#idk i think it could've been a cool thing for the show to follow up with

[scootersscooter]

I think we as a fandom don't talk enough about Oliver being Tecton's sidekick

[antariies]

how to build a chair........... director's cut ∠( ᐛ 」∠)__ this is about to be a very long very self-indulgent post where i just talk about my own writing. i also doodled on all the pages i think it makes the whole thing more fun to go thru. welcome to my ted talk

SIKE before i begin. credit where credit is due, this post was the start of it all. it changed my brain chemistry my jaw was dropped i was in awe i was obsessed and before i even finished it i knew that i would eventually have to make something similar for the commander or else i would be cursed to think about it for the rest of my life. and i Was cursed for like two years every day i would just be like........ is today the day i sit down and draft the commander chair fic of my dreams....... maybe tomorrow......

and then i got accepted as a writer for the gw2 zine ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ the chair idea was actually my backup option in case my first idea didn't pan out, and thank god it didn't, bc this one worked so much better. (still working on my initial idea, just turning it into a full fic! it was wayyy too long to be a zine submission.)

this is the chair i used. i downloaded the assembly instructions and tried out a bunch of different free pdf editors until i found one i liked, which ended up being sedja. if anyone's interested in doing something like this, i recommend printing out the pdf and writing directly on it! it was a lot easier for me to just figure out everything on paper first and then digitalize it after :P here's a picture of my physical copy

okay actually getting into it for real this time !!!!!

1. yeah i could've just erased the ikea logo and left a blank space but then i realized i could turn it into an in-universe joke. and then i ran with it.

2. i ripped this straight from the product description on the website. thanks ikea

3. i'm not sure if anyone went and looked it up, but it's a real item code!

hehe :3c

4. if your commander willingly goes to therapy i'm happy for them but TO ME? you'd have to drag the commander kicking and screaming. it's not that they don't know that something is wrong with them, they know, and they know YOU know. you're just never supposed to talk about it. they don't look at their own psych eval results bc that's none of their business.

5. i normally avoid specifying the commander's race when i write them bc i enjoy the challenge, but for the zine i was assigned to write about a norn commander! as a human main i was uhhhh very ill-equipped. but that just meant i had to study up on my norn lore (•̀ᴗ•́)و i spent hours on the wiki, then went around interviewing norn mains for their opinions, which was great fun :D it all helped me narrow the focus of my piece: joining the war on commander objectification on the side of commander objectification (ㅅ´ ˘ `)♡ and no one self-aggrandizes quite like the norn commander!

and to balance that i knew my narrator had to be patronizing as shitttt. they've clearly been following the commander since the beginning and seem to know a lot of intimate details about their life, despite not thinking very highly of them. wonder who that could be :3c

6. i can't stop making references. so the original part number is actually #122620 in the manual but i've changed it here (and on the previous page!) to #082812, as in 08/28/12, the date gw2 was released! no real reason for it, @dalennaugw suggested it for funsies and i liked it. if you're my pal and i show you a wip and you have a cool idea for it, chances are i Will put that shit in. hi dale if you're reading this

7. another thing about me. i loveeee repetition. here the word "over" is repeated four times to match the picture. honestly a lot of the creative process for this piece was just staring at the pages and figuring out how to tie the pictures to the commander in ways that weren't extremely corny or trite. idk why i enjoy writing like this when i could be frolicking in the beautiful prosaic meadows of a word doc instead but. it's like i see a tiny little restrictive box and i'm like OH BOY can't wait to think inside of that thing!!! i like when the format matters just as much as the content and in some cases informs the content. am i making any sense here. well all you need to know is that i'm a virgo and my favorite book is house of leaves

7. aw fuck just realized i wrote 7 twice. whatever i'm not changing it this is 7 part two now. the theme of my piece is glory, what it means to the norn commander, and how far they're willing to go for it.

8. does norn culture place emphasis on seeking individual glory Yes are norn also very community-oriented Also Yes. i think it's common to see norn kids napping together in a big pile, usually after they've worn themselves out playing games outside. it makes sense practically (apes together warm) and socially (pack bonding good) but that's just my hc. growing up i used to share a bed with my cousins all the time so it's normal to me.

a young, naive not-yet-commander, with no real combat experience, has no point of reference to compare a "blaze of glory" to. but the way everyone talks about it, it must be a good thing. a wonderful thing. a reward fit for a life well-fought and a legend hard-earned. so they imagine it must feel like falling asleep surrounded by the people they love, who love them in turn.

9. .........i was playing a lot of ace attorney when i wrote this page. i wish i was joking 👍🏼

10. ohhh shit the truth come OUT this whole chair thing was all a ploy just so i could write about the departing. again.

will i ever stop thinking about her. reply hazy, try again later.

11. out of all the pages, this one has the most emphasis on text placement, like comparing the enlarged picture of the screw to a sword, the numbers counting the screws, and "up up up" being arranged to mimic a wisp of smoke.

i also wanted to lean into the viking/norse mythology influences with my word choice.

12. more nods to norn culture. i didn't know they referred to the six human gods as "spirits of action" until i was doing the research for this piece :O

and the domain of the lost is called a hall of ghosts....... cause valhalla.....

13.

i'm sorry this so funnyyy. SAYS the guy who literally clawed their way back to life for a rematch.

me when i'm in a sore loser competition and my opponent is the COMMANDER!!!

14. arms as in "limbs" and also arms as in "armaments" :•]

15. haha get it because the picture makes it look like there are two mirrored speech bubbles while the text paints two opposing interpretations of the norn commander. one that's selfless and humble versus one that's selfish and vainglorious.

16. and the best part is IT DOESN'T MATTER which one is true bc at the end of the day no matter what their motivation, balthazar is dead by their hand. ofc i'm of the opinion that the most compelling interpretation of the commander is both, simultaneously. contradictions are good for the soul.

17. i could've name-dropped kas, the only person present that would do something like that, but i felt it was better to leave it ambiguous.

18. low-hanging fruit. the metaphor was so obvious here but i had to do it. for the culture

19. the alternate title for this piece was "THIS COULD BE GLORY". "how to build a chair" was only supposed to be a placeholder title til i figured out a better one, but the innocuousness of it grew on me. also i came up with the other one too late and had already advertised under the chair title lol

20. my first instinct was to end it with something more reassuring, like "what you have built so far is enough" but that would've been an ooc switch-up for a narrator who has been nothing but snide and detached this whole time. gotta stick to my guns

21.

obligatory chair joke as the last line. for realsies though it’s meant to be an earnest appeal to the commander to take a break, to have a seat, but it’s also a challenge. are they willing to lean on their friends? are the bonds they’ve forged strong enough to hold their weight? are they willing to put their faith in someone else’s hands? are they brave enough to try? well. only one way to find out.

also guess what that wasn’t even the real last page of the manual. it's THIS

but no way i was letting this be the image we ended on. IT LOOKS LIKE A DICK AND BALLS!!!

and on that note, THANK YOU if you made it this far!! a very special shout-out to @hawkepockets, my lovely boyfriend and beta reader, without whom this piece would not be nearly as polished. i would bring him pages to look over and he would say Scrap half of those lines you can do better than that. kill your darlings. i would complain and argue for a few minutes then we would revise. rinse and repeat until we had honed this thing to perfection. i can't stress enough the importance of having a second pair of eyes on your work throughout your creative process, even better if it's someone who challenges you. i don't even pay him 🫶🏼

and if there was anything i didn't cover that you still have questions about, please feel free to shoot me an ask! (ㅅ´ ˘ `)♡ thanks for reading! see u later dudes ;P

[katerina-marie]

The Uncertainty of Domesticity

Toji Fushiguro x Female Reader

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 of 3

Toji Fushiguro wasn’t afraid of much, though he definitely felt so when he became a widower in the same moment he became a father. Years later, he felt it again when you came along with the same hopes and dreams for a future he never thought he would experience again.

Content: JJK universe but no canon events / strangers & neighbors to lovers / medium burn idk / female reader and referred to as such but left descriptively vague / no y/n / out of character and soft Toji / single-father Toji / A little NSFW - brief mention/implication of vaginal sex so please avoid accordingly - but I can't write smut to save my life so it's not very explicit / Megumi-Mama/Mamaguro dies in childbirth and its mentioned once or twice / cutie pie child Megumi / fluff / slice of life / light angst from Toji's inner turmoil / discussions about having children / pregnancy and childbirth for reader / more notes below

WC: 9.2k (*nervous laughter*)

Notes:

Y'all....this thing is 9.2k words. It probably should've been split into another part, but I didn't and I'm just leaving it be. I'm sorry if it feels a bit "choppy?" I could've happily kept writing about all the little moments in between the parts shown, but I'm not sure if it ever would've ended at that point.

Also, I'm posting this at nearly 2:00 am my time because my end of week/upcoming weekend just got very busy and it's now or never, so please forgive any typos. I reread this chapter until I went crosseyed.

------------------------------

Toji Fushiguro liked to consider himself capable of many things. 

He, as a single father, had raised his son from infancy into a fine six and a half year old.

He was a teacher, no matter how unwilling, and had successfully kept all his students alive thus far.

He was your partner, doting and caring of your every whim and utterly wrapped around your finger. 

So, when he and Megumi woke up from a late afternoon nap in the middle of the summer only to step into a puddle of water in front of their kitchen sink, Toji was adamant he was capable of repairing the situation, regardless of his lack of experience in such an area. He mopped up the water, gathered tools, and squeezed himself under the sink the best he could considering his size. At some point, Megumi must have run across the street to fetch you because your legs appeared in his limited field of vision followed by your smug grin as you bent down to check on him. 

Your eyes glittered in a way that was betelling of your mischievousness, and Toji grimaced. “Having fun?”

“Just hand me a wrench from the counter, please.” 

You did as Toji asked without comment, and began to fill the silence (and test Toji’s concentration) with chatter about plans for the weekend in between his intermittent string of curses when something went amiss. As an hour went by with little progress to show for it, you made yourself comfortable on the floor next to Toji’s feet while Megumi had since found something outside to occupy himself with. When you felt water begin to tickle your toes, you reached out your foot to nudge it against Toji’s calf. 

“I mean this in the kindest, least offensive way,” you told him, “but don’t you think it’s about time we call a plumber?” Somewhere under the sink, metal clanged and Toji barked out an expletive followed by a groan of pain. 

“No,” he insisted grouchily, and you watched as he used his legs to wedge himself further under the sink. “I think I almost got it.” 

Your answering hum was full of disbelief, but Toji paid it no mind, even if he could start to feel the coolness of water seeping into the cuff of his pants. If only he could reach one more inch…

His concentration was interrupted when Megumi’s scream of pain filtered in through the open windows. Toji lurched upwards out of sheer instinct and hit his head hard enough against the metal piping that he saw stars. Through the haze of pain and spots across his vision, he saw you dash out the door, and primal parental instinct forced Toji out of the cramped space so he could tend to his child’s cries. When he finally managed to stagger out the front door, you were on your knees on the concrete cradling a sobbing Megumi to your chest. His bike lay on its side just a step away, and from how his son’s left arm was sitting limply over his lap and already changing colors, Toji suspected a hospital trip was in order for what was clearly a broken bone. He approached and you looked up at him with eyes that were glassy with your own tears, your heart breaking for how badly the little boy was in pain. Toji brushed a quick hand over your cheek before crouching down to meet Megumi’s eyes. 

“Alright, Megs,” he coaxed, and the sight of his son’s face clenched in distress and wet with tears was a sight Toji would never get over, “we’ll get you up and to the doctor to start feeling better, okay?” Megumi didn’t react to his words, but when Toji reached out to scoop him into his arms, he wailed harder and tightened the good arm he had wrapped around your neck, burying his face deeper into your chest. Surprise fluttered over your face and then it turned apologetic towards Toji, but he shook his head, the shock of his son’s preference for you in this moment not nearly as important. Instead, Toji carefully helped you up while you held onto Megumi and led the two of you to the car with a protective arm wrapped around your shoulders. 

