#i see fanarts of him being a gymnast

[tekitothemagpie]

Flexible Luffy my love 🙏🏼.

[anxietycheesecake]

I'm sorry that you're being attacked and blocked for having valid criticisms. It's really weird to be new to this fandom and watch it go from a fairly positive space to fans being as nasty to each other as Star Wars fans in such a short period of time, especially when the crumbs people are cobbling together and calling a canonized ship is what we scrape for in other fandoms with ships we know will never be canon and we KNOW we're stretching the material we're given. I love my queerplatonic ships, found families, and platonic soulmates. I can absolutely enjoy Nandermo through that lens, but the gaslighting and mental gymnastics here is raising such a fucking eyebrow and you don't deserve to feel like you've done something wrong for recognizing it.

Being allosexual or alloromantic is as valid as being asexual or aromatic and it's actually so fucking unchill to conflate being gay or pan with being ace or aro just because they are all under the queer umbrella.

Ace =/= celibate, but half this fandom thinks Guillermo is a virgin and I can't help but think that's being bundled into the hot takes that are coming out right now when it's canon that he's uncomfortable due to being in the closet and his Catholic upbringing. Yes, he could be ace, but that means at best were batting 1/4 for aroace Nandermo.

Nandor has sex with Gail onscreen and is very clearly not ace. The vampires would have MINIMALLY mentioned Guillermo being a virgin and wouldn't have eagerly asked about his sex life in Atlantic City if they thought he was one and they practically have radar for it. He was panicking over Jeremy being a virgin and having brought him into the house and the only thing that saved the guy was losing his virginity. Nandor and Guillermo are both romantic in romantic relationships, and both are expressive about it and tell others they love them.

When you speedrun the entire series and the notable interviews with fresh eyes and not over a stretch of years the leap between 'My Nan- Master' vs. best friends, cuddling a Nandor puppet at night, the I'll make you a vampire speech vs. the vibe in the warrior speech is SO visible and it fits perfectly with Simms' public discomfort with fans shipping Nandor and Guillermo. He is openly uncomfortable with them being in a romantic relationship or having sex with each other and uses every homophobic gaslighting tactic in the playback when speaking about it.

“No, I do think there’s a small subset of very vocal people on Twitter who are like ‘We want to see Nandor and Guillermo hook up,’ and we’re always like, I think their love is bigger and more profound than that,” Simms said. “And also do you really want to see that? Do you?”

This is literally how straight people talk when they're uncomfortable with queer shit. What haven't we seen in this show other than that? Is Nadja and Laszlo's love lesser for it?

“Times that we’ve talked about it and explored it, the power dynamics seem so problematic,” Simms continued. “I mean, that’s his boss.”

In a show where the main couple started with nonconsensual sex (it's still noncon if it turns out that they could have had sex without hypnosis) and Laszlo fucks Colin Robinson after raising him for a gag. Sure, keep telling yourselves that the power dynamic is what makes Simms uncomfortable.

"I mean, it's a nice thought, for some...I don't know about these guys" Kayvan says as he nods toward Simms.

I've seen the Harvey interviews and talking heads from earlier seasons on the subject of Nandermo. The 2024 panel couldn't have been more different, and Harvey seemed completely subdued when the others were discussing Nandermo fanart and them being a ship.

This isn't a person who deserves applause for queer representation and it seems toxic af that Harvey has been stuck in a workplace where he has to hear this drivel when he's openly gay. Yes, I am side eyeing the fuck out of this and it's not because I'm crying over wanting my blorbos to smooch.

You can actually have a romantic pair not kiss or fuck or say I love you without pulling a very clear 'no homo.' That would have been totally fine, but they didn't do that. Copy and paste that scene into anything starring Andy Samberg, or literally anything bro centric and tell me it's a romantic love confession. Or rather, try taking it off tumblr and see if anybody thinks it isn't deep platonic male friendship.

It's okay for people to be upset when they've been hoodwinked. It's okay to separate fanon from canon and still enjoy your ships. But ffs stop gaslighting each other and saying non-romance is romance or that non-romance has more worth than romance and that people are shallow for not valuing it when that's not the problem people have with this, and when that isn't the bill of good audiences we're sold in earlier seasons.

The call is coming from inside the house it shouldn't be.

(Also SO sorry for how long this was).

Never apologize for articulating this better than I ever could. I'm too lazy to look for all the recipes I know are out there, so most of the shit I say is like "source: trust me bro"; I'm glad someone else did it.

The aspec thing makes me so mad because, as a writer, I'm always going out of my way to properly and respectfully represent aspec folks. Like, I've got two novels starring an ace woman and an aromantic man. Do I deserve a medal for that? Of course not! It should be normal. But it's kind of infuriating that people are willing to give aspec rep credit to a show just because it made two male characters stay platonic after teasing their relationship for years and call me aphobic for pointing out that's not the case.

[forwards-beckon-rebound]

dick grayson figure skating hcs

i swear i wasn’t searching for any skater specifically but what am i supposed to do, look at yuzuru hanyu and not use the pic?

ft mostly men’s singles but there’s bonus dick x reader pairs at the end

we’ve talked about dick grayson going to the olympics for gymnastics

what probably happened was the batfam got together and decided to watch the summer olympics and we got to pommel horse guy

and jason made some comment about how that guy’s basically just a better dick

and he took that personally

so of course he’s already calling up the us gymnastics team because what is the point of being bruce wayne’s son if you don’t have the most random connections ever (and they were probably already begging him to join anyways)

but 4 years is a long time to wait, so in the meantime, he decides to work on competing in the winter olympics too

and he just so happens to be a figure skating prodigy bc ofc he is (bruce signs them up for a lot of extracurriculars so all of the bat kids are weirdly good at random stuff)

ooooh this means that he’d be good at ballet too which pisses me off

he’s kinda like nathan chen in the sense that this guy is good at too many things and my asian parents would unfortunately love him

anyways! back on topic

unfortunately brian orser cannot be flown out to gotham every day (if you don’t know who he is, he is simply the goat i don’t make the rules) so dick probably has a different coach for day to day training

but he went to intensives a couple of times a year growing up

he kinda stopped when the titans and nightwing stuff got to be too much to handle but the two of them still keep in touch and brian’s like i can’t believe my star pupil is wasting his talents being a cop, why is he not on the ice

so you KNOW as soon as the olympics idea comes up dick’s calling brian up and bro sheds tears when he gets the call

he already had the routines planned out and the songs picked because he keeps on getting ideas and being like this is so dick grayson coded (with the same energy as somebody writing headcanons i imagine)

guys hear me out, fun jazzy short

like he gets the crowd to clap along and he just has the brightest smile on his face the whole time

yes i am thinking about kagiyama yuma’s song choice at the beijing olympics. and honestly his outfit too but i’m imagining dick’s is a brighter blue

and you think it’s all fun and games

AND HE PULLS OUT THE CLEANEST 3A + 1EU + 4L KNOWN TO MAN

and ofc he can do a quad axel who is surprised

lives were changed with the short 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

alsoooooo the ISU legalized backflips now and you know dick is gonna do one of those

ACTUALLY if you guys have ever seen malinin's raspberry twist

are we seeing the vision guys

i feel like he would choose something more emotional for his free (gotta get those performance points)

if nobody is bawling by the end of his program then i am dead

i selfishly want him to skate to yuri on ice (like the actual piece, although i can make a whole list of yuri on ice songs i think would suit him) but i don't know if he's a weeb like that

as a dancer, i feel like step sequences is where i'm the least impressed

he would not disappoint though, like everything's so clean? and so emotive?

i feel like he was built for the biellmann, especially the hyperextended and no i'm not taking notes

THE PRETTIEST OUTFITS EVER

if anybody wants to draw fanart of dick in yuzuru hanyu's skating costumes haha

at the end of his program he's going to point towards his family and bow to them ofc

butttttt he may or may not send a particularly smug look in jason's direction

and the wide grin that he has on his face when he's announced the winner is made even wider because he knows that jason's in the stands gnashing his teeth

bonus: fanfic idea? dick x reader pairs event where they grew up skating together

they had crushes on each other but never said anything

they get into a fight because dick wants to quit

but then a few years later he’s like haha wanna compete together?

and reader thinks he’s not taking this seriously and is still mad at him for leaving but brian’s like great! welcome back dick so obviously they’re stuck together now

and of course they have a very…interesting program (tumblr is not letting me add the link but just search up the tessa virtue and scott moir moulin rouge perfrormance)

at first it’s super awkward, dick’s like not even super sure why she’s still acting weird around him, they continue to butt heads

and it all culminates in their free, when they realize that these emotions aren’t just for performance points but actually genuine??

AND THEN THEY KISS KISS FALL IN LOVE

okay that’s all!

[sprunkimortality]

I wonder how the Sprunkis (excluding the OCs) here would react to their Feeling Sprunki selves-

(Not cuz I want to draw fanart of them interacting one of these days haha- 👀")

Oren - he'd vibe with him ngl Raddy - kinda envies his youth (cause x've read that FS!Raddy loves sports and gymnastics so x assume he's pretty physically active- M!Raddy's just an apple juice addict) Clukr - would scrutinize him (the concept of alt timelines and universes intrigues his nerd brain /silly) Fun Bot - would ask to dance battle him (playfully) Vineria - she'd sense the good vibes in her, would also ask to talk to her plants

Gray - he's cool with him, would probably introduce his playlist of songs from his fav emo + techno bands and infodump abt said bands (it's his way of socializing) Brud - he'd be very happy to see another Brud :] and maybe mistake him for a long lost brother he never knew he had lol- Garnold - "you're a fish??" also would encourage him to lighten up sometimes (it's mentioned in ur interpretations post that FS!Garnold is serious; M!Garnold isn't all that serious most of the time LMAO) OWAKCX - would offer his shedded fur to him as a gift (he does that to anyone he likes tbf) Sky - "ok don't tell anyone i said this but i like plushies too" <- trying to keep up his reputation of being a "cool big kid" ; he'd also flex his ear piercing to him cause he thinks it makes him look tough

Mr. Sun - would be very joyous!! Durple - would attempt to give him a HUGE makeover and tailor a new fancy outfit for him because he's "too normie" Mr. Tree - would chill with him Simon - "WOW NEW FRIEND SIMON!!! :D" he would be ECSTATIC and he'd be jumping and buzzing and be very very happy !! Tunner - would find him adorable (esp cause he's twice as old compared to FS!Tunner)

Mr. Fun Computer - would be happy to see another MFC, would also tell him all about his hosted events and gameshows (Mortality!MFC is in charge of directing most of the events/celebrations that happen in Smalltowne, along with M!Wenda and M!Durple) Wenda - would find her adorable, secretly envies how FS!Wenda is more likeable than her in the sense that . well . FS!Wenda never was a bully as far as x know, unlike M!Wenda (who used to bully M!Gray a ton as a child) Pinki - would get along with her well, might also offer to bake together :D Jevin - "damn you're not like me at all" but said in his very own spooky and poetic way Black - would think Blackhat is a huge fucking edgelord 😭😭😭🙏🙏🙏 also is off-put by the fact that he's a demon cause . M!Black is seemingly just a grouchy foul-mouthed old wanker 😔 like yeah he has shapeshifting powers, tendrils, and can glitch, but essentially he's just a guy

[kamdensl]

I'm overjoyed to see this little renaissance for Olympics AU Kurt. I was thinking about what kind of events he'd like to watch and of course, he'd be in the audience for the fencing events, geeking out and being really supportive. While things like balance beam are not in his sport, he'd be so amazed by that and play with the women's apparatus. tbqh, I think Kurt would slay balance beam just for fun. He makes art on that thing

Absolutely, he'd love to watch fencing events! It looks like Breakdancing was added to the Paris 2024 Olympics, and I can see him being interested and checking it out. My next Olympics Nightcrawler fanart may be related to Kurt geeking out over other Olympic athletes...

