#criminal minds crit

[gold-onthe-inside]

if anyone needs more evidence of criminal minds being copaganda, in exit wounds they literally haul in everyone who's got a prior, or a bruise or bloody clothes and then keep a suspect in custody for 24 hours when there's no evidence of wrongdoing and act like it's a completely reasonable thing to do because 'hey, if you're in custody and the killer strikes again, then you're in the clear' ... which by the way is exactly the kind of logic they used in fucking witch trials and is not how the law is supposed to work ... and THEN HIS MOM IS KILLED and they're really just gonna go like, oops?

fucking look at that holding cell. what the fuck?

[frankiebirds]

hey. hey cm. why are we learning this about the new character six minutes into the episode. also why is she saying this to hotch and rossi who clearly already know. like this is a pretty interesting character backstory and i feel like revealing it this quickly does such a disservice to it. at least wait until the end of her first episode?

something i think could have worked:

keep this conversation. and if you keep it, i do think you need to do the backstory reveal in the same episode because otherwise it's just...weird. it's too heavyhanded to carry an arc. or, cut it entirely and sprinkle hints before a reveal.

but anyway, if you keep it: don't end the conversation like this. end it at "i appreciate the concern." episode happens, la la la, at the end, either hotch or rossi (probably rossi? from what i understand, he winds up having the best dynamic with seaver) checks in with her, asking whether or not the case wound up triggering painful memories. she says no.

someone else overhears, and as they leave the jet, they stop her— "painful memories?"

and then have this line. also, whether you keep the scene and do the reveal at the end of the episode, or scrap the scene and do the reveal later (and in that case i think only rossi should know) you could do a little bait-and-switch where you imply that she's lost someone to a killer rather than losing someone because they were a killer.

like. i don't know how the rest of the episode goes. maybe this wouldn't work. maybe i don't know what i'm talking about and i'm being pretentious. but ough. i don't like this. imagine if every other character had their backstory revealed six minutes into their introduction.

[andi-o-geyser]

Travis Willingham????

[hotch-girl]

I recently watched the new season, and I am curious what your thoughts are on Garvez and Garcia. Do you believe Garvez is still endgame?

hi anon! im sorry in advance this is so long. spoilers and cm/penelope crit below 

(writing penelope crit makes me legitimately sad 😭)

im not sure garvez was ever endgame. ill be happy for people who like them if they are, but after the date flashback im kinda done. i want luke with someone who can be with him without insulting him

my biggest issue is penelope’s terrible character development. by s16ep5 its pretty cringe. its completely avoidable too! if tyler was a detective obsessed with the case, maybe it’d be different. as a victim’s family member, every interaction with him is so bad. the yelling “no no no!” scene about interviewing him was embarrassing. she argues with tyler constantly, which would be fine if he wasn't a victim’s family member! when she ends things with him, she takes 0 responsibility for putting the case in jeopardy or disobeying emily. emily could get fired if it got out but oh well!! not penny's problem <3

her character is completely different now. penelope overstepped with victims' families before, but for THEIR benefit. shes struggled on cases before but handled it differently with hotch. i just dont think the current writers get her character. shes always brought comic relief, but the show used to be balanced about it. her character does things to find happiness and keep the horrors from her job at bay, but no one is better than her. she chooses to see the best in people while being the most professional when she needs to be. when she teases derek and the team, its usually at appropriate times. she has her moments, but shes not really an immature character. for most of the early seasons, shes probably the most well adjusted. shes given every character emotional support. kevin is a no, but for years she did have one of the most stable relationships on the team.

by the time luke joins, it feels like the funny parts of her personality are her entire personality. and then shes rude to luke for years!! in the moment it felt fine bc it was her immature reaction to a crush. looking back its weird. why is she suddenly like this? shes been in relationships before. she corrected herself after being cold to alex when she first joined the team, but shes so immature she can only deal with liking luke by insulting him for 3 years?

they’ve been writing penelope’s character poorly for years, but this is the first season where i’ve struggled watching her scenes. its actually impressive how they were able to ruin a character in 10 eps sdfkjsk. hopefully s17 will be better but i don’t have a lot of faith. mostly i dont want to see luke trying to win her over. if theyre together it better be because shes written completely differently and makes the effort.

[taldigi]

What are the personas of the Plan B cast? If you don’t know, I’m always willing to submit some ideas!

I have only a few. Since the OG phantom thieves are all based- at least, on some forme of gentleman thief/criminal i tried to stick to that.

ANYWAY this is coming from someone who hasn't had the chance to play the other games (I want to, I promise- i'm waiting for a good sale or a gift!)

Joker is Joker, but something is wrong. He's lost his ability to wield multiple personas, he instead goes for a curse/gun build with Raoul.

Morgana is the only other one who remembers the old timeline, and still has Diego. Wind/Heal.

Ryuji's suffered from the plot, and instead operates as the Navi, Lookout. He goes full in on the pirate thing, though w/ Captain Kidd ofc. Imagine the all-out-attack override being firing canons. Shit's cool. He knows it.

