#idk if that tag is meant literally

[shvoowsh]

mom: i don’t understand why you have body image issues

mom: you should change before you leave, that tank top sometimes shows your stomach (in the way that it is designed to, during a heatwave)

mom: you should track everything you eat with me as a bonding activity!

[mattodore]

birthday boy 🎂

[luna-loveboop]

Yeah sky and time's relationship is a whole mess over the master sword

but can we talk about sky and wild's view of the sword

Because it's just a lot of contradictions

Sky loves the sword. Sky loves Fi. Sky openly admits she can hurt them. Sky knows she has best interests at heart. Sky is dying for someone to care about the sword. Sky is pissed that wild broke the sword. Sky still handed her back to him.

Wild loves the sword. The sword tried to kill Wild and he's a little bitter about that. Wild worked to earn the sword. Wild doesn't feel worthy of the sword. Wild breaks the sword. The sword always comes back.

.

Wild is the only one who openly invites Sky to talk about the sword- how he forged it, and the voice inside. There is a lot of negativity around Wild and the sword. And the sword is a major bonding point with Sky. He's dying for someone to care about her too, but at the end of the day Wild is the one who actually talks to him about her.

[nenoname]

stan twins the canon cptsd brothers i will always think about all your unaddressed issues that would make perfect plot fuel for your spinoff

and also the whole 'stan getting that poem by bill via a website which contrasts with bill getting one from the axolotl via a website' foreshadowing thing

like idk i would love something like su future but like more optimistic, aka not an accumulated breakdown that has to be mostly resolved off screen at the end :/// but something thats being kinda addressed throughout? (although would love to see one of them turn into a monster thats always fun lol)

stan having severe issues from his dad and those years of being homeless that we keep on getting more info on but never really getting confronted on (the drifter catalogue and tijuana incident...), him being completely alone for like twenty years when running the shack before soos comes along to the point that 1998 is noted as his low point, and him not really learning about bill+what he did to ford until ages after he killed him if he ever did get the full context

while i think amnesia and everyone seeing him as a hero actually helped with stan's 'i'm a worse version of my brother' thing its still a lingering issue too and we now got him being insecure over his own hands

ford being immediately thrown from 'being tortured by bill' to 'being stuck in the multiverse and being chased by bounty hunters constantly', him fully expecting himself to die when destroying bill, and him only now being safe for the first time in 30 years ....relatively safe, he's still in constant danger because of course he is

idk in the end the series wants them to be happy and they deserve it, its why i wasn't too worried about the book being like 'ooh bill is back!! and the book is haunting ford' thing cos i knew they'll be ok

[pyr0frnzy]

The All Blue 🌊🌊

Full-Page:

[zours025]

Dude... What the flip...

Gets more torturey under here vvv

amehell at the mercy of these two. ame abused girlfriend. cute :3

[veryaren]

blarg

[nico-di-genova]

@raapija said the Tim Horton’s suit looked like an Indycar suit and it put ideas in my head.

Anyway, AU where Lance drives in the 500 because it’s always been on his bucket list. Fernando talks him into it, puts him in contact with Andretti so he can discuss securing a seat.

He misses Monaco, but he finishes the 500, does shockingly well (finishes P7) despite what everyone thought would happen. Fernando misses Monaco too, because he’s obviously going to come watch Lance race. Priorities.

And yeah, Tim Hortons sponsors him, because sure, why not?

[trashlie]

ILY FP 258

I can't believe we're actually passed episode 250 lmao I Love Yoo is truly the never ending story (affectionate). I appreciate how much of the story we really get to dig into at this pace and while I know a lot of people have long-since dropped it, I imagine the rest of us (those reading this post because why else are you here?) also appreciate it. And that's what is even more refreshing about this episode - if refreshing is even a word we can use to describe it. Getting the extra scenes from other characters, a look at their lives and from these glimpses, what we can glean in the unsaid between the lines.

Can you believe I used to prey on Kousuke's downfall? There's so many posts of me talking about him from a different view, believing that the only way he could grow and develop and make the changes necessary to make him a better person was for him to crash and burn, to fail so significantly that he would be forced to pen his eyes to reality. But here we are, me, fervently swaddling him up like a baby and shoving him into my pocket because GOD he needs to be protected.

I don't even remember when it was, that my view on him began to shift, when I went from "he's interesting but awful" to "GOD THIS IS MY SON AND I WILL FIGHT EVERYONE YOU HAVE TO GO THROUGH ME" but.... lol there's no going back!