Kurt would be so good at balance beam; it's a shame he wouldn't be able to compete on it. It reminds me of this video of male gymnasts trying women gymnastics skills, which highlights how different the sports are. I bet he enjoys hanging out with the women's team and trying to learn their floor and balance beam routines.

[humanpurposes]

this!! especially the bit about character interaction, some of aemond’s scenes interacting with other people feel kinda flat (more one their end than his, but still)? like the reactions of those around him make him look a little like a “cartoonish”, cold, evil-evil villain (which works sometimes, cause i feel like that’s the image he wants to convey, he always tries to hide his vulnerability behind a dark and imposing figure in front of people), but i really like him being more vulnerable. that’s why i think s2e8 is where he really shines, we get those raw reactions, from helaena and alicent, and vulnerability from him and we get a closer hint at what is going on in his head.

not saying i don’t love him, i really do, i just feel like there are some instances in season 2 in which things that happened in between scenes (like the return from storm’s end or him finding out that jaehaerys died “because of him”) could have helped further develop him as a character (i mean, that’s what fanfic/fanart/fanwork is for, right, to fill in the gaps, but still is there a need for gaps this big?)

That's what I love about Aemond, the image he wants to project vs the inner vulnerability.

It doesn't seem consistent on the part of the writers that they made his younger version sympathetic, thew in the twist of Luke's death being accidental, only to make Aemond such a one-dimensional villain. I mean he kinda comes across that way in Fire and Blood, but the Aemond we got in season 1, while cold and calculating, I think has a lot to prove as a second son and as a child that was alienated, teased, and left physically disabled by his family members. You're exactly right, I think there are too many gaps in Aemond's narrative in season 2. I can appreciate that they tried to show a vulnerable side in the brothel scenes and you can do the mental gymnastics to justify why he attacked Aegon at Rook's Rest or why he burned Sharp Point, but at what point is it just underdeveloped storytelling? It's like the writers don't trust audiences with moral nuance (they absolutely shouldn't because Aemond is my baby boy and I forgive him for everything <3)

No but I'm dying that everything interesting about the Greens and their dynamic as a family is just... not important to the writers of HotD. In that final scene with Aemond and Helaena in episode 8, it's so compelling to see Aemond tear up when he realises he doesn't have the trust of his sister. Now IMAGINE if they had a scene in the aftermath of Jaehaerys' death, Aemond trying to explain himself, knowing Daemon wanted revenge for something he didn't intend to happen but was powerless to stop. It really sucks because Ewan and Phia are so immersed in their characters and have created this connection between them, and yet they're both so underutilised.

[waitineedaname]

Sorry that fanart made me think of jade blood Shen Qingqui, both in the context of Shen Jiu originally going against his blood caste by being absolutely terrible to children vs. Shen Yuan transmigrating into SQQ and exemplifying all the qualities a Jade blood should have, especially if maybe he was originally a higher blood caste in his old life. I would just love to see what kind of mental gymnastics Shen Yuan would have as a troll. Also, I’ll be honest, I also had the thought that instead of waking up in his mushroom body as planned, he just wakes up in Binghe’s bed later as a rainbow drinker.

YOU HAVE UNLOCKED: SOL'S BLOOD CASTE THOUGHTS! i have thought about this So Much so thank you for giving me an excuse to talk about it

Shen Qingqiu as a jadeblood is perfect. within the social hierarchy, it makes sense to me that Shen Jiu would be a midblood -- he's got a relatively high rank as SQQ so he couldn't be a lowblood, but he was a street urchin and a slave early in his life, so he can't be a highblood either. middle of the caste system is the best place for him. of course then there's the irony of him being TERRIBLE with children, and then Shen Yuan transmigrating into him and just exuding milf energy out his damn pores. I feel like him still being a transmigrator means he should've been a human reader of homestuck (I understand being so angry with it that it kills you and motivates you to Fix It) but he has extensive knowledge of homestuck troll culture, so is it really still gay to be interested in men as a troll? trolls are mostly pansexual, after all! he's just getting his quadrants filled! never mind that he's only filling them with men. also I LOVE the rainbow drinker idea omg I hadn't considered that but that's PERFECT. I think Binghe would be very happy to let SQQ feed off of him lol

I think Shang Qinghua would be a lowblood, I'm thinking either bronze or gold. taken for granted and overworked to hell!

Liu Qingge and Liu Mingyan are both indigobloods I think. physically strong and high in the social hierarchy!

Mobei-Jun and Sha Hualing are both highbloods I think, with MBJ being a violetblood and SHL being a purpleblood. I'm sorry to make her a clown but it had to happen

Luo Binghe is the one who makes things difficult. is he a mutant? is he a highblood? was he a highblood this whole time but his blood color was a weird shade so he thought he was a lowblood? who the fuck knows.

[loststarphounix]

I've seen fanart wherein Kazuichi is the one that's waiting for Gundham to wake up after the Neo World Program/Island Killing Game ended, but I want a switcheroo where Gundham is the that wakes up from his pod despite not being one of the survivors— and while he is more than relieved to still be alive despite thinking that he died back in the virtual world, he is more concerned to learn that some of his classmates haven't woke up yet...

One of them being more concerning of all is Kazuichi, since he definitely survived until the end and should've been the one that got to wake up with the rest of the remaining cast, and not Gundham.

So what gives?

This is all I have bc I'm super tired XD

*puts on Monokuma hat* let’s see what the wheel says….Ah!

so in typical Monokuma “I love the misery and drama I infect in these kids”, he sees Kazuichi is bereft right? Completely lost and confused in his feelings and lack of for Sonia is other than the distinct loss of a potential friend and also thinking that he’s actually useless to his friends who after the Fun House aside from Chiaki have been Mean As Hell ™️ to him. So he begs Monokuma for a chance to bring Gundham back, even if it means he’s gone.

And AI Junko piggybacking in Monokuma relishes the despair and grants it. Just before they return to the NWP, Junko grabs Kazuichi’s consciousness and when everyone else wakes up their ecstatic to see they made it out…but he didn’t. At first they think it’s a fluke - he’s just sulking in the pod cause Sonia didn’t ask for help. But as the hours pass and his pod doesn’t unlock, they start to get antsy. And Hajime is working the tower in the center, trying to access his many talents to read the code and life readings, when a pod unlocks.

Akane and Fuyuhiko are relieved at first, finally thinking Kazuichi was gonna wake up. But when the pod on the far left in the circle opens and out tumbles Gundham and immediately everyone panics. Sonia is elated because her best friend is alive, but the others are mixed about this, especially Akane who hates him cause of the Fun House. Hajime is panicking because this feels wrong.

And as it all starts to come to end and tension is fraying, a malicious string of code suddenly appears and a very insidious sentence appears that reads:

A life for life; Kazuichi will do just fine for my plans ^.^

AI Junko took Kazuichi in the hopes to keep her original plan for taking over their bodies. A mechanic with all the skills and abilities will help her far more than a displaced princess, gymnast or rockstar. Hajime is panicking because what did Kazuichi do!? But he does remember how the mechanic was more subdued and withdrawn after the Fun House - how he seemed to skirt around their group after Chiaki’s death. He was isolated and alone; a perfect target.

And they got Gundham back, all for Junko to come back reborned in Kazuichi’s body. And that makes everything worse. Makoto and Bakuya have to drug Akane and restrain Fuyuhiko; Sonia is torn between hating Kazuichi for his behavior, but moved he would take anyone place; and Gundham is torn because he died for nothing and feels robbed for that, but is also concerned for the fools well-being. He thought Kazuichi a coward, but he’s starting to see that he had strengths were others would see weakness.

Gundham always felt a twinge a regret that he never really got to truly know Kazuichi, and now that he has memeories of their “frenemies” ship back in Hopes Peak, he feels dissatisfied. He wants more and as soon as the mechanic wakes up, he’ll make sure to get it.

Now the race for Hajime to begin the debrainwashing program and also to get Kazuichi back in one peace.

[haejjoon]

Hi I agree with the mako discussion I have always been neutral to her and this whole discussion articulated why. I feel like there's a big disconnect between the story concepts for p5 and the writers. I.e Ann's themes Vs her treatment in writing

Also I'm a local oc X canon shipper who likes to rewrite stories to insert my oc & Ur fic & blog is giving me inspiration for what I can do because I only recently started p5r after watching rtgame play it so I haven't digested & criticised details in full yet so hearing Ur thoughts really helps articulate vague impressions I've had!!!

That being said, I'm interested what u think of Sumi Because. I low-key don't like her (I DONT HATE HER but I don't love her beyond "she's cute")

Anyway that's all!!!! I love Ur au bye bye ✨

- oc anon

aw. hey anon!! thanks so much for dropping by :)) im glad the discussion helped somewhat

oh boy...... sumi. where do i begin.

i'll be clear from the start: i love fanon sumi. i think shes adorable, i love seeing her in fics, fanart, etc etc. and for the longest time i couldn't figure out why i loved her sm in fandom and hated her in canon? and then i realized:

sumi's character... has no clear purpose.

