#fictional is just differently real
Explore tagged Tumblr posts
Text
Just a silly guy, with silly silly thoughts.
@glowweek Day 2
Casual | Surprise
A casual surprise?😬😬😬
#Hooooo boiii this lad is about to get funky.#He was internally screaming the whole time.#It's in my core memory as a connverse fan. I'm never truly going to let this up I believe. haha#Our boy really one day went out there wanting to get married as a teen like a true classic Disney princess. 😭#It was honestly endearing but sad and also pretty embarrassing. 😔#Secondhand embarrassment aside. Steven is pretty much lucky in the romance department. Which. Deserved by the way. With all the other#crap he had to deal with.#connverse#Steven Quartz Universe#Connie Maheswaran#SU#my shiz#teal#SU comic#glowweek#connverse week#I have no idea if whatever Connie is spouting are actuallt true in real life. Good thing this can be chalked off as just a thing in their#fictional world.#Also I'm glad part of that was covered by Connie's body because I had to take a few notes from chat GPT to add in her enumerated rambling.#I had to make the glow bracelet float like that because I couldn't draw his hand holding it quiet right in that angle.#And yea that size difference is no error. That's how small Connie's wrist is compared to his hands. Or at least something like that.#comic
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
love (loath) this version of ‘empathy’ for characters that exists in fandoms that somehow means taking any articulation of the fact that x character is given responsibility and context by the story and that their poor choices lead to poor outcomes is actually a slight against the character (and implicitly somehow whatever oppressed group which they belong to or are alleged to belong to by sections of fandom)
to be clear this is something i’ve noticed in several fandoms which is why the beginning of this is general language but the pertinent example to my current frustration is liliana temult and the defence of her that lays on a claim that those who enjoy the narrative showing her poor actions leading to poor outcomes for her have somehow failed the empathy test is beyond incomprehensible to me. like even ignoring the very basic level understanding that fiction is a place to experience satisfaction in narratives that we cannot fulfil in non-narrative reality, it’s also like… holy fuck do I not want the kind of empathy that tells me it will all work out no matter what choice I make. it is actually imperative to human life that the choices we make have substance in the outcomes we arrive in, otherwise we would’ve long given up on the notion of free will. and to look at a narrative, particularly one built in the context of a ttrpg. a game notably influenced by the choices that players-as-characters make. and then see sections of an audience find it compelling and enjoyable that a character who has made categorically poor choices that have caused immeasurable harm to others is now dealing with the very obvious face-eating panthers consequences… idk man. if you see that as a lack of empathy i implore you to consider what role empathy is playing in your world.
like. if empathy to you is about comfort and stagnancy and not about growth and community, then sure i can understand how it might not be empathetic in your view to notice patterns and see their obvious outcome and acknowledge that . but as someone who has been in the position of making horrible choices with obvious outcomes, far more essential to my personhood was those who looked at me with careful but critical eyes than those who nearly babyed me into my grave. that’s actually why i love imogen’s choice to insist that liliana make her own choice and then quasi-encouraging her to stay, because it was a clear reminded to liliana that her choices have consequences, and one of those is that the terrible things she’s down in the name of her daughter have led to that daughter not being able to easily trust her.
and i think another thing that’s related that gets misconstrued with liliana (and as always unfortunately many such cases) is that the satisfaction of seeing her absorbed isn’t that it’s retributive harm done or some sort of punishment (at least not for me, skill issue if people in your fandom spaces are that cop-minded but, yknow, what can you expect from the thought-crimes capital of fandom spaces). the satisfaction is in the analogue (that i’ve seen well memed) to the face-eating panthers joke that liliana’s actions which have pushed an agenda that’s depended on the consumption and threat to her child and the children she specifically has aided in placing in danger via her choices, has led to situations where a) she’s ‘burdened’ by her care for imogen and the children (both of which she has played a hand in inviting into the context of danger) b) she is now the person in danger of being consumed after spending weeks simply shrugging off concerns about what might be consumed in the name of ludinus’ Just World™. like it’s not just ‘liliana does bad things, must be punished’ it’s ‘liliana has played a hand in creating a situation that is threatening to many including herself, it is narratively satisfying and engages in Common Narrative Tool: Irony to have that create situation negatively impact her directly.’
