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thecoolerliauditore · 4 months ago

Note

Pls tell me about Scott's views on women in general pls I'm begging you

o7 and I'm sorry

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fyi, the post itself isn't NSFW, but I'll be getting all gender theory in this bitch so I'll be referencing a lot of things and putting in pictures of naked ppl sometimes. maybe skip this one if you don't like that

(long post)

Disclaimers

An explanation for the tweet up there

I usually don't write these because I assume the people on my blog have enough sense to realise when I'm talking about the characters vs the CCs or are comfortable enough being a little confused, but I feel the need to extra-clarify here and expand on how I specifically view C vs CC because I think it differs a little from the average person.

To me, C and CC are two separate entities but not entirely disconnected. What differs (e.g. the exclusion of irl relationships -- their wives, kids, etc.) is poignant enough to severely detach them from the people they originated from, at least in my eyes, but there's also the fact that these are not scripted characters, just creators being themselves with a hint of behind the scenes drama-adding and improv thrown in.

For example, CC Pearl is a car nerd. So I assume her character is too.

This is where I state very clearly that yes, a lot of these thoughts come from things I've seen on Scott's twitter, which is undoubtedly the CC and not the C. However I, to me, am still talking about the C because any observations/judgments I could make on actual irl youtuber CC guy Scott Major would be tabloid at best and slightly invasive at worst. I'm seeing these statements within the context of "the death game guy would say this too and I'm writing this based on that", not "this is the inner psychological workings of the youtuber because I, as a fan, can totally tell".

TLDR I don't consider this post RPF but you might. This is a little more RPF-y than my usual stuff. If you don't rock with it we cool.

Everyone is weird about women, and that's okay

One short-hand I've used in the past to talk about Scott and women is just by saying that he's "weird about women" which I'm sure isn't exclusive to him.

(shitpost I made awhile back)

I see a lot of people now who love "villains" and "evil" but when it comes to any traits resembling real life evil (e.g. misogyny in this case) they suddenly become insecure. Just a couple of days back a saw a post on twitter essentially asking for permission to continue liking CC Scott in spite of the "bad things" he did.

And I think, in order to present an analysis like this, I must address that mindset first.

This is not a judgment on Scott's morality, nor is it trying to dissuade you from liking him. This is not saying that he is any more misogynistic than any other player in the series. This is just me pointing out Scott's attitude towards women and what I read it as, nothing less or more.

The feelings that me pointing these things out - be they apathy, disgust, anger or, what I would hope to see most, interest - are your own. I'm not here to tell anyone how to feel and never will try to police that on my blog.

Scott's Relationships with Women

aka. oh yeah this is about minecraft.

Scott and Cleo || "Yeah, you can kill me."

Scott and Cleo's alliance is arguably the strongest in the entire series, spanning through all five seasons and remaining unbroken with no (serious) drama attached. You'd expect from this that they two have a very settled and stable understanding of eachother, yet this isn't a case.

Their power dynamic shifts dramatically from one season to the next.

3L's initial Widows Alliance began on fairly equal footing, built on the mutual agreement that they were waiting for their respective partners to die. Both understood they were eachothers' "plan B" and felt comfortable in that arrangement.

Come LL, Cleo does what she couldn't in 3L, and initiates that plan, going to Scott after her last alliance, the fairy fort, fell apart. Scott requests nothing from her in return.

DL is the longest the two spent as eachothers main ally. Cleo is the one who initially proposes teaming up to spite their "cheating" soulmates and Scott agrees. Cleo admits to Martyn in private that she's aware she's taking advantage of Scott (which I've always interpreted as her talking about all seasons, not just DL). Due to the time they spend together, it's here where it becomes apparent that their initial assumptions during 3L were not entirely accurate, as Scott shows a level of gameplay competency much higher than Cleo's (e.g. teaching her how to axe-crit) but despite this Scott never berates her or thinks any less of her value as his ally.

LimL is probably this pairing at their most unhinged, as Scott, despite once again asking for nothing (or very little -- I'll be honest I'm a bit fuzzy on this) in return from Cleo, allows them and their allies to butcher him repeatedly for time. He gives more time to the Clockers than he does to Martyn, his closest ally that season. Despite this, Scott is never ever considered as a "family member" by the Clockers, despite them giving that title to even temporary allies (like the Bad Boys being their cousins) -- even Martyn gets a title with Scott completely unattached.

SL is relatively more chill, but shows that the two inevitably end up teaming together even despite their oath to avoid eachother that season.

The point being -- again and again, we see Scott literally and metaphorically making sacrifices for Cleo, with the only real transaction he requires from her being that she continues having his back when times get rough. This is despite that he's aware she isn't any more capable than he is and the fact that so far it has only been Cleo in rough times (LL, LimL and SL) and never Scott.

Speaking from a purely transactional perspective, Scott is not getting a bargain here -- and even Cleo seems acutely aware of it, judging by her comment during DL as well as the way she tends to speak of her survival capabilities very lowly in general ("rubbish pvp skills and spiffy one-liners"). I'm speaking in this sense because I've seen discussions in the past about the transactional way Scott views relationships but rarely does Cleo get brought up.

This is at stark contrast to how he treats Jimmy, whose predicted death was what spurred on Scott and Cleo's alliance in the first place.

Scott assumes Jimmy is "incompetent", where he assumes Cleo is capable. When Jimmy messes up, he reprimands him, when Cleo struggles to crit him, he patiently teaches her. When LL begins, Scott's first instinct was to look at Jimmy's lives and note that he was "useless to (him)", but holds no objections to Cleo joining his alliance despite her already having enemies being a potential liability. In SL, he jokes about how Cleo and him being allied is a given and pretty much expected of them, whereas in LimL he explicitly requests from Jimmy a recognition that he still cares ("say love you back!") before he will help him.

Scott and Gem || "You HAVE TO kill me, Gem,"

In SL, Gem settles in very easily in a leadership position within Gem and the Scotts due to her trying to live up to her reputation but also due to Scott and Impulse's more laid back, passive playstyles.

Both Scott and Impulse let Gem kill them for extra health this season, although Scott is arguably much more subservient than Impulse is, with him not only insisting that she kill him in the final episode but also not fighting back (and only yelling for her to stop) when she starts hitting him with a sword during the episode where her task was to literally kill everyone on the server.

Once again comparing her to Jimmy, Scott in 3L had a tendency to brush aside Jimmy's concerns over alliances (e.g. Jimmy questioning if they could trust Cleo) while in SL Scott runs his plans by Gem (and Pearl and Impulse) in terms of who he wanted to team up with (specifically excluding Joel from the potential mounders alliance) implying he held her opinion in some form of regard.

Before this becomes less of an analysis of Scott's treatment of men vs women and more of Scott's treatment of Jimmy vs everyone else, I think it's notable enough to mention that he and Martyn also lacked this sort of communication in LimL. He would inform Martyn of his plans, but rarely was it ever framed as a request.

SL almost feels as if Scott has slid Gem into the slot he had previously designated for Cleo in 3L (his girlboss ally) as he provides her and pretty much forces onto her by the end the acts of service he'd become accustomed to performing for Cleo.

Scott and Lizzie || "You killed her! I don't.. I don't know what to even say!"

Relatively shorter section because this is the one woman he hasn't teamed with, but there's still some interesting stuff I wanted to touch on.

In LL, one of the first thing Scott does is yell at Pearl to revenge-kill Joel for boogey-killing him. Pearl does as she's told and Joel's wet miserable pathetic LL life gets worse from there.

Several episodes later, the roles are reversed -- Lizzie lies to both of them and manages to isolate and boogey-kill Pearl. Scott, instead of reacting with the anger he had for Joel, is almost in a state of shock as he asks Lizzie to let him down so he could collect Pearl's belongings. He doesn't act aggressively towards Lizzie at all, with his most antagonizing act against her being to lie about his intentions when giving her a wither skull.

In SL, he's the only one aware of her early permadeath, but keeps quiet about it almost as if he's in a state of shock akin to when he saw Lizzie kill Pearl in LL. It's not until the others have noticed when he finally brings it up.

Scott and Pearl || "Tilly death do us 'part"

I wrote a whole post just for their relationship alone so for the sake of my sanity I'll be leaving this here.

So now I get to dedicate this section to the meat of this post -- how the way Scott treats women in general impacts his relationship with Pearl and how I view his heel-turn on her as seeping with relevance to Pearl's perceived gender.

In all three of the previous sections, the running theme is that Scott is 1. kinder and more patient with women, regardless of their competency and 2. someone who likes to be in a supporting role to women, occasionally aiding them more than he aids himself and his closer male allies (e.g. Jimmy and Martyn). As shown with Cleo, he assumes that girls have it together, but even if they don't it's not a big deal. When a girl's actions are truly disastrous, such as with Lizzie's, he goes into a state of shock and doesn't really react, preferring to swallow it down and not acknowledge it.

With the amount of times he sacrifices himself, I don't think it's a reach to say that Scott values his own life less than he values the lives of his (female) allies. This specific point actually does extend to his male allies too, shown when he's happy when Martyn literally backstabs him in LimL, but just as with the Martyn post where I point out his victim status-ing doesn't end at only women but includes all the women, Scott has pedastal-ed all the women he's teamed with.

Lizzie is, once again, the exception here due to his limited interactions with her. However that's actually somewhat patched over if you look at adjacent series (such as x-life) where he definitely shows her a level of admiration and respect.

Back to Scott and Pearl.

Their relationship during LL is very standard of how Scott treats women. While the power dynamic between them is obviously more caused by the initial life trade agreement, I don't think it's a far reach to say that Scott is somewhat comfortable in the arrangement.

However, this is also the first thing that sets their relationship apart from Scott with Cleo or Gem -- Pearl is the one making sacrifices, not Scott. She is the one "sacrificing" her lives to him, just in a more non-violent way as allowed by the season's mechanics.

When viewed through this lens, Scott trying to make it up to her and wanting his effort acknowledged makes even more sense. This is suddenly uncharted waters for him. His assuming that Pearl doesn't value him as a person goes hand in hand with him valuing himself less than her.

What Scott has with Cleo or Gem, situations where the other party is clearly uncomfortable with how he treats himself (Gem) or actively aware they are taking advantage of him (Cleo), is equalized to him because he is inherently worth less. What he has with Pearl, on the other hand, looks more equal to most people (lives vs labour) but is wildly imbalanced to him.

