#fanart wise there’s so many i can’t remember

[padfootastic]

☼ - appearance headcanon, so basically i wanted to ask- what do you think sirius looks like? do you have any fancasts for him or fanart that you think looks like him? what is his style and just overall vibe like?

oooh, i’ve talked about it a bit here and there but lemme give u an itemised list ;)

- pretty darn tall, like well over 6ft. used to slouch during the first few years of hogwarts bc he knew how much it annoyed his parents but as he grew older, stopped doing it & it made him look even more imposing.

- always well dressed. crisp, clean clothes; neatly knitted tie; pressed pants; shined shoes & buckle. even when he’s wearing racy muggle clothes it’s always ‘artfully’ ripped.

- started getting tattoos at a young age (he’s a bit of a masochist) and has a few piercings—lip, nose, ear.

- don’t have a fc myself bc i can’t do faces (tho dani’s is pretty good ngl) i do think his physical features were like—sharp, a bit like porcelain. makes him look a little delicate and a lot dangerous. kept himself mostly clean shaven.

- a lot of jewellery. rings. bracelets, chain necklaces etc. one is the black heir ring, one is a potter family ring that fleamont gave him, and the rest are cheap little trinkets he picked up in the muggle world.

- i think his vibe is very…’dangerous predator stalking gracefully towards you’ bc he’s better than most, knows the fact, and doesn’t try to hide it. it emits this aura of ‘stay away’ that makes most people very hesitant to approach him. (also said this once before, but i get similar vibes from bella hadid, particularly when she’s doing her ramp walk ykno? the straight back and intense gaze that doesn’t stray once?)

- doesn’t get embarrassed easily but when he does, he blushes so fast. (almost always bc of james tho)

From this character headcanon ask game

[bistaxx]

Honestly, knowing this event is (presumably) ending on my birthday is already the best gift I could ever get

[definitelynotshouting]

3am Moldy Martyn Anon Back Again

still rotating hunger au despite the MONUMENTAL EVENTS OCCURRING (as soon as i watch secret life instead of just admiring all the fanart i’m gonna be insane too)

1)

thinking abt the tragedy of current watcher grians existence.

so player grian got eaten, remembers being both the devourer and the devoured, etc etc etc, ship of theseus, we’ve covered that

but also? thinking abt the watcher larva that existed before it became grian.

if it could remember anything from that point, it went from

being cocooned in the not-yet-suffocating love of its caretakers, still so unaware of the scope of its world, taking its first steps, learning how to *be*

to, STRAIGHT TO, DO NOT PASS GO DO NOT COLLECT 200$ NO SNACK BREAKS NO NOTHING, DIRECTLY TO,

knowing far too much. knowing that you’re you, the larval watcher cradled by its caretakers, and also you’re you, the player stolen from his home and friends and everything he’s ever loved by these incomprehensible beings and NOW YOURE ONE OF THEM.

it’s incredibly sad— because there’s no one else for watcher grian to BE, other than grian. The larval watcher hadn’t had a chance to exist before it was someone else. Sure, watcher grian’s got the watcher form and watcher hunger and watcher needs— but there was nothing, really, to differentiate the biology from the watcher that watcher grian was before cannibalizing player grians code.

we are, i think, made up of our memories. There wasn’t enough memories in that larval watcher to be an individual at all, in the face of player grians memories. I wonder if the larval watcher had a name, before grian— did any of the watchers care about it, beyond a being a means of continuing a dying species? or was it always meant to be exploited?

think it would be mad interesting to see that angle as well. yes watcher grian and player grian are, functionally, the same person, just with differing amounts of trauma. But how empty did the larval watcher have to be in order for grian, memory wise, to be the same person?

Like, the question was raised and answered earlier, abt the differences between the player and the watcher grian being a ship of theseus question for both the characters and the readers, and like i said before—

who else is there for watcher grian *to be*????

it’s horrifying to think of the implications of the watchers kidnapping and meddling with the very being of a player. it’s even more horrifying to think they’d be so willing to give up one of their very few and delicate larva to this experiment.

even done in desperation, the willingness to sacrifice a child and irrevocably change them in the name of a nebulous idea they (the child/larva) can’t even understand enough to consent to, is both the most horrifying thing that’s come out of the hunger au and also characterizes the watchers extremely well.

2)

surprise! all that was context for a joke (<- says person haunted by the concept).

aware this isn’t canon but please imagine with me the forever toddler watcher consciousness living in the back of grians head:

grian, starving himself to avoid hurting his friends, going through two death games and maintaining enough of a facade to build some incredible structures: finally. sleep.

toddler watcher living in the back of his head: you got games on your phone? you got candy crush? temple run? doodle jump? You got games? Please? Games?

grian, searching up “lobotomy diy wikihow” on minegoogle: you’re lucky i cant punt you.

call that brain a meat hotel the way it’s— *EXTREMELY LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER*

3)

ever think about how tf the watchers came up with this batshit idea in the first place. like i’m imagining a board room in the void with these solar shrimp/centipede lookin mfers in a suit and tie (the pants are either one big pencil skirt or many formal looking leg warmers), and mx. [GARBLED TEXT] (DUBBED JAMIE FOR TRANSLATORS CONVENIENCE) stands up after doing a line of void cocaine (like normal cocaine except it glows purple) directly on the boardroom’s void table and says “I HAVE A SOLUTION TO THE POPULATION CRISIS. ITS GONNA KNOCK YOUR SOCKS OFF. ALL 8 MILLION OF THEM. EVERY ONE OF YOU.”

dramatic pause.

“WE FEED THE BABIES PLAYER BRAINS.”

a timid hand raises.

“YES [GARBLED TEXT] (DUBBED SALAXANDER)?”

“sorry but uh isn’t that what we already do???”

“NO. SALAXANDER THATS THE BEAUTY OF IT. WERE GONNA HAVE THEM EAT THE PLAYER BRAIN…. AND THEN BECOME THEM!!!!!! NO MORE PESKY BABY YEARS. ONLY CAPABLE WATCHER”

“jamie if this is about the larvae throwing up on you the last time you watched them im awful sorry about that—“

“DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IT TAKES TO GET REGURGITATED EMOTIONS OUT OF IMPORTED CUSTOM MADE GUCCI???? THE HALF DIGESTED REGRET STAINED THE VIBES FOREVER. AND DONT GET ME STARTED ON WHAT THEY DID TO MY JORDANS— DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH 800 PAIRS OF JORDANS COST?? DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO MAKE PLAYER MONEY LOOKING LIKE THIS?”

a deep breath.

“NO MORE BABY WATCHERS! FUCK THEM KIDS. ”

a cheer echos through the room, a near unanimous agreement.

salaxander looks like xier contemplating reducing the dwindling watcher population by one tonight.

DJCJDJVJFJCJDJX no but damn. jokes aside was player eating the first option or did they try other things? it’s not ultimately important, i think, in the scheme of things, but i do think it would be very funny for player eating to be the FIRST resort. like damn y’all saw half an opportunity and jumped on it like vultures on roadkill.

4) re: docs mystery solution i saw someone mention microwaving grian a bit and yknow that one vine where they’re like “GET ON TOP OF THE FRIDGE. GET UP THERE.” and the person climbing the fridge goes “THIS HOUSE IS A FUCKING NIGHTMARE.”? yeah. grian microwave hours.

or or or

grian, getting the Watcher Brain Rumbles: do not contact me i will be microwaved.

someone: what

cut to deep fried image of grian in the microwave with impact font caption being

“he will b

be microwaved”

yeah okay memes MOSTLY aside having to go meditate in the ATROCIOUS vibes room for 30 minutes every day/couple of days beats starving. i’m imagining walking past this thing with like telepathy feels like a concert having a collective panic attack.

5) speaking of docs mystery solution, while i know the fic is focused on grians healing, i’m having fun thinking about the random watcher that sees this and goes “WE COULDVE BEEN DOING THAT THE WHOLE TIME????????” well not random there’s like 40 left but i have to imagine at least one of them is odd enough to go “OH BOY CARDBOARD? SIGN ME UP” we all know someone who would subsist off of like the irl version of soylent green exclusively so i imagine watchers aren’t that different. i’m assuming it’s jamie for my own amusement.

don’t have to bother feeding the baby watchers anymore just stick em in the Microwave Incubator while they flop around.

It’s not Delivery, It’s Docm77’s Mystery Meal Solution!

also side note re the mystery solution i feel like that’s the equivalent of being Watcher Vegan. don’t have any follow up to that lmfaooooo.

wow i did. not expect this to get this long. thank you for your time and i hope you have a wonderful day!

ps: you got a 🍄 anon? i think i’ve sent like four or five asks in the past week so perhaps picking an identifier is not A Bad idea djcjdjxjdjdj

HELLO 3AM MUSHROOM ANON!!! :D ajdhsjdjd ur absolutely free to take the mushroom emoji, i dont think anyone has that rn!!

godspeed on watching secret life, i have a post-finale fic up on ao3 now to read whenever u want if u desire an extra dose of pain LOLOL gods that ending gutted me. ive been deboned like a fucking trout about it

BUT YEAH FOR THE HUNGER AU THINGS...

1.) you raise a really good and interesting point, in that like-- yeah!! the larva didnt have time to be anyone other than Grian, because it was specifically modified from the start to copy over his memory code. the entire time it cannibalized his code, it was copying over those memories, his personality, his stats. from the start, the moment it hatched inside of him it was collecting that data and rapidly copying it over.

i dont necessarily think it was super aware while it was doing that-- i think that as time went on the awareness grew, but it was cloudy and uncertain, not something he remembers very clearly or was processed well. he remembers emergence, of course, and he remembers Player!Grian dying (and feeding on him as he did), but those hazy days before that?? not much more than sense memory, i think.

i think on the Watchers' parts it was an extremely calculated move that came from sheer desperation, and it wasnt made lightly-- Watcher culture is very community oriented, and children are incredibly valuable when you can only reproduce like. once or twice every year or so. it was a calculated risk, but in all honesty, it was less risky to them in the long term than just trying to raise a juvenile from scratch. a child doesnt really know their own limitations; an adult, however, is much more knowledgeable, and in theory is more willing to listen to them when they say "hey if you mess around too much you WILL die." Grian was selected because he was clever and tricky-- the Watchers needed a Player with a quick mind so they could cut down on the amount of teaching they'd need to do..... but what they didnt account for, bc Players are so alien to them (and vice versa) is that ummm . well !!!! Thats Trauma, Babe™<3

it genuinely did not occur to the Watchers that Grian wouldnt want to stay. or, at least, they just didnt consider the traumatic aspect of all this, or the MASSIVE cultural shock. Player cultural values are way different in many ways to Watcher cultural values!!! it was a blind spot they truly didnt account for, and ultimately that was why Grian was able to escape; they just didnt see the attempt coming.

UHHHHHH other than that like-- i dont think the larva had a name?? like, the Watchers cared, of course they cared, but this was about as blank of a canvas as you can get to stretch Grian's memories over. and something to note here for you that you might find interesting-- you mentioned here the horror of the Watchers changing the code of a child who cant consent, and thats super true, it is horrifying.... from ours, and a Player's, perspectives. Watchers are subject to a very orange and blue morality system as opposed to ours, which i find a very neat dissonance in-- yes, its absolutely horrifying for us to contemplate being changed so thoroughly against our autonomy. but for Watchers, who forcibly changed themselves to avoid getting wiped out by the Seekers, who regularly shift code around like its water... thats just a tuesday. idk i just think thats a neat concept to noodle on, and that it highlights how alien their culture is vs ours (and Players, whom are closer to us in terms of cultural similarities)

2.) something something funnier as a system--💥💥💥💥💥💥

3.) i am utterly obsessed with this image youve concocted of the Watcher boardroom (which also might be a consequence of having JUST spent over 5 hrs straight playing Control with my cousin LMFAO) and also,,,,, void cocaine,,,,,, 😭😭😭😭😭 the implication that this is just a normal Watcher board meeting is so fucking funny to me I CAAANT

i dont think it was the first idea they had, because i think they tried for very many years to hold out the normal way-- but with how fragile Watchers are, especially their juveniles, it just wasnt a viable option. so they started looking elsewhere; another option i think they explored was to see if they could try and modify themselves again, but... like i said, Watchers are fragile. capable of really cool crazy things!!!! but theyre a "made of spun sugar and held together with a packet of chewing gum" type beat of an entity, yknow?? forcing another hardcore evolutionary change Just Like That was WAY too risky to try again-- i think a lot of Watchers just straight up didnt survive that initial change, bc when you're fucking with structural code, you're about one misstep away from collapsing like a house of cards.

so thats why they ended up settling on Player conversion, so to speak. it was a calculated way to try and mitigate the heavy infant mortality rates they suffer due to juvenile watchers not understanding their limits-- being able to just skip years of around-the-clock minding and monitoring to make sure a juvenile doesnt die would buy a lot of time for the rest of the Watcher colony to start expanding their numbers, which could eventually bring them back up to a larger population. what they didnt account for, unfortunately, is that there is a HUGE culture difference, and a Player forced to go through something that traumatic is unmmm mm. not going to wanna stick around<3

4.) im so obsessed with how everyone has latched onto the microwave thing wkndejfnekfj its so funny to me bc like i know what Doc's machine is, i know exactly how it functions, i even know the exact components its made of-- im honestly just keeping it a secret for the sake of my own amusement at this point WHEEEEEEEZE so seeing yall go ham in the microwave jokes and the machine speculation is SO funny to me. i cant wait for yall to see what it actually is like im so excited to see the reaction SJDBEJDNSNSN /gen

5.) you're so right, Grian is the equivalent of a vegan Watcher 😭😭😭😭😭😭 SKDNSNDNNSNDKSS

begging to the gods that my readmore works here because holy shit this is a long one. but thank u for the ask and the questions and i am indeed having a wonderful day!!! i hope you have a great one too :] ❤️❤️❤️

[coffbeanie]

One of my biggest “what if” thoughts for miraculous ladybug is “what if the writers let Nathaniel be another love interest for Marinette even after Evillustrator?”

(I elaborate on this under the cut!!)

Just bc as someone who was in the fandom (and by that I mean I watched the show on YouTube and saw fanart via Pinterest and google images) like before season 2 but after season 1 ended, Nathaniel not only seemed to me like a well liked character, but there was also a good amount of fanart with him and Mari

I feel like he was kinda the go to for people who didn’t quite like him with Adrien (I always wondered why she didn’t just pick him-he seemed just as cute and as nice and he liked her back) and I also see him as that “Luka before Luka” as in he was another guy to ship Mari with, and they’re both kinda emo with the artsy vibe

I say this bc 1. I think it would have been interesting story wise and 2. As someone who was present when Nath as a fairly popular side character it’s sad to see him be neglected by the narrative

1. I’m not saying the writers should have scrapped Luka entirely and replaced him with Nath- obviously not Luka’s important to the story. I also understand that having too many love interests would have been difficult to tackle, but it would have been fun to see Nathaniel go “oh yeah I had a crush on you lmao kinda awkward it’s fine tho i’m trying to move on and I might be into ladybug now” and to them have Mari do a double take and be like “crap maybe I do like you a bit”

Also I think it would have provided interesting development for Mari to have Marc as a romantic rival-characters like Chloe, Lila, and Kagami (at least when she was first introduced) were all kinda put into a bad light, Chloe and Lila cause they were just mean and manipulative respectively, and Kagami cause she first came off as kinda mean and cold, giving Mari enough reason to dislike them and question whether they’re good for Adrien outside of also being jealous, but Marc wouldn’t be like that for Nath-he’s a quiet kid who seems nice enough, and he just writes fanfics, plays soccer, and doesn’t want to be bothered. If liked Nath enough, she would just have to accept that she’s feeling pure jealously cause you can’t really hate him for any other reason, also could have led to fun shenanigans to her trying to justify not liking Marc when she really can’t, she’s just mad cause he’s getting close to Nath

Also cause it would have been interesting to see Mari almost be rejected-maybe it’s just me but I could never really accept Kagami as a romantic rival cause they always portrayed Adrien as almost hesitant to get with Kagami, and his love for Ladybug would triumph over all(yeah they would do Chat getting over Ladybug for an episode it barely lasted) so I couldn’t see them actually being together and having the both of them be happy. Also Chloe and Lila weren’t fit for Adrien just cause they sucked

And for Luka he’s just like still there, and while he knows now that Mari and Adrien are made for each other before he had this “but I’ll still be here waiting for you if you need me :D” vibe

I think Mari being rejected by a character romantically if he was presented as a legit love interest would add more to that “just a normal girl with a normal life” cause we all don’t get what we want and people we like aren’t just going to stay waiting around for us-if Nath clicked with Marc more than he did with her than she would just have to deal with it, and seeing her deal with a still kinda hard (cause rejection is difficult) but realistic situation (something must of could relate to as it doesn’t relate to superhero-ing) would have been refreshing

2. I understand as I’m typing that I’m slightly biased towards Nath (were all the fanarts I saw as a kid really that popular? Or was I just being given Nathaniel centric art caused that’s what I looked up? I can’t remember honestly) but I’m still disappointed with how he was being pushed aside in the show, especially when-the character who would draw his superhero self insert at first denying a miraculous when presented one, and having to share his hero debut with three other people

(Penalteam could have worked if it was more Sabrina centric cause it’s hard to get out of a toxic friendship so yeah she would have gotten her miraculous last, because while getting away from Chloe definitely took her some time, ultimately she was still able to do it and become a hero, and what a better villain for her to fight than a whole bunch of Chloes; Ivan, Marc, and Nath should have gotten their own eps and I stand by this)

Idk as someone who got into the show bc of the Evillustrator episode, it’s just hard to see my fav boi be pushed to the side :((

If you read all the way to the end, thank you and pls share ur thoughts!!! Especially any Nathaniel fans wanna know if anything else has thought of this.

