#enough of me blabbing

[theloveinc]

hi caitie love im sorry people are being mean to u like ur literally the sweetest loveliest person with such wonderful vibes they must be grasping at straws to hate on you 😭

i love what u said in the tags <3 you’re so lovely and i love how u word things and speak your mind clearly in such a genuinely nice way too <33

i heard that you can block anons who send nasty hate by pressing the three dots on their ask, i hope this might help :)

i hope you have a wonderful day/night and remember to stay hydrated dearie! <3

no no no, don't worry! no one is being mean to caitie!! i just know anon hate has been a big topic of discussion lately and it makes me kinda upset seeing the different ways people unpack it on the dash.

i'm such a... idk if the right word is bleeding heart or snake or WHAT lol but thinking about the way anon hate hurts EVERYONE involved just gets me kinda emo because. absolutely no one deserves to receive such awful treatment, but i truly feel bad for the people out there who are so hurt themselves that they need to take those emotions out on others through abusing the anon-ask system. i've grown so much since feeling this way but i can def relate to the anger that those kinds of feelings (self hatred, jealousy, loneliness) create.

all honestly, i'm really lucky because i've never had anyone on here consistently bully/harass me, and i think that's why i have such a hard time talking about anon hate in the first place, because i don't think my opinions are really relevant to what a lot of fellow bloggers go through. but i'm absolutely a supporter of blocking hate on sight!

it's true that i have a lot of empathy for my haters out there, but at the same time, that doesn't mean it needs to be rewarded with an answer, either! ;)

anyway anon, thank you so, so much for this! i will never be able to thoroughly express how much your kindness and positivity means to me other than by saying have a good every day too!!🥺🥺🥺go kiss yourself in the mirror and pretend it's me kissing you because I LOVE U !!

[muzzlemouths]

can i also be beautiful if i am dangerous?

[cosmicvaca]

Star Platinum’s arms closed around her, tight without being crushing, and the stand rested her cheek against the top of Jotaro’s hat. Her initial instinct was to squirm away. Pressed that close, she could feel Star Platinum’s breasts against her back. Why did her stand have the proper body when Jotaro didn’t? It was bullshit. When squishing the disappointment out of her didn’t work, Star Platinum flitted over to the other side of the room, one huge hand digging through Jotaro’s luggage, unzipping its inner pockets until she found something and darted back. When she uncurled her fingers, Jotaro’s dark blue lipstick lay in her broad palm. It hadn’t burned up with her original coat, since she had started keeping it in her luggage after the close call of Polnareff trying to jam his hand into her coat pocket looking to bum a cigarette, the other week. She still hadn’t gotten the opportunity to try it on, and it was still pristine. Her hands were shaking, as she raised the tube to her mouth. After a lifetime of watching her mother do this, Jotaro knew how—hell, if she was putting it on someone else (Kakyoin, her brain insisted, Kakyoin with his wide mouth pursed for her to paint soft pink...) it would have been easy. At this rate, she’d probably smear it down her chin. Star Platinum gently took it from her, her fingers dwarfing the lipstick as she held it between her thumb and index finger. Her other hand came up, very lightly holding Jotaro’s chin still. Her first stroke was tentative and barely left any pigment, like she was afraid to break it in half, but at Jotaro’s direction, soon she had lined her lips in dark blue. It looked good. It didn’t give her a chest, or round out her hips, or fix the trainwreck between her legs, but... Despite the harsh color, her face looked a little softer, more feminine. She could be the kind of girl to leave little lipstick marks on the ends of a cigarette, or on a coffee cup, like her Nonna Lisa Lisa. Strong but elegant. If there were vampires and stands in the world, then there could be girls with boyish bodies, right?

Have not been able to get this from chapter 3 of "Watching for the Tide" by glasscamellias on Ao3.

Save me trans girl Jotaro save me

Commissions and alts under the cut

[gotchibam]

Does anyone here draw in both desktop & mobile? I'm planning to get a galaxy tab at some point and since I don't really have any experience drawing on a (mobile) tablet, I'm curious abt how it feels to draw on one vs. drawing on pc w/ a graphic tablet 🤔

[knightwhoisni]

concept: unromanced eleanor as drifter's romantic advisor and wingwoman. how successful she actually is at this depends on how serious she's feeling.

