#i have so many reasons for why i disagree with a majority of these takes but

[ritzyperry]

just found out that some people apparently think milo murphy's law is transmisogynistic, perry is bad ace rep because he's ace as the "safe" option for queer rep, dan and swampy are bigots who shoehorn all of their queerphobic rhetoric into all of their media, and that phineas and ferb was a bigot's paradise all along... it's joever

[spacelazarwolf]

here is the reality. whether you like it or not, a large chunk of the global jewish population identifies as zionist, as in they believe that israel should exist in some capacity (regardless of their feelings about the current government). a lot of numbers have been thrown around that i don’t necessarily think are accurate, but it is very safe to say that particularly those who are involved in jewish community organizations and/or are more observant tend to identify as zionist. there are a lot of reasons for this that would take an entire doctoral dissertation to cover. if i wanted to cut myself off from every single jewish zionist or every single jew or jewish organization that believes israel should exist or simply has even one jewish zionist friend or one jewish zionist in attendance, i would have to completely isolate myself from the jewish community, and i am simply not going to do that.

for shavuot, we stayed up until past 3am having difficult conversations about israel and zionism and other rifts in the jewish community and how to talk about them without the inevitable defensiveness that always comes up, how to disconnect the political aspects of zionism from jewish identity and how to have difficult conversations with people who disagree with us without leaving the table. we talked about it through the lens of a story in the talmud about rabbi yohanan and reish lakish, a story that ends in tragedy, a story that is representative of where the community is headed if we aren’t able to start having these conversations.

so when gentiles show up and demand i abandon my community because it’s sinful politically incorrect to associate with sinners people with slightly different political opinions, it pisses me the fuck off. because y’all are constantly going on and on abt jews needing to “unlearn zionism” but then when non zionist jews refuse to just walk away from our people and decide instead to do the difficult work of starting and maintaining important conversations within our community, we get called zionists or accused of “associating with zionists” and therefore zionist by default.

so what do you want? do you want there to be less jewish zionists? because the only way that’s going to happen is if difficult conversations are allowed to happen, and those difficult conversations won’t be able to happen if you insist that all jews who aren’t zionist refuse to associate with the vast majority of our people. or are you simply looking to isolate jews with different political opinions than you because you don’t want to take the time to understand why so many jews identify as zionist. i know because i have had hours upon hours of conversations with the people in my community, and my understanding of their reasoning and motivation has made it easier to have conversations about zionism.

so it’s fucked because. y’all want there to be less jewish zionists. the only way for that to happen is to talk to them and understand them. but associating with them or trying to understand why they identify that way makes you a zionist. and therefore you should also not be associated with. but there should be less jewish zionists. so it sounds to me like y’all are just expecting people to change their minds because. what? because you said so? that is not realistic in the slightest!

anyway this post is not meticulously crafted it’s literally just me venting abt this shit but i’m just sick and tired of goyim who are not part of these difficult conversations deciding that they know better how to deal with jewish zionists (who they will not associate with) than jewish non zionists who are actually trying to have the difficult conversations with their community.

[psychotrenny]

There's a real unearned confidence to the way that Social Democrats talk about their ideology, like they've cracked the code and found the perfect way forward and the only reason people disagree is because they're misguided or evil. Like they'll correctly point out problems within Neoliberal Capitalism before spouting some absolute nonsense about how uniquely evil and dysfunctional Communism was (nearly always in the past tense too; they take it for granted that the end of the USSR was the end of all Communism) and then going "Don't worry though, there's a third way; a mixed regulated economy. We can have a free market in consumer goods while making sure that corporations pay their fair share in wages and taxes that can fund the welfare that looks after everyone". And like putting aside the fact that such a model relies on the super-profits of imperialist exploitation to actually function, and the inherent instability of an arrangement where the Bourgeoisie make concessions even while maintaining ultimate control of the economy, there's the simple fact that much of the Imperial Core did indeed had Social Democracy but does not anymore.

Like these Social Democrats never think about why that might be, why their ideology failed and what they can learn from it going forward. They just act as though some dumb individuals (i.e. Ronald Reagan, Milton Friedman etc.) managed to slip into power and make bad decisions and like the best way to fix this is to vote good people in who'll change it back. Like hell a lot of these people take the previous existence of these policies as like a good point, the whole "We had them before so we aren't being radical by wanting them back. We don't want anything crazy we just wanna bring back The New Deal or Keynesian Economic policy or whatever". There's never any thought about why those policies failed (how often do you hear these people even talk about "stagflation" or "the oil crisis" let alone the impact of the fall of the soviet union) and what implications this might have on the viability of bringing it back. They also love talking about how Social Democratic institutions are still largely intact in the Scandinavian countries, but rather than even consider what specific factors in their political-economic situation led to this these people just go "Damn isn't Sweden great. Why aren't we doing exactly what they do?"

And sure some people might compare this to Marxism-Leninism, the whole "trying to bring back a defeated ideology", but for one it's stupid to treat the dissolution of the USSR as the end of Communism as a global political force. It may have been a major blow, but even if you write off like Cuba and Vietnam as too small and insignificant to matter you can't just fucking ignore that over 1/6 of the world's population continues live under a Marxist Leninist party. Whatever concessions these countries may have made to global Capitalism, it's just plain ignorant to act as though Communism suffered anywhere near the humiliating loss of global power and credibility that Social Democracy has. Sure the latter may be more politically acceptable to toy with in "The West", but "The Western World" ≠ The Entire World. Also, nearly every ML on the planet is painfully aware that Soviet Communism collapsed and that it collapsed for a reason. There might be plenty of contention about why exactly it died and what exactly we can learn from this, but nearly everyone agrees that we need to learn and ideologically grow. No serious Communist wants to "bring back the USSR" in the same way that many Social Democrats want to "bring back The Welfare State". Far from being a form of "best of both worlds" mixed economy, Social Democracy is nothing more than a flimsy tool to stabilise Imperialist Capitalism at its moments of greatest strain. And if people are still gonna promote it wholeheartedly as the best possible solution, I wish they'd be a little less arrogant about it. It's not as though they have history on their side

[uriekukistan]

JJK 261 ANALYSIS: What happened, how, why Yuuta made the choice he did, and a discussion of tragedy & major themes of JJK

MAJOR spoilers below the cut so please read at your risk.

i wanted to dissect what happened a bit, and address a few points i saw floating around since the leaks dropped. of course, these are all my interpretations, so feel free to disagree, i just had a lot of thoughts floating around that i wanted to put out for discussion.

I. Gojo was never coming back

first of all, i don't know how you guys expected him to survive bisection. i said this earlier in the day as my justification for why i didn't think gojo was coming back, prior to leaks, and i don't think i can say it any better now.

and this is just my interpretation of reverse curse technique, but if anything, yuuta in this chapter supports my theory. in the scene where he's on shoko's table and arata nitta says that he's used rct to keep the wounds from getting worse, but it might be too late for yuuta to recover. in that case, gojo wasn't coming back from being sliced in half. it's just not possible.

additionally, and this is another thing that i've said for a long time. he says right in episode 6 (i forgot the chapter) that his dream is to reset the jujutsu world raise up a generation of strong students that work together. that is why he became a teacher. this very clearly comes from his relationship with suguru, and it's one of gojo's clearest motivations from the beginning.

the problem is, in order to achieve this, he has to die. so long as satoru gojo is alive, he will have to carry the burden of being the strongest alone. his students won't have to work together, because gojo will just take care of everything. this is already in the works, with how many people have come together to stand against sukuna. if gojo lived and defeated sukuna on his own, this wouldn't have happened, and bringing him back would, again, reduce the need for his students work together.

unfortunately, gojo has been doomed by the narrative from the start, and his primary goal as a character basically requires his death to be realized in its entirety.

II. They're not heroes, they're jujutsu sorcerers.

yeah, i'm stealing megumi's line because it's true. he literally said it twice for a reason, and then yuuta said a repackaged version of it in this chapter ("we're about to fight history's strongest jujutsu sorcerer. if we can win by throwing away our humanity, we shouldn't even be arguing about this").

trust, all the characters are well aware of the ethical issues with taking gojo's body after he's dead, both with what it means for gojo, and with what it means for yuuta. but this isn't a story about heroism, this isn't a story about the power of friendship. if it was, yuuji would have saved junpei all the way back at the beginning of the series. it was pretty clear from the start that this wasn't going to be the typical shounen manga like that.

in fact, expecting it to be is unrealistic. it's unrealistic in real life too, if i'm being so honest. everyone wants to think they'd take the moral high road in this type of situation, but the reality is, when you're fighting tooth and nail against an opponent that is fighting dirty, you have to fight dirty too if you want to win, and i think that's what yuuta is trying to point out in this chapter.

this happens in real life wars which im not gonna get into examples because i dont want to start that kind of discourse, but like...it's so great to be idealistic and hope that virtue will triumph simply because it is virtuous, but i think if you take a look around, you'll realize it's true that good people do not get what they deserve simply because they're good (that's so megumi of me to say...). or if you think of it like a board game, if a player is cheating, it is infinitely harder to win without cheating yourself.

maybe this is a bit pessimistic of me to say, but you will not win a dirty fight without getting dirty yourself, and i think it's pretty clear that sukuna fights dirty.

additionally, it's shitty to see gojo be weaponized, and i understand that, but it plays into the themes about strength in jjk, which i will get into.

III. This was not an "ass pull."

i don't really have much to say to this. did you think yuuta wouldn't take kenjaku's technique? plus, kenjaku being eaten by rika is probably the only surefire way to ensure that they're dead and won't just hop to another body. i've already said why gojo wouldn't come back, but it makes sense that if yuuta were to copy kenjaku's technique, who else would he body hop into, if not gojo? there's already narrative evidence to support this action, from the guidelines of yuuta's technique, kenjaku's technique, and gojo's technique, to the character of yuuta okkotsu, which i want to do an analysis in a separate post for him, so i won't get into that right now.

idk...to me, all the threads connect, plus i felt like yuuta's return was foreshadowed pretty heavily in 259 & 260, with the mention of yuuta's plan that yuuji couldn't know, and then on the last page of 260, the comparison of sukuna and yuuta, so for me, i always thought that it was not actually gojo, but yuuta at the end of 260.

