#bc it occurred to me that based on his canon personality

[abra-ka-dammit]

just little cloud guardian things

now gotta speedrun him to 80+ so he can actually equip one of the tonfa models

[cowboy-robooty]

everyday got a noose around my neck because i will find the best koitsuki golden kamuy artist ever and then immediately see they also draw sugimoto x asripa. will the pain ever end

[illubean]

Valorant Protocol as Highschool Stereotypes

Characters: Chamber, Gekko, Iso, Jett, Killjoy, Neon, Phoenix, Raze, Sage, Skye, Viper, Yoru Type: Headcanons

HAHA help me valorant brainrot >.< also this is based off of my hs experience soooo yeah

Warnings: none

Chamber

your typical pretty boy

all the girls love him all the boys hate him

well...most of the girls love him

they follow him around to classes or offer him gifts or ask to sit with him at lunch etc.

and he eats up the attention every time

he's lab partners with Viper in Environmental Sciences and he likes trying to flirt with her

she actually hates him btw

Gekko

canonically he skateboards

but honestly? I can see him being on the dance team

he's so high energy, he needs some sort of outlet

he never misses an opportunity to show off his dance moves

homecoming? prom? he is the center of the dance circle

like Raze, he doesn't know how popular he is

he's just happy to have so many good friends that it doesn't even actually occur to him that he's considered "popular"

Iso

he's an ap art kid

like he walks around with a big ass sketchbook every day

always talking about his portfolio

Iso baby ily but please shut the fuck up about oil paints <3

he probably volunteered part of his summer break to come in and paint a mural for the school

I think he'd also take a piano class as like a schedule filler but he actually gets crazy good at it

Jett

pe tryhard

if you end up on the opposite team as her while playing dodge ball good luck 😓

she's always picked as team captain because literally no one else is excited as she is

she's sorta like Hairo from Saiki K 💀

she gets a lil mad when her teammates don't try

Killjoy

she's in robotics club

she's not very popular but that doesn't bother her at all

she heads straight to and from every class and spends her lunch period in the workshop unless Raze drags her off somewhere

not a lot of people actually know who she is, and if they do they just know her as 'Raze's Friend'

i think she'd remind the teacher about the homework and hit you with the "erm actually 🤓" tbh

Neon

she's on track and field/cross country

after every meet you can find her laying on the floor somewhere ready to puke bc she tries so hard to win 😭

she always ends up top 5 tho

she complains about practice but joins the team every year anyways

she carries her bag around all the time and if you open it there's like 10 water bottles in there

#hydratedqueen

Phoenix

theater kid DUHH

he's probably drama club president or sumn

bro will NOT let go of a specific song from a musical he was in his freshman year and it wasn't even his song 💀

he's been in every show every year and somehow he manages to land every role he wants

he's insanely good at the game 'bang' (mostly because he's louder than everyone else...)

he probably plans/hosts the cast parties too

Raze

she doesn't care much about her grades

she does the bare minimum and gets straight Cs

she's just here to have fun

everyone likes her because of her approachable personality

she doesn't think she's popular but she is

Sage

she's in the medical assistant class

she takes it very seriously, as she plans on going to medical school

even before taking the class she carries a first aid kit and other essentials everywhere she goes

you need a bandaid? ibuprofen? a pad or tampon? she has it all

she's also ASB president

school events literally would not be able to run without her

lets just say her college applications/resume will look REALLY good...

Skye

she also took medical assistant but was less crazy about it than Sage

she just follows her friend's lead

she thinks the skills are useful but she doesn't see herself making it her career

but also I think she would play volleyball

she's a well rounded player but specializes most in defense

still, don't underestimate her bc this girl can SPIKE

Viper

she took every ap science class offered without taking the general ones first

she complains about getting any grade below an A...

"What are you talking about? That test was easy"

sorry not everyone is as smart as you Sabine 😑

she spends all her free time at chem tutoring (even though she doesn't need it)

Yoru

he thinks he looks cool and mysterious when he walks down the halls but he doesn't

everyone just thinks his mad all the time and stay out of his way 😭

randos try to pick fights with him bc he "looked at them wrong" (Yoru wins every time)

he's not exactly a 'quiet kid' but he does lay low when it comes to the social part of school

despite his 'bad boy' look, he has pretty good grades

he's also probably one of those guys that a handful of girls have a crush on but he has no idea

[elendsessor]

@paraseleneblur you have no idea how many goddamn thoughts i’m having about this because like. honestly made me appreciate the contrasting relationship more and the tragedy.

i’ve mentioned this a few times before but if there’s one thing base 5 did right was illustrating different kinds of relationships using the two halves of the same being/soulmate concept not necessarily always being romance. we get some of that, yet it’s not the same for every pairing.

most important to this is koshimizu and atsuta’s since they’re more of a boss and trusted employee/sort of a father-son dynamic, but it’s definitely based in the need to protect tokyo and not anything that much more.

despite the interpretive nature, aogami and vkun’s relationship is based in a need to protect and understand each other. they communicate a ton more than we see of any of the other nahobino pairs—aogami makes it all the more clear with the newly added bench. he fused with the protag to protect him, and considering how vkun “commands” aogami, it’s ultimately up to him to also keep him safe.

while we don’t get much characterization, v is seen to be a bit of an outcast, or at least struggling socially (same here sis). we don’t see him with any friends—atsuta considers him a friend at the beginning of the game but it’s implied they likely haven’t actually hung out or talked much. he seems distant in a couple of the school cutscenes, basically disassociating himself from the rest of the world (again, same here sis). aogami definitely changed him as a person, and he gets into the nahobino role easily because there’s that connection there. this was a meant to be pairing.

they’re both entirely different dynamics with differing viewpoints.

comparing canon of creation along with canon of vengeance really elevates and recontextualizes both narratives but especially how devastating losing a nahobino partner is for both parties involved.

brought it up before but to me, it seems that entire dynamic is a suicide pact. we don’t see any of the pairs die at separate times in canon of creation, and there’s oddly something more peaceful about it. kinda not in sahori’s case bc that was actually a genuinely sad moment in the og and she wasn’t exactly herself (i can’t decide if her being mercy killed in the middle of a half-hug surrounded by people who care about her is better or worse than her dying alongside tao in a pretty brutal way only to be mocked by/seen as fodder by lilith) but for the throne stuff, there’s at least some form of content.

vengeance doesn’t have that during the main conflict, but it’s heavily implied that it’s straight up soulmates in every universe due to the law route. if it weren’t for the fact that they were all drawn together due to the circumstances, vkun and the gang wouldn’t be shown hanging out in that ending. hiromine not wearing the jouin high uniform despite being in the school is proof that shit still happened, plus da’at forming is proven to be inevitable (at least if luci is to be believed). we can assume there’s some memory of vengeance’s events, and since the gods are heavily implied to still be around, yeah safe to say if nothing else, they’re aware of who their partners are. tne is the only ending where all the gods are wiped from that universe but with how megaten’s franchise-wide world building is, it’s heavily implied every ending is canon or at least ends up occurring in one version of that universe, so that meeting is a canon event.

that being said, it does make the deaths all the more tragic because if they are destined to be together no matter what, being destined to die at the same time isn’t entirely guaranteed. only in the vengeance canon do we see partners die separately. hell, dazai and abdiel never become a nahobino in that canon regardless of route despite sticking together. this could be due to mastema’s influence since the power of a fused nahobino could likely shut down his stupid brainwashing bullshit. they at least interact with one another upon death in creation but not in vengeance. abdiel still does technically die first. regardless, both end up dying. this goes for nuwa and yakumo, and the same for koshimizu and atsuta. their fates are intertwined.

both koshimizu and vkun lose their other halves right in front of them and knowing that soulmate stuff, there might be an even stronger connection present, which probably fucks them both up beyond repair. this also shows that just because they’re compatible for fusion doesn’t mean everything is hunky dory. in some ways, this defies the laws of the universe. if it weren’t for aogami’s status as a proto-fiend of a similar type to tsukuyomi, there would be no fusion. they would’ve lost.