[fortemelody]

Sometimes I wanna send asks but I don't actually know what to ask but.. what's your most interesting and/or controversial Sonic the Hedgehog take? Could be about a specific game or series or about Sonic in general.

LMAO you’re all good, i prob wouldn’t know what to ask myself either

wellll hmmm let’s see, i actually gotta think about this one a bit

i did already go on a whole rant in a different post about how much i hate dulcy the dragon, but i wouldn’t say that’s much of a controversial opinion considering most people don’t know who she is 😭

i don’t have many tbh but i’ll share the few i do have

first off i don’t like sonic x that much and it’s definitely a lot of people’s favorite sonic show. i think there’s a generational difference, seeing as though my fav sonic show is sonic boom 💀 i’ve only seen the first season so like my opinion could very well change if or when i finish it, especially cus i’ve seen clips of later stuff such as shadow and the chaotix being introduced and that seemed cool and a lot more interesting to me compared to the formulaic things i’ve seen so far. i think the argument that sonic is barely in his own show is a decent one too, bro literally never wants to do anything but nap and avoid chris (which i can’t blame him for that part). i personally also just haven’t gotten back into anime in general for several years becus i’m tired of the whole “you gotta wait for it to get better” type thing and i would rather just watch mindless stuff but everyone has their cup of tea and i don’t think it’s an inherently bad show at all either. it can never be as bad as the knuckles show…*shivers*. and ofc animation wise it’s fantastic and super nostalgic.

next hot take is about the song “almost dead” from shadow the hedgehog. it’s one of the most hated songs in the fandom however i LOVE it. i will blast that shit in my headphones thanks to the kind soul who uploaded it to spotify podcasts. the criticism that it doesn’t really match shadows character is valid, and it especially makes sense becus it was also in a horror movie. but as just a song in general my brain goes “ooo funny noises” and doesn’t really think about that part. i’d say the other infamously hated sonic song is sweet dreams from sonic 06 (and while i haven’t listened to it in awhile so i can’t be certain) i remember that song being pretty bad imo so i agree with that part at least

lastly i’m just gonna say that i’m not a fan of the ships sonjet, sonilver, and blazamy. this is not me hating on them at all!! and i have seen super cute fanart of them as well. the only ones i straight up despise are the ones that are illegal (looking at the weird ass sontails shippers on this app…). i just don’t particularly like them becus of either personal headcannons and/or just a gut feeling. with sonic and silver i feel like they have kinda like a sibling or cousin dynamic. for sonjet and blazamy i feel like they haven’t had enough interactions to really warrant a relationship, and i think they would be better off as playful besties. also i just realized that all three of these are gay ships and i really really hope people don’t think i’m homophobic for this especially also becus i spam sonamy on my page GUYSSSS IM A MULTISHIPPER I LOVE SONADOW TOO AND IM FRUITY MYSELF DONT KILL MEEEE 😞😞😞

anywaysss i think that’s all i got! sorry it took me awhile i got busy and forgot to respond but i always enjoy rambling about sonic so tysm mootie 😋😋

[carsonian]

Cap-IM Rec Week: Absolute Faves Monday

@cap-ironman, in no particular order:

"One-Man Army" by Captain_Panda

Takes place immediately after the Chitauri attack in Avengers 1. Steve is running himself into the ground. Tony notices. Then Steve gets knocked down hard. And Tony intervenes.

Mt. Everest. The fic that I've made 20+ fanarts for, the one that's been ricocheting around my noggin since I first read it. Ahh, OMA. You big, bombastic beauty.

"Role of a Lifetime" by Annie D (scaramouche) (@no-gorms)

It’s been almost a year since Tony was rescued from the Ten Rings by SHIELD. In this time, Tony has forged a new path for Stark Industries and taken on a new under-the-radar role as a consultant for SHIELD. Tony’s SHIELD job eventually brings him into contact with the newest Captain America, who’s a pretty cool guy, though for security reasons Tony can’t know his real name or see his face without the Captain America mask. This is also about the time that Tony notices a certain Mr. Stevens, a new hire in SI’s corporate office...

This AU….this AU… I tell ya, THIS AU….this is some high-quality, top-grade, cutting-edge, organically grown, grass-fed, imdb ten of ten, five-star michelin, test-tube perfection, new york bestseller, billboard luster, knockout buster shiz.

"Meso Park" by Captain_Panda

As the head theropod keeper for A.I.M.'s extraordinary new project, Steve Rogers wants a smooth summer opening. Then the unthinkable happens, on the same day the investor of a lifetime arrives, ready to throw his support behind the world's most ambitious theme park. Can Meso Park survive the upheaval? Can Steve? Tune in to this dinosaur-themed adventure inspired by Michael Crichton's classic, Jurassic Park.

I've said it many times before, I'll say it again: if Meso Park has 100 fans, I'm one of em. If Meso Park has 10 fans, I'm one of em. If Meso Park has 1 fan, that fan is me. If Meso Park has 0 fans, I am no longer alive. It's not yet finished and I'm already sure it's the fic of the decade. That's just Meso Park for you.

"Gather Ye Rosebuds" by lazywriter7

It isn’t like that, for many people. For them, love is the point: the axis around which everything else revolves, the destination at the end of a long, tumultuous journey. Realisation, confession, resolution. Happy ending. That’s how it goes. And love was a point in Tony Stark’s journey, except it came towards the beginning, rather than the end. The issue, instead of the solution. He hasn’t been alone on the trip, of course. Steve’s been there: sometimes three steps behind, sometimes waiting up ahead by the turn of the road. They’ve sprinted and stumbled, sometimes stood still and refused to move on ahead, sometimes thought of turning away altogether. Steve and Tony’s story began after they fell in love, and this is about how they fell in everything else.

I read this Way Back When, and I remember thinking I'd never seen such a convincing portrayal of MCU SteveTony and how a genuine relationship between the two of them could emerge while still accounting for (hold your puke) canon. Still rock-solid all the way through; knock against the fic at any point, and it will answer back with a fun two-part joke. Lush stuff.

"The First Time I Went Dancing Sober" by schemingreader

Steve Rogers is a great physical therapist who works with sick kids. Tony Stark is a damaged biotech engineering genius who really wants to be one of the good guys.

I've recc'd this before so I won't blabber on but rest assured it is heartwrenchingly good.

"But Your Spirit is Untainted; I Can Dedicate You Still" by BlossomsintheMist (@blossomsinthemist)

The incursions crisis is over, and Steve and Tony have gotten back together, but nothing is the same as it was. Fearing that things are broken between them forever, Steve asks Tony something unexpected to try to make things right. Or, Steve asks if Tony really meant what he said when he asked Steve to hurt him. Sequel to Might Have Cherished You More Wisely.

I couldn't give less of a FUCK that this isn't technically finished. It is finished, to ME. The character-building in this story is just rich and fleshy and the stuff of true finesse. I read this every once in a while just to have the taste of masterful storytelling on my tongue. You should, too ;)

"Sins of Omission" by Kiyaar (@kiyaar)

A Post-Civil War, Pre-Secret Invasion AU where Steve is dead, Tony's a mess, and everything sucks. In which Tony deals poorly with Steve's death, falls off the wagon, sees ghosts, and misses a lot. Oh, and the Skrulls are about to invade.

When I first came across this fic, I devoured it in about 2 days and proceeded to be devoured by it for the next 2 months. :) Lovely stuff!

"Catechism" by manic_intent (@manic-intent)

Inspired by fanart seen on tumblr, this is an End of Days story, with all the Avengers as Archangels. Tony had always known that he was a special snowflake. He just hadn't realized exactly how special.

Listen. I'm a simple gal. This ticks off all the boxes, uh-hello!

"not gruesome, just human" by isozyme (@isozyme)

“I need to crash on someone’s couch for a while. Your couch. I need to crash on your couch,” Tony says. Steve’s mouth opens. If he asks why Tony’s going to bolt, he can feel the certainty of it under his sternum. He doesn’t have a sternum anymore, just a tangle of metal under his skin. Too many things have punched through it to get to his heart. There hasn’t been enough bone left to reconstruct anything made of flesh in a long time. “There’s borscht on the stove,” Steve says.

Raw. Punchy. Kind of makes me want to weep. Kind of makes me smile. Lotsa stuff that you can only write about when you've been down and which after reading will lift you right back up.

And I'll stop myself there because I could definitely just go on and on and on.

Go forth: SteveTony lovers, fuckers, ambassadors, champions, perverts, freaks, losers, dreamers, legends! Read, re-read, kudo, comment, spread legs and spread love.

[lemonsrosesandlavender]

There were so many fanfic questions I wanted to ask!!😩 and my brain is so small I can’t remember number!

I think I wanted to know… 22, 31, 40, and one about what you hate to see in smut which I’ve forgotten the number of please 😁!

Ahhhhhh thank you Jessica <3 So much writing, it's going below the cut!

22. Are there certain types of writing you won’t do? (style, pov, genre, tropes, etc)

Mmmmm! That's such an interesting question. At this point, I've written fanfic in 2nd and 3rd person, and am toying with original novel stuff in 1st so... any POV is a good POV ;) And genre-wise, I'd hate to limit myself. I haven't written any mystery thrillers, but what if I suddenly had an idea I was itching to write?!

Trope-wise... we've got enough f!damsel in distress saved by a man in the world already. And bad boys turned good by the purifying love of a sweet woman. Non.

(I was also about to say I hate the "someone's video goes viral" trope that's in so much media nowadays, but I would actually love to read or write a thoughtful version of that where the virality is believable and the consequences are actually considered and extend beyond "wow the MC is even MORE the centre of attention right now!")

31. Do you start with the characters or the plot when writing?

For non-OC-centric fic: I've already got the characters, so then they drive the plot.

For OC-centric fic: broad starting point of narrative ("Good-aligned Tav romances Rolan during BG3", "OC isekai'd into BG3", "Rolan pledges himself to hot queen") then gives rises to "what kind of character would work in this story? what character growth might be spurred by the inciting incident?" gives rise to the actual fleshed-out plot and story. So... never one without the other ;)

40. If someone were to make fanart of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see?

Answered in forgetmemaybe's ask! <3 But um. Mostly big romantic moments b/c I'm a cheeseball (and smut because I'm a horndog. A horndog with cheese on?!)

63. Something you hate to see in smut.

OK, well, you all know my feelings about dominant men at this point, lmao. I'm just... really tired of the fact that men get to be dominant by default, whereas I feel like people have to be convinced that any particular man could be submissive or any particular woman dominant (unless she literally wears leather all day and is the most stereotypical domme to ever dominate). I used to feel I was more on the submissive side, but it's hard to disentangle that from the fact that kinkiness that for a woman especially is most acceptably channelled into submission. These days, submission to a man gives me the ick, and to anyone else leaves me rather "eh". (Also spare a thought for all the lovely subby men out there who are constantly the butt of the joke, and not in a sexy way. Submissiveness is not contrary to being a man).

(All this is said with a firm "everyone should write what they like", of course; I just steer clear of dom!m/sub!f, and skip over those scenes if I'm reading a fic I otherwise like. I'm absolutely sick to the back teeth of men thinking they know best - there's enough sexist crap irl - and I don't have any interest in fantasies that echo that.)

On a different note - safe sex. I'm mostly joking here, but I just don't give a fuck about whether these characters got STI tested/are wearing condoms/implemented a full BDSM check in with safe words (you know, if you're not doing pre-agreed CNC then "no" and "stop" must be respected anyway, right?! An additional safe word is an option, but not a necessity). Pleaaaasseeeee why must this sex scene grind to a halt for a lecture on safe sex?! I'm a grown woman who's been fucking for a decade. I don't need this!

The only time I'm fine with it is when it's actually important to the plot/characterisation, or risky sex when partners know they shouldn't be doing this bareback but they're just! too! desperate! But then I like that we're bringing it up JUST to turn up the heat.

[fleur1005]

YiZhan Fandom Interview with Renren !!

Preface:

In my attempt to sort out all the massive information that is generated almost daily in the BJYX fandom, I came up with an idea to interview prominent 🐢 for pointers, recommendations and advice as kind of a starter compilation kit for newbies.

Also, my intent is to provide some translations of the interviews (if you’re also interested in translating, let me know thru’ my twt acc below) for international fans and contribute my grain of salt to thin the language barriers and get to know more fans or simply, know your fave person in fandom.

With that being said, this is my first interview, so any constructive FB is welcome!

-::-::-::-

Thanks so very much for accepting my first ever interview, Renren 🙏

So, the first question is kind of a mandatory introduction.

Q. Please, tell us a bit about yourself. How you like to be called or how do you go by in this fandom and how long you’ve been in the swamp?

I’m Renren, but most folks call me Ren. I’m a fic writer and a szd shipper (which for new folks means I believe they’re actually in a relationship, this is also called being a tinhat lol).

I watched The Untamed in January 2021, and then watched the official BTS, and saw a shipper in the comments and was like “huh, people ship real people?” I was no stranger to shipping fictional characters (I’ve written Reylo before), but RPS was brand new to me. But the more I watched of the BTS and then the unofficial BTS, I was like, oh yeah, there’s something here. The cave BTS sealed it for me.

So, I’ve been in the pit since January/February 2021. I lurked for a long time, then joined fandom more actively in the fall of 2021, and started writing and released my first Yizhan fic in Jan 2022.

This is your first RPS? Wow, how cool is that? To debut with such a power couple! ☺️

Q. When you were a lurker, which SNS did you mostly use?

Which leads to the next question…

Q. Where are you most active/ favorite place to dabble in fandom-wise?

I lurked on tumblr mostly, and read Twitter without an account. I didn’t make one until August, and I don’t think I used it to post until September/October 2021.

I’m active most on Twitter, with Tumblr set up as my backup to Twitter.(@renren85105)

I’m also on AO3 as TheDevilandMrsRen.

Tumblr

By the way, you have very distinct profile pic (wyb with an octopus plushie on his head!). Did you always use it?? Is there a reason why you chose that? 🤭

I think I had a different one when I signed up, but I can’t remember it - I chose it because I like tentacles lol

As in a fic trope/kink? or something else? 😆

Both lol, I’ve always loved octopuses, I think they’re darling, but I also enjoy tentacles as a trope.

We’ll come to that later~~! There’s a question regarding that afterwards.

Q. What was your first drive/motivation to start writing about them? Would you share a link to your first fic?

It was Xiao Zhan’s lightsaber video!!! I had this idea for a Star Wars AU with the two of them, and it took me over body and soul and I finally had to write it. The first story I posted though was the first Golden Girls AU,

then the Star Wars AU came out a month later.

By the way, you guys have to go read Renren’s Golden Girls AU cos I can assure you, you are going to enjoy it SO much, if you haven’t already!!

So on to the next one!

Q. How many fics have you written so far? Which one is the one that you’re most fond of and why?

I’ve written 15 Yizhan fics so far, and drawn 10 mushroom fanarts! I’m not sure I can pick a favorite, but it’s between “Fireworks in the Stars” because it’s an original concept that I’ve been playing with for years and want to eventually write a full original novel with it, and “Houseboat of Love”, because I had so much fun with the exes-to-lovers concept. It was a bit angsty but I also wanted it to be a fun time with Xiao Zhan thirsting hard for his not-actually-ex-husband.

But I love everything I’ve published, if I don’t love it, I don’t release it.

I had totally missed that Renren’s mushroom posts are fanarts! I had to rush to see them and they are all SOSOSO Adorable, with capital A! The puns are sublime. I loved them all to bits and she has confirmed there’s more to come in the future!! Be on the look out, you guys!! 🥹🥹

Q. What’s your favorite trope to write/draw or a new one that want to try this year?

Oh, that’s hard! Because it’s different from my favorite tropes to read.

I really like to write getting together stories, especially if there is only one bed/they’re stuck together in some way.

