#except for the hearing plotline we see what he sees. we feel what he feels

[iirulancorrino]

Movies that attempt something different, that recognize that less can indeed be more, are thus easily taken to task. “It’s so subjective!” and “It omits a crucial P.O.V.!” are assumed to be substantive criticisms rather than essentially value-neutral statements. We are sometimes told, in matters of art and storytelling, that depiction is not endorsement; we are not reminded nearly as often that omission is not erasure. But because viewers of course cannot be trusted to know any history or muster any empathy on their own — and if anything unites those who criticize “Oppenheimer” on representational grounds, it’s their reflexive assumption of the audience’s stupidity — anything that isn’t explicitly shown onscreen is denigrated as a dodge or an oversight, rather than a carefully considered decision. A film like “Oppenheimer” offers a welcome challenge to these assumptions. Like nearly all Nolan’s movies, from “Memento” to “Dunkirk,” it’s a crafty exercise in radical subjectivity and narrative misdirection, in which the most significant subjects — lost memories, lost time, lost loves — often are invisible and all the more powerful for it. We can certainly imagine a version of “Oppenheimer” that tossed in a few startling but desultory minutes of Japanese destruction footage. Such a version might have flirted with kitsch, but it might well have satisfied the representational completists in the audience. It also would have reduced Hiroshima and Nagasaki to a piddling afterthought; Nolan treats them instead as a profound absence, an indictment by silence. That’s true even in one of the movie’s most powerful and contested sequences. Not long after news of Hiroshima’s destruction arrives, Oppenheimer gives a would-be-triumphant speech to a euphoric Los Alamos crowd, only for his words to turn to dust in his mouth. For a moment, Nolan abandons realism altogether — but not, crucially, Oppenheimer’s perspective — to embrace a hallucinatory horror-movie expressionism. A piercing scream erupts in the crowd; a woman’s face crumples and flutters, like a paper mask about to disintegrate. The crowd is there and then suddenly, with much sonic rumbling, image blurring and an obliterating flash of white light, it is not. For “Oppenheimer’s” detractors, this sequence constitutes its most grievous act of erasure: Even in the movie’s one evocation of nuclear disaster, the true victims have been obscured and whitewashed. The absence of Japanese faces and bodies in these visions is indeed striking. It’s also consistent with Nolan’s strict representational parameters, and it produces a tension, even a contradiction, that the movie wants us to recognize and wrestle with. Is Oppenheimer trying (and failing) to imagine the hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians murdered by the weapon he devised? Or is he envisioning some hypothetical doomsday scenario still to come? I think the answer is a blur of both, and also something more: In this moment, one of the movie’s most abstract, Nolan advances a longer view of his protagonist’s history and his future. Oppenheimer’s blindness to Japanese victims and survivors foreshadows his own stubborn inability to confront the consequences of his actions in years to come. He will speak out against nuclear weaponry, but he will never apologize for the atomic bombings of Japan — not even when he visits Tokyo and Osaka in 1960 and is questioned by a reporter about his perspective now. “I do not think coming to Japan changed my sense of anguish about my part in this whole piece of history,” he will respond. “Nor has it fully made me regret my responsibility for the technical success of the enterprise.” Talk about compartmentalization. That episode, by the way, doesn’t find its way into “Oppenheimer,” which knows better than to offer itself up as the last word on anything. To the end, Nolan trusts us to seek out and think about history for ourselves. If we elect not to, that’s on us.

[oh-no-its-bird]

Playing a game of "how niche 'yeah no one's gonna wanna hear ab this one' can I get" I want to have a svsss x Naruto crossover but like. Zapping my absolute all time favorite snake boy, Zhuzhi-lang into the ninjaverse.

Right off the bat: half heavenly demon!! How tf does that translate into naruto world? It'd be cool if he actually registers as a bijuu to the bijuu + any sort of detectors or seals that are bijuu specific

He has so many snakes on and around him at all times like, canonically, and that's so fucking funny to me. He is one of them fr. He goes to the snake summoning realm and they're all over him, long lost brother style. He registers to them as one of them (could he technically form a summoning contract w someone?? That'd be so funny. Sasuke tries to summon a snake for help and gets what looks like a whole ass MAN instead)

Also just regular fun culture clash of Chinese wuxia vs Japanese ninja genres.

Zhuzhi-lang talks SO formally it's very cute (in my opinion) but also noticeably odd for a lot of people, especially since a lot of people we see in Naruto are middle/lower class, and I believe that in Japanese society, talking in a proper sort of third person like he does tends to be smthn done by nobles at court? <- could be very wrong, I'm going off just stuff I've noticed in reading different light novels over the years, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong

But just my favorite snake son fucking around in ninja world. Ooo, maybe he can also resonate with the bijuu like they do with him, and he goes on like some little quest to free them, that could be cool. He sees them trapped and it reminds him of Tianlang-Jun's situation which makes him feel things.

Meanwhile, he's pinging people as some secret 10th jinchuriki, which has crazy political implications. Where did he come from?? What does he want?? Who gets to claim him?? If they kill him, whoever gets the bijuu they believe to be trapped in him gets a whole new jinchuriki, which is HUGE.

Zhuzhi-Lang and this gaggle of children he's picked up and convinced to cooperate to get separated from their bijuu, running from multiple villages. He's stealing all the jinchuriki, someone stop him !!!

Also I want to see Orochimaru and him interact just because snake.

Zhuzhi-Lang is also an interesting character to have, bc where in a lot of crossovers the characters have little reasons to stick around and like, interfere with things, Zhuzhi-Lang is a character who's proven to return any kindness he's shown a hundredfold (often without any real regard for what that person fr wants, oops) So it'd be so stupidly easy to have him get invested into literally any character or plotline— all you have to do is have someone show him some kindness and boom, he's doing his best to help whatever they may be doing

Like, POV little baby Naruto gives him some food bc he looks hungry or smthn and suddenly Zhuzhi-Lang is kidnapping him from Konoha "for his own good" (oh boy, where have we seen that before) bc clearly he deserves better. Don't worry Naruto, Zhuzhi-Lang will remove the demon from inside you so you can be a normal boy, and Kurama can be free :))

Everyone wins! (Except for the villages.)

[udretlnea]

The Divine City, Interlude Quest: Dormiens Factorem

Previous page \ Next page \ Prologue

(Words: 2.7k)

(Edit: I added more explanations to the Author’s Notes. Check it out for more insights about this chapter. Additionally, I deleted the interaction scene with Henry, Cecilia, Lyla, and Guy because - after checking my notes - that would’ve seriously ruined the pacing. (their interactions aren’t until later don’t worry).

(Disclaimer: This work is non-canon to the plotline of the Divine City by yuriisclumsy)

For anyone with siblings, one thing was consistent: they were a constant test of patience. Or if they didn’t have siblings they had that one friend who was practically sibling-coded. For Henry, he knew better than anyone what it was like to have a hyperactive little brother. Especially when said brother asks ridiculous questions like -

“Big bro, why can’t we just let the cows free and let them establish a brand new nation with the new milk element?” Henry paused mid-throw as he processed his little brother’s words.

The teen scoffed, amused more than confused. “Because they have no experience in ruling an entire nation, let alone harnessing the power of a new element.”

Henry was - as family - already used to his sibling’s more…imaginative daydreams. There was little he could do about it other than entertain them (Such is the need to have patience when you had siblings).

He continued his task of refilling the cow feed in the pen. One-two-one-two-one-two.

“Hey, rebel dingus, can you toss me that bucket?” 

“I’m no rebel! I’m future supervisor Bobby of the new cow republic!” He puffed out his chest and brushed back his dirty blonde hair with a hand. “Nobody can tell me what to do except-”

“Guy,” Henry said almost impatiently. He swore he could feel the threads of his patience begin to unravel. “Bucket. Please.”

His little brother wordlessly hopped off the fence, grabbed a nearby empty bucket and handed it off. 

Henry strolled over to the nearest cow and - having put a stool in advance - sat down to start milking. The liquid poured into the bucket without much ceremony. Distantly, Henry could hear his little brother start humming. 

Nothing much else to do while the rest of the adults take care of the harvest, he thought. 

Mornings are often this: After finishing this one chore, it’s on to the next. The two work in tandem cleaning the pens, gathering eggs, and taking care of the livestock. As Henry is patiently tending to the horses, Guy is excitedly and quickly sweeping up dust and sticks. The cries of birds, cows, pigs, and sheep fill the air. It’s a generally lively and pleasant day filled with things the two can expect.

“Ya think mom and dad will take us to see the parade?” asked Guy.

“That’s not until December. And yeah, probably,” Henry answered. He grabbed a brush and began gently brushing the horse. A memory of last year began to play in his head, one filled with warmth and whimsy. “I love that parade. I’ve been looking forward to it ever since the harvest started.”

“Me too. The food was very yummy. Can you believe Fontainians can eat cake every day?”

Henry raised an eyebrow in curiosity. “No way they do that.”

“Yes way! I heard it from a - a riputable source!” 

“Sure dingus. Maybe when we visit Fontaine we can ask to get those special 16-slices of cake that you can only get per day,” he dryly remarked.

Guys eyes lit up in what he could only describe as pure innocence. “Yeah!”

Henry chuckled. Setting the brush down they collected their things and headed out for their next assignment. The house needed to be cleaned, and luckily it was just right across the barn. He inhaled the morning air - savoring the scent of pine - and looked up at the sky. Maybe after this we can sneak into town and nab some cookies off someone’s window.

The teen was in high spirits and his head was filled with bright thoughts of mischief.

At least, until he heard the sound of wood and stone exploding in the distance. The two brothers froze in place and snapped their heads to the right where the path rose into a hill. For just five seconds everything was quiet. And then they felt the ground rumble. Henry put a hand on Guy’s shoulder as he braced himself. 

In the distance, a cloud of dust was kicked up. Henry widened his eyes as he witnessed tens of sheep racing down the hill. Whatever spooked them had caused them to break away 

- And into the brothers’ path.

Henry grabbed Guy’s hand. “Move move move!” 

They barely made it to the other side when the animals sprinted past them, followed closely by a couple dogs and several people carrying rope. The two passively observed them chase.

Excitement welled within Henry’s gut that compelled him to do what he was about to do.

“Guy, go inside and tell Mom I’m following them. Now.”

“Wait what - hey! Henry!”

Without even looking back, Henry ran after them.

As he caught up to the tail end, some of the sheep had broken off leading the others to chase them. The majority of them still ran straight. Henry managed to catch up to a young woman who acknowledged him with a quick glance.

“What - what the heck is going on?” he gasped out.

The lady bared her teeth, but it was out of frustration and had no bite. “I don’t know! Everything happened so suddenly! One minute we were helping the harvest and the next thing I knew a whole herd of sheep got loose and ran away!”

“Oh, it’s going to be one of those days where something weird happens and we have to work together to fix it,” Henry said almost tiredly.

“Eh, personally I find it fun! Keeps things interesting.”

Henry dryly chuckled. “Same! Ya can’t get any more fun out here.”

“Aight, enough yapping. I’ll take that group while you take the ones ahead.” The young woman ran to the right to corral more sheep that had broken off.

Henry saw three sheep running away and straight into a small forest. Cursing under his breath, he stopped to catch his breath. 

Henry greedily gulped down air. He hadn’t run this hard since that three-legged race with the rest of the kids. Henry wiped his brow, slick with sweat, then observed the forest in front of him. 

He remembered this place as where everyone would sometimes play hide ‘n seek. It wasn’t terribly dense, but still thick enough in some places. But now something was different about it.

The air exuding out of it felt…commanding, like a king to his people except he was kind of scary about it. What was that word? Opp - oppresi-something?

Maybe it was a trick of the mind, but he can’t let anything stop him now.

“Is this where the sheep went?” asked Guy.

“Yeah, they went - wait WHAT!?” Henry’s head swiveled to his left. To his utter shock and surprise, Guy was there. “How did you - where did you - why are you - ?”

“Mom told me to follow you in case you needed help. She’s back there calling dad,” he plainly explained. 

“I - you know what, fine. You can come with me, but you're sticking close to me.” Guy nodded. 

Guy wordlessly slipped his hand into Henry’s. Then, the two marched straight into the forest.

///////////////

The two brothers quietly marched down the trail. Their eyes darted to and fro from every direction; the atmosphere — previously light and calm — became charged with anxiety. 

Guy huddled closer to Henry. 

The teen gave a reassuring squeeze. “Don’t worry. Once we find the sheep, we’ll be out of this creepy forest.”

Seriously though, when did it get so weird? It’s almost dark here despite it nearing noon. He steps over a particularly large root and carries Guy over it. He’s just about to take another step when he hears it.

SNAP

A couple feet away, right in front of him, a branch breaks. 

Both freeze as they hear footsteps come closer. A vague outline forms in their line of sight as it steadily grows clearer and clearer to reveal —

Baaaaa

A fluffy white sheep with a bell around its neck saunters over with the air of a prince. It regards them like he just reunited with his retainers. There's a collar on it; it reads Lambchops.

Guy sighs. “Oh it’s just one of the sheep.”

Henry makes an exasperated noise. “Of course. Of course it’s the sheep. I mean, what else would it be? A Hilichurl? They don’t even get this far into the city!”

The teen laughs his anxieties off while the lamb just stares at them expectantly. 

“So what do we do now? Should we have him follow us while we search for the rest?”

Henry thinks for a second before shaking his head. “No. Here’s what we’re going to do: You’re going to take this guy back to the farm and get more help. The more bodies combing the forest the better. Meanwhile, I’m going to head further in and try to find the rest.”

Henry pauses to process what he just said before adding, “How many sheep are left to find exactly?”

“Three, including Lambchops.”

“Great. That just leaves two more.” Henry gently reaches a hand to help guide Lambchops who steps to Guy without complaint. “Are you okay with this? I can guide him out with you and get help together.”

Guy shakes his head. “Nah, I’ll be alright. Remember who won that test of courage two months ago?”

“Of course. How can I forget how you lauded around the fields wearing a paper crown and cape bossing everyone around for a week?” Henry flatly stated.

“Ahhh,” Guy blows a raspberry as he pushes Lambchops gently toward the exit. “That was fun and you know it! I’ll be back soon! Don’t die!”

With that cheerful note, Henry is alone.

He feels a chill down his spine. Henry has to fight his mind from coming up with spooky what-ifs to keep him grounded.

“Alright, let’s go find the rest.”

The next sheep is thankfully not that far and Henry calmly guides it by a rope still attached to its collar. Unfortunately, that’s when his luck ends because he can’t seem to find any more hints pointing toward the last one. Henry shivered and took a quick glance up. He cursed when he saw dusk already turning to night.

This is great. I can’t - I can’t go back with just one sheep. And where the heck is the help? He thought impatiently.

SNAP

The teen and the sheep froze. He whipped his head toward the direction and gasped. 

There, some meters to his left was a thicket that showed signs of something passing through. Henry squinted until the pressure on his eyes made his sight blurry, but he thought he saw a familiar round shape. 

“Finally…!” He muttered. Excitement welled up within him and he walked toward the thicket. He could see it now, coming out of the forest just in time for the others to arrive, and handing the sheep off. And then a nice warm dinner at home as Guy recounted the story with…with…!

What in the name of the creator am I looking at?

It should’ve been a sheep, but it wasn’t. Instead it was glowing purple and seemed to. Its skin was a dark shade of violet and its hooves were…webbed feet?! 

And then - as if sensing his presence - it turned its head to him. Henry covered his mouth with a hand. It was all he could do to prevent his breakfast from coming back up.

Two sets of yellow eyes with slit pupils looked at him. If he squinted, Henry could see what was supposed to be a sheep’s face, but the horn in the middle of its forehead was messing it up. He looked at the neck to see if - yeah, there was a collar there.

Just when it seemed like things couldn’t get any weirder Henry finally noticed the purple mist blanketing the ground. The sheep stepped to the right and the teen laid eyes on a glowing black cube with purple glowing runes. (At least he assumed they were).

The moment he laid eyes on it he heard it.

It was a small, velvet-y voice that whispered in his ear.

Pick it up, it said. Henry felt a pressure on his hand as he was dragged - no, guided to the cube. 

The regular sheep stood behind him, observing quietly.

Another step. And another until Henry could crouch down and hold it in his hands. He did just that when both sheep suddenly bellowed. The purple mist and runes suddenly glowed with new intensity. Henry shut his eyes as the light got as bright as the sun. The last thing he felt was the grass.

