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youremyheaven · 4 months

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The Severity, Spirituality and Stoicism of Saturnians ✊🏼🧎‍♀️💁🏼‍♀️

I will be criticizing Saturnian men throughout this post, if you don't like that, stop reading right now <3

Saturn is the planet of karma, justice, discipline, and order. In Claire's video about Saturnian men, she observed that "in Saturnian men you will find an exact duality contained here in breaking rules and doing strange stunts, pranks and having outbursts etc but also paradoxically find themselves submitting to ideologies, cults, political parties, motivational affirmations etc"

I feel like I touched upon this a bit in my first post about Saturn and in this post I'd like to go into different manifestations of this tendency along with some other things I've observed with Saturnian men.

Timothee Chalamet, UBP Moon

Full disclosure, I've never liked him lmao,, I think the hype he gets is undeserved and 90% bc of the fact that there is a dearth of young charismatic actors in Hollywood.

But anywayyys, Timmy Tim first attracted controversy for working with Woody Allen even though he's since expressed regret for it or whatever,, then he received flak for having sex in a pool during the height of the pandemic and manyyyy blinds about him giving women chlamydia 💀💀started making the rounds and he was lowkey exposed for being a whore

Then last year he drew criticism for smoking indoors at a Beyonce concert (where smoking is prohibited) and he's literally talking to Kylie and blowing smoke ??? at the same time?? which is sooo filthy?? who tf does that??

His silence on the Armie Hammer issue and pretty much all issues lol have also been criticized. Everybody thought he'd be some woke liberal activist but he's just been dead quiet and pretty self absorbed the whole time. He loves to lap attention and give absolutely nothing in return to the community.

The thing with Saturn however is that, bad behaviour does not go unpunished. Timmy Tim has been getting A LOT of flak and the total rose tinted obsession people had with him is slowly fading (even tho he still has legions of fans). People are now starting to see his true colors.

But anyway, this is a very minor issue compared to all the other Saturnians I'm going to mention next.

Jeffrey Epstein, UBP Moon, Anuradha Rising

I'm assuming most of you are familiar with sex offender Epstein. He has trafficked thousands of underage girls over the course of decades and to satiate numerous high profile paedophiles.

He committed suicide while in prison. One thing about Saturn is that, if you stray, are immoral, unfair, undisciplined, corrupt, foul, evil etc it WILL punish you. The truth is Saturnians know deep down that what they're doing IS wrong, they're not like Moon dominants who are completely convinced their corrupt evil idea is a "good" one. Saturnians know full well what they're doing and they do it anyway and they suffer its consequences.

Inviting Saturn's wrath upon oneself is basically how these natives find "balance", they feel like they get away with too much and they're constantly pushing their limits to see how far they can go before this wrath comes for them.

Epstein had been doing this for decades without much consequence, working with extremely high profile people including politicians and royalty. Eventually, he was caught and the truth of his immorality was exposed for all to see AND he ended his own life.

Salvador Dali- UBP Moon

Dali was known for being an eccentric and a weirdo and you can say that the way he pushed his boundaries as an artist is a more "positive" manifestation of Saturnian individuals and their need to test limits.

However, Dali was also a pretty messed up guy

Dali admitted on several occasions to having sadomasochistic tendencies. As a child he enjoyed throwing himself down the stairs, explaining that “The pain was insignificant, the pleasure was immense”. Shockingly, he once pushed his childhood friend off of a 15-foot bridge – as his friend lay injured, Dali apparently sat calmly eating cherries.

Pleasure and pain seemed intimately entwined. Dali wanted both. One other childhood incident of note included a wounded bat. It was kept in Dali's washhouse hideaway and stayed there overnight. When Dali returned to it was being devoured by a mass of ants. He impulsively bit into the seething mass delirious with pleasure.

I had briefly mentioned how Saturnians tend to be sadomasochistic in my previous post about Saturn and these examples just confirm it further.

When he is an adolescent a girl falls desperately in love with him. He kisses and caresses her so as to excite her as much as possible, but refuses to go further. He resolves to keep this up for five years (he calls it his ‘five-year plan’), enjoying her humiliation and the sense of power it gives him. He frequently tells her that at the end of the five years he will desert her, and when the time comes he does so.

When he first meets his future wife, Gala, he is greatly tempted to push her off a precipice. He is aware that there is something that she wants him to do to her, and after their first kiss the confession is made:

I threw back Gala's head, pulling it by the hair, and trembling with complete hysteria, I commanded: ‘Now tell me what you want me to do with you! But tell me slowly, looking me in the eye, with the crudest, the most ferociously erotic words that can make both of us feel the greatest shame!’ Then Gala, transforming the last glimmer of her expression of pleasure into the hard light of her own tyranny, answered: ‘I want you to kill me!’

He is somewhat disappointed by this demand, since it is merely what he wanted to do already. He contemplates throwing her off the bell-tower of the Cathedral of Toledo, but refrains from doing so.

George Orwell once described Dali this way:

"The two qualities that Dali unquestionably possesses are a gift for drawing and an atrocious egoism."

Art historian and critic Brian Sewell has also claimed that Dali once asked him to lie naked in front of one of his sculptures and masturbate whilst he watched.

He was also obsessed with Hitler in a perverse way.

While the vast majority of the Surrealist group professed far-Left political leanings, Dali kept curiously quiet during his early career, before being kicked out of the group for being a Nazi sympathiser, which he denied. Dali went on to make artwork addressing the Hitler, including “The Enigma of Hitler” (above) and “Hitler Masturbating”, once detailing that he “often dreamed of Hitler as a woman” and that the Nazi dictator “turned [him] on”.

He was a big old fascist who also supported the Spanish dictator Franco which made Picasso stop talking to him for the rest of his life. Orwell who fought in the Spanish civil war called Dali a "disgusting human being".

At age six, Dalí writes in his autobiography, he pre-meditated a "terrible kick" to his three-year-old sister's head "as though it had been a ball." Not simply childish not-knowing-better, this baseless cruelty continued as Dalí got older.

Here is an article that says more about his shitty behaviour.

Here is another article about his fcked up relationship with his sister

Saturn never fails to punish tho. It will let you fck up but punishment is imminent.

Dali died in his 80s, almost penniless, completely alone, as he had driven all his friends off decades prior, his wife had already passed and he was seriously ill and bedridden. He used button to call his nurse and one day that button short circuited and set him/the bed on fire. He suffered second and third degree burns all over his body. He lived for another four years in severe pain before passing away.

Just because you go a whole lifetime avoiding punishment, does not mean it isn't coming. People who suffer in old age have it the worst because you suffer 100x more

Dali was a Saturn defying narcissistic, violent, abusive person and guess what Saturn did? It saved it all up for the very end and left him without any kind of mercy. Friendless, penniless, bedridden, in excruciating pain, FOR YEARS until he finally died.

Saturn punishes you/is a harsh teacher because it wants you to uphold the Saturnian qualities of virtue, justice, fairness, doing your duty etc, you may never see the rewards of your good actions, so it may feel like a waste of time to keep being so principled but if you decide to just do whatever and disobey, you best believe Saturn will come through with that wrath. You have to keep being virtuous and morally upright even if you don't see yourself being "rewarded" for it. No one may recognise your goodness but keep being good anyway.

Alexander Graham Bell, Venus in UBP in 2h, Saturn in Shatabhisha in 1h

He is the guy who invented the telephone but he was also a very controversial deaf educator in his time.

Bell's father was a teacher of the deaf. His method of teaching the deaf was coined "Visible Speech." Bell's mother was deaf/hearing impaired and he would often speak to her by placing his mouth close to her forehead, believing the vibrations from his voice would help her distinguish speech more clearly.

Although he married a deaf woman, a former speech pupil, Mabel Hubbard, Bell strongly opposed intermarriage among congenitally deaf people. Bell feared "contamination" of the human race by the propagation of deaf people even though most deaf people statistically are born to hearing parents.

Bell applied his study of eugenics to his goal of preventing the creation of a deaf race and presented his paper Memoir Upon the Formation of a Deaf Variety of the Human Race to the National Academy of Sciences in 1883.4

Bell stated, "Those who believe as I do, that the production of a defective race of human beings would be a great calamity to the world, will examine carefully the causes that will lead to the intermarriage of the deaf with the object of applying a remedy."

In this paper, he proposed to reduce the number of the deaf by discouraging deaf-mute to deaf-mute marriages, advocating speech reading and articulation training for an oral-only method of education, removing the use of deaf teachers and sign language from the classroom.

Suggestions were made to enact legislation to prevent the intermarriage of deaf-mute people or forbidding marriage between families that have more than one deaf-mute member. His preventative strategies for deaf marriage included removing barriers to communication and interaction with the hearing world.

I feel like Saturnians often have a tendency to subconsciously make things harder for themselves and for others. Getting things easy is not Saturn's style. And this can manifest in sooooo many different ways. Bell grew up with a father who taught deaf people/children, his mother was deaf, he married a deaf woman YET he believed that they did not deserve to have separate schools that used communication tools specifically designed for them to make their lives easier. He spent his entire life working with deaf people but still somehow did not want things to be easier for them???

Steve Jobs, UBP moon

He had a pretty stellar reputation for being a major asshole. He was an extremely difficult person to work with and often terrorised his employees and was a toxic vile asshole to the women he dated.

Jobs was given up for adoption by his parents and later in life, he abandoned his girlfriend and baby after he got her pregnant.

His daughter Lisa later said that her mother felt uncomfortable leaving her with Steve alone after an incident in which he questioned and teased the then-nine-year-old Brennan-Jobs about her sexual attractions and proclivities.

Once, as Jobs groped his wife and pretended to be having sex with her, he demanded that Lisa stay in the room, calling it a "family moment."

It is well known that Steve Jobs was really good at conceptualizing things and coming up with ideas (touch screen phones, macbooks, iMacs etc) but he lacked the technical expertise to build anything. His partner, Steve Wozniak was the actual brains behind all of the creations to put it simply.

Early in his career, Jobs worked for the game developing company Atari who promised him a bonus of $5000 for developing a game called Breakout. Jobs did not have the know-how to execute this, so he made his friend Wozniak who worked at a different company stay up all night for 4 nights to design this whole ass game. He gave him $350 for it and told him he was giving him half of what the company paid him. Wozniak only found out much later that Steve basically stole his ideas, used him AND gave him a paltry sum as compensation.

Before Apple went public, Jobs refused to give any major shares to the many many developers and engineers who played a crucial role in pioneering the company. Wozniak gave those employees HIS shares so that they could make a profit when the company went public.

I'm not going to detail all the ways he tormented his employees and staff. You can google it.

Eventually, Saturn's karma started kicking in and Jobs was fired from the company he founded and for 10 years, he had to stay away from Apple. This experience humbled him a bit.

Apple really suffered in his absence and they brough him back in 1997 and we all know the kind of groundbreaking work he did in the next decade there. (hint: iphones, ipods etc)

In 2011, he found out he had terminal pancreatic cancer and resigned from his position and died 6 weeks later.

He refused to get surgery and chemo and chose "alternate treatments" until his disease had progressed so far that, there was no saving him.

He would eat a single thing and only that for weeks. Like apples. He'd eat only apples for three weeks. He was convinced that made him superior to everyone else and that it made him have no body odour, so he never showered either. This made it really hard for others to be around him.

Now back to his daughter, he was incredibly abusive to Lisa. She said she was forced to move home over 13 times before age seven as her mother struggled to pay the bills through a series of cleaning positions, while Jobs, then already a multi-millionaire, refused to help.

During one visit she innocently asked if she could be given his Porsche after learning the flashy vehicle had a scratch and needed to be replaced. His scowling response shocked Lisa, then aged seven.

“‘Absolutely not,’ he said in such a sour, biting way that I knew I’d made a mistake,” she remembers. “I understood that perhaps it wasn't true, the myth of the scratch: maybe he didn’t buy new ones. By that time I knew he was not generous with money, or food, or words; the idea of the Porsches had seemed like one glorious exception. I wished I could take it back. We pulled up to the house and he turned off the engine. Before I made a move to get out he turned to face me.

“‘You’re not getting anything,’” he said. “‘You understand? Nothing. You’re getting nothing.’ Did he mean about the car, something else, bigger? I didn’t know. His voice hurt—sharp, in my chest.” (an excerpt from her memoir 'Small Fry')

Saturn may delay punishment but it will punish and whether or not you learn from it, is up to you. Some individuals are not very malleable and they suffer the most. They make the same mistake over and over again and never learn. Steve died of any entirely preventable disease but he refused treatment. He was in excruciating pain towards his end and was completely bedridden. He expressed regret about not having gotten treatment sooner but :/

It's really scary how your karma catches up with you. Its the worst when it comes for you and leaves you with no time to remedy anything, so you just suffer agony knowing there is nothing you can do.

Woody Allen- Anuradha stellium (Sun, Mercury & Jupiter)

He molested his step daughter Dylan Farrow and is currently married to his former step daughter from the same marriage Soon Yi.

There has been a lot of misinformation regarding him molesting Dylan as a child even though the fact that he is literally married to one of his stepdaughters should be reason enough to suspect him

Allen had been in therapy for alleged inappropriate behavior toward Dylan with a child psychologist before the abuse allegation was presented to the authorities or made public. Mia Farrow had instructed her babysitters that Allen was never to be left alone with Dylan.

Allen refused to take a polygraph administered by the Connecticut state police. Instead, he took one from someone hired by his legal team. The Connecticut state police refused to accept the test as evidence. The state attorney, Frank Maco, says that Mia was never asked to take a lie-detector test during the investigation.

(Here is a link to the full article)

But again, Saturn's karmic lessons come through. Numerous actors have refused to work with Allen, he has been publicly condemned, lost all his reputation during #MeToo Actors such as Greta Gerwig, Colin Firth, and Mira Sorvino have recently apologized for accepting roles in Allen’s films, while many of his most avid fans have turned against him.

Johnny Cash, Rahu in UBP in 1h

Johnny was a drug addict and very abusive to his first wife. He creepily pursued June Carter while he was still married and despite her rejecting him MANY times, he did not give up. She was in a financially unfortunate position and he gave her the opportunity of touring with him, which she had to take up to make ends meet and finally in front of a live audience, he proposes marriage to her and basically forces her to say yes.