It's one of the many factors I see going into Scott's weird decision to abandon her in DL.

An Interlude, Before We Get to DL

La Pieta, Michelangelo

So this has been a lot of words so far and some of you might be wondering at this point: why say Scott is "weird" about women when so far this has been describing how he values women more, is kinder to them, is more patient with them, etc.? How is any of this behaviour remotely misogynistic?

And I would feel horrible if I forced you to read through all of my DL thoughts before I clarified this -- Scott is not your classic wifebeater "women are lesser" misogynist, Scott is someone who subscribes to misogynistic schools of thought and probably considers himself an ally to women, when in reality his beliefs are still rooted in dehumanizing them and these beliefs end up harming the women around him as well as himself.

After all, seeing women are your superiors is still not seeing them as your equals.

I know it's a bit of a meme on this blog at this point. But. Sigmund Freud identified what we know refer to as the "madonna/whore complex", which he described as a pattern of behaviour in men who separated women into being madonnas (pure, holy and admirable) and whores (debased, sexual, deviant). We'll be focusing on the former, the madonna, as it is more relevant to Scott's character.

Freud proposed that the madonna figure was something men projected onto women as a replacement for maternal love. These women are sacred and untouchable, literally as the projection of the maternal role onto them also makes it so that the sufferer cannot feel any sexual attraction towards her (keep this in mind for later).

Scott projects the madonna figure onto his female compatriots -- they are to be protected, served and supported. They are goddesses, queens, but they are never human. The madonna role in of itself is not inherently harmful to the woman, as seen with Cleo who takes control and advantage of it. However, it is enforced, as seen with Gem who at first revels in the superiority but almost breaks down when Scott offers him up as her sacrificial lamb one last time.

I linked this Utena AMV awhile back when vaguely talking about Scott and women, and this was the point I was alluding to.

youtube

Girls are beautiful and pure. They don't spit on the street, they don't piss on the street, they don't build hierarchies -- they subvert all the expectations of masculinity that I hate having to deal with. They are my escape.

But what about the girls who do spit on the street? The girls who piss on seats? Who build social hierarchies, who size up their competition?

The girls Scott interacts with are all painfully human. Cleo weaponizes his beliefs and take advantage of him. Scott is smart enough to know and accept this. Gem's playing into a role she has been assigned into by not only Scott but everyone around her. Scott supports the character she plays. Lizzie reflects traits he hates in Joel and Jimmy, but for her, he looks the other way.

Are they "demons", as the song says, or are they no longer girls at all?

(demons, gods, but never humans)

Weaponized Femininity and Women In Total Control of Themselves ;)

Hylas and the Nymphs, John William Waterhouse

Historically, weaponized femininity I'd argue is one of the oldest tropes in storytelling. Whether it's nymphs or sirens or witches or succubi or even more roundabout cases like Helen of Troy, there's countless stories of men's sexual attraction to women leading them to disaster.

One way to view these stories is to see them as warnings, don't let womens allure be the end of you.

There's a lot of good writing done on the femme fatale trope both in the context of weaponizing femininity and as a sexist way to argue against victims of sexual assault, as these stories often say that men who experience attraction to these "evil" women no longer have agency over their own actions.

Look at the painting above, for example - is it the nymphs who are responsible for drowning Hylas, or is Hylas climbing into the lake of his own accord?

Despite the fact we all know sirens, nymphs and succubi aren't real, the belief that men will simply lose control of themselves when encountering a particularly alluring woman persists to the modern consciousness. That there's something inherently dangerous about women and attraction to them.

(this is not 100% applicable to Ninja saying he won't stream with women, but it's the real life example I felt most comfortable putting in here)

Now, let's combine this with what's been said so far -- let's say you don't hate women. You love women, in fact, and you hate the way men treat women. You hate men, in fact.

Yet, you still believe in this inherent power women hold by being female and the loss of agency that men experience when attracted to them -- how disgusting.

It quickly becomes easily to not only demonize men for sullying the holiness of women, but also men, masculinity and attraction to women as a whole.

(apologies for using twt discourse in the meta post but this flew by my TL and i had to grab the irl example of mens non-violent attraction to women being used to frame them as misogynistic before the stupid app refreshed and i lose everything forever)

youtube

"To Venner" is a student film exploring a world set within this belief, where all the women have vanished and the men have become monstrous figures as a result of their pent up sexual frustration. fyi this is one of my favourite student films (and ive watched a bunch), but I do think its messaging is worth breaking down (especially its juxtaposition of dirty horrible monstrous sexuality vs pure and beautiful romantic love)

NOTE: this film is super graphic, lots of violence and nudity. have fun. or not

I admit this section is a bit hard to gauge as everyone in the series is gay as fuck. The closest in-series example I can think of is Scott reacting to Martyn's antics in DL with a sort of indigence but otherwise I can't really think of an example of a man expressing attraction to a woman at all, let alone one Scott reacted to. However, I do think it's still worth talking about because it opens up some interesting trains of thought in regard to Scott and Pearl.

For Scott, he himself has never been part of the picture. He's gay, after all, which gives him an edge over the bad straight men who objectify and assault women. Likewise, there's little evidence to suggest he finds the expectations of masculinity frustrating, but I don't think it's too far a reach considering how common of an experience that is for gay men and his adapting of more feminine mannerisms.

Double Life and Corruption

As mentioned in my previously linked post about Scott and Pearl's relationship, I do think Scott experiences what he would name as attraction towards Pearl, so my writing will reflect that.

Pearl is. ahem. not like other girls.

Not actually. But to Scott, she probably isn't like other girls.

She remains unaware of his different standards for her (how could she when she had nothing to compare them to), she acts out, sometimes violently, against Scott's urging (such as when she stole from Scar's wagon). She maintains their already irregular dynamic, and while she appreciates his care for her, she never quite falls into seeing him as a source of subservience the way Cleo or Gem do.

At the end of LL, right before the 1v1v1v1, she monologues to herself that she no longer has to feel bad for killing Scott. Which, in turn, implies she expected Scott to give it his all against her as well.

She entirely fails to embody the madonna with her immature naivete and her questionable morals. She is unpredictable, she doesn't take what she is owed, she is a monster in a lot of ways.

Scott, too, is a monster, to himself, for how he feels about her.

The very foundations of your understanding of yourself being ripped apart aside, let's rewind to the madonna/whore complex. To sexualise the madonna is to corrupt her and make a monster of yourself. Suddenly, you are no better than the men around you, the ones you've grown to hate. Suddenly, you are the grotesque figures in films like To Venner. You are Hylas and she is the nymph. And you are so stupid. Your worldview crumbles around its flawed foundations.

Scott is, however, immune to this corruption. This is a theme that appears in Empires as well, but throughout the traffic series he's prided himself on being loyal and kind and good. His monologue leading up to LL's 1v1v1v1 summarizes it quite well.

He can't let himself or anyone else see this side of him, but the energy needs to go somewhere. To defy fate, abandon your soulmate, is to admit you had a fate in the first place, is to acknowledge that she was your soulmate in the first place.

I've previously talked about how fate and romance are very ingrained in Scott's belief system, if it was anyone else it would've been amazing. He could've been like Bdubs and Impulse or Ren and Bigb, diving into domestic life and performative romance with a stranger. Or the world could've made his happy ending from 3L real, as he got to be Jimmy's husband all over again. I think it says something that he accepts Cleo as a "soulmate" before Pearl.

So what do you do with all that energy and tension, clearly apparent to yourself and everyone else, when you can't let them observe your feelings?

You project them.

Shout-outs to @/legally-allowed-to-slime for pointing out Pearl's comment early on in DL that she "feels like (she's) been broken up with" confirms she never saw Scott in a romantic sense. The "crazy ex-girlfriend" and "this is why I'm gay" comments really did come out of thin air, or perhaps insecurity.

Pearl is the crazy one. She's insane, because she wants me. She wants to be with me, so she does all this crazy stuff. She's lost control of herself because she wants me. She's disgusting.

I mentioned before that Scott is not your classic misogynist, but this is where the gears start turning. Scott's views of Pearl echo that of other players, most prominently Ren and Martyn, that Pearl has been overcome with some sort of corruption. She has become the witch, the demoness, the whore, in their eyes. Scott does not want to be the same as these men and I think his overcorrecting his behaviour in SL makes sense when you view it from this angle, but for now he has to rely on more traditional misogyny in order to navigate this new obstacle.

"Corruption" also implies that she had to have been pure (or at least pure-er) beforehand, something Scott personally knows is not true, but it falls in line with defaulting women to being "madonnas".

This is a Scott post but. shout outs to Ren for being all of this about Pearl but without the complexity of Scott like he literally accuses Pearl of seducing Bigb what the fuck man.

Pearl is, of course, none of that. But she plays into the role of being the witch much better than she fared playing into the role of the madonna.

Sidenote: I know I'm looking at this from a Scott/Pearl POV but I do feel like you can omit Scott's attraction if you look at it from a purely "pearl not performing to standards of femininity I expect and she makes me realise I don't view women as a whole as human which makes me feel weird so now we have to do this" POV. Like idk I think the exact reason he abandoned Pearl is going to be lost on everyone forever so any analysis I could perform is going to suffer at least a little bit of making-shit-up-itis.

I do also think there's something to be said about Pearl being pushed until she performed a role, any role and generally failing at Being A Girl tm but that's another post i think. yknow shes um. a bit. 🏳️‍⚧️ (but also very much not at the same time idk that's gonna need its own post)

anyway yeah uh the minecraft movie looks crazy huh

#asks #random thoughts

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katapotato55 · 2 years ago

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How to write good horror.

