#can you tell that i like analyzing characters

[instantpansies]

oh my word THANK YOU!!! i've been trying to say this since the wicked movie repopularized all of the "wicked is canon" stuff, but you've put it in a way i wasn't able to. YES. certainly wicked is allowed to be a derivative work that recontextualizes Oz. assuming that whatever is in wicked retroactively and automatically changes details about the story (ie, that the scarecrow and the tin woodman knew each other before the events of Wonderful Wizard and/or the MGM film) is simply incorrect.

i'm all for incorporating a body of work that may not be fully compatible into a coherent canon that works as an alternative parallel to the original. i think it's completely fine and understandable that people are hooked on wicked and will want to understand some characters through the lens of wicked. but assuming that wicked's popularity makes it truly canon, or assuming that the history it presents is accurate to Baum's Oz, is ignorant to both the original context of the Baum books and the long history of Oz adaptation.

i'm also a bit of a hater, as i personally believe that understanding Wonderful Wizard characters through a lens of wicked, especially the musical but also the book, is a less interesting way of analyzing the text and symbolism present in that story than either the Baum novel or the MGM film presents as each stands alone.

wicked is, certainly, its own thing. of course it exists in the context of over a hundred years of adaptation before it, but that context is simply not known by most people. it must be able to stand on its own, and i believe it does. but when this retroactive wicked lens is applied to that context and history uncritically, we will run into problems.

i almost want to blame the seemingly recent, but really just more visible shift in fandom to a need for everything to be canon and confirmed? like, it can be difficult to reconcile in our minds that so many different versions of oz are allowed to exist and don't have to be compatible. wicked "confirms" things viewers are left wondering about after the mgm film, so therefore it must be canon, and therefore it's appropriate to correct people on facts they "get wrong" when they contradict wicked canon. that's how the thinking seems to work, at least in my observation. and that way of thinking seeps its way into the secondary or deeper oz fandom, which has led to (in my view) a sort of soft shift from Baum-centric understanding of oz as a whole to a binary star system where Baum and Maguire are seen as co-creators of a more true or real world and story. i'm exaggerating, certainly, but i've seen this shift occur over time. i hesitate to bring this up bc it sounds like i'm whining about the fandom's natural changes and how things aren't the way they used to be, and i guess i am. i digress.

anyways, your original point. yes!!! while oz became baum's most profitable endeavor, and throughout the series you can see him sort of wishing his other books were more profitable so he could expand in different directions, that doesn't mean he didn't care about continuity or cohesion at all. i'd argue he cared more about cohesion and telling a story that made sense and continued to make sense as it was expanded, than he cared about maintaining particular canon details through the whole series. oz changed as baum's tastes, needs, and audience changed, and that is just as important as the changes that would be added by adaptation later on. (hell, many oz fans don't think of the 1902 musical or the silent films as canon, despite them being created by Baum, both because they're less well-known and because they do change things up to better fit their respective media and contexts). this sense of inconsistency, whether overblown or minimized, doesn't mean that wicked is canon compliant with the baum novels. wicked directly contradicts baum's work in some cases--which again, is completely fine. it's a derivative work that takes certain aspects of the original books and the mgm film, synthesizes them in a grimdark expansion on especially the political aspects of the world, and seeks to tell a unique story that allows you to think about Wonderful Wizard and MGM in a different way. but it is not itself an explanation for Baum's supposedly undercooked or unfinished world. it is not itself a part of the original story (i mean this in the context of canonicity of baum's work. oz fans know how complicated oz canon is.) but instead is--as it claims to be--another branch on the complex tree of oz adaptations.

tldr. wicked does not "explain" anyone's actions in Wonderful Wizard or MGM. it seeks to provide an alternative context, or an alternative explanation, certainly. but it does not retroactively "fix" the story. it's perfectly fine to think about the original story or the mgm film in the context of wicked, if you like the alternative history it provides. policing others' adaptations and understandings of the story, or implying or directly stating that wicked should be incorporated into others' headcanons or interpretations or adaptations, or claiming that wicked is canon simply because baum didn't care about canon so everything is canon, is not helpful or productive or good. in fact, that actively makes oz analysis less fun, in my opinion. i hope my point is made here i've been trying to say this for months but as usual i was completely unable to get my thoughts across until acted on by an outside force (seeing this post). so thanks!!

I've seen a lot of people lately harping about how "Wicked isn't canon to the Oz universe", "it's just glorified fanfiction", etc., and I can't express how silly that is, and how annoyed it makes me every time I hear it, lol. Baum's original Oz books were never meant to be some canonical series — they contradict each other constantly; Baum called it a "fairy story" with loose cohesion at best; and it only became a series at all because the first one got popular enough that Baum felt a duty to the fandom to keep making more (even after he had wanted to end it). And the 1939 film is every bit as much "fanfiction" as Wicked — it changes the story in both major and minor ways, including a complete shift of framing (i.e., making Oz into a dream rather than a real place).

Maguire's great contribution to the overarching legacy and lore of Oz was to harmonize the very weak "canon" of the older works with a different shift in framing: recontextualizing all of the prior Oz material as a revisionist history (going off of Baum's own idea framing of himself as a "Royal Historian of Oz"), and attempting to tell "the true story" behind the other works (fictively of course — we're never meant to literally think Maguire's version preceded Baum's, irl). In literary studies, this is called an urtext. The Wicked Years and its adaptations are as much "fanfiction" as the 1939 film: it's just self-aware of that fact in a way that earlier works weren't, and uses that perspective to deconstruct the material and explore deeper (and darker) themes — not simply adapting or reimagining the original text (as the 1939 movie did), but actively challenging it; interrogating it. It's not meant to be "canon" as such: it asks you to ask whether (and why) there is such a thing, and what that might say about the stories that we are meant to literally believe in, in real life.

[blueberrymocha]

lying to them *ೃ༄

┌──────────────────────────────────────┐

ׂ╰┈➤ fluff

➣ characters: gon, killua, kurapika, leorio, hisoka, illumi, chrollo

➣ word count: x

└──────────────────────┘

scenario:

“you’re home late, where’ve you been?”

———————————————————————————————————————

gon

- he doesn’t realize at all because even if he does, he’ll tell himself he’s got it wrong

- sees you as too good to lie to him

“you meant to say x right?“

- his absolute trust in you would compel you to come clean then and there

- part of him is upset that you’d lie, but he tries his best to remain calm

- if you’re willing to have a reasonable discussion about it, so is he

- but if you argue, play dumb, or act dismissive, it’d quickly turn into a full blown fight

- honesty is important to him, so while he appreciates your confession

- the fact that you lied in the first place would make him reconsider his boundaries and your relationship

killua

- he wouldn’t notice if it were a small detail

- besides he doesn’t feel like he needs to be on guard around you, analyzing every word

- he’d probably catch you in a lie after absentmindedly asking you a question later and noticing your answer changed

“did you see the limited edition chocolate robot while you were there?”

…

“i thought you said you were at the candy store?”

- he becomes a lot more assertive and firm as he questions you, a glare on his face if you brush it off

- whatever the reason was, he’ll distance himself from you for a day or so

- the idea of you hiding god knows what from him would totally piss him off

- he won’t be mad forever, but for now, it’s probably better you give him space

kurapika

- is inclined to believe you, but pays enough attention that if the story didn’t add up, he’d notice

- and he’d point out any inconsistencies, being upfront about it

“isn’t that friend out of town?

…

“you weren’t with them, were you?”

- his mind would probably fill with doubts and insecurities

- thoughts of infidelity springing to the front of his mind

- he would never be brash or demand answers, though

- if something did happen, his priority is fixing it

- he knows he can be unavailable, so would give you the opportunity to have a real talk with him

- are you unhappy with how things are? was it just a white lie?

