#but it is hilarious how much it contradicts itself

[nerdylilpeebee]

Kamal contradicted herself on the Israel/Palestine conflict trying to appeal to both Jewish and Arab American citizens by pretending be both Israel positive and Israel negative at the same time in different states. She didn't do interviews for the longest time and when she did, she guided every conversation away from her policies and towards Trump.

Kamala did NOT campaign competently. And if you think the Republicans are the extreme ones right now, you've not been paying attention. XD both sides have a lot of extremists, but the right isn't the one that spent a summer burning towns down a few years ago or has spent the last year telling Jews they're evil cuz Israel is defending itself from terrorists.

Hilarious tho that you whine about disinformation and fearmongering considering how much the left pretending the apocalypse would happen if Trump won. Literally, his victory can be blamed on the left. Y'all are such toxic assholes and think you're owed support now matter how you act, no matter how much you hate, simply cuz you view Democrats as "the good guys."

[bagelvangr]

Hugr einn þat veit · Only you know er býr hjarta nær, · what dwells in your heart einn er hann sér um sefa; · when you are alone; engi er sótt verri · but nothing is worse hveim snotrum manni · for a wise person en sér engu at una. · than to have nothing to love.

— Hávamál (Crawford), 95.

She really fucked up this time 😔

(And okay, I caved, I couldn't make her too sad 😭)

This idea wormed itself into my brain after I started thinking about the DLCs and how.... the timeline doesn't work? So, you know, canonically, Eivor does end up in Ravensthorpe and septupling down as protector and being with the people she loves. I mean, Francia still happens, you know?

Anyways, I imagine it wouldn't be all smiles and celebrations. That's a real big fuck up to come back to, and I assume quite a few years too. There's going to be a lot of thinking and a lot of introspection and a lot of being sad in a dark cave behind a certain waterfall.

She'll get there eventually, but like with a lot of what she learns, it's not an easy road to travel, especially when the consequences of her initial actions would have been so high.

For the residents and those who knew her, how do you forgive such an abandonment and betrayal of frith, duty, loyalty? After they had all been through, how do you justify an action like leaving?

TL;DR: Our girl gonna be hella sad for a real long time and tbh she would deserve it 😔 (but she will also deserve the outcome we'll eventually play in the following years 😌)

And if it feels like I am being too vague, feel free to DM me, cos sweaties, I got some thoughts and feelings and opinions about all of this, much like the rest of you.

I don't really know when to stop, so I figure I post this now instead of spending the next week working on it for minimal changes 😭 I posted a sneak of this here earlier.

[here-for-eddie]

rating the possible solutions to the bt problem in s8

according to my very specific and arbitrary criteria: likeliness of the solution, in-story satisfaction (how would it work in the show) and pettiness factor (how much would it piss off the bt fandom/tommy fans)

Tommy stays, bucktommy endgame

Very unlikely (thank god)

Storyline satisfaction 0/10

Pettiness -1000/10 (they would become insufferable forever)

Buck is single in 08x01, Tommy is never mentioned again

Unlikely

Storyline satisfaction 3/10 (would mean we suffered through 7b for nothing)

Pettiness 10/10

Buck is single in 08x01, bucktommy breakup only mentioned

Possible (happened with natalia)

Storyline satisfaction 5/10 or more (depends on how it would be discussed, what did Buck learn from that relationship)

Pettiness 9/10 (bonus points if it's not due to unavailability of lfj, just Tim deciding he has enough of That Mess)

Buck is single in 08x01, confirms they were only on a few dates and were never in a relationship

Possible

Storyline satisfaction 5/10

Pettiness 11/10 (bucktommies would explode)

Buck experiences buddie summer of infidelity

very unlikely (fortunately for me, because I love this concept in theory but would hate it in the show 🙃)

Storyline satisfaction 2/10

Pettiness 5/10 (would make Tommy the wronged party here, so I'm not vibing with that)

Tommy dies

Unlikely

Storyline satisfaction 0/10 (buck would have to mourn him)

Pettiness 6/10 (their fave would be gone forever but bt would be immortalised as a tragic romance)

They split up because of their incompatibility

likely

storyline satisfaction 7/10

pettiness 7/10 (would mean that Tommy is not the perfect partner they claim he is, but the solution itself is a boring as Tommy)

they split up because Tommy behaves like a jerk to Buck

possible

storyline satisfaction 9/10 (his behaviour in s7 is not brushed aside)

pettiness 9/10 (would contradict all those baffling interpretations of tommy's behaviour being peak romantic in s7)

They spilt up because of Tommy's past and/or present attitudes towards the Gerrard problem

likely

storyline satisfaction 10/10 (it would mean his past behaviour is not brushed aside and forgotten)

pettiness 10/10 (would contradict all those baffling theories and his fans ignoring his past behaviour)

They split up because Buck learns that Eddie was Tommy's first choice

unlikely

storyline satisfaction 9/10 (it would play into Buck's issues)

pettiness 10/10 (as an Eddie fan, I love it when everything is about Eddie)

they split up because Buck realises he is in love with Eddie

likely

storyline satisfaction 13/10 (a logical conclusion to everything that's happened in s7, especially 07x04)

pettiness 7/10

They split up because Tommy realises Buck is in love with Eddie

possible

storyline satisfaction 3/10 (it's something Buck should discover for himself, not have pointed out to him by anyone)

pettiness 5/10 (would mean that Tommy is forever intertwined with the beginnings of buddie, which I'm not vibing with)

They split up because of a threesome with Eddie

very unlikely

storyline satisfaction depends (could be 10/10 if they executed a very specific scenario but I don't really trust them to)

pettiness depends (could be 10/10 hilarious if they managed to convey that Buck was only ever crazy about Eddie)

They split up because Tommy is moving away

possible

storyline satisfaction 8/10 (buck would get to realise there are more important things in LA for him than his relationship with Tommy)

pettiness 4/10 (their relationship would have to be quite serious first)

They split up because Tommy doesn't want children

possible

storyline satisfaction 9/10 (buck would have to think about what he wants and maybe that he already has it)

pettiness 5/10

if you have any more scenarios, let me know!

[punkeropercyjackson]

Jason Todd takes dump by someone who's read every single issue he's ever been in and watched/played almost all his adaptions

He's afro-dominican,specifically monoracial and a third gen inmigrant on both Catherine and Willis' sides.He's strongfeatured and darkfeatured and his green eyes are a warmer/softer shade instead of the 'staring into your soul' meme

He's also jacked(fat + buff)and overly muscular Jason is unattractive while skinny pale Jason is unfitting

He's transmasc agender and partially identifies as a girl hence freely uses 'ftm' for himself and is a butch but in a goth punk way

He's also demisexual and bipan

Triple A(Austim,Adhd and Anxiety)with ptsd and also cluster b(bpd and npd)

The best love interest for him is/would've been a black Super who's Clark and Lois' adoptive kid and his childhood best friend that grew up to join The Outlaws due to their history

Og Rhato was an absolute disgrace to his character and he hates Roy fullstop and Roy should've hated him back instead of being a pussy.Kory deserves Dick and the Titan Girls forever and ever and the former dosen't even have to be romantic,she just has to be important to him and her own fufilled character too.JASON for that matter deserved to reunite with Eddie and him,Rose,Artemis,Kyle,Duke and Thad along with a bunch of other properly written characters should've been The Outlaws,including ones introduced in Rhato itself so it would an actual superhero team run

