dib when Zim splashed him with punch

Although she also laughed at Dib splashing Zim with punch. 

So really, this isn’t really specific antagonism against Dib - she just really finds petty minor acts of assholery funny regardless of who's doing them. Although I guess you can argue that she should 'side' with her brother.

"Dark Harvest"

Yet another classic example of ‘Dib bothers Gaz by ranting about something she doesn’t care about, and Gaz retaliate by being uninterested’

Dib: Incredible! You see Gaz, to defeat my enemy I must study my enemy, then become my enemy, then move in with my enemy, then wear my enemy's clothes then- Gaz: You're in my light.

There’s not even, like a toothless violent threat here this time, she’s just making it clear that she’s not interested in a way that's kinda rude.

"The Wettening"

Since I am here to discuss the antagonism between Gaz and Dib, I won’t go into much detail into this iconic scene

Outside of it being yet another demonstration of how often Gaz’s threats of physical violence usually seem more like toothless edgelordism than anything you should take seriously.

Gaz: If you wanna keep all your limbs, Zim, you will put me down, you will put me down NOW!

Our actual main focus here (outside of some mild snark from Gaz that Dib didn’t even pay much mind to)

Gaz: I'm leaving with or without you, Dib. Preferably without you.

Is what happens right after that Zim Umbrella Situation - Gaz is all set to actually make her threat a bit more than just talk

And then Dib splashes Zim and Gaz is caught in the ‘crossfire’.

And, y’know, Gaz doesn’t give a shit about Zim and Dib’s rivalry - she doesn’t see Zim as a threat and just sees Dib’s ‘fate of the world’ work as a selfish way to stroke his own ego. So while being splashed by a puddle is a relatively small slight (at least if you’re not Zim), it’s the reasoning and the fact that Dib shows no remorse or even really acknowledges what he did to Gaz that, I think, is what really sets her off.

Gaz: THAT was your fate of the world work!?! Jumping in a puddle!?! You do realize I'm gonna have to destroy you now. Dib: It was worth it. Score one for the human race! Score nothing for the Zim... thingy race. Gaz: I will destroy you.

So after this little threat, we don't really see much more antagonism from her outside of the usual snarky comments and general hostility to Dib trying to share his interests with her.

Until after Zim has delivered his ultimate defeat. That is when Gaz also unleashes her revenge.

Throwing a single water balloon at Dib.

This is really one of my favorite Gaz Revenge Moments of the entire show, because on one hand her anger is understandable and her way of getting back at Dib is technically perfectly proportional. He splashed her, she splashed him back. But the timing of when she does it just adds this angle of rubbing salt on Dib’s wounds that just makes it hurts so much more without her actually having to do anything extra.

"Battle-Dib"

Now, this is actually where you can say that there was a shift in Gaz’s character. Because while Dib eating her pizza right out of her hands was undeniably a Dick Move. I think that he clearly knew what he was doing since he did guess at that was what Gaz was upset about (he just couldn’t remember the food right)

Dib: Gaz! Help me! I'm sorry about your tacos or whatever, just help me...

It just feels like Dib thinks that being a ‘hero saving the world from the alien menace’ entitles him to his sister’s pizza, and Gaz - who refuses to see Zim as a legitimate threat to Earth’s existence and/or humanity's freedom - would obviously be enraged by this mindset.

And like, if you frame it as “Dib stole Gaz’s pizza, so she ruined his chances to get a permission slip from their dad”, it wouldn’t actually be all that bad. Again, Gaz doesn’t see Zim as a meaningful threat, and thus she sees Dib’s battles against him not as a heroic duty but a self-indulgent hobby. So she’s just screwing with the stupid thing he does for fun (and his own ego), not anything actually important.

But… the problem is that ‘ruining Dib’s permission slip’ wasn’t a one-and-done thing. In the process of ruining Dib’s attempt to get his permission slip signed, Gaz also got him tasered

And beat up in a variety of interesting ways

And dragged off forcibly by security.

So, like, even from Gaz’s perspective where Dib’s conflicts with Zim just Do Not Matter, this is way past the point that Pizza Vengeance can justify any of this. This is the first time we’ve got not just angry and snarky Gaz who makes a lot of threats but generally acts mean but proportionally so - but legit a ‘will destroy you over the slightest provocation’ Gaz.

Since this is still pretty early in the show's run, I wonder if this shift is just, like, what was always intended for Gaz’s characterization. Like, that from the get-go they wanted her to be this disproportionally vengeful and they just couldn't incorporate her actually fulfilling any of her threats into an episode's plot until then. OR if was an attempt to just make her more involved in episode plots and ‘wackier’ and more flawed (especially since this is a very rare occasion where Gaz doesn’t just deliver a Karmic Punishment, but also suffers one).

Especially, since this ‘change’ doesn’t necessarily stick to all, or even most, or her subsequent appearances. 

"Planet Jackers"

Dib: Gaz, there's an alien in the house! Gaz: You mean besides you?

Really just a tiny and pretty standard interaction, between these two. A snarky and mean-spirited comment against Dib when he bothers her about something she doesn’t see as important and doesn’t want to get involved in. Pretty much the baseline for these two.

"Rise of the Zitboy"

With this one it’s really clear that we’re back to the ‘classic’ Dib-Gaz dynamic despite the 'shift' in 'Battle-Dib'. Like, Gaz is trying to do her own thing, Dib is trying to initiate a conversation about the Thing She Doesn’t Care About (Zim) and she’s just trying her best to Not Engage. Only now, instead of her usual Game Slave, it’s a book!

If anything this is toned-down from her baseline, since she doesn’t even say anything mean or threatening, she just tries as hard as possible to ignore him and hopes he gets the hint (he does not).

"Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy"

Gaz is shown exacerbated by her brother’s actions during the first flashback, but outside of a light snarky comment to herself she doesn’t really do anything.

Gaz: Not again.

Now back in the present, we see a sort of inversion of the Dib-Gaz conflicts of “the Nightmare Begins” and “Battle-Dib” by having Dib complain to Gaz about her eating something he wanted to eat!

Dib: Hey Gaz, did you eat all the cereal? I was gonna have this for breakfast tomorrow, you know! Gaz: You think you own all the cereal. Well, you know what Dib? You don't. You just don't. Dib: Look, all I'm saying is if you're going to--

If the implication in these two previous episodes is that Dib eating Gaz’s food is a regular occurrence - then she is pretty justified by acting so appalled by his comment. It’s just plain selfish hypocrisy! Or… maybe this scene implies that the Membrane Siblings ‘stealing’ food from each other and getting angry at the other for doing this is something that they both do regularly. Which, like…okay, finishing a shared box of cereal before the second person could is still not anywhere near snatching a pizza a person was planning to eat right out of their fucking hand. But at the very least it makes both her reaction to Dib finishing the soda and her defensiveness here feel a lot less justified. 

And then when the time-shift happened…Well, I’ve seen some people suggest that Gaz’s non-hostile and even, like, kinda-audibly-concerned reaction to Dib’s questions about his past accidents suggest that in this timeline Gaz is a lot kinder to her poor injured brother.

Gaz: Tricycle accident when you were 3, don't you remember?

And while this is a plausible explanation. (It’s especially consistent with her ‘Enter the Florpus’ characterization. She says she’s Mean to her brother because she knows he’s strong enough to take it, but obviously Piggy Timeline Dib is not strong enough to take it). 

But I don’t actually think it’s a needed explanation. Like, even at her most extreme and petty - Gaz has always been mean in reaction to Dib. Whatever it’s just being Annoying at her or stealing her food right off her hands, and whatever this reaction is proportional to the slight or totally vengeful and unreasonable - Gaz’s meanness is almost always directed at Dib as a reaction to something. So I don’t think it’s that unthinkable for Prime Timeline Gaz to also react so amiably to Dib asking her a question that she doesn’t find horribly obnoxious.

Especially since even in the Piggy timeline, Gaz is still not beyond wanting to ignore Dib

Gaz: Dib, shhh. They're gonna show the bats eating a cow!

Or go for a snarky comment when he offers her an obvious opening.

Dib: And have my plans always been this lame? Gaz: Ooooh yeah.

Although it is maybe notable that the second Past Sequence where she is present

Is actually the closest we see of Gaz express, like, genuine concern when her brother is bodily harmed. Which is notable compared to other episodes, including…

"Bloaty's Pizza Hog"

Now, here’s a Real Proper Gaz Focus Episode, and as such, it’s naturally very important to her characterization. 

First things first, it’s the one to explicitly establish the fact that Gaz does not see Zim as a threat and therefore she sees Dib’s obsession with defeating him not as a serious world-saving undertaking, but as a frivolous hobby on kinda the same level as Dib sees her video-game obsession.

Dib: Don't you care that Zim's trying to destroy all mankind? Huh? Gaz: But he's so bad at it.

And that perspective, of course, informs a lot of my analysis of Gaz’s behavior through the post even before we got to this episode. I think it’s actually pretty interesting because you can totally see the internal logic that justifies that perspective - Zim is often the main person throwing a wrench into his own plans, and Dib’s motivations for positioning himself as a hero standing against his evil are partially self-serving (something that’s very easy for Gaz to see since she’s lived with him trying to play out self-aggrandizing fantasies all of her life). 

But from our wider perspective as the audience, we know that sometimes Zim can be a genuine threat to the people of Earth (if not legitimately dangerously close to destroying/conquering it, at least causing a lot of localized havoc and mayhem with his schemes) and that Dib’s efforts of stopping him are not entirely in-vain, and that his reasons are… not entirely just fueled by his own ego. And from Dib’s own biased perspective Zim is always a threat just one step from destroying all mankind if not for Dib's intervention which is obviously Altruistic and Heroic. So it’s very much a matter of their different perspectives and views of the Zim-Dib rivalry causing further conflicts between the two siblings. 

I mean, on a smaller scale that is why Gaz is so upset whenever Dib is bothering her when she’s trying to do something for fun. You know, kinda like here-

Both of these activities, fighting aliens and drawing little piggies, are equally frivolous in her eyes. But by constantly distracting her with talks about the Stupid Shit He Does for Fun Dib is kinda putting his silly hobbies as more important than her silly hobbies and thus his own needs above her own - which is what always gets her so upset. (But again, upset, but not doing anything but be a Bit Creepy About It).

But of course, the interesting thing about this episode is that this time, Dib’s Frivolous Hobby isn’t just interrupting Gaz’s Frivolous Hobby - it’s actually interrupting something a lot more important and with much more urgent stakes. Family Dinner Night.

Gaz: You know Dad's taking us out tonight. I picked Bloaty's. Dib: This is bigger than pizza, Gaz! This is the fate of all mankind! Gaz: You and your mankind... Dib: Uh-huh. Whatever. Look, if I'm not home in time, call this number and tell them the Mothman is caught in the spider's web. Dib: They'll know what you mean. But, like I said, I'll probably be back before the Mysteries theme song starts.

Even after being told that dad is taking them to dinner… I think Gaz is very much trying to imply “this is important to me, don’t mess it up” without being directly, emotionally honest about it. And Dib’s just totally not even considering it. Like yeah, from his perspective he is going on an Important Heroic Mission that must be worth anything else he could be doing with his time, but... he is also primarily worried about not missing his favorite TV Show and reduces the idea of Family Dinner Night to just 'pizza'.

And like, this is a very complicated family situation, isn’t it? It is understandable if Dib isn’t gang-ho about having dinner with his dad, considering what their relationship is like. And maybe the fact that he couldn’t take Gaz’s hint about this being Very Important to Her isn’t, like, entirely up to his sense of self-absorption but also to his general social inaptitude (and his Autistic Swag). But I can also understand why this is so important to Gaz and why she would still read Dib’s behavior as just pure selfishness and part of a pattern of disregarding her feelings.

(There's certainly some sort of Funky Neverending Loop of, like, Dib disregards Gaz's feelings, Gaz expresses her feelings about it in the most repressed, abrasive and/or mean way possible, Dib continues to Not Get It and disregard Gaz's feelings. Like, how much is Dib Not Getting It the fault of Gaz always letting out her feelings in exclusively in the form of snarky comments and edgy threats and how much has Gaz learned to express herself in this way as a coping mechanism due to Dib always walking over her wants and needs? It's hard to say)

So when Dib ignores (from her POV of the situation. Again, maybe Dib just legit missed the subtext) her honest desire to spend time with their dad for a change, she first reacts by… trying to abandon Dib. Instead of calling the Swollen Eyeballs as backup for him, she just destroys the number and tries to go to dinner without him.

Which… okay, this can be a dick move which is kinda way out of proportions of what Dib actually did. But remember that Gaz’s perspective refuses to see Zim as a threat. So she doesn’t see it necessarily as abandoning Dib to death, but just as an inconvenience. He’ll get out eventually on his own, he’s ‘strong enough to take it’, and that means she doesn’t need to bother with lending him a hand. “Well, if he doesn’t care about Family Night Out then he doesn’t get to go. And also he doesn’t get to watch his stupid ass show!”. Like she was thinking about it as wasting his time and not necessarily leaving him to die.

But also, like, this episode goes to great lengths to establish that Gaz is only saving Dib for the sake of her getting to eat dinner with her dad for once, and not out of concern for him. And while she might not believe Zim is actually capable of killing him, she is also pretty blasé about the idea that he’ll be harmed or tortured… unless it interferes with Bloaty’s with dad, of course.

Look at her big ol’ eyes, it’s not just an ‘eh, he can get himself out on his own’ mindset - she was looking forward to seeing him suffer horribly!

Dib himself is still being kind of a Jerk throughout the episode, even in an emergency he’s still thinking about how his little sneak-in plan will affect him in the most superficial ways.

Dib: There you are, Gaz! Looks like you'll have to tape the show for me, I made it in! 

Dib: Gaz, make sure you don't record over any old episodes.

Like, this isn't even a 'Dib thinks saving the world is more important than Family Dinner Night. But Gaz doesn't think the world is actually in danger so think this is just frivolous ego stroking even though we know Zim can be a genuine danger and Dib's goals are at least kinda genuinely heroic' thing when you consider these lines. Even in a dangerous situation where the world is at stake, Dib can still find the brainspace to worry about his silly TV show but not about the possibility he'd deny his sister the precious little time they have to spend with their dad.

You can argue that trying to stop Zim is actually more important than Family Dinner Night and Dib is in the right. But Dib's dialogue also puts Mysterious Mysteries as being more important than Family Dinner Night. Because that at least gets some sort of acknowledgement from him. Gaz's only chance to go to her favorite restaurant with her favorite person in the world doesn't even get a "sorry, Gaz, but I have an Important Duty to do!", he just totally ignores it.

And generally through the episode he's ignoring and understating Gaz’s desires - even after she did actually told him right to his face what she wants.

Gaz: Come home now, Dib! Your weird obsessions are not gonna mess today up for me. I just want to go out and eat with Dad, that's all! Stop playing with Zim and get back here.

