#because you get so invested

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

Hello may 31th anon! Look at that, another year behind us and a new one to come. Have a nice day! ₍՞◌′ᵕ‵ू◌₎♡

[littlecrittereli]

Okay I gotta say your art + story have gotten my fanfic engines a churning and now I'm picturing AU with the bros starting out in the wildlife game but with Martin as an 18-19 year old and Chris as this 14 year old and it's more "panicked older brother trying to keep his baby bro safe" while they encounter poachers/dangers.

OKOK HEAR ME OUT....

Martin has legal guardianship over Chris (uhh parents gotta die for this i am so sorry mom and dad kratt but it's for the fanfiction so please forgive me) Which is why a 14 year old is able to join their research team. Martin is technically "homeschooling" him, (i mean technically he's learning on creature adventures so...)

Martin was offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to join the Tortuga research program and Chris didn't want to be the reason that Martin held back on his dreams. So, Chris was basically like take me with you, I'll be good and stay out of trouble I promise. So basically Martin is trying to do his job while simultaneously juggling the responsibility of raising Chris. And the rest of the team helps out as well so they all become a little family and go on these adventures.

The rest of the team would step into older sibling roles as well: Aviva would teach Chris about programming and engineering, Koki would show him how the Tortuga runs and how to make small tune-ups, and Jimmy would teach him how to bake and play video games with him. JUST IMAGINE THE POSSIBILITIES

I don't think Aviva would make a CPS for him, Martin would lose his mind if she did. Chris was already a handful, he does NOT need to be running around as a gecko. Maybe she could make a less extreme version of the suit for him? Like a partial creature power suit, where it can give him traits of animals. Instead of turning into the whole leopard, it just gives him leopard claw gloves and a tail for balance. So a little kiddy version of the CPS. IDk it's just an idea.

[iam93percentstardust]

one of the things that really bothers me about modern franchises, and in particular over the last 5 years or so, is their refusal to commit. what i mean here when i say this is that it's not uncommon for a major franchise to make a decision, whether about the plot or the characters, that should have had huge, world-changing consequences... and then just never address that again or worse, immediately go back and undo it. and i'm gonna pick on star wars and the mcu here because those are the two big franchises i'm into at the moment (and i think they're kind of the worst at this), but i don't want you to walk away from this thinking that this is solely a disney thing. i've seen this happen with game of thrones and supernatural and plenty of other non-disney franchises. spoilers ahead, you've been warned:

in ant-man & the wasp quantumania, scott and hope make the life-altering decision to stay behind in the quantum realm and defeat kang instead of going through the portal to return to their world. this should have been a huge meta decision for the mcu, and when i first saw it in theaters, my immediate thought was wow, what is this going to mean for the mcu going forward? are we going to get a movie/miniseries about scott and hope helping to rebuild the quantum realm? how are cassie, janet, and hank going to react to the losses of their loved ones (in some cases, for the second time)? is cassie going to become the "first" young avenger because she has to take her father's place among the team lineup (and i only say first because as of this moment, none of the other young avengers introduced to the franchise are official avengers yet)? except nope, because less than 2 minutes later, cassie had fixed the portal that had broken way back at the beginning of the movie and brought scott and hope back.

and it felt like such a cheat. i was so disappointed in that theater, not as someone who was invested in these characters on a personal level (because yay, cassie gets her dad back!), but as someone who has spent years investing themselves in the story of the mcu. what was the point of wasting screentime on scott and hope accepting their new lives in the quantum realm if it was just going to immediately be undone? the entire scene could have been cut to scott and hope making it back bare seconds before the portal closed and it would have had the same emotional impact. there was nothing added by making scott and hope (and us) think that there was no way back only to rip the rug out from under us and go "gotcha! you really thought we were gonna give this movie a sad ending? haha! you're so dumb!"

and this isn't the first time the mcu has done this. one of the biggest complaints about endgame was the decision to set it five years in the future with no consideration for how that would actually change the setting of the mcu. characters were brought back to the exact place they disappeared from with no consideration for how things might have changed in the interim five years (like planes that weren't in the air anymore, buildings no longer standing, even just something as simple as a chair being unoccupied). and then the mcu didn't even really have the courage to address how this would have shaped the world other than a few jokes and making the bad guys in the falcon and the winter soldier people who cared about how the world had screwed them over during the blip.

