#in his situation. and his self-perception at the point where he’s already killed someone

[lifesver]

anyway laurel is also explicitly an expression of queerness. is it a healthy one? absolutely not. it is, like his other murderverse personas, a very physical manifestation of a coping mechanism and it’s a way of creating a mental block between himself and the horrible things he ends up doing. laurel is a way of expressing things he repressed for a long time, things that don’t matter when you’re nobody, when you’re dead, when you’re in the dark with a stranger, and when you’re supposed to kill that stranger before the night is over.

[super-paper]

Do you think Hawks will die to save Toga?

Personally, I wouldn't like it if either of them died. Like, the potential narrative payoff here would be strongest if both of them lived, imo. I would rather see a situation where Keigo donates just enough blood to stabilize them both, rather than a situation where one person completely exsanguinates themselves and leaves behind a rash of trauma and unresolved feelings in the person they "saved."

I'm definitely not the best when it comes to Hawks meta, but I'll try my best to break down my personal feelings on why I feel both Keigo and Himiko need to live in order to "break the cycle":

1. You Can Start Over. I'll Help You.

This one's the biggest, most obvious point in favor of them both living imo. Hawks made an offer to help Jin start over, but rescinded that offer and immediately went for the kill the moment Jin showed signs of resistance. This was Keigo's biggest failure as both a hero and as an individual, and something he has yet to atone for.

In turn, Himiko believes there are no second chances-- that her only options are death or being locked away forever. So, she chooses death. She needs someone to offer her a third option.

The set up is there.

There's also the matter of Keigo and Himiko both stating that they want an "easier world" as their core motivation, and both of them state that they want to be the ones who help make that world.

Their goals only sound simplistic on the surface and serve as a mask for their respective traumas, but... ultimately, a world that's easier for Himiko to live in (where she is consensually given blood by someone who loves her and she is allowed to give her blood back to the world in return) is a world where heroes can finally take it easy-- because it's a world that nips the endless creation of its own "villains" in the bud, through unified acts of compassion and understanding.

Both characters have caused others intense pain and hurt others in their attempts to take shortcuts to the creation of an "easier world"-- Hawks is the hero that's "too fast," and Himiko is also associated with her near-supernatural speed. They're both too impatient and want the quickest possible results. Having both Himiko and Keigo living and learning the "right way" to create their ideal world-- and then, getting to be a part of that world as they both continue to atone-- feels much more meaningful than having one or both of them die before they can see that future reach fruition.

2. The Big, Suicidal Elephant in the Room

The majority of the LOV members all struggle with suicidal ideation-- Touya wants to set everything Endeavor ever chose over him ablaze, and he wants that inferno to also serve as his funeral pyre. Tomura has got a dissertation's worth of issues regarding his own mortality and self-perception/identity, and his whole "let's-just-destroy-it-all/we-don't-need-a-future-actually-lol" schtick has always been a symptom rather than a legit proposal for a cure. Himiko wants to disappear into the identities of the people she loves, because the world treats her a little more kindly when she isn't "Toga Himiko." The LOV trio's arcs all revolve around "death of the self" to some degree. (That said... resurrection and rebirth are also heavy themes within Tenko, Touya, and Himiko's arcs, soooo....)

Keigo also struggles with suicidal ideation and places the worth of his own life far, far, faaaaar below that of everyone else.

This has already been said, and shouldn't really need to be said in the first place, but-- people have every right to feel uncomfortable and criticize a story that attempts to validate suicidal characters by portraying their suicide in a noble/redemptive light.

Next!

3. It's All About All Mi-- Err..... Tomie?

"I was fine with that-- not saving her, turning my back on her. Me, who claims he wants to help people." - Hawks, about Tomie.

"I tried to go about things the right way" is a good line that touches on one of the core conflicts of Keigo's character: He suppresses so much of his natural instinct to do good so he can do "right."

Keigo knows in his heart of hearts that "the right way" doesn't save people like his mother, it didn't save Jin, and it's not going to save Himiko. He's been groomed into upholding the society and status quo that caused him and Tomie to nearly fall through the cracks in the first place-- and I've always found it both fascinating and sad that Keigo seems to equate choosing "the right way" (i.e. becoming a hero) to abandoning his mother. Keigo effectively being *sold* to the HPSC is what took Tomie off of the streets and gave her a roof over her head-- it gave her "a chance to start over." But Keigo doesn't seem to view this as true saving. With that in mind, his attempt to "save" Jin by essentially giving him the same offer the HPSC gave Tomie was always doomed end in failure.

Keigo: "My mother feared punishment for harboring a criminal, so she took me and ran."

Tomie first ran out of fear of being arrested after Takami Thief was captured-- which led to both her and Keigo being homeless for an extended period of time. She ran again after Dabi/Touya threatened her for information on Keigo, this time out of fear of her son-- a son who had became synonymous with "the law" she feared so much in her eyes. She can't bear facing him after her betrayal and implicitly fears punishment/condemnation from him (even though Keigo had *no* intention of punishing her)-- Tomie readily leaves behind the "normal" home and "normal" life that Hawks obtained for her through "doing things the right way," bc the imaginary threat of punishment and condemnation is something that comes across as worse for her. This only further convinces Keigo that he failed to save his mother, even though he's the one who's being betrayed and hurt by her.

I can't help seeing similarities between Tomie & Himiko's decisions to run out of an intense fear of punishment/imprisonment, and how this inevitably ties to Keigo. Keigo subconsciously realizes that he can't truly save people like Tomie, Jin, or Himiko as "Hawks" because "Hawks" is part of the problem. He longs to save others as himself-- as "Takami Keigo" (which is why the loss of his quirk kind of has me like "👀 👀 👀 whatcha gonna do next, turkey boy...,,..👀 👀 👀" )

As an aside, I seem to recall that transhawks made a few meta post where they talk about how there are traces of Jin's design in Tomie (esp her eyes, which have the same dead-eyed thousand yard stare) and that their resemblance is likely intentional (edit: link to one post pointing the resemblance out)-- It's not as overt, but imo, Himiko also resembles Tomie (just a little!) when she has her hair down.

Anyway! Both Jin and Himiko dying after Keigo A) has spent his whole life agonizing about how his own mother wasn't able to survive in their current society, B) has expressed guilt about how he didn't even try to save her and didn't make attempts to involve himself in her life, C) has talked at length about he wanted to be "more like Bubaigawara" and then proceeded to roleplay him, badly, for a good third of Act 3 (ohhhh boy ☠️☠️☠️), and D) had demanded that Toga be killed immediately after she arrives in Gunga, only for Ochako and Tsuyu to explicitly challenge and reject the idea that killing was the only option available.... idk, Himiko dying while Keigo does nothing would just feel massively incoherent at this point??

TL;DR The resolution to Keigo's arc currently hinges on addressing his origin, his identity, his guilt, and his ties to these three characters. Keigo feels that he failed with Tomie, and he explicitly failed with Jin-- and I personally don't think his arc can have a satisfactory ending without addressing those failures through Himiko, or without him trying to right where he went wrong by helping her in some capacity. This is a chance for him to finally follow his innate drive to do good over doing what their society dictates as "right."

----

All that being said, if Hori did decide to have Hawks sacrifice himself: Hawks choosing to sacrifice himself because he wants to believe in the future that the hero kids are creating and wants to believe that children like Himiko have a place in that future feels WAAAY more tonally consistent with mha's themes than Himiko choosing to sacrifice herself because she doesn't think she has a future

One message is about healing and hope and belief, the other is about failing to truly save someone who was already suicidal from their inevitable self destruction.

MHA has been defining true saving as "going above and beyond" for hundreds of chapters now-- true saving means saving a person's heart, body, and soul. It means giving them a future. By mha's own definitions, Himiko choosing to kill herself means she wasn't saved. Pure and simple-- You can't save the heart but not the body/soul (Himiko), you can't save the soul but not the body/heart (Touya), and you can't save the body but not the heart/soul (Tomura). There's a lot more work to be done here-- but that's fine, bc MHA has never depicted true saving or true healing as some magical, instantaneous thing. (#recoverygirldni)

[mogamuncher]

Ok ok I know it hasn't been that long but it just hit me and now I have to inflict this on y'all as well (also season 3 of Re:Zero dropped and I've been gnawing at the walls)

So, remember how in my last Cakeverse post I proposed a Re:Zero branch of this au, with Subaru as the Cake and a lot of other characters as Forks? Well now I really want to brainstorm and analysize more closely what exactly this would mean for Subaru as a character, and how it would affect the story.

Because, like, here's the thing right: Subaru already gets killed by his own friends, a lot. Like, a concerning amount. If you made a tier list of the people most adept at killing Subaru then you'd see that a lot of his friends are up there (with himself being way higher ofc), so what's the point of this Au? What would it change for Subaru if his friends killed him for being a Cake instead of literally anything else?

See, this is where the themes of love in Re:Zero come to play, there's a reason why I specifically picked this fandom for this AU (outside of my own bias), this story is inherently about love. Every character has their own definition of love, their stories are permanently marked by it, Re: Zero is fundamentally a story about love.

Similarly, Cakeverse is an Au all about love as well. Both mediums represent all the visceral, ugly, terrifying and gory aspects of love, exploring them through a gimmick and metaphors as to drive the point home. The time loop is a metaphor for love, the cannibalism is also a metaphor for love, both are utilizing their most brutal aspects to literally hit the audience over the head with a hammer with their themes of love and what it means to love someone.

i think fusing both of these perspectives of how to explore love would be amazing. Thinking about those deaths with Rem or the kiss of death, how meaningful it would be to have the two women that Subaru loves most, who he would sacrifice himself over and over again, who consume and own his soul literally consume his body.

How enhanced would Subaru's own complexes be once he realized that the people whom he cares for literally want to eat him? Furthermore, how would he react to the fact that he's the only thing they can taste? Fate cruelly stripped them of a basic function everyone else has from birth, potentially turning them into a social pariah from the jump if others found out, and most importantly, they'll never know the feeling of eating for reasons outside of strict necessity, no enjoyment to be found in a plate.

I mentioned the concept of Cakes wanting to give parts of themselves away because they enjoy the feeling of being useful, of making someone satisfied and happy even if it tears the asunder. I do truly believe that Subaru, once he has the full context of what being a Fork entails, would spiral into this sort of behavior��ESPECIALLY if Rem and Emilia are Forks.

While, yes, he learns to not abuse Return By Death and to value himself in Arc 4, I do believe that some of his issues with being a Cake would still be mainly unresolved, because Subaru would genuinely feel awful for all the Forks that are in that sort of situation, especially if they're someone he knows.

His bleeding heart looks at the isolation Forks face, he sees how they're fundamentally missing something that everyone else around them already had effortlessly, they're being left behind by the world itself inherently for who they are, stagnating, and it's like looking in the mirror. Forks and Cakes didn't exist in his world, but he knows what it is like to feel misplaced in the world at large.

So he puts his bad habits to "productive use", food soaked in blood to give out flavor, telling Emilia to kiss him whenever she just wants to taste anything for a change, letting Rem or even Otto take a bite whenever, maybe this can even extend to Louis down the line. Out of seeing Forks as his kindred spirits, a misplaced feeling of guilt and his own skewed self perception, I fully believe Subaru would actively serve himself up to the Forks around him that are close to him.

As you can guess, the reactions to this behavior would vary, a lot. I also think that rest of the cast that aren't involved in these dynamics would be extremely concerned when seeing it from the outside. Like: "WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU ARE LETTING YOUR FRIENDS BITE YOU?!" Sort of stuff.

For a record, in my brain I believe that a few of the folks that would be Forks in this Au would be:

Elsa, Rem, Ram, Emilia, Satella, Otto, Reinhard, the gluttonies, Shaula, Todd, Cecilus and maybe Vincent.

And here are the Cakes:

Roswaal, Heinkel, Subaru (obviously), Felix, Aldebaran, Wilhelm, Betelgeuse, and maybe even Echidna herself

Anyways, much to think about. Feel free to come up with more ideas and concepts as well, I'd love to hear everyone's ideas for this Au!

[gobbinhalfglass]

Someone who didn’t know I write just got ahold of something I wrote and their response was “Wow this could’ve been super depressing and crushing for all the characters involved! Why didn’t you do that?”

Because when you’ve seen enough hopelessness and crushed spirits in real life, you don’t tend to have a taste for it in fiction, sir. I’m not planning to publish this work, so I don’t need to think about what the biggest reaction would be from a reader. I’m going to write happy endings even in stories where people struggle every step of the way because God damn it there isn’t enough of that in the world.

I have no doubt I could write horror and tragedy very well. But y’know what? Fuck that. There’s enough horror and tragedy in the world around me and I see no reason to fill my personal projects with it. “Oh but you could convey what you feel to an audience!” How about I don’t add my experienced pain and fear to others’ already bleak perception of the world? I don’t want anyone to understand it like that because that means they understand it. Why would I wish that on someone? I’d much prefer to make a fleeting smile than a lasting existential crisis in someone. I want to put into the world what it lacks, not what there’s too much of. I’m not gonna write anything really dystopian because y’know what? I live in a fucking dystopia at this point and it is really god damn boring. Nobody seems to want to admits either of those things but jesus christ… So many people feel it in their bones. Maybe some fucked up things happen in a story, but why does that tragedy need to be further compounded with more tragedy ad infinum to be interesting to some people? Why can’t a singular tragedy exist as its own fully formed plot point, with all the influence on characters and events that entails? Why do people want a character to just suffer over and over in a story that doesn’t fucking need that?

For context, my protagonist only found out he committed matricide immediately after striking a killing blow to the story’s witch-queen antagonist. And she dropped some pretty big plot twisting things in her dying breaths. APPARENTLY it’s been deemed more interesting for him to spiral into alcoholism, depression and self-destruction over it than to grieve healthily and actually grapple with his actions. This guy hasn’t been prone to extreme responses to emotion up until this point, he’s been on multiple literal battlefields and failed to save people. So the suggestion that he should suddenly turn to alcohol and totally self-destruct over this one event kind of pissed me off. Especially when he’s got two close friends who’re still there for him right there when this all went down. “But it’d be a better story!” No. Fuck off. You don’t get to read my stories anymore. The protagonist will grieve and process in the presence of his found family like the reasonably well-adjusted warrior he has been shown to be already.

