#it didn't have much to begin with

[iriily]

Taylor Swift - Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus

+bonus

[hurlyburlytopsyturvy]

when you get engulfed by a space-time anomaly and it forces you into therapy for the greater good

[purplepixel]

Happy SWSAnniversary!

This one's for you @psychologicalwarclaire! Finally can give a proper thank you for writing my favorite rise fic of all time. Here's to a Spider's Web with Strings Attached's one year anniversary! What better way to commemorate this with a little comic featuring the very beginning?

For those who are just stumbling on this comic, please go read the fic its based on! I cannot praise and recommend it enough!!

[sysig]

Ah, childhood memories (Patreon)

[shitpostingkats]

I swear, nothing makes me go bonkers fucking yonkers quite like comparing Athena and Apollos' introductions to the WAA.

When Phoenix asked Athena to come work for the agency, he reached out overseas to get in contact and offer her a job. When Phoenix asked Apollo to come work for the agency, he didn't even mention what the business was called or what they actually did.

On Athena's first day in court, Phoenix showed up and took over for her when she started to break down. On Apollo's first day in court, Phoenix made him an accomplice in crime and almost ruined his career.

When Athena introduces her childhood best friend to the WAA, they get her cleared of murder charges and save a friendgroup. When Apollo tries to introduce his childhood best friend to the agency, he dies before that can even happen.

When Athena returns to the space center, she is greeted by the robots with open arms. When Apollo returns to the space center, he is greeted by the name of a dead man.

When Phoenix sought out Athena as a protégé, it was because he realized how much she was hurting. When Phoenix sought out Apollo as a protégé, its because he realized how much he could be used to hurt others.

[hermanoga]

One of the best things 'The Eye' and 'Lull' have done is helping me reinterpret the romantic under(?!)tones of the previous openings and endings without any weird guilt (of forcing my gay agenda on anything, which I know is idiotic but anyway). Go back and listen to Vortex, Dive Back in Time and The Tides, everything falls into place all of a sudden. And ALSO, read the damn lyrics of Overthink!

ps : I forgot Break and Flash - the gayest gay ones. I will discuss if I want later :3

Yingdu is standing there with a scythe or something as I write this but I am actually feeling very content right now. Oh, also! found a theory on twitter thread titled This isn’t the dead wife you’re looking for: how Link Click leverages the “dead wife” trope for CXS while actively subverting it (bro wrote an almost academic paper, delicious arguments really, a similar discussion I was having with a friend the other day) which really makes a lot of sense! The form and content aligns very perfectly if we keep that theory in mind.

Edit : Some more Shiguang ramblings I posted.

I have tears in my Shiguang eyes cause I skipped lunch to edit this, I am hungry and I feel like crying.

[lunarharp]

back from a business trip. 1 hour earlier:

[front-facing-pokemon]

[mikimeiko]

The Expanse | Season 4 (2019), Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby

[coffeeworldsasaki]

Another thing that makes kaladin so painfully relatable is how much his mental illness hides his personality, because between depressive episodes and trauma he's this sarcastic little shit that smiles a lot at his friends and then the depression gets to him and all that disappears

[thesummerstorms]

Okay, so. Silly idea but bear with me. Typical time travel/reset fic idea.

Lucanis and Rook de Riva are engaged, they're clearing house of traditionalists and the kind of folks who would ally with the Venatori in the Crows, they are securing Lucanis's legacy as a reformist First Talon. Something dramatic happens. Possibly one of them or the other is dying or close to death. The world is ending. Wild magic. Somehow this results in time travel. You know how this trope works.

Rook and Lucanis both wake up in their respective Houses a decade younger. No one around them has any idea what they're talking about when they reference their present the future. Viago thinks Rook has had a poor reaction to some poisonous fumes she just saved one of the Fledglings from and gets all worked up about it. Lucanis is doing his best to hide Spite, who is also somehow back in time with him, and Caterina thinks he's having some sort of breakdown or has had a head injury.

They both end up confined and anxious for a while, trying to figure out what happened, draw up the lay of the land, and make a plan. But Spite is desperate to go find Rook, and Lucanis is terrified she won't remember them, that everything he gained, he will've lost.Rook is feeling the same, and also Viago is getting suspicious that she's so interested in the Dellamortes.

Finally, finally though, a meeting is arranged. Arsinoë tails Viago to one of the Talon's meetings, and Caterina has brought Lucanis to try and teach him some of the family business.

Their eyes meet across the room.

"Rook?" Lucanis asks, almost too softly to be heard in the bustle of the Talons gathering themselves to head towards the meeting chambers.

And Rook smiles. Lucanis's heart leaps at it, and it's all he can do to hold Spite back from spreading their wings and shouting.

Once the important people are off elsewhere, they find a convenient alcove or closet somewhere and instantly, there are hands on waists and lips meeting. Possibly the hint of relieved tears. Crows be damned, this is their partner, and they've been so worried.