Hifumi has sort of a.. jidaigeki energy. Classy, regal.. subdued.. till the tanto hidden in her sleeves come out, at least. The term exactly slips my mind. Her persona would prolly be some sort of Oni-adjacent deal- or even a Yamata no Orochi variant, which is already one that exists. She's got an Elec-Buff build.

Mishima is a classy, RPG-styled rouge. Somethin' from wizardry, perhaps. He gets to rock a light/melee build specializing in multi-hits specifically. He prolly gets something like King Aurthur-adjacent... Mordred perhaps? Merlin? Maybe not thiefy enough but weirdly, Merlin fits Mishima.

Shinya is a gun-only user who specializes in high-crit moves, he has a charge and a team accuracy . He has Billy the Kid as his persona, who's special ability allows him to reload his gun mid-fight. I think his codename would pprollly be smth like "Smoke"

and Shiho.. I'm.. not sure, I gave her a greek-ish look to tie her to sports and such but honestly I'm not super sold on it. Fire-Melee or Nuke-Melee.

If ya got anything better, lemmie know!

[noneatnonedotcom]

pathfinder second edition Jaune arc build

so this is a build i recently made and I wanted to make jaune something different than a normal paladin, think of this jaune as what he would have become if aura wasn't a thing. I'll be taking it to level 4 stats str: 10 dex: 16 con:12 int: 18 (22 with magical gear) wis:12 (18 with magical gear) cha: 10 hp: 44 race: human (versatile) background: sword scion class: investigator with mastermind rouge archetype methodology; forensic medicine:

You've learned that in most cases, especially murders, criminals tend to leave more evidence of the crime on the body than they'd like to believe. Information from bruising, bone fractures, blood spatters, and even the life cycle of carrion insects can provide valuable clues that help reconstruct the scene.

You're trained in Medicine and gain the Forensic Acumen and Battle Medicine skill feats. When you use Battle Medicine, on a success the target recovers additional Hit Points equal to your level, and the target becomes temporarily immune for only 1 hour, not 1 day.

bio: jaune arc was the child of the famous arc family, having been taught from a young age how to use a sword effectively jaune had a deep knowledge of the human body and how best to cause harm. instead of simply becoming a hired killer like most of his family did jaune instead tried to become a superhero. with no powers he did so using his mind. one of the greatest strategic minds on earth and an accomplished doctor besides the young arc is ready to make his mark on the world..... it's just a shame he's a huge dork and has very little charisma and little strength training. boy is a noodle. but he's on the case at least.

gonna cut off the feats and skills here so it's not too long but you can read below to see the descriptions. but as an explanation jaune's entire fighting style is based around using devise a stratagem combined with mastermind's use of recall knowledge to keep his enemy flat-footed and therefore easier to hit and crit. with this in mind when using his warfare lore it's impossible for him to get a crit fail thanks to experienced professional and unmistakable lore and even if he fails he still gets better information than anyone else. with automatic knowledge, he does his lore checks as a free action In combat and with assurance he's always doing so at a 24 for dice checks more than enough to make sure that no matter what his enemy is always flat footed. jaune can hit more often and is doing more damage than even a two-handed fighter. thanks to sneak attack and strategic strike. in essence even at a low level jaune's probably the greatest strategic mind in the world and it shows in combat. his ability to use medicine checks in combat to keep himself and his allies up and fighting also references his semblance and keeps him as a sort of godless paladin. with science being his smite! lol. in essence, jaune's a militarized Batman who's investigations are more about learning key targets then working to take them out. using his soldiers and connections to do the groundwork and investigate his enemies for him so he can put together a strategy and pick them apart. his day job is an officer in some sort of military apparatus which is more just for the earn income action but with all his feats in the warfare lore skill he's pretty much consistently making 4 gp a week (with weekends off) and a comfortable lifestyle only costs 1 gp a week meaning jaune's got quite a bit going into his savings even as young as he is. @weatherman667 any ideas as to what jaune's job would actually be? he's supposed to be his cannon age so i doubt he'd be an officer already but he's doing hard dice checks for his earn income action without having to roll so i imagine it's something important and difficult even as new to things as he is.

feats:

assurance (warfare-lore): Even in the worst circumstances, you can perform basic tasks. Choose a skill you’re trained in. You can forgo rolling a skill check for that skill to instead receive a result of 10 + your proficiency bonus (do not apply any other bonuses, penalties, or modifiers).

streetwise: You know about life on the streets and feel the pulse of your local settlement. You can use your Society modifier instead of your Diplomacy modifier to Gather Information. In any settlement you frequent regularly, you can use the Recall Knowledge action with Society to know the same sorts of information that you could discover with Diplomacy to Gather Information. The DC is usually significantly higher, but you know the information without spending time gathering it. If you fail to recall the information, you can still subsequently attempt to Gather Information normally. devise a stratagem: You assess a foe's weaknesses in combat and use them to formulate a plan of attack against your enemy. Choose a creature you can see and roll a d20. If you Strike the chosen creature later this round, you must use the result of the roll you made to Devise a Stratagem for your Strike's attack roll instead of rolling. You make this substitution only for the first Strike you make against the creature this round, not any subsequent attacks.

