#i hope this was phrased right

[variousqueerthings]

it also does a disservice to martha i feel, it's an easy way to go "and therefore she is the single companion who wouldn't want to see the doctor again or have anything to do with them (which, apart from anything else, ignores her s4 stories)" conveniently therefore we can take her out of the narrative

i think there's an issue with on the one hand the racism that was in the writing and in the fandom (and still is in the fandom) meant that martha was put in a position of "strong black woman" tropes, and her family undoubtedly went through some of the most traumatising narrative in doctor who, and there's a question there of how thoughtful the show was being (or wasn't) in how black characters are "allowed" to be involved in genre like science fiction in ways that are demonstrably different to white characters (i have a spiel here about human nature/family of blood, but i digress...)

-- and then on the other hand balancing out the fact that she's actually a very well-written character and her narrative with the doctor is way more give and take than it's given credit for, and -- in my opinion -- a lot of the issues in the writing weren't actually their relationship at all, that shit was for the most part really powerful and had a clear trajectory, and she ended up with a lot of agency over her choices and the doctor respecting those choices

to try to find the uncomplicated Issue Of Martha, regardless of whether going for racist "she was whiny and held the doctor back and isn't rose," or the ostensibly less racist "her relationship with the doctor was badly written because of the doctor, and she only deserved better," claims either way that there is inherently An Issue With Martha, when it's quite possible to hold the acknowledgement and analysis of the misogynoir in parts of the writing and structure of s3, and also that she's like... objectively really cool and her relationship with the doctor is very interesting and also they canonically think the world of each other

i really do think the desire to paint ten as unambiguously The Worst™️ when it comes to his relationship with martha is out of this desire to uncomplicate their relationship. to decouple them as friends and people who profoundly impacted each other’s lives. it’s just an easier narrative to swallow: that ten was Awful to her and then martha kicked him to the curb when she realized she was too good for him. easier, maybe, then dealing with the troubles of unrequited affection don’t have to be anyone’s fault, or that ten shut martha out in a lot of ways but let her in in others that he wouldn’t let any other companion near, or that they were still friends, they still wanted to see each other and be around each other, even though it was messy and sometimes hurt. you know?

[boar-cry]

UN JOUR, JE SERAI DE RETOUR PRÈS DE TOI ▪︎ 《ONE DAY, I WILL RETURN TO YOUR SIDE》

Y'know, despite how much I write and draw sad stuff, I truly believe in good things and happy endings. I don't know what the future holds, but I'm looking forward to it regardless! :)

(different versions beneath the cut:)

[thelaurenshippen]

okay, but, like, THAT'S how you do a villain story. in the FIRST scene, you watch him shoot a man in cold blood. the show tells you right away "this man is not a good man".

but then it gets you to sympathize - look at how much the world has stepped on him. look at how terrible the whole of gotham is. and even when he kills more people, does more terrible things, you still root for him. because it's fun to watch someone be terrible to terrible people. you root for sofia too, because if anyone deserves revenge its her, but you're rooting for both of them somehow.

and then the show tells you "when he was a boy he killed his brothers". but even still, you want to see what he'll do. the show is called the penguin, you want to see the penguin rise. when he lets his mother's finger almost get cut off, you pity him. he's a sad, broken thing. how could he be anything but bad? but he loves, so there must be something else there.

but then. but THEN

the show always told you: "this is the devil". but you thought, maybe the devil can make hell a little more bearable for some people. the devil is so often nuanced, sympathetic, complex. maybe he's like that.

you're wrong. there's nothing good within him and YOU rooted for him to succeed. you wanted to watch the destruction. and now you have to live with the consequences of thinking, even for a second, that he could be redeemed.

[mamawasatesttube]

one of the funniest aro traits i have is that i NEVER notice people i know being romantically into each other. they can be the most obviously pining couple in the world flirting ridiculously hard right in front of me and ill just be like wow, look at us three besties all just hanging out :) and then they'll be like btw we're dating now! and ill go WHAT???? oh that was romance??? WHOA. like yay happy for you!!! i just didn't clock it at all whatsoever!!!! (part of this is that im just an affectionate person with my friends and ill happily flirt with my besties and physically lay all over them with absolutely no romantic intent. so i forget that sometimes people are flirty or always concerned with each other for romantic reasons. like. EVERY time it's just oh YEAH... i forgor again...)