IV. Themes of JJK: The burden of being "the strongest," or even just strong

even many jjk fans see gojo as "the strongest," and nothing more, doing exactly what the narrative sets up as one of the chief problems of jjk. a lot of gojo's actions are spurred on by the burden he feels from being the strongest modern sorcerer. his entire character is built around this problem of the responsibility and burden that falls on someone who's considered to be "the best" at anything.

in fact, this is also a driving point for geto too, and the conflicts geto and gojo come into with each other, as well as geto's inevitable fall from grace. it all comes from this issue that's at the core of jujutsu society. gojo recognizes that, and, as i mentioned, that is why he became a teacher. so that no young sorcerers will feel the burden of being the strongest alone.

the problem is this is easier said than done. after gojo dies, this burden gets passed down to yuuta, and he feels that immense pressure, which is why he decides to do what he does. he says "haven’t we been pushing the burden of being a monster onto gojo-sensei alone? if gojo-sensei is gone, then who else will be the monster? If no one intends to become one, then I will!" and i think this really powerful evidence of the pressure and burden of being the strongest, and i think the word monster is really important here. the burden pushes people to be something they're not, a shadow of their true self.

it distorts morality, like with geto. it isolates people, like with gojo. it forces people to go to unspeakable lengths to uphold their burden, like with yuuta. it leads people with immense power to doubt themselves, like with megumi. it leads people to feel like a cog in the machine, not a human, like with yuuji.

this is sooo so important and a key theme of jjk, and this chapter in particular, and the driving force behind yuuta's actions.

V. Themes in JJK: Loneliness and Isolation

this one has, in my opinion, a bigger role in the story overall than just in this chapter.

as i mentioned before, gojo is lonely. the only person who could understand him was geto, and he turned away from him, and then died. he seems like a silly guy or whatever, but it's just a mask.

but geto also felt alone and isolated, and that's why he turned away. between gojo and geto, neither of them were able to put share the burden of carrying their strength alone, and it's what kept them apart and made their relationship so tragic.

arguably, and though he would never admit it, sukuna is also lonely, though it's buried deep within him and something he will likely never acknowledge, despite it, and his lack of understanding of love (arguably a symptom of his loneliness), are major reasons for the way he acts.

yuuta, though supported by maki, inumaki, and panda in a way that the previously mentioned characters are not, is still isolated. he alone carries the burden of his strength. he was also alone his whole life after rika died, and then again when he was shipped off to africa, away from his friends (yeah he had miguel, maybe i'm missing something, but i dont see them having that type of relationship.

not only that, but yuuta recognizes gojo's loneliness, and reaches out to tell him not to try to stand by himself once again, and gojo admits that's something he can't do, the reason being his relationship with geto.

even further, yuuji and megumi, the parallel to satosugu, are both deeply lonely, except for when they have each other. i mentioned in this analysis that the reason megumi can't just get up and keep going is because he's alone and has been for over a month. i want to get into this more in my next point.

VI. Where I think (hope) this leads for JJK

a satisfying ending for jjk, in my opinion, would be the resolution to this loneliness and burden of strength issue that has been present throughout the narrative. something like yuuji being able to save megumi and them being able to correct what went wrong with satosugu in their own relationship.

personally would like to see satosugu reach the ending they should have had through the itafushi parallels - let them save each other! but i do know gege said only one of them (the trio + gojo) will die, or only one will live....that was years ago maybe he changed his mind :D

we all want to see yuuji take down sukuna himself, but i think it would be a great resolution to see everyone take down sukuna as a team. no one person is alone, no one person has the burden of the strongest. i know i said this wasn't a "power of friendship" manga, and i stand by that, but i think this would be the perfect ending. yuuta throws his humanity away to do what he did in 261 because he felt like it was the only choice and it was something he alone could do, but yuuji represents unwavering humanity (literally his name), and i think to preserve that, they all need to share that burden. let them realize they need each other.

this is what gojo died for, and this is what he lived for. this is why he became a teacher in the first place- to raise a generation that can be strong together, that can support one another.

VII. "It's poorly written torture porn!" "There's no point if there's no happy ending!" etc

i said this in a separate post but tragedies have existed in literature since the 6th century BCE, 2600 years ago. many of the most popular stories throughout history have been tragedies, for example, orpheus & eurydice, romeo & juliet, even things like the fault in our stars and the titanic movie. here's a quick explanation of what it means for a story to be a tragedy (yeah it's from wikipedia but they want me to pay to access the original source and im not doing that for a jjk analysis)

one of things i like most about this definition is the use of the word "catharsis," which is to say that the expression of strong emotions is a way of bringing about renewal and relief. in literature, it's used to say that with the arousal and following release of negative emotions relieves suppressed emotions for the viewer. im not gonna get too personal with it, but i know i've experienced this with jjk.

additionally all of the aforementioned tragedies, they have a message, no matter how sad they are. orpheus & eurydice inspires perseverance and faith in the gods. even something like titanic has messages about everlasting love that overcomes all boundaries. jjk has its message too, and it's long underway. we just have to wait for it to reach its conclusion.

it's easy to lose sight of the bigger picture when we only get one chapter a week, and the fact that the pain is so dragged out is a bit tiring, i'll admit. but that doesn't mean it's bad. having negative emotions stirred by a story doesn't mean bad writing. i mean, i would hope you feel sad. i would hope you feel angry. i would be concerned if you didn't. but given that jjk is a tragedy, that just indicates good writing. especially these last two chapters, i've felt moved in a way nothing else has done for me in a long time.

as always, these are just my thoughts!!! im happy to hear from anyone what they think :D

[amarayys]

SPOILERS FOR DRDT AND THE CANON DANGANRONPA GAMES. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Okay, so. I've seen quite a few people hating on the chapter 2 culprit choice due to their execution and it not fitting their ultimate talent. The reasons they include as far as i've seen are; - Min's execution was centred around her talent, so to have the chapter 2's execution not centre around their ultimate is inconsistent. - The canon Danganronpa game's executions are centred around the the culprits talent, so having the culprit's not revolve around their talent doesn't make sense. - The "sections" (can u tell im not trying to spoil bfore the cut.) of the execution felt random and didnt really make much sense. My opinion of these takes? "NO, THAT'S WRONG!" In other words - I wholeheartedly disagree. And this post is going to explain why - as well as why I believe the culprit's execution is wonderfully done. *btw this is not an attack towards anyone and is purely my opinion as is your own dont come for me. please.

To begin: let's tackle the points I mentioned above. (side note - ik the colour coding looks a little random but its fun okay.) - "Min's execution was centred around her talent, so to have the chapter 2's execution not centre around their ultimate is inconsistent." I can understand why you think that, but Min's execution is more than just being based off her talent. Min's character revolves around how the only reason she's seen as anything more than a normal person is due to her being the "Ultimate student" and extremely smart (which can be seen in her bonus episode dialogue.)

She's terrified of making any mistakes and her life revolves around being enough. She also has imposter syndrome due to her talent not being scouted out like usual.

This plays into her execution as well - It gives her questions that have no real answer, causing her to fail - in other words, make a mistake. She also has to spend her last moments alive doing a test and being a student - which we know she feels as if that's all she's worth for.

Basically - Her execution fits her character well, as well as her ultimate talent, because her talent is very important to her character. Let me copy and paste a line from the above paragraph -

"her talent is important to her character." Min's execution fit her talent because her talent was a big part of her - which cannot be said for Ace. Sure, there's some lore behind him not enjoying jockeying - but it's not as major to his character as his fears. As we know, Ace is scared of many things - But the things he is scared of all have some way of hurting/killing him. To boil it down - Ace is extremely scared of death.

That's very major to his character, obviously - as it's the reason he kills Arei in the first place. Ace's execution is based on his fear of death and false alarms because that is the best way to cause despair for him- to make the execution as interesting for the audience and as torturous for him as possible. To sum this up - Ace and Min's executions are consistent. Sure, Min's execution revolved around her talent - but that's only because to her, talent is extremely important to her character. Her imposter syndrome and insecurity around her talent makes it a very big part of her, so that's why her execution was a test - Because it fit her character. Ace's talent, similarly, revolves around his character. He is scared of death and that is what led him to murder. The only difference is that Ace's talent is not as relevant to him as Min's is to her, and therefore it isn't part of the execution.

moving on! - The canon Danganronpa game's executions are centred around the the culprits talent, so having the culprit's not revolve around their talent doesn't make sense. Okay, to put it bluntly, no. as for the actual explanation!! I can give you multiple examples of danganronpa characters who's executions revolve not around their talent, but their charater. I think the best example I can give is Celestia Ludenburg. (please excuse me if i mess up anything on the following section its been a hot minute since i've played thh)

To recap on her execution: Celestia is shown tied onto a pole. A fire starts, and she begins to get burned alive witch style. Suddenly, an ambulance crashes into her, killing her.

Now, if you've been paying attention to the canon Danganronpa games, you would know Celestia's talent is the Ultimate Gambler. Which - shock - has absolutely jack shit to do with her execution! Anyway. Celestia's execution is actually pretty smart if you think about it. Celestia's character revolves around her wanting to seem extravagant and royal. (her clothing style, the whole European castle dream, you get me?) She doesn't want to be seen as some "Basic Japanese girl".

When she is caught as a culprit, she eventually says that she'd be okay with dying as long as it was extravagant. And, at first, it is. She's being burned at the stake - like a witch, probably referring to her gothic (?) like style - which is certainly not a boring way to go. We see in her execution she's pretty chill with dying like that, as she is smiling. However, the ambulance then crashes into her. The genius in this is that car crashes are one of if not the most common cause of death. In other words, a basic way to die, and nothing special. That's the best way Monokuma could have caused Celestia to feel despair - Make her feel normal. Unlike everything I've just stated above, Celestia's talent is not too relevant to her arc. It's really most relevant in her FTE's, which are completely optional. Hey, doesn't that sound familiar? A characters execution is based of their character and not their talent due to their talent not being as major to their character? Yeah?????? YEAH??? - Kirumi Tojo's (and maybe korekiyo's??) execution also doesn't really fit their talents, but I wont go into detail on that.

Moving on!

- The sections of the execution felt random and didn't really make much sense.

Well...no, not really! If you look into more detail, there's actually a lot of cool stuff to notice. (all the below comes from this post! check it out, it's super cool)

The first "death" is Death by Illness. This is alluding to how Xander's family allegedly died to an "unexplainable illness", which you can see in his bonus episode.

Death by Fire is referencing his "Fiery" attitude/temper.

Death by Car Accident - Ace mentions this one directly in chp 1. episode 2.

Death by falling is referencing Min falling to her death in her execution.

Death by murder is kind of obvious. The attempt on Ace's life Nico made - as well as how the weapon is pointed at his neck, similar to how Nico garrotted Ace's neck.

Death by drowning - This one is my own interpretation - maybe alluding to how water was used in both the murders so far?

Death by lightening: Xander being electrocuted?? Maybe??

