#getting special treatment from someone powerful makes one feel important

[fuck-john-calvin]

I raise you opporcold as a toxic relationship

[erzva]

…

zoro

how he shows love

acts of service & physical touch

zoro is a very sufficient and blunt, cut to the chase kinda guy bc he doesn't like waiting. he prefers things to be direct. he's not good with words and he doesn’t see the point in being. he doesn't like talking bc he's more of a listener, so he isn't too big on words of affirmations, in both ways.

he would get annoyed with disgusting over the top phrases about how great he is or how much you love him. even worse if you use stupid petnames. he would just be very weirded out and annoyed.

he's awkward with words. he never seems to be able to put what he's thinking into words correctly. it frustrates him that he is bad at conversing. most he can do is say that you're cool or impressive. if you're looking for a romantic poet, he's not the one for you. he just trusts you know that he loves and cares for you without having to put it into complicated words. the most you’ll get from him is an “i love you”/“i’m in love with you”. that’s as straight forward as it gets. he can do that.

he's an ‘actions speak louder than words’ person. he'll make sure you feel as loved as possible with the little amount of sweet talk you get from him. but just bc he can't tell you how much he loves you in riddled poems doesn't mean he isn't loving. it’s evident that he’s in love with you with all the things he does for you. you definitely get prince:ss treatment.

he's always near you, hovering like a shadow. he seems like a puppy the way he follows you around. or rather a grumpy wolf, ready to ward off anyone who gets too close. he sneaks little touches throughout the day and always finds a way to surprise you and make you feel special. and he gives the best hugs. they're warm and soft and he just holds you so perfectly. or maybe it’s just that you fit into him so well bc he’s so buff. it definitely adds to the confortness.

he doesn't really like/need quality time. he is a very out of sight out of mind person and spending a lot of time with someone is not an indicator of how much you love them to him. at least that’s what he used to think before you came along. he can’t help but feel warm whenever you seek him out to spend your free time with him. and he has found himself doing the same with you without even realizing it, accompanying you almost everywhere you went.

what he needs from you

physical touch & quality time / affirmations

your love prevails even after long periods of time apart but he would still rather have you with him all the time. that way he has an eye on you and can protect you. not that you can’t do it yourself, he just feels more at ease that way. you not being with him makes him worry and feel stressed so quality time is definitely something he needs now. you don't have to be doing anything important, just being together with you is good for him.

he likes it when you watch him train for example. having your eyes on him makes him wanna perform even better than usual and catching you staring at his chest or back is always something he looks forward to. and even though he gives his best and powers himself out, he’s never too tired for a little fun afterwards. your reward for being so patient.

he especially loves it when you join him for a nap. there's nothing that makes him feel more content than feeling your warmth and body close to his while he's sleeping. again, he likes having you close in case anything happens but it's also just very comforting and comfortable. he sleeps much better with you. he didn't know what a good night of sleep was before you joined him for a nap for the first time. and now he hates it whenever he has to sleep alone. but waking up alone is even worse. you need to join him for naps. if you see him napping just go lay down beside him so he can feel ok.

you’re good with your words. (even if you aren’t, it seems that way to him bc he’s not) and he admires that. he’s fascinated with how well you articulate yourself. he holds the same admiration for robin. only that his admiration for you is a bit stronger because your words are often directed at him, spoken in secret in your chambers with no one else to hear but him. and unfortunately he has grown to like it.

…

[planethibiscus]

Hiii !! I was wondering if you could do some jealous Yandere hcs (similar to the ones you did for until dawn) but with mouthwashing? Ty!!

JEALOUSY 🌸 MW

PRONE TO ENVY:

Jimmy

Jimmy is a vengeful and miserable man. He envies reader as they are, for who and what they are, no matter their situation. He's never satisfied, always wanting what he doesn't have. If he doesn't have you then it's all he can think about. When he finally does get you though, it still won't be enough. He'll adapt his victim complex to begin envying you instead of fully appreciating you. Oh how "good" you have it with him. You're so fucking lucky and yet you have no idea. Woe is Jimmy, the unwilling slave to your love.

Swansea

Swansea is a tired and cynical soul. He envies readers likeness. Similarly to how he is jealous of Daisuke, he is jealous of your lot in life. He wants to feel nearly as important as you are to all who you bless with your glimmering presence. He has a wife, kids, a job, he's stable. But he's miserable. Even if you're also miserable, or you don't have nearly as many accomplishments as him, there's just this special spark about you that makes you worth so much more than he could ever be.

SLIGHTLY GREEN:

Anya

Anya is exhausted and unlucky. She envies readers security. There's this way about you that comforts her and she loves it, but it's this underlying sense of safety that she assumes can only come from someone who has their shit together. Things seem to work out for you, and they should, because you're so lovely that life must give you special treatment or else it's being cruel and unjust. She just can't help but think that maybe if things in her life went half as well as they do in yours, then she'd be a better, happier person. One you'd like to be with.

Curly

Curly feels stuck. He envies readers freedom. So badly does he want to wrap you up in his arms and squeeze the knots out of your back with one powerful hug. He's just so worried that he'll scare you off and it keeps him paralysed. He wonders if you'd be terrified of your mismatched power dynamic or comforted by it. He wants you so terribly but he has a responsibility that you don't, as your captain, to make sure that you feel safe. If pushing advances on you might make you uncomfortable then he wouldn't dare. Even if it's all he can think about.

BARELY BITTER:

Daisuke

Daisuke is enthralled by the sensations of love but insecure. He holds no true jealousy towards reader, yet often finds himself wishing that he was half as cool as them. He adores being around you. Not a moment spent in your presence is a waste of time. He desperately hopes that you might feel the same, and that you don't think spending time with him is a chore. He doesn't want to bore you or annoy you at all. Your opinion of him holds him in a death grip, but he loves how it chokes him. It reminds him just how lucky he is to be perceived by you at all.

[808airsoftbros]

Vampire Kiss of Life's Reaction to you Getting Hurt

Julie Han (Alpha)

Big. Big. Big Mistake

Attacking an Alpha's husband especially if it's mating season is the equivalent of signing one's death wish and Miss Julie Han is no exception and is very unforgiving

Julie wouldn't love anything more than to rip the fool into shreds but first, she'd want to send them a final message before they die and feel nothing but dread and fear

But the most important part is that you are safe and ensure you are healthy and all wounds are treated if you sustained any

Would you be traumatized witnessing Julie rip apart the perp? Nope, Julie isn't a monster to let you see that and would likely tell you to stay in a safe hiding spot

"Mama? What happened?" Your innocent-self asked

"Oh, don't worry sweetie, that bad man won't hurt you any longer and I won't allow anyone to do so again, now come along sweetie~,"

Natty (อานัชญา สุพุทธิพงศ์) (Enforcer)

Oh boy... If anyone dares to hurt you in any way, Natty wouldn't hesitate to confront the perp and would ensure something like this wouldn't happen again

If they're are lucky enough that Natty is in a good mood, she might spare their life but not without several broken bones

Natty's super vampire strength can easily snap a human in half like a twig and lucky them that Natty is wise to know her own strength

But after she was done with them, Natty would constantly keep you close to her at all times and demands you to check up with her every now and then if she isn't around

"Come to mommy darling and I'll keep you safe and I promise nobody will be able to bother or hurt you when I'm around~,"

Belle (Shim Hyewon) (Blood Sister)

Belle is completely obsessed and possessive when it comes to you and you are the only thing that comes to her mind so you can imagine how she'll feel when someone lays their dirty fingers on you

She'd be livid and angry beyond the levels she never imagined in her life, Belle would nearly lose control of her emotions because she would feel at fault because she wasn't strong enough to prevent this

Belle would blame herself for failing you and worst of all, her sisters would be greatly disappointed but that was just overthinking thankfully and will handle the situation with pure elegance with a hint of blood

But what's more important to her is that you're safe and breathing, wounds will heal with proper treatment and Belle would go as far as make an example out of them

"Come near my precious baby and you all suffer the same fate as him..."

Won Haneul (Youngest Blood)

Oh boy, Haneul... How should I put this? Haneul is one of the most dangerous and powerful maknae Vampires in the sisterhood and she certainly won't take shit from anyone

Haneul takes her duty of being your wife and mother seriously just like her older sisters and has sworn to protect you from any dangers

She loves you to death and will do anything to ensure you're comfort and happiness so to see someone laying their hands on you is something that will surely make her infuriated with fiery rage

Haneul would chase them down if she has to letting one of her older sisters look after you while she was gone and will deliver a painful death to the person

"This is what you deserve for hurting my little angel and Hell has a special place for you..."

[demontruth]

Prison Time for Trump is needed and this Why...

Y'all, I just did the math (if I did it correctly), I just realized something Trump could get 136 years in prison!! Because each of 34 counts comes with a maximum of 4 years if the Judge decided that Trump should do them separatly boom 134 years! Which fingers crossed. I know that highly unlikely but still the thought makes me so incredibly happy!! However I do think the Judge should give 'No Longer Teflon Don' some prison time.

Here's my thoughts on that. Because no matter the amount of time it's gonna fuck with Trump's head psychologically, as I see it. He's gonna be put in handcuffs taken out of the court room, hopefully. Put on a prison bus, once again hopefully. He's gonna be taken to a prison, maybe it be white collar or please let be federal prison. They're still gonna take all this clothes from him and anything that he has like his expensive ass watch and everything else he has on his person. Then they're going to strip searching him, which I feel extremely bad for whatever prison guard that may end up having do that. Give that man bonus, no joke. That's gonna have to do that. But still just that experience is going to be humiliating and demoralizing which I'm sorry he deserves in my opinion. Maybe but doubtful it will teach him some humility. Then they're going to make him get into whatever color jumpsuit, may it be orange, oh please Jesus let it be orange! Then those he going have to put on those lovely prison shoes. Then they're gonna take his ass to a cell where he's gonna have a celly no doubt. Hopefully its someone that fucking dislike him strongly and not one of his MAGA asshole. And then they're going to close the cell door. That sound alone I would imagine would have a profound effect on him mentally. Because he's the arrogant, a narcissist, egotistical, sociopathic. In that prison he's just like everybody else. He's can't stand up there thinking he's the big man having all his loyal MAGA cult followers screaming and cheeringfor him. That's going to mess with him like nothing else. And put him on a level with what he considers common people is going to mess with him in a way that nothing else ever could. Because he won't get special treatment, the prison guards aren'tgoing to treat him better then the other prisoners shit they might treat him worse if he acts up. Ithink it's so important that it happens to this motherfucker. It's time he brought down to the level he deserves. The level he's been running from forever. Because has anyone seen him now? I have no by choice, just watching the news and of course he's all over the news. He looks so defeated, pathetic, sad, old, beaten, tried, as he would say zero energy. As evil as this may sound and I really don't care... I fucking love it!! Give more of it!!

Now we just HAVE TO DEFEAT him in the Presidential election!! Biden may not be what we want either but it better then a man that's going be hell bent on revenge on everyone that disagrees with him, but on trial, who still want to but him on trial. Remember he still has at least 2 more trials coming and if gets back in the White House he'll do everything in his power to squash them. He'll go after the FBI, the DOJ and every other agency that investigated him. He will literally go on a witch hunt! Don't be mistaken and don't be stupid enough to believe he will not go full Dictator if he gets back into the white house. Trump likes/loves power far too much either far actual prison time with more criminal trials down the road he'll use that power to make sure that don't happen. See the whole I want to President again is just a Red Herring, to distract everyone from his criminal trials and a way to make them go away.

Once again I'm saying something I've been saying since before Trump became President the first time omg I'm tried. But anyway. Trump doesn't give a flying monkey shit about anyone but himself! Not the us the American people, not our Foreign policy, not climate crisis, not gun control, not education... nothing!! The only reason his sides with the Conservatives is because they kiss his ass. I completely understand why us on the left will not. But it does put us in the position of Trump not doing that we need him to do. So as much as I hate this we should pick somebody on the left that would be willing to kiss his ass so hopefully he would start doing what we want him to do. And you have no idea how much that pains me to actually write that!

