#but i think thats. at least partially a shtick

[smokeys-house]

Jerma talks like he's constantly pretending to be on a phone call

[t4tpumpkinduo]

um. cschlatt finds out shes transfem post revival. is this anything.

AUGH IT'S EVERYTHING it'suwgwudgdhgh. hold on let me explain.

i think the cschlatt transfem throughline is, again, soso easy to read theres sm to dig into and chew on. i'm genuinely bewildered it's not smthng ppl hve picked up on more because it seems so v clear to me.

guy refuses to accept help bcs he sees it as weakness makes it v clear his narrative lesson is -> he should allow himself support and compassion w/o recoiling, because he's allowed to want it and need it, w/o masking it in disgust or irony.

on that point, guy refuses to see himself as disabled despite having very very blatent disabilities that leave him in horror of himself -> a panicked assertion of power to take back "control". ok ,what is he in "control" of, what can he wield, what can he have a narrative over.

guy likes being called a pretty princess and wears dresses "as a joke", using that same irony coated sheen he uses w a Lot of the things he's afraid of being more earnest in, like his care for other people or his wants. he likes being wined and dined and cooed at, and then reacts to "feminine" things, the possibility of being "not a man", in the same wild rejection as the other two, the rejection of the body. a real man doesn't care if he's betrayed, that's why he takes it so personally. a real man doesn't care abt sm partner, who needs 'em, and thats why the bow shot becomes a canon death that he feels personally heartbroken abt. a real man isn't scared and panicked and a real man isn't disabled and isn't needy. and he definitely isn't afraid. and he doesn't like the dresses. -> well. yknow how it is.

even the gym...we don't know his limbo specifically but i think it's pretty easy to infer that the gym is at least partially a manifestation of it? ghosts are confirmed to be able to be tied to locations, like mexican dream w el rapids. and in his, he has that "control", surrounded by that ideal figure, here he's powerful and on top and sooooo intouchable. the mask worked. and it doesn't actually because it still doesn't match up w how he acts. a "real man" doesn't need anything, doesn't care about anything, and glatt is still still still so deeply needy and clingy and longing for connection, and still tries to mask it w things like "spanish lessons" and "horror mansions" tht end up just being an excuse to throw little parties in. uuwgh. who even ca(blows up 320 walls with my mind)

additionally ppl forget that limbo is supposed t like..not actually be hell lmao? it's torturous for sure but it isn't like. supposed to represent their worse nightmare? it's supposed to, i think, represent a state of being unable to move on. the train that won't ever pick you up. a existence of blankness where you can't feel a thing except waiting for the other shoe to drop. a gym full of idols that you will never be able to "live up to".

bcs of that schlatt is bigender (✌️) to me specifically...cuz he clearly likes Parts of masculinity. the little conman shtick, the big guy-isms. it's smthing he enjoys, but he's v clearly fearful and panicked abt the "Ideal Masculine Figure™️", the mythologized toxic version in his quest for control. the conman thing is fun and easy, and the freaked out assertion of "i'm a man, i'm not weak or scared, i'm not like them." is smthng else entirely.

(and again the symbolism WHATT the fuck was going on in the writer's room. the gym is handled like a trap that he can't get out of by himself, and being in the sun, being visible is tangibly equivalent to being burned. Fucking Excuse Me? Answer My Emails.)

anyways this is very brief and i could talk abt this for 53 years and counting but the thesis statement is estrogen and anti psychotics could've saved her 👍and she does eventually get revived and accepts it abt herself and he's so happy and loved. forever and ever. happy tgirl cschlatt tuesday‼���

[lotus-mirage]

Trigun Stampede episode 6 liveblog!

oh, a defector, presumably?

Alright, Punisher is an apt title it seems

so confirmation that the red plants are the ones considered defective. but huh, "scheduled for disposal" - I was under the impression that they didn't have a way to get more? They wouldn't keep them around just in case?

Meryl and Roberto have good reasons for leaving, but I'm still kind of expecting it to not last very long

oh those were some suspiciously cross-shaped coat buttons. and symbol on the back of the coat.

huh I think his guns are also cross-shaped

Okay yeah so Wolfwood is very much taken off guard by this.

The 2D animation kind of startled me tbh lol

The lack of voicelines in this section is interesting! Kind of directing you to pay closer attention.

Wait the law enforcement appearing reminded me - Vash's appearance is pretty well known, right? Is he not disguising himself at all?

