#like an echo of something you loved

[lightthewaybackhome]

I'm having a terrible time with Leverage:Redemption. I enjoyed the first two episodes, but honestly, everyone feels like a cardboard cutout of themselves. Parker seems weird not because she is but because she's supposed to be. Eliot feels way overplayed, over acted, not like Eliot. He doesn't feel right at all.

Harry Wilson is hardly anything. Where is the found family? Where is the perfect balance between humor and heartbreak? Why are we even trying without Hardison?

And the cons? There's little danger. Some of them are just dumb. And there are no gut-clenching moments where you wonder how this is going to play out? I have not once wondered if everyone would get home safe. Most of it I'm watching through sheer willpower. I'm not having fun.

I fell in love with Leverage the minute I started it. It was all these lost and lonely people finding their souls, healing, and growing together. I don't know what this is.

[lotus-pear]

learning to love

[s0fter-sin]

codtwt is going off on brainwashed!soap bc of his new warzone skin and it’s making me think of ghost deliberately getting himself captured by makarov bc he knows he’ll be given to his dog to try and break him; knows he won’t be able to resist the irony, the cruelty of being tortured by the teammate he lost

he doesn’t fight; welcomes the chains around his wrists and ankles, welcomes the hands stripping him of his weapons and gear until he's defenceless

he wouldn't use them anyway

when he stalks into the room, the muzzle, the scars, not even the blank hatred or lack of recognition could make him mistake his eyes

that's his johnny

he doesn't flinch as he digs knives into his skin; would never shy away from his kiss even if it's tinged with rusted steel. doesn't swallow his screams; not when he always loved hearing him, when he spent so long coaxing his voice from the grave

frustration joins the anger in johnny's eyes the longer he goes without giving up information

just jokes; dark and puns alike

just advice when he can't get the jumper cables to spark right

ghost's not trying to escape; not trying to barter his return to the 141

he's right where he wants to be

[vaguely-concerned]

on the one hand I think inner demons could stand to have a bit more romanced rook specific content, but on the other hand the underlying in-built implication that 'yours is the one true voice of comfort and safety in my inner world' is a sentiment and intimacy so way beyond the romantic or the platonic or any secret third thing you could care to name that it makes me lose my entire poor little mind a bit. it's so big and fundamental — near-existential — that in that exact moment at least the distinctions kind of seem irrelevant.

all the people lucanis' mind conjures up along the way are relationships he has that are unavoidably mixed and fraught in some ways even when they're also full of love (they are fraught BECAUSE they're full of love) — the good in them inseparable from things that hurt him at the same time. (it's about: the basic disorganized attachment patterns this poor guy is dragging around with him. careful with those, they're dellamorte heirlooms. what you love also inevitably hurts you and you won't be allowed to have one without the other, you have to surrender parts of your soul to hold on to what little you have left: this is the story up until now.) and the idea that rook isn't that to him — that beneath the fear of wanting them when romanced (which is more its own separate thing because within this psychology, actively wanting something and not just clinging on for dear life to even a meager status quo lest you lose it is in itself dangerous bordering on catastrophic), this is a relationship where there isn't resentment, or guilt, or shame, or dread, or rage, or self-hate, or any of the other emotions that keep him paralyzed, unable to move this way or that. no debts, nothing owed of yourself and your soul's substance except what you can freely and safely and happily give. love and freedom don't coexist — but, I mean, you're almost starting to make me think........... unless...👀👀👀. the unconditional and undramatic 'you are here and I am here with you, you can be exactly how you are right now with me and it's safe for us both even though you're afraid it won't be, I'm not going anywhere' acceptance rook shows him here that he returns to them in the big romance scene, when it's rook who needs it. the way he's just. standing there in the center of it all, like a child desperately helplessly waiting to be found, hiding in the place he hopes you'll know to look first. (rook does know. it's one of the first things they say in there.)

in short the most important room in his little mind palace for the romance is the very first room — the one where rook isn't. where, in fact, rook cannot be, because they disprove the entire structure of the place with their existence and presence in his life. with everyone else he's putting words in their mouths about what they think of him, and rook is the one who actually gets to come in to speak their own words to him — and have him listen. ('he'll listen to you, he always listens to you', 'your voice is a comfort'.) of course rook isn't present anywhere else in there — at the risk of stating the obvious to a tedious degree, they aren't one of the locks, they're bringing the key. in the very finest 'the messenger and the message' sort of way.