Death by Execution: I hope I don't need to point out how this relates to DRDT.

Ace dying from fear induced cardiac arrest is both ironic and incredibly tragic. This post explains it VERY well.

TW FOR TALK OF EDs If I were to horrifically sum up the post - Ace could have lived if he didn't suffer from an ED. Anorexia makes your heart beat slower - having a slow heartbeat makes it so that, when you feel very intense emotion, your heart rate shoots up, making you more prone to have a heart attack, and therefore cardiac arrest. It's really, really sad that this caused him to die in the end. TW OVER

anndddd we're done!!! haha im so tired. anyway honorary teruko mention!!! also drdt dev i love u for chp 2 you did INSANELY well.

[coldairballoons]

i've seen a lot of people saying that saltburn (2023) isn't a commentary on class, and genuinely, i have to disagree.

keep in mind, i watched this at 3am last night with my sibling, but i'm also a literature major with a focus in literary criticism of popular culture (including film), so i do know what i'm talking about!

spoilers below the break

first of all, framing saltburn as a conflict between the upper class and lower class is incorrect. in fact, that in itself is one of the major criticisms that comes up throughout it! oliver is quite literally not lower class, but uses the preconception that the cattons will view anyone in a lower social class than them as a tool to manipulate his way into their life. despite this, he is not lower class. and you are not meant to root for him, especially not towards the end.

the marxist theory of literary criticism surrounds the idea that in every story, one of the key concepts is a class struggle. this could be between any class, but the most common is the rich vs poor duality that shows up in most stories - ex. titanic, the fall of the house of usher. the thing is, in both of those examples, the sympathy lies with the victims - the lower class. in titanic, you are meant to feel guilty on behalf of the rich leaving the lower class to die. in usher, you are meant to feel anger towards the mistreatment of those who seek out the treatment the family offers. but while usher is a clear criticism of class, is that its main genre? is is purely a class struggle movie? no. it is a story inspired by edgar allan poe that surrounds horrors of family, trauma, and yes, class, but also morality. meanwhile titanic is supposedly a romance. though jack dawson is young and poor, he is not the only sympathetic character. what i'm saying here is that media is incredibly layered, and while on the surface level, something may not be entirely a class conflict story, those undertones exist throughout, no matter what. even take hit series percy jackson for example. there is still a class discussion to be had there, with percy and his mom struggling with finances, while annabeth and her father live comfortably.

but saltburn is interesting, because the antagonist throughout the entirety of it is, as far as the audience knows, lower class. you are introduced to him, not through judgement for his living condition, but through compassion and generosity. felix offers him a hand, even when he isn't in the same group as him. that in itself is a criticism of class dynamics.

listen. i hate rich people as much as the next gen-z college student. i personally have a hit list with many a billionaire's name right at the very top. but it's undeniable that, despite the class difference, the cattons - at least venitia and felix - are kind to oliver at first. obviously, he is a part of the other, but he is still a person. elspeth enjoys his presence. james treats him as a son. farleigh feels threatened by his presence, because he knows that, if they so choose, they could replace him with oliver.

i want to talk about farleigh for a second.

i literally have not seen anyone talk about farleigh, and i am upset about it. not only is he one of the most compelling characters - a supposed american slacker who lives with his extended family and blows their money on lavish means -, but he is important in the class discussion because it affects him directly. the cattons do not support his mother. she is in america, and although they have the ability to, they actively choose not to. the reason felix is bothered when farleigh implies that it is, in fact, a "race thing", is because it is. why is farleigh the one dependent on the cattons, and risking expulsion from the family? because he is the first other that they encounter.

and then pamela, who not only has sought help from the cattons, but disappears midway through with no explanation. she goes directly from rehab to them, and although she is trying to find a place to live on her own, the cattons offer her no assistance. they offer her nothing, and complain when she is in their space. they offer her NO help, when they so easily could set her up with a small flat and monthly allowance to help her find a job.

and not only is this a criticism of the upper class - the inactivity and extremely single-minded worldview that the cattons have, the amount that they are out of touch with not only the outside world and the lower class, but their own emotions -, it's also a criticism of the upper middle class.

as someone currently in college, whose parents are a college professor and a high school teacher, i am fairly middle class. however, there are so many people in my immediate vicinity - folks i know from high school, in my classes, extended family, etc., - who are Extremely upper middle class. however, they have the comfort of certain things that i, and my family, don't have. that's just part of life. however, in saltburn, oliver milks the "middle" in his "upper middle" class. he milks it, and he runs it absolutely dry.

someone truly in his alleged position would not be able to spend the summer lavishly and hedonistically gallivanting around the countryside of england, playing tennis and smoking cigarettes by the lake. hell, someone in my middle class position wouldn't be able to do that either, especially not while attending oxford fucking university. he would likely need to work, not just to support himself, but to support his mother, especially after - again, allegedly - his father died. and not only is this coming from a place of an oversight on his part, not realizing what his privilege truly is, but it also comes from a place of oversight on the part of the cattons.

do i think that saltburn is a movie about class? nope. at its core, it's a story about a desire for power and possession, ownership and obsession. there is this intense, almost vampiric lust throughout the entire thing, and that's in part what makes it the perfect setting for discussions of sexuality, of madness, and, honestly, class. wealth is power, and the cattons have a lot of it.

[lordsammichsilas]

I saw a recent post someone made speculating on birth years for each of the FO4 companions. They had estimated Danse being born (created?) in 2261 and part of that reasoning was 1) he had been paladin by 2277 and 2) Maxson said it took Danse “many” years to become paladin.

I wanted to expand on it without dumping a huge wall of text onto their post. If you want to know which post, here's the link. And this isn't me disagreeing with any of it. It was just something that got me thinking and I wanted to expand on it.

I've been kind of stuck on Danse's character for a bit because of the fic I'm writing. I didn't actually realize Maxson had said it took Danse many years to become Paladin (I looked it up and it's when you first join the BoS and you're given the rank of Knight. If you ask why not Paladin, that's when you get that info).

So anyway it made me wonder what “many” years would be in the context of a military career. The Brotherhood of Steel was born from the US military, so I looked into the ranks of the US Army to get an idea. Danse is a senior officer with the BoS and a field commander. From what I can tell, the most senior field commander in the Army is the rank of Major. Just doing a quick Google search, it takes about 11 years to make that rank. Added to at least 10 years as Paladin, I'm estimating Danse has been in the BoS for about 21 years by the beginning of FO4.

If someone joins the Army at 18, they'd be about 39 by the time they reach Major. Since Danse is a synth and was created as an adult humanoid male, that doesn't mean much in terms of his actual chronological age. It does for his perceived age, though.

The BoS keeps really extensive records on its members. They even keep their DNA on file. When you walk through the Prydwen, you get a very paranoid vibe and the children on the ship are encouraged to spy on all staff aboard the Prydwen. And yet, no one suspected Danse was a synth.

Synths don't age. At SOME point, even if they never got the files from the Institute saying Danse was a missing synth, someone would have had to start questioning why Danse still looks the same after all of those years in the BoS. That hadn't happened, yet. Also the stress of battle and the scars on his face probably do give the illusion of “aging” to an extent. Danse also isn't close to anyone in the BoS and doesn't talk about himself. His background is as an anonymous orphan in the Capital Wasteland. All of this gives plenty of wiggle room on his perceived age to others. I'm guessing anyone in the BoS would probably just assume he's in his mid-late 30's. Maybe early 40's.

And up to that point, the timeline would match. His time spent in the BoS would point to him being that age. He looks like he's about that age. He's a senior officer. It's fine. Give it about 10 years, though, and people would have started asking questions. Danse was on borrowed time and he had no idea.

And then there's time spent in Rivet City. He and Cutler were quite close, enough that they joined up together. My guess is that they were probably seen as two young men at around the same age (I'll just say late teens, early 20's) when they joined up. Since we know Danse is an adult who doesn't age, I'm going to lean hard on the battle scars theory for simulating aging and also say he was probably clean shaven in the beginning which also made him look younger.

Even then, I am guessing he spent enough time with Cutler for them to become close without raising any suspicions on his age. I'm going to give about 2 years in Rivet City. I figure that's plenty of time for two young men to become friends enough that they run off and join the military together. Without the appearance of his age raising any red flags.

That puts the timeline up to 23 years.

Prior to that, it gets really fuzzy. We know nothing of his time in the Institute. We can make some educated guesses, but all we know for sure is that he was a missing synth named M7-97. Danse himself doesn't know anything about it. I can't really give any guess on how long he was there without going ENTIRELY into headcanon territory.

Him being born in the year 2261 is totally plausible. That would make him chronologically 26 years old.

His perceived age, though, I thought was interesting to think about because you have to see how his appearance and the direction his life took was almost out of luck that no one found him out sooner. I think he was in a far more precarious position than even he realized and even without the BoS discovering he was a synth from the Institute, he was getting close to a point in time where his age would have come into question even more and people would have started getting suspicious anyway.

[rachelfloof]

Caramel Arrow being Dark Cacao’s daughter is a bad headcanon.

I’ve been keeping this to myself for a long time, but there are so many things about this headcanon that bother me, both obvious and less obvious things. There’s certain things about it that I’m surprised people don’t consider and don't realize. I can tolerate it because I can totally understand why people would hc this, but the more I thought about it, the more problems I found with it. I feel like they need to finally be pointed out because, in my opinion, this headcanon does not deserve the popularity it has.

Before I start explaining my thoughts, I want to emphasize that this is JUST MY OPINION. you DO NOT have to change your own opinion after reading this. These are simply my PERSONAL thoughts on this, and you DO NOT have to agree with me. Also, if you DO agree, I DO NOT condone sending hate to or attacking those who disagree with me and/or continue to use this headcanon.

The family headcanon directly conflicts with Caramel Arrow’s character in two major ways. The first is in regard to her ancestors. Following in her ancestors footsteps and honoring their legacy is one of Caramel Arrow’s main motivations. Caramel Arrow currently has one piece of cutscene art, depicting her praying to her fallen ancestors, as well as several quotes where she mentions defending the kingdom, just like her ancestors did (1 star promotion quote). If Dark Cacao is her father, then what ancestors is she talking about? because I know damn well it’s not Mystic Flour.

The only way this headcanon works without conflicting with the canon is if you ship Dark Cacao with a mortal who has a long history of serving the Dark Cacao kingdom (like the Second Watcher, for example). Despite this, Caramel Arrow being biologically related to Dark Cacao in any way brings up the second major issue and, in my opinion, the most damaging issue.

