#its like my subconscious has to level out the good parts with something horrific

[skelleton-llad]

My dreams are fucking insane sometimes. Someone showed up in my dream, and idk what they did but it was cute so I was like watch it or I'll kiss you. And they told me to do it so i did. But then like 2 minutes later in the dream all the skin fell off one of my legs.

[one-abuse-survivor]

first i want to say, i know you won’t be able to remember or find it because i didn’t sign it or anything, but a long time ago i vented to you about the abuse and trauma i was enduring, and i wanted to let you know that i’m in a much better state of mind now, and i’ve learned a lot of coping skills that have helped me emotionally regulate to the point i can function. thank you for listening to me during that time and being so supportive, it really helped a lot.

now comes a content warning: [mentions of abuse, physical assault, violence, rape]. i’d like to ask your thoughts on something new. i’m a young adult now, been one for years, i’m working on building my own life and everything, have a healthy romantic relationship now and all that. not everything is perfect, but things are pretty good compared to how it used to be. recently, i started having frequent vivid nightmares. it’s not just general scary stuff. i had a dream that a boy i’ve only talked to a few times raped me. he’s never done that in real life. the dream still felt real. i’ve had multiple nightmares about my dad physically and emotionally abusing me and my family. there’s lots of hitting. last night, i dreamt that he was physically assaulting us, and he even choked me out. i thought he was going to try to kill me. the dreams about my dad have relevance to real life, as he has abused us in real life, though not to the level of violence that my dreams have. i thought the nightmares might be part of trying to finally start to recover from long-term trauma. but some of the dreams don’t have anything to do with trauma i’ve endured. they’re always traumatic, but not trauma i’ve had in real life. i really don’t know what to think or to do. i’ve never had nightmares this bad before, not even in the midst of my real-life trauma. it makes it hard to sleep. i even feel afraid to sleep sometimes, like if one wakes me up in the middle of the night, i might try to stay awake because i’m afraid of what else i might experience when i fall back asleep. on one hand i want to know why i’m having so many so often, so that maybe i can use that information to help relieve myself of them. on the other, i want to know how to cope with them. i know they aren’t real, logically speaking, but i am having real, painful emotional and cognitive experiences, so the knowledge that it “isn’t real” doesn’t really help me. i wanted to ask your thoughts on this. thank you again for listening :) i hope you have a great day ♥️

Hi, nonnie! I might not know what your previous ask was, but I'm really glad to hear from you again and to hear you're doing well. I'm really glad to have been of help ❤️

The nightmares you've been having sound horrific, and I'm really sorry you're going through this :(

I can tell you that it's not uncommon to develop new symptoms of (C-)PTSD years after the traumatic events have stopped. So yes, the nightmares only recently starting up can be a PTSD symptom, even if they never happened during the time you went through the trauma. But I'm not a professional, and I can't really tell you why you're having them so often. I can theorise, and say that maybe as you've progressed in your recovery and have started to feel safe in your real life, your subconscious is feeding you horrible traumatic scenarios in an attempt to keep you prepared in case anything bad happens again, like it doesn't want to let its guard fully down yet. But that's just one possible reason this could be happening.

Also, although I've never had a phase of frequent nightmares as severe as yours, I have had many trauma nightmares over the years, and I've also dreamt about my mother doing things she never actually did in real life. So, you're not the only one! And I personally think it makes sense. Dreams aren't coherent or rational, and they naturally tend to mix reality with fiction, at least for me. So I personally don't worry too much about my trauma nightmares being an accurate reflection of the abuse I endured.

As for ways to cope with the nightmares, I'm afraid I also can't be of much help. I can tell you that certain habits can make us more prone to vividly experiencing/remembering our dreams. For example, if you consistently don't get enough sleep, your brain might sink directly into the deep sleep phase when you go to bed, and that can make you more aware of what you're dreaming. On a different note, one thing that used to help me years ago (not with nightmares, but with insomnia) was to fall asleep while reading the most boring books I could find, and not stop reading until I fell asleep. Maybe this could work as a distraction for you, to keep your mind away from replaying your previous nightmares in your mind as you fall asleep.

Is therapy an option for you currently? It sounds like a good therapist could give you some guidance on how to cope with the nightmares, and could also dig deeper into why this is happening and maybe give you some outlets or exercises to work through what's causing them.

I hope things get better soon. Sending all my support your way ❤️

[ziracona]

hoh I'm really sorry friend but you got Talbot's backstory kinda muddled. Some things you stated that he did, he didn't actually do for the reasons you stated. He didn't experiment on killers just for fun -- he ran from them. they hunted him. he experimented on them to find a dosage right for himself. he also didn't experiment on an animal for fun. it was dead. Vigo apparently talked about escaping and it had to do with serum. Its why he injected himself after tests. He wanted a way out.

I’m going to answer this in two parts since it’s stated in two. First, friend, I am going to have to operate on the assumption that you have very very strong feelings about Talbot and assume everything said against him is pretty much the same after a glance or something like it, because I never once said he experiments on the killers for fun. I said the Entity I think lets Talbot experiment on other killers now that he is one too as “punishment for them and fun research times for Talbot,” not that Talbot experiments on them for fun. I think he does enjoy doing his scientific research, but that aside, the above is just a description of the Entity’s reasoning in letting him do that/its POV.  I certainly never said he does it ‘just for fun’. In fact, I explicitly stated his motivation for becoming a killer was to attempt to protect himself. I have to assume you didn’t really read my post at all, or perhaps got it confused with another. I know my shit. I read up. Though it is true I say ‘animals’ when, while he canonically experiments on both rats and crows, only the one rat happened for sure before he moved on to the Trapper. Although, that’s kind of worse... Again though, I never once said he did any of this for fun. I know he injected people to see what the serum would do, in a very reckless and poorly thought attempt to escape the realm. I explicitly mention this. Perhaps you are confused because I describe him as torturing people, and he’s not just doing pain for fun--this is because torture is not limited to only pain inflicted on someone out of cruelty or a desire to manipulate them. The dictionary definition of the verb, to torture, is “To cause intense suffering. To torment”. And he absolutely tortures killers, survivors, and reanimated realm animals alike as a means to his own ends. Also, the Entity has not erased all his memories--I know the archives has some memory deterioration lore added, but much of what he did to others happened well before any of that began, and explicitly some of his own addons mention things he explicitly remembers. The Entity did of course leave him to suffer in the void, with is a form of torture, and used the medical affects of blight itself to help manipulate him. Unfortunately, being hurt yourself doesn’t excuse you from the responsibility of what horrors you inflict on other people.

