#but instead its being a ninja

[dumbfandomdoodles]

It's A Lie to Say that I Learnt First as a Necessity

[im-bored-so-i-draw]

since rebel is released in cookierun kingdom so i downloaded it

I have been informed that I'm lucky in these pulls

Anyways heres my team rn and how i think they would interact (since i play this game just now)

I see wildberry and basque as the one keeping them in check. Basque is a bit more loose though.

Rebel and chilli pepper would kind of befriend each other? Like thieving partners??

Oyster tried to keep them in check too but it was too chaotic for her..

Also i slip a few bits of my oc-- which is just a Genshinified version of my beloved artist.

[bambiraptorx]

theorizing that part of the reason for draxum's fighting style so often involving using vines to attack is that it's meant to keep people away from him in a fight, because the horns on his helmet are a something of a massive liability if someone ever got close enough to grab them

[clockworkrobotic]

I cant get any tattoos or piercings for a bit bc waiting for surgery so instead I've spent £100 on kitchenware. This is how I am

[naturenaruto]

just saw (yet) another post (fanart) about kushina abusing obito.....like why do people seem to think the child abuse in naruto is so funny....why is it played for laughs......why is it such a joke.........why do ppl act like this makes kushina and tsunade and sakura badass...........they are abusive....????

[waywardsalt]

learning very valuable lessons in this conquest hard mode playthrough such as its not a good idea to play it like its normal mode

[thankskenpenders]

Thoughts on two specific areas of the writing in Sonic X Shadow Generations

The best new 3D Sonic game in over a decade (or even two, depending on who you ask) dropped late last year. And I didn't write anything about it! Sometimes life happens. Well, I've finally sat down to finish Shadow Generations, and by now everyone has already been singing its praises for three months. This is the rare instance where the entire Sonic fandom, and even mainstream reviewers, are in agreement on something. The level design is the best it's been in a long, long time and the cool factor is off the charts, embracing Sonic's peak cringe era in an incredibly confident way. It's great. If you're even reading this post, you probably don't need me to tell you that. So I won't!

No, what I'm really interested in here is the writing. Because this is me we're talking about. But I actually don't want to talk about the main narrative of Shadow Generations, which is really solid little story about Black Doom trying to mold Shadow into his perfect soldier. No, I'd like to zero in on two other aspects of the writing here: the revisions made to Sonic Generations, and Gerald Robotnik's unlockable journal.

The updated Sonic Generations script

The new package mostly presents Sonic Generations how you remember it. There are some tweaks, but it's not a major overhaul. Graphically, I don't think the game has been touched much, if at all. I certainly can't notice any difference without a side-by-side comparison, despite playing it on a PS5. The most notable update is that the game's script has been rewritten by Ian Flynn.

Naturally, this caught my attention. Generations always had a nothingburger story, so with Ian rewriting Pontac and Graff's lame dialogue there was nowhere to go but up. (I don't like to pin the blame for those games' stories entirely on them, as a ton of it was dictated to them by Sonic Team, but, well, I don't think they're very good dialogue writers.) But it's less a complete rewrite and more like Ian was brought on as a script doctor for some minor touch ups here and there. Many lines of dialogue are completely identical to how they were originally written in 2011, and many others only have slight wording changes. Ian was clearly not allowed to request additional scenes or extend the ones that already existed. He has to match the original beat for beat so that they can reuse 99% of the cutscene animations. Don't expect it to be a whole new experience compared to the original.

Still, I think the new script is an improvement, albeit a minor one. Various things have been tweaked to maintain characterization consistency. Cream calls Sonic "Mr. Sonic" instead of just "Sonic." Instead of calling Sonic "buddy," Rouge uses the pet name "Blue," like she tends to do in things like the IDW comics. Espio doesn't have to remind you in the dialogue that he's a ninja, and he no longer has a line making it sound like he has some kind of soul reading power. I also like that Modern Sonic now actually has responses to what his friends say when he rescues them, rather than being silent like Classic Sonic. They won't blow you away, but they make Sonic feel a little more engaged with everything.

In general, the altered dialogue just seems tighter to me, and some of the more childish or trite wording of Pontac and Graff's script has been altered. Here, let's actually make a direct comparison, just because this stuff is interesting to me as a writer. Here's a couple lines from after the Egg Dragoon fight late in the game, in the original script:

Modern Eggman: Ooooh... I can't believe this! I was supposed to beat you this time. Modern Sonic: Aw, I'm sorry! I didn't get that memo. I beat you every time! [Turns to Classic Sonic] No, seriously, we beat this guy every time. It's like it's our job or something!

This is a simple exchange. Eggman is mad that he lost. Sonic is unflappably confident because he always beats Eggman, and he explains this to his younger self. But the wording here isn't particularly good. Eggman's simple and direct wording makes him come off like a little kid who's mad because his older brother beat him at Mario Kart, rather than a mad scientist who just had his plans foiled. It's making light of the situation.

And I've never liked Sonic saying "It's like it's our job or something!" That doesn't feel like a thing Sonic would say, it feels like a thing an outside observer would say about Sonic. This is a frequent problem with so-called "MCU dialogue," where quips meant to echo the commentary of a casual, somewhat disinterested audience are inserted into the story itself so that the writers can be like "See? We get it. We're genre-savvy, too!" It also just reminds me of bad Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric lines like "Rings! It's like they're made for me!"

And then here's Ian's rewrite:

Modern Eggman: I recalibrated everything! This was supposed to be my time! Modern Sonic: Oh, please, keep dreamin', Egg-head. I beat you every time. [Turns to Classic Sonic] No, seriously, we beat him every time. Our score card's flawless.

Eggman's still mad about his defeat, but the line "I recalibrated everything!" makes it more specific. He put all this work into the engineering side of his latest scheme and got tunnel vision, thinking if he got his creations just right there'd be no way he could lose. "This was supposed to be my time!" also turns it into a time travel pun, which is a bonus. He's still pitching a fit over losing, but it feels more like Eggman pitching a fit, rather than sounding childish.

And then instead of saying that beating Eggman is "like his job or something," Sonic says he's got a flawless score card against Eggman. He doesn't take Eggman seriously as a threat—at least, not to his face. He acts like it's all a game. But he conveys this in a way that feels truer to the character, rather than feeling like the words of a real world observer poking fun at the tropes of the Sonic series.

Is this amazing, A+ dialogue that blows me away? No. Again, it's not a completely different scene from the one we already had. Ian had to fit the beats of what was already there. He couldn't go all out and write an all new story confirming his longstanding headcanon that the Time Eater is a remnant of Solaris or whatever. But the wording here makes the existing story land a little better and feel truer to the characters in subtle ways.

But to me, the main change is that the Sonics and Tailses seem to have a more solid understanding of what's going on with the timeline and the Time Eater, compared to how idiotic they sometimes seemed in the original game. Which is good! No more standing outside Green Hill and wondering why it seems so familiar. Thank god. As part of this, yes, there are a few more references to past games in the dialogue, like Sonic briefly being confused about the fact that they're time traveling without the Time Stones, or South Island and Westside Island being acknowledged as the normal locations of Green Hill and Chemical Plant. Yes, ha ha, insert joke about how Ian loves references here. Look, it's Sonic fucking Generations. It's a game built entirely out of nostalgic references. Just own it! And, again, in this instance Sonic and Tails come off as less stupid when they make it clear that they do, in fact, remember their adventures from presumably less than a year ago in-universe.

Eggman, too, seems to have a better understanding of the powers he's toying with. Where in the original vesion his focus was simply on going back in time to undo his previous defeats and he seemed kind of oblivious to how much the Time Eater was actually fucking up the universe, here Eggman says he wants to use the Time Eater to give himself complete control over the entire timeline. Eggman also makes way fewer references to his own failures and shortcomings. Of course he won't admit that Sonic has defeated him time and time again. To him, he's never truly lost—Sonic just keeps delaying the inevitable total victory for the Eggman Empire.

So, yes. The new Sonic Generations script is better. It won't blow anyone away, but it's better than it was. It's been elevated from "kinda lame" to "fine." No, if you really wanna see Ian flex his ability to breathe new life into old Sonic stories, look no further than...

Gerald Robotnik's Journal

Hoo boy.

The story of what happened aboard the ARK has always been... a bit confusing, to say the least. Fans with encyclopedic knowledge of the script for every route of Shadow '05 may disagree, but it's the truth. We've had all the pieces to understand the story for a long time now, but that info was given to us out of order by a pair of unreliable narrators—Gerald, who became a vengeful lunatic shortly before his death, and Shadow, who was subjected to multiple rounds of amnesia and altered memories. Some of the ambiguity left by Sonic Adventure 2 was cleared up in Shadow '05, but that game also retconned in a bunch of new elements to Shadow's backstory (aliens!) that lead to further confusion. Not to mention the fact that that game had multiple routes and only revealed the truth about Shadow if you sat on the ultimate final boss battle for WAY longer than the fight would normally last. Or the fact that Sonic X made its own tweaks in its telling of the story. Or the fact that none of these things ever had the best English translations. I can't blame anyone who hasn't played those games in two decades for not remembering the truth about these characters and getting some details mixed up.

