#like let's establish the fucking stakes here okay!!!!

[fiercestcorpse]

still absolutely baffled by the fact that when the untamed got popular on here you had people posting stuff like "i know it seems kind of weird and confusing for the first couple of episodes but don't worry, it picks up after that" like what the hell are you talking about. i loved the first couple of episodes. i was having the time of my life right from the opening monologue and it only got better from there.

[rindomness]

hello hi tell us about mementos and the security level

OH HELLO. Welcome to my personal hill to die on. This post is long. It's one of my out-loud rants in text form. Sorry in advance. There's a cut down there somewhere.

Thesis statement of whatever's about to come next is that Mementos fucks actually as a concept its execution was just horrible and also Yaldabaoth is a terrible final boss. OKAY LET'S GET INTO IT

First things first I really do think Mementos should have gotten a security level. The game plays "Mementos is the public's Palace" very straight, all the way to the end, insisting that Yaldabaoth is created by the public's desire for a status quo yadda yadda yadda. So like. Here's the screenshots actually

I didn't get the whole conversation mostly because I think I was streaming at the time and complaining out loud but like. He just straight-up says this? And then they do nothing with it???

Imagine this with me. Enter the imagisphere or whatever.

It's October. You've just defeated Okumura, and you just watched the mysterious black-masked figure you've been told cryptically about for a while now kill his Shadow. You watch Okumura have a mental shutdown live. It's horrific! It's worrying! What happened? What's going to happen to you? The Phan-Site meter starts dropping rapidly. You go to Mementos to prepare for the next Palace.

There's a security level.

NOT ONLY did this act make the public lose faith in you, but now you're enemy #1, and it's reflected in the collective unconscious. This Chekov's gun that they set up back in May goes off. You have to be much more careful in Mementos because if you aren't, you could get kicked out. The stakes are higher. Mementos, the public view of you, has changed. It's not just doors opening for you anymore.

THAT WOULD BE SO COOL. RIGHT? RIGHT??? BUT NO! No we don't get a security level until the depths, which contradicts itself, actually, because once you get to the depths, the whole POINT is that the public ISN'T reacting to you or your actions! Why the hell would they care that you're In There!

The obvious answer is that it's because the security level belongs to the Holy Grail/Yaldabaoth/the fuckass cup/whatever you personally call him. And okay, whatever, but the game goes out of its way to establish that the Grail isn't really a separate entity from "public desire," he IS "public desire," the status quo incarnate, so once again, I ask, why is this the only time you have a security level! (I know it's because this is the home-stretch to the final boss and mechanically it has to act like a proper Palace. I still think it's stupid.)

And now that I'm talking about the Grail. Hi. Hello. If you've talked to me on Discord you already know this but I fucking hate the Grail. I think it's stupid. I think it's thematically inconsistent. I think its only purpose is to be the "Let's fight God!" final boss. I truly believe that if I hadn't gotten into Persona 5 through Royal, I would not still be into Persona 5, because I would have gotten so frustrated with Yaldabaoth that I would have dropped the game. I regularly complain for half an hour straight about this thing in voice calls. One person once told me the only thing they knew about Persona 5 was that this cup sucked because I wouldn't shut up about it.

I've somehow managed to not do this on Tumblr but I can't really talk about Mementos without talking about it so I guess we're talking about the cup

Narratively: Yaldabaoth just sort of comes out of nowhere??? The whole game is building up to Shido. The whole game. And you do it! You defeat him! And then... there's this other thing??? Apparently??? I was genuinely really confused when I got to this part of the game the first time because I was going ok we beat the final boss complete with eight hundred phases! Hooray! And now there's this other fucker. Going back through the game there's some foreshadowing for him? But it's kind of all concentrated in the start of the game, around Madarame's Palace, when you're just getting used to Mementos, and then it all sorta just disappears.

YOU KNOW WHAT IS FORESHADOWED, THOUGH? MORGANA.

Imagine with me x2 because this is where I thought the game was taking us when it went "btw we need to tackle the depths now"

Morgana has no memories. Morgana knows there's something in the depths that explains who he is. Morgana assumes it's because he's human, and will become human again if he finds out what it is. The WHOLE POINT of exploring Mementos was for Morgana's memories! And then he starts getting these really unsettling dreams, right, where he's a Shadow, or has a Shadow, or whatever. And then you get to the depths.

What I thought was about to happen was that we were going to find out that Morgana was more or less what the Grail claims to be(a being created by the wishes of the masses) and that Mementos was going to be Morgana's Palace. "Oh but Morgana has a Persona-" Morgana's already a weird case I could easily see him having a Shadow or being a Shadow himself while also having a Persona. I'm ignoring Maruki because we're talking about vanilla and Maruki didn't exist yet.

I thought our final boss was going to be Mona's Shadow and that by defeating him(the part of Morgana(as a Shadow/Metaverse being/etc) representative of what they were trying to make Yaldabaoth: wanting to let the status quo handle everything, more or less, the desire to let the system do what it's designed to even if that thing is "crush everything in its path") we would reaffirm that change is possible as long as we all work together. Morgana getting to be this very physical symbol of rebellion and force of will and getting to go NO I want to try even if it hurts me.

What actually happened was... a lot more underwhelming.

What we got was, in a game where one of the primary themes is "rebellion against systemic injustice, you can't just get rid of the One Guy and fix Everything," a final boss who was... one guy who if you got rid of him you'd fix everything?

And I get it Atlus doesn't want to actually shake the boat that much but at the same time Yaldabaoth comes out of nowhere and says absolutely nothing of substance in a game that, over and over again, gets SO CLOSE to saying something really powerful and then sinking back into what's comfortable. It's the aesthetic of rebellion without the teeth of it.

Anyway now that I've complained for an essay's worth here's some positive stuff

I really do like Mementos. It gets a lot of shit for being repetitive and boring and like I sort of get that but on the other hand it is a JRPG. I'm not sure what you expected from the area that is, mechanically, "Here's where you go to grind." I don't see a problem with having this area. I think the special floor events manage to spice it up enough that it's not all that boring. I like Jose being there in Royal, I think he adds a lot, actually. The implications of everything Jose says are fascinating to me. The fact it's impacted by the weather! Like, as a world component, Mementos is so so cool actually guys. I know it's a Persona game so "world impacted by cognition" is sort of the bare minimum but it's really cool!!! The aesthetics fuck! The only layer I really don't like is.. fuck, I think it's Kaitul? Whichever one gets unlocked after Kaneshiro's Palace, I haven't gotten there in my current playthrough yet. It's just... too dark to see, all the time, imo. Mementos feels(except for... 90% sure it's Chemdah) very oppressive and spooky and I honestly think that's great. It's a depressing place to be! For a game about how corruption and systemic violence hurts everybody, it's really good!

In conclusion... don't ask me about Mementos unless you want an essay LMAO in seriousness I understand why Mementos gets shit but I think it should get less of it. And also that I could have fixed it(the cup. The cup is the big bad part of Mementos. Not the grinding you're going to get that with a JRPG no matter what you do you signed up for it when you launched the game.)

[ihavemanyhusbands]

Can I request one where Richie and reader get in a big fight over something that ends with reader being really upset until Richie eventually apologizes? A little mean Richie, hurt/comfort, established relationship.

Thanks for requesting! <3

——

Never before had you spent an entire weekend without speaking to Richie. Then again, all of the arguments you’d had in the past had been much easier to fix.

Since the Bear’s grand opening was right around the corner, things were hectic at the restaurant. Richie had been under a lot of stress, sleeping less and slowly losing his already small reserve of patience.

Given that you were so close to everyone at the restaurant, you came in a few times to try and help out however you could. But sometimes there’s just too many cooks in one kitchen and it ends up being less helpful.

So on a particularly stressful day, in which the inspector was meant to come in to check on the gas, Richie had reached his limit.

You’d been having a discussion with Fak about something trivial — which you had to admit was kind of distracting him from his task — when Richie stormed over to interrupt the conversation.

“Okay, okay, I’m sure this is a real interesting conversation, but we don’t have time for this shit right now. The inspector will be here in an hour and if everything’s not in top shape, we’re gonna be absolutely fucked.”

“I know that, Richie, I’m working!” Fak countered.

“No you’re fucking not!” Richie said exasperatedly, turning to you. “Do you even understand how high the stakes are right now? We could lose everything, we can’t afford bullshit like this right now.”

“Alright, calm down. I do understand. I know Tina mentioned she might need—” you started to say, but he interrupted.

“Don’t go bothering Tina, she’s busy, too. We all are! You know why? Because we fucking work here, and you don’t,” he pointed at you as if to emphasize his point. “I need you to leave. You’re in the way while we’re scrambling to get shit together and we don’t need your help, okay? Just go home and let us handle our shit.”

“Don’t talk to her like that,” Fak said immediately.

“Shut the hell up, Fak. This is between us, not you,” Richie snapped.

“Well I’m standing right here!” He argued.