For part two, I am sure my answer is coming off as a bit abrasive. I appreciate the apology, but yes, it is rather rude. Even without the lack of attention to detail. Let me try to say this more fairly though, because I don’t know you at all, and in all likelihood, you’re a very nice and decent person who doesn’t mean anything by this, and simply has deep feelings about this character. Also, this isn’t all directed just at you, but to some degree at everybody who has sent me one of these in the past, or will in the future, which I am very tired of. I am going to quit answering most of them from here on.

First of all, I understand feeling deeply about a character or topic. I understand being frustrated or even hurt when you see opinions that distress you, or seem unjust compared to what you believe. That’s natural, and even sweet. And I am all for talking about how you feel and think and why, and leaving that in the tags so other people might hear what you have to say. Even for messaging people to see if they want to have a discussion with you. It’s endearing when people love things and want to fight for them. I only describe Talbot as more interesting than many of the others, because I was not asked specifically about my sympathy level, and it doesn’t factor high in importance to me where he is concerned, but you’re not wrong that Talbot is more sympathetic--or, at least, depending on interpretation, much more capable of being written sympathetic while adhering to canon--than many of the other killers. That said, he’s also--completely in line with canon--interpretable as pretty monstrous. I don’t think I necessarily paint him heavily either direction. Simply I personally feel fairly little sympathy for someone who commits the kinds of dehumanizing acts of scientific research torture on war prisoners without a second thought, ignores the consequences of his actions, and so quickly casts his humanity aside when in tribulation. He devolves from someone who could have changed and been good, to a man who is a horrific monster and cares only for him self, with no lines he will not cross (his own words, and pre-killer even). And to some people, that is tragic. To me, I feel little kinship for the man he was before, and am simply disappointed in him for failing so easily and completely. I can see why someone might interpret his character quite differently, but my take is just as valid in line with canon, and it’s mine. 

I don’t mind people telling me their thoughts, and I don’t mind reading takes in the tags. And again, I very much understand the desire to stand up for something you care about if you feel it is wronged. But that’s not really what you’ve done here, messaging me on anonymous. To the best of my knowledge, I have never even interacted with you before. You didn’t open a discussion with me; you talked down to me, and you decided to argue with me about a topic I did not invite anyone into debate with myself. I am not an opinion blog, or a discussion blog. I am a personal blog. But still, you were discontent to not go into my space and try to scold me about my own opinions as a stranger. And you did all of it on anonymous, where there is no tag attaching anything you said even to your online persona, and no way for me to even be assured of you seeing an answer, or entering any dialogue with me. Which means that the goal, subconsciously probably since I know nothing at all about you and have no reason at all to think you’re anything but a decent person who is a bit carried away today with love for Talbot Grimes, but still the goal, was never to have a dialogue with me in the hopes maybe I would see and like your reasoning and we could talk about something we both have an interest in. It was that you felt so entitled to dictate someone you don’t know’s opinion about something they disagree with you on, that you felt compelled to leave a missive instructing me to correct my wrongs in my inbox. 

Which, well, is rude.

This is probably a bit more, uh, ‘icy’? Than is totally necessary. I really am not angry at all; I understand you probably had no real ill will towards me doing this. I just have this happen a lot, and I am tired of it, so I want an easy frame of reference to link back to for why I find this behavior rude and cowardly and an unasked for nuisance--badly intentioned consciously or not. I truly am sorry if this makes you feel bad or distressed to read, especially if you’re a younger fan. I truly am not mad at you--and I do not at all think or mean to imply you are a bad person. Everybody is occasionally thoughtless. It’s not remotely representative of character. But please don’t keep doing this to people who aren’t interested in a debate. And if you believe in something enough you want to take the discussion to someone else, sign your name to it. If you feel enough conviction to make something someone else’s problem, make it your problem for real too. I’m truly not mad though, and wish you the best.

(and my ‘if you are annoyed by this or any of my other personal opinions and desperately want me to read your thoughts on anon about that’ requirements below the cut)

It’s literally not worth my time to read anon hate or people upset I don’t like a serial killer, so if you for some wild incomprehensible reason really feel a need to see me read that and answer to you instead of just delete and/or block without a look, then either leave my $5 on my Kofi, or get used to knowing I didn’t even read it.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I have to actually get paid to not file that shit under ‘I’m not paid enough to deal with this’. 

[neuxue]

(Part the 1st)Now that you are in the Chapter 50-52 bubble, I wanted to share something. I've messaged you before about how your continuous comparisons of Rand and Egwene's arcs helped/caused me to see the depth and complexity of their relationship, and the way in which Egwene acts as Rand's counterweight in the series, providing the a balance to the Dragon Reborn in a series that is, at its heart, about how vitally important balance between forces is (at least within a strict binary system).

(Part the 2nd) In light of that I wanted to add that I had previously been a little dubious of your theory that Lew’s Theron’s voice in Rand’s head was actually a defensive construct and not necessarily Rand’s madness. It just felt like the writing was so clear that LTT’s voice was legit, and maybe it is on some level. But I was recently rereading earlier sections as part of another read along (it covers 1-2 chapters a week and is in the TSR, who will finish first? :P lmao). But I noticedin the lead-up to the battle outside of Cairhein against the Shaido, there are SEVERAL instances of Rand just suddenly *having* memories or knowledge from LTT… and at this stage there was no voice at all. The voice doesn’t appear until AFTER Rand nearly runs himself to exhaustion in that battle. And it’s presented so faux casually (as in, it’s a big deal and it’s pointed out, but within the context of us seeing the beginning of Rand experiencing the Taint. Much like the Joker’sline in The Dark Knight about people being ok as long as events are following “The Plan” even if The Plan is horrific. We are expecting to see Rand loosing it, so we don’t really over analyze it when it happens) if I had not been primed by reading your analysis from that perspective, I probably would have just KEPT reading and not noticed, so once again; thank you for this blog and for adding ever more depth and meat to this series for me!

