#idk why i didn't just do this to begin with

[cuntylouis]

what i don’t get is if armand loved louis lol i mean,i guess he did but i really don’t know and assad on sdcc iirc kinda said he didn’t he just wanted what louis had to offer or something like that. also many people say armand is actually all about lestat so idk,if he is,i hope louis really didn’t love him so much bc damn the guy gaslighted him and made him a prisoner while pining for lestat??? crazy shit if so and so unfair to louis. i really don’t know why nobody questions armand side,the guy orchestrated a public humiliation,almost killed him and killed his daughter but somehow is louis’s love into question but not armand’s 🤔

I think him loving Louis and wanting him for what he had to offer aren't mutually exclusive. It comes down to Armand being a selfish creature with this greedy emptiness that can never be filled. Armand is strongly drawn to Louis who's so full of life and emotion because he hopes Louis could complete him and bring him alive, but instead he ends up snuffing out all that life in Louis. Even in healthy passionate romantic relationships people often feel like the other person completes them and their life and gives them something invaluable, and what makes it different from unhealthy/abusive relationships is that you still see your partner as a full person on their own and respect their needs that could be different from yours. Armand constantly prioritizes his own needs in his relationship with Louis, it's all about Louis filling the role and purpose Armand wants. I think Armand does love Louis but that empty despair inside him rules his existence and ultimately everything, even his love for Louis and for some few other people, has to serve that emptiness.

That's actually an interesting point about how Louis' love for Armand is often questioned but Armand's love for Louis rarely is. I think Louis is much more loving and forgiving than people give him credit for. Throughout the show we constantly see him express kindness and forgiveness toward both Armand and other characters, often more than they give to him. I think in 2.05 that's particularly clear where after Louis and Armand's fight and Louis' subsequent suicide attempt, Louis is the one apologizing and trying to connect with Armand and be kind to him, whereas Armand is cold and angry and intentionally hurts Louis physically and emotionally. In the beginning of their relationship Louis forgives Armand for trying to kill him, their relationship is arguably already ruined from that moment because of Armand betraying him like that, but he still forgives him. He gives Armand so many chances, and when Claudia tells about Armand's threats he still wants to give him a benefit of doubt. Even in Dubai he's deeply upset when he realizes Armand has messed up with his memory and you can see from his face that a part of him still wants to believe Armand when he says he didn't do it or did it with Louis' permission. Even though Armand says he couldn't trust Louis' love to last that long, Louis is actually remarkably loyal despite Armand not really deserving it and it's Armand who isn't giving Louis that trust and loyalty back.

Wrt people who say Armand is just all about Lestat they're usually book fans who watch the show through those lenses. In the books Lestat is the center of the universe and Louis mostly just a stick figure. In the show Lestat and Armand (and other characters like Daniel) are likely to perceive their relationships in the context of their relationship with Louis

[scoobydoodean]

speaking of your "15.20 is like a punishment for Sam" idea, I've thought that Dean's death, Sam living on, etc. was supposed to echo the season 3 finale, except with a sort of remixing of Sam & Dean's roles.

imo it was only a few minutes that Dean was in heaven without Sam, because Bobby says time works differently in heaven ("Time up here, it's… it's different. You got everything you could ever want… or need or… dream.") in what seems like a deliberate echo of Dean's line around his time in hell ("It was four months up here, but down there… I don't know. Time's different.") so: in 3.16, Sam isn't able to save Dean, Dean dies & goes to hell, Sam goes on his revenge quest vs. 15.20 Sam isn't able to save Dean, Dean dies & goes to heaven, Sam lives a 'normal' life until he dies & reunites w/ Dean. Dean spends 40 years in hell, Sam 4 months on earth; Dean spends a few minutes (say 4) in heaven, Sam spend ~40 years on earth/in metaphorical 'hell' or at least in grief before finally reuniting w/ Dean. as you say, all the people Sam is closest to die/leave and he just has to live on for decades after. he does get his 'reward' in going to heaven and reuniting with Dean and everybody else, but still!