and things like this happen over and over and over again. the accords are put into place in civil war, but by the time we get to she-hulk, they're gone with no explanation because, as best as i can tell, the writers didn't want to have to deal with the worldbuilding that went into the accords. gamora is killed in infinity war, but heaven forbid quill not have an emotional investment in a film he appears for maybe 10 minutes in so now she's back in endgame. steve got to go live in the past with his ex-girlfriend (which is in itself a refusal to commit after the mcu both gave her a different husband and had the woman herself tell him to move on) but we need to establish that messing with timelines is bad because that's what the entire next phase hinges on so actually his ending was predestined and it's only everyone else who can't change time. whoever took this entire town and also wanda hostage and forced them to live out a sitcom fantasy is bad and needs to be stopped but wait, it's actually wanda and she can't be the bad guy yet, we need her for doctor strange 2, so actually everyone's going to defend her now and say that no one else could ever possibly understand her grief. thor has decided to accept responsibility as king of asgard, but we can't use him for any more movies if he's stuck in asgard, so actually he's decided to pass it on to someone whose entire leadership capability is developed offscreen. i could list more examples but this is making me angry, so let's move on to star wars instead.

with star wars, i look at first the oft-quoted meme, "somehow palpatine has returned." yeah, i shouldn't really need to go into detail on how that counts as a refusal to commit but. the last jedi was a study in how johnson refused to commit to anything that abrams had laid down in the force awakens, but rise of skywalker was almost like abrams had looked at the franchise and said "screw you for taking it away from me, i'm going to come up with the most bullshit stuff just to spite you for doing that in the first place. and i'm going to start by undoing the most important plot point of the first trilogy: the emperor dies." and yeah, disney's kind of tried to salvage this by dropping hints into the bad batch and the mandalorian about cloning, but that only really works if you're watching the franchise chronologically and not considering that both of those series came out after rise of skywalker.

and then there's the mandalorian, my sweet summer child, who is, in my opinion, the worst at backtracking their plot points. i'm not entirely convinced that any of the higher ups for this show really knew what they were doing when they started working on it and i'm not convinced that they know what they're doing now. yeah, there's the tie-in to the last season of clone wars, but the mandalorian has managed to walk back pretty much every single major plot point it's had. din is this legendary warrior who can't be beat, but no one will watch this show if he defeats everyone too early, so he's constantly getting beat up (tbf, sometimes some of the fights he loses makes sense like the krayt dragon and the mudhorn, but a lot of them don't. at all). moff gideon is dead, no wait no he's not, now he's imprisoned, no wait no he's not, now he's definitely dead, you can totally believe us this time guys. grogu can use the force and must be placed with the jedi, but wait, the only person still actively teaching the way of the jedi is luke and all of his students will be brutally murdered ten years from now, and we can't have that, everyone will be mad at us for killing off such a cute character and no one will buy baby yoda dolls (and also we have to set up luke's character degradation from hopeful, believes-in-love cinnamon roll to "i'm going to kill my nephew") so in between seasons let's have grogu decide to go back to din (and don't even get me started on how frustrating it is that a casual mandalorian watcher also had to watch book of boba fett to understand why grogu is back). din has the darksaber now which makes him king of mandalore, that's totally going to be important and what the entire series has been building up to, right? wrong! he might have spent the first two seasons making connections, learning about the world outside his sheltered upbringing, and demonstrating the various qualities that would make for a good leader, but the entire third season will be about din realizing that actually he's super unworthy and the darksaber should actually go to someone who... saw an animal in the water.

and it's really, really frustrating as a viewer! because how am i supposed to get invested in any of these plot decisions when they almost always get reversed? why should i care that mj and ned have forgotten peter when ant-man 3 has shown me that they'll remember him the next time they're all on screen together? why should i care that tech is dead when half of the last season of clone wars was about how echo was actually alive? if none of these decisions have any permanence, then where are the emotional stakes? why should i watch your movie if all you're going to tell me is that nothing matters?

[flamemons]

[yardsards]

people have brought up the difference between "this piece of media is good" vs "i like this piece of media". i would also like to mention the third axis "i would easily recommend this piece of media to others"

[morphestic]

i love rare pairs

[tea-earl-grey]

made some Worf quote calligraphy cards!

i also still have all of my calligraphy stuff set up so lmk (replies, asks, whatever) if anyone has requests for other silly quotes.

