#i think that’s an interesting part of her character
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drenched-in-sunlight · 2 days ago
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one thing that i find interesting is that even though we never get to interact with Marika directly, only knowing her via obscure cutscenes and other characters' dialogue... she actually displays a wide range of emotions as much as any other NPCs.
her statues depict her as having a warm, gentle smile:
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the Mimic veil description points to her playful, mischievous side:
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(it's a popular theory in the JP/Asian side of the fandom that it's sth from her childhood - hence the "Marika's Mischief", not "Queen Marika's", and she used it to escape the grisly fate befalling her family.
additionally, its equivalence in Dark Souls is also something described as "the mischief of a young girl who sought relief from the solitude of the woods at dusk", aka Princess Dusk who hails from "Oolacile, land of ancient golden sorceries", but i digress)
her portrait, the story trailer's "Queen Marika was driven to the brink" and Gideon's dialogue after the player defeated Malenia pointed out her sorrow:
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(back when i first played the base game, this is the portrait that drove my eyes most in Roundtable Hold. i kept gazing at her - the Queen with permanently lowered eyes, and thought "there is a girl in there")
The bat lady's song, Messmer's entire Crusade, all those conflicts to establish the Erdtree, shows her anger, and the cruelty she's capable of:
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Then there's Shaman's village, the clinic underneath Shadow Keep, the golden braid, the Minor Erdtree, the sealing of Death - that points to grief, trauma, survivor guilt, kindness, and the ruinous drive for revenge that results in the above path down hell:
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(there's also a theory for the Crusade's headless statue being a reminder for the Hornsent of what they put Marika's mother through, but it's not concrete canon so here is the link if you want to check it out)
The fact that all of Erdtree's incantations are heal and protection spells (with only one exception of Wrath of Gold spell which was found after the Elden Ring was shattered), the Capitol's Perfumers originally being blessed healers, and that all Erdtree blessings come in the shape of tears give the picture of Marika's gentle wish at the beginning: to heal everything and everyone.
(and to me personally, there's a kind of vulnerability and honesty in showing your tears to the world and let it be your power to heal at the same time.)
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the eye she blessed Messmer with (i do think the Eng translation at some part lost the sentiment of the JP text - that the eye is always referred to as a blessing)
the blessing flask that - unlike its Dark Souls equivalent (which ranges from 6-13 flasks), only have 4 available to us player, heal all ailments and status effect, and specified as sth made for Messmer.
the Marika's soreseal in the Haligtree + the waterfall near Godwyn's final resting place
the Regal Omen Bairn (that was fashioned after the Jizo statue - sth made by grieving parents wishing for protection for their deceased child in the afterlife)
the blessing, gifts, equipment that Messmer and Godwyn's personal knights all get
the fact that Marika's bedchamber and the Impaler's Catacomb (which is the only catacomb in the base game to have the spike trap mechanic used in catacombs in the DLC) remain the proof of Messmer's existence in the base game
how Godwyn's ending is the only ending where the mending rune is placed on the position of Marika's womb (the lower arc or the Elden Ring - also referred to as the basin in which its blessings pool)
that's a whole barrage of motherhood. the love, the fear, the postpartum depression, the guilt and anxiety, (the occasional scheming for revenge with her son). and despite how flawed and tragic that love ends up being for all of them, it is there.
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(there's a whole subplot about how Messmer is the only demigod to be called ugly in-game (Hornsent npc dialogue) while Boc's questline is about how his mother being the only one to always assure him he's beautiful, despite everyone else calling him ugly. and how each NPCs questline does reflect a wider theme seen in Marika and her children. but again, i digress)
every time i think of her, Marika is a constantly shifting kaleidoscope, holding everything from within (the beauty and the malign, light and dark, birth and death, she's warm and gentle, she's cruel and unjust, she's strong and kind, she's weak and resentful, she's sweet and she's bitterness made flesh)... and i could only stand there and admire it all.
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angstandhappiness · 4 hours ago
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Interesting
Hello, hope you're somewhat well. I was wondering if you could possibly explain what the whole deal with bismuth and rose was. To explain, I am confused on why exactly bismuth was wrong with her idea about killing the the diamonds and rose's later response. I remember reading somewhere that the reason that bismuth was wrong with her plans was because a) the diamonds are just too powerful and b) it wouldn't really fix/help anything because the system would still be in place (you'd just have dead dictators). Is that correct? And so why did rose later on do somewhat of what bismuth wanted if she (assuming here) knew it wouldn't work? Pink would be dead, but the system not at all dismantled. Please explain as if you were speaking to a really dumb person (me)
Thanks for this question. I know it's been sitting for a while in the inbox but I didn't forget, I just think that I should leave this macerate... because? that's a complicated question??? you're not dumb at all.
I think that you're conflating perspectives here: what the story is trying to tell, morally, with how the characters feel and do and where they morally position themselves regardless of the story. The first corresponds with your first question: why Bismuth's plan was wrong (in the sense that it was flawed, not necessarily inmoral--though it is). And the second question corresponds with what pertains the characters inside the narrative.
Objectively, Bismuth's plan was not going to be succesful, and it would've been a mistake in the future. We know this because... Rose went in with the idea, she carried it out. She killed Pink Diamond and it changed nothing about the situation. Homeworld's status quo, its hierarchy and its system, remained unchanged, but moreso it created an earthquake, a trauma, on the landscape that reverberated back on the crystal gems.
I want to say that this is normal. It's a plan that is blotchy, messy and runs on a very emotionally charged motivation. Bismuth was right on feeling this way, these emotions are admirable and also very valid. But having the right feelings does not mean that things are going to go the way you expect and the way you want to.
Let's look at what the story says about this: Steven Universe is a medium that sits on the belief that justice must be restorative in order to be justice. Punishment, vengeance, other contemptious actions are always unwarranted under this principle, because they're not considered useful to actually amend the hurtful situation and are in fact almost always counter productive to mitigating the injustice. Hurts keeps going because we keep hurting each other back.
There are several examples were this statement particularly stands out in the show, most notably Steven in Homeworld Bound when he shows resentment towards the Diamonds, perceiving injustice for the trauma they directly caused on him and feeling vengeful at this injustice. This is portrayed as wrong. It's okay to have feelings on the matter but if you want to kill someone that is actually already trying to fix their wrongdoings, the story says, you're the one that is going too far and the one that needs help.
Bismuth is another example because she also has resentment towards the Diamonds (for a completely good reason!) and wants to revenge her friends and free everyone by getting rid of the only thing that seems to be perpetuating that. While the way Rose acted is unfair and kind of cruel? , Bismuth's plan is never warranted by the story because it collides with this principle of restorative justice.
Parenthesis, part of the reason Bismuth hates the Diamonds so much is that she's been swallowing everything Rose had been saying about them. Rose comes from a place of self hate and she's particularly harsh on Pink Diamond when she talks about them with the CGs. We could talk about how she uses this to cope with her own inner critic and to find what feels to her like an honest response to her inexcusable behavior, but maybe not here.
Moving on to why Rose follows through despite disagreeing with that plan... I think she doesn't, necessarily, disagree on the plan of Killing Pink Diamond. I think that's a possibility although we cannot know for sure. What she's definitely against is the weapon. She doesn't think it's right. And I think it makes perfect sense when you think about her background and her feelings on the matter of destruction: she has the core belief that her nature is inherently destructive and she's deeply ashamed of it, she wishes to make it disappear, to not reproduce that destructive nature ever again.
There is some complex trauma around it that gets triggered when Bismuth shows her the breaking point. She had swore to never hurt anyone ever again but here it is the most Crystal Gem of all telling her that she created a weapon of (at the time) irreversible destruction... As irreversible as Volley's scar. How is she not going to feel responsible for this, after all she created the Crystal Gems, and how is she not going to feel contempt at someone who wants and seeks to do something like this to someone else?
Who says they wouldn't use this weapon against any other gems too? I don't know, I think Rose simply didn't want to get more gems hurt so horribly. Which is not incompatible with killing "herself".
One thing is that Rose is not aware of the impact this action will have when she decides to go through with it. She's under the impression that she's utterly irrelevant and that no one on Homeworld will miss her if she were to be gone (and I don't think she can truly believe it even after that, since she does it a second time).
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I think that the major catalyst to this decision for sure was what Blue told her in Can't Go Back. Immediately, she believes the words, fixates on them. Earth will be a colony for as long as she's there to rule. And materializes the idea in her mind. For as long as she's there. If she's not Pink Diamond anymore, if she gives up her status and kills this part of herself, Earth will be free and the war will end. And everyone will be free. She will be free.
With this comes the second and last realization, Rose’s goals killing Pink Diamond were never about dismantling the system. Not because she's conservative, that'd be absurd, it's just that she simply does not believe that she's capable of that at all (out of feelings of powerlessness). She thinks reedeeming the system is impossible, and therefore the only solution is to escape the system and create a new solar punk anarchist utopia outside of it.
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fanficsbysteve · 3 days ago
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Jeremy Crow
Note: When I write my BuckTommy stuff, I always draw on my own personal experiences when writing stuff for Tommy. He’s a 40 year old gay man, I’m a 40 year old gay man. His Dad was abusive as shit growing up. My Dad was abusive as shit growing up. So, I feel we could have some very similar stuff happen in our lives. So, I had this thought and figured that in my head this was true. So, enjoy another of my silly little headcanons.
Also available on AO3 if you want to leave Kudos.
***
Tommy took Evan up to his bedroom to get ready for bed, and some other things beforehand but Tommy was not going to push for that. It had been two weeks since they had spoken and realized they were both idiots and decided to try again, just not going at light speed that Evan had been going at. Tommy was going to talk about how things made him feel and wasn’t just ‘trying to keep up’ with Evan’s pace. They were also going to go at Tommy’s pace as well.
     Going into the room, Tommy looked at the bed and spotted something sitting in the middle of the bed. Tommy froze. Oh god he had forgotten to put that away. Evan went past Tommy into the room and his eyes also fell onto the bed, “Oh what’s that?” he asked, looking at the bed as well.
     Sitting in the middle of the pillows was a stuffed crow. It looked like it had seen better days, its better days being three decades ago. The black fuzz that had been its torso had all but worn away, the paint on its eyes had been rubbed off and was just the white of the eyes now. The only part that seemed to have withstood the test of time was the beak of the crow, “Um…” Tommy started, “That would be Jeremy. Jeremy Crow.”
 Tommy looked at the crow sitting on his bed, named after a character from a movie he had watched as a child. He had gotten it when he was around five years old and had been sleeping with him every night since. There was something comforting about having Jeremy with him. He slept better. Tommy sometimes thought that Jeremy kept the bad dreams away. He never had them when he had Jeremy in his arms. He had been trying to hide Jeremy away, not wanting Evan to see him because he was scared of what Evan would think about him. A grown man still sleeping with a stuffed animal from his childhood.
     Evan did something that shocked Tommy. Something he hadn’t expected. Evan walked over to the bed, got in, motioned for Tommy to join him, and handed Jeremy over to Tommy, “So tell me about Jeremy,” Evan asked as he lie down.
