#i don’t really know what meta is… but.

[thornieta]

HC that this happened shortly after the league formed:

Random Meta hero (really doesn’t matter who) upon learning Batman is human: oh wow, do you and Green Arrow know each other then?

Batman *scandalised* : what do you think all humans know each other?

RMH *nervously*: oh god I’m so sorry sir I can’t believe I just assumed that

Batman *knowing damn well that he and Ollie went to school together and have a bottomless brunch planned for the weekend* : don’t let it happen again

It must be so fucking weird for Bruce and Oliver to be on the Justice League. Like here they are with a bunch of metahumans, aliens, wizards and gods and shit, and they’re literally just Two Dudes. I bet they side-eye the fuck out of each other during League meetings bc like what the actual fuck? how can this be my problem? I’m going to the chiropractor after this?

[in-your-spoon]

I finished MTMTE/Lost Light and… man. That’s probably one of the best comics I’ve ever read. I made a post a few days ago about how weird it was that IDW just left the old universe behind to reboot in 2019, but my thoughts weren’t really complete until now.

The ending of Lost Light is sort of meta for the comic itself. In the author’s note, Roberts talks about how the final scene was inspired by the fact that he wouldn’t know where the characters were headed after he stopped writing them.

In the “main” universe, we see a future of muted colors. We know exactly where each character ends up and how some of them die. Everything is predestined. This type of epilogue happens in a lot of art, and it often leaves people unhappy. It left me unhappy when I thought it was the only ending! Nobody wants to know that Harry Potter is a police officer when he grows up. Nobody wants to know that Dratchet ends up together when they were gunning for Driftrod. Getting a list of futures with no story behind them is unsatisfying!

But in the alternate universe caused by the quantum leap, we (the artist and the audience) don’t get to know what happens next. And I think this ending is unique because a lot of serialized art doesn’t get the chance to wrap everything up before being cancelled. They end up like the “main” universe of MTMTE, with unresolved plots and unhappy characters (not that Happily Ever After is the best ending for everything). But the Lost Light gets to choose its own ending. They get to have that Happily Ever After, where the future is uncertain but optimistic. The characters get to live on, and the adventure never has to end.

[pinkiemachine]

Wait a minute, I didn't see gills on Kaldur's neck like where he usually has them. Where are his gills? Or does he not have any?

Also I saw the little detail of him having scales on his tattoos- ☆Noice detail☆

Oh yeah! The gills! I think I’m still in the process of deciding how I want to handle Atlantean physiology. Like, I’m deciding between keeping them like basically mermaids without the tails, or keeping them more or less human and Atlantis has more of an air-pocket sort of design—it’s been a whole thing in my head for the past year, and I haven’t had the time to really sit down and map everything out. Whenever I do that, I’m going to be reading Plato’s telling of Atlantis as well as all the years of comics for Aquaman, and every other scrap of ocean-related stuff, and finally decide how I want to design Atlantis and the people. Because where I left off (I think) was… the kings of Atlantis were direct descendants of Poseidon, and so there’s human Meta genes there, but then there are also a lot of ocean-dwelling creatures who also live in Atlantis, like Sirens and… others I can’t remember the name of currently. So perhaps there was intermingling, some half-n-half kids—idk—I thought about it, didn’t think about it very hard, then left it there for me to come back to and eventually tidy up.

I think the main thing for me is: what’s the coolest way to design Atlantis? Because if everyone can breathe underwater, then they’re basically mer-folk, and this essentially Atlantica, and then Aquaman is just The Little Mermaid. If we do it to where Atlantis is, say, a normal-ish city hidden under the ocean waters by some super cool, magical means, and not wet, then I feel like it harkens back to the Justice League cartoon of yore, and I always thought that approach was much cooler than the other one, personally. Also, I am one of those people to whom the physics of things matters far too much. Like, the comics would have you believe that because the Atlanteans live in the water at such great depths they have, like, greater density or something? then when they’re on land, they have super strength, and I’m just over here like… if they live on the bottom of the ocean, they’re gonna have blubber, or be very, very small, and they are going to look like a blobfish on land. Because that’s how water pressure and deep sea fish work. They are gelatinous and squishy so that when they are at such deep depths, the water pressure squishes them into one, neat, happy, healthy ball of fish. So… I don’t want to imagine Aquaman or anyone else like a blobfish…

…where was I going with this post….

I had a point…

I think the bottom line is, I don’t know yet if my Kaldur will have gills, but thanks to this post, I will probably be thinking about it all week, so you might have your answer soon, lol.

And the markings on his tattoos are actually spear heads, to symbolise strength and bravery on the battle field (inspired by Polynesian tattoos).

:)

[wildlybewitched]

First and foremost I’ve consistently held the opinion that I really really don’t think any of them looked back at the final script that ended up being used lol. Which is why so much of what they say feels like a slightly alternative universe to what actually happens in the show. I don’t enjoy going full “death of the author” but I also have to take these guys with a grain of salt, just based on their record. But in defense of the back and forth - weren’t there people who would work on just a few specific character’s dialog? I wonder how much was changed and wordsmithed through the process and at what stage? Maybe that was late in the editing process? Not sure why he would make this comment to avoid controversy - but again, I don’t know that they’re really thinking about the final script Iol.

On a purely meta sense, I’ve recently went on a long trail of thought about how Silco is an oddly glorified “parent” figure since he has almost no regard for children lol. He lacks the natural paternal instinct that Vander displays with the group in Act 1. Even with his care for Jinx he has very little sense to keep her out of harms way, other than not handing her over to his enemy.

Idk I also enjoy that all the characters relationships in s1 are complex and not always straightforward even to themselves. Even if he calls her a daughter, anyone I’ve met who was adopted at birth still has a unique dynamic vs w bio parents. And I think that is why I’ve generally disliked the overly disneyfied version of parenthood that has been popularized in the arcane fandom and s2, for silco, vander, jinx w isha, etc.

