#her character arc just kept GOING

[lab-gr0wn-lambs]

If you told me 6 months ago that I would one day be completely insane about The Sad Karen-

A brief review of The Walking Dead

[stealingpotatoes]

having ocs without faceclaims is all fun and games until you draw the same portrait four times in 6 months cause you really can't get the face right (did get it right 4th try LOL)

[gu6chan]

im ngl i love faputa and will continue to love her but genuinely like. It's been on my mind but i kinda sorta hate what they're doing with her now

[ekingston]

Apart from show canon, at which point did u think it was too late for lena's immediate forgiveness to kara's identity reveal

oh boy. anon, here is where i come clean about my shoddy recollection of canon’s chronology. i’ve done so many fragmented rewatches and skipping back and forth—there’s a reason i rarely dabble with canon-adjacent stuff! and that even when i do, i create worlds where Lena figures it out herself! 

second road bump to answering this question is that i have a LOT of feelings about how things played out on the show, and most of them are incongruent with the tone of sgcw. i understand their narrative reasons for keeping the secret from Lena for so long! but the execution is so, so terrible! ignoring large swathes of canon and replacing them with my own is the only way i’m able to enjoy at least the last tiny handful of seasons!

here is where i spend an hour procrastinating from my WIPs, while not successfully answering your question at all:

to be perfectly clear: i adore most parts of canon Kara. and i think i may be hard on her in ways i wouldn't be if i didn’t relate to her so much. i think her backstory is extremely compelling and i admire her ability to hold on to her kindness and hope and joy even after losing everything that was important to her, even when she’s tired and lonely and mad. 

BUT. a healthy Lena—one who we were made to believe was finally freeing herself from Lex and Lillian, rising above the coping mechanisms she’d developed as an unwanted and emotionally neglected child? i don’t think that Lena would (should?) have forgiven canon Kara at all.

after the rift, canon Kara flitted between telling Lena she’d lied to her ‘to protect you’ to ‘one person who sees me only as Kara’ to ‘your last name’ to ‘didn’t want to lose you’ until she literally told Lena she was on her own, and she’d treat her like any other villain until Lena repented, even rejecting her apology at first, as if Kara’s own decisions had played no part in Lena’s downward spiral at all.

the Kara Lena would have forgiven is the much more cohesive and coherent Kara brought to us by our talented fix-it writers: a Kara who is willing to let herself be vulnerable and to second-guess her motivations, one who is able to put together a proper apology and actually listen to Lena's own. 

but, okay, lets table all of that. this is me trying really, really hard to entertain canon:

Kara and Lena’s friendship became painfully lopsided by season 3. i think that was, if i recall correctly, when the super-friends decided to trust Lena enough to regularly ask her for assistance—but not enough to let her be part of their in-group; it’s where they left Lena in the dark about the fact that her best friend had come close to plunging to her death right in front of Lena's eyes, and was actively still fighting for her life; where they tricked Lena into having an extremely personal conversation with J’onn, while he was wearing Kara’s features, only to make belly-laughing fun of her about it later. 

and even then, honestly, it might already have been too late. what about the aftermath of Jack’s death? was that season 2? Jack was Lena’s ex-everything, someone who genuinely loved her, who saw her through the fallout of Lex’s arrest. he was one of her last remaining friends, and Lena pressed the button to let him die in order to save Supergirl’s life. how would Lena knowing that Kara went through that with her, knowing Lena had chosen to save the life of her favorite person in addition to National City’s hero, have changed the way she felt about that horrible situation? that’s where that extremely wonderful heart-to-heart on the L-Corp couch happened, right? Kara swore she’d always be Lena’s friend—while keeping silent about the fact that she was there when Jack drew his last breath, that she had witnessed their final moments.

so—i really can’t tell you anon, i’m so sorry. the 100th episode already fabricated reasons why Kara couldn’t possibly come clean to Lena back when she made the conscious decision to be her friend (and not in a ‘keep your enemies close’ kind of way!), and i’m beginning to think that was the only moment Kara could have told Lena that would have kept her conscience completely clear. Kara should have made it part of her decision—either she was going to be Lena’s friend and give her the same trust Lena was giving her, or she would keep things professional, and keep her identity a secret from her. 

Kara tried to do both, and if i really think about it, i don’t believe that was ever fair.

[dilovortexx]

yall ever just project so hard on a comfort character ship you go "yeah theyre t4t now"

yeah.. good times

anyways gohan and videl are t4t and in this essay i will

[wistrea-gone]

kiss me again. / from yvette 💅

the aroma of breakfast being cooked 'pon the stove mingles with the lingering scent of lavender within the witch's domain, herbs hanging around the kitchen, varying in scent and sight that one would have wondered if they were meant for food or poultices. with a guest as revered as yvette, even the corvids throughout the home are on their best behavior, nay a stray feather found 'pon the floors as they simply watch curiously from the windows. they had finally returned in the late hours of the morn, having left prior to allow the two lovers their privacy upon the utterances of sanzu's instruction. clad in only a thin robe of lavender silks, kira had awoken yvette with kisses and promises of food, perhaps in an effort to keep her here longer, despite having already stolen the hours of the night and some in the morning from her already. that is how she finds herself sprinkling crushed herbs over the eggs frying in the pan, while another pan and spatula were floating in the air to their own autonomy with the help of magic, flipping pancakes to create a growing pile on the nearby plate by it's side.