     Tommy took Jeremy and held him close, feeling the comfort that Jeremy brought to him, “I’ve had him for years,” Tommy started, “My Mom had seen him at a Garage sale and bought him for me. We didn’t have a lot of money growing up so things like this were rare. My mom did enjoy going to garage sales though. She could always find the most interesting treasures at those,” Tommy went to lay down fully in bed, “She passed away about a year after she gave me Jeremy. It’s the only thing I have left that reminds me of her.”
     Evan pulled Tommy into a cuddle. Wrapping his arms around the both of them, “I’m sorry that happened,” Evan said. Tommy had told him about how his mother had died when he was about 6 years old, and how his home life had gone downhill after that as his father had become an alcoholic, “I’m glad you still have something that reminds you of her.”
     Tommy let Evan hold him, feeling his warmth, Jeremy tucked in close to his chest, “I might not have it for long anyways,” Tommy said, “You saw what he looked like. He’s seen better days. I think his best days were back when I was a child. Soon he’s just going to fall apart like most things in my life and I’ll lose the last shred of my Mom.”
     Tommy felt tears welling up, but he refused to let them fall. He would not cry over this. He would remain strong, “You won’t lose the last shred of your Mom though,” Evan gave Tommy a squeeze, “She lives inside you. And you will always have her memory. Jeremy is a reminder of those memories but he’s just a thing.”
     “I know,” Tommy said, “Doesn’t make it less painful that I’ll lose him. Did you know that he’s the reason I don’t have nightmares all the time?”
     “You believe that your stuffed crow stops nightmares?” Evan sounded, “But my belief that I was cursed by a dead cowboy was silly?”
     “Oh, leave me alone,” Tommy playfully elbowed Evan, “I have my own beliefs just like you. I don’t believe in curses, but I’ve never had a nightmare so long as I have Jeremy with me. You’ve experienced my nightmares.”
     Tommy remembered when he was staying over at Evan’s place a few months ago. He felt he had his nightmares under control. He was very wrong. He had been having a flashback to his time in Iraq, he had joined the military and was working as a helicopter pilot, one of those big troop carrier types. They were flying over the desert when out of nowhere, someone fired a missile at them. Tommy saw it coming but not in time and the back of the chopper had been hit. He did everything he could to get them down safely, but they ended up crashing no matter what Tommy did. Six men died on impact. They were nowhere near a city or town. It took them 3 days to find their way back. Tommy had woken up screaming that night. Evan was freaking out about what was happening. He had no idea the PTSD that Tommy was suppressing every day, “I know,” Evan replied, continuing to hold him.
     “Lets just get some sleep,” Tommy said. He was exhausted from having to remember so many things he’s been trying so hard to keep down.
***
     Tommy was at Evan’s loft, laying in bed, waiting for Evan to finish up in the bathroom. He was ready for bed, laying in just his boxers, nothing else on. He preferred to sleep like this when at Evan’s loft. Evan kept the temperature up higher than Tommy did at his house, so it was always far too warm for him in the loft. Hot air rising and all that. Evan came out of the bathroom, dressed only in his underwear as well, and crawled into bed, “I got you something,” Evan said as he leaned over the bed to grab something from the side. Tommy was confused, “Since you don’t have Jeremy Crow while over here, I wanted you to have something to hold, maybe to keep the dreams at bay,” Evan pulled up a penguin, the size of Jeremy.
     Tommy reached out to take it from Evan. He had tears in his eyes. This was the first time someone had actually not mocked him for having Jeremy. The fact that Evan had taken the time to go out, find this penguin, just for Tommy to sleep with so he didn’t wake up screaming, which meant something to Tommy, “Evan,” was all he could manage to get out as his throat constricted as he wanted to cry.
     “He doesn’t have a name yet,” Evan replied, “I figured that you would want to name him yourself. I don’t know any good penguin movies besides Happy Feet. So, I will leave naming him to you,” Evan continued, “And if he works, would you allow me to take Jeremy to someone I found? After you showed me Jeremy, I started falling down a research hole.”
     Tommy was just staring at the penguin while Evan spoke, barely hearing what he was saying. Tommy at this moment knew that Evan was the one. The one to spend the rest of his life with. He just didn’t know how to broach the subject now. They had only been back together for three weeks, “Sorry what?”
     “I was asking if I could take Jeremy to a repair shop I found online,” Evan repeated. Tommy leaned into Evan, just staring at this new penguin, “He’s got a great online presence, lots of five star reviews on Google. I figured we could make Jeremy last awhile longer if we took him in for some repairs.”
     Tommy nodded his head absently at that, “Sounds good,” He said.
     “You seem a little out of it,” Evan asked, “Something wrong?”
     “Not really,” Tommy replied, “I’ve never had someone care about me so much. Usually, it was open mockery if anyone actually saw Jeremy. You are the first person who actually cared about me enough to not only not mock me about my crow that I sleep with, but you went out of your way to get something so that I could sleep well at your place as well.”
     “Well, you are important to me,” Evan said, “I wouldn’t have blurted out about moving in together all those months ago if I didn’t mean it. I want you to feel like you are at home here as well until the day we do decide to take the next steps.”
     Now it was Tommy’s turn to blurt things out. He shouldn’t have but he couldn’t help himself. He felt so complete now with Evan, knowing about his nightmares, how to help with them, “I love you,” Tommy said turning his head to face Evan, “I love you more than anything in this world. You are the first person who has ever taken the time to understand me. I want you to be my last.”
     Tommy watched as Evan was taken aback by his statement for a brief second, “I didn’t expect that,” a smile broke out over Evan’s face, “I love you too you fool. I figured that out months ago when I asked you to move in.”
     “We both agreed we were idiots,” Tommy said as he brought the penguin in for a tight hug. He felt similar to Jeremy, but softer, “But yes you can take Jeremy in for repairs, but only because I have Hubie here.”
     “Hubie?” Evan asked about the name.
     Tommy smiled, “Yes Hubie. I’m a child of the 80’s and 90’s. I watched a lot of Don Bluth movies. There was one about penguins and the main character is named Hubie. So, it fits.”
     “You’ll have to show me the movies that you get your names from one of these days,” Evan said, “But now lets get some sleep. It’s been a long day.”
     Tommy turned on his side, letting Evan take the Big Spoon position, holding Hubie close. A content sigh left his body as he felt this soft penguin in his arms, and Evan’s arms pulling him close. This was the perfect ending to a wonderful day.
***
Note: So yeah, I admit that I still have stuffed animals. I have the stuffed Mickey Mouse I had since I as a child still in my bedroom. I also have a stuffed Penguin I sleep with named Mr. Pickles. Just something I need to sleep. If I don’t have one of them, I can’t sleep well. And yes, I am actually a 40 year old man who sleeps with a stuffed penguin. Hate all you want but you won’t change me. For the record, Jeremy Crow came from The Secret of NIMH, and Hubie the Penguin is from The Pebble and the Penguin. Both Don Bluth movies.
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daretolovemyrambling · 2 days ago
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ARCANE: unreliable narrators (Silco and Vander focused) PART 1
I haven't really been in this tag/fandom before the season 2 finale, but can we talk about how both Vander and Silco are unreliable narrators? Especially when it comes to their flashback scenes?
I don't get why i've seen so many take the flashbacks we got in the show at face value. The show makes clear time and time again that when we get a flashback from the point of view of a single character, they are an unreliable narrator.
some examples of other characters:
on the left: biased/not the reality (character's memory/pov) vs on the right: unbiased/reality (our, the viewers, pov)
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I'm going to use video clips and transcripts of the memories because I can't just gif like 5 minutes of scenes. Since you can only have one video per post, I will have to post this in several parts.
Let's start with Warwick's memories from 2x5:
We see that the memory of Warwick in episode 2x5 is all over the place, memories from the past 15-20 years come flooding back in bits and pieces. 
In the first moment of this scene we see Warwick running through the mines, then we see Singed who has experimented on him, we see the Monkey Toy aggressively banging it's cymbals against each other, then we see a younger looking Silco about to swing something at an enforcer, for a split second the Monkey's face replaces Silco's, we see that it was a bottle bomb and set that enforcer on fire.
I think this represents Silco's almost obsessive nature when it came to their fight for Zaun's freedom, the Monkey overwhelms you with it's loud noise the same way Silco likely overwhelmed Vander with his ruthless actions.
the next scene, Silco looks horrified at Vander and we cut to Vander drowning Silco, then back to the moment Vander (and likely Silco) discover Felicia's lifeless body. 
We see a moment of Vander punching an enforcer with his gauntlets from 1x1, cut to the Monkey's face again, then we see Warwick's perspective of the prison fight with the enforcers in 2x4 (we see him choke one of them out with his claws) and slashing several more of them brutally.
Finally, we cut back to the mines were he hallucinates a toddler-aged Powder crying her little eyes out (it looks like something that actually happened. I think this might be a moment shortly after he takes in the girls. Powder looks like she just woke up from a nightmare, her body language is shy and scared). He softly wipes the tears away with his left hand (same hand he used to choke Silco and an enforcer just a few moments earlier) 
Powder's face turns into Jinx and then pre-teen Powder and we follow Powder's lifeless gaze to Felicia dancing at the Jukebox, before finally, Vander images a Silco shortly after the murder attempt, this Silco is still dripping wet from the lake (and he uses his signature glass) but smiles at Vander invitingly (likely a moment that actually happend but was warped by the many nightmares Vander likely had about what he did).
The idea that Silco escalated the Bridge Riot and thus caused the death of many Zaunites, including Felicia and Connol, is definitely supported by this short memory, but it's *not* the only way you can read the scene. Vander's memories are evidently completely scrambled, he is remembering the worst moments of his life all at once.
It's just as valid to say that Silco was not there during the Bridge Scene in season 1 episode 1 as to say that he was!
That is what makes unreliable narrators so interesting, we can make assumptions to what happend, but if we don't get an unbiased view at a scene, we don't know for sure if it happend the way the narrator imagined it.
Examples where we have unbiased flashbacks would be flashbacks like Mel's childhood in 1x8 and the Bar scene with Felicia in 2x5. In these scenes we don't follow the pov of one character, of course information is still omitted from us to an extend, but we can make our own assumption instead of seeing the biased/narrow pov of a single character.
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lost-romantique · 2 days ago
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Hey so I just came across a fan theory that said they think Vassago will play a part in reuniting Via and Stolas and during this process Stolas will pursue a relationship with him, again trying to refer to that one twitter post about Stolas finding a new BF even though it most likely referred to BTB guy. Also since his romance with Blitz cost him Via. That also brings me back to the same fear about Stolas’s ‘dirty bird’ song in season 3 that had the same person working on it as a song for Vassago that it may be a duet. But it doesn’t make sense since they’ve doubled down on how much Stolas loves Blitz, him pursuing a new relationship seems dramatic. And a love triangle along with all the drama that’s already going on seems extra. Also we don’t know what Vassago’s role would be, Loona or Blitz could easily also play a part in reuniting them. More fans who assume Stolas has given up on a romance with Blitz because he lost his daughter. I don’t think so, just that he is depressed about Via, not that he’s lost interest in Blitz. What do you think?
I feel like a lot of people are really desperate to get Stolas and Vassago to work out, but I personally feel like that would ruin Stolas' character for a lot of people and wouldn't make much sense in the long run.
Stolas has spent the entirety of Season 2, desperately chasing after an emotionally constipated lizard, and now he has him.