god that’s what i genuinely love. we only saw aogami care for the protag in base 5 but the protag not only caring to such a degree that he can’t even act like himself anymore and how defeated he looks when he’s separated is depressing. and there’s some obvious separation anxiety in general. vkun is seen relying on aogami’s input in some situations, or at least consulting with him to see if it’s okay to do certain things. naamah killing a bunch of people at the subway with her fucked up dog freaked the shit out of vkun, but he only stands up and tries to show he’s willing to take her on because he feels aogami would be there. as funny as the arm wave is, it’s clear he’s a much different person when he’s with aogami. also he doesn’t seem nearly as nervous in cutscenes with aogami there than without.

this doesn’t apply to koshimizu.

it’s not just the change in color or the fact that koshimizu is less dominant (his nahobino form with atsuta barely had any atsuta in him). heck, you could also argue the fact that his mouth being covered as the tsukuyomi nahobino could be symbolic of their lack of communication. his moveset also got more brutal. some of the flashier divinity is gone from some of the tsukuyomi-coded ones, or at least are considerably moodier. not just the battle end animation but his idles are a lot less lively. the battle music, too, isn’t as upbeat or cheery. it’s gothic. it’s dreary. it paints a clear picture of how uncomfortable the situation is.

koshimizu at least cares about aogami to a degree. enough to both consider him his brother (mainly due to aogami being modeled off of him) and care for vkun, but the dynamic is different. again, koshimizu and atsuta were bonded in an obligatory way. while aogami was programmed for a similar purpose, due to being susano-o, he would inevitably develop individuality. it was his decision to sacrifice himself, he did ultimately care for vkun as a person, and they were comfortable with one another. at the end of the day, the decision for koshimizu to fuse was because he not only knew vkun needed a partner, not only would aogami want someone to keep him safe, but there was going to be nobody left to stop the qadistu. atsuta is gone, so he only has one option. both of them only have one option.

all their decisions onwards are definitely to avenge their partners, and how they speak to one another proves a lot of it. vkun doesn’t seem comfortable but forces himself, meanwhile the same could be said for koshimizu.

i think about this smile a lot too

he fucking knows there was only so much he could do with vkun, especially with aogami explaining tiamat can’t be killed unless it’s at the hands of a godly dragon slayer. nice touch with murakumo being what finishes her off since if i recall correctly that’s the name of the sword susano-o gets after slaying orochi.

but koshimizu seems at peace here. the one destined to protect vkun is there, and though he could’ve definitely further stuck around in case something went wrong, he still sacrifices himself to revive tao/hiromine. i think that’s not just because he’s no longer needed, but because he could finally die and be reunited with atsuta. he was never meant to continue living, after all. he was never meant to fuse with vkun. he still seems to be grieving over his own loss. regardless of the ending, he does get to finally rest.

it’s so bittersweet and i fucking love it. actual amazing writing.

[cal-writes]

For the prompts - something to do with the crew being a bit apprehensive about zoro because truly, wandering around with no home base killing people is different to what the others were doing before joining the crew. OR (and?) Zoro pulling out some sort of weird knowledge related to the above and the crew being all 'suprised Pikachu face' bc zoro knows something. (I've mostly watched the OPLA and half the anime so I'm thinking like early crew but whatever floats your boat XD)

i went with opla canon then! before baratie

It occurs to Usopp much too late, that he doesn't really know any of these people. Sure they helped him save Kaya and seem nice but they are pirates. Usopp knows all kinds of pirates, of course, and he knows that many of them are good. But.

"So-" He clears his throat, fingers slippery on his drink. The condensation clinging to the glass like sweat. "You guys ever kill anyone?" He asks with a wink and a laugh to signal his jest.

Nami gives him an unimpressed glance, seeing right through him. "What do you think?" She asks sharply and her fingers curl threateningly over the rim of her glass.

Luffy has that stare of his that Usopp has come to associate with his undivided attention. "Nah, not yet!" He says with wonder. Nami shoots him a weirded out look that is perhaps the slightest bit fond.

"Sure." Zoro says and Usopp's fingers nearly slip off the glass. Zoro's drink slams onto the table, now empty and he wipes off the liquid clinging to his top lip. He misses a spot on the corner that Luffy points out to him, making him poke blindly with his tongue until he got it all. It's a bizarre display.

Usopp chuckles weakly. "Yeah, me too. I mean, I'm the most fierce warrior of Syrup Village!" He declares with a toast.

Nami kicks him softly under the table and catches his gaze, trying to communicate with her brows. Next to her Luffy tries to use his vest to wipe Zoro's face who leans back to avoid him.

Usopp's chuckle dies a little in his throat. "But, like, really?" He asks.

Zoro looks at him, distracted long enough that Luffy gets to him, dragging the edge of his vest over his face and earning himself a slap to the stomach that he laughs off.

"Like really." Zoro replies deadpan, shooting a glare at Luffy from the corner of his eye.

"He was a bounty hunter after all." Nami stresses.

"Damn good one too." Zoro says with a little sigh as if reminiscing about the good old days. The good old days where he killed people for money. Which. That's fine. Usopp doesn't have a problem with that. No sir. He chugs his drink.

Luffy slings his arm around Zoro's neck. "And now you're gonna be the best pirate! Well, second best right after me. But first best swordsman. " Nami snorts into her glass, unperturbed and Usopp takes a deep breath. Watches Zoro surrender himself to the gentle headlock of his - their captain.

Zoro's eyes flicker up, catching Usopp staring red handed and he feels himself break out into condensation to mimic his glass. He laughs a little and shuffles a bit closer to Nami as Luffy distracts Zoro by nearly wretching him off his chair as he tries to sing along to the song the tavern's musician starts to play.

"Should we be worried?" Usopp clears his throat and keeps his tone light, giving Luffy and Zoro a thumbs up when they look in his direction.

Nami holds her glass by the rim, legs crossed over the knee. She hums as she looks at the chaos unfolds before them and Usopp sees her fingers tighten on her drink before she deliberately relaxes them.

"He's dangerous but also gullible and thinks of himself as a good person." Nami says quietly under her breath and Usopp feels goosebumps break out on his back. She shrugs with one shoulder. "So probably not unless we piss him off."

Usopp swallows against the lump in his throat. "Cool." He says, his voice cracking midway through.

[rooolt]

In-Depth Rant About Possible Scamster Relationship Timelines Because They Plague Me

okay so! Scamster relationship timeline has been something I’ve tried to puzzle out since episode 23 dropped because the everything about it was so absurdly captivating and Anthony just dropped it and gave us nothing. So originally (and I think I’ve talked abt this before) I had perceived the timeline thusly:

we know for a fact they are together in the flashback in Alright which based on Anthony’s description of the teens most likely takes place a couple of years after s1 bc the kiddads are all still teens. I think 3 years is a reasonable estimate bc if you see the oldest kiddad in s1 as being max 14, that would leave them at 17. I’d say minimum two years and maximum five. Now, there is no way of knowing how long the two of them have been together by the time this flashback is occurring. I think it may be reasonable to assume that it’s relatively new as we know Morgan was still with Jodie in the finale and presumably had to experience some amount of time being together with him to want to leave him. Additionally, the way they talk to each other gives very much “honeymoon phase” energy, not that that’s concrete evidence, but still. Now with the information we were operating under for a large portion of s2, (probably up until episode 45ish if I remember correctly) scam and Jodie were Hermie’s parents, and scam left Jodie pretty immediately after Hermie was born. Working under that assumption, and the long held assumption that Hermie was 15, this would place them as having been in a relationship for about five to seven years (s2 takes place 25 years after season one, meaning Hermie (if he was actually 15) would’ve been born 10 years after season one and if they had been dating starting anywhere from three to five years after season one, there’s the math) WHICH IS A BIG NUMBER. And for a while that was crazy to me, that plagued me right I thought about that all the time.