anyways, i like to hand this to bart allen, aroace extraordinaire. guy who just straight up forgets romance is real and not something they made up for video games with romanceable companions. he's happy for his friends when they say they're dating someone, bc they're happy so yay! but until they come out and say it he will NOT clock any sort of romance going on.

now i also like to imagine that when the gang are all like in their late teens to early 20s, there's some RIDICULOUS lesbian drama going on. cassie and cissie have been kinda sorta dancing around each order for ages, but then after kon's death and resurrection cassie got distant and cissie and anita started spending more and more time together, and cassie isn't proud to admit it but she maaaay have gotten jealous and fucked rose about it, and now cissie is giving her the cold shoulder. and rose keeps flirting with cissie even though she and cassie keep having unplanned hookups, and anita just asked cassie to be her plus one to a wedding and cassie is shocked she didn't ask cissie and what's going on?! is anita hitting on her??? omg??? wait but what's going on with cissie?? and....

anyway, all of this to say cassie is going the fuck Through it and it's a mess that she keeps bemoaning to kon while languishing on his couch and eating all his ice cream (kon is listening wide-eyed like "wow. if i ever need romantic advice, i'll ask you and then do the exact opposite of whatever you say.") this whole ridiculous affair is going on for months.

until one day there's a core four sleepover and kon is like soooo is it the time of night where we start unpacking the latest developments in cassie's love life? and cassie goes AUURGHGHRHH!!!! yes but oh my god shut up don't say it like that auugghhhh

and bart just looks at her and tilts his head like a puppy dog and asks "wait. you have a love life?? since when???"

silence.

cassie gawks. kon looks positively gleeful.

and then tim starts laughing so hard he doubles over and accidentally slams his head into the corner of the coffee table hard enough to get a mild concussion. bart's aro swag claims yet another victim

[unpersoniverse]

nah because you know what pisses me off/breaks my heart about Isha's death?

Even though it is shown with a visually beautiful montage that could be read as heroic (??) at first glance, it is not. That child didn't sacrifice themselves to save Jinx or anything of that matter. That's a literal CHILD that ran through an open battlefield who probably didn't even though that death could be an outcome, especially not after seeing Jinx coming out of worse situations alive. Isha was a child playing pretend to be her hero/role model.

And what's even more heartbreaking is that it is a portrait of Zaun's infancies who are born and raised in an environment that exposes them to violence first than anything. These children who grow amidst the oppression, poisoned air and violent system that doesn't see them as people but as "one of many". These are children that mimic what they see because that's what children do. These are children, innocent minds that don't care if they're playing in the middle of a playground or a battlefield, they know violence but still naive enough to think they can escape it.

Yeah, Isha's death is not a heroic sacrifice, is just deeply sad.

[ioannemos]

the particular bad guy of this episode, a little apprehensively: the audience wants to see me die?

nate, with more sincerity than anything he's said to anyone in her presence before: like you wouldn't believe

[pokimoko]

Hello!! i just discovered your blog and firstly i wanna say that your art is gorgeous! <33 and secondly, if youre still taking requests could i get a lesbian/non binary cheetah? /nf

Thank you! Cheetahs be upon ye!

[oceanwithouthermoon]

imo everyone who insists that saikis life was perfect and he was a spoiled brat complaining about nothing are just purposefully ignoring and misinterpreting the whole manga simply because they like other characters better and want to make up scenarios to make their fav seem like a precious little victim in every situation

its hard to explain but i see it happen a lot with specifically people who have dedicated accounts for other characters and constantly misattribute every issue to "saikis such a baby, my character has it way worse!" "saiki hurt my babys feelings once so i hate him!" "saikis such a spoiled brat, my baby has a way shittier life and never complains about it!" "saiki hurt my poor precious fav once so hes an abusive monster!"

and said "shittier life" that they "never complain" about is either the persons headcanons (literally made up) or... the character DOES complain about it and the person takes those words at FACE VALUE but ignores everything else, including things that actually HAPPEN right in front of our eyes

[nadas-dirthalen]

I don't personally feel shame for enjoying Veilguard but I feel like it's vital to support positive readings of the game's content, given the amount of vitriol. And I adore that there are people like yourself encouraging individual engagement and entertainment, thank you 🧡🍊

So, here's my question for you: What do you think of Morrigan-Mythal's role in the game and how her motherly aspect was depicted?

