#but they're going to be different fuck ups
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i fear some people aren't ready to face the fact that at some point vi had to let go of her martyr sister/parentified-child role because it would also mean understanding that jinx is an adult who makes her own choices and doesn't need protection the same way she needed back when they were kids. vi says so herself ('why did you come get me? you don't actually need my help, you haven't for a long time').
everyone who expected vi to become some sort of leader for zaun didn't understand that the reason she fought so hard in her youth for her family was because what she truly craved for was safety for herself and her loved ones. it's the whole reason she has that conversation with vander back in episode 2 of season 1.
vi going after jinx when caitlyn opens the cell would only reinforce the idea that vi has to step into the role of caregiver/protector again. vi isn't jinx's mom, she's her sister, and she has her own battle against her internal demons.
in fact, she spirals down very quickly once locked inside the cell, which is later reflected when caitlyn finds her; she's certain she screwed up again and she believes she's lost both jinx and caitlyn, and she knows it happened because vi was being herself, by doing something she wouldn't have done during her act1 self.
her fallout with caitlyn happened because caitlyn couldn't accept who vi truly is, so how can vi expect caitlyn to be okay with what she's done, when that was the reason they grew apart in the first place?
because caitlyn chooses vi, she prioritizes her over her revenge. caitlyn lets go of it because she loves vi for who she is, and not despite it.
jinx and vi love each other unconditionally, even if they don't understand each other entirely ('i didn't get to do much of this with my sister, she was more into hitting things'), so how could anyone outside of her family love vi, while simultaneously understanding her?
and vi probably just went through ten different scenarios of how caitlyn is going to reject her for it, for showing who she is, and who she's always been.
so what does caitlyn do in response?
by this point caitlyn doesn't believe vi has forgiven her, so the whole 'you've grown a bit predictable' isn't a pickup line to get in her pants.
this is caitlyn's attempt at cracking a joke.
vi's worries are met with a dumb phrase that's meant to cheer her up, the same way vi did back in episode 1 ('thought for sure you were gonna get yourself killed').
she spiraled down believing she had lost everyone, and caitlyn proves her wrong with an easy smile and a reassurance; 'this is who you are, i know it, watch me be more than okay with it'.
this, for vi, must feel so, so freeing.
this is the one thing she's been craving for her whole life; the feeling of safety. i'm me, and i'm safe to exist that way in here.
she spent her entire childhood fighting to provide that stability for her family because she was given no other choice but to step into that role, she pushed her own needs aside to make sure everyone else was okay. and now, her sister is an adult who has survived without vi's protection, who has accomplished a lot of things without her big sister by her side.
now it's vi's turn to crave safety, it's vi's turn to choose and let someone else make her feel safe and reassured.
vi's not a symbol of zaun, that's what characters like sevika and ekko exist for; neither of them were pressured to step in and take that role, they fight for their city because they chose to and because they want to (and, if i might add, they're very good at it!).
she's just a girl who went through some really fucked up things in life and only ever wished for a little stability.
and she finds that in caitlyn, so she chooses it.
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Activism when I was growing up meant volunteering to help with voting, working at a food bank, getting involved in your local community, donating to verified causes, organizing to have conversations with politicians, marching for rights, cleaning up garbage from creeks, and so on.
Now activism is tearing down posters of a missing toddler and saying how good it makes you feel, or donating to scam bots without making an iota of effort to ensure the money is going somewhere good.
Leftist spaces used to be useful and now they're a shadow of their former selves
This is precisely why I stay far away from those spaces these days. I do what I can in my own way - I donate to organisations I care about that are verifiably making a difference to people's lives and when I do my grocery shopping, I buy a few extra items for the food bank box. It's not a revolution and it won't change the world but most of these 'activists' these days shout from the rooftops about glorious revolution and then don't actually do fuck all.
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Playerscope, modding and the hunt for aesthetic: why you should be more upset about mods and community expectations than you already are.
I love that this sounds like an academic paper but HONESTLYYYY. I need to put my thoughts to paper in regards to my burnout with xiv, otherwise I think I'll go insane. This is a controversial yet brave post. I am well aware that I partake in some of the things I'm going to be critiquing; aka, "thank you, dinklebottom, we live in a society." I'm also not critiquing mods from a space of offering more accessibility to people and/or facilitating representation not currently offered within the context of the game. There is nuance to every discussion and I'm coming at this from an overarching view around mods and community expectations/standards rather than player joy. I hope this makes sense. I'm also predominately writing from a roleplay perspective, though I'm sure a lot of what I end up saying can reflect in the art party/social space. Just know if I haven't mentioned the latter it's because that's not my scene and I don't pretend to know otherwise.
Anyway. For those who don't know, there's a new mod that's causing some strife in the xiv community called Playerscope. Here is the reddit thread about it. I'm not going to be talking too much about the mod in general because that's not the point of this post, but seeing discussion around it today just made me feel more exhausted than I already am when it comes to modding and the xiv community around it. It made me realise... I'm actually really sick to death of mods. I'm sick to death of what they're doing to the community when it comes to gatekeeping, policing and in general the interactions we have with each other in the community.
Let me explain: I wrote a post about the roleplay mod on bsky that kind of articulates at a surface level what I mean.
I think what makes me sad, which I'm sure is echoed by a lot of people, is that mods feel like the standard now rather than an option and that there's a certain expectation for people to have them if they want to engage with facets of the community—whether intentional or not.
Unlike XIV, WoW has a supported mod scene (within reason) and TRP 2 and the like have been accepted for years now. In a space where people can't slap on an RP tag, having that tool readily identifies you as a writer/roleplayer and you can include as much or as little of your character as you like. The general idea is if you have one of these tools enabled, you're a roleplayer to some capacity. You can dress up the profile to a certain degree, you can add links and supported pictures, but you're mostly reliant on what you put to paper in regards to your character. Even then, I find filling out what my character is doing currently and marking the rest as a WIP doesn't necessarily exclude me from roleplay if I want to find it. A lot of people will do that and a super simple description to incite interest around their oc.
These days in XIV... I don't know. I do think communities have gotten more insular—it's why I'm so pedantic about trying to find them for the Compendium—but I also think mods and, to a certain extent, the 'nightclub' scene have gotten in the way of it as well. My argument is such.
I want to go to an event (for example sake, I'll call it Seascape). In order to fully participate, I may need:
Their discord.
A roleplay addon.
A carrd/google site/etc.
Their synchshell (including mods, mare and everything else)
Potentially a mod of some description so people know I can see theirs (and vice versa).
Also that your mod isn't made by a shitty person.
Appropriate understanding of the scene/social space.
Some luck and a prayer that it's an inclusive space and not a closed rp group advertising as being open and/or a mod showcase advertising itself as something different.
Like??? Holy shit you guys. If you are someone who doesn't want to mod because you're worried about repercussions it really just feels like a big 'fuck you, good luck'.
And let me be clear, not every community is like this. I'm incredibly lucky to have found fantastic roleplay within my own rp event/community, I have great friends who run awesome, inclusive events for people of any skill (writing or otherwise) and I do fully believe you can just enable the rp tag and find fun, fulfilling roleplay. But I've also found the above a lot of times, too. I've had people point-blank get mad at my partner because he won't install mods and try to exclude and/or circumvent him in spaces. It's weird. I've been to events where the only time I felt like I got proper interaction(s) was when I joined the aforementioned, even if I have my character's profile linked in my about. It's weird.
Honestly, no wonder new roleplayers feel overwhelmed. Not only do they have to learn roleplay etiquette, they have to be a mod expert overnight? It feels less about what someone can bring to the table as far as a story but what mods they can install to either look cool or pass an unspoken social barrier. As much as I'm down bad for aesthetic and looking the part, I hate it being at the cost of accessibility and fun for someone else.
Arguably it's the same for gposing and the like as well, which contributes to my exhaustion alongside all the graphical changes and I just. I'm gnawing at the bars of my cage.
I don't think it's going to change and arguably it's more of a Twitter/X issue than a Tumblr, one but Tumblr lets me write mini essays and Twitter will tell me to kms.
Ergo, I'll go with the essay-writing platform.
Anyway, I guess this is just a reminder that you don't need 4596419651 mods to be in the community and that people should be more vigilant on including people who don't have them for whatever reason, provided they operate in good-faith and want to contribute. I think we're careening to a slippery slope of expectation for something unsupported and I don't like it.
#。・゚゚・ — sea speaks#i don't know if this a popular opinion or not#but i sure know it's mine!!!#idk man sometimes i'm like 'should i go back to wow'#at least i can find walkup#and read people's trp for fun#i'm enabling reblogs for now BE NICE
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i had the misfortune of ending up on mileven tiktok by accident and found some gold
dude. how many times do we have to say its not the fact that they're standing next to each other. its the fact that they're standing next to each other when all the other characters are paired off with their significant other with significant space between them. they are SANDWICHED between two couples that they have numerous other parallels with. like you have to be playing dumb if you think we're just saying byler is endgame because they're in the same proximity. and WDYMMMM MIKE ISN'T EVEN LOOKING AT HIM why does that matter?? the whole point is that they're all looking forward at the fucking apocalypse beginning. nancy and jonathan weren't looking at each other, joyce and hopper weren't looking at each other. why does that matter?? and holy shit watching them try to analyze media is hilarious. the byler commenter was very concise an respectful and ofc the mlvn has to be backhanded. no, the 2 minute scene of mike saying i love you is not random, it's actually meticulously crafted so that we're able to tell mike is lying...
uhh because WILL IS THE MAIN FUCKING CHARACTER OF SEASON 5 AND THE WUOLE POINT OF AN ENDING SHOT OF A SEASON IS TO FORESHADOW THE NEXT SEASON???
do they think we're making this up???
he is the center and lead of season 5 and his arc is going to tie the whole series together. but nah they just paired him with mike and left him in the background on the hill just because el needed to be in front. they could've done a million other set ups where it actually comes off that mike and el are a team and in love and want to work together. they could've had those couples together and then had will alone or behind them and done a close up like they did with el in the actual scene, but no, he had to be with mike. and not only is he with mike, he and mike are paired off together and CENTERED. the CENTER of season 5 is CENTERED in the final shot of the season and he is standing with his long time best friend who he is desperately in love with. and all of this is foreshadowing for season 5, which if you've forgotten, is all about connection and finding belonging with others.
"People talk about mythology and The Upside Down, and all that is huge, but the magic of S5 are the characters who find a sense of belonging with other and through that connection, become heroes."