1- DON'T EXPLAIN WHAT THE HORROR IS. DON'T EXPLAIN ANYTHING. no context = more scary. "oh but it is just a ghost- " YES. you know that, I know that, but things are way more scary if you don't explain it. let your audience scare themselves trying to figure it out! the first FNAF game didn't explain anything it was just "ok these machines are kind aggro". that is part of what made it popular! (And truthfully this reason is why i dislike the other games in the series) i can't name how many horror movies i immediately lost interest in because it was explained. "oh no! there is blood dripping from the walls! " its demons or ghosts or whatever. you explained it. it isn't scary now that you explained the joke. if you have to explain what it is, explain it at the END of the story or near the climax at best. (or better yet, don't explain at all) 2- restraint is key i know it is tempting to show organs and blood dripping from the walls and someone eating out a corpse or whatever but don't outright show that kind of stuff ALL THE TIME or else your audience becomes desensitized to it, and if horror fans are reading/watching your work, chances are they are going to think this is weaksauce. you need to be SUBTLE when building up suspense in your story. don't show the real scary bits until the end of the buildup/ 3- normalicy and familiarity is key i am going to use bugsnax as an example. bugsnax has no gore and can be considered child friendly, but what made bugsnax scare people is that it has the facaude of a cutesy little game. doki doki lit club has a simmular principle where its like a normal dating sim but you are caught off guard and things feel off. this is a valuable tool. 4- be original and understand why the more popular ones are popular in the first place everyone has done analogue horror. why ? because we are all so used to modern technology that older televisions and tech seem kinda creepy. Blue_channel by gooseworks is one of my favorites. It gets right to the point, and while it DOES explain what the product is, it doesn't go "oooh death and scary!!! oooooooh!" it lets the audience make up their own horrifying reason as to what is happening here. saying "oooooooh look murder your parents ooooh!" isn't scary, and putting a glitchy tv filter over it isn't going to make it more scary. and finally 5- describe the unfamiliar i know i just said familiarity is key but that is only 1/2 of the equation. Everywhere at the end of time depicts the sounds of memory degrading in an alzheimers patients. this is an experience that no one could relate to except for those who are experiencing it (and sadly, those people are either dead or mentally comatose) this is also why lovecraft horror is loved, because we can only imagine so much before the lack of understanding drives you insane. hope this helps, for the love of all that is good, please stop writing bad horror.

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official-darkforest · 5 months ago

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Sorry I would love for you to explain all of your rare pairs. I love deep warrior cats thoughts pls if you want to do so

ThornRat (Thornclaw x Ratscar) Dark Forest trainee pairing. They're also both old enough to remember the Old Forest . The whole dynamic I have in mind is Thornclaw being rather oblivious to his sexuality and also being a huge fucking hypocrite (he's one of the more conservative warriors of TC, ironically). Ultimately his relationship with Ratscar, if you can even call it one, is doomed from the start and Ratscar is stuck yearning for someone that's not worth pursuing for multiple reasons.

BrambleFern (Bramblepaw x Fernpaw) I specify -paw because I see them as a bit of a tragic pairing where it doesn't end up working out because Dustpelt swoops right in and inserts himself in Bramblepaw's place. Also, in the context of my rewrite, Brambleclaw is the one to run away to ShadowClan instead of Tawnypelt so whatever spark he and Fernpaw had going never gets to go anywhere. I imagine they're still friends but have some moments of 'what if' every now and then.

BrindleFlint (Brindleface x Flintfang) Honestly I just wanted to give Ashfur and Ferncloud a father that already existed in the series and also didn't fuck up the family tree any more than it already is. I think I got this idea from someone else but I can't exactly remember who - but it's a very interesting concept considering the events of the first arc and how Flintfang was still alive for the events that happened (according to Tigerstar's Fury and Blackfoot's Reckoning). I headcanon that Ferncloud is named after her aunt Fernshade, too. Additionally, in the anthro AU, their story is a lot sadder but that's another story...

LongWind (Longtail x Runningwind) Childhood friends to almost-lovers! They're around the same age and would've definitely trained together. As mentioned in my HalfOne family tree post, they had a budding interest but it was cut short by Runningwind's death. Sad :(

IvyBreeze (Ivypool x Breezepelt) This one is just funny. "You wanna kiss me so bad it makes you look stupid" kind of shit. Breezepelt would be fucking fuming over it because he doesn't want to be like his dad.

HalfDove (Half Moon x Dove's Wing) Another one that's mostly in the context of my rewrite! I'm imagining it's very one-sided since I also love HalfJay, but it's a very complicated thing where Jay's Wing is very focused on saving their colony and too scatterbrained to really put any serious commitment to Half Moon (something he tells her explicitly, but she pursues anyways). Dove's Wing is embarrassed of her crush and knows it was never meant to be, not only because she's a prophecy cat but also because Half Moon doesn't even like her that way.

IceApple (Icewing x Applefur) Another Dark Forest Trainee pairing! I have a lot of these because I got attached to them. Not my only Applefur ship but certainly one that's kinda fun to think about. I don't have much to say about these two sadly but I thought it was a cute idea that I could maybe build off of later.

MinnowMouse (Minnowtail x Mousewhisker) I don't actually think this one is that much of a rare pair, I've seen a lot of ppl talk about this but I was kinda running out of ideas since there's a lot of characters idgaf about sorry LOL anyways this one is based on a scene in Dark River and the fact they were both Dark Forest trainees in their adulthood.

#warrior cats #ask

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starryinkart · 9 months ago

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MURDER DRONES THEORY??

So, me and my significant other were talking about CYN and N’s relationship as siblings and we were talking about the Murder Drones theme song “Murder Brings” that goes…

"Winter rains down on the ashes,

Obviously referencing the state of Copper 9 and possibly other planets that have been destroyed.

Mother makes fuel from the bones,

We know that the Solver makes fuel from the bones to survive. In Episode 7, CYN in Tessa mentions multiple times they are “starving” and “let’s eat” only to N. We know the solver finds N interesting and he’s is its favorite due to the fact that he “likes doing anything” and it likes to mess with him, but also because him and CYN considered themselves siblings. There could be ALOT of other reasons but N is important to the Solver one way or another, so important that it even mentioned apologizing to his clones if he died. But more on this in a sec…

Murder rips gods from the masses,

This also confused me a bit, but now that we know that the Absolute Solver causes the hosts infected to have powers similar to gods and basically reshape the world around them with out much explanation or hows as of now, I’m assuming it’s referencing that murdering beings/drones, singles/revives out those who are special/infected with the solver from the masses and turns them into mini gods.

Basically Children of the Solver.

Murder brings, murder brings"

"Murder Drones"

Self explanatory. Murder Drones were basically confirmed to be the solvers pets, being sent to wipe out any resistance from solver users who can end up beating it, or make the process of consuming the substance it needs to survive easier and quicker, so the AS can move onto the next planet faster. Murder brings, Murder brings. Murder Drones. Which signifies the end of those who are being destroyed by them.

———

Now that that is analyzed, we are back to CYN and N!

The solver seems to see the DDs as pets, CYN its host. Whether CYN is partly still in there as herself trapped in her own mind or long gone we don’t know, but we do know N and her were very close. It seems to see the DD as creations, helpers, children it saved from death and the Solver holders as strength, pathways to its goal, another form of children in some sick way.

Then in the theme song, we hear context about a “MOTHER”, which in the context of the recent reveals, makes somewhat sense. All these solver beings, whether modified by the solver or inheriting its power came from the solver in some way. If it wasn’t for the solver salvaging N,V,J and the other DDs, we never would have had the threat Uzi and her colony, as well as other planets being wiped out and the solver gaining more power. Or Uzi/Doll developing the solver, Nori dying to the DDs, Khan having to put her out of her misery, Nori being gone causing most of the problems in Uzis life, as Nori said in Episode 7 etc etc. Basically the DDs do the work to keep their savior/creator/ MOTHER fed and powerful, giving her fuel, and in return, she makes them safe, not discarded and useful where the humans disposed them as WDs. Perfect bases for a new civilization seeing this Eldritch Being as their god.

Now, I’ve noticed something. Since the beginning of the series, the concept of Mother hasn’t been brought up again. Mother needing fuel from the bones. Unless we see CYN as Mother which I doubt, I would say Mother is the MAIN Solver Entity. The Eldritch beings we’ve seen are just smaller versions of the Real Solver, with Eldritch J and CYN, and recently that unknown being chasing N and Nori in the mines in Episode 7, which could possibly be Tessaritch. Either that or the idea was scrapped, but I feel like it is important. We definitely haven’t seen the real form of the Absolute Solver yet, and we might not until Episode 8 or we get a Season 2 (if we do, hoping we do!), but I feel like this is an interesting idea to latch onto when thinking for The Solver, and that it also relates itself to many names, Mother might be one of them. Especially if its goal after it consumes the universe and all of humanity/species, is to restart the universe in its own image and ways.

Lastly, if CYN and N were siblings and the concept of Mother has been brought up…

We know why CYN is important, as she was presumably Patient 0 and made a pact not to discard her for CYNS body and service. That’s why she is important to the solver.

But why is N, besides him being nice to it and just liking doing anything? And always surprising the solver? Unless there’s something else we don’t know yet? Or maybe that’s it and he really is just a sick plaything for the solver.

Who knows?? But I guess we’ll probably see more of this concept in Episode 8, or beyond depending how far the show goes. Even if not, I have some pretty good ideas for my Skin and Bones AU if it isn’t expanded on in the show.

Sorry if this was a bit confusing, it’s SUPPPERR late and I’m SUPPPPERR tired. I’ll edit this tomorrow if anything seems off. This also gave me a great art idea so, the creative brain is whirring. /gen

#murder drones #md theory #murder drones theory #murder drones n #starryrants!