That's enough rambling, let's jump in.

There is something so painfully devastating about every time ILY confirms to us something we have long-since known or suspected through nuance, foreshadowing, reading between the lines, etc: That Kousuke isn't Rand's biological son, that Shinae was at the formal for Gun Kim, that Kousuke has been manipulated his whole life. Nothing in this episode regarding Kousuke is actually new to us. We have known, and talked about, for months and months long before the confirmation reveal that Yui drugs Kousuke - that he has been manipulated by her his entire life, that she orchestrated his life to manipulate him into situations she could take advantage of. It's the way she spoke about Rand's affair around Kousuke, the way she commodified Rand's love so Kousuke became convinced he'd never earned his father's love, the way she spoke of their family vs others and convinced him from such a young age that everyone was out to get them, to destroy them, and that he couldn't let them get close, couldn't let them near - and how Nol was very much a target planted in his mind.

But it's the fact that he is speaking of this and acknowledging it! Until now, Kousuke has heavily lived in denial. Again, we know this. We talk a lot about the chasm between reality and the reality he believes in. We talk a lot about how Kousuke couldn't face reality, even though on some level he knew everything he believed and was told was not quite true not quite real, but that he was so afraid of the truth, he couldn't do it. Kousuke admitting that he's been driven by fear and envy explains everything about him, and why he could not accept the only unwavering unconditional love he was offered.

A few weeks ago I saw a video on instagram of this father talking about a conversation he had with his daughter, who was feeling a little uncomfortable with her friend group. A new girl started to play with her and her best friend and she said she wasn't exactly jealous, but that maybe it was that she was afraid that there wasn't enough love to go around. Her dad had to explain to her that love is not like a pizza - it's not finite, a limited amount that could be taken and hogged by someone else. But Kousuke never learned this. His father's love was commodified and he was made to fear this other kid who he mistakenly believed knew a version of his father he'd never been privy to. He never learned that love is finite, that Rand could have enough love for the both of them, and feared that Nol would hog it all - that he WAS hogging it all because whether or not it was good or bad, Nol received more attention that Kousuke did. And that speaks VOLUMES about how Kousuke sees Rand, what he thinks of their relationship. In his mind, he is still unworthy, that he's not noteworthy enough.

This part gets to me so badly. We, as omniscient readers, know that Rand has tried his best, but that Yui runs a spectacular interference with which he can't compete, largely because of the roles their family have placed them in - Rand the busy businessman, Yui the mommy homemaker. But no matter how hard he tries, it isn't good enough. Rand tries to reach Kousuke, but the manipulation and paranoia are so far gone that the times Rand does have the chance to convey his feelings, Kousuke can't even believe it, because he thinks he's not good enough to deserve that love, that he hasn't fully qualified for it yet. And despite that, Nol, who Kousuke feels hasn't done half of what he has to deserve Rand's love, gets the attention. It doesn't matter that it's negative attention, that Rand barks at Nol, that Nol feels Rand hates and regrets him, because ultimately, it's still more than Kousuke receives. And worse, to him, every time Rand is busy reprimanding Nol, he turns away from Kousuke to do it.

I want to make it clear that this is a deep trauma point of Kousuke's. He's never learned healthy love and the only person who gave him healthy love was someone he was set to fear and fight. Something I think about a lot is the flashback to Kousuke, in the bushes, watching Nessa and Nol's display of warm affection, before Yui appears literally looming before him. In that moment, he witnesses something he's been deprived of. "We're not like other families"'. He's told from a young age he shouldn't compare himself to those healthy families, to warm and affectionate relationships that he will not cultivate in this household. From such a young age it is normalized, that they aren't like others, that they are cold and distant. From a young age, he's made to stuff down his feelings, his tender wants and desires, in order to earn them. To be a good little boy who makes his parents proud. To make his father look his way.

There's also something about the way he says "I've been a good boy" that echoes Shinae learning she's been manipulated by Yui, devastated and angry and yelling about how she's been a good girl so why do these things keep happening to her, all she wanted to do was help her dad. Two people who, from a young age, felt they had to be so obedient, so good, to not be a burden, and despite following the rules, despite doing as they were told, despite trying to be whatever version of "good" they believed in, the world still beat them up and mistreated them. The world still punished them.