Ohhh my god, I love this ask. I LOVE this ask. (And thank YOU, anon!)

I'm sure people are going to disagree with me, but I loved it. Hear me out, people.

My own relationship with my mom is nothing short of fraught. No, I'm not going to divulge a lifetime's sorrows here in a response to an ask, but I feel like it is important context for everything I'm about to say. My mother has done frankly inexcusable things, and those things will not be excused! Not by me!

That said: I think Morrigan's adoption of Mythal was masterfully done. The biggest reason I love it is that it harkens back to everything we learned from Anders and Justice during DA2.

Morrigan talks about how Mythal appeared to her, and how Mythal appeared as a combination of herself and Flemeth. This shows me that BioWare are still very much writing from the same place, the same bit of lore, that created the best parts of Anders' arc (to me).

During DA2, I was frankly startled by how different Anders was to the one we saw in Awakening. But it soon became clear to me why: Anders tells you that the moment he took Justice into himself, willingly, that their two beings fused in a way impossible to extract or pick apart. Not even Anders knows how much of him is Justice, anymore.

His same sardonic humor from Awakening? His same wolfish grin and renegade attitude? Changed, irrevocably. We only get little glimpses of "Awakening Anders" throughout DA2.

The same, I feel, is true of Morrigan—and if it causes anger, fear, uncertainty, then I feel that is because it is supposed to. We can no longer see the line where Morrigan ends, and where Mythal begins.

I see her reasons, first and foremost, for taking Mythal into herself. Morrigan reminds me of me. As I've grown older, while I do not (and will not) forgive my own mother for some of her actions, I see their motivations in clearer light now. I see the person my mother is, and I see her good intent. I know how to be a different person than her, how to act better on my own good intentions. If I were to inherit all of her belongings and all of her diaries/memories today, I would not become her. I would use those things to do better in the world.

And if you look at some devnotes left in DAI for that scene with Solas and Flemeth, you'll see that Flemeth was always scripted as passing along her/Mythal's memories and spirit. She did so with the intent of those things being a gift to Morrigan. Whatever you believe about Flemeth, the fact remains: Morrigan was always going in this direction.

It is important, also, to remember that Flemeth is dead. Even if Morrigan is taking Flemeth's memories, the mother who abused Morrigan is gone. I think, as she's aged, Morrigan can see that for herself. Taking Mythal's spirit, and willingly, does not mean becoming Flemeth. It means being able to use Flemeth's tools, her magic, in better ways. It means being able to take Flemeth's intentions, whatever they were, and do better with them. Be better. End the cycle of hurt.

How much of that is now coloured by Mythal remains a mystery, and I love that mystery.

Much of Morrigan is precisely the same. Her quips, much the same. Her speech patterns, the same (go look at how much she uses the Hallelujah cadence in DAI, I dare you, everyone). She speaks of motherhood so reverently that if your worldstate inclues Kieran, it fits.

But there is something different. Something calmer, more refined. Something that speaks with more precision, and something that betrays less heated emotion. Something aloof, watching, from behind Morrigan's eyes. Age has done a lot to temper Morrigan, yes... but look at how she appears to not have aged much at all in the time since DAI.

Morrigan, in DATV, is kind, helpful, and reliable... for the same reasons that Solas is cunning, calculating, and unafraid to betray Rook many times over. Because it suits the Evanuris living inside her skin. There is no reason for Morrigan to give Rook any evidence to distrust her with. There is no reason to be anything but pleasant. There is no reason to not talk about motherhood and show Rook her soft side.

And on the opposite side of the coin? Emmrich (I believe) makes note of how spirits do not process emotions and move through them on their own. This is why Solas is stuck in the same regret for 10,000 years, until he gets the external help that lets him let go. This is also why Mythal, jumping from host to host to host (my theory is she was in Andraste, first, or Andraste's half-sister), has learned to soften and empathize with people in that time. Her hosts are that external help, enabling her to process feelings, to learn and grow in ways the other Evanuris (Solas included) have not.

We see it even when she is in Flemeth, and when Flemythal are venting about the betrayal that will shake the very heavens. In the same conversation, she is the only Evanuris who has ever said a kind word to one of the Dalish People. "You do the People proud." (or something similar!)

When within Morrigan, that statement goes one step further. Morrithal says that modern elves will eventually surpass their ancient ancestors, hinting that it is because of their mortal (multifaceted) spirits.