Anyway, this was mostly just a vent post about my own artistic preference and the fact that people seem so smitten with dystopian tragedy in their fiction that they seem to expect it from me. Kinda pisses me off that people want more sadness in media, frankly. I realize that’s a hot take on the “Put that character into situations” website but good god people are just in love with torturing characters when there’s not much to gain from it.

As a side note, kudos to all the people whose characters or fanfics actually have depicted character growth from the situations later down the line.

[itsclydebitches]

You know what might be a useful scene to think about here? Yang (supposedly) breaking Mercury’s leg.

Because the point is that she crossed a moral line. It doesn’t matter how justified she may have been in the act--“If you let teenagers beat each other up with superpowers during a high-stakes competition in front of a rowdy audience, someone is going to take things too far”--or how inconsequential others may perceive the action--“Who cares if he got hurt? Aura heals things like that almost instantaneously!”--the point is that there were ethical rules in place that others perceived Yang as dismissing. The audience isn’t shocked and appalled because they’re unused to violence, or because a break/shot is actually a serious injury in this world, they’re horrified because they saw all these competitors, Yang included, as being beholden to a certain moral standard.

That’s Ruby in this situation. I personally think she was 100% justified in that attack, but that’s not the point people are trying to make. The point is that beyond the justifications (he’s trying to kidnap her, Qrow is currently being poisoned) and beyond potentially seeing the act as Not That Bad (“Who cares if he lost his tail? He’s the bad guy!” Although here I would point out that holding the villains to a different perception of disability from the heroes is precisely how we got “Ironwood + lost limbs = visual representation of evilness), Ruby is nevertheless someone who, like Yang in a competition, the audience sees as toeing a moral line. So if she crosses that line, we expect it to have an impact on her because, as such discussion demonstrates, it’s already had an impact on our perception of her. Especially when her sister has just lost her arm. Especially when Ruby is the “simple soul” of this group. Especially when she’s primarily fought grimm up until now and, if memory serves, this is the first time she’s deliberately and permanently hurt another person. The issue is not “Writing bad for having Ruby maim” the issue is “Writing bad for having Ruby maim and then dropping that like a hot potato.”

It’s the same problem (though on a much larger scale) with having Yang and Blake ignore killing Adam. Most RWDE folks I’ve encountered aren’t upset that they killed in self-defense, but rather that this had zero impact on their development. And to anyone who comes back with those string of justifications for why it definitely wouldn’t bother the girls... then where’s the story? The entire purpose of a story is to have conflict and resolution and development. If RWBY’s answer to so many major events is, “And it changed nothing and the characters thought about nothing and it might as well have never happened,” then RWBY should just be a fighting game with cool special effects and no plot. Having the girls go through these major events and then shrug them off defeats the purpose of telling an 8+ season show.

For some reason twitter is getting all fired up again but JC pointing out that Ruby cutting off Tyrians tail is messed up. Now personally I’m in the camp that her just doing it in instinct isn’t necessarily the issue with the scene, she was defending herself and her uncle after all, for me the issue does stem from the fact that she doesn’t feel anything about it. No reaction despite her sister having lost her own arm very recently. Most people would feel something about this, some level of guilt or confusion, second guessing. Even if you didn’t do something wrong per say most people still feel something when doing something like this. Playing off Ruby not caring about what she did is what feels jarring and wrong for the character.

Their are a lot of jokes going around that the mains should kill more people and not feel anything and while I hope they’re jokes, I also really don’t want the writers to go that route. I don’t want to see people we call heroes killing people remorselessly. It’s just not the right feeling for what is supposed to be a hopepunk. And even if it wasn’t a hopepunk, having people kill with no regret…. It’s honestly a little uncomfortable for me personally. It makes the character feel completely devoid of empathy and that’s not a trait you want the heroes to have.

[kestrel-of-herran]

2521 ending crimes

hello again! unsurprisingly, the anger hasn’t left my body after almost a month, so i wanted to make another post pointing out all the inconsistencies and failures of the ending when it comes to character and story, for those who need it. if you accept the ending, great! but here’s why i won’t be able to make peace with it, both as someone who fell in love with this show and as a literature and creative writing graduate who’s spent years understanding what makes stories great.

failure to stick to one relationship narrative throughout the story: it’s obvious that this drama was written with the intention of portraying a first love relationship that ultimately doesn’t last, but this is not the love that ends up on screen. instead of a superficial and casual relationship that falls apart under pressure, we witness a relationship that starts when both characters are at their lowest points and survives through a complete communication blackout and a conflict of interest within their careers. in order to portray a relationship that starts as a positive one but turns into a negative one, a writer has to spend more time exploring the relationship while it happens, instead of spending 80% of her drama into getting this relationship to start in the first place. both characters have to be shown to be compatible in some aspects and completely at odds in others, to have an inherent power imbalance or difference in worldview that gets more and more pronounced until it deals a killing blow. instead, we were offered a healthy and supportive relationship that defies ordinary perceptions of love, where both parties are shown to be physically and emotionally incapable of staying away from the other, and where they constantly put effort to meet the other halfway and see the world through their eyes. it’s a relationship that was built on sharing hardships (yijin telling heedo about the bankruptcy, her telling him about her fencing struggles), on mutual respect (yijin admiring heedo for her spirit, her admiring him for his work ethic), and on the ability to create happiness together in spite of the hardships the world puts them through (yijin defending heedo when her gold medal was disputed, her consoling him when he had to report against yurim). it’s extremely disrespectful and out of character to purport that such a relationship that went on for four entire years wouldn’t be strong enough to withstand another external tragedy, especially since people are naturally more mature in their mid-twenties than they are in their late teens, and your ability to understand and communicate with a person grows as you spend more time with them.

robbing the characters of agency to achieve a narrative end: the very need to introduce an external conflict like 9/11 to force the couple to misunderstand each other already demonstrates how artificial such a situation is. the narrative is biased against heedo and yijin’s dating life from the start: instead of showing us an equal balance of good and bad moments, we’re fed a montage of yijin being late to dates, as if heedo herself isn’t extremely busy as a fencer (in ep.10 she says that she was never able to have friendships or experiences outside of fencing because her entire life revolves around it), or yijin is so caught up in a job that he doesn’t have a real passion for besides the need to financially support his family and his natural empathy for people. there’s no inherent need to portray 9/11 or send yijin as a correspondent there than to depress him and stage an unraveling of the relationship that in itself is a threadbare narrative. would someone as emotionally mature as heedo (“it’s okay that he left, i’m sure he did the right thing”, “i’m glad my mom inspires you even though she caused me pain”) not understand the emotional toll this position takes on him and how it brings out his weakest self? would someone as intelligent as yijin voluntarily sign up to continue an internship at a place he calls “hell on earth”? would he completely abandon his personal life to help strangers, given that every major life decision he’s taken in the series was with the future of his family in mind? the characters are rendered chess pieces in a story they’re no longer allowed to drive forward. the only agency heedo is granted is the agency to initiate a break-up, but she’s never granted the agency to process her feelings of hurt and attempt to mend her relationship with yijin when she clearly wants to. yijin is shown to oppose the break-up, but he’s never given the agency to translate his feelings into actions. when before yijin was allowed to confront heedo about avoiding him and heedo was allowed to wait in front of yijin’s house every evening until he showed his true feelings, now they’re rendered voiceless and powerless by a narrative that doesn’t want them to have power, because if they did, they would turn this story on its head.

using yijin as an emotional punching bag without giving him the space to heal: while yijin’s depression is a logical emotional response to what he witnessed, there’s no point in making him go through this traumatizing experience besides presenting a precedent for the break-up. yijin’s melancholy comes out only as a natural reaction to hardships, such as having to scrape by in pohang for months to escape creditors or being told that he can’t date heedo because of conflict of interest. so his depression wasn’t “always going to happen someday anyway”, it’s created by a narrative that relentlessly puts him from one traumatizing situation to the next. instead of using the 9/11 plotline to show him break down and get back up again with the help of colleagues and loved ones, the story keeps grinding him down without giving him the chance to get back up. it renders him passive and powerless, which in itself is a narrative fault, while its claim to realism is undermined by its failure to account for the intervention of family and friends who would never let a loved one suffer without offering them their entire support.

making heedo the villain in her own story: this is the cruelest element of the ending, the way it ignores the willpower and emotional maturity of its own protagonist for the sake of following a pre-determined narrative. the heedo who drives the story forward from the very start, the girl we fell in love with for her ability to find the comedy in a tragedy and offer a hand to her own bully over and over again, would never watch her emotional life fall apart at the seams while doing nothing. it’s true that heedo has a childhood trauma of being abandoned, but part of growing up is learning how to process and heal from our traumas as we gain a better understanding of ourselves and the people around us. if heedo was willing to forgive her mother for years of mistreatment and not hold a grudge against yurim for months of coldness and then lack of communication prior to madrid, why wouldn’t she find it in her heart to understand yijin and meet him halfway? why wouldn’t she see that she was speaking from the weakest place in her heart, and take back the words she doesn’t mean? what makes it so hard for both of them to say, “i won’t be the person who only hurts you, here’s how i’ll make you happy again”? i’ll tell you what: the writer.

missed opportunities to deliver a satisfying and logical resolution to angst: presenting your characters with one last hurdle before perfect happiness is a classic and highly effective story beat known as the “darkest hour”. at the last moment before the resolution, the protagonists lose everything they care about and the audience can’t imagine how they would get it back... until the protagonists prove the audience wrong, cementing their agency and earning their happy ending with a bang. the last episode presents countless opportunities to do this: them meeting at the airport when the suitcases get mixed up, one of them showing up at the others’ house after processing their fight, their friends setting them up on a drunk date that becomes the first step to bring them closer again (the comedy! the drama!)... if the narrative wasn’t biased against heedo and yijin, it would use a last external conflict to help them progress both as individuals and as a couple, to show them getting closer again with a newfound understanding of themselves and their relationship, to help them understand how to never make such mistakes again and build the future they both want with the other. the fact that they learn nothing from this experience and are not shown to have improved their emotional lives because of it renders it a meaningless narrative and a wasted opportunity for god-tier sexual tension, comedy, drama, heart-to-hearts, and falling in love with the other all over again—all things that would inevitably happen if the characters were allowed to grow and act towards the person they very much don’t want to lose.

failure to wrap up plot threads at the end: a guessing game with no revelation, a photo album and a workshop that contradict the apparent narrative, the ridiculous notion that heedo and yijin would never speak again despite having the same friend group and living in the same neighbourhood, heedo’s marriage and pregnancy being completely swept under the rug as if they’re not a major aspect of her life, yijin and heedo being shown as very much still in love but not taking a single step towards each other, as if that longing would not eat them alive until they ran to each other... the narrative has failed to listen to its characters, and so has lost its hold on them. they grow rebellious as abandoned garden roses, growing wild and strong and bigger than the people who planted them.

[nerdygaymormon]

Sorry in advance for this ask. I needed to vent to someone and I figured you'd be okay with it.

I'm a genderfluid mormon. I'm also aspec and mspec. I'm out to most of my family, because most of my family are at least somewhat accepting of queer people.

However, my dad is extremely homophobic and transphobic. He says that he hates seeing queer people on television, that queerness is being forced down people's throats. He says that it's now cool to be gay and trans. He says that queerness is against the gospel. But the worst thing he said was that, if any of his children ever came out to him, he would kill himself, because one of his children being queer would mean that not everyone would get to the celestial kingdom, so there wouldn't be a point.

And then, when my mom tried to counter him, he interrupted and told her that she was never going to change his mind about this. He also went on about how God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and so queer people should never be accepted in the church. I wanted to counter with "Well, black people weren't always allowed temple blessings or the priesthood, do you still think that should be the case?" Because I know he'd be like well no of course not, but I knew he'd also probably just be mad at me and probably mention Sodom and Gomorrah or something.

I just...I wish he wasn't like this. I wish I could just be myself and not be afraid to be open about who I am.

Oh boy, that's hard. I'm sorry. I certainly understand the need to vent

In the past the church certainly spoke very strongly against queer people, over the past 10 years there's been a shift in the rhetoric and a softening in some of the policies.

Many members who were comfortable with the church supporting their bigotry now are feeling like the rug is being yanked from under them and some are digging in their heels. The old position was simple, easy to grasp and some hold onto that. The new church position makes things more complicated as it's neither all good nor all bad.

Let me reiterate what you already know, you are not required to come out to anyone. If you don't feel comfortable doing so, if it may jeopardize your living situation, or any other reason or for no reason at all, you don't owe it to others to come out. You come out for yourself.

I hope your father is like most people in that when he finds out someone he loves is queer that it changes his heart. Knowing someone changes perceptions. Even if he doesn't change core beliefs, he can still love someone.

For you, my recommendation is find ways to affirm yourself. Wear colors for ace, multisexual, genderfluid, and any of the other labels that resonate with you. When he says negative things, you think of something positive to say to yourself. Remember that your Heavenly Parents made & love YOU as you are. Spend time where people affirm and welcome you as your whole self.

Until you can bring your real self to the conversation, until you can express your troubles, questions, feelings and doubts, your dad is missing out on knowing all of you. He has made an atmosphere where being vulnerable and open comes at a high risk, and sadly that means he robbing himself of some beautiful opportunities. He's put his comfort first where he should be putting his love

[stellocchia]

There is one thing I sometimes mention in my rants about c!Dream’s and c!Tommy’s relationship that I never expanded on, which is c!Dream assiging c!Tommy an almost divine value, well, that changes now! 

Turns out I just cannot write short and concise analysis it seems, so I put everything under the cut...

/rp

I’ve talked a few times before about how Dream in his mind gives Tommy added value (again, Tommy has value as a human being already, but Dream most definitely doesn’t see that), but I want to go a bit more in depth about it. 

So, we know by now that Dream has been obsessing over Tommy for quite a while now, though it really worsened with the beginning of season 2. 

It is important to note that, at that point, Tommy himself was back on the idea of there being a friendly rivalry between him and Dream for the disk that was still in Skeppy’s possession, nothing more then that. He most definitely didn’t hate Dream yet (although their relationship has always been complicated) and he shouldn’t have posed much of a threat to Dream, right?

We also all seem to recognise that Dream would not have let up until Tommy was exiled, but I haven’t seen many people discuss the WHY of it. Why was it so important to him? Did he just do it because he hated Tommy? Did he do it because he was bored and wanted chaos? 