- eventually, the problem would be resolved,

- but he makes it very clear he won’t tolerate lying in the future

leorio

- he wouldn’t notice, too tired from school to pay your words much mind

- it’d just be normal routine for you, and honestly, he might not ever find out

- even when he’s fully awake, he simply isn’t all that attentive

- if you decide to tell him, i think he’d be a lot calmer than you might expect

- of course, he’d still be mad, but the most he’d do is raise his voice and argue

- he’s also not the type to storm out, at least until he has clarity about the situation

- if the lie was innocent enough, he’ll be a bit ticked off for the rest of the night, but nothing more

- if it was something bigger, he’d ask for space, not wanting to let his rashness make him do something he’ll regret later

- he’d definitely try to mitigate his response because he does appreciate you coming clean to him

- even if it doesn’t absolve you of the consequences

hisoka

- he notices quickly, he’s an expert at lying after all

- if it’s a good attempt, he’d humor you; playing along, even asking follow up questions and pretending to be fooled

- he sees this all as a game after all

- but eventually, once he’s given the prospect of you lying a little more thought

- he’s a lot less playful, calling you out directly and demanding the truth

- it’s fun when he’s merely amused by your inability to lie

- but at heart, he’s possessive, and the idea that you’re trying to hide an affair irritates him more than he himself understands

- and if it truly was another person you were with, he’d 100% retaliate by killing them

- as for you? he’s content to let you off that hook at that point, warning you not to deceive him again

illumi

- as much of a mastermind he seems to be, social cues elude him completely

- in his eyes, you’re his partner, someone he’d never have reason to doubt

- if you never tell him, you’re free to go on with your day

- but make no mistake, he’s far from dumb

- if there’s a gaping inaccuracy in your words, he’ll immediately accuse you of lying

(e.g. saying you were with someone he himself was with)

- at that point, there’s nothing you can say to get out of this even if you correct yourself

- it’d start an argument, and in the end, he’d be more controlling

- your location? he’d track it at all times

- hanging out your friends? you’d have to ask him first

- and if they’re male, it’ll always be a ‘no’

chrollo

- so there’s no way to lie to him, he’ll catch on immediately

- he’s mastered every aspect of the social scene

- his typical patience is replaced by an eerie calmness as he questions whatever statement you made

- if you come clean at that point and explain yourself

- and he finds it valid enough, he’ll get over it; firmly telling you he won’t be so forgiving next time

- keep lying to him though, and he won’t hesitate to use manipulation tactics on you

- eg. ignoring you, threatening you or whoever he suspects you were with, guilt tripping..

- if you’d grown to see him as an understanding, misunderstood lover, his behavior would extinguish your perception quickly

- once you do confess, he’ll be more distant for the next day or so

- though if you asked him?

“i’m not mad, just disappointed.”

[writersrkive]

Light | Aaron Hotchner

summary: since a few days ago, you have been distracted. Something about the holidays and Christmas is triggering to you. Apparently, the team doesn't notice this, but your boss, of course, does. He is troubled, but when you say that you are sick on Christmas Eve, right before dinner, he is ready to go with you and keep you company. He also appears with a small gift that can cheer you up.

genre: angst, hurt, comfort.

pairing: Aaron Hotchner x bau!gn!reader

warning: holidays and Christmas being a nostalgic/sad holiday to reader, mention of reader not being from Virginia, family issues (reader), reader is new member of the team, allusion of an age gap (not specific), reader being called "kid" two or three times.

a/n: so... maybe I projected myself a bit into this fic. I hope whoever feels like the main character feels some comfort and understanding here. I'm sorry if there's anything wrong with the writing, I haven't edited yet, but I wanted it posted before Christmas (it's 11pm in my country). English isn't my first language, please be kind <3. Merry Christmas reader, thank you for being here one more year! I'm proud of you.

Masterlist Spanish ver. On Wattpad (coming soon)

Christmas isn't what it was a few years ago, but neither was your family. When you decided to move to Virginia, far from home, it was hard for you because despite having a broken family, the feeling of wanting to fix everything for everyone was still there. The holidays, especially Christmas, brought back memories of when everything was fine —or so it seemed—.

The dynamic of the team was like a family, but as the newest member —and one of the youngest— it was hard to feel completely into it. However, you didn't feel as isolated as you did at first. So, they didn't notice how nostalgic and sad your aura was the days before.

Oh, but Aaron, your boss, did.

It started the day that some workmates decorated the office with a mini Christmas tree, lights and bows. Everyone was heading home, except him, as usual. The paper work ended so the stoic man was closing the door of his office when he noticed the way you were standing in front of the tree, almost giving him your back. He could see half of the profile he caught himself admiring often. The lights were reflected in the sad look similar to that of a child hoping to obtain something impossible.

“Why are you still here?” He asked, not scolding, but rather with curiosity.

“Oh, good night Hotch. I was finishing some paperwork.” Your expression showed that you had come out of a trance.

“Are you done?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Maybe we can walk to our cars together.”

“Sure.”

He didn't try to make small talk. The feeling of tiredness was in the air, but he also felt that he shouldn't try to break down any kind of personal barrier that you had at that moment. Because despite showing a friendly smile, it was obvious that your mind was somewhere else.

Then, a few days later, you were distracted by something peculiar.

“Hey, are you okay?” Derek asked when he noticed that you weren't listening to his theories. Hotch was talking to a police officer, but he was looking at the way your workmate and you were analyzing the crime scene. “Are you cold?” His teasing smile made you chuckle slightly.

“Yeah. I still haven't gotten used to the weather, sorry.” The lie went unnoticed by your colleague. They were profilers, but you were one too, so it was kind of easy to fake certain things. It wasn't right, but at that time of the year you just wanted to survive. Besides, you couldn't tell them anything, not because you didn't trust them, but because it was too much to handle.

Across the street, Aaron looked in the direction you were looking before Derek spoke to you. It was a park a few blocks away. There was an ice rink, giant decorations, and lots of families gathered around. What could that place have to distract you so much?

There were many other occasions like that. The last time was on Christmas Eve. Months ago, Penelope had decided to buy an instant camera to take photos of the team inside and outside of work, when they had days off.

“Here it is, my beautiful fellas!” The blonde said excitedly. “Your handmade Christmas gift!”

She made all of you sit around the table, so she could put in the center the sparkling red notebook, with silver letters. 'Memories at the BAU' could be read.

“Garcia! It's so beautiful!” Emily said, smiling. Derek hugged his friend in appreciation and JJ got closer to Emily so she could see better.

“Look at that. Always a great time for pasta.” Rossi joked looking at one of the pictures where he could be seen making pasta for dinner after a heavy case.

“Always looking good.” Derek said pointing at a picture of him posing with one of the plushies García had at her office.

“Look at us! But why do you look so sad?” JJ joked looking at a group photo. You could be seen at the back with a forced smile.

“I was a little tired, sorry.” You answered, but the reality was that you had received some messages from your family minutes before that photo was taken.

“Hey, why did you take a photo of me taking a nap?” The confused tone in Spencer's voice made you laugh a little, but Aaron noticed the way your eyes didn't light up.

“Does anyone know where our newest member is?” Derek asked, smiling. He can't help but remember the way Emily, JJ and he teased you before. You started to get late to a few compromises —it happened at work once or twice—, but your boss didn't scold you like he would scold anyone else on the team. “He has a soft spot for someone.” Derek playfully twitched that time, thinking the bags under your eyes weren't caused by anything but work —he was wrong—.

“The kid just sent a message to the group chat.” Rossi announced.

“Sick?” Penelope showed her worry, reading your message.

Aaron felt a weird pinch on the chest. He immediately got even more worried than everyone in Rossi's house, even if his face just tensed a little bit more than usual. In his mind he debated whether to go with you to make sure you were okay, even though it might be intrusive.

Maybe you needed space….

Or maybe there was something else you weren't telling them, just like he noticed before.

“Am… I think I'm a little bit sick too.” He whispered after a while.

“What? We are about to eat dinner.” Emily said a little sad. She was worried about the team's health now that Aaron and you were sick.

“I'll be fine. I'm going to take some food with me in case I get hungry later." His movements were a little fast, as if in a hurry.

“Are you sure you don't need a medic, Aaron?” His old friend said and the boss could sense a little teasing in his tone.

“I'm good, I just need to go right now. I'll see you tomorrow. Everyone, please be safe.” The team could sense sincerity in those words when he gave them one last look, after he took the food, his jacket and his keys, and before stepping out of the house.

“Kid is gonna have some company.” Derek teased and everyone, including Reid, smiled knowing what was going on.

Both of you were surprised when you opened the door. He didn't expect to see you with red puffy eyes and nose, and you didn't expect him there, in front of your house, holding some tuppers with food and something else tangled in his arms.

“Hotch?” Your furrowed eyebrows and tilted head made his chest feel warm. You looked confused and also cute. He felt a little bad to think like that when something was wrong with you.