“It’s okay, Fak,” you said, trying to swallow the bitter lump in your throat as you glared at Richie. “Just… Whatever, fine. You’re gonna mess it up by being a fucking asshole, and I don’t wanna be here for that anyway.”

“Oh, I’m being an asshole?” Richie scoffed, shaking his head in what seemed to be disbelief.

“Yes, you are. I know you think its fine to take your frustration out on other people, but I’m not your fucking punching bag, got it?”

You shoved past him to get your stuff by the backdoor, not even saying goodbye to anyone as you made your way outside. Your face was hot from embarrassment and rage, so you didn’t want anyone to see you like that anyway.

You cried on the train ride home and ignored all of his calls later that evening. In fact, you didn’t talk to any of the staff members, wanting to distance yourself from the whole thing for a little bit.

It wasn’t until Monday evening that there was a knock on your front door. You opened it to reveal a forlorn looking Richie, holding a bouquet of flowers and a bag of take out from your favorite spot.

“Hey,” he said, his voice a little hoarse. “Can I come in?”

You nodded, stepping away from the doorway to let him in. He shut the door behind himself, but you didn’t let him take one more step, your arms crossed over your chest.

“You were right, I was a fucking asshole, and I was way out of line. With everyone, but especially with you. I shouldn’t have said those things to you.”

You looked down at the floor. “I was just trying to be helpful. I hated seeing you so stressed.”

“I know, I’m so sorry baby. All of the shit I said was stupid, I was just being a selfish piece of shit and-and I just didn’t think clearly.”

“You’re not a piece of shit, Richie,” you said. “But you were definitely a jagoff.”

“Trust me, I’m aware. Carmen and the others chewed me out about it, too. I shouldn’t have let it get to that point. I’m really, really sorry.”

You softened some at the earnestness on his face. You took the flowers from him and brought him in for a hug with your free arm. He clutched you tightly, planting a kiss on your temple.

“How can I make it up to you?” He murmured against your hair.

You turned your head to look up at him. “I could think of a few things… you’re lucky I didn’t make you grovel on your knees.”

He chuckled a little. “I could still do it, if you wanted me to.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

——

[carefulfears]

How do you think it played out between Mulder and Diana? I picture him as being very vulnerable after Phoebe, so to go into another relationship with someone who's also quite manipulative and actually trust them enough to get married... I'd be interested to know your thoughts on what that marriage was like, and the divorce

honestly i think the pipeline from phoebe to diana was just wideeee open like…i don’t see him as having been closed off after phoebe. even though he clearly recognizes things between them as having been bad (he jokes about her having “driven a stake” through him, he jokes about her cheating, he refers to her mind games and the way she just wants to hurt him as “classic phoebe greene”)

but he still….calls her “brilliant” and puts himself in a position of blame (“i got in over my head”) and helps her when she asks. he is still open to her. and he’s open to diana, when she comes back, after having left him. they’re kind and civil to each other. in the end, when she keeps pressing him about scully, he says “i’ve done okay without you,” and it’s not harsh. it’s a reassurance. i’m alright. it’s okay.

all to say that…i don’t think it was a matter of trust, or trusting someone again after phoebe. mulder never really struggles with trust, for all his talk. he’s always walking into the world with a hand out, no matter how many times it’s bitten. and no matter how aware he is of people’s true selves or behavior.

that’s what fucking kills me about mulder in relation to abuse, it’s that he knows. he doesn’t try to convince himself or anyone else that it’s not that bad, that it’s not on purpose, that they’re not hurting him. he knows. he knows that phoebe just wants to watch him walk through fire, and he walks. and for as much as he defends diana and doesn’t want to believe that she was involved in syndicate work, i think he knows that their relationship wasn’t healthy.

(children weaned on poison consider harm a comfort etc etc. children weaned on blame string themselves up on the cross)

so i think you’re right that he was vulnerable after phoebe, in the sense that he’s already been so burned, and is so aware, and he all but goes back for more. but…diana isn’t phoebe. phoebe was college affairs and trysts in graveyards and red hot fire. diana is established. diana is older. diana is…cold.

where phoebe would look away until he was apologizing and begging, diana stares him down. she never backs away. she never wavers, even in her most egregious lies.

i’m sure we’re all tired of me affirming freud, but diana is so much like his mother you guys. they both have that same quietly understated bite. they both know so much more than they let on. they both respond the exact same way to his questioning. (“fox, please. don’t do this.” / “nothing could be further from the truth, fox. nothing.”)

there’s a great post here on what draws mulder to diana, that touches on the difference between her and phoebe:

Mulder, who has never been loved properly by anyone since his little sister, flourishes in her company. She is evidently attracted to him, and he’s attracted to her, a slightly older, slow-moving woman. What does he have to compare her with? Phoebe, who belittled and gaslighted him? Compared to Phoebe, Diana is stable, level-headed, understanding, present, dedicated, encouraging, and admiring of his talents.

they’re both manipulative, and abusive, but diana knows what she’s doing. diana knows what moves to make.

the way she speaks to him is just so purposeful, you guys. her first line on the series is telling a room full of people that she thinks he’s right. that she believes him. she “takes his side” to scully. (and she belittles scully to him, like phoebe did. tells him that she just wonders how far he could go, with someone who really believed him). “fox, i’m going to get out of the car now. i’m alone, okay?”

she knows him. and he responds exactly as she knows he will: the very first script note about her character is that she’s anticipating mulder’s reactions. she addresses his fears and insecurities. (in the end when she tells him that she was impressed with him for his “good catch” on the videotape, he can’t even look at her. he turns his whole body away from her before shaking his head and responding: “oh. you would’ve caught it eventually.”)

a lot of this is learned over years (if they were together from when he graduated the academy, until the discovery of the x-files in 1991, that puts their relationship at around 5 years. from ‘86 to ‘91) but a lot of this is just…..them. just their dynamic.

i said this in my first post on the topic, but, he would’ve married her. if he’d walk through fire, he’d get married. if he’d search for family in extraterrestrial life, he’d get married. he’s a legacy government employee from martha’s vineyard. and he eats out of the palm of her hand, even a decade after she left him. (which isn’t even to say that she would’ve had to initiate marriage. but there’s also a certain level of….it’s just what you do. especially in upper class new england circles.)

he was young, and he was the FBI’s golden boy. he was “the best analyst in the violent crime section.” he was writing monographs that would catch the biggest serial killers. he was being talked about in the academy. that sort of thing matters to diana. even after she comes back, she speaks of following his work. having “an interest” in it. wanting him to be successful.

she looks genuinely concerned in one son, when he says that he feels like he should just give up. it seems like it throws her off, where she usually has the upper hand.

as far as how the marriage went, i think it was short, and cold, and lonely. in the flashbacks of travelers, it’s 1990, he’s wearing a ring, he tells arthur dales that he does not speak to his father.

as far as the divorce, i think she just left. i think it’s implied in her line: “sometimes i hear about you…and i think how it might’ve been if i’d stayed.”

1991: the x-files are discovered, diana gets a job in europe. i love that they worked cases together, in the beginning. she’s the original x-files partner, and she never lets go of that. there’s almost a threat in her voice, every time she throws it in both mulder and scully’s faces. (especially: “hey. you and i found the x-files together. don’t forget that.” …everything that he has, she helped build.)

i really love this fic that goes through mulder and diana’s relationship, it’s completely in line with how i view her character and their dynamic. but i especially come back to the chapter where mulder opens a file on samantha. and diana realizes, after all their adventures looking for psychics in hospitals, that this is going to be something very different, very quickly.

“spooky mulder” wasn’t always crazy and basement dwelling. he used to be the best analyst in the violent crime section. he used to be revered, and respected, for how “scary” quickly his mind works. that’s diana’s husband.

but so quickly, he becomes so enmeshed in so much trauma, and loss. the way he talks in the pilot, he tells scully that he just went to oxford and then went to the fbi, and when she asks what he did after samantha disappeared, he says that he was….good at profiling. that he was successful, and that allowed him room to pursue other interests. he finds the x-files. he spends 2 years trying to get the unit opened. and very quickly, he’s alone in the basement.

as far as the syndicate plays in, i go back and forth. sometimes i think they had hands in diana the whole time, and just pulled her out when the x-files were established. but mostly, i think they probably recruited her in ‘91. they wouldn’t really have much cause to have someone on mulder, before then.

so i think, most likely, the x-files are discovered. at first, it’s interesting, it’s in line with her own personal work in parapsychology, it’s something she’s into. something she believes in. but mulder is so myopic, and his obsessive tendencies are not progressing him anymore. he’s not advancing or respected anymore. things start to fall apart. the syndicate approach her, recruit her out to europe.

diana wants to be doing the work. i don’t think she perceives it as being opposite sides.

y’all remember that week where mulder could read minds? this is what diana says:

I know you know. I know you know about me... That my loyalties aren't just to you... but to a man you've grown to despise. You have your reasons but, as you look inside me now you know that I have mine. Fox... Fox, I love you. I've loved you for so long. You know that, too.

she has her reasons. and, the way she sees it, so does he. the way she sees it, she has loyalties to them both.

and diana does love him, she dies for him. “you know that, too.”

doesn’t it mean something, to know? to not be playing games? not be walking through fire? to be looked in the eye, even when it’s nothing but lies?

doesn’t it mean something, to be committed? i’ve said this before, but mulder and diana are grandfathered in. no one is allowed to speak on or to either of them, in the other’s eyes. even after nearly a decade apart, they still have a place with each other. they stand on each other’s ground. (everything he has, she built.)

there’s a lot of convoluted complexities between them that i could go on forever and ever about, and there’s so much purposeful maneuvering. it’s not just diana’s gaslighting and manipulation, it’s so much above and below her. ultimately, they are little more than pawns in a game. but mostly, i just think she was there, and she was knowledgeable and controlling and respectful in a time where he didn’t have much direction. and that goes a long way.