///////

…

Ah. It’s you.

So, how’s it feel?

Is it everything you ever asked for and more?

Aye, thought as much. Those upgrades I gave you really lended you an edge over that dastard. Hahaha…

Thanks to you, we have a shot of rebuilding. It won’t be like it used to, but so long as the foundation’s there our home will still stand.

So then, I guess that’s it. You’ll be executing your plan of escape huh?

I wish I could come with you, but I’m afraid I’m more suited here. Still, good luck mate. Oh, one more thing. I know those souls outside this vault seem scary, but I ask that you don’t be too hard on them.

I’m sure they’re similar to you in some respects.

…

I won’t be hard on them, but I can’t promise anything if they attack me first. Besides, what I’m looking for out there is nothing profound or special. What I truly want -

Is to take back my lost time.

//////////

Henry didn’t remember what happened after that. It was all a daze. One minute he was walking out of the forest with both sheep, the next he was getting lectured by his dad while his mom checked him for injuries. He’d been impulsive before, but this time was different. 

He tried to think back to his earliest memory.

There was this weird looking sheep…purple mist…a black cube that he picked up. Wait, where did he put it?

Curiosity and awareness filled his youthful mind. He certainly didn’t feel it on his person. Did he give it to Guy? To that lady? Or maybe he dropped it -

“Henry, are you listening?” says his father. The teen regards the man - wide shoulders, nigh-bulging muscles, tanned skin, and calloused hands. Despite the obvious difference in size, he’s gently rubbing circles into Henry’s hand.

In lieu of an answer the teen nods. 

Henry’s father sighs. “Why don’t you get some sleep bud? You look like you’ve seen a ghost. 

But I still have chores to do! As Henry opens his mouth, his father speaks before him.

“Don’t worry about your chores. I’ll take care of ‘em.”

Henry just hums; he’s too exhausted to care. He goes to his room and climbs in bed. After ten minutes of staring at the ceiling he manages to fall asleep.

///////

…

Thank you.

///////

Elsewhere, two hooded figures sprinted back across the bridge and into the defunct service tunnel.

Any bystanders would’ve noticed their cloaks were singed near the edges. They were so focused that they didn’t see the purple bird carrying a black cube in its beak, flying over the city wall.

///////

High above the city, a pair of eyes was watching a screen. It let out a couple of beeps, signaling that something changed.

A female in what almost passed as scientific uniform quickly hailed the Acting Director. “Acting Director, we’ve got readings.”

There was a brief flash of small light as an almost childlike figure instantly appeared by her side. “Show me.”

Tack tack tack tack

“Oh no, please don’t tell me - “

“It’s going inside the city,” She confirmed.

The Acting Director grimaced. “...Well shit - pull back everyone. Get ‘em back here. I’m going by myself. And keep scanning. Notify me of any changes.”

“Understood,” There was a beeping in her ear that she put a finger to. “Oh, squad 3 had a run-in with some civilians.” 

Marc raised an eyebrow. “How bad?”

“They got spooked, that’s all.”

“...Keep an eye on them for three more days. If they make too much of a ruckus I want them here and their memories scrubbed.”

“Yes sir.”

Marc nodded, already turning to leave. I’m fine. It’ll be fine. The creator isn’t even in the city - isn't even here so there can’t be anyone with sufficient power to open it.

And then Marc remembered that Teyvat was a fantastic place where coincidence was another word for fate. Things happened for a reason. If things were consistent like back home, the vault could be opened.

He growled. Best to be quick about it, then.

His body blinked out of the room.

//////////

A/N: 

Inspired by The Divine City by @yuriisclumsy

Ta-da! Revealing Henry’s little brother’s name. Also, I tried to execute how it felt to have a little brother; using some of my own experiences definitely helped and I hoped I achieved that. 

Yeah, peasant life is full of work. That’s what I wanted to convey.

I hope the sheep scene weirded at least one person out. I know I would if I found a mutated animal.

Hmm…odd how Ceci and Lyla’s cloaks are burnt. I wonder what caused that?

Up next, we’ll check in with Andre, Hugh and…Emery?! I swear there’s an important reason we’re going to them before we check in on Ceci and Lyla. Please bear with me!

Remember: If you have questions, comments, or critiques post them! They help keep me motivated! 

[allnaturalapplejuice]

New South Park season will most likely be dropping during election season and this is what I think is gonna happen except I know that none of this actually will happen so really this is what I would do if I was in charge of writing the season.

Obviously this season is gonna have a major focus on the election and will likely be serialized; however, seeing how poorly that went for South Park the last time they were airing regular episodes during an election year in 2016 they have to completely shift gears in order to make this work.

Obviously there's gonna be a plotline following

Mr Garrison and some of the other adults but guess what:

1. That's exactly what they did in 2016 that caused them to have one of their worst rated seasons.

2. I personally don't care about the adults so they are not included in this pitch

So what I think should happen is that the election is paralleled and told via a student body election. Sure, let Mr Garrison and the adults have their real election, but keep it super light and unserious. Something like "About Last Night." (12.12), which is the best election episode and in my opinion, one of their best episodes which it manages to be without focusing on the kids too much or even Randy or any of the main adults.

Anyways, the overarching plot follows Cartman and Wendy's battle for student body president with Cartman of course parodying Trump and Wendy parodying Kamala because everytime I see stuff about Trump talking about Kamala specifically him claiming that she's too afraid to debate him-it reminds me of “The Breast Cancer Show Ever" (12.09) and Cartman and Wendy's fight in that.

Butters would 100% be RFK Jr. and lowkey have his own thing going on where he slowly goes nuts.

Kyle is, as he always is, very vocally anti-Cartman and he is the one to start calling out Cartman as being "weird" which makes

Carman soooo upset and paralleling the real world, Wendy sees this and picks Kyle to be her running mate.

Ok so we've got:

• Cartman as Donald Trump

• Wendy as Kamala Harris

• Butters as RFK Jr.

• Kyle as Tim Walz

Now you’re gonna have to hear me out on this one…

Stan as JD Vance

HEAR ME OUT. Stan gets jealous because he thought Wendy might pick him to be her running mate and feels like his best friend is stealing his gf and his gf is stealing his best friend and there is underlying subtext there but it’s never actually acknowledged. Anyways, in a “Follow That Egg” (09.10)-esque plotline, we see what we should have seen in Snow Day and Stan betrays Kyle and Wendy to side with Cartman. But also because he acted rash and only did it out of revenge, he’s totally in over his head and is an idiot onstage saying nonsense and Cartman slowly regrets his decision, in tandem with the real JD Vance. This way, all of the main 6 characters play important student body election roles except Kenny but when have the writers literally ever given a shit about Kenny?

Kenny shows up a few times as a background character or maybe somehow gets involved with the real US election or is just fully dead for another season.

So who wins?

Because it’s South Park and they can do this, whoever actually wins the election is who wins the student body election, so if it’s the republicans Stan and Cartman win and if it’s the Democrats, Kyle and Wendy wins.

But in the end the true adult election plotline and the student body president election are intertwined and Mr Garrison does some sort of “I learned something today”-esque speech about his boyfriend, and no matter what, Stan goes and apologizes to Kyle and Wendy and regardless of who wins, everyone declares that Cartman is weird.

[aviculor]

Oh, I do not like Lydia dating her producer, or her producer being abusive and throwing her prescription meds in the trash.

DANNY DEVITO!?

"HORNY HANDYMAN"!?

Well, damn. I guess Beej's Bio-Exorcism actually is a real business that ghosts hire him for. It always felt like more of a side hustle at best. Or even just some bit he was doing in order to manipulate the Maitlands.

As an aside, I'm looking up Monica Bellucci and she was the girl who got assaulted in Irreversible. I can't escape that movie.

No, not the Beetlejuice backstory! He's supposed to be an ageless entity who might never have been human to begin with!

Proposing to Lydia during her dad's wake in front of a huge crowd, everyone is appalled including Lydia herself. This man is earning one hell of a death.

Is there any real purpose to Lydia wearing what's essentially her schoolgirl outfit? We really could be expanding her wardrobe a little more, I liked the Morticia Addams dress she wore on the TV set. Some of you might not want to hear this, but we are losing out on huge goth mommy potential.

I did get a spoiler on TVTropes that Astrid's quirky little meet cute boyfriend is a ghost. To be honest, I feel like this is the weakest plotline. It's like there was this entire story happened offscreen and we're just seeing the aftermath of it and left to collect scraps of context. And I say this knowing full well thanks to another spoiler that Delores hunting down Beetlejuice goes nowhere. That's simply how uninvested I am in Jenna Ortega being a 'teenager' whose personality is "ugh my weird mom SUCKS I wish my family was NORMAL". What do you get when someone is countering the culture of someone who's already counter-culture?

Okay, well, they did just canonize that the sandworms are supernatural beings and not just aliens that live on Saturn/Titan.

Oh, I thought for sure Astrid was going to be the one to say his name three times.

That's not how you ship snakes, those are CG rainbow boas and not asps, defanging a snake is animal abuse, anything else wrong with this scene?

Lydia is being manipulated, Astrid is being manipulated...Jesus Christ. You know, I think it would have made the plot a little tidier if Jeremy was actually BJ in disguise doing the same plan he tried with Lydia but smarter. Speaking of which, it's definitely a bit unwelcome the Juice seems to have evolved the bit into an actual attraction towards Lydia.

Well, as much as I love Winona Ryder as Lydia Deetz and Michael Keaton as Betel "BJ" geuse, I have to admit this film did not offer much except for the vibes. Luckily, that was basically all I was expecting from it.

So Rory got eaten by the sandworm, right? According to the page in the handbook which I paused because I knew it would be a freeze-frame bonus, a human getting eaten by one causes them to live as a million tiny particles in the afterlife. Which doesn't exactly sound like a pleasant existence. Fuck that guy.

[fullmetal-scar-simping]

Finding your blog is a blessing because I have ALWAYS been a Scar fan; and while I do generally prefer brotherhood's overall storyline, every time they bring up Ishvalans I have to prevent myself from committing violence because they bungled the imperial/genocide plotline so bad😭😭😭

And look not to be on the crazy agenda but it does deeply bother me that the only named Ishavalan we have in the series is Major Miles, whose father is likely Amestrian and that makes his surname also Amestrian.

And fine okay my babygirl Scar abandoned his name out of religious belief but damn...brotherhood gave me NOTHING about Ishvalans (except solidifying their ethnic features- after a lifetime of white silver-blond people in fantasy, it's sooo good to see brown people, who actually deserve white hair because they still have brows fhsjfj)

And look I like Miles. I genuinely do like him and enjoy the Briggs arc in mangahood, but he could have been such an interesting insight into the nuances of race politics because we know his Ishvalan grandfather and Ishvalan relatives were slaughtered during the war (and still he stays in the military😐); but what about his half-Ishvalan mother?

Was she spared the racial persecution because of her diluted blood in the same way Miles must have avoided going with the way of other Ishvalan soldiers? Or are you telling me Miles really hears that his Ishvalan family members, including his mother, were shot dead for being Ishvalans and decided that he's #different and he could totally liberal utopia his way into a Better Amestris😭

And I have the toughest life in the world because I am unfortunately a Miles/Scar shipper if only because I experience catharsis at the thought of Miles' third eye finally opening and he's no longer part of the Amestrian sheeple chsjdhsj

Again I do broadly speaking prefer mangahood (although I'll admit that opinion is changing with age), mangahood fans have to stop talking shit about 03 because that adaptation was phenomenal in its handling of the genocide that fmab conveniently forgets🙄

Chill mangahood fans who can recognize the pro-imperialism/militarism and racist politics in their fave media are always welcome here. I'm glad this blog feels like a blessing, even with how much I vent about mangahood and general fan wank. (o^-')b✨

I'll join you in committing violence on behalf of the Ishvalans. Hell, I'll encourage it even! I can never endure Broho again because of how they're treated, ignored, and written.

[Rant incoming]

Yeah, Arakawa, I have no doubt the various Ishvalan refugee settlements are living happily in spite of being displaced from their homes and carrying the horrors of a genocide fresh in their minds. Nothing bad happens to refugee camps and settlements at the hands of the dominant nation they've been forced to hide within. Scar's just unreasonably angry and violent, unlike all other Ishvalans who are nice and placid. (Being anti-racist is when you insist most people in an ethnic group would never raise a finger against fascists, right?)

Except also Scar states that the Ishvalans aiding the coup are "[H]ere to bring change... without resorting to terrorism." This both reads as Scar flagellating himself before his Amestrian 'allies', while simultaneously implying that all Ishvalan actions outside of quietly rotting in Amestris' margins was all terrorism (or more accurately, a 'negative' method of addressing their own oppression and occupation).

(This is why I argue that mangahood Scar's characterization once he's apprehended in Briggs is completely off. Arakawa derails the character she setup to instead force feed us a "redemption" arc that reforms the military. No one who watched their lives and loved ones get mercilessly slaughtered before their eyes would ever think that their murderers 'had some valid points' about how the relations between oppressor and oppressed ought to be run. This isn't what a character like Scar would say or believe, it's Arakawa's politic, boldly out in the open.)

Ahem.

For as much as I, rightfully, drag mangahood through the mud for how an ethnically oppressed group is (under)written, I do have to say that 03 could have also been better in many areas too! I wish there were more named Ishbalans, period. Especially named Ishbalan women with a major presence in the story (Lust is the only one we get, and as fantastic as her arc is, her Dante-gifted sin name is not her Ishbalan name). But I really appreciate that Ishbalans in 03 have diverse features AND opinions, unlike the Ishvalans in Broho. Both all have the unifying feature of red eyes, but for some reason Brotherhood makes it so that every single Ishvalan has the same hair colour and skin tone. They try to reflect this during the genocide flashbacks with the Amestrians being all blond and blue-eyed, but as we can see with both Amestrian civilians and the soldiers/war criminals, that's not true at all.

I'm on the same page regarding Scar (any version) relinquishing his previous name as working within motivations that align well with his character. On the one hand I like to think mangahood Scar does eventually take on a new name rather than giving others free real estate over how he's referred to. On the other, the sense of mystery is fun- until the recollection of the myriad ways he's dehumanized and mistreated throughout Broho come crashing in and I end up seeing his indifference towards deciding a name for himself as just another way to give ownership over himself to Amestris.

(Decent arguments can be made that this is his way to keep his future open, and that this could even be Scar intending to give himself space to create himself anew; only then would a new name become necessary. At least these are my more good faith theories on the matter.)

And hey, for all my ire about mangahood, Miles, and even Miles/Scar, I don't begrudge people liking any of the above. I'm not gonna shit on anyone for liking what I don't, even when I routinely express my dislike.

Miles is a maddening character for me precisely because of the incongruence of his backstory, familial line, his opinions on the military, his participation in their oppression, and how he sees Scar's actions in comparison to his own. I've said it before, but Miles feels less like a character to me and more like Arakawa's mouthpiece (one of many, Ed being the main one). There's no conflict in him regarding his position in the very military that destroyed his own family, no moment where he actually has to reassess everything he's done and believed, and make a decision on whether he wants to continue being Amestris' preaching lapdog or not. This is why I can't simply view him as a complex character with warped politics who makes atrocious decisions, but instead a token oppressed strawman for Arakawa to defend her fictitious militia.

Hard not to wonder though: how would Miles' arc go if he was written by someone who wasn't disturbed by radical actions against the state? There was potential for something far less insulting and racist, but that's not what we got. I can see why Miles fans like yourself would be conflicted with how he's used in mangahood, and I can also understand what potential he held that you folks see in him.

"I experience catharsis at the thought of Miles' third eye finally opening," honestly? Based. If Miles/Scar shippers have Miles finally enter his anti-military era, and both he and Scar shed their liberalism henceforth, then I'm here for it. May they both tear apart the ongoing Amestrian regime, brick-by-brick!

Anyway, bless you for this ask! I have no beef with mangahood enjoyers who aren't talking out their ass (in general and at us 03 fans). I may not post much about mangahood outside of my routine complaints, but we at least have a love of Scar to unite us. 🤝

[pillowfriends]

Lord of Chaos new reader thoughts: Chapter 16-25

I fell very behind on my Lord of Chaos reactions so I'm just going to do my general thoughts and favorite moment of each chapter. there are no spoilers past LOC chapter 25 in this post :)

Chapter 16 (Tellings of the Wheel): I don't have the brain to keep all the nobles and politics straight, way too many names and conflicting goals, but go off.

