#i feel like. there's a sort of Dissonance there. i cant explain-

[maareyas]

what do you MEAN they mentioned Iblis in the knuckles show???????

[dwter]

hey everyone, so ive had a lot of time at this point to ruminate and have had conversation after conversation about everything going on and i truly and genuinely mean this when i say i think so much of my thinking and immediate reactions were entirely based in fear, anxiety and grief that i didn't give myself the ability to view the situation as it is.

ill say from the beginning ive always chosen to view this in a worst case scenario perspective. not just for myself, but also i think dismissing the victim ESPECIALLY those using anything to dismiss her literally instantly is really icky and so ive always looked at this with the perspective of everything (more or less) being true. now with that in mind--i dont think this entire thing was nearly as black and white as i initially thought it was. im saying it straight to save everyone the time to try and figure out my perspective, but after talking with people and thinking about real life, how people irl would view this and DO view it and other instances of this exact scenario happening both online and in real life: this is truly just not the horrible morally bankrupt incident i thought it was.

i thought a lot about how i wanted to go about explaining my perspective or if i even wanted to bc i really didnt want this to he seen as "dream defense" or align myself with the people who have had that stance since the absolute beginning bc they are srsly insane, but this is more for myself and for anyone who felt like they didnt have a perspective they resonated with throughout all of this. this is one of the first instances where i felt a genuine dissonance between my thoughts and feelings and my friends in the community whose thoughts i have always always valued above anything else, often even my own, especially when i was struggling with feeling conflicted out of fear and grief. i always clung to the people whose opinions i trusted (and still do trust dont get me wrong) because it felt easier than having to sort my guilty and scared conscience into rationality that could possibly oppose the people ive always looked to for guidance in discourse. just that fear on being on the wrong side of history and such. but like i said, this long winded and horribly overserious essay is for me more than anyone else--if not for people who have struggled with the exact same shitty time.

ill say the absolute first thing: it was not grooming. i held this opinion literally the entire time and people calling it grooming are not only using the term wrong but genuinely causing harm to such a serious topic. we are talking about two adults in a relationship with an age difference of four years like holy shit. when the first girl dropped her story, almost everyone came to the conclusion that it just wasnt that serious because he thought she was 18. with the second girl, she was one month from 18 and the dms from before turning such were genuinely the driest conversations in the world that he never initiated or made any notion of pursuing. this isnt to say you cant be icked out--the point of me talking about this isnt to make you suddenly change your views on anything but to try and claim that it was grooming or a crime took place is just wrong and dishonest of everyone. this is such a large part of where my personal dissonance with everyone's takes came from bc the way people were trying to claim that liking an 18 year old as a 22 year old was something akin to literal pedophilia (<- bc people WERE genuinely saying this) made me feel confused but also deeply guilty because i really just did not understand. and now that im less miserable, i can recognize that that confusion wasnt just linked to parasocialism or whatever deep twisted thing i thought was in my soul, it was literally just not the big insane evil everyone made it out to be. again, this isnt to try and say you individually cant be like "i dont like this" or "this is icky to me" or "this was bad judgement on his part" (<- which is my personal view btw) but to pretend it is some strange insane act of an active predator genuinely boggles my mind. i dont want to chalk everything up to being covidbrained but i think its a huge part of where this dissonance to real life comes from because i really do think if most of you sit down with genuinely and utterly normal people, they will not give a fuck about this. ive SEEN people have conversations about this with noemal people irl and have them literally laugh in their face bc of how deeply unserious it is. and again, i want to reenforce that doesnt mean YOU dont have to care, but to act as if this isnt an objectively undeep incident between two people is odd, especially to the degree ive seen.

now i cant just say this and be done so lets talk about the next part that people had an issue with: fan and creator power dynamic. ill also say this very straight: when the stuff came out with both girls i had a much larger issue with the "age gaps" than i did this for so many reasons. ive always, even before all of this, had my own opinions and such about ccs and fans ever having relationships and it usually along the basis of "as long as there is consent and mutuality, i have no real issue." its not strange to me that people want to be with people they like and idealize and vice versa. to keep this as objective as i can with this perspective, i wont get into thoughts that for dream specifically it especially doesnt surprise me in the sense that his past relationship + facing vitriol from every corner of the internet but fans + overall paranoia could have absolutely reenforced the normalcy and reasoning in this judgement call but i digress. i mean just obvious examples of people wanting to get with celebrities, or groupies or even in platonic ways where fans become genuine and actual friends of creators--ccs having relationships with fans was never a big deal to me personally. and since its relevant to mention in this case, ESPECIALLY online ones. im not saying there cant be power imbalances among a fan and a cc/celebrity, but to get like theyre all inherently like that again just makes zero sense to me and never has even before dream. this applies especially online where power dynamics are significantly dampened from what they can be and just i mean logically, dream has been a full blown cc for like a little less than 3 years and only at this level for maybe 1 or 2 without experiencing it in real life too. the idea that he himself would not see an issue with this, especially because it was a mutual exchange of company, is so completely unsurprising. and at its core, there really is no real issue in it of itself. a bad judgement call from dream? yes and ill stand by that since he shouldve been better safe than sorry. morally bankrupt and manipulative? 😭 no, not after really assessing shit rationally. i also want to add that it was a mutual thing. i know people are really trying to tear everything amanda says apart (<- which is incredibly strange btw, especially if that was your instant reaction and you were doing it publicly too), but taking everything shes saying as true, we know that there was a MUTUAL exchange of things of a sexual nature and this wasnt some manipulative one-sided exchange where dream controlled everything and gave nothing in return. this isnt to say that amandas feelings are entirely invalid or anything along those lines, but those feelings stem from miscommunication and not morally bankrupt predatory behaviours. like seeing all of the info and looking at the situation as it is, its very clear dream saw and believed this to be a mutual relationship. i was so confused and scared and panicked seeing words like "groomer", "innocent", "guilty", "predator" and others being thrown around i didnt even want to try viewing it for myself. but now that i have and now that ive talked to others, this entire situation reads as a bad break up more than anything else, not a strange manipulative abuse of power where mutuality is nonexistent.

overall this entire situation was framed so horrifically and i was tearing myself apart so much about feeling confused, it genuinely did not hit me the extent of just how deeply unserious it was until a friend of mine told me how they went out with their normal, most unchronically online friend, told the situation in the most objective way possible, and they literally laughed in their fucking face 😭 i also started thinking about real life instances of this happening like if it was another cc, a random tiktoker, an actor and realizing i literally would not care--and significantly less people who are as up in arms as they are would care too. and that ignores the fact that it was ONLINE, compared to in-person where whatever power dynamic could exist would be amplified by a thousand.

this entire thing is just so entirely subjective and if your personal opinions and values find this all shitty, absolutely no one is going to try and say to feel otherwise, at least not me. but to completely ignore that its just that--personal--values and opinions that determine how you view this, and act as though it is objectively some morally bankrupt, impossible to understand, predatory situation just feels reactionary and disconnected from real life at best and just shitty and even virtue signalling at worst. and also dont get me started on what some of you twisted that charity event in technos memory into because fucking shame on you, but ill make a separate post on that later maybe.

this really isnt meant to be a form of "dream defense" because if i was taught anything this past week it was that the way i connected so much of my own conscience to my ability to defend dream and his pr was and is entirely unhealthy, and it was all a wake up call--just not towards dream. the level of miserable agony i experienced, not even mostly because of what dream did, but because i felt like i couldnt DEFEND it, was dangerously all consuming and i dont want that anymore. its just not a healthy way to engage with any media, the need to constantly justify it in every single instance, and especially not with a cc. i want to be able to just see drama and controversy ride out and not have it feel so utterly all consuming, even if i do choose to comment on it. im making this statement bc like i said, it really sucked to feel like there was no public voice i completely agreed with and i realized that i could do that role if i wanted. and honestly, its just been very cathartic for me to write all of this out after feeling like an echo chamber of other peoples thoughts and my own grief the last week.

