#have removed her from it. help

[icarianarts]

Wanted to redraw a gay pulp novel’s cover as devilman stuff because what else am I to do. Palette was colorpicked from various ova screenshots I just had on hand and I kept the book’s bright red background w/ bold yellow lettering because it was too perfectly vintage to deviate away from…

[daisybell-on-a-carousel]

"Jason was the happy robin" this, "jason was the angry robin" that. Let's all be fully honest here Jason was the lonely robin

[cometblaster2070]

oh boy im having thoughts about miquella and malenia again!!!

i don't know if it was intentional or not but like yk seeing malenia's entire character and seeing how the most important thing to her (save for her brother) is her dignity and her pride and her sense of self. after a lifetime of fighting the scarlet rot malenia is someone who still resists it every day no matter how strong it gets because she is someone who will fight to the bitter end to make sure it doesn't overtake her, to make sure that she's still just her and not the vessel for the rot.

(of course, the exception to this is when she bloomed in aeonia and in her fight with us, but I'll call those last-ditch attempts arising out of desperation so)

you get it malenia suffers every day of her life and the rot threatens to consume her but she refuses to let it win and instead completely rejects it and scorns it; she won't let it take away what makes her her.

and contrast it with the dlc where we see her brother miquella do exactly the opposite of what she does. because of his crosses, we see how much of himself miquella has lost how he constantly sheds pieces of himself in his effort to become a god to the point where he even discards his love, his other half st. trina.

he did all this to fulfill his goals, to succeed in what he thought was right; what he thought was a necessary sacrifice that would only bring him closer to his goals of a kind and compassionate world. only the problem is it ended up making him into something he was not; miquella the kind was certainly not like miquella the unalloyed.

i am aware that miquella even in the base game was not the wow sunshine jesusesque figure that did no wrong and was purehearted through and through. even then there were hints to a more complex character, but I think the difference between miquella the kind and miquella the unalloyed is that the miquella of before was someone who cared so so deeply on such a personal level; he was someone who put his heart and soul into helping each and everyone whether it be by crafting prosthetics or needles for his sister to ward away the rot and the meddling of outer gods or whether it was to try to give his brother godwyn a proper death; he was someone who cared very very deeply and in a very personal manner. but afterwards, I think in his quest for godhood miquella became someone very distant, very impersonal in the way a benevolent god who is looking out for everyone and who is "doing the right thing no matter what because ik better and I have the power to fix things" is. he is very removed from that which he once was; he abandoned himself and subsequently abandoned the very ideals he was fighting for.

miquella the kind still wants a world filled with peace and compassion but now, he is a god, now he is someone willing to take the most drastic of measures because now he is no longer the boy that was miquella the unalloyed that believed in an age of compassion with love present. you cannot have compassion without having love which, of course, miquella the kind has abandoned.

i don't know there's just something interesting about these siblings where one has continuously resisted the urge of an outer god who is trying to force her into being something she does not want to be and then there is the one who willingly rips away that which makes him him because he thinks that this will help him become someone he should be; it will help him become the god that will fix this broken world.

[moongothic]

(Frankenstein'd two asks together for the sake of previty)

I've been pretty torn between answering this ask and just doing a deep dive re-analysis post about Marineford as a whole (from Crocodile's perspective) because I feel like rereading it now as a Crocodad Truther, I could probably make a whole lot of new observations and/or read into things differently than I did last time I read it (when I was rereading for the purpose of studying the viability of Crocodad) Like there's so much to say about the whole arc and I'd include this line of thought in there anyways... But also, do I really feel like writing a giant essay like that........