❤️ Rand's badass speech to Sammael's creepy messenger - my boy is growing up.

Chapter 17 (The Wheel of a Life): It's fascinating seeing Cairhienin and Aiel culture mingle and clash.

❤️ BERELAIN IS HERE!

Chapter 18 (A Taste of Solitude): This chapter gave me WAY too many feelings at 7am - Rand encouraging innovation and learning, including things that don't have wartime applications, in case he breaks the world again... I can't handle it.

❤️ The school, but also "If it hurts too much, make it hurt someone else instead." LTT is spitting bars.

Chapter 19 (Matters of Toh): Oh I love this chapter, FINALLY we get Aviendha content. I really like Rand and Avi's relationship and this book has been holding out on me.

❤️ The Rand/Avi conversation!! They're both being so stupid and I love them so much.

Chapter 20 (From the Stedding): This was kind of cute I guess. I like seeing the Ogier view of history.

❤️ The really old Ogier crying over the maps.

Chapter 21 (To Shadar Logoth): I have no idea what the point of this chapter was, am I missing something??? Is it just a reminder that Waygates and Shadar Logoth exist, and that Rand doesn't want to see women die? Feels kind of pointless.

❤️ All the Aiel rushing to Rand because he only gave Sulin a count of 50 to round people up, so she was like "HE'S BEING ATTACKED!!" and everyone was jumping out of windows and shit to get to him. (This better be in the show - it's funny as hell)

Chapter 22 (Heading South): RIP to those Tinkers. Also Olver is so cute!! Mat is 100% adopting him.

❤️ Mat trying to sneak so the people in his tent wouldn't hear him. I don't know why, but I've never been more invested in a description of a guy trying to quietly stand there and avoid notice.

Chapter 23 (To Understand a Message): This chapter is short and sweet. Graendal got absolutely bodied by Sammael and I looove all the drama between the Forsaken.

❤️ Graendal being a wine snob.

Chapter 24 (An Embassy): I loved this whole chapter - very nice to see Egwene being comfortable with the Wise Ones, and also Amys being motherly towards Berelain is so amazing. So stressed about Egwene getting found out though, by both the Aiel and the Aes Sedai.

❤️ Egwene realizing she's gotten a lot stronger in her time with the Wise Ones

Chapter 25 (Like Lightning and Rain): I love the beginning of this chapter (Egwene spying on the Caemlyn Aes Sedai) and the end (the Aes Sedai trying to be crafty but completely missing the mark with their theories) but I HATE THE MIDDLE BECAUSE FUCKING GAWYN SHOWED UP AND HE AND EGWENE ARE AN ITEM NOW. Genuinely had to put the book down for a while I was pissed. In book 6?????? I thought I had longer to prepare. Someone please come put me out of my misery.

❤️ omg I am LIVING for Galina (who btw I'm claiming for the lesbians. don't ask me to explain I'm just sure) going "I've figured out Moiraine's plot. she faked her death and has a NEW IDENTITY as the Green Ajah sister we keep hearing about, and she's SPYING ON US"

Overall: Goddamn this book picked up speed here. Lowkey still not that much has happened but these chapters were bangers. I'm actually loving the Egwene plotline except now Gawyn is here to ruin it all. Fuck that guy.

< last

[castlebyersafterdark]

ok so maybe this is offensive stereotype but am i the only one who thinks the other white police officer in hawkins is written as gay? the writers would know this stuff and hint towards it even if it wasnt relevant to the plot. it could be in s5, but i just feel like them having a random gay cop who isnt out but its unspoken open secret is so Stranger Things. Conservative towns like Hawkins are full of contradictions and people who bend truths to fit their ideology. Plenty of townfolk could suspect or know without actually doing anything about it except feeling judgemental and superior behind closed doors. They other cop who works with Hopper is black, + he becomes the chief. People of colour are often featured in respectable, visible and authoritative positions like school staff, white collar workers (Lucas' family) and news reporters. Not to say they are free from prejudice, but I'm sure Hawkins bigots 'allow' these figures while whispers abide beneath the surface. I just like that non-conformists are dotted all over Hawkins and have been all along, and if the police officer is shown to be queer by being targeted in a very minor plot in s5 it could be really interesting as relates to will's story. Like just one moment in a scene during the inevitable witch hunt, or if there are church service scenes, perhaps some sly looks as the congregation files in or out. That kind of thing.

Hmmm, I can't say that I ever personally got gay vibes from that cop, definitely curious if you want to expand as to why? I'm open to hearing you out!! I mean, I don't know if it's a bad stereotype until I know what the stereotype(s) is? He's one of those side characters that's a familiar face, you know, but not one I've paid too much attention to for anything deeper than rounding out the cast. Tell me your vision.

Open secrets seem to definitely fit in the show, that's correct at least. I mean, we get little hints to this a lot in season one. Building up the vibes of the town. There's so much we learn but aren't flat out told about our core cast. Especially about the Byers and we never really get an easy picture - but we know exactly who they are. Lives lived is something I always say and the show does a good job "implying" things off screen. Trusts the audience to infer and understand. Joyce's known mental health issues, Lonnie being viewed different by different people (blue collar/lower class viewing him as a peer vs. the well-off families like the Harringtons calling him a fuck-up, etc.), the implication from various places about Will's sexuality or assumption of it, etc.

So that's interesting a situation to pose about other characters. I read it a while ago and I don't remember all the details (and I know the plots are only semi-canon) but wasn't there a plotline in the Robin novel about her english teacher who's a gay man? And if I recall - there was stuff about his fear of getting found out in Hawkins and I think he ended up leaving town or something? Clearly - from what I know, the authors are given key themes and plot points for the novel and this is pretty big. Because we've gotten hints and implications about how Hawkins really is but nothing has been absolutely blatant yet, re: bigotry regarding homophobia. There's Troy's bullying via Mike, the implication of Hopper maybe viewing Will's disappearance as a potential hate crime, and Lonnie's verbal abuse implied - but Will has yet to be shown facing it directly on screen. Uh-oh. I feel/fear it's coming.

We see the foreshadowing with how the town acts during a satanic panic plot with Hellfire and the murders and everything Jason whips up. We see more foreshadowing with the townspeople flocking to church post-Hawkins split. I think it's going to ramp up and expose the ugliness in town. I'd like to rewatch the show to see if there's any hints at all with this cop - but for some character outside of the main cast, it would be interesting to see what the fear and tension is like in the town during this catastrophe that happened, played out during season 5. Something's gonna happen. Will is a huge focus. We've seen so much of set leaks focused on that church. It's all lining up.

On a tangential note, you mention seeing this for the cop and I don't have an opinion yet, but it's funny that personally? I got gay vibes from Mr. Clark and yet he's been shown with woman on screen. Like, back in the early days as a casual watcher, from season 1 on I thought he was gonna eventually be key in Will's storyline specifically for his sexuality. He's already close with our little nerd sqaud, but I thought the seasons were always gonna revolve around fall and school and he'd play a bigger role. Because it's such a trope that gay kids are shown to have a close relationship with a teacher mentor. Rings true in media and in real life. Show went a different direction in many ways than how I thought haha. I always felt kinda sad that wasn't exactly a thing in the show. Maybe it's too cliche, but it's a cliche I like.

[that-foul-legacy-lover]

Hello, so this not a request per se; but seeing your reaction to the latest archon story quest, I was curious, but which nation do you think has the best story arc so far? Sumeru or Fontaine? what you like the most? Just want to hear your thoughts and opinions, that’s all.

oooh that's a good question!! i'll put my answer under the cut because it got kinda rambly and there are spoilers (i'm also quite opinionated i'm warning you now!)

in terms of a consistent plotline, i think Sumeru was better. but in terms of personal enjoyment, i liked Fontaine more.

as for why i liked Fontaine more (except the prison part, fuck that), it's for a number of reasons- i like the characters more (Arlecchino and Furina being two of my absolute favorites), the stakes felt higher and more mysterious (Sumeru i kinda figured out what Dottore and Scaramouche were doing early on), the NPC deaths hit hard because they actually stayed dead (rip Melus and Silver you two will not be forgotten), i really liked the trial aspects, and also FOUL LEGACY APPEARANCE!!!! HIGHLIGHT OF MY DAY!!!!! it also helped that Fontaine was the first archon questline to not feature the Fatui as the main bad guys, which i absolutely love

oh and i like the narwhal weekly boss better than the Scaramech boss. in fact i have a bit of a hatred for the Scaramech boss because of how it's entirely based off of the floating rabbit-thing gimmick- the only reasons i generally enjoy doing it is because A.) we're beating up Scaramouche and B.) the music slaps

Furina is also one of my favorite characters in the entire game now. she doesn't quite top Childe/Foul Legacy, Arlecchino, or Baizhu, but she's up there. i liked her from the beginning because she was goofy and dramatic, and now i think her story was beautifully written and it was something i can also relate to in a sense, although obviously not nearly on the same scale as Furina's struggles. Nahida's story was also good and very tragic, but i don't have anywhere near the same attachment to her as i do to Furina (sorry little radish)

Fontaine also brought back the trend of Fatui Harbingers actually feeling intimidating. the last time i really felt in danger around a Harbinger was Dottore, and since he wasn't the focused Harbinger of the arc i knew he wasn't going to do anything super drastic- i kinda knew Signora was going to die (still in mourning btw) and Scaramouche lost his intimidation factor when he tried to become a god, so Arlecchino being a quiet but powerful force through sheer voice and stance is very lovely

also i generally enjoy underwater exploration more than the rainforest and desert desert MORE DESERT exploration in Sumeru, so that contributes to my Fontaine bias

obviously there are some parts that could be done better, like the implementation of the narwhal boss and the plotline flowing a little better and Chlorinde definitely needing more screentime (better than Sara at least), but yeah Fontaine is my personal favorite. also the whole "erase our problems from everyone's memory" conclusion in Sumeru is kinda ehhhh, i can see why they did that but also the tree containing literally all the world's knowledge is lowkey boring and becomes a bit of a plot hole if you think about it. why couldn't we just take a little trip back to Sumeru to find out the origins of Fontaine's prophecy? i'm sure Nahida, bless her heart, would be more than happy to tell us what's up, but obviously we can't do that because it'd be too easy

i think Fontaine had higher highs and lower lows while Sumeru was consistently pretty good, so if you want a good, solid plotline to show someone, show them Sumeru. i liked Fontaine better, but that's definitely personal preference, hope that answers your question!

[velvetbunniie-archive]

AHH YAY FOR THE BOOK BLOG!! Can’t wait to hear all of your book thoughts <3

I do have a question for you: I know how you feel about Jacks and Eva (and that whole disastrous spin-off), but what are your thoughts on the original trio (Scarlett, Tella, Julian… and Dante/Legend too I guess!)? Thoughts on the ships, the characters, the plot itself?

(Also, I’m glad your surgery went well, wishing for a speedy recovery and nothing but good news from here on out!!!) 💗💗💗

OH, EVERYONE WILL B HEARING THEM… i am annoying, babey!!!

((we don’t talk abt that fucking spin-off on this blog.. love and light <3 need to send eva back to her pre-algebra class fr.))

BUT THE ORIGINAL TRIO…. scarlett is honestly one of my fav ya mcs still… she’s got that eldest daughter syndrome burned into her + she’s so refreshingly sheltered and anxious, but has the strength at the core of her that feels so human and mundane … that said, i think maybe she should’ve smacked tella for killing herself and coming back to prove a point. as an elder sister, i think scarlett should be a bit more ruthless, don’t you agree?

and julian is also a nice departure from the typical ya male love interest, wherein he’s, like, actually respectful, omg?? and kind and sweet? i find him much more interesting than dante (though maybe that’s bc legend being his brother is important to his character development. i will accept legend for this reason and this reason alone.) honestly, out of all of the characters stephanie’s written, i think scarlett and julian are the most soulmate-coded out of all of them. i mean, they have matching white streaks in their hair bc they died together for a day <3 need i say more? the DEVOTION!!! even in the small things!!

i will forever mourn the fact that stephanie felt she wasn’t mature enough to write their love story in legendary… be soooo serious. i want to see it!!! instead we get, like, two scenes with scarlett and julian when actually i deserve a thousand of them. on top of that, it defs feels like lazy writing to ignore all that development that occurs in that book. many issues with this (>jst wants to see them kiss a bit more, ithink.)

((also they were quite possibly her strongest-written charas with the most compelling storyline… WHERE are they!!! i deserve to see more of them!!!!!))

OH ALSO, THEY WEREN’T A LOVE TRIANGLE (legend tried for,like , half a chapter, that doesn’t count), and that, my friend, is what i like to see in a soulmate couple. or in more ya couples in general, bc i literally can’t do this anymore. (>will make exceptions, as always)

i found tella to be fun, it a bit like most of the ya mcs in fantasy novels… but again,, you can’t tear a character that’s a bit of a bitch away from me. go harder. make her a feral bitch too. but, oughhh, the ya fantasy series doldrums… the love triangle… :// maybe i want tella to be meaner to jacks (and also i think jacks wants tella to be meaner to him too. many things to think of.) rather than running off with legend.

whiiiich brings me to legend. i kinda hate that he’s the way he is. he’s jst super up his own ass in a less engaging way than jacks is (i also want jacks dead. we all know how i feel about him. killing him with my mind.) not only that, but he’s boring. oh my god, he’s so boring. the romance with tella felt like stephanie chickening out / making the sisters fall in love with the brothers to make it nice and neat.. honestly, finding out she hadn’t decided who tella would end up with while she’d been plotting out the novel made me all the more enraged. we have a boring ass bitch here??? instead of jacks?? instead of an actually more engaging plotline? i want ppl that are horrible !!!! i’m here for an interesting time, not a wholesome one!

that said, i want jacks left out in the cold, where he’ll die alone. love him to bits. i hope he’s mauled by a wolf <3 i’ll also stick him in a little terrarium, if need be.

anyway, i… won’t lie, i think finale is probably the most interesting book (mostly bc we actually get to see mistress luck, god bless!!), but the scenes with tella and legend had me rolling my eyes. when has he ever been interesting enough to pine after? maybe tella should’ve jst remained single (and honestly, with that travesty of a scene in once upon a broken heart wherein all of the original characters had their personalities mauled to bits, it certainly fucking feels like tella’s single). but alas.

(yes, it defs did!!! my hand’s bruising a bit and my stitches are stinging like a bitch rn, but such is the nature of having a healthy hand in the end, i guess ;;;; )

[black-rose-writings]

Watching Shadow and Bone Season 2: Episode 1 - I am losing braincells fast

Okay, I finally have time. Let's do this.

Firstly, sorry if I miss some visual details, I am watching it on a very legal site that unfortunately has something of a potato quality.

S1 Intros looked better.

Alina is looking around in her pretty little dream sequence like "My Saints, life is so emo right now."

Sasha, my beloved.

Wasting sickness my ass.

And there is Mal, assuring her that Sasha is dead.

Where did Alina get her new fancy dress, if they've been on a ship since the end of S1? And her hair grew a lot for it being just two weeks... sorry, nit picks, but like... her hair was not that long and it doesn't grow all that much in two weeks.

Oh, look, Ketterdam. Surely, Alina will not face any danger of being kidnapped and sold into slavery, despite there being a million kruge bounty on her head last season.

So, what exactly do they think they'll find in Kerch. At least when they were running in the books, they just wanted to get to the frontier to disappear there. But like, you two don't have shit to your name... ah, I'm barely like 2 minutes in and I'm already rambling.

Oh, look, Kaz arranged them fake passports... somehow. While they were all on a ship.

*stop thinking about the details, stop thinking about the details, or you'll drive yourself crazy*

So, when exactly did she decide to go after the Sea Whip? Why does she believe it's real? Fuck, I'm doing it again.

Ah, yes, let's talk about our plans and identities openly in public where anyone can hear us.

Also, love how this is 100% the opposite of book Mal. Kinda unironially. Book!Mal can go die in a ditch.

So, we're sticking to the stange season 1 plot of Alina being some kind of a clairvoyant, huh?

Or, wait, are they in Novyi Zem? I guess they are. Okay, nevermind my first few points, I am an idiot.

I know season 1 did weird time jumps, too, but this is going to be very jarring.

Oh, look, Inej still not scared one bit of Haleen.

And... that's what happens when you leave town for months on a whim. You dunce.

Oh, look, Kaz's backstory.