If Blitz is giving 110% of himself to Stolas, and Stolas magically goes "Well FUCK Blitzø, I'm now magically in love with Vassago". It would be shoddy writing, and many people would consider it cheating and a huge betrayal of trust.
Also, I think people are doubting Blitz here. Blitz is playing the role of caretaker and perfect boyfriend for Stolas because he sees Stolas as his now. Blitz is very much possessive of the things he deems that are his.
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Blitzø Buckzo is a man that has fucked, stolen, cheated, and killed many people to get what he wants, and to create I.M.P. His entire reason for being is to keep his found family, and Stolas is now part of that family.
Also, remember, this is Blitzø's dream now...
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Blitz is going to operate in a way to ensure that dream of his comes true. That dream of where he can eventually settle down with Stolas, and build a life with him and their daughters together.
And Blitzø will do anything and everything to ensure that he makes that dream of his into a reality.
In regards to 'Dirty Bird', I already made a post about it.
Also, Blitz has messed up a lot in regards to his relationship with Stolas, but here's the thing...
As Stolas says, this was his choice...
He chose to save Blitzø from execution. He chose to put his life down on the line for him in the name of love.
"I am the mastermind, the master of my fate. Sure as the stars have shined, I'll give my life to clean your slate."
He also did choose to give Blitzø the book, and start their transactional relationship.
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sasahuaa · 2 days ago
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Can you add scaramouche to your omega character series? He'd be a disastrous omega that needs lots of healing but I'm sure his partner can provide
You're doing great! I love reading your fics and characterization
Scaramouche as an omega
I was really considering Scaramouche before to start with genshin! I was a bit scared to start with Scara because I could see that I would start yapping, and almost did, I had to cut so many things bc my initial idea was to write him in all stages of his life, also not sure if you meant the canon timeline or fatui!scaramouche, but I can do that in the future, for now this fic has some brief mentions of Kabukimono and the fatui. And thank you for the kind words, it means a lot!
gn!reader; cw: contains deep dives into his mindset so he has pessimistic thoughts in some parts (like him thinking that reader is a sort of player, bur nothing too heavy)
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This poor omega is indeed disastrous, since the moment his creator abandoned him, Kabukimono was left with a lot of questions regarding his worth. He does not understand, truly, by venturing around he discovered that omegas were not treated with much respect, was that the reason why his mother abandoned him? Does she think an alpha would be more appropriate to be an archon? But he was a puppet, designed by her will, it didn't make sense why she would make him an omega to begin with if that was her reasoning, so what was wrong with him?
The little fledgling was happy during his stay in Tatarasuna, Niwa was a father figure that teached him many skills, and the village helped each other, he was pampered by everyone. What a pity that disaster caused by a doctor's interest befell such a kind community.
Scaramouche felt his dignity crumble more each year, month, day, second that passed. At every step that he was corrupted by the fatui's ideals and methods - his body torn apart from Dottore's experiments - the thoughts of self-doubt grew in his mind. He wasn't enough to be a god, discarded before he had the chance to try, his hands didn't purify the water nor cut through mountains, no one would sing his name in worship, but he also wasn't enough to be human, his skin is artificial, unflawed like porcelain, not even a mechanical heart occupy the emptiness of his hollow chest. Forever lost in between the limbo of where his existence belongs.
For a being so emotional, Scaramouche wonders when was the last time he felt anything besides rage, it doesn't matter too much for him, as he learned how to use his anger as a tool. His underlings - though only in the fatui, as the people of Sumeru never faced the omega's wrath (or better worded, don't remember) - whispered out of his earreach, murmurs wondering if the beautiful omega was capable of love.
And now, carrying the title of Wanderer and face to face with the reason that made the vacant part of him tremble, he finally found the answer.
Courting
Nahida's orders indirectly led him to you, to be a student of the Akademiya would eventually force him to interact with other scholars, you being from Vahumana or not didn't matter, as students from different darshans would often benefited from cooperating. And like many people he met nowadays, he was indifferent at first, which considering his past as The Balladeer, when everyone was an annoying fly in his way, is a considerable improvement.
But for many aspects of life, even as he accepted that this would be something that he never would reach, he was interested in humanity. What makes people human, their flaws, traits, mannerisms and personality, what makes them yield or fill them with confidence. His almost deification didn’t bring him the same satisfaction as he felt with Niwa and the rest of the Tatarasuna people, but watching the Sumeru's citizens may be close enough.
If it's something he can't be, then he will appease himself by observing.
As he looks at alphas, he thinks that this is another thing that he is flawed at. In his studies, Scaramouche determined that omegas supposedly went crazy over alphas, but he never felt it before, or maybe he never gave himself a chance to try. A long time before he learned the consequences of creating genuine connections, that humans tend to betray the same way gods do.
But… he learned that they never did abandon him, that maybe he can trust again.
And while you both worked on your project, these types of thoughts ushered to the top of his mind like never before. You were nice to him,and laughed it off when he was being purposely cunning. You were also attentive, meticulous in your work and doting on him, always bringing him tea or other types of bitter delicacies, and just shrugged when he said there was no need to feed him.
He liked to see your reactions, there were moments when your behaviour took a tired and upset turn, when you mumbled curses about the things that went wrong with your work. It was somewhat relieving and entertaining to witness, that the gentle façade crumbles when faced with challenges.
“It's always better to work with a full stomach” you said, not sparing a thought that he didn't need to eat.
“This is pointless” the omega grumbled, he took a step away from the food.
“So just eat for the satisfaction of it, the success rate of content workers is higher than stressed ones” you insisted, and Scaramouche hated that.
Why do you treat it like there was no trouble in taking care of him? Getting out of your way to please others is dumb, especially for the likes of him.
The omega knows that he is a pessimist, that people always have motives behind their actions, and even Nahida didn't escape his judgement as he does not believe she is merely being kind and benevolent. You are no different, and when he is alone with his thoughts after bidding you goodbye and retiring for the day, he must find your intentions.
As he looks himself in the mirror, Scaramouche looks carefully at his appearance, “alphas and betas are always kinder to pretty omegas, we all know that they only want one thing” it's what the older men from the bazar say. He raises his hands to cup his face, fingers touching smooth skin with no marks, doe indigo eyes look back at him with something akin to divinity, and as he glances lower, he does not think his body lacks in beauty.
That must be it, they clearly are being good to me only to get in my pants!
Scaramouche is not a saint, he knew that, but since he started to work on his path to atonement, he was completely honest about himself. The omega knows that not everyone is like that, people that mask themselves behind lies and generous mannerisms are the worst kind of evil, and to think that you would be capable of that-
Hurts.
There is an annoying pain in his chest and a prickle behind his eyes. He needed proof, he will uncover the worst in you, that's a promise he made to himself.
Scaramouche was snarky and insufferable the following days, refusing to cooperate at all. And though he won't admit it, it was hard for him to do that, your scent wavered with a hint of sadness everytime he was rough, and he felt a need within him clawing to be free, he had to fight himself against releasing a comforting scent to appease you.
But his instinct quieted down whenever he saw you acting honorably to other omegas, when you held the door open for a nobody, or when you generously lent a hand to someone feeling troubled. The rage he felt was immeasurable, he growled lowly and was almost convinced to attack whoever was taking your attention from him.
So he wasn't special at all, he wasn’t needed, he wasn't wanted, it's always like that.
It all came to a boiling point when he snapped at you, harsh words thrown at your directions about what he thought you were doing, messing with omegas hearts just to set them aside when you were done getting what you wanted, truly shameful. Nonetheless, he felt regretful when he saw your pained expression.
“What made you think that?” your voice was quiet, and Scaramouche would prefer if you looked pissed by his accusations, anything to reassure him that he was right “You could have told me you were uncomfortable, I would've stopped”
Uncomfortable? He isn't uncomfortable by your actions towards him, he is… pleased that you did not shy away from a broken thing like him. What he did not like was when you did things for others that he believes should be only for him, and the perceptions he created himself even when you never gave him a reason to.
During all this time Scaramouche was overwhelmed by feelings, and though he is used to feel too much, what he felt about you was completely foreign to him, not the familial care he felt for Niwa and the kid from ages ago, not the gratefulness he felt for Nahida and the traveler for giving him a chance to atone for his mistakes, and not the kinship when he met Durin.
“So are you saying that you were running away from it?” Nahida questioned, placing a flower crown above the omega's head, aranara's joyfully circling around both of them “It's fine to be scared, and if you talk to them about it I am sure they will understand”
“How are you sure that people won't disappoint you? Don't you believe it's easier if you cut the problem by the roof so you never have to discover it?”
“I decide to give an opportunity for everyone to prove themselves, and maybe you would be happily surprised by the results” the goddess cupped his face, pinching the fat of his cheeks and giggling when Scaramouche bat her hands away “You look different since you met them, even your scent doesn't hold that sour end from before”
And he followed Nahida's advice, not because she told him what to do, but staying away from you was killing him inside. This is not normal, is it? To think the world is falling apart just because your desired person is not close by.
Moreover, he guesses that since becoming a citizen of Sumeru he started to work on redeeming himself, what is one more person to apologize for when you acted out of line?
Scaramouche prepared a basket of fruits and Padisarah flowers and headed to your work station, exchanging these types of words is still unfamiliar to him, but he made it very clear that he wanted to improve your relationship.
It's possible that the state of your relationship was just confirmed when someone he was jealous of before questioned him.
“Of course we are courting, don't ask stupid questions”
Honestly, it's possible Scaramouche just came to terms with his feelings after he said that. The omega was still astonished that he is loved back, he doesn't know if he deserves this.
And yet, he can't deny himself the pleasure of being in your arms, taking deep breaths of your scent and resting his eyes with your rumbling under his head. If he is being selfish and taking a good alpha form a good omega, so be it! No one deserves you anyway, if another omega even thinks of taking you from him they will be met with sharp teeth and claws.
You both become inseparable, while it's mostly because he enjoys spending time with you as much as you - and he sees you as one of the few people that it's not a waste of time to be together -, it's also a result of a deeply buried insecurity of being betrayed, he knows that some were misunderstandings, but it's hard to change a mindset after hundreds of years believing in it.
He prefers the reassurance coming from actions instead of words, so when his alpha permit him to scent all of their clothes and also their body, or hold him tight and shows that he belongs by their side when he is feeling bothered by the presence of another, it's moments like this that he feels the most complete.
Scaramouche is truthful in a relationship and he expects you to do the same, if he feels that he needs something and you can provide he will ask, he may not be the romantic type, but everyday he makes it very clear how much he adores you.
He doesn't have a favorite gift to receive - unless you make a table full of sweets, he will complain non-stop if you do that. Spending time together is enough for him, but he appreciates anything you give him, gift him a small plushie and say you thought of him when you saw it, perhaps he will tease you and joke a little, but he will keep it safe. If you give Scaramouche jewelry or any small token, he will bring it with him anywhere he goes. His gifts to you include artifacts he finds when Nahida sends him on expeditions, also Scaramouche doesn't have hobbies for himself, so instead he will engage on yours.
Growling
During the fatui era, growls were very frequent sounds he made, it was almost impossible that someone that worked with him and never heard him growl. And he felt so powerful doing so, a long time ago, while he still lived in Inazuma, omega's were heavily punished if they growled at someone, and though this conservative behavior diminished a lot compared to the past, it was far from being extinguished.
