#kh spoilers-ish

[hollowwhisperings]

'Axel, part of 2 trios' wait whats the other trio axels a part of. him namine and riku? or him isa and subject x?

Axel's arguably in THREE trios, if we forget that Ventus only knew Lea & Isa for one(1) day.

when it comes to Trad KH Trios, Axel has the Seasalt Trio (Axel, Xion & Roxas) and another with Isa & a mysterious 'Subject X'.

while we don't know much of anything about 'Subject X' she's very helpful to the overall themes of KH: her inclusion with Isa & Lea allows them to become a more Blatant Parallel of Riku & Sora (something that DOES require more handholding to lead audiences to, sadly)...

...and how clinging to the same friendship dynamics of childhood can do more harm than good as you grow up.

where Xehanort & Eraqus showed us "what if Riku & Sora actually bought into some of the false dichotomies they've been presented with, what if they hadn't had the support of their friends & were entirely alone", Saïx & Axel served as a "okay, even IF Sora &/or Riku isolated themselves from outside support & shut down communication... you can still fix misunderstandings, mend rifts, reconnect again as tje different people you have now become".

i was kind of Relieved to see that KH3's ending montage showed all the different "trios" intermingling, forging new connections independently of each other. it's a sign of growth & trust, expanding your social circle & learning that having more friends doesn't lessen the friendships you already have. the KH fandom and, in a way, the Seasalt Trio & Kairi (in regard to the Destiny Trio) are/were VERY fixated on having these Friendship Trios, often making the natural jump of making them Romantic OT3s (before the whole "Axel, Terra & Aqua are canonically considered to be young Adults: Ventus, Roxas & Xion are considered children/tweens" revelation).

That the "Seasalt Trio" is now sometimes called the "Seasalt Seven" (Hayner, Olette, Pence, Roxas, Xion, Axel & Isa) is something I find quite heartwarming.

(and, never forget that Jiminy has Been The 4th member of Sora's adventure party The Whole Time! the sets of 3 are just a jumping point, not some strict ultimatum!)

[angelic-guardienne]

Just beat Final Fantasy V. The ending had me emotional!

[achillesisnotcomingdown]

I finished ToA not long ago and I wanted to write down some thoughts/scenes that stick with me

(in chronological (ish) order, watch out for spoilers)

Theres an italian girl at camp ! It means Nico gets to practice and speak italian ! (which probably haven't happened in about 70 years)

Will introducing Nico as "my boyfriend". I already knew they would be canon, but reading that line felt weird /pos

Apollo sees Solangelo and think of himself and Hyacinth

That night when Kayla and Austin disappeared and Apollo left to look for them, it probably was the first night Will ever spent alone in his cabin

Apollo's insane body dysmorphia. He's a god, he can always take the physical form he is the most comfortable and confident in... Until now. He is stuck in a body that isn't his, he feels ashamed, when he sees certain traits in others he find them charming or pretty, but when it's on him then it's disgusting. He complain that everything is this body's fault (ex. he wouldn't have been touched by the Eurynomos if it wasn't for his chub.)(I could go on for hours)

Lityerses ! I love that guy. Idk why i love him that much. He is my best guy.

Apollo's reaction to Commodus' name. His flashback of him. So painful he was physically sick.

Apollo talking Helios out of killing them, because he just want to be free, not to hurt them.

APOLLO ATTEMPT TO KHS TO STOP THEM ?? IM A SUCKER FOR SOME GOOD PAINFUL SELF SACRIFICE.

Jason. I'm not talking about Jason. I can't speak about Jason.

Frank and Apollo ! They are so fond of each other !!!

Apollo heard all of Frank's prayers when he was unclaimed and wished he could've adopted him.

And Frank respecting Apollo as a god although he is *vaguely gesture at Apollo/Lester*

Reyna saying aloud that she doesn't want nor needs romance. It's so rare to see aromantic representation and Rick did it so well.

