#it's up to us to find meaning in it

[quicksilversnails]

Yessss yes yes! That footstep thing has legit been haunting me for months because it’s such an obvious yet understated detail? You hear those regular footsteps throughout the entire game and it’s never commented on by anybody, because why would they be? It's so easy to just gloss over, especially in the demo and base release. But then in P&tD they change completely, and it's this huge source of tension leading into the full LQ reveal!

And, like, it’s not a retcon or an oversight or a holdover from the demo or anything, because the footstep sound returns to normal when you return to your body! They specifically chose to add regular footsteps at the end of the route after you switch bodies again!! And it’s so odd because it really doesn’t make sense for your footsteps to sound like that, even if you were a “normal-sized guy”. It was fine in the demos where the player could assume that you were wearing shoes, but you can see your feet in Wraith and Drowned Grey, and there are no shoes! Bird feet don't sound like that!!

Compared to the thumping footsteps of P&tD, the regular steps just feel artificial...

And that’s part of what makes me agree that it’s related to the Narrator: the greasy film that describes your reality. He’s already shown to be capable of altering your sense of sound: like when He summons the blade from upstairs in ch1. You hear the sound of the blade clattering on the floor before you see it, and even before the Narrator begins describing it!

There are also other cases where the Narrator's described reality doesn't match the Princess' percieved reality. If you let the Princess lock you in the basement in Chapter 1, the Narrator describes her escaping the cabin and running into the night (with the sound effects to match), but in the next chapter, Witch tells you that she clawed and bashed but couldn't escape. Since the Princess can't ever escape without you in other routes, it's most likely that the Witch was telling the truth here, which then implies that what you hear (and what the Narrator is encouraging you to think) doesn't always represent what's "really" happening.

And your footsteps wouldn't be the only part of you that he omits from your perspective. There's the previously mentioned "world trailing behind you", and your deceptively large size, but the one that stands out most to me is your wings. In P&tD they’re huge and practically cover your face, but they’re never shown from your perspective, even in action shots where you’d think they’d be more prominent. They’re also never described by the Narrator (or the voices, or even the Princess weirdly). Your body is constantly being damaged and described throughout the game, but not once does He comment on any injuries to your wings. It’s a conspicuous omission.

What's interesting is that the few times your wings are mentioned is in relation to your divinity. When breaking the construct, your wings are described as "spanning a cosmic plane" and are "bound in agonizing tension to a finite plane". In the fight leading to Your New World, you use your many wings to bind her arms, showing your total embrace of godhood. The feathered texture of the Long Quiet itself could be interpreted as wings. More generally, wings and flight are symbols associated with freedom, something you lack within the construct, and can regain as you break free of it.

The connective thread between all of these hidden attributes (your footsteps, large size, and wings) is they all make you seem more monstrous or godlike, less "normal", less like a person. And I'd argue it's very important to the Narrator's plan (at least before the end of everything) that you see yourself as a person. You're not just here to save the world, but to save its people. He needs you to care for these people, to WANT to save them, and it's much easier to accomplish this if you see yourself as being one of them. The Narrator wants to frame his story so that you'll "do what needs to be done", so of course He'd omit details that don't fit His narrative. Suddenly having those details revealed through the Princess' eyes would definitely be damaging from His pov.

And because you don't really know what you are either, all you have to go off of is what you can infer from your senses and the Narrator's descriptions. You assume that you're a person, or at least person-adjacent, because what reason do you have to think anything else? And so having your perception of yourself suddenly change in P&tD would be shocking!

The one detail that makes me doubt that this is the Narrator's direct influence though is how you hear the typical footstep sound and see the typical visuals in the final cabin, even after the Narrator is obliterated.

This makes me think that it's probably something more indirectly tied to the Narrator. It could be that your body was shaped to perceive itself in this way by the man before the Narrator. Maybe the construct itself is designed to make you see the world this way. After all, it's only when the construct is unravelled, when the Long Quiet reveals itself that you can see yourself for what you really are.