What we needed was something to piece together all of the info we have into one coherent backstory, told in chronological order. And thanks to Shadow Generations, we have that, in the form of an official journal tying together what we knew from Sonic Adventure 2, Shadow '05, and Sonic Battle into the tragic tale of Gerald's rise and fall.

Ian Flynn was the perfect man for the job here as the guy who started his career by tidying up the mess that was the first 159 issues if Archie Sonic. This is what he excels at: taking disparate bits of weird Sonic lore from multiple different sources, boiling them down to their most interesting elements, and connecting it together in a way that will make the audience see the dramatic potential he's always known was there. Rather than feeling like a cynical exercise in franchise building, going back and explaining things that never needed explaining so that people can add more bullet points to the wiki, he puts a new spin on things that retroactively enriches those past stories. The story here means something to the characters involved and gives us a better understanding of them as people, rather than as plot devices to motivate Shadow.

(And, of course, Ian didn't do this journal alone. He wrote the story, but I also have to give a huge shout out to Evan Stanley, who made the final product. All of her handwritten journal entries, sketches, and "photos" included throughout. The physical damage done to the journal over the course of 50 tumultuous years, passing from Gerald to Eggman to a certain special someone at GUN. The way Gerald's handwriting gets less and less legible as his mental state declines. So much love was put into what could have been a mere text dump in a menu, and it really elevates it to the next level. Congrats on officially getting hired by Sega, Evan, you've sure as hell earned it!)

The main idea the journal conveys is that Gerald was under a lot of pressure from a lot of different parties—GUN, the President, his colleagues aboard the ARK, Black Doom, even his own family—and boy did it get to him. The known incidents aboard the ARK mentioned in previous games are put together here to form a story where everything slowly spirals out of control as Gerald keeps compromising his morals to further his research, thinking he'll eventually find some way out of all this because he's a genius. I won't recap that whole story here (if you haven't already played the game and read the journal entries, I would highly recommend at least reading it on the Sonic wiki), but I'd like to highlight my favorite elements of the story, as Ian tells it here.

1) The Eclipse Cannon

Here's something that never quite made sense in Sonic Adventure 2: why does the ARK have a laser that can blow up the Earth built into it? It was supposed to be a peaceful research colony. Sure, Gerald went crazy and swore revenge on the Earth, but, like... when did he have an opportunity to go back up to the ARK and modify it? Did he have someone else do it? How? The ARK was raided by GUN and shut down! And then they arrested him, held him in prison for an unclear period of time, and executed him by firing squad when he was no longer useful! It doesn't add up. Shadow 'the Hedgehog '05 would give its own answer by introducing the Black Arms and saying that the Eclipse Cannon was always supposed to be a secret trump card against the Black Comet. But, like... we know that's kind of a bullshit answer, right? You don't need enough power to blow up a whole planet just to destroy a comet.

Well, the new journal retains what we already knew, but it paints a much more complete picture.

See, long before Gerald ever made a Faustian bargain with Black Doom, he had already made one with an even greater evil: the military. GUN gave Gerald much of the funding for the ARK, Gerald's personal utopian research station in space, but it didn't take long for GUN to start pressuring him to design them weapons. Gerald tried to get GUN off his back by personally contacting the President of the United Federation, and the President gave him an alternative: how about, instead, you just use your genius brain to figure out the secret to immortality for us, so our soldiers can be immortal? Gerald was initially sickened by the notion and found it completely absurd, like chasing a shadow... but given no other option, the sarcastically named Project Shadow soon began in earnest. (Maria would later put a more positive spin on the name after Shadow's awakening, pointing out that a Shadow can show us the direction of the light, like she says in the game itself.)

Of course, this search for the ultimate life form didn't go very well, and without any results on that front GUN kept hounding him for weapons. Gerald would throw them a bone here and there to get them off his back. His research on Chaos resulted in the Artifical Chaos prototypes, which he worried would be used for warfare but could at least theoretically be used for search and rescue missions in floods, in his mind. But that wasn't enough. So he gave them Chaos Drives to power their mechs. And that still wasn't enough. He's got Emerl. He'll give them Emerl. They're not impressed by Emerl. They'll shut the whole ARK down if Gerald doesn't give them something big.

Fine! GUN wants something big? Gerald builds a huge fucking laser cannon into the ARK. However, as a middle finger to GUN, Gerald makes it so powerful that it would destroy the Earth if it was ever fired at any target on its surface. In other words, GUN now has their ultimate weapon of mass destruction, fulfilling his contract, but they can never actually use it. Oh, the delicious irony. (And also Shadow will blow up the Black Comet with it in 50 years yada yada yada.) Is this perhaps extremely shortsighted and naive of Gerald, to believe that such a weapon would never actually be used just because of the risk? Of course. But hey, that's Gerald for you. And I love this as an answer.

(Also, this, uh, kinda echoes something from real life! Remember the bit in Oppenheimer where he says all nuclear war will become unthinkable, and Edward Teller responds "until somebody builds a bigger bomb"? Yeah, Teller went on to conceptualize a superweapon codenamed Project Sundial that would have been able to kill all life on the planet, as the ultimate deterrent for war. This was never made for obvious reasons, but hey, there's a basis for this sort of thinking outside of heightened sci-fi! There's a whole Kurzgesagt video about this if you're interested.)

2) The Biolizard

The Biolizard is, of course, brought up as the initial failed prototype of the ultimate life form, from before Gerald met Black Doom. We don't really learn all that much about it that we didn't already know, but I just love the way it's framed in the story.

As you can see above, we actually get to see a picture of Maria holding up the cute little salamander that would end up mutating into the Biolizard through Gerald's experiments. (Researchers want to figure out how to replicate salamanders' regenerative abilities for humans in real life, too, so this was a natural starting point for the project.) And then, after it grows to a monstrous size and goes out of control, Gerald has to lock it away in an unused sector of the ARK. He needs to keep the poor thing alive for his research into harnessing Chaos Energy, building life support systems directly into it, but he doesn't have the heart to tell Maria what happened. So it just becomes this first dark secret weighing on his conscience. The Biolizard becomes Gerald's Tell-Tale Heart beating beneath the floorboards of the ARK. I love that.

3) Lost Impact was the breaking point for the ARK

Remember the level Lost Impact in Shadow '05? The flashback level on the hero path where Shadow is running around fighting Artificial Chaos enemies on the ARK 50 years ago? Yeah, that wasn't just a random incident. That was important, as we now know due to its placement on the timeline.

See, Emerl's rampage aboard the ARK that was chronicled in Sonic Battle and Dark Beginnings set off a domino effect. Emerl riled up the Artificial Chaos, causing Gerald to lose control of them. They became violent, and so Shadow had to stop them, as depicted in Lost Impact. The thing is, that incident sent an SOS signal to GUN telling them that shit was going down on the ARK. Gerald didsn't fully understand the trouble he was in and assumed that he'd simply be reprimanded by the higher ups, or maybe face legal action. But, well... the next time he heard from GUN, armed troopers were raiding the ARK.

So Lost Impact was the straw that broke the camel's back. I just really like that detail.

4) Maria

And, of course, there's Maria herself. Maria has often been more of a symbol than a character, this perfect embodiment of everything that's good and pure in this world who gets killed to motivate Shadow and Gerald's revenge plots. But I really like the wrinkles this journal adds to her and Gerald's story, and their relationship. This is the most fleshed out they've ever felt.

For one, the journal leans into the idea of Maria's intellectual potential. The rest of the Robotnik family is all geniuses, after all, and she was proving to be a really bright kid. She excelled in her studies on the ARK, and she even helped design Shadow's jet skates and inhibitor rings. When Maria died, the world didn't just lose a symbolic personification of purity. She genuinely could have been a hugely influential scientist who did so much good for the world. That's what Gerald wanted for her. But we'll never know, because GUN killed her.

Speaking of her family, their presence isn't just mentioned for the sake of fleshing out the Robotnik family tree. It's mentioned that as Gerald struggled to find a cure for Maria's illness through his genetic research, he faced mounting pressure from his family. They didn't want Maria to be up on the ARK forever. They wanted Gerald to hurry up and find a damn cure, or otherwise just send her back home to Earth so she could be with her family again. She'd been up on the ARK for so long that Gerald's coworkers started thinking that she had been born up there. Eventually she gains a baby sister on Earth who she's never met. A rift forms between Gerald's two sons, and he's unable to really deal with it because he's so consumed by his work. There's this sense that the family is falling apart, and that everyone is dreading the possibility that Gerald will never find a cure and that Maria will just spend her final years up in space and die far away from her family, because Gerald just couldn't let go. If that happens, it'll break the whole family. But he can't stop now. So he just keeps working. Curing Maria is the only way to win his family back, in his eyes. It can't all be for nothing.