Gaz: All I want is to have some pizza...hang out with Dad, and not have your weirdness mess up my day.

So at this point this stops being some sort of misunderstanding and really starts seeming more like Dib not even trying to understand his sister’s motivations.

Dib: Come on, Gaz! You'd sacrifice the entire planet just for some pizza!?!

Which… makes sense as something that will aggravate her, especially in regards to something as emotionally important as getting to hang out with her father for once. But still, letting him get tortured is, like, maybe a tad disproportionate as an outlet for these frustrations? 

But I think it's still notable that while the angle of disproportionate response to technically-legitimate-grievances is similar, in contrast to her very active acts of sabotage back in “Battle-Dib”, she only really ‘gets back’ at Dib here through inaction when Zim is hurting him (and maybe being a bit abrasive to Dib during her rescue, but Dib was also a very annoying rescuee so that one I think does kinda balances out.)

"Bolognius Maximus"

Okay, back to the simpler and shorter interactions now. We once again see Dib initiate ‘conversations’ with Gaz about subjects she finds annoying and uninteresting. 

Dib: They try and say it's just a regular mountain range on the Martian surface, and it's just a trick of the light, but come on! It is so a monkey face.

And this time all Gaz does is casually ignore him.

When things start getting odd with the dogs and all, she only reacts with a snarky comment. But at this point it’s not even entirely clear to Dib that something very very wrong is happening. So I dunno who would expect Gaz to be worried about this?

Now, later in the episode, when Dib is very obviously turning into a bologna, Gaz still doesn’t give a shit.

Which I think actually matches up very well with her ‘Zim is not a threat, none of the things he’s doing/planning to do will actually pan out’ outlook. Like, lowkey she is pretty sure that this new Wacky Zim Scheme is gonna go up in flames and return everything to normal so there’s no need for her concern or interest and she can just casually enjoy the free bologna. Which is actually a fun character beat because usually the show leans toward Gaz’s attitude being kinda right - but this time she was very much in the wrong.

And like, if 'Bloaty's Pizza Hog' gave me a chance to talk about how Dib's tendency to see the Inherent Importance of everything he is interested in over any of Gaz's needs and desires might not just be a difference in perspective or miscommunication but also has an element of trying to rationalize his own selfishness - I think it's only fair for me to note this can also go the other way around.

It's easy to see Gaz's total dismissal of Zim's threat potential as just her being... you know, grounded and rational enough to see things as they are. But there might be her own emotional bias in play in here motivated by her own resentment with her brother and her own selfish desire to totally ignore and disregard him. Maybe on some level, she just can't allow anything that Dib cares about to be actually worth paying attention to, even when it seems to be literally life-threatening?

"Game Slave 2"

Obviously this episode has a lot of Gaz content, some that can invite a lot of discussion about how proportionate or disproportionate her reactions are - but we are going to focus specifically on her interactions with Dib, of course. Starting with…

Dib: Come on! Bigfoot would never say that! Gaz: Why do you have to read that in here? I'm trying to play a game! Dib: Mysterious Mysteries is on in five minutes!

This is actually really the first time where Gaz is directly, explicitly annoyed by Dib just sort of being around here. Usually her exasperation is fueled by him trying to talk to her about all kinds of Alien Stuff she just doesn’t care about, or trying to drag her into his world-saving adventures against her will, or stealing her food - but here is just doing His Own Thing in her vicinity. Like, the living room is a Shared Space, he has just as much of a right to hang out there as Gaz does. 

If anything, he has more of a right to be there since he’s waiting for his show to come on while Gaz is playing her handheld video game. So if Dib reading his magazine and complaining that Bigfoot Would Not Fucking Say That is bothering her so much - then she should probably just go to her room. Then again, she doesn’t do much other than verbally complain once and it was probably more about venting out her frustrations about the game than Dib himself.

But then…

Dib: I've been waiting all night to see this! She can wait to get her stupid game! Prof. Membrane: Son, video games develop hand eye coordination, and make kids into better human beings! Dib: Okay... But only after the show is over. Gaz: You stink!

So on some level this is just the same sort cycle of conflict that is always going around these two. Both of them prioritize their own hobbies (and this time it IS Dib’s hobby, there’s not much subjectivity around this. This isn’t about saving the human race from anyone’s point of view, just about a show he wants to watch) and thinks the other one is frivolous and selfish for caring about their hobbies more. But also… in this specific context Dib is the One Being a Dick.

Just like before I sided with Dib because Gaz can play the game in her room…. We know the Membranes have a way to record shows on their TV. That came up in literally the previous episode! Dib could’ve just set his VCR to record and ‘Mysterious Mysteries’ will be waiting for him when he gets back from the mall - but Gaz’s console launch is an actual time sensitive matter. (Plus ‘Mysterious Mysteries’ is aired on, like, a weekly basis. Consoles do not release in this frequency). 

So Gaz had every reason to be upset with Dib when they did get to the mall and see, like Gaz and any Gamer watching could’ve predicted, that a-half-an-hour delay in getting to the big launch event can screw up a lot.

Dib: It was a… really good episode…

And maybe I’m reading too much into it, but Dib’s reaction also feels pretty telling. You know, instead of giving Gaz any sort of apology, he’s being defensive by saying that hey, at least the MM episode was worth it? Like it is still kinda centering his interests and desires over Gaz’s.

And Gaz’s retaliation for it is…honestly relatively mild? 

Gaz: Hey, Dib. I think I saw a Chupacabra or something going into that parking garage. Dib: A Chupacabra? But there isn't a goat to feed on for miles!

She just gets him out of her way so she can be left alone in line in peace, and probably hoping to waste his time on the fake Chupacabra - a tit-for-tat revenge for getting her time wasted. Which… okay, it’s unclear if she knew about how large and labyrinthine the mall’s parking lot actually was and about, you know, the colony of horrible rat people. But still, Dib was already out of the building by the time Gaz finished Murdering a Fellow Child.

At worst, he wasted like a couple of hours that he didn’t have any specific plans for anyways. 

Really, since this episode gives us a glimpse into how Gaz deals with People She Finds Annoying Who Are Not Dib... it actually kinda gives the impression that Gaz... like, not just that she doesn't hate Dib specifically and will aim a similar amount of ire at any random person who annoys her in a similar way. But also maybe that she goes easy on Dib, compared to how she delt with Iggins. Which is... probably the closest we'll get in this entire journey to an indication that Gaz has any level of care towards Dib.

"Battle of the Planets"

Dib: DAD! Gaz! Come see this! Professor Membrane: Please! No more foolishness, son! Gaz: Your voice is stupid!

Dib tries to get Gaz involved in something she doesn’t care about, she insults him. Pretty standard.

"Mysterious Mysteries"

Okay, so, the first thing I want to note is the lil’ babies scene.

It seems like a really inconsequential gag but this is actually, like, an extremely rare occurrence of Gaz being mean to Dib without anything even resembling a provocation. Like, at least in that little scene at the start of ‘Game Slave 2’ she was venting because of her frustrations with the game and it was just a light grumble. This is really like the most classic inarguable example of Gaz bullying Dib.

Especially when compared to both her version of the Story and her general behavior in the ‘present day’ of the episode. Like, is portraying Dib in her version of the story as a barely coherent moron kind of Mean? Yeah, sure it was. But is it any more insulting to the actual person that it’s depicting than Dib depicting Gaz as his helpless adoring sidekick? Especially as her interview implies that she did find Dib’s version of events legitimately insulting in it's inaccuracy?

Gaz: My stupid brother did drag me out to look for stupid Zim. He didn't make that part up.

Maybe Gaz deliberately exaggerated Dib’s (and Zim’s) stupidity in her version of the story out of spite of how Dib framed her on national TV. Maybe just like Dib seemed to be genuinely under the belief that his version of Gaz is a decent reflection of reality, Gaz literally just thinks of Dib as this stupid and annoying. Either way, it’s a really an equally-matched kind of sibling assholery. 

Also, speaking of Gaz’s version of events... obviously it’s not entirely clear what really happened - but I do think, when it comes to like characterization and the general tone of Invader Zim, Gaz's retelling is at least pretty reliable on two fronts; why she was there-

And why did the video cut out when it did.

So while Dib’s interactions with Gaz had that undercurrent of, like, him always putting his own interests above her own for a long time - this really is the most obvious example. Literally forcibly dragging her out of whatever she was doing for the sake of getting an extra ‘eyewitness’ to his video. And so she responded with a little force of her own.

Again, this is all from Gaz’s story, and she does tend to give out exaggerated threats of violence that she doesn’t always carry out - so I don’t think it’s out of the question for her to also retroactively make up/exaggerate the acts of violence she commits. But since this kick in the shins is by far the most probable cause for the video cutting out that we have, I am going to assume that it did happen in reality on some level. And it is a very notable example of Gaz actually inflicting direct physical violence on Dib - until now, her preferred methods of inflicting pain on him were a lot less direct. 

And while kicking people in the shins is wrong, it was still in reaction to Dib forcibly dragging her along - which was probably a lot less painful, but also took a lot more time. You can argue this still follows a sort of tit-for-tat logic that a lot of Gaz's retaliations do... but also, with Gaz's second scene in this episode literally being the most Unambiguous Case of her being Mean to Dib for Now Reason

In this episode more than anything, it might be fair to assume Gaz just wanted to hurt Dib and humiliate him on National TV and there's nothing more to it.

(Also, of course, Gaz refusing to corroborate Dib’s story is one of the main reasons why he failed in that episode. But as I mentioned many times before, Gaz refuses to see that rivalry as anything serious or with more stakes than her video games. In her mind, this is about as bad, or maybe even less bad, then dragging her out to waste time by participating in this stupid show in the first place.)

"Future Dib"

Okay, so most of the other Gaz and “Dib” interactions in this episode kinda follow a unified-if-winding thread of thought so I want to start with the one that I have kind of a separate Point about:

While Gaz’s reaction was very disproportionate and unnecessarily violent, I think it’s also interesting to note that the thing that set her off was “Dib” putting his hand around her. It’s actually part of a recurring implied piece of characterization that Gaz hates being touched. 

Dib: Everyone, hold hands again. Gaz: Yeah! Your lives depend on it! Poonchy: Okay! Hold my hand. Gaz: No way! Be serious!

Since Dib very very rarely ever touches Gaz, and, y’know, has known her all of her life - avoiding physical touch is probably an established boundary between them. So while that doesn’t fully justify the intensity of Gaz’s reaction, that does explain both why that set her off so much and why that’s really the moment where she starts to notice “Dib” is really acting strangely. He was really violating a boundary that he should’ve known by now.

(Going back for a sec, actually, her ‘dramatic re-enactment’ in Mysterious Mysteries also has the Dib Actor dragging the Gaz Actor by the arm. So that’s probably another reason why Gaz reacted kinda violently then as well)

So Gaz giving out more edgelordy threats to (who she thinks is) Dib is pretty standard at this point, but there is something very unique about it in this episode. This is the first time since ‘Battle-Dib’ where she actively acts on these threats to such a literal degree. And this is also combined with the ‘Mysterious Mysteries’ trend of being much more directly violent.

Like, Gaz explicitly only realized she was dealing with a Dib Robot Replica after choking it out so hard it’s eye popped out. All of this violence and pain, she was intending to inflict it on the real Dib. This is about as bad or maybe worse than everything she put Dib through back in ‘Battle-Dib’. And she's doing it with her own two hands this time.

Plus, the reason that she’s reacting like this isn’t because Dib was stealing her Pizza or being generally inconsiderate to her - it’s really just for being weird and annoying (which, in this context, means ‘start to scream randomly and freak out’). So that feels a lot less justified. 

Then, of course, her reaction to finding out that she has been beating up a robot half-to-death is to use it as a replacement for her brother. Which has several different implications going on here about Gaz’s relationship to Dib:

First things first, I want to note that this episode ends with the implication that Gaz left Dib to be stuck in that cell for, like, the rest of his life until he died of old age or something?

I mean, yeah, obviously it is a ‘non canon’ jokey ending that gets totally ignored by the next episode. But the way I always took these snapback ending is as, like, obviously they probably didn’t actually happen in whatever passes for ‘canon’ in Invader Zim - but the events are still indicative of what would’ve happened in terms of worldbuilding and character actions. So while this episode isn’t telling us that Dib has literally died of old age after spending his entire life being beat up by a monkey for Zim’s amusement. This episode is telling us that if that did happen, Gaz would make no effort to save him, ever.

This is notable because of how it contrasts with the previous episodes, or at least my interpretation of them. Like I said, my assumption has always been that Gaz doesn’t care about the Zim-Dib rivalry and sees it as frivolous nonsense because she doesn’t see Zim as a threat. And thus, her general refusal to help her brother was less about outright hatred of him and waiting to see him gone/hurt, and more about just thinking he can handle that walking joke on his own and there’s no need for her to waste her Precious Gaming Time on this. 

This is very much supported by ‘Enter the Florpus’, both in what Gaz literally tells Dib right to his face and in the sense that when Zim does prove to be a credible threat to her world and to her family - she joins forces with her brother with minimal complaints. But of course, ETF Characterization don’t always apply to 2001 Series Characterization so while I prefer this reading partially because it allows ETF Gaz to feel more consistent with Main Show Gaz - I also I feel that Main Show has enough implications to point to this characterization and motivations on it’s own and I want to draw attention to it. 

But here… this is Gaz theoretically ignoring Dib’s plight for literal decades. At this point this isn’t something that can be explained as ‘she doesn’t think she needs to bother with it’. Like, at some point it should’ve been clear to her that even if Zim isn’t a threat to Earth, he is certainly torturing Dib somewhere. This really seems to be direct evidence toward the idea that Gaz just doesn’t not like her brother at all and wishes that he was gone. 

And also I want to discuss what exactly Gaz turned the Robot Dib into - an abusable servant. Something that fulfills her needs while passively enduring her random acts of cruelty.

So… is this what she would like Dib to be? Like, maybe I’m just looking at it from the totally wrong angle. Maybe it’s just a matter of ‘well, if you have a Robot Servant, you’d obviously want it to serve you. And if you’re an angsty preteen with anger issues, you’d like to have something vaguely human-shaped but non-sapient to take your frustrations on’. Maybe it’s got nothing to do with Dib. But… like, this Robot is still Dib-Shaped. So I feel like the implication is that she’s using Robot Dib as a proxy of what she would also do with Dib if he was, like, mind-controlled or something?

And that’s… not really the vibe I’ve gotten from Gaz’s interactions with Dib so far? I mean, maybe I won’t go as far as to say that she actually likes him - but I thought about it more in the sense that she just wanted Dib to leave her alone most of the time. That for her an ideal situation would be more if he did his own thing and she did her own thing without his ‘weirdness’ barging in and bothering her all the time. 

