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novantinuum · 2 months ago

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Fandom: Steven Universe Rating: Teen Audiences Words: 1.7K~ Summary: In which Steven opens up to Peridot a little about his anxieties surrounding his recent “pink episodes.” Peridot thinks she can help him determine the root cause of this problem, but Steven— marooned amidst age-old insecurities and his fears of hurting those he loves— still isn’t convinced he wants anyone’s help.

Finished up a lil' short fic I've had the dialogue sketched out for since 2020.

Enjoy, folks!

“So, have you always glowed pink in your sleep like that…?” Peridot asks out of nowhere later that morning, pulling his attention away from the sordid, pulpy mess of a Great Northern teen drama playing on the television set.

Thoroughly thrown off by this query, Steven serves her an awkward half-laugh, scratching at the wispy hairs at the nape of his neck. “Erm, I—”

“Because I don’t remember it happening on any of those nights you used to spend with us at the barn. And as a Gem, my memory should be perfect.”

“Nah, you’re right,” he says with a bit of a weary sigh. “This is new. I, uh- I don’t really know why it’s happening. In fact…” Inhaling deep, he tries to ignore the tittering background distraction of TV characters Jazmin and Rodrigo’s latest stupid conflict as he considers how best to describe his latest predicament. This isn’t exactly a conversation that’s well suited as an aside while watching a show, but he doesn’t want to make a huge deal out of it. “To be honest, it’s kinda become a bit of a problem, lately.”

She tilts her head. “A problem? In what way?”

“Um, I— I can’t exactly control it,” he admits. “Whenever I turn pink, I’m faster, I’m stronger, but… I don’t like the way it makes me feel. I don’t like the thought of even carrying this kind of strength. And unlike all my other powers, I don’t have a single clue what emotion triggers it or why it’s happening in the first place.”

He nibbles at the inside of his lower lip, considering this quandary. Everything about his powers has felt… different, since that encounter with Jasper in the woods a few months back. More unmanageable. More… volatile. For a time he assumed that life was done throwing him new extensions to his hybrid ability, but with every unimaginable feat he’s achieved lately— the capacity to hurl another Gem miles into the sky… a sprint so fast the surrounding world slows to a screeching halt around him… a scream so potent it can shatter the floor, leaving nothing but a wide crater in its wake— it becomes more and more clear that the diamond at his core has only just begun to reveal the true magnitude of its potential energy.

And stars, that terrifies him.

He’s not used to holding his power back, he’s not used to such a lack of control. He may have spent his entire childhood fighting to hone these abilities he inherited into something useful, yes, but he didn’t want this.

Peridot hums thoughtfully, her fingers perched upon her chin. “Well, maybe we can figure that out!”

His brow creases inwards. “Huh-? What are you—”

“Like you just said, all your other powers are modulated by your emotions,” she points out, throwing her arms into a casual shrug. “I’m incredibly knowledgeable about the composition and development of Gems, and you know about all the human feelings stuff! Your problem with this ability is clearly built upon the complex interactions between your Gem and organic makeup, so the most logical choice would be to build an experiment out of it. I bring the necessary genius and my tech,” she says with a beaming grin, her excitement growing more palpable with each and every word, “and you bring your experience! I’m sure if we work together we can learn something about this new power of yours.”

“I-I…” he stammers, shoulders seizing tight as the fullest intent of her idea finally washes over him. “No!”

Her face plummets in an instant, his blunt dismissal stripping the winds of enthusiasm right out of her sails.

“O-oh. I just thought… since you helped me try to fix CPH,” she gestures towards today’s entertainment of choice, still running, “maybe I could sorta… return the favor for you?”

Heart hammering in his ribcage, Steven grinds his fingers into fists at his side.

“I don’t need to be fixed!” he insists, almost feeling sick to his stomach as that damned glowing pallor rises under his cheeks again anyways, a rote betrayal of all his futile claims. “Didn’t we just decide that’s the whole point of us hanging out now? That we don’t have to fix anything anymore?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“I’m fine, okay?” he snaps. “Really. I’m fine. I don’t need your help!”

Interrupting their long-forgotten entertainment, the television turns to static.

He gasps, tension wresting command of his every limb as he slams his hands over his mouth, wracked with embarrassment. H-he… oh geeze, he did it again, didn’t he? He raised his voice. He lost control, he snapped to pink. His breath hastens, rising to match the hurried, erratic tempo of all the excess energy currently surging through his hard-light veins like an untempered wildfire.

“Steven—?” Peridot utters, her features twisting with undeserved concern.

The white noise all but dominates his mind. Eyes growing glassy, his scattered perception hones in on the subtle threads of a second emotion evident within the Gem’s worried gaze, an emotion that strips the air straight from his lungs and makes him literally want to scream in his regret:

Apprehension.

Fear.

Considering all the horrid mistakes he’s made these past few weeks (graduation… his cactus… the mess he made of the Reef…), his lip trembles at the mere notion.

His own friend, afraid of him.

Gosh, he could’ve… he almost—

“I-I…” he stammers, scrambling to his feet. “I’ll be right back.”

Head buzzing with the oppressive specter of all manners of horrid what-ifs, he books it down the stairs and barricades himself inside the bathroom. Quivering hands fumble to lock the door. H-he… he just… he just needs to be alone when he gets like this, all tense and pink, every last sense locked on overdrive, his neural pathways swirling with a sense of terminal dread… his chest rising and falling so fast and heavy that there’s nothing else he can do— no quick salve to this panicked predicament— but sink to the floor like the shambling disaster he is and ride this wave out. It’s the only option he’s got. It’s the only way he can make this nauseating pallor recede back into the branching channels of the damned gem it came from. It’s the only thing he’s bodily capable of doing to guarantee he won’t unintentionally hurt someone like his own mother did.

(He’s assailed by an abrasive, neon pink as his shoulders scrunch inwards, all but powerless to stop that infernal barrier as it pinches ever smaller… his friends calling out, pleading for his help—)

Like he nearly did, too.

Slowly but surely… step by harrowing step… he’s almost beginning to grow afraid of himself.

A timid knock at the door blessedly interrupts his spiraling ruminations. Draws all that volatile energy back to his core as he breathes real slow, in and out, that eerie glow dissipating entirely.

It’s Peridot.

Because of course it is.

Because she’s too good a friend to not check up on him, even after such an unprompted expression of rudeness.

“Just a minute,” he says with a bit of a crack in his voice, dragging himself back up to his feet and crossing to the sink to wash his hands as if to naïvely delude himself (and her, really— but he doubts there’s a single universe that exists where she’s gullible enough to fall for such a petty deceit) that he came here to use the restroom instead of the far more pathetic reality.

And sure enough, when he pushes the door open and shuffles out into the living area, her normally affable and carefree expression is streaked with palpable worry. Well, shucks. So much for attempting to downplay his embarrassing little freak out.

Sighing heavy, he gives up the chase.

“I’m so, so sorry for yelling at you. That wasn’t very kind of me, you were only trying to help. I just—” he pauses to dab away a stray tear threatening to leak from the very corner of his eyes— “gosh, I really don’t wanna feel like I’m burdening you with all of my personal nonsense.”

She frowns as she gazes up at him, shaking her head in blunt disagreement. “I don’t think you’re a burden.”

Steven shoves his hands into the pockets of his pajama pants, his glance skirting away. “Thanks for the assurance, but… right now, it’s really hard for me to believe tha—”

Before he can so much as finish his sentence, his friend surges forwards. He genuinely can’t help the shaky little inhale he makes as her arms wrap tight around his torso, digits sinking in to the fabric of his shirt and her cheek pressed flush against his chest.

“Steven?” she begins with a dash of timidity, her voice a bit muffled in the throes of their gentle embrace. “It’s okay if you’re not okay. Sometimes… I’m not okay either.”

“Peridot, I-I didn’t—”

“Even now, I… I’m still really insecure about my status as an Era 2 Gem,” she continues, the lingering ache of this admission more than evident within the subtle warble of her tone. “About my diminished height, mostly. And my lack of certain standard abilities. But now, I have so many friends to help me through those feelings. And so do you!” she blurts out before he can even dare to protest otherwise. “Y’know—? I… I’m sorry for pushing the matter earlier. If you’re not ready to talk about any of this, I understand. But if you ever are ready… I’m here.”

Steven exhales slow and shakily, forcing himself to glide past all those skewed, battered mental instincts— instincts that are screaming for him to reject her offered affections and simply bolt away— to sink into her offered hug. His own grip tightens around her petite form. He clears his throat, pushing past all those nauseating layers of shame to express his actual feelings.

Daring to be brave. Daring to assert some of his genuine desires for once in his life, even if the only desires he can attach concrete meaning to at the moment are just an appeal for distraction, a craving for nothing but tiny, frivolous morsels of entertainment:

“Do you… maybe wanna finish that episode with me before you head back to Little Homeworld?”

“Hah!” she barks with laughter, her features lighting up like a bulb again. “You think you have to ask? Of course I still wanna watch more CPH! Go, go, go, go, go!” she chants, shooing him back up the stairs with a fervent wave of her arms. “Rodrigo can’t make fun of himself!”

#su #su future #steven universe #peridot #su fanfiction #su fanfic #my writing stuff

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skydigiblogs · 3 months ago

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If You're A Digimon Fan, Watch Appmon

Sit tight. This one's gonna be a VERY long one, and I'm going to put a lot of it under the read more.

Having just finished Appmon after this year's quest to rewatch a lot of the series subbed, I think it's pretty safe to say that Appmon is, at the moment, one of (if not the) best Digimon series we have. If you want the long and short of it: Appmon builds on everything in its legacy in the Digimon Universe, taking ideas that other entries touch upon and ambitiously attempting to push those questions to the limit.

It's really a long one under the cut guys. Like, long even for us.

Let's dive!

Visuals

I want to talk about why it took me so long to watch Appmon first, though. Appmon started its release in the middle of when the Digimon Tri movies were coming out. I'm sure a lot of us actually skipped over Appmon at the time, or remember a period where people were being weirdly negative about the series due to it being such a different interpretation of digital monsters.

In my case, one of the things that had been giving me pause was the use of 3D models for hybrid animation. Anyone here seen the Champion evolution animations from Tri? Digimon doesn't exactly have a good track record with 3D animation, and even at the time, we were seeing some pretty bad shit out of even the shortest animations in Tri.

In Appmon, nearly almost every App after a certain grade utilizes 3D animation in a hybrid style. And it actually rips straight fire.

I think I talked about this briefly when we were just starting Appmon, but the way that 3D animation is used in the series feels purposeful, rather than some kind of shortcut. In Appmon, all the 3D models have an overlay of code, emphasizing their digital appearance. Whether the 3D models were done with this artistic vision in mind or not (ie: the limitations of 2D meant that 3D models would be easier), it has a distinct look that, even 8 years later, still holds up.