They remained married for 50 years and died within a year of each other so idk if they had a happy marriage or a troubled one but the Saturnian persistence was coming thru.

Cash's whole life is super Saturnian. His career came to a standstill in the 70s after a stellar decade long run in the 1960s, all throughout which he was abusing drugs.

In the early 1980s, Cash had eye surgery, broke several ribs, and damaged a kneecap, all on separate occasions, and again became addicted to pills. He was hospitalized in 1983 with internal bleeding that almost killed him. Upon regaining strength, he checked into the Betty Ford Clinic and remained clean until his death.

In 1994, after a looooong period of zero hits and chart play. He collabed with Rick Rubin (the GOAT) and then released a number of successful albums until he passed away in 2003 and from 1997 onwards he had been struggling with autonomic neuropathy and was frequently hospitalized.

Its interesting to me how between 1954 to 1973, Cash was undergoing his Saturn mahadasha and this period brought him enormous success and also made him completely addicted to substances. In 1965, he started a forest fire that burned off 500 acres of forest land and killed 49 of the refuge's 53 endangered condors. When confronted about it, he said "I don't care about your damn yellow buzzards".

From 1973-1990, he was undergoing his Mercury dasha, and this was a very low period in his career as he suffered major setbacks.

As he's sobering up at the Carter's family ranch, he's walking along a path. One of their ostriches is standing in the path. Well Cash thinks to himself "Hell if I'm moving" and tries to move it, so the bird starts trying to headbutt/peck at him, so he swings a punch at the bird, it responds by splitting his goddamn abdomen open with it's talon, from top to bottom. (he said the only thing that stopped the talon was it got stuck on his leather belt and couldn't go further). So he's laying on the ground, and grabs a branch (or an old fence post, can't remember) and starts beating it from the ground until it runs away.

Its interesting how his major highs in life were during his Saturn MD (He has Saturn in Uttarashada in 11h) and his biggest blows came during his Mercury MD (he does have Mercury in Shatabhisha in 12h 😬).

Mercury is not an inherently difficult dasha the way Saturn is. But what we sow, we shall reap. Saturn gives you 19 years to get your shit together and if you don't really learn during this period, it gets on your ass long after that. Jennie from Blackpink ended her Saturn MD in 2019 and some of her career's biggest moments have come since then but so have the controversies (she's currently in her Mercury MD) and it's as though the lingering after effects of the Saturn dasha really dictates how we experience our Mercury dasha.

Winston Churchill, Anuradha Sun

In 1943 in Bengal, over 3 million people died due to starvation and Churchill was directly responsible for this.

Churchill deliberately ordered the diversion of food from starving Indian civilians to well-supplied British soldiers and even to top up European stockpiles, meant for yet-to-be-liberated Greeks and Yugoslavs (all of this happened during WW2 for context)

He basically said, this is none of my business. Even though millions of Indian soldiers fought for the British during WW2 and were British subjects until India gained independence in 1947. Also btw India was the biggest contributor to the Empire's GDP. they looted and plundered us and left us to starve, basically.

In the book, Churchill’s Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India during World War II, written by Madhusree Mukerjee, Churchill was quoted as blaming the famine on the fact Indians were “breeding like rabbits”, and asking how, if the shortages were so bad, Mahatma Gandhi was still alive. 😡🤬😠he was a racist imperialist pig to say the least.

Some people are Churchill defenders and genuinely believe that the Bengal famine was a necessary sacrifice to win the war, and that those who critiqued him were unfair and had little insight about WWII. Aka: the colonized are expendable in a war between essentially imperialist, genocidal and fascist states. And they can kiss my ass.

To Indians, Churchill is a Hitler-like figure and rightfully so.

"I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place."

Winston Churchill to Peel commission in 1937.

Here is a thread that elaborates the many fcked up things he did.

When I talk about how cruel, brutal and callous Saturnian men can be, this is what I mean. Saturn restricts, limits and binds. This can easily mean Saturnians subject themselves and others to unnecessary rules, restrictions and limits.

Steve Jobs thought he was superior to others bc he only ate one type of food for weeks and months. Just because someone has discipline, does not automatically mean its good to have it. Free range parents can suck because they dont protect you or shelter you but disciplinarian parents also suck. Both Jupiter and Saturn struggle to learn "balance".

An unevolved Saturnian will be stingy af, very partial, biased and ill mannered. They act like cave men.

Churchill struggled with his mental health his whole life. He referred to it his “black dog:” fits of melancholia that followed Churchill throughout his life and often left him bedridden, suicidal and unshakably depressed for months at a time. It may sound cruel to say poor mental health is "karma" for his actions. (He also suffered 7 strokes and the final one, killed him). But the ways in which we are punished are often not materially obvious??? We may see terrible people thrive but often they are really suffering on the inside. Saturn often punishes by depriving you of peace of mind :/

Thomas Alva Edison, Anuradha Rising

In 1884, Nikola Tesla moved to New York City to meet Edison, who was famous for his low-voltage, direct-current electricity. Tesla believed the higher-voltage alternating current electricity was superior and suggested creating an AC-powered motor, but Edison claimed it was too dangerous. Instead, Edison promised the recent immigrant $50,000 (over $1 million today) if he could improve upon his DC generators, or “dynamos.”

After toiling for several months and making significant advances, he returned for his reward, only for Edison to say, “When you become a full-fledged American, you will appreciate an American joke.” Tesla quit—but the bullying didn’t stop there.

George Westinghouse had purchased Tesla’s patents and became the pioneering force behind AC power and its widespread implementation. Edison, who was ideologically and financially invested in his own DC power, began a publicity campaign against AC power. The campaign was ruthless; he wanted to prove that the high voltage of AC power was too dangerous for public use, so he and his cohorts began publicly electrocuting animals—stray dogs and cats, cattle and horses, and even, notoriously, “Topsy” the elephant. (you can hate me for pointing out how unevolved Saturnians abuse animals all you want but it will not stop it from being true<333)

The story gets worse. Edison was asked whether electrocution was a humane method of execution. In reply, he claimed that with Westinghouse’s AC power, it was indeed a humane and reliable execution. Westinghouse of course tried to prevent such an association, but Harold Brown, one of Edison’s employees, was hired by the state of New York to build the first electric chair. Obviously, he used AC power.

The execution—the first use of the electric chair—took place on August 6, 1890. AC power proved neither reliable nor humane. The first, 17-second-long charge failed to kill the man, an alleged axe murderer; after waiting for the generator to recharge and amping up the voltage, the next charge at last brought an end to the horrible, 8-minute long ordeal. Westinghouse, disgusted, reportedly said, “They would have done better with an axe.”

For his last two years, a series of ailments caused his health to decline even more until he lapsed into a coma and died at the age of 84.

Bo Burnham, Venus/Jupiter/Ketu in Pushya and Anuradha Rising

He does have a reputation for being a dick but I wanted to mention him because I think his sense of humour is VERY Saturnian. He has this tendency to humble his audience and its super Saturncoded to me. Like his whole shtick is serving you with a reality check in a slightly condescending way which is extremely Saturnian.

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He often makes "ironically" misogynistic jokes or whatever and its laced with that Saturnian bitterness except he's slightly self aware I guess.

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Aziz Ansari, Venus & Mars in UBP and Jupiter in Anuradha

Tbh other than the fact that his stand up comedy routines are hella lame, I dont really have much dirt on him.

However, he did sexually assault a woman in 2018 and nobody has heard much from him since tbh. I guess its an example of "instant karma".

Mads Mikkelsen, Anuradha Sun conjunct Ketu

Mads aka the man who made a career out of playing the bad guy

This isn't about Mads but about his most well known role, playing Hannibal Lecter.

Hannibal imo is very very Saturncoded

He is highly intelligent and cultured, with refined tastes and impeccable manners. He is deeply offended by rudeness, and often kills people who exhibit bad manners; according to the novel Hannibal, he "prefers to eat the rude". Hopkins described Lecter as the "Robin Hood of killers", who kills "the terminally rude".

Saturnians are either extremely refined or very unkempt. There is no in-between. You can always tell when someone has an imbalanced Saturn influence based on how disorderly, messy and chaotic they are.

In the novel Red Dragon, the protagonist, Will Graham, says that psychologists refer to Lecter as a sociopath "because they don't know what else to call him". Graham says "he has no remorse or guilt at all", and tortured animals as a child, (👀) but he does not exhibit any of the other criteria traditionally associated with sociopathy. Asked how he himself would describe Lecter, Graham responded, "he's a monster. I think of him as one of those pitiful things that are born in hospitals from time to time. They feed it, and keep it warm, but they don't put it on the machines and it dies. Lecter is the same way in his head, but he looks normal and nobody could tell."

Hannibal embodies the disciplined, orderly conduct of an evolved Saturnian along with the cruelty and harshness of it.

Charlie Puth, Anuradha Sun & Mars

half of this guy's discography is about how he hates women from LA. He literally has one song called "Nothing But Trouble (Instagram Models)" and it's just about how instagram models make problems. He has another song called "L.A. Girls" about how women in LA are fungible. It's like yeah maybe instagram models do suck but no one made you date them???

These are lyrics from the song LA Girls:

"There was Nikki, Nicole, Tiffany, and Heather But there's only room for you in my world But you say that I changed like the east coast weather How the hell did I get caught up? Messin' with these LA girls"

When I tell you the Madonna-Whore complex runs DEEP with Saturnian men. They will fool around with you and think of YOU as "cheap" for doing so and fall for the girl who never gives it up. The double standards of Saturnians are 🤮🤢

They will get frisky and frivolous with you and judge you for it :/

Woody Harrelson, Pushya Sun, Anuradha Moon

When I think of unkempt Saturnians, I think Woody Harrelson lmao

While filming in London in 2002, Harrelson found himself at a bar when two women approached him. According to the actor, the women asked if he wanted to "take a walk on the wild side." To which Harrelson replied, "I guess I do." A third woman joined in the fun, and the foursome returned to Harrelson's accommodations and enjoyed what the outlet described as "whatever-happened-next." Unfortunately for the Rampart star, "a paparazzo was able to snap a photo that soon hit the tabloids." The worst part — his then-girlfriend and future-wife Laura Louie saw these photos in the press. This "led to a good bit of groveling on Harrelson's part," and the couple worked past the incident.

I think I have noticed about manyyyy Saturnian men is that they often have enabler wives who put up with their shit + encourage it. Steve Jobs' wife, Laurene Powell was like that. Steve was such a perfectionist that he did not even buy furniture for their house and yk what?? she was okay with that lol and they remained married until his death even though literally everybody who has ever known him describes him as an asshole.

Woody Allen's still married to Soon Yi who is also entirely defensive about him. Same goes for Harrelson's wife I guess. How on earth does someone work past a foursome??? wtf

"I used to go to bars and fight the guys I thought were bullies. I've got scars everywhere," he revealed to The Hollywood Reporter. His fighting ways continued even after becoming a famous actor. Like when he once punched a reporter and claimed he thought the photographer was a zombie.

Saturnians never beating the abusive rumours 😩

On a different note, I've noticed how many Saturnian musicians make sad boy music with a ✨spiritual essence ✨

Sufjan Stevens is a UBP Moon

This is from a 2015 interview:

"I still describe myself as a Christian, and my love of God and my relationship with God is fundamental, but its manifestations in my life and the practices of it are constantly changing. I find incredible freedom in my faith. Yes, the kingdom of Christianity and the Church has been one of the most destructive forces in history, and there are levels of bastardization of religious beliefs. But the unique thing about Christianity is that it is so amorphous and not reductive to culture or place or anything. It's extremely malleable."

Tamino, UBP Moon

He said in an interview:

"We like to look at religious texts from all over the world, [and] they always share a lot of similarities. That's not because they necessarily influenced each other, it's more that our inherent experience as humans comes out through storytelling. It's awesome. So that's something that's really interesting: the story that we need to tell. And the stories that we tell will always survive longest. I think it sort of gives them a higher truth, a metaphysical truth, which makes religion quite beautiful to me. You don't have to necessarily believe in every little thing that's described in a book. I'm not a practicing believer—not in the classical sense. But I do have faith. I think a lot of people have faith without realizing [it]. Even waking up and starting your day, we all have like these little acts of fate throughout our lives without even noticing."

Hozier- Anuradha Moon

Faith is a big theme in their work and their lives and I feel like they are some evolved Saturnian men who have embraced the stoic spirituality of Saturn and poured it into their creativity.

In one interview, Hozier described Quakerism as a doctrine which taught him during childhood “to look for the God in each person” and “the spark of the divine that’s in every individual.” In particular, Hozier seeks this spark in his lover.

Its interesting to me how all 3 of them use religious metaphors often to speak of love because the ultimate form of love is devotion and Saturnians who have transcended the grips of limitations imposed by Saturn understand this more than anybody. They know what its like to love like their life depends on it.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger, Pushya Sun

Many Saturnians love to talk about working hard and kicking ass. Arnold is one of them, although I will say his preachiness comes from his Punarvasu stellium lmao

Arnold is a good example of a man who has worked very very hard and abided by every Saturnian principle to climb the ladder to the top. Yet he cheated on his wife with his housekeeper. He however did not deny paternity of the son he fathered with her. He has also expressed his regret about cheating and how he lost his marriage.

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Kim Kardashian, UBP Moon

She came under fire for her comments about "get your ass up and do the work" but honestly it's just Saturnian tough love

Kim is a good example of someone who has turned every single setback into a career opportunity. She is a true hustler. Obviously she's extremely privileged yada yada yada but she was Paris Hilton's assistant at one point and was at the bottom of the ladder. In 20 years she's built a fortune for herself and her family. Like, if it were Kourtney in Kim's place 🤡they wouldn't be where they are rn. Kim is a worker and its hard to deny that.