As Rin in our discord server pointed out, though, to some degree, Kousuke is very much a person who can - and does - act out, when he's emotionally high-strung. He's a volatile man, and it's largely to do with the fact that he's been drugged to placate him for so long. He never learned emotional regulation, he never learned how to deal with high-stress situations or to face conflict or to own up to things. This is something that some readers who hate Kousuke and expect him to act a certain way because of his age are missing. You don't just learn these things with age. You learn them with experience and Kousuke was deprived of the opportunity TO have those experiences. He never had to learn these behaviors, and now as an adult he cannot function when overwhelmed.

Idk this whole episode is just heartbreaking. It's devastating. I remember when I was someone praying on Kousuke's downfall and now I want to take it all back ;___; I always believed he had to crash and burn to be able to see the world for what it really was and to face his fears, but this is somehow so much worse.

And even though he's drunk, I don't think he's going to forget all of this in the morning. Rather, I think what he's voicing are things that have been plaguing him since waking up in the hospital. From that moment, we saw him wary and distrustful of his mother, we saw his concern for Nol rising above everything else, but grappling with the understanding that he doesn't deserve to stand in front of Nol anymore. These aren't epiphanies coming to him just because he's drunk; it's more like he's only voicing them because he's drunk. But even when he sobers up, he will probably still be haunted by these fears, these agonies, these truths, this understanding.

How does he face his mother after this? How does he face anyone? He may not even feel like he can trust Jayce - who while very kind to him, is still employed by his family. He may not even feel like he can trust Hansuke (though I really hope that's not the case).

He's so miserable and it genuinely hurts to have him lay it all out for us - everything we've known and suspected, like how it was so painfully clear he WANTED Nol's friendship, their brotherhood, but feared it, didn't believe that there was enough love to go around, that there could only be one of them and that even if it was for good or bad reasons, Nol cast him in the shadow. And all these years, watching as Nol, as Yeonggi, grew into this person who sounded so very much like this unknown version of their father, someone funny who makes others laugh, someone goofy, someone so boyish in the ways Kousuke was never allowed to be. Watching as he gathers friends, while Kousuke, so unlikeable, is wanted only for his money, for his status, for the clout.

He doesn't even know WHO HE IS! Questioning his own traits he's believed of himself, wondering if this is even him, if these parts of him are real or does he just act it, say it, pretend it, while trying to fulfill a role he was shoved into. That makes me feel SO deeply sad, because it's something I've been anticipating for so long: Kousuke wondering WHO he really is, how much of him is real and how much of it is the result of manipulation.

And that moment that he catches himself and says no no that's offensive and rude you can't be like that. ;AAA;

For him to admit how much he envies others, how much he craves the kind of connection others have, the kind of family others have, to feel that love and warmth that he's been deprived of, forced to endure this solitude because, as he believes, he didn't get the good parts of Rand. And what will happen when he learns that Rand isn't his father? That he never stood a chance to inherit any of those traits. Kousuke has operated on this belief that, if he tries hard enough, he can earn the things he craves, but I fear learning about his parenthood will make him think that no matter how hard he tried, he would never earn that, because none of it was ever him, could have gone to him.

I think this is where Shinae, in the future, will come in. I feel so very strongly that she will be someone who helps Kousuke to see that this isn't true, that these kinds of personality traits aren't something inherited, but rather something learned. For him to one day realize it's the paralyzing fear that holds him back, not his genetics. Of course, I acknowledge this will still take a lot of therapy but...

Something else very remarkable to me is the way Kousuke recognizes Shinae in Shinhye, because their eyes "feel the same" and he opens up to her - on some level, whether or not he is consciously aware of it, Kousuke knows, or maybe just wants to, that he can trust Shinae. That she is someone who is safe. He even knows how she feels about his mother. I don't think we'll see a lot of Kousuke and Shinae's friendship until we're passed our timeskips, but it makes me feel a little hopeful about it, that she'll be able to reach him, because she feels like someone who is safe. It's the way he sees Nol in her and wants to try to have that do over, a relationship with someone who  has unconditional love for him. It's the way he knows he mistreated Nol, that it was wrong, that he took it all out on this kid he was so afraid of because he had no other outlet, and he wants to do better but knows that there's nothing to salvage anymore.

