#he's justifiably angry but he's viewing them in the worst possible sense and it's not true

[heretherebedork]

The worst is Dohan wasn't just afraid of coming out, he had a very realistic fear of being outed by his evil sister which is a million times more violent and traumatizing than deciding on his own to come out. And Dohan's fear of being out is 100% justified by the narrative, yet somehow the writers still treated it like a character flaw. He started the show being sent pictures basically threatening to out him, he is from a very homophobic society/country, he has siblings who hate him and Jihan and want to ruin their lives, his Grandfather has been trying to marry him off for years, we find out the Grandfather wanted him to stay in the closet, and he was suddenly forced into the public view without much warning and really without his consent at the beginning of the show because his Grandfather decided Dohan needed to take over the company. Dohan had literally every piece of control stripped away from him throughout the entire show. He was consistently threatened and pressured and he knows he's at risk. OF COURSE he tried desperately to hold on to the marriage plans?? And again Jihan doesn't take a single second to think about how Dohan must feel or what he's going through. No, instead Jihan and the writers try to convince us that having a secret, even if that secret could put you in actual danger, is the most selfish thing you can do.

And on another note, I think you've discussed this before but the people saying Jihan and Ahjeong had no reason to suspect they would be followed on all their public romancing must've been watching another show than I was. It was literally established that both Ahjeong and Jihan knew reporters were looking for Ahjeong, they even found her house!!! If I remember right Jihan knows Dohan was being followed because Dohan mentioned pictures of him in New York. Jihan literally sent a photographer after Dohan in the first episode. Ahjeong got recognized by a famous actress who hates her when her and Jihan were together. They were later chased by a reporter and had to go on a whole car chase! AND Jihan knows his siblings are angry schemers. And yet neither of these people stopped for one second to think that there's some possibility they could be followed or recognized? That the siblings would send someone? That the actress could spread rumors? And somehow people think I should go "well their faces haven't been plastered on the 9 o'clock news yet so obviously they won't think this could happen!" ??? They even kept having public meet ups AFTER knowing they were photographed!!! The writing on this show is genuinely just bad. There's really no other way to put it. I've seen more coherent writing and characterization in BLs that got about $15 and a dream to make them. What a let down.

Yeah.

The fact that the show starts with someone threatening to out Do Han seems to be mostly forgotten by the narrative and completely ignored by the narrative in terms of emotional connections and emotional reasons for narrative choices.

Because the show had no idea what to do.

I really want to be clear that this show was not good.

Yeah, Ah Jeong and Ji Han made like no sense. Ah Jeong was stalked by reporters, Ji Han had hired reporters before and knew his half-siblings were looking for ways to take Do Han out of the inheritance line up so like... it's nonsense to think that they had no reason to believe they might be followed. None! Of course they were followed.

Ugh.

It's over!

Let's start daydreaming about a Thai remake.

This remake will add in a romance for Do Han, make Ah Jeong a better friend and focus on their friendship and her understanding of why Do Han doesn't want to come out, give Ji Han an actual redemption arc including a lot more sympathy for Do Han not wanting to come out and for the fake relationship and just generally be much more friendly to the whole storyline and make us very happy.

Let me dream, okay?!

[seasononesam]

thoughts on sam's relationship with john. i hold your opinion very high like i need to know what you think ab sam and john. s1 sam compared to lebanon sam crying when john came back to life. THOUGHTS

SORRY I know you sent this a couple of days ago and I'm just replying now I am the worst at responding to things but anyway here we go...

omg that's very kind of you to say! I really don't know where to start, this show is so expansive, especially when you start getting into the lore (tm) of john's journal and the comics and tie in novels so I feel like you could easily write an entire essay on just their relationship, not even getting into how it relates to john's relationship with dean, mary, ect. I guess I'd start by saying that while I think it's important to recognize john as a complex character and I feel like the fandom often reduces him to a very one dimensional villain, he was an abusive and neglectful father so his relationship to sam is going to be heavily based in that fact. so saying that this is probably gonna be all over the place bc I it's late here and I am not the most eloquent person and while I've seen season one a few times I have seen lebanon only once lmao.

john's view of sam feels kind of contradictory to me in a lot of ways, because he seems to know there is something "different" and possibly "bad" about sam, while also prioritizing his protection at all costs. and that is what drives so much of the conflict between them, bc sam rebels against john's very strict ideas of how he should behave (I think there was a passage in his journal about how sam rebels by acting "normal," which is abnormal in their family context). obviously this role of protector is forced on dean, which complicates the family dynamic even more since dean is often in the position of acting like a parent. so I feel like john has a lot of complicated feelings about sam, where he is terrified of losing him, but also OF him, and maybe even blames him for mary's death in a way?

getting into what we actually see on the show, john is such an interesting character in season 1 bc you don't really see him much if that makes sense. like obviously he is in the first scene of the show, but he doesn't appear again until mid season iirc and there's always this general feeling of him looming over sam and dean and how him telling sam to leave if he wanted to go to college is still holding tension in the family even 3-4 years later. but we also know that john still watched sam at stanford, which gets even more into the idea of john as a god like, all knowing figure, and also gets in to sam being surveilled and under scrutiny for so much of his life.

then we finally see john and sam interact and of course they start fighting, bc this tension has been building all season. and before it can really even be resolved john dies, and sam is left with all this grief and guilt. and not to get into my own daddy issues lmao but I think like a lot of people who are abused by a parent, sam has also a very complicated view of his father. unlike dean, sam remembers nothing about a life before mary died, he doesn't know a john who isn't on this revenge quest (not saying dean was better off bc of it, obviously a four year old isn't gonna remember a ton either). this is the world he has always known. I think he wants to love and understand his father but can't square that with how john treats him and dean. and I think sam blames himself for always being angry at his father (even if it was justified) especially after he dies. so when he comes back in season 14, even for a moment, he can't bear to really sort out his complicated feelings, he just wants to show that he loves him despite it all: "I mean, when I think about you… and I think about you a lot… I don’t think about our – our fights. I think about you… I think about you on the floor of that hospital. And I think about how I never got to say goodbye."

I guess to sum everything up and give a TLDR, it's about the parallels for me...like gabriel says in changing channels, about how sam rebels against his fathers wishes, how john is god, how everything is connected, how dean and sam have such different coping mechanisms and responses to how they were raised. idk I feel like this is just word vomit but I hope it makes SOME sense and if you have your own thoughts about sam and john and their dynamic I'd love to hear it!

[septembersghost]

It really is so tragic that Jimmy and Howard (hell throw in Kim who was patronised so much and saw her mother in how Chuck was such an asshole in private) never commiserated over how much Chuck could take advantage of them. They’d never do it, but so much could have been avoided maybe

i saw a post earlier that really spoke to this story to me: "[tragedy as a genre] means everyone is problematic. All the characters make significant mistakes that have terrible consequences, which might have been averted had they chosen differently. Every character, every institution - they are all flawed and they're supposed to be flawed. It doesn't matter which flaws you, personally, find more or less acceptable. They all have cracks a mile wide. That's the point."

it is terrible, because honestly jimmy and howard could've helped provide some measure of support to one another if they'd been willing to open up and admit to the damage chuck caused them, and the negative ways in which he made them act out. both of them looked up to chuck, and he let them down or misused that admiration. chuck manipulated both of them ridiculously unfairly.

i also think it's underestimated a bit the damage that did to kim, because chuck didn't directly impact her as much as howard did by proxy, but it still took a real toll on her. (the patronizing and the hypocritical actions for sure.) looking at a man she respected and realizing how hollow it was. i agree with you that so much could've been avoided if any of them had had the capacity to sit down and talk and work through some things together. even just jimmy and kim themselves - them striking out at howard is very much about chuck. howard was the one who had to tell jimmy HHM wouldn't hire him, make himself the bad guy, even though that wasn't his decision, he still did it (same for the way he acts in the meeting about sandpiper, though they discover much more quickly then that chuck is behind it). howard's punishment of kim by putting in her doc review is wildly unfair and condescending, but i think in a way she's ultimately more hurt and disturbed by the way jimmy was treated, since we know how she would jump to his defense. she can dig herself out, she asserts that, she works hard to prove that, but the only way she knows to help jimmy is to unflinchingly take his side.

howard is like the symbol of the way things went wrong - chuck's illness and death prevent them from being able to fully process their anger at him or even to place the weight of blame they may have felt on him, so it redirects to howard. at a certain point, i don't feel that it was even much about howard anymore, not him as a person, it was what he represented - the white collar legal world that kept shutting them out, or that they saw function unfairly; chuck's mistreatment and betrayal, and the lack of respect jimmy got from him no matter how desperately he wanted it (as jimmy admitted at the memorial); someone who seemingly never had to struggle and fight for everything he had because he was privileged and his career was preordained (this negates whether howard actually wanted it at all, but when looking at someone so fortunate like that, especially when you're coming from a much more difficult/disadvantaged background, it's hard not to envy it or view it as easy for them, and to not feel a lot of sympathy for them. i'm not saying that's a fair reaction, but it is a very typical and human one. obviously the way they then acted out was beyond the pale and wrong, but the origin of that resentment is not hard to unpack). of course they thought he'd simply bounce back, guys like that always do, don't they? howard kept trying to "fix" it in ways that came across as...pity? and even a bit self-centered - offering jimmy the job, or when kim is angry at him for acting like he's some kind of white knight, it's because those particular appeals aren't what they needed and struck them as somewhat humiliating, and howard, though he tried, couldn't quite grasp that. all three of them were coming from such individually skewed perspectives, from such different places in the world and from their experiences, from such different kinds of hurt. those aren't impossible gaps to bridge if you're willing to be honest and show empathy towards one another, but the outcome is tragic because none of them can get to that place.

[sparklemagazine]

Bleach fandom is known for its ridiculous ships. I’ve been thinking how dumb and forced Bazz-B x Haschwalth ship looks for a long time. And how it contradicts characters’ personalities. Some delusional fangirls try to justify this forced ship only because of a crappy flashback. When in fact that flashback breaks it into shambles. It shows what kind of shitty egoistical person Bazz-B was, and that he never treated Haschwalth like his true friend. He always cared only about himself. Bazz-B was staying with Haschwalth only because of pity and a sense of superiority which he got near the powerless (as he thought) boy. It’s funny that even the name of this ship sounds retarded and perverted, it’s too similar to j/izz lmao.

But back to the point, this flashback confirmed that Haschwalth would never have any close relationship with a person who reminds him of his childish hardships. We saw how Bazz-B aggressively tossed the bottle of wine and pushed away Quincy waitress in the chapter about Uryu's arrival to Silbern. It looks like Bazz-B is a heavy drinker and an abuser. And Haschwalth’s uncle in the past was also shown as an alcoholic with a bottle. No one would want a relationship that triggers bad memories and ptsd. Haschwalth would rather distance himself from Bazz-B as much as possible and would never date him. It’s totally understandable.

Bazz-B’s behavior when he discovered that Haschwalth was actually much more talented and powerful than him showed everything you need to know about his so-called ‘friendship’. From the beginning he proclaimed Haschwalth to be his ‘follower’, not a friend. It’s possible that Bazz-B never had friends before exactly because of such attitude. We saw him wandering alone in the woods. If he wanted ‘followers’ which he could push around, of course kids wouldn’t like it. It shows that he was always spoiled and unpleasant since childhood. And he saw Haschwalth as a servant who must praise great Bazz-B and admire him. He was only interested in getting more power, not love.

Bazz-B never considered Haschwalth his equal comrade, moreover he openly thought about him as a nuisance. He even thought that one of them might not accomplish his revenge plan against Yhwach. And of course it was Haschwalth who would fail in his view. Bazz-B didn’t need a friend or lover, he needed someone weaker to feel more cool and powerful in comparison. That totally explains why he lost his shit when Yhwach said that Bazz-B became powerful only thanks to Haschwalth.

Bazz-B became angry at his ‘friend’ while Haschwalth didn’t even do anything bad to him. On the contrary he unconsciously made Bazz-B stronger, so little jerk should have been thankful to him. But Bazz-B never thanked him, neither he was happy for Haschwalth who always wanted to be stronger and diligently trained for it. Instead Bazz-B became envy at the very moment when he knew that Haschwalth was better that him. What an asshole. Where is the ‘love’ that fangirls see in such relationship? It’s laughable. I’m sure no normal person would want to have such ‘friend’ as Bazz B in real life.

I think that was the moment when Haschwalth understood what a disgusting person Bazz-B was and felt betrayed. He still asked Yhwach to choose Bazz-B instead, because of kindness. But Bazz-B was pissed at Haschwalth even for it. What an ungrateful, envious and spiteful person. He only needs ‘friends’ who are weaker than him, that’s as shitty character as you can get.

It’s also possible that little Haschwalth was jealous of Bazz-B’s rich and comfortable lifestyle and secretly wanted for Bazz-B to experience misfortunes too. That’s completely natural for a poor kid and doesn’t make him bad. Besides Bazz-B was always a show off. That would explain why Haschwalth got a Schrift that takes away luck from others. It seems that Haschwalth is not a good friend for Bazz-B, because he wanted him to lose all luck and suffer. He secretly wished him the worst, but he had no choice but to keep him company to survive in the woods. There are zero warm feelings in such relationship.

Also that revenge plan for Yhwach was created only by Bazz-B in the first place. He never noticed that Haschwalth didn’t care about it. For Haschwalth that fire was a deliverance from his horrible life with an abuser. You can clearly see that he wasn’t upset about it. Haschwalth never showed any eagerness to fulfil this crazy idea, he obviously was thankful to Yhwach who indirectly freed him. He tagged along with Bazz-B simply because he had no other place to go. And Bazz-B never asked his opinion, being the egoistical jerk as always. He was too self-absorbed to really care about his ‘friend’s’ feelings. So Haschwalth never had any reason for revenge. If Bazz-B actually understood him at least a little he wouldn’t demand that revenge from Haschwalth. But he always cared only for himself.

When Yhwach said that he needed Haschwalth, young Quincy became so happy, you can see it in his eyes. It was probably the first time in his life he heard such kind words. Bazz-B obviously never said anything like this to him. If they had a kind of relationship fangirls fantasize about, Bazz-B would have expressed his feelings with similar words. But Bazz-B only saw him as a nuisance and later as a rival. Even when they got an opportunity to fulfill a revenge plan due to Haschwalth being recruited, Bazz-B wasn’t happy for him.

To sum it up, Bazz-B always looked down on Haschwalth, never needed him, became disgustingly jealous and angry when his ‘friend’ turned out to be better at something. This isn’t friendship and of course it’s nothing close to love. Bazz-B betrayed Haschwalth because of his jealousy. Meanwhile Haschwalth found the first person in his life who needed him - Yhwach. He gave Haschwalth purpose in life, love and care. You can see that he treated Haschwalth good from the moment they met when he patted his head caringly. And then Haschwalth instantly decided to join Yhwach and his army, and to forget envious asshole Bazz-B. It shows how much he needed even this little care and wanted to be helpful to someone.

One of the most retarded ideas the fangirls got is that Haschwalth was somehow bewitched or brainwashed by Yhwach. But it was clearly shown that Haschwalth chose to serve him out of his own free will for the reasons stated above. Yhwach never imposed any beliefs onto him, Haschwalth was always acting voluntarily and made his own choices. Actually the flashback confirmed that Haschwalth would never be faithful and serve under some tyrant or abusive person. Since he already had bad experience with abuse in the past, he would only trust a man who was kind and caring to him.

Considering all of this Haschwalth naturally had no reason to regret about Bazz-B later. Besides it was Bazz-B who attacked his ‘friend’ with a killing intent, while Haschwalth told him to stop several times and fought back in self-defense. Bazz-B couldn’t get over his butthurt for a millennia, think about it lmao. Yhwach was always much more important to Haschwalth, it’s not even comparable. The blond Quncy killed Bazz-B without any regrets, it’s even stated in the text. In the end he was saying:

“To make one’s own choice and proceed along that path of ones own choosing, that is what matters. I have no regrets. Not even one. “

Official English version can be inaccurate, but that’s a literal translation from Japanese. So Haschwalth didn’t have a single regret for killing Bazz-B and was happy to serve Yhwach till the end. While Bazz-B was thinking that he is still weaker than Haschwalth even during his final moments. Really pathetic. His grudge lasted for centuries and all that mattered to him was victory over his old ‘friend’. He only cared about his stupid pride, which was wounded by Haschwalth who turned out to be stronger. Wow, just wow, Bazz-B takes egocentrism on the next level. He never thought about Haschwalth’s feelings, neither he could be happy for his ‘friend’.  

It’s hilarious how hypocritical Bazz-B’s fangirls are. Before they started to ship him with Haschwalth, they tried to push Bazz-B into other random pairings with Meninas, Cang Du or Renji. But all those ships were instantly forgotten. It shows that they were desperately trying to ship him at least with somebody, they didn’t really care about the relationship and compatibility of the characters. Bazz-B was also hated for killing Kira, and at that time no one was defending him, meaning they didn’t give a shit for their supposed darling until he betrayed Quincies and turned into another Gotei's pawn.