I don't understand how he doesn't know if Silco sees her as his daughter when he was one of the people who wrote the episode where Silco calls Jinx his daughter while alone at Vander's statue with no reason to lie. Perhaps he isn't taking a stance to prevent further controversy considering what happened last time he said something was canon. But at least he's got the genuine care Silco has for Jinx and the way he empathizes with and feels he can trust her down.

[s-darling-art]

do you want jason and isabel to get back together

Realistically no.

Because I don’t trust anyone to really write that happening and also it would re-solidify that era of RHatO as canon and everyone is better off without that if we’re being honest. (Or they’d have to retcon just about all of RHatO and RH:O, which honestly is somewhat more likely considering how often they sorta restart Jason at square one over and over) However! From a non-meta perspective, I absolutely would love it.

I’m a huge fan of civilian x vigilante relationships within the cape genre and I really liked Isabel! (squinting through L*bell’s shite misogynist writing) She’s such an interesting character because while a lot of her characterization is, again, written through His writing, she comes out the other end as this super quirky and odd civilian with a crazy daredevil streak and stubborn headstrong temperament that actually complimented Jason and the Red Hood life pretty well! Most notably in Red Hood: Outlaw during Jason’s Prince of Gotham era. Jason in particular I feel is really hard to write a romance for, mostly for the fact that DC hasn’t actually known what to do with him for decades leaving his character to sorta restart every other storyline, but also because he’s not a hero and his morals (while ever changing these days /neg) tend to clash with most of the population.

Isabel is (shockingly) written pretty well in that regard in which her near ambivalence towards Jason killing people doesn’t feel out of place coming from her. They balanced each other out in a way I absolutely would’ve loved to see explored further and deeper; Jason’s lifestyle and general personality gives Isabel that excitement and wild experience and life she craves, and Jason himself says Isabel is grounding in a way very few people have been to him. They’re cute and I miss them!

(Also due to trying to write Jason as this stone cold lone wolf and trying to juxtapose Roy’s new womanizer personality (I’m SO sorry Roy fans) he comes across as quite asexual and generally uninterested in that sort of relationship, but that’s another conversation)

Do I think she’ll ever come back? No. Maybe if they get someone who really loves Jason and has read all his stuff to write him, but she did have a cameo in Gotham Knights tho meaning someone out there is thinking of her so who knows!

[monowires]

i’m gonna say it. mshenko’s development over the third game is so beautifully bittersweet.

two men who know they could wake up the next day without the other by their side, still deciding to love each other like they had the rest of their lives. and in a way, they did.

shepard’s “someone to live for,” which is so telling if you look at it for a moment. a man who has died and been resurrected—a man who knows what it’s like to die—admitting, albeit subtly, that he didn’t have any real purpose. nothing that was more personal than trying to save the entire galaxy. but kaidan… kaidan gave him something concrete to fight for. something that made him think, “gods dammit, i want to live.” something that made him see a person when he looked in the mirror, and not just a weapon.

kaidan’s “you’re real enough for me,” which tells of the depth of his love. because here, kaidan is saying that it doesn’t matter if shepard is some fancy, elaborate cerberus clone. here, he’s saying that he has finally been able to put some of his doubts and worries to rest—perhaps not all of them, but enough, enough that most of the hurt and anger from his sudden reappearance has been quelled. it’s kaidan saying that he loves shepard; that he’s not overlooking his flaws, but rather that he loves shepard with such an intensity that he loves his flaws, too, because they are part of him. it’s kaidan, who has always had an iron grip over his emotions ever since baat, admitting that shepard has somehow made him feel something so intense and so important that he’s letting it grow of its own accord. that shepard somehow got past all of his self control in a way that was utterly terrifying—and in some ways, still is.

it’s two men who are both broken in their own ways finding it a little easier to hold themselves together when they have the other by their side. it’s something so, so beautiful finding a way to grow amidst a world of destruction and loss.

and gods dammit, i’m so normal about them.

[kacievvbbbb]

Something about Vegapunk using the dna and blood of a caged and experimented on child to create more caged child experiments and the cycles we perpetuate.

Because what does it mean that all that King has left as proof, that the lunarians were real, that they existed as a tribe, as a people, are seven manufactured children he doesn’t even know about, enslaved as weapons to the government that wiped out the culture they’ll never get to be a part of, and Alber himself another enslaved child lost to something he’ll never fully know.

And what of the warlords? Already young once and hurt by their government, young again and slaves to it. Boa looking at a version of her practically pulled out of time stuck in her worst nightmare or Jimbei looking at a version of himself living out a past he escaped by the skin of his teeth but so many he loved didn’t, even Doffy once again at the mercy of the people that already abandoned him, has Kuma not suffered enough? Given enough, is this child version of him doomed to repeat the same path he already could not escape from . Property of the world government, beholden to the celestial dragons, this version of me that cannot go free?

It’s interesting that Vegapunk joined the government so that he could do the most good, but look at the long line of people right infront of him that he’s hurt with his own hands.

[mint-termsandconditions]

I Was Bored And Wanted To Attempt Future Kirby Character Designs

(THIS IS AN EXTRA LONG POST SO IM GOING TO SPLIT IT HERE EVEN IF ITS AWKWARD)

Future Kirby’s Design Inspirations:

Link 1

Link 2

Link 3

[quinn-pop]

let’s do some autistic meta knight headcanons!! over explaining my interpretation of meta knight yet again wooooo

this orb has NO idea how to talk to people!!! outside of work anyway. a lot of this is partially due to upbringing (suppressing his emotions all the time) but he does not know how to express emotions, like…at all.

this goes into a few things

1. yeah talking is hard. even after figuring out what he wants to communicate he will struggle. conversation can be so overwhelming, especially under pressure. he will need time lol

2. because of that, forming connections is hard. i really don’t think meta is much for shallow relationships, and certainly not early in the timeline. which also means he has very little experience with friendship. so a lot of the relationships he did have went kinda neglected, and issues that probably could’ve been worked on by talking became…*cough romk* escalated.