But this is the year I’ll finally write tentacles, which is actually so much harder than I thought because a) I want to do it justice since I love it so much and b) there is SO MUCH choreography involved with all the extra limbs. You Belong in My Arms is my tentacle WIP, with chapter one out. Chapter one just has a cute octopus and tentacle kink, but no actual use of tentacles in a sexy way.

I will just restrain myself to say that Renren’s octopus is so cute like an underwater jianguo. I am hopelessly hooked to her fic that am anxiously looking forward to new chapters! But I digress…

Q. Are you bjyx, zsww or lsfy? Is this dynamic important to you when writing? (Or reading?)

So I am a bjyx-leaning lsfy. I enjoy reading everything, but I prefer writing bjyx or Yibo top lsfy.

That sounds like it’s the same thing, but the power dynamics are different between them (bjyx Yibo is IN CHARGE while it’s much more neutral in lsfy).

You mean like, Yibo makes the move? Or that he decides how he wants XZ?

Yeah, in BJYX makes most of the decisions, he’s very dominant in the bedroom and outside of it.

I like strong Yibo, indeed 😏

Q. What’s your most fave 🍬? Have you written about it? Where do you get most of your 🍬 sources?

My most favorite candy is the tattoo cpn! I have used it, most literally in an unreleased work, but I love to give both of them tattoos in my works anytime I can.

My candy sources are from Twitter (overthinkingthis, ecah, shirasagis, ventus for older candies) and tumblr (accio-victuuri), and I avoid folks sharing stalker footage or making wild claims like they know someone in the business or disparage their co-stars, because it’s harmful to the boys & just flat out rude.

I think for us newbies, we need to be careful and prudent on that and not fall for everything we see or outright edited (fake) info, cos it’s becoming harder to distinguish 😵‍ (out of my own experience)

So, the next question is selective, you can choose either or both…

A) Did you read THE fic? The controversial 22/7 one? How did you like it? How would you end it?

AND/OR

B) Do you wanna talk about wyb’s latest NYG’s LtS performance?

A) I didn’t. I didn’t even go looking for it, it has so many emotions and events attached to it, I think it’s best to just let it rest. No judgment for folks who decide to read it, though! Just my opinion.

B) Yes I do!! it was gorgeous and emotional, all about the yearning and longing you feel when you’re away from your partner and the bright warmth you feel when you’re back with them. It felt real, like he was pulling it from the depths of his soul.

It’s raw and vulnerable, and he did such a good job, I’m so proud of him! (And no, I don’t think it’s a breakup song or born from anything other than long distance relationships being hard.)

That performance was so heartfelt indeed 🥲

Q. Who is a content creator (writer, artist, v/blogger… etc) you would rec to a newbie? (Name as many as you wish) And lastly, a piece of advice for newbie 🐢!

Oh gosh, so many people! It’s hard to not just list all of my friends lol.

OldObsess/Overthinkingthis is a fantastic writer and candy librarian, her fics have great footnotes with all the different things she references in her fics.

Elisamiao is another amazing writer and she is so supportive of new writers in the fandom. I call her the fandom’s librarian because she is fantastic at fic recommendations, and can find what you’re looking for so fast!

Jalpari runs great events, and is a prolific writer, her Yizhan Through the Years is the first/second most kudos’d fic in the fandom. She is also very supportive of new authors/artists in the fandom!

BJYXObsessed is hilarious, her fics are so good and her meme threads are laugh out loud funny, I see them all over the place as reaction memes.

Bjyxnoa is a great update account on Twitter, and for deep cpn and candy discussions I like to go to Accio-victuuri on tumblr.

A piece of advice I have for new turtles is to not worry too much about proof of their relationship. They don’t have to prove anything to us, and each person has to decide for themselves how to interpret the things they do tell us. Everyone has their own “realness” comfort level, and that’s okay! It’s okay to be 100% szd and it’s okay to not be!

Lastly, their privacy is extremely important. Stalker footage is wrong, even if it “proves” what you want to see.

And don’t break the fourth wall with them, for example, if Yibo makes another Instagram post, don’t flood the comments with shipper comments, their social accounts are for work, and so we should keep our comments to the individual and the work they’re doing.

END

-::-::-::-

I can’t thank Renren enough for accepting my offer and come on board with this wee project of mine, and especially her wise words of advice 🙏🙏🙏

It’s a great reminder to all of us 🐢 that we ought to keep in mind and keep our recklessness in check. If we really love and support them, we must first respect their individual works.

And that’s it for today, folks! Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it.

You can find me on twt @fleur_1005 for suggestions and/or comments!

[nickfoo]

Hullo!

Was just wondering: do you by chance have your OCs listed out anywhere, like Toyhou.se? And are you okay with fanart? You've been an artistic inspiration to me for a long while and wanted to take a stab at your babs. Ty, hope you're hanging in there. : )

First off, anyone who’s been around long enough to remember I have OCs - you are lovely. Whenever someone brings them up it’s the equivalent of someone randomly giving me flowers and I unfortunately can only stand there and apologize because I’ve been letting my OCs collect dust in the attic for many years.

I’m sorry I can’t really point you in a good direction because, sadly, by now I feel their old designs aren’t up to date and need some sprucing up to match my current art style and tastes. I’m very ok with fan art and people asking about them, absolutely, but I just don’t have anything updated to give the lovely people who are interested.

So I’ll add that onto my list of projects. To update these guys because I do still love them and I think they deserve to be dusted off. Anything art wise these days is slower than usual due to a good amount my time and energy also going to school, but I’ll try to make it something I’ll chip at along with other projects. Thank you for expressing any interest at all in my OCs and being around for so long. You do my heart good. 💛

[just-my-latest-hyperfixation]

I nEvEr GeT aSk GaMe StUfF

✨🦋🌿🎀💝💥💎💌

Geee, alright already! 🤣🤣🤣

✨What's a fic you've posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

Okay, first things first, I'm pretty satisfied with how all of my fics have been perceived so far, so I can't really complain. 

That being said: Someone who cares is doing significantly less good than Hic sunt dracones, statistics-wise. It is my own emotional support fic and incredibly close to my heart, so I really am delighted about every positive comment I get about it. 

🦋what are you most insecure about when you post a fic?

Erm, everything? Can I say everything? 🤣

I'm literally a nervous wreck after posting, anxiously hitting F5 and waiting for feedback, mind in a constant loop of self-doubt.

What if my characterization is off?

What if the premise sucks?

What if my readers don't like the direction I'm taking the story? 

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!! 

🌿how does creating make you feel?

So many things!!! 

For one thing, it scratches the brain itch. I’ve always had to create things, as far back as I remember. When I was a kid, my parents could stick me in a corner with some paper and scissors and crayons and glue and wouldn’t hear from me for hours. 

Even during the 15 years that I didn’t write, I always had to be doing something creative. Knitting, painting, drawing, photographing, you name it. It’s an urge that I need to fulfill and I get crabby if I can’t. 

Seeing the end results makes me feel insanely proud and accomplished. It may not be perfect, but I made that! I sunk my teeth into it and saw it through and made this wonderful thing that I love. 

🎀give yourself a compliment about your own writing

How dare you make me say nice things about myself?! 

Okay … I guess my writing does something to other people that makes them want to create their own stuff. People have repeatedly told me that reading my fics kickstarted their own imagination into creating stories or art of their own. And every time that happens, I get so incredibly happy because that is like a god-tier compliment right there! That somebody found my writing so engaging that it made their brain spin off on a tangent and they created something out of it! 

💝what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

Dragons! Dragons dragons dragons dragoooooons!!!! 

The feedback I am getting for this fic just won’t stop blowing my mind, seriously, and every time I think it’s done, you guys hit me in right in the feels again with your gorgeous comments and rec lists mentions and fucking FANART! I am incredibly happy and humbled and awed that people are loving it so much! 

💥find your least kudos'd fic - say something wonderful about it.

That would be Someone like you, which is a little bonus story to Someone who cares. It's a purely self-indulgent little one-shot featuring married Steddie and a baby. This universe is my emotional support AU and I loved visiting the boys again. 💕

💎why is writing important to you?

Wow, where to start? 

Because it's incredibly fun and allows me to completely immerse myself in the story I'm creating. Because I get to be self-indulgent and spoil myself and make the story exactly like I want it to be. 

And because I have met so many amazing, creative, lovely ppl through it over the past few months, who bring me joy and make me smile every single day.

I honestly don't know how I could ever go without it for so long! 

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

Okay, so I'm still firmly stuck on the demon!Eddie brainworm and fully planning on turning it into a chaptered fic. I'm still figuring out a lot of the specifics, but I've already got some nice twists and details planned. There'll be demon besties Eddie and Chrissy, a nice side of Buckingham, lots of smutty goodness, Dustin running a mystery YouTube channel and so much more, it will be glorious! 

[namelessmewmew]

[Image ID: Shown is a very rough simple drawing of an anthro demon character with Super Mario rainbow power effect applied to them. There are various blocks of text visible. First is "what a guy that watched the owl house finale and the [new] super mario bros movie back to back looks like". Second is "its 1:30am as I make this". Third is "feeling very emotion at the same time, also rainbow power, prepare for incomprehensible rambling.". END ID]

Large rambling wall of text ahead, that also has 10 million typos and errors.

Title:  Dude

massive spoilers for The Owl House Finale and for the Super Mario Bros Movie!! [Also probably 1239348 typos]Super Mario Bros Movie rambling:As a guy that cares way more about Mario lore then any human being should, I have thoughts about what this movie did lore wise [some negative, some positive] [as in I care about what a Goombrat is, or that I like to pretend the koopalings are bowsers adopted kids].My first gaming experience ever was new super mario bros on a friends wii when I was 5, the first game I owned was also new super mario bros wii when I was 6. I still distinctly remember saving up to get both Super Mario Galaxy 1 and Super Mario Galaxy 2 when I was 6-7 [My favourite games of all time!]. Mario is just something that means just an unexplainable amount to me. [as well for other reasons that are a bit personal for a 2amish ramble]Good things I liked: [in no particular order]Things like giving mario and luigi a family [so they feel less like they just popped out of the ground, also again i care to much about lore and this gives alot of lore and fanart ideas], making peach not be the one that needs saving this time [and making her very capable with fighting!], just the fact their was a luma in this movie at all [I love lumas!], peach making a super mario galaxy reference in the fire flower meadow scene?, super mario galaxy music partially in the credits, bowser not knowing what the spinyes are called cause they are alot less well known than a koopa or a goomba, rainbow road appearance! [its my favourite mario kart track], just the design of the mushroom kingdom as a whole! its my favourite ver of it I have seen, king boo appearance at the wedding! [hes my mario kart main but they made him look very weird], bowsers really cool combination airship/castle!, just the wide range of mario enemies - hammer bros - slegdehammer bros - spiky shell koopas! - and so forth, the blue shell but it has wings like its older versions!, the Mario Kart 8 anti-gravity!, the bonzai bill!, mario and luigi using the rainbow power together to depend bowser!, cat mario!!!!, Pauline cameo!, I recognized so many objects and some areas/levels [sand kingdom, new super mario bros canon, the 1-1 scene reaction near the beginning and so on], toads personality, the music as a whole [it was mostly just mario music that existed already but arranged differently so I don't think they could of messed that up, I also loved take me on.]Bad things I didn't like: [in no particular order]There was alot less luigi than I expected, crisp rat as mario of course [as a queer mario fan], basically the fact that they combined an origin story with tiny bits of super mario odyssey. [I understand it slightly as odyssey is the most recent big mario game and I can't imagine them not making this movie a origin story but still it confuses me greatly, like the marriage plot, the sand kingdom, the lochlady dress but then the rest is its own thing.], some of the humour  aka the predictable illumination humour that felt very out of place in a mario related thing [like the aggressive dog or mario getting throw around, he feels alot more like a generic male movie protag than mario honestly, though glad they kept the persistence part of his character.], where was my son bowser junior??? or did I just miss him??, kooplaings??? [though I read somewhere that apparently the piano bowser plays has ludwigs name on it??], I never like it when evil characters are described as psycho, The penguins also mattered alot less than I thought, I both hate and love donkey kong's and marios dynamic it feels a bit generic but its also fun to have them as frenemies, I thought their would be more yoshi but still glad they made an appearance.  I don't want their to be sequel really but that post credit scene hits at something, idk what though,the pacing felt completely off - some things that I felt should of been shorter were longer and so on, maybe it's cause I haven't never experiences a mario story that's less than 2 hours. Their are some things [like the actor choices and the illumination humour/ slight genericness to the characters personalities] that were obviously for people that aren't really mario fans, but this movie really had alot of things that only like big mario fans would notice and appreciate and I was not expecting that at all. Also again wasn't expecting so much game mario music. Thought it would be the original 1-1 and that's it.The Owl House finale rambling:The Owl House is a more recent love of mine than Super Mario but it's still something that means alot to me, Of course part being with how queer it is and particularly the first big thing I have encountered with multiple nonbinary characters [Raine, Masha and The Collector!] gives me hope as a nonbinary person that yes stories with numerous trans/nonbinary characters [ that respects them] can reach television and if snubbed near the end can still reach a ending. [instead of just stop completely without an ending] As well as it's the first time I ever seen an nonbinary or bisexual flag in a mainstream cartoon on television. All these things are things I thought I would have to wait years for something like to be possible. I'm glad the owl house happened but I will miss it dearly. It is and was a big inspiration for me to create media and stories that are just queer as hell.Good things I liked: [in no particular order]This episode felt like it had better pacing and flow than previous and I wasn't left feeling like things were happening to quickly or slowly, the collector getting redeemed [win for the he/theys (lighthearted)], luz getting a cool powered form and finally killing belos with eda, king and raine! [another win for the enbys (lighthearted again)], seeing king's dad!, I am just so so so glad we were able to get a timeskip.[I love timeskips!!!!! I love seeing the characters happy after the story!], so many cools bits of animation in this ep - which makes sense as its the finale of the series as a whole, the bye with everyone at the end - legit started sopping my eyes out, just all the moments between luz, eda and king.Bad things I didn't like: [in no particular order]Only bad things I have to say is that the full force of angry towards Disney for cancelling this and forcing the team to cram the last bit of the story into three episodes is really starting to settle within me [I was feeling it before but now that it is setting in thats its over, oooo boy.] 2 rats causing issues, huh?

[6blackfilin9]

I love your Anko fanart! Tell me, what are your views/headcannons on Anko X Kazuku?

hThank you so much for the ask, finally I can answer it

here is my big thank you for the waitng

In a nutshell, the shipp was created by accident while me and my buddy were working on our first Naruto AU in 2019, where Kakuzu and Deidara survived their shitty plotholes end eventually ended up in Konoha

Yeah

so, the shipp’s birth date is july the 1, 2019

anything like classy, aristocracy kind of tension-filled passionate gothic romance with playful, psychological games & hurt/comfort vibes with slight scent of rivalry is KakuAnko

Basically, they are: a very, very old man with absolutely horrendous background who’s trying to finally have his mother*cking 10 or 30 years of peace, and a rather young lady with a rocky youth who’s being good & noble yet has very strong antihero tendencies

You know, I think they do have potential, since, in fact, they seem to be very similar, at the core

They are both very pragmatic realists, the people of logic and reason, yet if Kakuzu’s irritability doesn’t affect him a tiny bit due to his ideal self-control, Anko’s can lead her to quite bad places, sometimes. They put their interests in the first place, and even though she tries to attach them to Konoha’s, she still has ‘personal’ things (I’ll write ‘bout it lower*). Their mindsets are so complicatedly organized that, at some point & way, it prevents them from having many close people, and makes them very hard to see through and predict

Both of them are very flexible & adaptive, independent individuals with similar outlooks on plenty of things and high intellectual level. They clearly can find plenty of traits that they would highly respect and adore in each other

Here I will speak mostly for “why and how” kind of things, bc both of them are terribly tricky to accurately figure out. But there will be some headcanons too

So, there are still some odds about them, due to the strong difference in their occupation, like, in plenty of cases they are really tricky to be brought together, because:

- Of the job

In original, Anko is a Konoha’s special jounin, and she is very dedicated to serving the country. Independently of whether she likes her job or not (depends on the plot), she orienteers at the people, at society’s gain from her work. So, accordingly, in any other AU her job is somehow connected to civil service, whether it’s something police-like, connected to science, or something like CCG in Tokyo Ghoul

Kakuzu, on the other hand, is a hitman and a persona non grata in literally all the five big countries, Konoha too (which makes it barely possible to bring them together in the original universe without hard complications or heavy drama. But still possible). He orienteers on his own gain alone, but, depending on the job, it can include others’ gain, too.

