#hi what is the best character archetype and why is it the trickster?

[kerink]

in light of people's confusion over cecil's longevity in @sexymanotd i wanted to document a bit of his history for those unfamiliar or nostalgic

welcome to night vale is a podcast written by joseph fink and jeffrey cranor. cecil gerschwin palmer is the main character and voiced by cecil baldwin.

it debuted on june 15, 2012 it reached its peak in popularity in 2013-2014

despite this, wtnv has been one of tumblr's top fandoms since staff started tracking fandom-related data in 2014

for the longest time the only thing we knew about cecil's appearance was: "He is wearing a tie. He is not tall or short. Not thin or fat." and that wasn't until episode 19 which aired march 15, 2013. for almost a full year we had no idea what cecil looked like. so tumblr's collective unconscious kicked into high gear and we did what we do best

we created a tumblr sexyman

from know your meme: "Defining traits of the archetype include skinny body type, trickster or villain role and dapper clothing."

know your meme identifies wheatley (portal 2, 2011) and the onceler (the lorax, 2012) as being likely tumblr's first sexymen. and the onceler fandom was at its peak in 2012-2013, the same time as wtnv. in addition to this, the hannibal fandom has been cited as one of the contributing factors to wtnv's success on tumblr.

so tumblr had created an archetype that worked and the wtnv fandom was made up of mostly hannibal fans - the foundation for putting cecil in a suit was there. and honestly? cecil's at work in the show, why wouldn't he be well dressed?

however, while this explains his attire it doesn't explain some of cecil's more unique sexyman features, namely the tentacles. for this we have to return to the 2014 fandom review analysis where you can see the most popular fandom at the time: homestuck

haven't you ever wondered why almost a quarter (189/923 at time of writing) of E rated wtnv fics on ao3 are tagged tentacles or tentacle sex? why cecil having tentacles for a dick is such a seemingly popular headcanon? well look no further then homestuck cultural hold over.

throughout all of this, the development of the sexyman archetype on tumblr and the rise of homestuck, one creator really stands out: kinomatika

kino was one of the most popular homestuck artists on tumblr at the time, popular for their eridan fanart. if you google image search "welcome to night vale" kino's art is still one of the first results you'll get

their design was so popular in fact it was featured in wtnv related articles from the time

and yes there were absolutely other artists giving cecil tentacles and moving tattoos at the time, but it can't be understated the reach kino had and the influence their homestuck roots had on their design choices

i recommend going through the archive of @nightvaleartclub to see how cecil used to be portrayed back in the early days. unfortunately the earliest fanart i've been able to find is july 2013 and i find it hard to believe it took tumblr a year to draw him. although, i started listening at episode 5 and didn't start drawing him until then myself so who knows...

cecil has had tumblr's heart in a vice grip since episode 1, with "20,000 posts, 183,000 blogs and 680,000 notes using the #Night Vale tag" during its first week. tumblr's love for wtnv has always been fairly genuine, from the impact the writing has had on tumblr humor and future story telling, to how wtnv paved the way for lgbt+ representation in indi media, to how it popularized podcasts as a medium for story telling, to the little comforts some of cecil's quotes still bring people today

cecil is not only a founding father of tumblr culture, but also a blorbo of the people. cecil the character in canon has a tumblr account where he posts his art and slash fanfiction.

although cecil's character has developed over time and we've come to see what a ditzy, eccentric, brat he really is, changing his status from sexyman to babygirl, cecil is absolutely a character you should embrace. and you know what... despite what i've said in the past

#cecilsweep

[ID: Images one and two are Google analytic graphs for the search terms "welcome to night vale" and "wtnv" between June 15, 2015 and January 27, 2023. They both depict very sharp spikes around 2013-2014 until the lines decrease greatly over time.

Image three is a drawing of Cecil from Welcome To Nightvale. He is white, with white hair, glasses, a third eye on his forehead, and he is wearing a suit. In the background is the silhouette of a neighborhood from the WTNV official art, a galaxy, and a moon. It is tinted purple. Image four is the always has been meme. Instead of the earth is the tumblr logo, and the text is: “a wtnv fansite?” “Always has been”. End ID] id thanks to @princess-of-purple-prose

[madmachaca]

I want to catch up with One Piece before I make a proper Usopp post because I know there are things coming for him, and I am interested in that because I really really like him.

He is such an interesting character, and I decided I wanted to write about him since Water Seven, when he projected his own worth into Merry, when even then he defied Luffy and for a second proved his brain could give him an advantage. And later when he swallowed his pride and showed real weakness as he apologized to his captain and the crew. He didn't stop being a coward or a compulsive liar. There was no need. He just learned he is loved for himself.

And then Thriller Bark...

Not only do we get a somehow comic confirmation that he holds so much anxiety and depression in that skinny little body, but it's used for his advantage. But that has always been the case. He knows who he is, he knows how "insignificant" he is compared to others, and that's why he is still kicking.

And then, the moment everything seemed lost, and his minutes were apparently counted, Sogeking came out. The mask may have come on first so he could fight alongside his friends without accepting defeat, but in Thriller Bark, it was a savior who could do what Usopp couldn't.

Sogeking is resourceful, smart, brave, and daring...and guess what, so is Ussop, but he didn't know that at the time, because Usopp is very aware of his weaknesses, and wearing a mask allowed him to be confident. This, however, seems to have changed after the time skip, but we'll see.

Ussop feels like a fable character. A trickster archetype. And maybe this is what caught my attention on the first place.

At the same time, he is the voice of reason in the crew. Even if he hysterically screams sense to his captain.. who would do whatever he wants anyway.

I love Usopp. He is the best.

[isfjmel-phleg]

Why I like it: Psmith in the City

After I read and enjoyed Mike and Psmith, I interlibrary-loaned the rest of the series and read them in rapid succession.

And honestly, my greatest appreciation for this book came during rereads and the need to overanalyze the text for annotations and conversations with a very longsuffering Allie.

Mike and Psmith's friendship comes about in the first book, and we get to see how much Psmith is willing to sacrifice for his friend, but their connection really comes to the forefront during Psmith in the City.

There's something delightfully escapist about these two friends rooming in Psmith's luxurious flat, braving the drudgeries of their shared misfortune of working at the bank by day, and living it up in Edwardian London by night. It's a setting that feels very real--and it was! Wodehouse peppers the narrative with real locations, and when I was in London, I was able, using this information, to take a little private walking tour of Psmith's part of town and experience it. Even with the reality of the locations, though, there's a certain glamorization. Thanks to Psmith's father's money, the boys are able to afford an experience of young adulthood and a first job that isn't available to most people, either then or now. And perhaps there's some glamorization of the friendship too.

Because it isn't easy to be Psmith's friend, and this starts to be evident. Psmith is a jerk in a lot of ways in this book, more so than in the others--even in his interactions with Mike. But these moments are easily brushed aside, and the friendship never really suffers. This is a Wodehouse novel, so we can be confident that when things get really bad, Psmith will come through as the good friend that he really is, and he'll find a way to save the day for Mike. The worst of his behavior vanishes by the last part of the book, never to be seen again in how he treats his best friend. Not especially realistic, but it is compelling. A real-life Psmith would be absolutely dreadful to put up with; the page, however, allows us a distance that assures us that despite it all, his intentions are good and he himself is good at heart.

And on the whole, he is. We know this because he really does care about Mike, because he's capable of dropping the flippant mask to show compassion when the situation requires. He's just...a complicated mess here. He's under a lot of stress that he hides most of the time. He's angry at his father and taking that out on his awful boss. He's an arrogant rich kid with more money than is good for him. He has one (1) and only one friend whom he's clinging to like the only thing keeping him afloat in life. (Psmith's got attachment issues, I'm starting to realize. That may be another post.) He's a very complex character, not just the comic relief or the trickster archetype, and because of that, he goes beyond hilarity to being interesting, even if he's not always easy to like.

Mike is still the everyman, perhaps even more so because his story is such a relatable portrait of what it's like to be eighteen, fresh out of school, and having to take on for the first time an adult world that you're unequipped for. Mike's classical education and cricket skills aren't particularly useful now that he has to make a living. The former class clown and jock is now an awkward mess of social anxiety. Wodehouse pokes as much fun at Mike as he does anyone else in the story, but he also takes Mike's struggles and pain seriously--because much of it was probably his own. Mike's grief at losing the glorious future he was promised, his increasing frustration and despair at being trapped in a dead-end job that stifles his talents and personality--they're very real, and poignant.

Mike and Psmith may inhabit a glittering dream world in their version of London and maintain a desirably close friendship that would have probably fallen apart eventually if it existed in the real world. Their shenanigans are sheer comedy with no grounding in reality. But the heart of the story is two eighteen-year-olds on their own in the adult world for the first time, with no support system but each other, trying to figure out life and often failing--and this is what makes the story resonate, because we've all been there.

And sure, their ending is a fairy tale, down to the final lines in which Mike imagines his future as pretty much perfect from now on (which will not turn out to be the case!), but...well, when you're a twenty-something in your first non-college job, taking the bus, feeling incompetent, dealing with difficult coworkers...a fairy-tale ending alongside a true friend is pretty appealing.

[trickstercaptain]

Can you elaborate on the "Disney Princess" Jack? Cuz I honestly feel he is one but I can't articulate in words how or why he is one, but I firmly believe the title fits him xD

       ahhhhh anon i ABSOLUTELY WILL elaborate on my Jack is a disney princess agenda, i adore you so much for asking as it gives me the perfect excuse to wax lyrical about this whole topic for a bit. because admittedly disney princess Jack is a sort of crack type thing, if we're being technical he's nothing like a disney princess — however i feel like there is a genuine argument to be made that he is disney princess coded, at least within his own narrative. you are right, he gives off those vibes. ( and we're not the only ones who think this — tumblr will not let me hyperlink the video but https://www.tiktok.com/@some.emmagination.huh/video/6961180862117367045 — the fact that Jack is so often seen with or around the princesses in the disney parks says a lot i think lmao ).

       it's possibly because he's assuredly not your classic white knight disney prince, he's not "bad" enough in own his narrative to be villain-coded, and his effeminate characteristics ( the famous story about disney execs thinking that JD was playing Jack as gay in the first film and absolutely freaking out about it ) play into that whole idea. I also think it's always fun to take a character like Jack, who belongs in a hyper masculine environment but consistently challenges those stereotypes, and consider him occasionally in terms of the feminine. Jack being a trickster archetype also helps with this; gender expression is inherently very fluid to him. plus potc plays with this too — Elizabeth is made the Pirate King, after all.

       but he does also fit some classic disney princess tropes! defining a disney princess is kinda tricky now because over the past twenty years or so that definition has (quite rightly) diversified from the more traditional princesses of older disney movies, but i wanna highlight some of the fun ways in which Jack fits into that vague category.

       he talks to animals! maybe not uhhhh... in the nice way that princesses generally do lmao, but he has his god-tier rivalry with Jack the monkey, openly admits that he'll have Cotton's parrot on board the Black Pearl in AWE because "at least I'll have someone to talk to," and in TPOF starts telling his new horse Caesar sea stories because he gets bored waiting for Ayisha. as a child, I am sure he also had very animated conversations with Tim the dog, too. he also sings, canonically. Elizabeth teaches him the song from the ride in CotBP and Jack continues to sing or hum that on two more occasions in the trilogy. he descends from almost literal pirate royalty, effectively already making him a princess. Jack might be the black sheep of the family but he comes from a familial line of very rich, very influential pirates within the Brethren Court. and calling him a prince just feels wrong, so princess it is. also if he gets together with Elizabeth post-AWE he "marries" into royalty and becomes the queen of the Brethren Court, true facts.

       another is that he has the most fairytale esque, romantic dynamic in the entire franchise with the Black Pearl. I've said it again and again, but if Jack's ship were a human and Jack still talked about her the way he does, he'd be the most romantic bastard in the fucking movies lmao. in TPOF, it was literally love at first sight, Jack stared at her on the dock when he first saw her ( and she didn't look her best, she was a ship that had been neglected for a while and Jack spent weeks sprucing her up and getting her shipshape ) and completely fell head over heels. he gets an entire paragraph in that novel about what it is to finally know what love is after hearing sailors talk about it for so long. he dies for her, gives up his immortal soul for her.... Jack is motivated by love in the trilogy ( no matter how difficult, or twisted, or toxic that love becomes ), I won't accept any arguments.

