#i'm legitimately really torn up about this

[bixels]

Hello, sudden influx of followers presumably from Twitter.

I've said this like 3 times already, but this really does feel like the final nail in the coffin. I'll probably be much more active here now.

[veilkeeper]

i do have to say that i like elgar'nan and ghilan'nain as our primary villains. because they look like cartoon bad guys on the surface but if you look a little deeper and find all those hidden little notes and codex entries, it's obvious they actually do have complexity that they don't want us to see.

ghilan'nain is actively in mourning. not just for andruil, but also for her fucked up little experiment of an archdemon, her most perfect creation, razikale. at the end of fire and ice, she is ready to throw herself into a fight that she might not win because she's blinded by her own grief, and she only doesn't because elgar'nan holds her hand and pulls her away. protects her. we can find notes that talk about how elgar'nan is concerned that she's not taking time to mourn properly. we know she's checked in on her first creations, the halla, despite the fact that she writes about them in this sort of detached, almost patronizing way. she calls them something she made when she was "untraveled and naive" and that she could never make them again, but she visited them just to see what they might have become in her absence. like she cares more than she wants to let herself.

and elgar'nan calls her sister, despite the fact that ghilan'nain is the youngest of them. he lets her experiment on lusacan for the express purpose of cheering her up. and when she dies he seems legitimately torn apart by it. what should be an opportunity for the first of the firstborn to finally become the sole tyrant he was practically made to be is instead him becoming completely and utterly alone, the only remaining of his kind. i don't think it's coincidence that both he and solas drift to each other as they do, even if it is as enemies. they're too alike, and they're also the only remnants of the old world, their world, that either of them have.

i can't say that i'm particularly sympathetic to either of them—they're both unrepentant monsters who have committed atrocities across millenia, but the fact that they have this hidden depth reminds me that at of the day they are not really anything that no one else is. they are very powerful mages that other people called gods. and people can be very sentimental, indeed.

[ms-demeanor]

I was homeschooled, and didn't much like it, and always kinda assumed I would've had a better time in public school, in large part bc I was raised in a religion that didn't survive much contact with the outside world. You're like the second person in as many weeks I've heard talking about nightmarish bullying experiences in school, and I'm remembering times now when I was a kid when I did occasionally talk to public schooled kids, and they always seemed to say they wanted to be homeschooled, mostly bc of bullies. (I was the kind of annoying to say that if I were public schooled I would probably just stand up to the bullies!)

I'm not totally sure what I meant to ask here but ig broadly what I'm thinking is just... Like, whoa, it's really bad in there, huh?

Eh.

I had a really, really, really bad time of it but homeschooling probably would have been much worse for me and realistically there were not that many people at my school who were dealing with bullying at a level that I was dealing with bullying.

I could have asked for homeschooling or independent study because of that, and I actually know two people who did, both of whom ended up coming back to school within a year.

I also think that schools are way better about bullying now than they were in the 90s-early 2000s.

That doesn't mean they're perfect, but the institutional attitude about intervention changed a lot when more kids started killing themselves.

But, like, legitimately without my public high school yearbook I probably would have killed myself. Getting bullied sucked, but eventually I found a niche where I was able to develop skills and some level of friendship and could spend many hours a day focusing on doing something that I liked that would have been impossible for me if I was on my own and without the resources a public school offered.

This is how I'm 37 and have been using InDesign at a professional level for 22 years. It's how I got into photography in a serious way. I have had at least three jobs that came as a direct result of working on my high school yearbook (even if people did think I was plotting out sniper positions when I climbed the roof to take student life photos with the telephoto lens).

So the bullying was bad and horribly traumatic but also it was the cherry on top of a shit sundae of other stuff that was going on and literally the best thing in my life at that point was the yearbook.

But also man there were weeks and months in there that I would have done much better with remote school.

So I'm torn!

I kind of think that adolescents are just always going to be terrible to each other and the best you can do is damage control.

[mathysphere]

Hey, so, this post here-- by @hadeelfamily, a woman trying to evacuate her family from Palestine-- is real. She is who she says she is. I'm certain of it.

I've donated myself, and will donate more; for the rest of the year-- or until their need is met-- one half of everything I get selling cross-stitch patterns will go to Hadeel Mikki and her family.

If you would like to see my research and reasons to be certain, it's after the cut.

The fundraiser is for a woman named Hadeel Mikki and her family-- her husband, two daughters, her mother, and her two brothers-- and includes two photos of her:

A search for her name brings up a long internet trail: as a programmer and former computer science major, Hadeel Mikki's been active online, and when she's posting about work stuff-- mostly web and app development-- Hadeel uses her real name and photo.

I found six different accounts, all using the same name, and all featuring photos of the same woman-- not all identical photos, but separate photos of the same person-- and all with activity dating back at least a year or more.

I've looked over the activity for each, and I do not believe there's any chance that they aren't legitimate.

Two of them are static freelancer websites, and another is an abandoned Pinterest account: the info there matches the others, but there's nothing current. On the other three (LinkedIn, Threads, and TikTok) the most recent posts are all variations on the same theme: "Please help my family. My young daughters are suffering. Please donate to help get us out of Gaza."

They're certifiably real accounts, and they link to the same GoFundMe. Is it possible that either her LinkedIn or Threads or TikTok account could have been hacked and hijacked into posting a scam fundraiser? I guess. But not all three, and not with the ability to post new photos and videos of her kids-- how would a hacker even get footage of a hackee's daughters in war-torn Gaza? You can't just hire some child actors. They need to match the kids from the family portrait.

This is not a scammer using someone else's name and photos, and this isn't an opportunistic hacker who managed to break in and hijack an account: this is a real woman trying to save her family.

I've looked through everything, and am myself convinced. I'll include summaries and screenshots of each account, along with the links if you'd like to check them out yourself.

On LinkedIn: profile from 2015, photo updated a year ago, liked and commented on various tech posts. Shared her GoFundMe four months ago.

On Threads: icon is her and her husband, shares programming content, "#ProgrammersCoffee" etc, and four months ago she shares a link to her GoFundMe. She has the same laptop as me.

