#bc it’s kind of impossible for it to fully have that when she’s already a year into this huge tour

[stateofgracetaylorsversion]

i’m absolutely not complaining about ttpd as an album, i love it even more than i thought i would, but i do kind of wish she would’ve waited to release it until after the eras tour was over so it could’ve gotten its own tour :/ like the visuals and the stage design and the outfits are just sooo good and not only is it being cut down into only seven songs so it can fit into an already massive setlist, but everyone who went to the shows in the us, mexico, south america, asia, and australia — aka a huge portion of the tour dates — didn’t get to see any of it live. like it’s so impressive that taylor was able to add the ttpd section into the existing setlist but i can't help but feel disappointed bc this means we likely won't get a ttpd tour, which is something i would kill to see </3

[crunchycrystals]

ok it takes me a while to form opinions on albums so know rn that my opinions on ttpd are 100% going to change so much this week but like i like a handful of them????? but id really prefer if shed start focusing more on quality over quantity

[redcherrykook]

──𐙚 delicate seashell - beach vibe, hotel sex

────୨ৎ────

content: friendgroup beach trip, hotel sex, penetrative sex, sweet loving, kind of body worship, established relationship, oral (fem), "gguk" bc its hawt

note from cherry: ignore the typos pls it's late :(

────୨ৎ────

summer hit seoul like a ton of bricks, the usual rainy weather turnings into 40 degree Celsius heat, living without aircon? Impossible.

For the first week of vacation that your work has granted, your far less busy friends and boyfriend all gather up for a trip

Fuck it, let's fly to jeju and enjoy the seaside while the sun lasts

Although blaring and someone unbearable from sweat drenched clothes, noting beats a beach day with enough suncream and fruit to cool off

"Soojin, are you gonna be ready soon?" namjoon calls out, your best friends boyfriend being just as impatient as she is,

"Seriously? We just started getting ready!" She shouts back, rolling her eyes at the closed door,

Sully who's also your childhood bestie, and you share a giggle at Soojin's typical behavior

"Baby?" a soft voice calls out for you, sticking his head into the small gap of the huge hotel bathroom, three girls still in pj's that are busy with skincare and waterproof mascara or the perfect bun all inside

His eyes only land on you, if the other two didn't speak, you're sure he wouldn't even have noticed

"Kook? You okay?" You turn, caressing his head with your hand,

"Yeah, we're gonna ahead though, if that's cool with you? Like, set up the chairs and drink station" he says, now stepped fully inside the doorframe, his hands finding your tshirt covered waist immediately

"If you promise not to look at girls in bikinis?" you raise an eyebrow, cracking into a smile shortly after

And my god did he look irresistible, already in swim shorts with that white muscle shirt that did nothing but show off his ripped body, big arms fully on display and his abs peaking out from the side of the opening

He tsk's , kissing your forhead softly

"You're crazy ma, you know damn well i only care for you" his voice is delicate when he speaks,

"Ew gross get out already" sully yells, even though she's 3 meters away from him

"Grooooosss they boutta start fucking in here" Soojin adds, making a disgusted face for you to see in the mirror

Jungkook laughs, "Sure ladies, take your time" surrendering to the fight against two very protective best friends, he leaves the room

Leaving you to continue your grwm session, 30 mins later, all three off you leave in your bikinis, bags stuffed with change of clothes, hairbrushes and something to keep you distracted

"what the fuck" your boyfriend mutters when he spots you from afar,

Even while laying on a foldable chair, just being able to make out your silhouette in the distance is enough to make him drool, willing to drop to his knees for any taste of you he can get

The dirty thoughts only become louder urges when you stand in front of him, setting your bag down,

As if the tiny, red triangle- tie up bikini doesn't already reveal enough to him, the way you bend down right there, tits almost falling out of their hold, pushed together by the bikini throws him off even more

He's sweating, nervously thinking how he would be able to keep his dick soft for hours if you're gonna walk around like that

"Baby" he says sternly, the look in his eyes letting you know that you're playing with fire, but you don't seem to care, smiling at him when you lay down on the chair right beside his,

"Ahhh, the breeze is so nice" you hum, closing your eyes momentarily to take in the roaring waves and rays of sunlight

Unable to stop himself for devouring you with his eyes, he just allows it

Tracing over your collarbones, the way your waist dips in before the squishy roundness of your hips, how your thicker thighs press up against the chair, making the string bottom appear even smaller on your covered cunt

It cant get worse, right?

Unless you decide on what you're doing right now, letting your beautiful hair out of the bun's restraint, shiny stands flowing messily over your chest area

You notice his obvious staring, looking at his needy eyes and spotting the suspicious looking bulge inside his swimmers,

Jaehyun shoots Jungkook a look as if to say "you cannot be serious" once he also notices the effect your innocent swim attire has on the younger friend

You stand up from the chair abruptly, while looking at Jungkook's dick you noticed how muscular and comfortable his thighs look,

"Baby please" he whispers into your ear, your ass planted down right on his bulge, the tiny string doing nothing to create an extra barrier

His hands move to caress your thighs, his chest pressed up against your back while he's trying his best not to grind you down on him in front of your whole friend group

"Namjoon, you need to cover my back well" Soojin says to her boyfriend when turning around and jungkook is sure he will thank her for this to the end of time, something in his brain lights up,

"Oh shit, i totally forgot about sunscreen. Lets go grab it" his finger nudges your side, a clear clue for you to agree and get up with him,

Why would you ever deny him anyways?

Your friends watch you leave hand in hand, rushing back for... the sunscreen..

"They're gonna fuck aren't they" Sully says, looking over to the rest with an annoyed look,

"Yep" Soojin answers, popping the p at the end,

"Whatever i'm going in" jaehyun announces, dragging sully up with him to push the unsuspecting girl into the water

"Fuck baby this bikini is too sexy, i can't take it" Jungkook says against your skin, immediately attaching himself to your neck the second the door shuts

He's gentle but desperate in his kisses, moving along messily but not putting on too much pressure, kissing his way all along your jawline, down to your neck and collarbones where be begins to nibble,

"So pretty, this body of yours is driving me crazy" his soft moans make your skin react, goosebumps spreading fast while you run your fingers along the muscle of his shoulder

He unties your top in no time, kissing and licking at your nipple while his hand stimulates the other one, groping and tugging on the pink flesh ws gently as he can

"Feels so good gguk" your nails dig into his shoulders, chest arching into his mouth with loud whimpers of pleasure flowing from your lips,

He responds by moaning, biting down on your nipple softly before switching sides, teasing and kissing with so much love

"I love your tits so much, they are perfect so perfect" Jungkook stops, big doe eyes looking up at you with need, one hand moves down to cup your pussy,

"let me eat it please , i wanna taste you so bad baby, please let me eat that sweet little pussy out" the way his desperation becomes evident in his pleas instantly weakens your will to tease him, nodding to him with a small bite to your lip

He wastes no time carrying you to the soft silk of the hotel bed, spreading your legs with his hands and dragging the string down from your hips,

"Mnhmm baby you smell so good" his kisses trail down your abdomen until they halt on the outside of your pussy, moving to your inner thighs instead, his hands working to caress you in the meantime

"Gguk please" you whine, squirming under the soft touch of his hands running down the inside of your thigh,

He smiles, leaning his head down between your thighs, right in front of your glistening cunt,

Thumbing your clit side to side, he takes a second to admire you, back arched just for him

"Cute pussy, all mine"

"Mghmm yes!" your high voice cries out, fingers finding his small locks and engulfing them into you, tugging at them while simultaneously pushing his head further into your neediness

"Just like that" you continue rambling, grinding your heat against his skilled, warm tongue that's working hard to lapp up all your juices

His tongue is tireldessly pushing into your hole, fucking you until you can't help but shake,

"You taste so good pretty"

"Prettiest girl" he whispers, blowing some air on your swollen clit, his cock throbbing inside his swimshorts as much as your soaked entrance

"Want your cock please baby!"