Yeah, I do talk about this one a lot. I’m glad it works for you!

And in my defence, it’s because most of the time I’m trying to work out what’s going on, as new information comes in and things change. Because it’s definitely taken me a while to figure out what’s happening – and I could very well be wrong! This is one where I think there’s a whole lot of space for different reader interpretations, depending on what makes sense to you (and, honestly, on what feels more satisfying to you; I often feel like explanations of a character’s internal landscape or mentality or psychology work better when they’re left a bit open to interpretation).

Your description of it as a “theory that Lews Therin’s voice in Rand’s head was actually a defensive construct and not necessarily Rand’s madness. It just felt like the writing was so clear that LTT’s voice was legit, and maybe it is on some level” is interesting because I never really thought of it in those terms; this is partly no doubt because I’ve been trying to work it out as the story unfolds, but also because I think the very nature of the whole…situation in Rand’s head also changes as time goes on. But I suppose you’re right; that is sort of where I’ve eventually ended up.

That is to say, yes, I think at this point in time, what is portrayed as Lews Therin’s voice is not an accurate representation of Lews Therin Telamon as he was in life, and is more something Rand has – inadvertently and more or less subconsciously – created, as a way of dealing with something that probably absolutely no one is actually equipped to deal with.

But I think initially it was much closer to a manifestation of Lews Therin’s actual personality and thoughts, as they might have been if he were there to experience what Rand does. And in between then and now, we see a transition.

It’s something I definitely want to focus on more closely in a reread, because again, my own understanding and interpretation of what’s going on has changed so much as the story progresses, so I think it’ll be different looking at it from the perspective of having seen the whole thing.

That said, I see it as progressing something like this:

We start with not even a voice, but just occasional things Rand seems to know, or remember, or be able to do, that he has no business knowing in this lifetime. It’s like that barrier between lifetimes has been thinned and torn, and then things start to slip through. It’s hardly even noticeable at first.

Until it is, and we move into the beginning of an identity crisis, with Rand occasionally responding to Lews Therin’s name and not his own, or not even realising when he’s saying something that comes from Lews Therin’s lifetime/memories rather than his present one. Because he has all this extra stuff in his head, and right now it’s not compartmentalised at all, so he starts to get a bit lost in it, or inundated by it, and he doesn’t have a way of anchoring himself against it (because what is himself?)

Then it starts to become not just memories and thoughts, but an actual voice. Initially, like I said, I do think this is probably very close to how Lews Therin himself would have sounded; lines like ‘I would burn the world and use my soul for tinder to hear her laugh again’ certainly seem like something that would come from Lews Therin Telamon. But that’s part of the same extended scene where we get ‘for a moment, he could not remember his name’. This is the barrier actually starting to dissolve in places, and Rand is no longer ignorant of what’s happening but is terrified by it (and as a reader, I was as well! I’m a proponent of reunification now, but at the time? Yeah, watching your protagonist forget his own name seemed like a sign that All Is Not Well), and – crucially – has no real coping mechanisms for it yet.

That is, I think, where we start to see a transition from a clear distinction between Lews Therin Telamon and Rand al'Thor (perhaps ironically, as I think a lot of what happens next is because Rand’s afraid of losing himself). Rand asserts his own identity in TFoH (it’s a major part of the climactic battle, even), and in doing so he more consciously sets up this distinction between himself and Lews Therin.

Despite that, though, the barrier between lifetimes is eroding (this, I think, is the taint madness…I personally headcanon this as being the same for all saidin users, but people react to it differently and it manifests differently in each of them), so more of Lews Therin’s memories and knowledge and even personality are there, accessible, in Rand’s head.

So I read it as Rand…creating his own barrier, in place of the one that’s falling apart, in order to hold on to what he defines as himself. It’s a self-vs-other kind of divide he sets up…but this time he’s the one defining it, which means we see it manifest a little differently than the one the Pattern put there for good reason.

From about…oh, Lord of Chaos onwards, we get what I see as a gradual transition from Rand al'Thor 100% on one side of that barrier and Lews Therin Telamon 100% on the other side to…a barrier being there, but a mixing on either side of elements from each…personality? Lifetime?

Because Rand starts using the voice as a tool, as something he can point to and say ‘that is a madman; I am sane’, or as a source of knowledge, or as a touchstone of sorts, or as someone to bounce ideas off of, or – I think – something he can contrast himself with. Like a mirror he can look into, not to see what he is but to see what he is not (what he refuses to be).

And it’s this last one that’s crucial, because this is what I think causes a lot of the shift in the first place. Rand knows he is Lews Therin Telamon reborn. Rand knows what Lews Therin Telamon did. And above almost anything else, Rand is terrified of doing the same. So we see him deliberately setting anything that falls under ‘not myself’ or 'madness’ or 'killing everyone you love’ in contrast with himself; he uses it as a way to set some of those thresholds (that he later crosses), to set himself up as distinct from all the things he refuses to be. He needs to see them as separate entities in order to hold to a) his identity, b) his sanity, and c) his hope of…not a second chance, exactly, but of not repeating Lews Therin’s fate. His autonomy, I suppose.

But then we start to see that shift, as well, because now it’s no longer the actual barrier between lifetimes that seems to exist (and for good fucking reason) in everyone, if this is a world in which everyone is someone reborn but no one remembers their past lives; but is instead a replacement barrier. A barrier Rand has made for himself, in order to keep his identity and sanity and autonomy safe.

