#is salvation of a sort

[lord-squiggletits]

What do you think is Tarn's favorite part of being ordered to do something? That he's worth something/seen as valuable or the idea of the reward at the end? Or something else entirely?

Probably closer to your first theory: my first instinct is that Tarn seems to derive a lot of his self-worth and purpose in life from an attachment to others/an ideology (see: his whole thing with Megatron), although I honestly doubt he was like that before Megatron fucked him up with brainwashing. Being ordered to do something = being needed, and being needed = having value and a reason for living.

It also seems to me that, even as Damus, Tarn has a bit of a rash/emotional/passionate streak: very much the type to fix an ideology/set of instructions upon himself, then charge forward with a sense of purpose. If we look at Damus getting irritated at Orion for "just sitting around and waiting for the Senate soldiers to show up," it seems this guy really wanted to ACT and DO, perhaps to the point of slight recklessness/thoughtlessness. As if he equated active "doing" with productivity and "having a plan" and taking initiative, but thought of waiting as a form of weakness/giving up/not being prepared. (Ties in rather neatly with his tendency for organization maybe... weird how he's simultaneously reckless with his individual actions but also needs a sense of Order And Hierarchy to feel fulfilled on a general life level.)

So I think Tarn also gets enjoyment from following orders bc eh... I'm genuinely not trying to make this a petplay thing 🤣but I'd say that maybe he gets a sense of comfort/security from being able to just charge forward and act, no need to worry about morality or questioning his own motives. Just outsource his thinking to someone else beloved, trusting, and all-wise (Megatron) so he can experience the pure bliss of fanaticism and utter self-righteousness/confidence in his own actions. He even admits to Deathsaurus that he let himself conflate Megatron with the Decepticon ideology when instead Decepticonism is based on a dream, an idea.

So on that note, it also seems to me that Tarn might like following orders specifically bc he feels a personal connection to Megatron? Megatron groomed him as a protege/his most dedicated and fanatical follower. Their conversation on Necroworld shows that Tarn quite obviously thinks the world of Megatron and wants to see him as that figure of legendary competence/willpower. I don't think Tarn just wants to have The Right Ideology so that he can Feel Good About Being A Good Person (TM); it seems like Tarn specifically wants* to have a personal connection, some sense of approval or specialness, a bond with some authority figure who not only assures that he can trust them, but that they also trust him utterly. I think it says a lot that Tarn was even able to fall in love (figuratively) with Megatron more than he was with Decepticon ideology itself. It points to the fact that what he's really missing is interpersonal connections. Er, as much as an incredibly toxic and manipulative parasocial relationship is an interpersonal connection, but I never said that it was a good connection.

*In light of recent panels of Damus I reviewed from a Tarn/Damus post I reblogged last night, Damus seemed to actually be quite comfortable challenging/questioning Orion to his face and wanting to know what their plan is and why. I think it says a lot that Damus' relationship with Orion was one between a leader and a soldier, yes, but it was also informal and non-hierarchical enough that Damus felt completely free to question Orion. When you contrast this with Tarn talking to Megatron ~4 million years later, he's suddenly switched to an attitude of absolutely worshipping Megatron and believing he has utterly absurd/impossible levels of ability, vision, confidence, willpower, etc. Seems to me like part of Megatron's brainwashing of Damus was specifically centered on wrapping his heart around his little finger for the purpose of cultivating that blind obedience. Given Megatron's thoughts at the end of his Spotlight issue (he refers to his soldiers basically as blind idiots who can be whipped into a furor with the right propaganda lines), this is a pretty common emotional manipulation tactic he used in general. It just seems like Megatron concentrated this manipulation by singling out Damus and making him feel special, that he saw himself in Damus, and that he truly cared about him and wanted him as a student. You know, an emotional connection.

Honestly, this is kinda dark tho, bc now I'm kind of sad and thinking that Tarn doesn't naturally have this level of codependence/slave-like devotion to a person and it was actually just something Megatron shaped him into as a leash of sorts... Damn, I can be horny about people sublimating their trauma/emotional issues through kink, but not in a guilt-free "haha he's a dog" way. 😔 JK I'll still call Tarn a dog (affectionate) bc it's just so true.

