#bc i brought it today

[ottosbigtop]

I think we as a society should bring back brotps. I think we should be weirder about characters being friends the same way people are weird about ships. Make those two characters who interacted once or twice besties. Make it difficult for them to get rid of each other even if they want to. Go nuts

[florida3exclamationpoints]

The last 2 hours of work were um. Not as good

[julykings]

25 today

[cream-and-tea]

must a book have ‘plot’ and ‘structure’ and ‘progression.’ is it not enough for characters to be in a place. and for that place to be really fucking weird.

[aroanthy]

i love how fraught and complicated discourse around various utena characters ‘dying’ is when anthy is literally stabbed to death eternally by a million swords imbued with human hatred. and then utena gets stabbed to death by them also. like. ‘death’ is incredibly interesting in rgu because most of the time it’s this ambiguous figurative thing that has interesting implications re: ohtori as a closed-off world one can escape. we are all trapped in our coffins. mamiya is the only named character with a grave. nemuro memorial hall functions as one all the same. ruka is implied to have died in the hospital— was he dead all along? who was the boy we saw for these two episodes? is this dead boy the same boy, or is this just another coincidence from the shadow girls, cutting like a knife? it’s heavily implied that akio and anthy murder kanae by poisoning her, adding to the previous implication that they were poisoning mr ohtori too, but there are no perceptible consequences of this. kanae’s absence is not felt. she’s fed an apple slice. what happens to the bodies? we know what happened to the 100 boys, but what about everyone else? and so on and so forth. ‘death’ is a tricky thing in utena, i think it’s constantly functioning on figurative and literal levels in very different ways for very different purposes. dios died. dios was dying. dios didn’t die. he grew up. etc etc

[necrotic-nephilim]

https://www.tumblr.com/necrotic-nephilim/761747687384252416/i-dont-care-how-much-you-hate-me-you-need-to?source=share

so i'm imagining that tim gets free

(maybe it's steph who's on the outs with tim and doesn't believe him about bruce but sure as fuck doesn't approve of whatever the hell this is or maybe it's damian who's jealous that tim is getting any so much of dick's attention despite the fact that he's the heir and robin)

regardless tim gets the fuck out of gotham and goes on his international art theft adventure to find bruce

unfortunately for everyone dick processes to lose his shit and now damian (and steph to a lesser extent) is doing for dick what tim did for bruce

also a lot of heroes are drawing parallels between this and b reaction after jason died

anyway tim gets his proof (and get saved by jason bc jason's looking at dick all "this is really creepy actually and i don't want you anywhere near tim despite how bad our relationship is")

tim then goes to green arrow with his proof because he knows that man would call dick out no matter what costume he's wearing and he actually does an ok job with all the kids he picks up

there's a jla meeting and dick sees tim and is just as unstable as tim guessed he would be and it's pinging everyone's radar as A Problem now

but obviously they get bruce back and no this is his problem bc literally everyone in the league is like "pls keep dick away from tim, his behavior has passed weird and gone into extremely unsettling"

i can't see what happens next bc i can't imagine bruce actually being help but i can see him being a disaster when he tries and that would be funny

this is SO good anon i love all of these things based on that fic so much aaaa

personally when i was writing it, i imagined Jason being the one to break Tim free. not out of wanting to save Tim or anything, but more so seeing it as a chance to make Tim owe him, and just to fuck with Dick. Jason will cause problems because He Can, and while i don't think he would particularly care for the moral implications of Dick holding Tim hostage (Jason was morally all over the place during Dick's Batman era i fear) he's just morbidly curious. that said the idea of Steph being the one to do so is also fun, because for her it *would* be the moral issue as well as caring about Tim. i think the most fun option is somewhere in the middle, where Jason and Steph are forced to team up, each with different end goals and not trusting each other whatsoever. so when they succeed and get Tim safely out of Dick's hold, there's a deep disagreement and slight scuffle over what to do now, Jason trying to manipulate Tim further against Dick and onto his side, whereas Steph is just prioritizing Tim's safety. i think it's fun if Tim is slightly mentally broken, just from how long he was held captive and the realization of Dick's feelings at the end fo the fic. so he's distrusting of anyone he's once trusted, even Steph, that he just slips away to focus on getting Bruce back, leaving both Jason and Steph trying to chase Tim. and course, Dick.