This is just really… I think that might be the ‘Meanest’ Gaz has ever been in my book. Like I know that there’s Another Certain Episode that people often put up as “The One Where Gaz is Really Mean to Dib” but I think that it's more Complicated than some people give it credit for. So, like, I’ll get there when I get there. But here we actually have the Gaz who physically attacks Dib over the slightest provocation and, like, actively hates him. 

It’s really one of those things that make me, like, kinda question my analysis so far. I mean, is this meant to be another attempt to shift Gaz’s character because meaner and more violent characters are more fun and wacky to write? Is it just a matter of the IZ writers prioritizing wacky escalation and cartoon violence and Dib suffering over giving Gaz consistent motivations? Or have I been just totally overly generous in my analysis so far? Like, maybe I was totally off the mark trying to look at which of Dib's actions seem to set Gaz off?Maybe we were supposed to understand that Gaz was always beating Dib to a pulp off-screen since the start?

But... I dwelled on these thoughts for a while and I think that my usual read of Gaz’s character is maybe not consistent with this episode, but it is consistent with a majority of the episodes she was featured in. Which is not something I can necessarily say for a reading that just centers ‘Future-Dib’ above all else. This level of physical violence here is still very unusual for her, even in episodes where she is more cruel to Dib.

(And the idea that she just legit hates her brother and wishes he was gone… honestly, yeah, that can go either way...)

"Abducted"

Especially considering this is the very next episode with any sort of Dib-Gaz interaction! 

Gaz just walking off while Dib is being, well, abducted can work pretty well if you assume that Gazthinks that obviously whatever is flying this thing

Is some sort of incompetent idiot and she doesn’t need to bother with the annoyance of saving Dib because he can handle it on his own (and she would probably be right).

But… it can also work just as well if you assume she doesn’t give a shit about Dib and would be happy if he’s gone forever.

"Dib's Wonderful Life of Doom"

Dib: How I am I still the only one who sees Zim's an alien? I mean, come on! Come on! COME ON! Gaz: Why do you have to have a head? Dib: Gaz! I want you to see this. Today, things are gonna change. I'm gonna do… something! I'm not just gonna sit back and watch Zim get away with his… his… things he do! Dib: I mean— Gaz: "Things he "DO"? What's your problem?

And we’re back to Gaz not being directly violent or even threatening violence, but just being snarky in a kinda mean way. Still, there’s maybe less of the justification for her exacerbation with Dib this time. Because this time he wasn't technically bothering her at all! Dib was lecturing another kid before she started insulting him. I think the implication was that she felt he was embarrassing her, but I still feel like that's a lot less justified.

Still, it’s not like her words seem to significantly hurt Dib, and she is at least able to share a laugh about Zim’s ridiculous behavior with him. (although with ‘Parent-Teacher Night’, there is also the implication that she would’ve also laughed at Dib in any sort of inverted scenario).

"Tak: The Hideous New Girl"

So for Dib and Gaz’s first interaction in this episode, we have this:

And well, kinda like the ‘Wonderful Life of Doom’ interaction, what Gaz does here is pretty mild in the grand scheme of things- but her reasoning also feels not very justified.

I mean, yeah, she was annoyed by the sound of them yelling, that sucks. But Dib has a right to yell in the shared living space of his own house. But… also, I suspect that she sprayed him with the soda less as a punishment for being annoying and more as a direct result of what he said just before. 

Dib: Thanks, Gaz. He was really…

She wanted to make it clear that she was not shooing Zim out to help him. She did it for her own sake. Because Dib keeps making this mistake of thinking of Gaz as his sidekick and that her goals and wants align with his and obviously that causes her a lot of exasperation and wasted time. So I think she was more lashing out at this hypothetical future scenario than just Dib annoying her in the present.

Next up, we have the scene by the Evil Weenie Stand.

Gaz: Be quiet. I wanted to let you know that my brother is trying to break into this building through some secret entrance. Weenie Clerk: We... we have chili beans. Gaz: I just though it'd be funny to see him get beaten up by security.

So, Gaz actively trying to get Dib grievously injured just because it’s funny is actually... kind of an unusual thing for her. Like, as I’ve said previously, she’s usually a very reactive character. Even when her actions are at their most disproportionate and least justifiable, they are usually at least somewhat motivated by Dib’s actions… unless the implication is that the reason why she’s here in the first place is because Dib dragged her out here to be his lookout and she's looking at a way to get back at him for that.

That scenario feels most likely to me, and obviously that wouldn't justify ratting out Dib and enjoying his pain - to me it's kinda on the same level as getting Dib tasered and dragged off by security for stealing her Pizza... But also it's notable that this time, she actually gives up on the idea pretty quickly. If you wanna be charitable to Gaz, you can say she wasn't really serious about the security thing and was just making an edgelordy joke and honestly... with her characterization, I think it could go either way...

Interestingly, once she gets a decent look at Tak and her plans, Gaz becomes a lot more cooperative. I mean, she still grumbles about the idea of saving the Earth. But, like, she doesn’t argue when Dib says the disk is ‘theirs’ when she was the one who found it and she doesn't put up any resistance about joining Dib in seeing Zim’s base. Compared to how previously she’d at best be really abrasive about it and at worst would have tried to actively sabotage Dib and/or cause him physical pain as revenge for prioritizing himself and wasting her time. 

That works very well with the idea that Gaz’s whole problem with Dib’s obsession is that she just doesn’t see Zim as a threat. Obviously after coming face-to-face with Tak, she can see she is much more of a Legitimate Threat to Earth than Zim is. So even if she’s not necessarily emotionally invested in saving the world, she can tolerate it a lot better if she can see that it is indeed something more than Dib’s extremely self-indulgent ego-stroking hobby. 

"Backseat Drivers From Beyond the Stars"

Gaz finds Dib annoying, Gaz goes to vent to her dad about it, Gaz is told to give her brother another chance, Gaz finds Dib annoying again and just leaves. This is a very Mild Gaz compared to what we had in the previous few episodes, closer to my initial read of her. Like, she doesn’t even insult Dib to his face this time. She finds him annoying, so she leaves!

"Dibship Rising"

Well, I… have made the decision to not discuss Gaz’s attempt to destroy all mankind in length, even though Dib is, in fact, technically part of ‘all mankind’. I just think this scene is more about her relationship with her dad then it is about Dib.

Gaz: That didn't wipe out all life as we know it! YOU LIED TO ME, DAD!!

The actual crux of Dib and Gaz’s interactions in this episode are once again - Dib’s obsession with halting the Irken Invasion of Earth has led him to also inconvenience Gaz (this time, by causing a lot of noise and being late to dinner), and Gaz is, like, mildly abrasive as a result and ignores him a lot.

"The Voting of the Doomed"

Dib: Willy's a drooling moron! As sole defender of Earth, I've got to do something! Gaz: I wish Willy was my brother.

Yet another case of Gaz insulting Dib unprompted (since he was talking to himself rather than to her. She just happened to be within listening range.) And also another implication that her problem with her brother is that he’s embarrassing? I think that’s how we’re supposed to read that line? "Willy would be a better brother than you cause he's less embarrassing!"

"Gaz, Taster of Pork"

Okay, now this is the big one. This is the episode that I’ve seen a lot of people in the fandom cite as being, like, the One Where Gaz is Really Cruel to Dib. And, like, I’m not gonna pretend like Dib doesn’t suffer a Lot in this episode (maybe even past the point that I find it particularly funny to rewatch) - but also the dynamic going on is a bit more complicated than just ‘cruelty’? 

Because this is also probably also the episode where Dib is at his most asshole to Gaz as well. I mean, he literally used her as a guinea pig (... pun not intended) to experiment with a spell he thought might be beneficial but was worried about the consequences for himself if it wasn’t… but apparently did not extend that worry to his sister - and thus, the entire conflict of this episode. Like Gaz is entirely in the right to be mad about being ‘blessed’ with Pig-Sense without her consent. Both with Dib’s false narrative about wanting to give her superpowers for her own sake

Dib: No! I only did it to give you super powers because you're the greatest sister ever!

And when she does actually learn the truth.

Dib: cast the spell on her because I wanted to see what it would do before trying it on myself!

Like, maybe that doesn’t perfectly justify taking and destroying Dib’s personal property, or potentially shoving mashed potatoes into his eyes, or repeatedly threatening him with her man-eating plushies, or encouraging a Pig Demon to punish him in some terrible supernatural Pig Demon way...

(While it would certainly be too much to ask Gaz to forgive Dib on the spot and advocate for him when she just found out he’s been lying about his motivations all along and used her as a guinea pig. The dialogue implications of this scene is that the Shadow Hog wouldn’t have done anything to Dib without Gaz’s encouragement.)

It's still important to remember that what Dib did to her was pretty terrible on it's own and was entirely unprovoked!

Then there are a few other factors to consider here, like Gaz’s constant violent threats towards Dib. Which I usually just chalk up to being edgelordy venting unless there is a clear indication of Gaz acting or considering acting on them (like with the mashed potatoes example above) because in most episodes Gaz is mostly all-talk and Dib usually does not take them seriously. But here… although we don’t see Gaz do even like a quarter of what she threatened to do to Dib - we do see Dib acting as if the threats are 100% real and serious. 

Zim: I'm going to destroy you all, Dib! Today! I've got it all set up. Dib: Uh huh, that's nice, Zim. It can't be worse than what my sister's gonna do.

Which does make them feel a lot more 'concrete’ than in most episodes. Like maybe she would’ve beaten him up if they did fail to cure her or if the Shadow Hog wasn’t there to offer an Alternative Punishment Method for him?

But like… I think it’s closer to a proportional response than getting him tasered for stealing pizza or literally beating (a robot she thought was) him with her own two hands because he yelled in an annoying way? Like, what Dib did was really shitty and Gaz has a right to be upset about that on some level!

Then there is the other complicating factor - Membrane. Like, while Dib was Not Having a Good Time in that episode - up until that last sequence with the Shadow Hog, Gaz was suffering a lot more for a much longer period of time. The ‘Pig Mouth’ curse has cost her not just her ability to eat most foods but also most of her hobbies, her freedom, her privacy, her dignity. And it’s clear that she blames Dib - the catalyst of this whole event - for everything that has stemmed from it.

Gaz: You will pay, Dib! You will pay!

But even though what Dib did was certainly a Dick Move… like, it is Membrane and his scientist team that really did the worst by Gaz. Dib only turned to his dad out of a sincere belief he could help, Membrane was the one who decided to announce Gaz’s condition to the world and quarantined her for life and sold the rights to make a goddam movie out of her.

So if Gaz is lashing out at the mistreatment she suffered throughout this episode, she should be at least just as mad at her father as she is with her brother, right? But instead she seems to be totally chill with him, just eating pizza together. Even though his apology for her is honestly as shitty and self-justifying as anything Dib would’ve come up with.

Professor Membrane: Sorry about imprisoning you and turning you into a media freak, honey! It was in the name of science and... hey, where's your brother?

So I think that might imply that Gaz has a massive bias against her brother, causing her to channel a lot of unrelated frustrations just at him.

…Or maybe more likely a massive bias in favor of her dad. You know, she does love him a lot - to the point that ‘getting to actually spend time with him’ is like one of the few things that can get her motivated to get Involved in an episode’s plot. And she also has some serious reasons to be frustrated with him (in this episode especially, but also outside of it). And instead of trying to, like, untangle the complicated contrasting emotions she feels about her dad (a process which would be complicated and hard for anyone, but especially for an extremely emotionally repressed 11 years old), she just channels all of the negative ones unto Dib whenever possible.

Which, like, doesn’t make blaming Dib for things he didn’t actually do more justifiable, but it does make her motivations for doing so more complex than just “idk she hates Dib like everyone else does”

"The Most Horrible X-mas Ever"

And our very last Dib-Gaz conflict for the post! (I didn’t expect it to run this long I swear) Starring Bitey the Vampire!

Dib: You stare at that dog every Christmas, Gaz! Come on, already! It's creepy. Gaz: Three Christmases ago, that dog ate the head off Bitey the Vampire! You said so yourself! I haven't forgotten. Dib: Well, fixing an alien spaceship is hard enough without you distracting me.

The interesting thing about this conflict is how similar it is to ‘Gaz, Taster of Pork’. We once again have Dib being an inconsiderate dick to Gaz for the sake of an experiment and then lying about it to try and avoid her ire, knowing that her reaction would be both violent and extreme. Just this time instead of Gaz herself, it’s her treasured sentimental possession.

Dib: Okay, Gaz. I think it's time I told you. The dog's innocent! I used Bitey the Vampire for a teleporter experiment and switched his head onto a fly's body!

Which, you know, at least he isn't overriding Gaz's bodily anatomy this time but... like... Dib must've had so many other options for his 'Teleporter Experiment'! I guess that without specific details we can't know for sure, but I really can't think of any real justification why he would have to use his sister's doll for this experiment and not one of his own toys or even, like, buy something cheapo from the dollar store or something? Maybe you can come up with some explanation of why it had to be Bitey, but it really feels like another demonstration of Dib's thoughtlessness and inconsideration.

I almost wonder, if, y’know, the show wasn’t cut so short - if this was a deliberate attempt to emphasize this aspect of the Dib-Gaz dynamic for the episodes going forwards. You know, give some more justification and context to Gaz’s anger at Dib - even as her responses to it continue to escalate. 

Although I guess beating Dib up like that in retaliation to ruining one of her beloved childhood toys and then lying about it for years isn’t like… the most disproportionate thing Gaz has done? I mean it is kinda bad, but also she has certainly done worse during the course of this list!

Also a quick shout-out to Dib complaining about Gaz distracting him by just like… standing in his vicinity quietly - when Gaz’s most common problem with Dib is him distracting her by talking at her constantly and generally being actually disruptive to her concentration.

(Some more general points in this episode are Gaz once again trying to abandon Dib at what he feels is mortal danger. Which, like most of these interactions could be read as her just underestimating Zim and thus not thinking he is in actual danger... or just legitimately not caring if her brother lives or dies. And Dib trying to take credit for Gaz repairing the ship, and threatening him with More Violence over it. First one is a pretty common sight at this point and the letter is a pretty quick interaction when they're both pretty jerky to each other.)

So… what is the main thing that I feel like I’ve learned from making such an extensive analysis? Well, I think in a way, all of those General Fandom Conceptions of Gaz that I talked about at the start… none of them were fully accurate, but also none of them are, like, entirely inaccurate either. 

You know, sometimes Gaz’s reactions come off as mostly harmless edgelordisms, and sometimes they’re totally disproportionate and/or violent, sometimes her behavior comes off as reasonable or at least understandable, and sometimes she’s just another person in Dib’s life who wants to punish him for being weird. And there was an escalation in her actions over time, but it wasn’t really just in Season 2 - and it coincides with a whole lot of factors that make it more complicated than just ‘Flanderization’; the increased focus on both Dib’s negative traits and the comedy of his suffering, a general need for escalation with newer plots, and a need for her to be more involved in narratives - especially as her initial role as Someone Dib Can Talk To has become kind redundant as the writers have become more comfortable with the idea that Dib can just talk to himself like a weirdo. 

