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mono-dot-jpeg · 4 years

Text

the antarctic idiots [pt.1] - c! technoblade

summary; in which two anarchist piglins adopt an ender boy.

genre; child! ranboo, piglin hybrid! reader, slight canon divergence from dream smp, fluff, found family au is my shit, reader is now ranboo’s parent i don’t make the rules, techno is a grumpy father but it’s okay you love him, realistic minecraft? (idk how to describe it-)

pairing; c! technoblade x reader, platonic! ranboo x reader

word count; 1.5k

a/n; fuck it, it is here now. here’s the techno x reader you fucking simps. i can’t even be mad bc i too am a simp for the anarchist pig that is technoblade.

i hope this is somewhat up to par with everyone’s expectations since i hyped this up so much. this is one of the few writings that i actually like so- i couldn’t resist waiting so long to post it AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

next >

now you never really expected to find yourself on a side of history that was deemed "the villain's side", especially when the villain wasn't even that bad.

okay, that's a bit of a lie. this piglin man blew up an entire country to end government. plus he has evaded his taxes. i mean the list goes on but that's not the entire point here.

the point is, you found yourself actually being friends (even going as far as housemates) with the so-called evil anarchist.

now we might be moving too fast here, so let's move it back a little bit.

"so you want me to join pogtopia?" you looked up, shutting the book in your hand as you leaned back on your chair. "and what would i get in return exactly?"

"...our friendship won't die?" the voice of wilbur soot rings in your quiet home, unsure and nervous at your stern aura and words.

"why can't you just help us?!" tommy flared up, nearly throwing a fit if not for his older brother holding him back.

"just because i am your friend, does not mean i am interested in fighting for your conflicts." you place the book on the small side table, adjusting your gloves while you explain yourself to the two boys, "i'm not saying i'm a pacifist, but i'm not here to fight. i live far away for a reason. i told you this before."

"can i call in that favor then?" wilbur asked. "you still owe me one." you huffed at his words. you saw this coming.

"you're lucky i'm a nice person most of the time." you sighed, standing up and nearly towering over the two boys if not for wilbur being a bit taller than you. "i will get my stuff packed, and then we can get to your pogtopia. but while i do that, please explain the whole situation." since you lived so far away from society, you didn't know too much about what was happening unless wilbur told you about it and wilbur never really talked to you too often.

"well, you know how we had l'manburg.." and then he starts to explain how that completely backfired on them because they lost the election and now they lost their country. "and now we want to fight back for l'manburg." wilbur finishes explaining as you put your old netherite sword in its sheath that hung on your waist. "we just need your help. are you willing to train us?"

"it's not like i have much of a choice since you're cashing in that favor." you pointed out. "i better not be staying for too long."

"i can't make any promises about that." you sighed. "you ready?"

"unfortunately." it was time to leave your home and face violence once again.

"if it makes you feel any better, you're not the only person we've asked to help us." tommy says in an attempt to get you out of your bitter mood.

"that made me feel worse, tommy. i think you guys would've been fine without me if you have another person helping you other than tubbo." you slung your bag over your shoulder. "but if you really insist on getting the help of me, then who am i to judge?"

"since it seems like you're ready now, let's go to pogtopia!" tommy said, ignoring most of your words of complaints as he starts to drag you by the arm towards the dream smp. "it's quite the walk from here. why do you live so far from everyone? don't you get lonely? why didn't you join l'manburg with me and will?"

"slow down with the questions, tommy. first of all, i've told you and wilbur why i live far away, you did not listen though." you pressed a finger on his forehead, earning a huff of annoyance from the blonde. you moved your hand back to your side. "i simply do not like people. also why get pulled into conflict that you never were apart of to begin with? but that's pretty hypocritical of me to say now."

"i get that you're not fond of people, but aren't you lonely out here?" you three walked into the portal that would take you right into the nether. the sounds of bubbling lava and squealing pigmen was always an oddly comforting sound to hear.

"i'm perfectly content in my house. even if it's very far from others. i'm happy." you answered though your words sounded so... monotonous. tommy gave you a look, he definitely didn't believe you. "i know i don't sound happy but i am." before you knew it, you made it to the other nether portal which would actually take you to the manburg and pogtopia. oh how you didn't miss this place at all.

you never liked how manburg was ran even before shlatt was elected. you never really like government in general. it always seemed to be ruining everything. freedom never felt like freedom, at least that's what you thought especially when there was a goverment.

"welcome to pogtopia!" you were so deep in your own thoughts that you hadn't realized that you had made it to pogtopia.

"so where is your other helper? the first choice that wasn't me?" you asked.

"i think he might be here. he's been staying up for a long time. ever since he got in here." wilbur said. "technoblade? you here?" wilbur leads you to a potato farm and you soon feel a sense of familiarity as you enter the room.

"yeah." a low huff is heard, causing you and wilbur to turn your heads toward the source of the sound. "i'm here." what immediately catches your attention is the crown messily placed on his head as he farms. as a piglin, you've always been fond of gold, that adoration never left you once you went to the overworld. you never really wore a crown but you wore a gold pendant instead that was pinned to your cape.

"you have a really pretty crown." it takes you a minute to realize that those words came out of your mouth. "fuck, i didn't mean to say that out loud." you explained quickly to the male that was farming. "piglin things." you muttered.

"a very unexpected compliment. understandable." techno said. "wilbur, who is this again? have i met them?"

"well, you'd think you know each other since you're both piglins, but i guess the world is bigger than i thought. well, technoblade, meet y/n, y/n, meet technoblade."

"i call him the blade." tommy said smugly. "the blade! how's the potato planting doing?"

"it's doing fine. i didn't expect any company to come though."

"well, this is the person that we wanted to recruit for pogtopia."

"nice to meet you, even if the circumstances aren't the best. wilbur is lucky i owe him a favor." you said. "i sort of expected meeting you since tommy and wilbur mentioned you once they came to get me. i just never expected to see another piglin here in the overworld."

"never expected to see another piglin here either." techno hummed slightly.

maybe staying in pogtopia won't be too bad. at least you made a friend?

that was sort of a lie. you and techno never really talked after the encounter. it never worried you, you’re not one for conversation right now anyways. you had a mission to do and you’re gonna do it. you didn’t have time to make friends, at least that’s what you thought. friends seemed to be temporary in the smp, considering the wars that were and have happened.

you weren’t going to make another friend, knowing that you just might get pulled into their fights.

“why did you stop fighting once you left l’manburg?” wilbur’s voice rings in the small fighting pit that was made for training.

“i simply didn’t find the need to fight. it doesn’t mean i’m any weaker though. i will still fight for what i want to fight for.” and that’s gonna be really ending this whole government. you think to yourself, letting the nighttime ambience fill the air.

“you still have your lives...right?” you show him your wrist which had 3 hearts tattooed on it.

“i’ve been living away from everyone, of course i won’t die that easily.” you let out an empty laugh. “bold of you to assume i would even die.”

“i know it’s ridiculous to even think that you would lose a life after you left l’manburg but what if dream were to chase you down and kill you?”

“i understand your worry, but need not to worry, i can handle myself. if i couldn’t you guys would never even assign me as cavalry captain those years ago.” you said, unbuttoning your gold pendant to place it on the stone cold floor along with your other accessories you had. “it’s not like dream can do too much to me. we made a deal after all.”

“a deal?” wilbur raised an eyebrow as he took off his jacket, tossing it on the ground.

“don’t be too concerned. i’m not like eret. i wouldn’t betray you.”

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#technoblade x reader #techno mcyt #mcyt fanfiction #mcyt+x+reader #mcyt x reader #dream smp x reader #dream smp #c!techno #sbi family dynamic #sbi x reader #ranboo #ranboo x reader #dream smp ranboo #dream smp ranboo x reader #antarctic idiots

1K notes · View notes

shihalyfie · 3 years

Note

You talk a lot about how the Digimon are born from the kids own souls, would you be interested into describing how the digimon partners reflect their humans' personalities?

Oh man, I love this topic! (You’ll have to forgive me in that my desire to do justice for it is why it ended up taking me this long to answer it.)

The part about the Digimon literally being part of the kids’ souls comes directly from official (it’s been mentioned several times, not only in what I just linked). This was never stated outright in the original Adventure or 02, and it took until Kizuna to really shove the link between the partner and the human’s inner self in your face and make it a huge part of the actual story, but fans had been catching onto it long before that, and even without reading what the staff had said. Kizuna throws a bit of a nail in this because it’s said to be a bit lore-noncompliant, but considering how much of the background lore it still goes out of its way to adhere to, and the fact it still does match the fundamental concept of “human heart = Digimon partner” regardless of detailed minutiae, we can still apply and analyze this concept with no problem, especially since Adventure and 02 always walked the line between sci-fi and fantasy, and there is undoubtedly a spiritual element to them no matter how you look at it.

(My personal comfort zone in analyzing Adventure and 02 comes moreso from a human behavior and mentality perspective, which is also why my meta on this blog tends to focus more on the human drama aspects of Adventure and 02 and especially the latter’s story being so heavily about human relationships, but if you’re interested in said spiritual elements, I heavily recommend @analyzingadventure‘s very comprehensive meta on Adventure background lore and themes, which also covers similar territory in detail. We’re different people, so our takes on it probably differ in some respects, but that’s the beauty of having different perspectives, after all.)

In any case, back to your question. I think it would be best to break this down piece-by-piece with the Adventure and 02 kids in detail, so more is under the cut!

...Well, okay, before we continue, I do want to touch on something briefly, and it’s regarding the fact that “evolution” in this series is generally a metaphor for human growth. That counts for when everyone gets their evolutions, but it also counts as a metaphor overall -- after all, Adventure is about self-assertion and pushing oneself as far as possible (the major evolution gimmick being tied to Crests), whereas 02 is about cultivating differing aspects of yourself and applying it to how you form relationships with others (the major evolution gimmick being tied to Digimentals and ultimately Jogress). The human self is quite a flexible thing, and the Digimon themselves quite often change personalities as they evolve. (I touched on this briefly in my discussion of honorfiics and first-person pronouns earlier, but in Japanese, the Digimon will often even change personalities and speech patterns as they evolve.) This also leads to a few other potential observations (not really corroborated by official, just my personal view of it):

Speaking from a meta perspective, the fact that only the “front protagonists” end up getting the highest level forms is pretty obviously so they don’t have to spend toy budget on allocating it to everyone, but from an in-story perspective, Adventure episode 50 adds an implication that not reaching as high of a form may also have to do with how inherently attuned one is to combat (Jou says that he believes that Gomamon will never reach Ultimate because he doesn’t have the sort of strength Taichi and Yamato do, and it contributes to his conclusion that his skills are more meaningfully applied as a healer instead of as a fighter). Of course, none of the Adventure or 02 cast is necessarily the belligerent type that inherently likes fighting in itself, but of course certain ones are less emotionally drained or more attuned to it, so you might be able to see a rough pattern there. (Again, I’m not going to sugarcoat how this still has a lot of dismaying issues on the meta level, but the difference between “how much this sucks on a meta level” and “whether this at least tracks in-story” is a common theme on this blog.) In a franchise sense, Digimon were of course conceptualized as fighting monsters, but within the narrative of Adventure, it probably stands to reason that having a manifested part of your soul or inner self shouldn’t necessarily mean they have to be fighting things all of the time unless it’s necessary.

It’s very often been pointed out that the 02 cast is at a sort of “combat disadvantage” compared to their seniors (well, and Takeru and Hikari, anyway) because their highest forms require two people/Digimon to be in play, so their overall combat power is rather low. My impression is that this is by design (and it’s a subversion of the usual expectation of shounen anime sequels where the sequel will often power creep everything to make the new guard outdo the first). That the 02 team is inherently dependent on each other for support, and to a degree far more than their seniors, is rather baked into its narrative, and moreover, from an in-story perspective, the 02 group doesn’t seem like the type to really care about being outflanked by their seniors (on the contrary, they’d probably take that as more proof that their seniors are amazing). Moreover, the forms you see their Digimon in most of the time tend towards the smaller Baby-level forms instead of the Child-level ones, and while this is partially due to plot logistics about being in the real world (and, admittedly, kind of inconsistently applied), it gives you a much stronger impression of the 02 kids and their partners in general being people who aren’t that individually imposing or strong and get more mileage out of flexibility and variety (see: the Digimentals and the huge number of lower-level forms the kids have access to).

With this kind of metaphor, I caution against taking it too literally as a 1:1 thing (especially since official has been generally quiet about it and there isn’t much in the series text itself to corroborate this), but I do think there is certainly some kind of relevance that’s worth thinking about.

Many people, including the official notes I just linked, refer to there being some Digimon partners that are "like-minded” with their partner, and some that are “opposite” in personality. This is roughly true, but I find this to be a very simplified description of the concept; it’s more like all Digimon partners are a reflection of the less easily exposed part of their human partner (and, most pertinently, the part that would allow them to express themselves in ways they wouldn’t normally), it’s just that the kids with more straightforward or less extreme personalities don’t have as much to hide or cover up in the first place, and so their partners come off as more “like-minded”. Even Urawa Megumi, voice of Iori and Armadimon (arguably one of the pairs of partners that seem “opposing” in personality), stated that she didn’t personally feel like the two characters are all that different, since humans have different sides to them, and Armadimon is functionally an expression of the side of Iori that isn’t apparent.

Because the Adventure narrative has the Digimon partners be linked to human mentality, this leads to the side effect that you won’t have a Digimon partner who ever truly denies the human partner (barring external factors like Evil Ring-induced brainwashing), which is something producer Seki Hiromi was quite insistent about. That said, this is a very Adventure and 02-specific thing, since other series go more into different angles about how one would approach partnership when this factor is not in play; half of Tamers’s drama regarding partners comes from the fact they are not necessarily mentally linked all of the time, and need to find a way to build a relationship by bridging that gap, and so non-Adventure universe entries are more freely able to explore the concepts of a Digimon partner more consciously entering conflict with their human partner. Well, that’s the beauty of having a multi-entry franchise, after all.

Taichi and Agumon

Taichi and Agumon immediately jump to mind as the first among the “like-minded” pairs, especially since the series shows them so often in sync and chilling together. Taichi himself is a straightforward person, so it stands to reason that his straightforward personality would also lend to Agumon coming off as being rather much like him.

However, there is one slight difference between the two, and it’s that Agumon has a somewhat stronger sense of “easygoing chill” than Taichi does, right down to using the more polite boku first-person pronoun in contrast to Taichi’s more assertive ore. He also lacks Taichi’s penchant for mild insensitivity -- in fact, very unlike Taichi, he has an incredible amount of emotional insight (02 spends quite a bit of time in 02 episodes 32 and 46 to showing off Agumon as someone who makes up for all of his lack of intellectual understanding with emotional and borderline poetic insight). And, really, while Taichi is a bit surface-insensitive, and while he seems to be impulsive, he actually is a conscientious person and is trying his best in his own way, and he isn’t the kind of person who cares about societal things like seniority, and he demonstrates multiple times that he’s easygoing and chill, and so you can say that’s a part of Taichi as well. Remembering that a Digimon partner’s presence helps their own human partner grow, Agumon being so openly friendly helps Taichi maintain good relations with others without running afoul of them.

One of Agumon’s most famous traits is that he likes food, which is not actually something that was in the original Adventure or 02 all that much but has been somewhat exaggerated since. That said, back in Adventure, while it was established that all Digimon regularly need food in order to maintain their evolutions, Agumon would usually be the first to complain “I’m hungry,” and whenever they did get food, Agumon would be one of the most prominently enjoying it. Food is, after all, one of the simplest and most universal of pleasures, and there’s a lot of visual framing of Taichi chowing down just as ravenously as Agumon is -- so, honestly, he probably got it from him.

Taichi also speaks a bit about his pain of being separated from Agumon in the space between Adventure and 02, and he directly refers to Agumon as “the other me”. The word “partner” was not actually used very much in the original Adventure or 02, and Taichi is not able to fully elucidate the sentiment of Agumon’s connection to his own self, but he still understands this much and why the loss cuts him so deeply, and by the time we get to Kizuna, it’s presumably why he uses similar language in his thesis proposal to refer to him. (I already covered the circumstances of Agumon’s relationship to Taichi’s existential crisis in Kizuna and how it led to their separation earlier, so I will omit it here for the sake of avoiding redundancy.)

Yamato and Gabumon

This might surprise some people to hear, but I would also pin this as one of the more ostensibly “like-minded” pairs. Gabumon is shy on the surface, but turns out to be quite passionate -- he uses the same assertive ore as Yamato, in contrast to Agumon’s boku, and he demonstrates his capacity for passion and action in that he’s arguably one of the most assertive in the cast. Note his taking initiative against Yamato’s frostbite in Adventure episode 9, or declaring his intent to stay with Yamato even if it means going against the others in Adventure episode 44, or singlehandedly dragging Yamato out of the hole of darkness in Adventure episode 51.

And, of course, Yamato himself is someone who initially seems a little awkward or detached around everyone, but is actually very passionate, so that’s all the same. And because Gabumon himself is so open about communicating with the otherwise closed-in Yamato, Yamato is able to express himself better over the course of Adventure.

Funny thing about that “shyness”, too -- the idea of Gabumon being particularly shy isn’t present in 02 much at all (we don’t get to see him very much, so it’s hard to say whether it’s completely gone, but it’s at least gone enough for the duration of his appearances). Which is funny, considering: guess who else stopped being shy and became naturally outgoing in 02? Yeah, so, as much as you might hear people (even official!) claim that the Digimon are static while their partners change, that’s not completely true -- the Digimon themselves develop in personality in the same way their human partners do. It’s just more subtle and less drastic, since they’re representing an abstract single part of their personality rather than being an exact match.

Sora and Piyomon

Sora and Piyomon have an interesting relationship in that they’re the only one where their relationship started off on a note of conflict -- mainly in that Sora was very put off by Piyomon at first and even looked down condescendingly on her (well, only for the duration of a single episode). In fact, Sora’s own surface behavior is very different from the kind and caring Sora we know -- Sora dislikes associating with the clingy and affectionate Piyomon for being “mushy”, and even declares that she doesn’t want to “take responsibility” for lugging her around.

Of course, Sora’s character arc later revolves around the fact that she has abysmally bad self-awareness and doesn’t even realize that she has a compulsive sense of responsibility to others. So Sora is affectionate and loving -- she just puts up a front of trying to act a little above that (well, at least, during this part of the series) and doesn’t even see herself as someone capable of being like that (again, purely during this part of the series).

Piyomon is also interesting in that she has one of the most dramatic personality shifts even as early as Child to Adult, where she suddenly switches from the casual atashi to watashi (sometimes even kono watashi, which is super regal), and becomes incredibly dignified and regal even as Birdramon, and you can certainly see why Sora immediately started taking her seriously thereafter. It also begs a lot to think about, considering Sora’s very convoluted character and the many layers of herself that even she isn’t consciously aware of.

The way Piyomon helped Sora shift her own mentality is pretty directly handed to you on a plate in Adventure episode 26 -- because Piyomon played the role of Sora in the metaphor of Sora’s behavior towards Piyomon correlated to Toshiko’s behavior towards Sora, Sora was able to re-adjust her position relative to her family and consider her both someone capable of love, and someone who is loved.

Koushirou and Tentomon

Koushirou and Tentomon are another pair that initially seem like they’re opposing types, with Koushirou being constantly curious and Tentomon being comparatively simple-minded, but the first key to figuring out where the similarity is ends up being a bit deceptive -- Tentomon says in Adventure episode 5 that he’s not particularly interested in himself. And, certainly, Koushirou is interested in Tentomon, but he, too, is not interested in himself -- in fact, he considers himself to be a topic he’d rather avoid instead of looking into everything else.

As far as language goes, while Tentomon does also use the stereotypically easygoing Kansai dialect, he also specifically uses the polite form, mirroring Koushirou’s own perpetual use of polite language. But unlike Koushirou, who uses it to keep distance from others, Tentomon is in fact very sociable, and is even portrayed as a Digimon who’s conscientious of others and “takes care” of them. And because Tentomon is so openly friendly, he manages to coax Koushirou out of his shell and allow him to think about more complicated things related to his own position in the world that he’d been avoiding.

As Koushirou’s character arc proceeds, we learn that he’s polite not only out of distance but also because he really is a very kind person, and moreover that he does eventually want to open up to others. And the payoff for this eventually comes in 02...

...when he ends up becoming one of the most visible members of the older Adventure cast to appear in the series, checking in on the younger kids and developing into someone capable of organizing and managing people. Hmm, seems familiar.