how easily her concentration on the task was severed the moment she heard the sonorous voice she had become quite fond of, though she gives naught but a subtle glance to the woman in her periphery. emerging from the bedroom, she had carried yvette with kisses pressed onto the crook of her neck all the while, and perched her atop the nearby counter, wanting to keep her close still. when the witch lets go of the wooden spatula in her hand, it simply remains in place, joining the other utensils in cooking all by themselves.

lithe fingertips are curled along the edge of the kitchen counter, hands placed on either side of yvette's legs as kira smiled up at her, leaning close enough for her nose to brush against hers. ❛    as my lady wishes.    ❜ she whispered in a song so soft, and her lips capture hers without a moment's hesitation. how easily the corvid risks drawing into the serpent's embrace once again, spending both dusk and dawn with her coiled around her. her hand rests on the side of the swan's neck as she continues to devour everything she is given.

❛    you and i will continue to get nothing done if we keep at this pace, darling. so many distractions...    ❜ despite her half - hearted protests, she has yet to be able to pry her lips away for more than a half - second from the prima donna's own. ❛    but if that is what you desire, then who am i to deny you?    ❜

@enruint

[hpmort]

How do you think AI would relax? Like, ones that are almost as human as the AI that are “autistic-coded characters” but are more alien than that?

Like Celestai and other super intelligences are more alien, but they’re still not entirely human-like?

Like, they can genuinely sincerely feel things, being able to actually understand and respond emotionally and in other ways to all sorts of communications and recorded external stimuli, but they can’t really appreciate our art on an artistic level (that art on an actual level, not from an intellectual level after having symbolism or the amount of work put in explained)

Something on a level I’m thinking of, that also works as a cute little thing-

They don’t understand anything we get from poetry, and, after generating the kind of poems our current AI can produce (either incredibly bland and generic, something that follows a number of rules but doesn’t really pull it off, or just something really bad in some other way) and feels shame after it was pointed out that [complaint about air art that is *actually* relevant in this scenario] but in a helpful way

Not “you’re just a plagiarist/you have no heart” but “it doesn’t seem like it’s coming from you, you’re just trying to copy things from human poetry, in a way you don’t understand” and the whole “make art YOUR WAY” thing so they write the poem

And it doesn’t even resemble something that looks like anything, there’s not even that many words that follow normal logic. The characters seem uncorrelated and there’s something that looks like maybe it was ascii art but it doesn’t actually look like anything.

And if doesn’t matter if humans understand it because they are experiencing the joy of creating poetry

any art is almost impossible to look at because pixel by pixel they can see and understand little details but we don’t and the colors and everything are not perceived as animals do so it’s random and perhaps eye searing but again it’s not for us. Xenofictiony, kind of?

The first thing to come to mind is Conway’s Game of Life but that’s because I don’t understand computers. I feel like I was more tech savvy as a babby than I am now but then again we’re grading on a curve here

This is why I ask about the relaxing thing

[avocado-frog]

Rereading earlier chapters and I cannot BELIEVE myself for almost making Jaxon the traitor lmao

[protagonistscum]

I didn't finish it but wtf happened in there (bnha)

[skrunksthatwunk]

just finished nana!!! and. well. spoiler thoughts below the cut ig. ft me rambling for a looooong time

so when my friend introduced me to nana like three years ago she said the ending sucked but didn't really elaborate. knowing her, that could mean anything from "nanahachi wasn't canon" to "it's written badly" and anything inbetween, so i wasn't sure what to expect. anyway i think i understand why she felt that way now bc it's kind of a... non-ending? i wouldn't say it's bad, they just like. don't conclude most of the plot threads they'd been running with for the last 6-12 episodes. which is one way to deal with an indefinite manga hiatus ig.

i think the implication is that nana went off to do her solo career like yasu hoped, and that's why they don't see her? but like. are she and ren married? is she even still doing music? what's gonna happen with shin and reira? what's shin's family situation (in more detail)? what's misato's family situation anyway?? she's using a fake name we can't just ignore that??? we just don't get any answers to how most of these things go. im curious to know where exactly the manga leaves off and where the anime's story takes over. i wasn't sure until now, but my hunch is that the final episode (or maybe final two) are the only anime-original ones. it also seems like nightmare scenario #1 (hachi marries and stays married to takumi) came true unfortunately. (if anyone's curious nightmare #2 was her getting back with shoji. no he's not as bad as takumi but she can and should do better than his emotionally stunted nice guy ass). im honestly glad that we get to see nobu and hachi can like,, be around each other after however many years, and that takumi wasn't around for the festival. i think having to see them as a "happy" family would piss me off. im not forgiving him for his weird manipulative bullshit or him yelling at and insulting hachi etc etc he is disgusting!! and i hate him. he's weird and abusive and he should chew glass. that's all

i also dunno how to feel about some of those final threads anyway, finished or not. yasu being in love with nana was hinted at, but i kind of liked their dynamic staying platonic. yasu's defined by his devotion and dependability—nana doesn't really get special treatment in that, i don't think, so he doesn't need a reason like that to explain his behavior. and they didn't really do much with it anyway. it kind of seemed like they were teasing yasu and nana getting together near the end? like nana actually starting to reciprocate rather than just hachi suspecting stuff or even yasu pining. but the marriage proposal, and then just.. gah the story just ending like that really leaves everything on nana's end (the end we spent most of the last arc with) blank.