The most… uncharitable reading is that Gaz’s characterization is just plain inconsistent. The writers didn’t have as clear of a vision of who she is compared to Zim or Dib, or maybe they just didn’t care enough to keep her in-line with the vision of what she was supposed to be - so her level of meanness, violence and hatred towards her brother just kinda fluctuate depending on the needs of the narrative or the joke, or what aspect of Dib's character they wanted to highlight. 

Y’know, even though this was always meant to be an analysis of both Dib and Gaz’s relationship with each other - it also became a bit of a Gaz Character Analysis along the way. Because Dib’s slights against Gaz can fluctuate on levels of intensity, but they are very consistent in terms of reasoning and motivation. It is pretty much always a result of Dib’s Terminal Case of Main Character Syndrome … but also about his social isolation and general inability to communicate with others and the fact that Gaz, even at her meanest, is still more likely to tolerate him talking about his interests than basically anyone else in the world

You know, I do want to emphasize that Dib’s inconsiderate attitude can also be understandable and relatable in his own way, just like Gaz’s reactions to him. I ended up focusing on Gaz more and more as I was writing this post because I kinda assumed Dib’s motivations were more self-evident in the fandom both because he’s more of a main character and because he’s more open about his emotions compared to Gaz. And also… because it would’ve been too repetitive to go over “Yeah, Dib has a problem remembering other people have needs and interiority but he is also deeply lonely and desperate for positive attention” for basically every episode. Meanwhile, Gaz’s reasonings seem to… fluctuate a lot more. 

I think my reading of the situation is a bit more positive than just ‘Gaz was written in a careless and inconsistent way’, because inconsistency… can also be a deliberate character trait. You know, a lot of people are kinda inconsistent in their reactions to things. There’s no reason why Gaz can’t just be characterized by her capriciousness. Especially when you consider the angle that she’s misdirecting some of her anger at her father or the world in general at Dib - so you’ve got maybe like a baseline of mild annoyance which is what she actually feels towards her brother in a vacuum. But every so often she is so much crueler because she is using him as a vector for a bunch of other frustrations and stress, some vaguely related to him, some not at all.

I think even the kinder Gaz we see in ‘Enter the Florpus’ can fit into that, if you take her words here not as just a statement of how she’s been all this time…

Gaz: Oh, uh, normally, you crying on the floor is hilarious, but come on. Dib: It's all my fault, Gaz. Why aren't you saying I told you so? Gaz: 'Cause making fun of you is no fun when you're this sad. You're my brother, man. I only torment you because I know you can handle it. I've done way worse than throwing you in a space prison. This is nothing. Get up!

And more of her, now seeing her obnoxious brother at his lowest point, suddenly coming to a realization that she doesn’t hate him as much as she thought she did.

And… okay, another challenge in analyzing all of these interactions is… I’ve been trying to look at all of the Membrane Sibling’s faults and flaws from as balanced a perspective as I can muster - but it’s also important to remember the context in which they exist. When I call out Dib or Gaz for being assholes, this is not necessarily a condemnation of their character. ‘Invader Zim’ is a show all about Flawed Messed-Up Assholes. And it’s also fundamentally a comedy show about the entertainment value in cruelty. If Dib wasn’t sometimes a selfish little egomaniac and Gaz wasn’t an asshole prone to violent acts of ‘revenge’... they just wouldn’t be good ‘Invader Zim’ characters, you know?

Really, between all the different episodes and all the times Gaz was more or less justified, more or less cruel… I think the overall picture that is painted of two very imperfect kids having understandable-but-also-shitty-reactions to the bad hand they were dealt by the world. Dib’s sometimes selfish disregard for Gaz’s interests and wants is maybe understandable considering how basically no one cares about him so… he might as well care about himself, right? And Gaz’s frustration with this disregard and constant egoism is also understandable… but also at some point it becomes kinda disproportionate. And sometimes it becomes really disproportionate.

And that’s just like… that’s just what the Membrane siblings are.  

[rottenpumpkin13]

I think CC had a huuuge problem with fleshing out Genesis and Angeal to be honest. I feel like the personalities they’ve been given by the fandom are mostly fanon and don’t have that much substantiation in canon because AG were both largely used as plot devices- which again I think is a big problem because it doesn’t make you feel or understand either of the characters or why they behave the way they do. By the end of CC I felt really bad for Sephiroth, was ambivalent toward Angeal but still felt a twinge of sadness because of how sad Zack was over him, and absolutely loathed Genesis. I’m still not Genesis’ biggest fan but the canon characterization has made him a bit more endearing, though when I go back to canon and see him I’m left disliking him all over again. Unless you really dig into CC lore you have no idea how Genesis felt about Sephiroth, it just comes off like he was always jealous of him and that the relationship was painfully one-sided with Sephiroth practically begging for his friendship. It doesn’t help that 80% of Genesis’ dialogue is Loveless quotes and the other 20% is him being angry and hateful. I guess it’s justified, but unlike with Sephiroth and Angeal you never see Genesis being anything but hateful. With the other two I found myself sympathizing and mourning the loss of the people they were prior to realizing the truth, but with Genesis I wished he’d just shut up and go away already. The training room scene also doesn’t help his case, because first it starts out with Genesis being cocky and wanting to take Sephiroth alone- despite Angeal’s warning- and then later on blasts his best friend in the face with a fire ball all while talking about being a hero. He purposefully escalates the fight, then when Sephiroth gets serious Genesis gets injured and crap really hits the fan- and all this could’ve been avoided if Genesis hadn’t had an inferiority complex the size of the moon. I also find it hard to excuse this whole sequence of events because this was prior to his degradation, and while it’s unclear whether it had started even before his injury, I’m going to say he was still mostly in his right state of mind and he still behaves like he has no care for his friends, even his childhood friend who was trying to keep the spar friendly and prevent it from turning into a fight to the death.

Sorry about the rant, but that other anon talking about Genesis also brought back my thoughts about him and I felt like sharing since I’ve never really written them out.

Canon vs fanon aside, there's a lot of context and nuance often lost when adapting Japanese dialogue to fit English contexts. My biggest gripe with the training room scene in english is how Genesis proclaims "The world needs a new hero" right before he fights Sephiroth, suggesting he wants to take Sephiroth's place/ be better than him. But then you look at translations like this one and that scene gains a whole new meaning. Genesis instead says "I too would like to become a hero." And rather than the cocky "That's no way to talk to a hero," before he blasts Angeal in the face with a fire ball, he states "All I want is to be a hero."

The training room scene is a lost cause, because it's easy to place the blame on any one of them, or on whoever decided to go in there that day, or even on the fight itself, but accidents happen. But in the end, no one is truly to blame because none of them asked for Jenova cells or to be part of the Jenova Project, and the truth is that if it hadn't been the training room incident, something else would have triggered the degradation, or the conflict as a whole, and they would have been doomed regardless.

And that's why Genesis is so angry, and why he's so desperate for the cure that he keeps reciting what (in his mind) is the answer to the cure. I guess the reason we never see him be anything but reactive to the situation he's in because when we're introduced to him, shit has already hit the fan. He's deserted already. The first scene we see in Crisis Core literally has Angeal answer the phone and get the news that Genesis left. The only crumb of pre-degradation Genesis we get is the training room scene which—as mentioned above—got mistranslated in English, so of course we're going to think Genesis was hot-headed and envious (which in all honesty he could've just as well have been).

It's easier to sympathize with Angeal and Sephiroth because everything that's happening is happening because Genesis revolted against Shinra, and I get that. But what makes me sympathize with Genesis (and this is coming from someone who used to hate him) is the degradation and his motives. He wants a cure. He wants to live, and it's hard to live when your body is working against you and literally degrading because of something completely out of your control. On top of that, the people after you, the organization you've always aspired to be a part of because of your childhood hero, your friends including that hero, are on the side of those who did this to you.

Don't know if this makes any sense because I'm literally trying not to fall asleep writing this out asfshsjska

[pruneunfair]

Ranking all the OI I read. Part 1: the lesser.

It'll be like my tier list except with added stories from the haven't read yet section and of course my opinions.

Since Tumblr only allows 30 images per post and a daily pass based on how many pictures can be posted at all. I'll be posting this list through multiple parts starting with the worst. Get ready because there's gonna be a lot of negativity right now.

Starting with the tier I like to call "Absolute dog shit." Terrible plots, gross content being glamourized and little to no potential at all.

honestly picking the worst of the worst was hard cause there's so many to choose from.. and I think the title of the absolute worst doesn't go to Remarried empress or Today the villainess has fun again..

Its this one: beware of the brothers

I really can't say I was surprised 😭. I mean.. look at the damn title. The FL gets adopted into the family because she looks like the ML's dead sister and it just.. escalates into step-bro love. "But it's not related by blood-" still incest and even if they didn't grow up together, WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO FUCK SOMEONE WHO LOOKS LIKE YOUR DEAD SIBLING!?

The order of slave breeding

Yes this is an actual manhwa.. I genuinely wanna know why the author just looked at themselves in the mirror and said "Yes this is a good idea." As the title suggests.. it's about a slave merchant for a FL and her slaves falling in love with her and as if it couldn't be uncomfortable enough it is one of the few manhwa with a dark skinned ML. I don't care how many times they'll offer excues for the lead I don't fw slavery being used as a romance device in media.

I belong to house Castillo

Technically I didn't read all of it, I just read the spoilers for the rest of the chapters but to be fair, I just got finished cursing myself by reading stepbro fantasies and master/slave ships, I'm not trying to give my FBI agent a reason to search my hard drives. It's a basic and cliché found family where the FL Estelle is sold by her mother to her father and the ML is a 17 year old who basically grooms her..why? Because raising your love interest is the "only" way to make a story stand out amongst the other generic found family tales.

I tamed my ex husband's mad dog.

More cases of grooming except this time it's the FL as the perpetrator. ML looks like he's 8 but he's apparently 16.. so we got a groomer protagonist in the form of Reinhardt who also neglects her first child and favors her second child she had with her victim with the excuse of not wanting to care for her son being that he looks like her toxic ex. Lady what? That boy deserves his own villain arc holy shit.

No more turning a blind eye.

This one really dissapointed me 😔. The cover looked stunning, the artstyle while a little off was still eye catching and the title sounded promising. Nah this is a hunk of junk that had a gentrification plot for some reason.. and you were supposed to sympathize with the guy who wanted to render hundreds of people homeless to make room for art galleries or whatever it was they wanted?

The dragon kings bride

I already knew this one was probably gonna suck judging by the title. First off it treats dark skinned people like barbarians, the ML Hakan meets Lucina when she's a child, Lucina is threatened with death if she doesn't marry him and you can probably guess where it goes. Like I said I don't really have a right to be shocked but it still goes on the list for its weird obsession with Lucina being so tiny that having sex with Hakan could kill her along with a not so hidden pregnancy fetish.

I became the tyrants secretary.

Its just workplace sexual harassment, theres not much to it. Cannot stand the ML who is a basic garbage human and Rosalyn is a block of wood when it comes to personality. She wants to do all these things but she has no spine and no will to actually do them but at the same time shes so good at everything on a whim. I usually don't mind a clueless FL but Jesus christ! She makes Adrien Agreste look smarter!

The villains savior

Gotta say the artstyle is really pretty and the FLs design is so cute. Everything else though is pretty bad. The point is basically the lead Ezlay is trying to essentially "fix" the ML as the title suggest. A lot of people dislike this one because Ezlay is very emotional and cries too much but that's honestly the least of the issues here. Now to be fair, Aseph is a villain so it's expected that he's gonna suck but that doesn't mean Ezlay needs to have the personality of a rock either, it's not that she cries a lot that annoys me, she's literally just a male fantasy personified. All she is absolute patience and acceptance for what Aseph does to point of enabling that toxic behavior.

Now we enter manhwas that are horrificly awful, not much difference except these ones have a bigger grain of potential

Lucia

This one got a lot of hate tiktok so naturally I had to read it and yeah, it was pretty bad. The artstyle though just.. I'm sorry but Lucia's face is literally just 👁 👄 👁 and thats not even mentioning the ML Hugo. It's really crinegy and it tries to fill that void with poorly made smut. The plot is also really and I mean REALLY dead set on 1950s values for women and the relationship between Lucia's and Hugo is downright toxic. In fact I don't even think there's a plot.. it's just porn. The only reason it's not in dogshit tier is that it's so iconic for being awful that it deserves to be higher up.

When the villainess is in love.

Okay all I can give this one is that Libertia has a better character design than Lucia. She's a mary sue but at this point that's a lot of leads nowadays so it's not a total shock but this is definitely a case where the story would be so much better if it was the actual Libertia as the protagonist instead of a carbon copy of the ogfl taking over. The worst part though is the fashion and I normally do not care about how dresses look in OI as long as they at least look good and fit the setting.. and dear God a lot of those dresses are nightmares to look at. Thankfully I had heard the novel was better.

Today the villainess has fun again

not a fan of the protagonist. Reilynn is really insufferable to follow since she's basically just an entitled asshole who thinks that just because she got transmigrated as the wealthiest woman in the land that she must be in the right because she's not like Iris who is a basic pick me girl. Beyond the fact that watching her throw money at people to get past an obstacle without effort she's also heavily written as a pedo because out of her options which had 2 green flags her age, she chooses the slave she bought who acts and looks like a 10 year old boy with attachment issues.

Try begging

what is with Solche and their weird obsession with rapist male leads? It's somehow worse then cry or better yet beg. Basically the FL Sally/Grace is a spy and when the ML Leon finds out.. he basically tortures her and SA's her multiple times and somehow they fall in love. Do with that what you will, the only slack I will kind of give Try begging is that it at least warns you of what your getting into beforehand. I really hate that Solches writing actually has so much potential to be amazing yet they use their talents to make rape fetish content. I want to know why manhwa tiktok likes this so much, they're all about girl code until a rapist looks hot (Leon isn't even hot, hes mad ugly)

Abandoned empress

Ah yes, good ol abandoned empress, the manhwa communities favorite punching bag so it's only right it lands here. For all the writers out there if your making a character you'd want the readers to support as the love interest you typically would give them an interesting personality and to tone down anything you think is too much for a healthy relationship. Abandoned empress decides to do the opposite of that and even after scenes of Ruve abusing his wife Aristia by cheating on her, beating her, SA'ing her, killing her dad, and causing her to miscarry so you would naturally think "okay clearly Ruve is the antagonist." But instead they pulled some bullshit "but he's not doing it anymore because he was poisoned in the last timeline!"... what!? Were there any new writers by any chance because how did we go from a abusive monster to a misunderstood Lil guy? I would say more but I think everyone already agreed a long time ago Abandoned empress is ass.