Mimi and Palmon

This one’s an easy one. Mimi is possibly the most straightforward person in the original Adventure cast -- well, that’s the point of her Crest after all -- and so Palmon is almost exactly like her, being a cheerful type who loves being cute. Any contrast between them is only really apparent in the very early episodes of the series, and that’s not even a contrast in theory as much as it’s just something that might intrigue audiences at first when Mimi spent a lot of those episodes complaining, but that’s also mostly because she was heavily under stress, and otherwise Mimi has always been kind and cheerful and indulgent in being cute.

Perhaps the only real difference is that Palmon, being a plant, is more willing to get involved with dirt and other things that Mimi ostensibly would rather not, but as the series progresses, Mimi manages to gain a higher sense of tolerance and get past her initial sense of materialism (which is something she’d had the capacity for the whole time).

Jou and Gomamon

Of the Adventure pairs, this one is probably the one that seems like the biggest contrast on its face, with the overly high-strung and constantly stressed Jou, and the more playful and relaxed Gomamon.

In the end, Jou is someone who’s defined by his desire to support others, and even admits at the end of the series that he’s better suited for a support role than for fighting, and that there’s nothing wrong with that as long as he continues to channel his desire to help people in a way he’s most comfortable with. So, in the end, he’s not actually an inherently aggressive type. And, meanwhile, Gomamon is the kind who’s constantly looking out for Jou, to the point of knowing (such as in Adventure episode 7) when he’s about to do something phenomenally stupid and minding him so that nothing bad happens to him, and so, this is probably why they’re ultimately able to settle down and end the series eye-to-eye (or perhaps hand-to-hand).

And, again, recall that Digimon partners generally reflect a part that’s vital to their own human partner’s growth; considering that Jou is most certainly one of the more extreme personalities in this cast, you get the feeling that he probably needs someone this chill to keep his massive stress tendencies in check.

Takeru and Patamon

Takeru and Patamon are an interesting case largely due to the two of them being so present for a whole two series. In Adventure, both of them seem to be largely like-minded, being playful, innocent, and childish -- although Patamon is more open about expressing the childishness that Takeru keeps trying to cover up. Patamon being roughly on the same playing field (no pun intended) as Takeru means that Takeru has someone he’s willing to be open with and let himself loose a little (such as in Adventure episode 12), because for the first half of the series, he’s almost entirely in the presence of elders and stifling himself for the sake of being “well-behaved”, and it starts his long journey of being able to understand his position and his actual sense of emotions over the course of Adventure and 02.

Patamon also has a striking personality change upon evolving, becoming the regal and dignified Angemon, and, interestingly, his appearances have a very “knight templar” vibe where he takes a no-compromise stance against dark forces and states that he’ll condemn all of them to oblivion. This is a stance that’s unnervingly similar to Takeru’s own no-compromise stance against the darkness in 02, and it’s interesting in that Takeru himself had been advocating for pacifism in Adventure episode 12, but this incident traumatized him enough to start taking a position that more resembled Angemon’s.

As we go into 02, Takeru’s contrast with Patamon initially seems like an increased mismatch, since Patamon is still ostensibly childish and playful while Takeru is ostensibly more mature. But for one, Takeru’s character arc is about the fact that he’s still pretending he’s more in control of his emotions than he actually is, and in some way you can also glean that there’s a sort of naivete present in his character that he keeps covering up with confident smiles. Patamon, for his part, does actually seem to have adopted a bit of a mentor role to the other Digimon, and we also learn that he’s capable of deliberately trolling people instead of just being generically playful -- much like Takeru himself, who’s a bit evasive and not entirely honest.

We do actually see Patamon reach HolyAngemon in 02 episode 34, but it doesn’t work out well, and while this is partially for plot mechanic reasons, it also says a lot that the “knight templar” stance that both Takeru and HolyAngemon have, with the full depth of no-compromise, isn’t going anywhere, and in the end, something more effective is only possible when Shakkoumon appears in 02 episodes 36-37 -- that is, Takeru is only able to better move on with Iori’s support.

Hikari and Tailmon

Hikari is the only of the Tokyo Chosen Children to have a Digimon who “defaults” to Adult instead of Child or lower, and it means that Tailmon herself comes with a certain amount of maturity -- on top of having been become a bit hardened due to her experiences being isolated. This is an ostensible contrast to the more pure-hearted and innocent Hikari, but note that Hikari’s own will can be pretty assertive when it comes down to it. On top of that, as much as Tailmon is a bit standoffish, Hikari is also “emotionally isolated” -- she has trouble vocalizing her negative feelings, and it’s difficult for anyone in Adventure or the first half of 02 to truly connect with her internal thoughts. Recalling that the Digimon partner reflects a side of the human partner that’s less easily exposed and allows the human partner to grow in ways they wouldn’t before, Tailmon’s sheer presence gives Hikari a route to action in ways she probably wouldn’t have beforehand.

In 02, Hikari becomes a little more mischievous and playful, and Tailmon also becomes a bit more willing to indulge (she even switches first-person pronouns in sync with Hikari, going from the more polite watashi to the more casual atashi). Both of them are now more able to enjoy themselves more openly. That said, Tailmon still has a certain degree of stuffy personal pride (she snarks at everyone quite easily for fussing over snacks in 02 episode 3), and Hikari herself remains emotionally elusive and repressive at the start of this series.

Tailmon evolves temporarily to Angewomon in 02 episode 13, which is the first time anyone (in this case, Takeru) makes some degree of headway to reaching out to her and allowing her to open up a bit more, but it’s not until 02 episode 31 when Hikari is fully reached out to via Miyako, which marks the first appearance of Silphymon.

Daisuke and V-mon

Now here’s a very like-minded pair, even more so than Taichi and Agumon -- and, after all, Daisuke is simple-minded, so painfully simple-minded that he’s practically incapable of hiding anything, and so V-mon is almost exactly like him, down to using the same ore pronoun and being feisty and mischievous (a point is also made that he plays soccer with Daisuke, something that Agumon didn’t necessarily do with Taichi), and, heck, in a rare show of Digimon-Digimon crushes, has a crush on Tailmon in the exact same way Daisuke has on Hikari. (By the time we get to Kizuna and its higher animation budget, a lot of attention is paid to having even their body language mirror each other.)

There is only one real functional difference between the two in disposition, and it’s that V-mon is very straightforward, friendly, and kind, without being prone to getting angry or spiteful at anyone, and in the end, it’s indicative of the fact that Daisuke’s tendency to lash out defensively at everyone is just a front -- at his core, he’s friendly, supportive, and kind. Daisuke’s experiences and banter with V-mon contribute to him getting the sort of validation he needed without having to worry about being on edge or lash out defensively, and because of that, he was able to form a healthier and more supportive relationship with the rest of the group.

Miyako and Hawkmon

This one seems to be a contrast right off the bat -- Miyako is bubbly, over-the-top, and rather messy and lacking in restraint, whereas Hawkmon is formal, graceful, and polite. But Hawkmon’s most prominent trait is his absolute loyalty and devotion to Miyako -- he’s very often referred to by both official staff and fans as her “knight” -- and is constantly minding her to protect her and make sure she doesn’t go over her head (most prominently, 02 episode 18). And as far as Miyako’s relationship to others goes -- she’s also devotedly loyal to everyone she loves and is constantly going out of her way to help others, and her character arc in itself is about the fact she wants to do her best to reach out to people and help emotionally support them in the best way she can, and Hawkmon managing to channel that to its utmost extent to Miyako in turn (in a very “who watches the watchman?” sense) allows her to regain her bearings and have better control over herself in the aftermath of 02 episode 18.

On top of that, as the series proceeds, it turns out that Hawkmon also shares Miyako’s penchant for dramatic theatrics and being a bit over his head -- even if he seemingly has himself more together than Miyako does, he’s not completely above it all...

Miyako is also the franchise’s first example of a female character with a masculine Digimon partner, and while Miyako herself openly identifies with and indulges in all things hyper-feminine, she also has zero issue engaging in more masculine-associated things as they suit her -- most prominently her Digital World outfit, and the fact she often displays a rather aggressive go-getter and hot-blooded/in-your-face personality that would not be out of place on a male shounen hero in a more conventional show. (Although, as much as these have generally been on the thread of “less visible aspects”, it’s not like this was that less visible of an aspect of her to begin with...)

Iori and Armadimon

Iori and Armadimon hold the honor of being the only pair in the Tokyo Chosen Children to be voiced by the same voice actress (Urawa Megumi), driving the parallel down even further. And while their surface temperaments seem different, with Iori being rather uptight and strict on himself while Armadimon is laid-back, carefree, and even somewhat assertive, they’re not that different -- Armadimon is basically the curious, impressionable, somewhat childish spirit that Iori would be if he weren’t constantly holding himself back. (There’s a lot to be said about Submarimon going out of his way to take Iori for a ride in 02 episode 16 so that Iori can finally properly enjoy himself for once.)

Iori takes a lot of very stubborn, no-compromise positions over the course of 02, but Armadimon asking just the right kinds of questions allows him to “snap out of it” and be a little more receptive to considering alternatives, or at least taking into account more emotionally-oriented issues he’s dealing with. You can say that Armadimon (especially as Upamon) softening Iori up a bit -- since Iori will never be cold or unforgiving towards his partner, no matter what -- serves as a precursor to Iori starting to question the limitations of his black-and-white view of morality, which allows him to successfully break through to Takeru and fill out the rest of his character arc.

Ken and Wormmon

Considering how much of the plot revolved around this one, this one almost goes entirely without saying! During Ken’s stint as the Kaiser, Wormmon represents the heart that Ken’s not entirely willing to leave behind -- and, also, the affection that he’s still craving from his family. The Kaiser going practically out of his way to deny Wormmon yet paradoxically keeping him around is basically his attitude towards his own “weak” and naturally kindhearted self. Notably, recall that the principle of “a Digimon will never deny their partner” applies here -- Wormmon’s “betrayal” of the Kaiser isn’t really any kind of denial, since he was doing it mainly for Ken’s own sake, and, more symbolically, it’s Ken reaching his own limit and coming to realize that this path isn’t what he really wants.

Wormmon is unusually clingy to his own partner over the course of 02, and it’s vital to Ken needing to learn to love himself and also getting important validation that he needs, especially during the critical point in time during 02 episodes 23-30 when he’s still not sure how to approach the rest of the group -- Wormmon gives him someone to talk to honestly and openly, giving him a proper springboard to sort out his complicated feelings about the others and himself. You can say also that as Ken becomes more open and straightforward over the course of the latter half of 02, he, in turn, becomes much more shameless about showing affection and opening his own heart.

Wallace, Gumimon, and Chocomon

Bonus round!

While it’s hard to fully apply Hurricane Touchdown to this theory (by official admission, it wasn’t properly cross-referenced with the original Adventure/02 series lore, and trying to correlate all of the evolutions in this movie to something metaphorical will give you a headache), Wallace’s two partners still fit very neatly into this overall theory of Digimon partners as a part of the self. Wallace is a character with very sharp duality, trying to be a flirt who asserts himself as a vagrant who’s about to “become an adult”, yet still feels an obligation to keep calling his mom and is engaging in increasingly self-destructive behavior.

Most pertinently, Gumimon and Chocomon represent the two stances Wallace is torn between: wanting to “return to the past” (Chocomon) because he’s still hung up on having lost Chocomon and is convinced that he can make everything just like it was before, and “being able to productively move on” (Gumimon). For most of the early parts of the movie, Wallace is stuck on Chocomon’s mentality of fixating on the past, and Gumimon isn’t even remotely subtle when he draws an explicit parallel between the two (saying that Chocomon didn’t like the heat, followed by offering to give Wallace shade as a hat). But once the conflict escalates and Wallace realizes just how deep in denial Chocomon is, to the point of being destructive to himself and others, Wallace comes to embrace Gumimon’s stance of practicality and moving on. In the end, the ultimate conclusion is reached, and Wallace is forced to fully accept that latter stance when Chocomon dies, but the movie’s ending (and Kizuna) provide an extra option: allowing the past to come back, but in a new form and treading new territory instead of trying to make it “the way it was before”.

#digimon #digimon adventure #digimon adventure 02 #digimon adventure last evolution kizuna #kizuna spoilers #qwertyshuman #shihameta #shiha's ask box

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beelspillowpet · 4 years

Text

A Lesson in Love - A “Character Analysis” on Asmodeus

I had to come for the tracks, wigs, and weaves of bitches when Pomade dropped because I saw people talking shit about my boy. This was a milestone “project” or “reward” I guess?

I hit 400 followers today while I was out running errands!!! Thank you guys SO SO MUCH for the love and support! I can’t WAIT to produce more content for everyone!!!

Below the cut there WILL BE talk of season 3, as well as some talk of chapter 16. There’s a healthy amount of theorizing on his personality as well, I hope you don’t mind! This came out more like a plea to get people to change their minds about how Asmo really is, rather than a comprehensive essay of sorts. So here we go!

There’s something we apparently still need to talk about in this fanbase. The unrealistic idea of Asmodeus being a sex freak, and an unreliable person in general despite there being little proof of it. We need to set a few things straight about Asmo moving forward.

December 25th rolled around and Asmo’s audio drama and song were released. I take it everyone enjoyed both parts, as well as I did. My timeline both on twitter and tumblr were filled with Asmodeus content, as well as the other brothers and such. But I mostly got Asmo content. However, in peeks and cracks, if I looked hard enough, I still saw people who absolutely loathed Asmo or who were indifferent to him. Keep in mind; I think it’s okay. You don’t have to like everyone.

I’ve only joined the fanbase in September, but even I could tell some of these takes were old fashioned. I downloaded the game on October 17th, a very important anniversary for me, while I

was still in bed in the morning. I blazed through the entire story of season 1 and now I am stuck in season 2, specifically in Chapter 24. I obviously don’t have every card of Asmodeus with his Devilgrams, but I have been analyzing his character over the past few days for this.

So needless to say, I have a considerable amount of information on him, as well as personal thoughts that may help some learn to love him. Or at the very least, from spreading a negative idea of him around as if it were true. Enough that should help clear his name, so to speak.

Let’s look at his title; Avatar of Lust. Now naturally the thoughts that come to your head are sex and other sexual bits. So I can understand how some people would come to the conclusion that he’s just a sex freak. But if you look under the surface of his title, like I’m sure you’ve had to for your own personal favorites (*cough* Lucifer, Belphie, and Satan ESPECIALLY) you would discover that Asmodeus is more than just about sex. In fact, sex takes up very little of his pass time, if you were to believe it!

In recent chapters, as I’ve been told, Asmodeus doesn’t really get around much anyways:

Granted, this was said while in Celestia, but I imagine not much has changed for him since his fall, as well as his brothers.

Not really comfortable being with just anyone, huh…? Sounds like someone who doesn’t have sex so warily often as you’d think!

Being lustful can come in many shapes and forms. It can be merely in appearance, which Asmo is not afraid of doing. He’s very comfortable about skinship and it’s very apparent in how he dresses and acts that he wants you to adore his body. To worship it! Maybe not sexually, but aesthetically! Being lustful can mean just thinking about sex or sexual scenarios often, which if you take a peek at Asmo’s chat’s either with you or his brothers, is very apparent too.

Personally, I believe that people would assume he is not good in a relationship because he would have a “cheating problem”. I don’t think Asmo is a monster, just like I don’t think any of the brothers are monsters. They may be demons (technically fallen angels) now but they used to be angels too. Their falling out with their Father doesn’t mean they’ve completely abandoned morality, it was a rebellion for Lilith’s right to live. Not for them to sin as they pleased. For all we know they might have been fine in Heaven otherwise! (with the exception of Lucifer.)

A monster knows right from wrong and chooses evil anyways. An ignorant person doesn’t know right from wrong. Asmodeus is not a monster, nor is he ignorant.

When Asmo genuinely loves you, I think he would take steps to calm down that side of him, if it were to exist. Lust is fairly limited, but it is a part of love to some extent. LOVE is vastly different. Love has many languages, and they aren’t all spoken either. For me, personally, I found that Lucifer’s love language can be either very direct, or roundabout so as to not let it go to your head, for an example. Asmo is just far more direct about his care for you.

I feel as though Asmo gets a lot of crap constantly for his presumed nature and because we don’t get to see much else of him at first, especially in season 1, his impression on us sort of stays. With most of the fanbase either somewhat new to the game or somewhere lost in the sea of the difficulty curve that is season 2, we can only assume based on what we’ve seen, and what others have headcanoned about him.

Let’s break and talk about Satan for a moment; this is going somewhere.

I’m led to believe that Satan can control his sin fairly well. He’s easy to get irritated, sure, but he isn’t as much of a walking ball of rage as I suspected. I would argue that, aside from Leviathan, Satan can handle his sin the best out of the brothers. But again, we’re forgetting about Asmo. The Avatar of “Lust”. Like I’ve shown before, he doesn’t really sleep around a lot, according to anon.

At worst, Asmo being flirty is through text and he’s not actively trying to sleep with you. It can be interpreted that way, but for me personally, it comes down to having a friend that is very up close and in your personal space.

(I myself am one of these types of people. Having ADHD, my social cues are always sort of off, and I’ve struggled with coping with it for years. With my best friend, we have seen each other naked countless times and have slept in the same bed as well. We were never romantic with each other. We were just very comfortable being close and personal with each other.)

I’d like to point out also that Asmo isn’t even there for most of season 1 too. Which can give you the idea that maybe he just was out sleeping around a lot, but to me he probably just went out partying a lot. You don’t get known that fast for sleeping around. Maybe in 5,000 years, sure, but I’d imagine being a party boy, as his Devilgram “Guided by Desire” suggests.

So the idea that Asmo isn’t in the house a lot because he’s out having sex all the time isn’t true is it? He’s probably just out partying, which can LEAD to sex with someone sure, but again, Asmo doesn’t feel comfortable doing that, now does he?

I feel like of all the boys, Asmo is the one who radiates with everyone else the most. Most people will never realize how surreal it is that Asmo is faking it until he makes it. He doesn’t always think he’s beautiful, or that he’s worth all the love he’s striving and straining to get. Something that is extremely relatable for a lot of people with self-worth issues. Asmo is just like that, but instead being sarcastic and self-deprecating, he simply works to make himself look as beautiful as possible, so that in his eyes, his beauty matches the affection he gets.

Which is why, when he falls in love with you, it’s strange. You are constantly telling him he’s nice and pretty, but you aren’t lusting after him. You’re just being nice. It may just be me, but when people are overly nice just for the sake of being nice, I’m very attracted to that. That is Asmo, to some extent. The fact that he reflects the insecurities and habits of others so clearly may make others uncomfortable, but that brutal honesty veiled behind insecurity is what a lot of people with self-image issues deal with.

Now for me to share my favorite personal idea for Asmo that completely changed how I saw him in season 1 onwards; Asmodeus is an empath. Now let me explain:

First, what is an Empath?

The term empath comes from empathy, which is the ability to understand the experiences and feelings of others outside of your own perspective. Seems simple, right? Everyone can do this to some extent. However, what makes you an empath is the fact that empaths genuinely feel the same pain as you do. So much so your experience becomes a very personal part of their own. They are capable of being able to feel other people’s emotions without them speaking, or even showing signs of it through their body language.

This would explain, for me personally, why there’s so little of him in season 1. The intensity of what goes on in the house, his sensitive soft-spoken mannerisms, the only time he truly gets mad is when he’s childishly arguing with Mammon? Asmo is afraid of true conflict, he’s afraid of violence and negative emotions. Let’s face it; everyone is indifferent or hates you at the start of the game.

While this changes fairly quickly, all the intense feelings come to a head in chapter 16. All those negative emotions swirling around, of course Asmo isn’t going to want to be in the house when it’s that intense. The attic didn’t just disappear completely, too. Belphie was still in the attic hating humans. That negative emotion could be affecting Asmo and he didn’t know why, so he could have been out of the house more.

Where Asmo can feel the emotions of others, it may mostly be the negative ones because they fill him with anxiety and panic if it persists. Which can be helpful in making him so urgent to want to make others smile and feel better, right?

Imagine being intimate with Asmodeus, and suddenly you aren’t in the mood for it anymore but don’t want to make things awkward. He could pick up on it in an instant and wouldn’t get mad because he understands how you feel completely.

Now to close this out about something that genuinely hurts me; Asmodeus is a narcissist.

I mean, the wiki says that he is, but personally? No, no he isn’t. Since when is loving yourself a bad thing? Sure he may go a bit far sometimes, but people with self-image issues need to go a little harder than the rest to make sure they're getting the love they need.

(Talking about myself AGAIN, but I do this a lot. At random, I will look up in my own mirror in front of my desk that I sit in front of all day and tell myself I am a cute bitch. I am VERY VERY cute and anyone would be lucky to have someone as drop dead gorgeous as myself. I say that a few times a day. In reality, I am very insecure about my looks. I do believe I’m cute, but sometimes it’s hard to say it. Which is why I force myself. Why wouldn’t Asmo do the same?)

