#dynast frame

[errantsquam]

updating mech refs!!! decided to rename this guy to "ankou" because i thought it was more fitting

[ghostinthegallery]

Adding that Pariah Nexus does (potentially) have the element of attempted apotheosis, between Orikan and Szeras' goals of becoming energy beings. Lacking gods but seeking to become them, out of revenge and spite and desire to escape their cursed existences. All while fighting the ultimate Space Catholics

Conflict in Literature + Necron Books

(Read more for titles and notes, watch out for spoilers)

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[lagosbratzdoll]

I'm puzzled by the idea that dynastic rot is unique to the Targaryens. None of the Houses are good. They're all imperfect. Of course, the rot is more obvious in House Targaryen because the author has written extensively about them.

We know about their failings and their successes. The other Houses don't really have that, and so many people don't read the supplementary novels or the main novels, which makes it easy to claim that violence is a uniquely Targaryen trait or that the Seven Kingdoms lived in peace until the Targaryens attacked.

I must admit, it annoys me when people frame the Targaryens as uniquely predisposed to violence, misogyny and abuse because everyone is rotten. Every House is imperfect, and every House has a history of dynastic violence to rectify.

[applepie2523]

" HOTD's Issues Writing Women Part 1: The Character Assassination of Alicent Hightower

**Just posted part 2 where I analyze the issues in the writing of Rhaenyra! You can find it on my profile.**

**This is part 1 of my analysis on the issues with the two main female characters of HOTD.** I think many fans on the Blacks and Greens and in between regarding HOTD have been concerned and disappointed with the way the two main female characters: Rhaenyra Targaryen and Alicent Hightower have been written in HOTD seasons 1-2. This is very understandable. Female characters in general in HOTD and I think a lot of Hollywood films nowadays are not being written as well as they used to be and could be. Go on Youtube or Google and you'll find many film reviews/tv show reviews that critique the Mary Sue and Girlbossification or just poorly written in general female characters that are taking up a chunk of characters in Hollywood. Rhaenyra and Alicent to me were such great characters in F&B. They were two different kinds of medieval women in a fantasy setting. One, the medieval queen who gains power/influence through her relationship with men and advocating for her son. Two, the medieval queen who sought power in her name and defied some norms that make her compelling but also immoral in their eyes. They are two deeply flawed and complex characters fighting on opposite sides of a dynastic civil war.

This first post is my analysis on the issues of writing Alicent Hightower in HOTD.

\***Some disclaimers: This is no issue with the actress herself. Olivia Cooke while I may disagree with her opinions from time to time, is a wonderful actress who is doing the best she can with the scripts she's given, so this is by no means a critique of her. I am going off of the show canon although the book will be mentioned.**

**So firstly... What is character assassination?**

While Alicent does at times suffer from white washing, she mainly suffers from character assassination. Character assassination is very sudden and almost inorganic changes are made to a character that makes them even worse; harming that character's impact and reputation. Many negative traits or changes have been made to Alicent's character that she is become completely different from her season 1 self (in a bad way) and her book counterpart.

**I will say not every change made to Alicent's story arc and personality are necessarily all bad. Some are decent or even good ideas, just poorly executed (ex - aging down Alicent) and others are just good changes in general.**

*1. Victims vs. Villains - Biases in Writing Female Characters*

In the words of the iconic Grey's Anatomy actress Ellen Pompeo, “Women are one of two roles. You’re either the victim or the villain. But the victims are only victims because they don’t have what it takes to be the villain.” I think she states the major issue with writing female characters nowadays that HOTD has an issue with. Women must either be victims or villains. The character assassination of Alicent and white washing of Rhaenyra to me stems from this: Alicent is the villain in Rhaenyra's story to Rhaenyra's victimhood.

*2. Alicent's Negative Portrayal: Motherhood, Loyalty, and Manipulation to Child Neglect, Betrayal, and Idiocracy*

In the show, I feel much of Alicent's traits have either been changed, ignored or downplayed. Alicent I think was the epitome of the medieval woman who used the patriarchal system to her own advantage. Who sought power for herself and her family/house through manipulating/influencing the men around her. The men also respected her to a much larger degree than the show implies, she isn't dismissed because she's a woman so much. While I do think in the show Aemond dismisses her from the council because he just didn't want his mommy scolding him in front of everyone, I think the show framed it more so to make it seem Alicent is dimissed due to sexism and "that's what she gets for betraying feminism" or something like that. Something about her learning that the patriarchy and siding with it is bad.

I found Book Alicent reminding me of Margaret Beaufort. She was the mother of King Henry VII, who advocated for him to be King, despite herself off of blood ties alone having the better claim to the throne than him. She manipulated men and women around her to gain supporters and more influence for him and by extension herself. She was fiercely loyal to her faction, the Lancastrians and Tudors. Strong and intelligent and pious and at times very immoral. Loved her son more than anything in her life. She even played the long game, playing nice but still subtly undermining the "enemy faction" (The Yorks). She also understood that because of his claim, despite being slightly distant, was strong enough for him to be a danger to the York faction hence she knew he had to get one the throne in order to be safe versus just renouncing his claim (like Aegon). She never stopped advising him or advocating for him. While Alicent Hightower isn't exactly like Margaret Beaufort, they exhibit many similarities.

Alicent loved her boys and would never choose Rhaenyra over them. For example, after her life was sparred when Rhaenyra took Kingslanding and her father was executed... she found out Rhaenyra planned to go after Daeron and Aemond. Alicent begged for them to be sparred, even offering a truce where the kingdoms would be split between Aegon II and Rhaenyra. She even states to Rhaenyra after surrending that Rhaenyra may enjoy her throne for as long as it lasts, until her son Aemond sets her free. She loved her Aemond and had so much hope that he would rescue her and avenge their family. She loved Aegon so much that his murder was her straw on the camel's back and she descended into full-on madness, spending the rest of her days mourning her children and grandchildren and remembering her time with King Jaehaerys. She was so loyal to her faction that in her madness after losing all of her children, she ordered her granddaughter then Queen Jaehaera, child-wife to child-king Aegon III (Rhaenyra's son) to slit her child-husband's throat. She stayed loyal to the Greens for life.

In the show we get neither an intelligent, scheming, manipulative, deeply ambitious, loyal, or mothering Alicent. In fact we get an exact opposite: bystander, unintelligent, unambitious, flaky, betrayer, and neglectful. Alicent didn't scheme herself to become Queen, rather that whole plot was taken away from her and placed fully onto Otto who is now nothing but a pimp when he is like any other self-serving ambitious lord who desires glory and power to his name and that of his house. Who does what any other lord of Westeros would do if a King is widowed with no male heir. I mean even Corlys did it with Laena! We hardly see Alicent begin her true influence on the court in Westeros while young in season 1 and older. When we do see her scheme, its through her degrading herself through medieval foot fetishes when she would never do that. Why couldn't Alicent scheme and manipulate using her words, threats, and her title like Rhaenyra should be doing in the books? Why must the few times we see her scheme include sexual humiliation. We don't see the Queenship of Alicent who wasn't just "baby-maker 2.0" but someone who had significant power and influence at court. The only time I feel I got a true hint of the power of book Alicent was when she wore Green the first time. But then they abandon her resolve and make her a Rhaenyra simp.

Alicent's desire for power and for her children safety is also downgraded. She only makes Aegon king because of a stupid prophecy, taking away more of her agency and intelligence. She schemes alongside her father and the Green council to put Aegon on the throne, not just mishears her dying husband and then goes along with it. She wasn't shut out by the men in her house and council, she was heard and respected. They took away so much of that I think to put out a message that Alicent is oppressed by the patriarchy. Was she in the book? Absolutely every woman in Westeros is to varying degrees, but that doesn't mean Alicent had no power! Alicent was motivated out of a desire for power and need to keep her children safe which she felt wouldn't have happened if Rhaenyra was Queen. Was she wrong for thinking that? Maybe, maybe not, but I feel like that was taken away.