[triglycercule]

dust with a fucked up savior complex save me dust with a fucked up savior complex SAVE ME!!!! he's literally sooo savior complex coded. he killed his underground to "save" everyone and stop the human from killing them. he thinks that it's better that he does the murdering instead of the human because he has better intentions. he's sad at the beginning (rightfully so) but savior complex dust really gets so much cooler when you add in the fact that dust eventually started to LIKE killing his underground 😭😭 like just..... imagine a manic dust who's gone mad going around claiming he's helping everyone with what he's doing when he's really,,,, not. soo cool.,,, (like dude how are you SAVING people if they don't exist after you've killed the person who was killing them. there is nobody to be safe but yourself anymore) (can you tell this was inspired by the one comic of dust killing his papyrus and saying "it was better if i did it" or something)

but also also on the other hand,,,,, revenge fueled dust??? he's gotten SO bitter from the repeated resets and genos that he's genuinely bitter enough to risk it all to stop the human. he doesn't have pure intentions in this one. dust doesn't claim he's saving anybody with what he's doing murdering them all. he KNOWS it's bad and wrong and hypocritical but he does it anyways because he wants to not only stop the human but to make them suffer. he purposely wants them to keep coming back after killing them just so he can kill them over and over and over and have them experience a fragment of the suffering he did with having all of his friends and family killed. but i think a revenge fueled dust (in contrast to savior complex dust) would be a lot cooler if he still felt shitty for killing everyone. it's painful to do but hate is stronger than love and dust's hate for the human is MUCH stronger than his love for the underground atp

[stagefoureddiediaz]

The thing with Hen calling Chim Buck and Eddie the three judases is actually really interesting. Because Judas did what Jesus/ god wanted him to do. His betrayal was necessary - in Christian theology it is his betrayal that brought the salvation of humanity.

So Hen referring to the boys in this way is a moment of double meaning - yes it is a reference to her feeling betrayed, but it’s also a way of foreshadowing that they’ll have her back - that they are also her salvation and I think that’s really lovely

[coffinmotif]

the puppet and the oldest dream

[gold-tinted]

I'm gonna say it, the matthew/cordelia/james love triangle was the WORST in all of tsc. literally every other love triangle was handled better I truly hated reading about that.

[cuchufletapl]

It does fuck me up a little that in episode 147 of Hunter x Hunter not only do they change the ending back to Reason (a song about Gon and Killua's friendship from Gon's perspective), but they also edit the song differently than how they did for the GI arc, so that as we see Gon and Killua sadly turn away from each other and walk away, it starts slow and ever so sorrowful with these fucking lines

I’m right here, by your side, I’m the closest I can be

And I’m fine, I’m content with this arrangement for now

Please tell me gently the rest of your dreams

That you started telling me one day long ago.

Like what the fuck. What the hell dude. Why would the anime directors do this to me, specifically.

[set-wingedwarrior]

I know it happens often to see writers during a long fic to complain at some point about the first chapters because they got better in the meantime and they look bad to them now.

But this is the first time where I saw this happened when the writing actually got worse

[yuseirra]

I've been three minutes in P5X, but do you think this game has to do with P2? The characters oddly resemble the characters from there with the protagonist sharing some resemblance to tatsuya, the homeroom teacher looks a bit like maya but it could be just me. I never played P2 but my brother did, and according to what I've heard, there are (spoilers but) two different worlds. Maybe this game has to do with that "alternate world" and everything that happens in P5X is an alternate reality.. but perhaps those two worlds that got cut off from each other could be merging and that's why there are problems that are arising or something? That was just a thought that crossed my mind and I'm sure there would already be theories from who know this series better

[raayllum]

perpetually obsessed with the way you cannot pry rayla out of what has led callum into aaravos’ clutches. callum being obsessed with the mirror in the first place? is largely because he was looking for a distraction from the pain of losing her aaravos being able to possess him at all? is because callum did dark magic to save her. and even if you subscribe for some reason, framing wise, that he didn’t do it solely for her and instead for the dragon, he only believed in that cause because she convinced him to (“someone has to take a stand when no one else will” “you’re right”). the 4x04 intro implies that the key is directly connected to aaravos’ interest in callum in the first place? callum only has the cube because rayla grabbed it for him even when everything went to hell in a hand basket. callum only asked for the cube because he recognized the symbols from rayla’s drawing, and only pursued magic because she called him a mage even when he dismissed himself as nothing. he only did a spell because she pushed at him to do it: “is this a guessing game? just do it” like they are insane

[jonsnowunemploymentera]

Thinking about Jon, Jaime, and Theon all journeying to the underworld and being surrounded by death/dead people. I’ve always believed that the important connector here is Jon (because I believe he functions as a sort of God of the Dead figure - though that’s a story for another day), but like…it’s so interesting that all of them have this experience, and that Theon’s and Jaime’s dreams are connected mostly to Jon (and I guess to each other if you buy into weirwood.net). It’s hard not to read into the religious symbolism here because GRRM is no C.S Lewis so it’s hard to tell what Christian parallels are intended by the author. But like…one messiah, two “criminals”, all go through “death”? But who will reach salvation and who won’t? 🤔