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ddodol · 3 months ago

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BY THE WAY, i did a quick research (quick tw//mentions of death threats and some political stuff)

do korean people really use funeral wreaths to make a statement? most of you must’ve seen the tweets where they argue “but we do the same for politicians, sports, and everything else!” well the answer, unsurprisingly, is no— they do not!

political protests mainly consist of the person themselves, a placard, and sometimes a (battery-operated) candlelight or a flag/banner. they hold these protests at a high regard, so resorting to something as low as a “death threat” could easily render their points invalid. koreans have a longstanding history with political protests, having successfully staged student uprisings, worker unions, and coups against political figures. the latest protests they’ve made date as recent as september 2024, with the korean people protesting for an effective response against climate change.

so yes, koreans value their protests a lot but they are smart about it. some protests even last a year or so, one recent and infamous case was against their former, president park geunhye. there are a series of protests dubbed the candlelight rallies for their use of candlelight for a peaceful protest. these protests stemmed from an incident back in 2002, the yangju highway incident, and the candlelight vigils were meant to mourn the victims while also protesting their unjust deaths. they continued to use this type of protests for more unjust deaths as well as to make a political statement.

now, sports are a huge deal in korea just like americans are with their soccer. the biggest and most important protest that had anything to do with sports was the 1988 june democratic struggle. the protests and uprisings were mainly to overthrow the dictatorship they were under, resulting in a revision of the constitution, stating that the single term presidency only lasts for five years, preventing another event of a dictatorship. (i kinda skipped over a lot of the details, especially the one related with sports, but if you’re interested, it’s a good read and it does remind me of the people power revolution in the philippines.)

you might be asking now— what do funeral wreaths have to do with korean history and protests? there really isn’t… like i mentioned, korean people mainly use placards and a candlelight to portray their messages. why? because sending death threats would render their points invalid because it's a poor attempt at intimidation and a wish for someone's early demise, which would not help their case if the people want to be heard.

funeral wreaths cost a lot of time and money to make and it’s impractical to use as a protest material because you would think that there’d be a lot of people joining, there’s no space for the wreaths to be seen, and, honestly, a large group of people is enough to garner the attention of anyone so the use of wreaths isn’t necessarily important.

from what i’ve gathered, wreath protests are popular amongst the korean industry, even dating back to a year ago where pentagon fans sent cube wreaths, demanding the company for a comeback. although, no, it’s not a funeral wreath. it’s the usual flower wreath that you would see when someone is being congratulated.

some fandoms that have sent funeral wreaths are tokkis and flovers for hybe. they mainly address these towards the company rather than an individual, since they argue that it is meant to be a protest with the intention of a better treatment for their artist. (personal disclaimer: i do not agree nor condone the act of sending funeral flowers even if it's directed towards a company. there will always be a better way to protest and have your demands met.)

the only instance i know of where “fans” sent funeral wreaths with malicious intent towards an individual are for suga, following his dui incident, and seunghan, for returning to his own group. considering the context in which these funeral wreaths are being used— no, there is no other way to view it as anything else but a death threat or wishing death upon the receiver.

one can argue that funeral wreaths don't necessarily mean wishing death upon someone alive. however, they made it abundantly clear with the messages they put on the banners alongside with the tweets wanting him to just "disappear" and leave the group, or to stop leeching/freeloading off of the other six members' achievements. so no, they don't have any other way to spin this. it's malicious intent. they also doubled down by dancing in front of the wreaths so like,,

"but you can't possibly know better than korean people themselves!" that's also true and i'm not claiming to do so. this was mainly written to bring some value into actual protests that were held by korean people, ones that brought change to their country while also debunking the claims that korean people have been doing wreath protests for years now.

i think it's disgraceful to have them be generalized as unreasonable and hateful protesters, or people with a backwards mentality, all because a select few can't accept a young man who dated before he debuted. whether sm entertainment likes it or not, all eyes are on them and people are not happy with what's going on.

with koreans being so deeply rooted with their culture, they should know better what funeral wreaths symbolize. also, here’s a fun read about how impractical and wasteful the overuse of flower wreaths are, you can take what you want from it.

#ddolposts #if anyone tries to argue the same #you can bring up some of the points i made #it's really not that hard to fact check their claims too #i know their guilt is working overtime #anywayss #riize is 7

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forestfiresandfics · 4 months ago

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Foils and Mirrors

Another oft misconstrued literary technique is that of the foil. It may just be me misconstruing it though, considering I have to periodically look up the definition because I’ve gotten it confused again. Character foils are two characters who interact and by their interaction, their differences are highlighted. TV tropes describes it as ‘the foil behind a jewel to make it shine brighter’ but another way to look at it would be the way yellow shows up better on a black background compared to white. Foils are defined by their differences. Mirror characters are defined by their similarities.

While I don’t think it’s wrong to call 3rd life Grian and Martyn foils per say, I think a more interesting reading is them as mirrors. And really, the two aren’t mutually exclusive. I’m getting ahead of myself.

Third life features a lot of parallels, both in plot and character arc, and the Desert Duo and Renchanting are often pointed to when it comes to discussions of this. I think it’s worth also including Flower Husbands in that list as well. And every day I consider adding Cleo and Bdubs to that list as well, but I haven’t quite decided how well they work, so for now I’ll focus on just the three groups. I will often in my writing and musing and comments and stuff refer to these three pairs as the ‘red-green’ pairs, because they spend a protracted amount of time where one of them is on their green life and the other is on their red. Scar and Grian are the most extreme example of this, spending 5 and a half episodes like that. But the timing of it aside, what’s maybe more important is that each of these teams entered into the battle of the red desert as one red and one green each. A pivotal moment in the story where we also see everyone mirroring each other.

I think it’s fair to view Desert Duo and Renchanting as mirrors, with the flower husbands acting as foils to the others. Each share enough in common that it’s worth discussing all three groups, but while the desert faction and the kingdom share basically the exact same plot lines and traits, the hobbits serve as something of an alternative option—what they ‘could have been.’ Also fun, is that the Flower Husbands spend nearly, but not quite, equal time with both other groups: doing their job well as foils in the context of contrast-via-interaction. They discuss their statuses and their plans, and as far as the reading of ‘desert duo: protagonists’ and ‘renchanting: antagonists’ go, the flower husbands are ideologically neutral for most of the series. They make friends where they can, call out bullshit where they see it, and it wasn’t until they were thrown into the war that they actually participated in taking sides.

So what are the similarities between each, and what are the differences? The similarities come first. All three groups are red-green pairs. All three pairs have some kind of strong partnership, all three pairs have a scene where the red of the relationship offers fealty with a trinket (flowers for the husbands, flowers for the desert, and depending how you see it either the rabbit’s foot or the axe for the kingdom). As I suggested before, Desert Duo and Renchanting have even more in common. Both partnerships began because of a debt, both leaders are businessmen, both leaders are red and indentures green, both of the indentures are the “brains of the operation,” both indentures grumble their way through the partnership at first before becoming devoted, and both sit on either side of the server wide war—not just as participants but as the ringleaders. There is also literally even a scene where Martyn tells Ren to put his clothes back on (��me lord? Fancy putting your armour on?”). Frankly this is just scratching the surface, it’s insane how perfect mirrors they are.

This similarity between the two main groups on the server really highlight the tragedy (lowercase t) of the death game, how these two groups ended up mortal enemies simply because of the world they live in, despite having more in common than differences. And the flower husbands as foils in my opinion ALSO make it sadder. While renchanting and desert duo are messing around with complicated hierarchical relationships and testing loyalty and ordering their partners around, the husbands are working together out of trust and respect. Scott starts out with his fellow greens in rejecting the partnership at first, but he demonstrates what mutualistic relationship should look like, not to mention a relationship that doesn’t make itself the whole server’s problem.

This is already getting long so I won’t get into this next bit too far, but while the red-green pairs foil and mirror each other, each pair also serves as a foil for themselves. Scar is confident while Grian is timid, Ren is trying to do a lot all at once while Martyn is organized and keeps him in line. Jimmy is friendly while Scott is matter of fact. All the reds end up acting as cloudcuckoolanders with the greens to bring them back down to earth and on track. They are all somewhat odd couples, they are very different from one another, and the juxtaposition of these differences highlights each other’s traits as well as their strengths and weaknesses. These partnerships are all advantageous, and they can each fill in for the other’s weaknesses. All three partnerships wouldn’t have made it as far as they did without each other. Not that this makes them idillic partners, they each have their flaws as well, but that’s not really the point. They each help the other shine, like the backing of a jewel.

Masterlist

#3rd life literary analysis #3rd life #desert duo #renchanting #flower husbands

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fountainpenguin · 4 months ago

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So I was rereading your lore on witches in your riddledeep au and um.

Would this technically make Dev a witch??? lol. He also freebies a pizza across a digital title card that episode too.

😂 Y'know, it's funny you say that because for the past month, I've been wondering if anyone was going to ask me if Dale or Dev are witches. I don't know why I was wondering that, but it's been clinging to me. I couldn't think of a way to bring up "btw, they're not witches in my work" without it feeling weird.

My witch lore for context

Dale and Dev can specifically not be witches under my lore even if I wanted them to be, even if I were following a headcanon where the Dimmadomes get around the XYZ chromosome sterility through clones, because of something extremely specific that also exists in my lore that I cannot go back on.

Magic Colors

So, I have a whole magic system set up around the colors of magic. There are 6 possible colors in the OG series- 5 of which are represented on the Rainbow Bridge, 4 of which are represented on the Fairy Council, and 2 of which are extremely rare.

I gave the Fairy Elder (namedropped in "Timmy's Secret Wish") yellow robes, thus tying the Fairy Council together.

Each magic color has a meaning associated with the mood or thought pattern behind magic use. I drew my original inspiration from the colors Timmy's brain turns when Poof's controlling his body in "He Poofs, He Scores."

For those interested, my Colors of Magic post (From May 2016, but has screenshots) & my worldbuilding sideblog's post on magic colors (Cleaned-up lore with no pictures). Short version below:

Red is an extremely uncommon magic color, though we see it when Foop is fighting Cosmo and Wanda in "Playdate of Doom" and when Wanda jumpstarts Timmy's heart in "Yoo-Doo." It's the color I associate with life and death magic. So, y'know... Foop is very okay.

There's also indigo (used by Juandissimo in "Fairy Fairy Quite Contrary"), which I consider a subset of blue.

Green is also extremely rare. Notably, it's the color Foop's magic slowly starts to turn throughout "Scary Godcouple"- He started off with blue, but sours to green in one of the only appearances we see of green in the entire series.

But you know what commonplace color we don't see?

Orange.

In my lore, orange-haired magic users (both Fae and genies) are the equivalent of shiny Pokémon. Even two orange magic-users don't normally have orange offspring- They produce yellows and reds.

And the thing is... I've already set up Happy Peppy Gary to be the only orange witch in my lore. In fact, I have a WIP multi-chapter 'fic about Gary getting discovered by H.P. and Anti-Cosmo, who lose their minds when they realize what he is (Pink and Gray).

Shout-out to one of my favorite dialogue exchanges I've ever written, from H.P. trying to sus Gary out as genie-descended:

H.P. brought his hand up to fiddle with his glasses. "Okay. Completely random get-to-know-you question. By any chance, are you afraid of small spaces?" "Deathly. Why?"

And Dale is Gary's age - in the same city where the Pixies dropped Gary and Betty after taking them in - which means if he WAS an orange witch, he would've been clocked so hard, so fast. Also, since I'm going the route of H.P. being Dale's godfather, there's no way he wouldn't have noticed even though Dale was MIA for years.

