#i just imagine that aspect specifically would get boring after a while in a fully fleshed out game

[marshmellowtea]

3 scary games 103 sent me down a molly moon rabbithole, and by that i mean i watched all of her tiktoks lmao

honestlyyyy, after actually watching her content, i'm even more disappointed in what we saw in the "excuse me, sir" demo. she genuinely seems to have a lot of creepy, interesting ideas that could be interesting to expand upon, and her content could be translated pretty easily into a full video game if approached right, but the story they chose to tell in the demo was just kind of.....boring. there wasn't much flavor or personality or, well, horror to it, which sucks cuz it seems like there's a lot of talent behind it. it is just a demo, though, so i really do hope that whatever comes out of it does live up to the quirky horror of her videos, this just.....didn't really feel like that based on my observations, lmao.

[nerves-nebula]

Idk about your intentions, and feel free to ignore me if I’m wrong, but Mikey sounds like a maladaptive daydreamer lol.

Just some background, maladaptive daydreamers use these huge fictional worlds called paracosms to escape reality. Some people do it because of anxiety or stress, but some do it as like a coping mechanism (which is how I’d see Mikey doing it based on your dissociation post) People with maladaptive daydreaming can stim while doing it, like rocking back and forth, pacing, etc, but some can master the art of being able to sit still and just daydream whenever. There’s almost an addictive aspect to it, and a lot of daydreamers have to take adhd or anxiety meds to shake it

Would Mikey stim at first but learn to stay still after Splinter lectured him too many times? Would his paracosm be the book that he’s writing about killing splinter? Idk feel free to look at this like I’m crazy but this subject is very close to my heart as I’m a daydreamer myself.

OK SO like. I don't know. and I don't know if Mikey has maladaptive daydreaming for a specific reason.

That being that I'm basing him on myself. I spent a lot (AND I DO MEAN A LOT) of my time in my head as a kid. I don't really know what a paracosm is so I'm not sure if I was exploring within them. but there are huge chunks of my childhood i really only remember via the emotional exploration I was doing inside these fictional worlds. Like most of puberty for me was just imagining gay fictional gods and forbidden love and abuse and violence and at all that. and it's hard for me to tell if that was a bad thing because it's linked to a very integral part of my personality- that being the desire to tell and experience stories.

I was always dragging around paper and pencils to draw these imagined worlds. But i was also often just sitting with my eyes closed (or sometimes opened, but closed if I wanted to really focus)

if I was painfully bored, or very anxious (which happened often, basically any time i was outside the house or not watching tv or playing a game) I would do this. If I was stuck in a car or a room while my siblings were fighting violently, I would force myself to try to only think about my characters. If the talk radio host was getting on my nerves I would try to drown him out by thinking about my characters going through their worlds and getting in fights and having sex and all that stuff.

this got even better (or worse, considering how you think of it) once I got earbuds/headphones and access to my cousins old ipod. I was finally able to fully block out the world and only, ONLY ever think of my stories. just how I'd always wanted.

and sure, I was always kind of spacey, but even when I wasn't thinking of stories and art I was bad at paying attention the way adults liked. I think adults liked me more when I was just sitting there thinking anyway, instead of being hyper and then having an emotional breakdown when i realize they thought I was annoying.

There was a particularly vibrant time for daydreaming around puberty where i had dozens if not around a hundred different intricate stories that I started to overlap, just because. And I'd go through them over and over, adding or changing little things, making up reasons that the characters would all end up living in the same bunker or fighting the same enemy. making up reasons for the god of war and his little lamb prince to be torn apart. making up reasons for them to attack each other. then forcing them back together through all the trauma.

and recalling these spaces makes me kind of shiver because they're almost like real memories to me. I remember thinking of these scenarios more than I remember my real life around 11-12 years old. And i think that's largely because after I got my blackbelt at around 11 years old, my parents let me quit karate, and didn't force me to do any more sports or anything. So for the most part I legit never left the house. My entire life was in these stories and in my art.

I really only stopped doing this once I got sent off to high school at around 13-14 and was basically FORCED to participate in the real world more.

but I did that all on purpose. i was bored, and i hated other kids because they never clicked with me. and it never seemed to interrupt my life in a way that my parents noticed or cared about. in fact it was the only thing that kept me from being actively suicidal for a while there!

so like. i don't know man. i don't know.

[lunarlegend]

okay here goes nothing

Ignis is demisexual, and averse to sex unless he's completely comfortable and sufficiently emotionally attached to someone

he also doesn't think about sex all that much

however, in the bedroom he takes charge

couple reasons for this:

one, as i've explained in earlier posts, i fully believe Ignis' role as a servant and subsequent lack of control in real life would make him want to fantasize about having control, and i think he loves to express that in the bedroom by being the more dominant partner in any relationship (not just with Gladio)

two, i think Ignis in general is more comfortable playing a part in terms of sex, because he's not the type to let himself be emotionally vulnerable, and 'regular' sex can bring up all sorts of feelings

by taking on a specific persona, or turning it into a game, he can kinda remove himself from the action itself and i think that's more fun for him

Older Ignis overcomes this a little bit and gets significantly more comfortable just sleeping with his partners (he's also more kinky when he's still being a Dom...for example, he teaches himself shibari during WoR and practices on Stella, lol)

Ignis is a really attentive lover though, king of aftercare, and still very modest after the act

--

Gladio is bisexual, openly flirtatious, and not nearly as shy about sex as Ignis is

he's always more of a sub when he's with Ignis, but a switch in general, and the dynamic totally depends on his partner and whatever they both feel like on any given day

i think Gladio is completely comfortable in sexual situations, he likes trying new things, and he invites the emotional vulnerability that comes with those experiences because it's not as much of a deal to him; simply an activity two adults can enjoy

he absolutely melts for Ignis though, and loves submitting to him and letting him take charge, he is so weak for Ignis compared to anyone else, lol (but that's also 'cause he's romantically in love with Ignis, unlike his other partners)

like Gladio & Stella aren't in love with each other, they just like to fuck, so it never hits the same as sleeping with Ignis

Gladio can also be really shameless, and will use that to tease Ignis sometimes, especially because Ignis is so uptight about sex, lol

--

Stella is a boring heterosexual and she just likes to have fun

she's a sub with Ignis, and tends to be more submissive in general, but like Gladio, is not fazed by the emotional aspect of sex because her focus is on how much she enjoys it, lol

she is shy about it when she's younger, but completely comfortable once she's older, at which point sex is just another activity for her

Older Stella loves trying whatever Ignis or Gladio want to try, and is a patient participant in almost everything (in addition to the shibari adventures with Ignis, Stella & Gladio love shower sex, and there is also this one infamous scenario where they try bringing food into the bedroom and Ignis almost loses it because of the mess, lmfao)

Stella's also just as shameless as Gladio is, and doesn't make any attempt to hide her sex life, however kinky it can be

someone can literally walk in on her while she's in the middle of sleeping with someone and it doesn't kill her mood at all, she'll just keep going (i found this out in an RP once, lol)

--

reason i didn't make this an OT4 thing is i honestly have not worked Aranea into the mix enough, i just know that she also enjoys being a Dom and can sometimes clash with Ignis in the bedroom because of this but they always work it out ;D

a lot of fun sparring that leads to very intense sex, is what i imagine

and she has a LOT of fun with Gladio no matter what, lol

i'm actually. really tempted to type up my bedroom dynamic headcanons for the OT3

[bigteefsmallbrain]

General Soul Eater HCs please

Soul Eater: General headcanons

Death the Kid:

He’s an art critic

Hear me out

He is obsessed with symmetry, and loves the beauty in it

So when he sees something non-symmetrical, especially in art, he can’t help but to critique it

May go as far as to send a personal letter to the artist (If they’re alive) about how offensive it is that they created something so asymmetrical

If he can’t send a letter to the artist, he’ll send one to the owner/museum and request it be taken down, while listing reasons why it’s horrible.

Anything he writes has an even amount of letters and words

Be that his test answers

Essays

Letters

Diary entry

Speaking of diary entries, he definitely has one

But it’s actually just a catalogue of symmetrical things he’s seen

He puts photos into it and writes about how beautiful it was to see

He doesn’t care what it is much, just that it was beautiful

Meaning he takes photos of people too

Which can be unnerving at times

He’s probably taken a photography class before, or at the very least is self taught

Literally has a photo album of things he views are beautiful, but non symmetrical and he would die if anyone found it

Like a particular sunset with uneven hills

Or a flower with one too many petals

Definitely has an 8 ball, not a magic one, just an 8 ball, it’s placed on a velvet pillow in his room and he frequently polishes it

Elizabeth Thompson:

Makes several backup plans as a way to cope

Especially after dealing with an experience with a ghost

She has notebooks full of them, labeled and detailed

At one point she started putting them in alphabetical order but stopped immediately when she realized Kid’s perfectionist habits were rubbing off on her

She practices acting in the mirror

Usually so she can charm a man into dating her

But also to con people

She used to be a “Street rat” and that thought of ending up on the streets again constantly plagues her mind

She takes full advantage of the “Rich life”

Shopping sprees

Quality makeup

Salons and spa days

The works

She lets Patty’s thought that she knows everything get to her head

The fact alone that her sister believes in her that much is enough to make her a bit egotistical

And Patty’s admiration for the girl makes it ten times worse

She literally doesn’t care if she ends up being wrong because she’ll just be right next time anyways

So stubborn in that aspect

Patricia Thompson:

She likes dark humor

You can’t convince me otherwise, you actually can’t, I have evidence

She made an origami Giraffe, and broke its neck

Laughed when Kid said he “wants to die”

She literally pokes him with a stick when he’s depressed

She likes dark humor, and probably looks up jokes to tell others just for kicks

She’s secretly sadistic, and likes scaring her sister and others

She may act naïve and innocent, but she is anything but

She definitely has, more than once, banged on Liz’s door at 3AM just to hear her sister squeal like a little girl

Honestly, she probably purposefully gets their pose wrong, just to see her sisters annoyance and laugh when Kid gets smacked

She likes origami

Probably first got into it because of the paper ninja stars

Then just found it relaxing

She most likely makes the ninja stars mostly, and keeps a box of her origami creations somewhere

Has in the past, and will not hesitate to do so again, beat someone up for kicks or just to destress

Patty has two faces, the childlike innocent one, and the insane anger one

So it’s not too far fetched to say that she’ll hide her anger till she can corner someone alone and beat them up

Or that she gets bored and decides to do so

I wouldn’t be too surprised if her sister occasionally joined as well

Maka Albarn:

She’s a Harry Potter nerd and you can’t convince me otherwise

She loves the concept of magic

Loves the dynamic between Ron and Hermione, though feels a bit of Deja vu thinking about it

Probably used to write fanfiction, but in a way that made it seem like it was actually part of the story

She will hit you if you mention it

Definitely the type to compare books to their movie counterparts

Not in like, a critic way, but she will definitely rant about the differences, or how a character looks exactly like she imagined, or if they didn’t put in a particular scene she liked in the book

Forces Soul into movie nights, but it’s only the movie counterparts to her books

I can see her forcing everyone into a group study session

Be super organized about it, and setting it up in a way so that no one can refuse

She probably has specific ways for everyone to study

Like having Black☆Star work out while studying so he retains the knowledge better

Or setting up the session in a symmetrical way so Kid doesn’t freak out about it

She writes letters to her mom, as a coping mechanism for when her emotions get to be a little too much

Like when she’s having a bad day

Or if she’s particularly peeved at something Soul did

She writes a lot more letters when it comes around the time of her mom's birthday or death anniversary

She likes the thought of an old timey romance, and often listens to songs that give off that kind of feel

She really likes “It’s Been a Long, Long Time”, it’s one of her favorites

She also likes the old Disney songs, like “Once Upon a Dream” and “So This Is Love”

She would be so embarrassed if anyone found out though, especially if it was her dad or Soul

She isn’t quite sure why she’s so worried about Soul finding out though

Speaking of, she half realizes, half doesn’t with anyone's romantic feelings, including her own

She’ll fantasize about getting a love letter or having someone present her with a bouquet of roses

But if it actually happens she’s like “Oh, thanks friend!”

She knows the behaviors, she just can’t put two and two together

They would have to be extremely blunt, no over dramatic confession, just “I’m in love with you and want to be romantically involved with you”

She reads dictionaries for fun

She really likes to read out of date dictionaries, just to see what words and slang existed back then

She also highlights words she likes and uses them frequently on accident

She has most definitely yelled “I have cupid’s kettlebells*! I’m not flat!” at Soul before

Soul Evans:

Bottles. Up. His. Emotions.

He’s influenced by “toxic masculinity” and fully believes that being vulnerable in a serious way “isn’t cool”

He will bottle everything up so deep down inside that it seems impossible for it to surface

Feelings of inferiority to others? Bottled

Want to cry or break down? Nope, gotta be cool

Started crying in front of someone and can’t stop? He’s not crying, you’re clearly blind

Speaking of crying, once he starts, and I mean genuinely starts, it’s so hard to get him to calm down, and even then the tears don’t stop

Sometimes he’ll start to freak out and send himself into a panic attack because the tears just won’t stop

He’s that influenced by the thought of being vulnerable

On a lighter note, he does adore playing the piano, but the only person he’ll play for is Maka

He swears it’s not favoritism, and it’s partially true, but favoritism does play a large role in it

He frequently drags Maka to his room to show her a new piece he put together

And if he notices her feeling a little down that day, he’ll start playing a song that he knows she likes

He definitely knows about her love for old timey romance songs and is very embarrassed to admit a lot of the pieces he constructs are based off of that

The walls are p a p e r t h i n , he can hear her music through the walls

He secretly finds it adorable when he catches her listening to it because she’ll be dancing around to it

He also frequently finds himself thinking about those moments

He’s the stereotype that parents tell little girls about, with how boys will bully their crush

He’s a lot more playful and easy going, but still teases Maka, so much

Unlike Maka, he’s fully aware of his feelings, and acknowledges them, but bottles it up, only letting himself entertain the thought every once in a while

He jabs at Maka’s lack of “Cupids Kettlebells” as a way to try and ensure she won’t fall for him, because he doesn’t know what he’ll do if she does

He reads the same dictionaries that Maka does, not for fun, but so he can know just what the actual h e l l she’s saying

More than once he’s had to look up a particular word or phrase online because he can’t find it in the dictionary

“What the hell? It’s an old Victorian saying!? Where does she keep finding this stuff!?”

Subconsciously, as time goes on, he starts using old phrases as well, he was so embarrassed the first time he got caught saying “Keep your idle daddles* off of her!” when defending someone from a perv.

Black☆Star:

Is so unbelievably selfish with food

It’s not even funny

He will stab someone if they reach for his food

He surprisingly eats healthy most of the time though?

Says something like “I have to otherwise I’ll never surpass the gods!”

The only person who could ever p o s s i b l y steal his food is Tsubaki, but even that’s pushing it

He has the weirdest dreams, and I mean weird

Dreams like being turned into a potato and being cooked, mashed, and devoured by Tsubaki herself

He didn’t talk to her for a week after that dream, and refused to eat potatoes for a full year because “You never know if it could be a person turned into a potato!”

He was also very offended when Tsubaki ate potatoes during that time period

He takes things very literally

Like up above, if someone does something in a dream, he acts like it was real

Or if someone makes a joke about fighting, he will drag them outside to fight

He’s secretly scared of Tsubaki

But it’s for literally the stupidest reason

And he fully believes that because of it she could fight god and win

She used to have a pet cockroach

One of the flying ones

And he is so unbelievably scared of them, because for some reason they just don’t die, and they have w i n g s

So the fact she owned one as a pet scares him so bad even though it was literally for only a week

He has a soft spot for children

He doesn’t really know why

He just does

Is secretly really good with kids

Literally the definition of dad material

He has his flaws but still

Little kids are the only people who could steal his food and get away with it

Every. Time. and it makes the others so mad

Tsubaki Nakatsukasa:

What can I say, she’s perfect

She probably receives love letters

Reads them over when she’s feeling sad

Likes to keep them in a shoebox she painted

She definitely paints to unwind and relax

Likes to go outside and paint the sunrise/sunset

Takes note of beautiful scenery so she can come back in her free time and paint it

She probably draws/sketches too

Carries a sketchbook with her

More than likely has drawn Black☆Star doing something

Like napping or training

She’d never show him though, too scared of inflating his ego or giving him the wrong idea

Stress bakes/cooks

We know she cooks

Liz took advantage of it and pretended Tsubaki’s cooking was her own

So we know she does

Sometimes painting/drawing doesn’t cut it

So she heads to the kitchen and bakes away her worries and unwinds

The main reason Tsubaki would possibly be spared from Black☆Star’s stabbing habit with food is because she cooks all the meals

She makes sure everyone is comfortable around her

She’ll go as far as to learn someone's customs and practice cooking their unique cuisine just to make sure that they feel comfortable and safe in her presence

She radiates mom friend energy

She’s perfect mom material, perfect wife material, perfect in general honestly

*Cupid's Kettlebells is a old term for a woman's bust

*Idle daddles is a old term for hands

I Hope you like these general headcanons for the main seven! You didn’t say which characters you’d like to see, so I played it safe by putting the main characters! Thank you for the ask!