But we on the left need to start fighting like we did in the last Presidential election! Grass root efforts, hitting the streets, online, fucking everywhere, especially with swing voters! We have get Biden re-elected no matter what because this another election of our life times that will matter in more then just 4 year from now!!

[a-998h]

Heyy, guess who’s backk😁💕

Anyways, 🍉 ANON here and I would like to make a SAGAU request

{Reader} is a teen in this one, so obviously all of their relationships are platonic with each character

So in this scenario when {Reader} descends down to Teyvat, higher ups like gods and Archons [I don’t know if those are the same in thing in Genshin] but immediately get pampered

You see, the Archons think that {Reader} wasn’t strong enough to go into their full form—so they came back as a teen, and as well lost some of their memories

{Reader} half of the time barley can grasp what’s going on because they just got randomly teleported to their favorite game, and now they’re suddenly being showered in diamonds and the richest gifts

I also feel like there would be times where people would gather in where {Reader} resides to worship them, offer gifts and ask for favors

And honestly the archons were expecting {Reader} to be an adult [Not in a weird way] so when they wear their ceremonial clothes they look so adorable in them because their arms can’t even fit through the sleeves

And I feel like {Reader} would take advantage of their role in Teyvat, like they would complain of their feet hurting and people would rush towards them, offering to carry them on their backs or their already building something to carty them with that’s equally comfortable

And randomly people would see {Reader} outside with a character as they plan to build a building of {Reader}‘s choice

Scenario: “And the buildings gonna be pink! And have clouds painted on the walls, yes! And with comfortable seats and flooring! And lots of stuffies!” {Reader} yelled enthusiastically as they waved their arms around which was hidden by their ceremonials long sleeves which covered almost all of their hands, as they excitedly explained what their building was going to look like

So now there’s just random vibrant ass buildings in the middle of towns that anyone can visit— and they all treat it like a sanctuary

I also feel like people would obviously give them special treatment, and {Reader} would try to wave them off like “I’m not a piece of glass, I’ll be fin-“ and as they say that their trip on their robe and fall face first on the ground.

Or like {Reader} would run away from important meetings, and they would lie to get away with it because the Archons would never think the Divine one would ever lie to them—so like the Archons, soldiers like Gorou waiting for {Reader} to arrive and it’s dead quiet, the only sound is the clock hanging on the wall ticking as some of the characters count the seconds of how late {Reader} is—before eventually someone goes looking for them responsibly or everything goes to shit as everyone tears the place up to find {Reader}, while they’re like up a random tree or something giggling mischievously, while behind them where they reside is burning down because they’ve disappeared/j—

Or I wonder how the some characters would react if {Reader} had a crush on someone their age, like an Npc and I wonder how overprotective they would be while the parents of that kid are just like “The Divine one has chosen my child” and the child in question is scared shitless because the most powerful people hate their guts because {Reader} likes them

But yeah, that’s all I request! Have a good day!

-🍉 ANON

Thanks 🍉 ANON, but next idea only have one idea per request so the post doesn't get too crowded.

But you are right, the Creator is getting pampered by everyone. Whether it's Venti braiding your hair, Furina sharing her sweets with you, Xiangling cooking for you, etc. You're their devine creator, they love you. They think something happened to your powers to make you teen sized. They love you regardless of your age.

The building idea is funny. Every nation has shrines for the Creator. They would decorate the shrines with the local style mixed with however you want. They're grateful that you welcome them into your sacred spaced.

Running away from important meetings would never happen because they wouldn't make you go to any. You're powers haven't fully returned, meaning you got injured in some way. They also knew you wouldn't be able to focus so no important meetings for you.

If you had a crush, everyone would fine it cute and kind of sad. If the crush was on someone who is immortal then it would be OK because then you two can date and be with each forever. If the crush was human, they would feel upset having to crush your hopes. Humans won't live as long as you will, so they want to try and save you from that heart break. Zhongli would try and set you up with Xiao, Xianyun would try and set you up with Ganyu, and everyone who wants to date you would try to win your affection.

[andrewwtca]

a Soriku Endgame, Actually essay on Light and Darkness

Also available to read on Archive of our Own.

Kingdom Hearts, with Sora and Riku in particular, has been on my mind as of late. It’s always been on my mind, to be honest, ever since I first got into the series. It’s grabbed my hand and hasn’t let go, especially with all the new lore. And yet, I’ve been struggling to make peace with myself. 

On one hand, I don't want to get my hopes up, thinking that Sora and Riku would ever become something 'more' or that what I’m seeing is anything other than in-depth speculation. I've had my heart broken before and this series means too much to me for me to foolishly dive in like this. 

On the other hand, I can't ignore what the story is telling me, as a literary analysis enthusiast and as a diehard fan. There have been parallels established, setups finally going through, and Nomura has said before that “this series is not intended to be child-focused, and so the complexity of the story is purposely made prominent.” I can’t keep turning a blind eye, knowing everything I know, thinking everything I think. If I did, I feel like I would be doing a disservice to both my experiences with the series and my experiences as a person. 

So yeah—Soriku Endgame, Actually. Today, I’m arguing its canonicality because of the balance of Light and Darkness (or lack thereof) throughout the series. Please enjoy my messy and impassioned essay!

a sky of falling stars

The Children of Destiny is a new concept introduced to us in the finale of Dark Road. To summarize, they are people with the ability to feel what others feel, connect, and become one with them—empaths with Light. 

It appears that the Children of Destiny are all descendants of Ephemer, characterized by silvery hair. There's Ephemer, there's Baldr, there's Xehanort—and, oh yeah, there's Riku. 

Upon the release of the finale, a lot of people—myself included—quickly jumped to the conclusion that Sora is a Child of Destiny, which isn't all that wrong. If we're going by what the games have given us, Sora is very special. What other character has housed five different hearts inside his own? What other character had an entire arc in Birth by Sleep talking about how he felt the pain in someone else’s heart?

But Nomura has insisted since the beginning that Sora is an ordinary boy, that he wasn't born with anything special, explaining that he “had the premise that a heart like Sora’s exists within all the players. Sora is ‘ordinary’, therefore everyone is ‘ordinary.” (Before anyone argues Nomura is just going through a retcon, I doubt he would go through with one to this extent, given how he has had the ending to the Dark Seeker Saga in mind for years.)

Riku, on the other hand, has not been given this kind of treatment at all. He's always been painted as a golden child, better than Sora at everything, being the original bearer of the Keyblade. For crying out loud, he had a light in Birth By Sleep that was seen from space, not Sora. If you factor in bloodlines, it wouldn't be too far off to theorize that Riku is a descendent of Ephemer's line. Riku isn't who most look at first, but all signs lead to him being a Child of Destiny. 

But that doesn't explain Sora at all. He may not have been born special like Riku, but he's special somehow. After all, Nomura did finish his ‘Sora isn't special’ line with, “I figure even if you’re ‘ordinary’, for something important, everyone can exhibit a special power just like Sora.” Aqua even calls out that Sora is the one who can set things right, the boy who can touch others’ hearts. 

And that is where the necklace theory comes in.

Sora has always been associated with royalty, sitting on a throne in box art or having crowns plastered around him—or on him. From his debut, Sora has had a crown necklace that has never been explained. Despite wearing it in every outfit, it's never been addressed how it came to be.

It’s after Aqua and Terra came, judging by the BBS cutscenes of him and Riku. But it’s before KH1, as that's when his journey began. That’s a huge timeframe, from being a kid to deciding to leave the islands, but it's easy to pinpoint a time when considering something the games still never fully fleshed out: the meteor shower. 

In Chain of Memories, Sora and Riku fight over this memory they supposedly both had of Namine one night during a meteor shower. One of them promised they would keep her safe, and it's all cute until we remember that Namine wasn't actually in these memories. And Namine can't make any new memories—she can only rearrange old ones. 

Sora and Riku both share this memory. And the way they fought over this memory gave it the utmost importance. It becomes obvious at this point that the both of them witnessed a meteor shower, and given what we know about their dynamic (and that's a lot), it would make sense to assume it was Riku promising Sora to keep him safe—almost like a charm.

The necklace theory has been around for years, but it’s only after the Dark Road finale that it was expanded upon (or perhaps it’s just me and maybe three others who think this, but I don’t mind one bit.) It isn't just Riku promising to keep Sora safe. In giving Sora a necklace, a crown, Riku has metaphorically crowned Sora. He has brought Sora up to his status as a Child of Destiny, putting all his love into a charm that he hopes can keep Sora safe. 

There’s a flaw in my logic though, trust me, I know. I just said that this meteor shower didn’t happen until after BBS, and yet it’s during the game that Sora feels the pain of others, it’s during the game that Aqua says that Sora is going to be the one to set things right. But I still stand firm in my belief. Riku has always been painted as the golden child, the Child of Destiny, but his love for Sora runs deeper than his love for anything else. 

Riku’s light is the one that brought Terra and Aqua to Destiny Island but Riku’s light shines for Sora; sort of like step one to Sora’s crowning. Riku’s light rubbed off on Sora, ever since they were kids—after all, a Child of Destiny’s power is to connect hearts. Why not connect his own with another? Why not share his light?

Further, in BBS, Sora can feel Ven’s pain and take care of his heart, but he isn’t fully aware of this nor is he able to really do anything about this. It isn’t until KH1 that Sora ever exhibits a power of truly connecting to another’s heart when Sora entered the darkness swallowing Riku and touched Riku’s heart’s light to obtain his Keyblade, explained by Nomura himself. And it isn’t until KH3 that Sora finds the power to wake up Ven’s heart.

Regardless of whether or not I’m right about this, it means Nomura isn't technically wrong about Sora being normal. Sora, no matter what, doesn’t have some divine birthright, but he still has the makings of someone who can bring peace to the world—all thanks to Riku.

This helps set the tone of their relationship, of the depth of Sora and Riku’s bond. It also moves the storyline forward to how they will be the ones to instigate change—but I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s first talk about who once were and who they could’ve been.

in another life

Kingdom Hearts is pretty on the nose on parallels between Xehanort/Eraqus and Riku/Sora. Besides personality, Xehanort and Riku are both Childs of Destiny who give in to the darkness and Eraqus and Sora are endless sources of light. But the parallels don't exist to make us empathize with Xehanort/Eraqus: they're to tell us a cautionary tale of what our protagonists could've been. 

So it begs the question, what actually separated Sora and Riku from becoming like Eraqus and Xehanort? Let’s start with Riku.

To recap, Xehanort was a student in Scala ad Caelum alongside Eraqus, who watched all his classmates die. He learned from Baldr about their roles as Children of Destiny and in his grief, became obsessed with wiping the world clean. He wanted a Keyblade War to create a fresh start, void of Light and Darkness, so that the world could try again. 

Riku seemed to have been walking the same road as Xehanort. He stopped fearing Darkness and started dancing on the line between it and Light. Riku was angry at the world and angry at his friends, and perhaps in another life, he may too have wanted to wipe the world clean. 

But every time I compare him and Xehanort, I can't help but think that a cautionary tale isn't what Xehanort/Eraqus is. Because I can't help but think that it just could never have happened to Riku, and it's for two main reasons: 

1) Hope.

Riku has hope in the world. When we look at all the other Children of Light, they all had a Darkness that took them down (although in Ephemer's case, it was a literal Darkness that killed him). Baldr lost himself in grief. Xehanort lost himself in rage. But not Riku. 

When Xehanort saw that the world couldn't be fixed (to how he believed it should be), Riku did not even see a world that needed fixing. Riku saw the world in all of its complicated glory. For instance, Riku is one of the first characters to acknowledge the feelings of Nobodies; their pain, and their love. He doesn't see them as an extension of Darkness or Light. They simply are. 