"[Season 5] It's about a group of people who question their value, who find each other, and who find superpowers in connection."
remember when mike beat himself up and questioned his value as a person because he feels weak and powerless and stupid next to el and then will gave him a painting where mike is a literal knight in shining armor and and confessed his own feelings about how mike holds everything together and makes him feel like he's better for being different and gives him the courage to keep fighting and how he'll always need mike and that finally made mike feel reassured
yeah...
alright you guys have to be lying. you can't think of a single reason why people would ship byler?? not a one??? you know what actually, you're right. why on earth would people ship two characters where one is canonically in love with the other, they've been best friends since the first day of kindergarten, they are always a duo, they have a special friendship compared to the others, one said asking the other to be his friend is the best thing he's ever done, one thinks home isn't the same without the other, they hold hands, put their arms around each other, always look out for each other, etc etc ETC. no yeah i don't see it
was the person who confirmed this named mike wheeler...
no yeah we just say random things. those of us using the knowledge we gained in film school/creative writing school to analyze a form of media are just saying random things. i just love making shit up!
mlvns are so silly lol like they really think they know more about film/writing than people who STUDY IT AND DO IT FOR A LIVING
#byler#stranger things#will byers#mike wheeler#byler endgame#byler proof#milkvan is bones#anti milkvan#anti mileven#anti mlvn#mileven is bones
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someone: do you think anders is a good person
the part of my brain that engages in genuine critical media analysis: i think it's disingenuous to label him through the lens of a binary good/evil paradigm because what makes him such an interesting and engaging character is his status inbetween a human with complex emotions and desires and flaws that will never fully align with each other, and the singleminded focus and purpose of a supernatural entity that is literally justice incarnate and has no capacity for nuance and whose very nature is fundamentally incompatible with humanity but the two of them are so deeply connected that they make up a single identity that's constantly at odds with itself and this struggle causes him to act in ways that aren't always clean and often land him and those around him in impossible positions. i think he was morally justified in doing what he did to the chantry but i also believe he understood the magnitude of what he was doing which is why i inherently disagree with the notion that characters like varric or sebastian were wrong in their reactions because that's the very nature of violent revolution—people get caught in the crossfire and are harmed despite their innocence and regardless of the righteousness of the action at large. if someone killed your mom to protect a hundred orphans you probably wouldn't come out of the experience full of love and admiration for the person who killed your mother because regardless of the outcome they still fucking killed your mother. anders destroyed people's homes and lives and there's a conversation to be had about how he gaslit and exploited hawke, his own potential lover, into being an unwitting accomplice even though we know through meta knowledge that he was perfectly capable of doing it on his own and very likely only wanted hawke's involvement because he needed a powerful figure to become the rallying symbol for his cause. the reality is his very nature would have never allowed him to choose hawke and his friends over his goal because to do so would have been fundamentally selfish and antithetical to his newfound identity as one who champions the needs of the many at the expense of the individual. it's a beautifully tragic story about the lengths a person would have to go to in order to enact any sort of meaningful change while constrained in a system that benefits from their powerlessness, and how that process cannot exist without suffering and pain on both the individual and collective level. i also feel like if anders was written by a person with a degree of compassion and awareness for not only the character they were writing but just what living as a vulnerable and targeted minority is like then the narrative and message would have been vastly different than what ended up on screen because, ultimately, the game wants you to look at the stark injustice of a child being ripped away from their family to spend a life locked away in cold isolation where they're at constant risk of exploitation, abuse, death, and even a complete removal of their personhood, and think that there's room for compromise. it's a narrative that perpetuates the myth that passivity and tolerance in the face of oppression is more virtuous than burdening the masses with the discomfort of seeing their own culpability in sustaining it. a better game would have challenged varric and sebastian while also affirming their anger instead of just the latter. a better game would have explored hawke's reaction in a deeper manner that examined their relationship with the system, their own internal biases, and how anders affected their worldview.
the part of my brain that was on tumblr in 2014 and is still extremely petty and spiteful: he should have blown up the conclave while he was at it
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In approximately a week I binge read the entire Sonic IDW comics and fell absolutely in love with Team Chaotix. They are perfection and you can't convince me otherwise.
Also I totally didn't scream in horror while reading the metal virus arc and nothing happens to my babies there hahahahah
#team chaotix#they're detectives you want on your siiiiiide!#sorry had their theme song playing every day now#these boys grew on me SO fast it's crazy 😅#they are like...#a bunch of weirdos hanging in a basement#and they're a found family#and they're all in a different age range it's so fucking cool#and I believe that if each of them were a separate character they would be so much more annoying#but together they balance each other's traits and that's just#*chefs kiss*#also just putting this here since I've read most of the IDW#Espilver is on my mind#and I might draw it#one day#I'm already getting late on my homework for them and now I am on a deadline#my art#sth#sonic#sonic the hedgehog#sonic the hedghog fanart#espio#espio the chameleon#vector the crocodile#charmy bee#chaotix detective agency#yeah I started speedrunning the comics at the metal virus arc because I could handle an issue a day but#zombies are the one thing I can't fucking deal with#like idk why but since birth zombie-like tropes would get me nearly throwing up and having nightmares#so I finished it all in 1/2 go because I didn't want it to be on my mind for too long and then I couldn't stop myself
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So I said in tags that I actually read this webcomic in my teens and that it had some strong worldbuilding, in particular its take on the seven deadly sins as demons, but that somebody would have to ask before I go infodumping again about such a hot mess.
OKAY here we go, I'm just gonna go over the sin demons because they're where all the imagination was concentrated and they sum up the setting in themselves really
Wrath: the sin demons in this are actually the damned souls guiltiest of their respective deadly sin in all of history (past or future because hell exists outside of time and all that) and Jack, the title character, is Wrath because he was Furry Hitler. Not literally Adolf Hitler in a furry timeline mind you, but a furry who became a genocidal dictator with a bunch of awkward Hitler parallels. He canonically genocided all humans, because at some point humans create furries only to treat them as slaves or something.
Anyway the sin of Wrath is also the Grim Reaper in this universe, and his punishment is that all memory of his evil deeds and why he did them were taken away from him, except for the factual knowledge of who he is. So this makes him a completely different, kinder person tormented by the act having to reap every death there will ever be, but he does know who he was and why this is his fate. I think you can see why people bothered to read such a fucked up messy comic because that's a pretty damn strong hook, for a character or story at all. Like imagine being your regular self but knowing you were someone as bad as hitler, and now you have to be the one who witnesses every death there is and rip families apart a million times a day. Would you deserve punishment at all for deeds that have been wiped from your mind? Are they still "your" sins in that scenario? These and other compelling questions raised by this premise.... would never actually be explored, as far as I can recall. All it really amounts to is the same as any sad antihero, and kind of a direct ripoff of Todd Mcfarlane's Spawn.
So then there's Greed, who was some kind of religious cult leader who built like a whole brutal Roman style empire, or something, until he was turned on and mutilated by his followers? He's the least interesting really, and his backstory, along with many other backstories in the series, completely contradicts Jack's backstory where humans invent furries through biotechnology. Other characters were definitely already furries during historical events centuries before then.
9/11 even happens during the events of the comic, but the world was already all furries at the time. By the way one of the towers themselves goes to heaven with all the good people who died in 9/11 and the other one goes to hell with all the bad people. This was not meant to be funny at the time but it is obviously VERY funny. Writing this has forced me to remember that I did do this infodump before. Oh no. I don't remember when. I just remember that I did. JUST LIKE JACK!!!!!!!!!
Gluttony is two characters, a husband and wife couple who were serial killer cannibals. They are also some sort of dinosaur or pterosaur that was brought back in furry form by furry society's biotechnology, but in furry society everyone of a carnivorous species lives on lab-grown meat, and these two couldn't stand that because it didn't satisfy their hunting instinct, or something. PERSONALLY I feel like this should not really count as the most sinful possible gluttony, I mean, these predatory lizard birds didn't ask to come back into existence and be cursed with unnatural sapience. Just feels kind of bullshit to me. They are the coolest concept design-wise for any of these sins though, and they fuse together into one body when they eat, with one of them becoming a face on the crotch like some of those old medieval depictions of devils.
Envy looks like a big fucked up Todd Mcfarlane Orangutan but is actually supposed to have been the last surviving human and was like, a mad geneticist or something. The artist could not draw humans, hence the plot about them being extinct and the only human character being warped into a demonic ape. If I'm remembering correctly (I could just check a wiki but I don't feel like it sorry) he's Envy because he hated furries for taking over our society even though most of them had nothing to do with the genocide and were just freed slaves and whatnot, and one thing I do remember clearly is that he engineers a furry zombie apocalypse that ends the furry world further in the future.
Vanity/pride I don't think was ever fully explained but she wears a cloak because she's skinless, and she goes around skinning other damned she thinks are beautiful to wear the pelts until they rot.
Sloth was revealed many years after I stopped paying attention to this series, but turns out to be the entire ground of hell, with a malformed tree as his seat of consciousness, making it impossible to get a moment's peace or rest. That's a neat concept but apparently no backstory happened before the comic stopped so we're left wondering how someone was as bad all these various Hitlers through slothfulness. I guess someone who could have easily prevented a bunch of suffering and didn't care enough to bother maybe.
So the last one is Lust, and Lust is a giant rat (who looks nothing at all like a rat) named "Drip" who was a violent misogynistic sexual predator, the worst one that would ever exist in our whole reality for him to be the demon of lust. This was the first piece of fiction I ever saw where Lust was someone like this instead of a Sexy Seductive Lady demon, which makes a shitload more sense yet it still isn't common.
Anyway this guy is the biggest reason why you may not want to go looking for this comic because the kind of shit he does is fully shown, and it's played for horror, yes, and it's also just drawn too sloppy to come across as the author's fetish, but for some time this character was supposedly the author's main "Fursona" he roleplayed as. His wife actually mentions the character by name in the MTV call. I'm not writing a callout here or anything, I mean this was like 20 years ago, I don't know him and haven't heard anything recent about him, these just aren't details you can rightfully leave out about this character.
Edited to add that Drip is also supposedly the father (without knowing it?) of what was the focal character in the beginning of the comic, the soul of an aborted fetus, who ends up wandering hell but protected from it up until Drip does something to him (thankfully off screen) that leads Jack to shred Drip into a million pieces and leave him as a screaming tortured severed head which I do believe Drip never recovers from before the comic stopped updating. I could be wrong? There is obviously a lot to unpack in all that, including the fact that, in a setting where an aborted fetus becomes a sapient child forced to wander hell, God was still written as a completely righteous entity and specifically a cute child-size lamb furry we were supposed to find endearing. In its heyday Jack was treated like a "culturally important" webcomic, like, hailed as proof that webcomics were a serious adult medium, which is also very funny on multiple levels in our current online culture. I know it was a big big deal in some furry circles, but I was introduced to it by just horror fandom at the time. It ran from before I ever even owned a computer to sometime in the 2010's, I think it was actually published at one point and it influenced a bunch of other webcomics to varying degrees of success.
So yeah, it IS internet history and I'm sure there's video essays and stuff about it if you want to know more because I still probably only ever saw a third to half of it at best.
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Ben's Big BL Blurb 4: I Hope I See Jay Sorathon Again
New year, new blurb. Time to reflect on a few shows finishing, talk about some new shows, and see where we're at in January.