I am going to start this by refering to this mini-essay I wrote like a month ago, about how Crocodile seems to have this attitude of "no crying over spilt milk". What's happened has happened, what's done is done, it's your own fault things turned out the way they did, there's no undoing any of it and you just have to continue on. And I do think that attitude would be key here to understanding Crocodile's actions in Marineford re:Crocodad

(Sidenote because this is not relevant to the rest of the post, but the reason this is about Crocodad and not CrocoUncle etc is because if Crocodile was only loosely related to Luffy it would not have the same kind of impact emotionally (for Crocodile; like there is a difference between a nephew and a son). Additionally a part of Crocodad is that it ties into Crocodile's connection with Ivankov in a really important way. If Crocodile was only loosely related to Luffy, him also being trans would kind of be like a random sidenote without being relevant to the two being family, but suddenly if Crocodile is Luffy's other biological parent, him being trans matters a lot more. Also if he's not Luffy's other dad then we'd be still stuck asking who the fuck birthed Luffy to begin with)

While Sengoku's announcement here would make for a horrific revelation to Crocodile in this situation (a revelation we never see his immidiate reaction to, which continues to be deeply sus), what would it change, really?

The little idiot child who Crocodile had attempted to murder multiple times was his own son. Sure, he might've insantly lost whatever grudge he might've held against Luffy, then what? That feeling would be one-sided, because at this point in the story Luffy hated Crocodile's guts and he knew that too. Luffy has no idea about them being related, and even if Crocodile literally walked up the kid right that second and told him the truth, what would it change? He'd still be the man who nearly nuked a million people off the face of the earth, took over a country and killed Luffy and his friends while laughing about it. Being Luffy's other dad wouldn't make him any less of a horrible asshole (if anything it might make it slightly worse 'cause you get to add shit like "child abandonment" onto his list of crimes).

Luffy came to Marineford to save Ace. Crocodile came to Marineford to kill Whitebeard. He had no reason to interfere with Luffy's quest, and with the help Luffy already was recieving from the prison escapees, the Newkama and the Whitebeard Pirates, what would Crocodile's assistance add to the mix? Would Luffy even welcome him in helping save his brother?

Luffy had his own life, a life Crocodile had not been a part of. He had no right to try to insert himself into it at this point, after all he had done to Luffy. There's no crying over spilled milk. What's done is done, you just have to move on. He should just focus on what he came to do; get his revenge and take Whitebeard's head, as planned.

Deep breaths

...Only to realize that Whitebeard is a dying old man and not worth even killing anymore, because he's not the same Primebeard whom once beat Crocodile and crushed all his dreams. Defeating Whitebeard would not give him the catharsis he came for.

And at that point, the fuck was Crocodile going to do? The revenge he wants isn't there anymore 'cause it went bad a few decades ago. And between the raging war and Doflamingo on his ass it's not like he could just sneak out without anybody noticing. He doesn't have allies (aside from Daz under him) to worry about. He only has his hatred to the World Government.

At that point, he might as well be a nuisance to the Government and assist Luffy. Even if the help wasn't welcomed, even if Luffy hated him and regardless if he knew the truth or not, helping Luffy right then and there would still be better than letting the Government have their way and kill his son right in front of him

[watcherintheweyr]

desperately need people to understand that alicent is a victim but she’s also an abuser and a perpetrator

that she actively makes choices to harm other women because of jealousy and envy and the greed deep in her bones because submitting to suffering didn’t get her what those women fight to grasp for themselves.

she is absolutely a victim, in show.

that doesn’t change that she abused rhaenyra and her children, her own son, most likely helaena given how she flinches every time her mother touches her, and is actively weaponizing the patriarchy of westeros against other women- rhaenyra primarily, but also mysaria and dyana.

she isn’t the moral, righteous force of good that even she thinks she is, she’s a wounded woman directing all of the rot, pain, and fury inside her at the wrong people and forces.

[proudfreakmetarusonikku]

hate that sonic free riders is Like That bc maybe if it was ACTUALLY PLAYABLE people would stop making such terrible metal sonic takes like she straight up still has the exact same personality and still has free will even if she can’t outright lock her dad in a room and take over anymore she disguised herself to try and beat sonic entirely on her own volition. she’s still a dramatic bitch too bc like, why would eggman Not want his magnum opus to act like him.