On TikTok: early videos are about programming and app development, and the current ones are asking for help for her daughters, including photos and videos of the girls both before the war and now.

On Pinterest: nothing really there. Looks like she tried it out a long time ago and then dropped it. Still links to her long-defunct Google Plus account, even.

Five years ago she did have a board called 'Boyfriend gifts'. Must've gone well for her; they're married now.

[marley-manson]

So upon rewatching Preventative Medicine I'm even more disappointed with it because they established a legitimate way to make Hawkeye's choice actually morally grey and ultimately pointless, and then completely ignored it during his argument with BJ and the final scene in the Swamp.

BJ assumes they're giving Lacey fake gastritis to keep him in bed for a couple days, presumably so he can't try taking the hill "tomorrow." Unbeknownst to them, Potter has also requested that Lacey be taken off the front lines. Based on the show's usual depiction of the army I think that request is unlikely to be honoured, BUT based on the narrative of this episode one assumes the point of showing us Potter making that call is that it will have an effect.

So what they could've had was an argument about, or at least mentioning, Hawkeye's escalation. BJ arguing that it's enough to buy a day or two of time to figure out a way to dissuade him from trying to take the hill, Hawkeye arguing that it's not enough, he'll go back and kill more boys either way and he has to be stopped for good.

Then for the 'woe it was all pointless ending' Potter could yk, come in all "good news I requested that Lacey be transferred off the front lines and they're taking it seriously. hey btw where is he?"

That would at least like, be a reasonable argument against Hawkeye. But unfortunately, BJ's argument in the scrub room is nonsensical in the actual episode and Hawkeye's angst afterwards is also nonsensical, so imo the episode really dropped the ball here. Hawkeye feeling bad about taking out his appendix would make sense if he knew he was going to lose his command anyway, but he doesn't know that (and neither do we, because it's never brought up again.) He just feels bad arbitrarily, because... he didn't stop the war? I guess? Even though that was clearly not his goal lol?

All that said, I probably still wouldn't like it, just because I don't really like the idea of an episode designed to make Hawkeye seem ~too extreme~ in his attempt to save lives, yk, in terms of evaluating the politics of the show. I'd still side with Hawkeye lol.

And to be fair, maybe the reason they dropped the salient points is that it would've made Hawkeye look worse and much less defensible, whereas this is an ending you can have a debate with your friends about, even if the narrative awkwardly sides with BJ.

But then why bring up Potter trying to get Lacey transferred at all if we're not gonna follow up on that in any way?

And there are still ways to make it more even, like consider: Potter's request to transfer Lacey is refused, but a delay of 2 days so Lacey could recover from fake gastritis would've finished off his attempts at getting the hill. His superior sends him to another area of the front to keep him away from it, maybe, after that phone call where Lacey practically begs to be allowed to throw more men at it lol. So then you have the moral quandary of: BJ's idea would've saved the boys in the short term, but Lacey would still be their leader.

Or maybe BJ gets his way, Hawk doesn't perform the appendectomy bc BJ threatens to tell on him or something, and Lacey misses out on the hlil but remains in charge and Hawkeye is torn between being glad that the boys aren't in immediate danger but knowing Lacey will probably sacrifice them for something else stupid soon enough.

Idk, I think the bottom line is it's sloppy writing, probably due to late-stage rewrites at Mike Farrell's request lol. Maybe they just ran out of time to make sure it was polished and all their ts were crossed.

But like, it's a shame. Could've been a lot more interesting a moral dilemma imo.

[gavillain]

AGATHA EPISODE SIX SPOILER DISCUSSION; HOLY SHIT THAT WAS A GOOD EPISODE!!!!

A LOT happened in this episode, and we got a LOT of answers!

I'm really glad we got Billy Kaplan/Billy Maximoff's full backstory here at the midway point, and I really enjoy the way this episode bridged the gap between WandaVision and Agatha All Along. I'm just really excited to see Billy's story getting adapted here in general too. Obviously it's a bit different from the comics, but they kept a lot of the core ideas of it in tact. And I'm super happy to see that they explicitly kept his Jewishness in tact as well given the MCU's unfortunate habit of erasing or neglecting Jewish identities. We find out here that Billy Maximoff's spirit is inhabiting the body of Billy Kaplan, who died in a car accident the day the Hex came down. We also find out that Lilia was the one who put the sigil on Billy after reading his palm and seeing his broken life line (I was surprised but I thought that reveal was very satisfying). We find out that Billy's boyfriend's name is Eddie, so he's not Teddy Altman and thus probably not Hulkling, which I personally never really thought but other people were theorizing.

Oh and RALPH BOEHNER RETURNS!!!! :D Honestly, I didn't think I would care, but my boyfriend and I went WILD when we saw him pop up. A+ callback right there :D And I like him being the one to sort of facilitate Billy going to Westview after Agatha. After how little he did in WandaVision post-reveal that he wasn't Pietro, it was nice to see him get a bit more relevance again in the overarching plot.

Agatha pulls herself out of the mud and survives, and I also really loved how Agatha wasn't mad or vengeful towards Billy. She was legitimately excited to see him and know who he was. Their relationship is one of the most interesting parts of the show, so I'm glad to see that it's not totally being burned to the ground. Obviously, Billy is fully in the right not to trust Agatha, but we're now at a juncture where the two of them are going to be more open and honest with each other, and that has me excited! We just saw Agatha last episode prove why she is still very much a villain, but we also saw that Billy has a bit of a dark side in him too. I think we're gonna see Billy be torn between good and evil as the show goes forward and deciding what type of witch he wants to be, with Agatha being the proverbial devil on his shoulder. I made the comparison a few weeks back about Agatha and Billy being Maleficent and Riku from Kingdom Hearts in another font, and that seems to be the direction we're heading, which excites me.