Oh what's catching up to the car and why are they so colorful??

... the 2D silhouettes approaching the building look kinda like caskets.

"child of blessing." huh.

oh THATS a color sequence

he's on an upside-down cross I... wow

also bit of a weird feeling that this might be kind of early to learn this?? Like I feel like this is at least a late-season or season 2 sort of sequence. There's been two and a half episodes of Wolfwood so far total.

That is a lot of cells

Wait the scientist guy seems surprised. Where did Wolfwood get the glass thingies if not from him??

Oh wtf is somebody psychic or. whats happening here.

Okay first of all I don't think we've seen this person before, but I think they have the same haircut as the baby twins and the angel kid.

Second "eye of michael," okay. I guess that's the thing in the center of the symbol, then.

Oh this is the guy with psychic powers(?)! Alright, that's a mystery partially solved. Second question: How??? (is that allowed???)

Huh, I'd have thought they'd also indoctrinate the kids, if they're getting them from that place?

Also. I'm assuming this is a framing thing for the viewers, but it also kind of feels like the guy is also seeing the future here.

Bluesummers, okay. Sure.

"Forgive us, boy." Unless he's talking about something else, this seems at odds with the priest's previous charicterization. Huh.

Oh I think I missed it, but they said something about Wolfwood retaining something, mentally, right? I should check that.

Implication that the orphanage needs to supply two kids at any given point?

More skull motifs on Bluesummers.

And the mask on Livio is sparking blue. Looks like it matches up with whatever was happening to his eye in the flashback. (I wonder why so many have their visible technology on their heads?)

Geometric patterns on Bluesummer's arm, noted (and small book! ...actual bible?). Also is he paralleling Wolfwood and Livio's relationship and Vash and Knives'?

Are they redirecting the ship to the orphanage?? Why???

That's like the most neon I've seen on this show by far. Feels a little weird honestly.

Notably Livio doesn't seem to have emoted at all.

End notes:

Uhhh general observations first. Animation in this episode was very cool as always. Background music was noticeable, but felt intentional in that.

On the symbolic stuff this episode, idk if I have enough knowledge to really speak to any of it? Bluesummer's emotions shtick seems like a personal rather than organizational thing, for one. I think Michael is an archangel, and other media I've seen them in has had them either as an authority figure or as like a high-ranking fighter. Those portrayals were also definitely taking a lot of liberties, so that further muddies the water.

No idea if "child of blessing" has symbolic meaning, but it kind of reminds me of Rollo from last episode? In the sense that they kind of undergo the same thing and also that results in a 'blessing' they don't get to experience/enjoy, potentially through their doom or demise.

I feel like I don't really have a lot to speculate on in this episode, particularly in comparison to the last. I'm surprised that Wolfwood is getting this much focus so early, let alone a two-parter mostly about him. With the reappearance of the neon desert raiders, I was expecting Meryl and Roberto to also return, but I could be wrong or it could be the next episode lol.

[golgoterror]

Alright, this is ungodly long, but I just wanted to talk about something regarding Jake. 

A lot of this fandom -- at least, from what I’ve seen -- label Jake as stupid. Some may even say Jake and smart are antonyms. This could not be further from the truth. It almost irritates me how much the fandom places this mischaracterization on him. Also, I get to talk about The Lad™ for about ten pages worth of words on Google docs, which is always very, very fun for me.

Well, first things first, let’s talk about the child genius and multi-billionaire polymath that is Jake English.

Puzzle Modus.

Let’s begin with something small. Jake’s modus is of puzzlekind! This is described as:

It's quite a handy modus, allowing you to captchalogue objects of any size, as long as you can fit them all in a finite space by maneuvering the cards around like a big game of Tetris. You like it because it keeps you sharp for solving any puzzles you might find when you go out raiding hallowed tombs, which is never. (x)

He likes puzzles! This is a huge headcanon I absolutely adore that has a basis in the comic: He’s a puzzles guy! This is just sort of a neat little fact about him that I adore to the moon and back. Just the idea of Jake fiddling about with a Rubik’s Cube is kind of adorable.

This is how he goes about doing everything every day of his life. I think that’s just amazing! And incredibly smart of him, I might add.

Skaianet. 