Fun Fact! Gary and Juandissimo are "related!" Juandissimo was finger-snapped into existence by Gary's ancestor, Crimsona. He's arguably a great-great-great-great uncle (5 generations up from Gary). In Cloudlands AU, Gary's middle name is actually Juandissimo! That's because Juandissimo's been assigned to godparent to this family several times (We met Gary's dad and grandmother, Quincy and Eunice, in Baby, You're a Rich Man; Sanderson matches Eunice's name to Juandissimo's in Chapter 10 while looking through godkid files).

Anyway, I COULD have witch genes passed down through Dev's mom's side of the family (Leadlys in my headcanon), but that comes with its own issues: if Leadly had XYZ chromosomes, he can't have Hadley, and I'm not going back on that. I could make his wife a witch, but that STILL has issues.

In my 'fics I play Ed Leadly as a guy who's looking for magical creatures (hence him being willing to drop 17 million dollars on someone else's dog in "Dog Gone"). I have literally shown him onscreen holding a witch-detecting compass that points to Gary (in "Opportunity"). There is no way he would not have clocked his ex as a witch, sldkfj...

Closing Comments

Dale and Dev are some of the only characters in my universe who are absolutely confirmed to not be witches, despite how much I have actually wondered if it would be fun to portray them as such.

I don't have a lore reason for the visual gags in that episode- I sadly have to clock it up to random cartoon silliness akin to Jenkins exploding into pieces when Jasmine sings in "Fly" (or Hazel also falling apart or exploding when people expressed crushes on her in "Multiverse of Jenkins").

In my lore, I actually do have Gary set up to be able to pass his witch powers to people he kisses (Because I thought it would be funny if that's why Betty is taller in some scenes than others; yes, I am that pedantic and it makes Betty's "But I don't like you like that" line exponentially funnier), but I've established that only genie-descended witches can pass powers... That doesn't make sense for Dev in this episode either.

Technically all the fluids can pass magic, so a blood transfusion would make Dev "a permanent false witch" if I wanted to do that, but I'm not gonna bother when again, we have people exploding in this show as a gag. Cursed gags I cannot touch with lore 😔

If anyone else makes the Dimmadomes witches, I'd be totally down to read that. I think it would be extremely funny if Dale Dimm was also a witch despite sentencing Alden Bitterroot to 350+ years of clawing his way out of Dimmsdale's well for witch crimes, but my AUs have pretty firmly locked Dale and Dev out of that option.

Riddleverse Design Facts

Here's another fun fact for any new followers who don't know I do this: I draw witches with spirals in their hair! Pics under the cut due to length:

Crocker has his in the back and Kevin has his on top!

You could TOTALLY make an argument that Leadly's spiral is in his mustache

Also, it's a very good thing I do this- I joked in the past that Gary and Dev look eerily similar (even sharing lots of body language), so it's nice to have things like freckles and a hair spiral I can fall back on.

I'm VERY happy with my adult Dev design, but I definitely kept freckles and hair spirals away from him, haha. Sneak peek of him next to his mom:

Note- Spiral headcanon excludes H.P., who has a unique family cowlick I gave him before doing this for witches. Poof doesn't count either since he's under Fae Get Alphabet Hair rules:

Whistle and Anti-Whistle [Soren] (at the bottom) are some of my favorite designs... I can't get over his upside-down W hair sldkfj.

But Wanda and Anti-Wanda having completely different Ws is another favorite thing. I'm especially proud of Dusty's little D tuft.

I'm not sure why Smoky ended up with what looks like an F (unless it's a T since he was Talon before Talon was Talon), but I remember doing a lot of designs for him. Sometimes I don't commit to alphabet hair if letters are hard (Soren's top zigzag is meant to be an S, which is a very hard letter to incorporate, and I think I didn't want Smoky and Soren to have the same one). I've been wanting to redesign Smoky a bit, so I'll probably fix it then.

Goldie's is subtle and you can see it better in some drawings than others, but she has M hair because her full name is Marigold :)

I should probably re-add her middle tuft to her official sideblog art, whoops.

Also, if this is how someone is finding out Poof and Foop literally were designed with alphabet hair, I have wonderful news for you. Fun fact, the "Anti-Poof" storyboard portrays Foop with a square spiral instead! It was the final detail of his design.

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an-au-blog · 1 year ago

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Omg!

Really loved the idea of East blue asylum. I have a few questions about it! (If you are willing to hear me out of thought about it, haha) First. Is Sabo really dead or is something like in the Canon where Luffy (and Ace before whatever happened to him) thought he was, but he actually wasn't? (A part of me would love the latter, but the first scenario is also very plausible). Second, I'm wondering about the other East blue villains? We know about Arlong, but the rest? (This isn't me asking about Buggy, of course not, haha)

(Thought I have an idea about the clown also related with Shanks because Shuggy: He was previously interned right after Roger's death, and with help he was able to recover. Maybe that was the reason Shanks recommended the place to intern Luffy in first place, giving him his straw hat and assuring him they've seen each other again once he fully recovered, making a parallelism with the Canon. Now the clown (like Franky) is a volunteer that helps whenever he could and Luffy loves to bicker with him because of his funny reaction about his red nose.)

Anyway! You can take it or not! He could also be a patient, I think that could work too!

Thanks for sharing the idea!

Oh! I'm happy you liked it!

Sabo is considered dead in this au, and just like in the series, both Luffy and Ace had a hard time coping with it and could "see him" from time to time. Losing a second brother down the line was what made him snap. And although I kept Ace's death like in canon, I moved it around a bit to make it the reason to trigger Luffy's disorders. And the series starts when he comes into the hospital.

In reality, Sabo isn't really dead. He almost died in a house fire but by the time they rescued him he had hit his head and gotten temporary amnesia. He grew up trying to remember who he was and by the time he did, he felt like he abandoned his brothers and felt like he couldn't barge back into their lives. Luffy was going to become a firefighter because of what happened to Sabo and Ace was volunteering for safety patrols. They had entire lives that he was no longer part of, but he just couldn't resist going to the funeral. Good thing he managed to outrun his brother.

(for people with no context: here)

Technically, keeping Sabo dead would make more sense in the real world, but I think it'd be more interesting and a bit more sad if he wasn't and Luffy kept seeing him. The first time he saw him was a bit before Ace's death. He told his big brother but he just went "I know, I sometimes see him as well... Like a mirage of the kid we used to love," but Luffy's just like "No, I saw him as an adult! He was real!" And it was a bit concerning but they decided, oh well, he's been a bit of an odd child anyway. But then Ace died and Luffy ruined the funeral because he was supposedly chacing his other brother. It was bad enough that he went in a state of shock for a full three days, but this was too much... Everyone keeps telling him that they're both dead. Accidents happen. But he refuses to believe it and slowly starts creating this makeshift world to fit the trauma of losing his family.

It got worse when he found out he got admitted into a facility. I believe he goes to visit him later on under a fake name, but tells him that he can't tell anyone he's alive. He said it mainly because he knew they'd probably think he was losing progress and double his pills.

As for the rest of the villains (Buggy)... The marines are just guards who won't let him leave - or in Luffy's eyes, suppressing his freedom. (Except for Garp, he's just his grandpa and he's in the military in real life as well. He comes to visit his grandson whenever he can but it's very painful for him.) Axehand Morgan is just an asshole guard who got fired for abusive behavior. His son had the same internship that Koby did and they both left after a while but would come back after some time later.

For captain Kuro, I think he'd just be one of Usopp's lies. Maybe he was an ex of Kaya's (before Usopp came along) who used her for her money and he told this big story about how he tried to kill everyone and how he saved the day and was all heroic for Kaya and sent him running for the hills. Luffy liked it so much that he put his own little spin on it and added himself to the story.

As for Buggy, I honestly didn't really think about it. But if I had to, I initially thought he could be a patient, but I didn't like that, so I thought "Maybe a guard", but that wasn't fitting either. But I think I got it! What would make a kid believe someone is a rival, become an ally, back to annoying kinda rivals and so on and so forth? Well I think one of his favorite uncle's exes would do just fine.

Outside of Luffy's world, Shanks and Garp have a normal relationship of tough love, the only thing Garp blames him for is spoiling Luffy and Ace too much. The boys have lived with Shanks for a long time and had seen a lot of his love life. His first love - Buggy, who was a part-time clown for kids' parties. Makino - who was Luffy's favorite because she would cook him tasty food, unlike Shanks who only ordered takeout. Mihawk - the cool goth, who was neurodivergent, (so is Luffy) so there was a kind of unspoken bond there. And then Buggy again.

In my mind, Shanks ran back to him after Ace's death for comfort. Buggy, now grown with a real job and no longer a part-time clown, stayed in Luffy's mind the evil clown who loved money and that's why he broke Shanks's heart. (Or that's how he saw it...)

...

But then I read yours as well and I liked it! I like the idea of him getting help after Roger's death. I think that maybe him or a parental figure were afraid that he was too emotional and could potentially get depressed. So he went to see a psychiatrist and they decided it's best to take him in for a little while, just to make sure he handles grief in a healthy way that wouldn't be harmful to himself or people around him. Maybe that's why he broke up with Shanks. But he was too embarrassed to tell him that he had such a hard time handling death, so he lied about it. He lied and made up a different reason to leave.

And now that I think about it, this - him knowing how hard loss can be, could be the reason why he was so willing to welcome Shanks again. Because he's been there and he knows that it hurts less if there's someone next to you and he wants to be next to Shanks.

Thanks for the ask! I'd love answering any other additional questions if you or anyone has :))

#east blue asylum wing au #one piece au #asl brothers #shuggy #answers #op

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iamnmbr3 · 3 months ago

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Maaaaaaan ever since I followed you you've brought up such good points I never even considered.

like how Snape actually SHOULD be allowed to remain bitter about his childhood and the abuse from James because it was genuinely awful

or the fact that Tom's genuinely terrified reactions to dumbledor when they first met essentially made him even more resentful of adults and possibly beyond the point of no return on that front considering how he feels and reacts later on. (Which honestly that whole scene just from dumbledors perspective sounded very biased to manipulate Harry and if Harry wasn't so focused on trying to stop Tom he probably would have empathized with Tom there)

I low key kinda feel like JKR forgot what she wrote halfway through the books because she actually did write some interesting characters just not in the way her current self agrees with (also how does someone's own opinions of characters change that much and that bad??? I still don't understand, tho the guy who wrote Ender's game was homophobic and he literally wrote a book about the gay experience soooo who knows anymore)

Anyway thanks for your interesting takes!

