#but just wanted to type out my thoughts

[itsaboutthepotential]

me still liking tellajacks/jackstella in 2024, but the only thing is not having people to talk to about them. 🥲

i still like the canon pairings, but to me, shipping is meant to be fun!

[stuckinapril]

friend wanted to see my tumblr, and when i told him i can’t show it to him bc it’s basically my personal diary he went “oh so I can’t see it but a bunch of strangers on tumblr can??” he literally does not get me. no one will get me like the people in my phone get me

[lylahammar]

People always talk about how Laios is a character who gives fat vibes even if he isn't technically fat in canon which is very true, and I have some thoughts on that!! (this will be a long post lol sorry)

There's a lot of material in the dunmeshi extras that show how fatness factors into dungeon exploration, which shows that only the most skilled adventurers are able to keep weight on while in the dungeon (thank you to @savaralyn2 for the translations! links to the individual posts these panels come from are added on the pics):

So we know, at the very least, that most of the characters are kept thinner than they would be naturally through the strain of death/revivification in the main dungeon. We also see that Laios has some fat on him, which through the text means that he's skilled enough to at least keep some of his weight (which makes sense, he doesn't die very often in canon).

(to be clear this ^ doesn't constitute as "fat," he is built as fuck here he just has some fat on his body which shows his prowess as a fighter in this universe) HOWEVER my personal little pet theory/headcanon is that Laios actually has a difficult relationship with food! I know that doesn't make much sense at first since he's shown to eat a lot in canon, but hear me out. In pre-canon, before he reunited with Falin, he's shown to be extremely gaunt:

But after partnering up with Falin, he gains weight and looks much more healthy very quickly. Part of this is definitely because of his unstable living situation/mental illness, but he and Falin still live in very poor conditions after this and he still manages to gain weight/get healthier, so I believe it's mainly due to her making sure he eats enough. We also know that Laios is. most certainly autistic. Nobody argue with me on that it's like pretty much widely accepted as canon for a lot of reasons lmao. So my theory is that he's actually food sensitive. He's shown to not really care about food that isn't monster-related. Even when he eats regular food, he's usually imagining it being a monster instead.

He has never eaten squid before, which is totally normal, but could also support my theory in a way :P it being a monster still can't save it from the autistic sensory bad experience in this case, though.

So I think that his adventurous eating during the course of the story isn't because he's actually an adventurous eater normally, it's purely because of his special interest (monsters, duh). During his journey to recover Falin, he's able to build up a healthier relationship with food through Senshi's guidance and the involvement of his special interest.

By the end of the story, after he's retired from dungeon exploration and living in comfort/safety, and with his newly healthy diet, he's finally able to gain a lot more weight. Imo, his is a story of someone who's naturally meant to be fat, but is only able to reach that point when in a stable and healthy environment.

(for the record I know he's not that fat in this post canon comic, but this is only a year and a bit after the end of the story so there's still time lol)

alright I'm goin back to drawing now just had to infodump for a minute ✌️ keep it sleazy

[bunnieswithknives]

hey in ur peri animatic: (https://youtu.be/OCqlRuDaXYU?si=K52WDu_vw9rg7chz) that I have been permanently obsessed over since today and have watched about 20 times by now so much that I have drawn & posted stuff based on it what was that partial bug form peri had?

I haven’t watched either of the show btw so if it’s explained in the show please tell me plsssss

OK, SO the bug thing is not technically canon to the series. It's based on my own headcanons for fairy biology, but i do have justifications for it!! Fairies have very strong shape-shifting abilities, so it would make sense that the form they show to humans isn't necessarily their true form(not to mention extreme that mimicry is very common in insects). And you want to know the visible traits almost every fairy has in common? Being very small with Insect-like wings.