“I needed to make sure you were okay.” That's all he said.

“Oh… Am… I'm just a little…”

“Sick? I don't think so. You have been acting weird, and Christmas has something to do with that. I know because apparently it triggers something that makes you… sad.” His voice was soft. It felt like he didn't want to expose you, but he needed to show how much he knew about the situation. “I don't think you actually fool them. At least, not now. Maybe in the beginning, but that wasn't my case.” But you did feel exposed, even a little ashamed. The lack of movement told Hotch that you were uncomfortable. “I'm sorry…”

“It's okay. I guess it's impossible to fool S.S.A. Aaron Hotchner.” You showed a sad smile, it was more like a grin. “Wait, what about Jack?”

“He's with his aunt. They were on a trip I couldn't join because of obvious reasons. I guess we can keep each other company.” Little by little he had begun to show a smile that was contagious to you.

“Sure.”

When he walked in he noticed the lack of decorations on the surroundings. There was just a small tree at the back of a hall. It had a start at the top and had some lights and spheres. That was it.

“I'm sorry if I'm being intrusive, but can I ask what's wrong?” he asked when you started to help him to put the food on two plates.

You sighted thinking about all the things you needed to explain so you could give him an answer. “It's complicated. I don't know if I wanna talk about that.”

“That's okay. Then, can you tell me how you are feeling?”

You smiled, knowing he changed the question so as not to make you feel uncomfortable, while still keeping in mind the fact that he needed to know how you were feeling. “Everything brings memories. I'm supposed to be with my family, but what family?” I asked, sitting next to him in the kitchen. “Sometimes I wish things were like before, like having a time machine and just going there: where everyone was. Now I know how heavy the family issues were, but I was a kid so at least I was living in a lie… a good lie.”

“I know family is complicated. There's people who hurt other people, and that's not right, but there's too much.”

“Exactly…”

“But you have a family here too, now.” He whispered. And the way he looked at you made you feel like you weren't alone, at least not how you have thought.

“That's why I bring Rossi's lasagna with me. He's gonna be sad if you don't get to try it.”

Dinner was good. Of course you loved Rossi's cooking, but you came to the conclusion that it was because of the company of your boss. He helped a lot by distracting you, chatting about Jack, some plans outside of work and various things. After a few hours you couldn't handle your curiosity anymore.

“Hotch, can I ask you something?”

“Sure, what is it?” Apparently, your question took him by surprise, perhaps it was the tone in which you spoke to him, almost tenderly.

“What is that?” You pointed at what he left coiled up on the armrest of one of the sofas in your living room. It looked like a silver wire with transparent stuff on it.

“These are Jack's favorite lights. We bought it a few years ago. He loved them until we bought a set of identical, larger lights. Do you want to see?”

“Yes!” Your childish tone made him smile.

He untangled the lights and plugged them into the nearest socket, quickly his hands and the place where the lights rested shone brightly.

“Wow…” It was almost a whisper, but Aaron enjoyed the answer as if it was a shout of joy. “These are beautiful.”

“I knew you liked the lights.”

“Huh? Oh! You mean the night when you caught me staring at the…”

“Yeah.”

“Well, yeah, I liked lights. I think I've always liked them, but at some point the feeling became sad."

“They are for you.”

“No, but, Jack…”

“Like I said, he has new ones, so, there's no problem. He will love that you have them.”

“Can you help me to…” You hesitated.

“Sure. Let's go, where do you want them?”

A fun playlist invaded your house. While Hotch held a ladder and watched your back to see if you lost your balance, you placed the string of lights in the living room window.

“Can you turn them on?” You asked him gently. The decorated window came to life as did your eyes and Aaron couldn't feel calmer as he admired your excited countenance.

“I'm glad you liked them.”

Suddenly, cries of excitement were heard from neighboring houses and some Christmas songs began to play from the speakers of nearby restaurants even louder.

“Merry Christmas, Hotch.” You said when you came down from the ladder. The man who came to brighten your night didn't think that seeing your expression would fill his chest with warmth.

“Merry Christmas, kid.”

You definitely didn't know or would have imagined that the man who watched your back at work was what you needed to feel better. He brought the light you needed for days.

[nickeverdeen]

Hi! Can I ask for male OBX characters walking in on their S/O changing?

Male Outer Banks characters walking in on their lover changing

JJ Maybank

JJ walks in with his usual chaotic energy, stops dead in his tracks, and just stares for a second before realizing what’s happening

He’ll quickly cover his eyes with his hands but peeks through his fingers, joking, “I’m being respectful! Totally didn’t see anything.”

JJ does a dramatic spin to face the other way, arms wide, like he’s trying to give you privacy but still wants to be funny

He’ll leave the room but stick his head back in to say, “Let me know when I can come back!” before finally closing the door

Later, he apologizes in his own way, which usually means awkwardly trying to make it up to you with snacks or jokes

“If you need help picking an outfit, I’m available,”

While he plays it cool, he’s 100% thinking about how good you looked the whole time he’s teasing you

Blames you for no reason

“How was I supposed to know you’d be in the middle of changing? You could’ve shouted or something!”

He’ll casually wrap an arm around you later, as if the earlier incident never happened, but it’s just an excuse to be closer

If you tease him back, he’ll actually get a bit shy and avoid eye contact for a few minutes

“You’ll never guess what happened,” he tells John B later, laughing about the whole situation

After the incident, JJ makes a big show of knocking loudly

Once he’s done joking, JJ makes sure you’re not upset

John B Routledge

John B quickly slams the door halfway closed, peeking around it awkwardly to apologize

He instinctively throws his hands over his face, muttering, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see anything!”

“I should’ve knocked—this is totally on me,”

He might stand there for a second too long, trying to process the situation before his brain kicks in to leave

Gets a bit playfully defensive

“Hey, you can’t blame me for this one! You should’ve locked the door!”

John B is respectful and leaves almost immediately, but you can hear him chuckling outside the door

“We’re cool, right? You’re not mad at me or anything?”

He starts loudly announcing, “Coming in!” every time he enters a room after that

Even if he acts cool, his mind replays the moment all day, making him blush when he thinks about it

He’ll sit on the porch later, wondering if he made you uncomfortable and how to make it right

He starts knocking on every door, even when it’s unnecessary, like when you’re in the kitchen

John B makes sure you know he didn’t mean to invade your privacy and promises to be more careful

Pope Hayward

Pope’s face goes red instantly, and he stammers out, “Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” before slamming the door shut

He spends the next five minutes pacing outside the door, shouting apologies through it

Even after he leaves, his face stays red, and he avoids eye contact for the rest of the day

Pope knocks on your door every single time after that, even if you’re in the middle of talking to him

“Why didn’t I knock? I always knock! What’s wrong with me?”

He’s extra careful not to look at you for a while, worried you’re upset with him

Pope spends hours analyzing whether you’re mad, embarrassed, or fine with it

If you tease him about it, he’ll stammer and go bright red all over again

“I swear I wasn’t trying to, like, spy or anything. It was just bad timing!”

Pope becomes hyper-aware of your privacy, going out of his way to give you space

He genuinely feels terrible about the situation and checks in later to make sure you’re okay

Unlike JJ, Pope doesn’t tell anyone about the incident, not even the other Pogues

Rafe Cameron

Rafe stops mid-step, his eyes widening as he realizes what’s happening, but he doesn’t look away fast enough

“Uh… I—wow—uh, sorry!” he stammers, quickly turning around but clearly flustered.

Even while apologizing, there’s a little smirk on his face because, well, he’s Rafe

He steps out of the room but keeps the door slightly ajar, peeking back in

Rafe tries to act casual, leaning against the doorframe afterward like it’s no big deal, though his ears are pink

He’ll later casually ask, “You mad at me for that, or are we good?” just to make sure you’re okay.

“Sorry… but maybe lock the door next time?”