[sunnysviolin]

God I love your blog I spent all day just looking at it and I’m like yes more Omori brain worms

Also, what do you think the Omori gang’s jobs would be when they’re adults? I kinda meta’d and thought Sunny would be a little comic book artist with the character Omoriboy but I’m curious on your thoughts

Awww thank you! Also you have given me the perfect excuse to show off my happiest AU aka the ‘everyone stays in town together, and lowkey they all live at Hero’s house’  I have a lot of different ideas for what they could end up being, so if this isn’t your cup of tea it’s not my firm canon haha! I actually do have an artist sunny series which would probably be up your alley if you were interested in hearing about that too! Alsooooo this got long again it’s under a read more. I’m calling it Come Home series and I really like it if you guys are interested in hearing more 0-0 I only talk about Basil Sunny and Kel here haha because it got long long, but there’s defintiely another part coming to this if you guys want it! 

Basil starts going back to school post-canon, and he ends up doing pretty good for his last two years, but it’s still a struggle considering he missed so much school over the last four years. The idea of going to college is particularly stressful to him, so Polly doesn’t push it on him. She didn’t end up finishing college, and she turned out alright. 

Polly does want Basil to be thinking about his future though, and so she encourages him to find something related to what he’s passionate about. Which leads to Basil working part time at Fix-It in the gardening section. 

He quickly branches out of just gardening, although that is still his favorite. There’s something deeply gratifying about seeing what he’s created with his own two hands, and having people ask for his help only with simple things he can fix for them. 

Basil starts up a deep mentoring relationship with the couple who owns  Fix-It. They like to hear his passionate rambles about the flowers, and they like the ideas he has. Basil starts to lead flower arrangement classes, and they end up being a big hit. 

When he’s in the spring of his senior year, they ask him about his plans. When they find out he isn’t really all that interested in college, they ask if he could come on full time, and maybe even apprentice. They have a son of their own, but he is a lawyer and has no interest in the shop. Basil is excited by this, and he almost immediately agrees. 

There’s a lot more to running the shop then he thought, but he loves it. He’s content just to be the manager for now, but the couple has assured him that within the next five years they plan to retire and the shop will be his for good.

Kel does end up getting a scholarship for basketball. It’s to a good school (not quite Hero’s level, but better than his parents expected). It’s a big state school compared to Hero’s tiny private, but his parents are happy and they have a winning basketball team. The problem is that Kel has no idea what he would want to do. 

He had some ideas, but I think that learning the truth really affected him. He had thought he wanted to be a basketball star, or something to do with the sports industry, but that all feels so juvenile now. Now Kel wants to do something real and good. He wants to work with people, but he isn’t sure what that might mean. 

Kel goes to school as an undecided major, and they stick him in a bunch of different types of classes. Most of them are painfully boring, hard, and he just isn’t interested. He briefly considers dropping out, but he knows how disappointed his mom and dad would be. They didn’t get the opportunity to get a college degree, so it kind of feels like slapping them in the face if he gave back all the money he got just because he didn’t have any passion. 

There is one class that Kel really enjoys. The class is called Child’s Play and it’s a psychology course. Specifically a class on the influence of play children’s lives. It’s still hard for him, and he struggles to fully comprehend the material, but it’s something he’s passionate about. 

He talks with his advisor about it, and the man suggests combining all of the things he’s been passionate about so far. He wants to do good for other people, he is interested in sports, and he liked learning about how children work. His advisor puts him in an education couse and a few physical health courses, and Kel enters his sophomore year with a physical education major. 

Kel doesn’t graduate with honors like Hero, but he does graduate with a plan. He does his student teaching at Faraway High, his connections with his coach and the school helping to grease the wheels. (It doesn’t hurt that he’s living with Sunny by this point, and Sunny got a job offer in Faraway that he’s going to accept...but more on that later)

They offer him a tentative position at the end of the year, and he accepts it. He also takes on the basketball team, and they win the playoffs for the first time since he graduated, which cinches his job in tight.

Sunny also doesn’t end up going to college. Not only did he not have the grades, it just wasn’t something he thought he would be very good at. He doesn’t really have a plan, just that he wants to still be by his friends. Hero is far from them now, and Aubrey is planning on going away too, but Basil and Kel are staying close by

He ends up talking to Kel about it late one night, and Kel proposes a great idea. They’ll get an apartment together off campus instead of him living in the dorms, and Sunny can figure his life out while Kel gets a friend and study partner. 

Sunny’s mother is very happy with this idea, and Kel’s parents are satisfied that he won’t be off partying every night if he has Sunny with him, so they agree as well. What Sunny’s mother isn’t excited about is the idea of her baby not getting any degree or anything. So she makes a compromise. She and Sunny will find a good trade school near Kel’s college, and Sunny will take classes in something he enjoys

She assumes he will pick art classes or something that she knows he likes, but Sunny surprisingly picks veterinary certification. It feels out of left field, but if it makes Sunny happy and he’s going to go to his internships and his classes then so be it. 

Sunny is never top of the class, but he is serious about doing well. There are aspects of the job that he does not do well with, but he manages. He gets his vet tech certification and finds a starting position near where he lives with Kel

Living with Kel is a breath of fresh air. It feels good to have a partner in life who doesn’t expect him to talk or to act like everyone else. Kel is a master at reading Sunny, and it’s a bone deep relaxation to not have to try and express himself. Most of the time Sunny can just listen and let Kel talk to him. They work well with chores and food and generally everything. Every day feels like a sleepover honestly, and Sunny starts to smile a bit more and reach just a little father out of his comfort zone. 

Kel loves living with Sunny. Every night they get to just spend time together and enjoy each others presence, and sometimes Basil will come up and they all get to eat dinner together in their little shoebox apartment. One of their windowsills is full of plants that Basil has brought them. 

At the end of their four years Kel knows that he wants to go back to Faraway to work. He has been commuting there for student teaching, and while it’s only an hour, it’s still pretty far. The problem is that he can’t imagine leaving Sunny alone. Not after four years of them being together every single day. Then Sunny reveals that he found a job in the town next to Faraway that he wants to take. He doesn’t want to leave Kel though, and he’s not sure what to do. 

They have a long conversation that night, and they both agree that they want to stay together. It’s been an unspoken thing, but neither of them ended up having any long term partner in the last four years. They don’t have romantic feelings for one another, but they want to continue what they have. It’s safe, it’s lovely, and they feel secure in their bond. Whatever happens they want to decide as a team, as a partnership. 

With Kel and Sunny both coming back to Faraway they assume that they’re going to have to try and find a place to live closer. They’re going to stay with Kel’s parents until they do, but Basil has a better idea. 

Polly loves Basil a lot. She has adored getting to raise him and helping him and guiding him the last six years. But now her quiet sweet boy is a grown man, and his parents stopped paying her for caring for him over a year ago. She knows that the best thing to do would be to detach herself and to let him continue to grow without her constant presence. 

Basil isn’t sure he’s ready to be all by himself, and when he finds out Kel and Sunny are coming back to Faraway, he offers to let them stay at his house. It might be a bit cramped all three of them, and they don’t have to, but it could be nice. They say yes before he can even begin to second guess himself

So as bright and bushy 21/22 year olds, Kel, Basil, and Sunny all have Come Home. 

[elyvorg]

Maki Harukawa: What She Wants Matters

As much as I love Maki and her character arc, I didn’t use to think there was any need for me to do a big analytical ramble about her like the one I did for Kaito. After all, Maki’s arc is very clear and in-the-open thanks to Kaito encouraging her to talk about things. Look at her opening up and making friends and learning to trust people and be trusted herself! It’s lovely to behold.

But I realised as I thought more about Maki that there is a part of her arc that’s a lot subtler and likely gets noticed and talked about a lot less, which is a shame when it’s possibly the most interesting aspect of her issues and development. I’m referring to how difficult it is for her to believe that her own feelings and desires are important in any way, and the series of events that pushes her into finally acknowledging this and beginning to embrace what she wants for herself.

So let’s talk about this. Because just like everything that goes on inside Maki’s head, it matters, and it deserves to be talked about.

Her feelings don’t matter

Throughout chapters 3 and 4, Maki gradually makes a lot of progress in opening up to Kaito and Shuichi about herself: the people she’s killed, the horribly gruelling training she’s been through, and eventually even her happy days back at the orphanage before her life became hell. But one aspect lags noticeably behind compared to her just talking about these things, and that’s her ability to acknowledge how she feels about any of this.

Maki repeatedly calls her stories about her horrible past “boring”. Really, they couldn’t be further from that – it’s heartbreaking learning how much suffering she’s been through – but she genuinely doesn’t expect Kaito and Shuichi to be having any kind of emotional response to hearing it all. She has so thoroughly convinced herself that her suffering doesn’t matter that it doesn’t occur to her for a second that anybody else might think it does – not even the people she’s just about beginning to accept are seeing her as a friend. There’s also the way she has a habit of calling Shuichi’s expression “gross”, specifically whenever he shows signs of caring about her feelings and seeing her as a person. She’s trying to write off his concern for her, because no, that’s not a thing he’s supposed to be doing. Her feelings don’t matter. Nobody else – not even someone who might be her friend – is supposed to care.

You’d think, when people found out her talent and became afraid of her, the most obvious way for Maki to defend herself would have been to explain that she never chose her profession and was basically forced into it against her will. Yet it never even crosses her mind to say that. It’s only more than a chapter later, in the chapter 4 training session where she talks about her past at length, that Maki finally fully admits for the first time that she never had a choice in becoming an assassin. But even then, she says it offhandedly, like that fact doesn’t ultimately matter or change anything.

There’s also a comment Maki makes in early chapter 5 about how killing for a living makes her no better than the evil sadist that they’re assuming Kokichi is. She genuinely doesn’t think the fact that she didn’t choose this and doesn’t enjoy murdering people counts for anything in terms of judging how good of a person she is in light of all her murders. That’s so heartbreaking? Of course that makes her a significantly less terrible person than a hypothetical sadist who kills just for fun!

There’s no way out

This whole problem is illustrated even more clearly in Maki’s final free time event. It might seem like a positive sign of progress that the event ends on Maki saying that maybe she’ll be able to quit being an assassin one day, but the way she approaches this possibility is so painfully telling about how messed-up she still is. And this FTE takes place as late in the story as chapter 5’s Daily Life, because Maki still isn’t going to get anywhere with this part of her issues until the fifth trial.

In the FTE, Shuichi offers to use his detective skills to investigate and maybe take down her assassin cult so she won’t have to kill people any more, and Maki instantly tells him that’s impossible. She explains that assassins are currently a necessary evil in this world and suggests instead that Shuichi should try to change the world enough such that nobody ever resorts to murder any more. Only then, Maki concedes, she might be able to stop being an assassin.

Which is a monumentally worse way to approach getting her out of her profession than what Shuichi was suggesting, and completely missing the point. Some assassins exist who actually willingly chose that job for whatever reason, and they should be the only people who “need” to do it. Even if assassins might be necessary, child slave assassins who never had a choice in the matter are very decidedly not. Taking down Maki’s one single child-slave-assassin-training cult is absolutely the simplest and most achievable way to help her.

But Maki doesn’t see it that way, because the fact that she personally never wanted this has never crossed her mind as relevant at all. If Shuichi asks her “but are you okay with this?”, Maki tells him that question is unreasonable and cannot answer it. It’s really a very simple question – the answer is no, obviously! – but Maki has trained herself to block out her own feelings about her situation and write them off as unimportant and irrelevant, so thoroughly that her mind just short-circuits and returns an error message when she’s asked about them.

The reason Maki’s like this, the reason that this is the hardest thing for her to change, is that this is the coping mechanism she’s had no choice but to develop. Trapped in her awful situation with absolutely no possible way out of it as far as she could see (she was ten years old), all of her thoughts and feelings about how badly she didn’t want this would have been just too painful for her to deal with. The only way she could cope was by locking those desires and feelings away and convincing herself that they don’t matter. She’s just had to resign herself to this. When there’s genuinely no escape, nobody could bear to keep fighting against it forever. It’s so much easier to just stop trying, and to forget that you ever wanted to try in the first place.

Maki has grown up telling herself that the impossible is just impossible, so she should accept it and get used to things the way they are. Trying to make it possible is futile and will only lead to more pain.

This is precisely one of the many reasons why Kaito is such a good influence for her and exactly the kind of person she needs to help her out of this!

She killed Kaito, and she definitely doesn’t care

…Or, at least, he might have been, perhaps – if she hadn’t gone and killed him.

After what I imagine was a huge emotional breakdown over the events in the hangar, Maki pulled herself together and suppressed that pain as hard as she could. She’s so well-practiced at doing so that the next morning – the morning after she killed her closest friend – she appears to be just about the same as ever. Even as they find Kaito’s body even more horrifically dead than she was expecting to see it, Maki firmly insists that his death doesn’t bother her.

It’s that same coping mechanism she always uses, for exactly the same reasons. This reality can’t be changed, and thinking about how she wanted things to be different only causes pointless unnecessary pain, so she doesn’t. She can’t. She just accepts things the way they are and convinces herself she’s fine with it.

Maki refuses to investigate with Shuichi not only because she doesn’t want him to figure out she’s the culprit, but also because Shuichi keeps infuriatingly talking as if Kaito might be alive – and as if she should want Kaito to be alive. She just can’t bear to be brought anywhere near those kinds of thoughts about what she might want when she knows that it’s already impossible.

Later in the trial, while fervently arguing that having broken into the hangar doesn’t mean she’s the one who killed Kaito, at no point does Maki ever try to defend herself on the basis that she would never want to kill him. Nobody has brought up the possibility that Kaito’s death could have been accidental at this point, so it would be a sensible argument to make. Granted, arguments about someone’s character and motives aren’t the most concrete ones to make in a class trial, but Maki has to know that it would be likely to give Shuichi pause, because there’s no way he’d want to think that Maki would do that either.

But no. Of course that’s an irrelevant argument to make. What Maki wants never matters, especially when it comes to her having killed someone. She’s just a murderer, and Shuichi should accept that she could just as easily have murdered anybody at all, even if it’s Kaito, no matter how she might hypothetically feel about it.

Even as Maki is confessing to the truth of what happened in the hangar and it becomes clear that her shooting Kaito with the poison arrow was an accident, she never actually directly mentions that she didn’t mean to kill him. She talks only very indirectly about the panic she felt while rushing to get the antidote, without properly expressing why she was so desperate. It’s only “I knew I had to do something about the poison,” and not, “I couldn’t let Kaito die.”

It just hurts too much for her to think of it that way when Kaito still died anyway because of her, and nothing will change that truth.

…Kaito’s alive!?

Until, out of nowhere, maybe something can.

If Shuichi still thinks it could be possible for Kaito to be alive, then maybe it actually is. The fact that Maki listens to him as soon as he expresses this is a subtle but huge testament to how much she believes in her friend’s detective skills. She only ignored Shuichi’s optimism earlier because she knew a lot more than he did about what happened in the hangar, and she didn’t see any possible way out for Kaito from where she was standing. But now that he knows that same information, Shuichi can still see a way out after all.

Maki puts her faith in his judgement and latches onto that tiny possibility that Kaito might be alive with everything she has. She refuses to let it go, despite Exisal Kokichi – aka Kaito himself – continuing to insist it’s totally impossible. I bet Kaito made a point of claiming it was impossible in a deliberate attempt to spur Maki to argue otherwise, and he must have been bursting with pride in her when she went and did exactly that. The impossible is possible! Maki Roll is finally believing that for herself! She’s finally trying to claw and fight her way into a better reality instead of just accepting the awful one she’s stuck in!

An equally important and absolutely lovely part of this is Maki finally expressing the fact that she didn’t want to kill Kaito, that she hates the thought that she did that. Based on her wording and her hesitant tone, it’s still difficult for her to admit it, but she’s finally doing so. It’s not quite so unbearably painful to think about when it might not be the truth after all. And it’s so wonderfully appropriate that this is the first moment we ever see Maki cry – she’s finally letting herself acknowledge and express her painful emotions and feel like they matter.

She also openly admits for the first time that she likes the nickname Maki Roll, not just begrudgingly accepting it, but actively asking Himiko to call her that! She’s desperate for anything that’ll remind her of Kaito and help her hold onto what she felt like back when he was alive, so that she can keep believing that maybe he still is. Maki is finally beginning to embrace how much she cares about Kaito and treat that fact like it’s important and deserves to be acknowledged, and it’s adorable.

Half a lifetime’s worth of forcing herself to just accept her lot as an assassin and ignore how desperately she wants to be a normal kid was always going to be nigh-impossible to break through on its own. But caring about Kaito and not wanting to lose him are new feelings that Maki hasn’t spent half her life suppressing. She only had a single night to shut away her pain over Kaito’s death and accept that he’s definitely gone – it’s far easier for that to be undone. The moment a tiny glimmer of a possibility opens up again thanks to her belief in Shuichi, Maki couldn’t ignore it if she tried.