[peniswizard69]

A sequence of events

Jacksfilms tries to guess movies by their Letterboxd reviews Youtube video

References Zootopia shrew Godfather scene

Remember that Judy met the shrew in a neighborhood marked "little rodentia" despite shrews not being rodents

Search what order shrews are actually in

It's Eulipotyphla. What else is in it? Moles, hedgehogs, solenodons (already knew solenodons). Moonrats?

One genus of moonrats is Hylomys, that's from Greek for tree top mouse, which is neat. What are some of the specific names?

Macarong from Vietnamase for vampire. Now I need to know about Vietnamese vampires.

The English Wikipedia page for vampire has Ma cà rồng listed as its Vietnamese counterpart

Etymology of Ma cà rồng deeply unclear; ma is demon, but cà rồng is confidently listed as different things in different Wiki sources: Vietnamese Wikipedia connects it to Indonesian for mountain, English Wiktionary connects it to a Tai Dam word not translated directly but showing its cognates all mean cage or prison, and Vietnamese Wiktionary connects it to Khasi for rib. None of those things connect and I've learned of two ethnicities.

Afflict Google Translate upon the Vietnamese page on vampires, dreading any possible inaccuracies

A quote from some book says: vampires act like humans during the day, being a servant and doing normal things, but at night they stick their two big toes into their nostrils and fly off to be a demon and drink women's blood as they give birth. Then they come home, put their feet in a bucket of water, take their feet out of their nose, and turn human again. The human doesn't remember what they were doing that night

What was that about the toes?

That's the phrase Google Translate spat out, "two big toes into their nostrils", which is to me both insane and visceral. This cannot be right

By a repetitive process of deleting parts of the sentence and seeing how it affects the meaning, identify the role of each word and run through Wiktionary to verify translation; it checks the fuck out.

Xo hai ngón chân cái vào lô mui would be "insert two finger leg big in hole nose" if xo had a little sideways semi circle on the o, lô had a tilde on the ô, and mui has a tilde on the u. My phone's keyboard has limitations

Fuck it keep reading. Boring stuff about European vampires that I already knew, oh goody more Vietnamese specifics! This guy says vampires have red foreheads and a lot of white in their eyes!

Wrestle Google Translate and Wiktionary in order to attempt to decipger what "a lot of white in their eyes" means. The literal translation appears to be eye much core white. The word for core can also be heart? What is it doing there? Dead end

Says it goes to its grandmother's house? More wrestling. Mistranslation of "midwife", back to women giving birth

South East Asian folklore is deeply concerned with pregnancy. I've learned this. I've learned this in my research

Says their nostrils are extra big to fit the toes. Also says they grab their ears in their hands when they fly off?

Wrestling ole Goog Transl and Wicker Shenary again. Tay xách tai - hand pull ear. Xách tai is actually an example sentence for xách, in the meaning of pull up (derogatory)! So yeah

It is roughly 1:30 AM.

Start writing this post

It is 1:52 AM.

None of this has anything to do with mountains prisons or ribs btw. Or shrews or Jacksfilms for that matter

I woke up at 8 today

I'm so hungry

[shredsandpatches]

probably shouldn't be reading about Doctor Faustus and religious trauma at 1 am but here's some good quotes: the top one is from top from Mark James Richard Scott, "'That’s hard': Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus and the Trauma of Reprobation" (Early Theatre 23.2, 9-20) and the bottom one is from David Bevington's intro to the play in the Norton Anthology of Renaissance Drama.

[noxtivagus]

hmmm. oh my god my mind is a mess i rlly can't write what i want to rn but i will just Dump

[bmpmp3]

people who make 1 hour+ long youtube videos of various genre or theme playlists thank u for my life

[ouclematis]

i hated meakashi hen because it hit close to home.

[bimyself06]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but since Elena is Katherine's and therefore Nadia's descendant doesn't that make her a traveler? Meaning that now that she's human and the traveler's curse is broken she can use magic and that means that so can her daughter, Stefanie?

There's also the fact that both the Salvatores are somehow related to Silas, who was a powerful witch, and yet none of his descendants have magic? I feel like it would make sense for the child of the last doppelganger who is also descendent from travelers and the former vampire who has consumed the cure to have magic.