But also, it just makes me hope more and more that in the future we WILL see a reconciliation between the brothers. As I say every time, it doesn't mean they have to become brothers or friends, but I just want them to see each other fully. Kousuke knows what he did to Nol. He doesn't deny it, even if he might not say it out loud unless he's drunk. But Nol is still so in the dark. Yujing is trying to tip him off and make him aware of it, but I hope one day when Nol realizes it, when he finds out that Kousuke, too, was Yui's victim, that he wasn't the only one, that Kousuke was made to fear Nol's love, he might.... understand. I'm saying understand here loosely because I don't want people to get the idea that I mean Nol will forgive him and Kousuke will be justified, but rather that Nol would be able to understand why Kousuke felt that way, and move on. But I can't help but hope that it will lead to an understanding, a reconciliation, where maybe they can try to be in each other's lives.

I think it's also interesting that Shinhye was somewhat honest, even if she wasn't very forthcoming, with Kousuke about her own family. It sounds like her mother has been gone for a long time, that she's been on her own the whole while, and I think it reinforces the idea that she believes both that Simhan is her father and that he rejected her, that he didn't want anything to do with her. It lines up, too, with how she feels that he wouldn't react well if he saw her (although I think she credited that to looking like their mother). In the same way that Shinae has felt abandoned and cast aside by their mother, Shinhye probably thinks their father never tried reach out, to find them, to maintain a relationship with her. Or perhaps it's that her mother fed her lies about him, made her believe him a different type of man, made her believe there would never be anything of their relationship to salvage. And given that she's the one who Kousuke opened to, it makes me think that there must be some kind of parallel there; the way she mentioned her own mother feels like maybe her mother, too, was a manipulative - or at the very least, dishonest - person.

I don't speculate a lot on Shinhye because frankly I don't think I know enough about her to really try to talk about her, but I do think that it's very likely there's some kind of connection between Shinhye and the Hirahras or Gun. To be clear, I don't believe she's working with Yui at all. I think it's more like... Alyssa isn't the only girl who has been trafficked by Gun. What's the likelihood that Shinae and Shinhye's mother was? Given her history, the gambling addiction that was so egregious her reputation haunted Shinae and chased her to a new neighborhood and school, was she seeking money somewhere else, somewhere more dangerous? Is that part of why they had to change their name? There's so many questions left about them, and I look forward to learning more about her, but, much like with Alyssa, I think it will take time and be dropped in little tidbits like this - things to read into and try to glean something from.

And maybe we'll see more of this duo in the future? It would feel a little weird to give them this one single run in, but I'm not entirely sure. Quimchee likes to keep us on our toes. After all, Minhyuk and Shinhye have also had only the one run in. Still, I think it would be interesting to watch, if Shinhye ever felt.... I want to say maybe compelled? to dig in more to Kousuke, ever feel a kind of kinship. I don't think she'll open up to him at all, but rather, maybe she'd keep going back because a. he's wealthy and there's more she can nick from him (assuming he doesn't realize she stole anything while in his apartment, if he even remembers any of this) and b. wanting to gather more intel.

Like I said though, she's hard to read so I don't want to cling too hard to any ideas and, instead, sit back and enjoy the show.

[ummmuhhidk]

this is so fucking funny to me

[secretagentspydetectiveninja]

since i’d already played the original trilogy approximately seven million times in french, i finally got round to playing french apollo justice instead. just finished it and hoooo boy was this localisation just as interesting

just like in the og trilogy, the entire thing now takes place in france (presumably paris, though they didn’t specify in this one). at least there aren’t earthquakes this time so it doesn’t feel quite as surreal.

apollo’s “i’m fine!” catchphrase is now “tout va bien !” which means “everything’s fine!”

some of the names have been translated again. for example, trucy is now called “Vérité” which not only is the french form of the english name “Verity”, but it also is the literal french word for “truth”, which gives some dialogues a double meaning whenever they’re discussing the truth. “Vous dites... la vérité... Apollo Justice... ?”

they did not change lamiroir’s name. they did however change machi tobaye to “Tomas Kashkash”, make of that what you will

in the first case, phoenix and kristoph use formal pronouns when addressing each other in court, and informal pronouns outside of court, which is fun. by the final case they’re exclusively using formal pronouns since their friendship has pretty much ended. (it’s a similar case with klavier and daryan, who switch to formal pronouns when they’re trying to be serious/professional and when their friendship starts to splinter.) (apollo and trucy use informal pronouns on each other pretty much the whole way through.)