AND THEN

AND THEN Anthony Burch dropped a piece of information that SHATTERED MY WORLDVIEW. Hermie the unworthy is not a person (or demon scam creature) he’s just a scam and he’s AT MOST like three years old. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR THE SCAMSTER TIMELINE!!! Here’s the thing. There is nothing Anthony Burch can say that will fully retcon Hermie in my mind as not Jodie’s son. It comes up so much, Jodie sees him that way, literally claims he was “scammed out of a son”, Hermie and Taylor are referred to as related multiple times, there’s nothing you can do to retcon that. Therefore, despite being a creation of scam, Hermie is still technically Jodie’s son. What do I mean by that? Personally, I like to think that whilst creating Hermie, scam knew that it takes two parents to make a child and thus pulled “dna” (I assume it’s like magic bc neither of them are human) from both himself and Jodie, either because that was the last long running relationship he was in, or because it was the funniest option. This, I think, leaves us with two possible options for the scamster timeline.

Original scamster timeline is correct/they broke up sometime earlier, but then three years pre-canon scam likely decided it would be fun to make a kid but didn’t want to deal with baby stuff so he pulled stuff from himself and Jodie to make like a 12 year old and then when he got bored of it not only did he implant fake memories into both hermie and his adoptive parents, but also within Jodie, making him believe that they had a son together 12 years ago but scam ran away with him, breaking up with Jodie in the process

scam and Jodie had actually been together for almost 20 years straight and Jodie was aware of, and maybe even excited about, the kid scam was making, but then scam just immediately whisked him away, implanting him within a mortal family. The reason I say they stayed together instead of breaking up and getting back together is the way jodie talks abt it, it seems as though he was blindsided by scam leaving him. This is obviously the less likely (ha!) option, but I think definitely still a possibility

n e ways, I’ve most definitely considered this in far more depth than either Anthony Burch or Jimmy Wong have, but there is something deeply wrong with me and they plague me.et me know if you have further thoughts or evidence suggesting a more canonical scamster timeline.

[thesherrinfordfacility]

I mean this in a gen way, but saying Crowley avoids responsibility feels incredibly unfair, bc as far as I can recall, of the two he's actually the only one who has ever apologized for anything?

hi anon!!!✨ more than happy to explain (as best i can, anyway) where im coming from on this!!!✨

so to my recollection, crowley has essentially said he's sorry twice in show canon; s1, when he tries again to get aziraphale to leg it with him, and s2, with the dance. however, imo, i think it's questionable as to how much he means either of these.

s1 apology to me is worded in such a way that, at worst crowley is purposefully inauthentic in his apology, and at best, just simply doesn't know what he's apologising for - but in both cases just wants to get aziraphale on side so they can escape the apocalypse by fleeing to alpha centauri:

the key part here for me is, "whatever i said, i didn't mean it...", because to me that feels an awful lot along the lines of 'im sorry you feel that way', rather than accepting responsibility that what one may have said may have caused the upset.

now look, i realise crowley is under a lot of pressure in this scene - he's come straight from being directly threatened by hastur, and that makes the rushed, poorly worded apology understandable - but id personally argue that, regardless, it's not a genuine apology. the argument itself isn't brought up again, it isn't discussed, and it isn't resolved. (once again, the plot doesn't really allow for a heart-to-heart to occur, but i doubt it was ever addressed in the interim between s1 and s2. that being said, i can only go based on what we're actually shown, as opposed to any supposition of what did or did not happen/was or was not discussed in the missing four years!)

as for the apology dance; i think it's fair to summarise that crowley walks off, out of the bookshop, believing that he's fully in the right. he might later regret how the whole argument went down, but with the context of gabriel's words from s1 in mind, it's fair that crowley would consider that he doesn't have anything to apologise for. arguably, neither of them have anything to apologise for (from aziraphale's perspective, he's also in the right - essentially, the argument isn't as black and white as that!), but when crowley then learns of the BOL threat, it's then that he comes back to the bookshop.

again, look - im perfectly prepared to accept this entire exchange, the wording within it, as one big shared idiosyncrasy, and one that works for them. but there's a couple of things that make this not quite ring true to me.

the way crowley says the first line, offering an apology, suggests that if he were to say sorry, he wouldn't mean it. says it in a way that's very guarded, but also seems snooty and lofty, like he's above the act - and that it would be a reluctantly-given gesture

when aziraphale states that that's in fact what he wants, an apology, crowley doesn't actually say sorry. he admits that aziraphale was right - but that doesn't take accountability for his part in the spat, and even then he says it again like it pains him to say the words

there was a marvellous meta (by @esthermitchell-author!!!) that summed it up, that i'll link back when i get my hands on it, but the way that aziraphale says 'with the little dance' suggest that the dance is additional to an actual apology, that they're not one and the same. now, i personally see the dance's meaning a little differently - maybe? - that the dance is the thing to break the tension (ridiculous concept altogether but that's another post). in that context, crowley only does the dance, not the apology. that being said, aziraphale seems to accept the dance as the apology, so maybe that's that and nothing more to be said

ive said it before, but the way aziraphale rattles off the years where he's done it, and crowley immediately says that he 'doesnt do the dance', suggest to me - and pure speculation here, admittedly - that aziraphale has historically been the one to always apologise. we could see this as aziraphale having always been the one that's in the wrong... but i somehow doubt that to be the case. instead, it seems to be that aziraphale is pissed that he's always been the one to bend, to apologise, to keep the peace, to break the tension, and this time crowley can 'bloody well do it'. the way aziraphale performatively straightens his clothes and cocks his head suggests that crowley doing the dance is a novelty, and he's going to savour it... but i digress-

all of this to me feels that crowley, again, is dancing around accepting any accountability or responsibility for his part in the argument, and therefore the apology - if we conclude that aziraphale does accept the dance itself as an apology - isn't completely meant. take into account the context of why crowley flies back to the bookshop, it can also be seen that crowley will do whatever he needs to ensure that he can help aziraphale shelter/hide gabriel, and therefore protect aziraphale in the process; a means to an end, essentially.

(now of course anon, if there is an apology ive missed or something i haven't taken into account, please come back to me - these are just the two instances that i can recall off the top of my head, and my personal interpretation of them!!! but im always open to thinking about things differently).

there are also other instances where he's... rather poor at accepting his own accountability, but tbh it's LWA that's analysed and summarised this better than i ever could, so definitely worth having a root around in those asks too, for some extra reading!!! (link in my masterpost)✨

[unreadpoppy]

I should preface this post by saying that a lot of this is just me straight up taking shit out of my ass. No basis in canon whatsoever, only my interpretation and theory on things. So yeah, this is more of a opinion piece/headcanons than anything.

Haarlep says they were only ever sent to distract Raphael. Not gather information and report back, just distract.

And like yeah, sex can be a distraction but in the long run, I don't think it's that effective, like eventually, someone's gonna tire. And yeah, incubus do have that irrestible, charming thing, but idk if it works on other devils? I could be wrong but anyways, maybe it's to a lesser effect on devils than mortals and also, Raphael's a pretty smart guy, so he could figure out Haarlep wasn't a gift out of the goodness of Mephisto's heart but to serve as a distraction.

And like, giving his status, maybe Mephisto could have sent something that would really keep Raphael distracted for a long time, or at least, keep sending things/people, but he only ever sent one incubus and then a balloon thought popped into my head.

What if Mephisto sending Haarlep was a sort of "two birds one stone" situation. Like ok, stick with me as I explain this crazy ass thought that began occuring.