Duke should've been not only an official Robin that was adopted by Bruce a bit after Zero Year but JASON'S Robin with him being Duke's Robin too.Jason would literally rather die again than be part of 'The Batboys' without Duke and that's why it being so accepted in fanon pisses me off so much because it shows zero care for transracial adoption representation('transracial' meaning 'adopted child that's in a different race family')and how it's inherently more interesting and nuanced storytelling than every 'Bruce adopts every kid he meets' edition.Duke deserves his own special relathionships instead of having to share or settle when nobody else does or has to

He hates being sexually degraded and objectified and considers it as bad as his death being used against him because he sees it as another form of violation of his personhood.The reverse is also true so when it comes sex and even just romance,he's all about consent and if someone won't respect his they have zero chance or appeal to him

Normies do nothing for him.He's t4t,autistic4autistic and poc4poc strictly no exceptions and he dosen't actively seek out dating because he thinks platonic love and familial love are more important

The Tim beef is not only hilarious but top notch writing because for once the white boys don't give a fuck about eachother and perfer the girlies and the poc.90s Young Justice,the Robin 1993 gang and Tam is wayyyy better as a cast for Tim than Jason could ever be too

Jayrose and Jaytemis are very good ships because Rose and Artemis keep their personalities around Jason and they have belivable reasons to be attracted to eachother within dynamic and individual characters too.Jaykyle has excellent potential but people who make it horny should just admit they're racist and want Kyle to be Jason's pet moc and Jayeddie should've been what they tried to make Jayr*y as it actually works with Eddie and there's no overlap between him and Roy unless you're shallow and bad at writing

'Wonder Woman fan Jason' is rather tokenish and unathentic and also i just don't think he'd like Diana that much at any point at all tbh.His childhood superheroine idol is Starfire because it makes way more sense(and no,not because of the Dick,it's because Kory is exactly what he admires in women in general)

Alchoholic/smoker Jason are not just canon contradicted but not sexy.It's better to give him comical vices like ridicilously bad for you food and being a pro-gamer

'Robin!Jason is an altruistic,peppy optimistic softboy who's a huge nerd in both meanings of the word and lowkey loserish but also has the bite losing his parents and living as a street kid for years gave him and is a little shit' supremacy or nothing

He listens to My Chemical Romance,classic punk bands and rap the most

He's NOT like Dean Winchester,Deadpool or Danny Fenton and saying so is an insult to his character because he'd hate them if they met

He IS like Percy Jackson,Miles Morales and Ichigo Kurosaki and it needs to be said way more since it's actually accurate

Trans woman Jason is just Marceline Abadeer /pos

If he were a supernatural creature,he'd be a werewolf

Talia is the only acceptable adoptive mom for him and making jokes about ThatTM scene in Lost Days is no better than batcest but with the added layer of violent racialized misogyny.Momlia is also better if Jason's afrolatino because we need more brown/black family dynamics that're healthy and wholesome

'Shiva is Jason's biomom' is gross and offensive to Cass and y'all know damn well him thinking she could be his mom was the writers being racist weirdos,NOT Jason looking wasian.Cass and Jason being on good terms can be well-written but they would NEVER be eachother's favorites and Cass' story is a femalecentric one by design

Stephanie and him are meant to be found siblings and J*ysteph is gross because it's literally just a cishet crack ship version of Stephcass and 'tis exactly why Jason should be her brother for parallels instead of erasure.They're also just not compatible romantically or funny for the bit,it's misogynistic towards her and looks bad on him thanks dating his little brother's ex.Also make Stephanie black too you weirdos and i mean BLACK,not 'blonde blue eyes loose curly hair and badly drawn melanin'.Dead Robins Club is A+ and him and Damian already have good dynamic,no notes

Dick and him should be close since his Robin days with Dick also playing a pseudo-parental role as is the natural order for eldest siblings BUT Dick should written as themself,not an adultchild.Neither of them would ever care about Slade because they're not chronically online white gays who think being anti-kink is code for queerphobia

And him being a Jane Austen fan is him being pretentious but it's funny so it's fine

[blueishspace]

Looped Sun 19

Loop #500

Tango: Oh, guessing we get a beach episode?

Grian: It is loop 500 now, I keep score.

Pearl: He does...for some reason. Why do you?

Grian: It just helps ok?

Scott: Pearl you can't just ask that.

Pearl: Oh I don't want to hear that from you mate.

Jimmy: Scott? Are you coming into the water?

Scott: Yeah! Putting on my sunscreen.

Jimmy: Oh...

Scott: Do you think I mantain my beauty without taking care of my skin?

Jimmy: You are always beautiful though.

Scott: I- uh ah? I mean, of course I am Jimmy.

Jimmy: ... Is Tango putting sunscreen on too?

Tango: I'm not coming.

Jimmy: What, why?

Tango: ... I need to take care of Anne. She can't swim.

Anne: ...

Scott: He's afraid of the ocean.

Tango: Am not!

Scott: Are too.

Anne: ... (he is)

Tango: I'm not scared! I just- water and fire don't mix, ok?

Scott: And I'm done, Jimmy?

Jimmy: Oh yeah... we'll see you guy later!

Pearl: You guys, I found a volley ball! Want to play some beach volley?

Mumbo: Uh... Sure.

Scar: I'm in!

Grian: I don't see why not.

Pearl: Great, Scar is with Mumbo and Grian is with me.

Scott: Oh this is much better.

Jimmy: Yeah. It's great!

Scott: We should probably see the others though.

Jimmy: Oh come on! A little bit longer! The water is so nice!

Scott: Eh. Sure, but we'll get to the others in a while.

Scott: Pearl, what's wrong.

Pearl: Grian is horrible at beach volley.

Scott: How? He's a literal god.

Pearl: Scar was shirtless. Apparently that's enough.

Scott: Oh, yeah, you should have expected that Pearl.

Pearl: I made an gigantic mistake.

Jimmy: Oh we should have a sand castle making competition!

Grian: Who would even be the judges?

Scott: I could.

Pearl: ... What, why?

Scott: I like judging people.

Pearl: Fair enough.

Mumbo: I could be a judge too?

Pearl: ... Alright.

Mumbo: Scar... Star Wars really?

Scar: How dare you!? The Millennium Sand-con is a masterpiece!

Scot: Huh uh. I give it a 8.

Mumbo: ... 9

Scar: I'll take it.

Scott: ... Tango, Jimmy?

Jimmy: I started making a sand castle but it fell apart!

Tango: So I told him to join up with me and Anne!

Jimmy: What do you think?

Scott: ... 9.

Mumbo: It looks good, I think It's a 7.

Mumbo: So, Pearl, how did you do this?

Pearl: I don't know what you mean?

Scott: This is... wow. Get it I guess.

Pearl: Oh thanks, mate.

Mumbo: But how???

Pearl: I don't know what to tell you, hard work.

Scott: You just contradicted-

Pearl: So, how much.

Scott: I'm going to say 9.

Mumbo: 10...definitely.

They ended up setting up a fireplace and roasting marshmallows on top as the sun set. All in all it was a pretty good loop.

Loop #508

Scar woke up... feeling really off. He couldn't understand why though, this looked like a pretty regular loop...maybe a bit basic but still pretty regular. He got up to get breakfast and the feeling refused to go. He tried watching tv but even then there was something...off.

Scar: Grian?

Grian: Scar, choose. Take the red pill or the blue pill.