Rose- UBP Moon

In her interview with Vogue Australia, she said:

“I ended up fighting for my life, training for my life. Because I couldn’t accept the fact that I’d just be cut and sent back, so I had no time to slack off. I remember I took every minute and every second to work on my craft so that I [could] make it,”

“When I got [to Korea], I was like, ‘This is quite intense,’” she said of the early period of training. “I notice[d] that there [were] 12 other girls who had been training day and night for about five years. And I had just gotten there.” She feared that if she didn’t catch up to the other she would be cut and sent back to Australia, where she’d already told her school friends that she was dropping out to work on her music. "

“I [had] left and I didn’t want to fly back [to Australia] without having achieved anything,” she said of her worry at the time. “And I think it was a good drive. Just the fact that I had flown all the way from Australia gave me more strength [and] determination to strive.”

Hardworking Saturnians ✊🏼🙏🏼🧎‍♀️making the most of that Saturnian determination and reaping its rewards OOF

#vedic astro notes #sidereal astrology #astrology observations #astrology notes #nakshatras #vedic astrology #astro notes #astrology #astro observations #astroblr #saturn #anuradha #uttarabhadrapada #pushya #Youtube

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halemerry · 1 year

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On Aziraphale, Protection, and the Greater Good

Alright folks. I’ve already written quite a bit about the ways the Metatron was trying to manipulate Aziraphale here, but I wanted to give credit where credit is due and talk a little bit about how I don’t think that necessarily means it worked nearly as well as the Metatron thinks it does.

Because Aziraphale? Is not stupid. It’s one of his defining traits that though he might occasionally be slow, he has always been intelligent. He has also always been a fighter. And a bit stubborn. And though the fact he is allowed to be all that and still stay soft is one of my favorite things about him, that does not mean he is soft and soft alone.

With or without Crowley, Aziraphale has nearly always been a character who, above all else, does what’s right. This is part of what Crowley loves about him and it’s part about what we as the audience love about him too. He shelters a demon on the wall he is meant to be guarding. He gives away a sword to humans and lies to God about it directly to Her face. He struggles immensely with being asked to do anything he cannot reconcile with his morals and, even if he might fight against his impulses as to what’s right for a little bit, when push comes to shove he almost always falls on the right side of that scale. It’s important especially that this is also true of him even without Crowley in the equation.

Now, Crowley makes it much easier for him to be this person. He encourages and enables Aziraphale to be himself. He complicates and challenges Aziraphale’s worldview but in a healthy way that helps him grow and develop it, but never forces Az to be someone he isn’t. He also, most importantly, gives Aziraphale someone he understands. He is a connection. And a connection that allows Aziraphale to take his time and to make the excuses he needs to, at least for a little while. Because he understands that while Aziraphale is slow to change, he is not as resistant to it as he often reads to be - especially when he thinks that change can benefit the greater good.

Because Aziraphale fundamentally loves Earth and the people on it. And he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that Crowley does too. Not taking an opportunity he has to help someone has never sat well with him - even if that person is a naked Gabriel showing up on his doorstep. He does not run away with Crowley in season 1 because it would have been wrong to run away when he felt he could help and the same principle applies here too with the decision he comes to about the Metatron’s offer.

While I definitely think the Metatron was using lovebombing and other manipulation techniques on Aziraphale I highly suspect he is underestimating his new Supreme Archangel. And I highly suspect that what is happening here is not Aziraphale folding back into this own cult as much as much a few other things that could be happening.

I may poke around at a few more of these later but for now I want to focus on Aziraphale lied theory laid out here by @las-lus. This whole season has focused quite a bit on Aziraphale lying/using sleight of hand for Crowley's sake. It makes sense he would do this too to protect him from the Metatron and critically I don’t think it’s an accident that the only shot we get of his conversation with the Metatron are flashbacks from Aziraphale's narrative point of view. Reading this actually changed the whole trajectory of this meta so please take a look at it if you've got the chance! I really love this theory a lot and would've slapped this all on a reblog if it wasn't so big. (Though I'll be the first to admit I'm biased to anything that lets Aziraphale do some rescuing.)

At it's core this makes this action a protective one. He is a guardian given a flaming sword by God. He was built to protect. And we see him in this role throughout the series even if it's not always in the way we expect or in the way he was necessarily built for.

I want to start before the beginning. This scene is an important one for a lot of reasons, but for the context of this the important bit is that Aziraphale is already anxious. He’s a bit starstruck and a little baffled by the strange angel he’s stumbled into chatting with, but his primary focus in the meat of this scene is actually concern for this stranger's welfare. The instant the topic turns critical he immediately starts glancing around anxiously. This scene ends with him saying, "I'd hate to see you getting into any trouble." and giving us one of the most worried expressions I've ever seen on his face.

Then again at Eden, the first time we meet Aziraphale, we are shown him acting twice in a row for the sake of keeping others safe. We see him offer Crowley shelter from the storm and also give away his God given weapon to protect Adam and Eve. A lot of people tie Crowley to Eden for obvious reason but I think people often forget that, yes, without Crowley humans don't leave Eden but without Aziraphale they do not survive it.

We then see him in conflict over the Flood. As far as we know he doesn't act here but he quite clearly thinks it is wrong. He's high strung and tense and his attempts to rebuke Crowley's frustration feels more like him trying to convince himself.

Now we get to Job. This minisode is so fascinating to me for a lot of reasons because through most of it, against pattern, we have Aziraphale as the driving force throughout it. First we get Aziraphale checking in with Heaven to make sure there wasn't some official solution to this. (We also get a line in there that I think says a lot about Aziraphale's priorities when he specifically draws attention to his concerns for Sitis being old enough birth that many times would be hard and risky.) Once Heaven fails him here Aziraphale is the one to reach out to Crowley and Aziraphale is the one to press for them to work together. He takes a gamble, hoping that his instinct that Crowley does not want to hurt kids is accurate, and gets up in Crowley's face to challenge him when Crowley refuses to prove him right. It is not Crowley taking the lead here, bringing Aziraphale in but rather Aziraphale trusting his owns instincts are right.

Aziraphale is also crucially the one constructing the charade Crowley plays in front of the angels as Bildad the cobbler/midwife. Aziraphale immediately and without hesitation provides Crowley with the pieces he needs to make the lie convincing enough. He tells him that what they need is an expert on human births and Crowley rolls with it and then clarifies very quickly that Gabriel witnessed Eve's birth, signaling to Crowley that mimicking that would be the play.

He is trying to tip the scales to get the outcome he wants - to keep this family safe - before he ever utters a lie. And then he does. He lies directly, giving his word as an angel. This is an act that eats him alive inside. He literally thinks he has fallen for this and has perfectly resigned himself as being damned to Hell for it and does it anyway. Because he knows it was right. Because he thinks a family of five he has no real connection to are worth falling to protect.

By the time we hit the Globe in 1601 Aziraphale's primary objection to their Arrangement has evolved from concern about what Head Office will think into concern specifically for Crowley's safety.

Then in 1827, even if it's in a misguided way, his concern starts out on Elspeth and her soul. He tries to protect her and very quickly changes his tune as soon as he's given proper evidence that what she was doing was net good. Again he is the one driving most of this narrative and the duo's actions forward as Crowley drifts along trying to get him to see that some actions aren't fully good or bad but can exist in a moral gray space. We also get him verbalizing his own moral code here explicitly when he wants to heal Morag.

He continues to have concern for Crowley on the forefront of his mind - asking very quickly after his good deed for Elspeth if he's safe or if hell noticed and then a few years later denies Crowley holy water out of concern that it could destroy him.

In 1941 we first get him operating under cover trying to unsuccessfully lie his way into dispatching some Nazi. We then get him offering himself as a magician for Crowley's sake and using sleight of hand to keep evidence of their relationship from making its way to Hell.

In particular I want to draw attention here to the fact the episode we revisit this moment in has two very similar moments toward the beginning and end of it. This episode opens with what the episode is named for - Shax hitching a ride with Aziraphale. He's relatively amicable with her until she at one point implies harm to Crowley wondering out loud why he would risk destruction for Az. Then toward the end when Furfur enters the dressing room, Aziraphale is pleasant and kind until the moment it becomes clear Crowley is being threatened. In both cases his expression turns more neutral and his body language becomes more focused and serious. He is ready to protect at all costs and is done being polite to these people who threaten his demon.

From there we go to 1976. Here as he hears about Crowley's holy water heist, he makes a choice. Even though he does not want Crowley having this weapon at all and tells Crowley as much that that position hasn't changed he realizes how dangerous trying to steal it could be. So he decides to make it as safe as he can in the circumstance, putting aside his own wants and feelings for the sake of minimizing even potential harms.

Even good old 'you go too fast for me' is a form of protection here. Even if it hurts and even if it's not want they want they need at least one of them to pump the breaks to make sure they are not discovered.

Then the world nearly ends. I won't examine what happens there too closely but I think we can all agree Aziraphale was willing to do quite a lot to insure the world and Crowley were safe once Crowley gets him on board with raising Warlock. Though I do want to note I don't think it's an accident that a lot of what Aziraphale says to Crowley at the end of six has echos of the bandstand - the last event Aziraphale has to reference that he knew would make Crowley go away.

A lot of the core of the current season is built around all sorts of protective Aziraphale actions. The flashbacks all gesture at it in some capacity, and anther notable one is him sacrificing books both as weaponry and to make the ball happen. He has committed to securing their safety before a single demon even shows up looking for Gabriel. We also get him willingly risking war to defend the people in his shop. Episode six in particular shows us a lot of Aziraphale in this mode, which he's pretty much locked into from the moment the demons arrive, Whether it's protecting Gabriel, Nina and Maggie, or at one point putting his body between the demons and a whole crowd of people including Crowley.

This season is a season that emphasizes that Aziraphale is a liar. It is one that draws attention to him pulling tricks and on him learning to do that for the greater good. It it about him learning that sometimes the choices we make are often more morally gray than we would like. And most importantly it is about Aziraphale believing this world and the people in it are worth protecting.

And who does he want to keep safe more than anyone? Who did he fight to share his life with? It makes sense to me that he would do this for Crowley. It's perfectly in character and gives Aziraphale the due credit I think a lot of theories lack. Because, to me, Aziraphale isn't the one that walks away from Omelas, Aziraphale is the child who would willfully sacrifice himself to keep the people he loves safe.

#good omens #good omens spoilers #good omens season 2 #gos2 spoilers #good omens meta #aziraphale

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excalibur-gone-missing · 5 months

Text

Paring: seungcheol x fem!reader

Requested: no

Release date: 24-04-24

Genre: mafia au, reverse of getting kidnaped by the mafia boss, fluff, e2l, crack, assistant au

Warning(s): mention of abduction, guns?, cheol is a menace, brief mentions of drugs (do tell me if i missed anything)

summary: It was not supposed to be like this, it was a meticulous plan perfectly curated by you, Jun and Seokmin. You were supposed to go get the man who was the future heir of the Kim Corps named Mingyu, you ever had a pic of his. Most importantly it was definitely not supposed to be the man who now sits in your basement claiming that he is the leader of the mafia organisation you three work for.

Word count: 5.8k

Other works

Beta reader(s): @wonuwrites-main and @anonmonty (sweet sweet angles helped me with proof reading, or else im fucking incompetent)

disclaimer: this is not the exact representation of the subjects in real life. I just use them for my inspiration.

a/n: I request each and every one of you to comment on this fic don't be a silent reader it helps me as an author to understand my readers and i would love to communicate with all of you. Constructive criticism is always welcomed by me so do talk about this fic or send me an ask.

[permanent taglist] [only for those interested, don’t fill the form otherwise]

It is a beautiful day, and like they always say: beautiful things happen on beautiful days, and you were damn ready for the said beautiful thing to happen!

The plan is simple—you and Jun have gone over it at least fifty times, and Seokmin has been standing there listening to you both intently throughout the whole ordeal.

“So, let’s go over it once again,” you say, pointing at the white board with the picture of a man, Mingyu to be exact, the heir to the Kim Corp. and your target.

“He leaves his office to have coffee every afternoon exactly at 3pm at the nearest café named ‘Carvery’, am I right?” Jun and Seokmin nod with a concentrated look on their faces.

“Next he goes to the park, sits there for fifteen minutes, on most days, and then takes the path that leads them straight back to the building, correct?” The two men again nod, and then Jun takes over the talking.

“More often than not, he hates company during his afternoon runs, so the best chance we have of abducting the man is when he is between the café and the park. This will give us at least a twenty-minute head start before the police and his family start looking for him.”

Now you and Seokmin nod at the man, and Seokmin takes the podium to present the next part.

“Jun and I will be on the streets while y/n waits in the car, and from the background check we ran last month, we know the man is well trained in martial arts, so we will try and attack him with the anesthetic as soon as possible.”

“And after the guy is unconscious, we will flee with his ass~,” adds Jun.

“Sounds like a solid plan,” you laugh as you high five the two men.

Indeed, it was a solid plan. You three had considered every possibility and chosen this day to execute your plan. It’s perfect and thorough, so what can go wrong?

A lot apparently.

You reached the destination ten minutes early to give Seokmin and Jun ample amount of time to prepare for the attack.

As you parked your car near the pavement where the abduction would take place, you see a man walk past the car wearing a beige trench coat with some sort of concoction from the coffee shop.

Now if you were a seasoned abductor, you would have known not to mess with the person as the timing was not right. But that was not the case, and seeing a person who vaguely matched the physical descriptions of the man you were actually supposed to abduct gave you enough reason to jump the gun and take this man hostage.

Before you could process anything, Seokmin jumped on the guy, trying to tackle him while Jun tried to find a way to inject the drug into his system. After another minute of struggle, taking at least five punches in their abdomen and faces, both the men were successful in sedating the man.

They hurriedly carried him to the car and you three sped off to the base to ask his family for ransom.

You have been back at the base for three hours now. As you look at the unconscious man tied to the chair in front, you realize the grave mistake you made by not seeing his face the minute you were actually kidnapping him.

“I mean if you look at his eyes, they look very similar to the real target, you know. Maybe he ate too much last night and is a bit swollen now,” Jun says in a wise tone. Now if you were stupid like Seokmin, you would have accepted this analogy of his just like the hundred others he had spewed in the past two hours, but you are not. So, you hit the guy’s head while calmly saying.

“Will you keep quiet for a minute? You know as well as I that this is the wrong man. We don’t even know who he actually is. So, we wait for him to gain consciousness and then interrogate him.”