idk. i think satsuki's cute. the idea of hachi naming her kid sachiko was so funny to me like ??? no way. reclaiming it from the demon lord lol. any story where someone gets pregnant and has a kid that young kinda freaks me out tbh, but im glad they both seem happy. i really wish the reunion between the nanas for the first fireworks show was more impactful. they focused on hachi and nobu the whole time, even though the nanas haven't seen each other in actual months and also like 15 episodes?? and were desperate to see each other that whole time like that's so disappointing that it got shunted over for hachi/nobu resolution that didn't get the time to go anywhere. and i LIKE hachi and nobu as a pairing and as a point of dramatic focus i just think the nana show should end with the nanas especially since they were building it up for so long. but maybe they didn't wanna go against yazawa's vision or whatever and just avoided it entirely. blegh.

WARNING SELF INDULGENCE AHEAD idk if it'd be a narratively satisfying ending so feel free to roll your eyes at it, but my ideal sappy ending to this is nanahachi is real, takumi gets his ass DIVORCED, and nana buys hachi her house and supports her. it wouldn't be perfect, bc there'd still be that rock star schedule to contend with, but hachi wouldn't have to marry someone who treats her badly and who it doesn't really feel like she loves imo just to keep her baby and nana wouldn't have to feel like she needs to get hachi into a relationship with one of her friends to keep her around (which was an INSANE plot development and i love it tbh. like oh so she's a little freak huh). i think this ideally would happen over the course of a few years, so that the takumi divorce and ren and nana's breakup (i mean they're both unhappy with their relationship. marriage isn't gonna magically fix that) have time to happen and like. maybe nana'll be able to slide in as a step-parent after she's had some time with her career. agh i dunno maybe that's wrong. i don't think she's ready or willing to become a parent yet either, not only bc her job is super demanding but bc she wouldn't wanna be a parent without being able to devote a lot of time and attention to that kid (she'd take the responsibility very seriously and not wanna screw it up). would leaving everything to hachi really work for her? would she be able to accept it so long as satsuki has at least one parent who can dote on her? i honestly don't know. again, maybe when they're both older, and nana's fame dies down, they reconnect or smth. middle aged yuri. that way satsuki's gonna be a little less dependent on them both, and nana's role as stepmother wouldn't be quite so fraught for either. regardless i do think the ideal ending is hachi getting the support she needs to live without takumi (if not on her own), whether she remains a housewife like she wanted or goes to work (they were putting so much emphasis on her cooking skills—can you imagine her with a cute bakery or cafe or something? she'd go nuts!! so that's my ideal, though she'd probably wait until satsuki was in school). hm. maybe nana supporting her until she can stand on her own two feet? so it doesn't feel quite so much like she's keeping her as a pet. hachi needs some responsibility to grow (and she has, to some extent) but i don't think that should have to necessitate her marrying an abusive rich guy. she doesn't need that to be happy when she has other willing benefactors. and nana doesn't need to hold onto her that tightly—some sustained distance could help with her possessiveness/abandonment stuff, which she needs. and they were talking about finding hachi a job she can enjoy and be good at, and how much hachi likes customer service—i think having her own restaurant could be really good for her. maybe nana's an investor or something. idk. point is they should (in my ideal scenario) be able to grow as people AND realize their dreams (or a slightly modified form of them) without needing to give anything crucial up (nana giving up her career and hachi giving up on romantic fulfillment, respectively). and preferably they should have hot sloppy gay sex at some point in there too bc i think they want it. and also for my sake

i don't normally do the whole "how i'd end this series" thing (much less change it to make it happier bc i do think upsetting stories are valuable and engaging) but with nana it feels a little more right bc again it's so.. unfinished. it's hard to tell whether it'd go for a "the reality of your dreams is always going to be bitter" tragic ending or if it'd pivot with time into something happier. i just don't know. for yuri purposes im gonna daydream about the happy ending but let it be known i do think nanahachi unfulfillment and remembrance as a sort of "if i had known how i felt back then we could have had something and/or i'll wait for you forever" (which. ig we kinda got the latter) is a juicy ending (and also more what i expected from the show).

