#but like. a lot of potential in a foil always and that did not see it through to the sequel

[spotaus]

Late Night quick thing (New Age Sillies)

Bad news: That joke post about including Reset + Orchid is definitely not canon. (I legit got sad thinking about Reset being in a universe where Orchid isn't- because their stories are so so intertwined- but Nightmare 100% would NOT risk the whole twins exploding Error's soul thing.)

Good news: This means I COULD include Kane (Reset's older brother who usually dies in timelines where Reset is born) and use it to develope his character a bit more! Also! Perhaps a Blue × Dream kiddo is finally in the stars for me to design?

[allegoryofthebeast]

I am obsessed that Jedi: Survivor explores Cal more or less slipping into the dark side/dark behaviors and patterns and how leaning into emotion as a Jedi can make you significantly more powerful though also extremely reckless and aggressive - however a balance could perhaps be reached by Jedi with the patience and support to understand their darker emotions and how it could be beneficial or harmful given the situation. But they fr don’t. Every time something within that vein happens to Cal everyone is like damn… crazy. Anyway

[ofbreathandflame-archive]

stans are actually very funny bc they often time talk themselves into the weirdest corners.

the whole point of criticizing acosf and its handling of nesta's character is to prove the point that sjm...doesn't like nesta as a character. that's is literally THE point - that sjm often abandons her moral themes (abuse, trauma, assault, etc.,) for character's deemed as undesirable or villainous to a capacity - and its through the handling of those 'vilified' (i.e. main character opposed - not even villianous) that we can gauge the extent to which sjm actually believes the ideals of her story. like - it is alarming that the only tolerable, empathetic parts of the a court of silver flames were the moments you could tell where ripped straight from sjm's own life (the hiking, training, mind-stilling etc.,). any actual characteristics about nesta weren't explored...like at all. her relationship with feyre and elain, with her mother, her trauma from her sexual assault, her conflicted relationship with her grandmother, her life before the cabin, her life during the cabin. in 800 pages - i still don't know mama archeron's name. what was life like in the cabin? what did nesta do all day? what was the dynamic? what was going on between elain and nesta?i don't know anything about her and nesta, we don't know anything about nesta's human life, her conversation with clare bedor, her relationship with clare beddor, moments with her dad - not even touching moments with him (and part of this story is her finding love for her dad). mind you we read 800+ pages and we learned absolutely nothing about her.

we essentially read sjm's emotional journey in one part, and a taming of the shrew narrative in another. i think the only way sjm had genuine interest in exploring nesta's story is through essentially self-inserting herself and avoiding the actual plot-points she set up in the first three books. like did nesta have childhood friends? if losing the wealth so drastically affected her life wouldn't she reminisce about it a lot? would she yearn for her mother? who were her childhood friends, how did she function at court?

and the whole point of saying alll of that is to argue the misuse of these topics - serious discussions abuse are only reserved for certain situation, and others its completely undermined in a way that only reinforces the negative ideals to begin with. (i.e. nesta needs to abused bc..." "the intervention was harsh but" - pair that with discussion around what feyre needed in acomaf - and it makes much more sense).

nesta antis often jump between the fact that nesta is so favored that sjm nerfed feysand to 'redeem her' and arguing that sjm secretly does everything in her power to embarrass and secretly laugh at people who like nesta's character. (1) we've gotta pick one or the other (2) in my humble opinion - sjm would have always given feyre a pregnancy plot like this regardless of whether this was nesta's book or elain. its literally so sjm. im shocked people are surprised she pulled the pregnancy as she did.

as with the tamlin discussion we had under this post - i think the story undermines its discussion of abuse with feyre/tam by essentially insinuating that tamlin (when placed in the same victimized position as feyre) should have sucked it up and braved out his abuse with amarantha (and the same with rhysand as well - esp with the deliberate foil of rhysand's 'willingness' v. tamlin's unwillingness). and when we start to have a real conversation ultilizing our own irl analysis and standards we really see how harmful and rather sisyphean the conversation becomes. instead of engaging with these topics earnestly, they only engage in them to prove a point - which is how the issue began in the first place. the whole issue with rhysand isn't the fact that he engages with harmful, potentially villainous positions. no - its that the book wants to prove that tamlin is wrong by justifying rhysand's actions. so even though rhysand and tamlin almost always have the same written and expressed intentions in their abuse of feyre, the book flocks to justify one, and eschews the other. and thats why we get so much reactionary critcism of rhys that is surface: people only admit the problems because they know antis will, not because they actually believe their are issues in the story.

and perhaps im still speaking into a void here but i can tell there's tension between pro stans wanting to have these serious conversations but understanding they can only really introspect so far until the conversation begin to prod at the validity of the topics being brought forth. so stans have to jump between invalidating the romantasy genre ("its just faeries") and treating this book as a serious topic (cue: "sjm put a hotline in the back of the book"). this is also the exact reason why the racism conversations stall (i.e. why inherent superiority is always passively emphasized - despite cc1 + 2 centering human oppresion there is no human in the ensemble cast. despite the fact that illyrian women are the most oppressed - rhys has no illyrian women - or reg illyrians (not his brothers) in his inner circle. aelin 'sacrificing' her human body).

[violetasteracademic]

I mean, I love Lucien so much but it’s obvious that he’s not that excited about the mating bond. It feels like it was something that was imposed on him, not something that makes him happy (as it was the case for Rhys and Cassian). He even used the world “shackled”. What can be worse than that? After a while, he didn’t even care about living someplace else and not seeing her often. He knows they’re a bad match and it’s possibly questioning the Cauldron.

I love both of them and they deserve better. Sometimes I wonder if the people that believe that Elain has to be with Lucien because he’s her mate, also believe that women should stay in unhappy, miserable marriages because they see divorce as a “sin”

Hello lovely anon!

Looooong post ahead, we are gonna get into it! I agree with you completely on this. I am a pro L/cien Elriel, and always have been. My first Tumblr post was a dissertation about Vassien for goodness sake, and my excitement for their story is genuinely second to Elriel! The secret Spell-Cleaver's son and the cursed queen, the bird of flame and lord of fire, there is so much I love about them. I did an entire breakdown on the possibilities of Vassien's story using Sarah's usual book structures and all of the information we have on them, because there is so much driving them plot wise and thematically it's actually crazy.

I think that sometimes it can be really easy to miss theme while reading these books, but it is something SJM puts a lot of work into and threads throughout her stories.

I spend a LOT of time talking about my girl Elain, and even though I love the boys they are just kinda there for me as cute little accessories for our ladies. So I appreciate this opportunity to talk more about who is right for whom from the mens perspective based on the themes woven throughout the books with a focus on L/ucien and Azriel, and whether or not Elain fits into those themes. In my opinion, these are the strongest indicators of what ultimately is being subliminally pushed by authors on the road to happiness for our characters.

I'm gonna nerd out about writing for a sec, but good writing has clean character arcs. Good romance shows the blind spots or flaws of the lead characters, and how their romantic interest will balance or push the character to growth. If there are multiple love interests, one of the love interests will undoubtedly leave the main character stagnant, or perhaps fulfill some external ideals rather than following their own heart.

Here are some examples of themes when it comes to Elain and Azriel, and I'm pushing myself to focus on Azriel here and not my girlie 🌸

Here we are being introduced to the areas where Azriel has blind spots to his own personal happiness. It is nearly impossible to get Azriel to take any time for himself that doesn't't involve work or training. He rips himself to shreds for mistakes, his perfectionism bordering on sadistic.

The time he spends with Elain is a direct foil to Azriel's inability to do anything other than work or train without being pushed to the extreme by his loved ones. He chooses to sit with Elain in the garden. He chooses to stay up until three am listening to her design plans. He chooses to rest in the sunlight with her. This is a direct tie of the author stating what this character needs, and then blatantly showing who is giving it to him.

G/wyn also trains hard and is competitive and perfectionistic. It makes total sense to me that people think this is cute, however, theme wise, it is a representation of a stagnant arc. The idea that training is a foundational element to an Az and G's potential relationship actually directly parallels Azriel's greatest obstacle to happiness- which is that he cannot allow himself to rest and *not* train.

Feyre and Rhys had to teach each other to share burdens, though it was extremely difficult. Cassian had to teach Nesta how to forgive herself and believe she was worthy of love. What Azriel needs is someone to help him believe he is worthy of rest and mistakes. These themes are tied to Elain.

There is also the issue of his hands and physical touch, and his feelings of worthiness.

Again, we discover that even if Morrigan, the woman he has supposedly been madly in love with for 500 years, stripped naked in front of Azriel, he still wouldn't touch her. We've also seen Morrigan cringe away from his hands. Meanwhile, Elain called his scarred hands beautiful. Elain initiated every act of touch in the bonus chapter. Elain moved so that his hand was covering her neck, and she wanted it.

Azriel fought against his feelings of disgust over his hands. He experienced intrusive thoughts about how he shouldn't be touching her with the things he has done. And yet, his feelings for her, and the feeling of touching her, was powerful enough to override the loop of self hate that tells him he is unworthy of being wanted.

So if Azriel's two themes that need to be challenged in his romantic relationship is lack of rest and lack of touch, Elain has already been pushing growth in those areas over multiple books. With G/wyn, whom he has not touched because of the strict line of professionalism with the priestesses and the only time they spent together training (which is also the thing Azriel uses to distract himself and push himself to the brink of exhaustion) thematically, for Azriel's specific needs in romantic growth, we are stagnant.

Moving on to L/cien, because there is a lot here for him as well and I believe we are being shown how Elain is also thematically the opposite of what L/cien needs.

Unlike Azriel, L/cien has experienced true, authentic, deep, consensual love. And the first thing he does when he meets Elain is compare her to the woman he loves, and frankly, he's not really understanding how someone like Elain could be his mate because she is so different from Jesminda.

L/cien is attracted to wildness, mischief and laughter. Someone who loved him not because of his status or stature, but choosing him for who he was. This is never going to be possible with Elain. L/cien's status as a High Lord's son plays a huge role in Rhys not wanting Azriel to interfere with their relationship. At this point, even if Azriel never pursues Elain again, that is the reason why. The Blood Duel, and L/ucien's status as a High Lord's son. If L/ucien were not these things, Rhys never would have interrupted their kiss. So even if Elain *chooses* L/cien in the end, it will never have been without question. It will never be untangled with this status as a High Lord's son, and it will never be because they weren't mates first before falling in love. In Lucien's monologue about Jesminda, we learn that the mating bond is not the ideal way for L/cien to fall in love either. With all his trauma and abuse and lack of choice in his own life, he both wants and deserves to be loved without question. This will absolutely never be true with Elain, no matter how their story develops.

