#but don't force it to become canon

[fauzhee10069]

TW-CW fandom-related RANT, read at your own risk.

i just now found out that beefleafers are worse than caatofags.

can't handle negativity and likes to gatekeep opinions.

even caatofags were loud in their delusion, they were not randomly shutting people off who disagree on them.

they may just brush it off with maturity.

just a single post, beefleafers' mentality already feel like being attacked.

imagine being a caatofag and read all of my posts denying their belief.

or imagine being a destieheller and asking every single one of anti-hellers to remove their posts/stop hating them.

you failed to provide me a proper argument like this, so you switch to do tag-keeping instead?

this problem shouldn't be overly hard to solve, by blocking me, your feed will look nice again.

i don't care having people blocking me more than you guys wish you could dictate me.

i don't know you and i don't care to know you.

it's not like you care to my other posts either.

you just want that single post to be gone on your feeds, right?

(...) -> block, just two clicks will solve that.

i've tested it myself, it simply swipes away the post you don't like.

it's more efficient than typing many words to complain in my ask box.

how long have you been in the internet?

does blocking feature sound alien to you?

i’m even going far to make this tutorial for you!

don't waste your time to change my mind, even a mother can't mold their kids into a man/woman she completely wanted.

i think I've done this much only for them.

of all my meta posts, this is the first time i have to give this massive warnings:

though it disrupts my usual writing flow, i’m still willing to do it.

then tw/cw tags:

EDIT:

this case reminded me of a Twitter trend a few months ago regarding entitled Wattpad users who wanted the algorithm to be implemented in AO3.

are most of the beefleafers in the generation of Wattpad users? Is that why they are not used to self-filters & lacking emotional maturity in viewing internet contents as they are too spoiled by the algorithm which often succeeds in showing the content they like?

so when the system fails them, they immediately become aggressive and blame the individual who made the post they don’t want to see.

i still want to believe that there are still enough mature beefleafers out there.

but if that's the case, they should be able to react to this post without confrontation.

just the word 'personal opinion' should be enough not to make them baper easily offended.

this one is not even properly tagged, so if there is beefleafer who gets triggered by this post and complain to me, THAT'S IT! You're truly the problem.

[canisalbus]

To me, Machete kind of has the energy of a secondary villain/coldhearted side character in someone else's story that a lot of fans latch onto, moreso than the protagonist. Question is, would he be the villain in anyone's story?

Why, thank you! I'm actually glad to hear he gives off that vibe. I don't think he set out to become a villain but a lot of people certainly view him as one.

[dazais-guardian-angel]

Okay, a good amount of time has passed, and after having seen this post by @weretiger-be-my-horse , I've been turning it over and over in my brain going absolutely feral over this concept. I need to expand upon my thoughts on this idea and all the evidence there is pointing towards it, whether that be actual tangible things, or purely strong vibes I have.

First of all, full disclaimer: I did not like the season 5 finale, and how it wrapped up the DoA arc. To say that I "disliked" it is putting it extremely lightly, in fact -- I absolutely hated it, and I am still, to a degree, in disbelief that I actually even watched those 24 minutes with my own two eyes, and that it somehow wasn't a complete fever dream. While I'm not going to go in long-winded detail into all the ways that I feel like the finale almost completely bastardized all of its featured characters and destroyed any and all buildup we've had going on in this arc for 50 some chapters now, because that's not the main point of this post, I will not make any attempt to hide the fact that the theory-crafting I'm about to pose here is partly influenced and prompted by how much I hated the finale, and how much I desperately hope that it will not end up being manga canon. Therefore, if you enjoyed the finale — and that's fine! — and don't want to read any negativity about it, then I would not recommend reading any further (I mean, you've probably already left by this point, which is fair lol), While obviously it's important that I be as objective and unbiased as possible when explaining my thoughts, some of my negative feelings about the writing will be a part of this analysis, even if this isn't going to be a full-blown rant. Just know that if you proceed.

With that out of the way, let me continue.

So. In the aforementioned post, the theory presented is that the anime may be operating on an alternate timeline, and that this will become evident once we read the upcoming October chapter, wherein things will go completely differently post-chapter 110 than they do in the final episode — probably for the worse, with the s5 finale intending to lull us into a false sense of security and make us assume that everything in the manga arc finale will wrap up as smoothly and consequence-freely(? lol) as it did in the anime one. It also suggests that the Fukuchi we see at the very end that sskk are fighting came from the manga timeline, where he won, and that he used the Book to jump to a timeline where he lost, the anime one, proven by the fact that this Fukuchi is wearing a mask with the same design on it as the mask Fukuchi is wearing on the chapter 110 DoA color spread/title page.

First of all, I want to note the fact that it's not just the mask design that's the same: the entire outfit is roughly more or less the same as well. It's not completely 1-to-1, because the anime can never fully match the intricacies of Harukawa's beautiful outfit designs, and the Fukuchi in this scene has the kimono half-off because of the... super saiyan mode he's in, but most all of the main pieces of clothing are there. Any small inaccuracies could also be attributed to the fact that Harukawa probably didn't have this finalized art ready back when this episode was being made, so the animators wouldn't have had the complete design to work off of. But in general, because it's all so similar, I think we can quite confidently say that the ending episode Fukuchi is meant to be the one from this manga art.

Also, people have pointed this out, but it's worth mentioning that the mask Asagiri wore at Anime Expo in July was referencing this Fukuchi. It's not a crucial detail, but it just proves more that Asagiri is a gigantic fucking troll, and that he clearly wanted to draw attention to this Fukuchi design. It's important. He describes the mask here as made in the motif of an ellipses inside a speech bubble... could that perhaps be referencing meta aspects, like the Book?

