#but i dont have any other choice
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Hey hey, if you like my work and also want to help out with our moving fund, don't forget I have a Ko-fi!
We'd appreciate anything rn, but do not worry if you can't help financially (times are tough for all of us rn, I know), you can help by reblogging this post if you want to!
I post updates about our situation on my main, but the tldr of it is we've received another section 21 eviction notice and thus have 2 to 3 months to find a place. The landlord is serious this time.
I've got £100 in savings rn, and while I'm aiming to put another 100 in next month, it just won't be enough (need at least 400 to 500 for a council house) by the time we have to leave.
BUT once we get in touch with a housing officer again, I'm gonna ask if they also pay deposit and first months rent on council houses too, as I'm unsure whether it's just private rented houses that they allow for that scheme.
Anyway, I'll be working on more art, and hopefully have something to show soon in terms of writing.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, hope everyone has a lovely day!!!
#me talking#i am deeply sorry that i have to keep doing this...i know its annoying#but i dont have any other choice#ive exhausted all other financial help
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EVIL MARK, EVIL MARK, EVIL MARK!!! I want to be coherent about this season but please picture me foaming at the mouth and running on the walls. S2 being what if Mark's just like his Dad? Insanity. I love this show. Anyways, AU where an Evil!Mark tries to make Our!Mark worse, and Our!Mark tries to make the other better. Something something confronting your idea of the worst version of oneself. Plus, tweaked black and yellow costume because I saw it and immediately went murder hornet lookin' ass and knew I had to draw it. Evil ass Mark. Horrible. I think he should be dragged kicking and screaming into redemption.
#mark and the fact he is fighting for this fucking life to avoid the Many Bad Endings???? im pacing. getting out the red string.#when the season is about who you are and what you could become. when trying to be good is an active choice and a struggle.#RAHHHHHHHHHHH#chewing on the bars of my enclosure...when every mark is evil OUR mark is the outlier. the exception. the OTHER. RAHHHH#dog poetry being mark poetry because how often can you kick a dog before it starts snarling before you raise your hand?#how often can you beat it before it rips into you without mercy? when it bites not at your hand but at your neck?#when does violence for survival and violence for vengeance start and end? when your opponent is down and you keep drawing blood?#circling and pacing and losing my mind over this btw if you care#anyways self vs self gets me going crazy. did you know i loved the end of atsv? because it shows.#i think o!mark would lose his fucking mind at what evil wasp looking mark has done + this mf wasp would LOATHE mark's kindness#they both see the other as the WORST version of themselves and they can't stand it. They can't shatter the mirror but they think they can--#--change the reflection.#evil mark seeing mark and seeing what he USED to be#mark seeing what he COULD be#CAN U SEE THE VISION??????#digital art#invincible rotating in my mind#invincible fanart#fanart#mark my beloved#mark grayson fanart#mark grayson#invincible s2#invincible show#mark like hello this is my secret twin and he is NOTHING like me hahahaha anyways wanna debate about having mORALS and LIFE#mark grayson vs the urge not to accept every responsibility as his own#he's batman coded that way#ok im done yapping#if this happened in the comics in any way shape or form dont tell me JACK SHIT or i will PUMMEL YOU with my SHOES
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hey guys look what i found in my drafts. from a few days ago .
#sorry i think its my fault that this happened#still unsure if The News is actually real or not tbh since no official sources have said anything about it as far as i know#and i hear the hollywood reporter is usually right about this stuff but idk#the fact that there are no actual sources or evidence for any of this other than ''just trust me bro'' is a bit suspicious to me#+ the fact that theyve been keeping the development of sonic 3 very quiet and secret#yet shadows voice actor. which is one of the biggest topics of discussion surrounding the movie. just. happened to leak somehow ?#but . the timing on this is kinda funny . and very tragic. if it is real#i said it already but i dont get why so many people are celebrating this. from what ive heard he doesnt fit ....#and it feels like another case of casting a random celebrity over an actual voice actor just to have a big name attached to the project#regardless of if theyre really the best choice.#which i thought everyone agreed was a shitty and annoying practice especially if its some iconic video game/comic/whatever character ?#but maybe i just havent heard the right specific voice clips that make people think its a good choice i dont know .
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like many who have suffered at the hands of bbc merlin before me, i recently indulged in a thought experiment in which i outlined my own version of seasons 3-5 that stay thematically and tonally in line with the show (except they're less fucking stupid). but then i quickly realized that focusing on details is pointless: all you need is to solve the one Big Problem the show has, and the rest will follow. the problem in question? ✨morgana✨
i like the first two seasons. s1 achieves what it sets out to do and has fun while doing it, and s2, while flawed, sets up a ton of potential that the following seasons unfortunately squander, beginning with the insidious season 3. you can only distract me with cute knights and goblins and fart jokes for so long before i start seeing through you, evil, evil season of television.
my hypothesis is that if the writers had crafted s3 morgana into anything more sympathetic than a violent half-alive poltergeist that can never be reasoned with because she's suddenly terminally off her rocker, everything would've fallen into place. a sympathetic morgana would've made real, valid arguments against uther (and arthur) that wouldn't just be the ramblings of a woman possessed. her betrayal of arthur would have stemmed from her feeling increasingly morally superior to him because of his complacency in the face of their father's tyranny. under morgause's guidance she would stop believing that arthur is capable of change, and the whole point would be that she might actually be right. arthur would have to actively try and prove her wrong, instead of getting praised for doing the bare minimum because the bar is on the floor.