The fact that their humanoid form isn't their true form in actually confirmed in the show! Cosmo and Wanda are revealed to look like biblically accurate pseudo-angels in the museum episode. (I say pseudo angels because the Flaming Sword of Eden is only debatably sentient and I don't think is considered an angel. Ophanim are also debatably not angels because they don't have wings (sorry for the angel tangent I like angels))

So wouldn't their true forms be angelic then? Well, yes. But I like bugs so. Also I have more headcanons to justify myself. I like to think that they have both a true-true form (incomprehensible to the human brain, probably exists mostly in a dimension invisible to us, that looks how we imagine biblically accurate angels), and a fairy form (which is visible to humans but is naturally very insect like and tends to scare people). So, in order to interact with humans, they have to learn to shapeshift into a humanoid form but will occasionally slip if they get too relaxed/aren't careful, hence the mandibles coming out when he yawns!

The reason they struggle so much more with human forms than the animals or objects they typically turn into is that, well, they aren't trying to convince those animals or objects. The more human they try to look, the harder it is to keep up convincingly. If you turn into a really uncanny squirrel, only other squirrels will notice. If you turn into a really uncanny human, they form a lynch mob and burn you at the stake.

[crustyfloor]

SUA LORE (I'm going to die one of these days fuck)

When Sua was younger, among all the sisters she had grown up with, she had one older sister, but seemingly, unlike their other sisters, that woman didn't treat Sua with hostility, in fact, she looked like she doted on Sua and looked out for her.

Translation (Creds to: @/greenbean1467 on yt in the comments section):

1/2 ?: You should take care of your hair. (Woah, careful) ?: So immature… 2/2 ?: Alright, it can’t be helped. Sua has to be punished! Tickle tickle! [ At that time, you were my only person, and for that reason, you also made me afraid. ]

"You were my only person, and for that reason, you also made me afraid" Is just...All her life, Sua had been an isolated individual, by choice, and because she had been shunned by her family, avoided due to her cold nature, and during those times she's only had two people to who she could really show herself too, this woman and Mizi, this woman being the only person Sua had in her life I can only imagine how afraid Sua was of losing her sister, and just how much her sister terrified her at times.

1/2 SUA: Mhm, so mother said, it’ll be time to leave after ten more nights. And mother seems happy, and I too… SUA: And that pink-haired kid could be there too, so… ?: Didn’t I tell you it’s uncouth to wiggle your toes like that? 2/2 SUA: Oh… I won’t then. ?: Ugh, so cute! ?: But you know, big sis is worried. ?: Worried that our immature little Sua could just up and die in that hellish place.

This woman and Sua look to be close; they are affectionate, and Sua almost seems to look up to this woman as if a sister figure, but the detail here I'm interested in is how worried this woman is about Sua and her remarks about Sua, she cares about Sua. Still, it shows that she looks down on Sua to some degree, whether this be in a teasing tone or not, I'm unsure. But there's an obvious obsessive fixation on Sua's innocence. And even in this relationship, cruelty was reinforced as a means to an end.

1/2 ?: You’re already so stupid, what if you just up and die in that place? ?: You poor thing, Sua. [They say that corpses fall from the sky in that place. When a weak kid like Sua just up and dies, They burn those kids in a hot, hot fire, And then they open the sky lid to sprinkle them over the living kids Like snow raining down. ] 2/3 ?: Even if it's not, I'm not smart, but I've gone so far ?: Pick--If you die. What should I do? ?: It's so cute Sua.

Growing up under the same guardian, Nigeh, who valued quality and beauty in her pets, it becomes obvious why Sua's sister was criticizing her appearance. She'd grown up hearing the same criticisms from the harsh and cold Nigeh who didn't care for their pets beyond their value, and what all they could bring to the plate, I could imagine just what kinds of things Nigeh would say to a pet human with "abnormalities".

Sua, however, was the perfect pet human, she was pretty, obedient, and acted obediently for Nigeh as a manicured doll to meet their expectations. She was attached to Nigeh like a daughter to a mother, looking to their validation to feel as if she was more valuable than she truly was even though the love wasn't reciprocated. For these reasons, she was treated differently from her other sisters, of course, there would be a level of envy and projection from Sua's sister.

