#don't take me seriously here
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controlledchaos1342-blog · 8 months ago
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clearly the children are becoming giant shrimp.
that one in the back is now just a dress/shirt thing with shrimp.
the one to the right of the picture has clearly had their legs transformed already
the one to the left is harder to figure out and probably the one that's most clearly seen
also there's a crab in the corner
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this is genuinely making me lose it
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coddda · 6 months ago
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I wish we could have met in some other way.
Lawlight Week Day 2: Soulmates
If you saw me repost and re-edit this several times uh No you didn't </3
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If you know what every frame is from you get a free cookie. by the way
#death note#dn#light yagami#l lawliet#lawlight#oh god here we go#death note jdrama#death note 2015#death note 2006#death note musical#lctw#l change the world#dntm#lawlightweek2024#my art#collapses i am NEVER putting this much effort in one piece ever again /hj this was the Only one i had mostly prepared in advance#ironically the most painstaking part about making this entire thing was converting the images into an animated file#that wasn't either horrifically compressed or just. wouldn't loop. why do gifs have to look so BAD it's so inconvenient#and THEN i realized I had to forcibly Stitch the two animations together so they would actually be synced and it wouldn't look dumb#and the end result is STILL so compressed. because Tumblr. uhhh just don't click on it it'll look so scuffed LOL. anyways#this is what i get for watching Every Adaptation of Death Note. i am a death note multiverse truther#usually i'd have something clever to say in the tags but. this drained the life out of me just uh.#yeah. they're doomed in every universe. this is the only way they could've met. they are doomed by their own natures and the#circumstances that surround them. there is no universe where light tries to prevent L's death. and even in the cases where L Doesn't die#there is no universe where L can save light. there is no universe where he can truly “catch” Kira and make him see where he went wrong#(<- if you read LCTW you know. :) )#in every universe and adaptation L will call Light his first friend. in some universes they'll take that notion more seriously than others#no matter what one of them will die due to the other. its the only constant. it's the only way it can ever be. they are the others downfall
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theerurishipper · 7 months ago
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I tried something new
Part 1 -> Part 2
Masterpost
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zuzu-draws · 1 year ago
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["....And there is a certain Hunger within him, that is difficult to satiate.."]
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marypsue · 2 days ago
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Man, it's cool and all if you see a metaphor for marginalisation in the monstrous, and if you want the power fantasy of 'what if you could just eat anybody who threatened you/pissed you off'. Me too.
However, as soon as you start saying 'no, these monsters are a 1:1 on Specific Marginalised Group, and you have to treat them in the fiction like they are directly representative of real human members of the marginalised group', BUT you also, in the fiction, make them hurt/kill/eat humans? And then try to shame me, your audience, for noticing or engaging with the bit where they kill people, because you made them directly representative of a real-world marginalised group? You have lost me, and also, I think, the plot.
#hear yourself. for the love of whatever you cherish.#'but they only kill bigots so ACTUALLY they're the GOOD GUYS -' your metaphor of monstrosity is entirely premised on the question of#'what if what you went around righteously killing; believing your actions to be justified;#were actually people and it was not in fact righteous or justified to just kill them'#'what if the world isn't neatly split into 'good guys' and 'bad guys'#who gets to decide who or what is 'bad'? because that's the original problem of monstrosity-as-metaphor-for-marginalisation#(if as a creator you say 'oh my intention with this was X' cool!#if instead you go with something like. well.#'well in this setting monsters are so rare it doesn't matter that they kill people and you'd have to be a homicidal sadistic psychopath >#< to hunt them; but sure I guess if you want to play a Bad Person' well I might have#but if you're going to explicitly judge me for wanting to engage with the moral question of 'how justified is this and who would do it#versus how justified are these monsters if they do have to harm or kill people to continue to exist'#then maybe I just don't want to play your game at all)#anyway I'm sick to death of poor uwu cozy vampires who are SO marginalised so I'm not Allowed to care about all the people they murder#it being fucked up is what's fun about it! do all the other shit but let me take the murders seriously!#and inb4 someone accuses me of being a bigot for saying 'actually I don't think you get a free pass to kill and eat people if you're gay'#remember when the CW's famously reactionary and conservative Supernatural tried to just gloss over the part where every time its heroes >#< killed a demon with a magic knife it also killed the person the demon was possessing#and say 'oh no it's fine we don't care about those killings; they don't matter; don't bother caring about them either'#but they were doing it to glorify exactly the kind of people that these 'monster as metaphor' stories are trying to cast as expendable?