#but this is a very informational post

[bixels]

Learning that fans hated Applejack and called her "boring" is crazyyy to me because I genuinely, unironically believe AJ's the most complex character in the main six.

Backstory-wise, she was born into a family of famers/blue collar workers who helped found the town she lives in. She grew up a habitual liar until she had the bad habit traumatized outta her. She lost both her parents and was orphaned at a young age, having to step up as her baby sister's mother figure. She's the only person in the main gang who's experienced this level of loss and grief (A Royal Problem reveals that AJ dreams about memories of being held by her parents as a baby). She moved to Manhattan to live with her wealthy family members, only to realize she'll never fit in or be accepted, even amongst her own family. The earlier seasons imply she and her family had money problems too (In The Ticket Master, AJ wants to go to the gala to earn money to buy new farm equipment and afford hip surgery for her grandma).

Personality-wise, she's a total people-pleaser/steamroller (with an occasional savior complex) who places her self worth on her independence and usefulness for other people, causing her to become a complete workaholic. In Applebuck Season, AJ stops taking care of herself because of her obsessive responsibilities for others and becomes completely dysfunctional. In Apple Family Reunion, AJ has a tearful breakdown because in she thinks she dishonored her family and tarnished her reputation as a potential leader –– an expectation and anxiety that's directly tied to her deceased parents, as shown in the episode's ending scene. In The Last Roundup, AJ abandons her family and friends out of shame because believes she failed them by not earning 1st place in a rodeo competition. She completely spirals emotionally when she isn't able to fulfill her duties toward others. Her need to be the best manifests in intense pride and competitiveness when others challenge her. And when her pride's broken, she cowers and physically hides herself.

Moreover, it's strongly implied that AJ has a deep-seated anger. The comics explore her ranting outbursts more. EQG also obviously has AJ yelling at and insulting Rarity in a jealous fit just to hurt her feelings (with a line that I could write a whole dissection on). And I'm certain I read in a post somewhere that in a Gameloft event, AJ's negative traits are listed as anger.

Subtextually, a lot of these flaws and anxieties can be (retroactively) linked to her parents' death, forcing her to grow up too quickly to become the adult/caregiver of the family (especially after her big brother becomes semiverbal). Notice how throughout the series, she's constantly acting as the "mom friend" of the group (despite everything, she manages to be the most emotionally mature of the bunch). Notice how AJ'll switch to a quieter, calmer tone when her friends are panicking and use soothing prompts and questions to talk them through their emotions/problems; something she'd definitely pick up while raising a child. Same with her stoicism and reluctance at crying or releasing emotions (something Pinkie explicitly points out). She also had a childhood relationship with Rara (which, if you were to give a queer reading, could easy be interpreted as her first 'aha' crush), who eventually left her life. (Interestingly enough, AJ also has an angry outburst with Rara for the same exact reasons as with EQG Rarity; jealous, upset that someone else is using and changing her). It's not hard to imagine an AJ with separation anxiety stemming from her mother and childhood friend/crush leaving. I'm also not above reading into AJ's relationship with her little sister (Y'all ever think about how AB never got to know her parents, even though she shares her father's colors and her mother's curly hair?).

AJ's stubbornness is a symptom of growing up too quickly as well. Who else to play with your baby sister when your brother goes nonverbal (not to discount Big Mac's role in raising AB)? Who else to wake up in the middle of the night to care for your crying baby sister when your grandma needs her rest? When you need to be 100% all the time for your family, you tend to become hard-stuck with a sense of moral superiority. You know what's best because you have to be your best because if you're aren't your best, then everything'll inevitably fall apart and it'll be your fault. And if you don't know what's best –– if you've been wrong the whole time –– that means you haven't been your best, which means you've failed the people who rely on you, which means you can't fulfill your role in the family/society, which makes you worthless . We've seen time and time again how this compulsive need to be right for the sake of others becomes self-destructive (Apple Family Reunion, Sound of Silence, all competitions against RD). We've seen in The Last Roundup how, when no longer at her best, AJ would rather remove herself from her community than confront them because she no longer feels of use to them.

But I guess it is kinda weird that AJ has "masculine" traits and isn't interested in men at all. It's totally justified that an aggressively straight, misogynistic male fandom would characterize her as a "boring background character." /s

At the time of writing this, it's 4:46AM.