Jake is shown in the credits to take over Skaianet after the game ended. For those unfamiliar, Skaianet made many things for the game, including but not limited to: the interstellar travel we see, transportalizers, the lab by Rose’s house, all Jake’s fancy-schmancy computers, and Sburb itself. In the beta timeline, Grandpa Harley founded Skaianet. In the alpha timeline, Grandma English did. I know Jake didn’t start it up and trying to pass off his alt-timeline self as him is a bit far-fetched at best, but he had the spoons to take it over. I think that speaks volumes for Jake’s intelligence -- this implies, at the very least, he can understand mathematics and physics at a high level. Remind you of someone we already know?

It is also important to note that Jake does, in fact, build the company back from the ground up, because it went to shit before his grandmother died:

GT: Pretty sure her company made a tidy fortune til it went belly up. At least i still have a few of her knickknacks for keepsakes. (x)

So he built an interstellar company back up -- using what his intelligent grandmother had once used -- to being very useful and practical once again. 

As someone with a degree in mathematics and about to finish a degree in physics, I can say this sort of work would for sure require at the very least a decent understanding of quantum mechanics, statistical mechanics, electrodynamics, calculus (vector and differential forms), ordinary and partial differential equations, and perhaps other things like topology. I don’t know about you -- and I’m probably tooting my own horn a bit by saying this -- but I think that’s pretty nifty, if I do say so myself. 

Actor.

Once again, I’m reaching into the credits to show that Jake has become a movie star after the game ends. Memorizing all those lines, slipping into characters... Being an actor is no easy feat. 

( Side note: This leads into my headcanon that Jake can imitate accents and voices on a whim. No more arguing about whether he has a British, American, or Australian accent -- you’re all right! )

And I would like to add he has two jobs! Skaianet and being a movie star! This guy’s a fucking polymath for Christ’s sake.

Reading People.

Let’s start of simple: Brain Ghost Dirk. I can hear the outcries now of Dirk’s powers being the cause for this. And, yes, I can’t ignore Dirk’s influence in this, but Jake’s hope powers were also needed for the projection to come alive. And the fact he was able to make such a startlingly accurate projecting of Dirk in his own mind is astounding -- even BGD himself thinks so!

TT: You could view me as a projection of the real Dirk within your mind, as expressed through all of your thought patterns about him. TT: So I'm kind of a splinter of his corporeal self who happens to live in your awareness. TT: I'm a startlingly close approximation to the real thing, for all intents and purposes. GT: Just how startlingly close are we talking? TT: I'm not going to give you a bogus percentage like the glasses cause that's not my shtick. TT: But pretty damn close. (x)

A very deep understanding of the other is needed for Jake to do this. That is pretty fucking incredible. He can clearly read people really well -- he had a few times where he was cluing in on Jane and Dirk have feelings for him:

TG: its one of those things jane likes about u so much GT: It is? TG: which TG: errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr im not supposed to talk about 2 u evr so nm GT: Talk about what? TG: nope GT: You mean how um... GT: Well a way in which i suppose... TG: no nope GT: Jane is prone to looking upon me with what i fathom to be more than just friendly affection? (x)

TT: I guess call it an extra birthday present. But instead of a present that's awesome, consider it more like a weird confession that may change the way you feel about me. GT: Whoa uh... GT: Dirk are you... uh... GT: Saying what i think? (x)

He’s not completely clueless on people! In fact, he seems to have a really good understanding of his friends. That’s something a lot of people seem to forget because of the incident that I will be getting to later on.

Fending For Himself.

I’ve already written quite a bit on this, but I’ll sum it up here: Jake is exceptionally good at living in the wild and taking care of himself. Sort of like a wild garden; he doesn’t need to be taken care of. Survival skills, especially around fighting and fending off things, aren’t something everyone has. This, once again, counts in his favour, even if it doesn’t line-up with “book smarts”.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

That’s five things! It’s clear Jake is, in fact, a polymath and incredibly intelligent. So, what’s with the fandom painting him as being dumb? What’s with people actually thinking he’s stupid? I think we can all take several wild guesses as to why that’s the case.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Takes things literally.

This is something that plagues Jake quite a lot. Case in point:

GT: Wow like the epic kevin costner film? TT: Almost exactly. Especially by the same degree of shittiness. GT: Oh man does that mean you have to drink your own pee?????? TT: You get used to the taste. Welcome it, even. TT: That takes about 15 days in a row of hard piss drinking though. GT: Ewwwwwwwwwwww no dude. No ew. :( TT: Relax, I don't drink any goddamn piss, ok? GT: Oh ok. Whew. (x)

But, well, let’s address the elephant in the room. The chat I laughed so hard at when I read it the first time due to pure, unadulterated second-hand embarrassment: Jake asking Jane if she had feelings for him.