Maki’s arguments for Kaito’s survival aren’t even all that logical. Her statements in the Nonstop Debate about the video are too caught up in what if it wasn’t Kaito? to make any meaningful suggestions like everyone else is; she insists the weird video angle “proves” a trick was used when really it only opens up the possibility; she’s the first one to hastily summarise everyone’s discussion about the video trick and just get to the point that this means Kaito’s still alive, right? Maki’s usually one of the best at taking the rational approach in trials and focusing on all the logistical details, but right now she doesn’t even care about any of that stuff, not when Kaito being alive is what she wants to be true, more than anything else in the world.

It would hurt so much for this to all be for nothing and for Kaito to turn out to be dead after all. Holding onto this hope is such a huge risk, and it’s terrifying – but it’s worth it. Even the tiniest chance of Kaito being alive is infinitely better than the alternative, no matter how terrifying it is. Whether she likes it or not, or even realises it at all, this experience is teaching Maki that fighting for that tiny possibility of something better, no matter how much it hurts, is always worth the pain.

Maki’s desperate defence of Kaito leading into her Argument Armament, though she doesn’t admit it and keeps trying to insist her argument is logical, is also her acting on her emotions. Her only real reason for it is simply that she doesn’t want to believe Kaito could have killed anyone.

And the only way for her to run away from that is to insist that she really did kill Kaito after all – which incidentally forces her to express a narrative of “this happened even though I didn’t want it to,” and not brush that latter part off like it’s irrelevant. This time it’s just a lie, but this is nonetheless a very important kind of narrative that Maki needs to learn to understand and accept. Sometimes things happen that she wishes never had, but that doesn’t mean that the fact she didn’t want it never mattered!

Losing Kaito after all

Maki is forced to learn this even more harshly at the end of the trial. Kaito’s alive, she didn’t kill him, he’s right here – but he’s dying anyway and there’s not a thing she or anybody else can do about it.

The Maki from before all this happened would have just given up, accepted it, and immediately begun insisting to herself that she doesn’t care in order to cope. Kaito is clearly a dead man walking on two separate levels – his illness and the execution – and changing his fate at this point really is completely and truly impossible. Maki is a smart and pragmatic person; she knows this perfectly well.

But the Maki who’s here now refuses to let that stop her from trying. She’s furiously determined to fight the Exisals to protect Kaito, despite knowing that even her assassin skills aren’t enough for that, despite knowing that Kaito is sick and dying anyway no matter what she does. She doesn’t want this, so she’s going to claw and scream and fight against it with everything she has, no matter how futile her efforts will be in the end. I love her line, “I don’t want this to end… I just… don’t…” – the only reason why she’s doing this is that she doesn’t want Kaito to die, and that’s the only reason she should ever need.

Amongst all this, Maki desperately admits to her romantic feelings for Kaito, because even if this can’t do anything to change his fate, her feeling this way about him still matters and she’s still feeling it and it deserves to be said. She’s not even really saying it for Kaito’s benefit like she expects a response from him about it; she’s just saying it for her own sake, because she wants to make it real.

Usually I’m the first person to roll my eyes and lose interest when romance rears its head. Yet I can actually appreciate the fact that Maki’s feelings for Kaito have a romantic aspect to them, because it makes this moment work for Maki’s arc in ways that it wouldn’t if her feelings were purely platonic.

Kaito was obviously always trying to get Maki to consider him a friend, so her having done that is still essentially her just doing what someone else wanted of her, like always, albeit at least someone who has her best interests at heart for once. But Kaito never asked or expected Maki to fall in love with him. Maki’s romantic feelings came from nowhere but herself. And while that in itself can’t quite be called her “choice” because that’s not how romantic attraction works, Maki accepting and embracing those feelings to make them a part of her and let them drive her actions is entirely her own choice. It’s a choice nobody else, not even Kaito, encouraged her to make. That’s such a huge, huge deal coming from her.

Maki caring about Kaito as a friend is something that was already pretty apparent from her actions and never really needed to be said. But her caring about him romantically was something that nobody would have known (Tsumugi’s incidentally-right-for-all-the-wrong-reasons amatonormative bullshit aside) if Maki hadn’t decided that it mattered enough to want to express it.

Maybe she manages to admit to all this now because she hated having to suppress all her feelings about Kaito like they didn’t even matter the last time he “died” on her, helping her realise just how important these feelings are to her and that she can’t bear to just ignore that any more. Kaito has been so, so good for her; of course she wouldn’t want to lose that, nor brush it off like it’s nothing.

Seeing him about to die for real this time with no way out, Maki’s probably also driven by some desperate irrational sense that if she just explodes with all of the exact reasons why she doesn’t want this to happen, maybe it somehow just… won’t? This is the very opposite of the lock-it-all-away coping mechanism she’s been employing for a lifetime, and even as it’s heartwrenching, it’s also so lovely to see her doing this.

Maki partly tries to cover up these emotions of hers at first with her fierce assassin mask. She’s still instinctively using her usual defences to try and block out some of the pain, but it’s not enough to stop her expressing things, nor to stop her from crying as she does so. As Kaito responds to it all by showing his usual painfully selfless pride in how far she’s come and can keep going from here, making it all about her and not himself, Maki finally seems to fully accept that there really is nothing she can do to save him, and she drops the assassin mask and just breaks down completely.

Kaito is inescapably about to die, even though she doesn’t want this, and both of those facts are allowed to co-exist. She lets it hurt; she lets herself cry over his death, because no matter how painful it is, it’s worth it. It’s so much better than pretending she never cared about Kaito and all the things he did for her. Maki tried doing that once, and she’s never going there again.

In their Kaito memorial training session after the trial, it’s such a big deal that Maki is the one to nudge Shuichi into talking about how he’s feeling and how much it hurts. She’s finally realising and learning for herself that opening up about her painful feelings can help, and by sharing that with Shuichi, she’s helping him deal with his grief, too. She resolves to honour Kaito’s memory by showing how grateful she is for everything he did for her, not even because that’s what Kaito would have wanted her to do, but just because she wants to for herself.

It’s all “fake”

But losing Kaito isn’t quite the end of Maki’s arc regarding all this. There’s still a little further for her to be pushed in trial 6.

When Shuichi reveals in the trial that Kokichi wasn’t actually a Remnant of Despair, Maki is subtly the most shocked out of anybody to hear this. She never explains why, but knowing what we know about her issues with never having her own desires and always being used as a puppet by somebody else, it’s clear that that’s what this is about.

Maki thought that her decision to kill Kokichi was her own. She even still basically kept thinking of it that way even after learning he wasn’t the mastermind, and even after realising that the Flashback Light was a motive designed to make her target Kokichi. After all, she’d have chosen on her own to kill a Remnant of Despair anyway; the Flashback Light just happened to let her know Kokichi was one, right? But upon realising that none of that was true, that there was no genuine, non-fabricated reason for her to kill Kokichi at all, it shakes Maki to her core.

It wasn’t really her decision, on any level. She was finally beginning to feel, after Kaito’s trial, that her desires were her own and they meant something – but here’s a sudden revelation proving that this action of hers that she thought was entirely of her own volition was never that at all. It was nothing but her being manipulated and used as a puppet to kill by someone with far more power than her, just like she always has been.

(Maki also overlooks the implications of Kokichi’s motive video during the investigation, even though she’s in the room when Shuichi watches it, meaning she should have seen it and been able to figure out what it meant by herself. The sad truth is that because of her background of suppressing her own desires and ideas, Maki is very susceptible to manipulation. She was quite happy to believe that Kokichi was a Remnant of Despair, because it justified her decision to kill him and made the whole situation easier to deal with. There was no way she was going to question that assumption on her own.)

Similarly, when Tsumugi boasts that the Flashback Lights were being used to control everyone’s emotions and motivations, Maki again sounds more distressed by this idea than anybody else. She thought her determination to “defeat despair” was her own desire, but really, none of it was. In this instance, that’s basically true, but hearing as such is especially painful for Maki. It hits her right in her issues and the progress she was beginning to make about feeling like her own person, making her wonder if she really even is at all.

This gets even more painful for her a little later, as Tsumugi goes right for where it hurts and insists that Maki’s romantic feelings for Kaito were just artificially implanted by a Flashback Light, never truly “real”. Tsumugi probably did this because she thinks that ~romance~ is so much more important than friendship and obviously Maki must be soooo sad to lose that – but that’s not the reason why Maki’s distressed by it at all. It’s because, as I went over before, Maki’s romantic feelings for Kaito were supposed to be hers and something nobody else wanted of her and that she chose to embrace and make a part of her, all by herself. Hearing that actually they just came from some evil asshole manipulating her and using her as a puppet yet again – it tears right into all of the progress that these feelings themselves had been helping her begin to make. Maki’s emotions and desires matter after all? No, they don’t. They were never even hers in the first place. They were never even real.

Someone more self-assured than Maki (such as Kaito) would have been able to stand up for their own feelings here and call Tsumugi’s claim out as the bullshit it obviously is. Even if her feelings were implanted, they would still matter just as much because she’d still be feeling them now – but also, there’s a mountain of evidence for the fact that Maki’s romantic feelings for Kaito were in fact completely real and organically arose throughout her interactions with him. She made it very clear as she confessed to them at the end of trial 5 that this is all about the kind of person Kaito is and the things he’s done for her. That’s where her romantic feelings arose from, and all of that was entirely real and happened after everyone was created from fake memories. Maki is the only one who was inside her own head when she began to feel that way about Kaito, so she of all people should know better than anyone else just how very not-fake her feelings are!

But she can’t realise that on her own. Despite the progress she’d been making thanks to Kaito’s trial, Maki had still spent a lifetime (a fake lifetime, but those fake memories clearly still wired her brain to think this way) suppressing her emotions as thoroughly irrelevant and feeling like she was nothing but a puppet for other people’s whims. She began the killing game with absolutely no self-assurance in who she is or how she feels; of course it would be heartbreakingly easy for her to lose faith in herself and revert back to thinking that way again when given the slightest reason to.

So Maki just buys Tsumugi’s claim completely, without even questioning it. Her feelings for Kaito were fake, as was her desire to defeat the mastermind, as was everything else about who she is. Nothing about her matters, and it never did. She doesn’t even get to be a person at all.

Believing in herself at last

We don’t see Maki reacting much as Shuichi begins his impassioned argument that the pain and emotions and desires everyone felt in this killing game were still thoroughly real. But it must have helped her begin to overcome this. If you feel something, that feeling is real and important, and that’s all that matters. She believes in Shuichi’s judgement; she must have been listening to him.

Perhaps even more helpful for her is how, as Shuichi encourages Maki to stand with him on this, he urges her to believe in herself. It might sound generic at first glance, but really, that’s exactly what Maki’s arc and her struggle with these issues always needed to come down to in the end: her believing that she has worth as a person. Not only in terms of not hating herself and accepting that she deserves to have friends, but in terms of embracing the fact that her feelings are real and important and hers, and they always have been.

It’s so hard for Maki to do this. It goes against everything that’s been ingrained into her throughout her whole life (a “fake” life, but what does that matter when it’s having a real effect on her?), and everything that Tsumugi’s been spouting for half the trial. But she can do it now. Thanks to everything Kaito’s done for her, and the things she felt as she lost him twice, and Shuichi’s continued support, Maki finally makes a conscious effort to believe in everything she’s feeling. She chooses for herself to make her existence as Maki Harukawa matter.

It’s such a wonderful culmination to her character arc, right at the end of chapter 6. She’s finally reached a point where she can fully accept and embrace that she wants to believe in herself like this. Kaito would be so, so proud of her – like he once said, “The only thing that matters is what you want to believe!”, and now Maki Roll is embodying that perfectly! But as much as Kaito would have loved to see this, the best part is that she’s not even doing this to make him proud. She needed her friends’ help and kindness to be able to reach this point, but now she’s not doing this for anyone else’s sake. Maki’s doing it purely for herself.

[davidmann95]

So you've talked a lot about Darkseid, but what about the other New Gods?

SO THIS HAS BEEN IN MY INBOX FOR ALMOST AS LONG AS THIS BLOG’S BEEN AROUND AND I JUST FINALLY FINISHED FOURTH WORLD

Well that sure was something. My musings on some major players that I either have substantial thoughts on, or where I especially think the majority consensus/interpretation has subsequently gotten them wrong (a state Kirby is well aware of, because a HUGE part of “Even Gods Can Die!” is him being frustrated at subsequent handlings of the characters even by 1984 mucking things up):

Orion: Perhaps the most hard-done by as a result of Kirby never being able to fully finish Fourth World as he had imagined it, as his character arc ends on a cliffhanger for a decade and is forced into a rapid completion later. When he emerges, while a warrior born he’s also every bit the classical, magnificent hero you expect to see in a superhero comic to try and overshadow his inner demons, while by the end of New Gods he’s embraced not only his true face (the OTHER face, as his father would put it) in the fight against Apokolips but the murderous, sadistic rage that is his birthright, reveling in inflicting agony and very much the berserker others have since portrayed him as. Surely as much a product of his trauma from a childhood on Apokolips (a detail frequently glossed over) and a sense of being unwanted as anything genetic, it’s ultimately unconditional love for him as he truly is in Hunger Dogs that lets him overcome his fear that he can’t be anything but a monstrous tool in service of better people than himself, and embrace ‘the tomorrow overture’. Even his anger has its righteous if tragic place as a primal force of upheaval: “It defies time! It stands firm against the hammers of change! It mocks life and defies death!” I won’t get to it for awhile yet, but very curious what Simonson does with him.

Lightray: Rules! He’s the closest the New Gods have to a traditional superhero, and it’s in that capacity that while a lousy warrior next to Orion (Kalibak thinks little of his attempt at fighting him, mockingly deeming him a “callow little killer”), his strength is in transformation: he makes himself light, he turns a tormented weapon into the glory boat, a machine armed against the New Gods into a weapon against Darkseid, Orion from a man alone into a friend. He’s not a warrior, but he’s the one who makes a better world worth waging war for and who might one day make such war unnecessary. Also he and Orion have definitely fucked.

Mister Miracle: Not WILDLY off the mark since, but it’s interesting that as I expect a result of JLI he’s been written so often since as an everymanish, relatable, bordering-on-comedic figure, when under Kirby he was very much the archetypal good guy. One often committed to freeing others as he had been freed himself, in the likes of Ted Brown and Shilo Norman, an avenue I’m surprised hasn’t been explored more often from what I’ve seen. Also worth noting: Darkseid declared the moment he got his hands on the kid that Granny would be twice as hard on him as others, and that it would eventually drive the boy away and let the war resume. Which not only indicates Darkseid’s understanding of the subtlety needed in control, but would seem to take Scott’s rebellion out of his own hands…except that at the moment of his escape Darkseid still offered him a choice, implored the boy to allow him to “complete the destruction of Scott Free – so you may live with the majesty that is the power of DARKSEID!” And instead he turned his back on his god and chose to be what he is.

Barda: Shockingly, great as she’s been since, her background is often severely mischaracterized. The shorthand is “love saved her and turned her from a servant of evil to a champion of good!”, but that’s…while not entirely wrong, a bad way of presenting it. When she leaves Apokolips initially, even after she starts hanging out with Scott Free and Oberson after having helped the former escape years earlier, she still believes in Darkseid. She fights and hates her former allies not because she’s turned against his vision of the universe (this is in fact a major aspect often overlooked - under Kirby Darkseid’s agents don’t simply fear him, they sincerely believe in him and his vision of how the universe works) but because she sees them as loathsome, brutish executors of his grand design. In short, she doesn’t think it’s the system that’s the problem, but a bunch of bad apples. It’s her experience with freedom and simple pleasures and life on Earth, her lingering guilt over the death of her friend Auralie as eventually manifested in her protection and training of Shiloh Norman, and yes, her eventual realized love for Scott, that brings her around to realizing she truly desires a life beyond what Darkseid can offer.

Forever People: Okay I actually don’t have a ton to say about the Forever People, though I do think they’re underrated and underutilized. Naive and in over their heads as the frequently are they’re also the best of their peers, believing in freedom and transformation and the potential of those around them to become better - their defining moment for me is when they reassure Sonny Sumo that having the power of the Anti-Life Equation doesn’t make him a monster. “Where we come from the Anti-Life Equation is one of many others–almost as awesome!! But they merely exist!! It’s we who live!!”

Metron: The big figure I haven’t really been able to crack. Machinery as not necessarily cold mechanization but extensions of ourselves and our souls, and able to nourish them in turn, is a big aspect of Fourth World, but Metron as the embodiment of mechanization and knowledge feels like not just an outsider as he’s framed but one who never quite became whatever Kirby had in mind for him, making his crucial role at the end of Hunger Dogs a bit of a non-sequitur for me. I’d be curious to hear what other people think.

Desaad: God Desaad’s been made boring. Not that he isn’t fairly one-dimensional under Kirby too, but his craft and awful glee as the god of torture isn’t just in strapping people to tables and poking them with unpleasant tools, it’s in manipulating their emotions and agonies to a fever pitch - he should be such an unsettling figure, and instead he’s a simpering helpless toady.

Highfather: Not a perfect figure, given how he’s framed with the likes of Fastbak, and the Forever People, and the Pact, willing to deploy fear as a weapon in the name of peace as Darkseid will use chaos in the name of a larger order, but always trying - as with Darkseid, an imperfect vessel of what he represents, but capable of growth and realization as a leader.