Lucien desires to be chosen away from High Fae culture and societal expectations. We also see how he is drawn to things wild and free, who says to hell with all of it. I'm choosing who I love and how I show up in this world.

And then we meet the human queen Vassa.

A foul mouthed, foul tempered queen who Lucien warns Feyre of right away that she will corner her to ask for help breaking her curse (which she absolutely does 🤣)

In the same book where Lucien can't help but compare Elain to the fiery love of his life, and feel Elain was thrown at him, he winds up on an adventure with a literal firebird queen with the attitude and energy to match. Perhaps someone who could taunt and tease Lucien within an inch of his life?

Thematically, Lucien has also struggled with the concept of home. He has bounced from court to court, facing different forms of abuse and control. He has never been truly free or comfortable anywhere he has lived. And he doesn't feel truly free or comfortable in Velaris. In fact, he can't stand it.

This is similar to what happened with Jesminda and the Autumn court. Her people no longer welcome Lucien because they believe he is responsible for what happened to her. Lucien doesn't want to return to Tamlin, but Spring was his home, and now he can't return there either because those outside of the high lords manor hate him for believing him being complicit.

Lucien and Vassa are also tied thematically through themes of manipulation and two faced people selling them out.

Which again, brings us full circle to L/ucien's theme of passivity. He believes he did not protect Jesminda. That her death was a betrayal of trust. This is a deep wound that needs healing.

Meanwhile, when it comes to Elain, he has maintained a passive stance. He is always telling others to get her back, or take her here, or do this. But if something were to happen to her, he never would have been the one to step in and stop it. He is repeating his passive behavior with Elain, beyond simply staying away from her. The theme is rooted much more deeply than that. It is tied to his past traumas and failures.

Meanwhile, when it comes to Vassa, he stares out to sea and sets a target on Koschei.

Elain is not going to be the one to shake L/ucien out of passivity and into action. Vassa is. And my understanding is that even E/ucien's believe this is true, they just assume Elain will be required for some reason. But what the E/ucien version of saving Vassa lacks is thematic resolution. Character arc and growth. L/cien's love interest being the foil to his passivity. Forcing Elain into the saving Vassa storyline makes it less of an emotional growth arc for all characters involved.

So no, I don't think Elain is right for L/cien, and I don't think L/cien thinks she is either. He is going to have to step up and fight for his woman. He has to face ghosts haunting him, and the fact that he didn't protect the woman he loves in the past. He is showing no protective, proactive behavior towards Elain. He *is* showing protective, proactive behavior with Vassa.

Azriel is not showing the ability to find peace and rest and breaks from work and training with G/wyn. He *is* showing the ability to find peace and rest and breaks from training with Elain. He is not showing an ability to let his hands touch someone's skin and work through the traumatic feelings that can bring up with G/wyn. He *is* experiencing that with Elain.

Obviously Elain's choice is theme, and we all know where that is headed. But it IS worthwhile to (occasionally 😝) pay attention to the men and their deeper traumas, threads and themes, and look at where the work of storytelling is already healing those things as opposed to putting the emotional labor on the women of the story to magically fix their men in their future books.

Phew, this wound up being a lot longer than I intended for it to be! I also agree that there are a lot of women projecting an incredible amount of internalized misogyny and frankly the least woman first takes I have ever seen in this fandom. It's disheartening and bizarre, especially when there is so much fantasy written by men where women solely exist to get r/aped or fill the needs of men. We should be celebrating stories written by women and for women, and appreciate authors who push against the societal norms of the roles women play in fantasy books and in real life.

[emelinstriker]

{Triad AU} Wukong ♡ Crafty Love

This is my own lil take/idea on the Triad AU by @skittlescripts​ - Basically you don't have a double life in my version but are the reincarnation of his love. Just cuz I can only write what my interest chooses to sit on, and it apparently didn't sit well with the by day/nightlife concept hfdngfhdngfd- So it ended up with picking a different path in my head. :'D

Smol doodle drawn by me with my persona cuz it fits more than a random Wukong screenshot. c:

♡ ~ Fluff ~ ♡

Today was a pretty chill day for your workplace. You did have customers come in, but it wasn't as many as usual. Assuming people were simply busy themselves today, you didn't think much of it. Well, that was until one of your co-workers told you about how your boss seemed to have gotten into some trouble with a member of the local triad. Something along the lines of her having gotten into an argument over keeping the restaurant on their king's turf. But apparently it was a lower member, so he ended up threatening to get a higher-up. And customers who received the news were wary about eating there for a while.

Nothing happened however, so it seemed more like an empty threat from your boss's point of view.

And yet due to what you heard, you were a little bit on edge yourself. Mainly about the potential shut down of the restaurant, making you essentially jobless once more. And you actually did enjoy your job here.

You were the one who designed the restaurant aesthetically, making it feel more welcoming for those afraid of the organization lurking everywhere. And since the restaurant was in a rather shady part of Megapolis, it stood out quite a long. You were also in charge of making to-go packages look nicely. Aluminum animals were littered around the windows for show of your abilities in the crafts of origami and general design.

And it did garner a lot of attention because most passerby found it really cute. Even customers' children sometimes asked if they could make their own little animals with your assistance. But your skills did not make you famous or really be seen. You were quite invisible to the public eye, always sitting quietly in a corner or in the back of the restaurant. In fact, you were so invisible that the two powerful demons that came in later that day didn't notice you folding up another delivery for someone who ordered for pick-up. The customer specifically asked for a fox as a little gift for one of his family members. You yourself were so occupied by your artistic piece and playlist's music that you didn't notice them coming in either.

The demons were talking to your co-worker and were 'kindly' asking for your boss. And of course, your co-worker, terrified as she was, jogged towards the back to get your boss.

"Ugh, why does everyone keep on picking this part of the city for their business?" The monkey with an eye patch questioned while scrolling through his phone, thoroughly bored. He knew this 'talk' wouldn't take long, so why was he demanded to join in the first place?

The other simian leaning against the counter huffed, "Well, they simply don't learn this area is off-limits. I don't even see any reason to keep this restaurant here anyway. We can just scare off every customer if we go the non-violent route." He quickly flipped through the menu, or rather looked at solely the pictures. "Even the food here looks mediocre at best. Killing the people here plus the business would actually be a blessing."

"At least the decoration's nice. I mean, look at this cat!" The black-furred one commented, holding up a miniature kitten made out of aluminum foil he found by the counter.

"Hm, true", the other one admitted. His eyes then glanced around the room's decor... until his eyes landed on you.

You, who made The Great Sage instantly freeze in shock.

You, who was sitting lonely in the corner of the empty restaurant.

You... who looked like an exact replica of his long lost lover, just with different clothing.

His one and only beloved, who managed to tame this beast of a feral demon... until they died to another demon's talons. It caused the Monkey King to snap and make sure this demon would no longer serve as a reminder of what happened. The environment wasn't safe from the encounter either. Unfortunately, he was unable to bring you back, and he had no way of knowing if you would ever be able to reincarnate. But it seems he finally had found you after so many years. And you were the one behind the creation of the only good thing about this restaurant.

The monkey stared at you for so long that his eyes started to dilate and his tail started to slowly swish from side to side. His lips curled into a soft smile as he witnessed your happiness with your work. His friend seemed to notice and followed his gaze.

Ah. Now he understood.

He smirked at his superior's lovestruck expression. Until your co-worker returned, trailing behind your boss, who suddenly seemed a lot more anxious than ever before. The two monkeys gazes snapped back at the two women behind the counter. One monkey seemed amused while the other seemed to have been caught off-guard.

"Yeah, so, we came here because one of my men noticed your restaurant and you were not willing to leave our turf. And we came to settle what he didn't manage to do", the black-furred one stated nonchalantly, his gaze lingering back onto his phone, seemingly searching for something specific.

"Oh Great Sage Equal To Heaven! I beg of you! Please don't kill us!" Your boss pleaded, lowering her head and putting her hands together.

The Great Sage's eyes then glanced back over to you, still vibing to your music and smiling at your crafty little work. You just finished another smaller fox as extra, and he couldn't help but find it absolutely adorable. He then looked back at your boss with a smirk. "You know what? Nevermind, you get to keep your lives and your business."

Confused, yet still frightened, your boss asked him what made him change his mind.

"Simple. You got one amazing and absolutely stunning crafty person working here. Would be a shame if anything happened to your or this business while they still work here~", he answered as his eyes traveled back over to your corner. Your boss glanced between him and you repeatedly before laughing in what one could only describe as a mix of relief and confusion... or concern.

"W-Well, they are a great person, indeed! I assigned them to this task specifically because they don't want to be seen or have to talk to customers. So we- ...huh?" Your boss stopped, watching helplessly as The Great Sage Equal To Heaven approached your seat with his hands in his pockets. Both her and your co-worker were silently praying for your life.

You were still busy with another aluminum animal, when you suddenly felt someone's presence drawing closer. You finally looked up when the person was hovering over you. "Um... may I help you, sir?" You asked as you took off your headphones. What you didn't expect was that the person was a monkey with fancy-looking clothing. He was blushing a little but you were too confused to notice. Apparently you didn't recognize him. He saw it as mostly a blessing because he didn't want the reincarnation of his beloved to fear him. The way you were so casual towards him was what drew him into your past life's relationship in the first place.

"Oh, I just saw your fascinating little crafts and wanted to say you- I-I mean, they look lovely!" He stammered out nervously. You blinked at him before leaning over the table to grab a little aluminum monkey you made before. It wasn't quite as accurate as the birds you've created, but it was still recognizable. You then held up the mini monkey in front of him with a smile.

"Would you like to have this one? It's not great by any means, I'm... still practicing monkeys. I-I hope it doesn't look offensive, otherwise I could-" "It's perfect..." He cut you off, gently taking the animal made out of foil. He would hate himself if he accidentally damaged it in any way with his strength. His claws barely brushed over the softness of your hands, but it was enough to make him feel the tingling sensation you imprinted on him. The Great Sage then gave you a loving smile and a nod in appreciation, "Thank you..."

While the two of you were chatting away about your masterpieces, laughing when certain jokes were made, your boss and co-worker were baffled. They wouldn't have believed it if the scene wasn't playing out right in front of their eyes. The Sun Wukong, Great Sage Equal To Haven, leader of the most feared triad, and immortal Monkey King... was casually talking to a practically invisible stranger without threatening them even once. Or even making them feel uncomfortable.

