#her father fucking traumatized her by destroying her special place
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I really shouldn't be so afraid to post this, but this one post has bothered me enough to the point where I just had to rant about it. I won't be surprised if this post results in a lot of followers dumping my ass. There's another controversial rant post I'm gonna make soon, so I guess this is a good enough warm-up.
It does take a lot of mental gymnastics to make "Rules for thee, not for me" sound justifiable.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
Also, I don't think that equity is working out very well right now with the race-bent Snow White.
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Side-note: Snow White's fucking name comes from the in-story explanation: "skin as white as snow". But that's not something we should respect right!
Just imagine the number of hopeful girls who would've been honored to have been chosen for the role of Disney's first-ever princess and would have shown so much more respect for the role and the story than this. I'd hope the social brownie points were worth it, but most people are actually seeing this lady for what she truly is.
Hell, the bigger problem nowadays is how most Disney Princesses are being given the same feminist story beats, being strong independent women who don't need no man and are also total girl bosses. Sure, just gut out the story in the name of "progression". And slowly make the Disney Princesses a "progressive" hive mind.
Also, there's the whole Nani controversy that really shows how skewed the priorities are of everyone who advocates for blackwashing established white characters.
Nani being dark-skinned isn't crucial to the story, though. Her actress is still a native Hawaiian, which is objectively the more important representative aspect of casting in a movie set in Hawaii with Hawaiian culture being heavily featured.
Look, personally I'd advocate for casting people who actually look like the characters they're portraying if these live-action remakes must be a thing.
But clearly the Hollywood execs don't agree. So this casting doesn't bother me. If anything, I find it hilarious - especially after seeing everyone throw a hissy fit over this. It showcases their hypocrisy, as these are the same people who were all "CHANGING ARIEL'S SKIN COLOR DOESN'T MATTER YOU BIGOTS". On top of that, these people are actually wishing harm on this actress, solely over her skin color.
Let me guess, though. It isn't really racism if colored people oppress and threaten and harm white people, right? By this logic, it's just a matter of ~equity~ that fair-skinned folk are subjected to the same prejudice. For fuck's sake.
Nah, let's just normalize the concept that no one can relate to a character unless said character looks just like them. Let's encourage kids to embrace narcissism and refuse to find commonalities in characters that don't physically resemble them in any way.
Because apparently it doesn't matter that I can't see myself and my mother in Tiana, even though her driven, workaholic underdog story resonates with us. But because we're not black, we're not allowed to feel a kinship. It's inconceivable for a little girl to feel that she, for what she is on the inside, can relate to a Disney Princess that she shares no physical traits with.
Maybe I'm just crazy for believing we should focus more on who we are than what we are. Maybe I'm a monster for discouraging indulgence in narcissistic behavior. Am I a bigot for rolling my eyes every time I hear a cry for "MUH REPRESENTATION"?
I like to think I'm not. But society is so heavily fucked in so many ways these days. So much that I'm actually afraid to post this publicly.
But I shouldn't be afraid to speak my mind when I see bullshit being glorified. So I'm gonna give my piece, come what may.
#I don't even think the live action remakes should exist#I am against them as a concept#and there's not a single one I enjoy#they're symptomatic of disney's creative bankruptcy#not a single one of them add anything to the legacy of their counterparts#but I can't make them not happen so#at the very least I just feel the need to point out the hypocrisy#halle bailey to her credit was much more respectful of the movie she was starring in the remake of#even called ariel her 'absolutely' favorite disney princess#but then proceeded to celebrate all these changes to her character#but like#ariel still had fascinations of the human world in the og#she had that long before she met eric#she didn't just give up her legs for a man goddammit#her father fucking traumatized her by destroying her special place#she felt like she couldn't go back home#cuz she's like 16 y'know and teens be dumb like that#that scene in the og of triton blasting all of ariel's things was legit scary for me as a kid#I totally understand ariel being stupid enough to trust ursula because she felt she had no place to go#that's what I hate about these remakes#the actors/actresses totally muddle the message of the source material#anyway sorry if this offends any of you following me#I'm just sick of the hypocrisy and it being glorified#Youtube
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Iām gonna do a thread of why I think that Miriel will live. First, Iām not exactly a Tolkien expert, I still have to finish a lot of his books, but Iām gonna point out why I think killing her isnāt the best choice, not only from the āI love her and sheās my favā line but from the āit doesnāt make sense to me as audience/reader" line. And, at the end, i will say why I think she will die. I am torn on this topic.
1 - The hints i talked about previously. Galadriel tells Miriel that she doesn't have to choose the path of fear and that she can choose the path of faith. We see that Miriel is really afraid of that faith because her father was forced out of his throne for it and, at the top, because she knows Numenor will be destroyed. She, eventually, makes a choice and we see that she has chosen faith. In the books, we know very little about her, but in the series we are actually seeing how much of an effort sheās making to follow the right path. Another hint, that might not be a hint, is the scene with that wood dolls (I donāt know the name in English, sorry) and Galadriel is saving Miriel from a dark place. Might hint that maybe something different will save Miriel in the end and it also might mean that she actually just accepted the Gods and made the right choice. Another one, that might be my favorite one: the DAMN EAGLES! Really, every single time we saw them in adaptation, it was to save someone. They saved Frodo, Sam, Gandalf, Thorin and his whole companyā¦I know the eagle itās sign on the scene, it shows that Miriel is the rightful Queen and in the books we see that they also disappear bc of her grandfather and bc of Pharazon, but theyāre connected to the Gods, so Iām a little bit hopeful.
2 - THE GODS! Forgive me, guys, but Gods are supposed to be merciful, you know? Specially those Gods! Like, they know who tries and who doesnāt. They send giant birds to coronations and they also made clouds, like eagles but in clouds, appear on the sky to warn Numenor that they werenāt pleasing them. They see everything and not her efforts? Like bitch please thereās no way they donāt see that Miriel has been suffering like Jesus!
3 - Why her death doesnāt make sense to me in the books and why it wonāt make sense if she dies like that in the series: sheās a good one. And the really, extremely good ones that I read about didnāt die. Not only that, but like I said, that woman is suffering too much to just die? When we watch a series that a woman suffers too much, she never dies. I can point a lot of female characters that suffered for at least three lives and are still out there surviving the most dangerous and traumatizing things. For me, it didnāt make sense for Tolkien to kill her just for the sake of narrative because her death doesnāt impact other arcs. Numenor was already destroyed, she was not a Queen anymore because she didnāt have a kingdom. I think he just killed her because he didnāt want to go too much into her, because it doesnāt make sense for a man that portrays faith in the way he does, to just kill of a character that has been faithful and tried to do the best for her people. In the series, sheās more explored and we actually see her efforts. She got blinded, usurped, might be forced to marry, will pass through a damn trial with a giant sea monsterā¦all that, and all that fucking magic, and girl canāt be saved? Be fr. The actress said she had to get a license, so Miriel will probably be underwater for a time and I do believe Numenorians have some elvish blood on them, even if itās littleā¦she has to live.
4 - Now as a viewer. I heard, donāt know if itās true, that they can change how a character will die, but not if that person will survive or not. Like Saruman. He dies in a different way, but still dies. So, to me, as a viewer and seeing how theyāre writing female characters, it would make more sense for Miriel to die in battle. And on the last battle, alongside the others. Miriel seems to be more rational, so I have trouble thinking that she might just die while trying to make everything right. I am not the producers or the writers, so I donāt know how they would write the rest of her arc, but I could only hope to see her with Elendil, building a new kingdom. I also want to know the point of Earien. I love the actress and I know that the character is young but likeā¦she helped usurp a Queen, using her faith against herā¦the same faith her father has š¤” and sheās doing all that bc her brother decided to go to war. He couldāve stayed but he wanted to go. Why tf this girl is blaming Miriel?
5 - As a viewer again: yes, for her to die in Numenor and all might make sense bc she fought to save that damn city, but sheās also worried about its people. Like, all the faithful are supposed to leave the island and those are the ones that are faithful not only to the gods, but to herā¦why would she stay on that damn city? She knows how this story will end.
7 - Why I think she might die: her arc with Elendil. I love them so much it hurts, but I think theyāre going to build the āsheās going to make something out of meā kinda o story line. He became her eyes and she will teach him what she knows about being a leader. Lloyd said something like that in an interview and I couldnāt agree more, because she will hear what he sees and he will hear her interpretations. The feelings they have for each other will affect their path and her death will be his ultimate push to be a leader and honor her memory. What I think to be incredibly sad is that she will drown, trying to save her city. And his late wife also drowned while trying to save their son. A parallel, a sad one.
8 - What I hope for: hope is the last one to go. I would like to see her being saved by the eagle and marrying Elendil, or at least building the city with him. It would be amazing.
9 - Make noise on social media if yāall want the magical eagle to save that woman.
#elendil x miriel#lord of the rings#rings of power#the rings of power#miriel x elendil#mirendil#miriel#elendil#numenor#tar miriel
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THE WAY I SCREAMED WHE HAPPY SAID THAT HE AND MATT TEXTED EVERYDAY BECAUSE MATT WANTED TO HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH HAPPY FOR ELIZA
AHHH
I JUST-
Okay. So.
Happy is the only one who has NEVER disappointed her. Ever. And he noticed that when they had coffee together. Happy just welcomed her back with open arms. And while Matt always thought she saw Happy as just a friend, he realized that he is far more than that. He is the ONLY ONE whoās always been by her side ever since she joined the Avengers, and since Happy canonically has neither a wife or husband or kids, I justā¦ I had to do it. He has Eliza and Peter, but Eliza with her backstory has a special place in his heart and Matt noticed that, so he desperately wants them to have a relationship in case something happens (again) and she needs a father figure in her life.
So he exchanged numbers with him and they got talking, and now theyāre friends. Happy has accepted him as family and Matt is just likeā¦ that guyās cool and he loves my girlfriend like a daughter so we need him in our lives. Besides, heās not sure what will happen with Tony and Clint is locked away at home, and her biological father died, so she can never have a relationship with him eitherā¦ that girl is traumatized and damaged and feels so fucking lonely when it comes to her destroyed family.
Happy is the only one she can rely on and since she misses her father (deep down) he thinks he needs to help keep the relationship alive ā because Eliza struggles to do so (I wrote her with borderline and bipolar tendencies because I myself, switch between the two diagnosis with every doctor I go to, so she struggles to keep her relationships because sheās afraid of commitment)
And yeah, I have decided that Happy will be her father from now on and heās accepted Matt as a future son in law. And Matt has already planned to be said son in law in the future, but since he didnāt hear them talk (out of privacy reasons) he doesnāt know she thinks the same.
But well, thereās still Season 2 and 3 so thereās gonna be pain for this happy couple and weāre gonna STRUGGLE.
And Happy also acts like a mother hen, letās be honest, but in a reserved and iconic way. He doesnāt show it often but he is. Weāve seen it with the Spider-Man movies and I will go down with the ship that Peter and Eliza would make the best sibling duo that gives Happy all the headaches, and Matt would just stand by and be like āIām gonna have to bail them out of jail eventuallyā.
THANK YOU FOR THIS ASK BY THE WAY!!
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THE LAST PERSON SHE EXPECTED TO SEE, was Chris. Honestly, she didn't expect anyone to show up. She hadn't believed Hotch would allow anyone to leave the plane once they were boarded. She understood why Hotch told her to stay, to work from here. Assist Penelope, and any other time she would be down to stay behind and assist , Garcia. But, this, this was her way of closing this chapter of her life. To finally be free of this monster that gnashes it's teeth at her, every time she closes her eyes. Even if she wasn't afraid of them any longer.
There was still that scared little girl, hiding out deep down inside of her. And it looked to her, to save her, to keep her protected from the big bad demon. Being able to catch him, to finally have him in handcuffs and thrown into prison for the rest of his life. THAT WAS HER RIGHT, no one else but hers, and Hotch was robbing her of that. Even if he didn't know it, he was destroying everything she had been planning since the day she escaped. Chocolate hues switched over toward Chris, as she watched him walk into the room. His expression looked pained, and she knew if anyone could understand her pain. It would be him, he has went through a traumatic childhood , just like her. He got his end, even if it hadn't ended for him.
But maybe, just maybe it could end her nightmares and trauma. Maybe she could beat that statistic. But no one would ever know if they didn't give her the opportunity. A soft breath escaped, ruby red lips, eye lids fluttering closed. As she felt those strong hands fall on top of her shoulders. IT'S TOO DANGEROUS! , what the fuck, out of EVERYONE! She thought Chris would be different, even though the right side of her brain knew he was only worried about her safety. The irrational side, the left, flushed that thought out of existence.
She felt anger, flush across her cheeks, spreading over her features. It was so disheartening for him of all people to say that to her. HE GOT HIS! It was all she could focus on in that moment, and all her mind would allow her to hear. No one, not a single one of them knew how the BLOOD MOON CULT worked, how HER FATHER did things. Yea, leave her here, behind with Penelope. But what Hotch didn't let her tell him. Was the fact that the crime scene, the specially placed carvings, and all of the precisley placed bones and bodies.
It was a trap, a calling card. Anthony Michaels Lopez never left a trace of a body. No one ever knew a horrific satanic ritualistic killing had happened until they stumbled across the bones, broken and washed up on shore or dug up by a dog. HOW'D SHE KNOW THIS WAS THEM. The upside down pentagram, with the rams head drawn into the points of the star. With that specific bloody moon drawn above it, it was his sigil. THERE SIGIL, they believed that when a Blood Mood occurred, it was Satan killing an Angel. Much more went into it, then that but that was the short explanation.
ā ------ NO, Chris, don't you fucking dare tell me I'd be safer. I wouldn't be, I know how my father works. That entire crime scene is a trap, he is drawing the team in to his sick game. And there has been some of my fathers men here stalking me for days now. The minute they saw the team get on that plane, they knew I stayed behind. And they will be coming for me! And I am not going to let them, OR ANY OF YOU take this away from me. ā
ļ¼©ļ¼“ ļ¼·ļ¼”ļ¼³ ļ¼¦ļ¼©ļ¼®ļ¼”ļ¼¬ļ¼¬ļ¼¹ ļ¼Øļ¼”ļ¼°ļ¼°ļ¼„ļ¼®ļ¼©ļ¼®ļ¼§. The cult was finally being taken down. The moment that Madison had been waiting for. Chris was surprised to find Madison not already on the plane. He figured she would be one of the first already on the plane. It was then that Hotch informed him that she wouldnāt be joining them. Chris knew exactly why, this was too personal and he was just wanting to keep her safe. Was it fair to deny her this moment? He understood where Hotch was coming from but he knew this was killing Madison. He wanted to fight Hotch on this, but he knew that he would be shot down for it. He needed to see Madison, make sure she was okay. He excused himself before Hotch could stop him; he was already unboarding the plane. He knew they wouldnāt leave without him, but he was worried he knew that Madison wouldnāt just stay put. She would try to find a way to get on board or another way. He moved as he entered the room and froze for a moment as he laid eyes on the agent. He felt something stir inside of him. He had feelings for her, but he never said a word. He was so afraid of what would happen, the fact that he was a part of that cult, that he hurt her once before even if it wasnāt really him but his split personality. Still, it made him sick that he did any of those things. He remembered parts of that time, they were hazy at best. It happened sometimes, when he blacked out and returned to himself. He would get snippets of memories but they were hard to make out.Ā He didnāt want to remember it, he wanted to shut it out. It put a big strain on him to keep his mouth shut about his feelings. He was protecting her. He wanted to keep her safe from him. Her words brought back and just like he thought she was trying to talk her way into still going. Chris placed a hand on either of her shoulders. Those intense blue eyes softened. His heart ached, he wanted to let her go, but he had to follow orders. āMads, I know how much you want to be the one to do this, but you canāt. Itās too dangerous, your father wants you to come. What happens if he gets his hands on you, or worse..ā He couldnāt bring himself to say it, he refused. He places a hand to her cheek, forcing her to look him in the eye. āIām sorry, but I canāt go against Hotchās orders.ā His eyes searched his face, silently begging her to not fight him on this. āYour safety is the most important thing right now.ā
#ā°āā¤ Interactions ą©ā©ā§āĖ BloodLct#ā°āā¤ Verse: Main ą©ā©ā§āĖ My Heart is a Cell thst You Created#ā°āā¤ Season 2 ą©ā©ā§āĖ Criminal Minds
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Fathering a Phantom ch2
I just wanna Talk, I swear
Here we have the chapter 2 for that fic from earlier! Once again, here ya go @five-rivers @floralflowerpower and @uwuplasmiusuwu
āCole Iām going to murder someone,ā was the first thing that Toby said to his husband upon arriving once more in their temporary sanctuary. Cole paused mid throw of his javelin, electric sparks crackling up the polearm, and turned to look at his husband. Tobyās wings were ablaze, his nails sharpened into claws, and his eyes a colorful storm, as though he couldnāt decide what to turn into for maximum lethality. Cole set down his javelin and wrapped around Toby in a hug.