What a delightful message to get!! Thank you so much! I'm really glad you've having a good time with this blog and that my posts have been thought provoking and enjoyable for you. That's so nice to hear.

I definitely think if Harry had witnessed the memory of Tom and Dumbledore's first meeting in a different context he probably would've reacted very differently - especially given his own history of unhappy experiences with adults arounds him during his pre-Hogwarts childhood. Harry is primed to be biased against Tom for the very understandable reason that Voldemort killed his parents, tried to kill him in 1st and 4th year and caused the death of his godfather in 5th year and on top of all that he met diary!Tom in second year and that didn't go well either. So of course the memory Harry sees is filtered through the lens of those experiences and traumas and doesn't raise any red flags.

If the diary had shown him that memory in an attempt to turn him against Dumbledore or he'd seen it in another context without knowing who Tom Riddle became things might well have been different.

And yeah. It's weird. The characterization in the books is actually very good and interesting. It's the strongest aspect of the series in my opinion and why I feel so drawn to the fandom surrounding these characters. The interesting thing is in general the characterization is internally consistent and complex. So it's not just a matter of wasted potential (though there is some of that too) where a character is shallow but could've been interesting or even a case of wildly inconsistent characterization that can be fixed with fandom.

Rather, it seems that what she created was accidental and wildly at odds with her intent. So what she wrote, isn't what she meant, but it's also a lot more interesting than what she meant.

#i don't know anything about enders game but im curious to hear more #Harry Potter #asks

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lostsyren · 5 months ago

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I think rafe and sofia have alot of potential and the writers kind of screwed up with how they introduced her. we’ve obviously seen how soft he is with her and how he’s already comfortable by him asking for advice and how much of an influence she has on him already. like cmon she literally changed his mind on him having his father killed😭 i think that flew over alot of people’s heads tbh. and i think they will have a lot of scenes together and hopefully a lot of domestic and intimate moments together, i have hope for that considering she’s been upped to a series regular🤞🏼also we didn’t really see a lot of behind the scenes of fiona BUT i think that’s because they were hiding her?? or maybe people just didn’t recognize her to be taking pics of her. cuz i saw an interview of someone asking her of any projects she’s working on and she responded with “ i don’t know if i can say.” but she did confirm her character (sofia) was returning back to a tv show she was in last year. also his smile when he was looking at her?? i nearly died seeing soft rafe on my screen i already love them so much😣. i almost forgot people recorded drew, chase and austin having lunch and they were with two girls and people were saying it was fiona and the actor who is playing toppers love interest. so yeah i have a lot of hope we’ll be seeing her and rafe together🙏🏼🙏🏼

and with what i think should happen between them in season 4 is i’m hoping she’ll become rafes safe space and the person that’s always there for him. since ward was always pushing rafe to be tough and just being an asshole to him, maybe rafe could have someone he could turn to when things get hard or he just needs someone and sofia will be there <33

sorry this is so long i just loving talking about them😭 im seriously rooting for them🙈

Noooo don’t apologise for the long answer! I love hearing from you, and i feel the exact same way– it’s so fun discussing theories and overanalysing!!

I agree, they could’ve done so much more with her introduction, even just a small shot of rafe and her making eye contact in the country club before the party, just to give a bit of context to where she came from would’ve helped so much without eating the screen time. But ultimately i think they’re just quickly setting her up for the next season so they can flesh her character out then. (Hopefully!!)

Exactly!! Like yes she was just used as a plot device, like a manifestation of Rafe’s conscience almost, but that’s so interesting– and I don’t think she falls under the “I can fix him” trope, she doesn’t think there’s anything to fix. It’ll be a breath of fresh air having someone who doesn’t know Rafe’s past, giving him an incentive to be good.

You’re so smart!! Like that makes sm sense of why we’ve barely gotten any bts of the two. And both Fiona and Drew hardly ever post, so I’m not surprised somethings hasn’t slipped. And I doubt much of the fandom know/remember who fiona is :(

That’s so sweet!! I agree wholeheartedly– rafesofia soft scenes will be the death of me!! And the people saying him being with Sofia will take away from his villain arc– I think it will intensify his villainy even more if there’s a possibility he can be good and he just chooses not to. And especially how that will play with Sofia’s character. I think we as an audience will definitely feel the suspense, waiting for the moment rafe slips and becomes villainous towards her and that will just make his character that more enamouring and entertaining, whether you root for him or don’t!!

#rafe cameron #drew starkey #outer banks #fiona palomo #sofia outer banks #rafe and sofia #rafe cameron thoughts #outer banks season 4 #༊*·˚syren

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felassan · 2 years ago

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Some more snippets of interest and insight from Mark Darrah PART 1, from a Mark Darrah on Games YouTube video where he is livestreaming playing Dragon Age II [link to Part 2] -

On Dragon Age: Dreadwolf and sort've like, the franchise in general:

A comment in chat asked ''Did you see the new BioWare blogpost about skill trees? Any thoughts on it?'' Mark replied "Yeah, I saw it, nothing particularly world-shattering or controversial there." A comment in chat then said "I wasn't a fan of how that skill tree looked, it seemed too busy" and he explained that "I wouldn't put too much stock in what it looks like, they will definitely do a ton of usability stuff, so I wouldn't be too worried about the actual visual of it".

He observed that none of the things that are presented in the lore as having huge consequences are actually usually shown as such (as having them) in the Dragon Age games. For example, if you're a Grey Warden, the Blight/Taint isn't affecting you very much, and if you're Templar spec, the lyrium isn't affecting you very much - "so it's something that I think legitimately would be good to see a bit more of".

On Flemeth's death in DA:I, chat asked "so it's possible she's still alive after what Solas did to her?" Mark replied "I mean, it's possible, if BioWare wanted her to survive the end of DA:I they could probably do that because they've sort've established the 'she can come back, somehow'" stuff [said in the context of Flemeth's DAII amulet delivery Horcrux scene].

Chat asked "Does Solas consider modern elves his 'people'?" Mark replied "I don't think Solas considers, I think Solas barely considers anyone his people, at this point." A comment in chat then said "I thought he grew a little more fond of the Dalish after DA:I?" and Mark replied "Yeah, I think he is more fond of them [then] but I still don't think he would consider them his people".

A comment in chat said "I think it would be nice to get a game set in the ancient history of elven empire". Mark said "I don't think we'll ever get something set in a pre-Fade [Veil] world, I mean, I could see something - [cut off by in-game combat]".

Chat asked about griffon mounts in DA:D. Mark replied "What's the present time period in Last Flight in terms of year? Because I don't know how long it takes for griffons to grow to adulthood." When chat advised that Last Flight happens a year or two after DA:I, so about 8 years before DA:D, Mark replied "Oh, so maybe. I don't know how long it takes griffons to grow up".

Someone in chat expressed in surprise, "DA:D is 10 years after DA:I???" Mark explained that "I think the idea is that, I think, the idea is that Dragon Age advances at roughly the same rate as the time between the games. I mean, I guess that's not what we did in DAII, because we have ten years pass in that game, but. They've definitely been releasing new books and stuff and time has been moving forward with that".

"I don't think a silent protagonist is gonna fly for AAA RPGs. Even Bethesda has moved away from it".

Someone in chat asked, "Is it honestly possible to start the DA series with DA:D? I think it's possible to start at any of the first 3 games but DA:I seems very important". Mark replied, "They'll definitely make it so that you can onboard with DA:D. That would be a big huge mistake for them not to do that. You'd be asking a lot to ask someone to start/onboard by playing a game from 2009." He later continued, "I would say that a significant percentage of DA people, not most, but a significant percentage, have only played DA:I. DA:O wasn't an attractive game even when it came out, now it's very aged".

There has been an active decision made for the franchise away to move away from dark fantasy as a genre (like it was in DA:O) for a couple of reasons. One is that it's kind of soul-crushing for the devs to work on stuff like that. Also, that's the sort of genre that The Witcher is. DA:I was moving away and kind of differentiating itself from The Witcher. (Everything in RPG games was dark fantasy in 2009 to 2011, and now we barely have any dark fantasy games at all.)

Relating to this Mark also pointed out that with the question of what dark fantasy is, a lot of this comes down to what you consider that to be. DAII and DA:I both have lots of dark fantasy themes, but if you consider it purely from a visual perspective, he doesn't think that Dragon Age will ever visually be a dark fantasy game/ever visually be a dark fantasy game again because it has slowly been turning the level of magic up. Dark fantasy typically has very low magic, and the goal for DA for a while has been to slowly turn the magic up. "There are still definitely dark fantasy themes in there though and I think there always will be in Dragon Age. I don't think it will ever be high magic like Final Fantasy though, I think it's more just trying to get it away from the very low levels of magic, which is what we had in DA:O especially, to differentiate itself a bit."

[source]

He also talked more generally about DAII and the previous games in general. These bits are collected under a cut due to length:

Chat asked "so, if you could ideally redo how blood magic looks in DAII, what would you replace the self-impalement with?''. Mark mentioned that he likes the way blood magic is discussed in DA:I where it's like 'these are the actions of an amateur' and you can be much more subtle (given that mind control is considered blood magic). "I think it's a little too much".