Theory wise, there's not a whole lot of new theories for me at least, other than the ones continuing from previous episodes, but I do have a few more scattered thoughts: *Eddie uses the black heart emoji for Billy, so does that mean HE was the black heart that Lilia wrote on the list instead of Rio? If so, it's kind of weird that HE would be a "black heart" in any way. But also this still has me thinking that Blackheart may yet be involved. Not as Rio (who we pretty much know is Death due to leaks), but maybe somewhere else? I dunno, I'm not giving up hope that he or Mephisto are involved, even if it's just as an after credits scene.

*BILLY HAVING A BLACK CAULDRON POSTER IN HIS ROOM MADE ME SO FRIGGIN' HAPPY! To see Disney acknowledging that movie always warms my heart, but to know that Billy is a fan in this universe is REALLY cool and gives me a sort of kinship with him. Love to the underloved!

*Rio is still MIA since Alice died. Is she still tending to Alice or is she doing something else?

*Lilia and Jen aren't dead, and we know as much, but they didn't escape the bog with Agatha, so I'm wondering if the next trial will see the get out or maybe see them waiting there for Agatha and Billy.

*Billy is apparently on the road to find Tommy, which makes a lot of sense. I know people are upset that he's not after Wanda, but I genuinely don't think Wanda's return to the MCU was ever going to be in another TV show. I think, if Wanda returns, it's going to be in Avengers Doomsday, much like her return in the comics during Children's Crusade. But I'm excited to see if Tommy DOES return in this show or if Billy's ambitions are going to remain unresolved at the end of the road. I'm excited to find out!

NEXT EPISODE WITH SPEED PLEASE! I have a MIGHTY need to see Billy in that Maleficent cosplay in what I assume is the next trial… yes, I am, as ever, myself XD

[midwesternvibes]

Hi ! So happy you are taking asks. You said in Donnie and Leo post of the Leon Me Alone! Au, that Leo really wanted to be Donnie's friend (probably before the beating up incident), but how does he feel about now been brother of the guy he thought was cool? And how does he feel on Donnie thinking all is just a scheme, a conspirational nonsense?

Hi! Thanks for sending an ask! I'm always down to talk about whatever lol I'm always thinking about my aus

So, as for what Leon thinks about having Donnie as a half brother? Honestly, he's very conflicted. Because on one hand, yeah, this is the guy he's been wanting to be friends with since forever, and now they're brothers, which is awesome!!! If you were to tell his 6-15 year old self this, he would be so excited!

.....on the other hand, he's now realizing just how much Donnie actually hates him. He thought their prank war was legitimately just a friendly little thing, but he's now looking back at it from a different lens and realizing that it was never friendly for Donnie.

All in all, he's pretty torn about it. He still wants to be Donnie's friend, but now there's more layers to their relationship and he's realizing just how much Donnie hates him.

As for Donnie's scheming, Leon knows nothing about it. Probably for the best, it would break his heart. He still believes that there's a chance that they can be friends, but Donnie....

Im sure it'll be fine! Thanks for the ask!

Previous // Next

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

Idk if the emoji thing works but 🐺

AITA for ignoring my friend's relationship and waiting for it to end?

Background: I (20F) have known my best friend (19X) since we were 14. We've gone through a few different friend groups (nothing dramatic, just fading relationships) but have always stuck with each other, partially because we are both autistic. I know them very well and they have said that I am their main support system. They have BPD which causes them to get obsessed with someone, which normally I would not think is my business, but they have a history of getting obsessed with people who hurt them, and I've always tried to warn them if I felt someone had bad intentions.

They've recently escaped their abusive household which is really exciting but I worry might make them feel lonelier because they've been getting into more of these situations recently. There were a couple minor relationships where someone broke a boundary causing them to have a breakdown, but neither affected their safety. And a few months ago they were talking to an older man online who I got weird vibes from but only mildly hinted to them he was creepy, which made me feel guilty when it ended up being way worse than I thought and became a disaster.

About three weeks ago, they started roleplaying with some guy on twitter, which I didn't think much of since they mainly just talked about what a good writer he is and he seemed fine. But then they asked what I would think if they started dating him even though he's in his 30s and I kinda thought they were just looking for a reason not to do it, so I said no he's too old for you. But then they started trying to convince me it was a good idea which only made me more hesitant. Their evidence in favor included that he used to be in the military (they know i hate the military so I do not know why they admitted this) and pictures of him (I am gay so this would not convince me regardless). They seemed surprised by my negative reaction, I said sorry but you asked for my honest opinion, they understood and I thought this was the end of it.

But now they're legitimately online dating and they talk about him all the time, they don't seem to understand that I am not a fan of this relationship and expect me to react positively to everything he does. I don't react negatively or completely ignore them I just go "ok" or "cool." They might not notice this because I often have times where I can't speak much so it's unfortunately normal for me.

I haven't noticed any other red flags from this guy other than the age gap and the military thing, but those seem a lot worse to me because of my friend's history and penchant for ignoring red flags, so I feel like if something worse was going on I wouldn't even know. Apparently he's going to come visit them in August (it's January as I send this) and I feel like that's enough time that the relationship will either die out or end horribly before he actually has the chance to physically be around them.

I feel torn in two different ways. On the one hand, I know that I'm paranoid and overprotective, not to mention scared of men, so I could just be overreacting to the situation. I don't think he's going to murder them or anything, but they're sensitive and I don't want them to add someone to the long list of people who traumatized them. They ARE a legal adult so it technically shouldn't be a big deal but they're the first person to be creeped out by legal age gaps, they just don't seem to apply this logic to themselves. I'm also not super experienced in relationships, I've only had a few short casual ones so I am not at all an expert.

On the other hand, I felt like shit when the situation with the other guy blew up even though they never blamed me for it. I feel like I should be doing more to dissuade them but they didn't seem to care when I warned them before so I feel like it's a lost cause and I don't wanna be pushy, I want them to genuinely understand why it's not a good idea.

I feel like I'm damned if I do damned if I don't, so I've kinda just settled on passively not really giving them feedback on the relationship in the hopes they'll figure it out themselves? As always I check in on them, try to give them positive attention so they're not desperate for it, and if the relationship actually lasts til August I'll make sure I know their location so they can tell me if they feel unsafe.