Rafe takes his time leaving, pretending to adjust something in the room as an excuse to stay for a few extra seconds

He’ll be distracted for the rest of the day, replaying the moment in his mind with a small grin

If it’s just him and Topper, he might casually brag about it

[yawping-poets-society]

been Thinking about richard cameron again...

and i think the thing that people don't always see when discussing his character is that we the viewers can and should have a different interpretation of his character than the poets do

i get why charlie punched him. fine, i'll say it, i even think it's justifiable (stay with me here)

charlie was a seventeen year old who had just lost his best friend, and had always been predisposed to dislike cameron. why? because charlie only ever saw cameron as a rule follower, a brownoser, a teacher's pet. when cameron talks to nolan, charlie sees it as a betrayal but not a surprise because to him, this is classic cameron behavior. in his mind, obviously cameron would choose authority over his friends and the one teacher who fought the limits that welton set for them. charlie doesn't ever think about what position cameron was in.

and i get it! again! charlie is a teenager who is experiencing probably the most emotional time of his life. same goes for the rest of the poets. they all feel betrayed. and frankly, cameron's dialogue in the scene where charlie punches him is cruel, and a blatant misunderstanding of who neil was, and what keating was trying to do (as todd points out). he says a lot of shit, and none of it makes you want to like him. he wasn't winning any sympathy points from the poets or from the audience.

it’s easy to watch that scene back and say, “cameron behaved horribly here, therefore he is a horrible person with no redeeming qualities.” but when we're actually analyzing the movie? i think we have a responsibility to really consider cameron's motivations.

for starters, he was always the odd one out among the poets. charlie picked on him constantly, and no one ever stood up for him, except maybe neil. and not only does cameron hang out with the poets, he's charlie's roommate. he probably never caught a break from hearing how poorly charlie thought of him.

more than that, though, he has a clear and consistent need to follow authority. on keating's very first day, cameron is one of the first students to stand up and follow him out of the classroom. he does it hesitantly, sure, but we can tell what he's thinking: when a teacher tells you what to do, you do it. this pattern continues all the way into the aforementioned scene with charlie when cameron says: "in case you hadn't heard, dalton, there's something called an honor code at this school, alright? if a teacher asks you a question, you tell the truth, or you're expelled." true, yes, cameron's saving his own ass. but what choice does he have? in his mind, none. this is how the world works. you keep your head down, you do what you're told, or you get punished.

do i think it was the right thing to do? maybe not. do i think the poets are entitled to their anger towards him? yeah, i do. but i understand why cameron did it. he was a scared kid, who, when caught between a rock and a hard place, fell back on what he'd been taught his whole life.

so, to wrap all this up: no, cameron's not unequivocally good. he hurt his friends, and they have a right to be upset with him. but he didn't set out with bad intentions. he was just a kid, and what he did doesn't make him evil, it makes him complex. he has a right to be treated as such.

[life-o-n-m4rs]

An Analysis on the Finale and Aziraphale’s Inner Monologue (Michael Sheen is an Incredible Actor)

Like most Good Omens fans in these tragic, triyng times, I’ve spent hours scrolling through Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr reading hundreds of people’s thoughts and opinions on the season, particularly the final scene of the season in which Aziraphale is offered to return to Heaven to be Supreme Archangel and Crowley confesses his love to Aziraphale after literal millennia of pining. After my most recent rewatch of the season, I spent a lot of time focussing on the final scene(s) and carefully eyeing every tiny detail. Not necessarily around the coffee, but around everything that came after it. I am somewhat on the fence about the coffee theory. Though I don’t think that Aziraphale decided to go back to Heaven entirely on his own fruition, I don’t think he was completely under the control of Heaven either. His ultimate decision was not entirely out of character.

Starting with the coffee and scene with Metatron itself: many people have theorized that The Metatron poisoned Aziraphale with cyanide, which I see the logic in. We saw earlier in the series in the second minisode that poison causes demons–and presumably angels–to act very strange, like they’re high or drunk. When he drank the laudnum, Crowley stops a girl from killing herself, while stating that it was not a kind thing to do as he was “Off [his] rocker on laudnum. Not responsible for [his] actions”. However, Crowley still drinks the laudnum to stop Elspeth from doing it herself, so obviously he was at least somewhat in his right mind. He still aimed to thwart her attempt, so his statement deflecting his actions due to his intoxication could just be another moment of Crowley denying any goodness in him, much like when he saves Aziraphale’s books and tells him not to thank him. So, coming back to the coffee, it is perhaps plausible that Aziraphale said yes to The Metatron because he was not entirely in his right mind. When we see Metatron order the coffee, he does ask for a “dash of almond syrup”, but when giving it to Aziraphale, says that there is a “hefty jigger” of it. That certainly doesn’t sound like a dash. Where the coffee theory starts to fall off, however, is immediately after Aziraphale drinks the coffee. When Crowley drank the laudnum, he immediately felt the effects of the poison, whereas with Aziraphale, we see that he is completely the same afterwards. Of course, cyanide is not laudnum, and it was also, theoretically, mixed in with coffee, so the effects could very well be different. Aziraphale returns to his shop with no coffee in hand, so it is safe to assume that he finished it, and we don’t see any changes in behavior until he starts talking to Crowley. That is when he starts to act off.

If we look at Aziraphale during his conversation with The Metatron, he immediately declines his offer. He flatout says that he does not want to go back to heaven. Not only that, but Metatron tells Aziraphale that he chose him to replace Gabriel as Supreme Archangel because he’s a great, natural leader. That he’s honest and doesn’t just tell people what they want to hear, which is just flatout not true. We see Aziraphale lie so many times in the show, probably more than Crowley, and he especially lies to Heaven on multiple occasions. That’s a huge focus of the minisode in episode 2, that Aziraphale lied to Heaven. He has never aligned with Heaven’s beliefs. He is notoriously insuboordinate. He is by far not the best choice to be Supreme Archangel, especially since he hasn’t properly aligned himself with Heaven, or even spoken to them, in years. This is the first piece of manipulation from The Metatron’s part. Not even necessarily some miracle or poisoning, but he was feeding Azirphale what he wants to hear. He’s praising him to get in his good graces, but that’s only the first half. Aziraphale still says no. It’s not until Metatron presents his second half of the offer that we see something start to crack in Aziraphale. If The Metatron did do something to Aziraphale, it still could not have worked without this vital piece. He offers to let Aziraphale, as Supreme Archangel, restore Crowley as an angel. Crowley can come with. Suddenly things are different, and we see it on Aziraphale’s face. Michael Sheen is an inredible actor and he manages to narrate a deep and painful inner monologue within Aziraphale with just his face. The second The Metatron starts to say that he could bring Crowley with him, his expression changes very subtly, but just enough for us to see that something made its way through to him.

We are deliberately not shown the rest of their conversation. There is clearly something there that we did not see. The only other part of their conversation we see is at the end of it. The Metatron says that Azirphale “[doesn’t] have to answer immediately. Take all the time you need”. All that Azirpahle says in response is that he doesn’t know what to say, to which The Metatron says, “Go tell your friend the good news”, as if he knows that, in the end, Aziraphale will come with him. We watch Aziraphale walk away, and he does not look like he has good news for Crowley. He looks scared.

Something inside of Aziraphale is battling itself in this moment. We see no change in his demeanor until we reenters his bookshop, and even then, it’s not until right before Crowley begins speaking. We see him looking at Crowley and something almost seems to waft over him. He’s no longer scared or nervous about this news. He suddenly wants to tell Crowley all about it.

When Aziraphale cuts Crowley off, he’s suddenly ecstatic about going back to Heaven, which does not at all match how he was feeling less than one minute ago on his way back to the bookshop. So, it might be entirely possible that The Metatron didn’t do anything to Aziraphale until after their conversation. That he performed some miracle on him just as he was walking away. As Aziraphale explains the ordeal to Crowley, he is filled more and more with joy and excitement about all of it. Aziraphale, who, just a few minutes ago, said that he didn’t want to go back to Heaven. I do believe that part of him here is thinking back on when he knew Crowley as an angel. We don’t know much about Crowley’s time as an angel, but we do know that he was an important angel. Important enough to be second to the Supreme Archangel as Aziraphale proposes. We saw a small moment of Crowley when he was an angel and how much he loved building the universe. Creating stars. Countless galaxies that were like his children. But we know very well why Crowley could never go back. So why doesn’t Aziraphale? Aziraphale doesn’t exactly have the best relationship with Heaven. They were the ones who tried to destroy him, to hurt Crowley, to destroy the world and humanity, which Azirphale stopped. Why should we believe that he’s even been forgiven for that? Crowley seems to share the same sentiment that the viewers do–why should Aziraphale go back after what they did to him?–because he immediately assumes that Aziraphale turned down the offer.