furthermore, morgana's prophetic dream about arthur and gwen becoming king and queen and her decision to prevent this however she can is a direct parallel to merlin learning about that same prophecy and making it happen by any means necessary. merlin's desires about his and arthur's futures are subtextually fueled by gay love and devotion, so why couldn't morgana's be? why couldn't she properly express her bitterness that arthur gets to be with gwen in a way she can't "took gwen away" from her, instead of suddenly declaring that gwen is nothing more than a servant, after two seasons of demonstrating again and again that she loves, values, and respects gwen more than anyone else in that godforsaken castle?
following this, an angry and emotionally volatile but still sensible morgana asking gwen to stay by her side during the coup of the castle in the s3 finale and gwen going behind her back to help arthur and the knights would've hurt like a bitch. double-sided betrayal! gwen having a real plot! the proper beginnings of a toxic yuri that would shape a generation!
then there's the utter hubris of having morgana shoot arrows at the same civilians she worried herself sick over for 2 seasons — even morgan, her medieval counterpart that was rooted in every sexist trope in existence, doesn't just go around killing senselessly but instead has (often petty!) personal vendettas against gwen, arthur, and the knights. morgana had every right to be sick of the pretensions around chivalry in camelot (she was always quick to mock it, even in s1), and to lash out at the knights and soldiers after years of feeling powerless in a castle full of armed men that blindly followed her oppressor. the show conveniently forgets that morgana was victimized as a woman as well as a sorcerer those first 2 seasons.
but like i said, this is not just about morgana. allowing her to remain a real and multifaceted character even as she betrays everyone in pursuit of her ambitions would've given the rest of the core four more interesting conflict to work with: merlin because he would have to experience real consequences to his actions, arthur because he would watch his sister go against his father (and his knights, and his birthright) and experience some actual internal dilemmas about it, and gwen because she would be forced to choose between morgana and arthur without the pretense that it's an obvious or easy choice for her to make.
even morgause and gaius would come off more interesting as mentors: neither one inherently evil or inherently good, both jaded by events that happened before our protagonists were even born, both heavily influencing morgana and merlin into fulfilling roles that they think are appropriate, but that morgana and merlin may not have chosen for themselves had they not been under their care.
you get the gist. if the show followed its own setup, morgana's mistakes wouldn't lie in cheap and senseless acts of violence but in alienating the people she loves because she is too hurt and jaded to trust them. meanwhile, everybody else would feel guilt over "failing" her and yet they would be too caught up in their own (sometimes flawed!) beliefs of right and wrong to truly see her point of view.
arthur would convince himself it was sorcery that corrupted her. merlin would know that isn't true but he wouldn't be able to argue without confessing everything, which is the defining conflict between him and morgana and it's cheapened when she's just an evil witch caricature and merlin is framed as inherently virtuous in contrast. gwen, too, would become a more active participant in her own life by choosing arthur over morgana and choosing to rule camelot with him instead of just waiting politely to see where things go.
and, of course, uther's downfall and death would be quick, final, and completely earned — when and why did the show even decide he of all people was the sympathetic villain, anyway?
lastly, and perhaps controversially, i think morgana should've learned merlin's true identity by season 4. her being the first of the main characters to find out makes perfect sense considering their shared history and their interconnected and mirrored arcs. even the show seems to agree, considering she does find out a little before arthur. but the narrative itself tried pointing flashing neon arrows towards this way earlier — there is a whole entire episode in s4 where merlin being emrys is repeatedly spelled out for morgana and she still isn't allowed to see it. that episode makes her look like the stupidest person to ever live, which is pretty funny im not gonna lie, but also another frustrating thing in the endless string of frustrating things that make up this show.
morgana learning that merlin has magic would've transformed the source of merlin's anxiety from a crippling fear of being outed someday to the crippling fear of knowing she could out him at any moment. this would make him want to beat her to the punch (perhaps he'd consider killing her for a minute and decide against it because she isn't a cartoonishly insane evil person in my version of events) and maybe he would even feel some tentative excitement at the idea of coming clean, now that it seems inevitable. after all, he always intended to tell arthur eventually! and i think gaius would have to admit outright that he does not want merlin to tell arthur he has magic because he, gaius, simply cannot risk such a gamble. it would be so interesting to see gaius and merlin clash and disagree once it becomes obvious that it's not merlin that isn't ready for the reveal, it's gaius. delicious!
with morgana's knowledge looming, things would inevitably spiral into a magic reveal by the end of season 4. i picture this season as an absolute mess of miscommunication between everyone at camelot, which is, y'know, canon. growing increasingly cunning and vengeful, morgana would use this tension to her advantage, destabilizing the court from the outside while she creates alliances with other sorcerers outside of camelot (instead of living alone in a hovel for no reason — morgana le fay i'm sorry i'm so sorry they gave you agravaine instead of your all-female entourage oh my god).