Riku believes in redemption. It's been his entire character arc, after all, to redeem himself and walk the Road to Dawn, a term coined way back in CoM. Ever since then, Riku has been closely associated with the sunrise—night turning into day. Darkness becomes Light. Redemption. This symbolism is shown in box art, said in interviews, even his Keyblade is called the Way to Dawn. 

The fact that Riku was even able to think of the Road to Dawn proves that he's nothing like Xehanort. Xehanort believes that there is no redemption because the world needs to be wiped clean. But Riku believes that there is a road he can walk, a road he can take to salvation because the world is not good or bad, but made for people to live and learn. But how? How was he able to walk that road? He has hope, but how was he able to use it? And that's the second reason. 

2) Sora. Riku has Sora. 

It may feel a bit obvious to say, but it's true: the fact that Riku is Riku; Sora is Sora; and their relationship is the way it is, is the key to why they would never have fallen to the same fate. We don't know the full extent of Xehanort and Eraqus's relationship, but it's safe to assume it wasn't as kind or loving as Riku and Sora's ever were. The two would play as kids, promise to keep each other safe, tell secrets—the two became princes of destiny together, destined to fight their way home.

I can't see Xehanort and Eraqus as anything more than students in a fucked up situation. Because when things got bad for Xehanort, he didn't think of Eraqus as his guiding light. He only thought of what he lost. There’s even a line in Dark Road of Xehanort hearing Eraqus crying in the other room, yet he never comforts him, never approaches him. They suffered alone, too afraid or perhaps too blind to reach for one another.

When things got bad for Riku, he saw Sora. He saw how Sora loved Kairi and sacrificed himself for her, and he saw that Sora was forgiving towards him. The reason why Riku and Sora didn't end up like Xehanort and Eraqus is that they simply aren't them. Their bond is deeper and their love is stronger, and Riku’s hope is simply stronger than Xehanort’s ever was.

It’s important to emphasize that this truly is a feat that only Riku (and Sora, one day) could’ve accomplished. It's natural to us that Riku, one of the series' protagonists, was able to do this. It's easy to shrug off the balance he managed to strike between his Light and Darkness, but for so many actually in the series, it's an incomprehensible thought. Mickey even stated in CoM, that Riku introduced Light and Darkness in a way nobody has ever seen before. To understand how this affects Sora and Riku’s relationship, it’s important to understand the way things currently are.

the light we pass down

Light and Darkness are the very core of this series. Light represents the connections you make with others, while Darkness represents the lack thereof—those with Darkness in their hearts are those who walk alone, while those with Light are those with many friends around them. Darkness is selfishness, and Light is selflessness. 

Darkness is usually framed as an inherently evil source in many stories, but it's something that cannot be extinguished. Light needs to be there to balance it. 

But Kingdom Hearts seems to be going down the path less taken—yes, Darkness isn't 'good', and it isn't desirable to isolate yourself from the rest of the world. But the series is asking the question many like to ignore: when does Light become Darkness? 

In nearly every game, you can trace one character fed into the illusion that Light is good, everything else is bad, and the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. MoM to his pupils in Union X; Odin to Baldr in Dark Road; Eraqus to his children in BBS; Yen Sid to Mickey in forbidding him to speak of Aqua; Donald and Goofy to Sora in telling him that their ship runs on happy smiles. It is generational trauma. 

A cycle of hypocrisy has been forced on not only the 'defenders of Light' but 'agents of Darkness.' Xehanort doesn't care who he hurts as long as he can get his own idea of balance in the world, believing his judgment to be supreme to others—despite his initial thoughts in Dark Road, that unless someone's heart is pure Light, how can one know for sure what is right and wrong? To which Eraqus responded that they as Keyblade Wielders held the supreme judgment towards morality. 

Again and again, this cycle of defending what they believe is good and Light repeats, hurting themselves and hurting others, and even Sora is not free of this hypocrisy. While he doesn't go out of his way to hurt others the way Xehanort has, he is capable of hurting others: Riku was hurt by Sora in KH1 when he was silent when Kairi suggested leaving him behind or when he shrugged off Riku going missing in Traverse Town. In CoM, when the idea of him ‘abandoning’ people was presented, he acted out harshly and completely rejected the idea (this is all another parallel to Eraqus!)

He even denies the idea that Riku has hurt others. Despite Riku acting out of his own free will, the reason he feels the need to atone and walk the path to redemption, Sora believes that the Darkness was forced on Riku by others.

Sora has been carved into the same mindset as so many others, the idea heavily tackled in Dark Road, that Darkness is only brought upon by others, and that it needs to be expunged. Sora is a firm believer that the Darkness is something to be eradicated, such as with his encounter with Vanitas in KH3. When Vanitas states that he is simply Darkness, Ven is quick to understand and even accept. Sora, on the other hand, rejects this and insists that it isn’t okay. 

Even our series’ protagonist is unable to shake himself from this self-righteous, black-or-white thinking. Riku is the only character in the series who has formed an actual balance in himself, with all other characters having to pick one side. Lea, Xion, and Roxas leave the Darkness of Organization XIII and become Keyblade Wielders. Terra embraces his Light, Aqua leaves the Realm of Darkness, and Ven is literally separated into a being of Light and Darkness (although not out of his own volition).

The series is not framing any of these things as negative—there’s nothing wrong with embracing Light. However, these characters are falling into the same cycle that the generations before have; they will once again be faced with a Darkness too deep to defeat and ignore. It must be talked to, reckoned with, and faced with open arms. Riku has been the only one able to return the hug and walk away.

We’ve explored what makes Riku’s character arc so significant and what Sora’s flaws are, and it’s time to dive into the murky waters of the future.

when does the sun become the night?

Sora. Oh, Sora. I love you, Sora. Now let me tear you and your smile apart. 

The parallels between Xehanort and Riku are very on the nose and easy to distinguish; meanwhile, Eraqus and Sora are a bit more challenging. 

In BBS, Eraqus is the Master of Aqua, Terra, and Ventus. He forms a bond between them, as one would expect, mentoring and looking out for their well-being. The Light in his heart is strong due to his connections with them, alongside being a Keyblade wielder. Although not perfect (feeding into Terra's insecurities about his Darkness, cough), he does care for them. But when the world falls to Darkness, Eraqus doesn't hesitate to be selfless, to give up his connections, the Light in his heart, to kill them to save a greater good. As long as someone somewhere can benefit from his actions, he isn't harming.

But is that selfless? Is sacrificing for a 'greater good' truly selfless? Is there a line between the needs of the many and the needs of the few? Or is there a certain ‘darkness’ that comes with these acts? Disregarding yourself, disregarding others, selfless yet selfish; it's not the right thing to do, and the series doesn't hesitate to frame it as that. What Eraqus did was wrong. He hurt others, even if he refused to acknowledge it.

And yet, no one seems to make any noise toward Sora. 

Sora is a Guardian of Light. He is the cheerful protagonist who makes everyone smile and feel better. Ever since the first game, when Donald and Goofy (although not with ill intent) told him that the Gummi Ship runs on happy faces, he's been under the precedent that his emotions do not matter in the greater scheme of things. In the long run, what matters is that others are safe, the people he cares about. 

Once again, like how Xehanort and Riku deviated in terms of having hope, this is where Eraqus and Sora begin to deviate from their parallels. While both are selfless to the point of ‘darkness,’ they show it in dramatically different ways. Eraqus is willing to hurt the people he cares about (and by extension, himself) to serve this 'greater good', but Sora is only willing to actively hurt himself. 

I feel the need to remind everyone that this is a teenager we're talking about. If we weren't in a franchise partially owned by Disney, I feel like more people would be willing to call this what it is: suicidal. This is not Light.

We've already seen ways that this harms Sora outside the narrative and the whole getting sent to Quadratum thing in his Rage form. Sora transforms into a drive form that’s oddly reminiscent of his time as a Heartless and can unleash powerful attacks that lower his HP (hmm). Furthermore, this form only appears when his HP is low (double hmm) and stated by Nomura, “based on him going into a rampage state, controlled by feelings of anger (triple hmm).”

Back inside the narrative, the climax of KH3 was Sora believing that he's worthless without his friends, genuinely worthless, and unable to fight at all. This is the very definition of a Light gone too far when remembering that Light is the connections you form with others. With too much Light, Sora lost himself. He couldn't find himself past who he was for others.

In the section prior that broke down generational trauma as it appears in Kingdom Hearts, I mentioned that Sora does not only end up hurting himself but passively hurting others around him, most notably Riku. Sora is unable to understand that Darkness is not the absence of all good but rather the shadow that simply follows you around. Sora cannot understand that Darkness is not something to be shunned, to never talk about. (This could also be tied back to his Rage form—while he does not actively channel his anger to hurt, that is what happens; only to never be acknowledged by him.)

(Off-topic, but I find it funny that Sora, who is so keen on the idea that Darkness is Not Good, was only ever to have a proper conversation with Riku in the Realm of Darkness. It’s very telling to their characters.)

Kingdom Hearts is setting up a narrative that Light and Darkness cannot exist in excess. That Light doesn't exist to balance out the Darkness, to stop it from becoming too strong—you need Darkness to exist as well. 

Sora has gotten this far along the story and still hasn't managed to learn this, because it’s just not something you can learn (or unlearn, rather) on your own. Because this kind of thinking isn’t undone with hours of contemplation; in a fitting Kingdom Hearts fashion, it’s connections that lead to the revelation.

the roads we walk

Xehanort and Eraqus fall out with each other. They stop talking and sever the connection with each other. That was a core reason things got as out of hand as they did for each other; they weren't keeping each other in check. Xehanort's Darkness left him blind and unable to see that there was Light after all, and Eraqus's Light blinded him and left him stumbling with a Keyblade for a 'greater purpose.' Their hearts fell too far to one end of the balance, leaving the scales unbalanced.

Riku and Sora do not have that. They have a connection like nothing seen in this series before—Riku had literally raised Sora to become a Child of Destiny alongside him. The Light of their hearts is just so awe-strikingly bright. 

Sora, however, has lost himself in all his light. He is stuck in the same bright room that Eraqus was, stumbling around with his Keyblade. But where Eraqus was forever lost, Sora can be found: because where Riku had Sora to guide him to the Light, Sora will have Riku to guide him through the Darkness. 

Riku spends the majority of his character simply proving that he is capable of redemption. It takes him the ending of a game to realize the errors in his ways and another game to figure out the solution he must fight for, and these weren't revelations he finds on his own—he found the first with Sora and the second (in CoM) with Mickey and Namine.

For Sora to even have the revelation that he cannot keep shutting out the Darkness in him unless he wants more pain for himself and others, he needs someone to help show him that is an option. And who else but Riku, who is living proof that existence isn’t just black-or-white, Light or Darkness?

Riku is Sora's foil. A foil is a character who either has pronounced differences between themselves and the protagonist or is so alike that a contrast appears. Riku is the ladder, similar enough to Sora that one can begin to make assumptions about where the story is heading. Their similarities aren't hard to find: they both hail from Destiny Islands, they both have a love for adventure, they both were assumed to walk a path of Light for the rest of their lives, and they both care deeply for each other. The contrast begins in KH1 when Riku begins his fall to Darkness while Sora remains firm in his standing.

Riku’s arc ended with acceptance; he needed to accept the Darkness and the Light inside him to find peace. It’s only natural that his foil, struggling with the same imbalance, would go through a similar arc but still different enough to be his own.

It isn't just the story telling us this. Riku has always been associated with imagery of dawn, the breaking of Darkness into Light, and Kairi is always associated with imagery of dusk, the breaking of Light into Darkness (which is a conversation all on its own). Sora, on the other hand, is associated with a large blue sky (his name, after all, does mean sky.) It's not hinting towards a journey of any kind—not a redemption like for Riku.