Sua's sister is shown to be anxious about Sua, she seems to have been attached to her in the way a hurt child needs a security blanket to rest at night, Sua is so childish, naive, and stupid, it is reassuring to her sister to have someone to care for, as if there was still hope in this world, so without Sua, her sister's worries wouldn't be soothed, her sister was so scared that she even threatened Sua with fear, expressing how frightening and horrific this environment would be (Like, "Pick, if you die" I read it as "If I lose you, what should I do?)

In this way, Sua seems to parallel mirror woman because Sua had this same dependency on Mizi, again, in the way a hurt, lonely, scared child needs a security blanket to rest at night, Sua wanted Mizi to remain naive and stupid, willingly kept her in the dark so that Sua could feel a sense of peace and security through her, her sister was the same way with Sua, she wanted to keep Sua from the hell she would be subjected to very, very soon, but in the end, telling Sua ugly truths, about the snow, and all, had to have been fueled by bitter feelings, to rid Sua of that type of innocence, could have been any kind of love, perhaps in a twisted way she wanted to protect Sua.

She obviously had to have been mentally unstable (understandably) to say these kinds of things to a child, no less, the way she stares at Sua like she's desperate and broken, really, it's not loving, it's just desperate and cruel. Really, the fact that Alien stage can bring a person to this kind of insanity is a horrifying concept. Still, I believe she was trying to teach a lesson to Sua at this time in her life when she was growing up, making attachments and being susceptible to impressions, it was purposely harsh to frighten her, to project her fears onto Sua, and those words from her sister stuck with Sua for the rest of her life.

From that day on, all Sua could think about was death, all she could do was worry and worry until she met Mizi again.

Meeting Mizi, in all her optimism and bright smiles, was like a healing balm on Sua's wounds, or in other words, her "Cure" .

1/2 SUA: Big sister, your words then made me, as young as I was, all the more afraid. I imagined “just up and dying” so many times, even more than before… 2/2 SUA: But if I meet you again, I want to tell you this. That you were wrong. The one to be pitied was probably you.

1/2 SUA: If this is hell… 2/2 MIZI: Found you! You're that snow doll!

Interestingly enough, Mizi calling Sua a "snow doll" may be a foreshadowing of Sua's death, as now it's semi-confirmed that dead children are cremated and sprinkled down onto the Anakt children's faces, but they only think it's snow. (THAT IS JUST FUCKING SICK. someone kill me)

And a parallel to the MIZISUA video, their first meeting. (The nickname is just--telling of how Sua is perceived, as a little dressed-up doll.)

(And that fact just gives this piece a wholeeee darker meaning. of course. It somewhat disproves the theory that the dead are instead fed to the Wagyein, but I don't know which is worse. Then again Sua's sister could've been going off on a psychotic rant, so I'm not taking it too seriously. It's a weird coincidence though)

1/2 SUA: Where else could you find such a paradise so wonderful? 2/2 SUA: So you're wrong.

(Some nuance may be lost in translation. I died)

So this comic, like Ivan's comic after ROUND 6, Cure, Heavenly Garden, was Sua's reminiscing during her final moments, and her only thoughts were the words of her sister, her face, haunting as it was, and Mizi, her universe.

Sua's sister pitied her for her inevitable fate, she had known the life of being a pet-human, used, abused, and hurt, she feared death and still had her instincts intact. Knowing Sua would go through the same cycle and then meet a terrible fate on that hellish stage...tasted bitter. It was frightening, but it was one small liberty for Sua to make it something of her own.

But for Sua, it was far from hell. Sua's sister references Anakt garden and Alien stage as a whole as hell because it's a one-way ticket to your demise, there is no true life once you're in, that's why it's so frightening, but being found by Mizi in that garden--Mizi was wonderful, Mizi made Sua feel like a child, to feel warm in her bright, gentle light, feeling the tranquility of feeling freed and loved in the comfort of Mizi's gentle song, Sua didn't want to be pitied, she didn't even regret making it this far, she didn't care about death as long as she wasn't without Mizi, Because to be able to be with her, and sing with her...everything was all worth it to meet Mizi. For Sua, there is no fate more miserable than living a life without Mizi and dying that way. Living a life of loneliness and anxiety was pitiful.

