#cynic replies

[cynical-canidae]

Dear Haters, Fuck Off 💛

[bunabi]

Hi Bunabi, pls ignore if this is too ranty

Dragon age has had me in a chokehold for 10+ yrs at this point, but the representation and racial dynamics in this series is bothering me. The Dalish and elves in general are just so painfully whyte. I guess it is more comfortable for white ppl to relate to oppressed whites rather than actual POC… My lavellan is dark-skinned, but she looks out of place among elves like Sera, Solas and Abelas. Even most Dalish npc are white. I am getting tired of the worship of European aesthetics in media, not only in terms of beauty standards, but also in fashion, architecture and art. Do you feel like Dragon Age is eurocentric?

I agree about the diversity of NPCs but I don't think the fashion & environments are strictly European worship, we've just been stuck in Fantasy France & England for three straight games.

And as far as whiteness helping players relate to them: no. 😭

Considering how fans talk about the Dalish in the wake of DAI, how they're treated ingame, how many Lavellans ditch their clan and culture in fanon, and everything that's been added to their lore post-DA2, it aint helping lol.

[total-drama-brainrot]

TD World Tour AU, where Noah is Chris’s Assistant from the start of World Tour, instead of a contestant ... Alejandro tries to charm Noah, like Alejandro had charmed Chef, but Noah is immune to his charms... What if Assistant Noah still told Owen that Alejandro is like 'an eel dipped in grease' and Alejandro CAN'T get rid of Assistant Noah for saying that?... Would they have a weird frenemy relationship for the rest of the show?... With Alejandro sometimes teasingly flirting with Noah, like he does with Heather? 😘

In my take on an Assistant Noah AU, Noah would be entirely immune to Alejandro's charm, not because he's switched on to The Archvillain's true colours (which, he is, but I digress) but because Assistant Noah is The Saltiest Bitch.

-

Imagine with me, for a moment, that you've landed yourself a pretty sweet gig; you're the personal assistant of an A-list celebrity who's only real job at the moment is hosting and directing one (1) reality TV show. The pay is really good and the job itself comes with a tonne of benefits, plus it's the perfect position for you to develop networks within the business (Noah canonically mentions "working his way up this 'biz", implying he has a desire to continue in the field of showbusiness).

Now imagine with me that said celebrity is Chris McLean, renown sadist and all-around disaster of a man. This guy absolutely pawns off the majority of his work onto you, meaning it falls onto your shoulders to; corral the on-set interns into some semblance of competency, make sure that each challenge is properly set up and ready to go, make sure Chris himself is set up and ready to go, and put up with regular coffee run requests. That's a lot of work for one 16~17 year old, even if you are a certified genius.

You're overworked, sleep-deprived and two seconds away from snapping at the nearest intern at any given moment.

And then, during the filming of the latest season, the guy you hand picked to star in the non-existent "Total Drama Dirtbags" (mostly because he was better looking than his brother, who also applied) tries to charm and flirt his way into you giving him advantages in the competition- or at the very least, trick you into divulging information on their next challenge. It's as if he thinks you're somehow not aware of the fact that he's a total scumbag, despite knowing you work on the show and therefore have seen both his acts of sabotage and the confessions in which he plots them.

Suffice to say, you're kind of insulted. I mean, really? Flirting? You don't even have time for something as trivial as a relationship, or even a fling! There's challenges to set up, international negotiations to suffer through, and unpaid interns to boss around- your schedule's booked!

And yet he keeps flirting with you, even after you've snubbed him multiple times. At this point you're pretty sure it's become a point of wounded pride for him, instead of the game tactic it started as; after all, his charms have worked on pretty much everyone on the cast, what makes you so different?

Eventually, as the herd thins, you decide to warn your best friend (who's somehow miraculously remained in the competition, despite his 'team leader's' obvious dislike of him) about Alejandro's less-than-noble intentions. Owen misconstrues your selfless act of solidarity as a sign of jealousy, or god forbid 'denial of your feelings', towards Alejandro. Which, what? No, that's not it at all! The one time you try to be a good friend and this is how you're repaid?

Alejandro overhears this, unfortunately, and seems to take the fact that you're not fooled by his obviously fake mask as some sort of personal affront. Of course, as the person who's essentially running the show, there's not much he can do to you besides carry on being the nuisance he is- which is exactly what he does, but more.

Suddenly, his flirting from before seems like nothing, because now he's really trying to get under your skin with that same plastic charm; it's like he took the dial to his natural flirtatiousness and turned it to eleven. It's annoying. And worse, it's getting in the way of your work flow.

You'd love to stage his elimination, but you know the public outcry from his untimely departure from the show would outweigh the relief of being rid of him, so you resolve to do as you have been; ignoring Alejandro until he gets bored. (That's easier said than done- he's really good at getting under your skin, like the thorns on a rose bush.)

To make matters Even Worse, your elusive appearances on the show- as Chris' personal assistant it would be impossible to avoid the cameras entirely, but you'd bribed the editing team to cut as much of your unwitting footage from the final edit as they could- paired with your 'entertaining dynamic' with Alejandro has the viewers clambering for more, so now you're obligated to act as a de facto co-host alongside your boss.