Scar: Wait are we in the matrix!?!

Grian: It took you way too long to realize that.

Loop #511

Scott: A god loop? I guess that means all of us loopers are gods now. Well... Tango, you and Jimmy really. Didn't get Aeoulus again but getting to be Nyx is fun too.

Mumbo: I-it's weird... uh. I don't really know why I got Ares...?

Scott: You? Ares? That's hilarious- Wait... Grian!?

Grian: Hello...

Scott: Are you... the sky?

Grian: Looks like I got Uranus and Scar got Gaia.

Scar: Being a planet is fun! Did you know I can create mountains now?

Scott: ... That is overpowered.

Grian: You are night itself-

Scar: I made a continent with my face!

Scott: What did I just say?

Tango: Look people! I'm kidnapping the god of spring!

Jimmy: Oh nooo I'm being kidnapped! What will I do?

Tango: Nothing you are mine mow and will rulificate the dead together or something.

Jimmy: I'm so scared and or sad about this, I hope someone will tell Pearl!

Pearl: Nooo! Give me back my ...son I guess.

Tango: Nop.

Pearl: Fair enough mate, guess I got to bring eternal winter now.

Jimmy: I'm back but oh no! Tango made me eat pomegranate seeds. I'll have to switch between two places. Oh noooo.

Grian: Ok, what was that?

Scott: You didn't even try to look realistic.

Tango: Listen, I'm not an actor dude.

Pearl: And I don't really care about killing a lot of people with a famine.

Grian: ...

Scar: What was that about Jimmy eating Tango's seeds-

Scott: Don't phrase it that way.

Grian: SCAR NO!

Loop #514

Grian: Let's never talk of this loop again.

Scar: Please.

Scott: Agreed.

Prev Next First

[thedaythatwas]

TW: Hegel.

So, what’s up with Shuake and dialectics? Click below to watch this user (who is not a philosopher) give this (frankly too invested) analysis a shot!

Something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately is the fact that most– but not all– of Joker’s confidant routes involve some sort of transaction. Joker does something for someone, Joker gets a favor in return. Joker’s identity revolves around what he can do for others. He’s got a different mask (haha game mechanic is narrative device etc.) for everyone in his life. 

Getting a little bit in my head about this led me to a (not-all-that-novel) realization: Akechi’s confidant route is largely non-transactional. Sure, he says that he wants to meet with you to talk about the Phantom Thieves, but that more or less directly translates to just wanting to hang out with you. The “favor” that you're doing for Akechi, if we follow the logic of some of the other confidant routes, is spending time with him. (Which is of course also about getting close to Joker for metaverse recon purposes… But I’d argue that amounts to more or less the same thing in the long run anyway). Really, that’s what your relationship with him is, up until you realize the heart he needs you to change is actually one of the big-bads of the game. And at that point… Well… 

Where am I going with this? I’ve also been thinking a lot about Hegel (I’ve seen some really fun posting about Akechi and Hegel on here this past week– thank you philosophy P5R tumblr!). Akechi’s paraphrasing of Hegel goes a little something like “advancement cannot occur without both thesis and antithesis.” Hilariously, this is how he frames his desire to talk to you more, his flirting is just like me forreal I understand him etc. etc. BUT! The interesting thing here is that the game is cueing you to view your relationship with Akechi through the lens of Hegel’s dialectics.

More on that to follow, but first, I want to plug the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s page on Hegel’s Dialectics here– If you haven’t used it before, SEP is a reliable, peer-reviewed source. It’s great. I use it like. All the time. It’s good for getting the gist of big ideas when you don’t have time to read full texts. (Also if I get any of this wrong please know that philosophy is not my field and I’m totally open to constructive criticism.)

Hegel’s dialectical process revolves around three key moments: the moment of understanding, the dialectical moment, and the speculative moment. These moments can also be referred to as thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. The moment of understanding, thesis, is the point at which an idea is seemingly stable. In the dialectical moment, antithesis, this idea “sublates” itself– the idea is challenged and destabilized because an inherent contradiction in the idea has been made apparent–importantly, part of the idea is preserved. The speculative moment, synthesis, negates the contradiction. A new idea takes form, containing elements of the original idea that was sublated (Marx’s theory of history, anyone?) 

This process continues on and on. Ideas naturally reveal their contradictions, are destabilized, and resolve their contradictions through the creation of a new idea, which is challenged again. This is because the dialectical moment does not come from outside an idea. Antithesis is not an external push against thesis, but rather, the moment when thesis is forced into instability because of its own tightly-bound restriction. 

So back to what I was saying. The game kicks off your relationship with Akechi with a nod to, uh, all of that. Could this be a throwaway comment? Of course! But it’s much more fun to work under the assumption that it isn’t. So bear with me. Akechi is framing himself and Joker as thesis and antithesis. What does that mean? Why do I think it has something to do with Akechi and Joker’s relationship being non-transactional?

Previously, I’ve thought that in the context of their relationship, Akechi represented thesis, and Joker antithesis. This isn’t exactly true (at least per the criteria above) but I do think I was on the right track. 

At the beginning of his story, we can think of Akechi’s worldview as thesis. The world is a stage, and he is a performer. His entire life is dedicated to destroying Shido. It’s a key narrative element of P5 that Akechi doesn’t have confidant relationships (as contrasted by Joker, who has many confidants and becomes stronger through building up those bonds). He views himself as deceiving literally everyone in his life for his goals– his “fans,” his father, the Phantom Thieves. He doesn’t trust, because to him, trust is failure. 

Still, he’s starving for approval, and not just from Shido. You can see the inherent conflict between his desires and beliefs in just about every interaction he has with Joker, particularly those where Akechi overshares about his past. He desperately wants someone to hear him. I don’t think his (primary) aim in that was to strategically win Joker’s trust by showing vulnerability– if that was all he was going for, I doubt Akechi would have been so honest. He omitted information, sure, but he gave Joker the honest-to-god broad strokes of his childhood.  

When Joker comes into his life, Akechi comes to realize that his stable worldview might be wrong. Watching Joker and the rest of the Phantom Thieves reveals the cracks in his own internal logic. Joker has friendships and he is stronger because of them. When Akechi sacrifices himself for the Phantom Thieves on Shido’s ship, we see his moment of synthesis. If Akechi really still internalized all of what he said in his “Teammates? Friends? To hell with that!” monologue, he wouldn’t trust Joker to change Shido’s heart in his stead. To be clear– he probably would have reached this point with or without Joker’s intervention. Joker just happens to push Akechi towards self-sublation a little bit faster.

In Royal, we see a new iteration of Akechi. He doesn’t really regret his actions, and he is still very distinctly Akechi, but we can see that his original perception of the world has made a shift. He is willing to team up with Joker. While he may not place a great deal of faith in all of the PTs, he certainly has real trust in the protagonist. He’s learned that he can be recognized (dare I say loved?) without being perfect, and accordingly, his driving desire for approval has been displaced by his desire to never be so completely under anyone else’s control again.

But ok— that’s kind of an old take. Perhaps a hotter one: I’d also like to propose that Akechi does the same for Joker. 