trucy says “Mééééééé !” a lot

she also calls apollo “Pollo”

wocky kitaki (”Willy” in french) is my fricking favourite oh my god. he speaks in such verlan-ified slang i had to painstakingly decipher every single thing he said. i love him. when he said “sakom” i felt that 😔✊ he’s nigh-incomprehensible just like he was in the english version. absolute king.

in order to make wocky so iconic they apparently had to sacrifice klavier though, because in this version he is english. ENGLISH. AS IN, FROM ENGLAND. usually the french localisation takes its cues from the english version so i thought they’d keep him german, and then when he started calling people “miss” instead of “Fräulein” i thought maybe they’d made him american, like he was in the original japanese version, but NO IT TURNS OUT HE’S JUST ENGLISH??? LIKE FROM ENGLAND????? U WOT M8 JOLLY GOOD OLD CHAP CHEWSDAY INNIT????? I’M FROM ENGLAND, THIS IS THROWING ME OFF TOO MUCH

and they didn’t even commit to the englishification!! he barely says any english stuff at all! he sometimes says “miss” or “mister” and that’s... about it? he doesn’t even have any “Achtung, baby!” equivalent!! he calls apollo “M. Grand Front” which yeah means basically the same thing as herr forehead but it’s entirely in french so what’s the point?? god if you were gonna curse him by making him from freaking england then at least go all the way?? at least his “Objection !” sounds cool i guess...

and his name is “Konrad” in this version. that’s fine because “clavier” means “keyboard” in french (like the thing you type on) so i get that it would have sounded silly. but imo they should have gone in the opposite direction and picked a random english word to name him then. they should have named him Stapler or something. why’d they give him a normal name. he is Stapler Gavin in my heart

ema calls him “minet pailleté” btw which yeah pretty much just means glimmerous fop. (she studied in england too in this version WHY THE FRICK IS EVERYONE ENGLISH)

there were some fun french puns, such as calling phoenix apollo’s “mentor” (french for “mentor”, if you couldn’t guess) and then calling him “menteur” which means liar and sounds very similar

“I killed a man named “Smith” with a bottle because I am an evil human being.”

[uranusguided]

Hey my publisher finally got my book series, The Silent Trilogy, up on Apple Books! Check it out!!!

My publisher calls Silent Trilogy 'X-Men meets Good Omens'. That's not wrong but it is a series about abuse, colonialism and the importance of love in ways those aren't.

In more detail: the Silent Trilogy is an urban fantasy series set primarily in Hobart, Australia. It tells the story of the dainisa, a not-so-hidden magical community, focused primarily on their non-binary Princess, Torao Yamaguchi.

Desperate for her child to have a better life than she did, the leader of dainisa Amaya Yamaguchi sparks a revolution to claim Australia as a magical continent where dainisa can live in accordance with their own laws, not those of humans. However fighting power is a complex thing in a world built to function on injustice, and a pretty siren desperate for revenge could ruin it all…

Narrated through the eyes of a human who doesn’t quite get it, the Silent Trilogy is about the narratives we build of history. It's an exploration of trauma, the ways people learn to live with it, and how bigotry works. Also there's angels and demons messing things up. More info on the website!

I finished this series a long time ago but I'm still very proud of it!! It's a niche story I had a lot of fun with. I wrote this NB protag before I even came out myself so that's always cool. And every time I have to reread a part of the series I have a really hard time stopping cos I enjoy my own work so much lmao. So hopefully you'll enjoy it too!!

(it's also on Amazon if you prefer kindle, and if you don't wanna support either, well, chuck me a couple dollars on Patreon)

[duthea]

an AU that popped into my head

[hauntingblue]

Last arcane episode ever..... here we fucking go....

[justawrites]

Unpopular opinion but I see a lot of AUs where Nari and Lamb Should Not Get Together. Like I see a lot of AUs where Nari or Lamb should straight up run away. Like. Unless you are going for unhealthy, toxic and/or unhinged (which is perfectly fine and can be fun) it's set up like an abuse victim falling for their abuser. Not every AU has to be romantic to be fun.

Thaaaat being said I'm definitely not here to tell people how to live their lives. I will just turn the other way. I don't fancy following these AUs which means they're not for me and that's fine! I'm sure I write things that aren't other people's speed so, live and let live.

[scalproie]

also mr. scratch could be either ANOTHER enemy but it would also be extremely funny if he turned out to be an actual ally because it would SO on brand for arthur to get help against malevolent entities by an arguably more sinister malevolent entity