When you make this substitution, you can also add your Intelligence modifier to your attack roll instead of your Strength or Dexterity modifier, provided your Strike uses an agile or finesse melee weapon,

strategic strike: When you strike carefully and with forethought, you deal a telling blow. When making a Strike that adds your Intelligence modifier on your attack roll due to Devising a Stratagem, you deal an additional 1d6 precision damage.

As your investigator level increases, so too does the deadliness of your strategic strike. Increase the number of dice by one at 5th, 9th, 13th, and 17th levels. rouge (mastermind) dedication: Where others might use sleight of hand or a silver tongue to achieve their objectives, you rely on your intellect to craft intricate schemes. You likely view your operations as a chess game, always planning 10 steps ahead where others might plan three. You might be a detective determined to solve crimes or a spymaster in the service of a powerful family or nation. If you operate outside the law, you might be an aspiring crime lord or information broker, excellent at directing others toward suitable jobs.

If you successfully identify a creature using Recall Knowledge, that creature is flat-footed against your attacks until the start of your next turn; if you critically succeed, it's flat-footed against your attacks for 1 minute.

battle planner: You are constantly drawing up plans and battle scenarios, assembling strategies and gathered intelligence for later use. When you scout an enemy's position or receive a detailed report from an ally who scouted the enemy's position, if you have a clear indication of the number, position, and identities of your potential foes, you can spend 1 minute to come up with a battle plan that takes such potential factors into account and reduces the role luck plays in the equation. Roll a Warfare Lore check. As long as the information was accurate and remains accurate when you roll initiative against those enemies, you can use the Warfare Lore result you previously rolled for your initiative roll; if you do, this is a fortune effect. catfall: Your catlike aerial acrobatics allow you to cushion your falls. Treat falls as 10 feet shorter. If you’re an expert in Acrobatics, treat falls as 25 feet shorter. If you’re a master in Acrobatics, treat them as 50 feet shorter. If you’re legendary in Acrobatics, you always land on your feet and don’t take damage, regardless of the distance of the fall.

automatic knowledge(warfare lore): Prerequisites expert in a skill with the Recall Knowledge action, Assurance in that skill You know basic facts off the top of your head. Choose a skill you’re an expert in that has the Recall Knowledge action and for which you have the Assurance feat. You can use the Recall Knowledge action with that skill as a free action once per round. If you do, you must use Assurance on the skill check.

experianced professional: You carefully safeguard your professional endeavors to prevent disaster. When you use Lore to Earn Income, if you roll a critical failure, you instead get a failure. If you’re an expert in Lore, you gain twice as much income from a failed check to Earn Income, unless it was originally a critical failure.

sneak attacker: you gain access to the sneak attack class feature (page 181), except it deals 1d4 damage, increasing to 1d6 at 6th level. You don’t increase the number of dice as you gain levels.

unmistakeable lore (warfare-lore): You never get information about your areas of expertise wrong. When you Recall Knowledge using any Lore subcategory in which you’re trained, if you roll a critical failure, you get a failure instead. If you’re a master in a Lore subcategory, on a critical success, you gain even more information or context than usual. skills (there's a lot)

arcana: trained +12 athletics: trained +6 crafting: trained +15 deception: trained +6 diplomacy: expert +8 lore warfare: expert +14 medicine: expert +12 occultism: expert +12 society: trained +12 stealth: trained +9 thievery: trained +9

[thedeafprophet]

other thing with mask that is less of crit and more of a personal thing is uh.

the whole hanging and court thing and wrongful conviction is uh... a pretty stressful thing? esp like rn im talking about capital punishment in my criminal law class.... like ooooof that's a Very Real Thing.. I mean it always is, it's just particularly on my mind rn

So the whole case situation with replay could never be casual for me. That is an extremely stressful situation to have a time limit on yknow?Even with the 'not fully dead' thing there's still a LOT of baggage behind the concept of hanging to treat it like "oh well didnt manage it this time :)". Which I think is why in particular the pacing was so stressful for me on playthroughs. now i just stop right before the court case lol.

[citralekha]

Yes I started a tumblr to talk about crit role and ttrpgs and stuff but I just finished four seasons of Criminal Minds in as many days and the need to share my latest obsession grows ever stronger.

Listen to me if anything more bad happens to my babey Reid I will lose my mind. He (and his friendship with Morgan) means the world to me

[maschotch]

like and when people get mad at the valid criticisms of her. it's like, I'm sorry the character you created is not the one in the show?? she doesn't have enough/anything that makes her likable enough to outweigh the things in canon that make her unlikable! like no thanks!