I also dislike how they spit on her motherhood. Alicent by our standards was not mom of the year in F&B. However, we see that regardless of her wrongs and the fact that yes she loves her kids because of the power they grant her, that no matter what she would never choos Rhaenyra over them and loved them regardless of how they disappoint or anger her. That's what I loved about parenthood in Martin's work. We see how parenthood offers layers into the characters and gives them depth. Characters who are naturally seen as more villainous and/or violent or ambitious are given softer sides and layers through their fatherhood or motherhood. We should have seen some of that with Daemon and with Alicent. We saw it with Cersei Lannister. Cersei was not mother of the year in terms of her parenting and child rearing skills, but she loved her children more than life itself and makes it not secret. No matter how much they may anger or disappoint her she'd never betray them. That's what I wanted for Alicent. A manipuative, at times immoral, ambitious, and intelligent woman whose softer side is shown through her motherhood and devotion to her children. It gives her layers. Just as if they showed Daemon taking pride in his sons or spending more time with his daughters, we would have gotten more layers.

Instead, Alicent neglect and is emotionally distant towards all of her children to the point they have serious mommy issues. The Green children already had a complicated relationship with their father. Viserys wasn't as neglectful in the book to his green children as the show, but there was an intense favoritism of Rhaenyra that affected his kids. However, they all at least had their mother who would put them first. Alicent was cold and distant and downright hateful towards her sons at times and distant from her daughter and grandchildren. Her kids then hardly like her in return. Alicent even betrays all of them by going to Rhaenyra and essentially offering up their lives. Offering the life of her son Aegon isn't enough and anyone would know it. Rebellion at this point and war and Green forces would then go to Aemond who will now also have to die, then Daeron the son she gushed over with Gwayne. So she then offers up her house, father, and three sons to Rhaenyra's faction's mercy which wouldn't end well for them as this is war at that point and it would stupid of Rhaenyra to spare any of them even if they swear fealty. She saves Helaena and Jaehaera? No! They are still of the green faction. If Helaena remarried and/or Jaehaera married and had sons, all it takes is either those sons or their families to be ambitious enough... more war! Alicent as well had a great relationship with her grandchildren. She loved to spend time with them. In fact, the night Viserys died he played with Jaehaera, Jaehaerys, and Maelor. Alicent was ambushed and victimized by B&C first because they knew that Helaena brought her children to visit her in the evening. Plus she was living in the less guarded Tower of the Hand. Alicent was bound and gagged, pleading for mercy for her grandbabies, not having an affair! In fact, Aegon even gave Maelor to Alicent to raise correctly because Helaena was falling in madness.

Most of all, I dislike the Criston affair. It went very off-book to give Alicent a lover. However, with what they changed in her relationship with Viserys, I didn't fully hate this change, just the way they executed it was wrong. I could buy Alicent and Criston having intense, deep, feelings for one another. However, I felt having a physical affair versus just an emotional one was very off-character. After Criston's incident with Rhaenyra and Alicent's trauma regarding marital rape on Viserys's end (hated that they made Viserys rape her maritally when the two had a much better and loving relationship in the book), it makes more sense for them to be rather traumatized or awkward regarding sex. I feel like an emotional affair where there is a lot of sexual tension and desire for more but because of social circumstances, they can't have more. Maybe romantic and heavy kissing scenes only to stop out of guilt and shame. They make her so hypocritical by giving her a physical affair. I feel book and show Alicent is pious for sex outside of marriage due to her upbringing and love for the Faith (she's not a religious fanatic, just someone who finds comfort and control in religion). They could have also used such scenes to showcase even more conflict between the factions. Alicent and Criston could be resentful of the fact Rhaenyra was able to be with whomever she wanted while Alicent cannot. Alicent whom is Dowager Queen is far too above Criston whom is also a Kingsguard and bound to celibacy. Plus, they always make her sex scenes be as unromantic and poorly timed as possible. Yes, Rhaenyra and Daemon having sex on a beach the night of the latter's wife's funeral is poor timing but because of the actor chemistry, romantic music, and tender movements and choreography it feels very romantic and loving. We don't get any of that. Alicent and Criston's feelings (which may not be love, but most certainly are hinted in season 1 to be a deep trust, understanding, and affection) are cheapened and made to be almost like two people scratching an itch versus two people who have genuine trust and affection for one another. They never show any tender aftermath with their love scenes, no soft hugs or cuddles or caresses. They never use any romantic settings or music (unlike for Criston and Rhaenyra's scene which was nothing more but a one-night-stand) and they showed it right after B&C of all things!

Almost all of these changes assassinated Alicent's character, made her less compelling, more unlikable, and untrue to her book self. They tried to create an Alicent whose story was victimized by sexist maesters and only created a character who is neither likable nor true to the narratives Martin creates.

*3. Women Must Stick Together? Fight the Patriarchy in Westeros?*

I've been asking myself... **why did Condal and the HOTD writers choose to go completely off book and have the two other main women, Helaena and Alicent, choose to abandon the Greens in favor of Rhaenyra and her faction?** I mean this is a change that is 100% off book and in major disservice to the original narrative. By surrendering to Rhaenyra, Alicent is essentially offering up the lives of her father, lover, house, supporters, and all three of her sons to the mercy of the Black faction which isn't exactly a merciful faction. I would be just as appalled if Rhaenyra or Daemon surrendered themselves, their children, and supporters to the Greens at this point in the story.

Then, the story became clearer when I watched Condal reviewing the scene with Alicent and Rhaenyra where he says it just all comes down to these women. That's when it became clear to me! Condal wanted to show a story of two medieval women and medieval system: one who seemingly opposes the evil patriarchy, and one who submits to it. He wanted a story centered on two women who were friends but were torn apart by evil men and the patriarchy who have to come together in the end. He wanted a story that sort of relates more so to 21st century feminism. He wanted a story where the women have to get together at the end which is Helaena, Jaehaera, and Alicent, the remaining main women not aligned with the Blacks defect to Rhaenyra's side. It's not bad to want such a story! If written well, that kind of story can be good. However, the issue is he doesn't choose to write his own story in his own fantasy world. No! The HOTD team picks F&B which is not that kind of story to write a poorly written fanfiction. It's a disservice to any fans of GOT, ASOIAF, F&B, or anyone who just wants faithful adaption or a good show. It doesn't fit with the narratives and themes of Martin's work. It doesn't fit with the original story.

The original story of the Dance was the story in which a dynastic civil war between two factions of the same royal family fueled by revenge, anger, resentment, fear of the opposing side, and ultimately a desire for power and control of Westeros tore themselves apart resulting in the destruction of the main source of their power that they never fully recover from that is step one towards them being overthrown. It is the story of the death of the last of Valyria's magic: the dragons. It is a story about how the central theme that connects every character in Martin's Westeros: ambition and desire for power, changes and destroys people when they pursue it. It is a story where two morally ambiguous factions backing two morally ambiguous claimants dividing the realm; believing their own side to be right when both sides are both right and wrong. It is a story that should center Rhaenyra AND Aegon with all their supporters, everyone getting equal screen time and perspective with a special focus on Rhaenyra and Aegon. It is a story about a realistic medieval conflict in an unrealistic world. It's a story about how the violent petty conflicts within a too-powerful royal dynasty in sole control of their world's equivalent to nuclear bombs ultimately effects and harms the nobles and smallfolk caught in between.

This is the story we should have had and this is the story that Martin sought to create that fans were expecting. The kind of story Condal wanted to create with his team is not congruent with the centrality of Martin's themes. Could feminism been included? Perhaps! I mean this is a medieval setting that 100% oppresses women and everyone who watched GOT or read ASOIAF knows it. Sexism and misogny certainly relates to the story, but it should not be the central focus. This kind of theme and focus was not executed and implemented properly, resulting in very negative changes.

It is also must be noted that the writers should have analyzed and understood the characters primarily through a medieval lens of Westeros versus just analyzing via modern 21st century pro feminism lens. It's fine to analyze Westeros using modern beliefs and terms, as long as, you couple it with a whole lot of understanding and analysis from their persepctive, otherwise you won't get the full picture. Like nearly every medieval woman of power in Medieval England, Rhaenyra and Alicent are not feminists by our standards and are not advocating for women's rights. In part 2 where I focus on Rhaenyra's whitewashing, I will talk about how she in many ways like Alicent gains power from, submits to, and operates within the patriarchal system like most medieval women.