Revenge on the real one

the protag is essentially those villainesses in regression stories that cause the heroines initial downfall. I was already aware of what would happen before I even read and let me tell you it was accurate. The protagonist Helga is AWFUL. The torture she puts Hillian through is overkill and at this point Hillian deserves her own regression story to stand up to Helga because my girl was not that bad for her sister to ruin her life because of a stupid tragic origin story. The worst part is the Helga fans I see on places like tiktok who just don't want to admit their FL is a bad person. "Oh but Helga past was so sad! It's not her fault she's like this." Don't mean she has to banish her sister from her own nation when Hillian was innocent.

Villain Dukes precious one.

I really dislike the reincarnated as a baby trope and I can only ever tolerate it when it's just for a few little chapters. They always feel like those weird ass Elsagate videos with embarrassing humor to come across as funny and this one is no different. Even after the FL grows up the plot is still bland and cringe inducing. I don't have a lot to say about this one other then it is weird as hell. Apparently it also got a little incest-y so no thanks!

Poisonous Lily

While the characters looked basic in terms of design the title sounded intriguing. Unfortunately the translation is horrible, they can't even get the whole Lily flower theme right on the tapas version by giving her tulips to carry on her wedding. The dialog is..interesting to say the least. I won't lose it too much though on this one though since I'm pretty sure this is a lower level book trying to make it out in a sea of over advertised manhwa

I thought my time was up.

You know those porn/no plot tags on ao3? That's basically ITMTWU in a nutshell. Within only 20 chapters, the male lead Asrahan is already obsessed with Lariette after chapters of her violating his personal space to force a relationship between them. The whole magic plot is pushed to the side, Asrahans curse isn't allowed to be an actual rotting flesh curse like it's described as cause he's still gotta be pretty, and the rest of the plot is basically just soft core porn and fanservice that does little to actually move whatever is left of the plot.

For my derelict favorite.

The. Hypocrisy. How is this book gonna make the entire message about deconstructing main character centered morality and then almost immediately backpeddaling with justifying Hestia for attacking a woman who doesn't know her for rejecting her favorite man and proceeding to just ruin her day whenever she can. Hestia would say "im not like other girls." Hestia would be an avid fan of those trust fund baby GMV. Hestia would put her hair in a messy bun, shit on whatever is popular and act like she's making a statement . Even calling her Hestia feels like straight up disrespectful to the real goddess of the hearth who funnily enough is known as one of the most chill Greek gods.

Marry my husband

now Marry my husband is not insanely problematic wheras it's just cliché, predictable and in general pretty bad. It is a fast food manhwa designed to fulfill the classic top boss takes good care of you fantasy so naturally a lot is put on hold to showcase the sweet relationship between the central characters and almost everyone needs to have a lover. It's so bad it's actually kinda funny because the villains are so cartoonishly evil for office workers. Sumin is out here speaking in 3rd person, dressing in clothes found in the little kid section of Walmart and makes comical comments about her desire to ruin Jiwons life, Minhwan is basically a borderline discord mod who casually killed jiwon in the first timeline and goes "Oh well." and there's this random ugly old man who's name I can't remember who's the only one interested in Sumin till the end because he basically wants em younger without the risk of going to federal prison.

Remarried empress

I don't think i need to explain much at this point, if you know my account then you already know how I feel about remarried empress. Season 1 was pretty good though.

Divorcing my tyrant husband

I think we all know at this point that's whenever a title has the word "divorce" 9/10 of the time there is never going to be divorce and it'll devolve into the FL changing her mind and staying with her trashy ex husband because he now decided that Robelia wasn't like other girls and left his mistress in the dust. The plot kinda started getting out of hand when Robelias love interests expanded to one of her obsessed slaves and a Duke to prove that Alexandros was the better option. The villian Aisha is a joke who gets her ass handed to her over and over because "damsel woman always bad." and the art starts to lose its touch. I usually don't mind when artstyle changes but dear God do some of these characters look a Lil fugly.

Cry or better yet beg.

The final story that is in the awful section, why? Because it has the most lost potential. As terrible as this CoHo equivalent is, it details the very realistic parts of being a mistress to a nobleman. In most other stories, the mistress is an evil wench who could easily back out but in cry or better yet beg, Layla is unable to escape Matthias's abuse because it could risk her uncles job. There's a lot to this manhwa and novel that could've made a tragic story about a girl trapped in an abusive relationship with little help, the art is gorgeous and the characters for the most part were well written. It's a real shame that it turned out to be a rape apologist work instead.

next up are the mediocre manhwas, finally there will a little more positivity.

The villainess is a marionette

its.so.boring! This one was hyped up all over the place on Instagram and tiktok and the art looked stunning so I gave it a shot. This is definitely one of those stories that only got popular because of its art in my opinion because the plot is so confusing. Events are happening left and right, the pacing goes from too fast to too slow, characters personalities and traits keep warping, and while this might just be the result of poor adaptation her brother comes across as incestuous a couple of times. while Cayena isn't the worst FL, she's a mary sue by all definitions. Sorry but it's a bunch of jumbled wires. The reason it earns a spot in "it's okay" is because I heard the novel like usual is better so it might not be the fault of the original author

I was the male leads ex

It wasn't bad just boring but a little less boring then the former I'll give it that. The artstyle looked prettier in the beginning so that was kind of sad to see it change in later chapters. What drew me to keep reading was the chance that the ogfl Julianna may not be evil but even a potential love interest. So I got excited and apparently there's the idea that Julianna is actually her brother in disguise which.. would just ruin it tbh, there goes any chance at a ogfl being a human being and not a plot device. Not a huge fan of Erica or really any of the love interests.

From maid to queen

This is the newest of the lineup I read and it was actually interesting for once to see a new story where the MC was the concubine. First off the maids feel less like women employed to do the chores of the palace and more like the cartel 😭, in early chapters whenever Urania is aiming to be the concubine, being lazy with her job or getting comfortable with a powerful man in general they're already out with sticks ready to ruin her day and they even try to kill her. Lot of people don't like that Urania isn't a girls girl but honestly I can't blame her for wanting more out of life then poverty, where she comes across as stupid is that she's still wanting that role even after it got her killed last time. I think that it could work though since it shows that urania is more human and not a perfect goddess of a woman however that does not make up for the shit world building (like what the hell was that mushroom that could turn into a perfect still corpse of you 💀)

The villainess maker.

Ill admit I'm a little harsh on this one on my tier list. The plot still isn't great but there are so much worse out there so it ended up moving up on the list due to default. The plot is mostly just bland and generic down to all the characters and the tropes. Ayla is a girlboss in the villainesses body, Charlotte is a super "revolutionary" kind girl turned wicked wench and the ML is another "touch her and I'll kill you" type. What i will give the Villainess maker is the distinct artstyle. It's not as stylized and while it does get lazy at the end it still is very recognizable.

Abellas dessert shop.

Its another extremely underrated manhwa that's another isekai about a wronged woman looking to move on from her shitty fiancé and start a dessert shop. Ngl the moments where Abella is forced to put on a kind face despite her cheating fiancé or her ex friend popping in is definitely relatable especially in the workforce. Still a little bland but wholesome.

I didn't mean to seduce the male lead.

Eleanor is the FL hired to convince the ML to accept women into his life with the hopes that he will fall in love with the ogfl Irene. Tbh this one can get very icky with how it tries to force the notion that you must fall in love but the guy just instantly falls in love with Eleanor so.. I guess that's a little better? Regardless though i will not fault this manhwa too much because unfortunately the author died before the story was over so it deserves a little slack since it never got the chance to be more. Rest in peace author.

Who made me a princess.

Ill be straight with this now: it's Mid. Objectively the story isn't too terrible and I do find Athy a good protagonist not to mention my love for Jennete but everything else is pretty "meh." Not a huge fan of Claude from his design to his personality, the ML is another case of a grown as immortal meeting his wife when she's still a child (theres a little credit ill admit for Athy being mentally a grown woman but that doesnt stop me from thinking its uncomfortable to acknowledge) It can be cute sometimes and I'll give it that but I don't think I'll ever reread it, just not for me.

Actually I was the real one

Good god this was such a bastardization of the original novel. With that said I'll admit i was still entertained reading it since you could say that the novel wouldn't be an instant cheat sheet to learn what was gonna happen. Still it could've at least tried to be a loyal adaptation. They give Keira 2 options to choose as a love interest when she had none in the source material, Zeke is pushed to the side and the maids honestly get on my nerves with their one note personalities. They also seem to forget that Cosette is literally being possessed by a demon he'll bent on destroying humanity (which she succeeded in the first time) because what was built up as an amazing antagonist is just a joke now. The only other redeeming factors are that in the Manhwa Cosette is still alive and the whole elemental plot stays constant. Despite my complaints on the adaptation it is still a interesting read but the novel will always beat it no matter what.

I know it sounds like I'm just being a negative Nancy with all of these and I'm sorry for being so negative but the next part will be more positive.

Next time on part 2 will be the decent stories.

[masterdetectivexx]

Hi !

The current case is a quite complicated, if you read last file could you give us your thoughts on it, who is the culprit.. also what about kazuha she is acting very strange this case

Last but not least, do you think the confession will happen or not

File 1129-1132 Review

Here's a promised early review of the recent big Osaka case that includes a case deduction. I have thoroughly been enjoying this serial murder case, as well as all the past references, character reappearances and the Heizuha confession plot that has been building through out.

Case Deduction

I think this serial murder is slightly more nuanced, in that there is not only one mastermind behind all the elements involved, but rather two.

I think the culprit behind the actual murders is Kuraishi Youka (the actress behind Ootsuka Kaede [Momiji role]). I suspect that she killed Narasawa (first victim) after fighting over Narasawa threatening to use Kuraishi's past conflict with the thugs 8 years ago (that lead to Anzaka killing a person and hurting his own reputation) into making Kuraishi give up her role so she could have a better chance with Anzaka.

Narasawa probably found out from Kakiwaki Ayari (second victim) that her love rival's (Kuraishi's) weakness was that she feels responsible for damaging Anzaka's reputation, and Kakiwaki was most likely the one who shared the screenshot of the news article (File 1132).

I suspect that Kakiwaki was killed because she figured out that Kuraishi was behind Narasawa's death, since Narasawa died soon after she shared that info about Kuraishi with her. Kakiwaki likely threatened that she would expose her unless she followed her demands, hence why she said to the police that she "has forgotten" [won't tell] who the love rival of Narasawa was unless it serves her (File 1130).

I also suspect however that the other layer behind killing Kakiwaki, and especially Nagakubo Nobuya, is that they might have had nefarious plans of orchestrating a death to not only boost the mystic and intrigue for the play, but also further their careers at the expense of Kuraishi and Anzaka, building on the marionette devil's curse (File 1129)

This would fit with how Kakiwaki was happily hoping for another murder to take place after Kabumoto (as if she has things in store) (File 1129).

So in short, this whole serial murder started with Kuraishi trying to protect Anzaka from the cast members who wanted to do him harm and she was planning to turn herself into the final victim (commit suicide), and I also suspect she was planning on framing Yoshiura for the murders, since she probably blamed him for not helping de-escalating the thug-fight Anzaka went through 8 years ago that hurt him and rather just filmed the whole incident (File 1132). Kuraishi might have also heard what Yoshiura said about himself, Nagakubo & Kakiwaki taking over the role of Heichi, Daigorou and Kaede (which was because he knew about Anzaka's deteriorating health from the incident 8 years ago that was gonna limit his activities) (File 1130) and it could have made her view him just as inconsiderate as the rest of the cast members.

This would explain why Yoshiura was always stuck in the bathroom with a bad stomach without alibi for all the murders (as if someone could have messed with his disgestive system) (File 1131) as well as why he was suddenly gone from the bathroom at the end of File 1132 (as if he could have been called to Naniwa Harukas observation deck to get framed for Kuraishi's suicide as she shows him the view from the top that he once showed her and Anzaka 8 years ago).

So now, at the end of File 1132, Conan and Heiji have ambushed Kuraishi as she is about to turn herself into the final victim and expecting Yoshiura to arrive and get framed for it.

Now, I think the tricky part of this case is that the Semaphore codes and phone messages left in the crime scene were actually not left by Kuraishi, but rather the only person who was mostly the first person present near the bodies, Anzaka Tenma (File 1132).

Anzaka immediately realized after Narasawa's fall that she was likely killed by his former schoolmate, Kuraishi, which is why he wanted to stop his mother from revealing that he was the first person to innocently encounter the crime scene (File 1132).

This explains why Nagakubo got the impression that Anzaka was first to arrive, but somehow pretended to arrive later (File 1130),... because just after fixing up Narasawa's body into a semaphore code, he ran up to the highest floor in order to drop her phone from the roof with the fake message from the Marionette devil (Kabumoto's curse), which Conan and Heiji later discovered (File 1129).

This also coincides well with Kuraishi's intense reaction to all the messages to the point of fainting and losing her cool, which made Heiji suspect that she is hiding something. All of her words so far while fearing Kabumoto's curse has directly been confessing that she has been responsible and that the murders will not stop unless she dies (File 1129-1131).

Anzaka's messages weren't however to scare her or give her guilt for the murders he predicted she would commit. I suspect that he predicted she was gonna kill Kakiwaki and Nagakubo right after Narasawa, and that she was gonna end all the murders with her as the final death (by suicide). This is why Anzaka wrote on the phone "two more to go" after Kakiwaki's death, and he wanted to convey with "from shimote" that when you gather all the letters of the semaphore codes ("E", "V", "I" and the predictable "L"), that you are supposed to read the message from the right (rather than stage right, as Heiji deduced), and so rather than "EVIL", he is trying to spell the message "LIVE" for Kuraishi, as in that she shouldn't commit suicide after Nagakubo's death (File 1132).

As for how Anzaka was able to leave a semaphore code using Kakiwaki's corpse despite her falling while he was asleep upstairs (File 1131), it's most likely due to the timing of her death getting fabricated. After Anzaka had discovered Kakiwaki dead on the ground (as he predicted), he formed the semaphore code with her corpse and then went upstairs to nap and asked Kuraishi to wake him up in 30 min.

When Kuraishi arrived to wake Anzaka up, the missing recording of Kakiwaki's scream from a previous play (File 1132) was then made to sound as if it was getting further away to mimic the scream of a falling person, from outside the balcony (for example, by making it so that the volume gradually gets lowered), and then followed by a landing "thud" sound, ultimately resulting in giving both Anzaka and Kuraishi an alibi for Kakiwaki's death. The framed certificate on the wall for the previous play might have been removed to not remind anyone about Kakiwaki's recorded scream amidst the police investigation.

Since Anzaka expected Kuraishi to come alone, I'm leaning towards Kuraishi being the one who fabricated the timing of Kakiwaki's fall and intentionally brought Heiji and Conan with her as witnesses for her and Anzaka to gain an alibi (File 1130).