So with his title as a harbinger, Scaramouche growled until they all cowered by his feet, just like a god should be revered.
But since living in Sumeru, he doesn't growl as much anymore, this is because he is not as stressed as before, he lifted the weight off his shoulders that was having to act like something he would never become, he was not trying to sacrifice his body for his objectives anymore. There's the occasional growl when other people irritate him, as a warning to watch their words and actions.
In a relationship with you, Scaramouche also growls when he is feeling jealous or insecure, but overall, he does not growl at you unless he is in a deep mindset that something feels wrong, he will require reassurance in times like this.
Purring
Scaramouche doesn't remember the last time he purred, and now he is almost sure his purr box is broken. The omega has two reasons to think that, one is that it has been centuries, he does not know how to purr due to the disuse of that part of his vocal cords, another is because of the experiments Dottore made on him, turning his body almost inside out.
Nowadays he does not care whether he purrs or not, it's a thing he lived almost his entire life without, and he does not miss it.
If he somehow discovers that he can purr again, it would be an almost inaudible sound. If you want to hear it, you would need to rest your head over his chest, it's more vibrational than vocal. Scaramouche will not purr in public, for him, it's a thing that just both of you should be aware of.
Nesting
Scaramouche does not have a proper nest, actually, what he calls his nest is merely two pillows and one blanket that he carries around his home. at max he will try to put the blanket in a circular shape.
He took a while before introducing you to his nest. He was a bit insecure at first, other omega's have big and filled nests, with an enormous assortment of colors and textures, while his… during the fatui, he would say it was just another thing that proved something was wrong with him.
And he enjoys it so much when you are with him in his nest, you could be just relaxing around the house, and he would bring his blanket and wrap it around you wordlessly. It made him feel warm with adoration whenever he saw you inside something purely his.
He won't get out of his way to buy or make things for his nest, but he will increment it if it is a gift from his alpha. He thinks it is kind of lovable that his alpha would try to get things to make him more comfortable, and Scaramouche deeply appreciates that.
Marking
He marks you all the time, even before you started to officially court. His scent is now almost ingrained into your skin, and if he already had permission to give you a biting mark, he would.
It's not just a sign for other omegas that you are already committed to him, it's also a reminder for you, that you have an omega to come back to, and that he would do anything to keep you with him.
But even after he becomes confident that you won't leave him behind - no omega or yourself is going to separate you from him - he still covers you in his smell, Scaramouche became very fond of the whole process of scent marking and to claim you for himself.
It's therapeutic to him, he will nuzzle quietly your cheeks and bring the scent glands of his wrists to your neck, not a single gland of your go untouched. For him, it's a mandatory procedure that you must go through before leaving home, especially if your agendas oblige you to not be together for the rest of the day.
Subspace
He never entered subspace before you, and it also took a while for you to achieve that. He denied himself the mindset many times before, he felt kinda scared by it, to be so vulnerable. Anytime he felt that his mind was starting to feel like it was becoming cotton filled, Scaramouche immediately backed away from you and tried to distract himself.
When he does enter subspace, he is whiny and clingy, following you around your home and hugging you when you are busy, from behind if you are cooking, sitting on your lap and throwing his arms around your neck while you work.
Scaramouche feels like he took a shot of serotonin when he smells your skin, he is addicted, touching every exposed part of your body to his contentment. He also likes to bite, so you probably will be covered by marks of nibbles by the end of it.
And when he sobers up again he gets flustered easily, he can't believe he let instincts control over his body. He will hiss if you mention anything that he did during subspace. Nonetheless, he will eventually get into it again and the cycle will repeat itself.
☽ ☼ ☾
Scaramouche supposes things should turn out like they were before, that everything would come back to normal, he followed Nahida's advice, the instinct in his gut that begs to be with you, and yet, it seems worse than before. The omega may have had a strong reaction before and jumped into conclusions far from the truth, but he has also gotten used to silently pine for you, not expecting anything from it - maybe he can be and was aggressive towards other people that had your attention, but he won't mention it! -, for he can count the number of times in his long life that situations turned into his favor.
But Scaramouche reminded himself that he has to learn that your entire existence is too good to be true. You give him hope in many ways that he never imagined before. Your arms are stretched before him, holding a light blue and soft blanket.
“And for what reason would you give me that?” he stepped forward, picking the material from your hands.
“Can't you guess?” you chuckled and shook your head, the movement dispersed your scent that was reeking of amusement “If anything, see it as a gift to compensate the time we spend apart, to show how much I cherish you”
His eyes widen at the proclamation, under his nose he can smell that the blanket is scented. An item for a nest and carrying your smell, isn't that a sign of a courting gift? He couldn't help but hug the blanket tighter at the thought.
“Thank you for trying to look out for me”
For a long time he desired for a normal life, all his objectives from the past had the intention to lead to it, sadly all was for nothing, and he hopes he didn't look pitiful for that. And yet, in front of him, he saw an opportunity for that, he just needed to reach for you.
Once again, he gives himself the chance to dream of a better future.
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lesbiansforboromir · 2 days ago
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Here's a more compact review of the War of the Rohirrim film for anyone interested! SPOILERS AHEAD!!
Positives;
The backgrounds were all very beautifully painted and the lighting really elevated the character design and smoothed over the janky animation. Where other aspects of the film fall off, often the background artistry and lighting over all of it still manages to convey a very dramatic and immersive moment to the viewer. It's probably the best part of the film.
The part where Helm's ice-ghost phase is teased was really cool and atmospheric and I got a little thrill of what I'd kind of always been wanting from this film.
Frealaf was pretty lovely (what little we got of him) and I appreciated that his darker skin tone was implicitely associated with his Gondorian heritage. I THINK I appreciate the idea that Frealaf's father was Gondorian, though I wish it had been better utilised.
I also really liked the moment where Helm is about to fight Freca and he gives his crown, signet ring and mantle over to Frealaf in this like... symbolic giving up of his Kingship in this moment where his actions are about to make him unworthy of it.
I appreciated Olwyn existing as an older female character in a purely action based roll.
Helm's voice actor and design were pretty cool, I came around to enjoying how much effort they put into making him extremely imposing.
Hama being a twink who was born to be a bard but forced to be a heroic second prince was a nice touch.
General Targg of Dunland might have been my favourite character, inspite of the fact that I am really curious to know where this organised military of Dunland is for him to reach the rank of 'General' in.
Negatives;
Gurl the racism. See here for more details.
The overall narrative seems to me direly lacking in like... basis. I am lead to believe Hera's journey is about her reclaiming her right to choose her own life for herself. But she is never actually pressured into any choice, nor does it appear that her father ever restricted her freedom in any way. So I don't really see where her choices were actually removed to such a degree. If her desire is to see her choices respected by the men in her life, well that never happens for either Helm nor Wulf, who force her to let them die or to kill them, respectively. It feels like in their rush to censor any negative aspects of Helm they kind of removed the reason Hera is frustrated in the first place, he cant be TOO much of a misogynist etc etc.
This is twisted up within 'gurl the racism' but Wulf's manner and presentation make me FEEL like he is a villain we are supposed to mildly feel for? We see him as a child, we see him struggle with what he's doing, we see his clear desperation and despair and hear him talk about loneliness and suffering... but at the end of the day in the way that it is presented Wulf is fundamentally foul and deluding himself and all his problems appear to be of his own making. In general it is extremely uncomfortable for the 'obsessive stalker' villain to also every now and then say 'I am devastated because of how my dunlending blood has been prejudiced against all my life by your family and the wider rohir society' like... by only him mentioning it but it never being actually acknowledged by anyone else it just comes across so shallow and unsettling.
This is a review from my book-biased perspective so understand it within that lense but still gurl... the lore. What the hell do you mean the eagles speak a language only a wizard can understand? No they can just speak! What do you mean there is A watcher in the water in some undisclosed lake in Rohan somewhere? There is one Watcher and it's name is very specific to the doomed Moria expedition! At least give this new squid fellow a rohir name. Speaking of!!
IS IT SO HARD TO NAME ROHIR CHARACTERS IN..... ROHIRRIC?? OLD ENGLISH IS RIGHT THERE... HERA HAS NO MEANING... THERE ARE SO MANY COOL HISTORICAL ANGLO SAXON PRINCESSES YOU COULD CHOOSE FROM...
Included in the 'gurl, the lore' segment but in need of it's own post so I will try to be brief; (Theoden voice) where was Gondor... when a herd of Mumakil were marched by Haradrim mercenaries across the Anduin, up through the Pelennor, across Calenadhon and over Rohan's southern border... did they sneak by... were they stealth Mumakil, did they have elven cloaks too.
But also Where Was Gondor just in general. Like to the detriment of the actual narrative, opening up plot holes that didn't even need to be there, the fact that Gondor is ALSO supposed to be at war right now is completely ignored and discarded.
THE BATTLE OF EDORAS... TF ARE YOU ALL DOING! Like I know it is kind of hypocritical of me to request sensible war tactics when we're adapting Tolkien, he did not give a good example, but like... where were the horse archers, why are you charging down an infantry-only army, why even be on a horse if you aren't going to use greater mobility to your advantage, this isn't a siege, this is YOUR territory this is an open field!! Come on! AND ANOTHER THING, did we really have to make the victory of the Dunlendings over Edoras so disconnected from their own effort? Like betrayal is fine, but this was also a well supplied and competant force, and that was a major part of their victory. These were matched combatants! Just kind of another way in which the dunlendings were robbed of any cohesive motive, narrative or skill.
To my admittedly untrained eye... the animation sucks? Like it's clunky and janky and you can see the frames transitioning between each other, the movements often feel awkward and a lot of the drawings are just bad! The Eagles are SO stiff, as are the horses which seems like a cardinal sin in the Horse Lord Film. And then I couple that with the multiple completely unnecessary spinning camera shots Hera gets which are annoying, superfluous and a bizarre thing to spend time on when the rest of the film needs so much more care and attention. In general the GULF of difference between how beautiful the backgrounds are vs how bland the character art is is kind of jarring.
Hera's design.... I hate it. Look I know it's anime but DID Hera have to have thigh high boots... did she really... Why is she so pale if she's supposedly riding sleeveless across the vast countryside everyday? Can a single supposedly feminist film about a 'wild' female protagonist let that woman be like... dirty, or not so agonisingly thin, or give her messy or god forbid short hair. At one point when she is grabbed by a troll and hung in the air they linger uncomfortably long on her ass which her costume design is specifically designed to allow for maximum viewing detail.
The designs of the Dunlendings, Haradrim and especially the Mumakil are all so grim. Like I liked Freca's design to a degree, it was more potent with symbolism and patterning and such, but the rest of it is just SO FUCKIN- well they're ugly! and therefore evil! Do you get it? The ugly grey animalistic people are evil! The Mumakil have literal red snake eyes just so you know they're 'evil animals'. I can't take it anymore, at one point the guy who Eomer throws a spear at in the trilogy just... turns up, like it's literally just him down to the facepaint. And speaking of...
SHUT UP ABOUT THE PJ TRILOGY, SHUT UP AB- besties this film's intro plays alongside the ring theme... THE RING MUSICAL THEME!!!!?? Lines from the films are reused so often and so WILDLY outside of their actual context and meaning that it makes me flinch.