Crowley tells Aziraphale that they’re better than that. That they don’t need Heaven. That when Hell offered him a promotion, he said no, without hesitation. Aziraphale rebutes with “Obviously you said no to Hell, you’re the bad guys.” You’re. When has Aziraphale ever aligned Crowley with Hell like that? Especially in the last few years of their relationship. They have been completely cut off from both sides for years. This is the first instance of something slipping through that isn’t entirely Aziraphale. This is not something that he would say to Crowley. Aziraphale says, “...Heaven. It’s the side of light, of truth. Of good.” He has spent all of both seasons of the show whole-heartedly believing that Crowley was good. He has always seen him as such. So, for him to not only include Crowley in the Hell collective, but to imply that Crowley cannot be good without Heaven, is a clear sign that something is wrong. Crowley is begging, pleading that Azirphale said no to Metatron. If we look back, he never gave an answer. The Metatron told him that he could take all the time he needed to answer. But Aziraphale has his answer. He never had a choice in giving one, did he? Aziraphale did say no and The Metatron didn’t take it.

At this point, Crowley can feel Aziraphale slipping away, so he goes on with his confession anyway. It’s clear in his voice that he’s now desperately trying to hold onto Aziraphale. Throughout Crowley’s confession, he plays a tug-of-war with Heaven for Aziraphale. He brings up Gabriel and Beelzebub, saying that if they “can go off together, then we can”. He’s not just bringing them up as a point in his argument to say that it is possible for an angel and a demon to love each other. He’s bringing them up because Beelzebub says flatout that they “found something that mattered more than choosing sides”. Crowley is trying to present himself as that for Aziraphale in that moment. He’s looking him in the eye, allowing himself to be vulnerable, and begging him to forget about sides. What about shades of gray?

Crowley is presenting Aziraphale with an offer. An offer for the two of them to forget Heaven and Hell, to forget everything but each other. But Aziraphale has his mind set, either by himself or by someone else, but it is set nonetheless. Even as he fights whatever is inside of him, pulling him toward Heaven, he’ll be damned if he doesn’t do everything in his power to pull Crowley with him because he cannot bear to be apart from him. Crowley would burn Heaven to the ground for Aziraphale, but he’s afraid of fire.

The best comparison for Aziraphale’s willingness to go back to Heaven, which many people have used, is that of an abuse victim. He has suffered at the hands of Heaven for millennia, but when the expectation is that he must feel worthless, he holds on so tight to any speck of praise like it is high above the standard. When Crowley presents his offer to Aziraphale, he’s not turning it down. He is trying to fulfill it while also getting to enact his hopes for Heaven. He says to Crowley, “Come with me. To Heaven. I’ll run it, you can be my second in command”. This line always stuck out to me. Second in command. When has Crowley ever been a second to Aziraphale? Throughout the series, we see them walking together, always shoulder to shoulder. Neither ever walks behind or in front of the other. They have always been equals. Now, suddenly, Crowley is no longer worthy of being Aziraphale’s equal. Almost as though Heaven is looking at Crowley and saying that he doesn’t deserve to be on the same level as a measly principality. Someone who was once important enough to build galaxies can never be on the same level again because he has fallen. The Metatron is starting to flood into Aziraphale’s head, and Aziraphale is fighting to stay afloat, reaching out for Crowley to pull him out, but if Crowley takes his hand he’ll just get pulled under, too.

“You can’t leave this bookshop,” Crowley says. You can’t leave me. Is what he means. “Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale patronizingly coos at him. He thinks that Crowley is refusing because of foolish attachments to material objects, something that Heaven has no time or use for. Something Heaven has no patience for. “Nothing lasts forever.” We won’t last forever. Crowley is offering Aziraphale eternity, and Aziraphale is laughing at him for it. At least, from Crowley’s perspective. Through his heartbreak, he can’t see that Aziraphale so badly wants to go with him, but something is holding him down, so he asks Crowley to come to him. There is no halfway point. “No, I don’t suppose it does.” Crowley puts his glasses on while he’s alone with Aziraphale for the first time in years. He spent years carefully tearing down his walls for him, and it’s as if, in an instant, someone came along and pressed undo. All the bricks came magneting back together and built themselves back up. Crowley opened himself up, truly, for the first time ever, and he thinks he’s being rejected becaus Aziraphale doesn’t know how to tell him how beautiful he looks. As Crowley walks away, Aziraphale doesn’t know what he did wrong. Why is Crowley leaving? He’s offering him what is, in his mind, the best possible outcome. He wants to fix Heaven for Crowley. He wants him to be that sweet, happy, angel he was, but Aziraphale’s too naive to see that he never can be. He’s begging Crowley to come with him now. “We can be together,” he says, almost like it’s a compromise. He still doesn’t know how to let himself love Crowley, but he’s willing to let Crowley love him if that means he will stay. He says that they can be angels, doing good, again implying that Crowley cannot be good without Heaven. Crowley cannot be good with Aziraphale. But the fact of the matter is, he may be good without Aziraphale, but he isn’t Crowley. More and more of Aziraphale breaks through in this moment. In his moment of desperation not to lose Crowley, he’s forgetting about Heaven. All he needs is Crowley. He needs him. And when that plead doesn’t work, Heaven surfaces again. He turns to anger. “I don’t think you understand what I’m offering you.” He’s now bringing Crowley down. He’s using the same tactics that Heaven does. Make them feel worthless so that they love you when you give them anything more. But this is also Heaven trying to push Crowley away from Aziraphale. The intention never was for Crowley to be an angel. Metatron knew very well that Crowley would say no. He just needed that option to get in. To break into Aziraphale’s mind, tear the two apart with no hope of mending, and keep them as far away from each other as possible.

Aziraphale gives up trying to hold onto Crowley. Heaven is in his head and in his ear saying, “Give up. He’s not coming.” Heaven has built itself back up in Aziraphale’s head. He has closed himself from Crowley. It’s not until Crowley kisses him that the battle begins again between Aziraphale and whatever The Metatron placed in him, whether literally or emotionally. We see on Aziraphale’s face and in his body language a flicker between wanting and hating it. But he never pulls away. When Crowley let’s go, Aziraphale looks horrified. Like he can’t believe that Crowley just did that, or that he allowed it to continue as long as it did. Deep down, there’s nothing Aziraphale wanted more, but not like this. As he struggles to find his words, his face is first sad. Afraid. He mouths something through an exhale that appears to be what wants to be an “I love you”, but his face shifts. Heaven takes over again and all he can say is “I forgive you”. He goes from sad and lovelorn to a sort of anger with Crowley. We see him flash back and forth between these two many times throughout this sequence.

As Crowley walks away, Aziraphale comes through again, wanting to go after him. He even appears to mouth “No”. He wants him to stay. He wants to stay with him. But then he looks after him with a furrowed brow. He’d better walk away. It’s better for everyone.

He pushes Heaven back again when he presses his fingers to his lips. He wants to remember what that felt like. He wants to feel it again. Desperately. But he changes again and wipes the kiss away. It’s not what Heaven would want, and so neither shall he, for this love is a sin, and angels do not sin.

When the Metatron returns and Aziraphale tells him he didn’t take it well, The Metatron immediately puts Crowley down, saying that he was “always asking damn fool questions”. Now that Crowley was out of sight, he needed to be out of mind as well. He did not align with Heaven or its goals, so Aziraphale cannot think even remotely fondly of him. He must be an angel again, and angels do not look upon demons with an ounce of kindness. Crowley does not deserve Aziraphale’s kindness. He offered him something great, and he was too foolish to accept it. Right?

The Metatron asks Aziraphale if he’s ready to start. Aziraphale never gave him an answer, though, did he? Because there was no answer to give. Aziraphale never had a choice. Crowley had to be gone, and Aziraphale had to be the one to push him away, because how else would they regain control over the both of them? The reality of it has suddenly hit Aziraphale. He’s still fighting Heaven’s control. Suddenly, he can’t leave the bookshop. Suddenly, it must last forever, because this is Crowley’s shop, too. While The Metatron is trying to get Aziraphale out of the shop, he keeps looking at the chairs. The chairs in which he and Crowley sat and drank so many times. Where they laughed together. Where they decided to stop armageddon. The chairs where they decided that their side was the only one that mattered. Aziraphale is doubting. He almost tells The Metatron that he wants to stay. He almost tells him no. But he can’t, because The Metatron won’t let him. He can’t.