"she's just the vessel for the writers shitty idea of what a strong woman looks like" soo true though. every attempt falls flat, or upholds stereotypes and her inability to look outside her own experiences

the fucksibdjdjfkdkg "my friends call me jj. you're not my friend you can call me jennifer"

its so fucking elementary afsgdghdjfh 9 year olds say worse to each other. it's not the slay moment everyone thinks it is

one instance in particular i can't stand is in s3ep14, they're at that carnival for rossi's case, and derek says "I can't believe people waste good money on these fixed games" and girlboss jj says "men" "its not people it's men" "only a man would waste $50 trying to win that $3 stuffed animal"

and just. parents. parents bring their kids to carnivals all the time. to have fun and win shitty prizes. oh but I forgot she wasn't a mom yet, so that wasn't her entire personality. I don't know. for me it just never hits as the girlboss moment every one thinks it is. but go off I guess afsghdhfkh

I've fallen out of it with cm a little lately, but unfortunately it will always have some hold on my soul lmao, and I got caught up in reading through your takes, and truly, this show fucking sucks, but analyzing it can be sO fun and you drop nothing but bangers. it reminded me in a way why I like this god awful show in the first place afgsgrhfjfjgshf

like if anyone gave me a single solid reason to like her character at all i might give her a chance. but i’ve been watching cm for a decade, and kept a finger on the pulse of the fandom for half that. so far ive heard absolutely no legitimate thing to like about her

even fanon jj falls flat for me? she’s so one dimensional and they never address any of her flaws. people either make her the target of emily’s infatuation (which is so fucked up on so many levels?? as if we need any more of the aggressive/obsessive lesbian stereotype) or they keep her as the mom of the group and leave it at that. absolutely NO nuance!! im convinced its bc they know we’re right… actually giving her a personality would mean acknowledging how insufferable she us

imo the best thing you can do with her character is actually talk about her internal conflicts. she’s got massive imposter syndrome and she takes it out on everyone!! thats interesting at least!! lets talk about that!! but nooo bc that would mean admitting everyones favorite blonde haired blue eyes beauty makes mistakes

god ur so right in that aaaaaall her girlboss moments are just so pathetic. i love to tear those moments to pieces because its just so fucking easy. clearly shitty attempts at the writers thinking theyre saying something clever or profound. it scares me how frequently the fandom falls for it. like. develop some critical thinking skills pls i am begging

im also well out of my cm phase, but its still so deeply engrained that even when i havent watched an ep in months, my opinions are as strong as ever especially since theyre always so correct. but yeah there’s something so special about cm? i think its all the half-suggested hints at something deeper that gives us a chance to try and build on it. but its also so casually entertaining that its also nice to just have on in the background. criminal minds is as good as you make it, ig

[hotchley]

I love Hotch. I love Haley. I contain multitudes.

[arsonistfriday]

So I decided to be mean to one of my wonderful blorbos (c!Sam) and figure out how long it would’ve taken him to starve to death if he hadn’t been found in the cell by c!Dream.

TWs: starvation, c!Revengers crit/neg

I tested this out by timing how long it took for me to die in MC on hard mode just from starvation. Now, keep in mind I consistently ran and jumped around in the cell while doing this, and c!Sam would’ve wanted to conserve his hunger as much as possible, meaning it would be longer. However, it took me about 9 minutes and 24 seconds to die from starvation, which is almost the entire daytime in MC.

Now, I then have to multiply this by 3, since he has 3 lives. This then results in a total of 27 minutes and 72 seconds, so rounding up to roughly 28 minutes. I then divided this by 20, since a full day-and-night cycle in MC is 20 minutes, and that equals to 1.3 days. Now, this is the calculation for the bare minimum: if he was sprinting and jumping the whole time, which he clearly wouldn’t. So his death would be much more prolonged, possibly stretching to 2 or even 3 days.

This is why I felt so disgusted by c!Revengers. The fact that what c!Dream did was technically a better fate than staying in the cell is just... it feels vile, in my opinion. They left him to starve in a cell, while ignoring the fact that a much more threatening criminal had just recently escaped, and that one of their team members was the reason for this person’s escape in the first place! I get it, Tubbo was pissed because he lost his husband and his son was kidnapped, but jfc no one deserves to starve to death in a cell while people just shrug it off.

[frankiebirds]

I've always been a little thrown off by the way the characters (the team and the passengers) react to Reid trying to talk down Ted, and I've never liked that the episode ends with Ted being shot (although I appreciate that he survives).

I'm not saying this to be critical of the characters: the team doesn't have audio, and the passengers (save for Elle and the incapacitated psychologist) don't have the knowledge to see Reid getting through to him, but:

I don't know. Look at Ted's face. I'm bad at reading expressions, but at the very least, this doesn't seem like the expression of someone unaffected by what's being said to him, or the face of a man who's about to start shooting people. During the conversation, Ted stops aiming the gun at Reid, and yells at Leo to shut up when he tells him to shoot Reid.

I really think that Reid was on his way to talking Ted down, and I wish he'd gotten to do it. I don't think Elle hitting Ted while Reid is talking him down makes a lot of sense*. She's one of the few passengers who can understand that Ted is calming down, and I think she's at the right angle to see his changing expression. I wish Reid had gotten the chance to keep talking, because I do think he was close to ending it without anyone else getting shot.