[sketchy-tour]

Update on the me again! No art to share but guess who started reading House of Leaves!

I'm only on chapter 2 but man it's got my head turning! And I already know it only gets crazier the further I go in. But man it's so fascinating! Like an ARG in book form! Very fun!

My AP Lit brain from high-school is having a field day lol

[pencilofawesomeness]

I was so caught up in the euphoria of making shit up, I forgot I wasn't uncontested. Wild that canon exists and is ongoing. Wild.

[dangdfeng]

i enjoy digital circus a lot and it's well aligned with my taste of content but imma be real its gotten to that point of popularity where id prefer if ppl just. stopped talking. and waited until the next episode is out. does anyone else feel this. i feel like we have said everything that needed to be said. and it feels like it got a fandomfication speedrun on MAX. ive seen plenty of things blow up with praise and popularity to a point they get hated on for said popularity because its inescapable to those who dont vibe with it... but i dont think ive seen it happen this fast. it has been one week and ive seen it all

also kinda interesting how people kind of treat it like its a full movie when it's just a pilot, and a lot of other cartoon pilots uploaded on YouTube haven’t gotten nearly the same treatment. I just hope people keep in mind that there's often changes between pilot and series and also no show ever peaks at the first episode anyways

[maingh0st]

I always noticed that Warner guy is always compared to Cardan. Thoughts?

hm, wild. they live in very different categories of characters in my mind haha. I guess on a surface level, they occupy similar spaces narratively: they start out as a more antagonizing figure to the MC, but you can tell that their obsession with the MC is shot-through with attraction. and they eventually become the I Worship My Wife kind of MMCs, which is fun but not exactly uncommon in fiction.

but while Cardan is an individual schoolyard bully who represents something very personal to Jude (he is a living reminder that she does not belong in Elfhame), Warner is an active representative of an oppressive global order that has made Juliette's and countless others' lives Very Bad. the power dynamic is really different, and has to be handled a lot more sensitively. and (in my opinion) I'm... not sure it is.

I think my biggest gripe with Warner as a character (and I am really not trying to start discourse here—people enjoy what they enjoy, whatever; I thought he was hot when I was a teen, too) is that his actions are almost always presented very romantically, and the narrative rarely tells us he's wrong. Juliette is the silly little woman who just doesn't understand, but thank goodness the love interest knows that she does like him, she is attracted to him, and she does want the power he offers her. silly girl, he knows you better than you know yourself! this is not uncommon in fiction; authors seem to think that a male character knowing better than a female character and forcing her to "become powerful" is somehow girlboss feminism (SJM and the "it's your choice" nonsense 🔪)

Warner also demonstrates a frankly concerning level of obsession with Juliette (maybe another reason people try to compare him to Cardan?), going so far as to steal and memorize sections of Juliette's diary, which she feels very violated by (they're her most private, intimate thoughts from a very dark time in her life! holy shit buddy who gave you the right!). but rather than the narrative being like "wow isn't this scary and weird and a total violation of her privacy?" he gets rewarded for Knowing Her So Well and ultimately gets to be her malewife.

Cardan, on the other hand, is wrong. we know he's wrong! the author knows he's wrong! and while the narrative shows us reasons that he is the way he is, it does not use those reasons to justify him. it makes him more understandable, but he still has to apologize and change. Jude is not treated as silly for disliking and mistrusting him; she's absolutely in the right! and Cardan has to realize that he has misunderstood her and both underestimated her (not realizing just how much of a threat she is) and overestimated her (thinking that nothing really hurts her bc she's so tough).

also, Cardan is more fun. there, I said it! Warner is melodramatic and purple proses @ the reader about what a Conflicted Guy he is. Cardan is a slutty little dude with crushing self-confidence issues who gets tricked into the Number One Job He Did Not Want and decides to cope with it by being Very Silly, and then somewhere along the way realizes that he can actually do a good job at it. he oopsies his way into being Elfhame's best king. who's doing it like him?

[thefirstradiant]

DEAN WINCHESTER!

Okay? Did I get y’all’s attention? I heard this song in the car a few day ago and immediately had a million thoughts. I also immediately began crying, thanks. This song cuts deep to Dean’s core (some Sam thrown in there too) and I think you all should give it a listen. If you care to read my line by line thoughts, they’re under the break because it got LONG lmao.