Not sure how I feel about this weird twist, but sure, let's see where this goes.

I'm sorry, who did they even kill? WTF is that?

I mean, I know Ketterdam kinda sucks, but that went down way too quickly.

And Kaz trying not to lose his shit because he's surrounded by people. Well, at least that's book accurate.

Love how the guy next to Jesper is staring at him like "bro, who you talking to".

Okay, what the fuck is happening.

Oh, look at that, we are not completely ignoring that Kaz and co. got hired to kidnap and sell Alina. Well, her side of the story will, but hey, at least it's not completely glossed over like the fucking maps.

Okay, excuse, what the actual fuck is this? What in the name of hell is Nikolai doing. I am confused and not in a good way. I feel like we're missing... a lot of context. Like, a lot.

Okay, so let me get this straight... the way that they get around the "Crows planned to sell Alina into slavery" plot line is... by retconning it so that Nikolai was behind it all along. For some Saints-forsaken reason. Well, Alina is still dumb as bricks, but okay I guess.

Fjerda made ship-art. Of Darklina. For their bounty poster. (Or is this part of the whole retarded "Aleksander is working with the Fjerdans for some reason" plotline.

My question is where they got the visual reference from since everyone except for Crows and Alina-and-co. got murdered.

Kaz, mentally: Jesper, you idiot.

Wow, look at that. Room like for a queen. Wonder where they got the money from. Definitelly an upgrade from the bed-bug infested group room of the book.

At least take your fucking shoes off you barbarian!

Mal is down for travelling the world. Wow, they really pulled a full 180 on this bitch, huh?

Ew. Just ew.

Thank the Saints for cockblocking fishermen. I will vomit if they go any further.

Kaz, screaming internally: Shut the fuck up Jesper.

Oh, look, we still doing the whole "paying with jewelry got her tracked down" thing. Just, slightly less retarded.

Hold up, are we saying Jesper and Kaz are having the conversation now. Like, come on, they've worked with each other for a long time, there's no way this didn't come up before.

That is way more than 20 seconds, just saying.

Oh, look, another Alina dream sequence.

Okay, so is that like a Tether thing or is she just having prophetic dreams? If it's the Tether, how does Sasha already know what Mal is, they spoke like 2 times. If it's prophetic dreams... why though?

Language barrier? What language barrier?

Ravkan Grisha? Of all places? Is she talking about the pogroms that happened after the Fold expanded? Cause if I understand the timeline correctly, there's no way the news have spread that far, yet.

I mean, even in Novyi Zem, Grisha are not safe, in the books. There might not be society-wide prejudice, but there's also not any protection from, you know, slavers and shit (or at least not enough). Ravkan Grisha might be soldiers, but that's not exactly an uncommon profession in this world.

(calm down. You can rant later)

Please tell me this interaction isn't the reason Alina is going to go "All lives matter" on her Grisha status.

Also, how come the maps are marked in Ravkan? Again, language barrier is not a thing here.

Alina being the most suspicious thief ever.

Also, ehm, what the actual fuck is that map doing?

Wow, look at Alina, definitelly not attracting any attention with her summoning.

Why are these two talking about it... in the library of all places?

Also, I'm pretty sure public libraries with all this quantity of information available to just anyone were not a thing until the early 20th century, which the Grishaverse is most certainly not.

Dear god, this is so dumb.

Who drew that shit that it's so accurate that the people actually recognize her by it? At least when she had the physical collar in the books it made sense why everyone recognized her.

Mal being no less suspicious about asking about this shit.

For some reason, there's First Army here. Is that Bohdan from season 1? Why the fuck is he of all people in Novyi Zem?

I know the plot needs to move forwar, but this is a bit too many coincidences for my taste.

Mal's doing parkour, because we've gone 20 minutes without an action scene and if nothing happens for too long, people will start to question our dumb-fuck narrative choices.

Also, the question stands. Where the fuck did Mal and Alina get their money.

Not that I am a big fan of the King's army, but like... just shoot him. He's gonna hang for desertion, anyway. You had a gun to his head, already.

And look, how much of a badass Mal is, taking down a handful of soldiers of equal training without much trouble.

Really... you're trying to stay hidden and you've just found out there's a massive bounty on your head and you... summon in a square full of people.

I don't know why I'm bothering to use my brain anymore.

Random Zemeni people decide to protect her because... she's a Saint? I guess?

Zemeni people believe in the Saints, I guess.

Okay... let's see if they can at least write a convincing sibling dynamic when they don't intend for those two characters to fuck.

Tamar sounding far too 21st century and that's not how people talk, in general. (I say as if I talk to people).

As much as I love the bounty posters, I do have to say, I don't get how they have such a good drawing on them so quickly.

Why is Inej stealing random people's knives?

They killed Haleen. Off screen.

I mean, I guess that's one way to avoid Inej's absolutely amazing, very important and already ruined by last season revenge moment. However...

I am not saying this just because they changed the story and I know they needed to include them again, since they did last season, but like... I don't trust these writers to do these characters an ounce of justice. Or make up an alternative story that makes even a little bit of sense.

And there's still 20 minutes of an episode left. FML.

Okay, hot take, I liked book!Pekka more. This one is far too much of a cartoon villain and not in a fun way. Kaz was the one for whom it was personal. Pekka was just doing business. So, either Pekka is being pupeteered by someone else (which would make the level of too complex and dumb to work conspiracy way too high. Like, it already is, but this would be over 9000) or they really made Pekka into a cartoon villain who would hunt down one guy for a single (fake) million kruge job.

And just like that, everyone in the room went deaf.

Oh, look, Wylan. He's baby.

Inej somehow got caught sneaking in the shadows. Book!Inej would be disappointed.

Ah, yes, asking a random stranger to help break your boyfriend out of the most secure and shitty prison in all of Kerch, like, right now, something which took a lot of planning and a lot of work in the book.

(stop comparing it to the book, we know it was better, you'll drive yourself crazy)

I think telling them you're innocent when you're being dragged into the cell is... a little pointless?

I am still asking the money question.

And that's Sturmhond's ship, isn't it?

Ew 2.

Dear god, they're still using the fucking pins. They didn't have to. They could have completely avoided it. They didn't have to do it. I feel personally attacked by the inclusion of the pins.

How does Alina not realize the boat people are after her, too, right now, is beyond me. Like... my dude, my lass, nobody is going to put their life on the line for one shitty pin.

Are we getting Sasha. Please tell me we're getting Sasha being the best leader and the best character, please, I need a little bit of common sense before I lose my shit.

So... the first army is doing the sham trials of Grisha. And Aleksander is going to save them. And he's still the villain and not the monarchy. Okay. Sure.

Is that Genya?

Tell me, if this is what happens, how in the hell is she going to join Alina, who is supporting the King.

Please, tell me the show is gonna go for a "Fuck the monarchy" twist.

The First army is laughing as they're preparing to murder a bunch of innocent people. I think it's only fair that I cheer on once Sasha and the Nichevoya tear them to bits.

It's Sasha to the rescue!!!!! Hell yeah.

Now that is a hero's entrance. Moi Soverennyi!

Ah, yes, time to catch up.

Oh, look, Alina being a dumb bitch finally but her in the ass.

Well, not really, we know it's Nikolai, but Saints I wish it did.

[soulerflaire]

It definitely feels like they rushed to get Wesley’s story finished and just shoved it in with this unrelated episode. This coulda been done so much better, and it sucks that they ended up going this route (whether by choice or due to lack of time).

First, get rid of the colony plotline. It has nothing to do with anything and should be its own separate episode. And I think this should have been a two-parter to give us the appropriate build-up. Have part 1 take place at the Academy. Show Wesley being depressed and frustrated. He has no friends at the Academy due to the piloting incident. He’s feeling overwhelmed by the workload. Have him contact his mom, and talk about how he’s looking forward to seeing the Enterprise again. He’s hoping that being on the ship will pull him out of this funk, give him the motivation to push through to graduation. Just all around, make it an episode explaining that he feels unhappy at the Academy, like everything he used to enjoy has lost its appeal. Maybe have him working on a personal project and then just...giving up on it. But when he boards the Enterprise, he finds himself dodging questions about academy life, trying hard not to lie, but not admitting how awful it’s been recently. The episode ends with him meeting Ensign Ricky at Ten Forward. Ricky talks about being a new transfer to the Enterprise, hearing all kinds of stories about Wes, and wanting to get to know him.

The second episode starts with Wes getting more and more frustrated with life on the ship. Everything reminds him of what’s expected of him, and how he feel incapable of meeting those expectations. He starts to snap at people and avoid contact. Eventually he just spends his time locked in his room. Through all this, Ricky’s trying to keep his spirits up, encouraging him to find his passion in life again, but without referencing Starfleet or the Academy.

At the request of Beverley, Geordi asks Wesley to come down to engineering to look at the new set up he’s developed, since Wesley used to love spending time down there discussing things with him. The scene plays out like in the original, with Wesley being rude and dismissive, except Geordi loses his cool and it devolves into a shouting match. Wesley retreats to his room, where Ricky shows up to try and talk to him, and Wesley ends up letting everything out, about hos he hates academy life, how he feels trapped and like a failure. After Wes calms down, Ricky suggests a Klingon ritual of centering he’s heard about from Worf. They go to the holodeck, and set it up, and Wes ends up having the vision of his father. After that, he realizes he’s changed, and doesn’t want to be in Starfleet. He goes to meet with Picard and Beverley, to explain and resign, when an EPS conduit blows in front of him and Ricky. Wes stops time the same way he did in the episode. Ricky reveals himself to be the Traveler, and they sidestep the explosion (no one else is nearby so no one gets hurt). Then we get a real and meaningful conversation with Picard and Beverley, and at the end of the episode, Wes says farewell to all his friends on the ship, not just those two (he also apologized to Geordi and they hug it out).

That would have been a satisfying end to his character arc. not this tacked-on unrelated side-plot with an uncomfortable appropriation of Native American culture sprinkled in.

[sophsun1]

I hope you don’t mind me sending you this ask but I finished with 5x07 (i am trying to go slow through these last episodes because while this season sucks, i am not ready to let it go). First about 5x06, i died at that moment where Emmett is waxing Carl. Also I need Emmett to go back to throwing his amazing parties because this new queer guy job, is not it. The things Brian said at that store were so right even though as usual it was rude. That brad pitt wanna be knock off, needs to leave. Oh my god, first of I am offended on Brian’s behalf because c’mon, he looks 1000x better. But also my gosh this story line is dumb. The ending was sad, but the whole ‘proper couple’ thing kind of annoyed me because weren’t they already that?? And now 5x07: i don’t know if it was here or not but I can’t stand Monty and Eli, im sorry i know it’s random but they’re so annoying. I feel bad for Justin but this whole marriage thing he’s now after is just weird, like c’mon you’re 21/22. Their break up hurt. I think this one hurt the most out of all (except the ethan one), Brian’s ‘youre making me nervous’ HURT! But also the part where Justin already had bags packed and ready. Fucking hell writers! I did though enjoy that he told Jen and Deb that Brian didn’t do anything wrong. And Jen’s ‘i wish you worked it out’ was so cute!!! I wish we hot waaaay more Jen/Brian scenes. The Brain and Michael scene hurt though. Seeing Brian have that smile right before Michael said ‘he left bc of you, who wouldnt’ and then his smile dropped and you see his eyes search Michel’s face. PAIN!!!! Gale, you will pay for my therapy! And the ending?!?!?! You ate my sunshine???? GIRL! I WANT TO CRY ALL OVER AGAIN! Also the bet is so fucking dumb. Please tell me this dude/storyline disappears in the next ep like the posse storyline did. But it was funny how Brian kicked him out of the club

Hey anon!

Of course I don't mind!

I love hearing people's reactions to watching the show for the first time and their descendent into anger at the brutally terrible story arcs this season offers up lmao.

Oh that bargain basement Brian Kinney, I cringed so hard... THE WORST PLOTLINE EVER. IT'S EMBARRASSING ON EVERY LEVEL. They really tested Gale, Randy and the viewers patience and yes, Britin's 100th breakup was again weak and just recycled issues that they had kind of worked through before and now Justin wants to be like Ben and Michael?

They were already a normal couple, that was the whole point of their relationship, they were unconventional and didn't bow down to society's expectations of them but that didn't mean their love was any less real. Somehow the writers threw that out the window and made Justin into a homemaker at 22!!!

The one thing I've always loved about their breakups is that they have never spoken badly about the other, or set out for revenge or been petty. In fact it's been the opposite you can see the love and respect for each other shine through unlike Mel and Linds for example.

God you are my sunshine playing over them as they walk away, PAIN!

What a way to stick the knife in from Michael, saying the one thing Brian fears the most the people he loves will ultimately leave him😔

[quietbluejay]

Sins of the Wreckers 9

no warnings outside the usual

Man this is so unnecessary no wonder you guys took so long to fight the war yeah instead of actually sending useful information let's just make sure to tell Prowl how much we think he sucks

prowl is literally being slammed into the ground both mentally and physically, RIP

Tarantulas: Tell it to me now, Prowl. Say the words I need to hear

Prowl is looking at the ground

Prowl, very quietly: wreck and rule

Tarantulas: What's that?

iconic moment

okay you know how I said Prowl wasn't hot well I'll make an exception for this

OKAY WHAT

THE GATEWAY IS INSIDE DEBRIS HOW ARE THEY SENDING IT THROUGH THE GATEWAY AAARGH

such a retcon of how the mindlink functions like why on earth would it work like that

okay back to the gate

so what did they take the gate out and are powering it…somehow and having it float in space and trying to fit something several times bigger into it???

oh hey guzzle, you seem unchanged from prior to your blood drinking everyone really just went "so THAT just happened"

classy Carpessa reference, lol

back to the trial thoughts sometimes i feel like none of the writers know anything about the military (not like i know a lot, tbf) like from a meta perspective it's a fun comparison between various perceptions of war and the military across writers much as i hate to say it, roberts is like the only one who thinks about logistics, like, at all he's the only one who is basically going "hey you need a large support staff that's not just engineers/scientists to support a military force" "and actual supplies"

some thoughts on the topic of Optimus:

i think it's implied that Optimus doesn't know about Aequitas which is uhhhhhhhhhhhhh Optimus' absence from the narrative in Wreckers is shocking it's a giant empty space

friend commentary:

like, Prowl getting away with a warcrime in the same plotline where autobots got held accountable for warcrimes requires there to be a systemic issue in which the autobots only hold themselves accountable for the warcrimes they can't hide/are being done by people they deem expendable enough to actually arrest instead of leaving to continue with a slap on the wrist also this in relation to autobot high command explicitly doing a whole thing of covering up the not so great schrodinger's warcrimes of the Wreckers prowl is kind of standing in for optimus …actually this whole plot would make more sense if it was optimus instead now that i think about it guy that actually struggles with being enabled because he's in charge of everything that's a character arc he has

it's like, the problem can't be optimus optimus has to be blissfully unaware, he's the symbolic beacon of hope it's all the evil advisor

this then derailed into a tangent about other ex-wreckers showing up including Sandstorm, the guy who kills (other) war criminals, and Scoop, who found religion and became a standup dude and then started working for starscream (lol) and Whirl

sandstorm would immediately try to kill everyone in the wreckers room au where he escapes off planet instead of going to prison friend:

dark comedy version of SOTW: "Prowl has been kidnapped by an evil spider, and also Sandstorm keeps trying to kill us" (whirl in the background: yikes scoop: what are you doing whirl: becoming an alcoholic, like a normal person) (scoop: have you heard the word of our lord and saviour starscream-)

me:

you know i could see Whirl start saying Starscream was the chosen one just to troll people including Starscream Perceptor should be here too! He was in Spotlight Kup, he set up the whole mind link, he was there in LSOTW you know what? have whirl and perceptor go back for combiner wars along with first aid that's it that's all that's required to get them there for this plotline

friend: the whole Aequitas will start the war all over again speech except Scoop is right there, ready to debunk it other friend: Scoop: you'd think the war will restart, but through the power of starscream, all things are possible-

okay, i will apply my stringent war crimes claims method to the Wreckers how do we know they as a group committed other war crimes? well, we do in fact have proof of other war crimes besides Pova! Sandstorm killing sparks! we also know that they acted to paper over things to make them not look bad so it's entirely possible there were more they just didn't stand trial for like, what is a war crime anyways killing noncombatants, false flag operations, killing medics, arming medics (which might not actually be considered a war crime under their laws), mistreatment of prisoners we see how they operate, there's a very high chance of a lot of collateral damage cruel and unusual punishment we get info from the clear items that appear in the text + patterns of behaviour that they do in fact do war crimes

friend: the story doesn't say it but it's full of implicit acceptance of 'just following orders' as an acceptable excuse to ignore culpability me: the same thing happens w.r.t. the dinobots and optimus (in Barber's writing) yes i am going to defend optimus here Optimus was not forcing you to do war crimes you fire breathing buffoons it's the same kind of thing friend: optimus didn't order them to breathe fire all over their enemies, that's on… everyone, kind of, for allowing it he didn't order the sparks killed he probably did order some other shit though me: like ordering war crimes is in general not optimus' problem! he has loads of other issues!

also do you recall how there was a bit that was trying to justify the war crime like "it's murky in here and maybe you do have to be this bad in order to stop the bad guys" and prowl was the bad guy bureaucrat who lets the bad guys get away because you're not following procedure like it wasn't super emphasized but it was treated as an ethical dilemma type thing

sparkle emojis tarantulas: every time you deviate from the script in my head you will suffer more

Arcee and the rest find that their restraints have been freed

Springer: Free. We're all free

Springer: Verity…

Arcee: I don't like it

she's frowning

Springer: yeah, maybe, but one we're tooled up for

Arcee: my kinda trap

Verity: we're being helped?