This detail makes him a saint once he holds supervising position in some company or any high position in the government (the better the working conditions of the staff now- the more money in the prospective), and the sheer nightmare once he has it on the opposite side of the law. Him as a mob boss is a complete different topic for discussion, but to get the point, in this case, the trouble isn’t him increasing the level of criminality (its rather vice-versa), but taking hold of too much control in the high and underground structures. Even as an ordinary hitman he’s rather tricky, since everything depends on the case

In most of the stories, they come to some sort of compromise, and how hard it is to reach it depends on how shitty his job is and how attached they are to each other at the moment

Like, in the above mentioned Shippuden AU and Harry Potter AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) everything went like clockwork, because there they are both more or less on this side of the law, in Tokyo Ghoul AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) it is a bit more complicated, with her being in-law and him being very much outlaw, in the Avatar AU (which I also figured out with my buddy, but we never happened to write it) it is also pretty smooth, with both of them being outlaws and then jumping out to the glory after all the shit is done, but in another Shippuden AU of mine, this all would be just a motherfucking bloody disaster

- Kakuzu is actually a hard nut to get attached to anyone

He lived too long to be truly afraid of anything, though. Its mostly because he doesn’t really need to get attached to or become close with someone to satisfy his need for communication. The man can get along with anyone once he wishes to, he can have countless acquaintances and plenty of buddies, but he doesn’t have many comrades and barely can call anyone a friend. Because he is used to lose everything and everyone he ever had or happened to have, because of his inhumanly lengthened lifespan.

It requires time for him to get used to the person, and then, eventually, in some cases, spend plenty of it to get attached

Plus, for him, due to his profession, each close connection is a really great responsibility for him. In most cases, he’d think twice of weather he is ready to take it or not

Though it of course has the personal factor, too

In Anko’s case, she has a grand privilege by being a very intelligent and keen woman, not just in cognitive plane, but in emotional, too. High emotional intellect is actually a rare trait, so she automatically stands out of the crowd for him. Even though it won’t guarantee his alliance, it will grant her his high respect and some sort of sympathy

- Kakuzu is, technically, an asshole

He does have his moral compass, which includes a great amount of common social morality, but he also has that “I am working” state

Even though Kakusu has a set of professional principles, and he still acts accordingly to what he thinks is right, one and the very same situation can be solved diametrically different once the context changes from working to casual and vice versa

This, and him being very independent and quite antisocial, makes the degree of assholeness depend on various factors

This can lead to major conflicts of interests, and if they are possible to have any compromise or not is strongly attached to the circumstances. After all, both are very, very prideful and dignified people

- In other words, the only major issue for them would be morality questions. It’s possible to make the case acceptable for Anko, since both of them ain’t truly squeaky clean, along with Kakuzu being willing enough to watch his borders

- She is provident and doesn’t really need a lot of money on a daily basis, which is much of a joy to him lol

- *they both seek for the stable ground, first of all

Taking in consideration the life conditions Kakuzu had in his youth (despite war state, he still stably had family, friends, grand respect from everyone, home, warmth and food) and how terribly he was torn out of his secured social environment, I believe what he seeks through all his bounty hunt and other money-connected manipulations is stability. Sustainability he had back then. The only way to have it in the conditions of our existent world order is to have money (and a very good mind and luck)

Anko has indeed much more altruistic motives, yet it’s still not that simple. It seems to be, on the first sight, yet considering the “Orochimaru related cases” and her very wayward behavior toward them, it’s clear she keeps her own motives and needs in mind oh so well. The service she has is very well payed, it allows her to do what she likes or believes is right, and to have the living conditions she finds comfortable. And only here, relying on the made sustainable basis, she does what she does

- Thus, they both illustrate the principle “first help yourself, next help the other” just right

- She knows she can keep an eye on him, yet it’s clear for her that her influence isn’t borderless, as well as telling him off some stuff is kind of a not wise thing to do. So in the majority of cases, she never interferes

- This is not common, yet he can actually change some plans if the situation is serious and the compromise can’t be found. He is that kind of person who works on a further prospective, and in this context, this would be the relationship with his loved one

- While Kakuzu is quite conflicted and has very reserved controversial persona, Anko is both controversial, conflicted, and sort of two-faced, on top of that

She is a very sincere, cheerful and humbly honest human being, yet she has some darker natural traits of her character that became rather strong with age and traumatic experience. Cunningness, guile, ways-depend-on-the-case and a bit of ruthlessness, that is. Moreover, she has some unsolved personal issues, which makes her even more twisted.

Like, remember the time when she confronted Orochimaru during the exam? And Kabuto, on the war? Getting rid of them is indeed beneficial for Konoha, but it’s clear that for her it is personal vendetta in the first place. She wouldn’t have tried to do this alone, otherwise, because these two are rather dangerous ones, to say the least.

She uses greater good to cover her real motives (even though it is not truly complete bullshit), and seems to have a terrible habit to keep silence about really important things, which makes her quite prone to lying, in some cases

And sometimes it very badly pisses Kakuzu off, since it makes her prone to doing useless but dangerous shit too

Yet this not any kind of separate hidden side, it is integrated into her personality, and coexists with her bright one. That’s where her violent humour comes from, for example.

But Kakuzu, on the other side, is completely monolith individual, yet sometimes his mindset can create contradictions when it comes to something important to him. but it's another topic

And seeing these layered constructions, and motives, they can pretty finely predict each other’s behavior. Not super-neatly, but they for sure see the basis. This is what helps Kakuzu to prevent Anko from doing some stupid shit, sometimes

- Anko has a role of an indicator for the people who don’t understand and see the changes in Kakuzu’s mood sometimes, since she usually reacts quite openly. Yet, when she has the same unreadable mask of cold, or one of guile, it’s a nightmare for them

- They prefer the non-verbal way to show their feelings, even though Anko is obviously the more chatty one

- They don’t say things such as “I love you”, or other sensual stuff like that really often, believing it to be some sort of cherished words that shall not be spelled mindlessly

- Anko isn’t majorly into PDA, but she fancies it much more than Kakuzu does. She has her whole moments of studying something with her hands, whether it’s a hand, scar or face. He’s more into passive display of affection, like wrapping an arm over her waist or leaning to her or something of this kind; they can allow themselves to (not sexually) kiss in public though

- She knows he doesn’t like to walk hand in hand due to considering it a youthful thing, so there are times when she intentionally walks holding on to his sleeve; generally they walk separately in order not to bother each other, but sometimes they walk arm in arm (like an old Victorian couple lol)

- Being older and wiser, Kakuzu eventually upholds some kind of mentoring position, yet he never considers himself any kind of a teacher or master to Anko, believing her to have a good head of her own. He is just insightful enough to break something through to her or give a word of advise

- This, combined with his highly powerful demeanor, also makes him have the leading position in their relationship

- Anko respects him much enough to fortify this, entrusting with plenty of life questions (like organizing the family budget), even though they make the majority of decisions together. Mostly because he is truly wise and highly experienced individual.

- This makes him one of the very few people Anko would actually listen to and take their opinion in consideration

- So basically they have equal relationship with some tendency to patriarchal order

- And it is, really, mostly economically-based disbalance, with him earning much more than she does

- Yet they never have any financial-based issues, since both of them keep in mind and respect the contributions of each

- There is major power play here, too. He has the absolute might, she has seduction. Anko loves how he makes her want to submit to him, let him have all the power, so she likes provoking him. And she knows he adores it, loves the subtle control she has over him

- They don’t have conflicts in their everyday life. Each knows how to avoid pissing one another off

- He cherishes her playful demeanor, her intellect. Combined with her cunningness, it allows her to rival him, in social sphere. The way she constructs her phrases, the way she speaks, mimics, moves, how bewitchingly it suits her feminine snaky features makes his blood boil and heart melt

- Both of them, actually, have rather specific kind of dry, dark humour. Kakuzu’s is very cynical, satirical, quite often menacing and subtly demeaning; Anko’s is very sarcastic and quite dirty, even gruesome and rather violent

- Sometimes they “fight” verbally as a form of a play. In some circumstances they may sound pretty vile, so some unobservant people mistake this for display of hate

- In general, Anko is the one to heat things up with her playful demeanor, which can include provocation and rivalry, and Kakuzu is the one to keep this energy in borders, accumulating it up to much more intense states

- They both put the comfort in the first place when it comes to household. Everything must be cozy, useful, silent and super clean

- Yet they are both very unpretentious and modest, really

- She absolutely adores when he is showing his serious, severe side, or powerful demeanor. She finds it incredibly suitable for him. She also likes how his real age is sliding out in this or that way. Like, even though he has rather young face (that of 37-40 y.o.), his eyes give away that he’ve seen oh so much more than it seems; the grumpy noises and grunts he makes, the lazy attitude in movements and the way how rapidly he finds a comfy pose once he has a chance to take a seat

- They are both rather patriotic, yet while in the most stories Anko’s feelings mostly lay towards the country she lives in, Kakuzu’s more often lay towards some places, so called small motherland.

- Kakuzu actually could be a source of deep, strong admiration and delight for her, despite all of his bullshit. The unbreakable will he has, mighty burning heart, all the wisdom, talents and mind. Being sent to fight god damn Hashirama, clearly a genius of his times, financial & management genius at the least. And, still, after all the hard times he’ve been through, he maintained the very strong sense of dignity and nobility, even though slightly twisted due to the profession and abnormal lifespan

- And the very same things can serve as the source for her chagrin: with all those traits, he could have been so much more rather than a criminal. With all the gifts he’ve got, he could have been of great use to society. He’s much easier about this, since his prospective is much wider and embraces decades (and in some universes even centuries) instead of months & years, and he knows that he’d be switching sides throughout his life, being on this and that side of the law, yet he still is a bit uncomfortable once it’s brought up

- They are deeply into science, which makes them atheists. He’s into medicine and human biology, she’s into chemistry and reptilian biology; both of them are nuts for physics, history and psychology

- They solve complicated physical and mathematical problems together time to time. She is the first one to have tea-breaks due to losing her temper over it, he tries to figure things out right until you can sense the smoke coming off his head

- Actually, they do have a stumbling stone aside from job & morality complications. And this is Anko’s attitude towards Orochimaru

What she does is basically ruins her life very-very slowly, maintaining the issues she has and planning to make him pay for all he’s done

Kakuzu knows exactly what is really going on with this attitude and why, but he can’t really do anything about it. Like, he knows he can’t make her change her mind or put something into her head

All he can do is really nothing but try to explain how those things are working, and even this option is basically a landmine field for him. At some level she does understand that he could probably be right, yet she just refuses to go back on her mind. And this is actually really dangerous, so at some moments they can fight quite badly about it

- He’s scared shitless to lose her, though; especially like that, even though he knows clearly that he will, anyway, sooner or later

- he knows that losing loved ones ends up with sheer disaster for him, yet he isn’t afraid to pay such a high price for those six, five or four decades of being with her. Because these decades are that of a paradise ones for him. Wife and family, as well as stable job, incomes and life conditions, are some sort of physical definitions of sustainability he craves. Especially family, yet it’s far ahead to plan

- The fact that he will have to bury her one day makes her rather depressed, as well as the knowledge that the only thing she can really do about it is to try to bring him as much happiness and comfort as possible before she dies

thank you, i'd say more, but it's too much already

[advancedpottery217x2]

ミツメイしか勝たない件について

I don’t know how many people actually look at this, but ミツメイ至高主義者 is the first line of my Twitter bio. I wouldn’t blame anyone for not remembering since I don’t talk about it much online but there is very much a reason why I put it before everything else.

Mitsumei (ミツメイ) is the Japanese pairing name of the characters Miles Edgeworth and Franziska von Karma from the Ace Attorney series (I will be mainly using the English names in this post because I would feel weird otherwise in this English language post). 2022 marks the 10th year since I have started shipping these two, which also makes it the 10th year since I started learning Japanese. Since 2012, I have held an unwavering belief that nothing I will encounter will ever top Miles/Franziska for me, hence the Twitter bio. This belief has shaped a large portion of my life for better or worse. Ten years of time have not changed that, so I thought now would be a perfect time to try to indoctrinate people reflect upon this.

In the first half of this post, I will talk about the pairing itself within the context of the Ace Attorney series and my own experiences. As such, there will be spoilers for the first three games. In the process of talking about why I like it so much I will also probably turn into a incomprehensible fangirl so don’t say I didn’t warn you. In the second half, I will talk about how it has influenced how I view other media. There will be large spoilers for Mawaru Penguindrum, Mirai Radio to Jinkou-bato, Soukou Akki Muramasa, as well as numerous others.

I recall why I started playing Ace Attorney.

In middle school I was looking for DS games to play and I knew a friend was playing the first Ace Attorney. I asked if they found it interesting to which they replied yes, which led to me playing the first game. After finishing that, I continued with the second, third, fourth, and even Investigations, eventually finishing all the available games on the DS in English at the time.

I do not particularly recall why I started to ship this pairing.

I remember being excited for Franziska's appearance in the second game for some reason to the point of staying up a bit to get to the part where she showed up in court for the first time. I remember feeling a bit excited the times she was the partner character in Investigations, the spinoff game where Edgeworth is the protagonist, and the time I spent walking around the map during those times just to see the sprites walk with each other. Timeline wise, something must have changed in the time I spent playing the second game, third game, and Investigations, but I just can’t seem to remember what happened ten years ago. I’m almost frustrated at this fact considering how deep in I am now.

In time I came to do what any budding fan of something does and went online to look for fanart and fanfiction. I searched... and I searched... and I continued to search yet again to the point where I believe I have exhausted most of the available English language content on Mitsumei as of now (If there’s something you want to show me, then by all means go ahead though). This is, in fact, the direct impetus for me improving my Japanese reading skills. And in the following years I worked on that through scouring the internet again for more content, this time in Japanese. While I am less confident than I am for the English side, I have seen a lot of what can be found online. If any people reading this know me as the person who manages to find shit online, I’m pretty sure it comes from this period of my life.

The Story So Far (Roughly)

Okay okay enough of my own backstory that I sometimes type the basic version of when the topic of learning Japanese come up, what I’m here to talk about today is my insane thought processes that lie behind this backstory.

First, an overview of the characters and the stories in the first two games where most of their background is established.

Miles Edgeworth (御剣怜侍, Mitsurugi Reiji)

Everyone’s favorite Ace Attorney prosecutor with lots of trauma. When he was younger, he wanted to become a defense attorney like the father he greatly admired. In fourth grade, he defended his classmate Phoenix Wright who was falsely accused of stealing lunch money, saying that there was no evidence that he did it. Afterwards, Edgeworth became friends with Phoenix as well as another classmate Larry Butz. Then the DL-6 accident happened.

On December 28, 2001, Manfred von Karma killed Gregory Edgeworth in a courthouse elevator. Earlier that day, the two had faced each other in court with Gregory managing to expose a small part of Manfred’s evidence manipulation to the public. As a result, Manfred received a penalty from the Chief Prosecutor--the only one in his entire career. Later that day, an earthquake hit the area causing the courthouse to temporarily lose power.  During that time, Gregory and his son Miles were in an elevator along with a bailiff. The power outage led the elevator to stop, trapping the three for hours and the increasing lack of oxygen (or perception of such) led to a skirmish between Gregory and the bailiff. In the confusion, the bailiff’s gun dropped in front of Miles and he desperately threw it towards the fight in an attempt to get them to stop. In a curious turn of events, the gun ended up firing through the elevator window right into the shoulder of Manfred who happened to be standing outside. At that moment, the people in the elevator lost consciousness and the courthouse power came back on, leading to the elevator doors opening. Manfred looked inside the elevator to find the unconscious Edgeworths and a gun on the floor. With the anger of Gregory destroying his near 30-year flawless win record still fresh on his mind, he pulled the trigger.

Of course, Miles didn’t know that Manfred was near the elevator at all. All he knew was that he threw a gun and heard it go off, and that afterwards his father was dead with a bullet in him. Gregory did not know of Manfred’s appearance either, and when his spirit was channeled by a spirit medium in attempt to clear the situation he naturally named the bailiff as the culprit. The bailiff’s lawyer got his client free by pleading insanity. But this created a dilemma for Miles. If the bailiff was truly not guilty, then he was the only other person able to kill his father. If he denied that possibility making the bailiff guilty, that would make the lawyer who got him off a heinous and despicable person. For the boy who had admired his father so much, the prospect of choosing between denouncing defense attorneys and loathing himself was a harsh one to face at such a young age. The fact that he had recurring nightmares about shooting his father and a debilitating fear of earthquakes now probably didn’t help. These conflicting feelings eventually resulted in him wanting to be a prosecutor, someone to make sure criminals were given guilty verdicts.

This led Edgeworth to study under the legendary Manfred von Karma, a prosecutor who had never lost a case. Beneath that prestigious veneer were suspicions of underhanded tactics used to maintain it, such as manipulating witnesses and evidence. When Edgeworth’s career started at the tender age of 20 and he also became known for having a perfect win record, those rumors began to circulate around him as well. This continued until his first loss to Phoenix Wright in the first game (1-2, Turnabout Sisters). Coupled with his loss in the following case (1-3, Turnabout Samurai), Edgeworth again began to question the values instilled into him for over 10 years. This culminates in Turnabout Goodbyes (1-4), where Edgeworth is accused of a murder days before the statute of limitations for DL-6 was to take effect.