But my favorite detail regarding Maria is this one paragraph:

Maria is growing into a lovely young woman. It breaks my heart that someone as bright and energetic as her is diminished by disease. There are no visible effects, and I've caught my fellow researchers muttering to each other, doubting her illness. It is infuriating. I find all my reason and restraint vanishes when she's slighted.

This is SUCH a great addition to the story! It's always been true that Maria doesn't really seem all that ill, just looking at her in cutscenes. With this one little comment, Ian flips that issue on its head and turns it into a story about invisible disability. She doesn't act like she's in chronic pain, so she must not be, everyone thinks. And this really, really gets to Gerald, as does the pressure from his family. He's dedicating his whole LIFE to saving her, and they think she's faking it?! It's such a small addition, never referenced elsewhere in the journal, but it adds so much flavor to the story, as does the implied family drama. It grounds Gerald and Maria and makes them feel more like real human beings, rather than being pure archetypes. It's just enough info to let my imagination run wild filling in the blanks.

You also get the feeling that Maria being such a walking ray of sunshine was the only real source of joy Gerald had left in his life before Shadow was awakened, and the only thing keeping him from snapping under pressure sooner. All this stuff just keeps piling on, everything's spiraling out of control, but at least Maria is keeping her chin up, right? It makes so much sense that losing her would make him go off the deep end when it's framed like this.

It's just... man, I never thought I'd care so much about Gerald and Maria. But that's the Ian Flynn touch. After years of less than stellar Sonic writing that seemed to be embarrassed of itself, I'm so happy to have new games coming out that fully embrace the history of the series like this, making its world feel so rich and real instead of just serving as an excuse for a string of platforming levels. I don't even like Shadow '05, but I'll be damned if Ian and the rest of Sonic Team didn't make something amazing by "yes, and"-ing Shadow's cringe past here. Sonic has truly reached levels of "we're so back" never thought possible.

[kindaasrikal]

I think its very important how Lloyd is notably more distant and emotionally unavailable whilst everyone else is written with so much more emotion in their interactions and words more often than usual in Dr season 3, and how that links heavily to his actual role as the Green Ninja, AND his connection to dragons and oni. As well as his possible role in part 2.

With the concept of the green ninja, Lloyd’s entire role and purpose is to defend others. It’s been shown so heavily throughout the series that the green ninja is someone kind, loving, hopeful, and good. Whilst the hope factor tends to lack sometimes, there has been no denial in how kind and good Lloyd is.

And yet, in dr season 3, there seems to be more of a lack of the kind part. He seems distant towards Frak, less involved in Sora’s handling with Arin gone, so much more distant to the ninja and the only time i can note where he seemed as emotional as usual was when he met Pixal again. Other than that he seems similar to Wu when he first began training the ninja, and even further back to when Wu began training Morro if i actually think about it.

I saw a few posts here and there about it and a very good point I’ve seen is due to how he is now watching someone he is supposed to protect suffer instead. Arin.

Lloyd’s role as the green ninja is to protect, yet i think he feels a burden to do so with how much he believes he has failed as the merge and its mystery continues. Where had he gone wrong? Why is it going wrong? He has to continuously tell people ‘i don’t understand’ or ‘i don’t have the answers’ or ‘it doesn’t make sense’ and his own damned actions show he doesn’t know what to do.

Has he ever?

This feeling of doubt in a situation like no other is weighing him down in a way it has never before because it is bundled up with the feeling of uncertainty.

Doubt in the truth of everything around him, uncertainty in the lack of understanding.

A man whose whole life and destiny was something he already knew, feeling uncertain? He doesn’t know how to react.

Linking it back to his Dragoni heritage, i think it’s very clear Dragons and Oni feel emotions a lot differently. Dragons seem to feel emotions on a more calmer sense, with even chaotic emotions like anger seeming easily rationalised to them and calm compared to humans or Oni. Oni feel emotions in a lot stronger sense, and more on the adrenaline and negative spectrum than anything.

For Lloyd, his Oni side is only shown through genuine anger in a way he has never expressed nor felt before. With a more distant Lloyd, is this a sign of his more Dragon side?

It’s like the writers are building up for something, and whilst it may not link to his dragoni blood, it does link to the choices and decisions he will make in part 2. Because Lloyd, even like this, will always been emotional in a sense, and i think it’s gonna burst out of him to the point he is a mess once more. He just needs a push.

Lloyd is a very important piece to the puzzle, one whose new destiny is going to attack without mercy.

Thinking on it more, you could also say he’s reacting this way because not only has he just lost Arin in a sense, but he is being forced to handle with either guilt, confusion, and possibly a form of anger at Wu.

Wu, who Lloyd loves so damn much.

Lloyd is no fool to believe that Wu hasn’t made mistakes before, but Wu is not only the first person who show Lloyd love but his uncle. How is he supposed to believe his uncle caused the merge on purpose? It doesn’t make sense to him, because Wu must’ve have a reason to do so. The problem is, is the reason a good one?

Man he’s gonna be an actual emotional mess next season poor guy.

Anyways I’m gonna rewatch season 3 i need to analyse more stuff properly because this just seems like I’m stating the obvious

[brookstonebf]

ninja + first date headcanons (& drabble) !!

notes: tried my best to keep them all at equal length.. i took breaks after like every 2 so i didn’t burn myself out

warnings: not proofread. i try to explain roller skating in nya's and fail at it because I'm too lazy to research. on the other hand, I nerd out really hard in zane's, also reader is ever so slightly implied to be short than zane in his but its like two words

—

lloyd - a walk in the park

i definitely feel like he'd keep it easy + simple, he doesn't want to come off too strong and scare you away.

after freaking out about it for hours, he finally comes to the idea of just taking you on a walk through the park right smack dab in Ninjago

it was the peak of spring, so all the plants and flowers were beautifully vibrant

poor boy was SO nervous

would defo be the type to pick a flower and tuck it behind your ear

“This place is beautiful this time of year.” You said, marveling at the plants surrounding you both as you sat on a park bench. Turning your head to look at Lloyd, only to find him already staring. “Lloyd…?”

“It really is…” He said, his voice dreamy like he was in a far-off state. “I- I mean!” Lloyd cleared his throat, looking away as he felt his face grow warmer, blush creeping up the sides of his neck. “Sorry, I meant that you’re- you’re also really… beautiful.”

Lloyd kept his gaze fixed on the ground, worried he’d messed everything up, but instead of rejecting his compliments, he was met with small giggles. He raised his head, looking over at your smiling face, a sight he’d remember for years to come.

“You don’t have to be nervous, Lloyd. I promise I like you just as much as you like me.” You said, taking his hand in yours. “And thank you… for… saying that.” A small chuckle came from your lips, a shared blush gracing your features.

“Yeah, it’s… no problem.” He smiled, looking away before his eyes settled on something, an idea popping in his head. Leaning over the side of the bench, his hand slipping from yours, he plucked a freshly blossomed daisy from its stem, facing back towards you.

You held your breath as he grabbed the side of your face, using his other hand to tuck the flower behind your ear. “There.” He smiled, leaning back as he admired his handiwork. “Somehow you just got even more beautiful.” Lloyd sighed as he took your hand once more, leaving a chaste kiss against your knuckles.

—

kai - an amusement park/fair

kai either wants someone who can keep up with his antics or keep him grounded (or both)

he’d take you on all the thrill rides, just to prove he’s “not a coward”

at some point he’ll end up getting sick from one of the rides (you told him not to eat so much cotton candy)

when the sun starts setting, you both go on the ferris wheel, sat side by side, watching the sun disappear into the ocean

“Holy shit!” You subconsciously grab at Kai’s arm, finally looking down and noticing just how high up you both are, granted you were riding the ferris wheel. Little did you know, this was Kai’s plan all along. He’d wanted to impress you all night, and what better way than to prove he’s definitely not at all terrified of heights?

“Oh, yeah?” He smirks, though the small tremble of his body doesn’t go unnoticed. “I’m like… way higher up than this on the daily.” Kai fails to mention that he’s usually in a mech, or some sort of vehicle. Now, he’s just left to his own devices if he were to fall…

The ferris wheel stops abruptly with a lurch, causing you both to let out small yelps. Looking at each other, you share a laugh when you realize you’re both being dramatic. You let go of his arm, hesitantly leaning back in the rickety metal seat. “Jesus, we’re high up…” The sun was now setting, casting a beautiful orange glow along the horizon.

“And it seems like we’re at the top, if I’m not mistaken.” Kai smirks, leaning his head over the seat before immediately bringing it back, a look of regret dawning his face for a moment. He mumbles something about that being a “stupid idea”, before turning his attention back to you.