I don't have a definite answer but it's really really fascinating to think about. Thanks for making this post and giving me an excuse to ramble :D

something that i find very interesting is that, while playing as the long quiet, your footsteps are light. you sound as though you are a normal-sized person wearing regular tennis shoes or something. yes, we can see how his hands look, and we get a decent look at him in the mirror, but for all we know, he could just be. a normal-sized guy who has some weird features. even when compared to the smaller princesses (like the base princesses, the damsel, the witch, etc.) as you walk alongside them, you look to be only slightly taller than them. you are, from your perspective, a normal-sized guy.

this is up until the princess and the dragon. you finally get a really good look at how the character you play as looks. he's big. he practically fills the room with the bulk of his body, numerous wings wrapped around his face and body and stretched out behind him, and tail feathers (are they really feathers?) splayed out behind him -- in the long quiet's own words, "the world trailing behind it". his hands look like a corvid's feet, yes, but his feet notably don't. they look like dragon feet. he hunkers down to fit in the cabin, bending at the knee and slouching so that his head doesn't brush against the ceiling.

(i am well-aware that i might be embellishing things here but. well. this is one of my favorite chapters so i'm gonna go ham in my descriptions)

according to the gentle princess, you're "scary" and "hard to look at". according to the harsh princess, you "look the way you always do". additionally, the gentle princess comments on the fact that you always stomp around, which upon hearing it from your own body, is definitely indicative of your large size. this is the long quiet's default appearance.

and i have to wonder. can the narrator affect how you perceive yourself?

i'm still unsure of the mirror bit, if it's intentional misdirection or if he really, truly does not see the mirror, but i lean very heavily towards the latter.

i do believe though that he would think that it would be damaging for you to know what you truly look like, and we see that in the long quiet's alarm at seeing how he actually looks, yes, but we don't get to see any repercussions from that because it's the final chapter. memory either returns or you're able to look at yourself in the mirror anyway, so it's not look seeing how you look was shown to be particularly damaging to the narrator's plans. especially since the long quiet ultimately just kind of shrugs it off and everything goes back to normal once you're back in your body. the perception of a body that properly fits in the cabin and walks with light steps is back.

honestly though, it's more likely that he just doesn't think that how you look is very important. it doesn't help you when it comes to his plans, so he just doesn't mention it. not to completely contradict my previous theory -- i'm just spitballing here. it's not as though the narrator is truly malicious towards you from the start, after all.

i do stand by my guess that he can affect your perception of yourself, bc why does everything go back to normal regarding your perception of yourself after what you've seen of yourself? you would think that having a true understanding of yourself from her eyes would affect how you would perceive your body, but well. idk. that confuses me

[egophiliac]

So.... what are your thoughts on Ace's UM, if you haven't been asked this already?

sneaky magic for the sneakiest boy

no but really, I think it fits him really well! I had thought his UM would probably involve something kinda sleight-of-handy or pickpockety! and I looooved that it made such a nice loop-around back to episode 1. ❤️ I was. kind of half-expecting him to just run out and punch Riddle in the nose again. but instead this time 'twas he who offed the queen's head! it was great! and he did it while stone-cold terrified out of his mind! because Ace is the only remotely normal or well-adjusted person at NRC and therefore the only one who is like "we're going to literally die, this is super effed up". but he did it anyway!!!! I AM SO PROUD

[puppppppppy]

who is your favorite AA character? 👁️👁️

ziska… I hope capcom brings her back someday

[bacchuschucklefuck]

they licensed his ass

my finished piece of the FWMS (official name definitely 100%) thing we started a few days ago! I had fun I hope folks had and/or continue to have fun with the sketch as well.

[bet-on-me-13]

Trigons Backup Plan

So! Trigon knew from the moment his Daughter was taken in by the Monks of Azarath that it would be difficult to turn her to his will. He wasn't stupid, he knew just how hard it would be to make his daughter turn on everything she has ever known in her (very short) life.

He can't really blame her, even he believed that indiscriminate mass murder was wrong until his mid-200's, he just needs to wait for her to grow out of it.

But until then he still needs a way into the DC Universe. And if his daughter wouldn't help, then he could always just make a 2nd one.

So, he searches and eventually finds a Couple of Scientists who seem to be good targets. They are researching Magic and Ghosts, so he makes a Demonic Pact with them. He will give them the secrets needed to complete their Research, and in exchange all he asks is that they help him bare a child.

They agree, and Danny Fenton is born.