As mentioned above, Joker’s identity for most of the game is defined by what he can do for the people around him. While a large part of this has to do with the fact that he is a playable character, this is a game, and a game needs to have things for you to do– it wouldn’t be very fun otherwise– it also seems pretty clear that this is part of his characterization. Joker is selfless to a fault. Like Akechi, he is a wildcard who can take on multiple personas. Unlike Akechi, instead of having a handful of personas directly linked to the core of his character development, Joker has as many personas as you want him to. He literally has a mask for every situation. You can equip a persona of the correct arcana to level up your relationships faster– a game mechanic, but also, an interesting meta statement about how Joker bonds with his confidants.

In Royal, however, Joker has the option to do something for himself. His greatest wish isn’t for someone else's happiness– it’s to have Akechi back, for selfish reasons, I would argue. Joker can sacrifice reality to keep him in his life, and depending on the actions you choose to take, sometimes, he does.

Loving Akechi teaches Joker to be selfish. This is especially poignant when you think of how adamantly opposed Akechi is to staying in Maruki's reality. Giving up the true reality to keep Akechi is a wholly selfish act on Joker's part, nothing altruistic about it. And if he doesn't make that choice? Well, don't forget about how Joker spent his wish.

He would have learned how to do this without Akechi– one tends to realize that neverending self-sacrifice is unsustainable sooner rather than later. Again, Akechi just pushes Joker towards effecting that self-sublation a little faster.

By spending time with Joker, Akechi learns that there are people he can truly trust. By spending time with Akechi, Joker learns how to put himself first. Their confidant relationship from this perspective is not only transactional, it’s actually one of the most transactional relationships in the game. Joker actively impacts how Akechi sees himself and the world around him, and vice versa. Their relationship is profoundly transformative for the both of them. To paraphrase Akechi, advancement cannot occur without both thesis and antithesis.

But also, we can forget dialectics for a second. Even without a fun analytical lens, Akechi’s confidant route centers two misunderstood people who find understanding in each other. That’s enough for me!

[nyc3]

Hey I have a question. I never saw the movie nor I want to see it +Nine sounds cool as fuck but....bk is in the movie) my question here is......why shig killed Nine?

When that scene was reblogged on Twitter I had the impression it was smth like "nine was using his name and shig wasn't pleased" ...can't be that bc this makes sense. Too much sense.

So did shig just kill the guy bc yes?

Maybe afo or the Dr evil asked shig to do so... which is plausible but damn...what waste. And it cements once again shig as a npc.

I'll try to explain this the best I can, because tbh nothing about this situation makes sense to me even today. And some context of the movie as well.

The movie starts with a scene of the LOV transporting Nine while he was still on a medical capsule inside a truck. There's a reference to this situation in the manga when the doctor request Shigaraki to deliver "something" for him.

But here's a thing: neither the movie or the prequel chapter Horikoshi made explain where Nine was being delivered or what the doctor intended to do with him in case he arrived to destiny. It feel that missing context is important.

In any case, the heroes attack the truck trying to arrest the league. The truck is destroyed in the battle and this allows Nine to escape and go back with his team.

Then we got a couple of scenes were Shigaraki seem to be tracking Nine activities, also using Hawks to do the research job for them (it's worth mentioning the events of the movie are supposed to happen at some point after MVA).

And after all this... nothing really, the movie drops this subplot and Shigaraki only appears again in the end when he comes out of literally nowhere to kill Nine. Allow me to ask how they even know his exact location? The black goo teleportation quirk doesn't even work like that btw.

Just like you my first assumption was Garaki ordered him to do so, maybe because after the spectacle Nine did in the island the doctor decided to eliminate him for security reasons. But we never got any indication of this being the case, in fact there's a scene when Garaki explicitly tells Shigaraki to not touch "it" (Nine).

Things became more confusing because in MVA when Shigaraki gives Garaki one of his edgy speeches about destroying everything he hates, there's a small cameo of Nine among the things crusty boy hates.

On a side note: this is technically Nine's first ever appearance, even before the movie itself was released. A sort of foreshadow for what it coming.

But going back to the point: why Shigaraki hates Nine so much in the first place? We never got a clear reason for any of this, isn't like they ever interacted, the only time before the movie they have some kind of contact was the prequel chapter focused on Nine, and that was only Shigaraki looking at Nine through a window.

Also the final scene when crusty boy kills Nine for some reason makes it sounds the situation is very personal? Like if Shigaraki hold some grudge against Nine for some reason.

And the line "I agree, there only can be one king" doesn't make any sense because isn't like Shigaraki knew about Nine's ideology and his desire of rule the world. The writers makes it seem to be like they both interacted and had a long term rivalry for some reason, but that never happened.

Oh and it's extra hilarious how Shigaraki killing Nine for no reason directly contradicts this other little scene:

If crusty a**hole always intended to be "a hero for villains" (as the story seem to pretend) what about Nine then? Idk but for me killing a defendless man while he was crawling on the ground doesn't seem too heroic.

Let's not forget Nine was a real hero for villains without presume about it. He saved the life of Chimera, Slice and Mummy in a way Shigaraki wish to be able to do with the lov.

Honestly is funny to think all this one directional hate Shigaraki feels for Nine could be just crusty boy being jaleous, which won't be surprise considering Nine is superior to him in everyway possible.

But well, thinking about this on a perspective outside the story itself an explanation of why Nine was killed maybe is because Horikoshi just needed a reason to get rid of him, as his presence might be problematic for the course of the main story. I mean it would be a bit suspicious to have another AFO possible vessel who happens to be better than Shigaraki, and Nine is the only movie main villain to be permanently killed on screen, while all the others like Wolfram and Flect survived.

Anyway, all this festival of bs let a bitter taste in my mouth.

Needless to say, such a good villain like Nine surely deserved way better than he got.

[itsclydebitches]

It's weird to think Vol 10 of RWBY just straight up might never happen. much less further volumes. No matter how bad it got I would still have loved some form of ending but Barabas comments don't paint a hopeful picture. Alas fics of RWBY will go until the end of time.

It's very weird. Most shows I come across have either already concluded, or give their audience an estimate of when things will wrap up ('We're planning another two seasons and each takes us about two years to film, so...'). I have shows that unexpectedly get more content after providing an ambiguous, but still satisfying ending (Alice in Borderland), shows where each season is self-contained so it can end whenever without issue (Bake Off), shows that were cut short and had to scramble to wrap up (Sense8), and of course there are always shows that are straight up cancelled and can't do a thing to mitigate that... but RWBY feels almost, almost unique in this combination. It's a webseries rather than a traditional TV show. It's gone on for a decade with absolutely no indication of where it's heading. Each season feels threatened to the point where the fandom can no longer differentiate between a real cancellation concern and Internet exaggeration. The story has hit what's arguably its most important narrative peak - the team has traversed an alternate world, Ruby has "overcome" drinking the tea, Summer finally appears on screen - only for news of the story's future to remain frustratingly vague. Not only have we never had a sense of when RWBY's story will end, now we don't even have confirmation of whether it will end. That's such a frustrating way to approach storytelling given that your audience relies on some level of commitment to remain engaged.

I too want RWBY to finish up because I am not immune to the Sunk Cost Fallacy: I put this much time into the series and it needs to satisfy me with a conclusion, even if the conclusion itself will inevitably be unsatisfying. Outside of any normal disappointment with a story you love getting the ax, I generally don't mind embracing unfinished works. I read abandoned fics, watch cancelled shows, browse barely started comics, because getting a taste of the world is always worth it if it's compelling to me. I never regret meeting characters whose stories go untold because as a writer myself I can at least imagine that on my own terms. But RWBY? Losing it now would be a real kick in the teeth. I personally don't think the story is salvageable at this point, but at the very least fans deserve a conclusion: one that will likely please a lot of devoted viewers and allow critical fans to put a satisfying tick mark on the box in our heads labeled "RWBY."

