#kind of. more mention of meta

[xshimaeraxx]

i need to stop writing lowkey faux-essays about how the concept of greed is bullshit (it is) in relation to cuphead & casino cups in my bestie's dms and to start writing more fanfic istg 😭

[myimaginationplain]

do you ever think about how Ohkubo extremely casually dropped the fact that Spirit & Kami were teen parents & then proceeded to never expound upon that fact or bring it up ever again despite it explaining a whole lot about them & Maka

[jilted-love]

Kurama being physically vulnerable in his Shuichi form actually has nothing to do with his physique because that body he's using is already demon in nature after he turned 10.

It's all about his youki. His youki, before he lost much of its strength and downgraded from the level of an A class, could be transformed into an armor. It's just like Sensui's which both of them recognized as true even if Sensui's was stronger.

So in the Dark Tournament, Kurama with a much weaker youki was basically fighting naked. His original fighting style with a spiritually conjured ki armor was risky because he relied on its defense to tank out the damage. He was willing to take hits just to plan his strategy but that (very old demon) habit came from when he had better defenses with a stronger demonic energy. His white clothing as youko only failed against Sensui because of their difference in power level with Sensui being S class. Kurama in the the Dark Tournament with his A class ki armor could probably take a hit from Toguro's 100% because Toguro was only Upper B class when Kurama used to be A class.

In post canon, however, it's safe to assume that Kurama surpassed A class already because his awakened youki (after witnessing Yusuke's death and revival) that made him able to shapeshift at will became stronger than before his peak in his previous life. His ki amor could have gotten stronger too. In conclusion, Kurama post canon is gonna be more unhinged and reckless in his suicide strategies. 😅

[kitsoa]

The Dystopia That Made Trigun

Ya'll the problem with Triguns insanely long speculative sci-fi timeline is the conundrum of trying to imagine exactly how a dystopian Earth could get so bad that massive amounts of folks needed to yeet themselves blindly into space, but could become so advanced that they single-handedly solve the energy crisis and maybe confirm the existence of god at the same time.

I am not a very skilled dystopia engineer, and there are a lot of flavors but I'd like to think the revolution of Plants on Earth has the potential to alleviate a lot of the aggregators in a full (or seemingly imminent) societal collapse. I'm struggling to work ahead of late-stage capitalism doomer scenarios right now which maybe puts me at a century out. I'm placing Trigun's timeline at 5 centuries out, But the tech advancement can pause at like 3 centuries in since 2 of those are used for space travel before the Big Fall.

So let's hash this out together

Here's what advancements Project Seeds needs to launch:

bioengineering (prosthetics and augmentations)

cloning and gene editing capabilities

cryosleep technology

advanced space travel

gravity control

supercomputing

Here's the rough and estimated environmental factors to cause them to leave Earth:

Resource scarcity

Environmental decline (like global warming and loss of land, and mass extinction)

[speculative] imminent doom from societal factors [like nuclear war and geopolitical unrest]

We know based on the society formed on No Man's Land that capitalism is probably the most familiar and default system used by the immigrants. So we can assume that Project Seeds was created with wealthy benefactors at the helm not only looking for salvation but probably power and influence (cause capitalism gonna a capitalism)-- a true colonial expansion echo despite the optimism.

The Seeds Project strikes me as unaffiliated with a specific country or culture. JuLai and some of the ambiguous ethnicities and lingering languages suggest that it's multi-cultural with English being the primary influence. So it's not a state-sponsored project, but very likely independent-- another point to the wealthy benefactor line of thought. Despite that, those shuttles alone took decades to construct and governmental cooperation to launch so it couldn't have been a completely apolitical endeavor.

Then there's the population. The project's reach is insane, not just in talent, but passenger interest. I'm assuming children were not on board, so you are talking about countless able-bodied adults abandoning their lives knowingly for the promise of a better world. The environmental factors aside, the prep-time for the project had to have been decades in the making. That's a long time to keep the propaganda circling for the promise of better. That kind of interest fades as people age into different stages of life. (Depending on the scenarios we could be looking at a mass draft? Unlikely but very interesting). We know that the survivors of the Big Fall were not specifically tailored to create a society without the comforts they were bringing along or the government of No Man's Land would look a little more stable.