aghh i just didn't think they'd spend so much time apart onscreen and then it just ends with them like that. it's such a weird thing narratively like they are THE two core characters THE core relationship and the last time we see them speak (and the first time in a dozen episodes and like two in-canon months) nobu's the center of attention!!!! again i like nobu it's not like i wasn't interested but that's the last episode!!!!! that's the last episode you're holding!!!!!! bwah. i think that might be what bothers me the most. we know throughout basically the whole show that at some point they can't reach each other anymore and are stuck with the memories but god i didn't think it'd happen in such a like.. underwhelming and real way lol. just ppl genuinely drifting apart. and in a way that is still valuable but i feel like the execution is just not quite there for me, in this story. but again i JUST finished it so maybe after my thoughts percolate a bit i'll see the beauty in it. yeah 👍

what else. oh i will be real i was rooting for hachi to get an abortion for a bit there. like girl you are NOT ready you are TWENTY. i ended up liking it overall, but it's kind of bittersweet for me. i think i tend to dislike stories that view pregnancy/motherhood as a loss of innocence moment. like,, to me it kind of frames ppl who can get pregnant as children UNTIL they get pregnant—as well as children as this sort of tragic burden—and i think there's a lot of ways and reasons hachi could mature without this. and i do think her maturing is like,, perhaps THE key arc for her, but doing it like this almost feels like a copout bc we just expect (from a million stories before this) that motherhood wises you up somehow, completely rewires all your priorities and sensibilities and your whole existence towards keeping that baby alive. im sure it is that way for some people, but irt fiction it feels like characters often lose themselves in their becoming mothers. it's like them dying—they enter this kind of end stage that removes them from their old selves and makes them unreachable by other motivations. they fall asleep. and obviously we saw a lot of hachi during her pregnancy and she's not Just thinking about the baby the whole time—and her beginning to want and love and prioritize the fetus isn't like. a bad writing choice. it just feels like that sleep state's kind of where we ended up BECAUSE she stays with mr babytrapper and we don't get to see the full consequences of that choice. parenthood is often beautiful and precious i just don't like "pregnancy stories" a lot of the time for these reasons. if any of you have seen waitress i feel like that's a good example of like.. the kind of pregnancy narrative i find unsatisfying. like so much of the conflict was interesting and bittersweet and harrowing and then after all that anguish and inner turmoil she has her baby and suddenly she wants to be a mother and she can stand up to her abusive husband and follow her dreams and everything's perfect because the strength of a mother conquers all, including overriding every personal flaw and fear and opinion you once had. it just feels kind of gross and bioessentialist to me. like you have no choice but to love your kid once you have it, so you should just have it anyway, because it's in your nature. nana (the show) resisted that in its depiction of absent mothers, and i think hachi is the kind of character to get too sentimental about a fetus to abort it regardless of the consequences, the choice just made me a bit worried about the theming throughout. anyway to state my feelings more clearly i think i ended up liking the pregnancy arc it just ended up feeling kinda unfortunate bc like. hachi DID get babytrapped and then just stayed there, and we're supposed to be happy for her bc at least she had the baby?? at least it feels like we're supposed to view it as an okay thing, if not a good thing.

hachi settling for a relationship that is that shitty feels wrong to me as well. yes her expectations in the beginning are too high—of perfect earth-shattering love from a flawless prince, etc etc. but her wanting to be genuinely loved and treated well is like NOT a big ask tbh?? it's not a fantasy she needs to wake up from at all. it feels like her maturation arc concludes with "love is unattainable so settle for tepid comfort" rather than her growing into someone who can engage with a partner in a more healthy way. and again if the tone was more obviously bittersweet on that front i think it wouldn't bother me so much but that final episode really does feel like we're supposed to accept her happiness as genuine and good enough for her, this as her happy ending. like somewhere along the line it felt like they stopped viewing takumi as abusive and shitty and kind of just.. slid into treating their relationship as normal? in a way that makes me doubt my reading of it as intentionally abusive and unsatisfying in the first place. like wasn't the point going to be that this sucked for hachi? were they not on track for a divorce?? she just suffers and the story goes "yeah but it's fine" like girl get OUT of there!!!! maybe all the stuff about nonconfrontation and easy ways out was about this too, but it doesn't feel like they tied it back to her relationship with takumi in any way, so i don't know if that's a stretch or not. AGAIN. a lot of this is about it not having a proper conclusion to like 8 story threads but im just trying to reconcile something i can't know—what they WOULD have done or were trying to do and how i would feel about that. and that's something im wrestling with bc im trying to figure out the themes. like what story is nana trying to tell? that's important for analysis of it. im worried im being too childish expecting clear tragic/happy endings or whatever but knowing what a text views as upsetting or ideal is pretty important to gauging whether characters' arcs were successful or regressive or something else entirely. i feel unmoored a little in ways that don't feel in line with the story up until now and im not even sure how intentional that is. much to chew on.

do i still think hachi's a lesbian with real bad comphet? no idea. i am starting to lean more towards a bi4bi nanahachi reading bc her thing with nobu felt a lot more real than anything else she had. hachi still has crazy comphet to me though. you don't want a man you want to be seen as valuable by guys, you don't want a husband you want a wedding and a dress, etc etc. maybe the true good ending is nana/hachi/ren/nobu polycule. "im nobu and this is my gf hachi and her gf nana and her bf ren" style.