#I have other examples that are like. real dramas. but That Paranormal Show is the one that's in the same niche that I'm talking about here#it feels more insidious when it comes through a fantasy show where there are monsters involved#so you can say 'no it's not real so it doesn't matter'#but then ALL of it is equally not real. and vampires are not actually an oppressed group. because they don't exist.#you can say 'these vampires are a metaphor for an oppressed group so this fiction matters in real life'#or you can say 'don't care about the murders because they weren't actually real'#but you can't say both and then get mad at ME for treating the murders as seriously as the vampires#let me engage with your premise and don't waste my fucking time#or just set your fluff in the Sesame Street universe where vampires drink cherry Kool-Aid and help kids learn to count
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pseudophan · 4 months ago
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i enjoy sneaky short clips and pics of the show as much as anyone else but people saying they're gonna film and post the whole thing... look i understand wanting to share it with people who can't go but at a certain point you are just being disrespectful. not filming in a theatre is a very standard rule, it's not even dan and phil's own invention, like sorry you're not at a concert. everyone's been lucky so far that no clips have been copyright struck like ii and tatinof ones were but if people start posting long ass clips of it they Will start taking them down and then congratulations you've ruined the fun for everyone because you think you're above following basic instructions. not to mention if you do get caught it's disruptive and annoying for everyone around you. just. come on.
also, some venue security will be stricter than the one in antwerp for sure. people got away with a lot there but that's not to say everyone will. is it really worth risking getting thrown out
and again like i'm not trying to be the anti fun police i think some very short very sneaky clips here and there aren't a huge issue but there's a limit to what they're gonna let pass
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fabbyf1 · 17 days ago
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to everyone who is concerned about lestappen fics going away now that kelly is pregnant... how many fics is she actually even mentioned in? she has been around for so long and we just pretend she doesn't exist when we write fanfic. (my ao3 word count is 659,152 and she isn't mentioned ONCE.) nothing has to change. it's all fiction and make believe. let's continue to be delusional like the veteran larry stans we are, okay? 😂😂😂
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autisticandroids · 1 year ago
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FAMINE: That's one deep, dark nothing you've got there, Dean.
[youtube with closed captions]
dean and his father. dean and his family. dean and how bad it is.
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(via @closetoyou1970)
#spn#vid#mind the warnings on this one for real#woe! fruit of my rewatch be upon ye.#pallas calls this my 'deangirl coming out vid' which honestly. true. but those who paid attention know i've always been a deangirl.#also. after this no more deanwinchester rilo kiley amvs I Pwomise#anyway. i'm not gonna give a full commentary here but a big reason why i chose this song is that the narrator#is essentially dismissing her own problems and instead watching the problems of someone else#and i kind of wanted to play with that theme. this is the parallels show so let's do some parallels. lots of things happen to characters#that are Like Dean somehow. either in personality or circumstance. that we know or can infer happen to him. but we don't see it bc it's#not sayable. not speakable. so like for an easy one. we see meg being tortured in caged heat. she also talks about apprenticing under#alastair just like dean. so i show her being tortured [in a way that is sexualized and demon-specific] and reacting how she does#because i invite the audience to imagine or interpret that this has also happened to dean at some point. we just don't see it#so there are many dean parallels in this video. some obvious. some subtle but textual. some products of my twisted mind. but that's the way#i am using them to make my argument.#oh also: dean voice sam's eyes going black is JUST like when he used to fight with dad and wouldn't listen to me when i told him not to.#i guess also the point is that because it's unsayable. dean can't say it. dean can't even acknowledge it. and so it bleeds through#into everything in his life#that's why it's important that the song narrator doesn't take her own problems seriously. dean doesn't either.
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mostotherthings · 3 months ago
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小偷 是誰跨過了界線?
This conversation and the subsequent happenings in the episode have made me repeat this episode a few times even without me realising what I was doing.
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So, it starts with classical guitar playing. She is playing Francisco Tarrega's Recuerdos de la Alhambra (Memories of the Alhambra), as the teacher starts to talk about the fortress of Alhambra
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怎麼了What's the matter?
你不喜歡西班牙You don't like Spain?
還是不喜歡收復失地 Or you don't like regaining lost territories?
Sheng Wang goes for the jugular- is it history you don't like or... you don't like conceding ground to others?