Well, I think it’s because Tommy DID pose a threat to Dream. He WAS a threat to Dream because Dream had seen him during Pogtopia. He had seen him rally the troops, he had seen him keep people’s morale high even after Wilbur detonated the tnt and Techno released the withers, he knew what Tommy could do if Dream threatened L’Manburg while he was there, even while not being president (I mean, he still managed to lead a revolution against Schlatt even while never being the official leader). And Dream wanted to get rid of L’Manburg because of what it represented, because L’Manburg represented freedom from him, freedom from his rules. L’Manburg was a HUGE problem, so he needed to take out what kept L’Manburg together and that was Tommy.

But that’s not the only thing. If Dream only wanted Tommy out of the way, he could have just let him unalive himself or he could have killed him himself and pretended it was an accident. Heck, he could even have pushed for an execution in the first place instead of the exile! But he didn’t... and later on, during the Season 2 Finale, he outright refused to kill Tommy even in self defence. So for Tommy to have so much importance that Dream needed to keep a constant eye on him in exile and keep him alive, Dream’s mentality of Tommy being sort of the “key” to power must have already been in place when he formulated the exile plan (perhaps it was there from before then, but we can’t know this for certain). 

I mean, he also ordered a whole prison that could have been meant to hold Tommy from the start (it has been confirmed by Sam out of character that it was made with c!Tommy in mind and the only indication that it wasn’t comes from c!Dream in a converstaion with c!Tommy, which we really shouldn’t trust at all) and a curious thing to notice on that, if that was the case, is that the prison itself is called “Pandora’s Vault”, why calling it “vault”? A vault is something that’s supposed to hold valuable items. It’s supposedly a secure location where you hide away your most precious things. Why calling a prison that? Anyway... that was just an interesting tid-bit I’ve been thinking about. 

Back on the main tangent now! 

So, what does Dream think of Tommy exactly? 

“Listen Tommy, since you joined the server, you’ve been a headache! Okay? You’ve brought war, you brought terrorism, you’ve brought bad everything! But! But! The cause of all the wars, of everything, was attachment, alright? Your attachment to the disks, your attachment to Henry, to pets, to friends, to land, to countries, to items, right? (...) That’s- That’s the one good thing that you’ve done. The one good thing you’ve done is that you brought attachment to the server. So it took me a LONG time to realize how important attachment was, but, when I did, you know? It made me stronger, and I realised that you- you’re- you’re important, right?”

This is a quote directly taken from the season finale. I know it’s a long one, but it’s seriously important. Because Dream, with this quote, just asserted that Tommy is the reason attachments exist at all, even if that isn’t true of course (the whole disk war was kickstarted by Ponk getting mad when Sapnap retaliated to his prank by burning down Ponk’s lemon tree because he was attached to it), but to Dream it is. 

Tommy, a normal human teenager with no “main character powers” (you know, like being a life and death god, or silk-touch hands, or having the brains to create nukes or being able to bring yourself back to life out of spite, basically he has nothing normally considered “special”) is deemed the reason why people are able to care at all. THAT is the added value I’m talking about. Dream doesn’t see Tommy as Tommy, he never did, he sees him as his own idealized version of him. And in Dream’s mind Tommy has so much importnace that, without him, attachments would just stop existing. “How do we know that” you ask? Well, why else would Dream have been so adamant about needing Tommy ALIVE? He already did his thing if bringing attachments was all the value Dream assigned to him. Now attachments exist, surely Dream can get rid of Tommy, right? Well, no. Because, as I said, to Dream Tommy is the embodiment of attachments. 

I mean, he admitted so in that quote, didn’t he? He starts by telling Tommy that HE is the cause of everything: of war, of terrorism, of everything. But then, then he says that those same things are caused by attachments. How can we have both be true at the same time? Easy, make Tommy the concept of attachment personified!

“If I can control the things people are attached to, then I can control the server again!”

All we said before kinda puts this more in perspective. THAT’S why Dream is in constant need of controlling Tommy. If Tommy is the embodiment of attachment in Dream’s mind, then he is the embodiment of control and power as well. Because, if controlling a singular attachment gives you control over one singular person, then controlling the embodiment of everyone’s attachments gives you control over the server right? 

“Look, it’s not fair! But Tommy listen: I need you, okay? I need you to keep bringing attachemnt to the server, because without you people weren’t really attached to things, but then you came and you brought ‘friendship’ and ‘countries’ and ‘things’ people can be attached to, right? And you brought that! And you’re- you’re the KEY, right? You’re the key to unlock the full potential of the server and power and everything”

Can’t get much more obvious then this... Dream literally described Tommy as “the key to everything”, that’s A LOT of extra value put on a random 16 yo. It would be a lot of value for ANYONE to have. In case it wasn’t clear, what Dream is saying is that controlling Tommy basically makes you a God. And, if it wasn’t clear enough yet, let me grab a quote from Tommy’s 3rd canon death stream:

“Tommy your life is literally IN MY HANDS, does that piss you off? Does that make you mad? Does it make you soo mad that I- you can’t kill me... I MIGHT AS WELL BE A GOD TOMMY! You can’t kill me and I can kill you!”

So, here’s the thing: killing Tommy is not that hard. A LOT of people on the server are stronger then him, even with the same equipment. At the same time killing Dream IS very hard. He’s literally one of the 2 best pvp-ers on the server. So why would this situation make Dream a “God”? Well, that’s because, based on his own philosophy, having Control over Tommy is what makes someone a God (it’s what gives you power over everything after all) and he here is fully in control. Not only because phisycally he is the stronger one, but also because Tommy admitted himself that he can’t kill Dream (Dream may wrongly assume that that’s because Tommy still has some attachment to him, which gives him another layer of control, truth is he’s just not much for killing people, the kid got too much empathy), which means he’s in control of Tommy’s mind and emotions as well to a certain degree. 

And here’s the thing: wouldn’t Tommy need to be somewhat godly himself to be the ONE THING that can grant people the ability to become a God? Dream, by now, has elevated Tommy to a point where Tommy himself might as well be God. That’s why Dream was so eager to become immortals together, to study the powers that make Dream now think even more that he is a God, together, because, in his mind, they’re already on the same level, albeit in a very skewed way (and I say a “skewed way” because Dream still doesn’t see Tommy as a person, he still sees him as a tool, only he is a tool that grants people godlyhood apparently). 

My theory on why c!Dream has this kind of perception of c!Tommy is because Tommy is his only remaining attachment. Dream got rid of all his attachments in order to gain absolute power, so he has to somehow justify to himself why this one particular attachment still doesn’t make him weak. Why still hanging onto Tommy (albeit in the most scewed up way possible) actually makes him stronger. He needs Tommy to be something more then a random 16 yo he once picked a fight with.

@ladycatland pretty sure you’d be interested

[undead-moth]

I'm gonna be a petty hater real quick since you brought up that scene where she talks about nearly killing the teenager:

I hate that scene for so many reasons.

Firstly, because of the fact that she's bringing this story up for a completely unrelated reason, and her fuckup is kind of just a side note to her real point.

I think it's really more evidence of her self-absorption. I don't mean self-absorption as in someone who takes a lot of selfies or who only talks about themselves, or whatever. I don't mean it in a vain sense.

But I mean self-absorption like how even though Carmy's mental break was clearly about his own trauma, and his own self-perception - Claire took it personally. She made it about herself in her mind. What mattered most to her was how it had affected her, how it had wronged her - and I'm sorry, if I'm Claire in that situation, and I'm a medical professional, and that's the man I love saying those things, no matter how hurt I am, I would be thinking, "I need to offer emotional support right now. I need to calm him down. I need to make sure he's not going to do something dangerous, or harmful to himself." I would not be thinking, "I can't believe he said that about me." She's self-absorbed in this same way about him not giving her his real number. She isn't considerate of him at all.

But another thing that gets me about this specific story she tells is why the writers included it. Why they created this story for Claire to tell in this moment, and what it means. When I first watched it, I found myself thinking, "What the fuck was that for?" And when I thought about it more, I realized the girl in this story is supposed to be a metaphor for Claire. The girl who is scarred thoroughly for life, who will never be the same, and who Claire says was laughing because, "it didn't hurt yet," is Claire.

The writers are using it to convey how this breakup with Carmy is going to affect her, as if the two are at all comparable. That's the only fucking explanation I can think of, and it sickens me that they used this story for that.

But even if that's not why they included it, and it's actually meant to allude to something else, the writers do another thing that really pisses me off, and it's another thing that would make me hate Claire in real life.

The first thing Claire has to say about this girl is that she's beautiful. She says this even before she says how young the girl is. What's important about this girl is that she's beautiful. Now, I'm already irritated with how often girls and women are made beautiful in stories for pretty much no other reason than because writers think girls and women exist to be beautiful, and can't find value in writing about a girl or woman who's not, and can't imagine anything about her being more important than her beauty - but in this case it's even worse because her beauty is being used to emphasize the tragedy of what happened to her.

This is a tragic story because a beautiful girl isn't beautiful anymore. This constitutes tragedy. A girl who nearly died but will go on to make a full recovery other than being less beautiful, is tragic. The fact that this girl nearly died but ended up living and not only living but living with zero long-term changes to her quality of life, something that should be considered a miracle, something that should be celebrated, something that should be cause for thanking God - is made into a tragedy because a girl isn't pretty anymore, which is of course all that really matters. What's an ugly girl good for? What's the point in saving her life if she's not going to be pretty after? Again, it sickens me. It sickens me that this is the story the writers created, and it sickens me that by virtue of it being the story the writers created, it's also Claire's canon in-universe point of view.

And honestly, I think it's really appropriate for Claire's character, because there's something else I don't like about Claire's character, and it's another thing that I don't think was done intentionally, just like how I don't think we're supposed to find her behavior predatory.

Claire is someone who isn't used to being turned down. She's someone who assumes she's wanted, because as a pretty white woman, she usually is wanted. Claire is someone who isn't used to things not going her way, and not being about her, because as a pretty white woman, things usually do go her way, and things usually are about her. She doesn't need to work as hard, or even at all, to make people like her. To make people interested in her. To make people think she's something special. People sympathize with her by default, and they're primed to take her side. Any predatory behavior like seeking out a phone number she knows was purposefully withheld from her is acceptable because it's her. A pretty white woman. Can you imagine if Sydney did something like that? And any mistakes she makes are not used against her. The fact that a teenager almost died isn't meant to make us think she shouldn't have the job she has. It's not meant to make us think less of her. We're not meant to think she deserves to be held accountable in some way for that mistake. No, no - we're supposed to feel sorry for her, because oh you poor thing, you must have felt so bad, that must have been so scary - even things that are blatantly a character flaw of hers are only used to further Carmy's and our sympathy and love for her. Again, can you imagine if Sydney almost killed somebody?

Claire is completely spoiled with unearned special treatment, and she doesn't even know it, because this is how life has always been for her. She doesn't know any different. That's, frankly, why when Carmy didn't give her his real number she decided she had a right to it anyway. That's why she didn't see anything wrong with doing that. She has never not gotten what she wants. She's never been turned down. No one else's feelings have ever meant more than hers. So she has a right to his number - and this, again, isn't something we're meant to question. It's played off as something cutesy and flirty. Maybe a little sassy, or adorably stubborn.

And this is all pretty evident even in-universe too - Everybody adores her, and after the breakup, people are deeply invested in whether or not Carmy has spoken to her, and what's going to happen to them. Only Sydney remembers to give a shit about anything else. She tells Carmy he needs to apologize and when Carmy assumes she means Claire, Sydney looks irritated, and says, "Not who I was talking about." When one of the Faks mentions talking to Claire, literally everyone is immediately asking what Claire said, except Sydney who is the only one who has noticed Marcus hasn't showed up for work yet, and she asks where he is.

So of course Claire thinks it's a tragedy that a girl isn't beautiful anymore. Of course that's what matters most about this story. Not that she almost killed the girl, and not that the girl survived and will make a full recovery - but that she's not beautiful anymore. She won't get to be like Claire. A girl with scars isn't ever going to be adored without effort or reason the way Claire is. Tragic.

And all this to say that I think it's incredible how The Bear seems to accurately portray characters who are oblivious to their own privileges and characters who are well aware of their lack of privilege - without the writers seemingly doing it on purpose, or even being aware of it themselves.

I've thought the same thing about Carmy. I will defend Carmy to no end, believe me, but his ability to unleash his anger, to permit his trauma to get the best of him, to be so self-righteous and unaccountable - is possible entirely because he is a white man. It is a perfect depiction of someone oblivious to white and male privilege.

Meanwhile Sydney constantly has to watch her mouth. There are very few, if any instances in which she doesn't have to hold back, at least slightly, and it takes way less for people to act like she's out of control, both in and out of universe. She bites her tongue around Richie. She can't bring herself to tell Carmy how she really feels, or to tell him how she really feels the way she wants to tell him. She has to hold it in until she can't stand it anymore, and when she does finally let it out she still has to reign herself in in ways white characters and men don't. This too is an incredible depiction of someone who is intimately aware that she doesn't have the privilege of being white or a man - and yet I still find myself thinking that the writers didn't intentionally do this.

It's the same with Claire. Her entitlement and self-absorption combo is an absolute perfect rendition of pretty white women I've met in real life - and yet, we are not supposed to think of Claire in that way. We are literally meant to think of her as someone Carmy has irrevocably wronged. We are meant to sympathize with her after the freezer scene and meant to be on her side. We are meant to think Carmy alone should be apologizing.

So, once again - fuck Claire so much.

I gotta say I forgot until rewatching The Bear recently how much I hate Claire. I don't mean as a character. I understand why her character was introduced and the purpose it served and she's an integral part of the overarching story being told -

But as a person, if she were a real person, I hate her so much.

She bumped into a childhood friend she hadn't spoken to in years, right? From what I can tell, she and Carmy were never close friends. They went to the same school. Their social circles were in close proximity, maybe even overlapped to a degree - but the two of them, specifically, were not close friends. Not even close enough to be friends.

And she bumps into him after years without speaking to him, and basically asks for Carmy's number. Carmy's in a social situation where it would be somewhat rude, and very awkward, to deny her, and Claire is aware that's the case, and purposefully exploits it.