āWho are you planning to murder, sunshine? And should I join in? I havenāt gotten into a good fight since we got here, which is a shame.ā Cole coalesced from a mass of clouds into something a bit closer to his original body when Toby relaxed in his embrace, running his fingers through shimmering feathers made of embers. āYou really do look like a star like this, by the way.ā
āThere was, I think, a war forged around here who fired a bunch of rockets at a child! You know that liminal kid I told you about?ā
āOh right, weāre rare in this realm, huh?ā Coleās face scrunched up in confusion and he arched a brow. āI thought the liminal around here beat up the tyrant ruling the place when he woke up?ā
āI didnāt exactly ask about what mustāve sucked when I half blew up the metalhead.ā Toby flew over to the couch and flopped face first into it. āNow I gotta track him down.ā
āWhy only half? Sounds like someone youād take out in one go if you had the drop on em.ā
āWell, do you wanna traumatize a kid of unknown cultural origins? Heās so small, and his friends were clearly still living humans. I dunno if heās seen someone die before, let alone a ghost getting Ended. If I recall, committing murder is a bad way to start a friendship with a child.ā
Cole snorted and gave Toby a pat on the shoulder. āAlright, fair, Sildar didnāt like me much after that rescue. But hey, now you can put that on your to do list! Murder, the answer to most problems.ā Toby laughed, phasing through the couch when Cole sat on him. āThere he is, my giggly celestial chandelier.ā
āDo you even remember what a chandelier is? I know you broke like three of them over someoneās head, but I forget whose head.ā Toby put out the flames in his feathers and stretched, satisfied when his spine popped a few times. āItās nice to still be able to do that.ā
āIāll be honest, being a cloud has made the sound of your joints popping kinda gross to me. It sounds like youāve still got a flesh and blood body.ā Cole sat up, scratching his head. āDo you still have a humanoid body? With like, meat and bones and stuff?ā
āProbably, yeah. Weāll see, cause if so thatāll come in handy with helping out this liminal kid. Said his name is Danny Phantom.ā Toby paused, the feeling of his feather being torn an odd and upsetting one. āSpeaking of whom, I should go meet up with them. Think you can find this āSkulkerā guy while I educate some kids?ā
Cole kissed Toby on the cheek and gave him a thumbs up. āWill do! I canāt promise thereāll be much left of him afterward though, Iām not a fan of idiots who attack kids.ā Toby smiled and in a flash of light and beat of wings, he was gone. Cole nodded to himself and grabbed his maul, crackling with electric arcs, and opened up the door to their temporary Sanctuary. āNow then, who the fuck is Skulker?ā
After having a small debate about where they couldnāt go and why, team Phantom finally ended up at the indoor roller rink that was partially destroyed by a giant ghost crab a while ago, and sat down at a table that Danny cleared of debris with an ectoblast or three. āOk guys, I think this is a good enough place to call him up.ā
āAre we sure itās a good idea to call him at all?ā Sam held up the feather sheād kept in her pocket, turning it about to watch the golden flame dance. āHe took down Skulker pretty fast and it usually takes you a good half hour to do that, Danny.ā
āSkulker specializes in attacking Danny is all, Sam. Weāve got the weapons to handle pretty much any ghost we normally deal with, and Danny took down the king of ghosts. Iām pretty sure he can handle anyone else.ā
āPlus, Toby wrecked Skulker pretty bad. If he wanted to fight, Iām pretty sure he wouldāve started a fight.ā Danny condensed his ectoblasts into one ball of ectoplasma and stretched it out into a pole. āImagine all the cool stuff he could show us!ā
āAlright, if you say so.ā Sam snapped the feather in half, surprised by how easy it was to do, and grabbed her ecto-pistol. For a moment, there was silence. Then the sound of wingbeats filled the room and Toby appeared above the rink as though landing from a long flight.
āThatās a spell Iām not used to casting frequently in a day. Heyo kids!ā Toby waved, tucking his wings by his sides while walking closer. āSorry for the delay, I was talking to my husband. So, names again just to be sure: Sam, Tucker, and Danny, right?ā
āYeah, thatās right. What do you mean spell, exactly? Do ghosts have magic ontop of the other ghost powers now?ā Tucker spun the lipstick laser around in his fingers, remembering Desireeās magic and Freakshowās staff.
āAnyone who can do magic keeps the ability in death, usually. Iām not dead though, Iām Deathless.ā He spread his wings and spun around, thumbs pointing to his chest. āI was born awesome like this, and so was Cole. But, based on your faces you werenāt born like this?ā
āNo,ā Sam said, gesturing at Danny. āThis is a recent thing, itās been since aboutā¦ā Sam paused, her gaze landing on the wall behind Toby. āMarch of last year, so 14 months.ā
āYeah, god, weāve been doing this for over a year now, havenāt we?ā Tucker, who had held up a camera to record everything Toby was saying, slumped a bit in his seat and sighed. āFeels like itās been like this forever and like it happened yesterday.ā
Toby stared at them all like theyād each grown extra limbs in odd places ā Danny even checked to make sure he hadnāt done that while feeling both old and young at the same time due to how little time had actually passed ā before zipping over to Danny and holding his hands just over the teenās face. āOh my gods, youāre a baby.ā
āI am a teenager, thank you.ā Danny gently pulled Tobyās hands away from his face, a brow raised. āWhat, is 14 infantile to angels, feather man?ā
āYouāre only 14 months dead, Danny, that makes you a baby ghost.ā Sam snorted and Tucker covered his mouth to try and hide his laughter. A snap of Tobyās fingers and flowers began growing in Tuckerās hat, and seeds appeared above Sam, growing into flowers as they fell all over her. āIf youāve had regular interactions with that metal head, no wonder your auraās all aggro.ā
āSkulkerās not exactly the worst of the ghosts weāve had to fight over the months,ā Danny said.
āOh yeah, thatād have to be either Walker, Spectra, or Vlad. Itās really a toss up between Spectra and Vlad, if you ask me.ā
āVlad wants to kill Dannyās dad because he sees his mom as a trophy that was stolen from him, while Spectra tried to kill Jazz just to depress an entire school so she could feed on the misery to look young.ā Sam brushed away the flowers and weighed two in her hands. āYeah, those around the same level of grossly evil.ā
Tobyās wings ignited at some point while Sam was talking, and the sunlight streaming in from the hole in the roof grew somewhat brighter. He reached into a bag he had strapped to his waist and pulled out a book and a pen, his smile all teeth. āTell me, please, a list of all the adult ghosts who have attacked you children? Iād like to have a discussion with each of them.ā
āIf we give you their names,ā Danny said before Tucker could answer, ādo you promise not to go slaughtering them all? I donāt need to know ghostly body language at all to know that flaming wings come from a place of anger and imminent violence.ā
āWhen did you read a thesaurus, Danny?ā
āSam, Iām insulted: I know tri-syllabic words. I can even say supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.ā
āI promise not to slaughter all of the ghosts you inform me hurt you in the past few months, yes. Names?ā When Tucker listed off names, Toby wrote them down with an inhuman speed, and Danny exchanged a look with Sam, worried about how exactly that deal might be loopholed around. āRight,ā Toby chirped while slamming his book shut, āIām here to answer some questions of yours, not just ramble about myself and assemble aā¦ list of people to talk to. Got any?ā
āSo many that I donāt even know where to start.ā
#Danny Phantom#Danny Fenton#Tucker Foley#Sam Manson#Tobias Lumano#Cole Lumano#OCs#Fanfction#fanfiction#fanfic#phanfic#phanfiction#phanphic#fanphic#fanphiction#Rexy Writes
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Why The Crows Being Teenagers Is Actually Perfectly Realistic
Thereās a TL;DR are the end because wow I like to rant.
I lightly discuss the general situations theyāre all in to explore how they are frighteninglyĀ mature and competent, but itās not particularly depressing or descriptive, itās definitely lighter than the books
I thought about this post with a joke first:Ā āPeople who think that Six of Crows is unrealistic because theyāre so young clearly have not spent much time with traumatized honors students.ā
Itās a bit of an exaggeration, but the point stands.
But I decided that, hm, actually, I could make a point about this. I totally agree with the aging up of the characters in the Shadow and Bone show, but when people straight up say that the books are wrong or unrealistic for having a young crew, I get annoyed, and hereās why (other than me reading the books for the first time when I was 13 and thinking āHuh okay, I see itā and now being lowkey offended when people say they ignore it for being unrealistic):
On Inej
- At first I thought Inejās wisdom and general demeanor was one of the most unrealistic things in the book
- When I thought about it longer, I was likeĀ āActually, sheās 16, right? Iāve sent some of the most lyrical philosophy trying to help my friends while in high school. My friends have done the same. Itās valid.ā
- Frankly, teenagers love hard-hitting philosophical truths. They love repeating what theyāve read or heard in movies and in books and from family stories. They love sharing little bits of wisdom they have come up with
- Inejās ability to hear and understand philosophy and wisdom that she was surrounded by for 14 straight years and then sit on it and elaborate it for her friends to understand, or even just to piss them off in Kazās case?Ā
- Teenagers have that. They do it. So, Inejās Wisdom passes, to me. Itās valid.Ā
As for her being calm
- You know how everyone jokes that Kaz seems calm on the outside but when you get to his POV heās likeĀ āWhat the fuckā at the Van Eck house or just straight upĀ āHuh, is this revenge for making tree jokesā at the Djel River thingy in the Ice Court?
- Inej is like that, too. And she gets angry, and she gets confused, or exhausted.
- AKA every quiet kid ever. Like, are you kidding? Have you ever been in a situation in which itās literally chaos all around you, people are screaming and things are being destroyed (think middle school classroom with bitchy long term substitute and even worse students), and youāre just, calm? You pick up your things, you do what you need to do?
- Thatās Inej. Like, what else is she gonna do? Sheās smart enough to know that panicking wonāt help anyone, and so she just rides it out. Internally she might be likeĀ āWhy is this happeningā but frankly, her being quiet and controlled in most situations is probably a coping mechanism and I respect that
- Pretty sure this is also based on the fact that the Suli have no land for their own and constantly have to keep moving. It might align with generational trauma, Iām sure someone could explain it better than me, but being able to keep your cool while constantly having to change and adapt to new situations, in, say, a country with hellfire politics and no land to call your own? Seems like a hereditary trait that could be useful in Ketterdam, although itās sad.
On Inejās abilities
- Simone Biles started training when she was 6 and went to the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships when she was 16, where she qualified in all the events.Ā
- There are videos of people walking over tightropes as young as three years old. We know Inej didnāt start that young, but not only was she naturally talented at it, but she spent a lotĀ of time practicing. I think itās valid. Plus, some of her family members do some pretty crazy things in her flashbacks, because thatās the whole point of what they do.Ā
- Youngest person to beat American Ninja Warrior was 16 year old Vance Walker
- Inej has a variety of of tools that help her wall climb, and while itās true that she started young and got good really fast, she already had a history of physical work that would help her, and from what we can gleam from the book, a surprising amount of free time in which she was actively encouraged to learn everything she could.Ā
So thatās Inej! I think her skills are perfectly possible for someone with her history and situation. Itās true that sheās naturally skilled, but thatās not actually all that unusual. And her demeanor and wisdom do fit in with what a lotĀ of teenagers are like and the circumstances she was brought up in
Onto Kaz!
- One thing I hear about is that Kaz is too smart for not having gone to school and also too young to know all that he does
- Do you all KNOW how many self-taught people there have been in this world? The word for people who are self-taught is autodidacts, and honestly a huge amount of famous people apply. Like many, many other people in history (thereās a whole list of them in Wikipedia), he had an vested interest in a field and he learned all he could. Sure, those fields were magic tricks and math, but still.
- Suddenly I have a lot of thoughts
- Okay, think, hyperfixations. Thatās essentially what Kazās thing with magic tricks was, right? Have any of you ever spent time with an eight year old that clearly really, really loves dinosaurs? Those kids can spout names and facts and identify them by their skeletons and frankly know more than I ever will. Kazās was magic tricks. All kids are special.
- Kaz continued working on magic tricks and practicing them for years, so, I think that gets a pass.Ā
- As for the math! Look, a Fact Of Life is that some kids are just Like That, whether it be possibly from neurodivergence or other factors:
- Flo and Kay Lyman are twins with Autism who basically have the calendar of EVER memorized. Kaz memorizing card decks is sensible, and these ladies donāt need to look up anything to figure it out, so Kaz doing sums inside his head seems plausible. HisĀ āphotographic memoryā isnāt impossible, although the term itself might be incorrect.
- Katherine Johnson who worked at NASA (yes, the lady from Hidden Figures), was so good at math that she was in high school by age 10 and went to college at age 15. Itās true that she had some teaching, but 1. Thereās no evidence Kaz had absolutely no schooling, even if it was just at home with books and 2. Kaz was 9 when he came to Ketterdam, and after Jordie died, when he wasnāt surviving, he was learning.Ā
- Human calculator is a term that is applied to children a lot and thereās definitely plenty of videos showing how smart these kids are and them doing mental math easily, which he does in the books
- He had a LOT of pressure on him to figure out all he could, and if he wanted to move forward, he was going to have to learn a lot. He spent hours practicing magic tricks, for all we know he spent hours practicing math too. We know Jordie was a bit of a bookworm too, so Kaz from a young age probably already had a reason to learn. Personally, a lot of my love for books was inspired by my older sibling when I was younger
- Young people are adaptable. Kaz is incredibly adaptable. The term prodigy exists because of people like him through history.Ā
- As for him being rational, thereās no other way to survive. Some of the greatest soldiers in history have been very, very young, and very, very smart. Itās true tacticians are generally considered to be older, but that doesnāt mean there havenāt been very young ones.Ā
- A lot of the generals I found were like, 19 years old, but Kaz is 1. not a general and 2. in a place where young people take up the mantle really, really quickly, and frankly itās been like that for a long time. I still think this passes. This isnāt relevant but William the Conqueror was apparently calledĀ āThe Bastardā?
- Frankly, underground communities of thieves probably donāt go around publishing their escapades so to me it makes sense that I canāt just look upĀ āfamous young thievesā and get anything that makes sense, but I did try
- Yāall I tried to do research on youngest escape artists since I think Kaz qualifies and I found myself in what I think is a magicians forum? Itās from 2002-ish and I feel like Iāve just found a relic. I canāt definitely prove theyāre all saying the truth, but some of the people there talk about 10-11 year olds at magic camps, so, itās not impossible for this to be a skill Kaz learned really young, particularly when he made a habit of following around magicians
- I think he passes the realism check overall
For the other Crows:
- Nina being so proficiently multilingual makes sense to me, because sheās been in the Little Palace almost her entire life with all the best teachers they could afford at her disposal. Some people just click with languages. One such would be Timothy Doner, who spoke 23 languages at 16.Ā
- Nina is a child soldier. She of course can handle the battlefield, although I imagine thereās a degree of trauma that she has to deal with (although itās true that most of her work was always meant to angle her towards being a spy).