Next, I want to talk about the even bigger elephant in the room, which to me is the most damning and undeniable piece of evidence there is of the anime operating on a completely separate timeline from the manga:

This Fucking Hand™️

As we all know, in the anime, Fyodor injures his hand when the password input device blows up, and as we all know, this does not happen in the manga. In the last episode, Dazai claims that the final nail in the coffin of his impromptu plan to kill Fyodor relied on this hand injury: because Fyodor couldn't pilot his escape helicopter himself, he would ask one of his Meursault vampires to do it for him, unaware that Bram and thus this vampire was now on the ADA's side, and said vampire could kill him while his guard was down.

Ignoring how utterly stupid and contrived this plan is when you stop and think about it for more than two seconds, the fact of the matter is that something that initially seemed like nothing more than an odd but inconsequential anime original addition ended up snowballing into being the entire reason one of the big bads was brought down. If Fyodor hadn't hurt his hand, he wouldn't have needed another pilot, and so the traitor vampire wouldn't have had an opportunity to get near him and kill him without him expecting it even though said vampire was presumably with him as they were leaving Meursault, and was probably already a traitor by then, so there was plenty opportunity for him to still die. not to mention by Chuuya's hands at literally any time he wanted to, because Chuuya was coherent the whole time. Also there's absolutely no way Dazai could have known exactly what Ranpo would do, no matter how smart he is and how much he trusts him. idk it's fucking dumb, just roll with it. Therefore, putting aside all other variables for now, we can conclude that, on the most basic level, this signifies that no hand wound = no death.

And let me tell you, this hand wound bothers me. It really, really does. Because they focus on it a LOT — they go out of their way to draw attention to it MULTIPLE TIMES, from the moment it first happens to the end of the season. Fyodor even talks about it to himself, about Dazai being able to cause him tangible, visible, bodily harm, (something that, again, as far as we've seen, has never happened in the manga). Hell, even after Fyodor's death, they're still drawing attention to it, because his right arm is all of him that survives, and Dazai picks it up and gives it to Nikolai to do his hilarious sad little gay fondling of it played completely straight even though there's nothing straight going on here at all! It's like it's a big red flashing sign at all times going "you see this injured hand? This is important. Are you picking up that it's important? Are you taking note of it?" Why is that? Obviously, it serves to give us the lore crumbs about Fyodor and "that man", but that's hardly the main, much more glaring reason, as I've already mentioned.

Fyodor doesn't hurt his hand in the manga. Fyodor won't die here in the manga. I am so dead serious by this point about this, and it's not just simply the fact that this was absolutely not at all the time for him to die, or the fact that his hand is the reason for his death in the anime in and of itself, but how much EMPHASIS they place on this, and on the hand in general. What would be the point of adding something like this, if it's not meant to alert us to the fact that it has a major impact on how the story plays out? We all know Bones: they struggle to get right and include everything that's already there in the source material; they would never go out of their way to add something this noteworthy if there wasn't a very good reason for it, if it wasn't absolutely necessary. I've seen a few people bring up the fact that Fyodor gets shot in the shoulder by Sigma and that that could lead to the same outcome in the manga, but I disagree: although he has blood on his shoulder in the manga, it seems like the bullet just grazed the top of it, because his arm and hand appears completely functional afterwards (not hanging limp by his side or anything). But that doesn't even matter, because this isn't even about the semantics/logistics of how the hand wound caused Fyodor's death because again, it's a stupid outcome, or what could serve as a substitute in the manga — thematically, this is a textbook example of the butterfly effect. Countless parallel universes exist within this series, ones where even the most minute differences lead to a majorly different outcome: this just happens to be one of them. There's no reason to think it isn't, and there's no reason to not think that the anime wants us to clue into the fact that things only went as smoothly as they did on the Meursault side because of this wound; in other words, that things will go very differently in the manga thanks to the absence of said wound. They wouldn't have added it in the first place and put such clearly deliberate emphasis on it otherwise.

Things are going to happen very differently in the manga, at least when it comes to the Meursault crew (but then, if you assume that, you then naturally assume it all will be very different). This is the only conclusion one can come to with the presentation of this anime-only wound, combined with the fact that parallel universes are a very real thing in BSD.

I'm going to go on a bit of a tangent, so bear with me. I play a lot of visual novels, and although such concepts aren't really as original now as they were a while ago, some of my favorite and some of the very best VNs out there are the ones that break the fourth wall and make the visual novel branching route format directly intertwined with the story: you know, the ones where the characters go "if only I had done things differently, maybe everything would have turned out better...!" in a wink wink nudge nudge moment, and the ones where the characters are aware of the different timelines, even, or even have the ability to gain information from their selves in said alternate timelines to influence events in their current one (I'm intentionally not naming the games I'm thinking of for the sake of spoilers, but if you know, you know lmao). It gets very meta in this regard, and this is how I started viewing BSD through the lens of ever since I first learned about Beast: like a visual novel with many branching routes, and only a few routes that feel entirely "right".