*4. Too Much Focus on the "Friendship of These Women"*

I think the aging down of Alicent (she and Viserys actually had an 11 year gap versus decades) was intially a decent idea. However, the issue that character assassinated Alicent is that they executed it poorly. In the book, Rhaenyra is still a child when Viserys marries Alicent. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, her and Viserys had a very warm marriage. Arguably, I would say he loved her more than Aemma, but he did care for Aemma and felt guilty for her death. Alicent being aged down was to establish the complicated, deep, and almost secretly romantic friendship with Rhaenyra versus Laena Velaryon.

I didn't intially hate this change, but like I said, it's the execution of this change that made it bad. I wouldn't have minded Alicent reluctantly going to seduce Viserys after Aemma died, after all it was on her father Otto's orders, not did I mind Rhaenyra having a problem with this marriage. Ultimately, Alicent and Rhaenyra each had a competition and they wanted to be the chief first lady of the Realm in the book. They each respectively wanted to be the most powerful woman in Westeros and most important to Viserys as he is where their power stemmed from. I think we should have seen the days leading up to as well as the wedding itself. What the writers should have done to portray a more book-accurate Alicent and real conflict between the women isn't just make Rhaenyra resentful but still loving deep down to Alicent.

They could have had Alicent transition to her more book self; an ambitious, intelligent, scheming woman despite being aged down. Instead of having Viserys just choose her out of grief for Aemma, have him choose her out of genuine affection and perhaps even lust/love as I interpreted in the F&B. They could have kept Alicent unwillingly seducing Viserys and reluctantly marrying him, beginning the tension on Rhaenyra's end. However, after their wedding and after she gives birth to her son Aegon, they begin to slowly transition her to her book self especially after its clear that Rhaenyra is remaining heir. They could have created true and book-accurate conflict if they made their Alicent begin to enjoy Queenhood a little too much (as power changes and corrupts people) and beginning to have more and more influence over Viserys (as her relationship with Viserys in the book wasn't nearly as creepy or neglectful. In fact I think book Viserys may have loved Alicent more than Aemma, but still wanted Aemma's blood on the throne out of guilt). He chose Alicent regardless of better political choices or the protest of his council. They could have had Alicent and Rhaenyra beginning to compete for the attention of and influence on Viserys, Alicent subtly advocating for her newborn son to be named heir, Alicent enjoying her Queenhood and the power that comes from it, and leading to the real souring of her and Rhaenyra's relationship: both competing to be the most powerful woman in Westeros. The Crown Princess vs. the Queen. This way they still started off with the friendship, but Alicent's budding relationship with Viserys and birth of her children giving her more power as Queen making her relationship with Rhaenyra sour. Essentially, as Alicent continues to rise in power and bask in Viserys's attention/affection and enjoy her newfound role/power as Queen, real conflict and competition between her and Rhaenyra would show.

We'd have the competition, tension, and anger that gradually built up to help foster the eventual war either way as well as a chance to show the real political intrigue characteristic of GOT. However, for the sake of friendship and the false narrative Condal wanted to create, we don't get what I suggested that would have been the proper way to execute Alicent's aging down and friendship with Rhaenyra. Alicent can't truly and fully enjoy her Queenhood, take advantage of her power fully to its extent, or have relationship with Viserys. She can't be ambitious or compete with Rhaenyra. She has to have this complicated friendship, advocate for Rhaenyra while she was still young, be thankful of Rhaenyra's "compliments" at the dinner and even continue advocate after her children's birth to her father that Rhaenyra is the heir and only want Aegon to be heir out of just fear and her father's manipulation, rather than desiring power and believing Aegon to be the rightful heir. They have to have her say 'Rhaenyra will be a great Queen' and stuff like that.

Of course, Book Alicent advised with Queen Helaena for Aegon to send generous peace terms to Rhaenyra, but it wasn't out of love for her stepdaughter or "friend" in this show.. but because she didn't want her to son be labeled a kinslayer just yet as that would forever damage his image and he would be seen as cursed.We get scenes after scenes of their weird friendship dynamic all the way up till Alicent going Black. Scenes that ultimately distract and take away from the narrative. In fact, we should see more anger and resentment between these women that is taken away in favor of this friendship. For example, peace may have occurred between the warring factions early on when Aegon sent those peace terms. However, once Aemond murders Lucerys and then Daemon sends B&C who murder Jaehaerys in retaliation, any hesitation towards war and any lingering affection the factions and two women must have harbored for one another should be gone! Luke and Jaehaerys's murders highlighting two innocent lives lost on either side were the breaking point that put the Greens and Blacks at full on war. They were points of no return. However, not only do we see Rhaenyra never be outwardly angry and resentful of Alicent when they finally do reunite, but Alicent defects to the side who murdered her grandson. We see Rhaenyra grieve her loss, but we don't ever see it again after that one episode nor her anger and resentment and vengefulness that should come afterwards. We don't see Alicent grieve her grandson who was supposed to be murdered in front of her. Instead, the women are still complicated friends who don't even seem that angry at each other.

**My Takeaway? The Writers are Biased and Fail to Understand the Medieval Context of Westeros and Martin's Female Characters**

I love that Martin tries to write his women the way he writes his men. He has explicitly stated that he writes his women the way he writes his men. He states that women are people too. They can be driven by the same things men are in Westeros and/or the real world: love, anger, hatred, a desire for power, vengeance, grief, guilt, bringing glory to their name and themselves, a desire to protect their family, etc.

I felt we should have seen more of the kind of women that Martin writes. The kind of women that fit with his medieval-fantasy narrative that showcases how pursuing power at all costs leads to nothing but ruin. We should have seen layered women. We should have seen a more book-accurate Alicent. We shouldn't have to settle for a lackluster story where Alicent nowhere close to her book counterpart.

**And most of all, the HOTD team shouldn't subtly or outwardly bash the original source material as nothing but sexist propaganda to excuse the lackluster writing of the female characters being nothing like their book counterparts or subtly or outwardly write off critics and fans like myself as toxic for pointing it out.**

**Stay tuned for my part 2 of this post where I examine writing flaws and white washing of Rhaenyra Targaryen!** "

[little-candy-store-of-horrors]

"Bella gerunt alii, tu felix Austria nube!"

Day 6 of @spaus-week 's challenge

"Let others wage war, you, happy Austria, marry!" Was the political strategy of the Habsburgs, and marry did the House of Austria! Infamously, scandalously, sensationally. A mangled wreath of a family tree. We all know this horror story. And we all know the bitter end.

After Emperor Charles V&I divided his Spanish and Austrian inheritance ((also gained through his parents' and grandparents' marriages)) to his descendants and those of his younger brother Ferdinand I respectively, the Habsburg dynasty split into two branches. The Spanish and Austrian Habsburgs notoriously intermarried for generations, right up till Charles II of Spain whose heirless death in 1700 sparked the War of the Spanish Succession. The inbreeding and this informal Latin motto behind it has been blamed to hell and back for their implosion, for the physical ugliness that ran in this royal bloodline. But it is not to say the Habsburgs never went to war, nor that dynastic marriage was a political strategy unique to them! But they were, if anything, bloody successful at it seeing how they did rule half of Europe for 200 years, and then a lot of it in the Austrian line for another 200. Before anyone figured out inbreeding was bad it was considered a privilege to marry into the Habsburgs, with Louis XV claiming that Louis XVI's betrothal to Marie Antoinette was marrying the "Daughter of the Caesars", and Napoleon Bonaparte infamously ditching Josephine for Marie Louise. Charles II was a poor sod who took the fall and the mugs were wretched from the same ugly gene being passed around countless times*, but they did wear power and privilege well.

