#highly-engaging

[prolibytherium]

Just in general I think trying to look to pre-late modern period history for validation of LGBT+ identities is an absolutely useless venture. Every single underlying human experience defined through the lens and framework of LGBT identity has always existed, but it's impossible to pin down Exactly who and what a figure might have been if they existed in this contemporary context and decided to self identify via these labels.

It's also a wildly reductive lens that flattens the complexity and variety of how sex and gender has been constructed across time in different cultures, how sexual norms have varied, etc. This is not a constructive approach to learn about history and you're never going to be able to fit historical figures neatly into little identity categories.

[sarasade]

A girl who cannot become a princess must become a witch

[kabutoden]

bug trolls… i am interested in kankri vantas. if that isn’t too much trouble. your buggy guys are so silly and interesting and i am a fan

here is kankri and his baby brother…. they don’t get along!! i wish they did though id love to see these two go on an adventure together where they look out each other. since kankri is a beforus troll and a vegan, his shell is pretty thin because he’s not getting enough iron. on the other hand, karkat’s shell is heavier then it should be due to stress. thanks for the RQ!! im soooo glad ppl like my sillies :D

[stillgotscars]

.

[uncanny-tranny]

Hey, you're being lied to about what fitness constitutes. If you can't work in an hour-long crossfit slog, but you can work in a five-minute walk, then that is still fitness. If you can't use your legs but you can do arm circles every now and again, that is still fitness. If you're moving around at work, that's still fitness. It can be intentional or incidental, but here's the best part: your body doesn't care if you're dedicating specific work-out times. It doesn't care if the "only" fitness it gets is your nine to five on your feet. It doesn't care, fitness is fitness is fitness. Some of us do it differently, but the end result is more or less similar.

If you can do any type of fitness safely, your body isn't going to care if you're doing it like an Olympic athlete or if you're just a casual.

[kelocitta]

Anyway that is the last I'm going to talk about any of this. Thank you for respecting my preference for vagueness. I'd like to draw pictures now

[kazamajun]

I read a quote once that was something along the lines of 'if I have to write two characters kissing for you to know that they're in love, I have failed as a writer.' This is a sentiment I not only agree wholeheartedly with, but something that came to mind when wanting to do an analysis of Kazuya's character ending and kazjun's relationship.

We get a bit of environmental storytelling with her picture. It's a beautiful photo, clearly posed for, and lovingly encased in an elaborate pure gold frame. The vibes are expensive, luxurious, and meaningful because he clearly cared enough to have it custom-made since it's got the Zaibatsu's logo on it. Behind the picture frame are two porcelain teacups and a teapot, along with Rochefort Tea, Azucena's coffee and that mixed blend of both. That tells us they frequently have tea and coffee together in his office!

On the first question Kazuya is asked, he is immediately dismissive of it. Asking about Jun however not only gets an immediate physical reaction with the curled fist and him filling the room with electricity, but he goes on to make it explicit that she is the only person in the world that he sees as an equal. She stood up to him over 20 years ago and he never forgot it. And, she's just as strong now if not moreso.

When he throws the trophy, that's him giving a demonstration of this. He's showing her off! He knew she would catch it, and likewise Jun knows that he knew she would, which is why she gives that soft little smile. And his tone when he delivers the "tsuyoi" is... very telling. He not only acknowledges and values her strength but is extremely attracted to it.

There's also the added framing context of this episode, that it's a documentary on him. He just publicly declared to the world that her strength turns him on. Iconic.

It's pretty damn clear that he loves her, not only from all of the above but the fact that he demonstrated it at all in the first place. Kazuya doesn't bother to talk about things he doesn't care about.