So, what kind of society could form such a vast space immigration project while simultaneously on the verge of collapse?

Well, a desperate one.

The logic follows that as the resources grow scarce and the inequality gaps create vast populations of suffering among disenfranchised people-- fascism rises, which broadly stymies innovation. It's a real roadblock to this scenario. So the jumpstart out of this would be either war or a scientific breakthrough-- or both. There's always going to be interest and innovation in DNA science as a part of the medical field. Even in heavy capitalism that is going to get a lot of money thrown at it. The only thing needed to create Plants is large leaps in gene editing and cloning.

I'll throw out a number, 50 years. We've got cloning and Jurassic Park stuff. Then boom. Angel Mummy discovery. Scientists create the First Entity. But at the same time, geopolitical tensions ramp up because of the destructive potential of this entity. (I mean the First Entity has the Drain ability, that's black hole powers. We're getting wars). But the Plants are developed off of that and the First Entity is destroyed in the Julai foreshadowing lab accident many years down the line. --We've solved the energy crisis and there is probably a huge boom in advancement-- probably those physic-defying advancements to boot. But we have our militaristic flashpoint in technological prosperity, all while the earth is raining hellfire, the cities are flooding, and mass extinction events are occurring. Enough to get Trillionaires with savior complexes to start making Project Seeds.

Aaaand they are probably funding the countless wars so people join the expedition.

Conclusion: Project Seeds is a corrupt colonial project manipulating the hopeful desperation of a beleaguered population, created by the ultra-wealthy to garner absolute control in a humanity reset.

Good thing Nai crashed the ships!

[skania]

I keep seeing people saying "Aqua only wanted to date Akane because he couldn't date Kana", but I'm not convinced things are that white-and-black.

The thing is, I think a lot of us underestimate just how attached Aqua got to Akane. Sure, at first he wants to keep her near because of her intelligence and incredible insight, but that changes the moment Akane figures out his secret.

The Japanese side-text even gives us a helpful ただのビジネス、 カップルを越えて— telling us that they're becoming more than just a business couple.

This little moment right here pretty much disarms the guy. He gets a taste of what being understood is like, and he can't help himself after that. Suddenly he is letting down his walls and allowing Akane to watch his childhood videos, something that even takes Gotanda aback because Aqua doesn't let anyone watch those.

More importantly, he even goes as far as to confess his goal to Akane. It was a clear gamble to gauge just how honest she was to him when she told him that she would be his ally no matter what, and Akane gives him more than he bargained for.

Akane is the real deal. What she is offering him—unconditional understanding and support—is the real deal. And Aqua doesn't know how to react to that. His black star even reverts back to white!

However, we see just how important this was to him a few chapters later, when we get this gem:

"Did you think you finally found someone who understands you after meeting Akane Kurokawa?"

In hindsight, the fact that Goro is highlighting Akane's understanding of Aqua and putting her right up there with Kana completely sets-up the events that would follow.

Because, what happens after Aqua finds out that he's finally free?

He thinks of both, Kana and Akane. She has managed to get under his skin to the point he is genuinely considering her as a romantic option, something he said would never happen.

This is when things get pretty interesting, because Aqua began dating Akane just to use her, right? So he no longer has any reason to keep her around.

Except he wants to keep her around, and this time it's for entirely personal reasons. He knows his growing attachment to Akane will do her no good though, so he shoots that selfish thought down at once.

Akane is young and she has a bright future. I can't hold her back forever...

By his own admission, he thinks he is holding her back, so he decides to break up with her to set her free. He even says as much as they're walking to the bridge, almost like he's trying to convince himself it's the right thing to do.

I don't think... it's good for me to keep you tied down forever, Akane.

In other words, Aqua isn't breaking up with Akane because he isn't romantically interested in her. At the contrary, he even ends up admitting that he is attracted to her.

However, he doesn't seem to be entirely sure of what he feels for her and he is under the impression that Akane isn't romantically interested in him.

All this to say, Aqua mainly wanted to break up with Akane for her. Because he has been deceiving her and holding her back.