When I first read Dazai's Entrance Exam, I was struck by how unnerving the ending sequence in the abandoned hospital felt. Obviously, Kunikida's internal struggle over Sasaki's actions and motives is him still desperately clinging to his ideal world that does not exist, but the specific type of phrases he uses — "who is wrong?" "[who is] the cause of all this?" "there has to be an ideal world" "there has to be something, I'm sure of it" "There must have been something we could have done!" — and the framing of the scene in general, is eerily reminiscent of a bad ending in a visual novel, to me. There's a haunting, looming, bleak sense that a different outcome could have been achieved, if different decisions had been made, or if things outside of anyone's control had been different... and we know that this is true, because in Beast alone, Kunikida never goes through the Azure Messenger incident, because Dazai doesn't have his entrance exam. Hell, you could even consider the anime's version of the Azure Messenger arc an alternate timeline in of itself, if you really wanted to, long before we even arrive at season 5.

When it comes to Beast, this timeline has almost the opposite feeling of what I described above, that I've also encountered in visual novels: the idea of a "good route" or "good ending" that still doesn't feel quite earned, or as perfect as one would expect. Beast is presented as the "ideal" timeline purely for one sole reason: Oda is alive. It is the only timeline where he's alive, and keeping Oda alive is the ultimate goal Dazai wants to achieve, the only reason this timeline exists; therefore, disregarding all else, Beast should be the best timeline, because Oda's death is the greatest devastation in the series to date. We all want him to live, so why wouldn't the timeline where he does be the best one? And yet... of course, it isn't. Dazai is alone, and steeped in darkness and loneliness without Oda, and dies by the end of the story for Oda's continued living. Atsushi has Kyouka still, but he's suffering and more traumatized, and unable to heal while stuck in the mafia, and neither can Kyouka. Akutagawa is living a much better life in the ADA... but without his sister, and without what he has from his bond with Atsushi in canon, that isn't replicated in Beast. And Oda... Oda is alive, and he has his children and his novel, but there is a feeling that he is aimless, that something in his life is missing. He has everything he ever wanted, but all that means nothing without what he truly needs: Dazai, and his time with Dazai and Ango at the bar. In this way, things going well and us getting what we want — in this case, Oda living — goes against how it's supposed to be, the natural order, which is why it feels so hollow. In the specific visual novel I'm thinking of here as a comparison (again, shoutout if you know), there's an alternate ending that involves you inputting information you gain at the end of the game very early on in the game, wherein the protagonist now has memories of the future and is able to bypass and prevent all of the events that take place normally. This means that people who die or are hurt somehow in general are saved from that fate, and nothing bad ever occurs; everything wraps up neatly and nicely... but again, there's an undeniable, unsettling feeling of emptiness, of a victory that rings hollow, because what's the point if everything is simply handed to you easily, where's the sense of accomplishment, without any struggles to achieve said victories, or any growth along the way? How can it feel earned if one doesn't have to, in Dazai's words, "scream within the storm of uncertainty, and run with flowing blood"?

You can probably already see where I'm going with this.

This finale feels weird. Really, really weird. It feels too cheap, too simple, too unsatisfying. So much so, in fact, that for almost the entire runtime, as I was bombarded with resolution upon resolution one after another, I kept thinking "There's no way this can be real. Where's the catch? When is the "gotcha!" moment gonna happen? The "it was all a dream" reveal?". And this isn't just because I hated the writing, and that it really did feel like a fever dream watching fanfic levels of bad (actually, that's an insult to fanfic writers, tbh; they could do better) — no, it genuinely feels so incredibly fake. Even upon rewatching it and already knowing what happens, my brain still naturally keeps expecting some kinda of "sike, you THOUGHT!" moment to suddenly appear. It just.... feels "too good to be true". Dazai and Chuuya come out unscathed, and it's revealed that they were never in any real danger to begin with. Fyodor, one of our biggest threats, is dealt with supposedly for good (I say "supposedly" only because of the Jesus line, but if anything imo, I think that's just a hint that this won't be the canon ending in the manga, so in a sense he's going to "come back to life"), and Nikolai seems somewhat at peace with his death. The other biggest threat, Fukuchi, is also dealt with, and he and Fukuzawa get their final moment together of closure. Yes, Sigma is left in Meursault don't even get me started on how angry this alone makes me, and Fukuzawa loses Fukuchi, but overall, everything is portrayed in a positive light, and any negatives or losses are quickly glossed over. Everything is tied up nicely, neatly, and smoothly. ...And that is exactly what makes it feel so wrong, and hard to trust in.