to that end that’s why the ‘if you’re like this about liliana you should also be like this about essek’ takes are beyond missing the point (without getting into the horribly built scarecrow that it is, understand that it’s actually undermining decades of feminist’s philosophical and political development to see a critique of a female character and go ‘well actually if she were a man you wouldn’t be saying that’ when it’s a provable fact that people Would be (and have been) saying that if she were a man. so not the feminist slay you think it is). like, as someone who Was just as interested in essek’s story having consequences as I am in liliana’s, there very much WERE consequences for essek that, just like liliana, were well contextualized and suited to the specific choices he made. they are ones that should be obvious even to the most surface read of the campaigns given that essek still appears in disguise years after the end of c2, should also probably be obvious in the rebuilding of relationships essek had to do with mn after they discovered his betrayal. like the notable difference between liliana and essek is not their gender, it’s that we’ve seen the end of essek’s story (in the sense of like. campaign containment, obviously his Story™ is ongoing) and have yet to see liliana’s— it’s entirely possible that liliana does get saved and goes on to repair her relationship with imogen (or goes on and is unable to repair it) or she just dies and part of imogen’s story is dealing with it; all of those are narratively satisfying. what wouldn’t have been satisfying, in the sense that would leave liliana feeling like a non-agent in a story dependent on her agency, is if her role was entirely dictated by imogen’s interest in reconciliation. because sure if you want to look very microscopically the current threat to liliana that exists is 1-to-1 caused by the fact that she’s been helping imogen, but taking seriously the story, the consequences bloom from all the choices that liliana has made leading to ludinus’ decision to trust her however far he does that made liliana’s choice a betrayal and affirmed ludinus’ strength and position so that he can do something like siphon someone’s life force away.
further the ‘why does liliana deserve to be funnelled and relvin gets off easy’ relvin doesn’t get off easy. once again the satisfaction of his narrative is that he did his best and it was insufficient and that cost him a relationship with imogen they both clearly wish for but neither can rectify. the consequence for relvin is that he’s in an empty house that is no longer home to the woman he loved or the daughter he was left to raise alone. surely i don’t need to unpack why i think someone who tried but wasn’t well equipped to raise a daughter with superpowers doesn’t need to evoke as ‘drastic’ consequences in their story as the stated right hand of the campaign’s bbeg for their story to feel complete.
and idk at least for me that’s the salient point; that the consequences that are happening feel like a plausible and suitable conclusion to the story we’ve seen of liliana even if she perishes at ludinus’ hand. it will be sad but it’ll be satisfying, and maybe i should have realized seeing the frequency with which parts of fandom have been campaigning to undo maybe the most weighty and narratively satisfying choices & consequence of vox machina’s story, but it’s truly confounding to me the amount of people treating the presence of any complex and non-traditional happy ending notion in a story set in a world defined by pyrrhic victories. like, empathy for vax isn’t saying he’s the puppet of a god that manipulated him into service, it’s acknowledging that he made a choice that he knew would have consequences and acknowledging that the consequences he demanded with that choice were pretty severe ones. that doesn’t mean i’m watching the end of cr1 seeing the characters destroyed by the loss of vax being like ‘dumbasses, they knew this was coming, vax chose this, these are his consequences’ it means that when i’m crying watching the end of cr1 it’s paired with my deep love for a story that takes seriously the weight of the character’s choices in the determination of their lives. idk man. maybe interrogate how much of your notion of empathy is dependent on individualism to the point of near complete alienation and get back to me on how empathetic it is to look at someone who has caused unarguable pain with their choices and say ‘no no it’s fine you didn’t mean to + you’re a woman :/‘ while the victims of those choices rot in their graves
#not to make fiction about real life but CURIOUS what so called liliana defenders have to say about alcoholics who drunk drive#critical role#cr fandom#on fandom#liliana temult#worst part of this is that i actually am a liliana lover she’s an incredibly interesting character to me#but. i see a post about her it’s like a 70% chance it’s just turning her into a agencyless zombie or otohans girlfriend (so a different kind#of agencyless zombie) like. can we engage in the story.#i bring a philosophy student who hates choice feminism vibe to discussions that contemporary fandom really doesn’t like#cr3
175 notes
·
View notes
Text
Some of this is an expansion of a thesis that I was prodding at in my speech and debate piece ten years ago in high school (which was an admittedly somewhat naïve exploration of the relationship between science fiction, optimism about the future, and scientific progress, though I stand by elements of it), but there really is something fascinating about the way Back to the Future, as a piece of science fiction media, engages with its own genre.
In the "better" timeline, George McFly, an avid sci-fi fan, goes on to become a science fiction writer. Doc Brown was inspired to become a scientist by the works of Jules Verne (and in the video game, has another Eureka moment when he sees the 1931 Frankenstein film for the first time); in the musical, he describes his time machine as "A car for the stars / Like Captain Kirk's." As a sickly girl, isolated from her peers, Clara Clayton fell in love with amateur astronomy and stories about traveling from the Earth to the Moon.