Side note, the title of this comic, Heavenly Garden, maybe a religious reference and, more specifically, a reference to the Garden of Eden. The themes here that connect to "Return to the Great Anakt", all children, in ashes and all will eventually return to the great Anakt, it gives me the idea that after Sua's death, her "Heaven", was returning to Anakt Garden and returning to her paradise, Mizi.

[sweetlullabyebye]

Charles' thing is that he wants to feel alive and that's part of the reason why he decided to never move on to the afterlife right? Meanwhile Edwin thinks Charles will move on and that he'll be alone again because 'he isn't good with people'.

But then when the Night Nurse shows up a second time Charles is ready to go wherever -including Hell- as long as Edwin shouldn't have to go back there, meanwhile Edwin refuses that they be split up, and both are okay with being sent together to the Lost and Found Department to be sorted out later as long as they're together-

[fumifooms]

do you happen to have that page that talks about the beauty standards of each race?

Yeah sure. While scavenging pics for this I found this neat reddit compilation & chart & theory talk too. I had um, way more to say than I anticipated (I know you only wanted the one page. I have nothing to say for myself. Like most topics in Dunmeshi things snowball because they’re so interconnected. Mercy…) so, many races and observations are only mentioned near the bottom.

Beauty standards and race in Dungeon Meshi

Not pictured there’s also how elven society is harsh on visibly disabled people, and how the demon took away Mithrun’s silver eyes and ears to take away his pride. There’s also how Senshi might have fit in with the orcs more easily because of the dwarven wide body shape, and how they tend to have more body hair too I suppose. In the extra on orcs we see Senshi living with the orcs and he gets judged because of the hierarchy rather than his looks.

What is fashionable also differs from culture to culture, and there’s how tattoos only seem common with elves, though dwarves and others do also sometimes have some. They seem to not raise much brows, which makes sense since for many essentially they’re for professional (magical) purposes especially with elves. Gender roles also differ in type and importance, but generally they are similar to irl ones for the races we see. Elven society seems to be the least gendered, which would be an unsurprising logical outcome of having lesser sexual dimorphism aka they look more androgynous. Comparing fashions and gender roles and how they affect beauty standards would be a whole other compilation and conversation. Kui has great worldbuilding partially because she’s got such a good grasp on sociopolitics and geopolitics. History affects cultures and beauty standards greatly. Kui’s oneshot Distant Utopia was very eye opening on her way to worldbuild and the consideration she gives these things, I do really recommend reading it.

Out of the big 5, we know the least about gnomes, but their sheet does say both culture and region are similar to dwarves’ and they end up being confused together often, so we can imagine the beauty standards are similar to dwarves’ as well.

I wanted to touch on this in a post eventually, but how one daydream hour page said half-foots tended to be curvaceous like in the artwork below puzzled me for a long time, all the half-foot characters we see during canon are rather slender and lanky after all, Chil’s succubi also being more curvy than plump. Economics are for sure a factor in that I imagine, the half-foots characters we see are all implied to be some flavor of poor or malnourished, as are half-foots depicted as empoverished oppressed minorities in general. Even comparing the artwork with the half-foot sheet’s depicted average half-foot, the ones on the left seem bigger. Wouldn’t it make sense though, if unlike dwarves half-foots don’t have similar naturally wide bodies, yet due to idolizing dwarves they work towards having a similar body shape/type to emulate them?

It’s said half-foots tend to stick to pretty ethnically homogeneous regions (aka half-foots-only communities) unless they move to the big city with ambition to try and make it big (like Chilchuck and his wife & kids did), and that’s interesting imo because then that would mean that in a ton of half-foot communities, they rarely see or interact with dwarves whom they try to emulate. Of course, one thing about beauty standards is that when they get adopted, at one point it stops being "this is how dwarves look and so this is how half-foots should look" and just becomes "this is how half-foots should look", most people feel as though beauty standards aren’t learned but innate, so I figure the half-foots wouldn’t have any problem still seeking dwarvish traits when there are no dwarves around.