As for Nagakubo's death, while Kuraishi most likely was scared by Kabumoto's curse, her plan was most likely exactly as Conan proposed, that she shouted to get Nagakubo's attention from the rooftop so he would lean on the railing that were corroded by liquid gallium and fall to his death (File 1132).

Confession

I predict that Kazuha is gonna be the one to confess her feelings to Heiji, as foreshadowed by how Osamu Kenzaki's fiancé Takeno Yuki proposed to him in Naniwa Harukas Observation deck, in order for Gosho to subvert the predictable planned confession attempts by Heiji that have constantly failed (File 1129-1131).

It's unfortunate that Momiji hasn't had an opportunity to be present through out this whole case, but since she was said to be busy with a Karuta match (File 1129), it's not unlikely that she could make an appearance in the resolution chapter just in time to interrupt Heiji from getting a chance to reply to Kazuha's confession.

Kazuha has however had other plans in mind. It seems like she has been planning to surprise Ran with something (File 1129), and though she got scolded for remaining involved with a case for that reason by her mother, and then later having her father Toyama Ginshiro appear sternly to also make sure she listens to her mother (File 1132), despite getting a little discouraged, Kazuha persistently goes ahead and tries to bring Ran to Naniwa Harukas observation deck (as planned by Heiji), as if her surprise for Ran can still be achieved over there.

From the way Kazuha has acted, it seems like her surprise for Ran is very detached from Heiji, so if she is ultimately gonna confess to Heiji in the resolution chapter, it's very likely gonna be a spur-of-the-moment confession like Shinichi's in London. In that case, it could mean that her surprise for Ran might get resolved after her confession to Heiji, and if the reply to her confession indeed gets interrupted by Momiji who arrives just in time after the Karuta match, then I could see all of this culminating into something like Momiji playing a role in Ran's surprise, like for example Kazuha and Momiji having planned a trip/event for Ran's upcoming birthday, since they are her friends. This would turn it all into a truly wholesome twist, and it could also set up an aftermath case where Momiji has to beat Kazuha into confessing to Heiji and get his reply before he gives his reply to Kazuha's confession, and subsequently more ShinRan developments and even a potential Shinichi reappearance.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this long case and I couldn't be more excited for the resolution. It's nice to finally have Ginshiro appear again (for the first time during Rum arc) after so long and I'm especially excited to find out what Kazuha's mother's personality and character is like after the recent reveal that she is an Ex-elite agent of the Osaka police's firearms control unit (File 1131).

[velvet-vox]

(This post is wrong as all hell. Please, only read the notes and reblogs of this mess.)

The Confession Discourse.

(Imagine lacking so much time and will that you take almost two months to answer one single rebuttal)

This post is simultaneously a follow up to my previous confession on @md-confessions and a response to @oldmanjenkins985 's confession on that same ask blog.

Originally, I wanted this whole argument to be a @md-confessions blog's exclusive thing, but I was too slow, and the confession box was closed, so now, after delaying it for weeks, I've finally decided to make my response to the whole thing, while also keeping some unsaid stuff for myself for when I'll eventually finish writing my giant critique of Doll, who at this point I'm not sure if I want to publish before episode 8 or not. You can find the links to all of the confessions that I'm talking about right above, in the coloured words.

I think that the best way to start this response is by going through @oldmanjenkins985 's confession and rebutting each and every point with my opinion, then I'll start speaking more generally on the whole subject matter while providing the reasons that drove me to make that original confession.

Read and Rebuttal.

"So, basically the way you talk about rewriting the story is that you just want an almost completely different story than the one we got. Getting rid of the school elements? Say goodbye to episode 3 and 4. 2 can still happen but there's some stuff that needs to be cut and stuff to fill those gaps."

Alright, so, to be perfectly clear, I wasn't saying that I wanted an entirely different story than the one we got. Originally, while making that confession, I was under the assumption that it was always Liam's intention to eventually escalate the story to "end of the universe" proportions, and that the reason why he decided to rush so much of the plot was to get to that aforementioned conflict with the Absolute Solver. Therefore, my suggestion was that, since Vickers seemed more interested in the apocalyptic aspects of his story and didn't have the time or resources to flesh out anything else, he should have sacrificed the whole school setting earlier on (since, despite how much I like it, it was kind of useless after the pilot, where it set up Uzi's character and flaws. It was semi useful in ep 2 and 3 to also set up Doll's character, but I'm currently advocating her erasure, so those instances don't matter to our argument) and just went straight to the things that he actually wanted to tell.

However, as I've learned more about the production history of this show, I no longer believe that to be the case; the Absolute Solver was always a planned thing, but not in the way it is currently iterated; I'm sure Liam rewrote the entire plot so many times, that, whatever he had in mind at the beginning, it's so wildly different from the final product that it might as well be a completely different show.

The school elements were probably very relevant to the first few drafts, but in the final take, they are completely disregardable, and I know that because the show itself quickly disregards a lot of those elements in episode 4, so this isn't even an idea I came up with in my spare time, Murder Drones itself instilled this notion in my head to begin with.

"but 3 and 4 not happening AT ALL like they do, that would have serious ripple effects."

Duh, that's what happens when you change a part of your story, it usually changes your whole story, even if in minor ways.

My main goal here was to make the story of Murder Drones simpler so that it better sticks to the eight 20 minutes long episodes.

In his current form, the story of Murder Drones is too big to be fleshed out in an eight-episode season, we aren't even sure if there'll be a season 2, and even if there was, season 1 is so crammed already that episodes 6, 7, and most likely 8 feel like the ending of a second season to me; that's just how crazy the pacing is.

"And episode 5/6 would probably go down differently as well since Doll wouldn't be there to steal the keybug."

Have you ever wondered why Doll didn't steal the keybug back in episode 4 when Uzi found it in that abandoned warehouse? Neither N nor V were there to help Uzi in case Doll decided to do the same thing that she did to Cyn in episode 6; Doll didn't even need to go straight into the Cabin Fever's labs (even if that's exactly what she ended up doing in ep 6), she could have just simply disappeared into the woods; the main gang doesn't know where her hideout is, therefore, she could have just stalled with the keybug until she figured out a trap or a setup (the one thing she has been consistently excelling at) to get rid of the trio (at least temporarily) and enter Cabin Fever labs to find what she was looking for.

So, why doesn't she do it? Well, it's simple: it's because she doesn't know what the keybug does at this point of the story.

Doll only learns about the secrets hiding down in the elevator shaft off camera through Tessa, who then engages her to steal the keybug from Uzi in episode 5.

Therefore, excluding the fact that yes, episode 2 through 6 would play out differently, Doll, in regards to her choice to steal the bug, it's only a tool for Cyn; and while this wouldn't feel like it if the show was better paced, due to the fact that our protagonists immediately teleport to the labs, and the way her arc plays out in the next two episodes, she also feels like a tool for the plot as well.

Again, all of this would have been perfectly fine with better pacing or more spotlight on Doll as a character, but that wasn't the case, so moving on:

"And Doll just being a plot device and not a character? Don't even get me started on that."

She is a character and a plot device, a lot of fictional characters are simultaneously plot devices, especially protagonists and antagonists, the trick stems in the writer's ability of masking the second component and, ideally, even the first.

Storytelling is all about manipulation; how capable you are to make the audience buy the events being told even if they are completely fake.

Some characters achieve this narrative illusion almost perfectly, while others like Doll are harder to pass by if their writing doesn't hold up.

You can fault me for my excessive scrutiny, but I'm going to explain how I got to this point at the end of the rebuttal.

"She's one of the most tragic and well written characters of the show and I LOVE her.

If it was just for that, I love her as well, but I don't find her to be one of the most well written characters in the show, far from it; I actually consider her to be a hot writing mess, though that doesn't stop me from thinking about her basically every single day.

Do I find her to be one of the most tragic characters in the show? Objectively speaking, no. A lot of other characters had it worse than her, Alice and Beau are technically more tragic characters than Doll, as they never had any other choice at every single turn. V had it worse, N had it worse, Cyn had it worse, Tessa had it worse, heck, you can easily make the argument that J of all people had it worse than Doll. By comparison, if you lack the emotional intelligence to understand that, just because one person's trauma is worse than someone else's it doesn't mean that the other person's trauma doesn't matter, as all life scarring experiences affect us in an indiscernible way, that invalidates certain statements such as "well that person clearly had it worse than you, yet you became a sh####er person than them, so your trauma doesn't matter because you could have just simply overcame it like that one person did, but you didn't because you were always a jerk", Doll just looks like a giant a#####e.

Is her tragedy the one that affected me the most? (Looks back at the several months of emotional damage preceding and succeeding her death) Yes.

I feel like that's partially due to how much I personally relate to Doll, but even if I am fully willing to admit that V's entire life story is technically far more sad than Doll's, I just have way more traits in common with Doll, plus it also helps the fact that Doll (to me) is the most down to earth character in the entire cast. Her serious demeanor may alienate her from the show's tone, but it helps her to be more likable to me, as she, more than any other character, feels like a real world person that reacts accordingly to all of the nonsense and murder happening around her. We don't get enough of the human characters for me to feel like: "Yeah, this guy is definitely me if I was in Murder Drones, I would do the same things and react in the same way to all the horrors happening around me". I like Uzi's and Tessa's quirkiness, and I could be considered a weird-boy even if I never was ostracized in school or emotionally neglected by my parents, but I don't personally relate to their antics and their comedic reactions to the horror moments pale in comparison to Doll's genuine reactions to pretty much anything. Also, while all Murder Drones fans can claim to share some traits with N and V, none of them can really say that they personally relate to being a disposable slave; therefore points to Doll being the most grounded Murder Drones character.

So yeah, Doll is a very tragic antagonist, but I am a Wakfu fan, thus I know the secret ingredients behind a truly magnificent sympathetic villain, and I can say that Doll lacks a lot of the pieces that make someone like Nox such a heart breaking rollercoaster of emotions. Of course, I wouldn't expect you to know what I'm talking about since Wakfu is a pretty obscure franchise, I'm only mentioning it for propaganda reasons, but nonetheless, I'm pretty confident in saying that I know what differentiates a good sympathetic villain from a truly great one; Doll has a lot of pieces of the latter but she ends up falling into the former due to various reasons, most noticeable reason of all being that she never feels like the protagonist of her own story, just a side character that refused to remain as such.

Loving her doesn't stop me from thinking about her critically. Soon we are going to discuss what her place in the narrative is and why it doesn't work in the way it was intended to.

"Her flaws especially."

I would really like to open up a tangent here, but I feel like that's a discussion for another day; so sure, you love her flaws, go on.

"She's very much a mirror to Uzi. Both had their parents (or parent in Uzi's case) get killed by disassembly drones, both are infected with the Solver, and both want to figure out what the hell it is and how to fix themselves. The difference between the two, is that Doll SAW V rip her parents apart while laughing."

There are way more differences than that, but I'm sure you already knew that, sorry for being incapable to pick up on sarcasm.

"Uzi was likely only a baby when Nori died, and even if she wasn't she didn't personally see her die."

I have nothing to say here, but I thought that it would be better to separate this sentence from the next one, just to narrow down the focus.

"That was what let her get over her grudge, because she had a grudge against a concept, while Doll had a grudge against a person."

This sentence doesn't make any sense to me. People can absolutely have a grudge against a concept, and Doll's hatred for the Disassembly Drones being targeted rather than vague like Uzi's hatred is (even if Uzi doesn't hate the Disassembly Drones, though I'm not sure what that scene with Uzi in episode 2 "The humans sent you without a communication relay and reformatted your memories to soup. Covering their tracks means that they are past negotiating. Not like they tried negotiating with my mum" was supposed to mean. Uzi in general is such a strange character to me, weird-girl my a##, Uzi stans, your daughter is straight up an enigma) it's not what allowed one to get over their grudge compared to the other.

One example of this is Bradford Buzzard from the DuckTales remake: he was traumatised as a kid by her strict grandma, who forced him to go on dangerous adventures with her, so when he grew up started hating the entire concept of adventures, and sought for a way to eliminate all unpredictable elements from the world and his life. This is only one example but you get the idea.

To be fair, you did mention the fact that you were tired when you started writing this, so I'm pretty sure that you weren't reflecting carefully when you wrote this part, plus once a confession is sent you can't correct it anymore, as such, I believe you would have probably changed this sentence if you taught about it a little longer. Therefore, I'll just let this one slide.

"Doll continuously decides to work by herself as a result, unable to overcome her hatred for V (very understandably mind you)."

Absolutely, screw all those people who said that Doll was being unreasonable by not joining sides with Uzi, 90% of all normal human beings wouldn't want to stay anywhere close to their parents murderer, especially Doll, who for some reason is the most realistic member of the cast, even if she isn't human. Plus, if you believe the theory that Doll's parents were killed during the pilot (there are some plot holes in the timeline of events for both this theory and the "child Doll saw her parents die" theory, but that's something for another day), then it's technically Uzi the one who created her rival, which would contradict the "Doll is completely consumed by revenge" allegations, as Doll weirdly enough sympathizes with Uzi and *insert here a giant analysis of Lizzie's line in Episode 3 "Dude, no one is gonna notice she is missing. Just do your thing, and I'll let in V" and how many questions it raises* despite her knowing that she was the one to let in her parents killer.

But ok, this is completely unrelated, let's move on.

"This ultimately ends up getting her killed because she alone could not take on the Solver, a threat we time and time again have seen to only be stoppable when people work together against it. When Uzi and N work together in ep 2, Doll protecting Lizzy in the same episode, in ep 4 when N helps Uzi regain control, in ep 7 when Nori and N fight back against possessed Uzi. Then think about all the times it succeeded. In ep 5 at the Gala it had Tessa alone, in ep 7 it had N and Uzi on the ropes when they were alone, in ep 4 when Uzi was on a rampage and V was trying to kill her rather than help her."

Uh uhm.

"Doll's death doesn't ruin her character, it IS her character (might be overexaggerating there but I really liked that sentence). Tragedy and bad choices stemming from reasonable thinking. A result of her going alone, trusting nobody."

I don't know what to say here.

At first I was like "Ehhhhhhhhh, you are kinda right but not in a positive way" but then I realised that there are a lot of right and wrong things in this paragraph, and in order to pick them apart I would have to go through a massive side tangent that would take focus away from the rest of the confession, as such, I'm just going to leave this as it is and maybe I will address it in a future post.

"Also, we don't even know that she's dead! Yes, it's likely she is, but Cyn only swallowed her core. It's possible it gets thrown up in ep 8 and she gets to continue living."

We'll see, but if I was the one who killed Doll in such a dramatic and gruesome way I wouldn't have her revived right away in the following episode, where there are already a lot of ongoing plot lines that need to be tied up; nor would I do this if I want for the stakes to remain high.

Sorry for bumming down your optimism, but I really struggle to see how Doll could possibly bounce back up when she was just brutally executed in the most anticlimactic way possible.

"Don't judge her before the season is done."

