#good-ish opinions

[chocogigi]

I have so many SO MANY thoughts, I don't know how and where to begin. I'll have to re-read the book at least twice: one for my Italian clummy brain and one to catch the hundreds of things I missed. I wanted to do a hot take, I didn't take notes while reading (I winged it), BUT I kind of needed a tiny bit time to """process""".

Anyway, SPOILERS under the cut part 1 of The Good and the BAD (part 2) in my humble opinion 🌩⚡️🌩⚡️

THE GOOD (ish)

1. Ridoc was the MVP of Onyx Storm. I always loved him but in this he SMASHED IT. I loved his humor, sense of loyalty toward Violet, the QUEST SQUAD thing made me cackle, the ride or die thing when he discovered Xaden's little venin secret. The jokes, the comments, HIS POWER, everything!!!

2. Sawyer's journey and his rehab, although I hoped we could get more. He obviously disappears at a certain point and the moment he reappers he has a prosthetic. I loved the sense of guilt toward Sliseag and the scene with Violet, it felt very real. But then it also goes from 1 to 100 and the moment he's back on his dragon it's: "well look at that, everything's back to normal, let's go slaying some venin!!". Kudos to Jesinia, I love them your honor!! 🥹

3. Ridoc and Sawyer's relationship!! My boys!! 🥰🥰

4. We didn't get much Rhiannon - Violet BUT what we got satisfied me. And I'll tell you when the book switched to Rhiannon pov, I legit SCREAMED.

The "Let us be menaces" being Feirge's. I think we'll get more and more povs in the next two books. It makes sense if the battles and the fights will be as fragmented as the one in Draithus. She is exactly EXACTLY how I imagined. Fierce, loyal and a great leader, who got the meaning of following orders no matter how much we care for others.

5. I got Quinn's death right on my OS bingo. It made sense to me as a "secondary" character, but IT SHATTERED ME, because of Imogen. Imogen's chapter was by far my favorite and I love, LOVE, her. She's so much sharper than I thought and I appreciate it. The "only person I truly love on this battlefield" quote makes sense: Quinn is just her friend and doesn't expect nothing out of her. She's not a marked one, not her signet and not her abilities, just someone to love and care for. I cried during her death.

6. FEARSOME FOURSOME!!! 🥹💗 Second squad lore was unmatched and I appreciate how the squad expanded to the gryphon fliers.

7. DAIN AETOS IS MY SECOND HUSBAND 💍 and I will die on this hill because I proudly wear the apologists club badge and he's in it deep and I love him, love him, love him!!! 💗💗💗

8. Amy gave us Dain/Sloane before it was canon and I sailed months ago. But their bits in the book made me scream. SHE GAVE HIM THE MIDDLE FINGER (she hates that she'll love him).

"Someone like you shouldn't have this much power" "Good thing I do"

and

"You're not venin. You're the artery power chooses to flow through. You're life".

YES.

Slone needed to realize her power is a good thing. I liked how it balanced out taking one Sorrengail's life away and giving another Sorrengail (Mira 😭) a new one. I liked it was Dain delivering that note to her.

9. I liked Cat's arc and truly felt sorry when Trager died. Also the "thank you" line was harsh and raw and I liked it.

10. Aaric Graycastle I love you too. You can be my third husband 💍.

After Garrick's big revelation, I knew we would get some big ass signet for him. I'm not a fan of how the precognition thing got on the page, but I'm glad it's his signet.

11. Xaden's fully turning venin chapter was beautiful to me. And it made sense.

"In my final act of resistance, I become the very thing I despise".

It broke me. There's chapters I liked Xaden so much and the fact that the loss of control is not over power per se, but over the ones he loves is well played. In the end he turns for the only two things that could descend him into madness even normally: Violet and Sgaeyl. I felt so sorry for Sgaeyl, it was so bitter sweet that ending and the fact she "accepted" what he did to save her life.

12. Violet my baby, I love you. She grew so much from the first book and she was shrewd to bits in some chapters it left me speechless (hello, are we menacing kids now? yes, we are apparently). She's very Lilith in some parts, very "ask me again when you're a mother what you'll do" (gods, spare us from the pregnancy trope in book 4 please), but there's obviously nothing she wouldn't do for the people she loves. AND IT SHOWS.

13. WELL, we got a marriage cliffhanger!! (more on the bad part on this), but the foreshadow was there throughout all the book. "duchess", "consort", "the one who stands at my side"...eeeeeh our girl really realized she had a massive ring on her finger and went "WELL AWWWW 🥰🥰💍💅" and then "oh shit I do not remember any of it". LOL

14. The world Riorgail made it to the page, I'm not okay. Screamed, cried, swooned. Their relationship in this: 1000000/10

15. The Duke of Angst™️ LOL

16. Bodhi my boy, I'm so happy you're alive (ish). Are you the brother? Speak to the mic, come forward, let us know. I'm happy I got you wrong on the bingo!!

