#friendship is allowed to exist

[ventique18]

"Lilia has a crush on Malenoa--"

Lilia and Malenoa were both raised by Maleficia and lived together from even before they learned how to fly (literal babies)

I get that we're all desperate to ship but sometimes can we just accept that characters just consider themselves as family and don't want to fuck

[stardustdiiving]

How evil is arlecchino and what is she cooking

As of 4.2, I’m really curious what they’re planning with Arlecchino as a character, especially as a villain/antagonist/morally dubious character, and how far/which direction they may go with that

Intuitively my impression is we’ll see her do something way more “villainous” than she presents herself as being for majority of Fontaine’s AQ in front of us right—(which isn’t a surprise given that, you know, Arlecchino nor the House of Hearth have never been presented as 110% ethical LOL) but I find myself not being in complete agreement with most analysis or speculation threads I see about Arlecchino’s morality and the like, level of sinister people seem to ascribe to her.

Idk how to put it, especially in regards to her children I do agree they are not a wholesome found family, that Arlecchino is not above pulling strings or using them for her own ulterior motives, but I kind of hesitate on the idea she only cares about the Hearth children as a means to the end/things she can control and there’s nothing else going on with her characterization wise there. I’m not saying that impression seems remotely unreasonable or unfounded, but just that it feels there’s something intentionally missing in how we are supposed to conceptualize her as a person

My main reasoning for this hunch is the fact they have not elaborated on Arlecchino and the previous Knave—who Arlecchino is stated to have taken over the position from by force. The extra tidbits I think about are that 1) Arlecchino was previously an orphan in the Hearth 2) the previous Knave is described as way, way crueler to the children of than Heart than Arlecchino was from when she took control of the House

Often, people’s major indicators that the House of the Hearth is kind of super fucked up are the NPCs we meet in world quests who are part of it and clearly suffering. But one thing I haven’t ever seen people mention w this that i think is a very interesting detail is, in The Very Special Fortune Slip Inazuma worldquest, where we stop this House of Hearth guy (Efim Snezhevich) from manufacturing tension between Watasumi/the Shogunate to restart the war with his other Hearth subordinates, at the end of the quest we get this dialogue that reveals he had been acting under the previous Knave’s directives:

It’s also mentioned he’s employing this plan in an attempt to “rebuild the prestige of the Knave” following Signora’s death, iirc? Now, see, the dialogue itself says that this is “assuming our captive is telling the truth” so who knows what’s really going on, but I find this a really odd/interesting thing to highlight. I’m a bit fuzzy on other world quests with Hearth members, and am not saying none of them were acting and subsequently being treated poorly by our Arlecchino, but like, this gives me a lot of questions especially when paired with implications this previous Knave seemed to be way worse

Like, what drove Arlecchino to take over? How unexpected and controversial was this within the House? Assuming the above information is all true it definitely says something this guy went rogue and acted on what the previous Knave would want and didn’t think our Arlecchino would greenlight it, which does feel consistent with the previous Knave being described as basically worse & crueler than our Arlecchino. It also makes me question how much house of hearth things we’ve seen outside the main story are the work of our Arlecchino or if there’s a bigger divide of loyalty. Heck, I could be wrong but it doesn’t even seem like we know if the previous Knave is dead or not

This isn’t me saying Arlecchino couldn’t possibly be treating hearth children worse than she wants us to know, especially ones who aren’t her “favorites” the way the fontaine trio seem to be, but I really don’t feel sure about making a solid conclusion of her exact level of malice the way ppl r generally understanding it rn when it feels there’s going to be more about her. Just the idea of she, as a Hearth child, clashed with the previous leader who was known for being cruel, overtook their position and took on less harsh methods of leading that made at least some members with more power/possible closer proximity to the previous Knave go rogue and try to commit atrocities in the previous Knave’s name…I feel this leaves a lot of room to suggest there’s more going on with how Arlecchino is as a person

I don’t mind if she’s just very evil and deceptive bc if she totally had me fall for thinking she was less evil than she actually was that’s fun tbh. But I feel people suggest that’s all her character could be with no degree of like, “sympatheticness” or deep grey morality and that if her character did go there it would be automatically poor writing and genshin walking back on making a truly evil woman when IDK. I feel you can claim at this point they have left it open ended and it’s never been completely confirmed she’s pure evil. Also sometimes I just get a hunch and feel cautiously confident in Genshin executing certain characters well. Not all characters, just certain ones. Especially given Fontaine’s character writing being very good and a character like Lyney feeling very solid to me when any development with Arlecchino would likely involve him and his siblings as well, I honestly feel open to the idea of Arlecchino being satisfyingly written to be both villainous/morally dubious but “sympathetic/likable as a person” in ways outside of just her ruthlessness if that makes sense

If I’m wrong/they drop the ball with it more than I anticipate I’ll eat my hat but I am pretty excited about her character and which way they decide to go with it. I will say the only potential impression I have of where they’ll go with her has been wondering if it will go in a “cycles of abuse” direction—I’d be surprised if they ever elaborated on Arlecchino’s character especially in how she feels about things and her also growing up as an exploited child of the hearth wasn’t relevant

[amelikos]

Something so interesting to me about the way they are depicting Gibeon's close friendships, while Amethio still doesn't have such bonds with others yet.