💅✨ Symbolism bc I'm a NERD and this my Category 10 autism event ✨💅 :

Charles V & Ferdinand I's joint portrait based on that propaganda woodcut, behind them the colours of the Habsburg flag.

The Spanish branch, comprising Charles V & I's descendants, is represented with a black background, and the Austrian branch, comprising Ferdinand I's descendants, gold, both colours pulled from their flag, a dynasty intertwined but split in two.

Round frames denote that the individual had no heirs.

Only the most influential ruler on both sides, the King of Spain and the Holy Roman Emperor, are represented as framed portraits, explaining Archduke Charles II's unframed depiction.

The unconventional placement of Charles II of Spain and Emperor Rudolf II's nameplates are a nod to their queerness: their intersexuality and bisexuality respectively.

Ferdinand III's portrait is lopsided because of the losses of the 30 Years War.

Cracks in Charles II's portrait: 🙃🙃🙃

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

SAKURA HARUNO (NARUTO)

1.) 1.) It is repeatedly stated throughout the series the areas in which she excels. We are told over and over again that she is gifted (early on in the series) or tremendously strong (end of the series) and yet with the exception of of the Sasori fight, there seems to be a staunch refusal to actually SHOW her being competent in a fight. 2.) her backstory ties into nothing plotwise as far as the overarching world and history of the village and its families. The three other leads (Sasuke Naruo, Kakashi) all get their own relevant backstory that gets delved into. But Sakura? Neither has one nor goes off and embroils herself personally into one of these overarching plot points. She is constantly forced to just be a companion/side character to the stories of her male counterparts. 3.) She’s given so much potential for a great powersuite and those all either go unrealized or she gets shown up by other characters. idk if this is what was meant by propaganda but its what i got

2.) Despite becoming the world’s best surgeon and doctor at age 17 (including doing open heart surgery in the middle of an active battlefield), her achievements are routinely undercut and underplayed by the canon.

It’s all the more disappointing because in some ways, she’s a very realistic and humanistic depiction of a teenage girl. Unlike her teammates, she grew up in what we would consider a pretty average family situation (two living parents who love her, even if they don’t understand her choices), and has relatively average goals at the beginning. Compared to her teammates who are orphans from dynastic ninja clans, who were basically born to a lineage of massive amounts of powerful ninja magic; Sakura’s civilian family has given her no genetic predisposition to being powerful. Despite this, she’s shown to be highly intelligent, achieving top scores on exams and having a deep knowledge for theory and concepts.

She begins the story having a crush on Sasuke Uchiha, a boy who has no interest in her, and hating Naruto, their village’s Omelas Child. However, as she works with her team, she bonds with them on a deeper level, and works very hard to meet their natural level of skill and not be deadweight on their team.

However, despite the fact that trios are treated with deep cultural and narrative significance throughout Naruto, the narrative quickly abandons the “Team 7 Trio” framing in all the ways that matter, becoming the Naruto-and-Sasuke show in all ways that matter. When Sakura gets her time to shine, she’s always undercut. Her massive physical strength and strong sense of self in Shippuden are never treated with the same reverence as her teammates’. Despite the fact that she can easily shatter rock and manipulate the ground with her sheer physical power, and that she was originally presented as good at genjutsu (illusion magic); she becomes a field medic/doctor – a carer/support role, rather than a DPS. Her decisions to advocate for herself and the people she cares about (such as trying to kill Sasuke) are treated as foolish and naive, not a heroic choice to try and help her friends at a large personal cost.

She also basically never gets to fight a man, except for one important case: Sasori. This is important, because the female characters in Naruto are routinely presented as less powerful and less of a threat than male characters. While her fight with Sasori is a fantastic arc, it ends with Sasori undercutting her victory by being like “well actually I wanted to die”, implying that he’d chosen to let her win, not that her win is well deserved. This is at the start of Shippuden, she doesn’t get a solo fight arc after that.

Of course, the most egregious thing done to Sakura is that she’s married off to Sasuke. Despite the fact that Sasuke is never once shown to give a shit about her, and the fact that her character development in a large part was about her giving up the childish and misogynistic desire to be a wife to the cute guy in her class, suddenly they’re together. Sasuke is a deadbeat husband, however, and immediately fucks off, to the point where he doesn’t recognise their child when he meets her, and tries to kill her. Sakura-the-housewife-waiting-at-the-window-for-her-husband’s-return is again now deeply in love with a man who doesn’t give a shit about her. The only photo she has of them together is shown to be a cutout of another photo of Sasuke stuck on a photo of her. She’s again trapped in a housewife box, her achievements and skill sideline to her ability to rear a child for the male lead. And worse, despite the fact she’s a very confident person who otherwise has no issue advocating for herself, she doesn’t really seem to fight back against this awful status quo in her relationship, grateful for the scraps of affection Sasuke delivers to her once a decade.

3.) Despite being on a team of three, she’s always side lined for the other two. Her whole thing is healing, then in a major arc at the end of the main series a character gets hurt and when she goes to attempt to heal them, she is pushed aside so Naruto can do his amazing magic healing that he just learned and is already better at it than her.

HINATA HYUUGA (NARUTO)

1.) When Hinata was introduced she goals, weaknesses, interesting interactions and relationships with characters other than naruto and a personality of her own. Post timeskip in shippuden, however, she was reduced down to simply ‘naruto’s future love interest’ and little else. The entire Hyuuga plotline was dropped and she no longer had any relevance or personality outside of naruto. Part 1 hinata was shy and insecure on the surface but underneath that she was determined & hardworking, even to her own detriment. Her struggles were compelling. Her interactions with neji and her family are something you look forward to seeing more of. In shippuden she’s like a flat carboard cutout of hinata. Her shyness exaggerated, her relationship with her family suddenly perfectly fine and boring. In part 1 naruto inspires her to keep trying but he isn’t the reason she’s working so hard, in shippuden he’s pretty much all she thinks about. Her change in character design really highlights these changes - the perfect little wife for cishet men to fantasise about.

2.) Her entire personality and arc is boiled down to “shy uwu waifu in love with Naruto” and basically any development she gets, which is barely at all because Kishimoto hates women, is as attributed to NARUTO and Naruto only. Even her reaction to her beloved COUSIN’S DEATH makes her be like “omg I love Naruto” and serves to further NaruHina, which is absolutely insane she would Not react like that. Naruto only starts being romantically interested in her at the beginning of like, The Last movie, which is after 500ish episodes of her being treated as the sidelined love interest who is devoted to a guy who only cares about her when she’s a damsel in distress on a fight.

There are so many parts of her character that are/could be interesting, like her part in the Hyuga Clan due to being born as a superior and her dynamic with her cousin Neji as a result, (which could have had SO many great moments of reconciliation and standing up for each other grrr grrr) an exploration of the impact of her bullying & being looked down upon (even when she’s supposed to be a superior member, which adds to the shame) LIKE MANY OF THE CAST, seriously the people Naruto trauma dumps to are mostly consisted of people unfairly treated like that and it could have been used to further NaruHina WHILE showing her struggles

She is an incredibly capable fighter but the moment Naruto is there, she instantly becomes defenseless and needs to be saved by her crush, mostly as a “wow look at him isn’t he so brave and kind to do this for her?!”

There’s an episode where she is literally used as a defenseless punching bag for Pein by trying to sacrifice herself for Naruto and telling him she loves him, JUST so he can be more angry and have more motivation to beat Pein’s ass (aside of the yknow. Killing his loved ones thing) AND her confession is ignored by Naruto for the rest of the series. Just like any moment she shows her crush for him is met with obliviousness, which would be fine if they weren’t the main couple and didn’t go on for THE ENTIRE SERIES!!!!

In Boruto, the shitty sequel, Naruto is basically her deadbeat husband in her bland lavander marriage and Boruto is rightfully mad about Naruto’s distance from the family and even says he left her basically a single mom and barely pays time to the family, and Hinata’s role in the show as the housewife is being like “no you see Boruto you have to understand your father’s pov as the Hokage” and the narrative treats NaruHina’s marriage as a Good, Healthy Thing as if the characters are not miserable in this marriage.