Were you so oblivious to the fact that you were speaking to a man who could not only kill you, but also destroy everything around you without even trying?

Well, it wasn't so much about being oblivious than it was just about being a decent person. You've heard of the triad, and you've heard rumors of the infamous Monkey King. However, that doesn't mean you would necessarily have to treat him any different to any other customer since you didn't know him personally. You've never even seen the guy until now. And by his looks, you could easily assume it was him.

Meanwhile Macaque seemed amused by the situation. Something only he seemed to have noticed was Wukong's tail wagging happily. Its movement wasn't fast, but it still reminded him of a dog who found its long missing owner. So he couldn't help but take a picture of the scene. It wouldn't serve so much as blackmail, but it would be enough to calm him down with a picture of you if the other simian started to go off again.

And if that wasn't enough, he took some extra pictures of specifically you being happy with Wukong.

"So what you're saying is that if I order food for pick-up or delivery, you would be the one packing it up?" The orange monkey asked, purposefully playing dumb.

"Yeah, unless I'm sick or have a day off. Then one of my co-workers does the packing instead", you responded, pointing in the counters' general direction. Your co-worker let out a nervous squeak before hiding behind your boss.

"Great, so I'll get to see your pretty face a lot more often!" Your face turned a light shade of red at his comment. Too shocked that someone, anyone, let alone The Great Sage would compliment you past your work. He gave you a grin, "It's decided. You can expect me to order food at least once a day."

You blinked in absolute confusion, meanwhile your co-workers were dumbfounded. "Eh?"

"Well, it was nice talking to a stunning and demon-friendly person such as yourself, peaches. But I believe my visitation time's up for today. I hope you're back here tomorrow though." He winked at you at the end, making your blush darken just a bit that he could still notice.

"And don't worry about your business, boss lady", he added as he turned towards the counter with a smirk. "So long as your amazing artist's working here, this restaurant is under the triad's protection. Anyone who tries to get rid of it will have to get through me and my men first." His eyes seemed to darken just a little as his smirk grew into something a bit more sinister. The Monkey King let out a laugh at your co-workers' scared expressions. The dark-furred simian on the other hand huffed in amusement, showing his own fanged grin to the two women. This seemed to scare them a few steps further away from the counter he was now sitting on.

The orange-furred monkey then pulled out a pen and used a piece of unused foil before writing something down on it. He then slid it over the table towards you, placing his other hand on his hips. "Here, feel free to text or call me anytime. And by anytime, I do mean anytime. Feel free to also contact me when you feel unsafe or just want company! I really wouldn't mind showing up in person!"

To be honest, it was actually strange for Macaque to see his old friend act this weirdly. He could tell Wukong was trying to sway and seduce you. But due to how he wasn't trying to do it to manipulate you, and him haven't genuinely done this in hundreds of years, he kind of lost his touch. The shadow monkey could see him struggling as he was a nervous mess on the inside.

His tail gave away his nervous vibes the most. It kept on moving around, curling in on itself, as well as seemingly trying to hold itself back from just wrapping around you for much needed comfort. You glanced at the info written down on the piece of aluminum before gently smiling at him with a nod. "Will do, thanks! It was nice chatting with you too, Mr. Monkey King."

"Please, just call me Wukong. 'Mister' just makes me feel an extra millennium older."

"But you are old, grandpa!" Macaque exclaimed from across the room, earning him a death glare from his ticked off boss.

"You're one to talk, emo dinosaur!" The King snapped back. You couldn't help but let out a small laugh at their childish insults, making the orange-furred monkey slowly turn towards you, his heartbeat seemingly increasing at the sound. He needed to hear your laugh more.

"Anyway, I'll take this with me," he stated as he picked up one the menus from the table, "and we'll be on our way now. See you tomorrow, peaches~" The Great Sage then rather aggressively grabbed the other amused demon by the back of his coat, casually picking him up and carrying him towards the exit, the aluminum monkey still being gently held by his other hand. "Move along Macaque, we don't have all day."

"Until next time, (Y/N)!" Macaque called out as he waved at you as best as he could, still being carried away like a kitten.

...How did he know your name? You only told Wukong during your conversation... 'Man, those rumors about the Six-Eared Macaque having incredible hearing must be true if he was able to hear that', you thought. Little did you know that he already knew your name despite his hearing.

However, from that day on your life's daily routine changed. Wukong would ask for a different order everyday, testing out everything from the menu to see if it was even worth buying more than one specific order everytime. And any food he didn't like he would give to MK to try out. His adoptive son was actually pretty fond of the restaurant's food, to the point where he would either go eat there by himself, with friends or come eat with his dad. Most of the time the triad would only ask to grab pick-up food, but there were days where members would actually eat by the tables. You weren't sure if they only asked for pick-up as to not scare away any non-triad customers, but it did seem to invite in more people each day.

Wukong would sometimes also stay at the restaurant, specifically eating at the same table as you while you were packing up other peoples' orders. He started off pretty nervous during your first conversations, but he quickly became a lot more casual with you. Even his flirting attempts became a lot smoother and would easily catch you off-guard, leaving you a blushing mess everytime. Meanwhile you decided to show him how to create his own little army of aluminum animals.

It might take a while to get you to fully fall for him again, but he would do anything to be with you forever. Even if simple little animal crafts would bring you two closer step by step. Reincarnation or not, he loved you until the day he dies...

Which is saying a lot in his case.

> Masterlist <

[thyandrawrites]

On "dream doping", or the lesson to be learned from despair

Alteratively titled: why breaking up with your high school sweetheart is vital for a career in soccer (with or without said sweetheart. Signed: Ego Jinpachi)

buckle up, this is a long one

We know that Reo went into this match with several hungups as to why Nagi would leave him behind, even going as far as asking Chigiri and Kunigami why they'd pick him

And his voice shaking (notice the wobbly speech bubble) as he repeats the validation, like he doesn't quite believe it to be true anymore. And then during the match he kept alternating between talking himself up and trash talking Isagi with increasingly frantic urgency. He needed to test his worth against Isagi and come out victorious to prove that he was worthy of being the genius' partner, yes, but one important factor is that he did all of this specifically seeking Nagi's approval. He needed to hear it from him, because it's Nagi's departure that crushes Reo's confidence in the first place. Before that moment, Reo was self-assured and cocky, even looking down on other players he felt were beneath him. But we could argue that confidence was born from a shaky foundation—the idea of staying a team with Nagi until the world cup and their eventual victory together for Japan.

I think a factor that doesn't often get brought up in Reo commentaries is that Reo derives a lot of his winning self-image from tag-teaming with a genius

And it's from "borrowing" his talent that Reo feels he lifts their collective value to genius level

And in the process, Reo also tends to undersell his own skills by comparison, and letting them stay an accessory to Nagi's brilliance,

despite how it's been remarked that Reo's a bit of a genius in his own light. If he honed that potential, he could be a big threat, too. Alone.

This is by design, of course. He foils pre blue lock Rin for this reason, too. Reo and young Rin are similar in that they both consider their soccer partner the true star of the show, subordinating their own skills as just a fancy accessory to make their partners shine and become world's best with them right at their heels.

The unfortunate consequence of this is that they end up internalizing that their dream is not achievable without their partner(s), because they ingrained being a sidekick so deep into that plan that they simply see themselves unwilling or unable to chase it on their own.

Hence why, for the continuation of their dream, it becomes vital to have their partner's approval. They just don't see the point in going on alone. Losing the partnership means losing the reason to play altogether.

Now, of course this mindset is incompatible with blue lock. Nothing really new there. Reo was always framed as the delusional oddball for signing up for the program with the intended goal of using it to make Nagi the best, rather than himself. In other words, for trying to bend the system into accommodating his dream rather than accepting Ego's philosphy and playing by Ego's rules. And of course, that plan was bound to be put to the test when Reo&Nagi got the first taste of "despair".

The series posits that despair is the feeling you get when your dream doesn't measure up to reality and threatens to crash and burn. Ego posits that there's only one way out of it that doesn't involve self-destruction. And that's avoiding the trap of the so-called "dream doping".

But what does "engraving despair" even mean in simple terms? I think Ego's point is that after experiencing a crushing, frustrating defeat, some players (the normies, or those who don't go very far) simply think "next time we'll win" without putting any active energy into changing their playstyle and rebuilding it anew to face the growing challenges and "devour" them along the way.

Think of Barou, and how he managed to come back after Isagi and Nagi made him effectively useless in the field. What Barou did was evolving into someone even more chaotic and unpredictable, and devouring them right back. Barou himself cites the despair he felt during that match as the catalyst of his growth and winning goal. In other words, instead of dream doping, Barou adapted and survived in a battlefield that would've otherwise left him in the dust.

But not every player has the presence of mind to pick themselves back up as the match is still unfolding, and when the defeats rolls around, they fold under the weight of that despair. We see this in action. When Sae evolves so rapidly in Spain and eats Rin for breakfast during their 1v1, Rin's reaction to despair is dream doping (at least at first). So is Reo's when he loses to team white. Faced with opponents that had an explosive soccer growth, they struggle to keep pace, and then refuse to face reality and admit they also need to change their playstyle to keep staying in the game.

In Reo's case, he even goes as far as saying he doesn't have "the courage to let himself be destroyed and reborn." And that defeatist attitude is what leads team white to choose Chigiri instead. A real egoist doesn't think "I cannot do it" but instead keeps fighting tooth and nail until the end.

But Reo isn't there yet. If you analyse his body language at the end of the match, it's clear he expects a rejection before it even comes. Notice his posture

Having just had a taste of the limits of his skills against strong opponents, his reaction is resigned. His stance is defensive and closed off. His arms and legs are crossed, he's the only one on the ground, his head is hung in defeat and avoiding Nagi's eyes. Even the camera angle looks at him from above, like he's already doomed himself by deciding to stay on the ground, not picking himself up. Remember, it's Kunigami who lifts him from his collar. Reo doesn't have that strength alone.

This transition here also shows it well imo. True to fashion, he only shows a reaction when Nagi's directly addressing him. A part of him is still wishing for things between them to mend, to go back to how they were. There's hope written all over his face in that second panel, but the moment he hears what Nagi has to say, it abruptly morphs into pain.