and here's where the events would change beyond recognition (aka here's where the meta becomes the fanfic i refuse to write). picture it with me: a militia of sorcerers infiltrates camelot and arthur and gwen have to set aside their differences (assuming gwen kissing lancelot and arthur overreacting happens, which it should) for the good of the kingdom as well as for love. picture high priestess morgana in her element, side by side with a bunch of misfit sorcerers that aren't so easily vilified, chopping down camelot's soldiers and knights and assuredly making their way to the newly-minted king.
then, just as it starts to seem that all hope is lost, in swoops merlin (the actual merlin, not his old fart disguise) on dragonback (kilgharrah hates morgana so much i know his sexist ass would stoop to anything to stop her)!!! imagine merlin showing off the extent of his powers in front of everyone and preventing the sorcerers from getting any further, declaring loud and clear that camelot is protected by him, by emrys. imagine that display of power alone being enough to send everyone home.
imagine the loyalties clearly drawn: merlin on arthur's side, morgana on the sorcerers'. imagine arthur, feeling confused and betrayed by everyone at this point, banishing merlin despite everything he's done for him in the angstiest, most emotionally dysregulated scene the show had ever put to screen. imagine merlin starting season 5 free at last but very lonesome, an embittered dragonlord like his father. imagine the absolute mess camelot would become without him, even with gwen — now queen guinevere — there to pick up the slack. imagine arthur actually earning merlin back, finally growing into his role as king as he does so. imagine the reunion.
all this and more could've been not just possible but inevitable if morgana was allowed to remain a complex character that is neither inherently good nor inherently evil: it was undeniably the biased and one-note treatment of morgana's downfall by the writers that set the precedent for literally everything else that happened after merlin chose to poison her. the show wouldn't have even had to jeopardize its tone or the monster-of-the-week vibe, all it would've had to do is admit that even the "good guys" are capable of mistakes and what makes them good is the ability to feel remorse and change for the better. (as opposed to uther, who was miles beyond redemption since way before the pilot and deserved to lose everything and die alone. OBVIOUSLY???)
in a world where morgana remains multifaceted and sympathetic, mordred would get a better arc as well, so if we really wanted to, we could still end on the same tragic note that the show ended on. with so much harm inflicted onto so many innocent people by the pendragons for so long (including mordred and the many druids and sorcerers that raised him), it could realistically end up being a little too late for anything more than one shining glimpse of king arthur and the sorcerer merlin's short-lived golden age before fate catches up to them. glimpsing that reality just to immediately lose it would've been far more satisfying and far more tragic than whatever the writers thought they were doing with all that pointless carrot-dangling.
and finally, an ending in line with morgana's new and improved arc. in this version, rather than bleeding out on the forest floor alone, she would channel the morgan le fay we know from the legends: sobered up by the reality of her brother dying, she would use her high priestess status (and perhaps also her pendragon status) to be granted passage over to avalon alongside arthur on the boat — a one-way ride — just to make sure he gets there safely. this is her penance for the harm she has caused, the same way arthur's penance is to die and leave the true ruler of camelot (gwen) behind to achieve everything he was too slow and indecisive to build while he still had time.
merlin's penance, then, would be to stay behind and watch them cross over without him, waiting and waiting and waiting until they come back or until he can finally join them. which is a bit fucking harsh if i'm honest, so i'd at least make it slightly more faithful to the legends by having him return as an old man and letting him take a long nap under a tree by the shore, his body slowly enveloped by vines like the cobwebbed fisher king in 3x08, never fully sure if he's dreaming or if there really are strange shapes fading in and out of the fog over the lake. still tragic, but nevertheless a little more open-ended and whimsical than [TRUCK NOISES] THE END!
#[johnny the dragon voice] ✨ MORGANA ✨#tldr: if you treat your villain with nuance then more nuance will follow and your story will be better for it! groundbreaking i know!!!#what im also getting at is that morgana broke free FIRST so she DESERVED to become the morgan le fay of legend#way before any of the others grew into their own roles.#morgana#bbcm#bbc merlin#analysis#merlin meta#morgana pendragon#theres no focus on the knights here but if you know me you know how angry i am about s4 and s5 gwaine at all times#so in a story with a more nuanced portrayal of villainy and knighthood i think he would openly question his choice to become one#and maybe he'd leave for a while#go home and sort out his daddy issues. have some fruity subplots along the way. visit merlin during his dragonlord era. that sort of thing#and interact with lancelot at least once!!! for gods sake#but i dont see lancelot surviving sorry. that dude will literally die for anything#also scientists and tv execs had not yet discovered bisexuality in 2011 and he already had everyone acting unwise#in ways that barely got past the censors :/ unsustainable#elyan however shouldnt have died. i know gwen ruling alone with only the lamest knights in her service is “the point”#but its a stupid point. elyan is her best knight and they rule camelot together. working class heroes etc.#poetic justice for their father who was murdered by uther + a fun narrative contrast to morgana and arthur#nightmare siblings of all time. banished from the mortal realm for their crimes. could never rule together. stinky#ANYWAY. I HAVE THREE (3) EXAMS DUE THIS WEEK. HERE'S TWO THOUSAND (2000) WORDS OF BBC MERLIN ANALYSIS.