3.) Man I don’t even like her that much but she deserved SO much better. She was introduced as the heiress of a really powerful and renowed clan with complex dynamics, yet the author somehow decided to do almost NOTHING with the potential she had, and gave her very little personality besides being shy and fawning over the protagonist. She gets slightly more active in Shippuden (part 2), but her character still pretty much revolves around her love for Naruto, which sucks because again, she has so much potential. It’s no secret that women in Naruto are badly written, and Hinata certainly is no exception. The male characters get dozens of episodes/chapters about their motivations, their backstories, what pushes them to keep going, and Hinata gets almost nothing besides her lifelong crush on Naruto that we are reminded of literally every time she’s on screen.

[royalty-nobility]

Usenda

Artist: Isidoro Logroño Lozano (Spanish, 1826-1895)

Date: c. 1853

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain

Description

Queens Ermesinda and Adosinda (Usenda), respectively the daughter and granddaughter of Don Pelayo, played a crucial role during the Reconquest, recognised since the Middle Ages, as transmitters of dynastic rights in the Christian kingdom of Asturias. Isabella II gave them a place in the Chronological Series as titular or proprietary queens, which they apparently were not, in her efforts to shore up her own legitimacy. Although the Academy of History issued a report advising against this, both queens were kept in the gallery, although it was decided to remove the inscriptions identifying them as titular sovereigns and giving the dates of their reigns, which all the other portraits bore at the bottom of their frames.

[fumblingmusings]

Hello, I saw your post about FrUK. It is a year old post, but I wanted to say that I feel like Spain and France's rivalry pales in comparison to France and England's, you should give England more credit I feel 😭😭 the latter rivalry's impact was still huge on respective nations, even if it wasn't always as equal as Brits make it out to be

Oh gosh, I would never argue that France and UK aren't tangled together for sure, nor would I argue against anyone who thinks the UK and France are permanently sitting in each other's top three most influential partners.

I just think... So to explain why I'm always a bit 'well yes but no' for them I mean, is The Plantagenet conflicts were very much a dynastic bickering between two families and England inserting themselves into French business, rather than 'the Kingdom of England' trying to overthrow 'the Kingdom of France'.

I think it was very much a French Duke based around West France (who was coincidentally King of England) quarralling with a French king based in Central and Eastern France. Does that make sense? You can argue it was much more of an internal civil war with troops from England being shipped over to support one side, rather than the clear-cut 1v1 conflict.

Like, it's based around different French Kings trying desperately to boot the other family off any claim to the French throne and gain control of land that 'should' be theirs. No French king ever really wanted England. Plenty of English Kings have wanted France, but only insofar in that they were French themselves. Normandy, Aquitane, Gascony, and England were all lumped together. England was useful because he gave them the title of King compared to the French lands, which were merely Dukes. That's the only reason England mattered in many respects in the 13th century. The Hundred Years War was based around a slight where England was not enough in of himself, his Kings were greedy and wanted more. The Plantagenet wanted those French lands back, and did horrific things to France in the process.

BUT!!! This for sure changes with time. By the time of Agincourt, it was not a French Duke with a supplementary English title of King versus the actual French King: it was now framed as England v France. One of the first instances of the great time that is English nationalism.

Like here, the French offer of peace in 1396 - it's all about how England needs to back the fuck off because there are bigger problems for the French -

It reads very much like Francis grumbling for Arthur to get a grip. We should be mates dumbo! It's why the Tudors I see as being such a huge shift for Arthur. He is enough, on his own, but he could be more. He, throughout that century, grows increasingly disillusioned with the mainland. He loses Burgundy and Portugal to Spain, and he loses Flanders to France. Those were his friends, you know??? He didn't have that many to begin with! They were taken as part of a broader dick measuring contest between Captiens and Habsburgs. England really didn’t feature in that decision making. Instead, Spain and France used England like a ping pong ball in their game to undermine the other. Ergo, Arthur cannot trust Europe. So he looks elsewhere for power and control. Cue the Americas. All an extension of this European conflict.

It's something I think Hetalia actually gets sort of right in the dynamic writing- England being seen as small and lesser and just plain envious and France only ever really engaging with him to crow about how much better the French are than England.

I suppose I just think of FrUK as being a shifting dynamic, which is always centred around Arthur's need to be on equal footing to Francis, and it takes him a long time to get there. It's just for the first 500 years, Arthur himself wasn't even of consequence to the people he looked to in order to complete this task (i.e. his Kings who weren't named Edward I or Henry IV). He was useful for his name - that bloody title of KING - and not much more. By the time we get to the Tudors, particularly Liz I, Arthur gets to hear he is the centre of the world, a beacon for freedom for Protestant Europe. I imagine then, the conflict between him and Francis becomes much more personal, ironically with Arthur dropping any claims to the mainland.

Arthur's priority is to make sure there's no single power on top in Europe from about 1500 on. Once the French had well and truly kicked out any Plantagenet pretence to their land, France's goal is to be the dominant power in (Western) Europe. Arthur will always butt heads with Francis. Francis will not necessarily always butt heads with Arthur, since Arthur has no want of being number one in Europe.

This has been such a ramble. This is long and confusing, sorry. I don't mean to sell FrUK short at all!! It truly is a rivalry and love for the ages, like God I have written too much here. I just felt like the Spain France element is critically undervalued in the English speaking fandom when I first spoke of them. At least, from 1000-1500, it's Francis against differing parts of himself (one of which is using Arthur as a brutal destructive hurricane in a misdirected payback for Normandy) . 1500-1700 its Antonio always. But 1700-1850, oh yeah, it's Arthur and Francis all the way, baby.

Or at least, that's one way to frame them! I hope this all makes sense. That's how I read the early years. At least. It's one way to read it rather! Not the only way. Not the right way, either!

Tell you what, I was reading Brendan Simms 'Britain's Europe' the other month (it was a pre Brexit narrative written trying to argue that we have never not been deeply tied into the mainland) and it's so interesting to me, how frightened we were of the mainland. I would love a book in reverse however, what actions did European states make to preempt or respond to English actions.

To contradict myself from all that above that is: There's this one bit about how, just after Charles II came back after Cromwell died, that France was invading the lowlands and how there was a bunch of European thinkers bemoaning England's withdrawal from mainland politics. England was seen (accurately or not) as a land of liberty. France was not. I just think it's a great little bit of storytelling:

Europe frequently banked on England interfering in French ambitions. These two didn’t have the courtesy to make their bizarre rivalry between them. Half the HRE, Italy, and the Lowlands counted on England's ability to shove themselves in as a bulwark against France. It crops up again of course during the 18th Century, then again during Pax Britannia and finally again (this time against Germany) in WWII. England has a history of being prescribed 'last man standing' when it comes to Europe. That is not to say that Europe is necessarily happy with them having such a title though hahaha.

It's a good wee book! Quick read for sure.

Sorry, gone off topic as always...

[marianadecarlos]

Miniature portrait of Mariana of Austria

This painting is inspired by some of the portraits of Queen Mariana painted after 1665. Portraits on porcelain plates were common in Spain until the end of the 19th century. It is, therefore, likely that this painting was made in a French workshop, although it cannot be ruled out that it is a Spanish work from around 1900, when portraits of illustrious figures from the past became fashionable and were used to form dynastic ensembles. Its frame follows 17th-century models.

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #11 – The Maya (10th Edition) by Michael D. Coe and Stephen Houston

My second proper history book of the year, and significantly better than the first! This existed on the happy intersection of ‘the r/AskHistorian’s big list of recommenced works on Goodreads’ and ‘stuff my public library inexplicably has a copy of’. It’s dense and more than a bit dry reading, enough that I read it over the course of a week as a side-dish to more digestible fiction. Still, fascinating read, and a book that left more far better informed about the subject than when I started it.