(sojiro voice) let me explain

each of the phantom thieves have a recurring theme of finding or rediscovering identity.

ryuji with track + his old teammates

ann with her stance on modeling

yusuke with his purpose for creating art (oh boy i also have a lot to say about Him)

makoto with her burnt out but not quite burnt out gifted kid syndrome

futaba with her purpose for living at all (ouch)

and haru with how she wants to define herself without her father's influence.

the only (ONLY) exceptions to this is akechi and the protagonist. akiren is the catalyst to aiding the others discover identity, and akechi already has his purpose in life so ingrained he doesn't need to (or doesn't bother) trying to grow as a person.

now... sumi.

she's first introduced as the brilliant gymnast honor student. over time, it's clear that she struggles with meeting others' (and even her own) expectations for herself.

if we follow the same formula for the other thieves, this would be when she'd start questioning why she does gymnastics at all, or who she does gymnastics for. instead, she double downs on her supposed love for the sport, and only spirals deeper and deeper when simple "hard work" doesn't pay off.

obviously we know why. she thinks she's her dead sister. but thematically, it just clashes with all the rest of the characters already presented, because the player now has no idea where her character's going with this. she suffers from the same thing makoto's character does: tons of payoff, no clear resolution.

by the end of the faith confidant she declares that she'll now be doing gymnastics as sumire, and not kasumi. that doesn't change the expectations stacked upon her to succeed. sumi never says, "it's okay if i don't succeed, because i'm doing my best." she says, "i'm going to succeed as sumire yoshizawa and not kasumi yoshizawa, and everyone will see me shine in my own way."

and don't get me wrong. it's a lovely conclusion on its own and i'm proud of her for it, but narratively it came so out of left field. there was no set up for that specific drive to succeed As Herself, because the entire set up thus far was that she just couldn't succeed at all. this is why the entire confidant felt so stilted to me.

and the reason for such a strange ending note is because of the twist itself. no one expected her to actually be her dead older sister. suddenly, sumi is a completely different person, and you're just supposed to roll with it through her confidant. there's just no time within the confidant itself for the player to digest it.

moving on from that though i just fucking hate how she's marketed. her entire palette is a copy and cut paste from joker's. her outfit is somehow worse than ann's--i get it, leotard for her gymnastic skills, but look up gymnastic leotards when you get the chance. there's no plunging necklines like her costume shows. her coat (again, carbon copy from joker's) is cut in the back in a way that no matter What You Do or How You Look at her, all you see is a flash of ass and thigh. the first thing you see of her the MOMENT YOU OPEN THE GAME is a slow pan up starting from her exposed crotch, for fuck's sake. fuck you atlus, she's fifteen.

also????? she's supposedly a gymnast, but she?? uses a ribbon??????? in her all out attack and in her final performance at the end of her confidant rank? is this just a localization issue? ribbon dancing and gymnastics are two very different sports???? someone explain??

she also pops up in thr story at the most random times, because the writing team over our beloved atlus couldn't figure out how to shoehorn her in to make her relevant to the main plot. why does she get the app in the first place, having nothing to do with the thieves as a whole? why does she awaken to a persona at all in maruki's palace, when all she does is vehemently deny who she really is?

dont argue with me on this, but the reason why she awakens to her persona SPECIFICALLY AT THAT POINT IN THE STORY at all... is so atlus could shove her into the opening cutscene where she "saves" joker. so the players could get hyped seeing her supple fifteen year old Pan Up From Crotch in the first five minutes of the game. joker didn't need saving. fuck off

and if you're gonna follow the rules already set in the p5 universe: how come she can use her persona so effectively in the first place? haru couldn't, even though she awakened. sumi definitely shouldn't be able to, given the whole... denying who she really is situation.

and lastly there's just some aspects of how she's depicted that rly irk me, but those are absolutely just my personal feelings. nothing inherently wrong with them, just annoying to me specifically:

- her over the top polite nature that only hinders her, but she doesn't abandon it to set straight boundaries with those being rude to her because she can't meet their expectation. even makoto told the principal to leave her alone that one time.

- the way she's so clearly shoved towards joker as the Canon Choice like makoto was in vanilla. p4 does this with rise, too, but it's far more bearable because of just how over the top she is with it, at least for me. i had a problem with yukari in p3 for much of the same reason as sumi.

- the fact that her outfit doesn't change after she accepts herself as sumire. i understand that it'd be a lot of work, but narratively, wouldn't it make more sense for it to change? akechi got two outfits (both ugly but i digress) for the two facets in his true self. if her thief outfit is a manifestation of her doubling down on her identity as kasumi, why doesn't it change? why is her hair, a clear indication of who she is as a person, still in a ponytail despite everything??? is she taking on kasumi's confidence in the metaverse?? it just isn't clear.

- her fucking magical girl transformation in her original awakening. sorry. it just wasn't necessary. again this is totally just a me thing but WOW it pissed me off so much first time i watched it, because what purpose was there to include that other than to make the player go "oooooooo shiny girl pretty girl near costume ooooooooo".

i think thats most of it. as a personality i adore sumi. it's why i love seeing her in art and fics. but as a Character made to drive a story's plot, there's so many holes i'm surprised the ship is still chugging along.

obligatory "this is my opinion im not forcing it onto you if you wanna dispute it with me go righr ahead, i love character analysis threads" here. jesus fuck this was long.

love you anon. muah <3

[emoryinaboat]

!! !! !!

TYSM Does this mean introduce 3 ocs??? Idk it does now, just for u bestie <33

(Also important info, all my OCs are magic like it started as a Harry Potter thing but then we obviously transferred them to our own thing and here we are, gay idiots at magic schools)

Cassidy💫

(Bby ur my -inhale- aNGELLL)

Name: Cassidy

Age: 17

Pronouns: She/her (cis)

Sexuality: Omnisexual

General description: The sunshine in the biggest sunshine x stormcloud relationship we have

TRIVIA:

- She has spastic diaplegic cerebral palsy, she can walk independently but not for long so she uses crutches most of the time, wheelchair on low energy days

- All her mobility aids are covered in sanrio stickers or is otherwize bedazzled somehow

- She actually always has beads in her braids, picrew is just a bitch and never has her hairstyle :')

- Has an angsty autistic Kaz Brekker core boyfriend named Booker (my S/O made him) and they are disgustingly in love it's very cute

- She's really good at making origami and she's constantly making little lotuses and dinosaurs for Booker and little frog hoppers for his little sister Bessie

- Talks to her stuffies, she has s o many of them.

- Has been keeping diaries since she was 6, never doesn't have it on her. She's painted a bunch of little white rabbits on the cover because they're her lucky animal

- When she was 9-12 she put those bicycle beads that go click-click-click when you turn the wheel on her chair

- Adores puzzles, riddles and brain teasers. Her rubix cube record is 31 seconds, she's very proud of it

- Idk man she's just really pretty in an aesthetic way, like she always has cute patterns painted on her nails, she has hearts in her edges and eyeliner, she wears cute pajamas to bed, she's just very cute-

- Feels love pains in her arms, needs to squish something

- Love languages are physical touch, gift giving and quality time

Milan⚡

(Bastard./affectionate)

Name: Milan

Age: 18

Pronouns: He/him (cis)

Sexuality: Bisexual

General description: Leading man but he's a little fucked up actually/lh

TRIVIA

- Lead singer and frontman of a famous pop-punk-kindof boyband, at first me and wifey dearest(/lh) couldn't think of a name for the band so we started just calling them Guys Being Dudes but that's what they're called now.

- Is dating his other bandmates, Ruben (mine), AJ and Zach (both my S/O's). Won't shut tf up about them in interviews

- Early diagnosed with bipolar disorder after very nearly decimating their careers.

- Had a really traumatic fanmail incident when they were really starting to break it big. Has some issues with their fans now but he's working on that-

- Has a therapy rat named Eddie (after Venom, not Stranger Things). The band also has one of those crusty white woman dogs/lh named MJ

- He will tell you his favourite movie is Back to the Future. This is a lie, his favourite is How to Train Your Dragon

- Best friends with an Olympic gymnast named Evangeline, she's had to hear his pining for his bandmates for years now

- Was really emo when the band was just starting out. Like bottle blond smeared eyeshadow Set It Off Band-T over striped shirt emo

- He gave Ruben his first haircut and thus saved Ruben from the "Awful First Trans Haircut" narrative because he's been cutting his own hair since he was 11

- Kind of emotionally distant Catholic family. Didn't outright say they don't like his lifestyle but by god they made it known. He only sees them around holidays and he only attends church loosely or for special occasions

- Really loves interacting with fan content, his twitter is a constant spam of fanart and fanfic, he follows back content creators, he reads and hypes up fanfic, all the time

- When he's scared (like harmless horror movie viewing kind) he doesn't scream or jump or anything, he just tenses up and starts crying-

- Colours his nails in with sharpie

Caio 🏁

(I promise you he is not as threatening as the picrew shows he's just got a ~persona~)

Name: Caio

Age: 18

Pronouns: He/him (Cis)

Sexuality: Bisexual with a bigg male preference

General description: We're genius for this ship trope.

TRIVIA

- Drag racer, his cars are his fucking babies

- Yes that's cars plural, his adoptive parents are RICH rich and are away for work a lot so they give him and his sister Genesis more allowance than they know what to do with. So what's an ND adrenaline-seeking teenage boy gonna do? Drag racing of course.

- Autism and ADHD and enough people-pleasing trauma to power a small nation. Most of his past relationships were his partners not communicating their relationship expectations and him wanting more than casual hookups and kinda being used :/ and now he doesn't really know how to value his own needs he's working on it-

- But he has a boyfriend now and they are also disgustingly in love and they're gonna make it everyones problem. His name is Keanu (S/O's) and he's a drag queen and I told you we were geniuses for that

- HoH and always forgets to wear his hearing aids, he mostly relies on lip reading. He has a walkie-talkie-radio-thing in his car that flashes when Genesis needs to contact him mid-race (cos like. Cops)

- When he has meltdowns it creates these magic power surges, he's been known to blow out lightbulbs. Once broke down so hard that he cut off the whole house's power

- He used to be on the cheer team and he can still do the flips and stuff, still super flexible

- Has like. No actual friends-

- He acts big at races and stuff but he is just the embodiment of the autism creature. He is just an excitable affection puppy who intensely autism stares when he's hyped

- Is an awful gossip, he needs to know everything about everyone at all times

- He makes rly good coffee-

- Him and Genesis are both fluent in ASL but his parents never bothered to learn. Genesis goes nonverbal sometimes though so Caio acts as translator when that happens

- Love languages are quality time, physical touch, verbal affection and late night drives

[river-bottom-nightmare]

The Nightwing Suit

There are some absolutely incredible artists out here on tumblr, and seeing their fanart makes me cry tears of joy. Dick Grayson, one of my personal favs, is always a wonderful contender for fanart. His innate grace and agility and flexibility translate beautifully on the artistic spectrum. Bottom line: I love all the Nightwing fanart. However, there is something I want to address with his suit. I’ve been an aerialist ever since I was 7 years old, and I’ve taken gymnastics since I was 3. Now, I specialize in Lyra, while Dick obviously specializes in Trapeze, but when it comes to costume, we’ve got many very important similarities.