Talking yourself up to be as beautiful as a sex god is no easy task, but Asmo isn’t the Avatar of “Lust” for no reason. When an insecure girl talks up her beauty, it’s her being strong and independent. When Asmo does it, its narcissism… it doesn’t really seem fair, now does it? Maybe he’s just an insecure person who needs to tell himself ALL THE TIME that he’s beautiful. That if he stares at his reflection long enough, he may see it too.

(Also, Simeon literally calls him out on being insecure. Insecure people tend to try and overcompensate where they feel they’re lacking.)

”Asmodeus is hinted to be insecure and seeking for love and attention. When Simeon was asked about what he thought of Asmodeus, he says that Asmodeus is still trying to fulfill the role of the angel he used to be; an angel that was adored and loved by many. Asmodeus laughs at Simeon's remark and brushes it off by saying that he is only jealous.” - A section from said Asmodeus Wiki.

People can choose to love or hate Asmo, obviously. Making things up about his character without having anything but speculation and having that dictate how he acts is plain silly. This entire “essay” if you can call it that, comes from the heart. I love Asmo as a character, and in the beginning he did make me uncomfortable, I didn’t like him that much. But I learned to look past that and figure out why he acts the way he does. Something didn’t sit right with me about him for a while, and it was that air of insecurity that I didn’t see at first.

All I can really ask for, is giving Asmo another chance as a character. He’s not as wild and wacky as Mammon, or as cool and sexy as Lucifer, or as edgy and precious as Belphie, but he matters in this story too. He fell from grace with his brothers for Lilith. Give him another chance, and let him show you that he is the Avatar of Love.

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me swd #om!#om! swd #om! asmo #om! asmodeus #obey me asmo #obey me asmodeus #Thanks for 400 followers!

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doreamu-san · 3 years

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An analysis of SolKy

Hello! Thank you so much for clicking on this. A while ago, I was asked to do an essay explaining why people ship SolKy other than the whole rivals/opposites attract reason, and I got a lot of feedback stating it was useful for newcomers to the ship! As a result I’ve decided to post this on tumblr, but just on the ship’s tag as to not bother uninterested people.

A couple of disclaimers before I begin. This is firstly just my own opinion, so whilst it makes sense for me, other shippers may disagree with my points. I’m also not claiming they are canon because they are not. But I do hope it’ll give some insight into why some people like me enjoy them together.

Even once you’ve read this essay, you can still dislike SolKy. This isn’t an essay stating you have to ship them.

This will be extremely long as I basically cover every single interaction they’ve ever had with each other since I know some people sort of gloss over their dialogue, so grab yourself a drink, get comfy, and I hope you enjoy reading!

(Last edited: 09/05/2021. This will be updated again when Strive releases!)

How this all began

If we’re starting right at the beginning, it’s common knowledge that Ky and Sol weren’t exactly on great terms and often clashed most of the time due to their conflicting beliefs. Ky saw the world in terms of black and white, and had very strict rules on what constituted as right and wrong. Sol seemed to think differently and went against that, which was a stark contrast compared to the other Order members at the time.

Considering that they were in fact, in the middle of a war, you would think that generally people would be willing to put their differences aside and work together.

But Sol wasn’t like everyone else, going off and doing his own thing instead of actually listening to orders, so it’s understandable why Ky found him rather irritating.

However, Ky did grow curious of Sol. Obviously curiosity does not equate to love, but it is the basis of Ky wanting to become more friendly with and know more about Sol. There seemed to be something that Sol knew but Ky didn’t, but how was that possible..? As a result, despite how infuriating he could be, Ky sought to seek out the truth and so fought him for answers.

In regards to why exactly they fight (aside from the fact that this is a fighting game), Ishiwatari wrote something called ‘Hostility is Akin to Love’ right above a picture of them fighting:

Hostility is akin to love Thinking of your opponent’s actions to fight, Reading your opponent’s inner thoughts to fight, Planning attacks that will hit your opponent to fight, And then transmitting your thoughts with those attacks, The more you think of your own advantage, at the same time you think of your opponent, In the instant you mix with your opponent, a passionate feeling arises, and blood boils, Reality is hurt, and you wound your opponent, Hostility is akin to love. — Guilty Gear Isuka Mook

It states how fighting someone can be close to feelings of love because you have to think about what your opponent is doing, as well as how you’re going to respond to your opponent. Overtime, you start to memorise how your opponent thinks, and as a result you’ll know them on a deeper level.

So considering the above, this explains how even though they weren’t on friendly terms, they still formed a bond with one another.

Now we’ve established how exactly their relationship started, and why Ky was curious about Sol in the first place, let’s look at things from Sol’s perspective.

Sol’s attitude towards Ky

We know that Sol was also pretty annoyed by Ky, which was totally justifiable given the extreme way in which Ky thought the world worked. But Sol didn’t exactly dislike Ky.

In order to provide some evidence that Sol cares about Ky, let’s cover that infamous scene everyone likes to reference which shows Sol crying over Ky’s dead body:

Sol: "I came to pick you up." Ky: "Always coming late... you never could fix that..." Sol: "You..." Ky: "As to be expected... until the very end... I could never beat you..." Sol: "Don't say anything!" Ky: "I have... a request..." Sol: "I said shut up!" Ky: "After Commander Kliff... carry on... the Holy Order..." Sol: "Stop it... that's your job!" Ky: "Please... promise me..." Sol: "Dammit..." Ky: "If it's you... you can do..." Sol: "Hey.... what's wrong. Hey! KYYYYYY!" — Guilty Gear XX Drama CD Side Red, Battle of Rome — Deathmatch

A lot of people bring this quote up when discussing SolKy and yes, it does show Sol cares about Ky considering how Sol never really cares about anyone in general, but the fact that Ky’s death managed to make him emotional shows what an impact Ky had on him. There are however more quotes that show Sol’s feelings.

There’s this scene in the GG Xtra manga, Ky and Sol get attacked by a mountain-sized gear. In order to save them, Sol rips off his limiter and Dragon Installs. This scene is very poignant when you take into consideration what Sol said in After Story A:

Sol: "Back during the Crusades, before we met... Kliff told me this rumour about a prodigy swordsman." Sol: "If you couldn't guess, that was you. I didn't give a shit at the time..." Sol: "But then I saw you on the battlefield." Sol: "I saw someone out there who surpassed all of my expectations. Or perhaps I should say 'something.'" Sol: "No openings, no wasted movements, no carelessness, no hesitation, no embarrassment, not even any honor. No chivalry or mercy. A being unaffected by emotion." Sol: "You were a killing machine. Taking down gears with brutal efficiency." Ky: "...That was a long time ago." Sol: "I'm not done talking. I've seen the face of the 'serious' Ky." Sol: "Then one day, you challenged me." Sol: "You wanna know what I thought right then?" Ky: "..." Sol: "I was afraid. Hell, I was scared shitless." Sol: "'He figured out that I'm a Gear, and he's come to kill me.' That's what I thought." — Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, After Story A

Sol admits that he knows just how scary Ky can be. Since Ky was extremely against Gears, if Ky found out that Sol was a Gear, then Ky would have most likely attempted to kill him. But Sol knew this and was willing to die for Ky’s sake, and transformed anyway:

Ky: "Sol..." Ky: (Really... that's really..) Ky: (That's really you!?) Ky: "SOL!" Sol: "Shut it..." Sol: "I didn't do it..." Sol: "To help you out—...." — Guilty Gear Xtra, Chapter 5: Unspeakable Thoughts

Going off on a bit of a tangent from Sol’s feelings, but I just want to point out Ky’s state of mind at this point. Ky in this time period was still very anti-Gear, as it was only through this moment and his encounters with Solaria and Dizzy later that made him change his way of thinking. It took a long time for Ky to accept Gears, and he still had the remains of that mindset in him when he had Sin, as he refused to make eye contact with him because Ky was ashamed of having a Gear child. So the fact that Ky knew Sol was a Gear, believed all Gears were evil, but still decided to accept Sol into his life and wanted to support him regardless of that, is interesting.

Back to Sol, another small quote that manages to show Sol’s feelings towards Ky is this:

Sol: (Maybe I'll finish them off while I'm at it...) Sol: (But that would mean breaking my promise to Ky...) — Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R, Sol Badguy Path 2

Now, Sol doesn’t care about 99% of what other people do as long as they don’t get in his way. The fact that he intends to keep his promise with Ky suggests that he holds Ky in somewhat ‘high’ regards compared to others.

There’s also this quote that shows Sol is thinking about Ky in Overture:

The frustrations of the man wielding a giant sword were piling day by day, and a familiar face appeared in his head. What’s he up to right now? “Hmph, whatever…” With a feeling of self-contempt, Sol Badguy shook his head. What am I getting sentimental for? — Guilty Gear 2: Overture, #0 “Noise”

And when Sol encounters Raven later on after seeing Ky incapacitated, Raven points out how he can tell Sol is upset, meaning Sol’s not really doing a good job of pretending he’s still indifferent to Ky.

Raven: "You're as ruthless as ever, huh, monster?" Sol: "Look who's talking." Raven: "Can you not put down your sword and talk? I understand you're upset with Ky Kiske defeated." Sol: "I'll ask your corpse for answers." — Guilty Gear 2: Overture, #5 "Gaze of the Chronicle"

Sol’s thoughts about Ky become even clearer during his confrontation with Sin when he’s under the influence of Valentine, where Sol defends Ky’s actions and tries to make Sin understand Ky is not 100% at fault:

Sin: "Can you see it? Can you feel it? This is my real power. This is my mother's strength." Sol: "But it's light. It must be from your father." Sin: "Shut up! Don't ever mention him!" Sin: "He abandoned my mother and me using justice as an excuse!" Sin: "Who cares about the King!? Who cares about the people!? That man, and that Kingdom, not one of them can protect a damn thing!" Sol: "I don't give a damn about your family." Sol: "But you know what, Ky may be a stubborn idiot, but at least he's true to his beliefs." Sol: "A punk like you is still alive thanks to his justice." — Guilty Gear 2: Overture, #15 "Roaring Compass"

Okay, that’s the pre-Xrd era for Sol done, now to focus on Ky’s pre-Xrd’s emotions.

Ky’s attitude towards Sol

We’ve established earlier that Ky was annoyed by Sol and disliked him in the Crusades. However, afterwards it seems as if Ky saw himself as friends with Sol:

Ofc1: "All of them seem to have been destroyed by... fire?" Ofc2: "Yeah... why could that be?" Ky: "........" Ky: "Change our course!" Ky: "Head towards the Eastern United States!" Ofc1: "May I ask why, Chief Ky?" Ky: "To meet an old friend." — Guilty Gear Xtra, Chapter 4: Former Friends

We know that Ky outwardly expressed his first signs of liking Sol when Sol stole the Fuuenken and Ky chased after him, only for Sol to win in their duel, and Ky says this:

Ky: "Promise me one thing..." Sol: "..What?" Ky: "We'll meet again." Sol: "Hmph... Well, if fate brings us together..." Ky: "..That's fine." — Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R, Sol Badguy Path 1

It’s pretty interesting that Ky wanted to see Sol again despite how Sol never used to listen to his orders, and how Sol never even tried to act like what the Order expected their men to act like (chivalrous, putting the people first, etc). It at least shows us that Ky saw possibly the potential of becoming friends with Sol. And Sol didn’t even say straight up ‘no’ or ‘in your dreams’ or whatever Badguy-esque notion he usually would’ve done, so we can assume he doesn’t mind seeing Ky again either.

Then they don’t speak to each other properly for 5 years until the tournament that Testament holds, though they have probably ran into each other a few times within those years.

A common misconception people have is that during those 5 years, Ky was obsessed with Sol and would constantly try to find him. Obviously, this is not true. Ky was busy with IPF stuff and Sol was hunting Gears down.

However, it’s not as if Ky completely forgot about Sol — he was just probably at the back of his mind, and Ky does admit that he has been chasing after Sol the most more than anyone else:

Ky: (Waiting outside for me when I left the ship... burning red flames. Soon, they seem to take the shape of a man... and he appears before me. Yes... it's him. The one I've been after the most... it's him.) — Guilty Gear X Drama CD, Vol. 1: Track Seven — Crater

There’s also these two other quotes:

Ky: (Sol...) Ky: (Why are you so stubborn about doing things alone?) — Guilty Gear Xtra, Chapter 5: Unspeakable Thoughts

You can interpret this in two ways: either Ky wants to help Sol out and/or he’s curious as to why Sol always does stuff alone.

And then there’s this:

Ky: "Maintaining peace, law, and order. That is my duty." Sol: "Whatever..." Ky: "You and I, we are cut from the same cloth." Ky: "How long are you going to keep that facade?" Sol: "..." Ky: "Answer me Sol!" — Guilty Gear Judgment, Sol and Ky Ending

Being ‘cut from the same cloth’ is quite a strong statement. The phrase means that Ky thought he and Sol were similar somehow, and that he shared something with Sol. Regardless, the ‘how long are you going to keep that facade’ at least shows that Ky knows Sol is intentionally acting distant/rough/etc. and that its not actually who he is.

Jumping to pre-Overture, just before Ky gives Sin to Sol, Ky is in a really depressive state due to all of the stress he’s been going through. This leads Dizzy to contact Sol. The fact that Sol is called means that Dizzy knows that Sol is possibly the only person who can help Ky at that point, which puts some emphasis on just how much Sol means to Ky or at least affects him.

Before I move onto Xrd, there’s this part where Ky gives his son to Sol. This proves he trusts Sol so much considering he was asking him to take care of Sin for a long period of time.

Ky: “Sol....I want to request something...” Sol: “...hnn?” Ky: “My son....Sin..can you take care of him for a while?” Sol: “...what did you say?” Ky: “I know it’s unreasonable but...I still want to ask...” — GG2: Overture Story, Sol's Story

The Xrd era (because it is so long, it needs its own section)

The Xrd era is extremely interesting to me, because Sol and Ky have some more in-depth conversations, and boy, do they have a lot of conversations.

Focusing on Sol first, theres a scene in REV where Sol asks Ky why he isn’t interested in his past:

Sol: "Why don't you ask me already?" Ky: "Ask you what?" Sol: "About my past." Ky: "I can ask you?" Sol: "I guarantee, it won't be interesting." Sol: "Every other word that came out of your mouth was 'Duel me,' or 'I challenge you!' You were so eager to fight and..." Ky: "........" — Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, Story Mode: Chapter 03, Sense A

Given that Ky was constantly pestering Sol about his background in the past, it makes sense why Sol is suddenly a bit confused about Ky’s sudden change in behaviour. But it also shows that Sol wants Ky to know about his past. After ~170+ years of being alive, Sol wants to finally open up to someone again, and he specifically chose Ky for this. It shows in the very least Sol trusts Ky and knows him well enough to decide to let him know about who he used to be.

And then Ky says this, which is basically him just showing Sol how much he cares and understands him:

Ky: "Sol. Of course I have an interest in your past." Ky: "But wanting to understand someone and trying to understand everything is completely different." Ky: "Right now, Sol Badguy's future matters much more to me, than Frederick's past." — Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, Story Mode: Chapter 03, Sense A

There’s also this scene in SIGN:

Ky: "I don't know your history." Ky: "I don't know if you had friends once, or if you fell in love, or why you burn with such hatred for That Man and the Gears..." Ky: "I don't even know your real name." Sol: "..." Ky: "But I do know a great deal about a man named Sol Badguy." Ky: "Blinded by vengeance, he lost sight of himself, and now he runs from the truth that frightens him." Sol: "...Say that again." Ky: "Tomorrow always comes, Sol." Sol: "..!" Ky: "If tomorrow promises to be cold and dark, I cannot stand idly by... even if I know my efforts will come to nothing." Sol: "... The self-righteous apple doesn't fall far from the tree." Ky: "I don't expect the world to change tomorrow, but I do hope that, today, perhaps my words will reach you." Ky: "Sol..." Ky: "I'll be waiting for you. We'll all be waiting for you. Sin, Dizzy..." Ky: "Once all this is over... come home." — Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN-, Story Mode: Chapter 04, Kaleidoscope B

Three things to take away from this:

Ky admits that he doesn’t know anything about Sol’s background, but that he knows a lot about the current Sol, and then goes on to explain how Sol acts. Which to expand on, means that although Ky used to care about Sol’s past, he doesn’t really mind about it anymore because Sol’s past won’t really change much who Sol is to Ky now. Also, the part where Ky explains how Sol was ‘blinded by vengeance,’etc. shows that Ky knows Sol’s current personality well enough in order to be able to distinguish his behaviours. Which is interesting because nobody has been around Sol long enough to be able to know him really well unlike Ky (Aria and Asuka count too, but they were around Sol when he was Frederick, and Sol seems pretty adamant on the idea that he’s a separate person from Frederick.)

‘Come home’ is pretty significant, as it implies that it’s almost like Ky is saying home is with Sin, Dizzy and the Valentines, and so when Sol is done getting revenge on That Man, instead of letting Sol just wander off alone, Ky wants Sol to be a family with them.

The fact that says Ky says ‘I’ll be waiting for you’ separate from ‘we’ll all be waiting for you’ implies that either Ky’s want to wait for Sol is somehow different from everyone else’s or it’s just for the sake of being dramatic. I interpreted this in both ways, as it seems like Ky knows that Sol treats him differently compared to others. So in a sense, by Ky emphasising that he’ll be waiting for Sol, it might make Sol more likely to ‘come home’.

There’s also a scene that shows Ky knows Sol’s personality well:

Ky: "When I look at you, Sol, I see a man who is afraid." Sol: "... What?" Ky: "It became clear when I watched you caring for Sin." Ky: "You work very hard to keep everyone at arm's length." Sol: "..." Sol: "I got Gear blood in my veins, and it ain't friendly. It's always there in the back of my head, whispering that I oughta just destroy all of this." Sol: "The only way I'm gonna get some closure is tracking down That Man and beating some answers out of him." Sol: "And if he doesn't have 'em..." Sol: "Then maybe there really isn't a good way to live." Ky: "That's why you close your heart off." — Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN-, Story Mode: Chapter 08, Hope A

There’s also this:

Ky: "Not all people have the strength to stand on their own." Sol: "..." Ky: "If only life were simple, and the right path was laid out before each of us..." Ky: "But even then some would leave it, and some would struggle with walking it. Such is human nature..." Ky: "The truth is that no path will ever be 'right' for all people. Each of us must find the one we are meant to walk--and sometimes that is where none exists." Ky: "That is what I learned from you." — Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN-, Story Mode: Chapter 08, Hope A

This just shows that Ky actually learnt something from Sol. Which I think is important because Ky is someone who always used to be very strict to his ideals. The fact that he learnt something from Sol that had an impact on his mindset means that Sol actually managed to have a great impact on Ky.

There’s this scene where Sol finds out that Aria isn’t dead when he confronts That Man, and he has somewhat of a mini mental breakdown. So Ky excuses them from the room, and goes outside to talk with Sol:

Ky: "Sol. The grudge you hold is certainly not something that can be taken lightly. And, whatever answer you think you've found, I doubt any of us will be able to stop you from seeing it through..." Ky: "But we have very little time left. Right now, we need the Gear Maker's help." Ky: "So, I'm begging you... Just for now. Why don't you stay outside with me." — Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, Story Mode: Chapter 06, Cause A

The last line that Ky says is interesting because it’s obvious that he’s just trying to calm Sol down, and Ky thinks that if he stays with Sol outside for a bit, he’ll be able to help him calm down. Furthermore, Ky thought it was more necessary to pause everything and help Sol out rather than keep listening to the plans of what their next course of action would be.

Ky does have the habit of comforting Sol. One of the more significant moments is whenever Sol refers to himself as a monster:

Ky: "Yes, he took away some of what makes you human, but that doesn't mean he altered your mind or your soul." Sol: "So what?" Ky: "I want to believe that you'll fight for the people of this world." Sol: "Are we seriously having this conversation?" Sol: "Look, kid. I'm a monster. I'm here to do two things: Destroy That Man, and kill all the other Gears." — Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN-, Story Mode: Chapter 04, Kaleidoscope B

To expand a little on Sol’s mindset, it’s common knowledge that Gears were generally in the past regarded as akin to monsters. Now we don’t have any solid proof Sol is referring to himself as a monster because he’s a Gear, or because he feels guilt about the whole Gear Project, etc. But we do know it’s something he’s affected by given that he constantly refers to himself as one.

So the fact that Ky constantly reassures him that he’s not one, and that Ky didn’t treat him differently after finding out he was a Gear, must be comforting to know.