[synthaphone]

colored these old sketches of PMD au Ben. He's a Ditto who works as a bodyguard/intimidation for his Perrserker father Patton's extortion racket. He's very good at shapeshifting except for three caveats:

he always has the eyebrow dots + 2 askew hair tufts (they're there when he's a Meowth, just behind the coin).

laughing makes him lose his focus- there's not much that can make him laugh though, so that weakness is pretty hard to exploit

the only move he can use is Struggle, which is his fatal flaw + the thing he's actually insecure about- it severely limits his ability to perform as a successful attack dog

[kabutoden]

scribbles of theodochia in a pink pony outfit and scorpi with his godtier, lusus and weapon (knight of hope, six-eyed crow+buster sword)(designed by xonn)

[shalomniscient]

natlan 5.1 was batshit insane but i won't deny cookery when i see it. last 1/3 of the archon quest is just brilliantly done in my opinion, from writing to level design to soundtrack. just genuine excellence

[fantasticgothicpeachsludge]

Help! I’ve fallen for a rarepair from a show that ended 6 years 1 month and 7 days ago!

And by rarepair I mean there is one singular fic about them where they’re not a side ship or in a collection of smut drabbles

[butterflydm]

"You lost someone important. Guilt's part of that."

*goes off and stares into the sea for a thousand years*

I do kinda feel as if I bought two games in one, because Veilguard is such a different experience in the second playthrough (this is not a complaint).

Grief. Regret. An ocean of it. And how to move past it. How important it is to be able to move past it and not let yourself be trapped by all your pain.

[endgame spoilers below]

Varric "goes to sleep" after your first big talk with him and then you can't talk to him again until after you've meditated and reached Solas (who is never far away, though you don't realize it).

It is amazing how Solas is able to criticize himself so strongly (via the memory of Varric) and then keep on doing everything that he's doing. He truly is the ultimate master of the sunk-cost fallacy.

Wisdom twisted into Pride. It is so painful to think that the thing that made Solas so furious and heartsick in his personal quest in DAI -- watching a spirit of Wisdom get twisted into Pride because it was brought into the mortal world to be a weapon -- is exactly what Mythal asked of him. And the anger that he shows towards those mortal mages (who he can and will kill unless you stop him) is thus displaced anger that he doesn't feel like he's allowed to feel towards Mythal.

So... what's up with the Rings of Power tag? It's about Solas, of course.

You meet a guy who is a lone wanderer. A vagabond, who claims no particular importance but somehow seems to understand the powers that are key to the world's salvation. He helps you out for a while. He's pretty arrogant - prideful, you might say.

You find out that he's essentially a demigod who has been lying to everyone for... weeks, months, idk. And that he actually is the person who helped break the world and make it what it currently is today... and he wants to fix the world. Except... well, except that fixing the world involves a whole bunch of people dying and basically destroying the world as it currently exists in order to create the 'better' world that exists in his imagination/memory.

His intentions may be good but every time he goes forward with his plans, it destroys so much and hurts so many people. His methods suck and his imagined perfect world can never exist. And he lies, over and over and over. He betrays you, over and over.

God of lies.

The Great Deceiver.

I've only finished one playthrough of Dragon Age: The Veilguard so far. And, in it, I gave Solas a good ending. The happiest ending that he probably could get. In which he doesn't get any of the things that he was trying to get during the game, but he does get a chance to atone for the many, many people that he's hurt and what he's destroyed. He gets shown a different path and is convinced to take it. He has someone who loves him enough to walk that path with him. "Where I'm going is terrible," he tells his love. "It won't be terrible if you're with me," she tells him.

Solas makes the choice that (Second Age/Rings of Power) Sauron couldn't make -- he chooses to stop trying to break the world in order to fix it. To atone by doing what the people of the world would want from him, rather than forcing his own vision on them. He stops. That's what Sauron can't bring himself to do. He can't stop trying to fix the world.

So finishing up Veilguard after watching Rings of Power let me play out a little power fantasy of: what if you could get him to stop? What if you could get him to see that his attempts to 'fix' the world are only making things worse? What would that look like?