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我不喜歡歷史 I don't like History
历史就是一部血腥的侵略史 History is just a series of bloody invasions
Jiang Tian's glasses are still on here. History to him are just filled with bad memories, bad things (his trauma, perhaps?)
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是誰打敗了誰 It's all about who defeated the other
劃了什麼界限 what boundary lines were drawn
然後以什麼什麼為國 and calling somewhere a nation
以什麼什麼為界 and somewhere its boundary
and he takes off his glasses here, he has conceded some ground, when he talks about defeat and how meaningless this giving and taking is
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怎麼啦?What is it?
我講錯了嗎?Did I say something wrong?
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也不是 Not really, 但是 But
正因為有這樣一次的運動和前進 It's because of this continuous movement and progress forward
才推到了一��高牆啊 that pushed down some high walls
Sheng Wang speaks frankly here, which I think is quite a show of his trust for Jiang Tian. From the beginning where he promises to keep his distance from Jiang Tian, Sheng Wang talks about progress, movement, the future, that led to the crumbling of the fortress walls (Jiang Tian's walls... perhaps?)
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讓愛 (and) let love
充滿了這個世界 fill up this world
and Sheng Wang has this love, that can fill up another person's world
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而且 正因為有了這些看似像界線一樣的東西 and it's because of these things that are like boundaries
才有進入別人的世界 are you able to enter another person's world
了解別人的可能 and understand that other person's possibility
It's like he's saying here - I respect your boundaries, and it's because of them, because of our differences, that makes me interested in you (?)
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那你覺得我現在是入侵了你的世界 So do you feel that I am invading your world now?
and Sheng Wang has had half an arm pass the middle point of the frame- he has been sitting, invading Jiang Tian's space for the entire conversation
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還是你侵入了我的世界呢?Or is it you who have invaded mine?
And Sheng Wang continues- so am I getting to know you... or are YOU actually getting to know ME?
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我就是不喜歡歷史. I just don't like history
Jiang Tian concedes the battle and puts his glasses back on. Sheng Wang returns to his side of the frame.
The teacher continues to talk about Alhambra being a ruin for many years, until the King of Spain started to restore it...
As the episode continues, Sheng Wang keeps getting into people's spaces.
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Auntie Jiang an example. Later when he witnesses the lovers at the West Gate- he's all up in other people's business this week, generally being an injured nuisance
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With Sheng Wang home, Jiang Tian thinks he can put back the boundary/walls he conceded earlier. He makes up a lie- he's not in the dorm, telling Sheng Wang, he's not where Sheng Wang thinks he is going to be
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The day darkens, the lie continues, the walls are coming back up
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那我怎麼沒有看到你啊 Then why can't I see you?
When the lights come up, the lie is exposed. There's no more hiding, and Jiang Tian makes a run for it
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Now Sheng Wang's closest to the person whose walls he wants to break down (he doesn't quite understand it yet)
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He doesn't understand it yet!
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But it's the thief, the thief who breaks down both their walls- it's a moment of vulnerability. Everyone else in the dorm room has gone home, and they should have been safe with each other. When the dorm master suggests huddling together for safety, Sheng Wang suggests it immediately. He now thinks of the room as their territory, they should be together to repel the invaders. Jiang Tian thinks about the last time he tried to put up a boundary......
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It's the same expression he had the last time he had his walls taken down by Sheng Wang. He just can't win this war. So he lies down......
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AND THEN THE MOMENT OF GENIUS IN THIS EPISODE, where Memories of Alhambra start to play again. The wall is in ruins, the fortress has crumbled.
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He has to concede this. He inches to face the 'invader'.
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It's their wall now. And they rest, safe.
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dirtytransmasc · 1 year ago
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how I think Theon would rank his siblings
Rickon - they're besties. he doesn't know how they became besties or why rickon likes him so much, but they're bff's and nothing will break that bond. is lovingly mean and teases him a lot like the good big brother he is. (there was like a 6 mi the streak where rickon would *not* sleep in his own bed and would only sleep in theon's, again, why this is, he has no clue. he didn't mind after a while. they normally watched a movie until rickon fell asleep and then Theon went about doing shit on his Xbox/computer till he fell asleep)
Arya - sassy little shit. has kicked him in the ribs. also tried to fight one of his shitty ex friends for being a dick. he respects her.