The book is more or less what it says on the tin – a survey of the history of the Maya (or at least the current state of what’s known about it). The book opens with an explanation of the Maya language family, the relevant geography, the characteristics of the high- and lowlands, and the division into northern, central and southern area the field seems to use generally. The better part of it is then arranged chronologically, beginning with the Archaic Period, through the Pre-Classic and Classic, then then Collapse and the Post-Classic. The Spanish Conquest and history since gets a very abbreviated epilogue, ending with a few micro-anthropologies of different contemporary villages and then a five-page travellers’ guide to the most important sites and how to access them.

It’s all, as I said, quite dense – the sort of book where every paragraph adds at least one new important fact and very little time is spent on repetition or review. Combined with the usually very dry, expository tone, it feels much more like a textbook to be read with a lecturer or group to break down and dig into each section than something that was really written to be read alone and for pleasure. Which you know, makes sense, given that this is the tenth edition of a book originally written several decades before I was born.

Now, I say this is a history book, but that’s honestly a bit of a kludge – better to say it’s an archaeology book or, failing that, about anthropology and historiography. There is very little narativizing, and it is very much told from the point of view of the present. That is, the sections are organized chronologically, but within them the unit of analysis is the archaeological site, with every supposition explained as emerging from the analysis of some ruin or artifact or fragment of text. Far more time is spent on the architecture and layout of Mayan cities than the people who actually lived within them, simply because the author’s have so much more to say about them.

It’s only really in the chapters on the Classic (and, to a much lesser extent, post-classic) periods that the book goes from theorizing about building and pottery styles to speaking more confidently about royal courts and high politics and dynastic grandeur, and above all the attempts to give specific particular people a sense of personality and personal biographies that you generally expect out of a pop history book. Which does make sense, given that those are the only periods where we really have enough textual evidence to confidently name and ascribe significance to any particular people – overwhelmingly dynasts and war-leaders, because of course those are the (almost invariably) men who constructed stelae and covered the walls of temples with testaments of their own greatness.

This means that you do get more of a look into nuts and bolts of knowledge production that you do in most histories – a passage about the development of chocolate drinks as elite consumption is framed with the discovery of cocoa residue on preclassic ceramic vessels, one about human sacrifice by the discovery of skeletal remains in cenotes near major architectural sites, that sort of thing. Similarly, just about every single discovery or theory is credited to one or a few specific academics who initially made it. Which will be either incredibly interesting or the dullest thing in the world, depending on one’s tastes.

The text is mostly incredibly dry and expository in tone, which makes the points where a real sense of personality and subjective opinion leaks through interesting. And endearing, at least to me, but I just find there to be something instantly likeable about the sort of academic myopia which considers human sacrifice and mass famine from the point of view of the universe but is roused to passionate rage by suburban sprawl building over unexamined archaeological sites.

I knew little enough about the specifics of Maya civilization going into this that just relaying everything that struck me reading this would turn this review into a novella. But the way that lowland urbanization and agriculture were based around, not rivers like just about every other culture I’ve read on, but cenotes (and artificially constructed simulacra thereof) in the limestone to capture enough rainwater to last through the dry season was just fascinating. The fact that, the region’s reputation for inexhaustible lushness notwithstanding, the soil the Maya relied upon was very thin and in most cases totally degraded after just a few years of agriculture as well. (Speaking of, the theorizing about how diet changed over the ages and how this related to population movements and density was just fascinating).

The book really wasn’t that interested in the specifics of mythology or divine pantheons beyond how they showed up on engravings and ornamentation – there’s no bestiary of gods or anything – but there’s enough of that ornamentation for it to be a recurring topic anyway. I admit I still find the fact that there’s this great primordial pre-classic god-monster which in the modern era is just called ‘Principle Bird Deity’ deeply amusing.

The book is deeply interested in the Maya calendar and time-keeping. Along with the monumental architecture it’s pretty clearly the thing that the authors find most impressive and awe-inspiring about Classical Mayan culture. There’s enough time dedicated to explaining it that I even pretty much understood how the different counts and levels of timekeeping interacted by the end of the book.

One beat the book kept coming back to (which I admit suits my biases quite well) is that there’s just no sense in the Maya were ever isolated or pristine. Cultural influence coming down from the Valley of Mexico waxed and waned, but on some level it was constant – Mesoamerica was a coherent cultural unit, and the similarities in philosophy and culture (not to mention material goods) between cultures within it are too blatant to ignore. The book theorizes that the population levels reached in the Yucatan before the Spanish Conquest really couldn’t have been supported by local maize agriculture, and instead cities were probably sustained by harvesting and exporting from the salt flats (among the best in the Americas) they controlled access to.

Even beyond trade, there’s several points where ruling dynasties were toppled or installed by armies ranging down from Mexico. The Olmecs and Toltecs make repeated appearances. Even the conquistadors conquest of the Highlands was really only possible because the few hundred Spaniards who got all the credit were marching alongside several thousand indigenous allies.

Speaking of – it’s really only an aside to an epilogue, but given I mostly know the Anglo-American history here, it did kind of strike me how...traditionally imperialist the Spanish were, compared to the more-or-less explicitly genocidal rhetoric I’m used to. If you were an indigenous potentate or ruler enthusiastically selling out to the Spanish Crown was significantly more likely to actually work out for you than trusting a treaty with the US of A, anyway (well, for a while. Smallpox comes for everyone),

Then again, the book does mention that the newly independent Mexican and Central American states in the 19th century were actually significantly worse for the Maya than the Bourbons had been (with things reaching their nadir with the genocidal violence of the 1980s in Guatemala), so maybe that’s it.

Anyway, the book is illustrated, and absolutely chock full of truly beautiful photography and prints on just about every other page. Even if you never actually read it, it would be a great coffee table book.

[errantsquam]

dynast frame 00: zhurong

commissioning a friend to redesign this guy...! the redesign is still in the works but i decided to toss out a render real quick to test out the current iteration. big fan of it so far. may just roll with this one

anyway for those (target audience of 2, probably) who come for the worldbuilding, context: zhurong is ekaitz's mech with a built-in frame intelligence. the intelligence is kind of a douche, but they're created from the remnants of a long lost civilization and no one really understands how they function.

or where the rest of the mech came from, actually. the mech can slowly regenerate injuries or just show up elsewhere when completely destroyed. all it needs is elemental energy to power itself, so it can't enter oasis civilizations, which shelter sapient races from megafauna but don't provide enough energy for large magitech like these mechs

[garland-on-thy-brow]

Hidden music and hidden crime

(a slightly expanded version of what I wrote on Discord last night)

[Pharsalia book IV 252-253 trans. Jane Wilson Joyce / Suetonius Nero 20, translation via LacusCurtius]

The original lines of Lucan for reference:

ac, uelut occultum pereat scelus, omnia monstra                  252 in facie posuere ducum: iuuat esse nocentis.

Lucan may be translating and paraphrasing one of Nero's favourite sayings: "hidden music" becomes "hidden crime". Nero's debut in Naples occurred in 64; Nero's use of the proverb must predate it.

Moreover, I believe that the context in which Lucan's line is placed points at Nero's behaviour. The crime that Lucan's soldiers show so proudly is kinslaying. A large part of Nero's method was parading around his guilt in order to "frame the terms of debate over [it]" (Champlin): in particular, he had a penchant for performing Orestes and Alcmaeon, the matricides.

[Edward Champlin, Agamemnon at Rome: Roman Dynasts and Greek Heroes]

It should be noted that while the image Lucan draws ("Amid tables and couches / they gashed the flesh which but lately they'd held and caressed" - lines 245-246, Wilson Joyce) may not be related to Nero's murder of Agrippina, it resembles Nero's murder of his stepbrother Britannicus at a banquet.

And so it appears to me that Lucan draws a metatextual connection between singing and crime. It is applicable to Nero (he sings on stage, performing his own crimes); it is applicable also to Lucan himself (his act of writing the poem revives the crimes and guilt of civil war and puts them on display, so they may not remain hidden).