this community disappointed me in many ways, both the freaks who jumped on any baseless thread disproving amandas claims, dissected her behaviour, was very strangely dream defensive and chose to do all that shit PUBLICLY too. but also the people who chose to use this as an opportunity to act in the most reactionary strange ways that felt so virtue signal-y it was nauseating. i know the people who held/hold the views i did also dealt with the guilt and fear i did too, and thus no one was willing to so deal with the mortifying ordeal of a) sorting through these thoughts and b) saying them in any kind of public space even with just close friends, but ESP on a public blog. i mean, that was literally me. but it really fucking sucked to have just these two extremely polarizing and extremely isolating opinions be the only available voices 😭 my thoughts are getting very rambley now and i apologize, but i hope my points are getting across.

this is already insanely long, but ill start wrapping up. if you disagree with me, obviously thats fine. like i said, this was never made with the objective to change peoples minds which arguably was what my usual dream discourse essays was meant for sometimes. this was made for me and for this specific perspective to have light for anyone who wants or needs it. all i hope is that if you do come out of this with anything, is some form of awareness. of either real life, your opinions or even just yourself i dont know.

i really did love my time on tumblr so so fucking much. and i loved the people here even more so. i think i owe it all to you guys and just my blog itself to say my thoughts on shit, no matter if any of you agree or not. plus i mean if this flops i surely never have to face the consequences if im leaving anyways so peepoClap. thank you all so much for everything, and if you made it this far, thank you so much for taking the time to read my bullshit. i dont know if after this ill still leave, but regardless, it feels wrong to not make some homage to such an impactful place in my life. impactful people too :)

thank u all for reading again, and good fucking night !

[marsixm]

hm.... i finally finished crystal kingdom n i got some Thots

[metalempire]

so for another original topic i havent done to death already i’m going to talk about how xenoblade 2 isnt as good as the original. big shocker i know but stay with me here. alright so now all the anime losers with shit taste have left that means only people who’ve played xc1 and have taste remain, with that out of the way i think its safe to say that no one is spoiled massively by knowing fiora dies in the like the first hour of the game not too long after joining the party. now this scene is one of many great ones in the game, and one of the best at that, the song “engage the enemy” is practically made for this scene and honestly this game’s soundtrack dwarfs its’ sequel pretty handily there too. the execution of this scene is what sets it up so well though, fiora isn’t expected to die initially since she’s a playable character and fits nicely into your earlygame party trio, with shulk as the break setup and support, reyn as the tank and toppler, and fiora with the quick arts that play off of that topple. so losing her permanently as that particular party member and playstyle is already a blow you feel as the player, but also isn’t expected from the typical rpg. not only this but the story up to this point and even the gameplay has been building up the monado and its’ ability to defeat the mechon, as you never play any situation where you lose holding it, it eventually damages dunban due to its’ power, but that just sells you more on how incredible the monado must be, and then shulk gets it and can use it perfectly and gets visions to avoid lethal situations. the monado is now yours as a player, and it’s getting even stronger and revealing new powers to you. the first boss appears and rather than being a demonstration of the monado’s power by asking you to use what you’ve learned so far with it in conjunction with your arts, instead the game does something you don’t expect (again) by making the first boss a forced loss scenario, where metal face cannoy be damaged by the monado, and wrecks your shit for a minute or two. you are made to feel as powerless and helpless about the situation as shulk, reyn and dunban do, and you are forced to watch in the same state as they are when fiora’s brave stance is ultimately quashed and she is brutally killed. you see the vision of her defeat, but to add insult to injury, you see her being killed, the blood on metal face’s claws, and the mechon going like scavengers to her corpse, while the party is unable to do anything about it. it’s heartwrenching as a scene and leaves an impact like no other on the player and the characters. 

now to sort of emphasise what this scene does so well in shock value and using gameplay and story together to immerse you in the events unfolding, lets look at a similar scene with a somewhat similar outcome from xenoblade 2, the true forced loss scenario of that game, jin’s awakening and the subsequent capturing of pyra/mythra. this scene takes place later on in the game, and is the main goal of the antagonists anyway, so seeing it as a possibility was always in the player’s mind, but also that the game itself has complete dissonance in its story and gameplay. boss fights like akhos’ first encounter play out in the gameplay that you win, then you seemingly lose in the cutscene, all that effort being meaningless. you drain a boss’ health to zero, but the resulting story acts like the gameplay just didn’t happen. what should’ve been a forced loss scenario doesnt play out properly and doesn’t catch you off guard properly like with fiora dying, but just seems like the game doesn’t know what it wants you to feel. an earlier example is defeating morag in gormott, then the party flees her rather than beating her like they did in gameplay. the game does a poor job of setting up a proper outcome based on gameplay, if you lose in these fights you have to do them over, even if the outcome in cutscene is the same as if you hadn’t beaten them. so when jin presents a forced loss scenario, its not built up properly, doesn’t subvert expectations as much, on account of you expecting that regardless of how well you do in a fight, there’s a good chance the gang loses anyway, so when jin just transforms out of nowhere and overpowers the gang and expositions his abilities to you in real time, rather than leaving it a mystery like metal face does, you don’t feel as helpless since you know his powers are just anime bullshit and that the game keeps defeating you all the time in cutscenes anyway. the aegis’ strength doesn’t get as built up as the monado since the game keeps tearing it down in every cutscene and downplays it, only using mythra’s awakening in uraya to really show it off. there’s also the lack of an impact in regards to the fact that losing pyra and mythra is more of an inconvenience than anything, and you know that you’ll get them back since that becomes an established goal, and that you don’t lose the main character’s weapon, or the heroine(s) of the story. 

fiora returning as a mechon hybrid is a genuine surprise since you see her die outright early on and the story is about avenging her death. again, the player is less involved in the scene where fiora dies, rather than with the scene where the aegis is taken from rex, since the game has built dissonance rather than harmony between gameplay and story, and its presentation of its antagonist is harder to take as seriously when he’s expositing his fucking powers to you as he uses them to effortlessly win, when previously akhos did the same thing with obrona throughout his encounters in uraya and explaining specifically why You Can’t Beat me, as opposed to xord and metal face who, once they speak, allude to the fact that You Can’t Beat Me, but leave it as a mystery for the player and party to unravel instead, making learning their weakness and defeating them feel more satisfying than getting a sudden power upgrade to match the anime bullshit. i mean, what sounds more possible to overcome with the right knowledge of said ability, having the blood of homs to prevent the monado from damaging the face units, or Literally Being Able To Manipulate All Elementary Particles AND Move Past The Speed Of Light. xenoblade 2 just becomes more absurd than the original, and as a result its story really has less of an overall impact on the player experiencing it, and doesn’t truly immerse them in that experience. 

also vandham dying has like zero impact on the player compared to fiora. fiora had a genuine spot in the team up to that point, whereas vandham not only gets his blade taken by rex later on, but he cant resonate other blades anyway, so he has only one option, so he’s already outclassed by rex as your attacker, since anchor shot is just that valuable earlygame. and by this point you already had a full team good to go. so his death is not a good counter to this post either, since it barely has any impact and outside of roc and the garfont mercenaries side content, it is never acknowledged in the story ever again and has barely any bearing on the rest of the plot, as well as being followed up by a fucking Mythra Being A Weird Tsundere scene that gives some strong fucking whiplash

[tumblunni]

Ehh I mostly Really do not like what they did with marvel Loki, and then the movie version in particular. I’ve heard that the recent threequel kinda hits the reset button on the entire thing and reestablishes him and like he actually has a decent brotherly relationship and gets redeemed now?? So like woo! I’m happy for you! EVen if i’m still mostly not interested in this character!