[ID: nine white index cards with the following quotes written in black and red ink in a blackletter calligraphy style. card 1 reads "There is an ancient Klingon proverb that says 'You cannot loosen a man's tongue with root beer'." Card two reads: "You will never achieve the 24th level of awareness." Card three reads: "Death to the opposition." Card four reads: "Sir, I must protest! I am not a merry man!" Card five reads: "At the first sign of betrayal, I will kill him, but I promise to return the body intact." Card six reads: "Today is a good day to die." Card seven reads: "Find him and kill him!" Card eight reads: "Good tea. Nice house." Card nine reads: "This is the story of a little ship that took a little trip." /end ID]

[thepoisonroom]

'I flirted with the idea that instead of being trans that I was just a cross-dresser (a quirk, I thought, that could be quietly folded into an otherwise average life) and that my dysphoria was sexual in nature, and sexual only. And if my feelings were only sexual, then, I wondered, perhaps I wasn’t actually trans.

I had read about a book called The Man Who Would Be Queen, by a Northwestern University professor who believed that transwomen who were attracted to women were really confused fetishists, they wanted to be women to satisfy an autogynephilia. And though I first read about this book in the context of its debunkment and disparagement, I thought about the electricity of slipping on those tights, zipping up those boots, and a stream of guilt followed. Maybe this professor was right, and maybe I was only a fetishist. Not trans, just a misguided boy.

About a year later, on the Internet, I come across a transwoman who added a unique message to the crowd refuting this professor. Oh, I wish I remember who this woman was, and I wish even more that I could do better than paraphrase her, but I remember her saying something like this: “Well, of course I feel sexy putting on women’s clothing and having a woman’s body. If you feel comfortable in your body for the first time, won’t that probably mean it’ll be the first time you feel comfortable, too, with delighting in your body as a sexual thing?”'

-Casey Plett, Consciousness

[kingofanemptyworld]

this felt appropriate

[itgr]

No actually I will say. The latest Marionetta episode is so good in its depiction of racism and colonialism. SOMEONE DID THEIR RESEARCH. You can tell Miriam learned a lot from Hooky because this whole scene was fucking hard to read and earth-shattering for me

Its also the way Mama Yalizah compares Sahed to an animal that felt. Yeahhhhhh 😶

I don't know. Its such a good depiction of growing up as a poc and constantly being expected to always behave and be palatable because if you weren't, you'd just get your humanity taken away from you for acting "animalistic" or "dangerous" (for being a kid)

I CAN NOW SAY I FUCKING ADORE SAHED. honestly Marionetta hadnt clicked for me quite like HOOKY yet but it's getting there. I liked Sahed but I didn't like him that much (also I feel like a lot of his fans tend to fetishise him a little which I feel like turned me off from him) so I've been more into Kamille and Rainah tbh

Like yes there was that scene where Dotty was embodying white feminism by basically invalidating him and being high key racist and that scene hit and conveyed the feeling of being the only poc in the room well but outside of that. Nothing's really hit for me personally UNTIL THIS. LIKE WOW. JESUS FUCK. I actually adore Sahed so much oh my god. He's done nothing wrong ever ive decided/j

[uncanny-tranny]

Periodic reminder to trans people who use minoxidil/rogaine on their face:

Make sure to wash your hands afterward, especially if you have cats. Also, please keep it off your lips. You don't want to ingest it (it also tastes like hell, take it from me). If you're prone to dry skin, invest in a good moisturizer, something that agrees with your skin and will keep it feeling nice.

Carry on. I wish you all the best of luck in whatever you do to promote hair growth 💛

[federthenotsogreat]

A little thing to celebrate the upcoming anniversary!! 🌟🎊

[eri-pl]

You know, what else would be hilarious?

You know, in AtLA the "Ember Island" episode? The one with theather? Imagine: After Doriath, the remaining Feanorians (M&M, A& maybe A depending on what you prefer) go spying among the refugees in one or another city (no, IDK how Maedhros is not recognizeable, elven illusions, ok? Maglor does it) and there is a theatre and it does a play about Feanor and his sons (mostly about the sons) and it has the budget of a Czech musical and historical accuracy of the Amazon series.