Then later, she finds out he gave her a fake number. She's an intelligent person. She knows it wasn't by mistake. And what does she do? She goes to fucking Fak and gets his real number, which she knows Carmy doesn't want her to have, and then calls Carmy and asks him why he gave her a fake number as if that isn't? Self-explanatory? Why do people usually give fake numbers, Claire?

And once again, she's putting him in this position where it would be very rude, and very awkward, to say, "I didn't give you my real number because I didn't want you to have my real number." She's already aware that he wasn't able to bring himself to do the rude and awkward thing the first time - she knows he won't be able to this time either. And then she has the audacity to tell him not to "make it weird," and ask him if he's actually okay with her having his number, when she knows he wouldn't feel comfortable telling her the truth!

What is wrong with her? If she were a male character we would all rightfully hate her. We would all readily recognize that this behavior is inappropriate, stalker-like behavior. And what's most infuriating about it is most women have been in this situation before, where a guy has asked them for their number and they didn't feel safe or comfortable outright saying, "No." Most women have given fake numbers, especially young, conventionally attractive women like Claire. You can't tell me that Claire has never given a fake number before.

And then? What does she do? She excuses her own inappropriate behavior by telling him that the only reason she's calling is to ask him to help her move? Are you fucking kidding me? First of all, "Can you help me move?" is the kind of question you generally only ask people who are pretty close to you, because you're aware it's a laborious and unenjoyable thing to do. But on top of that, she's supposedly asking Carmy because she knows that Carmy at one point owned a truck and might still own that truck. The same truck Neil Fak could just as easily drive! Why the fuck are you asking Carmy to help you move in case he still owns that truck, when you could ask Fak, who you are much closer to? Like? You're really going to ask someone you haven't spoken to in years, who you just happened to bump into, and who very obviously intentionally gave you a fake number, to help you move? When you already know he's not comfortable turning you down?! What is wrong with her? How fucking entitled is that?

And one thing that is frustrating is how even though we are meant to root against Carmy and Claire's relationship, and there's purposeful foreshadowing of its end, and even narrative hints that Claire isn't right for Carmy, and that she's an antagonist in this story - I don't think we're supposed to have a problem with her behavior. I don't think any of this was meant to contribute to us not liking her, or not wanting Carmy to be with her. I really think we were supposed to be endeared by all of this and think it's all perfectly normal flirtation, and not manipulative and predatory behavior.

What's more is that the heart of this story isn't about a man opening a restaurant, or a man falling in love - it's about a man learning to recover from trauma. If you found the lowest common denominator of this story and simplified it, that's what this story would be about. A mentally ill man healing.

I just rewatched the freezer scene. It is alarming - but all of it says more about how Carmy perceives himself, than how he sees Claire, or their relationship, or love. All of it is a neon sign advertising Carmy's severe mental state, and it is obvious this man needs help. He needs support. He needs reassurance from loved ones.

I understand why Claire hearing what Carmy said would be hurtful. I understand why she would be upset. I understand why she would be questioning their relationship.

And still, I think, you really just heard Carmy, this man you supposedly love, say all that - and you're just going to leave him like that? You're just going to leave and not reach out again at any point?

And especially with Claire, who is a medical professional working in the fucking emergency room. I would bet on a daily basis she gets people in the emergency room who are in a state of mental distress. Who are thinking about killing themselves, or have attempted to kill themselves. She knows what mental illness looks like, how it manifests, and the way it makes people think!

And she just left! She just left because she took it all personally and made it all about herself and how it affected her!

You can't tell me that woman ever loved Carmy. You can't even tell me that woman ever knew Carmy.

And if this was all it took - one single glimpse into Carmy's trauma - to make her leave, she was never, ever going to be right for Carmy. She was never, ever going to be what Carmy needed. She was never, ever going to be "healthy" for him, or "peace."

Sydney has glimpsed Carmy's trauma on multiple occasions now. She glimpsed it in season 1, when she and Carmy had only begun to have a mutual respect and investment in each other on an acquaintance shared-workspace level - and even though Syd left too, she came back. She came back even when Carmy's symptoms then were being purposefully directed at her and others - whereas Claire was never supposed to hear what Carmy was saying in the freezer. Syd came back even though they weren't committed in the same way, even though she wasn't supposedly in love with him, and even though what she got was worse. And she's been in that same position multiple times since, to different degrees - but nonetheless. She always knows her worth, and what she deserves - but it never means abandoning Carmy completely. It never means making his problems about her.

Fuck Claire so much, honestly. I'm so glad she's gone. This is just another way it is so obvious it was always, always going to be Sydney.

[endlich-allein]

Interview with Till about his life: he fought with his father, killed his beloved dog, swam on a wild river and worked on suffering. How Till Lindemann's mind works

"I will finish you off" and why you fought for the German army.

Werner Lindemann wanders around the room, interrupting the silence with strange questions, writing something down. His motive is to get to know his son and make him a friend. But it's complicated. Generational conflict.

"My island of tranquility is shaken every day. The day before yesterday, a guy pulled on my socks because his were torn. Yesterday he didn't put out a single lamp in the house. Now, with voluptuous delight, he spits cherry pits into the cat's fur. Is this grown boy really an adult?"

The apprenticeship in Rostock, where you have to do window production after graduation, is the limit of boredom. Till Lindemann moved to his father in the countryside so that he could forget about the hustle and bustle of the city and not fall under the article for anti-social attitudes. He thought of a new life, in which there was no pointless work, and arranged an attic in his father's house.

In the mornings over coffee, he scolded life that everything went according to schedule. And listened very loudly to music - electronics and metal. My father didn't understand and grumbled: “I matured late. Naturally, I wanted to listen to the music I liked, but I could not get my hands on these records. For example, my father did not understand when I bought the Alice Cooper record for a month's salary.

Werner Lindemann was a children's writer who went through the war.

At the height of his career he disappeared for weeks on literary tours - his fame spread to teachers and librarians across the country. His father pecked at Lindemann for refusing to work and promised to turn him in:

"My willful child. What doesn't fit his standards is rejected as nonsense or crap." So he took a job as a carpenter, where he made shovel cuttings and cart wheels. The head foreman constantly drank vodka during the day, didn't want to be annoyed with questions and addressed the long-haired Lindemann with the nickname: "Mozart!" This suited him.

Werner Lindemann talked about war, hard existence and limitations. For example, about a grenade splinter that remained in his body. Lindemann did not believe in all these stories - but categorically did not accept service, war and murder:

“After that I objected: “I would hide, I would not go to war. Why did you even let yourself be dragged into this? You could have hidden."

And he said: “It didn't work out. They searched for it and it took away."

Then I said: “I would rather go under arrest. Never in my life, I would go to the front line to shoot people. It's against my nature. It would be better if I went to jail."

Much of the time father and son were simply silent, even while watching television.

"He regularly made me feel guilty, to say the least, he placed himself on a pedestal towards me: I shouldn't complain. At your age, I ran barefoot through the stubble, and in my stomach - a potato in a uniform."

The only acceptance is Mike Oldfield's music: "One day my father came to grumble again. At that moment I was listening to Mike Oldfield, and he sat down and said: "That sounds interesting."

For me it was like a quantum leap: my father sits in my room, listens to my music and thinks it was good. Probably because of melancholy. He was sitting in a rocking chair that I made myself - at the time I was working as a carpenter on a farm. I, too, always sat in an armchair, immersed myself in music and smoked hand-rolled cigarettes."

The conflict was intensified by a fight. Lindemann bought a Trabant car, installed speakers in it and tested the sound - loud as usual. “Then my father came and I had to turn off this fucking music. It was kind of loud for him. He was then fiddling around his cases of flowers, and then suddenly the situation escalated. I think he slapped me while I was still in the car.

He leaned toward me and hit me with the back of his hand. I made some bullshit remarks like, "Leave me alone," something like that. That was a provocation to him, and he said: "If you do that again, I'll hit you for real." And I said, "Then you'll get it back. Because you're crazy. Don't you dare to hit me anymore."

And then he hit me with his palm again. He wasn't controlling himself.

He was exalting himself. Instantly he introduced himself as a boxer - he had boxed in the Hitler Youth - and I just... I thought I didn't hit him, I just pushed him away. And then he stood in front of me again, "Come on, I'll finish you, you haven't got a chance!" Somehow. After that, he went up to the attic and threw all my stuff out the window.

It happened over the weekend, my sister was there, a lot of screaming, serious drama. Then I packed my things, put them in the car, went to a friend's house and never went into his house again. At first I lived with this friend, and a week later I bought myself a house in the village."

His father's book is about his son, which the son will only open up after the death of the father.

Lindemann is a late child. He was born when his father was 36. The gap in their relationship was felt in everyday life and perception of the world. Werner Lindemann woke up early in the morning, worked with the circular saw under the windows and did not understand when his son slept until noon after a working week.

Lindemann's parents then lived separately, but kept in touch. Mom worked as a journalist and discussed her texts with his father. "She still lived in Rostock and always came to see him only on weekends. Mostly on Sundays she came back quite early, because she couldn't stand the stress of being with him, either."

In 1988, the book “Mike Oldfield im Schaukelstuhl Notizen eines Vaters" In this book, Lindemann Senior describes the relationship with his son (whom he calls Timm in the book), who settled with him at the age of 18. The book was written in the 80s and laid on the table until the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany were reunited.

Werner Lindemann wanted his son to take up writing too. But this only amused him, although as a child he wrote poetry. At the age of 13, little Till Lindemann and his father were returning home along the bumpy road to Mecklenburg. They talked about career self-determination:

"You should already have thoughts about what you want to become, boy." My answer: "I don't know yet, maybe a fisherman on the high seas."

But immediately, no matter what I said, objections arose: “But then you have to get a certificate of maturity. But then you will be away all the time. But then you won't be able to start a relationship."

There was always a “but”.

At some point it got on my nerves, as usual. And I said: "Worst case scenario, I'll just become a writer.

I still remember how alienated his face became. "And what do you think then, what do I do! It's a very hard job! In fact, it's not even a job, it's a passion. And it's a job that's supposed to be enjoyable."

I said, "I don't know anybody who works with pleasure."

"Yeah, that's the problem. You have to look for a job that gives you pleasure." Then I say again, "But some people never get to choose..." This gigantic discussion happened because I didn't take his profession seriously. At the same time, he was completely lost, funny!"

Lindemann thoughtfully read his father's book, in which he comprehends their relationship, after his death. Faked for hidden anger and indecision. For example, in a situation where their dog Kurt was bitten by a fox. The father was frightened because of rabies: “At the same time, we did not even know whether he was bitten by a fox or not. The father immediately called the huntsman. But I said: no one will enter this courtyard and shoot the dog. I'll do it myself if I really need it. At some point I really had to kill the dog."

Lindemann is not a monster. The animals he fiddled with are an important attribute of childhood. He had an aquarium and hamsters, brought mice and rats home, and was friends with dogs. “Like many children of new buildings, he felt the need for someone alive, in need of love,” said Werner Lindemann. Sometimes the appearance of an animal in the house was surprising:

“This guy will never say what he's up to. He appears on the doorstep at the same time as me. He gets out from his vehicle, throws his coat open and puts a young black shepherd in my hands. "Your Christmas present!"

Till's father is speechless. My son stands before me like the sun's little brother. Touchingly concerned, he directs me into the house, working out a plan for the animal husbandry, accommodation and diet of our new pet housemate.

With confusion, a question flies from my lips, "Wheredid you get the dog from?" "Timm" is gibbering, "Imagine, the mason in the barnyard wanted to hang him, simply wanted to strangle him with a rope, said he was a worthless eater..."

Werner Lindemann died of stomach cancer in 1993, when his son was 30. They didn't finally reconcile, but Till visited him in his last days and was there for him with his mother: "They couldn't be without each other, even though they lived apart. Unreal, but my mother never had another man afterwards. To this day she can't let go of him."

- Not going to the Olympics in Moscow and ending up in the German ghetto

Lindemann had the knowledge and the potential to be a swimmer. And a shyness that pounded harder three days before the competition than concerts in front of crowds of thousands. "I know how difficult it is to develop willpower and stamina and instill those attributes. In the GDR this was instilled in us by coaches and so-called functionaries."

Lindemann came to swimming at the age of eight and devoted his entire youth to the sport. He would get up for training at five in the morning and pass out in the evening. His grandmother watched him from the stands. At a competition in Leipzig she shouted at the coach, who told Lindemann off for a poor result. The grandmother took the coach by the ear and said: "How do you talk to my grandson?"

Sports tightened up his upbringing and developed self-discipline. “Drilling - probably the boy has already received this experience as a swimmer,” Lindemann's father wrote. - Once he had to take second place in a competition, but by no means first place. Of course, he got carried away, forgot about it, became the first, thanks to which he received a shouting for indiscipline. And whenever he lost in the future, his coach would torture him at practice for a long time and yelled at him: "Even if you win, you're not a winner yet!"

Lindemann swam the 1.5 km freestyle and could have gone to the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. Everything was ruined when he left the hotel without permission during a competition in Florence: "I didn't want to run, but just wanted to look at the city. Cars, bikes, girls. I was caught and kicked out of the team, but then I didn't give the required results either."

Lindemann competed at the European Junior Championships, but did not go any higher. After the story in Florence, his career in sport slipped away. Perhaps an abdominal injury influenced his departure. Lindemann is gone, but he doesn't yearn: "I was relatively young. There were no good [memories] left. I was glad it was over."

"The hardest part was getting back to normal. I fell into a real hole. My home was no longer a sports school, but a ghetto in Rostock. Now I stood out through drinking and fighting. I used to be surrounded only by beautiful ladies who were interested in swimming. Now I had fierce women standing in front of me asking, "How come you don't drink?" When I was shy about approaching a girl, it was interpreted as: "Are you gay?"

Lindemann now works with a coach and swims a few kilometers before his tours to get in shape: "When I exercise, I feel a certain lightness - not only physically, but also mentally. I just feel better. The main problem is staying in shape. That's where self-discipline comes into play. Teeth grinding is important."

- Three weeks in the wild and loneliness as a creative tool

Emotionally, concerts = sports:

"How do I go on tour? Hungry. And happy. It is good to compare concerts with sport. You don't want to do both at first. You don't want to go on stage. You don't want to go to the pool. You don't want to go to the boxing ring. It all happens with reluctance. It has to be accepted somehow, that's life: spring, summer, fall, winter.