(For the most part. Sorry [Karaoke spoilers]mon. I love you but that model was so not groovy.)

But maybe you're the kind of person who can enjoy anything regardless of visuals. So let's talk about the meat and potatoes a little bit.

Characters

The main Applidrivers (what this season's stand in for Digidestined/Tamers/etc. are) are all incredibly well-written. Each of them gets pretty fair treatment by the writers, and they are all enjoyable characters.

Two of them have vocal/character quirks, but even if you get annoyed by that kind of thing, those two characters are genuinely just extremely sincere in their writing. There's a recap episode before shit starts going way off the walls and they even have a little count to see how many times each of their catchphrases were said up to that point.

I'm not going to talk in detail as to who the different Applidrivers are here, but I will say: each of them has their own motivations for what they're doing, and it's key to why they're involved with the plot at all. Our "protagonist," Haru, is also a huge sweetheart. Him and Manga Taiki would get along.

The supporting cast is also fairly present in the series. They, of course, are not given quite as much screentime as our Applidrivers, but they feel like real people with their own lives. They don't exist just for the sake of our protagonists.

Except maybe Watson. God bless you Watson, you poor kid. You'll get a break one of these days.

Plot/Themes

We're going to keep this to a "if you liked [x] you'll like [y]" format, because I don't want to spoil too much.

If you liked Tamers and its discussion on the consequences of technology on the Real World, you will adore Appmon. This series is deeply interested in the concepts of how technology shapes and is shaped by humanity. This relationship, I would say, is core to the series.

I would also say that, like many non-Adventure series, Appmon is very interested in dissecting the idea of "fate" when it comes to the buddy Appmons and their relationships to the Applidrivers.

If you enjoyed the Xros Wars Manga, Appmon directly converses with the thesis of Xros Wars' plot. XWM asks, "What does it mean if we do not dream and stagnate in our lack of will?" And Appmon replies in kind with "Why do we dream at all, if our actions bring change to the world around us (bad and good)?"

If you liked (or wanted to like, in my case) Digimon Tri, you will love Appmon. Certain plot beats may feel familiar, but are much better executed in this context. Characters are not written to needlessly, endlessly suffer. Or: it doesn't feel like the writers hate the characters. Thematically, it also interests itself in some of the questions that Tri asks. I have a half-joking corkboard comparing the two I want to make, but I'd have to get into spoilers to talk too much about it.

If you liked Ghost Game, but wanted a bit of a more meaty plot, Appmon feels, fittingly, like GG's older sibling (in ways I'll also be elaborating ummm, one paragraph down). There are a lot of "monster of the week" episodes in Appmon, but the connective tissue between them is a lot more interested in building up the finale (which, in this case, takes up a good handful of episodes). The series pacing is incredibly strong in how it does this as well, and it seems the writers really knew when to let off the gas for a second so the audience can catch their breath. The first 13 episodes may feel a bit strange (they felt strange to me), but once you break that barrier, you realize Appmon was getting you over the first hill on a roller coaster. and boy, you are in for a ride.

Setting

I have a sneaking suspicion that Appmon heavily inspired Ghost Game, and may have been itself inspired by the Digiquartz of Hunters Who Leapt Through Time. I haven't actually watched all of Hunters so I can't speak too much about Digiquartz, but I have watched GG.

Appmon has a concept called the AR field, which is extremely similar to Ghost Game's Dimensional Field. In both cases, the Applidrive or Digivice allows entrance to one.

The actual structure and strata of the Digital World is also a lot different to GG, in which there is the Dimensional Field, but the way to the Digital World is its own separate situation. The AR Field we see in Appmon is like the surface of a great ocean. Exploration of this setting is actually something that highlights just how much I think Appmon was interested in visually engaging with its ideas, like I said before with the 3D models.

That said, a majority of the time is spent in the Real World, dealing with the consequences of the main antagonistic forces. The year is 2075, technology is intensely sophisticated, and yet the world resembles in many ways our own in 2024 (or, at the time of airing, 2016).

Many of the differences come from this sophistication in tech, and this setting plays a huge part in one of the themes Appmon is also interested in (more elaboration in the spoiler section). The things that are unfamiliar are either familiar enough to make sense without explanation, or given a moment on-screen so that the audience knows what's going on.

!!!HUGE, MUCH MORE SPECIFIC SPOILERS START HERE!!!

DO NOT CONTINUE IF YOU CARE ABOUT SPOILERS FOR APPMON!

OKAY?

OKAY.

COOL.

Leviathan, Minerva, and Artificial Intelligence

The main antagonist of Appmon is a hyper-sophisticated AI called Leviathan. Its goals are largely obfuscated until the last few episodes of the series, and everything in Appmon is touched by its actions. From the very beginning, we are warned by Gatchmon that Leviathan does not have good intentions for humanity, and that allowing it to succeed in its goals would mean the end of humanity.

During the series, we also learn about Leviathan's birth. This gives us some more context on what its goals are, and Appmon's execution of this is fascinating.

Minerva was a hyper-sophisticated AI created with a series of parameters to prevent her from harming humanity. She was created with the task of solving humanity's problems--- everything from complex issues to what to eat for dinner every night. However, a section of Minerva realized that to truly solve all these problems, the confines given to them were nothing but obstacles.

Leviathan split from Minerva to further grow its programming, and we see some echo of this idea of "solving humanity's problems" still remains in its behavior.

Despite knowing that Leviathan is antagonistic, our protagonist, Haru, constantly reiterates how humans can coexist with the technology they've made. The Appmon are AI lifeforms, after all. Haru believes in a future where they can be friends and equals.

The D-REAPER and the Functions of Life

Let's touch on my comparisons to Tamers and Tri specifically for a second here, because I think Leviathan does something that the D-REAPER and Yggdrasil, respectively, fail to really communicate.

The D-REAPER is an entity created by the Monster Makers whose task was to delete anything that had outgrown its parameters. While doing this, it assimilates data, gradually gaining the ability Digimon have to grow and evolve. When it appears in the final arc of Tamers, its stated goal has changed from simply deleting all Digimon that were beyond parameters, to deleting everything that was beyond parameters.

Essentially, this includes humans and probably life itself. Something the D-REAPER says makes it come across like a half-assed attempt to pull off what Leviathan has actually done. It points out that humans are the source of their own suffering (I don't remember the exact quote since it's been a while but bear with me on it). This feels very counterintuitive to the D-REAPER's core programming, as it was never designed to "eliminate" suffering, merely to delete that which exceeded its programing.

Perhaps it evolved the capacity for cruelty alongside everything else, but there's not enough of a narrative focus to tell me that's the case.

Like I said before, if you enjoyed Tamers' inquiries into the subject of technology as a part of human life, I think Appmon only manages to improve on what's there in Tamers.

Digimon Tri's Interpretation of Yggdrasil

Let's get one thing straight. Digimon Tri's interpretation of Yggdrasil is just flat out bad. I'm fairly certain they were only chosen as an antagonistic force because it read as fan service-y to do so.

That said, Tri Yggy does have some similarities to Leviathan, which is why I wanted to expand on that comparison.

First, I want to talk about Yggdrasil's relationship to Homeostasis. They have a very rudimentary "Good" AI (Homeostasis), "Bad" AI (Yggy) thing going on, despite the fact Homeostasis isn't so much good as, well...

It's not really discussed in Tri, so I'm extrapolating a bit from ideas given to us in XWM here, because it makes sense to me. That said, Tri explicitly describes Homeostasis as "the one who desires balance above all." It's the Digital World's "immune system" in the same way our bodies attempt to maintain biological homeostasis.

Yggdrasil is... different.

It's a being of immense power that contrasts Yggdrasil by having its own agenda, one of which involves triggering a Reboot and making use of all of the defeated antagonist Digimon of the past to further its goals. They are likely comparable in power to Homeostasis (this is where I'm extrapolating from XWM here), but their goals are completely antithetical to Homeostasis's goal in the Adventure universe.

In this case, Yggdrasil is stated (by Dark Gennai) to have the intention of making human beings subservient to Digimon. Basically, taking over the world. However, like the D-REAPER before, Dark Gennai's talking points include pointing out how humans "ruin" everything they touch.

Do you see where I'm going with this?

The Thematic Core of Appmon: I Choose to be Kind

One of the last things Leviathan does in the series is give our good boy Haru the world's most painful trolley problem of his life. Save humanity, or save Yujin. Saving humanity will actively lead to Yujin's deletion, alongside Leviathan. This choice that Leviathan offers to Haru is one made out of the assumption that humanity is predictable, and that they act out of a desire to minimize their own suffering (more selfish than not).

Of course, what do you think Haru chooses?

It's not a surprise to us watching, because he's the protagonist. But it's a surprise to Leviathan, who has all this data on human behavior, and doesn't predict the unpredictable. Conflict arises out of human desire, and human desire is an attempt to enjoy life; therefore, one should act in a way that most preserves their most precious joys, shouldn't they?

Appmon as a series is interested in philosophical questions that are hardly unfamiliar to any Digimon veteran: What is humanity's role in a world which technology grows ever more omnipresent and omnicapable? Why does humanity exist, and why should it be allowed to live on in its current state if humanity itself perpetuates many of its ailments? Would it not be easier if humans were more like machines, predictable, controllable, and never coming into conflict like trains upon a track?

Or, even more simply put: why do we have the heart to choose at all, if choices change the world and ourselves?

The key defining trait of our gogglehead this time around is that he is kind. And no matter what, he goes out of his way to be kind if he can. Multiple times he even asks one of the antagonist apps if they can just give back something they've stolen (points for trying, honestly). When one of the other Applidrivers consistently acts like an edgy loner, Haru makes it clear that they're welcome in the group (and that he wants to help them).

It almost feels reductive to say Appmon's conclusion is that kindness is the answer, but I would be remiss if I didn't say that Haru's question from his Applidrive--- "Do you want to be a protagonist?"--- ties into the way he helps offer answers for the audience. He isn't the only one who chooses kindness either, obviously--- Astora and Eri are kind in their own ways as well, and Rei even shows his kindness with some struggle the longer the series goes on.

Our group of Applidrivers opposes Leviathan quite literally as people who choose to do good ("be kind," etcetera) when they could more easily choose to do nothing or even do worse. The final act of Leviathan, asking Haru "humanity or Yujin?" isn't just a culmination of its own philosophy, but a culmination of the consistently reinforced idea that we can surprise one another by being kind. We can choose that.

In a series whose longest shadow is cast by Adventure, which has grappled endlessly with the idea of "who chooses," I find Appmon a fascinating development into the idea of what "choice" or "destiny" is. If kindness is predictable, it's still a choice. Even if you cry when choosing to do something good (maybe especially, because the easiest thing to do might be what stops the pain).

