#i mean it's not textual

[ian-thebean]

Alec x Maurice good mood goofin

for my darling romantics

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Snapping fabric and wandering fingers. The smell of dirt and the hot breath of midnight. Oh, spare me your dusty libraries and muted halls! Your vaunted cathedrals and the clack-clack of quick steps on worn stone are nothing to the softness of the night sky. Pity the lovers, those poor, filthy rich lovers, who laugh and chat floating down a manicured canal. Pity the glances over books, the stolen caresses, the man who is served a pittance and fancies it a feast.

White linen afraid of moss, salad forks made from stolen gold. Pity them, my love. Turn from their aching eyes into my sturdy arms. Hold me tight as we crash into the earth and nestle among the worms and rotting leaves. The blonde face of Cambridge is pale as parchment in the light of the drunken moon. Can Plato’s threadbare musings bring you anything but distraction? Anything but the recycling of philosophical sentiments must be hunted down in the chattering of the night-singing birds. Take my face in your hands and tell me that you’d give it up again, for there is no sweeter sound. Even the softness of your lips cannot compare to your vow to exist for me and I for you. Hand in hand, step for step, advance with me into the wildness of the woods. Kiss me with apricots in your mouth and dirt beneath your fingernails; let me see the velvet black of your suit streaked with mud and torn by bramble-bushes. Show me the man beneath the bowler for there is a fire in him that deserves to be laid bare and fed until it sets the world ablaze. Treasure the heat-kindling of my devotion until it consumes all that we’ve left behind. For you, for your breath on my neck, I here abjure the sun that shines on the new world. The fog, the cold, the rain I embrace for the sake of your split knuckles and gentle words. With the crack of cricket bats and sweat of midday, I declare that my love for you will last until the last tree on earth is blown down. 

[gayofthefae]

Shoutout to the writing of and inclusion of the line "Yeah, for Mom's work" that just so clearly makes sure to clarify: this is not characters who don't like each other. This is siblings fighting.

Will sees Joyce as El's mom and El as his sister and that is not revokable when he's mad, it is a universal truth to him now. He's upset with her but he is upset with his sister and they wanted to make sure you knew that that's what this is to him. This isn't season 3, he isn't tense with his crush's girlfriend. He's just having a squabble with his sister, which she is first now.

[spitblaze]

Sometimes I worry it's infantilizing to hc Odo as asexual given the autism coding. But then I remember the source of the headcanon, Odo's constant complaints of how he doesn't understand why people experience sexual attraction and never will

[shadelorde]

Why do so many people unironically think the Fire Nation is the misogyny-less “girlboss” nation. What the fuck.

[getyinyusedtoit]

i love hualian's specific brand of misunderstanding because it happens due to their internalized feelings of inadequacy and self denial, and these feelings remain self contained. there is no betrayal or argument of any kind, no big catalyst that changes the dynamic of their relationship in some awful way, no negative assumptions placed upon one by the other. they just happen as they are both testing the waters and working through what they're allowed to want, allowed to have while their individual inability to see themselves as worthy of taking want they want, of being loved gets in the way every time.

and it's so good, seeing them fumble these moments that are clearly veiled or outright confessions and yet continue to grow closer in spite of it. to watch them have this journey and watch them teach each other the things they themselves need to learn. it's good because centuries of self denial wouldn't go away overnight, no matter how perfectly they slot into each others lives. instead we get to see both of them learn that they can start to give and take what they want more and more over their journey, until it culminates in less of a confession and more of an acknowledgement, finally having the ability to reach out and embrace love you feel you don't deserve while also giving love to someone who equally fears they don't deserve it.

[nevertheless-moving]

continution of stormlight au 14, where kaladin keeps it together just a little longer:

Adolin: Storms! So both you and bridgeboy have been radiants—

Kaladin: surgebinders.

Adolin: surgebinders, this whole time? Unbelievable! Anyone else here secretly a surgebinder?

Renarin:

Shallan: I— your cousin. Jasnah. She didn't have a soulcaster. She was one.

Kaladin: Wait. I thought you said she died.

Shallan: Radiants can be killed! She had a sword through her chest!

Kaladin: I mean...I haven't tested that out specifically. But I've been shot a lot. And I was basically flayed alive. Teft nursed me back to life with a few diamond chips.

Adolin: Hah! The assassin did get you with a shardblade, didn't he? And you healed from it!

Navani: I knew it. She's impossible to kill.

Shallan: I— but I sank the boat. Oh stormfather...

Kaladin: I can also survive without breathing a while. 20 minutes easily. haven't timed my limits.

Adolin:

Shallan:

Shallan: I — wait, did you say you were flayed alive? What? Why?