When enough kisses have been gathered for the moment, Rook presses a hand to Lucanis's cheek, and although she doesn't say anything, he laughs. "I promise to start working on it, mi amor."

"I didn't say anything!"

He rolls his eyes fondly. "I promise, I will work on the beard. It... might take some time." He feels her laughter against his chest, pressed closed as she is, and catches her hand in his, rubbing a thumb across the back of her knuckles.

Suddenly, her gaze goes quiet and thoughtful as she looks at the back of their intertwined fingers, at the smooth band on her left hand, rough runes etched in silver and no stone to be seen.

"Lucanis...I think this means we just restarted the clock on the wedding."

A pause as this fully sinks in.

"... Mierda."

All of those months waiting, with Teia planning the aesthetics, Viago drawing up strategies for the most opportune and least dangerous times for the ceremony (which aren't the same), and Caterina and Viago both negotiating the contracts and dowries, dragging on for what felt like an eternity...

...and now, not only is all of that time lost, all of the preparations for naught, but they are now both in their twenties and presumably unacquainted, with protective older Talons watching their every move and no garnered reputations to give their own words weight.

The timer has not just reset on the wedding, it has been shattered and delayed by several calendars.

Spite growls in the back of Lucanis's mind. He buries his face in Rook's shoulder with a groan of his own.

"I am going. To kill them. All of them. Whoever's responsible. Mierda."

"I know, love. I'll help."

[borgialucrezia]

— If you create us a kingdom, we will write the book of our future. The future of the Church, of the world we live in will be ours, yours, and your children's. You say nothing? Why do you think we wished you a cardinal? So you would be Pope one day. Carve us out a kingdom, Cesare, and be both king and pope. I am stunned into silence.

[panharmonium]

i am not usually interested in dramatically canon-divergent scenarios because the canon story is what compels me, but i've been obsessed with this moment ever since i re-heard it during my second viewing. from the perspective of someone who already finished the story once and now knows the truth - this was wild.

WHAT IF?

[froschli96]

You know what, fuck it, I have to speak my truth! (this is gonna be a rant, so anyone who actually likes assassin's creed revelations and/or the secret crusade, be warned or maybe don't read this at all)

remember how altaïr talks to king richard at the end of ac1, and richard is like "[humans] come into the world kicking and screaming, violent and unstable. it is what we are. we cannot help ourselves."? and how altaïr answers "no. we are what we choose to be." and how that ACTUALLY has meaning bc he himself was "violent and unstable" at the beginning of the game but he has learned and is now CHOOSING to be a better person who cares about others and humanity at large? remember how his calmness and gentleness was something that he ACQUIRED over the course of the story?

and remember how in revelations they then suddenly had a PRE-AC1 altaïr say about the first of his targets "no man should pass from this world without knowing some kindness." and be all wise and calm and collected during a nice little chat with al mualim, who suddenly acts all fatherly? (like, this is suddenly supposed to be a positive relationship? what??)

also, during the confession the target says to altair: "you put too much faith in the hearts of men, altaïr. [...] humans are weak, base, and petty." and altaïr answers: "no. our creed is evidence to the contrary." KJASJFJDKL???? like, it’s almost insulting how close this exchange is to the one with richard. you know, the one that was actually earned after a whole game of character development. like WTF??? cool congrats now that development means nothing. like, apparently that was just altaïr reverting BACK to being the exemplary assassin who understands and believes in the creed that he was apparently just born as. (i also hate how having a young inexperienced altaïr saying this implies that altaïr's faith in humanity is a sign of naivete instead of a sign of the wisdom he has gained after being confronted with counter arguments for a whole game, and also something that distinguishes the assassins from the templars who use humanity's supposed wickedness to justify controlling them like in AC1, but whatever)

altaïr’s development in AC1 mattered BECAUSE he is not NATURALLY a good person, it actually said something about humanity's capacity for both bad AND good and how humans don't have to be forced to be good through mind control bc they can by their own free will choose to be better when taught how and when allowed the freedom to grow. but no. apparently altaïr has just always been calm, wise and gentle. and he just sort of forgot about that during AC1 bc…. ? bc of adha?? bc of abbas???