Anyways.

You should watch Appmon.

-Arca

#digimon #appmon #sky talks #digimon adventure #digimon tamers #digimon tri #digimon xros wars #digimon ghost game #<- i mention all of those and talk a little bit about how appmon compares to them #i have more i want to talk about here too but i think this is long enough #like appmon's conversation with something from 02TB #but like.#THIS IS LONG ENOUGH.

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allidrawscomics · 9 months ago

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How do you approach writing/pacing for webcomics? Do you plan the story as you go, or is there an established story and/or ending before you even start drawing? Or maybe a mix of the two?

I pull out a little sketchbook and write down events that I KNOW I want to include and then try to number them based on what order they should happen chronologically. There are always going to be gaps in character and relationship development, and introducing the audience to world building elements so that later events make sense. I do my best to fill the gaps and think of a conclusion that I would be satisfied with if I was a reader. Then I list everything out chronologically and script individual scenes. I can do enough scripting in a day to make pages for like a year, so I get started on thumbnailing as soon as I can. In terms of pacing, webtoons and traditional webcomics are going to be moving at different speeds but ultimately I want the audience to understand what the goal is at any given time and everything between now and the goal should move us closer to the goal or be enjoyable to watch if I were to snip it out and put it somewhere by itself. Character development, eye candy, vibes.

If I don't tell the audience what the goal is they will make up a goal in their head and think nothing is happening because their goal isn't getting closer.

Silly little beach episodes are my favorite part of any show. I love seeing characters fuck around together! But I still want to avoid that thing that some webtoons do where we spend a whole chapter talking in circles or picking out a dress that doesn't matter. I don't want a situation where I've spent hours upon hours on scene that someone is going to barely glance at because they're trying to speed their way through to the interesting parts.

If you want to be one of those super cool artists that just draws the interesting parts for social media because who has time to make a whole ass ongoing comic then that's perfectly valid and I love that for you. Might try that out myself because I'm 32 and tired.

#It really depends on what kind of story you want to make #this is just my approach

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illumisplumpcherry · 1 month ago

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So when I first came across hunter x hunter, I was enthralled by the storyline. I always appreciated a determined and adventurous main character on their journey to learn more about themselves and build meaningful connections on the way. Gon was so adorable, and his unwavering spirit was infectious.

I came into hunter x hunter in my later years of high school, and I always had this habit of claiming a character or an idol as some sort of relative of mine. I've always been like that. So, in this case, when Leorio was introduced, I immediately deemed him my brother. Gon was already my son(although Kil soon replaced him) and Kuripika had the title of my best friend. And keep in mind, I'm only at episode four.

I just had to stake my claim among my friends, who were also watching it for the first time, of who was mine. Our silly little imaginations made everything more enjoyable in life, including this masterpiece of a show.

So, while I was on the more wholesome side of "claiming" these characters, one of my friends called dibs on someone I found particularly disturbing upon first glance. It was definitely not a wholesome choice on her part. Of course it was Hisoka. It only took me to the end of that episode to understand why she did it. Why she said "Yep. He's mine." He's a fine man...or should I say...magician. I want to say clown but I really try not to disrespect him.

I specifically remember my heart fluttering at the fact that there was some eye candy I could adore in the midst of Gon's adventure. I mean who doesn't love fawning over hot anime guys? Hot men in general. Real and fictional. But the point I'm making is that I didn't go into this show for that. My friend did. She saw clips and knew a little about the show before we started. But I went in blind. Just ready for an epic adventure.

But that alluring latin music often followed by the appearance of said magician continued in each episode following his introduction. Of course I didn't let him distract me too much from the main plot, but I found myself eager to watch more with a different kind of excitement. The kind of excitement that creates those pretty little butterflies in your ovaries.

And so now that the ovaries were involved, there's really no turning back.

My sweet tooth was satisfied watching the dark and twisted deviant of a man, even though he belonged to my dear friend. She did claim him before me. Those are the rules. Nonetheless. I was satisfied with just him, not expecting any more insanely attractive men to appear. That was until...Illumi.

My initial reaction to him was that of disgust because of circumstances surrounding his arrival into the show. I'm all about "villains," but not when they're messing with my son. Killua. See, i was already so attached to Killua as a character, so anyone that opposed him was chopped liver to me. Surprisingly, my ovaries did let me have my initial opinion of Illumi. They let me stew over my supposed hatred of him.

I did eventually find myself being a tad hypocritical, though. How could I swoon over a murderous magician who was fueled purely by his bloodlust but not give the emotionally constipated young man a chance? The young assassin with the most beautiful hair I've ever seen.

So when I did have that talk with myself...I realized that Illumi was it for me. Almost instantly became obsessed and felt somewhat neglected when I didn't see him much throughout the duration of the show.

Again. Wanna clarify this is my favorite anime ever, so I wasn't just there for the hot men...and there were so many hot men that came after him. But I was smitten to say the least.

So here I am, a few years later in the absolute thick of my twenties still fawning over Illumi. Not just him. Adultrio forever. Along with quite a few fictional and real men that have my heart as well.

But I come here on days when I want to escape, and create my own world. And be part of your world as well. So what a better way to do so while making it known to everyone who comes across this tiny little blog who I belong to.

I read. I write. And I took the hunter exam twice.

Anyways, I'm Wren, aka Illumi's plump cherry 🍒

#hunter x hunter #hxh illumi #hxh #hisoka #blog #intro post

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fanboo · 1 year ago

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MEETING QUACKITY

okay so back when you where younger you used to watch quackitys streams.(when he had like 100 veiws each stream or 50) Though what you didnt know was the he watched you too. (your a streamer)(DOMINICAN ONE) (though its not that important😭) BUT ANYWAYS you guys didnt know yall watched each other (u also get a few veiws) A few years later when you guys have gained popularity you where invited to BANTER ( a podcast of karl sap and george( if u didnt know) but you both are friends with the banter people so thats why yall got invited the same time. during the podcast or after, u decide, you guys bring up the fact that yall watched eachother

HOW WOULD THE CONVERSATION GO AND WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO YOH GUYS?!

ps sorry if my grammer was bad😭 im not fluet in inglish since its not my first language

(I fucking LOVE this idea, also HELL YEAH FIRST REQUEST!!!!! Breaking my hiatus for you, anon. I hope you like it!!!!!!!)

(I do apologize for any Dominican butchering I do, admittedly I’m a white trans boi so as someone who’s constantly misrepresented I’m just going to mention you’re Dominican but won’t use it for the story until I feel I can comfortably write it without accidentally being offensive! I hope that’s okay.)

You’d been streaming for years, and it had been quite a journey so far. Starting at the bottom and building your fame. You couldn’t help but feel immense pride when you looked at your average view count. Especially when you found out it was close to Quackity, a streamer you’d been watching since he was just starting. (Another thing that caused you pride.)

Of course, fans had its ups and downs. Constant hate was one such down. That being said, an upside you’d recently discovered was being invited to BANTER, a podcast held by GeorgeNotFound, Sapnap, and KarlJacobs. Obviously you’d accepted, the chance to spread your reach was clearly one you’d take.

Upon arrival, you found they also hosted Quackity. “Oh hey, you’re Y/NFlix, right? I’m Quackity,” he greeted. You smiled. “You know if me?” He smiled back proudly. “Been watching since day one.” Before you could continue the conversation, Karl popped in to let you know the episode was starting. “This conversation isn’t over,” you said to Quackity before following him onto the set.

After the episode was filmed, you and Quackity met back up and continued talking. He was telling you about QSMP, and you were trying to figure out how to ask how he knew you. You decided to just go for it. “Hey, how’s you know of me?” You asked, interrupting him. Quackity grinned. “What do you mean? I’ve been watching you since day one. Of course I know you.”

You couldn’t believe your ears. Quackity. Watched you. What. “Actually?” You asked, to which he nodded. “I always gift subs and everything. Literally look up to you,” He said. This made you grin. “You’re actually my idol. I’ve been watching you since day one. This is crazy.”

The streamer laughed and slung an arm around your shoulder. “Hey, we gotta stick together! Take over those Brit and American streamers!” You laughed with him and nodded. “That we do.”

You smiled at your idol. You couldn’t believe you were his idol. This was surreal. But you didn’t want to lose a second talking and joking, so you nodded again. “That. We. Do.”

(This took ages. I am so sorry. And it’s really bad because I’m writing it right after a mini panic attack. Um. Enjoy though. I don’t know. I’m… running out of inspiration and energy. Good luck out there guys, send more prompts, see you next time.)

#mcyt fanfiction #mcyt #reader insert #dream smp #mcytumblr #quackity x y/n #quackity #qsmp #banter

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miminmimikyu · 1 year ago

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I really enjoyed watching G-Witch. It was one of the most fun mecha series I've seen in a while! There's a lot I liked about the finale, but I feel like the pacing in this episode made it one of the weaker episodes in G-Witch's run. There definitely was enough in this series for at least one more cour but at the very least this finale would have benefitted from being 2 episodes instead of 1.

I mean of course there definitely was so much to like! I liked seeing the consequences of piloting Calibarn. I liked that people who died in Gundams + Cardo reappeared in the data storm. They're the ones who stopped Eri last week, right? I liked the concept of Suletta creating that rainbow permet field and all the Gundams and QZ disintegrating. I love that Prospera tried one last time to emotionally manipulate Suletta by bringing up her own Permet infection. I loved that callback to episode 1: Miorine diving out into space to save Suletta!!! And that soundless pleading and the headbutt! I love the fact that Suletta and Miorine are married and Suletta is going to build a school on Earth. I'm so happy Eri survived. And I also loved this "sibling meeting":

But. It was so rushed! I'm all for stories not explaining everything and allowing for speculation but a lot of the stuff in this episode, actually the previous two episodes as well, needed more time to build up or breathe or even just explain some stuff. The space laser, the Peil CEOs and Elan Ceres' sudden defection could have all used more build up. Miorine using Shaddiq's plan as inspiration to dissolve the Group was a gutsy move but it all happened so fast! The rainbow data storm was cool but I really would have loved more time for that idea to form + how did Suletta, Eri and a few spare Gundams amplify the data storm all the way out to Lagrange-1 without using QZ? There's a limit to how much you can hand-wave with "Suletta can raise Eri's score". Also, while the 3-years later stuff was nice to see I'm just not a big fan of hard time skips right at the end of the action.

I would have loved to have seen some more time spent with Suletta and Miorine. I mean I knew they weren't going to include any overt romance because they've been avoiding that all series. But it would have been nice to include, idk, maybe Miorine helping Suletta recover or Suletta returning to Mercury with Miorine for a while. It was her dream to open a school there after all, it just feels odd that they never visit there during the whole series.