       Jack is surrounded by loveable sidekick type characters. potc is a great franchise for this anyway just in general, but Jack's crew fit a lot of those archetypes that you find in many disney princess movies. from the mice in Cinderella, to Scuttle/Sebastian/Flounder in the Little Mermaid, to the furniture/servants in Beauty and the Beast, there's a lot of overlap — and while you can also say that Jack, being a side character, also fits that role, as he becomes subject to main character syndrome in the franchise, he gradually becomes more and more at the centre of it instead of being with them on the sidelines. disney princesses, particularly from the older movies, are also frequently in need of rescue, and rescuing Jack from the Locker is the major plot point of the first hour of AWE. he might mockingly call Elizabeth the damsel to Will, but he is in fact the damsel put in distress in that movie.

       then there are the somewhat more angsty ones. disney is renowned for its absent mothers, particularly within its fairytales, and Jack is no different. I may have my well-developed headcanons about Jack's mother but in terms of the strict canon, we know nothing about her ( beside the shrunken head ) and that is on purpose, considering that the house of mouse would not let anyone, including the author of TPOF, write about Jack's mother or even hint as to her existence. Jack is also subject to the controlling influence of his single parental figure, Teague, in his early life, which is a classic plight disney princesses find themselves in, whether the dynamic is outright abusive like Jack and Teague's is, or less so. Jack — at least earlier in his life, less so in the trilogy itself — is easily manipulated by the "villains." the plot of TPOF hinges on Jack being manipulated and betrayed by Christophe, and then the plot of CotBP hinges on Jack being betrayed by Barbossa during the mutiny on the Black Pearl ten years prior.

       lastly and, a bit of an odd one maybe, but something I want to include, is that Jack is often coveted by others. it's most obvious in Jack's dynamic with Beckett which, whether you read into it sexually or not on Beckett's side, I personally think it's entirely up for interpretation, is very driven by Beckett's desire to possess Jack. he wants to control him and use him in the same way that he uses all material things, and is pushed to very extreme lengths when Jack resists that control and tries to assert his autonomy. I think Jack being such a free spirit, as well as the fact that he's a pretty boy and is unapologetically sexual ( the second not being a disney princess trait lmao ) he invites that kind of attitude from other people. he invites people to try to challenge that aspect of his character and put him in a box, or control him, or break him.

[monsterfloofs]

Jack O Lantern, Queensland Blue, and Fairy Tale can have me ANY day 😩👀

Whenever you have time/inspiration could you maybe write a romantic and/or thirst fic/head cannon for all three of them please? 😳🥺

I am sorry this sat for a while in my inbox I. . . geniunely didn’t know how to properly answer this? x////Dc

You thirsty anon you!

This is gonna sound silly, but I actually had to look up what a thrist fic was. I kinda knew what that was? But not exactly? And afterwards googling it, I-- ahhhh still don’t have a good grasp on the best way how to write that pspspspsp orz (I am sorry please for give my demi brain, sometimes I understandy- other times I stare at it with the most logic brain ever and it goes right over my head haha)

Since all three of them caught your eye. I can talk a little bit about them, if that would suffice? ://D

Mostly the pumpkin heads were a character design challenge and I didn’t think too, too hard on their personalities, though I do have some generalized thoughts that I can share from while I was drawing them!

The Jack-O-Lantern Pumpkin: Heckle

He has the most grounded personality of the three since someone was also interested in him! And I wrote that short! Design wise was absolutely inspired by the halloween trickster kind of character archetype.

Giggly, giddy, and goofy! A mischevious imp.

Most noticablly enjoys dressing up and giving mortals a good fright or playing pranks on them when the veil between worlds is thin. They enjoy sneaking around in corn mazes especially, mascerading as a scarecrow to spook unsuspected passersby. Those who get lost in mazes that seem to go on forever is part of his doing. And why wouldn't he be a pal and come along to get you back safe and sound? Though while he enjoys scaring folks he isn't exactly malicious. And if he realizes he has taken a joke too far will drop his act. Will stop his shenanigans to soothe / aid scared children too. A lost child can be found with a grinning pumpkin as a token apology gift and has been given lots of candy (much to their agreived parents.)

Like that sign that says, “Unattended children with be give espresso and a free puppy” ? Have you ever seen that one? Because that’s really along the lines of what Heckle does do.

Heckle in recent years of bounding around in the human world has realized as advancements in technology has grown so exponentially, that his own image can pass easier amoungst the many other sea of costumes that are out and about on Halloween. And he LOVES that! If there isn’t any reservations at your Halloween Party, he’ll probably be there. Heck, he will probably we there even if it was an exclusive party. He is tricky like that.

In a relationship, I see Heckle as being a PEST.

Playfully bantering with you, telling jokes, doing silly things. (Might be a little bit of a cheeky pervert under the right conditions)

But all in all, if your scowl breaks into a smile, or even-- gasp-- laughter?? He has done his job well and will continue with gusto.

Queensland Blue: Unnamed

Her design is most influenced by the Headless Horseman I think. And I see her personality balanced between Heckle and the Fairytale pumpkin. Has a streak of mischief to her, but will stand up for what she thinks is right. Will bend or break some rules along the way to make sure good people get what they deserve. And will also see to it, that wicked folks get there come'uppins. Is a hellion to those who think they can belittle others.

And what better way to knock pompous primadonnas down a few pegs, than a real good scare?

She has a protective streak, and also possibly a jealous one too? Strong willed and typically level headed until something clashes with her morals. Then the sword is drawn. (Figuratively and literally)

As a lover I feel like she would need someone that she could feel safe to let her guard down around. Even if it's for a just a short period of time? Perhaps a secret romantic? She will never admit it.

Fairytale: Unnamed

Fairytale has the most moral compass out of the other two. Heart of gold. Nay, you shan’t scare the kind people! Have at thee evil do’er! What you would expect from a gallant prince that has come to sweep you off your feet! Tender hearted and a little naive to the evil that is around them. They choose to be kind first and foremost. Sometimes that gets them into trouble, they are also reckless when it comes to matters of the heart. If something strikes them as immoral, it's definately act first, think later. :'3c

Also is the most romantically inclined, has big dreams of finding their one true love whom they will serenade with love songs, and take them on a romantic carriage ride through the night. 💫

[godsprettiestprincess]

Like, I think a lot of what people miss about Gabriel through all the hedonism is that he really does Care about the Rules. It’s a defense mechanism obviously, he was the mascot and the mascot’s job is to keep everyone upbeat and distracted from the problems™ and he categorically failed (God&Michael and Lucifer fight, Lucifer leaves and eventually has to die). This role, also, comes with a lot of self sacrifice — you do you job and keep the family together and cheer everybody up right? And when someone else causes problems you have to bring everything back to normal. (You see it a lot with the “comedy character who’s secretly traumatized™ archetype.) He’s actively participating in the system.

You can see it even in the job he picks for himself — he’s a trickster, he’s punishing the wicked, giving people their just desserts — but also you can see it in the way he talks to Sam. He minimizes Lucifer’s issue with God and humanity a lot, obviously, (“Dad loved you best (….) and when he brought the new baby home, you couldn’t handle it. So all this is just a great big temper tantrum. Time to grow up.”) but he also — admittedly like everyone else in s5 — blames Sam pretty much solely for Lucifer escaping. He addresses him specifically when talking to both of them about how there’s no choice in playing their roles and when he’s making fun of them for wanting to ask him for help (“It’s the apocalypse!” “And who’s fault is that?”) (“Let me guess, you broke the world and you want me to sweep up your mess.”) He’s BITTER, and in having previously been a very willing participant in the system, likely to his own detriment, and desperately wanting things to be over (/back to how they were) he takes the easy option of just going along with the out given to him and us by the Christian framework of the narrative.

No consideration is given as to why Sam would take the steps he did that ended in freeing Lucifer, or why Lucifer wouldn’t back down even if/when it meant everything being ruined, because to him nothing could have been worth rupturing the peace/status quo. Any reasoning they could or did have is, to him, as petty as Lucifer being jealous or Sam just being stupid.

Hi there’s so much evidence in changing channels and hammer of the gods both that Gabriel blames Lucifer pretty much solely for his fall.

[szethsmom]

SCREAMING BITING CLAWING CLIMBING THE WALLS SOBBING GOING FERAL

[uptoolateart]

Years ago, I read somewhere that part of how fairy tales work is that they portray all the archetypes in black or white terms. For instance, the wicked queen is not a complex character with good and bad traits who is suffering from chronic depression and taking out her problems on others. She is evil, no explanation needed. The princess has no flaws – she is just good. And the prince is just charming, which we take to be good, even though technically it means he’s bewitching and therefore probably a bit of a trickster with a possible dark side.

These concepts resonate with small children because that’s how they think. Part of the journey of growing up is learning to see the grey side to things. I do believe some examples of true evil exist, but that it’s rare, and most people / the world around us is more complex. This revelation can be painful, because it leads to discovering that our parents, for instance, aren’t the perfect heroes we imagined they were. They can’t always protect us, and they make a lot of mistakes. As long as they aren’t abusive, we need to accept people’s flaws, because if we deny these and continue trying to see things as black or white, we struggle in life.

To give a personal example, I remember if I met someone new in school, I always wanted to think we were the best of friends. If they then did something unkind to me, I found it difficult to accept that they might have just had a bad day; I felt like they had deceived me and actually they weren’t nice at all, and I’d feel ready to blank them for the rest of time. I think all children go through this learning process, and it hurts and it’s confusing.

I think this is perhaps the biggest focus of Marinette’s coming-of-age story. When she first met Adrien, she didn’t try to hear his side of things; she made an assumption, immediately threw him in a category with Chloe, and wrote him off. Then he handed her that umbrella and it was like he could do no wrong ever again, even though we all know he has often frustrated her as Cat Noir. And with Cat Noir, she thought she had him pegged, and she was visibly thrown by moments when her image of him was challenged, e.g. ‘Glaciator’ or ‘Strike Back’.

She has struggled to accept Adrien / Cat Noir as a person of complexity, which is key to her not working out that they are the same person, even after what happened in ‘Cat Blanc’. It’s easy to shout at the TV, ‘Are you kidding??’ until we remember that all children think this way and must learn the hard way that people aren’t all black or white. To reinforce this, Cat is literally black or white (although they turn traditional symbolism on its head and make white the colour of his so-called dark side).

