#god. don't get me started on him

[blaineslesbian]

honestly, untameable mc should've just left the ranch and gone back to the city when austin refused to let her help. would've saved her a lot of trouble

[lucabyte]

On autonomy, and what it means to be Obliged to Help.

Bonus:

[vaguely-concerned]

sometimes I think of all the on-the-surface warm, well-meaning but deeply ineffectual advice and attention john gives harrow through harrow the ninth (make some soup and get some sleep! get a hobby! don't be so hard on yourself! self care harrow! as long as I need take no actual responsibility in this relationship whatsoever I would have loved to be your dad!) set up against the stark truth that with his other hand he has been staging her attempted horrific murder again and again and again like a living nightmare on the logic that it will 'put her down or fix her'. and then I find that I wish there is a hell. a special hell where twitch streamers turned necromantic death emperors go

[abyssalzones]

can I say something is this a safe space. it's kind of fascinating that ford is meant to read as a deeply repressed character and a capital s Scientist no less but he leads this other half of his life entirely dedicated to the occult. in the 70's-80's. like the historical connotations of the occult and what they represented in the united states at least seems kind of interesting in this context. for no reason in particular I find the dual aspects of "extremely dedicated to presenting as a logical, steadfast researcher trying to earn respect and social acceptance to the point of hinging all of his self worth on this vision for the future working out" and "deeply tied to the paranormal and "unsavory black magic" and everything Weird/freakish but feels like he needs to hide this aspect of himself from even the people closest to him" Very interesting. hiding six-fingered hands compulsively behind his back even if it's the emblem he puts on his journals. "what are you attracted to?" and "maybe you're simply attracted to things that hurt you" from two different points in the book. sweet dreams (are made of this) on the record player. hey does anyone know what that tarot card with a snake on it is meant to represent

[serpenlupus]

About Wyll and his horns (and what they mean)

Let's say I was writing a part of my Tav's story with Wyll directly connected to the dialogue he has during the tiefling party, and while struggling with this bit, I've realized there's quite a few misconceptions floating around. I felt compelled to add information to the table that might clear them, so here we go.

First, what exactly happens to Wyll when he disobeys Mizora in act one? Well, he doesn't get turned into a devil, he certainly doesn't get turned into a tiefling, he's not a half fiend, not a demon, none of that. Wyll stays human, but he has horns and red eyes (and other features we can't see on his model as of now).

(Everyone has their race listed, Wyll's remains "Human")

This is because when a warlock fails to uphold some part of their contract they can suffer a certain number of consequences, Wylls is “The character grows horns, a tail, or some other devilish features that can't be removed by any means short of divine intervention. As long as these marks persist the character detects as a fiend when subjected to Detect Evil and Good spells or similar magic.” ( from Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus, page 214)

And I’ve come across some people that think it wasn’t so bad of a punishment, that he was being racist towards the tieflings, or just not being justified in being upset after having his body forcibly changed against his will. I think they are missunderstanding just how insidious Mizora’s actions were, and here I just want to give some context to maybe bring a better understanding to the situation. Your conclusions are up to you.

Gonna start by using a not exact analogy, but I think it’s going to make the explanation easier. Stick with me for a minute.

Remember Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean? He had a branded “P” on his arm that marked him as a pirate. A murderer, robber, criminal, etc. in the eyes of the society he was a part of. What did Jack do to earn the branding? (if you don’t know this I suggest you look up the “people aren’t cargo mate” scene) He refused to transport slaves and later freed them, and Beckett had him marked as punishment.

Then, in the first movie, he saves Elizabeth, a woman he didn’t know, from drowning. Right after however, when Norrington sees he has a branded “P”, he’s like “alright, off to jail with you, and then hanging”, no other option crosses his mind. Again, Jack doesn’t know Elizabeth, isn’t indicated to think he is going to be rewarded for helping her, he just sees a drowning person, sees that no one else is going to help, and chooses to save them. That is a pretty selfless/good aligned thing to do, for no other reason that he was the one able to do it, yet the branding in his arm overrides any good action he could ever do, marking him as a criminal for execution and no further thought.