Literally Apollo singing his way out of situations.

FRANK'S SELF SACRIFICE!!! (He already had one of my favorite character development before that)

APOLLO KILLING COMMODUS ??? why do never talk about that it's one of the best deaths I've ever seen that was BADASS AND FULL OF EMOTIONS.

Apollo slowly dying out of poison and the Dodona Arrow doing everything it can to keep him conscious.

I hope Dakota didn't get killed off just to give Lavinia the role of Centurion. I love my boy Dakota, and his death felt kind of meaningless, except for her rank up :/ also i feel like it doesn't suit Lavinia. Some ppl are strong and good and trustable but just not made to order others. (ill prop make a full post about that)

Dionysos confirmed to be an annoying little brother!

Nico. How does Rick manage to always give him more issues. Leave the kid alone.

When Will glows, Apollo is genuinely impressed and tells him how proud he is.

Nico destroying Nero's door with his giant zombie bull. That was cool.

When Apollo gets stabbed in Nero's tower and think it's the end, he prays "Zeus, Artemis, Leto, anyone"

And in general the few parts he talks about Leto, he's such a momma's boy and I love it.

When Apollo left for Delphi... I was fully expecting Meg to go with him. I was so worried that he went alone while already feeling that weakened from the previous events.

DODONA ARROW. FOREVER IN MY HEART.

Artemis is here when Apollo wakes up. She's by his side, she's the first person to tell him he succeeded, she hold him while he sobs...

The first thing he does is to greet his horses :) and then to see his friends.

When he gets back to the Dodona bush ! To tell them all how brave and heroic the Arrow have been !

I could spend hours talking about the character developments of Apollo, Meg and the Dodona Arrow (i love the arrow so much you have no idea) but its for another day

There's many things I didn't talk about, but the post is already long enough. I love those 5 books, and Apollo is an amazing narrator.

I love the Arrow of Dodona with all my heart.

[fooligandan]

very sorry if youve answered any of these already, feel free to disregard ones youve already done/give different answers LOL—but for the KH ask game—

1. How did you get into the series?

5. Favorite world?

6. Favorite song?

10. Would you change canon (past or future) if you could?

(meme)

TBH don't worry about repeat questions, if I really can't come up with any new answers to a question (I contain multitudes) I can link back to one that does answer it. And I like getting to share and talk anyway!

How did you get into the series?

I played the first game as a 6-ish year old, basically, and the rest is history LOL. I'm not sure who bought/asked for it (if anyone did?) or generally just how it got in the family PS2 library, but in any case it fell into my hands, I played it, and well.......both it and I never really left!

Also had the bradygames strategy guide for it at some point which IDK if it's, like, around but shredded with age or if it got lost at some point, I'd have to look for it. But I remember reading it a lot and it's probably the biggest reason I got as far as I did. Still don't remember beating it as a kid tho - I got to the final door but couldn't get through all of Ansem's phases. KH1 quite possibly could be the first game I looked up the ending for on youtube once it was a thing that I had awareness of. And found out about the (at the time japan exclusive) secret ending also which was crazy. Who else here remembers the age of "Who is BHK?" even a little bit?

Anyway rambling off topic now, point is I've been entrenched here for a while LOL

Favorite world?

I like a lot of the worlds for different reasons so my "favorite worlds" list is in perpetual flux and has no ranking system, but I'm going to choose Wonderland (at least this time), because I'm delighted any time it shows up and just generally enjoy it's world design. Also DR throwing in the 'Walrus and the Carpenter' bit was really good, both thematically and I like imagining it as a diegetic song and dance number happening in front of YoungNort and friends.

Also because it was a fave movie as a young kid to the point of my family members having to lie that the tape was broken to get me to stop asking to watch it all the time, so probably also just have a soft spot for it.

Favorite song?

LOTS to choose from here thanks to #thepowerofmusic being very strong in this series. However IDK if I can pick One Definitive Favorite because of that. Too many to choose from for me!