He is the daylight. He is the Light in everyone's lives. But ‘Sora’ doesn't mean the day sky. It simply means sky. Sky, at day or night—and I don't mind if you call me reaching at this point, but it feels like it's calling out to the fact that Sora needs to accept that he is both Light and Darkness, the way the sky is both day and night. 

Nomura has even stated in an interview before when asked about the two different versions of the Dream Drop Distance illustrations that he “wanted its composition and look to remind [the player] of the title’s catch copy, ‘Darkness becomes light, light falls into darkness.’” The parallel structure of the tagline serves to mirror the parallel structure of Sora and Riku’s paths, Sora’s road to night and Riku’s road to dawn.

But I digress. Exhaustively, it’s very apparent that Sora is heading toward a climax, a Darkness he cannot ignore. His breakdown in KH3 was left unspoken, unresolved, and his disappearance only contributes to the fact that he’s heading toward another breaking point, where the cheerful protagonist can no longer remain cheerful. But like in KH3, something is going to be the same: Riku.

At his lowest point, it was Riku who was next to him, telling Sora that he believed in him. It was Riku who carried on when Sora couldn’t. Riku is going to be key in Sora's journey to night. Riku was able to find his Road to Dawn by remembering Sora. He was able to walk by remembering his love, his passion, his everything, and it was because of Sora that Riku found balance. He found the Light within himself, and he learned to accept that the Darkness would always be a part of him, the way it is for others. 

Sora's arc will be spun into motion because of Riku. The next installments of Kingdom Hearts are setting up that Riku's dreams are the key to finding Sora, implying perhaps that it may be Sora and Riku all alone in a world. Whatever the case, Riku is going to be by Sora's side, as that is where they are at their best, to face Sora’s worst.

And it's fitting. Riku had to go from Darkness, defined as a lack of connections, to a balance with Light, having connections. He went from his isolation, wearing a blindfold and not being able to face anyone, to being the charming Riku we all love, fighting alongside the Keyblade wielders. His journey would have him open up, so he would be joined by memories, ghosts, not by people until he began to embrace others.

Sora will be going from Light to a balance with Darkness. He'd be going from connections to a lack (though not in the same extremes that Riku did), in a sense. Understandably, he can’t do it alone, make such a drastic change; he'd need someone.

This change, this balance, this emphasis on connections, it’s guiding us to what the narrative has been trying to tell us all along.

we can be the darkness, and the light, and the sunsets and sunrises too

When asked about the theme of KH3 and the entire series, Nomura answered, “It’s in the title: hearts. The consistent theme across the whole series is ‘What is a heart?’”

Kingdom Hearts is going to be doing something unprecedented in not only a lot of media but in its world itself. While the idea of Light and Darkness existing within characters is not new, the characters aren't exactly behind that idea. Most of the Keyblade Wielders and Guardians of Light cherish the Light above all else—while all the primary villains worship the Darkness. They fight for a balance but don't fully grasp that within (nearly) all of them lies both entities. 

Riku seems to be more accepted in the world, as he did join the Light in the end. But what Sora would do is... just absolutely bonkers. He will be embracing a Darkness in him, the same kind that Terra and so many others were taught to push out. Sora will be... well, a teenager. Happy and angsty and all the things teens are.

This is where Kingdom Hearts has the chance to seal the deal, to fully welcome this balance of Light and Darkness: a relationship between Riku and Sora. 

For all Guardians of Light, there is a generational trauma hanging over their heads and haunting them, and Sora will need to accept his Darkness to combat it, but the story can't end there. The games have been building up the idea that Sora will be the one to bring change to the world, that Sora will be the one to end this cycle. He won’t just accept his Darkness but lead a new age. He will be the one to show that there's a different way (or really, only one other way) to move forward:

Love. 

Unconditional love. Not love depending on whether they fit the wielders' definitions of Light and Darkness, not love depending on the amount of Light in someone's heart, not love clouded by hypocrisy. Just pure love, forever forgiving and growing.

So who better for Sora’s love than Riku?

Let’s get all the arguments for Kairi out of the way first. Some may say that Kairi could still fulfill this role of spreading love in the next games, but that’s only if her role in the story is completely revamped. She represents friends growing apart as they grow older yet remaining close. While Sora and Riku represent a balance between Light and Darkness, Kairi represents holding a Light close to your heart, even when it's so far away; fitting for her story of being ripped apart from her home.

The games keep pushing the friends' growing apart narrative rather than pulling from it, having Kairi remain with Aqua to train while Riku goes after Sora. There is little space for Kairi to suddenly walk a road to dusk that leads to romance. Especially because it’s Sora and Riku who are the Children of Destiny, they are the ones who will connect to other hearts and bring change, not Kairi. Her lesson would be for herself, not for the world to see. 

A relationship between Kairi and Sora would just be backtracking on this message. Sora needs to accept his Darkness, but joining forces with a Princess of Light does not challenge any norms, it does not provide a new answer. It makes sense because the core of Kingdom Hearts isn’t a Prince and Princess of Light—it’s two boys who saw the night sky fall one day, two boys who grew up together, two boys destined for something greater who write their own paths anyway. It’s Sora and Riku. Nomura himself has stated that “Sora and Riku represent the theme of the Kingdom Hearts series, which is the ‘light and dark sides of the heart,’” the essence of this essay. 

Carrying on, some may stop me here and say that their love doesn't need to be romantic for a point to be made. But I argue that there is no other way.

Romantic love in stories often serves as the culmination of the story’s themes. In Leigh Bardugo's books, her romances serve to show the importance of love and healing. In the Shadow & Bone trilogy, Alina has the options between the Darkling, representing power, Nikolai, representing nationalism, and Mal, representing love. Just love. Not one befitting of a Saint, someone to change the world, but that’s not who Alina wanted to be; she just wanted a happy ending. Shockingly, she picks Mal. In Six of Crows, Kaz and Inej's romance, both traumatized teenagers, serves to show that you can heal and you can love. They're both scared of people, scared of intimacy and yet they still love with all their scars on display.

In Revolutionary Girl Utena, the romance between Utena and Anthy reaches its climax at the end of the show, displaying the vulnerability of both girls and the rawness of their feelings. But most importantly, it drives home the message: that the power to bring revolution is not the power of a prince or a witch. The power to change the world is love. The only way to change the world to be suitable to live in is through love. The power, a revolution, brought by love.

Romance is a revolution. It’s often saved for the last act of stories because of how it acts as a thread between all of the themes. In Kingdom Hearts, the theme needing weaving is balance: balance between yourself and others, balance between selflessness and selfishness, balance between Light and Darkness. Sora and Riku getting together would be Yin and Yang—a boy who had to accept his Darkness and a boy who had to fight for his Light. They complement each other and fill where the other lacks. 

Likewise, a relationship between them stresses the importance of connections. Tai Yasue, co-director of the series, has stated that “the theme of the KH series is ‘connections of the heart,’” and the narrative will take advantage of any opportunity to let that theme shine. Previously, many defenders of Light would sacrifice their connections with others for a greater good. But Sora and Riku choosing to love each other, choosing to love the Light and Darkness in each other instead of trying to chase away their Darkness, is showing that love is their other option. 

Sora getting with Kairi challenges nothing. It tells the others that Light must be with Light, that good must be with good. Even their grand attack in Re:Mind is two giant angel wings where they proclaim, “Light!” Sora and Riku, however, show that Light does not mean good. It shows that people can do bad things, and it doesn't make them bad, because people are not black and white. Like two kingdoms forever at war with each other, finally coming together and realizing that the other side is human and that you can't simply demonize them.

Sora and Kairi say there is nothing wrong with the world. To carry on. Sora and Riku say that there isn’t anything wrong with the world; it’s the people looking the wrong way. There is nothing wrong with what’s around us. Nothing wrong, nothing right. “Nothing is whole, and nothing is broken.” It’s simply being: being Darkness, being Light, being both, being neither.

It has to be Sora and Riku. It's always had to be them. Riku brought Sora up to the status of a Child of Destiny, and their journeys were led by each other, their character development taught by one another, and their acceptance will come from (an eventual) conversation between the two about their pain and hurt and Darkness, it’s all always been leading here. To this moment in time where they show the world all the hurt they hold and how they carry on with.

All of that, and loving each other? 

They are crossing the line, as Hikaru Utada sings in Don't Think Twice. They are going to be crossing every line established in Kingdom Hearts, and this is their power. Their revolution. Their predetermined yet self-made destiny. The payoff for years and years of searching and yearning and pining and chasing is a love that brings revolution, and oh...isn't that just romantic? 

That is the answer to “What is a heart?” The heart is the love you have, despite it all. The heart is the connections you make, despite it all. The heart is your Darkness and your Light and your experiences and your fights, despite it all. The heart is Sora and Riku, despite it all.

grant us the power to bring the world revolution

A lot of this analysis really depends on whether or not you believe Sora and Riku are in love with one another, I realize. You may agree with me that it seems fitting that their coming together as a pair would catalyze all the themes in Kingdom Hearts, but you disagree that it means they'd ever be a pairing. Which, I'd like to thank you for at least hearing me out. 

The queerness of their relationship means there will always be naysayers to them getting together, there will always be people claiming that I'm reaching. I do not care if you see them as brothers or ‘just’ really good friends. I see a love story. I see a love story and a love story saying to love, above all else. Do not judge others for you don't know what is wrong or right, for you are biased, for you are flawed, for you are human. Love others for that is the heart's will. Love.

I see that their getting together would be a testament to that love. To that forgiveness, to those flaws we have. It would be an acceptance of Riku's pain and Darkness that he mysteriously doesn't want to acknowledge, it would be an acceptance of Sora's pain that he's been bottling up ever since the beginning of his journey, and it would be an acceptance to the Light they both share. It would be the balance that so many generations have looked for and couldn't find because they did not practice acceptance, only judgment. 

Sora and Riku getting together is acceptance and it's proof that love is the answer to a generational trauma that has been around ever since the beginning of time. So yeah: Soriku Endgame, Actually. 

Thank you so much for reading! I’m a really big fan of stories about light and darkness and the balance between them, stories about love, and just Kingdom Hearts in general. I didn’t want to keep these thoughts in the back of my head and I’m glad I wrote them all out, even if it’s messy (and a shocking 6k words long...) Kingdom Hearts is a bit messy, after all.

If you're interested in more about Sora and Riku's relationship or just literary analysis of KH in general, please check out Constructing Kingdoms on YouTube, as it helped give me the words to write a lot of this essay. Further, if you're in total denial that there is any queer text in Kingdom Hearts, please check out this amazing video essay on Riku being gay. 

That's all I have. Please feel free to share if you have any disagreements or if any parts really spoke to you, or if you have anything to add, or anything really. These two live rent-free in my mind, and I don't mind talking about them or about how they're just so perfect to change the world.

Thank you. Spread love (and the Soriku agenda.)

[canadianlucifer]

Yeah okay I'll finally make a post on my latest Takizawa headcanon bc ever since I made the connection I couldn't stop thinking about it.

In short, I think he probably has npd, or narcissistic personality disorder.

Now I wanna make it clear I'm not a professional, I'm not giving any diagnosis or anything here, this is just what I've observed through his behaviour and how I think it fits the criteria.

I'm going to be mostly focused on his human character, might bring up a point or two from :re, but it's just gonna be the good brown haired boy for the most part.

Going through the list in the DSM-V, first is: a grandiose sense of self-importance (exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)

We first see this when he criticises Juuzou for eating in the meeting room and not listening to him because he's older. He's not proven himself to be actually superior, but he believes he is.

And again later when he's jealous Juuzou gets to go on the Aogiri raid and he's left behind to do paperwork.

Second piece is preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love.

Now, we don't exactly ever see him like, just sitting there thinking about being promoted or whatever, but it is known that he desperately wants one.