You have figured that screaming and crying will get you nowhere. All it will do is trigger Seokmin’s panic attack, and you do not think he can manage another one after the one hour long one he just resurfaced from.

“Our best bet is that we abducted a pretty important dude, or else we know the boss will have our meat served to his dogs for their nightly feasts,” you continued.

“I can see he is wearing pretty costly brands all over. My guts say he is rich,” Seokmin pipes up.

“Seok, your gut told you to scream for the past hour. I don’t trust it a lot now,” you complain.

“I think it’s your fault, too. You should have stopped us from abducting the guy instead of just staring from the car, you know,” Jun says.

Now, you will consider yourself to be a level-headed person, but one thing that gets to you more than anything else is a false accusation. On top of that, the bitch has the gal to accuse you of being careless when they were the ones showing literally no care about their work, owing to the fact you were not even supposed to abduct the untouchable Kim Mingyu in the first place. The leader of your clan, although you three had never seen him, mostly operated through Jeonghan, his right-hand man. The guy you agreed to kidnap was apparently remarkably close to your boss. But when faced with the tough choice of loyalty towards one gang and the lump sum of three million, you three had to face the situation and betray your gang. You know you should not, but the small jobs with the gang were not enough to even pay your rent!

So, who does Jun think he is to shift the blame towards you when you have done nothing but try to make a secure living for all three of you. Therefore, you do the thing that your sane brain advises you to.

Go off at Jun.

“So, if I fail to babysit two grown men while on an extremely important mission that included them, the blame is shifted towards me?!”

“You were both supposed to wait for my instructions before confronting the poor bloke. Now, if things go wrong, it will be your faults, and I will be dragged into it because I was the main brain behind the planning.”

“Guys, I think we should focus on the guy more; I think he is stirring.”

This statement from Seokmin caught both of your attention, causing you to cease the argument immediately to take a look at the man in front of you.

Without hesitation, you put your gun on his head and ask, “who are you, tell us about yourself.”

The man albeit good looking with his doe eyes and plump lips, gave you three a mean stare before speaking sassily.

“Shouldn’t you know the identity of the person you kidnap?”

“If we knew, I don’t think I would have asked about you,” you reply.

The man scoffs before informing you the most gut-wrenching piece of information you have ever heard.

“I’m Choi Seungcheol leader of Choi Clan.”

When Seungcheol met Mingyu today, he was feeling particularly drained and sought the comfort of a familiar face, longing for a brief respite from the relentless demands of his job. Mingyu, sensing his friend's exhaustion, proposed they take a detour to unwind, considering Seungcheol's grueling schedule. Gratefully accepting the suggestion, Seungcheol had embarked on what he thought would be a much-needed moment of relaxation.

Oh, how wrong he was.

As he leisurely sipped his coffee, enjoying a fleeting moment of calm, the tranquility was shattered by the sudden onslaught of a group of thugs. Seungcheol had braced himself for a possible mugging, but the idea of being abducted never crossed his mind. He curses himself for sending Soonyoung away earlier, now regretting not having company in this unforeseen predicament.

To make matters worse, Seungcheol felt a wave of embarrassment wash over him. A mafia boss getting abducted!

How humiliating.

Now, do not get him wrong, he was, in reality, as far from incompetent as the Sahara was from water, as Seungkwan was from being calm, as Jihoon was from showing affection—you get the point.

In fact, he had been the first in three generations to successfully reclaim the southeastern part of the city for his clan from the Yoon family, a testament to his capabilities.

Now bound and surrounded by three hapless captors whose incompetence was glaringly evident, judging by the one who he suspects was crying prior to their conversation with him. He suspected they had targeted Mingyu, but mistakenly seized him instead. Seungcheol could not help but shake his head at their sheer incompetence.

Now, again, he is not that scared. He knows he has a trusted pack of workers who would join heaven and earth in search of him. No, he is least bothered about himself.

What he is actually bothered about is who planned to abduct Mingyu, because he is strictly off limits for his clan members. He knows this as much as anyone that they respect the young heir a lot, not only due to his kind nature, but also because of the relationship he has with their leader.

So, when he informs his three kidnappers his name, he gets the weirdest of responses ever—a chorus of ‘shits’ and ‘fucks.’ Moreover, he sees all three of his kidnappers suddenly fall down at his feet and grumbling out the most nonsensical bullshit ever. The only words he vaguely captures are ‘it was supposed to be someone else’ and ‘sirs’.

This confuses the man even more. But then he suddenly sees all three of them take their masks off, revealing two men and, dare he say, a very gorgeous woman. Now in any other situation,

Seungcheol would have laughed, but now that he is in it himself, the only reaction he can provide is a confused head nod as the woman immediately goes to untie his hands.

“So, you are telling me that you were paid to abduct my friend who you know is off limits, but still went ahead with the idea, even though you are the members of my gang?!”

He says as he looks at your group standing in front of him with their heads bowed down looking like kids getting scolded.

“But sir, we barely make any money from doing the jobs assigned to us. The only way for us to pay our rent was for taking up jobs from outside, and this one paid us a huge sum. We never wanted you to be the one getting abducted instead, we swear!” you suddenly exclaim with the extreme need to explain yourself.

Your two partners beside you do their dutiful job by nodding their heads with your rant.

“You three fucked up really bad, didn’t you?” He says, looking a tad bit amused.

“We are really sorry!” Seokmin chokes out, visibly scared by the whole ordeal.

“Well, it’s time I go back, so take me back to the office.”

Right after that statement comes out of his mouth, you three are escorting him out of the door to the car parked outside to take him back.

“So, you are telling me these three, these newbies who literally didn’t have any good job for them to gain experience, drugged your ass and took you to god knows where, and you couldn’t even put up a good fight?!”

Jeonghan exclaims, looking at the seated, nervous, and scared faces of the three of you from Seungcheol’s office’s glass.

“Apparently not,” the older man sighs.

“My friend, are you sure you are a real mafia? Because in light of the current happenings, I am starting to question your integrity a lot.” Jeonghan says as he barks out a laugh, taking immense pleasure at his friend’s humiliation.

“Or maybe you were too caught up staring at the pretty lady to notice that you were getting kidnapped.”

The bitch continues to make fun of the older man.

“I just thought I was getting mugged, so I didn’t fight hard enough. Who knew I would be kidnapped instead.” Seungcheol grumbles, pouting a bit.

“Which is even worse, because you are telling me you would have let people just mug you for no reason when you are one of the most influential people underground!” Jeonghan said while looking pretty concerned about the statement his superior just spewed, and he does indeed have a hard time accepting it.

“Ahh! Just get over with it and let me go. Plus make sure the three of them face the appropriate consequences for not only abducting me, but also trying to abduct my friend,” Seungcheol barks out while walking out, thoroughly humiliated, and annoyed that his junior was having fun at his expense.

So Jeonghan does the very thing at which he is extremely good.

Create chaos.

Right after his superior leaves, he strides towards the group and says, “so because the boss has instructed me to do something with you three which will stop you guys from going off the hook, I’m going to assign you some jobs in the organization because I can.”

Now, anyone even vaguely familiar with Jeonghan would recognize the expression he wore just before chaos ensued, but contrary to popular belief, Jeonghan is actually quite amiable—at least, that is what he believes, and that is what matters, right?

He continues, “Junhui, you will be overseeing the artillery division. Our deputy head Chan will ensure you are well informed about your job. You will meet him tomorrow. As for Seokmin,” he paused, a sly smile crossing his face, which made Seokmin visibly nervous, “You, my friend, will be our esteemed boss's driver. Lastly, y/n, you will be his assistant. You shall be meeting Chan tomorrow, too; he will explain the workings of your new role.”

Normally, in any ordinary conversation, you would not dare ask inappropriate questions, but the circumstances were far from normal, so you proceeded with the most audacious question you could muster: “Why did Chan leave his previous post?”

Jeonghan politely responded, “He left because the job didn’t suit him, so we shifted him to the artillery department as a deputy head.”

Unspoken was the fact that Chan had been worn down by the boss's relentless bullying, quietly requesting a transfer for at least three years before Jeonghan finally relented. Since then, the turnover of assistants had been alarmingly high. Jeonghan desperately hoped you would stick around. Moreover, if either you or Seungcheol objected to this arrangement, he had enough leverage to ensure you both comply. Enough dirt to keep both of you in line.

Your meeting with Chan the next day went well. He explained to you the workings, gave you tips and tricks on how to make sure all the work gets done. Overall, a 10/10 experience, except the small hiccup at the end where he cryptically said something along the lines of “Best of all fucking luck with this job because you will need it.”

Now a small best of luck is never a bad gesture, but that statement!

That shit was a bit too hostile, even for you. But you are fine, happy even. Anything that saves you from getting your life cut short by a mafia leader is always welcomed.

“What are you doing here?”

“Where is Jeonghan?”

The first two sentences to ever leave The Choi Seungcheol’s mouth the minute he sees your face when he comes into his office that afternoon. Indeed, so delightful!

"Sir, I've been assigned as your work assistant for the time being," you reply, your eyes downcast. It is a surreal turn of events considering just yesterday this man was tied up in your basement. After that ordeal, everything seemed to take on a different hue, almost as if you were hearing the bells of heaven. So, that reaction seems pretty appropriate to you given the circumstances.

Now you see our oh so beloved Mr. Choi was not just an underground mob because what is the fun in that, right! He mostly did international business under the guise of his company named The ChoiTech, solely based on providing technological change using sustainable means. Pretty cleaver tactic, although overused, but still gets the job done, so who are you to judge.

The man looking extremely shocked at your statement immediately rushed inside his office, you presume, to call Jeonghan. And sure enough, within five minutes of him disappearing from your sight, you could hear him loudly complaining to his secretary on the phone. “But Jeonghan I can’t be collaborating with her, after what she did to me yesterday!”

The man whined and then suddenly you could hear hushed whispers, so being the curious cat you were, slowly crept near the door to hear the conversation better.

“But man, it’s humiliating. She kidnapped me for fucks sake”, the oh so powerful man, who people assumed will one day rule the underworld, whined like a kid who has been denied to go on a playdate with their best friend.

By this time, you were almost pressed onto the door when suddenly the sound of someone clearing their throat made you jump away from it and look about for the person who stopped you from consuming you daily dose of gossip.

The culprit, Joshua, stood right in front of your desk with an amused look on his face.

Now Joshua is someone you were extremely familiar with, being the man who took care of assigning roles to the lower members of the group, you have had a lot of angry conversations with him.

“I would ask you if Seungcheol is busy, but the way you were trying so hard to eavesdrop, makes me think otherwise,” he says, making you roll your eyes.

“Just give me a minute to tell him you are here, then you can go in.”

The man nodded still looking thoroughly amused at how sad you looked due to missing out on whatever conversation you were listening to.

After a minute, the man was inside, now looking even happier that he has seen his next victim to torment.

“So Jeonghan was indeed right,” he said, looking like he was having a tough time controlling his laugh.

“Not you, too,” the pouty man whined from behind the desk. “But really, can you tell him to not put that woman as my assistant? I get war flashbacks every time I see her face,” he continued whining.

“I mean, I could do that, but where is the fun there, right!” Joshua, thoroughly enjoying his boss’s misery, replied. “But in all seriousness, you could just treat her like Chan. The boy is still traumatized by the amount of work you made him do,” he thoughtfully added.

The older replies, “I liked Chan, he was nice, would do anything you ask him to!”

“And so will she. Her life is at stake here, give her some benefit of the doubt.”

This statement made the older think like never before. Plans of tormenting you to quit your job rushing past his brain at high speed. Suddenly everything made sense.

“I can take my revenge! That is exactly why Jeonghan made her my assistant. Oh, my friend is such a genius!” Seungcheol said, looking a bit too enthusiastic.

“Ok, I am sure it was done to decrease his workload, but whatever you say, man,” the younger said skeptically after seeing the diabolical look on the elder’s face.

It has already been three weeks and suddenly you understand what Chan meant all those days back when he wished you good luck. To put it quite plainly, your boss is crazy.

The man was a combination of workaholic and perfectionist, which resulted in him getting swamped by work and by default the same fate befalls you every day, too. For the past three weeks, you have had a challenging time at the office to even take a break to eat food.

The men you called your enemies once, aka Jeonghan and Joshua, are the ones now saving you from dying out of malnutrition. You are eternally thankful to them. But more than anything now, you regret trying to kidnap Kim Mingyu—the name makes you want to cry in a corner and throw rocks at people, if you had any time to do so.

“Sir, you scheduled two appointments at the same time: the new project for the Orin Community Park and another one with Mr. Xu for the narcotic deal.”

You informed the man who had his face shoved in some papers, reading something diligently.

“Why did you not stop me from doing so then, you were right beside me when I was going through the plan.”

Now, it is your job to curate the perfect schedule for the man to follow, but Seungcheol being the guy born only to cause you inconvenience made his schedule for the week himself this time.

Why you might ask?

Purely because the man is a chronic insomniac and whenever he has trouble sleeping, instead of taking measures to have a peaceful sleep, he tries his hands in different works because he can, and this time his victim was the poor, poor schedule of his.

“Because you had already sent them both emails, sir,” you say, thoroughly exasperated.

“Ok maybe I did, so now I obviously can’t cancel on both so you figure out something so that I can attend both the meetings, because I ain’t missing any.”

The man just turns his chair around and keeps reading whatever he was reading in the first place.

With an extremely calm voice, you say, “sir I need you to stop trying to do something to pass time when you can’t sleep. I need you to actually go to a doctor.” “Can’t,” comes his response, making you sigh more.

Sometimes it feels like you are working as a babysitter to a grown man instead of an assistant to a CEO.

Seeing the conversation would be going nowhere if you keep talking to him, you go out and do the second-best thing in your books.

Call Chan.

“Lemme guess, the boss is giving you a hard time!” The first sentence he says right after picking up the phone.

Sighing, you tell him all of Seungcheol’s various administrative behaviors throughout this week. When you got to the part where he had so bravely and meticulously made the perfect schedule, Chan started laughing. The gall of that boy!