One other thing I noticed while watching this episode—throughout the episode, Leo has always been onscreen while he speaks, either in the same frame as Ted, or the camera cuts to him while he speaks. However, if you rewatch the scene, notice that whenever Leo speaks during it, not only is he always offscreen, but his voice has an echo to it that wasn't there before. I don't think most of the analysis I post is reflective of the writer's intent, but that seems very intentional to me, symbolizing that Leo is becoming less real to Ted and therefore losing his grip on him.

*this is a criticism of the writing, not the character. yes, elle is impulsive, but the choice to hit ted while he's being talked down and is no longer aiming the gun at anyone seems like a strange and risky choice.

[stillness-in-green]

Thoughts on Chapter 314 (and surrounding events)

Being a loose summary of several things I thought about in relation to the leaks, what they say about the series as a whole, a bit of new operating headcanon on the Peerless Thief, and a dash of how fandom is responding to the revelations. Spoilers, obviously.

This chapter makes it quite clear that the HPSC absolutely would have gone in and eliminated the PLF quietly, lethally, and wholly unlawfully if Hawks hadn't reported back the numbers that he did. The only reason the raid involved non-Commission-affiliated heroes at all is because the PLF's manpower was simply too much for the Commission to deal with via their usual methods. I'm both appalled that the disregard for human rights in HeroAca Land is somehow even worse than I thought it was and smug that that tiny little piece I recently posted criticizing the PLF's treatment has turned out to be totally justified and supported by the canon.[1] (Note that this does not absolve Horikoshi of the responsibility to, himself, treat the PLF better than paper dolls tossed into the incinerator of Plot Irrelevance when they cease being convenient to his story.) The fact that the Commission was forced to involve heroes might mean Re-Destro, Mr. Compress and the others are somewhat safer than might otherwise be the case. Because of the involvement of the unsuspecting stooges law-abiding heroes, and because the botched raid became such a huge disaster, there’s far more public scrutiny on this than would otherwise be the case. Of course, "accidents" can still happen,[2] especially in a chaotic environment, but the factors above (combined with Clone!RD murdering the bejeezus out of the Lady Prez) do, I think, suggest that there probably isn't an organized push for quick solutions going on behind closed doors.

I don't think Nagant has been around for a terribly long time or that there was an uptick in vigilantism in recent years—I think the scene where she mentions vigilantes becoming accepted as heroes is just in reference to the early history of heroism. It's in keeping with what Tsukauchi Makoto described in Vigilantes, and forms the basis of the current system—the current system that Nagant was a single cog in a big machine grinding away to preserve.

Speaking of Nagant and the system, it's interesting to me that one of the groups Nagant apparently targeted at the HPSC's behest was corrupt heroes—those who colluded with villains or specifically goaded/incited civilians into using their quirks illegally, thus turning civilians into capital-V Villains in the eyes of the law. One might easily say that targeting corrupt heroes (albeit using a much broader definition of "corrupt") was Stain's whole shtick, but it actually puts me more in mind of the Peerless Thief, Harima Oji. Harima punished greedy or corrupt heroes with theft, and presumably with a measure of declaration and exposure,[3] then distributed their money back to the streets. Someone who ridicules those who abuse their power, and gets away with it for long enough to build a reputation: that right there is a recipe for a folk hero. The HPSC, in whatever form they existed at the time, obviously couldn't let that go on—such repeated humiliations would weaken peoples’ faith in (and obedience to) the system the HPSC was trying to build. At the same time, though, it would also weaken faith in the system to openly acknowledge that system's flaws, to acknowledge that some pretty awful people had found their way into the heroics business specifically for the power and ability to abuse it that the title of Hero afforded them. Public trials would make it a matter of record that some heroes—and, accordingly, heroes at large—did not deserve the public's unquestioning faith. Obviously in a system that was built from the ground up on faith, that was unacceptable. And so Harima was branded a supervillain for exposing the system's flaws, while the corrupt heroes who embodied those flaws to begin with were—and continue to be—quietly disposed of at the HPSC’s discretion.