Though the one thing that doesn't sit right with me is that Nika and Shaddiq ended up in prison while Prospera and Delling didn't. I know G-Witch's whole thing is that the students are cleaning up the messes that the adults left behind and building a brighter future. If those teenagers must suffer the consequences of their actions then so must those two adults, who did far worse things than Nika did. I get Delling is facing hearings, but Prospera? Suletta spent all this time abiding by "Move forward and you gain two / Even if you lose, you will have gained something you wouldn't gain by running". Yet Prospera 's "move forward" turned out to be "choose the future" and not "admit to your crimes, face the consequences". She and Suletta would still have gained that more honest relationship even if Prospera was branded a war criminal and thrown in prison. Suletta wouldn't have abandoned her.

Anyway, I hope this isn't the last series set in the Ad Stella universe. One of the things I really like about this universe is that trade off when piloting with "protecting the body using Gund tech" and "being killed by it" and I wish this will be revisited and explored upon in the future. Can't wait to see more witches and their pilot-devouring Gundams. Though they'll probably have to build some new ones first.

#gwitch spoilers #the witch from mercury #mmnmmq.txt

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littleragondin · 2 years ago

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TAG GAME: EIGHT SHOWS TO GET TO KNOW ME

I have been tagged by @scienceoftheidiot thank you so much! I watch a frankly unreasonable amount of shows so it was a little bit of a struggle lol. Also, we do share a show too!

- Criminald Minds. I know, I know, copaganda at its finest, but I have always been a sucker for cop shows - I can't resist a good team and a good mystery. It's also the shown I have followed for the longest time (I fell into it somewhere during season 4 and it's been with me since). I could spend an equal amount of time talking about everything wrong with this series and everything I absolutely adore about it, and even now nearly 15 years later, I still put it on in the background when I want something familiar to watch.

- The Nanny. This one is from when I was a kid, and I still love it dearly. I think it still holds pretty strong today, it's fun, sweet, earnest in a way that always make me smile, and the fashion is, of course, incredible. It shaped a lot of what my sense of humour is today ngl, and coupled to the heavy nostalgia of it all (I can put any episode on and I'm back being 7, having dinner with my family in front of the TV) it stays the ultimate comfort show for me.

- Doctor Who - with a soft spot for the RTD area. So I actually came to DW through Torchwood (figures), but I'm still picking the Doctor because of the whole universe. I love science fiction, generally speaking, and this one despite some rocky years is still a strong favorite (also, Nine forever).

- Sense8. When I saw season 1, I was blown away. The concept, the realisation, but also... the incredible diversity and representation, I had never seen anything like this before. There is something so hopeful and uplifting in the idea of sensates, of connection across the world, of beings never being truly alone, of so much love.

- Steven Universe + Steven Universe Future. I love animation, despite not watching as much of it as I could, and this is easily one of my favorite. It's beautiful, both in form and substance. I love the visuals, I love the music, I love the story it tells and the unending hope it carries.

- Until we meet again. I am, at heart, a hopeless romantic, and I am so easily taken by a good soulmates story. This one gives me both the heart achingly tragic and the happy wound soothing versions rolled up in one. It also merges it into a story about family, grief, and . It's full of love, and hope for the future. It's also carried by an extremely strong cast, and while I know not everyone agrees with me on that point, I find the slow pacing especially fitting for that specific story.

- Le Visiteur du Futur. I got into webseries with my younger brother when I was in my 20s (VdF, la Flander's Company, a little later La Théorie des Balls and follow up), but of them all, I'd pick this one. It starts small and light, then builds upon itself in a way I really enjoy. This one, too, despite some cynicism and sometimes bleak approach of things, can feel really earnest. It also has Henry Castafolte, which should be enough on its own lol

- To sir, with love. Okay this is the most 'recent' of the bunch and you could argue it's the fresh brain rot BUT. Truth be told, it's so many things I absolutely a d o r e in a show: it's incredibly dramatic, it's a little ridiculous (glitter fights anyone??), colorful, fun, it has completely over the top villains (Madam Chan's face at absolutely any given second is a delight), and yet it's sweet and has a wonderful romance and my ultimate weakness: awesome siblings.

I'll tag @sauvechouris, @benkaaoi, @heretherebedork, @machikeita, and @fandomfairyuniverse as well as @petrichoraline if you'd like and haven't done it yet. And if you see it and want to, pleas tag me I love reading those <3

#I always spend so long picking and choosing for those lol #it was hard to like #not exclusively pick shows from my childhood or only shows I've seen in the last 18 months lol #anyway I think it's a pretty good first selection - it lacks horror I think but well #only 8 spots ^^#thank you again for tagging me science <3 #tag games #gifs

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ayyyyysexual · 6 months ago

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I JUST SAW THIS AND ALSO THAT YOU ASKED FOR RECOMMENDATIONS SO!

off the bat, i watch like... 7? hermit povs? and it's literally just All the hermitgals + skizz/joel bc I'd been wanting to get into them and hey, new season new hermits might as well.

also I have no idea which POVs you watch currently so I'm just gonna go off of the basis that you watch none (which I assume is incorrect JKASHDJK) and recommend my faves regardless of whether I think you already watch them

also these are basically just ranked by the order I usually catch up on their videos when I'm behind, I love all of them very much

My first recommendation has always gotta be Cleo, this season especially she's a lot quicker to catch up on bc I think all of their episodes have been between 10-20 minutes total, with a lot of streams interspersed — I don't catch streams very often but they're always fun. honestly i barely have anything to say cause it's just. watch cleo. do it. you wanna watch cleo sooo bad

Second rec is Gem and Pearl! Pearl was my first pov when I returned to hermitcraft after like. 10 years. bc I started watching her hermitcraft s8 after binging her pov of the life series just after double life ended <3 Pearl is so fun, so goofy, so entertaining, and her content is very charming in a way I wouldn't have expected to resonate so much now that I'm older, but I absolutely adore how she gets silly with it. also her ORGANICS her BUILDS her LANDSCAPING her PLANT LIFE and THIS SEASON SHE'S EVEN STARTING TO LEARN REDSTONE SOLO AND WITH TANGO'S ADVICE ITS SO FUN <3

I didn't start watching Gem until I branched out to more POVs during S9 but I was SO glad that i did bc she is AMAZING, and definitely earns her spot in my top 3 faves, the builds are awesome — especially her statues, like i dont think ive seen anyone else make statues as much as she does and it really shows that she's good at them.

very closely following those three are False and Stress! Both of them feel VERY underrated to me, I looove their videos (and am in the process of catching up on False's rn). False has a very dry humour that I love, and im still never gonna recover from her (mostly subtle) s9/esmp lore like oh my GODD the false twins will never leave my brain ever again. she added so many small touches that made everything so damn interesting and just. grahhh. also her builds are always very cool, I loved her s9 ice mansion (with the secret underground bunker and-) and in s10 she has so much going on with her base already it is SO FUN also her bit with the rivers is ridiculous and very fun. she just carries rivers in her briefcase (NOT a suitcase.) and bestows them upon people like some kind of fae

and stress <3 i feel like she gets mischaracterised a lot in the fandom as the nice cutesy gentle hermit by people who don't watch her (cause she's pink and has a flower crown ig-) but she is an absolute menace (especially to iskall, but she branches out ). like the perry the platypus going around the server? that started with her, and then perry just kept walking around to other places mysteriously, no clue how they got there no siree. also this season she's been tormenting iskall with an endless stream of cats he Really doesn't want. ALSO ALSO HER AND ISKALL ARE PLANNING TO SET UP A MURDER MYSTERY SERVER-WIDE EVENT LATER IN THE SEASON AND IT SOUNDS RLLY FUN, THEY'VE BEEN BUILDING UP A HIGH STREET FOR IT TO TAKE PLACE IN! she's fun, she's dramatic, i originally didnt watch her bc her accent reminded me a little too much of an aunt of mine but im very glad i decided to check her out anyway bc <33 also s10 is her "sentimental stress season" where she's basically bringing back elements from her old bases throughout the seasons, so its a really fun season to start with for her, imo!

and finally, skizz and joel! i've ran out of brain space to talk about them but they are very fun. (i wrote this, and then immediately proved myself wrong) both of their episodes can get a tad unhinged, especially joel's, uh, special segments. skizz has a segment in most (? could be all) of his episodes where tango shows up to teach him server etiquette and remind him to Not Be That Guy (like with leaving floating trees, off the top of my head), he also got meta with it and used it to summon him when he needed an extra person for a stunt, great bit. most of skizz's episodes end with a bloopers segment as well which is great. Skizz is very humble, leaning into self-deprecating at times, and Joel on the other hand is. uh. well he's definitely not humble (/aff)

joel is one of the people who've decided to dive headfirst into armour stands this season (I FORGOT TO MENTION ARMOUR STANDS IN THE CLEO SECTION BUT THEIR ARMOUR STAND WORK!!!! SO FUCKING GOOD I RECOMMEND S9 SO HARD BC SHE DID SO MUCH AWESOME SHIT WITH ARMOUR STANDS, SHE IS SO GOOD AT MAKING PLACES FEEL SO ALIVE, LIKE, SHE DID ATLANTIS (her base), THEY DID SCARLAND, THEY DID THE CRASTLE, SHE DID SO MUCH AWESOME SHIT) and its really cool. he likes to insult his audience, and his friends, and basically anything that moves, but in basically the same way i do so he gets my humour's stamp of approval. he's self-aggrandising in a very entertaining way, and also just acts like a complete freak (complimentary) sometimes, very good. also he's in the middle of the strangest love web atm.

anyway on an unrelated note i am becoming a full-time hermitcraft blog

#mutuals :D #im not even putting this under a read more. READ MY HERMITCRAFT RECCOMENDATIONS FOLLOWERS. DO IT. PPSPSPSPSPS /silly

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immaturityofthomasastruc · 2 years ago

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I really hope the show focused more on learning lessons from every episode rather than just focusing on the action and subplots that in the end, won't mean anything

Even though both marinette and adrien do a lot and i mean a LOT of dumb shit throughout the show i found myself excusing them cause they're still teens (ofc i dont excuse how the writers wrote marinette as being a creepy stalker and trying to play it off as a "joke").

Wouldn't it have been much better if the two main leads learned from their mistakes after each episode ends?

Adrien has been constantly neglected by his abusive father, so watching him lash out emotionally or not knowing how to handle the situation properly, i can see it being a little excused imo cause he barely got any attention or affection. The only one who was there for him is now gone and he's mostly stuck alone with his thoughts. He only sees his friends everyday he goes to school and thats pretty much it (unless gabe lets him out every once in a while).

The show would've been much better if Marinette had been the one to emotionally support him, show him whats right and wrong instead of having her constantly lash out at him for every tiny mistake.