Haschwalth was basically ignored by those dumb fangirls in the first half of the TYBW arc. They noticed him only after the flashback when they saw a potential for a new retarded ship. But if you pay actual attention while reading the manga, you’ll see there weren’t hints for ship in that flashback. Rather it confirmed that their relationship was bitter and hostile - thanks to Bazz-B himself. Besides childish friendship doesn’t mean characters are in love automatically, it’s retarded to look at two children as a lovers. Those fangirls are really perverted to think like that.

It’s sad that Haschwalth gets an unpleasant attention from rabid fangirls with their creepy fantasies. This always happens with beautiful characters in shitty fandoms, and Haschwalth is very handsome. Actually they noticed him only because of his looks, they clearly never cared about his motives or personality.

On the other hand, during the whole arc Kubo showed Haschwalth’s affection and care towards Yhwach and their mutual trust in each other. Haschwalth was literally called his other half, and Yhwach trusted him with his life when Haschwalth took his powers at night.

But most of fangirls can’t see their connection only because they consider Yhwach too old and because he is the enemy of the Gotei. And they are of course Shinigami fans in the first place. Very stupid, in other fandoms there is a lot of love for older characters and MC's enemies. Actually Yhwach isn’t much older than Kyoraku by appearance. Moreover Shunsui looks bara-level disgusting with his body hair, but it was never a problem for Gotei fangirls to ship him with different characters. So the main reason fangirls dislike Yhwach must be because he is Shinigami enemy. Really pathetic for self-proclaimed Quincy fans.

Haschwalth’s relationship with Yhwach always showed the greatest level of trust between them. As was mentioned already, Yhwach even gives his power to Haschwalth. It was very dangerous for Yhwach to remain powerless when he had so many enemies around. Some of them even in Silbern, like a traitor Uryu. Still, he did it. This must be because he was absolutely sure that Haschwalth would never betray him. He wasn’t stupid, we saw that several Sternritters later betrayed him, but Yhwach wasn’t surprised, meaning he considered such a possibility for some of them. But for Haschwalth he had only complete trust and relied on him with his greatest vulnerability. Also even when Yhwach got back his ability to see the future, he continued to exchange his power with Haschwalth. That can only mean there wasn’t a betrayal from blonde Quincy literally in all possible futures that the Almighty can see.

So theories that say Haschwalth betrayed him are moronic. He clearly wanted to warn Yhwach and save him, that’s why he was sending him the visions of the future that Yhwach mistook for dreams. Actually when Yhwach realized that, there was a close up on his eye while he was remembering Haschwalth. And his gaze softened a lot compared to those he had before. Kubo even specifically drew a shine in his eyes which we haven’t seen before. Looks like there were tears in his eyes while he he was thinking of someone very precious, which was Haschwalth of course.

As was stated above from the manga quote, in the end Haschwalth had not a single regret. Which further confirms that he helped Yhwach voluntarily and would have done the same again. He wanted to go with Yhwach, wanted to serve him and be with him, and had nothing to hate him for. When Haschwalth thought that, he reached out his hand towards Yhwach. That scene also showed that he wasn’t interested in helping Uryu. He didn’t care what would happen with Uryu or others, he wasn’t even looking at him at the moment.

And of course that quote about no regrets reaffirms that Haschwalth thought he was right to kill Bazz-B. Funny how fangirls still make a big deal out of that button, which was merely a memento of old days. He was thinking that he had no regrets exactly at the moment when the button was showed. Which means exactly that - he never regretted that he left that envious jerk and choose another life next to Yhwach. Also the way Haschwalth reached out his hand for Yhwach resembled a romantic gesture. This gesture is commonly used to show how lovers are reaching out to each other. For a note, the same gesture has been interpreted as a sign of romantic affection by UlqiHime fangirls for a long time. Well, Haschwalth was also literally saying that he is happy because only him alone could be of use to Yhwach, so there isn’t much room for interpretation. He was loyal till the end and didn’t have regrets for his choice to be with man he loved.

When speaking about Bleach ending you should also keep in mind that manga was axed and Kubo changed many initial ideas and cut off many plotlines. There were numerous things left unanswered and unfinished. Either it was his health or pressure from the editors because of low ratings, but it’s evident that he ended manga very abruptly and had to wrap up everything very quickly without thinking of any consistency or characters's logical actions.

So a lot of OOC and characters' weird behavior in the end was result of this mess. Certainly, Yhwach would never hurt Haschwalth and other Quincies if manga kept coherent plot. Considering all of these facts, final events in manga can't be taken as canon characters' actions, it’s direct contradiction to their early images. Regardless of any final changes, Yhwach and Haschwalth's special relationship, strong bond and mutual care still stays there as part of true canon plot.

[killerskillercaptain]

Applause

pairing : Levi Ackerman x Reader

wc : 1.8 k

themes : the ceremony honoring Levi's squad (including you) after the reclaim of Shiganshina went wrong, angst, hurt, comfort.

warnings : angst and hate

A soft light drenched your silhouette standing in front of the mirror. Inspecting yourself, you flatted out any crease on your long army jacket while arranging the collar of your shirt. You stood there staring at the image reflected to you : you looked put together, but your face still reminded you of everything that happened just days ago. Retaking Shiganshina didn't feel like a victory at all. With all that was lost, there was no praise, no glory, no nothing, only a bitter sweet sense of accomplishment, more torturing than satisfying.

You looked at the bags under your eyes, at the cuts lacerating the side of your face, even though you've been granted enough sleep and medical care to recover, you were still exhausted, and you could still see that dark cloud veiling your eyes, images of hell still flashing in front of you.

You heard a small knock on the door of the quarters you have been assigned to. It was time to go, the ceremony was about to start.

You shouted a weak but audible "yes" before heading out of the room. When you opened the wooden door , you were met by two even more tired eyes.

Levi

"They're waiting for us"

You walked side by side in the sumptuous corridors, you were in the capital and inside this part of the walls, everything looked so lavish that you felt out of place. You didn't exchange any word for a long moment until Levi broke the silence by asking if you were able to rest.

"Not really no"

By the way he stayed silence after you answered his question, you understood that it was the same for him.

The reason you weren't able to rest was the anticipation, no, the dread you felt in regards to this ceremony. With the suicidal charge Erwin commended causing the death of so many soldiers, both young and older ones, all of you who had survived this, felt sick to your stomach, you were all eaten by a sentiment that vastly resembled guilt. You, the rest of Levi's squad and Levi himself being the ones always coming back alive started to sound like a bad sonata to the ears of the population, they would rather see their sons, daughters, cousins and husbands coming back rather then the ones who always manages to make it, so eventually, you were expecting the worst to come out of this ceremony, and you felt that this honoring event was gonna put you all on an unwelcoming spotlight.

Approaching the great doors of the ceremonial chamber, all of you hesitated to to enter as the guards invited you in.

-----

You were totally right, the moment the heavy and palatial looking doors opened to welcome you, you were met by very concerned looks. Soldiers and other various members as well as government big heads were undressing you with disapprobation, you felt your heart tighten, all of you already felt horrible enough that you cursed those blaming looks for adding more weight to your already busted shoulders.

Levi's name was called first to be given his medal, impassive as usual, Levi climbed up the stairs to where Historia stood solemnly, each one of his steps followed by a horrible comment directed at him, sometimes in a low voice, sometimes not.

"How come they're always the one coming back"

"Yeah, nothing ever happens to them how come ?"

"I bet they throw the young recruits and the less competent ones right into the titans mouths so they can protect their lives"

"I guess they don't put their lives on the line so much to be able to always come back in one piece".

"This is Levi, he can take on anything, heh, must be nice to be invincible"

Some of the comments being whispered were down right nasty and they were all directed to Levi.

Of all the people, the captain was the one to whom was directed the messiest of remarks. Everyone knew he was the strongest soldier alive, and they hated him for this exact same reason.

Seeing how Levi manages to stay composed and be able to dismiss these comments made your heart ache, you realized he must have heard them so many times to be able to ignore them like this. You knew the captain, you knew that he actually cared but had to learn not to, you felt bad realizing that this became familiar to him.

You felt so bad for the fallen ones, your heart was still mourning them to this instant but you couldn't possibly describe how gut wrenching you felt seeing Levi having to bear all the weight of the culpability people unrightfully put on him.

You clenched your fists, closed your eyes and told yourself that it was going to pass, like all the other times.

You haven't been this targeted by hate yourself, but now you were put on this unwanted pedestal and everyone could see who were the usual lucky ones, and you could feel yourself being put on the the condemning spot as it was your turn to be called and climb those cursed stairs.

You kneeled before Historia, feeling her hands ghost over your head as she put and secured the medal around your neck, repeating the same careful but solemn gestures for the second time.

"They don't deserve the medals !" shouted a particularly angry red haired youngster.

More whispers could be heard now from different parts of the ceremonial room, enough to fill the spacious chamber. Small groups started forming, their chatter was now all you could distinguish. Some were agreeing while others were quizzical, you could hear the people's subtle judgements but all you could feel was your hands becoming sweaty and an incredibly uncomfortable heat, filling your head. You already felt bad enough, you already felt undeserving enough, you already felt guilty enough, why did they have to be so-

do they not know what war is like ?

"This Arlert recruit shouldn't have been the one to be saved ! Levi's duty should have been to keep the commander alive !" spat the red-haired young man, emotion seemingly making his blood boil.

You could only stand where you were at the top of the stairs, looking at this seemingly unsatisfied and outraged human, making you doubt every single choice you made back there, you wrapped your hand over the medal holding it tightly, trying to ground yourself.

"Enough !"

It was Levi who spoke this time, putting a hand over the boy's shoulder, understanding yet firm enough for the young soldier to turn around and face the shorter man.

"A lot of tough decisions had to be made back there, if there's anyone who wants Erwin to be present with us today more than anyone, it's me."

You felt yourself trembling listening to the captain instill some sense of understanding to the soldier who seemed to try and contain his rage, even if he didn't look convinced with Levi's words. He seemed to have already judged you all as guilty.

"It wasn't an easy choice to choose Armin, it was an even harder decision to let Erwin go, but his woman out there, you say she doesn't deserve that medal, maybe, maybe none of us do, but she and all the others faced hell back in Shiganshina and had to make the toughest of choices. You're still young, but if you ever make it, you will be met with the same inconceivable decisions we did, so the least you could do is show some respect."

Levi ended his speech with a firm tone that made everyone observe a ponderous silence and just like that, every person in the room understood that the talk was over.

Soon everyone made their way to the great halls, you were informed by some subordinates that honorary soldiers would be awaited at the great dinning hall, this news made Jean and Connie start chatting vigorously about how this was the least they could do for them, both of them trying to cheer Armin up, the poor boy looked beaten down and quite affected by the guilt tripping going on in there some minutes ago.

He wasn't the only one affected by what happened in the ceremonial room, you were still trying to calm your beating heart and your pounding head, still feeling quite light-headed. The crowd, the heat, the mischievous and unforgiving gossiping, even though the ceremonial chamber was one of the largest space you've seen, you felt almost claustrophobic in there, surrounded by so many people who blamed you all for getting a chance to live longer. Your already blood-shot eyes were all watery, they stared watering when the ceremony got interrupted and you could swear Levi noticed it when you were heading towards the halls because he kept looking at you directly

"I'll be back, i'll go breathe some fresh air outside" you waved at Jean, Connie, Armin and the others, Levi had long disappeared from your view and you didn't see which direction he went so you assumed he was with Hange.

You turned around and took the opposite direction of the hall, where there were two massive gates. They were opened on an incredibly well maintained garden. When you sat foot on the marbled path you were met with gigantic and well kept trees, all sorts of trees, with even more gigantic walls guarding the property. Each wall had an impressive amount of lush greenery drapped all over them.

You walked to the wall that was the further away from the gates and stood there, your back against it. And right there, once you were sure no one would observe you, you let it all out. Within seconds, you felt heavy damp pearls making their way through your burning cheeks before landing everywhere, your shirt, your jacket, your leather boots, the soil beneath you. You weeped silently, your head suddenly empty from being too crammed seconds ago. You were ready to weep some more if it wasn't for a light touch that brushed you.

Levi was standing by your side looking at your burnt cheeks, swollen lips and red eyes.

"Don't let it get to you" he said.

"Your guilt doesn't justify their anger" he added, resting against the wall. "Yes they're angry, that's what wars do, they stir anger, pain and resentment. Everything humans don't like to be reminded of"

"Let's honor their death with the decisions we will make" he added putting a comforting hand on your shoulder, at which your heart fluttered a bit to your own surprise.

He pushed himself off the wall, hands in his pockets and headed for the gates as the familiar smell of food being cooked started filling the air, only here, even the food smelled expensive. You followed Levi into the hall, walking by his side as he silently invited you to. Heading for the dinning hall, you felt a great amount of solace being in his presence, and right now, he would never know how thankful you were to have each other's shoulders to lean on when the whole world was up against you two.

[snafu-maniac1]

Zuko deserved better

So I rewatched Avatar the Last Airbender recently and let me tell you......

I wanna murder several people.

Looking back on this entire series I’ve come to notice something. I watched the show just like any other audience member and only saw the good and the bad characters. One of these prime examples is Zuko. Zuko’s redemption arc has been praised as one of the greatest in history, succeeding where others have failed. But watching it all again......it wasn’t redemption. Not to me personally.

Before everyone gets angry and defensive at me, please finish reading my post and hear what I have to say. I do not wish to start any fandom wars or discredit or disrespect anyone’s opinion, this is just my personal psychological analysis of Zuko’s character....Sigh and let me give you a warning.

It’s gonna be LONG. 

So if you’re not interested or don’t want to hear it or don’t feel like reading something this long that’s fine, you can go ahead and just click away and ignore this post.

Starting from book 2. 

Now you may be wondering why I’m starting here and not from the start of Zuko’s childhood but I first want to address the one question everyone had been wondering since the series 2 finale. What would have happened if Zuko hadn’t sided with Azula?

My answer is.....that wouldn’t have happened.

Everyone’s been focusing on the entire arc where Zuko was struggling to accept that the war was wrong and how Iroh was trying to get through to him when he tried to capture Appa and afterwards, but here’s something everyone tends to ignore.

Why didn’t Iroh try sooner?

Why didn’t he try to stop Zuko before Aang came, before he’d gotten so deep and desperate to the point that he continuously committed heinous acts to capture the Avatar? People would justify it by saying Iroh wanted Zuko to realize the wrongs of his father and Nation by himself to shape him into his own person. But that is in no way the appropriate way to approach a physically, psychologically and mentally unstable and abused child. Zuko was a thirteen year old boy when he was burned and banished. This is where we go into his childhood. Zuko was raised like any other Fire Nation citizen. As we’ve seen in book 3 and in the Pirate comic book, The Fire Nation citizens were led to believe that the other Nations were ‘savages’ and ‘barbarians’. It villainizes the Fire Nation even more. The very fact that they would spread heinous lies against other people when they themselves were responsible for the war that ruined so many lives. But when you realize, what Sozin and the other Fire Lords did was a solid battle tactic. Making the opposing side out to be these horrendous monsters. Making lies or accentuating every one of their worst traits to dehumanize their enemies so that the people would not have any qualms about fighting them. All of the Fire Nation schools were taught these lies. And Zuko was no exception.

Zuko was a member of the Royal family. And from what was shown in the Avatar series, the Royal family was isolated from the rest of Fire Nation society. Zuko had no way of knowing what the other Nations were really like, no way of knowing the truth about the war and no one had bothered to explain it to him. The one person that could have, did NOT. And yet people had expected him to just automatically know that he was being lied to and that his people were the villains. Zuko’s only social exposure was with Fire Lord Azulon, Fire Lord Ozai, Dragon Of The West General and Crown Prince Iroh, his cousin Prince Lu Ten, his mother Princess Ursa and his younger sister Princess Azula and her friends Mai and Ty Lee. All of whom believed in the Fire Nation propaganda and all of whom had no problem in participating in the war and making jokes about burning Ba Sing Se to the ground. Zuko was under scrutiny and aggression from Ozai. Ozai was Zuko’s ‘handler’, his ‘groomer’. He groomed Zuko into a certain type of submissive and obedient behavior. Zuko was not allowed to show any type of emotion otherwise he would suffer severe repercussions. Ozai and Azula taunted Zuko for having a sense of compassion and with how he was ostracized in a war loving family, he began to believe his behavior and way of thinking was unusual. It was like Azula said to Mai, “Your mother had certain expectations of you and when you strayed from them you were shot down.” In Zuko’s case, the expectations he strayed from resulted in severe punishment. Ozai was willing to permanently disfigure and traumatize Zuko when he was a thirteen year old boy. It’s not unusual to think that his punishments towards Zuko would sometimes very likely be physical and many people even write alternate universes of the Avatar series where Ozai was even more abusive than he already was. He was a manipulative man who brainwashed his daughter into being his perfect, obedient little slave and manipulated his son into questioning his own sense of reality. He would tell him that Azula was born lucky and he was lucky to be born, cementing Azula’s view of herself of receiving everything she wanted and turning her personality toxic while he made Zuko feel inferior and faulty. If there was something wrong with him, his father would tell him and he needed to fix it. But he never could. He strayed towards his mother, who like Iroh, abandoned Azula because of Ozai’s manipulation and did nothing to help her like they ‘helped’ Zuko.