Solas is able to admit -- after a lot of work by the protagonist to get him there -- that the world doesn't need him to fix it. By contrast, Sauron is going to double-down on his attempts to 'heal' Middle-Earth.

But it's interesting to get a chance to create a situation where a character who does have quite a bit in common with Sauron is able to have a different kind of ending.

As is tradition when I play RPGs like this, my first playthrough is for discovering a character and letting myself be fully led by the story, and now my second playthrough is to poke at all the choices and the seams of the story to figure out what I like best. And then I usually do a version of my first character again but 'perfected' in taking the alternative choices that I liked better than my first time through. So this second run is going to be for going through all the rest of the options and romances to see if I like them better than what my heart instinctively led me towards (Lucanis).

So this is my game plan for my second run:

Flirt with everyone. Make sure I do all Treviso quests before I go to get Davrin. Choose to save Minrathous (this is why I made my second Rook a Shadow Dragon -- Treviso seems so vulnerable to me, so I really have to stack the deck to get my Rook to choose to go to Minrathous). Sadly mourn that I cannot romance my Lucanis in this runthrough (my second Rook recently did the quest to acquire him and I found myself instantly enchanted all over again by his introduction. Thank goodness saving Minrathous takes him off the table; I don't see how else I could resist him).

Keep flirting until I get to the 'commitment quest' for each of the characters, and play through everything else until that's about all I have left. Then do separate saves for each romance. So six separate 'endgame runs' for this second Rook, allowing me to try out a variety of endgame scenarios.

Then, armed with lots of information, I plan to run as a dwarven Rook for my third runthrough, and do a run-through that uses my favorite choices now that I know how they shake out, and take a new approach with Solas. Probably a rogue. I've tried out the gameplay for all three classes, and rogue was my favorite (this is not a shock. Rogue has been my favorite in literally every DA game).

And now a collection of images I like to call:

They assumed Rook knew Varric was dead when these conversations happened.

Looking forward to what other conversations may happen where Rook is having an entirely different conversation than the other characters are having.

A collection of images I like to call:

Foreshadowing

A collection of images I like to call:

Ouch ouch ouch

One particularly excellent choice that the game made, imo, is that only Neve and Harding knew Varric already (of the companions). The rest of the team is assembled by Rook, and most of the team does not know Varric and doesn't even realize that there's a hole in the team, because Rook is already filling the position that she believes that Varric is meant to have. She is Varric's hand-picked second-in-command, and he trusted her to be able to handle this job. He chose someone with that thought in mind.

He knew the risks, and planned accordingly. He knew there was a chance (an excellent chance) that Solas was not going to listen to him. He had to try anyway, but he knows -- he says in the beginning -- that if it comes down to a fight, they will not be able to defeat Solas. He knows that if he can't talk Solas down, then he's probably going to die. And he goes in there anyway, because Solas is his friend.

He made a choice. Several choices. He chose to talk to Solas, knowing that it might lead to his death. And he chose Rook as his second, believing that Rook could save the day if Varric failed.

That's how Varric saved the world -- by finding the right person to finish the job.

[cerubean]

meet the mancusos (in order from left to right)

Silvia Mancuso (socially awkward, loyal, peaceful) --- grew up in tartosa as an only child with her mother (vita) and father. mysteriously disappeared 15 years ago.

Dom Mancuso (loner, cat lover, slob) --- born and raised in tartosa, but lives in san myshuno working as a salaryperson; loves his two children (nico and priscilla), but does not visit tartosa often after losing his wife.

Vita Azzarà (gloomy, cat lover, creative) ---

Priscilla Mancuso (creative, foodie, generous) --- joy of life challenge founder; dreams of owning her own bakery in tartosa

Nicolaò "Nico" Mancuso (music lover, freegan, goofball) --- engaged to mila and they have a daughter named after his mother, silvie. he's often found around tartosa busking for tips with his guitar

Mila Banuelos (book lover, adventerous, family-oriented): in university studying history and archaeology

[edwardseymour]

all this personal griping @ jane and her family for not interceding on behalf of anne/the five men…

well, one certainly has to wonder what the boleyn faction would have done if all the murmurings bore fruit and catherine (and potentially mary) were murdered/executed.