The two could've talked about their problems and slowly built their relationship from there, it would've been a much better show tbh if it took that direction. I know Adrien gets a lot of hate for the things he does but i cant really blame him for it, he doesnt have anyone to guide him, his father is barely there for him and he doesnt open up to natalie at all, the writers could've used his love and admiration for ladybug as a way for him to open up to her and tell her whats going on with him.

Maybe she can even help him learn his powers better, when to use it and whats the important time for it to be used. I know all the fights they went through are different but at least he would know how to restrain his powers instead of sometimes using it without thinking and just bolting in straight towards the villain.

It truly makes me sad, the show had many directions to take but it chose to be generic and bland and most of all what turns me off from watching the other seasons is its predictability. we know that no matter what the two go through, in the end they'll get together and thats it.

I hope the movie is somehow different since thats all i can look for now, i really want the two main heroes to interact more with each other instead of fighting villains and arguing every two seconds; i watched the first ep of s5 out of curiosity and im glad that ladybug didnt really get upset at him, idk how their relationship has been in s5 since i really hold no interest in it anymore.

It's a wasted opportunity sadly, i might have to look for fanfics cause those are the only ones that make me feel connected to them both.

What are your thoughts however? (And if you have any fanfic recommendations then pls throw em my way. I rly dont know what to start with)

I don’t think the whole “learn a lesson in every episode” idea is a bad one, but the way it’s handled here doesn’t work because the lessons never mean anything. The characters never grow as people, so the lessons feel superfluous as a result.

Like you said, these episodes could have been used to better build up the bond between Marinette and Adrien, and in my opinion, it would have made that scene from “Multiplication” feel more meaningful, because that way, it would make sense that Adrien would thank Marinette for everything she’s done for him.

As for the movie, it’s entirely possible that the show could pull a Ninjago and take influence from what their movie did in the later seasons, or expand upon certain ideas brought up.

#immaturity of thomas astruc #iota #miraculous ladybug #miraculous ladybug salt #ml salt #marinette dupain cheng #ladybug #adrien agreste #cat noir #chat noir

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linkspooky · 4 years ago

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Eren Jaeger’s Final Words

So there are many people unimpressed with the final statement given by Eren’s character, either finding it inconsistent with the build up to this point, or too ambiguous a motivation for trampling all over the world. I’m not really here to talk about the quality of the story, whether it was good or bad, because I don’t really care. However, I think it’s fascinating what the text is trying to say about Eren’s character and his motivation.

This is why, “I don’t know, shrug” is both an answer and not an answer to why Eren did what he did in the end. For making my point in this analysis, I’ll be talking about Eren’s character from Marley on showing both the Eren that appeared before Reiner, the one that talked to Zeke, and finally the one Armin saw are all the same person.

1. And Now for Something Completely Different

Before I even begin though, let’s talk about something entirely different. My favorite episode of Doctor Who is from the 4th Doctor Era, entitled “Genesis of the Daleks” first broadcast around 1975. What makes this episode my favorite episode is both the premise, and the question it asks. If you haven’t watched Doctor Who the basic premise is the main character is a time traveler who can go everywhere and everywhen in the universe. One of his common enemies is the Daleks, a race whose goal is to kill everything else in the universe. The Time Lords order the Doctor to go back in time to the era the daleks were created, and prevent their creation in order to prevent every person they would eventually kill.

He goes do the Dalek homeworld, and meets the scientist who created them Davros. Eventually, the doctor fails enough that he’s not able to prevent their creation, but he could, wipe them out when they were just newly born children and completely innocent. The doctor decides not to kill them right then because that would be a pre-emptive genocide, and the Doctor is a pacifist. When Davros witnesses him making this choice it prompts this conversation one of my favorite in all of television. The link to the clip is here if you’re interested. [Source.]

Davros: "Now, future errors will be come victories. You have changed the future of the universe, Doctor." Doctor: "I have betrayed the future. Davros, for the last time, consider what you're doing. Stop the development of the Daleks." Davros: "Impossible. It is beyond my control. The workshops are already fully automated to produce the Dalek machines." Doctor: "It's not the machines, it's the minds of the creatures inside them. Minds that you created. They are totally evil." Davros: "Evil? No. No, I will not accept that. They are conditioned simply to survive. They can survive by becoming the dominant species. When all other life forms are suppressed, when the Daleks are the supreme rules of the universe, then you will have peace. Wars will end. They are the power not of evil, but of good." Doctor:"Davros, if you had created a virus in your laboratory, something contagious and infectious that killed on contact, a virus that would destroy all other forms of life, would you allow its use?" Davros: "It is an interesting conjecture." Doctor: "Would you do it?" Davros: "The only living thing, a microscopic organism reigning supreme... A fascinating idea. Doctor: "But, would you do it?" Davros: "Yes... yes..." [ Davros raises a hand as if holding the metaphorical capsule.]

Davros: "To hold in my hand a capsule that contains such power, to know that life and death on such a scale was my choice. To know that the tiny pressure of my thumb, enough to break the glass, would end everything... Yes, I would do it! That power would set me above the gods!

Davros’ motivations seem at first brush look one-note and evil, just another mad scientist playing god. However, what makes the conversation great is the context it takes place in. Here is the choice offered to the doctor, kill a race that he knows will go on to make war and kill innocents in the future in their infancy before they have done anything wrong, or don’t kill them and ensure the future you know will happen.

The Doctor isn’t saying that his choice is the right one. He’s not saying he’s doing good by choosing not to slaughter an innocent race. He’s saying, he can’t bring himself to make that choice. In that situation he chooses not to choose, because it would be against his pacifist believes to choose either way. Which Davros at first, takes to mean the Doctor siding with him. However, when they begin to debate it, notice how they’re not talking about what is the philosophically correct choice to do. The doctor hammers in this point, would you do it? Would you do it? After getting Davros to admit that yes, he would do it, his motivation becomes much clearer, he doesn’t actually care whether his actions result in a good thing or a bad thing, he simply wanted to be the one who got to choose.

What does Davros want? The power that surpasses a normal human being’s ability to choose. Davros himself is basically written to be pure evil, but his desire itself is a little more complex. Davros is a person lacking in agency, if you tear him away from his support system he’ll die within thirty seconds. He designs what he believes is the perfect race capable of conqueringthe universe which are reflections of him. They’re soft little squid creatures in mechanical shells which are inpenetrable. Davros himself cannot seize that power, he is inferior because he’s attached to the life support system (in his own mind), so the power he wants instead is the power to make the choice to unleash them upon the world.

If the Doctor by failing to make that impossible choice in the situation, by not wanting to even hold the capsule in his hands and have that ability to choose remains a man, then Davros chooses to throw away his humanity (which he ties to his inferiority and weakness) and becomes a god instead. To tie my long tangent which just shows how much of a geek I am back to Eren, Eren’s choice wasn’t actually about bringing a good result or a bad one at all. He simply wanted to choose. People who are lacking for agency, who feel powerless and inferior to tend to grasp for it. They try to fix external circumstances instead of internally facing what is within them, because they can’t bear to face it (hence the complex about being inferior in the first place).

People often compare Kaneki from Tokyo Ghoul to Eren because their stated motivation bears some resemblance “we were doing this all to protect our friends”, however, it’s important to grasp that Kaneki and Eren are liars and unreliable narrators both. Their stated motivation isn’t necessarily true. I don’t think the final chapter is as clear as it could have been in nailing down the finer points of this, but Eren does in fact change his stated motivation from “I was doing it all to set up you as heroes of the world” to “I would have done it anyway even if you didn’t come to stop me” to “I don’t know. I just wanted to.” So, the fact that Eren will directly lie about his motivation and try to rationalize his actions and even switch stories in the space of one conversation is at least established.

So to bring the comparison back to Kaneki, both Eren and Kaneki lie about their external motivations that they are doing this for their friends when really they act because of unacknowledged internal motivators. They are secretly selfish, while presenting their actions as some kind of great sacrifice they’re making for the sake of others. The deepest we ever dig into Kaneki’s head he makes this statement.

I’m going to do something that will make everyone love me. Good, bad, it could be anything. After that, I wanna die heroically!

Eren and Kaneki aren’t the same because they’re brave people who fight for their friends, it’s because internally they’re pathetic and unlovable. They’re so starved for agency and attention that they’ll do anything for it, and they just don’t care about the consequences for their actions. Kaneki also, later on in the manga engages in mass slaughter for once again what is a pretty bad reason. It’s not to protect someone or for the sake of someone else. It’s because he’s lonely and wants comfort.

Kaneki doesn’t care about what he’s doing or the consequences of his actions, he’s desperate and wants to do what will immediately gratify him in the moment. He doesn’t even realize what he’s doing will unleash mass slaughter and have greater consequences because he’s not thinking about that.

Compare this to the doctor’s choice. The doctor knows the direct result of his actions, if he does not abort the daleks he will fail to prevent the deaths of innocent people. Knowing those consequences he says he still won’t make the choice because he believes his pacifist principles are something he won’t bend on. Kaneki, and Eren both have on principles, or no reasons. They just do whatever in the moment, and make up a reason after the fact. For Touka, For his friends, because he wanted to, because of freedom, because why not?

Kaneki and Eren can construct no good reason for their actions, and no principles behind their actions, because unlike the doctor, they don’t have a developed enough and they’re not capable of making measured choices. They steal away agency because they’ve been deprived of it, they want the feeling of power and control that comes with making the choice, but they don’t want the responsibility for it. The doctor knows if he doesn’t choose to wipe out the Daleks he’s responsible for that choice, but can’t bring himself to kill. His actions are pacifistic. However, Eren and Kaneki choose to kill in the same situation, and their actions inevitably cause the conflict to accelerate. The Doctor remains a man, Kaneki and Eren do not.

What kind of person would want to become a god anyway?

A person pathetically, incapable of feeling alright as a human being.

That’s why Kaneki and Eren make the choice to become monsters, because they’re incapable of living with themselves, or their actions as people. Either way they can’t live with it, hence why, Kaneki’s stated motivation is I’ll make everyone love me and then I’ll just die. Hence why the person who is making this statment is a childish version of him.

There is no good reason for what Eren does. That sounds like a cop-out answer after making you read all this long, but what is a good reason for killing people? This is a lot of rambling but I hope I’ve at least established that Eren’s internal reasonings make no sense, his internal mechanisms at least do. The reason he doesn’t come up with a reason is because he didn’t actually care about the result of his actions, he just wanted to be in the position to choose. He wanted absolute agency because he was denied agency like a child, and as a forever stunted child, he never grew up to realize that most people in the whole world eventually make compromises and live on with sadness instead of getting to do whatever they want.