I feel like an asshole no matter what I do, so what I'm asking specifically is AITA for basically just ignoring the situation hoping it solves itself? Either because I should be supporting it or because I should bring up my concerns with them again.

What are these acronyms?

[whumpster-fire]

Comin' in hot with some Wings Of Fire takes. Have only read the first arc so far so might be getting some things wrong because of stuff in later arcs but whatever.

I saw a YouTube video of Would You Rather memes for the series and one of them was something like "Would you rather be a Firescales or a red egg Mudwing" and the results weren't unanimously the latter so I have to point this out: Peril is legitimately disabled. Like, her condition is good in two specific situations: a fight to the death or if you need something melted, but otherwise her powers are actively detrimental to her quality of life because she can't turn them down enough to safely touch any flammable materials or other dragons. She can't sleep on a soft bed. She can't read from a scroll. Presumably she'd have to be very careful around grass or trees. She is clingy with Clay because he's literally the only person who can touch her without getting third degree burns. Even without Scarlett's abuse her condition would be incredibly isolating and traumatic to grow up with. It's basically the equivalent of if a rainwing had a disorder that caused them to constantly sweat venom out of their scales.

Speaking of Scarlett's abuse, uhh... not that putting any dragon in a gladiatorial arena isn't gambling with their life, but there's something extra cruel and evil about putting a Firescales in a gladiatorial arena because, like. There was no way for Peril to safely spar or playfight with other dragonets. Did she even have any training other than watching other dragons fight and maybe getting whacked with a long stick before she was thrown into a death match for the first time? And the only things she's actually immune to are breath weapons, and possibly Sandwing/Rainwing venom if her body heat just cooks it into uselessness. For claws / teeth / seawing tails / sandwing tail barbs her only defense is that nobody can hit her without getting hurt themselves and her opponents all know it because she's almost exclusively fighting dragons who've already watched her burn someone to death. But a dragon lashing out in panic or trying to escape being grabbed could still have easily killed or maimed her even if they only got one hit in before their brain registered the pain. Like, the injury Flame got from Viper. I have to wonder if Peril being Scarlett's unstoppable champion was really the plan from the beginning or if she originally put her in against a prisoner she really hated with the expectation that her opponent would probably kill her but then either die of their injuries slowly and painfully afterward or be guaranteed to lose their next fight?

Also if Peril was ever injured to the point of needing medical attention, did anyone even have a plan for how to safely move her? Let alone bandage or dress a wound or splint a fracture or stitch a torn wing membrane?

Other topic: Coral is not a good queen or a good parent, I'm sorry. Trauma over having her daughters repeatedly killed aside she had most of the dragons around her walking on eggshells because they could be murdered or imprisoned for failing, disobeying, or displeasing her. That is not a mark of a good leader. Maybe she was better before all the trauma but not at the time of Arc 1. Also Orca challenging her literally as soon as she was old enough and setting that statue trap going "You're going to rule forever, aren't you, Mother? You should thank me. No one can stop you now." is... giving me really, really bad vibes that something drove that child past the breaking point and even if she thought she could win the challenge she was ready to die rather than live under Coral's rule / parenting any longer. Also I'm convinced that the statue was not meant to kill Orca's own eggs assuming she won her fight, because if she wanted to do that she could have easily put it in the hatchery while she was queen under the pretext of "I want to make sure the first thing my children see is my face even if I'm unable to be there for their hatching." That thing was a Dead Dragon's Switch that I bet she either planned to deactivate if she won or programmed to have a different function if she won, like actually guarding the hatchery.

I really don't want to go here with speculation but given that Coral was canonically planning to marry Anemone off to a much older creep of a dragon... are we sure that this is the only time Coral did this? Because I'm just saying, I'm struggling to think of things that would make a 7 year old dragonet feel like she has to overthrow her mother or die trying RIGHT NOW and also create a machine programmed to murder any future sisters if she fails, and this fits horribly, skin-crawlingly well. Having a deadline to escape an arranged marriage that's set to happen very soon after her seventh birthday would give Orca a reason she absolutely could not wait another few years to challenge her mother, and believing that her mother who didn't believe her and refused to listen was dumb enough to make the same mistakes again with a future daughter would be a motive to turn from "protective of her siblings" to wanting her future sisters dead.

[personwithatophat]

Living Theory

as much as i want to say this is a crack theory, I do believe it ill take the loss if I'm wrong but the proof is here Generation loss theory I don't think the cast is dead. in fact I don't think there were any deaths in TSE Ep 2 This theory that the cast is still alive has a few roots that range from really easy to stupid complex we can start easy. Easy: The idea that showfall media can revive the dead needs to be questioned more. This run-down, abandoned mall with some camera equipment and brainwashed streamers having the power to raise the dead so easily that they will kill off characters, off-screen, legitimately. just in order to bring them back, doesn't make sense. if we find out that showfall mall is some TADC rebuilt reality, fine. but so long as we're working with real-world logic this is taking a step in a direction that's way too far from the rest of the story. "well hetch talked about reviving the cast, Hetch said it was all real" Hetch is an unreliable narrator. in generation loss, it's a very important (and horribly confusing) constant, that we have no reliable narrators.