Maybe Haarlep did something to anger/upset Mephisto, and as punishment, he sends Haarlep as a gift to his son, who he also needs to be dealt with. And like why punishment? 1) so, based on what I said on my other post, I don't think Mephisto thinks that highly of his son, so sending soemone to a person he doesn't like could be kinda like "now you deal with this little shit" 2) I mean, you're taking someone from freaking Mephistar and throwing them to fucking Avernus, that is constantly being wrecked by war, i'd be pissed, 3) Haarlep is a full blooded fiend, so it could be seem as as slight to him to have to service a half-devil and 4) i think there's a humiliation aspect.

I think saying Haarlep was a "gift" is a strong word, considering what gifts are supposed to mean, but it could be the use Mephisto used like here take this incubus as a gift (even if the reality was to distract raphael). Giving someone to another person is dehumanizing them in a way, you don't seem them as a person, but as something that can be gifted around to others, so it could, in a way, almost be seen as Mephisto saying "this is how much you're worth. nothing."

And like, maybe Mephisto sent Haarlep, knowing/thinking/expecting them to not last long, for Raphael to kill them eventually and since they were in the hells, he wouldn't respawn. Like maybe he just wanted to get rid of Haarlep, with the added bonus of possibly distracting Raphael for some time.

And ok, this is where I get on that stuff about Raphael and Haarlep's relationship being more complicated than what we think. (again we are reaching headcanon material here).

Because ok, what if Raphael sees that this incubus that was sent to him is obviously a ruse, that he should probably get rid of them but despite everything, he sees potential. Haarlep can change his form, can 'suck people's souls out' (in quotes bc i'm paraprasing the game) and charm them. They could serve as a really good asset to Raphael with the added bonus of sex as a reward. Like we know he straight up will send his important clients directly to Haarlep, he doesn't just keep him around for sex or see them as just a toy.

Maybe, despite everything, Raphael lowkey gives back some agency to Haarlep? Like, I've said it before but I'll say it again, these two are like a constant game of contradictions in my eyes: they hate each other, they love each other, they can't live without the other, they drive each other mad. Maybe this is one of the """"sweeter"""" sides of their relationship (idk like that word for this but it's the only one that's showing up in my brain rn).

To reitarate: this is all my brain going bunkers, so don't take it too seriously and don't come for me.

[seraphtrevs]

@jarmes - I think it's finally time for me to figure out once and for all Hector's timeline, particularly concerning his prison sentence, because that has a huge impact on Hector's involvement in their lives.

(Math and sad Salamanca children under the cut)

I had worked out their ages previously here, but I think I've changed my mind on Tuco and the twins. The BrBa wiki is kind of all over the place with their ages (like the timeline sometimes lists different birth years than the character pages) and people edit the characters' pages every so often to change their birth dates - like Lalo was at 1957 for awhile, but now his page says 1960. (I am possibly the only person who cares enough other than the wiki editors to notice this akdsfj;sdljf) It's all just guess work based on scant canon clues and the actor's ages, so assume +/- a few years.

So. The wiki has Hector's birth year as somewhere between 1936 and 1939. Let's go with 1939 because that's the birth year on his character page.

Max was killed in 1989, which makes Hector 50 years old at the time. That seems to track. We know the twins were about 8 - 10 years old in 1988 because of the flashback in BrBa 3x07. (Here they are btw right after Hector nearly drowned Marco in case you feel like having your heart broken)

So that puts the twins' birth year at around 1980, which is what's on the wiki.

The wiki has Lalo's birth year as 1960 - I prefer 1957 because I want Lalo to be pushing 50 in BCS for reasons (old man enjoyer), but we'll use 1960. That makes him 28 at the time of Marco's near-drowning.

Tuco's age is all over the place, but the wiki has him born in 1972. That's a bigger gap between Lalo and Tuco than I like (I originally put him at 1961)...but I think 1972 probably makes more sense for reasons I will get into. So he's 17 in 1988.

All right, ages established. Now comes the hard part - when the fuck did Hector get sent to San Quentin? We know he was there for 17 years. He was a founding member of the cartel and probably active within it for a few years. So let's say he was about 30 when he was sentenced. 1939+30 = 1969 for the year he went to jail. 1969 + 17 = 1986 for the year he got out. That seems about right because in the 3x07 flashback, he seems to be up to speed in cartel business, so he's probably been out for a few years.

SO. What does this mean for his relationship with his nephews? It means Lalo was 9 when Hector went to jail. The twins and Tuco were not even born yet. When Hector got out of jail, the twins were 6 and Tuco was 14. Lalo was 26 - a grown man. I think that the murder of the professor that Lalo so fondly remembers probably occurred shortly after Hector was released from prison and itching to exercise some power again.

So Lalo was old enough to have fond childhood memories of his tio before he went to prison...but probably not quite old enough to start cartel conditioning. When we see the twins in the flashback, they are normal children, not dead-eyed killing machines.

Assuming Hector didn't start ramping up the abuse until he felt they were "old enough" to learn, Lalo was spared Hector's abuse because Hector was in jail during his formative years. Meanwhile, Tuco and the twins were impressionable minors who were nonetheless "old enough" in Hector's eyes to start "learning."

Lalo is nuts, but I think he was born with a screw loose rather than it being beaten into him. I agree with Tony Dalton's headcanon that his mother was a gringa and he was sent to school in the States, so the cartel wasn't his entire life as a child/young adult. He's much more well-rounded and functional than his cousins. Tuco and the twins, on the other hand, seem the kind of violent and unstable that sometimes comes with severe childhood abuse and are completely creatures of the cartel. And I think that was in large part due to Hector, who was perhaps the main father figure for them depending on when their fathers died. Hector didn't mold Lalo, but he did mold Tuco and the twins. Poor kids. :(

[elrielbaby]

I was thinking on my Acotar journey earlier today, and whilst I’ve been an elriel since my first read I wasn’t a staunch elriel until August/September of last year. It did not occur to me that there would be any other potential end game pairing for Azriel & whilst I knew Elain had a *potential* someone else, it seemed highly unlikely, given the formula of SJM’s writings and my knowledge as a reader of this genre. It was only until a got on tiktok and I was all of a sudden bombarded with G/Az posts that I was like what on earth? So I re read. First, I read the bonus chapter, then ACOSF. Then I fully re read the series, including ALL bonus chapters. I fully took my shipping goggles off & read as unbiasedly as humanly possible. On my first read of Azriels BC I could understand why someone might think there’s something romantic there, but something felt off. I couldn’t put my finger on it. There was nothing actually romantic in their interaction. His shadows seemed to have a reaction to her, but given that they tend to lighten around people he loves or when he’s happy, that didn’t feel like a particularly positive or negative thing. What caught me off guard was the necklace. It does not fit SJMs usual style of creating new ships, but to reuse the Secret, Lovely beauty line? Red. Flag. I remembered feeling a little suspicious of G in the beginning but as a casual reader I didn’t think too much about it, I was content to just wait until the next book came out. Then I start seeing patterns. I start reading tumblr posts about G being a lightsinger - it makes so much sense. But I don’t just do that. I look at the other side and their theories to make sure I’m being as thorough as possible - I don’t want to miss anything & I don’t want to set myself up for being upset when the next book comes out. Now, we are talking almost a year ago I was doing this research, so I can’t remember exactly what their theories were but I’m sure you can all take a guess. None of it was canon based & when they did pull from canon all context was either left behind or completely twisted into something else. So I spent a good couple of months on the fence. I kept my personal feelings on ships to one side because someone could convince me that g/Az wasn’t icky. That could happen. It did not, and I just felt even ickier about it. None of their theories stood up when you re read the books. And so here I am in my own personal elriel echo chamber & I couldn’t be happier to be here, or on this side of the fandom who make canon based theories and arguments. 💕

[averysjameson]

idk but saying jennifer lynn barnes sucks at writing romance because your ship wasn't canon is beyond hilarious to me like okay???? HAHHAHAHA. everyone has their own preferences of course but the vehement hatred for jlb and the belittlement of her writing on booktok and bookstagram (sometimes on here) has been ASTOUNDING.