I keep listening to L'Impeto Oscuro (KH3Re:Mind mix; the link includes the 'time stop' phase's mix also) right now tho when I get back to specifically KH Tracks in my current song loop, so right now it's that by default/technicality.

I've posted independently about this before but I also mentally put it next to VS. Tatiana (both plain and EDM mix), a song from a completely unrelated game with little/no correlation between them aside from mental corkboard red strings stretching between "time stop/reversal", "electronic-classical" and "final boss music", IDK if I have a point here but keeping it in my answer as like a general song recommendation even tho it's off topic (be careful of spoilers in the comments though if you're interested in the rest of the game)

Would you change canon (past or future) if you could?

Aside from anything like "improved women" and "more skin tone diversity that isn't concentrated on bad guy(s) pleaaaase......", which I think people have rightly pointed out as being issues before and probably isn't the spirit of this question anyway... uhhhh.... Aside from little things here and there that I think In My (Unprofessional, Subjective) Opinion could be improved in regards to like information conveyance or just being fun things that I know for sure I'd enjoy seeing, overall not awfully dissatisfied with canon enough to want to make hyper radical changes? I'd have to think on this way more, and also remember more stuff to really be like "oh yeah huh yeah this could be better, here's how i'd change it!" for specific developments.

THAT SAID my first pick is probably something to do with un-pandemic scrunching and expanding Dark Road a bit more, like on giving the upperclassmen some more general development and let the mystery/thriller aspects go on for a little longer, and I thought the whole mystery reveal was a little too fast but, again, it was forced to end early (in addition to some delays) so it's mostly just unfortunate because what IS there is pretty damn good IMHO. Hopefully ML gets more of a chance to tell us all of what the writers want us to see? Fingers crossed...

[fallenangelofsalt]

New art blog @fallenangelofsaltart and current story/worldbuilding project @magicpiratesinspace

The AUs currently spinning in my head like a microwave

No idea if I'll ever write them.

Every one of them has a happy ending, but the road to it will be hell on earth because i like angst :D

TWST

Inkloop: Horror/mystery focused. 10 NRC students are stuck in a time loop, unable to stop the others from overblotting, and questioning whenever remembering is a blessing or a curse. But they will not stop trying. They will have their happy ending. They don't care how many more times they have to die for it. (TWs: gore, temporary character death, gaslighting, betrayal, body horror, possession, it is overall my angstiest AU because it lets me go ham without fear of permanently killing off a character so be warned)(there is also a lot of crack because the game itself has a lot of crack-ish moments and all the events happen at some point during the loops, so one moment it's pure angst and then sentient plush toy doppelgangers start falling from the sky) (Rollo becomes important at some point)

TITWT(This Is The Worst Timeline): Yuu does not get Isekai'd. This has a lot worse consequences than you would expect. Luckily, every student that would have overblotted in another reality gets the chance to see for themselves what will happen if they continue down their current paths via good old time travel shanneningans. Spoiler alert, they will need So Much Therapy. (Psychological horror, probably)

PokeIsekai: Yuu comes from the Pokemon world. Yeah. Not new. But this time the NRC students get air dropped through an ultra-wormhole in their world instead. In different regions. And I mean air dropped. From pretty high up. Someone got a concussion. And- WHAT DO YOU MEAN KALIM LANDED ON HISUI!? (overall pretty fluffy. Kinda. The pokeworld doesn't eat meat/fish so Savannaclaw+Octavinelle aren't doing so well, but Scarabia is currently separated by a couple hundred years and Kalim is deep in a survival horror setting because I could not resist abusing the hell out of the Zoroarks' angst potential and also gave him amnesia)

TwistedKingdoms: Kingdom Hearts crossover but without KH characters. Mostly just the setup. Each dorm is a different world with a "princess" of the heart, the teachers are the overworked remaining Keyblade wielders, and it's a mad dash to keep the worlds from falling into darkness one after the other. Heartslabyul has already been lost. (No one dies! ...Permanently.)