In the end, the key persons of that case were all related to DL-6. The accused, Edgeworth. The victim, the lawyer who defended the bailiff in the DL-6 trial. The actual perpetrator, the bailiff who had his life ruined by DL-6. And the person who planned it all, Manfred von Karma. Manfred intended for Edgeworth to be convicted all along. And with any luck, he could also get him to confess to killing his father all those years ago and make sure no one would ever find out about Manfred’s actions. Since the trial ended on the last possible day before the statute of limitations would go into effect it probably would have even worked too if it wasn’t for Phoenix Wright, who partially became a lawyer because of Edgeworth’s defense of him in elementary school. With Phoenix’s unwavering belief in his client, the two of them eventually reach the truth of both the trial at hand and DL-6.

While Edgeworth was finally able to reconcile with the fact that he did not kill his father, the issue of his existence as a prosecutor still remained. His job was to convict criminals in court, but that worked on the assumption that the accused was always guilty. If that was not true, then would his decision to become a prosecutor over a defense attorney have been for nothing? His answers to these problems and more are discussed in the second game...

Franziska von Karma (狩魔冥, Karuma Mei)

With Edgeworth not the main prosecutor anymore, we have a new kid in town. Before Phoenix faced her in court in Reunion, and Turnabout (2-2), he only knew that the prosecutor for the case was a von Karma. Of course, Phoenix had no idea what this meant as he brought Manfred’s crimes to light in the first game. When the trial began, he learned that his opponent would be Manfred’s daughter who became a prosecutor at the age of 13. Although she was born and raised in Germany (localizationized America), she stated that she flew over to face Phoenix Wright in an act of revenge. Of course being an Ace Attorney game, Phoenix gets a Not Guilty verdict in this case, shattering another prosecutor’s perfect record (starting to sense a pattern here).

In Turnabout Big Top (2-3), Phoenix and Franziska end up in a conversation about her revenge. Phoenix assumed she wanted to defeat him in revenge for getting her father convicted and was about to point out the futility of such an action when Franziska pointed out she had never mentioned her father up until that point. Her true reason for revenge was Miles Edgeworth. At the end of the first game, Edgeworth left behind a note in his office saying “Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth chooses death” and disappeared. So in “revenge” for this, Franziska decided to defeat the man who had presumably driven Edgeworth to such a state. She also wanted to confront Edgeworth for sullying the von Karma name and figured defeating Phoenix would be the best way to drag him out of hiding.

Of course being an Ace Attorney game, there is a small scene at the end of this case showing Edgeworth looking at a newspaper with Franziska’s picture in it, and not because she won that case. This leads into the finale of the second game, Farewell, My Turnabout (2-4).

What at first seemed like another Ace Attorney Case for Phoenix quickly took a turn for the worse when his assistant Maya Fey got kidnapped and the kidnapper pressured him to get a Not Guilty verdict if he wanted to see her safe. While he was busy worrying about accomplish this, Edgeworth made his return to the frustrations of both Phoenix and Franziska. In any case, Franziska’s third attempt to defeat Phoenix Wright would have gone on just as planned if it were not for the fact that someone shot her on the way to the courthouse on the first day of the trial. Not only was she shot in the right shoulder just like her father in DL-6, Edgeworth took up the prosecution in her stead to her great dismay.

On the final day of the trial, Franziska helped deliver the final pieces of evidences to the courtroom after an accident nearly prevented the detective in charge from doing it himself and the trial ended with the truth behind the case revealed. Phoenix reunited with Maya and his client got his due justice. Edgeworth revealed that he discovered his true duty as a prosecutor was to not only believe in the defendant’s guilt, but to believe in the defense attorney’s belief in the defendants innocence as well, leading to more possibilities being brought up and the truth being revealed. But Franziska didn’t understand how Phoenix could look so relieved when his client was guilty, or why Edgeworth was so confident in his approach while going against her father’s teachings, and left the scene of celebration while discarding her whip, which Phoenix picks up.

Later, Phoenix gives the whip to Edgeworth and encourages him to return it, leading Edgeworth find Franziska at the airport about to board a flight. Like Edgeworth in the first game, Franziska was on the cusp of questioning her ideals and the very meaning of her existence up until that point, which was part of why she attempted to leave her whip behind. In response, Edgeworth clearly stated that this moment would be their fork in the road if she decided to stop pursuing the path of a prosecutor. In that moment, Franziska burst into tears and declared her intent to keep “competing” with Edgeworth while leaving for her flight.

~The End~

Sorry to anyone who hasn’t played Ace Attorney because I omitted a lot of details here, some because I felt they weren’t strictly necessary for this post at all, some because I will elaborate on them later, and some because I felt they veered more into the personal conjecture territory (and probably some combination of the latter two). If this somehow made you interested in playing the games, then by all means go for it.

You may be thinking “Well this is quite the relationship, but how did you end up shipping this for 10 years?” and you would be absolutely right. Honestly Edgeworth and Franziska don’t interact much in the main games, although there is some improvement in this department in the Investigation games, so I’m used to not seeing much content about these two, official or fan-made, romantic or platonic. Like I said earlier, I don’t remember why I started shipping this. But I do remember the thoughts that have gone through my brain countless times after that point.

The More I Think About This The More I Go エモくね？　～沼怖ぇよ編～

Before I get into the finer machinations, I want to establish the physical/technical characteristics of this pair to make them easier to visualize in the mind after the lengthy story discussion.

In the second game, Franziska is 18 and Edgeworth is 25

Their heights are 162 cm and 178 cm, respectively (Please consult the handy chart below for reference)

In Japanese, they both use the first person pronoun 私 (watashi)

Franziska has a mole beneath her left eye

very important things to keep in mind in this post trust me (especially the last one, fanartists)

Now if you asked me what I liked most about this pairing, the answer I would give would depend on the time of day. But I think I would most likely say the certain immutable aspects of their relationship. Nothing will ever change the fact that Manfred killed Edgeworth’s father, and nothing will ever change the fact that Edgeworth was none the wiser when studying under him. As Franziska also studied under her father, this meant the two of them interacted not knowing just how fragile the foundation of their relationship was for an extended period of time. And as shown in the flashback case of Ace Attorney Investigations 1 (AAI1-4, Turnabout Reminiscence) and S2E6 of the anime, they seem to get along just fine. That probably wouldn’t change much if it weren’t for the fact that they had to find out one of their dads murdered the other. That’s gotta fuck up you relationship at least a little bit. But due to how the games work, it doesn’t quite end up like that.

Although the Ace Attorney franchise mainline games are numbered, you don’t have to have necessarily played the previous ones to play the ones that come later. In fact, the games outright avoid giving major spoilers for previous entries (Dai Gyakuten Saiban being the big obvious exception). This is sometimes talked about online as the no-spoiler rule. Of course, events are sometimes alluded to, but the exact details are never explicitly stated leaving old fans to fill in the gaps and new players none for the worse. This even occurs in the first three games which are seen as a tightly woven trilogy. This means that the relationship between Edgeworth and Franziska’s fathers is never discussed beyond a simple, “Hey these two went against each other in court and Gregory pointed out Manfred’s oopsie.” If you only play the first game with no outside knowledge you don’t even know Franziska exists! This pairing is established through two games but that same requirement means it never explores its full potential in canon!!!

This hurts even more in Investigations 2 which introduces the character Shigaraki (sorry, I played the Japanese version), a former assistant of Gregory and now a lawyer in his own right who heads Gregory’s law offices (he doesn’t even change the name from Edgeworth Law Offices........). When he first meets Edgeworth he is very snappy towards him for his “betrayal” training to be a prosecutor under von Karma because now people know he didn’t exactly do legal things. But the fact that Manfred killed Gregory is never mentioned. Now maybe news in the Ace Attorney world is the kind that doesn’t publicize the fact that a case that went unsolved for 15 years was connected to a prominent figure in the legal world, but if you’re going to hate someone I think hating them for becoming a prosecutor and taking after the person that murdered their defense attorney dad is a very valid reason. No juice in that department though. Although brief, Shigaraki also interacts with Franziska in this game and much like Edgeworth doesn’t dig deep into what the Edgeworths and von Karmas think of each other. Now I understand Ace attorney isn’t exactly the kind of game series you go to for extended character relationship dissections but it does make me a bit sad. Thank you Investigations 2 I enjoyed the game especially that case where you play as Gregory very much but there wasn’t enough bloodlust in it.

Back to the immutable part, even if Edgeworth and Franziska have relatively normal interactions in the games, there will always be that shadow hanging over them. No matter how many people in the world look at them and say that they had nothing to do with the actions of their parents, nothing can ever change the fact that one of them murdered the other. It makes me wonder just what is going through their minds when they talk to each other now that they are adults that know the truth. This contrast between the fact that I wouldn’t blame them if they harbored animosity towards each other and the fact that they don’t show that at all (in regards to their fathers) fucks me up because it’s really good. It’s fucked enough that it works really well as a platonic relationship and I love it enough as it is. BUT it gets so much, much, MUCH more delicious if you decide to add the element of romance.

Perhaps the number one example of this is thinking about when they first realized they had feelings for the other. Lots of juicy variables depending on whether this happens pre-AA1 or post-AA1. While I have imagined a variety of situations and read multiple fanfiction concerning this, usually I settle on Franziska/pre-AA1 and Edgeworth/post-AA1. Pre-AA1 while she does have a desire to overcome him and is slightly antagonistic about this, she knows deep down that they get along normally and takes solace in that fact (but is never fully cognizant of it or shows that to anyone). Over time, those positive feelings would grow closer to what most people would call “love,” whether platonic or romantic, still at the back of Franziska’s mind. The kind of feelings that would have stayed there never to surface if the truth of DL-6 didn’t come to light. When faced with the fact that her father did irreparable damage to Edgeworth, harboring those feelings or even interacting with him at all could be seen as pity/rubbing salt in the wound. And imagining how she channeled those emotions into an intense hatred for Miles Edgeworth (looking back at the screenshots I posted earlier) only for him to interact with her at the end of AA2 in such a firm but nonchalant manner and how this transitions to their interactions in AA3 onward is very good. I have a less firm grasp on Edgeworth’s side of things but I definitely think he would be reluctant in part because of the fact that he was one of the direct causes of her father’s conviction. Due to this and the fact that I think Edgeworth would take the age gap into consideration it would be harder for him to recognize any feelings as romantic love even when compared to Franziska who I think would also have a hard time in this regard. At the minimum I’m actually thinking post-AA2, most of the time around the AA3/Investigations time frame, but having him realizing after the 7 year time skip Apollo Justice (AA4) made the series go through has its own share of delicious minutiae that can only come from these two being around 30 at that point and Edgeworth becoming the Chief Prosecutor. The two of them overcoming their feelings of guilt towards each other and dealing with the ramifications of the sudden absence of a figure who held so much influence on their lives to enter a relationship is one of the most important parts of this pairing for me. I would be here all day if I continued so this is only one example! こじらせ最高！

Another very important part of this pairing is that the relationship between Edgeworth and Franziska is both a childhood friend and brother/sister combination (no not cousins) and not at the same time. Don’t worry, it both makes sense and doesn’t make sense to me too. The fact that there is not much outlined in the games doesn’t help much either.

While it is known that both Edgeworth and Franziska studied under Manfred to become prosecutors, little else is made clear. The exact time Edgeworth began his studies would affect the nature of their relationship and how close they would be pre-AA1 and that is where I’ve seen the widest range of interpretations. For example, in my observations of the western Ace Attorney fandom, it seems to be common consensus that Manfred took in Edgeworth relatively soon after DL-6 and raised him in Germany, with him meeting Franziska around that time as well. When I started reading Japanese fanfiction, it kind of surprised me to see versions where he met her at an older age as the probability hadn’t even crossed my mind at that point. There is also the issue of where these studies took place due to minor setting differences between the Japanese and English versions but that is outside the scope of this post.

There is a clear association of the von Karmas and perfection and there is no doubt that would have extended to Manfred’s education policies as well. This is in fact the focal point of the airport conversation in 2-4. Franziska spoke of the pressure she felt to keep up with expectations with her legendary father and Edgeworth being a prodigy while knowing she was not. Even so, she worked hard enough to become a prosecutor at the tender age of 13—nearly the same time as Edgeworth. But since Edgeworth started his career in America, there would be an ever-present physical distance. In addition, seeing him “choosing death” and coming back in such a seemingly easy manner further instilled the idea that she would never be able to stand on the same level, let alone overcome him no matter how hard she worked (There is also that moment in AAI2 where Edgeworth temporarily renounces his prosecutor’s badge and Franziska has a few words to say to him but yeah... not enough bloodlust...). She thought she could finally achieve that goal by defeating Phoenix Wright while Edgeworth remained in his disappearance, but found herself questioning herself just like Edgeworth must have after the first game. The difference this time was the presence of someone who already went through that soul searching, perhaps the only person who could understand the pressure Franziska felt, as someone who also studied under Manfred. Maybe that’s how he knew he’d get max damage by juxtaposing these lines in that scene.

‥‥キミは今日、私に追いついたのだ。われわれは今、ここに並んで立っている。 ‥‥しかし。私は立ち止まるつもりはない。‥‥キミが歩くのをやめると言うのならば‥‥ ‥‥ここでお別れだな。狩魔　冥。

Bonus: This is the text you get if you don’t present the whip to Edgeworth at the end of 2-4.

Therein lies the crux of the relationship between Edgeworth and Franziska: the exact emotional distance between them (距離感). Or rather, the inexact nature of it. While they did study under the same mentor with an ostensible common goal, the difference in their true goals and inner feelings would later cause events like the above paragraph to happen (especially the AAI2 one... feed me the genuine shock, the unbridled acrimony...). While they did know each other for an extended period of time, the undefined nature of it means that the term childhood friends may or may not be applicable, and that they may or may not be seen as siblings. This ties back to my statement about seeing them as childhood friends/siblings and not at the same time earlier. I believe their relationship is not so easily definable as to allow only one interpretation. I can accept most any interpretation and have it coexist with the others in my brain. I simply believe in all the possibilities of their relationship!

But I do have to dedicate a paragraph to talking about how the western Ace Attorney fandom sees this pairing as incest. In the consensus outlined above that Manfred takes in Edgeworth after DL-6, it seems to be a fait accompli that this was an adoption, making Edgeworth and Franziska adopted siblings. When taken together with the fact that they would have been around the ages of 9 and 2, respectively, during DL-6, I understand why it is an unpopular ship. Now I could go on about about this point in relationship to the western Ace Attorney fandom as a whole and Edgeworth’s sexuality, but that’s a whole other can of worms. What really disappoints me is that I feel calling them siblings, period, without leaving room for anything else erases some of the complexity of their relationship. That’s why it seeing people praise their “sibling” relation makes me a bit sad even if i agree with the points they make. I don’t expect people to think of them the same way that I do but sometimes it feels like an absence of thought. ロマンがない……

Now when that’s all said and done, why do I believe Edgeworth and Franziska would make a good romantic relationship? Their unique shared past of studying under Manfred gives them the opportunity to be emotionally vulnerable with someone who understands them in that part of life and can deal with their difficult personality in a way that other characters cannot. Although on the surface they seem uneven specs-wise, there is a delicate balance when they actually interact from the third game onward and they have a great amount of respect for each other’s careers which sometimes makes me forget they have a seven years age difference (but it is there, a very good one at that). They’re both not good at expressing their feelings honestly even though they’re both capable prosecutors, a profession where words sway the verdict of the case, which makes for one of the the most powerful combinations known to man, the double tsundere. And because I think that having a good talk with each other and choosing to be together in a romantic relationship of their own volition after what Manfred did is pretty raw. ...And so on.

Honestly, I know full well that the version of these two I love in my head is a culmination of everything I’ve seen and imagined of them over a period of ten years, something which is different from anything that was shown or will ever be shown in the games and alien to pretty much anyone familiar with the series. But I don’t care. I’ve been in this hole for 10 years and I’m gonna stay here until I feel like getting out. Although considering the amount of time I’ve already been here I don’t think that’s coming anytime soon...

Miscellanea: This Still Keeps Me Up at Night Sometimes

While I did go over the broad strokes, there are some details that I had to scream about somewhere that didn’t make it so here’s a small bonus section.

While Edgeworth and Franziska are referred to as 兄妹弟子,  Franziska always makes it a point to refer to herself as the 姉弟子and I think it’s really cute, just imagining saying Edgeworth is the 弟弟子 to his face when they have a seven year age gap. Due to this I also see the two of them as being both the older and younger sibling type at the same time.