Medium: All the deaths in Ep. 2 are comedic and nonsensical. it's in a way that's clearly portrayed to us as fake, and portrayed to the characters as real. while there's definitely some wiggle room for improvised show and trying to decipher what's supposed to be real or what is a prop, this is something that they do multiple times through the show where they aren't trying to convince US what's on screen is real, they just have to convince the CAST its real to get the proper reaction. An example of this could be the wall in Ep 1 that was obviously fake but was treated as realistic until the right piece of dialogue came through before sneeg comments on how obviously fake it is. In Ep 2 nikki dies with a comically long pistol, vinny gets crushed by a loony tunes anvil, ethan goes off screen with a rotating wall, the wall-crushing scene is powered by two rats slightly pushing sneeg and austin against a mostly empty room, and puzzler blows up leaving his shoes and slightly torn up chair wizard of oz style. all these deaths are silly, goofy, comedic not just that but since we know sneeg comes back to be in part of ep 3, it implies that austin and likely all the other equally goofy deaths weren't real either. Hard: ok for this just hear me out. at TFC - 20:40 and TSE 49:18 for Ep 1 ranboo picks up a cinderblock in order to slam it against sneegs cage lock. as ranboo hits it against the lock, it doesn't work, and the block warps in his hand. this is because the block is made out of foam, later on, sneeg actually throws the brick at ranboo during the evil snag fight. both ranboo and sneeg comment on the block being real to them. In TFC this scene of the block warping in ranboos hand is actually changed to have a different, debatably worse camera angle just looking behind ranboo and hiding the obvious prop behavior. if the founder's cut is acknowledged by the founder and this is an imperfection that was corrected, then that in its own way is an acknowledgement in canon that the block is made out of foam. Stick With Me If the block is made of foam and sneeg throws the block at ranboo, causing ranboo to reel back, then that means that showfall can simulate the feeling of pain. at what point other than this, would it be relevant that pain can be realistically but heavily simulated? The Surgery Scene. So let's swap the script. Let's say that during the surgery scene, charlie really was just there with a tub full of goop. in this case, it would be *much easier* and *much more effective* to fake the gore instead of the slime by having a short, few-second-long period that charlie feels like he's being cut open and reacts appropriately then find a way to do it real. and if the surgery is fake and its on screen its hardly a challenge to fake an off screen character death or 4. I wont speak for all the deaths but I have my eye on Ep 2 -Tophat

[ofdarkestdesires]

Alright! So, now that we have the full line-up of the Level 10 Bell’s Hells artwork, I think it’s about time I sat down and gave my personal opinions that nobody asked for about everyone’s styles.

Chetney Pock'o'pea

While I appreciate the more active pose and visible armor as opposed to his more unassuming original design, I am very off-put that he completely abandoned his original color scheme and all shreds of his original aesthetic. I also think the tracksuit is a bit much—listen, I’m a fan of toeing the line of what fashion belongs in a fantasy setting, but I’m pretty sure this fully vaulted over the it and did a full backflip and three-point landing into ridiculous. 3/10

And unfortunately, the same must be said for his Lycan form. This artwork feels like a serious downgrade from the original Chetwolf, which honestly filled me with a shock of horror each time he popped up. The only reason it is higher than base-Chet is that Chetwolf is still a werewolf, and werewolves are badass. 4/10

Laudna

Laudna, on the otherhand, is a total glow-up from her original design. Everything about her design ties together and brings in perfectly her aesthetic and backstory, from the haunting tree embroidery on her dress (akin to the Sun Tree she was hung from) to the little Pate birdhouse backpack (an homage to the Baba Yaga forest witch imagery she picked up), all the while looking so much like the elegant and imposing Delilah Briarwood. Easy 10/10 for me.

Fresh Cut Grass (F.C.G.)

F.C.G.'s new art...isn't bad, but I'm not as wowed by it as some others on this list. Something has clearly changed here in the choice to include his new blue jacket, and I approve! I'm also a fan of the wires having more definition and appearing more purposefully stylized, as if he's taking better care of himself...but the pose and the style just feel a bit lacking to me. 5/10

Fearne Calloway

Honestly, my only gripe with this outfit is the upper-half of her bustier. It feels very cluttered and like there is a lot of fine detail that just ends up being all meshed together. That would be my other only other gripe, too—there's a lot of small, fine details here that makes her feel cluttered. Which, honestly, fits her as the sneaky little hoarder that she is! But yeah, I would've done something else, something cleaner, with the upper half of her bodice. Also, while I know she is a Druid, I don't think she needs the plant growth on her legs... 8/10

Imogen Temult

I would just like to point out that this outfit was unveiled to us as Imogen's choice for winter-wear while traveling through the Crystal Sands Tundra. Is it sexy? Definitely. Is it my personal taste? Mm, not really, but I can see the appeal. Am I upset that even after the semi-canonization of her needing glasses, this bitch is still not a sexy glasses-wearing nerd? Absolutely—but the biggest sin this outfit does is fail to be climate-accurate. -1/10 for improper environment protection, and 7/10 for the outfit itself.

Orym, Savior Blade of the Tempest

I am incredibly torn here. Because, when it comes down to the armor itself, this is a clear winner. Orym's new uniform is a perfect upgrade from his original more humble and simple apparel, becoming much more about function and protection, while still retaining his svelte and limber appearance. The noted upgrade to Seedling is also nice, though I wish it was a bit more pronounced. What pulls me back from really loving this design, though, is his proportions—I feel like his head is way too big, or his limbs are way too skinny. Over all, I have to give this an 8/10.

Ashton Greymoore

Remember at the start how I said I'm all for toeing the line of what fashion belongs in fantasy settings? Yeah, this fucks! From the first episode, we knew that Ashton was a punk, and this just picks that up and runs with it in such a cool, fun way. I legitimately want this entire outfit—fuck cosplay, I'd just wear this irl! It leans enough on his old design to be recognizable, but pops out as truly his own. And the hammer looks wild—I can't wait to see that thing really pop off like crazy in the next fight. Definitely a 10/10 from me!

[imaginepirates]

I love your take on potc characters and your headcanons for them. It’s just amazing. If it’s not a bother, I was wondering how do you think those characters would be as a parent? I mean we haven’t seen much parenting even for those that had kids in canon.

Ok so I actually have a few posts about this for James (hc)(hc)(hc) and Barbossa (fic) but! I can always expand. I also have one for Beckett (hc) since I'm obsessed with the idea.

Jack – Oh god. This is such an interesting question, because I firmly believe that Jack is actively against having children. He really and truly cannot fathom the idea of having kids of his own and being torn between caring for them on land where they can lead good lives and being at sea where he himself is happy. It’s a moral conflict he just can’t bring himself to face. His idea of what a child’s life should be like is shaped by his relationship with Teague and the ways in which he recognizes his own childhood lacked structure and support. He knows he can’t be the parent he needed when he was younger, and is thus against having children at all. If he were to have kids of his own, he would have to make the painstaking decision to leave them on land. A pirate ship is no place to raise a child; it’s dangerous and unpredictable. In his eyes, the best place for a kid to grow up is in a place of more stability, where they might have a better chance at finding a legitimate profession and keep themselves out of the trouble Jack has lived in his whole life. Rather than having biological kids, I can more see him acting as a sort of father-figure to a lot of young boys who end up working on the Pearl, teaching them the ropes and watching as they grow in their abilities and confidence.