DON’TS

When it comes to aerial, we want as much mobility and flexibility as possible. So here are some things that absolutely will not be on his suit.

1. Shoulder Pads. I will scream it from the rooftops if I have to. The Nightwing suit WILL NOT have shoulder pads!! Red Hood? Definitely. Red Robin? Those shoulder pads are important for bo staff strength and support. Robin? Damian probably doesn’t need them, but they won’t hurt. Nightwing? No way. To me, one of the most important parts of my body when practicing and performing are my shoulders. They pull me into hangs and holds, let me rotate myself around, and basically support the rest of my body. This is partially due to user preference: I prefer arm-based stunts and hangs rather than leg based. But it honestly doesn’t matter that much. Nightwing will absolutely need 100% use of his shoulders. Him being able to freely rotate them can be the difference between life and death with his style of fighting. Shoulder pads will just hamper that flexibility. I will admit that shoulder pads look badass, but in this one hero’s scenario? Shouldr pads are a no-go.

2. Sleek Arm Braces. Nightwing, while being well recognized as a solo hero, does often work with a team. And on a team, he isn’t the type to huff angrily and say he can do this by himself. Emotionally? Yes, of course. Physically, and in a fight? He takes all the help he can get, with absolutely no would to his pride. When performing his flips and tricks and such, the other partner will grab hold of him by usually his hands or his arms. I’m just going to straight up say: catching someone by their hands is a Bad Idea. You will not believe the speed we travel when we go through the air, and catching by the hands will lead to dislocations and pain. For a few stunts it’s okay, mainly for the visual aspect of a performance. But when it’s life and death combat? Hands are a last ditch effort if you can’t catch someone by the arms. Because that’s what really counts. The forearms. When Dick is fighting with someone, and that other person has the strength to catch him/throw him from a drop or a flip, they will catch him by the forearms. If Dick’s wearing sleek ‘n sexy arm braces, he’s going to slip right out of their grip. I prefer to keep my forearms bare, but in regards to protective armor, the fabric around the arms better have a grip.

3. Extra Fabric. This one is a given. However, I want to get into the specifics. When you’re in the air, momentum is your most powerful ally, and if there’s anything opposing or hindering that momentum, that spells trouble. Extra fabric can sometimes be good, such as around the legs. Not too much, obviously, but wearing loose or baggy pants while fighting with Nightwing’s fighting style works (as long as you can, you know, actually fight in them and not trip over the extra cloth). Around the middle? Nuh-uh, nope. Anything looping around your waist, hips, or rib cage is a liability if it’s not skin tight. The belt that Robin often wears is okay, as long as it’s wrapped pretty tight around him and doesn’t move. For the kind of stunts that Dick pulls off on a daily basis? I don’t think anything but a skintight bodysuit will help. For arms, extra fabric is ~okay~ but not preferable. And anything strapped to his back, as long as it’s securely in place, will actually help his momentum (so his escrima sticks or any other weapon/item you want to put in there is fine). Nothing around the neck, at ALL. That one issue in Batman where Dick wears a scarf is hot as hell, and sort of makes sense because they’re in the desert. But on missions, at the speed Nightwing fights and flies through the air, anything around his neck will choke him. This entire section definitely wasn’t an excuse to say you should just keep Dick in a skintight outfit, nope, not at all.

4. Spandex. While we’re on the subject of skintight outfits, I just want to point something out that isn’t necessarily important or anything. It’s just a general preference for me. I prefer costumes with a little weight on them. The adrenaline rush is intense for some of my more advanced stunts, and those are things that I bet Dick would consider basic. I prefer something with a little substance/weight/texture to it. Nothing too serious, and nothing too restricting, just something to keep me grounded and focused. We all know how much Dick likes being in the air, but I’m willing to bet he also needs a little extra touch to keep his head in the game. So if you’re designing a serious Nightwing suit, not for crack or fun headcanons or anything, I would steer clear from the spandex, gauze, and showy-light-gossamer fabrics. They do provide extra mobility and flexibility, but that’s because they’re one drop away from naked.

5. Joints. Okay this may seem a little contradictory based on the last point, but around the joints, especially hips and shoulders, the protective padding needs to ease up. It’s one of the hardest areas on the body to injure, after all, even for a professional. And second, I know I’m sounding like I’m repeating the obvious, but flexibility is of utmost importance. If the fabric doesn’t bend with Nightwing, then there’s no point. It can’t chafe, it can’t grind against itself, it can’t break. The material around major joints needs to be malleable.

Dos

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s talk about what you can absolutely add to Nightwing’s costume to give it either a little pizzazz, or just your own personal touch.

1. Boots. Yes yes yes, boots are an absolute must! And it’s not just me thinking thigh-high boots are cool. Coming out of a big drop and other major stunts requires rolling on your back and then onto your feet. But Nightwing doesn’t fight with the one-hit-and-done style. (That’s more Jason’s thing. He plants himself like a tree and puts power behind a punch, kinda like Bruce, which is why boots-especially boot soles- are important for them.) Nightwing gets in a punch and flips away, then bounces back and gets in a kick and flips away, then bounces back and gets in another kick and flips away. You see where I’m going with this. Dick is constantly on the move, constantly on the verge of flipping back. The main way he does this is with his feet: landing lightly on the balls of his feet to absorb momentum before using that to hit back. Boots with fricion-specific soles are important, he cannot slide or skid. Also, ones that go higher up aren’t bad either: extra support is always welcome. As long as they don’t cover his knees and allow for ankle flexibility, they’re good to go. They may even help stop ankle dislocation. Anything you want to add to the boots? Go ahead. As long as it’s not gauzy ribbon or something too extra, or something that can easily get caught in something else, it’s good to go. In my performances, I like to cover my shins with something, it can range from simple high socks or performance boots to go with my costume. I particularly like Damian’s long lace up boots, especially in Super Sons. It’s a cute outfit, and it won’t hinder his fighting at all. As long as Dick double knots, he can wear those, and any other variants of boots.

2. Gloves. I’m not actually sure if Dick has ever been called “Fingerstripes” in canon, but I’ve seen it in fanon plenty of times. Regardless, it’s one of my favorite nicknames for him, and it does have a basis. The stripes on his gloves are an awesome artistic choice, and useful too. Assuming they have a different texture than the rest of his gloves, those fingerstripes could help with grip. Grip is one of the most important tools an aerialist can have. I have had grown men look at me with shock when they shake my hand because of my firm grip (and the calluses, ugh). I firmly believe that Dick Grayson has one of the strongest grips in the DC non-meta world, and I bet you he surpasses even a good amount of metas. Having a good, no-slip grip is essential, even if you’re just swinging from the surface for a second, or if the surface is another partner’s hand. Gloves, once again as long as they’re not too restricting, would be awesome with helping with that.

3. Wrist Braces. I said before that Dick can’t have arm braces because of the whole partner-grip thing. But with the amount of force and pressure Dick exerts on his hands on a daily basis, dislocations and sprains should be as common as a bruise. Hell, I’m sitting here typing this and my left wrist is sprained. Fanfic writers, here’s a helpful tip: you can write Dick with a sprained or dislocated or just a plain sore wrist anytime at all, and having him rub his hands with a grimace, rubbing lotion onto them, or doing wrist exercises in his free time is a go-to for if you need anything filler. Or, you know, it could even be part of the plot. Wrist braces help with this, they keep the joints in place and add a little extra stability to his movements. As long as they’re not interfering with wrist mobility, wrist braces are a very very good idea. When you think how long, think about the length of Peter Parker’s handmade web shooters. Long enough to be there, but not immediately noticeable. Also, make sure the material is something cloth, wrap, or gauze based. Anything too hard could scrape against the skin, cause cuts and bruises, and even cut off circulation. Unless it’s armor, it’s not comfortable or easy to do aerial maneuvers with.

4. Back Harness. To be honest, I have no idea what the official name for this piece of equipment even is. But the thing that holds Nightwing’s escrima sticks to his back. The thing that holds Deadpool’s katanas (in the movies, not the comics). The back-strap-harness thingy. That’s a go-for-it when it comes to costumes. Not only does it look badass and hot when it’s on your costume and you draw your weapons from it seamlessly like a boss, it’s practical and doesn’t interfere with your fighting at all. As I said, a majority of Nightwing’s moves rely on momentum. The back harness thingy won’t harm that at all. As long as it’s strapped to your back, unmoving and steady, it stays out of the way and may actually help you with your momentum. Drawing weapons from it is easy and seamless, and one of the quickest moves you can perfect, aside from drawing your weapon from thigh/calf holsters. But as I said before, Dick would probably stick to the back because, once again, momentum.

Okay this got much longer than I thought it would. But regardless, I hope this helps if you’re ever drawing or writing about the Nightwing suit and need specifics. Or hell, if you’re a cosplayer and need some information on how to make an accurate costume, here you go. Now I need to take a breather and chill, because while I considered myself a pretty recreational comic reader and not much of an analyzer, I had no idea how much I picked up about Dick’s individual fighting style and how that fits in with my own aerial experiences.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Why Cullen?

Today I bring you a post I’ve been in the process of mentally drafting for a while, a post that essentially analyzes the age old question in the Dragon Age fandom: Why is there always something with Cullen?

To do this, I am going to go through different “phases” of Cullen discourse. My thesis and answering the titular question: It’s complicated, and I don’t think I can answer “Why Cullen,” but “there’s sometimes recycled discourses made about his character through the years, maybe there’s a pattern.” When it comes to Cullen’s detractors, I understand the fact that it might be frustrating to see much content for someone so “boring” when there’s more “interesting” and “well done” characters (though interest is of course relevant) so it leads to a lot of vitriol from both new and old fans who think the man had too much screen time already. Furthermore, he is highly complicated man dressed as a Disney prince, and the “Disney-esque” feel of his romance creates a dissonance between coming to terms with his problematic past and reveling in the romanticism. We can have a happy medium everyone,  but because of what I can only describe as “tik tok thought” it’s become looked down upon to have problematic favorites, which leads to guilt in liking something problematic, or outright revisionism.