When Zuko was thirteen he wanted to ‘prove’ himself to his father by attending one of his war meetings. Zuko very likely only wished to do what his father wanted because by then, Iroh had abandoned him when he left after the Siege of Ba Sing Se, his mother disappeared and his grandfather and cousin were both dead. The only ones he had left of his family were his father and sister who both abused him and he only wished for their approval and their affection. Humans need mutual affection. Children who do not receive affection from their parents, tend to not take that type of neglect well. Because people need affection to properly function. Our parents love us from when we are young and that emotional connection is something very important to every human being’s mental state. However, Zuko’s only source of affection, his mother, was taken away from him. Azula herself, had no source of affection. Not from her mother, who thought she was demented from her father’s brainwashing, nor from her brother who feared her, nor from her father who used her as a tool. Returning to the day of the Agni Kai, Zuko wished to be of use to his father, he craved his affection because that is what the abuser does. They make you believe they are the only ones who can validate you and if you do not abide by their rules or follow their orders then you mean nothing. Zuko for the most part from what I could see in the flashback, held his promise and did not speak. But when he refused to back down when his people were in danger, Ozai was not pleased. This is because he is an abuser. He is Zuko’s ‘handler’ and when someone who is abusing another person witnesses this type of behavior, they have a feeling of loss of control. They desire control, they crave it, over the abusee especially. So when Zuko showed empathy towards the Fire Nation citizens and did not do as Ozai wished, he decided to ‘rectify’ that. In the most BRUTAL way possible. An Agni Kai. A public spectacle where he would establish dominance over his son, over his pawn and he would make a show of it. He would show everyone that HE was the one in control and NO ONE could defy him. When Zuko refused to fight Ozai, because of his love for his father, Ozai only saw that as a weakness. Ozai is a psychotic man. The fact that he did not have any problem in burning his son so cruelly shows that he does not have any sense of morals. Going back to Zuko, a thirteen year old child at the time, he had just been punished for disobedience, for straying from his father’s expectations, in the worst way possible.

Zuko did what many people would say is the right thing to do. He tried to defend his people from a cruel man intent on sending them to their deaths. But in doing so, he had defied his father and was punished for it. He was punished....for trying to HELP people. His life was essentially DESTROYED and he was thrown out of his home...for trying to help people. For showing empathy towards others. He was punished in the worst way possible for defying his father. His entire perception of right and wrong was thrown out of balance. He was taught that the war was right and that the Fire Lord, his father, was all knowing. And his mother tried to teach him kindness and her lessons of kindness got him punished. The amount of physical and mental damage he had sustained from such a punishment would in some cases be irreversible. Iroh was right there with Zuko and he did nothing. I CAN understand why he did not step in during the Agni Kai. He had been gone from the Fire Nation, his brother had taken the throne and he could have very well himself been punished severely for intervening. However, why did he allow Zuko to continue to believe he was the one at fault? Everyone of us has seen Zhao, has seen the way he treated Zuko during his banishment. Zuko very likely spent those entire two years before Aang’s arrival, being subjected to that type of behavior from everyone around him. All of them blamed him, all of them very likely said that he’d deserved what had happened to him. No one was on his side. He ended up turning aggressive and cruel towards others, because that was the way his father behaved and it was his empathy towards others that got him punished in the first place. He said in The Storm ‘the safety of the crew doesn’t matter’, just like the general that called the 41st division ‘fresh meat’. It was easier for Zuko to lash out at others and be aggressive than to let them see his vulnerabilities and hurt him for them again. It was the same with Song and her mother. Ozai tried to force him to be cruel, he tried to groom him the same way he did Azula. They dehumanized the other Nations and Zuko behaved the exact same way he was expected to. ‘Their compassion would cost them’. It was exactly the way his father wanted him to be. It was what Iroh did not wish for him, and yet despite claiming he thought of Zuko as a son, he did not in any way try to convince Zuko to give up his quest during the two years he had been searching for something that at the time was believed did not exist. The only instance we were shown of Iroh saying anything against his search, and even that is a stretch, was in the Western Air Temple episode where Zuko has a flashback of Iroh telling him that ‘destiny was a funny thing’ when Zuko said it was his destiny to capture the Avatar. Iroh had time to run the White Lotus, an antiwar organization for two YEARS maybe even longer and he did not think of taking two MINUTES to talk to Zuko, to ease him into realizing the wrongs of the war. Okay, yes he could have passed it off as character growth. But how do you expect a person, surrounded by people telling him he was at fault, he had no choice, either obey or never come back, to realize something like that? How do you expect an abuse victim to accept help all by themselves when their abuser forces them to depend on them? Did Iroh take him to some Earth Kingdom villages to see that they aren’t the vicious savages the Fire Nation portrays them to be? Did he take Zuko to the Southern Water Tribe to see the damage done to them at the hands of his own country? No. Instead he acted like an oblivious old man who had no interest other than Pai Sho and speaking proverbs that Zuko could not hope to understand.

Two years Zuko spent looking and looking and he turned desperate to the point that he was willing to do anything to go home. And then The Avatar finally returned. And then the people that Zuko was raised to perceive as brutal savages continued to stand in his way. And did Iroh intervene? No. He still did nothing. He allowed Zuko to continue his pursuit and turn into the worst possible version of himself. People say that Zuko should own up to the consequences of his actions. And he should. But would he have done those actions had Iroh stopped him earlier? Would he have done any of the things he did when the only remaining adult figure in his life had told him otherwise? Would he have listened to Iroh? The answer is yes. He was willing to do what Ozai had expected of him so why would he not listen to Iroh with time and patience instead of waiting till the last possible moment to do so? Children don’t automatically know right from wrong from the moment of their birth. They are taught by their parents, by the adults in their lives and Zuko had Ozai as his parental influence. And Iroh knew that. He knew the type of man his brother was and he did not try to overwrite his brother’s abuse to help his nephew until Zuko was already on the path of no return. When they became refugees Iroh still did nothing until they got to Ba Sing Se and until Zuko, again in an act of desperation, tried to capture Appa. That was when he FINALLY decided to step in. Three years since Zuko’s banishment, sixteen years of his father’s influence and abuse and he decides the very moment his nephew is close to the brink of insanity is the perfect opportunity to DESTROY his entire world view. He had worked day in and day out for two years before Aang appeared, only for his uncle, someone he TRUSTED, to tell him it was all for NOTHING. Two years of TORTURING himself. A year of fighting against his Nation’s enemies and SUDDENLY he’s being told it was all for nothing. When Iroh and Zuko reunited, Iroh told him he found his way again ‘on his own’ like how Zuko told Ozai he had to learn everything ‘on his own’. And they were both right. Zuko had no one to help him. He had to suffer through so much on his own, without anyone’s help and they’re SURPRISED he acted the way he did. When everything came to ahead in Ba Sing Se with Katara, people thought ‘Oh Zuko has changed he’s going to help Katara.’ And when he did not they HATED him for it. 

The reason for this is because Katara was the ‘good guy’ and Zuko was the ‘bad guy’. Black and white. Katara and Zuko shared a moment of understanding from both losing their mothers and Katara offered to heal his scar and he chose to side with Azula and both Katara and the viewers saw this as a betrayal on Zuko’s part. This assumption however is completely unjustified and unfounded. Everyone sees Zuko and the Fire Nation as the bad guys. The villains of the story. But Katara and the Water Tribes and Earth Kingdom were the bad guys in the Fire Nation’s eyes. Katara was the ‘savage’ standing in the way of Zuko going home. The Avatar was his home’s greatest ENEMY and THREAT. Had the situation been reversed and Katara had to choose between Zuko and the Water Tribe and her brother and father, people would have supported her choice because they were the good guys. Zuko’s people were the bad guys so it had to be the wrong decision and a betrayal to Katara and Iroh. But Zuko was an unstable, traumatized child who did not wish to believe his people were bad, who did not want to fight his home after he spent so long trying to capture Aang, his home’s greatest THREAT and ENEMY. Katara hated Zuko because he represented everything that the Fire Nation did to her family. And Zuko hated her because she was the ‘savage’ keeping him from his one way home. To Zuko, Katara was the bad guy. And looking back at their moment of sympathy where Katara said he betrayed her trust I can only ask one thing....how could Zuko have known that Katara wasn’t trying to trick him? Now, the viewers would automatically respond ‘Katara’s not like that! She wouldn’t do that!’ but the fact is, we the viewers KNOW Katara. We know she’s not that type of person because we got to know her through out the series. Zuko does NOT know her. To Zuko, she’s just another faceless enemy out to KILL his father. He chose Azula’s side because he could not accept what Iroh was saying to him because why hadn’t Iroh said so sooner? He did not want to join Aang’s side cause this was the AVATAR. The one out to KILL his FATHER and take down his HOME. When Zuko returned, he was conflicted about what he had done because he had begun to see how wrong his father and sister’s behavior and The Fire Nation’s war truly was. And Iroh cemented that further by proclaiming Zuko’s struggle was because of Roku and Sozin’s conflict when that was clearly not the case. Zuko was groomed and brainwashed by the Fire Nation propaganda like every other citizen but he was not dispelled from that belief by anyone. No one tried to make him question that belief. Iroh did not try to ‘help Zuko’ until the very last moment in Ba Sing Se. People believe Zuko betrayed Iroh because that’s how it’s supposed to be when Zuko was the ‘bad guy’ and Iroh was the ‘caring’ Uncle and ‘voice of reason’. And yet he did not think to ‘reason’ with Zuko before this entire mess even started. He did not in any way try to disrupt Zuko’s view of the other Nations or his father. In my opinion, IROH was the one who betrayed ZUKO. Iroh KNEW the entire time that what Zuko was doing was wrong. Zuko was a child who was not allowed to think for himself and Iroh KNEW Zuko was brainwashed by the exact same propaganda he himself had believed before he lost his son. If Iroh, who had believed in the Fire Nation for so many years, was unable to realize the wrongs of the war until his ADULTHOOD when he lost his son, how in the world did he expect a 13 year old child to do so? And Zuko became even more unstable and then he chose the Fire Nation.

When he realized it was wrong and went to join team Avatar, they were reasonably mistrusting.

Zuko’s redemption arc from a simple perspective, from team Avatar’s perspective was very well done. Team Avatar did not know what Zuko had been through. To them he was just another Fire Nation monster who had hurt them. To the audience, he was just another Fire Nation monster who had hurt the good guys. No one would think that deep into a fictional character’s perspective or psychological and mental state. No one would think past the ‘good guy’ and the ‘bad guy’. But one thing I cannot justify is Katara’s accusation of betrayal towards Zuko. As we have mentioned, Zuko and Katara were enemies who had a mutual hatred towards each other before his ‘redemption’. They had one single moment of shared empathy and understanding and that is NOT the basis for earned trust. What would Katara have done had she been in Zuko’s shoes? Fighting her enemies, fighting people she sees as nothing more than monsters and she has to choose between her long time enemy and her sibling and her home and her family. If she was in that position, she would choose Sokka and Hakoda and Aang and the Water Tribe over Zuko in a heartbeat because those are her FAMILY members and her FRIENDS and people would justify her because she’s the ‘good guy’. The hero. But Zuko is the villain so his actions automatically AREN’T justifiable. I understand Katara’s mistrust towards Zuko because of their history and because again, she doesn’t know anything about him or what he went through. But she cannot expect him to just automatically leave behind everything he’s ever known and ever believed in because of one single moment of understanding. Zuko should have done everything he could to make it up to the group because he owed it to them and they again, did not know any of his reasons for hunting them. But Zuko does not deserve to be labeled simply as ‘a bad guy turned good’ when he was NEVER a bad guy to begin with. When he was never even mentally stable enough to make that type of decision for himself. In today’s day and age Zuko and Azula would have BOTH ended up in a mental institution. And after all of the things he went through, Zuko was the one who ended up going back to Iroh and apologizing when Iroh was the one who abandoned him and then Zuko at 16 years old ended up as the leader of a nearly fallen apart country. He had to suffer through insomnia, assassination attempts and mental instability and abandonment. Iroh left to Ba Sing Se and only made two appearances in a total of SIX comic books after the end of the War and one of those was entirely brief. So while Iroh gets to enjoy the rest of his life selling tea, Zuko has to suffer the consequences for what his family did. He was also abandoned by Mai which brings me to another point.

Zuko’s toxic relationships.

Some people say they dislike Mai because she is emotionally abusive towards Zuko. It never occurred to me before but looking at it now, I have to say that I agree. In the comics after book 2 had ended it was shown that Azula used Mai’s childhood crush on Zuko to manipulate him into going back to the Fire Nation with her. And Mai.....I don’t even know how to get started on the entire mess that is their relationship. Mai is a person who does not like emotion. She doesn’t like to express herself and immediately shuts down anything even close to emotion. The same applies to Zuko. Zuko is a very emotionally unstable and insecure person. And instead of reassuring and calming him, Mai immediately cuts him off whenever he loses a handle of his emotions and just flat out ends their relationship on the spot. She gives Zuko no explanation, just gets angry at him and then all of a sudden when Zuko can’t take anymore and explodes she suddenly says she cares about him. Their relationship is toxic. Mai demeans his problems and things that trouble him. Quote “I just asked if you were cold, I didn’t ask for your whole life story.” when Zuko was nervous about going back home. She demeans his guilt towards Iroh and tries to make him feel better by ordering servants around. And then in the Boiling Rock episode she attacks him for his letter which is reasonable on her part, but there is the problem that despite being Zuko’s girlfriend, up until that point she was Azula’s subordinate first and foremost and she could have tried to let Azula know. Still was a shitty way of ending their relationship, I’m not gonna act like it wasn’t but I still wanted to put that perspective out there just for thought. Not to mention how she ended things in the comic books. The trust issue I understand. But I don’t understand how ONE single mistake would lead to her just immediately ending things instead of at least TRYING to work it out. She could have listened to him and seen why he was so upset and scared of messing up that he went to Ozai of all people for help. She did not stick by him when he needed her and that was what forever ruined their relationship for me. 

In simple terms, Zuko was a bad guy who became a good guy and redeemed himself.

In psychological terms, Zuko was an abuse victim who was brainwashed since his childhood, blamed for it and made into a scapegoat while his sister ended up in a mental institution because of her father’s influence and because the same people who ‘helped’ Zuko didn’t think she deserved it too.

So from what I’ve seen while rewatching the series....

Zuko never needed redeeming. Zuko needed help.

And he didn’t get it. 

[ice-cream-nekogirl]

Civilians in a world of superheroes

My point might not make any sense and I'm pretty much just rambling but as I've seen the recent BNHA chapters I must say, I'm disappointed. Aside from my personal feelings for Uraraka, just gonna point out she's one of my least favorite characters, but her speech was clearly meant to be an emotional, moving moment but here's the truth:

It doesn't work.

Remember Captain America: Civil War? Where Tony meets an angry grieving mother whose son died in what ended up being a warzone between the Avengers and Ultron? And then Zemo later mentions that after Ultron was defeated the Avengers just went home?

Here's the thing, it truly is messed up that the very young teenagers are being forced to fight in a war that they didn't start, and the civilians shouldn't be blaming them in particular and should be mad more so at the adult pro-heroes and the entire hero organization but the truth is, I don't blame them for being wary.

Deku is a victim in these circumstances for certain, but bringing him back to UA wasn't a very bright idea? Someplace might have been better instead of where there's a bunch angry civilians.

Yet these angry civilians are being portrayed as irrational and like the worst bunch of human beings, and while they DID want to hurt Deku as his Danger Sense went off, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth that they're portrayed so badly. Think about it. One of those civilians could be just like that mother in Civil War. Who knows what these people went through during all of the damage? And yet the overall point is that they're the bad guys for being understandably wary of heroes who haven't really done much to better the situation?

It didn't look like they cleaned up any damage they did, or what the villains did either. This is why Civil War began, because civilians were justifiably upset with how much the heroes didn't do their part to patch up the damage caused. Sure I get the point in BNHA is that being a bystander IS bad because it really is and it drives in the idea that it only breeds the ugliness that creates villains but I honest to god can't fault the civilians for being upset. Especially since overall the blame still lies within the heroes, just like the blame lies within the Avengers.

The young heroes such as Deku as well as Spider-Man himself now that I think about it, are pretty blameless in this, but the sad part is that they're still indoctrinated, they still can't comprehend why maybe the heroes are responsible for most of everything that's occurred and why they're so wary. Everything has a very black and white view in BNHA, because the MCU actually does it's part to explore the grey aspects of everything, including the way civilians view these 'heroes'. I don't see BNHA taking the time to do such a thing since we get little to no real insight from civilians, and then Uraraka appealed to the good graces of the civilians and it's why they even agreed to help Deku get into UA. I get that it was ultimately for his sake but that's arguably even worse.

Before you burn me to the stake, here's the thing. Deku isn't at fault here, I know that, and he's been through enough and needs to rest but when he's the literal target of the baddest man on the planet, would you feel safe with him? And when you dial it down, Uraraka might be a nice person who cares about other people, but she pretty much asked a group of traumatized people to put aside their anger just to let a boy she likes in, that's it. Even if she does care about how they feel, I didn't get much of that.

In the end she wanted the civilians to allow Deku to 'just go home' much like the Avengers did after Ultron was defeated. To just go home and ultimately not do anything about the damage left behind. Deku maybe gets that privilege, but let's not forget that she also asked for the civlians to also extend that same privilege to the pro-heroes to 'just go home' and deal with the damage later.