[blackjackkent]

Next up on the circus circuit (hah) is a djinn with a VERY ominous combat title:

Cool, that seems fine. O.O;

He has a TON of loot behind him; this would probably be quite lucrative if I was willing to destroy and/or steal everything around here. Most of it I'm not very interested in, but this one is interesting:

Anyway, let's see what he has on offer.

"APPROACH, UGLY ONE."

...Wow, okay. Fuck you too.

Hector just kind of stares at him for a moment. As mentioned, he's pretty bewildered (and probably kind of overstimulated) by this whole situation. After a moment, he just answers at the top of his voice, "YOU ARE VERY LOUD."

Karlach, again, tries desperately not to laugh behind him (which is probably good, because before that she was debating whether to deck this djinn for calling Hector ugly).

"YES," the djinn bellows, making Hector's ears ring. "BEHOLD: AKABI'S WHEEL OF WONDERS."

"SPIN TO WIN PRIZES BEYOND YOUR TINY IMAGINATION, AND MAKE YOUR MISERABLE LIFE MORE BEARABLE."

This guy is a dick and a spin costs 500 gold, so these prizes better be something special.

"What kind of things can I win?" Hector asks warily.

"AKABI HAS TRAVELED ACROSS THE PLANES, BURNING AND CONQUERING ALL. WIN THE SPOILS OF SUCH CONQUEST. OR, IF LUCK SMILES UPON YOU, WIN THE GRAND PRIZE. THE JACKPOT."

Inwardly, Hector grumps to himself that even at this circus, no one can answer a godsdamned direct question with a godsdamned direct answer.

"What is the jackpot?" he asks with exaggerated patience.

"NO MORE QUESTIONS," bellows the djinn. "SPIN OR DON'T."

...Dammit. This feels sketch as hell but we've established that piquing Hector's curiosity is a way to make him do ill-advised stuff. (Between this and the facepainting we're up to 1500 gold on the day. This place is pricyyyyyy.)

"I'd like to spin the wheel."

The wheel spun, Hector biffed a Perception check (which I'm guessing would tell him the game is rigged), and won this (after Akabi called him ugly again):

Gross.

This is fairly low stakes so I'm actually going to reload, toss Guidance on him, and save-scum the Perception check, purely because this guy called Hector ugly and I don't like him. :P

Returning for a second convo after the reload, Akabi doubled down on calling him a "SPONGY MORTAL" which is also rude.

Anyway, we spin and this time we get the Perception check:

Narrator: [PERCEPTION] You notice a glint in Akabi's beard - as it glows, the wheel moves away from the jackpot. He is *cheating*.

This unlocks a [ROGUE] dialogue line basically telling Akabi to work on his technique in scamming people; this line leads to Akabi offering a free spin and threatening us. Yelling back at him at that point causes him to do this:

Which is hysterical.

However, I don't see Hector really going down this path. What is very Hector-ish is how utterly scandalized the narrator sounded about the cheating. So I think Hector just walks away but Karlach and Shadowheart and Jaheira get to listen to him hold forth for a while on how pathetic such con games are and how someone really ought to put a stop to it.

[therainbowwillow]

I know Van Helsing is most popular for post-canon vampire hunter adaptions, but the whole Polycule of Light has so much potential!

They all try to go back to their day jobs, but they’ve spent months honing in on supernatural symptoms and can’t seem to shake off the wariness. Jonathan is tuned in to his clients’ strange behaviors and begins to suspect that something’s up. Seward is at least 50% sure that a few of his patients are communicating with other-worldly beings the way Renfield was. Mina notices that a few of her students are absent for some time after Lucy’s death and seem… off when they return. Van Helsing treats patients with Lucy-esque symptoms and starts to worry. Arthur, now involved in England’s upper class circles, notes that some of these families go way back… but never seem to gain new members, as if the individuals themselves have been around for ages. Quincey… what is Quincey’s day job? Maybe he’s less dismissive about his horses getting eaten by bats?

ANYWAY! Fearing a repeat of Dracula, they come together again, quit their day jobs and form a little society of monster-hunters. Word gets around and soon, everyone knows where to turn when things aren’t going the way they should. And so the Polycule of Light establishes themselves as the go-to monster hunting agency in England, with Jonathan handling financials, Mina, Arthur, and Quincey gathering information from clients (and spying on people & bribing them for further info) and Jack & Van Helsing examining victims. Once they figure out what’s going on, they pull out the good ‘ol knives, stakes & guns (okay, the guns were never put away, this is Quincey we’re talking about) and head off to hunt down some vampires or werewolves or some other monster that they now have to contend with.

There is POTENTIAL here! Give me post-canon adaptions where everyone plays a role in the story!

And now for an expansion of these ideas with spoilers because I’ve already read Dracula and have thoughts.

Spoilers also possible in the notes, use to your discretion!

Again, spoiler warning below!!!

This is your last chance! Major spoilers ahead!!!

.

.

.

I refuse to accept that Quincey dies and I feel like any good post-canon AU needs a cowboy to be complete.

There are a lot of work-arounds here. The easiest one is that he is injured, but the two doctors on site (Van Helsing & Jack) manage to save him. I do also enjoy the ‘Quincey is a werewolf’ theory (and thus can’t be hurt by Dracula’s defenders’ non-silver knives). I think it adds another degree of interest to the story that if not all supernatural beings are evil, Dracula is choosing to hurt people and that is extra fucked up. This pairs really well with a Vampire Lucy survives AU, where she takes control of her own (after)life once Dracula is dead and has lost control over her. She rejoins the Polycule of Light to hunt down the undead who are actively choosing to be cruel (with some extra perspective as to which “enemies” aren’t in control of themselves- she’s the Polycule’s ethics branch.)

There is also Jonathan & Mina’s son who makes for a great addition to the plot. I like to think that he is being coparented by the entire Polycule, but is not let in on the supernatural happenings that his six parents + grandpa Van Helsing are contending with while he’s asleep or at school. They tell him when he’s old enough to understand and eventually, he gets to join them on missions.

[waheelawhisperer]

Okay gonna post my thoughts on V9E8 now. Took me long enough.

This was certainly an episode.

Oh boy content warning

I’m sure whatever it is will be handled with the tact and sensitivity Rooster Teeth is known for

This episode contains: graphic depictions of suicide, graphic depictions of animal abuse and animal death, violence, blood, and what is obviously someone's fetish.

It also contains the brutal murder of a beloved character's established characterization. Again.

There, I've already done a better job of tagging potentially sensitive content than Rooster Teeth ever has in its entire existence as a company. Not that hard.

Back to first-person perspective. I like this Volume’s willingness to branch out in that regard

Let it all out, Ruby. Love that she’s finally being allowed to show how hurt and bitter she is.

Oh, Ruby, that is not the bridge you want to cross

I think she’s in the Jabberwalker’s acre now, which is the last place she needs to be when she’s alone and upset and Neo is hunting her

Dafuq is this house

Is this a Neo trap or just more weird Ever After shit? Either way, I want Ruby moving as far away from it as possible

Okay it’s a Neo trap probably

I know a little about the Roman/Neo book so I’m guessing the first portrait is Neo and her parents

The second one though lmao girl you are never beating the bottom allegations

You want someone to serve so bad

Bet you’ve got a praise kink too

“What is this?” I fucking wonder, Ruby. Maybe it’s a trap you wandered into.

Okay, Roman’s new voice is… not bad, honestly, and not even bad for him, but it is distinctly different from his old one. It’s not high or nasal or hammy enough, I think. It’s like Qrow’s new voice in that I think it fits him but it’s different enough from the original voice that it bugs me. I would be fine with it if he’d been voiced this way from the start, but now I can’t help hearing the old VA.

Interesting that Neo’s illusions can talk. Not sure if this is the evolution of her Semblance or a property of the Ever After.

Oh now Ruby can whip out Crescent Rose no problem. So much for her previous hesitation. Wonder if her PTSD will get dropped like Yang’s

Nice to see Pyrrha in the new artstyle. Been too long since we heard her voice.