3. honestly i wouldn’t be surprised if meta convinced himself he couldn’t feel emotion (anymore) until like. katam-ish. he tried very hard lol

vulnerability is terrifying. (though this gesture here is also just comforting, like his little cape cocoon thing he does.)

unmasking—yeah im taking the mask thing very literally here—is a big deal and a very slow process for mk. i’m sure he has a lot of feelings on that lol. it served as a way to ensure no one could ever, y’know, see him.

i can’t say i think he’d ever fully ditch it—there’s always gonna be some days that are more stressful than others and if having it could help him get through it, it just makes sense. mainly when working.

it really is about vulnerability. granted, i don’t think he has the most expressive face (in my head every astral just tends to stare at things) but i doubt he has much control over it. can’t fake a smile but also can’t hide it. probably blushes easy because yeah, astrals; just look at kirby’s face.

just the idea that someone might be able to read his expression and know what he’s feeling before he’s ready for them to (or even understands it himself…) yeah he doesn’t want that

but emotional turmoil aside, i think his mask also hides a lot of his stims

remember that whole “suppressing your feelings” thing? yeah turns out that ignoring half your instincts isn’t a good idea. so in true meta knight style, he tries to stim as subtly as possible

1. he has the least control over his wings, so they will flick and twitch on their own. they’re usually a good indicator of how he’s feeling, not unlike the body language usually seen in cat ears and tails lol. flapping is also an extension of this of course, though he probably suppresses it more.

2. this also effects when he takes his wings out. pretty much every time he’s excited or nervous it just happens. kinda makes me wonder if his wing cape ordeal might also go into the suppression thing… (i’d say yes, but using a cape is also very comforting so it’s not necessarily a bad thing)

3. going back to the mask thing; he stims a lot underneath it. think like biting or pursing your lips. he bites his tongue and clicks his mouth. that sort of thing. his mask also makes it harder to notice that he is constantly sighing, humming, grumbling…all that

one nice thing about the mask though is that it helps a little bit with lights!!! woo

(look at him and his magically floating glasses)

sensory stuff—i think he’s mostly bothered by light and sound. maybe a bit of texture. he’s pretty sensory avoidant and perfectly happy standing off to the side not touching anything.

the one exception to this is physical affection, which is, despite all of this, most of how he shows affection. it’s a lot easier to hug someone than to try to explain your feelings for them, after all.

i think he would like pressure though. so that’s probably part of it. and i’m pretty sure there’s some connection in here to fighting (dang, is that the only way he knows how to get his energy out?)

anyway, pretty much all of this is in contrast to kirby, who i would gladly nominate as the champion of Doing Whatever He Wants. he might pick up a few bad habits, but he will never mask the way meta knight does. he might not understand how he feels, but he’s in tune enough to express it…usually.

this is a very good thing for meta because it helps him to do the same thing. kirby’s so energetic, it’s hard to not want to stim with him. it reminds meta to be kinder to himself and explore his own emotions. he can also help kirby understand themselves, so this connection is very important.

yeah, at the end of the day, everything kinda just boils down to kirby and mk as parallels

this is the conclusion i promise

to me, meta’s arc is about growing stronger by growing kinder, and this is mostly by learning to be kind to himself. letting himself be a person again, loving and understanding other people, and eventually, letting go of all the expectations placed on him and doing the things he’s always wanted to do…

autism headcanons are fun for me because it’s cathartic to write, but at the same time, it just makes sense in this sort of narrative. meta is, to me, inseparable from these things. and so is kirby! that’s a dynamic that’s a lot of fun to play with, and it’s at the heart of my kirby interpretation.

if you actually read all this WOW thank you

[sammygender]

i’ve never been as angry on behalf of a character as i am for sam winchester

[fumifooms]

Thistle & Falin

Just my narrative of Thistle & Falin, collection of shippy thoughts and dynamic analysis. Creating some imagery and threads, etc. What if we both made devotion to our loved ones our purpose, what if we both hadn’t lived for ourselves in a long, long time. Who are we? Beyond who we love and our powers, what are we?

Background info: a short Falin analysis touching on Faligon and Thistle + an old thistlin post, compiling most of their moments. Here I delve into further thoughts but for base analysis of what they have in canon and in potential those are good starts. If you want I also have a full Falin analysis.

Disclaimer: Beyond the nebulous 1000 years I place Thistle as a young adult, and though I agree Falin mothers him to some degree I don’t think it’s unsimilar to the way that Marcille is a mom friend that sometimes mothers Falin and Izutsumi especially. Their relationship has layers like every other one in Dunmeshi, reducing it to being incestuously motherly or age discoursy to justify it being problematic is so funny to me, hello did you miss the mind control. Ah yes I love the 1090 yo with godlike powers being groomed by his chicken slave. You can have your own interpretation but canon is ambiguous enough, and dare I say intentionally ambiguous, that I have no qualms with not infantilizing Thistle, same with Yaad at the end of canon. I do ship Thistle and Falin, and although it’s in a nebulous qpr-or-other third secret thing situationship instead of conventionally romantic way, like, I puke on anything giving them a parental framing so don’t come shitting on my doorstep, kid-Thistle truthers be warned. Only nuance enjoyers allowed on this post. It’s valid if you’re uncomfortable with the ship!! Don’t make your issue others’ problem.

I thankfully finished my Falin analysis before posting this, but besides that I also have an analysis coming on the whole Thistle age thing which I think is interesting, beyond the well being poisoned there are things to explore there, idk in how long that’ll be done though. That’s all for plans that are relevant to this, now let’s get into it.

