#even when blur

[mymitochondriaforpresident]

Two suns in one pic???? ☀️☀️

[hinamie]

I could've been a better man, but I'm not

more lmhs megu bc i love him. he is here fr ur lunch money :>

jjk atla!au with @philosophiums

[somerandomcockroach]

[muchmossymess]

my contribution to the fmab fandom, slowly but surely (click for better quality)

[cenvast]

Laios, Monsters, & Toshiro: On Racialized Desire and Identification with the Other

Arguably, the most significant part of Laios' character is the societal ostracization he faces because of his non-normative interests and behavior. For the majority of his life, Laios struggles socially, and other humans mistreat him. When he rescues Marcille from the Nightmares, his nightmare dredges up his inability to fit into school and the army. During his early dungeoneering days, he's lied to and exploited by his fellow party members.

One of his earliest and most formative negative experiences with people is his village's abuse of Falin as a magic user. He shares that after the villagers discovered that she can use magic, "adults who were just kind yesterday, all began to bully [her]." Instead of protecting Falin, his parent tell her to leave the village. The prejudice Falin faces and his parents' response to it upsets Laios to the point that he leaves home.

While Laios cares about his friends, the Demon points out that Laios understandably does not care for people in general. Laios doesn't disagree with the Demon's assessment and suspects that the Demon "can sense all [his] thoughts." The Demon goes on to say that Laios actually "despise[s] all humans." Laios denies this assessment, but given the Demon's uncanny ability to sniff out people's desires and Laios' ashamed expression, at least part of Laios likely agrees with the Demon. It's not a stretch to assume that he's held onto some hurt and resentment towards humans due to their mistreatment of him and Falin in their youth.

In response to how human society has othered him, Laios distances himself from humans and invests his time and energy into monsters and demi-humans instead. In the DunMeshi world, monsters and demi-humans are the ultimate societal Other. People fear them, exploit them, and even hunt and kill them. As someone who's similarly been mistreated by human society, Laios resonates deeply with monsters.

His desire to become a monster and/or beastman reflects his desire to reclaim agency over how society has ostracized him. If he chooses to become a monster, he gets to place value on what society has deemed despicable. He gets to choose why society hates him and be different on his own terms.

Both textually and thematically, Laios' identification with the Other bleeds into the erotic. More blatantly, he says that he'd have sex with orc women, and his succubus is a monstrous version of Marcille.

The entire story is also steeped in the theme of consumption as carnality. Laios and his party spend the entire manga eating monsters — a taboo physical act which they reap pleasure from; the underlying eroticism isn't difficult to see.

The story also presents consumption as a form of extreme identification. Eating a monster makes the monster part of you through digestion. The line between consuming the monster and becoming the monster — between erotic desire for the monster, demonstrated by eating their flesh, and identifying with the monster — is very blurred. Note that digesting a monster is an act of absorption; it destroys the original creature. Senshi states that consuming a monster erases "its individual identity," and major manga spoilers, but Laios defeats and pacifies the Demon by consuming its desire to eat. We'll come back to this concept later.

As previously mentioned, Laios is disinterested in most humans. The notable exception to this rule is Toshiro and by extension, the Eastern Archipelago. Laios doesn't seem to know much about the Archipelago before speaking to Toshiro, so he isn't drawn to Toshiro because he's an Easterner. Instead, he's drawn to his "odd appearance."

Just like Laios views monsters and demi-humans as a visible Other, Laios views Toshiro as another visible Other. On the Island, Toshiro stands out as a foreigner at first glance. While Laios as a white tallman doesn't appear visibly strange to other people, he's drawn again and again to people and creatures who are immediately visibly "odd." He sees them as understanding what it's like to be different and be mistreated for it, and since he relates to that experience, he wants to learn about them and be closer to them.

Essentially, Laios behaves towards Toshiro and his culture the same way he behaves towards monsters; he wants to know everything about Toshiro's foreign culture — the thing which makes him different. Unintentionally, Laios unintentionally reduces Toshiro to being Japanese; if he wasn't Japanese, Laios would never have approached him.

While Laios doesn't have bad intentions, as Toshiro himself acknowledges during their fight, his behavior towards Toshiro still has negative consequences. Laios' harmless interest in monsters translates to fetishization in the context of Japanese culture. He enacts multiple microaggressions against Toshiro and crossing his boundaries.