Roadbuster: that would make a weird change, wouldn't it?

yet another joke that would be dark from a human, but is straight out extremely disturbing from a cybertronian

Surprise! his workstation gets blown up

Tarantulas: No! How? How?!

???: Excuse me, I was wondering if you could help us…

mtmte called they want the entire panel back

the moral of the story is if the sins of the past come up, they will either kill you or you will successfully bury them again

Tarantulas is on the floor

Roadbuster stands over him, cracking his knuckles

Roadbuster: …your turn

is guzzle possessed right now that line sounds nothing like him

ah yes. tidal wave.

Impactor kicks Carnivac to the ground

Impactor: …there, that's better

Impactor: Nice to see Mayhem are living up to their name. Real slick operation going on here. Having problems?

[press x to doubt]

how. how does this work. the portal is INSIDE HIM.

Carnivac: so…embarrassing

Impactor: Wow. Dissidents. They get bigger every-

YEET THE WAR CRIMINAL

[obislittleone]

House Of Memories (29/?)

Obi-Wan Kenobi x Padawan!reader

Warnings: okay so like this one's fun, very dark, but fun. not really a lot of warning except for maybe clone wars typical violence??

Summary: You've lost your path to the light... in an attempt to even the score, you travel with Anakin and Ahsoka to kill the man who took your master from you.

A/n: i cannot explain how much i LOVE this episode.... y'all needs understand i'm so hyped for this plotline it's my favorite in all of clone wars it's so angsty UGH

also y'all if you like the story, maybe consider buying me a coffee :)

Words: 3.8k

You did not sleep; you were never able to. You lied still until sunrise, and never rested. Obi-Wan was at eternal rest, but you were restless. It was impossible to calm your mind.

Your entire body was unable to move, weighted down by the heaviness in your head, swirling around and taunting you with its gruesome storm.

You faintly were able to hear the knocking sounds, two taps and then two more on the front entrance door. It shouldn't have made you anxious to hear it, but you were in no state of being to have any sort of company in your presence. You doubted you'd even be able to look whoever it was in the eye. You sure as hell wouldn't be able to speak.

Your prayers for them to leave went unanswered, as the door was opened, and a pair of footsteps came into the apartment, unwelcome. You curled even deeper into your solemn cocoon of sheets and blankets, closing your eyes and feeling darkness wash over you.

You'd welcomed the darkness during the night. The once scary and uncontrollable dark force inside of you, became the only thing that could bring you a semblance of peace... nay, not peace, but a quieter mind. When the darkness consumed you, your thoughts were not painful, just angry. You longed for revenge, to ease the pain and suffering. You were willing to let it drive you, to keep going, to live on after the loss you swore would be your end.

"She's not in her room," you heard Ahsoka's confused voice, and Anakin's reply, which came unsurprised from her words.

"She's in his."

You braced yourself to face your friends, or rather them facing you. You took in a breath in time with the small hiss of the door retracting, and now those same four feet brought their steps up to you, seeing your huddled up form lying motionless in the bed... Obi-Wan's bed.

"Is she awake?" Ahsoka couldn't be sure, she wasn't so in tune with your presence as Anakin was, and yes, he knew you were awake, and trying to avoid them.

He sat beside you on the bed, his hand lifting to rest on your shoulder, his thumb moving in soothing motions that did nothing to help you.

"We got him, the sniper," Anakin told you, and your eyes shot open. What? They got him. What does he mean by that?

"Is he dead?" you asked shortly, your tone was so flat and uncaring, the complete opposite of what you used to be.

"No, he's in a max security prison."

You forced yourself to sit up, looking at Anakin with your dead, sleep deprived expression. He didn't look all that great himself, but you were a wreck. What happened to you?

You shot him a glare, and he could have sworn he saw a golden glow reflect off the center of your irises in that moment. It was gone the next, but it frightened him all the same.

"You brought him in without me?" you barely moved, your normal expressions of rage, with your wild hand movements were not included with your statement... but no, this was far more terrifying. The state you were in, the way you spoke, it all told Anakin that you were battling the darkness, or maybe it had won. He was in no position to tell you it was wrong, because he himself was having to fight it, still.

"The council thought it best to avoid your inclusion," Ahsoka replied, trying to defend Anakin, but also deflect your attention for a moment. You had never looked more lethal than you did right now, wrapped up in Obi-Wan's blankets and clinging to his bed.

You turned your head in her direction now, and she gasped, having seen the face of the girl she knew become cold and ruthless.

"The council did not know what Obi-Wan meant to me; you did. And you decided not to tell me about finding his killer," you had to use every ounce of restrain in your body not to force call an object to your hand, before you would inevitably throw it across the room, shattering someone breakable. You still loved these people, you couldn't hurt them.

"He was unarmed, you would have killed him."

Anakin's words meant nothing to you, because yes, of course you would kill him. He could be begging for mercy at your feet, and you would use your saber to cut every limb from his body until he was unable to even crawl to safety, then you would end his life in the slowest, most agonizing way you could possibly think of.

"And would you have stopped me?" It was a valid question, if you had been there, you wouldn't have hesitated, but would Anakin let you go through with it?

He ducked his head, unwilling to lie to your compelling question, but not wanting to answer truthfully, knowing it would be a travesty against your master's teachings.

"Obi-Wan would not want us to act on revenge."

Good answer, but not the one you were looking for.

"The answer is no; you would have let me kill him in an instant," you corrected him, and he shot his head up to meet your dark eyeline. Everything about you emanated so much weight, something so deep that he began to feel the effects of it in his signature.

"It's not the Jedi way," Ahsoka reminded you, and for a moment you thought you heard Obi-Wan's voice echoing the sentiment to your mind, but it didn't instill in you a need to respect it.

"The Jedi have become corrupt, the republic has made us an army, and we do their bidding without hesitation. The Jedi way has fallen far from what it used to be, and you both know it."

You were getting more frustrated as the time passed, and you sent into Anakin's mind a hint that you wanted them to just stay away from you, to leave you alone and to let you wallow in your misery.

He looked at Ahsoka and nodded for her to leave the room, before ultimately, he stood to his feet, and followed after her. Before he shut the door, he turned back one more time. He shuddered to even speak the words he wanted to say, but they needed to be said.

"Obi-Wan said to us once, that if you suffer to let go, you will suffer to grow."

And then he was gone.

Obi-Wan was ever as wise as his former Master, and often you wondered why he was never a consular like Qui Gon. It was his spirit that was a Guardian. His passionate heart to defend his will and the will of the force, to defend those he cared about, the ones closest to him, and to defend you. He always defended you, and you relied on it, more than you should, but now you have to fight your own battles, and you need more strength than you have.

Sometimes suffering is just suffering. It doesn’t make you stronger. It doesn’t build character. It only hurts.

-

You heard the news of the prison break, it echoed in the halls outside of your apartment, and you were practically jumping out of bed to make sure you hadn't misunderstood anything.

The chancellor was sending Anakin and Ahsoka to capture the escaped prisoners, that of which included Moralo Evol, Cad Bane, and of course, Rako Hardeen.

They would likely be leaving soon to follow the trail that the prison had begun to track.

You needed to be on the ship before it left, this was your chance. This was your chance to even the score, it was your chance to avenge the life of your Master, the one you'd adored so dearly.

You were wearing his robes, and his old cloak, which he kept with him since his padawancy, even after taking the trials, it was a sentimental article that meant something to him. It fit you quite well, and it was full of echoes in the force, from his time and training before you entered his life. There were some remnants of yourself you could sense within the ragged fabric, a younger version of yourself who's trouble seemed so foolish, now.

Your saber was on your hip as you walked down the corridors to the elevator. There were few Jedi, but several clone squads that stared on. Some were from the 212th, which was now your battalion by inheritance. You never gave any of them a second glance, your focus was uninterrupted, and would remain that way until you had accomplished your main goal.

Stepping into the elevator, you caught sight of Master Kit Fisto, who had looked at you with disbelief before the elevator doors were shut and your view was blocked from his expression.

Everyone you passed on the way to the hanger seemed to be completely distracted by you, and you knew why. They sensed it in you, the vengeance was radiating off of you like hot steam, filling the air with the mist and heat when you walked by them. It was frightening to them for sure, to see a young girl who was so optimistic become so enraptured with hatred for a single being.

You saw Anakin and Ahsoka in the distance, waiting on their ship to be fueled, and you approached them swiftly, non-hesitant. Your confidence could not be swayed, even if they cut it down with a lightsaber, you would quickly rebuild it, and keep moving.

"What are you doing here?" Anakin stopped you from going any further, placing himself in the way of the ship and not allowing you even an inch of access.

"I'm coming with you. You'll need my help," you insisted, and though he knew you were very capable of doing so, he was still worried that your emotion will cloud your judgement. "He was my master, Anakin."

"He was mine, too. I understand how you feel, and I'm not going to hold you back, but I need to know you're up for this," he crossed his arms, looking down on you and waiting for a sign of your readiness. You furrowed your brow and shook your head, stepping forward so that you were nearly nose to nose.

"I will not rest until I know the man responsible for Obi-Wan's death has been taken out."

He sighed. That wasn't exactly what he wanted to hear, but he knew better than to argue with you when you were angry, especially this new side of you.

"Let's go," he stepped aside, letting you up onto the ramp, following after you and Ahsoka when you walked up.

The first planet they had been tracked to was already set in the coordinates in the pilot's console, and with Ahsoka as copilot, you figured you would sit in the back, and be company to yourself.

The ride was long, and silent.

Sitting in the hull of the ship, you waited. You waited for them to come back and tell you where you would inevitably find the escaped bounty hunters. You held your saber in your right hand, sliding your thumb up and down over the crystal chamber. It was a subconscious movement, simple and fluid, but you had no idea the affects you were causing with it.

You were already filled with so much anger, so much hatred, you let it motivate you, you allowed it to consume your signature in its whole. You hated that it had this much control over you, the darkness, but it made you stronger, you could feel its power in your veins, every muscle felt energized by the dark force. It was pushing you towards the only new success you craved: vengeance.

You closed your eyes, meditating on this darkness for the first time since you let it overtake you. You absentmindedly kept your hand around your saber, clenching it tightly and using it as a tether.

You weren't sure how you felt, indulging in the darkness like this, to meditate on it in a way you'd been raised to avoid. The Jedi never told you how peaceful and quiet the darkness could be. They always mentioned it was made up of all the horrors you could not yet understand. Perhaps they were wrong.

For you, the dark side had worked almost seductively, luring you in with all it could offer, and empowering you to feel like you were untouchable. You did not even think that something like this could be bad.

You poured all your anger into your meditation, and let it fester, turning into raw power that you could later use to conquer your enemy, and make them-

"Kriff," You swore silently, dropping your saber to the ground for the way it began to burn your hand. It wasn't hot like fire, but the energy stung your skin, and you opened your eyes, letting them fall on where your weapon hit the ground of the ship.

You sensed that something was off, and when you picked it up, you felt it. You'd infused your weapon with your feelings, you may have damaged it from the inside. You ignited it, just as Anakin and Ahsoka were now coming back aboard the ship, and all at once you all witnessed what you had done to your lightsaber, your treasured weapon. This weapon is your life...

"What did you do?" Anakin asked in confusion, looking at the blade in disbelief.

The beautiful green glow that emanated from the hilt was only halfway there, as it collided with the dark red that took over its beauty, and made it into something new, something deeper, something more powerful.

"I don't know."

He looked once at his Padawan, nodding for her to go and start the ship. You were still gazing upon the new red and green glow of your saber, mesmerized by the duality it now possessed. It was quite lovely, and you'd never seen anything like it before.

"We have to talk about this," Anakin said gently as he walked over to you. "I know it's hard to resist the darkness, but you're making me concerned."

You deactivated the saber, clipping it back to your hilt and letting it fall by your side. You looked back at Anakin and saw your truest friend as confidant, the person you felt you could be honest with, and the only other person in this galaxy who might be feeling even a shred of your loss, your grief.

"I can't feel the light anymore... I'm trying, I promise," it wasn't a lie. You were struggling beyond measure to find even the slightest bit of connection to the light side of the force, but every time you thought of your master's teachings, the way he led you, guided you, it pushed you back to the start... but the dark side let you in, and it embraced you with open arms, like it had been waiting all this time.

"This isn't the Jedi way; this isn't what Obi-Wan would want for you."

"Obi-Wan didn't want for me to suffer like this, either," you said, a tear that threatened to spill over but was held back for the sake of your sanity. You couldn't stand to cry anymore, it just kept you in the same state of pain.

"Going against the order won't do us any favors... the council already looks down on us, anything we do is under their scrutiny."

He tried getting closer, but soon realized that was a bad idea.

"I'm going to be expelled," you let out, scoffing with furrowed brows. You were so confident that it would happen, because deep down, even before you lost Obi-Wan, you felt you weren't meant for the Jedi. You felt that they only accepted you because they had to.

"You won't be expelled. They might act like they hate you, but for Obi-Wan's sake they would still care enough to help you."

“No, they won't. All they have ever done is lie to me. To the both of us. For almost our whole lives, we have been told to follow a code. No emotion, but peace. No ignorance, but knowledge. No passion, but serenity. No chaos, but harmony. No death, but the Force,” you stepped forward to him, and though you were not trying to, your force caused the ship to rattle and vibrate beneath you, “But, anger is what brings me peace. The passion to want to hurt the person who killed him…is what brings me serenity.”

He couldn't believe what he was hearing, the strained look in your eyes to hold back tears, your clenched fists. It was all too much for Anakin to take. He was still battling the dark, but for you, the darkness had won. The only way you would be coming back to the temple with him would be if by some miracle, killing the bounty hunter gave you your clarity back.

"You will kill him, I promise."

And with that, he was back in the cockpit, leaving you to fume in the hull.

-

The chase was on, and as you spotted the hunters in the docking port to obtain fuel, you heart pounded deeply in your chest. You were hovered over Ahsoka's seat, watching everything going on and making sure you had the perfect view.

"I have eyes on Cad Bane," Ahsoka said, nodding to the entrance ramp on the ship in the dock.

"Are you sure that's him?"

You scoffed and nodded along with Ahsoka.

"Who else wears a hat like that?"

Anakin circled the station slowly, being careful not to attract any unwanted attention, or to give away to the hunter that you were, in fact, after them.

He waited until they were airborne, letting them gain some speed before he rammed your ship into theirs. You jolted forward, catching yourself between the seats as you stood back up into a straight position. You could see them react rather quickly, but they had nowhere to go. The ship they were in had half the speed and agility capabilities that yours had.

"Ahsoka, take over, we'll bring them down ourselves."

You smirked, discarding your cloak and shaking off your nerves. This was finally it; you were about to set in motion a series of events that would end in the death of Rako Hardeen. You hopped at the chance to jump out of the ship with Anakin, landing on the stabilizer panel by the wing.

Anakin tried to gain access through one of the side entry points, but was immediately met with a challenge, fending off Cad Bane. He was perfectly capable of taking him on, and probably ten other men if he needed to, so you left him in order to find your real target.