Caramel Arrow’s loading screen trivia states, "Caramel Arrow Cookie became the First Watcher at a young age…" Which is something I feel like has to be one of Caramel Arrow’s biggest achievements in her life. First Watcher is a really highly esteemed role; she’s essentially the top general of Dark Cacao’s most elite troops. Therefore, she likely had to work really hard to be able to become First Watcher, especially at so young.

However, with the added context of Dark Cacao being her father, I feel that it heavily reduces the gravity of this achievement. Dark Cacao is the king; he could’ve easily been biased in Caramel Arrow’s favor when deciding who to make First Watcher since she’d be his daughter. Dark Cacao’s kid being in such a high position at such a young age makes the earning of that role seem like a blatant display of nepotism.

Yesss, why not add taking away positions from people who actually deserve it more to the list of reasons why Dark Cacao is a bad person? /s

By making Caramel Arrow seem more undeserving of her position, you’re essentially weakening the strong woman character. Turning her from “hard-working girl boss” into “daddy’s girl.”

Speaking of Dark Cacao being a bad person, Dark Cacao treating Caramel Arrow like a daughter makes him look even worse when you factor in what he did to Dark Choco. So essentially, what’s happening is that Dark Cacao emotionally neglects Dark Choco while at the same time treating his younger child with the love that Dark Choco originally deserved.

All of the previously mentioned problems go away if you just interpret Dark Cacao and Caramel Arrow’s relationship for what it is. Which is NOT BIOLOGICALLY RELATED. By making them family, you’re heavily simplifying her character; her motivations for standing by the king and the prince go from “this is my sworn duty, and I want to honor my ancestors.” to “oh, it’s because the royal family is my family too.” So it makes her motives seem more like an empty obligation and expectation rather than something she’s worked for and voluntarily committed to because she’s genuinely just that passionate and dedicated about the homeland that her ancestors have fought and died for over generations.

The only way this headcanon works is if Caramel Arrow becomes Dark Cacao’s daughter AFTER everything is said and done with her becoming First Watcher and Dark Choco taking the sword. Which can only really happen if you ship Dark Cacao x Second Watcher or Dark Cacao x Dark Cacaoian OC while having the two characters fall in love AFTER Dark Choco leaves, making Caramel Arrow his stepdaughter. Or if you headcanon Caramel Arrow as his ADOPTED daughter rather than biological, of course with the adoption happening after Dark Choco leaves.

Even then, Dark Cacao adopting his First watcher after everything already happens would just be super random and weird. That’s like if a worker climbs the ranks in the company they work at, becomes COO, and then the CEO just decides to adopt their COO because they become close. Based on the Cookies of Darkness flashback, Caramel Arrow would likely be a full-grown adult by the time Dark Choco leaves with the sword, so Dark Cacao adopting this grown woman would just be kind of weird and unnecessary.

Despite everything I just said, Dark Cacao CAN still see Caramel Arrow like a daughter, and Caramel Arrow CAN still see Crunchy Chip like a brother WITHOUT any of them actually being on each other’s family tree. They can just have a close platonic relationship with each other where they kind of see each other as like a second family, except, of course, they’re not actually related. Rather, they're almost like a family-like friend group or in other words, a friend group with a family-like bond.

This is the end of my little ramble, in case you forgot about the disclaimer at the top, this is just my opinion. Re-read the disclaimer in big red text if you need to. you don't need to agree with me. and I hope everyone has a good day. <3

Also, remember to never be a hater to anyone, hating is cringe ngl.

[rahabs]

Was there anything you liked about Veilguard?

The hair was an improvement over Inquisition's notorious fifty shades of bald. Emmrich had a lot of potential and was easily the best of what turned out to be bland, underdeveloped batch of companions that the game makes you coddle and affirm at every turn (or, in Taash's case, an insanely childish companion that I felt I had to babysit constantly). Davrin was also fine. The architectural design was beautiful to look at, even if the cities felt empty and stale. Some of the armour was nice, and an improvement on Inquisition. I wasn't a fan of some aspects of the CC (but that's more my general dissatisfaction with BioWare constantly issuing massive overhauls to the designs of elves and qunari, so it's not Veilguard-specific), but it was also a marked improvement over Inquisition. Combat was... fine. It got dull after awhile, but it was just your standard stuff. Nothing offensive. Solas' voice acting was great for the .5 seconds we got to see him. Some of the other characters were voiced well.

As I've said, my main issue just lies in the sterile, corporate writing--not just the companions. My dissatisfaction also extends to the general culling of roleplay options (and some of the reasons why they were cut--namely, because a certain head writer was against players being able to do things he personally didn't approve of, and yes, it's common knowledge as Weekes was vocal on social media about it for years), the rampant lore issues (which BioWare has always struggled with in this franchise; lore consistency is not Dragon Age's strength), the coddling and hand-holding (not just for companions but for all major plot points; it's like the game thinks we're all stupid toddlers who need everything spoon-fed and told to us in the most simplistic terms, leaving no room for nuance or discussion), and just how... demeaning a lot of this game felt, I suppose? Someone pointed this out once and it stuck with me, but this game feels more like it was designed for "lonely people who really like found family fanfiction and project way too hard onto interactive media." Everything's just constant affirmation, constant "how-are-yous" from Rook to the companions; you cannot disagree with a companion or risk hurting their pixel-feelings, even when the companions are objectively acting like arseholes. It kills the roleplay aspect BioWare has always been famous for.

Editing this response I gave to someone else on this post, because I should have expanded originally:

[…] I think part of the reason Veilguard fails is that, unlike DA2, in trying to cater to that “found family” crowd and recreate the feeling people got with DA2 especially, the writers forgot a crucial aspect of what makes found family dynamics work, or what makes them feel worthwhile to the audience: the conflict.  Part of the impact with DA2 is it takes time—literal years—for Hawk to help build that dynamic, and there are serious differences of opinions and many arguments, whether between Hawk and one of the companions, Fenris and Anders, Isabella and Aveline, Fenris and Merrill, Anders and Merrill, Aveline and Merrill, Sebastian and Anders, Hawk and their sibling (whether Bethany or Carver), et al, etc.  Can you imagine if Fenris and Anders had had one minor disagreement and Hawk held their hands and went, “I see you’re feeling a lot of big emotions about this, are you okay, maybe you should try getting along and seeing things from his point of view?” and that was that? Because that’s essentially what Veilguard does, and it’s part of why the game rings so hollow and the found family dynamic seems so contrived: it feels unearned. It is unearned.

In the end Rook feels more like a therapist to a bunch of whingey thirteen-year-olds than a leader of professional adults, and the sterile writing as well as the writers' deeming determination to coddle their audience just makes this M-rated game feel G-rated, and not in a good way. In the risk of going into spoilers, I'm not going to rant about the Executors (though know I hate them so very much) or about the whole thing with Southern Thedas (yes I'm mad, because it's so unbelievably lazy), but so many aspects of Dragon Age's lore was just... watered down to the extreme in this game.

Also, the fact that they turned the Antivan Crows, of all things--you know, the same Antivan crows who purchase and recruit child slaves, who kill them if the deviate, whom we've spent three games going "man, you guys are kind of nasty, aren't you" at, etc--into this soft, fluffy, weird little uwu family unit really stood out to me as a symptom of this game's overall problem, which is, again, the infantile writing and the overall issue of over-sanitisation. Everything has to be uwu family friendly and nice and no one can ever have bad thoughts or do bad things or be mean! Good vibes only! I mean, we spent years being told about Tevinter and its legacy of slavery, particularly in Minrathous, and there's none of that in this game. Just more good vibes because can't risk anyone being upset or encountering challenging narratives!

Also, a petty grievance: BioWare also failed to improve on the issues with the dialogue wheel from Inquisition, meaning you'll choose an option and then Rook says something completely different. Again.

I'm just so thoroughly disappointed in it.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

Your blog is my guilty pleasure lol, it's so validating to read your very matter of fact rebuttals after years of being talked over & down to in the fandom. Being in the fan space & hearing the way people talked about how much more "female gaze coded" Z/tara was made me feel like I was betraying other women by not liking Zuko or Zutara the way "real mature" women did.

Funniest thing is, when i watched the show as a kid as an older sister, someone with talent/skills that nobody else understood, a girl who felt she had to be mature all the time, Kataang instantly became my otp. Katara was living my dream of a fun, cute boy sweeping me off my feet, telling me I was special and going on a magical journey with me-- I had the HUGEST crush on Aang as a little girl. It was so lame growing older and hearing near constantly from the fandom how stupid and unbelievable the idea that Katara actually had feelings for Aang was, and how it's a "male" (aka: bad) fantasy, when honestly Zuko's angsty ass was far from dream boyfriend material in my opinion it made me feel gaslit fjhdidjskj.

Genuine Z/tara fans are fine, I totally get the appeal of the red/blue enemies to lovers sparks fly ship, but the meanest and loudest of your crewmates and the way they act like their tastes are the Correct ones has been just. ridiculous for many years. And why do those types always feel the need to start the conversation by bashing Kataang every single time?? I started with a positive opinion of their ship when I entered the fandom as a teen, even liked a few arts and whatnot as a "what-if," but all the nonsense has left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

So yeah, thanks for this space to complain about the experiences we've had lol. I've had one too many conversations about ATLA & how good it is interrupted with the other person going "well except for the Main Romance, that was shit and Z/tara should have been endgame" not to be Worn Out. Like if in their opinion the show is *perfect* except that One thing.... maybe the problem lies elsewhere?

Yup, that's definitely a pattern I noticed: zutarians are SO many and SO loud, that even though a pretty large part of the fandom disagrees with their takes (regardless of enjoying the canon ships or not) most of them just... didn't talk about it because they didn't want to be harrassed or talked down to or be hit with the "well, we are the majority therefore we're right" argument.

It's part of why I was innitially shocked at how much support this blog got. I thought I just gonna be in my own little bubble of the fandom, but nope, I got sooooo many messages of "FINALLY! Somebody said it!"

And looking back, I should've noticed something was off. There's a reason ATLA's ending was not one of these disasters that basically nukes and kills 90% of the fandom and live in infamy as one of the worst falls from grace ever, How I Met Your Mother style, even though both shows had the fan favorite ship not end together.

It wasn't just that one was well-written and the other wasn't (though that clearly affected the audience and critical reception of these endings, both at the time and through the decades).

HIMYM was a case of "The actual endgame ship was loathed by nearly everyone while the rival pairings were almost universally beloved."