Third is believing that they are "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions)

I don't have any solid proof or screenshots for this one, but it stands to reason that this is likely why he joined the CCG in the first place. Investigators are strong and "special", and we never see him interact with people who aren't investigators outside of Hide, who he really only seems to vent to, someone he probably doesn't see as an "equal"

Fourth, requiring excessive admiration.

Again, no solid proof, but he often seems desperate for praise for his work and to be recognized.

Fifth is a sense of entitlement (unreasonable expectations of especially favourable treatment or automatic compliance with their expectations)

See point 1, he feels entitled to Juuzou's compliance and to go on the raid.

Now, point six, being interpersonally exploitative (taking advantage of others to achieve their own ends), I don't think I've seen. At least, not as a human. In :re I can totally see him using Aogiri to eventually regain the CCG's trust as an example though.

Seven, lacking empathy (unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others), is a hard one.

The way I see it is that he sort of has empathy, but only for the attention. In one of the screenshots I added earlier he says he wants to get promoted so he can help people, but if we look at that statement through another lens, it could become "I want to help people so they thank and congratulate me"

Eight though, often being envious of others or believing that others are envious of them, hoo boy is he a jealous guy.

Like, I don't even need to say anything here, do I?

He is jealous of anyone better than him in anything and everyone around him knows it.

And finally, nine, showing arrogant, haughty behaviours or attitudes.

Again, when he wanted to go on the Aogiri raid, but this is most clearly seen as a ghoul to be honest. Especially :re volume 3, he's destroying squads with little apparent effort, fights Haise while making snarky remarks, and that monolouge he gives to those two investigators reads so much like "I'm better than you for having figured this out"

A few other things outside of the diagnostic criteria I would like to add is how he clearly has a strong hierarchy, like he views any investigators his rank or lower as below him and any investigators ranked above him as great

Something else is that narcissistic people often don't have high self esteem

And though he may talk big, it's clear he's not very confident about facing the Owl

These are just a few of my thoughts, definitely not everything, and it's not like he perfectly fits the criteria, but I just saw more traits in him than I didn't.

Just another headcanon of mine to add to the list

[southeastasianists]

Tan Ming Li is a certified death doula. Just as there are those who facilitate bringing new life into the world, there should be people facilitating more and better ways to talk about death and dying, she reasons.

In 2023, she started The Life Review, a social venture with the mission to normalise conversations about death, dying and bereavement. Events open to the public include Life Stories, a series of chat sessions with topics such as “Motherless daughters”, “Real men don’t cry” and “Pet loss and our enduring bonds”; as well as Death Over Dinner, in which people come together to have conversations guided by Tan about their personal experiences with loss while sharing a meal.

The last Death Over Dinner took place at South Indian restaurant Podi & Poriyal, where participants were served dishes containing ingredients with special life and death significance in South Indian culture such as black sesame seeds, which signify purification; and jackfruit, the wood of which is often used as funeral pyre logs during cremation.

“What better way for Asians to connect than through food?” said Tan, explaining that Death Over Dinner is actually a global movement that originated in the US, “but we tweaked it so that food was a much bigger component, building the conversations around the ingredients and dishes. In other countries, the concept is just for people to talk about death over the dinner table.”

Tan, who is in her 40s, believes that getting comfortable with talking openly and honestly about such topics is vitally important.

“A nationwide survey conducted last year (by the Singapore Management University) revealed that ‘only 53 per cent of Singaporeans are comfortable discussing their own death while barely a third (33.4 per cent) would do so with someone who is dying’,” she shared.

She feels there is also a tendency to over-medicalise conversations about death, focusing on treatments and doctors.

“As a society, death is not something that is commonly discussed and we tend to be ‘death-denying’. Healthcare and wellness are all about ‘preventing’ death. In fighting against death, we are unaccepting of this natural part of life. This makes it hard to be vulnerable about our emotions around it,” she said.

Even if you haven’t lost a loved one yourself, “When someone else experiences a loss, many of us don’t know how to address the topic and end up using platitudes like ‘I’m sorry for your loss’ or worse, ‘Everything happens for a reason’,” she pointed out.

Ironically, avoiding the subject of death inadvertently gives it more power. “This power can then suppress our thoughts, beliefs and behaviour,” she opined.

NO STRANGER TO DEATH AND DENIAL

Tan speaks from personal experience. When she was 17, her mum died of cancer. “Dad said, ‘Don’t worry, she will recover.’ Her sudden passing left us in shock. I remember my dad brought me to the hospital canteen, broke the news to me and simply said, ‘We just have to accept it and move on’. I don’t think he ever recovered. As far as I recall, there were no conversations about it within the family.

“In the years that followed, I lost my dad, grandma, uncles and aunts… I was frozen in my grief response and it took a mental health crisis for me to start addressing these issues.”

Concurrently, Tan had always been interested in social work, from her university years when she volunteered to support children with special needs, to volunteering to teach yoga and breathing at various institutions including the Society for the Physically Disabled (SPD) and the Institute of Mental Health (IMH). She also lived in Thailand for several years, where she gave her time to a social enterprise helping indigenous craftsmen sell their goods.

Her career was in Advertising Research until she took a sabbatical and travelled to India in 2013. Following that period of time in which to think and reflect, she embarked on a new path, offering services such as mindfulness and movement.

“In the course of my work, I encountered clients who are terminally ill or grieving the loss of a loved one. Curious about how to better support them, I started researching the topic,” she recalled. “One day, I received an email from students working on a grief literacy event, inviting me to facilitate a somatic movement session for parents who had lost their child. Somatic movement involves exploring the body's sensations and movements to promote healing. During this session, many participants were able to release long held emotions within their bodies, even years after their loved one had passed.”

Motivated by the experience, she enrolled in the death doula course offered by the International End of Life Doula Association, an organisation in the US. Participants acquire skills revolving around how to support and comfort the dying and their loved ones.

“As I delved deeper into the subject, I realised that this was something that needed to go beyond supporting my clients one-to-one. The societal reluctance to discuss death openly leads to a lot of discomfort and unresolved emotions surrounding the topic, and I realised the need to scale and bring this out to the public,” she said.

So, “I decided to pursue a Masters of Science degree in Thanotology – even doctors go, ‘What’s that?’ – and start The Life Review as a platform for people to get comfortable discussing end-of-life matters through education and engagement.”

As far as she knows, she’s the only one in Singapore taking a Masters in Thanatology (“When the course started, the Programme Director said, ‘Now we are an international programme, thanks to Ming Li!’”) and one of just four people in Singapore who have completed death doula training.

“While trying to help people going through bereavement and grief, it struck me that I also had to look at my own experiences and work through all the emotions and experiences that I hadn’t known how to deal with – or even realised was necessary to,” she divulged.

“The way society operates, if we experience a loss, we are given three days of compassionate leave – and only for immediate family – and then we are expected to get back to ‘normal’ as productive members of society. But what about losing a friend? A partner? A pet? Do you get over it in three days? Since the norm was to get on with life, that’s what I did. It was only later in life that I realised that it was affecting me in ways that I did not immediately connect back to my earlier experiences, such as in the way I interacted with people in relationships and friendships. I would not get too close in case they would disappear,” she shared.

And so, “The main reason I’m doing this now is because of what I have gone through in my own life. The programmes I’m planning are skewed towards caregivers for now, as I don’t want anyone to be in a situation that I was in.” She added, “It was a turning point for me to adopt cats, knowing that they will die before me, yet to accept this and love them.”

Her work has also turned into “my legacy project for my parents”.

“I have a purpose to fulfil now, to bring The Life Review into fruition, in the remaining years left of my life. And in a way, I’m already planning for my end, making sure that I don’t regret things that I could or should have done,” she said.

DINNER WITH A PURPOSE

At Death Over Dinner events, “The framing of conversations is intentionally designed to be inclusive and non-confrontational. Participants are encouraged to share their thoughts and experiences without feeling pressured to delve into deeply personal reflections or imagine their own funerals,” Tan said.

The dinner serves as a casual starting point for discussions about a normally taboo topic to unfold naturally, fostering a sense of comfort and familiarity around the topic of death, she continued. “The intention is not to impose rigid guidelines or restrictions but rather to offer gentle guidance and prompts to steer the dialogue in a constructive direction” while embracing cultural elements within our specific society.

It is also about equipping people with the knowhow and language to either walk alongside a person who is dying, or to support a caregiver.

There are sessions taking place every quarter, which are open for individual sign-ups. The next Death Over Dinner event is planned for Apr 25 at Podi & Poriyal, with a group size of 12 to 16 people. Tan is also open to private group bookings, and hopes to possibly work with other restaurants as well.

The topic of death is rarely broached when everyone is healthy, she mused. But, in the face of loss, which comes sooner or later to all of us, “People may struggle to find the right words to express their feelings or fears, fearing that broaching the topic could cause further distress or discomfort to the person who is ill. As a result, conversations about end-of-life wishes, funeral arrangements, or even acknowledging the possibility of death may be avoided altogether, creating a palpable tension and unease.

"Dealing with it openly and saying what needs to be said can help the ones left behind adjust to the loss after the person passes away.”

And, “In the case of someone who knows they are dying, people around them not wanting to talk about it can leave them feeling unheard. They may not be able to express their desires; there may be things left unsaid; there may be people tiptoeing around them and telling them, ‘You’re going to be fine’ when they know full well they won’t be.”

The question of how we can begin to approach the topic of death in a meaningful way begs another: How talking about death openly and frankly can help us to live our lives more fully and intentionally.

“Accepting the finite nature of life and finding peace with it can change our outlook on life. When we acknowledge that life inevitably starts and ends, we are able to define what happens in between that holds significance,” Tan said.

��How do we make what happens in the middle matter? How do we leave a legacy for ourselves and future generations? Do we want to spend our time sweating the small stuff and harbouring grudges, or instead, use it to create memories and foster deep relationships? Living intentionally prompts us to confront these questions and align our actions with our values.

“Ultimately, embracing the impermanence of life compels us to live authentically, love fiercely and leave a legacy of compassion and connection.”

To sign up for Death Over Dinner, visit https://thelifereview.org/death-over-dinner.

[youremyheaven]

Behen ab aapko apna manifestation routine spill karna padega kyunki

You 🧲 Venus men

Meanwhile me:

Me 🧲 underage boys (no I'm not a pedo. This just happens on its own I swear 🥲)

LMAOOOO 😭😭😭😭

fr it's crazy bc a Bharani stellium guy from college who I haven't spoken to in YEARS started messaging me recently 😭😭 I am fr a Venus man magnet

I also think I'm a very powerful manifestor ngl and i think I've been unconsciously doing it ever since I was a kid or something but here's my routine/tips:

1. Self concept

I'm sure y'all have heard of this already and there are a million people talking about this but this is kind of the beginning and end of manifestation

What is manifestation? It's creating your reality

How do you create your reality? With your mind, duh 🙄😜

I have always believed that I'm a 10/10 baddie, a complete and total catch, any man would die/kill to have me and I'm the bestest gf anyone could ever wish for and this has been my mindset since forever and guess what? 😌🤪That's exactly how I'm treated and the kind of experiences I have 🤪🤪 (sometimes to a crazy extent, one guy actually tried to kill himself when I rejected him 😳😳 so pls be very careful with this 😔)

I've always believed that I'll be adored, helped, taken care of and provided for no matter where I am. When someone tries to tell me about how hard things can be or how slim the odds are, I have to laugh like GIRLLLL ur making things hard for yourself and I'm not and will never be you 💅 I'm ME and things are ALWAYS easy for ME. that's just my mentality and attitude and NO ONE can tell me otherwise. i have had many crusty ass people tell me I'm delusional and guess what they're rotting rn and I'm not 😌💅

I've heard some people speak about life/love/career/finance etc in the most negative pessimistic way and they wonder why they have no friends, no boo, no money nothing GIRL UR THE PROBLEM 🤧🤧

why is my dating life so different from many women? why do I get princess treatment? it's because I BELIEVE this is what I deserve.

that means, rejecting anything BENEATH this. there will always be creeps, low effort men and assholes, it's up to you whether or not you want to put up with that. it's not that low value men never approach me, it's that I pay NO MIND to anybody who isn't worth my time 💅

others can sense your energy. it affects the way you carry yourself. you think you're being nice when you act low maintenance but you're actually repelling men bc they want to be with someone who is hard to get and hard to keep, bc they like the challenge. I was known throughout my college years for being the girl no one could have 💅 bc no crusty man could ever touch even the tip of my pinky nail and that exclusivity means that you have to be special enough for me to pick you and that makes the men compete 💅for you

BUT HERE'S THE IMPORTANT PART:

by having this mentality you can attract many men for sure but there's no guarantee that they'll like you as a person once they get to know you

I have this self concept of everybody bending over backwards for me and dying to be with me but I am (and this is another personal belief) a very warm, kind, sweet person so I'd never take advantage of anyone's generosity or toy with people's feelings.