Steppenwolf/Heggra: Essential to understanding The Pact, they’re the old ways of the world and war, petty despots and warrior-kings, supplanted by fascism in Darkseid.

Darkseid: So I’ve discussed Darkseid before in terms of his broad use and ideas, but the very specific ways Kirby presented him have their own dimensions. In the world of superheroes he’s larger-than-life and often such in here too, but in rare moments, and by the end entirely as all artifice is stripped away? Kirby’s Darkseid is a profoundly human figure. He recognizes the irony that the Forever People believe in letting all be who they are, for that very need to fulfill himself is why he must pursue conquest (“And of course - that’s the pity of it!”). While he thinks to himself “Oh, how heroes LOVE to flaunt their nobility in the face of death! Yet THEY know better than most that war is but the COLD game of the BUTCHER!” he too believes in “Boldness! Risk! The raw meat of existence!” even as he consigns himself to the role of puppetmaster rather than warrior. He does or so he tells himself “no more than what HAS to be done!!” rather than indulging in cruelty for its own sake. He dresses up in ridiculous costumes for his schemes, he gets sarcastic, he recognizes honor and respects worthy foes, he feels love, he craves the laughter of a friend, he fears the obsolesce of his preferred way of doing things, he tells himself that should he achieve omnipotence others will find “eternal shelter”. He’s a person, one capable of a range of emotions, but he is the TIGER FORCE AT THE CORE OF ALL THINGS regardless…not because he is a mythic unstoppable force, but because every day he rises and believes in himself over all others, because there is a black hole within him that he can only hope dominance might fill regardless of what pain he finds in the process. But as Mister Miracle’s battle with the Lump foretold, when left truly alone over a world that is himself he will be only within “a self-made prison”, reflections of his own fear and agony.

[maxwell-grant]

Thoughts on the Shadow's Doppelganger, Lamont Cranston

The funny thing about Cranston in the original stories is that, yeah, one of the most famous scenes across all Shadow media is the “Lamont Cranston Talks to Himself” chapter in The Shadow Laughs, where we learn that The Shadow is not Lamont Cranston, but has usurped his identity, and now shows up at his bedside looking like him, talking like him, knowing more about his own life than he himself does, and ordering him to leave town, effectively blackmailing him into letting him use his face. It’s a very iconic scene that exemplifies a lot of what makes The Shadow unique as a character, and you can imagine why so many adaptations have gone with the idea of Cranston being either a hapless stooge bullied into submission, or an actual villain, because that whole scene is very much a horror movie scenario. 

Thing is, none of them seem to remember how Cranston and The Shadow’s relationship developed past this. I’ll post this excerpt from Atoms of Death:

"Good morning, Cranston," came a quiet tone from the foot of the bed.

"Good morning, yourself," returned Cranston, rubbing his eyes without noticing the visitor.

"You should say: Good morning, myself," chuckled The Shadow, dryly.

Cranston was pulling down the sleeves of his pajama jacket. He sat bolt upright, staring. Then a slow smile showed on his lips; one that was almost a replica of The Shadow's.

"So it's you," remarked Cranston, sleepily. "Well, I knew that last night. It was about time we crossed paths again. Well, old man, you landed me in for plenty this trip."

Cranston shoved bedclothes aside and perched on the edge of the bed. He found cigarettes on the telephone table; The Shadow supplied a flame from a lighter before Cranston could ignite a match. The millionaire noted that The Shadow's lighter bore the initials "L. C." 

"You handle every detail, don't you?" questioned Cranston in admiration. “Jove! I remember the first time I met you. In this very room. You dropped cloak and hat and left me looking at my own face as plainly as if I had seen it in a mirror. Just as it is today."

"And I advised you," recalled The Shadow, in Cranston's own tone, "to take a trip abroad, while I used your identity. You were a bit exasperated at first."

"I must admit that I was. I threatened to have you arrested, as an impostor, until you proved that you knew more about my affairs than I did. I really believe that if it had come to a showdown, I would have been proven the impostor and you the genuine Lamont Cranston. Jove!"

"Jove," repeated The Shadow, quietly, "You have acquired that expression recently, Cranston. I shall remember it for future reference. You have a penchant for acquiring anglicisms during your sojourns in British colonies. Jove!"

"Bounder and blighter," laughed Cranston. "Don't forget those. I still use them occasionally."

Or this excerpt from The Hydra, which is an incredible book where the chemistry between the two really shines:

Lamont Cranston woke up and wondered why his head still whirled. It took him about half a minute to learn that the motion came from the fact he was riding in his limousine. Someone must have put him back in the limousine and Stanley was driving him home. 

He didn't have to guess who had helped him on his way, for at that moment Cranston heard a low-toned laugh beside him. He turned to see the black-cloaked figure of The Shadow.

"What did you hit me with?" asked Cranston. "All four of your automatics?"

"I'm only carrying a pair tonight," replied The Shadow

Look at these two dorks, just palling around and getting into shenanigans and The Shadow outright joking around Cranston, like they are just two old chums having a laugh at the weirdness of their lives. The “real” Cranston didn’t show up very often in the original stories, especially in the last stories when Lamont Cranston essentially became the real identity of The Shadow, but when he did, part of what makes him stand out as his own character is that he’s funny. Gibson gets a lot of mileage out of Cranston as this guy who is completely nonchalant and chill about all the weird shit that happens to him, even in The Hydra after he kills a man with an elephant gun, he’s still more or less the same, he largely just walks out of it with a newfound realization. 

Relieving Cranston of the elephant gun, The Shadow steered his friend into the closet. Hauling the big weapon with him, The Shadow opened the door to meet and dismiss arriving servants who had dashed upstairs when they felt the house quake. 

"Whenever I see this gun," began Cranston, coming from the closet, "I'll remember what I did with it -" 

“Quite right," interposed The Shadow approvingly. "What you did to Mance will make amends for any elephants you may have killed. Too bad Mance didn't bring along a few more Hydra Heads.”

Slowly, understanding dawned on Cranston. He'd never compared his big-game hunts with The Shadow's quests for men of crime. He felt that The Shadow's cause was justified, but it had seemed outside the field of sport. It still was, but Cranston, now that he had dealt with a murderer who deserved to die, was realizing that his game hunts were more deserving of rebuke.

His encounters with The Shadow gradually changed Cranston from a useless millionaire wasting his resources and talents on idle pursuits, to...still largely a useless millionaire, except his resources and talents are no longer wasted and he’s gradually grown into a useful ally and friend to The Shadow. The Shadow tends to have that effect on people who work by his side and even Cranston, the guy whose main role in his organization is to just stay away and be useless somewhere else, can’t help but change a little into a better person when he appears. 

There’s an interesting article written by Bob Sampson called “The Third Shadow” which refers to the Bruce Elliot run of The Shadow Magazine, which is incredibly maligned by fans and not without reason, the stories all largely suck and the Shadow bears little resemblance to his former self, instead mostly feeling like a diet take on the radio show Lamont, more of an average detective. The theory Sampson puts out is that, during this period, it was actually Lamont Cranston who became active as The Shadow while Allard was busy overseas, and I definitely like this theory. It makes sense specially considering The Hydra sets up for Cranston to become more pro-active and serious:

While not the towering master-mind of Allard, he does become the next best thing: A post-war sleuth. He even indulges in wearing the cloak and slouch hat from time to time (to varying degrees of effectiveness), while trying to laugh like Allard (also to varying degrees of effectiveness) as if to fulfill that forbidden fantasy until he finally gets it out of his system. After all, The Shadow pretended to be him, why not the other way around?

As Bob Sampson put it: “It is always Cranston who explains all and takes the credit”. 

Probably very cathartic for Lamont, who for the last 18 years was relegated to being a distant supporting player in his own life. Cranston is still in contact with the agents however. He even receives "assignments" from Burbank. 

This entire arrangement could only be with The Shadow's tacit approval. Let us remember, Cranston was not merely some insipid fop. He certainly had done his own share of exploring and was indeed a hunter. He could handle a variety of firearms, was familiar with exotic peoples and their customs, knew how to stalk dangerous animals through the jungle and veldt, but he was not, nor ever claimed to be, a master secret-agent and soldier.

I think it is fitting that the writing is completely different for this period as well. Not the enigmatic journalistic style of Allards exploits, but the witty, modern champagne fizz of Cranston's odyssey in a Post-War world. He feels a full range of emotions. In the Gibson stories, The Shadow is at arms length. In the Elliott stories, Cranston is sitting right next to you on a train or an airplane or roadster. 

It’s also interesting to consider how Lamont Cranston has basically become the true name of The Shadow in pop culture. Often times it’s the name people use when they specifically want to reference The Shadow, the supposed “Ghost of Gay Street” hauntings in Gibson’s former apartment took the form of Lamont Cranston, and even in the stories, more and more people became aware of it as the years went by (which also helps reinforce the idea that the “real” Cranston eventually took to acting as a fill-in for The Shadow, to draw attention away from the real Shadow’s operations), and Gibson even mentioned a few times that Cranston was The Shadow’s “favorite” identity along with Arnaud. Which is kinda fascinating to think about and does hint at some weird underlying aspects of The Shadow’s psyche, that his favorite identity is one not his own.

And at last, there’s these passages from The Whispering Eyes, a book that does not mention Allard once, and the very last Shadow novel: 

From beneath the seat he was taking his black garb. Cloaked and hatted as he stepped from the cab, Cranston merged immediately with the darkness. He had become The Shadow. 

Cranston's switch to his other self could well be attributed to a hypnotic mood. The mental lapses produced through hypnosis were the sort that would often cause a subject to revert to habit. Now, as The Shadow, Cranston was still in what might be termed a haphazard mood. He was skirting through darkness, pausing, changing direction, behaving generally as though avoiding something that did not exist.

Lang had flung away his glasses; his eyes now showed the shining, hypnotic force that the lenses normally softened. He recognized the eyes that met his above a leveled gun muzzle.

The Shadow's eyes, yet strangely Cranston's, for this was one time The Shadow did not care to disguise them.

Which begs the question: Did Cranston succeed in fully becoming The Shadow? Or did The Shadow succeed in fully becoming Cranston?

[shierak-inavva]

please ma'am i would like to know more about this 'obi wan gets sent to protect padme' au pls 👀

ok

ok so like, i’ve talked about this on twitter and i am gonna bring it here:

basically, my biggest gripe with the AOTC plot is why in the heck did a PADAWAN get sent on a high profile mission like protecting former queen and senator from naboo Padmé Amidala? even palpatine, at the beginning of the movie, mentions ‘master kenobi’ by name as a suggestion for a guard for padmé (and yes we know why, but still) so i went ahead and imagined a ‘what if’ for obi-wan getting sent instead of anakin—since on top of being a ‘familiar’ face that padmé AND her handmaidens trust and who already is a known name on naboo, obi-wan also already has bodyguarding experience under his belt.

now, factoring in that anakin stays at the temple for a bit and obi-wan DOES get like 3 days of vacation for the first time in....his life....then he gets a few days of just actually RESTING--in varykino, of all places, and with padme, who would literally let him rest anyway. so obi-wan gets a mini vacay. he gets to relax in one of the most beautiful places in the galaxy and padmé does, too--they talk about the battle of theed, about the senate, the jedi, about qui-gon, and for a little while obi-wan and padmé both get to just...breathe, and be...people. which is nice, and which tbqfh they both deserve.

there might not be a floating pear at dinner but there would be padmé watching him go through lightsaber forms in the early morning sun (either shirtless or yknow in some light clothes because fuck you i said so)

there's no balcony kiss, but there are some very lingering glances and smiles when the other isn't looking and some 'accidental' hand brushing...because they would ABSOLUTELY be slow-burn. obi-wan and padmé are both adults at this point, and both of them have obligations, obi-wan even moreso. but he's already known what attraction (physical and emotional) is like, what romantic emotions are like--he's not incapable of these things, he’s just reserved about them because he understands them, but his jedi teachings dictate restraint, and release. satine was still a figure in his life--he just made a choice, in the end, and do i think he regrets it? i think here and there he thinks about it, but i don’t think he fully feels regret over it by the time AOTC takes place. i think that comes later, when he sees her again during the clone wars.

now on naboo with padmé, he's faced with the same sort of emotions blooming up, and he would for sure think to himself about the choice with satine, about the jedi order, and about the repercussions there. so he might let himself get a little closer than he ought to, but ultimately nothing really WILD AND OVERT would come of it in AOTC, even if they'd been alone on naboo. there would be some very close calls, i think, for sure, but both of them are very good at keeping themselves guarded and very good at abstaining when necessary. again, these are two grown adults that have lived both of their lives with expectations weighing on them, and a certain behavior and standard expected of them. they aren’t two horny teenagers with nothing to lose and obi-wan would 100% respect padmé’s boundaries without hesitation while she would offer him the same respect, if maybe not so staunchly. padmé is for sure more flexible with her boundaries, but pair the two of them together flirting....i mean that’s a dangerous amount of chemistry right off the bat 👀

meanwhile anakin would be on coruscant and FRUSTRATED. not because he didn't get the assignment, though that would be part of it--the responsibility aspect—no, because they chose someone else to go protect padmé instead of him. hell, they could have sent mace windu and he'd still be frustrated and jealous as all fuck. but he still does as he's told. he just...looks into the dart. checks in more on the bounty hunter aspect of things because he’s SURE that’s a good lead after the zam situation. he's determined to prove himself, and if he can figure out who's trying to hurt padmé then she'll be impressed too, of course. and he wants that. a lot. obi-wan might have been sent to naboo but at this point anakin:

> is still VERY infatuated with padmé

> does not know about obi-wan’s romantic history and likely would assume he’s just boring her to death/that nothing would happen anyways

but instead of just consulting the council or the archives, anakin goes to palpatine.

palpatine offers NO help with the bounty hunter stuff.

but he DOES sow more seeds of jealousy in anakin's horny teen brain, and in the end anakin ends up jetting off of coruscant on his own. the movies just downplayed the everloving heck out of this but you KNOW palps was in anakin’s ear CONSTANTLY about obi-wan and padmé, stirring the pot.

now, anakin doesn't have the contacts that obi-wan does, but he's determined. i'm thinking he probably susses a few things out about the dart via the force; possibly with help from another master. kit? someone would help him focus if he asked. likely kit, or ki-adi, or plo, imo—he gets enough to at least send him looking for a bounty hunter and possibly towards kamino--but then the stuff with his mother comes up.

and he ends up on tattooine, with the lars family.

and shortly after the Sand People Incident™ is when he gets in contact with obi-wan--and padmé insists on seeing what's going on because she senses something is wrong and obi-wan agrees. (you can pry force sensitive!padmé from my cold dead hands) so anakin meets them at the lars homestead, tells them about his visions with the dart, about the bounty hunter and the feelings he got

and what better place than mos eisley to look for someone Seedy?

mos eisley has them run right into jango.

jango leads them to geonosis.

geonosis gets them all caught.

padmé is the one who sends a message to the jedi council about the geonosians and jango fett before she gets captured too--because you know they told her to stay with the ship while they investigate but then they took too long and she was like 'oh boy i better call the cops'.

the arena plays out like it did in AOTC, minus the secret kiss & love declaration. there’s a lot of ‘how did we get into this mess’ and ‘well you two took too long’ and ‘i told you i should have come in as a senator first’ and anakin trying to be very convincingly brave about ‘i’ll get us out of this’ which is aimed directly at padmé. honestly the rest of the movie would be VERY similar; i think whoever assisted anakin with the dart would wind up on kamino when anakin went to tattooine, and from there things progressed with the clones and the army gets to the republic.

but there's no clandestine wedding.

anakin returns to coruscant with the other masters, commended for his work helping the senator and with the dart. obi-wan and padmé likely have a small 'meeting' scene where she thanks him and he tells her he barely did anything—but there's some hand-touching, and some very meaningful looks, and they do kiss, just once. it's soft and quiet and not under the pressure of possibly dying or anything rushed by adrenaline or hormones, it's just a gentle kiss between two people who've had this building up for weeks; and in the end neither one of them apologize, but there's A LOT of body language that says they're into it and would kiss again--but obi-wan steps back, and padmé just smiles, and there's a shared understanding between them even if it's clear there's some amount of wistfulness.

“i hope your trip back to coruscant is safe, master kenobi," she smiles like nothing's just happened, nothing's different.