Elizabeth – Elizabeth would be an interesting parent to have, for sure. I think her relationship with motherhood would be something very complex. For one, she has nothing to go off of, having had no mother of her own for most of her life. With her father gone, she can’t ask his advice, either. She’s such a fiercely independent and active person, too, that mothering may feel like an obstacle for her sometimes. That being said, I think she loves her children dearly and wants to do her absolute best for them. She teaches them all she knows—from proper behavior at formal functions to sword-fighting multiple enemies at once. She’s going to have the most well-rounded kids of all time, tbh. I’ve always kept this image in my mind of her showing up to a meeting of the Brethren Court with a kid just strapped to her front in a sling across her chest, and nobody says a damn thing. This also works as a method of volume control because nobody dares raise their voice and make the baby cry. I have an intrinsic need to see this happen, actually. I love the idea of her kids having pirate baby-sitters half the time when she needs to do something dangerous; Pintel and Ragetti act as honorary uncles, Barbossa as a granddad. Jack is the wine aunt. In all, her kids probably lead a kind of busy, chaotic life with people coming and going throughout their childhoods, but they have ties to an abundance of people who simply adore them. 

James – The most devoted, doting father ever. James is terrified to mess things up as a parent, and is always worrying that he won’t be any good at it. He adores his children and has unparalleled dedication to them. He wants them to have a good scholarly education, something he never had, but if they choose the military over school, he’ll personally oversee as much of their training as he can. He’s a deeply caring father, too. Though not good at expressing his own feelings, he’ll do anything for his children when they need him. He wants them to feel safe when coming to him, something he could never do with his own father. He makes sure to spend quality time with his kids doing things that aren’t school or work, instead playing games or taking them out riding or reading to them. When the kids are young, he’ll take naps with them on his chest, holding them close. He recognizes that he may have to be absent for long periods of time due to the nature of his job, and it tears at him. His greatest fear is going to sea for months while his children are still relatively little and coming home to find that they don’t remember him. Thus, he works hard to be as present as possible while he’s home, wanting desperately to make a positive impact on their lives. 

Will – Honestly, I feel like Will would make the most sane parent. After resolving things with his own father, he’s one of the people with the fewest daddy issues, and actually has a dad to ask questions of when he needs advice. Will feels like a very relaxed parent, not putting a lot of pressure on his kids. He was poor for most of his life, and though he wants better for his children than he had for himself, he also knows that happiness can be found working simple jobs. He’s very open to his children’s wishes and interests, and he’ll support them in pretty much damn anything. He definitely advises not becoming a pirate, though. Assuming the curse has lifted for him by the time he has children, he spends a lot of time with them. If it hasn’t, then he exploits loopholes and just has his kids come aboard the Dutchman as often as possible. He wants to be a presence in the lives of his children, and takes active steps to ensure it. I think he’s a little in awe as he watches them grow up, so impressed by all the things they accomplish, doing things he’d never even dreamed of when he was their age. He’s their number one hype man, too. 

Beckett – I have…feelings about Beckett as a father. He’s not a particularly present one, given that he has zero knowledge on how to take care of kids. There’s a nanny, no question. He doesn’t really know how to properly bond with his children, but does ensure that they get the best education possible and that they have access to a wealth of resources. Especially as the children start to get older and enter society properly, he has a good time with them making snarky commentary about the social scene. Sass is the name of the game. Speaking of games, I do see him as the type to enjoy chess, and he feels a wave of pride whenever his kids beat him. He’s overprotective and possessive—he refuses to let his children suffer in fear as he did when he was their age. He has Mercer with them as a bodyguard whenever they leave the house. If anything happens to his kids, Beckett is not above having the person responsible killed. I think he has a certain terror of being alone, and though he’s not the best at socializing with his children, he never truly wants them to leave.  

Barbossa – Hector is another doting father. He’s led a rough life, and though he doesn’t want that for his children, he’s not above taking them to sea when they grow old enough to sail. Before that, though, he leaves them on land with someone else, coming to visit every so often bearing gifts from all the places he’s been in the meantime. He can afford some degree of comfort for his children, too, and he certainly doesn’t spare that expense—if he can’t be there for his children, they’ll want for nothing else, dammit. Barbossa can’t give up his pirating ways to raise his kids on land himself, which is unfortunate, but the truth. If they do choose to go to sea, he takes them on as cabin-boys (or girls, he doesn’t give a fuck), and lets them learn and progress just like everyone else. I think he’d be happy to have them around, though a little concerned for their welfare. He knows better than anyone how dangerous a life at sea can be. Still, he isn’t too worried; he’s a realist if nothing else, and knows that there are chances for both good and bad. He puts effort into teaching his children and making sure they’re safe and cared for, but he’s a bit more hands-off than some of the others so his kids don’t feel like they’re suffocating. He lets them learn things for themselves, but makes sure they know they always have a (sort of) stable place to return to should they need it. 

(also, if there’s anyone else you’d like to see for this, I think I could probably expand on the list)

[saltpepperbeard]

What are your top 5 Ed x Stede moments? 😊 I’m curiously asking several blogs to see how many of us share favorites!

MAN, anon! I tried to give this one some thought to see if the choosing would get any easier/become any clearer. Spoiler alert: IT DID NOT HSDLKS I AM STILL JUST AS TORN AS I WAS BEFORE. But let me see if I can at least ~*~attempt this~*~. My first three were easy but then the LAST TWO HAD ME PACING SHDLKS:

So okay, obviously have to put their first kiss in the ranking because it's so iconic and it's the thing that got me into the show in the first place! Like, literally the FIRST scene I laid eyes upon. And it had me crying full blown tears at work because I was just so floored that we weren't queer baited and that it was so sweet and tentative and cautious and just,,, The rest was history of course lol!