Part 1

So my favorite Falin things are Faligon + her sense of being like a pawn/misplaced, going on autopilot to follow the wishes of others, a feeling of identity being a burden and sort of fleeing from that, and her not really caring in the way/with the intensity that she’s "supposed" to (as per the points I go over in my Falin analysis). Meanwhile, Thistle has a lot of shit going on already but then there’s also how being a dungeon lord is highly wearing on his mind. As Faligon and as dungeon lord Thistle, the way they’re both so out of touch with reality in different ways holy shit?? They have power imbalance between them and it very much comes from mind control lol, but it’s also not something Thistle is fully aware of himself, because the powers are driving him unstable and he’s not even aware there’s someone in front of him really. He’s so out of it that he can’t even recognize that the dragon has been fused with a human and she’s so out of it we can’t even tell how conscious of her actions she is.

And then the interesting thing is that they’re kind of in it together… Mostly from Falin’s standpoint. We see that he does rely on the dragon increasingly so, hanging out with it, being saved by it and embraced by her etc. When he lets them both fall after breaking the web they were hanging from, he automatically, fully and wordlessly trusts her to catch him, instead of relying on magic or anything, and she does. Falin devotes herself to him but he’s devoted to The Cause which is just chasing ghosts at this point. But despite it all there’s a weird comfort here too… From the guy who in his last moment of lucidity reached out for someone, anyone’s hand, from the guy who hasn’t felt companionship in hundreds of years probably, hasn’t taken it slow and slept and eaten in who knows how long, from the girl who feels compelled to care after him like she’s always done with others… And the beast-ness allows her to have some freedom to figure herself out in a weird way, to simply enjoy being beside someone and doing anything her own whims tell her to.

It’s very destructive and weird and layered but like…. I can see the sliver where it works out. Where her kindness reaches him and he has a moment of lucidity where he sees her and it’s like, wait, who are you, you’re not the dragon?? Where finding someone else who feels just as messed up and devoted as them, like they’re just trudging along life like it’s a dream following their loved one, heals them a bit. Where caring for the other becomes a way to care for themselves too, a dark mirror of each other that shows you, oh, this is how bad it can get and I want to choose something else for myself actually. To grow to see the person standing in front of you, instead of only searching with your eyes in what way they’ll reflect on you. In helping each other, finding some companionship that’s weirdly vulnerable and self-healing. He gets her in touch with herself and her own needs again through the arc and conflict they have, and she gets him in touch with the world and his surroundings again. They have clashing ways to be selfless, very self-sacrificial from Falin meanwhike self-centered with Thistle (he ‘knows best’, ‘everything needs to be left to him’, etc etc, he needs the control, but he does it all for others, meanwhile Falin leaves that control to others and only grabs it for herself in exceptional cases like sacrificing herself to the dragon for Laios).

Like just let yourself be, damn!!! So then them being like, zombie mentally stunted babies kind of enhances that theme in a way too lol. The way they communicate together is very… Instinctive and basic, and I’d love to see how it could develop into a functional dynamic. They’re in ‘learning to be your own person’ kindergarten together to me. Thistle looking at her coloring wildly outside the lines and being like "you’re doing it wrong" and then you look at his and he colored everything a weird color. The precision is scary but then his crayon goes 1 mm out of the lines and he blows up into tears. Ok the metaphor has run its course

So yeah like the ship/brotp is very, them being isolated and against the world together and like… Slowly regaining their minds together. Getting their sense of identity grounded into them again. In my mind they have a 50k words adventure where they hang out and he slowly realizes there’s more to her than just dragon and she encourages him to dawdle around and eventually just play in water and shit and it’s like, starting to see life again beyond the laser focus you limited yourself to… And she’s allowed to just chill out and do whatever she wants besides the whole searching for Delgal thing. You can’t tie down a dragon! They are a duo they are an unit‼️ He’d have been fucked without her and at this point in time he sort of made her and he’s her world. Traumabonded kittens do not separate but it’s onesided in different ways haha. Honestly it’s sort of reflavored mickuro wait fuck…

If nothing else, they’re a very interesting dynamic to ponder. The depths of it all… I want to use them as a social experiment. I want them to stop to smell at the flowers and learn to work together… They’re master and servant they’re owner and pet they’re mothering and mothered (in a guardian hound way, in a mom friend way) they’re both incredibly (emotionally and physically) vulnerable in different ways…… Master and monster if you will. Mostly I see them as guardian & leader. Like I said I ship them but it’s not really romantic atp I think but it’s not quite qpr either it’s truly a weird secret third thing… What if we were sort of coworkers but also ?!!!>??????! You should hate me but you fiercely protect me I should appreciate you but I only see you as a tool WHAT IS GOING ONNN IN THERE

He wants to be protected even if he can’t really admit it. Here the catalyst was emotional distress moreso than physical threat. Notice how he lays there under her wing for a bit as he (refuses to) processes what Mithrun told him about Delgal dying and betraying him. She’s becoming his safety net, his comfort hound. Somehow, the both of them find they’re soothed in each other’s presence.

It kills me. Them being so toxic at the start of it, then somehow ambiguously just hinting towards how things could have went on to be better, could have been headed somewhere nice and healing and healthier, she dies and he dies everyone fucking dies and they forget each other and it ends there they never speak of each other again. Canon wanted me dead specifically. Like remember too that I was there when the last chapters where being released, my ass really was like "Oh I wonder how Falin will react seeing Thistle after being revived!" 🤡 But yess at least that means there’s a lot of Unsaid, a lot of space for speculation, and I want to see what could have been. I want to see it so so bad. It’s so interesting

Post-canon is also so interesting, where they’re sort of recovered but not fully not really, them actually getting to know each other… And she doesn’t remember him but he doesn’t remember her either, in a way they’ve never met even though they have, even though she was the first one on his side since so long, the first hint of companionship he’s had, companionship that he’s so unused to getting that he can’t even recognize it for what it is. He couldn’t even recognize a human standing in front of him!! He is so disconnected from others and the world!! He spoke to ghosts like they had no worries in the world and everyone was ok!! He’s out of touch, tone-deaf af!! Has always been tone-deaf!! Being tone-deaf when he was younger, a stick in the mud, caused him to be more isolated than he already was… Autism4autism, anyways—

It’s them not knowing why or how to express it but being drawn together, a bond forged together by the fire of circumstances and coincidences— or is it only that? No one can know for certain but there’s a grip they have on each other there somehow. Weird distant caring thing. I dont know who you are but I feel like I should know you

It’s like my headcanon that she doesn’t know why, but on her travels she feels something when she comes across wild thistle flowers… There are just faint remnants, whispers of feelings like ghosts.