Case in point, a chapter later he goes on a date with Kana, who even asks him what he plans to do with Akane. You'd think that this would be the perfect moment for Aqua to confirm his romantic-disinterest in Akane by telling Kana something like:

I tried to break up with her but we got interrupted

I'm going to break up with her

Or any variation of those lines, since that's what he intended to do last time we saw him with Akane. He tells her this instead:

We talked about it the other day, but we got interrupted.

Oh, so breaking up actually isn't a done deal.

We'll probably get an answer... the next time we meet.

So, it isn't only Akane who is trying to figure out what Aqua is to her. Aqua himself is thinking about what Akane means to him.

Something about his conversation with Akane got to him, so he starts second-guessing whether he should break up with her or not even though it's "a little too late", since they talked about breaking up already.

If he were 100% intending to pursue Kana, why would he be telling her all this? Not to mention, why is he thinking carefully about his relationship with Akane instead of focusing on his relationship with Kana?

When it comes down to it, ever since Aqua found out that he is free to love someone, Akane and his relationship with her remain at the forefront of his mind. He even broaches the subject right after Akane finds his corpse, which was far and away not the time for that lol

Which of course leads us to the moment they get the answer Aqua alluded to earlier.

Akane finally understands what she feels for Aqua, and while she tries to keep a smile on for him, her true feelings come pouring through her tears.

Aqua wondered if Akane even harbored any romantic feelings for him. Those tears seem to be the answer to that question.

Which leaves us with: What does Aqua feel for Akane?

Aqua seems to realize it in very much the same way Akane did earlier. Through it all, they have been supporting each other, getting to know each other, understanding each other and having fun together.

Their relationship hasn't been a lie. Akane sincerely wanted to get close to him to help him. He sincerely wants to stay close to her to protect her.

Since Aqua had already resolved the question of 'should I fall in love?', that left him with two other questions to answer.

Can he fall in love with Akane?

Does he want to fall in love with her?

Going by this, he obviously decides that the answer to both questions is yes.

Now, this post isn't here to claim that he did fall for her or anything, he obviously still has unresolved feelings for Kana. What I'm 100% here to say though is that Aqua's feelings were way less set in stone than people make it sound, and that that the order of events clearly show that Aqua actually gave his feelings for Akane a whole lot of thought, even before he realized he should keep his distance from Kana.

[tritoch]

the damsel and the hero: some thoughts on minfilia and elidibus

I get why many people have (understandable, justified, legitimate) gripes to this day about how Minfilia was handled, but I think you don't have to change anything about how she's presented in game to arrive at a reading that lets her feel like more than a sacrificial victim. Within the game as it exists, Minfilia is already a rich and layered heroic character. She is not a damsel or a tragic hero but a victorious figure whose very exit from the narrative affirmed her own ideals, and she controlled her own destiny to the end. All you have to do to see this more clearly is read her against one of her underexamined foils: Elidibus.

Spoilers through the end of Pandemonium (6.4) below.

After 5.3 dropped, the devs mentioned that because they basically had to develop and pay off Elidibus in the space of a patch or two, they drew conscious parallels between him and other characters. The game highlights the G'raha parallels in the scene just before Seat of Sacrifice. There's also the parallels to Alphinaud that people have noticed in both the broad strokes of their characterization (idealistic short kings who believe in the power of rhetoric and diplomacy to achieve true and lasting understanding between people, whose mission to save the world is forever held in balance with their duty to save those they love) and in specific lines of dialogue.

But a far more direct narrative parallel than either character is Minfilia. Like Elidibus and Zodiark, Minfilia offered herself to Hydaelyn, serving as the Word of the Mother, only to be called forth once more when an intractable conflict between her allies threatened the stability of the world. Both were messianic young figures who nonetheless lead their older allies by both example and command. Both, seeing an opportunity to save not just their close friends but everyone, offered themselves up to a higher power in an act not of desperation but of deliberate will. You can even poetically gloss both Antecedent and Emissary as "The One That Goes Before."

The difference between the two of them is that at every turn, where Elidibus failed, Minfilia succeeded.

Elidibus returned to broker peace between the Hydaelyn faction and the Convocation. He failed, and the result was the Sundering. Minfilia, entreated by Urianger, came back to resolve the conflict between the Warriors of Darkness (Hydaelyn's champions and Warriors of Light themselves) and the Scions, and succeeded in saving two worlds by her actions.