Given its popularity I wouldn't be surprised if RWBY wound up cancelled and then concluded in a comics run, or a one-off movie. Beyond the fact that this would no doubt mess up the writing even more (now you have to iron out this mess of a plot on a time limit, in a new medium, with new authors!) it would, unfortunately, be kind of hilarious too:

[generic tour guide voice] "Hello. Welcome to RWBY. Our fandom is known for having copious side stories connected to the canon in confusing ways. Some are incidental to the main series. Some outright contradict it. Some are crucial to your understanding of the primary plot and must be engaged with in a timely manner. These texts range from comic runs to random bits of information in abandoned mobile games. Please note that this corpus did not grow naturally across decades of storytelling, as is the case with fandoms like Star Trek and Star Wars, but was rather cobbled together by RT in an attempt to 'fix' numerous, ongoing issues with the webseries. Our latest addition? The ending. Yes, if you would like to finish RWBY please refer to this index of sources that together provide a semi-cohesive conclusion to a ten year show. Now, on your left you'll see the ongoing brawl as fans attempt to determine whether this index is canonical or not. Please watch your step..."

[the-love-giver]

Ranking the Top-Rated Hazbin Hotel Ships Part 2 (Lesbian)

Chaggie. It's the classic one, how could I not like it? It's perfect for fluffy stuff, and hurt/comfort from when they first met, as well as any number of other things. It's very versatile and very cute.

BloomingGun. This one is just adorable, and it spans so many ship tropes. It's perfect for comedy, fluff, a battle duo, and of course, it's also kinda hot. Let these women get married.

MollyBomb. This one is really cute, I find - a party girl and a presumably sweet, well-behaved girl. Cherri can protect Molly and Molly can rein Cherri in. It's perfect.

Velmilla. I don't actually like this one because I ship it, or because I'm attracted to them. I like it because of the sheer chaos these shippers cause. It's fucking hilarious.

RoyalHalo. This one is just really cute and wholesome. I envy both of them so much, they're both so nice and that just seems like it'd be a really healthy, good relationship.

Misie. I never would've thought of this, honestly, but it does seems cute. I can't see them getting married or being together for more than a year or so, but they'd have a fun time together, I think.

FallenWings. I don't actually like this ship, but it's familiar to me because I watching SATPOP as a little one. No hate to shippers, I'm just not partial to it myself.

Emilute. This one is odd. It could go many ways. I can see it being angsty and sad, with Em watching Lute go down the rabbithole, but she could also be the light that heals Lute. There's potential.

CherriMoth. I can't really see this ever working. Vaggie doesn't like trouble, and Cherri is trouble personified. Funny as a crackship, not so much as an actual relationship.

Vagette. Maybe I'm biased by my unbridled hatred for both characters, but I don't like this one. It just seems to contradict itself on so many levels. But I have nothing against its fans.

[eisforeidolon]

I feel fans should be able to interpret shows and characters any way they want but it really bothers me that shippers die on the hill of Dean is such a closeted bi sexual and Sam is the biggest heterosexual out there. I love these characters because they are extremely toxic and codependent on each other. The story would not be the same with out that. Why would anyone look to Supernatural to be their all time gay representation love story when it most obviously is not. it just blows my mind how out there Destiel shippers are and how much they truly hate this show and hate Dean without even realizing it. I need someone to figure out how we can get rid of them from this fandom...LOL

Yeah, IDGI either. Fandom is supposed to be about just having fun however you want with the building blocks from the canon + your imagination. It's not even the main point that they're hilariously bad at interpretation, project too hard onto the characters to even see them, can't understand context to save their lives, pointedly ignore a million things that directly contradict their agenda, and too much of their so-called proof is actually gross backwards stereotypes about sexuality and masculinity (neither of which they seem to understand very well at all). If they were just having fun with it, who the fuck cares? Sure, it's annoying, but a lot of fandom is annoying because it is so specifically tailored to things not everyone is gonna like. There are other canons with fans who are fine admitting they just like playing in the canon world but not the canon itself that much.

No, the problem is hellers are not content to just enjoy their non-canon interpretations in fandom. They feel entitled to flood any and every tag associated with the show, trying to demand their interpretations be considered indisputably canon fact because ... reasons ... and anyone who doesn't agree with them is A Bad Person because ... they say so. Their ship is the greatest love story (n)ever told, the best representation evar in media! It's the only important thing about SPN - and if they couldn't change the canon, they can change the fandom narrative! The fact there's actually no there there under their overblown thousands upon thousands of words of inept meta is why the very suggestion it's not canon, that someone doesn't see it as the greatest thing ever, that maybe Dean is actually just a heterosexual instead of putting on an elaborate performance of one or even that Sam might not be the straightest character ever written? Is taken as an attack upon their self-declared status as the real main audience. Which makes sense, because they never were. SPN was anything but subtle as to what its actual focal relationship was.

To some extent I get how they echo-chambered each other into believing their ship was/would be a thing in canon. If you just look at the size of the piles on piles of cherry-picked nonsense they accumulated over the years without actually engaging your brain to see how variously flimsy, out of context, or how many other more sensible interpretations there were for any of them? If you wanted to believe and surrounded yourself with others who did, too, and kept talking each other up, spending way more time doing that than watching the show? It's no wonder some of them ended up with really skewed expectations.

What I don't get is how they're still going this long after the show ended. SPN is over and there's no more 'Well, next season for sure!' to promise themselves. There are increasingly more stories out there now in a variety of media which are centering deliberately, openly LGBT+ characters and relationships they could invest in championing! Hell, just saying screw canon and burying themselves in writing their idea of "better" fanfic is a perfectly reasonable way to deal with disappointment, no matter how self-inflicted. Instead, they're still here making up elaborate conspiracies about how SPN was something other than what it blatantly obviously always was - because admitting they were wrong and the only thing they ever liked about it was their own OOC fanfic very, very loosely based off of it? Well, that's more than a bit embarrassing in light of how long they spent campaigning and how vehement they were about it totally being not just A Thing but The Most Important Thing Ever. So I don't know what would actually get them to move on, they clearly love being miserable and wrong and pretending to be martyrs over it far too much for me to comprehend.

[argumate]

(in response to a response to this post in which I joked about political parties constantly splitting; hopefully this offers some insight rather than inciting)

I am not familiar with the Party for Socialism and Liberation beyond what I read on their Wikipedia page, so I'm happy to hear they engage in worthy causes, but that alone is insufficient to exclude them from what I maintain is a much deserved roasting, along with their fellow travellers in Australia with whom I have more direct experience.

over here, the local communists can be found in front of the state library every Sunday afternoon, offering hot food, warm clothes, and revolutionary inspiration to the homeless population of Melbourne (or anyone else who happens to be passing by and wants to have an argument with them, because as with me that's how they like to make friends with people I think).

and this is a truly wonderful thing that they choose to do! feeding the hungry, clothing the cold, engaging in heated debate with the otherwise ignored, it's beautiful and it makes this corner of the world a little brighter than it would otherwise be.

I don't volunteer any of my time to that particular effort; I could say that I don't have the time to spare or that my skills don't run in that direction but really it's just that everything you do is contingent on who you know and how you know them, we are all firmly embedded in the web of social connections that define our lives and my path took me in other directions; had a few things twisted differently in university then who knows.