I would add that in re-watching 'Cat Blanc' (for the gazillionth time), it occurred to me the other day that their relationship in that version of the future never could have worked, because she didn't know Adrien was Cat Noir. In the brief scenes where we see them together as a couple, Marinette behaves like a giddy little girl rather than his equal. It isn't a healthy, balanced relationship, particularly because Adrien is pretending to be something he's not, by hiding Cat Noir from her. This is why, as Ladybug, she later calls him ‘my prince’, a reference to Prince Charming, pegging him as a fairy tale character rather than a real person with flaws. Only when she sees him as something ‘grey’ and imperfect will they work as a couple.

I wrote previously about the problem with Alya. Marinette decided Alya was her best friend and so she could trust her with everything. I think she brushed off a lot of things Alya did that were signs that this wasn’t the best decision. Something I didn’t mention in my longer article on this subject is a moment in ‘Time Breaker’ when Alex entrusts the watch to Alya, who passes it along to Marinette even knowing that Marinette is already busy holding up the banner. The watch ultimately gets broken due to Alya not looking after it, because she prioritised filming the race for her blog.

We now know the watch was a miraculous, and Alya cared more about her blog than the miraculous. She happily added to Marinette’s burdens, and it was Adrien who attempted to help Marinette when it was too much for her. This little scene sets up the complex relationship dynamics that come later on, but Marinette doesn’t notice them. She has to learn the hard way, about the limits of some people’s time for you, and also about those on whom you can truly rely.

We also watched Marinette learn through experience that although Chloe has her issues, she can’t be written off just like that. She’s more complex. And using their secret identities has been part of this (and can I just say: it’s really sneaky, the way they get insider confidence and knowledge by showing up in alter egos!).

What happened in ‘Strike Back’ was the final straw in this journey. Marinette mixed up Felix with Adrien because she doesn’t look beneath the surface. Even now, she can’t write off Felix entirely. Shrugging him off as ‘evil’ endangers them, because it fails to take account of his possible motivations. Similarly, Cat Noir once yelled at Hawk Moth that whatever he wanted to do with the miraculous, it had to be evil. Well, we know it isn’t. It’s more complicated. (To clarify, I'm not defending his actions, but saying his objective is complex.) And that’s the issue here – everyone is being forced to learn to accept that uncomfortable grey space. But it will be good for them. It’s just a painful lesson that we all go through as we grow up.

People are not one thing or another. People are messy. Fairy tales work when we’re small, as something to connect to and explore our young emotions. But there comes a point when you have to grow up and stop living in that fairy tale, and I think that’s a large part of the plot of ‘Miraculous’.

[honourablejester]

Top 5 Rogues in Fiction

Oh, okay. Watch me forget every character I’ve known. But off the top of my head:

Eugenides from the Queen’s Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner. THE BEST. THE WORST. Everyone around him wants to worship him and/or wring his neck, often simultaneously. Regularly steals kingdoms from people. My all-time favourite thief.

Corvo Attano from Dishonored. Everyone loves the mute traumatised rat assassin falling off buildings and (depending on chaos) saving souls.

Lando Calrissian from Star Wars. Baby me fell so hard for this space pirate prince with his cloud city and his cape and his gambling and his heart-wrenching decision between his city and his friend.

Ezra Standish from The Magnificent Seven (1998). I am a complete sucker for a fancy-pants gambler with a heart (and tooth) of gold and more ten-dollar words than actual dollars. Between him and Lando, gamblers are a bit of a thing for me.

If we’re talking archetypes, Hermes from Greek Mythology informed a lot for me. Also Lugh from Irish mythology, and several other mythological tricksters. But Hermes was my first, when my granddad gave me a big book of Greek Mythology. Hermes is why I love to mingle tricksters and psychopomps together, thieves and the grave.

(Occasionally) Honourable mentions: Rin Setsua from Thunderbolt Fantasy (amazing trickster asshole), Jonathan Carnahan from The Mummy (“And did I panic? I think not!”), Arsene Lupin (original flavour), Arsene Lupin from Lupin III, Selina Kyle from Batman, Hardison & Parker from Leverage, Althalus from The Redemption of Althalus (I realised David Eddings is iffy, but this was one of my childhood books), Slanter from The Wishsong of Shannara (arguably a ranger, but he was my introduction to surly, sneaky, morally ambiguous, competent, enemies-to-allies), Willow from Willow (even when facing an evil sorceress, bog-standard sleight of hand can and will win the day), Robin Hood from Disney’s Robin Hood (childhood), Hawkins & Jean from The Court Jester, Artemus Gordon from the (original) Wild Wild West, an uncountable number of spies …

Actually, you know what? I’ll shut up now. But I enjoy a good rogue, I really, really do.

[lokiondisneyplus]

'Loki' takes over: Tom Hiddleston on his new TV series and a decade in the MCU

Ten years after Hiddleston first chose chaos in Thor, Marvel’s fan favorite God of Mischief is going even bigger with his time-bending Disney+ show.

Tom Hiddleston is Loki, and he is burdened with glorious purpose: After playing Thor's puckish brother for over a decade in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, no one understands the mercurial Asgardian God of Mischief as well as the actor. He can teach an entire seminar on Loki if given the opportunity — which he actually did during pre-production on his forthcoming Disney+ show. In conversation, Hiddleston quotes lines from his MCU debut, 2011's Thor, almost verbatim, and will playfully correct you if you mistakenly refer to Asgard's Rainbow Bridge as the Bifrost, which is the portal that connects Loki and Thor's homeworld to the Nine Realms, including Midgard, a.k.a. Earth. "Well, the Bifrost technically is the energy that runs through the bridge," he says with a smile. "But nine points to Gryffindor!" And when he shows up to the photo shoot for this very digital cover, he hops on a call with our photo editor to pitch ways the concept could be even more Loki, like incorporating the flourish the trickster does whenever magically conjuring something. The lasting impression is that playing Loki isn't just a paycheck.

"Rather than ownership, it's a sense of responsibility I feel to give my best every time and do the best I can because I feel so grateful to be a part of what Marvel Studios has created," the 40-year-old Brit tells EW over Zoom a few days after the shoot and a week out from Thor's 10th anniversary. "I just want to make sure I've honored that responsibility with the best that I can give and the most care and thought and energy."

After appearing in three Thor movies and three Avengers, Hiddleston is bringing that passion to his first solo Marvel project, Loki, the House of Ideas' third Disney+ series following the sitcom pastiche WandaVision and the topical The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Led by head writer Michael Waldron (Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Heels), the six-episode drama sees Hiddleston's shapeshifting agent of chaos step out from behind his brother's shadow and into the spotlight for a timey-wimey, sci-fi adventure that aims to get to the bottom of who Loki really is. "I wanted to explore slightly more complex character questions," says Waldron. "It's not just good versus bad. Is anybody all good? Is anybody all bad? What makes a hero, a hero? A villain, a villain?"  

Even though Loki — who loves sowing mayhem with his illusion magic and shapeshifting, all with a major chip on his shoulder — has never been one for introspection, the idea of building an entire show around him was a no-brainer for Marvel. When asked why Loki was one of the studio's first Disney+ shows, Marvel president Kevin Feige replies matter-of-factly, "More Hiddleston, more Loki." First introduced as Thor's (Chris Hemsworth) envious brother in Kenneth Branagh's Thor, Loki went full Big Bad in 2012's The Avengers. That film cemented the impish rogue as one of the shared universe's fan favorites, thanks to Hiddleston's ability to make him deliciously villainous yet charismatic and, most importantly, empathetic. The character's popularity is one of the reasons he's managed to avoid death many times.

"He's been around for thousands of years. He had all sorts of adventures," says Feige. "Wanting to fill in the blanks and see much more of Loki's story [was] the initial desire [for the series]."

The Loki we meet on the show is not the one who fought the Avengers in 2012 and evolved into an antihero in Thor: The Dark World and Thor: Ragnarok before meeting his demise at the hands of the mad titan Thanos (Josh Brolin) in 2018's Avengers: Infinity War. Instead, we'll be following a Loki from a branched timeline (a variant, if you will) after he stole the Tesseract following his thwarted New York invasion and escaped S.H.I.E.L.D. custody during the time heist featured in Avengers: Endgame. In other words, this Loki hasn't gone through any sort of redemption arc. He's still the charming yet petulant god who firmly believes he's destined to rule and has never gotten his due.

Premiering June 9, Loki begins with the Time Variance Authority — a bureaucratic organization tasked with safeguarding the proper flow of time — arresting the Loki Variant seen in Endgame because they want his help fixing all of the timeline problems he caused while on the run with the Tesseract. So there will be time travel, and a lot more of it than in Endgame. As Loki makes his way through his own procedural, he'll match wits with new characters including Owen Wilson's Agent Mobius, a brilliant TVA analyst, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw's Judge Renslayer. The question in early episodes is whether Loki will help them or take over.

"One of the things Kevin Feige led on was, 'I think we should find a way of exploring the parts of Loki that are independent of his relationship with Thor,' or see him in a duality or in relationship with others, which I thought was very exciting," says Hiddleston, who also serves as an executive producer on the show. "So the Odinson saga, that trilogy of films, still has its integrity, and we don't have to reopen it and retell it."

Yet, in order to understand where Loki is going, it's important to see where he came from.

Hiddleston can't believe how long he and Loki have been connected. "I've been playing this character for 11 years," he says. "Which is the first time I have said that sentence, I realize, and it [blows] my mind. I don't know what percentage that is exactly of my 40 years of being alive, but it's substantial."

His time as Loki actually goes a bit further back, to 2009 — a year after Robert Downey Jr. big banged the MCU into existence with Iron Man — when he auditioned for Thor. It's no secret that Hiddleston initially went in for the role of the titular God of Thunder, but Feige and director Kenneth Branagh thought his natural charm and flexibility as an actor made him better suited for the movie's damaged antagonist. "Tom gave you an impression that he could be ready for anything, performance-wise," says Branagh, who had previously worked with him on a West End revival of Checkov's Ivanov and the BBC series Wallander. "Tom has a wild imagination, so does Loki. He's got a mischievous sense of humor and he was ready to play. It felt like he had a star personality, but he was a team player."

Hiddleston fully immersed himself in the character. Outside of studying Loki's history in the Marvel Comics, he also researched how Loki and the Trickster God archetype appeared across mythology and different cultures. "He understood that he was already in something special [and] it was a special character in a special part of that early moment in the life of the Marvel universe where [he] also needed to step up in other ways," says Branagh, who was impressed by the emotional depth Hiddleston brought to the part, especially when it came to how isolated Loki felt in the Asgardian royal family.  

There was a lot riding on that first Thor feature. For one, no one knew if audiences would immediately latch onto a Shakespearean superhero movie partially set on an alien planet populated by the Norse Gods of legend. Second, it was integral to Feige's plans for the shared universe. Loki was supposed to be the main villain in The Avengers, which would not only mirror how Earth's mightiest heroes joined forces in 1963's Avengers #1 but also give Thor a believable reason for teaming up with Iron Man, Captain America (Chris Evans), and the rest of the capes. Feige first clued Hiddleston into those larger plans when the actor was in L.A. before Thor started shooting.

"I was like, 'Excuse me?' Because he was already three, four steps ahead," says Hiddleston. "That took me a few minutes to process, because I didn't quite realize how it just suddenly had a scope. And being cast as Loki, I realized, was a very significant moment for me in my life, and was going to remain. The creative journey was going to be so exciting."

Hiddleston relished the opportunity to go full villain in Avengers, like in the scene where Loki ordered a crowd to kneel before him outside a German opera house: "It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation," says the Machiavellian god. "The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel."