Then at the end of REV, there’s the scene where Daryl is about to shoot Sol, because he (quite rightly) doesn’t trust the fate of the world to be left to Sol. And so, the kids get beamed up, but Ky asks to be left behind:

Ky: "But, if you plan on targeting Sol, then you must leave me behind, as well." Daryl: "What!?" Zappa:"60 seconds until impact..!" Sol: "What the hell are you doing?! Stay with Sin!" Ky: "I am well aware that this is a one in a million chance..." Ky: "But, if I survive at the expense of my dear friend, then there is little reason left for my ruling this world as king." — Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, Story Mode: Final Chapter, Fireworks

This was a really odd moment because Ky’s life was never in danger at that moment. If he had been sent on board Daryl’s ship as originally planned, he would have been safe. But Ky intentionally chose to risk his life, and its kind of startling because Ky has always put his people above everything. There were times when he put the people above his own family, like when he kept his family a secret instead of coming out with the truth about them in order to remain as King to protect his people.

So Ky suddenly going ‘I would rather die with Sol than take care of my people’ is really extreme. Also Ky was willing to leave his family behind, which is even more extreme. So this just really proves how highly Ky regards Sol considering how he would rather die with him than live without him.

Some concluding notes

I think Sol and Ky’s personalities do work really well. Perhaps not in the Crusade era, but if we take a look at the Xrd era, they have shown to get along and have deep conversations with one another that they both enjoy. They know each other extremely well; they know how to support one another when life gets a bit too much and they’re also capable of telling one another when the other is wrong.

Sol teaches Ky that life isn’t as simple as it seems, and that (figuratively speaking) he shouldn’t stick exactly to the textbook. He’s able to see under that perfect image Ky puts up about him being able to cope with everything, acting as a source of stability when you consider how Sol has been the only person who’s been around Ky since the very beginning.

Throughout all of Ky’s life, he’s been under so much pressure. From being Commander in the Crusades, to becoming the Head of the International Police Force, to becoming King. In every situation, people are constantly relying on him, and his environment is changing rapidly. But despite everything, Sol has always remained the same. He looks the same, acts the same, etc. Ky can rely on Sol and trust Sol. He’s like a source of stability for Ky in those hectic times.

And Ky provides something similar to Sol too, given how often he ran into Sol time and time again. When you’ve been alive for so long, it’d feel reassuring in the very least to see a familiar face. And Sol does seem to get less annoyed each time they meet each other again, considering like how in Overture he voluntarily went to go see Ky after seeing himself on a wanted poster.

Ky also gives Sol the chance to open up to people again and form connections with them, something that Sol has been reluctant to do. Sol needs someone to care about him, and Ky proves that by constantly reassuring him and never giving up on trying to help Sol, even though he kept getting pushed away.

They may not be canon but I really do love how they work together. Yes it’s true some people may like them because they are ‘rivals’and seeing rivals get together and bicker is great, but actually I think when people focus more on how much they support and rely on each other, as well as the fact that they do get along, them being in a relationship is more convincing.

Whilst this essay focused on their canon interactions, there’s plenty of other great material out there. For instance, the Guilty Gear 4KomaKINGS manga provides plenty of great SolKy interactions (like the time Ky wanted to have a friendship diary with Sol, only to get rejected and start crying about it. Of course, take these interactions with a pinch of skepticism considering the frivolity of the source material.)

And that, was my very long SolKy essay. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading! Though you may not have agreed with everything I have said, you still continued reading, and I am grateful for that. Thank you for showing such enthusiasm and loving this franchise.

#solky

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animeyanderelover · 4 years

Note

I've looked through your "sharing a darling" post and I've been inspired. I'd love to see Tsunade with a darling, who's Orochimaru's little sister. I imagine she and Tsuna probably were friends before she deserted the village with Orochi. And when she's nowhere near as heartless as Orochi, she's a morally-gray type of person. [With romantic yandere!Tsunade + platonic!yandere Orochimaru]

I’m glad you got inspired by my post☺️.

Tw: Yandere themes, unhealthy mindset, unhealthy relationship, possessiveness, obsessiveness, paranoia, violence

Darling is Orochimaru’s little sister

🐍🐌We’ve often talked about this, but Orochimaru has a weird way of showing his care, especially if it comes to persons he’s obsessed with. If you would be a test object he would most likely show genuine interest in you because you’re very useful. But how does this work when you’re his sister? It’s suspected that a part of why Orochimaru became the way he is like he is because he wanted to leave the painful memories of the past behind, including the death of his parents. So you were the only family he had left.

🐍🐌His way of caring showed himself from a very young age on with wanting you to get stronger. Orochimaru has a dislike for the fragility of life and it’s most likely that you and him shared more or less the same interest in kinjutsu. I can’t say that you had the same obsession as him with it, but you just tagged along with him.

🐍🐌Since Tsunade and Orochimaru were on the same team it was understandable that you were friends with them. Jiraiya was probably the guy who often asked you out on dates and made some less appropriate comments about you, earning a hit on the head from Tsunade and a unnerving look from Orochimaru. Tsunade was most likely friends with you because you were the only other girl from the three.

🐍🐌At the beginning it was just a friendship, a strong one. Tsunade was often a bit worried about you, knowing how twisted Orochimaru could be. You never minded, being used to all of this since you had grown up with him together.

🐍🐌Tsunade started becoming a tad more clingy and overprotective after Nawaki had died. It was somewhat of the beginning of her Yandere tendencies and it stayed that way even after she had got to know Dan. You often visited with her together Nawaki’s grave and showed him respect for his actions. But you were glad that Tsunade had found someone else who made her happy since you had suffered with her after the death of her brother. Because despite being slightly influenced from Orochimaru’s twisted personality you had always been the one who had cared more and showed it more.

🐍🐌Somehow I think after Dan died as well and you were again there to comfort Tsunade you somehow started to see things a bit more from Orochimaru’s side, understanding why he loathed the fragility of life. Because humans were so delicate that you could lose them at any moment. I would even go as far that Tsunade’s devastation over Nawaki and Dan left a huge impact on you and led you to becoming who you were.

🐍🐌Tsunade was at first most likely only a platonic Yandere for you, still seeing you as her best friend. She became incredibly clingy and overprotective and also started greatly disliking your brother. Why? Because Orochimaru gave off the feeling that you didn’t mean anything to him and he wouldn’t even be sad if you would die. He hadn’t looked affected when Nawaki had died and he hadn’t looked really affected when Dan had died. So it was no wonder that Tsunade was terrified of losing you as well and needing to see how not even you as Orochimaru’s sister would lead him to show any sorrow.

🐍🐌It was at the beginning just the genuine desire to keep you safe and alive. But with time it turned into something more intense for Tsunade. The knowledge that she could lose the person who had been always there for you made her go almost crazy. She might not even have realized when exactly it had happened. But one day you just gave her a warm smile...And Tsunade felt her heart speeding up in her chest rapidly and butterflies erupting from the pit of her stomach.

🐍🐌Orochimaru watched all of this with narrowed eyes, the way how Tsunade started clinging onto you tightly and the way she looked at you. It didn’t matter to him that Tsunade deserved happiness after everything that had happened to her. He didn’t want you to become weak by becoming too sentimental which you obviously were. It wasn’t like you had already changed a lot because of him, your view of the world having become slightly distorted because of his influence and the still fresh memory of Tsunade mourning over her brother and her lover. And I bet Orochimaru used that to control you a bit more.

🐍🐌Tsunade on the other hand worried because she noticed clearly how much you had changed in those last years and she knew too well who the culprit was. So she tried to keep you away from Orochimaru by often going out with you and asking you to spend time with him. And this didn’t suit with Orochimaru who would have preferred to continue training and experimenting with you.

🐍🐌It was most likely out of loyalty and own belief that you decided to follow Orochimaru into exile, some of his beliefs having influenced you as well. And Tsunade was once again completely devastated for losing another precious person to her, asking herself what she had done so terribly wrong in life to lose everyone she seemed to love.

🐍🐌Being Orochimaru’s sister and most likely on the same level of strength as him made you very respected and worshipped by his underlings like Kabuto and Kimimaro. And despite searching with him for a way to gain complete immortality You never agreed with his opinions all the time, disliking the way he treated others. You were somewhat of a mother figure for many people under him and were even known to forgive people different than Orochimaru. And Orochimaru didn’t really like this, fearing that your softness would be one day your death sentence. Orochimaru isn’t the type to start a fight over this, at least not in the classic sense. But he would cruelly tease your weak spots to get a reaction out of you and to try to reason with you that being so soft wouldn’t bring you anywhere.

🐍🐌I guess that Tsunade’s heart broke even more after hearing what you were doing, experimenting on people to gain immortality. She blamed herself for this, feeling like she should have ripped you away from your brother’s tight grip sooner since he had been the one who had corrupted you like this.

🐍🐌Tsunade met you most likely again whilst Naruto and Jiraiya were searching for her to convince her to become the fifth Hokage. She was already pissed enough at Orochimaru, never having forgiven him for ruining you like this. But she was also scared when seeing you again, freezing at first. She just really hoped that there was still some part of the old you left and not having become as cruel and heartless as Orochimaru had. You were also shocked to see her again, feeling a bit conflicted about how to face her after all those years again.

🐍🐌During the fight of the three you didn’t really participate, watching more from a distance. Not because you were lazy, but because you and Orochimaru knew that you might switch sides during the battle. Because you still cared. Tsunade was still your friend. So when Orochimaru wanted to kill Naruto and Tsunade kept sacrificing herself you would have lied if you would have said that you didn’t care. Instead you might have even tried to stop Orochimaru from completely killing her, that was at least until she released her jutsu and showed what she was capable off.

🐍🐌Different from Orochimaru you also never disliked Naruto and saw him as a poor excuse. You saw potential and passion in him, reminding you of Nawaki. That’s why you wanted to keep him alive. Because he had helped Tsunade out of her misery. And you were proud of her when she officially became Hokage, sending a anonymous gift and a small letter in which you congratulated her and told her how happy you were for her. And Tsunade knew too well who had sent her this.

🐍🐌I feel like after Sasuke joined Orochimaru you might have even gone as far as sometimes giving the village hints about his development without anyone finding out. And whenever such small notes received in the village, dropping hints about current whereabouts or informations about possible future plans from Orochimaru Tsunade always felt hopeful and encouraged that the old You was still there, that you weren’t completely possessed by evil like your older brother was.

🐍🐌I feel like you traveled back to the village after Sasuke killed Orichimaru. You had no reason to stay after all. And for someone who was known as an S-rated criminal you came over pretty calm when suddenly appearing in front of the gates of your old village. And best belief that when Tsunade Heard- that you were back, she completely lost it and instantly stormed towards you, not knowing whether to yell at you for doing such terrible things to her and other people or cry and suffocate you in a hug out of relief. In the end it became a mix made out of both.

🐍🐌You were taken under custody back into the village, your reputation being a bit saved because of all the small hints you had given them through the years. That and the fact that you answered all questions honestly have some ninjas troubles to judge you rightfully, not knowing whether to think of you as a good or bad person. On the one hand you had experimented on others, you had used the same jutsu as Orochimaru to reach immortality and many other things. But on the other hand there were countless tellings and rumors from many places and people that you had freed them out of Orochimaru’s grip or had even helped villages in need on your journeys. That made it somewhat troublesome whether to decide if you belonged in prison or not.

🐍🐌In the end it was decided to not send you into prison, mainly because Tsunade had insisted on it, but also because many had agreed that you had done many good things after all and had come back on your own free will, not to mention that you had told them everything they had wanted and needed answers for for so long. But you were kept under very tight custody, a few Anbu members always watching you.

🐍🐌Shizune knew from Tsunade’s love for you, having witnessed many times how Tsunade had started becoming very talkative about you after a few or many bottles of sake and knew that Tsunade had still feelings for you. And she advices to not risk anything with you, they still didn’t know whether you were on their side or not. Tsunade didn’t want to hear this, but not because she believed that Shizune was wrong, but because she knew that Shizune might be right.

🐍🐌She often came visiting you, wanting to at least talk to you and know why you had done this. Why you had left her. Why you had decided to tag along with Orochimaru. Why you had done all those terrible things and still so much good stuff at the same time. What were your motives?

🐍🐌I feel like Tsunade would be able to start a normal relationship with you after the war and after Orochimaru was reincarnated. Because the main problem before had been that people had, when looking at you, only been able to see Orochimaru. A cruel and sadistic criminal. But for whatever reason Orochimaru had been forgiven after the shinobi war and Tsunade also retired more or less since Kakashi became the sixth Hokage shortly after the war ended. There will be some tension between her and Orochimaru after that, especially since Tsunade still blames Orochimaru for corrupting you like this. Orochimaru wouldn’t be too happy either, but surprisingly he’s more okay than Tsunade with this since he doesn’t hold that much of a personal grudge against her like she does. He did become better after the war and was more accepting with it. As long as you don’t become a weakling that is, power is still a thing and will always be a thing for him.

#yandere naruto #yandere naruto shippuden #yandere orochimaru #yandere tsunade #yandere tsunade senju #platonic yandere

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mamahersh · 3 years

Text

The Road to Hell (is Paved with Good Intentions) Chapter 7

“Season 8 was well underway, and the server’s first conflict is bubbling just under the surface. But BDoubleO can’t worry about that right now because he has an Etho to find so they can work on the Horse Course together. However when Xisuma calls a surprise server meeting on behalf of EvilXisuma, BDubs gets his answers about where Etho’s been in the worst way possible.”

(CW: angst, mild torture)

Chapter rating: T

Nice long conclusion chapter to make up for the short one yesterday! From BDubs view, plus nHo hurt/comfort (emphasis on comfort)!

As in all the previous chapter posts, if you’ve enjoyed the ride I took direct inspiration from this oneshot on AO3! Please give them some love and appreciation.

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6

It had taken days before Xisuma figured out what EX had done to the server that had caused the respawns to break in the way that it had, and how to fix it. However, figure it out and fix the problem he did, and with respawn mechanics back to normal, everyone who had died and respawned during the glitch was able to reset their health completely. And properly set their respawn points as well, since part of the glitch seemed to be that people’s respawns were being set as they were dying. But the biggest adjustment in the days after EX had caused havoc was trying to help Etho recover.

While Etho seemed relatively ok once he was able to talk again (his tongue and all his other lingering injuries were fully healed with the fixing of the respawn, though figuring out a way to get him to respawn was both more difficult and less difficult than BDubs had expected); BDubs was hearing from Iskall that all was still not right with the world. Normally, Hermits would let current season basemates/regional allies/faction mates do the heavy lifting of any emotional or mental stress that a particular Hermit experienced on the daily unless the Hermit asked for help from specific Hermits. But in this case, BDubs felt he should invite Etho to an nHo reunion/get-together. Even if Etho didn’t necessarily need the reunion, BDubs knew the rest of the nHo did.

They had all been in various states of hysterics by the time they had gotten Etho out of the restraints and the death loop he had been locked in. BDubs had been the first person to breach the room, with Iskall and Beef right behind him. Beef had blocked up the water to stop the cycle as Iskall and a recently arrived Cleo began breaking restraints while BDubs clutched Etho’s freed hand (thinking back, he probably shouldn’t have. Etho’s hands had looked hardly better than the rest of his mangled flesh. He also wasn’t sure how they managed to get his wrists detached from the cuffs, as his arms and wrists were still solidly clipping into the restraints). Hypno had fiddled with the camera and looked over the speakers, before he managed to get everything deactivated and convinced the remaining Hermits to gather at Cleo and Joe’s base. By the time the Hermits were assembled at Joe and Cleo’s base, and Etho had been safely transported from the floating box, Doc was a hissing mess, Beef was greener than normal as his stress seemed to activate the alien transition, and BDubs had resorted to constantly checking his clock (a nervous habit he had picked up from 3rd Life, but the less he thought about that hell server the better). Etho had been quickly whisked away by Iskall to their shared base, but was just as quickly relocated to the Spawn Egg; as neither had wings, and Etho wasn’t nearly healthy enough to try and scale his own base in the sky. Plus, being at the Spawn Egg had the added benefit of easy access by the rest of the server so that other Hermits could stop by and check in on Etho’s progress while they all waited for Xisuma to fix the respawn mechanics. BDubs stopped by once while Etho was recovering. It was a little out of his way when trying to visit the Yes Wings Club, but figured he might as well since he hadn’t seen Etho since they had saved him 2 days before.

Etho looked about what he had expected to be honest. Since they were worried about whether a normal respawn would register his tongue being gone as normal if they healed it properly with potions, the other Hermits had determined to wait on healing him till after he had properly respawned. That left him bedridden till the server was fixed though, which no one was happy with. BDubs was told later that supposedly Etho had understood during the few times he was lucid enough to listen to someone during that time. While he had been there though, Etho had been solidly asleep, Iskall asleep himself by Etho’s bedside. BDubs had taken a moment anyway to sit on Etho’s other side and just quietly talk to him about what he had been up to in the day or two since they had saved him. Iskall had come to briefly to see who had been talking, before settling back into his chair to rest.

BDubs had left pretty quickly, if he were being honest. Seeing Etho as vulnerable as he was left BDubs feeling a bit ill. After that, it had only been a day or two more of anxiously waiting for Xisuma to fix the server before they had been able to get the other Hermits respawned properly. (There had been several deaths during the time the respawns had been on the fritz, including a couple during the search from fall damage.) But when it came to Etho, they had tried to explain what needed to happen during one of the next times he was awake, but he had been becoming more unresponsive the longer he had been bedbound. So with heavy hearts, it had been decided that Etho needed to respawn as soon as they could decide a way to do so. After much debate between Iskall and Xisuma, it was decided that a quick anvil to the head would suffice.

It was told to BDubs later that Etho had respawned a few paces from the bed he had been sleeping in at Spawn looking incredibly confused and lost. It took close to a half hour to explain what had happened to him before him and Iskall went back to their shared base. And if Iskall was to be believed, it sounded like Etho hadn’t slept since the first night back. Which was almost a week ago. Not that many of the other Hermits were doing better. From the sounds of the grapevine, Mumbo still blamed himself for what had happened to Etho, and despite apologizing and promising Etho a cut of all his profits that season to make up for his decision (which he had been told Etho had forgiven Mumbo for and told Mumbo to keep the profits as he was just respecting Etho’s choice) he insisted on trying to find ways to make it up to an increasingly exasperated Etho. (Which BDubs noted was somewhat out of character, since Etho almost never missed a chance to keep someone in his debt and exploit them for his own projects). Other than Mumbo, Doc had been reported also to not have been sleeping as much, but instead he worked on his most recent engineering marvel. Beef had been throwing himself almost entirely into setting up his own shop outside the Derpcoin market to sell his own brand of non-evil cat food. BDubs knew that Beef was taking the whole: “Derpcoin is actually evil not even a meme” thing incredibly hard, since his whole thing this season had been going over to the dark-side as an alien (which BDubs still didn’t understand how that had started in the first place). BDubs himself was doing just fine thank you very much! Sure, he’d been struggling with sleeping at night himself (every time he closed his eyes he could see Etho strapped to that chair and drowning again), and yeah, he’d been trying to work on the shopping district by the mountain instead of the Horse Course (he had heard from Iskall that Etho had been working on something outside the base, and BDubs had a sneaking suspicion he knew at least one of the projects Etho’d been working on). But he definitely wasn’t nearly as bad as the other members of the old nHo. Definitely. He couldn’t lie to himself, they were all having a bad time.

So, as BDubs was wont to do, he took things into his own hands and sent invitations to all the nHo members to come by his base for a get together. The date was set, and he visited every member in person leading up to the event to make sure they were coming, no excuses! (He knew it was particularly urgent as when he went to check on Etho, he finally found him sleeping in one of BDubs’ builds next to the horse course, and when he got Etho awake, he cracked exactly 0 height jokes until he tried to get Etho to come by later and it was a height joke every minute. The height jokes were BDubs’ way of figuring out how nicely Etho wanted to play. The less the better.)

But now the day had finally arrived, and BDubs welcomed each one of his friends into his base with open arms and a smile. First to arrive was Beef, seeing as he was closest. Then Doc. Then as BDubs was debating messaging Iskall to find Etho for him, the man himself showed up on BDubs’ doorstep. Everything went off without a hitch in the beginning. They all were able to reconnect and chat about bases and projects they were working on; Doc with his redstone magic he was getting from his friends on another server, Beef and his efforts to create a new kind of cat food, Etho and his many projects ranging from an inventory sorter to the horse course, and BDubs with his latest shop attempts in the Big Eye Crew shopping district. (It was good to see Etho making fun of BDubs’ attempts at making a redstone shop. Etho hadn’t heard of it yet, and it was a delight to see him light up while joking about what BDubs could possibly make with redstone that even someone like Grian couldn’t do themselves.)