The evening at the hospital passed in a similar manner. You reclined in a bed with Megumi against your chest while a doctor looked at his arm and Toji filled out paperwork. You murmured in the boy’s ear and brushed his hair back in soothing movements to try and distract him from the pain. When a nurse came in with an IV kit in hand, you let Megumi cry into your neck while Toji helped hold his right arm still. Eventually, after he drifted off to sleep, you took a seat next to Toji on the right side of Megumi’s bed while the doctor set his arm and fixed a cast onto it. The entire time, the worried father remained ramrod straight with eyes fixed on every move the doctor made, and he had your hand clenched between the two of his on his lap. You leaned to the side to rest your head against his shoulder, and adoration tightened your chest when Toji let out an anxious huff before turning his head to press his lips to your forehead.

When the whole thing was said and done and the three of you were discharged once Megumi was awake enough, you rubbed a comforting hand over Toji’s back as he carried his son to the car. Once home, the two of you worked to get Megumi changed and ready for bed, a delicate task when having to take caution with the state of his arm. Thankfully, the edge was taken off by painkillers, and he dazedly chatted about the cool blue cast on his arm and how he couldn’t wait to show it off to Yuji. Toji promised to get him markers for him to draw on it with while you persuaded him to get under the blankets after assuring him you’d bake a giant batch of cookies tomorrow in reward for his bravery. 

Toji took the time to place Megumi’s favorite stuffed animals around him and tucked him further into the blankets. You read him a bedtime story while Toji lay stretched out next to the two of you, and by the end of it, Megumi’s eyes were drooping heavily and his mouth had fallen open just the slightest. You gently lifted Megumi’s broken arm up so that Toji could settle a pillow under it, and after bidding the boy goodnight, he got up so you could slide in next to him. He watched with a thudding heart as you scanned his son up and down with fretful eyes and let your hands flutter nervously about him. You pushed some of the hair away from Megumi’s forehead and leaned down carefully to place a gentle kiss between his brows. When you looked back at Toji with a sad, wobbly smile on your lips but a determined gleam in your eyes in order to be brave for the little boy in front of you, Toji realized in that moment that he had fallen in love with you, and in the same breath decided that he was going to marry you, nearly a year to the day he met you in the middle of a grocery store. 

And later, when the two of you lay exhausted under the blankets of his bed, Toji rolled over onto his side to mold every inch of himself against your back and nestled his chin into the crook of your shoulder so his lips could brush against your ear. 

“Marry me,” he whispered, not so much asking as he was pleading. You were already half asleep, but he felt the shake of your shoulders as quiet laughter blew out from your nose, and you threaded your fingers up through his from where they were draped over your hip. 

“Of course,” you breathed, and Toji tightened his arms around you. He left a kiss on the back of your neck and let his eyes slide shut as he basked in the warmth of your body and smell of your lotion and the incandescent joy in realizing that he’d never have to go another night without it—without you. 

“But ask me again later so I can see you properly down on one knee.” 

A week later, because Toji Fushiguro was powerless to anything you demanded of him, he did as you asked in the middle of his kitchen while you, him, and Megumi still lounged in your pajamas and were only halfway done making breakfast. His son clapped excitedly when you squealed out a ‘yes’ and Toji grinned with pride as you admired the simple gold band that adorned your finger. Satisfaction made his heart full and your smile soothed his soul, but eagerness had him marrying you in a government building just a couple days later.

------------------------------

It wasn’t until Megumi’s seventh birthday that Toji realized stalling wasn’t going to work much longer. 

The months following your marriage had been busy with moving him and Megumi into your house across the street since it was bigger and didn’t hold the memories of a tragic past Toji was ready to move on from. The end of the summer had brought school for him and Megumi back into full swing, and two weeks into it Toji was ready to quit when all his students could focus on was the new ring on his left hand. Most of them were congratulatory in their teasing, but a few made jests about their disbelief that someone could bother marrying their grouch of a teacher, and while Toji had half a mind to bring you by just to shut them up, he decided it was kinder to not subject you to a particular white-haired menace. 

By the time the three of you got settled into the normalcy of being a new family, the year was already coming to a close and Megumi was turning seven. As requested, you had baked his son a double chocolate cake and covered the top in rainbow sprinkles. Toji had taken the time to pipe little swirls of frosting around the edges, though some were lopsided and varied in size (such small, precise tasks were simply too big of an ask for the size of his hands), but Megumi didn’t seem to care when the two of you placed it in front of him on the table, candles lit orange and reflecting off the wideness of his eyes. 

After singing and clapping, right as Megumi filled his cheeks with as much air as he could manage to blow his candles out in a single breath, you threw your hands out over them in an attempt to keep them aflame for just a moment longer.

“Wait, Megumi,” you gasped, yanking your hands back when the heat of the candles scorched a bit too close to your skin. Toji immediately gathered them into his to inspect your palms, but you shook them away, not minding his grumble as the brief sting faded. “You have to make a wish!” 

Megumi’s mouth dropped open into a perfect ‘o’ as he nodded vigorously. “Oh, yeah,” he chirped. “I forgot.” 

He immediately squeezed his eyes closed, and you and Toji watched in amusement as he scrunched up his nose and squirmed in his seat. You took the opportunity to snap a couple of pictures, and when he was done, Megumi’s eyes popped back open and he took in a great inhale before blowing out his candles all at once. You cheered while Toji ruffled his son’s hair, and Megumi looked quite proud of himself as you slid the cake towards you to cut him a piece worthy of being eaten on his birthday. Both of you chastised Toji when he kept insisting you make his piece bigger and bigger, almost so that he nearly had half the cake on his plate alone by the time it was all said and done. 

“Hey, Kid,” Toji said around a mouthful of cake while you pointedly took a polite bite of your own, “what did you wish for?” Megumi begrudgingly tore his attention from his cake, and you swatted at Toji’s arm from across the table. 

“You’re not supposed to ask!” you exclaimed, but he simply rolled his eyes and shook his head good naturedly before returning his focus back onto his plate. At the head of the table, Megumi stared at you with an all too knowing look for a fresh six year old and then set his sights on his father with an unimpressed quirk to his brow. 

“I wished for a baby brother or sister.” 

Toji promptly choked on the large bite of cake he had shoved into his mouth moments prior to Megumi’s unexpected declaration, and your lips parted in shock. Meanwhile, Megumi eyed the two of you expectedly as Toji hacked and coughed. You jumped from your chair to grab him a glass of water, then set it down next to him while rubbing a soothing hand between his shoulder blades. 

“Now, Megumi,” you began, not so much stern but intentionally practical, and he looked up at you with wide, attentive eyes, “babies, uhm, take their time getting here…” you trailed off and turned your head to your husband with an alarmed look on your face, but Toji was still working on regaining his breath and chugging his water and could only offer a shrug of his shoulders while he pursed his lips in defeat. 

You sighed and faced Megumi again with a weary smile. “Babies take their time getting here and that’s after their parents decide to have one. Any baby brother or sister will have to spend nine whole months growing in my belly before they arrive, so you’ll have to try and be real patient for us, okay?”

Megumi’s face fell dejectedly, and if Toji looked hard enough, there was a hint of disappointment on your features too. He watched as you playfully pinched at the boy’s cheeks and tempted him back into a happy mood with the hint of birthday gifts waiting for him in the living room. The whole exchange had guilt weighing heavy on Toji’s shoulders, and he had the bitter realization that it was his own fear—the one that lied solely in the scant possibility that you could meet the same fate as the only other woman he had ever loved—that caused the frown on yours and Megumi’s faces. 

In spite of that fear, Toji had promised you something, and in the six months since the two of you had been married, you hadn’t chastised him or given him grief when he pulled out at the last moment to spend himself across your stomach or back. You didn’t question him when he had a hard time meeting your eyes as he tore open a foil packet to remove the condom from inside. He knew your trust in him far surpassed whatever insecurities he wrestled with, but it didn’t make him feel less like a failure every time. 

So later that night, when Toji found himself above you and nestled in the warmth between your legs, he leaned into the security of your arms and sought reassurance in the taste of your lips as he came to his own end after ensuring yours. You ran your fingers down his back and whispered sweet nothings into his ear when the racing of his heart and trembling of his muscles could no longer be blamed on the energy he expended while pleasuring his wife.

------------------------------

You suspected something was amiss a couple months later. Toji had brought home your favorite take-out for dinner, and while the first bite was as pleasant as usual, every one after tasted more and more like cardboard and settled uncomfortably in your stomach until your appetite was thoroughly gone. You questioned whether it was something more and that maybe your period wouldn’t appear in just a couple of days, but when Megumi began to complain of an upset stomach toward the end of the meal, you banished the thought out of your head. 

However, two days after while you were cooking that evening’s dinner, one whiff of the package of raw chicken you had just cut open had you violently gagging and running for the nearest bathroom while ignoring Megumi’s call of alarm when you passed him in the living room. Your knees hit tile as you retched into the bowl of the toilet, and you weren’t sure how much time had passed when you were finally able to lift your head. You trembled on your spot on the floor and felt more tired than you had been in weeks. Nausea made your head spin, and you wondered if you’d ever be able to look at chicken again the same way. Just the sheer thought of it had your mouth souring, and your repulsiveness for it went deep into your bones. 

When you finally caught your breath and were mostly confident you had emptied everything in your stomach, you pushed yourself off the floor and rinsed your mouth before exiting the bathroom. Megumi stood on the other side of the door with his lips turned down in concern and your phone in his hand. When he raised it up to you, Toji’s name was displayed at the top of an ongoing call. 

“Hey,” is all you said when you brought the phone to your ear. 

“Megumi called and said something was wrong with you. Are you okay?” Toji’s voice wasn’t panicked, but you sensed the worry in it, and you could imagine his face looked much like his son’s had moments ago. 

“I was making dinner a few minutes ago, and the smell of the raw chicken…” you had to trail off when just telling him what happened made you gag a little. You hadn’t yet stepped away from the doorway of the bathroom, but you weren’t in a hurry to have to go back in, so you took a few deep breaths until the feeling passed. Megumi hugged your leg as he gazed up at you in concern and you patted the top of his head in reassurance. 

“Ah,” Toji remarked.

“Yup.” 

Toji cleared his throat after a moment of quiet and then asked a question that sent nerves skittering down your spine. “Want me to pick up a test on the way home?” 

“Please.” 

Later that night, after Megumi was tucked in bed, the two of you waited anxiously as the timer on your phone counted down from three minutes. Two pregnancy tests lay face down on the counter. You nibbled on the skin of your cuticle while Toji bounced his knee from where he sat on the closed toilet lid. 

“I mean, it’s not as if we weren’t expecting this to happen,” you pointed out, shaking your hands in front of you in an attempt to dislodge the nervousness from your body, and Toji snorted. 

“Yeah, certainly not.” He wiggled his eyebrows flirtatiously, and the smirk that tugged at the scar on his lip made your cheeks flush hot, and you rolled your eyes at him. As the two of you continued to wait as the seconds on your phone seemed to crawl by, a thought popped into your head. 

“Is it as nerve-wracking the second time around? Or is it easier?” you asked him gently, and you saw Toji’s features soften as his eyes went nostalgic. He worked his mouth in contemplation—perhaps in recollection—and then shook his head. 

“No, it’s uh, just as shocking I’d say—at least for me.” He pushed off his knees and came to stand next to you. “I think it’ll be this way no matter how many times we do it.” The thought of one day doing this a second time had the breath rushing out of you, but you filed the image away for a future discussion. It wasn’t something you had the capacity to consider now, not while you were currently waiting to see if you were about to become a mother. 