ATLA was a case of "70% of the fandom likes this ship - of these fans, 25% are multishipers that also like the canon ships, 25% only like the ship in fanfic but don't actually want it to be a thing, 25% loves it but can accept it not being canon at point because they acknowledge it'd be rushed, and the 25% are the ones that would burn down Bryke's house if they could, so in reality only a fraction of the fandom didn't accept the Kataang/Maiko endgame, while the overwhelming majority was either happy about it or indifferent to it"

And that's without taking into account that Avatar got new popularity boosts through the years that lead to plenty of people that had Zutara being hyped up for years being disappointed when they realized "Oh, it was popular because of fanon shit, not because it actually would have made sense story-wise" or people who reached that same conclusion after rewatching the show.

I think that's why Zutarians have such a victim complex and want to pretend Bryke and Kataang/Maiko fans are "oppressing" them - they've been dominating the conversation for years, and not only got no results out of it, they're now losing that "leverage" too. They're no longer in an echo-chamber, they need to use actual arguments that make sense if they want their opinion to be almost universal and they just can't do it because their ship was never that good to begin with.

[dn-838]

In defence of Undertale Yellow, how it can work with Undertale’s canon

So, I have seen a lot of debating recently on Undertale Yellow and whether or not it fits what we know already about the lore in Undertale. Of course Flowey’s presence in the mod is the primary thing that has sparked this debate, with many believing that he can’t have existed at the same time as the Justice Soul and that it is a major hole that breaks the continuity of Undertale. I however, as someone who has spent way too much time with Undertale and has vast knowledge about even the most obscure of details in the game, disagree. I believe that Undertale Yellow fits the original games canon well… maybe a bit too well, and I am here to give my own arguments against the things that I commonly see people say doesn’t fit the original game’s continuity. This may contain a few spoilers for Undertale Yellow, so unless you’ve already seen all 3 routes or for whatever reason don’t care about having the game spoiled, don’t read further until you are done.

Argument 1: all the Souls were already collected by the creation of Flowey and the amalgamates

Okay so this one I don’t really have much to say about. Yes Flowey and the Amalgamates were created using the SOULs of some of the collected humans, however it’s never specified that it was from 6 humans, all that’s made clear is that Asgore did have human SOULs (in plural) that were used in the experiment.

Argument 2: the timeline doesn’t match up

The timeline has always been a confusing topic among the Undertale community. While the most likely estimate of the gap between Chara and Frisk falling is 100 years due to what Sans tells us during his date.

There are a few reasons for us to believe that the gap is much smaller, especially considering the weird nature of the Deltarune timeline and the supposed grudge Chara seems to have against Snowdrake in Genocide (who is stated to only be a teenager).

However, no matter how you view the timeline, unless you have specific dates in mind for things like when Gaster was the Royal Scientist and when the fall of Integrity-Justice happened, or think the gap was REALLY short, Undertale Yellow doesn’t really contradict it too much. The game itself is meant to take place just a year before Undertale, with all the same characters existing in similar positions to how they do by the time of Undertale, however we never encounter them due to being on a completely different path that takes us to very different parts of the underground, being why they don’t behave like they encountered a human before in Undertale.

Integrity is a bit more interesting, because it can vary massively depending on how you view the lifespans of the Ketsukane’s, Starlo (Starlo won’t be important to this, but I mention him since he was childhood friends with Ceroba) and Dalv. It is strongly implied that as a kid, Dalv was best friends with Kanako, and was attacked by the Integrity human some point before the games events. At first you’d assume that this was all not meant to be long before the events of the game, however, Integrity was killed by Axis in UTY, a robot that was being worked on by Chujin back when the Steamworks were still in operation, which we can assume was long before the events of the game due to the state of the Steamworks itself and the fact it is stated to have been used as the source of all power in the underground, which would mean it would likely have shut down around the period that the CORE was first put into operation, so all the way back when Gaster was still the Royal Scientist, whenever you think that was (Axis wasn’t sent to kill the human until after Chujin was fired from his position, however due to the way Axis is locked up and deactivated before we wake up the Steamworks, we can assume he was shut down with the rest of the facility). On top of all this Dalv is shown to be a lot older than he presumably would have been when he was attacked by Integrity, and with him being a Vampire, you could say that he aged that much at a slower rate than a human would, with the Ketsukane’s also aging slow, 2 of them being Boss Monsters and one of them being a 9 tailed fox. We know that some monsters do likely age at very different rates due to monsters like Gerson who lived through the war.

So to give the whole timeline, basically, Chujin worked in the Steamworks and made Axis back before or during Gaster’s time as the royal scientist. After several failed prototypes that eventually got Chujin fired, Axis was sent to chase down and kill Integrity. He managed and Chujin kept the Soul hidden and over the span of years recorded a few tapes for what he had planning, meanwhile Dalv, who was previously attacked by Integrity, went into hiding, locking himself into a mostly dark and unknown part of the ruins. At some point when Alphy’s became the Royal Scientist, Chujin started to mentor Martlet, which led Martlet to enter the True Lab and get some strange serum. Eventually Chujin died around a year or two before UTY, revealing his hidden tapes to Ceroba, which Kanako overheard. This led to Ceroba attempting to inject Kanako with the Integrity soul, leading to Kanako falling and being donated to Alphy’s, and her of course then becoming an amalgamate.

Argument 3: Asgore killed all 6 of the other humans

Okay so this one is interesting, because Undyne does imply that humans before Frisk did make it to Asgore, with her saying that “no human has ever made it PAST Asgore” rather than “no human has ever made it TO Asgore”

The thing is, that other humans reached Asgore is all this really does imply, it doesn’t necessarily mean all humans made it to Asgore. You could argue that most of them died to Asgore, with Integrity and Justice being the only exceptions. If you really want to stretch you could even say that this line was actually just another attempt from Undyne to make Asgore sound like a powerful and threatening force (since she tries to make him out like that quite a bit in her fight, such as by saying that killing us is an act of mercy right after this), although I find this unlikely.

There is another line of dialogue that I sometimes see used to try and prove that Asgore killed all 6, and while it’s not used close to as much, I’ll still just quickly clear it up.

This doesn’t really mean that much, all it’s saying is that all the humans that leave the ruins inevitably die. She likely wouldn’t know any details on their deaths do to her isolation, and even if she had some knowledge she would probably still place the blame on Asgore due to his part in waging war and coming up with the plan to kill 7 humans in the first place.

Argument 4: The introduction of new incredibly powerful characters makes no sense

Okay, so this is a weird one, however the explanation for it is fairly simple. Nobody in UTY compares to the original Undertale cast when it comes to how “powerful” they are. We struggle so much against the opponents we face as Clover because well… Clover is much weaker than Frisk, bosses like Ceroba and Axis pale in comparison to Undyne and Mettaton, they just seem much harder since we are playing as a human with much less determination than Frisk. In Pacifist Clover fights a depressed fox lady, meanwhile Frisk fights a literal god; in Neutral Clover goes through a struggle fighting through Flowey’s mind after having his Soul absorbed, meanwhile Frisk holds on against Flowey with 6 Souls until those Souls rebel; and in Genocide Clover takes some time to finally destroy Axis, the failed prototype that got Chujin fired, meanwhile Frisk atomised Mettaton NEO, The greatest invention of the Scientist who was selected to replace Gaster, in a single blow.

The only Undertale Yellow character that I’d say surpasses any character in Undertale would of course be Zenith Martlet, but even then LV 19 Frisk would mop the floor with her, while LV 19 Clover had to go through a lot of effort to beat her, only ever managing to surpass Flowey in Determination after doing so. At LV 20 both Clover and Frisk have massive boosts from LV 19, however Frisk is far stronger, having awakened Chara and caused the destruction of everything, while Clover just destroys Asgore with a super laser blast directly from their Soul and leaves.

Argument 5: miscellaneous

Just to clear up any further confusion, I’ll give quick explanations for some more minor points that I have encountered

Nobody in the original Undertale apart from Flowey, Toriel and Asgore meets Clover, so the other monsters in Undertale acting like they had never met one makes sense.

Flowey not just stealing Clovers Soul is explained well by the game itself. He plans to, however he doesn’t get the chance in Pacifist; sees that we couldn’t surpass Asgore in Flawed Pacifist; steals our soul but is unsatisfied with the outcome and resets in Neutral, and gets gunned down in Genocide.

Toriel believing that it’s been a long time since a previous human fell when she sees Frisk in Undertale doesn’t mean much, she mostly lives isolated in the Ruins, with the other monsters being too afraid to speak with her, considering this and just generally how much seemed to have happened within that year, time could have felt much slower. Alternatively you could argue that the 6 humans all fell within months of each other, and that a years gap is a long time in comparison to the rate the first 6 fell (or 5, since she says the exact same thing to Clover).

Both Flowey and Clover using file 1 at the end of Genocide doesn’t fit what we know about save files no, however I feel it is a little nit-picky to use it as a definitive reason to discredit how well UTY fits into canon, after all the only thing you’d need to do is change the numbers and this would be fixed.

The Gunsmith having been born a week before the Human Vs Monster war doesn’t go against anything we already know. As stated before, we know that at least some monsters like Gerson do live for a very long time.

Flowey having more determination than Clover also doesn’t break anything. Flowey was injected with DT from 5 human Souls. The thing is that Frisk was special when it came to the amount of determination they had.

Unlike with most of the other cast, nobody in Undertale actually indicates that Flowey never met a human prior to Frisk.

Chujin being a boss Monster doesn’t contradict what we know about Boss Monsters. We know that the Dreemurrs are boss monsters, but nothing tells us that they are the only boss monsters.

Argument 6: the nature of the SAVE files contradicts Undertale Yellow

Here we go, the penultimate argument I shall argue against. Never did I expect for this obscure piece of Undertale lore to be the bane of my existence but here we are. For a short time I thought that this could not be countered, only after I had walked away from a discussion completely defeated did the pieces finally start to come together, and now finally… I have an explanation.

First things first, let’s look at the 10 save files. The files go from file 0 to file 9. We know that File 0 likely belongs to Chara due to it being the one that we save with in Undertale, and that file 9 belongs to Frisk since it works as the games Autosave/Checkpoint system. File 8 would then of course belong to Flowey, not just because it’s the one just before Frisks but because File 8 appears in your files after you beat Omega Flowey to mark your completion of a Neutral run, likely implying that his previous SAVE was of course when he was Omega Flowey. Flowey also uses files 2, 3 and 6 throughout the Omega Flowey battle, and since Toriel implies that other humans who fell were also able to save and reset, we can assume that 2-6 likely belonged to previously fallen humans.