It all comes crashing down when Etho asks Beef more about the cat food. Specifically what was wrong with the old cat food.

Now Beef hadn’t expressly said that he had been working with EX for having a cat food stand at the Evil Emporium; but he had implied that his previous cat food flavor would be going on the back burner. What they all had assumed was that Etho at least generally knew most of the gossip on the server. But what BDubs should have guessed was that Etho had been very absent this season, and unless the current events were directly affecting his plans, he had never been one for being up to date on server events. So BDubs should have guessed that Etho asking about cat food would only end in a bittersweet ending.

“So Beefers, you said something about your cat food getting a new recipe… What happened with the old recipe? Not up to snuff?”

“I will have you know that all my cat food is premium and delicious, and I will not have you slandering it in this way,” replied an overdramatic Beef.

The nHo chuckled at his antics before Etho came back with, “Well if it wasn’t the quality then what was it? Now you have me intrigued.”

Beef shrugged. “I just wanted a cat food to really call my own is all.”

Etho gave him a look. “Wouldn’t the other cat food be yours too?”

“Well…” Beef looked deeply conflicted. BDubs decided to say it for him. “He was working for the Evil Emporium since he started to change into… I guess it’s an alien?”

Etho stilled at the name, and the rest of the group held their breaths. “Ah,” he replied, suddenly tight as a bowstring.

“Which is why I’m making a new brand of cat food, one which I’ll be selling from a shop near my base for diamonds,” soothed Beef, trying his best to keep Etho away from bad memories.

“I can see why you changed brands then,” replied Etho through a forced calm. He was not subtle in the least however. Bdubs wondered if the hurt in Etho's eyes was from the idea that his closest friend had supported the monster that had hurt him, or the idea that his friend would completely change his plans for the season due to one off script incident? Bdubs had a feeling it was definitely the former.

(BDubs had asked Xisuma after all was said and done if he remembered anything leading up to them being in front of the screen at his base. X had said the last thing he had remembered before that was meeting up with EvilX to discuss business strategies before blacking out after their customary greetings. He explained it had happened before, but he had somehow never thought much of the memory gaps. However, he agreed with the rest of the Hermits that had talked with him about it that it was a problem that would need to be investigated because it sounded like mind control. And a player that could control the server admin was a force too powerful to allow free. Or at the very least, a player that needed to have some very hard limits as to what they could do placed upon them.)

“You know, Etho, have you been ok?” asked Doc hesitantly. BDubs hoped that Doc knew what he was doing, because Bdubs was definitely lost.

Etho looked a bit like a cornered animal at the moment as he looked between the 3 of them like they had betrayed him. “Yeah? Why wouldn't I be?”

Doc gave him a look that BDubs thought was completely justified. “Etho, you went through an incredibly traumatic experience only a week or so ago. It is completely fine if you aren't doing ok.”

Etho sighed. “And what would you even do if I wasn't ok?”

Doc gave a hissy whine and moved from where he had been situated to sit close beside Etho. “Well, we'd figure out what we can do to make it a little closer to being ok.” He looked down at his lap. “I know I've been struggling with sleep recently, so I understand at least if you aren't sleeping either.” Etho looked vaguely stricken.

“You were part of the group that was watching, weren't you?” BDubs watched as Etho began to close off. Doc just nodded miserably. “And the two of you?”

BDubs felt gutted, knowing that Etho either didn't remember him breaking in to save him and holding his hand; or was purposefully ignoring the memory. “I stopped you from drowning more by blocking up the source block...” muttered Beef, looking pretty hurt himself.

“I found your enclosure and got the search party together to come finish breaking you out; and was there next to Beef when he was saving you,” finished Bdubs, a bit more of the hurt shining through because he couldn't hold a poker face even if his life depended on it. But also, Etho needed to see that he wasn't alone, in a lot of ways.

Etho looked appropriately chastised, if also incredibly grateful. “Thank you, all of you.” He leaned lightly into Doc's shoulder; the most affection he would normally show to anyone. “I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you 3, so thank you. Thank you so much.” They all politely ignored the sniffling coming from behind the mask, though Beef situated himself on Etho’s other side, and BDubs decided to try and strategically place himself on the floor in front of Beef so that if Etho wanted to lean a leg against him, he could. BDubs was so tempted to drape himself over Etho’s legs, but he had a sneaking suspicion that Etho probably wouldn’t handle being immobile in a sitting position well for the foreseeable future. However he was vindicated when his hair was playfully ruffled by an Etho hand as the 4 of them devolved into just sitting with each other.

BDubs should have guessed that Etho wouldn’t stay down long however, as Etho (after inconspicuously wiping the corners of his eyes dry) said, “so, who wants to help me prank the Boatem Crew?” BDubs could feel the devious smile creeping across his face.

“Now you’re speaking my language Canada boy!” Etho wheezed a quiet laugh above him.

“You sure you want to be slinging that kind of slander at me short stuff?”

“SHORT STUFF?!?!” BDubs got up in a huff. “I’LL SHOW YOU SHORT STUFF, YOU DAMN BEAN POLE!” Beef, Etho, and Doc all burst into chuckles, leaning into the couch as they tried to get themselves under control. “YOU THINK THIS IS FUNNY, DO YOU? Ooooooh, you are all playing a dangerous game!”

Etho and Doc proceeded to laugh harder, leaning against each other. “What are you going to do BDubs, bite our ankles?” asked Beef before breaking down laughing again.

“I’LL BITE YOUR ANKLES JUST WATCH ME!” and with that, BDubs was all over Beef, trying to get a solid shoulder punch in, but being thwarted at every turn. A stray punch at Doc, and suddenly everyone but Etho was rolling around the floor trying to playfully murder each other. Etho wheezed in laughter at their antics, and expertly avoided getting added into their mischief by eventually hopping up a ladder to the next floor and watching from the opening.

Eventually they managed to settle down, and by the time they had gathered themselves enough, it was night time. BDubs, with a lighter heart than when he had let in all his friends earlier in the day, said goodbye to them with promises that if Etho really was serious about pranking the Boatem Crew, the nHo would be right by his side. They left one by one, first Doc (who complained that he was already behind schedule on his build), then Beef (who playfully recommended Etho come help him run his shop if he wasn’t too busy helping Iskall dye prismarine), and lastly Etho. But before Etho departed, he said, “you know, I already thanked you, but I feel I should do it again.” He met BDubs’ gaze. “Thank you so much for finding me. I don’t know how that would have ended if you hadn’t caught sight of that place”.

BDubs was humbled by Etho’s gratitude, though he still replied with, “You’re my friend Etho, of course I would give it my all to find you. I’m just happy we were able to do so before it was too late. And if you ever need to get away from it all, it’s pretty nice out here once you get past all the big eyes.”

Etho wheezed a chuckle in response, a hidden smile brightening up the corners of his eyes. “Sure, I’ll keep that in mind. You take care of yourself now, you hear? I don’t want to be hearing of too many shenanigans from you, ok?”

BDubs laughed in response, and nodded. “Can do! And you do the same, ok?” He let the humor drain a bit, a more serious tone shining through. “If things get bad, please let someone know. Doc knows what happened, and he would be able to tell you who else was there that you could talk to if you needed it.”

Etho nodded. “Yeah, yeah. If it gets bad I always have Iskall and you guys.” Etho glanced at a clock in his inventory. “Looks like I should be off. If I start now, I should be able to get back before sunrise.” Etho waved goodbye as he turned to go.

“Stay safe! I’ll see you around then,” called out BDubs as he watched Etho quickly jog to the nearest source of water. Then, once acquired, he flew with the flick of his trident, starting his way back to the nether portal so as to make it back to his base safely.

BDubs went to bed that night content knowing that if Etho ever needed the help, he knew who he could reach out to.

-fin-

#bdouble0 #ethoslab #docm77 #vintagebeef #xisuma #iskall #hermitcraft #hc fanfic #hc fanfiction #hurt/comfort #my beloved #finally #zombiecleo #hypnotizd #final chapter #I hope to have this mirrored to AO3 soon if it isn't already #if AO3 would ever get me off the wait list orz

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commonwealthoccurences · 4 years

Text

Not So Hard To Say Goodbye (SETL, ETD Part Three)

Word Count: 1,683 Prompt: Right Behind You Baby Day: 24/28

TW: Character death, gunshot tomfoolery (wound resulting in death).

Note: I exclusively listened to Georgenotfound’s Only Fans on repeat while writing this. Do with that information what you will. A single line. That was the barrier between Sole being undercover and genuinely being part of the Institute. It had blurred, somewhere along the way, and they felt as if they were slipping from the hold the Railroad’s ideology had on them. Maybe it was the shelter from the Wasteland, a space where they could fantasize about a life outside the constant attacks and the losses they had suffered, or maybe it was because Father was the last thing tying them to a life that had long abandoned them.

It was comforting, to be surrounded by furniture that wasn’t tainted by bloodstains and dirt. They were weak, they knew, to be so willing to give up everything they’d dedicated the past few years to just for comfort, but they weren’t too proud to admit that. They had nothing to return to, after all. The Railroad was a falling support of a failing mindset that would only betray the Wasteland. The Institute, though? They had far more potential, and the more Sole was sent to spend time on the inside, the more they started to believe the Railroad was a lost cause.

Soon, they arrived at a point where they could no longer stand with one foot on either side of the fence, indecisive and conflicted. They had to decide who they were going to betray. X6-88 had arrived with his signature stealthy footsteps and announced that Father wanted to see them. Then, he had informed them that they needed to take out the Railroad once and for all. What were they going to do?

The decision was made before they knew it, the moment they looked up in the Third Rail and saw Deacon acting as if he had never seen them before. It was pure spite, evil and unregulated, that drove them over the line. Did they care? Not particularly. They had gone far past caring after the Wasteland had shit all over everything they had fought so hard to protect, had been abandoned by the one person they thought understood them. Maybe they were ready to burn it to the ground just to feel something.

As soon as they left Goodneighbor they returned to the Institute to relay their decision to Father. He understood, as far as he knew, that there would be a conflict of interest considering they were the Institute’s double agent, but they were more than willing to witness what was to come. Somewhere along the line listlessness and apathy had been replaced by rage.

When they consented to be part of the process, everyone launched into action much faster than Sole was expecting. Apparently this had been a plan for a long time, they just needed the intel Sole about to hand them. They didn’t hesitate. It surprised even themself. “There’s a loose end we need to tie up.” They announced.

They were leaned against the table in the middle of the room, reflecting internally on just how stereotypical the situation was. Father was propped up on the other side of the room, receiving concerned glances from the scientists around him; it was obvious he didn’t have much time left. Sole didn’t particularly care. With a sigh, they pushed off the table and turned to look out one of the many windows at the sprawling space of the Institute ground floor below. “The Institute has an agent that’s currently undercover. Reconnaissance work, I think, I wasn’t told. I’m supposed to think he’s dead.”

This brought on curious murmurs that had them rolling their eyes internally. They should’ve known they’d doubt them, it seemed everyone did. They turned with their arms crossed over their chest to face the room. “They’re worse than you’d think at making sure their agents don’t get spotted. But I’d know his face anywhere.” If only that was an exaggeration. If only they could forget. “Without him gone, the Railroad’s going to keep recruiting.”

“I trust you can take care of it?” Father spoke up croakily from where he was reclined.

Sole responded with an immediate, firm nod. Maybe it was what they had been aiming for in the first place, who knows. Certainly not the scientists, who sat around with judgemental, conflicted looks, as if they had any say at the end of the day. Sole had to admire Father’s commitment to the facade that they were involved. They let out a soft sigh to show their frustration. “So are we moving forward?” They asked.

“You’re awfully eager. Aren’t they supposed to be your friends? You’ve known them for years, that’s why you know so much, right?” One spoke up.

Sole ground their teeth together and glanced away for a moment to compose themself. “That’s true. But we’re not friends. They lost my respect a long time ago. Besides, my loyalty lies with the Institute. It doesn’t matter what they were to me.” They lifted their head higher.

The scientist sat back with a shrug, seemingly satisfied with this answer, at least for now. They couldn’t help but feel a bit smug that they had backed down that quickly. Regardless, it was time to get moving. The meeting ended rather abruptly after that and they stopped by to speak to Father before descending one of the many staircases and their boots met the Institute ground floor. The sooner they got this done, the sooner things would return to normal within the Institute. They would forget about the Railroad and all the trouble they had stirred up for them within the white walls.

Sole stopped in their room to use a kit, kindly provided by the Institute, to smear dirt on their face and adjust their clothing in a mirror. A clean mirror, at that. Of course, they had to look the part of someone busy traveling, but God was it luxurious to play the part after spending all their time at the Institute when they were away from the Railroad. Soon, there would be no part to be played, and the Institute would be their home full time.

After making sure they appeared to have been traveling, they made their way back to the top floor and stepped into the teleporter, ready to get this over with. No, they wouldn’t fully enjoy getting rid of the Railroad, but it would certainly feel therapeutic. There might be something fucked up about that, but it was the apocalypse. They had a feeling there would be no therapist to judge them at the end of the day.

Sole landed somewhere just outside Goodneighbor and took a moment to collect themself. The teleporter always made them seasick. After tugging at the bottom of their shirt and shifting the weight of their pack on their shoulders, they began to focus on their breathing. For a few minutes they focused on getting it to a believably borderline-hyperventilating rate, then bounced on their heels to add to the exhausted look. With this, they rushed into the gates.

Deacon was leaned against the wall that separated Daisy’s shop and KL-E-0’s, looking every part of the drifter that he was pretending to be. Sole waited until they had caught his attention before pretending to compose themself. They walked over slowly, their head somewhat ducked. God, was it hard to be faking fear to fake hiding it. It took a mere second where they bumped into Deacon and a piece of paper wound up in his hands. An exclamation point with six lines extending outwards from it. The Railroad sign for them being in danger.

It was far too easy to make their way to the back alleys of Goodneighbor, conscious of the fact that Deacon was casually trailing behind them, covering the way he followed by pausing every now and then to observe something. They were pressed into an outcropping by the time he made his way around the corner. Even Deacon, the composed super-spy, jumped when they stepped out of the shadows. “What’s going on?” He asked lowly, avoiding their stare.

Sole rolled their shoulders and let out a quiet breath. “Do you remember what you told me in the beginning?” They asked quietly, their eyes filled with tears that couldn’t be more false, throwing a shaky smile in for dramatic effect. It seemed to work with the way Deacon grew more concerned.

“What do you mean?” He asked, stepping closer, reaching out to begin examining them for injuries. “What’s going on?”

Sole let their breath shake when he got closer and looked down at the ground, taking a step to get into his space. It was personal. He placed his hands on their shoulders and they nearly rolled their eyes at the fact that he was dropping his guard. Exposing his weak points. They leaned forward as they shifted to reach for the silence pistol that was holstered beneath their jacket. “Trust no one.” They whispered in his ear before pressing the barrel against his stomach.

They let a beat pass just to watch the way his face dropped and his eyes widened before pulling the trigger. The recoil encouraged them to take a step backwards, but they gave him the courtesy of catching him under his arms and lowering him to the ground slowly. The words Deacon had been preparing were caught in his throat, suppressed by the pain, and they took the moment to fire two more shots; one for each of his legs. He wasn’t making it out of the alley. No one used it anymore, and it wasn’t uncommon to find dead drifters a week later.

Truth be told, they were tempted to stick around and watch him process what was happening. Already, there was a look of acceptance on his face, like he’d figured something like this would happen, but they knew better. Deacon was smart, but if he were smarter, he would’ve never left. The fury in his eyes as he looked up at him, away from the blood spilling from his wounds, nearly made them shiver. Instead, they let out a quiet laugh and shook their head. “You should take your own advice.”

#Fallout 4 #Fo4 #Fo4f #Fallout 4 February #Deacon #Angst #Character Death #Oneshot #Imagine #Fanfiction #Fanfic #FF

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talkingbl · 3 years

Text

The Good and Bad of Tonhon Chonlatee

SPOILER WARNING. TW: rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment

The Good:

Characterization of supporting characters (especially Na and Aunt Nam)

Chon's general characterization as a self-identified gay man who is not toxically masculine or misogynistic and generally not judgmental. His brief arc with the unnamed nail technician and former sex worker is incredibly well-done for a Thai BL

Following the previous point, the nail technician character was treated decently well in this story. The fact that she was a bigger lady was never a point of repulsion for Chon (instead, he was more concerned that she was a woman and he's a gay virgin)

Characters who openly identify as non-straight and not just male characters who say "he's the only guy I'll ever like" (Na)

Parent-child conflict that isn't inherently about child's sexuality (Ton and his dad--technically it's about having a grandchild)

No real filler episodes, everything generally served the plot and there weren't any one-off 'let's go to the beach/camping' episodes

Male lead (Chon) shows physical attraction toward love interest (Ton) on multiple occasions

Ton and Chon's actors (Podd and Khaotung) have a somewhat understated but definitely present and persistent chemistry. Podd has the same look that Bright Vachirawit and Pond Naravit have opposite their co-leads Win Metawin and Phuwin Tangsakyuen. He just looks at Khaotung like he's the most interesting person in the room

For a man who just came to terms with being in love with another man, Ton is surprisingly open about his relationship with Chon and, once he confesses, not once does he second-guess his feelings for Chon

Charming story with an extremely charismatic cast of actors outside of a few

Mike Chinarrat. He's just so good at the comedic yet serious when he needs to be style of acting. It brought a lot to the show in terms of good acting

The Bad

Multiple characters are either raped, implied to have been raped, sexually assaulted, and/or sexually harassed with no actual repercussions for the attackers and/or exploration of the emotional trauma victims experience as a result. Under this one, Ai and Ni sexually assault Chon (played for laughs), Neung is implied to have been raped (NEVER addressed), and Chon kisses Ton without his consent (glossed over). I'm sure there's more instances too but yeah...

Ton is just....what the fuck is his character? One second he's bashing gay people and FORCING his male "childhood love" to lose his virginity (to a woman at that), the next he's confessing how he's known all along that his childhood love is, indeed, in love with him and that he feels the same way. They use the excuse of him having to live up to his parent's expectations despite the fact that it makes 0 sense if you think about it longer than a second

Casual colorism in the casting ONCE AGAIN. Nearly everyone who is portrayed as a bad/unsavory character is visibly darker than our "heros"

Same tired ex-girlfriend is an evil mastermind trying to break up our boys for no good reason trope

Ton's dad's character was not well flushed out. We think he's homophobic but actually he's anti-anything not straight and cis but then, no, actually he just wants his son to give him an heir but then all the characters claim that he hates gay people again and it's just like wtf? Is he homophobic, transphobic, tolerant unless it doesn't serve his goal of having grandchildren, all of the above, none of the above, just what? They go back on his characterization so much that I don't actually know what his biases are and which groups he's against/not against

Ton is dense as fuck to the point where it's a bit unrealistic..

The casual outing and forced outing of multiple gay characters by Baipai, Ai and Ni. Baipai outs Ai and Ni at the end, which leads to a Ai and Ni nearly being evicted from their home. And, again, Ai and Ni out Chon through SEXUAL ASSAULT.

Characters being made to apologize for their sexualities and occupations on multiple occasions. Off the top of my head I can think of: Ai, Ni, and Miriam apologizing to Ton's dad at the end for "negatively influencing" Ton to be interested in men

On that note, Ton not speaking up in that moment and telling his father that he's allegedly loved Chon since he was a child and that Ai, Ni, and Miriam didn't "change" him kind of annoyed me. That would've shut Ton's dad up quickly but he NEVER said anything about it

The or unexplained plot devices that need explanation. For example, how the hell did those bed pictures get leaked? How did Amp get the pictures she sent to Ton's dad? These questions need answers lol

Miriam's absolutely horribly unbelievable "pregnancy belly" that was just a sack of laundry stuffed into a dress

Most of the acting was just okay..supporting characters generally had better acting than our leads

Baipai's character. I just could not stand her. I even preferred Amp over her because at least Amp contributed to the plot

Speaking of the plot, the dumbass jealously plots have got to stop. They are so boring and repetitive. I'll admit that Tonhon Chonlatee pulled it off better than other series, but there was still so much they could have explored with the two compelling leads other than "let's make Ton jealous for 2 episodes"

The (lack of) kisses. The physical intimacy in this show was so stale it might as well have been a Chinese bromance censored by the CCP. Every kiss they either diverted the camera or had the actors do that weird tightly pursed lip smashing thing where neither person actually even opens their mouth for the kiss. Yet at the same time they showed a straight kiss 100%. I wouldn't have as much of a problem with this if it was rated G or something or even if the actors just weren't comfortable yet, but Podd has had better makeout scenes in other shows, and in 2gether Mike and Toptap actually have on-screen kisses

Even though I credited Tonhon Chonlatee for having an openly pansexual character (Na), they still had one of our main characters (Ton) claim to "only like Chon and no other men." Apparently you can be straight and like a guy as long as he's the only guy you currently like I guess.