[angevinyaoiz]

saw Dune 2 (2une?), and since I don't have my dune blog anymore I'll post here, since blah blah this is my place for posting about Dynastic Weirdos. This is long but NO MAJOR SPOILERS, except about like, small detail things that aren't plot things but whatever

Tbh it was disappointing. It had all the correct elements to be liked but one thing grated on me the whole time...the Bad Dialogue and lack of Elevated Speech! Why the hell were all these characters saying stuff like "these guys" "we're ok" and "literally" it took me out of the fantastical world sOOO bad. Super bummer because what I loved about Dune 1 (D-uno?) As someone who went into it before reading or knowing anything was how much it didn't explain, how it let the visuals and the world unfold before you, and how serious and somber it was in a way that gave it a sense of scale and time.

I can only wonder if WB saw all the complaints and tweets about people being like "we didn't understand the first movie!!! It wasn't funny and quippy!!!" And decided to simplify it down so characters just SAY things really obviously and inelegantly. The writing has some competence in moving the story forward but there's no poetry or rhythm to the way characters say things, it's serving "Rings of Power" scriptwriting to me lmao. And it's not like any of the actors are bad? I've seen them do well in the previous movie and in other things, so wtf was going on with the direction. I know people complained Abt Villeneuve saying that whole thing about being more into visuals than dialogue but maybe he was right...there needed to be LESS WORDS. bc much of the words we had were NOT GOOD.

Positivity: the middle and latter part was where the movie picked up for me. The Harkonnen Freak Villain behavior was everything I could have wanted! Finally instead of EXPLAINING everything obviously we got to see a LOT of character building, for Feyd specifically in a very short amount of time. I know a lot of us complained about Bald Feyd-Rautha but Mr Elvis did a very good job. And we got Madame Fenring and weird scifi femdomming finally, which is Essential for the Duniverse! Wonderful fantastic no notes.

Of course, getting back to our heroes, I anticipated this 2 years ago sadly and it was true...the Fremen were badass but SWAGLESS. More Learned ppl have already written about the frustration with the erasure of the Arabic/North African cultural presence so I won't reiterate that here since I'm not super knowledgeable about the specifics of that but even as a casual watcher there was a weird emptiness to the way I feel the society was portrayed. There were individual good character moments, such as fun bantering among the Fedaykin etc, but for Pacing or Whatever they cut out the community aspects that served to make them feel more like well, a People rather than just either Grizzled Soldiers/ Religious Fundamentalists aka Marks/Panicked refugees. I have to guess this was ppl were like "we can't show a culture too cool and colorful and the part with Harrah (Jamis' widow) would feel too ORIENTALIST!!! But the result is something sadly very dry. At least in more older orientalist works, the interest comes from when the ~exotic~ stereotypes figures are able to have charming personalities and personalities and be known as people despite the cliches sometimes but this sadly wasn't even like that....

Jamis' funeral is a good example of this; in the Book, it's a moment where you first get a good look of what rituals are like in this world, and how people relate to each other and to the dead. In the movie, the funeral is looks more foreign and even a little creepy as the water is extracted from the body. There's not really a Personal or community connection aspect to it at all.

The ending was pretty good as it satisfied all the Cool Dune Moments I think we all wanted to see, and also did literally the end of The Godfather Part 1 Framing which was hee hee heh. Anyways, Messiah is MY favorite book of the series personally so curious how they get to that.

Maybe I've been too spoiled by Cool Historical Fiction lately? I've been watching too much of The Devil's Crown where action happens mostly off screen but the dynastic drama is written and acted so compellingly, the historical mindset and setting so alien and yet so human and relatable, it's frustrating to see when works try to do the opposite? Idk??? Dune books themselves is fun in how action is mostly an "offscreen, offstage"' thing.

*if ANYONE in the Universe is a quippy Bastard, it should be Leto II esp in God Emperor where he literally has nothing to do all day but quip all day to terrified acolytes

[ghostinthegallery]

Time to overthink another necron guy!

Anrakyr the Traveler! Overlord of Pyrrhia (Pyrhhia? I never get it right, hang on...okay it's Pyrrhia). Blue guy who's good with machines and drew the short stick when it came to necron nicknames (Silent King! Stormlord! Diviner! Infinite! Traveler...sorry it just doesn't have a same vibes)

To get a little meta right off the bat, when I'm analyzing a character (a thing I just do for fun in my spare time because I'm a normal person), I generally start with the question most authors are going to frame that character's story around: what does this person want and why? Sometimes that's easy. An author (or multiple authors) has already written that character in a way that clearly outlines their goal+motivation so I just start there and let my thoughts run wild. Trazyn wants to collect things for his museum because he is a kleptomaniac gremlin believes in the inherent value of culture and history. Szarekh wants to reverse biotransference because it sucks and its his fault. That is the seed from whence all rambling blooms for me.

Anrakyr...does not have that clarity.

We do know what he wants! To awaken and unite all the sleeping necron dynasties. That's where his name comes from: traveling the galaxy, seeking out tombworlds to bring them up to speed on the state of this messed up galaxy we call home. Okay cool. Why does he want to do this? Uh...

Even in-universe, this question doesn't have a clear answer. To some, he's incredibly noble. He left behind his homeworld, sacrificing his throne, to help his people adjust to a tumultuous new era. A lot of these tombworlds are waking up damaged, or occupied by hostile alien species that didn't exist when they went to sleep. Maybe their planet is in a different part of space. It sure would be nice to have someone explain everything before an ork eats your face.

The opening paragraphs of Devourer refer to Anrakyr as "would-be overlord of the necrons." Does that just refer to the dynastic rank of overlord (if so, why add on the "would-be" since he literally is an overlord?) or does that line hint at higher ambitions? Is he trying to unite the dynasties under him? That's certainly possible! Ambition is not exactly unusual for necron nobility. It explains his suspicion towards the triarch prateorians who follow him around (put a pin in them). He thinks of them as spies, servants of a rival...and that rival is The Silent King. That's one hell of an enemy to choose.

Cool, right? Except there's another side to Anrakyr. Because he doesn't just go around helping other tombworlds, he demands a price: weapons, legions, other tributes. To some, who have just woken up and had lifesaving information dangled in front of them only to have it ripped away if they don't pay up? That doesn't seem strictly altruistic.

Anrakyr is fine killing his own subordinates for failure (see the Carnac campaign where he sets up his own general to die for the crime of not killing space elves with suitable efficiency). Of course, given that most of Anrakyr's armies are tributes, most of his forces aren't loyal to him per se. Aside from the immortals that left Pyrrhia with him. But overall he's in an awkward spot within his own army.

Except if Anrakyr wants to rule...why leave behind Pyhrria, the planet he literally ruled?

You see my problem here?

Okay then, where does that leave us? A goal with a bunch of conflicting motivation, actions, and no clear answers. And I admit, I was stuck here with Anrakyr for a while! I kind of wrote him off as "The Stormlord we have at home" and moved on.

Until I started writing for him myself. At which point "this dude is an inconsistent mess" doesn't really cut it.

The thing about people (and by extension characters) is that people change. Especially when a bunch of different unconnected writers major, violent events happen across millennia. So what if both versions of Anrakyr are true? What if the well-intentioned savior and the would-be conqueror are each aspects of the same person.

Going back to those three triarch praetorians.

For those unaware, Anrakyr has the joy of hosting three emissaries from the triarchy. Three praetorians whose names he does not know, so he literally just named them the necron equivalent of A, B, and C. He assumes they are spies for Szarekh, to whom he has no interest in pledging service, but he still keeps them around. They are mysterious, they literally hang random trinkets from their head pieces like Christmas ornaments, and they give cryptic advice.

What the heck are these three doing here?

I guess they could be spies, but why the heck would Szarekh send three praetorians to keep an eye on Anrakyr who really is not that important in the grand scheme of necron politics? Don't get me wrong, he's not a nobody, but...he's got a ragtag army, a planet he doesn't visit, and some Blood Angels he teamed up with one time. This is not someone the Silent King desperately needs to watch out for.

But hey, speaking of Blood Angels, remember The Word of the Silent King? The one short story where Szarekh has an active presence. Guess who else is in that story?

Anrakyr the Traveler.