- Jesper was taught to shoot from a young age by Aditi, who was likely incredibly proficient. Plus, thereās mentions of him and his father being on some sort of frontier at one point in the books, so, itās likely that Jesper got his fair share ofĀ ābeing a child soldierā since he wouldāve been 15 or younger. Plus, with being a Fabrikator, he gets a leg up
- Jesperās smart yāall, he just also likes to have fun
- I am a little terrified by the fact that I looked upĀ āyoungest sharpshooterā and found out about a 9 year old girl (Addysson āAddyā Soltau) who can indeed shoot guns, but uh, it does prove my point
- Matthias... I havenāt heard anyone really argue about Matthias. Heās the oldest at 18 and again, heās essentially a religious child soldier. Of course he would be built af and know how to handle himself in a fight, and in a flashback about meeting Trassel, weāre told that he was actually distanced from the other boys and was the biggest and strongest/smartest of the group. Perhaps not compared to Kaz, but still
- We know how Wylan ended up how he is, so I donāt think i have to defend how heās both a musical prodigy, good at math, and good at chemistry. Plenty of kids who canāt do one thing will immediately gravitate to a different field (think AP math students who canāt write essays, or those kids who could analyse a book and itās metaphors in class but didnāt understand geometry).
- Granted he took it far but itās kinda implied thatĀ his father ignored him eventually and what else was Wylan going to do
- I donāt really know how he did chemistry while not being able to read the symbols and stuff, but thatās likely because Iāve never had to learn the way he did and also I really suck at Chemistry, but I refuse to believe that it invalidates his capabilities
Final Thoughts:
- Theyāre Traumatized Honors Students
- People might say thatĀ āitās unrealistic that all the smart ones somehow ended up togetherā but again theyāre traumatized honors students and those gravitate to each other
- Of course the smart ones ended up together, theyāre the ones in those crazy situations precisely because they are prodigies. Nina wouldnāt have met Matthias if she wasnāt skilled and a spy, Kaz wouldnāt have known Inej if she hadnāt been skilled at silence (I canāt explain that one but uh ninjas did/do exist and it IS still a fantasy world). Kaz would have never been a leader of the Dregs in a position to find Jesper if he hadnāt been so determined to rise to the top, and Jesper wouldnāt have been in Ketterdam if his father hadnāt thought that Jesper was smart enough to get that chance.
- You know how those fringe revolutionary artists for new eras end up knowing all knowing each other and even hanging out? Thatās them.
- I have decided there is a strong basis for Autistic Kaz, someone who is more studied than me should feel free to explore this.
- I read this book a few years ago, A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah. Itās about this guyās experiences as a boy soldier and itās a painful read so Iām not sure I recommend it as a casual read, but he talked about these young kids being able to actually make competent military strategies and handle warfare. Itās an extreme example of what Iām trying to explain when it comes to them being able to handle the brutality of their situation, but itās true, essentially
- They are definitely serious, but if you think theyāre not teenagers I just, disagree so much. They have moments of lighthearted banter, they make light of their situation, they try to support each other Nina covers it so well in her farewell at the end of Crooked Kingdom: The little rescues of laughing at each others jokes or eating together and just supporting each other, is not only a very human thing, but a very teenagerĀ thing.Ā
- Scary experiences that shape us happen all the time, and although for most itās not the things that the Crows experience, picking each other up is a big part of why they do read as teenagers to me. Iāve seen kids be able to seriously converse about things like being questioned by the police, or being left to their own devices for days at a time, or the general impending doom they all feel, and itās dark, but theyāre also going to joke about silly puns 20 minutes later.Ā
- Teenagers arenāt exempt from terrifying maturity and competence
- Finally: Despite all I said, itās a fantasy story and doesnāt have to be realistic
In the end, everyone can believe what they want to believe, but this is my case for my opinion.
TL;DR The Crows are all prodigies and a lot of their achievements and capabilities are based in reality and there are real people who actually achieved things like what theyāve done. Messed up prodigies gravitate to messed up prodigies, hence how they all end up together. When it comes to their mental state, most of them have been brought up their entire lives in situations that required for them to problem solve and keep their cool even when things are going to hell.
#my crows#six of crows#six of crows duology#SoC#Kaz Brekker#Inej Ghafa#Jesper Fahey#Nina Zenik#Matthias Helvar#Wylan Van Eck#For traction:#Kanej#It mostly analysesĀ them anyway#child prodogies#character skills#character analysis#shadow and bone netfix#character trauma#The Crows#The Dregs#look I think it's realistic and I'm going to stand by that#Realism In Fantasy#feel free to interact#feel free to reblog#send an ask if you wanna talk about this
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Random Shigaraki Headcanons
This boi. This grubby boi. I love him so much but at the same time he would probably literally dust me so... (oof this one kinda dragged on and on... lol)
Literally has no idea about real-life relationship dynamics outside of what heās observed in his own parents, in Sensei, and in Kurogiri. All he thinks in the beginning is that people who claim to love you will stand by and let you be hurt, that villains took care of him better than any damn hero, and that he can only truly rely on himself. (And Sensei.)
It takes a loooooooong time of interacting with other people to break himself out of this mindset, and even then, sometimes it comes creeping back if bad things happen.
Getting into canon territory with this one, but really, really, reeeeeeeeally hates heroes because they didnāt even bother to help him when he was going through a whole mental breakdown. Literally one of the only reasons he hates them so much. I know this is pretty much canon, but I doubt he would ever grasp Stainās ideology ofĀ āmaybe some are goodā because in his eyes, not even the underground pro heroes even bothered to see if he was okay. Remember the scene from the manga with the old lady when he was a child? Yeah. There were bound to be heroes he bumped into, even off-duty ones, and nobody even gave him another glance.
Has extremely bad abandonment issues. If he likes you, heās gonna want to keep you because he didnāt really have anything nice to call his own while growing up, and Sensei kept him fairly isolated so he literally tolerates nobody else other than him and Kurogiri at first. Reacts horribly when his friends want to break off the friendship. Goes through a whole depressive episode for a while, his old insecurities pop back up, and he really thinks heās worse than trash and not worth anyoneās time or attention for a while. Prime time for Sensei to further twist his mind.
On that same note, if youāre dating, for the love of everything still good in this world do not break his heart. He will never forgive you. Literally will go to the grave before he forgives you for doing what you did (whether it be cheating on him or completely dropping him like a hot potato). Although this might also extend to little issues that make him feel like you donāt love him enough, heāll forgive you if you show him plenty of attention and apologize for whatever he was upset over. If you cannot remain patient through his toxic mindsets, itās best not to get into a relationship in the first place with him if you want to still remain friends afterward, because breaking it off means instant heartbreak.
Anyway! Back to happier, funnier hcs!!
The whole embodiment of theĀ āWears black in summer because I look good and am willing to sufferā vine. Will not give up his comfy black shirt and sweats for anything because yes, he does look good in black, and yes, he is willing to suffer. Heāll switch to a v-neck tee though. Even heās not that masochistic.
Really prone to dry skin. I know thatās canon, but just... this poor man canāt keep moisturized to save his own life. Constantly has to apply a special moisturizer thatās specifically made for ultra-sensitive skin and has no scents whatsoever.
Will gripe about having to spend so much money on ointment and moisturizer for both him and Dabi. Itās one of the very few things they bond over, other than having a shitty father and pushover family... and their hatred of All Might.
Shigaraki 100% would be Dabiās alibi if he actually managed to kill Endeavor. When it comes to the shitty dad club, heās a fuckinā ride-or-die.
Kinda sensitive over the fact that both he and Midoriya have the same sort of red shoes, but he loves his pair too much to throw them out. Purposefully aims for Midoriyaās shoes every single time they meet each other on the off chance that they get ruined enough for him to get different shoes, unknowing that he literally canāt just... get differently-colored shoes due to him being originally Quirkless (yes, The Shoesā¢ theory strikes again)
Literally never forgets a single thing about people he cares about. Heās the type of person who will remember every single thing you tell him about yourself, and especially birthdays. While he doesnāt exactly show his affection very loudly, he would be the type of person who tell youĀ āhappy birthdayā on the day of as soon as he first sees you, and would treat you a little nicer all day that day.
This boy just has the biggest, scarred heart for hisĀ āgood crowdā. I cannot stress enough just how much like Midoriya he couldāve turned out if he hadnāt been abandoned by society. This mf would give the green bean a run for his motherfuckin money.
āI really just hate the world and everything in it... except for you, maybe I could make an exception for you because youāre nice to me and I appreciate your company too muchā
Even though I hc quite a few League members to be like cats when it comes to affection, Shigarakiās spirit animal is a cat. Likes to lounge about in off-moments, slow to affection and very quick to remember exactly how people treat him, yet if he likes you he shows affection quietly enough that itās not obvious at first. LikeĀ āoh, youāre in the same room as me. Itās not like I missed you or anything, me sitting right next to you at the bar when itās totally empty means nothing. The fact that Iām looking right at you when youāre talking doesnāt mean I like you.ā
LOVES HUGS. If you hug him and he likes you, youāve probably made his whole day. Depending on how things are going, probably his whole fucking week. Just please hug him, he needs positive affection so bad
Major tsun-tsun. The most tsun-tsun. Grumpy until you get to know him, and if he likes you heāll show you in little ways: listening to your ideas more, letting you stay closer for longer, maybe getting you something like food.
AFRAID OF TOUCH. I REPEAT, AFRAID OF TOUCH. Not from anyone he likes, of course; this baby is so touch-starved that he deserves a thousand hugs. But if he likes you, he will not initiate physical affection because heās so afraid of accidentally dusting you. The memories of his family dying (except for his father, because #FuckKotaro2k21) haunt him almost every time he dreams (and if that doesnāt, then other traumatizing events certainly do), and he absolutely would not forgive himself if he dusted his favorite League member/civilian.
Definitely likens the rest of the League to his MVPs after a while of knowing them. Knowing how he operates, itās adorable.
Would begrudgingly let Toga play around with his hair. I can just see him sitting blank-faced, staring at the mirror as she talks about whatever while brushing and braiding it into a cute plait. He would be hesitant to undo her hard work afterward, no matter how much he grouches that itĀ āruins his boss vibeā.
The kind of person to go to McDonalds at 3 AM just because he was craving chicken nuggets and ranch. Yes, ranch. Heās an old-school mf who donāt got no time for no barbecue.
Gets really irritated over Toga mooning over Uraraka and Midoriya, but doesnāt stop her from talking about how much she wants toĀ ābeā them. (Encourages homicide. Advises homicide. Spinner has to stop her from actually getting ready to commit homicide.)
Disgruntledā¢
G L O A T S about the time he took away Overhaulās chance to use his Quirk.Ā āYeah, we wouldāve been satisfied with Compress taking his left arm away to be petty, but then Overhaul had to be a sentient piece of dick cheese, and well, yāknow I couldnāt let him get away with thatā
Itās becoming a problem. The others have learnt to tune him out once he gets going. Compress just smiles under the mask when he remembers it. Nobody knows what heās really thinking.
His damn crowning moment. His apex point. Thereās no going further beyond that (until he finally defeats Midoriya and takes over Japan as the worldās most feared villain of all time).
āShigaraki, Iāmma let you finish, but AFO still holds the record for being the most infamous villain of all time! Of all time!ā <-- let the boy dream okay, heās been waiting for this moment his whole damn life
Can you tell that Iām still horribly salty over Overhaul being an ass? Because Iām still horribly salty over Overhaul being an ass
Chronic emo phase. Hears the G note and just sighs heavily
Has probably seen hentai. Doesnāt really get the appeal of high-pitched feminine screams. Probably more of a tiddy man than an ass man. Just... boobie
His first fictional crush was Aeris/Aerith. Legitimately lost his shit when she died.
Man Crush Monday is Sephiroth all the way. Especially his one-winged angel form. Wanted to cosplay him for Halloween but didnāt because the cosplay was too costly.
Will makeĀ āThatās what she saidā jokes in the most deadpan voice. At least Mustard kinda snickers at them.
Probably wouldāve been pretty patient with Eri. Her traumatic past certainly wouldāve pitted her as a kindred spirit with him, and he would think her Quirk would be a powerful asset if used right. Probably wouldāve practiced it by destroying something and then telling her to rewind it so that he can break it again.
Shigaraki, holding Eri by her armpits:Ā āIāve only had her for ten minutes but if anything happened to her Iād dust everyone in the room to make her feel betterā
The rest of the League:Ā ā???????? Okay?????ā
Legitimately holds a powerful grudge against parents who abuse or neglect their children, especially against abusive fathers. Almost as powerful as his hatred for All Might. Will actively go after someone he sees is abusive to their children and will not let them live.
Would probably adopt an orphan after killing their abusive parents.Ā āOh, that was your dad/mom/parent? Well guess youāre mine now. Letās go get chicken nuggets, kidā
Might somehow rope Dabi into going abusive-parent-hunting with him during a raid. Takes great pleasure in seeing the guilty partyās horrified, pained look on their face as they slowly dissolve into a pile of ash.
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salut.... today? i beg for your thoughts on my ekaterina roskova.... monstrosity and loss of youth and all of that... AND how mabelanna interacts with her through that.... yeehaw sorry
oh ms ekaterina āaconiteā roskova? whose voice i heard and immediately went āoh i love herā? who i was fully fucking prepared for anna to give the throne to bcos why not? who viewed herself as monster and king and destroyer, remade herself in the image of Lack, named herself poison, and has an identity crisis every three seconds?
*vibrating intensely* yeah i love her a normal amount
and AS FOR SOME META,
boy do i have EMOTIONS about āi was seventeen years old and i did not want to die.ā like! thatās what she was! a child, and one who was experiencing Life, was experiencing Freedom (or more than she had had before), was experiencing the thrill of having friends and drinking beer and kissing a girl. and she could have had that life if aurora silver hadnāt taken it from her.
and the way aurora silver takes it... god i fucking hate her question? that false dualism? like ekaterina has just told us how she was kissing girls and aurora silver says ādo you want to marry an american boyā, she just told us how she escaped from the place that literally killed her father for speaking out and how she was searching for something better, and aurora silver says ādo you want to drink yourself to death from boredom by the time you are fifty-threeā. of course ekaterina does not want those things! and there was never any guarantee that is what she would have gotten!
like i know mabel and anna never quite fit in and found the human world dull and boring and like, ok valid, but ekaterina roskova was the daughter of a revolutionary, seeking out a world where freedom was possible... i do not think she would have grown so bored as that. i do not think she would have simply married a boy and had lazy children. with the fire she showed as aconite, set to right a wrong no matter the cost, ready to destroy the kingdom and her legacy rather than let it fall into the hands of a wrongful king... i think her life would have mattered. it would not have been an easy life; i suspect she would have run into some extent of āthe world views me as a monsterā regardless. but oh, the things she would have done.
but aurora silver took that from her. aurora silver laid out this terrible idea of a life before her, and said this is what you will be without me, and ekaterina who was already on a path to not-doing-that and thus would have very much not WANTED to do that, said i want my life to matter. she did not understand what she was agreeing to. she never should have been asked.