Asha - doesn't see her often. tough love. kinda mean. she's blood though and he loves her and she loves him more than she ever lets on.
Bran - kinda creepy and really stoic, but he likes to be run around in his wheel chair which is fun, and he's fun to watch movies with cause he's really quiet and won't talk like all of their siblings tend to do.
Sansa - air head, brat, mean, likes dumb girl things. (he loves her so dearly and has and would continue to maim anyone who even thinks of touching her. they just have that classic brother/sister dynamic where they "hate each other's guts" for simply existing)
Grey wind - his Bf's dog. best cuddler.
Shaggy dog - second best cuddler. likes to go on hikes on the beach with him (and rickon who runs the whole way through and then needs to be carried back to the car)
Ghost - 10x better than his owner. the goodest boy.
Lady - very polite. the goodest girl. only ranked this low because he 'hates' Sansa.
Summer - chewed one of his shoes once as a puppy. he never forgave that. does let her cuddle up with him when they're watching movies with Bran.
Nymeria - mean to him, except when she wants belly rubs.
dead brother #1
dead brother #2
All of rickon's friends
All of Bran's weird friends
Jon Snow - he's the worst of the worst. the devil himself. he could go die. (he's the closest thing Theon has to an actual friend his age and they claim to hate are constantly doing things together "for convenience" or because they "couldn't find anyone else to go with" or "Robb forced them to get along". they hate smoke and play Xbox together. they've had a shared Minecraft world since they were 8. they've fought to the blood on multiple occasions)
not featured on this list:
Robb - his boyfriend, he's not getting ranked with their siblings that's weird. if he were though he'd take second place, rickon comes first)
Edit: I made this while so sick, tired, and tripped up on cough meds that I have theon 3 dead brothers and it took me a while to realize... oops.
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brofightiscancelled · 11 days ago
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okay ill bite why do u hate kaoru sakuraba sidem aside from the fact that they went from hokuto as a main blue to downgrade to kaoru. to make it less awkward that I’m asking abt sidem on ur osomatsu side blog, what sidem idols would u assign to each matsu ?
i think sideM should collab w osomatsu-san and put them all in Beit so they can all get JOBS!!!!!!
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anyways i hate kaoru from idolmaster sideM. i need all my osomatsu-san side blog followers to know that i hate this man. "i need a lot of money fast to pursue an extremely niche medical research track, which is why i quit my stable and high paying job as a surgeon to become an idol while having no soft skills, physical strength or stamina, or interest in getting along with people" are you Stupid??
he's not even using his idol clout to spread awareness of the rare disease he's trying to cure (like SEM does) so it can secure funding, he sees it 100% as a job and refuses to have fun, he is actively unpleasant and uncooperative in every interaction with his coworkers because he's trying to "rise to the top". it seems like the only thing he has going for him are his looks and that he kind of liked to sing when he was a kid. why not become a model at that point when you have the personality of a wet tree trunk. or better yet why not STAY A FUCKING DOCTOR!!!!!
also, i don't like meganes, so write that down.
#context for oomfiematsus: idolmaster sideM's gimmick is that all the idols were other things before becoming idols#Beit is the unit whose gimmick is that all their members have part time jobs (baito)#others are like. lawyer -> idol; pilot -> idol; pianist -> idol; rakugoka -> idol; etc#finding out the backstories/previous lives of these idols is like the main appeal of this branch#a lot of times it's like trauma and stuff that causes them to switch careers. like there's a pair of twins who were former soccer pros#but one suffers a career-ending injury and it's sad. and theyre like well we were pretty good at PR and stuff though so let's be idols#(the other twin follows him because yknow twinsies <3 cant be apart)#and this guy is in the main unit so you meet him and he's just a fucking dick the whole time and he just seems to fucking hate being an ido#so the whole time youre like what's this guy's deal#(note i experienced this through the anime cuz all the games are EOS lol)#and then like 3/4ths into the anime in you finally get his backstory#and it's that his sister died of a very rare disease so he needs money to fund research to find the cure but no one will fund it#but instead of staying a doctor he decides the best way to do this is to BECOME AN IDOL?!!!?!?#like sure i bet the top idols do make more than an average surgeon? but it's like do you want a .01% chance to make a $2 million salary#or an 100% chance to make a $300k salary BECAUSE YOURE ALREADY A SURGEON!!!!#and it'd be another thing if he was like. kinda having fun with it. kinda being jovial#like there's literally another guy in the teacher unit who became an idol for the exact same reason (heard it was lucrative)#but then after he finds out being an idol actually isnt all that much cash#so he just decides to have fun being an idol instead!!!!#this guy NEVER GETS THERE. he's always a SERIOUS RUDE STICK IN THE MUD who is NEVER FUN TO BE AROUND BECAUSE HE'S LIKE#I'm Here For Work. I'm Here To Be The Best Idol. I Don't Want To Make Friends#LIKE GET REEEEEEEEEEEEEEAL DUDE YOUR COWORKERS ARE 10 YEAR OLDS IN ANIMAL COSTUMES AND 30 YEAR OLD MEN IN PINK TIGHTS.#anyways everyone likes him i guess he's supposed to be the “cold guy eventually opens his heart” kind of guy but he has always just come of#as very annoying to me. and also DUMB AS FUCK i cannot stress enough how STUPID OF A CAREER CHOICE THIS WAS#so i cant take him seriously when they try to play him up as this cool all-knowing guy when he's the STUPIDEST PERSON AT THIS COMPANY#INCLUDING THE 9 YEAR OLDS
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io-lu-art · 9 months ago
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uni: starts.