I do donate a little money towards housing the homeless as I believe it's a crime that this city compels anyone to sleep rough outdoors; this is a deliberate policy choice that we did not need to make and do not need to continue, it is a problem that we created and could solve at any time, and since I'm quite vocal about this I'm obliged to put up or shut up etc. and hopefully my contribution will offer some shelter to those who would otherwise be denied it.

but while some volunteering here and some donations there is certainly better than nothing, it's not enough, it's nowhere near enough! the gap between what is done and what needs to be done is staggering! it galls me, and I joke about it because things can be very funny even when they make me mad, the serious is often funny and the funny is always very serious.

when right-wing political parties fracture and begin to eat each other alive it's funny because the people involved are usually assholes, their vain attempts to spin the narrative in their favour are hilarious, and pratfalls and petty drama are just a reliable source of humour, and all of these reasons apply just as well to the scenario of left-wing political parties gratuitously shooting themselves in the dick.

however a right-wing party getting fractious is entirely on brand: at least ideologically they're supposed to believe in the virtues of individual self interest and robust competition and a war of all against all and to the winner go the spoils, so why not stab each other in the back for personal glory at the cost of the greater good?

but a left-wing party is notionally founded on the dream of overcoming what ails humanity by way of collective action, the principle that cooperation can achieve what competition cannot, that class interests supersede all other antagonisms, and in that case what the fuck does it mean when that party cannot even cooperate with itself? what is left for us to offer but derision for such monumental failure, not even to fail in a valiant but doomed fight against a powerful adversary but to be torn apart by internal contradictions (!) and the inability to unite as one despite the professed importance of the mission?

Australia never banned the Communist Party, and as a liberal democracy we can be proud of that, but of course we never needed to: it faded into meaningless irrelevancy of its own accord (a tradition continued to this day by the Greens, who if they ever catch a whiff of electoral success and the chance of actually doing something useful will promptly collapse into acrimonious debates about ending capitalism and disappear up their own arse until everybody else loses interest).

so is it funny that organisations predicated on working together for the common good keep splitting? yes of course it's funny, it's fucking hilarious! and tragic, if you believe in the goal, and think that it ever had a chance of being achieved in this way by these people.

in the meantime the rites continue to be dutifully performed but the modern infrastructure of Marxist organisation resembles little more than a pyramid scheme or an evangelical church that exists solely for the purpose of sucking in enough idealistic students to perpetuate the ideology to the next generation, while ensuring that they stay carefully isolated from any ideas that might seriously challenge the status quo (or honestly even ideas that might help to understand the status quo, a prerequisite to doing anything about it); this is also a funny situation but it's getting a little bitter, and I don't enjoy seeing so much potential go to waste.

I've said more on this topic, scattered across the past few years of posts, but I think that probably conveys the gist of it, although of course as always I'm happy to keep talking.

[ghostcrows]

the way this is so genius... cuz obviously at first glance its hilarious and absurd to be like yeah i helped someone with a gruesome murder but i draw the line at, toxic ships...but when you know it wasnt something he necessarily willingly did (i dont think we know still how easy or hard it was to convince him to do what he did but it obviously wasnt something he went along with happily) its like well yeah his moral compass isn't actually contradicting itself here...it just looks incredibly fucking bad in juxtaposition

and it shows just how much milo values comfort and desperately seeks it and tries to guard whats left of it in his life even when people are sending him death threats and shit every day on the same platform

[shut-up-rabert]

I read the recent post and I hope no hate anon is approaching you because I will bring my steel tupperware bottle

Anyway I am really glad that people like you and @lil-stark didi exist. I do not have much knowledge about the political power and parties and especially about the kashmiri pandit issue who was ruling who belonged to which party so I don't speak about this but people who downplay the atrocities that happenes with those pandits deserve a special place in hell. Like think you are moved away from your land by force, by brutal killing and rapes only after some years to hear a random person on the internet say yaar utna bhayankar bhi nahi hua tha and it's a propaganda

The amount of misinformation these so called modern radical folks have is hilarious. Ghanta ramayan mahabharat padhi kahin koyi translation chipka. Not so sweet61 posted that ss of ram following manu, if they really did Vashishtha wouldn't have asked for sita to be the commander of ayodhya instead of leaving with ram.

And Manusmriti itself contradicts the vedas and upanishads. We have had a culture that promoted women scholars, encouraged debate and questioning, and lol as if one could be a brahmin just because they were born in a family. You had to have those qualities to be that and then can you be one. It's as similar to a person being a warrior. Not everybody can be one. You need to train and practice for it. It's good that if you are born in one that way you have an exposure to the respective field just like today if I am born in a house full of doctors, I would have much knowledge about the study, expenses and related stuff to medicine.

Just like every culture every community has good and bad things, sees its rise and fall, we Hindus have seen too. From an era where it was encouraged for a woman to be a brahmavadini, we became resentful at the thought of sending girls to school. We forgot how the texts told to respect each and every person irrespective of their social status to discriminating them on basis of caste and there are all so many issues that we need to address too.

But majal hai that I will sit quietly and see these random people on the internet speak about my culture and insult it. From North to south east to west, Rama and Krishna have been worshipped and always will be. We will always look upto them and learn from them.

In the recent years, the youth of today apart from some dumb idiots who have bhagwan rama in their pfp and comment women tea on every post, I am happy to see that teens are taking interest to read and learn our own Indian history and scriptures. I am not seeing them blindly accept everything. I have seen them ask questions which might be considered 'blasphemous' by the elders but the vedas themselves promote curiousity, questioning and debate as the best way to gain knowledge. And I hope the younger gen keeps going in this path.

(You can respond to this ask in private varna tere piche hate anons aa skte hai)

Seriously, why did Ram, who supposedly followed Manusmriti marry a woman who was a scholar, a warrior, capable of lifting Shiva’s Dhanush and encouraged her to remain her brave, outspoken self because that’s who she was? Why request her to stay in the palace when Manu says that a woman should always be observed? Why give in to all her requests and respect her decisions when Manu says that a woman is mentally incapable of making sound decisions? Why be happy and praise her when she slays Sahastra Raavan?

If Manusmriti was truly being followed, why did the biggest scholar in that entire story, Janak, have his daughters educated, that too by a scholar woman like mata Gargi? Why train them in warfare? Why Did Dashrath bring Kekayi to war with him? Why did Dashrath request the hands of women, who impressed him by thier knowledge, for his sons? And like you pointed out, why offer a woman the position of commander??

If caste was the way Manusmriti says, why was Shabri, a lower caste woman, visited by the lord and sent to heaven? Why did he make a big show of letting the arrogant priests who looked at Shabri with scorn know that she is purer than them by making her touch clean the pond?

Why did Shri Krishna say that a true pandit (knowledgeable person) would see a Brahmin and a Chandala equally? Why did he say he resides in everyone equally, women and Shudras included? Why did the Vedas that are supposedly off limit for Shudras say this?

Manusmriti is not a scripture, it condradicts the Vedas themselves, when it comes to women’s education, the position of women (there is an exceprt where a warrior queen is mentioned), and being for everyone. Apparently women cannot read Vedas even though the Vedas speak to them directly in multiple excerpts? (Oh men and women, oh women etc,) Shudras Cannot read Vedas even though the Vedas say they are for everyone, Shudras included?