“You know… there’s this thing people usually do at the top of ferris wheels.” He raises his brow, looking at you with a grin.

“And what’s that?” You reply, playing into his antics as you both subconsciously lean towards the other like magnets.

Your lips meet halfway, just a small peck before you part once more. No words were said, no words were needed as you smiled, readjusting your body so you sat forward and leaned your head against Kai’s shoulder, his arm wrapped safely around you.

—

nya - rollerskating

now just hear me out…

something just speaks to me when it comes to nya and rollerskating, like my heart is telling me she loves it

her going rollerskating with someone (you), sharing that experience is just a testament to how much she likes that person (you again)

and let’s say, hypothetically, this is your first time rollerskating

a lot of the night is spent with you leaning against nya for support, her cheering you on when you’re finally able to skate on your own

The side of the roller skating ring shook under you, your trembling hands the only thing keeping you from falling flat on your face. To your left is Nya, cheering you on as you try to skate on your own. "C'mon! You can do it!" She exclaims, smiling.

You let out a deep breath, closing your eyes as you lift your hands off the rail. You stay still for a moment, your feet rolling back and forth ever so slightly. Hesitantly, you open your eyes, Nya now in front of you. Pushing one foot forward, trying to keep your balance, successfully getting a few steps in.

"You're doing it!" Nya laughs, but right after she says that, the propulsion of your roller skates becomes too much, your feet moving much faster than you can handle, and you topple right on top of Nya. Thankfully, her strength keeps you both from falling as she holds onto your arms, you grabbing onto her shoulders.

"I don't know how you do it." You laugh, leaning your head on her shoulder for a moment as you compose yourself.

"I've been doing this for years," Nya responds, laughing alongside you. "This is literally your first time; you're not gonna be perfect. Here, try one more time." She slowly lets go of your arms, allowing you to take the reins once more. Taking one final breath, you do the same thing you did before. Push off and try to keep your balance.

You don't even realize you're doing it until Nya's behind you, jumping up and down in her skates, cheering. "Yes! You did it!" She skates up to you quickly, engulfing you in a hug as she grabs the side of your face, placing a quick kiss on your cheek.

—

cole - bakery date

when he’s not on ninja duty, food is on the forefront of his mind (as well as you now), so of course the perfect idea to him would be taking you to his favorite bakery

it’s a small, family-owned one, so he probably knows the owners personally, allowing you two to get the best, freshly baked pastries

he definitely gets at least double your portion, making you question just how he’s able to keep his ninja physique with all he’s scarfing down.

probably does something cheesy like kiss wipe frosting off your cheek

You’re sat across from Cole, tucked away in a booth far off in the corner of the small bakery. It wasn’t too busy, just enough for the bustle of people around you to not be a bother. Cole’s telling you another story about one of the ninja’s “heroic endeavors”, taking bites of his chocolate cake slice between each sentence. You thought it was cute, his love for sweets.

“Hey, you gonna eat that?” Cole says, interrupting his story to point at the croissant you’d long since discarded, having eaten your fill. With a smile, you told him no, handing it to him as he takes his gratefully, munching down on the bread, letting out a contented sigh. “I told you this place was amazing.”

“Clearly.” You chuckle, finding his antics childish yet endearing. “I’m just shocked you’re able to, like… eat so much without keeling over.”

He simply shrugged in response, taking one last bite of the croissant before leaning back in his seat, letting out a comical groan, and wiping off his mouth with a napkin.

"Oh, here, you missed some." You mumbled, reaching over the table, napkin in hand, as you delicately wiped away a couple of crumbs. Embarrassment radiates through your body as you realize what you've done, hastily looking away and muttering out an apology.

Cole lets out a small laugh, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "Hey, hey, it's fine." He says, his voice nothing but kind. "In fact, I think you've got a little something yourself." As he says that, Cole leans over the table, delicately grabbing the side of your face, turning your head back towards him. He places a small, soft kiss to the corner of your mouth before sitting back once more, a small smile of triumph on his face as you're left there, a stammering, blushing mess.

—

zane - art gallery

i can totally see him downloading like, a bunch of articles of “top 10 best first date ideas” (toootalllyyy didnt search that when writing these)

he decided to go with an art gallery, deciding that it’d be the place with the “least likely trouble”, and the overall atmosphere

he’d most likely be attracted to someone who’s smart/an intellectual, and an art gallery is the best way to scope that out

while you’re admiring the paintings, he’d be admiring you

when you show an interest in one of the works, he’d scan it to find out all the information about it so he can tell you

With each step in the museum, your jaw dropped further at the beauty of the paintings. You were so thankful Zane brought you to the gallery; its openness eased your nerves. Zane was extremely accommodating whenever you got too sucked into a certain piece, reading the plaque and absorbing what you saw. He never showed a lick of impatience.

In fact, he would even tell you things about the piece that very few people actually know, just small anecdotes or fun facts about the artist or the art itself. You knew it probably came natural to him, what with his millions of archives, but the gesture was sweet nonetheless.

"Ah, those right there are Claude Monet's waterlilies," Zane says, bringing you to the wonderfully bright painting. It all seemed so elegant, the way the colors blended together, creating the impression of the waterlilies, which makes sense since he began the Impressionist art movement. "Unfortunately, this appears to be a replica. I believe the actual paintings are housed in a separate museum."

"That's a shame," You sigh. "They're still beautiful, though, regardless." Looking over, you notice Zane already staring at you.

"Unlike these waterlilies, you have a beauty that can't be replicated." He says it so out of the blue that it almost makes you stumble backwards. Fortunately, you prevent yourself from doing that, but not without a fervent blush spreading across your face.

"Zane!" You stutter, smiling.

"Did I say something wrong?" He replies, cocking his head.

You take a couple seconds to respond, just looking at him softly before laughing, "No, you're fine." Leaning up, you give him a small kiss on the cheek, a token of your gratitude.

—

jay - movie theater

he initially wanted to go to an arcade, but eeevvverrryyyoooneee told him not to

he decides either on some cheesy rom-com movie or a horror movie (no in-between)

rom-com to really set the mood of the date, making it feel more romantic

or horror so he can be your “knight in shining armor” (though he ends up being the one cowering

he does the stupid like, yawn and put your arm over the others shoulder.

After an extremely awkward confession, you were sitting here in a movie theater with Jay. It was a movie of his choosing, yet another horror film made solely for the shock factor. Admittedly, you were shocked he would pick it; he hardly seemed the type to enjoy horror, but he said he "just wanted to show you he can be there when you need it". Okay, man...

The movie wasn't bad at all; it was just extremely obvious it wanted to get a few screams out of people, with zero regard to anything else. At one point, you felt Jay grab your hand. Looking over at him, smiling softly, he just says you "looked scared", even though the trembles of his hand were a dead giveaway of his own terror. All you do is give him a soft chuckle, squeezing his hand in return.

As the movie went past its climax, the cheesy jumpscares thankfully died down. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Jay 'yawn', then slip his arm over your shoulder. You had to hold back a giggle, but the gesture didn't go unappreciated, the warmth in your face obvious to how you truly felt. You allowed him to win this time, resting your head on his shoulder. Looking up, you could just make out the goofiest grin on Jay's face.

"Hey, um..." Jay begins as you're both walking outside the theater. "Was it... okay? The date, I mean." He tried to laugh it off, but the insecurity on his face was evident.

Turning to face him, you smile sweetly, grabbing both of his hands. "Jay, it was amazing, don't worry." You laugh, your thumbs rubbing circles on his knuckles.

"Oh, good," He chuckles awkwardly. "Then, um, can I kiss you?"

You simply nod in return as he slips his hands out of yours, cupping your face as he kisses you so delicately you feel as if you could both fly away.

[masterbuilderintern]

Notes!

Ghosts all have some shade of green in their palette, but can also have a second unique color, which works very well for Skybound, given its orange/lime theme. (Believe it or not, Morro has a second color; he's just more green than anything else because that was his color when he was alive.)

Delara's hair resembles early story Nya, so they can look similar, but not exactly the same. Though Delara's hair has less gravity.

Not only do I think Nadakhan is lame (sorry), but Delara being the villain with her ghostly theme, related to her being a pirate, fits SO much better, given her resemblance to the elemental master of WATER.

Instead of any djinn stuff, I want to play more into how Ninjago just randomly has sorcerers? People can just do magic sometimes, but apparently it's rare and isolating, from what I've observed. So, duh, Delara is a sorcerer. But also a pirate. She's talented like that.

There's still going to be a theme of desire for Skybound, I do think it fits well with Jay and Nya's whole THING. They desire each other! But won't do anything about it!

There's no wishes though, it's more about Delara sniffing out a strong desire, doesn't even have to be your strongest, and creating a hallucinatory NIGHTMARE out of it.

Not that the ninja know these visions are fake at all. Oh no.