BUT ANYWAY SORRY WHAT WAS I ORIGINALLY MAKING THIS POST ABOUT WHUPS

What i mean is im not particularly interested in marvel loki in any way, but i always thought his movie plot was a really interesting and sad idea. That they TOTALLY WASTED! tho really it’d be wasted even if they pulled it off perfectly cos i still could not get over the general dissonance of ‘wtf loki wasnt his brother he was like twice his age and knew his dad before he was born, and also he was never half anything and always knew he was a jotunn’. Srsly its fuckin weird that in mythology he never had any magic excuse for working with the aesir, he just.. decided to. And he was good. he was one of the good guys. he turned bad later and he was always a morally nebulous comedic trickster man but he was never fuckin... im only here cos i was raised as a human guy. and also im somehow younger than my best friend’s son who was kinda my nephew i guess. srsly he just.. was a giant who.. chose to switch sides. its not a hard plot to do. why did they even feel they had to change that... tho also incidentally historically jotunn didnt mean giant, it was more like ‘chaos spirit’ in practise. loki being like a 4 foot tall angry gremlin wasnt particularly unusual in the mythos so its funny how out of place he is in the marvelverse actually. and also they weren’t all ice but had fire and ice as basically races or countries, and loki was never really stated which one he was, or if he was some sort of neutral aligned one or there were other elemental types that just never got a starring role in any particular story. or in some interpretations the vanir are considered to perhaps be a form of elemental god too, though that’s just an attempt to nail down how exactly they were meant to be different from aesir. Though there are some textbooks that describe loki’s name as coming from fire, that was actually brought up in-universe during one of his adventures where he fought an evil clone of himself named logi, which is the one that actually means fire. and also there was utgard-loki who was an entirely unrelated rival of his, apparantly just because they had the same name and he was pissed about it? anyway other-loki tricked loki into fighting logi who was actually a magic clone made from wildfire, who was by definition unbeatable in eating contests cos fire consumes everything. Also thor had to outdrink a magical ocean guy and got his ass kicked by a grandma that was actually death in disguise and somehow ‘nobody can fight death’ quite literally meant she was a master of suplexes. Also a cat. A cat was there. And they slept in a giant glove. It was a fun myth cos for once thor and loki got their asses kicked and it was kind of a moral about pride and stuff. Damn that other-loki and his gary oak role in my loki life..!!

SORRY SORRY IM GOING OFFTOPIC AGAIN sorry, mythology stuff was kinda my special interest as a kid and i got stupidly pissy about ‘innacuracy’ in something that wasn’t even claiming to be an adaptation, more of a ‘vaguely inspired by the thing’ I guess...

anyway WHAT I ORIGINALLY MEANT LOL is that ‘he never knew he was a monster thing and was raised as a human and got super sad when he found out’ is wildly innacurate and OOC to fuckin everything about this proud-as-fuck magic man who walked around being Aggressively Gay And Trans Erryday and calling odin out on his shit even when he knew he was gonna get his ass kicked. srsly loki never being able to stop being Happy About Himself is kinda what started his actual turn to evil in the myths, he got drunk and couldnt stop telling crude sex jokes and making up dumb rumours about how he was better than all the gods and banged all their wives and also their wives’s husbands btw. And odin was like Hey That Was Even More Loki Than Usual and murdered all loki’s children and locked him in the centre of the earth having his eyes constantly melted out with acid and regrowing and also a snake was eating him and also he was pinned with his dead son’s own guts as chains and also lets punish the wife who wasnt even there and tie her up too forever hugging her screaming hubby and trying to hold the acid out of his eyes with a comically small cup and her increasingly scarred skeleton hands. Because he was rude at a party. Then loki turned evil when he finally escaped and Hey I Think He Might Have Had One Or Two Reasons. Mythology is kinda fucked up sometimes, lol!

... ANYWAY WHERE WAS I, SORRY

loki being a lil emo teen dude who’s sad cos o no i am a monster and my dad never loved me = innacurate, and less interesting than many very interesting things of these myths that i wish they did instead

BUT

if it wasnt a weird attempt to change an already good story then it would be a good story yo!

like srsly there were a lot of particular elements to it that were really distinctive visually and i can see why they ended up being way more popular in fanart even if they were practically never shown again. It was a good idea to give the jotunn more of a distinct physical appearance from the Big Ol Protagonist Gods Of Generic Humanness, that like the one thing they made more accurate than the comics! And the funky blue look is really cool cos its like a fantasy equivelant of aliens, and like.. a cool lookin deep blue that isnt quite the cliche you’d expect for ice guys. And it looks nice with glowy red eyes and those weird patterns like theyre born with tattoos or somethin! And it was an interesting change from the comics to NOT have loki be a half jotunn or anything, he was just a regular jotunn orphan who was ambiguously either spared by odin as the last survivor of the war or stolen away from his real family as some sort of messed up trophy. But just like I Guess They’re Celtic Mythology Changelings Too so he magically ended up looking like a human cos he thought he was one? Which fits pretty cool with his particular magic powers being illusion-based, even though everybody else is all ice guys. (which is funnily enough also myth accurate to how NO OTHER JOTUNNS EVER SEEM TO SHAPESHIFT, GEEZ. srsly its not clear whether its some loki unique power or just a big ol plot hole XD)

And then it added a really cool visual aspect to have basically this guy who was under a glamour his entire life and didnt know it, and gets a really kinda existentially horrifying moment of finding out his face isnt his face?? srsly that was so messed up! you’re standing there and you know this is The Poorly Explained McGuffin That Somehow Powers Up Jotunns I Guess and you’re “dad this is your last chance to stop lying” and HE CONTINUES TO LIE ANYWAY but then whoops u touched the thing and I Guess You Really Was Monsters Poor guy...

BUT THEN MY PONT IS LIKE its so wasted!!! none of that really comes up again after that scene!! and we arent supposed to be sympathetic to loki and he’s just the bad guy and all we get is a twist that he did all his bad guy stuff with the unexpected motive of actually NOT betraying his father but just leading the jotunns to take over asgard and then killing them all and somehow faking being a hero so everyone would accept him back, even though nobody except the dad even knew he was a jotunn and indicated they were gonna kick him out and also why did you suddenly want to murder your brother out of a poorly established jealousy you apparantly always had yet also you still love him and just... uhh?? how was any of this plot meant to work out, dude. Srsly I am SO glad to hear they made his characterization more consistant in the sequels but i really hated the first movie so much i’ll probably never watch them lol. and did we really need to wait like half a decade to get some proper sibling dynamic? im so grossed out by how all the fans of the first movie shipped them and pulled that weird ‘not blood related’ excuse...