[tadfools]

POV the last piece of your grand evil scheme walks into the room for the first time and they have ‘forehead’ tattooed on their forehead

[short-for-jules]

aw hell naw look at my [doctor] dawwwggg I'm going to [die]

[accursedvoid]

Ran across a ‘humans are weird/space orcs/humans in space’ post the other day talking about how humans make up games if they’re stuck somewhere with nothing to do and it just got me thinking about that one game and how aliens would be so baffled

As in THE game, you all know the one (for those reading this I’m so sorry to make you lose ‘the game’ again, if it’s any consolation I have now lost ‘the game’ making this post myself) and just how baffling that is from a non human perspective can you imagine it-

this is for fun? And it’s not even a game game? It’s just saying you lost the game/mentioning ‘the game’ and humans will get irrationally annoyed/upset/angry about it like-

Brian: hey Lee, guess who just lost the game?

Lee: what gam- OH YOU ASSHOLE I HAD A STREAK OF FOUR YEARS GOING!!!

Every alien in the room: ??????

[marciaillust]

bro fuck it im workposting. i did illustrations, i storyboarded, i directed. I did many cool things in 2024 and millions of people all over the world saw em. that has to count for something

[obsob]

one thing u can count on me for is being normal about Some Guy

process under cut where u can see me losing my mind trying 2 figure out what i was doing in real time! :3

[wyllaztopia]

2025 is coming so i let my friend @kayseeye [new agdt mod and assistant!!] clear agdt's askbox

as devastating as it was to see a bunch of creative remarks and asks go down the drain - let's be real, i won't have time to answer them with how linear the story is becoming for ease of access [goodbye 500 asks... though kacey took screenshots of drawings you guys sent in our inbox!!!]

hooowever, there's also another key reason we had to clear the inbox

[^ satire btw]

very long and convoluted psa/ramble about this matter ahead! but also slightly important and i encourage you to read it if you think about using agdt's inbox as a way to vent or share things about your irl troubles

some people treat the blog's inbox as a venting area

it doesn't really make me uncomfortable, it's just something i prefer not seeing. i don't like sharing or being shared personal information especially from an anon or a stranger

this doesn't go for just agdt - it goes for all blogs you interact with: please don't make yourself vulnerable to a stranger on the internet. you are putting yourself in a dangerous spot.

if you need escapism or help, turn to a professional or someone close - going to a stranger can go horribly wrong in two ways: you make them uncomfortable and subject them to a responsibility they never signed up for, or you let someone use your vulnerabilities and personal information against you.

i can probably count like 100 or so asks of people sharing something overly personal and asking for comfort. i don't hate it, i'm not mad, i'm just worried and i hope the people who send them become aware that they should not send those asks knowing that if they're answered, they could be answered publicly with everyone and their mama being able to see that vulnerable moment in that ask.

"just ignore them, wyll! besides, you didn't have any rules abt yo blog anyway, yo!"

nah, i'd win

can't exactly ignore them when it's been almost a year of young impressionable users over sharing to a stranger who answers asks publicly [along with the fact that i hardly see people talk about this matter when it comes to rp/ask blogs.] also so they don't do this to another askblog that has another impressionable youngin running it and publicizes asks that contain personal life info.

we don't add rules to asks on agdt because we can pick and choose which ones we answer. a set of rules isn't going to stop an asshole from breaking them so i'm not wasting my time trying to enforce one. and that's not what i'm trying to do in this post either. i'm putting this out there because i don't want people making the irrational decision of making their life and weakest moments accessible to people who want to use it against them.

i'm not trying to make a big deal out of this either. i can just skip or delete asks that i know i shouldn't answer or won't be able to. but that's my side of responsibility as someone with a platform. i want to make it clear that the audience that decides to interact with these kinds of blogs should be aware that just because you're behind a screen and concealed by an internet persona, that doesn't mean you're any safer from other people using your vulnerabilities against you.