āthey made me so ugly,ā she says, āmade a monster out of me,ā when the people hurting her so terribly were the real monsters, if you use monster to mean evil, to mean look what you have done. we donāt know yet what the thing was that touched her and killed her and brought her to the kingdom under the hill, but if what it recognized was ekaterinaās monstrosity then i think it canāt be that bad. strange, yes, uncanny, yes, fractured-and-multiple-and-many-in-one (and she says she modeled herself after the king, but given her own fractalness, her constant identity crises about who and what she is, her changing story, āyou were wrong about all of your selvesā, i think she was modeled after this thing too, even if she didnāt remember it)
it also feels nearly significant that her eventual lashing out as aconite is about taking away power from those she feels use it unjustly; from those she thinks killed her father; from those who will rule and rule wrong. very little in that kingdom cares about fair or about just or about right; they care only about what works within their careful laws, and about what benefits themselves. aconite is driven by a righteous indignation, and really that should have been my first hint that she wasnāt quite a faerie after all. that wasnāt something built from the king; that was an echo of ekaterina roskova, the girl whose father was taken from her, the girl who was hurt and abused by someone who was supposed to protect her. the girl who crossed an ocean in search of something better.
(itās fascinating that that drive for better was what made her the antagonist she seemed to be; in a story where monstrosity is a metaphor for rejection by and of society, aconiteās claim to monstrosity was only and ever about righteousness, about fixing injustice, about speaking out against tyranny. that was what the world above would have rejected her for. i love her, your honor.)
as for how mabelanna treat her: YES. VERY MUCH YES. the like, the gentle way they speak to her? when they know who and what she is? the careful words they use to tell her about what was, frankly, a fucking traumatic past? how anna is quick to tell her your father disappeared when ekaterina says he died, even though they both know he must be dead, but anna wants her to know the real truth as they have it, not just conjecture. wants the truth to be a comfort to her.
how anna says āshe did unspeakable things to youā but does not outline in detail what those things WERE, even tho iām sure they couldāve found out. annaās choice to let ekaterina know she was abused without forcing her to relive it, bcos if those particular memories are suppressed then dragging them out and talking about them is not what she needs. and then later she is allowed to speak those truths out to us, in her own words, bcos she is ready and does want to say some of what they did to her.
how mabel tells her that what was done to her was not her fault, that they wonāt punish her for being abused. (and mabel would know! survivor to survivor!) how even thought mabel was so upset a little while ago, at the idea that she might not have been special to the king, she puts aside those hurt feelings - and ekaterina then admits to her that yes, mabel was special, she saw it, they all saw it. the like, mutual healing they do there, even tho it must be so fucking difficult.
and just. the things they give her. are so personal and so powerful, especially under the hill. a name. a truth. a home.
(also the sworn protection of king-and-consort, which like... wowza! thatās a whole bunch!! please let them go fuck up aurora silver, itās what all three of them DESERVE)
#mabelblogging#mention of abuse and torture#pls i adore her... from the moment i heard her voice i have loved her...#she also has a lot of parallels to veratrine which. ok i have a type i can admit that.#inflashback
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āØ TAYLOR ZAKHAR PEREZ. CIS MALE. HE/HIM. ā© though the mist might prevent some from seeing it, SANTIAGO DE ANA is actually a descendent of D I O N Y S U S. itās still a question of whether or not the TWENTY-FIVE year old LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAJOR from TEQUILA, MEXICO has taken after their godly parent completely, but the demigod is still known to be quite LOYAL & STUBBORN
.basic info
NAME: pablo santiago de anda sauza
PRONUNCIATION: SAN-tee-AA-gohĀ
NICKNAME: santi, tiago, chiago
GENDER: cis male
PLACE OF BIRTH: tequila, jalisco, mexico
DATE OF BIRTH: november 23, 1995
AGE: twenty-five
SEXUAL ORIENTATION: bisexual
MAJOR: landscape architecture
EXTRACURRICULARS: Vicepresident of the botany and gardening club, bird watching member, vicepresident of the latinos student association, eonia choir member, traveling club president
SPORTS: water polo captain, cheerleading member
.character inspo
TBA
.background
I WILL MAKE A PROPER BIO SOMEDAY, NOT TODAY
tw: death, drugs use
born in tequila, mexico. his mother was the daughter of an important family. the family business was tequila and they were very conservative. thatās why when carolina came home with a man, pregnant and unmarried her family kicked her out.
the man, the father of this baby was none other but dionysus. i guess he liked that carolina was a tequila heiress bc shots! but he actually did love her? i mean at least he stayed for a year following santiagoās birth. then he was like i miss the party life gotta yeet
little issue here son of a gun dionysus never told her he was a god, so she know how to raise a demigod without knowing.
he spent six years in mexico city with his mom but when he was 6 years old and earthquake struck, or thatās what everyone believed. it had been a monster and dionysus actually showed up and saved santiago but he couldnāt save carolina.
upon hearing the news, carolinaās family were like meh poor caro and her bastard child but... his uncle had a heart and traveled to mexico city to pick up his nephew and raised him as his own.
he considers his uncle, his father and loves him more than anything.
he had a nice comfortable life and it was boring until his 12th birthday when dionysus came back to claim him.
his uncle was like āuh, what?ā but in order to prove that he wasnāt lying dionysus took them to a dope party in ibiza, which is not suitable for a twelve year old but dio be dio.
anyway, his uncle was like āokay you be telling the truthā and he allowed santiago to go to different camps.
things were smooth until santiago turned 15. he became a party animal, and started doing drugs which concerned his uncle but santiago was like āyo, tĆo, itās in my bloodā
he got in sooooo much trouble and failed school even if heās not dumb he just never wanted the party to stop
he touched rock bottom (sort of) when he drove his ex boyfriend mad. after that, he was like bye mexico and just jumped from party to party for two years.
he came back when he was 20
he worked at the familyās estate until a monster, again, found him for using his powers to help the agave plants and almost destroyed everything.
after fixing the estate, his uncle said it was for the better for him to attend eonia and he agreed bc he loves his uncle and doesnāt want to put him through more pain
full bio (NOT YET)
.personality
Santiago is a fun person to be around, he can be a bit intimidating and definitely not the friend you call whenever you want a non honest opinion. Heās brutally honest but he doesnāt say things with malice, instead, he would help you out. Despite his honesty, he is very kind and grateful for what he has. He is a family guy, and still calls his father who lives in Mexico every day. He can be very sarcastic and sometimes people don't understand his humor. He is also very proud of his roots and will try to find any excuse to brag about his country. Sometimes he can be too demanding and some would even describe him as arrogant, but that's just a facade. He loves to argue because he's so stubborn and always thinks he's right, but overall, he's happy to help and a very loyal friend.
.powers
chlorokinesis: this is the skill santiago has more developed. he first noticed when he moved back to his familyās estate in tequila. it had been a difficult time for his family because a rival company had poisoned their agaves plants, so they were losing almost all their plants. he was very young to understand what was happening but he sensed that something was wrong, and he always had a thing for communicating with plants. his mother always believed it was just kids stuff, but really, it was his powers manifesting. he was able to communicate with the agave plants and he healed them, ever since, his familyās estate has had the best agave plants in the region. he was a special relationship with nature, especially plants, he considers them his best friends and he feels at ease in a place full of plants or vegetation.
alcokinesis: party trick!!! no wonder santiago was the most popular kid at his high school. somehow he always managed to get alcohol, his friends often wondered how but he never revealed his secret, mostly because they would think heās insane. now that heās at eonia he doesnāt do it as often because well, he has siblings and heās a lazy mf. he doesnāt mind not feeling the effects of alcohol, after all, thatās what drugs are for, no?
cause madness: itās a power he discovered when he was about seventeen and heās only used it once and by accident. he had a relationship with a classmate but he decided to break up with santiago and as someone who doesnāt know rejection he felt very bitter, like never before. it also didnāt help that mentally he was drained after partying too much and too many drugs. they had a fight at a party and he said some hurtful stuff, out of spite and apparently he said the magic word or whatever and that threw his ex off the edge. it was a very traumatic event and he still feels guilty because he doesnāt know how he did it or how to fix it.
natural acting abilities lol no. heās a terrible liar, has stage fright and finds theater boring
ability to appear at any party being held: pitbull aka mr. world wide has nothing against santiagoās party skills. after he drove his ex mad, he spiraled down and pretty much lived a party lifestyle for the next two years.
.headcanons
Born in Tequila, Jalisco but he and his mother moved to Mexico City shortly after his birth. He returned to Jalisco when he was six.Ā
He can speak Spanish, English, Greek and Portuguese
Heās a bobarista atĀ tea-o-logy
Loveeeees nature, and heās always talking to his plants
His family has money but he doesnāt talk a lot about it.
Favorites: Como agua para chocolate by Laura Esquivel (book); Scent of a Woman (1992) (movie); De mĆŗsica ligera by Soda Stereo (song);
Again, no one asked me but I will reply: āElla, does Santi hates Iker?ā āWell, thanks for asking. Yes, he does. Heās fucked half of his siblings.ā
pinterest | | wanted connections (dont look mace, thereās nothing here)
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Some thoughts on Luther, the apocalypse, and the situation at large
Alright, so. Getting the sense that Iām one of maybe like five people in the fandom that doesnāt actually hate Luther Hargreeves, so Iām gonna do some analysis here and see if I can change any opinions.
So, first things first: Luther is not perfect. Not by any stretch. This post is not trying to claim he is, or that heās some āmisunderstood angel baby uwuā. Locking Vanya up was absolutely awful, and his obsession with making decisions for everyone else and acting like a martyr does him no favours. But! He is by no means the only person responsible for everything that happens in this series.
The post is gonna be under the cut, because boy oh boy itās a long one.
Argument #1: Luther locked up Vanya, causing her to become the White Violin and destroy the world.
Yep. He locked her up. However, itās not like he was the only person capable of getting her out. Allison, Ben, Diego, and Klaus all were present when this happened and knew that Vanya was trapped. Ben couldnāt do anything. Allison tried to pass by Luther and he held her back and refused to let her do anything until eventually she passed out. Then they all left Vanya to veg out in a soundproof chamber and lose her mind. While Luther is still obviously the one who locked her up, why did nobody else think to...idk...unlock her? He was sitting with Allison in her room right after this incident and obsessing over her. They could have just as easily climbed into the elevator and gone back downstairs to free Vanya and show that Allison wasnāt the only one in her corner. Hell, Diego is pretty much eternally ready to fight Luther throughout the series and while that doesnāt in any way make what happened his fault, it is worth noting that while Luther is the one who locked her up, the others were complicit in allowing her to stay locked up.
Argument #2: Luther is self-absorbed and constantly invalidates the trauma of the others in favour of his own trauma about being sent to the moon.
Iāve only watched the show once, so I may be wrong in this. But most of the instances that come to mind of Luther bringing up the moon are either when it seemed like a natural place in the conversation to do so (like the window conversation when he was sitting and talking with Allison about what it was like up there) or towards the end of the series when heās trying to solve the apocalypse mystery and suggests that it might have something to do with his research on the moon and how finding that will help. He hated the moon, and he hated that he wound up becoming a half-gorilla-skin-graft situation to survive. But he literally hid the body issue until it straight up came out when Hazel and Cha-Cha attacked the house, and then while he was upset about the others knowing, he didnāt want to talk about it. As far as I recall (and again, might be wrong here) he didnāt talk about it until he was egged into it and got into an argument about how the others shouldnāt have left him alone. Which, okay. Admittedly, poor argument to make, given that the others left for a damn good reason and Luther should have left too. All the same, itās not like heās sitting there rubbing it in everyoneās face about āwhy are you upset? Dad sent me to the moon! Locking you in the mausoleum/soundproof rooms is nothing!ā He barely even seems to regard it as traumatic for a while, because he thinks there was a point.
Now, obviously everybody in that house went through hell as a kid, but none of them want to talk about that. This is not a family that is open with emotions, and Luther especially is removed from all of them with the arguable exception of Allison. Would it really have done anything if he had responded to the others by trying to have a sit down about their trauma instead of moving on with their life and bringing the conversation back to the moon (which again, at the time he thought might be a useful lead) so they could solve this mystery, stop the apocalypse, and never have to see each other or the House Of Horrors again?
Argument #3: Luther is self-absorbed and keeps forcing the idea that he is a leader and making decisions for others.
Yep. He does make decisions for others without their input. He often makes really stupid decisions. So does literally everybody else in the Academy. Five tries to solve the apocalypse by running off and handling shit on his own constantly and theyāre halfway through the series before he thinks to involve anyone else in addressing the issue and solving it, much less mentioning the fact that the coming apocalypse is not a distant event, itās happening in a week. Diego sees Grace sewing through her hand and turns her off without further discussion with the family. Allisonās entire power revolves around making decisions for and manipulating people into doing what she wants (ie, the Vanya incident which - again, I understand that she was four and didnāt know better and hell, maybe she forgot about it until Vanya brought it up, but aside from that, while she is trying to get better about it by not using her power anymore and thatās wonderful character development and I am by no means trying to undermine that, the point remains that she has the same capacity for manipulation and forceful decision making as any of the others.) About the only people who donāt and seemingly never have routinely taken the decisions of others away from them because āthey know betterā are Ben (who is dead), Vanya (who thinks sheās ordinary until the end of the series), and Klaus (who nobody would listen to anyway because they view him as a junkie and heās rarely in a state of mind to even make his own decisions). Even Pogo gets in on this by keeping all of Reginaldās secrets instead of being forthright and saying anything! Everybody in the Academy is really bad at decision making and constantly tries to tell the others how much they can or canāt handle.
Argument #4: Luther is self-absorbed and idolises their father too much to be a functional human being/is too busy pouting about their dad at the end of the series to be useful.
Luther Hargreeves is every bit as traumatised as each and every one of his siblings. He shows it very differently, though. Letās look at it this way: Luther believed in their father until the day the old man died. He was with their father well past the others having left, leading to the incident where he almost died because he was trying to solo a mission that was impossible to solo. The others had years upon years upon years (in at least Fiveās case, literal decades) to distance themselves from the trauma of their life and figure out a way to work through it and accept how awful their father was. Vanya wrote a book to get through it. Allison left it behind and didnāt look back. Klaus got into drugs. Diego became a vigilante. They all saw this mess and they left it, but we donāt know what that looked like in the moment, what even finally prompted them to officially give up. Iāve seen some hints that it was Benās death, which makes sense for some of it, but on the other hand whether it was Benās death that inspired the exodus or not, the fact remains that we donāt know what the other Academy members were like when they first left. Maybe Allison stopped talking to anyone for a while. Maybe Klaus just didnāt come home some time and three months later someone tried to bring him home and Klaus told them to fuck off. We donāt know.
When we see the Academy at the start of the series, itās the first time any of them have seen each other in ages, and they are all still very screwed up and struggling to recover from their life and are incredibly dysfunctional as humans in general, never mind the undoubtedly complicated feelings they must have been going through about the entire situation of their Dad being dead now. For Luther, he actively still cared about their Dad and hadnāt left. He didnāt have that curtain of time to take the edge off of the loss, and then a week later he found out that it was all for nothing and Reginald Hargreeves was every bit the bastard his siblings had always claimed he was.
This puts Luther at a very, very different point in his progression of grief than the others are at. Theyāve had time to adjust to the idea of their father being awful, but for Luther it is a fresh revelation that he absolutely cannot ignore anymore, and unlike the others, he doesnāt even have the option to bring it up to their father and get any kind of answers, because Reginald Hargreeves is dead. His claims that he wasnāt going to lead anymore, his running off to the rave to get high and get distracted, those are all probably similar things that the others went through when they hit that eureka moment about how much of a prick Reginald Hargreeves was. Heās grieving a lot of things, and he has an excuse to not be okay with everything.
Argument #5: Well, thatās Lutherās fault! He was a grown-up when he got sent to the moon. If the others left, so could he!
