#but as an endless he cant have it

[orionsangel86]

Gotta admit I wasn't aware of Neil's comment that he's had more lovers than we see. I always figured that perhaps certain relationships lasted for far longer than a mortal life span and that maybe covered longer chunks of his life. We dont know how long he was with Alianora for, or Calliope before Orpheus died. I definitely headcanon that the Lucifer relationship happened, but it happened before Lucifer fell and its therefore totally plausible that it was a longer term thing but Lucifer changed so much when they became Lucifer that it was like they became a different person and that relationship is therefore never talked about explicitly - though a great concept for a fanfic.

I also faaar prefer the reading that even with all that he is, and how alluring he is, that he can't seem to be successful in this one thing he wants more than anything else. It just suits his character better than to say "oh yeah he's had countless lovers they all just ended bad". Nah i prefer him mostly bitchless lol.

Also, what fascinates me is how little we know about the love lives of the other endless compared to Dream.

Does Destiny date? Not sure how that would work but if Father Time could get his shit together enough to have seven kids with the primordial goddess of the night then I don't see why Destiny can't find a lover?

Death? I dunno if there are other DC comics which explore her relationships outside The Sandman but she certainly never seems interested.

I can't recall Desire ever actually taking lovers within the comics. They appear to dismiss anyone who shows interest. Which is odd because you'd think Desire would be all about the lovers, even if they are cruel.

Despair and Delirium also never seem interested in lovers.

Interestingly the only other endless sibling who canonically has a partner is Destruction, who dated Ishtar. From what I remember from the comics it was Dream specifically who broke them up. Jealous much Dream?

Why is Dream the only endless who ever seems to crave love that much? Why does he have a string of broken hearts behind him when none of the others seem to? Even DESIRE?

I view the concept of Dream even taking lovers as odd when compared to his siblings. He's the outlier. The one endless who craves love and companionship. It is of course all a part of his nature. The prince of stories who refuses to even acknowledge that he has his own story, and yet its so very clear he does, and that he wants it to be a love story. Its painfully tragic when you really think about it.

But he is the only one. I feel like its not really normal or expected of the endless to take lovers, simply due to what they are, and therefore if any of them try, even if those potential lovers are immortal, its ultimately got to end in doom.

I know that the Gaiman "word of God" on Dream of the Endless's romantic history is, "He has had many more lovers than the ones we see" with regards to Killalla, Alianora, Nada, Calliope, and Thessaly (ugh) and as someone who will absolutely incorporate word-of-god canon , it's the height of hypocrisy to just dismiss this.

And I will accept that probably Dream has had some sexual encounters outside those five canonical relationships, like the implied Lucifer and Titania flings.

But I just can't escape the sense that the whole, "Oh yeah, he's had tons of other lovers like, just loads of them, believe me, the dude is definitely not billions of years old and only had a half dozen romantic encounters all of which ended in tears, that would be crazy, right??" is just more... something a dude would say about their super cool dude character?

Because I personally like to, in this one instance, rigidly stick to canon as we see it on the page. And that canon is: Dream was deeply lonely and never even officially hit a half-dozen long-term lovers in his life and he only married once. He is a divorcee and he is sad and he is lonely and he would love to find someone to be with and be in a relationship and just continuously eluded him. And our evidence for this? The Wake.

We have some of Dream's past lovers show up at the Wake. Bastet specifically notes that they could have been lovers, probably should have been, but it never happened. Titania implies a relationship but won't say anything more and obviously it was not long-lasting romantically speaking, whatever it was.

But basically, if we take the Wake as an on-the-page canonical account of the living beings who were Dream's lovers and who had enough of a connection to actually show up, it's still a depressingly small number for so long a life, for a character who is defined by his romanticism and loneliness. Even if we say, give or take, there might have been a few more, none of those after Nada could be mortal, so we can't just say they're all dead. That means the other immortal lovers either didn't show up or didn't bother to speak. And sure, if there's other immortals in the mix, sure, we could "Doylist" say the comic just doesn't have room for them all but really, to me, the more compelling take is... there just weren't that many for Dream, and that it's deeply sad. Some of it was, yes, his own fault, probably a lot of it. But it's still sad.