“Wait, he still does that!” He exclaimed between his laughs, making you feel even more annoyed.

After calming down he says, “just make Jeonghan or Jihoon go for the community meeting and let him manage the narc. I know you are thankful, so do not mention it, but maybe buy me a meal when you are free, as a repayment.”

Chuckling at the younger boy, you agreed to get him whatever he asks for purely because he is a literal angel, and he deserves the world. Ok, maybe it is a bit too dramatic, but the boy was indeed your angel in disguise.

Planning on following through with the advice Chan gave you, you called both Jeonghan and Jihoon simultaneously. As Jeonghan was busy, Jihoon accepted the work of going to the community welfare meeting instead of Seungcheol.

After that, the whole day was smooth sailing. But the main root of all your problems was happy, maybe not healthy, but the look of pure happiness and the twinkling eyes when he passed by your desk was hard to miss.

This man was slowly but surely making sure to strip you of your patience bit by bit.

The last straw to eradicating your already depleting patience came when Seungcheol in all his glory, during one of his nightly ‘Imma take away other’s jobs because sleep refuses to befriend me’ escapades, deleted all your assistant notes for the server by mistake.

You still are baffled as to how he did that. Truth be told so is he. He was scrolling away on his phone when he saw this reel about ‘how to increase your Wi-Fi speed.’ Extremely intrigued by it, he had actually tried to increase the internet speed in his house, and he swears on every god on planet earth it worked. So, he tried doing so with the one in his office, which weirdly enough resulted in removal of all the information that you had stored in your laptop.

Now if this would have happened to his computer, too, you would not have gotten as angry as you were, but the motherfucker’s computer was all well and good and if you actually pay attention, it seems that his internet speed has increased, too!

How this man become a CEO is beyond you. What is not so beyond is your pure hatred for him and his technologically challenged ass.

So that night when Seungcheol, stayed back as usual to do work, you took your chances, entered his office, and slammed a ball of yarn and two knitting needles on his table while scaring the life out of the, not so, poor man.

“Start knitting!” you calmly said.

“But I don’t know how to though!” he replies, thoroughly confused.

“Then learn, Seungcheol! I don’t care what you want to do, I need you to learn and pick up a hobby, start gaming, try knitting anything! Just make sure you are not trying to turn the office upside down.”

Anyone who knows Seungcheol also knows never to question his nightly routines, but more than that, they also know the pride of the man is too high to ever accept his mistake. So, when you commit the grave crime of pointing out his mishap with the Wi-Fi router that morning, you hit the nail on the head and pissed him to the fucking moon.

“So, you think I’m bad at what I do?!”

“No, I think you are technically inept. And you should leave it to people who are good at it.”

This pisses off Seungcheol more than anything, but you don’t let him intervene as you keep speaking.

“On top of that you are constantly making changes in your schedule without informing me. You’re your assistant. Maybe have you ever considered the fact that your schedule was made so that your day is smooth sailing, and no two activities overlap!”

“Just because you refuse to go to a doctor and try and find a way to manage your stress does not mean you make the workplace hell for us.”

By the end of your rant, you were fuming and Seungcheol was stunned.

Clearing his throat, he says awkwardly, “I’m sorry you feel so, I will try and fix my schedule.”

Now, although this statement made you feel better, it also confused you, as you were fully prepared to have a full-blown fight with the man. Him backing down was never an option. But now that it has happened, you muttered a small, “I shall be going then”, to which your boss meekly nodded.

After you were outside, you ended up feeling better due to unloading all your anger on the man. It was refreshing. Now you just needed to see what changes tomorrow will bring for Seungcheol.

It had been two months since you had the argument with Seungcheol, more like your single woman shouting spree. But things have been better. He has tried to keep his need for new experiences down and this has made your life exponentially easier.

Did you now have time to eat. Absolutely not!

But the office was not a nightmare anymore.

If someone would have told you five months ago that this is what your future held for you, you would have straight up laughed at their face and told them to get themselves checked. But life has weird ways of throwing you in situations you don’t expect yourself to be in, and you have no other ways of getting out but learn to go with the flow.

You sometimes talk to Jun and Seokmin, and you have realized you got the hardest of all the jobs.

You asked Jeonghan about it once and his answer was, “because I can and its fun!”

So here you are sitting on the couch with Seokmin while enjoying your sandwich when you see Seungcheol come outside carrying a bag, Jeonghan trailing behind him sporting this devilish look on his face.

The big man walks towards you and hands you the bag. Opening it you notice a green scarf sitting at the bottom.

“Seungcheol’s first knitting creation, and he says thank you for forcing him to learn knitting. It helps him sleep now.” Jeonghan says while pointing at the bag even before the older man could open his mouth.

Seokmin tries to make himself as invisible as possible while looking extremely interested in the whole situation unfolding in front of him.

Seungcheol waves his hands at Jeonghan trying to hush him down and whines, “let me speak!”

“I made this cause you told me it would help me sleep! I didn’t think it could actually help me, but it looks like it did, so I’m extremely thankful for your suggestion.”

“Good job!” Jeonghan says, patting Seungcheol’s head like he was a child, making you laugh a bit.

“Thank you for listening to me, sir!”

“Oh, no, call him by his name, or else he will become weird with you again!” Jeonghan says, making you laugh again. Seungcheol pouts at both of you and storms back to his office, with Jeonghan at his tail making fun of him yet again.

After that, you kept the bag in your desk and went to bid your friend goodbye.

“He looked like he was confessing to his crush, you know”, Seokmin muses.

“Maybe he has a crush on you!” He exclaimed after pausing for a moment.

“I don’t, he is a weird person,” you had replied thoughtfully.

Realizing he has been chatting with you for a long time, Seokmin quickly rushes outside while loudly screaming a ‘goodbye’ for the whole building to hear.

When you came back to your desk, Jeonghan was waiting for you there. The man just looked at you with a smirk and said, “see you later y/n, and make sure to wear the scarf!”

Jeonghan is a weird person. You more often than not don’t listen to what he tells you to do. He forces you to do them anyways.

“Seriously, lady, do wear the scarf. Plus, it’s cold outside—you won’t get a heatstroke if you do so.”

With that he was outside of the office, too. Slowly work caught up with you and you forgot about the scarf altogether.

That evening, as you were finishing up at work and preparing to leave, you grabbed the scarf that had been gifted to you and wrapped it around your neck before stepping out of the office.

Unbeknownst to you, the man who had given you the scarf felt a rush of joy upon seeing you wear it. Concealing his flushed cheeks, he quietly followed you out and spontaneously invited you to join him for dinner, explaining that he had given Seokmin the night off and now was in extreme need of a dinner companion, as Seokmin would fill in that position on most nights. It was unusual for him to make such a request, but you were both hungry and couldn't resist the offer of a free meal, even if it was from someone as harmless as him.

"So, what do you think?" Seungcheol asked as the two of you sat at the ramen shop waiting for your orders.

"About what?" You replied, genuinely puzzled by his question.

"Didn't you read the letter?" He asked, his face turning even redder as he mentioned it.

"What letter?" You responded, glancing around until Seungcheol nodded towards the bag in which he gave you the scarf, looking inside you noticed an envelope that matched the interior perfectly sitting at the bottom.

"Oh! I can read it now," you exclaimed.

"Don't worry about it right now," he interjected as the waiter arrived with your bowls of ramen.

Despite his reluctance to discuss the letter further, your curiosity only grew stronger after he dropped you off at your doorstep. Once inside your home, you wasted no time in retrieving the letter from your bag. Its contents filled you with excitement like never before.

The following day at the office, you placed another letter on Seungcheol's desk before getting on with your usual tasks, eager to see his reaction.

"So, let me get this straight—you've been dating our boss for the past month?" Exclaimed Jun, eyes wide with disbelief.

"Why didn't you tell us sooner? How did this even happen?!" Chimed in Seokmin, equally stunned by the news.

As soon as you revealed your relationship with Seungcheol, you found yourself bombarded with a flurry of questions from your friends. It was amusing to witness their sheer astonishment, and yet, deep down, it felt incredibly rewarding to share this surprising news with them.

What started as a casual hangout quickly transformed into a lively interrogation session, with your friends firing off all sorts of curious inquiries. Most pressing among them was the question:

“How and when did all of this happen?!”

You couldn't blame them for their curiosity. It seemed like just yesterday that you had kidnapped Seungcheol off the street instead of his friend Mingyu, which resulted in Jeonghan gaining the perfect opportunity to bully you both half to death. And let's not forget the hell and back experience you were subjected to from Seungcheol himself, the man who had once resorted to extreme tactics to get you to quit as he was reminded of the oh so humiliating experience he went through every time he saw your face. But somehow, it all worked out in the end, and you couldn't be happier about how it turned out.

Near the end of your gathering, you couldn't resist the urge to pull out your phone and reveal the most treasured image in your gallery: a photograph capturing two pieces of paper resting on a desk. One paper bore a lengthy paragraph, while the other simply displayed a single, bold sentence:

"Take me out on a proper date first!"

The photo encapsulated perfectly how you both worked so well with each other. It was a sweet reminder of how unexpectedly love can bloom in the most unconventional of circumstances.

As your friends marveled at the photo, you couldn't help but reflect on how far you and Seungcheol had come in such a short time. Despite the initial hurdles and challenges you faced with the man, you were grateful for the bond you now shared—a relationship built on laughter, friendship, and, of course, a bit of unexpected romance.

The end hope you like it !!

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hamliet · 2 months

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the notion that bnha is pro authoritarianism or social hierarchies is nonsensical not to mention acting like being pro cop is bad

Err... BNHA is pretty pro-authoritarian. I actually find it pretty disturbing. And that's even if the story turns out with the League alive at the end.

As for being pro-cop--cops are human individuals, yes. But people have in recent years in multiple countries (including Japan, by the way) protested against cops being used as tools to maintain social hierarchies wherein people who are not part of that hierarchy suffer for daring to want to be treated as human beings. When I say I'm anti-cop, I'm not saying I hate anyone on the basis of being a cop. But I am saying that the ways in which the police force are used in many countries does societal harm. Critical thinking, yo.

Honestly I feel like this whole story (BNHA) and fans reactions throughout (especially when compared to other stories) demonstrate how people are not using critical thinking. And that can have real world consequences, though it doesn't have to.

I just find it weird that people are okay with a story where the ruling class is always right and always wins. Like... how have they not? I mean, even stories that end up suggesting the ruling class isn't entirely wrong or show flaws in rebellions generally don't go hard on the authoritarianism. But Horikoshi... is doing this.

The whole thing is so weird to me personally, too, because Horikoshi's wishy-washy framing and switches in coding generally seem to be the result of him caring, deeply, what his audience thinks and feels. Too much, really, but it also seems like he genuinely doesn't want to hurt people. Except this ending--even if Tenko does reappear as New Character and saves the League--is the exact opposite. (If Tenko doesn't reappear, then everything I'm about to say is multiplied by a thousand.)

It's catering to mean-spiritedness, and while I do understand fiction isn't reality, the side he's catering to now is making the argument that fictional crimes are real crimes and thus must meet real penalties.

I can play this game too.

If people are gonna make those arguments, I'm going to say they're the problem and the reason we have wars, genocides, assaults, and more.

If you ever want a cycle of violence/abuse to stop, someone has to accept that they've taken the last punch. Not keep going until the other side is WIPED OUT.

If you equate justice with equalizing losses, then you are enacting Dazai from BSD's statement on justice: justice is a weapon. You can never heal by it.

If you want to heal, you have to stop fighting and bandage wounds. And maybe you are too injured to do the bandaging. That's okay. But someone else can, and if you try to stop them on the premise of "but no one bandaged my wounds" you're a bitter person who makes the world a worser place.

If you say a tragedy is the story, sure. But you have to set up tragedies from the start. See, Attack on Titan, which's ending I love. It began with someone crying and an ominous message to the future. You don't set up your first chapter with "this is the story of how I become the greatest hero!" spend 200+ chapters criticizing hero society and have the hero fail at the goal he'd been repeating for 200 chapters in the end and join hero society and still think you wrote a story that delivered in what you promised. You failed.

Either you wrote a tragedy and are trying to pass it off as a happy story (see how well that works usually) or your understanding of a happy story is pretty much just fascist propaganda. And yes, BNHA does have fascist themes at this point. Way more than AoT ever did. But they have smiles and cute frog girls so it's not nearly as dangerous, right? (sarcastic).

The thing is, this is where the lack of critical thinking comes in. While I've seen people talk a bit about how BNHA seems like copaganda, it's taking things much, much further than other stories usually do and into territory where I'm frankly disturbed.

Yes, BNHA started out as a clever critique of hero society and of the very idea it's now seeming to uphold: that the human instinct (which is universal in real life to) to idolize people leads to a lack of humanity for those who do not have those traits we idolize, whether their fault or not, and for people to become villains in response. But not only has it failed to deliver on this premise by upholding society (hey, Naruto and to a degree Tokyo Ghoul also failed to completely change society), it's gone so far as to endorse what it previously criticized.

It's more akin to Game of Thrones Season 8 upholding racism, sexism, and classism, than it is to Naruto or Tokyo Ghoul. GoT ended with a joke about prioritizing brothels being open, as if the misogyny was actually a good thing and not what caused a lot of the problems. There's no critical lens here. It's just like "hey, there was no point in struggling. Monarchies that abuse women, rah rah, let's go!"

BNHA seems to be going a similar route. Deku's murder of Shigaraki, Ochaco's crying over Toga, the way Shouto reaches out to Touya--it's sad, but not framed as something the audience should see as a wrong done on behalf of heroes. In fact, the heroes are not criticized at all. Frickin' Edgeshot, whom no one cares about, is fine. All of them are fine. Their statuses are generally fine, too, except maybe Enji's and even then he's not like going to face the fate of the League and die alone. His family still supports him. Hawks is completely fine and framed positively. His regret over Twice is pure lipservice. Deku really did just need to kill Shigaraki, and all his "I want to save" spiel, much like Ochaco's, is for naught. He just needed to learn to grow up and get in line.