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

because karma is real

You can manifest winning the lottery but you could get into a car accident two days later and never live a life of wealth

This is to say that life does not end with manifesting something. Our character, our virtue, how we treat others and our intentions ALL MATTER. You can manifest something amazing and then have a horrible time experiencing it. So it's always important to keep a clear heart 💛 if you want to enjoy the fruits of your labour/manifestation

I'll give you my grandpa for example

After my grandma died, he went and got married in less than a year and it really hurt my dad's feelings (my dad was like 25 when it happened tho) and my grandpa said that he really wanted company in his old age and it's hard to find a widow around his age from the same community so he jumped at the first one he found and thought it was fate lmao aka Dadu (paternal grandpa in Hindi) thought he manifested that baddie but GUESS WHAT, she dumped his ass a few years in and he was all alone in his old age with no one except my dad to take care of him.

So you can manifest marrying a baddie but how that marriage works out will all be dependent on your karma 🫶

2. Embodying your beliefs

Look at your lifestyle. You want people to give you princess treatment but do you live like a princess?

Maybe the thing standing in your way is money but let's start there then. Manifest money. India has 1 billion people , if you can get 10 people to pay you for a service you can still make 10k + every month for pocket money

Do what you gotta do to live the life you deserve and don't make excuses

You want princess treatment but you act like a broke scarcity minded kanjoosi girl ??? Not gonna work 😔

3. Have faith

This will help you detach and not obsess over outcomes or be desperate

Are queens ever desperate?? No 💅 neither should you be

Have blind faith (easy for me bc im delusional) , it gives you a sense of entitlement maybe but a healthy entitlement 😌🫶bc you know you got God on your side ✨

4. Persist

Don't change your mind , keep believing even if you don't see results yet.

It's like placing an order. It might be delayed but it WILL come

Happy manifesting ✨🫶💛

Hope you attract everything you've ever wanted

[imminent-danger-came]

Here comes the complaining about Mei's treatment in the fandom:

Mei gets basically zero fandom attention unless it's about shipping her with Red Son tbh, and even then it's barely ever discussion about her character. I've seen nearly everything she does in S4 be somehow attributed to Red Son, her temper, her impatience, even being concerned about Heaven(?). It's like she's a satellite character, like she doesn't matter until it relates to a man.

The thing about her temper especially gets to me because it's a trait she had since the pilot, and it feels just the teeniest bit like sexism to erase it in favor of making her into a Wholesome Softgirl.

(Also isn't her temper the main reason her dynamic with Red Son works? Like they play off of each other well because of how similar they are?)

Shipping is fun, I get it. I really like a lot of the popular ships, and Red Son is probably my favorite character but sometimes it feels like people don't actually care about Mei's canon character, they just care about giving him someone to blush or angst about.

Not to mention, for a fandom that loves angst I've seen nothing about her canonically tense relationship with her family or her fear of hurting others with the samadhi fire. That and her focus ep's almost never get talked about, except for the one with Ao Lie but even then, the discussion isn't about Mei, it's about Ao Lie.

Sorry if this isn't coherent I just have very strong feelings about this.

Anyways Mei deserves better

We are holding hands anon.

This was SUPER coherent, and I totally agree with all of your points—hope you don't mind if I write a kinda-sorta-meta about it! This is a long rant, and it's full of a ton of things that have been in my head for months.

Mei is rarely discussed as a character, and it's such a shame! Mei, MK, and LBD are my favorites, and I think I need to express my Mei love here more.

I think Mei being sidelined and ignored is far too common in the lmk fandom. I saw one person complain that Red Son should have gotten the Samadhi fire, and that it was "nothing against Mei", and it just kinda left me dumbfounded.

Like, there's nothing that giving Red Son the Samahdi fire would have added to the story that would trump what giving the Samahdi fire to Mei, our main female lead, added to the story:

"MK: “Mei! You have to stop. I know you’re upset, and that’s okay! I know what it’s like to have a power you don’t know how to control—to feel like the fate of the world is in your hands and you have no idea what to do! But you always have my back, and help me through it. We, will figure this out! Together!” (3x10 The Samadhi Fire)

This sentiment of "having no idea what to do", and that being okay, is something that MK is repeating back to Mei all the way from the Revenge of the Spider Queen special. They're truly friends—best friends who are always there for each other—and I don't think MK could have even gotten through to Red Son in this situation. He got through to Mei, because if "you're bonds of friendship are as strong as you say, you will always find your way back to one another", you can always reach one another.

To me, it just feels like they want to "give" this important place in the story to a popular male side character, rather than give it to the female lead they don't care about. And it just feels misogynistic. The particular post I'm thinking of mentioned how amazing it would have been for Red Son as a character to gain back and learn to control the Samadhi fire, completely ignoring what the Samadhi fire did for Mei as a character. This is not something that could be "handed" over to any one else, not without taking away everything thematically and narratively relevant about this part of the story.

As I've mentioned in my dear Hero and Warrior meta, MK and Mei fulfill the "roles" of the Hero and the Warrior to each other. MK's choice to not abandon Mei when she needs him is a CRUCIAL choice, and something that wouldn't have even close to the same amount of impact if it were replaced by anyone else.

There's also the matter of how Mei's trust impacts the story, for better or for worse. When she makes the decision to trust someone in the name of what she thinks is right (like how she trusted Sun Wukong's plan to defeat LBD, or Azure's plan to save their friends), it leads to her being tricked. To pain—which parallels her to both MK and Lady Bone Demon in such a significant way.

However, instead of MK's-

“No matter what I do, it’s going to lead to pain. It’s like the Lady Bone Demon said—it doesn’t matter if I want to help people or not! Everything I do just- it just makes things worse!”

-Mei instead takes on the position of "We have to try." Even if the odds are stacked against them, even if it doesn't work, even if it just makes things worse—she has to try. And that works with how Mei more often than not is the one supporting MK, always having his back. If I see one more person describe MK as the "optimist" of the group when Mei is so clearly the hopepunk girly we deserve, I may lose it.

All the way back in 1x10, MK is doubtful about their victory against Demon Bull King and Mei reassures him: "But we won...right?". Mei, AGAIN, in Revenge of the Spider Queen is the one to comfort MK that "They got this" and that they would "'Figure it out. Together". Mei assures MK in 2x10 that he's mastered so many powers and that Monkey King might not even need to come back, and when MK stares in his lemonade cup sadly, cocks an eyebrow insinuating that she knows something is wrong. In 3x04 when MK is wondering what use he is without his powers and how he's going to fight the Lady Bone Demon, Mei pokes his cheek and tells him that's why they're getting the Samadhi fire.

She has her own doubts, but she stubbornly works through them—anything to protect and support her friends.

Mei is her own character. And it's a good one at that.

(The rest of my thoughts are going under the cut, this is getting a bit long lol)

Now, this brings me to Mei and Red Son's dynamic.

"Also isn't her temper the main reason her dynamic with Red Son works? Like they play off of each other well because of how similar they are"

100% IT IS. Mei and Red Son's dynamic is lovely, and I think Red Son becoming Mei's teacher really expanded on that. Red Son giving Mei "some fire training" was a perfectly fine role for him to have in the Embrace Your Destiny Special, furthering their dynamic from Revenge of the Spider Queen.

Mei: "But...what if I fail everyone? What if I...lose control" Red Son: "My parents have succumbed to the Lady Bone Demon’s power—like countless others. You, and the Noodle Boy, will stop at nothing to free them. That’s how I know you won’t lose control. You can’t. Because you’re the only hope I- The only hope this world has left."

(3x11 This Imperfect World)

Red Son was so anti-hero originally, and yet here...he needs a hero. He needs Mei. Together they have to wrangle the wild emotions and energies around them to save everything. Mei is a feisty and angry character, rushing into things headfirst, and she couldn't do that or be that with the Samadhi fire, lest she destroy all she holds dear.

And, Red Son understands that. That's why he's there in the first place—to make sure Mei doesn't burn herself from the inside out. Red Son doesn't want to fail his parents and Mei doesn't want to fail the world. That's why I find them interesting.

So yeah, I really feel your "it's like she's a satellite character, like she doesn't matter until it relates to a man" sentiment. It's painfully true.

Honestly, I've been spinning around Mei's conversation with Ao Lie in 4x05 in my head for MONTHS, and not because of Ao Lie lol:

Mei: “What’s the point of having power if you won’t use it? Don’t you have people you want to protect?” Ao Lie: “Of course I do! But I can’t protect them with careless actions!” Mei: “Inaction is careless! If you’re not giving everything you have to protect the people you care about, you are nothing!"

Mei: I would watch my sword shatter into pieces a thousands times, so long as I used it to protect the ones I care about. If you're just going to sit here and screw around, then maybe, you don't deserve power." Ao Lie: "And perhaps with greater caution you would still have you're sword. I know a thing or two about disappointing people, about feeling powerless to protect them, but I do not sense you are a disappointment! Even now, locked away in imminent danger you're thoughts are to protect others!"

Mei: "But how am I supposed to protect everyone if I don't have my sword?" Ao Lie: "A sword is powerless without the hand that wields it."

(4x05 Court of the Yellow Robed Demon)

(omg hi hand motif) (Whenever characters (most often MK, followed up by Mei) look at their hands, it's typically as a sign of resolve or the character showing that they feel the weight of the world on their shoulders. I know I keep mentioning hand motif but god I love it so much and it's important to this convo about Mei.)

Here we see Mei all laid out: she doesn't want to be a disappointment and she's motivated by protecting her friends, which all tracks. Her first scene in the whole show is saving MK, and every damn day I think about her smile towards MK before she sacrifices herself to the Lady Bone Demon.

The dialogue "What’s the point of having power if you won’t use it?" is such a lovely paring with her "We have to try" mentality. If you have the power to do something, you should do it. You should try. In this sense Mei is bound by an incredible sense of duty to her friends and to the world.

And GOD, did we need a female character entirely motivated by helping the people she cares about, armed with a kick-ass sword and her temper. She's basically a female shonen protagonist, and I think most people don't realize that about her.

Mei's line “Inaction is careless! If you’re not giving everything you have to protect the people you care about, you are nothing!" in particular is interesting. Like I've said, she's a character whose whole motivation is protecting the people she cares about, and yet she hurt MK and everyone else at the end of s3.

There are certain things in s4 that lead me to believe she feels like "nothing" because of how she handled the Samadhi fire. Like, look at Mei's face when Subodhi mentions it for the first time in s4:

Subodhi: "As someone who once wielded the Samadhi fire, I thought that you would know that the flame that lights a candle is ALSO capable of lighting a forest fire."

(4x09 Roast of the Monkie Kids)

It reminds me of this scene from 3x09:

Macaque: "How do you still not see that he has no idea what he’s doing?"

(3x09 The King, the Prince, and the Shadow)

And, along with this parallel to MK—our poster boy of low self-esteem/belief—I just have to say I'm a little worried about our girl! I'm so excited to see where her character arc goes in the future, especially with how her own self-doubt is going to mesh with her duty to her friends.