"and yours, senator amidala. may the force be with you." and he bows, smiling back.

but they do look back at each other again, and everything is different.

and then you get into TCW—and PLEASE imagine all of the tension there because these two AREN’T married, they ARE sneaking around but only a little; obi-wan isn’t near as brazen with things as anakin and he and padmé get enough time together in the first few seasons to really build some THICK tension between them. like i’m talking dangerous rescue missions, them having to fight their way out together, getting smooshed in tight spaces together, S O M U C H accidental touching, SO MANY almost-kisses....and then there’s the clovis stuff, which would play out way differently because obi-wan isn’t the jealous type at all and would absolutely trust padmé; and then satine shows up again and we get a whole arc of obi-wan dealing with these conflicting emotions and padmé coming very close on multiple occasions to just telling him she loves him but! supporting his decision no matter what and respecting his emotions, because she understands, and because she knows love is selfless and not possessive and she wants to be with him...if that’s what he wants, too.

but then satine dies—and she worries about him once he's back from mandalore, and there is possibly some very gentle and sweet comforting for the audience to enjoy 👀 the big season finale after that is maul holding padmé and another senator or two hostage and it's an ultra close call but maul dips out, bc it was just bait—and the season ends with him admitting as clearly as he can in Obi-Wan Terms™ that he loves her and padmé reciprocating. they kiss and it's very sweeping and dramatic, but now maul knows kenobi has yet another weakness uh oh...

anyways honestly all of this leads to ROTS being about anakin dealing with the jealousy that palpatine’s been feeding into: jealousy towards obi-wan about padmé, and about being overshadowed. it’s about anakin feeling like he can never have enough, about wanting more and more, about obsessive love and doubt—and when it turns out padmé is pregnant, anakin’s suspicions get confirmed and he turns to palpatine yet again.

IDEALLY padmé survives this movie and she and obi-wan go into hiding together with the twins, (or their child? i mean this is for sure up to interpretation for this specific au) and anakin/vader combs the galaxy for them, resulting eventually in padmé’s death and the separation of the twins, and giving some actual meaning to leia remembering her mother in ROTJ.

so yeah i just. have a lot of feelings about things and at any given moment i can and will talk your ear off about ‘what if’ scenarios like this hdkdjdk 😭💦

[vrisrezis]

My fav danganronpa characters with a crush (part 2)

- sdr2 chapter 5 spoilers

- chiaki in my opinion can be a character at times that is hard to understand especially given romantically, even if she is a romantical interest for our protag, however ..

- I think that chiaki having a crush is full of her trying to play different games with you, more specifically games you like, and doing what she can to seem entertaining enough.

- she hates the idea of boring you honestly, she has a fear of it to be honest. She also has a fear of making you disappointed in her in any way, so she tries to be especially kind when you’re around and watching how she acts.

- she never behaved poorly of course, but she’s still more careful around you anyways..

- she tends to sleep like a lot, we know this of course. She doesn’t wanna sleep around you too much though, especially if you invite her to hang out, she’ll feel so bad and feel like she will disappoint you.

- I think chiaki is good with a crush specifically because she can deal with it in a positive way.

- will blush if you try to touch her physically as she isn’t used to the physical affection but does appreciate it quite a lot!

- often chiaki will try to be positive and always is looking for ways to make you more healthy mentally as she is always a good positive influence mentally for people!

- she gives you a big hug before her execution, she’s very sad she’ll never really get to see you again after this, but is sure to give you some advice she never got to give you. And perhaps even tell you that she loves you.

- I don’t think personality matters much for chiaki but would probably like somebody with some sort of big “issue” because she’d want to help them. (Ex; having a issue with confidence or loving yourself; having a family issue; having an issue making friends)

- she’s a bit harder given her lack of romantical interest, however I did decide to play dangan island (danganronpa 2 island mode) and was able to get some stuff ;)

- I believe akane will blush at any compliments or whenever you may do something she deems as kind or “soft” as it’s something she’s not very used to

- Being kind and showing actual emotions and being open and vulnerable just isn’t really like her.. given she grew up in a situation where it’s very likely she couldn’t be like that. (My reasoning for that being her free time events where she seemed to be sexually abused or manipulated)

- it takes time but akane warms up to the idea of at least being a little more soft but that’s as vulnerable as she will get. Truth be told she just doesn’t know how to be vulnerable, it’s not like she doesn’t trust you or anything..

- akane might wanna fight you a lot and claim it’s just a friendly match, just her way of showing affection it seems..

- she always thought humans needed only food until she met you.. you taught her love and companionship is just as important for humans!

- i imagine akane liking somebody who’s very energetic like herself, she needs somebody who can keep up with her dammit!

- akane thinks about you a lot and initially doesn’t understand why she’s thinking about you so much and hates it. At a point she thinks that she wants to fight you, but it doesn’t fix anything. She still thinks about you..

- she comes to find out from her other classmates she probably has a crush on you, which makes more sense to her now but still.. she kinda hates it.. having a crush... isn’t that a weakness?? She can’t go soft! Not for anyone! Not for you?!

- but alas she is very soft for you and doesn’t know how to deal with her feelings and tends to overthink it and complicate things. She’s constantly looking into the things you do.. is there a deeper meaning behind it? Do you like her too? Or see her as a friend?

- nonethless akane thinks about these things a lot and I think she will definitely confess to you soon, she isn’t the type to keep silent about things really.. plus what’s the point in beating around the bush?

- since she does (kinda? Probably?) have a romantic interest towards gundham there’s some stuff to go off of here

- Sonia would be very quick to compliment a crush! She’s very kind in this regard I think and loves to compliment her crush a lot!

- Sonia would spend a lot of time with you, though she wouldn’t go out her way to purposely try to bond with you.

- the reason I say this is because I think for Sonia to crush on you she has to already feel a good bond/connection with you already

- it’s very likely that you’re a bit of a loner or didn’t grow up with many/any friends, she feels she can relate to you in this aspect and it makes her feel a bit better about these things.

- she blushes around you, especially if you compliment her or go as far as to hug her or something.. she boutta be so pink!

- que Souda being a jealous boy.. as he should .. you’re sexy and get to have a princess crush on you.. a ultimate princess nonetheless!

- Sonia loves talking to you about whatever creepy shit she may be into at the moment, but she loves hearing you talk about yourself as well!

- Sonia would be very trusting towards you, if you were ever a culprit during the killing game, or you were simply falsely accused she would never believe it! You are so kind and such a good friend!

- v3 spoilers for chapter 1

- Kaede has Shuichi but even at that not really a romantic interest, however looking into her character I can get a bit of an idea what she’s like romantically if you simply analyze her character. Especially given her love suite event and such.

- kaede will definitely seek your approval for things, I wouldn’t say to the point where it’s a flaw but she definitely seeks your approval when she goes on one of her optimistic Hope speeches

- I like to think kaede is very trustful of you, even in the killing game. I think that kaede will have trouble trusting the others towards the end (which would lead to her fall), but she will always trust you!

- kaede would at least give you a hug and while crying tell you her true feelings towards you before her execution ;(

- I think kaede likes to joke around with her crush a lot because she loves seeing them smile. Kaede also always knows how to comfort her crush and always knows the right things to say and how to cheer them up. She pays close attention to them and how they react to certain people and certain jokes.

- I think kaede could like a variety of people personality wise, I could say she’d like somebody like miu, shuichi, himiko, tenko, maki, kokichi etc. she could like any kind of personality but despite how you act if you seem to show interest in her this will make her happy

- even if u act all tsundere about it what matters to her is that you’re interested!

- I will try to make this one really gender neutral, I have for most of them but I won’t talk specifically about certain genders like I had with Mahiru, since there’s so much discourse within her sexuality.

- I think tenko would be interested in somebody that is a performer, I think that’s why she was so obsessed with himiko.

- she would be obsessed with you too though, always trying to be your friend and having conversations and doing her best to form a bond with you and constantly praising you, despite what your responses may be.

- tenko has a hard time concealing emotions and definitely deals with more emotions than most, crushing on you is hard for her to keep to herself for these reasons.

- which is why I think she’s pretty upfront with her emotions and will state at times that she finds you physically attractive but also finds your personality to be attractive.

- she will go as far to state anybody is lucky to date you, you could be with anyone you want.

- personality wise I do think it’s more likely for tenko to like somebody different than her own personality, somebody similar to maybe maki or himiko.

- lots of blushing from this gal, “you’re making me blush!” Can often be heard from her.

- Angie will be very open about her feelings, but this being when you get close as I think it takes a bit for Angie to like somebody.

- Angie will outright say you’re the one for her! That atua said you’re the one for her! So as such she is always calling you cute nicknames.

- Angie loves to grab your hand and drag you around to places. I also think Angie tends to act like you two are a couple already and probably claims you are ?

- quick to give hugs and such! She’s also quite clingy too and hates being separated from you at any time.. she loves being with you after all!

- she’s the ultimate artist for a reason, so she likes to make portaits of you and show them to you as well as other people.

- personality I don’t think matters much to Angie but I think she will tend to like people more shy, more nice, or in general just don’t really have a backbone.

- it makes it easier for her to have a person going along with pretty much anything she wants to do and no complaints or being that stubborn!

- likes praying with you a lot, claims she cannot pray without you now!

V3 spoilers for chapter 4

- I think that miu can be a bit strange towards a crush at least by her own standards. She definitely acts different towards you.

- she acts sexual and says sexual things specifically to gain your attention. Over time eventually stops doing this, but still does it from time to time.

- blushes around you, she feels nervous around you and she cannot help it.. she doesn’t fully understand why she gets so nervous though..

- it takes her awhile to understand what her feelings are, they certainly aren’t sexual.. (well maybe they are.. but it’s totally something else too)

- she will realize she cares for you a lot.. it will lead to her growing desperate to leave with you.. obviously she will give into that desperate need and it’ll be her own demise.

- miu laughs a lot around you as she cannot help but feel so happy in your presence. She wants you to feel the same so she tries to make a lot of jokes to make you laugh. She’s not always good with people and making jokes however and may come off as insensitive or mean.

- speaking of being mean, she’s usually very mean to everyone but never really to you. If she ever is she didn’t mean to be .. well mean. So she’ll try to make it up to you.

- has probably offered her body to you before. She also likes to show you her latest inventions and even invent things for you that you’d find useful. Many people find some of her inventions weird, she doesn’t care what anybody else thinks but she cares what you think so she has a fear you might find some invention weird.

- I think miu could like a variety of different people, but what matters to her is that you know how to catch her off guard. Whatever that be like kokichi with your.. attitude, or being more like kaede with your optimism and it being completely foreign to her. Catching her off guard gets her to like you. Though I do think praising her a ton totally works as well.

- you’re a lucky duck if himiko likes you! I think tenko would agree ;D

- himiko loves to smile and laugh around you, then again she wouldn’t stop smiling and laughing around you even if she wanted to.. she wants you to have fun too though! She likes making you smile by doing lots of magic!

- himiko blushes around you, you make her feel so nervous and giddy.. though she does pray with Angie when she’s feeling especially giddy because then she can avoid her feelings.

- this of course leads to kokichi knowing and teasing her relentlessly, but also genuinely telling her she shouldn’t run away from her emotions... in his own little way of course

- she likes spending time alone with you.. it’s pretty rare because of tenko which is why she likes spending alone time with you so much.. even if it makes her kinda nervous

- sometimes she feels nervous about preforming magic tricks and such in front of you.. but still manages showing off

- i imagine her liking the complete opposite of her tbh, I think she’d like somebody with lots of Rn every despite what her attitude would be to somebody like that. Maybe somebody really optimistic or somebody really in touch with their emotions.

[gguktarts]

decathect | jk (3)

1. to withdraw one’s feelings of attachment from (a person, idea, or object), as in anticipation of a future loss

summary: if one thing was clear to you when you first met Jeon Jungkook, it was that he would never love you. at least, not the way you wanted him to.

pairing: jjk x reader genre: unrequited love au || angst || a bit of fluff || drabble series word count: 3.5k parts: « previous | 3 / ? | next » cw: none this chap, i think. maybe it’s a bit less angsty than the ones before. note: this chap (is rlly crap i APOLOGIZE) was meant to include another scene,, but idk how to write!!! properly!!! and the first scene got outta hand so :(( here it is. the next part i rotated for it to be on the next update. im so sorry it took long,, id rather not get into the personal specifics about it but i got bad writers block at certain points and just. didnt get to finish it for my own deadline 🥺 & im still developing my writing so please!! if anyone feels like something is off/like it dragged on for too long (which is what i felt), etc, etc please let me know. also i haven’t checked for mistakes so sfhdk there’s that aha

The last few days were hectic, with finals approaching and your mind on absolute overdrive. Your Intro to Thermal Physics course was biting you in the ass, which you had felt oddly thankful for. With no time to think about Jungkook or the girl in his painting, the hours blurred themselves into a continuous loop of exhaustion and academic focus: wake up, go to class, study, sleep, rinse and repeat. You’ve even gone as far as seeking out Hoseok, your astronomy lab partner and the busiest bastard you’ve ever met, to have extended study sessions within the Atrium’s library. The mixed efforts of passing the course with flying colors, and avoiding all trace to your fuckboy crush, had so far been a success—in some ways more than others.

Time spent around any hall (either within the dorms or elsewhere in the university) was minimally reduced to avoid any lingering shadows in the corners of your eyes, while each study session left you feeling more confident. Effective, convenient. Two birds, one worm. Yes, worm.

Two mouths, shared crumbs though. Your extreme devotion to the books had, after all, demanded social sacrifice. 

You haven’t seen Tae nor Joon—nor any of the other boys in days, and while you aren’t ignoring them per se, they likely know why you were behaving the way you did up until yesterday. 

That night, after dinner and after dark, Taehyung had found you with your face buried in his favorite pillow, with droopy eyes and a soft pout etched onto your lips. You didn’t need to tell him about your crush, nor did you have to speak. All he needed was a look at you, a single glance, for him to decide you needed his comfort but also some space.

But apparently enough was enough, and your presence was pointedly demanded the very minute after you handed in your last exam. The day of the week —Thursday— was thus dubbed “Movie-Theather-Night” effective immediately, so he said.

That’s why currently you find yourself staring at Jimin’s front door, phone held tight between your fingers. Tae told you he was already, conveniently, near the ticket stand so he would “obviously” buy the tickets in advance. That left you with the other side quest he couldn’t complete, which you blindly agreed to do. 

Your job is simple: grab Jimin —yes, the little one with a penchant for lateness— and meet up with Tae before 7. 

Swallowing a groan, you pointedly stared up at the imaginary heavens beyond the building’s ceiling. Praying it be on your side for a few hours longer at least, you tuck away your phone (Tae’s mild threat about stealing Jimin’s rings if the latter didn’t hurry getting dressed completely unnoticed by you), knock on the door by mere habit, and go in.

You don’t expect the loud moans, you really don’t.

Jimin’s name gets stuck halfway past your throat as the high-pitched whines continue pouring over the living room, stiffening your shoulders and rooting your legs to the floor just a step inside the flat—just enough for the door to close itself shut. It isn’t even loud enough to cover the sounds either. Your ears turn red in a heartbeat, embarrassment tugging your lips into a frown, when you note the timbre of low, soft grunts you know belong to one guy. They hide behind and below the higher pitched ones, but you somehow pick them up nonetheless. 

They don’t last long. Or maybe time goes by alarmingly fast when you zone out, because not two, three minutes later, one of the muffled voices scoffs out in discontent, dulcet tones all gone.

“What? Now?” you hear, feeling the disbelief permeating the air along with underlying disappointment. “But I thought—”

The sudden thud of a door slamming open makes you jump, startling you into partial motion before the girl rushing out the hallway catches you like a deer in headlights. 

You hate how quickly you notice that she’s not the girl from Jungkook’s painting. And it’s hard not to feel guilty when your heart quickens its pace at the idea that maybe both of them are nothing more than victims of his ways. Actually, you hope for it, because you can’t help but feel it’s equally jarring to see one of his choices so soon, and so up close, right after he’s done with her. Her disheveled hair and bruised neck, the traces he’s left, almost distract you from the heated glare she sends your way for blocking the door. Almost. 

You move out of her way when she tries pushing past you, leaving with a huff and as quickly as she appeared.

Suddenly, this movie-theater-night sidequest thing seems like a really bad idea. A very bad idea. You hate it here. 

“J-jiminie?” you move near the hall, voice shaky in all ways you don’t want it to be. “I’m here, let’s go.”

“Just a second! There’s finally some goddamn silence—”

His muffled voice carries over from your left, closer than the door of his room. You briefly debate waiting for him there, the aspect of continuing your naturally cryptic tendencies very seductive. On the other hand, you could raid his pantry for any and all m&ms, which sounds far more soothing to your rumbling stomach. 

Decided entirely on candy—Taehyung would definitely enjoy mixing it with the bucket of popcorn he never fails to buy—and maybe some food, you turn around only to collide with something, hard. 

The start of what sounds like a “boo!” trails to a low grunt upon impact. It drowns out your sharp gasp, and if it weren’t for the hands grabbing you by the elbows you’d have likely lost your footing entirely. 

“Oh—shit”

Jungkook’s wide eyes and o-shaped lips greet you full force, his cheeks a soft pink hue you’ve been missing lately. They don’t exactly match the deeper flush painting you from ear to ear, your reactions to him far less graceful when so near in proximity. You can’t even speak, too enthralled by the warmth of his hands, by how his eyes shift over your body in evident worry. The way his lips tremble into a frown makes you want to smooth them into out just to see his face light up like you’re more used to, but a look to his neck is more than enough to remind you what happened just minutes ago. Right. 

“Hey, sorry, didn’t think you’d turn around so quickly, are you alright?” he asks, hands moving lower on your arms and eyes searching, as if he’s testing if you’re steady enough. Taking the chance, you quickly pull back and rip them altogether from his hold. His lips form a pout you don’t catch. 