I made a home here in unsteady things

It was hard to think that I could ever leave

For me I see most of this song through Dean’s perspective, but that could also just be because I’m so Dean-coded that it’s also just my perspective. I’m picturing the constant moving around as kids with John and trying to make a home in the hundreds of motels. I’m picturing the Impala, adult Dean’s first real home, and how he brought Sam back into it. I don’t think Dean thought he could ever leave this life and at times he didn’t want to, even if it was unsteady.

So I gave my breath each time she couldn't breathe on her own

This is both of them, but from my Dean perspective of the song and the earliest time we see it in the series, this is Dean trading his soul for Sam. It’s also Dean as a kid giving Sam all his food and treats and energy and his everything so he could breathe just a little easier and contentedly.

I felt her scars and asked her nervously

Who was the thief that stole your certainty?

Demon-blood Sam to me. This is Dean scared of his brother and his powers and realizing that he may be more messed up by their childhood than he thought. This is Dean cursing himself for not doing a good enough job of protecting Sammy so that nothing could ever hurt him. Dean can see all the scars that that addiction left on Sam and it kills him and confuses him at the same time.

She didn't know, she lost it some time long ago

Oh Sammy. This part is just sad. No matter how hard Dean tried as a kid and young adult, Sam was already damaged. He was bound to fall into the demon blood addiction.

I've fought so long, it's what I do

My fists are fine, it's just my soul's a little bruised

Daddy’s blunt instrument. Soldier of Heaven. Ultimate Killer. Need I say more? This is Dean hearing everyone else tell him that fighting is what he does. He comes back every time so he must be fine right? Wrong. Some wounds aren’t visible.

But I'll stay on my feet until I lose

But I never learn to lose

My favorite lines. They give me shivers. This is what we know Dean for. The man who absolutely never gives up. Who would get back on his feet a million times over again for Sam. And then the “learn to lose” part. Throughout the show we see this in Dean. He doesn’t know how to process his loved ones leaving him or dying or their plans failing. He just needs that next “big win”. This is my favorite unfinished (thanks finale) exploration of Dean.

It's hard to know me

At least you tried

It's hard to love in the cold

And it's gotten so cold outside

Ah the chorus. Really punches home how Dean feels. He loves that Sam tried to know him and stay with him, even if he still can’t see that he ever deserved it. The cold gives me such amazing imagery here of desolation, of emptiness. It is HARD to love in the face of such emptiness that we see time and time again during the apocalypse events and times when the brothers get separated. But they’re still trying. They’re shivering in the cold, but trying.

My younger years went by so urgently

And left me grief that I'm still servicing

Quite obviously Dean. Just want to point out I love the word choices of urgently and servicing. I think Dean will always be servicing his trauma from John and his upbringing, but I just so wish we could have seen some conclusion to his attitude of not caring about himself at all. Stupid finale with the “it was always about you, Sam”. Dean deserved to love himself.

If good times change, why do the bad days stick around?

No thoughts just me crying over Dean sitting in the bunker, happy, maybe cooking and smiling with Jack. Sam’s reading the paper and drinking coffee. Sometime in the later seasons when they think they’ve won. And then Dean just feels this crushing weight and wonders why, when everything around him points to being happy, he just can’t feel it.

She said, I'll just keep going to be kind

To that same little girl who wondered why her parents cried

Ah back to Sammy. I could write a lot about Sam watching John abuse Dean as a child, but I won’t because it would go on forever. These lines feel to me like Sam as an adult trying to understand how different his childhood experience was from Dean’s and coming to terms with, yes, Dean may have seemed to have it worse, but that doesn’t mean Sam was unscathed. Sam realizes this and has to change his thoughts toward himself. Also Sam comforting Dean.

Cause she grew up and learned to lie like them

Dean watching Sammy grow up a hunter and fight and kill and all the things he really never wanted for his baby brother that he swore to protect.

I've tried to lie to you

But boy you listen to me with your eyes as well

In the song, this is still from Sam’s perspective and it’s really interesting to me with the closeness and codependency these brothers have. They don’t lie to each other well at all. It’s a forced closeness from their childhood and lifestyle where all they have is each other. This is Sam trying to persuade Dean to let him go his own way etc. Dean doesn’t listen well and sees Sam instead and how much he needs him, both because he wants to help him and because Dean is very codependent as well.