I'm not sure if this will make sense, but to me, the finale is so incredibly poorly written that it almost feels.... intentional. It's so bad to the point of feeling self-aware in how bad it is, how unrealistically happy and convenient an ending it is. It had to end this neatly in order to rush to wrap up this arc for the season finale and not leave the last episode on a cliffhanger — which imo is chiefly the main reason it turned out this way, and, if this whole theory is true, Asagiri just used it to his advantage — and I'm not saying this was probably an effect Bones had in mind intentionally, I'm sure they just threw shit at the wall and went with whatever stuck, maaaaybe with some suggestions/approval from Asagiri, but the result is that you have a conclusion that contradicts so much of what was set up before and goes against so many character arcs, making some characters so out of character and even regressing in their development Dazai. I'm talking about Dazai abandoning Sigma, because he would never; hashtag #NOTMYDAZAI. Also Nikolai, Nikolai for most of that is so ooc I can't even begin to describe it oh my god. Everyone is OOC to a degree though lmao, and opens so many plot holes, to the point that it's impossible not to watch all that and get the feeling that it is subtly saying to you "did you really think it could be this easy? It feels wrong, doesn't it? It doesn't feel satisfying. It feels unearned." I find it incredibly interesting and suspicious in particular that they confirmed multiple theories people had about soukoku in Meursault: that Chuuya slowed the elevator's fall so that Dazai wouldn't die from it, that Chuuya slowed down the bullet so that it only penetrated Dazai's skin and not his skull, and that the both of them used Fyodor's camera angle to their advantage because they knew he wouldn't be able to see certain things from his view. I'm not saying that Asagiri trawled BSD twitter and tumblr after those chapters dropped for the most popular theories before the final episode was made lmao, there was no time for that (imagine though lol—), but I do think it's highly likely that he already had in mind exactly what theories would be made about these parts (I mean, the evidence for the gun scene was all there), and that Dazai rattling them off in his long monologue to Fyodor at the end is essentially him speaking to the audience and going "yeah, that's what you would predict, right? Those are the clichés, after all", much like him suggesting earlier that he can maybe bring Chuuya back to himself with a few moving words and the power of friendship, and Fyodor using the split personalities trope to fool Sigma. We expect these tropes to be true. Of course we'd fall for them, as Fyodor tells Sigma, especially if the evidence is right there. But Asagiri himself has explicitly said that he likes doing the opposite of what people expect. And so just because people predicted correctly with the three things I mentioned in this timeline... doesn't mean they'll be true in the manga's. Things happened how we wanted and expected it to, and everything turned out happily. So we can relax now, right? Everything will work out just as easily in the manga, right? Or... is the reason most of this finale feels so fake and unsettling and unsatisfying because it's meant to lull us into a false sense of security before all our heroes lose in the manga? Because deep down, we don't want an ending that's this simple, because we'd rather have a conclusion where our characters have struggled more and grown more and come out the better for it, and we know it?

After rewatching the episode a lot, and watching some other videos, and doing a lot of thinking, I am pretty confident in suspecting that the only part of this finale that is actually from manga canon, aside from Aya jumping off the building of course, is Fyodor and Nikolai's exchange after Fyodor leaves Meursault — specifically, them talking about Fyodor leaving Sigma behind, and their "new game" and Nikolai being excited at the prospect of it. This little conversation actually feels in character for them, and it's easy to tell this when contrasting it with everything that happens immediately after, wherein Fyodor is fatally stabbed, and Nikolai, completely at odds with what he was just talking about, just... stands there and watches Fyodor die while Dazai monologues lmao. I'm not sure if the helicopter is still a factor, but I would bet good money on Fyolai getting out of Meursault being manga canon, and that Dazai and Chuuya getting out as well and killing Fyodor + everything with FukuFuku, is part of the anime original ending, in order to wrap up everything positively. It makes much more sense if you think about, in reality (aka in the manga), Dazai and Chuuya still being left behind in Meursault (where they can eventually try to get Sigma), because none of it was an act and things did not go according to plan, and Fukuchi having an entirely different goal that doesn't feel so stupid and contradictory to his character, and Fukuzawa possibly dying — everyone seemingly loses, with Aya still being the last hope, perhaps by awakening her ability like we all speculated.

There's a youtuber I watch who covers BSD in-depth, despite being an anime-only (she reads the respective manga content after each season, though). Going into this finale, she knew about the fact that the anime had overtaken the manga, though she didn't know where the cutoff point was; despite that, however, she made predictions about what was from the manga so far and what was anime original, and it was almost entirely spot-on, based mostly on what she basically described as "anime original dialogue." She talked about how you can always tell when dialogue is veering into the realm of anime-original, because the sentences are very short, choppy, and slightly out of character, but generic enough to not be TOO out of character, and so that anyone can easily write said lines, even if they're not extremely familiar with the character like the original author would be. And when I heard this explanation, everything clicked — because so much of this finale has dialogue like that. The Fyolai scenes just feel peppered with it, around the lines I mentioned earlier, the Dazai dialogue does too, and ESPECIALLY shit at the end like Fukuchi and Fukuzawa exchanging the cliche death lines to end all death lines: "Are you there? I'm a little tired." "Rest up." That just isn't Bungou Stray Dogs. That isn't Asagiri. BSD is cheesy at times, yes, but it isn't like this; it's smarter. The dialogue is smarter, the explanations/plot twists are smarter, Asagiri is smarter, and the aforementioned youtuber I watched agreed. She's a pretty casual fan of the series, so if even she could pick up on these things, I think it speaks volumes.

I mentioned this briefly earlier, but this theory makes sense if you consider that this situation probably came about because of Bones wanting two seasons back-to-back when they did, and this arc being as long as it is. Season 3 aired in 2019, and I imagine Bones would have wanted season 4 in 2020, and might have then been willing to wait a bit longer for season 5 in order for more of this arc's manga chapters to come out — but then covid happened. Because of that, season 4 was delayed to 2023, creating the longest gap we've had between seasons, and I wouldn't at all be surprised if the delay made them want season 5 right together with it, after getting so far "behind", so to speak. S4 was announced in November of 2021, and roughly around that time, Asagiri was finishing up writing the plot of the DoA arc. If Bones came to him sometime in late 2021 and said they wanted two seasons now (so basically, one giant two cour season), Asagiri would know that not only of course would this arc not be finished publishing in the manga for a very long time yet, but that roughly 20ish episodes would not be enough to cover it all to the end, with this arc being longer than any arc the anime has adapted to date. Because of all this, and the arc manga chapters being nowhere near fully drawn to completion, he'd have to make a decision about what to do, and what to give Bones. Without ending season 5 on a massive cliffhanger that wouldn't be resolved for years until an eventual season 6, the only other option would be to rush towards an anime-original ending for the DoA arc.... and for Asagiri to take advantage of that, and integrate it into BSD's lore. Thereby creating a truly unique cross-media experience that utilizes the different mediums to create multiple timelines, that could make both the anime and manga interact with each other and become part of a bigger picture (not that you'd need to see both to get the full experience, mind you, just that it'd provide a little bonus if you did).... and would without a doubt be Asagiri's biggest surprise yet.