Even if Tenko comes back, and even if Deku like... somehow knew this would happen via vestiges or whatnot (let's be real, he will if this is the case), and the message is just that society isn't ready to move forward, but at least they can live, then... I don't know, y'all. That's still depressing. I don't see how Deku is a hero for that, much less the greatest number one hero. He decided to be a hero at the cost of his own integrity, and if this was a gritty story about the realistic struggle of living in a capitalistic society where ethics are always compromised that would make sense, but... it's not. Even until the final battle, the characters were endorsing idealism.

At the very least, Horikoshi didn't deliver on his promise in the first chapter. At the very worst, he's endorsing fascist ideals.

Like, I'm sorry, but "kill this person for the good of society," the violent upholding of oppressive societal hierarchies, the importance of being a cop hero and the way the military hero brutalities are worshipped, the way heroes are lauded and everyone who doesn't get in line with this is punished, went from being criticized to being endorsed. Those are all central elements of fascism.

The little guy deserves to lose, but, but Deku is the little guy, so it can't be! Except it can be. Because it's actually pretty common irl even to trot out examples of people like Candace Owens to be like "hey, you can't possibly say Republicans are racist!"

And don't you dare say "but Japanese culture makes it unreasonable to expect a non retributive justice!" The Japanese people are not a monolith. Not to mention... Naruto, Bungou Stray Dogs, Monster, Hunter x Hunter, Yu Yu Hakusho, Mawaru Penguindrum, Oshi no Ko, Dragon Ball, Attack on Titan, and Tokyo Ghoul all say hi.

I hated the TG ending, and still hate it, but I'm not going to say that it upheld the CCG as right all along because it didn't. BNHA thus far is doing that with hero society. And even if the answer is for the League be revived and to leave society or whatever, then how can we be happy Deku is a part of this society? How can we root for him, or his classmates? Is he going to work from the inside to change it? Why wasn't that emphasized beforehand as a theme or struggle?

tl;dr Horikoshi has cooked his story no matter what he does now, and I don't think it's salvageable. Either way it has themes that are disturbing especially considering real world events across the globe, and that people should be more aware of instead of focusing solely on stories that have fascism and monsters in them but don't uphold it.

#ask hamliet #bnha #fascism #mha #hero society #mha critical #bnha critical #bnha meta #mha meta

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cameronspecial · 1 year

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Hi I know I just requested one but I Kinda have and idea and I tought just to send you cause I have nothing to lose. The reader is Topper’s sister and she again is Rafe’s girl, the whole island knows she’s off limits, the difference between her and her brother is that she gets along with everyone including the pouges. The idea is that Pope developes a really huge crush on her, without even realizing. The reader is kinda clueless because she’d been with Rafe her whole life but Rafe knows for sure because he’d seen how Pope acts around her and he’s not happy about that (I imagine him being really touchy with the reader when pope’s around them and smirking when he sees the sad puppy face he makes). And maybe at the movie party where they fight cause of topper’s boat the reader tries to defend pope and tells Rafe to stop he’s insisting pope has a crush on her and when she says he’s just jealous for no reason he’s something like “then kiss me princess/angel” but when she gives him a quick peck on the lips he smirks while rolling his eyes and he get’s her really close to him saying “not like that” and they fully make out in front of pope who looks at them with a really sad face kinda proving Rafe’s point.

It’s okay if you don’t want to do it, I kinda went overboard with the details and I really like the concept and the extremes here cause I mostly see imagines with the reader between Jj and Rafe. Jj is the poor bad boy and Rafe the rich bad boy. Here Pope is the poor good guy who’d love you and cherish you and Rafe is the rich bad boy who’s really posesive and gives the “she’s mine” vibes

The Lesson

Pairing: Rafe Cameron x Thornton!Reader

Warnings: Violence, Ass Grabbing.

Pronouns: She/Her

Word Count: 0.5K

A/N: @a-j-stuffs feel free to send as many requests as you want as long as my requests are open. Hope you enjoy it!

Everyone knows that Y/N Thornton is off-limits. If not because of her protective big brother, then because she is Rafe Cameron’s girl. The difference between her and both boys in her life is she doesn’t mind hanging out with the pogues. She can often be found getting drunk with them at the Chateau or getting caught up in their hijinks, much to Topper and Rafe’s chagrin. This leaves Rafe to have to pick her up so she can get home safely just like he is about to do right now.

She’s hunching over the toilet, puking out all the alcohol she just consumed. Pope sits beside her with a reassuring hand on her back. He moves her hair out of her face, “Let it all out. That’s it.” Rafe isn’t blind to see that Pope has a thing for his girlfriend. He clears his throat and moves to sit beside Y/N. He swats Pope’s hand away. The other boy stands up with his hand in the air, watching sadly as Rafe kisses her temple with comforting words. Rafe catches Pope’s sad look from the corner of the eye and smirks as she turns into his hold, which causes the pogue to walk away.

———

Y/N begged Rafe to go with her to movie night, which he was happy to comply with. Little did he know that Pope would be there giving his girlfriend love-sick puppy dog eyes throughout the whole movie. This goes unnoticed by Y/N as she enjoys the movie, but Rafe has had enough. Pope and JJ get up from where they sit and round their way behind the screen. Rafe gets up from the blanket, promising to return with more snacks for her and motions for Topper and Kelce to follow him. “I’m tired of that pogue always ogling my girl,” he explains with an edge in his voice. The boys find JJ and Pope zipping up their pants. They wait for the both of them to turn towards them for the attack. Rafe punches Pope in the face and gets on top of him, continuing the battery.

The scream let out by Y/N stops Rafe. He looks up to see the disappointed look on her face and rushes to her. However, she heads to help Pope up. “What are you doing, baby? Are you crazy?” she criticizes, looking over Pope’s face. Rafe just shakes his head, “He has a crush on you, Princess. It’s obvious. I’m just reminding him who has your heart.”

“This is very childish. You don’t need to remind him of anything. I love you. I only have eyes for you.”

Rafe smirks at the look of pain that crosses Pope’s face, “Then prove it. Kiss me, Princess.” She sighs, knowing this would be the only way to get him to stop. She walks over to him and gives him a quick peck on the lips. He again shakes his head, pulling her in by the waist. “Not like that,” he growls. Y/N attaches their lips and this time, deepens it. She allows his tongue entry to her mouth. He slips his hand down to squeeze her bum. Pope observes the scene with a sense of defeat and signals to JJ that they should go. Rafe catches this happening from the corner of his eye and smirks. Looks like Pope got the message.

#rafe cameron #rafe cameron x reader #outer banks #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron imagine #rafe cameron x y/n #outer banks fanfiction #outer banks imagine #rafe imagine #rafe fic #rafe x reader #rafe obx #rafe outer banks #outerbanks rafe #rafe cameron one shot #obx fanfiction #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron x female reader #rafe cameron blurb

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stupidlittlespirit · 7 months

Text

Rating: SFW Type: Drabble, Tags: None, no use of pronouns for reader, accidental confessions Word count: 1400 My other works: here on tumblr and here on Ao3! Reader meets Reigen's mother and learns something new.

You hear her before you see her.

The office door is slightly ajar when you come back from your lunch break, and where you stand on the landing, you can catch the sound of voices from within.

It's not altogether uncommon. Clients come and go throughout the day. It wouldn't be the first time you'd returned to find someone already waiting, but the closer you get to the door, the less and less the conversation inside sounds like one of a customer-provider one.

The unidentified voice is female, slightly husky like they smoke, and it sounds like the owner is scolding the only other person inside the office today: Reigen.

"....Absolutely no reason to keep paying out for this place, Arataka." Says the woman. "It isn't too late to just give up and come home."

You frown. Definitely not a client, then.

Quietly, you nudge the door open and enter the hallway. Whoever it is, Reigen doesn't sound happy to have them here.

"We've talked about this," he's saying, sounding considerably exhausted. "I like my job here. I don't want anything else, you know tha-"

"Don't be ridiculous! You sound just like your father, you know. All caught up in something that you know is going nowhere, but you're too proud to admit it!"

The comment gets under your skin. This unwelcome visitor sounds utterly unbearable, and you decide you ought to make your presence known before things get too heated.

You hang your bag up on the coat rack and round the corner, ready to interrupt whatever the person is about to say next until you catch sight of her.

The stranger is short. She's a plump woman, dressed in a garish long skirt and sweater combo with a shock of bright red hair that's pulled back into a tortoiseshell clip at the back of her head. The woman turns when you clear your throat, as does Reigen, and the look of surprise on both of their faces is almost identical.

The unbearable stranger is his mother. They look so similar, the same face in different flavours, and she bears all the same hallmarks of her son: freckles, soft pale skin, and an unconventially attractive face.

Her dark eyes flick up and down your form, critical and assessing, and behind her, Reigen is pulling a face that suggests he'd rather being ripping his own toenails off with pliers than be in his current predicament.

No one speaks for a moment.

Reigen clears his throat, awkward. "You're back early." He never sounds so disappointed to see you, but right now it seems that he'd much rather you'd run off for the rest of the day than return to him.

"Sorry," you say immediately, looking between them. "I can come back later, it's fi-"

"Oh!" Reigen's mother claps her hands together and an oddly broad smile cracks her face. "Don't be silly, love. I know you anyway, come in!"

She says it like it's her office.

"You... know me?" You ask, frowning a little. You've never met this woman in your life, only heard of her existence in stories.

Reigen rarely speaks of his parents. The subject has only come up once: both of you drunk, alone in his apartment on his birthday, where he had confessed how tumultuous their relationship was. It had been the first time you'd hugged him. The first time he had cried a little in front of you, his face in your neck and your own eyes damp. You think about it a lot.

Bad parents are hardly a new concept to you.

Reigen's mother nods quickly, ignorant to your internal recall of her.

"Of course!" She exclaims, her earlier cool tone replaced with something falsely friendlier. "You're the one on his phone!"

Your eyes flick to Reigen, who suddenly looks like he wants the ground to swallow him whole. You smile politely, a little confused. "On his....?"

"His wallpaper, whatever you kids call it," she gushes. "I'd recognise you anywhere. All he does is talk about you!"

Reigen chokes on his spit. "Mom, no I-!"

"Be quiet, Arataka," his mother chides dismissively. "Oh, you're so pretty!" She turns her attention back on you, her attitude flip-flopping so violently it almost gives you whiplash. "Has he taken you to dinner yet? He said he would, but you know men, they're just terrible at-"

"Mom!" Reigen snaps, strained and completely humiliated. His face is so red that you briefly wonder if he has any blood in the rest of his body. "Enough, please!"

Reigen's mother rolls her eyes at her son's clear embarrassment. "You shouldn't be so shy. It doesn't get you anywhere, you need to be braver at your age."

You're unable to do much except watch their exchange in vague surprise. All of this is news to you. You're close with Reigen and so fond of him that it's ridiculous, and in spite of the fact that you've spent many a night wondering what it might be like to wake up with him next to you, you never considered that it might be a possibility that he felt the same way.

Reigen covers his face with his hands, peeking out between his played fingers.

"He is brave," you say boldly. Overbearing parents like this are a source of annoyance for you and Reigen's sad face from that night is visible in your mind's eye. You feel an urge to stick up for him. "Very brave."

His mother raises her over-plucked eyebrows at you and Reigen drops his hands, staring at you in surprise.

"And he already asked me to dinner," you tell her, enjoying the way she seems a little flustered at your interruption. "I said yes."

Reigen's mother turns to look at him. "You didn't tell me that."

Reigen swallows and when it's clear that he can't quite conjure an answer, you speak up again.

"He's a big boy," you say, folding your arms across your chest. "He can keep secrets if he wants to."

His mom frowns. She appears to want to say something more on the topic, to needle him further, but rather than try again, she backs off at your slight pressure.

"Well," she says brusquely, smoothing down her sweater. "Good. That's good."

She picks up her purse from his desk and shoulders it, clearly having decided her time for bothering her son has run its course, and spares you another up-and-down glance as she makes her way to the door.

"I don't want to wait another ten years for grandchildren," she says, half to you, half to Reigen. "Although, best to wait until you've got a proper job to have a baby, Arataka, you can't start a family in place like this."

You do very well to keep the look of disbelief from your face. The woman knows how hurtful the comment is and you don't want to give her the satisfaction of seeing how much it bothers you.

"Make sure you're using condoms for now," she snips, one last smart remark on her way out. That one is directed at you, and though you hear Reigen's strangled sound of mortification, you steamroll over him to prevent him from suffering any more torture.

"We're not," you say, with a horrible, smug smile. If she wants to play mean, you can too. "I like it better without, but thanks for your concern. Anyway, it was nice to meet you."

Reigen's mother looks mildly horrified at your retort. Reigen, on the other hand, is caught somewhere between awe and laughter, and you cross the room to stand beside him. It's a silent dismissal of her.

With a huff, she bids her son farewell and strides out of the office without so much as a glance at you. The door bangs on its hinges and you wait a minute to make sure she's properly gone before you turn to your boss with a smirk.

"I'm your wallpaper?" you ask.

Reigen flounders, cheeks cherry again. "I- Well, no, I just- it's both of us and Mob, it isn't-"

You laugh and roll your eyes, pretending not to notice the way your chest squeezes with affection. "Pick me up at eight, tonight," you say, patting his shoulder and heading towards the staff room.

"What?" Reigen yelps, watching you go.

"For dinner, asshole." You grin, backing up through the door.

Reigen doesn't stop smiling for the rest of the day. Neither do you.