Laios goes beyond merely learning about Japanese culture. He takes parts of it for himself when he names his sword a Japanese name. Akin to his consumption of monsters, Laios attempts to participate in Toshiro's culture while failing to respect Toshiro himself. Just as eating monsters destroys them, Laios consuming Toshiro's culture while enacting racism against him causes real harm.

Many people have already written about Laios' microaggressions towards Toshiro, but a couple include Laios telling Toshiro that he looks "odd" and asking where he's from, mispronouncing his name as "Shuro," and assuming his favorite food is rice. Laios' treatment and fetishization of Toshiro is racist and harmful. However, I'd like to dive beyond the surface of Laios' micro-aggressive remarks and examine how his obsession with Toshiro becomes a racialized mode of desire, paralleling real world phenomena.

Though no concrete canonical evidence of Laios' feelings towards Toshiro being romantic and/or sexual exists, his interactions with Toshiro have erotic undertones. Their fight dialogue, in particular, revolves around eating, an act the story consistently shows as carnal. During this fight, Laios places his thumb in Toshiro's mouth and asks him, "What's the point of even having a mouth?" Laios' penetration of Toshiro's body via his mouth and his question's potential as an innuendo lend themselves to an erotic reading of the scene's more obvious conflict. Considering the overlap between consumption and carnality throughout the story, it's not a large jump to read eroticism into Laios demanding Toshiro meet his body's physical needs.

Furthermore, Laios is more enthusiastic about Toshiro than any other human in the series. While he cares deeply about his sister and his friends, Laios repeatedly expresses how much he admires Toshiro. He retains and brings up things like Toshiro's (perceived) favorite food. He wants to go to the East in Falin's place after she rejects Toshiro's marriage proposal, and in the "What-If" extra material, he's adamant about setting up a scenario where Toshiro travels with him through the Dungeon.

Undoubtedly, Laios is drawn to Toshiro. Since he sees non-white-ness and monstrosity as equivalent markers of societal othering, Toshiro's identity as a foreigner is what cultivates and maintains Laios' interest in him. Even if Laios learns to care for Toshiro as a person, his desire for Toshiro, platonically or otherwise, is still filtered heavily through race within the narrative.

Laios' relationship with his masculinity is also fraught. He broke off his engagement with a girl from his village and doesn't express normative interest in female tallmen. Seeing how the nightmare versions of his parents ask him when he's going to give them grandchildren, Laios experiences societal pressure to conform to a normative performance of masculinity through being attracted to and marrying a tallman woman and creating a family with her.

Laios frequently talks about how cool and admirable Toshiro is when he performs masculinity through combat, etc. He might find Toshiro's Asian masculinity more appealing and more accessible to him than the masculinity that's been forced onto him, precisely because Toshiro's Asian masculinity appears non-normative in a Western lens. But co-opting the masculinities of men of color as a white man would only further feed into the white consumption of cultures of color.

Overall, Laios' entitlement to and consumption of Toshiro's culture mirrors the real-life way white people co-opt and fetishize non-white cultures. Laios' fetishistic treatment of Japanese culture, because of his attraction (platonic or otherwise) to Toshiro, parallels white people's treatment of Asian people in the Western diaspora. I can only speak on the Asian American experience, but Laios immediately being drawn to Toshiro's "odd appearance," obsessing over his culture, and primarily treating Toshiro as a conduit for his said culture feels eerily close to how some white anime and/or K-pop fans act towards Japanese and Korean people.

Similarly to Laios, real queer, neurodivergent, and/or otherwise non-normative white people are marginalized by white Western society. They relate to how society others non-white cultures and/or people of color and latch onto them. While forming human connections based on curiosity and shared experiences is wonderful, white people are often unaware of the racial dynamics at play when they engage with non-white cultures and people of color and unintentionally, end up consuming and fetishizing non-white cultures in detrimental ways.

None of this negates the reality that Laios and Toshiro canonically care for each other. For instance, Toshiro's willingness to hug Laios reveals his genuine familiarity with and affection for him. The racial dynamics of their friendship complicate their relationship in fascinating ways and open up a potential path for Laios' growth. With time and effort, Laios could absolutely unlearn his racism and become a much better friend to Toshiro.

In conclusion, Laios' behavior towards Toshiro is a study in a marginalized white person's identification with and racialized desire for a non-white Other and how even a well-intentioned attempt at connection can replicate harmful racist dynamics. Toshiro's experience with Laios closely parallels real Asian people's struggles with racism and fetishization in our world today.