But liking things with problematic elements doesn’t make you a bad person.

Alright, let’s begin: 

The first phase truly began of course with DAO with Cullen’s crush on the female Circle Mage Warden. Some were endeared, others not so much. I cannot speak to this phase too much as I was around 15-16 and pretty preoccupied with my high school drama instead of fandom, though I played both DAO and DA2 upon it’s release and followed updates for DA2 before it came out. Despite not being an active fandom member I was what they would call, a lurker. I knew some people liked Cullen and thought he was cute, wishing for more screen time after the game and hoping he’d be in DAI through IMDB message boards (remember those?) and YoutTube comments. When news broke he’d be an advisor in DAI and a romance option, I remember seeing a lot of people in those same spaces rejoice. I’m sure there were also people who weren’t so pleased, but from what I saw, people were happy. When Inquisition did release, I actually did quite a bit more lurking on tumblr despite the fact I didn’t have a blog, because I played the romance route, really gravitated toward it, and wanted to see fanart and such. People liked the romance, liked his arc and how Bioware handled his struggles with lyrium; and found it realistic. Even in my lurking days I did see some blowback on Cullen from detractors, those who didn’t think he should have been the military advisor (which canonically it makes total sense to me why he’s where he’s at, but I won’t get into it here however.) But likely because I wasn’t fully “in fandom,” my surface level understanding of how tumblr felt about Cullen was relatively positive and there was only standard fare discourse.

Phase 2: I can speak about this phase better because I established this blog in 2017. Two years after DAI was released, you still had a lot of fans who loved his romance and character, but you also saw a lot of those fans really dive into his flaws, insisting even that just focusing on the Disney Prince aspects of him reduced his character. There were also more internal debates. Would realistically Cullen be a good father was one. One thing however was for sure, there was a strange them and us line between detractors and fans, and to many fans, myself included, oftentimes the Cullen blowback would extend beyond the valid, “hey I don’t think his characterization was handled well” or “his redemption arc isn’t that great” to outright vitriolic hate that blatantly ignored his PTSD and lyrium addiction, and even sometimes “you just like Cullen because he’s white.” As a POC fan it was a fantastic thing to be accused of. I used to be more involved with discord during this period and I remember a few discussions about this as well. Even those indifferent to Cullen didn’t get it.

Overall, I have to say the air was one where people in Cullen fandom enjoyed all aspects of him, from delving into this troubled past to indulging in the Disney prince aspects of him. It was a happy medium I think, even if occasionally I would see a Cullen fan feel bad for liking him, and feel like they needed to justify it. Heck I even did and still do feel that way sometimes, like I need to justify what I like. But we all come into fandom for different reasons. I come into fandom some days for different things. Sometimes I want smut with my favorite character, other times I want more intense thought pieces and challenging fics. Great thing about fandom is that it’s a bakery that has cherry tarts, cinnamon rolls, or all kinds of pie depending on your mood. Craving a different sweet treat, you can make your own. Or you can commission an artist or writer for something you fancy.

*(sexual assault mentions here late in the paragraph****)And now I’ve been warped back into Cullen/DA fandom through what I am calling phase three, where the general air on Cullen reads as….very different. After having one foot outside DA fandom for a while coming back and reading the air has been different. There was the bizarre nuggetgate and other things with Cullen. Now, instead of accepting his flaws and exploring him there seems to be a lot of revisionism going on, as if his past never happened or we’re supposed to ignore he was a templar. A sexually active Cullen is looked down upon but in a different way from before. Instead of smut works with him “reducing his complicated character.” it’s distasteful to write smut with him where he’s sexually dominant or even just a lot of smut because he was sexually assaulted. (***Now, it is implied that he was, if you are a female Circle mage in DAO, with “sifting through my thoughts, tempting me with the one thing I always wanted but could never have” but this is an implication. I will be honest, it is what I have implied. However, it’s not there if you’re not a female Mage. He was however canonically sexually harassed in the Winter Palace, something I will always argue, even if canon treats it like a joke, even if Leliana tells him to “just look pretty.” Just because he is a man doesn’t make it funny that someone grabbed his bottom, and if you take Cole he flat out says “Cullen is afraid.”***)

So here I am, wondering what changed and what’s going on. Here’s what I believe: Cullen is a complicated character and his flaws and his past make him interesting to me, and they are interesting to explore. However there is nothing wrong with wanting to just explore a romantic, sexual Cullen. He’s a character with many facets. He’s romantic, determined, nostalgic, stubborn, unrelenting, loyal, driven, all things that made him seem so real. Here we get to my theory: in today’s media “criticisms” I see people—particularly younger people—beat themselves up for liking something problematic. It’s like every time you engage with media that’s potentially problematic you have to write essays to yourself why it is so and hold yourself accountable. I see this on tik-tok a lot and why I refer to it as “tik tok thought.” Look at the way some young Hamilton fans talk about the musical, or heck even here, and you may see what I mean. It’s like if you don’t acknowledge the problematic aspects of the historical figures behind their fictional portrayals in the show you’re a bad person. Same thing with nostalgic Disney fans my age in younger, if you don’t clown on Ariel for “choosing a man over anything” (SHE LIKED THE SURFACE WORLD BEFORE SHE MET ERIC) you don’t get your brownie points.

I want to make it clear: being critical of media is good. I am glad I see young people and people my age think about the messages we are given in media, but somehow this is turned into ANALYZE EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME. Ya’ll I’m a grad student. I’m critical most of the time, when I come to my tumblr blog’s lawn I’m here mostly to have some fun, and hey sometimes my fun is being critical. But sometimes it isn’t. You do not have to always be critical. You do not have to beat yourself up for liking something that’s problematic or write an essay about why it is as if that’s your due diligence in stanning a fictional character. I’m going to be honest I used to kind of think I had to justify my likes once, especially because of the Cullen vitriol on tumblr. I worked overtime in my early fanfic efforts to try to prove to the world I knew Cullen was problematic for fear I’d be perceived as just an idiot horny fangirl. Well, let me tell you: I largely don’t think that way anymore. If I want to just enjoy writing some smut or reading some smut with him, I am. But I think there is a second part of this in Cullen fandom currently, a revisionism of his problematic elements. Now, if you have to do mental gymnastics with a character in an effort to ignore problematic elements, perhaps you don’t like the character that much. That’s totally okay. DA has many awesome characters to write about and stan.

So, why Cullen? For so many reasons a bit of a shit show has always followed this character. There’s a divide between fans and his detractors and sometimes there’s a divide within the Cullen fandom. What I can extrapolate for now is the need to keep him squeaky clean and safe and away from anything “problematic” because his of past, his templar roots, or the fact that he’s white when there are POC characters with less content. It reads as a guilt associated with liking him. But please, do not be guilty. He’s not real. Templars aren’t real, mages aren’t real, Cullen isn’t real. Here’s my advice, something I learned while in my directing class in college. What my teacher always said was direct what turns you on, direct a story that gets you thinking, gets you excited. What gets you thinking and excited in a fictional world may be tons of conflict and dramatics, or it may be peace and love. Sometimes it can be both or more. Don’t shame others for coming to a bakery and wanting blueberry when you want cherry, and the baker has both, especially if the baker labels each pie, especially if the recipe for the pie has some salt in it and people like the salt. We can have it all and enjoy it all. What we want in our fiction doesn’t always align with something we may want real life. Lots of people write Modern girl in Thedas stories. Ya’ll if that actually happened to one of us it would probably suck. I’d probably get killed and not even get to meet Cullen and pose around the desk to get things going, so I’d rather it not happen. However, it is fun to read about.

Again, don’t be guilty for liking Cullen, please. But if you have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to like Cullen, maybe you don’t like him at all. To that I say, there are many other amazing characters, or perhaps you could write your own.

[lady-divine-writes]

Kama Sutra for the Married Man

Summary: Aziraphale thinks that he should take his and Crowley’s relationship to another level.

From the book his angel is reading, Crowley isn’t sure exactly what level that is.

Neither does Aziraphale. (1744 words)

Notes: Inspired in part by this wonderful piece of fanart by @millerizo. Rated PG13. Fluff and a lot of second hand embarrassment.

(AO3)

“Whotcha got there, angel?”

“Crowley! Oh!” Aziraphale twists in his seat, jumping nearly six feet straight in the air when his husband walks through the door. “I didn’t hear you come in!”

“Obviously. Is that a new book?” Crowley grabs it out of Aziraphale’s hands before the angel can think to hide it. “Must be good. You look like I caught you with your hand in the cookie jar.”

“What!? What are you talking about? That? Th-that’s nothing! It’s just a boring old book. Just got it in. Taking a browse before I put it on the shelf.” He tries to swipe it back, but his husband is too quick, perching on the back of the sofa across the way and opening it, picking up where Aziraphale left off.

“Whoa!” Crowley barks a laugh at the first picture he sees. “Well that was a little white lie, wasn’t it, angel?” He leans in close, squinting at the diagrams crowding the page, then flips to the cover to check the title for more context. “Kama Sutra for the Married Man?” He chuckles once, high pitched and giddy, and on Aziraphale’s small cushion, the world skids on its axis and stops cold. “Now where do you expect this fits in with all the children’s books Adam stocked in this place?”

“Well, I …”

“Wait, wait, wait! Don’t tell me!” Crowley interrupts, choking on his own joke. “Between The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew, right?”

Aziraphale pinches his knees together, praying that, at some point, he’ll dissolve into the ground beneath his feet. “A-actually …”

“Seriously, though - why in the world are you reading this?”

Crowley stares at Aziraphale, waiting for an answer.

Aziraphale stares at the floor, hoping to spontaneously discorporate.

He sighs, shifts in his seat and rolls his eyes. It’s just a book, he tells himself. A book full of explicit and vulgar pictures. Crowley is his husband. It shouldn’t be hard to talk about this. He clears his throat, attempting to shoo a metric ton of discomfort and embarrassment from his brain.  

“Because we’re married now, Crowley. Married people …” Aziraphale continues, but using only vague hand gestures to express his meaning. The half-smirk growing on Crowley’s face as he watches him suffer through this explanation spears him to the bone. “Isn’t that something you want to … do?”