WHOOPS IM RAMBLING AGAIN

anyway it sucks that: * we never get to see Cool Blue Monster Loki Design ever again in the film * he’s suddenly evil and does a bunch of shit that doesnt even make sense given the motivation of Sad Because Monster Lies * we dont even get any emotional continuation or conclusion on that one big sad reveal scene that looked like it had so much plot potential * ALL THE JOTUNNS ARE JUST EVIL. At the same time that the film tries to make a moral about loki being bad for wanting to kill them all EVEN THOUGH THATS WHAT THOR DID AT THE BEGINNING * srsly the film starts off with thor being a huge jerk and then he doesnt become more sympathetic until way after loki suddenly turned unsympathetic so we have this void in the middle where we cant root for anyone. and it makes you wonder why they even bothered with SUCH a powerful sympathetic scene for this poor dude! * all the jotunns are evil and just agree to murder all of valhalla for no reason and also none of them even talk except Biological Dad Man, who is also super super evil and doesnt love loki cos Hey We Cant Have Any Complexity Here * also they mixed up the names and called him by myth loki’s mom’s name which I suppose could work if this was the same character who transitioned or something, but this was at a point back when marvel tried to cover up all references to genderfluidity being a literal superpower of loki’s. also they didnt show him having a mum at all and all the female characters were kinda poorly handled so yeah. * loki for no fuckin reason stays loyal to odin even though he just learned he was kidnapped as a kid and has been raised to want to kill his own home village like seriously what the fuck * last minute out of nowhere backstabbing of personalityless evil jotunn dad and yknow.. like the million bazillion jotunns who were all (as far as we know) super happy to have their presumed dead prince come back and perfectly nice to him as a family. like seriously could you not have at least established that they were jerks to him in.. some way? WE SAW SO MUCH OF ODIN BEING A TERRIBLE DAD UNTIL NOW. And he was supposed to be sympathetic! and his last scene up until now was being called out on lying to his adopted son for a bazillion years and the question of his goddamn motives was left wide open so we dont KNOW if he was sympathetic or not, geez! if you cant bother to establish why loki should side with odin then at least establish why he should want to murder his entire biological family right after they ACCEPTED HIM INTO THEIR HOME. They were shown being evil in that they wanted to invade asgard, yeh, but also your protagonist’s main goddamn struggle is about wanting to invade jotunheim and like apparrantly everyone’s being doing this for a bazillion years and there’s not even the slightest hint who started the damn war in the first place... * Don’t kill jotunns thats bad, loki is bad for doing that. But also all jotunns are bad and we can kill them anyway cos they invaded first. Yknow.. due to loki tricking them specifically to kill them. And them believing him cos he’s Kinda The King’s Presumed Dead Son And Seriously Why Does Nobody Talk One Way Another About Whether They’re Happy Or Not That He’s Back * did loki and incorrectly named king guy even have a single sentence together that wasn’t ‘mwahaha we shall Plot Device to Evil Invade’? not like five seconds of ‘fuck i missed my son’ or ‘its awkward to bond again with a son that grew up without me’ or even ‘what was it like to be trapped with our mortal enemies that we all assume are evil and kidnapped you’  * LIKE ACTUALLY WHY WAS THAT NEVER BROUGHT UP? the jotuns didnt fuckin know that loki got adopted by a guy and raised as a human! did any of this make sense from their perspective?? were they not even slightly suspicious when he didnt tell them where he’d been for all those years and also spent all his screentime staying in human form and never showing off that cool special effect evr again?? didnt anyone think maybe he was just an asgardian lying to them? and did nobody recognise him as the son of their mortal enemy and think that was a way bigger reason he might be lying, or even a reason not to trust him even if he was indeed a jotunn with an identity complex...? or hell, did he NOT EVEN TELL THEM HIS BIG BACKSTORY MOTIVE??? did they just think Hey Some Random Asgardian Wants To Betray His Own Kind, That’s Not Suspicious In Any Way? i mean at least that would explain about why Dad 2; The Redaddening literally never mentioned being his damn dad or showed any emotion except Generic Evil... * Anyway none of this matters cos we killed all the jotunns in a justified way even though killing the jotunns is why loki is the bad guy, and then we do some sort of magical segregation power to cut off the path between the worlds so like.. the 5% of not dead guys over there can never appear again and we can have some sort of weird sense of moral high ground. Also loki falls off a cliff and dies, but obviously its a fakeout for the sequel, The End

THINGS THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN REALLY COOL TO DO WITH THIS PLOT INSTEAD MAYBE: * like fffuckign show goddamn Loki Real if you bothered to invent a new design for the jotunns looking not like humans in the first place... * hey actually explore the kind of existential horror stuff of finding out your preconceived notions about some other realm’s citizens being Inherantly Evil Monsters are all wrong and also you were one of them all along * also like.. actually commit to the plot of them NOT being Inherantly Evil Monsters. like seriously i guess loki was the only not bad one cos he was raised as an asgardian?? and then he immediately switches sides as soon as his orignal nature is revealed, so i guess not. >_> * like man there’s fifty bazillion ways you could have handled trying to stop a war between two sides where neither is evil, and like seriously the dude who’s part of both works could have been the symbol of peace who did that... * also minor note but why is every other jotunn identical and never speaks except loki and Evildad Plotdevice, thats really fuckin stupid * srsly imagine if they had any form of established culture or civilization or anything instead of just Standing In A Field, Being Vaguely Menacing, With No Houses Even Nearby. like srsly their whole world is just generic jrpg dungeon tundras i guess... * imagine all the plots that could come from Not Villain Plot Loki getting to go visit this other country of the monster folks and get a first hand experience on how the citizens live and how they’re not just all enemy soldiers with no damn personality or motive beyond Bad Hatewrong The Anger Things. imagine the fuckin complex plot sads that could come from if he was actually WELCOMED by his birth family and had a dad that had been mourning him for like thirty fuckin years and just wanted to keep him happy and safe. You could have eighty more angsts if the plot of those angsts is Oh Fuck I Was So Wrong About These People And Stood By And Supported This War That Was Killing Them, And Am I A Bad Person Because I Only Found Sympathy For Them After Discovering A Blood Relation? * and like you could still have bad guys, you could have bad guys on both sides who are perpetuating the war and both have to be stopped so this peace can happen. And you can have not bad guys who were suckered in by war propeganda into working for these bad guys, and you have to try and make them reach the same realization that poor loki had forced upon him. * and like.. what if they did explore that one weird throwaway line about not knowing if odin’s motives were sympathy for the last survivor of a massacre, or a desire to steal a kid as a trophy of that same massacre? like maybe odin actually was a war hungry monster back then and his intentions were cruel in kidnapping this kid, but he realized what a horrible mistake he’d been making with his life when he began to see the kid grow up and have just as much of a complexity of emotion and potential for goodness as any of his own people. And the reason he never told loki his past was not because of Plot Device but because of shame for his original motives in this whole sad affair, and guilt in feeling that he could never undo what happened. like ‘oh god maybe the boy will be happier if he never knows he had all the stuff he lost because of me’. And thats also why he could seem distant like he doesnt love him, its feeling like he doesnt deserve to experience this kid’s love after he’s coe to realize the true atrocity of what he did to him.. * and also i dunno maybe the two dads could get At Least One Scene of Actually Talking Together and resolve some damn things... * could even be sad if odin like.. wants biological-dad to kill him so he can atone for his sins, and loki goes bursting in at the last second like WAIT NO ITS A TRAP HE’S TRYING TO COMMIT SUICIDE DAMMIT and then we find some way to resolve a plot that isnt Action Scenes And All The Bad Guys Die A Lot * also fuck i dont know if u want a ship of monster dude and not monster dude then do the two dads instead of a guy and his adopted brother, thats just gross * also MORE SCREENTIME FOR THE CUTE AND COOL MONSTER LOKI DESIGN. like yo you cant have any form of plot about accepting yourself unless you show his true form like.. more than once. as far as i know it never appears in the sequels even after they give him his super overdue redemption plot :/

^ Dat’s Pretty Neat

srsly it sucks that this is even the only damn screenshot i could get of it like fuckin 0.4 seconds of one damn movie, never shown again

its funny how just by googling it you’ll get like fifty bazillion edited screenshots of what if he stayed that way for the rest of the film and also the sequels and also a bazillion fanarts and fan jotunn ocs and like seriously fuckin EVERYONE likes the cool blue elves design, marvel, use it more often!!