There is a plump little fellow called Leif who is the royal Page I think and everytime someone called Freca fat in such a vitriolic way I was like wow... I mean Leif is right there guys!
Overall a 4/10 from me, it is a watcheable but shallow film that I suspect was more of a cynical attempt by Warner Bros to keep their death grip on the rights to the books, since I think they would have expired if they didn't do something with them soon.
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eurydicees · 1 day ago
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oh dont apologise i loved your essay 😭 and i 100% agree with everything. Theres such a innate theme of choices and consequences in wicked the musical and its so fascinating to me how choices made by all the characters have such profound consequences at the end. And fiyero’s choices are no different in the way they alter the trajectory of multiple characters.
He is really the only one i can think of who sacrifices everything for elphaba and does it all willingly. How do you like elphaba and then dislike the one character who was ready to give up his whole life and everything that came with it for her 😭
Twitter is very binary in that regard honestly, and its such a shame that they miss out on some pretty interesting character analysis about their favourite characters bc they decide to be so rigid and weird about other characters who had an impact on their faves. Couldnt be me lol, making multiple threads about a character you hate. I also think something else is at play here but dont wanna say it publicly lol but given your other responses i think you’d probably agree.
And yes totally agree about dividing the film in two parts - i can only hope the film watchers stick around for part 2 and see fiyero’s whole arc
thanks for the ask! also i wrote another fiyero ted talk. if i were like charles dickens or whoever and i was getting paid by the word to write about fiyero, i could be so goddamn rich btw.
anyways, choices and consequences!!!!! like that's the whole thing!!!!!!! and the way our choices affect and change other people!!!! fiyero isn't an exception to any of that!!!!
you're so right that fiyero is truly the one who makes the ultimate sacrifices for elphaba. like glinda loves elphaba, she absolutely does. but she isn't able to take on the work and life that elphaba chooses in defying gravity.
when it comes to the things that are most important to her, glinda prioritizes comfort and reputation over, like, morality and principle. and the thing about glinda is that she actively makes this choice. she chooses not to go with elphaba. she wants elphaba to succeed, but she's not brave enough to join her. in order for glinda to find the bravery to take up the work elphaba starts, she has to lose everything that actually matters. and she has to be complicit in her own losing of those things.
fiyero loves elphaba to the point of sacrificing all of those things that glinda can't resist. the day with the lion cub, and elphaba's general influence on him, changes fiyero profoundly in a similar way that she affects glinda, but fiyero finds the bravery to act on all of that. the difference is that he doesn't get the choice to go with her until mid-act 2 after wonderful.
in thank goodness, there's that one exchange between fiyero and glinda where they say smth like "you just can't resist all of this" "well who could?" "you know who could, and who has." and he's talking about elphaba, he's talking about how she had all the love she ever wanted at the tip of her fingers when she met the wizard, and she chose to let it go because she saw the ugly parts of the wizard's world. and this exchange is so clearly boiling it down to "elphaba resisted the temptation of being universally/publically loved and glinda did not." which tbh is something so in character for a person who has never had that, and a person who has always had that and thus doesn't want to leave it behind.
ok i was going somewhere with this but i don't remember where. just. fiyero isn't a perfect character. and for SURE the choice to erase gelphie's romantic subtext from the book when adapting it for broadway was an act of homophobia. but if we're just looking at musical canon, fiyero is brave enough to give up everything first to save elphaba, then to go with her, and then to protect her. and so-called elphaba stans don't think that's good enough. which is CRAZY to me.
also like. he's literally not the comphet love interest. sorry you didn't mention that but i keep seeing people throw those words around and like that's not what's happening here guys. elphaba loves him. she sings a whole song about it. multiple, even.
comphet implies that she mistakenly thinks she loves him because society has molded her into believing that's how she should be (fyi if anyone's experiencing that, it's glinda but i digress). elphaba, who notably has never been able to comply to the mold society makes for women, because she's never been pretty white woman enough to be afforded a place in that society? you mean that elphaba?
guys elphaba just...loves him. that's all there is to it. she loves him when she realizes he's more than he thinks he is, more than the airs he puts off. she loves him when she feared he might have changed, she loves him when he proves he did change--for the better. she loves him when he sticks by her, when he chooses her. she loves him when he's a fucking SCARECROW. ("go ahead, touch, i don't mind" "you're still beautiful" lives in my head rent fucking free).
when she has her breakthrough "okay. fuck this world that has never been good to me, if you want me to be wicked, i'll be wicked" moment, it's because she loses fiyero. she gets betrayed by nessa, and she fails dillamond, and she loses fiyero--and it's then that she loses sight of what good she had begun fighting for. it's a love for fiyero that drives most of no good deed (broadway songs of all time btw). like sorry but you dont sing someone's name like that if you don't love them. that's just musical theatre rules. trust me i was a theatre major.
anyways. sorry for that detour. back to the point. twitter treats everything as so black and white which is crazy because this is a revisionist musical about how evil isn't black and white. like?????? whatever. imagine being so bitter about a character you dislike that you want to change fundamental pieces of your favorite character so that he isn't relevant.
look. gelphie is great doomed yuri and i support that so hard. but dont try to tell me fiyero isn't deeply important to elphaba and to understanding elphaba's character. tbh the love triangle here isn't fiyero choosing between glinda and elphaba. it's more like elphaba choosing between glinda and fiyero and what either of them represent to her (glinda and working within the system, or fiyero, and abandoning it).
and hot take maybe but like ultimately--as someone who has never been conventionally accepted, as someone who has been hunted down to be murdered, as someone who has been the victim of a smear campaign and propaganda against her character/intentions, all of which was in part driven by glinda--she was always going to choose fiyero.
i respect gelphie shippers, i do. in another world, maybe one without the wizard, they could've been so happy together. i'm with y'all. but given canon, even if all others fall, i will be the last fiyero defender standing. god i hope movie-only fans watch part 2 and at least learn to RESPECT him. at the bare minimum. please. please. please.
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avatarofthearchives · 2 days ago
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If I could make any two character's interact in TMA it would 100% be Gertrude and Distortion! Michael.
It would be so interesting to see how much of Michael is really left, and how Gertrude would react to the consequences of her actions literally right in front of her face.
Plus, I think the contrast of their emotions would be super neat. I really believe that Michael is actually a pretty decent part of The Spiral because of the "And she did not HESITATE," line that is said with far more bitterness than something completely removed from Michael would have. So I think Distortion! Michael would pretty wound up in this confrontation.
Then there's Gertrude, who, as Sasha calls her, is a "stone cold bitch." Even if seeing Michael brought up any emotions in her, I doubt that she'd react in the way he'd want her too. I think she'd stay cool, calm, and collected, which could very easily piss off a raging Michael.
There's so many interpretation's of how this conversation could go down and I'm going to spend hour's thinking about all of them, but man I would love a canon answer of how that would play out.
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mjbarrosart · 23 hours ago
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My Dragon Prince Boards season 7, episode 705, part 1
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It's time to talk about my boards for episode 705 of the last season of The Dragon Prince. I did a lot of stuff in this episode, so instead of going in order, I'll divide my work differently for this one, we will talk by group of sequences and not in order of appearance.
Let's start with the sunfire elf side of the plot. As a lot of you know, most of my work in this show was related to the Sunfire elves, and to be honest Janai and Amaya are two of my favorite characters of the show, so every chance to work with them is always a bless.
I did all the scenes of Karim talking with Amaya in this episode. It is hard to explain how I feel about Karim, he is such an idiot, but I am also kinda fond of him because I spent so many hours working on him thinking about his mannerism and motivations. I am fond of him, but I also hate him, hahahaha.
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There is not a lot to say about this sequences, they are pretty straight forward. While I can understand why Karim hates humans so much, that doesn't mean he is right about it, and this hate is starting to feel like pettiness, and well fits him, he is a really petty man.
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Let! Green! Say! Ass! hahahaha. Its always funny to board this kind of little jokes. I love Green and Amaya dynamics, they are such good friends, and I love how Green is always making sure that Amaya's bluntness is not coming out as "rude". But sometimes I feel he should just translate directly what Amaya is saying, because I don't think Karim deserves special considerations, haha.
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That little speech Karim does about how he and Amaya are not the same was interesting to board for me. I wanted him to feel aggressive and menacing, even if his hands were tied. Like he was trying to intimidate Amaya, but she will not bend, she can see thru his BS. I wanted him to trespass into Amaya's personal space, portrait him as the bully he is. He says that his faith comes from knowledge, while the truth is that he leads using fear. Such a pathetic little man.
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Another instance where is wish the rigs where able to translate between the expressions from the boards. I wanted him to spit his words trough his teeth when he says "humans are vermin, a plague", like his mouth is full of poison and hate.
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But the Amaya, who is mostly motivated by making sure that Janai doesn't regrets the decision of killing her brother, does the right thing and reminds him of the fact that Miyana is pregnant, that there is a future worth to live for. Karim shows some doubts, so Amaya leaves and Miyana enters the stage.
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I feel kinda bad for Miyana. I mean she deserves the punishment she got, at the end of the day she betrayed her people. But I feel bad for her, because I think that she honestly loves Karim. Imagine loving such a foolish man. And Karim can not learn a lesson, he keeps being an idiot. He is offered a second chance to be with his family, but the only thing he can see in Miyana is that she is carrying "his heir", and Miyana is right of being offended by that. But she wants to believe that he will made the right choice. And maybe for a minute Karim ponders it. I wanted him to loot vulnerable and maybe open in the final shot, so I made him kneel close to Miyana, laying his head on her belly, close to his child. We know how this will end for him, but for a moment there is maybe hope that he will change... no?
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My next scene in this episode is one I am really fond of. Is the one when Terry says that the only person who can stop Claudia is her mom, and Soren is really against that idea.
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First, is always fun to have a moment with Terry. I have really small ones during my work in the show, so this one was a blast. Second, I got to have another emotional Soren moment, and that is always nice, because Sores in my boy.
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The back and forth of this conversation is pretty straight forward too. What was important for me was what will be the moment that will make Soren change his mind, and support the idea. So I decided to use Corvus for this.
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Soren is struggling with the idea of bringing her mother back, even if that means they will have a real shot making Claudia stop. Corvus see his pain, and touch his shoulder. We talked before on how touching is a love language between this two, they don't need tons of words. Corvus is saying "I know that it's hard, but I am here with you". On my boards I had him giving Soren a little nod, they removed that for the final shot, and I think is ok. The nod is not necessary, Soren understand what Corvus means. With his support Soren can do it.
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So he gathers strength and gives the drawing to Ezran. I like that in the animation stage they kept Corvus hand all the time on his shoulder. For Soren the idea of facing his mom is one full of pain and conflicted feelings, but he doesn't need to face it alone, he has Corvus at his side (as a partner, friend, soulmate, brother, whatever you see them being).
I love them so much...
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The second part of this post is about the last sequence I did for this episode, it is a small one, but one that you could say... brings a "surprise"!
I will posted right away, so stay tuned!
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stuiie · 1 day ago
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This Wild, Fragile Thing
I can’t really put into words how rewarding it feels to finally reach the part where I get to explore my take on Sevika’s past, what shaped her personality and possibly adds more depth to her actions in the series. Of course, this is entirely my interpretation and imagination at work, but I couldn’t help feeling unfulfilled by what little we got of her in the show. Then again, she was a side character, so I wasn’t really expecting them to spend much time on her, but still.