The shrill noise from your phone that indicated the timer had run down made the two of you jump a foot in the air, and you looked to Toji with wide eyes. 

“Take that one?” you offered, pointing with a trembling finger to the test that would answer with words versus a combination of lines, and Toji was suddenly very grateful he grabbed two different kinds at the store. While he knew he could squint at a test and convince himself that an extra line may or may not be visible, he was almost a hundred percent positive he wouldn’t suddenly become illiterate and unable to distinguish between “pregnant” and “not pregnant.” 

He nodded, and at the same time, the two of you reached for each test on the counter and flipped them over close to your faces only for your jaws to drop simultaneously. You turned to each other, wide eyed and bewildered (as if you didn’t know what the two of you had been doing these last couple months) because “pregnant” and two dark lines could not be misunderstood. 

You brought your free hand up to your mouth to cover it as unabashed laughter poured from your lips, and Toji wrapped his arms around your shoulders to yank you into his chest. Joy spurred him into kissing you deeply, and the pure love and elation in your eyes when you pulled back was enough for Toji to feel the first stirrings of excitement at the prospect of having a child with you. 

It wasn’t until later in the night, in the dark of your shared bedroom with nothing but the evenness of your breathing to interrupt the noise in his head that Toji could admit to himself that the entirety of it terrified him.  

------------------------------

“That’s a baby?” Megumi’s voice was full of skepticism, and he eyed the ultrasound photo with disgruntled disbelief as you pointed at the grey and white blob in a sea of black. 

“Yes, Megumi,” you giggled, smiling at Toji over the little boy’s shoulder as the three of you sat cuddled in your bed, “that’s your sibling. They are very small right now, but next time they’ll look bigger and more like a baby.” 

He wasn’t appeased by your answer, and he crossed his arms with a little huff of disappointment that had Toji struggling to muffle his laughter. The two of you had just returned from your first doctor’s appointment and had decided to break the news to Megumi now that you had a picture to confirm it, and while he had taken it well, he clearly was expecting more. 

“How long till it gets here?” he asked, glancing up at you, but Toji replied first.

“Doctor said January. You’re gonna have to be patient, Megs.” Toji grinned at his son, but Megumi looked even more unenthused than before and glowered at his father. 

“Why’d you have to take so long to have a baby?” he muttered, and the words wiped the smile clean off Toji’s face as you shook with laughter. With a pained look on his face, Toji simply shoved a pillow playfully over Megumi’s head and tickled him in the ribs to distract him from the question at hand. 

You used the opportunity to burrow under the blankets as your eyes began to grow heavy. Nausea, fatigue, and a general feeling of being unwell had plagued you from the moment the pregnancy test had turned positive, and you hoped an afternoon in bed and watching movies would offer a reprieve. You had just begun to drift off when you heard Megumi ask for Toji’s attention. 

“Dad, where do babies come from?” 

------------------------------

“I don’t think there’s much in that book you have to worry about,” Toji told you on a night that found the two of you lounging in your room after Megumi went to sleep. He was lazily folding laundry from his perch at the foot of the bed. You were reclined back against the headboard with said book in your lap. One hand rested against the curve of your belly that had just started to protrude against the fabric of your clothes in the last week, and the other dog-eared every other page laden with information about pregnancy, childbirth, and newborns.

“Perhaps,” you said, setting the book down on your thighs, and the pointed look you gave him made it clear you didn’t feel the same, “but that’s easy for you to say—you’ve done this before.” 

A harsh laugh fell from Toji’s mouth before he had a chance to stop it, and he tossed a bundle of socks in his hand at the tower he had made of his folded boxers. “Yeah, well, I wasn’t doing a very good job of it. We were barely surviving.” 

He watched as the pile of fabric warbled upon impact, and just as it began to tilt, you shot your foot out to brace it in place. When Toji looked up at you, frustration didn’t furrow your brow or pinch your nose. Instead, your smile was gentle and understanding.

“I know,” you said, voice soft, and it carried an undercurrent of reassurance. 

Toji released a deep breath and tilted up the scarred corner of his mouth in a way that he hoped looked contrite. He reached for the stack of his boxers and righted them so you could lower your leg back down. “I’m probably not the best person to get advice from anyway.” 

You tilted your head to the right, perplexed by his unusual self-deprecation. “I wouldn’t say so.” 

Toji just shrugged and continued fiddling with the last bits of laundry. 

“Sure, you’re a little rough around the edges.” 

“Can’t deny that,” he grumbled. 

“You can be a bit grumpy sometimes, and you have a history of giving in to questionable decisions and habits.” 

Toji shot you a withering look. “You really know how to kick a guy while he’s down.” 

“And,” you emphasized, holding up your hand to indicate that you weren’t finished, “you have a really tragic backstory that just makes the whole thing sad.” 

For once, Toji seemed to be struck speechless, stupefied by the bluntness of your words, and the bundle of socks he had been playing with rolled from his hand. 

“But,” you said, “there’s no one else I’d rather be doing this with than you, Toji.” Your husband, who had clearly been a bit rankled by the conversation, melted. The tension released from his shoulders and the puckered set of his lips smoothed out into a dopey grin as his countenance perked up.

“I love you too,” he teased, his tone light and easy, “even if you are something else.” 

You beamed at him as he got up to gather the laundry in his arms and set it in on the dresser in front of your bed, intending to deal with it tomorrow. He then flopped onto his stomach on the bed next to you, shaking the whole thing under his weight, and if the two of you hadn’t already thoroughly tested its limits, you’d worry about its ability to handle the size of him. The thought had your blood suddenly running hot and you rolled onto your side to nip at his ear when a different sensation in your lower half made you pause. 

For the last two weeks you had been feeling the tiny bubbles in your stomach and knew that your baby had gotten big enough for you to begin to take notice of its movement. However, this was the first time it felt significant enough to be noticed from the outside. You returned to your position on your back and pressed your hand lightly into the skin under your belly button. Nothing happened for a minute, and just as you were ready to give up, you felt the faintest hiccup against your palm. 

“Toji!” you blurted, and you urged yourself to stay still despite your excitement lest your little one move again and hide away. 

“You going to insult me again?” Toji’s voice was muffled from where his face was mushed into his pillow. 

“No,” you scoffed, wiggling your fingers at him even though he couldn’t see, “come here.” He groaned in protest but propped himself up on his elbows to shift onto his side nonetheless, and you snapped your hand out to grab his.

“What are you—,” 

“Shh!” You didn’t bother explaining as you covered his hand with yours and settled it onto your belly where yours had just been. His jaw shut with an audible click. You watched Toji’s expression carefully as you waited for another burst of movement, and even though you knew this wasn’t a foreign experience to him like it was to you, overwhelming joy filled you to your depths when his eyes glossed over with wonder as his child wiggled against his palm. He was quick to gather you to his chest with the arm that wasn’t draped over your hip and you tucked your head under his chin in an attempt to snuggle as close to him as you could manage. 

“Megumi’s going to get a kick out of that tomorrow—literally.” Toji’s voice was thick with emotion, as well as amusement at his own cleverness, and you swatted at his chest. But your laughter deceived you and Toji placed kisses all along the top of your head. 

------------------------------

Toji wondered if all the blood on the floor was retribution for the amount of it he had spilled in the years before. It pooled slowly, eating up the white of the tile and creeping closer until it stained the tip of his shoes. He was empty, void of anything really, and maybe this was the curse doomed to follow him. Loneliness, robbed of anyone precious to him, and instead of incandescent joy that should have taken over him at the sight of his newly born child, nothing except for seething rage and despair filled his mind. There was hatred for a family name that he had already tried to escape, a desire to soothe himself in all the previous vices that had once kept him occupied, and bewilderment that he was somehow in the same situation again.

It was all eerily similar, from the sudden rush of panicked movement in the room to the way he fell back into a cushioned chair, just barely conscious of the baby in his arms. The face of his late wife and yours flashed back and forth, superimposed onto each other as the two of you laid still with eyes closed and arms slackened at your sides. A shrill whine, a solid ringing filled his ears and silenced all other noise. 

Not again. Not again, not again, not ag—,

Years of discipline kept Toji from jolting into wakefulness, but he did suck in a mouthful of air when his eyes opened and took in the darkness of your bedroom. He wasn’t trapped in the sterile four walls of a hospital room, nor was he struck numb by the darkness of your blood. Instead, sweat stuck the sheets to the skin of his back, and above him the fan you always insisted be on spun quickly. The thought of you had his hand clambering across to your side of the bed, but when all that met his fingers was the unusual coolness of your pillow, he lurched upwards, flipped on his bedside lamp, and searched the room.

Rationality told Toji that you were probably fine, that you were in the bathroom or the living room and would be back any second. Rationality would tell him that there wasn’t any need for him to seek you out and confirm you were alive with his own eyes. But adrenaline, a tragic memory, and the nausea simmering in his gut drove him from bed and onto his feet, clad only in his boxers.

Toji was still a bit disoriented from his nightmare, and he tried to be extra mindful of his heavy footfalls as he passed the door of Megumi’s room. As he neared the end of the hallway, he heard the faintest plink of metal against glass and the racing of his heart slowed at the sound before ultimately returning to normal when saw you in the kitchen. 

Despite it being well into the middle of the night, you leaned back onto the kitchen counter with a bowl of cereal in your hands and a happy hum in the back of your throat. Your belly sat low between your hips, pulling taut the fabric of his shirt that served as your outfit of choice as of late, and the sight of it was a reminder that you were nearing the end of nine months now. Nervousness was a constant state Toji was in as your due date rapidly approached, and if he thought too hard about it, panic would shorten his breath and tunnel his vision, such as it was beginning to do in that moment. Thus, Toji wasn’t sure if he made a noise or if you just happened to notice him out of your peripheral vision when you turned your head to him, curiosity taking over your face. 

“Did I wake you?” you whispered, spooning one last bite of cereal into your mouth before setting it into the sink behind you. Toji shook his head and padded over to your side. He dropped his head to rest his cheek on your hair and trailed a hand down your stomach to spread his palm over the front of it. Satisfaction coursed through his veins when you let out a happy, weary sigh and leaned into his chest to rest your weight against him. 

Toji knew you were struggling. He knew your hips ached and it made walking a chore. He knew that your back only stopped hurting after he rubbed the muscles loose for half an hour and that everything including breathing had become difficult for you. The baby kicked you awake during the night, and if you weren’t tossing and turning in an attempt to get comfortable, you were up and going to the bathroom for the nth time. Toji did his best to dote on you in between his job, taking care of Megumi, and doing all the chores around the house. He certainly did want this to be all over for you so you could bask in the enjoyment of motherhood, but each day closer to your child’s birth spiked his anxiety exponentially higher, and he ashamedly wished he could ignore what was to come. 

“Would you like to go back to bed?” he asked, taking a step backwards. 

You nodded your head unwillingly. “I’m too uncomfortable to sleep right now. If I stay up and watch TV in bed will that bother you?” 

“No,” he replied immediately, and Toji was secretly glad he wouldn’t have to stare up at a dark ceiling, too afraid to close his eyes when all he wanted to do was bask in the warmth of your body and the steady rise and fall of your chest. 

The two of you made a slow walk back to your room, and Toji helped you into bed and shifted the pillows behind your back until you were as comfortable as can be in your given state. He scrubbed his hands over his face to rid his eyes of the tiredness that lingered behind them and then slid in next to you as you focused on flipping through channels on the TV. Toji snaked his right arm under the small of your back and wound his left across your lap so his hand could cup the side of your belly and then set the side of his face on the top of it. Your fingers came to scratch through his hair absentmindedly, and the relief that Toji felt from your touch and the quiet thump of your heart was nearly instantaneous. 

As minutes ticked by and most of the lingering tension from his nightmare had subsided, Toji still found himself tapping against the side of your stomach and pushing his fingers against it in an effort to get his child to respond to him. 