He stops, pressing a kiss to your cunt before crashing his covered lips onto yours, your hands busying with his shorts, pulling his hard on out with a sigh

Then, you turn sideways to kiss his neck, licking over his sweet spots and making him moan until he can't wait anymore, gently lowering your back on the bed and aligning his stiff dick against your entrance

"God so tight" he whines, hands getting lost in the flesh on your hips, you moan from feeling so full,

His bicep flexes while he begins thrusting into you, as needy and hot as it is, he's slow and firm nonethelss, keeping his eye contact with you

"You're beautiful" he smiles, referring to so much more than your tits slapping against each other erotically, than your little cunt drenched in slick or your soft face in the sunlight, he means everything, every little detail on your skin, that mole on your neck, that sound from your lips, the way you touch him, the way you love him

"You feel so so good, so pretty too ggukie" your moans are genuine and long, not hasty or in a rush to release

He does feel himself get close when you begin touching his torso, abs flexing with the little touches and his cock becoming more and more desperate to paint your gummy walls white

Savoring the moment with a passionate kiss, he caresses your hips and listens carefully to your moans,

"Almost there pretty, cum for me" his encouragement drives you up the edge, the, getting pushed over it by his finger drawing small circles on your oversensitive clit

You cum blissfully, coating his cock in your essence while he paints you with his, smiling into ths open mouthed, messy kiss

"Mhm.. i love you" he breathes out, kissing your cheek repeated, his softer cock remaining inside you

"I love.. you too jungkook" you reciprocrate, pressings a tiny kiss to his nose

The romantic moment is disturbed by your phone buzzing,

Soojin: did u find the suncream or did he cream you instead?

Both of you giggle, sending a selfie that shows both of you are probably naked, happy and definitely naked.

── ‧ ୨୧ @luvismenu

[yuellii]

catching floating clouds ( i’m in stupid love )

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐓𝐔𝐃𝐘 ;; the heart-stopping, stomach-twisting, gut-wrenching way in which they fall hopelessly in love with you

feat. neuvillette, ayato, baizhu, kaveh ( separately )

notes. gn reader, heavily inspired by @miyosei who you should check out bc she is much better at this than i am, really felt like thinking about my favorite genshin men

NEUVILLETTE falls in love like fresh springtime.

There’s a certain silence in the air that catches his breath, one that forces him to breath in so deeply, he might as well consider himself human. It’s new, like a flower bloom in the spring where the air is crisp and the mornings are tranquil.

He takes notice of it, of course. It was impossible not to when the mere thought of you swarmed his head in instances he needed it most. Amidst expense reports, amidst case filing—you more often than not somehow make your way back into his head. And despite such shortcomings creating an imbalance in his work life, he can’t seem to hate it.

Perhaps he’s fallen ill, or perhaps there was something in the air as of late that has him feeling all sorts of things. Because this feeling was all so fresh, so new, he might’ve sought for it.

Your touch is akin to the end of summertime, when days are hazy and he finds a moment of relaxation. Your voice is a serenity like harp strings attached to his heart; and for once, he feels human.

And suddenly, he begins to notice the simpler things in life that he hadn’t noticed before. Fontaine waters have never smelled so fresh since before he fell in love with you, nor did the evening clouds ever looks so ethereal. These emotions you gave him were a gift from the Gods, showering him in the blessings and beauty of human life. And at the center of it all, it was you, the one who made him human.

KAMISATO AYATO falls in love in hesitance.

You prove to be difficult to get out of his head. He’s frustrated, he’s furious, and he’s fallen so fully in love.

There’s a tinge of stress that comes with the realization, like you’re another item of baggage to add onto his already-tired shoulders; another piece of food dropped onto his full plate, but he somehow hates himself for comparing you to such burdening analogies. You didn’t deserve that.

He likes you. He wishes he didn’t.

Only despondency clogs the air when he thinks of you, late-night thoughts in the dim glow of his office as he twirls his pen between his fingers. His hand movements are the only thing stable right now, for his mind was in disorderly disarray at the shambles of his emotions. Gods, he was in love with you. He had so much work to finish, but he was in love with you. He wanted to stop thinking, but he was in love with you.

He feels sick, like the lack of sleep from nights he went overthinking his future made him close to throwing up. Or like the mere imagination of you coming in to save him from this workload made him sickeningly nauseous.

He couldn’t work like this. No, not when your clouded his thoughts like he was some lovesick fool.

And he was—he knew he was a fool. But when you’ve damned him just from making him fall in love like this… he fears he has to shut you out.

BAIZHU falls in love in the present time.

He is a man of the future, a man that has his entire life set out, from his plans to obtain the grace of immortality and thereafter. When he falls in love with you, it’s a sudden obsession that has him craving the thought of you for weeks. It affects his life, his plans, his work—it forces him to live in the present time where he was still weak, still mortal.

He can’t help but sit there, staring down at his table in a wide-awake agony that eats at his ambitions. It’s not that he’s never felt this kind of love. It’s that he’s never allowed himself the chance to, not once since he made this contract.

He loves Qiqi like family, he loves that he can take care of her; he hates how he can’t do the same with you.

And he hates how you force him to live in the present, the way you cloud his head with thoughts of a future he had not considered. His future never included you in the picture, it never involved living with another human so fragile like himself. This vision did not include a lover that would age so quickly after he himself achieved immortality.

But he can’t help it, not when the mere imagination of living and dying by your side sounded like a love he was suddenly hoping for. He only wishes he could have both lives at once.

KAVEH falls in love like dancing petals.

For a person so human and so gorgeous like you, how could he not? He’s always romanticized the reiterating idea of romance, for it was one of the beauties that human life had to offer. When flowers dared to fade, there was still hope for love.

And when he found that love in you, it was like a breath of the summer solstice. It felt like the longest day of the year, yet simultaneously the brightest. Smiling with joy that reached up to the corners of his eyes, that fluttering feeling flew across his body so long as he was in love.

From there on, every time he speaks to you is akin to a whisper of collective creative minds. They tell him how perfect you are, and it makes him distracted. He begins to admire you like he admires architecture—staring and learning every little detail until all of you is etched into his brain. He’ll start to remember every little detail you offer to him; it’s endearing in a way that’s purely natural.

Genuine, unadulterated feelings of admiration—that was how he continues to fall in love over and over again. Love is beauty, beauty is love, and when you smile at him, it’s so beautiful he swears his heart collapses every time. And when he doesn’t leave you alone, always sacrificing the time just to see you, your welcoming laughter will always be his favorite song.

All life was an art piece in his eyes; you were the most beautiful one, and he would gladly take you as one of his painters.

all inspirational credits to sunny the loml again bc i even referenced her with the title 🫶

[vechter]

👀 please elaborate on ur Cass and Damian thoughts, I’m also always thinking about what their dynamic could’ve been

omg i have so many!!!

okay, so initially, in batgirl 2009 #5 (iffy about character portrayals in this comic but that's a whole other thing), we see damian kind of anticipatory and even excited to meet cass:

it's super interesting to me because at that point, damian is still grappling with being a product of the league, still very much figuring out his role in this group of people his father chose.

and cass is one of them. cass, who's respected and considered formidable even by the loa. cass, who has also killed! i think in damian's eyes, they've had similar upbringings and he probably expects a certain degree of kinship with her.

because yes, dick, steph and alfred are coming to accept him, have purposely and actively showed that they care for him but they don't understand him! they don't know what growing up in that kind of isolation, with that demand for perfection is like.

damian's primary arc being dick's robin is about acceptance, from others but also, from himself! some heartbreaking panels below from red robin 2009 #14:

for damian, who is still actively fighting against his own instincts, who wasn't someone his father- a near mythical figure- chose, cass is someone who can, maybe, not only understand him but is also incontrovertible proof that people can change, that their childhoods don't define them. so, he already has somewhat high expectations for when they eventually meet, as we see in their first real interaction in gates of gotham 2011 #2:

gates of gotham is actually a great comic but unfortunately cannot consider the editorial nuance of cass being pushed aside by dc and removed from gotham entirely. but if you consider the implications, tim and steph definitely talk about her- probably dick and alfred, too. at this point, all of them respect and consider cass one of their own- she's accepted, she's even loved.

and that's probably something that damian is plagued and intrigued by. here's this girl who was brought up by someone the bats deem morally bankrupt, who changed her life around and went from being a would-be assassin to a hero (just like him!). she meets even his father's impossible standards, who has assigned her a whole city with batman inc. he lashes out at her when he thinks she hasn't accepted him (at this point, cass hasn't even done anything except come back to gotham lol so you can see how much damian struggles with acceptance, especially from someone he considers his peer!):

it's a deeply skewed view bc we know how much cass struggles with her own redemption but damian is still just a kid, lacking the emotional maturity to fully understand her.