a note about the "poorly done romance/love triangle" in tig: jlb never said it was going to be "even". no one ever said that. personally pioneering the idea that one character was "not given a chance" does not make it a poorly written love triangle or a poorly written romance. in love triangles, there is usually ALWAYS one option who is simply NOT a real option. look me in the eye and tell me characters jeremiah fisher, aspen in the selection series, gale hawthorne, adam kent, jacob black, and i'm sorry but grayson hawthorne amongst a myriad of others were actual contenders for the main character. if you believed they are/wanted them to be, that's great! but all of these characters are in well known love triangles and at the end of the day, books with love triangles WILL sell because they generate conversation and hype around the book. it is a marketing tactic and you are NEVER promised equal opportunity from both love interests. you losing the love triangle or that you believe there is wasted potential doesn't mean bad writing has occurred. also, for the love of god, while you are supposed to relate to a character, you are not the main character!! belly, america, katniss, juliette, avery, what have you, all chose based on who they are as characters. and also, female characters don't have to "experience" both love interests to make a decision. if they want to, that's totally fine, but specifically about avery bc this is what this blog is all about, she absolutely knows what she's "missing out" on with grayson and she doesn't care. shipping averygrayson just blatantly feels like ignoring avery's wants and needs.

anyway, if you want to call jlb's writing poorly done bc you didn't get your way, that's totally fine. you are entitled to your own opinion. it's just funny that you say that bc had grayson and avery been randomly thrown together in the epilogue of tfg or something, i have a feeling you wouldn't be of this opinion.

tldr; love triangles are a marketing tactic and you are neither entitled to a win nor is is poorly done/executed if you lose. love triangles, more often than not, have a clear winner from the beginning (coughcough "see? you're already his") but the debate and drama of another character sells the book.

[roobylavender]

im fairly new to batcomics so forgive me for this dumb ask/being uninformed, but do you ever have like. doubt in your reading for bruce as a character, or feel bleak about it (?) im aware you dont really like the reading of him as an abuser, but from what ive seen he most often does emotional neglect/distance and parentification of a child, which /are still/ abuse, and this happens very consistently. from what i can tell there is more evidence of him being a bad parent than otherwise. people often say hes incapable of having a child without messing them up beyond repair, and from what ive seen that rings true😭 i also know you said u dont like alot of his modern portrays, but these types of abuse also occur in older comics as well from what i can tell. i myself often have doubt (perhaps this is because i havent read everything yet and im still informing myself on his character)-that maybe this /is/ just his character, bc of HOW consistent the pattern is. idk if im really asking a specific question. im more so wondering what your thoughts are, like on parentificafion of his kids and emotional neglect/distance, would this be different if DC portrayed him more empathetically/based on your reading, and/or is he just fundamentally unable to parent someone without abusing them like some ppl say. i understand i may have just opened a whole can of worms lol but im so curious

you are totally fine! canon is quite overwhelming in both volume and scope, and conversations about bruce being an abuser definitely dominate at present (not wrongfully btw), so i don't blame people for ascribing to them early on. i will say at least from what i have read (and i will admit here that my pre-bronze age reading is not nearly as consistent as my post-bronze age reading so i have kept less track of specific writers and runs there) that i think the aspects that largely define present interpretations of bruce as an abuser tend to take from canon post-crisis onward. so that's probably why in a sense it looks like bruce has "always" been an abuser, bc realistically speaking if you're a new dc reader it makes most sense to start with the aftermath of the crisis and go from there. most conversations about "canon" tend to be about post-crisis canon (ie what has taken place on new earth/prime earth) and usually when you're looking up batman reading lists they will start with year one rather than with anything in pre-crisis. the crisis was nearly forty years ago after all! it covers a lot of territory and unless you're a really dedicated comic reader with a lot of time on your hands i don't think most people have the time or energy to go further back (to no fault of their own obv)

all that being said. pre-crisis canon is obv not monolithic in nature and there are definitely blogs out there who have dedicated themselves to compiling individual issues or moments they would personally interpret as evocative of abusive behaviors on bruce's behalf. i don't think that's inherently wrong to do per se and to each their own reading but my primary divide with that practice is that it's often performed within a vacuum. to me the most important thing when it comes to being a comics reader (or any kind of reader really) is taking into account real life context and genre conventions. how do the politics or culture of the time shape the way a given narrative is written and with what tone it's written? all of that is crucial to incorporate into an analysis. i'm going to use a pretty famous example of why. world's finest comics #153 (1965) is the origin of a pretty famous panel you may be familiar with:

on its face this looks pretty bad (and it'll actually factor into when i discuss parentification later) but contextually this issue imagined an alternate reality wherein superman was responsible for the death of bruce's parents and subsequently became the face of bruce's relentless revenge and pursuit of criminal activity. obv that's not a bruce who actually exists in reality and this was merely written for the sake of exaggeration and entertainment but it can also give rise to some interesting questions about what the writer here was specifically trying to satirize and why. primarily it's obv trying to poke some fun at the idea of bruce's crusade to begin with (which i am sure most people would agree was quite cartoonish in the early decades of dc despite the more layered portrayal and analysis it was afforded in later decades). but what's also pertinent here is the sort of "natural" exaggeration of bruce's dynamic with dick. in even as far back as the original bob kane comics, bruce and dick had a dynamic where dick was comedically portrayed as the more morally responsible one of the two. it wasn't much reason for concern back then bc the stakes weren't nearly as high and dick's tendency to question some of bruce's decisions (eg his tendency to always let selina go or to allow some villains to die horrifically) was almost always played off with a laugh. but the foundation was still there and you can recognize it in these panels despite that foundation obv being taken to an extreme. all of which is to say: the portrayal of bruce as an abuser largely depends on what a writer is willing to exaggerate, and why, and how. this issue was obv a one-off with no relevance to actual canon but it was nonetheless a peek into what that dynamic between bruce and dick could look like given a writer willing to pursue a darker tone and to explore the potential extremes of what was on its face merely a gag

the novelty of cape comics is that they are a place to explore anything and everything. extremes are possible bc no writer/artist and no editorial staff are ever on a book forever. what creatives want to explore with what they're given can hugely vary esp if a particular editorial staff is liberal enough to allow that exploration. and i think it's fair to say that a lot of writers are interested by the idea of that what if the above issue explored. not out of malice per se but certainly out of a growing curiosity as to how far disbelief with respect to the internal reality of cape comics can actually be suspended. the big question for batman in the 80s was whether having a kid sidekick constituted child abuse. this was primarily explored via the starlin run that ended in a death in the family. and obv following that we got the triple whammie of year three, a lonely place of dying, and knightfall. these arcs to me were what really cemented the foray into parentification in batman comics. the fledgling idea of it had always existed in a sense. dick was the more morally upright character of the two known for chiding some of bruce's decisions. he was the leader of the original teen titans, who historically demanded more respect and support of their mentors (i do not think it all inconsequential that dick and roy were developed so closely). and increasingly as we moved from the bronze age into the modern age we saw a dick who simultaneously desired to be independent of bruce and to be recognized by him. so the components to take that fledgling idea to its natural extreme were all there. editorial merely had to create the right circumstances to mesh those components together, and those circumstances were the buildup to and execution of the death of jason todd