There's a lot of talk around about how Lady Nagant is stupid, or hypocritical, or delusional, or whatever other dismissive adjective people want to use, because she expresses a preference for AFO's rule over the HPSC's. Firstly, I think it's dubious Lit Crit to fault a character for not being a Paragon of Rationality, especially when they're under the cascading stressors Nagant has been under since she was, what, 13? 14? Forced to live this dichotomy of smiling gallant hero and ruthless covert assassin, had her life threatened by the man who'd taken her in,[4] probably dumped in Tartarus until such time as her trial could be held,[5] and kept in those ghastly, dehumanizing conditions for who knows how long? How shocking, that her objectivity might be somewhat compromised! Secondly, it's not like she's saying that AFO's rule would be a sunny walk in the park. The kanji she uses doesn't even mean "better"; while it can mean serene or tranquil, her more likely meaning is clear/transparent. Her phrasing indicates that she's aware it would be pretty bad; she's simply of the opinion that at least his rule wouldn't be a sham, a pretty lie. It would be bad, but everyone would know it. No one would have these comforting illusions they could lose at any time; if you stepped out of line and got shot in the head by an assassin, well, at least you would probably know you that being defiant was running that risk, rather than never seeing it coming because you'd been told all your life that Heroes Didn't Do That To People. Again, this is a woman whose life was shattered no less than three times by the duplicity of the highest acting authority in this comic.[6] She doesn't have to be Objectively Correct By The Standards Of Ethical Utilitarianism—nor do you have to agree with her choice that because she doesn’t want to live in the Matrix, no one else should get to either—for her opinion to make sense from her own perspective! Thirdly, while I think it's fair to say that the HPSC and AFO actually use fairly similar methods to recruit followers and punish dissenters, we have no idea how much Nagant herself knows about AFO's recruitment tactics other than her own brief experience of it. And while AFO is a controlling and manipulative bastard, at least in his case it's coming from a man who openly styles himself as a Demon King, not an organization positioning itself as lawful regulators of the protectors of society at large while secretly training child soldiers to flagrantly violate every law protecting the human rights and due process of that society's people.

Overhaul's presence is delightful, and yes, he is a victim of Hero Society, if only because Hero Society could have put him in some kind of prison-based rehab facility after Shigaraki was through with him, but chose to dispose of him in Tartarus instead, for absolutely no justifiable cause. I suspect it's only due to Horikoshi not being very interested in the harsh realities of the trauma caused by enforced isolation[7] that Overhaul is the only Tartarus escapee that talks to himself and has dissociated from reality almost completely. Overhaul's maiming was not the fault of Hero Society, nor did Hero Society force him to torture Eri and repeatedly commit cold-blooded murder. But his madness? Yeah, I'm pretty comfortable laying that one at Hero Society's feet, actually. I can’t wait for Deku to have to face the victim that Chisaki Kai has become due to levels of systemic cruelty and negligence that really ought to be criminal—and which, if this were real life, would be.

--------Lately, footnotes are really popular with us!--------

[1] Lady Nagant: *talks about how the Hero Society everyone believes in is illusory, a thin fake over a brutal reality, and that returning to the false simplicity of that status quo will only cause history to repeat itself* Me, two weeks ago: Hero Society will never stop creating its own villains so long as, every time it fails people, it does nothing but shrug and write off the victims as unavoidable, inevitable sacrifices for the greater good.

[2] Yes, I'm still highly suspicious of the "Destro committed suicide in prison" claim.

[3] Compress tells us Harima “preached reformation,” but regardless, you don’t dress up in a modified kabuki costume and waltz midair through nighttime cityscapes raining cash out of the sky if you’re trying to keep your activities a secret.

[4] And her family situation couldn't have been much better than Hawks', if she was targeted by the HPSC to begin with. I would guess she was an orphan in the childcare system, easy to move from whatever alternative care arrangement she was in, be it an orphanage, a group home, or simply mature enough despite her relative youth that she lived alone on government support payments—that kind of thing isn't as unbelievable in Japan as it is in the U.S.—to the HPSC's care.

[5] And given what we learned between this chapter and 297, I doubt she was even allowed to be present for it. Japanese law states that everyone by default is supposed to be present for their own trial, but as in the U.S, that right can be waived if the defendant proves themselves to be a threat to the safety of the judge, court staff and other attendees. And of course, what a threat the HPSC could have painted her as being!

[6] At least until Hori deigns to show us a damn Diet session.

[7] To say nothing of the physical consequences of spending six months stuck in a tiny room with no natural light while frequently being strapped into a straitjacket, of which there should also be several.

[kitkatopinions]

There is a bit from a SFDebris review (YouTube psychojaneway sometime), that really speaks to the tragedy of Ironwood, or at least how Mettle should’ve been portrayed). I’ll post the monologue (sorry for length).

This is a really interesting way of looking at James’s semblance and I really like it. I want to make a post pretty soon about how I personally think his semblance should’ve worked and how they should’ve applied it, but this is probably my favorite explanation of how it might work in the actual show. Long post full of RWBY crit and Ironwood defense under the keep reading. If you hate criticism or bashing of CRWBY and hate Ironwood, this post isn’t for you.

Funnily enough, I’ve written a RWBY character having a semblance that acted as a defense mechanism that shut down feelings like doubt, grief, loss, stress, so on and so forth. Before season seven came out, I’d written one of the pre-existing characters to have thought for most of his life that his semblance was passive and was good luck, only for it to later be revealed that his passive semblance was actually survival, and it’d been forcing him to do whatever it took to survive, whether that meant rewriting his moral code when circumstances demanded it, making him skate by incredibly dangerous circumstances sometimes without a scratch on him, or making him just survive even getting eaten by a giant Grimm and promptly blown up. Yep, this guy right here.