So now you're stuck having to at least acknowledge Alejandro, if only to give the editors something to work with. Great.

-

At least, that's what my take on an Assistant Noah AU would entail.🤷‍♀️

[luthienne]

Also to comment on the previous asker's tirade: a very interesting thing about Sansa is that she's very genre-aware, but for the wrong genre. Like, in the books, it seems that the world-picture of a great many characters is jaded, cynical, "down-to-earth", "pragmatic". And whoever adopts this view gains power from it. Tyrion, Tywin, Littlefinger, the men of the Watch, the Knights of the Kingsguard, the Hound, the ironmen, Arya... They derive their power from their "awareness" of "how the world works" which revolves around selfishness, fear, greed, death... To an extent, Sansa's fault, to these people, is the fault of her father: thinking she lived in a better world.

She's still the girl raised on courtly love and virtuous knights, and they hate that she doesn't believe in "The Real World". They see her as too stupid to understand that world, or refusing to join it out of selfishness... In both cases denying herself power.

But it's part of what makes her a great character, 1) the tension between how she lives the world and how she wishes the world to be, something which a great many characters have all but given up on 2) the fact that she isn't really interested in power. She plays the game with Littlefinger because there's nothing else to do, but she'd rather be home with her parents at any given time. She wanted to be a queen, but now she wants something more human. And 3) that she's essentially Emma Bovary getting to live the stuff novels are made of, and she doesn't like that either.

But that makes her intolerable to men because she doesn't try to "achieve" stuff, she's not on a mission, she has no goals, not even pleasure. She's just a teenage girl trying to live after losing everything... She's "unproductive" she doesn't respond "optimally" to stuff, she doesn't care about "the grand design" of Littlefinger's schemes. These men think that if they were dropped in the world of Asoiaf they'd become rich warrior-lords from their jadedness, or change history. Sansa not "min/maxing" her life is an insult to them because she scorns their entire value system by existing as a teen girl.

To me, that makes her the most interesting character of them all, because she really is alien from all the other characters. She is watches them caught in the cycles of desire and suffering, ambition and self-destruction, and has yet to participate. Whether she ends up playing or stays removed, the journey to getting there will have been so interesting...

!!!!!! you articulated this so perfectly <3333

[northwest-by-a-train]

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[oetscop]

i am so fascinated by cases where ppl like. either post the same thing over and over again or ask the same slightly reworded question a bunch. idk what it is. think like. captain kutchies key lime pies, steamworks goes bye bye always on drm, that guy posting for literal years about hyper-specific scenes from a potential lost show or movie (msiss006 i think)

IDK. IT CAPTIVATES ME. smth abt it

[vse-kar-vem]

me on the bokris ao3 tag obsessively refreshing while everyone else is on damon's instagram 💔💔

[n41r]

A quick comic(?) I made, inspired by Hell Assassin Edge's and Wind Sieg's cut-in dialogue and a random post I saw while browsing tumblr-

The team combination here is based on an enemy team I encountered on New Prologue, since I actually don't have either Kurt or Sieg in my team yet-

This was the post that inspired this drawing-

[anintelligentoctopus]

Actually whenever you do try to fob off evangelists with 'I'm already a Christian/I already go church' etc they always ask you which church and it's just occurred to me that this might be a way of figuring out if you are trying to get rid of them by doing just that bc if you can't actually name which church/denomination then you've been caught out and they can give you the sales pitch

[korzionarchive]

@kingmaketh sent: After all that I do, after all that I’ve done, it’s never enough.

"There is no such thing as 'enough,'" Rhaenys returned bluntly, turning her head to look at him from where she had bene standing looking out the window of the council chamber. "It is a concept meant to make us stretch ourselves to our physical, mental, and emotional limits in an attempt to be better than our best. A fantasy. Better for you stop reaching for the impossible before you kill yourself in the process."

[cynical-canidae]

S12E10: The Timeless Children (2020).

[eggmeralda]

okay but I am genuinely so unwell about numbers and dates and ages and time and years etc. so I'm blaming all my bad luck on the number 23

[laufire]

Hey! Hope you're having a good day and if you aren’t, feel free to vent and I hope it gets better.

This may come off as a lil random but I really loved your "why is elena like THAT" analysis but I can't find it now- atp tumblr's search function is really as useful as Elena's ability to change Damon xD. If you can find it, can you link it for me? No pressure, I just really loved reading it <3

here it is!

and here is a (much shorter) post I wrote on DE's nature around the same time, as a bonus.

[bye2k]

mm ok I'm leaving that ask up because I like rambling about weird stuff, but I just clocked that same question was spammed to a lot of people so :/

[orewing]

i'm sorry is that character actually called roberto de niro

yes and he's my grouchy uncle

[eiiskonigin]

@badluckqrow: ❛ your hair looks really nice today. ❜ (sends from Qrow 13 hours late whoops)

Winter's expression is difficult to read -- simply staring blankly back at Qrow in response to his words. Still trying to decipher whether this is a sincere compliment or a thinly veiled insult of some sort. It says more about her, that she hears insults in any and all compliments she receives.

Finally, turning her gaze away, "My hair looks the same as it ever does."

six word sentence starters