You reached an arm over his head to prod at the center of your belly yourself. “He’s been wiggling around a bunch throughout the day, but he might be right about here…” you trailed off just in time for Toji to feel a quick bump under his cheek. 

“I think you meant ‘she,’ isn’t that right?” he said with a smile. Only one of you was to be right about who your child was destined to be, but neither would know until they came out to meet you. 

“No, ‘he’ was correct, thank you very much.” Affection warmed his body and Toji pressed his fingers back into your skin so he could feel the movement again. The baby reciprocated his touch each time until Toji finally relented and figured you’d appreciate the break from being repeatedly poked and prodded. Your palm drifted down to cup his jaw and the swiping of your thumb over it was enough to lull him into the beginnings of sleep. He snuggled a bit closer into your side and let out a great exhale, recalling how you had once made a comment likening him to a large, lounging dog. Toji supposed he could understand what you meant. Really, at the end of the day, all he wanted to do was cling close to you and bask in the pleasure of your touch. 

While Toji knew that no amount of time he spent listening to your heartbeat or prompting his child into movement would prevent a cruel fate from bestowing you both should it be decided, he would let himself pretend if it meant keeping himself together enough to see it through. 

------------------------------

As a surprise to no one at all, childbirth was just as nerve wracking for Toji the second time around as it was the first. 

It didn’t help that he had been on pins and needles since your due date had come and gone, so when you stumbled out of bed and into the living room on the morning of the third day passed, your hand clutching your stomach and a harrowed expression on your face, Toji was coiled tight enough that he sprung into movement. He flung Megumi over his shoulder and was across the room at the same moment to grab the bags you kept at the ready by the front door. By the time you walked out, teetering between amusement at how your husband scurried about and uneasiness at the thought of what was about to happen to your body, Toji already had the car loaded and turned on. A few minutes later, you almost felt bad for Megumi when Toji stopped outside the Itadori’s house to practically throw him at Yuji’s dad—followed by his overnight bag—had the boy not already been hollering to his best friend about how he was about to get a new baby sibling. 

At the hospital, the terrible familiarity of the beige walls and speckled tile had Toji desperate to pace the room at how trapped he felt, but the desire to stay put next to your bedside and keep your hand in his won out. Labor could take hours, that he knew, and Toji spent every moment of it cycling his eyes between the baby’s heart monitor, your face, and the clock on the wall. Each time your expression would twist into a pained grimace, your hand would crush his and a potent cocktail of adrenaline, fear, and anticipation would send his heart racing. 

When the day turned into evening, just an hour before midnight, a doctor placed Toji Fushiguro’s second son onto your bare chest, much to his shock and delight. The noise in the room threatened to overwhelm him—the excited exclamations of the nurses, your panted gasps, the shrill crying of a newborn baby--but Toji wouldn’t let anything tear his focus from you. He stared at how wisps of your hair stuck to your temples in sweat, the red of your cheeks, how your eyes were full of tears and wonder and flicked back and forth between him and your child. Toji knew (how he wished he didn’t) that you could be fine in one instant and dead in the next, but for every minute that passed where you still breathed and your heart kept beating, he could feel the fear slowly trickle from his body. 

Once he was an hour old, Toji held his son for the first time as he sat next to you on your hospital bed. The baby had your nose and tufts of hair the same color as yours, and Toji realized with a sudden pain in his chest that he didn’t remember Megumi in his first couple hours. He couldn’t recall what it felt like to hold him for the first time, nor did he know how much he weighed just after birth. All the tiny details he assumed every parent would remember until the end of their days was overshadowed by a curtain of devastation, the death of his wife wiping it clean from his memory. 

So this time, when the room was quiet and he had you leaning against him, he studied every part of his newborn with rapt attention, determined to commit every detail to perfect recollection. And unlike before, in a moment he’ll always mourn, Toji felt peace and quiet and something indescribably blissful. 

------------------------------

It wasn’t so much that Toji forgot what it was like to have a newborn so much as he had completely blocked what could be considered some of the worst days of his life from his memory. He had been too sleep deprived to even properly grieve his wife and utterly shell shocked at the prospect of now being a widower and single dad. There had been no one to help, no one to encourage him when Megumi cried for two hours straight in the dead of night for a reason Toji couldn’t begin to figure out, no one to help him plan for a couple months down the line when his savings inevitably ran out and he’d have to figure out a safe, legal plan for employment or consider the risk of something illegal since it paid better. 

Yet two weeks into it, when Toji was just starting to discern the difference between Megumi’s wails of hunger and those of exhaustion, someone knocked on his door. He grumbled the whole way down the hall in fear that the sound would wake the baby he had just spent the last hour putting down, and also because he couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten or let alone brushed his teeth. So, Toji figured he looked worse for wear when he swung the door open and glared at the man on the other side of it. He was middle aged and wore dark clothing and an even darker pair of sunglasses. He claimed he was an instructor at a school in the city and came to find him out when he heard that rumors began to swirl of Toji Zenin having a son. Toji had spat at him, snarling and enraged and cursing his old last name with vehemence, and he was all too ready to come to physical blows had his son not been sleeping just a few yards away. In the end, the man had just smiled and extended his hand with the promise of a job and to call him the next day. Toji had been wary, but he knew that pickiness wasn’t a luxury he could afford, and appeared at the gates of the school a week later with Megumi strapped to his chest. 

Things were a bit different now, that at least Toji could acknowledge, and the heavy exhaustion that threatened to wrench his eyes shut and made his hands clumsy as he refilled your water bottle didn’t feel so catastrophic this time around. He squinted at the clock on the wall and sighed wearily when he realized the night wasn’t yet halfway over and the two of you were already up for the sixth time. Five day old newborns apparently would wake up and eat more frequently than he could remember, and each and every time he insisted on getting up with you to tend to any needs you had while ensuring his son got the meal he demanded. With an extra snack in hand and a full bottle of water, Toji shuffled back to your shared bedroom and quietly closed the door behind him. 

“You fall asleep standing up at the counter again?” Your voice broke the silence and got a chuckle out of him as he fell onto the bed in a heap by your side. 

“Something like that,” he muttered, but thankfully you didn’t pry and instead gave him a grateful smile when he unwrapped your granola bar and held it up to your mouth since your hands were preoccupied with holding the infant to your chest. You munched on it slowly, and in between bites you would settle  your head back against the pillows and let your eyes flutter shut, trusting your husband to keep a dutiful watch on the two of you. Toji moved closer to you so he could gently rest his head against your shoulder and peered down at his son as he got his fill of milk. He rubbed a tiny foot in between his thumb and forefinger and grinned at the soft suckling noises he made, amazed at how differently things felt this time. Toji was stunned at how having a new child felt so much like the first time since he could actually slow down to process it all now. Maybe this time, when history didn’t repeat himself and he was at home with the people he loved, contentment would allow the memories to stay. 

------------------------------

It happened for the first time three weeks after your son was born. 

That particular Saturday was dreary and wet, but it made for a cozy atmosphere as the four of you lounged about after a late morning breakfast. Toji was putting away the last remaining dishes. The TV played a vintage cartoon on low volume and Megumi sat on the floor in front of your feet as he colored quietly in his notebook. You sat curled up in the corner of the sofa with your newborn nestled in the crook of your arm, and you watched him, utterly transfixed. As he slept, his nose would twitch and his bottom lip would jut forward. Every once and a while, a dainty grunt would escape his mouth and he would squirm and stretch and whimper just a little before going still again as he drifted back into deeper sleep. He let out a yawn that seemed to take over his entire little body, and in the next moment he was blinking up at you with unfocused eyes as his lips smacked together once or twice. The sight of it made your heart feel as though it could burst, and you wiggled your finger into his clenched hand just to feel him hold onto it. 

“Oh, hey, his eyes are open.” Toji’s voice caught you unaware, and you jolted a little at the suddenness of it. You glanced up at your husband from where he leaned against the arm of the couch to your right, and there was a soft smile on his face as he traced a finger gently down the apple of the baby’s cheek. The newborn’s eyes couldn’t hardly focus on his father’s face from how far it was, but it certainly seemed like he looked for Toji in the moment before his lashes fluttered and his eyes slid shut. 

Toji drank in the sight of you two. There was a blissful glow to your features that couldn’t be missed, even through the signs of exhaustion that still lingered from another night of caring for a new baby. You barely paid him any mind as you smoothed your palm over the wispy hairs on your son’s head, and Toji decided that he would give you another couple minutes before gently urging you to take some time away to shower and do your morning routine should you feel like it. He pushed himself off the arm of the couch and made a move to step around it and sit down when Megumi spoke up from the floor. 

“Mama?” 

Megumi’s voice was barely above a whisper, and it was heartbreakingly timid. The single word punched all the air from Toji’s lungs and he stumbled mid-stride, just barely steading himself lest he land in a heap on top of his eldest son. Megumi didn’t move from where he was hunched over his notebook, still coloring carefully onto the paper, but Toji could see the burning red of his ears and how his eyes flicked back to take stock of your reactions before they went back to what was in front of him.

When Toji whipped his head towards you, you were already looking up at him with a wide, helpless expression. You had never once pushed passed a boundary Toji had yet to lift when it came to how you handled your roll as Megumi’s stepmother, and he could see from the way your eyes searched his that you were waiting for his guidance, his acquiescence before you dared to respond back to the little boy who had just referred to you as his mother despite you technically not being such. 

To Toji’s endless gratitude, you had always treated his late wife with the utmost respect. While you almost always fielded Megumi’s questions about her to Toji, you didn’t hesitate to pull out photos of her when he asked, nor had you ever tried to erase her significance as Megumi’s mother over the time in which you had become a part of their family. 

However, as Toji had come to acknowledge, there was no denying that Megumi had come to see you in that way. Not so much as the woman who had birthed him (Toji had explained that to him in child-friendly terms) but in every other way a mother would be seen. Megumi had no tangible connection to his late wife, no emotional attachment to the idea of her that Toji hoped one day would blossom as understanding matured in his mind, but to hold that expectation to him now wasn’t fair. Toji knew, as you looked at his son with tears of adoration and love in your eyes, that you had been making space for Megumi in your heart for a very long time in preparation for this possible moment, and he figured that having the love of a mother in the land of the living didn’t take away from the one now gone. 

If nothing else, he supposed that Megumi would catch onto your shared habit eventually. Frequently did you and Toji refer to yourself as such when tending to the new little one. 

“Shhh, Mama’s here,” you’d murmur when he wailed out his discomfort while the four of you watched TV in the early afternoon. 

“Mama’s comin’, kid, I promise,” Toji would say when the baby would nuzzle into his chest in a search for milk when he and Megumi sat together on your bed while you showered at the end of the day.

So Toji swept a hand along your shoulder, capturing your attention, and his quivering smile paired well with the tear that trickled down your cheek when he nodded at you. Your hand swiped away the moisture from your skin and you cleared your throat.

“Yes, Megumi?” Your voice sounded a little thick and wet, but the boy spun around in astonished elation nonetheless, and his smile was so wide that Toji wondered if it stung the skin at all. Megumi jumped up to his feet but very cautiously approached you until he could rest his hands on your knees and stand on his tiptoes to try and look up at his baby brother. 

“Mama, can I hold him?” You giggled and nodded as you reached out your hand to caress Megumi’s chin, and he squirmed where he stood as excitement made him antsy. 

“Of course,” you told him. “Come sit next to me and your dad will sit on the other side to help you.” Toji felt his heart expand further than he thought possible when the two of you turned towards him with loving, expectant looks that spurred him into movement.

“Up you go, Megs,” he said, lifting his son up from under his arms so he could plop him down on the cushion next to you before taking a seat himself. He threw an arm along the back of the sofa so he could scootch in closer to you three. Once Megumi situated himself, you slowly transferred the sleeping infant to lay him in his brother’s lap, and Toji was there waiting with an open hand to help cup his head and neck. 