Yeah Roman makes a good point here

Ruby's still having zero trouble wielding Crescent Rose. What a surprise.

Let her fuckin know, Ruby

I feel like this episode kind of wants you to have read the Roman and Neo book, because even the stuff I picked up secondhand made aspects of the episode make more sense

Tree equated with death again:

"Well, if you want me dead, then come get me"

"You don't deserve to die, Red. You deserve to be broken down, torn apart, wiped from existence."

Note that this last part is said just as the leaf lands in the teacup. Neo wants Ruby deader than dead. Gone. Obliterated.

Ruby responds to the attack instinctively and with no hesitation, apparently having fully recovered from that aspect of her struggles in prior episodes.

Nice showmanship Neo, you missed your calling as an actress

So glad Ruby’s at the mercy of a supercharged Neo, no way that can end badly

Once again WBY show no sense of urgency despite knowing that Neo is out there and targeting Ruby and having recently seen Ruby be unable to lift her weapon to defend herself. It's like they've forgotten that stakes exist. You love to see it.

Get a fucking move on you four I’m kind of at the end of my patience with you here

Yang curse count goes up again, and once again it’s “damn it”. At this point she’s cursed more in this Volume than in all her previous appearances put together and I don’t really like this choice. It feels like they want to let her swear properly but are also too afraid to let her cut loose, so they’re splitting the difference and it just feels silly. Either let her cuss for real and fucking commit to the choice or treat her dialogue like everyone else’s and save the profanity for when it has any kind of actual impact like it did in Volumes 5 and 6.

I don’t know Yang maybe she ran away because you all consistently failed to give her the help she needed throughout the Volume, prioritized someone else’s pain over hers, and stood there while Jaune screamed at her. Then you specifically acted like she was a threat to Bland instead of reaching out to her. Great way to be the emotionally intelligent overprotective big sister you’ve been for the rest of the show, 10/10. I guess now that there’s nothing left of your girlfriend to massacre, the writers have started in on you.

Character Assassination: The Volume.

She tried to talk to you, Yang, but circumstances kept interrupting and then you all both failed to push hard enough when you did have time and then focused on Jaune the moment she actually managed to express her feelings

Thank you, Weiss, for being the only intelligent person in this entire season’s fucking cast. You have officially been the best character of this Volume for a while now.

Goddamn Neo’s really tearing into Ruby’s psyche

Not sure how I feel about the choice to skip more or less to Ruby’s Aura breaking. On the one hand, I don’t think we needed to see the actual fight. It’s not what’s important here. On the other hand, this Volume has really not impressed me with the action so far and I would love to have at least one good fight scene out of ten episodes.

"Are you ready for that drink yet?" Just another reminder that Neo thinks that drinking that tea means Ruby fucking dies.

Damn Pyrrha I guess you really can control poles

Too bad you died before you could show that move to Jaune

Why are half these characters here how does Neo even know some of them are dead and why does she think Ruby had anything to do with it

Literally why are Clover and Lionheart even here

Someone on this writing team really loves torturing Oscar, Jesus.

Oh great the Cat is back

Ruby says “I don’t want to be me anymore”. Yikes

What the fuck is the Cat doing hasn’t Ruby suffered enough

“I’ve been trying to wear you down for so long” you’ve known her for like 3 days dipshit don't act like this is the work of years I know your attention span is short but come on

Yeah anyone with a brain could’ve guessed you haven’t been entirely honest you’ve been giving off bad vibes since day one

Okay yeah the Gods remain dicks who casually break people and throw them away, what else is new

GET THEIR ASS LITTLE THIS IS YOUR ONE USEFUL MOMENT IN YOUR ENTIRE LIFE THIS IS YOUR TIME TO SHINE BABY

Lmao get wrecked Cat you just got finessed

Wow. Okay. That was a moment. RIP Little you would be missed if you hadn’t been both useless and annoying as fuck throughout the entire Volume but since you were I don’t really feel anything here beyond surprise that the writers would go there. If you want me to feel sad at Little’s death, give me a reason to have an emotional attachment to them to begin with. As it is, I’m just waiting to see what Ruby’s response is. That’s the only part that matters to me.

So there are two possibilities: either this breaks her utterly, or this reignites her resolve and she goes HAM on Neo’s ass. My guess is that we go with option one, that seems to be what this Volume is building toward and it’s too early for her to recover fully.

Okay, yeah, we went there. The main character just killed herself on-screen. Fantastic. What the actual fuck is with these writers and their obsession with suicide?

Also this scene was horrendously executed but I’ll talk about that in a sec

Sorry Neo I don’t care about your mental turmoil oh boo hoo revenge feels empty and now you don’t know what to do with yourself now that you’ve accomplished all your goals. Too bad, so sad, guess you should’ve tried being less of a cunt

Everyone just stands there fucking staring. Lovely.

What the fuck does that even mean, Cat? Who writes this dialogue? It has not been on point this Volume.

Weiss gets ragdolled again lmao this is her purpose in the universe

Lmao good work rabbit creature you saved Jaune’s ass. You’re literally the only useful Afteran

Did we really need such an extended closeup of Neo getting reverse vored? Somebody got to animate their fetish this Volume and milked it for all it was worth I swear to God

Jaune’s too late again it’s his most salient trait at this point, but he still gets more points than everyone else in the cast because at least he did more than stand there staring blankly at any point during this scene

Good riddance Neo you weren’t remotely likable and I can’t make myself feel sorry for you. Get fucked.

Well that’s creepy as shit

but I guarantee you someone on the animation team is aroused by this

Anyway oh look RWBY dropped the ball at the end of the episode again, what a surprise

Most of the episode was mediocre as shit but the end was fucking godawful (just like Episode 7)

You love to see it when 4 trained and experienced combatants see their friend and leader lying beaten on the ground with an enemy standing over her and just fucking stare for 20 seconds of screentime while she drinks fucking suicide tea. Make it make sense. Good work guys you’ve kept up your fantastic track record of failing Ruby for the entire Volume.

No thoughts going on in their entire fucking heads for 20 straight seconds of runtime.

Great showing from the woman who reacted in a fraction of a second and moved on instinct to throw herself in the way of an attack an opponent in disguise launched without warning when she was exhausted after fighting for like two straight days

Great showing from the woman who moved so fast to save her partner that she crossed a platform before the comrade that partner sacrificed herself to save had even hit the ground (way to hand more ammunition to the people who say the Bees only care about each other btw)

Great showing by… Weiss, I guess. She's here. She's participating.

Great showing by Jaune too but honestly I don’t expect anything from him at this point anyway so I don’t care. The other three have the capacity to be useful, so I hold them to higher standards.

The fanbase likes to say they couldn’t have known it was suicide tea but literally who gives a fuck, they know Neo wants Ruby dead, Ruby’s on the ground having obviously gotten her ass beat, Neo’s standing triumphantly over her and sure as hell isn’t bandaging her wounds, and any one of Ruby’s teammates could cover that distance in less time than it took Ruby to raise the cup to her lips. All three of Ruby’s teammates knew everything they needed to know to have a reason to defend her. All three of them have canonically demonstrated the ability to cross the distance between their entry point and Ruby/Neo in seconds at most and have made this exact kind of snap decision in combat situations on-screen. Yang should’ve been firing her gauntlets and parking her ass between Ruby and Neo the moment she saw what was going on, not standing there and drooling like she’d been spontaneously lobotomized the moment she walked into Neo’s House of Horrors and Blake and Weiss should’ve been right behind her

Yang has officially been killed. We now have two corpse-puppets being piloted around by foul necromantic magic and pretending to be characters I once knew and loved. I’m assuming Weiss is next somehow, can’t wait to see what travesties they inflict upon her.

This really is Character Assassination: The Volume, I was like 50% joking before but now I’m not joking at all holy shit I genuinely think the writers hate their characters at this point

Either that or they’re so staggeringly incompetent that they don’t even understand their characters

I bet they blame this shit on the animators again

Somebody please teach these bungling assclowns the absolute basics of screenwriting I am begging you on hands and knees how do you work on a show for a decade and still learn nothing how do you have decades of collective experience and still suck this much it defies belief

Really not sure how I feel about having Neo talk through her illusions but I don’t expect Rooster Teeth to give a shit about a character’s disability in any capacity at this point

Overall rating: DEAR GOD THIS IS AWFUL/10

[gaykarstaagforever]

Part 1

Fine. You want Fat Superman? Here is Fat Superman.

PART 2: FAT SUPERMAN

Spoiler warning: he gets fat from drinking expired champagne on an alien planet.

No I'm not joking.

And while he has to exercise to get thinner, faster, it was always going to wear off and he'd go back to normal.

Those are the stakes of this idiot story.

You see this? You see Lois being a bitch about it, and all the cruel fat-related puns?

10 and a half pages of that. That's basically it.

This is a joke that isn't funny, that eventually just...stops.

They made this the cover feature.