Nagi echoes the words Reo wanted to tell him when they split, but to Reo it doesn't come across as the approval he was seeking. Rather, as the opposite: while Reo couldn't bring himself to encourage Nagi to go ahead in fear that Nagi wouldn't look back (that is, in fear Nagi wasn't as attached to him and their dream as Reo was)... Nagi says them easily enough. And to Reo, that's more crushing than the loss itself because he misconstructs it as indifference towards their promise.

It all circles back to Reo's insecurity. While Nagi just showed him he's able to change even without Reo as his partner, Reo is insecure about being able to do the same because he sees them as his biggest weapon, not anything inherent to Reo alone. Thus, once Nagi mines the foundation of Reo's confidence (their team up), any step Nagi takes in an effort to get them closer to the world cup in Reo's eyes is just another step away from it (and from him). Reo always assumed they'd crossed that finish line together, that he'd build Nagi up into the world's best striker. He wasn't prepared for a path where Nagi teams up with other people, leaving Reo powerless in the sidelines—their combo (and thus himself) a weapon that outlived its usefulness.

Much like Rin declaring that he'd lose his reason to play soccer if he can't chase his dream with Sae the way they had agreed to, Reo metaphorically sees his future as the "abnormal monster duo" crumbling away (notice the decaying effect on the square with his internal narration). Instead of taking steps towards ensuring their dream still has a chance of happening in the future, he sees it as already doomed.

The thing is, Reo isn't ready to give up on it, though. He doesn't want to. I could be wrong about this but him seeking out a clean cut from Nagi came across to me less as if he was blaming Nagi for leaving, and more like he seeked a fight as self-punishment for his thoughts during the match. In the previous chapter, he tried stifling Nagi's potential and then resented himself for it. Now, his internal narration is almost goading Nagi's anger. I think it's still up in the air whether he was lashing out because he was overwhelmed by his conflicting feelings or if he was seeking out Nagi's rejection because he hated himself for not measuring up to his own standards during the match. Maybe a bit of both.

Point is, Reo is refusing to face reality. By saying "then pick me", to cite Ego, he's denying that he was powerless in the match, and putting the entire brunt of his loss onto Nagi's shoulders for not choosing him. Simply put, he's relying on Nagi to open up the door to go further in blue lock instead of growing into the player that gets to choose who to pick.

And Nagi recognizes this and feels hurt by it, cause if Reo refuses to evolve, switch up tactics and try new things, he's also implicitly refusing to go further in the program. From Nagi's perspective, it's Reo that's breaking their promise by being unwilling to put in the effort to keep staying in the game. Remember, the consequence for failing blue lock is no longer being allowed to play professionally for Japan. If Reo quit putting up a fight, his dream would be over for good.

And the story tells us, the measure of a great striker is how they react to the challenges thrown in their path. Nagi's growth happens specifically because he doesn't tie his success to Reo, but knows when to throw in other variables and when cooperating with Reo makes them stronger. In Nagi's eyes, their dream is not reliant on their combo, but their combo is a weapon that makes their dream achievable. Whereas Reo based his plan to get the world cup around his partnership with Nagi, and let his own skills lay dormant and underdeveloped cause he always defaulted to passing to Nagi to score.

But when Nagi leaves the equation for good, Reo's forced to address where his own strengths really lie and how to weaponize them to avoid elimination. That's why the chameleon awakens for the first time. It gets roused by Reo's despair, which gets "engraved" only when it dawns on Reo that their combo is not an option anymore, and it's on Reo and Reo alone to fight his way back up, evolving and devouring rivals along the way. And much like Nagi's talent for trapping, Reo's stregth was also inherent, and never just reliant on them being a team.

[inbarfink]

The thing that I’ve been thinking of is… so one of Dib’s most defining traits and flaws is supposed to be his desire for fame and emotional validation. You know he is fighting to protect the earth, but he’s also fighting for the sake of his own ego

It’s got a lot of fun potential because it’s both extremely understandable - he’s been bullied and emotionally neglected for his entire life, it’s no wonder his biggest fantasy is just to be loved - but it can also motivate some really selfish acts. Not to mention how much it acts as a mirror to Zim’s own desire for respect and prestige among his own people.

And because of that, I guess it actually kinda surprises me that they never tried to have Dib pull a… reverse Planet Jackers moment? Like, just as Zim will protect the Earth from outside threats because he wants the credit for destroying it - will Dib help Zim if his ability to get credit for defeating him is threatened?

Like, I imagine a story where maybe Dib meets a rival paranormal investigator, and the guy’s like a Super Mega Asshole to Dib and also thinks he’s crazy. And then this guy manages to capture Zim and it seems like he’s going to be the one to expose him to the world and get all the credit for foiling his infiltration scheme. The credit that Dib feels he rightly deserves. Or he simply get a chance to defeat Zim, but there are no witnesses and no evidence and no chance anyone will ever believe him. 

For Dib, stopping Zim and proving to the world that he’s been right all along have always been interwoven goals. He has always taken it for granted that doing the former will naturally lead to the latter… So how will he deal with a situation where Zim can be stopped for good, but his situation will not change. No one will know or believe what he just did, he would just be the same ridiculed social pariah - the only thing he actually accomplished is that he has gotten rid of his best chance to change that permanently.

And you know, he doesn’t necessarily have to take that chance to help Zim or let him go - even just having Dib struggle with the idea momentarily could be a very strong character moment for him. I think it’s a shamefully underutilized aspect of his canon characterization and I do hope we’d get to see it played with more one of these days. 

But you know which piece of canon really came closest to tackling this aspect?

Dib’s little plan for Zim in ETF is not quite exactly what I was talking about above - but there are some similarities.

I’ve seen some people talk about Dib’s ETF plan like it was meant to be a favor to Zim or some sort of attempt at redemption for him or like… a thing that Zim benefit from in any sort of way? Like, I've seen some people describe the plot of ETF like Zim's manipulation of Dib’s plan was him using Dib’s kindness and empathy against him? And that’s not exactly what’s happening here.

To recap, Dib tries to stage yet another confrontation between himself and Zim (to let off steam from his Daddy Issues) only to find Zim a total emotional wreck, depressed to the point of total apathy. His first instinct is to drag him away to ‘lock him up’ but... he’s not really feeling it.

Something’s not quite right about winning like this. And then, he shifts to empathy 

But then, he shifts again, when he realizes the ‘real’ thing he’s been missing - a crowd.

The real reason this victory was feeling hollow is because he hasn’t made it public enough! If he's going to use Zim's emotional rock-bottom as a way to finally defeat him and condemn him into a life of painful experiments.... he wants to do it in front of a cheering crowd!

And while Zim’s scheme seems to have started once he first laid eyes on the Membracelet 

That plan couldn’t have worked without Dib’s own scheme to exploit Zim’s suicidal depression to get him in front as many people as possible so that Dib can get worldwide fame and Daddy’s approval and Zim can get... experimented on for the rest of his life. 

There was no kindness here to exploit, only a desperate desire for emotional validation.

The big mistake Dib did that allowed Zim the window of opportunity he needed to take over Membrane Labs was not doing the Kind Thing when he should’ve done the Practical Thing - and it was not doing the Cruel Thing when he should’ve done the Kind Thing. Dib had his chance to do the Practical Thing right there and then - kill or capture Zim while he’s not fighting back. He considered doing the Kind Thing (empathizing with Zim) and he decided to abandon both of them in favor of… the thing that will get him the most fame and attention.

And that’s the weakness of Dib that Zim exploited in his scheme. And that’s the thing that almost doomed planet Earth. Quite ironically, it’s literally a flaw Zim himself possesses quite strongly.

If Dib was willing to think purely in terms of what’s safest for Earth he would’ve taken out Zim right there and then and Earth would be safe forever - but for the sake of his own ego he took a risk that the planet almost paid very dearly for. 

(And if he was willing to resist the temptation of fame and continue with the thread of empathy he showed Zim? Well, we can only speculate of what would've happened then...)

It’s not quite what I was talking about above; Dib would’ve probably gotten some of the fame and validation he wanted if he just stomped Zim’s head right there and dragged his corpse out - he just wanted as much attention as possible. And he didn’t knowingly help Zim or even seriously considered it as much as he was just tricked into a situation of Mutually Assured Bastardness. But I think it is the closest we’ve come so far, and I think it’s interesting.

[raayllum]

THE WAY THE FROZEN SHIP IS CALLED THE "RAY OF ILLUMINATION" + RAYLLUM LIGHT MOTIF... (also how the ship is consumed by light in the form of flame – rayla/callum's love for her is going to be what (temporarily) sinks due to callum's posession... CHET...)

ALSO CALLUM FOLLOWING IN VIREN'S FOOTSTEPS AND VIREN DYING THIS SEASON (for real this time) SO THERE'S SOMEHOW EVEN MORE EVIDENCE FOR CALLUM DYING A METAPHORICAL DEATH AKA POSESSION, BY DOING DARK MAGIC AS SOME SORT OF SACRIFICE I'M NORMAL-

(sorry for flooding your notes and this but aa i love your metas so much, i'd NEVER think of the show in the same way had i not read them and there would be so many details i missed (eg both things above) – thank you so much for every one!)

(aah i always appreciate seeing you in my notes, no apologies ever needed!! that's so sweet and i'm so happy it makes you appreciate our amazing show even more!)

And honestly I think a lot about how the boat only starts breaking after Rayla says "Make the sacrifice," and then Callum ("every step forward is a choice") stumbles backwards. And then he makes her promise to sacrifice him as they watch it burn and sink? Which is what'll happen if they don't choose each other over everything? Yeah.

The boat name being a way to spell Rayllum but also continuing with the ever present light connotations, Lux Aurea's great light falling to dark magic sickness, and Katolis being burned to the ground, and the boat's destruction bringing these two things together in some ways.

The Viren-Callum dying parallel — one literal as you pointed out, and one less literal is also one I've mulled over a lot since s6's release. Callum and Viren's mirrored arcs in S6 are largely resolved in 6x06, with both of them facing/finding their truth, which allows Callum to repair a relationship (embracing his light) and causes Viren to realize it's better to leave it as is (burning the letter, returning to that emphasis on fire his character often has, which honestly might be worth a meta someday).