me: ok, do I have a big enough colour pallet with me to draw the gaang in class?
also me: only draws zuko and sokka
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copia · 7 months ago
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delighted though i am for ghost's growing success i'm keeping my fingers crossed for an obviously low-budget ghovie like the chapters before it. because the papa nihil darth vader breathing and seestor's car crash montage and the shitty nihil ghost effects and copia living in the hall outside a bathroom with no door etc all add a certain je ne sais quoi
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qcomicsy · 9 months ago
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I have the controversial opinion that maybe, just maybe we stop wanting to go after people with pitchforks for getting characters wrong and not reading the comics inviting them to easy and accessible ways of and making our own content with comic accurate representation
people might feel less anxious about starting comics and misinformation won't spread as easily
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illegiblewords · 6 months ago
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Almost current in Dawntrail, I make some references to plot stuff under the cut but this post isn't mainly about Dawntrail. This is an analytical rant. There are people who disagree with me that I adore/respect to bits who have done brilliant stuff from angles I wouldn't take. People shouldn’t stop doing what they’re inspired to do according to whether I like or dislike something. This post qualifies less with 'I think' and 'I believe' statements/is a little harsher because I'm venting though. Proceed at your discretion.
Features critical/darker discussions of Venat and Hermes with brief mentions of Zenos.
I really, genuinely think a lot of people are only getting pieces of what's going on in FFXIV.
The story still isn't black and white. Characters very, very often are not what they advertise themselves to be. Neither the cast nor fans are immune to misjudging.
Hermes is not as compassionate as he presents himself. There is an enormous discrepancy between what he professes and the choices he consistently makes, both with regard to other ancients and creations. I do believe he was genuinely miserable but he is basically Satan from Paradise Lost, who wonders why he alone was made unsatisfied with obedience and perfection. Who recognizes there is difference in himself compared to others but is conflicted about whether this is a defect or higher calling. Satan sees himself as inherently 'other' above all else and Hermes is just the same. The shared snake imagery isn't a coincidence either.
Everything I've seen points to Hermes being a narcissist who does not have instinctive empathy in a society where empathy is the most valuable quality a person can have. He strives to have more empathy than all other people without truly understanding what that means. It's why he projects his anger and hatred onto the wolf creation as it dies instead of offering it any kind of comfort. It's why he sends Meteion into space to suffer pain, death, and despair as a high empathy being who challenges all concepts of what it means to be alive… instead of presenting her to the Bureau of the Architect, where her very existence might instigate star-wide reform for how all other creations are handled. For his ego, he needed to be the only one with extensive knowledge of dynamis. He needed to be the only one with answers from on high regarding the nature of life. That was far more important than Meteion's wishes or well-being, and the creations he claims to love are expendable for this purpose. He frequently oscillates between seeing himself as beneath all other ancients and the sole, divinely powerful judge/jury/executioner of all living things. Like Satan from Paradise Lost he can't be grouped with those around him. He can't be just one of many ancients dealing with fears, doubts, despairs. He MUST be exceptional above all else. I'd argue the main reason he accepts the Warrior of Light at all is because we do not appear as a fellow ancient to him--he sees us as a familiar, and therefore inherently without equal authority and agency compared to him. When we are useful to his worldview he uses us and when we aren't we're disposable.