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Not me genuinely in a dilemma of whether or not I should block someone just for one absolutely ASS take even though it literally won't make a difference from their POV
#I have blocked so many people just by seeing ONE absolutely frigid take of theirs- i am fucking petty alr-the catharsis is insane#me before: oh i dont like this :( <-UNABLE TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT#me now: oh i dont like this actually- blocked#curate my own internet space and yada yada yaknow#even though i probably will never come across them again on my dash even if I didn't block them#i just like pressing buttons I think atp#anyways. If it sucks- hit da bricks!!!#its not even like a personal issue- Im sure they're lovely people but also BLOCKED /j /lh#im just being a dick- dw <3#on the other hand- ou folks can block me any time if you don't like my stuff#i mean it was entirely your choice in the first place so im not like- allowing you to do it or giving you permission or smth!#just letting you know that sometimes- Im the shit that sucks and you gotta hit the bricks from#block me if I have an ass take- i dont care- you do you bestiepop#my post#sput chatters
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making a new post bc the other one is pretty bulky, im about to be severely overdrafted when i pay my rent in a few days and i really really really cant let that happen :( pls if you have anything to spare i'd appreciate it, im in the process of finding a new job because my current one refuses to give me hours. im transmasc and i dont have a car so finding a job has been difficult but im doing everything i can to make ends meet. even just spreading this around helps
pp: paypal.me/bewearrr
vnm: tobias_leviathan
thank you 🥺💕
90/450
#ive been rejected from multiple jobs simply because I don't have a car. even the ones i dont need to travel for#i have drivers license and a bus route but thats not good enough#its not like i even tell them i dont have a car either like they Find Out or theres some situation where i have to disclose that info#which feels illegal but whatever#anyways i am so fucking hopeless for the future im so terrified idk how im gonna pay my bills next month#ive tried asking for more hours at my current job but they dont care!!!! they dont fucking care!!!!!#idk how i went from having full time hours to working one day a week so suddenly but i hate it#and the worst part is theyre really guilt trippy about it and the managers are constantly talking abt it in the group chat#like they have all these extreme standards they only give you hours if you go way above and beyond in every aspect#even my good coworkers have been getting their hours cut#like even the IMPORTANT people arent getting hours#its fucked up!!!! never ever ever work for sheetz its a fucking nightmare#ive signed up for multiple temp agencies and none of them have given me any leads#im working on comms every day but it takes me so long to work on one piece that the process has been slow#im about to apply to work at fucking mcdonalds or something like its THAT bad rn i really dont want to but what other choice do i have
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i now have an aching thumb bc of this
#digital art#my art#fanart#dead plate#dead plate game#dead plate fanart#dead plate art#stood awake till 12 am to finish this#i dont wanna do animatics like this ever again oop#(may still do one eventually..)#photoshop kinda ruined the quality but ehh didnt have any other choice#i shall do a legit animation eventually but dunno#dead plate rody#dead plate vincent#rody lamoree#vincent charbonneau
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Kinda crazy that we’ve got 3 different lords of fortune between da absolution and tevinter nights and none of them showed up in datv but instead we got. A half assed isabela cameo. Like ok-
#dragon age#dragon age spoilers#dragon age the veilguard#datv#datv spoilers#dragon age veilguard#dragon age veilgaurd spoilers#dragon age isabela#isabela dragon age#dragon age critical#LIKEEE#im fine with most of veilguard ill be honest#i do have other criticisms but my enjoyment overrides them tbh#but i was so excited for the lords of fortune#hell taash is still like. uhh top 3 companions for me#but as a faction. disappointing#the rivain coast is boring as hell#and also. the lof is like. kinda orientalist#especially since we literally dont see any of rivain beyond that fucking beach#and the annoying ass warden area. and the volcano#LIKEEEE#that section just suffers. so much lmao#and isabela. i love her but why include her#if none of our choices from previous games matter lmao#its kinda weird#im sure someone can say all this better but. yeah idk#i still cant get over like. clearly rivaini ppl are based of romani ppl right???#but not seeing any of their culture makes it soo. eugh.#AND GET ISABELA OUT OF THAT OUTFIT#ok im done i swear. probably
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the way evanora possesses agatha again when she says "i can be good", like she wants to prove her own view that her daughter cant be. making alice attack her evanora, almost recreating what happened in the trial a little bit, making this new coven see what agatha will do (again, not on purpose), and making them turn on her
#i dont think evanora is like. evil. i mean no ones evil i guess but thats also kind of the point with all of these witches right?#esp for jac schaeffer it seems#anyway i think evanora was in a position where she didnt feel like she had any other options#and it's a very intense choice to make she raised this kid for 18 years#and im not sure how full a person a ghost is#'emotion ties them to this plane' and all that#ghosts might just be like kinda like this frozen traumatic moment#so i think evanora's ghost is less complex than evanora the woman#but i think also that evanora the woman HAD to tell herself 'you were born evil' to be able to like come to this course of action at all#you have to tell yousrelf SOMETHING right? something convincing enough to commit murder#i think that agatha was born evil was a justification she told herself to be able to go through with the trial#i dont think her mother believed that all of agathas life. i dont think she even believed it except for that she needed to#but as a ghsot shes stuck in that traumatic moment same as agatha#and so agatha has to hear this#this justification for why she deserves to die and will destroy any coven shes part of
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A hot take here: but can we all agree that it's not an artist or actor or athlete or any other celebrities' responsibility to be a political activist on every single goddamn issue?? Like for fuck sakes guys give it a rest...I'm sick of it