I do think I'll keep the "trying to revive a loved one" plot, too. Given the way I've changed ghosts up, it IS possible for Delara to be around while Nadakhan isn't, despite both being dead.

Should make a proper post on Delara's motives later, since it's not just "I want my husband." That's more of a side quest for her.

[imababblekat]

Oops

Prompt: It's been a grueling few weeks of dishing out ass whooping's to bad guys, and to top it all off is your exhaustion of the ever growing guilt of keeping your true identity a secret from your best friends, the Ninja Turtles. Surely all this fatigue of hero work and life crisis thinking wouldn't accidentally solve your later issue, right? . . .Right?

prev(don't need to have read for this post)

A/N: Wow, this has been a long time waiting huh?! Welp, I finally got my thoughts into words, drafted, and edited! This is my personal interpretation of how the turtles would find out spiderman reader's identity. I really wanted to get this out before delving into other ideas of how it'd happen from requested prompts sent into my ask box. I'm so happy to finally get this out to y'all. It's short and sweet, but I hope y'all can enjoy nonetheless <3

◌(s,p) = spider persona◌

~xXx~

The window slides open with a snap, two legs swinging over the sill like heavy weights as you tumble into your darkened room. You can't even be bothered to turn on the small touch lamp resting on the nightstand, body riddled with exhaustion from today's bad guy butt kicking. With a heavy 'mph', you throw yourself onto your plush bed, reveling in it's softness and the slight relief it offers your aching muscles.

"There's gotta be an evil convention this week or something, because shit man.", you grumble tiredly into your comforter.

The past week had been non-stop for criminal activity. From small no good doers to the big professional criminals, you had hardly a moment to breathe it seemed.

With an aching neck, you turn your head for better comfort, tired gaze landing on a small quilt thrown across the top of your pillows. Any previous annoyment had dissipated upon gazing on the gift, memories of the a certain tough to the bone turt bashfully handing you the handmade quilt for your birthday.

Dimples quirked in the corners of your cheeks, a smile etching its way there. Despite the mountainous call to duty you faced these past few days, you were at the very least grateful to not have to deal with it all alone. No, with four mutant ninja turtles as friends, you five were New Yorks greatest bunch of vigilantes. Thinking back to a time when you were alone in keeping the streets of this wondrous city safe, it's hard to believe you could have ever handled so much without your four best friends. Now, so much time later, it's as if you, Leo, Raph, Donnie, and Mikey had been a crime fighting team since day one. Something, you could never had imagined but would forever be beyond grateful for.

A sudden spark of guilt ignited deep within your chest, burning away your fond smile and replacing it with a sorrow frown.

Being such amazing and close friends, one would think no secret wasn't shared between the lot of you. However, that wasn't quite true, and whether the mask was on or off, your growing repentance of this secret identity matter only seemed to continue growing as time passed.

It wasn't that you didn't want to tell them. Truthfully, you did, but it was more of a fact that you couldn't. The four brothers already had a major player in the criminal underworld on the back of their shells, the Foot Clan. Adding your own long list of enemies to that, and surely their hard shell would shatter. Something you would never want to happen to them, simply from knowing that their normal friend, (y/n), was not so normal and ordinary after all. You already lost important people in your life, you weren't about to lose them too.

However, this sensible logic did very little to quell the ever growing guilt of hiding something so important from them, when they put so much trust in you. Both of you at that; you as normal, everyday (y/n) and you as the amazing (s/p).

With a pang to your head, you released a loud groan, ignoring the ping of your phone and instead opting to force your self off the comfort of your bed.

“I need food. All this life crisis thinking is giving me a headache.”, you grumbled, pushing into your apartment.

The smell of left over pizza wafted into your senses, a low rumbling noise from your stomach echoing your desire for nutrients as the eyes of your mask widened in excitement. Rubbing your hands together you quickly made way to your small living room, the box of pizza sitting like a jewel in a museum perfectly atop your coffee table. Hopping over the back of the couch, you quickly reached for a slice and took a deep inhale to truly appreciate the godly scent. For leftover pizza, it sure smelled rather fresh.

The thought had you pausing for a second, trying to remember when exactly you had bought this food. However, just as quickly as the concerning thought came, it left with a shrug of your shoulders.

“Eh, senses must still be high from kicking so much ass today.”, you exclaimed, ripping off your mask to take your first mouthwatering bite.

Your senses, however, were in fact not still highly aware as you'd thought.

CRASH!

The sudden loud sound of breaking glass had you nearly jumping out of your skin, spidey senses actually jumping into action this time and going haywire. With a swift turn of your head, mouth awkwardly agape and pizza drooling cheese from your hand, wide eyes locked onto four pairs of equally astonished stares. Well, somewhat equal anyways.

Because nothing, and I mean nothing, could equate to the absolute astonishment that riddled through none other than Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, and Michelangelo in this singular moment. For you, all you could do was stare back frozen like a deer in headlights. Well, if a deer in headlights had a slice of pizza dripping cheese into their lap instead of their still agape mouth.

With gear still strapped on, and fire scape window billowing your curtains open with a chill breeze, it was very clear that the four had just arrived from patrol. The patrol they had with you, as the amazing (s/p). Recalling the ding of your phone moments ago, you internally cursed, now realizing without a doubt that it was for certain one of the brothers letting you know as (y/n) that they were headed over. Something your tired brain forgot had become habit for them.

Clearing your throat, you awkwardly waved a greasy hand at the still flabbergasted quartet.

"H-hey guuuuys~"

Hand still loose from once holding the now broken glass of grape juice, it was not Leo, not Raph, not even Mikey who reacted first, but Donnie, eyes wide and brows narrowed behind his crooked glasses, voice echoing what his three other brothers must have also been thinking.

“You have to be shitting me!"

~xXx~

[howi99]

The Nest chapter 5

13 yo Adam: *waking up, not feeling the burning sensation on his face anymore* What the-

???: Oh, you're awa-

Adam: *picking up the first thing he could find, brandishing it as a weapon towards the voice*

11 year old Jaune: *looking unimpressed by said "weapon"* You know, i think it's the first time someone tried to threaten me with a porn book.

Adam: *looking at his hands, seeing the cover of Ninja of love* AH! *Drop the book in pure disgust*

Jaune: *picking it up, posing it back on the nightstand* It's actually quite the good read-

Adam: *trying his best to get as far away of Jaune, which was complicated since the bed was against the wall* WHO!? WHERE?!

Jaune: *perplexed* ... Dude, you are like twice as muscled as me. Heck, i'm probably more in danger than you are-

Adam: *snarl, looking ready to fight*

Jaune: *putting his hands in the air with a timid smile* See? No weapon! Just, calm down and-

Adam: *tries attacking Jaune, who grabs his arm and use the momentum to throw the other kid on the ground* Argh!?!

Jaune: *sigh, twisting the arm of the angry teenager behind its back*

Adam: *trying to move around but being unable to do so as Jaune used aura to strengthen himself* L-let me go!

Jaune: *deadpan* You just tried attacking me! Fuck no i wont!

Adam: *angrily* You humans are all the same! Taking pleasure in hurting us! *Trying to move even more so and again, failing* GET OFF ME!

Jaune: *annoyed* Hey, i just fucking saved your eye you stupid bull! The least you could say is thank you!

Adam: LET ME- *realising what Jaune just said* ... Uh? *Blinking, then closing each eye one at a time* What-

Jaune: *feeling the bull faunus weaken his attempt to escape* Shit man, took you long enough.

Adam: *looking around, seeing the inside of a tent* ... This isn't the mine?

Jaune: *sigh, releasing him, dusting himself* Tell me, what would i be doing in a fucking mine? Do i look like a god damn employee to you?!

Adam: *quickly getting up, still wary of the other kid* ... No?

Jaune: *sigh again, pointing the bed* Sit down, there's a shit tone you need to know.

_ _ _

Adam: *touching the almost invisible scar on his eye, looking himself in a mirror* That's... Woah..

12 years old Vernal: *grinning* Not bad, eh? Jaune's semblance is the shit, man! Can heal almost anything as long as it's recent enough!

Adam: *looking back at the teen talking to the weird lady* So you guys-

Vernal: *cutting him with a smile, looking proud* Are badass? Awesome? Exactly like Robin Hood?

Adam: *deadpan* I was going to say "you guys are the bandits i've heard of?"

Vernal: ... Really? We save you and that's all we get?! *Annoyed* Fucking transported you on my back for not even a thank you!?!

Adam: *nervous* I-i mean-

Raven: *walking towards them* So, kid, how do you feel?

Adam: *a bit (lot) intimidated by the woman dressed in war gear* I-i uh-huh-

Raven: *confused* What's wrong with you? You got a concussion or what?... *Looking at Jaune, worried* He didn't have a head injury, right?

Jaune: *shaking his head* Nope, just a dumbass who can't think before acting.