When it's done, winter's gone, the blooming begins, greenery appears, it gets bright, and you start to get a taste for it. When it's over, you feel happy. Then the body produces a sea of chemistry, a lot of happiness hormones. I think the body rewards itself."

The stage, like sports, is an embarrassment, but a necessity. Lindemann wore dark glasses in order to collect fewer views from the audience. Therefore, a couple of steps before the water, he looked at the pool with a shiver. You need to cope with yourself in order to open up to new emotions.

Lindemann's gut requires solitude and moderate solitude. This is the point:

“Loneliness is always good for a creative push - you drink a glass of wine and you feel even shitier. Art is not complete without suffering; art exists to compensate for suffering."

With his friend Joey Kelly, Lindemann spent three weeks on the Yukon River. They paddled through the wilderness in a kayak for eight to 10 hours each and lived in a tent. Lindemann didn't take a tape recorder with him, so he transferred the lyrics wandering in his head on paper.

They were catching inspiration and atmosphere:

"There were times when we wouldn't say a word for hours, but then: look there, look there! It was breathtakingly beautiful. These relatively fast-changing panoramas and skies, layers of clouds, the colors.

Except for a few bears and wolves, it's hard to see anyone else out there, it's exhilarating. Along the way we saw two hunters setting traps. No one else.

I grew up in the countryside, and I have a very strong connection to nature. I love fishing, hunting. It's an archaic experience that I like to revisit over and over again. When I'm in the city for too long, I start to miss it."

To recreate situations in the Yukon, Lindemann and Kelly trained for nine months on the Rhine river in Germany because of its liveliness.

"We went down the Rhine to where the transport ships create huge bow waves. If we hadn't had a coach with us, we probably would have been sunk by the side wave impact already during our first attempt," Lindemann said.

Together with Kelly, he had four sessions with two coaches and swam from Cologne to Koblenz [more than 100 kilometers by car]. Lindemann trained separately each week on the lakes in Mecklenburg. It's both physically challenging and savage identical to being natural.

In 2015, Till started his solo project Lindemann. On the album Skills In Pills, the song Yukon was released, in which the lyrics appeared first, and then the music.

- "My lyrics come from pain rather than desire."

The country boy is big and not much of a talker. That's how the Rammstein members saw him at the start, when they were hanging out at home. "He looked cool, like a big peasant talking one sentence an hour," keyboard player Christian "Flake" Lorenz recalled. - He always had food and vodka. He'd just steal a couple of ducks somewhere and cook them on a tray. And then, frozen like in Sleeping Beauty, there were people lying in corners and on trunks in his house."

Lindemann loves and appreciates home gatherings. This came from my father, who always had guests. “In my opinion, this is the little bit that I inherited from him. Throwing parties and gathering people. Throwing parties and getting people together. He just enjoyed being a good host. The house was always full of guests from Leipzig, from Rostock, foreign guests, even from Kazakhstan.

It was always exciting for him. He stood at the stove, cooked, bought an abundance of wine, and there was always a fire in the garden. At some point he stopped drinking, then he left the party at 21:00 and the whole company continued to feast. And in the morning he got up at four, cleaned and tidied up."

Till Lindemann is about self-digging, overcoming and childish shyness, which is covered by a pumped-up figure of a swimmer. This is how Lindemann decrypts himself:

• “And I really am like a big child - ill-mannered, but harmless. People think that I am always strong, explosive. This is not true. I am sensitive and easily hurt, but in love I am romantic and passionate."

• “At the very beginning, you sit somewhere in a dark room, open a bottle of wine and figure out how to make the lyrics popular with the music. At first you only have a vague idea of ​​what it could be.

And when, three years after recording, mixing, and more mixing, developing the artwork, all this nonsense, then you stand on stage, and what you came up with then really works, when you manage to get 20 thousand people to raise their hands, then you experience incredible sensations."

• “Art is a kind of therapy.

When I feel that something is arising inside me, domineering and is most often dark, I need to give it a way out, otherwise it will simply crush me. So destruction and self-destruction are the two pillars on which my creativity is based.

But everyone chooses this for himself.

• “My lyrics arise from feelings and dreams, but still more from pain than by desire. I often have nightmares, and I wake up at night sweating, as I see terrible bloody scenes in my dreams. My lyrics are a kind of valve for the lava of feelings in my soul.

We are all struggling to hide behind good manners and outward decency, but in fact we are governed by instincts and feelings: hunger, thirst, horror, hatred, the desire for power and sex. Of course, there is also additional energy in us - this is love. Without it, all human feelings would fade away."

- "When you're constantly living someone else's life, it's very hard to get back into your own skin. I like that in principle, but sometimes you start to get confused - are you out of a role or not yet. You're already Till, or you're still a homicidal maniac."

- "I hate the noise. I hate the chatter. I expose myself to it, which is pure masochism. And then I have to protect myself from it. Noise makes you crazy. You die in it."

• “I think there is no God. And if he is and actually allows all the misfortunes on this earth, then he must punish me along with other sufferings. I will not pray to such a god."

This is how the members of Rammstein see Till - flexible and with a split personality:

Guitarist Paul Landers: "Till is so good that when you let him know that his lyrics should go in a different direction, the very next day he brings a new version of the song."

Guitarist Richard Kruspe: “He's a hell of an extreme man. He dives very deeply into situations where I cannot follow him. Everything he does is very extreme; I don't know anyone who does it. "

Drummer Christoph Schneider: "I would not want to be in Till's shoes: his soul is tormented by doubts and contradictions, he is equally a moralist and a monster."

June 1, 2021 - Translate by Lindemann Belgium

[iamanartichoke]

I wasn't sure if I was going to post this, but I may as well.

I keep starting to reply to things and then stopping bc the words just aren't there, and I suppose I figured out the core of what bothers me so much (and is making me have such a rollercoaster of a fan experience) about the show.

(cut for length)

It's not well-written. My opinion is my opinion, so I'm saying this subjectively, take it or leave it, but ... I feel that it's not well-written. The overall story is fine, and the plot is fine, but I don't know if it's because of the limited number of episodes not being enough to house the story, or because of the relative inexperience of the writer/showrunner+director, or both, or something else, but -

In an earlier reaction post to episode 4, I mentioned really wanting to sink my teeth into all of the subtext I picked up on. That was what made me initially enjoy the episode so much - there were a lot of little moments that I initially felt revealed so much about the characters and about Loki, and I wanted to analyze them. But at some point, as I gathered more information, my perspective changed and now I no longer want to analyze the subtext bc ... subtext = good. Subtext w/out payoff = not as good.

I'll go into more detail in a moment, but I think the tl;dr of it is that I feel like the narrative requires the audience to work way too hard to put together all of the moving pieces here and, like, I kinda just don't want to do that work? Not so much of it, and not in vain. A lot of the enjoyment of Loki's characterization is coming from fans who are rationalizing why he's behaving as he is, but the narrative never actually confirms those rationalizations. It's asking us to figure it out and maybe our conclusions will be correct but maybe they won't, though. At some point, subtext isn't enough without explicit follow-through.

I thought my issue was with the lack of character development - that is, not having enough narrative space to really earn the big things that are happening now, like Loki/Sylvie or Mobius turning against the TVA. And that's still true, to an extent; I still feel like the pacing is all very off and it seems like most of these things kinda came out of nowhere (but are not unbelievable - just undeveloped).

But, yknow, it is what it is, it's a limited series, and I can excuse some things. Ultimately, my issue isn't a problem with what the narrative isn't doing, it's a problem with what the narrative already failed to do and probably cannot recover from at this point.

The narrative has left out significant details that should at least help us do some of the work here. If a person turned on Loki and started episode 1 and had no background knowledge of the character besides that he tried to take over New York - how would that person interpret Loki? Would that person say, oh, well, he's been through X, Y, and Z, and plus A happened, not to mention B, C, and D, so really, it makes sense that he seems off-the-rails, or that he'd want to get ridiculously drunk at the worst time ever.

Maybe we'd like to believe they would, but how would they be getting to that conclusion? The narrative hasn't led them in that direction so, no, they would not say well we have to consider this, this, and that. It would be impossible to really understand Loki as a character from just what we've gotten in the series. The general audience would probably interpret Loki as being out of his element and so it becomes, I wonder how this character is going to get the upper hand here. And, while that's not wrong, it's just so limited.

The narrative at face value does not address Loki's identity crisis from Thor 2011. It does not address his hurt and devastation at being lied to, nor does it address how complicated his self-image is (bc it sucked to begin with and that was before he found out he was part of a race of "monsters," as he'd been taught his entire life). It does not reference Loki being so broken at the end of Thor 2011 that he deliberately let himself fall into the void of space (aka tried to kill himself). It does not reference that he was tortured by Thanos or even that he went through a seriously dark time in between Thor and Avengers, and it absolutely does not reference or address any influence or control of the mind stone.

These are all things that we, the fan audience, know because we've already invested our time into this character's story. But tons of people, the general audience, wouldn't know these things. Or if they did, bc they saw Thor and Avengers, they wouldn't be thinking about them as deeply as we would, nor contextualizing them with how Loki is behaving now, or why it would make sense that he needed to get drunk, or why it's understandable that he needs to keep going-going-going in order to not have a spare second to think or feel.

They'd probably look at Loki, again, as a character who was a villain and is now getting his comeuppance in a place where he has no power or control, and no literal powers, and even when he manages to escape and catch up to the variant, he proceeds to fuck up their plan for seemingly no real reason except that he wanted to get drunk bc he's hedonistic. Which Sylvie even berates him for! I mean. This is not exactly a complex character breakdown, nor a very flattering one, but that's what the narrative has given us.

(If the narrative has addressed Loki's mind control, his torture, his mental breakdown, his suicide attempt, and his general shitty self-esteem as a result of his upbringing, please point it out to me. If the narrative has explicitly acknowledged and referenced these things anywhere and I am missing it, please show me where. Please explain to me how the casual viewer would know any of these things that they need to know in order to actually understand what's happening in this story.)

So I mean, okay, we have a narrative that doesn't paint a full, accurate picture of Loki. Fine, sure. But because the general audience starts out on the wrong footing, they're not going to get out of the overall story what the writers probably intended them to. For example, in episode 3, a lot of us theorized that Loki had some kind of plan - that he broke the timepad on purpose, for some reason, bc otherwise it wasn't believable that he'd be such a failure. But episode 4 revealed that no, there was no bigger plan, Loki just plain old messed up. Which is fine if, again, one is only considering the surface-level portrayal here, but it's not true to Loki's actual characterization.

I mean. Loki is not perfect and Loki actually fails a lot, this is true. He fails for a lot of reasons, but incompetence has never been one of them. Usually it's that either things grew beyond his control, or there ended up being too many moving parts, or he had to change his plan at the last minute due to some roadblock or another being thrown his way, or even that he got in his own way - whatever the case may be for his plans' failures, he was always at least shown to know what he was doing.

That wasn't the case here. The "plan" to fix the Timepad failed as a direct result of Loki's actions, which were careless and made him seem incompetent, like he couldn't even handle this mission. "You had one job," etc. And there were pretty big consequences for this; they were not able to get off-world in time and would have been killed had the TVA not shown up at the last second.

And maybe none of these things matter bc the writers never intended any of this to be a reflection on Loki's character, positive or negative. The situation exists solely because the writers needed to put Loki and Sylvie together in some kind of hopeless scenario so that they could get closer, and thus the narrative could set up their romance. I get that - but, there were other ways to do it that didn't require Loki to look foolish.

Furthermore, the whole reason they needed to set up the romance is to show Loki eventually learning to love himself (like, figuratively but also literally). The audience is supposed to gather that Loki and Sylvie fell for one another, possibly due to the high emotional aspect of, yknow, being about to die (in addition to the variant-bond). The intent is clear: Loki and Sylvie almost die but get rescued at the last minute, having now created an emotional bond --> Loki and Sylvie team up and the narrative further establishes that Loki, at least, has caught feelings --> Loki might confess them but is pruned before he gets the chance --> he somehow survives, he and Sylvie are reunited and don't want to lose one another again, and the combined power of their love is enough to break the sacred timeline and spawn the multiverse, and the reason that the power of their love is so, well, powerful is because it's about self-love and self-acceptance as much as it is about having the capacity to love someone else. The end.

I get all that. The writers more or less said all that. And, I mean, it's certainly not the way I would have chosen to go about it, but it's a fair enough arc to explore. I don't really have an issue with the intent - but my question, however, is this: if the narrative has so far not addressed Loki's background issues (as outlined above), and has furthermore kinda gone out of its way to portray Loki as hedonistic and narcissistic, among other things (like kinda incompetent), and the context the audience starts with is that Loki's this villain who deserves what he gets -

- my question is 1, why should the audience care whether or not Loki gets to a point of loving and accepting himself (thus to make the theme of self-love, via the romance, hold weight) if they don't know that he hates himself to begin with and 2, why should the audience root for Loki to reach that point when so far the perception of him is that he's "kind of an asshole"? if he's a hedonistic narcissist, he probably already has a pretty inflated sense of himself, right? A misplaced inflated sense of himself, at that, because, again, the narrative has made him out to be not that capable of much of anything. (And it didn't start out that way! It seemed to start out with Loki being capable and intelligent but it's like episode 3, in trying to set up the romance, just jumbled it all up somewhere. I think this is why I'm harping on the Loki/Sylvie aspect so much - it's frustrating bc it kinda messes up the whole story and can't even accomplish what it's supposed to anyway.)

Anyway, that's beside the point. What I'm ultimately getting at is, at what point is the audience supposed to get invested in Loki's personal growth journey?

They can't, not really. Without understanding and having the context of everything Loki has been through up until now, and why he hates himself, and why it's so important that he learn to love himself, then the "payoff" becomes kinda pointless bc the significance of it is lost in translation. So suddenly we're left with this romance that comes off as either "Loki loves Sylvie bc of Reasons" (best-case scenario) or "Loki loves Sylvie bc he's vain, narcissistic, and kinda twisted" (worst-case scenario). Neither of these conclusions are what the writers intended or were going for, I'm positive, but there we are, regardless.

In order for the writers' intent in these storylines to land, they need to address the context of what makes these particular stakes high for Loki. So far, they haven't done that. They're asking the audience to pick up on all of these things, and they're showing things that subtextually make sense and are relatively in-character - but only if you realize there's subtext in the first place.