#taylor swift#taylorswift#or any other celebrity for that matter#its not in their job description to be a political activist on top of their profession whatever it may be#so enough of the “why doesnt he/she/they talk about [insert issue here]?” especially if they choose to speak up on one or two things#its getting quite annoying#especially in regards to Taylor#man the woman cant do any god damn thing right in y'all's eyes#the woman is not perfect like jesus christ let her be#if she want to speak up on Gaza or any other issue thats her choice#she donated to Gaza we obviously know from that alone she's pro human rights#like I understand shes the biggest celebrity at the peak of her career#but still its not her responsibilty to be speak up on political issues thats what you have politicians for#call your MP or congressman or state senator or whoever is in the political realm if you care that much to make a change#the fact that she speaks up at all on any issue whether its feminism or LGBTQ or any issues regarding the music industry is good enough#i dont expect her to speak up on every god damn thing her job is singing and writing and performing not the POTUS
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my fucking god damn god fucking shit insurance is the wrong plan for my PCP to be able to accept. so I can't get my prog. I can't do my labs for this month. I have to wait until fucking November to try again. I hate the american healthcare system, eat a dick and choke on it you fucking shit stain of a goddamn idea of a healthcare system. what a backwards fucking garbage dump, I hate it I hate it I hate it!!!!! God fucking fuck why is it so hard to see a goddamn doctor!!!!!! fuck!!!!!! im gonna fucking cry!!!!!!!!! FUCK
#fuck it#going to go thrift shopping and might go buy some chicken wings to make me feel better#i need something cause im trying not to want to kermit#how humiliating it is to basically be told “hey your insurance card declined#and your only choices are pay $160 out of pocket minimum just to be seen or cancel“#idk it just fucking sucks and im so upset#and i dont even have anyone i can go to rn for physical comfort#my partner's asleep. my bestie just got home from work and will likely be by the time i get home. i dont have any other friends who live#near me.#idk. fuck it. whatever
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i have finished watching g-witch and Belmeria is person I relate the most to.
#she has no strengh to admit her wrongs and act to redeem herself#and i love it because i usually feel the same way#feel like i dont have any choice rather than follow other people orders... and its not truth but it usually feels really limiting#because standing for myself is not the immediate option my brain suggests for me#even though she has a criminal record for conducting experiments on humans she doesnt see herself as villain#but she doesnt think her actions are good so... as long as she gets no punishment she proceeds doing questionable things she was assigned 4#because she believes she is under control of people with more power and thats how hierarchy works#i like her little bravery in ep 23... in danger she tossed off her anxious beliefs and broke from chains of helplessness she created hersel#i like her character a lot because she has a weak personality and she is an adult who lived like this for a long time...#its not like the anime tells 'its okay to be weak' because no one actually tells her that (some charas get annoyed even)#its more like anime allows us to see that adults can be irresponcible too..they can be full of anxiety and fear... and its not good for the#but they exist like this... and they can do better if only there was situations or people that could help them gain more confidence#sorry i have so many thoughts about her. thanks for coming to my ted talk#gundam the witch from mercury#mobile suit gundam the witch from mercury#the witch from mercury#belmeria winston#my art#also big thumbs up for her design... its simple and she feels like a really tired woman who gives no attention to her exterior.. i love it
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i'm trying to watch a trans guy critique some video game trans rep bc i'm interested in hearing more trans ppl talk about it. but he's very. i'm paraphrasing here but "why would anyone ever in a million years want their rpg character to have top surgery scars. isnt that a constant reminder to you and everyone around you about how you were born" and "you don't work on transitioning. you just need hormone treatment and possibly some--"
#i get that some trans men need to fight themselves and everyone around them to feel ''man enough'' in like a semi toxic masculinity way#but its kinda tiring to hear ngl. im sorry you feel that way and i know not having been born cis sucks and i understand your emotions but d#you have to make them my problem. like idk i feel like my transition DID take work and#personally for me my top surgery scars are a positive reminder of how far ive gotten#when i pay them any attention. which is not very often#man im just existing not analyzing every part of my body at all times#yknow. some ppl sound like they watched a bit too much of a certain youtuber who was rancid about other trans men and talked about stuff li#like how theres a mens and womens way to flip your middle finger and stuff.#sight thats so besides the point#anyways i am open to hearing opinions that differ from mine and i want to do that but some people you just dont vibe with#leevi talks#obvs no hate to this creator btw. he speaks about stuff very well but some little word choices here and there rub me the wrong way#and he has good points so far i am intrigued of what he has to say i just needed a break to bitch so i can continue#edit: no this video isnt even good. like i dont agree with bioware but he sounds like hes just on purpose misunderstanding everything#so he has more stuff to get mad about for his video#is it ragebait
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"the sonic franchise has never had a misogyny problem" <- person whos never played a sonic game in their life
#sorry i just saw that poll that was going around. what do you mean theres people saying no ....#im not gonna elabroate too much rn because i dont feel like writing a whole essay on it but#the sonic franchise absolutely has its moments of mistreating its female cast and its wild to me that people can just. not notice ?#like yeah theres a lot of great and loveable female characters but that doesnt mean theyre never portrayed in a misognyistic way#or dont fall into a pattern of misogynistic writing choices even if the character is fine on her own#do you never pay attention to the amount of screentime or plot relevance a lot of them tend to get ?#or what storylines and roles theyre given?#what types of personalities and designs theyre allowed to have and how much variation they get compared to the boys ?#if theyre ever allowed to interact with other girls onscreen?#i think things Have gotten a bit better in more recent years but thats mostly because idw sonic is doing a lot of the heavy lifting here#and obviously im not saying any of this out of hatred for sonic. you can like something and admit that it has issues in certain areas