Because ultimately here’s the thing: Rand and Lews Therin aren’t separate, really. Rand is Lews Therin reborn, so it’s the same…person? Soul? Entity? Whatever you want to call it, but with two distinct lifetimes and thus sets of experiences. It’s just that the files have been corrupted and there’s this weird bleedthrough, so the separation isn’t working the way it should, and everything we see next is Rand trying to, essentially, figure out from this mess of two lifetimes who he is (and who he wants to be). Does that mean shutting one entire lifetime away? But what if some of it is useful? Maybe some of who he is now is anathema to him, given what he has to do, so maybe it’s better if that gets shut away. Maybe he should take some of that old knowledge, maybe he should recombine some things (maybe he should learn from his past, both successes and mistakes, so that he can take this as a true second chance). But to go from zero to just accepting the whole thing is uh…unrealistic at best, so instead we see Rand struggling with it, and the situation evolving as a result of that.

And yes, I think a lot of this comes from how everything is presented in the story, and how it unfolds, and how we’re primed to interpret it. It’s one of my favourite aspects of Rand’s character and arc, honestly, and is definitely something I intend to spend some more time on during a reread or post-series.

[tamrinetamomille]

Prompt #8: A Mother’s Love - Rhyne

While Tamrine had her differences with her family, it would truly be a mistake to assume she wasn't deeply loved by her relatives.

One of the most vivid memories of her childhood was of the day she had witnessed her mother's love in its most raw, most intense form.

Tamrine had been on her way back to camp after gathering some ingredients as part of her daily chores when she had suddenly felt drowsy, only jolting awake thanks to her knees hitting the burning sand of the desert. Whimpering, she lifted her head up, looking around, her subconscious having guessed the most probable cause of this sudden weakness before her conscious mind had. The next second, before her eyes had found anything, a presence had suddenly appeared next to her, pushing out the air that had been filling that space till then.

And before Tamrine even witnessed the new presence with her eyes, that sudden push of air brought their scent to her. The scent of the woman who had given birth to her. Rhyne.

Her mother immediately grabbed her by the waist and got her up and close to her in a protective embrace while her remaining hand held her wooden, intricately-carved staff. Wordlessly, she was the one scanning out the surrounding area now, but Tamrine still couldn't detect who ever had tried to put her to sleep with a spell. Rhyne didn't relax a single muscle nonetheless, for what felt like a long time to the young Tamrine. Either her mother was detecting something that Tamrine wasn't, or she was assuming the enemy was still here.

Finally, a hooded, masculine silhouette stepped out from behind a nearby dune, holding their own staff, black with a big shining jewel at its top.

“And here I thought I had completely concealed my presence.” Said the suspicious individual with a gravely, complaining voice.

“What a confusing statement.” Rhyne finally spoke in turn, calmly. Her expression was closed and her cold red eyes were deeply fixated on that person. “If you didn't want me to hear you, you would have to stop your heart from beating. If you didn't want me to sense your aether, you would have to deplete your mana in its entirety. If you didn't want me to smell you, you would have to cease to exist.”

The enemy scoffed and opened his mouth, but he interrupted himself to suddenly hold his staff higher, rising a barrier in front of him that blocked Rhyne's thunder spell.

“A pity.” Rhyne simply commented.

Her opponent laughed, “You won't kill me that easily, mother cat, so let's not make this difficult, alright?”

“Yes, I have lost patience for the difficult method. A pity I couldn't capture you to figure out your motive.”

A more strict parent would've made Tamrine fight to train her and test her worth against a real adversary. A more reasonable individual would have made more than a single attempt to capture an unknown, mysterious assailant that could very well be the omen of more incoming danger.

Rhyne was neither of those things. She was a mother overflowing with love.

“W-what are y... stop moving!” As the individual was about to start casting, they suddenly started to panick for no clear reason. Despite their words, Rhyne still hadn't moved a muscle since quietly throwing that thunder spell at them. “Stop dancing! You won't influence me!”

“I don't need to influence you.” Rhyne replied, unwavering, staring at her enemy without letting go of Tamrine. “You just need to burn.”

Tamrine ears' jolted up a second before it started. The hooded figure suddenly contorted wildly, and would've have screamed if not for the fact that what came out of his mouth and his eyes were flames, turning their face into an horrific mask of pain. Finally, their entire body burned at once as they flayed wildly, as if grasping at their last embers of life as they were extinguished and turned to ash.

“What... have you done to them?”

Tamrine wasn't a mage like her mother, but she could tell without problem that the barrier erected by the enemy couldn't been easily breached.

“Tan'rhyne, are you all alright? They didn't do anything to you?”

For the first time since she had appeared, Rhyne was finally looking at her child, her cold expression having now left place to visible worry. Rhyne had crouched to her level and was meticulously examining her.

“Just a sleep spell... It has worn off now.”

“Good.” Rhyne smiled at her. “Let's get back to camp.”

She held her child's hand and they started walking back home, leaving behind the scorched corpse to the creature of the desert. “To answer your question, what I did is simply convert a portion of their mana reserve to flames. Like a fire spell cast from the inside if you will.”

Tamrine had had no idea you could even do that to someone else. That seemed pretty amazing. Her mother was amazing.

“They thought... that you were dancing? Was that the Kriegstanz?”

“It was, sort of! You could say I was in fact dancing, but in a way that let me keep holding you.”

This part of the explanation, Tamrine really didn't understand, but the last part of the sentence made her really happy and warm inside. While she knew it wouldn't be the case, a part of her wished she would never have to leave her mother's side.

[mittensmorgul]

Hello there. I know that this might sound a bit subversive but I have to ask if I m the only one a bit wirded out about jack's self preservation? I like him don't get me wrong but when he resurected Cas in my opinion it was for protection (against Dean). His want of killing Michael even if it kills Dean (its not the same as for sam and lucifer)

Hi there! I… haven’t heard it phrased quite that way. I think it’s a lot more complicated than this.