I've seen people claim that Hermes is just anxious and that's why he didn't submit Meteion. You don't opt for genocide and decree all of humanity as immoral and unworthy of mercy without even allowing your targets a voice to answer out of anxiety. You certainly don't do that while having specifically gone out of your way to avoid any steps that might have given room for more charitable judgments. Hermes opted to destroy everyone because it was what he wanted to do, but it didn't fit his self-image as a benevolent and empathetic person to do so. That's why he made a loophole via memory erasure.
Venat, further, is not a hero. She's gray at best and in all likelihood a pretty dark shade of it. Light motifs and crystal mommy themes do not change this. She not only decided, independently, that Hermes' genocide was an appropriate course without allowing anyone else room to discuss or address the issue--she actively denied everyone else knowledge of what happened or even basic information about dynamis (LET ALONE METEION'S LOCATION) so they could deal with the issue effectively. She passed judgment on the entire Convocation because of Hermes' appointment without once judging herself for withholding information on his true character. There is a reason Emet-Selch called her out for being immediately ready to see herself as a morally correct messiah of the star. He wasn't wrong to do so. And especially after Endwalker I think Venat grossly misunderstood not only what led to worlds self-destructing on a philosophical level (never mind Meteion's emotion amplification powers), I think she misread her own star and its people. Pursuit of purity and certainty was what led to the destruction of worlds. The total absence of pain is just one form that can take, but it isn't necessary for a world to be in perpetual agony to avoid that. Venat dismissed the despairs and struggles of her own fellow ancients because there was no room for them in the view she had of herself and her world. If she didn't see them they didn't exist, but even when she did see them they didn't count enough to sway her judgment. Venat had to be the most correct person and she didn't allow even as Hydaelyn the possibility of making mistakes or unwarranted cruelty to others. She is 1000% guilty of 'ancient hubris'.
Venat might be a more middling gray, in my view, depending on whether she'd been trying to shield as many people as possible from tempering with the traveler's ward only for most of the star to become tempered by Zodiark post-summoning. There are a lot of repeating phrases between Elidibus, post-Final Days ancients, and the lunar shades that I think point to mass tempering. Venat would have grounds for assuming people had homogenized views, prayers, and voices if the star was largely tempered. If they weren't, I think she becomes pretty sinister for how she deals with people's post-Final Days trauma. Her injustice toward the ancients in that case would just happen to be in a way that benefits the shards.
The Zodiark plan prevented life from going extinct. It was necessary. Zodiark's tempering and the subsequent sacrifice spiral were not deliberate I suspect, seeing as Zodirk was the first primal EVER. People have been consistently misreading the loporrit quote on this to try and argue that Zodiark didn't temper the Unsundered.
The line states that Venat used a different summoning technique to the one utilized by Ascians. Venat's technique specifically does not temper people. The Ascian method does. If Venat's technique was used to summon an entity of Zodiark's magnitude (whose power could not be resisted according to Emet-Selch) there might be a slight tug toward tempering despite the technique being much safer.
This is not saying Zodiark didn't temper anyone. It's specifically saying that despite Venat having a safe technique, Zodiark's summoning was on such a monumental scale that even Venat's technique would carry some risk.
Meanwhile, Lahabrea has been getting set up for years as someone who has been dehumanized, judged, isolated, and misunderstood. This has continued to increasing degrees through Dawntrail. It has been going on since A Realm Reborn. The sheer consistency of it is insane at this point. There is a HUGE gap between how Lahabrea emotes and what he's actually feeling. His choices reflect this and it is demonstrated firsthand in Pandaemonium.
No one seemed to think it was weird that Lahabrea was ready to commit a pseudo-suicide by killing Hephaistos. No one seemed to catch that the 'pseudo-suicide' in the lyrics to Scream referenced Lahabrea, as did the 'shadow left far behind' line. People contorted themselves into pretzels trying to say that Scream was not about him. Nevermind that Pandaemonium is the Lahabrea raid, in which all other characters were supporting cast to flesh out Lahabrea. It must be mainly about Hegemone and Agdistis! If not them, it must be mainly about Erichthonios!
The man's entire story is about being dehumanized, dismissed, invalidated, and excluded while suffering severe mental illness. It's kind of horrendous that fans are continuing to do this to him on a meta level.