You climbed up in front of the cockpit, seeing Moralo Evol looked scared out of his wits. You scanned the area, and as soon as your eyes met with the man who killed Obi-Wan, you froze. Something didn't feel right, but that must have been the anxiety talking. Everything else, the hatred, the anger, the fire that was lit beneath you, it pushed you forward.

He looked at you with not a semblance of fear, but with confusion, and dismay. He made eye contact with you, and for whatever you reason, he looked distraught, like he was sad. It didn't make any sense, but you weren't going to let it bother you. In the end, he would die by your hand, and nothing could stop you, now.

You placed your hand on the glass, focusing the new dark energy within yourself, and using it to slowly crack the glass. The hunter you sought after wasn't scared of you now, but he would be. You'd make sure of it.

You detached your lightsaber from your belt, holding it out to your side and activating it, never breaking eye contact with the man you called your target. You wouldn't be letting him out of your sight. His mouth gaped open and having seen the half-bleeding blade of your saber, he now held deep fear in his eyes.

The glass was almost shattered, with only a few lines left to connect with each other, and Rako knew he had to act fast. He shifted the steering on the ship, lifting it into a climb momentarily, causing the ship that Ahsoka flew above it to collide with the top, and send both transports spiraling into the ground. You were thrown from the vessel, along with Anakin and the other hunter, Bane.

You stood to your feet after coughing up a small amount of dust that you'd inhaled, and then you dusted yourself off, force pulling your saber to your hand as it had landed a bit further from you.

You activated it, stepping through the cloud of fog that surrounded you, and finding the man you were here for. He had gotten off the ship, for what reason you were unsure, but it didn't matter. He was making it easier for you.

You saw Anakin step closer to him on the other side of the fog, surrounding him from leaving in any direction.

"You're going to pay for what you've done," Anakin engaged him in hand-to-hand combat, throwing him into a pit, which you quickly jumped into.

Anakin was kicked back into a corner, so you took your chance, pushing Hardeen into the rocky wall that had formed around the hole in the ground.

"You shouldn't have gotten involved," Rako sounded, for lack of a better word, exasperated, like he took no joy in fighting you both. He had no problem in killing your master, so what was any different now, with the both of you?

You took a hit to the shoulder from Cad Bane, who was fast approaching on your left. You deflected his next shots with your saber, and struck forward, taking out one of his boot thrusters. He was grounded for now, and you needed to focus on the target.

Anakin was now tangled up in a bash with Bane, so you fixed your saber on Hardeen, slowly walking towards him as he struggled to stand to his feet.

"You took everything from me," and then you were right in front of him. He looked at you with eyes of pity, and it bothered you to no end. You were about to bring this man's life to a pathetic halt, and he was the one looking onto you as if you deserved to be pitied. You hated him, hated the very ground he stood on.

You raised your saber, only for it to stop in the air, along with your arm. Why can't I move?

Rako tackled you into the ground, deactivating your saber, and pinning you beneath him, arms on either side of your head. He straddled your hips and put nearly all his weight to keep you immobile, before he leaned down and whispered in your ear.

"I can't hurt you... Stay down, little one."

You froze, a gasp leaving your throat and your eyes widening in shock.

"Obi..." you trailed off, complete disbelief washing over you. You felt a warm, comforting presence embrace you, before his hands at the side of your head faded you into unconsciousness.

-

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[markantonys]

amol chapters 21-36, though once again contains major spoilers for character endgame fates that still haven’t happened yet as of chapter 36

so asha’man can compel aes sedai with the bond but aes sedai can’t compel asha’man? that’s rancid

“she also wanted to be done with the black tower” mood!

my man demandred shows up with the sharans, being very sexy as always. don’t lie, we all have our FILF (forsaken i’d like to fuck) demandred is mine 100%. i love an evil man with a weird nose and an antagonistic homoerotic obsession with the hero (see: francesco pazzi in i medici season 2). i hope he doesn’t get cut from the show and instead absorbs some of the less sexy forsaken’s plotlines so that he can have something to do prior to the final season lmao

he’s acting like a jilted ex by claiming that he has “crawled through the depths of sorrow and risen up to accept my glory,” asking people if they know anything about rand, saying that leane is beautiful but he doesn’t give a shit because he just wants her to deliver a message to rand. “tell him i will finally have satisfaction.” literally the gayest possible way you could’ve phrased that my dude

“i will slaughter and destroy. i will seize his people. i will enslave his children, i will take his women for my own. one by one, i will break, destroy, or dominate everything he has loved. the only way for him to avoid this is for him to come and face me.” somebody is not taking his recent breakup well! his recent 3000-years-ago breakup. on a more serious note, exhibit fucking A of how stupid it was for bashere to make elayne publicize that rand is the babies’ dad!

i’m laughing about all these gay dramatics because rand is literally about to go face the dark one, he does NOT have time for your shit demandred. he’s gonna hear this message and be like “oh my god why are you so obsessed with me” and then continue on to shayol ghul. the dark one is gonna be facepalming that demandred’s gay dramatics are trying to get in the way of his faceoff with rand.

previously we’ve discussed that demandred is mat’s foil, but he’s also gawyn’s foil: homoerotic obsession with rand that consumes their every waking thought meanwhile rand never thinks about them and has no idea they’re obsessed with him. but gawyn was able to get over his onesided breakup and find closure where demandred couldn’t. although rand DID have that angsty gay thought about how maybe demandred wouldn’t have turned to the shadow if rand/LTT had loved him instead of competed with him, so not quite as onesided as gawyn. we’ve also previously discussed mat and gawyn foiling each other (young extremely skilled military men thrust into leadership positions they didn’t want, wary of being used by aes sedai, complicated relationships with rand), so this is just a nice trio of foils here.

in conclusion, demandred and LTT are that post that’s like “characters that never dated but are definitely exes now”

when perrin vanishes graendal’s balefire in TAR: “the woman started. they always did that. didn’t they realize that nothing was real here except what you thought to be real?” i’m so sick of perrin reading 1 wikipedia article on TAR and then acting like he knows it better than women who’ve been studying it for years (he also kinda did this with the wise ones when they tried to warn him against going in the flesh and then once he did so he was like “this doesn’t feel evil, they’re wrong about that”)

“a warrior who will not strike a maiden is a warrior who refuses her honor.” king gaul!!! and we have quite a bit of both gaul and lanfear shaming perrin for Not Killing Women and perrin himself acknowledging that it was foolish of him not to kill graendal when he had the chance. this combined with lan’s scene in the last chapter chunk, i feel like sanderson is coming down hard on how stupid this rj attitude was lmao bless

lanfear says that graendal was invading bashere’s dreams oh no!!!! what did she do!!!! i’m remembering that min had some kinda Darkness viewing about bashere and biting my nails!!!

well, if bashere is under the influence of the shadow then at least that would explain why he made elayne endanger herself and the babies by making her tell everyone rand is the dad lmao idk if he WAS under the influence of the shadow back at that time, but i’m going to believe he was in order to rationalize that buckwild stupidity.

“[egwene] looked at [gawyn], a cold strength in her eyes, and nodded. light! how could she be so calm when he had to clench his teeth for fear they would start rattling together?” that’s our wife!!

gawyn is using the bloodknife rings oooh sexy

at the shayol ghul group, rand has placed aviendha in charge ❤️❤️ so we could’ve had rand facing off against the dark one, aviendha leading at shayol ghul, elayne leading the armies, and mat maybe helping her lead the armies if he was here instead of ebou dar. power polycule!!!

aviendha sees rand approaching the cavern: “he wore his coat of red and gold, but under it a simple two rivers shirt. what he had become and what he had been, wrapped together in one.” 😭 rand has two swords, callandor and laman’s sword. “he carried that because of her. fool man.” 😭😭 “aviendha raised her hand to him, and he raised his in return. that would be their only farewell if he failed in his task or she died during hers. with a last look, she turned away from him and toward her duty.” 😭😭😭😭😭

randlayne was given priority for a number of chapters, and then in this brief portion avirand got priority - avi is the last one to see rand here, and she’s also the last one who got an on-page Relationship Moment with him (a couple chapters ago when they were standing together after scoping out shayol ghul), not to mention the Romance of her being the one leading the group protecting him outside the cavern. meanwhile min has only exchanged about 3 words with rand in the entire book 😌 fueling my belief that min was just sex while rand was Going Through It and desperate for companionship and she was literally the only one available, but elayne and avi are his endgame. now that the end has come and he’s back with his other loved ones, min has all but vanished from his mind and from the book while elayne and avi are the ones he’s focused on and the ones who have onscreen Relationship Scenes with him. min didn’t even GET an onscreen goodbye with him at all lmao! cadsuane mentioned that rand had given min jewelry as a goodbye gift but we didn’t see the interaction! we love to see it! or not see it, in this case.

we have a battle scene here that i did enjoy because it was wonderful to see avi flexing her leadership AND channeling skills! a perfect culmination of her character arc!

moiraine on the shayol ghul cavern: “this is not the bore, this is not the dark one’s prison.” it’s not? oh. well then...................i don’t know what the bore is and at this point i’m too afraid to ask. (update: later on it’s mentioned how the bore is Outside The Pattern. i would very much enjoy seeing the show adapt this whole pit of doom confrontation because it’s hard for me to visualize so far in this chapter chunk.)

so moiraine and nynaeve will be the 2 women to use callandor with rand. awww i really think one should’ve been egwene since she and rand have been foils and two sides of the same coin and complements and yin and yang and co-protagonists for so long. bummer! i think her instead of nynaeve would’ve had more impact bc it would’ve shown how far rand has come out of his paranoia and self-isolation, if he was doing this with 2 aes sedai he strongly mistrusted for a long time rather than with nynaeve who was always the only one he never mistrusted or pushed away. and in fact it would’ve been such beautiful poetic cinema if callandor only required 1 man and 1 woman and it was just rand and egwene going into the cavern together. haha i was also thinking that egwene would’ve been better than perrin doing all the TAR stuff, so i guess my dream last battle would just be egwene doing EVERY task jkfjg it’s what she deserves!

nynaeve is wearing a beautiful dress because of course women be dressing to the nines to go BATTLE THE DARK ONE

i once saw someone say that the dark one’s all-caps dialogue makes them think of an old person on facebook accidentally writing things in all caps all the time and now that is always what i think of jkfgjh

rand is now entering the cave, so he officially has no time to deal with demandred’s gay dramatics and in fact has never even heard about them. god it would be so funny if demandred gets killed without ever coming face to face with rand in the entire series, that’s HUGE gawyn-onesided-homoerotic-rivalry-with-rand energy!

“an empress had to be crafty, strong, and skilled if she was to survive” and we have never actually seen tuon be any of those things, we’ve only been told that she is, so i guess that means she won’t be long for this world yeah baby!

“matrim would never be a rival...was not the prince of the ravens a check upon the empress, to keep her strong by providing a constant threat?” see, if the ship had been done well, i would be swooning over the romance of tuon being puzzled that for the first time she has a healthy relationship and a family member who won’t try to kill her, but it wasn’t, so instead i’m just like “yeah i WISH mat was a rival and a threat to her” (but i can soothe myself that maybe this is a sign that mat WILL someday be her and the empire’s downfall, and she’s just underestimating him here as usual)

wait shit tuon believes that rand knelt before the crystal throne, and now that i think about it he did do so literally and also kinda did do so metaphorically since he let her walk all over him in arranging their “alliance,” but the dragon kneeling before the crystal throne was a marker of the bad future in avi’s visions..............OH NO

tuon can you stop forcibly renaming mat FOR FIVE MINUTES

mat just says “knotai? i kind of like it” because by this point he has been officially slave-broken and happily accepts his new slave name

but again i can soothe myself that tuon naming him this as “a bringer of destruction” is a sign that someday it’ll backfire on her and he’ll bring destruction to the empire rather than to the empire’s enemies, as she believes here

mat tells tuon that they have to go help egwene’s army and has the audacity to be upset that she seems like she either might not help or might use the opportunity to enslave all the aes sedai. “i never thought the leopards would eat MY face,” sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People’s Faces party.

“you gave your word.” “i signed a treaty. any treaty can be broken, particularly by the empress...the empress cannot be constrained by words on a paper.” LMAO wasn’t there a bit in a past book where she insisted that she was so honorable and always kept her promises? LMAOOO and she’s always pressed about the westlanders not keeping their oaths (that they never swore anywhere but in her deranged mind) and whatnot.

me after violating a legal document that i signed: i cannot be constrained by words on a paper 😌

she doesn’t Actually break the treaty yet because she decides it’s in her best interests to help the ~marath’damane army~ so she can use them to defeat the shadow (with the alternative being go back to seanchan right now, solidify her rule, and then come back to fight the shadow with her own forces. because obviously we totally have enough time for that, tuon, it’s not as if the last battle started DAYS ago or anything.) however, this just proves how fucking stupid and pointless the seanchan peace treaty is - tuon does not consider herself bound by it in any way and WILL violate it the SECOND it inconveniences her.

“the clouds had parted above them - they often did when [elayne] was near, one way the bond with rand manifested” ❤️❤️ romance!

just a week or two ago i saw someone shitting on elayne’s pre-battle speech in this book and saying it was lame, but i just read it and it rocks??? fuck off. elayne says “i am supposed to reassure you but i cannot...doing so would remove responsibility...this is not a day for empty promises” and people say it’s lame and not inspiring, but if she HAD hyped the soldiers up more with false positivity then people would’ve said she was being insensitive of the gravity of the situation and treating war as child’s play. there is literally no winning for elayne among Certain Readers.

“birgitte, i am in command, and you are my soldier. you will obey...i’m one of the few channelers of any strength this army has, and i’ll be drawn and quartered before i let myself sit out the fight. i’m easily worth a thousand soldiers on this battlefield.” GO OFF!!!!!!

birgitte tries to protest about the babies, because as we know those are the people she actually cares about and elayne is just a vessel for them in her eyes, and elayne claps back with “even if min hadn’t had that viewing, i’d still insist on fighting. you think the babes of these soldiers aren’t at risk? many of them line the walls of that city! if we fail here, they will be slaughtered. no, i will not keep myself out of danger, and no, i will not sit back and wait. if you think it’s your duty as my warder to stop me, then i will bloody sever this bond right here and now and send you to someone else! i’m not gong to spend the last battle lounging on a chaise and drinking goat’s milk!” YES!!! 👏👏👏👏👏 CHEERING AND PUMPING MY FIST

also, this is another example of there being no winning for elayne among Certain Readers: she does stuff like this and they complain that she’s reckless and gets people killed and Doesn’t Listen To Birgitte, but if she were to spend the last battle lounging on a chaise and drinking goat’s milk they’d complain about her doing nothing and letting everyone else die in her place.

mark my words, lounging on a chaise and drinking goat’s milk is exactly how tuon will spend the last battle. probably min too.

“an odd sensation came to mind. one of the women was in trouble. was it elayne? aviendha? he could not tell.” when rand senses one of his bondholders is in trouble, elayne and aviendha are the only two he cares about 😌 either that or he doesn’t even consider min could be in danger because she’s not doing anything in the battle lmao

moridin arrives. “you could step aside. if my victory is not assured, neither is your fall. let me pass. for once, make the choice you know you should.” “now? now you beg me to return to the light? i have been promised oblivion. finally, nothing, a destruction of my entire being. an end. you will not steal that from me, lews therin! by my grave, you will not!” and they start swordfighting. poor demandred, he wants what ishamael has with rand. demandred and gawyn shaking on the gates yelling “let me in!” whilst rand is too busy in his intense and complicated *and reciprocal* relationships with ishamael and mat.

also, like lanfear, ishamael hovers just on the edge of being a really interesting and complex villain and character, and i hope the show will bring out his motives and psychology more especially through use of AOL flashbacks. it already did a great job establishing “i just want existence to end” as a motive for joining the shadow via dana.

perrin sees the cavern battle from TAR: “two men, locked in battle. two women, as if frozen.” if moiraine and nynaeve spend the entire battle just frozen and not doing anything i’ll be so mad lmao i guess it’s actually good that egwene wasn’t wasted here

perrin and gaul are attacked by aiel male channelers who have been turned to the shadow. this is so interesting, why the hell is it just kind of a 5-page footnote in the final book of the series? why didn’t we get any aiel asha’man? that would’ve been so cool!