Adam: *glaring at Jaune* You- *sees the big grin on Jaune's face, seeing his lack of seriousness* ... *Sigh* Yeah, i'm fine.

Raven: *nod* Good. You were too hurt to be sent with the first batch, but the white fang should be back in about 3 months to take the others.

Adam: *confused* ... What?

Raven: *looking back at Jaune again* You didn't explain him?

Jaune: Yeah, but i think he was too focused on playing with his scar instead of listening... *Shrug* Which i mean, i'd probably do the same, not gonna lie.

Adam: What's going on?

Raven: *sigh* In short, we raid mines in exchange for food from the white fang. They'll also bring you to menagerie, since you're still a kid.

Adam: ... *Shaking his head* Man, can't believe i was saved by a bunch of humans. Criminals no less.

Jaune: Hey, it's not like we are a bunch of killers. *Smirk* Human, faunus, it doesn't matter much when the law wants you dead, right?

Adam: I... Guess not? Huh... Never thought about it that way before.

Raven: Ah! Can't blame you! *Smirk* It's hard to think about others when you're suffering.

Adam: *looking at both Jaune and Raven's smirk* ... You both have that same punchable face.

Vernal: *nod* You think so too, huh?

[crumb-crumblet-s-crumbington]

yooooo!!! you’re my favorite ethan winters artist i just wanna say that first and foremost, thank you for the wholesome content of my comfort character and father figure 🥹🫶

i’m really curious bc i feel like i see a lot of people against mithan (not me personally, i’m p neutral on them!) but i’m curious to know all your thoughts on them! thoughts on their canon relationship, their fanon portrayal, the backlash against them/mia accusations, and your headcanons? i’m just really interested!!! hopefully that’s not weird :”)

have a good day!! sparkle on!!! ✨💖

i heart mithan... i think that they can be so cute...

i personally hc them t4t and i like to think that the dated in highschool before they both had fully transitioned

mia likes to bake and ethan likes to scrap book and he always likes to take pictures of mias cakes/ baked goods and has a album for them 😭

i am a multishipper so i draw a lot of ethan ships so my girl is left out sometimes and im sorry mia 😔

i actually really like their relationship, its a really complex dynamic that i like to talk about with my friends

i think the issue is that when talking about mithan or mia in general, theres just SO MUCH misinformation that its honestly a pain the butt to talk about

people still think that she was responsible for the creation of eveline, people still think that she experimented on eveline, people still use examples of her attacking ethan as if she did it on her own will instead of being mind controlled

in reality she was just someone who oversaw the transportation of evie. im not excusing her or anything because obviously she knew what she was doing, but people really try to accuse her of doing something she didnt and it bothers me alot lol

the problem with the fandom is that people either try to water her down to girlboss who did nothing wrong and fail to acknowledge the complexity/ moral grayness of her character and the other side is misogynists 😭😭😭😭

its hard to talk about her without people either going "stop trying to villainize her and make her look bad!" or people ACTUALLY villainizing her and acting like heisenberg would have treated him better 😭😭

mithan is such a sad relationship because they loved each other so much and that ended up being the reason their relationship fell apart (sort of... its not like the broke up... ethan kinda just straight up died)

i get a lot a trouble for saying this, but mia is a selfish person.

its not a bad thing! well i mean it is but it doesnt make her some evil witch who is somehow worse than the guy how made a werewolf american ninja warrior. its just a major character flaw she has! which is good! mia being a flawed person who makes mistakes and morally gray decisions make her a more interesting person!

she is selfish in the way that she wants to keep her family with her no matter the cost. even if it means lying to ethan about her job so that he wont think different of her. here is a interrogation from the re7 DLC, which is easy to miss!

she isnt necessarily trying to apologize for the things she has done, she is more of a, "u wont need to forgive me in the first place if we just forget it all and move on"

she doesn't try to redeem herself for what she has done, she tries to move on and return to the normal life that she wants so bad. which is fine! everyone copes a different way and she has to right to move on from her trauma. the problem that lies in this is that she has a shared trauma with ethan who still has no idea what went on in dulvey and still effects him till the present (he is mold! this is a important thing to know! most people would want to know if they were a walking corpse)

she played a direct part in what happened in dulvey, and im not referring to the email, she did not send that. she never wanted ethan to come in the first place. she tried her best to send a video to him, begging him to forget about her because she wanted to protect him, BUT it didnt send.

he got involved because she was involved. its honestly a series of really really unfortunate events.

THOUGH! she did know what she was getting into. im tired of seeing the narrative that mia was innocent and didnt know what was going on or was simply a bystander. she knew what she was doing, she knew eveline was a bioweapon, she knew eveline was a child. she used a MACHINE GUN! she knows how to use weapons and was obviously trained for it.

she tried her best to keep everybody out of the mess, ex: warning the bakers not to take them in, warning ethan not to find her, sacrificing herself for ethan in the later half of re7

but again, those are the consequences of HER actions

her consequences just happen to get really big and end up hitting ethan on the head like a metal sheet 😭

their relationship is really so interesting, it makes me really sad to think about sometimes 😭they both went through something that nobody else would ever understand, in the end they really only have each other. they get moved to an entire different country and the dulvey incident gets covered up with a "gas leak"

its really tragic because their marriage definitely had some flaws and bumps. and i know im repeating myself but its because people always take this in the worst way possible but just because i say their relationship was rocky doesnt mean im saying they dont love each other!!! thats the entire basis of mias character!! saying she doesnt love ethan would destroy her entire character!

you can see in the re8 DLC how fondly ethan talks about mia! he loves her so much, though im not sure if his comments in the DLC are him narrating current (post re8) or his thoughts before everything went down and he died (pre re8)

everything mia did was because she LOVED ethan. she would never do anything to intentionally hurt him, she is not a cruel person. she hides the truth of her job from ethan pre re7 because she loves him and doesnt want her job to drive them apart. she CONTINUES to refuse to tell ethan the truth post re7 because she wants to move on a live a happy normal life with him and knows something like her being directly associated with the connections would probably cause (more) problems. she refuses to tell ethan that he is mold because again, hard to live a happy marriage with your husband after you tell him hes a bioweapon.

obviously i dont think it was right that she did this, thats what makes her selfish! she did it for herself! she did it for her family! she thought it would work out, she thought that they could move on and be happy together.

the issue is that ethan didnt want to forget. he wanted to know what happened, he wanted to know the part mia played, he wanted answers! which is reasonable! he knows to some extent that mia was partially responsible for his involvement and he was always suspcious that mia was lying to him about her job which is implied when mia says "you were right, i did lie to you"

she doesnt learn, she doesnt stop lying, her lies get bigger and worse and it sucks yeah but it makes her so interesting!!! she keeps doing stupid things under the idea that this is whats best for her and her family, that if she hides this everything will work out and it will be for the better but its not!

just because telling your husband hes dead and a bioweapon is a hard subject to bring up doesnt mean you DONT bring it up. people shouldnt use that as a reason to excuse mia 😭, its a very bad excuse and honestly highlights how horrible their communication skills were. you cant just not tell your husband that he is actually infected with the mold and not tell him for the tree years between post re7 and pre re8.

im not saying these things to put mia down, or try and villanize her. these are all just actual things her character does! she isnt evil, but she isnt a knight in shining armor either. we need to be able to have talks about complex characters without crying everytime someone points out a flaw. characters have flaws! and mia just happens to have a lot of them!

im not mad at her, i dont dislike her because i think this way of her. shes a fictional character! you can like characters that are morally gray, or villains that drink blood and make corpse soldiers. they are fictional! pointing out the flaws of a character does not mean i dont like them.

i wouldnt call her "the real villain of re8" but i wouldnt treat her like a damsel in distress either. she is a competent person, she knows what shes doing, she has her reasons for doing them. she made bad descions with good intentions behind them! they can coexist and we should let them!

i like mithan! its a complex relationship because they both love each other so much but hurt each other in the process

talking about them is just a pain in the butt because talking about mia is a pain in the butt lol

i really hate how she keeps getting sidelined, its super frustrating to see mia get put in a cage in every game 😭

its even more frustrating that mia straight up just disappears???? in the shadows of rose DLC... like she just stops taking care of rose and theres nothing said about it. no reason or explanation. i dont think mia would ever ditch rosemary because she didnt care about her, but we probably will never know because capcom sucks at writing and they probably forgot the mia ever even existed.

all in all, i think the fandom is really just full of misinformation which make people either think mia is some horrible evil person, or its full of people who think that saying mia messed up is the equivalent of comparing her to wesker lol.

i really love mia, shes a incredibly fun and complex character, its just hard to enjoy her sometimes with the people in the fandom haha.

also ive got no idea what u meant by "the backlash against them/mia accusations" so sorry if i didnt answer that!

thank u for the ask! sorry for the long response!