I will judge Doll based on what's already present in the episodes because I have very valid reasons to believe that her arc was being made up as the story went on; planner and pantsie are two different terms used to identify the writing style of a writer, the former is for writers who spend time planning out the various aspects of their stories before releasing them, the latter is for writers who make up their story as they go along; both writing styles have their advantages and disadvantages, and writers can actually adoperate both simultaneously if they need to, and that's what Liam Vickers did: he planned out a lot of aspects of his series (at least in the final rewrite), like the Tessa reveal and the Solver mystery, and made up other aspects as the episodes went along, like Doll's entire storyline.

Getting the obvious differences in characterisation between Pilot and series Doll out of the way, have you ever wondered why we get the reveal that Doll's parents have died both in episode 2 and 3? It would have been a lot better if it was just revealed to us in The Promening, after all Liam's writing is hardly ever on the nose when it comes to this type of stuff, why repeat to the audience information that they already know?

That scene with Lizzy and Doll in episode 2 is in general one of the most forced scenes in the show; it serves his purpose of setting up Doll and Lizzie's characters alright, but it doesn't make a lot of sense if you start peeling away at its layers for a while.

I can and will judge Doll as she is right now if her story was being made up as the show went along, I've seen good pantsie writing in my life, and I can usually tell at which point the writer lost sight of his original idea and it's starting to fall apart.

"If you like the series how it is, Doll and the school elements are VITAL. Irreplacable. And if you really don't like how the series went, as it seems you do considering you think it'd be better if the entire thing was rewritted, make a fanfiction"

I like how the series is, but I really like how Murder Drones could have been.

Ideally, in a perfect universe, we would get two 20 episodes long seasons that set up all of the things that have happened in these 8 episodes and also give us plenty of time to flesh out all of the cast, the world, and look at side stories that reinforce the main themes of the series or give us some breathing room between the big events.

Of course, we don't live in that perfect universe; we only have 8 episodes to tell a story, thus, we need to be very thoughtful of what we put inside the plot because we don't have a lot of time to flesh everything out.

Probably, for the story that Liam wanted to tell, 16 or 12 episodes would have been enough, even if it still seems a little bit scuffed, but again, we don't have those, and he should have paid more attention to that fact.

We'll circle back at this in just a moment.

"Whew, that was...a lot. I think you can tell I really like this show. Again, I apologize if I come off as rude or pompous or whatever."

No problems. You sounded genuine.

"I'm just very passionate about the show. I don't think it doesn't have flaws, it is rushed and Liam isn't one for super fine worldbuilding details, but ultimately those barely affect it for me. They dock like, half a point combined for me."

And if that's the case, good for you. I'm happy that you can still enjoy the show the way it is because I've become pretty miserable as a result of picking apart all of its flaws and wishing for them to not exist.

The real Reasons.

Now that I have taken apart all of the individual pieces of the confession, it's finally time for me to provide you with some answers.

The main reason why I wrote that original confession was because of this Other confession, that basically pointed out the fact that confessions as a whole started s#####g ass, and it got me into questioning if I could write something better.

I had a couple of ideas I wanted to discuss, and threw a couple of them into that original text, hoping that it would live up to my standards. @oldmanjenkins985 read it, disagreed with what it had to say, and that's how we've got to this point.

As I have stated in the first part of my rebuttal, I used to believe that Liam Vickers was so interested in his end of the universe storyline that he wanted to go for it at any cost, even if that meant skipping important character work and rushing through most of the plot points he had in mind.

With that assumption, I thought that all the other ideas, like Doll, Alice, Beau and the sentinels, were just things that Liam came up with as production progressed and thought they were too cool to disregard, so he kept them. He kept them even if he didn't have the time to flesh them out or the courage to simplify his story so that we, the audience, wouldn't feel robbed.

I really love Doll.

I can't stress this enough, I love Doll way more than I love Murder Drones.

But exactly because I love her so much, I need to keep her at harm's length; she's not a real person, she's a fictional character, and as such, she can and should be eliminated from the story if the final product would benefit from it.

I'm someone who's willing to make the necessary sacrifices for the sake of art, even if it means eliminating good ideas that can't be done justice in their execution, and I believe Doll to be the biggest example of this due to her own niche role in the narrative and how said niche exists only because of her.

Let me explain: Doll is the main side antagonist of the first season of the show.

Let me repeat that: Doll is the main, SIDE antagonist, of the first season of Murder Drones.

You don't just "make" a side antagonist and drop it into the story because he's important, no, you have to consciously make room for their existence because they are not as necessary to the story as the protagonists, the supporting characters, or the main antagonist. The niche that Doll fills in the story is one that innately benefits her and her only, so she needs extra character work to make sure that she feels connected and important to everything else going on.

Alice and Beau are roadblocks, you could say that they had a lot of untapped potential, but the show never teased us with said potential in the way that it teased us with Doll's, so they don't feel like wasted characters because that's all they were ever meant to be.

I would cut Lizzie and Alice out of the story to give Doll more development, but I wouldn't cut Doll out of the story to give Lizzie and Alice more development.

Two out of three fulfill their roles decently and extra screen time isn't mandatory, the third one has a role that exists only to benefit them and as such they should be given the necessary screen time to make their presence not feel like a burden.

Another thing that I've noticed while writing "The insane, untapped potential of Rebecca from Murder Drones" (which I encourage everyone reading this to check out, as I consider it to be my masterpiece), is that Doll doesn't really tie all that well into any of the themes of abuse present in the show; sure, there's her relationship with Lizzy, but you can interpret that in a miriad of ways, some of which being more healthy than the others, and a lot of them even positioning Doll as the abuser and Lizzy as the still guilty yet repented victim.

Side antagonists or just general side characters whose stories are focused on exist to expand the themes or the world of the setting, and they need to be included into the narrative only if you have the time to focus on them, otherwise they need to remain on the concept board.

My obsession with Doll isn't a temporary fluke, it's going to carry on for the rest of my life.

But guess what? I've been hyper obsessed with a lot of things in my life, Murder Drones being one of them; when the dust will be settled, the only thing that will matter is the quality of the actual show, and in his current state that future isn't looking so bright.

I've seen a lot of Murder Drones creators losing a lot of interest for the show after episode 7, and I myself have lost my suspension of disbelief after having lots of time to internalise it.

I'm not sure if anyone reading this has noticed it yet, but ever since episode 7, the world of Murder Drones has become ten times smaller. We've erased Tessa, the school setting, JCJenson and Doll from the equation; many people now believe that the planet is going to be destroyed and only the most relevant characters will survive its collapse, thus eliminating the entire worker drones society from the plot; all human life is most likely dead and the planet Earth was revealed to have been destroyed back in episode 6; it really feels like with every passing installment the Murder Drones universe just keeps getting smaller as the stakes get higher, and I don't think that's a good thing, it actively harms the potential and creativity of Murder Drones as a series, and it makes it harder for the fear of the unknown to have any sort of impact when the universe is so claustrophobic that it's far easier to assume that all of the undiscovered mysteries are just the angles of the room.

If I had to compare Murder Drones to any other series, I would say that the Epic Mickey franchise is the best way to describe how I feel about it.

Both series are a collection of pretty cool concepts and have a lot of angsty and edgy material as a part of their world building, and both of them execute some of their individual ideas perfectly while the overall product misses the mark of a masterpiece.

And while Epic Mickey is held back by the poor gameplay of both installments and the poor writing of the second one, Murder Drones is held back by a lack of focus and restraint from his creator.

People often point to the founders of Glitch when they try to justify the rushed pacing of the story, but in my opinion, if the higher ups of Glitch were truly responsible for their show's shortcomings, at this point at least one of the members of the crew should have made us aware, and this reasoning still doesn't take away the blame from Liam, as he still has mostly unchecked creative freedom.

Remember that video on Liam's official YouTube channel titled "So I've been given too much creative power and made a show"?

Well, you know what the saying says.

"With great power comes great responsibility"

And this is true even for art.

[writingquestionsanswered]

I wrote an outline for a chapter I haven't finished but I still can't get around to writing the said chapter. Any advice/tips for that?

Chapter Outlined But Still Can't Write It

I'm not sure if you mean you haven't finished the outline or the chapter, so we'll tackle it both ways. :)

Chapter Outline Isn't Finished - If you're struggling to finish the chapter outline, start by looking at the conflict of the scene/s that make up the chapter. What does the character want in the scene? Are they trying to solve a problem? Are they trying to obtain something? (Like information, improvement of a skill, an object, agreement from someone to do something?) What tactic do they use in an attempt to get the thing? What obstacles do they face, and how do their tactics escalate? Do they succeed or fail in getting the thing? Are there consequences of getting the thing or not getting the thing? Understanding the purpose of your scene/scenes/chapter helps greatly in figuring out what needs to happen from beginning to end. You can also look at scene structure, which I tackle in my post Easy Scene/Chapter Structure.

Chapter Outline Is Finished - If your chapter outline is finished but you're still struggling to write the chapter, it could be because although you know where it needs to begin and what needs to happen, you may not know specifically how to start it. In other words, it's one thing to know that the chapter needs to start with Katniss preparing to go hunting with Gale, but that doesn't tell us exactly how the scene needs to begin. Try analyzing what needs to happen at the beginning and visualizing where your character is at the first point you know.

In the THG example, we know Katniss will walk out the door to meet Gale to go hunting. So, we can imagine her poised at the door getting ready to walk outside... now we rewind it. What was she doing in the moments before she got to the door? What did she need do in order to get ready? What room was she in? Who or what did she interact with? What was she thinking about? These can give you clues to specifically where you can start. Remember, it helps to start with movement, or in other words, something happening. Like, "My feet touch the ice cold floor..." or "Wooden bowls clatter to the floor when I open our tiny cupboard." Or, in the case of THG: When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold. My fingers stretch out, seeking Prim's warmth but finding only the rough canvas cover of the mattress.

You want the opening image of the chapter to be a hook, either a dynamic moment that asks a question ("Where's Prim?") or dynamic imagery: Nothing about the woman sitting across from me suggested she was a private investigator, much less one who came so highly recommended by Hollywood's rich and famous.

Other things that could be going on... I can think of some other potential issues which are worth considering if the above advice doesn't help you move forward:

1 - You're not sure where the story is going - You may have a full or partial outline for your chapter, but if you're not sure what happens in the next chapter or later on in the story, that can create a sort of mental block that makes it more difficult to get started. It's almost like your brain can see the road is washed out up ahead and doesn't want to start moving until the road is repaired. So, make sure you have a good idea of what needs to happen next and where the overall story is going. You can head over to my Plot & Story Structure master list of posts if you need help plotting.

2 - You've stressed yourself out about it - When we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to start something or finish something, we end up creating an association of stress with the thought of that activity. In other words, when we think of doing the thing it stresses us out, and since our brains are programed to avoid stress, it makes us not want to do the thing. We can think we want to do the thing... we can be motivated and have things ready to go, but if that little bit of stress bubbles up, our brains can say, "Nope! Uh-uh... that way lies danger," and we just can't get going. So, see what you can do to resolve any stress you may be feeling about the chapter. Do some fun activities related to the chapter, like try story boarding it with cute doodles or images from the internet. Make an aesthetic for the chapter, or make a chapter playlist. Try doing a little meditation, yoga, or take a walk before you sit down to work on the chapter. And don't give yourself a hard time when you try but it doesn't go anywhere.

3 - You're not ready to write the chapter - Sometimes there's something blocking you from writing the chapter and it's not something you can necessarily figure out. On a subconscious level, maybe your brain realizes you don't know the characters well enough to give this chapter justice. Maybe something about the chapter isn't working. Or maybe you're just more excited to write another chapter. Remember it's ok to skip chapters and come back to them later. Sometimes that's all you need in order to make it work.

I hope something here helps for you!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[besttropeveershowdown]

I would like to add to the Dream-Plot Defense Squad!

Yes, "It was only a Dream/Simulation/Whatever" Plots can be highly frustrating if they are used to just wipe away any and all consequences that we would usually get, but in the hands of people that know what they are doing you can actually get the opposite!

Slight Spoilers for Young Justice Season 01 (Watch it now!) incoming:

The Dream Episode in question features a full on end-of-the world scenario in which major Heroes and Characters die at astonishingly fast speed. This should usually clue us in, but the surviving characters believe that nobody actually died but instead was warped into some sort of prison, which in turn pulls us viewers back from realizing the twist too soon. This type of pacing and back and forth is excellently done and by the end we look back at a terrifying what-if scenario for how those characters would act and react when everything goes wrong.

And that's when the show really steps up, because the next episode is completely focused on just that, the fallout! All of those characters have just gone through something extremely traumatic, and it not being real does not change just how traumatic that was!

This ends up setting up major character arcs & moments for just about everyone for the rest of the season and beyond, so in this case the "All just a Dream" Episode actually had massive consequences, specifically because it was a dream in which things could escalate in a way they never would outside.

So yeah, the problem is that most showrunners/writers are simply picking the easy spectacle version instead of fully thinking through what they could do with a Dream-Plot!

I've never seen Young Justice, but that is a really interesting approach to the dream plot, because it gets to be an element of the overarching plot in its own right instead of just a one-off defense to fall back on. Dreams can be fascinating in fiction if the creator embraces the full implication of the dream - either by using the surrealist aspects that dreams by nature have, or by exploring the psychological traumas and fears that led to the dream. The issue with the trope happens when creators want to use dreams as a plot device without fully understanding them. Completely agreed, anon.

Your propaganda has been noted!

(Please keep sending in your opinions on the tropes, by the way: as a mod, propaganda makes the tournament much more fun, and as a trope nerd I live for this stuff)

[turbulenthandholding]

👀 just wondering if you’re writing anything these days!

1. Hi, hello, thank you for the ask @anxietycroissant! ❤️

2. I am...or I am trying! I am about 16,000 words into what is probably going to be a pretty long fic. It's an unexpected pregnancy/speed-run-the-relationship Sydcarmy and I am happy to be writing it because it's what my brain wants to read but it alternately falls out of my head and gives me great angst. I had been pretty blocked for more than a week but 3000 words fell out of my head like nothing last night which was a nice surprise.

Excerpt (Syd and Carmy are at IKEA):

“Sammy, right? Weren't you Carmy's sous?”

Sydney looks up to see Claire standing before her. “Claire. Hi. It's Sydney, actually,” she says and rises. Claire's eyes fall to Syd’s abdomen. “And I'm his CDC now.”

“Oh, that's so cute!” Claire says, her eyes falling to Syd’s belly. “You finally got over your weird obsession with Carmy and moved on,” Claire says. “Congratulations!”

“Weird obsession?” Syd asks. She feels pinned again like she did the first night she met Claire during the reno, glared at for reasons Syd at least thinks she understands now. Jealousy, and this time, lingering anger at her breakup with Carmy, which Claire lobs at Sydney like a knife.

Syd struggles to respond. “Sorry...are you like here to look at a couch? Or like, eat some meatballs? Sorry.”