But more than that, Elidibus provided us a picture of what it actually looks like to lose your identity to a primal like Zodiark. He'd lived a thousand thousand lifetimes as himself and he was so broken he could scarcely remember anything more than his name and his duty. He is one of the most explicitly tragic figures in all of FFXIV, and his final sendoff in 5.3 was an image of him plagued by unanswerable grief, which for him was a consequence of his failure: "The rains have ceased, and we have been graced with another beautiful day. But you are not here to see it."

Meanwhile, in the preceding expansion, you actually had the chance to spend multiple scenes with Minfilia and they're all extremely clear: unlike Ardbert or Elidibus, after 100 years this was still Minfilia, she remained resolute in her mission to see the First saved, but she had not forgotten the woman she was or the people she loved. In both 3.4 and 5.0, she went out as herself, head held high.

Speaking to the Warrior of Light before she departs for the First: "So many times have I watched you depart, my heart filled with worry, and ever did you return to me in triumph. Someday, when I have found a way to free this star from Her sorrow, I promise you I shall repay the favor."

Her final words to Ryne: "No one, however powerful, is immune to the whisperings of doubt and despair. Do not give in to them, but do not deny them either. Look instead to the light within, that you may continue to serve as a beacon to others."

In both instances, we were given a Minfilia who had not merely accepted her fate, but who had chosen it of her own volition and rose confidently to meet it, even imparting to her successor some final hard-won words of wisdom. And unlike Elidibus, she met her friends again at duty's end; they live, and they are happy, and she is content. She's already heroic, but the contrast to Elidibus (and Ardbert, and Emet) underlines the extent to which we should see her as extraordinarily driven, self-possessed and ultimately victorious on her own terms.

And in making the connection between Elidibus and Minfilia, we can begin to let Elidibus's characterization inform hers in retrospect.

Elidibus as we see him in 5.3 and earlier more specifically paralleled Minfilia as the Word of the Mother. Prior to that point in her arc, Minfilia's parallel was Themis, the pre-Zodiark Elidibus we glimpse briefly in the 5.3 Echo flashbacks and would only meet properly an expansion later in Pandemonium. The important thing about Themis for our purposes is that he was not some naive or too-young figurehead tricked into serving as Zodiark's Emissary. This was not a Crystal Braves situation for him. In Pandemonium, you can see how the kind of man Themis was very clearly lead to him choosing to be offered up to Zodiark. He took seriously the principles and duties of the Convocation. He valued dearly the lives of all people generally and his friends and comrades in particular, but held those truths in balance rather than prizing one. He was rational, clear-sighted, and decisive.

All of these, obviously, were true of Minfilia. And unlike Elidibus, whose ascension into Zodiark was forever somewhat obscured by the narrative, we were quite close to Minfilia before she became the Word of the Mother. We were quite familiar with her grief and guilt over surviving where Louisoix did not, her fear that she could neither fill his shoes as a leader nor serve in action as others did. She confided in us about the difficulty of her task in serving as the pillar of strength and guiding light for the rest of the Scions. She despaired alongside the player character at both the death of Moenbryda and the disastrous events of the Banquet. We know what she believed, what she valued, what she feared, what frustrated her. When she chose to depart for the First, it paid off very directly everything else the game has said about her through 3.4. Her arc was one of trepidation and doubt, and it ended in her ultimate victory and an astonishingly clean win that compromises none of her values.

Both Urianger and some fans raised the question of whether it was wrong for Urianger to ever offer her the choice of sacrificing herself for the First at all. Minfilia, for her part, got a chance to speak to this directly: "Have we not walked together in the light of the Crystal, and at Her bidding borne witness to the joys and sorrows of this land? Each and every one of you knows my heart. If this be the price I must pay, I pay it gladly." It did not matter whether she was given this particular decision or not. You could have offered her this dilemma in a thousand different permutations in a thousand thousand different scenarios. This was the choice she made. This was her choice, forever and always: to save everyone she can, in honor of those she loves.