(on a writing level, it feels revealing to me that the writers didn't go with a remix of season 3's original ending, of Sam being able to save Dean. because the actual season 3 ending didn't happen naturally but because of real-world setbacks. yeah yeah Dean dying & Sam carrying on it fits with the show's focus on how people deal with death and death's inevitability, but... idk, there's something about it that just feels off to me. can't explain it logically though.)

Yeah that's one of the other Big Things for me about the ending of Supernatural is that it presents Sam as a failure who tried over and over to save his brother but always failed. He wanted to save Dean in season 3 and failed repeatedly and it ripped him apart. He deluded himself into thinking (to an extent) that he was saving Dean somehow in season 4 (see: 4.12 and 4.18) but he epically failed. Season 5 was supposed to culminate in some sort of redemption in a way, but then Sam came back soulless and harmed Dean. Then in 8.14, he promised to save Dean from his suicidal thoughts, but then became suicidal himself, tried to kill himself, blamed Dean for not Sam not killing himself, and then Dean did something reckless (take on the Mark of Cain) as a build up to literal years of depression and then again at the end of season 9, culminating in his death (and Sam was trying to be there but Dean got stabbed through the heart anyway). Then Sam makes a series of incredibly morally dubious plays to save Dean in season 10 but unleashes the darkness at the same time, which again—culminates in Dean needing to die to save the world at the end of season 11 (with a brief stint where Sam tries to take on the Mark of Cain but fails). Then Dean succeeds in stopping the world from ending all on his own, and comes to save Sam from the BMoL. Then Dean agrees to be possessed by AU Michael to save Sam and Jack. Then Dean makes the box plan and Sam insists Dean not get in the Mal-ak box and that he trust Sam to fix all of this. Then they don't actually fucking fix it. It all blows up in their faces and causes a chain reaction like so many dominos toppled over.

And over all of that time... Sam also has a fixation on trust. He wants Dean to trust him so bad, but Sam never actually succeeds at the things he promises/wants and tries to get Dean to believe he can do so bad (without dire consequences). And I don't think Dean resents Sam for that, and I really don't actually think he distrusts Sam either in the late series. But I think it weighs on Sam and that's part of why he has a fixation on trust to begin with that he can never really let go of. All that to say... if I had to summarize the "brothers" storyline, it culminates in Sam failing at the number one thing he wanted to accomplish most: save Dean from a young and bloody death. And the fact that the majority of the people who claim to love Sam and Dean's brotherhood more than anything celebrate that as poetic disgusts me, because there is nothing poetic about it at all. It's meaningless garbage that makes Sam look like an utter failure who is being punished.

[rustfoxes]

This has just become a list of things I don't like about the game tbh. Oh well.

I do not like having non-Warden characters fighting darkspawn. The whole entire point of the Order is that they are, again, the only ones who can face the Blight without dying instantly, because darkspawn blood is poison. If any rando can fight them, why the fuck have Grey Wardens to begin with?

What is the goddamn message of this game? If you're faced with people doing horrible things absolutely do not try to help? Someone's trying to enslave the whole of the world and you should know better than to try and stop them! Because, oh boy, you might not do it the exactly correct way that doesn't negatively impact anyone! And wow if you did make a mistake, never ever try to mend what you've broken, because that makes you a bad person. You honestly think that a literal spirit of Wisdom didn't consider every fucking option available? I really hope they can tie this shit up in a nice lil bow by the end of it.

I'm so fucking tired of Morrigan being in every goddamn game. I didn't like her in the first one. Same with Isabela. Didn't like Leliana either but thankfully she's not shown up this time outside of conversations. But just fuck Morrigan, I can't stand her being everywhere and the most coolest and most important and oh so special. Love her VA, don't like the character. Don't ask me why, idk man.

Kal-Sharok outpost... with sunlight? I mean, it's beautiful, but no self-respecting dwarf would go where the sun might hit them. You can't really call a place with sunlight the Deep Roads. The first word in "Deep Roads" should give you a pretty significant hint.