When I said that both of them using 私 (watashi) was very important I meant it. Even if two characters both use watashi, it’s usually a pick two between 私, わたし, and ワタシ. Or maybe 私 is just moonlighting as あたし (atashi), わたくし (watakushi), or any of its variants. But no, in this case both Franziska and Edgeworth use 私 (watashi) which I have not seen much (or at all?) for a het pairing. I didn’t know not being able to distinguish who’s speaking in Japanese from the first person pronoun alone could be so thrilling. As an aside, nine-year old Edgeworth is shown to use boku.

In the third game, Edgeworth calls Franziska to prosecute the first day of the final trial because Phoenix fell off a bridge and got sent to the hospital, with him becoming the defense attorney in Phoenix’s place. At the end of the trial, the following line can be found:

Still thinking about this line since it is quickly moved on from and because Edgeworth uses 相棒 for Phoenix. Tell me what he is thinking Capcom.

While I will consume most anything about this pairing, I will skip most R18 works where Franziska is underage depending on how skeevy the premise is/how it is depicted. Just not into that...

While imagining situations for fictional characters when listening to music is a time-honored tradition I don’t think anything could have prepared me for this official song from the Ace Attorney Pachislot soundtrack:

どうすれば思い出す 幸せだったそんな時を うらやんでいるだけじゃダメだとわかっているよ 戻れないことがほら 僕たちを 明日へと導かせぬけど 消えないんだ 笑いあった日々も すべて僕の中にあるのさ（だから今は）

(Lyrics are personally transcribed so may not be fully accurate)

VGMDB doesn’t have a lyrics credit so I don’t even know who to scream at but to have lyrics that match this close to my mental image in an official songs is bonkers.

Their in-game themes are the same with a different intro.Thank you GBA-era space limitations.

Edgeworth and Franziska occasionally refer to each other by their first names. This stands out even more in Japanese because of how infrequently first names are used. And because when they do it’s in katakana with no honorifics. Even I don’t use Edgeworth's first name where I can help it. You keep on rocking guys.

Franziska’s voice actress in game-related official media is Sawashiro Miyuki. I want more Franziska content even if it’s only for this reason.

That one image from the second ending of the anime’s second season:

What is the explanation for this anime staff???????? It’s been three years and I’m still thinking about this picture. Who decided to put this in???????????????????? I would like to thank them very much.

Last but not least, an unexpected crumb of content in the year of our lord 2022. I watched this year’s Ace Attorney orchestra concert online and one of the songs performed was the ending theme of the third game. The video played on the screen during this song featured a scrolling timeline of the cases in the trilogy along with characters saying what I think were new lines made for this occasion. And then this line appeared:

Now this line is clearly lampshading the airport scene in the second game, a scene has not been referenced in any Ace Attorney media that is not an adaptation of 2. They decide to drop this bombshell for 2 seconds at an orchestra concert video and here I am now, wondering if they ever plan on making Franziska appear in a game again and talking about something that happened in a past game.

The Search for What Once Was or: The Advent of ミツメディア

Unfortunately, there are no bottomless pits of content in this world. Although I am an Ace Attorney fan, I am 90% I was able to stay one for this long because I got into Mitsumei, meaning that I had but a passing interest in other fandom content after playing all the games. And due to the fact that I got really into this pairing at a relatively early part of my Ace Attorney history, I did not (and still do not) have a marked interest or disinterest in any other ships in this series. With all this in mind I had no choice but to set my sights outward.

Of course it’s not like I abandoned all other media even during the early heights of this obsession. But looking for things to enjoy when you know you pretty much have no content in a certain area feels very different. That is why I yearned for something that reached the highs I felt while engaging in fanworks, something that would leave a lasting impression on me. While it’s easy enough to find things to like, finding things that live up to those expectations and years of emotions is a much more Herculean task. For example, if I reread a fanfiction, it doesn’t matter whether I last read it two weeks ago or two years ago, my heart never fails to swell with emotion and I pretty much will always tear up at the same places. When reading/watching other things it feels harder for tears to well up, but if I hit a certain line in a fanfiction they come out whether I want them to or not. Ever since ten years ago, I’ve only ever been chasing for that high in other media. That’s the real reason I decided to get into visual novels starting with White Album 2. I figured that I could find a romance—or any kind of story really—that could take me to similar heights. And White Album 2 did satisfy me in that front a great deal (I even bought the Vita version and replayed it to get to the console-exclusive scenario before Extended Edition was a thing, and I ended up buying EE too). And recently (okay that was 2018... four years ago...) Tears to Tiara has succeeded in leaving a lasting impression in me and recreating the emotions I felt the first time I played every time I see certain quotes from the @arawn_b account on Twitter (See previous blog posts).

But there was still a certain peculiarly shaped hole in my heart. It was only a few years ago that I realized that shape could only be filled by Mitsumei. I don’t know how long it took me to realize that when I’m probably the person most obsessed by this pairing on this side of the internet. Filling that hole is actually quite difficult, especially when you realize that most romances can never even dream of getting close to what my mind soup has been cooking for years. that While I have seen many relationships that have bits and pieces of what Edgeworth and Franziska have such as shit between the parents that may or may not involve murder, age gap, studying under the same mentor, feelings of inferiority, and knowing each other for X amount of years, there is nothing with all of them at once and to the degree at which they are present in Mitsumei (If you have any recommendations hit me up). And I know that finding such a relationship is pretty much impossible, to the point where I realize it makes me a bit more passive/narrow-minded when seeking new things to try out. But still I continue to consume, in hopes of reaching that mountaintop.

I will now introduce some works that I have enjoyed throughout this journey despite my now permanently attached Mitsumei goggles in relation to the pairing at hand. This will be my last warning that I will not hold back on spoiling anything.

Mawaru Penguindrum (2011)

I first watched this around 2012~13 so I didn’t make the ミツメディア connection that much, even when I rewatched it a while afterwards (I don’t remember when this happened). But seeing other people post screenshots I went to myself, “Oh so that’s why I liked it so much“ and decided I had to rewatch it for this post. I still really, really love this show but I’m sure there are many other blogs out their with their own Penguindrum analyses. In this post I’ll mostly be talking about the relationships between the Takakura siblings and their relation to Ringo.

One of the more obvious parallels between Penguindrum and Mitsumei is the fact that the Takakura parents are labeled as criminals, with one of the victims of the subway attack being Ringo’s sister Momoka. In the present, Kanba, Shouma, and Himari live with the fact that a lot of people in Japan hate them through the actions of their parents and Ringo feels she has to take on the burden of the death of her sister tearing her family apart by “becoming” Momoka. Even then, they eventually grow to see each other as their own persons individual from their relatives. I liked how Panguindrum showed that yes, there were people who didn’t through the character of Tabuki. During my most recent rewatch, when I got to the scene where Tabuki denies any ill will towards the Takakura siblings I was pointing at my screen like that Leonardo DiCaprio GIF. Because then there’s the episode where Tabuki puts Himari’s life in danger at the construction site and reveals the hatred pent up inside the darkest corners of his heart (Yes! Bloodlust!) and how petty he was in how far he was willing to go to take the siblings down in an attempt to find their parents and get revenge. Ringo also comes face to face with Tabuki as an individual with his own past and trauma and not as a prize to be won and become a glue to keep her family together.

I also greatly admire how the Takakura siblings are portrayed in this anime in that they exemplify both ends of the family/strangers (他人) dynamic. In the first half of the show, there is no denying that Shouma, Himari, and Kanba are a family through and through, as shown through both words and actions. It feels natural every time the brothers say they’re doing everything for Himari, every time Himari is shown doing what she can to show her gratitude. But it’s clear that there’s something in the background, and I’m not just talking about that one Kanba/Himari kiss at the end of episode 1 (still wondering what this means). In the second half it’s gradually revealed that none of them are related to each other by blood with Shouma being the sole Takakura from birth. Kanba taking his actions to greater extremes, Himari reflecting on her past and how differently things could have gone, and Shouma desperately trying to keep everything together all while a tabloid reporter is clearly trying to seed mistrust among them strains their relationship as both family and 他人. The fight between Kanba and Shouma and Himari leaving the house acts as both the surface-level culmination of those negative emotions and proof of their strong love for each other, no matter what form it may take. Having Himari receive and give back Shouma’s scarf—the symbol of them becoming a family—in consecutive episodes was pretty devastating. Including these quotes because I just like them a lot.

生きるってことは罰なんだね 。 でも、罰でも晶ちゃんと一緒にいたかった。 だから、選ばれたかった 。

これで私と晶ちゃんは他人だよ

Everything comes together in the final episode, and I believe that depicting the Takakura siblings as both family and 他人 at length made the finale and the displays of love that much more impactful. Although I didn’t realize it the first time around, I think this is why I’m so firm on seeing Edgeworth and Franziska as both family and not family at the same time, without denying one or the other. I also just like things being vague and defined at the same time. I will eternally thank Penguindrum for being the show that showed me those possibilities with such conviction.

Anyways time for Triple H posting.

Penguindrum is good... I hope the movies get a US release...

Mirai Radio to Jinkou-bato (2018)

When I played Hakuchuumu no Aojashin (See previous blog post), I knew that Cases 1-3 were somewhat based on Laplacian’s previous games although I didn’t bother to play them before Hakuchuumu. But in the end my curiosity got the better of me and I ended up doing them all anyway. While playing Hakuchuumu, the setting of Mirai Radio interested me the most what with the global network connection pigeons and the concept of living in a world without that. And in the end I think it actually is my favorite setting out of all the Laplacian games even over Hakuchuumu.

I see this game getting blasted online for having not enough content and saying the trial version was the peak and honestly I kind of get it. The common route had that build-up leading to the satellite crash with everyone working together to build and distribute the radios and disable the artificial pigeons. But then Kaguya decided to tell everyone that the reason the pigeons don’t function as a communications network anymore is because they’re working to basically be her life support and if they die, she will too. Since the cast is a nice group of people, they try to find another way to stop the satellite crash but at the end of the common route, Kaguya dies as the satellite crashes into her home at Terminal 1. That’s right, the end of the common route has the protagonist Sora desperately running to the terminal trying to save Kaguya as the satellite plummets towards Earth. I got so into the game at this point that although I was also playing Muramasa at the time I decided to finish this first. After this incident, Sora wakes up a month later with no memories of what happened.

I looked up where the trial version ended after I finished the game and it was right after he first woke up after the incident. I can understand the complaints here because honestly while it is a good stopping point it is way too much to put in a trial considering how much content there is afterwards and after this point it does kind of feel like a different game. But that’s why I like it so much. The second half of the game is actually about how people deal with trauma differently and that’s so sexy of Ono to write about even if the routes still feel half-baked like the previous games. While this theme is also present in Mizuki and Akina’s routes, I will mainly be talking about the relationship between Kaguya, Sora, and Tsubaki.

The artificial pigeons and their network functionality was developed by Hazuki Izana (Kaguya’s mother) and Azamino Tsubaki. It is widely known that Izana caused the pigeons to go rogue and stop functioning but even Tsubaki didn’t know the reason why until Kaguya figured out and told everyone. This made Izana an easy target of hate, especially in this case for Sora, who lost his parents in the resulting airplane crashes. Kaguya’s secluded upbringing in the abandoned Terminal 1 made it that much more shocking when Sora outwardly displayed his disgust at her mother’s actions before knowing the truth behind them. The two later develop feelings and and confess to each other, but that only solidified Kaguya’s resolve to sacrifice herself to restore the pigeons’ network functionality for Sora’s sake. But after Kaguya died, the network didn’t come back.

In Tsubaki’s route, Sora finds out why—he is actually being kept alive by the artificial pigeons as well.

Ironically, Sora found himself in the same situation Kaguya did in the common route. Faced with the knowledge that your every breath is dependent on an event that caused the suffering of many and your death would be able to end that can be a pretty good reason to contemplate suicide when push comes to shove. Luckily, Tsubaki was able to convince him to live a natural lifespan and the two worked on compressing the new info they learned into audio data, banking on the fact that it would be caught by the future broadcasts on Sora’s radio. And that’s how Kaguya’s route proper branches from the common route.

While the end of this route is pretty okay.jpg, I like how it highlights the thought processes behind Kaguya’s decision in the original timeline and how her interactions with Sora help her acclimate to living in a world outside the airport and recognizing the human urge to live. Also Izana creating the future radio because she wanted to know there was a possible future where her daughter was happy and healthy is very good.

While the main relationship between Sora and Kaguya is nice enough on its own it cannot compare to how delicious the one with Tsubaki is. The game’s official site states that Tsubaki is bi and you do find out that she had one-sided feelings for Izana (And has been with women but not men before. Cowards.). That makes it so both Sora and Tsubaki are NTRing each other from dead people.

Speaking of dead people, one thing I really liked in this route was the treatment of Izana. She died seven years before the story starts so Kaguya and Tsubaki have no choice but to talk about her through distant memories. Throughout the game I kept wondering if there were going to be any flashback scenes with Izana speaking. In the end there weren’t and I find myself appreciating the game all the more for it. There are only fading memories that appear in dreams and that Zippo lighter Tsubaki has with the photo of her and Izana on it. Specifically I would like to point out the residual Izana voice files in the pigeon data banks. It’s two or three voice files and they are all of Izana’s voice lines in the entire game. Seeing Tsubaki desperately repeat those clips really makes it hit that she still isn’t over losing Izana and is a stark contrast from the nonchalant personality she’s shown up until this point. Sora decided to create a simple AI with Izana’s voice, synthesized from those voice clips. Tsubaki is then able to have a simple albeit fabricated conversation with Izana, and ends up leaving the program within the radio Sora gave her in the place where Kaguya buried the dead artificial pigeons finally putting her lingering emotions to rest. It’s so good how the “real” Izana never truly speaks and this game is one of the few times where I really felt for the pre-story death of a character where there were no flashbacks with them. Even when Sora realizes the person he’s been seeing in his dreams is Izana, he is never able to hear her voice or see her face and I love that. I still want to see Izana interactions with Kaguya and Tsubaki though.

Of course, I can’t talk about Tsubaki’s route without talking about the ending scene, also known as:

Gyakuten Kenji 2 (2011)

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Now that that’s out of my system, I love Tsubaki so naturally I love this scene. How she desperately pleads for Sora to live after having to go through both Izana and Kaguya’s deaths. How they both are “selfish” for leaving the pigeon network as is in favor of living their present lives. The piano version of the opening song fitting so perfectly in this scene. One thing I have to point out is that Tsubaki mentions Kaguya dying before her very eyes which would imply her being in Terminal 1 when Kaguya committed suicide but there is nothing else in the game to corroborate this so I am still confused. Other than that I love Tsubaki. Also she is the hottest character in the game.

Mirai Radio really was a slightly good game that could have been a gooder game if it had some more meat to it but it just... doesn’t. It has some parts about trauma and life that I really like mostly because of the Mitsumei goggles so it’s hard to recommend to normal people. One unbiased thing I can say in its favor is that the music and songs are really good, even though I first heard them in Hakuchuumu. In fact when I replayed Hakuchuumu with the Steam version I found myself feeling emotionally compromised when they played certain tracks. Sorry, after playing Mirai Radio any rendition of Seia no Wata being played in scenes without any of those characters is going to make me feel complicated.

To end this section I will leave the common route ending song and the lyrics that destroyed me.

白い鳥に願う　罪の終わり 新しい朝のむこうに 自由な空 あなたが羽ばたけば どこまでも飛べる 　 明日は わたしを翼にかえて

「 白い鳥に願う　罪の終わり 」って、うわぁーーーーーーーーーー

Soukou Akki Muramasa (2009)

I have had an interest in playing Muramasa for quite some time, and finally decided to get around to playing it when I saw the English version was going to be released (Note: I actually got around to starting it after the English version was released). I was interested in the alternate history and wondered about the 善悪相殺 memes going in but nothing could have prepared me for how much I would obsess over what would continue to occupy my mind to this day: Ootori Kanae.

I enjoyed my time with Muramasa much more than I expected and found a lot of things to like about it but Kanae simply eclipses everything else in that section of my mind, so I will not be talking about other parts of the game much.

Even in the common route, I could tell Kanae was definitely the kind of heroine I loved, and I’m the type who saves their favorite routes for last so I would have done her route second even if that wasn’t the most recommended order. But seeing her in the common route tempted me just a bit not gonna lie.

First her uniform looks really good on her (not that we have any other female GHQ officers in this game to compare) and I love women with guns so the sprite above sent the serotonin rushing in the brain.

Sometimes she acted flirty but there was definitely an unhinged side to her that I was extremely curious about.

And after going through the emotional turmoil of common route chapter 5 and Ichijou’s route with a basic grasp of 善悪相殺, I finally reached the promised land...

I think just seeing this title card got me excited. And miraculously, that excitement never waned in the entire route.