Danny was supposed to become a Hellmouth when he turned 16, unlocking his Demonic Powers and opening the way for Trigon to enter the DC Universe so he could conquer it.

Instead he managed to get himself killed at 14. Then he managed to come back to life as a Halfa, he got himself adopted by Clockwork, and he usurped the Throne of the Infinite Realms in the span of 1 year, therefore putting himself on the same level as his Father on the cosmic scale.

So there goes his Backup Plan.

Dammit.

...

Meanwhile Raven is panicking. She had been messing around with her Friends when they asked about the Spells she could do, and she off-handedly mentioned that she could cast Family Tracking Spells.

One thing led to another, and they all wanted to know if they had secret family. Then they asked if she wanted to try as well, and for some reason she agreed.

And long story short, she has a little brother somehow. A little brother who is only a few weeks away from turning 16, who doesn't know the Azarathian Spells she learned to prevent his own transformation into a Hellmouth.

Oh shit...

[anghraine]

It's interesting (if often frustrating) to see the renewed Orc Discourse after the last few episodes of ROP. I've seen arguments that orcs have to be personifications of evil rather than people as such or else the ethics of our heroes' approach to them becomes much more fraught. Tolkien's work, as written, seems an odd choice to me for not wrangling with difficult questions, and of course, more diehard fans are going to immediately bring up Shagrat and Gorbag.

If you haven't read LOTR recently, Shagrat and Gorbag are two orcs who briefly have a conversation about how they're being screwed over by Sauron but have no other real options, about their opinions of mistakes that have been made, that they think Sauron himself has made one, but it's not safe to discuss because Sauron has spies in their own ranks. They reminisce about better times when they had more freedom and fantasize about a future when they can go elsewhere and set up a small-scale banditry operation rather than being involved in this huge-scale war. Eventually, however, they end up turning on each other.

Basically any time that someone brings up the "humanity" of this conversation, someone else will point out that they're still bad people. They're not at all guilty about what they're part of. They just resent the dangers to themselves, the pressure from above, failures of competence, the surveillance they're under, and their lack of realistic alternative options. The dream of another life mentioned in the conversation is still one of preying on innocent people, just on a much smaller and more immediate scale, etc.

I think this misses the reason it keeps getting brought up, though. The point is not that Shagrat and Gorbag are good people. The point is that they are people.

There's something very normal and recognizable about their resentment of their superiors, their fears of reprisal and betrayal that ultimately are realized, their dislike of this kind of industrial war machine that erases their individual work and contributions, the tinge of wistfulness in their hope of escape into a different kind of life. Their dialect is deliberately "common"—and there's a lot more to say about that and the fact that it's another commoner, Sam, who outwits them—but one of the main effects is to make them sound familiar and ordinary. And it's interesting that one of the points they specifically raise is that they're not going to get better treatment from "the good guys" so they can't defect, either.

This is self-interested, yes, but it's not the self-interest of some mystical being or spirit or whatnot, but of people.

Tolkien's later remarks tend to back this up. He said that female orcs do exist, but are rarely seen in the story because the characters only interact with the all-male warrior class of orcs. Whatever female orcs "do," it isn't going to war. Maybe they do a lot of the agricultural work that is apparently happening in distant parts of Mordor, maybe they are chiefly responsible for young orcs, maybe both and/or something else, we don't know. But we know they're out there and we know that they reproduce sexually and we know that they're not part of the orcish warrior class.

Regardless of all the problems with this, the idea that orcs have a gender-restricted warrior class at all and we're just not seeing any of their other classes because of where the story is set doesn't sound like automatons of evil. It sounds like an actual culture of people that we only see along the fringes.

And this whole matter of "but if they're people, we have to think about ethics, so they can't be people" is a weird circular argument that cannot account for what's in LOTR or for much of what Tolkien said afterwards. Yes, he struggled with The Problem of Orcs and how to reconcile it with his world building and his ethical system, but "maybe they're not people" is ultimately not a workable solution as far as LOTR goes and can't even account for much of the later evolution of his ideas, including explicit statements in his letters.

And in the end, the real response that comes to mind to that circular argument is "maybe you should think about ethics more."

[askfordoodles]

Emmrich Volkarin is stronger than any marine 🥓

[turtleblogatlast]

I think a lot about Leo standing up for his brothers in the things that really matter to them.

