#it's FACTUALLY FLAWED!

[thundergrace]

Watching more true crime and a judge really just sentenced a man to death and then said, "if I'm wrong, hopefully God has mercy on both of us"

Fuck you, dude. Just fuck you.

He's like "if you didn't do it...oopsy!" Abolish the death penalty already.

[mcybree]

I prepared this ask in the Notes app only for Tumblr to not let me copy and paste the text so here’s a screenshot bc I’m not typing all that again lol

there’s this funny trend i see in trafficblr art, in that, when there’s a lineup of every past winner, most players will be surrounded by symbols that were relevant to their POV, and perhaps drawn with the last emotion they’d felt just before death (or maybe just whatever emotion the artist most associates with the character). The winners might be doing something, or in a pose that reflects how they won—there are a million ways to make a life series winners’ piece. What’s funny about it is that no one ever seems to know what to do with Scott. He’s most often just standing there looking mildly disgruntled. And for the symbols he’s most depicted with, it’s typically poppies, which are only relevant to the first season; last life scott does not place any importance on poppies, poppies dont ever come up beyond a brief interaction in episode 1, and jimmy as a whole is less relevant to scott’s pov in last life than he is in every other season.

not that this is an issue with the art; the pieces are beautifully done, it’s just representative of how little fandom discussion there is about scott’s win thematically. Most discussion I see are about the watchers and how they hate scott for defying him or whatever, but watcher lore is not discussion of the series itself as much as it is a fan creation that is retroactively applied to create meaning.

Scott’s Last Life win, to me, was achieved through accomplishing what Third Life Scott could not.

Scott spent 3L waiting for his day one ally to die. He kept Jimmy at a distance, often fully gearing himself up first before backtracking to help Jimmy along. There’s a funny disparity in episode 5, where Jimmy spends the entire episode trying to get good enchants on his iron armor, while Scott sets up a villager and gets good enchants for the full diamond set that he’d already had in storage, in about half the time Jimmy took trying to accomplish his own goal, iirc. This disparity is also something scott acknowledges with the “I’ll always be more powerful than you” line, but it’s been a while since ive written a post like this so i unfortunately do not have the episode number memorized on that one anymore. But Scott goes on to explain that he’ll always have better armor and weapons, which is why Jimmy could never kill him. This is all to say that Jimmy and Scott do not stand on equal grounds in their alliance, and, more importantly, Scott does not depend on Jimmy. The progress Scott makes in Third Life is entirely his own, with Jimmy as more of an afterthought than a teammate.

This is what landed Scott his all time lowest placement. After Jimmy dies first, Scott loses sight of his priorities and dedicates his remaining time alive to avenging Jimmy, rather than focusing on his own longevity (like he’d go on to do in future seasons). And, in that way, Scott’s attitude towards Jimmy (disposable, going to die, unreliable) was an indirect contributor to Scott’s low placement.

In contrast: Scott could not have won Last Life without Pearl. Scott has to rely on Pearl from day 1, having only two lives to start with himself. Pearl gives Scott two lives total. Pearl and Scott are almost always together. They made it to the final four by each other’s side. And that forced day 1 reliance on pearl breaks down the role scott typically assumes (*he’s* supposed to be the person people rely on, he’s supposed to be the one bringing everything to the table) which curbs his tendency to see himself as above others, which then allows for the most genuine happiness i have ever seen him have in an alliance.

The comparison between the way Scott talks to Pearl and the way Scott talks to Jimmy is like night and day. Scott doesn’t compliment or otherwise say anything supportive towards Jimmy (save for the “I believe in you! MCC has trained you for this moment!” during Jimmy’s dare to flare attempt) until after Jimmy has already died. With Pearl, however, Scott is much more open about his care towards her, saying that she’s his best friend and that he loves her as early as episode 2. There’s more examples but between last life and third life, Scott’s attitude towards his primary ally is completely different, and i think it’s symptomatic of Scott allowing himself to love and be vulnerable rather than keeping himself at a distance. And i think that it’s so special that scott won the season where he was so close with his day one alliance, directly because of his day one alliance.

because, to me, one of scott’s defining characteristics is his self reliance. He will have allies, yes, but he often assumes a supportive role and acts as a supplier. He doesnt like taking things from other people. Last Life is different because Scott relies on Pearl, too. It’s also not a coincidence that last life is the only season where scott is normal about jimmy but that’s a different post

tldr yes scott won last life with the power of love but not in the way people say he did (ignoring the boogeyman curse was strategy ☝️)