Even the scene in the very beginning where Kanae and Kageaki are in the rain and you can feel them probing into each other through their conversation got me very worked up because I was sure that this route would deliver what I wanted.

And it did so in quite a spectacular manner with Kanae killing Kageaki’s foster father right in front of his eyes. Since Kanae was in her tsurugi (the mechs in this game, okay I know the European ones are called cruxes) and Kageaki didn’t know she had one, he didn’t even know it was her. But since Kanae did know about Kageaki’s tsurugi, but not the fact that the person she killed was related to Kageaki, this created a very delicate situation, a situation ripe for DRAMA unfolded before my very eyes and I brought out the popcorn for the fun times ahead. I was about to get the bloodlust I wanted, and this time with the blood included.

Also with that brief dream scene that took place after I can’t believe Muramasa  made itself Ace Attorney media so quickly.

But what everyone’s looking forward to is the scene after that, the initial confrontation between the two of them after such a charged scene (They also casually drop that Kanae has a sister seven years younger than her no I’m not going anywhere with this).

Kanae reveals that Yuuhi, the boy Kageaki killed at the beginning of the game, was her cousin and one she loved very dearly. And of course, she won’t forgive him. But to her surprise, Kageaki does not beg for forgiveness, but instead thanks her profusely after confirming multiple times that she will never forgive him for his actions. His absolute desperation here after being denied his desire to be put on trial for his actions from the people he thought would give it to him is great. And then he starts going on about dedicating himself to her because he sees her as a sort of savior in a world he believes will never acknowledge the true horror of his actions. The CG in this scene is very good at showing the absence, with neither of their eyes being shown. Everyone rightly screenshots the line where he thanks her and I do agree that that is the highlight of the scene but what really gets me is this small part near the end.

Throughout the scene, Kanae has just been standing there dumbfounded at Kageaki’s reaction to her terse judgements. And then at the end there is this one line, this one simple line that got my brain juices flowing more than Kageaki’s words of thanks ever did. In her stupor, Kanae can only think about how she does not understand Kageaki at all. Thinking back to the common route, she gradually finds out Yuuhi is dead and Kageaki is the one who killed him, all while interacting with Kageaki in an unchanged manner. Due to her nature as an undertaker of revenge, she must have conjured an image of what Kageaki must be like underneath what she could see on the outside. And all of that came crumbling down the moment his knees dropped to the floor in front of her. That was the moment I became enamored between the relationship between Kanae and Kageaki. I think people having imprecise mental images of each other only to realize they don’t actually understand the most critical points is very sexy.

This moment brought to mind that AAI2 scene where Edgeworth renounces his badge and Franziska expresses disbelief at him leaving her behind again which I totally get when you think back to what he said to her at the end of AA2. Franziska thought he would stay in that sort of rival/fellow prosecutor position and he threw it all away in such a simple manner (in her view). Edgeworth certainly had balls for doing that after saying he would part ways from her if she did something similar. This is completely unforgivable if it weren’t for the no-spoiler rule because this is the game where Edgeworth doesn’t recognize DeKiller which I also could not begrudgingly handwave otherwise. I kind of love that Edgeworth just does shit like what I mentioned above and the “choosing death” incident because while he is quick to discern what he wants to do to further his ideals as a prosecutor he also does not really consider the effect these actions will have on the people around him which gives us scenes like Phoenix and Franziska not holding back on the malice when he comes back in 2-4. Edgeworth having that legit asshole side to him in addition to Franziska having an unabashedly selfish personality (although they do improve a bit) is very good actually.

Back to the topic at hand, Kanae finds out that the person she killed in front of Kageaki was his foster father which puts a wrench in her cleanly laid plans to kill Kageaki in revenge. Now that Kageaki unknowingly also has grounds to enact revenge on her, Kanae has to think a bit more about how to apply her life principles. ...But not now because it's time to stop an atomic bomb from being deployed!

Had to mention the airship section. It was pretty fun and I managed to solve it without guides. The atomic bomb couldn’t be stopped though so lots of things went boom and Kanae and Kageaki escaped to the countryside for a bit.

This section of the route includes the infamous coin-stacking scene but I also want to mention the scene the CG above was in and how there is zero comment as to what Kanae is wearing and instead they talk about politics and the types of pottery of cups used in tea ceremonies which I think is sexy in a different way.

I just think this line is kind of funny out of context but if only I knew how true this line would come to be in the coming hours...

After this the gang heads to the Ootori estate for some political fun and turmoil and also to kill Shishiku. The train conversation that happens here before Sorimachi decides to ruin the fun is one of my favorite scenes in the game. I just love the atmosphere of it with both Kanae and Kageaki having so many things to say to each other but voicing none of them, opting instead for empty pleasantries and forlorn gazes out the window. The silent, growing tension between these two until the climax of the route is palpable. It boggles the mind why I did not take any screenshots of this when I played the game.

Sorimachi appearing leads to the trauma-inducing Guts Eider fight—and quite literally at that as Kageaki throws up at the end of it. He already hated himself enough for killing Yuuhi and then he had to realize he was about to kill Konatsu as well when it was too late. Although he didn’t actually end up doing any killing in the end, Guts Eider still came to a deadly stop taking the people inside with it. The horror of these actions furthers Kageaki’s self-loathing as well as his desire for Kanae’s swift judgement.

God he’s so pathetic here... I love it... The pathetic little screams... The fact that Kanae is secretly there just staring in a daze at the scene in front of her...

Anyways they head to the Ootori estate and to one of the funnest arcs in this route.

She’s perfect... Guns under the skirt are so good... I love her...

The scene where she kills Shishiku is very good with them screaming at each other and Kanae’s gutteral laughs and the transition where you only see the sky as the mansion burns and you hear what sounds like Kanae sobbing until it turns into laughter and you really feel the unhingedness settling in. But the best part is still yet to come.

Well there is the H scene where Kageaki fully embraces his fate of getting killed by Kanae, which is excellent and one of the most visceral ones I’ve ever read, but nothing could have prepared me for what lay ahead.

The final showdown of this route, the true beginning and end of Kanae as a character, is what mind broke me (compliment) more than anything else. To be honest, up until this point while I really did vibe with this route, you didn’t really see things from Kanae's side so it felt a bit off. If only I knew they were saving everything for this one moment.

There is a substantial flashback showing how Kanae’s tendencies for killing and revenge got their start in her childhood, and how firm those tendencies were grounded within her to her father’s great dismay (and also partially his fault). Her love of killing and revenge-based justice went well together, so enacting that revenge in place of others became kind of a life duty for her.

I love Ace Attorn(ry

But she had never met anyone who so willfully desired that revenge, who basically prostrated themselves in their desperation to be killed, who denied their right to exist in the world until the moment Kageaki did so right in front of her. Kanae’s revenge had always consisted of both her and the opposing party’s belief in their sense of justice, that their killing was right in the eyes of at least one person. That was why she fulfilled her revenge in combat with the other party. But Kageaki was always hesitant in killing due to Muramasa’s curse. He knew the weight that taking a life would bear on his soul even as his blade sunk into human flesh. Unfortunately due to the denial of his wish to stand trial, the “safety net” he had that tied him to human society disappeared, making him cling to the existence of Kanae all the more. That kind of revenge would be far too one-sided, which plays a part into why both of them use their tsurugis in the final battle. To Kanae, she is getting revenge on Kageaki for killing Yuuhi. To Kageaki, he is getting revenge on the mysterious crux who killed his father. Ironically, this veil of metal separating them was the only way to make their acts of revenge more “equal”.

To Kanae, Kageaki’s thought process was like a denial of her very existence. If her revenge didn’t bring anguish to her target, would it truly be in the benefit for the ones who died? Who does benefit from revenge in the end? This small blip in her world view that popped up was the start of a mental spiral into questioning her actions up until this point. The game poses the age-old dilemma: Is revenge truly fruitless? Perhaps it is; after all there is no shortage of works depicting how revenge draws people into madness and often ends up in their deaths as well.

But this revenge story is not of those people, it is about Ootori Kanae, a woman practically born to enact revenge in this world. And her revenge is not for anyone in the living world, least of all herself.

It exists solely for the dead. It does not matter what she feels about the people involved because she is simply a tool used for that revenge, that justice. And that is why there was only ever a single option in the end—to kill.

Goddddd everything in this sequence just sequentially destroyed my brain (compliment) more and more. It answered all the questions I had about Kanae’s character and then some. It made all the little moments in the route fall into place in such a satisfying manner. And the “answer” to revenge that she derived was really refreshing to see and quite fitting for her character. Really, a perfect conclusion to this route.

But my true favorite scene in this route (and possibly the entire game) is the post-credits scene. Kageaki is dying in the snow after the two of them attacked each other and then he faintly recognizes Kanae and goes “大鳥大尉...” Right at that moment her theme starts playing, which made me absolutely convinced that that song was made for that moment alone because of how well it fit the scene and how perfect the timing was. I’m probably wrong but let me dream with this one.

At the very end, they were able to kill the person they wanted to, and at the very end, they died without ever truly knowing each other. Kageaki doesn’t even realize that Kanae killed his father (although he does get very close). And so, the curtains close on their tale of revenge.

Honestly I would give Kanae’s route alone an 11/10, that’s how much I enjoyed it. I have nothing bad to say about it. It’s the one thing I’ve read that’s come the closest to what I’ve been searching for all the time. Some of the finest クソデカ感情 I’ve had the pleasure of witnessing. Kanae is definitely one of the most characters ever. I also enjoyed the rest of the game but I never reached the ridiculously high highs when playing Kanae’s route. Somehow I ended up playing the fandisc/spinoffs Janen-hen and Shokuzai-hen right after and while I enjoyed them in varying degrees I was also pleased by the new Kanae art in them. She is very pretty.

Special mention to Kanae’s crux which is my favorite tsurugi in the game for a very simple reason: it has a fucking crossbow. Its dormant form is the bass she plays. What really makes it special is that its power is a copy of Williams Tell’s auto-tracking arrow ability but shittier, so the user has to manually change the target coordinates every time they want to change the arrow’s direction. In the hands of any other person this would be way too inconvenient to use in battle due to things moving around all the time, but Kanae just so happens to have some... ”special” eyes so she has the ability to perceive time at a far slower rate than humans normally can, making her able to control the direction of her arrows at will. The fact that Kanae and Barrows were pretty much made for each other is very sexy.

Also couldn’t resist screenshotting every instance of “The paradox of ‘Tell and apple’.” because of how cool it sounds.

Bonus: this game has a character named 来馬豪 when Manfred’s Japanese name is 狩魔豪(かるまごう) so this makes Muramasa certified ミツメディア. You cannot change my mind.

Honorable Mentions: It’s Almost Over, I Swear

Unfortunately, not every piece of media can cause my brain worms to multiply like the ones above did, but there are a lot that get me thinking. Here is a small selection of such instances.

In Aete Mushi Suru Kimi to no Mirai, the protagonist is an adopted child of the Sawatari family and in his sister Nanagi’s route, it is revealed that this was due to the guilt the Sawatari parents felt as the other party in the car accident that caused the protagonist to lose his parents. There were some good quotes in there but unfortunately this revelation happened after the H scene quota was filled so there was no brooding over this fact while having sex, although I guess I shouldn’t have expected to see that from a brand named Alcot Honeycomb. Also Nanagi is a pretty standard Eroge Imouto™ so the relationship doesn’t set my radar off in any other department.

I have never interacted with anything in the Muv-Luv franchise, but sometimes I remember that one of the characters is named Mitsurugi Meiya (御剣冥夜) making me wonder if I accidentally stepped into the worldline where Mitsumei is married (no).

I played Riddle Garden because one of the heroines also voices Arawn from Tears to Tiara and I really enjoyed it (except for Phils route fuck Phil's route). It made my heart beat faster than anything I've read outside of fanfiction which I have to tip my hat to. Interestingly enough, there were two (2) characters I liked more than the one voiced by Arawn, although I liked them all (except Phil(ry). It also made me think that maybe 女性向け is really where it's at because in my time scouring the Japanese web for content I have a feeling most of the Mitsumei content was 女性向け (furtively glances at my doujinshi collection). The same goes for Ace Attorney in general I guess, especially now that its doujin heyday is way past. I do have an increased interest in otome games but I am still as lazy in starting things as ever. Where else can I scream at things like this?

ｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｱｯｯ

In the novel series Sakurako-san no Ashimoto ni wa Shitai ga Umatteiru, there is a line in one of the earlier books that’s remained in my mind: 「遺族は一生遺族」 (paraphrase). The series is pretty good at going through the implications of this while Sakurako solves mysteries and the like, especially near the end when she finally finds out the truth behind the death of her little brother. When’s season 2 of the anime........

I think this cover of the season 1 Kaguya-sama opening (the best one) by Kaguya and Shirogane is very good.

(Direct link because cucked from embedding by Sony: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=motF91gTdO0)

Here’s to Ten More ～至高主義者の道～

Congrats, you made it to the end of this post! If you read it all, good for you. If you just decided to just skip to the end, I commend you for wanting to see what the hell is down here. This concludes my post on how I ended up shipping something 10 years ago and how it affected my life way too much.

The first ideas of this post came around the time I played Mirai Radio and Muramasa. Because I played them both in a very close time frame and had all those thoughts I wrote above pop up in my brain in the same time, I felt that I had to write them down somewhere. But I also felt I couldn’t truly express why I liked them so much without also explaining how Edgeworth and Franziska dominated my mind and media consumption. I also kind of wanted to let people know that no matter how much anyone thinks I ship them, it’s actually much, much deeper and much, much worse than other people can feasibly imagine. I saw that this descent started nearly 10 years ago and came up with the mega post idea for this year, which leads me here.

Will I ever stop thinking like this? Maybe, maybe not. What I do know is that finding something you truly enjoy from the bottom of your heart is a very lovely feeling and I hope everyone gets to experience that in their lives.

Thank you for reading about the endless thoughts in my head and I hope you have a nice day.

ミツメイはそのうち万病に効くようになると信じてる あと世界平和の鍵にもなる。まる。

[bigskydreaming]

Hey, i come asking for references, sorry for inviting, could you please name an actor who you think looks like Dick, PLEEAAASE

also, how did the robin deck card looked when dick was robin? Does it change with each new robin? Or does it conserve it's form changing just the current holder in your by lost ways fic

Okay, you of all people never have to apologize for asking me for references! I'm still giddy about the fanart you made for By Lost Ways, which is def on my list to return to. (I have my appointment to get my ADHD meds refilled today, FINALLY, so fingers crossed for some more fic updates really soon. I suck at promising updates though so I'm not doing that, just hoping!)

I'm also pretty random about fancasts, I either have very clear mental images or none at all, lol, and for Dick its usually been more of the latter, for a variety of reasons....mostly because I’d prefer unknown actors cast as him and given the career boost from his visibility. Especially in terms of movies, like.....people always talk about how a young Dick Grayson can’t work in live action because it would break the tone and I’m always like oh ye of little faith and point to Logan, the X-Men film from a few years ago, where a twelve year old Dafne Keen played Laura in a highly centered action role that absolutely did not break the tone whatsoever....and there were multiple other kids her character’s age in the movie as well? Like, its not actually hard? People are just weird about Dick being a kid in live action, when ‘prepubescent bad-ass’ is a classic trope in action movies and shows like from Kick-Ass to Hanna and more.

But the downside of wanting to see them go with a young Dick Grayson for once is like, my ideal casting for him likely has yet to be discovered, y’know? So unfortunately I’m not a huge help here. Bit of a cop out, I know, but it is what it is, lol.

As to your other question.....the Regents’ Deck card you did for Dick as the Owl Regent a couple years ago actually inspired me to change my own mental image of how they looked. I loved the constellations you added into the background here, and it really works story-wise since a big theme was always gonna be that Mother Sky was just one of many gods creating worlds in that particular universe. And idk if you remember that one-shot I did as a journal entry Roy made while experimenting with feather-magic and trying to create different magic arrows.....like he talked about in his notes there, Atlanteans, Themyscirans and Tamaraneans are all technically alien races in the By Lost Ways universe, who all originated on other worlds created by their own gods and with their own unique magic systems. And then the Themyscirans and Atlanteans eventually migrated to the planet Sky, and members of other races like Kory ended up there too via the magic equivalent of spaceship travel.

So I think the starry backdrop with constellations is something that recurs on all the various cards of the deck, just featuring different constellations. And I think that like how we have the Zodiac constellations, that world has constellations for each of the different Regents. Like there’s an in-world myth that after Mother Sky left her creation in the hands of her initial Regents.....once their power changed hands and passed on to the second generation of Regents, the original ones took to the heavens in search of Mother Sky and eventually became constellations in the forms of the various birds they’re linked to.