And it's hard to see me

At least you tried

It's hard to love in the cold

And it's gotten so cold outside

Beautiful chorus again. Makes me cry. This time saying “it’s hard to SEE me”. Dean almost never feels seen, even when people try to, because he just can’t accept their love unless he loves himself first.

Farewell my uncle

And farewell his son

I mean, this is the Winchester farewell to all the family that they’ve lost along the journey. The bitter cold outside takes its toll not just on Sam and Dean but everyone around them. Uncle of course makes me sad about Bobby again. And son could be a lot of different people. I read it a lot as Dean’s feelings about his “kids”. Claire, Alex, Jack, Ben… Just a very full circle moment to Dean saying goodbye to his childhood and trying to make a difference in some other kid’s experiences.

Farewell the pieces

Cause they're all I was

This is older Dean looking back on his years of hunting and watching all the pieces and fractures he was at the times. When he felt like he was only half there or had to put aside his grief because the world was ending, like it always was. I like to think Dean is trying to say goodbye to that. He wants to be whole, he wants to be happy but he doesn’t really know how. He never learned how.

Will you stay with me,

As I turn to dust?

Like I said, he never really learned how to “carry on”. In a part of his mind, he would just be turning to dust. Once the world is saved, once Sammy is saved, what then? He reaches out, clutching to whatever he knows, just wanting to not be alone. He finds Sam and Cas and family and thinks, maybe I can just stay like this. I still think he thinks he’s in some limbo, just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

When you tell their story

Tell them I was loved

Cries. Just,, Dean doesn’t even think of himself as the one to tell the story. He just passes himself by. Sam can tell the story. Sam can carry on. Also he doesn’t want to be this tragic story he’s been playing out for years. When he’s gone, just tell a happy story, tell about his favorite foods, his Impala, how much he loved cowboy hats. He doesn’t want to be a heavy burden even when he’s dead. Maybe in a bedtime story, he can be a firefighter in small yeehaw town without depression or a traumatic childhood. And maybe he can just Be.

So now you see me

For the first time

This song is Dean laid bare. His grief, his purpose, his pain, his love, his family, his fear, his determination, his strength, his Sam. He WANTS people to SEE him, but at the same time, he can’t put that heavy burden on anyone. Except he learns a little about how to place it on Sam towards the end. If anyone really Sees Dean, it’s Sam. And it took him a long time to see him “for the first time”.

It's hard to love in the cold

But boy, it's time I tried

And there we have the core of Dean. His love. His love in the face of everything. The fact that he TRIES. And TRIES. And TRIES AGAIN. He may not ever have thought he was good enough, but to so many, he was. He was more than good enough. He was the best. And they all loved him so much. Especially Sam.

*sighs* time to go listen to the song a few more times and cry about how Dean never got the chance to finish his story and his growth. We could have had Dean loving HIMSELF. That’s his ending. His real one.

[theloveinc]

[might-be-tiny-gt]

MY FINAL IS OVER!!! IM DONE IM FREEEEEEE!!

[energeticpoltergeist]

i have yet again drawn something Fire Emblem related

still kinda sucky at drawing FE characters, but im slowly figuring it out and seeing as i have plans(which i'll hopefully be able to act upon sooner then later, no promises though) im going to be getting a lot of practice in my future anyways yeah, Chrom time

[gotchibam]

Just a lil reminder for my current commissioners that I have a trello board for updates & backlog of requests in case you guys missed it :)

Also I still have 4 commission slots open if anyone's interested! (doesn't have to be pkmn - any kind of characters will do!)

[professorllayton]

back on the top baaabbyy

[pencilofawesomeness]

What is Twisted Wonderland and how would you sell someone on it?

Ohoho. Ohohohoho. Anon. You have activated my trap card >:D

(I'm about to be soooo annoying/unhinged and I'm sorry. I'm not.)

Alright, so:

Twisted Wonderland is a Disney mobile game made in Japan and co-produced by Aniplex. (Yes, that Aniplex.) I'm not here to sell you on the game, so much as the story, but it is a sort of story-book rpg with turned based fights and rhythm games, where you build character units from a gacha pull. As far as gameplay goes, it's very simple, and most of the emphasis lies on the characters and the story. And it's wonderful.