There’s also stuff you can glean here and there if you want to extrapolate more. Like how in the race swap artworks, Mickbell is only smiling in the dwarf portrait, and Rin’s elven portrait looks very close to her elven one- Rin who is stated to be beautiful in her profile blurb. Benichidori’s extra does teach us tallmen can definitely have harsh beauty standards, but also since the text portrays her as very dysmorphic that’s likely reflected in her thoughts to a much more intense degree than is common, not an accurate strict baseline to go off. Ah, Kabru’s blue eyes are also why he and his mother lived a rough life in Kabru’s hometown, but that seems to be regional. Good post here on the topic of Kabru’s blue eyes and ties to irl history. There’s a lot to be said about Kabru being a man that in many ways is close to elven beauty standards, and how that might have affected or been affected by his upbringing with elves + his persona as someone that can effortlessly charm most people. Marcille’s section here in this essay also goes into Marcille’s struggles to fit in with the ideal image of an elf.

Looking human

Also notable are beastkins and demihumans: Demihumans are all dehumanized which makes people treat them worse. So if you differ from the visual idea of "human" (an in-world subjective categorization just as much as demihuman is) most people do judge you negatively. Elves and dwarves get to fight about which type of human is considered the prettiest, but demihumans are below tallmen and half-foots, they are considered as simply below the beauty contest, incompatible with it.

Onis are perhaps the demihuman people we know of with the least cultural influence on the dunmeshi world, and with the least intensely different appearance than other demihumans—they seem to be technically categorized as human to people not from the eastern archipelago?— but even them are treated as lesser than human, treated as beasts to slain for reputation points or useful strength to have around and command. It’s said their "magnificient horns" and fangs are often shaven off when the oni lives in tallman towns, so you could easily make the argument that onis are denied the right to have their own beauty standards, having to conform to other people’s and going through mutilation to take away features they might otherwise have taken pride in. Inutade was bought by the Nakamotos from a dangerous sumo fighting ring that got one of Inutade’s tooth broken on her first and only fight, and kept as a low ranking servant ever since. Remember when I said different fashions existed in dunmeshi and how those could also affect beauty standards? Like the elves, if you look at the portraits pages which include a lot of characters that aren’t in the story you can see distinct cultures within the same races, for example one young elf is bald which is in sharp contrast with the usual elven long luscious hairstyles, and that’s especially true for onis I think. Maybe not only from different regions but different eras as well… They have a bit of population in the very north of the western continent, so I like to think some of the ogres live in very cold, maybe even subarctic or arctic conditions. The point I’m getting at here is that within a race, culture/ethnicity like with Kabru will also influence them it isn’t just tallmen as a whole, different communities will have differing beauty standards. The oni history blurb and third row first collumn portrait remind me of Mongolia (which historically was a lot of different nomadic communities with different cultural identities as well. Something something, the oni empire experienced a decline and then tallmen overpowered them, and now they’re governed and split apart by stronger social classes & slavers and the richness of culture was hurt for it especially if they have no real community left of their own), but obviously many of them are dressed and look rather japanese, makes sense considering living in/close to Wa, and first row second collumn portrait reminds me of ainus which again would be logical considering geographical placement, though I’m far from an expert. Interestingly, ainus are indigenous people both in Japan and Russia- Perhaps the northern western continent ogres are meant to be closer to Russia than Canada like I imagined? Ok tangent over.

The kobold sheet says they’re especially sought after as slaves because they’re "adorable", but locally in the western continent they’re repeatedly said to be seen more as ferocious and dangerous. The dehumanization is most apparent in the first comic below. The language barrier and conflicts no doubt worsen this by a lot, but I think it’d be hard to deny that their canine appearance makes the dehumanization worse. "They’re ferocious beasts, they’re demihumans, they can’t be communicated with". Most characters in Dungeon Meshi’s world are desensitized to slavery and most characters are prejudiced one way or another. Point being, kobolds are fully removed from human beauty standards, but no doubt for kobolds, other kobolds are more beautiful than humans are. They’re assumed to be an uncivilized bunch, but just like any other people they like to adorn themselves with nice clothes and jewelry and keep themselves clean and groomed; they too take care of their appearance and take pride in it.