In the scene just before Aziraphale gets on the elevator, the music is a key factor. It tells the viewer exactly what’s going on in Aziraphale’s mind. He is still flipping between Heavn and Crowley. Every time Aziraphale leans toward Heaven, the music plays in a major key, with more emphasis on the flute. When his mind goes to Crowley, the strings take over with a melancholy melody. Strings that pull Aziraphale down, back to the world, to Crowley. And then he takes that final breath and steps onto the elevator. The flute takes over again and the music changes to a hopeful melody, but still sad enough sounding, especially when we cut back to Crowley getting into his car. We see one final look of doubt on Azirphale’s face as the elevator doors close. The weight of his choices are hitting him. But he doens’t dwell on them long because he’s finally let go of the ledge. He’s stopped trying to float. He’s sinking down into the black waters of Heaven and his mind has vanished. He’s under the Metatron’s control now. We see him struggling and fighting one final time during the credits until finally, just before both he and Crowley are completely gone, he cracks an unsettling grin. The last ties to Earth have been severed. His uncanny expressions throughout the entire credit sequence are meant to be unnerving. Something is deeply, deeply, wrong.

So, I don’t think I necessarily believe in the coffee theory exactly, though I do think that it is important. There was so much cinematic emphasis placed on the coffee, but whether that be because The Metatron meddled with it or just as a red herring to raise unease from the viewer with The Metatron is uncertain. The only person who knows is Neil Gaiman and we all know just how much we’d get out of him if we asked. Ultimately, if Crowley coming to Heaven was never presented as an option in the first place, Aziraphale would not have gone. But he leaves with blame placed on Crowley, and that’s exactly how The Metatron wanted it.

[bitchthefuck1]

It's kind of funny that Kendall and Shiv are both equally delusional about their ability to charm people for business and somehow think they can do it even though they choke almost every single time, whereas it's like the one thing Roman is consistently good at despite being the "least legitimate" option.

I think part of this comes down to the fact that Shiv and Kendall both have very clear ideas of the versions of themselves they're trying to be and the images they're trying to project, and they're trying so hard to be seen that way that they end up coming off as a little desperate and off-putting. Meanwhile Roman "knows" that there's something wrong with him and he's worthless, so he doesn't get sucked into the trap of trying to force people to see his idea of himself and instead molds himself into whatever he thinks the other person wants from him because that's the only way he can compensate for "being him," which works very well in the short term but also means he's the least capable of maintaining any relationship for very long because he has no sense of self.

[dykedvonte]

wanted to say I appreciate your nuanced takes on MW and especially Curly. i don't get the claim that the fandom is full of Curly apologists when majority (esp yt and tiktok) say he's worse than Jimmy. Yes there's commentary about bro culture defending people, he def messed up in trying to placate Jimmy (tbh "we'll fix this" sounded more like trying to keep someone prone to outbursts like Jim calm and not hurt Anya/himself) but I don't think he did nothing to help Anya, since she continued to confide in him and he had less than a week to resolve it before the crash (I also don't get everyone saying he knew for ages when it seems like Anya told him that same week). I get Jimmy's a pos but saying stuff like Curly should've known he'd crash the ship or that Jim had a criminal record he ignored, reducing them to obviously horrible villain and willfully ignorant sidekick feels like a disservice to the game. If your best friend turned out to be horrible, what would you do in a confined space in the span of a few days to respond? I'd say some of the horror comes from trying to do good but ultimately failing, Curly's state after the crash is meant to be tragic horror not revenge/punishment

Thank you and this is what I want to get across.

A lot of information we have to supplement when it comes to how long things have been happening on this current ship. I think people try to add on to the horror and negligence by making things more obvious so it can feel like it was easier to avoid when, true to life, its not. Jimmy clearly didn't deserve or appreciate what Curly did for him in getting him the job, but do you think if Jimmy was that big of a menace on Earth he would've given him a position where he could have that level of power over people's lives? There's something in the fact he specifically chose to pick a position so close to himself where he could watch Jimmy.

I hate the bro code argument because that is a whole can of worms people really don't get. That sort of mentality is born from the general respect and preference of male matter over female ones. Curly is clearly not that guy, he is absent minded about the issue and inadvertently dismissive but he clearly believes Anya, he just can't understand what she's going through. It's an onslaught of information that no one really reacts right to. Additonally, the entire discussion of her assualt plays to heavy into the idea that there is fault outside of the perpertratior when it comes to SA. It's too close if she only did this or if Curly had protected her better but the fact of the matter is Jimmy did what he did. He did it before any of the conversations with Anya about it and it's why her behavior seemed to change so drastically in those last two days.

He has other conflicting thought and while his role as a Captain should've taken over, people act like it's not a very human thing to have such a toxic presence cloud your judgement. It is never easy to separate friend from coworker once that connection is formed, you want to help them, especially if they were friend first and for a long while like in this case. It's not right, but people act like it would be easy when the game clearly points out that no choice is easy to make, especially when you have to make it for more than one person. You have the weigh the consequences, look at all the options and make a plan. People can headcanon and decide how long things where happening, but if we look at what we were presented through the characters eyes, the only person given time to do that was Jimmy.

He waited two months after the crash to appoint himself Captain. Every time a problem was brought up he immediately took action and refused to sit on it and find a better solution. I think it's important to look at the warped way Jimmy takes initiative where Curly didn't as it works as a good contrast of why you don't just run in to "fix" things. The quickest and easiest option may not be the safest or most beneficial. I think some thoughts on the game suffer from the black and white thinking the game doesn't operate on along with us being voyeurs. We see what exactly led to what but the characters don't. They don't have the hindsight and foresight we do and even ours is scrambled by the non-linear story telling.

Like it's hard to talk abuou those grey zones without sounding like an apologist because you're explaining why taking responsibility isn't easy. It's not and it's weird to act like it would be in a scenerio that led up to the events of the game knowing what we know. We see all these characters in such isolated moments with various things before, in between, after and even during we aren't privy too. The idea that Jimmy is worse than Curly heavily banks on the words Jimmy was saying to Jimmy before he crashed the ship. That whatever happened on the ship was his responsibility to bare, which is true due to his position. But, are they not still not responsible for taking the actions Curly then must bare?

Like i feel like people think that these are situation that become easier with age or when you are in a postion of authority and they aren't. You don't lose your biases or gain some sudden knowledge that makes it easier. It just becomes more tiring as you keep dealing with it. I would be first in line to say Curly fucked up and should've done more but the idea he knew how bad it could get or he really saw the worst in the people around him and ignored it pretty much ignores a huge aspect of his character and the game.

[flying-cat]

Preparing myself to read a Persona 5 fic because it sounds super interesting but Maruki is a tagged character which means there's like a 70% chance that he's being mischaracterized

[ruvviks]

it's been a hot sec since i've talked about cyberpunk and i was initially working on a fic that would tell the story of this whole thing, but i've abandoned it many months ago and cannot say when i'll be picking it up again SO! i've decided to instead make this timeline. sorry in advance for how much information is in this thing the cyberpunk extended blorboverse essentially refers to the story parallel to the in-game events of cyberpunk 2077 that @mojaves and i came up with. we don't really have a better name for it but at this point the term has been used so many times that i feel like everyone here knows what it is by now, but at the same time we've never really explained the full scope of what the story is by now (it's a lot sorry). so in an attempt to get you guys a little bit more up to date with it all, here's a semi coherent timeline that describes the core events of the story and every branching story that came out of it! for additional background information, you can check out the following posts (timeline 1 / timeline 2 / timeline 3) to catch up with the continuation of the in-game storyline that's referenced in this timeline, but it's mostly irrelevant to everything here save for a couple of referenced events that cross over between the stories. it all ties together very intricately sorry about that. don't worry too much about it i've included my taglist down below to make sure people who are interested won't miss this post, but feel free to skip over this if it's not your thing! won't be doing a lot of this kind of stuff in the future but i'm trying to get back to the cyberpunk roots so this is kind of like, a good starting point and reference point for later posts!

The story starts in early 2077 and is centered around Sebastian Vidal, gang leader of the Cobras and previous test subject of Arasaka Special Programs (the linked page is a lot of information but gives the most coherent overview of what the branch actually is). The current director of the SERPENT projects, Andrew Colton, and Dr. Alana Cartier, both want him dead, to tie up their last loose end before the rest of Arasaka can find out and shut down Special Programs once and for all.