“Yea, I’m, uh…”

Your mouth runs dry when you let your eyes travel lower, along exposed ink, sun-kissed skin and hardened muscle you had never seen before. A faint stripe of hairs peeks out from behind his gray sweats, the sight enough to make your mind wonder how he looks lower underneath. Would he be as pretty as you imagine him to be?

Fuck. Typical. Just your luck.

Pushing the thought away, you will yourself to grimace and take a step back, away from his heat and onto clearer ground. It helps that the sudden scent lingering on him isn’t the most pleasant one.

“I’m fine, thanks. Wasn’t it laundry day yesterday?” you ask, a weak attempt to defy the heat spreading up your neck once you fully process his touch, and to hopefully derail whatever thoughts he likely just formed of you. 

“What?” Jungkook looks down at himself with mild amusement, a smirk growing on his lips before his eyes bore into yours again. “Do you want me to wear a shirt? Do you not like what you see?”

Again. You hate it here.

You ignore the way your stomach tightens, hating that what he’s implying is right. A part of you does, undeniably, like seeing his skin, you can’t deny that to yourself. But for all of that, an even bigger part of you exists that simply does not. Not when your head swims with the overwhelming idea of getting rid of the dot on his collarbone, be it by hiding it through makeup or painting it a deeper hue of violet all on your own. And much less when the smell of sex gets more distinct each passing second, making you scrunch your nose in distaste. 

“No,” you grumble, crossing your arms and making your way past him and towards the kitchen. 

“No you don’t want me to wear a shirt?” he counters, tilting his head to the side, round eyes faking innocence a few steps behind you.

You whip your head around without thinking, cheeks pink and eyebrows knitted together in annoyance as an unthought retort makes its way to your throat. Before you can say anything in return, though, he’s already grinning at your flustered state. 

“I’m kidding,“ he laughs, “You’re just easy to tease, Y/N, sorry. I was going to go shower but apparently hyung’s still in there, and I haven’t seen you in a while, so." 

That last bit goes completely over your head. ’Still’ is definitely worrying, but you’d rather not know how long he’s been there in total.

"Do you think he’ll be there for more than 10?” you ask, briefly looking at the clock and doing some math. If it’s 6:27 he has exactly 10 minutes to finish. Since the ride to the theater takes around 15 minutes, let’s say 5 is spent on parking, then you’d have exactly 3 minutes to find Tae before the clock strikes 7:00.

“Hopefully not, but who knows.”

“Very reassuring,” you deadpan. It comes out halfheartedly, your focus now on finding the candy stash they keep in the corner cabinet of their kitchen.

Jungkook trains his gaze on your shorter frame when you set your attention on the upper shelf, noticing your confusion at the sight of all the snacks up there. Grabbing a mini bottle of milk from the fridge, he watches on with amusement as you get on your tippy toes, hand trying and failing to grasp the giant yellow bag of m&m’s you’re determined to steal. Before today he’d wondered why Jimin keeps on buying two bags when the shorter strictly eats the peanut-less ones, and when Yoongi doesn’t even eat sweets, but now it makes more sense to him. He vaguely remembers you eating his bag without knowing it was his. Not that he ever corrected you.

Clearly, your struggles are new to you. The peanut m&ms were always on the bottom shelf, always. You had no clue the others decided just last week to stash the dorm’s snacks somewhere more unreachable, mostly so it’s partially forgotten and not inhaled in a single day as compared to how it’s been until then.

Exasperation reveals itself on your clenched jaw and dramatic pout, but just when you’re about to climb the counter, a pair of warm hands anchor themselves to your waist and joist you upwards. 

“W-whoa, hey— w,what are you doing?” Your breath hitches and squeaks as you tense, unused to the touch but trying to work on automatic as warning signals immediately start to blare red. 

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Some of his warmth spreads through the thin fabric of the shirt you’re wearing, giving you goosebumps and speeding up your pulse. “I should be the one with questions, you shorty. Like, is there a reason you’re stealing our m&m’s?” Jungkook asks, tone light and in total contrast to the hot breath you feel against your back. It ignites a shiver to run down your spine, no permission given. Honestly, you’re surprised you hear him over the pulse continuously pounding in your ears.

“Is there a reason you’re helping me steal your m&m’s?” You counter with a mumble, voice small despite your tries to seem unbothered.  Holding onto the wooden cabinets for some stability, you snatch up the bag.

Below you Jungkook drags out a hum as if he’s thinking it through, but with his chest millimeters from your back you can feel the subtle vibrations. You want to scream. Shovel it, Y/N. Shovel it.

“Eh, I don’t mind sharing food in times of need.”

“How do you—is it my dark circles? Do they look that bad?” After Tae’s message you had gone straight for a shower and a fresh change of clothes. Makeup had never been a source of comfort, and today was no different. 

“Um…”

Peering down with the full intent of adding that he can bring you down now, you catch a glimpse of the fading marks on his knuckles seconds before his grip tightens around your waist. If Jungkook manages to hear your weak whimper he says nothing. He simply lowers you gently and without command, muscles flexing but no complaints of your weight present. 

“Thanks,” you add, turning to face him but rooting yourself to the spot instead of following his touch like you want to do. There’s only so much you can take before all that’s left is to crumble, and you deny to let yourself seem that weak. It’s not like you’ve changed your mind regarding your crush, after all. The quicker you forget about it, the better. The more you suppress it, the easier it will be to forget. Right? “For the lift, I mean, and for allowing my petty crime.”

The fact that you find Jungkook halfway towards the island counter, mere seconds after he lets go, stays in the front of your mind. The distance between you two grows back to the one you’re used to faster than you expect. 

“Y'welcome,” he says, words slurred together as his accent shows and that toothy, bunny smile of his gets shot your way. It’s blatantly infuriating how easily he manages to make your erratic heart thud, thud, thud. But you swallow the truth, suppress how you’ve long to see every little thing he keeps on doing. “And nah, you should’ve seen Yoongi hyung this morning. Still look exhausted though. When do you finish?”

“Today—”

Jungkook blinks. “Already?”

“—Mhm. Which is why Taetae wants to hang out, and why I need these,” you motion for the bag cradled in your arms as if it were your very own child—as if you’d ever want any. The small space on the counter becomes your new seat, feet swaying anxiously with each second Jimin doesn’t come out.

“Let me guess. Movies?” he asks, eyes starry as he slurps the remaining liquid from his bottle and extends an arm your way. You get the gist of what he wants when he makes grabby hands. He looks adorable, but the way his bare torso keeps on making your stomach flip and sink at any given glimpse tells you he’s actually at his most dangerous. 

You simply nod, letting him grab some m&ms from your bag before you can come to regret it.

“Which one?”

“I… dunno yet,” you confess, head tilting. “It’s his turn to choose.” Truthfully, the question hadn’t come up. Movie sessions at the dorms always consist of rotating turns: one week him, one week Jimin, one week you. Considering Tae hadn’t even mentioned the name, you take it he’s claiming his turn. It’s been ages since you’ve been to the theater, as well, so no new or specific titles of your choice come to mind.

Sometimes it baffles Jungkook that he doesn’t really know how much time you spend with his friends. Tough maybe less when he met you first, lately whenever you’re available he’s busy trying to finish his latest piece, or getting x or y homework done with, or waiting for inspiration to strike, or de-stressing through a good fuck or some exercise. Or at least he thinks so. Whether you’re busy with astrophysics or something else he doesn’t ask, he only knows you’re often not there. So whenever he hears about you from his hyungs, he wonders just how close you’ve gotten to the most important people in his life, while completely skipping over his radar. 

“Oh? ” he hums, mildly interested but unable to say or do much else besides munch.

An idea begins to play in your head as you pop a blue in your mouth, the recurring invite repeating itself like a broken record stuck in repeat, waiting to be talked about. Would he even want to go with you guys? Part of you figures he doesn’t, that he’s likely preoccupied with matters unknown to you so there’s no point in asking. The other half tells you to try anyway, that maybe officializing a… deeper friendship —if you had one in the first place— might be just what you need. To take him off the pedestal your heart built for him, to know a more real side of him, if he ever allows it.

“Hey, Jungkook? Would—”

“Incoming”

Your tongue gets tied to your throat the second Widowmaker’s voice travels around the kitchen, resounding loudly from whereyou guess is his pocket.

Jungkook gives you a sheepish look as he takes his phone out, a sorry halfway past his lips when his eyes catch the screen. He’s so entranced by whatever is catching his attention that his voice loses all volume. By the way his head suddenly cocks to the side, you know he’s either feeling challenged or having his ego massively stroked, but you can’t quite place the flush faintly covering his cheekbones.

Another apology tries leaving him when he notices your waiting stare, his fingers hurriedly tapping at his screen. But it’s a useless effort, since he’s cut off again, this time by ringtone. 

Jungkook doesn’t hesitate to answer, a slight smirk of his in place. You can’t help but squirm and look away.

“Gimme a sec babe—no I’m not, just give me—”

Oh. 

The way his tone changes, the way his eyes glaze in less than a heartbeat, him. You drown it all out, drown him out. You don’t need this right now, or so soon, or at all.

As if knowing you need a saviour and a distraction, your forgotten phone begins to play Tae’s chosen ringtone. The clock reads 6:36 pm. 

“Oh, fuck.” Scrambling, you pocket the bag of chocolates and stand up in a hurry. 

“Wait, Y/N,” Jungkook calls from his seat. You see his phone pressed to his chest, as to muffle your conversation from being heard, or to ignore the loud voice still finding a way to be heard over his own. “What did you want to ask me?”

But it’s then that Jimin barrels out of the bathroom, loud and striking as if a new form of thunder. And like thunder, you hear his voice before his body.

“I’M DONE, Y/NNNNNN LET’S GOOoooo!" 

His voice dies out the closer he gets to you, a confused sound replacing his words at the sight of his roommate. It’s clear he didn’t expect to find you and Jungkook in the same room, presumably… interacting. 

Turning to the youngest, you offer a halfhearted shrug and an easy lie. "I kinda forgot already, sorry." 

If he replies, you don’t know. You don’t register Jimin’s confused "huh? forgot what?” either. Tae’s call had gone to voicemail amidst all the noise, so you have to do damage control. 

As expected, he picks up after the first ring. “Y/n?"

"Is that Tae?” Jimin suddenly asks, head whipping your way. His tiny hands reach for your phone without your confirmation, making you twist away to evade his wiggling fingers. t’s as if he somehow knows it’s his friend despite not being able to hear his voice, nor you giving any indication. “Kim Taehyung! Why aren’t you picking up my—”

“Hyung, can you lower your voice?” Jungkook calls from somewhere in the background, a bit exasperated at the commotion. 

Your head hurts. Why couldn’t they both shut up? 

“Hey, Jimin’s with me already, we’ll be on our way.”

“Ya, Jungkook, are you really asking me that? Just go talk somewhere else! And what are you doing without a shirt on? I told you not to harass Y/N.”

You can hear Taehyung whining from the other end of the line. Honestly, you missed it, missed him. “You haven’t left? Is that Jungkook? Why are you still in the dorms?”

“What? I didn’t do anything! If you didn’t take so long in the bathroom—wait—” a timbre shift. He’s not talking to Jimin anymore. “Did you really just disobey me?" 

“Disgusting…” Jimin huffs from besides you, annoyed and equally embarrassed by his roommate’s lack of shame. It’s exactly what he needs to move into action, bidding the boy farewell with a simple “just behave while I’m gone.”

You can only roll your eyes at the background exchange, ignoring, ignoring, ignoring. "No, yes, and I’ve no idea why but we’re leaving now,” you answer. Jimin’s smaller hand grabs yours before you finish speaking, pulling you along until you fall into steps behind him.  “Plus I bring m&ms so that’s a win.”

You don’t catch Jungkook’s warm see you later!, too caught up with Tae’s praise over your choice of chocolate and the rush to go once and for all. 

And that’s okay. You wouldn’t have been able to answer, anyway. Not with the growing uncertainty in your chest. 

Would a friendship with him be worth the impending heartache? Could you put yourself through that before you push your own feelings away?

Maybe you aren’t ready just yet.

[bigskydreaming]

Setting up a side blog  at @bigskywritings to have a place to put all my original work, commissioned work, and commissioning guidelines for both fanfic and original work, as well as other services offered like developmental edits, etc.

That’s why I’m going through so many old files, lol. Probably gonna be a lot of posting going on over on that one today. Got a lot to go through, and not to be dramatic on main, but there’ve been enough points over the past several years where I didn’t think I’d ever get a chance to actually do anything with any of this, that tbh, I’d rather just have it out there in some form that can actually be enjoyed by people rather than just sitting in my files. I’ve always been heavy on the world-building, with that usually being considered one of my strengths, that I’ve got a ton of settings that could work for any number of short stories that wouldn’t take anything away from the longer novels or projects I have going for them. 

*Shrugs* Or maybe they’ll just sit there like they do in my files, lol, its honestly not a big deal either way, its just I’d rather err on the side of potential interest these days.

Here’s a snippet set in one of my primary shared universes, something I call the Citadel ‘verse. Basic premise is its a fantasy universe where the universe itself is sentient, but more of a raw, primal sentience than having a fully formed consciousness. But it derives and evolves its own consciousness from the presence of sentient beings, after the first ones evolved on their own without design, and so it knows it wants to be more than it is, but the only way to do that is through sentient beings. So long ago, it shaped the focal point of its power and consciousness into something that would be seen as embodying power to anyone who saw it, and thus the Citadel was made. The Citadel is the universe, the universe is the Citadel. Its all the power of creation, of godhood, contained in one place....but just lacking the will and the imagination to make use of it on its own. For that it needs people, and those people are whomever end up within the walls of the Citadel, claiming the various Rooms and the forces each embody for their own, and in doing so, becoming gods.

But entropy is the natural state of all universes and the one thing the Citadel can’t abide is stagnation, so whenever a god or gods becomes bored or content with whatever they’ve done with that power, whenever they stop creating, changing, manipulating, and just sit back and rest on the fruits of what they’ve already done, the Citadel takes back its power and begins a new cycle of someone new coming across it or seeking it out, and becoming the next god or gods. Some cycles there’s only one occupant of the Citadel, sometimes two or three, sometimes entire pantheons of gods each with their own Room or Rooms, it varies. The last cycle of importance only had one god, and upon his death, the entire First World erupted into war and chaos as people vied to find the Citadel and claim its power. 

Many Rooms were claimed by people whose first acts of godhood were to attempt to seize as many more for themselves as they could, and the whole world was being torn apart and in danger of being destroyed.....so when one of their number, Seshan, finally seized control of the Throne Room, the ultimate seat of power within the Citadel, she sealed each of the other new gods in the Rooms they’d already claimed, and split the Citadel and cast its various pieces to the edges of the universe, where reality was still shapeless and unformed. The exiled gods used this to form new worlds of their own making, via the power of their individual Rooms. And thus their war has continued throughout the eons, as they continue to try and seize control of more and more Rooms and consolidate enough of the Citadel’s power that they can finally force open the doors Seshan locked behind them and challenge her for the Throne Room itself.

(Just FYI, before anyone asks if I’ve read Brandon Sanderson, the answer is yes, I’ve read some of his earlier stuff. This universe was in no way influenced by his work, as I started building this setting back in high school, lol. What I think IS likely is that we were probably both inspired by the same works. I was a big fan of the multi-world nature of The Deathgate Cycle, and I really liked the shared multi-verse setting Michael Moorcock uses for his various protagonists like Elric and Corum, and those and more are pretty clear inspirations, lol. Like....I don’t have an issue with being accused of ripping off someone else, I just want to be accused of ripping off the right people, the people I’m actually ripping off of, loooool).

This particular world, the setting for the snippet below, is one of the worlds created by Pelk the Harper, the god of music (among other things). One of his claimed Rooms is what amounts to a concert hall, and its hidden away on this world, the one he formed from it before moving on to make new worlds. A wide range of cultures and religions formed in his absence, but a common concept many of them circle back to is the idea that all of creation has two parts, existing as both a Shape and a Sound. Some have different names for this, some call it the Shape and the Voice or the Shape and the Song, or Form and Function or Substance and Speech, its defined differently in various parts of the world, but all ultimately contain the idea that there’s a physical component to existence, and a non-physical.

A small percentage of people on this world, usually called something like unbinders, have the ability to find the thread that binds the physical and non-physical aspects of a thing together, and temporarily unweave it, leaving two separated parts. The Shape, which exists unbound as an image without substance, a seeming illusion that has no mass, sound, scent, etc....and the Song, which exists unbound as the essence of a thing, but without form to concentrate it and define it. Once created, its the nature of a created thing to exist as a complete whole, and so being Unbound is an imperfect state of existence. Meaning as soon as an unbinder stops concentrating on keeping the two halves apart, they’ll snap back together and rejoin the way they’re supposed to.