They should be remnants in each other’s lives. A deja vu of a person in the way Falin hugs small dolls to her chest, or how Thistle reminisces of something when he sees bird feathers discarded on the ground. < This paragraph courtesy of @cabinette’s huge brain

He canonically writes poems btw… Poems would be such a good way for him to get in touch with himself again post-canon, find desires in again and get creative fulfillment. He should make poems about her. To explore and vent and express all the vague feelings and memories he has, both those of during canon and after canon. He doesn’t remember her but he remembers her, slivers of kind eyes and warm gentle hands and healing magic like a blanket…

Yaad, an unlicensed therapist but the best you're gonna get in fantasy land: Maybe you should try journaling.

And too the thing is their relationship with each other in a way is ONLY about themselves, even when Falin is being self-sacrifical it’s less about him and more about how she generally is, that sort of instinct to latch onto someone and just follow along with whatever they do and ask, meanwhile to Thistle she’s only ever been a factor in his plans. Idk idk them getting to that point where they see and know each other, stumbling into that through canon or actively working towards it post-canon, there’s weird beauty in that Like. Thistle cares about her because he’ll take anyone as long as they fit the job description well enough, he’s desperate to find Delgal and will grasp at straws to find him. In a similar way that he’ll reach for someone, anyone’s hand on the verge of death, she seeks to protect someone, anyone. That’s how she centers herself, makes someone her compass and her world. Falin wants to protect someone and Thistle would use anyone, pushed to the states they were in they would latch onto anyone for comfort (caring for him, grabbing Marcille’s hand).

Mirrors truly truly. And Thistle likes to shatter those, and silence anyone who tries to talk to him about reality, so then the option left is to be by him quietly and subtly gradually, gently (her specialty) nudge him in the right direction … Nooo but actually why did he shatter those mirrors. Very interesting to think about. Would seeing himself in others anger him?

I like to call him a ghost of who he was sometimes, a ghost of the past, he’s so haunted, and I think there’s fun imagery there too. The care she offers Thistle somewhat reminds me of the one she offers ghosts. I wonder if part of it is that she sees herself in ghosts, that she wants to offer them freedom and peace of mind she can’t get for herself.

And of course meanwhile on her end, the thistlin arc is also about growing self-respect. I don’t want to see Thistle as a lost cause in saying that her efforts are wasted on him, but being so permissive and invested in him is obviously not healthy for her. She needs to learn when to put her foot down

Oooh, just realized that choosing to eat in this scene was a big character moment all things considered. By eating she faltered in her task, stood up for herself and her needs, was selfish for once (/positive go get your damn food girl). She chose to eat. Anyways

I bet he’s the one who healed her wounds after the Shuro party fight. And on that note— it’s interesting he could change her form from Falin to Faligon without touching her isn’t it? Healing by everyone else like Marcille and Falin always required touch, physical contact between the healer and healee, which some like Chilchuck say is a negative, but… The dungeon lord not needing to touch to heal makes a nice metaphor for how isolating the powers are I think. Truly clinical instead of warm. Theme of community and freely offering affection in Dungeon Meshi etc etc. Like I said, Thistle is out of touch.

The way that he has the powers to change her form and heal and like soo much magic power but he can’t even realize when he’s hurting himself and she’s the one who has to heal him. He’s so fully devoted to the cause even when he acts selfishly that he neglects himself too, and she has to remind him to take care of himself, to eat, etc. That she feeds him. Eating is an act of love to yourself and to life. The berries, the curry, the soup that Thistle refuses to eat—

Do you see the vision. Do you see all the narrative relevance and themes and parallels of their dynamic. To chase ghosts, to cling onto them so they stay with you no matter how warped and ugly they get, and to soothe souls, purifying them and helping them depart for the afterlife… Both magic prodigies whose lives revolve around protecting and caring after their loved ones more than anything else. A family member who looks elsewhere while they are their whole world. They can flee their emotional issues together 🤝 Who are we? Beyond who we love and our power, what are we? I think about the way she cradled him in her arms just before they fell down into the dungeon all the time idk idk

^ End notes from the one fic I wrote about them so far: Slivers, on AO3. For a moment, they were both slivers of themselves, bound together.

Thistle feverishly holding onto ghosts of the past and his source of power, meanwhile Falin cradles the people she can protect in the now with the powers that reside in her… Him cradling his book, her cradling her master……… Parallels

Interlude

And yess it’s important to remember too, Thistle became a mage only after delgal asked… He had innate talent, but moreso than Falin it’s through studies that he learned to actually harness his magic etc. Idk I think it’s an interesting parallel that could have interesting stuff be done on it. People often characterize him as predominantly bratty but. He’s smart and composed he’s mainly smart and composed… He’s unstable and everything during canon was happening all at once with the winged lion being freed and Laios’ party and the canaries and agh </3 He can have a meltdown as a treat he’s smart and cool-headed if it wasn’t for the dungeon wearing on his mind ok… Obvi I love my chars with anger issues but saying he’s overly childish is having tunnel vision I think