I'm just so enamored with the fact that, unlike some other media, Back to the Future loves being sci-fi so much. There's a consistent throughline in every piece of BttF media--even the newer ones--that science fiction is something good, and inspirational, that makes people feel less alone, and forges connections, and encourages people to learn and invent. And that throughline is absolutely in conversation with the fact that the 2015 segment of the second film presented a decidedly aspirational vision of the future, even though other contemporary portrayals on the new millennium were starting to skew bleaker and more cyberpunk. It would come across as a little self-aggrandizing if it didn't feel so genuine--and it also helps that some of the positive impacts shown are smaller, and more personal. George finds a fulfilling career. Doc and Clara fall in love. It's more like watching a work of fiction earnestly believe it has something to say than it is watching it be self-important.
"You can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it," "Your future hasn't been written yet. No one's has. Your future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one." Do you see. Do you see it.
#like yes it's very cheesy but. by god do we need some cheese sometimes#also when i say my previous takes on this were more naïve#they very much came from a place of feeling like there was a Right Way to talk about the future#which was very high school of me#ten years later i would say that different stories have different goals and a good dystopian critique can have its own kind of optimism#but that being said. the imaginative potential of fiction is real#and i really do think there's something to be said for stories that revel in it - and want us to revel in it too#something something sci-fi cannot save the world but it can uplift the people who will along the way#a very 'somebody will' vision of progress to get a little filk about it#i just really like that bttf embraces that idea#readily and cheesily. would that we could all#f: your future is whatever you make it
73 notes
·
View notes
Text
@gontagokuhara-week Day 6 - pregame / postgame
Major spoilers for V3 under the cut!
Sooo the idea is that this would be in-universe promo material for the upcoming Danganronpa V3 series, designed by the lackeys over in Team Danganronpa's advertising department.
Given how Danganronpa was massive in-universe, with presumably a shitton of advertising and publicity... I wonder how pregame Gonta would have fit into that. Why would he want to join the killing game? How would he feel about all the publicity - would he be into that like pregame Kaito, or is whatever motive he had to join the game strong enough to get past any uncomfortable feelings?
Some of these questions could be answered if pregame Gonta had any lines of dialogue :( But him never speaking could itself be a character trait. I think he could be someone who rarely talks because others find him intimidating and they don't engage with him... and his silence then makes him look more intimidating, which makes him keep more of his thoughts to himself, and so on. But that interpretation of him then sends me back to 'why would he put himself through a TV show?'.
Would he be aware of the "muscular person goes down in Chapter 4" trope, and if so, would he want to buck that trend, or is he relying on it? It's all interesting to think about.
Also, change of topic but I kind of have a plotline for the promo material in-universe
Each student would have their own variant, with their own memetic/self-referential taglines
Tsumugi suggested the taglines for each variant - she's the only one in the department who understands what they mean, the rest of the team just nods along as she's the mastermind and they think she has some authority because of that (she doesn't)
The higher-ups at Team Danganronpa swiftly come down on this and ban the taglines for being "tacky" and "only marketable to obsessed old-school Danganronpa fans", replacing all of them with the generic "thrills, chills, kills!"
but not before merch with the original taglines is created and sent off to stores. Said merch is put on second-hand websites for several times the original price. Tsumugi ends up being called to the CEO's office for an awkward conversation
#danganronpa#danganronpa v3#gonta gokuhara#own art#trying to do some form of semi-realism... never again lmao#i'm guessing the 'real reason' why pregame gonta doesn't speak is that him changing pronouns might give away#the 'contestants become different/fictional characters' twist early#but it's interesting to come up with other theories!!#i just noticed how long this post is#sorry about that!!#tomorrow's post might be worse ^^;
203 notes
·
View notes
Text
Oh how I love this man. I adore every part of this man.
I won't lie, my 5-year ago self would be screaming if she saw me now on her knees crying 'why' and all I could be saying is "he silly"
#king candy#gotta love how I started this blog for KCB and just focused on Kc#meanwhile Turbo is over there on the corner like a wet sad cat#like SORRY HUN ILL GET TO YOU EVENTUALLY#maybe#hhhh I need to smooch him#god looking down at me fawning over fictional characters when he made real life ppl: 🤨#ok ok but jokes aside he just makes me so happy<3#he's awful but I love him like-#MAYBE if he had a different outlet#maybe if he just...... got laid. he would chill tf out#//yes I'm referring to that one video#cuz like............ if he had OTHER people's attention and love and praise instead of having to focus solely on racing attention#m a y b e he could chill tf out#I could fix him#or make him worse if he wanted to#it's way too early for this I'm sorry yall aldjkskdksmd#simp rambles
60 notes
·
View notes
Text
Alright, as much as I love the Avatar fandom, the sexualization of MINORS has gotten VERY out of hand.
So, because some people cannot determine if a character's a minor even if they don't know their age, here's the canon ages for the characters!!!
(From the OFFICIAL visual dictionary)
Tsireya's age isn't listed, and Rotxo's not even in the dictionary, but Tsireya is Ao'nung's younger sister, and Rotxo seems to be around Ao'nung's age, maybe younger by a few months.