i won't go into all the events of gates of gotham because it starts off with friction between them and they eventually end up working as a team and everything's sort of hunky-dory. but i think if flashpoint hadn't happened and we had actually gotten a deeply exploratory continuation of the nuances of the complicated bat-dynamics after bruce's return- we would definitely see more friction between cass and damian.

for cass, who sees everything- damian would be painful to witness. her own fears, her own guilt staring back at her. and i absolutely adore cass but she isn't going to be capable of tact or the kind of support that damian is passively seeking from everyone, but especially from her! cass is incredibly compassionate but her world-view is also so deeply jaded by her feelings about the life she took.

damian's initial robin tenure would be about developing his own moral code + coming to grips with what kind culpability he has in his own childhood- and cass would probably not see that bone-crippling regret and remorse and guilt she has, or even the one she often sees in bruce, and it would not sit right with her! sure, damian is a kid but she was a kid, too. and she can never get over what she did so for her to see damian coming to terms with his childhood would be like looking at a distorted reflection. i think it's also possible there would be something like- i don't want to say jealousy- but a complicated kind of resentment, not just from cass's end but also from damian's.

(also, a begrudging sort of respect from damian for cass's abilities expressed in somewhat snide comments)

this is not to say that they couldn't or wouldn't have a good dynamic! i think if they continued to spend time together, they would eventually come to an understanding (just like gates of gotham lol except a much more nuanced and complicated route to getting there) and while it would not be the kind of understanding either of them were expecting- it would be good! and there would be a very strong foundation of kindness in it.

[sidsinning]

UNNECESSARY AND UNHINGED RANT ABOUT CINDERELLA'S CHARACTER FROM CINDERELLA (2015) INCOMING

Lemme talk about Cinderella from Cinderella (2015) for a bit actually yeah because these changes to my girl completely baffle me

She has friends now

Goes outside on her own

Says the only reason why she's staying is because it's her parent's house- bruh.

All of this takes away (+ more reasons down the cut) from the true cruelty of OG!Cinderella's backstory and how it all connects so well to inform you of her character and the actions she takes

OG!Cinderella has been indoctrinated into accepting her life as a maid to her step family since she was a small child. She is never seen going outside of the house besides the night at the ball. The only friends she had were random animals around her she couldn't even fully converse with. She had no other human perspective on her situation or how to get out of it. It makes sense why she's just taking her stepmother's tyranny while holding everything in because this isolation and neglect is all she knows. This is the entire limited scope of her world. A sad reality to many cases of abuse in real life.

And they just. Erased all of this for some. Reason???

The night at the ball was a big deal because she literally NEVER gets to go out. This is the only time she interacts with the outside world aside from the ending. The impact of that was HUGE in the original movie. The new one just cheapened that imo by implying she goes out in town and talks to others regularly. This event was an impossible, fantastical dream come true to someone who is never treated as anything but a servant to everyone she knows.

Basically OG!Cinderella has it way worse which is what makes the ball such a huge deal in the first place.

Third point I don't think I need to explain how Cinderella staying in her abusive home bc the house is "hers to love now that her parents are dead" is not a good character change and doesn't make sense. I would understand if her dad was alive and insisting on staying, but he is GONE. It is a building you grew up in sure, but that's all it is. Not something you sacrifice your wellbeing for. So that's a shit reason they didn't need to make up to say why this character is stuck in her abusive household. The isolation and years of gaslighting were enough. (Also showing how much of a frightening presence and manipulative villain Lady Tremaine is.)

And she sure left it quick after getting hitched lol

The Fairy Godmother having the audacity to test Cinderella with that "oh I'm a poor old woman and I want some milk please" nonsense

Not very godmotherly of her in this version. 🥴 The Fairy Godmother appeared in the original to offer pure comfort to Cinderella in a time of desperate need, when this resilient and kind spirit finally reached her breaking point. The dress, slippers, pumpkin carriage, and magic were all given freely as a present to make her feel better at least for one night.

Meanwhile this goofy ass Godmother has the audacity to be like "hey is she gonna be nice or not even though she's crying in tattered, recently destroyed clothing- I need to see that or else she doesn't get the magic juice". Like why did this become a way to test her morality all of a sudden? Why did you need something from her to give up the magic goods?? It's not even a good test she just walked a couple steps and poured some milk in a bowl,,,

Idk man they made their relationship transactional for no reason which taints the original purpose of this scene imo. The original Fairy Godmother already KNEW Cinderella was kind without having to make sure by disguising herself as a rancid old lady. 😭 Weird and unnecessary addition.

Kinda nitpicky here but this film did not at all match the terror of the torn dress scene which really shows you how horrifying and humiliating it was to Cinderella

Comparison

AND THE BIGGEST OFFENDER: THE WAY SHE "ESCAPED".

I NEED TO TAKE A BREATH

BECAUSE LIKE. WHAT WAS THAT.

Original Cinderella, seeing a real chance of escape from her abuse, uses everything in her possession to do so. She's yelling for the mice to get the key, to get Bruno to chase away the cat, running down to meet the prince's attendants to make sure they get the proof of her identity from her- and that moment she oh-so-casually pulled out the second slipper??? SEEING HER STEPMOTHER'S SLACKED JAW??? GAGGED US ALL.

ICONIC

But 2015. Bitch. What is going on. She gets locked up and easily accepts her doom. She just twirls and sings in her prison like a dunce because cINDerELLa wAs aLReADy cONTenT wIth her sMaLL mOMEnts oF hAPPIneSs anD dREamS wItH thE pRinCE.

Just. Gives up.

Not the mice begging her to get up and save herself come on now

The mice have to do their best on their own to push open her window so the prince and his crew hear her on time.

And yeah, all she had to do was open a window.

WHAT. WHY. HOW. WAS THIS??? MORE EMPOWERING???

1950: use your brain to fight to the very end

2015: quit while you're still ahead, or don't try you just gotta dance and sing all pretty then someone will come along and save you

I'm sorry, but for a production that was so critical of the notion of "Cinderella just waited around for a prince to save her"...is that not literally what they changed the ending to?

You wanna talk about lack of agency in princess stories well here you go 😭

You know what's sad about all this in the end is this is still the best recent live action Disney remake imo LOL

Anyways hello if you've made it all the way down here I rest my case

[t1oui]

chaotic bcj headcanons bc i have brainrot about this man OFTEN

italian, greek (mum), british, and spanish (dad)

grew up in italy, it's his first language (he was invited to hogwarts bc his dad works for the ministry)

can learn a language in about 2 seconds

speaks italian, english, greek, and spanish (only learned it to spite his dad who can't speak spanish)

almost sorted into ravenclaw, he was nearly a hatstall

likes to spend his time pointing out all the reasons why english sucks (he is probably the best english speaker of all his friends and he wasn't fluent till he was 11 (they've been speaking english their entire lives))

very tall. it is literally impossible to lose this man in a crowd

loves to swim but gets pissy if the water's too warm

is a sub 100%. if evan is ace he's still a sub but in a nonsexual way

he's crazy in the way that all smart people are a lil crazy because nobody fully understands him (read: he's best friends with lily evans)

makes fun of jegulus for being jealous but will throw hands if someone smiles at evan from across the great hall

in constant need of piggyback rides but too tall to get them from anybody but remus

love language is physical touch, if he is not touching someone at all times he gets anxious

this usually means holding hands with his friends... and biting evan

worships the ground his bf walks on daily <3

never studies but has perfect grades

loves dying his hair, usually green but also random colors like red and purple and blue (pandora's favorite color)

once sirius dyed barty's hair hot pink to get back at him for who knows what it's barty but barty actually loved it (sirius was PISSED)

bisexual

happily asks evan to give him pictures to wank to (evan obliges)

have i mentioned he's a total fucking simp. yeah

was quidditch commentator for 2 seconds before mcgonagall fired him (he kept gossiping about the players)

actually loves people so deeply it hurts (james does the same thing but his love for people is on the surface while barty hides his most of the time)

hella adhd

insists on being the little spoon, can't sleep otherwise

has a ton of piercings and is completely COVERED in tattoos (at least half are dedicated to evan, the other half to the rest of his friends (including the gryffindors, especially lily!!))