#tonhon chonlatee #tonchon podd khao #poddkhao bl boys love #thai bl thai drama #mike chinarrat toptap

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auncyen · 3 years

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So, my thoughts on bd2 so far (still not done) are both spoilery and...a little salty, so under a cut they go. I’ll get the good out of the way first.

BDII is pretty nice as a return to the brave/default battle system and asterisk system. The controls are pretty fluid (once I realized I could press zr to unbrave in the middle of commands lol). Music and visuals are both nice. THE CHARACTER THEMES ARE DISTINCTIVE AGAIN (I still like BD1′s set the most, but in BD2 I can tell you which theme is which character’s and uh. I wouldn’t be able to do that with b2nd’s). “A Hectic Moment” is very fun.

And then like. Both the story and parts of the game design are baffling to me. I was not surprised by the prologue feeling dry because. BD game. Partially because it was a BD game I half-expected Sloan to defy his death flag parade and simply be forced to retire due to a wound or something similar but ok, he died. And first chapter made me hopeful! I don’t care at all for Orpheus (even as “love to hate” he just ends up kind of “meh”) and Anihal and Bernard felt a bit one note at first, but the twist with Castor where it seemed like his flaw was prejudice and then it was oh no backstabber was good.

The maniacal laughter kind of ruined it a bit, but still, good. (On this note, Castor and ...pretty much every ch. 2 asterisk holder had me thinking for a while that the asterisks handed out by the woman might have been tampered with and were driving people nuts, but at this point, seems firmly not to be a case, Castor was ax-crazy on his own. Okay.) And a later flashback about Anihal and Bernard made me regret a bit that the latter had died.

But like also at this point I’m kind of concerned that there hasn’t been any inner party conflict. Or like.........internal doubts. Or anything.

Ch. 2 was initially a bit funny for everyone having The Accent but eventually I got properly into it and, yes, all three people grieving a lost child was pretty touching.

Screw those woods though and why is the institute set up like that??? I know this is an RPG but guys. Guys. they’re supposed to be brilliant at that institute, at least one person would have set up the bare minimum of a rope ladder so they didn’t have to deal with the nonsense in between floors.

And then there was Folie. Folie’s dungeon is AMAZING. Her job is good.

Her boss fight is utter bs when you’re punished for using two different mage jobs and the character in general is just.............idk. I kind of preferred Mona’s death being accidental because it seems rather odd for someone like Folie who does not seem particularly attuned to others’ emotions to be like “ah yes, let me kill zis little girl and zen all of these people will be emotionally vulnerable for me to give zem my paintings” --yes, I also hated the accent.

I am of the opinion that there is no bad VA in this game (thus far) but goodness, the direction some of them were given.

Ch. 3 was interesting intrigue wise and the reveal with Adelle was GREAT but it also hinged very heavily on this being a BD game, since they made it obvious from the start of the chapter that, hmm, there’s something funny about her. (Honestly my guess had been shapeshifting dragon, so I wasn’t quite surprised by her saving Martha, though I WAS a little surprised by Martha not SAVING HERSELF BY JUMPING AWAY BECAUSE SHE WAS A FREAKING DRAGOON.) The party’s surprise at this is dealt with very quickly. Elvis’ reaction is kind of cute but it also just...........seems to cement that there’s never going to be any inner-party conflict, and there doesn’t seem to be any internal character conflict either, so it’s kind of just. Guys. Pls. Something interesting.

Coming back to world design: this religion feels so dumb and poorly-designed (Martha is in DIRECT CONTACT WITH THE LORD OF DRAGONS BUT ISN’T TRUSTED TO KNOW HIS WISHES??? THE FAIRY TRIALS ARE A ‘TRADITION’ BUT ALL THE DRAGONS ARE COOL WITH ADELLE???) and why is their holy hall full of crumbling walls and is, in fact, the only place I’ve found so far to “smash rock”? Yes, it has been bugging me.

the highlight of ch. 4 was Lonsdale, because he might not be the most original character concept, but it was interesting to have an antagonist with morals who has a friendly drink with Seth and warning for him at the tavern. (Also Seth’s piss-poor job at pretending to be just recovered from a cough for all of one sentence. And, in my game, while wearing heavy armor.) The low point was finding out how absolutely pointless Adam is.

It’s just....been very mixed and somewhat mediocre with the story, and lbr bd and b2nd both had issues with story too, but bd had an endearing cast that b2nd heavily borrowed from. The BD2 warriors of light seem very obviously inspired by bd crew but Seth never grieves his lost crew or misses his hometown or shows any uncertainty about the question of him living again. Gloria welcomes Elvis and Adelle easily even though they’re both clear about working in self-interest and there are never any trust issues even when Adelle’s concealed identity is revealed.

I’m not saying they should have had the exact same issues (esp since Gloria didn’t have any set up for mistrusting fairies) but they don’t have ANY issues.

I may now be at a point where Gloria does have an issue but it’s just kind of...1) there should have been at least a couple tell-tale hints about this sooner, it could have been as subtle as the king of Halcyonia gently suggesting she consider the marriages which would have painted him first as possibly evil, then as possibly just sexist or out-of-touch, and then finally you realize oh he knew and was hoping they could find other solution and trying to get her to consider a future that wasn’t dying (I think he knows. or at least I hope because if they gotta do this every 200 years then Gloria????? who knows to pass this down???? were you gonna teach your traumatized companions the secrets of being a vestal-lite as you were dying? because you didn’t.) 2) it’s just kinda. too late. A part of me is checked out. I know there is more and that the bd-style tweeest is finally starting, but this was the end of ch. 5 and both the main crew and story just haven’t been that interesting. If this wasn’t a bd game and I hadn’t gotten impatient enough about wanting to know about one detail that I spoiled myself for it being a fake ending, there is a high chance that I would have watched the credits, gone “well, okay. that was the game” and just set it aside.

And then maybe a few days later gone “wait they never explained the book was it buried in some request” because there is SO MUCH buried in requests and reloaded the game, but yeah. I still wanna fill in the gaps of what I’m missing, but I’m probably going to be slowing my pace and I really doubt I’m going to be active in the fandom because none of the characters have really grabbed my interest that hard.

#my thoughts on bd2 are also apparently a wall of text #so. that's a warning #bravely default ii spoilers #salt

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elencelebrindal · 4 years

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Alright, can you rank which modern Golds are often portrayed closest to their canon parts in fan fiction and which are practically fanon (even if we love it).

I sure can! Keep in mind this is my personal experience, so people might have read different stuff than me. If you see something you feel like it’s wrong, it’s probably because we have different sources. I mostly rely on English and Italian fan fiction. I started reading something in Spanish and Portuguese, but my understanding of the language is not smooth.

I’m going to use a scale from 1 (least accurate) to 10 (most accurate), and then write my explanation.

Mu 5/10 He’s mostly depicted as calm, collected and gentle in any situation, with no regards toward his actual somewhat “aggressive” nature in combat. Mu is not Shun, he’s not that diplomatic and he’s not that kind with everyone. Though, I’ve seen a fair share of works in which Mu is considered a gentle man with a tough attitude, so it’s fine.

Aldebaran 10/10 As far as I know, Aldebaran is very well depicted in the works he appears in. It might be because there’s already not that much information to use for him, because unfortunately Aldebaran doesn’t get the same amount of attention of other characters, but his personality is almost always spot on and even when it’s not, it’s still compatible with his canon version.

Saga 4/10 I read too much stuff of pre-Ares Saga that completely ignores the fact he was really gentle and kind. Most people use his aggressive and demanding personality when it’s not the case to do so, especially if he’s written as part of the pairing Aiolos x Saga. And then, the works that depict him after the entire ordeal with Ares still have him as somewhat evil and ready to betray. I know the Hades Chapter has a good influence on that, but Saga himself is not evil. Some authors, though, handle this character really well, so he still gets his justice.

Kanon 7/10 While he gets a lot better treatment than Saga, I still come across works with him as the Gemini Saint still depicted as inherently malevolent, in some ways. I love what people do with him as the Sea Dragon, it’s almost always perfect how they capture this character, but there are some hiccups here and there with his Gemini self.

Deathmask 10/10 Deathmask is a character that can change depending on what major source it’s used to describe him, but I’ve never seen (aside from ooc representations) wrong depiction of him. People are really amazing at describing him as a heartless bastard (thus using the classic as inspiration) or as a man that has evolved and got his redemption (thus using Hades and/or Soul of Gold as inspiration). To this day I’ve never really seen his canon self being distorted.

Aiolia 8/10 He is amazingly close to the canon counterpart in fan fiction, but sometimes people tend to focus too much on the fact that he has to be brave and strong all the time. We had Aiolia prey of his own emotions in canon, so why going this heavy-handed only on one side of his personality? Rarely I’ve seen Aiolia described in his worst, like when he was grieving and angry. A couple works I’ve read perfectly summed up Aiolia using the entirety of his emotion range, and it was one of the best representations I’ve seen of him.

Shaka 9/10 I feel like people actually got what Shaka’s character is. Sometimes there’s something that goes too far into the fanon side of the things, but it’s not that prominent in the community so I’ll let it slide more than I’d normally do. I like that people take into account his emotions without using them too much, and I like that people never forget how powerful he is or how messed up his early life was. The only thing I don’t like is how easily some authors make him get close to another person, with no second guesses or thinking, because canon Shaka is not that close to his companions. I made that mistake myself, after all, so I count in the list of those people. Most of the times I’m only disappointed when it’s clearly an ooc situation, and those don’t count because it’s intentional.

Dohko 10/10 He’s pretty spot on, if you ask me. Dohko is relatively easy to get right, because he has a good balance (ironically) of irony and wise thinking, sprinkled with a good old-fashioned fighting spirit. I’ve never seen a fan work mess this up. Dohko is probablt the most “human” fictional character I’ve seen, because he acts a lot like a real life person (paranormal stuff notwithstanding), and I think that’s something really helpful in writing him.

Milo 5/10 Milo is either a hit or a miss in fan fiction. I see so many people focusing on the wrong stuff when tackling him, like only caring about the “sexiness factor” or making him a mischievous trouble-maker. Milo is a complex character, with a proud nature and a loyal attitude towards Athena and his companions, and this side of his personality is almost never showed. It’s always him being a goofy man with an inclination for disaster, and not enough about him being an actual competent Saint with more than his looks. I read a whole lot of stuff with him, and I was pleased in a good number of works, but at the same time I was disappointed in seeing how many people don’t actually care about how Milo is presented in canon.

Aiolos ?/10 I don’t know. Honestly, I didn’t read enough about him, and I’m conflicted. Some people depict him as an overall perfect character, others like to make him more human, and a few just have fun using Aiolos without giving him a proper personality. Though, I haven’t seen anything that made me go “no, this is wrong”, so I guess it’s a good thing. Aiolos is one of those characters that really depends on what specific vision people have of him, since canon works don’t help as much in pinpointing a set behavior.

Shura 8/10 Aside from those works that love to put him as a helpless participant of the chain of events, he’s very well depicted. Faithful? Yeah. A bit crazy? Also yeah. I don’t like when he’s described as someone who refuses to take responsibility for his actions, because I’ve seen very bad works with him as a Saint that was forced to follow Ares so “killing was an order and nothing else”. I like when people give him awareness of his own actions, because it’s something that actually appears in canon (and most notably in Soul of Gold).

Camus 5/10 Too many times I’ve seen him depicted as a traitor that loves to betray anything and anyone for his own amusement, and too many times people threw away the kindness hidden under the ice. This particular side of his personality only shows up in fan fiction that depict him with Milo, and in works where he’s with Hyoga as a child. Most of the time, aside from these examples, he’s always cold and heartless, or lacks personality. I might have been unlucky with what I found, but this is my experience.

Aphrodite 1/10 Please. Aphrodite is one of the Saints that gets the worst of everything. People love so much giving him a narcissistic and self-centered view that they forget how, on the contrary, Aphrodite is not like that. I mentioned this in one of my earliest posts, but it’s easy to guess why: because he’s feminine, because he wears makeup, and because he comes off with a somewhat sensual vibe, Aphrodite is often depicted as this inherently androgynous man with a deep care for beauty. Guys, that’s not him. That’s Misty. Misty is narcissistic and fixated with his beauty, Misty hates getting blood on himself. Aphrodite thinks power is beauty, not the opposite. He doesn’t care about spilling blood on himself. He’s cruel and he’s merciless, and he willingly betrayed Athena, willingly killed Shun’s master like nothing. Stop depicting him as this weak Saint that cannot stand an insult or a stain on his clothes. I almost never see a good depiction of him. His canon personality almost never shows up in fiction.

#saint seiya #i cavalieri dello zodiaco #los caballeros del zodiaco #os cavaleiros do zodiaco #knights of the zodiac #gold saints

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johannas-motivational-insults · 5 years

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Adora might be autistic too

Alright, most people in the SPOP fandom agree that Entrapta is autistic, as her coding is extremely obvious. However, some of us also believe that our beloved protagonist Adora is on the spectrum as well. She comes off as quite the aspie, and while Asperger’s is no longer a diagnosis in the DSM-V (but is in other manuals), it falls under the blanket diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and its diagnostic criteria is still useful in analyzing people for signs of the disorder. In analyzing Adora’s character I will refer somewhat to both disorders, with the understanding that Asperger’s is a specific manifestation of ASD.

I would like to preface this by saying this is a headcanon and people are free to disagree with me. Some of these characteristics I’m going to bring up could also manifest because of her very sheltered upbringing in a cult-like atmosphere or mental illnesses such as anxiety and complex PTSD (both of which she arguably has). I am autistic myself, so obviously I am inclined to interpret these symptoms this way, but to each their own. It’s also worth noting that Adora has a lot of symptoms that cross over with AD(H)D, a cousin disorder to ASD, and it’s totally possible she has both.

In any case, there is now enough evidence hinting at Adora’s neurodivergence (especially now that the Rebel Princess Guide has been released) that I feel the need to explain this theory in detail instead of just occasionally mentioning it. So here goes...

She’s naive/easily manipulated

This one doesn’t really need explaining, we’ve all seen it. Adora assumes people are telling the truth because why would anyone lie to her? That is such a relatable spectrum feel. She was handily brainwashed by Shadow Weaver in the Horde, while some of the others didn’t seem to swallow the propaganda so easily. This is of course partly because of the special attention and affection Adora got from Shadow Weaver, but she had to be vulnerable to manipulation in the first place for it to work.

Later, she trusts Huntara easily in the Crimson Waste despite Bow and Glimmer’s warnings about her questionable character. Adora happily follows her into a trap even once Bow and Glimmer tell her they're going the wrong way, reasoning it’s probably a shortcut rather than reevaluating her misplaced trust. This can be partly explained by how she‘s gay af for Huntara, but still.

(Interestingly, the episode cuts straight from this moment to the obviously autistic Entrapta going against her own friend's advice and refusing to give up on the portal machine despite the obvious warning sign of Hordak’s violent dismissal. Parallels, much?)

Her difficulty understanding other points of view

A lot of Adora’s conflict with Catra is predicated on misunderstandings, and she has a hard time understanding the effects her actions have on other people, Catra in particular. For instance, she misunderstands Catra talking about ruling the Horde together as being purely about power, while Catra’s actual goals are safety and Adora’s companionship. That miscommunication is not just Adora’s fault, but it illustrates that she has difficulty understanding other people’s needs and motives without being explicitly told.

This isn’t just a problem with Catra, either. In general Adora has a difficult time understanding other’s motives and feelings. For instance, she doesn’t understand Glimmer’s insecurity over Bow’s friendship with Perfuma at Princess Prom, and she can’t fathom why Entrapta would choose to work for an evil faction, going so far as to assume she must have been brainwashed into it. This is because, just like with Catra, she doesn’t understand that some people’s priorities are not the same as hers.

Autistic kids tend to reach developmental milestones at different times than neurotypicals, sometimes being way ahead and other times falling behind. One such marker that is usually slower to develop and often stays impaired is theory of mind, our ability to a) understand that other people have different perspectives and b) understand those perspectives. Adora’s difficulties being able to put herself in someone else’s shoes definitely lines up with this symptom.

She’s clumsy

For someone so athletic, Adora sure lacks coordination. This is a commonly cited symptom of people with Asperger’s, though it shows up in people with other forms of ASD too. In general, autistic people often have difficulty with fine and/or gross motor skills, and this can lead to being accident and injury prone. According to Catra in 3x05, Adora bumps her head a lot. That may have just been a callback to 1x01, but either way clumsiness has been part of her characterization since the beginning, one of her many loveable, adorkable qualities.

Her lack of social and self awareness

Adora can be painfully oblivious to her own inappropriate behavior. There’s several examples of this throughout the series, one of the more costly ones coming at Princess Prom. Shocked by Frosta’s youth, Adora fails to register how maybe this (in front of Frosta, with all eyes on her) is not the time to remark on it. She immediately realizes this was the wrong thing to say (or at least not something she should shout), but that small delay causes both her and Glimmer a lot of embarrassment.

Part of the issue here is that she loses control of her volume, which in itself is a common problem for those of us on the spectrum. This isn’t the only time we see her have this problem, either, and it’s amplified (tee hee) when she’s drunk/infected.

More generally, one of the funniest examples of Adora’s poor social awareness comes when she barges into Huntara’s flirtation with the bartender in the Crimson Waste. She’s so focused on her task of recruiting Huntara that it doesn’t even occur to her that this is an intimate moment and intruding would be rude.

In the Rebel Princess Guide Adora also says she wishes Queen Angella would let her make some adjustments to the uniforms of the Bright Moon guards, which implies she tried to make these suggestions already. Maybe she figured She-Ra could suggest anything, but as both a newcomer and a royal subject that’s a bit of a faux pas. Chances are, that went right over Adora’s head.

She can’t read a room to save her life (literally)

This is another, more specific aspect of social awareness. Adora has difficulty picking up on the implicit rules (social norms) when she enters unfamiliar situations, and has a tendency to step on toes because of it. She also doesn’t understand when her friends try to nonverbally communicate what she’s doing wrong, and nonverbal communication deficits and problems with social awareness and insight are two major symptoms of ASD. One specifically listed example is “difficulties adjusting behavior to suit social contexts”, including:

Lack of response to contextual cues (e.g. social cues from others indicating a change in behavior is implicitly requested)

Unaware of social conventions/appropriate social behavior; asks socially inappropriate questions or makes socially inappropriate statements

Here’s a couple specific example of times where Adora misses or misunderstands nonverbal cues to change her behavior:

At her first Rebellion meeting she doesn’t realize that maybe she shouldn’t sit in the special-looking chair, and doesn’t clue in that that’s why everyone is freaking out.

In the Crimson Waste, Glimmer responds to the growling bar patrons surrounding them by suggesting that maybe these aren’t the kind of people they should be asking for help, but Adora persists. She jumps up on the bar and makes a speech trying to get directions (which is socially inappropriate for the context as well as dangerous), somehow missing all the scowls from the patrons as well as Bow and Glimmer’s wild gesturing.

Panic over unfamiliar social situations

Adora’s anxiety about going to Princess Prom could be attributed to many things, not just a spectrum disorder. Her obvious anxiety, for one, though to be fair there’s a high comorbidity between the two disorders. In any case, it seems the unfamiliarity of the situation is a sticking point for Adora in particular, while Bow and Glimmer are nothing but excited for their first ball.

Adora’s anxiety seems to stem mostly from being overwhelmed by the prospect of entering a new social situation with a whole bunch of unfamiliar rules to remember. She’s still learning behavioral norms outside of the Horde, and this is a huge jump up in terms of difficulty for her fledgling social skills.

To cope with her stress she goes overboard trying to prepare by making a conspiracy board of sorts, flash cards, and an obstacle course. And at the ball itself, it seems like she’s even rehearsed how to behave.

This probably isn’t only relatable to autistics, but it’s very relatable to us. Creating and rehearsing behavioral scripts is a common strategy to avoid embarrassing ourselves in public. Unfortunately, as we saw above, this works for about five seconds before Adora botches the whole thing by commenting on Frosta’s age.

Extreme stress over details

In general, Adora is a very anxious, perfectionistic person who hyperfixates on details, a very autistic trait. As mentioned above, this is wonderfully illustrated by her overpreparation for Princess Prom. She’s broken down the overwhelming list of rules in the invite into categories to make it more manageable, gone into detail categorizing people’s relationships to each other, and learned trivia about the guests in order to feel more prepared. Yet, somehow she missed the important fact that the hostess is only eleven years old.