And the orcs! This one we have the most contact with in canon, with not only there being foreigner characters from the ethnicity or hearsay of their homelands and culture but full on contact with a community. We get to see up close what they’re like and what they think, and of course in turn they’re our introduction to how demihumans are harshly looked down upon and seen as inferior, less human and thus less worth valuing and less dignified. It’s text that orcs are ugly to most humans and humans are ugly to most orcs. Since I judged they didn’t need accompanying explanation the pictures showing this are in the pictures dump at the top.

God forbid you sell vegetables to orcs my god- but then again they do basically mandate adventurers to kill any orcs they come across so yeah the world isn’t above that even a little bit.

So yes, my main point here is simply that orcs are yet another evidence of the physical ideal of "human" being an important beauty standard for human societies globally.

Izutsumi is our glimpse at how beastkins are treated in the world, and in Wa at least that’s ending up being caged and mistreated as part of a freak show. Izutsumi hates her appearance and wishes she could leave the feline part of herself behind to only be human. Interestingly, not that we have a lot of info on them so this is very much a take with a grain of salt situation, but there seems to be less stigma around artificial beastmen, those who can shapeshift at will. The main difference is of course appearance, that most of the time they simply look like average tattooed humans. Artificially creating humans is an illegal practice, and no doubt it’s not well regarded, but being able to hide that makes them less likely to be discriminated at any moment, or even just discriminated less intensely. Again, looking human is important, not only for belonging but for safety’s sake. Beauty standards rule the world with harsh hands.

Mermaids and fishmen

Ok we’re done now right? Right-! But wait… Wait…! Mermaids and fishmen are said to be demihumans too, special separate cases to the main three demihuman species however, which is also represented by how mermaids and fishmen both are in the Adventurer’s Bible chapter Monsters meanwhile ogres, kobolds and orcs are in the chapter World. They’re an interesting topic because they directly tackle this topic, not only in a meta way for the readers but also making characters themselves struggle to quantify their humanity with the goal of knowing wether they should be eaten or not, especially Chilchuck. Chilchuck’s "is it really just a matter of feelings?" mini arc.

The party asking themselves "Should we eat this?" is very common, and often they end up playing a little loose on morality, like eating the red dragon’s meat despite it having digested Falin. Not unsimilarly Marcille freaks out a little over the vegetables they harvested having been grown with fertilizer, aka largely human poo. Half of the motivation of "should we eat this perhaps sentient creature" is out of consideration and compassion, but more strongly and more often, the characters struggle with a sense of taboo at eating something too closely related to humans. Even, feel uncomfortable because of the deepseated impression that eating it would dirty them in some way. Cannibalism is an interesting and relevant topic in many ways, but what I want to mention is how there’s the more or less universal belief that committing cannibalism inherently taints you as a person and turns you more monstrous, morally but also literally depending on some myths such as w*ndigos and onis in some cases, like in Touge Oni. Marcille and Izutsumi both express a fear of eating monsters turning them monstrous. Maybe this is part of what Laios was hoping for, honestly. There are two fears here, if eating a demihuman monster constitutes as cannibalism or not, and so, will eating it taint you because it’s a human, or will eating it taint you because it’s a monster? You are what you eat, until it’s a little too literal. You morally are the means by which you get your food, and you physically are the result of your nutrition. Dungeon meshi manages to mix an exploration of humanity with the theme of food because our relationship to food is very deep and complex, psychological as much as physiological.

In the end, the characters sort of shrug and accept that they’ll never quite understand the world of mermaids and fishmen and how they operate, and what that means about them. Laios is the one always challenging these notions other characters take for granted, it’s not obvious to Laios why people are softer on mammals than other animals and plants, it’s not obvious to Laios why people would be afraid of eating a monster just because it’s a monster, it’s not obvious to Laios why some food is gross to Marcille but not fish testicles, it’s not obvious to Laios why you should immediately regard orcs and kobolds badly.

