#bruno bear

[aliciadoodleshow]

Happy Pride Month! 🏳🏳️‍🌈

(also, these are my oc's sexuality and genders)

[justnoodlefishthings]

[bruabbastars]

part 5 characters as care bears :3c

[mensuited]

[haveyouseenthisseries-poll]

[whos-hotter-jjba]

Hottest JJBA Outfit Bracket - Round 1 Match 1

[way-too-addicted-to-fandoms]

I am unfortunately not immune to a man with curls😔

[thegirlking]

Mother and son shaped by trauma: a deeper look into Alma and Bruno's damaged relationship

Alma and Bruno's mother-son relationship seems like such a minor aspect of the movie, but when you give it some thought, despite the limited focus, it's not only a very complex relationship, but also a narratively significant one.

Obviously we don't have a lot of information on it, but let me reflect a bit on the things we do know, while trying to fill in some blanks. Long post ahead.

Back to the start - how did it go so wrong?

There's one particularly interesting detail that Jared Bush shared on a podcast some time ago. It mostly comes down to the reason Bruno's visions were usually so negative: because that's how he was taught to use his gift by his mother, who would ask him to look into the future for any possible dangers to their home.

Now, this makes perfect sense for Alma's character and gives a great insight into how her trauma affected her. It's a completely natural consequence of the tragedy she experienced - of course she would be gripped by fear and desperate to protect her home from another tragedy at all cost. And the power of foresight is seemingly the ultimate key to preventing tragedy, so of course she would rely on her child's gift for that...

...and yes, that's a great burden to put on your child's shoulders and something that clearly had troubling consequences. The particularly frustrating thing being that those consequences could have been largely prevented only if Bruno had proper understanding and emotional support.

The thing is...the understanding and support probably were there for some time. Some bonus materials suggest that Bruno was not always the black sheep of the family, but quite the opposite. He was apparently once the golden child of the family - until people began to believe his gift was actually responsible for bad future events.

Which brings me to the important question: why did it go so wrong? If Alma herself believed Bruno's gift could help prevent disaster, how and why did this belief that it's actually causing disaster came to be? Didn't she try to protect her son from his gift being horribly misunderstood?

Well, I'd like to give Alma the benefit of the doubt that she did try to protect him, at least when he was a child. But I do wonder if she simply grew exhausted by Bruno at some point, as he grew older? Exhausted by his unclear visions, which were hard to control and not that helpful after all (I think Dolores' verse in WDTAB kinda suggests it). Exhausted by Bruno's eccentric personality that was so far away from the "perfect image" she wanted for the family. And maybe that frustration led to her ultimately neglecting him emotionally and enabling the negative attitude to his gift, even if it wasn't intentional on her part.

Broken trust

Again, this is all just my interpretation and I don't want to assume the worst without any proof... however, I do think it's reasonable to believe that Alma did fail Bruno in some way.

And she might have not realized it, but I think Bruno himself very much felt she failed him. That would also explain his evident lack of trust in her. I talked in one of my previous posts how Bruno not trusting Alma with the vision about Mirabel is a big red flag that something was very wrong in the family. Ideally, he should have been able to trust his mother with the vision, but we were as far from the ideal scenario as we could be - Bruno choosing to hide the vision is a clear sign how damaged his relationship with his mother was at this point and how broken his trust in her was.

Ironically, if Bruno's decision was a result of broken trust in his mother...the same decision also broke her trust in him.

Let's look at it from her (sympathetic but misguided) perspective for a moment. Bruno's gift was something she had relied on in order to protect her family. And so many years later, no matter what the present attitude to his gift was, she still went to him in a difficult moment. So the fact that he essentially denied her that help would definitely feel like a huge betrayal - for Alma it probably looked like Bruno had betrayed the family and betrayed the miracle.

Those would be the understandable feelings of a traumatized woman who probably couldn't stand losing someone she loves yet again - believing Bruno betrayed and abandoned them because he doesn't care was likely a kind of coping mechanism to numb the grief.

Regardless of how understandable those feelings might be though, this coping mechanism was deeply unhealthy and harmful. What's more, the choice to paint Bruno as the bad guy shows horrible lack of self-awareness. And that lack of self-awareness only intensified the unhealthy environment in the family.

Because in the end, Bruno leaving the family should have been the wake-up call that the "perfect" family might have some issues to work through and something needs to change to avoid driving away anyone else. Alma might have not known Bruno's motives to leave, might have been understandably angry and hurt about him hiding the vision, but she definitely should have reflected on her own mistakes as a mother that led to Bruno making this decision.