look at this really great fanart by this artist here I can’t say any opinion on the rest of their art tho cos they seem to be one of those people that ship him with his brother.. sigh... >_> still drawing terrible ships elsewhere doesnt make your other art any less talented! thank u for blessing us with Casual Monster Man Knows He Is Cute BECAUSE MARVEL IS TOO COWARD TO DO IT

[whifferdills]

“World Enough and time” quicktakes:

fuck dudes what if the Xmas special is a “Caves of Androzani” thing where the Dr is basically dying the whole time. that'd explain the dramatic 'noooooo', bc this Dr Who i feel isn't a 10 Dr sort of, fuck you i need THIS ME to live, but in the context of 'i can't do the regeneration tango rn i have work to do' it makes sense

god i love generational ships. this ep doesn't quite nail it but i love that SF trope

MISSY. who is Doctor Who, with her plucky assistants/expendables. i am in love. "Think of the age gap" fuckin

"Nardole, do something non-irritating," says Dr Who, eating snacks. all my Twelvedole headcanons are basically canon now

"Time Lords are friends, everything else is cradle-snatching." you could do a meta on the Time Lord take on intimacy using that line alone.

Friends above all else. And the Dr and Missy are very, very old friends

"You're probably handsome, aren't you. Well congratulations on your relative symmetry." I love Missy ok

"And if I'm in the shower, just bring me some beans on toast. That's....that's roughly human flirting, right?" MISSY.

her accent ramping up on "this ridiculous exercise" right i just really love Missy

Dr Who's real name is Dr Who. the meta nods, i'm livin. "I'm cutting to the chase baby, I'm streamlining, I'm saving us ac-tu-al minutes." *dab* M I S S Y

"Are you eating?" yes, yes they are. luv this hungry boy

Nardole was Blue, once. what the fuck is Nardole

"Is this the emotion you call...spanking" holy shit Missy please i cant

i love how the Dr's speech is just cut off, it reminds me of - i think it's an Indiana Jones? where the one dude is like *dramatic sword flourishing* and the other dude just straight-up shoots him

like i know it'll end up ok but BILL NO. this moment doesn't quite feel earned - like maybe if more of the writers had really used her? but it kind of just feels shitty and cheap. horrifying, but it woulda landed better if she'd been more present beforehand. see also: how "Heaven Sent" woulda worked better if Clara hadn't been fridged or off away wherever i really wish we'd had more 12&Bill moments. i love what we get here, just that shoulda happened all season

nice kitchen. looks like an Aalto-Shaam and a salamander, plus fryer and misc. decent set-up for a college cafeteria.

"What's so special about her?" "I don't know." "Yes you do." "Are you having an emotion?" See THIS is what i want this Team TARDIS to be and i'm so mad we're only getting it now

Twelvedole is canon tho look @ these 2 obnoxious boys

and fuck that scene w/ 12 and Bill just chatting about crushes i wish we'd had more of that

i feel like 12 has eaten more on camera than any other dr who, i am here for this hungry boy who drops chips on their lap

"she was my man-crush - I think she was a man back then" all the gender-misc sexuality-misc stuff yes YEs like sure it's clumsy but it's CANON

"but you still call yourselves Time...Lords." "Yeah shut up." seriously why did we not get more of 12 and Bill hanging out

the PACT to see ALL OF THE STARS anyway Best Enemies is real

i love Bill admitting that she's scared, and doing the thing anyway. Bill in a nutshell right there

oh GOD the body-horror of the Cybermen and the VOICES uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhghghgwaghfgejf nope

"Wait for me" oh way to use hope to fuck someone up again. why, why dude

on first watch i did not at all suspect that this dude is the Master in disguise, i’m a dum-dum

so this hurts more on re-watch

and after input from smarter people - the disguise the Master uses is sort of...like it edges into a hinky area. dunno if it's anti-semetic as such (im not an expert, just it feels fucky on second viewing) but it does flirt with those tropes a lot and w h y would you go there

ffffffuck the converted people just screaming out best they can that they're in pain, and then being silenced. this is for me probs the most directly horrifying thing DW has done since, idk, "Midnight"? been a while, anyway. fuck, dudes

so i know it's the Master now but i do really love the relationship Bill has with Master-In-Disguise. it's a trick, a trap, but it also feels almost...genuine. they have a dynamic, Bill believes in it and i'd be almost be willing to believe the Master does too, despite themselves

Nurse Ratched continues to terrify audiences. the self-assured evil-nurse trope, like. is it cheap? yes. is it fucking me up? also yes. (my favorite aunt is a nurse, i’ve had a lot of - like not good experiences, but experiences where the nurses saved the day best they could; i love nurses but ALSO this trope ok ok ok aw geez)

the body-horror in this episode continues to be OFF THE CHARTS like this is as if someone asked me 'what deeply upsets you' and then they made an episode about it holy fuck

why's Dr Who fucking around for so long if they already know the bottom is much faster and Bill's down there for years like fuck off, be succinct, cough it up. 12 is every waiter i've ever dealt with as expo like - just FUCKING SAY WHAT YOU NEED don't dick around

i do really love Bill here. that mix of needing to leave and wanting to stay, or vice versa

V E N U S I A N  A K I D O. they've got hidden talents and hidden arms

the graphics in this episode are nice that black hole is nice somebody put some work in there

speaking of the assets - Murray Gold nearly on a Phillip Glass tip here. that sort of dissonant orchestral thing. you could rescore this with the soundtrack to Koyaanisqatsi, easily

god that Cyberman voice is...so upsetting. again, always. fuck that shit. this does have a big Spare Parts vibe, with the dying world trying to save itself and the semi-volunteers. it's not quite as emotionally crushing as Spare Parts but it does angle towards that whole...yknow

"aw, sorry mate, guess what I'm about to do" like even knowing what he is, what this situation is, this is such a pure Bill moment and i love it

DONT U DARE DO ANYTHING TO BILL I SWER

but fuck dudes this is ultra horrifying this is so bad and i like it bc i'm confident it'll end up ok but god oh god oh no Bill i wish that hadn’t happened

Missy/Master sure is a thing. i'm really hoping Missy is stronger than that now, better than that now

fuck my emotions are all over the place

A  M O N D A S I A N  C Y B E R M A N

that Master reveal was straight out of Classic Who

"You've met the ex" / "I waited for you" oh shit oh no

NEXT TIME: my soul dies, everything is bad, aw fuck

[sabraeal]

Prompt: Obi and Shirayuki stumble across a village where the people speak in riddles and shed their clothing from dark until dawn in a trance-like state. Shirayuki has to figure out what is going on because now Obi is running around naked with them

Lyrias has not brought tribute for months.

“Is that odd?” Shirayuki asks when they stop at mid-day, lettingEpona rest. She wanders some steps off before she speaks, splashing her facewith the cool water from the pool. Although her stout-hearted mare has come totolerate Zen and much of his entourage, she has never quite warmed to Obi. Evennow she shies in the clearing, feeling his presence.

Obi, tucked firmly into a willow’s shade, replies, “What doyou think?”

She ducks her head, flushing. His tone is as conversationalas it usually is, but it is hard not to imagine impatience coloring his words,to hear clipped edges in his accent. She thinks to apologize, to explain howeasy it is to forget, but she knowsthat he would like that even less.

“I doubt Izana would suffer disrespect from his tenants,”she says instead. “He is fair, but not merciful.”