I was thinking about it earlier—and as a fun little bonus theory at the end of this meta—I wonder if a Mei VS MK fight is in the cards for us. The line "They will destroy you, harbinger of chaos" doesn't fill me with much confidence, however I also doubt any of the main cast is going to fight MK with the intent of destroying him. So, that got me thinking that maybe they're going to fight MK to save MK, in a sense. I'm a "Mei is going to get a dragon form" truther (thank you Lego set), and Mei unlocking her dragon form while trying to save MK would be ONE hell of a way to debut it.

Anyways, I'm going to cut this off here, but tldr: Mei deserves better.

[mytalemyworld]

He not only keeps their secret but also goes along with their play.

He finds a lie to help Songül. He says he did a business with Songül's husband. Actually it's not entirely a lie, you know he's good at skirting around the truth. Lying by telling the truth is his special talent.

Her watching him from afar breaks my heart. She obviously misses him but always must remind herself that he ruined her life.

So he is not a mob anymore, was retired from that "job". Oh, he paid a very heavy price for that. A jail sentence, a divorcement and him breaking his most beloved one's heart.

Hayriye: What are you doing here? Yavuz: My business partner invited me and I came. Hayriye: Your business partner invited you? To the place where exactly we are and the party which my sister threw? Yavuz: Yes, exactly. It's just a coincidence. Hayriye: Coincidence? You never appear coincidentally. I know that very well. Tell me what you are up to. Yavuz: If there is someone who has a secret agenda here, it's you all, Hayriye. But don't worry, your secret is safe with me. Hayriye: If you heard what happened and came to help- Yavuz: Hayriye, it seems I couldn't make you understand. My business with you is done. You don't have any importance for me, okay? Hayriye: What about the money you sent, then? I know you sent it, don't deny it. Yavuz: Yes, I sent it. So what? We did a business together, you got your share and the account got closed. Nobody owes the other anything. Hayriye: If we went through all accounts, you would get stuck under them. But whatever. I am not glad at all to see you again. I hope you will never show up again.

Ouch. But he asked for it.

The balance of power apparently shifted. She makes him feel shit and makes it look like she just detests him. This throws him off balance, I mean it's not like he wouldn't expect it though, but he has never seen Hayriye completely cold and hateful towards him. She, even when they argued, showed she still loved him. But he knows he deserves this treatment.

He gets a taste of his own medicine. When she saw another face of his she exactly felt like this. Very much lost and hurt.

[night-rise]

I think the biggest issues I had with the Owl House series were centered around two specific characters:

Alador and Hunter

One character’s story wasn’t as great as it could’ve been and the other character’s story was more great than it needed to be.

I’ll break it down separately:

(Once again as always with these negative posts before choosing to read know that these are my own personal thoughts and feelings on the show and don’t speak on the behalf of the Owl House community or its creators. If you have any negative feelings towards what you read I sincerely apologize and know it wasn’t meant as an attack or slander to you on a personal level. That being said feel free to comment what you like, I just ask you please keep it as mature, calm and civil as possible) That being said on to the post:

Alador! The Head Blight of the prestige Blight family household. Praised as a brilliant Abomination user and inventor. His work has earned him not only fortune and wealth, but reputation and respect.

With all of these facts in mind, how was his story UNBELIEVABLY underwhelming?

From the moment he was “debuted” we can already feel the power radiating off of him. You could hear it in his tone, his word was LAW and his ambitions focused and clear. He was the rule maker in the family. Plain and simple. He decided what his family does or doesn’t do.

He sounded like the type of man that wouldn’t even do what Belos would tell him to do.

The type of man and individual that Belos would want to keep close to him at all times. Which is why it PAINS me to this day that Alador wasn’t a Head Coven Witch.

Him and Odalia! Think about it.

The Blights were a BIG DEAL in season 1. Amity was looked upon and praised as the most important witchling on the isles because she was a Blight. She had expectations and special treatments because she was a Blight. Because she was also born with talents and skills of a Blight. 

I mean come on! How does a “common” family be able to afford and provide Amity the Head of the EMPEROR’s FREAKIN COVEN as her personal mentor?! THE HEAD! Lilith was the right hand FIST of the Emperor. The Darth freakin Vader! And the Blights were able to get Lilith to teach their daughter!

A daughter that wasn’t part of the emperors coven yet. Still in school. That is incredible. Amity got to be Lilith’s student-

RAVEN MOM! YES!

…

(I am so sorry… I’m still recovering from that ending hug, please excuse me) ANYWAY

With such special treatments and fame around Amity wouldn’t it had made sense for her parents to be higher up the food chain than what they were in the actual show?

Alador and Odalia should’ve BOTH been Head Witch’s. One for Abomination and the other Oracle. Being the only witches in history to be of the same family but both climb to Head Witch status.

This storyline not only would’ve been more interesting but it would’ve saved sooo much more time.

Think about it, we have two Head witches we know NOTHING about because there simply wasn’t any room for them.

Alador and Odalia being head witches would’ve given our heroes a reason to interact with them and given more depth to Amity’s story. Something she DESPERATELY needed. Her being ANOTHER character who’s story wasn’t as great as it could’ve been.

And I mean we don’t have to make him the abusive controlling parent. Just stubborn and neglectful.

Odalia is the still the abusive controlling one. But Alador is in full control of it. Allowing it, as long as it makes his kids stronger for it.

Alador would’ve made an amazing villain. A complex villain. Someone that was a HUGE threat to our heroes but could easily turn around and do the right thing whenever he felt like it.

Alador could’ve at some point choice to protect his family rather than do what the Emperor wanted him to do. It wouldn’t make him forgiven, but more respected and seen as an ally instead of an enemy.

Alador’s story, it was nice, but we ALL know it could’ve been a thousand times better.

HUNTER! The Golden Guard… The personal guard of the Emperor of the Isles. Of all witch and demon kind. …this guy had an aura of power around him since the day we met him… literally…

When we first saw him in season 1 we were ALL convinced he was going to be this top tier spy/villain. But instead we got… well, a child in a mask.

Before I go any further I feel the need to say I freakin love Hunter. He’s a sweetheart. A badass. And overall amazing character that I’m happy they brought onto the show.

HOWEVER. His story was way “more” than it needed to be. Way more complex. Way more deep and involved. I’m happy we have him, I’m just bitter of how much of him we GOT.

I love his (original) origin story. A powerless witch with no powers since the day he was born. That could’ve been taken in so many directions.

First off it would’ve thrown us off the “spy” scenario. I REALLY wanted a spy to infiltrate the Owl family and sabotage them.

Hunter being introduced as the new kid at hexside. Everyone picking on him because he’s a “no witch” orphan, from a long line of “no witches”. His being the ONLY witch family on the Boiling Isles with no powers. Luz also having no powers and Willow being the “half a witch” sympathize and befriend him. Just like he planned.

Willow developing feelings for him overtime and Hunter conflicted starts feeling the same towards her. Which would make his reveal all the more heartbreaking and devastating.

Amity, being the ONLY one suspecious of him, investigates him. Causing a rift and tension from an already shaky bond with Willow, and problems between her and even Luz, when she tries to warn them about her suspicions.

Amity eventually figuring out who Hunter truly is and “betraying” the group by joining the Emperors coven and being a spy of her own. Hunter giving her early access to the coven in hopes of keeping her quiet. But really she’s only in it to protect her friends from him. Going as far as to pretend she hated her friends for not believing her.

A moment of redemption for Lilith as well when she tries to get her former student out of there by begging Amity not to make the same mistakes she did.

All leading to amazing fight scenes between the group.

I’m talking Amity vs Willow, Luz vs Amity, and then eventually:

Luz and Amity vs The Golden Guard

That would’ve been an AMAZING fight! Hunter with his artificial magic staff, mask and all vs Lumity on the day of Unity! Around the same time Harpy Eda and Harpy Lilith were fighting Belos on top of the Isles head! It would’ve been beautiful. Romantic! Symbolic! A master piece! Everything going down under blood red skies…

Hunter not wanting hurt Willow or the new friends he made, and discovering Belos orphaned him by murdering his family (via information provided by Amity who found The Emperors journal while remaining a spy) betrays the Emperor and joins the group.

A quick and easy turn that keeps his character the same and makes Huntlow canon.

None of this Grimwalker/Caleb stuff. Caleb doesn’t even exist. Philip was the ONLY human to ever be on the isles before Luz. And Hunter is a descendent of him.

Philip wasn’t even evil. He just became evil by being corrupted and possessed by the spirit of an evil Titan. (No collector either)

Belos plan was to revive himself by transporting his remains to the human realm and combining the two suns.

Short and simple. Not overly complicated. Not overly dramatic. Simple and Clean that gives more time and development to characters that were already introduced in season 1.

That’s the BIGGEST issue I have with Hunter, his story took ALL the limited time we had on the show. All the time we could have had on Lilith’s redemption story and Amity’s development.

Amity’s story could’ve had WAY MORE DEPTH if Hunter’s story was cut in half.

His story did NOT need to be as big or as deep or as complex than it needed to be.

It’s actually unbelievable looking back at it now… these were the two I was most afraid of besides Belos :/

[nothing0fnothing]

I noticed the comments you sometimes get from people with NPD… as I have. It makes me laugh because the way they approach it… the way they try to get their point across is by using the very techniques that they’re saying we can’t call abuse. Gaslighting… feeling as though they deserve special treatment and feel they have a right to dictate our feelings and using a term that is widely accepted and used in mental health, emotional black mail, insults etc.

Do they not realize this?

Hi there thanks for your support <3

NPD is one of those disorders, lots of people love to talk about it but very few want to actually educate themselves on what it really means to have it. I think because "narcissistic abuse" and "narcissistic personality disorder" sound the same they like to get discussed in the same circles, regardless of how little they have to do with one another. I do try to ensure when it comes up on my blog I deal with it in a way people with the disorder find respectful so I really appreciate you coming to this page being open about your diagnosis and your support. It means a lot to me.

I tend to get abuse on this page in two distinct categories. The first is really aggressive violent abuse. Usually from people who are self diagnosed with NPD or ASPD, usually they self identify as narcissists and usually their blog is full of edgy posts about how cool it is to be a narcissist or to have a cluster B disorder. The second are mostly younger people in with leftist ideals who have all the right politics but don't really have any real world experience in left leaning or social justice spaces.

The former tend to be the group coming in with the vile abuse. "I hope you die", "your parents should have beat you harder", saying "you deserved it" in my post replies and flooding my anons with cruelty. Usually this group don't stop till they are blocked and I have had some come after me on multiple accounts just to continue the abuse.

I had one who wouldn't stop even after I'd blocked 4 or 5 associated accounts, so I screenshot his blog with his vile comments and shared it to a cringe subredit. Very quickly he went from powerful abuser to wounded puppy, posing as his own partner in the comments begging I remove the post as people with his disorder can't help it and people who are not narcissists should know better than to hold him accountable. My post stayed up and he's left me alone since then, but it does open a door to explore the mindset.

Usually, untherapised and undiagnosed people who suspect they have NPD have an understanding of what it means to have the disorder that isn't consistent with reality. They tend to think that NPD is "abuser disorder" and therefore claiming they have it gives them the undisputed right to abuse and bully whoever they like, however they like, and anybody who calls out their abuse are being ableists for expecting them to behave in a way that is generally expected in polite society. To them calling narcissistic abuse what it is feels personal, they know it describes who they are and they feel that it is an unfair criticism of their selves, after all, its the mental illnesses fault they're a cunt, right?

Generally I don't like to reply to this type on my page. It only furthers the misrepresentation of NPD, promotes their own delusion that this is normal behaviour for NPD, opens the doors for their fan boys to flood my asks and falsely represents people with the disorder as obligate abusers. It really isn't useful to my blog at all.