In a way, that’s what Mizora did to Wyll; she forever visibly branded him as someone that has made deals with devils, and that in the world of DnD is a VERY BAD THING. Personally I really like the mod that gives him more devilish features, but at the same time I think there was something clever about choosing to leave him looking more human. He can’t be confused with a tiefling, he doesn’t have the ears, the claws, the tail, all those features that characterize them. He looks kind of uncanny, and that would be like a red flag for anyone in that world. (Beyond the already existing hate for tieflings that I’m not gonna tackle on here because it’s a complicated thing that deserves its own post). And Wyll wants to do good, he wants to help people, to be a positive force in the world so, so badly. This dude got abducted by a nautiloid, got tadpole’d, and the first thing he did right after that was come across the Tiefling refugees and be like “Oh you need help? No worries let me teach you self defense. Oh you being attacked by goblins? Let me blast them real quick”. His way of saying fuck you to all the awful things that have happened to him is being aggressively good and kind. Mizora knows this very well, wants to see him suffer for her amusement, wants to remind him he can't escape her claws, so her choice of punishment was to forever taint his future interactions with mistrust and suspicion. Some people can go real fast from “oh thank God they saved me” to “oh no, are they gonna rob me, are they trying to trick me, are they in cahoots with the ones that attacked me first?” just because of outward appearances. Especially in DnD world. And that deserves its own conversation, but we're focusing on Wyll here.

(Mizora, when I catch you Mizora)

“Well, maybe he shouldn’t have made a deal in the first plac- - “ He was seventeen, alone, preyed upon by Mizora and put in an impossible situation. Please PAY ATTENTION to the story you’re witnesing.

Anyway.

About the tieflings. I know it’s easy to think his words can be derisive towards them, but it’s less about the horns and more about his body being changed against his will. Imagine instead that he got half his face burned, or something that disfigured him. I think his feelings at the moment were closer to that, and yeah they are pretty insensitive words to say to someone with a similar condition (horns or disfiguration), but when feelings are fresh and raw like that it’s easy to say insensitive things. Not saying it was ok for him to say them, but there was no malice in his words. I’ve also seen some people share that they think Mizora wanted to change him more to make him unrecognizable to his original self, the Wyll Ravenguard kid, and I think there is some truth to that too. She wants to make sure that Wyll remembers that he belongs to her, there's no question to that.

(MIZORA, WHEN I CATCH YOU MIZORA)

Whether the Tieflings refugees would feel unsettled by Wyll or not? Yes. In a way, they would. From reasons aside from the ones I explained above, remember that these specific tieflings come from Elturel. If you didn’t pass the History check or don’t remember, Elturel is a city that was literally ripped from the land and dragged to Avernus, First layer of hell (it left a hole on the ground and everything) because their mayor made a deal with the Archdevil Zariel some decades back in the timeline. He sold the souls of all its citizens and the city itself.

This was probably one of the worst times of their lives. Some even got captured and forced to participate in the blood War, like Dammon as a mechanic. And after Elturel got returned to the surface, the tieflings lost their homes because they reminded the other citizens of the literal Hell they’d just gone through, and they kicked them out. And remember, they met and saw Wyll as a human, and then saw him with horns. It’s not unreasonable to think that by looking at him they would be reminded of all the events that led them to the awful situation they’re in. Because of someone that was making deals with devils, just like Wyll. Even if his situation is completely different. And Wyll knows that, that’s why he tells you the tieflings are unsettled by him and chooses to stay away during the party.

It was never just about the horns.

And I know Wyll calls himself a devil but I think it’s because it’s the closest thing he looks as; devils are a whole different race with their own intricacies, although humans can be turned into devils ONCE their souls go to Avernus and they start climbing the power hierarchy there (Mizora and Raphael are cambions/ half-devils btw, which is a different thing,  there are plenty of videos exploring those details more in depth).