"I just knew that in the structure of that film, I had to lean into his role as a pure antagonist," Hiddleston recalls. "What I always found curious and complex about the way Loki is written in Avengers, is that his status as an antagonist comes from the same well of not belonging and being marginalized and isolated in the first Thor film. Loki now knows he has no place in Asgard."

Loki did find a place within the audience's hearts, though. Feige was "all in" on Hiddleston as his Loki from the beginning, but even he couldn't predict how much fans would love him. Feige recalls the reaction at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con: "Did we know that after he was the villain in two movies, he would be bringing thousands of people to their feet in Hall H, in costume, chanting his name? No, that was above and beyond the plan that we were hoping for and dreaming of." It was a dream Feige first got an inkling of a year earlier during the Avengers press tour when a Russian fan slipped past security, snuck into Mark Ruffalo's car, and asked the Hulk actor to give Hiddleston a piece of fan art she created. "That was one of the early signs there was much more happening with this quote-unquote villain."  

Despite that popularity, the plan was to kill Loki off in 2013's Thor: The Dark World, but the studio reversed course after test audiences refused to believe he actually died fighting the Dark Elves. Alas, he couldn't out-illusion death forever. After returning in Taika Waititi's colorful and idiosyncratic Thor: Ragnarok, Hiddleston's character perished for real in the opening moments of Infinity War. In typical Loki fashion, before Thanos crushed his windpipe, he delivered a defiant speech that indicated he'd finally made peace with the anger he felt toward his family.  

"It felt very, very final, and I thought, 'Okay, that's it. This is Loki's final bow and a conclusive end to the Odinson saga,'" says Hiddleston, who shot that well-earned death scene in 2017.  

But, though he didn't know it yet, the actor's MCU story was far from over.

Credit: Charlie Gray for EW

When Hiddleston returned to film two scenes in Avengers: Endgame in 2017, he had no idea where Loki portaled off to after snatching the Tesseract. "Where'd he go? When does he go? How does he get there? These are all questions I remember asking on the day, and then not being given any answers," Hiddleston recalls. To be fair, it's likely the Powers That Be didn't necessarily have answers then. While Feige can't exactly recall when the writers' room for Endgame first devised Loki's escape sequence, he does know that setting up a future show wasn't the primary goal — because a Loki series wasn't on the horizon just yet.

"[That scene] was really more of a wrinkle so that one of the missions that the Avengers went on in Endgame could get screwed up and not go well, which is what required Cap and Tony to go further back in time to the '70s," says Feige. Soon after that, though, former Disney CEO Bob Iger approached Feige about producing content for the studio's forthcoming streaming service. "I think the notion that we had left this hanging loose end with Loki gave us the in for what a Loki series could be. So by the time [Endgame] came out, we did know where it was going."

As for Hiddleston, he didn't find out about the plans for a Loki show until spring 2018, a few weeks before Infinity War hit theaters. "I probably should not have been surprised, but I was," says the actor. "But only because Infinity War had felt so final."

Nevertheless, Hiddleston was excited about returning for his show. He was eager to explore Loki's powers, especially the shapeshifting, and what it meant that this disruptive figure still managed to find a seat beside the gods in mythology. "I love this idea [of] Loki's chaotic energy somehow being something we need. Even though, for all sorts of reasons, you don't know whether you can trust him. You don't know whether he's going to betray you. You don't why he's doing what he's doing," says Hiddleston. "If he's shapeshifting so often, does he even know who he is? And is he even interested in understanding who he is? Underneath all those masks, underneath the charm and the wit, which is kind of a defense anyway, does Loki have an authentic self? Is he introspective enough or brave enough to find out? I think all of those ideas are all in the series — ideas about identity, ideas about self-knowledge, self-acceptance, and the difficulty of it."

“The series will explore Loki's powers in a way they have not yet been explored, which is very, very exciting.”

The thing that truly sold Hiddleston on the show was Marvel's decision to include the Time Variance Authority, a move he describes as "the best idea that anybody had pertaining to the series." Feige and Loki executive producer Stephen Broussard had hoped to find a place for the TVA — an organization that debuted in 1986's Thor #372 and has appeared in She-Hulk and Fantastic Four stories — in the MCU for years, but the right opportunity never presented itself until Loki came along. "Putting Loki into his own procedural series became the eureka moment for the show," says Feige.  

The TVA's perspective on time and reality also tied into the themes that Waldron, Loki's head writer, was hoping to explore. "Loki is a character that's always reckoning with his own identity, and the TVA, by virtue of what they do, is uniquely suited to hold up a mirror to Loki and make him really confront who he is and who he was supposed to be," says Waldron. Hiddleston adds: "[That] was very exciting because in the other films, there was always something about Loki that was very controlled. He seemed to know exactly what the cards in his hand were and how he was going to play them…. And Loki versus the TVA is Loki out of control immediately, and in an environment in which he's completely behind the pace, out of his comfort zone, destabilized, and acting out."

To truly dig into who Loki is, the creative team had to learn from the man who knows him best: Hiddleston. "I got him to do a thing called Loki School when we first started," says director Kate Herron. "I asked him to basically talk through his 10 years of the MCU — from costumes to stunts, to emotionally how he felt in each movie. It was fantastic."

Hiddleston got something out of the Loki school, too. Owen Wilson both attended the class and interviewed Hiddleston afterward so that he could better understand Loki, as his character Mobius is supposed to be an expert on him. During their conversation, Wilson pointedly asked Hiddleston what he loved about playing the character.

"And I said, 'I think it's because he has so much range,'" says Hiddleston. "I remember saying this to him: 'On the 88 keys on the piano, he can play the twinkly light keys at the top. He can keep it witty and light, and he's the God of Mischief, but he can also go down to the other side and play the heavy keys. And he can play some really profound chords down there, which are about grief and betrayal and loss and heartbreak and jealousy and pride.'" Hiddleston recalls Wilson being moved by the description: "He said, 'I think I might say that in the show.' And it was such a brilliant insight for me into how open Owen is as an artist and a performer.'"

Owen Wilson as Mobius and Tom Hiddleston as Loki in 'Loki.'| Credit: Chuck Zlotnick/Marvel Studios

Everyone involved is particularly excited for audiences to see Hiddleston and Wilson's on-screen chemistry. "Mobius is not unlike Owen Wilson in that he's sort of nonplussed by the MCU," says Feige. "[Loki] is used to getting a reaction out of people, whether it's his brother or his father, or the other Avengers. He likes to be very flamboyant and theatrical. Mobius doesn't give him the reaction he's looking for. That leads to a very unique relationship that Loki's not used to."

As for the rest of the series, we know that Loki will be jumping around time and reality, but the creative team isn't keen on revealing when and where. "Every episode, we tried to take inspiration from different things," says Waldron, citing Blade Runner's noir aesthetic as one example.

"Part of the fun of the multiverse and playing with time is seeing other versions of characters, and other versions of the titular character in particular," says Feige, who also declined to confirm if Loki ties into Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and/or other upcoming projects.

Making Loki was especially meaningful to Hiddleston because they shot most of it during the pandemic, in late 2020. "It will remain one of the absolute most intense, most rewarding experiences of my life," he says. "It's a series about time, and the value of time, and what time is worth, and I suppose what the experience of being alive is worth. And I don't quite know yet, and maybe I don't have perspective on it, if all the thinking and the reflecting that we did during the lockdown ended up in the series. But in some way, it must have because everything we make is a snapshot of where we were in our lives at that time."

While it remains to be seen what the future holds for Loki beyond this initial season, Hiddleston isn't preparing to put the character to bed yet. "I'm open to everything," he says. "I have said goodbye to the character. I've said hello to the character. I said goodbye to the character [again]. I've learned not to make assumptions, I suppose. I'm just grateful that I'm still here, and there are still new roads to explore."

[bloody-wonder]

Thank you for answering my ask....If you don't mind me asking (again), who are your top 10 favorite characters from all of the books (fiction) that you've finished? And why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before....Thanks...

thanks for asking! i love making lists and rankings so this is some awesome enrichment for me :D i didn’t manage to come up with a definitive top 10 favorite bookish faves list but while i was thinking about it i realized that almost all of my faves can be sorted into certain archetypes so instead i will break down those archetypes, explain why i like them and highlight one or two characters in each of them that i do consider to be my all time faves :))

*i’m sorry but this is gonna be mostly a sausage fest bc female characters who embody these specific archetypes are few and far between🤷‍♂️

**i will only mention what book the character is from if you can’t find it out by googling

***the obligatory disclaimer: i don’t condone any of this irl, fiction and real life are different things etc etc. most of these guys are horrible people so it’s a good thing they’re fictional and can’t hurt you and the staff i say about them is just dark humor and sarcasm etc etc🤡

****some are not from books but i had to mention them

welcome to my evil blorbo empire! >:)

nasty incel, thinks he deserves to get the girl, murders people about it: the phantom, severus snape, frollo, father konstantin (the winternight trilogy), joe goldberg, heathcliff (don’t remember if he actually murders anyone but otherwise he fits). disgusting irl, fascinating in fiction. this one’s probably the most controversial on this list and i have psychoanalyzed myself for a long time trying to understand why i’m drawn to reading about these guys. the answer probably is that i find relatable wanting something which you don’t deserve and which can never be yours and can vicariously live out the dark fantasies of obtaining it by any means no matter how vile. “be mine or you will burn”. as i grew older and learned about misogyny, objectification, male gaze an so on, i learned to enjoy this kind of stories more critically but still an obsessive friend-zoned maniac makes me go👀 it’s especially fun if he has something else going on as well: the phantom’s shtick for example is the whole tortured monster genius thing and what i love about snape is his,, let’s call it dedication lol. seriously the guy never moves on, it would’ve probably been better for everyone including himself but nope. he said i’m gonna stay right here in this puddle of anger, guilt and self-loathing and make everyone around as miserable as i am. relatable.