mama's boy, like this man brings up his mom every 6 seconds, he thinks she's the smartest person on earth (other than evan ofc)

has a lot in common with james (as seen above), barty beefs with him for about a month and then realizes james is actually super chill (james and evan were already friends lol)

the biggest fuck you to his dad? not only does he hate politics, he wants to be an artist

likes painting just fine, and drawing is ok (he mostly just draws evan and the skittles, sometimes others like lily and james), but he LOVES ceramics

is an amazing cook, spends a lot of time in the kitchens with the house elves

(in a world without voldemort, he and hermione granger would get along very well)

favorite subjects are charms and defense against the dark arts (y'all remember when he was actually kind of a good dada professor in gof? yeah)

my computer's about to die so i'll leave it here, might add more later tho <3

[deathbealady]

Y’ALL. I had a very important revelation while yelling about ACOTAR with a friend today

I’m sure everyone has realized this already but please humor me bc I’m simply raging from this revelation

So, remember how in ACOMAF or ACOWAR (sorry I forget which, but I know it’s one of them), Feyre had told Rhysand that she wanted to live and enjoy her new immortal life with Rhysand before they went on to try for kids? And then, in ACOFAS, she immediately changed her mind and decided she wanted to have Rhysand’s baby? That old thing?

Well, my friend and I were talking about how we didn’t like this change of mind for Feyre and thought it was stupid and unnecessary. I mean, sure Feyre is allowed to change her mind but like, stay with me for a moment on this

Feyre specifically changed her mind because she met that lady who lost her husband and said she didn’t even have kids to have that part of him left. Yes, I can understand how hearing the woman’s story can hit hard. It was very sad, and I get how Feyre would hear that and be like “I’m so lucky to still have my husband” and “we should make the most of any and all time we left have together” and that’s why she decides they should have a baby right now after all, bc omg what if Rhysand dies again????

Except… Feyre literally never has to imagine a world where one is left behind with no part of the other left, because they fully had a conversation that went: “hey. if I die, you die?” “bet”

They made that irresponsible AF death pact at the end of ACOWAR, so they have nothing BUT time in the world together! They will literally never have to live without each other!! Which makes the whole plot point of Feyre rushing into having kids even stupider than it already was, because Feyre made the decision based on a literally impossible hypothetical situation

Feyre:

This kind of bs is what I’m talking about when I say Feyre is so dumb it’s embarrassing. It’s really so fucking sad because (like so much else in the ACOTAR series) she could’ve been really great, if only SJM would get out of her own way 🙃

[demodraws0606]

Whit and Eden Accomplices Theory (or mostly just rambling about how Eden could be the culprit in a way that makes sense to me and also how Whit's strange behavior could be explained alongside it but that's a way longer title, oh wai-)

(I'm so sorry every DRDT theory I have involves Whit maybe if he was fucking normal and also not my fav character I would stop putting him in everything)

My entire mindset about theories is just throwing shit at the wall until it sticks, and it seems that this one has really stuck in my mind.

I feel like this post will be long bc there has to be a lot of explanation as to how I got to this theory.

See, I have an issue with the Eden motive from mostly a character perspective as Eden coming up on her own such a cruel method to kill Arei just does not feel in character even if she did snap. It also doesn't help that there isn't much of a motive for her. I've seen people justify but I just don't buy it and I personally just find it a bit boring. I also don't believe she would be fully distrustful of Arei unless being pushed to believe so.

However, the idea that she might have an accomplice could help that justification but it ends up creating a lot more problems. Because you'd need to find a character who would be willing to put their life on the line for seemingly no good reason. This is the issue I had with the Levi/Eden accomplice theory and now for me that theory is pretty much debunked since Levi admitting to his secret just drives more suspicion around him (it also doesn't match with his behavior in the trial, he does seem to genuinely want to help).

I can't deny that Eden definitely is the most suspicious despite me throwing Levi and even Whit under the fire purely because I just don't buy narratively that Eden murdering Arei makes sense. However undeniably, Eden could have access to both Teruko/Hu's clothes and she could've gotten hold of the tape, doesn't help that she was also quite suspicious when Teruko snuck up on her.

So I start to go back to the idea of accomplices, if it's not Levi, who could it be ?

Now before I get to Whit, I do want to propose the kind of other thought I had that didn't quite work out but also is interesting.

Eden culprit + Hu accomplice theory

Now this one is purely because of the fact that we know Hu and Eden hanged out a lot the day before the murder happened, Hu and Eden talked about the clothes as well. There's enough of a connection to make them planning a murder make sense.

However, it doesn't make sense with Hu's character so far. We do know she seems reluctant about her secret however we run into the problem that she has no reason not to just admit it on the spot when the secrets are now already revealed. It works especially not well with the fact that her whole thing is that she wants to live and blows up at David for wanting to play with the cast's lives. In fact her secret quote emphasizes how much she wants to live.

Her having also an alibi makes it impossible for her to have committed/contributed to the murder directly though if she's an accomplice that isn't much of a rebutal, it just makes it impossible for her to be anything more than just a distant accomplice.

Anyways, that really just doesnt leave us with a lot of viable accomplices to help Eden, at least not ones that would make actual sense except....

*sigh* Whit...

I would like to say this is kind of an evolution/building up of my personal theory of Whit being the culprit, as he was linked with a lot of suspicious behavior and also would be the only one with a hypothetical motivation (which in this theory there is a potential second motivation possibly here).

Now my main argument against a lot of the accomplices is the threat of death, who would willingly risk or give up their lives for someone's murder ??

The thing is...Whit already has multiple times refused to tell the truth both in the first case and second case, to the detriment of the survival of everybody. Trial 2 being the most obvious with him being reluctant about Eden's note and David's secret, if he truly continued to keep it shut he had potential to risk people's lives by leaving out information. In the first trial it's him being reluctant to divulge Charles's trauma despite it being the key reason as to why he couldn't have commited the murder.

In fact it's such an issue that Charles hands his secret to Teruko and not Whit because he can't trust Whit to divulge the secret in the class trial.

This would also give Whit a motive, his strange disposition to not unveil anyone's secret could potentially expand to him having personal motivation to not have everyone's secret revealed.

But I think the real motive lies in the strange subject of Whit's secret, his secret being thrown away by Rose without her looking at it, making it impossible for Whit to ever know what his secret was. Interestingly enough he also takes a strange amount of time to indentify that secret as his, like to a point of it no longer just being carelessness.

Therefore lies a potential motivation of him overthinking what his secret actually is. If you want more I go into Whit's potential motivation more in the Whit culprit post (specifically his strange behavior) but let's get onto other information that's smaller but works well with th

Another thing that like, while is mostly based on vibes and circumstancial evidence is still an interesting thing to think about. There's the fact that Whit and Eden were both the people chosen with Teruko and this is something I want to bring up for three reasons.

One, it is important to bring up the counter argument of "them orchestrating Arei's death would go against the body announcement rules right ?" and that is correct. However, the rule is extremely vague to an almost ridiculous degree, if Arei died of suffocation or if Whit and Eden weren't looking when she actually died would it not count as "witnessing the murder" ? In fact I believe this rule being there more so hint at it being subverted especially since we know how unreliable Mono-TV is. Also if we're going with that argument, it is interesting to also note that Eden and Whit were weirdly reluctant about Teruko going to the playground (aka Whit asking if she even really is at the playground and Eden telling Teruko to please wait when she opens the door).

Second, is Whit and Eden's closeness due to this trial, well that wouldn't be the right word, the more correct word would be proximity. Whit jumps to comfort Eden, although in a quite strange apathetic way (no whit saying "there there" doesn't count as actually emotionally being there for someone whose friend just got hanged). They both are in charge of the evidence by Teruko with Rose being grouped up as well. Whit tries to avoid the subject around the note that is incriminating to Eden. They also both "coincidentally" didn't notice Arei's swaying.

Third, more shorter and "funny" little subject would be Teruko's bad luck, especially with Min in the first trial. How unlucky would she be to have picked both of the people responsible for Arei's death. It would be an interesting running theme. However there's not much evidence behind that.