Haunted Hearts Sucked
Final Verdict: 5.5, Not Recommended. Y'all don't need to watch this weird mess of a show. Despite joking about "devirginizing" its lead multiple times, it was so chaste in the end. It also did some weird world shenanigans I was not feeling. The leads are supposed to be in another Oxin Films project soon, so we'll see if they're better there.
Caged Again Flopped
Final Verdict: 6, Recommended Only For Jay Sorathon. This one really hurts me, because I genuinely loved the first half of this show. Jay Sorathon as Junior was one of the most refreshing experiences I've had in a while. This young actor is charming in a way that felt different, and I found myself enjoying every scene he was in because he could deliver what he was asked to do. However, the show generally failed to do much with most of its themes, and I think it was a real waste of Nokia and Jaonine as a pair. There were interesting themes about how Junior and Sun wanted different things out of their relationship that didn't get resolved, so all of their skinship felt disconnected from the big themes they were teasing out.
I am sad that I cannot really recommend this as a complete viewing experience, but I do not want that to detract from how much I enjoyed the entire cast's chemistry. I just cannot pretend that this show didn't peak at the gif used above before floundering completely.
An Apology to City of Stars
Final Verdict: 8, Recommended. I skipped this show originally because I was overloaded and unmoved by the first episode. However, this show was actually one of the most consistent narratives we've had about the consequences of fan culture, sponsorship, and commercialization of queer actors we've had this year. Unlike Only Boo!, this show inflicted real consequences on Feuang for coming out to the point that he essentially had to change careers (which happens to real actors all the time, going back as far or further than William Haines).
The leads also kept having sex after getting together! A novel experience! I loved that Krom had almost no swag, and Feuang fell for him entire on family photos and his mom gushing over him. He really won as a tech worker. Watch this if you're interested in seeing a show with clear ideas about the entertainment industry and are willing to deal with some weak acting.
Our Youth Left Me A Bit Wanting
Final Verdict 8: Recommended With Reservations. I wrote my write up for this already, and will say here that I like parts of this show a lot even though I wasn't fully satisfied by the viewing experience.
See Your Love Got All The Important Things Right
Final Verdict: 8, Recommended for the Mains. I will admit that I didn't much care for the side couple, but I loved Shaopeng and Sean's relationship. I loved that this wasn't a story about fixing someone's hearing so they could be in a romance. I also love that one of our final scenes in Shaopeng's dad telling Sean's dad to go fuck himself. The leads reminded me of Jimmy and Tommy from Why R U and I loved their work together.
Love in the Air Koi Was a Genuine Delight
Final Verdict: 9, Highly Recommended. I liked it a lot. I think new and old fans will be able to enjoy it. I have high hopes about cross-cultural adaptations as a result.
Love is Like a Poison Was Spectacular
Final Verdict: 9.5, Highly Recommended. I had so much fun with this show. I love that this show blended multiple genres together, and I loved that Shiba was always in a legal drama. By blending this together this way, the show supports the idea that the different ways we love and see the world are not incompatible in relationships. Shiba and Haruto are one of the best couples we had this past year, because they each made the other better, and they each add something to their relationship. Also, this show was actively horny the entire time. Run, do not walk, to support this show (if you can) on Netflix.
Fragrance You Inherit Was The One of the Kindest Shows I've Ever Seen
Final Verdict: 9.5, Highly Recommended. Thanks to the constant efforts of @isaksbestpillow we were able to enjoy this incredible show. @twig-tea already wrote a great review. I will be thinking about Sakura and Touki for years. I will just add that I really loved that Hoshii was just a goofy dude that loved the women in his home. He respected both of them, and was just so happy to be included in their shenanigans. I cannot overstate how much the episode where we met him properly kicked this show into overdrive for me. I loved that he was a good dad and husband and that it was clear his wife and daughter felt safe and happy around him. I loved that this show was about kind people doing their best.
Okay, on to the currently airing stuff.
Your Sky is Faltering, but I Still Like It (8/12)
Look, I am just not keen on the Oh redemption arc. I'm also feeling the show dragging its feet at this point. I also am not sure what the relationship between the various sides are contributing to this story. That being said, I continue to enjoy the chemistry between the leads, and I am looking forward to seeing their dating era. This show has been riding the line on the bubble, and I am curious to see where it lands.
Ossan's Love Thailand (1/12)
I've grown to love Ossan's Love over the last year, and so I was cautiously optimistic about this adaptation. I don't think the humor is as tight or zippy as I would expect, and I think the branded pair component is hurting some of the initial setup. I also feel like the shower scene shifted in a way that doesn't entirely work. In addition, making Kongdetch a widower slows down his dramatic development. I'll check in again next month.
Call Me By No Name Started Weird (1/8)
gif by @my-rose-tinted-glasses
This show got off to a moody and somewhat intriguing start. I am looking forward to our little gamer's interactions with this possibly-fey creature for the coming weeks. It's difficult when the show starts coy.
When It Rains It Pours Has an Uphill Battle (1/7)
I am personally interested in the journey this show wants to go on as what will more than likely be a double cheating narrative. I like that the show started with boy guys in relationships they feel a bit frustrated with due to a lack of intimacy that is being actively ignored by their respective partners. I'm also intrigued because both partners seem like they're overall committed to our leads. This one started off in a mild note, so I'm curious how it holds audience attention. Still, both leads had sad masturbation scenes, one explicitly remembering when his partner used to fuck him, so it has my attention.
That's all for now! I'll check back in with one of these in a few weeks and we'll see where we're at.
#Ben watches#Ben writes#caged again#see your love#fragrance you inherit#Kimi no Tsugu Kaori wa#ossan's love thailand#haunted hearts#love in the air koi#love in the air: koi no yokan#city of stars#call me by no name#when it rains it pours#Futtara Doshaburi#your sky#your sky the series#love is like a poison#doku koi: doku mo sugireba koi to naru#our youth#miseinen#thai bl#japanese bl#taiwanese bl#filipino bl#bl series#japanese gl#gl series#bl recommendation#drama reccommendation
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the great british fake-off | xmh
you thought the guy in the hawaiian-print shirt who seems physically incapable of being quiet would be the most annoying person here, so imagine your shock when it's xu minghao, who has seemingly decided you're the enemy and keeps sabotaging you. a baking competition for charity might have others on their best behavior, but what's a little sugar without some spice?
❆ pairing: minghao x reader ❆ genre: great british bake-off, holiday au; crack, fluff ❆ wordcount: 5.5k ❆ rating: e for everyone ❆ warnings: some swearing, minghao is a saboteur, idiots abound. ❆ credits: this netflix psd template for the banner. this recipe for the yule log; this recipe for the gingerbread house; and this recipe for the entremet. divider from here. this post for the divider. this was roughly edited by me, so any and all mistakes are my own. ❆ written for: the winter with you collab hosted by @camandemstudios. thank you for letting me participate! please make sure to check out the rest of the stories as they're posted. ♡ ❆ author's note: i had this rotting away in my wips since literally 2021, so even though it started as a completely different story, i'm so glad it's finally seeing the light of day even if it's not what i originally intended. (also, i know the banner says 12 contestants but the holiday specials only had a couple, okay. i forgot when i made it and i wasn't going back to fix it.)
The obnoxious one is wearing an aloha-print shirt.
He’s also extremely loud, his raucous, fake laughter filling every corner of the large warehouse you’ve been assigned to for filming. Makes a show of batting his eyelashes, throwing his head back every time someone cracks a joke that’s not even funny, comes up with nonsensical nicknames for the entire crew just to suck up to them.
“John Davies? Mind if I call you Joe?”
Joe doesn’t even make sense as a nickname for John, but John fucking loves it, apparently. Looks at the annoying guy like he just watched him string the stars in the sky.
But it’s the shirt—god, the shirt drives you absolutely crazy. He’s about to go on national television, be a household name, and some ill-fitting, charity shop Hawaiian print shirt is what he woke up and chose to wear. What’s his angle here? Appeal to the public with some sob story about only being able to afford second-hand clothes so that’s why he’s competing? Needs the money to care for a sick relative?
(The expensive watch on his wrist and his limited-drop sneakers tell an entirely different story, but you’re keeping that to yourself for now. No reason to play your hand so early.)
As much as you hate the shirt, you have to admit it suits him. The colors are garish and unsightly, just as obnoxious as he is, and you can’t stare at it too long because you start going cross-eyed. Looking at him feels about the same as stuffing your mouth with a bunch of sour candies: you get that same burn in the back of your jaw, same scrunched-up, grossed-out look on your face; have to squeeze your eyes shut to blink back tears.
You don’t even know his name, but you hate him immediately.
Your eyes scan the other contestants. None of them inspire the same level of animosity within you as the annoying one does; all of them nearly unremarkable. A variety of ages, appearances, backgrounds. You hear one say they’re a retired investment banker. There’s an accountant, a teacher, a fucking aerospace engineer.
And then it’s his turn to introduce himself. He clears his throat, speaks with an easy, practiced confidence. Completely void of nerves. Makes eye contact with everyone in your conversation circle. Gesticulates wildly as he speaks, immediately endears everyone to him.
“I’m Tim,” he says, and you nearly recoil at how honeyed his voice is. “But you can call me Tim. I’m thirty-eight, originally from a small town. Work as a…”
You can barely stand to listen to it anymore, each “Nice to meet you, Tim!” like another punch to the gut. How can’t these people see right through him? How are they falling for his bullshit? You should’ve known. Producers always throw in at least one bomb to up the ratings—a secret millionaire, someone rude and confrontational, a flat-earther. Even if you’re competing in a charity baking competition, of all things, it’s still reality television at the end of the day.
Just because the bunch of you are going to spend the next few days creating confections out of sugar, spice, and everything nice, doesn’t mean you have to be part of that ‘everything.’
Tim thinks he’s got this in the bag. Thinks he’s going to show up and win easily, the rest of you be damned, and even if you are typically a very nice person, you’re also highly competitive. There’ll be no rolling over done by you, and if Tim wants to play dirty—
Game on.
As you introduce yourself, you feel his eyes burning a hole in the side of your head. Probably because you don’t bother with the faux-humility the rest of the contestants have. Polite and charming but firm, just the way your mother had taught you. You’re not boisterous, don’t crack silly jokes to play up to the cameras the way Tim loves to do, and you know he’s scrutinizing you the way you’d done to him, trying to figure out your angle.
Well, joke’s on him—you don’t need one.
And you really, really hope it drives him crazy.
Except maybe the joke is on you, too, because you don’t account for Xu Minghao.
In true reality television fashion, the tent is boiling hot.
As if the universe itself had looked down on all of you and decided what you all needed was a heatwave uncharacteristic of this time of year, just to up the ante. Not even ten minutes in the tent and you’re all fanning yourselves and wafting air up your shirts. Which is great, really, because it isn’t like you need to use ovens or stand over hot burners. It’s not like you aren’t going to be soaking through your clothes with anxiety sweats, either! Sweat dripping off your brow into your eyes won’t matter because you don���t need to use them.
Everything’s going to be fine!