[sieglinde-freud]

finally got to the first three second seals what do we think

[dandeyrain]

i've been rotating the "this doesn't make any sense!" response to boy and the heron in my head and i wonder how much of it comes down to like...the kind of audience that engages with ghibli movies vs the kind of audience that mostly only engages with weird art movies vs the kind of audience that only really engages with blockbusters and marvel movies, and the overlap of those groups in the theater.

because, like, the boy and the heron is far and away more straightforward, from a plot perspective, than a lot of other Weird Extremely Personal Art Movies i've seen and love, but it IS a Weird Extremely Personal Art Movie even so. usually the only people seeing Weird Extremely Personal Art Movies, especially in theaters, are people who like that and expect that and have seen those types of films before and are therefore capable of engaging with them even when things aren't as clear as they'd be in an average blockbuster flick. like, nobody who only cares about Cinema to the extent of marvel movies and MAYBE john wick is going to see beau is afraid, and if they did they wouldn't have the tools to engage with such a dream-logicy movie. it would just be a weird thing that doesnt make sense to them, at least until they worked their media engagement muscles with other weird films. there's a lot of self-selection to the kind of person who usually sees these kind of movies.

while boy and the heron is weirder and more complex than a lot of other ghibli movies, as far as weird art films go it is incredibly, INCREDIBLY straightfoward. every weird plot point is explained very clearly to the audience, very little is up for interpretation from a strictly "what was the plot" point of view. boy loses mother. father remarries and moves the family. boy struggles to contend with grief. boy is pulled into a magical world by an old man who wants to use him. time is weird and fucked up in the magical world, but the movie is going to go out of it's way to highlight who's who and make it clear how the time travel works and the characters' relations to one another. the boy refuses to take over the magical world because he wants to live in the real world with the real people he loves. boy leaves the magical world having learned an important lesson about moving on. but the boy and the heron trusts its audience, doesn't handhold, and expects the audience to engage seriously and with focus to its plot and characters and stories.

a lot of people never watch movies like that! a lot of people are used to uncomplicated superhero movies and romcoms and that's it. the difference is that those people were never going to see beau is afraid, so the discussion about that movie instead comes from people who have the tools to engage with it. but because of the aesthetic-ification of ghibli, a lot of people who don't Do art films but are really into the aesthetics of cute little guys and girls in pretty dresses went to this art film and were confused that it was weird and dream-like and dark and strange and requires more of its audience than just passively watching.

anyway there's nothing wrong with not having the muscles to engage with weird art films, though i do think everyone should challenge themselves with the kind of stuff they watch. there's nothing wrong with preferring simple straightforward uncomplicated plotlines. but it is really interesting seeing people talk about the movie like it's insanely weird and doesnt make any sense meanwhile me and the friends i've chatted with about who DO have experience with this kind of film all feel insane because the movie is SO clear and SO straightforward by the standards we're used to. its just a neat crossover re: the kinds of movie fans that exist

[prostocupoftea]

I brought you. "Baby I'm Yours" KinitoPET Animatic.

[druidonity2]

Dragon Noodle Soup :3

[cheerfullycatholic]

Hmm methinks that only telling people "that's a sin, repent and believe in Christ" is the opposite of helpful

I think how it's worded is important too, but that's not the point of the post

[beefcake-penguin]

#people just do NOT know how to be FANS of media anymore. they don't know how to interact with each other or with the text without anger#fandom is supposed to be FUN#it's supposed to be fun to speculate and headcanon and write fanfic and draw and go a little bit feral for your faves

This!! It's okay to just enjoy things! It's ok to walk away from media you're not enjoying!!

10/10 tags, my friend 💪🐧❤️

Thank you, broski! It drives me kind of beefsane (beefcake insane) when I bop along online to see how a community is enjoying a show or movie or game that I'm also enjoying and the fandom is just:

"OUTRAGE!"

"ANGER!"

"UGH!!! THOSE BASTARDS ARE 'QUEERBAITING' US!"

"IF YOU LIKE THIS FICTIONAL CHARACTER WHO KILLED SOMEONE IN A WORK OF FICTION, YOU MUST BE A MURDER-APOLOGIST!"

"WAIT, WHY DID THOSE BASTARDS STOP 'QUEERBAITING' US?!"

"THOSE CHARACTERS SHARED A SCENE AND A STEAMY LOOK! LET'S HARASS THEIR REAL-LIFE ACTORS/ACTRESSES!"