queer swashbuckler, trickster, possibly outlaw: francis crawford of lymond, captain jack sparrow, lock lamora (not queer. yet.), seregil i korit, yan wushi (technically not a swashbuckler but a wuxia equivalent maybe?), savonn silvertongue (the magpie ballads), robin loxleigh (the gentle art of fortune hunting - the regency era equivalent), eugenides the thief (not sure about this one yet). i love adventure stories, i love queers with swords, i love sassy conmen, i love gay evil wizards. lymond fits several categories on this list but i feel like this one describes his archetype the best. won’t say much more about him, he’s the love of my life💖 jack sparrow is not a book character but i couldn’t leave him out of this bc he’s the first character i was ever obsessed with and even now he would definitely make my top 5. you may ask how is he queer and i will tell you to rewatch the potc trilogy with an open mind and behold his vibes🙌

slytherclaw schemer, conniving politician, often mean bc people are stupid: the entire lannister family, laurent of vere, sherlock, dr house (both are from tv shows but had to include them bc they’re the embodiments of the douchebag ravenclaw archetype which i love), the littlefinger, margaret lennox (the lymond chronicles), jin guangyao, shen jiu, phil burbank (he’s kinda a mix between 1 and 3, definitely doesn’t want a girl tho lol), tom irwin (the history boys), milady de winter, seiji katayama, marquise de merteuil, aramis, bai rong, john childermass. brainy is the new sexy. reckless bravery is out, thinking ten steps ahead and manipulating people is in. sure, this isn’t very nice of you but don’t worry bc the narrative will assign you a gryffinpuff friend or love interest who will love you no matter how mean you are to them😁 (unless you’re the antagonist, then ofc you don’t need friends). maybe there’s something to be said about being kind and patient irl but fiction is for living out the fantasies of being the smartest bitch in the kingdom who makes people scared and horny. laurent is the epitome of this and i have already talked about why i like lymond jr at length (1, 2). and tyrion lannister has a tragic love story and daddy issues to boot, so as someone who has a tender spot in her heart for cripples, bastards and broken things i just couldn’t walk past. in this category we also finally have some ladies who have done nothing wrong ever and i love them😌

queercoded murderous sociopath (basically 1 but queer): tom ripley, hannibal lecter (queercoded in the show), xue yang, the mystery protag of gentlemen and players, graham reid malett, henry winter (the secret history), oh sangwoo (i do think he’s straight, it makes the story juicier), yoon seungho, dorian gray. listen, my tastes are depraved but they are also classy. this is about the quintessential queer experience of not knowing whether you want to be them or to be with them and solving the dilemma by beating them to death with an oar and drowning the corpse in the sea. or pushing them off the roof. or blinding them. or eating them. or breaking their legs. lol by now you must’ve realized i have lots of bottled up rage and zero social skills and take to characters who help me channel this condition into fictional psychosexual stabbing. i don’t think there’s a *fave of all time* in this group of fucked up guys but if i had to choose their union representative it would probably be xue yang. either you can fix him or he stabs you and sleeps next to your corpse for eight years, it’s a win-win👍 

feral bastards & drama queens, mostly not straight either: andrew minyard, neil josten, kevin day, wei wuxian, howl pendragon, yashiro (twittering birds never fly), jinx, henry “monty” montague, boris pavlikovsky, francis abernathy, cardan greenbriar, aiden kane, the gentleman with the thistledown hair. *takes all of the aftg mcs, slaps the feral drama queen label on them*😅😅 anywho. kevin’s personality is probably the most similar to mine and neil might be my favorite pov character but andrew joseph minyard is an Experience. i can talk forever about why his story and canon characterization is important - as i did two years ago, you can still find those asks on my blog - but the reason why andrew would probably take a spot on my top 10 is bc he’s just so. entertaining. to observe. much like laurent or lymond or jack sparrow he’s larger than life and steals almost every scene he’s in. he’s smart, he’s funny, his dialogue is just exquisite, he’s seemingly effortlessly competent and at the same time so relatably apathetic. neil’s the protag of aftg but andrew (who, ironically, hates the game) is the soul of it. these books just wouldn’t be the same without him and my life certainly wouldn’t either😌

“not good enough”: jiang cheng, theon greyjoy, robin stewart (the lymond chronicles), aaron minyard, the hound, rodion raskolnikov (certainly wasn’t good enough to get away with murder hehe). always overlooked, always second best, always in someone else’s shadow... the only remedy - stabbing people.. lmao but seriously isn’t this the most relatable shit? feeling acutely that you’re not the protag of this story but an unremarkable side character at best or a secondary villain at worst😒 all of these guys are neat and their anger at not getting enough pets and treats is very amusing but the real star of this category is definitely uncle sourgrape aka jiang cheng. his story just hits different bc it’s about the biggest aroace fear - your bestie promises you will be together forever and then elopes with his crush (well he also kinda dies and gets resurrected in between but that’s not important! it’s not about him!!) and then you find out that all this time he’s been doing what’s best for you and so you don’t even have the right to complain that he broke his promise. and everyone acts like you’re evil bc you refuse to forgive and live love laugh >:( maaan did jc & wwx just destroy me😭 i don’t think i’ve ever encountered a non-romantic fictional relationship so ripe with tragedy and insurmountable conflict. can’t even talk about it anymore here have this post and this character study fic😢

she's a heinous bitch and she can step on me: marthe (the lymond chronicles), madam yu (she can step on me twice), attolia, claire zachanassian, captain zamira drakasha, daenerys targaryen (not a bitch in the books. yet.). finally, a ladies’ corner👩🏼‍🤝‍👩🏻💅 there’s very few specifically female character archetypes i like bc even nowadays, although women are hardly a minority in fiction anymore, the archetype of so many of them is just “token girl”🙄 or “love interest”🤮 progress has been made but i have yet to encounter a female lymond. speaking of whomst - marthe, the light of my life, the apple of my eye. dorothy dunnett tried to *spoiler* only to *spoiler* *spoiler* (katie, this is for your benefit😅). anyways, if you’ve read this far and know any fictional ladies who would fit one of the above descriptions please tell me how to find them👀

neurodivergent king (gender neutral): lan wanji, jean baptiste grenouille, murderbot, jahir seni galare, peter gordon (the power of the dog), mr norrell. this one’s pretty new! i’m still exploring this side of myself but i’ve become really interested in characters who interact with the world in ways different from the norm. this is obviously a very mixed bag bc these guys share no traits except for being nd in one way or another but that happens to be what i like about them and find interesting or relatable: grenouille’s unchecked obsession with his special interest, lwj’s trademark poker face and brevity of speech, jahir’s touch-aversion, murderbot’s... everything. also, funny how all of them are either queer and/or killed people. they do have more traits in common after all😅

nlog (affectionate): brienne of tarth, felicity montague, jude duarte, vasya (the winternight trilogy), tatyana larina, sophie hatter (turned herself into an old lady, other girls don’t do that), naomi novik’s heroines. we don’t stan “femininity” in this house. some “femininity” is okay but if a girl isn’t a heinous bitch i like when she has “masculine” pursuits or “male coded” character traits or in some shape or form doesn’t perform the kind of female gender identity the society wants to see. looks like nowadays women online are reclaiming the other girl “slur” and embracing femininity but this is my personal preference🤷‍♂️ no all time faves in this group either but ngl nothing will make me connect to a ya heroine faster than saying that she doesn’t like dresses and baking😅

depressed, byronic, tortured by the ghosts of the past: eugene onegin, most gillian flynn heroines, athos. tbh nothing better and nothing easier to incorporate into your story than a brooding character with a dark past. they’ve seen some shit, they’re tired of life and honestly aren’t we all? lol this positive message concludes my shamelessly long post thanks for reading

[kelpieice]

While William Joyce provided DreamWorks with a good idea, his books that had potential to be great came out lackluster...

Nightlight was the forever boy Joyce created. I take this a crying shame. Nightlight had so much potential as a character and to be honest, he was created not born. He is a servant. A child servant. There is already so much to explore with this quiet, reserved, warrior archetype star boy. Even his relationship with Katherine could of been explored better. (I was waiting for a conversation between him and Katherine, but it was never provided. :P)

Possibly why I don’t ship Jack and Katherine because I don’t care for Joyce’s decisions. While I am ok with Jelsa I refuse to acknowledge his obvious pandering. Katherine was the love interest of a quiet, reserved, warrior type starboy. While I adore Jack Frost (the movie) I refuse to change Nightlight but to focused on character development that his creator should of been focusing on.

In most incarnations of Mother Goose, she is old and I can’t find evidence she was ever married. 

So in my version to make this lackluster series make sense. Her true love she met as a child, he sacrificed his light for her sake. Their was consequences to his actions. She never could find the same relationship she had with her dear starboy. Perhaps she gets into her state of pinning for him and occasionally   “what if” and regrets she didn’t work hard enough to help the boy who always helped her. (I am sorry, Katherine is a marysue, she needs flaws.)

Jack Frost is a completely different character who is not reserved and more of a trickster type. But when the moonlight hits Jack Frost, he reflects the light just like snow which gives him a glow appearance. She misses Nightlight but knows Jack won’t be him. She is a good friend to Jack, that is it. 

She misses Nightlight but won’t misuse his sacrifice and does her best to be a great guardian. 

[jcmorrigan]

What are your honest opinions on all five kids from CatCF?

Charlie: Good kid, I hold him no ill will, but dang is he vanilla and boring. Which was the point - it takes a vanilla person who plays by the rules to make his way through the trickster-fae-level gauntlet Wonka has set up to make sure people take the job seriously - but geez, I feel no actual attachment to him.

Augustus: Poor little meow meow. Also a savage snark. I want to buy him ice cream.

Violet: BEST KIDDO. Little girlboss in the making. I've seen the discourse on how the 80s version should've inherited the factory, and you know what I'mma say that's universal, gum is adjacent to candy and Vi knows gum. This doesn't mean she's a nice person, though. Which is exactly why I like her.

Veruca: Yzma energy, absolute Yzma energy. I love snotty diva characters so much.

Mike: You know those characters who are designed to be hateable but in the most fun way possible? There's almost nothing redeeming about Mike whatsoever and I love that about him. Little headstrong brat.

I will adopt them all (or get them crossover parents) except for Charlie who is good because he is now a billionaire

Thing is, I'm not mad at Charlie (except for how boring he is), and I'm not even that mad at Wonka (I really just...consider him a trickster fae archetype, and one must be careful in one's dealings with the fae) but I like angry, jaded, petty characters and so I will ABSOLUTELY support Augustus, Violet, Veruca, and Mike embarking on an EPIC REVENGE QUEST to bring down the chocolate factory system

So yeah, I kinda don't subscribe to "they did nothing wrong" because of my particular flavor of character enjoyment but I'm also all about said angry, jaded, petty characters finding friendships and getting satisfying lives regardless, so they're my kiddos

[raeynbowboi]

How to Play as Link in DnD 5e (2.0)

With the release of both Mythic Odysseys of Theros and now the new big expansion in Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, I figured now would be a good time to reexamine Link with the context of new subclasses, class features, and game mechanics that weren’t around the last time that I built him. While I won’t do this for every character I’ve built before, characters who have new options made available with these updates will get a new rebuild for 2021. If you want to compare and contrast this build to the original, I will link that build right [here].

The Spirit of the Hero

Link’s a Hylian and that’s just a fancy way of saying elf. His best racial options are either the High Elf, the Wood Elf, or the Half-Elf. Half-elf’s extra skills are tempting, but as Link is never given any parents or an ancestral family tree, we can’t really justify him as a half-elf. We’ll call him a Wood Elf for the extra +2 to his Dexterity and the +1 to his Wisdom as well as that woodsy vibe. But if you wanna go for a Half-Elf for the power build, I won’t tell anyone.

Link’s alignment is tricky. On the one hand, he is shown kneeling before the monarchy, defeating the forces of evil and darkness, and doing odd jobs to help the common people he comes across. However, he can also start forest fires, break into people’s houses, smash pots, steal people’s life savings or personal belongings, and attack the chicken population until they attack back. I’d wager he’s Neutral Good if for no other reason than his morality is highly dependent on the player.

My first choice for Link’s background would be the Folk Hero for Animal Handling and Survival. However, Link’s background is so inconsistent, it’s easier to just list out the skills he tends to have and tell you to pick a background that has those skills, or create your own: Animal Handling, Athletics, Investigation, Nature, Perception, or Survival. There’s a case to be made for other skills as well. Acrobatics works a little and his jumps did involve sick flips in Majora’s Mask, but Link doesn’t tend to balance or platform jump very often. Link can play instruments fine and danced in the Subrosian Dance Hall in Oracle of Seasons for Performance proficiency, but he’s usually playing instruments to activate effects, not to actually perform for a crowd. Link shows some Stealth skills in Breath of the Wild, but this hasn’t been a longstanding skill of his, so I didn’t lump it in with his main skill list.

Becoming a Hero

When it comes to his build, Link has made some use of spells in the past, but he’s nowhere near the spellcaster that Zelda and Ganondorf are. Link is definitely more of a martial fighter who augments himself with a wide arsenal of magical items. So when it comes to picking Link’s class, we have a few things to keep in mind.