Over the past months they’ve been hiring various assassins in secret, to try and get Seb killed; however, these assassins keep failing, and their latest attempt lies in the hands of Cassidy Shaffer, an ex-corpo turned assassin with a strong moral code and plenty of experience to his name. With little to work with, as his mysterious client doesn’t give out much information, Cassidy starts with what he thinks is gonna be a quick and easy job– but he ends up hunting after Seb for essentially a year.

During this year, the two men have a series of wild encounters that get more and more insane the longer it goes on; it includes, but is unfortunately not limited to, Cassidy biting off a chunk of Seb’s ear, the two of them running over the highway, the two of them getting handcuffed together and chased by the NCPD then hit by a car right in front of the hospital, and Seb sensually licking blood off Cassidy’s face after having stabbed him when Cassidy wanted to strike at a concert Seb is visiting.

All of it comes to a sudden stop when Cassidy learns his client has been lying to him the whole time, and since he does not appreciate lying clients he ends up jumping sides and teams up with the Cobras to do some cleanup duty in Arasaka Special Programs. He and Seb work together to go after a list of targets to get the still ongoing projects mostly to a halt, while remaining in the shadows themselves as to not draw too much attention their way; and during this collaboration they meet several people from their past, bringing back both good and bad memories.

One of these people is Hanan Chisaka, the Head of Security at Special Programs. She ends up becoming the next test subject of Project Cobra after the last successful subjects, Xavier and Gabriel Mason, end up escaping in the midst of the chaos of Hanako Arasaka’s capture in mid-2077. Once Seb’s best friend and Cassidy’s mentor, she’s now forced to hunt the both of them down; but in their final confrontation she snaps out of the controlled mode Arasaka keeps her in and runs away with them, effectively leaving Special Programs without any test subjects. Another one of these people is Reid Bennett, Cassidy’s ex and ex-coworker back at MaxTac. He still works for the corporation and has been on an ongoing investigation into Arasaka Special Programs; seeing Cassidy alive and well, working together with Seb no less, piques his interest and he continues to look further into the case, which will cause him to make a very big mistake later on in the timeline.

By September 2078, Seb and Cassidy have successfully taken down all their planned targets and retreat back into the shadows, leaving Special Programs with many losses and no test subjects. With the APEX program discontinued a month earlier (incident discussed in this fic, which is a continuation of the in-game events), and Hanako Arasaka recovered and ready to take the corporation back from the hands of her corrupt brother, Special Programs ends up having to retreat for the time being, and cook up a new plan in the background.

Special Programs by this point is run by Andrew Colton, Alana Cartier, and Kaida Akiyama, three players who have been in the game for a long time already in the SERPENT projects’ runtime. Colton and Cartier are married– Cartier used to be married to Seb and cheated on him for a good amount of time when he was still at Arasaka– but their marriage is starting to fall apart. Akiyama has had to watch over Special Ops agent Ambrose Hawthorne for a while during his chase after the Mason twins, which ended up with the twins dead and Hawthorne going into early retirement (Arasaka doesn’t know the twins faked their death and Ambrose is now dating one of them lol), and xe is now determined to help Colton and Cartier get Seb back into Arasaka so the projects can continue.

Cassidy’s initial plan was to leave as soon as the collaboration would come to an end, but he has found his place with the Cobras and instead ends up officially joining them.The next chapter in the story is a more laid-back and easygoing chapter, in which Cassidy learns to be part of real life again, and in which Seb learns to let people get close to him again after spending years trying to convince himself he doesn’t need any help. Over the course of a little over a year (all the way to November 2079), the two grow even closer than they had already done, going on gigs together and, you guessed it, slowly but surely falling in love until they inevitably end up together at the end of it.

Not long after the two get together, Reid returns into Cassidy’s life. He wants to try and be friends again and Cassidy gives him a second chance, though this soon enough turns out to have been a mistake, with Reid trying to create distance between Seb and Cassidy and then going as far as trying to sell Cassidy to Kang Tao (one of the few corporations that have been hunting Cassidy down for a while now) in exchange for his own freedom from MaxTac (where he would have otherwise been stuck at for probably the rest of his life). Naturally, Reid can’t watch Cassidy get tortured for long and leaks his location to the Cobras, who find and free Cassidy and take Reid into captivity instead– he does not get killed, but instead has to sit out some time at a safehouse somewhere in solitude, where he gets to decide what kind of person he wants to be in the future.

This brings us to Elysium; a gorgeous spaceship which was supposed to be a relatively cheap escape from reality for everyone who wanted a refreshing break from Earth, but through Arasaka sponsorship has become just another cash-grab project to compete with the Crystal Palace– and considering the megacorporation has its greasy hands all over it, the secret labs in the spaceship are used for a series of very unethical experiments. Naturally so, it would be the perfect place for Colton to continue his SERPENT projects without the risk of Hanako Arasaka finding out and shutting the place down. He sends forces up to Elysium (obviously after his other attempts at relocating the project to space have failed tremendously, having lost contact with every single crew in the smaller Arasaka stations in orbit around the planet), but since he’s not there himself his cousin (one of the CEOs of Elysium), Maxwell Crane, unbeknownst to Colton, takes control of the SERPENT projects in space instead. From the earlier linked Special Programs page: “Project Eryx used the technology of previous projects, but took a completely new approach in the hosts it used; rather than focusing on the human psyche it attempted to create a new type of cyborg which would lack the humanity that caused previous projects to fail. The Cobra chips were no longer used and the software was instead installed directly onto the host’s mainframe. The flexibility of the new hosts– more robot than human, and in some cases the entire human aspect was lacking altogether– allowed for experimentation with highly advanced cybernetic enhancements and military grade tech and upgrades, turning the test subjects– dubbed ‘prototypes’– into dangerous, unstoppable killing machines.”

Things settle down for Seb and Cassidy, but this moment of peace does not last long. In January 2081 the two find themselves traveling to the spaceship Elysium, to investigate a curious situation in the laboratories– they’ve been hired by Arasaka without their knowledge and it’s a setup to get Cassidy killed and Seb back in Cartier’s control.

While in space, they learn that the secret labs have suffered an outbreak of the above mentioned prototypes. They quickly connect the dots and realize Special Programs is back in the game, and they work together with security guards Aubrey Valentine and Leon dello Russo to try and fix the situation before it gets out of hand. Obviously this fails tremendously and Elysium ends up on a complete lockdown after a ship-wide outbreak, which is eventually contained in late March of that year, with CEO Maxwell Crane dead, leaving only his wife Kinsley Osborn behind.

Elysium continues to exist and is rebuilt after the crisis, and Kinsley Osborn can now finally turn it into the retreat it was always meant to be. Previously, most Elysium employees were to be stuck in space for the rest of their lives; however, with Arasaka out of the picture they are free to leave as they please, which results in a gigantic cut in total employee count in the months that follow.

Seb and Cassidy return to Night City and take Aubrey and Leon with them. Aubrey reunites with his sisters; Becca, James, and Rikki, and soon after his return to the city he opens an LGBTQ+ nightclub called Bodytalk with them, found Downtown, City Center, in June 2081. Not only is it a fun place to hang out at, it’s also his main hub as a fixer, and he starts a collaboration with the Cobras to get business going between the gang and the club; and soon enough it grows into a large and powerful network of connections, which is the foundation on which the rest of the stories are built.