because Dick would of course try to get Tim back, again and again. Damian is trying to reel Dick back, just because he wants Dick's attention and he does sort of believe they should focus on Gotham. and then Steph is also trying to distract Dick to protect Tim. so everyone's tail spinning in the most complicated game of cat and mouse. Steph and Damian are forced on the same side, trying to get Dick to focus on Gotham instead of Tim, just for now. Steph is promising to keep an eye on Tim, Damian is insisting Gotham needs Dick's attention and combined, they're able to at least keep his immediate focus away from Tim, giving Tim time to find his proof. Jason having to save him is just *fun*, because it reinforces how sort of helpless Tim is. he's not up on his training and his become soft and with Dick's need to catch up to him eventually, it puts him in a vulnerable spot he would *hate.* he'd despise needing to be saved by Jason of all people. it'd fuck him up so bad, because all the bad things Jason is saying about Dick are technically true and somehow, the world is so flipped upside down that Jason is the reasonable one. i think it'd make Tim isolate more and more, distancing himself from the Batfamily, even the ones he should trust like Steph. sure, he's on the outs with her (likely still upset from the Search For A Hero arc) but she's looking out for him. and maybe he knows it, deep down, but Tim is just terrified of trusting anyone associated with the Bat name.

and since he can't go to the Batfam with his proof, him going to Oliver is *so* fun. i adore any concept where Oliver is the one to notice something is very wrong in the Batfam i swear anon it's like you're connected to my BRAIN. because sure Oliver doesn't *like* Bruce, but even Oliver knows this is fucked up. the story Tim tells him is a horrifying one. Oliver has always done right by his kids, or at least tried his best to. so to know what Dick pulled is horrifying. there's this implicit trust the entire hero community has in Nightwing that would get badly shaken up and i think that's fun. the Justice League meetings about it would be a shitshow. someone like Clark who's as close to Dick as he is would want to at least hear Dick out, try to understand his point of view. maybe Dick was in the wrong, but he had to have been doing this out of a place of concern and Tim's just twisted up about Dick's intentions. at the very least, trust in Dick is shattered but no one can agree on what to do, if they can do anything at all. it's agreed to keep TIm safe and away from Dick and long talks are had with Dick, but Dick is disturbingly good at being charming and manipulative, convincing them all he's sorry and he knows he took it too far, it's just the stress of the mantle that got to him.

and Bruce coming back would further complicate things in such fun ways. because Bruce will *always* protect and side with Dick. yes, he's worried about Tim, but he refuses to let any negative blowback hit Dick for this. because sure, Bruce would've never done that, but also, Bruce has done equally shitty things so, he's also not going to fully question it. Dick made a judgment call in the heat of the moment, and now, Bruce is going to defend his right to do so. it sends the League even more out of control, because they didn't expect Bruce to be so deeply on Dick's side. the phase "what would Bruce think?" got thrown at Dick a lot by all of them and now, well. they look a bit like fools for it because Bruce has made it clear what he thinks is that Dick had the right to make the call he thought was best as Batman. so while Dick is socially exiled, he doesn't face any *real* consequences. he's still in hero society and is respected as Nightwing and allowed to exist on the League. Dick just patiently waits for it all to blow over because eventually, there's always something more important to focus on that will make people forget about this outside of just a weird bad mistake Dick made.

and the longterm for TIm is fun. because I think he'd keep his distance from Gotham and Bludhaven, mostly keeping around Oliver, given Oliver is one of the few League members still refusing to let it all go, and it gives Tim some kind of safety net. but i think Dick would still try to pursue Tim. Dick would convince himself he just went about it the wrong way, he came on a little too strongly and he can still fix it. he keeps harassing Tim and trying to get Tim to like him back, making it clear he has no real regret for his actions. i think it's fun if Tim is forced to fake a relationship with someone else to get Dick to leave him alone. maybe Jason, maybe Steph. (honestly, this being JayTimSteph could be fun) and that fake relationship ends up developing into something more real, which would make Dick *insanely* jealous. i'm torn between Dick actually taking it too far (possibly forcing himself on Tim) or keeping his distance because both are fun. i'm partial to him forcing himself on Tim, just for the fucked up non-con that Tim has to cope with, knowing nothing he does will get Dick to leave him alone. he learns the best ways to stay safe, but it essentially kills his ability to have a vigilante career bc it puts him too out in the open. he takes a more Oracle-esque role (Tim working with the Birds of Prey could be a lot of fun) and always lives in some kind of fear of Dick catching up to him. it's so fun and fucked up that even when Tim escapes, he doesn't really and he knows it.