Hereās the thing: the kind of abuse the Hargreeves children went through has some serious impacts on a kidās psychology. Speaking from research and experience here, when you have a parent that tells you youāre special, that youāre Number One, that youāre Important, you want to believe them. When itās a parent like Reggie who shows no emotions and is unfailingly awful to his kids āfor the greater goodā, that only increases. Put yourself in Lutherās shoes for a moment here. His siblings, one by one, had left. Heās the only one his father still has. Heās Number One. Heās been told theyāre saving the world. If he doesnāt stay and bear the load, what happens then? Who saves the world if all the heroes have left? Heās supposed to be the leader, and if the ones heās supposed to be leading have left, well. That just means more effort is needed out of him.
When you want to believe that somebody has your best interest in mind, that they love you, you will make excuses for them. Everybody constantly will tell you that your parents love you and want whatās best for you, and if you truly believe that, you will make excuses for their behaviour, especially in situations like this. Thatās why this kind of abuse is so awful: it puts the blame on the victim. Luther truly believed that there was a purpose to everything Reginald did, that making him Number One and pushing them to their limits had a reason, because your parents are supposed to be the ones you can trust and when they tell you something is for your own good as a kid, you adjust your worldview to reflect that perspective. It is hard as hell to break free from that.
The others managed to get out. They managed to see Reginald for what he was, and they left because they knew it wasnāt getting better. Luther couldnāt see that until the very end of the series, and he went down believing that everything their father did was done with the best of intentions because Thatās What Leaders Do. They arenāt nice, they make the hard decisions nobody else wants to make. And thatās what Luther took away from everything: that he had to make the hard decisions to keep his family safe.
Argument #6: That doesnāt excuse him locking up Vanya!
No, it doesnāt. Locking up Vanya was a horrible choice. It was cruel, and terrible, Ā and exactly the sort of thing Reginald would have done. It was also not done to be vindictive or vengeful. It was done because he thought that was what he needed to do to keep the rest of his family safe. Keep in mind, when Luther sees Vanya for the first time, he has just found out she almost killed Allison losing control of her powers. When he chokes her out and locks her up, he is apologising the whole time because he genuinely is sorry. This is not him being vengeful, this is him making hard decisions because he thinks thatās what Number Ones are supposed to do. It is not a good decision, but itās the only one that comes to mind for him in order to keep people safe when he already has a LOT on his mind (such as: Vanya having powers, Allison almost dying, the rave, the revelation that Reginald was in fact every bit the douchecanoe his siblings always said he was... Not exactly conducive for clear thinking, no?)
Argument #7: But he didnāt let her out when the others gave him other ideas either!
No, he didnāt. No, that wasnāt okay. Yes, that was awful. But again, he didnāt do it because he thought Vanya needed to sit where she was and think about what sheād done. He did it because he thought that this was safer. The others were suggesting they let Vanya out, but nobody made any suggestions on how to keep them all safe afterwards. At the time, Allison could barely move and had almost died. They were all emotionally screwed up. From his perspective, they were all either missing or at low power, and Vanya was freaking out in the cage - you know, kinda like how she was freaking out when she almost killed Allison? That said, I am ABSOLUTELY not blaming Vanya. I would freak the fuck out if I was locked in a cage too, especially if it was done by my brother who I thought I could trust and wanted to believe in. But while this was a fucking stupid and awful and horrible decision to make, I would like to return to my former point: if nobody else agreed with it, why was Allison the only one who even tried to do anything about Vanya being locked up?
Argument #8: But Luther caused the apocalpyse! He made Vanya the White Violin!
No. Like Five said, Vanya is the bomb. Leonard was the fuse. But there were a whole lot of other things that lit the match. If Luther had been the only person Vanya was mad at and the only one responsible for her situation, she would have only killed him. Instead, she wrecked the entire Academy and went for everyone outside of Allison. Letās look at this in review:
- Allison Rumoured Vanya into thinking she was powerless as a kid. Granted, she has apologised for this and has been trying to be a better sister to Vanya. Hence, Vanya doesnāt intentionally attack her.
- Luther locked up Vanya and told her she was too dangerous to be let out. The only person Vanya actively saw trying to free her was Allison. Nobody else came back.
- Pogo lied to every one of the kids for Reginald Hargreeves. He kept his secrets, he perpetuated his lies. He knew about Vanyaās powers, and Allisonās role in hiding them, and he kept it to himself even when he knew better and didnāt reveal anything until it seemed like āa good timeā, despite KNOWING how deeply the siblings trusted him over their father.
- Klaus threw away the contents of the box to go pawn it all, meaning that Leonard got hold of the book he used to train Vanya and screw her over.
- Leonard found Vanya, manipulated her, lied to her, and used her to enact his revenge fantasy against the Umbrella Academy and Reginald Hargreeves and all those other āExtraordinary Peopleā who made him feel like he was nothing, leading to Vanya feeling used and betrayed by the first person she has ever thought actually loved her for being herself, ordinary and all.
- Diego missed no opportunity to tell Vanya how little he valued her opinion or her presence, particularly in the first half of the season. At every given chance, he made sure to make jabs about her making a sequel, about how she didnāt get a vote until he decided her vote was useful. He loves her, yes, but he did not ever make her feel any more welcomed than the others did, and he certainly didnāt include her in the rest of their reindeer games as kids, either.
- Five, as stated, knew the apocalypse was coming. Rather than warning his siblings and trying to get them to come together to stop things, he spent the first several days trying to handle everything on his own, leaving a trail of corpses and problems in his wake while he tried to discover the owner of the eye and killed the assassins after him and then got shitfaced drunk when he hit a dead end and didnāt tell anyone what he saw until three days before the fact because he kept trying to handle it on his own and nobody else would understand.
Most importantly, above all others, there is Reginald.
Reginald Hargreeves was an absolute bastard. He abused his kids physically and emotionally. He neglected every one of them. He set them to fight each other, he set them up to go into situations which they were unprepared for, he set them up for ruin because āit was for the greater goodā and was never emotionally available to coax them through anything. He screwed over every single one of the kids, he was the mastermind behind Vanya being lied to and put on her medications and having her powers suppressed, he intentionally isolated her and made her feel worthless, he let nobody tell his secrets, and he was never straightforward or understanding or even marginally remorseful about any one thing he ever did in his life. He took seven kids and threw them in a house together and raised them to be extraordinary by his standards at the cost of their sanity and their emotional stability. He told them to be a team, and he made them each otherās enemies. Thatās why the series starts with almost none of them being able to talk to each other, no connections between them, and all the other nuances of them being dead, addicted, disgraced, imprisoned, or otherwise isolated. These traumatised kids all grew up to be traumatised adults, and he is the reason.
The only person who is completely innocent of blame in terms of the apocalypse is Ben, because he was too dead to do anything about it. Even then, he did all he could - saving Diego, trying to get Klaus sobered up, fighting the guys at the theatre - but in the end, all of the siblings were too fucked up to work together and be an effective team. They all had a hand in what happened.
Now Luther is not a perfect person. He makes some stupid decisions. He makes some absolutely idiotic, cruel, inexcusable choices. But he is not an irredeemable person. He is in a different stage of his life and grieving journey than the others, and he is still reeling from trying to figure out who he is outside of the identity he was assigned as Number One. That doesnāt excuse his actions, but Iād say it makes them make a lot more sense. The apocalypse happened because Reginald Hargreeves screwed up seven superpowered kids and called it child-rearing, and now those kids are trying to fix the problem by going back to the start and rewriting the story. It didnāt happen just because Luther locked up Vanya and was grieving their dad.
#the umbrella academy#tua#luther hargreeves#tua spoilers#luther hargreeves defense squad#the hargreeves siblings
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Come at me with the lore, fam, after making my own overly complicated fanfic for almost more than a decade with its own magic system nothing surprises me
//OH BOY YOUāRE IN FOR A TREAT
Iām putting it under a cut to save your dash.Ā
TW: A lot of stuff. Rape, sexual abuse, abortion, murder... just... just prepare for the worst.Ā
//Okay, so, Blazblue AU.Ā
Key characters here are: Kagura Mutsuki, Ragna the Bloodedge, Celica A. Mercury, my OC Riku Akasaka, and of course Ren and Goro.Ā
First off, in the BB world, there is a one-world government police state thatās currently been having a bunch of in-fighting and schisms since... forever. They had a civil war (the good guys in this fight lost 8( ), and Kagura has been trying to fix shit for uh... a long time. Heās got the true heir to the throne (Homura Amanohosaka, I think? Their name is long.)Ā
This is an alternate canon where Kokonoe decided to bring her dead aunt back to life like, 3 games early. So it diverges during Calamity Trigger, or The Only Game I Understood (tm). Celica has this power to absorb seithr, or magic energy that can also kill you. The main villainās body is kind of MADE of seithr. The main villain, Terumi, had a plan to merge with his host and make himself unkillable by linking his life to Noel Vermillionās. But because Celica decided to show up and cling to Ragna, plans did not go through, but the time loop didnāt restart. Ragnaās plans are at a standstill as well, and he gets attached to Celica, and... itās complicated.Ā
To sum up Ragnaās story super quick because itās side information-- He falls for Celica, they have twins, Ragna realizes that his soul-eating grimoire could kill said kids, gets Jubei to cut it off of him, and they live mostly happily for a while until Celica starts dying of seithr poisoning. Then Terumi decides to finally pay back for having his plans ruined, kills Celica, burns Ragnaās house down AGAIN (you know, for extra trauma), and kidnaps one of his kids. The other had a power like her mother so she didnāt get taken because being near her made Terumi sick. Ragna nearly died in all of this, spent years trying to make a decent life for his daughter, got arrested, and then after basically making prison hell for everyone else with his anger and violence, was basically given a plea deal by Kagura ofĀ āLook my dude, get on my side in this government coup Iām doing and weāll basically give you your daughter back, a job, and a steady income. We cool bro?ā Aaaand by the time Akechi is around heās a parent with 7 kids, 2 who are the same age as Akechi and grew up being his friends.Ā
Kagura is the part where it gets relevant to Akechi. Kagura hears about this scandal with the Fumizuki family (long story short Shido is a Fumizuki in this case because itās a Duodecim family they havenāt used yet, and it meansĀ āmonth of eruditionā so I figured a focus on intelligence above all else would be fitting...) involving a bastard kid whos mom just died. Now the whole family is looking to basically throw this kid as far away from them as possible.Ā
Kagura, at this point, is a walking scandal magnet and has stopped giving a fuck. He married a woman literally nobody in his family liked, started a government coup, gave Ragna the Bloodedge the sweetheart deal of a lifetime and more. His wife is my character Riku, who uh...Ā
Goddamnit, another character break. You see why I said this would take a year and a half? XD Anyway, Riku. Riku is one of the last Japanese people in this setting. Japan got magic nuked in Blazblue, to put it bluntly. A giant world-ending monster decided to appear there first. Japan is *still* not inhabitable centuries later. The Japanese people are very few and far between, and Rikuās family is one of the last families that can boast a 100% Japanese heritage. Yāknow. Except for Riku. Because her mom went and married an outsider without her familyās permission. Her mom doesnāt give a single solitary fuck what others think and does what she wants. So sheās actually only half Japanese, and her family treats her and her older brother like shit for it. Theyāre basically only cared about if theyāreĀ āusefulā. Her brother went into the military academy to basically gain info for the family (they like to hoarde grimoires as well so the NOL and the Akasaka family kind of hate each other), but heĀ āmysteriously went MIAā. I.e. was violently murdered and had his grimoire stolen. Riku went to the academy after to figure out what happened to her beloved onii-chan. It... did not go well for her. TW sexual abuse- she was raped in her freshman year, ended up pregnant, and when she went home in her third trimester, the head of her family forced her into an abortion that caused serious damage. They cut her hair off and basically sent her back to school traumatized and miserable. And now everyone in school treats her like a whore. She decides fuck it, if theyāre gonna treat her like that, sheās going to use being aĀ āwhoreā to her advantage. She slept her way to status, and, using her own special abilities, gathered a bunch of blackmail on literally everyone in the NOL. Nobody can mess with her, but she also has no one she can rely on.Ā
She was initially trying to use Kagura as well (trying to get put in intelligence so she could ruin the people who made her life hell), but Kagura noticed she didnāt actually seem to enjoy sex. He helped her get surgery to correct the damage done to her (he only convinced her to go along with this by saying it was for his own benefit. She did not trust him. He said basically he wanted to be the first person to make her enjoy sex.) She eventually began to open up to him and trust him when she realized they were very much alike. They both were isolated from their families for not following tradition, both had many enemies, and both genuinely wanted to destroy the government around them and create a better world. She joined him in the whole government coup thing, using her intelligence-gathering skills. Theyāre newlyweds when Akechi is a kiddo.Ā
Understandably, considering all of this, Riku doesnāt really want kids... the trauma of it all is a bit too raw. So Kagura wasnāt really planning to adopt him? He figured heād give him temporary housing, then send him off to Ragna. Ragna would gladly adopt the kid after all. But he and Riku found out they were very attached to this sad little kid who didnāt understand why everyone looked down on him. Riku, in particular, could relate to his problems.Ā
So Akechi gets a nice, (mostly) stable family! He meets Ren in middle school. Ren outed a pedo teacher that was very well-liked by most of the students and staff, getting him fired and arrested. So, he was something of an outcast. Akechi, upon hearing this, decides that Ren is a hero. (And Ren p much instantly had a crush on him after that). The two grow up as childhood friends. Theyāre pretty inseparable. Ren doesnāt really like being at home with his family (theyāre very much the type that says nothing to avoid being a target for potential assassination. The NOL has been legit very dangerous their entire lives, after all. So their outspoken, determined child causes them no shortage of headaches), so heās always hanging out at Akechiās place.Ā
You can probably guess that, actually knowing Akechiās life story, Ren *actually* assaulted Shido when he saw the dude trying to assault another woman. He was genuinely enraged and just kinda lost it. >>; Thankfully connections save Ren. Kagura basically goesĀ āOk so enjoy going to the military academy as a reform school. Also you need someone to keep an eye on you. ....My son can do that.ā Really... he just wanted Ren to look out for his son.Ā
See, Akechi in this verse is still very concerned with status? He feels that he owes it to his mother and father to live up to his family name, because theyāve done so much for him. He wants to be accepted by the Duodecim as a whole. Riku and Kagura tried their very best to keep him the hell away from all of that political bullshit, but the kid decided to go into the military anyway. Heās not physically the strongest, and heās pretty naive and childish, deep down. His parents are pretty damned sure that Goro will be eaten alive if left on his own there. (The military academy is, for the record, itās own massive city. So they wouldnāt exactly be able to keep an eye on him.) So, Renren gets asked to protect his friend.Ā
They also get chosen by two grimoires while there. These are the Rebelās Grimoire and the Heroās Grimoire. Grimoires are basically... to put it bluntly, training wheels for magic. Most people suck at magic by nature. Hell, most people donāt even USE grimoires. They use the even bigger training wheels that are Ars Magus. Grimoires usually specialize in a particular ability. They have their own rules, conditions for use, and often choose their hosts. People fuse with their grimoires over time. If the two become completely synchronized itās called a Remix Heart. (This is the only important lore information from Remix Heart btw, I saved you from reading a crappy fanservice manga, youāre welcome.)Ā
The Heroās Grimoire picks a host with a strong sense of justice. The Rebelās Grimoire picks a host with a very rebellious spirit. The catch is, they always pick their hosts at the same time, and the hosts are always very connected souls, two sides of the same coin. The Rebelās grimoire also likes to do this *wonderful* thing where it latches on your face and only accepts you if you rip it off. If you donāt, it kills you! Fun times. Goro turned around to look at Ren when this happened, and the Heroās Grimoire embedded itself into his spine. (Renās looks like a pair of glasses when not in use, Akechiās looks like a crow tattoo with a weird growth between his shoulder blades.)Ā
The two grimoires are sentient and talk to their owners while giving them similar but contrasting powers. Ren can use his Third Eye ability from the games, destroy barriers, teleport through shadows, and has very little presence-- almost nobody notices him around unless heās pointed out or makes himself known. Goro has the same third eye ability, can create barriers/obstructions, can obscure his movements in bright light (either dazzling people or simply teleporting in light), and has a glamour that attracts others to him. (Ren uses this to basically cling to Akechi at all times while nobody notices him. He loves it. Akechi hates it, because PLEASE STOP HITTING ON ME I HAVE A BOYFRIEND HEāS RIGHT. HERE. )Ā
The phantom thieves also still exist in this AU! They have a different MO but similar intents and goals. Basically, they steal back what the NOL has taken from others. Or, if said thing canāt be replaced (like, say, innocence, trust, etc) then theyāll take what they consider a karmic equivalent (status, power, etc). It actually all started because Ren wanted to get Rikuās grimoire back (Akechi was still vERY upset that the government had it, how dare they do that to his family). So Akechi is on the team from the beginning. Whether he wants to be or not.Ā
Thereās a lot more but this is just the basics... @_@ I told ya it was a lot.Ā
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My problem with DCEUās Birds Of Prey
I was excited that we are gonna see Black Canary, Huntress and Montoya as the Question and possibly Barbara as Oracle and Cassandra Cainās live action debut. But then I read the rumored synopsis.