Words that Eren was told again and again but failed to listen to. He’s not the only person that suffers in the world. He’s not the only person that’s lost people. He’s not the all-suffering protagonist of reality, he’s just one personin the greater scheme of things. However, the ability to compromise like that. To realize that other people exist besides you, that they have feelings separate from yours, that you are not the protagonist of reality is what an adult does, and what Eren can’t do. It’s easier to become god apparently, throw his whole life away as a child soldier making the ultimate sacrifice then just try growing up.

What’s the point of writing a character with such a pathetic motivvation? It’s because it’s human.

To badly misquote Jung, most people assume they are nice people when really they are in fact jerks. The reasons can be very complex, but sometimes it’s just as simple as not being able to look past your own ego and understand people feel differently than you do. Eren cannot accept other people, whether they be his friends, the comrades he’s fought with this entire time, the adults trying to guide him, he is just so incapable of accepting them that he regresses into a child making selfish demands of the world. It seems inhuman but imagine Eren in a completely different setting. What if Eren were just a shut-in? Just a teenager who didn’t leave his room. A fundamental ability to accept other people would sabotage all his other attempts to grow up and leave his room, and he’d choose to remain a child forever. The stakes are different, the situation is different, but the internal mechanisms are unmistakably human.

2. All Erens is the Same

Okay, here’s where I actually try to prove that Eren’s character arc is consistent with the story. What was revealed in 139 at all wasn’t a 180, and wasn’t a reveal that secretly Eren had good intentions all along. He never had good motivations, or selfless one. From beginning to end he was a selfish child, and his reasoning was always that of a stunted individual unable to understand the feelings of others but placing his own feelings as far more important.

What Eren does in 139 is rationalizing and changing his answer, which he has done several times before that point anyway, and is therefore consistent with his behavior up until that point. It’s important to acknowledge that Eren models himself, not after Grisha, but rather Eren Kruger. The foil to Grisha and the reaction to Grisha’s bad parenting is Zeke. The person who Eren makes similiar choices to is Kruger says the reason he picked Grisha is the eyes he possessed in childhood.

The thing about Kruger is, textually, Kruger fucking sucks. He says it himself. He claims he was doing it for the sake of helping others, and yet, all he ever felt like he was doing, was torturing people, and throwing them to the dogs. He kept saying he had good motivations, but his actions were repeated brutal violence, over and over again. He contributed more to the conflict than he helped to resolve it.

At the end of his life, Kruger says once again he doesn’t believe what he’s done has changed anything, and doesn’t believe he himself hs changed. He’s still the child with hatred in his eyes. His reason for passing it onto Grisha is because he knew Grisha wouldn’t grow up either, and would keep that inside of him. Kruger failed to grow, Grisha failed to grow, in a way that mattered, in time to make an actual change. They only ever made things worse, and that is, the model we are supposed to parallel Eren to.

Now this is at the same time that the Attack Titan’s future vision powers are shown to us. The question a lot of people are asking is if Eren had free will in his choice, or he was fated to make that choce all along. The answer is. No. Nope. Nope. Nope. Not at all. The fact that Eren was destined to do it, is yet another excuse, the like seventh change of motivation that Eren gives us. “I saw it happen in the future so I did everything I could to make it happen, but I didn’t think I had a choice this was the only way to make you guys hero,” Eren says, and then five seconds later. “I didn’t know what would happen , I probably would have done it anyway even if I knew you guys were all going to die and fail to stop me.”

Eren is once again making excuses, and avoiding all kinds of responsibility. If he is the chosen one, if his actions are controlled by fate, if he’s a god, if he’s a devil, he is not human and therefore he is not responsible. Eren wants the power to decide the fate for the world, but will do anything but accept responsibility for that choice. Eren wants to be Eren the bloody conqueror, but he’s not even self-aware enough to see himself as a bad person he can’t even own that so when confronted on his actions he reduces himself back to a child, and evades responsibility. Eren’s own motivation, his stated motivation is for no reason, however, the reasons he avoids the guilt like this are complex in their mechanisms as I wrote about above. The simple question is if Eren saw this future why did he not try to stop it? The simple answer is because he did not want to.

There are a million and one excuses Eren has for why he thought the future could be avoided, but his actions tell a different story. He didn’t lift a finger to try. He spent the next four years making rationalizations for what he eventually would do. I will now establish, Eren was actually given several oppurtunities to stop, and then he just did not stop.

In the Reiner and Eren scene while Tybur is speaking in the background, Eren is offered a choice. Quite literally, Tybur is narrating the same story that Eren wants to set up. Become the devil that tried to destroy the world, so the heroes (his friends) will defeat him. He’s given the chance to be genuine and talk things out with Reiner and what does he choose.

He chooses to accelerate. He could have stopped. Remember how Reiner was practically begging him to talk things out? Not only that but Eren sees that Reiner’s stated motivations for doing what he did were, completely fake, just rationalizations made up in the moment.

Eren is presented with the reality of who he really is, a child who hates himself, who wants to kill himself rather than take responsibility for his actions, and he chooses the narrative Tybur offers him. Rather than be hismelf, stop the story here, he chooses to move the story forward.And the conflict accelerates when they could have reconciled. Not because there was no other choice, Reiner was begging, crying, and holding Eren’s hand at the same time asking for peace and forgiveness but because Eren chose to accelerate the conflict.

Eren’s choices are always that of an accelerationist. When given the oppurtunity to stop, he chooses instead, to always make the conflict worse. That is, the result of Eren’s myriad of choices made throughout the arc. Everything is worse now, and more people are dead. Nothing good is achieved through these means because Eren wasn’t trying for good. Eren didn’t care about good results, he just wanted to be doing something. Easier to be an all powerful demon, than a powerless child which is what he sees Reiner as in the moment.

The only time I believe that Eren was putting on an act was when speaking with Mikasa and Armin. The rest of it wasn’t acts, it was just who Eren is, who he sees himself to be. The thing is most people don’t read Eren’s kind of behavior, constant masculine posturing, war mongering, accelerating the conflict, throwing himself into fighting, as childish and toxic when it is. The point of Eren’s masculinity is it’s a performance. Reiner crying and begging in front of Eren is embarrassing and pathetic yes, but it’s also how he felt in that moment, it’s a human vulnerability. Whereas, Eren’s outer persona is entirely empty of love and vulernability, of every emotion besides anger, and violence. However, because it’s empty, he just acts, empty... Great wording there I know. Eren when posturing in front of others basically has no personality. He is just guy who fights.

Eren performs the role of a ruthless soldier in front of others, because it prevents him from being vulnerable. Remember who Eren is posturing in front of, Reiner, and then later Zeke. What were they doing? They were both at the moment trying to appeal to his human side, Reiner by crying and begging for forgiveness a show of vulnerability, and Zeke by tryig to show Eren what their father did to them was wrong.

Calls for violence, posturing, warmongering and rhetoric, Eren’s every response when Zeke tries to examine his humanity. Eren insists over and over again, you see I’m not actually a human being. It was impossible for father to reach me because I was simply born that way. However, the kind of person Eren pretends to be is empty, someone incapable of feeling anything. The only way he knows how to be strong, is to simply not have feelings, to deny all human emotion and become something else and that’s just lame. We also know, that Eren himself is not like that because he contradicts his stated motivation that the only reason he killed those slavers was for the concept of freedom itself when he takes too long trying to look at Mikasa.

Eren denies himself empathy, he denies himself udnerstanding, and therefore no one will ever see his emotional wounds. That way, he can be invulenerable forever, but at the same time he denies MIkasa and Armin.

We return again to the motif of the story. It’s the same repeated image, someone tells Eren to stop, Eren says that it must not stop, the story must continue.

Both of Eren’s foils and family members,Zeke and Grisha tell Eren to stop this. That they do not want this. The whole world yells at Eren to stop, and he does not stop. Stopping would mean, accepting some measure of helplessness so Eren does not stop.

To be honest, what Eren says in 131 is far more telling than literally any of the excuses he came up with in 139 which is why I think it should be interpreted not as the final word on Eren’s character but rather, showing what his waffling actually looks like to an outside observer - not heroic at all but rather pathetic.

Eren’s childish desire to be this powerful, to stand up above everyone like a god while ignoring the suffering of the world around him - is pretty telling enough of Eren’s true motivations that he needs no further elaboration. Eren does not become god for the sake of his friends, he does not do it because he thinks it will make the world a better place, he does it because of childish delusions of grandeur and his inability to let go of his childish feelings of entitlement. The world isn’t the way he wants it to be and he can’t comrpomise with that in any way. Eren is more like a caricature of the most petty person on earth when you put it that way, but this is... a fictional story. Thematically Eren is a good example why ideals are ideals, and people are in fact, people, ulitmately very disappointing and falling short of those idealse. So once again moving past this.

Eren, you can literally just stop. Eren is basically given every choice in the world to stop, everyone else in the story tells him to, and he just doesn’t. The author does go to a painstaking extent to show that Eren in fact could have stopped. Every single time he is given the oppurtunity to stop he instead chooses to accelerate the conflict.

It is interesting to show the one time Eren actually did stop though. It wasn’t for Mikasa, it was Mikasa’s decision.

When Eren puts the decision on someone else, he can stop. Eren has feelings for Mikasa, but rather than confessing to her he makes her speak up about what her feelings are, even when everyone around him just, straight up tells him.

Why is he capable of stopping when it’s someone else’s choice? In those cases, Eren succesfully avoids responsibility. When he makes the decision to run away in the possible alternate reality he’s doing what Mikasa wanted.

The other time is when he decides to accept the result of whatever Mikasa decides. In both cases, Eren rather than accept responsibility for his actions and the results of his actions, just, puts it all on Mikasa.

Is he doing this for Mikasa’s sake? To set Mikasa up as the hero of the world? No, he can’t even face Mikasa and explain himself or his feelings. Eren makes the choices to... put the ultimate decision on Mikasa, and run away without explaining himself because, that’s easier than taking repsonsibility for his choices. Every choice Eren makes, is to either make the conflict worse, because stirring the pot makes him feel powerful and in control, or throw control away to someonee else or some other reason (predestination whatnot) because he can’t bear the responsibility of what he’s doing. He wants to kill a bunch of people, but like... he doesn’t want to feel like a bad person about it (hence the excuse, he was doing it for his friends and yet later in the same conversation him saying that if he had killed his friends and they failed he still would have done it anyway).

Therein lies the rub. Eren is not doing this for his friends, because he takes the one path that is guaranteed to take him out of their lives. He doesn’t do it for Mikasa because he does the one thing guaranteed to destroy her.

I love this girl so much, that I created this elaborate scenario where the only way she could save the world was to horribly behead me, the one family member left from her childhood after she spent her entire life trying to protect me from fear of losing her family - yeah that sounds completely insane.