So yeah. STOP the excessive sexualization of minors because it's getting annoying and gross to see.
Thank you and goodbye.
(The pictures aren't mine, I found them from this post here.)
#also i don't wanna HEAR the “oh but it's fiction!!!”#SO?????#if you think it's okay to say that teenagers who act very much like teenagers in fiction are “sexy”#than what's stopping you from thinking that about real teenagers too???#it's different if you're a teenager too but it still isn't okay to sexualize minors in fiction regardless of if you're close in age or not#because it's gross#and it's also getting really annoying to have to scroll for miles just to find some content that isn't x reader smut#the next person who reblogs my art with a gross thing to say is getting blocked#avatar#avatar the way of water#atwow#avatar twow#awow smut#awow x reader#avatar the way of water x reader#avatar twow x reader#awow x y/n#avatar the way of water x y/n#avatar twow x y/n#spider socorro#neteyam#lo'ak#loak#kiri#avatar tuk#tuktirey#tuk tuk#aonung#tsireya#rotxo
170 notes
·
View notes
Text
if you are someone like me who has trouble processing life events/mental health stuff create an oc. like. make a guy who's entire story is yours, who knows every inch of your suffering b/c they are you but maybe all their troubles stem from being in an intergalactic war with goob noobs or something. hurt them in terrible ways so that you dont hurt yourself.
#spacie spoinks#fiction is a good way to explore things that are difficult to deal with i do it all the time with my ocs!!#i mean this wont work for everyone#but making an oc who i just constantly take my pain and suffering out on#is something i find very cathartic#also hes not real!!#i made him up!!#hes like just a vessel for my own suffering#a copy of me and what i think i deserve#but will never actually give myself#yk?#also yes make the character you essentially but also keep a certain distance from them in your mind so#that you know that they are you but not *entirely*#its a really hard thing for me to explain#but when i think about my self harm oc i feel bad for him#b/c hes me and we share the same story but different circumstances#hes me but also his own person#and when i think about what hes gone thru i feel sad and sympathetic#and so i end up feeling that way about me too#b/c we didnt deserve 2 go thru any of it#especially good for suicidal ideation#which is something i struggle with a lot
39 notes
·
View notes
Text
“more mid to late 50s” ???
“maybe early 60s” ???????
oh, i am so fucked. i had just come to terms with emmrich being the same age as my parents, but the possibility of him older???????
ha, i’m never gonna psychologically recover from being attracted to someone over thirty years my senior.
#rocking myself back and forth saying ‘it’s different. it’s fiction.’ over and over again lmaooooo#crazy how much a few years can change things lol#JUST TO BE CLEAR: i do NOT have a real problem with this#i just think it’s funny and emmrich is still hot okay nothing is gonna deter my attraction to that old man#dragon age#dragon age the veilgaurd#dragon age: the veilguard#datv#da:tv#emmrich volkarin#emmrich romance#emmrook
53 notes
·
View notes
Text
the fixation of fandom these days on there always being a Black and a White. A Right and a Wrong. A Villain and a Victim. is soooo fucking tragic and frankly REALLY DAMN ANNOYING
especially in stuff where like..if THAT'S your priority? you've missed the entire damn point. and yet it always is. so loudly.
look beyond your blorbo. your kintype. your CC. your f/o. look beyond your otp. look beyond your found family dynamic and actually absorb what's going on with the other characters. i'm begging.
honestly do a study on the characters you hate most or care about the least. take a half an hour to put yourself in their shoes
no this isn't an anti-shipping, anti-kinning, anti-selfship, or anti-blorboing post, because i don't think those are the things that inherently ruin characters or tags or whatever other ppl think. but if you do do that, it'll make it even better if you look at a larger scope beyond that as well I promise
#txt#like i believe in ppl approaching fandom however you want as long as youre not actively hurting ppl#but i just cant stand to see nuance die just for the sake of being unwilling to look at a different perspective than the bias#it also sucks ppl feel like they cant like flawed characters anymore because suddenly that means they Condone Real Life Abuse or whatever#what if we took a step back and remembered that fiction is for entertainment and not here to be Morality 101#you should be getting that elsewhere or from idk shows literally made for toddlers if any fiction#people have been enjoying villains and flawed characters and characters with different moral compasses in general for as long as fiction ha#existed and i promise that's not what makes someone evil or whatever#everyone out there doing shitty shit feels enabled because of their circle of ppl or powers-that-be enabling them#and sometimes pretty directly!#not because the fictional serial killer said some deep shit about the nature of man and ppl vibed with the mood or because#the fictional war monger looked kinda sexy while doing his shit#bateman joker tyler durden fanboys who made one or more of those men their fictional jesus or whatever were always doomed to be Like That#the joker didnt crawl out of their TV and brainwash them directly into shitheads#everyone who ever blames or claims some fictional shit Inspired them is just giving an excuse for something that was always and already in#their heart for other reasons i swear that to you
26 notes
·
View notes
Text
Benny would be thrilled by Nick Valentine. Like I know the concept of synths and replacing people would initially shock him but I don’t think for long.