...A cover feature with a scene that doesn't even happen. Superman just says, "Man. What if I got fat in a phone booth, instead of a space capsule? (He was in a space capsule when he got fat. A FAKE space capsule. Look. It doesn't matter.)

Yeah. God forbid any actual dramatic story beats come out of this, you fat bastard.

Great. Now I'm doing it.

The only mildly amusing thing he does while fat is use his giant butt to plug a hole in a dam.

Speaking as a man with a giant butt...you use what you have, you know?

But even that isn't fun, because he has to make some comment about how he can't fly right, because of temporary obesity.

Yes. Because Superman's flying ability before now was totally a matter of real-world aerodynamics and particle physics.

Having him complain that his thighs are generating 10 million kilojoules of heat as they rub together when he walks would have been cruel garbage, but I would have accepted and even laughed at that. But FLYING? He is too fat to fly? Give me a break!

The blimp jokes were right there, you hacks!

Also, look back at that first dam panel. The people on the dam call him a hippo and wonder how he can still be a hero when he's fat.

It is well-established in the comics at this point that Superman can do anything, all the time, and also has super-hearing. Mostly because he tells everyone any time he does anything. And these jackasses have the nerve to stand well-within even NORMAL hearing range, and make fun of a LIVING GOD WITH LASER EYES for suddenly having man-tits?? He should have blown them over the edge, just to make a point.

Granted, this is Superman, and he's a goody-two-shoes. And they also no doubt know that. Plus he himself is currently whining about how he's TOO FAT TO FLY PROPERLY.

I've been mad for three days about this. Let's pause for an ad break.

Intriguing. I'll have to look up this 'Sesame Street' thing later, see if it went anywhere.

Back to hell.

Speaking of weird physics, I can't imagine how people on a plane flying at like 700 mph, passing even a fat Superman going at least as fast, can recognize anything, let alone have enough time to accurately guess his real Fat Superman weight.

But they do. Because this story is awful.

Okay this panel is pretty dense so let's talk about it.

1) He built that scale super-fast out of NOTHING, just to weigh himself. Looks to me like his super-abilities are just fine, even if he can't see his own penis.

2) ...I mean, okay, he is literally two tons. I admit, that's kind of really goddamn heavy. Maybe he should worry about this a little bit.

3) That last sentence is the greatest sentence in any Silver Age comic, ever. "Why ask questions?" Who gives a shit, right? It doesn't matter. None of this matters. Why did you buy this? Fuck you for reading this, kid. Go outside, nerd.

They didn't call him a blimp, but they DID have him call himself a parade balloon.

And then make him real sad about it.

...Did the Government pay DC to do a comic bullying fat children, because it was the height of the Cold War and they were afraid the next generation would be too porky to battle the Russians on their home tundra? Was someone on DC's editorial staff mad at his overweight mother-in-law? This is reaching frightening levels of antagonizing people who like donuts.

I've lost the thread, here. There is slightly more stupid story, but I've hit the "pictures of Fat Superman" limit, so this will need to continue in a Part 3.

[neonscandal]

Manga With Me: JJK Crackpot Theories (But Maybe Not) Rapid Fire Edition

I have had a lot of thoughts lately without any time to properly articulate them so let’s start the new year off with a shotgun blast of my least founded hot takes because, why not? Some of them might have some context clues but others might just be ideas I know I’ll never use for fanfics so, now, we all have to suffer. Enjoy my “What Ifs” and weigh in with your own. 👇🏾

⚠️ Spoiler warning: as these are rapid fire takes, covers info through current chapter of 209 and JJK0.

Nobara isn’t dead, Megumi was just paying Yuji back with his vagueness.

I just think it would be such an unhinged turn of events for Nobara to be largely okay but Megumi played the long game because how dare Yuji go along with Gojo’s half baked plan and force him to feel things for a sustained period of time?? Like, no real benefit to the plot in concealing her status except as a prank. I feel like Akutami would totally pull something like that too just for the sake of trolling. But if she came back as a critical plot point!? Even better, she deserved more shine. We also haven't seen a satisfying end to Nobara's need to reunite with Saori so I won't confirm her death until it's conveyed explicitly.

We haven't seen the best side of Miwa

I maintain the Akutami has been pretty good about tying in even the slightest of details (okay bit of dickriding here, I know). I've written about the fact that Miwa may not have such humble origins but I believe the last time we saw Miwa sets her up for a big awakening as well. The Tokyo and Kyoto schools differ in many ways as the latter tends to toe the more traditional line in agreement with the reigning jujutsu elders. Yaga, an indicator of the Tokyo school's tendency toward progressiveness, was considered odd with his cursed puppets and this eccentricity is foundational to those who work and attend the Tokyo school.

During Yuta's introduction, Maki makes it a point to mention that the weak always gather in packs, sorcerers and curses. We see countless times that Kyoto school executes as a pack, whether that is during the Goodwill Event or even when going after Kenjaku!Geto. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Gojo presses his students to go on missions appropriate for sorcerers of his caliber unsupervised. Where the elders and Kyoto seem to be intent on pacification and predictable power scaling, Tokyo is home to those the established order would consider abominations and would rather see gone. Those too weird (Yuji, Panda, Maki, the third years, I believe even Inumaki is a bit of an outcast) or those too powerful to control (Gojo, Yuta). So, the last time we saw little old Miwa... why was she alone? Because her powered up debut is loading. ✨

Megumi will be the one to exorcise Sukuna.

This is perhaps the rawest of theories considering. But Megumi’s technique requires him to summon and effectively exorcise a different animal curse in order to successfully wield it. We saw the eldritch horror he summoned as a final “fuck you” before Sukuna intervened and saved him (seriously, what was that?). So what if Megumi, in the end has the power to exorcise and wield Sukuna (a la Rika to Yuta)? Like... is this the best case scenario to save our sunshine boy, Yuji? This theory is held together by silly string but I am going to stake it on the fact that we were given the hopeless backstory of Gojo and Geto as how things had gone wrong. As the reader, should we not expect that that new iteration of this dynamic would prove to be more victorious? I'm just holding out hope. *weeps in Itafushi*

Megumi is an integral piece of the future of jujutsu and emotional damage is in the forecast

In many ways, this is already apparent. Gojo, following Toji's last directive, plucked Megumi and Tsumiki from their lives alone knowing the value of Megumi's technique and birthright. In cultivating Megumi's talent, we find out that centuries ago their ancestors were powerful enough to fight one another and we already know Gojo is OP. Megumi, unsure of himself and still developing will be a force to be reckoned with. We've seen it in glimpses already. This potential is something that Sukuna also covets which speaks volumes. We've seen with Gojo’s origin story (and Spider-Man) that great power leads to great responsibility. End game, I believe Megumi will be tasked with exorcising or killing Yuji out of necessity. But, if things in the box go horrendously wrong, I also think he'll be responsible for putting Gojo down. Hell, it might simply come down to a painful choice between Yuji and Gojo and we’ve already seen that Megumi trends toward Yuji’s preservation. I won’t say current events put a decision between Yuji or Tsumiki but 👀

Worse, I fear there will be a reckoning when he realizes he didn't have the full story behind what went down between Gojo and Toji. Either way, Gojo has cast Megumi as his equal and so has Akutami. Historically, this has ended tragically and Gojo's heart would simply be torn asunder to be undone by his own beloved protege.

Toji isn’t actually as much of a piece of shit.

This isn’t actually a plot development. I think we, as the readers, are meant to contextualize a few things to comprehend what may come to light about him. 1. He named Megumi “blessing” which leads me to believe that, while he was demonstrably awful, Megumi’s birth could have been a turning point. Tbh I think something happened to Megumi’s mom (well before Toji met Tsumiki’s mom) which sent him back down the spiral of being a degenerate and ultimately selling off his kid. I wonder how much the elders may have had to do with her death. Whether those be the Zenin or Jujutsu elders is really up in the air. 2. Akutami, in interviews, implied that Gojo wasn’t really a monogamous person in that they couldn’t see him settling down with one woman. Mind you, they then slowly reveal the deeper connection to Geto which fills in some gaps to what I'm considering a deliberate misdirection. So I’m wondering if the implication about Toji being a broke ass bum, while valid, has additional context yet to be seen.

Yuji hasn't seen the last of Yuko Ozawa

Again, this is a raw ass theory considering, I can't even lie and call it half baked. But wouldn't it be crazy if Yuko makes it to the end fight, perhaps similarly motivated as Kurusu with some cursed entity within her seeking Sukuna's head but she'll retain an affinity toward Yuji or something? Like why introduce her and that precious history with Yuji if she's not going to boomerang back into the story? Even if all she'll be is sentimental cannon fodder (I'm looking at you Junpei).

[stackthedeck]

What are your thoughts on the new Spiderverse run? I'm only reading it because of Cooper and I managed to find some bits here and there.

Have a good one!