Kaladin: It's — it's how the whole stormblessed title happened. Got strung up in a highstorm.

Adolin: Huh. At this point I was wondering if you got the title talking to the stormfather himself, ha!

Kaladin:

Adolin: ....Bridgeboy?

Kaladin: It. I mean during highstorms sometimes...

Adolin: I swear if you say you thought it was a hallucination I'm throwing you as far as I can. And I'm wearing plate right now.

Kaladin: It— it can't have been real.

Adolin: I'll do it bridgeboy. I know you can take it.

Kaladin: Fine. Anyway. That's how I got the stormblessed name. Sadeas ordered me outside, left upside down in a highstorm. Not fun, but I lived.

Shallan: So... she really could be alive...

Adolin: My captain of the guard, my bethrothed, and my cousin! Ha! Renarin, you'd tell me if you were a radiant — I mean a surgebinder, right?

Renarin:

Adolin: Renarin?

Renarin:

Adolin: Renarin...I...but why wouldn't you tell me?

Renarin (crying): I thought I was going mad. I was seeing things, I could hear screaming from my shardblade...

Kaladin: I hear that too!

Shallan: There's...something wrong with most shardblades.

Renarin: I thought it was...

Adolin (gripping Renarin's shoulder): Brother.

Adolin: I don't think hallucinations are real.

[quixoticanarchy]

Maglor saying "the oath says not that we may not bide our time" is very interesting (not, unfortunately, conducive to conciseness). bear with me.

a) if they can bide their time, that kind of undermines the idea that they are driven by the oath into atrocity; rather, they can choose the moment to obey it (to some degree). the truth of this statement is unclear because it does seem that they spend a lot of the First Age biding their time, but also when they try to bide their time before the third kinslaying, it was said that they were tormented by the oath. was that false? what is it that pushes them into action, if not the pressure of the oath? or, is it the knowledge and shame of the unfulfilled oath combined with events that enable them to strike out for the jewels, but not actually any metaphysical pressure forcing their hand?

b) Maglor is also saying here, let's go back to Valinor and just see what happens. maybe eventually we can get the silmarils peacefully and be forgiven (I have to agree with Maedhros that that seems.. unlikely). probably correctly, Maedhros envisions the difficulty of trying to get the silmarils in Valinor while unforgiven, and what it would entail and cost to do violence there again. Maglor imagines peace; Maedhros definitely anticipates violence

c) I think Maglor also just wants to go home. he wants to stop. he would probably like to fulfill the oath (or be freed from it), but also would be fine with kicking the can down the road, presuming the oath will allow that. but once Maedhros talks him out of the likelihood of success if they wait til Valinor, he's also willing to break it entirely. his contention that Manwë and Varda making the oath impossible to fulfill would also make it void could be interpreted as a hope that both these things would happen

Maedhros makes the points that they can't be released bc they swore also to Ilúvatar, and therefore they're still facing the Everlasting Darkness if they fail. to which Maglor makes the fair point that if they can't be released, then either they hold themselves bound by the oath and keep trying for the silmarils (and if they fail, face Everlasting Darkness), or try to give up the oath, find they are still bound by it and, having auto-failed their task by breaking the oath, face Everlasting Darkness anyway. therefore yes, they would do less evil in the breaking, but the result is the same to them - as long as in neither case do they actually anticipate fulfilling the oath. Maglor therefore is maybe ready to give it up as impossible; possibly, Maedhros is arguing that it remains achievable for now, but "its fulfilment be byeond all hope" only once back in Aman, lending urgency to the final attempt to get the silmarils now.

a follow-up question: do they at this point believe that success is still possible? what is success? if they have to get all 3 silmarils to satisfy the oath, they're up against Earendil, but they never mention that. what does fulfilling the oath mean - that they evade the consequence of failure? is the force that 'drives' them to stick to the oath not so much (or not only) a metaphysical pain or burden that torments them, but the fear of the failure condition itself - the Everlasting Darkness?

this would explain Maglor's interest in wanting to stop pursuing the oath, but also wanting it somehow neutralized - whether by biding time or having the oath declared void. and Maedhros is arguing that a) they can't be released, b) they can only keep the darkness at bay by continuing to actually try for fulfilment, and c) they should take this one last shot while arguably they still have a chance (or at least it's easier than it would be in Aman). it may not matter whether success is ultimately possible (i.e. if Earendil does come into the picture, or the crosshairs), but it matters that they are trying.

but then, what to make of them reportedly realizing Eönwë was right and they've lost their right to the silmarils? what does that matter to the oath? the oath declares they'll do anything to get them back, and they do. as much as it sucks to get burned, getting them back (ignore the 3rd silmaril) should mean their deed has not failed so they should not face Everlasting Darkness.