That's not empathetic. Think about it, she asked a group of traumatized and angry civilians that could very much be just like Civil War's Angry mother to put aside their justified dubiousness to put some very shaky faith in a group of literal children and pro-heroes who have repeatedly failed them.

How many of those civilians lost people? How many of them are possibly grieving like that mother from Civil War?

I'm sorry but I wouldn't put my faith into them? I love those children, I love maybe 3 pro-heroes but after the repeated failures combined with the fact that Deku is the exact target of the most dangerous villain in the world, I just can't put my faith in them. Not only is it ethically wrong, but it'd be asking to just ignore any trauma suffered as an innocent civilian and help out the people responsible for the entire mess.

[tobi-smp]

i guess the thing that absolutely Baffles me is when people say "c!dream sympathetic" as if it can only be this helpless, dumbing-down brand of woobifying, and then everything else is critical at best or demonization at worst. because there is a way to view c!dream sympathetically while actually sticking to canon text, at least imo. like c!dream is a really interesting character when he's not being twisted into whatever image the reader wants to justify their pre-existing bias and it's very possible to sympathize with him by understanding his warped but ultimately logical perspective while not... "philza spoonfeeds him"-ing him. it just seems like an exhausting way to enjoy the character.

oh absolutely, it's layers upon layers of absolutely Baffling ways to interact with not only dream as a character, but fandom in General.

I had an unpleasant interaction with a dream apologist not too long ago and when I went to their blog to block them the first thing I saw was a post they'd made along the lines of "wouldn't it be funny if sad-ist liked c!dream," not if she was a dream apologist but if she liked him as a character. and it just, made me absolutely choke laughing.

genuinely there's a section of dream apologists Completely Convinced that in order to like a character you have to bend over backwards to justify everything that they do, and if you recognize a character as a villain then you must not like them.

and again, you'll see this idea floating in apologist spaces where people will talk as if other fans create content that they don't like to Spite them rather than because they enjoy it. people getting angry over fans for making meta dissecting dream's character because Obviously No One Likes Making Or Reading It so it's Got to just be to make them angry. or more recently people insisting that people are Only drawing horror themed art of dream to make dream apologists mad because Obviously people don't just enjoy horror art, they want to make c!dream look bad.

dream apologists live in a weird bubble of denial where they create the rules that washes over everything, from canon to word of god to common sense, and it would seem a portion of them assume that everyone consumes media (and Specifically the dream smp) exactly like they do, and that anyone putting their time into making something they don't like (something that makes dream look bad) Must be doing it out of spite and nothing else.

they'll watch sadist spend Hours lavishly animating dream, going out of their way to frame him as cool as possible, and assume that she Doesn't Like Him because he's framed as the villain. and that some fantasy world where she Did like him would mean that she'd be like them.

they twist literally everything and everyone to be what they Think it is and it's, anywhere from fascinating to hilarious to horrifying depending on the time of day. I wish to study them

none of this is even getting into how the woobification nits itself in with ableism to an Uncomfortable degree, but that's a whole other can of worms innit

[monstersdownthepath]

Demigod Dossier: Velstrac Demagogues, part 1

Pictured: Aroggus, the Abbey-Maker

Lawful Evil Mad Artists of the Shadow Plane

The Complete Book of the Damned, pg. 120~121 Additional information is also present in Adventure Path: Return of the Runelords: The City Outside of Time, pg. 74~79

Our second-ever Demigod Dossier, now fully in-swing! The Velstrac Demagogues are the rulers of the Shadow Plane and all the lives within, though many of said lives within aren’t really fans of them. Natives to the Netherworld find the presence of the Velstrac an annoyance at best and a threat to their lives at worst, and would much prefer if they went back to Hell where they came from, but unfortunately for everyone everywhere they don’t appear too eager to throw themselves into the jaws of the inferno just yet. Instead, they’re busy throwing themselves into the jaws of one another.

The Demagogues represent the pinnacle of a specific subset of the Velstrac’s twisted senses of ‘art’ and ‘perfection,’ either because they’ve mutilated themselves into something wholly unlike anything else that can, did, or could exist, or they’ve pioneered a form of artistry that other Velstrac couldn’t even conceptualize in the first place and gathered a fandom. It takes some very twisted, alien forms of thinking to become a Demagogue and get others rallied behind you, even moreso because the Velstrac themselves are, putting it kindly, completely out of their gourd. When your audience already expects the insane and outlandish, you have to go even further, and many of the fiends you’ll soon see have.

We’ll only be covering four in this initial post, with the rest to be saved for later...

Demagogues view mortals as little more than primal clay to be shaped, and thus see little worth in investing true divine power into them, worshipers receive Boons that are are relatively simple: a trio of spell-like abilities, each of which may be used 1/day. Boons are normally gained slowly, at levels 12, 16, and 20, however entering the Evangelist, Exalted, or Sentinel Prestige Classes can see the Boons gained as early as levels 10, 13, and 16. Note that while they are Lawful Evil fiends originally from Hell, they are not devils, thus you cannot enter the Diabolist Prestige Class to obtain their Boons without DM fiat.

Aroggus, the Abbey-Maker

Demagogue of Possibility, Revenge, and Sanctuary Domains: Evil, Law, Protection, Trickery Subdomains: Deception, Defense, Fear, Tyranny

Obedience: List the names of those who have wronged you until the writing covers a page, then consume the parchment. Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on saving throws to resist compulsion effects.

What a completely normal, sane, and healthy thing to do! As the first of the Demagogues to flee from Hell, Aroggus is EXTREMELY angry at the devils for locking them up in the first place. Angry enough to want revenge on the whole of the diabolic race, as well as the Asura... Angry enough that he hasn’t yet even started getting around to enacting his revenge, instead just constantly thinking about and refining it as if no iteration of suffering is perfect enough to match his fury.

True to form, he wants you to ruminate in your anger rather than doing anything to enact your vengeance, blacking out a page with the names (or just one name) of all who’ve wronged you no matter how petty or insignificant the inconvenience they may have caused. Unfortunately, no two ways about it, you’re going to look insane (in the literal definition of the term) doing this every day, especially if you only have one or two people who’ve wronged you enough to get onto your list. Scrawling their name, front AND back, until the page is filled and then eating it is behavior that will raise eyebrows no matter who you’re adventuring with. Best to keep this one behind closed doors. Make sure you have a glass of activated charcoal after, because all of that ink day after day (unless you write with, I don’t know, berry juice or blood) is going to do amazingly terrible things to your constitution.

The benefit is good. Compulsions are typically Save-Or-Suck effects, so having more Save means less Suck for you later on. It’s useful at any point in your adventure, so I can’t say anything bad about it! My only wish is that it was a little stronger, since some other gods give +4 vs compulsion and charm effects.

Boon 1: Nondetection Boon 2: Forcecage Boon 3: Imprisonment

Nondectection is a good spell for those times when you need to sneak by diviners, hide magic items from scrutiny, avoid the gaze of a Paladin who’s a little too judicious with Detect Evil, or to add another layer of shroud over Invisibility and the like. It’s a spell that’s a pain to prepare every single day, but useful to have when you need it... but you only have one casting of it per day, so using it wisely is paramount. Ironically, it combines well with your own Divination to find out if you’ll even need it later.  More often than not you won’t be using it at all except to idly ward yourself when going into town or diving into a dungeon.

Forcecage is a completely different animal, the offensive and defensive applications of the spell simply mind-blowing, to the point that keeping this to just one paragraph to save space is going to take some herculean effort on my part! So, the basics: Forcecage has two versions, both of which halt all movement through them: A 20ft square of force bars that allow spells, projectiles, and line-of-effect through, and a 10ft cube that blocks line-of-effect and all forms of magic and supernatural abilities. A Forcecage is effectively invincible (having Hardness 30 and 20hp/level) and impossible to move, so anyone trapped inside without the ability to teleport is likely to stay there for the spell’s duration. Also, to put it simply, shoving enemies in the cage is the main point, but if you cannot, a 10ft/20ft square is an enormous roadblock to stop up narrow passages with.

Which leaves Imprisonment, a portable hole you can shove all sorts of problems into, which will likely create new problems down the line if the target had anything you needed on them. I recommend knocking out a foe, stripping them of their valuables, and then shoving them into their baby jail for all eternity! With the Freedom spell being the only means to undo Imprisonment (even Wish and Miracle fail), you’ll have no actual way to undo the spell against any target you cast it on for one or two more levels, if at all (depending on the party composition). Make sure to use it only when the villain has no MacGuffins, or is a powerful recurring threat. Imprisonment works on anything and everything capable of failing the Will save (take note, anyone wanting to fight Kaiju, Great Old Ones, or Spawn of Rovagug), which gets a -4 penalty if you know the target’s name and some facts about its life, so famous villains are even more vulnerable to being thrown into the Eternity Marble! 

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Barravoclair, Lady of the Final Gasp

Demagogue of the Elderly, Fatalistic Insights, Resurrection Domains: Death, Evil, Healing, Law Subdomains: Murder, Restoration, Resurrection, Undead

Obedience: Practice breath control, holding your breath until you nearly pass out. Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on checks to resist drowning and on saves against inhaled poisons.

A hell of a step down in terms of unhealthiness in terms of Aroggus, and significantly less suspicious, too. Breath control is practiced by people of all stripes, from athletes to explorers to simple monks attempting more profound meditation. While ‘nearly passing out’ is skirting an edge most people won’t approach, it’s not exactly as dangerous for you as, say, inhaling water or eating poison every day. Without any materials needed, the Lady of the Final Gasp is one of the simplest and probably the single cheapest Obedience ritual one could ask for! There is a minor caveat in that races who can’t breathe can’t technically do this Obedience at all, but those aren’t the audience Barravoclair wants anyway.

Unfortunately, the benefit is as weak as the Obedience is easy to do. Drowning is unlikely to come up as a danger unless you’re physically dragged into the water by a monster (which means holding your breath likely isn’t an option anyway), and inhaled poisons are the least common poison type in the game. Against the odd Catoblepas or Green Dragon it will come in handy, but it’s protection from injury poison you really need, which the Lady of the Final Gasp doesn’t provide.

Boon 1: Speak With Dead Boon 2: Resurrection Boon 3: Soul Bind

Alright, let’s face it. Some days, you need Speak With Dead to keep the plot running smoothly. Whether your overzealous DPS kills everyone in the room, your Fireball-lobbing Sorcerer kills everyone in the room, or your summoner’s unchained beasts kill everyone in the room, chances are at some point in your career you’re going to save the party a lot of headaches by being able to pull answers from a corpse. Having Speak With Dead available every day will likely not matter 80% of the time (meaning you can typically use it at your leisure just before going to bed), but much like with Water Breathing and spells like Remove Curse and Neutralize Poison, having it for those 20% of times you need it can keep the wheels spinning and stop unneeded side quests.

... And speaking of side quests and things you’ll need once in a blue moon, Resurrection? For free? Even 1/day? With the hefty cost of 10,000gp for the normal spell, even a well-off party will feel the impact every single time they have to use Rez, but the removal of the cost ups the power level of the spell by a margin so enormous that it doesn’t really matter what Boon you get before or after this one; THIS boon rewards worship of Barravoclair enough to justify putting up with her empty benefit. Even without factoring in the ability to raise party members, you can now curry favor with people of all stripes and demand all forms of insane payments for your ability to raise centuries-old dead at no cost but time... or do your work for free and call in favors at a later date. Do note, however, that you’ll also need someone else on standby to remove the negative levels/stat drain caused by the resurrection process.

I said it didn’t matter what the third Boon was and I stand by it. Unlike with the free Rez above, Soul Bind’s enormous cost still makes its use as anything but a once-per-campaign finisher of an annoying enemy irritating and unfeasible. Spell-likes normally require no components, but Soul Bind operates in a gray area of the rules in that its focus component becomes the subject for the spell, meaning that a DM can very easily and very rightly say you DO require the  gemstone whose value must equal or exceed the target’s HD x 1,000. Binding even a simple 5 CR creature requires the tall order of a 5,000gp gemstone, and if you want to use it on a target that’s worthwhile, it gets expensive fast. It’s way cheaper and easier to just hire a Cacodaemon. 

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Fharaas, the Seer in Skin

Demagogue of Experience, Murder, and Patterns Domains: Evil, Knowledge, Law, Repose Subdomains: Ancestors, Fear, Memory, Souls

Obedience: Study the interior of a freshly severed limb. Benefit: You are immune to bleed effects that deal 6 damage or less.

This Obedience is deceptively simple for what its implication is. You’d best get yourself a Sack Of Rats or have access to a lot of disposable prisoners (or the Regenerate spell)! But thankfully, there’s some wiggle room in the wording: ‘freshly severed’ means no cheating and using Gentle Repose on the same arm over and over, but it ALSO means you can carry around a single corpse and slowly slice it apart, as the limbs themselves don’t have to be fresh, just freshly cut off for the purpose of the ritual. Also, you can use the bodies of Undead, Constructs, and any other creature that technically has severable limbs! Though Fharaas, the Seer In Skin, will likely punish you if your ritual doesn’t involve the examination of actual flesh.

You’re going to look really weird, is what I’m saying. At least if someone barges in on you, you can claim you’re inspecting them for something or other. Infection, signs of magic, etc, whatever you can come up with to blunt the blow. You can cover yourself moderately well by being a butcher or a hunter in your day job, as the severed limb doesn’t have to be human, or even sapient (hence why I suggest a Sack Of Rats), letting you freely slice up and examine your kills.

Bleed effects are fairly uncommon in the grand scheme of things but are also a pain in the neck to deal with in the middle of battle, so this giving a +4 bonus aga--wait, sorry, hold on no, this isn’t a bonus to saving throws? Or skill checks to heal bleed? It just... Stops them if they deal 6 or less damage? You don’t even have to make a save?

Okay. Okay, alright. So you’re just immune to bleed, then?

More or less, really. There are very few monsters that deal more than d6 bleed damage with their attacks (be warned that higher-level ones can sometimes stack their bleed!), and this ability also works on the rare but dreaded stat bleed, and off the top of my head there are NO monsters that deal more than a d4 dice in stat bleed damage. My main problem is that it doesn’t reduce the bleed damage you take by 6, so taking even 1 more point of bleed damage makes this ability useless. Still, though it’s fairly narrow, being effectively immune to a dangerous and irritating status ailment at level 3 or so (when bleed is at its most threatening) is well worth taking up butchery. 

Boon 1: Keen Edge Boon 2: Vision Boon 3: Foresight

Keen Edge is a spell you absolutely want to slap onto any vaguely pirate-y or hoity-toity party member you may have, as cutlasses, rapiers, and scimitars all leap from a dangerous 18~20 critical range to a terrifying 15~20, meaning they threaten to critically strike 1 out of every 4 attacks instead of just once every other fight or so. With a duration of 10 min/level, the enchantment will likely last multiple fights even if you only have it 1/day, but unfortunately it refuses to stack with any crit-boosting enchantments or feats the wielder may already possess, lessening its usefulness as your adventure goes on and your martial party members pick up increasingly fancy gear and pad out their collection of feats. Still, it’s useful for when you get it, and will remain useful for several levels after.

Vision is a whole different beast, and a dangerous one at that. It operates as the Legend Lore spell but vastly accelerated, allowing you to scrape the public consciousness for any information it may have on a specific person, place, or thing. I’ve complained about the general niche uses of Legend Lore before, but Vision grants the information in a much shorter time (a single standard action) at the cost of a potential for failure and a slap of fatigue whether you succeed or not. I don’t like 1/days that do nothing on a failure, but since Vision is purely a downtime spell (unless you need to know the boss’ weakness or info on the Evil Doom Artifact right now immediately), it’s not as much of an impediment to lose out on whatever information it could give you. That being said, the DM will likely have ways for you to do whatever plot-relevant research you need anyway, so Vision is more of a way to speed up the process than anything.

Which leaves Foresight, a spell whose main benefit relies intensely on DM cooperation, as I’ve ranted about here. Mechanically it’s fairly unimpressive, but if the DM reads the spell carefully, they should realize it gives whoever you cast it on a 6-second glance into the future at all times. Whatever horrors befall the victim 6 seconds from now should spring into your mind before they happen, making you the best trap radar on the planet, and the spell’s warnings for the best ways to protect yourself will urge the DM to grant you information about the enemy’s capabilities you may never otherwise know... but what do you expect from 9th level magic? It SHOULD be filling you in with details you’d never figure out!

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Inkariax, the White Death

Demagogue of Preservation, Absolute Cold, and Solitude Domains: Evil, Law, Void, Water Subdomains: Fear, Ice, Isolation, Slavery

Obedience: Inventory your collection of hoarded knickknacks, reciting your unique name for each item as you do Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on saving throws to resist effects that would petrify or paralyze you.

God, finally, someone normal. At worst you’ll look like someone with a few obsessive issues, but at least you won’t look like a menace to society as you lay out your, I dunno, marbles or bone dice or dolls or what have you and make note that they’re still there, cooing to them with names only you know. It’s fitting for Inkariax, of all the Demagogues, to have an Obedience that requires no self-harm, physically or psychologically; unlike all the rest, he was born perfect and doesn’t need to chase after it. Instead, he pursues finding perfection in others, freezing and collecting people and items he believes represent perfection in whatever unusual way he desires that day (having perfect posture, or a perfect scream, or a perfect pair of eyes, etc). Much like him, you’re encouraged to expand a collection of whatever you deem perfect and desirable, which you’re often going to do just over the course of normally adventuring. I’ve yet to see a player character that doesn’t start amassing all sorts of junk in their pockets the moment they get a Bag of Holding or similar.