BARD

Link is a talented young man, and he has had magical instruments in a few games over the years, as well as dancing in Subrosia, among other things. While I don’t subscribe to the idea of Link being a bard myself, I understand why people would come to this conclusion, as Link isn’t really bad at anything... except talking. And lying. And looking threatening. Or haggling. Yeah kind of hard to depict Link as a CHA caster who isn’t proficient in any CHA skill checks. 

Spirits (UA) This doesn’t fit for every Link, but especially for Breath of the Wild where Link gets help from the spirits of his fallen comrades, the flavor of calling on the dead works for Link. For a non-BotW example, maybe Link can tell stories of his past lives, and the memories he shares with each of them.

Valor This college has the downside of being built as a cheerleader, while Link really should be built for solo-combat since that’s how he approaches most fights. But Valor is better than Swords and also gives Link proficiency with martial weapons and shields, while Swords does not.

FIGHTER

While there are many martial classes, the Fighter differentiates itself by being the most down-to-earth option. It’s not beholden to rage, or smites, hunting, or sneaking. It is the simple skill of the blade, and this is a skill Link has in spades. From the earliest games, Link has been a master of the sword, the shield, and the bow.

Battle Master Link is a strategic fighter. He looks for weak spots, and he exploits them the best he can. Of all the fighter subclasses, none is more clever than the Battle Master. Its many maneuvers resembles the numerous sword techniques Link has learned especially in the later games. Even in Smash, Link showcases how clever he is by being able to combine his arrows with his bombs and shoot a bomb arrow. To my knowledge, none of the other characters can combine their abilities like this in Smash.

Cavalier The subclass is poorly named, and was better in its initial name as the Knight, as that is really what this subclass is. It is the idea of the knight in shining armor. They can also be flavored as bodyguards, a traveling sellsword, or castle guards. So Link does not have to be glued to Epona to make use of this subclass. The main reason to want this subclass is the Warding Maneuver, as giving Link the chance to either block or reduce all damage he takes is going to seriously improve how well he can tank a hit, and help keep him in a fight longer.

PALADIN

More than any other class, the Paladin actually stands for something. They fight for a value or a belief. They swear their life to a cause and are prepared to die fighting for it. Link works on a lore level as a Paladin. Especially when he’s dedicated multiple lifetimes to the same cause. Across every timeline and game over screen, Link has always returned and stood in defiance against whatever evil may come. 

Ancients This oath makes Link sworn to the forces of nature, such as the Great Fairy, and protecting the balance and harmony of the light, life, and love against death, decay, and darkness. The Ancients Paladin is all about protecting the balance in the world and valiantly opposing evil wherever it might arise. It also has a druidic or fey aspect, which kind of works for Link.

Crown With this vow, Link serves the Hyrulian Royal Family. This makes Link the princess’ personal knight, and an agent of lawfulness, order, and peacekeeping in the land. While 5e has backed away from typecasting Paladins as Lawful Good, this is probably the most Lawful subclass one could pick, as it places the authority of the royal family above all else.

Glory Instead of being sworn to the light or the law, the Glory Paladin is the harbinger of the goddesses. They are flavored as legendary heroes of destiny, possibly being demigods or the personal errand boys of the setting’s pantheon. This subclass is clearly focused on being a frontline warrior, and the features make Link a true force on the battlefield.

RANGER

Anyone who’s played Legend of Zelda knows that Link is very good at surviving. The games don’t tell you how to navigate the wilderness, Link just has to figure it out for himself. What’s more, Link may be willing to venture into the wilderness, but he’ll be hard-pressed to find many NPCs that far outside of settlements or cities. Yet what they fear, he thrives in. And it’s no wonder that this is the class most peole would assume for Link.

Hunter This conclave is the slayer of all things that threaten civilization. They can choose to be better at chipping away at one enemy, counter attack bigger monsters, or mow through hordes of minions with more ease by taking out multiple at a time. Especially at higher levels, this conclave excels at ripping apart Ganon’s forces with nary a golden curl out of place.

ROGUE

The rogue doesn’t need to be a wanted criminal on the lamb. They can be a clever fighter with a variety of skills and a knack for evasion. That speaks a lot more to Link’s skill set than one might assume at first glance. It’s not a perfect fit for Link, but it’s really not that inaccurate either.

Inquisitive This roguish archetype is defined by being clever in combat, looking for weak points to exploit. They’re also much more observant, making them better at discovering clues or secret passages, or telling when they’re being misled. At higher levels, their ability to look for weaknesses can even increase their sneak attack damage. This especially fits some of the older games where boss fights were focused on using items to exploit the dungeon boss’ weaknesses, rather than hacking away at their health bar. In these older titles, Link was less of a straight up warrior and more of a clever trickster pulling off strategic victories.

Scout The Scout Rogue has heavy Ranger vibes, as they get free expertise in Nature and Survival, enhanced mobility, the ability to disengage from fights more easily, and at higher levels become masters of ambushes. This fits well with Link’s sneakier sniper playstyle that can be done in Breath of the Wild, as Link can take out entire camps without ever being seen.

Thief While Link is not a standard cutpurse, Link is a treasure hunter, a dungeon delver, and the jokes about him robbing the people of Hyrule and breaking into people’s homes doesn’t exactly help. The thief also gets to use more magical items, allowing Link to use things such as enchanted instruments without being a bard.

WARLOCK

Link usually isn’t the hero of his own volition. He often starts his journey with Triforce of Courage, a source of power gifted by his patrons. It’s honestly a weak connection, but it loosely works, so I’m including it. 

Celestial While this subclass is geared toward serving something other than a god, I don’t see any reason why a Celestial Warlock couldn’t serve the Triple Goddesses of Hyrule or even Hylia/Zelda directly.

Hexblade The most obviously martial warlock option, this is a good choice if you want to incorporate Fi into your character.

Link’s Toy Chest

Hero’s Sword - Longsword (+1-3) Mirror Shield - Repulsion Shield Hero’s Bow - Oathbow Gale Boomerang - Storm Boomerang Fire Rod - Wand of Fireballs (requires spellcasting) Mastersword - Sword of Zariel, Holy Avenger Longsword* Hylian Shield - Shield of the Hidden Lord  Goddess Bow - Ephixis, Bow of Nylea Golden Gauntlets - Gauntlets of Ogre Power Zora Tunic - Cloak of the Manta Ray Pegasus Boots - Boots of Speed Hover Boots - Boots of Levitation Hook Shot - Rope of Climbing

SIDEKICKS

Sidekicks are a new edition from Tasha’s that let Link bring allies on his hero’s journey. Experts are skill monkeys who focus on Help actions, Spellcasters dip into the INT, WIS, or CHA spell lists, and Warriors are trained to fight and don’t have to talk, so they can be animals.

Epona - Defender Warrior Riding Horse Navi - Expert or Healer Spellcaster Sprite Sidon - Attacker Warrior Merfolk Sheik - Expert Noble (Elf) Wolf Link - Attacker Warrior Wolf

Theros Piety

The Piety System from Theros lets us be devout to a god and earn features from worshiping them. As far as I’m aware, this is an optional feature, and not every DM will make use of these, but if you’re able to, here’s a handy guide. These gods really stood out as the clear choices for Link to go with.

Iroas - God of Victory

Domains: War Virtues: Achieve a great victory, Overcome slim odds honorably, Defeat a foe in single combat, Perform a great feat of strength or skill Sins: Being a coward in battle, Beat an honorable foe through deceit, harm innocents Piety Bonus: +3 Learn Compelled Duel spell +10 Learn Crusader’s Mantle spell +25 For 1 minute, creatures cannot gain advantage on you +50 Increase STR or CHA by 2 to a max of 22

Keranos - God of Storms

Domains: Knowledge, Tempest Virtues: Solve a riddle or puzzle, defeat an unwise enemy, plan ahead for an upcoming challenge, build or restore a temple to Keranos Sins: Jeopardize others through foolishness, ignore a wise course of action, fail to plan for a challenge, give in to anger or self-destruction

Piety Bonus: +3 Add 1d6 lightning damage to melee attack up to INT mod turns. +10 Reroll a failed INT or WIS saving throw +25 Advantage on Initiative rolls +50 Increase INT or WIS by 2 to a max of 22

Nylea - Goddess of the Wild

Domains: Nature Virtues: Help any wild animal, stop those who hunt for sport or profit, win an archery competition, slay an aberration, fiend, or undead Sins: Kill an animal without reason, Dedicate a building to or make a sacrifice for any god (including Nylea), protect a city from a natural disaster

Piety Bonus: +3 Learn Hunter’s Mark +10 Learn Speak with Animals +25 Attacking creatures must pass DC 15 WIS save or change targets. +50 Increase DEX or WIS by 2 to a max of 22

Cunning Tactician

Battle Master Fighter (12) Inquisitive Rogue (8) Fighting Style: Dueling Maneuvers: Brace, Disarming Strike, Feinting Attack, Parry, Precision Attack, Riposte, Sweeping Attack Tools: Thieves’ Tools, Mason’s Tools

While Link is brave and strong, he is most defined by his clever mind and unorthodox solutions to boss fights. With this class split, Link has prioritized strategy and tactics over everything else. While it leaves him a little squishier, Link is still a very capable warrior. As a Battle Master, he got a free tool proficiency. Mason’s Tools allows Link to find secret passageways in stone walls, which most dungeons tend to be made of. On top of that, with his Feinting Attack, Link can give himself advantage, meaning he can use Sneak Attack even in a 1v1 fight, which fits his solo adventurer playstyle.

One-Man Army

Battle Master Fighter (12) Hunter Ranger (8) Fighting Style: Dueling, Archery Maneuvers: Brace, Disarming Strike, Feinting Attack, Parry, Precision Attack, Riposte, Sweeping Attack Hunter’s Prey: Colossus Slayer, Multiattack Defense Tools: Mason’s Tools

I used this build once in a level 10 campaign. 6 levels of Fighter, 4 levels of Ranger with a +2 Longsword, and let me tell you something. This build creamed the competition, which was the other PCs at the table, who were also built as level 10 characters. Link nearly defeated his first opponent in a single round, dealing around 70 damage between his four attacks. When I say this is Link’s “power” build, I mean it. I didn’t even sweat when an adult blue dragon showed up after the tournament ended, that’s how much faith I had in Link’s ability to fight. I honestly forgot to even use Link’s battle maneuvers, he was just dealing so much damage that it slipped my mind. You could swap Battle Master for Cavalier, but for me, the Battle Master is more accurate to Link’s favor of techniques over basic hack-and-slash.

RANGER SPELLS

1 Absorb Elements, Ensnaring Strike, Hunter’s Mark 2 Cordon of Arrows, Healing Spirit

The Hero of Hyrule

Battle Master Fighter (12) Glory Paladin (8) Fighting Style: Archery, Dueling Maneuvers: Brace, Disarming Strike, Feinting Attack, Parry, Precision Attack, Riposte, Sweeping Attack Tools: Mason’s Tools

As a Glory Paladin, Link is driven by a desire to be a legendary hero, and at least in the UA version, the Glory Paladin served the gods, as Link does. Like the two builds above, Link balances the brute might of the Glory Paladin with the tactile diversity of the Battle Master.