Unfortunately this hangup doen’t only affect her, but also her friends and allies. The overarching theme in “Roll With It” is how debilitating Adora’s anxiety and perfectionism can be. Her eye for detail and ability to see flaws in plans is actually very valuable, but she gets so hung up on every possible thing that could go wrong that she can’t accept imperfect solutions with calculated risks.

Her propensity to be overwhelmed by too much information (like with the Princess Prom invite) shows up here too. Adora grows more and more frustrated and overwhelmed as more princesses join the planning session, adding more variables to deal with and more people to manage. She begins lashing out and shooting down every possible solution that doesn’t satisfy her need for perfection immediately. Her behavior looks like it may be headed for a meltdown until it culminates in an epic rant revealing all her anxiety and how it ties into her insecurities about her own imperfection.

Thankfully her friends are able to reassure her that she has support and doesn’t have to be perfect, but it’s an ongoing battle, one we already saw her struggle with in “Flowers for She-Ra” and “The Battle of Bright Moon”. It’s a strong tenet of Adora’s personality that is proving difficult to shake.

What she misses about the Horde

The recently published Rebel Princess Guide contains a list by Adora of things she misses about the Horde, and this list screams neurodivergent. I’ll go through it point by point, since there’s a lot to unpack here.

THINGS I MISS ABOUT THE HORDE

1. I miss the rigid schedule. It never changed, and I always knew what to expect.

Ritualistic behavior and an insistence on sameness are often seen in individuals with ASD. In fact, it’s a major symptom. Many of us have diifficulty adjusting to changing schedules, changes in diet, or even minor changes in our environment (such as placement of objects, boy do I have stories there). We need warning when things are going to change, and even if we know it’s coming it’s still a struggle to adjust.

2. I miss the constant sound of machines and whirring. In Bright Moon, there’s always music playing, or people laughing, and birds singing. It’s nice but it makes it hard to focus!

Autistic brains process sensory information differently from neurotypicals, that’s basically our disorder at its core. Over or under reactions to sensory input are common and in fact considered a major symptom, and this entry of Adora’s specifically refers to difficulties with sensory filtering. We have a hard time filtering out information that’s irrelevant to our current task, which makes us easily distractable.

3. Believe it or not, I miss my hard cot in the barracks. My bed in the castle is way too soft!

This ties into both the insistence on sameness and sensory issues.

4. Catra… sometimes.

This isn’t autistic, it’s just gay.

Speaking of which...

She’s gay

Adora's relationship with Catra has always been queer-coded, but any doubts about her sexuality were dispelled in season 3 by the way she fawns over Huntara like a baby gay over her gym teacher. Her obvious queerness might seem unrelated to the topic of autism, but those of us within the community can attest there’s probably just as many queer people among us as there are cishets. It’s so notable that there has been quite a bit of scientific research confirming people with ASD are more likely to be LGBT and gender atypical and exploring the cause of this link.

(This needs no proving at this point, but enjoy these gifs anyway...)

In conclusion

Overall, there’s a lot of hints and circumstantial evidence suggesting Adora could have ASD. Was this the creators’ intent? Hard to say. Adora is the protagonist and one of the most developed characters, so she’s definitely not a cardboard cutout or checklist for ASD symptoms (compare that to Entrapta, a secondary character whose behaviors can often easily be attributed to autism). It’s totally possible the creators just characterized her as naive and awkward and obsessive without realizing the implications of that cluster of traits together.

Regardless of authorial intent, it’s perfectly valid to look at Adora and see representation of the ASD community. The groundwork is there. And if someone else looks and doesn’t see it, or sees something else causing this behavior, that is also fair. No one is forcing anyone to accept this headcanon (or at least they shouldn’t be), but in return please don’t disparage it. Even if she is not autistic Adora is definitely autistic-coded, and we could use some more heros with the disorder, given how we’re mostly relegated to being villains and anti-heroes (not that there’s anything wrong with us filling those roles sometimes, but a little variety would be nice).

Adora is often referred to as a dumbass, but she’s actually quite intelligent, just sometimes slow to understand how she should act and how people feel. Still, she tries her hardest, just as she does with everything else. Adora is heroic and compassionate, even if she sometimes struggles to understand others. When autistic-coded characters are so commonly portrayed as cold and unforgiving, Adora is a sorely needed exception.

#spop #she-ra #she ra #meta #autistic adora #adora #autism #asd #asperger's #actuallyautistic

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shihalyfie · 3 years

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The Kaiser wasn’t very good at being a villain (and that’s the point, actually)

Ken’s journey of redemption is generally well-documented overall, and it was explicit enough in the series that there’s only so much you really need to explain it, but due to the blurred boundary of what was supernatural influence from the Dark Seed and what was Ken’s own emotional problems wreaking havoc, it’s somewhat more difficult to bridge that gap between the Kaiser and Ken, and how they can be the same person.

The easiest way to understand it comes from both directions. One is that Ken, even in his normal element, is much more assertive than he’s often given credit for -- it’s just that the Kaiser is a (fragile) manifestation of that very carefully cultivated to channel that in all of the wrong directions. The other has to do with the fact that the Kaiser is actually really terrible at being a villain, and the persona itself is very fragile and difficult for him to maintain.

Rewatching the first half of 02 shows multiple indications that, for all he seemed to be the stereotype “evil genius”, Ken was forcing himself into the mold. He was never cut out for it from day one. Even from the beginning, Ken’s actual nature as a lonely and inherently kind eleven-year-old child was tearing apart at the Kaiser persona, and the fateful episode 21 was not so much a single turning point for him as much as it was the last straw in a series of things tumbling down for him.

Before we continue: While all of the meta on this blog is only possible thanks to support and input from a handful of friends (whose names will not be disclosed on account of privacy requests), this one in particular arose from a long and extensive discussion with said friends that I am extremely grateful for. As always, I hope I was able to convey your points well.

Well, firstly, it’s important to understand that, much like nearly any other character in this series, Ken’s surface demeanor is a bit deceptive. The Crest of Kindness has the original Japanese name of yasashisa (優しさ), which has a secondary meaning of “gentleness” (lost in translation, but still apparent with the bubble metaphor in 02 episode 23). That also ties into the secondary meaning of “kind” -- it’s not just about being naturally “soft”, but actively choosing to be gentle with others even when you’re theoretically capable of not doing so. (For those of you who have seen Appmon, the entire point of that series was about what it means to consciously and deliberately choose to be kind, and, in fact, quite a few parallels could be made between Ken and Haru...)

The contrast between Daisuke and Ken goes far beyond just the surface. Daisuke’s surface demeanor is abrasive, but he’s not actually very good at being assertive until push comes to shove, and he otherwise tends to bend easily to others or get overwhelmed; in contrast, Ken has a more polite demeanor and for the most part seems non-confrontational, but has much stronger control of his emotions and is more easily able to be assertive than Daisuke is. (Of course, both of them share the common point of being like-minded when it’s something that really matters, but Ken is much better at imposing his will and getting what he wants done before Daisuke ever gets to that point, which is what fuels the whole punchline of Daisuke and Ken’s Shopping Carol.)

So, the point is: Daisuke is kind out of instinct and just “naturally” being so, but Ken is kind because he consciously believes in treating others well and not causing conflict, and not causing pain to others.

That’s not to say that Ken’s behavior is out of suppression or anything! It’s not a case like Takeru, who’s trying to push complicated emotions down while pretending they’re not boiling under the surface, nor is he like Hikari, who’s compulsively pressing her emotions down out of a desire not to burden others. Rather, even as early as 02 episode 26, he’s very straightforward about what his issue is and what he thinks about it. Ken’s “shyness” during the latter half of 02 is largely due to shame and hesitation from not knowing the other 02 kids well, but as the series goes on and as we go into post-02 material, he indicates that he’s perfectly wiling to be vocal about what he thinks without necessarily fighting any compulsion to suppress it. For someone who claims he doesn’t know much about his own heart, he arguably seems to have the best grip on understanding himself compared to a lot of this cast!

So in essence, the main take-home here is that Ken is theoretically capable of being strong-willed and assertive, and is very good at choosing when he wants to be assertive and when he wants to hold back. And he likes seeing people get along, and he wants everyone to be happy, and he doesn’t like seeing people be hurt or hurting others, and under normal circumstances, Ken has very good control of his emotions for the most part and quite a lot of self-awareness. That’s why Ken is the one to get the unique designation of this Crest; everyone in this cast can be said to be generous and supportive of others in some form, but there’s a difference between being a “natural” doormat who defers to others by default (Daisuke being a very good indicator of how this kind of mentality has a flip side of lack of self-esteem and high insecurity, and Tamers’s Takato being a good indication of how “being deferential” doesn’t necessarily preclude you from having tendencies towards selfishness or cowardice), versus choosing to be kind by understanding everything and still being gentle out of a belief that it’s the right thing to do (again: see Shinkai Haru). And it’s why Wormmon says in the 02 episode 23 flashback that Ken’s kindness can be used against him; being “kind” in this way requires a lot of mental fortitude, strength, and guts, all of which are things that could easily be very bad things when applied in the wrong direction.

This means that all the Dark Seed really needed to do in order to turn him into the Kaiser...was make him lose grip on that self-control.

Actually, Ken says it himself in less-than-subtle words in Spring 2003:

…It was revenge. But who was this revenge against? Did I want to triumph over the ones who made fun of me? The ones who looked down on me and used me? But… In the end, it was revenge against myself. I couldn’t do anything but deny the kind of human being that I was.

So in other words, the Kaiser persona was, effectively, a self-loathing eleven-year-old boy throwing a massive tantrum. A lot of the Kaiser’s actions in the first half of 02 are honestly rather petty -- he’s basically upset at the kids spoiling his holiday in 02 episode 6, he attempts torturing Daisuke out of a petty grudge over a soccer sliding tackle in 02 episode 8, and everything to do with expanding his territory and eventually (hopefully?) becoming ruler of the Digital World is frankly very sloppy. For all he’s said to be a genius, his genius only seems to extend to book smarts, and his “tactical planning abilities” never really expand beyond that of a soccer field sort of affair; his way of locking down control on other things is basically just “brainwash it harder” or “whip it harder” and applying harder brute force instead of doing something in the long-term like, say, trying to rule with charisma and recruiting allies.

(Again, bringing Appmon back into this, seeing Cloud in action will give you a much better example of a charismatic human villain who’s actually competent at his job. Or, heck, you can even look back at Savers’s Kurata, who at least was savvy enough to pull strings with people in powerful positions. Or even the Kaiser’s predecessor Saiba Neo from V-Tamer, who may have been openly sadistic but still had the sense to align himself with background power. Really, compared to all of these folks, the Kaiser is downright pathetic.)

Remembering that Ken fell into the Kaiser persona partially as a desperate attempt to become a “perfect person” like Osamu, Ken “imitated” Osamu’s cruelty to him because he felt that was how he could improve himself to become a “strong” person better than him. But the irony here is that Osamu’s “cruelty” was something that he himself never liked, and mainly came from lashing out at Ken due to feeling like he had a lack of control over his own life. So Osamu was never happy in that position, and Ken, who is indirectly pointed out via the bubble metaphor to be even more fundamentally inclined towards gentleness, is probably even more miserable.

Because everything Ken does as the Kaiser is “unfocused lashing out at everyone”, the Kaiser has less control over his emotions than Ken normally would. Takeru manages to emotionally pin him to a corner by confronting him with enough assertion in 02 episode 19 (this is before he punches him), and correctly points out that the Kaiser isn’t capable of winning with words (i.e. ideologically) and resorts to violence as the first thing he can think of. You’d think that if the Kaiser were actually someone with the self-confidence to consider the other Chosen Children beneath him, he wouldn’t even bother giving them the time of day, but Takeru just happening to be a little assertive is enough to make him lose his composure and start falling apart, and a lot of his shaken “insects!” yelling comes from him seeming pretty desperate to cling onto that rather than being all that confident about his natural superiority over anyone. 02 episode 20 establishes that he’s getting himself in over his head by tampering with the powers of darkness he can’t control, and while, on a plot level, it means that he’s misjudged his own capabilities, on a metaphorical level, it corresponds to the fact that even Ken himself is incapable of getting himself out of the emotional abyss he’s in.

And on the flip side, one of the biggest “tells” that Ken is still miserable during all of this is 02 episode 9, where he’s seen ruminating on the “glory” he’s getting in the real world despite having just decided to leave it all behind. The episode prior, after all, had been called “The Digimon Kaiser’s Loneliness”. The media is using him like some kind of “hot topic”, his parents’ affection (in his mind) is shallow and based only on his achievements, and he has no friends (how much of a role Akiyama Ryou played in his childhood is unclear, but either way, he’s no longer around now). With no emotional support coming from any direction in the real world, he’s resorting to at least trying to have some “fun” in what he perceives to be a “game”, and yet he’s still not having fun at all.

If you look carefully at a lot of the Kaiser’s actions during the first half of the series, one thing you’ll notice is that there are multiple indications that he’s not quite up to par to being as sadistic as you’d think he’d be. Recalling that we learn in 02 episodes 20-21 that the Kaiser is under the impression that the Digital World is like a game that he can “reset” and the Digimon in it not real living beings, it has interesting implications of the fact that he’s actually very hesitant to physically harm other human beings -- he certainly likes emotionally toying with them, but even when he’s trying to take petty revenge on Daisuke in 02 episode 8, he goes out of his way to set up a trap with Bakemon to torture him rather than, well, actually using the kids as hostages. That’s a hell of a lot of work to do, but he instead uses this extremely roundabout way to get them out of the picture in a somewhat less harmful way, risking having them escape (which is exactly what happens).

And in 02 episode 19, when Takeru confronts him and he ends up whipping him, you can hear a slight “...gh?” in the Japanese audio for a split second right after that, meaning that the Kaiser is, for some reason, having a hard time dealing with the fact that he just hit Takeru, and he does a very poor job defending himself against Takeru punching him out despite ostensibly being trained in judo. (Seriously, if you watch the animation of the scene, he’s just lying there while Takeru repeatedly punches the hell out of him, because he’s so out of it.) Regarding the Digimon, he’s convinced himself that they’re not living beings, but regarding the human Chosen Children, who undeniably are, no matter how much he might look down on them, he has a suspiciously hard time harming them as much as he could...

On top of that, one interesting question that might come up to one rewatching the first half of 02 is the strange “contradiction” of why the Kaiser ostensibly seems to hate Wormmon so much, calling him an unworthy idea of a partner in 02 episodes 10 and 19, and yet does remarkably little to get Wormmon away from him or off his case (he hates Wormmon calling him “Ken-chan”, yet doesn’t really try very hard to stop him). He could have easily locked Wormmon away in a cage or something if he really wanted to -- actually, there’s the question, why doesn’t he slap an Evil Ring on him? Because in the end, Wormmon is the only emotional support he’s really getting, and so it’s likely he unconsciously doesn’t want to lose that. Recalling that Digimon are fundamentally linked to the inner self, the Kaiser rejecting Wormmon for being “weak” is analogous to Ken rejecting his own self for being “weak” and “not perfect” -- which means that the fact he still keeps Wormmon around is analogous to the fact that Ken hasn’t really been able to bring himself to completely let his fundamental nature go. And, hence, it’s why he gets so initially incensed at Wormmon’s “betrayal” at 02 episode 10 (and yet still keeps him around despite that), and is ultimately emotionally destroyed by his death in 02 episode 21.

Although, actually, if you look carefully at 02 episode 21, it’s not quite Wormmon’s death that necessarily does it -- the turning point where he sheds the Kaiser persona is right before that (and in case you have any doubts, the animation puts highlights in his eyes for the first time in the series right at that point). Wormmon’s death is the first major consequence of his actions that he has to deal with, but what actually brought Ken back to his senses was his own realization that Digimon are living beings, that his actions have had permanent effects this whole time, and that he can’t take back anything he’d done.

Remember that 02 is a series that is largely about moving on and accepting that you can’t change the past, and that you have to move forward regardless of that. Ken’s fall into sadism was only possible by driving him into extremely deep-seated denial -- he was already starting to face the potential reality of Digimon being real, existing beings in the real world an episode prior. He says, outright, in 02 episode 21, that part of the reason he came to the Digital World to do all of this was escapism -- and, presumably, under the idea that any mistake he made could be rolled back and redone, unlike Osamu’s death. But the Digital World is not a place you can reset like a game, Ken will have to live with the consequences of his actions again, and moreover, every single one of the actions he’d been convincing himself were relatively meaningless had caused severe and permanent harm, and the entire thing overwhelms him.

It’s also important to point out that this was probably where the Dark Seed had to work a lot of magic to get Ken to embrace this kind of denial so easily -- after all, it’s established in the final quarter of the series that it does have a tangible impact on personality and puts a damper on one’s ability to feel empathy. In the flashback in 02 episode 23, regardless of whether Ken considered the Digital World to be a “game” or “able to be reversed” or not, he clearly still didn’t care and treated those around him with proper kindness (even if he did consider it to be all of that, it probably wouldn’t have been entirely unlike how a lot of us have a hard time picking rude choices in video games). It’s a very complicated chain reaction of events that allowed this to be even possible, and it was so against his fundamental nature that once the denial broke and Ken reached his limit, he wasn’t able to do it anymore. The Chosen Children’s main role in 02 episode 21 was really just cleaning up the massive mess he’d made in the form of Chimeramon, but as far as the whole thing about the Kaiser’s persona completely falling apart and Ken being forced to confront his own self goes, that was pretty much all Ken and Wormmon, in a series of dominoes that had already been collapsing for episodes on end.

The following episodes have Ken treat the 02 team with a certain amount of detachment, and this is often construed by a handful of people as being reflective of Ken being standoffish of some sort. The fact that Daisuke and Ken are often promoted in franchise materials as “rivals” mainly due to them being in the “protagonist and right-hand-man” position such characters are in might tempt you to think that way, but they are most definitely not!! (Considering that even saying that Taichi and Yamato fit that mold is a bit questionable, and neither Ruki nor Jian quite fulfill the expectations of the role in regards to the genre-subverting Tamers, Frontier, which is explicitly said to be deliberately written to be conventional, is probably the first proper execution of this trope in the form of Takuya and Kouji.) Ken’s detachment from the group at this time in the series is something he actually gives the reason for quite directly: he believes it’s his fault and doesn’t want to burden them with what he considers to be his job, and in the end Daisuke ultimately breaks through to him and they become completely normal friends who get along. “Rival” what?

Ken is, at worst, distant during this point of the series, but he’s actually very straightforward about what he wants and intends to do; it’s just that he’s being a bit blunt about it because he’s still drowning in his shame and not sure how to approach them. (Also, consider the fact he was rather lacking in friends or a support group before all of this; he doesn’t have a lot of experience in socializing, either.) So he keeps everyone at arm’s length, and the reason he comes off as so standoffish is because he’s so assertive! He directly and bluntly makes some very strong remarks about how he believes everyone else shouldn’t be getting involved! Again, when left to his own devices and not being manipulated into by a supernatural evil seed into multiple levels of denial, Ken is very in control of what he wants and thinks, and is even very open about speaking his mind.

That’s even when they’re not good decisions, mind you. Ken starts off the climax of 02 episode 26 being very firm about wanting to suicidally throw himself into the reactor in order to stop it, and 02 episode 30 has him consider himself a burden to the team after the fallout with Iori and try to stay out of it despite them very badly needing his presence, which Daisuke (of all people!) rightfully calls him out for being childish about. But he also listens to reason very quickly and acknowledges the others’ point very easily, with Daisuke reminding him in 02 episode 26 that his suicidal recklessness is actually pretty self-centered and short-sighted of him, since it’ll prevent him from doing anything else to take responsibility for his actions going forward, and Miyako, uh, slapping him in 02 episode 30. (But he comes quietly right away as if acknowledging his own idiocy, and never holds it against her thereafter.)

Nevertheless, the point is: you can see that this kind of assertiveness is the same kind of assertiveness he had as the Kaiser, just channeled in a different direction and for a different purpose. But as the Kaiser, he was angrily lashing out at anything and everything and stepping on anything he could just so he could have a show of power; once he comes back to his senses, he reserves that force for it being something he consciously believes is the right thing to do (regardless of whether it’s actually the right thing to do or not).

Because of the fact Ken spends a lot of the last quarter of 02 suffering and parsing a lot of trauma, a lot of people have tended to pin him as constantly sad and being a soft crybaby, but that couldn’t be further from the truth! Despite all the emotional pain he goes through, Ken has a hell of a ton of strength through all of this -- he even flings a well-aimed quip at Oikawa in 02 episode 44 despite being in a completely helpless situation, and in 02 episode 45 he himself is the one who volunteers to open the gate to the Dark Ocean, despite knowing exactly what it entails. That takes a lot of guts, and all things considered, his recovery from being the Kaiser spans only four months and is altogether incredibly fast given what he went through -- it did not take long for him to regain his bearings and get himself back on track. Again, it’s the same kind of “assertiveness” and capacity for action that fuels what the Kaiser did, just better controlled and in a direction Ken knows he actually wants.