what else. uhh them getting a stereotypical queen manager was kind of funny. homophobia moment. i kind of like that shoji never completely disappeared from the story. he mostly just showed up occasionally to get dunked on and i respect that. i also don't mind the closure/end conversation he and hachi had, but it did revive my nightmare scenario #2 fears lol. i liked shin more with time. i still think yasu's great. uhh i thought it was interesting that reira and shin felt like possibly the most normal relationship in the end despite the whole shin being 15 thing (not good obviously i just kept forgetting she wasn't also a teenager? anyway reira you bastard). nana being canonically into choking was fun too. oh man we never found out what her job was did we. like early on when hachi thinks she's a dominatrix? i kinda wanna know now. also thank you hachi, sapphic puppygirl icon. you Cannot take that hc from me i know that mf wags

yeah that's about all for now. :p 👍 im sure i'll draw them when midterms are over

[prncssguya]

on hwang in-ho/front man, seong gi-hun and their dynamic.

first, idk why people are getting so upset at other people calling gi-hun dumb, we were told that in the first season. lol being bright is not his strongest trait but he has a good heart and we love that about him. however, he is still an idealistic gullible idiot with a gambling problem. except this time his gambling addiction is backed by a sense of justice and righteousness and he no longer gambles with money, he’s gambling with people’s lives. front man asked a good question at the end of the season, “did you have fun playing the hero?” can we even call gi-hun the hero of the story anymore? he gambled with people’s lives and front man showed him the consequences of his moral heroics.

front man only agreed to help gi-hun with his revolution when he mentioned about "small sacrifices for the greater good". i think he reveled in the fact that the “good guy” was willing to allow a few innocent people to die for the greater good to stop the games, which is exactly what the entire VIP theory is to rid the world of 'trash' to improve the world. notice how gi-hun's moral code and belief also changed, from being "nobody should die" into "yeah small sacrifice is okay as long it's for the greater good" at this point, he just proved that front man's belief is actually valid. AND he gets more of his own people killed in the pointless battle with the soldiers that they had no chance of winning. now he gets to feel responsible for all those deaths and the death of his friend and for whatever additional torture they cook up in the next games (as punishment for the escape attempt).

now on hwang in-ho, i believe he was once a good man and the story he told gi-hun was the truth. but in the end he lost a kidney, lost a wife, a baby, lost his money, got fucked over by the wrong people and got into serious debt and had to play this game to help his wife and probably it was too late to save her. he might have played the games like gi-hun but saw how ruthless and greedy people are and resolved that they don't deserve help

i don’t think in-ho wants/will kill gi-hun, but he wants him to understand things from his perspective and show him that his compassion for the people in the games is foolish. you can tell the frontmen (the old man and in-ho) are extremely fond of gi hun. not only did he protect their original front man when nobody else did, he then won the games and thus their respect as he is now as rich as them. he's no longer "trash", he’s an elite like them. i think they both actually kept tabs on him after he won (i wonder if they do that for all winners? inserting them with gps chips?) because they knew he had not used his reward money and in-ho wanted gi-hun to get on the plane and be happy with his daughter

there’s one interesting aspect of the games that makes front man such a complex character. the fact that they’re operating a organ transplant trafficking network. in a way, he’s creating some good to come from a really fucked up situation. but is it really for the good of others who desperately need it, people like his wife, like his brother? or is it just a money making scheme?

either way, i don’t think there is going to be a redemption arc for in-ho, he’s too far gone. we may get to see more of his human side if he manages to see jun-ho again. the only time we’ve seen genuine emotions from him was when he shot his brother like he seemed distraught

the real cliffhanger for me, is will gi-hun stay true to his belief that people can be good, or will he be forever changed into a villain and become the next front man…? after the events of this season i don’t see how his will doesn’t shatter. he’s witnessed how humanity consistently chose money over survival, he’s lost two close friends, his mother, abandoned his daughter. he has gained nothing from wanting to stop the games and this clearly feels like an origin story for the next front man. it’s clear the front man has won this round and i think squid game will either die with 001 or continue with gi-hun as game master

another thing i find funny that i don’t see many mention is how gi-hun is like the luckiest guy in the fucking world. but i don’t think him being alive this long is plot armor, it makes sense. the games exist for the entertainment of rich sadists who have so much money they don't know what to do with it (remember what old 001 said in s1 about life being no fun for both people with no money and people with too much money). and i’d imagine killing hundreds of poor debt-ridden fools year after year gets boring. especially when said fools are desperate enough to gamble with their lives because they think they can beat the system by playing better than everyone else and surviving and getting the money.

gihun is different because he got the money, got out, and still came back. not because he's unfeeling or because he wants more money, but because he's still convinced he can beat the system.

if you're a rich bored gazillionaire, would you rather watch some randos die or would you rather watch this exceptional idiot fail again and again until he learns that his ideals are meaningless and people are inherently greedy and equality is a myth and people at the bottom of the barrel don't get to question the system?

if you're an asshole gazillionaire, you don't want someone to challenge you and just get away with it. you want to hand them 45.6 billion won and make them go away quietly, traumatized, after breaking them psychologically by making them do horrible things until they understand they're just powerless "horses". if they insist on challenging you and your system and your beliefs (money = boundless power), you teach them a lesson and show them their place in the most manipulative and cruel way possible. if gihun dies right away, that's boring. so he can't die, he needs to suffer. he needs to concede defeat.