Do I think Larian should have made some of this information clearer/easier to access? Maybe? but to be fair, it's a game focused and dedicated to a crowd that was already somewhat familiar with the source material, that blew up waay out of what they originally expected to reach. Hopefully they’ll add some clarifications like they did to other quests. 

Anyway these are my two cents to the conversation, have a nice day, and don't hesitate to add your two cents if you feel like it!

[mamawasatesttube]

So I know you’ve mentioned it before but I just wanted to hear again your thoughts on Tim x Ives

ooohohohooo timives the gently doomed romance of it all ♥

in robin '93 and even briefly in rr09 ives is just always kind of there. he drifts out of tim's life sometimes, but he always drifts back in, later. and he's been tim's civilian best friend for so long, and tim knows so many of his secrets. they click. they don't judge each other. they make each other laugh. if tim's gonna fall for anyone he knows in his civilian life, of course it would be ives. who else has been there, been a constant, the way ives has? of course it's ives. but at the same time there's something so tasty about their contrast - the way tim runs headlong towards danger every time, while ives describes himself as a coward. the way tim feels like he has to protect him.

to me, ives is tim's first m/m relationship. it happens in a manner so cliché they both laugh at it: after taking a gap year or two, to wrangle his depression and his ptsd and his Everything, tim decides to get his ged and maybe try college (lucius tells him he'd make a great engineer at waynetech r&d, but he needs a degree for it, and he figures, okay, what the hell, he's already good at tinkering, how hard can getting a bachelor's degree in engineering be?). and then he remembers the difficult thing about being a vigilante and having a full courseload at the same time and goes AUGH. and ives, a year or two ahead of him in university classes (and majoring in something else, but still there) laughs at him. and offers to tutor him. and tim goes yeah fuck okay fine sure yeah. what the Fuck is a free body diagram. and ives laughs at him some more but also really does help him out. (when he gets really stuck and confused, especially on his second semester of chemistry, he phones up zoanne, but that's neither here nor there.)

so tim and ives have this cute little romance over study dates at cozy cafes, over accidentally running into each other at a queer student association meeting and going "oh!" about it, over movie nights at ives's apartment where they squabble over a bowl of popcorn and tim pretends he didn't sleep through the last half of the two towers, disc 2. and it feels nice, and easy, and simple...

...until it doesn't. because tim shows up to a study date with a black eye that even his best attempts at makeup can't fully hide. tim has to miss dinner, and then their rain check dinner, and only comes to the third attempt half an hour late and limping. tim is tired all the time. and he's always been sleepy all the time, but now ives is wondering. and they're making out one day and ives's hand curls over the back of tim's neck and then he recoils, because tim, what is all this scarring, what happened, holy shit is this why you grew out your hair and keep wearing turtlenecks?!

and tim goes. ah. fuck.

and it's only a matter of time. it has only ever been a matter of time. because ives knows him. but he's been lying to ives the entire time they've known each other. the other shoe has always been going to drop. it was only ever a question of when. never if.

so ives finds him out. and he's shocked, and hurt, and betrayed, but then he's even more distraught to realize that he's not that shocked. it makes sense - why tim's always tired, why tim has always been kind of flaky, why tim has always had weird injuries now and then, why tim is so unbothered in the face of things that terrify ives. but what gets him is that these are things he's thought were always just... tim. because tim has been lying to him the entire time they've known each other.

so they break up, but it's softer than it could've been. because ives gets it, he swears. he gets why tim lied. but this is... a lot, and he needs some time to process all of it, and how he feels about it, and about tim. because it's hard to reconcile his goofy gearhead (ex-)boyfriend with a caped crusader who patrols the city by night, fighting crime and solving mysteries. hard to realize just how much tim has boxed up his own life and taken care to only ever let ives see part of it. he gets it - he's not angry, after the initial outburst - but it's hard, and he needs some time. he needs some space.

and so tim's secrets eat away at one more person he cherishes. it was inevitable. they were doomed from the start. but they made each other happy anyways, for a time.