First off, Jack didn’t resurrect Cas, and I think this is an incredibly important differentiation to make here. Jack called out to Cas, unconsciously, with his power, and Cas “woke up” from what was supposed to be “eternal sleep” in the Empty. Cas was still effectively trapped there, and would’ve remained trapped there except for the fact that he raised a ruckus and continued to fight against the Empty Entity, until the entity agreed to release him. Jack didn’t make that happen. That was Cas’s fight on his own behalf here. All Jack did was ring the cosmic alarm clock that made the rest of Cas’s fight even possible.

I also have never heard anyone suggest that Cas called out for Cas for “protection” against Dean. I mean… that’s… really reductive. What Jack overheard was this:

Dean: Look, I know you think that you can use him as some sort of an interdimensional can opener, and that’s fine. But don’t act like you care about him, because you only care about what he can do for you. So if you wanna pretend, that’s fine. But me? I can hardly look at the kid. ‘Cause when I do, all I see is everybody we’ve lost.Sam: Mom chose to take that shot at Lucifer. That is not on Jack.Dean: And what about Cas?Sam: What about Cas?Dean: He manipulated him. He made him promises. Said 'Paradise on Earth,’ and Cas bought it. And you know what it got him? It got him dead! Now you may be able to forget about that, but I can’t!

I don’t think his reaction was one of fear, especially considering Jack fear of his own powers and whether his powers potentially made him inherently evil. Dean’s words that Jack overheard weren’t about Dean being afraid of Jack, or hating Jack, but of the personal emotional pain he experiences that in his grief, are all traceable back to Jack. I don’t think Jack is afraid because of this, but heartsick that he might be in any way responsible for this pain he sees/hears/feels from Dean. And he wondered if he might really have been responsible for Cas’s death after all, because he really had no idea.

And I think Jack’s line of thinking regarding killing Michael even if that meant killing Dean too? Yeah, that’s based 100% on his own personal observations OF DEAN, and really on a surface level knowing that– had Dean been there to weigh in on it– Dean would’ve said the exact same thing. Like, back in 10.09, ,when Dean was terrified of what the Mark of Cain could turn him into:

DEAN: If I do go dark side, you got to take me out.CASTIEL: What do you mean?DEAN: Knife me. Smite me. Throw me into the freakin’ sun, whatever. And don’t let Sam get in the way, because he’ll try. I can’t go down that road again, man. I can’t be that thing again.

He even knew Sam would try to save him, and he begged Cas to do it anyway. But we KNOW Jack is serving as a mirror to all of TFW. And we know (from 10.19) that Dean even admitted to himself (via the hallucination of Benny in Purgatory that was actually just a bit of Dean’s subconscious) that he could never really force Sam or Cas to have to kill him, not because they couldn’t or wouldn’t, but BECAUSE IT WOULD BREAK THEM.

BENNY: Oh, I-I’m sorry. I forgot… about your plan. You gonna get Sam and Cas to put you down? You really think that they’re gonna keep that agreement? Come on. Dean, let’s say they do. Do you think they will ever recover from that? It will ruin them. This little backup plan of yours, I know you’ve been thinking about it for a time, I know it’s been gnawin’ at you. You can’t leave that job to them.

Dean had already admitted to himself that he couldn’t put that burden on Sam or Cas, knowing it was a horrific thing to ask of either of them. But when he offered something very similar to Jack in 13.02? It hadn’t been so much a threat as a promise, because Jack WAS terrified that he would become evil, or be manipulated into doing evil things with his power, like Asmodeus nearly tricked him into doing in that episode. He didn’t know enough about his powers or the world to know right from wrong, good from bad. He struggled with those concepts for a good long time, and still does to a degree…  But Dean said to Jack the one thing that would’ve given Dean himself comfort back in 10.09– I will not let you go darkside and murder the world. I will be here to stop you if you do.

And yeah, in that moment Jack was afraid, and said as much to Sam, but heck… after that Jack actually began to consciously try to understand his own power (sure in 13.03 he pushed back against Sam’s strict teaching methods and scared himself… but heck, he clearly now understands what Dean was trying to tell him back in 13.02). Remember, this entire confrontation was prefaced by Dean’s horror that Jack would just sit there calmly stabbing himself to watch himself heal again. Dean grabbed the knife from him, protecting Jack from himself, and then took the burden of stabbing himself out of Jack’s hands:

Dean: You know, my brother thinks you can be saved.Jack: You don’t believe that.Dean: No, I don’t.Jack: So… if you’re right?Dean: If I’m right… and it comes to killing you… I’ll be the one to do it.

Dean didn’t say it with malice. He said it with finality. Even though at the time they had no idea if it was even possible to kill Jack by any known means, you know? In Dean Logic, this was supposed to be a comfort, to take this weight of fear off Jack’s shoulders, you know? Because Dean has BEEN THERE, DONE THAT, HAS THE BLOODY T-SHIRTS TO PROVE IT. From all sides of the coin, going all the way back to John’s orders to him in 2.01– if you can’t save Sam, you’re gonna have to kill him. As the least emotionally invested person in Jack at that time, Dean stepped up and announced he would do the do should it become a Jack Murdering the World situation.

Because Dean knew himself in 10.22 that Cas could never follow through and put him out of his misery:

Castiel: Maybe you could fight the mark for years, maybe centuries like Cain did. But you cannot fight it forever, and when you finally turn, and you will turn, Sam and everyone you know, everyone you love, they could be long dead. Everyone except me. I’m the who’ll have to watch you murder the world, so if there is even a small chance that we can save you, I won’t let you walk out of this room.

Cas would’ve stayed by his side to bear witness to Dean’s ultimate destruction rather than kill him. And that’s why Dean walked out. He knew he had no failsafe, that he was essentially doomed to destroy the universe, and nobody would stop him (and he knew he couldn’t stop himself– Cain became what he was when he tried to take his own life with the First Blade and was reborn as a demon, after all… Dean couldn’t kill himself… which is why he went to Death in 10.23).

So yeah, to Dean? That statement would’ve been a comfort.

But let me underscore this point too: DEAN POSSESSED BY MICHAEL IS NOT THE SAME AS MoC DEAN “GOING DARKSIDE” OR JACK “TURNING EVIL BECAUSE OF HIS POWERS.”