For a people as devoted to remaining unchanged, the Kal-Sharok dwarves sure changed their ways quick, if it only took a couple of generations.

Why is the only child in the game in the Grey Warden fort?

Super grateful that Mila isn't an example of the "spunky kid" stereotype where they're a freaking pain and you have to rescue them from trouble they get themselves into. Thanks for being a sensible kid.

I find the whole "wow Solas was so condescending always" thing to be... strange. If you talked to him with the base amount of respect you'd talk to anyone with and told him to knock it off when he started to be rude, he was a perfectly polite and fine conversation partner. He appreciated being told that the elves are trying and if he's so much smarter, he needs to teach them. He acquiesces that you're right and asks what you'd like to know. I never thought he was particularly condescending. Morrigan was much more condescending and belittling at times. The forest echoes as you yell into it. If you were rude and condescending, he was rude and condescending. If you were polite and firm, so was he. I really don't like the assumption that the person playing the game interacted with Solas a set way in the previous game, specially since the assumption is that you were a dick and he was a dick in kind.

The Cauldron got me. Seeing the urns for the gryphons just go on and on into the darkness actually managed a solid hit. Well done on that one.

I get where the Red Lyrium Ghost is coming from, but "why do [the elves] get to thrive when [dwarves] have suffered", really? Really? Orzammar and other dwarven kingdoms are rich as hell off the lyrium they sell to literally everyone else, meanwhile the elves until quite damn recently have been enslaved by humans and lost to their past. No one's a winner here. I get that she's talking about the elves of old, but still. Bub.

Why do we have so much time to hunt down the Gloom Howler though? Wouldn't blighting the gryphons take like... 2 minutes max?

Still frustrated about being immediately told what to do when the game gives you a puzzle. Absolutely zero trust in the player's capabilities.

Disjointed DAtVG feelings/opinions

I've played the game for a bit, I'm not too far in yet, and honestly? I hope it gets better. Spoilers & venting below as you might guess.

Everything seems to be tell, don't show. There's very, VERY little trust in the player. Characters happen upon a ruined village? "The village is ruined! There's no one here!" Yes, we can see that. Character looks upset? Text pops up on screen to tell you that IN FACT!! Character is upset. Couldn't have guessed.

Everything is explained out loud immediately, except the arguably actually important things. If I remember correctly, there's no mention of the 10 year (?) timeskip from DAI, everyone just now knows everything about elven magic and the Fade and the Veil EXCEPT FOR THE PLAYER. None of that is explained! New players are expected to just know, which in some games works, but when you throw characters into a magical forest and say it's Arlathan forest, how tf are they supposed to know what Arlathan is.

Why is Varric a brunette all of a sudden

Characterisation of returning characters is fucking wild. Fun, jokey Harding? Massive chip on her shoulder and real aggressive for some reason. Soft-spoken and measured Solas? Yelling, again, for some damn reason. Where is his iambic pentameter? And he hates blood magic all of a sudden?? Did the writers play the earlier games at all? Solas SPECIFICALLY says in DAI that blood magic has no morality to it and is merely a tool.

The game is linear to the extent that I cannot for the life of me see the point of the game asking you to wrap up unfinished business before moving forward. What unfinished business? You've locked us into a small room with 0 exits and 1 chest. There is no business.

So far there's been zero time for any of the story to breathe. There are no story beats, because the drum machine that is the pacing just keeps hammering on. The gravity of the situation has no time to set in for anyone. THE ACTUAL GODS OF MYTH HAVE BEEN BUST OUT OF GOD-JAIL. THIS IS A HUGE FUCKING PROBLEM. "Yeah, well, people would've died if Solas hadn't been stopped from tearing down the Veil." And this is preferable???? What the actual fuck. DAI Solas wanted to rebuild and to safe-guard his people. TWO of the people he wanted to PROTECT EVERYONE FROM are now out. But oh man, that Solas, he would've hurt folks. You think the wondertwins won't? Jesus fucking Christ.