Indeed, you can just pick up whatever catches your fancy, be it stones, sticks, or severed bits of an enemy, though I’m sure Inkariax will ever-so-slowly raise a disapproving eyebrow if you just pick up any old junk. Make sure to curate your collection now and then! Being able to perform this Obedience with anything you happen to gather is especially helpful if you’re ever separated from your collection (always a danger) and need to start again, but note that each item you gain in your collection must have a completely unique name. That’s only really a danger for especially RP-heavy campaigns, but in such campaigns Worship of the White Death isn’t for everyone who just names all their collected bird feathers Jeffery. Start getting in the habit of stretching out your inventory sheet with names for all your items!

The benefit you get from lovingly counting up all your stolen statuettes and dusty books is resistance to two of the worst status effects in the game. While petrification is relatively rare it typically appears in Save-Or-Suck form, which makes protection against it far more valuable than, say, protection against something like the far more common fatigue or exhaustion. Paralysis is an ailment just short of a death sentence by itself, costing the victim their turn at best and their life at worst, so even a +4 between you and that is something you need to cling to with your entire being.

Boon 1: Sleet Storm Boon 2: Sequester Boon 3: Microcosm

Sleet Storm is a very simple spell with a decent number of functions. Its Long range means that any enemy in your line of sight can potentially be a target, letting you lash out easily at ranged enemies or dangerous casters by creating a 40ft-wide and 20ft-tall area of concealing sleet that’s impossible for any vision to pierce (except the rare and niche Snowsight or Fogcutter Lenses). Anyone inside will have to rely on Tremorsense or Blindsense (though the jury’s out on if the splashing of the sleet would confound those, as well) to navigate it, and 40ft of difficult terrain can feel impossible to clamber through when you start right in the middle of it with no idea which way is the way you need to go. It’s one of the strongest vision-blockers in the game due to its immunity to common tactics that thwart lesser spells (Gust of Wind, True Seeing, etc), forcing enemies to either blow their valuable uses of Dispel Magic or suffer for its entire duration. My only complaint is that you only get it 1/day and that it screws over your party just as hard if you use it incorrectly.

Sequester is as niche a use spell as there ever was for players, requiring a bit of forethought about what or who you’d want to hide with it. The target must be willing or inanimate to be affected, so tricking an enemy via Charm or Dominate into accepting the spell can keep them fresh as a daisy for weeks at a time if you ever have a reason to do such a thing. More often than not you’ll use it to conceal items you seriously don’t want seen or detected, such as a Bag of Holding or similar loaded with your collection of knickknacks or emergency supplies, a particular hostage, an NPC you need to keep alive, or your phylactery if you’re a Lich. If you’re especially sadistic, using it on an item someone else needs and throwing it into a well or a hoard of other objects will keep them occupied for a while. If you’re a more martial character, using it to hide your armor is viable, making it seem as though you’re invincible when enemy blows bounce straight off, or even your weapon to confound your enemies who seem to be taking wounds from an unseen item. Your mime routine will be killer, literally! Just... Just don’t drop the thing, because in the heat of battle you’re never going to find it.

Microcosm is one of the best spells you can hurl into a crowd of commoners or a swarm of foes meant to gum you up instead of actually threaten you. Its 30 HD limit will mean it likely will only strike one or two creatures capable of actually threatening you, but it’s brutal even then. The spell is permanent, trapping your victims in an illusory world in which everything goes right for them even as their bodies starve to death in the waking world. Anything with less than 10 HD is automatically affected with no saving throw, the spell easily mopping up mobs, while anything with 11~15 HD escapes automatically after 10 min... per level you have. On a successful save. There’s Save-Or-Suck, and then there’s the immensely rare Save-And-Suck! No wonder Microcosm is ONLY on the Psychic’s list! Anything with more than 16 HD is unaffected if they succeed their save, but all their allies are likely in an everlasting dreamland now. The big issue is that the HD restriction is way tighter than you may think; creatures, especially at higher levels, usually do NOT have HD matching their CR, but if you’re mainly battling level-appropriate Humanoid or Monstrous Humanoid creatures, Microcosm is fairly reliable in such battles, as those foes typically have HD that roughly matches their CR. But if you’re up against, say, Dragons or Outsiders, good luck bud.

Side note: Microcosm and Sequester used in combination make for excellent ways to start your own morbid collection of living creatures, just like your icy master! Just make sure you have some non-Divination means of seeing them, as Sequester blocks even True Sight.

[booasaur]

God people being angry bc the Hera died and the girls survive is one of the things I kinda expect it but surprise me.

And another anon:

people really are being like "actually literally everyone other than the lesbians were the best characters in fear street and it should've focused on them instead, but I'm not homophobic or anything" i don't know why i'm surprised

I dunno that many God people would be angry if Hera died... :P

But yeah, I get it. You know what, I'm gonna address a bunch of the complaints and comments I've seen. First: where is the media literacy?! What do people think they're watching? It's a slasher, most people, including likable, fun best friends, will die.

And despite how often this happens, I am surprised each time. I guess in this case I at least expected that with leads, as rare as that is, THEN they'd get a certain inherent sympathy that leads get. But the issue is, Certain types of characters have to earn it. The viewer actually starts off a little bit against them, waiting for them to justify their selection over someone more default in Western media.

This happens for a variety of people, in all kinds of combinations: men (and even many women) find it difficult to get women's viewpoints, straight people toward LGB people, cis people toward trans, white people toward POC, POC toward other POC, especially Black people. Even within groups, darker skinned people find it harder and it took me a very long time to feel the same empathy for desi characters as for white (in case you don't read my bio, I am desi).

Even people who've had one queer experience may feel judgmental toward other queer people, like recently we've seen a rise in frustration and annoyance with closeted people, right. The biggest victim of Sam's struggle with homophobia is not Deena, or even Peter, it's Sam! So many people act like closeted people are manipulating others for the joy of it, like it's a secret because of selfishness and not a deeply traumatizing fear! They're never granted that empathy, though. I've seen people call Sam boring and undeserving, meanwhile she's the girl who showed huge personal growth, fully came out to her scary mom, has a fun lowkey sense of humor, and made the decision THREE TIMES this night to die!

Now to Deena. Again, the way people view her from the outside instead of thinking, oh no, she has to try to force pills down her gf's throat and then drown her while hearing her best friends be killed, now she has to pick between her brother and gf, hoping that she'll be able to save both but possibly losing them. You know what it is, it's such a lack of good faith toward these characters. I said sympathy and empathy above, but really, it's simply not believing them of being capable of the same emotions and feelings as everyone else. There's this suspicion and bad faith jump to the worst motivations.

Like, other characters do this all the time? Prioritizing saving a loved one? There is almost no concept more generally pushed forward by Western fictional media than "a group that sacrifices the few to save the many means they don't deserve saving the many"?? That love and teamwork will always win out, that you don't give up or give in, that against all odds, every effort should be made to save everyone?

Speaking of which, going back to media literacy, I love Kate and Simon, enough to say that before the official airing, but the moment they were ready to sacrifice Sam? These movies don't forgive that kind of selfishness. Like, okay, usually that comes from very obvious bad guys, the kind of smirking, bullying jock that Peter was, who would normally survive to be able to pull something exactly like this and then be killed right when he thought he'd escaped but the movie playing around with tropes doesn't mean it's completely ignoring them.

It's funny, people talk about how bold media like GOT, The Boys, Succession, etc, are but really, where's the boldness when you know your audience is gonna eat up your straight white people doing shitty things? It's stuff like this, wanting your audience to like characters they normally wouldn't and allowing them to be messy, that is far braver.

HAVING said all that....thanks for letting me vent the thoughts that've been percolating, lol, but I don't think we should dwell on this. As hard as that sounds, because the more mainstream this is, the more ubiquitous the discourse and it's obviously more than just fiction, it's about the real life ways real life people relate to us, and clearly I have had a lot of thoughts about itttt, but let's not let them ruin it, eh? Get your frustrations out and then just have fun.

It's not our responsibility to try to defend or promote the movie or even, really, try to get its ratings up. It's incredibly unfair that we have to do that and surely media producers and neutral consumers expect things like review bombing and lack of audience sympathy and factor it in. We get two more movies, it's their loss if they can't enjoy them.

[katsidhe]

could you do 9.10 and 9.13 for episode reviews.

Love your takes btw.

9.10 Final Thoughts

well, well, well, if it isn’t my old friend season 9. God I love season 9. buckle in. 

Plenty of what season 9 tries to do with angel drama falls flat, but plenty of it doesn’t. It’s at its strongest when interrogating the ways that the angels are looking for personal purpose, rather than folding themselves into various suit-clad factions. In this episode, we have Gadreel, Abner, and Thaddeus, all with very different takes.

Thaddeus is the most boring of the three—a straightforward narcissist and sadist. (Lucifer will follow in his rockstar-impersonating footsteps in s12. SPN clearly has a dim view of the music industry.) We don’t care when he dies, and we aren’t meant to.

Abner’s found a family, and he’s let go of revenge. He’s clearly found peace and happiness—but it’s stolen.  I’m ambivalent about this. I guess I could take his word that his vessel was abusive and therefore deserves to have been permanently body-snatched, and I guess I could believe him when he says his new family loves him, even though they clearly don’t know what he is or what he’s done. His regard for humanity as something other than a project is… uncertain. Even if everything is as sunny as he explains to Gadreel, there is fundamental selfishness and short-sightedness here. Get what you want, Abner says, and never let go.

Gadreel asks Abner if his vessel is happy. This reveals both Abner’s scorn for his vessel, and Gadreel’s uncomfortable awareness of and respect for Sam (and his bartender vessel, who Gadreel stares at, and who accepts Gadreel back easily).

Gadreel! OF COURSE Gadreel’s gotta be the scapegoat for Lucifer’s release, HAHAHAH. I love him to pieces, oml. Seriously, the Sam parallels could not BE more blatant. I’ve talked about this before, that it makes the earned antipathy between them all the more alarming, all the more visceral. The big sticking point is that Gadreel’s years of pointless torture came prior to his “redemption” arc, rather than as a consequence of it. Gadreel has all of s5 Sam’s despair and helpless anger and self-loathing, all of his drive to set things right at any price, and all of it is amplified by his trauma.

Sam and Gadreel’s relationship is defined by its liminal spaces. Gadreel threatens to tear Sam apart, but he does not, even when he is tortured. He locks Sam away in a dream rather than force him to watch him kill, or to suffer. But when Sam forces Gadreel out, Gadreel leaps instantly on telling Sam he is weak, reciting back Sam’s fears and Gadreel’s own. This reads like Gadreel is aiming quite a lot of his own self-pity and self-hatred at Sam.

Cas’s murderous rage at Gadreel when his identity is revealed is fun. It shows that Heaven’s PR team did a good job, for one thing. But Cas is furious because it’s specifically Lucifer. And the Apocalypse, and all the attendant suffering, his and Dean’s and Sam’s. It’s a personal wrath.

“Stupid for the right reasons…” oh, Cas, your scarcity of positive human role models is showing. Also, Cas’s particular brand of reassurance here isn’t actually something Dean has a problem with. He expresses regret over having been tricked—he says he’s stupid, he says he got played—but he’s never in doubt that his intentions were good. He’s never in doubt that he did the righteous thing. He’s never in doubt that he’d do it again.

Dean apologizes to Cas for barring him from the bunker. (Sam will not receive an apology.) Cas compares what Dean did to Sam to what Cas did by trusting Naomi. There’s a key difference here. Cas’s moral compass is not the problem; it’s his critical thinking skills.

Crowley, Cas, and Dean are a hilarious trio. (Also, I really hope that Cas’s pimpmobile got to Heaven too, like the Impala.)

Crowley being genuinely sorry that Kevin’s gone and his willingness to risk his life to help Sam are the best two moments of the generally weak Crowley-has-human-blood plot line. They feel earned. [also Crowley’s ‘I told Kevin he should’ve run!’ is both accurate, funny, and sad.]

Let’s talk 4.21 parallels! I mean, first, the glaringly obvious: Sam locked down to be purged of something supernatural; Sam suffering; Dean unable to bear Sam’s tortured screams; a very atmospheric fan. Dean walking away.

and then, of course, there’s “at least he dies human.” Right off the bat, Dean tells Cas he’s going to kill Gadreel. Cas, concerned, says that this will kill Sam too; Dean, sounding tortured, says he knows. Now, obviously, Dean doesn’t kill Sam. He doesn’t even get particularly close. But it’s really interesting that this is the first thing Dean brings up! He declares unprompted that he’s ready to kill Sam rather than leave him possessed. Which is both a recapitulation of the save-him-or-kill-him mantra, and an ironic twist on the decision Dean made in 9.01. Then, Dean knew Sam would rather die than be possessed, but had him possessed anyway. Now, Dean has decided instead that Sam must die because he is possessed. Obviously Dean’s opinion on the possessing entity has changed in the meantime: Sam’s hasn’t, but Sam’s isn’t what matters. 

Dean reaches new levels of PEAK IRONY when he declares that Cas should possess Sam too. Cas has to actually point out that Dean can’t, in fact, volunteer Sam’s permission. Because apparently Dean had forgotten, lmaooo. Crowley, on the other hand, is happy to oblige. Dean directs Cas to burn Sam’s tattoo off.

The language of this entire scene is so sexual. I mean, it’s Crowley, of course it is, double entendre is his first language. But this theme recurs again and again. Here it is just more pointed than usual. It is queasy.

Gadreel has Sam trapped in a Dean-type happy place—a hunt with ghouls and cheerleaders, no organic produce to be found. And I don’t think it’s because Gadreel doesn’t understand what Sam likes. I think it’s because Gadreel’s aim was for Sam to feel comfortable, not blissful. It smacks of Hallucifer, just a bit—using the verisimilitude of Dean’s louder moods rather than trying to appeal directly to Sam’s contentment, because of his always questionable, always a question, sense of reality. If things were too smooth, too cheerful, Sam might just be suspicious. Sam is easier to trick by proxy. 

The HORROR of this episode for Sam: Gadreel washing someone’s blood off of Sam’s hands. Crowley pushing needles into his brain. Sam’s body and life as a bargaining chip as Gadreel threatens to kill him, and then as Dean threatens to kill him right back. The quiet heartbreak as Sam remembers Kevin’s death, as he realizes the magnitude of Dean’s betrayal. But the worst part of it, I think, is somehow still Sam’s face when Crowley comes to get him in the dream where Gadreel stashed him. How his expression just crumples as Crowley tells him he is trapped in a lie, that his mindscape is once again a prison, that he truly cannot trust his reality. The sheer devastation of this on top of Sam’s history, plus the knowledge that Dean did this—and he pulls himself together and puts his foot on Gadreel’s neck and casts him OUT anyway. Sam Fucking Winchester.

and then the Bridge Scene. The lighting, the staging… it’s fucking gorgeous. It’s one of those scenes where I knew as I was watching it for the first time, seven years ago, that it was going to be something. I held my breath and still hold my breath. I can’t take my eyes off the way that Sam is shaking slightly, the entire time. The way he can barely meet Dean’s eyes but he does it anyway. He SAYS HIS PIECE, says it clearly, says it with an even tone despite what he’s gone through, despite the holes in his head that were healed seconds ago.

I love the gentleness between Sam and Cas here. I love knowing that 9.11 follows this. I love that there is no question that Cas will leave with Dean—he is staying with Sam, to heal and support him, even after he spent this episode mostly reassuring Dean.

Dean does not start this conversation to apologize. He starts out with the intent to DELIBERATELY egg Sam on: “come on, let’s hear it.” It’s an incitement, because Dean wants Sam to act angry, so that Dean can feel more justified in leaving. Sam does not rise to the bait.

Dean has an excuse for every point Sam has: I had no choice, you were dying, it’s not in me, he saved your life. He says, “I did a bad thing with bad consequences and I would 100% do it again, anyway, bye.”

And then the most infuriating thing: Dean is in the wrong, so he tells the person he’s wronged, ugh, I’m just such an awful poisonous person, I’m going to burn for this. It’s so clearly wrong-headed. Intentional or not, it’s such an obvious invitation for Sam to comfort him that it might well have been embossed. If this were in e.g. season 15, or if the crime he’d committed had been less awful, I can easily hear Sam’s reassurance: no, Dean, I promise you’re a good person, we all make mistakes. It is the most toxic way possible to frame a potential apology.

The textual theme of Dean-as-poison (and, for that matter, the consequence of Kevin’s death vs. the initial crime of the possession) is an intentional muddying of the waters: Crowley, Cas, and Dean himself all bring it up in some fashion, linking some fundamental aspect of Dean himself rather than Dean’s choices to Kevin’s death. Crowley is trying to be cutting; Cas is trying to be supportive; Dean is both excusing himself and camouflaging that fact in his exhausting self-loathing. There is a complicated interplay of what the text says about Dean’s guilt and what it condemns; this pattern continues throughout s9, and reaches its apex in the next several episodes. Dean’s love as a condemning feature rather than a redeeming one is one of my favorite things about SPN, and s9 has it in HIGH gear.