Like really, the Power it has. Didn't even know the characters or the story that much at all, and was already crying LMAO.

Then of course I have to put the second beach kiss(es) because good god lol GOOD GOD!!! I think I adore it so so much mainly because Ed and Stede are finally on the same page. No more doubts, no more worries, no more anxieties, no more questioning if they have the same feelings or are going too slow/fast. Just them and their strong, solid love--their good bones.

Not to mention Ed dropping the double "I love you" ??? I cannot even begin to express how thankful I am that we heard a legitimate "I love you." And Ed being the one to say it after all the hurt, all the pain in feeling unlovable, all the fear that he'd die completely alone, all the worry that his strong feelings were too much...Man. MAN.

And thennnnn the reunion scene because yeah. Yeah. I've said this before and I'll say it again: watching this at like 4:30am for the first time almost gave me an out of body experience HSLDSHS. Like, I think there's just something about the fact that we were all going through so many different iterations of possible reunions during the s1-s2 gap. We envisioned angsty, silly, romantic, and everything in between.

But this lol THIS,,,

I feel like it just surpassed expectations in such a beautiful, fantastical way. Like genuinely, I never EVER anticipated Ed being stuck in purgatory about to die and Stede coming to him as a mermaid because the real Stede is sitting with his body begging him not to succumb.

Also, Stede begging and screaming at Ed not to die/to wake up/to come back to him always makes me feel some sort of way. Something something he's normally so silly and so theatrical but he's so choked up and so serious in that moment that it PUNCHES ME IN THE KIDNEYS. Like it really just goes to show how utterly desperate he is. And that last, whispered, strained, "come back to me..." ??? Homie............

ALSO also, obligatory "This Woman's Work" mention because I knew that song and nothing else for like two months straight HSKLDS. Or two months gay, rather.

...

see this is where i start Dying because i'm being pulled in so many different directions lol DO I GO FOR ROMANTIC, OR SILLY, OR EARNEST, OR,,, SKLDJHLDJKDKDA

Okay okay I think I'm going to have to go earnest because I adore that they actually talked things through together. FLEETING LMAO, BUT STILL GLAD THEY DID, EVEN IF IT WAS JUST FOR A BIT. I just love that they actually expressed some frustrations, that Stede actually talked about his fears/his panic, that Ed set a boundary, and that Stede respected it. And then Stede gently navigated around and expressed his love in different ways and it folded Ed in half almost immediately hsdkljs YOU LOVE TO SEE IT.

But yeah no--if me rolling around Atticus' fics and me writing my own stories is any indication, I really REALLY LIKE IT WHEN THESE TWO ACTUALLY TALK LMAO. BECAUSE THEY HAVE SO SO MUCH BOTTLED UP, BOTH INDIVIDUALLY AND AS A COUPLE, SO IT'S JUST HSLDKS TALK IT THROUGH AS A CREW OF TWO MY BELOVED!!!

......

oh god oh god what do i pick for the last one lol WHAT DO I PICK FOR THE LAST ONE,,,

mmmMMmmmMMMM,,,,,,

SUCCUMBED TO MORE TALKING IT THROUGH LMAO.

I love so many of their other moments, and honestly, so many things could have made this list. But the bathtub scene...man. Taika saying it's more vulnerable and even more romantic than their first kiss is shdljks yeah. YEAH. LIKE HE'S COOKING A BIT WITH THAT BECAUSE IT'S JUST,,,

I feel like it's such a pivotal and important step in their relationship. Ed has literally never told that secret to anyone else, but he entrusted it with Stede. He feels safe enough around Stede to expose the darkest parts of his past, and he's entirely right to do so, because Stede doesn't view him any differently at all. Stede is right there, wanting to be his friend--loving him still.

And I think it's also good for Stede because of that vulnerability. He gets to see how much Ed trusts him and feels safe around him. He's getting to see Ed and Ed alone, which can't be said for so many other people.

It's just the two of them in that moment and I adore it so much.

...I just adore THEM so much, anon, so thank you for spreading this sweet little ask around! It was super fun to consider, aLBEIT SLIGHTLY RGGHGHGHH INDUCING BECAUSE I COULD INCLUDE SO MUCH LMAO. But thank you kindly! <3

Also, for the record, if I had to rank them from most favorite to still favorite but not AS favorite, I'd go Double Beach Kiss, Reunion, First Kiss, Love Everything About You, and Bathtub.

[squishyneet]

I'm really torn on Hangyeoul dude. Like he's supposed to be a minor, but like how is he doing surgeries? Bc it said that the majority of the time, he does normal surgeries and gives people what they want. The man is a legitimate surgeon. He knows what he's doing.

I thought since his dad used to be the director, maybe just maybe, Hangyeoul has the copy ability and instead of copying fighting, he copied surgeries?? Bc how else would he be able to do that? Unless he is one of the geniuses and he's like a surgical genius or smth lmao.

Also, I'm really curious about his history with beauty and how he ended up like this. Bc we see him exercising and it's not training to fight like other ppl, it's yoga/calisthenics I think? Maybe he is just keeping up his appearance.

On that note, why is my guy so buff for no reason? He doesn't fight, so he probs has an obsession with his own appearance. What if he got plastic surgery himself a long time ago and that's when it started? Or what if his dad did it to him? Or he did it to himself? T_T

[divorcedfiddleford]

anyway. moving on from the show itself. so possibly my hottest take is that i think journal 3 should not have been published KJSHDFLGKHSDFGUIWEHRGJSDF. basically i think instead of trying to write the actual journal 3 they should have picked a handful of stories from his research era that they wanted to tell and made a graphic novel about that. i got WAAAAAAAYYYY off topic and wrote PARAGRAPHS about this but it's not related to the question you asked so i'll just summarize by saying i think it would play more to their strengths as writers, leave more to the imagination, and they could leave out all those fucking retcons that i hate