Like... Viren swore off dark magic, and then did it to save everyone (at Soren's request) and Soren himself (despite his willingness to lay himself down), and it was the Right Thing To Do, even if that meant sacrificing his Human!! heart and his life. And the potential parallels of Callum having sworn off dark magic again (2x08 / 6x06) and then doing it again to save his heart because he refuses to sacrifice Rayla, even if that means sacrificing himself (to dark magic corruption / Aaravos' control as a metaphorical death, or desired death at her swords in a more literal sense) because it's the Right Thing To Do ("do the right thing. make the sacrifice" can be subjective as hell, after all). And of course he'll get saved afterwards and end up not dead but like... it'd really bring their foils relationship full circle I think in all the best ways (Viren hesitating and then giving up his life; Callum never hesitating but being saved, etc etc.) and I'm really hoping that's the path we're on tbh

[bluecheeseinmyoffwhites]

Very late, but, https://www.tumblr.com/blue-cheeseinmyoffwhites/756639587329277952/rwby-asks-are-open-im-bored?source=share

Who's you're favorite character?

Quick shoutout to the lovely @tumblingxelian for their amazing RWBY content check them out on YT

Let’s do Top 5

Mercury Black

This is solely because of his fighting style. If I could fuck up some stuff with my legs I’d probably be a dick about it too. I started RWBY during V2 & he was one of the first faces I met. I remember LOVING his design & liking his cool laid-back attitude. He started gaining my attention in Volume 3 after his fight with Coco & Yatsu, then won me over after his fight with Yang. I remember being baffled after his prosthetic reveal, & after learning about his allusion it all came together. For the longest time I was trying to decode his semblance (I thought it was something to do with wind manipulation) then V6 came around & shut all that down. I understand he hasn’t been very popular as of late, but I think he has so much potential & they just need to give him more screentime in V10+

Sun Wukong

I appreciate an unconditionally positive character. Sun & Mercury have always just been so cool to me. His design is great too, I like his monkey traits & how he shows his abs. His weapon is genuinely top 5 in the series, & his semblance matches his bright personality. One of my favorite fight scenes is Blake & Sun vs Sea Feilong & his contribution played a big part of that. I did like his appearance in V4-V5 & I was excited to see his gun-chucks return against Ilia. I think he is a great foil to Blake & serves her character arc really well.

Cinder Fall

Sorry but Cinder Fall is just that bitch. I hate everything she does & that’s why I love her. She knows what she wants & can easily get people on her side to do her bidding. She actually pushes the narrative & I consider her to be the main antagonist. The animators take real care when it comes to her battles. She has not missed a SINGLE fight she has been in. Seriously every one has been a hit: Glynda, Amber, Ozpin, Pyrrha, Raven, Neo, Winter, Penny, etc etc. Anytime there is a fight involving Cinder it’s going to be rememberable in some way, especially the Raven vs Cinder fight. I vividly remember my mind going numb watching it for the first time. I do feel they made her a little OP but it’s whatever. I really like her character arc & how she’s slowly turning into a Grimm. I loved her backstory, a lot of people didn’t because it’s just “Cinderella but dark” but like…..that’s kinda the entire point of this series, dark retellings of fairytales. She’s a great foil to Ruby & actually learns from her to gain victory in V8. I just want them to have a proper fight.

Qrow Branwen

Qrow Qrow Qrow. I love their man & want to give him hugs. If there’s one thing RWBY does amazingly, it is setup & payoff. I love his they slowly teased him in V1-V2 as a badass & then finally let us visualize it in V3. He doesn’t take crap from anyone & says what’s on his mind. Love Love LOVE his relationship with Ruby (forever holding onto my cracktheory that he’s her real dad). He acts as her mentor & influenced her fighting style. I like how he became the leader of the team for some time & how his laid-back attitude conflicts with him suddenly having to take care of 8 kids. But he does it anyway. His fight scenes are also amazing. He always looks so confident. His first appearance in V3 he had that super dynamic fight against Winter. In V4 he fought Tyrian & showed Team RNJR (& us) the difference between students & Huntsmen. V7 is where he really shined for me. He finally had a relationship that wasn’t affected by his semblance & can just chill for a while. I very much enjoyed his relationship with Clover & was heartbroken by what happened after. But those last 2 fights with them were pretty great. I hope his semblance evolves into Good Luck as well.

Yang Xiao Long

I like all members of Team RWBY but Yang stands out for obvious reasons. She had the best Trailer for one. Also her fighting style is the most different from her teammates. They’re all swing-swing-slash & she’s all punch-punch-kick. Like Cinder, Yang gets the best treatment when it comes to fight scenes. She’s been marketed as the strongest member & it shows over & over again. Her semblance is super cool & makes her look like a Goddess. I like how her character arc revolves around her fighting style & we can actually see her improvement throughout the volumes. I like how she is the most vocal about the whole trust situation in V5-V8. She lost her arm for this war, she of all people deserves some answers. I really adore her relationship with Blake & I think their story is perfect. She’s the heart of the team & it’s most present in V5 when she is the one reuniting the team.

[bibibbon]

It's just infuriating seeing media after media doing the same mistake! All because the folks in charge of creating these medias keep favoring these horrible characters so much, that they rather make EVERYBODY suffer than to hold them accountable! It's turning into propaganda at this point! Enable the abusers/jerk*sses/monsters, but condemn/lash out/hate the victims, kind people, and people who fight back! Ps, Transformers Earthspark had a MHA Easter egg in one of the human kid's room, making how the show handle abuse and racism/immigration themes feel like they took a book from MHA but watered it down. 5/5

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 part 4 part 5

There are many shows and pieces of media that handle and present the topic of abuse differently.

Abuse comes in many forms and can effect others in different ways meaning that there are a lot of different ways it can be explored in shows.

A lot of the shows can ineffectively explore abuse in a horrible way and make their shows messaging sound awful and while ONE of the reasons is character favouritism there are many other reasons like simply not giving the issue enough screentime to develop or not narratively highlighting the issue of abuse and more

I think a great example of a show that has some trouble dealing effectively with abuse (but it's not because the author favours the abuser character) is tokyo revengers

The way tokyo revengers handles abuse is well interesting (I do have some critiques that are mainly surrounding the akashi family and Shiba family)

I understand that due to the manga publishers cancelling the manga and making Ken wakui wrap it up at chapter 278 combined with wakui's own health issues that he wasn't able to delve deeper into the unhealthy and dysfunctional dynamic of the akashi family. The unequal treatment of sanzu and senju by takemoi or the neglect that they all went through or the straight up hate that sanzu has for senju and takemoi ETC ETC. However, I still feel like it's important to bring this up since it seemed like there was potential for them to be developed and portrayed in an interesting light.

Moving on to the Shiba family. I think that the Shiba family and their arc was written well! My problem lies with the friendship that mitusya and taiju fromed and more specifically the lack of screentime when it came to the aftermath of the black dragon for the Shiba family. We are told that taiju changes his ways but it's not shown specifically with the way he Interacts with his siblings. I also have a problem with how yuhza an important character in all of this isn't actively present here at all especially when it comes to her brothers 'change'.

Now the Shiba family dynamic is interesting to me. You have taiju the older brother who is viewed and introduced as the primary caregiver of yuhza and hakai since neither their mother or father is in the picture. We never learn much about their parents since the story is told from hakai and yuhza's prespectives. It can be argued that the eldest sibling taiju maybe aware of what happend to his parents and that they may have influenced his behaviour well we know that their absence within the family definitely did since there was no one to correct taiju's aggressive behaviour and it maybe from the absence of his parents within his life that he started to develop such a twisted idea of family and using it to manipulate his siblings.

We actively see the consequences of taiju's actions whether that be hakkai and yuhaza growing afraid and distant towards taiju because of his manipulative and abusive behaviour or hakkai developing a twisted idea of love and saying that he always though that "love was supposed to be painful" until he met mitsuya. We even see a young hakkai start to mimic taiju's aggressive behaviour in beating kids up but all of that changed when hakkai met mitsuya.

The narrative goes out of its way to clearly contrast mitsuya and taiju. They are direct foils to each other and show two vastly different ideas. This is best shown during their fight when we see their beliefs clash with mitsuya making a grand entrance and saying that to be a big brother you need to forgive and be kind to your family whereas in taiju's case we see him try to murder and belittle his siblings.

The narrative (thankfully) frames mitsuya in the right. Going on a tangent, but the way mitsuya and taiju are framed is interesting to me. We clearly see that taiju is depicted as the much more muscular and stronger looking one whereas mitsuya is the shorter and less muscular character. I think its interesting that this view can be framed in a way where we see that mitsuya is the little tiny sliver of hope within the black dragon arc and this specific fight.

Mitsuya represents both his belief of family and becomes the embodiment of hope and courage for hakkai, taking hits and matching taiju's strength punch for punch (kind of reminds me of the interpretation of hope. Hope isn't some strong dude or girl but just an incredibly resilient being whose covered in mud and blood and would still get up and shine because that's them:hope).

Mitsuya influences hakkai and both him and takemichi end up influencing him to stand up for himself and him sister. Mitsuya influences hakkai to stand up and tell the truth while takemichi and his actions help hakkai come to an understanding that even with his fear and cowardice towards his older brother he needs to and will stand up to taiju. The fight ultimately ends with taiju defeated by Mikey and the siblings leaving taiju behind.

Now I do like this ending of the fight as I think it showed:

Hakkai and yuhaza are no longer connected or associate with taiju

They have both developed and managed to overcome taiju (their abuser)

Hakkai has overcome his cowardice and his inferiority of not being able to be a man and be the one to take the hits for yuhaza

Yuhaza finally receives acknowledgement for what she sacrificed and is no longer bound to be taiju's punching bag, neither is she bound to protect hakkai from taiju

Taiju is the one that loses everything that ranges from his family, to his gang, power and even money (that he used koko to gain)

There's a hint of hypocrisy and irony in Taiju's arc here as he is a religious Christian who went to pray in a church during Christmas eve. Taiju went to pray which is seen as a form if religious practice yet he doesn't follow his religion properly, I am not Christian but iam pretty sure that abusing, manipulating and beating your siblings is a sin. Ultimately, taiju ends up losing everything and his family on Christmas eve which in Japan is am incredibly important day as its spent with your loved ones to share and spread joy yet the complete opposite occurs.

My main problem with taiju's arc is how wakui involves him in the story later on. We see fromba tiny flashback that mitsuya and taiju are in contact and they seem to be friendly. We also are shown and somewhat told that taiju has changed but the thing that annoys me is that we don't see that change, we don't see or get to know why and how it happend. Finally, we don't even get to truly see hakkai's and yuhaza's reactions to all of this (at least with hakkai we got to see a shocked face but even that is too little and they robbed yuhaza of screentime)

The fascinating thing is that while abusive, unhealthy and toxic family dynamics within tokyo revengers play a big role in the story, there is also focus on individual characters who have been abused.