But, here, at least, Sam doesn’t rise to this bait either. “Don’t go thinking that’s the problem, ‘cause it’s not.” The problem is obviously, achingly, exhaustingly clear. Sam’s spelled it out in this very conversation: you tricked me. You lied to me. You got me possessed when I was willing to die. But Dean, and a fair portion of the audience, can’t hear it. So he doesn’t. And they don’t, and they pretend that this line is some sort of puzzle! a cliffhanger on a conversation unfinished! when it was the conclusion, not the beginning.

image that is now inextricable from 9.10

[saphira-approves]

Don’t Compare My Boy To K*l* R*n: In This Essay I Will—

okAY I’m talking about it

So I can’t find the post right now, but a few days ago I saw a post on my dash comparing Murtagh of the Inheritance Cycle to Kylo Ren of Star Wars, citing parallels for their similarities.

Since we all know this blog is really just a poorly-disguised Murtagh stan blog, I decided I’d share my thoughts on this comparison. I’ll be discussing character backgrounds, character roles, character motives, and character actions.

Part One: Character Backgrounds

Murtagh and Kylo Ren are both descendants of the “previous generation.” Their mothers were both prominent rebels, their fathers were both considered handsome and rogueish, and both sets of parents eventually separated. But that’s about where the similarities end.

Kylo Ren’s—or rather, Ben Solo’s—parents loved each other and loved their son. They may have been flawed in the way they showed it, but then again, the only account we hear of Ben’s childhood (as I recall, anyway, and I’m not rewatching those movies just for a tumblr post) is Ben’s, after he’d been groomed and manipulated by Snoke for many, many years. Han Solo died believing he was helping his son; Leia Organa died saving her son; at the very least, they both loved him enough, even while he was serving the Dark Side, to give up their lives for him. 

Murtagh’s parents, on the other hand, were a mess. From Murtagh’s account of their relationship, Morzan didn’t care much about Selena except for her usefulness as a weapon; he was happy to manipulate her and her emotions, but I highly doubt he actually loved her. He certainly didn’t give a damn about Murtagh, throwing a sword at his own three-year-old son. Selena, meanwhile, although she obviously loved Morzan at first, loved Murtagh even more, and clearly recognized that Morzan didn’t care for her the way she had once cared for him—when she recognized an opportunity to work against him, she took it. 

Kylo Ren despised both of his parents, but that hatred seemed hollow, shallow—it had no real reason. They led busy lives, perhaps didn’t make enough time for him, but their actions revealed that they did, truly, love him despite his mistakes, and Kylo’s loathing reveals itself to truly be the manifestation of a spoiled child’s anger, magnified tenfold. Murtagh, conversely, had very good reasons for his complicated view of his parents: he loved his mother, but she was kept from him (and him from her), and she died—possibly in front of him, though he never says, and, unbeknownst to him until much later, having just hidden his brother in Carvahall. There was no love lost between him and Morzan, who was in the best case just an angry drunk, worst case—and more likely—an abusive father, and the only thing Murtagh ever expected to receive from him as inheritance was his sword (which is by itself another whole post in the making). 

Part Two: Character Roles

Both Murtagh and Kylo Ren played the role of foil to the protagonists of their stories. 

Murtagh and Eragon were very similar in many ways; I’ve mentioned before the many “subtle” hints Paolini gives to their true relationship (”a pair of matched blades” and “brothers in arms” come to mind off the top of my head). Their differences clearly highlight their different upbringings: Eragon thinks in the moment, with his heart and his compassion, while Murtagh thinks ahead, makes plans and contingencies—this difference is most clearly seen when Murtagh kills Torkenbrand and Eragon's strong moral code makes him protest, even though killing the slaver was, objectively, the best course of action they could take. Yet Murtagh is not only Eragon’s foil in action, but also his foil symbolically: they are both sons of Selena, which binds them, and yet the sons of opposing fathers, which others unwittingly use to pit them against each other (yes, this is also a whole other post in the making. like i said, poorly-disguised murtagh stan blog). Murtagh’s foilness to Eragon is deeply interwoven into their friendship and their parallels, showing up in many subtle and unsubtle moments throughout the series.

Kylo Ren’s foil status, on the other hand, is… complicated in a different way. For one thing, he’s not just a foil to Rey, he’s also a foil to Finn—in fact, I’d argue he’s more foil to Finn, and more just a complete opposite to Rey. He’s the experience to Rey’s raw talent, he shifts toward the Light while Rey shifts toward the Dark, but with Finn, their stories of pulling away from the Empire could have been fantastic foil stories. Wasted opportunity. And I’m so mad about it but this isn’t a star wars blog so—

Part Three: Character Motives

Of course, both Murtagh and Kylo Ren’s motives change over the course of their own stories, so we’ll be looking at what they are and how they change.

Kylo Ren starts his story in TFA as a ruthless, power-hungry fanboy who cherry-picked his history lessons and simply ignored the fact that his oh-so-esteemed Darth Grandvader was actually redeemed in the end because Luke refused to give up on whatever scrap of good was left in him and I hate hate hate hate hate Luke’s sequel characterization UGH and so Kylo is “emulating” a false image of what he thinks Vader was: the power, the presence, the mask and modulator aesthetic, the “I’m on the Dark Side because it’s fun, and I get to do whatever I want consequence-free.” Which… no! So, at first, what does Kylo want? Power! Sure, he’s serving Palpatine’s Smeagol puppet Snoke, but eventually he’s gonna be the most powerful person in the galaxy. …well, but then eventually starts getting a little boring, so in TLJ Kylo ups his timetable, tries to get Rey on his side after torturing her for information (OF HIS OWN VOLITION! BECAUSE HE’S A JERK! He did not CARE about even trying to convince her at first, he asked the few questions necessary to justify meeting her resistance with a Force mind-rape), and then when she doesn’t join him on the Dark Side he fights her, again and again and again until he nearly DIES, and then HIS MOTHER DIES TO SAVE HIS UNGRATEFUL ASS, so now Kylo’s priorities switch from “power” to… uh… what, again? Redemption? By… how? Sacrificing his life for Rey?

Oh, now he remembers how his Darth Grandvader history lesson ended.

he’s still a copycat though

Murtagh’s motives, conversely, actually make sense for his situation. When we meet him, he has in the last few months run away from Urû’baen and lost his mentor and father-figure. His two priorities: keep himself and his horse alive, and see what the deal is with the new Dragon Rider he’s heard so much about. He meets Eragon and Saphira by saving their lives from the Ra’zac, and he’s there when Brom dies, and Eragon loses his own mentor. Having just recently gone through that pain himself, Murtagh gets attached, and joins Eragon on his adventure/vengeance quest against the Ra’zac. Murtagh doesn’t reveal his parentage, but he and Eragon find that they have a lot of similarities and get very close, sparring and bantering and becoming “a set of matched blades” and “brothers-in-arms” and other such friendly roles that are not-so-subtle hints at their true relationship, and even when they fight—notably when Murtagh doesn’t want to go to the Varden, because they might kill him, which would be actively violating his first priority of staying alive—Murtagh still agrees to help Eragon because he’s a nice f*cking person okay. And then, through shenanigans, Murtagh ends up getting kidnapped, assumed dead by his few new friends, and then 

TORTURED AND MIND-RAPED FOR AT LEAST THREE OR FOUR MONTHS.

And Murtagh’s will never broke! Not until Galbatorix gave him a dragon egg, and that dragon egg hatched into Thorn, and Thorn bonded with Murtagh, and Galbatorix threatened Thorn.

Murtagh fought Galbatorix until Thorn’s well-being was put into danger. 

After that, Murtagh’s priorities are skewed; he’s forcibly sworn to Galbatorix’s will, which sucks, but he’s also given fantastic power, which is great; but he and Thorn still get tortured as punishment for messing up, which also sucks. And then Nasuada, someone Murtagh actually likes, is captured and brought to Urû’baen, and Murtagh tries to hide his face behind the silver mask when Galbatorix forces him to torture Nasuada (physically, because Galbatorix never forces Murtagh to attack Nasuada’s mind) because he doesn’t want to torture his friend. In fact, he does everything in his ability to help her. And in the end, he cares about her so much that he realizes hang on a minute, I would actually put SOMEONE ELSE’S health and well-being over my own, which means something in me has fundamentally changed, WHICH MEANS I CAN DEFY GALBATORIX, and so what does he do? He gets rid of Galbatorix’s wards and lets Eragon finish him off. He gives up the Eldunarí to Eragon and Saphira, which were a huge source of his power, because in the end, he’s not a power-hungry maniac, he’s a nice person that shitty things happened to.

(And if Murtagh is a nice person that shitty things happened to, then Kylo Ren is a shitty person that nice things happened to)

Part Four: Character Actions

If you don’t believe me, then perhaps we’ll let actions speak louder than words.

Kylo Ren: In his first appearance, he orders his troops to kill an entire settlement. From there, he tortures Poe for information, obsessively pursues the protagonists who have the key to Luke’s location, becomes obsessed with Rey, who seems Force-sensitive, attempts to torture Rey the same way he tortured Poe, kills his own father even as his father apologizes and tries to help him, chases Finn and Rey (again) into a snowstorm on a planet that’s imploding in on itself because of a lightsaber; and then he’s chasing the Resistance—including his own mother—across the galaxy, killing Snoke and calling himself Supreme Leader (yeah, totally something a secret good guy would do), cornering the Resistance on Crait with the threat of DEATH. STAR. TECH. (miniaturized, but like. what’s the miniature of a planet-killer???? half a planet killer??????), and then ALLYING HIMSELF with PALPATINE (the stupid crusty meatsack didn’t even have to groom this one, he got a new apprentice for FREE), while also PLANNING TO DOUBLECROSS… PALPATINE… and continuing to chase Rey across the galaxy, trying to get her to join the Dark Side, and he only stops when his mother gives up her life to save his. 

His mother… who, just recently, he THREATENED WITH DEATH STAR TECH. 

All this to say, his “redemption” arc is hollow and stupid. Dying while doing “good” is not redemption, it’s a cop-out. Vader was ruthless not because he took pleasure from killing, but because it was efficient; he was redeemed because he found out he had been lied to, manipulated, used, and abused. Kylo Ren was fully aware of his situation, an abuser himself who took pleasure in his power and in killing people; and he was not redeemed by a kumbayah force-life-transfer BS or for turning on Palpatine, WHICH HE WAS PLANNING TO DO ANYWAY. 

Murtagh: Helps Eragon, helps Eragon even when he could get captured or tortured or killed, helps Eragon even though he’s surrounded by people who would suffer no regret over killing him, helps Eragon even though he will get tortured for it later, helps Nasuada because he doesn’t want to torture his friend (let me repeat, he DOESN’T. WANT. to TORTURE. his FRIEND. And he even ends up sneaking into her cell, AT RISK OF PUNISHMENT WHICH WOULD INVOLVE TORTURE, to talk to her and heal at least some of her wounds, and give her a way to tell reality from illusion when Galbatorix does try to force his way into her head), helps Eragon kill Galbatorix in the final battle, helps a little girl he’s only just met and gives her an enchanted fork, because why not, and only waits to rejoin Eragon and Saphira because he recognizes his own need to heal, to take time for himself and Thorn, and later, if FWW is anything to go by, probably to redeem himself by helping people, and fighting whatever threat he’s hearing rumors about in the north. Murtagh doesn’t take pleasure in hurting people, and he goes out of his way to do good things, even at risk to himself, as much as he’d hate to admit it.

Murtagh is hardly perfect; on the one hand, I fully agree with his decision to kill Torkenbrand because what else were you gonna do with him, Eragon, but on the other, yes, he’s flawed. Notably, there’s the moment of him killing Hrothgar, which I’ve discussed, his anger issues, his potential alcohol issues, and his general tendency to put himself first (which… yes, but also, he really doesn’t). Best thing about this, though, his his enormous potential for change, because we’ve already seen him change! And it saved the whole war! One tiny thing, one small moment of self reflection and realization—he changed himself, without any outside influence except for finding someone to care about. 

TL;DR Don’t insult my boy Murtagh. Come back when Kylo Ren gets some actual character development.

[shinidamachu]

No Place I Would Rather Be

Summary: We're a thousand miles from comfort. We have traveled land and sea. But as long as you are with me, there's no place I'd rather be. Word Count: 3.617 Genre: fluff Fandom: InuYasha Pairing: Inukag Format: oneshot AO3 Link: 🌹 Fanfic.Net Link: 🌹

Boredom was eating him alive.

Days had passed without a single lead about the jewel fragments. So much that their little group had disbanded for the time being. Sango went back to what was left of her old village. It had been a while since she last paid homage to their dead. Kirara, of course, was her loyal company — and also ride. Miroku was visiting Mushin’s Temple, as if the place hadn't been profaned enough, already. Shippo was still around, but keeping his distance due to InuYasha’s stormy mood.

The frustration of it all got him desperately wishing for some kind — any kind — of action. Something that didn’t involve sulking under a tree and watching time crawl. Every second of this idleness meant another second Naraku was out there, still breathing. Collecting the shards was a small mean to achieve a bigger, imperative ending. It gave him purpose, a sense of getting closer to his ultimate goal step by step. Waiting got them nowhere. It only granted him to be alone with his thoughts and the combination was nothing but disastrous.

Lucky for him, his private source of distraction was not too far away.

Kagome was humming a foreign tune, the same one she liked to sing whenever she was happy. Following the melody was almost mandatory. InuYasha didn’t realize what he was doing until he arrived to the other side of it, where the girl thumbed through her hair in a futile attempt to tame her hair, the lake’s surface a natural mirror at her convenience. InuYasha made his presence known before his own reflection joined hers.

“It’s no use, ya know.”

“Jerk!”

The girl glared at him and retaliated by splashing water on his direction — of which he easily dodged. InuYasha had to admit her reaction was justified, given his past tendency to be utterly unkind to her. This time, however, although his tone wasn’t devoided of casual teasing, he was being completely honest. When you spend sunrise to sunset with someone for so long, it was inevitable learning a thing or two about them. Kagome had a wild hair. Not in a bad way, but it sure had its own will. Especially in the humidity, which was definitely the case of that afternoon. To an outside viewer, the strands could pass as straight. Noticing the shy waves at the end and how they used to stand out after getting wet was a privilege for the few allowed to look closer — a privilege InuYasha cherished. She always had her hair down and he liked that she did. It was destined to be free, to go with the wind. And it had grown a hell of a lot since they first met. The half demon wondered if Kagome was aware of how much. He certainly was.

Then she got up, revealing clothes that were undoubtedly new to his eyes. It was one piece, all lime flowers and malleable fabric against her cream skin. A bit longer than what she usually cared to wear, but leaving her arms and shoulders at plain sight in compensation. The view was thrilling, until his eyes caught the yellow backpack laying by her feet, causing his grin to falter. He understood the implication behind it, even if the question had yet to pass his lips.

“What’s with the weird kimono?”

“Oh, this.” Kagome lowered her gaze, inspecting for herself. Her combative attitude swiftly turning into a cautious posture. “It’s a sundress. I’ve been meaning to ask… can you please give me a ride to the well? I’m going home.”

There it was.

Somehow, getting his suspicions confirmed did nothing to prevent the scowl from forming on his face.

“Thought the school thing were over for the summer.”

“Well, yes...”

“Then why the fuck ya going home for? We still have plenty of supplies!”

“Because I promised I’d go to the movies with Hojo and now that we’re on vacation I don’t have excuses not to go, anymore. My grandpa literally ran out of diseases I could have. And what’s the point, anyway? Jewel hunting is going through a dry spell, everyone left… and I haven’t seen my family in weeks.”

Half of what she said didn’t make any sense to him and InuYasha positively hated the half that did.

“What if something comes up? I can’t see the damn shards like you do.” He argued.

“You jump through the well and get me.” She shrugged, as if the idea was highly unlikely. InuYasha opened his mouth to list the many, many reasons her solution was flawed. She bit him to the punch. “Listen, it’s not a big deal. I’ll be back tomorrow. I bet Miroku and Sango won’t even be here yet.”

It wasn’t fair.

In general, storming off to her era was Kagome’s way of punishing him for being a massive asshole. He got that. To tell the truth, more often than not he deserved it. But InuYasha was in his best behavior — despite feeling rightfully entitled to throw a tantrum, given the circumstances — precisely because he needed her close. He needed her to stay. Picturing Kagome hanging out with someone else instead was the worst kind of self torture. Would she change her mind if he swallowed his pride long enough to say so? Would he ever get the guts to let it out? She hadn’t invited him to come along. Was this Hojo guy really that important to her? More than InuYasha was? Trying to talk her out of it was a dangerous move. He’d put his foot in his mouth, she’d put his face on the ground. That’s what they did.

Either his expression betrayed the turmoil inside or Kagome became too good at figuring him out. Whatever it was, her smile shined, reassuring and warm.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be so quick, you won’t have time to miss me.”

“Who says I’d miss ya?” He dismissed, his indifference unconvincing even to himself.