That said... Mythal, I am watching for you, and I am so ready to see your beautiful face in Morrigan down the road.

[pixelatedquarter]

the "patrick probably doesnt even know!!!" crowd on twt just comes across as a massive cope idk. like you simply need to come to terms with your middle aged white man fave not being a paragon of leftism, it's really really okay man. you can still like the music. if you feel guilty turn that energy towards positive action for palestine, not tweeting excuses for Some Guy's silence on it. idk

say that!

Like, it still sucks because he positions himself as not a leftist paragon but still left leaning. It IS disappointing i get it, even when i was kinda expecting it i held onto idk hope? that 'well maybe he won't straight up perform with cobra starship for any related or unrelated reason, that'd be cool to not see', but it's a bit much to go from seeing your fave fuck up/don't care to start making excuses for the upper-upper-middle class white guy from the US who was in 'woah! nostalgic summer camp with all my old buddies~!' mode because that's where his priorities are at. It also rubs me the wrong way that some of them seem to need to cling to the moral purity of an artist or else it's all over, like, it's up to you to decide when something crosses a line to where you're uncomfortable supporting/engaging with someone but you can't move that someone into "no, he's perfect and would never" by sheer force of excusing his behavior.

There's a lot of mixed feelings and for some the shitty feeling can coexist with enjoying their performance this weekend, others need time to process the shit and need to step away for a sec, for others maybe it was one shit too far, for others it was an 'of course he did this [eyeroll]', all those reactions (and plenty more and variants to them, i've seen about as many reactions to it as i've seen fobbies) are fine, but, not to police people's feelings i mean moreso the actions, i feel like making up reasons why your blorbo is unproblematic ain't the way to go.

A NY WAYS using this opprtunity to share: here's a handy link to a resources masterpost on donating to Gaza directly, and one directly to GazaFunds if you feel you cannot choose who to help and the click to donate if you want to help but can't financially (and there's no link for this but i encourage you if you are in any way able to engage offline, especially if your country is influential on the global stage)

And here's a list of a few of the people who've contacted me, if you can donate to any of them:

Salahaldin Ahmad Khalil Hor shared by 90-ghost Muhammad Atallah shared by 90-ghost Asma Ayyad shared by 90-ghost Muhammad Al-Shaer shared by el-shab-hussein and also #88 on his and nabulsi's spreadsheet Ahmed Al-Agha vetted by association as explained by a-shade-of-blue Mohammed Almanasra #192 on el-shab-hussein and nabulsi's spreadsheet Rana Akeela vetted by association as explained by determinate-negation Fatima Alanqar shared by 90-ghost Abdelrahman shared by el-shab-hussein and 90-ghost Wafa Abdul Karim Abu Al-Rish shared by 90-ghost with an update by ana-bananya Khalid sisters vetted by association as explained by a-shade-of-blue Mahmoud Alkhaldi shared by 90-ghost Safaa Jad Al Haq shared by 90-ghost Hanan Mahmoud shared by 90-ghost Eman Khader shared by 90-ghost

[hannibalfan15]

this was meant 2 have more going on but I couldn’t figure it out and didn’t ant to lose the Artistic Vision so here’s The Guy. Explodes him with my MIIND

[kiee0712]

nothing can serve as an excuse for running away, none

hii guys its been a while anyway . where can i find revstar nuis from the PH I've been daydreaming of throwing nana's nui across the window for days now

[marshmallowgoop]

I combined footage from my Detektiv Conan Blu-ray with audio from my Case Closed FUNimation DVD and made an HD English dub clip compilation for Episodes 57-58, "The Holmes Freak Murder Case."

[fraternum-momentum]

always the artist, never the muse.

always the artist, never the muse

always the artist, never the muse.

[reiney-weather]

my heart in the dimly lit aisle

Heyyyy so I just got around to drawing one of my absolute favorites from @nextsoundofthefuture !!! bright <333 followers expect more and also read the comic because it’s so good. firmly gripping my brain also

[jxmey]

actual conversation between me and my bf

convo between me and my bf after i showed him this shitpost

EDITED 5.24.24 BECAUSE I DID INDEED SCUFF THE RUSSIAN AND ALLIGAYTORSWAMP VERY KINDLY CORRECTED ME SO THANK YOUUUU ALKDSFGKLF