Candidly, I understand critiques of Minfilia's writing far better than any praise it could ever receive. Nothing I've written above answers the clear and obvious truths that she is underwritten, that she does not get much to do or much screentime for a putatively important character, that it is very easy and common to read her death as a fridging, that she is unfairly dismissed by many due to her role in the narrative and the way she leaves it. Her sacrifice plays into specific gendered tropes that are disappointingly common to see. Those things all remain true.

But I think as we remember those things we should also keep in mind that she does still get a complete arc that is interesting and thematically rich in itself, and which puts her in some senses on the same level in the narrative as characters like Elidibus, Emet-Selch, and Ardbert.

Her sacrifice continues to inform the game. Her literal ghost returns to affirm the truth and value of her beliefs and the choices she made. Her guiding words ("For those we have lost, for those we can yet save") remain a mantra not just for the Scions but specifically for the player character. They are not an empty slogan. The phrase succinctly conveys an ideal of all-encompassing humanism and compassion arising from grief. The ideal those words represent is one of many organizing principles and responses to grief that the game examines (because a lot of FFXIV is about grief and how we respond to tragedy and change), it is Minfilia who develops and articulates it, and it is the one the heroes continue to align themselves with. It is the same principle that leads her to the First, and G'raha, and us too. It is Minfilia's ideals--Minfilia's heroism--which continue to serve as the model to which the Warrior of Light aspires, in the game's text.

Truthfully, my gripe is this. I think it is very easy to imagine a male Minfilia--same lines, same screentime, same blocking, same ass cut-out--appearing in place of the Minfilia we have. And I feel quite sincerely, and quite frustratedly, that if we had Malefilia, both the fans and detractors of that character would ascribe to him more thoughtfulness and more thematic depth than the Minfilia we already have, even though their lines would be exactly the same. We are so ready to see the damsel we expect in Minfilia that we are unwilling to see her as the hero she is in the text, and my hope is that by holding her up to her mirror, Elidibus, we may see her as a rich character in her own right all the more clearly.

[cabeswaterdrowned]

Obviously mstief’s whole thing about confirming Blue as biracial a few years post the series being finished was… bombastic side eye. But I will say that the detail of the Vancouver crowd being mostly poc / ‘diverse�� students of Aglionby and Blue bonding with and feeling kinship with them she hasn’t experienced before is an interesting note through that lense.

[lurking-latinist]

.

[gothamsfinestdummy]

One day I might actually write an essay thing about how the reboot completely destroyed Pinky and Brain’s characters I am soooo very passionate about that subject

[cuddlytogas]

Fyre sent me an article that made me Lose My Mind, so instead of sending 800 tweets about it, I decided to just write up my thoughts here

so, in re: ET Fox, 'Jacobitism and the Golden Age of Piracy' --

Fox is definitely exaggerating. His logic jumps from 'ship names and alleged toasts', to 'every pirate was one contact away from a confirmed Jacobite', to "a Jacobite maritime community" (296), with little evidence beyond each previous assumption. He does demonstrate a link with popular Jacobitism, but overstates pirates' political commitment by far.

There's one letter to George Camocke, a Jacobite naval officer, suggesting that the pirate fleet should unite under his command and take Bermuda as a Jacobite base, but the source is shaky, and it went nowhere once Woodes Rogers ousted the pirates. (It's I think from 1718 and unsigned? Possibly from Charles Vane and his crew? Fox only says that, "Through these contacts [unspecified, between Vane and English Jacobites] a letter reached George Camocke" (286), which is suspiciously vague, and I can't access the original to check. Either way, it would still only prove the committed politics of one crew.)

Fox also makes a lot of Archibald Hamilton, governor of Jamaica from 1710-16, who commissioned and profited from the anti-Spanish privateers who turned pirate and made up some of the original Bahamas pirates c. 1715. Since "it has been suggested that [Hamilton] was a Jacobite supporter" (283), Fox claims that these establishing pirates were also committed Jacobites, and therefore the whole pirate community that grew around them must have been. (Which leads to Fox then being baffled when there's no direct evidence of Jacobitism among some of them, such as the crews of Anstis, Fenn, or Rackham.) He relies on these assumptions, and then claims that every connection between pirates proves their mutual Jacobite sympathies.