In application, this semblance pushed Roman from an optimistic would-be-hunter kid not very different from V1 Ruby, into the uncaring and cruel criminal who beats up on kids and laughingly aids in the destruction of Fall of Beacon that we see in the actual show over the course of around twenty years. In my fic, he survived the Grimm attack and later learned from runaway Emerald and Mercury that Salem planned to destroy the world - which then activated his semblance into another change and caused him to join the heroes (with Emerald and Mercury in tow) in order to try and find Neo at the same time he helped stop Salem, which was a long, painstaking process, and people only started to come around to him after his semblance was revealed to everyone including him, and it was a whole big thing. But that isn’t the point. Sorry for rambling. XD

My point is, this is a very interesting concept that I already loved in theory. It was a handy way to redeem an otherwise very hard to redeem character for my fanfictions, but it also gave some angst and presented all the characters with some very hard to answer questions. And there was also a question of just how much Roman could be blamed for, since his semblance technically hadn’t made him do anything, and had instead slowly stripped him of his morality in a loop he could’ve probably broken early on, but hadn’t, and had instead blamed everyone else. To use a probably faulty metaphor, he’d been sliding down a slope already, he just wasn’t responsible for the avalanche that made his fall faster and more destructive.

Ironwood being in a very similar position is such an interesting concept. His passive semblance acting as a defense mechanism that pushes him to do what he thinks needs to be done, but then latches onto that and pushes him to do whatever he can for that one goal while stripping him of his morality is something that makes his character much, much more understandable, sympathetic, and very easy to redeem. But it also doesn’t excuse him of everything. He still arguably set the path for himself, he still was arguably responsible for how he started down the decline, and he has to deal with the fact that whether or not he was entirely culpable, he still hurt people and that hurt isn’t going to go away just because it wasn’t James’s fault that he got so bad. He started slipping down the slope, but he wasn’t responsible for the avalanche that made his fall faster and more destructive.

And while it clearly wasn’t slow going growth over the course of twenty years, and his circumstances were so suddenly severe that it feels less like James had outs, with this interpretation we can gauge stages of how much his semblance seems to affect him.

Stage 1. Barely affected

He still has clarity, is able to hold himself back, does things even though he might not think it’s the best course because he trusts and listens to others, clearly cares about everyone, seems like a very reasonable person, so on and so forth.

Stage 2. Somewhat affected

We don’t see much of James here, but we see that he’s flexing his power over Jacques, pulling back his forces from the other Kingdoms, threatening - All for very good reasons, all understandable, all incredibly sympathetic, but still, it seems a bit too much.

Stage 3. Is it him or is it his semblance?

There’s a lot of good James did or was trying to do in season seven, not everything - in fact, very little - he did was evil, it was all well intentioned, it was all in pursuit of good goals. But, he was neglecting what Mantle needed. That doesn’t mean that he didn’t try to protect the people of Mantle, he’s the one who started the evacuations in the first place, after all. But we can see that he’s focusing on his end goals and letting other things fall on the back burner, even important things. I don’t think this is outside of his character, but with the application of his semblance, there’s the question: How much of it is James and how much of it is his passive semblance building up and pushing him into things he otherwise might not do? However, there’s still this softness, still the fact that he’s trying, still the fact that his back is to a wall, still the fact that underneath ‘what he has to do I.E. his semblance’ he’s clearly still himself, his semblance hasn’t taken him over to the point where he’s hard to recognize. Theeennnnnn there’s

Stage 4. This isn’t ‘James,’ this is his semblance.

This doesn’t connect with the earlier seasons at all. This was a rapid fire quick and jerky fall that didn’t fit with his earlier character (no I won’t argue this point, Ironwood haters don’t @ me.) The only thing that really can make this make sense for me is James’s semblance manifesting in a strong way that eclipses his personality. Personally I still think it’s godawful writing because A. his semblance isn’t even mentioned in the show, so it feels like a stupid and totally out of character forced sudden jump, even if the writers ‘intended it to be because of his semblance,’ but also B. because it went too fast still, so there isn’t as much of an impact here. However, the potential is astronomical! James’s semblance has taken control of him, and it might be his fault that he started down this road and started slipping, but now this isn’t him anymore, he can’t actually stop himself from doing these things, his semblance is acting as a form of partial mind control, forcing him to not care about anything outside of his one goal ‘save Atlas,’ to the point where there is no reasoning with him, and he can’t help it. Tbh, the fact that his aura broke and they decided to keep going with ‘evil Ironwood’ is such an incomprehensible mistake imo. There’s every possibility that his aura was already replenished by the time he woke back up and his cell went down and his brain said ‘kill Jacques’ for who knows what reason, but there’s also the possibility that CRWBY was just like ‘people were expecting the semblance we literally gave James that makes him much less responsible for anything he did to matter and for us to make him sympathetic in the narrative, and for our story to therefore make more sense? RIP to those amateurs, they should know by now that we don’t use good concepts!’