Honestly? In the depths of his possession, drowning and failing to claw his way to the surface, we don’t know if Dean would’ve begged for death or begged for life. When he’d said yes, it had been in part to save Jack’s life (as well as Sam’s, as well as ensuring that Lucifer was stopped now that he had Jack’s immense nephilim power source and was intent on destroying the world as we know it). For all Dean knew, Lucifer had already killed Jack and Sam, but he knew he had to try to save them. And I think Jack does bear some measure of personal guilt over this fact. He’d been the one to trust Lucifer. He’d felt confident enough in his own power not to see how Lucifer was ready to betray him for standing up to him.

Jack’s already lamented the loss of his powers because he was unable to save Dean or defeat Michael.

I in no way think Jack’s insistence that Cas accept that he might have to kill Dean in order to defeat Michael was predicated on a fear of Dean. Or even on anger at Dean for having said yes to Michael. But Jack’s understanding of humanity, and his understanding of right and wrong, good and evil, is… not fully developed yet. We’re watching him go through the emotional equivalent of adolescence here, considering he was ready to run away from home because he didn’t think he should be treated like a kid in 14.03. He may have been parroting back things he’s heard Dean say in similar situations before, but he doesn’t understand the nuance.

Also, Cas needed to hear that from the other side of the table, you know? Just as Cas was unable to verbalize his objections to killing Dean back in s10, now he’s had a chance to have considered that scenario. He knows how Dean (and Sam, but we’re talking about killing Dean specifically here, so I’m gonna pin this one on Dean for now) had been willing to stay by his side and fight Ramiel in 12.12 despite having no real hope for his survival. They refused to give up on him. And in 12.10, Dean had a chance to banish Ishim and save himself, but the risk that Cas wouldn’t survive being banished was too much and Dean had essentially surrendered his own life even on the uncertain chance that saving himself might hurt or even kill Cas. So. In 14.02:

Jack: Cas, Michael has to be stopped.Castiel: I know, and he will be, after Dean is –Jack: No, Dean doesn’t matter. You’re all so focused on trying to save Dean. And I get it, I understand, but if he can’t be saved, if it comes down to him or Michael… Michael has to be stopped. Caged or killed –Castiel: And if that means that Dean dies, too?Jack: Then Dean dies. I know this Michael. I’ve seen what he’s done to an entire world, and so have you. If stopping that from happening here means that Dean has to die, then… Do you think he’d want it any other way?

Cas… really has to think about that… because this isn’t a question with an easy answer. Jack makes it sound so simple, but Cas knows from personal experience that it is in no way that simple.

[pleinedelavie]

a thought exercise (of sorts)

I think a lot of y'all can probably relate to a feeling of discomfort with the popular/Christian model of the afterlife in which people who live in a certain, very specific way are going to go to heaven and all others will end up in hell. The popularity of The Good Place, which interrogates and criticizes this concept, is a testament to this. So let's run with that. (This is a long post and frankly also a bit of a rant but I promise I have a point, please bear with me.)

At least for Americans, we live in a society that buys into this idea pretty wholesale. Almost everyone probably knows some people who are pretty religious, or at least has encountered someone telling them that eventually their sinful life will catch up with them, and they will be in hell. "Go to hell" (and variations thereupon) is a common phrase in our society and the concept shows up fairly often in popular media.

And I think most of us agree that while many of these examples are surface-level harmless, being endlessly confronted by the belief that you are doomed to some horrific end, that the ultimate culmination of existence is this idea that you find horrific, is pretty shitty.

So we start to push away from this idea, at least in our minds. Some of us might try to reinterpret these concepts, mentally redefine how this afterlife works in order to make it line up better with what we're comfortable with. Of course there are lots of other religions and philosophies with different interpretations of the afterlife that give alternative possibilities for what the point of our lives is.

And of course there's the other side, the final belief: maybe there is nothing after this. Some people find a certain comfort or at least logic in the lack of some final reward or punishment for earthly behavior. They don't need that promise of ‘life everlasting’ in order to find life fulfilling, because there's a lot to live for on this earth.

My belief, at least, is that there's nothing wrong with any of this, and if you don't agree you may want to stop reading because you probably won’t connect super well to the point of this post. (Yes, there’s a point, remember? Eventually.)

As mentioned before, the hyperchristianity of American society and culture (at least, I can’t speak to other places) means that anyone trying to stand apart in this matter experiences a lot of pushback, some subtle and some not. There's a view that those who try to reinterpret Christian ideals are doing it wrong, fundamentally violating the faith in an unacceptable fashion. And of course xenophobia is rampant, and those who believe in other religions or none at all are seen as somehow less moral-- and thus, implicitly, less human.

And on the other side... I imagine even those who have made some peace with the idea of no afterlife find the concept of that final end, of simply ceasing to exist, a little scary; personally I think it's terrifying, and I would guess based on  the concept of existential crises that this feeling is pretty common. Especially from a cultural context that's incredibly individualistic, probably because of the values from the same Christian obsession that brings us hell, there's a huge subconscious urge to fear that if we truly are gone when we are dead, that nothing we did had meaning in the first place.

Nevertheless, we believe what we believe, and while we can explore different paths I think that we don't really have a choice in what finally makes sense to us. So we walk that razor edge between the rather oppressive-sounding end society claims we are destined for, and the hysterical alternative it presents to make that end seem like the better option.

Now, maybe I'm just stretching out on a limb here, maybe I have been this entire time, but in my opinion, that description doesn't sound too different from the experience of being aromantic in modern society. To review:

We live in a culture that aggressively promotes something as a fundamental purpose of the human experience that we find repulsive or at least not especially attractive: romance

This concept shows up everywhere, almost ubiquitously present in music and fiction, seeping into language and pretty much omnipresent in public consciousness. We're often presented with the idea that even those who dislike or avoid romantic love are eventually doomed to it, with imagery like cupid literally shooting people with arrows actually considered charming (???), or the tradition of kissing under mistletoe getting brought up whenever two people who look like they might be a ‘good couple’ are vaguely near any hanging plant at a christmas party, or the trope of the aggressive matchmaker friends

The relentless push of this, the insistence that we *will* end up in a romantic relationship or at least experience simply as a result of being human, really sucks for aromantic people. It's upsetting for us to be confronted with it constantly with essentially no warning when we're just out here trying to have a good time. We feel attacked. (I'm using old meme language because this post is depressing to write and I needed to lighten up a little for my own sake, but I'm also 100% serious, it really does feel like an attack sometimes.)