But everything is not fine. Not only has the universe gifted you with sweltering heat, it’s given you the work station directly next to Tim’s. You’ll have to feel his annoying, off-putting aura near you for the entire competition. There’s always the possibility of him bungling it and making an early exit, but you know that’s unlikely. Obnoxious he may be, you also know a strong opponent when you see one, and something tells you you’re going to be stuck with him for the long haul.
Think of the cats, you tell yourself. All of this is for the cats.
It’s not like you never would’ve returned here of your own volition. No, your first go-round with feel-good, competition-based reality television had gone fine. You hadn’t won, of course, because you wouldn’t be here again if you had, but you placed respectably in the top three. Became a fan favorite, too, which was arguably more lucrative than winning. People make a living on social media these days.
So, it’s not the competition itself that has you white-knuckled gripping onto the edge of your station. It’s the man at the one beside you, cracking all these stupid jokes about the weather and how it’s a horrible day for tempering chocolate, so he bets that’s going to be the first challenge!
You suck in a deep breath. Try to remember the breathing exercises from that one yoga class your sister had dragged you to. It had been about the same temperature then, too—well duh, it’s hot yoga, your sister had said, which was news to you, because you never would’ve signed up for something called hot yoga willingly. Still, you endured it, just like you’ll endure this, and a little sweat is not going to get in the way of you delivering a check to all those poor, sad cats without families.
“Psst, hey,” you hear from behind you. When you turn, a man is smirking at you as he finishes tying his apron around his waist—has to wrap the strings around twice, you notice, because only someone hand-picked by the gods themselves would have that shoulder-to-waist ratio.
You don’t really recognize him. Can’t recall his name or where he’s from; can’t remember what he mentioned doing for a living. Probably something artsy, if you had to guess—he definitely has the style and demeanor of a creative, with his trendy shag-mullet and the multicolored, glitter-y snowflakes decorating his nails.
You aren’t sure he introduced himself at all, but the confidence with which he holds himself—easy, like it’d take a national emergency to rattle him even a little—implies he doesn’t really have to. Most of the people here already know him, if you had to guess, and he gives the impression that he’s not fussed with impressing any of them.
If only Tim was so inclined.
You clear your throat, vaguely aware you need to respond. “Yeah?”
“Are you nervous?”
“Ah, I don’t think so? We’ve done this before, after all. We should be seasoned veterans by now.”
He smirks. “Should be,” he emphasizes. “Feels different when it’s for charity. Extra serious, you know?”
“Right,” you agree, taking a look around the tent. “Anything for the cats.”
There’s an immediate shift in the atmosphere. What was friendly and carefree is now tense; where a smile and a floral giggle sat on the man’s lips has been replaced with a crooked scowl. And it doesn’t make sense, all you’d done was agree with what he said, but then the producers are yelling something at the front of the tent, cameramen are rushing to their equipment, and a woman appears at your side and starts clipping equipment to your clothes, and there’s no time to question it. On your right, Tim’s laughing and joking around with some crew members like they’re old drinking buddies. It drives you nuts, has annoyance pricking at your skin, flushing your cheeks—
So much so that the woman at your side leans in and asks, “Should I get hair and makeup over here?”
“I—no, it’s fine.”
The unnecessary members of the production team scatter away after a loud countdown. Hair and makeup don’t come to wipe the sweat tracks from your skin. You already know Man Behind You is standing there looking perfect because he’s equally as attractive as he is mysterious. God truly has favorites, and this guy somehow made the top five.
You stare down at the instructions in front of you, confident in your ability to read but not so confident in your ability to make sense of any of it. And it’s your own recipe, which is the worst part. You’d typed this recipe yourself. These are your hand-written notes in the margins. You’ve conceptualized, tweaked, baked, and eaten this recipe more times than you can count, and now all you can do is thousand-yard-stare into the ether.
In the time since you were on the show, you’d somehow forgotten about the chaos. Not unlike that hormone women have that makes them forget about the pain and agony of childbirth, you reckon.
In addition to being one of the most bothersome people in history, Tim apparently doubles as a prophet.
Because it is a terrible day to temper chocolate, and you’ve got a bûche de Noël on the horizon that requires you to do so. You can pivot, maybe make some kind of buttercream, but a basic chocolate buttercream is not going to win you a world-renowned baking competition even if it is Swiss meringue. A child could make that.
You sigh. Push that wave of panic to the back of your mind. In a setting like this, you have approximately ten seconds to come up with a back-up plan and execute it and you wasted your time thinking, so you’re just going to have to temper the stupid chocolate and stick to your original plan. God, you have a headache.
But the show must go on, so you do too.
Step 1: Preheat the oven.
Easy enough. If nothing else, you can preheat an oven.
Step 2: Make the sponge.
Not as easy, but you’ve made so many sponge cakes throughout your life you could probably do it in your sleep. Whisk attachment on the stand mixer. Four eggs. Sugar meticulously weighed and added to the bowl. Sugar and eggs whisked together until the mixture is the color and consistency you’re looking for. Flour, cocoa powder, and salt sifted in. Metal spoon to fold it all together as delicately as possible. You won’t have a sponge cake if you beat all the air out of it, now will you?
“Good enough,” you mutter to yourself, staring down at the bowl.
At least you’d had the foresight to grease and line your baking tray, because the entire entourage arrives at your station just as you’re meant to be pouring the batter into it and sticking it in the oven.
“Ah, we meet again,” the group choruses, genuine smiles peeking through as if you’re old friends separated only by time and distance.
That’s the weird thing about being on television. For as long as you’re able, you exist within a microcosm of daily life. A world exists outside of your bubble, you know, but you don’t see much proof of it. All of your meals are eaten together; all of your conversations are had with one another. You share temporary living quarters and oftentimes too much of yourselves, and you’re thankful the show encourages teamwork and kindness because that’s the kind of thing that can grow sour if you leave it unchecked too long.
And then it just—ends.
Bubble burst, you all go back to your regular lives. You look back on that time fondly, but the friendships are thinned out by time and distance. Eventually it all starts to feel like a dream, except every now and then something breaks through the haze to remind you it actually happened: a stranger recognizing you at the store, a message on social media, the casting team contacting you to ask if you’d be interested in competing in a holiday special for charity.
“We certainly do,” you retort, smile matching everyone else’s.
All things considered, you are happy to be back. Even if the tent is crowded and far too warm, the atmosphere is unmatched, especially when it’s decorated for the holidays.
“What are you working on?”
You explain the general workings of your yule log: chocolate sponge, hazelnut liqueur cream filling, and chocolate icing to top it off. You aren’t sure how you’re going to decorate it yet—you’ll figure it out once you get there, depending on how much time you have—but you guarantee them it’ll look festive and professional.
Satisfied with your plan, they wish you luck and move on to the man behind you. It’s so great to see you again, Minghao, someone says, and you’re grateful they’ve spared you the embarrassment of having to ask for his name. It still doesn’t ring a bell, and you can’t recall what season he’d been on for the life of you, but he speaks with a patience and a gentleness that is so unlike Tim that you nearly drop to the floor in thanks.
But as the commotion of the tent reminds you, you don’t have time to waste thinking about Minghao. You’ve only been given an hour for your signature, and you’re going to need all sixty of those minutes if you have any hopes of presenting a finished product.
It doesn’t register at first.
It doesn’t register at second or third, either.
In fact, you’re sure you’re hallucinating when you open the oven door to pop the sponge inside and you aren’t hit with a blast of hot air. Room temperature. Perhaps a bit on the cooler side, if you’re being honest.
And that can’t be, because you know you preheat your oven. It was the first thing you did, because it’s always the first thing you do. It’s just… automatic, like opening your mouth to eat or washing between your toes in the shower. Instinctual. Not something that needs to even be considered, because it’s always the first thing you do.
No, this cannot be. Forgetting to preheat the oven is a rookie mistake and you’re not a rookie.
…Could it be?
Perhaps you were so caught up in the lights and buzz, the thrill of returning to the tent, that it had slipped your mind? Perhaps you’d pressed the wrong buttons and turned the wrong dials? While it’s not likely you’d somehow bumped into the oven and turned it off, nothing is impossible, so… maybe?
“Shit,” you hiss through your teeth. The producers are not going to be happy about your swearing. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“Everything okay up there?” Minghao asks from behind you. When you turn, he’s got a flour-dusted towel thrown over his shoulder as he nurses a cup of tea, and his composure in the face of your hysteria has your head spinning.
Your mouth opens and closes like a goldfish. Minghao is drinking tea without a care in the world and your oven isn’t even halfway to the temperature you need. “I—yes? No? I don’t know. I could’ve sworn I preheated the oven, but—”
“Don’t panic,” he offers, his top lip catching on the rim of his mug. “You got this. Work on something else while you wait.”
Something else. Right, you can work on something else. Both the filling and the frosting still have to be made, and quick mental math tells you there should just be enough time to get everything done if you’re efficient. Of course, that’s a big if, but that’s why you’d chosen a yule log, after all: sponge cake doesn’t need that long to bake, and anything can happen (and go wrong) in this tent.
So, you get to work on something else. Measure out a sheet of parchment paper, dust it with cocoa powder, and set it to the side. Decide to get to work on the frosting, because if one thing has already gone wrong, you don’t trust the universe to let you temper chocolate correctly.
The chocolate is halfway melted when the oven dings. A small harrumph of victory and you’re finally good to go, setting a timer for twelve minutes. Minghao offers you a discreet thumbs-up, fingers covered in something sticky you assume is marzipan.
Time flies after that. You get both the frosting and your filling made, and it’s only through divine intervention that your sponge cake comes out perfectly and with enough time to score and cool. When you dare a look around the room, everyone seems to be in a similar position as you: frazzled and covered in powdered sugar, making frantic trips to and from the refrigerators, chucking seized-up caramel into the trash and starting over for the third time with a pained expression.
A holiday special—it was supposed to be more laid-back, more for the vibes and festivity than actual competition, but it looks to you like everyone’s taking it just as seriously as your first go-rounds.
“Fifteen minutes!” someone calls, and your competitors fade out of focus. You’ve got a yule log to ice and fondant to roll out.
You make it by the skin of your teeth.
It isn’t perfect, of course, as few things on this show ever are, but it’s more than acceptable. It looks great and tastes even better which is all you can hope for. Much to your dismay, Tim also gets top marks, but it’s Minghao that shocks you all. His stollen wreath earns him a handshake and a lot of clandestine, private glares, but he’d been kind to you earlier, helped untangle that knot of pandemonium, so you return the thumbs-up he’d given you earlier with a smile that feels akin to getting away with murder.
Something is wrong.
On its own, this is not necessarily surprising. Gingerbread, tasked with bearing the weight of an entire house, can be fickle. On any other day you wouldn’t blame it if it wanted to rebel and go sideways, but the thing is—you’ve made gingerbread before. Tons of times. Another thing you could probably make in your sleep if you absolutely had to. So it doesn’t make sense when you look down in your mixing bowl and it just… doesn’t look right.