[casualavocados]

An idiot like you...an idiot like you...

KISEKI: DEAR TO ME Ep. 9

[oneluckydragon]

“Fool me once, Dusknoir. Fool me twice?” Echo supplies, ice in the bite of her voice, “And you’ll regret it.”

--- --- --- --- ---

ECHO : (Hero)

Abilities: Bad Dreams / Synchronization

Nature: Impish / Quiet

Moveset: Dark Void / Psychic / Alluring Voice / Moonlight

[entropyvoid]

Golden Hour (+ lineart below cut)

I took a picture of the lines for once and did some basic crappy photo editing on my phone, so you could probably print this out and use it as a coloring page or something if you so wish lol. Do with it what you will.

[slasherscream]

No bc ur post about hitting Jordan with the "this you? 🤨" is so real. Like maybe you two are frenemies like you hang out but are academic rivals so as soon as they get a little too bold, you pull up their jitterbean promo lol It def shuts them up but they're secretly into it when ur mean to them

(Sorry for rambling I just really like ur stuff)

They'd never know a minute's peace. Even when they think you're being nice there's teeth to it.

"You look really good today, Li."

Jordan, not trusting you to not be a cunt, "....thanks?"

You, copying their exact cadence and tone during the 'Godolkin Campus Tour with Jordan Li' video, "So much swag!"

"FUCK YOU."

[neverbesokind]

Oh my god it's The Alchemy day I have SO many thoughts about this song so I'm gonna try and condense them.

First of all, the song starts and ends with "This happens once every few lifetimes," which is a statement filled to the BRIM with irony, in my view. The entire album up to this point has been concerned with two romances, both of which Taylor states she felt were destined and fated and "storybook" in their own ways. The entirety of TTPD is exploring how these fated, destined, storybook romances could actually crumble, and with it, her faith and belief in the existence of fate and destiny and storybook love.

But THEN... almost at the end of the standard run of the album, Taylor states that she's getting back from recovering from this tragedy - "I'm back / The hospital was a drag / Worst sleep that I ever had". She gets back from the messy process of healing from the events described on the album, and despite everything finds herself falling in love again.

This is why the title is significant, too. Alchemy is the pseudoscience of making a material into something more valuable. And this reflects the emotional process of Taylor falling in love again - she felt like the past two tragedies took the shine off of everything, killed her belief that love could ever work. But then, despite everything, she falls in love again and the normal, even tragic world she lived in before is transformed into something golden.

And then the first line repeats again, to reflect the cyclical nature of what she has experienced. Obviously, "this" doesn't happen once every few lifetimes, it's happened twice before on the album and is happening again in this song. She's falling in love, she's finding something beautiful and fated, and she can't help but find it gorgeous and meaningful, even if she's been shown again and again that she might be proven wrong in the end. And it feels so special that even if it's obvious that it isn't a once-in-a-lifetime experience, it feels that rare and that precious.

In this song, love is the alchemy, the process of turning normalcy into meaning and beauty, and she can't help it.

[three-bunnies-in-a-trenchcoat]

I FUCKING TOLD YOU GUYS

[ayyyy-le-simp]

SPOILERS FOR BAD BATCH SEASON 3 EPISODE 11

ANYWAYS

YALL ik it’s bad but I’m insane so let me have this moment

HUNTER WITH WET HAIR SHOWN?? HUNTER COMING OUT OF THE WATER??? HELLOOOOOOOOO HELLOOOOOOOOO

Shitty but we got SOMETHING RIGHT?????