...I feel like at this point I'm starting to ramble, and my evidence become more and more incoherent and less substantial lmao, so I should probably end this post. 💀 Thank you if you've read this far, and hopefully it made some semblance of sense, despite not being structured very well; I know I promised at the start to try to be as objective as possible and curb my negative feelings, but I'm not sure how well I succeeded in that regard. If it weren't for the Fukuchi thing and the Fyodor hand thing, I probably wouldn't take how wrong and strange and bad the finale feels to me as serious evidence about it being an alternate timeline, especially since I seem to be one of the only people who actually hates all of it.... but combined with everything else, I am just so convinced of this theory being true. It started off as pure copium, but as more time has gone on, I fully, 100% believe in my bones (ha) that there is no way that finale is the same Bungou Stray Dogs I know and love, for so many reasons. It just isn't. It can't be. I know BSD better than this, I know Asagiri better than this, and I know that it's absolutely in the realm of possibility for him to cook up this whole scheme to completely blindside us with in the upcoming chapters, because that's exactly the kind of shit Mr. "Please Be Surprised!" himself would pull. If I end up being completely wrong, I guess I'm wrong, and you can laugh at me all you want then.... but I just know that ages ago people were teasing the idea of the anime operating on a different timeline from the manga, and I truly do think that only now are we finally seeing that idea come to fruition, as a setup for Asagiri going full-bore insanity with the Book in the upcoming arc(s). if I and the OP of that theory end up right, this will be the wildest time in the BSD fandom's history.

Like. I cannot even emphasize how hard they are trolling us at this point. Something is going on. Something is being cooked over there, the likes of which we've never seen before... and I don't think any of us are ready for it.

Oh yeah, and one last thing of note: both Fyodor and Nikolai here have their right arms hidden from view. Is that alluding to anything? I'm not sure. I also think that since chapter 110 was so short, next chapter will likely be 110.5 instead of 111, and if that's the case, this title spread could still technically be associated with the next chapter... wherein we might see this Fukuchi, who ends up wreaking havoc, right before he jumps to the timeline in the anime, as we see him at the end of the s5 finale.

I guess we'll find out on Tuesday.

[infriga]

Ngl I just can't personally get on board with the idea whenever I see posts claiming or speculating that Markus somehow controls or influences the androids he deviates.

Like most of the deviants we see him convert aren't just fresh new people out of the box, they still have all the memories and experiences from when they were machines, and we've seen explicit evidence that androids can feel emotions and have their own thoughts and opinions before deviating, they just don't recognize them and can't act on them. Markus's painting or music, Kara showing obvious fear when threatened by Todd, or care for Alice, or unease when she sees Alice's drawings (and this is even after she'd been reset), Connor's distress after the Kamski test when he thinks Hank will be angry at him for not shooting, or him admitting to Amanda that he's been having thoughts counter to his programming, the scene where he tells Hank he appreciated working with him and emphasizing that he thinks he actually means it (and no I don't believe Connor is special in his ability to feel and express emotions before deviating like some people think), etc.

My point being, they're not empty shells suddenly given sentience, they're prisoners suddenly having their chains removed. Sure that would be disorientating and scary for someone born in those chains, but that doesn't mean they would all automatically be completely moldable clay ready to take orders from a new master. And we even have a perfect example of how even immediately after being awoken they can have free will and desires when we look at John.

After being deviated John asks to join Jericho. He isn't asked to join by Markus, in fact Markus can even say no, and it isn't automatically assumed that he will join, he chooses to ask himself. If Markus refuses John will even get upset and set off the alarm. When he sacrifices himself to save Markus, that's clearly not something that Markus wants or directs him to do. In fact he goes directly against what Markus chose if Markus went the pacifist route and starts attacking the police. And this isn't shown to be an instinctive thing either. After being deviated if Markus fights the guard John doesn't help him and just stands back and watches instead, meaning he specifically chose to defend Markus during the march.

These scenes contain multiple clear and direct examples of someone Markus deviated exhibiting their own free will even immediately after being deviated and not just mindlessly obeying or following Markus. So why would we assume that all the androids who joined him in the streets are just mindless drones following his authority, and not that they were inspired as they watched him march and then decided to follow his lead when actually given the ability to choose to do so? And if it was the case that Markus could control or influence androids he deviates, why would he ever even use that ability when it goes against everything he stands for?

So personally, I just don't think that interpretation tracks. I'm sure androids he deviates could be influenced by being grateful to him for freeing them, but that's no different from a scenario where he let's people out of a physical cage as opposed to one made of programming.

[randomnameless]

What do you think about the fics where children of nabateans and humans are either humans or nabateans?

Fics are fics so it's basically the author's interpreration and fantasy being written, but as far as personal taste goes, it's not really my cup of tea!

Where's the fun with fantasy settings if you can't come up with mixed blood humans who sekritly (or not so sekritly) descend from some sort of other race of beings and got super powers from that deal ?

I think I ranted about it in a french post some months ago about this but it was kind of salty.

The only setting in FE where half human children were developped is Tellius with the Branded and... well, let's not go there, after all, it's the verse that tells you that racism is BaD, but miscegenation is also BaD...