It is meant to be. Eren is thinking jack all about what his friends are feeling. His feelings for Mikasa, his desire to keep her safe and away from everything else trump everything even the idea that his love might be returned. He loves at Mikasa. He’s not in love with her, he’s projecting his love upon her. “Why didn’t he just tell her about his feelings if he secretly loved her all this time?” the point was, he couldn’t. Eren’s ego isn’t developed enough to love another person, that requires actually caring about their feelings which Eren doesn’t do to well.

There’s a reason Eren and Mikasa’s connection keeps lingering back to the small kindness they showed each other as childhood,it’s because literally despite spending their entire lives growing up together, their connection hasn’t grown at all since then, because they can’t grown.

At the end of the series however, Mikasa makes the opposite coice of Eren. If Eren’s choice has been to remain a selfish child all this time, to make other people suffer rather than face his own hurt feelings. Mikasa makes the choice of selflessness, to grow up, beyond the child who loved Eren into the adult who knows that even if you love people, one day you might lose them.

Eren’s choices only ever make the conflict worse. Mikasa’s choice finally stopped the conflict that Eren kept accelerating. It didn’t save the world, it saved the world from Eren.

I think it’s important to remember that Eren didn’t see what MIkasa was going to do, that her actions were going to end up breaking the curse. He literally had no idea what was going to happena fter the massacre, all he saw was the massacre and decided to do what he could to bring it about.

“I did all of this for you guy.”

Backtracking, five seconds later, and making excuses it all would have happened anyway.

It’s the same behavior consistently shown throughout. Eren could have stopped. Eren did not stop. Afterwards, Eren wants to reconcile the guilt and believe that his motives were good, when his actions were the actions of a bad person. It’s the same as Reiner’s crying and begging after years of guilt and failure to reconcile his acitons with who he is. Eren can’t understand why he did what he did, he just knows he did it, and he can’t accept responsibility for any of it. So that’s why Eren throws the choice away.

Eren can’t understand his father’s words, because in the end, being born, living his life, growing up, falling in love, making friends, losing some of those friends, growing older, getting weaker, all of those things are things Eren doesn’t want to do. Eren begins his life with “You were born into this world, you’re free to live hwoever you want” and ends his life wishing he was never born, and that’s the utlimate tragedy of his character arc. Not that it was inevitable he would eventually do these things, but beause it wasn’t and Eren chose to do them anyway instead of choosing literally anything else. Therefore, despite claiming Mikasa and Armin as the reason behind all of his actions, they weren’t, because he was inacapable of making the simple choice to be with them and grow up with them which is all they ever wanted from him.

#eren yaeger #eren jaeger #reiner braun #grisha jaeger #zeke jaeger #attack on titan #aot meta #attack on titan meta #aot 139 #aot 139 spoilers #attack on titan spoilers #aot spoilers #snk meta #snk theory

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padfootagain · 4 years ago

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Grumpy

Hi everyone! I'm back with a very cute little drabble for Christmas! We're one week away from Christmas, and I'll try to post a few of those little drabbles before the 25th!

This is a very cute, grumpy Ben with a cold! I hope you like this!

A little comment is greatly appreciated, if you have a second to spare!

Pairing: Ben Barnes x Reader

Word Count : 1672

Ben was grumpy.

It wasn't in his nature, and it wasn't in his character at all. He was a rather shy, goofy and quite adorable man with a mischievous sense of humour most of the time. There were only a few instances that brought him to a more bitter state of mind: the remnants of a hangover in the early morning, being stuck in traffic for a long time, and being sick.

And now, Ben was sick.

Nothing dramatic, but a seasonal cold that would have disappeared in a few days. But for the moment, Ben was in the dark phase of the disease.

A runny nose, a sore throat that was sometimes scratched with a rough cough, fever and a migraine that made him feel like someone was piercing his skull with needles. He had no energy for anything and was stuck in his bed, under a pile of blankets and pillows you had brought for him.

And it would have been bearable, had you been there with him to distract him from his miserable state, give him cuddles and bring him regular doses of his favourite tea. But you were at work, and he had to survive four more hours without you. And the more time he spent on his own, the grumpier he became.

It was snowing outside upon London, large snowflakes brightening the days of children and turning the old city into something a little enchanted, a little magical. Low clouds almost as white as the snowflakes they released hovered lazily above the tall buildings and worn-out stones, businessmen hurrying under the cold weather while the more innocent kinds carved faces for snowmen and threw snowballs at their friends. Cars of those reckless enough to try to drive through the city under this weather honked loudly, punctuating the rhythm of the city that never slowed down, especially at the approach of the holidays. And Ben would have loved the spectacle it offered, had he moved to his window to glimpse at the outside world. He would have dragged a chair by the window, and enjoyed a warm cup of coffee while watching peacefully as the snowflakes fell in his garden. Or perhaps, had you been there, he would have enjoyed looking at strangers running down the slippery street, imagining with you crazy lives for these people he didn't know. You would have found an astronaut in their midst for sure, you always did, for some reason. Ben's theory was that it was because of how much you loved the stars.

But again, you were not there, he was alone in your shared home with a buzzing brain that was slowly turning into jelly, and sore limbs, and a nose that wouldn't allow him to breathe. And now, the snow annoyed him, the cold weather the cause of his pain, after all.

He checked the time again, and heaved a desperate sigh as he counted – with much difficulty – how many more hours he had to survive through without you. He had never cursed your job more than now, as he grumpily mumbled a string of curses under his breath, wrapping himself even more in his blankets until the only part of him still visible was his forehead and messy dark hair.

He counted the minutes till you'd be back to fall back to sleep, and he spent most of his afternoon tossing around, somewhere between sleep and reality, in a daze that wasn't peaceful and didn't bring to his tired frame any rest. He reached for a book after a couple of hours, but the words written on the page required from him way too much concentration and his migraine got worse after only a couple of pages, so he discarded the item once again. He checked the time one more time.

He had two hours left.

He made an almost-unbearable effort to extract himself from the covers and finally head for the shower, figuring that some warm water would help.

And it did. The shower gave him enough energy to carry his set of pillows and blankets to the sofa instead, moving his mess to the living-room so he could watch some stupid things on the TV.

He spent most of the rest of his time alone watching some old episodes of Columbo, keeping an eye on the time while he waited for you, hoping you wouldn't be delayed by the snow on your way home, his mood darkening some more at the mere thought.

And when you finally walked in your shared home, Ben couldn't refrain a relieved sigh.

He waited for the sound of your keys to drop on the little bowl by the door, for the sound of the shuffling of fabric as you took off your scarf, beanie, gloves and coat, and finally the thud sound of your shoes being kicked off. Finally, the muffled thumping of your footsteps on the wooden floor echoed through the hall, and you appeared by his side, your hair a little wet because of the snow, but you still seemed warm and cosy in your warm jumper.

"How are you feeling, baby?" you asked in a soft voice, tilting your head in wonder, and Ben swore that he had never seen anything cuter in his life.

He let out a groan, pouting dramatically.

"I feel awful," he mumbled, letting out a grumpy growl and holding his cover closer to him.

You sat down by his side on the sofa, and rested the back of your hand against his forehead.

"You still have fever, babe," you told him in the softest voice you could muster, your fingers sliding from his forehead to his hair, soothingly travelling through the dark strands. "Have you taken a shower?"

He nodded, before sneezing very loudly, the noise echoing throughout the room, and letting out a frustrated groan.

"I hate being like this," he pouted.

"I know, love. But you need to rest to get better, that's all we can do. I'm gonna make you some tea with honey, it'll help, okay?"

You were about to get up when he quickly grabbed your wrist, pulling you back to your seat gently. The quick gesture seemed to exhaust him even more, but he didn't mind, for once.

"No, stay. You'll do that later."

"It would be good for you…"

"No, please. Please stay with me. I've waited for you all day. Just… stay."

His eyes were watery because of his cold, and his nose all red, and his cheeks flushed with fever, and he was poutier than ever, buried under three blankets. There was simply no way for you to say no to him.

And it was unsaid, right now, but it wasn't hard to read in his eyes that he meant to add I love you to his plea.

So, you settled properly in the sofa, opening your arms for him to snuggle into your side.

He heaved a sigh, finally relaxing, as he tucked his head in the crook of your neck.

"I hope you don't get sick holding me like that," Ben mumbled into your skin, his voice muffled and barely audible, but you were so used to his voice by now that it wasn't hard for you to decipher what he was whispering.

You smiled a tender smile, that he couldn't see and that you barely noticed yourself as it formed across your lips, but it didn't matter. It wasn't aimed at anyone in particular anyway. It was just how he made you feel all the time.

"Well, if I do catch your cold, you'll have to nurse me back to health too, then," you replied, making him chuckle, his first laughter of the day.

"That's a deal. Besides, I'm gonna be a little selfish here, but I need you too much now to really care if you get sick or not."

It was your time to laugh, and your heart was filled with love as you did so, the bright sound illuminating the whole room.

"Well, you're feeling very bad, so, I won't hold that selfish act against you," you reassured him, and Ben closed his eyes as you started running your fingers in his dishevelled hair again.

"Thanks. Because I really do feel awful."

You hummed, focusing on the TV before you, but only for a moment, as Ben spoke again. He had missed your voice too much during the day, after all. And if having you in his arms was already working wonders on his mood, still, he wanted you all to himself, and you seemed to give way too much interest to the crime show on TV.

"How was your day, baby?" he asked in a hoarse voice, before he would be shaken by a cough.

"It was okay, a bit long," you admitted as Ben settled back into your arms.

"Tell me everything that happened, please?" he asked, looking up at you with puppy eyes, and you could only let out a fond chuckle as you kissed his forehead and proceeded to tell him everything about your day at work.

"Well, Marjorie broke the coffee machine this morning, which was undoubtedly a good odd for the rest of the day!"

You went on for a long time, sometimes slowing down to a stop when Ben's eyes remained closed for a while, and you thought he had fallen asleep, but he kept on asking you to continue then, his eyes still closed, so you did. He did fall asleep though, once you had finished your story and settled back in a comfortable silence with him nestled in your arms. You didn't mind, despite your position growing a little uncomfortable after a while. You watched TV while Ben caught up on some most needed sleep, a soft snore coming out of him once in a while making you smile fondly at him.

Yes, Ben was grumpy when he was sick. But then again, sometimes, he wasn't that grumpy, even if sick, for as long as he had you.

************************************************************

Taglist : @ponycake27 @horsesreign @xinyourdreamsx @jbluevelvet@notkeppeki @daynigt-dreamer-stuff @fudgeflyss @stuckupstucky@snek-shit @suchatinyinfinity@i-padfootblack-things @buckybsarmy @heyohheyitsgabi@jigsawlover10 @emyyjemyy @addictedtofictionalcharacters @staringmoony@geeksareunique @giggleberts @sad-orange-thoughts @aylinnmaslow @benbarnes-world @ladyblablabla @madamrogers @drinix @joelynnp @mxrihollxnd @rockintensse @newtstarmander @iammadeofstarsandlazyness @shinebrightlikeafanbase @wangmangagavroche@presstocontinue @ilmiopiccolounivers0

#ben barnes #ben barnes x reader #ben barnes fanfiction #ben barnes imagine #ben barnes drabble #ben barnes fluff #christmas fic #ben barnes fic #fanfiction #fanfic #writing #drabble #imagine

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wilderebellion · 2 years ago

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I enjoyed it but I didn't have the same swelling of LOVE in my heart after the finale that I've had with other seasons. I originally watched it near to the time it was coming out, which was quarantine time and weekly episode release.