But you can't expect the audience to do all of the work for you. If you don't want the audience to think that Loki is a narcissistic asshole and instead you are trying to convey that, worst-case scenario, he thinks he's a narcissist but is an unreliable narrator, then you have to address that. If you need the audience to understand why you're going the selfcest route and why it's important to explore Loki's capacity to love himself and others, you have to address where that exploration is starting from and why it matters. Etc etc etc.

The narrative isn't doing any of that. And it isn't like it'd be that hard to do it. They don't need to reinvent the wheel here; a lot of the pieces are already there. A few lines of dialogue for context, a brief scene here or there addressing the issues, a little more care and consistency in how Loki handles things - these are all little things that could go a long fucking way in making the narrative stronger.

I'm rambling. My basic point is that my rollercoaster of emotions with this show is because

- as a part of the fan audience, not the general one, I can contextualize and analyze the subtext and come to the conclusions the show wants me to, and thus find the story and the characters more or less enjoyable,

- but I am also going to be using the subtext to come to conclusions that aren't there but probably should be (I think it would be a better story, for example, for Loki to confuse platonic love with romantic love bc it would pave the way to explore just how fucked up Loki's understanding of love - whether of other people or of himself, and the different forms it can take - actually is)

- and when they're ultimately not there, then I think, okay why am I bothering doing all this work just to ultimately feel very unfulfilled? They don't even have to write it the way I would, I'm not saying that, but they do have to do something to make the story feel rewarding.

If we don't get some confirmation of what Loki's been through, and where his headspace is, and why it matters for him to love himself, then the story remains pretty shallow and, for me, it's not fulfilling enough. It's not engaging enough. There isn't actually anything to sink my teeth into, so it becomes kind of boring. Maybe it's rewarding to other people, and that's great for them, but like - I need more than whatever this is.

So I'm just like - well, I had a lot of worries about this show, but my being bored wasn't one of them and now there's only two episodes left and am I really not going to get anything out of this, in the long run? No new canons, no new depths or layers, no new information on Loki's experiences? This is it?

I don't dislike it. I didn't start out disliking it, and I probably wont end up disliking it. I mean, there are a lot of good moments, and good things, and fan service-y things that I appreciate. As far as inspiration for fic goes, it's a goldmine, both plot-wise as well as aesthetic-wise. All of that is great. I don't dislike this show.

But I am disappointed in it, and I feel like I'll be watching the next two episodes lacking the sense of anticipation that would make it exciting. I'll still enjoy them, probably, if for nothing else just the sheer Loki content, but whatever it was I felt watching episodes 1 and 2 is gone and I'm sad about that, too. Because I really wanted to feel fulfilled by this series; I wanted it to fill up the void that Loki's death in IW created three years ago. And I just ... don't feel it. Maybe, maybe that'll change over the course of episodes 5 and 6. I don't know.

Everything that I end up enjoying long-term, I think, will come about as a result of my own interpretations and analysis and while theoretically there's nothing wrong with that, if I had known all I'd get out of this series was more headcanons or support for my current headcanons then, well - that's fine, I suppose, but I'll definitely a little bit robbed.

[henrysglock]

And adding onto that: Victor, Henry, and NINA all tell really different but definitely connected stories.

Victor doesn't go into too much detail about Henry, but he does verbally describe him as sensitive and film-wise we're shown that he's artistic. These are traits he shares with Will, who we all know is a sweetheart. That, plus the fact that Victor is clearly in shambles about both his and Alice's deaths, leads me to believe that Victor liked whoever young Henry was.

So...whoever young Henry was, he was likable on some level. However, we also know he's not able to hide his true self very well. His teachers and doctors said there was something wrong with him (but we don't know what, exactly, that perception of wrongness was based on), and he clearly didn't have many friends near the end. WHatever was "wrong" with him, he couldn't hide it. Victor was involved, just not on the right path. He was, to a certain extent, in tune with his son.

Victor likely knew about Henry's weird tendencies and still described him kindly. Victor isn't the type of guy who would enjoy sadism/psychopathic behavior. I mean, just look at how he feels over an accident.

So, to recap: Henry's not good at hiding his social "wrongness", but whatever it was it wasn't bad enough for Victor to dislike his son.

The main proof people use for Henry being a little sadist is the rabbit scene, and while it may look really damning on first watch...let's break it down.

Right off the bat, Henry didn't even look like he was enjoying whatever was going on with that rabbit, despite him verbally describing his fascination and intrigue with expanding his skill set. In fact, visually, he's frowning. There's no sadistically intrigued gleam, no awed fascination, not even a hint of a smile. You'd think if he was discovering something really cool, if he was testing out new abilities, he'd at least look positively engaged. Instead, we get this:

Distinct frown, face shadowed, eyelids lowered, eyebrows furrowed. No glint. No enjoyment.

His expression in the rabbit scene is very reminiscent of him as an orderly when 002 is being shocked by Brenner, which he canonically does not enjoy:

Same furrowed brow, same frown, eyelids lowered, face Shadowed. No glint. No enjoyment.

The thing is, Jamie and Raphael do a really good job of matching expressions/mannerisms. They're both talented and reliable actors, and we can see that shine through in other scenes where Henry’s displaying a concrete like/dislike of something.

Let's look at other scenes were Henry isn't enjoying himself.

Henry's not enjoying himself when:

He's being harmed, or someone in his same situation is being harmed in a cruel and unusual way (Empathy Win!)

When he or someone in his same situation is being forced to comply to rules that are perceived as harmful and ill-fitting. (Empathy Win 2: Electric Boogaloo!)

Clear frown, slightly different eyebrows (but matching between the the two actors), but still generally unhappy. Mind you, neither of these scenes result in personal gain.

Henry gets no brownie points for looking upset that 002 is being tortured. No one is looking at him but us. Everyone else, El included, is focused on 002. He has no reason to pretend like he cares. This is him when he's not being watched. And then, Henry gets no added assistance from El when he decides he's going to break out by force. He literally puts her out of commission. He's not convincing her to help him kill or telling her what to do, all he's doing is alerting her to his plan. There's no resistance from El, she doesn't want to be caught up in the violence. She already trusts him. He's getting no extra brownie points for this. Brownie points have been maxed out already.

(Both of these shots of adult Henry exist solely to showcase his pre-absorption empathy, while the matching shots of young Henry exist to highlight his distinct lack thereof post-absorption by showing us that he has experience basis for empathetic reactions, but...y'all aren't ready for that discussion.)

I'm so normal about this.

Anyway, moving on.

For contrast, here's Henry being fascinated by something and enjoying it:

First, he's looking at his spiders, studying them, trying to find out more about them, and enjoying it. This is even more supported by the sunlight streaming in in the background. This is young Henry enjoying himself. Later, he's looking at El's plinko game. He's trying to find out more about her, and he's enjoying it.

The same open stare, eyes wide, eyebrows raised, the same almost-smile, the only difference is that in one he's peering at something tiny and in the other it's a whole sheet of wood (hence the slight difference in eyebrows).

"Well...young Henry is just exerting himself and/or concentrating, that’s why he’s not looking happy".

Okay, so lets see Henry exerting himself pre-absorption:

Not the same face. He's completely scrunched up when he's attacking the guards. Literally every feature is scrunched up.

We don't even get a comparison shot of young Henry truly exerting himself by attacking Virginia! We don't see his face. We see him probe about the radio, looking anxious. This is self defense. He's afraid.

Then we see only Virginia. The next time we see Henry? He's about to pass out.

Look at the unevenness of his eyes, the slackness of his face. He's not present. Victor has to physically pick him up. Henry's already finished with whatever he was going to do to Virginia by the next time we see him.

We don't get a companion shot of exertion, even in the perfect place to include one.

There's a lack of...anything, really, to tell me Henry is a sadistic little boy.

So, I want to look at a time when:

We see Henry kill on screen. (not just implied)

He’s enjoying the kill.

He’s not on the verge of passing out. (i.e. the dinner table scene)

The best shot for that is this. Here’s Henry enjoying violence/inflicting pain:

See the slight smile, the way his eyes are wide and have that malicious glint, the way he stares for half a second to savor the moment? He wants to hurt this lead guard. He’s enjoying it. It brings him satisfaction. ([S3 Will voice] And I don't blame him!)

Mind you, this isn’t Vecna-Henry. The absorption hasn't happened yet.

This is Henry in the split-second before he starts absorbing people. This is entirely Henry’s enjoyment of killing someone. There’s no one else influencing his behavior yet.

In fact, this is the only scene we have of him outwardly enjoying violence without also having other, canonically sadistic and brutal, people irreversibly and completely meshed into his own psyche.

We never see Henry, uninfluenced, enjoying violence except for this one scene where he's killing a threat/abuser.

Even his descriptions to Nancy and to El are all biased by other people.

He's the very definition of an unreliable narrator! He's been in a lab specializing in molding people's self-perceptions for twenty years.

Biased 32-year-old Henry claims he was so fascinated, paints it as himself pushing his boundaries and discovering new abilities...but 12-year-old Henry doesn't even look like he's seeing something cool.

He's not happy. There's zero positivity in his expression. Raphael Luce is a good actor. He easily could have pulled off at least the barest spark of enjoyment. A small quirk of the lips, eyes open wider, anything. He doesn't, though. Whatever young Henry's doing...he's not enjoying it. It's not giving sadistic little boy, it's giving "there's something else going on here".

All this to say: I don't think he was a scary-weird kid. I think he was just...weird. Reclusive, maybe. Introverted, definitely. But mostly...just plain old weird.

I really, really want to know how other people saw Henry, because an objective lens for at least one full scene would be great.

Me, knowing the Creels were in Hawkins for ~2 years and that Henry Creel and Scott Clarke would've been around the same age: I need Mr. Clarke to at least once be like "Henry Creel?? You mean the weird quiet kid who got brutally murdered when we were all in 7th grade??"

[austajunk]

Please PLEASE go into detail about how protective he is over Chiaki!! I literally am begging to finally hear someone else actually acknowledge their friendship/relationship especially after having to deal with a pretty toxic anti-bi/pan Nagito rper I was on a server with for a good part of a year! (Sorry went kinda ranty but hopefully my anguish is understandable!)

Oh my lord, you’re giving me a chance to shine with my fixations?! I can’t thank you enough! Now, please understand that this is based on my perception of the series as I’ve played through the second game twice. I’m pretty good when it comes to being the person who has unpopular opinions and ships and I know claiming that Nagito is bi/pan/Demi is probably one of them. But honestly, it comes from the desire to see this boy get as much love as possible. Because he sure needs it.

Ultimately, Nagito’s sexuality is never canonly specified, so I think whether gay, bisexual, Pansexual, or what have you, we’re all well within our rights to just have fun and see what we want to in a really flawed and relatable character. And that’s what makes it interesting.

That being said, let’s talk about Nagito and Chiaki. Friendship or romantic, I don’t think you can deny that Chiaki is at least special to Nagito in some way.

Upon replaying the second game, I’ve realized how protective Nagito actually is towards Chiaki interestingly enough.

In chapter 2, she leaves to go question Fuyuhiko but Nagito stops her and tells her not to let Fuyuhiko get rough with her. Every time Chiaki’s skills help them advance, he deeply praises her. Even after he’s stopped praising all the others (which he does mostly after Chapter one, hinting he does not like some of them as actual people). But for some reason, especially during the trials, Nagito is quick to jump in and mention how wonderful Chiaki is and compliment her (only to be usually cut off by someone when he starts to ramble).

It should also be noted that Chiaki and Nagito both share an appreciation for games. Nagito seems to like more luck-based games for obvious reasons, but he also mentions that like Chiaki, he likes the Twilight Syndrome series. Both of them similarly state that they felt Monokuma was butchering a favorite game of theirs.

They also both have an odd way of trying to cheer Hajime up and joke with him, the examples shown coincidentally beside one another. Chiaki says she’s gonna look for a dirty book, throwing Hajime off and Nagito “jokingly” tells Hajime to lick his boots and now to him, but Hajime is extremely put off when he claims it was a joke. These oddballs get each other in the weirdest of ways is what I’m saying. They’re both incredibly antisocial, but their hearts are reaching the same place too when they try to make an effort.

In chapter 4, when Chiaki teams up with Nagito and Kazuichi, then leaves because they’re both being clingy, Nagito quickly follows and chases after her to make sure she’s okay. Then he chastised her for running off, looking deeply concerned. Even after his attitude change, he will answer her more directly and not ignore her. When she tells him to be quiet, he politely obeys... or maybe it’s because he’s deep in thought about her motives as he mentions he was watching the trial carefully to decide on who the traitor is.

I may just be mentioning this because they’re my OTP, but if you know about their school time together and pay attention to Nagito’s Hope versus Chiaki’s Hope, I think it’s fascinating.

Okay, now let’s head into Danganronpa 3 territory. Now this is the part where I am the most shaky as I’m still trying to determine what I take canon from this series. The thing is, a friend who got me into the series informed me that the production was way rushed and that Kodaka never wanted to do the anime in the first place. But! That being said, Chiaki and Nagito have some great moments in this and the anthology comics along with it, so let’s get into some stuff.

First of all, Nagito warmly mentions that Chiaki being their class rep makes her the true Hope of their class. And you can tell he’s serious because as he’s saying it, he’s doing that thing where he’s staring at his hand desperately like he wants eat it. You know the look.

Moving on, it’s clear that aside from Chisa, Chiaki is the only one to value and treasure Nagito. And this makes sense. In her own dying words, she loves her classmates. They are the world to her. All of them. And of course, she loves Nagito too with all her heart. As evidenced as she cradled him protectively in her arms while he’s injured. At first when Chiaki and the others are determined to stand up to Junko and get their teacher back, Nagito pleads with Chiaki not to. That his luck could not overcome them. He knows they can’t win in this situation and I do think he was actually trying to talk Chiaki out of it. But of course, when Chiaki pushes back and says she wants to go anyways, he literally can’t help himself when it comes to wanting to see Hope shine. So he agrees and praises her again because of course he does.