Even if you look at other works of the time, like Kamasutra, which technically is somewhat of a scripture in some parts where it discusses philosophy, because its prologue says it was first written by lord Nandi. Manusmriti thorughly contradicts that aswell.

Oh, and Kamasutra was written after Manusmiriti, And Ramayan and Vedas before it, and all of these except Manusmriti are now engraved on temple walls, so you can clearly see which ones of the restrictive and liberating philosophy was preffered by Hindus at large throughout.

If Casteism was so prominent and rigid, how did a shudra become the partriarch of the biggest empire in mainland India?

Chandragupta Maurya was either clanless or a Shudra, and the current existence of Maurya tribe in Bihar enforces the second one. How did he make it to the top, that too with the help of a Brahmin, if things were as dire? Same can be said for

How was Queen Durgavati’s Father in Law able to change himself into a Rajput despite being a tribal?

How was Vishwamitra, a born Kshatriya able to be a Rishi? How was Lord Parshuram, a born Brahmin revered on a higher level than most Kshatriyas in warfare and was able to put the fear of lord in their hearts?

How was rishi Matang able to be a brahmin despite being born a Shudra?

How was Mātang blessed with goddess Saraswati as a daughter?

How did Lord Gorakhnath become such a prominent saint?

How was VedVyas, son of a Fisherwoman, able to be a sage? How were children of Satyavati able to be kings?

How did the founder of Raghukul become a Kshatriya after becoming a king when he was born a Brahmin?

How was Lord Krishna happily doing the physical labour of a cowkeeper, like a shudra, while living in a vaishya community, despite being born a kshatriya?

I honestly have no more questions to ask that I can think of right now, and I honestly cannot agree more with everything you say. Slay girl💅🏻

I think its better if I make the answer public, simply because I ranted in public so the follow up doesn’t change much, and this is something people should see. But girl, thankyou so much for being worried <3

[mulletmitsuya]

I hated the tr ending so badly. Not because it was rushed or anything. Wakui could have fleshed out the last timeline so thoroughly and logically and I would still hate it because the ending itself goes against what I felt the story stood for in the first place. He replaced all the characters for fakes, none of the characters we were intoduced to had happy endings because they either are totally different people or re lived their life to avoid healing. The ending basically proved izanas last words right "there's no saving me" yeah I guess not if the only way to help everyone is to make sure their lives never happened the way it did. Horrible I hate it so much. Also one ship I hate is rinzu or ranzu because they don't even interact once and it's so popular for no fucking reason other than "its hot" and tbh they would prolly hate eachother like petty bitches, they would NOT get along at any point. Also Koko and amane ship because if people actually read the manga with their eyes open it would not make sense. Anyways thanks for letting me be a hater in ur askbox, I love your blog btw

This is long, also tw for typical tokrev themes and sa

I think you're the first person who has the same opinion as me lmao😭. I also didn't believe it should have had an ending like that at all because of the themes that had been set up during the entire story. I understand people's perspectives of "It's Wakui's manga and it's his ending he can do what he wants" but media is supposed to be talked about, discussed and even criticized at times. That's like, the whole point of publishing stuff. As an enjoyer and supporter of Wakui's manga, I feel like I have the right to question some inconsistencies and contradictions (not directly attack him tho, that's never okay. like people who send death threats over ships and stuff that's messed up) that showed up in the ending. I also believe lots of people didn't really take it seriously as a manga idk. It had some very serious topics that people seem to forget about. For example: suicide, abuse, abandonment, child neglect, substance abuse, extreme violence, rape, prostitution etc, and I think people just kinda see it as a silly manga that has cool characters they like. And that's okay. It's okay to not take a piece of media seriously and enjoy it for the sake of enjoying it, not everything needs to be critically analyzed, but stop shitting on the people who take it seriously enough to question why the fuck it ended how it ended. Lots of the discourse took place between critical analysers who wanted an author to finish the manga by sticking to the themes and messages he has set up the entire time versus casual enjoyers who just wanted everyone to be happy for the sake of liking the characters. And I completely agree with the Izana thing!!!! You cannot claim to have saved someone by rewriting their entire life!!! Takemitchy was not supposed to be god!! Also, isn't the moral story of time travel that you should never ever do it? Because you win some, you lose a whole lot fucking more. I thought Draken dying was setting up that narrative. That saving Mikey, was gonna fuck up a whole lot. Isn't that why Chifuyu broke down?

Idk about you guys, but dark impulses being a curse disappointed me quite a bit. I thought it was supposed to be a symbol of Mikey being deeply mentaly ill. And that he had to deal with it head on and not run away all the time (this was Takemichi's entire storyline basically and the the main theme of TR). I just feel like it sucked because the message of the ending, whether Wakui intended it or not, was that you can't be fixed without magical time traveling. Although the story had some fictional aspects, it was realistic at least. I thought they'd deal with everything that wasn't time travel realistically.

Any ship with Sanzu and the Haitani's is hilarious to me and although I don't ship any of them seriously, the fanarts fun to look at some time (and you're right I think they look good together cause they're hot😭). You are completely correct about them not liking each other tho. It's actually canon. Idk if you remember during the three deities fight when Ran hit Haruchiyo with his baton? Nothing but pure malice between their eyes😭. The Koko and Akane ship actually triggers me because one thing about me? I'm not comfortable with large age gaps. Akane was 5 years older than Koko💀. And I didn't know people took what she said to him seriously. I thought she was just trying to not hurt his feelings? Koko and Inupi were around 7/8 when the fire happened. Meaning Akane was like 12/13. Uhhh Idk bout y'all but I don't think a 13 yo would be attracted to someone that young. And waiting for them to be of age is...😶. Be fr.

[sarucane]

OFMD Spiral Narrative Analysis 40: Izzy Being Wrong Part 1

Intro: What I love most about how season 2 builds on season 1 of OFMD is the spiral narrative structure. Ground is repeatedly and explicitly re-trod from season 1 to season 2, but in season 2 everything goes deeper than season 1. Meanings are shuffled, emotions are stronger and truer, and transformation is showcased above everything. The first season plucks certain notes, then the second season plucks the same ones--but louder, and then it weaves them together to create a symphony.

---

Most of these posts are about scenes in OFMD that repeat certain element from season 1 to season 2, but this little series is going to be looking more closely at Izzy and how his character arc spirals to its conclusion.

This was inspired by my noticing in a rewatch that in season 1, Izzy is like always wrong. Always. Almost every scene he's in, he's wrong. And the interesting thing here is that Izzy actually doesn't know about this. When he says something, he seems to believe it. He isn't lying. He's just wrong. Here's how:

He makes a statement that is factually incorrect or proved wrong by later events within the same episode

2. He demonstrates a profoundly inaccurate understanding, which is later contradicted by his own character development and/or by the show's overall narrative itself.

So, shall we begin?

Episode 1: Shout-out to Izzy's first scene, where he does actually manage to (mostly) accurately read a situation: Stede and company are, indeed, idiots.

That said, this does still juuust barely fall under category 2, because this assessment of Stede is later complicated by this scene

In the first season, Izzy hangs on to his idea of Stede as moron long past where it's useful. In the second, he gets that Stede isn't actually an idiot, he just has 0 skills, and he hilariously marvels at how this somehow doesn't translate into death.