[brucewaynehater101]

Hear me out for something. So we agree that Tim definitely took a bunch of Ras ninjas when he blew up the place right? And they're *super* loyal to him and also very, very competent.

What if when Tim brings Bruce back from the Time Stream, once Bruce is healed up, he insists on taking over WE from Tim. Not because Tim is bad at it, but because he doesn't want to sit around doing nothing while he physically heals and isn't allowed to be Batman.

So Tim decides to use the money he made to revive Drake Industries. He'll need a bunch of very loyal workers who know how math works to fill out upper management to make sure there isn't any corruption and wouldn't you know it. He has a couple hundred of exactly what he needs stolen from ras who are getting antsy about not having anything to do.

It only takes a year, maybe two at the most, for Drake Industries to raise to rivaling Wayne Enterprises and Lex Corp like it used to before Tim's parents died. There are rumors though, that it's impossible to rise beyond a certain point in the company as all those positions are filled already and if a new one opens, it's given to someone that no one has ever heard of before (more defectors from Ras). All the people on the board are weirdly young (is that Olympic Gold Winner Cissie King Jones???) And one of them just had a big scandal go public about being Lex Luthor's illegitimate son that he kicked out for being gay?? This is not at all what happened with Kon, and Lex has been trying to calm the rumor mill around it but the gossip collums have taken this and ran with it.

You would think that with a board of directors so young and a company so new that's so big, corporate espionage on them would be *easy* but that's to the fact that every single member of upper management would die for Tim, none of it happens. His company is massive and air tight. People who try to bribe his workers into selling secrets often end up in strange accidents. After all, you can take the person out of the Ninja Death Cult, but you can't take the Ninja Death Cult out of the person.

Yes! There is a series not quite like this, but dear to me. "Where Bats and Birds Roost" by Mouse_in_this_house has BAMF Tim Drake with ex-LoA agent spy network that he hides via the Neon Knights initiative.

However, I love that your AU had Tim make it from the corpse of his parents' company. Instead of using Bruce's resources, Tim used the ones that only belong to him. I also like his rehabilitation plans for all the defectors and their loyalty to him because of it.

Tim should go around snatching up people from his enemies because he has better benefits, way less chance of the job killing its employees, and charisma. Maybe Bruce gets a little annoyed cause WE employees also prefer to work at Drake Industries (probably not, but it would be funny).

Also, YJ working for DI? Brilliant ^^

This type of chaos and the BAMF Tim are spices I need more of. Let Tim use his whacky ability to befriend his enemies for his benefit!

[bulbabutt]

okay. lets bite the bullet and talk about 2012. lets talk about child abuse, familial abuse, generational abuse, toxic family units, whatever you wanna call it. lets talk about it and whether it exists in this show. i actually encourage you to read this no matter what your take is, just to hear it out. let me be FUCKING clear: i love this show, but i get scared to talk about it seriously. everyone on every side is defensive all the time but i love every turtles show to no end.

this post is going to go over so well and not controversially at all.

precursor: every splinter is some level of shitty dad. he always has been. the fucking bare bones of the character is that he raised his children to kill the man who killed his own father. thats inherently fucked up. every splinter has some level of fucked up about him. maybe hes inattentive, or neglectful, or strict, or secretive, maybe hes just not very good at dealing with his kids. splinter is supposed to be far from perfect. thats what makes him splinter. maybe he grows over the course of a series, maybe he doesnt. maybe hes supposed to be shitty his whole life, maybe hes not. thats just splinter. each is adapted differently depending on the story being told.

and 2012 has a very interesting tone to its story.

lets start at the beginning, back in japan. this is season 3, was this story what they intended when they started writing the show back in season 1? probably not, theres probably things they would have written differently had they known this was where splinter's story started. thats kind of the way tv works, you add the details later. but for our sake of analyzing the character of splinter as a whole, it seems best to start here as if its all intentional.

hamato yoshi is a member of the hamato clan. theyre a very traditional old ninja clan in the modern world, they have old feuds and theyre trying to keep their culture alive. they're literally the last of a clan of ninjas like this, having (supposedly) defeated the foot clan (their generational enemies) back when yoshi was a baby. hes set out to lead next, and its very important to him. and yet hes married to a woman who works in the city, a modern woman who doesnt live the life he does. she even moved to be with him. i feel the need to compare this to how men in the real world who want traditional wives never go for women who are willing to be their housewives, always try to break down the independent ones. splinter seems unconcerned with how his wife wants to live. with how she wants their daughter to be raised.

im not necessarily saying this is how this comes off in the show, but i find it interesting to think about. this is absolutely the most rounded version of tang shen as a character (thus far) it stops her being just a name on a page "hamato yoshi's love and the object of his enemies affections who died" and turns her into a woman who has a stake in the story. gives her more agency.

its very interesting that this show implies an actual relationship between tang shen and oroku saki, albeit a one-sided one that didnt work out, but they do seem to have parted on equal ground. the pair of them discuss yoshi's inattentive duties as a husband and father, that he's too obsessed with the tradition and lineage of his clan. honestly, if this woman just took her baby and left no one would blame her! he has his priorities set, and it leaves no room for her and their newborn baby. if she ran away with saki at this point, the story would make just as much sense.

but then disaster strikes, saki learns the truth about his family, that he was actually a child of the foot clan (honestly i wish we saw this play out instead of jumping ahead in the story but thats not what this post is about) and he kills he and yoshi's father. revenge for him having killed his. cycles of abuse and revenge that never end. the pair of them were raised in this society that values lineage like this, that would kill for it. its no wonder they both grew up this way.

anyway, tang shen is killed by a blow meant for yoshi, and saki takes their child and raises her. based on splinter's lack of desire to be a father so far in the story, its honestly not one you can blame him for. its fucked up, but it makes sense. saki does to miwa exactly what his father did to him. cycles of abuse and revenge.

yoshi loses everything, and moves to america. he's turned into splinter the mutant rat, and gains four turtle sons.

so as established, he's not exactly grown up with a stable family life. he obviously, while human, wasnt acting as a stable father for the child he intended to have. so how good is he at this?

ive talked before about how the 2003 show treats the turtles as kind of one whole unit. they don't have individual relationship arcs, they dont have overarching storylines where they grow apart or closer, they're always in each other's corner.

2012 makes this more dynamic. here we see that 15 years seeing no one but each other, growing under this splinter has come with its own quirks. these brothers dont understand each other that well. they get jealous of each others treatment, some are left out, some are misunderstood. raph resents leo, none of them appreciate what donnie does, mikey bothers everyone else for attention, etc. it creates a really good starting place for this show.

(the issue i have with this show is more that they never really open or close any of these beats, at least not in ways that last. but boy does it make for some good dramatic scenes)

we see over the course of this first season that splinter treats his children just as he was, as little ninjas more so than sons. he raises them to follow his traditions, the ones tang shen never cared for. but this is all he knows how to be! you cant really blame him.

most people bring up mikey as the quintessential example when they talk about this, i dont want to do that cuz i know you've all heard it. while i think his father does disrespect him and i think it is paid forward and his brothers do too, i'd rather talk about raph for a change.

in one episode, raph loses his temper. to teach him a lesson, splinter makes his brothers pelt him in training while insulting him any way they can, and tells him to just... not lose his temper. this is a terrible lesson in general. instead of trying to coax out why he might be angry, it just plays up that if he loses his temper bad things happen.

splinter in this episode basically encourages bullying. this comes up a lot when it comes to raph. to compare, in 2003 when raph loses his temper, hes told to blow off steam which he does. his brothers don't blame him for having emotional outbursts, they know thats just how he is so they know how he needs to cope with it. he's given the physical space to let it out.

im not saying this show needs to be like that show, im just saying thats a version of this story where the outcome is better for raph as a whole. since this outcome is not as good for him emotionally, you can tell why he's still got these emotional issues. splinter never helps him more than that. thats more why this raph differs from that one, if that makes sense. one has his family in his corner more than the other.

speaking of. raph has a pet turtle. this turtle is the only one he can talk to about how he feels. why might that be? it's the only thing hes kind and gentle to, and he refuses to let his brothers make him feel weak for being kind to it. where did he learn to be ashamed of being kind and gentle? thats a learned behaviour. in a house full of other men... yeah, that would happen. but whos values start that?

when this turtle gets some mutagen spilled on it, it tries to get revenge on his family. there is such a resentment going on here, its extremely juicy. the show chalks this up to "post mutation insanity", but its just as easy to think that everything raph has experienced has made him seem angry and resentful and perhaps scared to his pet, and that former pet wants raph to himself so they can be free. the frustrated venting of a child complaining about how no one understands him in such a big way turns slash into a vengeful monster, cuz thats all he's ever heard. it makes sense, he went from a little turtle to a fully cognizant adult aged being in an instant. emotionally no one would handle that well, and definitely not someone whos only ever heard the worst about people.

he comes around later. notably by being on his own, away from the hamatos.