"After splitting up with The Joker, Harley Quinn and three other female superheroes ā Black Canary, Huntress and Renee Montoya ā come together to save the life of a little girl (Cassandra Cain) from an evil crime lord."
Okay if this rumor is true. I honestly have no interest in this movie.Ā
It is rumored that Black Mask will be the villain of the movie and are you serious? Do you honestly expect me to believe that Black Mask can subdue and hold Cassandra Cain hostage? It would be ONE THING if this were Lady Shiva or David Cain. But Black Mask? Cassandra Cain would absolutely DESTROY Roman Sionis. The mere thought that Cass needs saving from Sionis is preposterous and idiotic. This is how youāre gonna introduce Cassandra Cain, the best Batgirl, Bruceās daughter and one of the best combatants in the DCU? What the actual fuck are you even doing?
Now to my issue with Harley.
āHarley joins The Birds Of Preyā Let me stop you right there. It is already canon in the DCEU that Harley Quinn helped The Joker murder Jason Todd. Do you honestly think Barbara and Helena would ever accept Harleyās help? Do you honestly think there is a force alive that could stop Helena Bertinelli from killing Harley Quinn for what she and Joker did to Jason? And if DC chose to keep Zack Snyderās bullshit of Dick being the Robin who died, do you fucking really expect me to believe Barbara to ever accept Harley Quinnās help if Dick was the Robin who died? The mere concept that Barbara and Helena would ever accept Harleyās help after what Joker and Harley did to Jason is complete and utter bullshit. Harley has already shown in Suicide Squad that sheās a villain.Ā āWeāre bad guys, itās what we doā Harley and Joker are in love in these movies. Harley willingly went home with The Joker, showing that she loves him. Whether Margot Robbie, WB/DC likes it or not The Joker and Harley love each other.
And now I need to address the real problem I have with how DC treats Harley.Ā
Harley Quinn is a villain.Ā
Harleen Quinzel chose to become Harley Quinn.Ā Harleen Quinzel was not tortured or thrown in chemicals to become Harley Quinn. Harleen Quinzel fell in love with The Joker in therapy. There is a large portion of manipulation on The Jokerās part, but it was Harleenās choice to become Harley Quinn. Sheās not a victim of The Jokerās madness, she chose to become who she is.
Their relationship isnāt one sided abuse itās an on and off again relationship. The Joker and Harley are both insane and dysfunctional, there is no way this can be a normal and healthy relationship because that is the complete opposite of these two characters. No one is saying the relationship is healthy nor do I suggest it to be healthy or a relationship to strive towards. Itās meant to be a violent, unstable relationship. Itās also fictional. Itās a fictional relationship between two horrible, demented murdering clowns. To pretend the relationship is a run of the mill one thatās portrayed as healthy is just preposterous. Same with pretending the relationship isnāt also filled with a sick, twisted romance. Romanticizing Joker/Harley isnāt the problem. The problem is encouraging the behaviors, which no one is. And I love them together, they are like the psychotic clownish super villain Bonnie And Clyde. The Joker DOES love Harley, he is incapable of showing it normally because he has never felt love for anyone and because heās trash. If he didnāt love Harley he would have killed her ages ago, if all he needed was a way out of Arkham, Harley would have been killed. Ā He tries to kill her to push her away because he thinks that romance is a distraction and alien. Really, Joker sees Harley as the perfect partner. and this is according to Harleyās creator Paul Dini, The Joker himself Mark Hamil and Harley herself Arleen Sorkin āHe loves her as much as he can. He loves her in his way.ā -Paul Dini āā¦That, to me, is kinda their private life. Joker opens up and in those moments he is whatever he is at his core and all his demons come in. And the only one he trusts with that is Harley, or Harleyās the only one who knows how to deal with him in those moments.ā -Paul Dini āExpressing emotion in any way thatās real and meaningful is alien to The Joker, but heās learning those parts of himself, however unconsciously, through Harley.ā -Mark Hamil āEveryone else sees The Joker laugh; only Harley has ever seen him cry.ā -Arleen Sorkin Sheās completely and utterly obsessed and in love with The Joker. She loves Ivy too, but her heart is primarily with Joker. Hell there was a comic where Joker was all nice and sweet to Harley and eventually Harley became bored and tried to get the old Joker back. Harley is in love with the mad clown, Harley wouldnāt have it any other way.
Harley Quinn is not a hero nor is she a anti-hero as DC has been trying to reshape her as. Harley Quinn IS A VILLAIN! Harley is not this role-model, she is a psychopath and a villain. Harley is not as psychotic as The Joker, Harley Quinn can be just as dangerous. Harley isnāt this precious baby, she isnāt a precious teddy bear and she isnāt someone to coddle regardless of how much you love her. Ā She doesnāt need to be protected from The Joker when sheās a super villain who has murdered her fair share of people and can hold her own against The Joker. Sheās also crazy exuberant and peppy. Sheās lighthearted evil.
Harley Quinn isnāt a pushover or defenseless cinnamon roll āthat must be protected at all costsā. Harley can defend herself and kick Jokerās ass, she can hold her own against Batman(Harley came the closest to killing Batman) or any of the rougeās gallery and she can fought Mercy Graves and she won that fight!
Harley works best as a second in command/follower. Why? Ā Because she became a villain in the first place to follow someone. And she as a villain only follows two people, Joker and Ivy. She has no motivation if sheās not following someone else, and her character is not meant to be heroic or quirky. Sheās obsessive, lovesick and is solely devoted to her two loves. She kills for Joker and Ivy, she steals for them, she collaborated with them. If sheās not with one of them, her heart isnāt in it. And having her own solo series had rendered her into just another generic female anti hero. And since she was created to be a sidekick, she really works best in small doses. Trying to overwrite her character weakens the complexities of her.
Harleen Quinzel did not come to Arkham Asylum to help people. Harleen was power hungry and saw the inmates as a get rich quick scheme for a book and wanted to be the one to understand The Jokerās secrets and what made him what he is. In her own words. āIāve always had an attraction for extreme personalities, theyāre more exciting more challenging. You canāt deny thereās an element of glamour to these super criminals.ā
Harleyās dad was and is a con artist. Heās been in and out of jail, constantly cheating on Harleyās mom, duping rich women for everything they have. Growing up in Bensonhurst around her constantly cheating and lying father, being left in squalor with her bitter mom and slacker brother, Harley vowed sheād be different, make a difference and actually be somebody. But itās the classic tale of growing up to be what you hate. Harley loved cutting corners like her dad, though I imagine she always justified that to herself by saying she was actually going to make a difference, unlike her con artist father.Ā And then she also became her mother, by falling in with The Joker, who is scarily a lot like her father. Ā
Harleen QuinzelĀ was already traumatized and unstable from her fiance committing suicide right front of her but went into Arkham right after that anyways because she wanted to study the inmates from Arkham Asylum and wanted to study The Joker so she could be famous for Ā learning his secrets, which we all know what happened. I would say the madness was already in Harley just buried underneath, The Joker just helped it surface.
Like it or not The Joker and Harley are made for each other. Harleyās entire character is built around The Joker. The only way Harley would ever be free from Jokerās influence is if she stripped away the clown aesthetic, stopped calling herself Harley Quinn and became Harleen Quinzel again.Ā Harley is supposed to be obsessed with the Joker and no one else, she was created for The Joker.Ā In my opinion, taking away the obsession a character is literally built around will not improve it.Ā Everything would have been different if Harley hadnāt been built around the Joker, but she was created for him, therefore taking her away from him not only is out of character, but is also bad for the character itself. Joker, like it or not, was and still is what made Harley a special, complex character. Harley Quinn does not work without The Joker and does not work by trying to make her a hero or an anti-hero. She was created to be a villain and taking that away does not work at all
The issue with Harlivy. I love Harley and Ivy togetherĀ but I hate what The New 52 and Rebirth andĀ Jimmy Palmiotti & Amanda Conner have turned them into. This has to do largely because Poison Ivy is no longer Poison Ivy. In the New 52, Poison Ivy is no longer an eco-terrorist/feminist, she no longer hates humans, she has no character and is just a cardboard cutout who is Harleyās love interest. And if you hate Joker/Harley because itās an abusive relationship thatās fine and dandy but do not act like Harley/Ivy are the perfect girlfriends. Both relationships are not good for Harley. Ivy is abusive and manipulative of Harley. Ivy has beaten Harley, guilt-trips and manipulates Harley to abandon Joker for her, and further toys with her mind, restricts her daily life, and threatens her if she ever shows any interest to leave Ivy to go back to Joker. Ivy has poisoned her, left her for dead, had fantasies about strangling her, and all because Harley annoyed Ivy and either messed up their plans or put her plants in danger. Ivy is not the perfect girlfriend for Harley that the fans choose to picture, Ivy is a super villain who has no regard for human life, Harley is the only exception, but even sometimes Ivy wants to kill Harley and has tried many times to do so. She is not the character The New 52 and Rebirth keeps telling you she is. I love Harley/Ivy but the New 52 and itās fans have pretty much driven me away, I love them in DCAU and in the pre-DCU but I do not ignore the abuse.
I donāt think some fans love Harley. They are in love with the idea of who they think Harley Quinn is and they reject the previous universe/classic version of Harley. Fans are willing to accept the New 52 version over classic. In the New 52 Harley is no longer the villain we love. Sheās a looney toon female deadpool. I love that they made Harley/Ivy a thing but the writers do not understand either character AT ALL. Itās sad really. A character who is so well written in the past but instead the majority of her fandom prefers a watered down version that is not her, but a generic Deadpool clone and prefer to have Ivy be totally out of character just so Harley and her can be in a relationship.
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Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka
Hi, Iām Lex and I love to pour boiling garbage into my gaping maw.
First off, hereās my friend Jane writing about this show. Iām sure she can write about it a lot better than Iām about to.
Two words of the title of Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka are a lie and you already know which two. This is not a show about magical girls. It is not about girls overcoming their problems and exploring their friendships. This is a show about trauma and how much it can gleefully show you, the viewer. Itās a lot more interested in telling a lukewarm political thriller featuring high school girls with PTSD using magical girl elements as window dressing. Did I enjoy it? Maybe, but probably not in the way it was intended. I found myself watching in a removed state, less engrossed in the story and more interested in how deep a hole it was intent on digging for itself.
Spoilers and discussion of some uncomfortable content below the thing.
I think the most illustrative example of what kind of nonsense Asuka (the show) gets up to is that over its twelve episodes three different named characters each have an arm severed. Thatās probably the highest limb-removal-to-episodes ratio Iāve seen. Iām pretty sure that for all three itās the left arm. Whatās more, the arm always ends up reattached and fully functional so the injury itself isnāt actually used as character development or anything, itās just a cheap shortcut to have these anime girls injured (yes the ones who have their arms cut off are all girls, why would you expect differently). Thatās the show in a nutshell, really.
Another point as to why this isnāt actually a magical girl show: thereās no female characters to help mentor the girls or look up to in any way. Itās all just tuff army dudes.
Letās take a step back. The premise of the show is that a number of years ago the Earth made contact with or was contacted by a generic magical world that Iām sure is meant to be a parody of or at least evoke the kind of magical realm that sometimes exists in magical girl stories. They tell Earthās governments that theyāre being attacked by evil monsters or whatever and so they choose Earth girls to become magical girls. The show takes place after the war, with the five surviving magical girls from the original team at high school age and living in a world thatās had to adapt to the existence of magic and dealing with the new wave of terrorism enabled by having magical teleportation drugs etc..Thatās a premise that has a lot of potential and what originally brought me to the show. Itās a shame it turned out the way it did (and I feel that I must stress: itās very deliberately terrible).
Also enjoy this side character who committed warcrimes, I guess.
Now, Asuka seems to care less about its characters and more about showing off an array of mannequins to torment but there are two that are worth discussing: Kurumi, one of the surviving magical girls and single-handedly responsible for the worst excesses of the show, and Asuka herself.
She literally has BLOOD on her HANDS, get it?
Letās start with Asuka (the character) because thereās something I want to bring up thatās darkly hilarious to me. In the very first episode weāre shown that during the war with the whatevers, Asuka (the character)ās parents were kidnapped by the chaos thingers and mailed back to her in pieces. Which is both over the top enough to be chuckle-worthy and something that should have left a major impression on Asuka. What actually happens is that this is explained in episode one, and then not even referenced until episode ten when itās just briefly shown as part of a montage, then never brought up again. I find that hilarious. Though aside from her overwrought trauma, Asuka (the character) doesnāt have a whole lot going on in general. At best she can be described as generic. Her arc basically just amounts to her joining Japanās special anti-magic force and seeing the other magical girls again.
Kurumi (whose magical girl codename is āWar Nurseā and I canāt help but feel she got the short end of the stick there) is the single worst thing about the show. The actions the story has her take truly elevate Asuka (the show) from merely bad to reprehensible. Just like pretty much every other character in this show, Kurumi has an excessively traumatic backstory involving being bullied until Asuka chose her to be a magical girl. She also enjoys fucked-up BDSM torture! Twice we half-see Kurumi sexually torture āevilā magical girls in order to make them āatone for their crimesā. The second time involves Kurumi leading the girl from the first time around on a leash in some doggy roleplay. Weāre later shown both torture victims happily serving Kurumi and friends in a maid cafe (thatās actually a cover operation for the anti-magic squad, itās that kind of show). Itās just bad. Kurumi is also the one responsible for reattaching those arms after they get severed.
Thatās not how this works. Thatās not how any of this works. This show would have been better off just being a hentai.
There are other characters in the show, of course, though hilariously the last of the original five surviving magical girls doesnāt show up until the last episode doing something completely unrelated to the rest of the cast. There are the main villains who just kind of disappear for about four episodes, then show up in the last episode to talk about how they arenāt going to just destroy the main cast because reasons. The writing of this show does not strike me as āgoodā, is what Iām trying to say.
This is Chitose. She has another terribly overdone backstory, an abusive father and a mother who was killed in a car accident specifically engineered by the bad guys to traumatize her so they could make her into a magical girl. Then she becomes Kurumiās second victim.
The Russian magical girl is under this delusion that one of the magical beasts is her sister. This is revealed in the last episode and this is pretty much the only shot we get on that.
Weirdly, the show seems to like parodying Cardcaptor Sakura specifically. See, hereās this shot of a freshly-traumatized child clutching what looks to me like a knockoff cardcaptor wand.
And occasionally the mascot does these ātriviaā bits that remind me of the post-episode bits of the Cardcaptor anime.