oh don’t get me started on the whole abbas thing. (it doesnt even make sense that abbas is so hung up about his father and "his family’s honor", like what about the whole point of al mualim not allowing parents to be close to their children bc it would make them weak? like, my dude, you’re not supposed to HAVE any family aside from the brotherhood)

they used the throwaway character that had like 5 lines and made him into altaïr’s main antagonist in revelations… like, abbas wasn’t supposed to be this ONE dude who had personal beef with altaïr, he was just supposed to show how while altaïr’s revered by many, a lot of his brothers also hate him, bc 1) altaïr is a shitty person at this point and 2) bc there’s no real feeling of community and family in this version of the brotherhood, but just a pervasive sense of competition and jealousy — these assassins don’t care about their goal of safeguarding humanity bc they’re too hung up on petty squabbles and divided by rivalries (you know, the things that made malik hate altaïr even before solomon’s temple and that he overcomes in the end which enables him to forgive and to reconcile with altaïr so they can work together and stop al mualim? (you ever just think about "we are one. as we share the glory of our victories, so too should we share the pain of our defeat. in this way we grow closer. we grow stronger." and cry? bc i do. all the time. malik, the man that you are))

and now abbas is altaïr’s childhood best friend turned lifelong enemy?? like, bowden bent over backwards to come up with an explanation for why altaïr is an arrogant ass at the beginning of AC1, when the explanation is right there: he was raised to kill without asking questions and was constantly praised for how good he is at murder, which resulted in him becoming arrogant and disregarding human life. like, it doesn’t have to be some shakespearean family feud type shit. and guess what, this "simple" explanation actually plays into the story’s themes, who’da thunk!

(like, abbas might not have been a "fleshed out" character in AC1, but he had a specific function and now that function is gone. mr bowden, mr mcdevitt, you know characters are allowed to simply exist to tell us something about their worlds and the systems they live in and sometimes that’s more important and also more interesting than having every single character have a detailed backstory to explain all their behaviors, right?)

with all of this revelations loses all nuance in regards to the levantine brotherhood and also the creed in general. like, altaïr being a master assassin at the beginning despite being a terrible person and not actually understanding the creed is a criticism of the brotherhood and the creed itself. like, it said something about the order that someone like altaïr was able to get that high in rank, simply bc he's good at killing, which also tells us what is considered important in the al mualim era assassin order. when you make altaïr’s arrogance the result of his personal conflicts instead of how we was raised by a brotherhood that only valued one's ability to kill, you lose that characterization of the assassin order itself!

and by suddenly making al mualim a semi good "father figure" you also downplay his manipulation of not only altaïr but all those under his care. (altaïr says something about al mualim being "as a father" to him exactly twice in the codex, but he doesn’t mean by that that he WAS a father to him, what he means is that he was the CLOSEST THING he had bc HE DID NOT HAVE PARENTS, not because his mother died in childbirth and his father was executed when he was young btw, BUT BECAUSE IT WASN’T ALLOWED, like his parents actually lived but weren’t allowed to be close to him, he says he came to view al mualim’s "weak and dishonest" love as enough and even better BECAUSE HE HAD NOTHING ELSE, BECAUSE AL MUALIM ISOLATED HIS ASSASSINS FROM THEIR FAMILIES. al mualim "loved" him bc he was good at killing people for him! hm, i wonder if this could be trying to say anything about cults and indoctrination and the inherent contradiction in fighting for peace and free will by taking children away from their parents and raising them to become killers?? like, altaïr wasn't ~the special orphan boy~ taken in by al mualim bc his father died a hero's death, it was "the way of the order" to have al mualim be the closest thing to a parental figure for everyone to ensure absolute loyalty! altaïr saying al mualim was like his father is not supposed to make you go "oh, he must have actually been a good guy for altaïr to consider him a father", it should make you go "oh that's kinda fucked up that he considers the dude who made him into a killing machine and who manipulated him a sort of father figure"!)

and then in revelations they suddenly portray that relationship as positive and healthy??? like, it would be one thing to give it some nuance by delving into the psychology behind al mualim’s "love" and maybe showing how al mualim did care about altair in a complicated, fraught sort of way (like, you know, there’s a lot of interesting things you could say about al mualim at several points addressing altaïr as "my child" in AC1 and how that parallels Garnier referring to the people he drugged and abused as his "children", and what that says about how the templars view the people who they say they want to save and in whose best interests they supposedly act (in any case, al mualim doesn’t use that phrase because he has any real parental feelings but rather to patronize and to invalidate any objections, like in a "mother knows best" way))

but they even fucking DARE to parallel that relationship with that of altaïr and darim in revelations, by having the reflection in the puddle of darim hugging altaïr showing altaïr hugging al mualim…. like their relationship wasn’t inherently abusive but just tragically cut short because al mualim was just "corrupted by the apple"… like WHAT???? so it’s not the very real problems like grooming, manipulation and indoctrination and the hierarchical structure of the brotherhood itself (all of which are antithetical to the assassin ideology), it was just the evil apple all along. great. that’s DEFINITELY a lot more interesting.

god im sorry i really dont want to spread negativity but this is driving me INSANE. like, somebody please tell me im not crazy bc i feel like somehow most of the fandom is in agreement that revelations and the secret crusade have better storytelling and characterization than ac1.