[foxflowershrine]

hey, small psa:

fictives are just people. you wouldn't walk up to a person you saw on the news once while they're having dinner and say "holy shit guys it's Jimothy Cumwomble, great job on stopping that armed robbery, sorry your brother died in the process". that would be completely socially unacceptable - you'd be butting in on their life, overstepping not just their boundaries but basic social decency, and bringing up potentially traumatic life events. it's rude, infantilizing, and potentially directly harmful. so why would you do the same to a fictive just because you know, or think you know, their source?

and that's not to say "never bring up a fictive's source to them", plenty of fictives enjoy talking about their sources! but there's a little thing called tact. you can ask whether they're okay with talking about it, or join in on a conversation where they already are, even just a "hey if you don't mind could we chat about your source" would go a long way. but suddenly changing the topic to their source not just without warning but by singling them out as "weird" or "interesting" and saying things about their source that would never be appropriate to say to a singlet about their past is not cool.

TLDR, a fictive existing in a public space is not an excuse to single them out, put a spotlight on them, and bring up potentially traumatic parts of their history just because you think their source is neat. have a little common sense about timing and approach, or just let them exist in peace.

[thedarkestcrow]

News:

The Emerald Witch Arc will begin airing in April 2025.

Here are some teaser visuals:

(Source)

[communistkenobi]

The deeply moralist tone that a lot of discussions about media representation take on here are primarily neoliberal before they are anything else. Like the shouting matches people get into about “purity culture” “pro/anti” etc nonsense (even if I think it’s true that some people have a deeply christian worldview about what art ought to say and represent about the world) are downstream of the basic neoliberal assumption that we can and must educate the public by being consumers in a market. “Bad representation” is often framed as a writer’s/developer’s/director’s/etc’s failure to properly educate their audience, or to educate them the wrong way with bad information about the world (which will compel their audience to act, behave, internalise or otherwise believe these bad representations about some social issue). Likewise, to “consume” or give money to a piece of media with Bad Representation is to legitimate and make stronger these bad representations in the world, an act which will cause more people to believe or internalise bad things about themselves or other people. And at the heart of both of those claims is, again, the assumption that mass public education should be undertaken by artists in a private market, who are responsible for creating moral fables and political allegories that they will instil in their audiences by selling it to them. These conversations often become pure nonsense if you don’t accept that the moral and political education of the world should be directed by like, studio executives or tv actors or authors on twitter. There is no horizon of possibility being imagined beyond purchasing, as an individual consumer in a market, your way into good beliefs about the world, instilled in you by Media Product 

[secriden]

Not to be a Style apologist, but I feel like some viewers haven't quite picked up that Style's brand of wooing Fadel is quite literally intentionally designed (by both the writers and the character) to be as annoying and frustrating as possible.

Lets consider:

Style thinks his bff is in love for the first time in his life. He thinks Kant is genuinely down bad for Bison: let’s not forget his clear surprise when Kant agreed to give up the car. As far as Style is concerned, Kant is acting really out of character and it's because Kant desperately wants to be with Bison.

He also thinks the only thing standing in the way of True Love™ is Fadel, who according to Kant is being unreasonably difficult about Kant and Bison dating. He doesn't know that Kant has a secondary motivation, nor does he know about the mind games that Bison is playing with Kant. Worse, he has no frame of reference or context to make any of Fadel's animosity towards Kant reasonable.

Moreover, while I think we all agree that Style made a terrible first impression on Fadel, the same has to be said of Fadel towards Style. Like, yes, absolutely Style was in the wrong, but Fadel came off as not only condescending and impatient, but unreasonable (and very weirdly cagey) when Style tried to immediately offer a resolution. Again, Style has no frame of reference for why Fadel would first demand that he take responsibility for his actions and then immediately after claim to have no time to entertain Style's attempt to take said responsibility.

Also, it doesn't help Style's wounded pride that Fadel keeps 'besting' him at every turn. So at this point I think a significant portion of that initial attraction (in ep 1) has shifted to annoyance when it comes to Fadel. By the time he gets his hands on Fadel's information, I think he's more than a little invested in some payback. While I think Style very much still wants to help Kant (and Bison) out, at least a part of him figures as long as he keeps Fadel busy, he kind of meets his goal. And if he gets to embarrass, frustrate and otherwise harass Fadel along the way, all the better!

You can see him start to have some fun with it. He ramps it up SO much in ep 2. He gets to lean into that wild, brash, playful personality because he doesn't really care if Fadel likes him. Style gets to be dialled up to extremes, and I love that for him because he's honestly kind of justified because he knows so fucking little about what's really going on. I think it's only fair if the other 3 are playing 4D chess while Style only has the Uno game rules in front of him, he gets to be the most Unhinged about it.