Except centuries ago, people invented devices called mirrorflasks and echo-catchers.....to catch and contain these separated halves of an unbound thing, and keep them separated. Mirrorflasks are glass vials of any size, whose interiors are coated with an alchemical mixture that acts as a mirror that keeps a Shape eternally reflected and never fading, as long as the flask is corked. Echo-catchers are metallic vials whose interiors are coated with a similar mixture, that keeps a Sound or Song eternally echoing and never fading, as long as the stopper is in place. An unbinder is necessary to separate the two halves so they can be caught and contained, but after that, anyone can uncork the containers, the effect is the same no matter the person: the Shape and Sound will immediately rejoin, no matter how physically distant the mirrorflask and echo-catcher are from each other. 

That’s irrelevant, the important part is that both flask and catcher need to be opened, and so they’re fairly useless except in pairs. If you uncork a mirrorflask but not its accompanying echo-catcher, the Shape or image of the thing will be released, just as if you uncork the catcher but not the flask, its Sound will escape as a formless thing that briefly can be heard or smelled or even felt, before its lack of a Shape leads it to spread out in all directions without boundaries, diluting it to the point of non-existence then.

So a fire that’s unbound and contained, will just be the illusion of flames if just its flask is opened, while if just the echo-catcher is uncorked, there’d be the sound of flames, the sensation of heat, but it’d be there and gone in a matter of moments. Anything can be unbound and contained, physical objects like weapons or forces like fires or even storms (the trick of unbinding is seeing something as a whole thing unto itself. An unbinder who sees a storm as disparate elements will never be able to unbind the whole storm, just pieces of it like a lightning bolt. But one who sees the storm as one singular thing can unbind that whole storm and store it in a flask and catcher.) Even animals can be unbound. The only thing that can’t is human beings, but with one exception....unbinders can’t unbind anyone else, but they can unbind themselves. Separate themselves into a bodiless voice and essence as well as a substanceless image...a kind of astral projection that’s exceedingly rare as its viewed as extremely reckless and dangerous....because while in that state, even an unbinder can be trapped in a mirrorflask and echo-catcher, the same as anything else.

Anyway, that’s the scoop on the below snippet. Gonna try and be better about tagging things on the sideblog because yay organization, lol, so the tag for things Citadel related will be ‘tales of the Citadel’ and specific to this setting will be ‘The Chaos Vault.’

(That’s the title to the bigger project linked to this setting. There are legends on this world of a vault that was hidden away or lost centuries ago, but in it was stored all the greatest natural disasters and cataclysmic forces that had ever been unbound. Unbinding things like that is basically a lost art, as older civilizations could do things with unbinding that ‘modern’ inhabitants of this world can’t even dream of....as the more scientifically advanced they became, the harder it was for them to see major cumulative things like storms and other disasters as just being one single thing that could be unbound, rather than a lot of smaller, individual elements. So there’s lots of legends about something called the Chaos Vault existing somewhere. Which eventually culminates in a high fantasy heist caper FTW).

Snippet from The Chaos Vault, in which Miya kills people cuz that’s kinda her thing:

Choosing a spot a few steps from the door that separated the kitchen from the hall - close enough to get a clear view of the servers coming and going from it, far enough away for her to time things just right - Miya braced herself against the far wall, leaning as if she needed its support to keep her upright. Less than a minute later, a server emerged from the kitchen bearing a full tray of dishes, and she straightened and pivoted just as he came within reach.

Her seemingly wine-drunk stumble was nothing short of artful, if she did say so herself, and their collision tipped the man’s tray just enough that the outermost dishes cascaded to the red-tiled floor. The sounds of shattering dishware echoed loudly thanks to the vaulted ceiling overhead. The shattering of a small mirrorflask was a trivial thing in comparison, when she let it fall from her clenched fist. A minor tinkling easily lost in the chaos she’d caused, just as the sound of broken dishes was drowned out by the much louder revels taking place down the hall.

And much like the shards of the broken flask were effectively camouflaged by the mess on the floor.

“Oh, Shape and Song, I’m so clumsy!” She bubbled exaggerated apologies at the man and clung to his shoulder, keeping his attention firmly on her and away from the red and black banded firesnake that slithered rapidly away from the noise. It reached the escape offered by the ballroom at the end of the hall, and vanished into the forest of dancing legs and swirling skirts.

“Its quite alright,” he assured while attempting to be graceful about dislodging her. It most assuredly was not, if the grimace he couldn’t quite hide was anything to go by. Then again, Miya mused, anyone likely to give him grief about the matter would be concerned with far greater things in a few moments.

But only if she made sure her little friend got his Voice back before he was spotted by the revelers. With no physical mass to trip over and coloring fairly well disguised against the tile, she had some time, but not much. 

Miya heaved herself off her unknowing accomplice, and with a few more incomprehensible mutterings, she staggered toward the other end of the hall. Making use of the wall once again, both for “support” and her charade, she came to a rest near a window left open so the heated air from the kitchen wouldn’t circulate. 

She dipped her head and unclasped her right earring. Its intricate array of tiny chiming windpipes, while annoying, hid the equally tiny echo-catcher among them. With a single smooth motion deftly hidden by her hunched stance, she uncorked it and tossed both vial and earring out the window and into the canal below, glad to be rid of both.

A Song once released needs no direction to find its other half, and rejoining its Shape and binding itself back together took but an instant. It would only take a few seconds more for it to be drawn to the scented-oil she’d dabbed her target’s sleeve with when brushing up against him earlier. With that thought, Miya pushed herself off the wall and started down the hall again, this time at a much quicker pace.

3…2…1…

A single scream cut through all other noise and carried horrified silence in its wake.

There we go.

And then it was the silence that was shattered. People spilled out of the kitchen and into the hallway like so many confused and frantic ants. But ones with their eyes all drawn towards the ballroom, leaving nothing but backsides watching her. Her steps straightened and took back their usual confidence, her stride made short work of the rest of the hallway, and she vanished through a side-door at the end of it before anyone thought to look around.

She skipped as sprightly down the steps to the garden as her garments would allow - which is to say, not very - and reached behind her head to release her hair from that ridiculous style. Mussing it just enough to let it flow freely down her back, she sank deeper into the night’s shadows and allowed a smile of satisfaction to curve her lips.

Surely there was nothing wrong with taking a little pride in one’s work.

[deamabilisworld]

The first thing a gay person should do is find a community.

So blue is the warmest colour.

First things first, Emma's outfits make me fall in love.

We oftentimes understand genres from superficial features. Horror for instance by threatening situations, death, etc.

But once in a while a radical author arrives into the scene and triggers all the emotions related with the genre, without actually repeating any of its tropes.

It is easy to classify lesbianism as girl on girl relationship. And the relationship with sex, and so lesbianism with a girl on girl sexual relation.

It is more difficult for a trans lesbian such as myself to understand what it means and why was I not satisfied with relationships with women who saw me as male, even disregarding penetration and the assumption that I should be the dominant partner.

So when I try to realize what it means, I try, like many of us, to reflect on lesbianism in media. And throughout the past few months it helped me understand what I was missing, even though I'm yet to theorize or put it into words.

The first hour and a half of the movie was all that for me. I connected what was going through Adele. Especially when she sees Emma for the first time. Having a confident butch wrap her hands around you as you walk in the streets, seeing it from afar and longing.

As for her sex with men compared to the sexual fantasy, that's also interesting.

Men tend to be very focused on penetration. What's more interesting is that they almost have no discussion about their own personal enjoyment in sex.

Think about it: the market for male sex toys is very poor, and men freak when you discuss penetrating them, even though the anal region is filled with nerve endings which guarantee enjoyment.

This leads to their sexual interaction begging technique-driven. Very linear and centred on specific tasks in an almost mechanical way.

I obviously also talk from my own personal experience.

Maybe I'm not the right person to speak about it, but I couldn't find much pleasure when having sex as a guy. The experience was stale, repetitive and motionless. I was not driven by my sensations, rather by my imagination and the need to please the other. It reached to situations where I used to throw my used condoms as fast as possible since I didn't really climax in these interactions.

Which obviously also limits the other's capacity to enjoy the interaction.

The most affirming first experience in my transition was when I was treated as a woman in sex, and I actually reached orgasm for the first time in my life.

Having said that, the first actual sex scene with Emma also bothered me.

When I think of lesbianism and sapphic, I think of things I can actually do as a woman, and to what I relate. Which is obviously very gay scenarios, but rarely penetrative sex.

I imagine cuddling in the middle of the night, a dildo pulled out, we both climax and low key going to bed as if nothing.

I imagine looking her in the eyes as she plays with her fingers inside of me, her dominant eyes give me comfort.

Eating her up.

But having said all of that, vaginas gross me out.

I mean penises gross me much more.

I love breasts and buttocks.

But I really find it difficult being attracted to the vagina, playing with it, kissing it.

One time in the army, I sat with someone as she guarded the base entrance and she told me she usually finds the penis appalling, but when she has sex, it becomes the most beautiful thing in the world.

Dejana once made me insert my fingers to her in the shower, but I couldn't find joy in it.

Let's talk about Dejana for a second.

While she saw me as a hetero and despised lesbians, BITWC was one of her favourite movies. And I could see a reflection of our dynamic in that relationship.

I was stronger in that dynamic. I came from abroad, I had more money, I was her boss's daughter.

I read more, especially and of course philosophy.

Our relationship was a form of escapism.

She wanted the classical type of romance, that which doesn't exist in the rural parts of Serbja. Love, warmth, real human affection deeper than sexual lust.

I was looking for a simple relationship. Cooking together, travelling, I didn't want to think about the fact that I was a lonely outcast in an unfamiliar country.

We laid in bed. She was playing some game on her phone, I was reading for a philosophy essay. In truth, I was avoiding the need to interact with her. Because when we didn't do recreational activities, we didn't have a connection.

For someone who often speaks about the need to hear as many narratives as possible, to understand and relate to the earth, and to understand emotions rather than thoughts, I failed miserably connecting with her.

Dejana would have probably been content with such a relationship. She is used to male detachment, and she is very willing to deny issues in a dynamic, but I couldn't go on with it.

I didn't feel guilty when I broke it up. I felt relief.

Emma tried to change Adele, to educate her. But in so doing she clearly doesn't understand her.

Which comes to an analysis of the movie itself.

It is a classical rich-poor romance story. But instead of the American-dream infumed version of the story, we get a cynical, french depiction.

Emma tries to connect with the rural schick. Her last exhibit is presented in very oriental streets, that almost remind me of Jaffa.

Emma uses Adele to relate with this simpleton lifestyle. In all of her relationships, she is strong, in control, and she uses her girlfriends to tell her story.

Emma is open with her sexuality because her family is embracing, Adele hides her true identity because in her society she would be isolated and categorized.

Emma can study whatever she wishes, Adele needs to be practical.

She has the time to educate herself and discuss many worlds, Adele cannot, she has only her own experience to reflect upon.

And Emma doesn't understand why is she content with these lives, how can she live like that.

But is it better for Adele to dream big and see it get crushed?

Well sorta yes.

After all, when they break up, Emma bounces back but Adele is lost. Without anywhere to sleep, no one to love her or to understand her.

And yea, it is partially because of circumstances. Emma is far richer. But with these circumstances came the fact that Emma is groomed to live free.

And let's talk about grooming and praying in the gay community and why Emma is an awful person.

When I started to come out, I immediately joined the BDSM community.

When I had to move and lost my family, I digressed a lot.

I returned to my horse only when I met my rugby community.

A gay community gives you power, a place to discuss, to understand yourself better, friends to relate with and gossip who is dangerous within the community.

Two days ago I woke up a mess after 5h sleep and a lot of packing to do for my new flat.

Right in that morning, I received a message.

I met that girl in the philosophy common room.

She was an economics student. Like many other Bulgarians, she knew her way and got the code for the room from a friend to steal coffee, tea and food.

We became friends. She was always a powerful person, one of those Nietzchiens who understand everything as a power dynamic.

I told her my radical feminist theories and she was dazzled.

She graduated, moved to London, found a boyfriend and started dating.

It wasn't a common relationship.

That person was her feminized slave. I suggested to her that perhaps he was actually a she, but the person denied it. Until recently.

But she messaged me not to ask for help with her transitioning. The opposite, she was overwhelmed by the fact that her bae wants to transition and she wanted confirmation that her transitioning is wrong. I was horrified. That day, the Bulgarian convinced her bae not to go on hormones so she won't hurt her, and so the Bulgarian won't leave her.

In a society where people discover their sexuality and gender only in sexual surroundings, natural predators would abuse them as a means of gratification.

Adele could only discover her homosexuality in gay pick up bars. Emma naturally picked her up and raised her.

Adele, who didn't know anything gay other than Emma, relied on what Emma was willing to teach her.

Becoming Emma's toy, she was dependent upon her.

The first thing a gay person should do is find a community.

Although Emma tried to pamper Adele, pushing her to express herself in writing, she never introduced Adele to friends or to the community.

The only way Emma knew how to pamper Adele, was to try and make her a copy of herself. Which failed.

While the film attempts to escape the male gaze upon lesbians, it flirts very directly with the burgeois-gaze upon the poor and oriental.

Can that power dynamic be non-abusive? and if so, how?

We want to say that Emma should understand Adele's culture and embrace it as much as Adele needs to embrace Emma's.

But Adele's culture has unavoidable ugly aspects. It is grotesque, not refined, narrow-minded and closed. And it is a central aspect to her cultural as much as the other, beautiful, aspects are.

Do gays have any choice? Can you be gay and poor, gay and be part of the ethnic 'simpleton' culture? or are these aspects inherently negating?

My answer was to escape. I lived in poverty in the streets, away from my home, where I could define my own culture as a mix of orientalism, punk and classical beauty.

But not everyone is as lucky to do that.

When I write that 'hetero culture is boring' I fully say that I find it difficult to relate to Dejana. And part of me is sad because there are some morals and beauty in her world which I couldn't connect to.

For while I was attracted to my representation of her culture, I was not attracted to her, she was just a canvas for me, a cynical tool beyond my comprehension.

I could have found beauty in her only when I painted her in my own likening.

[very-grownup]

THE YEAR IS 2020 AND I WATCHED NEON GENESIS EVANGELION FOR THE FIRST TIME, PART 13

Episode 25.

I spend twenty minutes after the episode ends trying to articulate what I think happened to my friends, gesticulating wildly.

The episode starts with a condensed version of the last upsetting bits of the previous episode and thus sets the ground for my difficulty in expressing my thoughts on it because of the imperfect intersection of linear narrative and metaphorical examination of selfhood. I've been trying to follow the show as a narrative, even as things dissolve, but here everything just goes STOP NO CONTEXT JUST IDEA AND INTERNAL INTERROGATION which I think I follow but I have difficulty following WHILE ALSO thinking about giant robots.

Something bad happened after the events of the last episode and maybe in the overall narrative structure that's all that matters? I guess this episode is about the question of what the end goals of all the barely understood players are vis-à-vis humanity through Shinji et al.

How can we be our fullest self? What and who informs who that self is? The passive approach, as seen in Shinji, isn't it. You cannot only do what you are directly told to do and you can't intuit what other people want you to do as unspoken directions.

The isolationist approach, as seen in Asuka, isn't it, either. Trying to act and live above and without human connections or direction has made her sense of self the most fragile. She's just a shell projecting an ideal around a core of hatred.

Misato is there as, perhaps, the end result of trying to live life like Shinji into adulthood (the result of Asuka's approach is evident because she's shattered), a projected false self created to fulfill the outside expectations of others while the inner self gets lost.

Rei I feel is the one who is closest to having it 'right' insomuch as there can be a right way to be a human being (and perhaps part of what Evangelion and its characters are grappling with is that there isn't or if there is, it's not a simple thing). She recognizes that who Rei is is shaped by Rei's interactions with other people and the passage of time and I think that Rei 3's apparent rejection or turn on Gendo's influence is because she knows that's not the entirety of it. Everyone is confronted to some degree by the fact that the version of themselves seen by other people is flawed but in Rei's case she's able to know it in a profound way because she is aware of the previous Reis and their memories but also of herself as distinct from them. So Shinji knows her but he doesn't Know Her and much of what Rei knows of others is removed, the Rei deaths and recreations putting a barrier between a direct human connection. The human connection is key but perhaps the degree to which so much of it is abstracted in Rei is why she isn't fully emotionally engaged as a person, even when her understanding of personhood is so much fuller than the others. No human connection leads to Asuka: fragile and quickly destroyed. Shinji recognizes the importance of the human connection, maybe, but fails to enact the how and in its place he has the projections of what he thinks other people want guiding him.

The people in our hearts aren't real people but just manifestations of our self speaking through puppets that look like people we know and can't substitute for human connection and create a similarly false self for the benefit of the false people projections (Misato).

Shinji's fear of being hurt by human connections results in his inability to make human connections and his holding himself up to the standards of imagined human connections which are unsatisfying and disappointing to everyone, including him.

Gendo's Human Instrumentality Project seems to be about recognizing the need for human connections, specifically individuals filling needs for each other that cannot be filled by the individual alone, both for the pursuit of fulfilling the need to find the true self but also taking humanity beyond humanity. I think it's because Gendo has sublimated his grief and sense of loss with respect to his wife into viewing the ability of individuals to obtain fulfillment and then lose it as a weakness that can be overcome.