You tell yourself it’ll get better when you knead it. Maybe the color just looks off because it’s underworked, and a few good punches will set it straight.
But it doesn’t. The dough sits at your station like a sad, formless lump, giving you no indication it intends to become anything at all. Which is, admittedly, a problem. Your technical challenge is to build a gingerbread house—one complete with little windows and golden-toned nightlights, a scalloped roof dusted with powdered sugar to look like fresh snow, a working door!—and you’re far from an engineer, but you don’t think you can have a gingerbread house without gingerbread.
You sneak a peek at Tim’s station, where he’s well into measuring an immaculate-looking dough with a ruler. The contestant in front of you is in a similar place, too, so it’s with an oh fuck I’m doomed sigh that you turn around and hope to find a comrade in Minghao again.
“Hey,” you whisper, trying not to draw attention to yourself. “Does this look right to you?” You jerk a thumb in the direction of your dough-lump. Minghao, bless him, looks around you and tries his best to hide his grimace.
He does not succeed.
“Um. Well, no.”
You sigh. Place one flour-dusted hand on your waist and pinch the bridge of your nose with the other. “I can’t figure out what’s wrong with it. I’ve made gingerbread a million times.”
“Looks pale,” he offers. Of course, this is the exact moment he dumps his own dough—his beautiful dough, flawless chestnut brown—onto his station to knead it. “Was the sugar right?”
A strangled, disbelieving laugh escapes you. Was the sugar right—of course the sugar was right! Dark muscovado sugar. Everyone knows that's what you use for gingerbread, so of course the sugar was right because no one, both in their right mind and at this stage of competition, would use anything else.
Before you can respond, Minghao’s pointing at your jar of sugar. Your jar of pale, producer-supplied sugar, which even a blind person could tell does not resemble dark muscovado sugar.
A million thoughts race through your head at once, but it boils down to instinct, you think. Your brain had seen flour, butter, and sugar and went into baking mode, not stopping to take in the color of anything. Maybe a smarter, more perceptive person would put two and two together and get sabotage, but you don’t have enough time to play detective.
“Here, here,” Minghao says, hurriedly handing over his (correct) sugar. “It’ll be close, but you should have just enough time to redo the dough.”
You’re going to throw up.
In the end, a chunk of chocolate buttons is missing from the roof and the piping around the edges is far from your neatest work, but it’s passable. You already lamented your loss during the signature bake, because anything less than perfection was not going to win you much of anything, and you’re now 0-for-2 on showstopping, unbelievable, awe-inspiring confections.
Just like the devil, your fall from grace will be studied.
Overthinking isn’t going to get you anywhere, but you can’t help it.
You collapse sideways into a chair, immediately face-planting into the catering table. Everyone else buzzes around you—animated conversations that have your head spinning, words that jumble together and start to sound like nothing at all—but you’re a million miles away. One mistake is out of character for you, but two? It’s unheard of. Something you would’ve said was impossible if it didn’t happen to you just a few hours ago.
This is something you need to file away for later so you can think about it just as you’re about to fall asleep, horror and embarrassment there to keep you company when it keeps you awake until the wee hours of the morning.
A chill runs down your spine.
“Hi. Do you mind?” You startle. Bang your knee on the underside of the table. “Sorry,” Minghao apologizes, but he doesn’t look sorry at all. You shake your head. Gesture to the empty seat across from you as if to say it’s all yours. “I brought you some tea,” he continues, setting it in front of you. “I find it’s easier than coffee when you don’t know how someone takes theirs. Less chance of getting it wrong.”
You smile. Wrap your hands around the Styrofoam cup and delight in the warmth. “Thank you. This was very kind of you.”
“Seemed like you had a rough day.”
Groaning, you try to wave away his words. “Please don’t speak of it.” Minghao jokingly salutes you before miming his lips sealed. “Anyway. Let’s talk about something that is not reality television or baking or a reality baking competition.”
So, you do. Most of the talking comes from you, to be fair, but Minghao is a good listener: nods along, chimes in when appropriate, keeps the spit in his mouth where it belongs. You talk about your hometown and what made you apply for the show the first time. He tells you about growing up in Haicheng and all the things he grew up baking with his mother. You swap stories from your respective seasons; Minghao shares anecdotes with a straight face that have you clutching at your stomach.
Hours pass this way, and you end the night feeling like you’ve made an honest-to-god friend.
Xu Minghao ends the night feeling the guilt weigh him down like an albatross.
In retrospect, it is probably a bad idea to make another sponge, but no one can accuse you of learning from your mistakes.
“It’ll be a patterned joconde sponge with two mousse layers—chocolate and raspberry—and a raspberry jelly. Then I’m going to attempt to top it with chocolate and raspberry decorations.” The judges blink. Are you sure that’s a good idea? you know they want to ask, but this is a holiday competition for charity, so they’re trying not to be pessimists. “Anything is possible through holiday cheer,” you tack on, hoping your smile doesn’t look crazed.
They nod. “Right, right,” they say in unison. “Well, good luck!”
And then they’re off.
Determined to nail this, you triple-check your oven, which is preheating to a crisp 400 degrees; you double-check all your ingredients and confirm they’re correct; when you can spare the time, you watch your refrigerator like a hawk, making sure no one tries to sneak their own work in there and displace yours when you aren’t looking, but everyone’s engrossed in their respective showstoppers.
Tim’s planning a shadow box of sorts, with blown-sugar baubles and isomalt fire. Someone else is stressing over their three-tiered cake, asking the presenter if they think they’ve taken on too much. From what you can piece together, Minghao is making a three-dimensional house, also made from cake that he imported special pistachios for.
“Special pistachios?”
“Mm, from Iran. They have a better color.”
“Iranian pistachios! Can you believe it!”
But you don’t have time to worry about Minghao and his special Iranian pistachios. You have so much to do and not enough time to complete it. Your paste is in the freezer and the sponge is in the oven, but you’ve still got two mousses to make, a jelly to infuse, and little chocolate trees to create—and all of this wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t pointless, but you don’t want to disappoint the cats by half-assing it. They deserve your whole ass, and your whole ass is what they’re going to get.
The result is stunning—not necessarily in stature, but rather craftsmanship and effort. This is what you’re capable of. This is why you came back to the tent. For all your complaining and wanting to put your head through a concrete wall, there’s nothing like seeing the judges ooh and ahh when you present your work to them. There’s nothing like the ego boost of someone taking a bite and watching their eyes light up. There’s nothing like carrying your cake back to your station feeling proud of yourself.
“Great job,” Minghao says, a genuine smile stretched across his face. He also exceeds expectations, of course. Must be those special pistachios, you think, but your congratulations are also sincere.
Production makes a spectacle of judging, much like they always do.
The set is decorated to look like a winter wonderland, even though you’re still in the midst of autumn: a giant Christmas tree in the center decked to the nines with garland and baubles; warm, golden bulbs strung from every awning they could find; all the participants bundled up tight in festive sweaters and scarves all the way to your chins, cheeks and tips of noses dusted with red-pink blush to mimic the cold that’s nowhere to be found. Fake snow falls from the sky, and it doesn’t feel real, but it does feel magical.
One of the hosts catches you by the elbow, asks who you think is going to win. “Oh, I’d have to say Minghao,” you answer, because you’d rather die than give Tim the satisfaction. “His showstopper was incredible, but he was really great the whole competition.”
In the end, however, neither of them wins—it’s Jeon Wonwoo, three-tiered cake guy, who comes out of nowhere to claim first place. He’s bashful as he accepts his prize and says he’s going to donate the prize money to an organization that provides underprivileged kids with video game equipment. No one has a whole lot to say about that.
Once most of the hubbub dies down (and you give Tim a half-assed you did great, so sorry you didn’t win), you find Minghao near the refreshments table. He’s frowning around another mug of tea. “Alright?” you ask, helping yourself to some cider.
“For some reason, I’m no longer feeling very festive,” he replies, which is a very funny thing to say while wearing a hat with a little pom-pom on the top.
You roll your lips to keep from laughing. Sidle in a little closer and knock his shoulder with your own. “Ah, I know how you feel, but you really did do great. You were my pick to win, for what it’s worth.”
“Please don’t tell me that. It only makes me feel worse for losing.”
“Yeah.” You sigh. “Would’ve been nice to donate some money to the cats, but shit, if I didn’t know better, I would’ve sworn some dark force was sabotaging me. Like, come on—forgetting to preheat the oven? Using the wrong sugar? Not even a kid would’ve made those mistakes.”
Two things happen in rapid succession: beside you, Minghao goes very, very stiff, and you realize you had been sabotaged. And not by some dark, evil force, either. You were sabotaged by the very man standing beside you—the man you shared thumbs-up with and thought was your friend. The man whose cake you complimented and picked to win. The man who is now standing ramrod straight, as tense as a corpse, and the thought of sabotaging someone in a charity baking competition is so ridiculous and unbelievable that you just—
You just laugh.
At first, it’s a bark of stunned laughter. Then, the more it sinks in how absurd, how nonsensical all of this is, you can’t stop. Tears are rolling down your cheeks. You gasp for breath as your stomach begins to ache. People are staring, including Minghao, who sort of can’t believe what he’s seeing, but none of it does anything to deter you.
“Oh my god,” you wheeze, “I can’t believe it was you—”
Minghao groans. “In my defense, it was for the cats!”
This was not the answer you were expecting. It makes you laugh harder. “What do you mean it was for the cats?”
He swallows. Removes the mitten from one hand to run it through his hair as if that one tic was enough to distract you from everything that’s happened in the last sixty seconds. (It is.) “Listen, you told me you were going to donate the money to a cat charity if you won and I just—so was I, was the thing. I was also going to donate the money to a cat charity if I won—”
“Okay, but which one, though?”
“The Cat’s Paw-jamas.” Much to Minghao’s horror, this sets you off again. “What? What’s so funny?”
“Minghao,” you try to choke out, but you can barely breathe around the cramp in your stomach. “Minghao, that’s the charity I was going to donate to. Oh my god, you sabotaged me and I was going to donate to—to the same fucking place. Jesus Christ, this is some Gift of the Magi shit.”
Your saboteur, who has gone deathly pale, is quiet for a very long time. Every now and then he’ll open his mouth like he’s going to say something before it snaps shut again. When he does manage to speak, what comes out are mangled apologies that sound like gibberish, and you wave all of them away. “It’s water under the bridge.”
“I—I really don’t think it should be?”
“Minghao, it’s fine, trust me, this was just for fun—”
“No, I really insist.”
You sigh, good-natured and exasperated. Something about the fake snow has you feeling romantic and a little bold, so you turn, grab him by the lapels of his coat. “Please tell me if I’m misreading this, but if you insist, maybe you can start by taking me to dinner…?”
This was clearly not what MInghao was expecting you to say. Dazed, he recovers quickly, the corners of his mouth tugging upward in a half-smirk. “Dinner, hm?” You nod. “I think I can manage that.”
You smile. “Great. How do you feel about cat cafes?”