[cowardlykrow]

“I let him die / Taking your advice”

[padmesbox]

Our savior is here.

[useless-prophet]

How do you. How do you NOT expect a wizard to want to become immortal??? Like hi person with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and wonder for the world and burning desire to know how everything works and recreate it. You only get max 100 years to experience it all. Sorry.

So OF COURSE wizards pursue immortality. It’s in their nature. It’s what makes them wizards. Sure, you can talk about the loneliness of living forever and the boredom of not having an end but guess what else doesn’t have an end. Science. I’ll be very content travelling the world, helping people, and publishing my 39th paper on the solvent properties of moonflowers in potions while you’ve been lying in a grave for 200 years, thanks.

The problem is societal stigma against research into necromancy, which pushes young wizards away from studying ethical and safe methods of immortality and forces them to rely on untested, volatile myths about lichdom, inevitably creating yet another “evil necromancy wizard”. You think they would turn to such means if they had proper support? Proper resources?? You branded them as heretical and insane first! Why are you surprised that desperate, isolated, and stigmatized individuals become what you make them?

Wizards believe that life has more to offer than unfulfilled dreams and a sudden end. And the wizard is RIGHT.

[hydrus101]

It’s so fascinating to me about how much of Malevolent centers around bad or misguided fathers.

We spend ample amounts of time with Arthur’s grief and his faults, his fear of fatherhood, his failings of Faroe and the ensuing spiral afterwards. We hear of Bella’s strict upbringing, of Daniel’s controlling nature, the desire to shape his daughter into what he expected her to be, and even admitting to Arthur’s face that he intended to mold him as well, into what he thought his daughter’s husband should be. We learn of Larson’s betrayals, the sacrifices of his children: the monsters he made of those he should’ve loved, all in the pursuit of power and legacy. There’s an argument to be made even, of fragments and reflections and daughter and sons, that the King - that initial version of him now dead in all respects - was a sort of father, with John and Yellow as his residuals, his sons, his heirs, in a way. Finding their own identities now, free from the shadow of a predecessor, free to chose their own destinies, wether that is to separate themselves entirely, to scream defiantly of humanity and hope and self, or to try and reshape the visage of that dead malevolent god in desperate pursuit of love that wasn’t given, driven by a hate that was shared. What other analogy so seamlessly fits with the relationship between Arthur and Yellow than that of a neglectful father? The one who was supposed to be patient, be caring, be kind, the one who was supposed to teach this new being, this new child, about what life could be like? What love and kindness it could hold? But Arthur was too unsteady then. Too unstable to give Yellow the upbringing that he deserved. His nature was shared with John, and we’ve seen the depths of love he’s embraced. Yellow was simply nurtured wrong, encouraged down that spiral by a foster father who embraced and even venerated his rage. And similarly, in the basement in New York, we are reminded of nature and nurture, of animals and babes. Briefly, quick as a glance, we learn of the Butcher’s father, both a seething livewire and a subtle undercurrent in his motivations, manifested, perhaps, in his tumultuous relationship with failure, his self inflicted violence. Roland and Amanda receive less of the spotlight, but the foundations of everything are built upon their relationship. And now, with the Unclean, we know more of Arthur’s own father—who’s fate is known and the same as his mother’s—and his envy towards his friend, his childish jealousy and vindictive actions, of which he now condemns, having learned better, having known better. Every aspect of the narrative is seeped in fatherhood, in parenting, in children. Malam says as much by the fire: “They are our betters, our futures, our learned mistakes.” Malevolent is, at its core, about parents and children and hope.

And now, Arthur and John are on the run from a mother, on a mission given to them by a father, who’s daughter is largely a mystery, or perhaps, more familiar than we might think.

