#just to drive her up the wall

[mollysunder]

This is their dynamic in s2.

[bigfatbreak]

they both got bonked for being silly.

[headbandsandflats]

as stated in the tags, i am obvs fifteen years late to watching this show so i don’t know if this is a normal opinion or an unpopular one but i really enjoy neal and sara? first of all, the first love interest on the show who had any chemistry with neal (the main casting is v good - some of the recurring characters? ...not so much). they’re super cute and fun together and she’s so real for being so set on the fact that he’s a total asshole until she spends like five minutes with him being charming at her and then she’s basically twirling her hair (who among us). and she’d rather bend the laws than break them, but she doesn’t want to change who he is on a fundamental level. she just wants to have a fun, sexy, slightly dangerous time with neal that doesn’t end up with anyone going to jail and honestly that is the dream.

[justabrick]

A place where I can be without remorse...

You know, I've read many a discussion about MGR and occasionally polls pop up that aim to rank the bosses from least evil to most evil. And somehow Mistral frequently ends up in some kind of "misunderstood" or "lied to" category.

I have a couple strong opinions on that view.

I'll start this off with a weird thing – the dwarf Gekko.

Little recon focused UGs that follow Mistral everywhere. Here are some fun facts about them: - they vocalize in high-pitched tone that can be interpreted as childish and cute - when the player gets hit by Mistral, the Dwarf Gekko will either applaud Mistral or laugh at Raiden - in the section where you get to play as one you can applaud the other dwarf Gekko and they'll dance with you - chopping off the upper arm of a Dwarf Gekko in blade mode will result in it briefly pausing in confusion as it searches for its missing limb - Courtney thinks they're cute and compares them to little mice

- there are cute figurines of them made as merch - a lot of fanart features them in adorable chibi forms - they react to pain by wailing and screaming

So, they're little critters, right? They're cute, make cute noises, they display surprising degree of emotion through both sounds and gestures for a military UG. Like little monkeys, or mice, as Courtney put it.

Now how does Mistral treat them? Her pre-bossfight cutscene: Comforts the tripod that Raiden hurt, even holds it's hand tenderly.

To only moments later tear off it's arms and crush it as it wiggles around and squeks in pain.

Comforts something -> hurts it, keep this dynamic in mind for later.

And throughout the fight she tosses them around, obviously killing them in the process. Courtney comments on that too:

You could say that it's all intimidation tactics to get under Raiden's skin, except we get to see Mistral in her downtime in Bladewolf DLC. Boy do I have a lot of details to highlight there.

The very first thing Bladewolf sees as he comes out of VR training

Yeah, that's a freshly killed tripod just laying there, fresh enough to be smoking and throwing sparks still. Remember that "NPC gekkos will dance with you" detail? Yeah, those things are seemingly programmed to be social, and she killed and displays the remains of one of their kin to her "chair". The gekkos composing her chair are constantly whining and moaning as they try to hold up her evidently immense weight. And I mean constantly, all the time she sits in that thing, they shake and make noises. That thing is NOT comfortable or practical on account of said noises, so the reason she does this instead of opting for just a chair is because she loves hurting things. I'll dare to say that she displays more moments of pointless cruelty on screen than Sundowner does, and it's an achievement.

Look at the poor thing on the left hugging itself and rolling around looking traumatized. It jumps up in fear the moment Mistral turns around, too.

She's also not just hurting them, she frequently displays mock "affection" towards them. She does it at two different points to the chair gekkos alone:

Here and here. Let's not forget holding the hand of the Gekko in the pre-fight cutscene.

It can be argued that she does it to Bladewolf in a similar manner, calling him endearing pet names while constantly mixing them with mockery, insults and threats. The whole "shake" scene follows it to an extent as well, Wolf is being tortured while being forced to engage in what should be a friendly and affectionate gesture.

Also note all the gekkos cheering her on and acting like they adore her as it transpires.

So, what we get from all these scenes is that Mistral enjoys hurting cute things she has under her control while constantly flip-flopping between giving them affection and torturing them. Besides that she's casually abusive to every single UG we see her interact with, whether physically or verbally.

Give affection to something that trusts you and depends on you and then hurt it, rinse repeat.

If you know what exactly this resembles, I'm really sorry, if you don't – I'd rather not shatter your hope in humanity. That'd be very dark. Instead I'll just go for slightly less dark.

Look, I'm not implying that this is the pattern of behavior that indicates somebody who enjoys torturing small animals...

I'm telling you in plain text that it's exactly what Mistral displays in overwhelming majority of her cutscenes. She's an unrepentant sadist, one that will take advantage of even allies, and she won't be quick about it either.

And it's not like she's lashing out due to some kind of trigger relating to her past, this crap is done just because she's enjoying it.

Desperado really is the one place she can be without remorse, surrounded by two equally cruel partners whose ideologies only encourage her to indulge in her horrible desires shamelessly and openly. One could even say that all three of them are broken to the point that they're all eternally strangers to any kind of normalcy.

It's not like she's fighting for Armstrong's ideals of mega freedom anyway. Out of the horse's mouth:

Belonging, purpose. That's all she wants, really. Armstrong gave her a fucked up little family she can relate to and some goal to share with them. What that goal is about isn't really all that important.

[tytangfei]

I still am not over the choice to turn parts of pan yue's hair white. He's menacing, he's merciless, yes yes, it's what he portrays outwardly, but also visible to everyone else are those streaks of white, his grief in full display, and not a single person thinks he is mourning his dead wife. He is cunning and secretive, but not with this. He could've dyed it back to black, but he doesn't, and so displays his greatest heartbreak, and no one sees this vulnerability.