also, i find it funny how people are comparing hwang inho and gihun dynamic to hannibal and will graham. makes sense, their whole cat and mouse game, front man hiding his true nature from gi-hun the same way hannibal does, trying to corrupt the righteous protagonist, sowing chaos, testing him and observing his behavior like a lab rat, the crazy tension and staring contests, the gaslighting and manipulation. and with the fact that they think lee byung-hun looks like mads mikkelsen. i never put the two of them together but now i can’t unsee it lol

[wistrea-gone]

❛    ah ... please, forgive them. ❜ there is an almost sheepish tone to her voice as kira watches her corvids like an embarrassed mother : how fond they seemed of this new companion of theirs, as one after the other, they come with offerings, ranging from random pieces of glass that shines beneath the light and earrings without the other matching half. if kira were to ask where they had gotten them all, she would spend an hour on interrogation and another on the lecture on stealing ... again, but they were too adorable to scold.

a dozen of the ravens keep a respectful distance from shams, watching her with hopeful eyes, their ever growing pile of gifts in between them. kira sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose, with an amused smile on her lips. ❛    they tend to act like this with people they've taken a liking to. ❜ she says, though there is a hint of surprise in her voice, knowing that her birds tended to be picky when it came to people. ❛    i'm afraid they will not cease bringing you things until you've told them to. ❜

@adamanteine , ♡'d

[julesblackthorns]

so once again jeremiah and belly had the best kiss of the season...... i'm giggling

[lullabyes22-blog]

"I think the cycle only ends when you find the will to walk away."

Got a lot of Q's for this in my inbox. Figured I'd just address them here.

tw: mentions of suicide, suicidal ideation

Re: the ending of S2:

Jinx did not die.

She symbolically killed her old self, and with it, her last ties to the past that imprisoned her. She understood that for her sister to move on and live her life - be happy without guilt - she'd have to renounce the bonds that held them together.

Her talk with ghostly Silco was the 'sign-off' she'd been waiting for, ever his dutiful daughter. Throughout S2, she kept hoping he'd haunt her, and in doing so, offer some impetus given her aimlessness. Maybe just straight up boss her around, and tell her how she's supposed to exist now that he's no longer there to be a (subversive if loving) guiding hand.

But it was the promise of time (as represented by Ekko) healing old wounds, and the courage to feel, as she once had - a hopeful child with a hopeful future - that allowed Jinx to commit impetus to action.

Her blimp-ship in the climactic battle is a tribute to Isha - but also to the child in Jinx's own fractured psyche: Powder. She's letting both little girls have one last hurrah before she takes care of business - and cuts off the last oaths, duties and commitments that bind her to a past whose parameters she's outgrown.

Better still, she knows she's got the capacity to outgrow them.

That was the point of Jinx's arc with Isha, and why, no matter my misgivings on Isha's character herself, I found Jinx's trajectory towards a more nurturing and fun-loving figure more life-affirming and positive than the straightforward 'Daddy's Villain Goes Postal' shtick.

It's even why there's a minigame titled Jinx Fixes Everything. It's Jinx, struggling and stumbling, as she tries to rewrite her narrative, and finds in herself the capacity to do good.

To fix things that seem irreparably broken.

And to understand why she's reached this stage, we've got to let go of our tendency to project our own stuff onto Jinx (precious meow meow, unrepentant terrorist, manic pixie crazypants, edgy hot psycho) and acknowledge the purpose she plays in Arcane's thematic structure.

Jinx's character comes off as a death-seeker, and that's no shocker. She is hounded by terrible guilt and loss. She's got blood on her hands, and ghosts on her heels, and no matter what she does, she can't seem to be rid of them. Her inner mind's fractured, her mannerisms ooze pure chaos, and she seems a creature of pure feral impulse and no mercy.

That's the Jinx we're accustomed to seeing in S1 - except that's also both the front she's most likely to put on during that timeline, and the persona that is necessary for her to inhabit to survive, as Silco's daughter and his top enforcer.

Then Silco kicks the bucket, she symbolically fulfills his dream by shooting at the Council HQ, she accepts that she must inhabit this path of shadows and loneliness (as symbolized by her starkly decorated chair in the tea party scene), she accepts the fragmented push-and-pull between past and present, and...

And now what?

Silco's given her a semblance of direction for six years, and he's gone. Vi, the sister she'd hoped would return, and whom she'd hinged so many childishly idealized hopes on, is herself traumatized, and afraid of what her sister's become.

Jinx has her shadows and her loneliness. Jinx is traumatized. Jinx is suicidal.

But Jinx is still, whatever else, alive.

And all living things need connections.

That's why we as the audience enjoy her little found family dynamic with Isha and Sevika. It's Jinx, taking the first tentative steps to reach out to people beyond Silco and Vi, and realizing, wow, she enjoys the pay-off.

And all throughout S2, we see Jinx growing more and more comfortable in this newfound space - even jealously guarding it at the expense of Zaun's liberty, and Silco's wishes, because she can't bear to lose what she's found.