“I’ve never asked for this, have I?” Crowley spins the book 180 degrees, trying to make sense of the next picture on the page.

“No, but I thought it was because you were being …”

Crowley’s head snaps up, his slotted, reptilian eyes fixed on his husband’s face. “Don’t say it!”

“… nice.”

Crowley groans, flailing dramatically, nearly falling head over heels backwards. “I told you not to say it!”

“Or you don’t want me,” Aziraphale murmurs under his breath. It’s soft, downright imperceptible, but Crowley hears, and it makes him take notice. He takes a good long look at his husband for the first time tonight. Aziraphale has already showered, his hair combed down neatly and he’s dressed for bed, but in his best dressing gown. A sublte sniff tells Crowley he’s splashed on his best cologne.

Those clues and this book?

Crowley slowly begins to understand.

Whatever this is about (and Crowley has a good idea …) it’s not spontaneous. He’s been planning this.

But they haven’t spoken about it. Aziraphale came up with this on his own, based off an assumption.

And now he’s making another one.

Crowley shakes his head, amused grin on his face trying its hardest to be sympathetic, but he can’t help himself. Aziraphale is the most clever being he’s ever known. Why is it then he can also be so incredibly dense?

“Does anything you’ve seen in this book make you comfortable, angel?”

Aziraphale recalls the few diagrams he’d seen before Crowley snatched the book away. They make him shudder, and not in a good way. He knows about physical affection, intimacy, and sex, but the stuff in that book looked medieval … and that coming from someone who lived during the Spanish Inquisition. Frankly, the thought of it all – the sweet and the severe - makes Aziraphale anxious, sweating like a condemned man minutes from a beheading (yet another situation he has first-hand knowledge of) and angels don’t even sweat! But Crowley’s a demon. They’re more like humans in that regard, Aziraphale finds. Demon needs are different than that of angels, right?

Aziraphale doesn’t know for certain. He couldn’t find the time – or the courage – to ask.

He pulls himself up straight and squares his shoulders, hands gripping his knees till his knuckles turn white, but he can’t look his husband in the eyes. “No, but …” He swallows hard enough to make his throat and chest ache “… I’d be willing to do it … for you? If that’s what you wanted?”

Crowley nods at the response of his adorable but oblivious husband. “A-ha. Well, let me have a look-see, alright?” He flips through the pages of the book, not really focusing on the pictures, more stalling to give himself time to think. They’ve only talked about sex once that he can remember. It wasn’t even in the context of their relationship (since, at the time, they hadn’t owned up to having one) but Aziraphale turned into a stuttering mess. Crowley would be willing to revisit that discussion if Aziraphale wishes. But there’s a tremendous difference between making love and the carnal gymnastics outlined in this book. Why Aziraphale thought this was the direction Crowley would want to go is beyond him. “There’s a pretty picture, if I do say so!” he growls, delighting in the shade of ruby red his angel becomes. “Though I think there’s about four people wrapped up in that ball of coital agony. I’m having a little trouble pinpointing all the limbs … And this one? No. I’d have to be in serpent form to pull that one off. And this …” He throws his head back and honestly laughs out loud “… well, we could get into this one, but we’d have to miracle our way out, and I can just imagine the angry letters you’d get over that!” Crowley flips through more pages, muttering commentary for the sake of torturing his husband, who’s become as petrified as an ancient tree stump. In the dead middle of the book, Crowley finally comes up with a plan. He bites his lower lip, suppressing a smile. “Ah, I think this one’s more our speed.” He climbs down from the back of the couch to settle on the cushions where he can look his angel in the eye. “Number 117.”

“A-and, pray tell, wh-what is that?” Aziraphale asks, trying to peek over the top of the book to see. But like any good poker player, Crowley keeps it close to his chest, out of his angel’s view.

“It’s where I carry you to bed,” Crowley says smoothly, “tuck you under the covers, and bring you a tray of tea and biscuits. We read a book, you fall asleep in my arms, and we call it a day.”

Aziraphale’s eyebrows snap together so quickly, Crowley swears they make a sound. “Is that really in there?”

Crowley closes the book, index finger wedged between the pages to save the spot, challenging his angel to call his bluff. “If you’re determined to go through with this, we’ll do what’s underneath my finger. Do you honestly want to check and risk proving me wrong?”

Aziraphale’s eyes fall on the book and stay there. No, he doesn’t. He doesn’t want to prove Crowley wrong. He knows Crowley is lying. Demons lie – that’s what they do. Even the better ones. But not all lies are necessarily bad. Some lies spare people from hurt feelings, keep them from doing things they’re not prepared to do. But now, he feels more than a bit foolish. He hadn’t exactly been gung ho about the plan he’d come up with for tonight, but this is a bit of a letdown.

But that has to do with his own self-doubt and feelings of inadequacy.

In the six thousand years they’ve known one another, Crowley has never done a single thing, said a single word to make Aziraphale feel inadequate. There’ve been the odd jokes, of course, the way friends will, but none of them ever hit at the heart of Aziraphale. He pictured that same energy carrying them through this small change in their relationship.

But as it turned out, that change wasn’t so small. Transitioning from friends to husbands flipped a handful of otherwise dormant switches in Aziraphale’s mind, made him start to question whether or not who he was was enough.

Crowley is just so much, and Aziraphale?

He’s so soft.

Crowley obviously fell in love with the angel he is, and has never asked him to change, but Aziraphale began to think that his demon needed something more.

At the time, he felt his logic was sound.

He should have realized that love is all that matters, and his husband loves him enough to give him an out.

Shouldn’t he take it?

“Number 117 it is!” he says, patting his poor strangled knees. “I’ll start the kettle!”

“And I’ll get the biscuits.” Crowley tosses the book aside, miracling it with a snap of his fingers into a signed first edition of The Adventures of Beekle – The Unimaginary Friend, which he feels better fits both his angel and his shop.

Both stand, meeting in the middle on their way to the kitchen. Aziraphale stops Crowley with a hand to his bicep, looks into his husband’s eyes, and smiles. “Thank you, Crowley.”

He starts on his way but Crowley winds an arm around his waist and holds him still against him.

“Make no mistake, angel,” he whispers, lips dancing kissing-distance from his ear. “I want you, but my reasons have nothing to do with sex. Nothing at all. If it’s not important to you, it’s not important to me. Understand?”

Aziraphale blushes for the nineteenth time during this conversation, but in a softer, less scandalized shade of pink. With the touch of Crowley’s arm doing weird things to his head, Aziraphale utters the only two words that pop to mind.

Incidentally, they’re the only two words he could come up with at their wedding, when Crowley’s fond eyes on Aziraphale’s face affected him this same exact way.

“I do.”

[itskicks]

Haru being taught to use a whip by Dino bc she’s probably already got a good grip on it because of her gymnastics THATS SUCH A GOOD IDEA?? I LOVE THAT???

ofodhdodjd i forget who drew fanart and can’t find it rn, but i remember seeing her fighting with a ribbon dancer and thought “hold up, dino could teach her how to use it like a whip!!!”! i feel like their personalities (gentleman boss dino who cares about the common people and big hearted haru who would do anything she can for the people she loves) would work really well too and that they’d end up having a super tight brother/sister relationship!!

also random idea for the ring arc: he would probably try to juggle between her and hibari until eventually he realizes it’s impossible and they’re all three sparring to save time. hibari thinks she’s a pest at first (she’s someone getting in his way during battle) and haru lowkey thinks he’s scary and high key thinks he’s rude af because of his attitude and is determined to be the better student/improve more than him. because of this one(-ish, because haru will make him acknowledge her even if it kills the both of them) sided rivalry and haru’s stubborn determination, she (the ring candidate with the least fighting experience) shows the greatest improvement in the shortest amount of time and dino’s incredibly proud ☺️

[destinycaught]

give us the salt about raihan ship dynamics

guhhh . this will get long. tw for like. racism && oversexualization. ALSO NSFW,. LIKE THIS IS REALLY NSFW. 

full stop: fandom raihan makes me so uncomfortable && i hate it with my whole life. the nerd does one kinda hot pose && suddenly everyone’s being nasty. i mean, it would have been inevitable but here we go regardless.

OK, let’s break it down. I’ll do some ships. 

rai x lee 

Ouuugh. Next to Kabu && Raihan, I feel like this one has the most can of worms. People just … infantilize Leon to death in this ship, && they dont only do that, but they in turn also make Raihan this super confident && grossly domineering person ? Which is of course gross on its own, but I think uh, we all know why that’s bad from a stereotype stand-point … but I think like. It’s probably supposed to be some, “Oh! Leon kicks his ass all the time, now it’s time for Raihan to put his ass in place >:)” Which would be fine in like, I guess an isolated incident, but having Raihan constantly look so dominating && in charge can be . .  eugh. 

rai x piers

Uh. I’m going to be real, I really don’t look at much fanart of these two ? Most just comes from what i see reblogged. I think the issue is kinda similar to Leon && Raihan, but at least there isn’t that super weird power dynamic. People either have the “raihan breaks that twink in two” or “piers is a dom” or whatever. It’s weird. I don’t go there so it’s not my problem. 

rai x kabu

GROOOOOOOANS ! THIS ONE IS THE WORST I HATE IT THE MOST. So, people on some level seem to get it’s super gross to have a man who’s like, twice someone’s age to be in a relationship, so they just do the same thing with Leon. I have never seen people reach so hard to make a ship less weird by having kabu be super inexperienced. The problem is that it goes from inexperienced to be kinda… again domineered by raihan. Personally, I don’t think the reverse would make me any less uncomfortable, but hey, at least they aren’t doing so much mental gymnastics. 

TLDR: People think it’s really sexy to make Raihan a gross oversexualized domineering figure, && it’s really bothersome to me. There’s this ignorance of his other traits in favor for what ones are more appealing, which is also by virtue of his lack of character development in the game. Also not included, but people really forget how to use this when drawing him. 

Which also pisses me off, because if I have to see your gross interpretations, at least make him look right. Smh. 