Now here are like short little bullet points that I think kinda cement my thoughts on how Whit being an accomplice can work (bc a lot of people have talked about Eden being the culprit already)

-Whit again one of the few who knows about Arei's rope, everyone could've technically gotten their hands on it but only a few would really know about the rope itself and it being taken away

-Whit is the one to question about acomplice thing and in fact actually manages to get Mono-TV to accept his criteria on who would be considered the blackened. Aka the one that was the most "active" in the crime. If Whit managed to do less than Eden this could be a potential attempt at him for the rules to be in his favor in case Eden gets found out (or vice verca, if he did most of the work he'd be the one to escape).

-I feel like Whit would be high in the spot of being able to manipulate Eden, they both have similar ideologies, plus his intuition seems to get him to read people like a book (or see the future ? were still not sure about that one chief /j). Along that it would be really funny if the Ultimate Matchmaker was the one to break down a relationship. Similar irony to the Ultimate Student killing the Ultimate Rebel.

Anyways I'm sorry about these incoherent ramblings, i'm trying to piece this whole thing together and Eden just being the culprit just doesn't sit right mainly because it feels like the story doesnt justify itself enough.

So here's some spice

By the way if Whit's motivation seems strange throughout my ramblings is mainly because I don't fully know what they are, what I was trying to get across is mostly that it wouldn't be out of character for Whit to have motivations that would lead him down to helping Eden. Unlike, say, Hu whose whole theme of being someone who probably having taken their own life before considering the secrets, has an immense determination to live.

[uriekukistan]

tokyo ghoul characters in a ballet class

kaneki is trying his best but he’s like an awkward little duckling. generally not bad, but constantly questioning why he’s there. always in the back of the class. he can’t fully keep up with the moves and is tripping over his feet.

hide is having the time of his life. absolutely horrible at ballet but smiling the whole time and laughing at his own mistakes. making comments about the “funny words” for the moves. teacher’s nightmare.

haise, unlike kaneki, while still awkward and tripping, is having a great time. very eager to learn. putting 100% effort into everything even though he’s not very good. teacher loves him because he always takes feedback very well.

touka is angry and frustrated the whole time. annoyed because what the teacher tells her to do is “physically impossible.” in my mind, shes not suuuper flexible. limps out of class bc she may have dislocated her hip to get a 90°+ extension.

ayato is similar to touka in that he’s angry and frustrated the whole time because he can’t do anything properly. unlike touka, who complains in her head, he complains out loud. gets thrown out of class for sassing the teacher.

shuu probably already knows ballet. if he doesn’t, he’s definitely a natural. ballet seems like something shuu would really like. super dramatic with everything and gets so into it. class is his stage. has really high jumps.

juuzou loves petit allegro (little jumps). he hates barre though. weirdly good, but he gets so dizzy during turns and lays on the floor after. naturally flexible and the class regulars hate him for it.

do yall remember when naki called shuu an american because he kept yelling in french? well he gets really confused in class and gets kicked out when he yells at the teacher and calls them a stupid american.

saiko makes it through tendus before she gives up and goes to sleep in the corner. she doesn’t wake up when the teacher asks her to leave, so they just leave her there in the corner. either that or she has a lot of fun bouncing around like the sunshine she is.

shirazu talks the entire time the teacher is giving the combination, and the when the music starts, he has no idea what to do. follows other people to get through the combination. not bad at barre actually, but can’t keep up with center.

urie keeps it well hidden, but he secretly enjoys ballet. ballet combines the creativity of painting, and the physical activity of working out, so it’s perfect for him. despite this, no matter how much he tries, he’s not great. he secretly goes to classes a lot though.

mutsuki is actually good but kind of hates it. he might like it more if it didn’t involve tights and a leotard. he’s very graceful and delicate with the way he dances. the teacher loves him and he gets lots of compliments.

[montypng]

new follower here, love your art so much it's filled with so much character! I saw your tag on the lovely ghoul art; so, thought I'd send an ask: I'd love to hear your thoughts on danger days! Any things at all, feel free to ramble if you want! I always love hearing others hcs/opinions/etc on the series!

HELLO this ask has been sitting in my inbox since january sorry..its mostly bc i have sooo many things 2 talk about and i wasnt sure what i wanted 2 say in this answer but whatever im just gonna ramble SO!!! U get a bunch of random hcs and maybe thematic analysis yippee!! and thank u soo much for the kind words :]

imo all the kjs have some form of body focused repetitive behavior because this is my world and i do what i want.. poison and ghoul have dermatillomania (compulsive skin picking), and kobra and jet have trich (hair pulling) maybe. I think constantly being on the run + adrenaline highs and lows would lead to unhealthy coping mechanisms for all of them and desert living leads 2 pretty shit skin (poison+kobra have at least had bad acne for sure) which is conducive to skin picking..i think the venom siblings and ghoul are bat city runaways too so the withdrawal from bli pills (+shakes and sweats) contributed to them developing bfrbs.

ghoul also gets really bad shakes and jitters from withdrawal, so when it gets so bad that they can’t work on their explosives he blasts mad gear as loud as it can from its speakers and lets himself scream all the frustration out.

also ghoul definitely has hearing loss from bomb detonation in too close proximity. tell me it would know abt proper hearing protection safety protocols with a straight face its impossible.

kobra was born w microform cleft lip, which means he has a little deformity/groove in his upper lip kind of similar to a snake’s . also he broke his nose at some point and it healed wrong so crooked nosebridge↴

both jet and kobra are prone to migraines bc of eye strain and sensitivity (jet is nearly fully blind in his right eye and both kobras eyes are extremely sensitive to light, hence the sunglasses).

sometimes when the migraines are too much they both lie down in the trans am seats together at night and close their eyes and breathe in the dark

prior to jets eye injury they were the teams best marksman, and im not sure yet how greatly that changes after they lose depth perception, but one thing i like to believe is that jet is also a great sniper (stereoscopic vision due to retinal disparity is also only effective up til about 30 meters too so he wouldnt need to rely on binocular vision for that), so maybe they focuse on that skill post-injury. how i picture their scar ↴

this is so long already but 1 last thing more in a thematic analysis vein: i need ppls opinions on the girl and her story PLEASE. she has so little agency in the canon narrative but . Where r the girlposters around here i need to hear others thoughts on her guilt complex from the fab 4s sacrifice and her running away from her own role as the protagonist of a story she never wanted 2 be part of and her blowing up the city that killed her family and whether or not that alleviated her neuroses and brought catharsis or not and her characterisation as a literal bomb and destructive force even though shes just a kid and ughhh. Linking this girl post i made a while ago w an anne carson quote that makes me crazy ANYWAYS. Talk 2 me about her. Im begging.

[haloburns]

i know the show is about bones and booth, technically

but hodgins and angela's love story is my favorite part of the show. they love each other wholly and unconditionally. its the kind of all encompassing love that i hope i have with my partner. they go thru hell, and still they stay together.

like their proposal??? hodgins fully accepting that angela isnt ready for proposal and marriage just yet and simply asking her to be his??? and her finally agreeing to marriage bc she needed to know he accepted her in all of her funky insanity???

AND THEN

they find out angela is still married and hodgins is like "cool. we'll find the broomstick guy and get ur marriage annulled so we can still get married." when MOST shows wouldce used that drama to have them break up or fight or whatever.

AND THEN

they get married in a jail cell. by the judge/barber.

and then when angie gets pregnant and michael vincent (rip) tells them that there's a chance their son could be blind, theyre like "okay. okay, we'll just. pivot. we'll deal with it." even as they grieve the life theyd already been dreaming of bc. well. they love each other, and they love their son, so everything else is inconsequential

and that is the theme of their love story. when pelant conpletely obliterates their funds (which. the way he did that was impossible. im still so angry about it. but thats another post), theyre devestated but theyre like "we'll deal. we'll switch to generic and take the bus. as long as we have each other, thats all that matters."

when hodgins is disabled in that explosion and paralyzed, even while he's angry and grieving, angie stays by him. she never ONCE lets hodgins think shell stop loving him just because his needs have changed. they change their WHOLE LIFE to make everything easier and accessible for him, and angie is just like "this is what i have to do for you and, yes its a burden, but its one i bear because i love you, i cant imagine my life without you."

they are the epitome of "its rotten work/not to me. not if its you." and it gets me EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

[your--isgayrights]

You're like one of the only ones that I feel like can answer my question. But anyways, do you think there is a connection between Bathes framework(death of the author ig) being so prominent in HSY's arc and how it relates to JHY's, YSA's, JHW's arcs and their experiences as a woman. Like ik there was some gender stuff goin on with HSY when she was a guy apostle. But I feel like womanhood isn't as explored in her arcs like it is with the three other characters but I feel like you can somehow make a connection 😭 sorry if this is a tall order.