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oh fuck wait a minute. the amalgamates probably remember resets dont they
#trousled rambles#undertale#i was gonna say at least i only do true pacifist runs but honestly thats still pretty fucking rough for them aint it#no wonder lemon bread is so angry actually. like damn i would be too#flowey doesnt remember true resets but i feel like thats more by choice somehow? idk how but i can’t think of any other reason tbh#but the amalgamates dont have any knowledge about any of that. oooooookay#look dont laugh at me if this is all common knowledge or easily debunked or something it did not occur to me until like right now#and suddenly alllll of the existential horror of them set in at once#like obviously they have always been fucked. but that is So Fucked#my bad guys :(
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Asking because I’m extremely curious about this, how did MonProm’s writing get different over time? I remember you saying that the lore and characters feel different, and that it's missing sincere character interactions, too. I know almost nothing about the lore and I’ve only seen a few people mention the characters, so I’d be interested in a rundown of what aspects you think got worse in the series
I wouldn’t mind a very long response since I’m not that active in the fandom, I need to catch up on what happened
sorry for taking so long to answer this! i kinda waffled on it for a long bit, mainly because i started doubting myself again, and whether or not this was me simply overreacting or being tinted by nostalgia or simply being extremely picky and choosy in what i like (the last of which is true, i seldom get into fandoms at all for this reason and stay away from most popular media, but i wasn't sure if it applied here). i've posted about it already, but i'm in the middle of a psychotic episode where i can't feel a lot of pleasure to begin with + most things i do experience ending up solidly in the "very bad" category, so as you can imagine, i really didn't want to mislead and check that i was actually in objective reality.
as it is, this is also when a lot more screenshots started to be posted in the monster prom tag, and that helped me bridge the gap back into returning to the games themselves and feel like i was making a more accurate judgement. if you're one of those people who have been posting screenshots, i sincerely thank you, and i appreciated seeing you in the tag greatly.
for those not in the know — i've been in the monster prom fandom since it first released, prior to even the first additional ending to be added (the "Punch the sun" ending, and i recall the minor fandom drama that happened at that time due to it). my impression of monster prom is very much influenced by this, as what got me into the first game was the fact that the characters genuinely seemed to care for each other and were friends with each other (not merely tolerating each other's presences nor dressing it up, they sincerely thought of each other as friends and were open about that fact), on top of the wide variety of small details and statements that, if taken at face value, could create compounding complexity in the lives of each and every character and had wider implications for their lives.
no, they were not necessarily explored nor even necessarily "real", with so many conflicting events and statements, but i liked this too, because it meant a wider flexibility in what you could imagine, helping to create a more tailored experience for everyone who thought about these characters. this was what i liked about the early fandom too. what was baseline "canon" was so vague and minimal that you could have wildly different interpretations of the same characters' histories and relationships with each other. you would have radically different perspectives on what the world itself looked like, what it was like, that there wasn't really any wrong answers so long as their personalities remained the same. this is where you got the old headcanon of polly and liam being childhood friends who knew each other as humans, or that the world of monster prom was post-apocalypse where humanity itself had gone extinct or only existed in tiny pockets, or my personal headcanon that both monster and human society existed right next to each other and had minimal crossover for petty cultural reasons. this was also prior zoe-as-ro, and there were wildly different interpretations of zoe's personality, with most going for a far more disquieting creepy-cute than the deep nerd we got.
this is why you get stuff like the timeloop theory, where everyone is repeating the same weeks leading up to prom over and over, and are perhaps vaguely aware of it but broadly unconcerned. this is also why it felt like the joke that, the characters were still in high school but were all fully legal adults with most in their 20's, best landed, because it was absurd and strange and didn't quite make sense, but the world itself was inherently absurd and semi-malleable to begin with. realistically, i felt like everyone understood it was making fun of the trope of having adults play teenagers in american sitcoms and wildly casting outside the age range, but for more in-universe explanations it wasn't any different from the way that you would have a large, dramatic ending in which everything changed, but then you'd restart and everyone would be right back at the beginning with nothing different, or even having conflicting events in the same run. it was a dream-logic that fit with the tropes and, thus, diagetically made sense.
to be clear, i don't mind canon having a set, well, canon on which it refers back to itself. i don't mind expanding that or including more things which are set in stone. but there was a perceivable shift in how the games handled this over time, becoming a lot more... bitter, it felt, towards all of these different branching ideas and concepts that, yeah, the people making them knew wouldn't necessarily be "canon" because "canon" already liked to contradict itself so much. most people weren't even sold on any one idea, and there was a much greater sense of enjoying and appreciating all the varying ideas people would come up with even if you personally didn't share them. making the characters be out of character was the real crime, because then it didn't diagetically make sense in the same way, didn't wholly fit.