That’s where we, as the fandom, come in and help, right?
I really wanted to create this romance around her because, honestly, I always felt a deep sadness for how alone Sevika seemed. She took all those beatings and dealt with so much without ever showing an ounce of self-pity. She just powered through it all, and while that made her so strong, it also left me feeling heartbroken for her. She seemed so isolated and alone, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I wanted to dive deeper into her story and give her a bit more without ruining the canon Sevika we know and love.
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If anyone would be interested in my take on Sevika while trying to stay true to her character, check it out through the link below:
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distractedvoid · 3 days ago
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remember those sonamy for sonic 4 ideas? here they are i couldnt wait
So, now that Amy is definitely confirmed, based on the after credits scene in Sonic 3, I have some silly thoughts about how Sonic and Amy's relationship could unfold in Sonic 4.
So, first, I think their general dynamic would definitely change. In pretty much every other form of Sonic media, while it has changed a bit recently, Amy is shown as constantly chasing after Sonic despite him avoiding most of her advances anyway.
Now, movie Sonic is definitely not as mature as the Sonics in other medias. A huge part of his continuous character arc is that he's still a kid, a kid that doesn't really know what he's doing.
And here, we have Amy, which, from the very small amount of her character that we've seen, at least seems like less of a damsel in distress. (It reminds me of how they changed Princess Peach's character in the Mario Movie.) In contrast to the story of Sonic CD, we see Amy saving Sonic from the many copies of Metal Sonic.
Now how exactly does this make their dynamic different? Well, if you take an immature Sonic, and put him in the same room as an Amy that needs less saving than the usual, the firsthand difference is undeniable. Thus why I think their dynamic would be reversed in a way, at least, that's what I want to happen.
I have a feeling Sonic would be "chasing" after Amy, but more so in the way that he's constantly trying to impress her. He'd probably get into some unsavory situations due to his most likely failed attempts at this, prompting Amy to have to make sure he doesn't keep doing stupid things.
Amy herself wouldn't understand why Sonic kept getting himself into trouble like that, much less that he did it for her, until she sought out some third-party information.
Speaking of (I never really mentioned anything related but just go with it), I haven't talked much about Amy's own feelings yet.
So we know about a possible tiny fraction of her character, and while that's not a lot to go off of, I don't see any harm in forming early ideas based off it.
When Amy, presumably, met Sonic by saving him from the Metal Sonic copies, I don't think she would really think too much of him at first. As soon as he actually started talking, though, she'd find interest- I wouldn't wanna take away the part of her that probably falls in love way too easily.
Unlike the usual Amy we're probably all used to, she wouldn't show her feelings that much. She'd have the occasional giggle at Sonic's attempts at impressing her, even if she didn't know that was why he did it. For all she knows, that's just what he's usually like! Until she inquires with Tails- she learns that she's somewhat special to the blue blur.
I might just be projecting, with the weird way my own feelings work, but I think Amy's little crush on Sonic would skyrocket at that information. Sonic, the guy she only really had a small crush on, was trying that hard to win her over? Admittedly, that was pretty cute in her eyes.
After that Amy would definitely be more forward with Sonic, causing the latter to be a little confused and wonder if a certain two-tailed fox said anything...Guess you can't even trust your best friend with secret crushes anymore, sigh.
If they ended up together, if we were to ever get so lucky, I don't think either would really change how they act around each other, other than holding hands occasionally and maybe a few kisses here and there. Sonic is still adventure focused, though how much he likes Amy is sometimes painfully obvious. He'd gain a little confidence boost if they became official, but overall, if they went on any dates, they'd be dates to kick Eggman's ass for the thousandth time.
That's all I have for now, I'm gonna let the brain worms rest LOL. Thanks to anyone who actually went and read my yapping session
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Why Episode 7 is the worst episode in all of Season 2.
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This fuckass Timebomb ship is the worst thing to ever happen to Jinx's character.
Ok so finally we're gonna talk about Boy Savior Complex and AU Girl Next Door Powder
This is gonna be long. Also, we're not only talking about Episode 7 and Timebomb, we're also discussing Jinx's suicide attempt and how her character's resolution is actually really sad.
First of all, Jinx never liked Ekko back. Season 1 makes it pretty clear that they're friends, and that Ekko has an unrequited crush on her. His feelings are clear, but she never shows any reciprocation. And, no, the art book that came out after season 2 concluded doesn't count. You can't just put "the boy with the unrequited crush" trope in your story and then retract it.
And now to get to the serious part... who the fuck is AU Powder?
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Ekko gets transported into this alternate timeline where we the audience soon realize everyone is happy and none of the conflicts that plague the original story exist and everything is perfect and "as it should be". So this is the ideal world and the one where all these characters reach their highest form of happiness. Even Silco is back with Vander.
And in this ideal world Powder is... a waitress at The Last Drop? I rewatched this episode and I genuinely tried to pay attention to see what does she actually DO. Like what occupies her time in this universe. And between Vander's line about how she's "too smart to be spending her life in a bar" and the fact that she is at one point behind the counter (while Ekko is studying his books... imma get back to that) and the fact that we never see her in any other places besides the bar and her hideout and that one time Ekko takes her out... this seems to be it.
So in the perfect timeline, Powder has decided to stay back with her family once she's grown up, to remain with Vander and help him run his bar, and implicitly has no big ambitions of her own, and definitely no ideas that she would sacrifice her family life for.
Now... Powder/Jinx as a family person is not actually wrong characterization. This is pretty congruent with her character in season 1. Her entire story and literally everything revolves around her family and not much else. When she's Powder she's attached at the hip to Vi and when she's Jinx she doesn't seem too interested in the world outside of her hideout and Silco's office. So considering all we know, yes, Jinx does place family first.
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And this is pretty assumed by the show. Now, I also characterized her like this in season 1! She is a family girl. And Jinx happens to have all these people with big revolutionary ideas around her, be it Vander or Vi or Silco or Sevika, but she herself never actually seems much interested in that. She has a small moment in arc 1 of season 1, which i think it's significant to mention comes right after Vi plants the idea in her head. It would've been one thing if these ideas stayed with her, but post time-skip she doesn't bring anything like that up again. She mostly acts like a bored teenager whenever Silco drags her to the river to tell her all about his tragic past that radicalized him. Overall, any time she exhibits any revolutionary spirit, it seems to actually be more of a personal vendetta for her.
So, okay, Jinx is a family girl and she's never really actually been about all these big ideas, I can agree with the writers that this represents her character.
It's just that... this much?
Man, COME ON. There were people making "Everything's Perfect" AUs since season 1, and they almost all had Powder be a student at the Academy. This girl was clearly passionate about her little inventions, her bombs didn't work but she kept and kept trying. You're telling me she would be completely uninterested in learning more about engineering, in getting a formal education in that, in doing anything with it? Since in this world, there's peace between Piltover and Zaun, we can't talk about any barriers to her becoming a student. And, for that matter, in League lore there's an academy in Zaun, too, that she could have attended.
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Even Ekko points it out, man. Now, to the writers' credit, the story acknowledges quite clearly that Powder choosing to stay with Vander and help him run the bar is weird. It just... never explains it. Like why is she like this, though? Let's throw out some possibilies:
(1) in some scenes, there seems to be a little "jinxiness" in this Powder, too. maybe she's aware of that side of her, and doesn't like it, and fears that if she went off and did what she wanted, and was truly herself, it would ruin what she has, "things are good now" (in this case, this Powder is actually a tragic character. nowhere near ideal timeline stuff.)
(2) in act 1 of season 1, the reason Vi makes Powder stay back is because she fears losing her, after Vander tells her that she might lose Powder in a confrontation with Piltover. since Vi dies in this universe, on a job, maybe in that moment Powder internalizes that rocking the boat in any way is bad. Vi was spirited and had big ideas and wanted to be someone and it led to her death. so maybe this Powder gave up on all of that then. Vander seems like the type to give her a "look what happens" speech, too.
But these are just my theories. This doesn't ever get properly explained in the show. So then maybe Powder is actually content like this and likes this and maybe these people constantly pestering her that she could do and be more are just annoying nuisances to her, same as Sevika is an annoying nuisance to Jinx in the original timeline (although there it makes significantly more sense).
(Also, why is Vi even dead in this universe? They could've easily found another way for Piltover and Zaun to make peace. Guess Jinx doesn't even get to be happy in the Perfect Timeline, goddamn, girl really is cursed after all.)
If you're gonna spend an entire episode on fix-it fanfiction that is supposed to pander to fans and give them, on screen, what they always wanted to see, why didn't we get grown up Powder in a cute academy uniform, being a top student and working on school projects and being loved by her professors cause girl was a prodigy.
Instead... this is Ekko in this universe, actually.
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Ekko is the "big idea guy" and he's working on an entry to the innovations fair and he gets to be Heimerdinger's pupil. To her credit, this Powder still seems to be very smart, Ekko comes to her for help cause he can't actually build his invention alone. But she only uses her intellect to help Ekko. I always thought it would be Powder who would be Heimerdinger's pupil. Instead, here, she's hanging off Ekko's arm, and being all cute, as he discusses Important Stuff with Heimerdinger, stuff that she doesn't get to be privy to, but that she is expected to help them with anyway.
So AU Powder is this very smart girl who is helping her boyfriend build his entry for a contest because he can't actually do it himself but it's okay she'll help him of course and no he can take all the credit she doesn't want to be recognized or anything or to go to like University that would be crazy she's doing it cause she loves him and she's sweet like that and she likes to help others and she doesn't have any character traits that make her difficult she's just a cute funny and relatable down-to-earth girl and she pokes fun at Ekko but like in a loving way and she likes being a waitress and she'd rather be recognized for her dancing skills and................ I'm sorry.....................
So you're telling me Ekko gets transported into an alternate timeline in which his childhood crush who never liked him back is stripped of all her personality, has no goals or ambitions of her own and has no interests besides being his supportive girlfriend, is devoid of all the traits that might have made a relationship with her difficult, and despite the fact that she never showed interest in him in the original world, here she is head over heels for him, always acting all lovey-dovey with him and being nothing but a cute and affectionate puppy.
This is every little boy's with an unrequited crush dream right here. Man, Ekko won more than any other character in this show. And she's mentally ill, too! He's hit the jackpot. Y'all what the fuck am I watching.
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I'm sorry but literally ALL I COULD FUCKING SEE WHEN I WAS WATCHING THIS STUPID DANCE SCENE was that in this universe Powder is a good christian girl who stays home with her dad and loves her boyfriend and is always happy to help WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS GOOD GIRL PROPAGANDA get this bullshit OFF my fucking screen I cannot fucking believe what I'm watching here
Moving on.
Ekko has hurt Jinx more than any other character in the show.
Physically speaking.
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Ekko is the one who does this.
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Which leads to this.
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Which ultimately leads to this.
It has always confused me and it continues to confuse me why no one in this fandom treats Jinx being injected with shimmer as a big deal, when this is the worst thing that happens to her post episode 3. And it's a point of no return for her character, she can't undo this. And yeah I know everyone thought Shimmer Jinx was cool in season 2, but her being turned into a half-dead monster is not a good progression for her character. She also goes through agonizing pain in the process.