[bimbroad]

fighting the urge to write a s2 canon divergence fic where the hextech cosmic horror is replaced with extensive medarda family drama (+ rell + kino is alive bc idc) & everyone thinks she’s too good for whichever partner she chose and should break up and marry someone from noxus instead actually

[itsjaywalkers]

this is so random but one of the things i'm the most excited about writing in the oby universe is reg and lily meeting

[angelsdean]

don't know how people multi-fandom. dipped my toe into another one and immediately backed out bc everyone there was insufferable.

[andiwriteordie]

i’m a mike defender until the very end because i love my boy so so much but nothing makes me angrier than when he calls el “eleven” 

[prismbearer]

Idk why there's disbelief over Mark S/Helly in terms of motivation. Helly is just as capable of cruelty and selfishness as Helena. They are at the core of it, the same person with different memories/experiences. They can be two perspectives worthy of indulging their own dreams and desires and also be the same person. Narratively here especially, this isn't about morality, it's about human nature.

Helly was never cruel, sure, of course. Helly felt like she was the same as the other people in MDR. But Helly has something right now that she never even achieved as Helena. Someone who loves her. Someone who is choosing her. Helly is Winning over Helena here.

Jame Eagen wanders down just to be a freak and reinforces the reality of it. Helly is "More" than Helena, hasn't been worn down by the weight of experience and the world (and their cult and corporate bullshit). She still has, in some way, the innocence of youth and lack of experience with the world. She doesn't have the same fears and burdens or triggers as Helena in her conscious experience. She still has the ability to express her passions and outrage and defend herself. And to love and not feel sorry for it.

Severance gave Helena a chance to exist without the learned perspectives and burdens of the Eagens and she is able to be free with herself and her passions and desires-- whereas Helena was likely drained of any dreams for potential beyond a strictly guided future decades ago.

Of course Helly is feeling a rush of joy and satisfaction over Mark loving her. Mark choosing her. She tried to do the "right thing" by being logical with Mark. "I'm her." Even outside of Lumon, if they bring it all down, there's no hope for an Eagen and an ex-severed employee in reality. In the Real World they will never be together. Mark couldn't love Helena, how could anyone love an Eagen? (Poor Helly really with like, the enemy is within etc, but that's kinda the situation framed by Lumon for everyone by setting the stage with your Innie isn't human kinda rhetoric.) (This was also reinforced by Helena trying to get close to Mark to see if he still had feelings or chemistry with her and finding out they were not going to work outside Lumon.)

What if the equator is a building that could be a continent? Can be their whole world? They're choosing to live Now. Together in the present despite knowing that with their half lives, they could be brought to an end at any moment. It's very willful young love of them. And why wouldn't it be? This is their First Love. They haven't even been "alive" that long or have any memory of romance beyond their current infatuation. They don't know the world or it's places, and maybe that's okay, maybe they can exist in this space so long as they have love and the others.

It's completely human for Helly to accept Mark choosing her. To run to him just to see him for maybe the last time. It's human for Mark S to run to Helly. It's human for poor Gemma, who doesn't even know her fucking husband is severed, to be pounding on the door.

But this is their Final Day to Mark and Helly. Maybe the very end of their world. It's Judgement Day. Of course they'd have them holding hands and running back to the unknown to face the end together. To die together.

There is also zero fucking chance Mark Scout would risk his life and brain continuing reintegration once his wife is back. Mark Scout is going to choose his wife. Mark is choosing Love on both sides here.

All of it is reasonable.

[rigginsstreet]

Steve singing beach boys California girls to/about billy all the time send tweet

[adaines-furious-feast]

Kipperlilly is the kind of person that thrives off the approval of teachers, and having a teacher that is not present must have really, really sucked.

[ofcrossroads]

Aira logic is: Since I have a crush on Momo, I have to intercept Okarun to have Momo to myself.

[im-not-a-l0ser]

I think I'm unintentionally giving myself exposure therapy regarding Grace. That queer poll? I absolutely, 100% see her as a cishet person. But, someone (specifically @androgynous-sack-of-flesh-3 ) talked about how she just genuinely doesn't think about it because it's not really brought to her attention that it matters, she's busy with being a terror on society basically

Which, made me think. Both of my parents are greygender. Both of them. Both of my parents were also indoctrinated into a christian cult, into which I was born and lived in for over a decade.

So, here's my first official queer Grace headcannon. Grace is greygender. She doesn't understand gender stuff, and just follows her agab because that's how she was raised, that's how she was directed by God.

So... what do you guys think?

[atopvisenyashill]

the jacenyra scene is amazing omg this episode is taking me on a rollercoaster we got no nettles we got addam riding seasmoke we got marilda fridged offscreen we got visaemon when viserys is rotting we got oscar repping for house tully we got the continuation of this dumb fuck way they’re dealing with the driftmark inheritance we got jacenyra sondaughterhusband fight with rhaenyra over harwin and the dragonseeds we got SMALLFOLK DRAGONSEEDS MESSENGER NETWORK we got whatever the fuck those ali scenes are we got ulf wrestling with whether the stories he’s been told are true or not, suddenly terrified that maybe it was all bullshit, ADDAM WORKING FOR MYSARIA? the dragon keepers unionizing but for the worst reason possible (eugenics blood supremacy classism hellbrain getting to the keepers of Valyrian lore AMAZING)

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

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