What I mean is that tokyo revengers also focuses on characters personal abuse without the families of those characters being active fleshed our characters. The two primary characters of this are takemichi and kazutora.

Takemichi's experience from the first timeline specifically his life experience between middle school to his adult life are what shaped him as a character. The reason why takemichi is so weak willed and such a bad fighter in the beginning of the manga all adds up to what happend to him with kiyomasa and him running away. Takemichi is in a sense a haunted character because even after creating and altering the timelines so much that they aren't recognisable he still is very much effected by kiyomasa and the manga takes it time dealing with the effects of that (while kiyomasa's name is never directly stated to be the cause its kind of obvious it is) however, more focus on kiyomasa and takemichi specifically would of been interesting and needed in my opinion. While kiyomasa and takemichi do interact and takemichi does try and fight against kiyomasa just to fail and return to square one remembering just how much kiyomasa and his abuse truly effected and haunted him. Overall, I do think that later on in the series we should of gotten a chapter where takemichi meets kiyomasa again and contrast chapter 1 takemichi with the now developed, stronger and currently healing takemichi.

During his time under kiyomasa takemichi was used as a tool. He and his friends had to become perfect bidding tools using their bodies fighting, winning and losing to entertain a crowd all while getting beat by kiyomasa if they didn't achieve the desired goal or effect. This continued on for approximately 3 years of takemichi's life being physically and emotionally beaten by kiyomasa to such a degree that the second he graduated from middle school he ran and never looked back. Kiyomasa's mistreatment was so bad and horrendous that takemichi thought his only escape was to move far away even if it meant sacrificing everything else like his friends, girlfriend, education and home. Ultimately, even though takemichi ran foolishly trying to achieve a sense of autonomy and agency he ends up having it robbed again by another thing: capitalism.

Due to the lack of education takemichi receives and the direction his life choices took him in, he ends up being a slave to the modern cooperate system (japan is also known for their work culture). In the end, takemichi can only bow down to others and ask for forgiveness if he ever did anything wrong. Due to the damage kiyomasa's abuse caused and the slowly pileling reasons of him accidently doing something wrong and peoples reactions start to all eat at him and effect him. Being told that you're incompetent and useless so many times that you also start to think so and become the embodiment of that as well. Takemichi's life was never free and so he couldn't run away from a job meaning that all he could do is apologise and mentally try and escape his miserable life devoid of loved ones.

In all of this running and avoidance takemichi forgets who he really is and forgets himself. This is exactly why we see him shocked to hear his ex girlfriends name or how he believed that middle school was his peak but when he sees himself he realises that he is wrong. This can also explain why takemichi physically forgot how he acted at that age or how he forgot how to fight. Takemichi was trained and toughened (forced to for survival) during the 3 years kiyomasa made him fight like a lab rat. In all of those years michi would of learnt the basics and even more so it makes sense he would of left that all behind and tired to forget everything in the end.

Even through out the series Takemichi's behaviour reflects this. He is always effected by that incident and it haunts him. Takemichi feels, acknowledges and even sobs that he is inferior that if he was a bit more like Mikey in terms of strength or a bit more like draken in terms of kindness or a bit more like baji in terms of courage he would of already solved everything, he would of already saved everyone and had the perfect life. Whenever anything goes wrong he blames himself and his flaws. This is mainly seen in chapter 134 and 135 when takemichi contemplates if he should just die since he believes that it was due to his incompetence that naoto died.

Evidently, through his own experiences loneliness and fear takemichi is able to understand and help other characters like hakkai and mikey even if it cost his life because takemichi has experienced loneliness, how painful it is, how haunting and scaring it is and he wouldn't wish it on anyone else especially people he cares about.

As the series progresses takemichi comes to terms with these aspects of himself and even if he beats himself up for it he comes to the understanding that these things are apart of him and that he can live surrounded with loved ones. He would do anything to achieve that goal even if it meant sacrificing his original ideal world the bonten arc because he understood and hated what mikey was going through.

In the end I definitely enjoy the way tokyo revengers handles abuse however, some of the cases wakui tries to tackle like the akashi family and South end up falling apart due to the lack of focus and development. There are good cases of how the story handles abuse like the Shiba family, takemichi and kazutora but they do end up being quite flawed and in my opinion need more development

[amoneki-ramblings]

this is a pass to do a couple things:

finish the manga!!! u can do it so u can follow all the other blogs without getting blindsided by a spoiler

do the ship ask thingy for amoneki :]

Gahh I'm trying !! I'm so busy with school and life stuff so it's hard to squeeze in time to read but I'm trying! I'm getting through volumes very slowly but hey, I'll get there ! Just. Well. There's 16 volumes so. Okay it might take a bit orz

For now I'll just be in my little fandom limbo corner I suppose orz, as for the ask thingy:

when I started shipping it if I did: Several months ago, probably a few months short of a year? It's a bit complicated, Basically I decided to rewatch the anime (because my original exposure to tg was. the anime :') ) and vaguely remembered that I really liked Amon (honestly the encounter at Kanou's Lab/Cochlea was one of the scenes I remembered the most), and after rewatching and seeing Amon and Kaneki's interactions they piqued my interest again. Then I got into the manga and. Yeah that interest turned into insanity and now i'm here

my thoughts: Well I have a 119-slide 15K+-word google slideshow for starters. But I'm taking that to my grave so I guess I gotta condense that somehow. On one hand I feel like everything needs to be said about these two to the point that there's too much to talk about but also nothing needs to be said at the same time. They parallel each other in just about every way possible, it's impossible to ignore the ways that they foil each other. They also have had irreversible effects on the others' character. Kaneki finds resolve in Amon's words ('the world is wrong'), and turns to them at pivotal moments (when he leaves Anteiku, Kaneki's own mantra is also basically a derivative of Amon's, wishing to take out the "bad/wrong" things in the world, and he basically takes them to his grave, "The world is wrong", Amon's own words, being his opening to his final dialogue in the last chapter of the original series)

Similarily Amon is just haunted by Kaneki. Like. In general. He thinks about him constantly (even under more mundane circumstances, in the novels he gets reminded of Kaneki just by staring out a window because it reminded him of the Aogiri raid. lmao). Kaneki is basically the catalyst to his character development, and Amon is constantly bothered by his presence/existence, and even comes to recognize how they always encounter each other at important moments. Amon is so haunted by This Guy (creature) it's both a little funny but also makes me very insane. He's basically being a failure of a ghoul investigator, and it's even more ironic, given his hatred of himself for being raised by and potentially caring about a ghoul (also he's catholic, something something religious guilt), yet he seems to have a lot of faith in Kaneki, even to a faulty degree (I'd daresay it's almost to the point where he puts Kaneki on a bit of a pedestal/idolizes him to an extent. I have a whole other ramble about Just that on the self-rb'ed half of this post. Like I'm sorry but Amon definitely fell hard for this guy I'll die on this hill and I'm going to poke fun at him endlessly for it, he could've done so much better, he starts off the manga hating ghouls with a passion and his mentor's disdain for ghouls runs ten times as deep but nope now he's chasing after the dangerous somewhat unhinged (/affectionate) half kakuja guy and it's not even to fight/kill him like okay, sure.) They have affected each other in irreversible ways. They reflect each other so much even if they don't know it. They just want to sit down and have a conversation. They didn't get to. And instead They Killed Each Other (okay not really but it was very close and they absolutely could, not that they want that) ((It's also partially Kaneki's fault for losing control of himself and he feels awful for that (sidenote but any scenario with Centineki and Amon make me lose my mind))). They're also married by first-encounter marriage bite, apparently. I think we should talk about that more that's kinda?? Donato approves btw

What makes me happy about them: Everything that makes me miserable about them makes me simultaneously happy about them because I am an Angst Guy but honestly just how much they clearly respect each other. While they're not allowed to understand each other because of their circumstances they still very much Want to. They recognize that they probably share a lot of views and could really have a meaningful conversation with each other, and it really shows, even if they're fighting. Amon again has a surprising amount of trust in Kaneki (not assuming he's fighting for Aogiri when he saw him during the ward 11 battle, having faith in Kaneki as a person even if he just saw him potentially killing his superior and being presented with the possibility that maybe he was just being fooled all along, when he's nearly dying at Kaneki's own hands but says he won't die because that would make Kaneki a murderer, having faith still that he hasn't turned into one). They recognize that they're equals (well technically they're not, obviously Kaneki is much stronger objectively, being a ghoul, and a kakuja at that), but they treat each other as equals and that's what really matters. I just think it's a very neat dynamic and their roundabout way of caring about each other despite their positions makes me happy :)

What makes me sad about them: I was gonna put images but then I quickly realized that I'd basically be pasting almost all of chapter 133-134 just uh. The fact that Kaneki really lost control of himself and the parallel with him biting Amon's shoulder escalates to him cutting off his entire fucking arm, the way that Amon's first thought in regards to that is simply that Kaneki is strong, how he doesn't reprimand him for it whatsoever (also Amon's blow pretty much takes out the entire area of where Kaneki's kakuhou should be, which is a detail I find Extremely Interesting and I think it should genuinely be talked about more). This fucking line that happened literally the panel before all of that despite their mutual wishes for the other to simply Not Die:

Amoneki divorce. Absolutely life ruining :thumbsup:

(Also just. Again Amon Please. This guy bit your shoulder (probably gave Amon rabies honestly) and almost ate one of your colleagues; when he loses control of himself for the second time you just tell him to take a break, and now he's cut off your whole damn arm and you're Still not complaining and are instead praising him by calling him strong. I just. Yeah that's Not Normal. It's kind of impressive, really /derogatory)