It's much more likely (and in line with the historians I've read so far) that the Jacobite toasts and ship names speak to a broader anti-authoritarianism among pirates, with no evidence of committed Jacobite actions by them, eg, specifically targeting Hanoverian ships, or materially supporting or trying to support Jacobite rebels beyond that one letter. Indeed, the 1710s/20s pirates are generally agreed to be distinct for not adhering to religious/national loyalties like the C17th pirates usually did. (I'm so sorry, I haven't consolidated my notes yet, but I know Marcus Rediker goes through this, as does Kris E Lane, and I think Tim Travers and David Cordingly.)

Fox does identify a correlation between the rise and fall of Jacobitism and piracy over the mid/late 1710s, but attributes a pretty shaky causation: pirates ceased their Jacobite loyalties due to the suppression of Jacobitism in Britain and Europe. A much more obvious explanation is that both anti-authoritarian movements simultaneously flourished in the post-war, post-succession instability, then were both quashed as the new regime established itself and cracked down on rebels.

So, did many pirates espouse Jacobite sympathies? Yes! They named their ships in favour of Jacobite causes and rulers, and there are plenty of reports of them toasting to King James / the Pretender. (Which it must be said, although the sheer volume lends a ring of truth to the trend, individual claims should be taken with a grain of salt, as Jacobitism was a common accusation against criminals at the time, with or without a basis.)

Does that mean that the 1710s Caribbean pirate community was centred around a heart of politically committed Jacobites, as Fox argues, or largely motivated by Jacobite sentiments? Yeah, probably not.

Anyway, I am SO sorry that this article got me riled up XD the whole point of this is to say, I've never read anywhere that "many pirates were Jacobites driven out of Britain", which I KNOW wasn't even your main point, but I am unfortunately Insane. We can and should talk about expressions of pro-Jacobitism and actual political engagement among 'Golden Age' pirates, but what we know of their actual actions and espoused ideals doesn't speak to a trend of committed Jacobite politics beyond a general loyalty to rebellious causes.

[enbyjane]

The Mentalist: season 4, episode 12 - My Bloody Valentine

[leatherbookmark]

an interesting thing abt jgy antis is like. where is the source of their, shall we say, negative opinion of jgy? like, 1. jgy is a villain, he does horrible things with no remorse, he’s willing to do everything to achieve his selfish, egotistical goals. --> 2. the source of this claim: this, this and this scene. --> 3. alright, but to me -- says someone who’s not an anti -- this reads differently. that he did all those things, and did them on purpose and without remorse, is not that obvious to me. why do you think that? --> 4. well, obviously because he’s a villain and does horrible things with no remorse.

like... he’s evil because he does bad things, and he does bad things because he’s evil. i’m interested in how antis came by those opinions, but a, unfortunately i have them all blocked, and b, even if i or someone else made a poll, it wouldn’t be authentic because no sane anti is going to say “well, people hated him and wrote all those things about him on twt, so i started hating him as well”, or “i only care about wgxn, you could sell me anything about other characters if your arguments were convincing enough because i zoned out during the parts when wgxn weren’t on screen/pages of the book”. it’s all “written in the book/shown in the show” and “logical arguments you’d agree with if only you could read”.

[blackholebunni]

hi hello its like 2 in the morning and ive decided to post this stupid deranged theory <3

so in the zim fandom theres this common trope in fanfics that i will affectionately refer to as "pak theory", where some kind of error or propoganda or some such is directly interfering with zim's ability to Be Good At His Job (invader).

so. "we apologize for the interruption" amirite. the plot of the episode is essentially zosky wants to take a break but apparently that's against the terms and conditions of this contract that he Did Not Know Existed (kaput is also part of this contract, obvs). The guy who runs up to scold them abt Taking A Break proceeds to patronizingly explain to kaput and zosky that they're cartoon characters doomed to try and fail at taking over a planet each and every time. Kaput and Zosky... don't seem to register the cartoon character part??? like at all?? they argue with the guy and then he sentences them to "cartoon hard labour" but i am mostly focused on the fact that a: kaput and zosky are apparantly part of a contract they do not remember ever signing; and b: they do not react to the cartoon character thing AT ALL. i would argue they literally did not or /could not/ register.

anyways. what do you think would happen if that contract, which sounds kind of illegal, where to be destroyed or render null and void. because i think abt that a lot

[tovaicas]

now that I've finished: I enjoyed shb. not as much as I did hw, but I quite liked the msq (with the couple of quibbles that I've mentioned). post-patches I felt suffered from similar problems as hw's did, as in they wrapped up everything and then very quickly and suddenly pivoted to new expac content in a way that didn't feel suuuper natural, but I also think to an extent that's also an MMO curse. with a larger available scope I would've preferred a more natural lead-in, but what can you do.