Then there's this Category 1 scene, where Buttons says he thought the island was deserted and Izzy says this. Izzy's clearly suggesting that he and the boys are the only ones here, but there's a whole village of indigenous people living this island.

Nope. Category 1

Is Ed half insane though? Or is he just weird? And trapped? Putting that in category 2.

Episode 2:

He was. Category 1 and 2.

You're a pirate, Izzy. Don't make excuses. Category 1.

The future of Izzy, Ed, and this crew will not follow this narrative. Category 2.

When Izzy meets Stede at Jackie's, he does actually manage to avoid both categories. That said, he also manages to not actually tell Stede who he's working for, so still got a definite thread of untruth there.

Category 1 here: no you didn't, Izzy. You just thought you did. A misunderstanding on Izzy's part that actually rebounds on him: if Stede has met Ed after being brought to Ed's freaky room, on Ed's ship, and hearing god-knows-what from Izzy before he went in for the meeting...seems likely that things would have turned out very differently.

Episode 3

Yes but also no, Izzy. And worth noting that despite the embarrassing performance here, the ship actually is repaired a few hours later, so they managed in the end.

These both fall firmly into category 2. Izzy's going to die for these people he's calling useless and planning to murder.

Ed has a plan, and has the whole time. Category 1.

They're eating right now, Izzy, so clearly they do get food when they've been invaded.

No they don't, they live at Ed's pleasure, and Izzy's very clearly the only one who wants to kill them. Ivan whacks Pete a few times (I think Ivan might remember him...), but in this scene Fang and Ivan are just chilling in the background the entire time. The situation's already gotten well away from Izzy, even though he clearly doesn't understand that: category 2.

Category 2. Izzy refers to the "years" he's spent with Ed one more time, in season 2.

The second scene casts the first scene in rather a different light. How much of Ed's erratic behavior was actual mania, and how much of it was him acting out to try to escape a situation he felt trapped in? A situation whose continuation Izzy worked for years to maintain. When we first meet him with Izzy, Ed's sitting alone in a dark room. How long had Izzy been the only intermediary between Ed and the world?

Izzy in the first scene is describing his woes as a middle manager, making sure Ed could stay Blackbeard. But doing that was closing off avenues of possible escape for Ed. Izzy in the second scene is acknowledging that this was...just not an okay thing to do. And that it was about him, not Ed.

Nope.

[horizon-verizon]

I'm YOU but I'm crossing my fingers that the Alicole thing is a lie. I can't take the crazy writing decisions of this show anymore!! Can someone in the writing room give consistency to TG?! Certainly the blacks were robbed and diminished but they are also moderately consistent in their writing

I swear I'm crying and pulling my hair, hitting my head to see if a concussion makes any of this make sense. Alicent "you are the threat Aegon", Alicent "OMG they planned an usurpation?!" Alicent "she will kill my children", Alicent "UPS my son killed hers", Alicent "I want his eye", Alicent "Aemond be good to those guys ❤️" Alicent "extramarital sex is bad", Alicent "Cole is the exception". What do you want Alicent?! What do you really believe in?! This goes beyond being hypocritical and using patriarchy to her advantage, What Alicent believes from one chapter to the next changes according to the need of the script. Just give that poor woman some consistency, the cognitive dissonance can't be that strong 😭

If I have to grab Show!Alicent and analyze her motives, what she wants and what she is... I'm left blank. She is a plot device that instead of allowing her to move the plot they kept her locked away and untouchable. She's not nuanced, she's inconsistent.

I can't be bothered, I've long given up on the show. I'm here for memes, article links, the dragons, and enjoying being proven right as obnoxious as that seem or is. To me, this show and its writers have been obnoxious, sexist, and condescending. Sure the dragons will be entertaining if maybe not as colorful as they should be--which might just be a trailer-specific dilution to otherwise make the preimeire that much more visually stunning--but I have a sneaking suspicion the writing will fall too short for other characters or contradict itself again.

Alicole will be just hilarious to me.

But to get into Alicent's character (bc I can't resist):

"OMG they planned an usurpation?!"

I believe it wasn't that they planned a usurpation, but that she was left out of their plans and those plans being to murder Rhaneyra. About the murdering Rhaenyra part, I do look 👀 at her, bc...this is a usurpation and you have already tried to get this women/her kids' lives ruined on multiple occassions or put those kids' lives in danger! Clear inconsistency. However, the fact that these men planned without including her at all is definitely a good thing in terms of her hypocritical characterization--the leopards have eaten her face. It's just her immediate desire to save Rhaenyra out of "love" is some crazy ass bullshit.

Alicent "she will kill my children", Alicent "UPS my son killed hers"

By the 2nd I take it you meant her surprise in how Aemond could have ever killed her kid during an envoy mission before Rhaenrya could try to any of them, thus immediately proving herself/Otto wrong. I'm fine with this actually. Again, describes and paints her hypocrisy, and the problem is that she then continues (by the trailers) try to diminish it as Aemond wanting semi-righteous revenge. To me, despite the whole kin-slaying being a huge cultural no-no, Alicent is also betraying Viserys' and going against his word before Aemond kills Luke. She has always been this way.

Alicent "extramarital sex is bad", Alicent "Cole is the exception".

Same as above. Alicent may make herself-Criston the exception bc she is at least "hiding" her relationship and (MAYBE, if it began after Viserys died) it was not while she was married...as if this would matter to the Andal-Faith patriarchal authorities of womanly behavior and totally save them from their condemnation?! Think of Otto's reaction if he were to know? He would either be as horrified and shocked, or he already knows and keeps mum bc it is towards his benefit but he'd still resent & be disgusted with her or accuse her of being sluttish privately as if he's the paragon of sexual ethics. Again, perfectly shows her hypocrisy.

Really, it's that she doesn't have her bk!counterpart's ruthless politicking except in one episode out of 10 (the 6th one). It's ruined by the implication that she cannot really think or reason bc she was SAed for most of her married life and pimped out, which spells some disturbing, oversimplifying implications for SA victims and esp those who are femme, female identifying, or women/girls. From the already-there notion of femininity being innately "irrational", creative, and nonintellectual.

But I also ultimately agree with you abt her being more a plot device than a character who does what the script of the day requires her---once more, bc she's forced to delusionally see possible friendship in Rhaenyra AND bc she doesn't have a clear, steady, personal motive separate from the stuff Otto-the-individual imparts on her and that guides her actions aside from blind envy and a need to see everyone conform towards the "peace for the realm" that she herself doesn't even follow. Not like with Rhaenyra's desire to find some sort of functioning and the least self-erasing compromise b/t duty and happiness/autonomy when we see her w/Aemma.

We never truly established what Alicent wanted at the core--in the bk, that was the highest rank, prestige, etc. possible for a woman. In the first season, all the possible possibilities and things you can see in Olivia's portrayals show a woman wanting to find final validation within the system...but we needed a more concrete aim aside from her jealousy and other than fear of her kids dying, which is what we were left with. Show!Alicent went wherever the wind took her (the wind here Otto, perceived expectations of her, and her own resentments). That's the heart of the grand inconsistency, I think. The void that is this character.

They never replaced Alicent's loss of ambition with something just as self-serving than just "she should suffer like me" that guides and justifies that inner feeling into the real world. Something that would keep her interesting and engaged with the war players.

Rhaenyra still has huge issues in her characterization that I already went over in other posts. This article by some Substack writer also gets into it, but overall, Rhaenyra is more steady & concrete than Alicent.