"Cows are probably closer to humans [aka closer to being human] than fishmen, though they’re clearly intelligent", dehumanization to lessen empathy towards them to be able to eat them. Meanwhile, mermaids seemingly have a less noticeable "civilization" or intelligence, they hunt in groups like fishmen, but they don’t use tools and such, they feel more primal and similarly instinct driven, and yet… Do they attract sympathy more? Mammals, humans, is it because of their nature or because of their appearance?

Both the nature and appearance of fish are ones people don’t typically sympathize with. "Fish don’t feel pain", "goldfish only have 5 seconds of memory", "it’s okay to keep fish in completely empty bowls too small for them until they die from it", so many lies and misconceptions exist that make people less considerate of them. The average lifespan of a goldfish is 10-15 years, the record is 43, but they’re not seen as lives that really matter, so a lot of goldfish die in a few weeks of bad aquarium conditions. There’s a lot of research on animals evolving to look cute and appealing to make some predators want to kill them less and parents want to care for them more, including humans. First good google research result gave me this credible short article on the topic. In Chilchuck’s weighing wether a fishman is far enough from being human or not to eat, "face is 100% fish" is his biggest argument for it being more acceptable. The face, the most important thing for empathy and recognition. The face, the decapitated fishman one that falls into his hands next chapter.

To quote @room-surprise: "Chilchuck can't explain why it's wrong to eat the merpeople, even though it's NOT complicated. But the problem is Chilchuck would have to accept and acknowledge that the merpeople might be people? And that's outside of the worldview he passively believes, so he can't just say that, because he doesn't think that's true. But that IS why he "feels" it's wrong. And it's all you'd need to say for Laios to understand! But it would require acknowledging that maybe the way they're treating and talking about the merpeople is wrong."

The idea of Chil not being able to grapple with how maybe some monsters are more humans than they seem, him who had been an advocate of half-foots rights, half-foots who get undermined and treated as inconsequential sacrifices… Grappling with how he could relate to the merpeople’s situation almost, and pulling away because it’s so existentially horrifying. I do not want to see myself into an hostile fish-faced warrior I can’t communicate with. In a way this also relates to Chilchuck being the only party member who doesn’t see Izutsumi as a cat in the relationship chart, the only one to treat her with full human dignity. He knows the struggle to be taken seriously, he knows being infantilized and he knows what it’s like to be treated as less than human.

Below, you will see Chilchuck draws the line of where they become not okay to eat as when "they already look like mermaids". Above, there’s speculation that the algae hair is partly to mimic "the mermaids’ beautiful female form". Is it because mermaids are their enemies and the ambiguity might give them extra seconds to attack or flee? Is it to trick adventurers instead? It’s striking to me that this is what works, with the adventurers. Sure the fishmen are intelligent, but explicitly here, what makes them no longer acceptable prey to Chilchuck is that they look close enough to a mermaid, close enough to human. Mermaids who of course themselves have this form to entice and seduce and charm the adventurers they prey on. Chilchuck considers the intelligence due to the tridents, but most of his internal debate centers around their appearance, and the image of a fishman skewered sickens him. The power of mimicry… Mimic being a beautiful human woman. Mimic being cute, babies being wired to make us feel protective and softened. Half-foots, sometimes pretending to be children for scams or help or avoiding trouble.

The mermaids are only concerned by their differences and not their similarities, and have no trouble treating the fishmen as food rather than peers. To an outside perspective like us, the audience, all these categorization of "more human" and "less human" between onis and orcs and elves and tallmen etc seem stupid and unfounded, but to the people living in Dungeon Meshi’s world, elves may as well be mermaids while onis are fishmen, not alike at all, unworthy of empathy and thus fine to eat.

Ultimately, Dungeon Meshi promotes unity. It’s about seeking to understand the unknown and the misunderstood, the dehumanized and the inhuman. It shows the good that comes from seeking to understand what you do not, even when that’s one another.