“He’s still so small,” Megumi said quietly—wondrously—but you and Toji laughed at how the baby was still too big for Megumi to fully cradle in his arms. 

“Don’t worry,” you said, “he’ll grow big before you know it, and then he’ll be ready to play all day with you.” Megumi offered you a small smile in response before he settled back to watching his little brother snooze in his arms. You propped your elbow on the back of the sofa so you could lean your head into your hand, and Toji stretched his fingers to swirl them against your arm. Your eyes met, still glimmering with the last remnants of joyful tears, and Toji was nearly overwhelmed by a surge of emotion as he took in the little family that the four of you made.

Fear had once hung like a heavy shadow over his hope for an idyllic future and his ability to experience it. Your smile and the small hands of his children were there to whisk it away. 

------------------------------

A little bonus:

Three years after the birth of your son, a daughter made her appearance nearly two weeks early, thrilling her eagerly awaiting older brothers. For all the work you did, she came out a near exact copy of her father, and Toji had no problem letting you know how proud he was about it as you laid propped up next to him in your hospital bed. 

“I’m telling you, there was a hint of green in them!” 

You rolled your eyes playfully as you watched Toji recline your daughter against his knees with her head cradled in his palms so you could both gaze at her, and she looked positively tiny in the breadth of his hands. 

“You know a baby’s eye color might shift from what it was at birth once they get a bit older. We can’t know for certain yet.” 

The words seemed to have no effect on your husband, and he simply dropped a kiss to your temple and murmured a soft “we’ll see,” into your ear. 

(To your surprise—and secret delight—Toji was right.)

------------------------------

Again, thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who took the time to read this<3 I really just love giving tortured characters soft, happy endings, so I hope you enjoyed this endless rambling of fluffy fluff.

[triflesandparsnips]

Lot of takes going around the internets about certain "deaths" in the ofmd season finale, so, uh-- guess it's time for me to try and lose some followers on tumblr dot com with

Some Thoughts on Why I Am Not Particularly Bothered or Concerned about Izzy's Apparent "Death"

Laying the groundwork first...

1. Narratively speaking, Izzy's been a dead man walking since the start of the season. Babe shot himself and got a rebirth-- but he still definitely intended to die. Every minute he was still around was borrowed time.

Did he have to die? Maybe not. I know I could've written a version of the show where he didn't. But then that would be my show-- not theirs. I can't know exactly what themes, bugbears, bête noires, catharsis, or artistic Vibes are driving that writers' room, and until the credits run on the finale of the third season, none of the rest of us can either.

2. Izzy spent the season being in a liminal state-- and there's nothing in the story saying that he can't continue doing that. Izzy spent the season having one foot in one space, one hoof in the other, and himself halfway through the door, a chimera of mirrored things right up to his "death": pirate and ship, hard and soft, old ways and new, etc etc. But "the gravy basket" is a weird little liminal space between life and death, a place that both Ed and Buttons have found (and returned from) before. We don't know where Izzy "is" right now-- he could be there.

(tbh, I wonder how much poor feeling we'd be having about all this if we'd gotten a final tag of a blue-washed Izzy staring down at a bowl of soup while helplessly saying "but this isn't gravy, what the fu--")

3. I think there is an unfortunate belief that "it's not real unless you see the body" is a universal -- or perhaps inarguable -- "fact" of storytelling. But it's not. It's just a bit of narrative shorthand that got popular, and now we're too ready to fall into the trap of believing the inverse is true too-- that if there is a body, then there must therefore have been a "real" death.

This season has spent quite a lot of narrative time and effort telling us that its story is using a different model, with different shorthands; specifically, that magic is real, that there is at least some kind of existence after death, and that the dead can be resurrected.

And that brings me to the meat of why I'm not particularly bothered or concerned about what, at this stage of the story, could still very well be just a minor setback--

4. This whole show, and particularly this season, is a fairy tale. It's a story that works with fairy tale logic and tropes, and it's in conversation with other fairy tales too, ones that the OFMD audience is likely to know well enough to spot their narrative beats in action. So "Pinocchio" gets mentioned a lot? Cool-- the audience applies what is commonly known of that story to this one ("a real boy", the mirror-opposite being a puppet with no nose, etc), and finds some Cool Shit. Then they're primed to keep looking for fairy tales, even unnamed ones, in case there's another little nugget of reward-dopamine for finding a connection.

So the fact that we saw a mermaid? Suddenly, I personally am noticing "Little Mermaid" motifs all over the place. That Ed was in a "sleep like death" -- after fucking around with a spinning wheel -- until his prince came to wake him? Well fuck, man, that's Blackbeard playing "Sleeping Beauty" for us all.

And bringing it all back to a "dead" Izzy Hands... when I add up a "dead" body surrounded by a bunch of laborers mourning the person who nominally kept their living space nice AND who was wanted dead by an authority figure for the crime of being the "better" version of what that figure wanted to be...

...well fuck, idk about the rest of you, but to me that all adds up to Izzy's story being Snow fucking White. Waiting for someone to come pull the bullet poisoned apple from his body so he can live again.

5. This is a second season. Of three. And Izzy Hands is the writer's favorite chewtoy, so there is lots of time, space, and incentive to bring him back. If there's a third season, we have a pile of ways he could be brought back over the course of hours of literal viewing time and possibly months of in-narrative time. That's ages.

And the solutions don't have to be difficult! For instance, we still have canonical hallucinations from Stede-- that's one route. Or fuck it, we could have Izzy's (very solid-looking) ghost be the embodiment of their being haunted by the Sea, that would work too.

And even barring all that-- his grave is right there with our heroes. The ship is out there hunting down his murderer. Even if you're happy he's dead... bad news, friend. He's all over the third season landscape. (uh oh, it's GNU Izzy Hands)

But those are just a few options that leave his body rotting but his character still alive. I happen to think we could all dream a little bigger, darlings. For instance:

A. You cannot tell me that these writers, on this show, with these actors, would not absolutely go all in on a zombie-esque hand thrusting out of the dirt mere hours after burial. Look me in the eyes and tell me Con O'Neill wouldn't pull off an entire digging-out scene only to end with himself panting beside the hole, looking around, hearing Ed and Stede being weird in their haunted hut, and wearily say, "Are you fucking kidding me."

B. Don't like zombies? Want to stay closer to the Snow White vibe AND introduce a love interest for him? One hyphenated word: body-snatcher. Gotta dig those bodies up fresh for the Definitely Historically Accurate anatomists of the time! But oh, says this New Guy, this corpse is-- wow, it's weird that they buried him with a rose and really amazing makeup and a truly extraordinary number of whittled whales, plus what's with that horsey leg grave marker, this guy must've been fucking fascinating, man, I wish I could've met him-- --at which point Izzy's hand shoots out and chokes the guy half to death and the lads come tumbling out of the house and ta da, mission accomplished, Izzy resurrected in 5 minutes or less with his horsey leg conveniently beside him and an entire season for himself and everyone else to Deal With It, amazing, fantastic, no notes from me.

C. Come to think of it, there is genuinely a non-zero chance that the crew just. Fucked up the burial. I mean... even though I was just arguing why we shouldn't see it as Law, we didn't actually see the body. We saw a grave. What did they bury him in? Was it a box? Was it some canvas? Did they definitely pick up the right one when it was time to bury him? Or did they maybe carefully make him an ahistorical safety coffin just in case a cat demon came to bother him and his corpse wanted to make a fuss about it, y'know, very common, could happen to anyone, and Frenchie just so happens to have Blackbeard's old collar bell right here--

6. Here's the bottom line, imo: The only thing that would keep Izzy really actually dead and completely removed from the story is a lack of narrative time and space-- and we have plenty of both. Stories are like Lego. If you've got enough time and you're willing to play with pieces from a whole lotta different sets, it's not hard to put the same elements together in different ways to get new, exciting configurations. It's why I'm actually rubbish at predicting exact details of stuff-- there are a lot of ways something could go, there are infinite doors out of problems the narrative seems to throw at us, and no two people will come up with the same thing because we're all different.

That, to me, is one of the big ways I personally enjoy and engage with stories. And it's why I genuinely can't be fussed about Izzy's death, not when we're only two-thirds through the story as a whole; observing someone setup and then try and execute a complicated narrative trick is my jam.

But my way of engaging with all this is by no means the best or only way. How we all interact with art, and what speaks to us, is extremely personal. If how this season and Izzy's death went just didn't work for you, that's okay. I'm sorry it wasn't the story you wanted it to be. That blows.

I just know I can't say yet that it didn't work for me. I won't know until I can take in the entire picture, just as I can't judge a finished Lego set by the one piece I step on midway through construction. I can see different ways Izzy's death/rebirth could absolutely work, but will the writer manage it? I dunno.

But I'm willing to wait and see if the stupid puppet can pull it off.

[onebadpunspoilsabunch]

Another thing I hated from those last two seasons were the villains, especially cozy glow

Bgdsafhbb

I really should stop talking about mlp. It's embarrassing 😅 I'm kind of embarrassed. I apologize to all my followers. But...

But again, 100% right.

Funny thing is, I can see a world where Chancellor Neighsay's character is written better. The problem with his character is that the terrible writers wrote him as the most stereotypical, strawman-y racist villain that I've ever seen in any piece of children's media, ever. 

If they wrote him more realistically, and actually gave the audience an explanation for why he feels that way about the other creatures...

For example, they could've showed that the reason he hated the other creatures is because of their past history with ponies:

The hippogriffs/seaponies refused to help when the Storm King attacked 

The Yaks were very picky when they came to visit for the first time

The dragons were usually very hostile towards ponies, to the point where ponies were afraid to approach them

The Changelings attacked Equestria twice

The griffins had a better relationship with ponies, but the majority of them were still very rude

Of course, the explanation for all of their behavior is the result of their environment, leadership, and upbringing. But it would still be an understandable reason.

And if they had him realistically realize the error of his ways, combined with writing him in a realistic way and giving an explanation for his mentality, then BOOM! Character fixed, problem solved :)

Now, as for Cozy Glow...

Idk what the writers were thinking when they came up with her character, but in terms of writing/character motivations she is 10,000 times worse than Neighsay. At least with him I understand what the writers were going for, and he can be more easily fixed.

But Cozy Glow…

She is a child. The same age as the CMC. Who is... inexplicable an evil sociopath who hates the other creatures, wants to get rid of magic, and... rule the world...

Absolutely no explanation given for how this child turned evil, racist, a sociopath, a master manipulator, and a megalomaniac. No backstory, no explanation. At all.

At least with Neighsay, you can logical see how he got there. But I have no idea what they were going for with Cozy Glow. 

The only thing I can figure out is this: Cozy Glow exists to prove one point that Neighsay made. He was afraid that the other creature students would use their friendship lessons and the school to secretly take over Equestria. He believed that they were sociopaths who were incapable of being changed, so instead of being improved by the school they would only learn how to better manipulate ponies. That's what sociopaths do in real life. 

But instead of it being the other creatures who did it, it was a pony. The point of Cozy Glow's character is to prove that ponies are capable of being the megalomaniac sociopaths that Neighsay thought the other creatures were. So in a way, I can see where the base concept for her character came from. 

The thing that makes it terrible is that there is absolutely no backstory or explanation given for why this child is evil, or how she got there. The writers just expected the audience to accept this incredibly bizarre, horribly written character. 

Lol, shrug

Grogar would've been a really cool villain, if he wasn't actually SPOILERS Discord in disguise the whole time.