After this point in time, many many more things happen but it would take me another hour or ten to go into full detail of all of that, so instead here’s a quick rundown of some of the other things that Bodytalk gets involved in:

Reid Bennett is handed over to Aubrey and he starts working at the club, and he becomes a very valued employee as well as a good friend to many now that he’s no longer fucking insane

Kaida Akiyama returns from Elysium and shows up to Hanan’s doorstep, to ask for her help with getting out of Arasaka for good; much later on, xe starts working for Bodytalk as well, in an attempt to put xyr past behind xem and become a better person

Urban Dynamite starts performing at the club regularly, and it becomes their home base

Luna Serratos, Cassidy’s ripperdoc friend from all the way back to killing era, gets involved in the Harbinger case from Maelstrom (one of the gang’s most feared members); turns out the Harbinger is in fact Reuben de la Rosa, a by then 22-year-old kid who has ended up in Luna’s care with his friend Noah Telavera after the two got caught up in an explosion. She requests the Cobras’ help with getting Maelstrom to let Reuben go

Officer Michele Diaz from Militech (who used to be Cassidy’s boss) is demoted following the lawsuits after the Elysium incident, and her investigation into the incident in hopes to get her job back leads her to Bodytalk; she begins threatening them and sends the whole club and their allies into uncertain times

Many people get married. There’s so many fucking guys here we went a little insane with the numbers but there’s several weddings and there’s a whole polycule going on too feel free to send asks about this if you’re interested

Cobra Cybernetics releases a new line of cyberware, which is incredibly buggy and dangerous to the public; it’s brought to the club’s attention and it makes them realize that Luiza Vidal (Seb’s sister), who not that long ago asked them to kill her husband (William Colton (Andrew’s brother), CEO of Cobra Cybernetics), has gone missing; they now need to get involved without getting the news out that they actually didn’t kill William and that he is still alive somewhere, while also balancing out dynamics between Biotechnica (angry at Cobra Cybernetics for stealing their designs) and Arasaka (the actual reason why Cobra Cybernetics’ designs look like Biotechnica’s designs, because William stole designs from Special Programs after halting their partnership after the Elysium incident, but these designs had been stolen by Arthur Jenkins from Biotechnica even BEFORE that to be able to hijack the European Space Council’s cybernetics following the Frankfurt incident. Are you still with me)

Vitali Dobrynin (fixer and main character from the in-game events storyline and the continuation of it; Vincent “V” Mayer’s boyfriend) ends up visiting Bodytalk after meeting Aubrey at a Fixer Council meeting, which happens in late 2083; this essentially ties the two main storylines together, which means that yes, a lot of the characters from the two separate storylines end up meeting :]

Officer Ulysses Dimakos (used to work with Reid at MaxTac) is sent to investigate Bodytalk following the Cobra Cybernetics scandal, and ends up teaming up with the club to get MaxTac on a dead trail in exchange for his freedom of the corporation

On top of the Bodytalk / Cobras centered storyline, there’s a couple of side stories that are still connected to the whole thing but are more of a standalone thing with only a few touching points to the rest of it all:

This obviously takes place a lot earlier because it’s already mentioned above, but Special Ops agent Ambrose Hawthorne is tasked with chasing after the escaped Mason twins; naturally he lets them go and ends up going into retirement, and Xavier Mason later on ends up becoming Bodytalk’s part-time repair guy on account of knowing Kaida

Gabriel Mason ends up in a car crash with retired security specialist Ames Ortega, who was also in Elysium during the incidents there, and the two end up babysitting Ambrose and Xavier’s kids together while those two are helping Hanan with getting Kaida out of Arasaka (Are you still with me. Blink if you can hear me)

Mercenary Frankie Sayyad gets a promotion from his fixer, Vulture (real name Diana Crane, Maxwell Crane’s older sister and cousin of the Coltons), and becomes one of her Bloodhounds; he works together with Evelyn Harris, Nimue Nkuna, and Beckett Rydel, the latter being one of the very first test subjects of Arasaka Special Programs, and the four accidentally get themselves mixed into a mystery concerning their secretive fixer

Caleb Harris, ex-security at Biotechnica, ends up back at Club Bodytalk not long after the conclusion of the Cobra Cybernetics scandal, and starts working for Aubrey; he is partnered up with Ramiel Al-Masri, a mercenary who has been working for Vitali Dobrynin for a while and has recently joined Aubrey’s mercenary roster too, and together they dive into a series of gigs neither of them had expected

Journalist Bodhi Shankar has finally found more evidence and information surrounding the mysterious cult gang Umbra and its so-called Prophet, Thiago Salazar; however, his antics have led to him accidentally becoming part of the gang himself, and he has to figure out a way to get Thiago to stop listening to the supposed deity that the gang worships known as Scintilla, before she makes him do things that will get many people killed

taglist (opt in/out)

@velocitic, @deadrlngers, @euryalex, @ordinarymaine, @gurathins;

@mojaves, @shellibisshe, @dickytwister, @mnwlk, @rindemption;

@ncytiri, @calenhads, @noirapocalypto, @florbelles, @radioactiveshitstorm;

@strafethesesinners, @fashionablyfyrdraaca, @aemondtargeryen, @radioactive-synth, @katsigian;

@estevnys, @elgaravel, @aezyrraeshh, @carlosoliveiraa

[julianscarcass]

.

[volfoss]

it is beyond infuriating how anne rice seems to insist on marius being a positive force in anyone's life ever. like she can't fully commit to exploring the fact he groomed armand and has repeatedly taken away his consent for what marius thinks is best (take the end of TVA as an example) and just kind of flatly puts it in the narrative. there's not really much interest in how these horrific events make marius come across as the worst because EVERYONE loves him. for gods sake, lestat learns from armand exactly what marius did to him in TVL and then proceeds to go find marius and be super friendly to him in the same fucking book. even armand and pandora, two of the people who have MORE than enough right to hate him, do not. it doesnt feel like shes trying to explore the toxicity of the abusive dynamic he traps them in, it just is there. and like yeah ofc the toxic vampire romance series but i think that this should be handled with more care. and it is not ever really framed in a way that she is interested in exploring how marius should easily be one of the most horrific characters in this series because it kind of feels like sa/rape/grooming/other things of that sort are just put there to further plot and not to really get the respect that they deserve in a medium.

[lord-squiggletits]

I 1000% don't mean this in a moral judgement manner, or saying ppl aren't allowed to like evil characters, or saying that silly fandom stuff means people don't take analysis/real world parallels/whatever seriously

But honestly I have yet to experience as emotionally/mentally jarring of an effect as I did hearing about MTMTE Megatron so positively from the fandom (best Megatron ever! best character in IDW1! sad grandpa! compelling character arc! tragic villain!) only to actually read MTMTE myself and go "This guy is so fucking annoying, self-righteous, insufferable, and an asshole, what are you people talking about." ladjskfjsdalfk

Like I get that Megatron can't go from fresh off a heel-face turn to being an actual hero, and believe me I know that ppl in this continuity are almost all flawed/jerks in some way. But MTMTE Megatron was a special breed of annoying to me like. It wasn't just "he did bad things so I dislike him." In fact, the moments where Megatron regressed closer to being his old self (such as massacring the DJD during Dying of the Light) were the moments I liked him the most.

I don't really know how to describe it, bc it's not the idea of Megatron being redeemed that bothers me (I love redemption Megatron), and I'm not one of those ppl who postures about how I don't like him because his crimes are evil IRL (I literally like villain Megatron more than I like Autobot Megatron). There are characters who have done things that I found shitty/annoying but didn't have a significant reaction to besides going "omg what a jerk (chews popcorn faster eager to read more drama)". It's literally just Megatron where I have this feeling of being viscerally annoyed/pissed at every other thing he says salkfjsdkaf

[larabar]

quick random poll because this has been bugging me since frontiers came out

cutscene in question -> X

[icewindandboringhorror]

Everytime I face a new character limit on a website that didn't have them before/used to have really long ones... AUGHHhhh the modern social media world was not made for people like me (lovers of details, rambling, elaboration, thorough explanation, and nuance)

[waitineedaname]

Realized you might be a good person to ask for input about these two guys from a show I like (if it's not too much trouble). It's a western show but these characters are Japanese and they're both friends and coworkers. One is the boss's son and has a somewhat more "childish" personality, and typically addresses his friend with the "-kun" honorific, while his friend doesn't use honorifics for the first guy. What if anything would you say this indicates about their friendship?

oh hm!!! I mean, I can't really say much without knowing the characters myself. I should probably give the caveat that I don't speak Japanese lol I just hyperfixated on honorifics for a bit because that's just how my brain works. I'd say the one using "-kun" is using it with some affection! "-kun" is used between boys/young men who are similar ages, and also used by adults for boys/men younger than them. It could potentially be used in a rude way depending on the dynamic, but I'm assuming these two characters are the same age, and since you said he's got a kind of childish personality, it seems to me that he's probably using it in a friendly way, like "we're buddies!! we're bros!!"

as for the other character, I guess it would really depend on how he's using his name and how he refers to other people! It's a lot harder to draw conclusions on the absence of something since I don't know the character and context lol just based on the vibes you've given from this ask, I'd assume his lack of honorifics is just. neutral? it's not rude but it's not overly familiar but it's not particularly respectful either. it's just his name!