Let’s analyze this, shall we? Jake starts off by being vague as all Hell, and I’ll spare those details, until finally...

GT: Just come out and say it. Do you fancy me? GG: No! GT: I see. GT: Very well then. GT: Jeez i mustve really misread that one! I feel like kind of a bone head now. (x / x)

Okay, she says no, and he backs off. That’s fine and dand--

GG: No!!!!!! GG: Oh my God, what am I saying here? GG: Jake, I didn't mean it! I didn't want to make you feel that way! GT: Now jane lets not backpedal here. GT: Youve spoken the truth and i greatly appreciate and respect you for that. GT: But now that i think about it you know what? GG: ... GG: No? :( GT: Please dont take this the wrong way but your answer is actually kind of a relief! (x)

... Oh, right. Yeah. It keeps going. It just keeps--

GT: Actually since youve made your feelings apparent and only see me as a friend that makes it a lot easier! GG: Haha, yes! GG: Friends!!!! GT: Maybe you could help me sort out some stuff that has been weighing on me lately? GG: Well what are friends for Jake!!!!! (x)

Sweet Jesus, Jake.

GG: Me? GG: HOO HOO HOO! GG: I'm just GG: Terrific! GG: I'm feeling so... GG: Friendly!!! GG: I clearly just want to be a good friend and bring all my AMAZING FRIENDLINESS to bear on your problems. GG: Friendlystyle! Ahahahah? GG: Shit I mean GG: Ahahahah! GT: Thats aces. Jane youre a sweetheart. (x)

Alright, alright, enough! You all remember the fucking chat. 

Regardless, it’s very apparent Jake takes things at face value. I also will cite him talking to Jane before her birthday, but not list examples, because what happened above will just happen once again. 

Okay, so he takes things at face value. What’s wrong with that? He trusts people to not lie to his face -- to not sugarcoat things or beat around any bushes. Perhaps I’m projecting a bit, but I do the same damn thing. I think a lot of people do! I don’t think reading things as fact over text is a good measure of someone’s intellect. All it does is show he has issues with communication. Okay, so he struggles with one thing. Sue me.

Doesn’t catch things right away.

Yeah okay I’m just gonna dump a few examples of this.

GT: Haha wow. Must have been a hell of a guy. TT: So... TT: You're not making any connections there? GT: Where? Huh? TT: Famous comedian, about the age of your grandma, inheriting the family name of the Baroness... TT: Not ringing a bell? GT: What are you talking about! Dirk stop speaking in riddles and keep telling the story i am on tenterhooks here! TT: Ok, well it's not like it's that important. Just a super obvious thing that'll probably occur to you later when you're looking in the fridge you don't have, at which point you'll feel like an idiot. GT: Oh my god you can be one opaque motherfucker just clue me in bro! TT: Nah, it'll be funnier this way. GT: STRIIIIIIDEEEERRRRRRRR!!!!! TT: Moving on. (x)

GT: Whats going on? TT: Took you long enough to figure it out. TT: Pages really are a slow burning class. Damn. GT: Figure what out! TT: You're asleep. (x)

This leads into the point above. His mind doesn’t work that way -- but that doesn’t mean he’s not intelligent. He needs everything laid out in front of him so he can make the connections and understand what’s happening, but there’s no real harm in this, and it certainly doesn’t dictate whether the guy is “intelligent” or not.

There are many, many more examples in canon depicting Jake as having difficulties with communication and you all can open most of his pesterlogs and probably find one. I’m not going to list anymore. But, hold your horses, I swear I’m getting to a point!

Difficulty reading.

A lot of the media Jake consumes is picture-based. Movies, comics, even the puzzles are most likely spacial and probably not riddles. It’s not far to imagine Jake might not be a terribly good reader, considering nobody was really around to make him read. Of course, his grandmother was around when he was little, so he can read -- and he can read just fine. But he probably isn’t very good at it simply from lack of practice. He also has terrible grammar, something Jane picks on him for, so it’s entirely possible that’s a contributing factor. He may just have trouble reading and writing.