If all of humanity loses its individuality and turns into the orange tang all humans are always complete and cannot be made incomplete by losing part of themselves. This is too much connection and gross, indistinguishable. What is the point of this if there is no individual?

Right now it looks like all approaches are imperfect and lead to failure, certainly in the context of Evangelion and these characters.

Visually everything is very cool in this episode even though the budget limitations are obvious. The work arounds are creative and inform the substance of what's being said, I think? There's distortion and dissolving and isolated figures on foldout chairs under spotlights.

My favourite thing is how the false characters, the characters talking to the real characters in the chair, are clearly drawn differently, badly, off model. Something is done to indicate their lack of realness, especially the false Shinji in Misato's heart.

I'm sorry if this commentary has become increasingly boring, I'm sorry if I'm doing or talking about Evangelion wrong or badly or pointlessly. I've really enjoyed it. This concludes my report on the penultimate episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

The final episode behind the cut.

Episode 26.

I appreciate the honesty of opening the episode with text that basically announces "look we don't have the time to explain everything so we're just going to explain it as it pertains to this microcosm called Shinji". It's a very clever/honest sort of meta acknowledgement of MAN THE BUDGET OOPS but I feel it's also in a way of framing the psychological aspect of the narrative as something that is not unique to Shinji but Shinji is merely the lens through which something more universal is viewed.

The episode seems to be divided into four distinct sections. The first bit is a ramped up version of the meditative internal discussions that have become increasingly frequent during the series. Interrogation by on screen text asking questions like are you happy, why aren't you happy, what do you want, why do you want this, why do you do that ... some of them very basic therapy sort of questions, others being refinements of that, questions meant to prompt you to look inward for an answer only you have.

But although we're told that this is an examination of Shinji sometimes Asuka is answering, sometimes Rei is answering. Sometimes they're asking the questions. Sometimes other characters are asking or elaborating, unseen.

Previously I've talked about feeling like narrative-wise things have been dissolving, when I try to recall a sequence of events, but here what's dissolving is the distinction between the characters because the experiences are unique but the feelings are inherently universal.

There's a lot of different things going on here, visually. Still portraits, reused footage from previous episodes, repeated shots of a rotary phone with the cable cut really sticks in my mind for some reason, what seem to be actual black and white photos of contemporary Japan. There's a universal quality and it's also how everything around you, all the people and experiences, make up the you that you are, shown with an outline of Shinji that's filled with rapidly flashing poorly imposed images of others that don't fit in his outline. It's cool.

That's when the episode transitions to its second bit which is, like, I don't know. It's a bit student film, it's a bit like that Loony Toons bit where Daffy Duck is talking directly to the animator who can erase and redraw him at will. It's barely animated in parts.

I had this understanding that Evangelion ran out of money near the end and that the last episode was barely animated at all and I think I assumed it would be like how I understand the second disc of Xenogears to be, just ... text because we can't do assets? But it's not. It's unpolished and sketchy and minimal, in spots just pencil drawings or roughly coloured in with markers, at one point it's just wave forms? But it was sad and weirdly beautiful and it felt like an extension of Shinji's internal struggle for meaning and understanding. Maybe because the lack of budget gives it an aesthetic similar to a student or art school film, it informs the material with a sincerity that I feel would be lacking in a more polished, traditional product. The fewer hands that can be felt in something the more /authentic/ it feels.

I, at least, have a greater patience and a great appreciation for something when I feel an authentic quality from it, even though that's only my perception. Form and substance compliment each other here, even if it's just because of budget constraints.

There's a really good part where it's just Shinji in a white void and it's, you know, about how that's the safest because there's nothing constraining him because he's the only thing, but it feels empty because how do we know what we are if we have no references. So a horizontal line is drawn and that's the ground in this white void and Shinji is then standing on the ground and it's reassuring, it's a reality that simultaneously limits your options but in limiting them defines what they are. It's just ... good.

Once things have been completely broken down it's time to I think reassemble them and that's the third part of the episode where Shinji wakes up in an otoge game where everything is good and normal and Asuka's his childhood friend, his mother is alive (but still faceless) and his father ... also exists and is not being actively cruel but hidden behind a newspaper, similarly faceless, existing but known (he's at the table, Yui is in the kitchen with her back always to the camera), Misato's his hot teacher, Rei is the new transfer student ... There's running to school with toast in mouth (from otoge Rei). Shinji's just a Normal Teen (but the normalcy is false, this weird artificial hyper normalcy that contrasts with the sad, raw realness of Shinji's life in Tokyo 3).

That's on the stage that Shinji is watching from his stool in the empty gymnasium with Misato and it goes dark and it's like ... this is another reality but I don't think it's meant to be a quantum thing but an example of the potential of, like, /imagine/ a you who is happy. So this is the fourth part of the episode and it's characters, every single character, interrogating Shinji, pointing out Shinji's flaws, and giving him ... advice? Guidance? A lot of it is ... bad. The characters recognize real problems Shinji has, that Shinji knows he has and then they tell him things which are presented as, for lack of a better term, 'solutions' to his problems of self. But a lot of them are not actionable. Some of them are little more than 'you hate yourself but have you considered ... not hating yourself?'

Much like when Shinji gets praised, once, by his father for what he did in the robot and that is assumed to be good because it's good in comparison to the nothing he's received, the words Shinji gets here are presumed good because they're actual acknowledgement of his problems.

The result is Shinji standing on the earth, surrounded by the other characters, announcing that he is determined to care for himself, and they all applaud and congratulate him and it's weird. It's presented as happy but there's no emotion. No emotion in this climax of a series that has so effectively evoked so much emotion, raw and powerful and real and relatable. It's not happy. It's not sad, either. It's just an absence of sadness. It's this orange tang safety in muted absence of loneliness or danger. I think because Shinji is given good conclusions for his problems (self-worth and love have to come from within, you need to allow yourself to care for yourself or you'll never believe completely that others can care for you) but he's not shown a good path to get there. What people tell Shinji gives him an understanding of what the goal is (happiness) but none of the tools to get him to happiness, something he has no real personal experience with, so the ending he arrives at isn't authentic. It's a false construct, like the otoge realty.

It's not a good ending but I think it wants there to be a good ending and the viewer to recognize when a 'good' ending isn't really good. It's a lot to think about. This concludes my report on the final episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

[herelivesahobbit]

I've really come to hate the adjective "strong" for a person, especially women, real or fictional. I wish that people would pause for a second before using that word and ask themselves exactly what they mean by it. As far as I can see, the way its used is more often to denote "a woman I approve of" than any other meaning. Think about it - if I say "strong man" you're probably thinking of like, a physically strong man. If I say "strong woman" you're thinking of - well that's the conundrum isn't it? A vague nebulous meaning that basically indicates - a cool woman. A worthy woman. A stamp of approval woman. You never hear any body say their favorite female character is a "weak" woman right? No, it's the "strong" women that are exceptional and therefore exceptionally worthy of being loved and deserving of respect (unlike those other nasty hos).

It irritates exactly because of how you rarely hear it used in the same meaning for men. Men get to be stoic, resilient, courageous, proud (in the positive sense), determined, resourceful, and any other number of specific things. Women, as always, are reduced to whether or not they're likable, everything else be damned. Using this adjective of strong might seem like progress, but actually, in trying to work our way out of reductive labelling of women, we've ended up in the same place (which always happens when changes are limited to semantics without addressing the root of the problem).

I mean, so, what exactly is a weak woman then? Let me frame this in the context of what triggered this post. According to the show runners, as well as a sizable chunk of the fandom, GoT Sansa becomes a "strong" woman due to the rape and abuse she endured. She's gone through so much, she's emerged stronger than ever, she's a strong, kick ass woman now etc whatever . It's a cliche enough way of putting things - in fact here you can see the two popular contexts in which this word is used combined i.e. for women in general and for people who've endured trauma, mental illness etc. But the implication of this of course is that Sansa was weak earlier and might have remained so if horrible things weren't done to her by monstrous men. And of course to take it further, she shines as an example of "strength" vis a vis other female characters who survived abused incorrectly. What is this strength exactly? What do you mean? I think for most people, what they mean is, she was an annoying, whiny, boring, passive character before she was raped and afterwards she became more entertaining. They didn't like her before, they like her now.

The thing is, it's fine if you didn't like her before. Sansa isn't exactly easy to like in the first book. She's supposed to be the one exception to the "Starks are awesome" rule. That's what GRRM added her in for and you can tell in book 1. But once he started writing her, he had to imagine her as a fully realized human being, and he's pretty good at that. So what we ended up with, on the page, is a character that is far more than just a foil to any one else. She's a fully realized person, with interesting flaws and hidden depths and developing talents. With a really unique and compelling POV that adds something important to the narrative. That's true whether or not you liked her in book 1 (or ever). I'm saying that in the most value neutral way possible. It's okay to dislike a female character without also trying to rewrite a narrative and take away everything that she actually is and always has been just to justify your dislike. I can acknowledge that Theon has one of GRRM's finest written arcs, one that is really moving, while also listing him as one of my least favorite PoVs and characters.

The truth is, there weren't (or rather, aren't) many female characters to begin with in fantasy fiction, so any well written female characters should always be welcome. Sansa never was a weak character (in fact one of GRRM's best written) nor a "weak woman/girl" (a meaningless adjective). Yes, of course she initially lived by a limited/narrow world view and subsequently (NOT consequently! Know the difference!) she suffered major trauma and she's gradually changed over the books. Her world view was challenged, destroyed, rebuilt. She's learned from some mistakes and still has more to learn, and is on her own coming of age path thats about a lot of things, including the importance of dreams and stories, truth and lies, and yes, holding on to, losing and/or remolding your sense of self in the face of the disappointments, shocks and trauma that life throws at you.

What that story and that arc are not about is the "right way" to survive abuse or how "strong" women deal with pain. It's, well, an interesting variation on the human experience. I mean, we've had centuries of interesting variations on how men deal with challenges, so now we're finally getting the same kind of variety with women, seeing how every person is unique (and therefore every woman is unique too) and finds their own ways to get through tough times, yet it may be compelling to us because we connect with aspects of them. That's what stories are about, aren't they? Taking the confused patterns of our real lived individual as well as universal human experiences and trying to sort them out via narratives? And so, this is the problem with describing women as "strong" especially in the context of surviving abuse and trauma. Because as I said earlier, ask yourself, what then is a weak woman? What is a "weak" way to survive and react to abuse? It's dangerous territory. And with women, the focus seems to be, always, sadly, infuriatingly, on how likable the survivor is after their abuse.

[jamesmartin30-blog]

What Is Academic Writing And Why Is It Important?

Academic writing is becoming an extremely essential aspect of schooling as parents and teachers understand the importance of analytical thought abilities and prepare students for college.

Nevertheless, many pupils, guardians, and even many teachers have no understanding of this field of learning and why it is so important.

As such, it is necessary in English not just to teach scholarly literature, but also to make people understand why it is crucial to produce insightful and competent students.

What Is Academic Writing?

First of all, what is scholarly writing? Some students see writing as something they only have to do as the instructor said so, so it's going to be a boring so time-consuming task. Our goal is to bring an end to this kind of thought.

Clearly stated, scholarly learning shows students how to compose essays. It seems pretty easy, but there's a lot more to it than that.

Writing essays is a means of expressing abstract concepts, feelings, or views. Writers learn to create a very complex statement or description by merging sentences into phrases and phrases of an article.

Why Should Students Learn Academic Writing? Because Writing Is Thinking

Learning how to compose powerful essays is essential not just to get a good grade or get to a decent school and you'll get a good career or something. It 's vital because, at the most basic point, it's about having your own ideas and then rendering them rational and real, first to yourself then to your readers.

It is when you take these ideas out of your head and crystallize them on paper or on a computer. They 're in a situation where you don't always have to accept them for what they really are, but other people will do so. When the theories are convincing and strong, such thoughts will become the thoughts of others. It's the crux of conversation.

In other terms, positive thoughts are equivalent to good prose. If the words are not straightforward or consistent or lack structure, they would be bad prose, and many do not appreciate or approve.

Many authors begin at a point where writing is not especially strong, but through learning writing skills, they learn how to be more better writers, which means they are better thinkers.

Practicing writing is about sharpening the thought method – the more you practice something and the better you do it, the more people can listen to you.

The other significant aspect about academic learning, of course, is that students really need it for college! This is a very realistic and simple educational talent, so if anyone is trying to be a professional student, they ought to be at least a good writer so communicator.

Skills Academic Writing Develops

Academic writing is important, but what particular skills do students have? They 're:

Strong communication

Students who can compose a persuasive and coherent article will talk in a straightforward, organized and assured manner. Not only are these people able to compose well, but they can communicate and analyze with the same techniques.

Critical Thinking And Reasoning Skills

The willingness to switch from one thought to another and to grasp the relation sounds simple, but it is shocking how few people really learn this skill. Nevertheless, learning to compose shows students how to think. In other terms, writing introduces "structured learning" to students.

Throughout fact, teaching shows pupils how to evaluate, or what scholars term "serious thought." Students tend to think, "Does what I tell make sense? "And," Is that what I read true? ”. We learn to accept facts, to understand complexity and context, and eventually to build the capacity to make up their own minds about issues. We believe that's the whole point of schooling.

Understanding An Audience

When you're writing an article, you ought to consider how it's supposed to be, what it's supposed to be, whether it's required or what it's intended to be, and how to deliver it in the most persuasive or approachable way. Through practicing writing, students know how to talk of their audience as well as how best to meet them.

Language skills

Academic research is a composite of all such language capabilities. You ought to have a good grammar. You ought to use an advanced language. You need to be able to respond to and appreciate the orders, and you will need to be able to speak freely and pose questions and voice your views. Perhaps more significantly, you need a lot of training.

If the improvement of professional English skills is something you are seeking, there is no easier way than to study academic prose.

Research Skills, Because You Learn A Lot

Finally, writing shows students how to carry out work. The truth is, students do not know the answer to any of the queries they are asked to respond in writing. It means they're going to need to go find out. The sophisticated word of "going to find out" is "study."

Through conducting research, students learn to appreciate their writing concepts at a finer level than other would would imagine. When they write on a science, cultural or literary topic, they know from doing work not only what they need to get a decent score, but they do recognize that there is a great deal to know on nearly any topic.

Types Of Academic Writing

Okay, so we may accept that writing is necessary and useful, but then what do students will need to know directly in academic writing classes? There are several types of essays with specific reasons. Here's a short sampling of a couple of them:

Persuasive essays – seeking to convince people of your view on the topic

For example: “In Praise of Idleness” by Bertrand Russell

Expository essays – explaining a topic to an audience

For example: “I’m an environmental journalist, but I never write about overpopulation” from Vox.com

Narrative essays – to convey a story in an essay.

For example: “Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell

Composite essays - Essays that inspire, justify, or reveal a tale

For example: “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell

Compare and contrast essays – taking two subjects and analyzing their similarities and differences

For example: “Once More to the Lake” by E.B. White (this is also a narrative essay)

Cause and effect essays – Essays that describe whether something has occurred or the consequences of an occurrence or operation.

  For example: “The Adults in the Room” by Megan Greenwell

Analysis – not an essay sort, but a lot of essays seek to get readers to grasp the topic better.

For example: “A.A. Gill on Autobiography by Morrissey”

Research papers – typically convincing, expository or comparing and contrasting, while often involving quotes and analysis to justify the author's statements. 

Characteristics Of Academic Writing

Until we wrap up, it is necessary to consider the characteristics that characterize quality academic learning. For any piece they compose, both students and authors will look for such qualities for their writing.

Focused, clear, and logical

One of the very first things we 're telling writers is that they need to Stay On Point. As a matter of fact, we literally scream that phrase in class because it was so essential to the process of writing.

Writing needs to be about a specific subject and only about that scope. In addition, readers should be able to fully understand not just thoughts and phrases, but how they communicate to form a larger argument. In other words, academic writing needs to make sense of it.

Convincing and interesting

The concept may make sense to a person, but that doesn't imply they 're in agreement with it. Academic writing has to move beyond reasoning and still be compelling – audiences will come to believe that the speaker makes a valid argument.

In addition, scholarly writing should be engaging irrespective of the topic. Sure, academy may be boring, but it's the writer's task to make the subject fascinating and worth reading. Each of the essay references in the segment above are thought-provoking and persuasive, even though some of their concepts might be less than thrilling to all readers.

Based on evidence

Finally, scholarly writing must be real. Storytelling articles are never imaginary, but if they were, they would be short tales, which are a particular type of character.

Writers of scientific literature should give proof of their arguments and conclusions, and analytical reasoning must be focused on what is true and can be claimed honestly rather than speculation or mere fiction.

Academic writing is a must for teachers. It is necessary for practical reasons, as students will have to write an essay for tests such as TOEFL, IELTS, and SAT, college applications, and then so many once they reach college. After graduation, whatever their role is, they'll have letters, papers, interviews, and speeches to write. It's not just philosophy – academic writing skills make sure students are ready for their future.

However, scholarly writing is critical far beyond bottom line. Reading scholarly writing sharpens brains, shows students how to relate, and strengthens their analytical abilities and capacity to comprehend others. Publishing is talking around,

But every student needs to be a successful thinker.

Let the English aid them move in there.