Until it all leads to the Pain Train with Despair coming out on top. Chiaki is brutally slaughtered and we see something new from Nagito. He breaks down crying. Tears are streaming madly down his face as a forced and twisted smile appears on his lips. He even beseeches Chiaki’s name. “You understand right? You know you’re a stepping stone for Hope!” “What has been done to Nanami is unforgivable...” Nagito’s already trying to cope. To rationalize something horrible that he just witnessed in his mind. He’s trying to protect himself as he’s utterly being destroyed and breaking down like all of his classmates. Chiaki’s death literally shatters his mind. It’s a pretty well done scene even if I’m not a big fan of the brainwashing stuff. Not to mention, the way he says “You understand right, Nanami?” As if he’s begging for her forgiveness as he falls apart. It’s so very very tragic. And of course, when being made apart of the Neo World Program, his desire to see Chiaki once more, just one more time like his classmates, brings her back to him(and the other classmates) in AI form.

Honestly... it’s pretty beautiful. Chiaki is apart of Nagito in some way and is imprinted into his mind and heart. He longed to see her as much as everyone else. This person, who doesn’t seek out relationships because his luck either gets them killed or he finds their Hope to be too weak, has a connection with Chiaki like that. This is literally a person who believes his life is just a stepping stone for better and more worthy people, someone who knows their existence is a formality at this point. And still, he does have connections. There are people capable of caring about him and loving him and Chiaki was one of those people. And he wanted to see her again in the Neo World Program. Like Chiaki said, it’s no less than miracle.

But alas, this is getting rather long, isn’t it? Well in the D3 anthology, Nagito also is concerned when Chiaki avoids eating because of her hyperfixation on gaming. Chiaki skipping out on self care?! Not cool, Chiaki. And so he challenges her to a game to make sure she’ll eat lunch. Fucking protective as hell. And yes yes, the anthology isn’t canon... but that’s the thing about Danganronpa. The series is over. Any additional info and stuff added to it is meant to enrich the experience for the fandom, so it’s canon to me. What’s the fandom gonna do? Whine at me and tell me it isn’t? That Nagito wouldn’t do these things when official anthologies and content that’s sold for Danganronpa tells me he would? So... yeah.

Ultimately, whether you ship them or not, I think this fandom is missing out on the Komanami side of things and how good their relationship is when you really observe it. :3

[bigskydreaming]

Its always interesting to me when I see people saying Damian is just like Bruce, in a totally matter of fact way, like its just such a foregone conclusion to them, because I don’t really see it at all, lol. 

Like to be clear, its not that Damian doesn’t have ANY similarities to Bruce, I think all of Bruce’s kids share various attributes with him....I just think most of the ones Damian shares tend to be more superficial than characteristic, and there are others who are far more like Bruce than he is? Personally, I think Cass and Tim have the most in common with Bruce, albeit in different ways.....but tbh I think even Jason has more in common with Bruce than Damian does, for example.

Idk.....like for instance, I consider one of the key differences between Dick and Bruce being that Bruce’s sense of morality and ethics is clearly defined, exists as specific, hard-clung to views that he applies regardless of whom is involved in whatever situation he’s applying them to. To Bruce, ethics and morality exist outside of people, and are inviolate.....they’re not meant to change depending on who they’re aimed at or will be affected by them. In contrast, Dick is someone I see as having a morality largely defined by people. His sense of morals and ethics are more fluid....its not that he doesn’t have clearly defined views of right and wrong that underly his regular actions and choices as sort of a default benchmark, a starting point to work off of....its that Dick sees morals and ethics as meaningless if they don’t serve those he cares about or fights for, or if he has to sacrifice someone he values in service to what he views as an arbitrary moral or ethic that CAN be adjusted if he so chooses to adjust it....like that’s the thing HE’S not willing to do. Its like.....Dick sees individual lives as having more value than the abstract, which is what he ultimately considers a singular principle, and so he’d rather sacrifice the principle than the life. Bruce in contrast doesn’t view morals and ethics as being remotely abstract, and views them as the very things that GIVE individual lives value, so he’s not willing to sacrifice his values or principles full stop.

Or to put it another way: If it comes down to a choice between a killer and their intended victim, where it looks like the only possible way to save their victim is to kill the killer before they can kill instead....Dick will take the shot so to speak.....but since he does still believe killing is wrong and an absolute last resort and he’s been raised by someone who he very much does value and who believes that there’s always another way.....then Dick will self-flagellate for not having been able to find another way that didn’t involve killing the killer. Bruce on the other hand, will attempt down to the very last second to find a way to save both lives, no matter how impossible it seems.....and if he’s ultimately unable to, he’ll then self-flagellate for not having found a way to save both. 

The truly ironic thing IMO, is even in a situation where BOTH consider themselves to have failed, they’ll both still consider their failure to be the exact same thing....though for entirely different reasons and with different results. Both will view ‘not having been able to find another way’ to have been the true failure.....even though, one killed and one didn’t. Because Dick wouldn’t perceive having killed as his true failure.....because that’s the part he doesn’t actually regret, if it means that he saved the killer’s intended victim as a result. He still did it with intent, in this complete hypothetical, because he perceived the victim’s life as more important than his personal desire not to kill or view that killing is wrong. BUT he’ll still consider himself to have failed because despite having saved one life, he’d view the fact that he couldn’t find another way where taking one life wasn’t a NECESSITY in order to accomplish that.....that was his failure, in his mind. Similarly, but completely differently at the same time....Bruce will consider his failure to have been not having found a way to save both. BUT just like Dick’s true regret isn’t that he killed the killer, Bruce’s true regret isn’t that he DIDN’T, in order to save their victim. Its that he couldn’t find a way out of that box that made it a choice of one or the other.

Course, that’s just my perception of the two of them.

But as examples, this is I think WHY Dick was able to kill the Joker at all in Last Laugh, whereas Bruce will ultimately never bring himself to cross that line. (And while Dick wasn’t matter of fact about it by any means, its significant in my mind that his actual stated regrets about that were always that he played into what the Joker had wanted and thus let him win, and that he’d failed Bruce and let him down....never once was it actually that he’d killed the Joker, period.) Similarly, its why Dick’s a lot more willing to work with people he’s ideologically opposed to or more flexible....in fact, I maintain its specifically why Bruce was so convinced that only Dick could infiltrate Spyral. It wasn’t JUST about the logistics of Dick being believed dead after Forever Evil, or Bruce’s issues about having just watched Dick die.......because Bruce is great at undercover work himself, as Matches Malone, and he traditionally HATES delegating the ‘hard stuff’ to someone else, especially when the stakes are this high....even if he does trust that person absolutely. He believes that if its his responsibility, its up to him to do it if at all possible.

Which is why I think that ultimately, the only reason Bruce didn’t find a way to take on the Spyral mission himself, is because he didn’t think he’d be able to. Spyral was a shady spy organization that engaged in morally compromising work on a day to day basis. Deep down, I think Bruce was aware that there would be too many occasions in which he’d be likely to be sidetracked or frozen by his conviction that there HAD to be a way around whatever he was being asked to do for the sake of keeping his cover, that didn’t require acting against various hard-set morals....which more than likely would have cost him the mission and rendered it a failure.....with catastrophic results for his family and the rest of the hero community. Whereas he knew that Dick would be able to find a way to make it work, because despite having a very strong sense of right and wrong of his own, he knows Dick’s highest moral prerogative is that he WILL act on even something he does firmly believe is wrong, if he’s convinced its the price he needs to pay for the sake of loved ones. And thus, even though he wouldn’t be any happier about the moral compromising nature of a lot of Spyral’s work than Bruce is, he’d be less likely to find himself unable to act in a split second decision time, so long as Bruce uttered the magic words: this is an utter necessity for the sake of your family.

Also ironically, btw, I think one of the key ways that a lot of people perceive Dick and Bruce as different....I’d disagree and say is actually where they’re MOST alike. And that’s that people point to Bruce as closed off and tightly guarding his emotions, hurts, and vulnerabilities at the expense of getting close to people or letting them in.....whereas Dick is more of a people person. But honestly, I disagree. I think people overlook that Brucie Wayne is still as much a part of Bruce Wayne’s life as Batman is. Bruce is and always has been completely capable of being the life of the party and surrounding himself with droves, on a surface level. I think Dick takes it perhaps a bit further than that, he IS more approachable than Bruce in general, that sorta thing.....BUT when it comes to his most private emotions, hurts and vulnerabilities.....I think Dick is just as inclined as Bruce to keep those parts of himself closely guarded and he doesn’t LIKE giving them up. The actual difference between them IMO, again comes down to the role other people play in their ways of thinking.....as I think that the times and reasons Dick DOES open up about his most closely guarded thoughts or emotions....its for other people, because he’s convinced himself that THEY need this from him. Left to his own devices, or at least the perception that he’s the only one likely to be affected by whether he shares his most intimate self with someone else or not, I think he’s just as likely as Bruce to well, not.

And all of this is key to why I think that Damian tends to have a lot more in common with Dick than Bruce, whereas others in the family have more in common with Bruce than Dick. Because see, Damian, like Dick, is more likely to ACT as a result of other specific individuals rather than his own personal sense of right and wrong. Look at when he first came from the League of Assassins. He had a clearly defined view of right and wrong, an already formed morality of his own, even if it was diametrically opposed to most of the Batfam’s, particularly Bruce’s. 

Damian didn’t set all that aside because people succeeded in just uniformly shifting his paradigms to be more in line with their views of right and wrong. The changes to his moral code came as a trickle down result of him ALREADY adjusting his actions or behavior - even before he necessarily came to view them as wrong - for the sake of the connections he was building, with Dick, with Alfred, with Steph, and then from there with others.

Just like I outlined with Dick, where he’s more likely than Bruce or many others to act on even something HE believes is wrong, if he views it as a necessity for the sake of a loved one.....Damian is similarly likely to act in a way that completely flies in the face of everything he came to Gotham already believing....if he views it as a necessity for the sake of the individuals he came to value. Just like Dick, simply starting from a different point on the moral spectrum. The sense of right and wrong that they ‘betrayed’ for the sake of other valued individuals was different....not the reasoning for that ‘betrayal’ of their previously established moral code.

Similarly, while Damian is just as inclined to be closed off and guarded as Bruce is (and Dick. and well, most of the Batfam shares this part in common, lol) - like Dick, when he does open up, be it to Dick or Alfred or Jon or Colin.....its because he’s convinced himself that on some level its what THEY need, rather than because he actually believes that he himself needs to let them in.

Meanwhile, the reason I say Jason is actually more like Bruce than even Damian is, lies in viewing Jason as falling somewhere between Dick and Bruce on a lot of this. Basically, I think that Jason is more naturally inclined to be more like Bruce in how rigidly he holds to a particular sense of right and wrong.....its just that the particulars of what they both view as right and wrong are different. Same thing with it being more natural to Jason to be like Bruce in terms of guarding his emotions. But in both instances, he’s still ENOUGH like Dick, as opposed to Bruce, that he does still adjust his emotional behavior and how likely he is to act on or against his personal view of morality.....for the sake of valued individuals. It just doesn’t come to him AS....naturally, I guess, as it does to Dick, and thus he’s not AS fluid as Dick in these things....but he’s still MORE fluid about them than Bruce. And that’s why even though it takes a LOT to budge him from his view of the right and wrong approach to vigilantism, he IS still willing to put aside what he does still believe is a necessity or right....if that’s what it takes to have his family in his life, etc.

To be clear - I am trying to not cast any particular judgments on any of the approaches to morality here....simply just, not the aim of this post. I’m more trying to view things analytically here, so when I frame Bruce as being the most intractable of the lot here, the least likely to budge his morals or act against his personal sense of right and wrong for the sake of loved ones, its not because I’m trying to say that he DOESN’T love his family, or even that he loves them any less than Dick does, Jason does, etc. And I’m not even trying to suggest that he’s wrong for his approach. I’m literally just....exploring the WHY of it.

And for me, that tends to go back to the singular difference between Bruce’s later childhood, after his parents’ deaths, the period between ages 10 and adulthood.....versus the childhoods of his various children around those same ages, or after their parents’ deaths.

Because these are the ages when most of us most fully develop the....intricacies of our personal moralities, when we explore and shape how our behavior stems from that sense of right and wrong and when and where we act on our beliefs, etc. 

And the key thing about Bruce during this period of his life, IMO, is that at the time.....he had very few specific INDIVIDUALS who played significant emotional roles in his life and in his mind. Bruce cares about people. Absolutely. A lot. But for a lot of the period in which Bruce shaped a lot of his personal moral behavior, people were almost as much an abstract to him as morals themselves. That’s not quite the right way to put it, but I mean, its more like....there was a kind of uniformity to the way he viewed people as a whole, because there were less individuals specifically standing out from the rest, as PARTICULARLY significant to him himself....and thus likely to influence his growing moral code.

The other key factor is the people he DID have valued emotional connections to at this point, like....they had a kind of permanence that stretched back to early childhood for him. They weren’t NEW additions to his life. While I believe that his parents’ deaths absolutely was formative for him and left him with severe abandonment issues....for Bruce, these abandonment issues were specifically geared around fear of losing people to death. He was already rooted in the same place, same life, same people, that he was before his parents’ death, that part of his life didn’t change.....and thus the people who were left to play large emotional roles in his life and worldview, like Alfred and Leslie.....he might have been afraid of losing them the way he lost his parents, but he wasn’t especially of losing them for other reasons. Specifically: I don’t think Bruce grew up during this time feeling any particular fear of losing someone like Alfred - a staple of his entire life - to, say, Alfred judging him for his choices or his morals.

As a result, Bruce grew up shaping his personal view of right and wrong and resulting morality-stemming behavior, on pretty much nothing BUT those morals and ethics themselves. And there wasn’t any particular NEED to shape those morals AROUND the people he valued in life, or likelihood that he’d lose them due to differences in opinion or ideology, like....with all of this adding up to be the reasons HIS moral code and behavior is less fluid than even most peoples’. Because there wasn’t really any reason for it NOT to be. There were very few people and thus few occasions, while still DEVELOPING all this, that made him feel that he was maybe on the wrong track, or that he needed to make room for exceptions or the possibility that he might need to adjust his views or behavior in these regards.

In contrast......Dick, Jason and most of the others all came to Bruce after significant upheavals in their life that necessitated basically starting over in an entirely brand new environment with brand new people, etc. So they lacked the specific aspect of the PERMANENCE Bruce felt in regards to his own valued loved ones during this period of his life. So unlike him, where he had a bit more space to contemplate his moral code and behavior without being particularly afraid of getting it wrong or that his choices here might cost him these people.....Dick, Jason, et al like....they formed their moral codes and behavior with significantly more awareness that many of the people they valued already had fully formed codes of their own they felt very strongly about...AND at the same time, they had REASON to be....less secure about whether or not the choices they made here could potentially cost them these people.