So, yeah, while I absolutely agree with all the posts out there that recognises just how reasonable and polite and tired Fadel is, I do think we need to give Style some credit here. He's absolutely SO extra, but he's also the one, arguably, that has been lied to the most and I feel that he deserves some slack for that.

[royalarchivist]

Quackity: These past days I've been in many calls, and I'm not done yet. I've spoken to a lot of people and creators. I've read your comments and I'm well aware of what needs to be done to carry out this project. I want to tell you all, beforehand, that for me the team's well-being is fundamental. I'm very involved in this topic to sort it out and I want to make that very clear. I want to tell you something... I want to tell you all that the administrative staff responsible for so much harm to the project has been fired. Specifically, those who made decisions without my permission, affecting the administrative and financial area of the project. Consequently, after this, I was in charge of doing a financial analysis that's carrying out for the QSMP.

Guys, to be really honest, it was not going to last. Therefore, I've had to make deep drastic structural changes that have lead me to reduce the performance of the server down to the most essential, and this is in order to ensure the well being of everyone involved in it. Having said this, I want to give a very important update: I want to let you all know that the QSMP will have to slow down temporarily. This is to ensure this new structure adapts to the project, because it's a restructuring that's taking place. I'm letting you know, and I reiterate, there are no voluntary positions inside the QSMP.

At the moment, there will not be any more individual update accounts of all 5 existing languages in the project. In any case, during this transition, there's going to be a temporal absence of all Eggs and NPCs. I know these are difficult changes, and I repeat, it's temporary until we adjust to these new conditions that will improve the performance of this new structure that's being made from scratch, both in the administrative and financial part. I'd like to reintegrate people fro the QSMP as time goes by if a financial viability can be found for the project Taking advantage of this update to tell you guys that within the changes of the server as it is, creators will have full control of their lore and stories. The team will not intervene in the way that it was being done. Moreover, efforts will be made to change the competitive dynamics inside the game so as to ease up the game style for the creators. Like I'm saying, all of these changes, and more, are being carrying out to have the project as best as possible, and they're being done little by little. This is a whole new structure that will ensure the best continuity and experience for the creators, the community and the team behind.

Guys, I want to make very clear that this is restructuring process, and again, it's not a fast one. The server being open does not mean everything's perfect, I understand that very well. Conversations will keep taking place, communication will continue and the constant improvement of the project as well. I ask, please, for everyone's patience and understanding regarding all changes. Please do wait for official announcements since a lot of incomplete and incorrect information is being spread. I want to tell you all something- if you don't trust in these changes or have many doubts about it, and don't want to consume any more of the project's content, I understand 100%. I have a personal commitment with the QSMP and I will work until it functions in the way it is supposed to do.

Lastly, I want to let you know that it was being worked on for months on finalizing the integration of Korean creators to the QSMP. For that reason, tomorrow we will be welcoming the new Korean creators of the QSMP, of course, taking into account all the changes I've just mentioned. I hope you can give the new Korean members warm welcome to the project. And as you know, their schedules are earlier. For everyone who would like to watch, they will be joining at 11am Mexico time and at 9am US time. Basically, I wanted to give that update regarding everything that's being done within the project. Again, thank you for your patience and understanding- these are necessary changes and I'm glad they're being done now. And many more things will keep being adjusted.

via @QuackitySubs

[mirensiart]

i think it's very funny that i've seen people headcanon wind to speak spanish or for his hylian to be similar to spanish cause like

i'm chilean, and our spanish is recognized by other spanish speakers as being the worst spanish since we speak with weird unique slang and we have a sing-song accent

like, there's a reason why there's so many memes of our spanish sucking ass lmao

anyway, this is a very convoluted and stupid way for me to say that wind is chilean now, i'm claiming him

someone in the chain mentions they know spanish too and wind replies with a heavy chilean accent and slang and everyone's like "what the fuck was that"

[julijbee]

girlbossing too close to the sun.

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

OP: Check out. The fully-sexual charged cinematic movement design.

Cnetizens: How did the director come up with the idea to have him kneel on a playing card, adding so much aesthetic energy, is that some kind of genius?

[slutforpringles]

via: Daniel Ricciardo from The Dan Diaries: I'm asking the questions … (Japanese GP 2017 review)