I see a couple of possibilities here: a) they ceased being bound by the oath when they lost their right to the silmarils, which would make it vain and mean none of the atrocities had to happen. but is that how the oath operates? did they stop being bound by it long ago and just not realize? or, alternately, b) does their losing their right to the silmarils mean they auto-fail the oath bc they’ll never truly “reclaim” them? and therefore, rather than their never being at risk of Everlasting Darkness, are they consigned to it now no matter what? (but Maglor at least seems to evade that, unless it’s very metaphorical…) or, c) were they indeed bound by the oath all along and indeed fulfilled it, it just doesn't really matter bc the victory is hollow, and they themselves can’t hold the very things they killed others for holding? could be harsh enough on its own, whether or not the oath responds to the status of their “right” to the silmarils.

there is also the matter of we don’t know what the Everlasting Darkness is. lol. but I’m not touching that now beyond I think it’s a thing the SoF are genuinely afraid of

[vigilskeep]

i really enjoy that they gave illario a funny little shirt with a bit of flash. and a bit of colour at the belt. he would be the one guy in the room who can’t abide by the blue-black colour scheme to save his life. and only buttoning it halfway basically goes without saying

[cuddlytogas]

there was some Twitter madness recently where someone left a comment on someone's art to the effect of, "Ed shouldn't wear a dress, he's a man!" which I do disagree with on principle, but unfortunately, it brought out one of my least favourite trends in the fandom

so, naturally, I had to write a twitter essay about it. and I already largely argued this in a post here, but the thread is clearer and better structured, so I thought I'd cross-post for those not on the Hellsite (derogatory). edited for formatting/structure's sake, since I no longer have to keep to tweet lengths, and incorporating a couple of points other people brought up in the replies

so

I want to point out that the wedding cake toppers in OFMD s2 aren't evidence that Ed wants to wear dresses. Gender is fake, men can wear skirts, play with these dolls how you like, but it's not canon, and that scene especially Doesn't Mean That.

People cite it often: 'He put himself in a dress by painting the bride as himself! It's what he wants!' But that fundamentally misunderstands the scene, and the series' framing of weddings as a whole. I'd argue that Ed paints the figure not from desire, but from self-hatred; it's not what he wants, but what he thinks he should, and has failed to, be.

(Yes, I am slightly biased by my rampant anti-marriage opinions, but bear with me here, because it is relevant to the interpretation of the scene, and season two as a whole.)

The show is not subtle. It keeps telling us that the institution of marriage is a prison that suffocates everyone involved. Ed's parents' cycle of abuse is passed to their son in both the violence he witnesses then enacts on his father, and the self-repression his mother teaches, despite her good intentions ("It's not up to us, is it? It's up to God. ... We're just not those kind of people. We never will be."). Stede and Mary are both oppressed by their arranged marriage, with 1x04 blunty titled Discomfort in a Married State. The Barbados widows revel in their freedom ("We're alive. They're dead. Now is your time").

But even without this context, the particular wedding crashed in 2x01 is COMICALLY evil. The scene is introduced with this speech from the priest:

"The natural condition of humanity is base and vile. It is the obligation of people of standing ... to elevate the common human rabble through the sacred transaction of matrimony."

It's upper class, all-white, and religiously sanctioned. "Vile natural conditions" include queerness, sexual freedom, and family structures outside the cisheteropatriarchal capitalist unit. "The obligation of people of standing" invokes ideas like the white man's burden, innate class hierarchy, religious missions, and conversion therapy. Matrimony is presented as both "sacred" (endorsed by the ruling religious body), and a "transaction" (business performed to transfer property and people-as-property, regardless of their desires), a tool of the oppressive society that pirates escape and destroy. That is where the figurines come from.

When Ed, in a drunk, depressive spiral, paints himself onto the bride, he's not yearning for a pretty dress. He's sort of yearning for a wedding, but that's not framed as positive. What he's doing is projecting himself into an 'ideal' image of marriage because he believes that: a) that's what Stede (and everyone) wants; b) he can never live up to that ideal because he's unlovable and broken (brown, queer, lower-class, violent, abused, etc); c) that's why Stede left. He tries to make himself fit into the social ideal by painting himself onto the closest match - long-haired, partner to Stede/groom, but a demure, white woman, a frozen, porcelain miniature - because, if he could just shrink himself down and squeeze into that box, maybe Stede would love him and he'd live happily ever after. But he can't. So he won't.