Which is a perfect recipe for the kind of moral fluidity based around specific individuals, that I maintain most of the kids display to various degrees. In fact, you can almost kinda....chart the extent of their moral fluidity, via various factors like the QUANTITY of significant emotional attachments in their lives at this time. Like I maintain Dick is the most morally fluid based on people.....but that I think has a lot to do with the fact that Dick had the most attachments to....protect or preserve. Even though he was forced to live apart from his extended circus family, they still very much figured into his thoughts as people he cared about and valued, and then there were Bruce and Alfred, and then Clark, Barbara, the Titans, etc, etc. 

In contrast, look at how Jason came to Wayne Manor with very few pre-existing emotional attachments with anyone still alive.....and the fact that Jason during his time living with Bruce didn’t really even have occasion to form a large number of attachments outside of his immediate family, as he wasn’t on any teams unlike Dick, and he didn’t mingle all that much with other members of the hero community. Ergo, Jason’s LESS morally fluid than Dick simply for the reason that like Bruce, he had more reason to construct his personal morals around simply his own perceptions and convictions, and less people he felt this moral code and behavior needed to acccomodate, or be prepared to make exceptions for or around. 

Meanwhile, I’d argue that Damian is like Jason in that he had fewer people to build into his personal view of right and wrong and how and when to act based on that.....BUT a key difference here is that Damian didn’t have a lot of experience pre-Gotham with feeling valued and valuing other individuals in turn, like...at all. The connections he developed with Dick, Alfred, Steph, etc.....they were brand new to him, basically a revelation in a lot of ways, because before that we’ve seen how he was often taught to dampen his view of how valuable or not to view personal connections.....whereas Jason, pre-Wayne Manor, like......we know that he DID very much have a strong emotional attachment to Catherine that he embraced and was not hesitant to value, etc. So my point here being that the sheer NEWNESS of what Damian was feeling in regards to even WANTING to adjust his behavior based not on what he THOUGHT was right or wrong but based on the PEOPLE he was coming to value....this was a complete shock to the system to Damian in ways that it wouldn’t necessarily have been for Jason, resulting in a likelihood that Damian would feel an enhanced INTENSITY around all this that Jason might not, and thus despite both of them having similar NUMBERS of emotional attachments they shaped their changing and developing moral codes around, these people carried an additional weight for Damian, just as Jason’s few carried an additional weight that Bruce’s didn’t have due to the differences in THEIR upbringings in this period of their lives.....and thus resulting in Damian having an even more fluid moral code and behavior than Jason did....closer to being on par with Dick’s, just as Jason still has a more fluid one than Bruce does.

ANYWAY.

This was a LOT longer than I thought it would be when I started a little post about huh weird how I don’t see Damian the way a lot of other people do BUT SINCE WHEN IS THAT NEWS.

In conclusion, this has been a post.

Good day.

[linkspooky]

Gojo and Mahito

Nanami and Gojo share several parallels as pointed out by Nanami in Chapter 22 of Jujutsu Kaisen. A connection between the two of them that’s developed to the point where we see Mahito steal a technique from Gojo (domain expansion activation for only a few microseconds) in the latest chapter. More on the parallels of Gojo and Mahito, because for both of them there’s more than meets the eye. 

1. Children with Too Much Power

Mahito parallels Gojo, but more specifically I believe he has the most in common with teenage Gojo we see in Hidden inventory. Especially on two key points. Both of them had immense strength that they hadn’t quite figured out yet.

Teenage Gojo, who was still figuring out the infinity and could not yet quite make the universe bend at the snap of his finger tips. In his introductory arc when Mahito was fighting Nanami, he was like a child figuring out how to use his body for the first time. 

Everything he does in that arc is out of a childish sense of curiosity. He gets to close to Junpei, to observe what will happen from prolonged interaction with a human. He toys around a long time with fighting Nanami because he’s still figuring out how his curse technique works. 

Unlike the other curses who seem to already exist knowing what they are, or have existed for years already long enough to figure themselves out, Mahito is actively learning about himself when he fights Nanami. 

Just like Gojo, being pushed to the brink of death by an incredibly powerful enemy, only seems to make Mahito bounce back stronger. Mahito and Gojo parallel each other in their comparison to Nanami. Simply put, Nanami is the most mature character in the series, he’s the role model for a normal, decent adult. 

While Gojo will drag children to battlefields, or take big bets with their lives, Nanami acts much more responsibility, with respect to the fact that Yuji is a child whose emotional well being he’s nurturing. 

Nanami is introduced to us as the opposite of Gojo, someone mature while Gojo is immature. He even says that he doesn’t respect him in the least bit. Gojo’s powerful, but he’s not grown up. Nanami even explains this quite logically, people don’t grow up by fighting bad guys, or getting stronger. People grow up by accumulating experiences. 

Gojo and Mahito are all powerful in ways that Nanami will never be, while at the same time they act like children. Especially teenage Gojo, but even adult Gojo doesn’t really like to get along well with other people, and decides everything based on his own emtoions and perspective. In other words both Gojo and Mahito have a tendency to be egocentric. 

Egocentric. 

thinking only of oneself, without regard for the feelings or desires of others; self-centered. 

2. The World Through Their Eyes

Mahito and Gojo are characters who appear childish and frivolous on the surface, but if you plunge their depths they have a deeper understanding of themselves and their desires than most ofther characters in the series. They might not get other people, but that’s not their priority either. In classic Jungian symbolism, shallow water belies greater depths. 

Gojo and Mahito are both extremely well thought characters, capable of immense amounts of self reflection. (Probably too much self reflection in Gojo’s case, he just loves looking at himself in the mirror a little too much how vain.) It not only shows in how much of themselves they have figured out but also their jujutsu. I think it’s safe to say that there is some resemblance between the infinity, and Mahito’s idle transifguration. Their Jujutsu makes them both privvy to the world that no one else can see. It’s unknown what Gojo can see with the six eyes exactly, but considering the limitless. 

You can infer that he’s capable of seeing much greater sensory perception than the normal person. Mahito doesn’t have the six eyes, but because his jujutsu is about altering the form of the soul, he has the unique ability to see the shape of the soul inside of the body.

Mahito can see through people’s bodies, and see down to their souls. However, his perceptiveness has caused him to give up on the idea that people have any individuality at all, that they have “hearts” you know like, thoughts and feelings and stuff. Which is why all humans are pretty much interchangable to him. Mahito can’t see life separate as him from having any particular value. 

Both of their cursed techniques create distance between themselves and others. Though in opposite ways. Gojo’s cursed technique is based around the idea that nothing can reach him, because it will always slow down in the infinite space between them. Mahito is able to completely change the shape of whatever he wants with one touch. 

However, at the same time this resembles how they both interact with other people. Mahito sees people as nothing more than toys to play with and experiment in developing his jujutsu technique on. He even is literally pictured in an official color illustration as destroying Junpei, Nobara, and Nanami as torn up dolls. They were just toys that he got bored with and threw away. 

Gojo can sometimes even share this tendency, not to mercilessly kill and slaughter of course not, but to be so far away from other people, and too busy perceiving the infinity that he can’t get caught up in ordinary lives. Remember, Mahito, Jogo and Hanami’s plan was to shake up Gojo with the sheer amount of people he would have to save in Shibuya, and it just... didn’t work. 

Gojo just isn’t that shaken up by the people he can’t save. He’s not Geto. He’s not Yuji. Of course he cares enough to try and minimize the damage, he could have just used unlimited domain to end the situation at the cost of everybody gathered, but he made a decision to try to balance between everybody’s lives, protecting his own, and exorcising the curses. 

Mahito and Gojo are both extremely distant from other people, but because of that they have a unique understanding of themlseves. Mahito’s domain expansion is called “Self Embodiment of Perfection.” When Gojo figures out reverse Jutsushiki he quotes the budha when he reached enlightenment. 

They are extremely isolated characters who have others plumbed the depths of themselves. Gojo’s goal is to be the best version of himself he can be, to push himself into being the strongest. Their individual will is so strong they want to impose it on the world around them. Gojo wants to reset the jujutsu world, Mahito wants a world of curses. 

They both encourage the other people around them to also think deeper about themselves, and how to evaluate themselves. Gojo tells Mahito to stop repressing himself for the sake of others. To try to be stronger individually instead of more of a team player. Instead of judging those around you, look inwardly. 

Mahito is furious that Yuji doesn’t evaluate himself, doesn’t think deeply about his own motivations. That’s what he criticizes Yuji for constantly, he doesn’t think for himself, he runs blindly into fights. Mahito calls their fight a clash of truth. Yuji has to know his own self, and know his belifs and know why his beliefs are better than Mahito’s if he wants to face him. 

Mahito and Gojo are both always looking inside of themselves, and that’s why their depths go much further than their seemingly shallow surface. If I were to make one last comparison between the two of them, I would say that the reason Mahito imitates Gojo is because his end goal is to become enlightened. What Mahito wants, is to be true to his nature, the truest embodiment of a curse in the series. He wants to reach an enlightenment like Gojo has where he has himself, his role in the world, completely and totally figured out. Where he embodies his own idealized sense of perfection. 

Which is why he imitates Gojo, the strongest. Though his is the opposite path, like a reflection of a mirror. If Gojo uses his power to be the model, the embodiment of a jujutsu sorcerer who exorcises curses to save human lives, then Mahito chooses to be the embodiment of a curse that plagues humans.

Mahito and Gojo both see through things, they can see what everybody else can’t, however they differ in how they use those perceptions. Gojo tethers himself to responsibility to other people, because he finds meaning in doing that, he thinks there’s a point in protecting and nurturing the weak because eventually he’ll be able to find strong comrades. Mahito however, believes in the opposite of camraderie. He can see through other people, so he acts like they’re not even there. Gojo is a character who while his tendency is to try do everything on his own, is currently waiting rescue from the strong comrades he focused so hard into training. While Mahito will most likely end up alone. 

[kornelia-yells-in-the-void]

oooh i can weigh in !! so i’m shifting for a villain, and i also scripted out most of the evil stuff he did (not everything, but bear with me)

this is gonna get VERY specific to this one character so if you don’t want to read about Pan from Once Upon a Time, don’t read this lol

anyway

the first impression thing is a very good point. it doesn’t apply to me because my first impression of the character was fanon. Aka it was skewed through a lense of his fans justifying or rewriting his actions or just plain leaving out a lot of things he did in fanfics.

Eventually I ran out of fanfics and watched the original show, which did change my perception but not enough to undo that first impression of him being kinda selfish but also very passionate about people he loves. in canon the positive part basically doesn’t apply unless you’re willing to do a lot of mental gymnastics.

and for me, with my shifting journey and scripts that include him, i really just stuck to my initial impression of him. the one i got from reading fanfics that portrayed him through rose colored glasses essentially.

in canon, he’s a shitty person who abandoned his son for eternal youth, kidnapped his grandson, kidnapped his grandson’s friend and blackmailed the friend’s brothers, tried to kill his great grandson for power & immortality and then later as he was already losing the battle, killed his best friend in a last ditch effort to save himself and kill his enemies with a curse. not a lot of redeemable qualities there on the surface level.

but then if you look closer there’s hints of some better qualities- like the fact that some of his followers were insanely loyal to him (particularly that best friend), that he apparently gave a home to people who felt lost and unloved and that some of them even viewed him like a savior. even years after his canon death, some of his followers remained loyal and stayed *his* followers. sure, that could’ve just been him being manipulative, but it also could’ve been him actually having a good side.

and then there’s the reasons why he did those bad things in canon: grief and self preservation. Obviously, those aren’t excuses for his actions, but it makes sense. And to an extent, I think the reasons make it not as bad. If he wanted immortality just for the sake of it, that’s a different situation than the fact that he didn’t want to die. And yes, he’s selfish, but to an extent I can’t blame him for not wanting to die. Few people would ever be in a situation where either they themself have to die or someone they barely know and then choose to die themself.

those things are what the fanon interpretation was based on and that in turn is what the person i scripted into my dr’s is based on.

another factor that applies more generally to villains and not just him and the way i found out about him specifically, is the psyche of the shifter. this of course also doesn’t apply to every shifter etc.

also i’m going to study psychology soon but i haven’t actually started yet, so don’t expect a very scientific explanation here, i’ll just be yapping abt my theories.

anyway, most villain characters exude power and confidence. a lot of them have sad backstories that involve them being othered in some way or wronged by supposed heroes.

and that feeling of injustice is probably common for a lot of shifters. Because what’s the combing factor between a majority of all shifters? A yearning for a different life.

Maybe because they just want more experiences or maybe because they don’t like their current life. The latter is what I’m trying to get at.

These shifters might relate to such typical villain characters due to that feeling of injustice. “I deserved better” vs “They deserved better.” With villain characters, it can sometimes be very black and white what happened to them (bc in this reality they are just fictional characters or plot devices) vs with the shifters the situations could tend to be more complex, but people often victimise themselves and so from the perspective of the shifter, it’s again comparable to the character.

That establishes that the character has a relatable aspect. And then villainous characters are often as previously mentioned powerful, confident, sassy etc/whatever. People who have been victimised or feel like they have been, might view those traits as desirable, especially if they feel weak or powerless. And even without that, power can be attractive to a lot of people.

the combination of that + the fact that they can just script out the parts they didn’t like can make it pretty logical why people would shift for villains

anyway idk how much sense that made

Possibly mild take but i genuinely don’t understand why some people shift for like actual evil people.

And i don’t mean people who like eventually do change or just happened to live under bad circumstances so they did whack stuff to survive. nah i mean like straight up evil, all they do is spend all their time tryna fuck up people’s lives, and actively enjoy hurting people. Yk, like a racist rat. i mean Imo ur about as good as your worst friend sooooo…🤷‍♀️

Even if you script that they’ve never done bad things you kinda gotta consider that your original first impression of them, which is here in this reality, all you see them be this awful person. So what about that made you wanna shift for someone like that?

There’s bad and then there’s just straight up unredeemable evil.

and icl i do just think it’s pretty privilege tho coz if they were ugly trust nobody would be shifting for them…

anyways actually curious if you have a possible explanation for this wild phenomenon!!