Like- Leo is the one who immediately pushes Mikey and Donnie into finding Raph the second it’s clear that their oldest brother is missing because he knows Raph can’t handle being separated like that.

Leo is the one who stands up for Mikey when Mikey wants to go on a solo mission, actively vouching for him and being the one to convince Raph into letting Mikey go, because being independent and proving himself just as capable of standing on his own two feet as everyone else means so much to Mikey.

And Leo defends Donnie’s honor in particular when his brothers’ intelligence is insulted because Leo is well aware of how important Donnie’s smarts are to him - and how important having those smarts valued and acknowledged is as well.

All this goes right into just how well Leo knows his brothers. For as much as he’ll tease or fight with them, he knows them, and he loves them.

[evelynpr]

Anime twt so shit they're calling Spy x Family basic heteronormativity and boring as the "correct" stance. Sorry the performative role and war trauma narrative flew over your head, can't be me.

[beif0ngs]

LUFFY’S DREAM

Huh? Have I never mentioned this to any of you before...? I guess I only told Shanks, Ace and Sabo then.

[on-the-clear-blue]

To help boost relations with the people of Amity Park, Danny (with the help of Sam and Tucker) starts a podcast.

---

Tucker, sitting across from Danny in an abandoned house: So, continuing where we left of last episode before we were rudely interrupted by an overgrown man child dressed up like a vampire...Phantom, is it true that yoy are a sickly Victorian child that died at the ripe age of 12?

Danny, eye twitching at the comment: No...no I am not...sorry why do people think this?

Tucker, grinning ear to ear: oh, it's the frail weak voice and sad wet kitten energy.

---

Sam, looking up from her phone, bearly holding back laughter: Now for the question segment of the show...this one is coming from...Dashtom4life asking "if not twink why twink shaped?"

Danny, pained look on his face: Not...not a twink, I swear to the ancients I am not a twink.

Tucker, on the edge of loosing it: I-I don't know Phantom...G-Got a snatched waist...

---

Just the idea of Danny starting the podcast so he can help the people better understand ghosts and how they do things only for it to be derailed in the second episode to be 30 straight minutes of Sam and Tucker ragging on Danny and arguing about things that barely pretain to ghosts.

After Danny gets over the exasperation of having his podcast getting taken over, he gets a 10 minute weekly segment for talking about space.

(Jazz finds out later, and after a little bit of convincing, she gets roped into doing psyche evals on ghosts.)

[aethersea]

I've always wanted to learn bookbinding, ever since I was a wee little nerd, but there are a lot of things I've always wanted to learn, and this one has both a daunting upfront materials cost and a daunting upfront research cost. however, my sister is a jewel among siblings and gave me for christmas last year a handy dandy bookbinding manual, a block of good paper, and a little bag of tools.

but I still didn't have a suitable workspace, nor any of the many important tools and materials that she didn't include in her gift. so I just read the manual and pined. until maybe a month ago I got fed up with pining, flattened a cardboard box for a cutting mat, and went to town.

and I'm real proud of myself, so here's me rambling, plus photos!

I went to the thrift store and got glue + some fabric to bind the cover, went to Michaels for a paintbrush (and later went back for a metal ruler lmao it's amazing how useful it is to have a straightedge for cutting the paper), and...could not find material for the cover boards. so I went home and pined some more. but the urges were too strong, so after a couple hours of moping I got a stack of printer paper at the grocery store (I could not bring myself to use the good paper for my first, inevitably weak attempts, I just couldn't do it) and started making a little booklet. which was a great idea, it turned out, since it makes for good practice with cutting the paper, measuring things, punching holes in the signatures, etc.

I have a big box of greeting cards from Michaels, which I used for the covers. it didn't feel like I was making a Real Book, so I got some colored paper from the stationery store and used that for end papers.

so fancy~

galvanized by this success, I ordered a stack of chipboard online to use for cover boards; and once I was confident that I could cut paper without making it look too stupid (getting that straightedge ruler sure helped lol), I made signatures out of the good paper, left them under some heavy books overnight since I don't have a book press, and then punched holes in them! (huzzah for this nice video on getting the holes right)

my sister's gift included good linen thread. it's unwaxed, but after some poking around on r/bookbinding it looks like that just means I'll have to be more careful to avoid tangles and keep good tension. I am fine with this. I can be extra attentive. (I considered just running it over a beeswax candle, but one commenter said if your wax has paraffin in it, it could melt in a hot car, ruining the spine. I can't guarantee my candle is 100% beeswax, I didn't make it, so maybe we just move on.)