Ok so the elephant in the room… First of all how present is Falin in Falugon exactly…… We have no clue. The end sequence does show her in purgatory with a dragon foot holding her down, which can easily be read as it suppressing her personality- with how it’s shown though it feels like she’d be fully suppressed by that? And we know that’s not the case, since not only does she recognize Laios and calls out to him, she hesitates to hurt Kuro because of the dog association, she’s excessively kind towards Thistle, the latter which her Adventurer’s Bible profile confirm to be "her kind nature remaining as the chimera". Maybe it’s a dream-like state? Maybe the dragon is the driving force with the instincts, and it’s only bits of Falin and her personality that show through? A state of mind very primal and not very think-y, even if Falin has enough brains to think of sharing the berries, gesturing and oh- of course, casting magic. No issues with controlling the human half of her body as well. To some degree, her and the dragon are working in tandem. My own preferred interpretation is the driven by instincts one, a state of mind like an actual dragon’s, which in my Falin analysis I delve into the significance of it for other parts of Dunmeshi too. So yeah, dreamlike mindless autopilot… I think exploring her pov as Faligon would go super hard. Aware of her surroundings but sort of disconnected with it, and disconnected from herself too, entirely living in the present… And like with her talking to Laios— the only time she speaks in her chimera form, a simple observation, "Laios, brother", sometimes her human thoughts peek through more sharply, short moments of lucidity… I think it’d be interesting to see an arc where as the chimera, she learns to share the "brainspace" more with the dragon.

It’s also unclear if Thistle had a say in how much of ‘Falin the human’ is in control? He very well might have suppressed her somehow when he changed her form to be more dragonlike. That might also be due to just getting back the dragon meat though— and the dragon meat itself might be why/how the brainspace is shared. There is a lot less of Falin’s body in the chimera than there is of the dragon, body mass wise. Dungeon Meshi is a lot about physicality so I wouldn’t be surprised with this reasoning. But there’s the whole mind control soul bond situation too…

The mind bond is another thing that’s left mostly to interpretation when it comes to the details. She feels compelled to listen to the dungeon lord’s orders as a monster created and owned by it, like the dragons Thistle summoned during the fight at his house, but again like we see with the dragons, if the monster has a "strong will" it can disobey to some level without being punished by the bind or anything. The eyes of the magician, the small wyverns, level-of-control wise can’t be accurate examples because they’re sort of like familiars, Thistle can see through their eyes in real time no matter where they are but it’s only this species as far as we know. So otherwise the mind bond is more subtle… There’s also the question of how much the control is shared between the dungeon lord and the demon, which again Thistle’s situation is exceptional because he managed to seal his demon in a book, presumably all the power goes through Thistle without the intermediate of the winged lion, though we do see he has some reach since he reaches Laios through his dreams. ANYWAYS all that to say. I do really ponder about how a dungeon lord's monsters get their orders, like... For the fight on the first floor, did Falin just feel Thistle's agony in her bones and came clawing and barging her way in desperately and angrily to protect him because of his distress, or did he more directly demand she come, consciously or not?! Idk, since Falin is actively protective of him unlike the dragons who reluctantly listen to him, her being very fast and intense about it doesn’t have to be forced… It’d be interesting if she can sense his feelings, wants or thoughts, bc I don’t think it’s as conscious as like, telepathically communicating "hey you, do this"…? Pondering, pondering. Mind bond <3 Soulbound <3

They’re both very trapped in the past… I wonder if as Faligon a lot of her mind goes back to memories of Laios and such, if she’s in a dreamlike state and not just sort of absent, where would her mind retreat... I don’t think so like I said I think she’s mostly driven by dragonlike mindlessness, but still… Thistle stuck in the search of Delgal, thinking back to everything they’ve shared and where it all went wrong obsessively, and Falin, sort of larping that she’s still beside Laios, not unlike how Thistle treats having the corpses of the royal family at his house like them being safe. Delusions. Idk I just want more character studies.

The metaphors in this truly… It’s not literal, like def not something that happens during canon at no point are they or could be ever atop a mountain of frames and paintings of the Golden Kingdom’s royal family and fine art lmaoo, so then like the meaning behind it all… She offers him reprieve, an outsider from all the Golden Kingdom expectations and drama, just someone warm to lean on, someone who’ll stay…….. I love Faligon pushing him to rest and nap so much. Man has first nap in a thousand years. Feather duvet like a nice warm pillow. The peace she offers him man……. Live in the present bbygirl Unfortunately it doesn't help. Look at them eyebags… Man needs to sleep!!

Part 2

^ This panels drives me crazy It’s the possessivity. It’s the "my". It’s the "stealing".

What if you have fear of abandonment and think you have to prove your worth for people to stay by your side. What if belonging to someone makes you feel like you belong and you feel loved and soothed by it lowkey, feel like it makes things easy. What if I was bought as a slave and servant but I was adopted into a pretty loving family. What if ownership is what love looks like to me. What if that’s why I have no problem rationalizing keeping people against their will in a glorified kingdom-prison, because that’s just what someone with the power who Knows Better does, and… Did he always call her his dragon hello? Feelings

He is not letting it go damn He hates when people mess with what's his. Or Delgal’s.

But imagine. The dragon is like, the last thing he has. The Golden Kingdom has moved on from him, everything is shit, but his dragon is the last thing he still has some realm of like. Ownership over. But that ownership is kinda just his sense of belonging. His role, his duty.  So it’s like "Don’t steal the last thing I have" especially if post-canon… It’s thinking from his time as a jester bought into a loving family that ownership is natural in love and care. It’s thinking that’s the way you get to belong beside someone, beside earning that through achievements and being useful and capable. Everything is being stolen away from him. Control and things and people and even the importance he has to the Golden Kingdom as he becomes part of the background & past history and the kingdom switches into new hands aka Laios’…

My dragon, not the dragon. I do like to imagine especially after the berries he’s starting to feel differently about her. He keeps being like "you’re acting odd, dragon". His dragon is special. She’s not just another regular monster npc to easily replace, there’s human contact in there. His dragon just for him. <3

I do think Falin has some issues with like, asking to be with the people she loves, feeling safe in asking for that, that she’s worth that. She follows them and is quiet and just takes the crumbs of love that they offer, she doesn’t ask Marcille at the academy to spend lunches with her, doesn’t ask anything of her distant busy father and ill anxious mother… The person she did ask things of, Laios, who she always asked to go travel the world with him and whatnot, left her behind. Like how Delgal left Thistle. Theme of leaving </3 theme of family and abandonment issues </3 So she just follows and cares after them and makes herself useful and is grateful she gets to be beside them at all. So yeah what I’m saying is being owned/belonging to someone might feel yeah like, belonging. Being One Person's. He’s seen her at her worst and most bloody and raw, and still wants her? Very comforting And especially post-canon he doesn’t need her to be witty or useful or such, he just needs her love and that’s what she has lots to give.