InuYasha perceived another presence approaching. Shippo. His arrival couldn’t be more providential. Kagome had a soft spot for the brat. If anyone could get her to stay, it was him.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s just the runt.”

Like he had been announced, the kid emerged from the trees in a hurry, Kagome’s bow and quiver looking gigantic on his tiny hands.

“Kagome! InuYasha!”

“Shippo-chan! What’s going on?” She asked, as soon as the boy reached them.

“There are rumors of a jewel fragment, two villages to the west.” He explained, with the pomposity the information called for. “Kaede sent me.” His chin was up high, like the statement added a final hint of importance to the message. “Here,” continued the kit, offering Kagome her weapon in a formal manner.

She hesitated.

“Kagome, let’s go!” InuYasha was prepared to move at the sound of the word ‘jewel’, their earlier argument happily buried and forgotten.

“Wait! Don’t you think it’s strange? For days we had no leads, and now, just when we splitted up…”

“Yeah, well, so what if it’s a trap? It wouldn’t be the first.”

Coward that he was, Naraku resorted to the nastiests schemes in order to get what he wanted. His disgusting fingers laid on every happenstance that had ever caused them harm. What choice did InuYasha have, though? Ruse or not ruse, he had to check it. Regardless of anyone else’s help, it was his duty to get vengeance on the bastard — for Kikyo, for himself — and Kagome knew that.

She sighed and took the bow and arrows from the fox’s hold.

“Thank you so much, Shippo-chan! Now can you do me another favor?”

“Anything!”

“Go back to Kaede. Tell her InuYasha and I are on our way.”

“I’m not coming with you?” He whined, as confused as InuYasha. They never traveled without the child.

“That’s right. We don’t know how dangerous this may be. I need you to stay and if we don’t come back tomorrow by noon, get Miroku and Sango and send them to us. Can you do that for me?”

Shippo resolutely nodded .

“I won’t let you down, Kagome.”

“I know you won’t.”

And through the same path he had appeared he went. Kagome fixed a pleading glance at InuYasha.

“Can I at least change clothes before we g—”

“No time to waste.” He said, grabbing Kagome and her bag to leap towards west.

Kagome was whistling that same song again.

It took him an enormous amount of self restraint not to whistle along.

He was happy. So wonderfully happy. It was astonishing, the effect that tiny, bossy human girl had over his humor. The fact they were following the possible whereabouts of a lost jewel piece also played a role on his attitude swing, there was no denying that. But even if this turns out to be nothing at all, it would be a small price to pay in exchange of spending more time with her.

“Weren’t you mad about not coming home just now?”

His curiosity was genuine. Kagome had been angry since they left and InuYasha would be the person to know. She had two kind of anger. The one he could hear and the one he could feel. Even though she had been unusually silent, her frustration was palpable at first. Mercifully, it seemed to fade away the more ground they covered. Her one complaint was the soreness that too many hours on the same position inflicted upon the muscles, which was why they were both walking. As a rule, he was strictly opposite to anything that might slow them down, and the human pace was unbearable once you had a taste of demonic speed. Running free, with trees and people alike turning into a blur on each side of him, was an unparalleled sensation, amplified tenfold whenever Kagome was riding his back. He didn’t regret giving in, though. They weren’t far from their destination, after all. In addition, her comfort came to be a priority, despite him still being unaware as to when or how.

“Well… yeah, but… what can I do, right? Besides, I haven’t realized how much I missed this.”

Clueless, InuYasha searched their surroundings, unsuccessfully intending to spot what she could possibly be referring to.

“Whatcha talkin’ about?”

“This!” She spinned around, open arms and face to the sky, chasing daylight like a sunflower, the movement bringing her garment to life. “You. Me. An adventure. Don’t get me wrong, I love Shippo and the others, I’m glad they joined us. It just feels like we haven’t had as much quality time together as we used to, after they did.”

“Y-you miss that?”

She shook her head up and down with enthusiasm and a content smile fought its way across his lips.

“I know we could hang out in Kaede’s village, but it’s not the same as going out. O-on a trip, I mean.”

Although InuYasha couldn’t make out why her cheeks were suddenly burning red, he did see the logic her reasoning, and the feeling was mutual. There was a certain level of closeness only the road could provide. No curious eyes. No sly comments. No need to explain themselves. InuYasha had missed that as well.

He often played with the thought of stealing her away, of placate his selfish thirst for her undivided attention. Not once had he imagined Kagome would be as eager to go as he was to take her. Regardless, the timing wasn’t right. It never was. From the moment they met, they were tossed into a mission and there was hardly space for anything else. So he settled for whatever he could get until it was over.

“Why would you miss those trips? It ain’t like I was nice to ya back then.”

It didn’t make sense to him that she would. His memories were of a spoiled little girl, complaining about the bugs and her aching legs and the fact she hadn’t bathed in days. There was no escaping InuYasha’s share of responsibility on the issue. He could have made her life easier, had he bothered to. But at the beginning he saw Kagome as a potential threat he would eventually get rid off. How could he have guessed, after the many betrayals he had endured through the years, that his heart would be safe on her hands?

Kagome limited herself to a shrug.

“You are now.” She stated, as if it made up for his unexcusable former behavior. Her unconditional forgiveness amazed him, no matter how regularly she had shown it to him. “Also, it feels like old times.”

“It doesn’t unless you get kidnapped, somehow.”

“It happened once or twice!”

“Keh! Stop kidding yourself.”

“Shut up.”

“You shut up.”

“No, shut up. I’m sensing a shard and it’s moving away.”

Wordlessly, InuYasha returned the backpack to her and offered her his back.

They raced at full gallop, Kagome guiding their course. The forest transitioned into arid highland, where dirt, thorns and rocky surfaces took place.

“Hey, you!” Kagome yelled at the youkai emerging in their camp of vision. Their target. Over his shoulder, the startled creature sneaked a peek at them and increased speed. Growling, InuYasha matched his rhythm. “Wait up! We won’t hurt you.”

“I’m pretty sure Imma hurt him.”

“Give the jewel fragment to us peacefully and you’ll be free to go!” She went on, his snide remarks as ignored by her as her plead was by the demon. InuYasha’s patience was wearing thin. Now that the rumors turned out to be true, his focus was entirely aimed at the task at hand.

“Are those fancy arrows of yours just for show?”

Kagome let out a deep breath. Shooting was her last ressource. She preferred to sort things out with words first. It rarely worked. Still she always tried.

“I suppose we have no choice.”

The arrow hit the creature in the calf and his groan of pain reverberated through the field. Not lethal, but enough of a nuisance to make him drop the run. InuYasha closed the distance between them within seconds. Kagome climbed off him and together they inspected their opponent.

On the floor, a possum demon hissed and exhibited his fangs at them, his ugly face twisting in agony while he pulled the arrow out. A cascate of blood immediately flowed from the wound. InuYasha was not fooled by it. Being a full youkai, he would be healed soon.

“Where is it?” InuYasha asked Kagome, not daring to leave the bastard out of his sight.

“His belly.”

“Step away, you filthy half breed!”

“Excuse me?” Kagome defied, any trace of courtesy forgotten.

“That was quite the damage she did on ya, there.” InuYasha released Tessaiga from its sheath as he approached the fallen man. “Think I can top it, though.”

“Step away, I said!”

His fear was palpable. InuYasha could feel it. See it. Smell it.

Smell it.

Faster than realization, the odor filled his lungs. It burned his nostrils, his throat. He could taste the toxic substance on his tongue. It was unbearable. And gasping for air only resulted in the pungent scent flooding him further, overwhelming his senses. A defense mechanism, he thought, his vision blurring, his knees giving in. I’m going to faint. No. No, no, no, no, no. Kagome. He had to protect Kagome.

There was a cry of his name.

And then an awful lot of darkness.

InuYasha came to abruptly, uncertain and alarmed by the new reality.

In one minute, the sun was up and he was succumbing, his consciousness leaving him to drift. In the next, he was awake and crickets sang the night’s arrival.

It was tempting to think he had dreamt the whole thing. A stupid, ridiculous, crazy ass dream. However, the lingering smell left no room for argument. It happened. The scent was weaker. Fading. But was there, overpowered by a significantly nicer aroma. A familiar one, sweet on the nose and soothing to the soul. Kagome’s.

He was lying half naked in her sleeping bag.

Sitting up, InuYasha seeked for the priestess, desperate to make sure for himself she was safe and sound.

The fragile light of her modern lantern illuminated the cavern that sheltered them. At its entrance, a girl rested — her silhouette contoured by a starry sky. 

“Kagome.”

“You’re awake!”

She rushed to him, tripping over her own eagerness. Her beautiful clothes were dirty and a bit ripped at the hem. A small scratch cut her cheek, remnants of dry blood tainting her skin.

“Are you alright? What happened?”

“I’m fine!” Kagome kneeled in front of him, a gesture he appreciated. There was no peace for him without an up close inspection of her well being. “I purified the demon after you blacked out. Turns out it was a trap. Thousands of Naraku’s second-class demons came for the shard when I took him down. I tried to purify those too, but more of them kept coming and I ran out of arrows, so I casted a barrier and—”

“You casted a barrier?”

InuYasha was beyond impressed. Barriers required great power and discipline. Even from Kaede or the monk. Kagome had apparently done it all by herself. Effortlessly. On the spot.

“To be honest, I don’t know how I did it. I just… I saw you lying there and I… anyway, the barrier purified the ones who touched it. Eventually they all died or left. How are you feeling?”

InuYasha didn’t answer the question.

“I’m sorry, Kagome, that you couldn’t rely on me.”

Guilt pulsed within him like a heartbeat. Constant and compulsory, expanding the outcomes of its work through every inch of his body.

“It’s not your fault. Your nose is too keen, of course you’d be affected the most.”

“But you got hurt!”

“In the thorns. I was careless. Don’t worry about it, it’s not even going to leave a scar.”

“It shouldn’t have even happened. I’m supposed be the one protecting you, not the other way around.”

It could have been worse. InuYasha should be grateful for that. He wasn’t. It could have been worse. And he wouldn’t be able to help her, to save her from this insignificant peril while she had already saved him in every conceivable way there was for a person to be saved.

“I’m not as helpless as I used to be, you know? I’ve grown a lot.” She had a point. InuYasha himself had told her that much, once. Kagome had faced scarier dangers than that. And she could absolutely take them. But he didn’t want her to have to. “Not to mention, it was totally worth it.”

As a proof, she exhibited a jewel fragment, glowing in the healthiest shade of pink.

“You got it!” InuYasha captured the shard, glancing at every angle of it in awe.

“Don’t act so surprised.”

Kagome went for her backpack and came back, falling on her knees again. Her hand dove in and emerged holding the glass container in which they kept the other pieces. She opened it and tilted the receiver to InuYasha, hinting for him to do the honors.

It was as if she had been waiting for him so they could do it together.

As if it was their private, sacred ritual.

He did as she wanted, mirroring her satisfied smile.

“Where’s my haori?”

“Oh! I… I put it away.” Blushing, Kagome tore her gaze from his and InuYasha followed it to a corner of the cave, where a huddle of scarlet fabric laid forgotten. “I figured you’d heal faster with that smell gone and your haori is soaked on it. Sorry.”

“D-don’t apologize, stupid. It was the right call.” To feel useful — and to occupy his brain with something other than the image of Kagome undressing him — InuYasha searched her backpack for the first aid kit, a tool from her era he was sadly too intimate with. “Now let’s take care of this cut.”

“Okay. You have to g—”

“I know what to do. I’ve seen you do it a thousand times.” Her lips parted, and InuYasha added: “Don’t act so surprised.”

He cleaned the wound with cotton, water and soap, then used a different ball of cotton to carefully apply the content of a smelly little bottle to the extension of it. Kagome hissed, but he ignored it in favor of wrapping it all up with a band-aid. To ensure it was properly stretched, he gently ran his thumb through it, allowing the touch to linger more than necessary and his stare to go from her cheek to her eyes.

Her eyes.

The most stunning maze.

Let yourself get in, you are sure to get lost.

She blinked before he could, keeping them closed and leaning into his palm, her hand lifting to cover and caress his.

It would be so easy to grip her chin. To turn her face to him. To bring her to his lips. 

So easy to steal a kiss.

Why do the easiest actions have to carry the most difficult consequences?

Clearing his throat, InuYasha transformed present into a loving memory.

“Take some rest. We leave first thing tomorrow.”

“Sounds good to me.”

On the way to claim Kagome’s prior guarding position by the entrance of the cave, InuYasha collected Tessaiga while she busied herself with getting cozy inside the sleeping bag.

“Kagome?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“InuYasha, I think we’re way past saying thank you for saving each other’s lives.”

“No, not for that. I mean, for that too, but... for coming. For staying by my side.”

“Stupid.” She mocked him, her voice lethargic as exhaustion finally caught up to her. “Where else would I be?”

A/N: this was some serious self indulgent bullshit. I regret nothing.

@inukag-week​ here is another piece of contribution. Kind of merged the Loyalty and the Instinct prompts here. Oops.

[headcanonsandmore]

Why Ron Doubted Harry in GoF

All over tumblr, I see people criticizing Ron for doubting Harry about how his name got in the Goblet of Fire when his doubt is completely normal and healthy. His doubt by itself was not fueled by jealousy or betrayal; it was fueled by common sense.

I think the best way to understand this to put yourself in Ron’s perspective. This is a bit hard to imagine in the actual situation since we can’t relate to the Goblet of Fire or a magical tournament directly, so I’m going to use a comparably more relatable metaphor below for what happened:

Imagine you and your best friend are perusing a car shop, basically fangirling about all the expensive cars that are on display. In the center of the lot is the most expensive car, and it looks like the coolest thing ever with heated and comfortable seats, built-in GPS, insane horsepower, self-driving features, etc. In other words, your dream car, a car you can only fantasize on driving.

It costs way more than a million dollars (an amount you will probably never earn in your lifetime), so the only way your fantasies of driving the car can exist is if you stole the car. Naturally, this leads to you and your best friend talking about how to steal the car so that your fantasies can come true. Your best friend comes up with this detailed, brilliant idea on how to steal the car at night with no evidence left behind. It’s so ingenious, but of course you both don’t do anything since you both are just kidding around. Or so you thought.

The next morning, the car you and your best friend was ogling at the day before is suddenly missing from the shop, and lo and behold, it’s found in the driveway of your best friend’s house. There is no evidence left behind (like in your best friend’s plan), just your best friend saying they didn’t steal the car to the authorities.

In this scenario, it would be extremely stupid not to doubt your best friend’s words, especially since you know that your best friend is a troublemaker who would say they didn’t steal the car to the authorities whether they were lying or telling the truth. The best thing to do is to get your best friend alone, make sure they know that they can trust you, and ask them for the truth since you would understand the situation better than everyone else (as their best friend).

You show your friend the benefit of doubt by not jumping to conclusions, not blindly accepting that your friend is wrong or right. You want to eliminate all of the possible ways that your friend could have stolen the car and make sure that your friend is telling the truth before giving your full support of them. It’s not that you don’t believe them; it’s that you have to eliminate the obvious other solutions before fully accepting the real one which is both natural and reasonable.

From this point-of-view, Ron’s doubt and questioning is extremely reasonable and alright. Ron does not believe Harry is lying; it’s just that he’s also not confident that Harry is telling the truth (basically in a middle ground). Could Ron have worded his doubts in a different, less accusatory matter? Absolutely. But regardless, he is NOT at fault for questioning Harry.

In fact, in this argument (in their dorm room), Harry is mostly at fault. Harry is the one that is assuming that Ron’s words are implying that Ron believes that Harry is a liar. Harry is the one that gets angry first even when Ron is stating his concerns fairly calmly. Harry is the one that calls Ron stupid. Though this is extremely understandable since Harry’s had to deal with everyone outright telling him that he is a liar, including Dumbledore. Harry was forced into a party for 30 minutes where everyone wasn’t listening to a word he said. The fight between Harry and Ron is not because of Ron’s doubts but because of Harry’s understandable impatience. (Let the poor boy sleep before you start Ronald!)

Does this mean that the entire fight is Harry’s fault? Absolutely not.

While fairly doubting Harry (without insulting him, mind you) is not Ron’s fault and only natural, making a couple of snide comments about Harry wanting fame and icing him out afterwards was completely Ron’s fault. The narrative clearly states how Harry was ready to talk to Ron the morning after (I wonder why; maybe it has to do with actually getting some sleep and recovering his patience.), but Ron isn’t there. Ron purposely avoids Harry, preventing the necessary conversation from happening, until Harry becomes too stubborn and angry at Ron to talk to him back.

Again, Ron’s actions are somewhat justifiable (at least for a 14 year old boy), given his insecurities, feeling that Harry betrayed him, and possibly slight jealously. Ron is not privy to Harry’s thoughts like we are, so in Ron’s point-of-view, Harry is enjoying his newfound fame. Harry spent 30 minutes at a party celebrating becoming a Triwizard Tournament champion after he nonverbally agreed to talk to Ron. Plus, Harry’s explanation for why someone put his name in the Goblet of Fire is “I dunno”, the weakest defense and worst lie ever (“to kill me” is not too melodramatic for Harry someone-tries-to-kill-me-once-a-year Potter!). Harry calling Ron stupid for having legitimate doubts is the last straw for him, and he retaliates like any 14 year old boy would- insulting Harry and stopping talking to him to avoid getting hurt again.