We try to find our own way to be happy, some exploring romantic relationships despite not feeling attraction, or trying to seek fulfillment through different types of relationships such as QPRs, close friendships, family etc.

Some people aren’t looking for that sort of life-defining relationship; they genuinely feel fulfilled by other aspects of life.

(All of these approaches are okay and if you don’t agree kindly fuck off.)

We get a FUCKTON of pushback for this. Aros who come out to their romantic partners are often automatically dumped because they’re perceived as unable to hold up their end of the relationship; even if they genuinely love their SO, they're by default perceived to be 'doing it wrong'. This is especially relevant when the aros has certain boundaries because of their identity (or if they happen to also be ace, though that’s not necessary for this to happen), which to a lot of people makes their relationships fundamentally inferior to a relationship between non aromantic people.

The fucking insistence that *love makes us human uwu* means that those who choose not to participate in romance, or in any sort of life-encompassing interpersonal relationship, are seen as somehow less capable of being fully fulfilled or even just... Less human. If you don’t think this is true I want you to take a good hard look at how many aro/aro-coded characters in media are robots, aliens, villains, young children, or other groups not treated as fully human by the narrative. (I’m reblogging with links to articles about this because that’s apparently the only way to get tumblr to let it show up in the tag. There’s also an interesting movement called voidpunk which i think originated in the aro community that afaik is a response to this dehumanization)

This pervasive cultural drive toward romance also manifests as a sort of... I want to say internalized arophobia, let me know if that's appropriative since it is based off terms used by other groups. I, and probably a lot of other aros regardless of how genuinely proud we also feel, do have a fear that being without romantic connection will leave us unhappy, or worse that we are somehow broken. This feeling is terrifying and it sucks, and the fact that it’s reinforced and probably created by our amatonormative society means that there needs to be a change.

Finally, we are who we are. I'm pretty sure its not a challenging opinion anymore to say that you can't choose who you love, and that means aros are just as valid as any other identity. So I'll restate: we're stuck in a society that says either that who we are is impossible and we're going to end up somewhere we don’t want to be, or that who we are is horrible and will leave us fundamentally unhappy.

(If parts of this sound combative or frustrated, that’s because I am. We are. Sometimes, even often, it feels like society hates the very concept of aromantic people, and most others it feels like we’re just invisible. I personally don’t have the courage to talk about this in real life but all of the frustration has to go somewhere, so...)

I hope that this post helps you relate a little better to the problems that aros face. This post is partially meant for aspec people who want something to relate to, so I'd be really happy if other aros and aspec people weigh in, even/especially if its to point out the places where I'm overgeneralizing or just plain wrong. I'm not any kind of expert on this, it's obviously just my thoughts.

This is even more important because I'd also hope that this gets to non-aspecs and gives you some insight into our experiences with amatonormativity, because we are a pretty small community and if the world is going to get safer for us we need your help. If this post makes sense to you, please share it, because people need to hear it.

I don’t have a solution to the problems presented here, though the staples of this kind of thing are important: include aspecs, in your fiction and your discussions. think before you say something that might erase or dehumanize us, and if an aspec person tells you something you said was hurtful to them, listen. don’t constantly push romance onto people. (specifically @ some allo aces, many/most of you are fine but you know who you are, don’t put romantic stuff in our tags please god why). more generally, it would be really cool to start tagging things as romance or romance mention because some of us are romance repulsed and don’t want to be surprised by that stuff.

(Finally, because this post does talk a lot about religion, I do want to mention that I don’t mean to trivialize or take away from what religious minorities face, or say that our problems are one to one identical. Please let me know if some part of this is offensive because that's not my intention at all.)

TLDR: Since people seem to have trouble understanding how alienated aspec people feel in a society whose values are fundamentally hostile to our existence, here’s an example that might be more relatable.

[retrocollect]

Before I actually delve into the main meat and potatoes of Cowardly Creations’ recent PS4 and Vita release, I want to discuss the title. Uncanny Valley is named after the notion that the more accurate simulations of human faces and expressions get, the more we (as in, us real humans) become aware that they might not be authentic. A great example of this are the characters seen in the Tom Hanks computer generated movie The Polar Express. The facial animations of the characters are eerily lifelike…but there’s something decidedly soulless about them and the human eye has an unnerving ability to detect the fabrication. The same can be said of the young Jeff Bridges in Tron Legacy or the recreation of Peter Cushing depicted in Star Wars Rogue One. Like The Thing from John Carpenter’s eponymous 1980s masterpiece, it looks like a human…but it isn’t. And so ends the pseudo-science lesson. I simply find the notion of the uncanny valley theory totally fascinating and this in part might be one of the reasons that I was drawn to this retro-inspired psychological horror in the first place.

Uncanny Valley is actually a fairly old game, having originally been released on Steam way back in 2015. I only discovered this after searching for information about the game prior to its release on the PlayStation Store earlier this week, and I unearthed a bunch of rather unfavourable reviews, too. Not wanting to be influenced by the actual reasons behind the various two-star ratings Google threw at me amongst the search results, I decided not to read them and instead wait for the game to arrive and play through it with no prior knowledge or information about the storyline or the gameplay mechanics. The only things I cared about at the point of purchase were that I was enamoured with the 2D, pixel art trappings and the promise of playing what looked like a retro-themed take on Silent Hill. Having experienced and enjoyed aesthetically similar games on my Vita, such as Lone Survivor and Slain (both of which have a definite horror theme), I wanted to give Uncanny Valley my full, undivided and uninfluenced attention.