The gameplay more or less just completely scraps character classes. Playing a mage rn and for some damn reason she has separate ranged attacks. What the actual fuck. What is the point of making people choose a class if a damn mage has to stand next to enemies to attack?

So far doesn't feel like an RPG at all. Starts in media res which is fine, but your character is already established as a cool hero and an important figure. Why? Why weren't we along for that ride?

Character movement is janky af, DAI was much smoother 10 damn years ago. Hopefully they'll somehow manage to fix it.

Either they needed better actors or a much better voice director, because holy shit is the dialogue awkward and halting and just... no.

Writers have clearly had shoes far too large to fill. Dialogue wants to be funny and witty and clever. It is not. Specially not with the phoned in voice acting.

Where have my Welsh/Irish elves gone? Wtf happened there? Also why wasn't there anyone around to tell the actors how to pronounce the elvhen words??

Why the fuck is the rogue our healer.

All quests so far have been walking from A to B, collecting some coins along the path, and then fighting 5 or 10 enemies. No variation at all.

Idk man, I really hope the game will find its legs as it goes on, but so far? Massively underwhelming and honestly quite disappointing. Absolutely does not feel like DA. People critisised DA2 for being rushed and DAI for a whole host of shit, but at least I felt like I was playing a Dragon Age game.

[pastelaspirations]

So, u h.

H O W. HOW, I ASK. ALL I DO IS POST ART ONCE IN A BLUE MOON AND MAKE REALLY CURSED REBLOGS. LIKE, I'M SO VERY GLAD YOU'RE HERE, BUT I CAN'T UNDERSTAND HOW OR WHY YOU'RE HERE-

I also like. Make really angsty, ungodly long fanfics that I do absolutely nothing to promote on this dumpster fire of a blog, but that's besides the point- ANYWAY. HAVE SOME REALLY SKETCHY DOODLES THAT I DID TO THANK YA MAD LADS ;_;

Thank ya, thank ya, you absolute mad lads. I will uh... continue to do what I do. Thank you for joining the ride, even though it's less of a ride and more that I found an abandoned theme park ride and decided to ride it as a prolonged death wish and you inexplicably strapped yourself in next to me with the moldy seatbelt-

[meu-meu-kissy-ceutie]

Thinking about it, we've had quite a few pokemon rivals go from "I want to be a champion" to "I want to be a researcher", I want the opposite to come up in the next game. I want a rival that starts off taking the gym challenge so they can get strong enough to go to harsher environments and study stronger pokemon, and in the process discovering they like battling more, eventually leading to them (as i think should happen way more) becoming the champion before you! I know some people don't like rival champions because its like "How can they be the best if I am" but that ignores that 1. Strong trainers (like blue) come back in future games for fights and 2. In any actual competition no one is the best forever, maybe you're better than someone today but maybe not next time. There could be something about this even with a hint at the rival talking about traveling and getting stronger so they can meet you, and for post game battles randomizing their team (aside from their starter) with a ton of new pokemon they captured and trained during the interim! Neway, this became waaaay longer than i thought, but, maybe ya'll agree, i know this would be hype as fuck for me.

[rimouskis]

sigh someone on twitter extolled the virtues of furiosa and said it was better than fury road. I just saw furiosa. they are wrong.

[keeps-ache]

gonna keep it shmoovin man

[bumpscosity]

I started playing pokemon diamond! i've been meaning to play it for ages so im super excited to jump in and finally play a 2D pokemon game, though i dont know if i trust either of my rivals yet.... I've only ever played pokemon games where you get exp share pretty much at the start so remembering to individually level up my whole teams gonna be a bit of a learning curve but im always up for new challenges

Naming my starters has always been important to me, it took me a while to come up with her's but i ended up picking Mori, after the japanese word for forest and a city in hokkaido, the island that's the partial inspiration for sinnoh :)

[agnimybeloved]

i do wish death parade stuck with just the more intimate case-by-case story structure overall... the wider worldbuilding and narrative just doesn't hold up that well and i personally get impatient in the middle of the series 💔 i think going super vague with how arbiting works and adding more judgements would have made for a stronger series overall, with the overarching narrative just sticking to chiyuki's arc and maybe one or two other arbiter judgements like they did with ginti if they wanted to still make the world feel wider. though i really think making it smaller overall would have really been the move...