#reigen arataka #reigen arataka x reader #reigen x reader #reigen arataka/reader #reigen arataka/yn #reigen arataka x yn #reigen arataka x y/n #reader insert #mp100 #mp100 reigen #mob psycho 100 #mp 100 #reigen fluff #reigen aratakaxreader #he said no pickles!!!!!#my fics

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sideprince · 2 months

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Re-read this bit in Half-Blood Prince again and thinking about how blatantly it seems to be telling us that Harry is biased against Snape and our impression of him thus far has been clouded by seeing him through Harry's eyes (emphases mine):

‘The Dark Arts,’ said Snape, ‘are many, varied, ever-changing and eternal. Fighting them is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before. You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible.’ Harry stared at Snape. It was surely one thing to respect the Dark Arts as a dangerous enemy, another to speak of them, as Snape was doing, with a loving caress in his voice? . . . ‘He tried to jinx me, in case you didn’t notice!’ fumed Harry. ‘I had enough of that during those Occlumency lessons! Why doesn’t he use another guinea pig for a change? What’s Dumbledore playing at, anyway, letting him teach Defence? Did you hear him talking about the Dark Arts? He loves them! All that unfixed, indestructible stuff -‘ ‘Well,’ said Hermione, ‘I thought he sounded a bit like you.’ ‘Like me?’ ‘Yes, when you were telling us what it’s like to face Voldemort. You said it wasn’t just memorising a bunch of spells, you said it was just you and your brains and your guts - well, wasn’t that what Snape was saying? That it really comes down to being brave and quick-thinking?’ Harry was so disarmed that she had thought his words as well worth memorising as The Standard Book of Spells that he did not argue.

Half-Blood Prince, Ch. 9

There's a direct contrast being drawn from one scene to the next between Harry's perception of Snape and Hermione's less-biased, more critical one. Where Harry hears a "loving caress" for the dark arts in Snape's voice, Hermione hears the passionate, determined explanation that Harry gave a year earlier - one based in a firsthand understanding of what it takes to protect oneself from harm against dark magic.

This is also the first scene in this book where we see Snape teaching a class. The first time he shows up in the book is when he's entrusted by Tonks to deliver Harry safely to the Great Hall from the school gates. So the first encounter with Snape in HBP is as Harry's protector, be it begrudging or not, and the second is one where an immediate parallel is drawn after between him and Harry, Hermione questioning the latter's bias and hinting to the reader that judging him based on Harry's perception may not paint an accurate picture of Snape. Through the rest of the book we see Harry have an increasingly hostile relationship with Snape while developing a great fondness for the Half-Blood Prince, despite it also being Snape, only Harry doesn't know that, so he's able to see his humor and cleverness.

This theme is a dominant one throughout the book, though it doesn't become clear until the end when we find out Snape was the Half-Blood Prince, but by then our impression of the Prince is murky given the unexpectedly violent outcome of Harry trying out Sectumsempra (and it can be argued he's to blame for doing so against another person instead of finding out what the spell does in a safer way), and our impression of Snape is even worse given that he'd just killed Dumbledore. We don't find out until the next book that Snape had been fighting on the same side as Harry the whole time, risking - and eventually losing - his life for the same cause. In retrospect, Rowling (boo, hiss) spends a lot of time in HBP dropping breadcrumbs that Harry's impression of Snape - and thus the reader's - is affected by bias and thus inaccurate.

#meta

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chirpsythismorning · 1 year

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Mike's character regression can be explained in large part by one emotion in particular: guilt

Just want to preface this by saying that, this is not Mike slander. I love this dude. In fact, I think what makes Mike such an interesting character is that a lot of his behavior throughout the series can be explained in part by previous moments, and after really looking at all these moments together, what you end up with is a pretty fucked up story.

So while some might want to take this as Mike slander, these points I'm making are a part of Mike and things he has done and said and whether they were intentionally harmful or not, it's Mike. It's all shaped him and his role in the story. The fact that we're seeing a visible shift in his behavior at all, with plenty of moments from the show to back up what brought us here, makes it compelling enough to talk about.

So, without further ado, back to our roots:

Ah yes, the infamous canon proof disputing Mike's I think my life started that day we found you in the woods, claim during his monologue. Not only that, but in this original scene from 1x02, it turns out Mike actually intended to send her away the next day (all of which El could hear Mike saying from the open bathroom door).

Mike outright calling El a weapon, again telling the others they need her because they stand no chance at getting Will back otherwise.

I wont elaborate on this now, because there is way too much to unpack that'll honestly be more worthwhile discussing further on.

For now, this is a secret tool that will help us later.

These next couple scenes right here though, are pretty painful if I'm being completely honest. The way its shot, specifically El's very visible exhaustion, accompanied by the varying priorities of others around her, leaves me feeling pretty unsettled upon rewatches.

I obviously can't remember how I felt when I watched these scenes for the first time, but I imagine I viewed them as this huge romantic moment for Mike and El (I was tricked by heteronormativity, okay?). But, again, upon rewatching them since then, I've realized I get this sort of sad feeling by the end. You'll see what I mean.

El obviously just went through something extremely traumatic. She tried to go find Will and Barb in the void, only to find Barb dead and Will presumably alive, but then slipping through her fingers at the last second (no, literally).

We then got a moment where Joyce held El while the others sat by quietly because she clearly needed a moment of comfort given what she just endured.

Then in this scene shortly after, everyone is leaving to get ready for their final attempt at saving Will.

Now, notice how not only Lucas, but also Dustin make the effort to reach out to El to comfort her affectionately after that traumatic event, with those twos' actions specifically being showcased in sequence?

Lucas, who spent the better part of the season being critical of El, is now ending the season rubbing El's shoulder to warm her up, literally soothing her to make her feel better.

Then there's Dustin, who right after Lucas' gesture makes a gesture of his own, putting his hand on her knee reassuringly, to show her he's there and he's happy she's okay.

And lastly there's Mike, who is so kindly allowing El to rest her head on his shoulder. This placement of Mike and El here is definitely a testament to the fact that Mike has vouched for El this whole time in contrast to the others and so, understandably, she put her head on his shoulder for reassurance, because out of the three of them, he's the one whose been looking out for her the most. (Right?)

Now you might be thinking that this sequence's only purpose was to show Lucas and Dustin's development with El, and that it wasn't intentional that they focused on Lucas and Dustins' priorities in this moment in contrast to Mikes'. And I raise you, this next scene.

Here we have a focus on Mike looking on to where everyone left, while the others beside him are presumably just processing what went down and taking a rest (and boy oh boy do they (El) need one).

Mike on the other-hand decides to take this moment of rest to display the most cliche and universal forms of distracted unrest known to man: he checks his watch.

Mike then stands up abruptly, causing El to fall without his shoulder there for her to rest on anymore, all while her and Dustin are looking on after him, sort of like... Okay?

It's small. It might seem insignificant. But if you actually pay attention to what this scene is trying to make you feel, after really looking at it for what it is, it's kind of sad.

In a moment that chooses to highlight the other boys' acknowledgment of El after what just happened, and not only that, but at the tale end of their final battle of the season, Mike is... distracted?

Mike, who has been presumably looking out for El more than the others in the party this whole time, is conveniently out of commission? And right now when El is looking for his reassurance the most? Mike doesn't even have a moment to say, 'Hey I'll be right back, I just want to check something. Can one of you?--', asking Lucas or Dustin to sit next to her in his place. No. Dude just stands up without even acknowledging her.

If it was any other moment in the show, under less post-traumatic circumstances for El, then I wouldn't even think much of it. But it's at this point in the story when El is essentially at her most exhausted and quite literally seeking out support from others, specifically Mike, that makes his distractedness so eery.

Again, you might still be thinking that this isn't that deep. However, I think based on the events leading up to this, and what follows right here, could quite literally hold the answer to the guilt Mike is still keeping to himself to this day.

So... How are we feeling?

Are we feeling like Mike None of you are thinking about El's wellbeing right now! She could get brain damage from using her powers too much! She's not a weapon!* Wheeler is a little bit of a hypocrite? (I told you that tool would come in handy!)

It's actually quite terrifying how similar this scene is framed to the scene in Hopper's cabin in s3, where Mike pretty much says the exact opposite. In s1 Mike goes from being one of the first people to refer to El as a weapon within the context of them using her powers to find Will, with him being completely un-attuned to the fact that she is exhausted in this moment while the others are saying El's rest and safety is the most important, to then in s3 completely flipping script and saying El was using her powers for nothing, blaming the others for treating her like a weapon and not taking her wellbeing into consideration.

It would be one thing if Mike had a little arc where he acknowledged this script flip. Because that's what it is. It is them having Mike use a word in s1 to describe El, that being weapon, only to say the others are treating her like that with that same word being used. It is them having Mike not agknowledge El's well being after overusing her powers, only to say the others aren't taking her wellbeing into consideration for overusing her powers.

And it would be one thing if Mike had spoke to El or literally anyone about how he felt like he wronged El for planning on sending her away the next day after they found her so that they could go back to looking for Will, or how he said she was a weapon that they needed in order to find Will, essentially being no better than the people she just escaped from, who also used her for her powers. But we don't get that (actually we do.. but it's not acknowledged for what it is aka survivor's guilt. It's instead seen as romantic... another tool for later...)

Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think any of Mike's behavior takes away from what Mike did do for El, because yes he was kind and accepting when the others weren't. But even despite all of that, at the end of the day, he was often at the forefront of expecting El to risk her life for them, even if he wasn't outright asking that of her.

Before you freak out, No. I don't think Mike, a literal child, was capable of fathoming that El was going into these situations risking her life. She's a superhero. El's alternative was literally going back to the lab, running, or staying with Mike. This was her safest option.

After a bunch of rewatches and putting together a lot of these moments as a whole, I've come to a point where I believe that Mike's behavior throughout s1 was him thinking that because of who El was, she's already in danger at all times. That is a constant reality for her. And so why not have her help them find Will, because she is able to, all while he can also help her. And El clearly wanted to help them, because she wanted to help good people and finally do something meaningful with her powers for a change. Unfortunately, she also had to endure PTSD flashbacks almost every single time Mike and the boys had her use her powers to help find Will.

Speaking of Will, he is currently missing and possibly dead. Will also, in contrast to El (for now...), does not have any sort of superpowers.

Mike's concern over the threat of Will's livelihood is much greater than Mike's acknowledgement to the true risks El is exposing herself to each time she uses her powers to help them. That is s1 canon.

Is there times when Mike is focused on El and her well being. Absolutely! But is there also times when Mike is not showing any display of concern to El's well being in the moment, in complete contrast to the other characters around him... Also yes.

And so the events happening the way they did, with Mike himself not fully comprehending the severity of what's been going on during these high stake situations going on around him, makes sense.

And that's what makes it all the more sad that when Mike finally does realize what he's truly been asking of El this whole time, which is to risk her life for them, it's too late.

This whole scene is obviously very emotional. All of the boys are crying, but the focus on Mike calling out for El painfully is heartbreaking.

But what's even more sad to me, is that El has been sort of used to mistreatment her whole life. She's used to having to find any comfort she could get from people in her life, all the while they were using her for her powers. I mean even despite Brenner being who he was and doing what he did, she still showed these signs of wanting to love him despite it. Which is very very fucked up. But knowing what she's gone through, makes sense.

Mike on the other-hand does greatly contrast Brenner because he was one of the first people to actually treat her with genuine kindness right from the start (before he even knew she had powers), making it a lot easier for her to care for him even despite that pesky trait of using her for her powers being almost synonymous with Brenner's very similar trait.

So when she looks back at Mike, and points him out specifically before sacrificing herself, it feels like a few things at once.

It feels like her acknowledging the fact that she appreciated him specifically for taking her in and supporting her more genuinely than anyone has in her entire life.

And yet it also feels like her, either intentionally or unintentionally, acknowledging the unfortunate side affect caused by days of Mike leading the efforts to find Will, with the expectation of her to do things to achieve that, which could have all lead to her demise technically. And so now when it all comes down to it and the stakes are at their highest yet, same as the risk, she's got to a point where she believes there is no other choice but to do just that, risk her life, especially if it means saving them.

While this is happening, Mike is backtracking in real time. He is trying to get El to stop and it's because he doesn't want her to die. Obviously.

But that's the fucked up part isn't it? When he finally realized what he's been asking of her this whole time, it's too late.

Which takes us to S2 Mike Wheeler, known by many for being a boy whose been calling his true love everyday for almost a year now because he's just so in love, but is actually in fact a boy suffering the most intense form of survivors guilt, one that involves a person who genuinely feels responsible for the persons death...

But that will probably take at least another 2,000 words so I'm thinking maybe I better split this into multiple parts.

I will tease that the next part involves one specific detail in particular that I never see anyone talk about, a detail that I think, in combination with what's discussed in this post, is so important to understanding Mike's breakdown for what it truly was at the end of season 2. I will also probably do more posts beyond that for s3-4, to delve into the impacts these moments from the first two seasons have basically put in place a perfect recipe for what is currently going down.

So feel free to stay tuned for those nonsense updates.

Continued

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cosmicghoul99 · 5 months

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An interesting Hannibal theory I think you should know about

I'm not sure how many people know this, but if you're unaware, some really interesting things relate to the show and Hannibal's character specifically. (Wanna add that I am not religious, so apologies if I get something wrong. I mean no offense to anyone, this is just a little analysis on my part)

There are a lot of biblical references in the show. It makes sense; religion has always been a deep, moral, and philosophical concept, and Hannibal loves to incorporate the ideas of religion and God into his actions and that of those around him. One of these references is a recurring one. Hannibal is often referred to as the devil. Like this quote from Gideon:

"You really are the devil," Abel Gideon - Antipasto

Or this one from Bedelia:

"Who holds the Devil, let him hold him well. He will hardly be caught a second time." Bedelia Du Maurier - The Wrath of the Lamb

Add this to all the religious imagery, the references to stags and the wendigo, plus the season three discussions about Dante. Bedelia says that she was "swallowed whole" by the beast at the mouth of Hell. You get the picture. There is a lot of talk and allusions to Hannibal being "the Devil."

Obviously, this is a metaphor first and largely used because he is the main "evil" or antagonistic character, but there's actually some truth to this.

Both Bryan Fuller, the creator, and Mads Mikkelsen, the actor of Hannibal, have stated that Hannibal is meant to be the literal devil. He is meant to be both a personification of the devil and the literal devil.

According to Bryan Fuller, Mads Mikkelsen plays Hannibal like he is Lucifer. In an interview, he stated that "he is as close as you can come to the Devil, in the sense that the Devil has no reasons," following it up by saying that Hannibal's reactions aren’t something of a person, but of the Devil. He intentionally plays the character through the lens of the fallen angel, Lucifer. Hannibal is meant to, in the eyes of the actor, be a manifestation of the Devil

Bryan Fuller has also said in interviews and online that he believes Hannibal is the devil. Of course, he states that this is his opinion and that others are up to their own interpretation, but the show's main creator and writer believes this also means that we can reasonably see this in the show.