SPEAKING OF WHICH, can we talk about how, even IF we completely ignore AC1 and treat revelations altaïr as his own character…. the narrative still doesn’t really work?

basically, the whole point of his story in rev is that "he gave his whole life to the brotherhood", this obsession led to him not using his time with his family which has him ending up dying alone in a dark library and this in turn makes ezio reevaluate his life choices…. except. he doesn’t? neglect? his family? or whatever? like, his devotion to the assassins is sort of painted as this tragic flaw that leads to a lonely death bc it supposedly comes at the cost of his family, but… his wife has joined the assassins, (at least) one of his sons is in the brotherhood and even when he goes to protect the assassins against the mongols, he takes his family with him (except for the son who stays behind bc he has a family of his own and who, ironically, ends up dying bc of that)… like, you can’t describe altaïr as a good husband and father in the database and have his son tell him that "everything that is good in me began with you, father" when they say goodbye, and then want to make us believe that he put his family behind the brotherhood and that that is a character flaw that leads to his tragedy.

because you HAVE to have a character’s tragedy be the result of a character flaw. like. that is how tragedies work. otherwise it just becomes tragedy for the sake of tragedy which is… boring bc it has no purpose. and we know it is SUPPOSED to have purpose bc ezIO FUCKING QUITS BEING AN ASSASSIN AFTER WITNESSING IT!

it’s like they want to have their cake and eat it, too — they didn’t want to actually make altaïr a bad husband/father, but still wanted to make his life a tragedy where he loses his family which is why instead they outsource all responsibility to abbas who now has to be the reason for ALL the deaths.

like, they try to make at least maria’s death kind of sort of the result of altaïr’s rashness or whatever but like… these guys KILLED THEIR SON and TOLD HIM THAT ALTAÏR HAD ORDERED HIS DEATH. like, altaïr losing it in response to that is not rash, it’s fucking logical and justified! if anything the scene made me angry at maria for trying to stop him. like, GIRL, he was YOUR son too??? but god forbid we give female characters actual real emotions, she has to fill the role of "voice of reason who dies for altaïr’s man pain" i fucking guess.

like, it’s this weird mix where his tragedy is simultaneously painted as his own fault but also not really bc abbas is the one responsible for all the shit that happens. it just… it just doesn’t really go together.

the only way to make his story make sense narratively and to give it actual purpose is by looking at it in the context of ezio’s story, bc the things he sees in altaïr’s memories are supposed to be a revelation (ha!) to ezio specifically. and i guess that’s maybe the crux of it all — altaïr’s story in revelations was conceived of first and foremost to support ezio’s story and development. which is probably also why many people maybe don’t notice bc, having skipped ac1 and started with ac2, the majority of people mostly care only about ezio and only really appreciate altaïr’s story in as far as it serves to push ezio forward. (tho i’ve also seen a few people say that ezio is also written kind of weird in rev, but i’ve never really been an ezio girly myself so i can’t speak to the truth of that)

like, altaïr dying alone in the library doesn’t really have to make sense for his character, i guess, bc it’s only really supposed to be a cautionary tale for ezio.

so, i guess, for once, they actually had a MAN dying for another man’s character development, which is pretty woke actually. ubisoft, i take everything back jksdsfjhgdsahfhsdhfghfdsgjhsdgjh

[smhalltheurlsaretaken]

if you're wondering why I kind of abandoned this blog, there's several reasons (fandom just doesn't feel fun anymore, I'm trying to cut back on screen time, I've been feeling like my faith is in contradiction to what I see/read/interact with on here is for years and years now) but the final straw has been what I see on my dash every day about Israel/Palestine.

I keep seeing people I used to interact with and used to like now peddling conspiracy theories, debunked claims, inflammatory headlines, and even bloodthirsty rhetoric with tens of thousands of notes (when corrections of those posts get ~500 notes at best), and reacting to nuanced conversations like they're calls for hatred, all while turning a blind eye to the very literal vicious hatred or sheer ignorance in many of those big posts. The level of black-and-white thinking is so strong that we are wayyyy past 'us-vs-them,' we're in the kind of discourse where even 'know thy enemy' (being interested in understanding the opposing arguments even just so you can dismantle them) is considered hatred - people can't be bothered to know what they're arguing for or against, nothing short of plugging your ears and screaming for the death of the Bad People is enough. This is a wave of just about the most hypocritical, callous and uninformed 'activism' this website has ever been guilty of and it's too much. I'm done with this.

And yes, this is about antisemitism. You can all shout 'not antisemitic, just anti-zionist' all day long but you have done jack shit to prove you don't hate Jews beside chanting 'punch a nazi' in the same breath you use KKK slurs and cheer for groups that have 'curse the Jews' in their slogan. I trust none of you anymore.

[leisi-lilacdreams]

another commission done!

my friend slid in, dropped some money, and left with a uwu

if you're interested in commissioning me: Ko-Fi link if the goal is met i'll reveal another merch design!