I don't have good linen fabric to use for the tapes, but the important part there is that the fabric be thin, sturdy, and not stretchy. the probably-cotton I got from the thrift store fits the bill, so it'll do!

this is a french link stitch, which I got from this exceedingly good tutorial. apparently it's strong enough on its own that for a book of this size, I don't actually need tapes, but I'd already cut the things so eh here we are. and tapes plus french link will make it a stronger binding still (according to a friendly redditor on r/bookbinding), so we carry on.

specifically we carry on to the gluing step. now as I mentioned, I do not have a book press, and you....kinda need one for this step. you need to hold the book block in place with the signatures facing upwards, pressed together hard enough that the glue won't run down between them and stick the pages together (though you do want the glue to get between them just a little, just for like a 16th of an inch). you at least need some clamps and a couple boards to sandwich the book block with.

but you know what? I'm not a professional, this is my first ever book, if it's a little bit off it'll be fine. so we grab all the heaviest books off the bookshelf and improvise.

it's fine! I'm sure it's fine! and just in case it's not, I've tucked a bit of cardboard underneath to catch any glue that drips down so it won't land on the floor. see? I'm prepared! I'm acing this.

and actually, it really was fine. I used clear elmer's glue, applied with a flat paintbrush from the art supplies aisle at Michael's, and frankly I liked the way the flat paintbrush let me slip glue in between the signatures. I did poke around on a couple bookbinding sites to see what kind of glue I should use, and the gist is that although there are better options than this, elmer's glue is perfectly serviceable, and the main downside is it's not archival grade. but I don't need my first bookbinding attempts to last 200 years, that's fine.

the next step is to add the mull. mull is a specific type of fabric – extremely loose-weave linen – and the idea is to paste it down over the spine to essentially hold the tapes and signatures all in place in relation to each other.

but I don't have mull! so I'm using more of the thrift store probably-cotton, because it's thin enough and not really stretchy at all. I'm sure this will be fine too. I painted a layer of glue onto the spine, then left it to dry a bit while I measured and cut the fabric, then painted a generous stripe of glue down the center, where it'll affix onto the spine. then I added a bit more glue to the spine, just to be sure, and pressed the mull into place, rubbing it thoroughly to make sure it's firmly affixed to every signature, with no creases in the fabric or air bubbles beneath it.

honestly I might have overdone it on the glue. I've never done this before, I don't know! I think it's okay, though – I tried not to ever let it become a thick layer, just a slight coating, since the danger of too much glue is that it might crack once dry and weaken the spine.

and now we leave it in the press overnight to dry, and pick up the next step in the morning!

[hue-kangz]

Happy birthday to the most beautiful doll 🩵

Kang Taehyun 2.05.2002

[gummi-ships]

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep - Commands - Balloon Letter

[shower-phantom-ideas]

Danny as Fenton takes a hit that no human boy should survive while in a different city (im going crossover here) and just transforms into phantom and pretends to be all sad that he died. Just for a moment. He then proceeds to kick the baddies ass. Claims he got ghost powers and fucks off. Imagine if Captain America or Batman saw this while failing ti protect him, hell or any hero type. Danny doesn’t think much on it and just goes on with his week. Continues being Fenton of course but what if he runs into whatever hero, but out if costume, saw him do that.

“How are you here? And alive?”

Danny holding a smoothie:”uhhhh I made a miraculous recovery”

He just shrugs it off and goes about his day. It isn’t until he finally gets some sleep later that night that he wakes up in a cold sweat realising he now knows their secret identity. “Oh well it’s neat I guess” starts to go back to sleep only to bolt back up “oh god now they know my secret identity”

Meanwhile said hero is too busy trying to figure out how to help this random kid to even be worried about the fact that they outed themselves. Someone else probably points it out to them and has to explain it twice before it gets thru.

[arovalentines]

all you ever need is to be nice and friendly