#winterwithyoucollab#minghao x reader#seventeen x reader#minghao fluff#seventeen imagines#minghao imagines#seventeen fluff
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Things I think the fandom just willfully ignores or has no idea about that would be super easy to slip into your fanfiction if you want to be inclusive and try out new things.
Lucifer just likes shibari, nawajutsu, or some form of rope tying art, and there's nothing inherently sexual about the excitement it brings him. He's a sadist too, but attraction to the other party would only add to the experience, not be necessary or a byproduct.
Belphegor could age regress and nobody would really be the wiser because of his position as coddled/spoiled youngest child. Even if they were, it doesn't change anything, really.
Beelzebub can fuck. He's also a cannibal. Do I need to say the vore word for you to understand how underutilized food/gore as a love language would be with him? No, it doesn't need to be sexual either, but goddamn so many keep treating him like UwU baby when he kills demons in cold blood because he hungy
Asmodeus is any gender or sexuality you want him to be. Lust ≠ attraction, and you can make him asexual. He's pretty free with how he presents. Also, his fans are so desperate for nice content on him that they'll take anything too. Nobody is going to kill you over this.
Mammon's greed can also be depicted as someone who wants to monopolize your time and/or affections. He attempts plenty of times in canon.
Barbatos' strongest attachment is Diavolo, but he does care about other beings. As long as they're not getting in the way of Diavolo, he's allowed to show care in his own way goddamnit. He's not an ice statue.
Mammon is allowed to be a non-sexual masochist. I don't know why people think all kinks are sexual, BUT HE'S ALLOWED.
I just want to take a moment to acknowledge bloodlust counting as a lust.
Luke is a genuinely deep character with a compelling story and important appearances, and you will be doing better than 99% of the fandom if you just acknowledge that he's more than just a kid who tags along and whines when he's scared (like all kids do when they're his age btw). Kicking him to the side is just another child discrimination case, and you can just say you don't understand him...
Almost everyone if not everyone has had a 1-on-1 in this series, and you're allowed to write about that scenario that "seems ooc" because there's someone out there who wishes that they could write who wants to see them interact, and they haven't found you because you haven't made yourself known.
I think over 75% of the cast has what humans would call a trauma disorder, and you guys have got to stop ignoring the fact that Solmare usually just brushes over stuff that genuinely affects them to keep the plot going. They've done it since the beginning, even before the cursed lesson 16.
Non-character-specific stuff under the cut:
You can headcanon and write any character that you want to as aromantic or on the spectrum. Also, news flash: familial, platonic, romantic, and sexual are not the only relationship labels to exist. Go look up "alterous attraction" if you wanna do something that would line up with, you know, emotions that aren't all centered around how our society depicts stuff.
If they're all built like that and inherently different from humans, neurodivergence may not exist to demons but have fun with the headcanons anyways. The world is your oyster.
#obey me#obey me shall we date#obey me lucifer#obey me belphegor#obey me beelzebub#obey me asmodeus#obey me mammon#obey me barbatos#obey me luke#obey me nightbringer#obey me diavolo#idek if i tagged properly#obey me headcanons#obey me satan#obey me leviathan#mirr's rambles#me praying I won't be burned at the stake part ∞#i missed some people so just gimme a message or sum if you want more random things that come to me#I can't believe i thought my special interest was dead to me
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Kai’s Pretty Girlfriend [4]: Confusion?
OT5 x f!reader
Warnings: lots of kisses and a little dry humping <3
Ever since the game things have been pretty tense in the dorm. Well, maybe tense isn’t the right word but awkward? Not between you and Kai, never between you and Kai, but there’s definitely a difference in the way the guys treat you.
It’s not even spoken about and if you hadn’t known them all for so long, maybe you wouldn’t have realized. But you can tell. It’s almost as if when they’re with you they default to their ‘idol’ personalities.
You feel it when you visit the practice room to drop off food on a long day and while Kai greets you with a hug and a kiss, the guys simply thank you and disperse to eat.
You feel it when you’re watching anime with Soobin in the living room instead of his room and rather than you leaning against each other and borderline falling asleep on top of the other, he keeps a large distance between the two of you.
You feel it when you’re talking with Beomgyu and instead of having conversations that range from deep and intense to silly and random, he keeps it surface level before he makes an excuse to leave.
You feel it when you stay up late to make sure Taehyun eats when he makes it to the dorm after he stays to practice more, and he politely thanks you but tells you he already ate and then you wake up to him sneaking out of the room later to go eat.
You feel it when your messages with Yeonjun go from being filled with silly pictures, and videos of some new choreography he’s come up with to read messages and reactions rather than actual responses.
You especially feel it when you come into the dorm when Kai is out to wait for him to get back and sit in the living room to watch whatever’s on and everyone scatters suddenly having other things to do. Or when everyone starts eating out of the dorm instead of begging you to cook or ordering takeout. Or when… yeah, it’s been a lot.
It’s not hard for you and Kai to make a plan to corner the guys and address the tension that’s settled over you all. It took a bit of convincing from Kai because you’re, admittedly, feeling a little rejected. What else are you meant to feel when they go from having you in an intimate way to flat-out ignoring you?
It's a perfect reflection of the talk they gave you and Kai after the movie incident. You and Kai standing in front of them while they're sitting on the couch.
"You guys have been avoiding me."
"No, we haven't. We literally had dinner together yesterday." Beomgyu is right but the dinner was shrouded in silence with them leaving immediately after they finished eating.
"It wasn't the same as it used to be, and you know it." You take a breath before continuing. "Listen, if we... If I made you guys uncomfortable, I'm truly sorry. We don't have to do anything like that again, I just want us to be good again."
"There wasn't anything wrong with what we did. We're just... confused." Taehyun's words are accompanied by his brows furrowing as if he's trying to figure out the answer to a problem. You would probably consider it cute in another situation.
"Confused about what?"
"What you want from this. What you both want from this. Even if we didn't do much, you can't expect us to act as if nothing changed when something did."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Was it just a one-off thing? Are you guys experimenting or something? You went from begging us to leave the dorm for you to have alone time or doing things quietly to fucking in front of us and letting us participate. It's a big change and while we were okay with it, we don't want to push boundaries."
You expect Kai to answer, but he turns to you first.
"Well, I guess experimenting is the best way to put it.”
“So, Kai wants to watch us fuck you?”
“No!” Kai exclaims in answer to Beomgyu's question but then continues in a softer voice with red crawling up his face. “Well, maybe, at some point. But what I mean is, I don’t mind if you want to do that or anything really.”
“Anything like?”
“Anything that y/n is comfortable with. Actually, she should really lead this." All eyes turn to you.
"Um, like Kai said we're okay with me being more intimate with you all if you're okay with that."
“Why?” Taehyun asks, and, really, why does anyone do anything? You don't need to do this with them. You and Kai are as close to perfect as you can be. You shouldn't need to seek anything else, but you are. Is that so bad? Is it selfish? Probably. But you want it and you think they might want it too, so it can't be that bad.
"We don't really have a reason. Just a feeling and we wanted to try it out with you."
“So you guys have an open relationship?”
“No!” Both of you exclaim.
“No, not that there’s anything wrong with that but, ugh, I wouldn’t trust anyone else with y/n the way I do with you guys. So, maybe, but not with anyone else. If that makes sense.”
"It doesn't, but I think we get the gist. What do you want exactly from us?" Soobin asks, and though you've never seen him in the setting yourself, you imagine it's similar to when he's in meetings speaking on behalf of his members. Making sure he knows what's expected so he can make a decision that doesn't make the group fall apart. And, really, this is one of those decisions.
“I want us to be close like we were. And maybe more? It feels kind of selfish but you guys are all so good to me, why wouldn’t I want to be doted on by you?”
“So we get to have you?” Beomgyu's getting excited, shifting forward in his seat.
“Yes, if that’s okay with you all.”
“All of us?”
“Yes. Or no? If any of you don’t want to, you don’t have to, obviously, but I’m okay with it. With you. All of you.”
“Oh.” It’s quiet until the four form a circle and start playing rock, paper, scissors.
“Um…” you and Kai stare awkwardly at them. “What are you doing?”
“Seeing who gets to kiss you first, duh. Use that big brain of yours. Go ahead and prepare yourself.”
“Wait! I want to play, what the hell?!” Kai cries indignantly.
“You get to kiss her all the time, suck it up. Shit. Do you see what you caused?” Beomgyu is out.
“Fuuuuuuuck.” There goes Soobin.
It’s a war of nerves between Taehyun and Yeonjun. They don’t even notice Kai turning you to him and planting a kiss on your lips until a moan leaves you when he bites on your bottom lip.
“Hey! No! That’s cheating!” Beomgyu’s words startle Taehyun out of his thinking and Yeonjun ends up winning the round, jumping up and letting out a screech of victory before pulling you out of Kai’s arms.
“So, you come here often?” Yeonjun brings a hand out to tilt your head up at him with the other making a home on your waist.
You let out a giggle before playing along, wrapping your arms around his shoulders. “Sometimes, I haven’t seen you around before though.”
“Well, this may come as a surprise to you, but I do in fact live here.” He’s steadily closing the distance between your faces as he speaks.
“Are you sure?” You tilt your head up until your lips are barely touching. “I swear I would’ve remembered a face as pretty as yours.”
You cut off his screech of ‘you stole my line’ by pressing your lips to his. He freezes for a bit before relaxing and returning the kiss. His lips are soft and plump and taste faintly like a strawberry chapstick you're sure you lost a while back. He squeezes your waist once, twice, before rubbing his tongue gently against your lips to get you to open up for him, which you obviously do.
He pulls you impossibly closer to him and deepens the kiss before a different set of hands wraps around your body and pulls you away.
"Hey! Keep it in your pants, old man! We still haven't gotten to kiss her yet." Beomgyu is holding you against his chest as he shouts.
"I won! I can do whatever I want. It doesn't seem like y/n was complaining about it either!"
"Well, she couldn't with your tongue two miles down her throat," Taehyun interjects smoothly before taking your hand and pulling you away from Beomgyu. He gives you a soft smile before bringing a hand up to your face and caressing your cheek. "This okay?"
"Yes. It's okay, I'm okay." A bright smile rises on his face in response to your words and he brings your lips together in a short, but sweet kiss that leaves you wanting more. You can’t help but lean into him again. He smiles into your next kiss and his free hand moves down to your hip giving it a short squeeze before pulling away. This time he uses the grip he has on you to keep you separated but the look in his eyes is so warm that you don’t doubt you’ll find yourselves in a similar situation soon.
Taehyun has always been a bit reserved with his relationships, wanting them to be known but kept private. Though your situation isn’t anything like that, it makes sense he would want to fall into you away from the prying eyes. You look around for Soobin to see him still sitting on the couch.
“Yah! Choi Soobin don’t make her chase you!”
“I’m not! I just want her to be comfortable. Four first kisses is a lot in one night.”