He turns one of his wicked blades in his hand, long fingersdeftly moving in a way that had she tried, would have resulted in significantlyfewer digits. “Few of his kind are.”

“Even fewer I would call fair,” she says with some measureof censure, “save of face.”

He grins at that. “True enough, Miss.”

The days grow shorter and colder as they wind their waynorth. They follow good practice at Shirayuki’s insistence and keep the riverto the west of them. Obi doesn’t protest so much a whine, mouth set in a petulant pout, calling it a useless human superstition. It’sserved her well all these years and she sees no reason to abandon it. Itclearly makes him restless, edgy, but since Tanbarun that has been the rulerather than the exception. She doesn’t precisely disregard him, but she’slearned often enough to take a sidhe’s word with a grain of salt.

One noon she comes to rest by the river’s side, and when shedraws Epona to drink, it is frozen.

“Is that –?” She stops herself, takes a moment to rephrase.“This isn’t normal.”

“No, Miss,” he says, closer than she expects and worryinglyserious. “It isn’t.”

They come to the village late in the evening, the sunalready setting behind the trees. Frost sets the brown grass white, and as theywalk toward the light, it’s as if Shirayuki is walking on glass for the way ittinkles beneath her. She might as well have bells on.

Obi, of course, makes no sound.

He’s tense, his shoulders a hard, forbidding line besidehers. His muddled magic buzzes in her ear, rattling with agitation like teeth in a skull. Folk take one look at the both of them – two hooded figures, onedark, one light – and close their doors. A mother catches the gold glint of Obi’sgaze and hurries her children inside, mouth a worried line.

They act as if heis the threat, but Shirayuki feels something deeper, something darker press against her skin here. Thedanger here does not come from without, but within.

“Mistress!” calls out a sandy-haired boy, breaking throughthe thinning crowd. “Your cloak is Cunning green, is it not?”

She’s surprised he can pick out the hue in the dying light. “Yes.I am kept by the court of Clarines.”

His eyes grow wide. “Come with me then, lady. There’s othersyou should talk to.”

The boy’s name is Kirito, and his uncle is the Cunning Manof this village.

“One of them, at least,” he explains eagerly. “He has a fewstudents under him here.”

A few turns out tobe an understatement; there’s no less than ten students that make up hispractice. Shirayuki’s never seen such a thing, not even when she lived closerto the city.

“He’s gone missing,” says his most senior apprentice, Suzu.He’s a handful of years older than her, with hooded eyes that give him analmost laconic air even as he imparts this dire news. “A month ago, I’d reckon.We’ve been trying to hold things together since then.”

“It’s like trying to build a house with balsa and bootlace,”one of the others volunteers, a girl Obi’s age that calls herself Yuzuri. “It’sjust not enough, not to keep up with as much as it’s spreading.”

“And there’s no physical reason for it?” Shirayuki asks,gaze sweeping around the sickroom. Three dozen able-bodied men and women lay onits floor, packed side-to-side, making no sound save for the harsh noise oftheir breath. “No grain left to wet, or rot in the well?”

Suzu shakes his head. “No, they just drop right in thefields like this, and only rise when the sun sets. If we get one to talk, it’sall in riddle and questions.”

“Riddles and questions?” Shirayuki stares at the endlessfield of patients. She does not need to turn to know how Obi is looking at her. “Do you mind if I try something?”

Shirayuki kneels at a patient’s side, trying hard not totouch. She doubts its communicable, but there’s no need to risk exposure.

“Tell me,” she says, voice level and stern, “what happenedto you.”

The man merely stares at the beams of the ceiling, unseeing.She notes that his pupils are blown; it is almost certainly a trance of somemeasure.

“Sir,” she begins again, “what has happened?”

“What is it you wish you could divine, cunning-child?” heasks, voice sing-song and cruel. “Do you wish to dance the mummer’s steps? Can you keep up, cunning-child?”

Her gaze flicks to Obi; seeing the way the muscle in his jawjumps. So it is as she thought.

Ah, how cursed it can be to be right.

“Do you –” Shirayuki hesitates, mulling the words around inher mouth. “You know what this is.”

Obi leans back against the sill of the window. Yuzuri foundthem a room to sleep in for the night, though it only had one proper bed. Whenhe’d balked at sharing, she’d found Obi a straw-stuffed mat to roll out on thefloor. Even now he eyed it warily; she doubted he’d do much but pretend tosleep until he could sneak out to the roof.

“I think we both do,” His gaze slants toward her. His eyesglow oddly in the moonlight, and his magic feels different tonight, thicker.The thousand layers jitter against each other, like dissonant chimes in thewind.

“Geasa.” It sits heavily between them. He must have knownshe suspected, even if they had never spoken of it. “Like yours.”

His mouth splits in a knife slash of a smile. “No, Miss,” hesays, amused, “not like mine. But a geas nonetheless.”

“Do you know what it is?”

His eyebrows lift in a mild sort of surprise. “Besides tolay abed all day and dance naked in the moon’s light?”

She flushes. Of course he would latch onto that part. “I mean its purpose. Or it’smaker?”

He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Miss, but I’m no help withsuch things.” His mouth cocks at a corner. “I’m not like you, Miss. I’m afraid I’m just cursed.”

Shirayuki wakes when the moon is high, light spilling through the windows as if it’s day. Something sits wrong in her belly, makes her wake nervous and full of dread, her hands shaking where they fist in the coverlet. She wants to tell herself it’s merely her imagination, merely the remnants of a dream, but she knows better now, now that she’s been beneath the mounds and felt the kiss of eternal summer –

She rolls over to see that Obi’s mat is bare.

That should not set her heart pounding in her chest. There are a thousand reasons he may not be in bed – namely because she does not believe he sleeps unless it might cause her some small inconvenience – but his absence makes the pit in her belly clench. Something is wrong, she can feel it; more than just the wrongness the geas has laid over the village. Something is wrong with him.

The scent of his magic still lingers in the room, metallic and heavy. She doesn’t know how he bears so many geasa; whenever she brushes against them it is as if she is being weighed down with a hundred heavy chains, all hungry to squeeze the life from her. Even still they are layered delicately, like a house of cards, all purposeful, and if another were to be added on by a less deft hand –

She needs to find him.

She does not have to go far.

For a man who is usually so stealthy, his trail is easy to follow. She finds a glove just outside their door, and then another, a boot at the door…

It keeps going until she finds his belt in a bed of pansies, a few steps further his shirt –

“Obi!” she shrieks, rushing to him. His hands are already at the waist of his trousers. She’s too late to stop him, but just in time to see him pull just so at the closures so that the buttons spring free at once.

He was not joking all those months ago when he said small clothes ruined the line of his trouser.

“O-oh,” she gasps, desperate to look anywhere else. She had not – oh my –

He slides his hands under the material, working it down over his hips, and –

“Obi!” She grasps at his wrists, tries to pull his hands away, but his arms are steel. So is the rest of him, she notices, pressed so close to him. How had she never noticed this all the times she had stitched him back together?

“Obi, please, stop!” she begs, breathless. The movements of his arms drag her against him, and she feels it press into her belly – “What are you doing?”

Well, that was foolish.

“My lady,” he growls, his hands closing on her own wrists, holding them behind his back. One eyebrow arches, and his mouth cants in such a familiar way. “What would you like me to be doing?”

She tries to make words, but they fail her with him so close, with the scent of him – not his geasa, but him – filling her nose. “I –”

He bends, and she has no time to react before his mouth seals over hers, before heat thunders through her veins to throb between her legs. This is not – she does not – she has never –

Her hands curl against the muscles of his back; he is so strong, so much stronger than her, and she is helpless when his tongue swipes over the inside of her mouth, when it slides so tauntingly over her own. She can taste his magic on her tongue; copper and pine for before, the honeyed taste of Izana’s bonds, and – and –

A bitter bite of cold.