(the coda, to me: tim and ives reconnect and start working on their friendship again a few months later, and tim promises to try not to lie to him anymore, and in an effort to actually show ives the other half of his life, he introduces him to kon. so we have tim sitting there struggling with feelings and complications of feelings and what it means to be honest and to be seen. meanwhile kon says something about his opinions on star wars and ives goes "BRO i am going to KISS YOU on the MOUTH" and tim goes wait. WHAT?)

[divineandmajesticinone]

KISS X KISS X KISS: Love ii Shower (2023) I Atelier Kiss "Aside from me, do you ask someone else to model for you?"

[sga-owns-my-soul]

anyways i'm thinking about rodney mckay again and how he's literally the great character on tv to ever exist. the complexities. the contradictions. the way his character growth is so incredible but it's not linear. the way he's soooooooooo fuckable. like there's literally nothing about rodney's character that i don't love. he's albertan canadian. he's an asshole. he's the smartest man in two galaxies. he's an absolute moron. he knows more than anyone. he doesn't understand the reasons behind polite greetings. he strives to learn more. he's hates biology/medical sciences. he's a hypochondriac. he's the strongest character in the show. he has tons of health issues and weaknesses. he hates people. he cares more about the people in his city than he does about himself. he's a selfish bastard. he will risk his life over and over again for other people, even if they don't deserve it. he's also so fucking hot have you seen his fucking arms and his HANDS UGH HES LITERALLY THE. CHARACTER. WHY ARE YALL SLEEPING ON HIM HES SO INCREDIBLE!!!!!!!!! the internet does not deserve him and yet we are blessed with him anyways and y'all need to give him the respect he deserves!!!!!!!!!!

[dykedvonte]

Can you talk about trans!Curly a little bit more? I'm curios if you have any headcanons and the like

-💀

It's just such a thing in my mind because it adds a truthful sadness and differing aspect to mouthwashing.

If Curly was trans it adds the horror of the horribly selfish thought he could have easily been in Anya's situation. It could've been him but it wasn't and he so conflicted on the pit it put in his stomach that brings and the shameful relief it wasn't. In this scenario he is friends with Jimmy for a long time still. Jimmy likely knew him pretransition. Maybe he gave Curly weird looks then, maybe they never stopped after, maybe they seemed meaner. They are guys now, bros, both of them are. He doesn't really have to worry what those looks mean anymore, Jimmy just has that face with him sometimes. It's recontextualizing a lot of things for him that he was in denial about or too ashamed to admit. How naive he was being and how he let that get another person hurt.

Specifically with Anya, it's he knows the dread and fear she's feeling. He can understand it because he had to live with it for a good portion of his life, he knows it cause he still does, just in a slightly different way. It makes him think of all the times he's been alone with Jimmy, all the times he's been way more drunk off his ass and not remember the night, Jimmy was always with him the next day. Makes him think of the comments he would laugh off both because that's what guys do but because that part of being a girl says to laugh so Jimmy doesn't do something. It's the selfish realization that he was never safe and he's uncertain now too. Mad at himself for forgeting that feeling, espcially since for a long time he would've been considered the only woman on a crew (with all that implies) for a long time.

He should've taken those blinders off, step back into that position for just a moment and it's so much more painful that Anya likely came to him because he should've gotten it. Those thoughts don't leave his mind after the crash when he's in an even more vulnerable position than she was...

[imrllytootiredforthis]

sub yuta okkotsu agenda 😔

no bc i got THOUGHTS, i got so many thoughts about my babygirl named yuuta okkotsu, you don't even UNDERSTAND how badly i want him

him in the movie-*aggressive eye twitch*, his big sweet innocent puppy eyes-fuck it just *short circuits*