I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS! First off, there's never been a spider verse that I didn't enjoy because I just love all the creative spins that writers and artists put on the spider mantel!! And usually, a spider verse run means that at least one of the new spiders will get their own mini series or even a full run (Spider-Gwen and Spider-Punk my beloved)

okay this got long specific thoughts and minor spoilers under the cut

And I love the five issue series of end of the spider-verse because all the new spiders are so cool!! And I think the evil wasps work really well because it allows us to check in on the other spiders we know and love but they're turned evil so that we can focus on the new spiders! It's a very visually engaging villain and it really doesn't need to be that complicated for an end of the multiverse story you know

I love Web Weaver more than words can I express I have not stopped thinking about Cooper since I read his issue!! I just want him to have a mini series after all this is over marvel please I will write it!! I think he honestly has the strongest introduction out of all the new spiders because he actually does stuff and it's not just his origin story. His design is gorgeous but also his panel layout was so engaging like that beautiful web page that summoned up his origin story!!! I love his writing and the jokes he makes, you can tell that a gay man wrote his dialogue like yes!! (Steve Foxe, sir I hope marvel lets you write more of this character please Slott can't be trusted with him!) But like he'd have such an excellent mini series because there's a plot hook established before he leaves for the multiverse and it's his relationship with Albert Moon!! It's a love square with two people I'm literally gaging yes please marvel please I need to see how this goes!! Like Cooper and Albert are exes, but Silk and Web Weaver have crushes on each other and Albert kissed Web Weaver! Like oh my god the drama and if I don't get a comic for either of them soon I'm going to fucking write it myself

I also adore the other new spiders!! I like the new spider UK, she's an interesting character with a cool design, but her writing was a little clunky but I think that would have been fixed if she had a whole issue rather than like a quarter. Same with Sun Spider, love everything about her but the writing could have been stronger but also this isn't her first appearance so idk why the felt the need to go over her origins again. I would love for both of them to get their own solos. The character I'm really excited about is Spintress!! I thought her universe was so creative and the way they translated the typical spider man villains into Disney princess stuff. I hope she gets like a children's book or since Disney owns marvel maybe a little animated short in the traditional 2d style like I'd literally kill for that!!

Okay, I love this spider verse, but its whole is less than the sum of its parts. Like it moves into Slott's Spider-Man run and it instantly stops being charming and exciting. It immediately focuses on Peter despite the fact that this whole series started with Anya Corazón and Julia Carpenter! And they started calling Peter the chosen one which fuck no!! The whole point of spider verse is that Peter Parker isn't special, that anyone can take up the responsibility of spider-man, that anyone can be behind the mask!! And then they take away the tension of the evil wasp turning the spiders by saying that 616 citizens can't be turned which like way to bring down the stakes! Noir now has a sword that erases people from existence which fuck fine okay whatever. But the new spiders are instantly pushed to the background so that Peter can have the spotlight! He makes a homophobic comment to Web Weaver, he's nasty to Spintress, and he hates Felicia for no fucking reason!! Like he's so out of character, but it's Slott so idk what I expected. I'm going to read how it ends, but fuck I wish like the core of the story actually cared about the new characters introduced because what's the point of having them there if they don't do anything

[may-tine]

Someone who has never watched TMNT Rise reacts to the movie

@gauntletknight​ this is for you

so the last tmnt anything i watched was the 1990 live action film and the 2003 cartoon, when i was like 7? so we are off to a great start, but lets get into it

hey what, why are we in hell

okay wow Casey is here already i remember him

hey MIKEY??? WHAT im sorry does leo have a metal arm?

are we opening with time travel WHAT

WHY IS CASEY JONES FROM THE FUTURE.WASNT HE JUST SOME PUNK FROM NEW YORK?

I just watched a man die.

things keep happening and i cant put my thoughts down- oh i JUST WATCHED ANOTHER MAN DIE

alright pausing for half a sec to get thoughts down, this is a wild opening, tho i guess for a movie you need some higher stakes then a normal show. Im pretty sure the normal show is more classic turtle hijinks. aight back to it

actaully whats the krang? was that in the original? Are we going to see shredder?

oop yep classic teenage turtle hijinks

now i dont remember much but i remember Donnie and Leo being kinda hard to distinguish personality wise. Im glad they put some further characterization on them both

Mikey is somehow more childish?  but like in a babyish way

oh yeah Raph is the leader this time around.

okay so the magic thing is already established in the show, and Shredder has been dealt with?

oh buddy

WHO THE FUCK ARE THESE RANDOS?

I think Donnie was always tech but was he always THIS tech? Damn son

music is super funky

Eyy foot clan! wait these are shredders guys arnt they?

Raph is still mostly angry but hes like, softer. and WHY IS LEO BEING SUCH AN ASS! is he always like this?

Rat dad! We Love splinter

this version of casey is so weird compared to what im used too, i dont hate him tho

yoo wait thats April? APRIL STEALS?

Yo  have they been training her as a ninja as well? good for her- APRIL DONT STEAL RANDOM CHEMICALS

Oh this is begging to go wron- yep

this entire interrogation scene is amazing

Okay i do adore this casey

shit is it really like, too late, too late?

god this krang thing is heking creepy why are they blocks

OH THE MAGICS OFF, right after i noticed April had magic too

oof Splinters out cold

Do they have a pod for casey? ok yeah- oh leo no

wha

hey waat the fucK? RAPH?

oh god the you survived banner is about to NOT be funny

nooo hes turning on casey

oh god the powers are still gone

Raph isnt captured... is he?

COMMANDER?

oh he is captured, kinda surprised there

ah hostage situation got it- HEY WHAT THEY FUCKKKKK

AHHHHH?????? bye foot clan

same mikey

AHHHHH HIVE MIND

oh caseys about to ruin the mood

or hype them up

oh no reveals are being delayed

GOD  this is horrifying isnt this a kids show?

HEY LEO I THINK THEY SAW YOU COMING!

APRIL HAS A MOTORCYCLE YESSSS (did she have that orginally? maybe?)

Im worried how single minded Leo is getting about this, but at the same time, i get it.

THEY POSSESSED A TRAIN???

SOFT SHELL? oh your kidding

Oh god dont possess the tank

APRIL NO- oh, april yess

Ive never been so scared of a train in my life

WHY IS THIS A STRAIGHT UP HORROR????

WHY DID SHE STEAL SO MANY????

Casey with the call out!- oh not like that kiddo no

yep like cops will do anything- WHY ARE THEY GOOP LIKE THAT, Its too fleshy my guy.

Casey what was that smirk?  Did you do this on purpose?

Mickey with the mystic hands stuff worries me cuase is LITERALLY KILLED HIM

oh the triangulation scene ive seen this

oh no

oh raph is not going to be raph once hes out of there is he

AH I HATE BEING RIGHT

WAIT I THINK I SAW FANART OF THIS EARLIER TODAY I THOUGHT IT WAS SOME AU

WE ARE HITTING FINAL HOUR SHIT AND ITS ONLY HALF WAY THROUGH THE MOVIE????

god krang raph is so spooky

HEEY FAM? HEY TMNT FANS??? ARE YOU GUYS GOOD??? i was not expecting such levels of cosmic horror 

wait why does a turtle have eyebrows?

god the krang possessed tech is the worst, horrific,OH GOD WHAT IF THE TURTLE TANK.

shout out to Donnie having a step counter, same buddy.

i do enjoy the art style

oh why he sound like that

god the animation on krang raph is upsetting

I do adore this mikey as well, i was thinking i wouldnt liked this take on ‘immature’ but hes growing on me

OH NOOO DOnnie no dont do it oh god the goop

guys WTF

GUYS WTF

I DONT LIKE DONNIE IN THERE

AHH THAT EYE

WTFWTFWTFWTF

Hello?? am i about to cry over turtles??

MYSTIC POWERS!!!!!! What about the power cancel?

oh yeah B team. Love that Aprils first idea is dropping a building on somthing

AHHH THATSD A BEAM THROUGH AN EYE AAA, like its an alien but ye

YOOOO MIKEYYYY JUST THROWS A BUILDING

Oh this is so sick

yeee the anti power stuff or not? they still work?

Leo damn it dont do the self sacrificial shit YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT SCREWED YOU UP WHEN RAPH DID IT

hot moment to appreciate the Krang mechs, great monster designs

HAHA PORTAL FUCKERY

Casey my boy ; _ ;

oh god it ended on a portal chop

whats he holdin- NOOOOOOO DONT DO THAT TO ME

ONE OF THEM IS STILL ALIVE AHHH

MIKEY NO DONT HURT YOURSELF

HES CRACKING- THEY ALL ARE AHH

WAIT THIS IS GONNA LET KRANG BACK IN

QUICK SAVE YEAAAAA

ive only been to new york once whats wrong with Staten island

Casey gets pizza!!!