The entire argument is based on bad timing and stubbornness on both Harry’s and Ron’s parts. Ron questions Harry (which again is not a sin) way too early for Harry, right after the party. And then Harry wants to actually explain himself better way too late for Ron, the morning after. When Ron finally gets over his feelings and insecurities after Harry’s call for Sirius, it is way too late for Harry who spent the last weeks convincing himself that he hated Ron. (It didn’t help that Hermione unknowingly rubbed salt to the wound by spouting her mostly wrong I-read-a-psych-textbook-once insight to Harry.) It isn’t until after the First Task that Harry is ready to accept Ron’s well-deserved apology and they finally reconcile.

Note: I’m mentioning this just because many people trying to absolve Harry from all blame and responsibility forget this happened (maybe because of the movies), but Harry was completely wrong in throwing a badge at Ron to give him a scar and mock him for his supposed jealousy (Thanks Hermione!). It is never okay to physically hurt a friend, especially with the intention of permanently scarring them. I know Harry was mad, but Ron was obviously trying to reconcile and confused with Harry’s anger (since he didn’t hear Hermione’s spiel). Harry’s the one that elongates the fight after that moment, something that many people choose to forget since apparently, both people (especially the protagonist) can’t be wrong in a fight.

TL;DR: In Ron and Harry’s fight in GoF, Ron is not at fault for doubting Harry. He is at fault for icing Harry afterwards. Also, Harry is not blameless in this fight like some people choose to believe.

~~~~~

[oranges8hands]

I agree with everything except the last sentence. I know it's trendy lately, but we really don't need to mix racism with everything. For me, a POC girl, this is as ridiculous as saying that liking top! Joe is racist. I am glad that people have become more aware of certain things, but you cannot exaggerate it and see racism EVERYWHERE. Even where it is not the case.

re: this post

Well, thanks for sending in an ask. There's kind of a lot of parts to this I want to address, but first let me ask - do you disagree with my assessment that Joe gets more blame for the exile and exile length, or do you disagree with my assessment that Joe getting that blame comes from a pattern of fandom racism? Because the first is a fandom interpretation and as always, interpretations will vary and be heavily based on the fandom circles you are in; it's based on a pattern I noticed in my engagement with fandom, the same way I noticed fandom's treatment around Booker's exile, and I find the two intricately linked. Some people (like possibly you) may not connect fandom's prioritization of Booker's pain/trauma to be implicitly (or explicitly) against Joe specifically, rather than against the group of Andy, Nicky, and Joe. [Regarding not naming Nile, the fact that she is a) new and b) voted for the apology-only means she seems to rarely get conflated into the blame game.] Like, ymmv, etc etc.

However, if you do think Joe gets specifically and repeatedly put on a different level from the other two in terms of being the one to heavily push for a long exile (against group opinion), being the one who wanted the strictest "punishment" possible because he's the angry/resentful/unforgiving one, being the only one who wanted the "punishment", being emotional (irrational) in his hurt while the other two are calm and collected (and therefore rational/objective in their decision), that his reaction is going to be a continued vocalization of his anger only and/or that his vocalization is a problem but Andy's immediate reaction or Nicky's silent treatment isn't, that his reaction is only anger while Nicky and Andy are disappointed/hurt/guilty/etc (aka a spectrum of emotions and not just one note), that his main motivation is retribution (esp that the other two don't feel that), that his anger is based on and only on selfish hurt (for hurting Nicky) while the others are looking at the larger picture of Booker's actions or able to see Booker's side of it, that he is quick to temper (unlike the others) and can't control his response, and/or that in general his anger about the betrayal isn't justified, I don't quite get why you wouldn't assume racial bias has a role in it.

Like, Joe is a different character from them! He's considered the emotional one, the expressive one, the vocal and loud one (to varying degrees of fairness.) The genesis of those traits exists in canon, and fandom as always has the weird ability to both flatten a character to specific traits and layer on complexity to the shown facets of character's canon. I even get why he gets tagged as the most mad in comparison to the others (though I don't actually agree with it) - the way Andy had her angry moment with Booker but doesn't continue with that anger in the lab and she's caring with Booker in her goodbye, Nicky basically tells Joe now is not the time to yell at Booker and then you never see him interact (look at?) Booker again, and again Nile wanted to let him off with an apology. I'm not saying it doesn't make sense or comes completely out of left field to view it that way.  

But again, it's not that he reacts differently; they're all different people and obviously their reactions will reflect their personalities and their relationship to Booker. It's that his reaction to betrayal is held to a different standard, the way he's subtly and consistently painted as wrong for his reaction in a way the other two aren't. And to be clear, I am specifically and only talking about the dynamic around Booker's exile and Joe, and not how Joe in general is written, but there's some touches of it in that too. My comment is also very much not about one specific fic or one individual's opinion about either Joe or the exile, but about the pattern I noticed that Joe's reaction is often treated with a different (lesser) level of acceptance than Nicky's/Andy's, that his reaction is often assigned more/only negative motivations (esp in comparison), and that (which ties to the main point of my first post) his reaction (even if - though it’s not - just anger) should be de-prioritized in comparison to Booker (or the others.) 

And obviously, this isn't all fic. Maybe not the majority of fic. But it's definitely more than one; it's something I started to pick up on as a potential thing to look for, and I know I'm not the only one. This is a large fandom and it is growing. This fandom on A03 alone has almost 6k works, and that's been in six months. (And that's just one platform!) It is frankly preposterous to me to say this one (large) fandom is somehow the only fandom where racial bias isn't a factor, or that it doesn't affect how all the characters get written.

(also I think it's worth bringing up while my original post, this ask, and this response have been heavily leaning on words about fandom's racism, I don't think that's divorced from its Islamophobia and the western (US/Hollywood) racialization of Muslims.)

As for the general fandom and racism discussion - look, I'm not going to speak over you a poc and say you should or have to notice racism in everything. It is 100% not my place to tell you how to experience/react to racism, how to interact with fandom and racism, or to say you are doing it wrong.

I'm personally coming from a different mindset - that racism does affect everything, and that fandom is absolutely not different in that regard, and that reactions to racism (either for people of color in general or the specific identity being talked about) are not monolithic.  

I also think - while I get why you use it - the word 'trendy' does a disservice to fandom racism discussions and how those got co-opted and conflated in the larger cancel/call out culture.  Cause

racism being used as an excuse/reason to cancel something ("I hate this, and here's racism as a reason no one should like it/why you are a bad person for liking it")

racism being discussed as an important issue canon failed at ("I'm criticizing the canon and depending on what it is, I may think canon's racism should hold the highest priority in terms of canon's worth")

racism being looked at through the lens of fandom ("racism permeates every facet of this world and that includes canon/fandom, here's how")

are all different things, and while the first one is used a lot more, and all of them are a lot more visible now, I don't think the other two are that much more accepted than they were before.

I only caught the periphery bones of the top/bottom joe/nicky controversy, but my understanding is these two sides collided very badly: side a) early into fandom people pointed out the trend, related it to how that trend works in every other fandom, discussed specifically how bias in interracial and interfaith relationships are likely to show up in this fandom and that dynamic, called for more nuance/thought into this dynamic, and all of that got flattened into "top!Joe is and only is racist, and you're a racist for liking it." and side b) because call out/cancel/purity culture, fans (specifically including fans of color) were being called racist for either engaging in the characters the "wrong way" or not engaging at all, pushing them to create content they didn't want to create, left the fandom due to harassment/bullying, and got treated like even the hint of top!Joe was the Worst Thing They Could Ever Do, so that even suggesting racial bias may play a part on shipping dynamics for joe/nicky is completely unreasonable/without merit. That, again, is how my (limited) view followed the issue, and like everyone else where I fall on the spectrum of that discussion is very much dependent on the circles of fandom I float in.

[aurirising]

Another potentially unpopular/controversial opinion

From the girl who brought you the long defense of Kal/call out of the squad, comes the thrilling and really rather contradictory sequel. I humbly present to you A Defense of Squad 312 because nuance is fun and important and I'm nothing if not fair in a situation like this.

Okay, so, to clarify, I'm not necessarily going to be saying that their actions were morally right or that I agree with them per se, but, what I am going to do is explain why some of them make sense and are understandable given the circumstances and who the characters are as people.

I'm gonna go character by character here and first up we have Scarlett. Go big or go home right?

So, Scarlett has possibly the worst reaction, but also the most justified. Everyone in that squad has gone through absolute hell but Scarlett has at this point suffered the most, second only to maybe Auri (who has had time to process and let go and move on and stuff in the Echo but we can get to that later). Let's remember that both books in their entirety span less than 2 WEEKS and in that time Scarlett has:

Had a death scare for her brother on the very night all this started

Been shoved into an incredibly dangerous mission which she, along with everyone else, was completely unprepared for

Been attacked by God knows how many different groups of people almost everyday INCLUDING AURI, even if that wasn't really her and she didn't want to do that

Lost her absolute best friend in the universe thanks to this mission neither of them really signed up for

Had to watch her brother, the only family she has left who she absolutely adores, fight a monster with a TINY KNIFE and almost watch him get killed right in front of her

Watched all the people she's grown to care for and feels at least somewhat responsible for get hurt and nearly killed over and over again

Actually lost her brother to the clutches of the very people/being that took away her best friend maybe a week ago and doesn't know if he's even still alive or what might be happening to him

Been thrown into a leadership role she has never wanted or trained for under the absolute worst circumstances and doesn't have time to grieve anything that's happened to her and is now being slowly crushed under the pressure of leading the squad and keeping them safe that even Tyler - the best Alpha in their year - struggled with

And this isn't even to mention the fact that the Starslayer killed her father and his relation to Kal did in fact put them all at higher risk from the Unbroken even if, like I mentioned in my Kal post, this can't all be blamed straight on him.

Now, although this isn't all Kal's fault and, if Scarlett was thinking more rationally, she'd realise that, you have to remember that she ISN'T thinking rationally. Look at that list and tell me that if you'd been through all that, you'd be thinking clearly and I will straight up call you a liar because we humans are incredibly emotional beings and stress and loss makes us do all kinds of things we'd not normally do. And Scarlett, well Scarlett is one of the most deeply emotional people of all.

Throughout both books, it's repeatedly said and shown how much and how deeply she cares, even about these people she's only just met, and, I mean, she's a FACE for gods sake, feelings and caring about people and being in touch with the emotions of others to better negotiate is literally part of her job and one of her core personality traits. If that kind of stuff would destroy any one of us, it would without a doubt destroy her too. And then to get such an earth-shattering piece of news that could at first glance link directly to most of her problems? Well that is just the straw that breaks the Camel's back and so she lashes out. It makes sense, it's understandable and an emotional response that doesn't come out of nowhere. It's been built to all this time and no, it's not fair and it's not right, but when you snap, you snap and Kal is about the only thing right in front of her that she can see having caused her some of these problems that she can let it out on.

I want to reiterate once again that this isn't right. It's not an action that's supposed to be okay, it's one that highlights the flaws in good people and that doing what's right isn't always easy and people sometimes act selfishly. But the fact remains that she had a reason for behaving how she did, even if it wasn't a good reason, and though she acted incredibly harshly, that doesn't make her a bad person, it just makes her a person.

Also like, if I remember rightly it wasn't her who was first to tell Kal he needed to leave but choosing as the leader to do so also makes sense in circumstance. Something like that reveal will create something of a rift whether people want it to or not. When you find something like that out, you absolutely would start questioning what you know about a person in even the best of times and, as we've already established, this is far from the best of times. With everything going on and the crushing weight of grief and anxiety and fear and doubt and everything else she's feeling, it isn't surprising that she would opt for the simplest solution to this. Whether Kal was trustworthy or not and regardless of whether he'd been the cause of any problems before or would be in the future, if he's not there, he can't possibly cause any further problems and they can focus on what they have to do without that extra worry on their minds. In both a tactical leadership sense and from a highly emotional view, it makes sense and I get why she and the others chose that.

Once again, I'm not saying it's fair or right or just, but it is understandable and one poor and somewhat cruel decision does not make Scarlett a mean person.

Okay, moving on. You'll be glad to know I'm not gonna go on so much with the other characters because there was significantly more to talk about in regards to Scarlett than any of the others.

I'm actually gonna talk about Fin and Zila together because I feel a lot of their reaction comes from a similar place and they handle it in ways not too different from each other.

So for both of these guys I got the impression that they were more shell shocked and a little hurt rather than truly angry like Scarlett. They don't do or say a whole lot in this scene in comparison to Scar and Auri and Zila even tries to mediate just the tiniest bit at the begining. Both of them really seem to mostly be puzzling it out and trying to deal with the hurt of being deceived somewhat (especially Fin after he'd shared some meaningful bonding moments with Kal and had also come to him about the note and been lied to then) and barely get involved in the whole thing. Fin really only does when it looks like things are about to get physical between Kal and Scarlett and it's more out of worry that her rage is going to get her hurt if she tries to punch him or something (which is exactly what happens). And Zila is just in distress throughout the whole thing and again this doesn't seem to be specifically because of Kal but more from the fracturing of this group she'd started to feel at home in and like she belonged. She'd been coming out of her shell in the last few days after finally letting these people in and starting to feel safe with them and then this huge fight and breaking up happens and it's like another family unit is all being ripped away from her again and it triggers that trauma response that makes her start shutting down again.

Similarly I can see some of that response happening a little bit in Fin because he also has never felt like he belonged and has always been cast out and he finally found a group that cared about him and didn't consider him a burden because of his disability and he's also having that torn apart which can't be easy even if he seems to handle it better than Zila since it's more traumatic for her.

They both have milder reactions that are able to be somewhat more logical in approach since they comparatively have less emotional investment in some of the implications of this reveal than both Scarlett and Auri do. However, they're both still deeply hurt by the fracture this has caused within the group and Kal is in fact part of the cause of that fracture for them so they go along with Auri and Scarlett (who is literally their leader now and following orders and sticking together is so important to these two now that they have this group. They don't want to lose any more of it). And like I mentioned in the Scarlett section, they're smart and they recognise that distrust within the group as they head into what's next is incredibly dangerous and a huge detriment to the mission so since they are understandably hurt and a bit unsure now, they make the logical decision to reduce the potential risk in keeping him around.

Okay so a quick bit on Tyler. He, like Scarlett, is understandably hurt by finding out about Kal but his reaction is muted and more reasonable after what he's gone through with Saedii on the TDF ship and also due to the gravity of his situation and everything going on with Cat somewhat overshadowing it all. I don't think anyone is really mad at Tyler so I'll move on, but I think his level of hurt, betrayal, and anger is more in line with what I'd expect from him and probably Scarlett if she hadn't been through all she had and was being more rational.

So, where my irritation starts coming into play more is with Auri. She's spent 6 months with Kal in the Echo where they grew closer and more in love and I guess I can see questioning all that because if he lied about that for all that time then what else could he lie about? But there's also the debate to be had about certain point of view like in Star Wars and whether omission of something that might never really have needed to be said is acceptable. And the thing is, I can't give a definitive answer on that because every person is going to have a different opinion on that idea in general and on Kal's handling of this situation in particular based on what we've experienced in our own lives and where we draw the right/wrong line or handle the grey area of morality. With something like this, there really isn't much in the way of a right answer and that's okay.

But I think the thing I see with Auri which makes her a bit more understandable here is how she's using Kal's OWN WORDS to rationalise this and figure out how to feel. "And I remember you said our past makes us what we are." That part in bold is what Kal told her, what she knows he believes. When you know someone holds that belief and then you find out THAT is their past, there will be a question mark over them no matter how well you think you know them.

Also, Auri has dealt with so much loss lately and time and again people and systems she should have been able to trust and feel safe with have let her down or turned against her and, speaking as someone with some level of trust issues, I know it's incredibly hard to get rid of doubt after it's started to set in and all too easy to call up any small moment that might support that doubt, so I can see why Auri might be doing that now.

I am still personally of the opinion that Auri should have reacted better and known him well enough to not have acted that way but remember this is a defense post and I already gave the other side (at least most of it) on my Kal defense post.

I think we're gonna leave it here now. And in conclusion of both of these posts, whichever side of this you come down on more (or even if you sit in the middle like me), that's completely fine and valid and you're not wrong for feeling a certain way about a situation like this. Fundamentally, it comes down to which characters you most identify with and who's experiences most resonate with you.

It's not a clear cut right and wrong thing because literally every single character handled something badly and everyone's motives, including Kal's, were understandable in some way and believable. They're all people and people are flawed and selfish and jump to conclusions and lash out and although we have to remember that those aren't morally sound things to do, they're a shared human experience.

I know no one asked for this long-ass analysis of this scene and situation but as a writer and film student, scene and character analysis is kinda what I DO so I thought I'd go ahead and make this post. Something like this is actually brilliant writing from Jay and Amie because there's a lot more nuance to it than a quick glance at the situation might suggest and since it's such a hot topic in this fandom after Aurora Burning, I wanted to address it and make sure a bit more of an in depth look was taken into exactly what happened.

Anyway,

Tl;dr: this is something of a counter point to my Kal defense post and every member of the squad had understandable reason for reacting the way they did in this situation, even if they may have been too harsh. People are flawed and these characters are no exception, but that's okay.