Do you think Falin wants to be needed… Do you think she’s a little restless if she doesn’t feel like she is, like she thinks just like Laios people might leave you behind and you never see them again.  It’s also because of what she said, that she put others before herself, that she just followed/imprinted on her parents/Laios/Marcille. She avoided conflict, she wanted to be liked and live in peace. The only times she was selfish, she hurt people (left school for Laios, sacrificed herself for them, teleported them out despite possibly hurting people on the surface), so she chooses to be selfless instead. "One of the most selfish things i've ever done was barely even for the sake of myself" - Falin and Toshiro both hah Falin is often told she doesn’t care the right way or not enough, you’re cutting classes Falin, I’m upset you left me and you don’t even seem to think it’s a big deal Falin, you shouldn’t have sacrificed yourself to save me (her not noticing her ostracization in her village wasn’t told to her but I’m including it also). And with Toshiro when considering her proposal, she was worried to accept because yeah it’s have been convenient but she wouldn’t be reciprocating his feelings in the way he wants and expected her to with what he asked of her… And she’s worried it wouldn’t be right… Bc she doesn’t care about the proposal on the same level he does….. I just think that’s neat I think that Falin caring both too little and too much, with laser focus on Laios & Marcille neglecting even herself, is a big part of her. She focuses on others and their emotional needs so so much always, babygirl be selfish for a while…

Thistle’s interaction with Laios is interesting too, especiaoly when Kaios heals him. How he looks at his shoulder, surprised and confused… Guy who's used to not having his personal needs met because he's so busy doing everything for the people he cares about receives care??? Woah that’s crazy Something something being so unused to human contact and affection that you don’t know how to process it and don’t recognize it when it happens/stares you right in the face. Thistle the Toudens are gonna make you open up ur heart to humans again on god…

What if… He doesn’t want to admit she’s not the dragon. If he admits it’s not the dragon that means giving up some control… This was not in his plan, he doesn’t know how well he can control a chimera rather than a dragon, it’s weakness it’s vulnerability it’s feeling like he’s losing his grip on everything again and thus losing his place and purpose. Hmm…

Finding yourself through someone else… Because defining yourself through others is what you’ve always done… Yeah. Yeah.

I do love it tying into Falin’s arc of finding herself. Like, she doesn’t remember her time as a chimera, she just remembers this guy she has conflicted but fond feelings of for some reason, so say if they travel post-canon, traveling with him would also be a way to figure out more how she’s feeling, and then there’s how when looking at him she gets the feeling that it’s been a long time he hasn’t lived for himself either… And like for him traveling is about seeing the world a bit too. Seeing it not as something to control or always dangerous but something to explore, and just enjoy the little things instead of worrying about the court. And just. Aghhhh. He hasn’t had someone on his side for centuries. Sighs. Of course Yaad also becomes that largely but traveling post-canon with Falin… Would love to see that in fancontent

Them growing to SEE each other, with the film in front of their eyes slowly fading away. Both of them coming out of it more genuine than they’d been even before meeting, before becoming warped, growing more comfortable in their skin and with the thought of connecting with others. It’s the mutual care <33 it’s having been on each other’s side at both your ugliest <3 Unconventional caring...

Toshiro saying "you can’t tie down a dragon" is always so good… Someone should so do stuff with that. "But you can tame it" / "I tried to once" / "but she chose to stay with me anyways"… Musical theme of How to Train your Dragon starts playing in the distance

When/after they get together, I feel like their relationship isn’t something they like to label… If anything it’s like. Partner. Or calling each other by name… Him calling her my dragon, except now it’s warm and personal would be so. Aughh <3 But then that just also makes the first time he calls her by name so huge.

Conclusion

They and their relationship is weird and unusual but that’s just how they are, and how they need to accept themselves (again: as they are) and roll with it! And make a place in the world for them anyways!

Magic forced them to be vulnerable in front of each other but it’s them who have to like… Be pushed out of their passivity and do something with that vulnerability.

BROTHERSSS THEY’RE BOTH ALL ABOUT BROTHERS. LEAVING. OUT OF TOUCH WITH REALITY. OUT OF TOUCH WITH THEMSELVES AND THEIR OWN IDENTITY. In a twisted way only the other would understand what it’s like.

Thistlin is so crazy, in humanizing you it humanizes me, in recognizing you for what you are I get more back in touch with the world again.

Flighted birds have hollow bones. With freedom there are risks and drawbacks. Thistle was Falin’s.

It’s not everyday you can have a ship where both characters are out of touch with reality and others and themselves and have this weird almost innate bond of her being compelled to protect him and care for him and him holding onto that unknowingly… Even if he didn’t need to, keeping her by himself and sitting on her while he plans and has a panic attack….. And also he owns her and robbed her of her freedom & body & full mind but she still wuvs him. Weird intimacy with the guy who horrifically changed you into something else, and yet is not even aware he has done it.