Anon babe I'm very flattered and I'll try to make some connections here, but if someone who is actually woman has something to say about this please come on in and feel free to tell me to stfu 😭😭. Like obv just from living in Society I have concepts of womanhood/gender dynamics/lived experiences of misogyny but also I need you to understand that identification with and appreciation of a personal identity of womanhood is something that I as a person have consistently been repulsed by my entire life. Like the act of wanting/choosing to be a woman is something I will never be able to fully understand or experience.

THAT BEING SAID I HAVE WRITTEN A FEW PARAGRAPHS HERE IN RESPONSE TO YOUR ASK.

TLDR;

authorship is creation outside of motherhood and therefore queer.

narrative control is queer, and therefore disassociation from traditional gender roles comes with increased narrative control.

the narrative of ORV equates Barthes' framework with the "reality" of a reader that has to be challenged by the compassion and love of another person experiencing their own "reality" and authorship of a story is an attempt of that act of impossible communication.

Like ugh ok wanna be clear that I'm not like shim saimdong on the 50,000 won style trying to equate womanhood to this role via like bioessentialist weirdness, but I think that the most obvious connection with authorship and the female characters in orv is the idea of creation that like is sort of tied with motherhood via a character like LSK. Bc yeah if you look at the two big authors writing Kim Dokja's life, it's literally his mom with her prison book and then also Han Sooyoung later on, right?

This is kind of fun to me bc I have a friend whose like actually a lit/film major type person and writing an essay about queer tragedy in film and we were talking about queer narratives and ideas of artificial conception/creation ala Frankenstein, the "unnatural birth." In Western lit tradition this kind of thing has obvi been like connected to horror more modernly, but I think in like early Korean lit (me saying this as a guy who has like only read the Samguk Yusa so 🌾 of 🧂) the connection between unnatural birth and the divine is less complicated and not treated as the same kind of perversion that subversions of nuclear family models have been by narratives in lit largely influenced by a majority religion that values that structure of subservience in the West.

(example of unnatural birth that is fun fine and normal in Samguk Yusa: the first king of Silla is born from an egg and so is his wife and like she even has a beak until it falls off and like Kylie Jenner lip cup style gives her bbl lips /hj.)

The act of authorship can then be seen in/equated with this unnatural birth, or maybe a better term is divine birth. Authorship/narrative control in orv is also shown to be something inherently queer bc like again if you think about LSK and HSY, there is, like you mention Anon, a conflict between the societal role of Woman and becoming an author. Like if you've read feminist lit you are probably already been knew about this but to put it in terms of a referenced text from ORV, there are foundations of an equation of womanhood with motherhood from those very beginnings of Korean lit. The bear mother is a story literally about becoming a woman and that good old neoconfucian influence can be seen in how the path to womanhood for the bear is to completely obey the instructions of a male deity without questioning or straying. She is then "rewarded" by said make deity when they wed and she becomes the mother of Dangun, the deity founder of Korea. This neoconfucian framework of 'womanhood' places emphasis on subservience to higher power and motherhood.

It is notable, then, that the act of becoming an author in Lee Sookyung's case is literally the very action that abandons her child. The act of authorship is juxtaposed from reality, as Kim Dokja's lived experience is retold transformatively and then believed to be true by others and by himself to some degree. Authorship is something that alters the 'natural' and 'real' and divests the author of their subservient societal role. (Abandoning your child #justqueergirlybossthings /j)

So then, let's look at female characters in ORV and their relative relationships to narrative control and femininity. YSA is a good contrast to HSY here, because as you note Anon, reading ORV HSY seems more divorced from womanhood than YSA, but why is that? In all likelihood, it's because YSA takes the place of a certain type of female character that often exists in the stories of this genre, a female colleague who performs her role much better in the original society than the male lead before an entry into the world of the story. Something to also note is, how, despite not being a "character" of the original WoS, YSA is particularly tasked with a role of passivity/narrative inactivity that commonly befalls female characters in the modern day but most notably is exemplified in East Asian lit by the monk Tang Sanzang in Journey to the west. A character who motivates the actions of the main character but is often thwarted in attempts to directly change the narrative and put into inert states (TSZ is told to go somewhere by bodhisattvas and follows their instructions and always gets kidnapped by demons who want to eat his hot cicada body or w/e, YSA studies languages, has her contract renewed, takes the subway when her bike is stolen, gets yanked around by Greek gods and prophetizes herself into a backroom library she can use to peer into the mind of God, etc.) In some ways, bc YSA tends to follow 'the rules,' because she appears to have less awareness and control of the narrative, she also seems to fall more easily into the societal category of "woman." Put directly in contrast with Han Sooyoung, whose perspective on the narrative as a creator leads her to show less care for the lives of those in the story and who actively kills many of said characters without remorse, perhaps contrary to the role of complete creation an comparison of motherhood and authorship might imply, narrative control is power both to create and destroy. If you're in a daoist mood, you could draw a taegeuk and equate this balance of divine birth and unnatural death with the balance of androgyny between feminine and masculine, the balanced whole then being considered a cosmic whole/the absolute/something powerful/ the author, etc. (Singshong being a couple who wrote the book together kind of also adds another layer of context to this in that like in the daoist/Confucian tradition of heteronormativity man and woman together are a complete form, if all cosmos can be divided to binary then the collaboration across that binary recreates the whole, an androgenous true state of creation)

Again, in this way, narrative control/authorship is something that inherently breaks reality and in a heteronormative world this force can be coloured as inherently queer. Thats probably why are transgender girlies JHY and YJH are so significant in that their experiences of womanhood are ones that directly defy the predestination of narrative. There is no direct reveal of YJH having been the Punisher, because it is something beyond narrative understanding, beyond the rules of the universe that Kim Dokja defines as the Reader. JHY's identity directly contradicts the design of the author/creator and reader alike, her choice in her personal gender identity directly defies narrative and in that way gives her agency outside of the realm of "character," her queerness being something that gives her transformative power and control over her reality.

In the matter of Barthes, I would say I'm a bit biased, because I find reading less interesting when the context and the intent of the author are not considered. In fact, I kind of resent that death of the author is sort of a literary standard in that a lot of modern English courses will discourage essays that use terminology like "what the author is trying to say could be" and instead encourage only the use of text, because on the whole I find it less interesting to look at words and not imagine the soul behind them. In some ways, I view death of the author as a selfish framework that emphasizes only the reinforcement of a reader's worldview and desire for escapism in text that doesn't have to be connected to the real world, a delusion. Not to say enjoying a book means one must love the author, but I feel that every reader will naturally have their own (mostly one sided, I suppose) relationship to the author within and without the text, and denying that fact denies personhood to the art form in some ways. In this view, I think one of the reasons I love ORV so much is probably that some of its themes seem to very much agree to this sentiment. Authorship and readership are often equated to this act of "impossible communication" between people. ORV views authorship, the sharing of stories, as this way to impossibly try to understand the life of another person. Part of what gives the text of WoS and then ORV itself so much meaning in the end is the fact that we know who wrote them in the fiction and for what reason. Knowing the author is actually phrased within the text as pivotal, foundationally important, the only understanding that can lead to the salvation of the reader in the end, his knowledge of the person he can recognize in the author's words being himself and the fact that the author's understanding means that he is in some way loved and and known by others who love the same story. When the HSY who wrote WoS is shown to literally cease to be, trying to reach the reader and failing to be seen, it's a scene that makes one cry, a tragedy, a loss. Death of the author is not a preferable frame of analysis in ORV, only connected by a morose sense of inevitability defined by a consumerist literary world that holds said framework as truth.