Now the only files that need an explanation are file 1 and file 7, and I’ve seen 2 interesting theories for this. The first is that file 1 belongs to Asriel after he took Chara’s Soul, and the other is that file 7 belongs to Lemon Bread since they know what a SAVE point looks like and tries to trick us with it; but the thing is, which one of these are true? Surely it can’t be both since we know one needs to belong to the 6th… okay I’ll cut that out you already know I’m going to say they are both true.

So for Asriel having file 1, he absorbed Chara’s Soul so should have all of their determination and therefore should also have overtaken their ability to SAVE. Of course it’s unlikely that Asriel would have made anything out of it since the idea of saving and loading was fairly alien to Flowey, however that doesn’t necessarily rule out the possibility that Asriel didn’t SAVE or at least have a file created.

Lemon Bread is a bit more complicated, and we are gonna need to look into the order of events within the True Lab to try and work this out. Firstly, we need to look at some of the true lab entries.

ASGORE asked everyone outside the city for monsters that had "fallen down."

Their bodies came in today.

They're still comatose... And soon, they'll all turn into dust.

But what happens if I inject "determination" into them?

If their SOULS persist after they perish, then...

Freedom might be closer than we all thought.

This is entry 6, when the fallen down monsters are given to Alphy’s and have Determination injected into them.

I've chosen a candidate.

I haven't told ASGORE yet, because I want to surprise him with it...

In the center of his garden, there's something special.

The first golden flower, that grew before all the others.

The flower from the outside world.

It appeared just before the queen left.

I wonder...

What happens when something without a SOUL gains the will to live?

This is entry 8, Alphy’s gets a hold of a golden flower that she injects Determination into.

“One of the bodies opened its eyes.

This is entry 13, when the fallen monsters started to regain consciousness, 7 entries after they were first delivered.

Seems like this research was a dead end...

But at least we got a happy ending out of it...?

I sent the SOULS back to ASGORE, returned the vessel to his garden....

And I called all of the families and told them everyone's alive.

I'll send everyone back tomorrow. :)

This is entry 15, by this point all the monsters that had fallen down were awake, and the still not conscious Golden Flower was still just a Flower, being returned alongside the human Souls.

no No NO NO NO NO NO

This is entry 16, the fallen down monsters started to melt together and create the amalgamates.

the flower's gone.

Finally, we have entry 18, when Alphy’s noticed that the Flower seems to have disappeared from the garden, 10 entries after she first selected it.

So, why are these entries so important? Well we know that to have ever held the ability to SAVE, Lemon Bread would have to had held the right amount of Determination before Flowey first became conscious in the garden, and did they? Yes, yes they did. Flowey could have awakened anywhere in the timeframe between entry 15 when he was returned to entry 18 when Alphy’s noticed him gone, however all the fallen down monsters that were injected with Determination were already awake by this point, and therefore prior to Flowey waking up, they would have been the most determined beings in the underground, perhaps with enough determination that whichever monster happened to have the most was able to SAVE. The time that they would have had with the ability would also have at least been for longer than Asriel had it since Flowey can’t have awoken until after a couple entries later at the bare minimum. Of course since this follows the idea that Lemon Bread had the SAVE ability since they knew what a SAVE point looks like, we can assume that the monster in question would have been Shyren’s sister, since I doubt that the Moldbygg and Aaron that also make up Lemon Bread would hold such a role.

Argument 7: Flowey’s backstory

I really thought I was done with this infuriating Flower, but it appears not. For there is a single hole I need to clear up… Flowey’s Genocide speech. Of course this should be fairly simple to clear up-

Ah… well okay this makes things interesting. If Flowey didn’t know where the Souls were stored then that would make it very hard to believe that Flowey ever encountered a human before Frisk since if that were the case then Flowey would definitely have an opportunity to sneak by and see where they are hiding, however this is not what the dialogue actually means. Flowey knew where the Souls were, he sneaks in to steal them in Neutral while we are talking to a defeated Asgore, his only issue was that he wasn’t able to get them out without Asgore. In repeated Neutral runs he still just waits until we are distracted with Asgore to take the Souls, and in Pacifist he takes them while the main cast are all distracted which again is when the canisters are open and available.

On a last note, here’s some dialogue that actually helps the idea that Flowey encountered another human.

It’s made clear all throughout the underground that humans have far greater Determination than monsters, and while you could argue that Flowey was just overconfident in his abilities, it’s still fairly strange that Flowey would still find a human having the DT to overwrite his abilities something special, unless of course he’d encountered a human previously who wasn’t able to do as much.

Conclusion

So, that’s about all I have to say, honestly I’m just glad to be done with it. This was a lot of work, and I’m excited to see this post which I’ve been working on for 3 days get completely dismantled almost immediately. Anyways, wish everyone reading a good day and goodbye!

[aufberontrove]

Jayvik, Christian Linke, and the Discourse

Hey y’all, I’m breaking a bit from my usual type of post, but we’re still talking about Arcane, so it’s not too off-topic. I encourage anyone reading this to share their thoughts on anything I’m bringing up—or even to bring new ideas into the conversation. Just please, don’t harass anyone because of it.

Let me give some context first: I haven’t watched the full interview, and I might’ve spent way too much time on Twitter and Bluesky reading about this stuff. I still love Arcane, though. As someone who mostly posts Arcane content, I feel like I kind of have to respond to this, even if no one really cares.

About Jayvik:

Was there homoromantic subtext? Sure—if there wasn’t, people wouldn’t be shipping them this much. But to me, it feels like BBC Sherlock all over again: throwing in gay subtext without committing to it.

Honestly, there’s a simple way to handle this kind of situation: just say you didn’t intend for it to be read that way but can understand how people got that impression. That’s it. For some reason, though, Christian Linke doesn’t take that route—or at least, I haven’t seen him do so.

On Christian Linke

The main reason I’m writing this is to talk about Christian Linke, the co-creator of Arcane, who, apparently, is one of the worst people to disagree with on the internet. Let’s break it down by topic.

The Pitch

First, the quote he used. In this context, I could argue it’s okay to use the slur since it’s a quote, but you have to wonder: Why use that quote at all? There are so many other quotes to choose from, and he chose that one. It feels… weird.

As for the depiction of Zaun: maybe I’m misremembering, but the show doesn’t really lean into what he described in the pitch. The moral codes in Zaun seem pretty similar to those in Piltover. Sure, the chem-barons aren’t exactly moral, but neither is the Piltover council. Piltover is far from pure or righteous.

Let's talk about Viktor:

Apparently, Viktor is ace now. That kinda makes sense to me, but there was no hint of it in the show. It gives me “2007 Dumbledore is gay” vibes—except now it’s the German Twitch edition. And as many people have pointed out, gay asexual people exist too. So, framing it like this doesn’t really fix anything.

There’s also controversy about asexual disabled people, but I’m not comfortable commenting much on that since I’m neither disabled nor asexual. Still, it’s worth mentioning that people are discussing it. (Maybe this is related: Link 1 or Link 2).

Also apparently there is a joke from S1 that implies that he usually brings men to his room so yeah... so, there’s that.

Let's talk about Season 2:

Let’s just get this out of the way: Season 2 was rushed. That’s not really up for debate, and Christian himself confirmed it during Arcane Afterglow. The pacing feels weird in a lot of places. Was it entirely his fault? No, of course not. But certain moments, like “Timebomb” and the sex scene—even though I enjoyed at least one of them—feel like filler to either kill one of the main characters so you don't need to bother with them or cater to the majority of your audience.

Then there’s his cocky tweets and Reddit post.

Like, ok the show is good but I felt the same while watching Owl House, Avatar: Last Airbender, or anime like Koe no Katachi. I agree the fans aren’t owed anything, but the way he responds shows he has no PR training whatsoever.

If you have anything more share it with the class. I am closing Twitter because this discourse is killing my brain cells.

[getvalentined]

i want to ask you all of them is that allowed? ALL OF THEM

exercising great restraint, i limited myself to most of them

❤: Which character do you think is the most egregiously mischaracterized by the fandom?

🧡: What is a popular (serious) theory you disagree with?

💛: What is a popular ship you just can't get behind, and why?

💚: What does everyone else get wrong about your favorite character?

🤍: Which character is not as morally bad as everyone else seems to think?

🖤: Which character is not as morally good as everyone else seems to think?

💖: What is your biggest unpopular opinion about the series?

💔: If you had to remove one major character from the series, who would you choose?

💕: What is an unpopular ship that you like?

[ Unpopular Opinion Ask Game ]

I will be putting most of these behind a cut so as not to stretch anyone's dash, but I'll take 'em all!

❤️ · Which character do you think is the most egregiously mischaracterized by the fandom?

Honestly there are so many characters who are grossly mischaracterized by fandom that this is hard to say. I'm going to go with the most popular and most mischaracterized, which is Sephiroth.

This man all but asks permission to have opinions in CC:

Sephiroth: I would prefer not to believe it, but… Zack: Then don't believe it. Sephiroth: Very well, I won't.

He also seeks permission to leave the company:

Sephiroth: […] Depending on what happens, I may abandon Shinra. Zack: [says nothing, but looks at Sephiroth with obvious trepidation, clearly uncomfortable with the option] Sephiroth: …Until then, I'll remain loyal to SOLDIER.

When Zack doesn't respond affirmatively, Sephiroth drops the prospect of leaving and never brings it up again.

This man is not socially confident, nor is he remotely dominant in his behavior. He's not eloquent or debonair, he's quiet and awkward and has been brought up in such a way that he's all but incapable of making decisions for himself. We can very easily blame Hojo for this, controlling and demanding as he is, but for some reason the fandom portrays pre-Nibelheim Sephiroth as some sort of Daddy Dom sex god in spite of the fact that he almost certainly died a virgin.

🧡 · What is a popular (serious) theory you disagree with?

Where do I even start? President Shinra is not Cloud's father. Glenn is also not Cloud's father. The identity of Cloud's father doesn't matter at all, actually! Hojo did not sexually assault Lucrecia to produce Sephiroth. Vincent did not "abandon Sephiroth" to Hojo. Gast was not a good person. Just because the Cetra may actually have been self-important pieces of shit as a culture does not mean Jenova is secretly good. Sephiroth was not born in 1984. This is all extremely stupid.

💛 · What is a popular ship you just can't get behind, and why?

Censored to keep it out of searches, the two that I avoid like the plague are Va|enwind and AG$ZC.

The first because it really bothers me that C!d is canonically abusive toward Shera for half a decade, still manages to get his act together enough that they get married post-Meteorfall, and then Va|enwind shippers straight up act like she either doesn't exist or like she somehow deserved the way he treated her. I've literally discussed this with people and had them assert that nobody likes Shera anyway so it doesn't matter how he treated her, she's "barely relevant to his character" and "easy to ignore." Multiple people have told me that she'll probably be removed from the FF7R series altogether because she just doesn't matter.