I'm not sure how I feel abt the heavy focus on zenos and fandaniel, zenos has never been that much of an interesting character to me (stb didn't handle him and what he represents well, and imo he doesn't get more interesting as he keeps appearing) and characters who are written as 'well he's cRaZy so we don't have to explain his motives or erratic behaviour' like fandaniel I find inherently uninteresting. plus I just hate it every second he's on screen HBFSBJ

I wish the grand company of eorzea stuff was the conclusion to a long, real attempt at making amends rather than smth wrapped up as a loose end in two or three patches; feels disingenuous, in a way. I also wish they'd actually leaned with the theming of 'the wol has friends who genuinely care for them and feel genuine remorse for the things they put them through for the sake of others', shb msq's back-half was all about how everyone gambles with your life and how the wol is a tool and how shitty this is (to an extent, at least; one of my bigger quibbles with g'raha is how he's consistently framed as justified for manipulating you and directly playing with your life), but as it stands as soon as you're cured of the lightwarden stuff everything goes back to you feeling like a secondary background player with no outstanding trauma in the post-patches, being told where to go and what to do.

on that similar note, I have strong feelings on g'raha and most of them lean negative. I'm not going to clutter this post with unnecessary character hate that's biased by my own wol's writing (unless like. you want me to), but a lot of my feelings abt him from shb msq haven't really changed.

otherwise I quite liked a lot of the worldbuilding and historical sections, I do think those were well done. the norvrandt goodbye genuinely got me, and I actually really liked elidibus' sections. I miss ryne already

[lightdancer1]

I still think that there's one bit of A Winter's Tale that a lot of meta and fanfics neatly skip past:

The funny bit is that when I use this in my own fics it's basically the bargain basement level of textual analysis and when I lay it out you'll see why. Because the Endless, after all, are anthropomorphic personifications defined by their jobs, ultimately, that take a physical and metaphorical form as their realms and the nature of their being. Dream and Destruction struggle with it in ways not unlike Death, but here it gets into the interrelated but that I will also bring up.

As per A Winter's Tale and the (slightly modified) version of it in the show, Death has a vision of her job/function unlike any of her siblings. In the comics, the harder version that I prefer to use over the show, she outright walked out because her job wore her down and she had, essentially, a nervous breakdown because of a deep depression that a careful reading of A Winter's Tale shows she's in denial about never addressing. Naturally my stories tend to hit her with this Negan Bat with great gusto.

Now factor this is in from a canonical POV and a family of beings who are defined by tasks, where Dream and Destiny are the most rigid....and then equally factor in the irony that Dream, one of the two most rigid, is at his closest with the one who's ultimately one of the least and the most flighty about aspects of details of her job. Factor in that this family of immortals who date from the dawn of time have one person in the family who completely cracked and walked out and broke reality in the process.

From their POV it would no doubt be a thing that hung over their sister and her decisions and a thing that they and those old enough to have been there would long remember. From the perspective of job-defined inhuman immortals, the very thing that would make Death the most appealing to humans are a mark of permanent failure on her part, while her becoming mortal and taking her mortal days might well anchor her in mortal affairs in a way only Destruction comes close to.....but it can easily be read in a much darker fashion than I usually would be inclined to take it because I've struggled with those thoughts myself and writing that into fiction is playing with fire when soaked with gasoline.

A human would see the events of A Winter's Tale as 'the job got to you and it was hard' and understand that. Would the Endless? Even Destruction? Ultimately no, I don't think any of them really could understand that even if they tried, and there are some careful looks at Destruction's actions in Brief Lives and Song of Orpheus that both strengthen the parallel with Death and where they differ.