The game starts with you playing as a guy called Tom (which was disconcerting at first, as I though the game somehow knew my actual name), who has just taken a job as a security guard at an isolated facility surrounded for miles around by nothing but snow-covered forests. The facility was once the home to an organisation called Melior, but now stands unused yet is eerily still full of office equipment and machinery. So far, so The Shining; and I think it’s important to reference Stanley Kubrick’s seminal horror flick at this point because Uncanny Valley draws much of its uneasy atmosphere from the 1980 movie. The feeling that everything appears to be normal, but there’s something not quite right. Where are all the workers from the facility? Why does the massive building stand empty apart from you and another security guard with who you share a shift pattern? Who is the mysterious house keeper you occasionally run into at the now deserted staff accommodation block? There are so many unnerving elements to the game’s story that you can’t help but be drawn in, driven by a desire to know more. It’s like The Shining mixed with the desolation of Pripyat and the mysterious, unnameable weirdness of HP Lovecraft’s novella Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Once you settle in, Uncanny Valley sets you the task of doing the rounds in the Melior building after dark, where Buck (the other security guard) gives you instructions on which floors to patrol and barks at you over the radio to fix the generator if the power goes down. During these shifts (which actually only last for 7 minutes each) you are generally free to roam around the deserted building and the limited outside areas by torchlight, picking up audio tapes and reading emails on the various computer terminals you find. Both of these activities will yield further information about what went down at Melior before the firm went to the wall, and also reveal the unease felt by staff at working in such a remote location, with the company dabbling in unethical and slightly disturbing research. It is once these night shifts end and Tom finds himself needing the warm embrace of sleep that Uncanny Valley truly takes a trip into the macabre and surreal.

The dream sequences place Tom in a host of unconnected scenes and locations – police stations full of corrupt cops, alleyways populated by mutilated corpses and tenements full of what can only be described massive green faces bursting through walls…because that’s what they are. The desolate reality merged with the horrific dream sequences, both in turn coupled with no real idea of what is going on (initially at least) do make Uncanny Valley a truly unique and genuinely unsettling experience. For this, I cannot fault it. The game does start a bit slowly, and is a little bit more of a walking simulator than you would expect, but after a while the creepiness ramps up and the action starts…and then it goes fully Silent Hill and you find yourself running down shadowy corridors, shooting zombies in the head and being chased by crowds of invincible silhouettes. What does it all mean? What was Melior doing out there in the place beyond the pines? Well…I won’t spoil it for you, but rest assured it’s pretty creepy and makes Uncanny Valley stand out on the Vita especially as a game well worth investigating.

Another, not so positive aspect of Uncanny Valley, is just how full of glitches it is. At first, I wondered if what I was encountering was a play on Eternal Darkness’s way of messing with the player. Remember the ‘corrupt memory card’ prank and the other ways in which the Gamecube classic tried to freak you out by breaking the fourth wall? Well, Uncanny Valley has plenty of these moments…but they aren’t intentional. A major bug I found was that if you are in the middle of attempting a puzzle when the game forces Tom back to his bedroom to get some sleep (it’s a bit like the mechanic used in Shenmue where Ryo Hazuki has to keep popping off to bed when it gets late), then the game will not load the following screens. It’s hard to explain, but essentially you can still move around and interact with items and other characters…but you cannot see anything on the screen. Pressing pause will make the black mask flash for a split second, revealing the game as it should be before going back to a black screen. In this case, the game had auto saved and no matter how many times I reloaded my save, the black screen glitch was replicated. Annoyed, I restarted the adventure resigned to the fact that I’d just wasted two hours of my life.

Interestingly though – and as a testament to the message you get upon starting Uncanny Valley for the first time – on my second play through I got a slightly different experience. Different conversations with the same characters, different items in the game world to collect and slightly different dream sequences. Uncanny Valley boasts several different endings and you are encouraged to play through the whole adventure multiple times to see everything the adventure has to offer, and the fact that this annoying glitch forced me to restart after just two hours allowed me to get a look at what the developers intended. There are some other clever aspects to Uncanny Valley, such as the ability to heal certain parts of Tom’s body with bandages, and the damage model will hinder progress (such as making Tom walk slower or not allowing him to move boxes at all if his arms are injured). There are standard puzzle elements too, such as finding key codes and unlocking doors and there are also some nice little touches like being able to interact with the vast majority of background items. However, the muddled way in which the story is revealed to the player, and the general air of not knowing what to do next does detract from the overall experience.

In a nutshell, Uncanny Valley is an intriguing and refreshing experience – certainly on the Vita, anyway. It looks pretty great and the animation is brilliant, while the sound design perfectly builds suspense and a feeling of uncertain and otherworldly horror. Sadly, there is a distinct air of style over substance. The somewhat aimless wandering around and slow pacing of the opening sections will probably leave many gamers cold, and the occasional game-breaking glitch means that many will likely never get to see the further recesses of either the Melior facility or Tom’s subconscious. Indeed, if I hadn’t decided I was going to review Uncanny Valley here for RetroCollect, I probably wouldn’t have restarted the game at all. Ultimately though, if you’re hankering for a new approach to horror on your Vita (or PS4, as cross-buy is included in the price), then by all means give Uncanny Valley a few of hours of your time. It looks good and the general weirdness peaks the interest just enough to make you want to see just how bizarre the game can get, and with multiple endings there’s a decent level of replay value.

Since playing Uncanny Valley, I’ve been back and looked at those reviews I mentioned in the opening section of this review and for the most part I agree with the criticisms levelled at the original Steam release. Not much seems to have changed since the jump from PC to console, and even the same glitches appear to have been dragged along for the ride. That said, as a Vita game there’s not really a lot of competition for Uncanny Valley and it’s really quite an interesting take on survival/psychological horror. Head into this expecting a Super Nintendo version of Silent Hill and you’ll be disappointed. Head into it expecting an intriguing new slant on the genre and you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Just remember not to attempt any puzzles before Tom’s bedtime.

Link: Uncanny Valley at PlayStation Store

via RetroCollect - Retro Gaming Collectors Community