Like, the concept of how it could work in action is so good and I honestly would really enjoy it in practice in the show. Unfortunately, the writers suck too much for that and throw good concepts away on a whim.

[moiety-of-the-throne]

OH, tagged? | tagged by @lpdwillwrite4coffee <3

favorite color: scarlet

currently reading: My Friend Mothman AND Women's Work, both by the inimitable @lpdwillwrite4coffee

last song: Gimme by BANX

last movie: Black Widow which I thoroughly enjoyed

last series: currently rewatching Criminal Minds

sweet, savoury or spicy?: yes

craving: caramel iced coffee and my friend's mom's chocolate chip cookies

tea or coffee: yes

currently working on: too many things. I'm toying with the idea of painting a still life, but I should also fold my laundry

unpopular movie/TV show opinion: hmmmmm,

a movie you liked and everyone else hated: cannot think of one

a movie you hated and everyone else liked: GREATEST SHOWMAN DON'T @ ME

a movie you think deserved to be more famous: Why was my first thought Birdman, it literally won an Oscar. I also really love The Island with Ewan McGregor.

a show you would sacrifice many others in order to save:

a fun fact about yourself that doesn’t come up in conversations: I have like 4 best friends that are twins, only two of whomst are twins with each other.

celebrity crush: oop, just one? Halsey, David Tennant, Liam O'Brien, Marisha Ray, fine just the whole cast of Crit Role, et cetera

something you love about where you live: it is BEAUTIFUL. My hometown is also rather lovely.

something you can’t do but wish you could: I'm capable of everything, what are you talking about?

One thing the pandemic made you miss, that wasn’t even your thing before: dining out on a regular basis

Do this! @irreversible-s @floralparanormal @mariescarisi

[literateleah]

tagged by @seavoice and @deithe ! thanks so much y’all 🤗

fun get to know me asks:

1. name/nickname- leah! i don’t have any nicknames irl my name just doesn’t work hmm

2. gender- female

3. star sign- virgo sun pisces moon aqua rising

4. height- just barely five foot three inches

5. time- 12:47 am

6. birthday- august 29th, 2004

7. fave bands/groups- PARAMORE, big scary, sylvan esso, superfruit

8. fave solo artists- tinashe, banks, lennon stella, dua lipa, ellie goulding, hollyn, aluna

9. song stuck in my head- weakness (huey lewis) by lennon stella or you get me so high by the neighborhood

10. last movie i watched- thoroughbreds (2017) IM OBSESSED prob gonna rewatch this weekend

keep reading below the cut :)

11. last show- i’ve been trying to finish the 100 for literally five months but i get so distracted and never watch it

12. when i created this blog- march! got bored in quarantine but actively started using it in october i think

13. what i post- oh boy hmm rr crit is prob my most serious content but i reblog things from all media i consume which is a huge variety. my original posts are every random thought that passes through my brain and y’all just gotta read it all unfortunately

14. last thing googled- criminal minds unsub three men; LOL looked that up for my sister while she watched an episode

15. other blogs- i have a backup/side but i need to change the url before i get it up and running and i have a few other urls saved

16. do i get asks- yeah sometimes! mostly from moots or anons on ask games but i appreciate literally anything and everything y’all send to me, the joy i get seeing that lil inbox icon pop up is such a rush like you want to send me a message!? so cool

17. why i chose my url- i regret this sometimes haha but i wanted to use this for mainly book/literary crit content but devolved from that somewhat obviously

18. following- yikes idk but it’s prob in the hundreds i’ll let y’all know when i declutter

19. followers- 98 woohoo so close to my lil 100 celebration yay!

20. average hours of sleep- about 6-7 because i’m usually up reading all night to slow my thoughts

21. lucky number- 4! i like the neatness of an even square and it was my dads jersey in college all american sports as well as my childhood jersey number

22. instruments i play- none UGH. i wish i did so badly so i want to learn piano soon. in another life i’m writing songs like crazy i promise y’all but in this one i dance

23. what am i wearing- a navy cotton pajama set from old navy! super comfy

24. dream job- if we’re going dream dream then any kind of performer. a singer-actress-dancer triple threat is basically my childhood dream but i’m focused on dance and writing moreso now. gosh i just wish i could sing. actually being a full time fiction author is my dream job i just thought about it

25. dream trip- hmm probably where i am now in north carolina with family! not far or out of the country but the coast (emerald isle mainly is my safe place)

26. favorite food- fruit smoothies idk if those count but i drink them every day

27. nationality- american! but my race is mixed (black/african american and white)

28. favorite song- of all time?? ooh that’s rough but maybe mother earth by banks

29. last book read- the lies they tell! i forget the author but it’s a ya fiction i loved from my local library. reminds me of thoroughbreds and i have a post lined up about that next

30. top three fictional universes- prince edward island of anne of green gables, narnia, tkc/riordanverse even though those are rooted in myths and cultural truths

tagging some moots and anyone who sees this if you wanna do it!! @royalpenelope @haleymalaffey @juliesdahlias