I guess the author just has a specific beef with Cardcaptor. Then again, maybe there are other digs at specific magical girl shows Iām not picking up on, I wouldnāt be surprised. See, itās never explained why magical girls in particular. Thereās no reason why these magical soldiers had to be young girls in the first place. Surely it would make more sense to choose existing top-tier operational operators to get this magical power. The show never explains why this is. Iād be willing to overlook this point in a better show, a more compassionate show, a more fantastical show. But Asuka (the show)ās attempts at realism make this omission stick out more. And, if I were to give the writing probably more credit than it deserves, Iād say thatās to make a point. To make you, the viewer, question why magical girls. Thereās this line from episode ten:
There is no answer to this line in Asuka (the show). I can only conclude that itās for us, the audience, to think about. Really, that just kind of feels like an insult to the concept of magical girls in general. Like itās asking why shows where teenage girls have to fight for themselves exist. Now, Iām just a cis guy, but I donāt think Iād be out of line in saying that itās important for girls to have shows where they are shown as powerful enough to overcome their problems. Just as long as those shows arenāt anything like this one.
In closing: this hateful sludge is the show, and all it wants to do is drown you.
We get flashbacks to the original squad of magical girls just so we can see them die horribly.
I only regret that I donāt have the energy to go on more about the showās shortcomings. But, because Iām me, thereās one last thing I need to go on about. Over the course of the show weāre introduced to five āclassesā of monster. They are, in order: Halloween, Voorhees, Greed, Cenobite, and Gremlin. Four of them are references to horror movies, three are named after the monster itself, and two are named after the franchise (Gremlin counts as both monster and franchise). I have questions. Why not stick to just monster (Myers, Voorhees, Cenobite, Gremlin) or franchise (Halloween, Friday, Hellraiser, Gremlin)? And what the hell is āgreedā doing there? Could they not pick a system and stick with it? This whole monster-naming debacle is just another example of the mess that is Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka.
Why are the Cenobite-class magical artillery, what are you doing, show!?
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Not your typical love story because a girl woke up and fell in love with a gay sweetheart. It's a tough journey.
I'm a bisexual girl who happens to like girls a lot. I had two ex girlfriends and zero boyfriends in the past though I dated a few guys too. For the past years, some people considered me as lesbian already as my interest in men almost hit the rock bottom while women gets my attention effortlessly. As I get to meet more people and evaluate myself, I kinda realize maybe I'm demisexual or something. It's so easy to be interested with anyone but it's a different story to fall in love with someone.
I have this circle of friends at school called marupokswhom I am badly attached and close to. We go on adventures together, share little secrets, get drunk, sneak out, cry together and I have to say that there is one special person in my circle, let's name him 'K'.
Let's drop the bomb, K is gay. Not the guy looking gay but he is very gay. The moment he speaks, the moment he moves, the moment you hear him, you know he is that gay. So cute.
In our circle, we have bisexual guys too who acts feminine too but I have to say that K is the girliest of them all, maybe even girlier than the other real girls in our squad lol. Still cute.
K and I? We weren't really close. We share jokes ā he is witty and very funny ā and stories and hang out but we're not that tight. If you leave us together in a room ā just us ā there might be some awkward silence. You know?
I don't really pay attention to him that much, he was just a normal school friend before though there are times he is there drinking with me and some of our mutuals, he heard my tragic story about my ex girlfriend, he heard the complicated stuffs about me and my love life and my mind bleh. He's a good listener in my opinion, but then one day I woke up and asked myself: He always listen, not just to me but to each of the squad's stories, but did I ever try to listen to him? That's the time I started to notice him.
His eyelashes are so long, his skin glows, it fascinates me to stare at him when he talks. Our squad is composed of about 11 members so it's kinda hard to speak in big groups, some won't pay attention, some gets distracted, some may not even know you're speaking but when he speaks, I try my best to listen. And then I knew a little bit about his story.
He's either sleeping or laughing or smiling. But then behind those happy and sleepy bean, there is another book.
A broken family that he keeps wishing to be complete again. Struggles in life to survive this cruel world. He needed to work while studying to help his family and himself. Jeez. I can't imagine myself being in such situation considering that I am so lazy and my family are well and stable, we never really had financial problems or anything related to that.
I remember what K said, he was like the mother and father to his own family. Masyadong maaga pa but he had no choice. Sucks. Now he works at a fast food chain ā Jollibee, my favorite, lol!
You know what's so fascinating about it? He loves his work. I don't think it's just because of the money he earns from it but he is that appreciative kind of person. Maybe he appreciates his colleagues, his manager, the fast food chain itself, the operations, the memories that he learned to naturally love what he is doing. Imagine that? Instead of cursing and going like "Hay nako may duty nanaman ako." He goes like "May duty ako." There's a difference.
I can feel his passion and care for the place he works on. It's amusing and sweet at the same time. He is really appreciative of things ā very.
He also do sidelines to earn, that's so diligent of him. I remember him selling coin banks. Ang sipag samantalang ako tamad tamad. Lol! He is also a student council treasurer of our school's organization ACES-PICE. Btw, he won the elections by a super landslide (I'm so proud! He deserves all the votes yessssss!!) He hosts civil engineering events on our school too even without any talent fee ā just love. Ain't he the nicest?
Last year, November 2018 we had a ball and he hosted it. He had a co-host and it irked me to hear that there was an instance where a student officer handed a food for his co-host and had nothing for K. Jesus. What the actual fuck? She even asked K to hand the food to his co-host.
Man, I saw all K's efforts for that whole week, for that whole event, he hosted the event without asking for any fee but to treat him like that, like "Wag ka na bigyan ng pagkain, sayang budget."
Where's the appreciation? Where's the consideration.
Ano ba naman yung kahit food nalang oh. Sick. Don't get me wrong but that student officer is a trash. Sorry not sorry. I'm so angry lol.
As a busy officer that night, I still managed to eat at the buffet, K was so occupied with the hosting and the only time he was able to munch something was when I brought my plate backstage and he had a few bites of my food. I hate that I wasn't able to do anything for him that time. Ugh.
After that night, I appreciated him more as a person. I didn't have heavy feelings yet but I barely noticed that the path I was taking was on the way there.
I started with throwing banats and cheesy jokes on him on our group chat. Our friends laugh at us a lot because I am their friend that they can't imagine being with a guy more because I AM THAT INTO GIRLS FOR ALMOST MY WHOLE LIFE and K is so gay that he's like created by the heavens for a guy. Then it went on and on then one day I realized, I really like this person.
I went crazy. I locked myself in a room and evaluated myself and my feelings. Maybe I'm lost? It's just a crush but no it wasn't JUST a crush. I kept it for myself for a while. I never saw it coming ā me liking a friend who is gay who is biologically a man. That is like against all my rules and against the norm.
I remained silent. I didn't want to make things awkward but people were right. The more you hide what you feel, the more it demands to manifest.
Then I couldn't take it anymore. I had to tell someone about it and I told one of the marupoks, Abbi, about it (love her). She was startled because as I've said, it was against all my rules and the norm but she is the most understanding and open minded person in our group, she knew how great K is and there is literally nothing not to like about him.
Then I continued to keep all my feelings to myself. Some of the squad started to ask me who am I blushing to, who is my crush but I kept it hidden and when I drop K's name, they won't take it seriously. I thought it was a good coincidence.
I gave him a polo top as a Christmas gift from H&M. I thought of buying it because I remember one time he showed me a polo top from a shop (I forgot) and he looked so amused by it. Hindi naman siya maluho that's why I thought it wouldn't hurt to buy him something he can use and might like, right?
Man, it's been ages since I felt that feeling. You know? Going to a mall and thinking what is a good thing to buy for him? This looks good on him? He might like this. I forgot myself and that's so rare.
My friends think I'm joking whenever I put efforts for K but the truth is I'm actually expressing. I thought maybe K would find it as a joke too because I've been very playful with him ever since but then as days go by, I don't know if I'm getting off guard or if he is just that sensitive to notice. Some of them started to worry about me.
Baka masaktan ka.
'pag ikaw umiyakā
Control control lang.
I always tell them he's just my happy crush but I knew I was in love.
HOW WEIRD IS MY LOVE FOR K?
I knew I was when I thought about rejection but I was ready for the pain he might cause and I wasn't afraid of it. I knew I was in love when I didn't care if he tells me he doesn't feel the same way because the only thing I want is for him to know.
I didn't want him to know because I want to oblige him to love me back or to pressure him to reciprocate what I do, I just wanted him to know that there is someone believing in him, there is someone appreciating him, there is someone out there loving him for who he is because that's what he deserves.
You deserve all the love in the world.
I always tell him.
He said he was so touched when I said it to him the first time but I always wonder why nobody has told him that yet or why isn't there anyone reminding him that? Jesus. He's so wonderful, it hurts.
Ever since I had my heart broken from my first girlfriend, I've been very wary of the people I date and people I get interested to. My walls went so high, I may get interested but when I see one flaw in the person I date, I tend to just choose giving up and stopping everything because I was traumatized by my past. I was destroyed when I gave almost everything to my former love, courted her for half a year even if she was straight. Nabasted for a couple of times but I thought she was worth the struggles, I won her but then she just ended up cheating on me after being with me for two years. I just find it hard to be interested with someone and trust them completely. I was tainted, I had trust issues with everyone thinking they will just all end up hurting me like my ex.
I dated a lot of people but honestly, I haven't felt the strong admiration I had for my ex to anyone until K came along. He was special, even I was surprised.
Akala ko di na ako makakafeel ng ganitong kilig, ganitong devotion and determination for someone. I even wrote a song for him. He inspired me that much.
Man, I have so much words for him. He is perfectly imperfect and I love his assets and flaws ā I don't mind seeing more.
We already talked face to face.
He said he thinks I'm out of his league. I'm above him, he said. Then I told him "Eh I'm looking up to you." Hoping he'll realize that I am not in anyway out of his league and he is wonderful, don't he ever dare to put himself down.
He said he doesn't deserve me, I deserve someone better because he's just him. Common line but I know my worth. I know what I deserve but put me out of the picture ā YOU are the one who deserve so much more. You're amazing.
He said when he knew that I liked him he was surprised, he couldn't believe it. Then when I started to be vocal and showy about my feelings, he had no choice but to take it in and he confessed that it overwhelms him to have someone to put so much effort on him and he just couldn't help but think of how to return the feelings, efforts and gifts. I told him I don't need him to return all of that, I don't need him to think HOW to reciprocate and return all of it, I just want him to think WHY I do all of those efforts and WHY I give him all those appreciation and surprises. Simple. Because he deserves to be treated that way, he deserves to be loved that way, he deserves to be spoiled that way.
He deserves more and all.
He once smiled with a face of disbelief as if everything he's hearing was surreal, then he asked me bakit ako? Then I laughed because I couldn't believe he had to ask why? Is life that shit to him that he doesn't know how wonderful he is? I replied bakit hindi? He was silenced. I hope he realized his worth, bakit nga ba hindi?
Then I looked at him in the eye and told him how most of the people close to the both of us ask me why do I like him, it's weird, it's unusual but then I told him alam mo kung ano sagot ko? He asked what? I told him:Ā What is not to like about him? What is not to like?
He once told me he is afraid to take risk and he doesn't want to take risk because things might go out of hand and he doesn't wanna hurt anyone or me. I told him it's okay. He can reject me that very moment face to face and I will accept it. I told him I might be even proud na nabasted ako ng isang katulad niyaĀ knowing how great he is. I won't be ashamed of it. He is really something to be proud of. Best thing I never had.
I told him not to worry about me. If he doesn't like me back that's okay. I saw it coming already, I was half ready for it. I won't be lying but that shit hurts but what is pain? It heals and when it heals,it leaves scars and scars remind us of lessons.
I'm so enchanted. I'm in the state of wanting him so bad but I won't complain if I won't for as long as he is happy. I don't care if he reciprocates the love or not for as long as I see him smile. My walls are down for him, kahit masaktan okay lang, I'm such a masochist but the pain he is inflicting on me reminds me that I still feel and I still know what love is ā thank you for that.
I have no bad words for K. I'll stick to my words. He is wonderful and I know whenever I get hurt because of him, it wasn't his intention. His intentions are pure, I trust him so much that my guards are all down.
I admit it hurts me to think one day he might find someone else but then on a second thought, I won't mind because seeing him happy is at the top of my list ā masasaktan lang naman ako for a while pero at least siya forever na masaya if he finds his perfect pair, what's so bad about that?
Nevertheless, after all the talks, I knew the feeling wasn't mutual and that's okay. I told him you can reject me everyday but I won't stop putting efforts for you. Just because he didn't feel the same way for me ibig sabihin he became less wonderful? E he deserves all the love nga 'di ba? Why stop? Just because nasaktan naging hypocrite?
K is worth pursuing, K is worth fighting for.
I think he lost words already and he knew there is no way to change my mind about him so he just told me to just stay and we'll try to get through it without being weird around each other. I agreed. Kinda hard at first but kakayanin dahil yon ang gusto ni crush. I'm just a puppy. Jk.
I told him to just let me appreciate him because I'm happy, if he's in the state just not being ready, I can wait for him but alongside, I promised him that I'll stop when he finds his perfect man ā I won't interfere, I'll let go, life goes on. In return, I asked him to promise me to choose the one who will treat him the way he deserves.
NEVER SETTLE FOR LESS, K! YOU DESERVE ALL THE LOVE IN THE WORLD. :)
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( reposted from my about page in a reblogabble form w/ formatting changes. if you find the formatted version visually difficult or irritating to read, the unformatted version is on the about page!Ā this & the about page will be updated as i learn more things about my muse.Ā )
for the most part, my portrayal will follow the canon ofĀ star trek: alternate original series. however, here are some things iāve added to my version of jim.
trigger warnings: abuse, starvation, murder, death, ptsd, traumatic mutism, bipolar disorder, & eating disorder.
triggers are bolded at the beginning of each section so that you can skip over anything that may be triggering for you. if youād like a summary of any part that you skipped over, feel free to ask me! i can change things around, to a certain extent, so that we can write together.
1. tw: abuse. jim & his stepfather, frank, were not on the best of terms. ever since frank had come into his life, jim had despised him. there was just something about the way he treated winona that jim didnāt like. heād only given the guy a chance at his motherās request, something which he sorely regretted after she married him. when winona went back to starfleet, sam ran away from home & jim was left with frank & his abusive tendencies. it started just bad moods & snide remarks, but the remarks got worse with time. words became stronger, louder. they were picked more carefully, picked to tear the young boy apart. & as if that wasnāt enough, frank shoved him, hit him, even made him bleed. the effects of this abuse still haunt jim, but heās been healing with time & distance.
2. tw: starvation, murder, death. after jim had stolen & wrecked frankās car, frank unilaterally enrolled jim in the earth colony on tarsus iv. winona had no knowledge of this decision, as she was off-world with starfleet. the distance was freeing, at first. he was glad to be out from under frankās thumb at last. on tarsus iv, he was able to live the kind of childhood heād wanted. for a time, he was happy. he did well in school, he played sports, he had friends ā he thrived. but unfortunately, it didnāt last.
famine fell over the colony as an exotic fungus destroyed their food supply. suddenly, paradise had become hell. as colonists panicked & worried, riots began to break out. jim ran from the facility heād been living at with the few children he knew that were now or previously orphaned, & they stuck together for as long as they could. naturally, he took charge of the small group, organizing them in a way that would benefit the group the most. he & the older children would scavenge for food while those younger would stay together & hide.
it worked for a short while, but like the rest of those who had survived the first wave of death, their group began to succumb as well. jim tried his best to care for them all. he made sure they had first pick of the food, & he only ate as much as he needed to survive another day. he did everything he could to make sure they survived. there are things he did there that heāll never speak of.
but the worst of it all was how he killed to save them. the first time, he didnāt sleep for days. he felt so ill he could barely move, but he had to. he had to take care of the others. it got a little easier with time, but it was always a last resort. in the end, though, he lost most of them to starvation or illness or both. by the end, it was only him & kevin riley left.
they were eventually forced to rejoin a larger group out of necessity when kevin fell ill. jim refused to let the young boy die too. with help from the larger group, they were able to nurse him back to relative health. but thatās when it happened.
governor kodos, under the pretense of aid, divided the remaining colonists into two groups. unbeknownst to them, the division would cost 4,000 colonists their lives. kodos had separated the survivors based on strength & likelihood of survival. those who were stronger & more likely to survive were allowed to live. those who were weaker & less likely were executed. jim was one of nine eyewitnesses to the execution.
supply ships arrived too late to save the 4,000 sentenced to death, but when they arrived, jim & the remaining orphaned children were sent home to earth. to this day, jim still has ptsd & nightmares about life on tarsus iv & the execution of 4,000 innocent survivors.