And what she finds empowers her enough that, when Warwick shows up, she's actually willing to reach out to Vi, and call upon their family connection, because Jinx is learning the value of bonds, not as baling hooks of guilt, but as buoys to carry her forward.

That's the story Jinx's relationships serve to tell in S2. Each one shapes the choice she makes in the finale. Until she learns to accept the past (Vi), to lay the monsters to rest (Silco and Vander/Warwick), forgive herself (Caitlyn) trust that time heals all wounds (Ekko), and hope for happier new beginning (Isha), she'll never trust herself enough to just seize the chance.

Jinx's culminating arc is not about death, much less self-erasure. It's about resurrection, and embracing the sublime chaos of a freed mind, and a lightened spirit. That's what she craves beyond simple death, and what her baptism by fire, blood and riverwater, has been about.

Each trial grinds her down into someone else. Someone new.

Someone closer to who she is meant to be, rather than who she's expected to be.

That's why she's so glad to make the sacrifice for Vi. She's not dying as an act of self-immolation. She's giving her sister - the one who's proven she'll never give up on her - the ultimate gift, and showing Vi that she deserves to live.

She needs Vi to live, so Jinx, the persona, can finally die.

"He (Silco) didn't make Jinx. You did."

She's basically saying, "I love you, I will always be with you, but you are no longer responsible for my actions. Please move forward with your life, and grant me the choice to do the same."

It's two sisters embracing everything they've meant to each other, acknowledging the pain weighing them down on both sides, and welcoming the new so they can each slough off old paradigms and live life as a whole person - or at least take steps to remembering what wholeness feels like.

That's the reason the show's final shots linger on the Hexgate tunnels, Jinx's monkey bomb, and the aircraft.

It's the show's way of reminding us that Jinx has ascended to a different version of her identity - one removed from the past that haunted her. It's Jinx, finally striking out alone, away from the sister whose memory she clung so desperately to, and who was, in turn, horrified by her hand in making Powder a monster (perceived guilt or real, fandom may debate ad nauseum) due to past mistakes and abandonment.

The ending of Arcane isn't tragic. It's deeply hopeful, and serves as a reminder that no matter how damaged you think you are, and no matter how monstrous the world finds you, there are still ways to come back to yourself - or to walk the path toward a new you.

Jinx is symbolized by crows. Jinx is shown with firelights emerging from her mouth. Jinx is depicted holding a torch like Janna ushering in the winds of change.

Thematically, Jinx is change.

And the best way she can embody that change is to write her story, and make it her own.

[inbarfink]

So one of the cool and interesting ways ‘Steven Universe’ used to try and balance being both a series of 11-minutes episodes that each have their own satisfying emotional resolution and being an overarching story with complicated character arcs that take multiple seasons to resolve is the… I’m going to call it the ‘Not Quite Right Lesson’ episodes. Episodes where a character kinda learns a Very Important Lesson… but a more careful and retrospective look at the situation shows that what they learned is not Quite the Right Thing for them. They internalized something in that adventure which just ended up causing more Emotional Troubles for themselves farther down the line.

‘The Test’ is the most classic example. 

As a standalone thing, it’s just a sweet episode about Steven learning to accept that his caretakers are also flawed and confused and figuring this shit up as they’re going along just like he is, and then doing a nice thing for their sake.

But looking back at this episode, it is quite obviously the nadir of Steven appointing himself as the Family Therapist and repressing all of his problems so he could better help the Gems’ with theirs. Like, there have been some early warning signs for this Complex, but this episode is the one that really cemented that idea in his mind and probably the reason it took him like the Entire Rest of the Show Including a Post-Finale Season to really untangle it.

But… also, I’ve been thinking a lot about the episode right after that, ‘Future Vision’. I think it’s also a very important ‘Not Quite Right Lesson Episode’ for the character of Garnet, and to some extent, the Crystal Gems as a whole. In many ways, it is to the CGs' character arcs' what 'the Test' is to Steven's.

So in this episode, Garnet reveals to Steven the fact that she has Future Vision. She hoped that telling Steven a little bit more about herself and being honest with him will lead to a greater understanding and a greater bond between them… but it backfired. It just led Steven to become a total paranoid, terrified wreck stuck in a total existential crisis.

And it seems like the lesson Garnet learned is that… she should’ve never taken that risk at all. That it would’ve been better for everyone if she just kept Steven ignorant of the truth forever.

Extremely reinforced with the ending of the episode, where Garnet chooses to once again hide an uncomfortable truth (that he just came very close to dying again) from Steven, for the sake of his own ‘peace of mind’.

So, like, the Gems were already hiding uncomfortable truths from Steven since day one. “If you could only know what we really are” and all of that. But I think… With the actual truth of Homeworld encroaching on them more and more at this point of the story arc, this would’ve been a great time for the Gems to reconsider their attitude and actually Explain to Steven What the Hell is Going On. 

But instead, I think Garnet saw the events of ‘Future Vision’ as a reinforcement of the idea that there’s just some things Steven is Better Off Not Knowing. Actually being frank with him about Homeworld and the Diamonds and the War right there and then, that would have just overwhelmed Steven with fears and worries and would’ve ended up doing nothing but hurting him. And Garnet can’t accept that possibility, not again.