[wikiangela]

honestly the way and speed at which I went from "wait, who's Tommy? oh he's been on the show before? wait, who?" to "omg why are people obsessing over this guy already" to "I still don't really see it" in 7x03 to "oh no I love this but I don't like him calling buck evan" to "Tommy calling Buck evan is the greatest thing and I adore this so much" and to just being so fucking obsessed with him and bucktommy is so fucking insane lmao

it happened so quickly and so intensely, he won me over before he even kissed Buck istg, and then bucktommy just took up permanent residence in my brain lol

lou ferrigno jr I'm obsessed with you, sorry I ever doubted the tommy storyline lol

[jadewritesficshere]

Pretty

Eddie Munson x reader

Contains: no plot just filth, sub!Eddie Munson, bound hands, edging, slight overstim, cumplay, ass play, aftercare, pet names (Eddie is called Baby), no gender descriptors for reader (your thighs are mentioned but not size or shape just that Eddie finds them beautiful)

This is unedited I wrote this in a blur idk how many words maybe 1k ill add that at a later time

18+ only!

"You look so pretty like this."

Eddie shudders as he feels your breath against the back of his neck. He looks ahead into the mirror, pupils blown wide at the scene before him.

You sit behind Eddie. A saccharine grin on your face. His back is flush with your front, he can feel every inhale and exhale you take. Your beautiful thighs he wants to bite are on either side of his. Your ankles are locked around his, holding him in place. Eddie's hands are bound with his belt, resting on your thigh.

Eddie's shirt is pushed up, belly button piercing glinting in the low light. The red of his piercing matches the red on his face that runs down his neck. If he had his shirt off, you'd be able to see the blush bleed into the top of his chest. He shivers as you blow against his ear.

"Look how pretty you are Eds."

He lets out a whine as your fingers delicately trail his length. His cock is flushed a deep red, almost purple at the top from how turned on he is. Slightly curved to the left, the tip leaking so much cum he's practically glistening. Your fingers ghost over the slit and his hips jump forward, only for your touch to leave. Teasing him again.

It was torture of the best kind. He isn't sure how long you have been teasing him. Tears in his eyes from pleasure and annoyance. Your hand wrapped firmly around him bringing him to the precipice only to let go before he reaches the edge. Tantalizing touches that sway the line of not enough and too much.

"Say you look pretty Baby."

He gasps as your hand wraps firmly around him again, hoping you won't remove your hand again. His nails dig into your thigh, trying to grab hold of anything he can. He can feel your smirk as you press a kiss to where his shoulder meets his neck. "I uh I look pretty," Eddie's voice is raspy.

"The prettiest boy." You murmur. "The fuck the prettiest boy." Eddie whimpers. A tear rolls down his cheek and he watches as you swipe it away. "Color?" You pause. "Green so green please don't stop," Eddie babbles slightly, turning to face you. You smile sweetly as your hand forces his jaw back to facing the mirror.

With your ankles locked around Eddie's, you spread your legs, thus causing his to spread wide open. Its obscene, being fully on display. "Awh," you coo at him, making him whine. Eddie shivers as you slide your hand up and down his shaft, your other hand gently squeezing his heavy balls.

Eddie jumps as you trail your fingers lower. You lightly press against his hole, just enough for him to feel it. It takes him a minute to realize the moan he hears was from himself. His cock leaks another spurt of precum, dribbling down your hand as you continue to jerk him off.

You remove the pressure teasing his hole and swipe up the cum that has leaked onto your hand. You coat your finger with it before pressing against Eddie's tight hole again. Your gently slide your finger in.

Eddie can feel his eyes crossing as his mouth drops open. He can feel you pump your finger in and out of him in tandem with the hand that is stroking him up and down. "Gonna come for me? You look so good baby. Look so perfect like this," you kiss the shell of his ear. Eddie nods, barely able to open his eyes. Barely able to think of anything as he feels the warm pleasure spreading throughout his limbs.

His hips snap up as a loud whine leaves him. His brain goes silent as pleasure comes over him in waves. You never falter your pace, its almost too much as he keeps cumming. It's the hardest and longest he has ever come, it almost knocks the breath out of him. His senses hone in on the euphoria he feels, numbing his mind to everything but the pleasure.

He pants and gasps as he slowly comes back to himself. He's barely aware he's holding onto your thigh with a death grip. "Did so good baby, so good." You murmur. "Uh-huh." Eddie can feel his heart beating in his chest. His limbs feel like jello. He's pretty sure if he tried to stand his legs would shake.

You slowly move out from behind him (wait when did you stop touching him?). Eddie opens his eyes, tracking you as you grab a water bottle and wash cloth on the bedside table. You wet the wash cloth before wiping the cum off him. Eddie tries not to but jumps from still being sensitive. You murmur apologies, as if you have anything to apologize for. If Eddie's tongue didn't feel of lead, he would sing your praises.