BlotPoisoned: A new magic-based poison has been created, known for having no known antidote and its slow but lethal effects. Unfortunately, Kalim and Jamil get firsthand experience with it, and now Kalim must find a cure before its too late. (has themes of suicide, murder, mild consensual human experimentation and Jamil is in a coma for half the story) Has a bunch of OCs.

BNHA

Devil's Gaze: OC reincarnated as a newborn Aizawa Shouta. They are not Eraserhead. She is someone else. But he can't afford not to play his role. That doesn't mean they have to do things his way. (angst and fluff focused. OC is going through the wringer before they graduate while still making the best of their new life, then things mellow out once they reach 20 and then canon starts and shit hits the fan)

QuirkSoup: (Nearly)Everyone has a different quirk. This changes a LOT of things.

MagiMadness: Madoka Magica inspired Magical Girls(and boys) AU. With a few changes because I'm weak for angst and gore but also can't handle killing anyone(permanently). (extremely gory, the main characters keep losing limbs on the regular)

MCSM

Mobapocalypse: The command block is damaged, and the Witherstorm is not the only disaster to happen that day. In fact, it is the lesser evil. Now everyone has been turned into a mob hybrid, and Jesse is the only one who has kept their sanity. But with every monster, wolf, fox and cat out for their blood, destroying the command block and ending this madness will be one hell of a challenge. (Survival horror, Jesse is being literally hunted for sport)

No.285: Jesse doesn't want to be a hero. Aiden is a mother hen. Lukas is a delinquent. Petra is a scaredy cat. They are not supposed to be this way, but the story will play out still. He will make sure of it. (mystery, kinda. Might count as psychological horror) (TW: has themes of suicide)

MAD(Mutually Assured Destruction): Aiden and Jesse(pre-Endercon) Time Travel to the (canon divergent) future, where Aiden is the tyrant of the Blaze Empire and Jesse is the leader of the resistance against him. Eventually becomes canon divergence. (does it count as major character death if its a future version of your very much alive friend?)

InkyMystery

Inky Secret: This body is not his(why does it feel like it is), he does not know how the story ends(oh god stars why did he have to be a dish of all the magic races), and the existence of the Labyrinth keeps his mouth shut(he does not remember his own name, his old face, his life), but cuss it if he's not gonna try his best to help. (Classic transmigration story) (I gave the OC such an overpowered talent and then gave them self worth issues to balance it out)

KingdomHearts

BTDO(Below The Darkest Ocean): The realm of darkness has actual worlds instead of just being a Danger Beach. They're just under the ocean(and based in games instead of disney movies with 1 exeption Aka TOH) (actually, animes get included as long as they're game-based. Ex, YuGiOh). Sora learns this the hard way after waking up in TWST with amnesia post-KH3.

PrincessRiku: Sorikai RoleSwap AU where Riku is the Princess, Kairi is the Hero and Sora is the Villain. I don't think I've ever seen someone switch their roles like this, and I find the concept interesting.

YuGiOh

MagiCards: Magical Girl/Boy/Kid AU, crossover with a side of reincarnation, VRAINS is a thing, magic is real, of course, and one of my favorite tropes: your power doesn't define you. Even if said power was given to you by an eldritch evil card god.

Persona

DnS(P5, Demons+Swap): Mix of a Swap AU and Demon AU. Demons take the place of personas and Akechi is the Detective Prince, recently placed in Shibuya to work on the Calling Card Killer case, where evidence heavily suggests Demonic influence at play. P5-typical warnings cranked up to 11. Seriously, everything is worse.