I SHOULD NOTE, though, that the boogeyman curse was still a fail. Although purposeful, Scott receives the penalty and apologizes to his team. He says he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. I do think that his words here aren’t fully honest— he’d admitted earlier that this choice was fully for strategy. But I also think his apologetic attitude here is genuine. Scott is a perfectionist, he needs to succeed; failing, though purposeful, still hurts. He feels the need to apologize. It means so much to me that his win in last life directly follows the choice to fail on purpose. I’m insane though idk

third life scott embodies scotts flaws while last life scott is him overcoming them 👍 is what im trying to say 👍 last life scott is everything that third life scott could not bring himself to be, in allowing himself to love and depend on other people and overall just be a person.

[exerzist]

Erasermic, where their cats (bastard and sushi obvi) like to sit on the fridge and plot. They only come down when shouta gives them treats. When they come to the edge of the fridge, shouta swipes them up but still gives the treat. hizashi always complains that it's rewarding bad behaviour. At some point, they stop falling for shouta's schemes, and the only way to get them down is to scare them off by vigorously shaking plastic bags at them.

Cut to hizashi being woken up at like 5am by shouta coming home from patrol and 'bagging' the cats.

[lucabyte]

🐮

[bamboozled-distress]

it’s midnight but do you ever think that the reason that there’s so much mischaracterization of nightwing among some writers and in a lot of fans is because we see dick through the lens of Bruce? Like we think he’s a little sunshine and he’s happy and he’s better than Bruce and he’s everything that justice should be and he’s the best superhero because that’s what he thinks because he knows nightwing is better than him and that dick is happier and is doing better then he ever could?

[monards]

dies a little inside when people wholly demonize rhinedottir

[jupiterjunebug]

See the problem is that the way my brain works is itll come up with a watsonian explanation for something even if shootwise the answer is "bad booking" and "this wrestler is a shitty person or had no charisma and so he wont get over enough for a push" so ive got essays in my brainspace regarding things that literally no one TRULY gives a single fuck abt

[communistkenobi]

I think I’m gonna speedrun reading anatomy of fascism. It has good historical information about interwar western europe but it doesn’t feel very helpful in forming a theory about fascism

[cringecomp2014]

man how the fuck do i begin to unpack complaints about pacing and narrative payoff when the high points i felt they rushed into were a) story beats that feel inevitable and satisfying, just not in the first 10 minutes of a season b) literally beyond my wildest fucking imaginings. why should i know what i'm doing about the krabby patty formula, i never thought i'd get this far.

[rancidrubysoho]

there's a fascinating phenomenon on this site where people very clearly want to be doing complex, interesting political media analysis, but also very clearly have media tastes that aren't super conducive to that. so they're trying to wring big statements out of farming simulation games and network TV sitcoms and making very menial, unimportant things seem massive in the process.

like, yeah, everything is political. all art believes in something because all people believe in something, and even total neutrality is a belief in and of itself.

but like... you're fishing in a puddle here. you're treating Minecraft and Factorio like they've got the writing and depth of Disco Elysium. there's statements to be made about all three of these, but not recognizing what the thing you're analyzing is trying to do is just silly. it's like watching Young Sheldon and trying to extrapolate some grand statement about anti-intellectualism or classism or white christ-nationalism in the American South.

the statement's probably not incorrect, but you're talking about Young Sheldon.

[death-rebirth-senshi]

I love just abandoning Elden Ring playthroughs I'm just like "okay that's enough" and start a new game...I've been playing Elden Ring almost nonstop (with a little mass effect break) since I got it in November and it's now June. And I'm still like...hm I think I'm done with this strength/int endeavor I want to try blasphemous paladin again

[captainkurosolaire]

Well, since you said to.. Seeing you come across my feed, either with writing or screens, is always a treat. I could never ask you to rp for fear of being boring in comparison, but I will just cheer you on from here. Keep being awesome, Cap'n!

ANONYMOUSLY TELL ME YOUR HONEST OPINION ABOUT ME. I CAN’T REPLY, JUST PUBLISH.

[bloodyke]

who wants to invent therapy that works

[makerofmadness]

I use Safari and I'm not gonna change that

me and my 500 tabs are happy

[fma03envy]

Something about the parallels between Calvin's dad in Calvin & Hobbes and Nagito Komaeda

[bijoumikhawal]

Rotating siskarak in my mind again