Another reason why some of the Dalish changed to Welsh accents in DAII was probably the fact that they had found a voice actor that they liked for Merrill, who happened to be Welsh

In DA:II, the wave-spawning mechanic of enemy mooks was a time saver for asset creation

Why spiders? They're creepy and otherworldly, but also common irl so there's a ton of reference material for devs to go by. They also have a 3D aspect to them without having to have flying implemented, which is good because flying is a huge design problem

Chat asked about the "Awesome Button" marketing for DA:II. Mark explained that "The idea for DAII was to have two-tiered marketing - 'frat house' marketing (it's a cool action game!), and 'tree house' marketing (for the Dragon Age 'core' [fans]). But the way marketing was run was that effectively, none of the 'tree house' stuff was done. I think it would have been fine if it had been backed up with stuff showing the more RPG elements of the game. As a result of it being all on its own all we got was confirmation from the core that this had been dumbed down for consoles, so a lot of the backlash at launch comes from just confirming peoples' fears. The game isn't so different [to DA:O] that there wasn't opportunity to prepare the audience better. And that wasn't done. I'm not necessarily super against the actual 'Button', I mean it was overdone, I'm not against it as a part of the marketing campaign, but it started to be too much of the marketing campaign. The frat house marketing wasn't supposed to push the DA core out, it was supposed to be delivered with something else, but effectively it did that. There were issues for sure"

Mark said that his biggest complaint about DAII is that one of the messages that comes out of it, to his mind, is that 'everything the Templars believe is right, mages are all going to become abominations given half a chance', because at the end of the game all the mages basically flip. "I think that could have been navigated a little more cleanly. It basically says 'better not be casting a spell and get a papercut because otherwise, demon'. It isn't that you can't make it make rational sense, but it is confirming a lot of the anti-mage propaganda"

He observed that DAII storytelling is like 'you're fighting against the sea'. He said that he really enjoyed that but not everyone did, as you lost a lot of agency as a result

A comment in chat said "Apparently, David Gaider has been saying that DA:O should get a remaster in PC Gamer". Mark replied "David Gaider has no way of knowing that, even less than I do"

A question in chat was "How does BioWare decide on the default canon worldstate?" Mark replied "I think it's a combination of, if we have the telemetry, going with the majority, and also 'we really need this person for some reason so let's write into that'. But I do think it typically goes with majority rules if that data is available"

Chat asked "Has Flemeth been weakened by putting a piece of herself in the amulet? Like permanently." Mark said "I think the answer is as dictated/needed by the story"

Regarding the piece of Flemeth and amulet in DA:II, he said "you could look at it through the 'Archdemon, Corypheus' lens and she's body-hopping, just through a more elaborate ritual probably"

A comment in chat said "We get a peek in Trespasser that before the Fall of Arlathan, the Elves were more or less Tevinter where powerful mages enslaved everyone else". Mark replied "Tevinter is basically the old elven empire, it's a photocopy of a photocopy of the old elven empire, for sure".

A comment in chat said "Do you think they write Solas too convincingly? I saw people legitimately saying he was right." Mark replied, "I think that's what you would want from a villain, I think you want a villain that you can say is right. He definitely believes that he is the only person that can fix everything. He would be a terrible manager. He would be micromanaging you to death. I think Solas believes that we are in the best possible universe currently because he did the best possible thing at the best possible moment, even when it didn't go right. He absolutely has Main Character Complex. He's probably the most Main Character cCmplex of every character ever"

A comment in chat said "it just sounds like Solas thinks the only 'real people' are ancient elves". Mark replied "you're not wrong, I think that's basically where Solas sits, maybe not if he thinks about it, but kind've his default is like, ancient elves are people, everyone else is someone who came along later and is kind've in the way"

Qunlat is a very literal languauge

"The Qunari are the youngest race for sure"

We haven't really yet interacted with any "civilian" Qunari much

The games haven't spent much time on the Qun's concept of gender roles, "so it's kind of half-baked as a result and a lot of people just find it very confusing"

The games often inject different pronunciations for place names depending on the characters' accents

In DAII, Act 1 is more like 2 acts together

Players tend to stick most to the companions that they're used to, so people don't use Sebastian very much because you don't recruit him until Act 2

A question in chat was "How come this game [DAII] is so stingy with money? I always feel like I'm barely scraping by." Mark explained "that's the point, is that, this whole beginning part up until Act 2 is about you not having enough, barely scraping by, like it's supposed to be this refugee story. Even then the balance is kind've off, because you can basically still get the 50 sovereigns in Act 1 doing mainly critpath stuff only"

A person in chat quoted lore: "According to dwarven scholars, surface dwarves may soon outnumber their underground-living peers." Mark replied "the 'according to dwarven scholars' is the perfect example of the unreliable narrator, whether that ends up being true or not, that could just be propaganda on the part of Orzammar itself"

On Branka making golems, if she's left to do so in DA:O, he said "I never got a very clear understanding of how many golems there are if she is. I always assumed it was in the hundreds, not tens of thousands. If it was the latter it would change the balance of power in Thedas dramatically"

In the current timeline, present day Tevinter and the Qunari in Par Vollen are presented as being the two strongest nations. "Everything else is kind of in balance, Orlais and Ferelden were fairly strong but then banged at each other and brought themselves down to the level of about Antiva, the Anderfels etc. They're all kind of recovering powers, though Antiva, not so much, it was never a superpower as it has always used assassins to keep people at bay."

"Tevinter was the Ottoman Empire back in the day, 'the rest of Europe worries about them and unites to stop them if necessary'. Honestly, a Tevinter-Qunari battle that was on a large enough scale would probably turn into World War One with people picking sides for political reasons. I could totally see Ferelden taking the side opposite of the one Orlais chooses."

At this point I ran out of characters in this post, Part 2 of this post can be found here. :)

(pls note that in places there is a bit of paraphrasing of the info, the best source is always the primary source with full quotes in their original context)

[source]

#dragon age: dreadwolf #dragon age 4 #the dread wolf rises #da4 #dragon age #bioware #video games #solas #fav warden #long post #longpost #sry these posts were originally posted early unfinished w/ some broken links by mistake and in the wrong order #theyre now finished & fixed ^^

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himluv · 7 months ago

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DA Review Series – The Calling by David Gaider

<<< Previous Review: The Stolen Throne

At last, my media tie-in tour of all things Dragon Age continues! You can find the previous review linked at the top of each post and I will probably make a master list once all is said and done. But, let's talk about the next thing!

Title: The Calling Author: David Gaider Publication Year: 2009 In-World Year: ~9:10 Dragon (possibly 9:11 Dragon) Verdict: ... eh? There's much more to like here, particularly lore, but it's long and feels longer. If you're determined, give it a shot, otherwise maybe just read the wiki?

The Calling is the direct follow up to The Stolen Throne, but still a prequel to Dragon Age: Origins. In this book we meet Duncan just months after he has joined the Wardens, and they have travelled to Ferelden to ask King Maric for a favor.

The favor? Oh, you know, nothing much... just if he would lead them through the Deep Roads and back to Ortan Thaig so they can find their missing Commander who *should* be dead. So, you know. Typical Warden shenanigans.

And, as one might expect from a dummy like Maric, he agrees. Now, I am being a little hyper-critical. I actually found Maric to be much more likable this time around – he's grown up quite a bit, and he's grieving Rowan's death and a life he never had. He's got some complexities showing through in this book and it looks good on him.

I also really enjoyed the other Wardens we get to meet. Especially Kell, an Avvar, and his hound Hafter, as well as Orlesian battle couple Julien and Nicolas. We also meet quite a few important folks in this book! Obviously we have Duncan, and he is a delight, but we also meet Fiona, Utha, and of course, The Architect.

Which brings me to the point of this book. The Architect has concocted a plan to infect the whole world with the Darkspawn Taint in hopes that the survivors will achieve some sort of middle ground like Grey Wardens do in the advanced stages of their Calling. Ghoulish and horrible, but still retaining their minds.

Except... do they retain their minds? The evidence suggests that the further the Taint spreads, and the more corrupted one becomes, the angrier and more hateful they become. Which is interesting, because I don't know if that's really come up elsewhere in DA. It definitely makes me consider Red Lyrium a little differently, that's for sure.

Of course, if you've played DA: Awakening, then you know that The Architect and Utha escape and do continue... refining(?) their plans to bring a "lasting peace" to Thedas (read my tin hat theory here).

Also important to the series, Maric and Fiona do the nasty in the Deep Roads which results in the birth of one adorable wee baby Alistair. We also get some context about Duncan's promise to Maric to watch out for the boy, so we know his recruitment was hardly coincidence.

There's one more thing I really want to mention before I wind this down. I've been pretty critical of Gaider's writing in these reviews so far, and while I still think the writing isn't great in The Calling, it is GREATLY improved. It's obvious to me that he learned a lot and grew over the course of writing these books. But, there's one moment that I think really shines, where I actually got the sense that Gaider was writing something that mattered to him.

When the party is trapped in the Fade, Maric finds Nicolas in his dream with the recently deceased Julien. It's a poignant and tragic scene, where Nicolas knows he's dreaming, that Julien truly is dead, but chooses to stay anyway. It's beautifully done and made my chest ache with the weight of Nicolas's pain. It also made me think about when it was written, how it was "revealed" so far into the book that these two very buff warrior bros were actually devoted lovers. And how the gaming landscape in 2009 might not have looked upon that with the most kindness and empathy.

I'm glad it's there. To me, it was the best part of the book.

Overall, The Calling is a decent addition to the Dragon Age series. It struggles with pacing a bit, feeling like the pacing of a quest in Origins (which also struggles with pacing imho), but there is quite a bit of lore and extra context for characters we see later in the series.

So, while it took me a little while to get through, I am glad I read it again!

#HIMluv reviews Dragon Age #Dragon Age: The Calling #Dragon Age #Dragon Age: Origins #Duncan Dragon Age #Maric Theirin

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a-bad-case-of-the-stephs · 27 days ago

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Oh also bestie do you have any reading recs for Steph stories but like. Not the common ones (i.e her solo, mainline appearances in Robin93 or Batgirl00, etc). bc I literally bought the JLI 1990 annual (the justice league Antarctica issue) bc it had cluemaster on it and it was the closest I could get to a Steph comic (genuine insanity on my part. This is before Steph was even introduced too she's not even mentioned 😭)

I have ofc read her DC showcase and her Solo short story by Damion Scott (which are some of her better known 'bonus material' I'm thinking) but I honestly don't mind rereading any of her stuff (I might reread her stuff from the Jon Lewis era of Robin bc I generally enjoy his take on Steph a lot).

Anyway feel free to take your time, Lord knows when I'll be free to read these (end of term hell) but yeah. Need more Steph in my life right now and she's not appearing in any books currently so...

I’m sure any comic i could mention you’ve already seen, so I’m not sure how much help I could be unfortunately. I will try my best however!!

If you’re doing rereads I have to start with mentioning Bruce Wayne The Road Home: Batgirl (2010). It holds such a special place in my heart. The closest thing we get to acknowledgment and catharsis for all the fucked up ways Batman treated Steph. It’s got a few weird lines but generally a very uplifting read for me. They finally let her slap Batman in the face!! Huge win!!!

One Steph related comic I hadn’t read until super recently is Suicide Squad #1 (2001), the comic where Arthur Brown “dies”. I always figured Arthur died in a suicide squad given the context we get in Robin 1993 but I never actually got around to finding and reading the actual issue until fairly recently. Definitely recommend checking it out if you haven’t yet, steph isn’t in it physically but there’s a few Steph mentions and they’re all Fucked up.