PALADIN SPELLS

1 Cure Wounds, Divine Favor, Guiding Bolt, Heroism, Protection from Evil and Good, Searing Smite, Thunderous Smite, Wrathful Smite 2 Branding Smite, Enhance Ability, Find Steed, Magic Weapon, Warding Bond

Oaths and Promises

Glory Paladin (12) Celestial Warlock (8) Fighting Style: Dueling Pact: Blade Invocations: Eldritch Smite, Improved Pact Weapon, Maddening Hex, Relentless Hex

The builds from here on are more for the flavor than necessarily Link’s character. As a Blade Pact Paladock, Link becomes a CHA-focused martial with some extra spell slots that turn his smiting sword strikes into a bokoblin slurry machine. This build focuses Link more as a servant of the gods than anything else. Just make sure he has the Hex spell, but you can replace Maddening Hex with Agonizing Blast if you want to use the Master Sword laser beam at full potential.

PALADIN SPELLS

1 Divine Favor, Guiding Bolt, Heroism, Protection from Evil and Good, Searing Smite, Thunderous Smite, Wrathful Smite 2 Branding Smite, Enhance Ability, Find Steed, Magic Weapon, Warding Bond 3 Blinding Smite, Crusader’s Mantle, Elemental Weapon, Haste, Protection from Energy

WARLOCK SPELLS

C Blade Ward, Booming Blade, Sword Burst 1 Armor of Agathys, Cure Wounds, Hex 2 Lesser Restoration, Misty Step, Shatter 3 Spirit Shroud, Summon Fey 4 Galder’s Speedy Courier

To Serve and Protect

Battle Master Fighter (12) Crown Paladin (8) Fighting Style: Dueling, Interception Maneuvers:  Bait and Switch, Brace, Disarming Strike, Goading Strike, Parry, Riposte, Sweeping Attack Tools: Mason’s Tools

Link is Zelda’s knight, bodyguard, and servant. So this build prioritizes features that makes Link the loyal emissary of the Princess of Hyrule. As such, this build changes Link’s role to be more of a defender to the princess than a solo hero. This build assumes that the princess or someone else who needs to be protected is joining Link on his adventure.

PALADIN SPELLS

1 Command, Cure Wounds, Divine Favor, Heroism, Compelled Duel, Searing Smite, Thunderous Smite, Wrathful Smite 2 Branding Smite, Find Steed, Warding Bond, Zone of Truth

After all is said and done, I hope I gave everyone a lot to work with. Of course my suggestions are not law, and if nothing else, I hope it gives you an idea of how you want to build him. Last time I built Link, I gave one set build for him, but I still laid out other options. Recently though, I’ve been trying to show multiple builds at the end of my build posts to offer a wider idea of what building a character can look like. Happy 2021 everyone, and let’s hope this year goes smoother.

[the-ferocious-kittyrose]

What I would’ve done w/ Lotor’s character

It’s not exactly a secret to anyone who’s been following me for a while that I’m not the biggest fan of canon Lotor. I had high hopes for the character from his 80s counterpart and intro in season 3 but I was really let down by the direction the writers went with him in canon.

When he was introduced, I was so hoping for him to be this cocky manipulative asshole that’s only out for himself. I love that character archetype so goddamn much.

But in canon he was just kinda boring to me. His personality was bland and his motivations never really made sense. He’s introduced using empty promises of peace and comradery to manipulate people, then its revealed that he actually does want peace and comradery and wants to lead a peaceful empire, then that turns into draining Alteans and wanting to kill all Galra...

I also didn’t like how the writers decide to tack on this whole child abuse plot to explain why he was the way he was. As if that’s the only way to make a villain sympathetic. Yeah other versions of Voltron have touched on Lotor’s childhood before and it was never pleasant, but VLD really leaned into that shit, to the point where it felt like the writers were just shoving angst down our throats thinking that equals good writing.

It takes more than a tragic backstory to make a character compelling. It takes an interesting personally and motivations that make sense. And you can make a character tragic/sympathetic in more subtle ways.

For me personally, I wanted Lotor to be a sorta fusion of Loki and Littlefinger in space.

Loki is a sly trickster who grew up feeling like an outcast, unaware of his true heritage. He grew up believing he could be king but when his shity father handed it to his perfect brother he felt he had been robbed and decided to take the throne by force.

Littlefinger is a small man from a small house with no power, and after getting the shit beat out of him trying to win the hand of the girl he loved, he decided he would use his intelligence and skills in manipulation to screw over all these noble lords and weasel his way into the throne. And when he did he would finally get vengeance on all those who had looked down on him.

I feel like this fits Lotor well. Lotor is a prince, so he isn’t small in that regard, but he is not respected in the way a prince should be.

He is a lot smaller than the average Galra. And even though Lotor is still quite strong, developing a fighting style that suits his small form and uses his opponents size against them, in a society so heavily based on physical strength that’s still a big blow to your rep.

He employs half breeds, which we know are looked down on in the empire. And there are definitely rumors about Lotor himself being a half breed. I think after 10,000 years Zarkon would’ve done a pretty good job at hiding Lotor’s heritage from the public but just looking at him compared to the average Galra there’s going to be some suspicion there. On that note Lotor is probably considered butt ugly by the Galra.

And Lotor works in the shadows and achieves his goals through lies and trickery, which Lotor himself says are things the empire looks down on.

So yeah, the people in the empire hate Lotor. Even Sendak who’s all ‘Gung ho empire’ has no respect for Lotor. And because of this it would probably be up in the air whether or not Lotor would even be allowed to take the throne if his father were to pass, even though it’s his birthright.

And in the face of all this rampant disrespect, Lotor decides that he is going to overthrow his father and take the throne. And when he does he will take vengeance on everyone who had ever undermined him and expand the empire beyond anything his father could’ve dreamed of.

And don’t try telling me, “oh that’s so out of character! Lotor would never take pleasure in the pain of others!” Because he does.

Remember Throk? Remember how Lotor sent him away to the worst station in the empire and joked about letting him, “rot with the ice worms?” Remember how Lotor later invaded his station then watched with a grin as he was tortured by Haggar?

Lotor 100% takes pleasure in hurting those who would hurt him, because it makes him feel powerful.

Now let’s talk about Lotor’s planet. The one given to him and destroyed by Zarkon. I always felt weird about this plot. Obviously it’s a very sad thing to have happen, but I always liked the idea of Lotor’s promises of peace to be empty, a means of manipulating people. So this whole situation being genuine feels weird to me.

In my version, Lotor didn’t get banished for being too kind. He got banished because Zarkon caught him in a plot to betray him.

When Lotor was put in charge of the planet, he seduced and married the princess Ventar. He filled her head with promises that her people would be free and they would rule the universe together and convinced her to secretly round up her armies and send word to her ally planets to do the same, so they could start planning a way to overthrow Zarkon.

It’s left ambiguous whether or not he was being genuine and whether he really loved Ventar and intended to keep his promises to her or if she was just a tool to get the throne. But either way, it ends the same. Zarkon finds out, destroys the planet, kills Ventar, and exiles Lotor.

Still sad/humiliating thing for Lotor, and definitely a story that could gain sympathy from Allura.

Speaking of Allura and Ventar, let’s talk about Lotor’s relationship with the women in his life.

(Trigger Warning: Brief mention of of a rape scene in GoLion)

In the 80s Lotor was incredibly misogynistic. He walked around with a harem of half naked women, tried repeatedly to kidnap and marry Allura against her will, and in GoLion it’s heavily implied that he raped Romelle because she looked like Allura.

It’s a common joke in the fandom that he went from this to drinking respect women juice in VLD but I don’t know if I’d go that far.

He’s definitely better in VLD than he was in the 80s, but even in VLD he manipulates, uses, and hurts most of the women in his life.

Allura is the obvious example, but you also have his generals. Acxa talks to the paladins, Allura in particular, about how persuasive Lotor could be. Implying that she and the other general were manipulated the same way Allura was.

Well not EXACTLY the same way Allura was, romantically I mean. Though there are people who believe that Acxa was also in love with Lotor and he used that to his advantage, which I can see.

But I feel like it was more about giving them a place in an empire that didn’t care about or accept them.

I hate The Last Jedi but I really feel like the line, “you’re nothing, but not to me,” fits really well. They were outsiders with no place to go until Lotor swooped in and gave them a purpose.

Do I think that there was a part of Lotor that genuinely wanted to help them because he saw a kindred spirit in them? Yeah. But I also think that at the end of the day, they were more tools than real friends. And he had no qualms about killing them if they betrayed him.

The situation with Narti proves that. As well as the fact that Ezor and Zethrid seemed very scared of the prospect of Lotor being alive and coming for them.

And then you have Allura. Lotor’s lust for Allura has always been a very important part of his character. In the 80s the reason behind his obsession with her was that he had a lot of baggage about his mother and had a thing for women that looked like her. Also the fact that he just didn’t like not getting something he wanted.

There was never any love. He didn’t want to be with her, he wanted to own her.

In VLD, his want for Allura seems to stem more from the fact that she’s Altean than an Oedipus complex. As well as the fact that she’s powerful and skilled in Altean alchemy, which makes her rather useful.

I don’t personally believe that Lotor ever really Loved Allura. I think he liked the idea of her and what she could do for him, but the end of the day she was more a means to an end than anything else.

Allura’s been trough a lot. Zarkon betrayed her family and destroyed her entire planet only about a year ago from her point of view, and she appears to have a pretty bad case of survivors guilt and PTSD. And to make matters worse, while Lotor was on the ship she was fighting with Shiro, someone she clearly cared about. The idea of loosing him after already losing so much must’ve been really painful.

She was hurting, conflicted, and lonely. Which made her all the more vulnerable to Lotor’s manipulation.

He took advantage of her loneliness and insecurities, making her believe she had found someone who understood her and could help her avenge her family and planet. She trusted him, let herself be vulnerable around him, which made it hurt even more when it was revealed to all be a ruse.

And then you have his relationship with his mother Honerva/Haggar.

I talked a lot about this in my whole rewrite/rant about Honerva, but I’m not a fan of how they made their relationship 100% negative. I feel like it robs the show of a lot of interesting character interaction.

It’s sad. The whole relationship is really tragic. Shit like this is literally my worst nightmare. The thought of looking my mom in the face and have her not recognize me as her daughter keeps me up at night.

But the thing is, in canon the relationship kinda falls flat because Lotor and Haggar/Honerva have no connection. Haggar was awful to Lotor and Lotor hates Haggar. What reason do I have to be invested in their relationship?

So If you haven’t read my Honerva rant, here’s how I would’ve done the Honerva Lotor relationship.

10,000 years ago, when Alfor came to Dibazzal to convince Zarkon to close the rift, Honerva went into labor. Alfor and many Galran doctors tried there best to save her and the baby, but the quintessence had damaged her body so much that she couldn’t be saved and died in childbirth.

Zarkon went ballistic and Alfor had the doctors take baby Lotor somewhere safe, fearing Zarkon would take his grief and anger out on the child.

After Honerva was resurrected as Haggar and throughout Lotor’s childhood, they had a strange sort of relationship. Lotor was an inquisitive child and was always curious about Haggar and her work, making a habit of following her around like a little shadow and watching as she worked. And there was also the fact that, while his father was never friendly, he was calmer when she was around.

Haggar had no idea what to make of this weird child following her around all the time. All these big strong Galra were terrified of her but this tiny child showed no fear as he tugged on her robes and excitedly asked questions about her work. And she never minded. She didn’t know why or how to explain it, but she cared for the child. As much as a soulless undead witch could care for something anyway.

But as time went on there relationship became more and more strained. Lotor was a smart kid he was gonna find out about his mother and deduce what happened to her.