17. Tbh, I'm still settled on the Garrick or Ridoc theory. Thought of Brennan but Xaden wouldn't leave him alive to come back to Riorson House (maybe...)

18. DRAKE/MIRA (and Broccoli). They're practically a family already, they just need like a farm to raise their cat and house their dragon and gryphon. I wanted to see more of Drake, though. But I'm happy he's exactly like everyone thought.

19. The Mira/Drake encounter deserves a point on its own, sorry.

20. For the same reason Professor Riorson, deserves one too. Bye.

[moongothic]

Madoka is the promise you won't turn from a child, full of hopes and dreams and the wish to save the world, into a bitter adult who just wants to hurt others and ruin people's lives

Madoka promised to be there for you to remind you of the person you wanted to be and to stop you from becoming what you sought to destroy

Madoka made that promise and became the very embodiment of it

[starlitdumbass]

Old SSJ4 F. Zamasu design thing I never finished + Vegito

[mathematical-apprentice]

nobody in PXG is normal lol

[blurredblu]

Ooooh sm else occurred to me regarding sonic's characterisation in the games vs prime

In game/X, his actions speak louder than words. Even if he doesn't stick around for stretches of a time, he'll always be there and do what you need to save the day

In Prime, it's the opposite - he's so much more expressive about his feelings but doesn't pay close attention or back it up with his actions. And that's where all his room for growth begins

[autumnoakes]

y'know i kinda DO wonder if we're going to be able to bring those trapped in the house back to the crossroads eventually. it would be EXTREMELY neat if we could but at the same time there's hm. a not insignificant amount of bad blood between some of the people trapped in the house and some of the people in the crossroads lmao

[sunflowersandscreams]

actually if you start your book review by listing the POC/queer/disabled/etc representation i'm not reading the review. that is a bad way to portray a book and really tells me nothing.

[sweetgaleria]

god it makes my DAY whenever i see a video or a reel about miraculous and it's made by someone that actually likes the show and the characters. like, it's an INSTANT happiness boost i wish i was kidding

[cheriafreya]

Penacony's 2.0-2.2 patches: genuinely HSR's peak, full of unforgettable moments. I still get chills watching the cutscenes and some of them still make me cry like the first day.

Penacony's 2.3, 2.6 and 2.7 patches:

[verflares]

i Wish i had some degree of sewing/plushmaking powers because honestly that might be the only thing between me and diying my own light dragon plushie. if i can be so real

[cloudysfluffs]

Don’t listen to haters, everything ever spread about Vivzie was disproven. Your art is cute.

LMAOOOOOOOO NO IT WASNT????????!!??!?!?

[jichanxo]

re: senseific, i don't remember if you've talked about it, but i was a little bit surprised that it was sawa who suggested kitakata as an advisor for amasawa. yeah it's been 13 years, and in the game their relationship is not particularly hostile, but i still wait from her the "fuck that guy" attitude towards him xD speaking of (and this, of course it doubtly would be The Theme, but will you talk about their relationship or just mention that stuff happened and they got over it? or not at all?

you all know the drill ↓

Considering the outcome of the Kusumoto situation in sensei au, I don’t think her feelings towards him would be so negative. He mishandled the situation at first, sure, but he realised it was serious, and I think he did everything he could to make things right. Of course, effort alone isn’t enough to make up for all the awful things that already happened because of him, but it must count for something, right? Kitakata was willing to admit he was wrong, presumably apologised, took responsibility, put in the work. I think Sawa sees that. That he’s flawed but ultimately sincere and trying.

Her impression of Kitakata isn’t wholly positive – she’s levelheaded and sees his flaws very clearly, especially now as his colleague (he’s prone to mess and disorganisation, and I see him as being kind of lazy and inconsiderate at times in his day to day). He perhaps doesn’t deserve her respect, and Sawa is definitely the better teacher, but I think her presence helps hold Kitakata to account. She expects quite a bit of him, and Kitakata knows this, wants to be the person that she expects him to be. Kitakata’s wish to change and do better is sincere, but I think he might slip back into old habits if he wasn’t diligent, and Sawa’s presence helps.

She certainly expects Kitakata to at least hear a student out when they go to speak to him, and she’s known him long enough to notice him with a mystery novel or two. Why not ask him to help the mrc? ...well, I dunno. I’m not married to the idea. But that’s the train of thought.