She pulls back. He lets her.

“Obi?” she says against his lips, her eyes only just open, meeting the dark sliver of his own gaze.

“Miss,” he rumbles, and she feels it through her palms, feels it where his hands rest on either side of her hips.

And then she feels cold all down her front and –

His pants drop into the grass. She valiantly refrains from looking at – at what is now so very hard to miss.

With one last grin, he lurches past her, going to join the other revelers, and she – she watches him leave. She’s only human.

The chill still lingers on her tongue. Time to fix this.

[traumabrained]

anonymous submission

i know my dad (not sure about my mom) was emotionally abusive, but i’m sort of struggling to figure out what was part of it and what wasn’t… like i don’t know what’s normal. this is something i’ve been thinking about tonight:

i’m autistic and dyspraxic as part of that, so i’m clumsy as hell. so i accidentally break things a lot. and i remember multiple times as a kid when i broke something that belonged to one of my parents, they would get mad (sometimes in a scary way sometimes not), then disappointed, and then they would be like “well i guess you can have this now”. i would keep it and it would make me feel guilty a lot. (they were low-cost things and we were relatively wealthy if that’s important) (also this is in the context of my dad guilt-tripping me a lottttt my whole life)

i also remember a couple times asking to keep things that i had accidentally broken (why throw it away if i can find another use for it?) and i got accused of breaking it on purpose so i could have it, or of being selfish. i had autistic hyperempathy real strong as a kid so i would never break something on purpose. i called my dad out on this (“selfish for not wanting it to go to waste, really?”) just a couple of times and he said he was joking. he always said he was joking about stuff.

he’s always made me out to be this selfish, spoiled brat–telling me and others that that’s who i was(/am?)–and he meant it, he was mean about it in private, i was scared of him, but any time he gets called out he says it’s a joke. but maybe i was just really spoiled as a kid and he was right? i dont know….

anyway i’m really sorry for rambling and i’m sorry if this is hard to understand, language is hard for me rn. i guess what i’m asking is what parts of this are normal and which aren’t? like there was a lot more to my dad’s emotional/physical abuse but this stuff in particular i’m not sure if it’s bad or just normal family dynamics… i’m sorry if i’m asking too much you can just ignore this. thank you reading this and for running this blog

-------------------

to preface i’m also autistic and sometimes my words come out like im angry but im not! im just trying to speak normal so if i sound angry or irritated, i’m absolutely not, i promise. and also, sometimes i speak in circles and it takes a really long time to say it correctly and is confusing, so if you don’t understand something i say here, then send me an ask saying “hey can you re-explain x” and i’ll do that!

what’s normal: out of everything you said, nothing is normal here. had you been poor, and broken something expensive, then it would have made a certain amount of sense for them to get a little angry, but then normally they would cool off and apologize for snapping because you obviously didn’t break the thing on purpose!

it’s normal for parents to get annoyed but its abnormal for them to punish you (beyond a time out or maybe confiscating a toy for a little bit) and then not apologize for snapping.

accusing you of breaking things on purpose: not normal and also incredibly mean

your dad saying it’s “just a joke” constantly: this is actually a fairly common abuse tactic. if he’s “just joking” then that means 1) any reaction you have is an overreaction and 2) he can say whatever he wants because it’s all just a big joke. it means you can’t get hurt by what he says and if you tell other people what he does, he always has a defense. it also means that if you try to call him out, then he’ll say youre overreacting and can’t take a joke. essentially, insulting/hurting you and then passing it off as a joke makes you look bad and him look like an innocent guy who was just making jokes. it also means that he can pull this shit whenever he wants.

it’s also a form of gaslighting--you hearing insults and him saying it was just a joke creates cognitive dissonance, which is what gaslighting is.

telling everyone that you are spoiled: that’s another abuse tactic. it paints you as the bad guy, as someone who’s mean and untrustworthy and selfish. and he does it behind your back (at least sometimes, presumably) so that you can’t defend yourself. and then when you actually meet the people he was talking to, they have this preconception of you as someone who is spoiled and terrible. and it’s incredibly hard to change that perception. so essentially he’s made sure everyone thinks you are bad. and now if you try to go to any of those people for help from him, they will think “i’m sure its not that bad, their dad said they were spoiled anyway!”

also--just a note but. even if you were spoiled (which you aren’t), whose fault would that be? your parents. because of course they make up problems with you that, if they were true, would be their fault anyway, and then blame them on you.

basically. yes, your dad is emotionally abusing you. he should not be doing any of these things. getting mad at you for breaking things when you clearly have a history of being clumsy and also clearly cant help it, suggests that he knows you’re not at fault, but completely doesnt care. because he wants a verbal punching bag, not a kid.

these are not normal family dynamics, not at all.

also, it feels important to add that your mother is not blameless here. i know you didn’t talk about her at all, and maybe she acts like a saint. but the fact is that she can see your father abusing you and then doesn’t do anything about it.

im sorry this is very long and possibly confusing, please feel free to message me for clarification!

[bridgetbites]

Bridget Bites : You Can Never Go Home Again

Q:

Hi, Bridget!  I've been reading your blog for quite a while now, and am really fascinated by how wise and understanding you are (not talking about your lifestyle, view on life and many other things that inspire me all the time!)  Knowing how your job involves a lot of travelling and adapting to new cultures, I wanted to tell you my story, since I'm struggling with understanding, what the place I should be able to call "home" is. My name is Aya and I originally come from Kazakhstan. It is now my 3rd year of doing my bachelor's degree abroad, and lately I've been having a lot of thoughts about who I really am and who I should be, which can sometimes be depressing. The thing is, trying to immerse myself into the new culture I am a part of at the moment, made me distant from my own home country. Not only physically, but also mentally.  So I feel like I am somewhere in between. I still can't get along with the people that surround me now and fail to fit in, but at the same time, when I go back home during holidays, I can see that I changed a lot, and that I no longer have a lot in common with my Kazakh friends from the past. Knowing that you had to leave you home country and settle in different parts of the world, I was wondering if you ever felt that way. And if you did, how did you deal with that? I hope the way I explained is not too confusing, and I would really appreciate getting a reply from you! Love, Aya

A:

Hi there! Thank you for your kind words 😀 means a lot to me. And boy can I relate to your situation.

When I first moved away from Perth I had just turned 17. I had graduated high school, and went to NYC to try out modeling. I did not anticipate just how much changes in you when you leave home for the first time, and how much of a dissonance that brings up inside of you when you return home. Thomas Wolfe had it right, you can never go home again.

I spent many years feeling homesick for a home that doesn’t exist anymore, and that only existed for a very short period of time. I was living in a country that was so foreign to me, (still is, but that’s ok) and traveling so much with complete strangers. I found it extremely hard to forge a connection with other humans, due to language and lifestyle barriers. And boy was I homesick. Whenever I would come home for a bit though, I was shocked at how much nothing and yet everything had changed. My friends were still the amazing people they are today, but there was something in me that had shifted. And I still cant really put my finger on what that was; but it caused me a lot of pain. The fact is that you can never go home again, but learning this and accepting this stops a lot of anguish and self-doubt.

You are in the painful process of developing your sense of self. Those first few years of independence are years of discovery and development of character, and I found that this process gets sped up when you are far away from your home culture. Especially when you are at odds with what society around you is saying. This can really hurt, but I believe that getting away from where you grew up, at least for a few years is integral for self-development. So hang in there.