Birds of Prey #99 (1999) is a another good one where Steph is not there physically (she was busy being dead at the time), but she gets mentioned in a really fucked up manner. Important to my understanding of Babs and Stephs relationship in Batgirl 2009, it’s sort of a precursor to their relationship there. Also just great for the tragedy of Stephanie’s death and how people acted about her once she was dead vs towards her when she was still kicking. Also a win for Steph and Jason Todd parallels.

If you’re rereading Jon Lewis’s run you KNOW I have to mention Robin 111. So much is there. Her huge sweater. Her horrible bruise. Her fuckass bob. Her little smile. Her eyebags. The pure sweetness and raw anger and soft hurt. Big comic for me.

The Robin/Spoiler Special (2008) is very interesting and I haven’t seen anyone talk about it here (then again I am super new to tumblr so I’m sure it’s been discussed). A lot of the art is extraordinarily beautiful, and it’s the only comic which shows us any part of Stephanie’s Dead Year (that I’m aware of) so it gets points for that. I haven’t broken it down very much in my head but there’s really a Lot to look at and consider.

Another Steph comic I just recently finished fully reading is Batman Family (2002). 8 issue series I generally found enjoyable. Steph only appears in issues #2 and #8, and generally plays a minimal role. It’s mostly of interest to me bc where it takes place chronologically. It takes place more of less immediately after BW:Fugitive concludes. So for steph, about when she was fired as Spoiler but didn’t know It yet. I’ve been trying to place each issue timeline wise for her because there’s some fucked up Tim Drake related connotations depending.

Secret Origins 80 Page Giant (1998) is another essential steph appearance for me. It gives us harrowing insight into a lot of aspects of Stephs childhood, her relationship with Crystal, her experiences with abuse, and a painfully sweet glance at how she saw Batman when she was a kid. Takes place mid-pregnancy arc where Steph reflects on her past.

Idk if these count as ‘mainline’ but I feel like I have to mention Gotham Knights #22 and #37 (2000) anyway. Essential to my understanding of Stephanie’s dynamic with Batman during her time sanctioned as Spoiler. I reread these all the fucking time. They are exceedingly sad from a Steph POV so reread with caution.

Anyway, hope I was able to be at least a little helpful. Would srsly love to hear ur thoughts on any or all of these if you end up reading or rereading. No pressure, like you said, it’s a pretty busy time!

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tokiro07 · 5 months ago

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Magic in Shonen Jump

When I think about my Shonen Jump crossover, I often think about the interplay between different power systems

My general rule of thumb is that all "life forces" are comparable, so Ki, Nen, Chakra, etc. can all be used to strike a Devil Fruit user's true body the same way that Haki does

Then I got to thinking about Black Clover

At first, Magic/Mana seemed like it should function the same way, being a form of energy that exists in all living things, and therefore Asta's Anti-Magic should be capable of cutting/deflecting/absorbing/etc. any life energy-based ability within Jump

Buuut then I remembered that Black Clover's Magic very explicitly isn't life energy - much like Dragon Ball has both Ki and Magic, so too does Black Clover include Ki in its power system

So now the question becomes: what power systems does Asta's Anti-Magic work on?

Criteria

The exact definition of "magic" is pretty loose and can vary even within a series, as even Devil Fruits are referred to as either science or magic depending on cultural contexts and understanding within One Piece's world, so it's not as simple as "if it's called magic it's magic and if it's not, it's not"

That said, I think if it's referred to specifically as Magic or Mana and doesn't have a definition that somehow clashes with Black Clover's distinction between Mana and Ki, I think it's safe to just label it as Magic and be done with it. This means that the Magic in Mashle, Dragon Quest, Beelzebub, Muhyo & Roji, Magical Taruruto-Kun, etc. all qualify as Magic

Jujutsu Kaisen's Jujutsu literally translates to Sorcery, so we can reasonably assume it's a form of magic, especially since it's power source, Juryoku/Cursed Energy, is definitely not any form of Life Energy, deriving from negative emotions and needing to be polarically inverted in order to perform healing techniques

Along the same lines, if it's explicitly referred to as Ki or Life Energy, or clearly functions as Life Energy without having a clear parallel to what one would normally call Magic, then we'll put it in the Life Energy category. Dragon Ball's Ki/Chi obviously counts, and so do JoJo's Stands, as they are explicitly manifestations of Life Energy

Stands are also expressions of one's "fighting spirit" or willpower, so we can further extrapolate any willpower-based energy system to be Ki adjacent; this includes things like One Piece's Haki, Hokuto no Ken's Touki, Reborn's Dying Will, etc.

Spirit

Of course, the term "Spirit" has other connotations beyond willpower; it can also mean the soul, which is very literally tied to the concept of life. Therefore, I think that any system that uses Soul or Spirit Energy should, at their core, be considered Life Energies unless otherwise stated to have distinct properties

Undead Unluck, Yu Yu Hakusho, and Bleach all use something to that effect, with a deceased person becoming a ghost upon death and all powers being in some way derived from that fact (though UU kind of reverses that logic)

However, Bleach has an interesting caveat where, while all spiritual things are made up of Reishi/Spirit Particles, effectively soul atoms, which can be converted into Reiryoku/Spirit Power to perform Kido, which are effectively spells. In the same way that Black Clover's Mana exists both within the living and ambiently in nature, so too does Reishi. Obviously Reishi is distinct from Mana, but the usage of Reiryoku is quite similar, so to my mind, Spirit Particles are exempt from being affected by Anti-Magic, but Spirit Power is vulnerable to it. A Shinigami's body, which is made of Reishi, would be susceptible to Ki-based attacks but not Anti-Magic, while their Reiryoku-based abilities can be damaged/deflected/etc. by Anti-Magic

Shaman King's Furyoku/Shamanic Power, is similar to Reishi, in the sense that spiritual matter is made of it, though it isn't stated to exist ambiently. Rather, it's more of a measure of a Shaman's capacity to interact with Spirits and personally manifest them to be capable of interacting with the living world (Over Soul); in other words, while there is a spiritual energy within living things and deceased spirits, Furyoku itself is more akin to Bleach's Reiryoku, the power to bring about outcomes with that energy. Thus, Over Souls are effectively spells cast by the Shaman, and are therefore susceptible to Anti-Magic, though spirits cannot be exorcised or otherwise directly harmed by it. This is fortunate, as Furyoku has more recently been localized as Mana, meaning that we don't have to break the earlier established rule of Mana=Mana just because of an odd translation choice

Naruto is a particularly interesting case because while it does have two forms of Life Energy, in a Physical and Spiritual variety collectively known as Stamina, neither is ever really treated as the focus of Naruto's system. Instead, it focuses on the byproduct of those two base energies, Chakra. We've already made the argument that the refinement of basic energy into a manifested outcome leans towards Magic in both Bleach and Shaman King, but even if that argument falls through, Naruto's setting clearly sets it apart from the others; Chakra is not inherent to the people of its world. It was introduced to the world by a higher being, and it was then found to be replicable by mixing what was already present. Chakra is, technically, an external force that was effectively transplanted into the people of the world, making it quite definitively not a Life Energy in and of itself

Miscellaneous

Of course, the majority of power systems don't use either name at all, and need special considerations to be categorized as "Magic" or "Non-Magic"

Saint Seiya's Cosmo is difficult to qualify because technically it's based in science, using the energy from the bonds between atoms to manipulate matter. However, because we've already established that Mana is an ambient energy, that same logic should technically apply to Cosmo, as it is found in all matter, not specifically living things. Furthermore, Cosmo is used to often used to effect miracles and invoke the blessings of the Gods, which implies that Cosmo is a form of thaumaturgy; in other words, Magic

D. Gray-Man's Innocence is a semi-sentient material, so it's difficult to say for sure, but given that it seems to have divine origins, my inclination is to say that Innocence is miraculous, and therefore Magical for the purposes of this crossover. Because it is able to harm Akuma, manifestations of departed souls, I will concede that it has overlap with Life Energy and should still be able to harm Devil Fruit users, though

In contrast, Buso Renkin's Alchemy, while also utilizing weapons constructed of miraculous substances, is strictly scientific in nature. While it's far enough beyond real-world understanding of science to seem akin to magic, it does not draw on magical energies and instead specifically utilizes exaggerated scientific principles

Wholly biological abilities, like the physical enhancements of Demon Slayer's Breathing or the endocrine Someinine of Mission: Yozakura Family, definitely don't count in my book. Psychic powers like Psyren's PSI or abilities that are rooted in one's mentality like Medaka Box's Skills are technically biological in the sense that they're rooted in the brain, but the ability to manifest thoughts into the world is debatably a form of magic, but generally I have to say they're non-magical

However, Nurarihyon's Fear, while based in mentality and perception, is actually based on the perceptions of others; whereas psychic abilities derive from one's brainwaves, Fear is effectively manifesting the imagination of humans. Yokai are mystical in nature, so it stands to reason that their ability, which depends on human belief in the supernatural, would qualify as Magic

Fear in Chainsaw Man, however, is much more debatable. While the relative strength of a Devil is determined by how feared they are, what they're literally capable of is determined by the aspect of the world they represent. Devil Contracts are Faustian deals, which are akin to black magic, but they're never referred to as magical; it almost seems like Devils are a force of nature, simply facts that act as they please and able to affect whatever change in the world they like so long as they're properly compensated. In that sense, they almost seem divine, but their placement is treated so mundanely that it's hard to make a solid judgment. I'm inclined to say no, but I think I could be convinced that it is magical

Conclusion

This list is by no means exhaustive, as there are tons of Jump manga that I'm either unfamiliar with or just didn't go into detail on here, like World Trigger's Trion, Toriko's Appetite, or Yugioh's Ba (all stated to be Life Energies, though the use of Ba to summon monsters or Ka is almost certainly a form of spellcasting), so if there were some you wanted me to cover, let me know

I'm not even against Life Energies being considered magic, I just think they're typically more akin to what Black Clover calls Ki than to what it calls Mana, so if you have a case for why any should be reevaluated, I'd love to hear them

Honestly, I'm not really too hung up on it either way; like I said, Asta's ability to use Ki typically makes up for a lack of Anti-Magic vulnerability in most of his potential matchups, as he'd still be able to interact with spiritual energies just fine. This was just a fun thought experiment, and I hope anyone who reads it will enjoy it too!

#shonen jump #power systems #black clover #jump over

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