WHo the hek is Cassandra- UH OH

oh this ending song is a banger

WELL That was a lot of fun and SUPER DARK WHAT. At least I get the hype now. I dont know if ill start the actual series but I will be rooting for a s3 for all the fans

[whatthehelliswrongwithme]

Voltron Part 49

Oh. My. Fucking. God. It’s the series finale. Where the fuck did the time go??? Now, please remember, that I’ll still post a season review of S8 and of the whole series as a whole. So, no need to get emotional. Yet! Season8 episode 13! 

Here we go:

Yeah.... 8 seasons and I still can’t really comment on fight-scenes

I still just remain, feeling sorry for the crew of the Atlas, who didn’t sign up for this shit

Who needs Allura x Lance, when you have Allura x Anger issues❤?

Space witch is off to another AO3 search!

I love how Shiro just does not fit into the groupshots of the other Paladins, simply cause of the visuals

Like... he sticks out so much! Baby, I love you but you do not belong there!!

Awww, it’s so nice of Space witch to answer the Paladins questions~

Do you ever have these moments in a show, when it just feels like the stakes are too high? Like, Jesus! Calm down a little!

I’m so emotionally detached from this season..... 

The ~drama~ just feels ridiculous at this point

Yaaaaa! Pidge! You go Girl!

What the fuck was that “flashing, yellow eyes”-thingy?

I love how the Paladins struggled so much in this fight before. But now it’s just “Nevermind! We’ve got this!”

Allura, how do you even know where you are?

Why are the Paladins giving Space witch a Ted-Talk now?

Oooop, Space witch markings changed. Is she now magically healed?

They’re currently talking about how Lotor wasn’t actually that evil...... He killed his friend, who trusted him. He’s an asshole. He’s an egocentric maniac who made himself a Jesus-figure. He tried to kill the Paladins. And our introduction to him, was him literally killing off a person who didn’t fit into his scheme!

And you’re saying, that he wasn’t actually that evil!!!!?

What! The! FUCK!?!?!?

Wait, will Allura die for real now?

Cause in the other season-finales she often “died” or put herself in mortal danger

It wAy mY fUcKiNg RuNnInG-jOkE!!!!

Why did the writers feel the need to kill off one of the major characters? What is this bullshit?

If they needed a “big sacrifice”, couldn’t they just have destroyed Voltron for the magic bullshit?

Allura’s telling everyone goodbye (Which probably made some shippers very happy)

Lance got really screwd over here (Sorry for the Allurance shippers)

why. does. he. have. altean. markings. now?

(I didn’t know, that being a princess is contagious)

Okay. I know, that I said that Lance got screwed over. But think about Moustache Man!!!! He was literally her father-figure! He basically was her father! And now he doesn’t even get to tell her goodbye!?!?????

The thought of Moustache Man losing Allura made me sadder than the entire “Goodbye”-scene

What’s with this bullshit of killing off Allura???

All the OG! Paladins appeared in the light. and Lotor for some reason...

Okay.... Altea’s back for some reason.....

~!Timeskip!~

Why is Keith now the head of the Galra empire?

And why did it take him one fucking year to hold that speech?

Sailor Moon. I love you. But why are you a cook now?

Matt. Please let your hair grow out again

The Nerd Sibs’ are building a robot, that looks like it came straight out of my nightmares

Moustache man is best dad! He built her a fucking statue!

Oooooh, Farmer Lance!

Okay. Nevermind. Keith’s not the leader

“Classic Keith”..... I hate this.... I literally have the same expression as “Side-Eyeing Cloe” right now

If I try really, really, really hard, I can see a Sheith here

They’re all in their PJ’s!

Why did the lions leave now??????????

How is Pidge gonna get back?

But seriously. What the hell?

.-•-°-•-.-•-°-•-.-•-°-•-.-~☆

Ooooooohh! Credit-scenes!

Oh God. They’ve aged....

Pidge looks great

Shiro looks like a dad.He  likes reading books, while cuddled into a warm blanket

Hunk looks also... good? Not much really changed

I don’t know how to put it, but there’s something so uncanny about Keith

Lance didn’t change. Because for some reason he’s Altean now

Moustache Man ..... deserved better

Why does the Holt Family establish the next Legendary Defenders and not the Garrison?

It’s cool that Hunk’s a professional cook now. But didn’t he say, that his true passion was fixing things? Which is why he bacame an engineer at the Garrison?

Now that Lance is Altean, he can be sad over Allura’s death way longer! Great way, to move on!

Krolia and Marmora Boss Kitty are apparently now the presidents

Keith decided to be social for once in his life, and founded the Space Red Cross

Wait.

Shiro married “Some Other Guy”???????

Oh the irony..... 

Great Queer Representation. They were gay for like... a solid 4 seconds on screen!

So. The lions are just floating around in space randomly?

Welp. I hate this! Time to look for some Fix-it Fics!

[no-reply95]

Jealous Guys

Something I’ve been thinking about for a while now is the different ways jealousy manifested for John and Paul over the course of their friendship.

I’m going to look at John and Paul in turn and have a look at some of the key ways jealousy appeared, before, during and after the Beatles period. This will be a looooong post so if you want to go on deep dive keep reading below.

John

Jealousy was something that John acknowledged as a big part of his personality, as far as I’m aware, he only acknowledged his jealousy publicly in terms of his relationship with Yoko but I believe jealousy was a feature of all of John’s major relationships. John’s first real partnership was with Pete Shotton, his childhood best friend, and Pete has outlined how John’s jealousy and possessiveness was a feature in their friendship with them falling out when Pete first started showing interest in girls and with John acting out when Pete started to spend more time with other friends, instead of him, here Pete recounts John’s reflection on this period of their friendship:

“Years later John confessed to having felt acutely jealous throughout that interlude: “I was scared shitless I’d lost you after our fight in science class, when you starting playing with David Jones. I really thought I’d gone too far with you that time.“

Pete Shotton, John Lennon: In My Life , 1983

Pete’s recollections establish a pattern in John’s life of acting out due to a fear of abandonment and losing those who are closest to him so it’s not surprising that once John had formed a strong bond with Paul that would stir similar fears in him. 

Below I’ve categorised the groups of people that were the focus of John’s jealousy and have picked one person from each group as an example:

Family - Jim McCartney

Paul’s family was and continues to be a big part of his life. From the outset of their friendship, John was made aware of how important Jim was to Paul and vice versa. John and Paul had to skip school to hang out together because Jim wouldn’t have John in their house initially and John confessed his resentment of Jim’s influence over Paul’s life. It appears that after some time John grew tired of having to contend with Jim for the position of the most important person in Paul’s life, and this culminated in John giving Paul a pseudo ultimatum as John discussed in 1971:

“But Paul would always give in to his dad. His dad told him to get a job, he fucking dropped the group and started working on the fucking lorries, saying, "I need a steady career." We couldn't believe it… “So I told him on the phone, "Either come or you're out." So he had to make a decision between me and his dad then, and in the end he chose me”

St. Regis Hotel interview, Sept. 5, 1971

Friends - Mal Evans

Throughout the active years of the band it was typical of them to refer to each other as their best friends and, given the lives they led, I think the simple fact that no one else could understand what it was like to be a Beatle would have meant they all shared a special bond. However, they all had friendships outside of the band and this was something that could cause issues for John when it came to Paul.

According to Tune In, Mal initially became friends with Paul during the band's initial shows at the Cavern Club then, after a suggestion from George, Mal became a part of the Beatles entourage thereafter. Mal had friendships with all the Beatles, as part of their inner circle, but from his comments it appears John took umbrage with the closeness of Mal’s friendship with Paul:

“Paul would suddenly come in with this circle saying, “This is Magical Mystery Tour, will you write that bit?” And I was choked that he’d arranged it all with Mal anyway, for a kickoff, and had all this idea going”

St. Regis Hotel interview, Sept. 5, 1971

Mal also comes up when John discusses his recollections of the writing of Eleanor Rigby:

“So rather than ask me, “John, do these lyrics—” Because by that period, he didn’t want to say that – to me. Okay? So what he would say was, “Hey, you guys, finish off the lyrics,”... “ Now, I sat there with Mal Evans, a road manager who was a telephone installer, and Neil Aspinall, who was a not-completed student accountant who became our road manager. And I was insulted and hurt that he’d thrown it out in the air”...” There might be a version that they contributed, but there isn’t a line in there that they put in.“

Playboy interview, David Sheff 1980

John’s discomfort with the closeness of Paul’s relationship with Mal was something that wasn’t lost on Mal’s wife Lil:

“He was always at their beck and call. He was a nice fella to have around, so much so that it could provoke little jealousies within the band. When I met Yoko years after Mal died, she said John had told her he’d been very jealous at one point of Mal’s relationship with Paul.”

Lil Evans interview with Ray Connolly, 2005

Love interests - Linda McCartney

Throughout their friendship both John and Paul had quite a few love interests, which (to varying degrees) prompted jealousy between them.