What really helped me was letting go of any attempt to become my new culture. I set out to learn as much as I could, to make new friends from the USA, and to see and learn as much as I could; but at the end of the day, I will never be from the USA and subsequently will never feel 100 percent at home. I will always be Bridget, who grew up in Australia and is now living far away.

In reading your question, the idea of “who I should be” came up. In my experience, should is a nasty word. It bestows this idea that you are lacking, and that you shouldn’t trust your instincts. This isn’t great. Learning to throw away should’s is extremely freeing. By all accounts I should be more social, should be more mindful, should train harder, and should dress more stylishly. But the fact is that I am introverted and need my alone time, sometimes sleep wins out over meditation, when I train harder I get injured and lose all my energy, and I just don’t care enough about clothes to pay close attention to them. Society has all these ideas it throws onto you about who you should be, but I say fuck that. Listen to your intuition and do what feels right to you. Because you will never, ever live up to whatever the hell it is that society wants you to be.

Maybe to help with homesickness you could try to find a network of expat’s in your college. I’m sure that you aren’t the only person going through this – try finding other people from your part of the world. If there isn’t some sort of organization, create one. Just having a reminder of your traditional customs can help. Maybe you can all meet once a month, cook food from home and talk about life. When I discovered Tuckshop in NYC the sound of Aussie accents was so nice. I then met a group of Australians who really helped with the homesickness. It came at a time when I really needed it.

Finally, remember at the core of it all, you are still the person who grew up in Kazakhstan. And all your friends are still the good people you loved at that point in time. You will all develop very different interests and become very different people, but at the essence of it, you are all the same. There was something that connected you with them, and that is still there. Just let the natural rhythm of your friendship find its new level.

Also this whole experience gets so much easier with age. So hang in there. Everything will settle in you, and life becomes a lot easier to understand and rationalize.

You got this 😀

 Love,

Bridget

[isaacathom]

technically the logical extension o Rhia’s arc is for her to actually become the Champion in between the ‘first’ game and the ‘second’ but i also feel like that only makes sense if she took the e4 job willingly. which she ONLY does if you reconcile her and Elliot. if they dont reconcile, she takes the job out of a sense of duty, not because she explicitly wants it. she DOES, like she does want the job, because even if she hates authority on some level she still really wants to be a powerful trainer and protect people. but she didnt go into it with the right mindset. but if Rhia and Elliot sort out their problems, Rhia is able to deal with her issues with authority and take the e4 job with glee. she revels in it! she loves it! its the culmination of her childhood dreams! and this would allow her to become the champion in future, should Gwendolen allow it (bearing in mind Gwen is a fucking beast). but if Rhia still has that slight block, if she and Elliot didnt really deal with their problems ‘correctly’ (constructively?) then Rhia wouldnt have the drive. so even if Gwendolen said ‘hey Rhia you’re really strong. would you consider trying to become the Champion?’ she’d probably say no! even though, in her heart, she really wants to. but being unable to deal with Elliot properly is a block on that, for her.

its like. the thing with the split ending is that, even though Rhia becomes the e4 member no matter WHAT route you put her down (due to postgame content), Rhia doesn’t get to feel correctly about Elliot. with Reconcile, your actions prove to her that Elliot has changed, and she opens up to the possibility of sorting out their problems, which ultimately allows both of them to grow. not to move past, because Rhia’s life has been intimately shaped by his actions, but to grow with it instead of remaining stunted. but Split, your actions prove he HASNT changed, so she is closed to the idea. so when Elliot basically forces her to consider that he’s changed (by intervening in the confrontation with Felicity and nearly getting himself actually killed like straight up human murdered) its not right. she still ends up acknowledging that he has changed, but the context for that revelation changes EVERYTHING for her. because in reconcile, its mutal. in split, its one sided, and its elliots side, forcing what he wants onto her AGAIN. and even if Rhia doesn’t consciously acknowledge this (if she did she’d probably fucking shatter so its for the best), she’s aware of this dissonance on some level and it continues to hold her back.

the only way to properly reconcile these differences (in routes, not elliot/rhia, fuck) is for that hypothetical second game to recognise those choices you made, and change the formation of the whole elite 4 around it. like, in the ‘first’ game, the only change that is made is whether Elliot is in the e4 at all. Rhia will be in the e4 by the end regardless, but Elliot can be there for a while (at least once - you can take on the league during te postgame story though thats a weird choice for you to make as a player but i mean fuck it power to the player?). but in the second game, as an extension OF that choice, it changes whether Rhia is just an e4 member or if shes the champion, WHICH then extends to affecting Gwendolen, who would now just be a regular elite. and that seems like a lot of effort to make? though it would be kind of fun. the ‘default’ would be Rhia Champion because i make the rules.

though if i was going to allow the E/R routes to have that much of a consequence, then id have to make the same allowance for Sam, since the asumption is if you ended up with team!Sam (who then disappears after the tower because /they got arrested/) they would return in the second game as a Villain. or could they be reformed? thats the issue. once Sam is arrested i imagined that the player would get one last chance to talk to them, maybe apologise or wish them good luck, or say shit like ‘good riddance’ or laugh. and if thats the case, would THAT dialogue feed in? would a Sam who received an apology act the same as a Sam who did not? i dont think so! id hope that the apology would help Sam be a better person, while an insult would make Sam more bitter and more likely to commit more crimes in their future! so THAT alone is like, a SPLIT in the route, meaning theres actually 4 permutations of Sam. apology!sam, insult!sam, neutral!sam, and friend!sam. which is a shit to fuck. my god. thats so much. admittedly neutral!sam does fuck all, but friend!sam would have a place, absolutely. they’d be working with Mattie and Rhia and all the other org loyalists to continue running the region but properly this time. insult!sam is off being a big part of whatever new villain appears. and apooology!sam issss..... maybe double crossing? their past as a Team member allows them power in the new villains group but theyre good intentions allow them to work with the ‘new org’ and they can double agent. which would lead to some significant differences. then theres Zeke, who i STILL havent figured out what the fuck is doing. and THEN theres the other characters who would exist in that game who would have their own routes. itd be a clusterfuck, is my point.

idek what this is useful for. psychoanalysing Rhia? about right. if she doesnt get closure the way she wants it - with mutual understanding - then she never truly grows. on the surface she may end up in a similar place, doing similar things, but its where she goes from there. with closure, shes free to move forward onto other things, other problems. it will always be there, but it can be managed. if the closure doesnt come or it comes wrong, it will be harder to manage and she cant move past it as much. yay! she can only unlock her potential if she closes that door to that which holds her back and confronts it. and while forcing her to confront it is ONE way to do that, allowing her to make that choice to close it herself at her own speed is more meaningful to me and lets her feel satisfied with the outcome.

in the hypothetical far future, a split!Rhia, even though she has technically reconciled with Elliot, will probably never truly come to terms with it until he dies. and he will, probably 10-20 years after the end of the postgame. thats when a split!Rhia will open herself proper, but its too little, too late. the ability to have proper closure is lost and im fucking projecting arent i. god fucking dammit. im projecting. nooopppeee zip that shit we arent do that again.

idk maybe if i got closure id be able to give Rhia the closure she deserves but i imagine she’d end up in the same boat as me, where she’s never able to properly close the door on that chapter of her life and it hangs open at all times, flapping in the wind. she can never truly right it off. and maybe if he’s not there she’ll be free on some level, and able to move forward in a different way, but it definitely isnt the same, and its not the ending she wants. Rhia wants to confront Elliot and have him be genuine with her and explain himself, and for him to accept what he’s done. if he dies before she thinks he’s done that (or before SHE has properly explained herself in a way that feels satisfying) then its a failure.

this is just some fuck shit.