“i killed two of those myself, perrin aybara. one could channel. i think myself great with honor, then you slide in and take two captive. bain would laugh herself all the way back to the three-fold land if she saw this.” aw a tidbit of gaul-bain banter/friendship! it should be gaul and bain who are first-siblings rather than bain and chiad. like maybe bain and chiad are already lovers, gaul and chiad start falling for each other, and bain’s resistance is to taking gaul as her first-brother and sharing chiad with him, and then they get a nice little rivals to friends to first-siblings arc. it would’ve made so much more sense! i’m hoping the show will give us mixed gender first-siblings in general (and first-brothers, getting rid of the nonsense that men are worse at being close friends with each other than women are lmao)

“i don’t like fighting beside those seanchan” king gawyn strikes again! and egwene thinks that she “should be fighting the seanchan with every breath, not allying with them. her instincts rebelled as she approached the gathering of seanchan.” i swear to god gawyn and egwene are the only people who still remember that the seanchan suck (and elayne, i believe she was resistant to the idea of allying with them back in the big meeting?)

“egwene’s chances depended on the seanchan joining the battle and engaging the sharan channelers. her stomach twisted...the seanchan damane were not free women; they could not choose to fight. from what she’d seen of the sharan male channelers, they were little more than animals themselves.” queen egwene being the only one to acknowledge this!

“egwene revised her expectations. she’d imagined fortuona as a spoiled adolescent, the product of a coddled lifetime.” no yeah you were right on the money there egwene no revisions needed

egwene absolutely OWNS tuon throughout this conversation and it gives me so much life!!!!!! it is so goddamn satisfying to see someone FINALLY stand up to tuon, given the way she carries a spine-removal kit around (to use @butterflydm​’s extremely apt analogy) for use on literally every single other character who has interacted with her thus far.

now i am going to take a pause simply to record some epic egwene quotes before going back to analysis mode

when tuon says she’d considered whether it would be appropriate for her to speak to egwene with her own voice: “i have considered myself whether it would be appropriate to speak to one such as yourself, who has committed such terrible atrocities.” OOH

when tuon decides oh so generously to see egwene as a queen rather than as a marath’damane for this conversation: “no. you will see me for what i am, woman. i demand it.” OOOH

when tuon agrees and says that she’s spoken to marath’damane before, as it’s allowed for an empress to speak with her pet hounds: “then i will speak with you directly as well. for the amyrlin judges many trials. she must be able to speak to murderers and rapists in order to pass sentence upon them. i think you would be at home in their company, though i suspect they would find you nauseating.” OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH a worthy successor to that epic elaida clapback

“i represent the ultimate proof that your society and empire are built upon falsehoods. here i stand, a woman you insist should be collared for the common good. and yet i display none of the wild or dangerous tendencies that you claim i should have. so long as i am free from your collars, i prove to every man and woman who draws breath that you are a liar.” OOOOOHHH and the other seanchan murmur at this!

there will be more epic quotes coming but now i want to analyze. suffice it to say that this was me throughout this scene:

tuon insists that egwene wouldn’t criticize the collar if she’d known its peace and whatever nauseating shit, and egwene reveals to everybody that she WAS collared and she HATED IT!! tuon is big mad because she didn’t know this so now egwene’s made her look like a fool (and undermined the damane system and her authority) in front of a lot of people.

tuon rounds on mat to demand why he never told her that egwene was collared. he replies, “i didn’t think too much about it. she wasn’t one for very long.” boy i bet egwene wishes SHE was able to not think too much about it! mat has deadass been mooning over the head slaver for all these books with that one time his best friend was enslaved by these people just completely slipping his mind. he also chimes in with an obedient little “may she live forever” when tuon ends a sentence with “the empress” which is sickening.

egwene’s FIRST assumptions when she sees mat among the seanchan are that he’s undercover and they don’t know who he really is or that he’s a captive, that he’s in danger, and that she needs to save him from them. i think this is supposed to be a humorous role reversal of mat thinking these things about egwene being amyrlin when he first arrives in salidar, but it’s absolutely heartbreaking. egwene sees her close friend all buddy-buddy with the people who enslaved her and who have enslaved or murdered countless of her sisters and allies, and she assumes that mat must be there for an ulterior motive or not of his own free will, but nope, he voluntarily threw himself in with them because he was into tuon’s ~mysterious eyes.~ and how can i laugh at egwene ~presumptively~ thinking mat needs a rescue, when he DOES need a rescue before he spends the rest of his life miserable and under tuon’s thumb?

egwene says that their marriage was a result of tuon getting caught up in mat’s ta’veren pull (which tuon denies). “‘being ta’veren never did get me much,’ mat said sourly.” so is he admitting that he doesn’t want this marriage or this life?

tuon is mad at mat for not telling her about egwene’s stint as a damane and says “we will speak of this on another occasion. it will not be pleasant.” and later in the scene when he displeases her, “we will have many words about this tonight” 🚩🚩🚩

“egwene regarded the woman, baffled. light! these people were completely insane.” YES. YES THEY ARE. what a breath of fresh air to see a pov character FINALLY acknowledge this. egwene you’re the only bitch in this house i ever respected.

“oh, light, rand. what did you promise them?” mood

egwene actually makes an effort to get concessions from tuon AND SUCCEEDS (tuon agrees to give up tremalking) unlike rand just going “oh well there’s nothing i can do” the second tuon counters him and mat just standing there silently not even trying. because egwene is the only bitch in this house i ever respected.

me @ every character but egwene, gawyn, and elayne: you have the moral backbone of a chocolate eclair

egwene announces that all sul’dam can channel. tuon tells her not to spread such lies. “oh? shall we test it, fortuona? you said you trained them yourself. you are a sul’dam, i presume? put the a’dam on your neck. i dare you. if i am wrong, it will do nothing to you. if i am right, you will be subject to its power, and will prove to be marath’damane...let us do it and test the real strength of your commitment. if you prove to be able to channel, will you do as you claim others should? will you stroll up to the collar and snap it around your own neck, fortuona? will you obey your own laws?” i am screaming and hollering in approval, but then, for some GODFORSAKEN reason, this DOES NOT HAPPEN. at this point being collared and forced to channel is literally the only thing that could possibly force tuon into any sort of character development, so WHY in the name of the light would you set this up so perfectly and then wuss out of following through???????????? what’s the point????????? i’m so mad!!!!!!!!! just when i think tuon might finally be forced to face a consequence for the first time in her life!!!

“‘i plan to live centuries,’ egwene hissed. ‘i will watch your empire crumble, fortuona. i will watch it with joy.’” AND YET EGWENE FUCKING DIES IN THE LAST BATTLE AND TUON’S EVIL ASS GETS TO LIVE!!!! IT’S SO UNFAIR I HATE IT!!!!!!!!!! nobody is going to stand up to the seanchan once egwene, possessor of the sole backbone in the westlands, is gone!!!! i’m sure egwene’s death will be a moving Heroic Sacrifice moment, but my god it’s the worst thing that could’ve possibly happened for the upcoming fourth age. the world doesn’t need rand or perrin or mat or nynaeve anymore after the last battle, but it needs egwene DESPERATELY. if an ef5 had to die, why couldn’t it have been literally any of them except egwene? except i don’t want rand to die because he deserves a second chance at life, and i don’t want nynaeve to die because she deserves her happy ending with lan after they’ve had a Doomed Relationship for so much of the series, and i don’t want mat to die because he needs to overthrow the seanchan empire and then go back to the westlands to marry rand and elayne. so, i will amend my statement: if an ef5 had to die, why couldn’t it have been perrin? lmao (tho i do stand by the fact that rand or nynaeve not making it would’ve been better For The World than egwene even if i would’ve been sad personally, and possibly mat as well unless i really AM meant to believe that he’ll destroy seanchan, in which case he needs to survive to the fourth age too)

mat intervenes and pushes them apart. “let’s be civil, ladies. don’t make me throw the pair of you over my knee.” i am going to strangle him and make it stick this time. my earlier-in-this-book sympathy for mat is over now, fuck post-WH mat all my homies hate post-WH mat. like can you IMAGINE a woman with no political authority saying this to two extremely powerful male rulers/leaders while they’re arguing about serious political and human rights topics? ..........okay cadsuane would absolutely do this, but aside from her.

“the people of the world need you two, and they need you levelheaded, you hear me?” they literally do not need tuon mat they would literally be so much better off without her. “this is bigger than any of us. when you fight each other, the dark one wins, and that is that. so stop behaving like children.” and so we have the culmination of the gross ass “one side wanting to enslave the other vs. the other not wanting to be enslaved being treated as equally petty, selfish, and in the wrong” theme that’s been present ever since COT. i’m fuming!!!! chewing rocks!!!!!!!!

“when you fight each other the dark one wins” would’ve been an effective line to use when the world leaders were squabbling in the big meeting scene or when rand and egwene were arguing, NOT when tuon is threatening to enslave egwene and egwene is saying she wants to see her slaver empire destroyed!

although at least mat does chide tuon a little bit extra and tell her that she needs egwene, and doesn’t say anything more to egwene or try to tell her that she needs tuon, so that’s a small mercy

the meeting ends and egwene returns to “where gawyn waited for her” sanderson couldn’t have gawyn present for/within earshot of the meeting because gawyn would’ve beat mat’s ass for treating egwene like that, and rightfully so. also because he would’ve just straight up killed tuon using his bloodknife ring abilities the second she threatened egwene. egwene wouldn’t kill tuon because she’s too practical and levelheaded, but gawyn would’ve snapped and taken her head off, my impulsive boy.

elayne’s exhausted herself channeling in battle, and birgitte actually admits that elayne was right to want to fight and that she did well and that seeing her fight right on the front lines inspired the soldiers, thank god.

elayne realizes that bashere’s been spreading misinformation, which led to them being taken by surprise by a second trolloc army, and concludes that he’s a darkfriend and fires him from being her general and puts him under guard. lan’s been noticing agelmar making mistakes too, so i’m guessing graendal’s messing with all the generals’ dreams.

i’m sad because i always was fond of bashere, but i’m also thrilled because now elayne is in charge and flexes her military general muscles and puts together a good battle plan on the spot! that’s my girl! fuck perrin and everyone else who claimed she’s only a good leader because she sits quietly and lets the male generals do all the work.

“the one power flooded into her, though she could hold only a trickle. she could act as if she weren’t exhausted, but her body knew the truth. she would lead them anyway.” ❤️❤️

min gets sent as a messenger from bryne to tuon. the aes sedai doing gateways have to make them as small as possible since they need to conserve their strength, and min is annoyed that they make her one so small she has to crawl through it. why don’t you do something useful rather than complaining that other people don’t have enough energy left to do things, min?

she mentions that one of the aes sedai notes her “breeches and curls” do NOT tell me min has been curling her hair even during the last fucking battle????? 💀💀 i hope that sanderson just forgot or didn’t realize that her hair wasn’t naturally curly (and it isn’t - there were multiple times in rj’s books where she mentioned that she started curling it For Rand) because otherwise, oh my god.

she’s been doing odd jobs in the camp for a week. interesting that a week has passed since the day before rand went to the pit of doom. “it wasn’t work that had required her, specifically, but it was better than sitting in tear and worrying about rand...or being angry at him for forbidding her to go to shayol ghul.” meanwhile, avi was briefly disappointed that rand wouldn’t take her but accepted immediately that it was the right course of action. “you’d have been a liability there, min told herself. you know it. he couldn’t worry about saving the world and protecting her from the forsaken at the same time.” at least she admits it. “sometimes, it was hard not to feel insignificant in a world of channelers like rand, elayne, and aviendha.” that’s because you ARE insignificant 😌 like, there are so many ways to pull off “non-magical non-warrior character has strength in other areas” and none of them were used with min. her viewings are useless and the emotional support she allegedly provides for rand is either nonexistent or detrimental 90% of the time.

like what’s going on???? lmao anyway

min was just internally moping about being useless but when mat says “hey i could use you” she gets offended that he phrased it rudely or something??? not sure if you noticed but we’re in the middle of a WAR here min, people don’t have time to waste on making sure their requests are phrased politely enough so as not to hurt your feelings.

min even seems to know about mat’s luck??? you’ve met him ONCE and it was before he had that luck! elayne doesn’t even know about it and she’s his bestie! what’s going on??? i would say rand told her, but i’m not sure even rand is aware of mat’s luck? totally possible that he could be, i just don’t remember.

“they’re insane, min. they’re all bloody insane.” “i’m sure egwene would help you escape if you ask, mat.” “well, i didn’t say they weren’t fun. just insane.” mat name ONE time that the seanchan, infamous war criminals and human rights abusers in whose company you’ve been constantly miserable and fearing for your life and your freedom, have been “fun”

“gritting her teeth, min went down on one knee. the woman was the empress, after all. min wouldn’t bow to mat or the generals, but it was only proper to show respect to fortuona.” literally why??? she’s not YOUR empress!

“who is this one, knotai? she thinks herself high.” “oh, well, she’s just the dragon reborn’s woman.” “how curious. that would make her your equal, knotai.” DJFKGJKJHJKDFHGLJ tuon is calling mat rand’s lover and you can’t change my mind

also, it’s making me completely insane yet again that mat is fully aware that min is rand’s girlfriend and is also fully aware that rand is elayne’s babydaddy and we just do not ever see him have any reaction to that or wonder what’s going on. and we can’t even say “maybe rand explained it to him offscreen while they were catching up” because they didn’t GET one of those catchups like rand & perrin and mat & perrin got.

mat tries to hustle min out: “just keep moving. don’t risk her deciding to snatch you up. she’s not particularly good at letting things go, once she has them in hand.” i was all prepared to feel sorry for him, but then, “he actually sounded proud, saying that.” sigh. “you’re as crazy as they are, min thought.” for once something we can agree on. i am trying so hard to interpret everything as mat having been brainwashed and psychologically beaten into submission, but at times it is difficult.

“i don’t belong to anyone. except maybe rand, and him to me.” compare with aviendha: “he did not own her, and she did not own him.” HMMM. very telling. we now have this, avi shunning the thought of possessive public touching while min drapes herself over rand in public constantly, avi accepting immediately that rand has his duty and she has hers while min mopes over rand not taking her to shayol ghul, avi thinking that she couldn’t be with rand until she knew who she was while min thinks she’ll be whatever rand wants her to be.............the two of them are truly at polar opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of how they view relationships, with min being the end of “painfully insecure, possessive, and monogamous.” “we belong to each other” is probably meant to feel romantic, and if used it a different moment maybe it would be, but the fact that we had avi thinking mere CHAPTERS ago that she and rand don’t own each other really throws this line into sharp relief.

oh wack tuon declares that min is her truthspeaker now. is something interesting and non-rand-related finally happening to min for the first time in 14 books? also, note that it’s something interesting happening TO her rather than her DOING something interesting. that’s the real reason she’s insignificant compared to rand, elayne, and aviendha: not because she isn’t a channeler, but because she’s a passive character. things happen TO her, she doesn’t MAKE things happen.

“loial fought on. this song was not a song of victory. it was a song of life. loial did not intend to die here on this hillside. by the light, he had a book to finish before he went!” 😭❤️

mat is weirdly into min all of a sudden lmao hate that. although it IS further evidence for the “mat is gonna cheat on tuon so fast” folder, and that’s always a good thing. and i guess i shouldn’t have expected anything different when the “thinks of all women in terms of whether they’re fuckable” character and the “exists solely to cater to the straight male gaze” character met up.

“she was with rand, so that made her practically his sister.” so you’re saying that min is your sister-wife, because you are also with rand? also, contrast to in LOC when he was like “elayne is so hot, but i wouldn’t kiss her, not because she’s with rand, just because she’s annoying” mat was 100% willing to homewreck rand with elayne, make of that what you will jkjfgh

mat managed to retain his old clothes and puts them on now! phew

it’s so wild that tuon can just go “you’re my truthspeaker now” and snatch min???? and no one does anything about it???? well min, i guess you’re headed off to seanchan forever after the last battle. sucks for her and i’m not necessarily glad about someone else falling into seanchan hands.............but this DOES clear the way for avirandlayne throuple raising their six (6) babies in caemlyn endgame to happen, it has to be said.

mat mentions that he burned the ugly ratty coat he wore to visit elayne in TOM, aw he was so upset that she made fun of it djkfgj

“mat grinned at tuon, and she favored him with a smile. light, but he liked those smiles.” sigh. though this does absolutely read like a fully brainwashed damane being happy to receive a sul’dam’s approval, which..........well, it sure doesn’t SOOTHE me, but it’s better for mat’s characterization to believe that he’s been brainwashed and slave-broken rather than that he’s just fully bought into all this while in his right mind.