[ganondoodle]

Regarding Demise: He is an interesting concept, as is the whole eternal cycle, but for that to actually become something worthwhile the games/stories would have to actually DO something with it. So far they are introduced in Skyward Sword and thats it! No other game even references them. And, yes, that cheapens EVERY other game because there is this implication that its all out of the control of the actual characters in the story because of this one asshole that we only ever saw once! Why not have Ganondorf realize that he is possessed/manipulated by this weird old Demon God? How would he react, would he embrace it, would he rebel, would he be broken by the realization that none of his actions were ever *his*? I dont even care which of these options they pick, as long as they pick any of it and do just ANYTHING with the concept.

Or maybe Link or Zelda figures out the Cycle and starts looking into breaking it because endlessly repeating Demon Attacks kinda suck and you dont want that for your descendants.

Or have a game focus on them remembering bits from past lives and having to piece it all together or, again, just ANYTHING!

The closest they ever came to was with BOTW Zelda praying to Hylia, aka HERSELF, to unlock her powers, which is some brutal narrative irony, but not much more.

And regarding the whole Zelda is Hylia thing, I've seen some headcanons about how Skyward Sword Zelda is terrified of herself after learning that, because she now has to assume that everything she did was planned by a version of her that she no longer is. Is Link her friend or is he the useful pawn that Hylia needs to turn into the Hero? Does she even deserve his affection when she probably manipulated him into becoming her champion and fighting, possibly dying for her all her life?

Thats juicy, thats something you can do something with but Nintendo really does like to plan those stories game per game without any care for the larger story.

Which I guess is the Irony of it all. They tried the whole larger connected story/universe thing once: With Skyward Sword. After all that was also the time we got the first Hyrule Historia & "official timeline" as well as "How it all began" in the game itself.

It felt like the start of a new era for Zelda games and stories and then it just... wasn't.

And while I get that they want to focus on gameplay over story, I will never stop mourning the stories we could get/have gotten, if they put a bit more thought into things.

I actually feel like its harder to make the 'cycle' into an interesting plot point when its a .. divine thing that happens, and not perpetuated by the people (though not impossible, given how the series is build up it would need alot of work to not make it worse still..)-

i actually cannot stand the idea that ganondorf is possessed or manipulated, made eviler by demise somehow (demise is dead, leave him beeeeee hes not some evil master mind behind anything aaaaah) bc it STILL takes away ganondorfs agency and character and gives right into the whole hes basically born evil and just pushes the fault tm onto someone else it in turn legitimizes that the kingdom of hyrule and its high rule (heehoo) is right and if only gan wasnt manipulated hed be good tm, aka allied with the goodest guys, hed gladly accept their invitation and join their holy empire of goodness tm if wasnt for da demon

(and i love to say, who decides what is good tm and evil tm? bc hyrules monarchs making every other tribe their subordinate and persecuting shiekah for example isnt what id call good but its fine bc the good holy guys did it in the name of "peace" -what is their idea of peace? everyones under their rule and must worship their god? uh oh- and resistance to it is gonna get you labelled as evil!! (unless you join their holy kingdom and become their vassal of GOOD) what good and evil boils down to in zelda is .. being allied/ruled by the kingdom of hyrule and being opposed to them, even if its only not wanting to be subjugated by them)

i can see the appeal to some degree, but i dont like the idea of ganondorf even being able to be manipulated or possessed, what makes his character, before it got flattened into well he just be demon in the eyes of the average fandom, interesting is his unbreakable will, that drive to keep on living and resisting those that want him dead, its poetic and sad, to the point that (until totk ...) it was really just ONE ganondorf that refused to die and came back over and over (also something i found a compelling thought for botw, that after all this time theres nothing left BUT his will to resist, its a tragic idea that rly spoke to me)

my personal idea of the cycle is that its only a cycle bc they, the kingdom of hyrule and their belief system, keep it going, its not a divine thing that needs to be broken (though the divine surely messes with it, just for the bit i guess) but something that keeps repeating bc hyrule is so soaked into the idea that their princess once was a god and hers is the right to rule it all in light- so anyone who doesnt agree must be of the demons from the darkness seeking to destroy the world, and what means the 'world' could just mean the kingdom of hyrule- in botw even with the calamity people went on and lived, same in windwaker, they dont need the holy kingdom to live- (who is to say the 'monsters' are bad for the land, to me they mostly looked like well adapted territorial beasts, and the bokblins etc clearly arent mindless monsters either, why do they need to be eradicated? they attack you? ok dont go into their territory, or defend yourself, you dont need to exterminate something just bc it could be a threat at some point)