I don’t know how in depth I’ll go with those two, mostly because I’m approaching the Sawa-Kitakata relationship from the angle of Yagami seeing that there’s something going on there, but not knowing exactly what. So for the most part, it’s not going to be something that’s spoken about outright. But their relationship is interesting and I think it speaks especially to Kitakata’s personal motivations and shortcomings in a way that can’t be done any other way.

[thatonedemonnamedlucifer]

honestly instagram is a terrible place to go if you're an mlp fan, especially if you like G5. literally half the g5 posts i see (fanart, simple clips, etc) are full of people ranting about how much g5 sucks or how they miss g4 in the comments. like bitch (gender neutral), you have every right to dislike g5 but how about you make your own post about it instead of ruining the fun for others.

[cyarsk52-20]

this is nice and all but mind you last week he was defending deshaun watson bc ppl booed him for being a serial rap*st. you don’t care about women.

[match-your-steps]

just read a review of the lego movie from 2014 and it is genuinely a horrible piece of literature and through perusing the comments underneath the review, I have gained an intense dislike of the reviewer. it's not even that I liked the lego movie and he didn't it's just that a lot of the stuff he says is factually incorrect, really stupid-sounding, or he doesn't provide any real reason, and in the comments, he reacts to even the friendliest and politest constructive criticism as if it's a personal attack on him.

[hassianlovebot]

i've seen some people talk about einar's romance dialogue and how it feels offputting and rude to him but i'm gonna be honest,,, i never really saw it that way?

like i do agree that the player's dialogue options Suck compared to the other romances. something about it just feels really childish and definitely not as,,, "serious" or even committed as the other romance dialogue options. that being said, it never felt patronizing toward him.

to me, it feels like the player is just. being human. while einar is being galdur. the player doesn't get mad at him for not understanding certain jokes or not showing affection in the same way. and einar doesn't get uncomfortable with the player being human, making human jokes, or showing human affection. they're just Being Human and sharing their humanness with einar. which einar, while not always understanding of it, is completely used to and Does understand and enjoy it later on in the 3-4 levels. not that he didn't enjoy it before, but once you get closer to him, he Does understand more of the jokes and even joins in on certain ones (like the catch one!).

idk man it just always felt like the player and einar are just sharing their perspectives, personalities, and culture with each other. and of course there is the chocolate thing where he says he doesn't need it and the player has to learn what he actually wants from the relationship (ie spending time together). and there are still jokes that he ends up taking seriously, which yknow, that's kind of what i meant when i said the player's options often feel very childish compared to other ones. but it just never came off as patronizing to me, especially since einar repeatedly says that he enjoys spending time with the player and engaging in their "togetherness".

like to me it always felt like he enjoys learning about new things, even if he doesn't want to participate. like at the maji market when he says that while he doesn't understand the hotpot game, watching it fills him with "oneness". he enjoys learning about human and majiri culture and seeing them just be themselves! none of his dialogue implies that he's uncomfortable with the way the player shows affection (there Is something to be said about the dialogue options only ever showing one form of it,,, but tbf they can't put in 50+ options to cover the minutia of human brains lol)

idk i want to be clear im not shitting on anyone else's opinion on this!!! there's room for all perspectives here. i just wanted to share! i've seen SO many people say that romancing einar feels patronizing and like. i've just never seen it that way ! and it always confuses me when i see it akjhgd tbf i think some people are also neurodivergent (same lol) and don't appreciate the dialogue options that einar doesn't understand because in real life it Does feel patronizing when someone does it on purpose even knowing you won't get it. but for me, einar being galdur and not a neurodivergent human/majiri is an important distinction. he shows multiple times that he enjoys learning about human cultures and perspectives, that he enjoys talking to the player even when they don't understand each other, and that he's capable of understanding the player's jokes and sarcasm once explained to him. he Likes that they're different !

einar seems to enjoy the player acting "human" with him because he gets to learn about them! and he wouldn't want them stifle their true personality just to please him! einar is alllll about being true to yourself, your beliefs, your oneness, etc. he wants the player to understand him and his affection, but he also wants to understand the player's personality and affection. he wants them to share each other's "quirks". and don't get me wrong, i do wish there was more we could do to share in his way of affection (especially if his way is our way,,, like i'm Not flirty or jokey like that irl at all and i'd love to have more options where it really is just "hi i enjoy parallel playing with you :)))" lol) and that the dialogue options were less jokey or at least more affectionate/serious but idk,,, i think for me, i've just always seen einar as someone who wants to know and appreciate everything about the player, even the things he doesn't Immediately understand. he wants the player to explain things and share their culture with him SO bad