But again, if death of the author is "reality, " then the ending of ORV is one where radical joy can be found in the breaking of said reality. It's pretty notable from a queer framework that the "happy endings" in ORV all occur in non-nuclear family structures, the 999th turn adopting the OD, KdjCo wanting to live in a house together, etc. Also notable that, because that is a dream that KDJ cannot see as "real," the absolute power the reader is given to determine the world keeps it from happening. In this way, death of the author and absolute power of the reader is the final boss of ORV as HSY and the characters batten down the hatches and scream into the void "YOU ARE NOT ALONE, YOUR REALITY IS NOT THE ONLY ONE, LOVE THAT EXISTS FOR NO PREDETERMINED PURPOSE CAN BE YOUR SALVATION."

It's also kind of important to me outside of the text in the understanding that this story, though obviously formulated in the context of trying to appeal to a wide audience for commercial success, is also one that comes from people who experience our reality trying to tell us that love is the answer to it all. Young people today in SK are very likely to at least know someone who has attempted in the past and you know there are some pretty similar statistics if you happen to have friends involved in queer communities here in the US. Because of my own experiences, I've always felt that distinct lack of recovery narratives in fiction, as past generations tend to see it as either so outside the norm or so clearly regulated to certain situations that it's portrayed as obviously wrong choice by a weak person or the obvious right choice by a brave person and ORV is one of very few stories I've seen not try to make a value judgement on it, but rather illustrate exactly the reasons why KDJ wants to die, why he doesn't value himself, and saying please, please stay. There is so much love for you here even though I know you haven't seen it yet. And an understanding that these ideas of love and happiness are something some people in certain situations can only be shown proof of in the stories of others. And I feel like understanding of that context is what makes ORV so important to me as a Reader, even if I know very little about SS aside from that, the fact that they exist as people living in this same world is still important to my enjoyment of the story as a reader.

Ok, sorry, this became more about narrative queerness than death of the author/womanhood but again a lot of my views of womanhood exist in like, opposing it? Lol. Tho my experience of manhood also exists in opposing a lot of it, I just personally enjoy tussling with it much more than I ever would have with womanhood I think lol.

[frunbuns]

I finished reading Jedi: Battle Scars not that long ago and some parts of it really got me thinking.

I am nowhere near an expert and my information comes from the Internet, so take what I say with a grain of salt.

However, several times in Battle Scars we see Cal taking on the role of a target so the rest of the crew aren't in danger. This is something Merrin notices and takes great problem with, and it takes Cal a great effort to let this behaviour go for her.

Supposedly some effects of childhood trauma is that you're more likely to participate in dangerous and risky activities, so one could hypothetically tie this to that, as well as the fact that he already has lost 2 caregiver-figures in his life bc they were trying to protect him and is unwilling and/or feels uncapable of going through that trauma again. Even a friend.

There's also the fact that Cal and Cere struggle to see eye-to-eye in the book, something that they argue about. Cal wants to take down the Empire now, while Cere wants to build something for the future. Cal struggles to see how that helps when there might not even be a future for the Jedi. Cere struggles to see how productive it really is to put themselves in danger, but Cal is more than willing to risk his life.

This makes me think about how individuals with childhood trauma may have a hard time planning for the future. Children who grow up under conditions of constant threat are so focused on the now, and surviving right now that planning ahead and anticipating the future becomes hard, if not impossible for them.

Maybe Cal feels that because there is an ongoing threat, he cannot even fathom creating something for something that is so far away, and maybe even impossible in his eyes. It doesn't matter if there'll be no one around to see it anyway.

We also know from jfo that he struggles to trust Cere and Greez at first, and he feels hurt when he finds out Cere hasn't been entirely truthful with him. Cal has lived in a world where he has been unable to trust anyone fully for the past 5 years, so when his trust gets betrayed he reacts harshly, though not all that immaturely. He doesn't particularly want to talk to her, and gives her the cold shoulder for a while, but they both agree to put it aside for 'later'.

As well as having trust issues, a person who has experienced childhood trauma may have trouble expressing and regulating their emotions. They may either have extreme outward reactions, or internalise it. Though I may be stretching this a bit far, it does take some time for Cal to start forgiving her, and even understanding why she may have done it.

It seems to be a fairly agreed upon fact that trauma can alter the very way your brain works, and for children whose brains are still developing, it can lead to problems that last well into their adulthood if left untreated.

I feel like it's fair to say that Cal may be exhibiting some of these symptoms, whether intentionally or not from the writers' side. It can certainly help explain more reasons as to why he thinks, acts and reacts as he does.

It does, of course, not mean that it's everything behind the way he is, but it can act as a part of why. A sort of explanation that could impact him and his life. There's reason to believe that his trauma affects him, but is not necessarily the whole reason why.

Cal was so young when he went throught hat trauma, so of course it's going to impact his life. Going through any kind of trauma can alter your entire life. He's one of few who survived a genocide. He's had to live in hiding, with fear and mistrust. And it's not really over, is it? It's still incredibly dangerous to be force sensitive. The Empire still rages across the galaxy, and it will for longer yet, but at least now he's got friends and support from people he loves, and who love him back.

Do with that what you will, and feel free to add to this if you wish

[ancientgreekyuri]

TW for discussion of incest / a godly curse presenting itself as mind control / sui.cide in the context of greek mythology 💔

I've looked at the myth of Phaedra and Hippolytus soooooo many times seeing if it would be possible to remove the insect aspect of it, but it really is nearly impossible to have a story that makes sense and fits into the world without it... I also just feel uncomfortable with the idea of completely sanitizing these myths. there are some things I removed, but as i thought more and more about this one, I realized it was something I just could not... So I decided to keep it, but made it so the situation as a whole is just Horrifying for everyone involved. Like how Pasiphae was cursed to fall in love with a bull, Phaedra is cursed to fall in love with her stepson. The actions she takes are not her own, it's as if her body and even her thoughts are being controlled by someone else. Even though they never got along, Hippolyptus isn't so ignorant that he wouldn't realize that Phaedra is acting Unlike herself. Despite this, it all unfortunately ends in a violent altercation; Hippolytus is forced to attack his stepmother, and all Theseus sees when he comes to intervene is a bleeding Phaedra and Polytus' sword red with her blood. 💔 Theseus calls on Posei.don to punish Hippolytus for his crime (Phaedra still lived at this time, but kinslaying is a grievious sin all the same...), and despite the god being no doubt aware of the truth of this situation he does as Theseus asks all the same; cruelly enough, the truth of the situation is only revealed to him once Hippolytus perishes. The goddess Arte/mis herself takes Polytus' body, as he was one of her most devout worshippers... ...The curse wears off only then, and Phaedra is unable to bear the guilt of it all (despite how it was all caused by godly cruelty, you know the deal...). she drowns herself, leaving Theseus to raise their two young sons. (the trauma of losing both his son and wife in such horrible ways (and it being kind of his fault even if it wasn't his fault Entirely) sorta leads directly the very toxic romantic friendship he has with his buddy Perithöus later on but thats a story for another time) (morbid funfact: hanging is more a traditional form of sui.cide for women in greek myth but death works best here bc of how that's like, a very frequest occurence in theseus' family history. even hippolytus died while along the coast....) when it comes to the afterlife... hippolytus was actually revived by artemis and got to serve as a priest of hers. he logically knows that everything that happened isn't fully the fault of his stepmother and father but like, from a purely emotional standpoint it's just not something he wants to deal with. *maybe sometime in the future... Phaedra is in Asphodel, somewhere. she spends a lot of her time alone. Her and Theseus do eventually get to talking, one day; Theseus wishes he had done more for her. Maybe he could have done something about her curse... he was too ignorant, too self-centered to realize something was amiss back then, and it's something he hates himself for. But Phaedra asks him to forgive himself for that, as she wasn't the most loving wife either... and besides, no amount of blaming himself can undo what has already been done. *Hippolytus makes the big decision to try reconnecting with his family after learning about Theseus' daughter with Dianthus... his first little sister!

[superfluouskeys]

omg i just realised you're in law school?? can i ask what prompted you to pursue a (i presume) 2nd degree? i am nearing 30 and considering going for a 2nd degree as well but i'm super reluctant haha, would you mind sharing something about your experience? are you doing like a master's, did you choose it to get a specific job you are aiming for?