This is also why I tend to object to insinuations that Ken would be overly touchy about or traumatized by the mere discussion of him being the Kaiser in the aftermath of 02, because the series itself, multiple times, portrayed him as being very able to talk about his experiences bluntly and honestly, at worst maybe considering it a bit of an awkward topic. He has no problems admitting that it was a thing that happened, especially if it involves discussing it as part of taking responsibility or preventing further damage -- it’s just that he of course doesn’t enjoy it either, and is equally as open about the shame he feels as a result. All of the times Ken loses his composure in the latter half of 02 involve either physical pain being inflicted on him, or a lot more actively vicious invocation of his memories and insecurities, and even then he gets himself back on his feet with a rather prompt amount of speed. Poorly timed of a statement as it may have been, Miyako is not incorrect when she says in 02 episode 31 that he has a certain amount of natural resilience that he carried from being the Kaiser.

All the way back in 02 episode 9, shortly after it was revealed to the group that Ken was the Kaiser, Iori, Hikari, and Takeru all label Ken as someone who doesn’t look like someone who could do something so horrible, and Hikari even says that his smile looks “gentle” (note that this is yasashisou, a word derived from the same root word used for his Crest). So in other words, even all three of them were able to catch on to his actual nature betraying himself even during that awful period of time. It’s still poking through, all things considered.

But we as the audience know he’s putting on that face for the camera, and his eyes are still as dead-eyed as they are for the first half of the series, and when Miyako accidentally makes him laugh during the Christmas party in 02 episode 38, it’s very much framed as probably the first time Ken has been this genuinely happy in a long while. He was never able to be this happy even when “satisfying” himself by stepping on others as the Kaiser.

And that’s why it’s so extremely unlikely that Ken will ever be able to lapse back into the Kaiser persona after the events of 02, even with the Dark Seed technically still inside his neck. He wasn’t enjoying it anyway; the Kaiser persona wasn’t a habit that he fell into out of emotional suppression or even catharsis, but rather him forcing himself into a role he was never comfortable in to begin with. He was never truly satisfied with anything he was getting out of it, and moreover, it took the combination of supernatural influence and a hell of a lot of denial to allow it to get that far in the first place, because of how far against his fundamental nature that was. (Again, for those of you who have seen Appmon: think about what it would take to get Haru to embrace sadism.) Even Osamu wasn’t enjoying being cold; being kind and living your life with positivity is a lot more fulfilling and fun, anyway.

In 02 episode 48, Ken describes the influence of the Seed as “horrible” in retrospect; even if it didn’t involve physical pain and exhaustion the way it did for the Dark Seed children, the entire experience sucked even back then. And while Ken theorizes about the Dark Seed’s influence being countered by the power of love earlier in the episode, when you look at the whole of 02, it’s not just his family’s love -- Ken now has the emotional support of his family, and Wormmon, and his newfound friends, and that’s giving him all of the fulfillment he wanted that putting on a front of sadism wasn’t giving him, and he doesn’t really need anything else anymore.

02 itself is very much about the fact that it’s not a bad thing to rely on the support of others to be happy; the Ken and Kaiser are undoubtedly the same person, but the latter’s existence requires a very specific lineup of events and factors to happen, and one of the massive parts behind that was a severe lack of emotional support or anyone who properly understood him. And by the end of the series, Ken has more than enough strength of heart to accept everything that’s happened and move on, and to stop reaching out to denial and clinging onto the past, and he has emotional support and understanding from a whole new group of friends that thoroughly understand everything he did and went through, and wholeheartedly accept and love him anyway.

He is never going to have a gaping hole in his life like that again.

#digimon #digimon adventure 02 #ichijouji ken #ken ichijouji #shihameta

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violent-optimism · 4 years

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Rey as a Palpatine and Why it’s Grown on Me

Hello my lovelies!

I think it’s been quite a while since I posted any kind of essay on here. Between work and other things I honestly haven’t had much time for it. However in recent days I’ve felt very motivated to work on a very particular kind of essay; a subject that I’ve been stewing over since December of last year.

Obviously from the title you already know what I’m going to be talking about. I’m not going to deny that this is a rather heated subject for some Star Wars fans, particularly those who disliked this plot choice and The Rise of Skywalker in general. As per usual in my essays, my goal is not to change anyone’s mind or argue over who’s opinion is “more right”. Plain and simple, this is just going to be me talking about MY thoughts and MY observations about Rey’s journey and lineage in The Rise of Skywalker. I hope this doesn’t need to be said but if you read something in this essay that you disagree with, I politely ask that you keep it to yourself and move on. At the end of the day, we are just talking about a movie, and this is all just for fun.

Now, with that being said, let’s get started! This essay is definitely going to be a bit more structured than my usual efforts and I hope this will result in a much more straightforward and clear-cut essay. Enjoy!

1. My Initial Reaction

While I don’t want this to be a major part of the essay, I do think it makes sense to start this off with a little story about the time I first saw TROS in the theatre. I can remember it pretty well. My whole body was tense, my eyes glued to the screen for what I knew was about to be some kind of major reveal in the story (even if it felt very late in the film for such a scene). Then came those shocking and irreversible words from Kylo Ren: “You’re his Granddaughter. You are a Palpatine.”

Wait…what?

My mind recoiled at this statement. My heart sank into my stomach with complete rejection. This can’t be right. He must be lying. I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit. A man behind me just snorted with laughter and I can totally see why. Rey being related to Palpatine sounds more like a crazy Youtube fan theory than something that could actually be canon in the Star Wars universe. We had always thought she might be related to Luke or even Obi-Wan, but…Emperor Palpatine? Darth Sidious? No, just no.

So yeah, suffice to say that my first reaction towards this plot twist was not very positive. I admit that even once the movie was over, I still didn’t like this reveal. I don’t even think I began to warm up to it until my 3rd or 4th viewing of TROS. I had become so used to the idea that Rey had no special lineage and she was just a very force-sensitive girl from nowhere that it was extremely hard to let go of that. And honestly, if JJ and everyone else involved had chosen to keep it that way, I would have been perfectly content. So why…you might ask, has Rey’s true lineage grown on me in the last several months?

Now, don’t get me wrong…there’s still a part of me that thinks it was a very odd choice to introduce a reveal like this considering what happened in the previous installment. However…this fact has already been discussed to death and this essay is intended to be more of a story exploration rather than a critical film review. So let’s talk more about Rey being Palpatine’s Granddaughter and how I have actually grown to love the idea.

2. Rey’s Journey

Throughout the trilogy, Rey has had to overcome quite a few challenges in her path to becoming a Jedi. Her journey has been one of mostly self-discovery and personal growth. In The Force Awakens, Rey discovers that she is strong in the force and can do things she never imagined. In The Last Jedi, Rey’s strength in the force grows stronger and she learns to accept that her parents were nobodies and that some things do not turn out the way we expect.

And so, thematically, it would almost seem like Rey has reached the end of her character arc. This is Rey at her most powerful. There’s nothing left to learn, and there are no more secrets to be revealed…right? Well, we know that this is not the case. Even from the first scene with Rey we know that something is wrong. She knows that something is wrong. There is a darkness inside of her; she fears for her destiny and who she is meant to become. It’s not until later that we understand why these feelings have come to the surface.

Up until TROS, we didn’t truly know who Rey was or where she came from. However, by this point in the story anyone should be able to describe her as a character. Kind. Brave. Resourceful. Curious. Compassionate. Strong. Rey has proven time and time again that she is an incredibly kind and capable individual who wants to do the right thing. Although both TLJ and TROS strongly hint towards Rey possibly turning to the dark side, we know that our protagonist never actually would because we know who Rey is.

And this a huge reason as to why the Rey Palpatine reveal works so well for me. There is an incredible juxtaposition with Rey being the most heroic, kind-hearted person imaginable, and yet she is related to the most evil man in the galaxy. There is something deeply profound about the last living Jedi having Sith blood in her veins. Part of the reason why this reveal is so shocking is because the two characters are complete polar opposites in terms of good and evil. Rey is absolutely nothing like Palpatine and so the familial connection seems impossible. It doesn’t just seem like an unlikely truth, it feels entirely incorrect. And yet, that is also what makes it (again, in my opinion) so interesting and bold.

3. Meaning and Impact

Apart from giving Rey one last emotional challenge in the final installment, I think this choice was made for other reasons as well (3 to be precise).

1. It made Rey even more similar to Kylo as he too is grappling with the dark influence from his Grandfather

2. This decision subverts a long-existing trope in fantasy stories

3. Used to further tie the 9 films together as a story about the Skywalker and Palpatine bloodlines

Since The Force Awakens, it was made very clear early on that Rey and Kylo were connected in some way; their destinies were intertwined. Although this was further explored in TLJ, we would not truly understand just how similar their journeys would become until the final installment. The dynamic between Rey and Kylo is infinitely interesting because at first glance they seem like completely opposite people, when in reality they share a very similar struggle, especially in The Rise of Skywalker.

Both Rey and Kylo experience the overwhelming darkness of their respective families. Kylo even says it quite bluntly before the lightsaber duel on the ruined Death Star: “The dark side is in our nature, surrender to it.” He is quite obviously trying to use Rey’s lineage against her in an attempt to turn her over to his side. What makes this so interesting is that we know Kylo himself is not yet completely taken over by the dark side. Despite his evil deeds, he has always been conflicted during this story.

When Rey finds out that she is related to Emperor Palpatine, she becomes withdrawn, angry, afraid and unstable. This is the closest to the dark side that we have ever seen Rey at. Indeed there are some moments where she almost seems to be channeling behaviour that would be more suited for Kylo (snapping at her friends, using anger as power). Although Rey eventually comes to her senses and realizes what is happening to her, she was clearly affected by her Grandfather’s dark influence, just as Kylo was.

Despite the fact that both Rey and Kylo come from families with a history of the dark side, the film makes it very clear that one character’s lineage is far “worse” than the other. This is where the subversion of a common fantasy trope takes place. Now, to be clear, this is only my interpretation and I don’t claim this to be exactly what the filmmakers were going for; however this subversion is yet another reason why I enjoy the Rey Palpatine reveal.

How many times have you watched a movie or a TV show where a character’s lineage was a significant part of the story? It’s probably more times than you can count on one hand, right? My point is that the idea of a character’s lineage/family history becoming a main plot element in a story is nothing new, we’ve seen this before a million times. For example, in Disney’s “Tangled” (2010) Rapunzel learns that she is the long lost princess who was taken away from her family when she was an infant. Disney influence aside, does this sound somewhat similar to Rey’s story? Yes, it absolutely does…but not in the traditional or conventional sense.

This is where Rey Palpatine (for me at least), becomes extremely appealing. This reveal is like the evil, twisted version of a heroine discovering that she is the secret heir to a royal family. And instead of the protagonist being overjoyed and enlightened by this information, the reveal comes with great personal shock and emotional turmoil. In this case, Rey is the Granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine, which essentially makes her Sith royalty if we’re being really comparable. Am I the only one who (for lack of better words) thinks this is insanely cool? Not only is it a direct subversion of a very common story trope, it directly ties into Kylo’s arc and it also parallels Luke’s family revelation in “The Empire Strikes Back.” Coincidentally, this also makes Rey’s journey similar to Luke’s in that regard, but I’ll get back to that later.

Now as you’ve probably heard before, as we look back on all 9 films in the Star Wars saga we can see that this is clearly a story about the Skywalker and Palpatine families. Granted, the Palpatine bloodline is largely unexplored in comparison to the former. We know that Rey’s Father was the son of the Emperor, but we still don’t know his name or who he really was. Ultimately this information is not relevant to the story as a whole, but it’s clear that Emperor Palpatine has been pulling the strings throughout basically the entire saga.

More specifically, Palpatine himself has always been tied to the Skywalkers. He seduced Anakin Skywalker to the dark side and later tried to do the same to Luke. Via Snoke he was also able to turn Ben Solo, who shares a dyad with Rey, Palpatine’s Granddaughter. It kind of comes full circle and it’s really quite clever in my opinion. The Villain of the ST is related to the Heroes of the OT, and the Hero of the ST is related to the Villain of the OT (Did I just blow your mind?).

Put simply, Rey being a Palpatine makes a lot more sense thematically when you examine the story that came before her. Families are complicated and messy, especially in Star Wars. Rey’s experience echoes this, but in a much darker and harsher way. Her journey is meant to resemble Luke Skywalker’s in many ways, but their stories do have differences. In Luke’s case, he actually got to see and interact with Anakin, the real face of who his Father was. Anakin Skywalker was certainly not a perfect person, but in his last moments he turned to the light and saved his son’s life.

Rey, of course, did not get to experience a moment even close to this. Palpatine is about as evil as evil gets. There is no hope or chance of redemption. She was forced to look upon her own flesh and blood and see nothing but a monster. It would be unfair to turn this into a competition of “who had the most devastating family reveal”, but the point I’m trying to make is that Rey and Luke’s journeys are undeniably similar, which serves to further strengthen the connection of Skywalker and Palpatine in these 9 films.

4. Conclusion: The Power of Choice

I feel I must end on the note of choice, because this is how The Rise of Skywalker chooses to end. Despite everything I have mentioned and how much I have grown to love the idea of Rey Palpatine, there is something that I love much more than this: Rey Skywalker. Even just reading it or saying it out loud fills with me an indescribable amount of joy.

To put it bluntly, Rey did not have an easy life. In fact, she probably had one of the most challenging upbringings of any Star Wars protagonist. Yes, Anakin was a slave at a very young age, but he also had friends and a mother who supported him. Luke was even better off with a relatively normal childhood, friends and parental figures who loved him as if he was their own son.

Rey had nothing and no one.

She was forced into a life of struggle and hardship, not by choice, and certainly not by her parents’ choice. Although they loved and cared for her, she would never feel this or know it to be true until much later in life. Rey did not choose where she came from, nor could she choose who she was related to. This is perhaps the most powerful and meaningful message that one could take away from the Sequel Trilogy: You cannot choose the circumstances of your childhood, nor can you choose who you are related to by blood. However, you can choose your destiny, you can choose who you want to be, and you can choose who you consider to be your family.

Rey had all the makings of a villain, but she chose to be a hero. A Sith that chose to be a Jedi. A Palpatine that chose to be a Skywalker. It doesn’t matter where you come from, only where you’re going. At the end of the day, it’s up to you to decide who you want to be. That is a beautiful thing.

Well folks, it took me a long time to get here but we’re finally at the end. I hope this essay was able to make some kind of a comprehensible point. Even if you didn’t agree with anything I said, I hope it was still something that made you think. It was quite a lot of fun to really delve into this topic and explore every microscopic detail. I sure hope it made sense, and if not, I’ll try to do better next time.

Thank you so much for reading! Bye for now.

#star wars #rey #rey palpatine #rey skywalker #TROS #please don't hate me!

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duhragonball · 4 years

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I'd like to suggest Majin Buu for the character asks. He's a strange dude who stuck around longer then expected, so I'd imagine you have some mixed feelings on the character. I'd say any version of Buu applies, but thats up to you.

Give me a character and I will answer:

Why I like them: Those who know me, know that I am all about that post-Frieza era of DBZ. That’s why I want Hit to kill him again, because it did wonders for Z, and maybe it could improve Super II or whatever they end up calling it. I’ve already discussed why I love Cell, but for me, the Buu Saga was not much of a step down. I came out of the Cell Games wanting more, really craving an epilogue to show how everyone was getting along after Cell’s defeat. And the Buu Saga gave me exactly that.

The common criticism leveled against Buu is that he isn’t much on personality. He doesn’t have the charisma of a Frieza or Buu, but I think that works in his favor, since it gives the good guys more time to work out all their issues. A big part of the arc was about Goku and Vegeta getting on the same page, and it’s tough to make that happen when the bad guy has his own monologue. I think that’s why you don’t see much of them together on Namek, or during the Androids crisis.

I’ve seen Team Four Star compare Super Buu’s absorption forms to sort of a carbon copy of Perfect Cell. I’m not sure I agree, but 1) I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, even if it’s true, and 2) If you don’t like Buuhan, don’t worry, because he doesn’t stay that way for very long. Majin Buu has lots of variety, is my point. No one’s going to love all of his different forms and appearances, but you’re probably going to find a few that appeal to you. I had trouble picking a header image for this, because it feels like it does a disservice to the character. He’s so many different things. He can be cute and cuddly, or vicious and terrifying, or sassy and rude.

I also like what he represents to the series as a whole. When he was first introduced, Buu was presented as this instant “game over” for the universe. If Babidi reawakens him, that’s it, we all lose. No one can stop him. But then he breaks out anyway, and the good guys still manage to rally. He proves too powerful to defeat, but Goku comes up with a plan, and the Supreme Kai comes up with a plan, and the Old Kai comes up with a plan, and finally Vegeta comes up with a plan, and all of them are premised on the idea that maybe we’re not so doomed after all. Maybe the Z-Fighters are strong enough to pull this off. And they do pull it off, and somehow turn Buu good in the process. There’s a very hopeful message in that.

Why I don’t: Not gonna lie, I find it somewhat uncomfy that Fat Buu survives the conflict and just... stays that way. I’m not talking about his appearance, mind you, I mean he still seems like the same guy who gouged out Dabura’s eyes, who creeped on that one lady, and seemed unable to stop eating.

Let me put it like this: When I first watched the episodes where Mr. Satan befriends Buu, I wasn’t entirely surprised, but what worried me was that he cooked food for Buu, and then he’d immediately demand another meal. The implication, for me anyway, was that maybe Buu couldn’t be reformed, and he would be compelled by an endless hunger to destroy everything in his sight, regardless of how he might have felt about it.

In hindsight, I think the “can’t-stop-eating” bit was just intended to set up the emergence of Evil Buu. Once he got that out of his system, he was fine, but it still bugged me, and even Vegeta was concerned about Buu making another Kid Buu someday. Because no one really understood what Buu was or how he worked, so who’s to say that he could truly shake off the ways of evil? Also, Fat Buu owes his existence to absorbing two of the ancient Supreme Kais, so it bothered me that they got everyone else de-absorbed but not them.

But, I can’t say that bothers me too much, since the final episodes of DBZ show that he lived peacefully with Mr. Satan for at least a decade. Even so, I wasn’t surprised to see Dragon Ball GT merge him with Uub. I think the urge to write him out of the story was pretty strong. Notice how Dragon Ball Super has Majin Buu, but they hardly ever use him. It makes you wonder.

Favorite episode (scene if movie): You know, I think I might go with the one where the Supreme Kai explains Buu’s backstory to the Old Kai. Pretty sure that one ends with Kid Buu blowing up the world, so it’s got a lot going for it.

Favorite season/movie: The Fusion Saga is kind of my go-to answer for the best of Buu, but after I rewatched everything last year, I think the Kid Buu Saga make be the better arc. It’s tough to decide.

Favorite line: When Goku and Vegeta power up on the Supreme Kai Planet to draw Buu’s attention, he senses their ki and grins, saying “Dum-dums!” like he’s so excited that they’re gonna try and fight him again. That’s in the dub, anyway, but I always liked that this was Kid Buu’s pet name for those two idiots.

Favorite outfit: I don’t think I have a preference, but it might have been nice to see more of this version:

OTP: I guess that female Buu he made so he could have children? Honestly, the less I have to think about Buu being romantic the better I like it.

Brotp: Gotta be Mr. Satan.

Head Canon: The Xenoverse games and Dragon Ball Online introduced this whole notion of Buu starting his own race of Majins on Earth. I’ve been trying to figure out how to work with that in my fanfic, and the main thing that sticks out in my mind is that Buu is the progenitor of that entire population, and I’m pretty sure he’d still be alive at any given time, so it intrigues me that a Majin OC I might come up with could just stroll on over to Buu’s house and say hello. But I’m not really sure what they’d talk about.

Unpopular opinion: Killing him off was one of the few smart moves GT made, and providing a means for the absorbed Supreme Kai’s to escape was one of the few smart moves Toyotaro made.

A wish: If they do another Tournament of Power, Buu should actually be in it. He can absorb Frieza and that way they can get around the cap on team members.

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: If they do another big fight, for the love of crap, don’t just have him nap through it. I just realized he probably slept through the Broly movie too. Lazy bastard.

5 words to best describe them: That’s the tubby custard machine.

My nickname for them: “You r--” whoa ho-hoooo. Just kidding.

#dragon ball #ask duhragonball #majin buu #offbeatcat

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