“gawyn stepped up to her side, faithful as always.” ❤️❤️ THIS loyal husband DOES spark joy.

egwene notes that gawyn is looking pale, as if at the start of a sickness. oh no!!!!! i think i remember it was mentioned that you don’t live long after activating the bloodknife rings, but idk if that was just because people only activate them to go on suicide missions or if it means that the rings themselves will actually kill you after a certain point. i do know already that gawyn dies (sob) but i don’t know how or when it will happen (same with egwene’s death, i only know the bare fact and not any details).

lan ousts agelmar and mat ousts bryne later in the chapter. and tenobia dies in the battle, so with her gone and bashere currently unfit to rule, does that mean my girl faile is now queen of saldaea? nice! i mean, rip tenobia and everything, but all hail queen faile.

“‘he seems to be yelling for the dragon reborn,’ galgan said. demandred’s voice boomed across the battlefield right then, enhanced by the one power. he was demanding that the dragon come and face him in a duel.” THIS IS SO FUNNY TO ME KJFGKHJ the Unhinged Ex energy of it all! the dragon is a little busy battling the dark one, demandred, read the room! i can’t tell you how much this is making me laugh!!

“mat inspected the fellow through the glass. ‘demandred, eh? has he gone a bit dotty, or what?’” mat watching demandred and going “imagine being so obsessed with rand. could not be me!”

in worse news, mat ends up getting his very own slave due to Can’t Kill A Woman behavior, so that’s fun. (he didn’t explicitly reference Can’t Kill A Woman or give any reason for saving the sharan channeler’s life, but i assume this is the reason.) his response to realizing he accidentally enslaved someone: 1) tells tuon she can have her (because slavery is fine as long as HE’S not the one doing it, i guess), and when tuon insists that the channeler is his, 2) “mat shrugged. what else could he do?” i can think of a few things, mat. just a few. “maybe, if the damane belonged to him, he could let her free or something.” all right that’s something at least. now to see if he actually follows through on that after the last battle or if he simply grows ambivalent enough to let her remain damane.........

“has he punished you for that?” “yes. he returned me to life.” wow moridin needs even MORE therapy than rand does

logain’s contingent arrives on elayne’s battlefied. “we came to you first. the black tower stands with the lion of andor.” fistpump! they may have given up on their deadbeat dad, but they went straight to stepmommy elayne the second they had the chance.

“the woman approaching wore fine seanchan silks, and egwene’s stomach turned at the sight. that finery existed because of a foundation of enslaved channelers, forced into obedience to the crystal throne.” GO OFF QUEEN!!!!! but then it turns out that the woman is min, so idk if that’s supposed to make egwene’s moral rant feel humorous or something? also, the narrative has definitely 100% forgotten that da’covale, aka regular non-channeling people, are also slaves (earlier in this book a westlander referred to them as “servants” which i remember seeing quite a bit in the late rj books too)

“‘you should see the things [the seanchan] drink, egwene.’ ‘i’ve seen them,’ egwene said, unable to keep her tone from coldness. ‘oh. yes. i suppose you have.’” absolute dick move by min here. wasn’t she in falme for a long period of time trying to help rescue egwene?? she should be even more aware of egwene’s captivity than mat! why does everybody have such an easy time just Forgetting that their friend was enslaved and traumatized?

“‘i suppose i’m better off with fortuona. she...knows about a certain talent of mine, thanks to mat, and it might let me help her. and you.’ the statement was laden with meaning.” is min actually going to try to use her newfound influence with tuon to take seanchan down from the inside? now that would be an interesting plotline for her. why didn’t this happen to her 7 books ago? i say, axe min as rand’s love interest and instead send her into tuon’s path MUCH earlier on so that she can use her viewings to influence her into having a little smidge of character development, and plus min has known the sul’dam secret since TGH and so might make more headway with tuon there than mat ever bothered to. then have mat stay with rand instead, being his general and a childhood friend to remind him of who he used to be (since mat actually knows the shepherd boy and min does not). they would both be way more useful in the other’s plotline. hell, we can even switch the romances and make min tuon’s love interest and mat rand’s!

egwene on mat: “a carouser, leering at every pretty woman he met. treating her like a painting and not a person.” i’m probably supposed to think egwene is being unfair to mat and misjudging him, but this is literally exactly how he’s been treating women in his own narration ever since WH and even ACOS. since then, every single woman he meets, he describes in terms of whether or not she’s fuckable. this was not the case in the first 6 books.

“he’d jumped into the river to save kiem lewin from drowning. of course, she hadn’t been drowning. she’d merely been dunked under the water by a friend, and mat had come running, throwing himself into the water to help. the men of emond’s field had made sport of him for months about that. the next spring, mat had pulled jer al’hune from the same river, saving the boy’s life...that was how mat was. he’d grumbled and muttered all winter about how people made sport of him, insisting that next time, he’d just let them drown. then the moment he’d seen someone in danger, he’d gone splashing right back in. egwene could remember gangly mat stumbling from the river, little jer clinging to him and gasping, a look of pure terror in his eyes.” 😭😭😭😭😭

“he was a scoundrel and a fool, but she trusted him. light help her, but she did. she’d trust him with her life.” ❤️❤️❤️ i remember when they parted in LOC being so afraid that that was the last time they’d ever see each other, so i’m so happy to see them interact again in this book! even if their one interaction thus far was mat being shitty to egwene. but i have hope that there will be more and better interactions coming.

once again we have mat fretting over how he married an “aes sedai” and not the fact that he married a slaver

“she was something incredible, though. he felt a thrill each time she gave orders; she did it so naturally. elayne and nynaeve could take lessons. tuon did look very nice on that throne.” 🙄🙄🙄 and once again we have mat gushing over how good tuon is at bossing people around, but failing to provide us with any examples of her showing ACTUAL leadership skills. and gushing over how good tuon is at bossing people around when he constantly shits on the wondergirls for a non-malicious and less extreme version of the same behavior. elayne could take lessons? please. unlike tuon and mat, elayne knows that being a ruler is about more than giving orders and looking good on a throne. mat’s “coming to respect nobility” arc, if it had to happen at all, should’ve been him realizing that being a monarch is hard fucking work, rather than declaring that tuon is Not Like Other Nobles when she embodies every single one of his original negative perceptions of them.

but the good part of this passage is that it gives grounds for mat to have a Queen Elayne kink in a better universe, god bless. getting railed by elayne would honestly do him so much good.

“the sul’dam, catrona, almost choked on the words ‘aes sedai.’ mat couldn’t blame her. those could be tough words to speak.” and once again we have mat showing more empathy for the sul’dam than for the aes sedai they think should be enslaved.

“he didn’t look too hard at the damane [whom he accidentally captured]. mat was responsible for her being captured. it was better than her fighting for the shadow, wasn’t it? blood and bloody ashes, he thought to himself. you are doing a fine job of persuading tuon not to use damane, matrim cauthon. capturing one yourself...” sorry, have you EVER tried to persuade tuon not to use damane? this is literally the first time i’ve seen any indication of that, mat. at least he’s feeling some guilt and sense of responsibility right now, for a whole 3 sentences.

“it was unnerving how quickly the sharan woman had taken to her captivity. the sul’dam had all remarked upon it. barely a moment of struggle, then complete subservience.” AKA EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED TO MAT IN COT

“demandred - despite continuing to rave about the dragon reborn - was continually testing mat’s defenses.” JKJDFGKJJKH KILLING ME AGAIN rafe please give demandred a canon messy gay backstory with LTT because no other justification for this behavior would be as good.

more lines of mat gushing over tuon’s pretty eyes and how much he likes it when she's pleased with him

mat just referred to the sharan channelers as “marath’damane” ugh. but then a paragraph later he mentions “[the seanchan] had started using the term [aes sedai] instead of marath’damane by mat’s order” so that’s good. maybe the prior line i’ll chalk up to it originally being galgan’s line which sanderson then gave to mat and forgot to change “marath’damane” to “channelers” or something.

“he had an inkling of what tuon might be capable of, if she grew displeased with min. he loved her - light, he was pretty sure he did. but he also let himself be a little afraid of her. he’d have to keep watch so that tuon didn’t decide to ‘educate’ min.” okay this is bone chilling. mat is SO CLEARLY in an abusive marriage and a subconscious part of him KNOWS it and is trying to protect min from tuon, though he’s resigned to the thought that it’s too late to protect himself. but the conscious part of him is insisting that he loves tuon, he really does! heartbreaking.

mat spends a whole paragraph talking about how it sucks that seanchan women’s armor doesn’t show boobs and how he ACTUALLY ASKED the armorer if that should be changed. “light, these people had no sense of morality. a fellow needed to know if he was fighting a woman on the battlefield. it was only right.” i’m thinking that in addition to Objectifying Women and Can’t Kill A Woman nonsense, mat is also afraid he might be like “ooh that soldier’s hot!” and then realize it’s a man jdfkjg just accept it mat it’s okay.

“tuon blinked once, looking straight at min. the room seemed to drop into shade, feeling colder. mat shivered. he didn’t like it when tuon got like this. that stare of hers...it seemed like the stare of another person. a person without compassion.” i mean this is literally how she always is? name ONE time when tuon has displayed compassion. also, more “mat being trapped in an abusive marriage and trying to convince himself that it isn’t so and that this isn’t the ~real~ tuon” vibes here.

really interesting scene between tuon and min regarding min’s viewings. tuon attempts to take advantage of the viewings and prevent them from happening, which is a refreshing change from how everyone else just immediately accepted “ah well they can’t be changed, no point trying.” and min stands up to tuon and refuses to share her viewings anymore if tuon will just use them to execute people she suspects of future treason, which is a refreshing change from everyone else having their spine removed when tuon is in the room. see? these two characters play off each other quite well and this plotline/dynamic should’ve been set up way sooner! my 2 most hated characters in the series, yet when they’re together i actually kinda enjoy their interactions lmao it’s witchcraft! probably because min is finally showing an actual personality outside of loving rand now that she’s been separated from him, and because she argues with and challenges tuon and tuon actually listens to her (to an extent) since she’s her truthspeaker.

“if only min would learn a little respect.” mat is literally so scared of his friend getting abused the same way he is, he wants her to just keep her head down.

i love egwene and mat talking in code about his medallion! “do you still have your pet fox?” “i do. he’s snuggled up nice and warm.” “take care of him. i would not see you suffer gareth bryne’s fate.”

mat says “what does elayne want to do? isn’t she in charge?” king shit! respecting her authority and wanting her input, unlike perrin! and then he asks them to make another gateway to get elayne to this meeting so she can discuss with them!

“elayne strode through, thick with child, eyes practically on fire.” mat shaking hands meme with rand and aviendha over commenting on the fire in elayne’s eyes

“she maintained the posture of a queen, but her disheveled hair and clothing burned in several places indicated what she’d been through.” and his earlier description of egwene: “blood and bloody ashes - if he had a soldier with that cast to his skin and that look in his eyes, mat would send the fellow to bed rest for a week.” see, mat? this is what ACTUAL leadership looks like, while tuon has been sitting cozy on her throne letting everyone else do the fighting.

i love to see mat and elayne making battle plans together!!!! power couple!!!!!! tuon could never (she’s just sitting there silently for the whole discussion)

“now, if only [galad] could right [elayne’s] moral compass. she wasn’t a bad person, but galad wished that she - like other monarchs - could see as clearly as he did. he was beginning to accept that they didn’t. he was beginning to accept that it was all right, so long as they tried their best. whatever he had inside of him that allowed him to see the right of things was obviously a gift of the light, and holding others to scorn because they had not been born with it was wrong. just as it would be wrong to hold a man to scorn because he had been born with only one hand, and was therefore an inferior swordsman.” y’all are really trying to tell me that gawyn is the worse trakand brother when galad’s self-righteous holier-than-thou superiority-complex christian-fundamentalist ass is out here behaving like this??? unreal. galad fucking sucks!!!!!!! and has learned absolutely nothing from what morgase was trying to teach him in the last book - his arc should’ve been coming to realize that his view of what’s right isn’t absolute truth, but instead it was coming to accept that it’s okay if other people aren’t as good and perfect as he is because they have not been blessed by the light like he has. bonkers!!!!

like, this is VERY close to how tuon thinks in her povs. this sense of entitlement and enlightenment, this conviction that they are the only ones who know what’s truly right and they must help the ignorant rest of the world see it too - that is BANG ON seanchan thinking.

“he had stopped worrying that his words offended [elayne] long ago. it seemed he couldn’t claim that a day was pleasant or his tea warm without her taking offense somehow. it would have been nice if aybara hadn’t run off. that man was a leader - one of the few that galad had ever met - that one could actually talk to without worrying that he’d take offense.” galad literally being a rightwinger complaining about how easily offended everybody is these days by harmless little things such as being part of a group trying to take away their rights! clearly, elayne is just a special snowflake who’s too sensitive, it’s so unfair that she’s mean to galad! 

no wonder reddit is on galad’s side and whines so much about how immature and prejudiced elayne’s behavior towards him is

the virgin galad (religious zealot, misogynist, joins a group dedicated to oppressing people like his sister and then complains about how mean she is to him about it) vs. the chad gawyn (respects women, devoted his life to protecting his wife, switched sides when he realized that his original side was actively bringing harm to his loved ones)

in conclusion, fuck galad all my homies hate galad. except all my homies DON’T hate galad and so i am alone being old man yells at cloud meme! wake up, my homies! he’s the worst!

there IS a small moment where he instinctively thinks of the whitecloaks as “the whitecloaks” instead of “the children” and is shocked with himself about it, so i guess that’s something. too little too late!

we catch up with faile retrieving the horn from tar valon! wow i completely forgot about that. their conversation at the beginning of the book where they sent her to get it feels like it was 5 books ago.

and aviendha is attacked by some of the aiel male channelers! turns out that when an aiel man can channel they send him to the blight (i’m sure this was mentioned before, i just forgot) and that’s how they all got corrupted by the dark one.

“mat had run off to the seanchan, talmanes to fight alongside queen elayne. one by one, everyone in this group was being eaten by trees, mud, or monsters. why did they all leave olver alone?” “noal...dead. would mat die too?” 😭😭😭

“i am not spending the last battle clinging to a rock! [nynaeve] thought.” my mood exactly lmao we’re on page 600 and she and moiraine have not done anything yet!

it turns out that alanna is in the cavern and is dying, and rand will snap and go crazy if she dies, so nynaeve has to save her but she can’t use saidar because she’s still linked with rand. oh shit!!! it’s nice to see alanna’s bond with rand FINALLY be relevant and have narrative payoff.

egwene is still so ready to help mat escape tuon and the seanchan 😭

mat complains that tuon wants him to sit in judgment. “mat was not going to order men to be executed, and that was that.” okay so then you should sit in judgment and pronounce them innocent rather than avoid jury duty and let other people pronounce them guilty and have them executed? obvious solution here, mat. he complains about elayne and other nobles (gawyn here in this passage) being entitled, yet when HE is given power and privilege that he could potentially use to help others, he does nothing with it. (obviously he’s too busy preparing for the battle to sit in judgment right at this very moment, so that’s fair enough, but his objection IS that he doesn’t want to execute people rather than that he has more pressing duties right now.)

we get 2 little nuggets of the mat-gawyn interactions i’d hoped for in the previous book and didn’t get and i’m delighted!!! “gawyn trakand was apparently practicing to be an aes sedai sometime, because he kept giving mat glares that would have made moiraine proud.” “‘burn me, first rand, then you [egwene]. is everybody going to chivy me about these days? gawyn, you want a turn?’ ‘yes, please.’ he sounded eager. ‘shut up,’ mat said.” JDFGJKHKJHJFG that’s one of my top 10 interactions in the book so far, why did it make me laugh so hard!! could’ve been even better if mat had married elayne and he and gawyn were now annoyed brothers-in-law!

“he could feel something pulling on him, tugging him northward. rand would need him soon.” “he narrowed his eye. rand was tugging on him.” one more cauthor ta’veren pull instance for the road!

“this is it, egwene. take a deep breath, a last pull on the brandy, or burn your final pinch of tabac. have a good look at the ground before you, as it’s soon going to be covered in blood. in an hour, we’ll be in the thick of it. the light watch over us all.” dun dun duuuuuuuun!!!! and the next chapter, titled “the last battle,” is TWO HUNDRED PAGES so i’m calling it a day for this recap.