[geddy-leesbian]

bitches love me for my lesbian Luis Serra swagger

(could not get a decent pic of it but the industrial bar I'm wearing has a heart with a ⚢)

[vangbelsing]

One last thing about the Keep spoilers below the cut

I am more worried about the inquisitors portrayal than the lack of options. Like I wanted reactivity, but I get why it's not there, and while the absence of reactivity to my choices is regrettable, that absence doesn't contradict my world state, so to me that's livable. But the Inquisitor not having any options to tweak their personality at all?? Not even a general "were they more humorous or kind or violent" section??? That seems... Very much not promising. They seem so excited for people to see how they've portrayed the Inquisitor but... Y'all know people only care because it's their Inquisitor, right? Like there isn't some universal Inquisitor we all agree we love, we like ours. So the fact that there's absolutely no control over them? I. Am more than a little anxious over how they're gonna get handled.

[fear-no-mort]

thinkign about how alone and unloved morty was for all his life and rick was the first time anyobdy ever put such an amount of intense attention and dependency onto him . and rick had a whole new family and losing them made him stop seeing the value in other people as a whole and morty was the one and first thing that woke him up

[greenlaut]

on the way ! ✩°｡⋆⸜ 🎧

[ur-ghostgirl]

.

[dailydegurechaff]

Today's Daily Degurechaff is… Strawberry Tanya

[fatuismooches]

smiles

[foreverfearlessred]

I’m still majorly pissed that Andrew Garfield didn’t win an Oscar for Tick Tick Boom

[spocks-kaathyra]

lecture doodle #3. in honor of spocktober

[fullmetal-scar-simping]

Nowadays I find Mustang and co’s whole thing to be faux-deep. Like it’s supposed to be a compelling story about guilt and how we’re all messy and terrible, and anyone who hates this just can’t handle protagonists being flawed people.

But in practice it’s about how PoC’s brutalization and misery, often at the direct hands of white people, is ultimately meant to be the backdrop behind the white character’s growth and maturity so they can better understand the world now. And if they keep stumbling then PoC have to patiently, passively accept their continued brutalization for the sake of the white character making the right choice for THEIR agency and development.

It’s demeaning as hell, it’s like their victims don’t actually exist other than to be perfect victims without feelings or thoughts who are just punching bags for the white character to feel sad over and maybe wonder about the perspective of, but the narrative itself doesn’t actually wonder.

As an addendum to my ask; I hate how the brutalization of their entire lives and culture is just the price that PoC have to pay for the self actualization and development of a few white characters. Jeez it’s cool that Mustang found a new purpose and meaning in life, too bad his peace of mind came at the cost of so many innocents who deserved that more than him! Like why is Mustang’s growth prioritized over Ishvalan lives, how many had to burn just so he could get the hint?

Very well said. The characters of colour are backdrops both literally and figuratively. The white characters won't worry about the suffering or personhood of the (in this case) Ishvalans. At best they (and the narrative) will project whatever is most useful for the betterment of the white/light skin characters onto the Ishvalans. All while dearly protecting the pro-military-under-correct-leadership message of the manga/show.

-

This is going to be a side tangent, but bear with me here:

No doubt you've noticed the phenomenon of tumblrinas flocking to defend USAmerican soldiers and other military personnel the moment anyone (rightfully) disparages the armed sector of the American empire. They'll cry "You don't understand! These non-billionaire young Americans join the military because they were preyed upon by recruiters! They're poor and they were promised an education and a career in exchange for their recruitment! Our education system is bad and never taught them about the military industrial complex! They had no idea what they were getting themselves into!"

Which is all such bold-faced horseshit for one too many reasons.

1) The USA is a military state. It's infamously exorbitant funding towards its various military branches and projects eclipse the GDPs of entire nations. Even the most ignorant American ever knows their military is a big deal.

2) Their entire entertainment industry, particularly the mainstream movie industry, is bankrolled by the American military. All anyone is fed is either at-home copaganda (police) or abroad copaganda (military). It valorizes itself, yes, but it's not hiding that you're going to commit violence on others in order to police the world.

3) American culture is deeply, deeply, DEEPLY nationalist. It exults its own military forces as their true protectors, and the protectors of "freedom" the world over. ('Freedom' is America's fave euphemism for its global dictatorship.) You ever hear a diehard military bootlicker/active duty pig/veteran talk about their time as a professional murderer? Most are pretty stoked to do what they obviously signed up for. I'm not remotely convinced that your average USAmerican teen/young adult has never once encountered this form of jingoism. Many themselves are just are pro-invasion, pro-war as their elders.

4) They train you in combat and the use of drones, firearms, armoured vehicles, etc. Put two and two together. You don't need to be an aged academic to grasp what the fuck the weapons are for. You're signing up to kill people, even if its coated in a paint of "protecting your own people". Generations grown on shit like CoD aren't left scratching their heads about what they might potentially do to people when they sign up.