Oh yeah also the fight at Kanou's lab also kills me and takes over my brain constantly but I wouldn't classify that as making me sad I would classify that as making me lose my mind, laugh hysterically and start climbing up and clawing at the walls (like Centineki, actually)

things done in fanfic that annoys me: Maybe I'm just extremely picky but I feel like people tend to fumble Amon's characterization a lot. It's kind of a fine line, and Amon has a lot of conflicting feelings as is, so I get it, but I'm especially bothered when Amon is written as way too harsh. When he's first introduced he has a strong hatred for ghouls, and it's not like that just goes away, but when he's written as especially harsh or even cruel towards Kaneki, especially if it's just because for him being a ghoul it feels like it kind of defeats the point, as Kaneki is supposed to be the reason why Amon starts changing his mind. When Amon sees him for the second time he doesn't think about fighting him at all, even that early on he decides he wants to talk instead, 'cause He's Different. I don't see this kind of characterization too often but I don't really vibe with it at all when I do (Also this is definitely just a me-thing but I wish there was more angst in the tag. Which is ironic considering these guys are surprisingly normal most of the time and have so much potential to be actually Happy but uh *vague hand gestures*, hurt-comfort would also be a decent compromise)

things I look for in fanfic: I love pre-:re fics that explore the complicated-ness of their dynamic. I'm really fond of fics where they kind of dance around each other in a sense, they won't just straight up completely directly interact because that's Still a bit dangerous but they see each other in passing, maybe Kaneki watches over Amon sometimes, etc. Also you probably saw this coming a mile away but yeah religious references mean instant bonus points from me. I could go into some (too much) detail but. uh. stares down at my feet look I'm normal I swear

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other:  Saying Amonhaise is definitely cheating but I'm not really invested in any other Amon ships. I'm not particularly against any I'm just neutral. As for Kaneki, like I mentioned in a previous post, I see potential with Etoken, and it's pretty hard to go wrong with Hidekane, though neither drive me to insanity like these two do at the moment

My happily ever after for them: Let them finally officiate their marriage ghsfdljbhf

who is the big spoon/little spoon: Well that's pretty easy huh. Kaneki small spoon he is a Little Guy just let him feel comfortable and secure y'know? Kaneki is probably someone who runs very cold and Amon is very warm so it works out :) If he's super tired he very carefully (and cautiously) wraps his kagune around Amon he will now be Trapped there until Kaneki wants to get out of bed (good luck)

what is their favorite non-sexual activity: Well I would say that Kaneki loves cooking for Amon probably. He makes food at home and tries to make new sweets following recipe books. It's a bit of a mess because y'know, he's a ghoul, and at first Amon tries to hide that, unfortunately, his previous experience with cooking does Not, in fact, hide the fact that he cannot taste or smell human food, but eventually Kaneki is able to get a hang of it (with Amon's help) and it's very nice :) That's what I would say but. well. Amon is Also a Ghoul now so that doesn't really work :')

[givemearmstopraywith]

As a lover of god, I’m curious. what are your thoughts on Satanists? 👀

they're cool! i am not a huge fan of anton lavey. this isn't true, i actively really dislike him the same way i dislike, for instance, martin luther, on both personal and "theological" levels, although laveyan satanism isn't theistic so i'm not sure you can call it a unified theology. in terms of lavey as the originator of satanism, i think his thought was unsound and more sensationalistic than genuine, more out of a desire to rile people and poke fun at major religions than any particular sense of moral or ethical reasoning. i see this in his exploitation of his daughter in particular. i empathize with zeena lavey, i feel for her, and have always been interested in the paralells between her relationship with her father and that between aleister crowley and his daughter lola.

i like that satanism acts as a foil to religion by calling attention to its hypocrisy and the overprivileging of christianity, especially evangelicalism/christian nationalism, over other faith practices. but i have the same criticism of satanism that i do of martin luther and christianity. if your ideology can be coopted by nazis, its bad ideology. of course this is a very generalized assessment since almost anything can be coopted by white supremacists and nazis for their own ends, but lavey was lenient on white supremacists who found empowerment in satansim, and i never liked that much. i mean, he did admit that satanism was just ayn rand philosophy with ceremony and ritual, so im not surprised.

i have less of a unified thought on theistic satanism because of how splintered it is- i don't really believe in the christian notion of satanism, or any particular notion of satan in general. i don't know enough about it to have any useful comments to make. i've met lots of satanists i like (one of my closest friends was a satanist when we met), and in terms of politics i think the satanic panic of the 80s never died and was a concerted effort to disguise much worse abuses within christian institutions and family units by playing off religious anxieties.

there is little comprehensive philosophical or theological thinking on satanism, but as much as i can venture it in a tumblr post all belief, in anything, even only the self, is still ultimately a belief in the same thing i believe in. the way i understand God he is as present in his absence as in his evidence: so in my mind, as long as we are all working towards ultimate good (even personal good) rather than purely self-service without due interest in goodness that transcends what is dictated by authority to be "good" in an attempt to be absolutely good, which i think many satanists ultimately do, we all believe the same intrinsic thing. God is matter, thinginess: the fact that God is matter sanctifies the world as part of him. but i also see God as absence. God's absence is also holy: what many christians might call profane is then also holy. if i love God, i love his absence too. satanism seems to me, an intentional manifestation of that absence: religion without God, or a very christian-style theism without the trinitarian godhead, and frankly both are a valid undertaking that i genuinely think should be considered as potentially fruitful by people in my own field (christianity desperately needs to get humble in how it deals with comparative theologies and interreligious dialogue).

[yellowbluemoonshine]

Main Hero Trio Potential

I would like to talk about Izuku, Ochaco, and Shouto and why they deserve better as characters. The theme of Bnha is about true heroes, asking the meaning of hero, and it's a story about how kids should learn to be better heroes, not just as jobs but as real heroes. Deku, Ochaco, and Shouto are characters who are shown their overwhelming empathy abilities, and kindness. The meaning of hero is saving others so it fits, they are naturally kind people who want to people but at the same time, they are more than that. They are not just good kids who always do right. Their characters are more than that and I would like to focus on how the story could/can/should focus on that.

Izuku;

Izuku is a character who is always shown as a kind kid but his main flaw is he is really obsessed with heroism too much. On one part; he hurts himself and makes him unable to see the flaws of society but on another part; this is the reason he could see Shigaraki as a victim. He didn't just magically see Shigaraki’s childhood/past, his one look was enough for him to want to save. Once again, let's remember that Izuku is the only one who talked about ‘saving the villain’. Not even Todoroki’s or Uraraka’s thought about it. It's just Izuku finding an excuse to save anyone.Another interesting detail is the difference between class 1 A and Deku. Compared to blessed kids or ‘normal’ kids, Deku doesnt seem to belong in there because he is an outcast. He is not golden child, a not lucky kid who was born with an amazing quirk, he is the kid who is constantly rejected and bullied by society and people for something over which he had no control.

Deku is a lot like league of villains. Shigaraki is literally his foil. Deku is like Toga who obsess and imitate their idols. Both Touya and Deku idolized their abusers and it lead them to self destruction because they feel worthless and they do everything they do feel worthy. Deku is like Spinner who is just ‘normal dude’, bullied for something he had no control. Deku is like Twice, failed by hero system.

The thing about Deku and what makes him different is he is or at least he was written to be challenge against system and even the world. He would save Shigaraki even whole world said No. He would speak up for abuse victims and started questioning the system he blindly followed and even Allmight. I mean remember the time Deku call Allmight out for hiding things. Remember the time he called put Endeavour for what he did at spor festival. Remember the time he asked Allmight what Shigaraki said about not being able to save everyone.

Since Deku is written to be outcast, it makes more sense him to empathize with people like league, just like Batman who had ‘one bad day’ and wants to help people/even villains because they had ‘one bad day’ too, just like him. If Deku’s unable to criticize the system challenged and let him have the great potential he always has would be amazing.

Ochaco;

Ochaco gets less screentime she deserves, she gets shine whenever she gets involved with Toga and thats the thing. Even though, Ochaco seems to have character flaw (that her repressing her own needs), for some reason, story doesnt focus on it enough. The parallels between Ochaco and Toga is more than just ‘romance’. Ochaco isnt just repressing her romantic feelings, Ochaco is repressing any kind of ‘negative feelings’ to not be burden to others. She displays toxic positivity, she always notice people’s feelings because she pay attention to them all the time because she cares. Story should’ve this part of Ochaco more. Same as Toga who was once just like good, well-behaved girl like Ochaco but had mental breakdown at some point. Its fine to talk about romance and honestly, IzuOcha can be great, if it gets developed properly but their story is more than that and deserve focus on how to neglecting your own needs for others make you end up crazy.

And another interesting detail that wasnt talked enough. Remember when Shigaraki talked about ‘how heroes hurt their families only to help strangers’ and guess who isnt doing that? Ochaco. She always prioritize people around her and honestly, that actually makes her true hero but its hardly mentioned. Deku and many heroes should learn this from her. Ochaco is kind of hero who is also reminding of the humanity of heroes and honestly, let her interact with Shigaraki or Dabi, let Deku interact with league of members more, they have so much potential in there.

Shouto;

I think the most important part of Shouto’s story and the difference between him and other kids is his goal isnt really getting stronger. Every hero kids focus on trying to be more tough, stronger (well, thats how heroes are raised in this society like soldiers) while Shouto is getting softer because he was already treated like a tool as child so he knows thats not gonna work to be better heroes which is something Deku and Ochaco lacks. Shouto desperately wants to be invidual, just a person with feelings and by focusing on that, thats why he could easiely see the similarities between him and his villain brother. He can speak up his mind more than others. He is a lot more honest and his dark feelings than other characters.

I think this is why his character arc is a lot about inviduality. He is one of the prime examples of why kids shouldnt used as child soldiers and groomed. This could go anywhere. He or other characters who knows his story could speak up about why they shouldnt use kids for this.

Just like Ochaco, Shouto is kind of hero who prioritize family and invidual feelings over strangers, something Deku needs to learn. Tododeku has potential there. Honestly, Shouto and Ochaco would get along well since they have so much in common and Ochaco would realize when he was in trouble and Shouto would know how to show his graditute.

- - -

Of course, other hero characters and hero students have interesting potential too. Bakugou doesnt need villain foil, his dark foil is Endeavour, he is supposed to learn not to be like him and him learning Todoroki story and being called out for his actions could actually be good start of his change and redemption. He could learn the real meaning of winning and be the one who can turn toxic competition to healthy one.

Aoyama and Deku’s quirkless arc could’ve exlpored with this tratior plot, instead of ‘you being quikless is the reason you can hold one for all’. Iida’s obsessions with rules eventually could turn into questining them so that he can help his friends. And honestly characters like Monoma and Shinsou’s story would be really interesting to explore. And honestly Endeavour’s story makes more sense as villain. Dark heroes like Hawks and even Lady Nagant or corrupted side of hero society hsould’ve explored and adressed more.