Lahabrea has a long history of Abrahamic imagery. If the Warring Triad mirror the Unsundered, Sephirot as the Tree of Life maps to the Kabbalistic process of creation. The game explicitly and correctly references this in the attacks used. The lyrics to Fiend track for Lahabrea as does the association with Id issues, and there's symbolically significant overlap between muscular/multi-armed Sephirot (where multiple arms reference the boddisatva Guanyin, who uses those many arms to help those in need) to muscular/multi-armed Zodiark as Lahabrea's creation. And Zodiark being Lahabrea's creation is indicated in Akademia Anyder. People have been trying to attribute Zodiark to Hermes because Hermes hijacked him in EW and it drives me nuts.
Meanhwile, what did Pandaemonium do?
Paired the Tree of Life to The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. There's a ton of snake, fruit, and mouth imagery in Pandaemonium. Athena is Eve offering Lahabrea as Adam knowledge of good and evil via the soul bonding. Lahabrea has been afraid of himself as an extremely powerful ancient (which I've analyzed before, tying to Emet-Selch too), particularly given he's in a position of power. He reflects the societal idea that someone with his aetherial strength and authority cannot afford to be selfish or he risks causing immeasurable harm to others. Result is that Lahabrea is absolutely terrified of being selfish in any capacity, even on a basic healthy level. Athena meanwhile is a purely selfish being. Like I believe is the case with Hermes (and am positive is the case with Zenos)--she does not have instinctive empathy. Athena deliberately psychologically violated her husband by forcing him to acknowledge understanding selfish desire through her perspective, then compounded it by exploiting his lack of self-confidence to say he was bound to be just like her for understanding such selfishness. She's not an authority on that, but Lahabrea sees himself as personally less than Athena and is not at that point equipped to argue on his own behalf.
Anyway. Abrahamic connections, Hegemone has the snake imagery. Agdistis has the tree and the fruit. Athena is Eve. The soul bonding is the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Hephaistos uses a ton of snake imagery too. Lahabrea is covered in symbolism both on a personal psychological level and tied to traditional symbolism via the hand of god acting upon the world, the eye of god watching the world. For savage, one arm is covered in eyes. This is his role as Lahabrea employing power for his people. The other arm, his personal desires/needs, is long and thin and malformed/not really functional. He covers his heart with a pair of wings for protection and reduces himself, weeping, to DNA because that's the only value he sees in himself. He'd rather be that than himself as a person because at least as DNA he's wanted for something. Lahabrea doesn't think anyone would ever give a shit about him on a personal level.
When Hephaistos is defeated, there's a reason Lahabrea is shaken when he states that Hephaistos' goal was never to raise himself high. That was what Athena wanted and what she told him he'd want. All Hephaistos wanted was his family back and to be loved. That was the moment Lahabrea had to introspect and realized Athena wasn't correct about his motives. Her declaring something about him didn't make it true.
Erichthonios is convinced he has a cruel and indifferent father for much of the raid. We see him twist neutral-to-kind gestures as malicious in front of us, as with Lahabrea allowing him to go to Pandaemonium as a child but insisting he know spells to protect himself. Erichthonios takes Lahabrea's insistence as believing he's not good enough instead of wanting him to be safe. We also see Erichthonios construe something that actually points to Lahabrea being depressed (giving himself no credit for completing the phoenix and advertising nothing only to be surprised by coworkers throwing him a celebration anyway) as him scorning Pandaemonium for not sharing the achievement with them. Erichthonios was taught to do this by Athena, and Athena likewise twists Lahabrea's self-image as a form of psychological abuse from the moment he approaches her in the soul bonding scene. She cites his status and accuses Lahabrea of thinking himself morally above others for descending to Pandaemonium and judging her. It never occurs to Athena that Lahabrea would try to stop her because he loves and wants to protect his son.
People are projecting their own personal beef with parents behaving poorly to assume Lahabrea is an uncaring father. He's not. He's extremely mentally ill and Erichthonios was groomed by an abusive mother while having no concept of what Lahabrea's mental illness would even look like... let alone how to deal with it.
Lahabrea explicitly thinks Erichthonios is better off with the false memory of a mother who abused him than having him present as a father because he considers himself so personally worthless. He can only see his presence as a detriment in his son's life. He is a short step from the kind of suicide people commit when they think other people would be happier and less burdened if they were dead. 'They might be sad for a while, but ultimately they'll be better off.'