Protecting the family and understanding the true miracle

But beyond how trauma shaped their relationship, I think there's something else at the core of the issue: their love for their family and their different understanding of what it means to protect it.

I talked about how Alma went to Bruno in a difficult moment, when she feared for the future of the miracle - and that the fact he never gave her the vision and simply ran away must have felt like a betrayal to the miracle.

In some way Bruno did betray the miracle - he betrayed the miracle in the way Alma understood the miracle at that point, as a source of magic more than anything else. And ironically, by doing so, Bruno showed that he actually understood what the miracle was truly about.

Alma was so fixated on protecting the miracle that she ended up losing sight of what was truly important and hurt the family. On the other hand, Bruno saw a threat to the miracle and yet still chose protecting his young niece's well being over anything else - one "giftless" little girl mattered more than the magic.

My point here isn't "Alma bad, Bruno good", that's a huge simplification. Both of those characters were very damaged and were going to unhealthy extremes to protect what was important to them. I'm not saying Bruno's decision to hide the vision was the "right" one or something to be glorified - I mostly think that it's a decision that should have never been made and again, the fact he felt he had to do that shows the deep rooted issues within the family.

But ultimately, he did have the right priority there - of course Mirabel's well being matters more than the magic. Every member of the family matters more than the magic. That's the whole point of the movie and the core of Alma's character arc - realizing that the family itself is the greatest gift.

And one detail I particularly like is that Alma and Bruno are the two people to tell Mirabel she's the real miracle in the end - it shows their values are finally on the same page and there's finally hope for mutual understanding between them.

[shimmychimmy]

combining my interests in a way that pisses everyone off

+ some other ones i didnt rlly feel like coloring

[rebouks]

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Transcript:

Rhys: I wanna do this kinda shit full time after uni so it’s good practice, y’know? Tommy: It ain’t work yet though, don’t get carried away n’ forget to have fun. Rhys: This is fun.

Ivan: Oscar ain’t no employer, do whatever y’want; take a million n’ get a portfolio goin’, or sit n’ eat cake all day. Oscar: [laughs] As long as we get one or two photos we can stick up; it doesn’t really matter-.. just save some cake for me. Rhys: I’m more of a savoury kinda guy, don’t worry.

Bruno: Aren’t you nervous? Oscar: [scoffs] No way. Ivan: I reckon I would be.

Oscar: Pfft, of all the shit we’ve been through recently, getting married is like.. the least worrisome thing ever. Ivan: Holy shit! I ain’t thought about it like that. Oscar: Right?! This is a piece of piss in comparison.

Ivan: [laughs] Christ-.. we fuckin’ did it, bud! Oscar: Fuck yeah, we did! Ivan: And t’think I almost left…

Oscar: I’m glad you didn’t. Ivan: Ahh, I love y’too much. Bruno: Maybe you two should get married.

Ivan: Awh, but then I couldn’t marry you! Oscar: Are you jealous? Do you want a bear hug too? Bruno: [chuckles] Save it for later, I think everyone’s ready.

…

Ella: I swear, if anything goes missing… Norma: Don’t be daft. Ella: Well, you were investigating these lot not long ago.

Norma: [snorts] You never listen, it wasn’t-.. I suppose it’s complicated, but they’re fine! Ella: Hm. Norma: Come on! The grass is dry, the pond is a little less stinky, they cleaned the barn up for us-.. it’s cute.

[DISTANT HOLLERING] Norma: We ought to tell them to leave it all up, renew our vows. Ella: Pfft.. if we’re doing that, I want to be somewhere hot with a cocktail in my hand.

Norma: [laughs] Deal. Ivan: Dude! You good t’go?! Norma: Are you ready, Bernie?

Bernard: Always! Ella: Don’t forget what to say this time. Bernard: Good lord, that was over twenty years ago-.. give me a break!

[aliciadoodleshow]

Bruno and Patty are here!

(also, they're Maggie's siblings too)

[mp3minded]

i've been dragging my feet with my first season 4 playthrough, until Bruno's charm worked on me 🥺 i love how silly we can be together 😭 and his kiss dialogs.. oh my 🫣 if i'm not mistaken, i think they're uniquely his, and i really missed that aspect from later seasons too

[sitting-on-me-bum]

Polar Bears

© Dorota & Bruno Sénéchal

[sassmasterintraining]

My part of an art trade with the wonderfully talented @dororoxpenana ft her OC, Maria!

This was so fun to do, and these two are just the sweetest!! Please go check out Pena's art, so you can get those warm fuzzies~!!

[5qu1dink]

i have a sickness

[nitrozem]

Fun lil' family