They know they're being abusive, they think I am being abusive too, they think it's okay for them and not for me because they "have NPD" and I don't. They know its illogical, they do know better and they're aware of the optics of abusing someone for discussing abuse. This is why they hide behind side blogs and anon asks. To me they're a great example that personality disorders shouldn't be self diagnosed and as they have nothing of any importance to say, they get blocked immediately.

The latter tend to abuse via gaslighting and stonewalling. "I hope you die" is a common one in this group too but its also comments like "you have no right to use the term narcissist", "just call it regular abuse" and accusations that I am armchair diagnosing my abusers with a mental health disorder I routinely explain on my page has nothing to do with the way they behaved.

Usually these people feel rightous in their abuse because they are convinced that they are protectors and hero's for people with NPD who (for some unspoken reason) can't speak up for themselves. Usually they too are misinformed about what NPD actually is and will parrot weird ableist notions such as that people with NPD "can't help it." (Yikes) or will assume that my abusers had NPD based on the descriptions of abuse that I share on my page (I have never disclosed the mental health diagnoses of any of my abusers.) They beleive that narcissism and NPD are one in the same and that accurately describing narcissistic abuse is ableism against people with NPD for that reason.

Generally they come in hard with the accusations of ableism and insistence that every abuse specialist and victim advocacy group who acknowledge narcissistic abuse are ableists, but will quickly stop replying when I gently ask them why they think the solution to this problem is to harass strangers running abuse recovery blogs and victim support resources.

This type of person is absolutely blind to the contradiction in their "support." They genuinely don't understand how making statements publicly like "you just want your abuse to be special" and "I don't care what experts say this type of abuse isnt real" is super bad optics for the group of people they're claiming to be protecting. Every person new to this discourse seeing that won't assume that the person with the long heartbreaking posts about getting yeeted down the stairs as a 4 year old and is openly disabled and neurodivergent is secretly a hideous ableist out to destroy people with trauma induced personality disorders, they're going to think that to support people with cluster B disorders you need to be pro abuse and anti victim support.

What's important to me is that when people come to this blog they're not coming to a place that unfairly pins their awful experiences to a mental illness that nobody who has it asks for. Whenever I get comments, no matter how well meaning, that present NPD as a disorder that causes abuse, I have to break it down and explain how it isn't, not for people who think coming to my blog to gaslight and harass me to jump on my side, but for the people coming here for support who deserve to be educated on what happened to them.

[implausiblyjosh]

Been watching Superman & Lois recently, and with the 3rd season wrapping up, I wanted to talk about what I saw as "Drama Busywork" in this season.

One of the b-plots in this season is that Jordan, one of Clark & Lois's sons, is dealing with Teenage Issues. In episode S3 E12, he sees people make fun of his superhero alter ego right in front of him & he responds like most kid superheroes do in these types of shows, basically saying "so what if this new superhero is a kid and wears goggles? seems like this new superhero is kinda badass and saved some kids!"

That exchange makes his ex, Sarah, think that Jordan doesn't care about his secret and having a secret identity… despite the fact that she saw the entire conversation start to finish and saw him keep the secret, all he did was kinda go "whoa hold on peers, what if the kid hero is cool and awesome instead???" Sarah, going off of this wild interpretation of events laid out in front of her, tells her mom, Lana Lang.

But this game of telephone telephones-back? It starts as "heyyy what if the new kid superhero is cool haha", then Sarah sees this as "Jordan doesn't care about his secret, so I shouldn't have to care about keeping his powers a secret", which Lana Lang takes to Clark and Lois as "he cares too much about his alter ego", and finally Clark & Lois go to Jordan with "you don't think people knowing about your alter ego is bad". And this last point isn't in a "People should know Superman and Clark Kent are the same person" way, it's in a "People should know Superman exists" way.

So Jordan doesn't actually get to address the core problems here, which are:

1) he is a bit of a Teen Weirdo dealing with Teenage Adolescence on top of being a Teen Hero

2) His relationship with his ex, Sarah, is Bad

Watching the season finale right now, and we haven't gotten any meaningful closure on this Jordan arc. So, like, what's the point?

It really feels like meaningless drama that isn't really adding much to the story or the characters, it's just giving them something to do. Just a lot of characters handling things horribly, AND characters who aren't handling things poorly have the memories of goldfish.

One of the other characters, DOD Grandpa (cannot remember his character's name, but he's Lois Lane's dad) is the one who got Jordan on this whole alter ego track! But when everything comes to blows about Jordan wanting recognition as his alter ego, he gets to just kinda peace out of that whole conflict.

Another example from this same episode is a Clark and Kyle interaction, part of the C-Plot of Jonathan (Lois & Clark's other son) feeling kinda left out of the whole family because he doesn't have powers like his brother and he's not someone of worldwide importance like his mom.

Jonathan has been working as a firefighter in-training with Kyle, Lana Lang's ex. Recent developments have made it so Kyle knows Clark is Superman. This has had an impact on how Kyle treats Jonathan, since Kyle knows that not only is this Superman's son, but also Kyle used to be Clark's biggest bully. Clark goes to Kyle and asks to not treat Jonathan any different because Clark is Superman, and clearly and concisely states that this is about Jonathan not wanting special treatment and Jonathan wants to make it on his own merits.

Kyle would literally not be receptive to that idea from anyone other than Superman, he's still in "this man could kill me and coulda killed me in high school when I was his biggest bully" mode of thinking. So, how does Kyle take this new info to Jonathan? like Jonathan went and ratted to his dad! Even though Jonathan clearly states that's not what happened, Clark just overheard him talking about work! Jonathan's obviously comfortable talking to Kyle about these issues, or else he wouldn't expand on them and defend himself by basically saying "what, you expect me to never talk about work outside of work?"

This is the drama equivalent of worksheets. This is busywork. I don't feel like anything productive is happening here in these interactions, either as character work or as narrative. This doesn't get into the fact that a lot of underlying issues here are just… not really brought up again!

If we focus back on my two points with Jordan, there's one that's just normal High School Drama Stuff. The second is his relationship with Sarah, his ex. Despite this second point being a huge driving force in a lot of Jordan's B-Plot (I'd argue the reason he wants to be recognized as his alter ego is directly caused by this awful relationship) there isn't much movement on dealing with the relationship.

This angle is completely unresolved. The Sarah & Jordan angle starts going sour because Sarah cheats on Jordan over summer camp. They talk it out, and are still together despite it, until Sarah decides because of her own cheating she just wants to be friends. Jordan is (understandably!) heartbroken about this, and tries to continue to be friends with her and it bleeds into that first point. Now he's gotta deal with this heartbreak, on top of the usual High School Drama Stuff. It is the catalyst for all these other things in his life, and all his actions, but like… nothing satisfying is happening there!

(Additionally, this plot point hits really close to home for me! I've been on the cheated-on end of a situation, and watching all this knowing it comes from this unresolved issue that hits close to home makes watching Jordan's B-plot hard! However, that's a Josh-Issue not a Writing-Issue, but I felt it needed to be said so you can take that together with my criticisms)

Again, this all feels like busywork. I don't think any character development is happening, and I don't think the character work being done is good in these scenes. It's just… nothing. I know "Filler" gets thrown around a lot, but this feels like that! This feels like padding. It feels like taking up time to hit a word count.

Next season a lot of these characters are leaving the show. On the one hand, it sucks cause I think they're good on-screen! I don't necessarily dislike these characters! On the other, I think having a smaller cast with less of this writing baggage will likely be for the best, or at the very least we get a different type of bad writing.

[sigridhawke]

IMMA DO IT Kann: 🖊️🐈💘😞 Enfer: 😖🎮🤍🔺

YEAH YOU WILL!!! Details about OCs ask for our beloved Crimson character just for you!

Also cause I haven't shared any art of them yet and this is my dear co-author coming in with the great asks about characters we've been obsessing over over the weekend.

Enfer on the left, Kann on the right.

Kann:

🖊️ BALLPOINT PEN — does your oc have any tattoos? do they want any (more) tattoos?

Under the armour/sleeve of his right arm he has a full sleeve tattoo that is a mix of elven and dwarven stories and how Greater Ekatha came to be. He got it because it reminds him of his roots and what the kingdom stands for. It's not in colour, just a very pretty lineart.

🐈 CAT — does your oc prefer a wide circle of friends or a few close friends?

He has a pretty large network of friends, he’s one of those people others would direct you to cause he’s bound to know someone. He has a couple close friends but in general he is happy to just move from social circle to social circle.

💘 HEART WITH ARROW — what and/or who do(es) your oc consider the most important to them?

The people of Greater Ekatha mean everything to him. Not just those born there, but the people who come from afar to stay for a short time or a long while. Much like the Princess he desires a world where everyone is free to travel and intermingle as they please and celebrate the life they have. While many in Vespera think themselves above the Elvendwarves of Greater Ekatha he considers them all family too and makes fairly regular trips to the sunless kingdom.

Arguably Enfer is one of the most important individuals to him, while he tries not to play favourites, Enfer absolutely gets a lot of special treatment from him. If Enfer desires something he strives to find a solution to not compromise his morals while also meeting the faun’s needs.

😞 DISAPPOINTED FACE — does your oc attract others, or do they tend to be left alone?

Part of the reason Kann ended up being put into a position of power is cause he can befriend pretty much everyone. He’s that friendly neighbour that will bake you some bread and say hope you have a good day as you head out to work. He does thrive in that environment, he loves being around people. He just doesn’t feel cut out to run a kingdom politically but that’s what Enfer is there for lol.

Enfer:

😖 CONFOUNDED FACE — is your oc an introvert, an extrovert, or an ambivert? do they let people in easily, or are they more reserved?

Ambivert! Before he lost his standing as leader of the fauns he let people in much more easily, but after being challenged for the right to lead right before an important council meeting that would hopefully end in treaties signed to prevent war, he became much more reserved and cautious. Being Greater Ekatha tho and aiding Kann politically has made him much more cunning but also the general atmosphere of Greater Ekatha and what it stands for has been bringing him back out of his shell. Mostly he live vicariously through Kann when it comes to social interactions.

🎮 VIDEO GAME CONTROLLER — what are three of your oc’s favorite hobbies?

- He loves experimenting with different tea blends. Between Greater Ekatha and Vespera there are a lot of different flora to try. With the Wildlands close by too it's just a goldmine. He often brings a new blend for Odin and Thane to try when he and Kann travel to Vespera.

- Practicing sword fighting. Not something he needs so much in Greater Ekatha, but it was something he took a lot of pride in when he traveled between the three faun settlements.

- Being on the water. Not swimming necessarily, but he loves just being on the water. Thankfully you can take a gondola from one side of the kingdom to the other. It is something he misses from his time in the settlements was being on the ocean so often. He loves the smell of the sea, the warmth of the sun, the feel of water against his legs.

🤍 WHITE HEART — what are three of your oc’s neutral/questionable traits?

- Enfer plays into the ‘poor damaged faun’ role which wasn’t hard when he showed up to Greater Ekatha hornless, bloodied, face and body gouged. But for 16 years he’s kept up this ruse, letting people believe he has been broken by the experience and Kann keeps him close because he needs that support/is too weak to look after himself.

-  Enfer is greedy and bitter, but mostly greedy. While he had the best intentions to keep the fauns politically neutral, he did very much enjoy the power and once he lost that he found a way to get it back by working with Kann. He is also greedy for Kann's attention and is prone to jealousy given Kann is very blatantly a people person and beloved by all.

-  in the words of my co-author: gaslighting, gatekeeping, girlboss

🔺 RED TRIANGLE POINTED UP — does your oc know how to use any weapons?

- Like many fauns their horns/antlers are their prime weapons. Horns being stronger but if they break they don't grow back, antlers being weaker but more dramatic and more likely to grow back if broken. Because of this fighting/challenging for leadership often includes weapons too. Enfer is particularly versed with a sword.