The other distinct feature of each card, I think, is the border. I really liked the golden border you had for Dick’s Owl card, to match the golden owl eyes, and I think the borders of the other cards are a mix of different colors and symbols. Like the Robin card’s border is green I think, since the Robin is the Regent of Change and New Beginnings, particularly tied to springtime....and maybe with hints of leaves curling around the edges like the border is a vine encircling the whole card. 

And that element, like the color scheme and the constellations, would stay the same even as the face of the Regent changes whenever the power passes on to a new one. Oh and there’s always a feather of the Regent’s associated bird like, present SOMEWHERE on the card, even if not exactly the way you did it with the owl feather on Dick’s card.

So the Robin card is basically the same when its Dick as the Robin Regent and then Jason and then Tim and then Damian....the only real change is their face, hair, etc....even the clothes I don’t think really change, because they’re not meant to mimic what each individual Regent wears so much as just be like...a heraldic emblem of each Regent. Like, as the Owl Regent, Dick’s card always shows him in the same cloak and hood no matter what he’s actually wearing at the moment, y’know? 

(There IS weird stuff going on with Steph’s card, because you might remember Steph, although the Mockingbird Regent, was at one point believed to be the Robin Regent, but that’s because its the Mockingbird’s nature to be mistaken for other Regents. There’s a whole thing going on with that, that’s unique to her and her Regency, but that’s a big spoiler so I’ll leave it at that for now).

So yeah, with the exception of the Mockingbird card, which does....weird stuff, with all the other cards, the clothes, border/background and stars all stay the same whenever a Regent changes....its just the head that tends to change. And of course in the unique case of the Owl Regent, since the Owl is the Regent of Secrets and Silence, that Regent’s face is always obscured by their hood, but people still can tell when that Regency has shifted hands because like, the little bits that they CAN make out of the Owl Regent’s face are different if people pay close enough attention to like, the shape of their mouth or chin or cheekbones, etc.

[tundrainafrica]

Hi Sav,

I want to ask your opinion about aot in general. We know that Aot is a good show and has great stories.

But, do you have any critiques on aot? I'd love to know...

Thank you in advance 😄

Thank you for the ask! I actually am a serial complainer so I LOVE LOVE LOVE answering things like this because I have complaints about a lot of things lmao.

At the same time though, I’m answering this as a Levihan fan.

Occasionally, I would see AOT material and feel this strange disconnect because I think I’ve read and written too much fanfiction that when I actually see AOT material, I’m like ‘wait oh right, Levi and Hange came from there....”

To answer your question though, here are my general complaints about ATOT as a whole.

The general reason why I kinda feel strongly about the story telling being REALLY weak towards the end is because AOT started strong. Like, I’m sure most people can agree that in the anime at least, or maybe in most parts of the manga as well. every panel, every scene HAD purpose, which adds to the overall quality of the writing and the pacing.

The plot twist and the change in genre was also built really well. Yams left enough to speculate and he also created this story where every scene had a purpose in building the overall plot, the plot twists were done incredibly well. He cleverly planted all the hints, most readers wouldn’t have been able to pick up which was created some really great rewatch value for the previous seasons.

Character death wise, he was also incredibly trigger happy but all of the deaths seemed to have had a purpose anyway so I wasn’t too salty about all the characters dying. And most important characters who died anyway, died for one reason, to introduce a villain or to signal an end of an age, or there was a huge build up/foreshadowing leading towards the death which made it stomachable.

Towards the end though, Yams wasn’t writing to actually build some plot twist anymore. He actually had to pull at the threads of every single plot point he planted and write some semblance ending.

No ending can satisfy everyone but for me, a quality ending is supposed to tie all the loose ends in some tight logic manner which Yams low key KINDA failed to do. This explains why when the purpose of writing ‘changed’ from setting up AOT for a major plot twist and a genre shift to actually tying all the loose ends, the quality of writing kinda diminished.

With the amount of questions left unanswered, I can’t help but think Yams was in a hurry to just end the damn thing. (But really, I’m not too blah about it, because the story telling and world building was great overall, it’s just the ending which left a lot to be desired. At least, it’s not ‘Game of Thrones’ BAD lmao)

Tight Story Telling

Story telling is supposed to have a purpose. Every scene, every death, every scene leading to the finale is supposed to have a damn purpsoe and literally, it’s been months and I still think about Hange’s death as one of the most pointless plot developments in AOT.

HANGE DIDN’T. THEY LITERALLY JUST DIED. And every day, I literally try to fathom why the hell, Yams had to kill her, and I have speculations about it. The strongest one being the fact that Yams didn’t know what to do with Hange towards the end of the show and he needed to kill someone to prove the gravity of the situation I guess. And I guess Hange was the best option since she was old or something or she was just so difficult to write that Yams decided to kill them?

And I dunno it just seems like an asspull.

And Hange’s death wasn’t built up at all. Like there were no signs, there was nothing, no character arc which could have made it stomachable so Hange’s death just seems like lazy writing to me tbh and I kinda take it slightly personally because most casual readers I know tend to gloss over Hange’s death?? Which kinda diminished Hange’s character as a whole

And I thought about who could have died other than Hange and I realized, no one was built up to die in that scene? Or there wouldn’t have been anyone in that scene who I would have been okay with dying? Which kinda points to the fact that maybe Yams just didn't prepare properly for that death scene?

Which brings me to my next point.

Consistency of Characters

If a character is prepared for greatness, it doesn’t make any damn sense to put them through shit and kill them in some anti climactic way (Like Circe in GOT style)

And at the same time, most people might not agree with me here but I guess it kinda doesn’t make sense for me to see Eren redeemed at the end for the sake of love? Or him having to do everything for the sake of JUST the love with Mikasa?

It makes sense, I have to admit, there were plot points which hinted to the really strong bond between Mikasa and Eren but destroying the whole world FOR Mikasa? All I’m getting from this is Eren is just some crazy psycho who is overly obsessed with a girl that he tries to destroy the world and his sacrifice was in vain anyway because the world was kinda messed up too.

I personally think it would have been way more stomachable if Yams just highlighted everyone as a whole instead? Like it seems much more believable for me to think that Eren reached points of irredeemable or maybe if Yams just highlighted the fact that Eren did it for EVERYONE, not just for Mikasa. Because I think with the way that Yams wrote it (putting emphasis on Eren’s relationship with Mikasa), most casual readers would gloss over the fact that Eren had no choice. If he didn’t do the rumbling, Paradis would have been overrun.

Mikasa being there and her relationship with Eren WAS built up from the start so it has some place in the ending. But to put it at the centerpiece instead of Eren’s relationship with the whole Paradis which would have kinda made Eren’s decision to just ��genocide’ everyone make more sense.

Some parts of the ending kinda remind me of weathering with you and I have a lot of beef with that movie.

Which brings me to my next point:

Values Dissonance (????)

Whenever I read or finish something, the final question I ask myself is ‘so what? what is this piece of media trying to tell me?”

For AOT, I think the most glaring message is ‘the cycle of hatred always continues,’ but I don't think that the message was properly built up? Yams went through the love, the relationships and he highlighted them too brightly for me to even properly stomach the 'cycle of hatred' message as the main one.

It seemed like, towards the end he was jumping from one message to the other in a low key sloppy way and there was no consistent message in all of them.

What was Eren’s purpose? What was the purpose of his sacrifice? What was the purpose of the sacrifice everyone was making?

If Isayama’s whole intention was to tell us that the sacrifice was meaningless and the cycle of hatred continues, I feel like there were better ways to build this up than to dangle ‘love’ in front of us and as the centerpiece of the genocide and the finale before the extra pages in some way where it wasn’t even properly built up in the first place.

That 180 from 'okay Eren did all these stuff out of love’ which is kinda overly mushy and kinda crazy already mushy way and suddenly create this message like the ‘world is doomed, seems like a sloppily placed 'plot twist' to me. Like the type of plot twists authors just put to surprise the reader but it doens't seem well thought out in the first place.

Why highlight something as hopeful as love and make Eren start the war over it when you’re just going to create some major dissonance with a plot twist. Like with the values Yams was highllighting towards the end, I feel like it was a roller coaster with a lot of abrupt twists and turns and there was no time to really reflect on the overall message because he was highlighting too many opposing points at once with no clear thread connecting all of them

I don’t know if I make any sense here haha but yeah, those are my general complaints with AOT as a whole. Don’t get me wrong, I love AOT as a whole but I guess like all shows it has its flaws especially towards the ending.

And hey Yams, still made Levi and Hange and I think anyone who built a world complex enough to inspire others to write fanfiction and draw fanart is a good author either way.

Disclaimer: These are just my thoughts on what I remember from reading but I have been trying to forget a lot of the plot points so I can enjoy it again when the anime comes out. My thoughts might change depending on what I think after rewatching.

[ladyyatexel]

I Went On A Manga Binge

So you don't have to

For those of you who have wisely avoided the shreds of it I've left around the blog thus-far, I had some weird notion to go re-experience Yu-Gi-Oh uuuuuh a week ago? We'll go with that. Time is meaningless.

I'd been able to read a good portion of the early manga at the end of highschool, and somewhere in my stacks and stacks of paper is fanart from this dark time, so you know I cared. I also still own a Dark Magician action figure somehow, so. I'd also watched a large portion of the anime with my brother because it had been laced with some kind of crack and we couldn't look away? I remember when we both were just like shit, wait, don't change the channel, I can't stop looking at it. And the next thing we knew we were waiting for new episodes and I was doing research on the Japanese original because I was that kid.

Anyway, unnecessary backstory out of the way, here are some... let's call them Observations and Consequences of having read somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 chapters (and growing) of a manga primarily hinged on card games from a spectrum of sources ranging from boringly lawful to sketchy as fuck.

Surprise actual character that develops in typical shounen fashion being Jounouchi. My limited experiences with the 4Kids dub and only early manga had not painted him in a particularly good light. I don't know if episodes were being aired out of order or if I had just missed the ones that established that he was making shit up as he was going along, but Wow I liked him a lot more going through the manga than I ever did watching the (dubbed, heavily edited and censored and thrown into a slurry machine) anime. I'd managed to come out with the impression that he was just as reasonably experienced with the game as Yugi back in the day. Wild.

I'm now reading every single comic-style post on Tumblr backwards.

Striking inverse to first point, wow, I don't like Seto Kaiba. Though he gets points for his general philosophy of the future, and the line I read in my sketchy online combo of scans and scanlations in which he said, "If God is in your way, you run him down," was Metal As Fuck. I somewhat shame-facedly admit to enjoying him a lot more as an Abridged Series character. (I watched Abridged as it came out back in the day! The experience of watching the anime with my brother had been so fresh that I got all the in jokes about the way things were edited and dubbed, it was great. Series remains influential part of my life to this day, which is hella weird.)

I almost understand how Duel Monsters works now. I don't want this.

That said, wow a lot of the decisions made in the anime made everything a lot more ridiculous than the admittedly already ridiculous original. I got the distinct feeling in the manga that the Duelist Kingdom stuff we were seeing was designed to be used and exploited in ways that don't make sense in an actual cardgame just played on a table like a normal person and this was part of testing everyone to think higher, differently. Maybe this is obvious to everyone already, I don't know. I had always liked that it was very, 'Not so fast, I'm going to blow up the moon to change the tides,' but I'm not really sure the anime gave enough explanation that this was an extra layer added to things for that event? You can see people actively getting used to it in the books, and people who aren't considering the real or 3D nature of it getting owned, but my memory of anime version is everyone just like, 'oh, shucks, fuck me, I forgot to consider the phase of the moon before i played this card, can't believe I forgot.' No one calls Yugi on any of this stuff because it's valid play in that situation. Plus Yami Yugi had mad trickster energy in the beginning and it suited him to think of ways to do things inside these little simulation boxes the way it suited him to set perverts on fire. I imagine the real card game trying to emulate this element as something that would be to its detriment, but I neither know nor particular care haha

Ryou Bakura.

Really, though. I think he became kind of casualty of 'wow, we have a lot of characters who really aren't able to do anything in this story anymore,' despite the fact that his whole inner life could have been as interesting as Yugi's. I always like thinking about the possibilities of stories in which main character falls into magical world and is given magical item and told they're the hero and then they find out they've been the bad guy the whole time. The first several volumes of manga were about the quiet weirdo kid that no one talked to who was always blacking out and turning into a fucked up version of himsef because he was so attached to his ancient Egyptian jewelry, so like, Bakura could have much the same shit going on. I want to know what's happening with him so much. He clearly doesn't love being possessed, but he's also so drawn to the ring. Despite it having stabbed him at least twice and him knowing it's a danger to him and his friends, he keeps being pulled back into it. You see so much more of him being like, 'Oooh, a creepy thing, I love that! :D' in the manga than ever in the anime, which I'm all about. Also more blood. I'm very about that as well. Though my memory of the anime also made it look very much like normal regular daily Bakura was just a weird facade in places before he ever would have been. I think that was it trying to compensate for what people didn't see from the Toei anime, but okay whatever, that I love everything about this guy is not news, I don't need to talk about Bakura excessively here, I'm pretty sure that's gonna show up on my blog by itself

On a related note though, damn, more of these people need to talk to each other. Can we have some existential crisis support clubs or something. Can we get like some apologies or something? "I respect you as a duelist." "Cool, but you literally built a tower designed to specifically assassinate me and my friends? You were supposed to get Better after I retaliated by putting you in a coma, but you kinda didn't." "Why would the coma have made it better" "I just told you it didn't" ---- "Sorry I went along with the plan of your evil parasite stabbing you, misled you, and then also jumped in and took up some real estate in your head too." "I understand, I also have an evil thing inside me that does things while I'm blacked out." "...no, I was conscious for all of that." "Oh." "..." "..." "..." "Do you like Ouija Boards?" "sure okay" ETC. Like damn we are reading shounen manga because no one is talking extensively about their feelings here and I'm tapping my foot angrily.

Holy shit there are so many mythologies happening at once. The ancient family guarding the Egyptian Pharaoh has a surname that's a Mesopotamian goddess. None of the god cards make any Egyptian sense except Ra, and just like. Baaarrrrely. Somewhere either Evil Ring Bakura or Mar/lik makes a reference to cremation and spirits being taken to heaven with smoke which several things, but definitely not Ancient Egyptian. Marik/Malik meanwhile is clearly trying to head Arabic, along with Rishid, but then, hey, our sister is just Isis. Goddess McGoddess. Sometimes they're the same goddess! Her name could be Isis Isis or Ishtar Ishtar. Meanwhile, all the obviously 'occult because Christians think it is freaky' stuff. ~ancient egyptian pentagrams~~~This isn't a complaint, I guess so much as a 'Wow, I can kind of see the cultural spot the author was coming from and where he was aiming' kind of thing.

Wonder where things would have gone if the card games had not been latched onto the way they were.

Managed to forget how gross the pre-cardgames stuff was on the sexual harassment front. I'm glad there was a sort of explanation of everyone drifting away from being dick heads and that that decision was made. It got way more comfortable to read after no one was bringing Yugi p*rn on VHS.

Yugi looks better with a nose, glad we got that upgrade.

Interesting to watch the series style shift as it goes away from being horror to being over the top cardgames and friendship (with blood!). The first picture of Mokuba is fucking Jarring. Also noticed that the nicer a character is, the less their teeth are defined.

Glad manga did not go as completely off the fucking the rails about Marik's face. I never got as far as seeing him back in the day because college occurred, but I remember seeing pictures and stuff and being like, "what in the Fuck happened to that dude, I think the house style has collapsed in on itself"

Things the author Really Likes: motorcycles, belts, SHOES, holy shit the shoes. These are some of the most lovingly rendered sneakers I've ever seen. All the detail on his characters goes straight to their feet and then it's stretched upward until it forms stiff peaks. Gently fold in 3000 years of trauma and bake face down in a crumb coat of scattered mythology. Remove when you roll two zeros.

Where the fuck am I going to put the extremely large omnibus volumes of this comic I purchased in order to balance out how much I would be reading for free on the internet. I should have grasped that a three in one edition would be Thick and yet somehow I was still :O when it arrived. Have I strategically purchased volumes that contain my favorite parts, maybe, what's it to you will i eventually get the whole thing because incomplete book series gnaw on my soul? yes

Wish the transition from "I've murdered several people in delightfully karmic ways" to "all you need is friendship in your heart and cards in your hand" Yami Yugi/Pharaoh had been discussed more/transitioned better. Buddy, where did you get this approved for television high horse? Please go back to strangling people with yo-yos or at least tell me why you stopped.

I still can't tell anything that looks like a big robotic monster apart from any other big robotic monster. My dude, I can't tell cars apart, all these monsters look the same.

Yami Yugi fascinated me way more in highschool? Maybe because it was still super early and the anime was like 'we need to torture you about his origins WeEkLy. Now I'm just like 'wait hold on, can we go back to Bakura and Marik for a minute, there's some extreme unpacking to do here?' Those two are paying so much more in baggage fees here my guy wow

Violently uninterested in any of the spinoff media