The fantasy fails: Ed is morose, turns away from the figurines, then tips them into the sea, a lost cause. He knows he won't ever fulfil that bride's role, but he sees that as a failure in himself, not the role. It's not just that "Stede left, so Ed will never have a dream wedding and might as well die." Stede left when Ed was honest and vulnerable, "proving" what his trauma and depression tell him: there's one image of love (of personhood), and he'll never live up to it because he's fundamentally deficient. So he might as well die.

This hit me from my very first viewing. The scene is devastating, because Ed is wrong, and we know it! He doesn't need to change or reduce himself to fit an image and be accepted (as, eg, Izzy demanded). Stede knows and loves him exactly as he is; it's the main thread and theme of season two!

(@/everyonegetcake suggested that Ed's yearning in these scenes includes his broader desire for the vulnerability and safety Stede offered, literalised through unattainable "fine" things like the status of gentleman in s1, or the figurine's blue dress. I'd argue, though, that these scenes don't incorporate this beyond a general knowledge of Ed's character. Ed is always pining for both literal and emotional softness, but the significance of the figurines specifically, to both Ed and the audience, is poisoned by their origin and context: there is no positive fantasy in the bride figure, only Ed's perceived deficiency.

Further, assuming that a desire for vulnerability necessarily corresponds with an explicit desire for femininity, dresses, etc, kind of contradicts the major themes of the show. OFMD asserts that there is nothing wrong with men assuming femininity (through drag, self-care, nurturing, emotional vulnerability, etc), but also that many of these traits are, in fact, genderless, and should be available to men without affecting their perceived or actual masculinity. It thematically invokes the potential for cross-gender expression in Ed's desires, especially through the transgender echoes in his relieved disposal, then comfortable reincorporation, of the Blackbeard leathers/identity. It's a rich, valuable area of analysis and exploration. But it remains a suggestion, not a canon or on-screen trait.)

Importantly, the groom figure doesn't fit Stede, either. Not just in dress: it's stiff and formal, and marriage nearly killed him. He's shabbier now, yes, but also shedding his privilege and property, embracing his queerness, and trying to take responsibility for his community. In a s1 flashback, Stede hesitantly says, "I thought that, when I did marry, it could be for love," but he would never find love in marriage. Not just because he's gay, but because marriage in OFMD is an oppressive, transactional institution that precludes love altogether. All formal marriages in OFMD are loveless.

So, he becomes a pirate, where they reject society altogether and have matelotages instead. Lucius and Pete's "mateys" ceremony is shot and framed not like a wedding, but as an honest, personal bond, willingly conducted in community (in a circle; no presiding authority, procession, or transaction).

That is how Stede and Ed can find love, companionship, and happiness: by rejecting those figurines and their oppressive exchange of property, overseen by a church that enables colonialism and abuse. Ed is loved, and deserves happiness, as he is, no paint or projection required.

ALL OF THIS IS TO SAY: draw Ed in dresses! Write him getting gender euphoria in skirts! Write trans/nb Ed, draw men being feminine! Gender is fake, the show invites exploration, that's what 'transformative works' means! But please, stop citing the cake toppers as evidence it's canon. Stop citing a scene where a depressed Māori man gets drunk and projects himself onto a rich, white, silent bride because he thinks he's innately unlovable and only people like her can find happiness, shortly before deciding to kill himself, as canon evidence it's what he wants.

(Also, please don't come in here with "lmao we're just having fun," I know, I get it. Unfortunately, I'm an academiapilled researchmaxxer, and some of youse need to remember that the word "canon" has meaning. NOW GO HAVE FUN PUTTING THAT MAN IN A PRETTY DRESS!! 💖💖)

[arsenicflame]

Izzy's never had any social media- why the fuck would he?- but there is a facebook account out there with his name, made for him by Ed back in the days when it was the hot new thing, and everyone had to have a facebook account. Theres a sum total of three posts on there;

The first two, made when Ed opened the account, marking that he changed his profile picture (Ed's favourite of them, armoured in leather but grinning at each other, full of love, like theres nothing else that matters in the world), and that Ed changed his relationship status now Izzy has an account- "Edward Teach is married to Izzy Hands"

The only other post, made more than a decade later, is Ed changing his relationship status to single.