And more importantly, it's a more interesting character. Anyone can say their stupidly powerful godlike character who is beautiful and magical and can craft dreams and stories and is this Byronic hero of poetry and darkness is also someone who had a bunch of romantic partners and can definitely hook up with anyone he wants, psshh, obviously but... a character who is all those things and can't get this one major part of their life together to the extent that he's demonstrated to want a loving partner which he is repeatedly shown to want, is just... it's a certain kind of unique for that character and I'm here for it.

[canon-gabriel-quotes]

Transcript:

Gabriel : Please, council. I know I failed you, but surely there's another way besides turning me into a marketable plushie?

No!

AAAAAHHHHH-*Squeak*

This is my lowest point, but I know it can't get worse from here.

Who's that? Someone approaches! Perhaps they could help me?

You! Listen, I need you to get me out of here.

What is that claw descending upon me?

No!

EGH-*Squeak* It squeezes me pretty tight!

Agh, oh it's carrying me to the exit. Thank heaven!

It's about to- *Squeak* AGH! Oh!

You had missed, fuck!

Try- try it again.

Come on I know you have another quarter, yes?

Yes, try it again, yes.

Okay, this time I'm out.

I'm out! I'm- *Squeak* AGHHH!

AW YOU FUCK.

V1 : YAYYY.

Gabriel : SUCH A- JUST BREAK THE GLASS.

FUCKIN' IDIOT.

Audio source

[dykedvonte]

Curly's little blurb on his steam trading card just keeps reminding me he is a much more miserable person than people realize.

We don't get a lot of his thoughts, inner confliction that aren't bogged down by what Jimmy says or does. Even in the The Last One and Then Another, his dialogue is reflective, not the Curly before the crash but the result of everything. Parts of the him he was are there of course, but also disfigured and warped beyond recognition just like he is physically.

Curly really doesn't think much of himself and desires. He clearly chases fleeting moments of happiness. He doesn't really have prospects for himself, assumes in a similar way to Swansea, that if it should make it happy then he is happy. Though, he hasn't reached the point Swansea did to admit it doesn't. He neither sees the glass half full or empty, it's just water, something he needs and he'll take it from any perspective.

He wasn't running from anything but he's never really been going towards something either. He's listless. I've been using the term complacent to describe how he feels about his life and the closest people (really just Jimmy) in it, but now that word feels too neutral, too nice. Happier than Curly really was. There isn't just one word for it, he's unfulfilled, uncertain, uninspired. There are no active problems he faces and that's the issue, why should he be upset?

I believe he really is a person who doesn't know who he is or wants to be. He follows a structure. I don't think he's suicidal, but he clearly doesn't think about what makes him happy. He's numb. I suppose that is a better word than complacent, used to the feeling even if he hates it. It doesn't hurt so why stop it?

[chickensauras]

Ok listen. I just have *some thoughts*. Thoughts I can't articulate. So I drew this instead :U

Ref image is from ch. 6

[ganondoodle]

(while i am crumbling into pieces from cramp pain)

back when they announced the totk masterworks book i said i wasnt happy about it bc it would either

prove they thought all this was good from the start and everything went as planned

show us that they had unbelievable better ideas and plans but for some unknow reason scrapped it all

as it stands now with the concepts i have seen ... they somehow did both, some things seemed to have been planned fro mthe start (the whole focus on sonau/zonai stuff for example, which i personally just dont like bc i liked them better as an unkown mystery you never get to meet) and other stuff (like ganondorfs concepts, or the infinitely cooler castle in the sky esque concepts for the sky islands, instead of some nonsensical, meaningless little stone crumbs) was much, much more interesting initially (together with the interviews that said they initially planned to have the battery be a magic meter and make the sonau more magic than tech- but then decided to build their stuff around modern electrical devices just so players would immediately know what it was an what it would do -why????? thats so boring?? and unecessary ?? and they still give you tutorials for it anyway, multiple times??!!- for some ungodly reason)