He's in the first line! The necron half of the story is being told to him by one of the praetorians. Why draw such an intentional parallel between these two characters? Sure, sets up Anrakyr's involvement in the Devastation of Baal lead up (ngl I don't know the order these stories were published it could be the other way around, either way GW is tying up their lore in a bright little bow) but narrative continuity is a BORING answer for CHUMPS so LET'S GO DEEPER!

What might three weird little triarch praetorians see in Anrakyr that they also see in Szarekh?

Tragedy.

Szarekh's entire character is defined by tragedy (see my ramble about him for details). What if Anrakyr is in a similar position? What if he started his journey with all those good intentions? The desire to save his people, free them from alien invaders? And overtime those intentions got corrupted, turning him into the harsh, suspicious, bitter person we see in Devourer? The Anrakyr in that story doesn't care about the tombworld he's supposedly saving. He hates organic life, he needs the reinforcements from that world...but never does he truly express concern about it. Or sorrow when he finds it consumed by the flayer virus. But consider how many tombworlds he's seen fall to the flayer virus? Or infighting, or madness, or aeldar, or orks, or humans, or a random supernova or a million other things? Imagine how many worlds he found but could not save? This is a person who has lost the plot.

But the person who inspired those stories of nobility still exists. He still organized a massive campaign of different dynasties to save the tombworld of Carnac. He still defended necron tombworlds against the Silver Skulls (who are a real space marine chapter and not just a Trazyn goof!). He still fought Tyranids alongside the Blood Angels and the Mephrit.

Anrakyr's praetorian buddies have told him the Silent King won't speak to him. Yet. But Szarekh will if Anrakyr proves worthy. Anrakyr probably doesn't care either way, but for a praetorian to say this about their king is huge. To me it shows that they believe Anrakyr could be worthy, one day. They think he's worth watching. Not as a ruthless crusader, but as another person who suffered for their good intentions and came through it with a renewed purpose.

[wonder-worker]

"...The rise of royal bureaucracy and organized jurisprudence from the eleventh century was transforming formal government operations into a male preserve. At the same time, the Policraticus by […] John of Salisbury gave the body politic its classic medieval formulation as patterned on the human body. Morphological analogy exemplified an ideal cooperation among that body's members, but no function John detailed administrative, military, conciliar, or ecclesiastical-nor any bodily member to which these functions corresponded, implied a female body. A king's male frame, especially, embodied his realm and betokened its strength and vigor; its impermeability figured the security of the realm's boundaries from intrusion or invasion. To a body politic so imagined, women in general, queens in particular, were outsiders, their pervious bodies perilous openings that could threaten the realm. Subjected by royal ritual to the king's body as the site of supreme authority, the queen's body could not serve as the seat of power.

These developments did not bar kings' wives from all access to power, but they did critically affect representations of a queen's position and the methods open to her. The rise of bureaucracy meant that, as reflected in the disappearance of queens' names from witness lists to twelfth-century English and French royal charters, the advisory role of a king's wife was no longer officially publicized. [...] Of course, charters and other records that witness such changes were written from a male perspective, and do not prove that queens' power was contracting. But the way they were seen to perform their roles changed significantly. It was no longer visibly, in the council chamber, that a queen fulfilled the duties the coronation ordo urged upon her as a counsellor, mediator, or intercessor with the king. Given her primary function as the mother of his children, the focus of her activities was now the bedchamber, in which at least one thirteenth-century queen chose to receive petitioners as a means to advertise her intimate relationship to the king as the real base of her power. ['But if queens no longer shared openly in formal consultation, medieval royal government was always personal and [...] directed from the royal household, whose domestic model gave that household's women effective if informal means to persuade royal business.'] As this intimate, wifely access to the king was not rightly subject to (male) official restraint, any formal limits on her voice implied by her advertised presence in the council chamber fell away. Whatever other parts of the regal anatomy she did or did not command, she was always assumed to have the king's ear. But any wife, queen or subject, who was seen to abuse an ecclesiastically sanctioned access to her husband menaced the right order of society. Thus a queen's persuasive influence, inextricably tied to her sexual and domestic role as bedfellow, could seem to threaten the order idealized and represented by evolving male officialdom in ways not understood to exist when her place was affirmed in written acts that announced the king's decisions. The queen was left uneasily poised between the official and the domestic, a position that heightened fears about her ability to sway the king and her potential role in court intrigue. Chroniclers witnessed these anxieties about queenly influence by focusing on the approved performance, or the perceived corruption, of a queen's domestic roles as wife or mother. If later medieval portrayals thus make it seem that queens' power had declined, they none the less witness, by criticizing behavior as inappropriate or by praising compliant and selfless deeds, consorts' continued eminence as exemplary figures to society, as potential participants in court intrigues, or as fomenters of confllict, especially in the familial contexts that remained central to dynastic politics. Significantly, Peggy McCracken sets within this same changing political terrain her study of the increasingly prominent image of the adulterous queen in Old French romance."

-John Carmi Parsons, "Damned If She Didn't and Damned When She Did: Bodies, Babies, and Bastards in the Lives of Two Queens of France", Eleanor of Aquitaine: Lord and Lady (Edited by Bonnie Wheeler and John Carmi Parsons)

[kemetic-dreams]

What did Roman Empire pagan soldiers think of fighting under Constantine and Christianity?

Probably not very much.

The Roman military was a world of its own. More than today, soldiers had their very identity shaped by the institution and people they served. Upon enlisting, they swore allegiance to the emperor and received new names as his servants — Valerius during the tetrarchy and Flavius under Constantine. Those who didn’t speak Latin were pushed to acquire a basic grasp of it, pretty much like the French Foreign Legion of today. Starting from the late republican period, Roman soldiers were accustomed to receiving salaries, booty and pensions from their commanders, not the state in an abstract sense. Under the empire, loyalty often lay with the emperor, as long as he was perceived as strong.

In that frame, Constantine never lost the faith of his men thanks to his talents, accomplishments and image. It surely helped that he was Constantius Chlorus’ son, but dynastic feelings were not so strong in the 4th c. What really mattered was that he was a victorious imperator, with plenty of experience both before and after his ascension. His CV included wars against, and victories over, foreigners (Franks, Goths, Alamanni) and rival emperors (Maxentius, Licinius) alike. That kept soldiers satisfied and himself secure on the throne. Besides, Constantine took care to associate his military exploits with the Christian God. On the contrary, his sons failed to live up to his legacy and had to face claims by men like Magnus Magnentius and Julian.

Another thing to consider is the role of religion in the then Roman military. In general, early Christianity wasn’t unanimously for or against military service, hence a decent minority of soliders were Christians even before Constantine. In the late 3rd c., you could find Christians like St. Marcellus holding even the rank of centurion. The statesman Cassius Dio is reported to have spoken of Christians in the comitatus of all four original tetrarchs. Cases of individual disobedience cannot be excluded, of course, but the military was, above all, a state mechanism. Under Diocletian, they persecuted Christians; under Constantine, they fought the Donatists and may have even destroyed the Asclepieion at Aegae, Cilicia.

On his part, Constantine didn’t adopt Christianity the way most people after his time imagine(d). There was a long, gradual process, for the most part inscribed into the norms of late antiquity. Nomenclature and visual language were preserved to a considerable extent. Separate Christian and non-Christian prayers are reported to have been taking place at the same time. At some point in the 320s, a group of veterans greeted Constantine with the traditional “May the gods preserve you for us” salute. Two elite army units, Diocletian’s Jovians and Maximian’s Herculians, were not rebranded, although their names recalled the gods Jupiter and Hercules whom the late tetrarchs associated themselves with.

With the benefit of hindsight, we now know that the dynamics of that complex situation ended up favouring Christianity — if anything, all of Constantine’s successors were Christians except for Julian. That, however, should not be taken out of context. Few have a panoramic view of their time or the acumen to predict the future, and the provincials who made up the bulk of the late Roman military were not among them. Even if they were, though, they may not have had particularly strong feelings about any potential outcome. At the same time, various (quasi-)henotheistic traditions like the cult of Sol Invictus and Mithraism were around. The period was transitional, hence quite fluid.