He resented Haggar. Resented her for not remembering him. Resented her for the fact that he had to go through life without a mother while she was right there. And he resented her for being loyal to Zarkon, who had been making his life hell for thousands of years.

Every time she showed him something resembling kindness he’s conflicted. He knows he should feel happy that she cares, but at the same time, why does she care? It’s not like she sees him as her son.

He turned to denial, insisting that Haggar couldn’t possibly be his mother, even though he new the truth deep down, and a part of him always secretly longed for her to remember who she was, who he was, and embrace him as her son. He hates that part of himself.

And when he does meet Honerva for the first time, it’s... tense... to say the least. Having his mother reach out to him and acknowledge him as her son is something he thought would bring him joy, but in that moment all the pain he went through rises back to the surface and he lashes out. He draws his sword and is about to cut her down but he hesitates. He’s trembling with tears in his eyes. He can’t forgive her, but he also can’t bring himself to kill her.

Then you have his relationship with his father.

It’s no secret that Zarkon is an awful man and a shity father, always has been.

The explanation as to why is kinda shaky. All we get is Zarkon saying Lotor is his greatest shame because he’s Altean but I don’t know about that. Zarkon may hate Alteans but he loved Honerva and I don’t think he would be ashamed of his relationship with her.

He definitely did his best Lotor’s heritage from the public. But I don’t think that’s the reason he hates him.

In my version of the story, Zarkon hates Lotor because Honerva died giving birth to him and Zarkon blames him for her death. He lost his beloved wife and was forced to watch the son that killed her waltz around wearing her face.

It didn’t help that Lotor was a snarky rebellious kid that liked to show off. He did things his own way, didn’t care much for rules, and had a real knack for finding loopholes. All things that made his strict father very angry. He was an embarrassment. Small and rebellious. That’s why Zarkon began training Sendak.

I personally believe the reason Zarkon was so trusting of Sendak and had so much faith in him was because Zarkon had been grooming him to be his “true heir.” Sendak is the epitome of what a Galra should be. Strong, loyal, and brave. He would be the son Zarkon wished he had. The favorite child.

Lotor obviously hates Zarkon, and rightfully so. Zarkon hates him for something he had no control over and constantly disrespects him.

Lotor may not follow the rules, but he passes every trial. He excels at everything he does but Zarkon refuses to see that all because he blames him for Honerva’s death.

Lotor sees Zarkon as an old fool. He knows that he could do a far better job at running the empire.

Lotor dedicated thousands of years of his life to overthrowing Zarkon. His hatred for his father was his motivation, what got him out of bed every morning, so when the deed is done and Zarkon was finally defeated, in the moments after he felt empty.

But he didn’t have time to dwell on that feeling for long. He still had to deal with his father’s men and take the throne that was rightfully his.

Then you have his plan.

Lotor’s plan in VLD is really weird and over complicated. There was no real reason for the whole draining Alteans thing. Just a lazy way of making him 100% evil.

The plot could’ve been a lot simpler. He gains the paladins trust, gets them to help him build his ships and overthrow Zarkon, and then once he has the throne he pulls an Uno reverse card and is like, “yeah, nothing personal but this was all a trick and imma lock you and your lions up now.”

Obviously more complicated than that but that’s the basic idea.

One of my main problems with VLD is that they had a bad habit of over complicating the plot. People don’t care about VLD because of the plot, they care about the characters and their relationships, the actual plot doesn’t have to be anything spectacular.

It’s strange to say but I feel like the writes tried too hard with Lotor. He had the potential to be an amazing villain but the writers were too focused on tricking the audience and making him angsty that they forgot to make him compelling.

[beautifulterriblequeen]

Trickster: an Ethari theory

I've had yea many Ethari headcanons, and I hope I live to have yea many more. Most of them are probably wrong, or incomplete at best. But boy are they fun.

I love to wonder what Ethari will really be like in canon when we get to know him for more than 3 minutes, but whoever he really is on his own, he will have an effect on Runaan , Rayla, and everyone who loves him, because they love him.

The first headcanon I can remember having for "Tinker" was that he could be like Leonardo da Vinci: a genius, creative, surrounded by beautiful ideas given shape by his hands, but also capable of creating deadly weapons, enchantments, and devices with equal beauty, and perhaps not really seeing where the line between them was. It was fun, but Ethari has ended up far softer than my headcanon, and I love and support him in his softness!

After a nice string of Ethari headcanons, this year I've started poking at the Trickster archetype and seeing if it applies to him. And I think it absolutely does!

Tricksters often seem like Chaos. But they're not. They're just Difference. "Chaos" is subjective. Like the "divergent" in "neurodivergent." Who says? Divergent from what, exactly? Perspective matters, and Tricksters have a very broad take on things which allows them to think outside any box people might try to invite them into.

My enjoyment of Loki has brought all kinds of ideas to my dash with the arrival of the Loki show. I've got a copy of the Edda, and I highlighted the hell out of it a couple of years ago as I searched for the roots of Loki's origin story. (It's truly fascinating reading and the symbolic language hidden inside their poetry is dazzlingly amazing and I'm super using it sometime just so you know)

Loki is a Trickster, and he's far from alone in myth and legend. Anansi, Coyote, and Sun Wukong are some you may have heard of. Aaravos is another, of course. Tricksters can be called upon to lend aid and wisdom when the rules don't have an answer for some extraordinary circumstance which the Trickster's people find themselves in. But that's not because they are truly outside the rule of order. They are actually a part of it. They are the catch-all for when the everyday ordinary rules fail people, and something "unthinkable"--in the literal sense--might just hold the answer.

This post crossed my dash today, and something finally clicked in my head, and all of this coalesced from what felt like separate places. But they're not separate, not anymore! Serotonin, baby. It's basically upped my headcanon to a full-blown theory.

What caught my eye was an answer to why Ethari's clothing is so determinedly asymmetrical, compared to Runaan's specifically, but Moonshadows in general. It's because of this:

Long protective sleeves below patterns on shoulders. A high collar paired with a bright and noticeable swoop around the neck. Fine detailing and graceful taste. Asymmetrical tunic point on the left, below broad strappy leather. Knee high boots with stylish protective gaiters.

And let's not forget the curling horns! In some comics, Loki has a broken horn. So does Ethari.

Yes, there is a lot of similarity here, but I'm not focused so much on the visuals as the reason they were chosen. Feel free to consider other aspects of Ethari's personality and how they might be similar to certain parts of Loki's. I did! But I wouldn't be me if I didn't go deeper than that.

My favorite book in the universe (so far) is Lois McMaster Bujold's The Curse of Chalion, and one of the many reasons why is because of her pantheon. It holds five gods, represented by a hand: Father, Mother, Son, Daughter, and Bastard. The first four all have their roles and places. The Bastard--the thumb--inherits everything else. He is the god of all things that do not belong to any other gods, and that includes self-sacrificing vengeance and queerness. He is a Trickster, and his influence on Cazaril's life is far deeper than at first glance. Chaos has its place. It belongs, and so do the Tricksters who engender it. God, I love this book. Please read it if you haven't. Bujold's work is amazing.

If you've seen or read any version of MDZS/Untamed, you know that Wei WuXian is a trickster. Competent and badass in battle, but playful and teasing to the point where sometimes even he isn't sure what he truly wants, he can bring a massive amount of power and focus when he wants to. It's always a matter of "but is it important to me?"

I love WWX so much. The Trickster vibe is very apparent in his character, and in a way you just don't get in Western media. We see him on his own, and we see him with family and loved ones. And he's always feeling something so intensely! He's driven by his emotions, for good or ill. He vibes with chaos, and he will create it if it doesn't exist yet. But he will also create family from nothing, and that's something you don't see enough of! WWX is a Trickster with an emotional preference for joy.

In TDP, Ethari doesn't have a lot of lore yet. It's being Moonshadowed because spoilers for future seasons, and I respect that. The longer the wait for S4, the more ideas I will just amuse myself with in the meantime--and yeah, this is one of them, so what? :))) But we do know a little about him.

He loves music. He loves to read. He leaves his mark on things in swirly form. He works very hard, even through headaches, because what he's doing is that important to him, even though he would much rather be making jewelry. He loves taking the time to polish rough stones into brilliant jewels, and he adores big pretty flowers and had them at his wedding.

Ethari has a temper, but he also loves puns. The weapons he crafts are exquisite: "light, elegant, strong, and clever." And he knew darn well that Runaan was trying to flirt with him, but why return a sentiment he may or may not feel yet when he can play with the overly earnest assassin just a little bit first?

Okay, just... A "simple craftsman" deciding that it's going to be fun to toy for a bit with a broody assassin's feelings? Would you risk that? Ethari got balls the size of the moon, and a brain to match. When he has to make weaponry, he does not half-ass it. Ethari's stabby creations nearly have a life of their own. His creations are literally called "trick weapons." This elf is a lot, okay. And it's possible that he doesn't even know how "a lot" he is. Yet.

We're meeting Ethari after he's found something that is, in fact, genuinely important to him: Runaan, and Rayla, and Laindrin too. Ethari has found a relatively stable place to settle and find a role to adopt. I say adopt, though, because making weaponry for his loved ones is not what he grew up wanting to do. It's what he had to do to keep them safe, once he found a place to bestow his heart.

But in the show, Ethari has lost his family, one by one. First Lain and Tiadrin, ghosted. Then Runaan, supposedly fallen on his mission. Then Rayla, ghosted for abandoning Runaan. He and Rayla have reconnected now, but the rest of his family is still out of his reach. If Rayla has indeed told him, by S4, what she learned at the Moonhenge in TTM, then Ethari may parallel Rayla's journey to seek answers. But even if he doesn't know yet, and gets pulled into some other story arc first, we will be seeing Ethari without his family.

Remember the ATLA episode "Zuko Alone"? Consider: "Ethari Alone."

Ethari has chosen, for love, to fit himself into a box that wasn't of his own making. And now that box has broken. His family doesn't need him to be their craftsman anymore. Perhaps others will need him to be other things to them. Or perhaps he will know that his family does need him, but to be far more than just a maker of pretty swords. A rescuer, perhaps. A healer, a guide? An avenger?

A trickster. Capable of taking many shapes, because he understands them all. Ethari works with form and function. If he needs to transform himself, he will.

That's what Tricksters do. It's delightfully queer and delightfully neurodivergent. Ancient peoples accepted and revered the different among them and actively sought their help with things they themselves struggled with.

Tricksters are Difference. Sometimes that manifests as chaos, sometimes as genius. But if you do not love and appreciate your chaos, it will absolutely turn on you. Wei Wuxian did. Loki certainly has, many times. Perhaps Aaravos is doing so as well.

I cannot wait to see what Ethari does with his difference. I have something very specific that I hope he goes and breaks.

All this from a picture of Tom Hiddleston in his Avengers 1 Loki costume? Yeah. Because Ethari was designed to wear asymmetrical clothing, in a Moonshadow culture that prides itself on balance. Sure, there are some other Moonshadows who wear this or that asymmetrical item, and I do love to see it. But Ethari has the most asymmetrical lines of them all. The meta glee I feel knowing that Moonshadow elves are designed to hold many layers of meaning in their appearances--that the writers, creators, and character designers just flexed with them--is truly a delight.

Ethari is asymmetrical. The full and practical application of that is a glass casket, and I hope it becomes a gift that keeps on giving, because boy do I want to keep receiving it. But right now, I'm genuinely seeing evidence of the Trickster archetype in him. And I really hope it gets to come out and play.