^ excerpt from this post i made a couple weeks ago. i wanted to post those paragraphs i spoke of teehee so in case anyone is curious here they are

aside from all the retcons that i hate, i think the biggest weakness of journal 3 is that it limits the imagination. with the publishing of journal 3, they had to establish a set timeline and list of events that happened. there's no way they would have been able to construct a chronological narrative otherwise. however this is actually quite stifling to a creative audience. before it was published, the timeline was largely left open to interpretation, with only the biggest plot points being cemented. and while i'm not going to act like this was some sort of golden age of fanworks (there were a LOT of stupid theories and objectively bad content), i do think it lent itself a lot more to creativity. i distinctly remember several authors in the middle of writing having to make disclaimers that their works were no longer "canon compliant" after the release of the journal, as though that meant they were inherently of lesser value, and i think that's really too bad.

i want to be very clear here. the issue is not that alex hirsch and rob renzetti wrote stories about what happened when ford was young. the issue is that they chose the journal as the means by which to tell those stories. they had to pull a LOT of retcons just to make that even possible - some of which i'll talk about later, others (like the fact that they were DESTROYED before the end of the series) are self-evident and/or have been bemoaned by me ad nauseam - when a graphic novel would have sufficed and probably played more to their strengths as tv writers. hell, they did this later! the only reason they chose to do it as journal 3 itself is because it's like The Symbol of the show and they knew everybody would buy it and it'd be a really cool collector's item.

but the problem with turning the journal into a chronological narrative (which it wasn't originally, i'll get into that) is that you have to decide everything that happened, and by extension, everything that didn't happen. creatively, this is torture. they made a book and said "this is it, the whole book, with all of the torn pages restored magically". therefore if you come up with a scenario you think is fun for ford to be in, you have to come up with a reason why it isn't in the journal. this isn't just a problem for fans. alex and rob wrote themselves into a corner with this. the book of bobos hasn't even been released yet and we've already seen that it features "lost journal pages". they thought of other things after the fact which would be cool to include! do you understand? they now have to legitimize the fact that they weren't there in the first place, which wouldn't be an issue if they just hadn't published journal 3 in the first place! i have no idea if this makes any sense i didn't take my adderall this morning but so many of these stories would have functioned just as well as a graphic novel.

another (more nitpicky) thing is that the journals are introduced to us as scientific research. field journals. ford measures the heights of organisms, rock formations, etc. the text blocks to the side of them are scribbles in the tv show, but you are meant to infer that they are more detailed notes about each of the entries.

(image descriptions in alt text)

this stuff is SERIOUSLY LACKING in the published journal. and i get why! it's easy to imply the science in the tv show when you can just scribble to represent a block of text, but when you're publishing a book, you have to actually write all those words. alex and rob are NOT scientists, and writing realistic scientific descriptions of each anomaly is an unreasonable request, especially given the fact that they were so pressed for time and had a page limit. so i understand why they leaned into the diary angle instead - it's more narrative-based, it's in their wheelhouse, and it makes for better reading. but as an amateur scientist myself i was just very disappointed (the "hawktopus: too stupid to study" gag made me so sad. come on ford. i know you. i know you observed that hawktopus for like five months and took in-depth notes on its diet and behavior). again, i think this would not be a problem if the actual contents of the journal were limited to just what we're shown in the tv show and the audience's imagination. but i doubt very many fans care about this as much as i do shldjfkglskdfhgk

in the show, ford also seems to jump between journals as needed, implying that they were not separated chronologically - that is to say, he did not simply write in one book until it was full and then move on to the next one. this makes a lot of sense for scientific journals. you don't close the book after one encounter with an organism or phenomenon. you observe it multiple times, returning to it again and again, sometimes months or years after the initial sighting. you need to leave yourself space for future notes, which is precisely what we see ford doing here! it also made sense given the fact that he was able to go back and put part of his portal plans into each journal. if he waited until each journal was filled up before starting a new one then this would be a lot harder (he would have to add more pages to each book, which would mean redoing the binding. that's a lot of work! also he opens up journal 1 and almost immediately starts writing in it after coming out of the portal so unless there were empty pages in it beforehand when would he have time to add more pages? checkmate atheists). however this had to be changed for the book they wrote. again, i don't begrudge them for this. non-linear storytelling is HARD and, again, TIME CONSUMING! time is NOT something the writers had. but again i just think that this would not have been a problem if there wasn't a physical journal.

thank you for making it to the end of my post. as consolation here is a link to a doodle i did of ford in the portal 2 jumpsuit

[natmasthestinkylizardliker]

the post got likes so here is, mostly in order of appearance, screenshots I really liked in the current Arknights event (obvs spoilers for the story of the event) (no really, spoilers, ideally you should read the event yourself and get the impact of these for yourself)

Starting off with one of the best, such a high impact scene, we all knew it was coming but it's still so well done, the red on monochrome colour scheme, it's so good

(also from this first chapter is this image of the storm over Kazdel that shows up a few times over the story, it's actually before the picture above but it's my post so I put things in whatever order lol)

the arrival of this adorable mess

I posted this one earlier, but it's great, bully that fukin lil dweeb Ascie

this moment was great too, it's amazing how emotional Arknights can make me

then this sceeeeene omggggg

then you have some really nice sweet stuff with Amiya and Doc

okay, it feels like I'm just posting every CG from the event now, but just look at them, look at how evocative this is

look at the detail in this painting, like, usually there's just one or two really special images in an event, if we're lucky, but this event has several story sections with multiple absolutely sublime pieces

yeah me too lads

I promise I'm not posting literally everything, but just look at this stuff, it's fantastic

there's always one of these style of action shots in events and they get me every time, legitimately so fucking cool

Q_Q

and again with text because I wanted to

echoes of earlier, but bloodied and battered

then there's this motherfucker

and another ruined echo of before

it just keeps happening btw, I legit haven't even posted everything and this post is still massive, but look at thisss

Q_Q

and that's everything!

Honourable mention to the backgrounds, some of which have been so so so good this time too, like the Scar Market

or just look at the detail in this random shithole residence

or this war torn cityscape

all of which are absolutely fantastic, gorgeous art all round.

but seriously, go read the event, it's so good!

(also holy shit this is a long post, sorry about that lol)