i really do not think it can be underestimated in any sense what an enormous impact that event has had on the entire bat mythos at large. beyond utterly shattering the readers' suspension of disbelief wrt sidekicks' place in cape comics what a death in the family did was create an unavoidable void. this was not an event that could merely be skimmed over and moved on from. the aftermath and the consequences had to be dissected to their fullest extent otherwise batman editorial risked falling into the exact same problem the crisis was written to avoid: circular and aimless continuity. everything had to have concrete, forward moving direction and the consequences had to matter long term for there to be meaningful character development. so when you created the circumstances for a child dying bc batman had him gallivanting around as a masked vigilante, he had to retreat into his shell and utterly fall apart from the guilt of it all while everyone else fought like hell to keep him standing. it was pretty riveting and compelling. knightfall is probably one of my favorite arcs ever despite how utterly boring it is bc the introspection into bruce and his breakdown following jason's death was superb. but the circumstances it created for everyone else in bruce's vicinity to act like his emotional crutch while he took the next decade to recover obv had significant long-lasting consequences. dick had to be relegated to acting as the go-to family man rather than ever again pursuing his own dreams as he had in the 80s and early 90s. when jason came back he had to deal with all of bruce's grief and guilt being projected onto him while his own concerns went unheard. tim had to spend his teenage years deluding himself into believing he was the only one who could hold gotham together while bruce was falling apart. cass had to expend an enormous effort trying to prove herself to bruce bc all of the built up circumstances from the last decade drove him to insane paranoia about having sidekicks at all. and damian had to deal with whatever bruce had become by the time all of that was over

all of this to say: do i think bruce was always meant to become an abuser? not really. but did editorial avail themselves of and relentlessly pursue narrative circumstances that allowed that path to be realistically taken? absolutely. it's ultimately a debate of whether or not you agree they should have taken that direction long term. and i know it may look like i would probably be a hard no on that but personally i find myself more in the middle between these two imaginary camps. bc i'm not unsatisfied with what knightfall explored. i found it hugely interesting to explore the natural conclusion of bruce taking all burdens upon his shoulders and making himself highly vulnerable to collapse bc he refused to open up to anyone out of a fear of burdening them in turn. but knightfall was also followed by contagion and legacy and no man's land and murderer and fugitive. it was bruce taking one hit after another until he was utterly ripped to the core and had to start over from scratch and ig that's what i fundamentally disagree with. i don't think they needed to have gone any further than where knightfall took him and to me the end of knightfall should have signaled that bruce was ready to turn a new leaf where he could healthily balance his emotional commitments without letting them be guided by fear. publishing comics takes a long time so i think people often forget that despite there being a decade worth of comics between the events i immediately listed above what actually transpired in real time in the pages was two years or less. if we want to go all of the way back to a death in the family and account for that as well it becomes four years. four years isn't at all a long time nor is it unsalvageable. but by the time knightfall was over i truly think editorial was so obsessed with its own ideas on exploring bruce's collapse that it failed to see little else in the way of that. everything became about how people responded to him rather than about how bruce responded to the world. ironically by being the main character of his books he became the maker of his own demise. bc everything and everyone had to relate to him and his problems first before they could ever have any of their own. that is why keeping him in a perpetual state of emotional collapse has been so profitable. it is the easiest way to tell a story without ever having to make an effort on anyone else in it

note: one clarification i forgot to make earlier is that everything i wrote above is specifically with respect to bruce’s emotional abuse. i personally think there is zero justification for bruce’s physical abuse and that it can’t actually be extrapolated from anything about him as a character at the core, so whenever writers resort to it in the pages i dismiss it completely

[chirpsythismorning]

What 'early breakups' are you even talking about? Steve and Nancy's? Lucas and Max's? Nancy and Steve broke up in an 'ambigious' way and it happened what? After the Party mess and when Nancy was drunk... so that did not exactly even happen that early into the season. Lucas and Max were broken up off-screen so they could get together.

They want Milvn to break up permanently in an unambiguous way, without any possibility of them romantically getting together while at the same time asserting their importance to each other on a personal sense with the show's narrative.

How's an early and quick breakup where El just goes 'i am done bye' does that, with the knowledge we have that El drew strength from Mike based on love, not hatred. The words 'Mike's hands were pulling her from her drowning' and other variations are not about El drawing strength from anger...

Sorry if you felt like I was calling you delusional. Pointing out that the almost entire fandom is willing to ignore canon narrative is not calling someone delusional it is just a fact. It's not even an interpretation.

We cannot expect to really expect anything going into S5 when the fandom almost consistently ignores canon and prefers to go by fanon instead. All the analyses then become heaaaaavy handed but very misguided expectations from an analyzing standpoint.

Yes all of those couples followed a somewhat similar pattern of breaking up early on. But specifically the Steve/Nancy/Jonathan love triangle is what I’m referring to.

In s1 they separated early on and the rest of the season Jonathan and Nancy were a focus, which allowed us to root for them the whole season, besides the beginning and end. In s2, they had their fight at the beginning revolve around Nancy not being able to say I love you, which allowed us to root for them for the rest of the season and followed by them getting together.

Mike literally refers to him and El’s fight in s4 as 'a fight that you can’t come back from', a fight that paralleled his sister’s fight with her first boyfriend, who she also ended up being broken up with after that incident, not years later, because we all know that that wasn't a fight you could just push under the rug and save for another time, it had to be addressed.

The thing is, the time jump for s5 is likely to occur early in the season, because the cast's age difference is something they don’t want to be too distracting. The earlier the time jump, the more they film stuff post time jump, accommodating to that age gap between s4-5.

So having Mike and El’s break up be midseason, means that’s Mike and El would presumably be ignoring all of the deep and very hard to ignore problems in their relationship, for those initial epiosdes, and then for another 1-2 years depending on how long the time jump is, which I just don't see happening. I don't see them putting on a show of a romantic relationship for much longer, and that's based on how S4 ends. For them to go from not talking and staying within at least like 3 feet of each other in those last moments, tells me that they're not going to be gravitating towards each other the way romantic love interests do, the way Mike and Will are doing at the end of the season in direct contrast.

I think holding off on it until mid-s5, is arguably even more ambiguous than what I would imagine is going to happen if it’s addressed sooner rather than later. Because that would mean them just awkwardly dancing around it and acting like it's not going to happen, even though we know it's inevitable.

Because Mike and El’s problems were highlighted in s3-4 in a big way. We saw how especially in s4 neither of them were being honest in their relationship. The romantic love there was lacking because neither of them were in it for genuine reasons, in terms of genuinely being in love and wanting to be together in a romantic way.

El craved normalcy bc she has always had so many things in her life making her feel different. Mike and his relationship with El is all he knows. And s4 made a point to build up just how impossible it is for them to keep this going and act like everything is okay when it’s not. Like did you see early s4, the fake sort of show they put on to act like everything was fine? Why would s5 be repeat of that? Why wouldn't they evolve that to show that their conflict is no longer something they can ignore, and instead convey that it was indeed a fight they can't come back from.

And I personally do not think that the break up is just going to be an 'I’m done, so bye!' scenario 🤣. Even if it was midseason, it wouldn’t be like that either.

It's a lot more likely that how El felt about their fight in early s4, and how she felt about his monologue, is going to at least be addressed and acknowledged in early s5, because the audience deserves that closure of knowing how El truly feels, with her being able to say it. Meaning that if they stayed together in early s5, we’d also need El in early s5 saying she loves Mike too and to actually resolve that conflict with her actually being able to even respond to it.

And with them breaking up and byler being endgame inevitable, I just highly doubt they’re going to play this game all over again, only to rip it away haphazardly.

She started the show barely being able to say a couple of words. And now despite the fact that she can talk and speak for herself, she hasn't been granted that affordance in the narrative. Instead her brother confessed her love for her, using all things that applied to him. If they wanted to give us El's genuine feelings about Mike, they wouldn't be identical to her brothers and given from him. That's just soooo sad and not fair for anyone in this situation and that's why it needs to be addressed.

We know she was upset with Mike calling her a superhero in their fight, we know that she looked at him with this frustration that he was still not getting it. That was like the climax of their fight in her room, with her looking at him with fed up determination, because saying something like that was the last thing she wanted to hear. And if anything, her experience at Nina, where Brenner told her she needed to fly and revealed that he used her to find Henry from the very beginning, how would Mike saying she could fly and she's his superhero, be something that provides her comfort, when if anything it's just a similar thing being expected of her, without her having any say in it?