In Elibe, fwiw, bar having weird mystical powers and longer lifespan than humans, but shorter than full blooded dragons, hybrids aren't generally developped (and that's taking into account Al from the manga).

That being said, in the particular context that is Fodlan and some characters' pov about Nabateans, their blood and a general discussion about what is "humanity" used to "other" sentient beings that are despised because they are "others"...

The "kids are either humans or nabateans" isn't really something I'm fond of.

But hey, fics are basically someone's takes on canon and there's no point about arguing headcanons !

Like, even with half-lizard Lycaon AUs, some people could try to explain his "died from a sudden illness" in different ways : he can be inherently prone to sickness because he is a half-lizard, or, in my hodgepodge of an AU, the "dies from a sudden illness" is a cheap cover up story to hide his assassination, at the hands of members of his dad's family because they wanted the throne and because he was a half-lizard.

We basically have two different takes, coming from two different people about a thrown away line, which creates, in substance, two differents AU/HCs/fanfics!

So, to reply to your question anon, it's not the HC i came up with and not one I like because of all the racial implication and tensions Fodlan, as a setting, has regarding coexistence.

But I'd be really pissed if anyone went to comment on a fic to say the author's headcanon is "wrong".

Now, if we're talking about people claiming to write meta or to comment canon, it's another story - but in the end, the canon answer is "10k years of lore" so we're pretty much quickly entering headcanon territory, and when people try to pretend their headcanons are canon, that's how you end up with 5 years of discourse lol

[dragonsasastronauts]

Bioware was so real for this

[everythingwasalreadypicked]

Thinking about Al and Ethan and Kronos again but mostly how it affected the rest of the demigods in the army

Al is one very popular demi lmao the gods exiled him in fear he would corrupt the rest of his siblings, he is listened to, he is respected, they trust their general etc etc

When it comes to everything else that doesn't directly involve Kronos that is.

Alabaster also, out of all named Ta demis, is the most loyal to Kronos (which is another can of worms I'm not getting into rn)

They do trust Al as a friend (He might be a general but he's still a kid like the rest of them) or to not push them hard or to joke around and help cover up it up when they make a mistake. When it doesn't involve Kronos.

It's common knowledge amomg the Ta demis that if you mess up enough to invoke Kronos's wrath you don't go to the general, you go to Ethan

Someone mentioned Al and Ethan being the good cop-bad cop in the army [I think it was bread(?) Hi bread] And yeah Ethan is the strict one, he's not the fun general but instead the stern lieutenant. He also is fully aware how dangerous Kronos is and can be. (Hello The Last Olympian and the amount of times Ethan got threatened on page)

So Ethan has arguably the one who will cover it up instead of telling you it will be fine and Ethan would probably get punished on behalf of who he's covering for

Of course the demigods trust Alabaster.

It's General Torrington they don't.

[br1ghtestlight]

straight ships are worse bcuz i forgot that sometimes popular fanon ships actually become canon and its like WAIT.......

[manyothermusingsofmine]

oh my god I also realised that since I kind of dont really have a purpose for two rogues I reclassed Astarion as Bard but in a way that I can only imaging like in story played out like

Vendor: Hi are you here to buy-

Mydia: Sell. Give me cold, hard cash.

-some purchases later, at camp-

Mydia, shoving a violin into Astarion's arms: Congratulations you're a Bard now.

Astarion: What?! WHY?! What do you want me to do with this?!

Mydia: I don't know; insult our enemies until they drop dead or play yourself some melodramatic track to go along with your bitching about my choices; dealer's choice. You're welcome by the way, and good night.

[freedarick]

I've been on a binge watching yuri anime and 99% is bait/you have to read the manga to actually get the yuri

[malewifehenrycooldown]

When Ly.on meets Nova at a poignant point in his life, he doesn’t become infatuated with Ju.via. However I think it would be cool if Ly.on and Ju.via were friends :D

[bat-besties]

hi rose wilson for the ask game?

Thank you!!

Headcanon A:  realistic

Trans woman Rose!!! Growing up, I think she didn’t have any disconnect in being a boy, since she was allowed to do and act how she wanted regardless of gender, and was in a very female environment. When puberty and the Gender Trouble hit, I think Lili was extremely supportive - so much of Lili’s life has been different than how she expected it to be as a sheltered minor royal all those years ago, and she didn’t get this far without being able to adapt. She loves her child more than anything, no matter what.   

I think Rose has physically transitioned, and struggles with very little dysphoria now. She also doesn’t choose to disclose her identity to anyone unless she really trusts them, as is her right! 

Headcanon B: while it may not be realistic it is hilarious

God, it’s hard to think of anything funnier than how canon Rose is. 

I think she should print out a picture of Cassie to throw darts at

Headcanon C: heart-crushing and awful, but fun to inflict on friends

I think that because Rose is a young woman who is abrasive and well, Rose, people who know her assume she doesn’t want kids. In actuality, she doesn’t know, it’s not something she’s thought about and she's still young. But she loves kids, as we know from canon, she gets them and finds them genuinely interesting. Having a little girl like Lian one day…isn’t something she can let herself want. What if Rose messes up? What if she’s come too far from being that teenage babysitter who everyone trusted, what if having built up her walls she’ll become a prisoner inside of them?

Or worse, what if she does become soft and open and loving with her kid…and that weakness leads to both of them getting hurt. She knows Slade would want her kid, and other villains could hurt them, just like her kidnapping leading to her mother’s death was revenge against her father.

So yeah, she doesn’t think about it.