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Singed agrees.
It's Ekko who forces Jinx between death and being turned into a half-dead corpse. It's actually insane to me that no one in the fandom considers this and that this is never brought up in the show. If they wanted Jinx and Ekko to be a thing, you'd think this would be a big deal in their relationship. Ekko has changed her irreparably, for the worse.
Idk, is the guy who beat you up and left you for dead really boyfriend material?
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This is the first moment Jinx shows any interest in Ekko. Interesting timing.
I'm pretty sure she doesn't even mention his name post act 3 of season 1. She doesn't wonder about whether he's alright after the bridge fight (for that matter, neither does he). The first time when Jinx looks at him with any hint of affection is when she's standing on a ledge, ready to throw herself off.
Jinx has no one anymore at this point. Her old family is long gone. Silco is dead. Isha is dead. Vi has decided having a good time with Caitlyn is more important than her. This is Jinx at her lowest moment. Does she like him back or is he just the only one who showed up?
Ekko is a winner once again. His crush has been abandoned by everyone, and he is the only one left to comfort her. Luck like this is hard to come by. And of course, she's gonna be super impressed and touched by any sliver of affection now. Probably gonna look at him with big, grateful eyes, and see him as her savior. I'm disgusted.
By the way, this should have never been Ekko. If Vi was too busy with fucking Caitlyn, this should have been Sevika. Sevika is the only character who has known Jinx since she was a child, and who has been with her through every iteration. And she's the only character who has never cared whether she's Jinx or Powder or any other persona she decides to take up, to her she'll always just be an annoying kid. And to Jinx this might actually be comforting. Sevika is the only one who has a realistic perspective on Jinx, and recognizes her flaws, so her talking her down might have actually been very touching, and there are things she could tell her that neither Vi nor Silco could.
(The fuck could Ekko tell her, honestly? That he went off to an alternate universe where she was his perfect girlfriend, so she shouldn't kill herself actually? What the fuck.)
I also wanna talk a bit about Jinx's resolution as a character. Not her fake-out death, but her in the last episode. I think it's interesting that everyone who had a connection to Jinx is gone, namely Silco and Isha. Silco and Isha are both people she chooses, actively, and she is herself around. Instead, now, she's back to Vi and Ekko, the same people that were with her in her childhood. This is a full circle moment for her.
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This is Powder right here, guys. Powder was a little girl who made a mistake and then she went off on this journey where she met new people and she was someone else and it was fun for a while but ultimately she realized what she was doing was bad and she came back to her family and is ready to be that little, sweet girl again. The problem with the Powder-Jinx dichotomy is that Jinx, as much as she represents all this bad stuff that the show has made clear, also represents Freedom and Power, two things that Powder definitively lacked. Her coming full circle, coming back to Powder, is not actually a good resolution for her. She's right back where she started, with Vi and Ekko. Her venturing off on her own and making her own decisions was ultimately a mistake that only lead to her suffering. We can take this all the way back to when she decides to venture off on her own with that bomb, despite Vi's disagreement, and the consequences plague her for the rest of the story.
I know everyone thought it looked super cool when she lifted off that hood, but I could only think it was tragic.
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museishere · 2 days ago
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I have been convinced to post more of my ISAT takes on here, so I guess I’m doing this. My fond little nickname for this beautiful game is Autism: The Game, and I say this as someone diagnosed at an early age; I see so much of myself in the Family.
In Odile, I see the awkward inability to properly tell what others are feeling without obvious clue paired with the need to logically justify the emotions of myself and others. I see the hyper-fixation and curiosity about the world and how things work, the awkward feelings when trying to navigate social interactions, the need for everything to be Correct and the dysphoria brought about when things are Wrong.
Bonnie is the energy and passion. Where Odile struggles due to logical disconnect, Bonnie struggles due to simply not understanding. But that doesn’t mean they’re stupid; far from it in fact. Much like Odile, Bonnie hold a certain curiosity about the world around them and a love for learning. They understand far more than others give them credit for and it frustrates them to no end, and when they’re upset they lash out because they don’t know how else to express their feelings. They feel and feel until it all explodes.
Mirabelle takes the anxiety and trauma of living in a world that isn’t quite made for you, a world that makes assumptions about who you are without knowing you at all. She’s afraid to correct anyone’s perceptions of her because her mind cannot help but catastrophise. She tries her best to fit into the box society has deemed she fits into, no matter how cramped it may seem.
Isabeau is the one who best masks. He fits into society not because it’s genuine but because he has learned what to do. He takes parts of himself and hides them away because they go against what people would expect of him, a lot like Mirabelle, but unlike her Isa has crafted his image himself. He hides his intelligence behind the mask of a big dumb man with strong muscles and a heart of gold, and he does it with such skill that it has clearly become second nature.
And Siffrin takes all of these traits together to make the whole picture. He is someone that forms few attachments because he doesn’t know how, so he wants to hold on to them so desperately that he begins to self-destruct the moment he makes a single misstep. He falls into unhealthy habits and they can’t understand why others disapprove when what they do Works.
And looking at the other side of the coin, Loop is much the same; They are simply dialed up to 11. Loop has lost Everything, and clings to the one thing that gives them purpose. Once they aren’t needed for that they melt down and react with violence, vitriol towards themself misdirected to target someone due to convenience.
Can you tell this game has me in a chokehold? I’m considering starting yet another play through to gather evidence of why I think all of these characters are at least a little bit autistic if anyone is interested in that? I’m always happy to talk about my theories/interpretations in DMs if anyone wants.
(Please don’t take this post as me saying the characters are definitely autistic, and please don’t use this post to self-diagnose. K thank!)
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helluverse-rewrites · 2 days ago
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kind of random but ! viv desperately needs to try smth other than animal motifs for her symbolism. I know animals are an easy choice for things like that, but her dependence on it is a (small) part of what makes her designs so ass.
It gets to the point to where characters have the same motif and for what? They're not connected. The least she could do is make them connected. (for example in my hazbin hotel redesigns i made all the angels have bird motifs. vaggie is a dove, adam is a rooster, lucifer a duck) I know kemonomimis and furries are fun to draw but sometimes its just plain confusing and overused. Esp when she puts more focus on that than shapes or colors or even personality sometimes! I guess I'd love to see more characters based on objects or even common phrases, fairytales, time periods, abstract concepts. Yk? There are more of these in helluva boss (even though theyre highly LACKING), some background characters are like this in hazbin. I can see the 7 sins are somewhat based on their concept, but again its lacking, because she always goes back to her animal things. And I know this whole helluverse started out with zoophobia or wtv but cmon. Whys valentino a moth? I dont know any symbolism of the moth that ties in with val, or even how he died. He'd generally be better as a shadow or a puppet master, given hes deceptive and manipulative. The animal motifs often feel tacked on, too. Like a last minute thought, or like a design first-story later thing. Which even if they are, it shouldn't feel that way. It's really just a pet peeve of mine I guess because a lot of people including 14 yr old me thought these characters were soooo high concept and unique when really they somehow have worse design principals/patterns than Spongebob (not an insult to my boy spongebob though, theyre all just sea creatures they dont need to be high concept). Animals are literally the most overused, easy way to tell the audience something (or nothing). Like jesus christ its like whatever goal they have for a character they go hmmmmmm this is hard Ill just give them cat ears ^^.
Oh my god you're right
Angel Dust doesn't even look like a spider, and Alastor looks nothing like a deer. Istg the Valentino concept is way more interesting than whatever Viv did
You're telling me that Asmodeus is supposed to be a rooster. Likely story but okay Ig :/
I just think that the shows could've branched out a bit more than just animals
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sapphoscreature · 2 days ago
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Caitlyn and the Grey- A Deep Dive
I’d really like to explore Caitlyn’s use of the Grey in Act 1. This is not me trying to excuse Caitlyn’s choices, but I think, as with all things in Arcane, there’s nuance in the reason, the outcome, and the reactions this causes from other characters. There are grey areas where the characters interact, and nuance in the morally grey choices they make, something I think in large part the Grey embodies, and I just really want to explore it out of a fascination with the storytelling in this show.
The Background
In episode 1, it is agreed that enforcers will enter the Underground to locate Jinx as a ‘single deranged individual’ responsible for the Council attack. Mel and Caitlyn are reluctant to allow this to happen, knowing ‘innocents will be caught in the crossfire.’ With Ambessa’s interjection, however, the invasion is set to go ahead, although without the use of Hextech.
Throughout this episode we see Caitlyn’s dwindling mental state. Her grief, guilt, and anger are battling with her empathy and level-headed thinking. This affects all the choices she makes. This is so interesting to watch, especially when it comes to Vi.
Vi is the person with whom Caitlyn is vulnerable. She collapses into her arms and breaks down. She represents calm to Caitlyn, as reflected in the vent/wind chime system in her hideaway. Yet Caitlyn’s guilt is causing her thinking to go askew, and I think she is falling back onto the systems and structures of Piltover with which she has grown up for guidance. Not only that, but she is now head of the Kiramman house, a ‘pillar’ of the Piltovan society, something which she admits she does not feel deserving nor ready for. Heavy is the crown.
In relation to Vi, this leads her to spring an enforcer badge on her. Caitlyn’s reasoning is complex, for she no longer believes in the ‘reckless plans’ which they had carried out in season 1 and which she believes led to her mother’s death (‘my arrogance led me to take on more than I could handle, and she paid the price’), but there remains that belief in each other that was there in season 1 when they addressed the council. ‘You can show that not all of Zaun supports Jinx. We can show them. Together.’ Caitlyn is falling back onto old systems, but I think she also believes that Vi can be the difference within those systems, that she defies, to an extent, those systems. The lines blur around them as their feelings for each other continue to defy the ‘oil and water’ division. And, if Maddie’s words are to be believed, Caitlyn demanded a badge for Vi because ‘if every enforcer had a heart like yours, we could take on Noxus itself.’
Vi is fiercely protective, and Caitlyn’s safe space, and Caitlyn needs her help. She says as much after the memorial attack when admitting she was ‘wrong’ to ‘spring the badge’ on Vi. It is only that ‘every way I slice it, if I go after your sister alone, one of us comes back in a box.’ Caitlyn does not want Jinx dead, although once again why is complex, perhaps both for Vi’s sake, and for justice’s. But Vi is crucial, not only in being the first to become suspicious of the attack on the memorial and stopping it, but also grounding Caitlyn afterwards. Well, as much as she can, as this is when we see Caitlyn slipping. The memorial attack is the tipping point. She is so angry. She is losing her empathy, calling the attackers ‘animals.’
Vi encourages her to stop the invasion on Zaun. ‘Down there, you’ll be on their terms.’ ‘None of this is on our terms,’ Caitlyn replies, growing more and more anguished. ‘Maybe you should change that,’ Vi challenges, looking, I think, for the Caitlyn who took on the council in season 1. The Caitlyn who, after that failed, was ready to make a new plan and ‘fix’ things. The Caitlyn who was a misfit to her own society.
But as I’ve said, she is falling back onto Piltovan power structures. And she reveals as much to Vi. ‘She dies and leaves this giant hole, and I’m just supposed to fill it. Like she was never there to begin with.’ This is an expression of grief but also, I think, of the rigid structure of Piltovan society. One Kiramman dies, another steps into their place.  