The on-the-box description of this game doesn't do it justice, per se, but that might be because Disney has a little bit of influence on it and they suck at knowing who their target audience is. It is about a high school based on classic Disney villains—but no, not in the way you're thinking, because I once made that mistake too. It is not a villain school. Rather, the world of Twisted Wonderland is its own entity, with characters built as sort of nods or foils to classic Disney characters. The world itself is somewhat built with these films as its past, and history has become so twisted (ha) that modern society views some of these classic villains as the heroes or supporting characters of their stories, and respect them as The Great Seven. (The seven in question being the Queen of Hearts, Scar, Ursula, Jafar, the Evil/Raven Queen, Hades, and Maleficent. None of them are remembered by name, though.)

The game takes place in the modern era, a society with both technology and magic. Specifically, it takes place in a magic high school called Night Raven College, an all-boys dormitory prep school where the only requirement to get in is a magic mirror that peers into your soul and determines whether or not you can a) do magic and b) kin the Great Seven. And, of course, the player character is a regular-ass human who gets isekai'd in and gets stuck with a talking magic cat direbeast named Grim.

Now. That is the general synopsis. I, on the other hand, affectionately call this the Mental Breakdown game.

See, here's the kicker. The magic system is pretty nifty; while it's functions as a standard magic-is-magic sort of soft system, it has ✨consequences✨

Magic has this byproduct called blot. It's this icky stuff that builds up when you a) use too much magic and/or b) are emotionally distressed. But less so in a "I'm panicked right now" sort of way and more so in a "I have chronic depression and/or anxiety" sort of way. And, when a mage is powerful enough, and sad boi enough, and then goes and uses way too much magic and sad boi juice in one sitting, this amazing phenomenon occurs called "overblot"—which is pretty much a super-powered evil form that turns the mage into the darkest form of themselves and then uses magic until they die.

Naturally, this happens in the game. A lot. The formula is pretty much that each "book" of the story, there is an overblot. One for each of the seven dorms, which are based off of the seven villains/the movies they come from. (And "based on" is pretty loose. Yes you can see the similarities, but these are dumb teenage boys with their own hopes and aspirations, and, sometimes, the game completely lies to you about what character they emulate the most. The guy who's Jafar? Well yes but he's actually just a really stressed out Genie stand in. The Hades guy? Whoops that's Meg. Is that a card soldier or the White Rabbit? Doesn't matter, he's got problems.)

The characters are so well written. I could gush about them forever, and they are the driving points of this plot and it means everything to me. They are some of the most traumatized and messed up individuals, but also, they are dumb teenage boys who do dumb teenage boys things. It is all incredibly well balanced and startlingly realistic for a game that amounts to beating the emotional constipation around people. Mostly because it cannot be beat out of them. The blot can, but they have to deal with their emotions with their own two hands, with varying levels of success.

And the shenanigans!!!! Oh, the shenanigans. I call this the Emotional Trauma game but I have once laughed so hard someone heard me through the floor. It's not all doom and gloom for sure. Sometimes you're watching your friend fall apart because his toxic mother instilled debilitating perfectionism and slowly start making enemies of everyone and sometimes you're sending three of the most gremlin students plus one cinnamon roll to infiltrate a gala that a bunch of weather fairies are throwing in the greenhouse because they stole your temperature regulating magestone to be shiny jewelry and you want it to stop snowing inside your dorm room. And sometimes you can have the exact same character who experienced losing his little brother right in front of him gush about a magical girl sledding anime and all of his gacha games. It is the best of both worlds.

And, that's not all! No, no. We get amazing character interactions. Not just pre-determined friend group interactions, but also random interactions. Yana Toboso (the writer/artist) really likes to stick names in a jar sometimes and make them interact and it is the best thing ever. Every single one of these characters I hold in my hands. Every single one of them gets to have their moment to shine. You can emotionally invest in all of them and be rewarded for it.

The game itself is free and pretty easy to get into. There's not really a bad power creep so you can get through it with what you got. Of course the fun part of collecting cards is that there are stories attached to them that you can watch, and those are also sources of joy. (And it's well documented, so you can find things online pretty easily to catch up and see more.)

I just think it's neat. (Read: I accidentally became wholly obsessed with this game and its characters and they are all blorbos to me.)

You should definitely fall into this rabbit hole with me :))) It's so worth it :)))