The whole You're regressing Eleven is literally hinting at this idea that El is holding onto something in her life that is keeping her in the past, in a situation that makes her development sort of go backwards, and that is in large part highlighting her holding onto this idea that her and Mike are peak romance, despite the fact the that he isn't loving her the way she deserves. By staying with Mike despite knowing both of them are unhappy and forcing it at this point, is a huge regression to all of this build up leading to an inevitable separation, then being followed by them finally accepting themselves in each others lives without the obligation to be together because they met in the woods a few years ago and have felt this pressure to stay together ever since.

In their fight, she didn't want Mike to point to her powers as a way to deflect her genuine feelings about their relationship and her insecurities with him not being able to love her the way she wants, as a person and not as someone who can keep saving the day for him. And so how would him again saying she is a superhero, HIS superhero, suddenly be what she wants to hear in the end after everything she went through?

The problem with that moment in the script is that it's the only thing that is supporting the assumption she was happy with Mike's monologue. Everything else in the story goes against that. All of s4 makes it very clear that that was not what El wanted from Mike.

This is a big part of the reason byler makes sense, because they follow an I didn't say it/You didn't have to approach to love (show don't tell). Mike never should have had to say I love you for El to believe it. If it was something genuine between them, completely natural like breathing, El wouldn't have asked of it from him. But he made a point to struggle with merely writing it, avoiding it at all costs, making El feel even more insecure that there was something wrong with her causing Mike not to love her anymore. And the monologue didn't fix that.

You don't have to apologize but you also don't have to get upset and say everyone in the fandom is wrong, but you're right. If you truly believe that, continue to and leave other people alone. If people are on their posts saying how they feel and it upsets you, block them.

My problem is that everything leading up to byler, that makes it make sense, is at it's core what lead to Mike and El having conflict in the first place. And not addressing that and leading on Mike and El fans, for shock value isn't exactly good for the narrative. And it's never been good for the narrative which is why they like to address it early on so that we can move on to focusing on the pairing that they want us to root for.

Arguably, a break up before the time jump allows for byler to get together well after Mike and El separated instead of mere days/weeks. I would think with how much people are going to have a hard time with considering byler as it is, the time jump happening after Mike and El's break up would allow them to accept that Mike and El are for sure done and have been done for a while, and Will isn't some rebound because Mike is feeling insecure and he'll just be with him the second him and El end things.

How I imagine a mid-season 5 break up is that it would be even more ambiguous than an early one, because it would require El and Mike to ignore their problems for five episodes when there really is no reason to do that with how obvious it was that their fight was a fight that you couldn't come back from. And addressing that is what will allow us to watch El actually experience closure on screen and then be able to focus on Max and working with everyone to beat Vecna. If the whole audience is watching at the edge of their seat being led on the whole season that Mike and El have a chance of getting back together, they're not going to be able to focus on El's arc as an individual character, bc they're going to be waiting for Mike and El to make up and be together.

But then when it doesn't happen, and they've been led astray unnecessarily even more than the previous 2 times, we'll only have a mere 4 episodes to build up them being a platonic pairing with it being blatantly obvious that the audience needs to accept it AND that we need to accept Mike and Will being romantic.

Whereas with an early s5 break up, by episode 3-4 we will know that they are not together and can focus on the new conflicts that have arose from the final season, because dragging on stuff that has already been heavily built up in s4 as being a problem, just to give us the most obvious anti-climactic outcome halfway through in the middle of all the new storylines they are focused on, would fall flat.

Mid-season is likely going to be made up of Mike and Will having a substantial amount of time alone. That's something that those early break-ups allows, so that we can have that development for them that is necessary in order for them to be endgame. Arguably as Mike and Will are going through that, El isn't going to be around to break up with him.

If anything I could see an early s5 breakup, with the audience being aware of it, but not Will. This would mean that Mike and Will's interactions could still be interpreted as romantic comfortably, but we would see for the first time Mike pining and Will still assuming that Mike could never feel the same, until maybe mid-season he finds out that they are indeed not together.

I can't subscribe to the monologue when all of the conflict leading up to it makes it abundantly clear that isn't what El wanted to hear. And we would see in mid-season 5 that El is just going to end up saying all of the stuff we already knew. She's not stupid. She knows that something is off with Mike, that was the whole point from the beginning. That inner struggle he is having is even more heightened and made obvious by the fact that Will was what encouraged Mike to say I love you in the first place. She heard all of that. And then she proceeded to ignore them at the cabin.

How s4 ended is not at all giving the impression El is going to start s5 by gravitating towards Mike and looking to him for comfort, it was actually the direct opposite.

If I were to subscribe to the monologue being a convincing love confession to El, at that point I'd rather Mike and El just stay together instead of holding off even more on facing the truth about the conflict of their relationship that didn't just get fixed by the words I love you. I'd rather byler didn't end up together if Mike is just stringing El along to inevitably choose Will over her anyways at the last minute.

I do think that I love you is what El thought she wanted to hear from Mike, but not like that. And it would be a disservice to her character to have the focus be on her hoping he might choose her for any longer, only for him not to.

If a bunch of people are interpreting the show this way, then there's a good chance that they could be right. We were right about byler being endgame and all of our reasoning is supported by the conflict that has been building up for seasons, and that love confession that paralleled to El beating Henry in 79', doesn't look like one rooted in love, whereas that first face off was. Mike's monologue was bathed in red, El's memory of her birth bathed her in light.

Will on the other hand is bathed in light from Mike's perspective, most prominently at the end of s4. That wasn't in the script, does that mean it's not important? Almost all of bylers moments aren't in the script, does that mean everything about them means nothing?

Feel free to subscribe to whatever you want to. If you end up being right you can say I told you so and live with that satisfaction! Personally, if I'm right, I won't feel the need to come and say I told you so, bc it's not about some sort of vindication for me. I don't even plan on doing that to redditors bc they're going to be dealing with that enough as it is. I'd rather them just insist we're crazy right now and let it all unfold and let the show speak for itself. If I have to subscribe with everything they think bc of the scripts, then I'd be pretty bored rn because all of the evidence for byler would essentially mean nothing and they're just being put together for no reason. All of that lead up meant something, otherwise their endgame wouldn't be satisfying, least of all if El is once again being framed as waiting for Mike to choose, only to not choose her this time. She deserves so much better than that. They all deserve better than that.

Will on one hand assuming for a little longer that Mike doesn't feel the same merely drags out the mutual pining leading to that endgame. El assuming for a little longer that Mike does feel the same is just making her plot regressive for no reason when she could be finally getting that independance arc, truly separated from being linked to Mike in a way that prevents her from truly progressing and knowing her worth and living up to that authentically.

We'll have to wait and see. But I don't see the use in coming in other peoples inboxes and directing your dissatisfaction with their interpretation of things as contradicting yours and so they need to just drop it and subscribe to what you think or else...

Everyone on here can interpret things how they want since there is still a season left and everything is still up in the air. If you want to blow off steam and say your piece on your profile, then do that and if other people resonate with it then that's great! You don't have to force other people to involve themselves with your narrative. If people are doing that to you, you have every right to block them because you also shouldn't have to have people in your inbox saying that your interpretation of things is wrong.

I'll continue to analyze and break things down as I choose. That's not stopping anytime soon. And IDK why you would want others to. It would be pretty dead on here if we all just stopped and believed everything we've been told superficially despite everything we've been shown contradicting that. If everything we're being told is all there is to it, you could argue byler isn't even happening. But most of us can agree that isn't the case.

I hope you can continue to analyze how you view things and embrace your interpretation instead of tearing others' down. We still have two years left, let's not make this more unnecessarily unbearable than it needs to be.