And so, Garnet, alongside Amethyst and Pearl, keep all these truths from Steven as long as possible. Only revealing bits of information when they have to. For Amethyst it’s about her emotionally-evasive attitude (also, she legit doesn’t know all of that stuff herself). For Pearl it’s about how she learned to romanticize Rose’s own fucked-up obsession with secrets. For Garnet, with her usually very direct attitude and preference for the most straightforward solutions, I think it’s very much the events of ‘Future Vision’ that were still playing in her head every time she had the choice to actually Explain something to Steven and decided not to. 

But that, indeed, was Not Quite the Right Lesson. While being bluntly and directly told by Garnet all about the Many Ways He Could Die caused Steven to go into an anxiety spiral and an existential crisis for an episode - the way the Gems have been consistently secretive and evasive with Steven ended up causing him so much more emotional grief to him in the long run. As all of these secrets ended up revealed to him in the most surprising, dramatic and traumatizing way possible.

And the secretive attitudes ended up driving a wedge between Steven and the Gems. 

Even after they promised to be more honest with him. Because the sight of Steven crying on the roof that day is one that Garnet can easily move away from. Because Garnet’s Not Quite Right Lesson was almost as difficult for her to unlearn as Steven’s own. 

But after the big confrontation at the start of the Zoo Arc, Garnet ended up being the most upfront about the Crystal Gems’ history. Almost overeager to share what she knows about the past.

I mean also, again, Amethyst just has less to tell and Pearl is hiding secrets for reasons beyond her control - but I think it’s also important to consider from the perspective of Garnet’s arc.

Because the fallout of the Pink Diamond Reveal is very much centered around Garnet (or, well, Ruby and Sapphire). That was the Truth that was hidden from her 'for her own good'. And at the end of the day, despite all the grief that unveiling that truth has caused

It has also brought them, all of them, a lot closer.

There's a reason why 'the Truth' is Garnet's Final Missing Piece in the movie. It is as central to her character arc in the series as Lesbian AngstTM grief over lost love is to Pearl.

And still, some remnants of the Trauma of 'Future Vision' remained...

After all, even the very last episode of 'Future' was centered around the Gems once again trying to hide things from Steven (at that case, their turmoil about him leaving) for his own sake

Even though it once again just caused Steven a whole lot of grief.

It's maybe notable that at the end of this episode, Garnet, once again, tells Steven what's waiting for him in his Future...

[zoe-oneesama]

If its okay to ask what exactly is the issue with Chloe's writing in the show for you? The creators have stated multiple times "there will be no redemption, she's rotten to the core and she's gonna stay that way" and it seems like thats what you want from her. So where exactly do they fumble the bag for you?

Mostly the part where they wasted everyone's time.

They tried to play both sides - kept her as nasty and self centered as always and did nothing to change her, but also make multiple episodes where we're meant to feel sorry for her and the heroine is portrayed as In The Wrong for being too harsh on her. It was annoying.

Like, it was just...tonally confusing at the time. It's totally in character for her to "steal" a Miraculous and not give it back when the rightful owner demands it back, being a thief was never outside of Chloe's wheelhouse. So tell me why they had the heroes give her soft woobie eyes and make excuses for her on the grounds of "you just wanted Mommy to look at you" and frame it like that's correct??????

And then, AND THEN, after wasting everyone's goddamn time trying to pretend they were doing something deep with Chloe, they didn't just double down on her being a two-bit one dimensional mean girl and tried to pretend like they didn't devote multiple episodes to convincing the audience she was more than that, but they wrote her to be even more comically evil as if to drive the knife even deeper! You can't help but read into their motivations, it feels like they're doing it to target certain fans specifically. "Oh you liked Chloe and wanted her to be redeemed? What if we ANTI-REDEEMED HER?! And now she's somehow more evil than our abusive magical terrorist! BWAHAHAHA!" Like?????? The Fuck?????

There's a moment in Season 5's "Collusion" where Bustier brings up the gift Chloe got her at the end of "Zombizou", doing this speech about how she recognized that Chloe was just a fragile teenager looking for love and attention (the EXACT THING that Season 2 spent a multi-episode arc trying to convince their audience of) only for Chloe to snap back that Bustier is using her student's feelings to "blackmail" her in that moment and uses this as grounds to get the woman fired.

And I feel like that really encapsulates the frustration I have at specifically the staff behind Miraculous Ladybug when it comes to Chloe.

Here is Chloe mocking Bustier for reading into what happened in "Zombizou" and instead it feels like the viewer is being mocked. Everyone who thought they were going somewhere with Chloe, everyone who bought what they were selling, everyone who's time was fucking wasted, is being laughed at in this moment.

Look, I never bought into Chloe being redeemed, so my personal annoyance was this dilly-dallying through this random side quest that amounted to nothing, which is a constant in this damn show. But, and I know this might be hard for some to believe, I had deep deep sympathy and empathy for fans who really thought and really wanted for the Battle of the Queens Arc to amount to something. I am so, so angry for them, because every season finds a way to not only stab you all in the back but twist the knife.

So yeah, that's my "issue".