[nauti-ca]

i think if you choose to ignore nautica’s clearly written implied romance with skids ur doing a huge disservice to her character

[rookflower]

i am a hypocrite when it comes to warrior cats shipping because I will gripe and moan about even unrequited cinderfire from dawn til dusk because i think it is weird and boring and makes cinderpelt's character worse, however, i will clap and cheer for unrequited cindersand despite it being literally just the exact same thing except gay and less direct and they never interact in canon

[void-tiger]

…sometimes I just. Think about. How literal siblings get stuck with rumors they’re dating, and m-f friendships often don’t get a chance to truly start or develop because of the strain those assumptions and pressure causes…

…while literal same-gender and aspec-affirming couples get slapped with “like siblings” this and “just really good friends” that.

And then how this gets even more reductive with infighting like “m-f friendships can only occur when one of them is homosexual,” or aspecs picking at eachother over rep until it’s a very specific type of aroace on the aroace spectrum of the aspec spectrums (and nobody’s actually happy), and of course fanon ships pitted against gen-no-ships…

…and how everyone just ends up feeling stressed out and invalidated. Because anything—and I do mean anything—that doesn’t fit neatly inside of the heteronormative narrative of “men and women can’t be friends, men and women must be romantically involved, people of the same gender and/or aspec/any other queer identity(ies) must never date.”

And how it makes the queers and cichets alike absolutely miserable.

[cuteniarose]

I'm bored and can't sleep because of cramps so I decided to mess around with an incorrect quotes generator using the latest OCs @katkastrofa and I created that I unfortunately cannot talk about in detail here because I'd get nerfed in an instant:

[unproduciblesmackdown]

billions also comedy gold presenting winston as a scapegoat for abuse culture fans when it's like but hey it can't be actual scapegoating if you Enjoy It or consider it Justified or experience Reassurance from Its Opportunity For A Group Cohesion Substitute For A Cohesion Based On An Inherent Equal Degree Of Belonging, The Absence Of Which Allows For, Encourages, Reinforces, & Rewards Scapegoating

it can't be Bullying if someone's Weird or you Just Don't Personally Like Them or Nobody's Actually Stopping You, Maybe At Least If They Don't See Too Much Of It, Maybe Others Are Supporting It

it can't be Abuse if you're just doing things Normally or are Following Rules or Aren't Feeling Malicious And Aren't Getting Divine Revelations Otherwise and probably it's just that a lot of abnormal people are being whiny &/or unfair &/or the Real malicious ones. kinda just like how that scapegoat is the real person ruining everything and really just forcing you to treat them like this

[the-trans-dragon]

The longer I am alive, the more my brain replays that scene in Lilo and Stitch where the scientist is watching Stitch fret around at night, and the scientist says something like, "poor thing, doesn't even have fond memories to keep it warm at night" or something

As a kid, I didn't realize how comforting memories could be, and I rarely had the luxury to create them.

I am glad I survived. It would have been easier, with fond memories to comfort me during painful times. I have many now, though, and they are indeed good company.

[collectorcookie]

Don't mind me, i just need to make a screenshot compilation of paradox roid

Owen. Just. Owen.

[the-blind-assassin-12]

it's 3:41 am, and I'm just sitting in my living room thinking about how glad I am that I met you. Thank you for being such a great person and a wonderful friend. Thank you for putting up with my dumb ramblings and my incoherent thoughts about fragments of stories and plots and about characters. I cannot wait until we get to hang out in person again, because it's been entirely too long. And as always, fuck the entire state of Pennsylvania.

🥹🥲

Rachael, were you trying to make me cry at 3:41 this morning? Because you were successful circa 6:27 am which is when I first woke up and saw this.

I fucking love you and I thank my lucky clovers for you every single day. No, that’s not an exaggeration. Your friendship means the world to me. Thank you right back for always being in my corner and always listening to and supporting my wacky ideas. I truly can’t wait until we get to be in the same fucking room again either, because it really has been too fricking long.

No offense to Pennsylvanians, but fuck the whole state of Pennsylvania for being in our way. 😭

[mainfaggot]

oh also shes straight

[thedevotionaltour]

i just have to remind myself why the fuck would i ever want to go back to being in a romantic relationship with someone who is good friends with people i just don't like at all felt very hurt by did contribute to my crisis and find fucking annoying as hell in general at this point. like why would i do that to myself. well i will make sure i won't i will just find someone better who doesn't do that

[navree]

"netflix is making a jfk series that's gonna be like an american version of the crown" i cannot express how little i am looking forward to that

[favroitecrime]

just finished 12 season of bob’s burgers and i’m not ready for the movie not season 13

[wen-ning]

thinkin about how star vs. was such a disappointing missed opportunity for depicting co-ed teenage friendships. they could Literally Just Be Friends and it would be far more interesting