3. tw: ptsd, traumatic mutism. following the traumatic events on tarsus iv, jimĀ & kevin returned to earth & were placed into the care of jimās mother, who had returned as soon as she had learned of the famine & that frank had sent jim there. at that point, she was in the process of divorcing frank, & she filed for a restraining order on her & jimās behalf.
jim regularly saw a child psychologist to help him through his ptsd. directly following the events of the tarsus iv massacre, jim went without speaking for about a month. his psychologist assured his mother that he would speak when he was ready, & that it was his mindās way of coping with what happened.
additionally, for years after his return from tarsus iv, jim would hide scraps of food around the house. this was both to convince his mother that he was finishing his meals & out of fear that another famine could occur at any moment.
with time & support, his symptoms have nearly disappeared, but he will occasionally have periods of ptsd related distress, specifically in the form of nightmares & anxiety, even in adulthood.
4a. tw: bipolar disorder.Ā while at starfleet academy, jim began to act out of the ordinary. some days, he found it difficult to get out of bed. or when he did, he felt incredibly numb & unable to enjoy all the things he loved to do. some days, he couldnāt sleep at all & stayed out all night, & he could become incredibly irritible at the drop of a hat. there was no obvious reason as to why he behaved these ways, so jim hadnāt seen them as a problem at the time. but as these behaviors & others began to exhibit themselves, jimās friends became increasingly worried about him. leonard mccoy was especially concerned.
being jimās roommate & best friend, leonard had a hard time standing by & allowing jim to push himself into riskier & riskier situations. shortly after leonard had expressed this concerns, jim began to see that he was right. he had been denying any problems heād been facing for far too long, & he needed to confront them instead. so, with a lot of coaxing from leonard, jim made an appointment to see one of starfleet academyās mental health professionals.
the process of diagnosis didnāt happen overnight. in fact, it took many weeks before they reached any sort of conclusion. but when they did, it was then that jim learned he had bipolar disorder.Ā ( this form is likely bipolar II disorder. source: here. )Ā at the time, he was unsure of what this meant, but he was assured by the counseling team that with some help & support, he would be able to manage his moods better.
for the rest of his time at the academy, he continued attending weekly therapy sessions & tried out different medications until he & his therapist were satisfied heād found the right one. while friends came & went, leonard was there every step of the way.
by the time he was given command of the enterprise, he was mentally in a much healthier state. but that doesnāt mean he never struggled. currently, he does what he can to manage his symptoms, but heās human, & he canāt always handle them as well as he would like to. but with the help & support of his close friends, his therapist, & a strict self-imposed therapy plan, he generally manages well.Ā Ā ( for more information on bipolar disorder, go here. many of the items in the chart of signs & symptoms apply to jim during the corresponding episodes. )
4b. tw: abuse, eating disorder, bipolar disorder. as a result of growing up with a physically, verbally, & emotionally abusive step-father, jim occasionally has trouble when it comes to taking care of himself. specifically, he has a mild form of anorexia & struggles with eating enough food. this tendency seems to stem from the traumatic events of tarsus iv & childhood self-esteem issues brought on by his step-father, who often made negative comments about his weight when he was young.
this disordered eating has gotten better with time & effort, but he is more likely to relapse during depressive & manic episodes of his bipolar disorder. during depressive episodes, his self-esteem is lowered & he begins to worry about his weight. thisĀ causes him to eat very little. during manic episodes, he can be moving so quickly & erratically that he forgets to eat.Ā
even when he is not experiencing symptoms of an episode, he can have trouble with food. as a result of his time spent in crisis on tarsus iv, he rarely eats a full meal. he feels that there must be other people who need food more than he does, so he can go without for them. itās a habit, a destructive thought heās been trying to break, but itās been years & he still has trouble. with a lot of coaxing & assurance, he can finish a meal, but he never feels truly great about it. he has, however, broken his habit of hiding large quantities of food.Ā
5. on a lighter note, jim has a cat! her name is rosie & he adores her. he found her during one of the enterpriseās pit stops when she stowed away on the ship. he loves her so much that no one has had the heart to remind him that itās not exactly allowed.
she is very affectionate & serves as an emotional support animal for jim as well as an unofficial therapy cat for most of the bridge crew, as those are the crewmembers closest to jim.
rosie is a special cat as well. she has the ability to walk on walls & ceilings, & she is often found hiding on one of those surfaces when she wants some alone time. additionally, her eyes & fur appear to sparkle a bit, like she was bathed in stars.
6. jim is very respectful of women.Ā Ā ( fuck you, j.j. abrams. )Ā therefore, that scene where he hid under gailaās bed and saw nyota undressing? jim may have seen nyota, but he immediately looked away. same goes for that scene with carol marcus changing. james. tiberius. kirk. respects. women.
7. follow these links forĀ romance & sex headcanons.Ā
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Some thoughts on M!Lorca and Emperor Georgiou
I was reading some posts and thought that a greater exploration of these two characters and their respective villainy may be called for. The main thing I keep coming back to is: is it really so hard to accept that both mirror Georgiou and mirror Lorca are both pretty bad and neither of them should be āsidedā with? The sins of one donāt cancel out the sins of the other, and theyāre both horrible (albeit interesting) in their own special ways. Iām just sayinā, though Michael will probably have to make an alliance of opportunity at one point or another, neither of them is a āgoodā choice.
So letās break it down a little, shall we?
Georgiou:
-eats sentient beings
-doesnāt hesitate to kill a room full of people
-is a-okay with torturing people for life
-may or may not be an overbearing, controlling mother-figure
-kills and subjugates alien races without a second thought
-rules the human population through terror
Big Evil Things all.
Lorca:
-possibly killed the entire crew of the prime Buran to cover his entry into the prime universe (arguably speculation at this point, but something weird happened there and lorca at the very least lied about his āeye injuriesā)
-pushes his crew past their limits, jeopardizing their health
-orders Dr. Culber to fake a medical report
-pulls Dr. Culber away from taking care of Paul so he canāt figure out what happened (with an extra dose of gaslighting when Culber accuses him of planning their departure from the prime universe), therefore extending their stay in the mirror universe
-tries to manipulate Katrina Cornwell with sex and, when that fails, sends her into a dangerous situation hoping she will be captured or killed and refuses to help when it is confirmed she was kidnapped (what happened to his whole āi know what happens to people captured by klingons and not on my watchā spiel??)
-puts a traumatized p.o.w back into action without any therapy
-to avoid punishment (and complete his own personal mission) he inputs coordinates to take the Discovery to the MU, stranding his crew in hostile territory and erasing the last coordinates to keep them in the dark
-apparently manipulated a woman named Ava and used her until he was done with her before casting her aside or worse--and he has no remorse concerning his actions
-allegedly manipulated/had a relationship with mirror Michael, whom he must have known saw him as a father, and conspired with her to kill the emperor, her mother-figure (just sayinā, if the relationship bit is true, even if they arenāt technically related and she was an adult when a relationship began, thatās still super problematic. She still grew up under his care looking up to him as a father. The inherent power disparity there is stunning and unnerving. and regardless, her father-figure was helping mirror Michael plan the murder of her foster mother. just...wow)
-we donāt know if he wants to overthrow the emperor to make the empire a better place or just to usurp power. but we do know he was the right-hand man of the emperor, tasked with executing her most sensitive missions (which probably included mass murder on the reg), that he ran his ship in the prime universe like his own personal fiefdom and he didnāt think twice about telling michael to destroy the rebel base, no questions asked
(note, the lorca section is longer because we know more about lorca than we do about the emperor. To that end, I will include more commentary about lorca because, again, Iāve had more time to ponder lorca than evil georgiou)
Okay, so a lot of this might be excused(?) by arguing cultural relativism on behalf of the Terrans. Personally, I donāt think borderline incest is acceptable by any universeās standards, but for the sake of argument I will agree that the source reporting this likely isnāt reliable and maybe that part isnāt true. But I donāt think Lorca is a āgood guyā and unless some dramatic shift happens, I donāt think he should continue as captain.
From a certain perspective, Lorca may be said to have done a lot of good, too, and there are interesting arguments in favor of this. But I also think thereās another side to that coin, and I want to explore that a little more.
Look, Lorca has always struck me as an expert at manipulation. Expert manipulators know that itās all a game of give-and-take, but they make sure to stack the deck in their favor when itās their turn to take. Theyāre also extremely savvy when it comes to securing the loyalty of their followers.
Letās look at some examples from Lorcaās stint on the Discovery using this theory as our guide.
Busting Michael out of prison? He didnāt do it solely for the pleasure of her company. He needed her for his own plans, as we now know. He also likely meant to cultivate a sense of indebtedness between him and her. When that didnāt go as planned, he had to change tactics and appeal to her curiosity and sense of duty to convince her to stay, a much softer but decidedly more effective approach. And Lorca, above anything else, cares about results, not how he gets them.
Rescuing Sarek? He knew that mission was important to Michael, sure, but he also predicted that allowing her to rescue Sarek would make her feel gratitude and loyalty to him as well as convince her to trust him (trust being one of the most basic and important tools a manipulator has to work with). When she thanked him for his support, he even said as much: āI need a group of people around me to carry the dayā. He wants her steadfast loyalty and trust so she will follow him even when heās doing things she knows arenāt strictly in keeping with Starfleet ideals.
Speaking of which, from the get-go he encouraged her to shift her thinking away from Starfleetās diplomatic ideals and start thinking in a more zero-sum, militaristic way. She proves a little less pliable than he might have liked, but she trusts him enough that she ignores his underhanded tactics. Still, he has to step lightly around her because he doesnāt have full control of her yet and he knows it. Thatās another reason why he has to bend to her will at times; if he pushes back too hard she might begin to question his motives and start to doubt him, and that canāt happen for his plan to work.
Another thing expert manipulators do is forge a sense of commonality between themselves and the target of their manipulation, emphasizing their mutual (but superior) āothernessā from the group. Lorca is quick to call Michael superior to the other Federation scientists around them because she, like himself, can think outside the box and do what needs to be done (āuniversal law is for lackeys; context is for kingsā). They are members of an exclusive club, one that knows whatās really happening, what needs to be done, and the difficult means by which to do it; everyone else belongs to the lackey club that must be guided by their superior insight.
As for other āniceā things heās done? Springing Tyler out of prison was a strategic decision. Tyler said it himself;
Lorca needed Tyler as much as Tyler needed him.
What about promoting Tyler and giving him a place among the crew? Look, if someone helped me escape a klingon prison hellhole after seven months of torture, Iād feel pretty fucking indebted to them. Lorca also knew that Tyler, like anyone whoās been through torture, would be anxious to get back at his tormentors and be prepared to break any rule to do it (see his conversation with Saru on Pavo).
I wouldnāt exactly call Lorcaās actions here altruistic, but rather a calculated risk, like most of his decisions.
He sounded pretty kind to Tilly when she was freaking out on the captainās seat, but then again, yelling at her and making things worse would have blown their cover and made a mess of his grand plans, so... *shrug*
The thing thatās so insidious about Lorca, even assuming his intentions are āgoodā and his end-game somehow justifies the means, is that heās so good at manipulating people and so incredibly deft at controlling the people around him that it really makes me question his true intentions or feelings about anything. Heās a long-term strategist who can pivot and adjust to any situation, which makes him an extremely interesting character. Itās easy to look at his actions in the moment and say they are good, but Lorca is a big-picture thinker who dons whatever hat he needs to fit the situation. For manipulative people, kindness and cruelty are both tools that must be used appropriately and in the right measure to get what they want. Particularly in the Federation, honey will catch more flies than vinegar, and he knows that.
Iām not saying that Lorca isnāt a fantastically dynamic character and that I havenāt enjoyed watching his arc. And Iām not saying heās devoid of emotion either; he may have some passing fondness toward a few of his crewmates, but at present I get the feeling that, while he doesnāt want to lose them and waste resources, theyāre all pretty expendable if it comes right down to it. I do think he cares about Michael more than he cares about anyone else (that doesnāt excuse the bad things heās done āfor herā though...). And, smart man that he is, he has been careful to bend the truth instead of outright lying when possible. But that doesnāt mean heās honest or that the sentiment he holds toward Michael is āpureā. I think her mirror counterpart always represented some avenue to power for him. He could care about her while also using her, but that kind of takes something away from the dynamic, doesnāt it? I donāt think you can love someone/have a healthy relationship with them while simultaneously using them imo. Even if he and mirror Michael were working together in full equality, prime Michael isnāt; Lorca is holding all the cards and that means he has all the power in the situation. She hasnāt been given a real, honest choice (as opposed to the illusion of choice), and that is fundamentally unequal and manipulative. He has asked her to trust him, but he hasnāt trusted her with critical information about himself and his goals in return. Thatās selfish, dangerous, and pushes him further into bad/evil character territory for me.
Pivoting back to Emperor Georgiou, I also think she cares about Michael--or at least mirror Michael. But that also doesnāt make her a good person or better than Lorca. Sheās comfortable in her fascistic regime. She commits genocide regularly and uses torture daily to impose fear and order among her subjects. Thatās pretty cut-and-dry evil right there, no excuses. Sheās probably her own special brand of manipulative, exploiting Michaelās straightforward Federation ideals and attitudes to her gain. Like, sheās obviously no peach herself (but holy hell, does she know how to dress to impress).
At the end of the day (and with the information currently available), neither of them are a good option for Michael to form an alliance with. On the one hand, sheās got the devil she knows; Lorca seems interested in protecting her, whatever his reasons, but fuck, heās royally screwed all of the crew on Discovery over, and possibly the Federation too (remember they had the information needed to win the war but that donāt matter if they canāt deliver it). On the other, she has the devil she doesnāt know; Georgiou represents an evil empire, but hasnāt personally betrayed Michael and initially seems to be on-board with getting the infectious ideals of the Federation out of her empire and back where they belong. Obviously neither of them are trustworthy, but they arenāt trustworthy for different reasons. Hopefully Michael will be able to find a solution that doesnāt āsideā with either of them and possibly plays them off each other.
Personally, I donāt even think either of them are going to be The Big Bad. I predict that dubious honor will go to:
He only corrupted the Mycelial Network, aka The Cosmic Force That Binds All Life Together. Seems pretty important.
Just a thought.
Anyway, long story short, characters can be evil for different reasons and be equally deplorable (though is Lorca that different from the Emperor? If he was emperor, would he use his power any differently? He seemed pretty okay with the idea of killing all the non-human rebels. Even if itās all a show and the end justifies the means...thatās pretty ghastly. Hopefully the next episode will shed more light on his character). Itās not a linear spectrum where one must be more evil than the other. They both, at present, look pretty fucking terrible from my perspective. Lorca might pull some more magic out of a hat and somehow make himself less horrible, but that also doesnāt mean heās automatically a good guy. And Emperor Georgiou could assist the Discovery and that wouldnāt erase the fact that sheās a genocidal maniac. Complex as they both are, theyāve both committed acts of evil and they both should be held accountable for their past deeds.
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