I'm not even bringing out my citations right now. This isn't an Archon Thesis because I want my evidence properly assembled for that. But I recently saw someone try to frame the Convocation and Zodiark plan as uniformly awful, when the reality is doing nothing would have resulted in life going extinct. And if we're talking about zodiac signs mapping to Convocation members, there are more layers to it than 'Ascians = bad versions of the zodiac'.
Ex. The duality (two fish) and creativity associated with Pisces both apply to Lahabrea, but the emotionality does too. It isn't obvious at first but when you look it's there. Lahabrea has hidden strong emotions consistently through a variety of methods across the game. Sometimes it's reserve, sometimes it's aggression, sometimes it's hysteria. But when you look at the surrounding circumstances from his perspective, it makes perfect sense how and why he'd emote that way. It has never been safe for him to be emotionally vulnerable.
One of the earliest moments of 'villain laughter' from him we see is at Carteneau. His assistant waits quietly for him to finish. At that point Bahamut had been unleashed in yet another action that goes directly against Lahabrea's own morals, but is necessary to the Ardor. The sundered respond by invoking Lahabrea's phoenix as protection for humanity against a primal Lahabrea helped orchestrate. On some level people instinctively believe Lahabrea can and will protect them despite his failures, their own reincarnations, and thousands of years passing. It's ironic and horrible but this kind of irony has been happening to Lahabrea over and over again. If he doesn't laugh the dude's going to cry and (again) it isn't safe for him to do that.
(Also as the only Ascian to ever refer to Zodiark as 'master', Lahabrea is A) very tempered B) continuing a pattern of thought/behavior/worldbuilding where he puts his people first and himself dead last C) not talking about Athena. Lahabrea says in-game he had no earthly idea Athena was in the Heart of Sabik. I do think Heart of Sabik effected him by magnifying his desire to save his people and redeem himself in the face of survivor's guilt. It might have influenced his phrasing too. I have theories about what Lahabrea did at Praetorium but blowing it up was not 'the ultimate magic' by any means. I'm pretty sure he used it as a Themis and/or Zodiark backup drive, which Athena's presence at Anabaseios proves is possible anyway. He doesn't need to know about her to figure it out.
People have tried to say Athena is Lahabrea's god instead of Zodiark. Especially given the history of abuse and Lahabrea's own repeatedly shown priorities/actions, that take is pretty appalling imo. Completely dismisses how devoted he has always been to his people to destroy his will and identity altogether on a meta level.)
Even if we strip shit down to the most bare bones narrative form and ignore evidence--where motives and arcs are concerned 'oh Lahabrea has always been evil/uncaring/sociopathic/self-absorbed and stayed that way forever after' is bad storytelling. That would require a 'failure to change' arc as literal or spiritual death. That arc form ties to death because life requires accounting for/adapting to new experiences. If a character fails to do that (for better or worse) that character is stagnant and effectively not living. Such arcs require meticulously showing the process of rejecting experiences though. Zoraal Ja actually approaches the form a bit when we see him repeatedly taking nothing from the trials he undergoes, but his trajectory becomes 'change for the worse' after losing to his father's shade. None of the Unsundered are set up with that arc form, Lahabrea included. It wouldn't offer any insight, fit with what we know of the ancients and their values/society, or carry any emotional impact. Trying to go that route without setup is just bad storytelling and makes characters less believable. But yeah. Tl;dr I really, really wish people paid more attention and examined words vs actions vs surrounding circumstances vs motives.
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benkeibear · 2 months ago
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Back to normal Navi
The dreaded post has come...
I will not finish this years Kinktober on here. Opening tumblr has become a chore for me more than anything. It sparks no joy, I dont want to scroll dash anymore, I don't bother to keep up with anyone anymore on here.
My interests have shifted greatly over the past few weeks and I found my way back to crafting, gaming and even playing the bass again. At the moment I don't enjoy animanga / fandom on tumblr and wish to no longer participate or create for it.
I'm 99% certain that this is just a mood and I will most definitely be back but as of now I have no motivation or interest to create for tumblr. I'll be here every once in a while and answer asks should I get any and to still do background work in my network but otherwise it will be silent until I found my love and passion for all of this again.
There is no point in forcing myself to write for characters I do not care for, to force myself to keep up with the latest stuff that changes every 2 weeks. I will be selfish now and put myself first until my love has returned- be it 2 weeks, 2 months or 2 years.
- Much love, Luma.
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