I mean, Shera is in the OG, in OTWTAS, and it's revealed that C!d named his new airship after her in AC, and she's mentioned multiple times in Dirge, but sure! Not important at all! The dev team didn't even cut Johnny but they'll absolutely cut C!D'S FUCKING WIFE because she makes him look bad and gets in the way of a popular noncanon ship! That's definitely how this works!

I don't like the Big Polycule because I don't think the character dynamics actually work all together, and most people who write it do so in such a way that everyone seems to be in high school for some reason. Like working for Shinra is the same as high school? As someone who has worked in a corporate setting as an adult, and has family who have been in the military and law enforcement, I find this whole trope to be really strange and it puts me right off.

Further, even if we ignore the canon that Cloud wasn't even on active duty until after both Genesis and Angeal had defected, hadn't even seen either of them in person until Modeoheim (where Zack held Genesis back so Cloud could pursue Hollander and then Angeal beat the shit out of the poor kid to stop said pursuit), and didn't meet Sephiroth until the Nibelheim mission, there's still a lot about it that grinds my gears. This is not shade toward people who don't care about this kind of thing, but I'm personally uncomfortable with the concept of two teenagers (Cloud is 14-16 and Zack is 16-18 prior to Nibelheim) being in a sexual relationship with three adult men who are up to 10 years older and in positions of power over them, particularly how this is always treated in-story like a great thing that is no big deal. If that power dynamic were ever played with or discussed in any way it might be different—I can appreciate some dangerous or unhealthy relationship dynamics in fiction—but I've literally never seen a Big Polycule shipper address it at all. Between that and the characterization mismatch, it just rankles me really bad. (Also, while I'm not particularly squicked out by the fact that Genesis and Angeal are canonically related, I feel like they had some issues with that, and it would definitely fuck up the sexual dynamic there.)

💚 · What does everyone else get wrong about your favorite character?

You already talked about how Vincent is fucking hilarious, and I've talked about it myself in the past, so I won't soapbox about that. Honestly I think that's secondary to the thing that I feel everyone gets the most wrong about Vincent, which is that he's no longer in love with Lucrecia postcanon.

His entire character arc over the course of the series, from BC to Dirge, is him learning that he was wrong about her, she made mistakes, it's her fault he's so fucked up to begin with, and then forgiving her for it. It's him setting aside his idea of her and seeing who she really was, looking past the brilliance of which he speaks so fondly to see the mistakes that only he is still "alive" to pay for—and in doing so, reaching an understanding so deep that he's willing to give her the absolution and release that no force on Gaia can offer to him.

He thanks her for saving him, because he understands that's what she was trying to do, and he is grateful that even if she was never in love with him (which she wasn't) she did love him enough to do that. He's grateful that she loved him enough to throw away years of her life in the attempt to save him, just like he lost his entire life in his attempt to save her. They're foils of each other, but they're over. At the end of Dirge, he thanks her and he leaves, walking into the light for the first time in decades, free of the self-loathing he'd been burdened with by his misunderstanding of Lucrecia.

I think it's a beautiful, bittersweet story, but Vincent's ability to move forward afterward makes it more sweet than bitter. By portraying Vincent as still every bit as obsessive and love-blind as he was up until the events of Dirge, folks do a huge disservice to his character arc. I don't think it's impossible for him to fall for her again postcanon, if she somehow returned to the world of the living (which she won't, she's very clear that the majority of her spirit has been eroded by that point and there's no way she could come back), but it wouldn't be the same relationship. He still loves her, I have no doubt of that, but he's not in love with her anymore. That's the whole point of his character arc. It's only way he can be free, and he deserves it.

🤍 · Which character is not as morally bad as everyone else seems to think?

Genesis. Genesis Genesis Genesis. I'm not gonna wax on too much here because I already have a fucking manifesto so I won't go into too much here, but Genesis is only the antagonist of CC because Zack is with Shinra, he's not the looming, manipulative liar that people portray him as in the slightest. He doesn't actually lie, like, at all. That's the problem. He is so brutally honest it ruins his relationships with literally everyone he's ever loved, because he can't fathom someone not wanting to know the truth. That's not a moral failing, that's a misunderstanding of emotional processing—because he's autistic as hell and nobody ever wants to talk about it.

He's described by Gackt himself as being "a sweetheart," the way he dresses indicates that he's used to fighting in very close-quarters while everyone else aims to keep as much distance as possible, he constantly puts himself down while elevating his loved ones, and he's not the one responsible for the accident that ruined everything.

And yet. Somehow. Bad guy forever. Okay.

🖤 · Which character is not as morally good as everyone else seems to think?

Angeal. I have a tag for this. 'Nough said.

💖 · What is your biggest unpopular opinion about the series?

The "official timeline" provided by the multiple contradictory Ultimanias is wrong. This is proven by the actual source material, but god forbid you try to make people do basic fucking math.

Oh also Rebirth's ending was phenomenal and I'm sorry that it didn't go how people wanted it to go, but it's still exactly what it should have been for this point in the story. Sorry.

💔 · If you had to remove one major character from the series, who would you choose?

This is...difficult. Almost all the major characters in the series are integral to the story in some capacity, so removing any of them would make it something else altogether. Yuffie could be removed from the OG without affecting the plot, but she couldn't be scrapped from later titles, so that's out. The main party member I'd be most personally invested in removing would be C!d because his backstory is very triggering to me as a survivor of domestic abuse, but that would break the story. I dunno how to answer this one—just because the character isn't integral in every title or I don't like them doesn't mean they should be removed. The series I love wouldn't be the same without them. I think they can all stay.

💕 · What is an unpopular ship that you like?

I am a load-bearing pylon in the Tseeve tag, which I think is a travesty, but folks wanna pair Tseng with his shitty boss instead so it is what it is.

[itsallpoliticsstupid]

Throughout the election, I maintained to my boyfriend that I couldn't call who would win. Because it was just too close. I think that was always untrue, in my heart I always knew that Kamala didn't have a chance at becoming President.

I think there are a number of reasons for this. The car crash of a Presidential debate between Biden and Trump; the way she became the democratic candidate; her stance on the Israel/Gaza war, which turned away a lot of her more 'traditional' voters; the fact that, outside of abortion, there didn't seem to be any other real issue that she was running on - I mean I could literally go on and on. But it just felt everything was against her.

For me though, it boils down to 3 major issues:

The Economy

The fact Biden decided to run for a second term

'Democracy' (e.g. the way she became candidate)

And other Political Analysts will likely disagree with me, but I'm used to it.

The Economy

We look first at the economy. This is a huge motivating factor to why somebody would vote for a candidate. Under the democrats cost of living has increased, and people are struggling to maintain a good quality of life.

An average voter is going to ascribe that to the Government, and in this case the Democrats.

They're not going to know, or care, that the cost of living increase is a global issue caused by world events. Such as the War in Ukraine, War in the Middle East and Climate Change making large scale production more difficult due to the instability of the land.

So if the opposing Political Party are using that big issue to their advantage, claiming that they will help lower taxes for the normal working family, of course that's going to be an incentive to vote for them regardless of the other issues surrounding that candidate/party.

Biden's decision to stand

I think the moment Biden decided to go for a second term was the moment the democrats had no hope of winning the election.

It had become apparent quite late on in his presidency that he was struggling with his neurological health and it should have been advised much earlier that he shouldn't run for a second term.

Had he stepped away much earlier, they could have bought in a candidate who could run from the off. Somebody who would be able to put what they stood for across much earlier, and could really make an impact in an election.

Because really, who knows what Kamala stood for? Outside of the abortion rights, I can't tell you one thing. Yes, I wanted her to win, but that's because I do believe Trump will cause damage globally. But, I don't know what Kamala's policies were. Or what she really stood for. It felt like the democrats were more interested in damaging the Republican party's image than really showing what they were about.

In essence, negative campaigning. Which came to a head when she referred to him as a fascist.

And it just goes to show that negative campaigning doesn't work.

Democracy (How she became the candidate)

This leads me to the final point. How Kamala became candidate. In a parliamentary system, nobody would blink twice if you had a change of leader candidate half way through an election. Because you vote for the party, not the candidate.

I think changing the candidate half way through this election process made people feel a bit...off. And is probably why so many people said that threat to democracy was a core issue for them. Because, if it was mainly democrats answering the threat to democracy being a core issue, the election would have been a hell of a lot different.

Anyway, that's just my opinion and assessment.

It sucks right now but, as I said in my country after Brexit, you will get through, whether in the US or in another country. It will be a deeply uncertain, challenging time, but all you can do right now is have faith that things won't be as bad as we all believe.

Take care of yourselves in America. I may wait for the next 4 years to pass before reconsidering relocating over there for work.

[writtenicarus]

Why AFTG sucks but doesn't suck

Okay so I swear that will make more sense in a minute. The main point I'm trying to tackle here is why, despite its notable flaws, AFTG "sucks" to other readers but not to its fandom. Trigger warnings for basically every triggering topic in AFTG.

You may realise the majority of people who dislike AFTG have little to no understanding of the characters flaws - and that's because they cannot relate to the characters. They may criticise by saying Andrew is abusive or Nicky is too sexual. But the majority of fans disagree, and here's why. They can relate. Andrew is a victim of rape, child rape, and that is VERY recognised in the story and in his character and whilst many who are unfamiliar with this variation of trauma see his actions as abusive, fans of the series and in some cases victims of it themselves such as myself, see his behaviour as liberation. We see it as him taking back control.

Furthermore, with Nicky, people see his behaviour as creepy. I understand some fans POV is the same but to understand my point of view of the Nicky/Neil I did do an extensive explanation in the past but I want to delve deeper in the future, it's up on my Instagram around July 2022 if you want to read it. Moving on, I do not see it as creepy. His confidence in his sexuality and confidence in himself and his kindness I see as an act of freedom. Nicky is finally away from his abusive household where he was shunned and traumatized for who he was (remember the fact he went to conversion "therapy"??) and now he doesn't have to experience that. He's free. It's so beautiful to see and he is my favourite character. Keeping in mind, he gave up said freedom with Eric to come back and look after the twins, one of which he had never met or heard of.

There are a lot of other examples I could use, but the point is, the majority of people who claim AFTG is simply unrealistic thankfully haven't experienced the trauma many of the fans have who are able to relate to each character. And that's why AFTG will never suck. It can't suck - it's freeing and liberating.