“How do you feel about a lingonberry juice box?” Carmy asks Syd as he returns, focused, unaware, unwrapping and inserting the straw as he moves to hand it to her. “Got some water too,” he says, finally engaging with the scene in front of him.

“Carm, hi,” Claire says, features pinching. Syd takes a sip from the straw.

“Uhh, hey, Claire,” Carmy returns. He slips his arm around Syd, possessive fingers digging into her hip. A united front.

“Just one…” Claire begins. “Did this, uh, overla…how far along are you?”

“Due at the end of February,” Syd says.

Claire calculates, glares at Carmy. “You didn't waste any time.”

Carmy shrugs.

“Well, this is just so fucking precious,” Claire says through clenched teeth. “I guess when you said you didn't have space for fun or enjoyment in your life, you really just meant you don't have space for me. Cool. Cool. That's just…I’ll see you around, Bear. Good luck with whatever.” She slings her bag over her shoulder and stalks off back towards the escalators.

“Uhh,” Syd says, before taking a last drink from her juice box. The lingonberry juice is good, a little tart cutting through the sweetness. The box scrunches and crunches in her hand and makes the sound that juice boxes do when they are finished. “Sorry, that was loud. And just like…sorry that, uh, this happened.”

(2.5 - I could probably use an alpha reader if any of my Sydcarmy mutuals wants to take a look and tell me if it's bad or that I'm crazy because it could very well be!)

3. I'm also working on a soul mark/soul scar Sydcarmy. It's probably about 3k words so far but I put it to the side because I realized I had a huge plot hole and haven't quite figured out how to come back from it yet.

Excerpt:

Sydney gets really good at applying foundation to her arms, pressing it in with setting powder to help keep it waterproof just in case. The number of tattoos gracing her arms has been growing exponentially over the last few months. There's a pyrex measuring cup holding the whole world, a couple of angels, a fish. S-O-U on the fingers of her hand. She's a senior in high school on track to graduate with honors and the body art would be a distraction, a mark against her. An indication that she's not serious enough to do anything other than make terrible decisions or jeopardize her future; a constant, tangible reminder that she doesn't have the grace about things like this than people whose skin is lighter than hers. She wishes she didn't care. But she does, so she covers them up every day in a routine that feels like it has become her religion. She wears button-down shirts with long sleeves secured at her wrists most days, even when the heat and humidity in Chicago are oppressive. Counts the seconds until she can go to the CIA where maybe the sight of Schrödinger’s tattoos (simultaneously hers and not hers) won't hold her back.

[anewe9]

My black mage is too cute... (and a carboncopy, too)

If you like Spy x Family (SxF) you might find this somewhat interesting. A plus if you are a wee bit familiar with Harry Potter (HP)

If not, skip this.

Warning: Chapter 1 Spoilers for My Black Mage is too Cute under the cut. Long post, too.

Yes, the above is official. It is not fanmade. The chap above is a student actually saying "I will kill you" whilst thinking "I like you". The pink-haired girl is a classmate, shocked as SHE CAN READ HIS MIND.

So... what can I say? The boy looks suspiciously like a teen SxF Damian, and the kawaii girl looks like a teen SxF Anya. Browse the damianya tag and you will see how similar they are.

Other than being students in a magical school (hi, Hogwarts), and girl is a prefect (hi again, Hogwarts) the rest does look like an AU Damianya to me... sans the Damianya/SxF charm.

-Background-

My Black Mage is too Cute (such an unimaginative title but on par with other shoujo titling standards) launched in the August 2023 Hana to Yume issue 17/2023.

The premise is quite damianya simple: Tsundere boy, named Jade, with a rather obscure family, is hiding romantic feelings for your standard bubbly, chirpy pink haired shoujo heroine, named Aria Popwell. She is a senior (third year) to him (first year), and prefect at their School of Magic.

-Aria, the female lead-

Seriously, "Aria"? Nothing to connect with certain Anya, right?

Anyway, chapter starts with introducing Aria, the female lead. She is a prefect (whatever this means) at Hogwarts Hardy Quartz Magic Academy, "where apprentice magicians attend classes" We don't know where this Academy is (Japan, I suppose)

Aria is in her third year (no sure if this is a grade, and in fact, how many grades there are if any). She also teaches other junior students (perhaps for being a prefect, this is not confirmed) Her first words are to let us know that Kafugori are big bad wolfs that are very dangerous and how to face them. This is important to the plot (more on this later) It also sets some expectations. To me, I am led to believe that Aria is proficient and competent in whatever she does as a magician or at least, as a student in a Magic Academy.

Yes, let's have a closer look at our heroine... Yep the ^_^ shoujo trope.

Oh no no... that is not a damian jade-shoujo-filter yet. This is how WE are meant to see her. The shoujo flowers are absolutely necessary to help you understand that she is the cutest, loveliest creature on Earth. Unfortunately, we have seen the same face, same flowers and same cheerful shoujo attitude hundreds of times.

-Jade, the male lead-

Yes, this is Jade. Probably if Damian's puberty makes him... agonisingly emo teenager whilst keeping his mysterious and irresistible good looks. Or else. And Yes, Anya Aria just read his thoughts for the first time, much to her shock. Apparently until now, she did not know she can read thoughts when she touches people.

-Giving Tsundere a bad name...-

In case the first time's insults (pushy bitch) were not clear, he escalates his attitude. (Note: I appreciate that the fan translation might not be that harsh, so probably bitch is not what the original Japanese intended to sound) As he is such a cute and charming misunderstood black magician, he has to make sure his prefect is well aware that he is not only terrible at throwing unimaginative insults... he is also proud to announce he will kill her. Why? I do not know.

If you are a hopeless 13-year-old romantic teen that finds that charming, I hope you grow up out of this as soon as possible. If not, please stay away from handsome, dark, mysterious boys/men who might feel the opposite when they say "I'll kill you" Good looks are not worth it and I bet you do not have mind-reading abilities.

There is a kind of cute tsundere (Damian himself, though he is just a young boy), this is not one. There is absolutely nothing sexy, romantic, attractive or remotely interesting in a guy that pretends to hate you, says he will kill you, when they actually like you. Insulting is no praise either and I detest this trope.

Some tsundere fail to recognise or deny (again, Damian, he is too young); some are a bit embarrassed and these pass soon. Insulting and threatening is not charming.

-No, we don't need to see your fantasies (part I)-

Is he really fantasising / wishing to be kissed by her???

Yep, he is. What a creep.

It is bad enough that this guy thinks Aria is cute/hot/pretty and admits (to himself) that he likes her, when in actuality he is insulting her (a charmer). Wait, why would she kiss him? Because she is flattered she is called pushy bitch? Slow poke? Because she likes to receive death threats?

I was truly hoping Jade wanted her to kiss him to destroy that stupid crush. Only an idiot would kiss such a jerk. That would be his eye opener, at least, to realise he cannot possibly like someone so daft. Otherwise, this is ridiculous.

-She is adorably clumsy... NO. She is not.-

Moving on, good news is that the story goes to the point, way too much. Does not waste time with world-setting, simple when/where/why/how/what...

No, we meet cheerful Aria, and dark Jade like that. Other characters do not have any names, and do not really matter. Simple and lazy storytelling.

As Aria is completely shocked she reads minds, she has some little insights/flashbacks about this newly (and conveniently) found ability. No creativity, no build-up, no surprise, nothing. It just happens. Maybe this will be developed later, but it is just dumped like that.

Next panels are a few random examples of him pretending not to care about her, but actually saving this clumsy Aria girl. Too fast and again, no time to digest anything.

First time Jade stops a magic lab accident by destroying a hazardous chemical aimed to that foolish girl.

Second time, he appears to be shoving Aria off his way when in reality, he was saving her from being poisoned.

Why is she even a prefect???? How come she is not aware of the hazards around school??? Why are there hazards like those in a school no matter how magical this is???

Frankly, instead of being charmed by Jade's apparent indifference (yet saving her arse), to me this is a disservice to the girl that started the story being introduced as a prefect. We meet this shoujo heroine explaining useful tips as to how to defend yourself from big bad magical wolves. Sets a bar, you expect some proficiency even if you are not (yet) explained her merits or how she got the prefect status. By being this dumb, requiring the hero to save her, we have to lower our standards. At some point, even Jade himself wonders how she even became a prefect in the first place...

Back to the story, as now Jade inadvertently picked Aria's interest after saving her, we have Aria determined to know him better because, and I quote "Is Jade actually a really good kid who's easily misunderstood?"

So she joins him for lunch. Basically now she is trying to connect with him which only makes him complain and insult again. Now I have to agree with Jade, and I hope these attempts to connect with him help him realise his crush is as dumb as Aria.

How many times have we seen the kawaii heroine with that exactly same pose??? Eye wink + finger + cute smile + shoujo flowers. This is supposed to charm boy who (for no reason) is already charmed by this standard shoujo/magical girl trope.

The highlight of the chapter is when dark boy saves clumsy useless girl from being eaten by a Kafugori. Yep, the same beast she started the chapter talking about. Too bad, I would have appreciated getting rid of this ridiculous FL.

Why is a prefect unable to defend herself when chapter started with this lady mentoring others? I've no idea.

Why is the first year student able to save her? Other than a convenient plot device, I suppose we are led to believe that (1) he is powerful (more than her, but this is not a high bar at this point) (2) as he is a dark mage or comes from a family of dark mages, then his abilities are better. Or both.

She is again pushy, wants to understand why he saved her again (and yes, we want to know too) The pacing and rhythm are confusing, he declares he does not want her around because he is dark magician and would stain her reputation. There is a flashback when they meet, on his first day at school, and apparently, how he started his crush on her.

Again, the same shoujo-face, with shoujo-flowers, with naive shoujo-girl that smiles at sad kid declaring she does not care about his dark magic nature.

-No, we don't need to see your fantasies (part II)-

After the flashback to understand (?) why he seems to like her so much, Aria insists she will help clarify that he is actually a nice kid so that everyone knows.

Then she touches him again, and so she reads his mind.

My face mirrors Aria's. D:

Why does he have such ridiculous fantasies about her?? Marry her??? WHY??? Even poor Damian, being six years old, did not even fantasise about marrying Anya (and it is overkill, yet so appropriate for the comedic tone of SxF) With panels like this one, I wonder if this is actually a parody of shoujo fantasies, inspired by damianya doujins, or the author is really serious about this romantic trope.

To be honest, there are damianya doujins that are ridiculously charming, and follow the comedic style that SxF has and it is so refreshing. Here, those fantasies seem so serious I am inclined to believe it is just feeding shoujo readers.

-Conclusion-

Yes, there are fics and doujins that do a much better job at using the crazy and hillarous setting of a tsundere boy crushing on a mind-reader... A tsundere's worst nightmare.

However, this story has not earned that tone yet. It feeds from the premise of Hogwarts with a teen damianya... but both worlds (HP and SxF) are set and well-constructed. This one not yet.

This is a confusing setting instead, I am reading this as a (serious) romantic story (shoujo) with some supernatural/magic environment and bits of comedy. But also, perhaps it is just a comedic shoujo with a HP/damianya parody; a parody of both shoujo and HP/damianya ship; an homage to SxF damianya... Or simply a confusing combination of shoujo tropes with zero creativity (nothing we are presented tries to be original) The humour/comedic tone is just not good either.

Speaking of... and considering that Damian and Any are in primary school and are just little kids, these two have so much charm. She can read minds, yes, but she is young (it is implied she is 4 or 5 and not 6 like Damian and the rest of her little classmates) Therefore, Anya cannot identify that Damian has a crush on her, and Damian, as a little boy, does not know how to deal with a crush. The insults are not cruel, they compete with each other and they also care for each other in a naive, adorable way. But here... Aria just unlocked this mind-reading ability, so maybe it would have been more interesting to see her confused by his feelings towards her, as a first time mind-reader, making the comedy more intriguing. But no, she clearly reads him and concludes he is misunderstood and wants to help him (?)

The fantasies he has (kiss, carrying her bridal-style) are so disconnected... Even with the lame flashback, we have no reason to understand why he seems so infatuated other than Aria being pretty and choosing to ignore his dark reputation. He does not even know her (ok a boy crushing on a pretty girl does not need more) And when Jade gets to know her just a bit, it is to realise she is useless. And the crush seems to be at least the same or worse (wedding!!!) But again, I cannot help to remember how Damian started his crush: it was earned. We see him noticing Anya at the student ceremony and smugly believes she is the one crushing on him. Such a conceited brat. Then she punches that very smug face (priceless!) and you cheer for Anya. And then she tearfully apologises for punching him. Damian realises he does like her, we are shown his now celebrated damian-shoujo-filter... and we have to adore this kid. Poor Damian runs away embarrassed and disgusted (he is a child) And then their friendship develops, with comedy and nice moments that do progress their connection (keeping it in line with their age) Anya does not take advantage of Damian's feelings for her, as she is clueless about these.

But with Jade and Aria, I found no chemistry, nothing to really empathise with Jade's feelings towards her other than she smiles too much and has the standard kawaii looks. Compare that to how badass Anya is, she stood her ground, yet she was such a sweetie when she genuinely felt sorry for punching him. She is not necessarily pretty all the time, but Damian's shoujo-filter sees her as such a cute girl. I insist: the crush is earned. I would have crushed on Anya, too. With Jade? Not really.

Conversely, I also struggled to understand why would Aria care for such a jerk, no matter how pure his actual feelings are. Yeah, we need to wait for him to realise, and publicly accept he is not actually a killer and he has this heroic streak blah blah. But I am not even intrigued by this potential either. Moreover, I mentioned that Anya did not take advantage of Damian's feelings as she is not aware of these. Aria declares this mind-reading ability will make her "feel guilty" and "she will not touch anyone again"... yet she definitely touches Jade, and does use his secret to approach him. How noble.

Regarding this mind-reading ability, with Anya, we don't know much (yet) other that she was experimented on since birth (or was she born with the ability?) With Aria, we are shown a simple flashback of her Mum mentioning this ability as "high level magic only used by some bloodlines with excellent magic manipulation skills" and that some Popwells have the ability. Being so useless, Aria is not in the Sue category yet... but I hope being such a special snowflake with such great blood and the cute shoujo clumsiness does not make her one.

Probably this Story has not found its place yet, and I am definitely not the target group. But I would have never considered myself the target group for the crush of a 1st grader like Damian, and here I am. I will read the next chapters until I confirm my suspicion, but this is definitely not my cup of tea.

If you like this, it is okay, too. It is simple (very, very simple), easy to read, and does not seem to deceive anyone: Aria will eventually fall for the misunderstood tsundere with a secret heart of gold, and probably more shoujo tropes will be added to the story (boy saves girl, exes, competitors, jealousy, his family of evil magicians...)

1/5 only 1 for some decent artstyle. Zero/few backgrounds making the art super amateur and lazy (only faces and people) And lack of originality.