He’s not a technology guy by any means but he certainly appreciates it and understands what it can do. He’d be pro-synth and synths at people for purely pragmatic reason at first but seeing some noir detective would have him thinking of all the ways he could improve on his plan if he had that tech for Yes-Man.
If Yes-Man could pass as human he’d have no reason to hide him and could even have him buddy up with the rest of the Chairmen! Even if he’s found out and House wants him and especially synth Yes-Man out their is a loyalty to them that is only made stronger that Yes-Man looks like them now. It’s also such a complex thing for Yes-Man too now to struggle with “humanity” in a new context and his teacher tragic being Benny Fucking Gecko.
#also nicks like super cool in his mind cause in my heart Benny is like#a science fiction fan boy and big reason he listened to house at first is house offered something cool and had cool shit to back it up#Benny is like to me a man who is petty but not childish as the wasteland has allowed very few kids to have real childhoods#so he’s silly about somethings like when you give an adult a childhood toy and watch them become kids again#but it’s different here cause he’s an authority figure now and also he’s like planning a coo#so all his child behavior is forced to come out through his personality and choices and why he seems like a man child#fallout#fallout new vegas#benny gecko#benny fnv#yes man fnv#fallout 4#this was supposed to just be about Benny finding synths cool but then I kinda got off track in the notes#Benny would have a crush on nick and want to be his cartoon rival cause like holy shit seedy mob boss Rat pack type#and big city detective??? why are they not kissing in the floor#nick valentine
144 notes
·
View notes
Note
Aro culture is questioning if you really are aro if you like fictional characters/men and not real people in the middle of the night
(Help, I'm actually questioning this... THOU SUMMON THE CHILL AMAZING ARO COMMUNITY and that one chill girl that gave me a sticker of a possum playing the banjo)
plain text:
Aro culture is questioning if you really are aro if you like fictional characters/men and not real people in the middle of the night
(Help, I'm actually questioning this... THOU SUMMON THE CHILL AMAZING ARO COMMUNITY and that one chill girl that gave me a sticker of a possum playing the banjo)
--
quick note: colored text can make it hard to read these posts depending on how the screen colors are loading and color blindness or color changed screens for disabilities. the mods have frequent migraines, and we sometimes change screen colors to avoid aggravating them. if we receive stuff with colored text, it will have plain text posted underneath.
#aro culture is#aro#aromantic#actually aro#actually aromantic#ask#mod phoenix#u could always be fictoromantic or it could be the distance of a fictional situation rather than a real situation#i can enjoy some forms of fictional romance - rivals to lovers for some reason just hits different#but i've never personally experienced romantic attraction like. ever
27 notes
·
View notes
Text
Origins is of course the DA game most closely in conversation with and playing around with Tolkien (right down to the walking talking poetree haha) -- and even more so than most works in the larger western fantasy tradition derived from Tolkien's work that DA:O also hails from and owes a lot of its Stuff to, what makes the game so great to me is that it's doing so very deliberately, and is subverting and deconstructing those tropes and entrenched ideas in some very interesting ways without at all denigrating what it's commenting on. (it doesn't have the almost disdainful undertones of the vein of fantasy that seeks to make the world more 'realistic' ala the more tedious reactions to G.R.R.Martin's work, for example, despite having the darker fantasy bent to it.) among other elements it adopts, what I find the most fascinating is the choice to use the same literary device/conceit Tolkien did in ostensibly only having in-universe biased sources and works to deliver the world through (which I feel is an underappreciated thing about his approach but is part of what makes his world so enduringly compelling and real-feeling -- the feeling of real scholarship devoted/applied to a made-up world. the grounding effect of a good diegetic footnote about source criticism, truly).
many things to be said there, and I'm glad each following game has taken on different perspectives and lenses and traditions to view the world of Thedas through because if you stick with that one too closely for too long I fear we could teeter precariously close to Pratchett's famous and bitingly accurate accusation of most modern fantasy of that era just being about rearranging the furniture in Tolkien's attic lol. and while you could accuse DA2 (my perfect wife who has never done anything wrong in her life to be clear) of many things, that's not one of them, they are pulling on some completely different strings for that one and both the game and DA overall is better for it, to my mind. as so many things in this series: worth staying with and exploring for an installment even if it might get stale if all of it was like this! people are understandably sad about the elements from previous games that they liked which were lost along the way, but that capacity for reinvention is to my mind a huge strength of dragon age as a whole.