[kneworder]

some of you guys weren't raised on heroes (2005) and it shows

[annieisyourfavourite]

so when are we as a society gonna move past the need for characters to be special because they have special Good Blood from their Cool Pure Blooded Ancestor. like when is that gonna stop being the go-to reason for why people are special

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

okay so like two things about this particular line.

one: i like the irony in claude telling someone to trust more.

two: HOWEVER, dimitri has literally absolutely no reason whatsoever in the name of yeehaw fuckity to not trust claude. i hate the way the game tries to absolutely force the things gw/sb claude does into ag when it doesn't even exist at all in ag. he never made a single hint of planning to just betray/harm the kingdom and this is literally at their first war meeting. not just that, but claude chose to go to faerghus himself and didn't ask them to go to leicester (which he specifically states being the one to choose to go to faerghus), so there wasn't anything indicating he might be up to something at all.

then we've got this stupid nugget:

each side lacks trust and is expecting foul play? the church expects foul play from the kingdom? from the alliance which has done nothing to them in this route, and that's bad enough... but the fucking kingdom too?

the kingdom and alliance watching for foul play even though they're allies and never had a history of being aggressive toward each other?

i know i've talked about it before but... i just hate how they tried to force this "claude is always scheming something terrible" plotline, even where it doesn't belong. then they also added in the dumb bit here about even the church not trusting the other armies, even though they've... literally been helping them, gratefully, this whole war. they also didn't have to fight but chose to out of gratitude for being sheltered.

suddenly after the timeskip they just... don't trust each other?

like i totally get just being in it to reclaim gm and go home and not really in it for someone else or anyone else, but the distrust is just an asspull to make the church seem BaD as usual.

claude just walked in and wasn't trusted. they also keep hammering it in right through the whole second half of the route with lots of kingdom allies (including playable ones) not trusting him. even if they relatively trust the alliance and the soldiers helping them that were integrated into their army, they specifically do not trust claude at all and are apprehensive about him.

dimitri agrees here if they can't be trusted, but he doesn't mention just personally distrusting them a whole lot. he agrees that they should be cautious if what the others say is true, but he also just shrugs it off as "they'll be enough to deal with the alliance if so". he seems unsure at first and kinda goes back and forth, but by the end he's the only character who faithfully believes that claude isn't just fucking around and leading them on (which literally, right to the very very very end, every single character except him is still very vocally doubting claude).

but like... why? there's... just... nothing to distrust him because of in this route. man literally exists and the game wants us to believe he's untrustworthy.

yeehaw wtf??? why would anything happen between the kingdom and alliance after the war? why would anything need to happen? even if you try to argue that claude is gonna try to uwu depose of the top church officials, if the church is watching the kingdom like hawks like dimitri is apparently aware of, why would the kingdom get involved? why would they care? clearly the church doesn't trust them all that much after all, or at least anymore since the timeskip for some unknown reason, and the kingdom has now, after this war, paid back any debt it owed the church.

so like, why would they suddenly rush to the church's aid and help them if the church doesn't trust them? if they were friendly/allied it would make sense if they still wanted to help, but if the church is expecting foul play from the kingdom, why would the kingdom even care what happens to the church? they could turn a blind eye and pretend they don't have the resources to aid them anymore and that their own territory is still busy recovering.

even if you argue what they discussed at the very beginning of the war, the church either A: didn't ask for aid in this second conflict, or B: even if they did, the above stands. i don't think there would be any riots or anything like that in those cases if the kingdom didn't help the church. it's one thing to help, but it's another to just fight at the back and call of another territory, which dimitri clearly expresses he won't do in gw because he puts the safety of his people first. no matter what his feelings are on the matter, he knows he's a king and that he has a responsibility to his people first and foremost, as would be expected of a king (to protect his own people first and foremost).