The real Grogar does exist in their world. He could be dead, he could be alive. We don't know. But the writers lied to people, telling them that Grogar would be the final villain, hyping him up... only for it to be taken away with a terrible plot twist. That they (apparently) planned from the beginning:

But when Discord was impersonating Grogar, he was still a better villain than Cozy Glow and Neighsay. The plot twist was the real problem, not Grogar himself. 

I actually feel kinda bad for Grogar's character. They did him dirty. They did my sheep dirty :(

Anyway, my final thoughts on the season 8/9 villains:

Chancellor Neighsay: Terribly written, but can be easily fixed.

Cozy Glow: They were high on BATH SALTS or something and were watching Cats Don't Dance (or the episode of Batman the animated series with Babydoll) when they came up with her character, and didn't give a shit about anything else.

Grogar: I feel bad for my poor sheep :( You deserve better, you could've been great 🐏

[williamaltman]

Life is Strange 2 thoughts/feelings/review

So, Life is Strange 2. I finished the game yesterday and watched the other endings today. Things are not as fresh in my mind as if I had just finished and I talked a bit about it in other places so this feels a bit hard, but I'll try to lay down all my thoughts...

First of all... All my homies love LIS2, fuck you if you don't like LIS2! Seriously though, for years I've seen people say that the game wasn't good, that the characters weren't as good as the ones from the first one, that the Sean/Daniel relationship wasn't that interesting... I kinda did suspect it was just nostalgia goggles or whatever, but now I know for sure. I don't think there's anything wrong with connecting more with LIS1 and having a deeper relationship with it, but in this case I think you shouldn't even be comparing them and expecting the game to live up to that to you in the first place.

Now, onto the actual game. God, this was so fucking heartbreaking. I think I cried in every single episode. The very core premise of the story is just so sad, so unfair, and despite the powers so rooted in reality that it left me legit feeling uncomfortable with how fucked up their whole situation was. There are good moments, sure, but honestly every single thing that happens from the moment their dad is shot is just... Not how their life should've had to be.

Sure, LIS1 and BTS had dark themes too. But here, it's like, they lose everything from the beginning. Sean doesn't get to go to his party, to hang out with Lyla, to continue his normal life in any way. Daniel loses a part of his childhood. They're both forced to grow up so much faster than they should. There's a line Sean says in episode 3, and it's just a little idle VO, but it fucking crushed me, "Stop overthinking. You're not a teenager anymore". Even though he's fucking 16... He's 16 and he has to essentially become a parent. I knew what the game was about and lowkey followed it a bit when it was releasing, knew a few spoilers, but that didn't make anything any less heartbreaking.

I thought it was beautiful how the game took the opportunity to showcase and celebrate alternate lifestyles. The "family", Away, their freedom and how they interacted with society brings so much into perspective. I'm still a bit conflicted about Karen tbh, but I'm glad that at least they did show something beautiful through her story.

My biggest problem overall is probably how they handled the Finn romance route... I knew back when the game was releasing that despite adding a male LI, they pushed the female one more onto you and gave her more content, while locking the option to kiss him with a "bad choice" (I didn't know what exactly it was). And yeah, that is still true. I still think it was a mistake to lock the kiss with accepting the heist, and while I kinda understand the writer's explanation for that, I still think it could've been handled in another way, or they could've just let him kiss you and "betray" you by doing the heist anyway, since he still does that when you're friends lol.

I see people complaining that because they moved from place to place each episode, there wasn't enough time to connect with the characters... Idk if I'd say I disagree, but it just wasn't really the case for me. I was very invested in all the relationships, in Finn, Cassidy, Jacob, Chris, Karen. Everyone at the farm was cool and everyone in Away too. Lyla. You get so many tidbits about the characters even when they're not there on screen. The only thing I have to say which is kinda related to that, is that I think the time jumps were maybe a bit too big, and that the way they handled Mushroom was... weird.

I got the Parting Ways ending, and I'm satisfied with it. I kinda planned to get it, but only in the sense that I was spoiled that you get with Finn there. I didn't know that the whole morality thing had anything to do with it, and I played the first two episodes without even knowing that there was a points system about that and about brotherhood. I just made all the choices that were high morality (besides killing the cougar and the heist) because it was what I would do, and tried to be a good brother for Daniel. I figured that choosing to cross the border would most likely give me that one, but I just couldn't accept Sean having to go to prison for 15 years for something he didn't even do. If we were able to choose between Parting Ways and Blood Brothers, then I would actually be conflicted about which I wanted.

With the way the game's system works though, where you need to have low morality to get Blood Brothers, I couldn't really do it. I can't imagine myself teaching Daniel to be selfish and not care about killing people. I actually think it's super cool to watch Daniel use his power offensively and fuck shit up, but it just wouldn't be my version of the story. It's funny because, if we just played as Daniel, I wouldn't mind going that route. But since we play as Sean, with it being our job to raise Daniel, I feel a different kind of responsability towards leading him to become a good person. I also think it's beautiful that he gets to have the rest of his childhood, teenagehood, and live a "normal" healthy life with his grandparents. He does it in the redemption one too, but as I said, that just screws up Sean too much.

So, I'm a little disappointed that they're separated (and maybe can't ever see each other again? I'm a bit confused about Daniel's situation and whether he could visit), and that it's a bit shorter than the others (at least than the redemption one), but it IS the ending my playthrough led to and in that I'm satisfied.

I think this story is just incredible. It touched me so much, and the fact that some people can't see it genuinely frustrates me. The people complaining it's too political in particular can just go fuck themselves. It might not be perfect, but like with all things I appreciate, I'm just so glad it exists.

[moongothic]

Re reading the manga I have noticed that when the news of the 5th emperor happened Crocodile was drawn in a fancy castle with some guys that are armed (like his own guards?). I wonder where was him and what happened to those dudes? Clearly only Daz followed him to Cross Guild. Did Oda had an idea for Crocodile and then changed it and thought that making Cross Guild would been better?

Which i have another thought like Oda told us about the underworld and show us some characters from there in WCI, i wonder if he is gonna show us more about that place and is that where Crocodile was and how he gained his money, beacuse after going to prison he lost all his money so there must be a way where he got it on the first place to give it to Buggy and also explain what he was doing all these 2 years before wanting to form Cross Guild.

I hope we get some more information about this, Cross Guild going to the underworld would be cool, i personally wanna see what is in there and would give us some funny Buggy interactions there shsh he will probably recruit more ppl with his charm but idk if Oda has that planned.

I have discussed some of this in the past so I wasn't going to reply to this, but after like a month of sitting in my inbox... oh to hell with it, I repeat myself on this blog all the time anyways

One thing we do have to considder is that we don't know what Crocodile was doing during the timeskip. The two times we've seen him before the Final Saga were during Dressrosa (where we saw him at some docks reading the news about Doflamingo) and right after Whole Cake Island (the fancy building with goons), so we can tell has been in like, populated places in the New World post-timeskip, but during? We have no idea

To me, thinking about it, it is more than likely that after Summit War Crocodile and Daz have been on the run from the Marines. Like the WG went immidiately after Mihawk and co after they all lost their Shichibukai rights, so knowing what a threat Crocodile could be, surely he'd become a target for the WG to hunt. And as we've seen with Mihawk losing his Shichibukai status and joining Cross Guild (+the Marines being like "Crocodile's been spotted at Emptee Bluffs!" when he arrived on the island), famous criminals with high bounties don't want to stay stationary by themselves, it makes you an easy target for the Marines. Having equally powerful (if not more powerful) allies will bring safety in numbers (making you a less favorable target for the Marines to deal with, which is why the Yonkou were kind of allowed to do as they pleased (as long as they stayed on their own territories at least)).

All of which to say, to me it'd make sense if Crocodile kept a low profile during the timeskip, just to avoid the Marines coming after him. Now that could mean a number of things; he could've sought shelter from people he MAY have had dealings with in the past when running Baroque Works. He could've been travelling by himself and Daz from island to island, always on the move to avoid detection. He could've done what Luffy did and found some uninhabited island to hide in and have a little training arc with Daz until the time was right to leave for good (only occassionally going out to like get new clothes or whatever). Like we can kind of assume that the reason Crocodile chose to make his move now in the story was because all the pieces for his grand plan had finally lined up and/or it was his last chance to do so (collect the debt from Buggy before he vanished off the face of the earth + recruit Mihawk for safety reasons since he's on the run now too). But what he had been doing until now is unclear, as is when he might've started preparing for making his move. Like had he been hiding on Fuck Off Island for 2 years, went to get some groceries, heard the news from the Reverie and was like "whoops time to go, hurry up Daz"? Or had he been on Fuck Off Island for the past two years and decided to start making his move after the Strawhats' return made the news (for that Crocodad Propaganda)? This is all extremely unclear

Like personally, I would like to believe he and Daz had been hiding on some remote island, going through a training arc and only started hanging out in public again etc after Luffy returned to the spotlight. We know Croc has trust issues so personally I do find it unlikely he would've been hiding out with people from the underworld even if he had any past connections+fame to keep people from trying to mess with him, meaning the two times we've seen him post-timeskip are like outlier moments. But I could be absolutely wrong and maybe it was the opposite, that he had been hanging out with the mafia in some nice manors and just chilling. Who the fuck knows.

As for Crocodile's money... Yes, the underworld is again An Option, but also we just don't know how much dealings he might've had with the underworld beyond from the bounty collecting (which would've been with the Marines really) and obtaining Dance Powder. Like, it's possible he might not have had any dealings with the underworld at all beyond those things. So how else would he then have obtained money to lend to Buggy? I mean there's a few things.

Crocodile could've had like A Secret Stash hidden somewhere in case of emergencies (in Paradise or the New World, Paradise seems more likely to me, he just would've had to have gone and picked it up immidiately after Summit War, before heading to the New World. But hey that's plausible, he would've needed money to get a ship etc anyways if he didn't just steal one). Or, since Crocodile does seem to like gambling, who knows, maybe he hit some casinos in the New World and hit some jackpots. Or maybe he just robbed people. We know Crocodile made a lot of money as a Warlord not just from cashing in bounties but also from stealing the shit pirates had on them; looting other people's loot. Crocodile totally could've been just spawn camping at the entrance of the New World for a little while for newbie pirates, just to beat their asses and rob them blind. (Something he couldn't have continued doing for too long though due to G5 + shit happening on Fishman Island making it nearly impossible for pirates to pass through anyways, but hey all we need to do is assume Croc did the spawn camping for just long enough to have money to lend to Buggy before pissing off to hide somewhere, and yeah that could work)

Personally, I don't think the underworld is going to be a plot relevant thing in the story, not at this stage. Like to me it felt more like a side thing to add to OP's worldbuilding, but I don't really see what it could really contribute to the plot at this point. But I could be wrong, who knows, time will tell

[webbedphantom]

I think he's done

I'm not a 100% satisfied with it, but it's probably as good as I can do with just edits.

I'll walk you through the additions below the thing;

Firstly, changed the colors to a purpleish blue and yellow, which I got from his All Out Attack image

Secondly, added lightning bolts and a skull buckle to the belt (might end up changing the color on the buckle later but for now it's fine). I left the shotgun shell pouches, despite the fact that he probably won't use a gun, because I thought it broke up the bolts nicely. Maybe he puts batteries in them, idk

Thirdly, the mask is a mix between his and Classic Electro's. Originally, it was going to be an energy construct like in NWH, but I changed it to a full one so it would contrast better with-

Fourth, the hair has been changed to a more white-ish yellow, and a texture has been overlayed to try to convey its now glowing with energy, though it doesn't come across as well as I'd have liked. I definitely like the idea of changing up the characters hair in their costumes though, just to hide their identities a little better. They will be wearing these out in public, after all.

Fifth, the spine is now a power meter, very much inspired by Dead Space's health meter. I think it'd be cool if it actually showed how much SP he had left for electric attacks, but it could also just be decorative

Sixth, I added some blue wires coming from the spine that follow the "ribs" and form another lightning bolt on his stomach. Probably could've done it better, but I think it looks cool

And lastly, I gave him a lil smirk~

That's it really. Was pretty fun to make! And I look forward to actually drawing him at some point to (hopefully) make some of my ideas come across a bit better.