(I think Veilguard is coming in as a close second in Tolkien conversation-ness if only in outlining/revealing the worldbuilding that indeed may have been planned since DA:O around the animosity that SHOULD by all rights exist between dwarves and elves in this universe (as per Tolkienesque tradition standards). but doesn't really because you see: politics and the many pitfalls of conservation of knowledge over the ages. our ancestral enmity got semi-intentionally lost between the floorboards of history and you know what. maybe for the best. the humans are already up to so much shit you gotta keep your eyes on them at all times you can't be brawling with each other in the deep roads while they're still around getting up to their nonsense or they'll just pile up even more of it)
#dragon age#dragon age origins#been thinking about the unreliable narration/in-universe texts only element being the thing da:o took from tolkien that's most defining#for a LONG time and I want to write something smart about it sometime but alas. this is what I've got right now haha#I think *some* da:o nostalgia is about that familiar safe childhood feeling of Fantasy World in a pattern that was so deeply entrenched#for many many MANY years. it's been in the groundwater of the genre for so long it's only fairly recently the patterns were broken#on like a mainstream sort of scale. I know I'm getting older b/c I keep going 'how do I explain to some of these people#that the world (both the real one the fictional one and the gaming one) was a very different place back in 2009' lol#and I agree there's something so tremendously comforting about it even with all the grimdark elements more in the martin vein#that's also in da:o. the same way you get satisfaction out of the structural familiarity of fairy tale logic but for a whole genre#da:o follows the Rules of a fantasy world in post-tolkien tradition -- even when it's subverting them it's doing so in reference#to a set of tropes and ideas both you and the game are deeply familiar and comfortable with#(da:o IS also just a really fucking good game I'm NOT saying people's love for it comes from being blinded by nostalgia haha#just an observation of a thing I've recognized in myself as well. there are elves there are dwarves there are talking trees and dragons#and basically orcs. all is as it should be and everything makes sense <- the part of me that grew up on lotr and derived works lol)#and while the other games also have all these elements they don't USE them in the same way and it doesn't feel the same. it's so interestin#dragon age: the veilguard#dragon age: the veilguard spoilers#dragon age spoilers#only in the vaguest way but still#you know what veilguard occasionally feels more like actually. sci-fi! and it's not an accusation or a bad thing for me I think it's great#da:i veers more to high fantasy and da2 feels weirdly low-fantasy -- it's a story where magic also happens to exist but I almost forget lol#it's a magical world and magic is integral to the plot but thematically it's so much about real-feeling political conflict#da:o is a Quest in da2 you're new in town (and it gets worse)
20 notes
·
View notes
Text
So The Bear ends season 2 with Carmy fucking up his pretty serious relationship with Claire. They spent an entire season developing this relationship between Carmy and Claire, and now it's over, and not just over, but abruptly and painfully over. Throughout this same season, they continue to develop Carmy and Syd's relationship, incorporating undeniable nods toward an eventual romance.
Then in season 3, they have Carmy dealing with the fallout of his painful fuckup, that ended a relationship that was, as I said, pretty serious, and was developed over the course of an entire season. They do this while continuing to develop Carmy and Syd's relationship, and while their interactions are mostly tense this season, they continue to incorporate blatant nods toward an eventual romance.
This is happening at the same time they have opened a restaurant, and Carmy is under enormous pressure, pressure that has been made worse by his breakup. Pressure to make the place a success, to live up to his potential, but also to make sure that Tina has an income, that he gives Marcus's mom what she wanted for Marcus, that Ebra, elderly and at the point where he really needs to be retiring, continues to have a job, that he doesn't endlessly waste his uncle's money, and crucially, so that the restaurant can earn that star Sydney is dreaming of, and that Carmy didn't even want.
And yet there are people genuinely criticizing The Bear for not canonizing SydCarmy this season, when...?
The man just went through a devastating breakup -
At the same time he opened a goddamn restaurant -
And is clearly going through the crisis of a lifetime -
And on top of that, he's just quit smoking.
Do you think, in real life, that it's realistic someone in that situation would immediately turn around and start seeing someone else? Do you think the writers would have spent a whole season developing Carmy's relationship with Claire, just for Carmy to shrug it off like it was nothing when it ends?
I'm even more baffled by the idea that SydCarmy not becoming canon this season is because the writers this whole time, have just been, what? Fucking with you? Straight-baiting you? Or do you think that just because they didn't canonize SydCarmy this season that this is indicative that they didn't intentionally allude to a future romance between Syd and Carmy?
I will tell you right now that The Bear is one of the most purposefully written shows I've ever seen. And while I will say that this season might be the weakest so far and wasn't what I was hoping for either - Nothing on that show is an accident. Nothing means nothing.
The writers of The Bear are too good to have accidentally implied SydCarmy was a thing. They are also far too dedicated to their vision for The Bear for them to be throwing things in just to fuck with you.