Most of the men are played by girls (because boys and adults are mostly dead or fighting), Maglor is the main character, portrayed as weeping all the time and talkieng about hope (see: Katara in the episode) and hating his brothers (also, a strong suggestion that he's actually Fingolfin's son). Maedhros is portrayed as an orc-like monster but also has a lot of evidently artifical muscles which he flexes all the time in a flirty way. Celegorm is shown eating people, beating his dog, and still somehow is a comic relief. Curufin is played by the same actor as Feanor, only wearing heels (yes, they do the "short Feanor" thing) and is basically the same character, only he screams less and speaks in whole sentences (yes, they somehow make Feanor dumb). Caranthir is somehow turned human to marry Haleth (who is an evil witch). Amrod and Amras are one character.

Oh, and the actor playing Maglor cannot sing well (for an Elf at least).

And they need to sit there unnoticed in order to gather information about the Silmaril later, or something.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

One of my favorite things that happened during my last mage Hawke playthrough was during the final battle against Meredith. Everything's going well. We're kicking her ass, she's got just this much health left, we're so close... but then everyone gets stunned dizzy.

Hawke is stumbling around all confused, seeing stars. The rest of his companions are stunned. I'm annoyed because I just want to end this fight. Don't know how or who did it, probably Meredith, but the situation's dire.

Meredith's standing by herself at the center of the Gallows, shouting nonsense and smugly believing the Maker's going to come down and make her his new bride after she murdered a bunch of innocent people.

Truly, this is the part of the story where Varric says they all thought hope was lost, that in the end, Meredith would pull a fast one on us and claim victory...

Until the REAL hero of dragon age 2 comes storming at her. I don't know why Carver was the only one to not be affected, but he literally jumped out of no where and just started bashing Meredith with his sword while everyone else was too dizzy to do anything until she was dead and the cutscene played.

"Hawke defeated Meredith-" LIES, VARRIC. I know the truth! I was there! Hawke didn't do shit! Carver Hawke was the main character all along! He got shit done and Varric gave Hawke all the credit!

I bring this up because last night I finished my warrior Hawke run and when we got to the fight with Meredith, I kind of hoped the same thing would happen where Bethany dashed in all heroic and got the killing blow on Meredith.

She did not.

She got squished by a statue.

But it's fine, Bethany Hawke was the true main character in my heart.

[the-amazing-spider-bi]

reading a game of thrones and fuck. robb doesn’t get to be a narrator (he’s lyanna stark he’s the dead girl in the pool he’s the narrative’s most special ghost) but he barely has to. we’re watching him from every point of view but his own. he’s the lannisters’ second thought, a teenager pretending to be the man his father was. he’s jon’s best friend, his older brother, the guy he compares all the others to, snowflakes melting in his hair forever. he’s catelyn first son, it was just the two of them for so long, her boy who looks like her but takes after his father so much it aches, and yet is never like him quite enough, a boy soldier leading men to war when he can barely grow a beard. in private, he listens to his mother’s lessons about command as if she was a school teacher, blushes when he gets the answers wrong, then he earns the lords’ respect in public, like he is older than his years. her son slipping between her fingers when he’s right here.

but most of all in the first book we see him through bran. he’s lord robb, who commands his men and fights wildlings and only has to say one word for his wolf to rip an attacker’s fingers off. he’s robb the brother, who comes into bran’s bedroom in the evening to cry because he’s scared, actually, he’s so scared that he’s going to die, that he has no right to order all these people to die for him, that his father isn’t here and he went south and starks never come back from the south, and now he’s the fifteen year old boy on the throne of a war hero with no idea what he is really doing. he’s scared and he does it anyway. ned tells us very early in the book, after the execution, that it’s the only way to be brave and we don’t know yet that he’s talking about his son. robb haunts the narrative and he’s not even dead yet

[prince-liest]

F/F Radiostatic where Allie is like “Ah yes, me and Vee seem to be very good friends” and Vee is like clenching her fists so hard her claws are digging into her palms and making her bleed, flashing the pride flag on her screen

(I’m unsure if you’d ever gender-bend Vox, but it was a thought I had which I wanted to drop here lol)

Hahaha, god, yes. I feel like Allie would be so deeply entrenched in compulsory heterosexuality in that "it does not even occur to her that this thing she has with Vee might be gay" kind of way, and meanwhile Vee is just suffering acutely every time Allie acts like they are basically married. It's gonna turn into some "oh, you've never had sex? Let's practice" kind of shit before Allie catches a clue.

Meanwhile Vee is the "married for ten years but 'are you sure she really likes me?'" lesbian except the anxiety is actually 100% validated (and directly caused by) by Allie's...everything.