(i do agree that conflict with zelda being interesting but uuuh .. well they never did anythign with that huh)

in the end, demise was just a throw away villain, and if i may get my tin foil hat back here, i feel like the whole creation myth skyward sword does was really just a way for them to get out of the predicament of having to consider a villain to be treated like a person to save themselves from having to think about what they imply and can just go, well this is the evil demons, this is the good gods- ironically enough the attempt to get out of having to consider complicated writing it ends up reversing straight back into the WORST of kinds of implications .. that arent even subtext anymore, if totk is anythign to go by, the most 'simple' or 'easy' narrative to go for might not be actually simple, just a so often retold one that it appears simple if not made aware of its dark maw, the status quo repeated ad nauseam

(and if i may, the whole gameplay over story thing is bs in my eyes, that sounds like the typical attempt of dismissing any critique, just like the stupid, and frankly, offensive "its just for kids" argument, story and gameplay are inherently intertwined, the story influences the gameplay, the gameplay influences the story, especially in a series like zelda that is a futile thing to go for and a reason why the stories themselves lack depth, how are you gonna have an epic adventure that drives you to get through any amount of puzzles and battles if there is no story to motivate you, at this point it feels like the series has set itself up for catastrophic failure bc i imagine, people might just keep buying and playing the games bc its attached to the series, bc they hope to see characters they loved return, new ones that will grab their attention, perhaps be taken away by a world that meant alot to them once before, hope that there will be something exciting-

i am not saying the series has no value or doesnt do anything well (hello who am i) but how many times can you repeat 'this guy good he fight evil guy he get the pretty princess as reward' without any interesting twists or narrative, even the most beloved characters can only keep it passable for so long, even the best gameplay loses its potential if its surrounded by cardboard characters and a story so "simple" as offensive it fits into a single page, i often wonder how a game would be seen if it wasnt titled -the legend of zelda- ..

it hurts especially when looking at its long history, how much estblished thigns it could exploit and expand, the potential the series has is still immense, it hurts to see it be wasted over and over :(

[godblooded]

just an fyi, and it feels like it needs to be said here: your blog is your own space and you should be able to say whatever the fuck you want. if you’re sad? vent. get sad. maybe put it under a cut, definitely tag it, but get sad. if you feel like you need someone to talk to? drop a freaking message about how you’re feeling like you could use a buddy, or anything randomly engaging. if you’re having a hard time, you should feel safe and okay to talk about it in your own space. we’re writers and we’re people and while there’s a lot to be said for how engagement outside of oneself is necessary in rp (and really really needs to improve), i think there’s a lot that must be said about people reaching out to others. it’s become so solitary here — the whole ‘reblog from source’ thing when it comes to shit like about and musings is absurd. the whole refusing to like things is ridiculous. yes, curate your space, that’s important, but curating your space into a studio apartment only you live in doesn’t make this a community anymore, it makes it a studio apartment you live in.

just be yourself here. do whatever you want. but i’m always saying: remember you’re not alone, and don’t let yourself feel that way.

[gabbiarts]

Ohhh my gosh, echoes of wisdom is SO GOOD. Loovvedd this scene so much, I had to do a little drawing--and then the shading happened and. Yeh. More rambles in the tags!!

[Image description: a bust of my version of Princess Zelda from Echoes of Wisdom, standing in a dark prison cell. Sunlight shines through a window, illuminating only some of her sad face.]

[mayormimii]

Thinking about the fact that (in Pathologic 1) Daniil looks almost exactly like Victor Kain.

You know, Maria’s father.

There could be something in that, I think.

[abigfanofstarwars]

jesus fucking christ

tech got me way too nervous for a while there

“Your concern is not warranted. I will be fine.”

bitch huH??? what kind of stupid horror movie type shit is that 🙃