[oozmium]

I've finally beaten vengeance and while there's a variety of thoughts swimming in my head abt it, I think the one that really sticks out to me is just how women-centric the Canon of Vengeance is, especially comparing it to other Atlus games' handling of their female characters (continued below the cut with spoilers including endgame ones)

So with the new route (I'll refer to it as CoV from this point on), we have our new re-release girl Yoko joining the cast, which leads to a lot of development for both her and Tao (as they end up bouncing off each other ideologically). Then we also have our advertised villain group in the Qaditsu, again comprised of women. Then, as you start up the game and play the opening hours, you notice Miyazu is getting much more attention than she ever had in the entirety of the original storyline.

For the most part, it's almost as though the male characters of the cast are either pushed aside (such as Dazai, who's development ends up occurring offscreen for the most part) or their actions are driven because of a woman (for Yuzuru, his desire to protect his sister is on blatant display; then you have Yakumo bowing out of the race for the throne because his other half is gone; Khonsu is just as devoted to Miyazu in CoV, but it extends to helping her enact vengeance against the person she blames for her brother's death). This even extends (in my eyes) to Aogami and Koshimizu: Aogami, as he pushes the protag away, promising that she (in likely reference to Tao) is waiting for him and Koshimizu, who uses the last of his magatsuhi to save the respective goddess of creation you sided with. I'd dare say the protagonist essentially acts as the vessel for our two reps (Tao and Yoko) to create the world they want (with the way these girls talk to each other, it really made me wonder why the protag was even there lol. Glorified escort much? lolol)

There's also the way the Qaditsu play on your expectations. If you read their compendium entries or understand the basis of their lore, what unites these ladies together is Samael. The game doesn't even name the being the Qaditsu are attempting to reawaken until the moment they succeed in summoning her; you might spend the entire time either clueless to who they'll awaken or assume they're trying to revive Samael. But instead, Tiamat—another goddess—is revived. Samael doesn't even have any substantial relation to the Qaditsu either, based off the endgame sidequest where you're tasked to kill him; they were simply a means to an end, so to speak (in dismantling the rule of the bull god). And he only attempts to avenge them as a fellow serpent/one oppressed by the bull god rather than for any personal relation. (Also bc Mastema sends you to kill him. lol)

Anyway, it's been refreshing to see how the girls were handled in CoV. Especially coming off 4a (bleh), the contrast is really stark.

[bylertruther]

Im like slash gen confused on the gnc debate like what sparked this. Will is canonically the most visibly gay out of everyone in the show according TO the show, so why are people so against it? Like I get headcannoning mike as gnc but that doesn’t take away or mean that Will isn’t bc he canonically is. I’m Actually confused

I wish I knew lmao. People think that calling him that or acknowledging the misogyny involved in being assumed to be gay due to a perceived lack of masculinity is somehow homophobic and enforcing stereotypes. As if refusing to acknowledge a very real phenomenon that still occurs now and thus insinuating that "those" kinds of gay people are invalid is somehow morally correct lmao.

Will is the ONLY character who is called all of the many slurs he faces and he's the only character we've seen be targeted for his sexuality. Will has never done anything with boys—he doesn't get called a fairy because of that, he gets called a fairy because of the way he acts and how he exists outside of what Hawkins deems to be acceptable masculinity.

We know that he's a sensitive kid who isn't like anyone else and who gets made fun of. They call him names and they make fun of his clothes among other things. The words used to describe him—gentle, soft spoken, sensitive, artistic—were all euphemisms for gay (and still are in some places, since the internet does not reflect real life and we do not live in a homophobia-rid utopia). Like, this is part of his character design. Those are the words of the Duffers themselves. He's the only character that experiences any of that. If you want to consider actor opinion, too, Noah has spoken for years about how Will feels like he doesn't fit in anywhere, that he's sensitive, scared of everything, he's the one that takes care of his friends emotionally, and so on and so forth.

I don't know why it's such a big issue or why it's something so many people are, like... unwilling to even consider. Men get called gay whenever they're deemed "not masculine enough." Nonconforming behavior is a part of Will's homosexuality and that nonconforming behavior is what clued the people of Hawkins in to who he is. They could've just called him a twerp, or called him a nerd the way they do Mike, but they don't. Instead, they call him gay and a fairy and his father calls him the f slur and he has people ranging from his peers to adults talking about his sexuality. Like, not even Robin gets that treatment lol. Will is literally the only one, and they went out of their way to show us that first thing.

Will isn't a stereotype. Not being super masculine does not equal being super feminine. Gender nonconformity is not about just what you look like, and it's based on your society's values as a whole, not your personal leftist values. Feminine gay men exist and have done so much for our community, and seeing people inadvertently hate on them online makes me wanna throw bricks. Headcanons are not canon, and discussing canon is not a diss to anyone's headcanons because those are two different discussions.

This was one of those things that I naively thought everyone knew only to post about it online and receive so much hate about it. People get really defensive when you talk about how Mike is canonically written. The same thing would happen whenever I'd post in support of Mike with a sword. People really act like you're disrespecting them personally and get super petty and spiteful, and I don't get it. Have your headcanon if you want, but don't get upset that it's just that: a headcanon.

The Duffers nor Finn speak about Mike the way they do, and the behavior Mike has exhibited on screen does not support the wimpy, meek, known by everyone to be gay caricature that they cling to and suggest is actually canon. If it was JUST a headcanon to them, then they wouldn't get so upset about it, but they do. They don't like the way Mike's sexuality has been depicted thus far, and now it's everyone else's problem, too.

There's more than one way to be gay, and those experiences help shape who we are. Will has never fit in and instead has always stuck out. The fact that he's never been allowed inside, so to speak, is why he tries his best to embrace/explore his otherness and clings to people who can make him feel better for being different. Mike has always been Wrong—deemed a nerd, then a hellion, then a satanist—but he's able to blend in well enough to not be found out. He gets mocked and bullied, but at least he can pass as straight and be targeted for that instead of his sexuality. He still has a shot at conforming and playing by the rules, even if it isn't fulfilling or something that comes naturally to him. This is in part why he became so attached to Eleven and why he struggles to accept that he can still be worthy without her.

I just... I don't know, man. I'm confused, too, lol.

[marchingxiezhi]

Yip Tak

- I have put a custom pin on his courtyard that has the distinction of being the first custom pin I actually named instead of just leaving as custom pin

- I wonder who does his voice it’s good

-does this confirm that Gaming technically has a last name? This discussion was going around a lot when he was first announced and people were mad it was spelled Gaming instead of Ga Ming like Hu Tao but Hu Tao’s name is written like that because Hu is her family name. She’s like the kamisatos etc. same with Yun Jin. NPC dialogue often refers to them as Director Hu or Miss Yun. A guide for intl fans on naming conventions I read back in MDZS fandom explained that at least for mainland China you never really address someone by only one syllable, it’ll always have a title or honorific or reduplication or you’ll use family name and given name together to bypass this (diaspora communities are different) Gaming’s given name is Gaming, it’s intentionally pronounced and written in canto instead of mandarin, and it matches the syllable conventions of every other character in the game who only goes by given name so like. I’m personally not going to hyphenate it or add a space bc I feel like ppl r being annoying by prioritizing how “goofy” it looks in English over the way it’s just a name, like, inverse kind of annoying as people who are pronouncing it gaming but still myopically western centric. But ANYWAY! There are a lot of playable characters in the game with canonical last names that aren’t part of their unit name (why is inazuma so heavy on last names) like Eula Lawrence or Mika Schmidt or Dori Sangemah Bay. In an explainer on why Gaming isn’t romanized Ga Ming, someone on Twitter said Xiangling is technically Mao Xiangling because it’s more likely Chef Mao is referred to by family name, a thought that did not occur to me earlier. AnyWAY all this is to say that based on how Yip Tak is referred to in dialogue as Uncle Yip etc Gaming’s full name is Yip Gaming. Or. I guess it would be if he wasn’t like. Disowned.