it makes me more and more sure that this game, that took 6 years to make with most assets already being there (the same time that botw took to make?????????), went through a similar development hell as that one final fantasy game did where the director decided to make it an entirely different game every few weeks bc he saw something cool in another game-

its the only thing that makes sense to me, why else would it be so weirdly ... unfinished, its full of grand ideas badly executed, or like i said in a previous post, like an alpha build (weird! did someone in charge also see cool stuff every few months and decide they wanted it in there too no matter what so everyone had to scramble to try and put it in making the whole jenga tower fall over and over??), just to test how far you can push things, with placeholders everywhere, the same cutscene pasted in where another should be and a placeholder reason to get players to go soemwhere (fake zelda) and rough ideas for puzzles etc, that was never finished, jsut highly polished (in looks, sounds and presentation) in hopes of it being 'good enough' or players not noticing (like, take the underground for example, the idea itself is fantastic and cool as fuck, but its feels like an idea that was never finished and just barely fileld with some things to try and cover up the fact that it was never done, like a statue that wasnt done being carved but ran out of time so they painted it anyway- take the base map and invert it, put some easily accessible points of jumping down into it in random spots to test if the game can handle it- no time left to actually get that idea anywhere more specific and well thought out/put together, so its left like that, put the same texture everywhere, barely modified copies of the same enemies, and some little reward spots that make no sense, modelling three types of trees and an enemy camp is way quicker to do than actually making an entire new map (they didnt have to make it the same size btw, just make it big but unique caves, put the gravity effect down there in enclosed spaces! makes it less weird to have randomly happen in the sky! etc) but its there!! its in the game and if they are lucky most players wont go down there enough to notice how meaningless and unfinished it all is)

knowing they would most likely never admit to it though, probably bc of their reputation, is just addign to the frustrations i have with it :I

(i just hate to not know the reason for things, if the devs, who are usually the ones being worked to the bone for things they know arent good, where put through that bc some executive big shot threw their tables around every so often or neglected their project bc they wanted to focus on something else first ... id like to know, i dont enjoy making up these conspiracy (?) theories .......... but i cant shake this feeling, its jsut makes no sense)

[haunted-xander]

So. Fatebreaker, right? Ryne's biggest fears made manifest, daddy issues personified, yes?

He's an amalgamation of Thancred and Ran'jit, his face, his voice and his weapon is Thancred's, but his body, his fighting style and his words are Ran'jit's.

Throughout the fight Fatebreaker constantly makes comments about how only he can protect Ryne, only he can provide for her, only he has even the right to so much as stand beside her, to be in her general presence. He's possessive and obsessive, repeatedly asserting that she is HIS and his only. Which is exactly what Ran'jit says basically every time we encounter him.

But this time it's in Thancred's voice. This time it's with the voice and face of a man she actually cares about.

Ryne isn't scared of Thancred, she never has been. Even when she first met him she was barely even nervous (as clearly shown in Thancred's short story). There's a lot of different feelings happening between those two, but fear has never been one of them.

But now, after things have gotten so much better, she is scared of Thancred becoming like Ran'jit. Because if Thancred was just a little further gone, if he was just a little less compassionate, he would've. It wouldn't be hard for him to go down the same path as Ran'jit did, to be incapable of letting go of the ghost of that girl he loved so so much to the point he'd stubbornly grip anything close to her he could. He didn't, but the fact he could've is terrifying.

It makes his final words, words that are Thancred's, so very important. This is her deepest fears made manifest, but he still says he wants her to be happy. Her happiness not only matters, but is important to him.