[sevenines]

i saw this tweet and found it interesting for two reasons. one is that some people base how good cartoon network would be to toh by how it treated su, and despite the fact that su’s treatment by the network was considered poor at the time, now its thought to be exceptionally good in comparison to modern shows.

two is how exactly su got impacted by a limited budget. a common criticism is how characters like connie, peridot, and lapis are left out of missions. but balancing a lot of characters is not only hard but also costly (extra animation, extra voices—it’s been revealed that the show is limited to a set number of characters per episode otherwise they’re over budget). animation mistakes are not uncommon since retakes cost extra. the entire reason the original show got cut short was due to loss of funding!

[masterofiodine]

bbc ghosts modern au!!

making up their outfits was really fun (especially kitty and thomas, he would look great in skirt)

[gobstoppr]

Tetris Fanart.

I've been playing tetris while listening to horror podcasts. and yeah

[justanotheryellowsoul]

More pages under the cut, it just got a little long!

So if Mira doesn't have her big talk in the last run and neither does Isa, what if, just hear me out- they talked to each other.

Part 2!

[disaster-magician]

Had a lot of fun using the template by anikiri._.6 on insta and my most recent comm from @sunflowerpin to show off my baby more 💕

[i-am-not-a-who-i-am-a-what]

so about the header that proceeded today's statement:

Viability as agent: Low

Viability as subject: None

Viability as catalyst: Medium

i didn't know what to think of this part of the entry at first, but the longer the statement went on... was the institute in this universe trying to manufacture avatars?

the dice can't do anything without someone to use them, they can't be an "agent" by themselves, but might be capable of manipulation, so in that aspect their viability is "low."

the dice could be a "subject" in the sense that they could use further studying, but the statement itself was a very thorough investigation of their workings, so in that aspect their viability is "none."

the dice seem to influence their holder to roll them, or at least find more victims to roll them, and could therefore be described as a "catalyst" for someone's becoming. but, as seen in the statement, their owner can give the dice to someone else (albeit not without consequences), so in that aspect their viability is only "medium."

so what about the line following all this, what does "Recommend referral to Catalytics for Enrichment applicability assessment" mean? if we go by this interpretation, i'd say it could mean the institute wanted to find a way to make the dice even more potent as an artifact, maybe even remove that pesky ability for their owner to reject them.

imho all of this this brings a whole new level of context to the events of episode seven, of unknown violent agents going after an influx of objects that seemed straight out of artifact storage. was that the nature of the titular "magnus protocol" first mentioned in episode four, the one that involved the starkwall group? containing or destroying potential artifacts before the institute could get their hands on them?

it also makes their "gifted kids program," and sam's link to it as one of the kids being studied, all the more horrifying to think about. was it not just avatars in general they were after, but child avatars specifically? no wonder gertrude got so defensive over the possibility of sam and celia dragging gerry back into the institute's business last episode, we all picked up on her clearly knowing more than she's letting on but now we might know the shape of that information a bit better.

and one final bit of food for thought... this statement had a lot of familiar themes, didn't it? free will or the illusion of it, gambling and not-so-random chance, the statement giver being done in by one final hit from what feels like a bit of an addition... all hallmarks of a certain mother of puppets. doesn't it seem fitting that "chester" would use this kind of statement to warn sam about what harm pursuing the magnus institute could bring to him, considering the one his voice might draw from? and doesn't it seem so painfully ironic that his warning seems to have only driven sam further into that web?

[moreaugriffins]

IDK who needs to hear this, but Egon and Ray aren't the only autistic og ghostbusters

Peter is too

Your telling me this man with two PhDs related to psychology, who always has the exact right thing to say to manipulate a situation to his favour (when it's a planned/known situation), but cocks up massively when it's an unknown situation, who has a massive reaction to getting slimed (more so than the others), who would rather joke all the time than take a situation seriously because wtf should he say

you're telling me this man is neurotypical?

nah

Winston's the only NT in this group (idk how he deals with these weirdos (affectionate))

[lunarharp]

shirahama-sensei reminded me she has a thing for the teacher from pokemon s/v so i randomly went off on an au where qifrey is the professor. etc