Throughout the show, Hannibal is simply on another level. Many times, he does not seem human but rather otherworldly. I think that is where Mad's acting presents itself, alongside whenever Hannibal is talking about humanity and God.

Hannibal loves to play at being God and also criticizes God as well. I believe it is in episode three after Will kills Hobbs, that they discuss how Will killing Hobbs felt good. Hannibal responds with this.

"Killing must feel good to God, too... He does it all the time, and are we not created in His image?" Hannibal Lecter - Amuse-Bouche

Oh boy. This is such an interesting line. He talks about being created in His image. Let's be honest; he speaks as if he were God or knows God at least. His comment actually makes more sense if you view this as him being the Devil. Lucifer, the fallen angel, was cast from Heaven for rebelling against God. He feels that it was unjust. Most people talking about God and His actions view him with benevolence. Hannibal does not. In the bible, Lucifer had a problem with humans. And humans are, of course, said to be created in God's image. You could also argue that angels, especially Lucifer, were created in that same image, too. Hannibal has an issue with the rude. Why the rude particular? It is because those who are rude often showcase the worst of humanity's attributes and free will. Hannibal despises the rude because I believe that it, in some ways, represents the hatred that the Devil, or Lucifer, holds for humanity. The Devil had an issue with humans gaining free will and felt they did not deserve life via God's hands. This is similar to how Hannibal feels that those who are rude do not deserve to live. Hannibal, then, of course, being Satan himself, would be resentful of God for casting him from Heaven. Again, Hannibal often discusses God's motives, or what God feels doing certain things. Literally, a few seconds later in that episode, he says this:

"Hannibal: God's terrific. He dropped a church roof on thirty-four of his worshippers last Wednesday night in Texas while they sang a hymn.

Will: Did God feel good about that?

Hannibal: He felt powerful." Will Graham and Hannibal Lecter - Amuse-Bouche

That last line about him feeling powerful gets me thinking. Hannibal is speaking not just about this but also about his own fall. But more importantly, he's also showing us what he thinks of himself. Killing makes God feel powerful. That means that killing makes Hannibal feel powerful as well. He is both giving motives and somewhat criticizing God at the same time. Hannibal seems to find the situation amusing. I think he believes it quite funny that humans were killed while worshipping God. He might even see a comparison between what happened to him and what happened here. He is simultaneously praising God and calling Him a hypocrite.

Hannibal's motives for killing are also interesting, and I said earlier that I think the reason why he kills is because he believes that rude and ill-tempered people are the problem with humanity. And he wants to get rid of them.

Now, let's explore how this connects with other metaphors, his decisions in canon, and his relationship with Will.

Let's talk about the stag. I did some research, and in many religions, including Christianity, stags represent God and his might, at least from what I could find. I find this interesting because stags are also meant to represent opposition to the snake, another symbol of the Devil. Why is the representation of Hannibal, at least in Will's mind, a stag? I think it actually represents the darkening of Will. If stags are meant to represent good, then that means that Will starts off that way and then slowly follows the stag and is affected by it, which, to me, means that Will is slowly being corrupted. Just like the stag was corrupted due to Hannibal's influence, Will is starting to change and fall deeper and deeper into darkness. It's also interesting that the dynamic between Hannibal and Will is clearly that of one between the Devil and the person they are trying to tempt. Hannibal is trying to tempt Will into changing himself and embracing the darkness inside of him.

Will is Hannibal's realization that humans are actually not that bad. They are complex, and their free will actually makes them relate to him more than he thinks. Will is his weakness, and Hannibal is intrigued by him. If the Devil, which is Hannibal, is the snake, then, in Hannibal's own words, Will is the mongoose that preys on the snake. Hannibal originally fell because of humans, and at the end of the series, he falls because of humanity again. He fell for Will. Will is meant to represent the lamb of God. The symbolism is that Hannibal fell for Will, who sacrificed himself to keep the Devil away, getting corrupted in the process.

Dolarhyde is also a factor. The original painting, "The Great Red Dragon," represents Satan. How does that tie into this idea? I think it's not Dolarhyde who is meant to be Satan; rather, it is Hannibal. We know that Dolyrhde idolizes Hannibal in a sense. Like Will and many of his other patients, which I'll get into later, Francis is influenced by what Hannibal says. Yet another temptation by the Devil. This is also connected to Will coming into his own life because Francis is also manipulated by Will. There is a connection between Hannibal and Will, which is shared via the tempting and manipulation of Francis.

I mean, we have this statement by Jack talking about The dragon, the lamb, etc. Jack says that,

"He's not the Dragon, you are. The Devil himself bound in the pit." Jack Crawford

Hannibal compares Jack to God. But I think they both are, in some way.

Many of Hannibal's patients and the people in his life, in general, are manipulated by him. I mean, some of his patients are tempted and influenced by him to do bad things commit crimes, and murder people. That's very indicative of the Devil's work, in my opinion. Even Jack and Alana end up being manipulated and deceived by him.

There is a lot of other religious imagery and symbolism, so I'll only discuss some of it. To start with, the reference to Bedelia's presentation and Hannibal's name in Italy and what they could represent. I mentioned earlier that in season 3, Bedelia talks about her time in Florence with Hannibal. She talks about how Dante gave a physical space to Hell, a solid concept, but before that, people would say, the "mouth of Hell." Then she says that she was "swallowed by the beast." This refers to Hannibal, but here's the interesting thing. In the Bible, the Devil is also referred to as the Beast. Bedelia is yet again referring to herself being used and brought into the mouth of Hell by the Beast, Hannibal. The name that Hannibal was monikered by in Italy is also the same. "Il Mostro" translates to the monster, which can be interpreted as yet another way to refer to the devil. Then, there is the obvious references to lambs in the show, with it being a sacrificial symbol. I'm sure that's been talked about a lot, and I mentioned it earlier.

There are many mentions of justice, redemption, retribution, and more in the show. This connects with the religious themes, of course, but it also plays into Hannibal's view of himself as a God, as well as how the show depicts him as the Devil. He is the one who casts judgment onto people, like his patients, and onto the rude, like a God. He is the one who issues punishment for sins and misdeeds, like the Devil. I think it's so interesting to see them both working in tandem.

I once saw a post saying that Hannibal acts like he's lived the same life a hundred or so times. And I agree. He does. He acts like he has been around for a time so long that many have forgotten it. It makes sense why he's so confident, and nothing seems to phase him. Nothing that happens has any consequence for him. The only thing, really, that he cares about is Will. That's why he tries to get Will to have his Becoming and Fall with him. He wants Will to be there with him. Which is sweet, I think :) And not to bring up related trauma for anyone that has ever been a fan of Devilman or Devilman Crybaby, but IMO, it really really reminds me of Akira and Ryo and how Ryo is stuck in the same cycle over and over again as a lesson. Idk, my opinion. Let me know what you think.

I also wanted to touch on some other interpretations of the raven stag shown alongside the wendigo and how other religions and beliefs might relate to this.

The Wendigo is a demonic entity or evil spirit from the Algonquian people of Canada. It is a winter spirit that is meant to represent greed and gluttony. When humans succumb to greed, like being greedy for money, being cruel to people, or generally evil things, the Wendigo spirit can possess you. During harsh winters, when food is scarce, people commit taboo acts and consume another human, participating in cannibalism. This also causes a possession and turns this person into a wendigo, never to be satisfied and constantly craving forever. I am not Algonquian, or even Indigenous/Native American, so I can't speak too much on this, and I don't know too much, but I hope I explained it well enough. I apologize if I did not. The show has its own visualization of this, and Wendigos traditionally doesn't look like the one in the show, but the overall message is the same. Even if Hannibal is not the Devil, he could be some manifestation of a Wendigo. It makes sense. Remember his back story? He was forced into captivity while hiding by soldiers during an extremely harsh winter during the war. Harsh enough that food became scarce, and the soldiers had to resort to cannibalism. They fed Mischa to Hannibal, which might have triggered something. Ofc this is a reach, but I did want to bring another interpretation into this.

Obviously, this is all just speculation. I love this show, with its dark complexities and incredible depth, and I wanted to talk about something I've been thinking about for a while now. Again, not everything might be correct. I apologize if that's not the case. Please feel free to correct me. I also apologize if this made no sense or was not cohesive, it's pretty late for me, but I couldn't get this out of my head.

I hope it was interesting ;)

#hannibal #nbc hannibal #hannibal lecter #will graham #hannigram #just a little analysis #i'm sleep deprived so apologies if this makes no sense #i just really wanted to share

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moonstrider9904 · 4 months

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It's taken me a while to process the fact that Crosshair lost his hand, and I've seen many different takes on the subject. All takes and sentiments are valid and I understand they all come from somewhere, and I'm grateful to have seen such a diversity of opinions before forming my own. Cards on the table, I disagree with the sentiment that Crosshair losing his hand was a bad writing choice on the basis of it meaning that he's now healed.

Let me elaborate (and I will elaborate a lot on this):

I feel like the relation between the hand coming off and the tremor/PTSD stopping is more a symbolic connection that the fandom perceived rather than something explicitly established by canon. It was never said after Crosshair lost his hand "he is now healed because of this." If anything, the way Crosshair was written through season 3 shows us he is putting in effort to healing way before losing his hand. Meditating, slowly opening up, moving past the horrors of Tantiss, etc. These are all things Crosshair does throughout the season that help him move forward. When the subject of Tantiss is brought up again, the tremor returns, and this is a very normal response.

But if I'm honest, I doubt how much PTSD and the concept of healing is truly understood by those so openly criticizing this writing choice, because that would also mean understanding that healing is not linear and it does not come magically through one sole act, deed, or loss. If the aforementioned was understood, so many people wouldn't have an issue with this connection in the first place because, symbolic as it may be, it is not fact. It is a symbol. What we did see was healing being depicted throughout the season: you work through your issues and you do better but then you can be back at square one the next day. Even if you're doing well for a period of time, the source of your PTSD can return, and your physical symptoms along with it, and of course this is normal and valid and it is wonderful to me that this was put on screen with Crosshair.

If it had been explicitly established on screen that Crosshair was magically healed because his hand's no longer there, I would have some other things to say about the matter, but again, it was not. This is something that fandom is coming up with and people are now deciding they have an issue with, because canon did not turn out to accommodate their theories and beliefs. And, even if it had been established that Crosshair fully healed from his past demons because he lost the hand that had the tremor, that wouldn't erase all the healing he had beforehand. I think it's invalidating - to the writers, to anyone with PTSD who relates to Crosshair, and to the character's phenomenal character arc - to assume that Crosshair's hand loss is the most significant part of his healing when he did so much work on himself before it.

And I would also argue that the loss of a limb is a traumatic event in itself, and I question how exactly it would be possible for one trauma piled on top of past traumatic events is supposed to heal someone.

I hate the fact that Crosshair lost his hand as something that happened to him, I hate it because it's Crosshair. Because I saw him getting hurt on screen, more than he already was. Because his whole body was trembling when it happened. Because I witnessed a man I've loved since day one, who's so kind and caring and has grown so much have to go through something so terrible. Because he had to endure pain and suffering yet again. Because I love him. Because my heart breaks for him.

As a writing choice, however, it was shocking, but it led up to a key moment between Crosshair and Hunter, and by extension, the climax of the finale. Yes, it would be significant for Crosshair's hand to have stopped shaking for him to take the clean shot, I wouldn't have objections if that had happened in canon either. But I think the power of Crosshair landing that final shot wasn't in the hand tremor. It was in losing his shooting hand, after a lifetime of equating his own worth to being a sniper, then hearing his brother Hunter, who he went through so much trouble and resentment and forgiveness with, encouraging him. Hunter really said "you can do it" and that was when Crosshair stopped thinking of himself as a sniper, and more as a brother. And he helped saved his sister. And with that, he saved all his other brothers on Tantiss. As a writing choice, Crosshair losing his hand is something that I accept and acknowledge as canon and I have processed the initial shock to the point where now I can talk about it more, and analyzing the scenes further makes it not just sensate writing, but poetic.

Back to the subject of the PTSD, Crosshair was able to rise above losing his hand in the moment on the bridge to team up with Hunter and save Omega, and that is admirable. And even if he was peaceful in the finale, one thing we can say for sure because it actually works that way in reality is that Crosshair will have to do a lot of healing and a lot of coping post losing his hand. I arrive at that conclusion quicker than I would conclude that "he's fine now" because the latter is not humanly possible. Even when people are capable of summoning the strength in the moment, there is a lot of healing and coping needed afterwards.

Being strong in the moment and mustering a smile when things turn out alright does not invalidate the struggle and effort put into getting better both before or after that moment of strength. Crosshair was so brave on Tantiss, but he's not fully healed upon returning to Pabu because no, PTSD is not stored in the hand, and I sincerely don't think that was the writers' intention on what to convey. If anything happens afterwards that we don't see on screen, I would anticipate it's the continuation of his healing process, which is not linear or constant.

And before anyone gets angry and wants to come at me with a pitchfork, let's remember Tech's wise words: Understanding you does not mean that I agree with you. While I see and understand the reasons why many people perceived this writing choice as a lazy one, I only wish to shine light on reasons that to me make this choice make sense. I've suffered PTSD from more than one traumatic event in my life, and for a total of twelve years (and counting) I have put in the work. I have had my share of non-linear healing. I have seen first hand and know this process all too well and it is yet another reason why I think Crosshair's character arc was masterfully done.

Lastly, I want to make one final call to be respectful towards the writers of The Bad Batch for how they chose to write their story. Here on tumblr, many fanfiction writers would be appalled if a reader came up to us spewing the things they hated about our story and how we should change it. I would be appalled too. That is not a cool thing to do to a writer. So let us treat other writers with the respect we want for ourselves.

May the Force be with you all ❤️ Now that the finale's done, us writers have the whole world of TBB to explore, adapt, and make into our own, and all of it will be valid and beautiful. Just be sure to always embrace others for their differences, for that makes you whole.

#the bad batch #tbb finale #tbb season 3 #tbb analysis #tbb crosshair analysis #tbb crosshair #tbb spoilers

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