[lusthurts]

tina or marley for the character ask :)

omg yay im so excited to talk about these two, thank you !!

tina cohen-chang

how I feel about this character

I love her, and I honestly think she's one of my favs of the og new directions. I think she's a very realistic character that has some hilarious moments in the show (props?? revolution?? breaking down in tears whenever she starts singing at the beginning??), plus she has a great voice and is almost always there and supportive

all the people I ship romantically with this character

she and mike should've been endgame. of all the ships in this show, they were like the only one that was genuinely healthy. they constantly supported each other and I was actually really entertained by their storylines in season 3

I haven't really explored any other tina ships, but I do kinda like the idea of sapphic tina -- I've seen some really fun edits of quinntina (that so far away cover slapped !) though they rarely interacted in canon so idk where that came from, I just think it's fun in theory

my non-romantic otp for this character

definitely blamtina! I think their friendship felt very realistic and well-developed, especially for something that really only existed to that extent for one season. also, they are so that friend group that has no boundaries and is very incestuous and it feels so high school

also love it when she's a girl's girl with mercedes and occasionally rachel

my unpopular opinion about this character

I loved bitch tina in seasons 4 and 5 - this felt like a natural progression of her character following the end of season 3 and everyone immediately discounting her as a potential lead soloist to replace Rachel - she was right when she said Rachel herself thought it would be Tina's turn her senior year only for her to be completely disregarded once again. sure, sometimes it was too extreme, but it was very entertaining and imo pretty realistic

one thing I wish had happened with this character in canon

more solos! I think she had a cool taste in music that was very distinct from the other new directions - more performances like dog days are over & I follow rivers would've been awesome (hung up was also sooo good)

I would've much rather seen her in new york than Artie - imagine blamtina being roommates !! and I know the timeline doesn't line up, but can you imagine how fun it would've been if it was tina fueding with Rachel in season 5 over funny girl??

marley rose

how I feel about this character

I don't really have a strong opinion. I think I liked her overall, but she and the other season 4 newbies were done a huge disservice by being created as either carbon copies of the originals or being given zero personality or interesting storylines

I think she had a lot of potential as a character, and I'm obsessed with her voice - I could listen to new york state of mind & blow me one last kiss forever

all the people I ship romantically with this character

I think Jake is my favorite ship of hers? though the cheating was real ick. def prefer him for Marley over Ryder though

I think it would've been interesting to see something romantic between her and kitty as a sort of replacement to faberry which we never got - kinda wild faberry was that popular with the fans and yet they got a whole do-over in season 4 and still didn't give it to us

my non-romantic otp for this character

definitely unique! their friendship in the show is super underrated and very wholesome - I don't think they ever fought, and they were always total girl's girls for each other

I wish we'd gotten to see her and kitty's relationship develop into a real friendship - once again, could've been a faberry do-over, and I think it had even more potential than them, but it didn't happen

oh, and I really enjoyed her interactions with finn as a sort of mentor/student dynamic - don't dream it's over is very wholesome, and I think her little card she made him was very sweet. I think it was a much healthier depiction of a teacher/student relationship than mr. schue had with anyone

my unpopular opinion about this character

I kinda liked the eating disorder storyline, and I wish it wasn't half-assed. I think it made a lot of sense for the character and it fit in well with the show (especially after they'd hinted at these storylines with Santana, mercedes, Quinn, and Rachel then never acknowledged them again). It sucks this plot point literally never got resolved !

one thing I wish had happened with this character

omg where do I begin.

obviously I wish they'd kept the season 4 newbies around in season 5 & 6 - I actually enjoyed the McKinley stuff in season 4 & 5 more than I enjoyed the New York stuff, and I found it incredibly annoying that these characters just dropped off the face of the earth because the glee club disbanded. All of them had so much potential only for it to be thrown out in favor of introducing a bunch of totally new characters with only a few episodes left of the show

I wish they'd resolved her eating disorder storyline better - it felt very much like an afterthought, and the way it was handled by the other new directions, the staff at the school, and pretty much everyone around her was pretty fucked up. why was her mom the only person taking this seriously???

[jakowskis]

Day 28 - Do you like how tragic Torchwood is, or do you wish it was more light-hearted? Do you think the ‘dark and adult themes’ were explored sufficiently?

torchwood's weird bc it exists in this place where, like, the creators + writers were all coming at it from different angles, and i think there was a lot of... internal confusion amongst individuals, too. like, a lot of the concepts in chibnall's scripts are actually profound and intriguing when it come to the characters themselves - but he's also the guy who put a cyberman in a bikini, and the guy who came up with the sex alien, so. rtd, idek his vision tbh - in the director's commentary of i believe the first episode, he says something like "everyone's talking about what a dark, edgy show it is, but we've got a pterodactyl. can we talk about that. like that's ridiculous - it's brilliant." so i think he was partially intending for it to be kinda silly from the get-go. but he also did push the dark edgy adult spin off angle, so idk. the show tried to do both and it's... kind of iconically bad, but also unique and, imho, endearing. you certainly don't see it elsewhere. i love my bad 2000s show.

as iconic as that edgy campiness is, obviously torchwood would've benefited significantly from simply picking a tone and being consistent with it. s1 was criticized for unevenness, but i think it was earnest in its ridiculousness, which i appreciate. it committed. s2 takes itself a bit less seriously and leans into the silliness, which some ppl like, but i find it less compelling. idk, s1 is just special to me; it's so experimental and tonally bizarre, but i love it. i always say torchwood's weird bc it's like they had gold but they somehow managed to bury it in manure. like there's a spark of something magic but you have to wade thru the shit to get to it and even then it's not there for the taking, you're like eternally digging for it and you're constantly finding little tiny pieces of it HFKDSF or at least thts my experience (<- guy who's a year into being insane about this fucking show. it is Not that deep im just ill.)

and a lot of that magic exists in the underlying darkness. torchwood isn't dark when it tries to be; torchwood is dark in the implications. it's haunted by it's own darkness but it refuses to look directly at it. watching it is, like, you're staring at smth simple and underwhelming, but there's something terrifying in your peripheral - but if you look right at it it won't be there. so you're fascinated by what you can't fully grasp at. again, maybe i'm just deranged, but that's how i feel about it. there's so many insane connotations in each episode that feel peripheral and unconscious. it's bizarre. it's probably just the result of bad writing, but i do not control what my bastard brain latches onto and decides is worth painstakingly deconstructing.

so what i'm saying? is where torchwood 'thinks' it's dark, it's not, and what's actually dark isn't even a consistently conscious thing and therefore isn't remotely touched on. so, no, they're not explored well at all. that's what fanfiction's for 👍 im very stimulated with this fixation still, after all this time, bc there's soooo many cool threads that i can pull from and actually put the work and time into playing with in a way the show wasn't willing to, and i love that. i love dark themes in general, i'm very naturally oriented towards miserable things, and torchwood's so tragic and dark but it doesn't live up to its potential whatsoever. so many good seeds that didn't get planted. that being said, i do like the silly shit. but if i could make it stick to a tone, i'd have it commit to the dark stuff, because i mourn what could've been. it's a ghost that follows me 🫵

[bearpillowmonster]

Star Wars: Visions S2

Instead of doing awards, I'll just do thoughts.

The Sith - It's up and down for me because I really like the aesthetic and it looks gorgeous at times almost like spiderverse but also very corrupted, like I get why everything's a canvas and how the colors change depending on what's happening but I actually wasn't sure if it was supposed to look like that at first, it looked corrupted or glitched and I had to look up some more footage to make sure. Weird.

Screecher's Reach - I feel like there's a trend with these shorts where there's a potential Jedi, a Sith shows up, they defeat it, the end. Like, I get that you're pressed for time but I've thought of all kinds of diverse shorts in general. Here's one right now, have someone scarred by a lightsaber keep one in their drawer, scared of the thing. They challenge themselves more and more to look at this thing, to touch it, to even go as far as to grab it but nothing more, we never see any colors. Then there's a disaster (house crumbles on the pet Massiff or something) and they have to use the lightsaber to cut them out of the rubble. They begin to learn new ways and uses for it. Cutting crops, starting a fire, etc. Really push the limit of what a lightsaber can be used for and how it reacts in certain situations. Anyways, as for Screecher's Reach, the style is unique and it's an interesting ending but nothing beyond that, just like half a prologue. Don't just bank on a twist or sequel, give me flavor.

In the Stars - Easily the best one so far, and I do mean that for both seasons. Other than Tales of the Jedi, this is the best thing I've seen in Star Wars in a while. The claymation, the hieroglyphics and the tribal-like setting, the characters, the plot, the scenery, it all just works. Give me this. I'll be surprised if anything surpasses it in this season.

I Am Your Mother - Play on the- I don't have to explain it but it sounds cool already. Not sure how they could top the last one though. It was good though, another claymation with british humor AND IS THAT AARDMAN?! FINALLY! It'd be a lot funnier if the mom was evil though and that's why the daughter is embarrassed. (Creates mini Death star) "Mom!" "I can't help it honey, it's how I was raised."

Journey to the Dark Head - Film level. Wow. Had to shut everything else out after this one so it could consume my thoughts. And people were disappointed with this??

The Spy Dancer - That sounds...really cool actually but eh. I see that they followed tradition in a way, a lot closer to something you'd see in S1 but I imagine it better as a Clone Wars episode where they're watching the opera (like in ROTS) and the performers use that to extract information whereas in this one, the actual spy part was a failed attempt because we didn't get to see what would've happened with that, we can only imagine. Fight dancing is cool and all but I just think it could've been delivered better.

The Bandits of Golak - 3D, fancy shaders, could've been about anything. Might've had a more interesting dynamic should he have resented her for her powers, idk.

The Pit - Sarlacc? No, a dark little oppression short. I'm not too sure what to think about this one, definitely interesting. The whole chanting thing was a bit cheesy though.

Aau's Song - Big finale. What'd they save for last? The Halo theme is magical, I'll tell you what. I'm interested in these creatures, I want to see more of them in the Star Wars universe, perhaps even Aau herself but the plot remains an AU. Its a strong premise, though different from Star Wars lore, it makes sense that the kybers would have a voice since they "scream" at ignition and its implied that being in its raw form can cause damage as well, making the saber the tool that grants it a voice and manipulates it. I always love the exploration of kybers in general from quests to get them in TCW and Fallen Order to having them be a part of Jedi Knight II in weird, unconventional ways. And the styling of this short is neat, they have set models for everything, just change the eyes and switch out the heads sparingly to accommodate the mouths and such. It reminds me of something you'd see out of Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio.