[fearfearer]

i have caught up with the magnus archives.

when i started listening, i started a text file to note down any thoughts/confusion/analysis/jokes i had as i listened. i isolated a few bits of it into standalone text posts that i already posted, but here is the whole thing, my long-form liveblog

thoughts on the magnus archive as i listen

jonny sims gives an impassioned performance of someone's statement-- a diegetic impassioned performance, as we witness it being interrupted and resuming-- and follows it up with his own judgement of merciless doubt. classic. why the impassioned performance? he's just a nerd. i dearly hope this is the fandom consensus

every episode ends at the perfect volume to which i have adjusted it, and then i start the next episode and it blares in my ears. i think the volume of the intro must be like 1.75x the volume of the rest

*makes a serious effort to listen to and remember the name and date at the beginning of the statement recording* *forgets completely within 2 minutes*

i saw a fanart of gerard keay and learned [1] that he must be a good guy after all, since they drew him lookin cute, and [2] that his name is not, in fact, jared key. what, am i supposed to be looking at the transcripts? understanding names properly? in my defense, jonny sims clearly articulates "Jared" when he says it. maybe i'm not as good at decoding british accents as i thought. [footnote added in later: ok good i'm not the only one who hears "Jared" and thinks "Jared" instead of "Gerard"]

when gerard keay was described as having numerous eye tattoos on his joints, obviously my first thought was, "including the ankle? so he's count olaf?" because that's definitely a way count olaf would disguise his eye tattoo: by tattooing eyes everywhere else too and becoming The Eye Tattoo Guy. anyway this is part of why i was not at first inclined to think favorably of gerard keay

"The first thing about this statement that makes me dubious is that it comes from a fellow academic." if you know shit fuck you

it has come to my attention that there are ships. makes sense... after all, everyone in every fandom is horny af*. i'm not in deep enough to ship yet but naturally i'm keeping an eye on it

*horny af for depictions of intimacy, sexual or otherwise, but mostly sexual

definitely feel like i need to be writing down every name i hear because they're never not cropping back up but for now i'll just let it all wash over me

so sasha has been replaced with not-sasha, huh? pretty sure. though i'm not good at distinguishing voices. but that sounded pretty different, and my listening comprehension wrt that table isn't that bad. <<as time passes i doubt myself more and more on this point but not enough to go back and listen again

"You believe me?" "Yes, I think I do." (smashes button labeled "CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT" and a loud buzzer sounds)

IT'S MICHAEL!!! i hope michael is a long-term good guy... he's not seeming like a good guy right now... he says he's mostly neutral. vaguely recall seeing a tumblr post about michael in the recent past but that didn't give me any hints and i don't remember it well anyway. michael's voice is good though. good laugh

i'm not good at visualizing characters based on descriptions, let alone based merely on their voices, so the only image i have in my head of jonathan is a furrowed brow

i'm on episode 49 and i don't like jonathan's distrust of his colleagues... i don't understand why his immediate suspicion was that gertrude's murder was an inside job. hasn't he just learned firsthand that the institute is not impenetrable? it's not inconceivable that someone could enter and shoot her and leave. especially when it took place in underground tunnels connected to unknown locations.

there's a good Old Lady Voice Combo on episode 62

so agnes montague was heavily cursed... that's my conclusion after episode 67

elias seems to tell jonathan to "get some sleep" a lot. though it IS generally good advice

episode 70, 9 minutes, 41 seconds: jonny sims's cell phone goes off in the background

small brain: ghost ship medium brain: ghost train galaxy brain: dirt train

i wanted to see if there was fanart of michael so i looked it up... i might as well have googled "blonde slenderman"

sweeney todd mentions tally: II

for some reason, hearing michael described this time as "a tall man with curly blonde hair and an unnerving laugh" puts an image in my head without my consent, and that image is chris fleming. now, he's not quite blonde, is he? but that doesn't change my casting decision, which is now set in stone. hope he does a good british accent

"YES i know what a meme is."

why is melanie the first/only one to notice that sasha is now not-sasha? is it because she is experienced in firsthand paranormal encounters (whereas the archivists are experienced in decidedly SECONDhand paranormal encounters, save for the worm debacle)? oh, my question was answered handily in the next episode. ok.

the replacer definitely limits its glamour to everyone except one person just so that it can be amused by the distress and confusion of the one person who can see the truth. that must also be the reason it chooses a completely different appearance. it surely COULD replace a person with their exact likeness; it just uses another face for fun, and to be satisfied that it can get away with it.

this table has appeared in like 10 episodes... Guess It's Crucial

jonny sims yelling while swinging an axe. jonny sims goes through michael's door (eyes emoji)

the idea of the replacer killing jonathan and not even replacing him brings to mind "AT LEAST RIDE IT YOU ASSHOLE"

wasn't expecting to hear from leitner at this point... he's dropping tons of lore here. too much lore. so much is happening. i have to say i kinda like it better when the stakes are not quite so high as this.

so at the end of season 2, tim and martin believe that jonny sims killed this guy, who they probably don't know is leitner... and we the audience believe that elias, now almost certainly a double murderer, has very quietly stabbed leitner to death. do i the audience believe it? i'll keep an open mind for now. things are not always as they seem. except when sasha was replaced with not-sasha, which was exactly as it seemed. [footnote added in later: looks like elias being a double murderer was exactly as it seemed.]

so jonathan sims is the name of the actual guy voicing jonathan sims. it's a cecil situation. so are they someday going to go back and retcon every episode to change his name, like with palmer/baldwin? or does jonathan sims just not mind being a character as well? as long as it doesn't devolve into RPS i guess it's fine. if there's fanart of jonmartin i hope it doesn't depict them as their actors bc that's too close for comfort to RPS

there's been a truly hellish c*ndy cr*sh ad that has played like 40 times between episodes and i'm pretty well convinced to never ever play that curséd game

elias has some serious blackmail for daisy, huh? that's heavy, having police characters in fiction who do extrajudicial killings. life imitates art imitates life

"i'm not on drugs or anything. ...what? i could be on drugs!"

he said "ample opportunity" but like "amplopportunity" with emphasis on the "plop"

it was obviously elias who delivered the statement to jonathan in hiding, because he knew he would record it despite not being at work... bc he's a nerd

so if gerard keay has eye tattoos, does that mean he also serves the uhh the observing or whatever? [verdict arrived at later: no he just has those because he's cool. or because his mom tattooed him. ok almost certainly the latter.]

"what do i feed it?" obviously you feed it filled up cassette tapes, jon... nothing has ever been more obvious

it's okay that jon very stupidly burned his hand to a crisp. you don't need even one hand to turn on a cassette recorder. you can do that with your nose

so if these people who are wax figures serve the desolation, and not-sasha was spending time at the wax museum, does that mean there is a connection between the replacer and desolation? i think that would make sense, since both seem to enjoy making people feel bad feelings. also i'm starting to think that agnes was not actually cursed, but that would mean she burned that guy on purpose after being nice to him... was she just really selfish in that way? using him to experience Dating and mutilating him when he crossed the line, so she punished him as a cruel goodbye? or just building up his hopes so they will be even more fun to burn down when the time comes?

"perhaps doing a bit of mindless filing will help distract you." honestly that is something i would like to do in real life... i do enjoy a good mindless task. though doing mostly mindless tasks 40 hours a week is not a fun time for me lately. but it would be better if i didn't have to listen to bad radio at the same time

what?! the friendly midnight acrobat described in episode 90 sounds totally non-threatening and i hope there's fanart of it. was that gym just jared the bone turner helping people live their twisted athletic fetishes?! [footnote added in later: YES! god i hope people draw these turn-boned creatures optimized for their gymnastic of choice. show me a person who remade their body specifically for the balance beam]

so the power endowed in the archivist by the viewening is that when you sit them down across from someone they want to interview, that someone will invariably spill SOME beans and think it was their idea. maybe? [footnote added in later: yes.]

ok so Michael "The Distortion" Michael, of fractals and golden ringlets, has specifically tormented this other michael, lichtenberg michael?

jon is clearly moved to ask questions by an external force because he's a sensible guy who would not try to ask questions when daisy is holding a gun on him

i think basira has precisely the same accent as estelle... or maybe just a similarly staccato way of speaking (or of line-reading)

[episode 93] elias: (holding jon's face between two pieces of bread) what are you? jon: (sigh) the archivist...

well, they did something i didn't expect them to do with this show: create a compelling in-universe reason for jon to read statements aloud. because obviously until now there was none.

jon did the cockney accents. (insert emoji for indescribable feeling)

here's the purpose of the pit: if we all climb in the muddy pit together at night, the earthquake will only jiggle us gently and no one will be inside collapsing buildings to be crushed. it's only logical

ok i was gonna say this before but why is jon still at georgie's house??? he's not on the run for murder anymore, right? he has an apartment with all his stuff in it, right? [footnote added in later: i still don't understand why it was like this.]

i will confess that usually once the credits start to roll i zip to the next episode, but this time i zoned out a bit and it's really funny that jonny sims reads out "Rate and Review Us Online" in his archivist voice

a third michael. this one is probably already dead though. unless distortion michael takes over this guy's body or something. oh, jon came in at the end of the episode to say precisely this.

was episode 100 mostly improvised? if so, that would be appropriate. but i wouldn't put it past them to write every stuttering bit of those four statements

MARTIN...................................................................................................................................................... (typed this as martin gave some of his own money to the lady who expected payment for a statement)

i'm skipping 100.1 through 100.5 for now... just for now.

ok so michael is michael but not lightning mike michael, and two of these michaels are dead, but one is something that has never been alive nor dead. got it

everyone's morality is much more gray than i at first anticipated. the only people who seem to be solidly and earnestly on the side of good, as much as possible, are jonathan and martin and basira and georgie and maybe tim?

so michael just died and was overtaken by pseudo-helen? neo-helen? ok. that's kinda too bad, as i enjoyed michael's terrible laugh and unpredictability. but the feeling of michael being revealed as having been michael shelley feels somewhat similarly disappointing (but a bit less staggeringly groan-inducing) to when the mysterious koro-sensei in assassination classroom was revealed to have been a twink in his past. because of course he was. (that's when i stopped reading that manga. too precipitously dumb to sustain my suspension of disbelief.) it's like, ok, you had an interestingly mysterious character going on, but having solved the mystery, what interestingness is left? not much. fortunately this was resolved by promptly ending the existence of this michael and instead introducing new and improved helen

ooh martin has the asky ability too huh? nice [footnote added in later: he only used it this one time, and i'm wondering if they did that and then forgot and decided that jon is actually the only one with asky ability.] [[another footnote added in much later: How did i manage to mistake jon’s voice for martin’s voice? How?]]

the way martin said "kumo ga tabeteiru" in episode 110... alexander j newall does not watch anime

"I'm a book." ~Gerard Keay, 2017

it was a few episodes ago now but i noticed that when jon clearly articulated "Jared" referring to gerard, elias was like "Jared? you mean Gerard Keay?" (pronouncing it like "Gerard.") there is definitely a disagreement between these two (actors) about how to pronounce that name

the eye, the spiral, the end, the stranger, the lonely, the desolation, the slaughter, the vast, the buried, the dark, the corruption, the web, the flesh, the hunt.