“Thank you for wanting to make me comfortable, Bin.” You say as you slowly walk over to where he is on the couch, hesitating a bit before straddling his lap. “But I want to kiss you now, is that okay?”
“Yeah, yep. Totally! So okay with me it’s actually insane.” He finishes with a soft smile that is so cute, you can’t help but indulge yourself a little. Leaning down to press a short kiss to each of his dimples and nose before bringing your lips to his. He sighs softly and moves his hands up to your waist, drawing little circles with his thumbs.
You know that this is meant to be a small kiss, something of a marker of the new relationship you’re stepping into with the guys, but the implications of that new relationship are finally catching up with you. Maybe you should've pulled him off the couch to kiss him because this can quickly get out of control. Especially with the way he puts his all into the kiss. The way he’s not even trying to dominate the kiss but going with the flow whether that means you’re leading or him. You can’t help but shift your hips down to meet his. And, oh, the sounds that leave him after that make you want to drag him to your (Kai’s) room and see what other sounds he could make. But you forgot about the people watching.
“As hot as this is, I would like to kiss y/n before I turn fifty.” And with that, a familiar set of hands are wrapping around your waist in an attempt to pull you off Soobin. Too bad, Soobin doesn’t seem to want to let go. Just as you’re starting to wonder how far he’s willing to go with the others as an audience, he pulls away and presses a last peck to your lips before taking his hands off you.
“Hey, you.” Beimgyu says after wrapping your securely in his embrace.
“Hey.” You smile up at him.
“Ready for the best kiss of your life?” Kai lets out a prompt ‘Hey!’ at his words.
“You can try your best.” You challenge.
Rather than responding to your words, he just cradles your face and presses your lips together. It feels like something clicked into place in your mind. There's no doubt in your mind that there is nowhere else you should be than right here surrounded by these five men.
Beomgyu's thumbs rub back and forth across your cheeks as your lips move in tandem. Against your expectations, he does not try to deepen it more than this. He just kisses you as if he has all the time in the world.
When you pull away from Beomgyu, you look around to find five fond smiles turned towards you. You don’t really know where this is going to lead but you trust these men so fully that you know they’ll treat you right. You only hope your heart can handle it.
Step four is “completed”, yippie! I don’t really like this chapter so if you see it updated at some point, mind your business. >:(. If it’s unclear, you and Kai had a talk off-screen about what you wanted. Now we get into the member specific chapters! Guess which member goes with which description! Masterlist
#txt x reader#hueningkai x reader#taehyun x reader#yeonjun x reader#beomgyu x reader#soobin x reader#txt#tomorrow x together#hueningkai#beomgyu#yeonjun#txt taehyun#soobin
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Season two fumbled many things but out of all the things they could have possibly fucked up I'm upset at how they messed up Silco. Yes, because he's my favorite character but also because he was the one holding everything together in season one. He was such an integral part of s1, to the point where when you examine acts 2 and 3 most of everything that happens can be traced back to Silco in a way. Season one ended with his death, and the implications and effects that was going to have on the story were truly fascinating.
But season two does, probably, the worst thing they could have possibly done. They almost COMPLETELY ignore his existence! Despite the fact that Silco was known by many and was running the undercity, the only character that is acts somewhat accordingly to his death is Jinx. None of Silco's vast number of employees react to his death, they're never seen again despite the fact that some of them had been with him since day one. Sevika only mentions Silco once despite being the person he was closet with outside of Jinx. What's worse about this is the fact that Sevika mourning his loss is never explored, it's only used as a plot device to get Sevika and Jinx to team up in early s2. We only get three episodes with their dynamic and then it's completely abandoned, SEVIKA is completely abandoned. Jinx remembers Silco but...does she really? When you compare the way Jinx understood Silco in s1 to how she understands him in s2, it's a night and day difference. In season one, Jinx understood that Silco was like her father and she was like his daughter. In season one she is able to see the flaws in his thinking when it comes to betrayal and she's able to understand his hurt, something he himself has ignored. But in season two Jinx is under the impression that she was like a friend to Silco, and she somehow thinks that Vander's apology would have been enough for Silco to forgive him. She's also under the impression that Silco only wanted her to continue what he started, which was never a concept presented in s1. It was very clear that Silco had no intention of turning Jinx into the heiress of Zaun, yet this is how Jinx thinks of him in s2. In season two Jinx's subconscious uses Silco's memory to convince herself to end her life. We see "Silco" say a bunch of shit he would NEVER say, once again highlighting how Silco as a character is completely misunderstood in s2.
Silco's relationships with others isn't all that's forgotten, his impact on the world around him is ALSO forgotten. The absence of Silco in Zaun is never explored. We see the chembarons fighting for less than an episode and then NOTHING. Shimmer, the popular drug that loads of people were addicted to, the drug that boasted Zaun's economy up, the drug Silco was producing? Suddenly irrelevant. Silco's dream of an independent Zaun? An idea that is never revisited. The peace deal that was offered to him? Never mentioned again. It's like the writers completely forgot how important silco was in season 1. Or like they made the assumption that because he was now dead he didn't matter to the story.
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Yeah
Always think about that scene where lucifers mother tells him that instead of being sent to hell, God wanted to kill him.
And while she clearly had her own motivations for telling him this (to get lucifer angry enough to get revenge)
So whether or not she was straight up lying for bending the truth, what gets me is how fast lucifer believes her. That belief doesn't come out of nowhere. Which never gets addressed ever again???
Though you could argue that that belief came from sending lucifer to hell indefinitely (which is just if not more cruel because c'mon) Netflix lucifer has a lot of canonical self hatred and implied suicidal ideation (plus his "devil form" which supposed to be a reflection of how he subconsciously see himself)
Coupled with the fact that we've never been given any indication whatsoever of the actual events that led to lucifer being sent to hell other than a vague "rebellion" and a something about Michael manipulating lucifer (which feels like a cop out but whatever)
uppermost with how in the show (bcs comic lucifer is a completely different dude) lucifer is extremely pacified, sure he makes scary faces and will get violent every now and then but nothing about him screams "diety who committed a sin so grave and horrific and showed no sign of stopping that the only option was to banish him to a place so dreadful that the goddess (a being who should effectively be God's equal) feared going back" painting a picture that lucifers punishment was not necessary or just.
And speaking of the goddess or Charlotte ig, she was also sent into hell. And I get the reasoning that it's because she kept causing mass death to humanity, which might seem justified from a human perspective, but to her, God, and her children this is the equivalent to sending her son to Diyarbakır Prison because he said "no" to you or challenged your authority some way. And then later, sending your wife to the same place because she knocked over your ant farm that you were investing more time than into your family.
Because both Lucifer and Charlotte have shown to be good people. Sure they're a little fucked up and have a tendency to use underhanded methods to get what they want but they're motivations while sometimes misguided are rarely malicious.
Charlotte was introduced a big scary figure (let's not forget how wary and downright scared of her he was initially) but she's really a hurt (rightfully so) ex spouse who wanted to get back at God for what he did to her (and lucifer bcs that scene in hell with dead uriel proves that she does love her kids she probably has trouble expressing affection in a straightforward way a trait that was either worsen or caused because of stay in hell) her method of revenge was likely the only thing that could save her herself too because lets be real, everytime both lucifer and her were on earth they both had angels coming down to bring them back to hell through extremely violent means. (I don't care if they were apparently "misguided" every angel that came after them wholeheartedly believed that what they were doing was justified and were pretty damn sadistic about it, too. that belief didn't come from nowhere)
From episode fucking one, it's unsaid, but we establish lucifer as a character who has already had his redemption (and this is through the assumption that he was more "evil" before the show starts) the whole plot with Delilah, someone who made a deal with lucifer to become a star but ended up a addict and involved with shady people. She was at her lowest when she asked she owed lucifer (I think about this a lot bcs I believed she assumed that whatever lucifer would ask of would either be something she couldn't give or something she wouldn't want to) lucifer said to "get her life together" as payment, thus giving Delilah a second chance at life.
Again this is episode fucking one, one of the things I hate about the show and fandom is it portrays Chloe and Lucifers relationship as "the awful misguided evil who is tamed, saved, guided by the second coming incarnate" everytime lucifer has growth as a person the credit is given to Chloe like she did something or just being around her gives you heaven points instead of the reality "lucifer holding Chloe in such high esteem because he's falling in love with her that he bends himself backwards to make himself into someone she would approve of"
because that would acknowledge that God was wrong, that lucifer didn't grow because of his interference, not in fact he did all the work himself (reconciling with a sibling who was hostile for a long time, forgiving his mother for being a bystander, even going to therapy like srsly bro is stronger than me).
And this is why they have God coming in acting like some goofy harmless guy because the narrative established that lucifer doing good thing = Chloe doing "miracles" and since Chloe was directly made by God thus put in lucifers path, it means Lucifer's "redemption" and happiness is on account of god.
That's why everyone is so easy with him. Lucifer is hurt and mad and God is like "but a gave you Chloe ☝️😊 aren't so much happier now?" And "lucifers like damn ur right, all is forgiven!" Chloe's the same way.
And since he's literally God the same goes for every other character for whatever reason or another he's essentially bribed every character to like him and has been playing a long term honeymoon phase (cycle of abuse) with lucifer. lucifer has essentially lost his support system which makes me grind my teeth.
OP you're especially right about Linda because Lucifer specifically made himself vulnerable to her about his traumas, self-esteem, self hatred and so much more to her and for her to say that to him must be gut punching, because she essentially invalidated everything he expressed to her 🫠
Honestly, to me, Lucifer Netflix as a whole has a lot of trouble validating lucifer as someone who was hurt. They love to hammer on his flaws (which makes sense since it started as a series about growth) but when it comes to his trauma, self-hatred and or when he's hurt by another character it gets brushed aside or mentioned once and never again.
Take for example the early seasons with Chloe and Lucifer first developing their partnership it it always delves into a series of misunderstandings, Chloe being a no-nonsense person and lucifer doing everything out of the box. What usually happens is that lucifer steps out of line Chloe will lash out (verbally) and lucifer goes "I don't understand your point I will go to Linda about it" wakiness ensues and by the end of the episode Lucifer has learned some kind of life lesson.
But the thing is that Lucifer is a character who's so genuine with his actions and is worldview is vastly different from hers in so many ways, he always means well so when Chloe says hurtful things (I'm not berating her for this it's completely understandable from her perspective) it's never acknowledged later, no "Hey I was wrong" or "sorry for calling you that" or maybe a "I should have taken you seriously"
It's such a miniscule aspect but it's brushed aside. Same thing with the whole poison situation there's little remorse and Chloe gets to handle the consequences on her terms.