while i could see claude wanting to talk after the war and get things straight, and while i could see dimitri there as a mediator, there's just... literally no reason for bad blood after all this. even if they don't trust each other, there's just no reason - and that's aside from the fact that it's total bs that they all just don't trust each other.

lorenz just asks if shez has confidence in them. doesn't mention claude. shez though just... randomly is like oh yeah btw just not claude. totally unprompted.

lorenz distrusting claude has been part of his character since houses so his part of it is reasonable. normally i'd say it's really pushing things with claude not being trustworthy for someone to say they feel bad for shez/the kingdom army for the implication of having to deal with claude even as an ally, but the only reason i give this a pass is because it's an understandable and reasonable character who says it.

still though, it's like the game throws it in at every single possible opportunity for no reason at all. they don't give us any indication that claude is this big bad evil guy. he doesn't trust the church. like... that's it. he made that clear even in ag (even without the zaharas chapter), and that's just... it. the rest of this makes it seem like claude is going to just up and invade the kingdom after this war and try to unify fodlan (i.e. just go what edelgard's been doing this whole time).

it's just like... here, nobody trusts claude at all in this game just for simply existing. you don't even have to bring him up, because someone else will do it for you and shit talk him to remind you he's the biggest piece of shit the game can offer! meanwhile, we've got marianne who is concerned about edelgard (implication is her well being no less!) because the empire's army ain't doing so hot. poor indading aggressor! sure hope she's doing okay! fuck our leader though, he's the biggest steaming pile of bullshit garbage to ever exist (marianne didn't say that, but that's what the narrative is going for: poor edelgard, it's so sad that the invader is having it rough right now. anyway fuck claude he's literally as evil as tws).

i love ag but i'd say this is one of if not the worst hiccup in the writing. when it comes to faerghus itself and its characters, it's mostly fine and even great, but when it starts going into other territories/characters it ends up taking a nosedive in quality.

siiigh

[llycaons]

sooooo many fanfics are like 'wwx and lwj are sexy coworkers/strangers/acquaintances/customer and barista and then they meet and have amazing sex immediately' etc. etc. because that is the nature of fanfic but I have no idea why these random boring meet and get-together/fuck plots are so popular. well I guess I understand the appeal, but it's baffling that THIS is the route authors take when wx have so many other neat things going on. they have such a long and rich history! they call each other zhiji! they've been through decades of character development because of and with each other! writing them as a businessman and a tech ceo who happen to meet and then immediately have sex is THAT rewarding for people? no respect for the buildup I swear. I'm not saying they wouldn't sleep together as soon as they get together, I'm just saying there needs be some kind of (preferably fairly lengthy but at least close) relationship between them in the first place for sleeping together to make any sense just because of who they are as people, and also to not just sqander canon

[papercutsmp3]

bro is inquisitive

[sarcasmchandlerbing]

Now this is what has to happen in the playoffs (according to me and my wishes) and also I will predict the outcome:

Florida Panthers has to beat the scary opponent. They can. They have the change. It might be a tough round 2 with these two and I will be scared. I hope I'm not going to start to hate the opposing team if they manage to win. Go Panthers! ❤

Carolina Hurricanes needs to get rid of of the big bad wolf. I am so scared of them (the big bad wolf) winning this whole thing it's not even funny. They can. Easily. Nothing can't stop them. But I hope Hurricanes can! I want Hurricanes to win so bad but I think the others might win 😬 I hope I am so wrong about this one! Go Hurricanes! ❤

Dallas Stars need to beat the other team. Who I think will win? Well, this might be a tough battle they are going to have. It could go either way I think. Go Stars! 💚

Vancouver Canucks, you have one job. To destroy the team which has already won in the past. No need for it again. So please please Canucks, win this. I don't know about this one, the enemies might win. Hope I'm wrong again! Go Canucks! 💙

[viktortittiforov]

the 2010s sure were a time in my life