Doorsverse: Mementos is now dead in a ditch, the thieves got more members, and the entire story has been scrambled to hell and back. Has both elements and characters from P3, P4 and P5S(apparently P1&2 too?). Velvet Room? Gone. Yaldabaoth? Never heard of him. Maruki? Got a reality check. Morgana? Has no idea what he's doing but he's sure doing it. (it eventually turned into a whole series rewrite)

ReincarnationProject: A collection of AUs centered around someone with Persona knowledge getting Isekai'd as one of the Persona characters and how that affects the story. Rules: Character must have died before the start of their main story, AKA Chie dies before P4 or Junpei dies before P3, and since their death was too early to count as part of the story itself, the universe makes up for lost potential by reviving the body and then placing another soul inside. Their knowledge affects their abilities, Arcana, Persona and how the Metaverse works around them. Slow, gradual but sure deaths have a chance of merging their souls and memories. Otherwise, the New Soul will not have the Old Soul's Arcana, memories or Persona without external cognitive influences.

Dollhouse: P5 Angstfest, NG+, Joker has a palace and things keep getting worse. Heavy gore, horror, repeated temporary character death and permanent Major Character Death. A bunch of horror tropes smashed together into a story and before I knew it someone died for real. Basically Inkloop but P5.

SilentWish: P5, TimeLoop, Joker has a Palace. (TWs: Gore, Horror, Existential Horror, Gaslighting, repeated temporary character death, his palace is so many levels of messed up)

TADP(The Amazing Digital Palace): The Amazing Digital Circus AU.

Persomon: Pokemon AU where Pokemon are a product of the Metaverse and exist in place of Personas.

Homestuck

HomeStranded: Dave accidentaly Fucks Up So Severely it crashed the game and the timeline and now its lagging and bugged like someone downloaded 200 mods and half contradict each other. Impossible things have become possible, timelines are merging, there's a second Alternia, and everyone's sessions have become borderline unwinable because everyone has the wrong classpect. ...Why is Lil Cal still here?

HomeStolen: 3 years after the disappearance of his and his friends' younger siblings, Kankri is starting to lose hope of ever seeing Karkat again, when a self-proclaimed AI chooses to request his help searching for a different group of missing children that might just be connected. AKA, roadtrip from hell to save the beta kids and trolls from a doomsday cult that drabbles on human experimentation, starring Kankri, Hal, and Damara.

Unheroic: Classic Hero/Vigilante/Villain AU, with Dave as the hero working to keep his siblings safe, Sollux as the vigilante who is tired of sitting still while people die, and Karkat as the villain with the highest hero kill count.

LegoMonkieKid

Ink and Bone: MK villain/feral/possessed arc with a side of psychological torture courtesy of LBD, AKA LBD and Azure team up and ruin everything.

AnimatorVsAnimation

Purple Gold: Gold is "alive" and Purple pays the unexpected price. Contains horror. Masterpost here.

Team Screen: Hero/Vigilante/Villain AU. Scorch, AKA Second, is the leader of the vigilante group Team Screen, composed of themself, Scare(Red), Scream(Green), Smoke(Blue) and String(Yellow). She and her friends fight crime and run from the law in the streets of the outernet, unaware of her father's dark past as the top villain Noogai, or his connection to the top 2 heroes and their leader.

Black Gold: Swap AU where Gold is a runaway, Purple has a staff, and Dark is Suffering.

Cursor Curse: Alan is cursed to become a halfstick, half cursor and half stick.

[tvok]

bragi

[ohlookitsgeorge]

Eraqus: Is 13 a lot?

Baldr: Depends.

Baldr: Medals? No.

Baldr: Murders? Yes.

[storm-driver]

Sora’s color in KHMoM is red, while Roxas’ is orange and Ventus’ is green

Red and green are complementary colors while orange is a mix between both

[strelitzicae]

[venacoeurva]

Time for some Mild Angst, in which Isa probably HAD to know getting re-associated with the org and who they were going against meant he would fade and so would pretty much everyone else not benched

-please do not reupload/edit/use without proper credit or linking back, ask first please.-

[3ladyinred3]

[phylumhearts]

if they do revisit babynort and babyqus’ stories at some point and it’s revealed that they had a third friend who was a girl who had some kind of tragic fate I’m gonna steal all of nomura’s spinal fluid

[kayyabread]

Your memory exists, in my heart

[sapphireskys]

kh3 manga means we'll get to see vanitas with sora's face but like in cutesy big sparkly eyed anime style and honestly? I don't think any of us are ready for that lmao

[kingdomsaurushearts]

Donald: This. Looks. Like. A. Good. Spot. To. Find. Some. Ingredients.