You toss the wash cloth away and quickly undo the belt around Eddie's wrists. Even though there isn't a mark, you take your time massaging his wrists and hands. You gently place a kiss on the back of both of his hands. If he wasn't already completely in love with you, that would have done it.

Eddie can barely focus on your words, barely think through how good he feels. He's aware you are holding the water bottle up to his lips and he drinks greedily. You swipe away the water that dribbles down his chin.

Eddie curls into you, head against your chest listening to your heart. You slowly stroke his hair, comforting him. He's aware you're whispering to him, praising him. All he can think about is how loved he feels in this moment. How safe he is in your arms. How he can fully let go and know you have him. How he knows you love him with your whole being, just as he loves you.

[skitskatstudios]

Guess who got a new cane!!! To celebrate, I have given Kaidou a cane. :)

[artbyblastweave]

Many years ago J. Michael Straczynski wrote a miniseries for Marvel's MAX imprint called Supreme Power, which was itself a spin on the classic Marvel Faux Justice League The Squadron Supreme. And in this miniseries you've got a Flash Expy, The Blur, who in a very compelling way is like the inverse of A-train from The Boys. They're both black speedsters from impoverished backgrounds who use their powers to become walking billboards instead of going directly into conventional superheroism- at least in part because there isn't actually a lot of call for conventional superheroism. They even share a color scheme.

But unlike A-Train, whose moral core is thoroughly corroded by celebrity, Blur's apparent crass commercialism ends up being thematically linked to the fact that he's easily the most moral and considerate of the entire first wave of superheroes, because he's literally the only one of these people who's ever had to work any kind of day job, and thus the only one who's really in any way beholden to the logic of human society and its associated common courtesy.

[cuntylestat]

there have always been a lot of people in the fandom who have been very gender essentialist in their read of louis and lestat but it's really ramping up now

[canisalbus]

Hello! I hope I won't sour your mood with this ask but I have been thinking a lot about your gay dogs this month especially.

I'll just try to keep the context short but in general I'm someone that has accepted being romantically undesireable. It was hard but in the end I have built my life just around me, my humble family and at this point in time I don't even think I have the time for a partner. And considering that it's the love month and a lot of people are preparing to celebrate it with their SOs I assumed that, actually, this is a thing that I sort of have in common with Machete.

From the miscellaneous lore on your profile I see Machete as someone that also has kind of rejected love. That also has built his life around his job, possibly hobbies, his family or mentors (depending if we're talking about canon or modern au). Who kind of forgot that relationships are a thing and that people bond with others in that way. Well, at least he did until meeting Vasco.

I just love thinking about their awkward beginnings. Machete being 100% sure that Vasco is just joking, maybe even sometimes teasing him (in a friendly banter type way) or just explaining to himself that all that kindness and interest is just him being a very considerate friend. And then we have Vasco that just tries to be subtle, as if he was trying to pass a fawn without it noticing and running away, but also with time gains confidence and tries more risque moves. Vasco being all smug and Machete being flustered when their hands or shoulders or tails brush in passing. And then when both are sure of their feelings we have Machete who has to choose between God and his love. Who, at first, unwillingly accepts that divine wrath will be worth their brief love.

I just love your boys. I swear they are all the love supply one might possibly need

Thank you for such a long and thoughtful message! I don't know why you thought you might accidentally sour my mood, I'm utterly delighted whenever I hear that someone has been pondering my little guys (rotating them in their head, as they say), and when they go through the trouble of sharing their findings and conclusions I'm so happy I could crawl up a wall.

I think you deciphered Machete's inner workings very well, especially those of the original canon version. The concept of love is of course prominent in Christianity, so even as a kid being raised in a religious environment that discouraged overt displays of affection and close personal bonds, Machete wasn't completely alienated from it. But it has always been a nebulous, unperceivable and unattainable thing for him. When he was old enough to lock down his career choice he readily accepted he'd never have romantic relationships, spouse or a family, and I think he must've been too young and socially inexperienced to think of it as a significant loss. Either he consciously blocked out the need for companionship by studying and working like his life depended on it, or he didn't really consider that being genuinely befriended, appreciated and loved as a person instead of a respectable and competent authority figure was even an option for him, at least not until Vasco came along.

[tppart]

So I finished this portrait a few days ago and even though I very much didn't like the pencils I used I think it came out pretty neat 🙂