(again, this is not to say fanon didn't happen and characters weren't smoothed down into a simplified personality that fit these varying fan-interpretations instead of the game itself. certainly damien love/lust was just as bad as it had ever been, and everyone loved to mangle his character into a more stereotypical "bad boy with a heart of hold" all the time. but it certainly felt less set-in-stone about it than it does now, with any deviation from the norm being considered strange and odd and even broadly shunned from the wider fandom.)
all of this is setup for establishing what the writing, lore, and characters felt like in the earlier days. the characters were the strongest part, with their relationships to each other being equally as important. the lore played it fast and loose and was far less interested in setting anything in concrete because that wasn't the important part. the lore wasn't the important part, which was what made it all the more intoxicating to think about, all the more fun to play with.
montrip is easily the biggest offender when it comes to setting everything in all-or-nothing terms and demanding absolutism from the world. broadly i blame the hitchhiker conversations for the worst of it, but i think ultimately the way they handled the entire premise of the game is where this problem stems from. it's not really an exploration in the same sense that you might explore the first game, discovering different perspectives and different people with different relationships to each other. it's an exploration in the sense of a sequel that over-explains the monster, that takes the most boring option out of all those that were possible and floating around and settles on something that was blatant, obvious, typically rejected not because of how novel it is but how trite and par for the course it is in the rest of the genre.
yeah, okay. humans know nothing about monsters and there's a "monster dimension" that exists separately from the human dimension. there's no crossover between the two of them. of course there's a big grand-scale fight between the eldritch powers that zoe used to be a part of, from which not only are slayers the main organization against them, but also the merkingdom has some horse in this race too. it's an urge to make things so universal in explaining them, in revealing connecting threads which unite everything that's ever happened in here, that makes the worldbuilding and lore immediately much more boring than it ever was before.
and it didn't have to be this way! nothing in the first game contradicts any of this too explicitly (see the above, the first game loves to contradict itself), and i would even be happy if this was basically canon but never stated or confirmed to be the big overarching everything going on underneath it all. i believe you should probably know these things about any world that you create and have them in the back of your mind. the difference is that you can know these things and keep them in mind, even focusing on things where its very relevant, and still not reveal them. this is why you have lore bibles, after all. every horror writer knows exactly how their monster works and the full underlying reason for everything that happens, but that doesn't mean the audience will see it or possess this same information too, and leaving it intentionally obscure will make far better stories.
which, this is bad enough, but it wouldn't be the breaking point for me if this was all there was.
but the worst thing of all has to be the slow decay of the very same characters that sold me on this world, this lore, this game in the first place. monster prom is nothing without the characters in it. it's a dating sim, it has nothing but characters to get you to play, and liking these characters are the entire reason anyone would pick up monster prom in the first place.
and the first game pulls this off extremely well. it's all in the tagline: be your worst self. they are, indeed, all terrible people. yes, even that character that you just thought of right now. they all have points in the game where they commit atrocities, where they kill or hurt people, where they do inexcusable things that could not be ignored in a more serious setting.
but that's the point. i think there's something very powerful in creating a character who not only do you love and love their personality and the way they interact with the world, but who also are inapologetically terrible, and to have the humor and the charisma be so good that you don't get bogged down in the "this is awful". likewise, it never feels the urge to really go out of its way to justify what's going on. this is not to say theres no discussion of if someone "deserved it", but usually there's still the sense that the joke is on them, that this is still an extreme reaction specifically for comedy and not necessarily something that can be justified. you can have damien set leonard on fire and have it feel earned, without prompting the needed reaction of what it's actually like to watch someone burn to death.
this is what sets the prank masterz ending apart from the rest of the game, and really establishes it as the first real "bad ending". because nothing that you do or happens in the prank masterz ending is any different from anything else that happens in any other run. you summon evil beings from other dimensions as a throwaway gag on how visiting one location raises your stats. you kill other people and damn them to terrible fates. you watch as body horror happens. the only difference is that, in the prank masterz ending, the laugh track doesn't play.
the rest of the game and the writing echoes this philosophy, this careful interplay of tropes that keeps everything tongue in cheek and yet sincere enough to make sure emotional beats still land when they're needed. the characters feel true to themselves and their own emotions, even when the world is extreme and excessive, when everything else runs on comedy logic.
this is also what i noticed failing first as time went on.
like i said, fanon has always existed and there's always been very specific ideas as to what characters are like in the same way fanon always flattens down characters into the same tropes over and over. scott is stupid and innocent and doesn't know what sex is. damien is violent and hot and too cool for anyone else. miranda is the idiot girl character. repeat over and over and over until you get sick of it.
but it's been an issue as time has crept on that canon has started to approach fanon and began to merge with it. now, scott is so innocent that he can't even curse. polly starts being mean to her friends and saying things that would be very hurtful to hear. the merkingdom isn't really super evil and fucked up, it's just miranda that's like that. they become simpler, easier to digest, streamlined for social media posts and mass-sharing. they become less and less subversions of existing tropes and moreso just another example of them, something else to add to the collection, not their own individual stories.