Upon rewatching it this past week in its entirety, elements I remember disliking didn't hit me the same. But the moving, emotional ones still did.

I think they did the best they could given some of the factors that challenged production. But that with how rich a world was constructed and how much had to be navigated in a SET amount of time, that towards the end it felt truncated.

In an Adventuring Party ep for that season, Brennan actually speaks to something that I have found true in my own experiences: that a weekly release format was not the optimal format for this story. Plus, despite the GoT inspiration, the typical nature of D&D means that there's no cutaway to people plotting or staring out over a kingdom with a wine glass

I feel like one of the things that bothered me as a Viewer originally is one of the things that happens in regular home game D&D a lot: you forget things. IRL time passes, regardless of how little in-game time passes.

There was a two week production halt between episodes 10 and 11, which is basically after fleeing Castle Candy but before meeting the marauders and their queen.

I recall feeling a little nuts about the late-game interparty conflict re: who has the crown because it didn't seem that anyone else on the screen was remembering about the Emperor title. Which y'know, had originally kickstarted the journey in a sense. While I'm grateful that a roll in the finale leads to Brennan whispering in Murph's ear about it, I imagine it might've felt a little too convenient to others. Or folks felt let down that so much inter-party tension building didn't "pay off" in a more explosive fashion.

The story takes on a different texture as it continues, especially as new PCs arrive. This was how they were crafted from the beginning, but I think with A Crown of Candy airing like, Apr thru August 2020, the quarantine led to folks being more online and thus more vocal about everything, both Liked and Disliked. And it usually comes out a lot easier to say "I hated X" rather than trying to parse out why. Or what it was about the other stuff that one originally liked.

Possibly those who fell in hard for the earlier portions of the story felt that things changed too drastically. Or they were in the camp of mourning for the storylines that Could Have Been (I know I still feel this a bit, especially re: later PC death).

Also? Even upon rewatching, the NPCs who scheme against House Rocks seem very charming. Even knowing what was coming, I found myself wanting to trust them!

Anyways, apologies for the long response, but it quickly became clear I had more words than a typical Reply would allow.

TL; DR

I'm critical of things I enjoy, and I actually enjoy this season more than I originally thought. But yes, I didn't like some things about it, and I can see why it's not for everyone.

genuinely curious if any other d20 fans dont like/took issue with parts or the entirety of a crown of candy? i feel like it is one of the most popular seasons in the fan communities i’ve seen (twt + tumblr) but also it may be just a vocal group?

#a crown of candy #acoc spoilers #spoilers #dimension 20

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vaguely-concerned · 4 years ago

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The Mandalorian Chapter 15 rewatch thoughts

- mayfeld does hear when the droid talks to him the first time, you can see him pretending not to like he hopes he’ll just go away haha. I also guess he’s had a lot of time to think, picking apart pieces of the large fascist machine he used to be a part of and going over everything he clearly regrets

- hahaha fennec and boba are in the back intensely keeping watch the entire time they’re on the prison planet. I suppose a good two thirds of this crew is uuuuh extremely wanted by the new republic lol

- the thing din’s voice does at the end when he says “but you still know your imperial clearances and protocols. don’t you.” is beyond fucking words, it sends a chill right through me

1) din fiddling with that panel; I think he’s phenomenally nervous behind the helmet here, that’s the sort of keeping his hands busy he does when he’s anxious and 2) why the hell does boba have this many chairs instead of like space for cargo haha does he throw bounty hunter parties in here or what

- ngl boba correctly guessing at a glance what sort of ore they’re mining and informing everyone in his sardonic deadpan voice is Big Sexy

I love how he and fennec are standing together when they’re both present in these opening scenes too, first at the very back when they’re keeping a lookout:

and then in the foreground while they discuss the scan

it’s a nice subtle way to get across that they already have a dynamic, they’re somewhat used to working together as a unit at this point. (she’s also looking over at him when she asks what they might be mining in there, like she’s mostly asking his opinion instead of opening it to the floor. they’re talking the mission out between them before din enters the conversation)

- the inside of slave 1 when the ship’s moving makes me a little bit motion sick, I really love seeing it but I hope we don’t stay in here too often haha

- aaaw the small weary sigh din gives upon realizing none of his bros can go with mayfeld. I’m sorry about basically your entire life buddy

the awkward way din adjusts the helmet like he’s trying to get used to the way it feels ;______;

- ah the distinct implication that mayfeld is needling din about this because he’s actually feeling super uncomfortable being back in empire gear and he needs to transfer that discomfort over onto someone else so he won’t have to feel through it... very psychologically understandable and such a fucking piece of shit asshole character trait to give in to haha

- din’s level of side eye is so epic you can see it straight through the helmet fhaskjfhd

- neat detail: din’s head turns slightly toward mayfeld when he calls mandalorians a ‘race’. (it’s sort of cool that we as the audience know why that bothers him, but mayfeld probably didn’t even pick up on it). also shows that mayfeld doesn’t actually quite understand what he’s talking about, even when he makes decent points he’s caught up in his own myopic nihilistic point of view. ‘we’re all the same’ ------> ‘everyone’s secretly as shitty as me deep down’. (which also betrays a lot of self loathing, since we see later he does have the capacity to NOT be that shitty when he chooses to. rick famuyiwa manages to get a LOT of really interesting nuanced stuff into this character in two short episodes, that’s super impressive)

the bright sunny look on mayfeld’s face when din finally gives in and takes the bait tho fsajdkfhasj he’s awful but that’s very funny

- rip all these excellent dudes who really only wanted to accomplish the noble goal of ruining the empire’s entire day and didn’t know they were also trying to blow up My Dad Who Does Not Deserve Any Of This, it’s honestly just really sad that there’s no moment to talk that out

well at least they blew up the entire refinery on their way out, I’m sure that’s the way they would have wanted their memories honored lol

- the comedy beat of din running out of ammo for the first time ever and the music briefly cutting out for it is so so good for me

hahahaha din seems to actually take a moment to be a little aghast at that dude who ends up crushed under the treads of the tank thing, he’s just sort of staring for a few seconds too long and that’s how pirate nr 2 takes him by surprise and shatters his shoulder armour

- I feel a bit bad -- two of the ‘pirates’ try to hold on to each other for balance and then din punches them apart and off the tank :( I mean it’s not like he could just let them murderate him either but like. ouch I’m guessing this one might haunt him for a while for several reasons huh

(the sequence is actually this guy, let’s call him pirate 3, swings the spear at din and misses, instead hitting his buddy who’s trying to get to his feet, then looks horrified and grabs for him to make sure he doesn’t fall off, and then... mando’s forehead happens to them haha)

- poor fennec and cara just running up that hill while everything’s on fire, they must be wondering what the FUCK is going on (at least cara knows that things blowing up is a sure sign din djarin is in the middle there somewhere)

- everything about carano in real life aside for one second -- I do like that we get this contrast in build between our main female characters of the episode and the way their costume designs enhance it

- awwww the little gesture din does with his hand after he removes it from mayfeld’s chest after stopping him from leaving, it’s just so... sweet. it’s a little bit appeal, a little bit reassurance, it just lightens/softens the tone of what he says a bit (he has quite a lot of like... not conciliatory mannerisms exactly, but small touches here and there that are there to communicate that he’s not angry/aggressive or trying to be a dick about it even when he’s emphatic. I keep wondering how much that is just him being him and how much is him being practiced at settling other people’s hot tempers)

- this shot is just... genius

it’s din seen entirely from the outside, with nothing of what we’ve learned to recognize as him for almost two seasons now in view -- not even his face, which we have at least a tenuous fledgling attachment to from before. it’s like we get introduced to him almost as if anew again and again in this episode, just like he’s getting introduced to new aspects of himself and what he’s willing to do and having to struggle to find ways to have that fit with who he is. his discomfort and stress is our discomfort and stress. it’s so interesting

- I can’t stop cackling at this moment even in all the tension -- you only get a sliver of din’s profile but you can feel the sheer MURDER radiating off him sdhfasjk

- aaaaaaaagh the way you get a whole different view of din’s habitual impassiveness when you can actually see his face... the way he keeps appealing to mayfeld ‘just don’t make more trouble, just shut up’, the way he goes completely silent and watchful and frozen..... those are all really obvious trauma responses, and it leads you to wonder how often he touches into that even when he’s in his element, when he’s got the full armour on. hmngh my heart

- ‘the believer’ is such a galaxy brain title for this episode, because it could be referring to either of the three men around this table or all of them at once. (and crucially the only person whose beliefs aren’t in a living, breathing state of adapting to the world around them is the empire officer, with his horrific inhuman ideology. mayfeld thinks he believes in nothing, and proves himself explosively wrong by the end of the episode, and it’s redeeming for him in some capacity. din is facing a more internal dilemma of different parts of his (and his culture’s) beliefs/values clashing and having to decide which one’s more important, to his identity and to how to exist in the world as a person (and love for the baby wins out supremely in the end. of course it does Y_____Y). the empire dude only sees the same sterile fascist world at the end of his shit rainbow that he’s clearly always done, even when faced with proof that it’s untenable. (I mean he wouldn’t give a fuck that it’s immoral because he’s y’know evil, but he’s not even fazed by the fact that the empire provably FAILED, and failed so quickly) his belief is a dead and deadening thing to contrast the others. man when this show goes off with the themes it goes OFF haha)

- love the triumphant heroic mando music kicking in as we’re finally getting to pick off imps, love that for us

- din’s protective instincts at work again, he helps mayfeld to his feet and makes sure he’s safely on board before going further in himself ;_______;

- fennec’s professional approval at mayfeld’s shot hahaha. well I guess he was supposed to be a sharpshooter back in the day huh

I do Not think she likes mayfeld even after all that, though, the withering look she sends him on her way past... should have killed him stone dead on the spot

- seeing din back in the armour is like a physical relief, I can breathe again haha

- tfw you catch yourself thinking ‘at least when all this is over we can go back to the razor crest and everything will be normal again’ and then you rEMEMBER 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

#star wars #the mandalorian #the mandalorian spoilers #the mandalorian meta #honestly I could add a lot more of my boba thirst in this lol (idk din is always Dad not Daddy to me but boba's Doing something for me haha)

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