Sora: Could you maybe say that a little slower?

[tvok]

It's always been sort of weird how Young Xehanort is such an unapologetic little asshole the whole time he's time traveling, mocking Sora about his inevitable demise to the last moment as he fades away (while even Xemnas and Ansem get moments of humanity before their deaths). It's notably different from how he comes off in KHDR, where he can be sassy with Eraqus sometimes but is mostly just cool and aloof—more like he's a bit withdrawn than anything else.

The scene that I think connects these different aspects of his personality is his meeting with the Master of Masters, which we see in both Re:Mind and KHDR. Xehanort is playing it cool, but he's also letting a bit of his true feelings shine through: he doesn't quite want to agree with MoM about the idea that there's two types of people—the strong and the weak. He's thinking about the world with nuance.

"And even if I was either type, it doesn't mean that I carry those dark intentions." But then MoM reminds him of his own history with darkness—"Is that what your experience tells you?" That's what MoM seems to be best at—planting a seed of doubt and letting it grow on its own.

And it does. YX goes out and sees the world and become convinced of the conclusion MoM was leading him towards. And when he returns, MoM tells him exactly what he wants to hear: that he's the one who has the power to make a difference. That he's destined for greatness. Xehanort believes, deeply and truly, that he is the child of destiny. He's the chosen one. And if that means he has the power to prevent what happened in Scala from ever happening again, wouldn't he want that?

And extrapolating, I think we can tell that Master Xehanort, his future self, uses the same tactic, appealing to his own sense of exceptionalism. He brings Young Xehanort to the future and tells him that he will fulfill his destiny, everything is set in motion, and he just needs to play his role. "That is my destiny, but it has yet to become a reality." Young Xehanort sees the future and wants to believe so badly that it's the destiny he wants. And how could it not be? It's him.

In KH3, the YX moment that sticks out to me the most is this incredibly odd exchange in the iconic Toy Box scene. YX is his usual villainous self, mocking and monologuing, and then Sora rushes at him and he says this:

And it doesn't sound sinister. It's not a taunt or jeer. He says it hushed and almost hurried, as if afraid someone is listening.

Which could be true. Young Xehanort, weirdly, holds a piece of Master Xehanort's heart in him, doesn't he? I think it got buried in interviews, but recall the YX boss fight at the end of DDD. The reason Mickey reacts the way he does to YX moving during stopped time is because he recognizes that isn't Young Xehanort— it's Master Xehanort, briefly inhabiting YX as a vessel.

He's become a puppet of his future self, an extremely literal self-fulfilling prophecy. It leaves Woody calling Xehanort "hollower than any toy" in the earlier scene ring incredibly different. Did he want any of this? Did he even have a choice?

We still don't know exactly when YX time travels from, but it's got to be fresh off of the events of KHDR. Especially since his dialogue with MoM, which happens one year post-KHDR, seems to imply it's happened already at that point. I wonder if his old classmate rubbed off on him in some way—the theatrics, the boasting and posturing. But that's what it is—he's playing a role. It's the hand he's been dealt. It's all he has. (Which leads me back to thinking about Xehanort & Xion parallels, Xion as the 14th organization member, Xehanort saying "no, wait—fourteen lives", Xion saying "this puppet will have to play her part"...and, interestingly, YX and Xion being next to each other in the Real Organization's hierarchy: YX as no. 12, Xion as no. 13. The lowest among their ranks. The least worthy of respect.)