Headcanon D: unrealistic, but I will disregard canon about it because I reject canon reality and substitute my own.

I think Rose should be able to hug Eddie/Kid Devil for a few moments because of her super serum, maybe feeling a bit of a sizzle like if you stand too close to a fire or have food which is just spicier than your tolerance.

[asmfic]

I know that Sadness Prayer states that Koito talks to Oriko for the first time after Komaki's death but I'm firmly throwing that out for ASM. I think leaning into Oriko's human connections and the extent to which they clash with her desire for a purpose and her magically-assigned mission is sooo fun.

[dnangelic]

idc about allonormativity but sugisaki's handling of things is vague enough around the edges that i can still put forward the thematic thesis of 'anybody who doesn't want to be alone shouldn't be alone' and 'lives and people's souls/hearts, like art, can be freely shared with each other and witnessed in order to be good and beautiful' and that sort of thing is like almost the entire driving force of daisuke's character. to me.

[randomnameless]

"even if IS just said she was the villain and needed to be stopped, clear as day, people would reject it." Let's be real: the moment people started using "death of the author" to reject the Nintendo dream interview where IS confirms Supreme Leader is the villain, that's when we should've realized that people have already made up their minds and don't care anymore. It's like telling a flat-earther that the earth is not flat or trying to debunk a conspiracy theory to believers of that theory.

Tbh, I agree sometimes with disregarding the author's intent, especially in some games where the "author" wants to push "feels" and tells the olayer how they should react.

Take Berkut for instance, for a reason I still don't understand, SoV wants to paint him as a tragic figure, who ultimately redeems himself dying. You're supposed to feel bad for Berkut and sad for what happened, to the point where Alm, the Hero - who was challenged on earlier opinions - plainly states Duma is the reason why Berkut turned sour, and no one is here to tell him "uh no sorry to tell you but your cousin was a bona fide asshole".

Ditto for the devs's lunar interview about Clout's story being a "heart-warming story", like no, sorry, no matter how much you push for it, I personally don't think his story is heart warming, rather it's blood boiling.

Does it mean I use the "death of the author" like the people we're talking about?

Yeah, maybe!

But what is more gratting about those people isn't how they use DoA to make up their own canon and story (everyone can make headcanons!), but how they push their headcanon on everyone's lawns and asking for everyone else to treat it as the truth - the Aeneid is the perfect example, people really rec this fanfiction to have a "better understanding" of canon characters, or some people said it understands the characters better than the canon does. For a fanfic, sure, it's cool and all*, but to treat this as canon?

Like, there is no discussion possible between people who argue canon and others who argue using headcanons and imo that's the crux of the discourse bcs FE Fodlan is vague about 70% of its worldbuilding.

I don't like Berkut and believe he toasted Rinea because he loved being Rudolf's heir more than he loved her, but FE15 makes it uwu clear that Berkut apparently loved Rinea a lot and apparently torched her just because Duma promised him power, which makes somehow Duma the reason why Rinea was Bernie'd.

But you won't see me pop up in a discussion about FE15 or people talking about their favourite ships in that game to point out how Berkut burnt his fiancée at stake for "power" on his own volition - canon is canon - even when it blows - I'd rather rant about it and have my own HC in this space rather than piss canon-lovers/users with it.

Saying in your hcs Supreme Leader isn't the villain of the game?

Sure, do whatever you want, have a nice day, eat a sandwich, whatever. Maybe some people will join you, share your sandwich and you'll have fun developping hcs!

Saying in canon Supreme Leader isn't the villain and disregarding the dev's interviews?

That's going to be more problematic, in a way that this specific interview isn't subjective or open to interpretation (thus hcs, like Sylvia being FE4!Claude's relative or not), so people are going to disagree and be more vocal about it.

Some other blogs already explained it, but it seems like FE Fodlan attracted a lot of persons who aren't used to fandom, as in a place with transformative works and where making OCs and fics and having headcanons isn't "BaD" - so they try to retrofit canon in their headcanons because "fanfics" and transformative works are BaD etc etc (insert the general dislike for fanfictions from the early 2000s (?) and the regular/usual insults towards people who write fanfiction from the same era (them being fujos, etc etc)) so they're not writing fanfictions or arguing headcanons, no, they're just writing "totally meta pieces that are better than the canon".

Imo, the second you're disregarding canon to write something about a work, you're writing a fanfic (let it be a "real fic", random hcs, etc etc etc) and that's totally fine! You're not a "fujo degenerate" for not liking the canon and "rewritting" scenes, or building more stories about a character your like!

What's not "fine" is forcing everyone to adopt your headcanons and fanfictions - if the flower is red, you cannot force people to admit the flower is blue, otoh, if you write a story where the flower isn't red but blue, it's your story and you can whatever you want with it! Ditto with fanfic writers when someone argues canon against them, dude, you're reading a story where the author wrote the flower to be blue, like they gaf about the flower's canonical colour to be red - it's a fanfic!

Don't like, Don't read!

*not withstanding with the actual quality and body of the Aeneid, which isn't something I'd personally call cool or "alright", but that's another debate.

[warriors-rewritten-chaos]

Detailed Plot Summary- Fire and Ice, Part 2

Part 2 of Book 2!