Falin loves nature and Thistle is named after a flower… Her post-canon coming across wild thistles and feeling a rush of fondness and she doesn’t know why… Thistles have thorns, but they taste sweet. Just gotta peel them off and enjoys the sweet taste of it once it’s open <3 Eat it like them honeysuckles

Slice of life 40k words thistlin sitcom I need you. Don’t make me write it myself. Sob

You are so so close sweetie…

wutiwant

I don't know what I want But I know it's not this These words don't mean nothing Once they left my lips More awake inside of my dreams Was that really you, next to me? Give me what I want, who am I supposed to please? Who am I supposed to please? Who am I? Who am I? I? Give me what I want Give me what I want

Some links, since the pair is small enough that finding stuff for them can be hard: Falin & Thistle search on pixiv Falin & Thistle search on danbooru Ao3: Thistle x Falin, Thistle & Falin Ship names: ファリ���ス / シスファリ. Thistlin

My own spotify playlists: Thistle & Falin, Thistle, Falin

source v

[heavencasteel420]

It is amazing to me that the show has a character who:

Explicitly says “my father forced me to kill and I was good at it, but I hated it”;

Makes multiple efforts to walk away from a fight where his opponent is doing the absolute most to provoke him and, upon finally snapping, handily beats him;

Stabs a dude with a pair of scissors in self-defense and immediately looks horrified at himself; and

Can stomach all kinds of gross and scary shit unless it involves harm coming to his little brother, whom he obviously has a lot of baggage about protecting.

And a not-insignificant number of people are like “his neurosis is that he feels bad about not being a fighter or a badass.”

[unordinary-diary]

Blyke and John: the Followup

In my last entry, I pointed out the similarities between chapters 249 and 121, but I had hit the image limit and wasn’t able to embed screenshots. I got around this by linking the chapters, but this is probably my favorite parallel, and to do it justice I think I need to really put them next to each other.

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

(121) (249)

It’s the same fucking scene but backwards and in a different font.

They’re the SAAAAAAAAAAME!!!!!!!!

This was definitely on purpose. Shit like this ^^ doesn’t happen by accident.

[miyamiwu]

In S2E6, we are shown a window with avery wide crack

In S2E8, the kettle is still on the counter. (Remember, this is after the window was already broken by Lu Guang)

But then CXS, as “Lu Guang,” used that kettle to break the window. So we’re off to a wrong start here.

We aren’t shown how wide the window crack is this time, but maybe it didn’t look wide enough for an adult male to go through? Maybe that’s why the police officer didn’t pay it that much attention and immediately noticed CXS?

Anyways, I still think CXS misunderstood Lu Guang’s intentions with the photo left on the phone. LG went so far to sacrifice himself to save CXS. There was nothing more for CXS to do; he’s already out of danger. Why would LG want CXS to do more dangerous stuff?

And remember, a photo can only be dived into once. Without the ability to see the future, there was no way CXS can get it right in one go. (He even threw the damn kettle)

As for why LG left his phone… maybe it was just to distract them. To not get CXS involved. A red herring, so to speak. (or maybe there’s another reason, but I’m too dumb to figure it out)

Also, LG had a flashback of CXS dying in S2E1. If CXS had really been kidnapped, then maybe he really was gonna die. But now that LG has saved him, crossing a node that shouldn’t be crossed, a life has to be paid

Anyways, one thing for sure is that my boy Lu Guang is so dying this season 🥲

[nonas-third-tantrum]

I’m trying to figure out when exactly Pyrrha realized that Nona was Alecto. I had been thinking that it was after Kiriona woke up, because at that point Pyrrha would have understood that Nona’s eyes came from Alecto, not Gideon, but I think it may have actually been a bit earlier…

After the fight between Ianthe and Cam, when Pyrrha and Nona go off to find the corpse, Nona tells Pyrrha that she’s dying, and Pyrrha says, “‘Course you are…the soul longs for the body, Nona. Even a fucked up soul…even a soul that’s been changed forever. It takes a lot to acclimate a soul to a body it wasn’t born in, if that original body’s around for it to miss.”

Now, she could still be talking about Gideon. BUT something about the way she phrases this, with the “fucked up soul that’s been changed forever” …feel free to disagree but to me that sounds a heck of a lot like Alecto. I think it’s possible that Pyrrha has even worked out Alecto’s true nature, so when she refers to the ‘original body’ she could be talking about the planet earth itself.

Pyrrha goes on to say, “Kiddie, when you were yelling…” but she trails off and doesn’t get to finish her sentence. We know that Nona “screamed like the captain had screamed.” We also know that when the captain screams, Nona hears her speaking in varun’s voice, and it’s interesting that Pyrrha describes it as yelling, not screaming, which to mean indicates that Nona may have said something. Something that alerts Pyrrha to the fact that Nona is not who they’ve all been thinking she is.

Yes - Pyrrha does say within the next couple of pages that Gideon’s body “might be you, kiddie.” But I don’t think that necessarily means she doesn’t at least suspect that Nona is someone else. I know the rest of that scene heavily implies that Pyrrha still thinks Nona is Gideon…but I’m suspicious. I think what she wants to believe and what she knows to be true might not match up.

This post is getting away from me but I just have to add that after the roof incident, both Nona and Pyrrha know who she is, and Nona is desperate to keep herself in the dark. Pyrrha starts to call Nona “A…” but Nona stops her and begs her not to make her remember. And then Nona slips into her Alecto self, and mocks Pyrrha for playing house with her (hello, more doll references), and that must absolutely break Pyrrha’s heart, but she lets it go.

So when Pyrrha finally says her “what’s like except a love that hasn’t been invited indoors?” speech, she’s reckoning with her feelings towards both Nona and Alecto, has probably been wrestling with those feelings for a while, and it’s just. So devastating. Pyrrha loved Nona. Nona loved and was loved by Palamedes, Camilla, and Pyrrha.

But Alecto? Nona is terrified that when she realizes who she is, she won’t love anything. We know that John loved Alecto, and I think we can infer that Anastasia did too, and Alecto loved them back. But then Pyrrha tells us that she and Gideon liked Alecto, and for some reason that feels even more significant to me—maybe because there are all kinds of twisted love in these books and to like someone, while less intense, is more…mundane. There aren’t a lot of instances in these books where people just like each other, plain and simple. And I think that the love everyone has for Nona is a lot less complicated than the other types of love we’re shown. Truly a like that’s been invited indoors.

[selenaxsc]

Every day I struggle with the urge to delete Instagram.