Its like that with every situation really, any character (but mainly chloe) gets to stomp all over him and he's never allowed to fight back or they get "proven right" .
the most annoying part of lucifer on netflix is that he was literally right the whole time. i don't give a shit if the literal actual god was "just trying his best." lucifer was 100% right to be angry at god and in fact, i think everyone should've been downright pissed when they met him. ESPECIALLY linda. fuck her for real for telling him that his conflict with god was partially his fault. lucifer described an abusive father to her countless times and the second she met him she started fawning over him? fuck that. chloe should've punched god in the face
#holy shit sorry for dumping that essy on you op#but this fandom is practically nonexistent on this platform and that ugly bitch from hazben whatever its called didn't help in finding stuff#so i lached on this like a dog with a bone lol#lucifer tv#lucifer#lucifer morningstar
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I KNOW THIS POST IS A JOKE
https://x.com/strike_dr/status/1876821001889075296?s=46&t=FcoVShSsnYmEcygKTqiuBQ
But goddamn i didn’t realize how much commies hated America and generalized everyone in it. And I do get it to extent but cmon be a little realistic as much as either country doesn’t really like us atm I don’t think they’re going to just … do that.
Majority Americans from what I’ve seen don’t want us to annex these guys either!! I mean for fucks sakes Mexico sent up some their firefighters and I think Canada sent help as well for the LA fires!
Also what would the combine take over of Canada and Mexico do for them? Yeah it gets rid of America but once it’s gone wouldn’t their next target be either of these countries??? (I would think particularly Canada since I think one of their heads is trying to be a mini trump) Or was the goal just death to America bc either country is sooo much better in comparison.
The reflexive anti-Americanism is so exhausting, I'm just done with it. I'm not going to hate myself for being American. I'm not going to pretend America isn't a country with a lot of people from many different backgrounds living in it, people whose lives matter. It's not an abstract concept. I've made anti-America jokes and I'll probably continue to do so once in a while because sometimes they're funny and it's a nice counter to right wing hyperpatriotism but this kind humor is something I've outgrown. Other people have pointed this out but "America is the worst and most evil" is just another form of American exceptionalism. I have worked hard as an American raised in a culture obsessed with American exceptionalism to internalize America is just a country like any other country, some good, some bad, full of people. There are some qualifications to this because the US is uniquely powerful and also just unusually large and wealthy, but I think you know what I mean.
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Okay, but:
Agatha and Billy getting so deeply attached to each other that everyone's a little bit convinced that she might some sort of weird aunt of his that no one (including his parents) knew he had until now.
Just imagine all the different things they could get up to together that no one ever bats an eyelid at anymore, 'cause that's just what they do/how they are together, and no, you can't separate them, sorry - they're a package deal: you want one, you have to take the other one as well. Also, please ignore the fighting - yes, we've tried to stop it, no, it didn't go well, no, we don't recommend trying again (for your sanity/wellbeing, not theirs), no, we don't offer returns or insurance, please close the door on your way out, thanks for visiting!
Bonus points:
Billy's parents let him get away with a lot of stuff if Agatha's involved - yeah, sure, she might be a bit more dangerous than they'd like her to bed, but she always brings him back in one piece, and he's never been too traumatised (at least, not in any sort of way that can't be fixed with a few more sessions with that therapist he's already seeing), and a good wash will get rid of pretty much all the rest, so what's the harm?! At least he's not doing drugs/crime/etc. like some of those other kids -
Extra bonus points:
Wanda returns, and everyone's immediately suspicious of her. She hates it, 'cause why is everyone looking at her funny when Agatha's right there?! why is she getting the third degree, and not Agatha?! you know, the one that is arguably even more dangerous than she is?!
(Wanda's as dumb as a brick wall, though, 'cause she doesn't get that everyone's eyeing her funny 'cause she quote literally rolled up out of nowhere and tried to kidnap a kid out from underneath his parents/family/friends/community with literally zero awareness whatsoever as to why that might be a problem - her logic is probably something along the line of, 'but he was my kid first??? why won't you give him back when you stole him from me???'; she'd probably also try to bring up the fact that, while the kid in front of them looks like William Kaplan, William actually died in the car crash and the individual now residing within his body is actually her son, Billy - this, of course, would not make things better as, while this would throw the Kaplans through a loop (especially re: how long Billy's known about this), they're not about to just give up the kid they've raised for the past few years to a complete nut job with a moral compass even more fucked up than the devil's)
. . . I don't remember where I was going with this. Oh, well 🤷♀️
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MORE. MORE.
1. who fell first/who fell harder?
oh shit...i think they both were on the same page the whole time, except they have severely different ways of expressing it. but i wanna say...kylie, then kylie again.
(2/3/4 absolutely no idea what these are.)
5. (two QUEEN song titles, huh?) who killer queen, who good old fashioned loverboy? kylie for both.
6. go to pet names for each other?
daisy sticks to the classics like "honey", "dear", "sugar" — meanwhile kylie genuinely uses pet names to remember people, so she gets a little more creative. i think the main ones kylie has for daisy are "smokeshow", and "spacegirl"
7. what are their star signs? i have to google this.
kylie was born on the 29th of February, daisy was born on December 31st. pisces and capricorn. (and wikihow says they're compatible; awesome.)
8. (paraphrasing) where in the los gibitties are they?
daisy is a cis lesbian gray ace attorney; kylie's a genderfluid transfemme, who uses she/they with the occasional "masc associated" words (like "handsome", "dad/daddy", etc), and identifies herself as a "lesbian with a biiiiiig asterisks"
9. soulmates by chance. pure chance.
10. skip.
11. (paraphrasing) who's more random in public, and who says "unfortunately thats the love of my life" i have no idea, honestly. i feel like daisy, when drunk and happy can be quite expressive and loud, and kylie would just...fall in love all over again.
12. three songs that remind me of:
Daisy:
- first love/late spring
- washing machine heart
- my love all mine
(it's all mitski 😭😭😭😭💥🚛🕊️)
(i think, subconsciously, daisy's design is heavily based on the kind of women mitski writes about. and whenever i write daisy talking, i tend to go the kind of weird figurative language route that mitski tends to go for in her music...so i think thats why.)
Kylie:
- mr. blue sky - electric light orchestra
- the blonde - tv girl
- and this ones just a straight up Movie, but, pretty woman starring julia roberts and richard gere.
13. who's "tell me im pretty" and who's "ur annoying" (so many of these questions are in that "who tops" type format, but ill answer anyway. cuz its fun.)
daisy never asks kylie to tell her she's pretty, but kylie can feel when she needs it, so she says it. and daisy expresses her love for kylie in protective, but — at times — overly rude quips, because deep down, she can't stand the idea of HER woman in danger.
(also Kylie's a subby top.)
14. love languagesss!!! my favourite trademarked set of behaviours!!!
gifts, and service from kylie. service, and words for daisy.
15. yknow despite the fact that one of my girls is an astronaut i have no idea what "sun moon star eclipse" is. skip.
16. non sexual acts of intimacy.
- kylie cooking the foods daisy likes and remembering how she likes them.
- in bed, whispering about their days, and all the hours spent without each other at work
- daisy showering while kylie shits.
17. i...cant imagine either of them in a physical fight,...theyre both athletic to some degree, i just cant imagine them having the desire to fight for themselves.... Maybe Daisy? daisy has more bloodlust. but fuck i dont know. she could never beat kylie in a fight. right? even if kylie doesn't fight back, she's canonically bigger and heavier...daisy could throw a million punches while kylie does nothing and it would be a fair match.
18. three other ships from other things that remind me of daisy and kylie:
- fucking Arin and Suzy from game grumps.
19. who likes dogs who likes cats? kylie loves dogs. daisy hates animals. she'll take a Cool Fish™ , maybe, but could never take care of it
20. favorite thing about each other?
daisy likes that kylie doesn't need to be babied. that—on the contrary, kylie takes care of, and pampers daisy (as she deserves). kylie can be kinda shallow at times, but she's good with her hands, and quick on her feet. — that's what daisy likes about kylie. she can rely on her.
kylie likes...everything about daisy. to kylie, daisy is the kind of girl they wanna write home about. yknow? she likes that daisy's smart—she's a reader, she fills the gaps in conversation where kylie just prefers to listen. she's a good cuddle. she has pretty hair. she looks sexy in everything. she makes a lot of money. she's awesome to cook for. she's a competent mother. her family adooores her. (and this one's selfish) but daisy can be a bit of an insomniac, so she's still quite Active late at night; which works for kylie (nightshifter), cus now she has someone to come home to.
21. do they ever match??? in clothing? no, bc there's a severe gap in the way that they dress and shop. however i can see daisy wearing kylies t-shirts and boxers around the house...and i can see kylie wearing daisy's stuff for more Fashionable events
22. their own little ways of saying i love you:
- daisy protects kylie. but would risk crossing her own comfort zones for kylie. and when kylie's in bed, she falls asleep a little easier, because kylie protects her too.
- kylie pets daisy hair, and kisses every inch of her body. kylie waits to see daisy, almost every time. she's at her beck and call.
23. daisy wouldn't marry herself, and neither would kylie. they both kinda hate themselves a lot.
24. coffee or tea? coffee for both
25. one to five tropes they could embody in an au:
- highschool au (the real alteration being that the girls arent four years apart)
i think the reason for this is because the way i write kylie is heavily based on the way i write GRENDAN in my dr*wtectives highschool fics (fun fact) (censoring so they don't FIND ME.)
kylie is a gifted kid with severe imposter's syndrome, meanwhile daisy is an overachiever with no friends.
that's always a fun dynamic for me.
- princess x peasant is another good one for these two...
i think daisy would make an amazing politician,
princesses are just... politicians with a facecard. but i also believe that kylie's girldick is strong enough to tear the military down
🌙 * ― silly little unique trivia about your otp.❫
who fell first, and who fell harder?
their hypothetical godly parents (or a deity they could embody in a mythological setting).
soldiers, poets, or kings?
the olive theory according to them (and their palate).
who's the ‘good old-fashioned lover boy’, and who's the ‘killer-queen’?
go-to pet names they have for each other, if any.
what are their star signs? (i know nothing about astrology, but it's funky so out with it!)
their sexual orientations and/or gender identities.
soulmates by fate/chance or by choice?
their hypothetical hogwarts houses, either traditionally speaking, so to say, or following the sortinghatchats method. (alternatively, if you'd rather: their alignment by dnd standards).
who's more likely to do stupid, impulsive, or random stuff, and who's there being like, ‘regrettably, that's the love of my life’?
one to three songs that remind you of them.
who's the “tell me i'm pretty” one, and who's the “you're pretty fucking annoying is what you are” in the relationship?
their love languages.
sun, moon, stars, earth, or eclipse?
three to five non-sexual acts of intimacy.
who's the “i could beat the shit out of you” one, and who's the “i know” one?
one to three other ships from other pieces of media that may remind you of them.
who's the dog person, and who's the cat person? (other pets or animals may also apply.)
their absolute favourite thing about each other in the whole wide world.
do they ever match in any way?
their own little way (or ways) to say ‘i love you’.
who's the “i wouldn't marry myself either” one, and who's the “i would marry you with parer rings” one? (alternatively: i'd marry you with paper rings vs. i'm rich. i'll get you a diamond)?
coffee or tea?
one to five tropes they embody or could pull off in an AU.
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