Ah, I would be happy to talk about my questionable life choices lol! For law school in the US if you want to actually practice you get what's called a Juris Doctor (JD) degree, which is a professional degree, and you have to have completed a Bachelor's to pursue it. People who want to like, specialize in something will sometimes get an LLM (Master of Law), but generally do that after the JD, even though a JD is technically "higher" than a Master's. Absurdly long story of my Journey TM under the cut lol

I tell people law school was a response to the pandemic even though that's not really true bc I don't want to get into the years-long insane series of thought processes that led me here lol. I only have a Bachelor's degree (in German/Music) and never intended to pursue anything beyond that. I'm naturally intelligent and did very well in school without trying, but I never had any particular interest in pursuing a higher education and pretty much just did it because that's what you're supposed to do. Looking back I feel quite embarrassed that I didn't fully appreciate the value of my education, even though I obviously wasn't doing it on purpose LOL. I got a lot of value out of college in general but it's frankly amazing that I did fine in my classes given my general self at the time. Fortunately I went to one of those schools where ppl hear the name and go oooOoooo woOOooOOow and don't generally care about my mediocre GPA.

I never really had a clear idea of what I wanted to do with my life, and I don't feel I'm one of those people who has a Calling TM. I'm good at and enjoy a variety of things, and I have a hard time being happy doing the same thing for a long period of time. I worked as a professional actor/singer when I graduated, and even within that field I became unhappy when I did too much of the same kind of work. Ultimately, as I grew into myself, I became frustrated and disillusioned with the industry in general, and with how I was being forced to live my life. I so rarely got to do anything I genuinely enjoyed, the work that paid best was utterly soul-sucking, and the general attitudes of the people around me esp. towards maintaining one's appearance were very unhealthy for me. They're unhealthy for everyone of course, but I was trying to recover from viewing my body in a negative light, and being around ppl with these attitudes made it pretty much impossible.

So I was already sort of looking for a new path of some sort a few years ago, but what I didn't realize at the time was that I had completely lost faith in myself and my abilities, and was selling myself incredibly short. I tried to do a bunch of dumb shit which obviously wouldn't be fulfilling in any way, tried to reshape my life into something bearable, and failed miserably several times. I was in fact halfway through discarding another failed attempt and taking up a new one when the pandemic hit. I ended up having to move back in with my mother, and what we all hoped would be a couple of months turned into Whatever This Is. So I found myself with a lot of time to think lol. And while it was a very difficult experience, I kept telling myself, whatever you do, no matter how bad it is, you need to actually think ahead for five fucking seconds and try to do something that will actually work, you know lol, because otherwise you're just going to end up in the same place again.

Law school started as a whim like any other; I was having lunch with my mom, and she mentioned offhand that she thought I should go to law school (she didn't go but she has a lot of lawyer friends). And I was feeling just insane enough that day that I was like yeah idk maybe I should. So I went home and was like okay how does one go to law school. I looked up a practice LSAT, took it knowing absolutely nothing about the LSAT, and did EXTREMELY well. So I thought, well. Huh. I need something to do w my life so I stop wanting to eat drywall, why not study for the LSAT lol, can't hurt.

And it just sort of kept going from there. Practicing for the LSAT gave me a sense of purpose, applying to law schools gave me a sense of purpose, and that sense of purpose enabled me to start slowly improving the horrible circumstances I was in. I didn't know how anything would shake out and to be honest I didn't particularly care at that point. Looking back I think I really had no hope for the future, and I was pretty crazy and didn't really feel like I'd be able to live very much longer. I didn't envision myself as a lawyer really, more as a law student lol. Schools have a lot of free resources and people who want to help you, and even as crazy as I was I felt I was in a much better place to take full advantage of those things than I had been in undergrad, in order to achieve SOMETHING. I wasn't really worried about what that might be.

So, I vowed to myself that whatever happened, I would really try, not just in school but to build a better future for myself. I did not arrive here in a good mental state, to say the least lol. And going back to school brought back a LOT of painful memories from my previous time in school when, as I mentioned, I was infinitely crazier. As just a couple of random examples, I was sort of toying with the idea of trying to learn a new language, and realized that I was still holding onto this intense guilt about the mental breakdown I had while taking a Russian class in college. One of my professors told me that I was an amazing writer, and I realized no teacher had ever told me that before. I had these insane moments sitting in class where I would get emotional because I was just so happy to be there, in spite of absolutely everything. I stopped regretting all of my past mistakes, because I genuinely think, no matter what horrible things I've done, I would do them all again if they would bring me here. My favorite professor literally saved my life, and is probably the only person in the world who could have successfully convinced me to go to therapy. I can't really even wish I'd done any of this sooner, because I know without a doubt that I wouldn't have been ready.

There are definitely some challenges to being back in school after so long. I remember feeling especially when I was around my friends who were in grad school that if I had to, like, write a long-ass paper or something, I just wouldn't be able to do it lol, like I'd just be so pissed that I had to do some arbitrary assignment. But it should be noted that I, like, despise philosophy-type subjects and things with no practical application, and always felt like I was bullshitting my assignments to make them longer. Not only do I love law school assignments because they are about applying the law to a set of facts (which may be made up but still have real-world relevance), but I always have a LOT to say, and am always struggling to make my papers SHORT enough rather than dragging out my dumbass takes to meet the minimum lol. It's a lot of work, but generally it's work I actually WANT to do, which makes all the difference.

I definitely also feel a bit of a disconnect from most of my fellow students. I think this is partially an age thing and partially a life experience thing. Like, for example, I had a series of hilarious conversations with ppl a few weeks back bc one of my classmates was like "where do you go?? you leave class so fast?" and i was like ?????? when class is over you get to leave that's the deal??????

And I was talking to my fave professor about this and she was like yeah that's definitely a difference of being a little older, you're probably just not in the same mindset that they are. Which is definitely true, and worth keeping in mind. It's not a big deal really but it can be very isolating if you don't feel like you can relate to your classmates on that level. I sometimes get a little :( because I don't usually have a hard time talking to people but I'll just have the most insane interactions w some of my classmates and have to talk myself down like it's okay it wasn't you the other person was the one acting weird LOL. Also, for me at least, I definitely have a little bit of a 'you can't tell me what to fucking do' attitude sometimes LOL, and will get really irritated when professors keep us over time or make us do something pointless. That may just be my sweet personality, but I think in general having been out of school for awhile and also being a bit older, I'm MUCH less tolerant of trifling bullshit than when i was younger LOL. Generally I think there's a lot LESS trifling bullshit to deal with in law school bc there's just so much that's genuinely important to learn? But something to keep in mind.

But god there are SO many benefits! Like, as I mentioned, I'm a naturally intelligent person, but it's actually terrifying how much my mind had slowed down over the past few years. I've had SO many moments here where I was like oh my god, I'm stupid, I'm just stupid and I can't understand this-- and then I was like okay sweaty :) have you considered taking a nap and maybe you'll calm down :) lol but you get my point. Learning new things in a structured environment where you literally have to do the work I think is so beneficial especially at this particular age, since most people get pretty settled into their ways around 30, and personally I don't particularly like being set in my ways and want to always be growing and improving and pushing myself. Every aspect of my life has improved noticeably since I've been here, my physical and emotional and mental health, my memory, my writing, my personal relationships--everything.

BUT that is a direct result of all the work I've put in, because I did this at the right time for myself, and at a point in my life when I'm able to truly appreciate the value of a good education and all the benefits and resources that come with that. So, I would say that if you're in the right mindset to go back to school, it's absolutely 1000% worth it. But if you feel like, 'I don't want to do this, this is a waste of time and will make me miserable,' then I'd say wait it out a little more. There might come a day when you're like, wow, I'm so ready. Or you might think, I can't believe I was gonna go to grad school for That TM that would have been insane, and want to go for something else lol. I think we're so conditioned not to listen to our intuition that we don't realize a lot of the time our gut instinct will tell us whether something is the right move or not!

Wow this was long lol, thank you so much for reaching out, friend, and I hope some of this was mildly helpful or entertaining! I wish you the best in your ventures, and of course I'm always happy to talk more!