And I just sort of immediately go: "💪🏽😐... hmmm... I just came here to have fun... 💪🏽😔" *leaves in beeffeat (beefcake defeat)*

Which is why I'm so grateful to people like you and so many of the other moots (my beloveds 🐧❤🐧) that I've made here. I deleted my old ancient tumblr from the Before Times(tm) due to how stressed it made me and just the fact that my life at the time was already full of things causing me stress and making me have panic attacks and anxiety attacks on an almost weekly basis. Being unable to even come to my own blog without being stressed about what imaginary slight someone might accuse me of in my askbox really just took the wind out of my beefy sails... but I'm so glad I came back to this site with the goal to much more carefully curate my experience, because it really is so nice to be able to be a little insane about mutual blorbos and occasionally subject your poor unbeefspecting (beefcake unsuspecting) mutuals to one of your out-of-left-field hyper-fixations, too.

Which is just my long-beefded (beefcake long-winded) way of saying: people like you and my other be(ef)loved mutuals are what makes fandom communities great, my friend. 💪🏽🐧❤

Penguin-hug for you:

[goodthingscomeinthrees]

just sayin' that the analogue for bertha is alva vanderbilt, but george's is jay gould — ruthless robber baron, but also family man and orchid enthusiast. jfells is being picky-choosy, so we'll go down the consuelo route in s3, but i think he'll veer off-course at some point. he's done it enough already (gladys' debutante ball was actually a costume party, etc.) that i do not foresee divorcée suffragette bertha happening anytime soon. thanks for coming to my ted talk.

(while we're here, please look at what people wore to alva's costume ball, specifically the lady whose costume included TAXIDERMIED CATS.)

[lilidawnonthemoon]

[m-s-justice]

Though it is a sad thought knowing that without Richtofen, Takeo remains the same and probably even worse than ever if he was the officer that tortured Miller. Cause he learned his lesson that he shouldn’t rely on false leaders like the Emperor. I’m betting Nikolai got locked up in Vorkuta given that he’s technically one of Stalin’s enemies due to his political background.

if they do go that route they will definitely be reverting whatever development they got in the original universe. Atrocities were common on both sides of the war and I doubt that any of our crew is entirely "moral" since there's no such thing as a "moral" war, considering how much they throw themselves rather gleefully into it. If Takeo *is* the officer, he has certainly experienced a bastardization arc where he becomes more "evil" so to speak.

I however doubt that because it contradicts his scant characterization pre-115 experimentation where he had condemned the Division 9 for their use of POWs as test subjects. I simply cannot see him treating Miller like that without some major Fucking Up of his life to make him compromise his honorable ideals.

However if we did go along with it, a bastard Takeo seems like an interesting angle to pursue considering the other ones are very honorable and respectable. Kinda like seeing an Oath Breaker paladin instead of a regular paladin; lots of things to explore about a person who has abandoned their code. But the writers would need to be Extremely Careful because that could get Really Racist *really quick*.

As for hypothetical Nikolai, having him be imprisoned would definitely change things around for him. More than likely disillusion him to communism and his own government/country. Probably either depress him more with him being abandoned by everyone (his wife dies, his home is destroyed, his country betrays him) or it turns into rage. Ultimis Nikolai was too addled to have strong opinions while Primis Nikolai was too despondent + removed from the situation to showcase his emotions without it feeling shoehorned in. also it would probably wean him off alcohol since it's not allowed in prisons (though one could argue that he just drinks moonshined prison liquor)

A rageful, even more confrontational Nikolai sounds interesting. The ones we've met are always subdued in some way, either by alcohol or their own mental demons. An outspoken one would be pretty refreshing considering their natural coping mechanism seems to be either repression or resignation.

Though that offers a trend within these hypothetical reboot ultimis, that being the hoisting off of previous inhibitions. Which I guess could be symbolic considering how oppressive Ultimis Richtofen was. Without him there, they are more "free" for better or for worse.

I suppose that leaves Dempsey. What exactly could he be "freed" from? We don't know anything about him, really. He served in the Marines and was happy with that, plus he could leave at any time. He is only truly restricted when he is captured by Richtofen, who cannot do that in the new universe. The only thing I can sort of grasp at is Player Control? so I guess it means he's "freed" from being playable. Which I guess is a Dempsey W??? it has weird implications yet no real consequences on any canon story because his Player Shtick is purely meta. damn you Dempsey I can't even speculate about your ass.