Speaking from experience, I have dyslexia. As such, reading and writing are incredibly hard for me. I never read the books in my literature classes -- both in English and French -- but I did get the gist of the books (enough to get a decent mark in the class at least) by watching a movie adaptation of the novel. I don’t think it’s that far-off to think Jake may, indeed, do the same thing.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

NOTE: This next part is a bit hard for me to write, because I don’t want to vilify any of you. It might not have clued in on anyone or maybe you just saw Jake as a sort of comic relief and meant no harm by it. And I hope shining a light on this will make you all think twice about the guy. However, I can’t really avoid this next part, and I may get a bit emotional in it. Just a bit of a warning.

All of the above points are just me trying to say Jake probably has undiagnosed learning disabilities and perhaps autism. I don’t think I need to go into detail about how those don’t make someone “stupid”. If you think that’s the case, fuck you. I can’t argue with ableists, much less do I actually want to. 

NOTE: I wrote a thing on his speech impediments. That may be of interest too. I don’t really know, but here it is nonetheless.

My take-away message here is: just because someone struggles with socialization or other things doesn’t mean fucking anything in terms of their intelligence. Jake is very clearly smart and has the ability to read people incredibly well -- to the point of making copies of them! Perhaps it’s just a bit easy to underestimate the guy compared to other characters, though.

There are other things that muddy this up a bit, unfortunately.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Trolling.

Jake is such a fucking troll. Jesus shitting Christ, does he get a kick out of acting stupid just to make the other person look silly. Or perhaps even to make himself laugh in the process. Case in point:

uu: I WILL JUST BE YOUR PATRON DUDE. uu: OR MAYBE. YOUR PATRON MANBRO. GT: Sounds pretty gay. uu: WHAT THE HELL IS THAT? GT: Whats what? uu: GAY. WHAT'S GAY YOU IDIOT FUCK. GT: Oh right. GT: Forgive me i forget you arent familiar with all of my earth lingo. GT: Its like... GT: How do i explain. GT: You know. Its a rather old fashioned term for being jolly and festive together. GT: Like "that rollicking time we had scrumming the other eve sure was gay." uu: I SEE. uu: THEN YES. YOU ARE CORRECT. uu: THIS IS GOING TO BE GAY AS HELL. (x)

Look at his goddamn face during this exchange:

That little bastard knows exactly what he’s doing. 

And these aren’t stand-alone events! Jake is very, very silly and will use the fact others see him as stupid to have a little fun. May as well, right? And, in the process, he makes others look pretty damn stupid. 

But sometimes it’s a bit hard to tell when he’s acting stupid against when he’s genuinely not getting something. I think he even fools himself sometimes! So you have to be a bit careful about fake-outs. I’m sure even the other alphas have trouble deducing when he’s doing this -- which only adds to the myth of him actually being “stupid” when viewed on first-glace.

He probably also does this with crushes, purposefully ignoring the signs because he doesn’t want to deal with it or may not believe anyone could like him that way. After all, if he’s wrong, he may think himself to be conceded and having a big head. So, he ignores the signs, thus convincing himself the feelings aren’t there. Then he gets absolutely fucking bamboozled beyond belief to find out they actually do like him. But that’s just a little side-note.

Thinks he’s stupid.

This one is just a bit... Sad. Very sad. Jake genuinely does think he’s stupid. Quite a lot, really. 

GT: I shoulda asked where he fit into the picture if you were raised alone. I can be dumb as a bag of penny candy sometimes. (x)

Just... Man, he’s been called and treated as stupid so many times, he’s at the point where he believes it. If you asked him, he’d say Dirk is a genius, Roxy is always smart and sassy, and Jane is brilliant. (I don’t have a source for that last one but... Come on. She lectures him about grammar. Don’t fuck with me.) But when it comes to himself? He can’t say the same. Of course he then acts that way. He sees himself as a burly adventurer who is also a gentleman and tries to live up to that. No where along those lines does he think he’s intelligent. And that’s just... a little heartbreaking, really, all things considered.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Can’t believe this blog is just me going, “Wanna see how fast I can talk about Jake?”, and a shit-ton of people all nodding before I talk for six hours straight. Anyway, take-home message is: Jake’s smart. Jake’s very, very smart. He’s also a himbo, but he’s incredibly smart. Just because he has learning disabilities doesn’t mean fuck-all. 

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk. There are drinks and refreshments in the back. Have a safe trip home. Remember to tip your waiters and waitresses. Jesus fuck can I run this gag any harder into the ground? Giving me language was a mistake. No but, really, if you read this whole damn thing, thank you! I hope this was as fun to read as it was to write.