Another thing I'd like to note is why I believe despite MANY flaws Nora is an incredibly intelligent author. So many under-represented groups were heard and targeted in AFTG and one of the reasons why AFTG is so "underground" or disliked away from the fact it's old and self-published is the fact it has such a minute target audience. And considering all things that happen in the book, some may question my phrasing of that so let me explain.

It's not the variations of trauma or events that are minute but the fact and extent of the trauma the characters experience and their reactions to it. All of the foxes are flawed - that's the point. And none of their responses to their trauma are healthy - that's the point.

The foxes can be seen as a representation of the minority of people who respond to their trauma in negative ways and the whole point of the book is to give these people second chances. And that's again why so many feel seen.

To summarize, I just personally believe that without a very self-aware or understanding mindset a lot of the people who cannot relate to either of the foxes simply just won't and did not like this book and even call it problematic. I'm not saying these people are narrow-minded (they are) but if we look at the large minority of readers who disliked the books that's the case and those who could relate but still label it as problematic probably could not understand why the foxes responded the way they did, and that's okay.

[punishing-eden]

Rant/Review: Wuthering waves, its Writing...

((An Essay about what I think about the game so far. Note, I have not played into the story of the Blackshore))

Edited

Tags: Feel free not to read, rant, review, essay, long read, opinions, spoilers

*Do note that everything I say are my opinion*

So, I started playing this game since it's launch. Agree to disagree how I feel about this game and it's current trajectory, because my take on it won't be an overall positive one.

I will mostly take about the story writing in this essay since it is the most glaring issue for me. This topic, I know, would set off some really heated debate, mainly, as I have observed within my scope.

In regards To Wuthering Waves, I'll start with the positives, the combat. I think this is an area that actually outshines Genshin. The bosses in Wuwa are harder, but fun to play. The stakes are higher, and the flexibility of player attack combos feels nice to play.

Unlike Genshin, the boss does not hover, go under, or flash around the area for the majority of the time. I can count how many times I have to wait in the area for a few seconds just for the boss to reappear, hit them within a few nano seconds before having to wait again.

The bosses have their own movesets, attack, counterattack, parries, and combos that keeps you at your toes. They don't shy away from giving you a hard time, and Kuro allows the bosses to have their abilities to be on par with the playable characters.

What I also like are the bosses, or anything really, does not caters to certain limited characters' playstyle or element. This, however, might be too early to say.

The graphics looks quite nice, the NPCs have personality, and I enjoy the many expressions they give. More generous cutscenes, and Rover being allowed to speak. Exploration modes like the grappling hook and parkor are nice touches as well.

With many good stuff happening in Wuthering Waves, it is easy to see how this game can compete with Genshin Impact in the market. Yet, despite so, it did not stop me from uninstalling the game from my Ipad.

It has been said before by many since the launch. Voiceover, music, dialogues, Ui, and other details in general are making and breaking the game.

I have heard a lot of theories and things as to why the launch is what it is. Back then I was told to wait due to their history with PGR. As a fan I was willing to wait, and endure the state of its launch and mediocrity as long as the experience of the whole package is good.

Which brings me to the glaring issues:

1. The Writing and the Execution.

Needless to say, people flocked to Wuthering Waves is because the game feels like it could offer something different in the genre of open world RPG. Not only is the combat a factor, but also the type of themes and the stories it can tell.

Genshin's story is not bad, but some players deemed the themes of the plot are a little too fantastical and childish. Wuthering waves, given how serious its lore is, and the devastation theme in their concept of a sci-fi world seems like a nice change from a pg friendly game.

I would like to point out, Lore ≠ Story, and Plot ≠ Storytelling.

I think the marketing team stating Wuwa as a story rich game might be a mistake, because the game certainly did not live up to the hype; it did not execute that hype it display in the launch trailer. I won't go into a detail analysis of the storytelling. But, I know this topic has sparked heated debates.

We can all agree to disagree, but this still does not take away the disappointment, and the issues that I have for the game.

The reason for my source of unsatisfaction are due to the quality of the writing, the writing direction, and the medicore execution of plot points. This extends to character story as well.

I want to experience what the lore and open world has to offer, as it was marketed. The story is essentially the overarching experience of the game; a window to the world of Solaris-3

This is where I am coming from when I am getting into the game.

Yet, as the patches progress, the glaring issue of actually writing a story, instead of a fanfic fantasy tested my patience. To me, the main story didn't feel like a progression of the protagonist's journey of their own agency or their accord.

Which brings in my next point:

2. Characters and Fanservice

I hated the fanservice in Wuthering Waves. I know, quite a big statement.

I believe a good story and fanservice can co-exist, as long as there is a good ratio to it, and is tastefully done.

The fanservice is overly glaring in the story and character quest. Mostly, it was unwarranted. This is what I hate, not the nature of the fanservice itself, but the unwarrent fanservice that is shoved down our thoarts.

Given the vibe and type of game Wuthering Waves convey through the main story, the fanservice really feels jarring. Pairing it with bad writing, it feels like a amateur fanfic writer wrote this, and somehow the Creative Director green lit this as good.

Yinlin's character quest is an example, the one I have gripes with the most. The writing of her story, by how I experienced it, did not make me like her at all, and to force a fanservice scene really takes the cake. It doesn't make sense to me, and it made me begin to question am I playing an Sci-fi open world apocalyptic RPG, or actually an anime isekai dating fantasy game.

The latter is not what I signed up for.

So, it is no surprise I never rolled on the character banner after the beginner's banner. I was pretty much rolling for weapons for my existing characters instead. (Hence, I wish I can convert my green and gold convene to weapon convenes.)

In theory, I should have rolled for Jiyan, but I didn't, because there isn't much interested shown by his character other than the beef with Geshu Lin. ((Edit: The craziest thing is, I legit have no idea what that beef is even about?)) His character quest did nothing to convince me to roll for him.

I shed a few tears during Xiangli Yao's story quest...but it's for an NPC and his monoluge. Not sure what Pascar has to do with Xiangli Yao's, at least how I understood it, urge for solitude to ponder and search for answers to his intellectual curiousity(?).

The characters in Wuthering Waves, to me, feels like a 3D manifestation of tropes rather than characters. There is no depth, and has shown no depth, in their own personalities, and how their dynamic with other characters, NPCs, and Rover develops. It's (the developed relationship) there because the story said so.

My favourite characters so far in the story are actually, Aalto and Encore. These two have more personality to show, and when they are together, they actually create character dynamic. They are also introduced with something to contribute to the progression of the story; providing an insight to the lore of the First Civilisation and the Black Shore.

Scar is also a character that seems to be interesting, but I won't say that for sure until we see him more in action. In all honesty, I think he is interesting because he is the "antagonist" in the story who provides tension and conflict, something like building up to a climax or a twist.

With an antagonist, there is a protagonist:

3. Rover as a protagonist

Now, I know that the silent protagonist is seen to be a self insert. But, I tend to believe even if the protagonist is silent, there should be at least some consistancy to the characterisation. Because, the switch between the UwU rover, to the Serious/Hardcore Rover feels jarringly inconsistent.

Another point to make is Rover and their, still, lack of agency. From my own understanding of what was presented to me, we should be viewing the story through Rover's lens. Yet, there are times where I felt their response and reactions are passive to naught, and I does not make sense to me, as there is no reasoning on Rover's behalf.

For example, should the seed of doubt linger in Rover's mind after a confrontation with Scar? Since Rover has no memory, what makes them fully trust Yang Yang to the tee? When Rover learns about their significance to the world through Jue, during the confrontation scene with Jinhsi, should the first thing Rover did was to demand for more answers? Ask more questions on the spot, instead being like, "Oh... Okay...". Should the first thing Rover did, after Yinlin zapped them unconscious, is to deem her as a potential enemy for self preservation purposes?

Instead almost all of the agency are given to other characters. In the arc at the Northfall Barrens, most of the agency were given to the resonator cast when they were defending Jinzhou; having their Avengers moment. Rover was just there. Then they were told to find Jiyan. And the rest of time was Jiyan speaking, taking initiative even towards the end.

Like, what was the purpose of Rover being there? Was it because Yang Yang said so? What would Rover achieve by fighting with the Midnight rangers other than earning a hero status? Who knows.

Because of having little to no agency for the Rover, the story feels lost. There is no definate overarching goal.

Sure, they might be searching for their lost memories, but there is no definate goal post for the story to reach it's conclusion for Rover's journey. There is no intrigue to keep the story moving forward.

Genshin's story, as an example, has always been about the MC finding their lost twin, with the conclusion that they will, hopefully, reunite and continue on their mysterious journey. Along the way of finding their sibling, things happened. The regions and their crisis as subplots, that reveals the lore and the trajectory of the world MC is travelling in to reach that goal.

Gameplay alone can only take a game so far. In the Jinzhou region of Huang Loong, the exploration of the world map needs more work, and even then there needs to be stories that makes the world an interesting place to explore.

I am not saying Genshin has the best writing. It has it's flaws. But, regardless of the sometimes, messy and muddled execution of plot points, having a good story can really make an impact to the gaming experience with games like these.

Due to the three points mentioned, I was heasitant to begin the new chapter to the Blackshore. With how the story's bad ratio of Character/story development to Fanservice, and the execution of the storytelling, I have been, instead, grinding the domains, bosses, and Tacet fields.

The voice about whether or not I have been phished to play an Anime Waifu fantasy game grew louder at each patch. The fact that I, as a player, have no choice but to endure the jarring superficial segments of dates and fanfiction-quese sequence (I mean the cliche and chessy ones) is enough to turn me off from the game.

It might have not been it's intent, but with how intergrated the fanservice is, it's really hard to take this game seriously anymore. To me, I feel like I was in a lost.

The gameplay alone was not holding the game up for me, as there's only so much you could do in the open world. Either it's boss, puzzles, or combat. The events are always in relation to combat alone, and they are recycled at each patch.

My patience for the, "Just wait, it will get better just like PGR" is wanning. I don't think being a fan of PGR can be used to excuse the apparent state of the experience of Wuthering waves.

Which is a shame, because I really tried to be patient, and I tried so hard to like it. I have been waiting for this game since its first announcement. I remember looking at Rover's very first design and the promo art, being all excited, wanting to play it so badly.

Needless to say, Wuthering Wave, unfortunately is not living up to what it says it's going to be. I think there is potential for the game to be great, but, as of now, and the direction things are going, it feels like they have decided to go a certain way.

Though, I wish they didn't have to phish me into adding numbers to their download count on lauch day. (They didn't actually phish me, but given how everything turned out felt like it.)

I hope, things will get better in the game, and that the experience can be more enjoyable for players alike. Yet, as of now, I won't been having it in my gaming roaster.