again, im not saying the show is writing this intentionally, but i think tonally its in the zone where you could see this analysis as being canon. that these little pieces of narrative fit the worldview of a toxic family unit that isnt dealing with its problems in a healthy way.

there's other small aspects. leo slaps mikey early on, having seen it on his favourite show be used as a way of getting someone to calm down. mikey questions this behaviour, leo seems to feel bad about it when questioned. if we know that that behaviour was bad, what other things might he emulate in a similar way?

there's things like donnie's predatory behaviour towards april. in a world where all they ever knew was splinter's stories of the outside world (and perhaps television from decades earlier), hearing splinter's story of his love for tang shen, his rivalry with his own brother over her, you could actually see why he would behave the way he does, why he claims her the way he does. not as an excuse, but as a reason he learned the behaviour. and there's multiple opportunities for his father to tell him off. he never does. why would he? he knows no better.

this splinter, unlike every other, is not old or disabled. he doesnt require a cane (at the start, but also was never a good cane) and its interesting that despite being like... a 40 year old man in the peak of his life he does not accompany his sons on missions. he sits around doing nothing and disproves of his sons heroic actions. april literally calls him out for this at one point. the show is actually telling us some of this man's behaviour is wrong.

one of the more upsetting things that happens in this household is a lot of physical hitting. "theyre training" you might say. understandable. but when you see a lot of hitting come from the father in this show, played for a laugh, when you see splinter play the "drunk master" bit it makes you think. is that okay? isnt that a bit much?

the end of the muckman episode is a freeze frame of splinter (after having knocked out all of his sons to punish them for leaving while grounded) turning his anger on april and her running away. idk thats just not funny to me. this is a bit of the dating of the show, 2012 was a time where character's in shows were meaner, less affectionate, more bullying in nature. that was the sense of humour at the time. that isnt me making a judgment, it's just kind of the era. a pre steven universe world, if that makes sense. so many of the jokes that end in a hit aren't funny in 2024. especially not when they come from a parent.

when this splinter speaks about his kids to their brothers he often ends up insulting them. "you should be like mikey, he never overthinks because he doesn't think", this would be a big reason the boys speak about each other the way they do to their faces. puts forward a bit more of that bullying thing i mentioned earlier. if their own father talks about them like this, of course their brothers do too. so of course they join in and give payback.

again. splinter wasnt raised in a normal family. he was raised in a ninja commune with a bunch of murderers. he wasn't great with his wife and baby daughter. its not surprising that he's bad at this.

so, ive just said a bunch of things about what's wrong with this household as a whole. i think ive explained why the family unit behaves the way it does: generational teachings of feuds and traditional values. i dont think this makes the show bad! i, in fact, wish there was more of it. i think theres so much low hanging fruit that the show kind of wants to play with, but cant fully bring itself to.

specific example: during the space arc on a planet thats driving all the characters emotions against each other we get this amazing scene where raph screams at leo for being splinter's favourite. leo responds by hugging him. its really well done!

however its never brought up again, never actually getting into the nitty gritty of why raph feels like that is exactly what i think makes this show resonate with so many people

its dark! it pulls at your heart strings! it makes people feel seen! we go in mikey's head at one point and see such splintered (lol) personalities in his head. he has a huge anger problem (much like raph) in there. he retreats into imagination land when stressed. the show kind of toys with "these kids are fucked up!" but never lets those character moments go anywhere. i love how fucked up this family is. its so complex, it feels real. at least real to me. i wish it went that little step further and let the characters talk about these things a little more.

maybe you have a different experience, and thats fine! but i wouldnt brush off people like me who look at 2012 and say "these dynamics make me uncomfortable". to excuse it by saying "my family is like that and we're fine" sometimes i just wanna say... <:/ are you? have you talked about that? and if that's your read on it is that its fine, thats great. but some people notice patterns and those patterns can make them uncomfortable. i hope ive explained the patterns here.

i think thats why the fandom is as big as it is. this show would lead to the most amazing deep introspective fan-works youve ever seen, it lays the pieces out so perfectly for you to draw your own conclusions about why they are this way. you cant really blame people for talking about it as if its got a way higher rating than it does. it feels like it does.

i should say, i dont even know if i blame the show on its own for leaving those pieces laying there, it was on nickelodeon. i sense studio meddling in the tone. i mean, given that the show wanted to end with the big mutant apocalypse storyline, and yet the network wanted to end it with the big 87 crossover..... yeah i think its safe to say nick would rather they keep it light.

which is funny, because i think the most controversial thing i can say is i personally love the finale arc as the mutant apocalypse. it so encapsulates my favorite part of this show. to end this show in the darkest timeline and say "even though these characters are so far removed from who they used to be and even though the entire world is over they still have each other in the end" and i find that so perfect.

so. i understand that this is always a touchy topic. i know people want to brush it off as "people say the 12 brothers are abusive to mikey but mikey is fine", and i think thats a really skewed version of it from both sides. first of all. mikey is not fine, look in that boys head. look how he copes. he's not. but also, mikey is not the only victim. they all are. these turtles are victims of their upbringing, victims of generational war. of men who didnt know how to be good fathers in the first place. and thats good writing! it feels deep! it connects!

for more context: any fucked up way you can think of karai being raised by shredder? its probably the same way here. splinter and shredder were raised the same way.

i guess i think about this a lot, cuz i always see things like "oh, rise fans write crossovers where the rise boys love each other and have to teach the 12 boys how to be nice cuz they dont like 2012!" and i just think to myself:

guys. do you understand why a person might do that? why would someone (likely a teenager) want 2012 mikey to be treated nicely by a kinder more openly affectionate version of his own family? do i need to spell that out for you? why do we connect with media at all, why do we write our own stories about it?

if you genuinely dont. i mean, im glad for you. but sometimes you wanna imagine a world in which your own family is more openly affectionate with you. where they hug and tell you theyre proud and love you and you never have to question it, never have to look elsewhere for that kind of approval. its less that they're idolizing rise, and more that they're looking at the two families and saying "this one is emotionally mature and in touch with their feelings more than that one. how would that play out?"

doctor feelings ass response.

look, im not saying everyone understands 2012, that everyone likes or needs to like it. im just trying to say that i think these fucked up parts of 2012 are all around my favourite parts of the show. its an inspiring story about this fucked up little family that has no one but each other, and they're not great about it. they try, but they don't always get it right. i just wish the show would have talked about that part more. but i think that since it doesnt people get to fill in those blanks themselves, and they do it so beautifully. and i really wish people on the internet would be more kind to one another when they wanted to discuss these darker themes they find in it.

these are the reasons i love this show. i think its so very interesting that splinter dies this fucked up father figure who never really apologized for his behaviour. i like that raph needs to be held to stop punching his brothers. that leo doesnt have a good grip on what it is to be a leader, that he tries bad ways of doing it. i like that no one copes well! i like that their relationships are so complex! this show is messy! its good! i wish it was more messy!

and id love if we could be more honest about these things and how they make us feel instead of just brushing each other off as "likes the show" or "doesnt like the show". the things that make me uncomfortable are why i love this show and i'm pretty sure i'm not alone there.

[kirein-ca]

Hello Ninjago Fandom

Do we fw sibling bond Lloyd and Arin AU

It's pretty self explanatory AU but I really want to rant about it

Sides Of The Same Coin AU

As it is self explanatory, instead of The Merge bringing Arin somewhere in the Merged lands (I think, Wyldness originally?) He was sent to the past

But that didn't stop him from trying to become a Ninja, if anything it made him understand more about it

So yeah this AU does consists of Arin and Lloyd basically being the Sora and Arin or the Kai and Lloyd relationship where they meet when they were kids, Lloyd trying to be evil while Arin trying to be a ninja(which is what made me make this AU in the first place cause its so funny how different they were)

And moreover, Arin going from the path of right to wrong in S2+ is something I also wanted to add in this AU so instead of Ras we have the overlord promising to give Arin his parents (which I find is another ironic parallel cause like how different they were as kids they're also different as teens)

And Arin learns Spinjitzu through the overlord just like Ras, and Sensei Garmadon notices the shatterspin particles (due to having learnt it in the shatterspin comics)

So yeah Arin is going thru it during rebooted

More doodles

Oh and, by Seaon 7 just before Wu ends up going and facing the twins head on, Arin willingly takes his place since he's all since his adolescent knew he was never supposed to be there, just like the twins. And so he sacrificed himself to face them on through time and it reverted Arin back to how he was and sent back to the same place he was prior, which was the merge lands after the whole The Merge explosion

The next time Lloyd ever sees Arin is Dr 1 just like in the canon show and Arin doesn't remember him because everything felt like a whole vivid dream when he got back to the merge lands as his child self, just like the time he lost his parents and the ninjas saved him

Thinking though,, after dr3 he regains his full memory of it(but I haven't seen part 2 ending so eh)