Just as Fireheart feared, Cloudy’s arrival in the Clan starts a debate: many cats don’t want another kittypet in the Clan. However, Bluestar’s concern is if the kit was surrendered willingly, and when little Cloudy proudly says that his mama gave him to his uncle Fireheart to be a Warrior, she lets him join. Brindleface offers to nurse him and Ashkit and Fernkit seem to like him and even declare him to be their new brother, much to Fireheart’s relief. Now isn't the time to celebrate, though: RiverClan has been trespassing on Sunningrocks yet again and are stealing prey to boot. Through Silverstream, Fireheart and Graystripe know that RiverClan has been forced into hunting outside their territory due to a combination of Twoleg activity scaring their prey away and their prey being stolen by a group of cats that both smell like ShadowClan but also don’t at the same time, and are torn about the battle. Swallowing his jealousy of Graystripe and Silverstream’s relationship, Fireheart offers to fight in the battle in Graystripe’s place. While the battle never actually takes place due to the thawing river ice being unsafe to cross, Graystripe is offended and angered by Fireheart’s decision (seeing it as Fireheart not trusting him and doubting his loyalty) and the two have a vicious falling out. Strangely, Sandstorm comforts Fireheart- albeit in her usual prickly way. They hang out together for a while and character development happens.

At the next Gathering, Graystripe-still ignoring Fireheart- goes to sit with Silverstream, while Fireheart and Sandstorm begrudgingly sit together in the absence of their respective best friends (Dustpelt is with Longtail and Darkstripe). After everything gets under way, RiverClan, ThunderClan, and WindClan all gang up on the confused ShadowClan, accusing them of prey-stealing (meanwhile Fireheart wonders why all the Gatherings he attends go to shit). Nightstar denies any wrongdoing and offers a way to prove it: until the next Gathering, all the Clans but ShadowClan will increase border patrols. Therefore, any cats attempting to steal prey are more likely to be caught. Nightstar swears that if any ShadowClan Warriors are caught stealing prey, he will punish them as severely as necessary. With that uneasy truce established, the Gathering is ended.

Soon, ShadowClan is exonerated, but not in the way anyone wanted them to be. Brokenstar and his band of rogues (who were behind the stolen prey) attack the ThunderClan camp when almost all Warriors are on patrol. How did they sneak into ThunderClan territory? It doesn’t matter because they’re here now! Duskface attacks Fireheart head-on and makes a sadistic remark about killing him the same way he killed his mentor. Fireheart fights back valiantly, but he is no match for the stronger, older tom. Graystripe comes running to his rescue, though, and kills Duskface. The rogues are driven away, bar the now-blinded Brokenstar, who also lost a life in the battle. He is taken by ThunderClan as a prisoner and is referred to by his Warrior name, Brokentail. While Fireheart hopes that Graystripe is alright with him again after saving him, Graystripe is still cold and angry towards him. He tells Fireheart to “leave me alone and go hang out with Sandstorm! She’s your new best friend, isnt she?!”. Fireheart is heartbroken.

But plot beckons! Yellowfang takes Fireheart aside a couple days later and tells him her secret: Brokentail is her son. She tells him all about how she used to be a Warrior and the mate of Raggedstar, ShadowClan’s Leader prior to Brokenstar. But then the prior Medicine Cat Sagewhisker received a sign from StarClan that Yellowfang would be her new successor, and so Yellowfang reluctantly became a Medicine Cat. Unbeknownst to anyone, she and Raggedstar continued their relationship in secret until Raggedstar chose a prettier, younger molly to be his new mate and abandoned Yellowfang completely. Unfortunately by that point the damage had been done and she was pregnant with his kits. She later gave birth to two stillborn kits and one surviving tomkit (Brokenstar). She was forced to give the kit up, and you know what happened from there.

Yellowfang tells Fireheart that she always wanted a son like him, and he offers to call her mom. She responds by threatening to rip his ears off for his insolence, and they return as normal. Later on, Ashkit, Fernkit, and Cloudkit go missing, and Fireheart and Brindleface are distraught looking for them. Thankfully, it turns out that they are completely fine and only snuck out of camp to hunt, with Cloudkit catching a vole. The kits get in a lot of trouble for this. Meanwhile, Cinderpaw’s leg has healed... but it is no longer functional and Bluestar says that she cannot be a Warrior. Cinderpaw is devastated by the news. Fireheart thinks for a moment, and remembers Tallstar’s favor. Soon after, he starts sneaking Cinderpaw over to WindClan at night so the similarly three-legged Deputy Nightoak can train Cinderpaw to fight on three legs.

A while after the Kit Incident, another ShadowClan cat comes barreling into the ThunderClan camp, but this time it’s for a very different reason. Volewhisper delivers an urgent request for aid from Nightstar. Since neither WindClan or RiverClan know the culprits of the prey-stealing incidents were Brokenstar and his rogues and not ShadowClan themselves, they have banded together for an assault on ShadowClan. Bluestar accepts the request and brings a group of Warriors with her to help, including Fireheart and Graystripe. In the battle, it is very obvious that Graystripe is only going after the WindClan Warriors and avoiding the RiverClan ones, casting Tigerclaw’s suspicions on him. It is only when Fireheart refuses to attack Silverstream and Graystripe thanks him that the Deputy appears to realize what is going on.

Tigerclaw only watches on as Fireheart faces up against the formidable WindClan Warriors Mudclaw and Sharpears and doesn't step in to help, which Fireheart picks up on. Eventually WindClan retreats after Tallstar loses a life, while RiverClan retreats after Tigerclaw nearly kills Stormstar. After the battle, Fireheart and Graystripe are cornered by Tigerclaw, who questions their loyalty to ThunderClan. But on a lighter note, the book ends with Graystripe and Fireheart apologizing to each other and rekindling their friendship.