[emotionally-charged-arson]

Transitus Comic Studies

These were meant to be colored but alas. Faulty art supplies. Still like these sketches though! They’re lifted from the OG comic book. The idea was to only use direct poses and scenes from the source material and try to infuse some more productive character design into them.

Focus on status of a given character (and changes in it) and some stronger air of historical reference, kept as far away from my own personal head canons of the characters and their backstories as possible.

Really had fun with these. Great figure practice ✏️

[schizowitchic]

also like i partially found out i might be intersex because i was looking at trans stuff and there was like "(however many) months on t and finally seeing some bottom growth" and like pictures of t-dicks and i was like.... um.... that's kind of just what my clit looks like anyways. so i was like "hey google give me a quick rundown on this" and learned what clitoromegaly was and then i was like. hm. intersex resources. and it's like a sign? symptom? side-effect? of certain intersex conditions

[thefirstknife]

Apparently there was a roundtable with a senior narrative head at bungie about destiny

where he stated "don't expect to be allies with the hive. or even Savathun"

which to me seems like a weird choice to say right after deeps ending?

That's interesting. Honestly, valid comment to me. Here's the link to the article itself! The dev that made the comments is Robert Brookes. One extra quote that isn't in the tweet (goes in between the two in the tweet):

“It’s gonna be really hard to walk that back from anyone’s perspective. Even if that ever became a possibility, there’s a lot of ground to cover to make amends for that.”

We often forget about that, because obviously everyone deserves a second chance, especially in a situation where the Hive were literally manipulated into becoming what they did, but at the end of the day, their gruesome conquests that wiped out thousands of civilisations is not something that everyone can or has to forgive.

People are really eager to forgive Savathun, completely, which was always weird to me in a fandom that has gone ballistic over infinitely smaller crimes. And I get it, Savathun is an incredibly compelling character, fantastically written, absolute banger of VA work. She's such a crucial element in the whole setting of Destiny and is fascinating to read about her. 100% one of the best characters in the entire franchise, intriguing and complex beyond pretty much anyone else.

But the characters within the story itself can't view her in this way or it would be immersion breaking. To them, Savathun isn't a character that's well written, she's a monster who is responsible for some of the most horrific things across time and space. I can definitely see any alliance with her to be temporary, out of necessity and not exactly on good terms. I would love for us to eventually get together with the Hive and join forces against those that are responsible for their course in life, but I think it's definitely something that, within the universe in-character, is not something entirely realistic and would be difficult to justify.

Definitely an odd thing to say now though. Maybe it's telling us to temper our expectations next season? We need Savathun's knowledge, but I don't see us being besties with her in any capacity. I'm not sure what people expect from a season where we rez Savathun; there's probably a lot of people who expect a Caiatl situation.

Realistically, it might be an uneasy cooperation that will be very limited and possibly exploited by Savathun to get out at the end. Right now she's dead and she can't do anything and for as long as we keep her, we're safe. But now that we need her... We have no choice. We have to get her out and once she's out, she will not be bound by anything to obey us. It's a very risky move, one that we're looking at out of desperation, and the risks were nicely laid out by Saladin, Saint and Zavala in their conversation. That bit is definitely priming us to expect some heavy resistance to help from Savathun from various characters and this comment might be as well.

I can't wait for the next season's story though! Savathun talking to us again, in any capacity, is something I've been waiting for eagerly since the end of WQ. I don't doubt for a second that the conversations she'll have will be full of some heavy stuff and that she will not play nice with us and that she (and Immaru) will make most of the situation where we're desperate for her help. She will probably also genuinely want to get her revenge to the Witness, but not necessarily as our sidekick. I think that continuing with the animosity between her and us adds an extra layer of depth to the whole story with her and the Hive.