[jzixuans]

Your honest thoughts on Lonnie +family?(i.e her parents and older brother)

OOPS HELLO. SORRY IM LATE

1) i loooooooooooove lonnie she's my girl and everyone's favourite scene the Kitchen Scene TM is such a good place to show her kindness and her compassion

2) i wish we could've seen her with her family rather than have mulan's name tossed around for her reputation

also li'l shang is the stupidest name i have ever heard and any cool bi reawakenings he might've given jay in that r.o.a.r. practice moment were completely drowned out by de la cruz's bad shitty naming. i hate it and lonnie's cool older brother deserves better

3) that said i do like how lonnie followed in her mother's footsteps to join r.o.a.r.!! it shows us her own character agency and how much she looks up to her mother (and in the greater worldbuilding scheme shows us how much auradon really . hasn't improved since the storybook generation's troubles)

4) god i love her friendship with jay. i wish they showed us more tourney because that would have been a Real teamwork moment for the two of them that they could have given us

gonna divert from numbered points because the rest of the thoughts that i have on her are very jumbled :")

her wardrobe in d1 is very in the vein of . it looks vaguely east asian to hammer home that she's Mulan's Daughter and im not any expert in huafu but it feels like one of those things that's just made to Look oriental without much actual thought or research put into it

so that's part of what lands her in the token asian girl category because she's represented as Nebulously East Asian rather than Chinese as she should be, which shows their lack of care for genuine representation and more just to say "hey look the cast isn't entirely white" (further compounded by the fact iirc her actress isn't ethnically chinese? might be wrong don't quote me on that but like booboo isn't swana and they still cast him for the son of jafar so u know. :') not a great track record)

(also these are more personal bitter thoughts from a 3rd gen chinese person who's been into descendants since it came out but when she wanted Cool Hair and they made her hair lighter, longer, and wavy it made 13 y/o me really sad and then further ostracized when she said that mulan would make chocolate chip cookies w her rather than any typical chinese dessert)

and idk how far you guys have read into the books but that one where she dragged ben away to settle a dispute between china and agrabah that was 1) ridiculous 2) petty 3) had both sides be incredibly hostile and obstinate which required the white boy king to step in and hash it out 4) gave ben. bubble tea and a steak as part of Chinese Cuisine. 5) resulted in them DESTROYING PART OF THE GREAT WALL TO PUT A DOOR IN??? . very uncomfortable did not enjoy. the sole redeeming part of this miserable side plot was that it told us that lonnie and ben were childhood friends and i think that's really cute

[thegeminisage]

ok. ok. im cool im normal im gettinngggggggg my tower

i know it was in promotional material but it is SHOCKING to see typhlo lit up. especially since it actually is zonai-ish, one of the few places from botw that was

skdfjgh this npc

"you're not a fellow researcher? you're just some guy?" so true he literally is just some guy

zonai ruins with text written in "modern hyrulean," eh...i wonder who could've done that...

oh this tower is gonna be a pain in the ass huh.

nvm i got it lol

i found some sky islands!!! some are big rings i really don't know what to do with...i hope i get another piece of diving armor or something but idk how to "activate" it

man sometimes when i'm up on these things i like to just stop and look. you truly can see the entire map from this high, and the lands beyond hyrule easily. it's genuinely fucking breathtaking

found the minigame!!! more diving armor here i come

there's a shrine up here but it's eventide shit...IN THE DARK. i turned right back around & walked out

YESSSS got my armor. ok rad

oh SHIT the lost woods???

i tried to dive in, caught sight of some truly freaky trees, and immediately got swallowed by the mist...oh no...

guess i'll have to go in the long way, but there's a chasm there i know i'll get distracted by lol

found it! time to go back down :| i have such a love/hate relationship with the depths...

GLOOM TREE GLOOM TREE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

THAT WAS SO SCARY. I THOUGHT IT WAS A GIANT HAND

THERES SO MANY...........I HATE IT HERE!!!!!!!

oh i can see the fire temple from here! heroically resisting the urge to run off and get those lightroots i missed before lol

i decided to go in the direction of the lost woods even though i usually follow visual landmarks bc i did not want to explore the death mountain area rn...i got, ha, lost, but then i fucking found some of the creepy trees under here!!!

whooaaa "korok grove" i'll be so pleased if i can just warp straight up in there, i think i see one of those shortcuts

NONONONONON I FOUND MORE HANDS

JESUS FUCKING CHRIST

i had to run blindly into the dark, and theyre faster than me, and if i didnt have stamina potions id have been done for. i climbed a tree and im staying here

i have too few arrows for this 😭 maybe the sages will get them for me again...

they...they vanished.......

ok. not quite as scary as guardians like presentation wise. BUT. it's scarier that theyre randomized. that they can show up anywhere anytime and then just vanish and you dont know if theyre coming back or if anywhere is safe

I Want To Leave

unfortunately for me i gotta find a lightroot first so i can fast travel back. i see a bunch. surely it will be fine

stal moblin jumped out at me and i nearly had a heart attack thinking it was more hands. guardians were different. theyre more frightening but you always know they're there. AAAAUGH

ok. i grabbed the lightroots i could see from the shortcut, then fast traveled back. i am getting the Fuck out of here

[chipthekeeper]

acolyte ep. 6 commentary because it turns out i do enjoy the sound of my own voice after all

- Not sure how lively this commentary will be for me tonight because I'm fucking tired and I have a fucking headache and my fucking cat….is probably gonna be a dick

- Also I'm still depressed from last week so that's not gonna help. This is probably a preview of how Andor is gonna go season 2. I'm just gonna log on and be depressed every time

- I kinda hope I fall asleep

- (during Previously On) I don't wanna watch this again

- “Unknown planet” great, thank you! You could've just said nothing, that would've….Very helpful

- It really does have Ahch-To vibes though. But those aren't porgs so I'm gonna say nooo…..?

- Aww...I can't tell if it's cute or very ugly

- (Sol getting mad and sad) You gotta bottle that shit up, buddy

- [previously mentioned kitten sits with me and starts purring loudly]

- Does Sol even know that Bazil's still alive and on the ship? [whining at the adorableness] ohhhhh is he gonna fix him? Can they talk to each other???

- Look it's Darth Arms

- Is he gonna get nekked!!!??? Oh my god. The internet is going to love this

- Oh. Wow....

- [perfect Mulan impression] I never want to see a naked man again

- “you should hold your elbow up higher” Oh are you giving batting lessons?

- “you’re wondering if it’d be honorable to kill me like this” Yes, it would be…….It's still justified because you're fucking evil

- “Did you kill Sol?” Uh well, no that's the only one he didn't kill

- “Did you kill Mae?” Okay well, not her either

- When are we gonna go through the ring on Brendok? I wanna see that

- “Give me a couple minutes” hahaha you don’t know how to fix anything

- Mog? 

- Oh great, we're gonna lose a whole 'nother team. Well no, he’s not there anymore jk

- “It was a really long time ago” Hmmmmmmmm

- “Everyone does seem to want you” Weird thing to say

 - I find this all very unsettling

- Yeah get her Bazil, get her! [laughs hysterically] ooohh right in the eyeball!

- DON’T YOU HURT PIP!!! Nooooooooooo. No, no, no, no, n–oh god. I just keep losing……aw, evil Pip…..

- What is with this little bird family?

- “Anger…fear…” Hmm. Heard of them

- Stab him in the faaaaaace!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- Yeah cut his head off!!!!!!!!

- [distressed sigh] This is some serious R*ylo shit

- We really don't have to go back to Coruscant, I'm fine

- Mog.....

- Oh fuck yeah. She's gonna whip that saber

- “you get nauseous when you travel through hyperspace” [gasps then moans] Oh noooo…Oh I know whyyyy….Ohhhh….Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let me see something. Let me see somethinggggg

- (about Pip) “He’s okay now” He’s EVIL NOW [pouts]

- Are they finally gonna have an honest conversation when it's not actually who he thinks it is?

- Wait does he know?....Yep.

- What the fuck? What is happeninggggg? Where you goin’? Back to Brendok???

- Actually get to see a ship land, that was cool. We didn't get to see Vernestra in hyperspace though [fart noise]

- (smash cut to dead jecki) DON’T FUCKIN' SHOW ME THAAAT!!! (i sounded weirdly italian here???? been watching the bear too much??)

- [pathetic whining] Is no one gonna gather them up? I'm so sick of this shit

- [sounds of me shooting the kitten with the spray bottle, followed by delighted chuckling when Vernestra uses her whip] Sick

- If that's the one time we get to watch Vernestra use her lightsaber and we saw it in the fucking trailer, that's upsetting to me. Just to kill a bug. I mean hilarious….but disappointing

- This is upsetting man, what are you doing?.....You’re not seeming like a good guy right now, Sol!!

- Do you mine it (cortosis) right there? No wonder this is an unknown planet

- (Osha puts on the helmet) Can't fucking see nothing…….Okayyy..I'm sure that means something but I don't…I'm too tired to figure out what that is. Bye!

this was a weird one for me, idk

[visionthefox]

I agree Eclipse was turned into a joke and the worst part the he could've become a bigger better threat to them and the whole universe they are creating since now Eclipse is friends with everyone.

Second they only addressed one thing in the previous episode when Sun and Moon reunite with Monty saying that he has been acting weird but they aren't going to address that Eclipse went and visited Freddy and saw that Freddy and Chica had a baby i think called Francine (Idk i don't follow much the other shows, aside from Monty and Foxy show) and he is thinking on using her for what who knows.

ok, the whole "world reset- now Eclipse is good in everyone eyes" idea - I wasnt up for it, I knew it woudnt be good.. idk- Eclipse tricking people, thats his way to go, but also, seeying how.. uncaring he is on his plans now? made me really dissapointed .. and ah! let me guess here, Eclipse will try- again- to have a right hand to do the dirty job? use her an a puppet? mmh just let Eclipse be gone! let him die with some dignity! he was indeed such a cool idea of bad guy - but they NEVER use his full potential, only just a sly - sassy guy now into boring simple villain,,

[phoenixheart98]

Will never forgive them for wasting those precious episodes in season 4 (or 3 idk) on following the governor around his grey scale purgatory, when we could've been watching the group bond with the refugees from whatever his community was called. (It feels like we see the new residents get off the bus and then the next thing we know, they're back on that same bus and being turned into Walker stew, all those people gone so suddenly and violently and yet all we were thinking is "Where's Glenn?! The baby wasnt on there right?! Whew, cool) We missed so many new developments cause they focused on the Governor, and yet the moment he meets up with the group again he gets shish kabobed (rightfully so). It just made those episodes feel pointless. Meanwhile back at the prison, we've missed: Daryl coming out his shell a bit (the man literally had a couple little fans, I would've loved to see more him receiving props for all his bad ass survivor and provider skills); Rick providing Carl with the space and peace needed to adjust his perspective on what it takes to survive in this new world of theirs; Michonne's adjustment to participating in being apart of such a large group for the first time since she lost her son; Actually getting to see the early stages of Carl of Michonnes friendship forming ( I mean I get that the writers and show runners weren't planning on Rick and Michonne getting together but seeing where their stories gone, it sucks they didnt have the foresight to show the origins of what would be come two of the most integral bonds on the show (Rick/Michonne & Carl and Michonne); and (Most unfortunately (am i using too many parentheses??)) Getting to see more of Rick and Michonne becoming friends. Rick was is such a dark place after Lori's tragic death,(hate her or hate her more that's a gruesome way to go), I would've love to see the process of Rick finding companionship and safety in Michonne. Did they ever talk more about their past with eachother. Did she offer up anymore about her own ghosts in an attempt to help him battle his own. Just the little human moments that twd use to take their time with that made the struggles and losses hurt so much more. I mean imagine if we had've gotten to actually see them transform the prison into the thriving community they were working towards and then out of the blue, the threat Rick had finally managed to convince Michonne no longer existed shows up on their front lawn and destroys everything we've watched them work so hard to build.

While the loss of Hershel and displacement of the group was still terrible to see, I think that one choice of choosing to not shift focus away from the group could've created room for an even higher tension (which they struggle to build in the later seasons without relying on shock value charatcer deaths) resulting in an even more devastating fallout.

I forgot how bashful Rick seemed around Michonne in the the opening of Season 4. He wanted her to stay, he worried about her going out looking for the governor, when he offered to help her (after washing his face lol) clean up with the walkers and she said no he was like ☹️. What I wouldn’t give to see them getting to know each other between season 3 and 4. He may have realized he was in love with her post prison but he was already in the process of falling before.

He was like a little puppy around her, it was so precious! His crush definitely started developing during that time which is something I also would have liked to have seen. I feel like when he completely fell in love with her was on the road after the prison. The way he looked at her on those train tracks with Carl was just giving "I was in love with my son's best friend. I didn't know what to do."