Q: why would anyone want one of these rituals to succeed? A: it's their fetish. it's their sexual fetish

ok time to make up names for each possible apocalypse. these are the real and true names according to me, who knows such things: the eye - the viewening the spiral - down the drain the end - the really end end the stranger - oh wait we know this one. it's the unknowing. the lonely - the alonening the desolation - Out of the Frying Pan, Into the Lightless Flame the slaughter - world war all the vast - the expansion the buried - the grand lahar (or the Smothering) the dark - the extinguishment the corruption - the Great Rot the web - the spidening the flesh - the smorgasbord (or the Eatening) the hunt - come and get it

gerry said there was no dark god of indigestion, but i can tell you from personal experience that there is. though it's true that there is also fear involved, so maybe no separate pantheon is necessary

i sense that there is a battle between people who say it like "gotta get myself oriented" and "i feel disoriented" (as feels correct/natural to me) and people who say "gotta get myself orienTATed" and "i feel disorienTATed," and this podcast falls SQUARELY on the latter team. they've said it like 20 times

idk why he has to be such a dick to helen. jeez

the guy who coded his mind into a computer, which of the 14 was that? the corruption? the stranger? gotta be the corruption, but that doesn't fit perfectly with its rot/bugs aesthetic...

speed -> speeding -> sped. heed -> heeding -> hed. thus i decree

in my dream i listened to a whole episode of this show, narrated by gertrude, and i was like "whoa this is cool" and i went to write it down but i was still in the dream and writing doesn't work in dreams :( also any successful writing in dreams doesn't transfer to real life paper :( the only snippet i remember: “...in his white mouth, which had known only bread...”

"I, uh..." Jonathan Sims, a thousand times, 20XX

martin's job is PLAINLY to distract elias and elias barges in like "martin. i see you're trying to distract me." and martin's like "maybe i am!"

o, jonny took a breath. that's good

he wasn't hooked up to an EKG or anything? you spend long enough with no heartbeat that they're just like "i guess we can turn this off"

this episode about philosophical zombies sounds a lot like that NPC meme from a year or two ago... and it makes me kind of uncomfortable, the way this person inspects others to determine whether they are True Minds or Impostors based on their emotional expressions, their eyes... because i don't always do the correct or appropriate expressions, and would someone judge me as being a non-person who is trying and failing to imitate human emotions?

i generally don't enjoy ships that have more-or-less explicit canon support, but i can't say jon/martin isn't good

melanie blaming jon isn't right... no one had a better plan to stop the unknowing, did they? (they didn't!) didn't all of them agree on the plan and understand that they might die? (they did!) she's just imposing survivor's guilt upon him because he survived for supernatural reasons. but it's not like he eagerly embraced his new supernaturalness, or even asked for it outright! i think she's being unreasonable. i didn't like her insistence on trying to kill elias either, even though elias is a huge dick. what's with her?

wait, peter lukas is the lonely? (meme where calculations and equations whiz past me)

jonathan baa'd

oh, see. the bullet is making melanie act without reason. i get it now. can't say i think they had the best approach to getting the bullet out, but all's well that ends well (???)

martin is being prohibited from talking to jon >:I martin is on a first-name basis with peter lukas >:I...

martin grumbles, "i don't like being manipulated..." while obviously and continuously allowing himself to be manipulated

jon is afraid of and uncomfortable with what he's becoming, at least to a degree, right? but he seems to be going about his duties (i.e. feeding the eye) with vigor and without reluctance. is he really that motivated by his own desire to know and understand? who is he doing this for? is the eye's influence on him so strong that "doing what the eye wants" seems to manifest as what HE wants to do?

"He'd place it over the one he wore already, and he would larf and larf and larf" (from breacon’s statement... just heard it like this for some reason)

deep water could be the domain of both the buried and the vast, because you could lose yourself in the vast ocean, but experience the physical effects of being buried under thousands of feet of water...

so tom han was an avatar of the flesh but he ultimately died after being tortured by the spiral... right?

"we're not people, though, are we? not anymore." close enough, i'd say.

jonathan has deployed THREE "I, uh..."s in episode 131 alone and i want to smack him in real life. FOUR NOW. JON. JONATHAN SIMS THE REAL ACTOR. LISTEN... quit falling back on your "I, uh..."s. and if they're written into the script i'll punch whoever did that too. total of five in a single episode. never utter "I, uh..." again

i hope whoever's throat is okay after doing bone turner voice for a whole statement.

jonny sure needs saving quite often, doesn't he.

peter lukas being a slightly chipper advocate for becoming a follower of the lonely is very strange

neil lagorio and his whole cinematographic history is made up but they namedropped kevin costner, who is real

VERY, VERY GOOD laugh at 23:44 of episode 136

melanie getting her session recorded... i was doing audio transcription for a while and you'd definitely come across bits of therapy-type sessions that very much seemed like they should have been confidential.

i wonder if the eye ultimately turned its back on gertrude and allowed her to be killed. if jon could survive a collapsing building, could gertrude not have survived a couple of bullets? wouldn't the difference be the protection of the eye? [footnote added in later: of course now i see who turned their back on whom.]

i'm somewhat heartened to learn that agnes montague was, in fact, a heavily cursed individual, though she seemed to have embraced it to a degree... and she wasn't made of wax.

i like that jon now includes helen in his office politics briefing

basira's like "Edmund Halley" and jon's like "Halley's comet?" (like “Hale-ey”) and two minutes later jon's like "Edmund Hally" (not "Hale-y")

"What's this?" "OH... That's, uh... that's... my rib..." "Right." (tiny clunk of rib being set down)

so giving a statement puts a curse on you... or is it "having a statement extracted / being compelled" that puts a curse on you? and the resulting curse, the fear it reawakens, is that good for the eye, or is that good for the powers that initially caused the fear?

well, i heard a homestuck reference in one of the patreon names at the beginning of an episode, and who is surprised? of course, i'm not one to talk

episode 144- the english think their summer is bad... as a professional "hot weather is bad" person, i feel doubtful, because if the sky is grey, it is not as hot as it Could Be, and therefore one should quit one's bitching

first statement about the extinction... interesting. but hearing martin be a jerk to daisy makes me sad :(

the powers never tell avatars exactly what they need to be doing, but that's just concerning the means. the ends are always clear: the power gets fed. and all of the powers feed on fear. also jonny is horny for statements. i hope, but also doubt, that his harmful behavior is at least partially the spider's doing. oh, i see now that it's not. yeah.

jon wants to eat fresh and delicious statements produced just for him, instead of reconstituting the dusty old statements already in the archive

episode 148 - samson stiller gets a crush. but in all seriousness, is he becoming an avatar of the eye but like, not institute-related? is that a thing? i guess that would make sense, but still seems weird

episode 149 - considering ring -> rang -> rung, we seem to have stumbled upon spin -> span -> spun, and the compasses gently span around (9:40)

does martin have loneliness powers now? it's sad that he is getting lonely... as a lonely person, i know.

the lady on TV in episode 150 was just speaking simlish.

i really want jon to overcome his urge to forcefully take statements because i want to be able to root for him still

british podcasts really have a leg up over american podcasts, at least among american audiences, purely based on their interesting and varied accents

i can't say the gravedigger's envy doesn't make me myself feel like going to sleep in the cold dirt forever. but bad depression lately is also a factor, so

jonathan having to settle for reading already archived statements instead of harvesting fresh ones is exactly like a vampire (not the kind detailed in this series) who has to choose between hunting people to suck their blood or drinking bags of donated blood from a (near-endless) stockpile. there's an ethical choice with a clear right answer, but the urge is also understandable

jon following up gertrude's tape with just "fuck" was really good. now he's like "ok martin. let's run away together"

spent all day at work thinking about how i can't fuckin believe the first thing jon did when he heard how to escape the institute was to go tell martin like "there will be a great cost, but... we can elope now"

also if tim was still around jon would tell him the way out and he would do it right then and there, i'm 100% sure. like before jon was finished explaining tim would be like "the eyes? (grabs scissors) got it. (does the deed)"

earlier today i was just thinking that we would almost certainly hear gertrude's death on tape, especially given that we now understand tape recorders are wont to turn on autonomously whenever something important is happening. anyway then i came home and heard gertrude's death on tape

peter, as an avatar of the lonely, is easy to play like a cheap whistle because as someone who clearly hates spending time around other people, he is not keen to the symptoms of being played.

elias is like "you'll have to go into the lonely to get him" and jon's probably thinking "but then at least we'll be in the lonely... ~*~*~together~*~*~"

i think martin's whole thing for most of the series has been that he sounds a little doofy, for lack of a better word, and people constantly underestimate his intelligence. and now he has played peter lukas like a cheap whistle and forced me to realize that by taking for granted that he was being successfully manipulated by peter lukas, i too was underestimating martin... and his pure love for jon <:3c no but seriously i even remember explicitly making a mental note to remember that martin is smartin but it fell by the wayside as my emotions (of sadness that jon and martin seemed to be growing further apart) took precedent

i work a non-verbal job just doing mundane tasks and that gives me all the time in the world to think about things like "if they were to have jon and martin reunite in a tearful embrace, how would you convey the physical contact in an audio format? like, whap? soft thud?"

jon enters the lonely and voiceover peter comes in to try and factcheck the ship

i guess it makes sense that peter would try to do the ritual for the lonely all by himself

did he kill peter by asking him to death? or did peter just self-destruct rather than be forced to answer?

the way jon snapped martin out of the loneliness just by making him look at his face... that's powerful. as a lonely person, i know that the most cry-making thing you can realize when you feel alone is that another person is, in fact, there with you

martin went for a walk and now it's thunderstorming. i wonder if he came back as soon as it started raining and now he's standing nearby invisibly as jon reads the intimidating magnus statement. ...I GUESS NOT

i plan to read through the transcripts of all the episodes (as it’s faster than re-listening, though i might selectively re-listen) so that i may better understand some things and answer some questions in this post that i didn’t ultimately resolve. i can’t say i was paying 101% attention all the way through. also april is very far away