Have some patience maybe? When was the last time you watched a show that didn't hand you something the moment it was hinted at? Aren't you tired of watching shows that skip to the good part? Which is, as a result, not as good as it would have been?
#the bear#sydcarmy#I don't know I'm just venting#I had my own criticisms of this season but man#I felt like I was being punked when I realized how many people feel slighted sydcarmy isn't canon yet#and then on top of that there's like a lot who have decided that I guess this means it was all about platonic love the whole time?#and I'm sorry but#there would be nothing wrong with Syd and Carmy being friends#but the writing devices being used in this show to develop their relationship and inform our understanding of who they are to each other#are explicitly romantic#there is no other way to read it from just a narrative standpoint#obviously in real life friends can look like anything.#But in fiction friendship and romance are both written about very differently.#Might not always be that way but as of right now it is and the bear generally isn't about challenging those dynamics or our understanding#of what constitutes them. It's not subverting our understanding of platonic or romantic love. That's not what the show is about.
38 notes
·
View notes
Note
i think there's something really beautiful about carpenter distancing herself from the trawler man every chance she gets and still getting showered by miracles while faulker, oh he of strong convictions, gets to bring the miracle of the trawler man to everyone around him but never quite gets to ascend to glory himself. i just love that they're both perfectly poised to stare at each other and each think "your goals are backwards and your methodology is dumb and possibly sacrilegious" and then still end up as something close to friends
also let's talk about how, despite these dynamics, at the end of the day, the trawler man is really just trying to give each of them what they want from him.
MMM YEAH. carpenter being beloved by multiple gods despite being such an ornery bitch who wants NOTHING to do with their sacrificial bullshit..... it really gets me. as does faulkner's ongoing crisis of faith and spiral into Faithless Cult Leader (TM). SO GOOD.
perhaps only tangentially related, but.
i've been thinking a lot about faulkner killing roemont lately. i was surprised that roemont's death ended up Breaking My Fucking Heart -- a real testament to his voice actor!! the whole pathetic old man losing everything he's worked for really.... Got To Me. ough. "don't you recognize me?" OUGH.
but i've been thinking about it in the context of faulkner's crisis of faith, too. because like. faulkner Knows that roemont is faithful. he considers roemont a heretic for trying to legalize the worship of the trawler-man, but it's like....
i feel like. killing roemont was a test of the trawler-man that faulkner devised on purpose. because if roemont dies due to the prayer marks that faulkner scrawled, then there are two possibilities:
1. the trawler-man really IS furious that the high katabasians want to legitimize the faith; the trawler-man really IS on faulkner's side; this schism really IS necessary to keep the faith "pure," and faulkner has never done anything wrong;
OR
2. the trawler-man really IS nothing but a mouth. this isn't a god with a plan or with sentience or with feelings, this is just a living river that chews things up and spits them out, and it doesn't care for its followers at all. and if that's the case, then faulkner is betraying nothing by being a faithless cult leader lying repeatedly to his people.
faulkner is devastatingly clever and constantly being underestimated. but he's also completely alone in the world. and he's Desperate for any sign that the choices he's making are the right ones. and he can't find that sign in anybody close to him, because he keeps destroying the lives of those close to him. so he has to devise his own trials....
hrugh. my boy. my boy my boy my boy.
#replies#the silt verses#the silt verses meta#faulkner#carpenter#horrible godsaint trauma pals#i keep just thinking about like. the constant question of how much gods care and how much agency they have#how much of this worship is a social construct made by people and how much is natural to the world?#does it matter? is there a difference between those things?#as someone whose original fiction ALSO plays a lot with#'magic is real but the way it's perceived is based in social constructs'.... I FUCK WITH IT SO HARD.#and the silt verses is a piece of media that like... i end up having different thoughts every time i listen to it#so in a few days or weeks i might not even stand by this meta. i might have different thoughts/interpretations entirely!!#it's a different story every time i listen. it's SO GOOD.
135 notes
·
View notes
Text
Sometimes I’m reading BSD x MHA crossover fics (which I love btw!!) and I see the take “your world (MHA) is black and white, ours (BSD) is gray” and this can be a GREAT way to differentiate places and cultures in a story when done well!! But sometimes the take itself can become black and white when it’s not acknowledged that any “black and white thinking” in the MHA world is solely undertaken by the reigning hero class and those who subscribe to its notions, ignoring the large subset of vigilantes and darker hero figures (as well as the rampant corruption and blatant prejudice propagated by the society), as well as the fact that BSD already solely focuses on those grey areas a la the Tripartite System, but that this nuanced view on legality and morality is only tackled within the general range of characters shown in the show, whereas there are countless civilians who live perfectly normal lives (within the more affluent or well-off areas of Yokohama) which are not shown, who often are completely clueless about any such darkness in their world and thus most likely often take on the same clueless, “black and white” mentality that some civilians of the MHA world do (a fact which relates to the prevalent headcanon, especially in MHA x BSD crossover media, that abilities are extensions of the soul or such which are a defense mechanism to protect someone from severe trauma/the like, which I can talk on and on about, but I’ll spare you all).