- - -

What getting away of their potential is simply author’s writing story as black and white. Story stopped adressing the social issues which became the biggest fall of almost all charcters. At some point, kid heroes vs adult heroes shouldve happen, not necessarely as fight but as mindset. Deku’s getting bullied because of being quirkless isnt exlpored and since heroes have to be right, heroes lost their character flaws. Deku used as narrative tool to make heroes better, you can tell its not Izuku is talking, it is author’s talking and defending bad heroes. Since Izuku is good person and mc, he always is right so he is used for this purpose. It ruins Deku’s character more than Ochaco and Shouto because Izuku is the kind of character who supposed to empathize with villains side because he was once outcast too.

- The scene Deku rejected Toga only happenned to make Toga-Ochaco interaction. Dabi doesnt need Endeavour’s appravol. We could get a scene where both Toga and Dabi give up on their obsessions to help league and Shigaraki since league is exist in story for a reason.

Ochaco isnt explored well because author doesnt know how to handle female characters. I think Shouto is luckier compared to those two since he is not written to be outcast like Deku so it makes sense for him to not think about saving them and he is not female character so he gets better fihgting scene and more screen times but his character is not explored and his feelings is not explored enough, despite being one of the main characters. Other than this, someone else already mentioned this before, i think Shouto’s liking and worrying abour Endeavour doesnt make sense. I mean, how could you care about someone whom you doesnt have one good memory with? I didnt think about this before but they are actually right. I always saw Dabi as proof that Shouto still secrelt despises his father but respressing it because of system and eventually confronting it which would be better writing, in my opinion. Unfortunately, story started to focus more on power and less on characters.

Well, we dont know how story will goes or end up but at least, i really wanted to talk about their great potential as heroes. Especially Deku, Ochaco and Shouto. Their characters is actually interesting and they have great potential both as heroes and characters. I also want those three to hang out together with villains at the end.

[ilynpilled]

actually that was great 😭 and i pretty much agree. also i think on some level maybe jaime resents them never asking? like in their eyes (and tywin’s) he killed aerys to protect his father and align himself with the lannisters as they enter KG and they don’t care for any other reason he could have. but its the opposite. he warns aerys not to let his father in. also then out of all people why does he choose to tell brienne… i mean i have some ideas but what are your thoughts?

The thing is we do not really know if they asked lmao. I mean I will assume Tywin didn’t give a fuck. Not for the right reasons, anyway. That’s Tywin. I am not certain of that assumption regarding Cersei and Tyrion. Anyway, I think what distinguishes them from Brienne, is how distinctly they view Jaime as a result of the fact that they are Lannisters, as well as what their respective struggles are as individuals. They have a history. They have an established relationship with him. It is a relationship with insane baggage. With that baggage comes a lot of blindspots. They knew him before Aerys, but they did not truly know him after. As much as they love Jaime, as he is the glue of the family, they also loathe him in some form for meeting the standards that their horrid abusive father set. He is the only one of them that was gifted with the potential to gain Tywin’s approval (not that such a thing is possible lmao). The other two do not even have the chance. Jaime then took up a role in life that was never really an option for either of those two. Knighthood is reserved for Jaime, both meta textually, as that is what his story is mainly deconstructing, and within the text itself, as that is what he dreamed of being as the young boy prodigy. This experience completely changed Jaime and his outlook on the world. It sent him down the path of amorality, nihilism, and cynicism, specifically regarding the feudalistic constructs of morality, knighthood, and honor. This is something that Cersei and Tyrion can never truly grasp, just as Jaime will never understand their respective struggles. These blindspots the three siblings have concerning each other are always very apparent in their POVs. I talked about JC and how they put each other into boxes, but Tyrion and Jaime also do this with each other. Despite their bond, we never gain that much insight into Jaime from Tyrion’s POV in the first two books. Like even he reduces post Aerys Jaime to “my impulsive and flippant big brother who loves murder”, (however he gives us glimpses of the fact that Jaime loved him, unlike the rest of them). The person that Jaime presents to Brienne is a person that nobody has seen. That is how the narrative is set up. Brienne is the one that is interlinked with the deconstruction of knighthood. She is such a necessary foil to him in the beginning. I said this before: Brienne and Jaime’s dynamic in ASOS is “the goodhearted and naive idealist vs the jaded, cynical, and callous asshole who is a disappointed idealist that recognizes their old self in the former, making it a battle of who succeeds in pulling the other closer to their side of the spectrum.” The conclusion to this question of knighthood is something they have to come to together. I kinda elaborate more on this here:

So he lays this side of himself bare to the reader and Brienne only, bc that is how his development is meant to happen. This is a side that only us and Brienne are meant to see, because it is who it is most relevant to.

[thestobingirlie]

I think Steve, Dustin, Lucas, and Max’s plotlines in S4 would’ve been a lot better if there was a focus on the relationships between the four of them.

For one, Lucas taking up basketball is an excellent opportunity for Steve-bonding and then Dustin getting jealous and latching onto not only the only other older dude in his life, but one interested in the same hobbies as him and therefore in no danger of ‘abandoning’ him. And if Dustin was just some kid in his club to Eddie before things went to shit? The drama. If Eddie was supposed to just be another version of Steve to Dustin they could’ve at least not been lazy about it.

For two, Dustin and Lucas were Max’s first friends in Hawkins and the love and support they give her should’ve been shown and explored just as much as her romantic one with Lucas.

As a side note, I think having Erica be noticeably upset when she learns about Max would’ve added a lot to both of their characters. Partially because the duffers don’t give Erica much of anything (as interesting as she is, she’s one of the worst written characters in my opinion) and partially because Max has been in Lucas’s life for almost two years by this point, which means Erica would have been somewhat close to her as well. Everyone got a reaction to Max being cursed except her. That’s her brother’s girlfriend on the chopping block! She’s going to care!

And finally, Billy was specifically written to be Steve’s foil so having Steve there successfully older brothering Max while she grapples with the grief of her actual brother’s death, what their relationship should have been vs what it actually was, would’ve and could’ve been an absolute sucker punch of emotional turmoil. Just the idea of Max feeling guilty over viewing Steve as more of a brother than Billy and wishing Billy could’ve been more like Steve when Billy did nothing to earn her care before dying in front of her is the kind of lost potential that keeps me up at night.

i will always fight for more time for my junkyard four, regardless of their arcs. but also, i totally agree, i think a lot of their plot lines were actually involved with each other, but for some reason we just didn’t get to actually see the relationships.

yeah, the whole jealousy thing is really underused and kinda weird, it would’ve been really cool if it went two ways! dustin jealous of lucas and steve’s bond, and then steve jealous of dustin and eddie, as both boys think the other two have more in common. and then the resolution. eddie telling steve that dustin worships him, and lucas telling dustin that steve talks about him all the time. and then we can get a conversation between dustin and steve where they hug and tell each other that they’re brothers and they love each other <3

dustin and max have really been forgotten about and it’s pretty sad. i get that dustin had a little crush on her, but he’s not the type to hold it against her. they’ve had so few scenes since s2, it’s tragic. just another example of the duffers prioritising romance over friendship.

i wish we’d gotten erica and max this season instead of nancy and robin. like, imagine that girl power team. it would’ve been fun to get any erica and max interaction, even maybe erica being a bit standoffish to max, because of all the lumax drama.

steve literally is max’s big brother, and the duffers don’t give him enough credit. like, max confiding in steve and opening up about her guilt, and steve reassuring her. ugh, that would’ve killed me.

it’s interesting because even though max has such a big role this season, i still feel like she got kinda tossed aside. i guess because we have such a huge cast now, it’s hard to focus on anyone. that’s why they need to start killing off characters. but not any of my favourites

but yeah, the junkyard four and erica, i would kill for them.

[kiefbowl]

Finally another person that hates HIMYM as much as I do. There isn't a show that I hate more tbh, like there are shows I dislike, but that damn show is something else. Just like you I hate what they did to Robin(and she's the only character I kind of liked; I liked Ted when he wasn't trying to be like Barney and when he would actually call Barney out, which sadly wasn't too often)...and I hate how more often than not the show treated Barney's treatment of women as a joke, or rather the show rarely called him out, and i especially hate the way they ended his character arc, I was like "oh now he'll see women as humans" *eye roll*-- I hate that trope so damn much. The show had potential, and the premise was interesting, it's just that the show was filled with the worst tropes and some of the worst characters on today's tv(or ever, really). I just cannot for the life of me understand its popuplarity.

Also, oh my god yes, I totally agree with you on that final season. What the hell were the writers thinking?!

>"I liked Ted when he wasn't trying to be like Barney and when he would actually call Barney out, which sadly wasn't too often"

one of the most unaware things the show does is pretend Barney is a foil to Ted when Ted and Barney are extremely similar in their views of women. The difference is that Barney is always on, and it's always a goofy heightened reality, while Ted will be written fairly straight wrt wanting to sleep with women.

>"I hate that trope so damn much."

a baby daughter fixed me is definitely one of the worst tropes and also is sooooo fucking lazy. they didn't build a story around Barney in which him having a baby girl in the 11th hour would feel cathartic, that's why it feels so cheap. If he had conflicted feelings about his life and about fatherhood at all, it would still be a lazy and misogynistic choice, but it would at least follow some story logic. it's like a big ass trifecta of shit: Robin and Ted endgame, mother dead, Barney has a fucking baby.

Writing that reminds me that they have Robin "fail" both of her love interests by not being able to have children since children are obviously the one true ultimate goal in this story. A child fixes Barney, and Robin wouldn't have ever been able to do that for him. Truly ridiculous. But anyway I haven't gotten that far yet.

>"I just cannot for the life of me understand its popuplarity"

I have thoughts on this, looking back on old subreddits I think a lot of people hand waved unpleasant parts of HIMYM because they wanted to believe the set-up they were seeing was intentional. Most of it was not as intentional as believed and it ended up being poorly done for the actual planned ending. Case in point: the internal life of Robin is clearly not something the writers cared about. But because the story is focused on who she loves and wants to be in a relationship with, fans thought 'well the internal life of Robin is being treated seriously, so I will read into the subtext'. I think this also comes off because Cobie cares about Robin's internal life. I don't think the writers ultimately know why Robin loves Barney, but I think Cobie knows. I wonder if the writers ever really cared what the actors believed was true about their characters. There needs to be some give and take on this even if writers ultimately gets to decide how the story plays out.

Additionally, I think the five leads are very charming and elevate a lot of material, they all have exceptional physical comedy chops. People liked the characters when they were good, tried to close their eyes when they were bad, and hoped the good parts were leading somewhere satisfying.