[iridescentmirrorsgenshin]

hi! love love love all of your haikaveh analyses! they're so wonderfully done and itch my brain so right. i was wondering if you had any thoughts on the recent quest featuring them ('an odd textual mystery')? hope you have a wonderful day!

hiya! firstly, thank you so much for your ask! i'm so glad you enjoy my haikaveh analyses!?? they truly live in our heads <333 secondly i am so sorry this reply is coming late!! i wasn't able to play during the first half of the event, and then i've had technical difficulties, so i've only recently finished the quest! that being said, here is part one of two of my thoughts!

firstly, i love how this event feels like a reference to kaveh’s hangout, in which alhaitham says that kaveh’s annotations, according to the ex grand conservator, are too long and hard to read, and that as a student, kaveh had the habit of scribbling in all sorts of books, which won him the nickname “the urchin of Kshahrewar” ???

we're starting off strong with kaveh canonically hiding behind a ladder out of sheer embarrassment after trying to find the book on which he inadvertently founded a conspiracy. things will just never go his way huh :(

i thought it was interesting (and very deliberate) that when we go to where we would find kaveh, it's The House, and when the traveller and paimon believe they've heard kaveh-

it's this guy... homosexual jumpscare next time.... and then he says this phrase (before leaving in his typical manner, which parallels his 'see ya' in his character quest, plsss he's so !?!?!?)

after waiting again, the traveller and paimon believe theyve heard kaveh, and this time it IS kaveh... you mean they couldnt be told apart...?? really leaning into alhaitham and kaveh being innately bound by the mirror motif i think.!!

paimon then impersonates alhaitham, to which kaveh recognises, saying that paimon doesn't sound herself - which could parallel how the kaveh comments that the traveller sounds like alhaitham in one dialogue option within his hangout, a cute detail <3

also, kaveh clinging onto the narrative that no one knows he lives with alhaitham, and then listing a scroll of names, being all of his and alhaitham's close friends... ironically very intimate

also it being confirmed that kaveh has low stamina, i didn't know i needed this until i was given it

kaveh drunkenly circling a spelling error in permanent ink, thinking nothing about it but that the book is terrible, returning it, and then creating a city-wide mystery, believing it to have happened AFTER he returned the book, and frantically trying to piece together what happened is so kaveh coded, ofc it WOULD happen to him

tighnari checking the book out when kaveh complained about it him because he thought it sounded FUNNY!! i love hibm..,m,,,

also kaveh using red ink and alhaitham using green ink... oh so the contrasting outfits aren't enough, you're also canonically using complementary colours... oh so.. huh...

tighnari immediately clocking that alhaitham joined in by adding a circle, calling it a 'game', so he knows that alhaitham is having fun doing this...? dare i say... f-flirting,,,

tighnari saying flirting.!! HE DESERVEDLY CALLEDHAIKAVEH OUT!!! they are too much in their intricate (homoerotic) rituals.

tighnari using a leaf in the forest metaphor... very interesting

cutting to cyno and sethos, cyno being bitter that sethos makes excuses to not play TCG, referencing their voice lines about the other, this is such a nice detail

absolutely no thoughts here just pure homoerotic brainrot of knowing what style of ink and the penmanship of your life partner, along with an unnecessary specific memory of the two taking breaks from their schedules to spend time together in their secret spot in the tree in cyno's second story quest... ive not had one coherent thought since this, the writing for cynonari is so so great and lovely and everything, they deserve the best

"back to the book" BRO GOT DISTRACTED!!! FR THERE WAS NO NEED TO TELL THAT STORY ABOUT HIM WATCHING TIGHNARI DO HIS HOMEWORK IN THEIR SECRET PLACE HELPPPPPP

also, cyno wanting to solve the mystery of the book for tighnari's sake and protection. oh. (if this weren't haikaveh's fault/event then cynonari would own it... tighnari, i, too, am so tired of them.)

and cyno canonically calling sethos bro!! another reason as to why its a crime this mini quest wasn't VOICED????

this is part one! part two is here and focusses on the final scene with alhaitham and kaveh, my bane...

[spottedgardeneelstan]

so we all agree that the system is just airplane shooting towards the sky right

[gayofthefae]

Thinking again about "you're my superhero" and how powers use anger and sadness, not love, and how there were two words used with spite in that note, not one

"Dear Mike,

I have gone to become a superhero again.

From,

El"

She put "superhero" on the same plane as *"From"*. OH, She did not like that shit at all.

[faerynova]

what if i draw holiday and rex as a pietà painting what then

[sunforgrace]

you guys please understand they were going to say “CASTIEL’S PERSONAL HEAVEN” and paper the walls like a teen girls room with pictures of dean pictures of dean’s face PLASTERED onto the bodies of beefcakes all while cheek to cheek blares out. as brought to you by fucking metatron

[joseigamer]

Patalliro! is fascinating to me because of stuff like this. It's unapologetically gay - even within its anime which aired during primetime hours in 1982 - in a way that many later BL manga would never be, like the ones from the early 2000s which would never dare to call their characters actual homosexuals. Patalliro has actually aged quite well in this regard, there's something comforting about how campy it is.