Death is willing to fully yield her power for 24 hours a century to live among mortals without any of the sorcery and the responsibility and the nature of the Endless. None of her siblings are willing to go so far, or to truly experience life within the worlds they govern in that way.

And then combine this with the knowledge that unlike the rest she will outlive the universe, and without the universe Death of the Endless is but a title and a moment in time, a true job that will one day end....at the price that all her siblings go into something she cannot see and she alone cannot. And then take another look at the mortal days and as much as it anchors her in the mortal world and in being able to relate to mortals it can be seen in that darker sense as both an escape hatch and a deeply necessary one because she is ultimately still chasing the same outlet she tried to get and failed and only returned to because well....

[ficoandleo]

. . .However, for that he's doing that and plans on spending the day hosting his little pseudo buffet party, he'a simultaneously aware he's doing something else that day at the same time.

It's been like this for a little while, actually. Leo had explained the likelihood to him. And he'd spoken to Hyde about it too. The island itself was already an anomalous location. So for there to be anomalous occurrences on it was no surprise. They just didn't normally regard time and space.

Another version of himself. Multiple of Taiga. Places being the same but different. Unfamiliar ghouls and staff. Familiar ghouls and staff, but different. But also, he knew them, sometimes he remembered things that weren't his life--but they were his memories too, the memories were from himself, but. . .from another timeline, adjacent to this one. Or the one he was from. Or some other one. He wasn't sure what the core of all of this was. He could tell, though, that usually the only one from 'his' timeline was Leo. Taiga was often close, but not exact. The Taiga's weren't 'his'--but they were, they were his and he was theirs, and there was nothing unfamiliar about anyone even when they were different. Like he, briefly, became the Romeo they knew in some capacity, or rather that he knew the things that he'd been through and he felt like he was him, or. . . .

Time passed differently. A week for every month. He lived a period in time once and then lived it again differently. Sometimes he was in multiple places at once. Sometimes he bounced around through time. Or he knew things he shouldn't know. He thought of Taiga often when he noticed it--Taiga was always knowing things he shouldn't and guessing the future and knowing the past and present he shouldn't know. And yet he didn't feel confused or disoriented by any of it, unlike Taiga. He must be experiencing something different.

He could generally tell which Taiga was which--same with knowing when someone was from another timeline, even without speaking to them first. Nothing happened if he spoke to or touched his other self. When he returned to his time and space and life--or returned to one that was familiar to him, anyway, that felt like 'home' where everyone around was 'his'--all of that fell to the back of his mind and he was unburdened by it. Even living through it he was unburdened by it. It was simply a fact.

The people around him were the people he knew--friends, enemies, acquaintances, strangers, faces in the crowd, lovers past and present(or never but past in their presence)--but different. And oddly enough that didn't stir him any, where changes often did. Because they always had a Romeo. And he was usually himself. And he got to be another himself for a little while, sometimes, sort of, he wasn't sure.

But all of that to say, he would be spending his birthday in Sinostra, perhaps among friends and underlings.

But he would also be in Kabukicho, another pair of R&R permits he'd managed to. . .convince Hyde to give him in his hand. But only in one timeline, where he and @taiga-shark had gone to Italy for his birthday, because Taiga wanted his gift to be Romeo being happy again. And Taiga remembered he was happiest at home. And he was happy. He had fun, once he relaxed. But it felt. . .wrong that Taiga's birthday had been for him.

So he would spend his birthday on Taiga. Maybe taking him places he used to know. Maybe doing things with him that he used to do. Maybe it wouldn't spark any memories that he'd once had. Maybe it wouldn't feel like home anymore. But Italy hadn't quite felt like home for Romeo either.

They had made a few new memories in Italy instead. And they visited the ruins of a place that was once 'home.' So maybe they could make new memories in Kabukicho too. No matter how brief they were. And Taiga's home there--Romeo's home, too, where they lived together--was no ruin.

But whether or not it was home, what mattered was that they were together. They were each other's home.

(Even if he wasn't 'his' Romeo all the time. 'His' Romeo who was 'his' home. But it would feel like his because they would be one for a while. Everything they did and experienced would be essentially the same.)

The whole thing was strange. Existing had been strange lately. And yet it wasn't strange at all. Just a fact.