[july-19th-club]

i know for a fact i have made this post before but for me it's very important that bbc merlin is a pointless tragedy. it wouldn't be good (it's frequently not good anyway but it would be a lot further away from good) if it wasn't a pointless tragedy! it's simply not arthuriana if it doesn't go past the high point of the heroic/legendary/high medieval romance stuff and end with detailed rundowns of exactly how everybody got betrayed and died like that is what makes it real arthuriana to me and not just a silly show about a wizard

[beesgav]

I really prefer when they make him a bit more chubby over scrawny

[dakotac0le]

i love dakota cole such a stupid fucking amount hes so important to me

[benreygenders]

when the codependency hits

[ineffablyendless]

i watched the Old Guard yesterday bc I was interested (it was very good) and I wanted to give Hob Gadling, my blorbo, some immortal friends in my head and after wathing a couple of times and puttering about the fandom I came to the conclusion that Hob would make the Guards uncomfortable.

Not least bc his circumstances are different in the ways that matter (its will to live per century, and he can die whenever he'd like) but bc Hob doesnt have the sense if martyrdom the rest of them do. They never chose their immortality; they do the best they can with it.

Hob DID choose his immortality. He CONTINUES to choose it. He RELISHES in it.

Already that marks him as different, by core of faith and belief. Men like Hob are dangerous; bc people who deeply enjoy life, enjoy immortality on the scale he does without much regard for what it means are the kind of people who would kill for it. Whatever it takes. He can and will and HAS left things and people behind for the sake of it. If it took killing a man once a century he would have done it. Hes done worse. Theres always someone out there who deserves to die, by mercy of themself or others.

Hob is CONSTANTLY compared to the Corinthian by the sheer apetite for life; his own and others.

Thats bound to make the Guards uncomfortable. It would probably explain how Andy would prefer not to have him in her ranks. Hes too dangerous, and hes not a good person. His motivations are not something she understands, and definitely not something she trusts.

Theres a fanfic premise in there somewhere

[skiploom]

[get-more-bald]

the biggest thing about X6 is not that he doesn't think of himself as human (though he doesn't, and according to some it's correct) BUT that he doesn't see himself as a Person

[heavensmortuary]

not even joking one bit but reading Trigun was like. It's ok to grieve and burn at the cruelty and overwhelming pain that you see and feel and know you're capable of immense evil and it's normal to feel disgusted with your own capacity for evil (even if you're trying your BEST not to hurt others) and it's ok to grieve about how broken the world is, as long as you don't go to those dark places, either in your mind or wherever your path leads, alone. As long as your anger doesn't lead you to sin. As long your despair doesn't pull others into despair.

That your own capacity for good and peace can be shattered in an single weak moment, and that's just your nature, but it has to be fought against regardless, and you can't do it alone. That grief and struggle are not things to keep to yourself, they're nothing to be ashamed about, that embracing them will help others too.

Trigun really said that joy ISNT happiness, and should never be confused as such. Joy is a bloody, dirt and glass shard covered thing. It's not just for yourself, but for others around you. If you have joy maybe they can hold onto it too, hold it close to them too. Because sometimes hope simply isn't enough. Sometimes things are hopeless. But joy makes a hopeless fight worth struggling over. Joy makes you abound in hope. Patient in tribulation. Lacking nothing.

To quote N.D. Wilson in 'Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl', "Tragedy must be destroyed by someone willing to be swallowed by it, willing to be broken, torn out of the flesh, but able to return to it."

It's holding nothing back. Willing to face to most horrific parts of your own self, the worst of this world, the things you are desperately scared of, the things you hate, to suffer long, and hold nothing back. To live like you're meant to die. Meant to be ragged. Run until there's nothing left, until everything is burned away and even the bones don't remain. That's how life is supposed to be lived. Nothing held back, thrown into the darkness. Biting and tearing screaming into the sunlight

[sigmaelxgr]

Malkhest adressed me those brave words: "I was expecting you to be some kind of blood obsessed brute. I was wrong to misjudge you."

Well, Sir...