And the most important, glaring point that every single apologist just can't seem to grasp: why in the goddamn should anyone outside of the USA and the West give a flying rat's fuck about whether an American youth can afford college or not based on whether they take up arms against the Global South and SWANA? They think their lives, their nation, their lifestyles trump the lives of the rest of the fucking globe.

To them, everyone else should be ok with having their resources, their land, their people, their labour, and their lives ruthlessly extracted and mass slaughtered because it helps ignorant American cunts afford to be better capitalists/workers (go to school and have a career)! Your average American is convinced they're more oppressed (and naturally more important) than the people in the countries they sign up to subjugate! Slandering the very cogs who sign up to be cogs, who are key to allowing the war machine to continue churning black, brown, and Oceanic lives into mulch for USAmerican prosperity hits American psyches too hard.

Americans are real people, complex and pitiable, noble but exploited. Everyone else are cold hearted barbarians who could never ~understand~ The States (nevermind that the entire world can't go 5 seconds without encountering American marketing, products, news, entertainment media, aggression, etc etc etc, but I digress).

-

I bring up this real world example not to equivocate fiction with the very real, deep horrors of unending American atrocities (let us not lose perspective). But rather to illustrate the threads of imperial and military propaganda so imbedded in the mass consciousness of imperial citizens. The logic of existing societal structures informs the stories that get produced by workers, embraced by audiences, and then reinforced by fandom and merchandising. Mangahood fans are very precious about maintaining the illusion of criticality against militarism and genocide because it offers them comfort in being cogs in these real world systems too. (There's blood on the hands of everyone in the West. When it comes to tech, the blood of mining and factories is on the hands of the entire world.)

It's tooootally fine that mangahood dwells only on the humanity of Amestrian pigs for the price of painting a lousy caricature of the Ishvalans on thin paper that backdrops this lousy attempt at an "anti-imperialist" narrative. Because soldiers are people too! And yes, they are. So why are they exempt from from the direct culpability of their actions, their patriotic dogma, their ignorance that "allowed" them to carry out the extreme violence bought them security in their fascist nation's hierarchy? Why should we swallow what fma wants, that the Ishvalans ought to "know their place" and accept that their extermination will better their exterminators? Why should Ishvalans, especially Scar (and whatever other radical/anti-Amestrian Ishvalans that are implied to be around but never seen), be ok with that? Mustang, Riza, Hughes, etc needed to commit ethnic cleansing in order to feel like maybe Ishvalans are people too? That this shit is unethical? That they should have never signed themselves to become professional murderers simply because they "didn't know it would come to this"? Because they were too idealistic and self-serving?

Obviously we want flawed characters. We want narrative tension. We want to explore stories about imperialism. We don't want to pathologize war criminals in such a way that its abdicates the citizen class from their key role in agreeing to commit these acts, or back imperialism more broadly. And I'll never be the sort to champion the wretched notion that "certain topics must never be written about or depicted". But we sure as hell can point out when something that's passed off as anti-racist is in fact the total fucking opposite, especially in the ways it defends dominant racial/national/ethnic groups against the groups they thrive off of oppressing. We need to see through the sleight of hand excuses baked into media, and the ways that fans regurgitate the logic of racist systems as a way to comfortably enjoy said media without grappling with hard truths.

Many want to convince us that the hard truth in mangahood is that fascists and war criminals are human. That your ideals can lead you to do tremendous harm (it does such a lopsided job of this). These stories fail this goal when they strip the humanity of people of colour. And the fans who can't handle critique of mangahood avoid the hard meta-critique that gets made in regards to mangahood's execution of such a story. It wants to present challenging themes but flubs the execution because it always opts for the framing that grants the most grace to the people within institutions that commit genocide.

The truly difficult truth for most fans is everything you wrote so well, anon. Racialized people exist to be the dominant race's personal development. That mangahood plays this trope straight, with greater criticism against the agency and actualization of racialized, oppressed classes. Ishvalan deaths are not a tragedy for Ishvalans, but a tragedy for the Good Real People who carried it out. Killing those teary-eyed Real People in retaliation is a more grave act than killing anyone who refuses to be amalgamated into the nation. (The fear of violent resistance against an imperial nation is core to mangahood.)

Mangahood does everything it can, as a story, to conjure these rote defenses of its primary military figures. Their mass slaughter led to guilt which led to resistance against Bradley, the council, and Father. So why should the Ishvalans be seen in any other light besides a glib plot point? They'll be made anew by their killers soon anyway. Because their killers have grown, as People.