even further from this, what more complex traits they had are now stated and not shown. polly is stated to be smart and clever in a way that her party girl persona doesn't imply and to be sincerely rather down to earth with the people she cares about, but we seldom ever see this anymore unless its the game specifically trying to make a point about it, in which case it won't let her do anything that implies cleverness and moreso will just outline it in the narration. vera is stated to care for people in a very genuine and heartfelt way, but seldom will get a chance to do so, and every opportunity for her to do so to their faces is missed while she will just outright state it later. it does not feel consistent, it does not feel like any of these are intended reads of their actions. it feels like the devs have something they want to do but no idea on how to actually do so. and forget it if you want these traits to manifest in small ways that show up in unrelated moments and scenes.
the dialogue becomes harder and harder to tell between each speaker, if you are just looking at what's said and not at the pictures attached to it. the characters' distinct voices have been eroded away, so that they speak more and more like each other, relaying the same terms and ideas in the same words. perspective becomes a suggestion, instead of a must.
this is something that started back in monster camp too, as all of the endings in that game felt ultimately the same as every other ending. it's very hard to place or define the full reason why, why there feels like there's no emotional stakes nor investment, why everything feels moreso like selecting different coats of paint and trying to find all the different ending pictures rather than being interested in exploring the characters as characters.
stranger yet, the series that started with the tagline of "be your worst self" has experienced a kind of... softening, for lack of a better word? what i mentioned about being able to handle the balance between terrible people who do terrible things and the light tone of the game starts to change, as abruptly the same characters who were down with violent murder in the first game start to lose their nerve, acting more and more on more typical morality. it's one of those things that feels like it's starting to damage the tone, as abruptly it's not as absurd as it used to be, demands less suspension of disbelief which could buffer and support the rest of the setting on it. there's even a part in one of the endings in montrip which involves current-polly and current-scott looking back on their monprom selves and reacting in horror at how violent and careless their pranks are, in a way that fundamentally felt like it was undercutting and disparaging all the things that felt fun and made monprom what it was.
which is odd, really, because more and more i feel like the characters in these games like each other less and less. the friendships and genuine enjoyment of each others company that brought me to this game in the first place has gone. now they don't mention each other as much, don't care for each other's feelings and reactions as much, aren't as willing to support each other. they are more and more found on their own, relied on their own, seem to seek out contact and interaction with their own friends less and less. it feels like they're all separating out into their own worlds, but also feels like they wouldn't willingly want to interact with each other if they weren't already forced together by some other outside contrivance.
if anything, i'd compare it to every other dating sim out there, where you, the player, are the most important person in these characters' lives, and they only feel ambivalent or antagonistic towards every other character. which, again, is not why i picked up monster prom or why i liked it so much in the first place.
and it's because of this that it feels like the current state of the series has to focus on its increasingly weak worldbuilding and lore, trying to form a more serious foundation without character relationships being so tightly bound together, without the characters themselves being more developed and rich, without an aspect of absurd humor to rely on.
more and more i've noticed monprom has to rely on referencing other series to make itself funny and create humor, which, again, it's always done. it was just easier to ignore back then, if you didn't know what was being referenced, because there was always more going on in the exact same scene to bolster it and give context clues as to the setup and punchline at play. it feels like the current games are much more dependent on you knowing pop culture references in order to have any fun with it, and i'm someone who, again, is very picky in what i like or what i'll seek out. i'm not interested in a stream of references about other things that i would much rather be doing than playing through a game that feels like it hates that i like it at all, when i could, again, just be engaging with the thing that takes itself seriously and knows what it wants.
#all the care guide says is 'biomass'#monster prom#asks#vanillabeenflower#this is. so long i am so sorry.#and its still not my entire thoughts because i have so many thoughts#this is an unedited ramble tbh and im very sorry for that#i have more complaints like#how fucking snide and condescending the narration is to its own characters#which it already had but gets even worse in the later games#which is why despite loving aaravi i dont want to play moncamp at all#where a character says they like something or feel something and the narration has to be so. sarcastic about it?#like how i mentioned about how it feels like how its looking down on them as people#instead of whats probably the intended read which is#more jokingly calling them dumb in an affectionate way like how you might do with friends#and ofc theres the whole miranda rant#i hate what theyve done with the merkingdom and i HATE adrien as a concept i wont lie#just. cool. this female character is too stupid to count as a lore character. we obviously need a MALE character to fill in instead#we cant just have miranda talk about this or center any of the other female characters#and how they feel about this and whats going on for them#no we need to make up a new man to talk to instead#im. im still really bitter about it i wont lie.#like i said i could go on and get way more specific about it#i just feel like any and all emotional weight to this has died and the characters are more and more obviously actors on a stage#for your own self gratification rather than their own people living their own lives#this is so bitter and i really shouldnt put this in the main tag#i am so sorry everyone who will see my rant. but my peace must be made.#dont worry im already asking myself if im just making all this shit up myself#what if some of us liked that the characters were so mean to the player and had no qualms about aggressively rejecting us#because it gave some illusion of them being able to make their own choices and decisions in what they wanted
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