Okay, sorry for the random long paragraph about crossover fics in two of my favorite fandoms. Despite my occasional gripes with some takes within this sub-fandom, the different ways that people can tackle similarities and differences between the two are always so interesting to me, and I love to read them!
#BSD#mha#bungo stray dogs#bungou stray dogs#atsushi#my hero academia#bnha#boku no hero academia#fan fiction#fanfiction#fanfics#bnha fanfiction#mha fanfiction#bsd fanfic#mha bsd fanfiction#bsd mha fanfiction#bnha deku#deku#mha deku#tripartite system#bsd meta#mha meta#also btw this isn’t to say that those fics/etc which have a more surface-level take are bad !!#sometimes things are just for fun#or authors focus on different things and don’t have time to devote to a certain topic#which is completely understandable and so real !#so no hate to any creators out there#this is really just some random yapping of mine#love y’all !!!<33
31 notes
·
View notes
Text
Ok this is probably gonna be controversial
Even though I generally don't mind the fanon marauders (i couldn't hate them more but also idc, let ppl hv fun), i think it's a very interesting phenomenon. Don't get me wrong, i definitely don't conflate what ppl enjoy in fiction with real life, but imo it's rather interesting to see how our values and worldview influences the literature we produce and consume (otherwise it wouldn't be necessary to completely change the marauders' personalities in the first place)
Generally, i think it's just that ppl want to impose current day values and trends on the characters they grew up with and thus have a great degree of nostalgia for, seems lyk a perfect mix. And most ppl probably don't want deep, complex and heart breaking stuff in something they view as recreation. And that unconventional ships are fun in general. The entire thing is just silly fun
But also, i think the specific characterization of the marauders as one dimensional social justice warriors who are completely correct all the time(to the point where they're justified in every wrong thing they do in the name of defending rights or sm shit) comes from the fact that a lot of ppl like to think of themselves in this way as well. There's no place for growth, correction or nuance, there's just good vs evil and right vs wrong. In the sense that they're the knights in shining armour and the rest of the world is purely evil. And this is just my opinion, but i think being an sjw is more of a cool fad now than anything else (particularly in the West). The purpose of what ur fighting for comes second to feeling good about yourself and having a superiority complex that comes with believing that ur completely, totally right with everything u say and do. The truth is, despite the fact that it's good to feel this way, i think literally no one is lyk this, no matter how accepting and empathetic they believe themselves to be. A lot of it is constantly questioning if ur doing the right thing and constantly critically analysing ur views and positions by trying ur best to see things from every perspective (or at least thts the way I see it). Everyone always has something they need to change. My point is, i think ppl hv a hard time accepting that those fighting for noble causes can still be wrong about other things and can still believe in the backward thinking of their time without being revolutionaries(a simple glance at history would have made this obvious but nvm) It obvs doesn't make it acceptable to the slightest but it is what it is, the younger generation learns from their mistakes and so on. This, imo, is particularly common amongst the more chronically online folks, those who see themselves as the ultimate upholders of justice. U can have assholes who are trying their best to do what is right while still being shitty in their own ways. Snape can save the world and represent the power of redemption while still being a pathetic and miserable person. James and Sirius can be extremely cruel bullies while still being brave and noble by risking their lives and fighting for the cause when they were barely out of school (particularly Sirius, given what he was raised to believe in). Regulus can still be honourable and brave for ultimately sacrificing his life in hopes of bringing down voldemort while still retaining the fact tht he was obsessed with a cult leader calling for genocide (and incidentally, we hv no proof tht regulus stopped believing in all his other prejudices before his death).
None of these characters need to be confined to the 'a part of the LGBT community- or homophobic' binary to categorise them into good and evil, in the sense that the uwu marauders and Slytherin skittles (who were literal DEs in canon) are always the good ones and Snape gets the rear end of the stick. Plus being a part of the LGBT community doesn't automatically make ur character interesting,complex, or better, neither does it need to be their entire personality..imo this idea isn't as progressive as it's made out to be and isn't the representation ppl think it is.
These are thoughts haphazardly floating around in my brain and I cannot write a satisfactory and conscise conclusion to save my life, so, uhh, feel free to fill in lmao
#ps#pls know that this isn't to target or assume anything about anyone#everyone is obvs free to enjoy whatever they like outside real world standards and ideals#these r just my unnecessary 2 scents no one asked for#tbh i think of this as a social phenomenon that merely reflects on fiction#i just wrote this to see what different views ppl hv#harry potter#james potter#sirius black#severus snape#regulus black#anti fanon#anti fanon marauders#hp meta
27 notes
·
View notes