I think this is the most vulnerable we ever see Caitlyn when she admits that ‘it’s all coming apart,’ and Vi is there to offer her comfort and hope. ‘We won’t let it.’ We’ll figure this out, she seems to say. We’ll come up with a plan. ‘We,’ as if they can function as they used to, defying all the power structures in place to follow their own path. But it is far too late for that, they are already embroiled in a war, and having to pick a side. Vi in this episode deserves way more attention than I’m giving her right now, but she puts on the enforcer uniform, believing her sister is gone. Believing this is how she can help.
And Caitlyn seems to stop fighting the pressure of her name. She accesses her family archives using the literal symbol (the key) of their power and discovers the vents and the Grey. She interrupts the council and wields her family name like a weapon to impose her own choices. There will be no invasion, just her strike team. They will enter Zaun to ‘locate Jinx, dismantle shimmer, and neutralise any agents still loyal to Silco.’
The plan is structured and methodical, as is Caitlyn. The plan is stopping full on invasion. The plan is targeting those individuals who are harmful to both Piltover and Zaun. But the Caitlyn of season 1 has vanished beneath a colder exterior. Her visual presentation is enough to tell us that she might be driven by justice, but she is also driven by revenge. And that revenge, that burning hellfire of emotions, is distorting her vision and her choices.
Zaun
I want to touch now on the context we are given as to what is happening in Zaun following Silco’s death before finally tackling the use of the Grey (I know, sorry, but I think this is all important in trying to analyse what is going on).
Jinx puts it best. ‘It’s all going to shit.’ Fighting has broken out amongst the chem-barons now vying for power in the vacuum Silco has left. The ‘Sucker’ sequence shows us fighting on the streets, fires breaking out. Children like Isha are running from the chem-barons’ goons. The Firelights are bringing people to their safe haven because of all the fighting. Deaths are referenced in a meeting with the chem-barons organised by Sevika.
Jinx walks through all of this, cloaked and seemingly uncaring, focussed on the loss of Silco. She does, however, save Isha from the goons when she literally falls on top of her. Like Vi, she deserves her own deep dive, but I will be touching on her actions in response to Caitlyn’s across episodes 2 & 3 in a bit as it’s so interesting, particularly considering how they always parallel and contrast each other.
Something that’s clear, I think, is that these are, as Sevika calls them, ‘turf wars.’ Inference tells us that different chem-barons control different areas of the city- ‘you started this dance when you raided the Rapturewalk.’  Innocents are getting hurt because the conflict is in the city itself. This is the environment into which Caitlyn’s strike team enters.
‘Hellfire’
So, let’s look at Caitlyn’s use of the Grey, and how it intersects and impacts what’s happening in Zaun. I am going to discuss the ‘hellfire’ sequence alongside events as shown in episode 2 as they happen concurrently, teasing out a timeline before analysing what we can interpret from character actions and how they are framed within the narrative.  
Timeline of Events
Having decided on a plan, Caitlyn’s strike team descend into the undercity using the ventilation system which they access through the wind chime mechanism in Caitlyn’s hideaway (this is where the strike team- minus Cait and Vi- are shown to be exiting from in episode 3).
We see Caitlyn activating the vents in order to drive the Grey down into the undercity. First, Silco’s goons are seen running from the plume of gas. Then, they target Margot’s base, engaging in physical violence to incapacitate her group and question them about Jinx’s whereabouts (who we know wants nothing to do with this).
Chem-baron Smeech arrives at Margot’s base, from my understanding, as the strike team are carrying out their plan. He sends his men in, where one encounters the strike team. These same men are shown fighting with the strike team during the hellfire sequence. The strike team seem to be easily able to overpower them. They have the Hextech weaponry, of course.
Piecing together the timeline, I think Smeech moves on to the meeting with the other chem-barons and Sevika. I’m assuming they have left their lackeys to do their dirty work. The strike team then heads for the shimmer factory, flooding that with the Grey. As far as I can tell, Caitlyn uses the net device on her gun to capture two of the chem-barons before destroying vials of shimmer.
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The next time we see them is with Jinx in the arcade. We can assume that Vi is the one who leads them there, seeing as it was a place they frequented as kids. After Jinx escapes, we next see them in the pipes for the vents where they come across Heenot and Jinx’s booby trap meant to lure them towards her in the temple of Janna.
(I’m going to focus more on Jinx and her retaliation in a bit).
Analysis and my own interpretation
(Disclaimer: this is all I have gleaned from my interpretation. Tbh to an extent it’s difficult to see what exactly is going on, which maybe be an intentional choice which only adds another layer to grey areas surrounding these morally grey choices)
So, the strike team’s aims were:
Locate Jinx
Dismantle shimmer
Neutralise any agents still loyal to Silco
We see them doing all three (or, at least, trying to find Jinx). And this is where it gets complex, because to an extent the strike team’s motives might actually benefit Zaun. Destroying shimmer, something which stems from the damage Cait and Vi see shimmer cause, because of Silco and Singed, in Zaun during season 1, would be to destabilise the power struggle going on between the chem-barons causing violence on the streets. When Smeech reaches Margot’s, he comments that the Grey has ‘cleared the place out. Might have made our jobs a lot easier.’ The Grey may have de-escalated violence (although what Smeech wants- domination for himself- is hardly beneficial to Zaun, but Sevika soon takes care of him).  
When Vi confronts Jinx, she argues that they used the Grey to ‘clear the streets. To keep people safe.’ If Vi believes her own words, the Grey might be perceived through the strike team’s eyes as a preferable choice to a full-on invasion. We do see them run and free Heenot, Smeech’s lackey who Jinx leaves tied up (I’ll get into that soon), inhaling the Grey, to aid him. Harming innocents is not their intent. Their use of the Grey appears targeted to the chembarons, Silco’s ‘agents’, and Jinx- the Grey seeps from Margot’s base but the street itself is not flooded. As the strike team enter the arcade the Grey seeps in, but when Jinx escapes afterwards, the street outside is clear.
But this is where it is important to consider the framing and Caitlyn’s mindset at this time. The Grey is threatening, even if it is not being used with blind abandon. It is consistently presented as a monster. We see this through its depiction in the Kiramman archives and through the eyes of the Zaunites- Smeech’s lackey and Jinx perceive it, and the strike team who appear from within it, as such. That the reflection of this monster is reflected back onto Caitlyn’s face is a clear indication of the dark path she is going down.
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And, as with the chem-barons’ terf wars, this is playing out on the streets of Zaun. The frame of the strike team coming after Silco’s goons appears to be on a street (note: from what I can tell, these are Silco's people. Looking back at season 1 they appear with him). Crucially, they are the only characters depicted in this frame, no other Zaunites, but that this frame is paralleled to an image from the Kiramman archive of Zaunites running from a pollution cloud is striking (although also worth considering the differences in these frames, too), and is why I think the Grey intentionally represents the morally grey path down which Caitlyn is venturing through its very being.
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The strike team is both helping the undercity and harming it. They are seeking justice against those who have harmed the undercity by being complicit in the distribution of shimmer, but are utilising systems which underline the ingrained imbalance of power between Piltover and Zaun- Caitlyn has knowledge only available due to her position of power and privilege. At the same time, becoming ever more blinded by revenge, Caitlyn is harming her own name and legacy- the vents had originally been built to help- and losing her moral compass. She is a figure of vengeance in the hellfire sequence, eyes burning red. The framing pulls no punches.
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Jinx
However, there is yet another layer to the Grey that I want to explore, concerning Jinx and her retaliation to the strike team’s actions. As in other cases such as cracking hextech and breaking into Caitlyn’s house to kidnap her in season one, Jinx defies the power imbalance between Piltover and Zaun (something which leads to her becoming a symbol of Zaunite resistance, but I’m not going to go deep into that right now).
She is deeply upset when she sees Vi as part of the strike team flooding the arcade with the Grey. We see she lays trigger explosives in the vents to presumably incapacitate the strike team. She stops a propellor, tying Smeech’s lackey Heenot to it (following the fight with Sevika) and also hanging vivisected dolls of the strike team members. She is taunting them.
Heenot tells Cait and Vi that ‘Jinx is off the rails, even for her. She’s got a real fire lit under her ass. She’s planning something big, right here in the pipeworks. She was heading towards the old tunnels. Something about rerouting the vents.’
We see Silco and Jinx use the Grey (or something like it) on both the chem-barons and Sevika in season 1, and it seems clear Jinx has some knowledge of the vents. She redirects the Grey down towards the temple of Janna to lead Caitlyn and Vi to the fight in episode 3 (worth nothing- who is Janna? Idk anything about lol lore so maybe I’m wrong, but is there something in suggesting it could be a Kiramman ancestor, if they were the ones to provide cleaner air to the undercity? Interesting to consider in light of the myriad ways the two cities interact with each other).
Significantly, following the fight, Sevika triggers explosives which releases air which travels at high volumes through the vents. This streamlines the Grey directly up towards Piltover, where it explodes throughout the city in Jinx’s trademark flourish of vibrant colours.
To me, this represents how Jinx defies the power imbalance. She does this for her own ends, but her actions also benefit Zaun as a whole, churning the Grey up to topside. Arcane features a conflict between two cities older and larger than the characters, but it is through the characters we watch it play out. Their choices. How they continue the cycles of violence.
For Caitlyn, I think Jinx’s retaliation reflects how her actions have become more harmful than helpful. She is harming everyone, including the city she is trying to protect, as well as the people she loves, turning on Vi out of a feeling of betrayal. The Grey explosions cause great distress and injury, something which enables Ambessa to consolidate her position as Piltover’s saviour (and so, in a way, ironically doom Caitlyn to the commander position to which she is appointed).
She is harming herself, too, which is symbolised by the Grey (dyed Jinx’s blue) bursting through the metal slats in the wind chime device in her hideaway. This device had represented the turning of Caitlyn’s mind and the peace she had found in Vi. All of that is destroyed and stained blue.
Conclusion
There is so much more you could interpret about the Grey, about how the characters’ personal vendettas become political as Piltover and Zaun are pushed further and further into war. However, I really wanted to dive into Caitlyn’s use of it and why. The good intentions of the strike team to prevent a full-on invasion and dismantle shimmer are mixed in with the thick air of grief and guilt-poisoned vengeance. It’s devastating to watch, I think, as Caitlyn loses herself. But then, ‘Arcane’ is a tragedy.
If you’ve reached the end of this, thank you so much for reading. I realise it is really long. This is just my interpretation of things born out of a fascination with the layers and complexity in this show and is by no means intended to be definitive. I could have probably kept rewording and exploring more layers and parallels, but I have other things in my life lol.
But I will say, I think it’s easy to look at Caitlyn and decide that she represents all the wrongs Piltover has ever done to Zaun. But if Arcane is character driven, then it is worth considering how Caitlyn herself becomes trapped in a system far greater and far older than herself. This entrapment is certainly of her own making to an extent, although we see how the power structures in Piltover work to create demands and expectations (and add to that Ambessa’s presence… it’s a power battle), but what I’m trying to say is- we have characters who are agents through whom systems of power, etc. continue to function and whose legitimacy is either questioned or upheld, defied or manipulated. By act 3, we see our characters willing to defy these systems, to end cycles of violence and trust in ‘the promise of tomorrow.’
But in the smog of the conflict, everything seems grey.
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