AND THEN afterwards when he's his anxious, tired, emo self (me too fr), like he's still just my cutie patootie and it's a literal CRIME how little sub fics of him there are bc take one look at that baby AND TELL ME that he is a daddy dom in bed-you'd be lying to yourself and me-and we do not tolerate lying in this house

no but fr, he is not domming for his life. a service top-perhaps, he would still cry a lot though and if you were making HIM fuck YOU he would beg for you to just take over, his arms shaking on either side of your head as he tries to make you feel good. because it's not the same like this-he wants you to fuck him, he wants to ride you as your hands grope over his body, he wants to pinned against a wall and fucked hard and rough within an inch of his life.

babyboy just wants to be loved and taken care of by his so

[thekittyokat]

you ever just have a lot, a LOT of feelings all at once about a character and not even remotely enough words or brainpower to FORM the words to describe everything you're feeling. so it feels like you may explode. yeah

[ryllen]

[ But i wish, the '"interesting" him' I am talking to right now, Hold some part of truth of the 'true him'. ]

----

( a bit of thought after seeing their 2 interactions on x & x )

[moonlit-orchid]

These two lines in the movie make me the most mentally unwell.

"I should have been the one to go. You needed your mother more than you needed me."

The amount of layers to this, oh my god. He's blaming himself for being alive. He probably wants to die. He genuinely thinks Adrian needs Emilie more.

And it's been YEARS since Emilie's passed away. Look how tiny Adrian is over there, he only just about comes about the bedpost. Gabriel still looks like he did in the pictures of when Adrian was little. It's been literal years. It could have literally been a full decade ago.

And Gabriel breaks the narrative here. He's supposed to be telling a story, he's supposed to be saying what happened in the past. But at this point, he doesn't say "your mother was taken from us" or anything like that referencing Emilie's passing. The story breaks, he's using a statement. I should have been the one to go. It's completely out of the story, because he isn't saying what he felt then, there's no "I felt like I should have been the one to go". It's just "I should have been."

Because he still thinks this. It's been about a decade, and his opinion, his feelings about this, is still "I should have died". It interrupts his storytelling because of how strongly he feels this way, almost like it's a fact to him.

And then he follows it with "You needed your mother more than you needed me." Again, he says this like it's a fact, like Adrian actually did need his mother more. Because he believes it himself. And this could be because of so many things. It could be because of the way people consider the mother to be the one supposed to care for the children much more than the father, or it could be that Gabriel himself didn't see how much Adrian needed him, or even that Gabriel didn't see himself as useful to Adrian. Especially because he said he should have been the one to die. He's essentially saying he was useless. That he was expendable but Emilie wasn't. He literally is implying he doesn't see any worth in himself regarding being a father.

And then it's not just his grief, it's Adrian's grief that has him desperate to bring Emilie back. He literally doesn't care about himself, he wants his son to be happy and doesn't see himself as able to do that. He loves him to the point of being suicidal and self-sacrificing if it would give Adrian what he need, all while simultaneously not seeing himself as what Adrian needs because he doesn't think he has that much worth regarding him.

[rexonalapis]

it is very telling that average genshin players cannot comprehend seeing an actual mature, qualified leader that is actually good at taking her job seriously after meeting archons who either is still childish, clowning whimsically, or straight up incompetent.

[no-nightingales-iwanttodie]

I can't believe Felix spent so long as my bias just for bangchan to bias wreck him so hard, and now that I've finally accepted bangchan as my bias, Hyunjin is coming out of nowhere and starting to bias wreck😭 HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO CHOOSE THEY'RE ALL AMAZING

[raeyhem]

fuck dude i love god troubles me so much because all the characters are fucking losers. none of them are cool. none. protagonist, chosen one, child of a god and monster? she's literally a one in a million failure. cringefail girloser. she's poor, she's lazy, she's an icon. threw a guy into the stratosphere twice and then cried in a haunted house. the pretty, powerful looking immortal? moron. malewife. pathetic with his cunty little outfit. never had a full thought in his life. he's a phone btw. the aloof, standoffish "cool guy", strongest in the Monster realm? he only cares about video games and cat food (he's a cat). idiot. prefers to remain as a cat 90% of the time so he doesn't have to do things. can't cook. they're all insane. nearly defeated by 3 bugs and a rat. whatever