Although John displayed jealousy of a few of Paul’s love interests this was no more apparent than with Paul’s first wife Linda McCartney, which is confirmed by both John’s words and actions regarding Linda and her partnership with Paul:

“"Then Klein informed Lennon that McCartney had secretly been increasing his stake in Northern Songs. ‘John flew into a rage,’ recalled Apple executive Peter Brown. ‘At one point I thought he was really going to hit Paul, but he managed to calm himself down.’ One unconfirmed report of this meeting had Lennon leaping towards Linda McCartney, his fists raised in her face"

Peter Doggett, You Never Give Me Your Money

"Int: When did you first meet her [Linda]? John: The first time I saw her was after that press conference to announce Apple in America. We were just going back to the airport and she was in the car with us. I didn't think she was particularly attractive, I wondered what he was bothering having her in the car for. A bit too tweedy, you know. But she sat in the car and took photographs and that was it. And the next minute she's married him."

St. Regis Hotel interview, Sept. 5, 1971

“I was reading your letter and wondering what middle aged cranky Beatle fan wrote it... "What the hell—it’s Linda! . . . Linda— if you don’t care what I say—shut up!—let Paul write—or whatever.”

"Of course, the money angle is important—to all of us—especially after all the petty shit that came from your insane family/in laws—and GOD HELP YOU OUT, PAUL—see you in two years—I reckon you’ll be out then"

Draft letter from John Lennon to Linda McCartney, circa 1971

"The presumption is a) the Beatles would get together again or are even thinking about it and b) if they got together, John and Yoko split, Paul and Linda split"

John (with Yoko) talks to John Fielding on Weekend World, 1973

"John often speculated on why Paul and Linda remained married while, at the same time, resenting their evident happiness, to the extent that he had Green do a tarot reading to ensure him that Paul and Linda were really secretly miserable and were going to divorce within a year"

According to Fred Seaman and John Green, source

Paul

Of course jealousy wasn't a one-way street in the Lennon-McCartney relationship. Unlike with John, for Paul I'm focusing more on the key people I believe his jealousy, regarding John, was directed to:

Stuart Sutcliffe

John met Stu at Art College and struck up a really close friendship with him. At the point that John met Stu, John had already become friends with Paul so Paul felt threatened when Stu entered the picture:

"When he [Stu] came into the band, around Christmas of 1959, we were a little jealous of him; it was something I didn’t deal with very well. We were always slightly jealous of John’s other friendships.

When Stuart came in, it felt as if he was taking the position away from George and me. We had to take a bit of a back seat."

Paul McCartney, Anthology 2000

"Paul was saying something about Stu’s girl – he was jealous because she was a great girl, and Stu hit him, on stage. And Stu wasn’t a violent guy at all."

John Lennon, 1967 Anthology 2000

"I looked up to Stu. I depended on him to tell me the truth. Stu would tell me if something was good and I’d believe him. We were awful to him sometimes. Especially Paul, always picking on him. I used to explain afterwards that we didn’t dislike him, really."

John Lennon, The Beatles Hunter Davies 1968

Yoko Ono

Of all the relationships I've already discussed, the relationship and jealousy displayed from Paul towards Yoko is probably the most widely discussed in Beatles historiography and general discourse. From the official start of Yoko's relationship with John in 1968 it was clear that Paul resented her presence in John's life and her proximity to the band:

"He even sent them [John and Yoko] a hate letter once, unsigned, typed. I brought it in with the morning mail. Paul put most of his fan mail in a big basket and let it sit for weeks, but John and Yoko opened every piece. When they got to the anonymous note, they looked puzzled, looking at each other with genuine pain in their eyes. ‘You and your Jap tart think you’re hot shit’, it said."

Francie Schwartz, Body Count 1972

"Cause she’s [Yoko] very much to do with it from John’s angle, that’s the thing, you know. And I – the thing is that I – there’s— Again, like, there’s always only two answers. One is to fight it, and fight her, and try and get The Beatles back to four people without Yoko, and sort of ask her to sit down at the board meetings. Or else, the other thing is to just realize that she’s there, you know. And he’s not gonna sort of – split with her, just for our sakes."

Paul McCartney, Let It Be Sessions, 1969

"I told John on the phone the other day that at the beginning of last year I was annoyed with him. I was jealous because of Yoko, and afraid about the break-up of a great musical partnership. It’s taken me a year to realise that they were in love. Just like Linda and me."

Paul McCartney, interview with Ray Connolly, 1970

What are the similarities and differences in the way jealousy manifested for John and Paul?

I think it's obvious but bears repeating that both John and Paul displayed jealousy towards other people who they felt would threaten their relationship so that's central to all the instances I have flagged, Jim, Mal, Linda, Stu, Yoko all posed real or imagined threats to John and Paul's partnership.

However, you'll note that I included more sources to display John's jealousy regarding Paul and that I categorised John's jealousy targets whereas I only pulled out two key individuals for Paul, this isn't to say that John was more jealous than Paul was, as jealousy isn't something you can quantify, but to highlight my opinion that Paul's jealousy regarding John was more targeted than John's jealousy regarding Paul. I think what stands out to me is that, I think generally Stu and Yoko are held up as the prime examples of Paul's jealousy of other people getting close to John, as far as we know, Paul never had significant issues with other people who formed close relationships with John like Pete Shotton, Cynthia Lennon, Magic Alex etc., why was that? I think that Paul was more threatened when he felt that John was replacing him so by bringing Stu into the band (even though he wasn't a musician) and Yoko into the studio (one instance where Paul was especially hurt was when John gave Paul's line in The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill to Yoko to sing), Paul perhaps felt that his place as John's primary collaborator was in jeopardy and that he could lose a partnership that had become central to his self-worth as a person - that, I believe, was when his jealousy was most likely to rise to the fore. John, on the other hand, had a much wider range of targets when it came to jealousy regarding Paul, why was John jealous of Linda? Linda wasn't trying to replace John as Paul's collaborator, if anything she wanted the Lennon-McCartney partnership to be stronger. Why was John jealous of Mal? Mal wasn't a musician, Mal was a huge fan of the band and constantly worked to fulfil their requests, so why was John so threatened by his friendship with Paul? For me, John's jealousy regarding Paul was more than just a fear of directly being replaced, I believe John's jealousy was fundamentally triggered by a fear of abandonment. I think the childhood trauma John experienced, of being left by both his parents, meant that whenever any of his close friendships and relationships were threatened, or he felt that someone close to him may leave him, he would act out. John fell out with his childhood best friend Pete when he got a girlfriend, John hit Cynthia when he saw her dancing with Stu, John was rude to several of Paul's love interests and ultimately John never fully accepted Paul's relationship with Linda because, although he could see that she could offer Paul the family life he always wanted, John didn't want Linda to take Paul away and give him a family that meant that Paul would no longer be able to prioritise John in his life as he had in the past.

Ultimately, we'll never know all the ways that jealousy factored into John and Paul's relationship with each other and those around them, as I'm sure it impacted several relationships in more complex ways than I can articulate (i.e. I suspect jealousy played a part in Paul's initial resentment of Brian but they grew closer over time so maybe Paul's jealousy lessened over time or Brian became less of a threat?). I do think it's important to consider that jealousy was present on both sides and was likely a factor in the breakdown of John and Paul's relationship, the breakdown of the Beatles and was a continued factor in disrupting reconciliations between John and Paul into the 70s and 1980.

[strawberryjamsara]

Keiji and Sara’s relationship throughout yttd

In which I analyze the found family dynamic between Sara and Keiji then nobody reads it. But jokes aside, I realized back when that anon asked me for my thoughts on Sara that I had enough thoughts on the relationship between these two alone for its own meta so here goes. What Sara and Keiji’s relationship means in the grand scheme of yttd.

ALSO THIS IS NOT SHIPPING SHIPPERS GET THE FUCK AWAY

Sara when she meets Keiji is distrustful of him. And how can she not be? The guy has some creepy bags under his eyes, doesn’t seem to care about the situation, and for no reason is gravitating towards her. And his response when she asks why the hell he keeps putting a random stranger in charge? “Because you’re cute.” Yeah. I’d stay within 50 feet of this guy too Sara. Especially when he’s not spilling a word about himself.

Alright we might as well get the gross part out of the way. To clear things up. In the Japanese version, the word he uses “Kawai” can be seen as a more fatherly word to use with a kid. But the comments about going on dates from himself and from Shin? Those are still there. And I still think they’re really uncomfortable and wish they weren’t in the game period but we can get thematic significance out of them.

We still don’t know Keijis reasons in game for being attached to Sara. My theory? She’s his handicap. He was told to get close to the higher scorer who could easily backstab him, and he’d be stuck with her. It just kinda makes sense to me. But since that’s just a theory I won’t lean to heavily on it for support. But let’s talk about his comments.

Keiji… well, it’s shown at many points in the game that Keiji just thinks of himself as doomed to be a bad person. It can be seen during his day two negotiations when he calls himself a killer and explains he can’t even trust himself so Sara shouldn’t really bother and more explicitly so is the classroom scene between him and Ranmaru where he says he isn’t fit to protect Sara because of his sins. The flirting is both a way to distract people, and to put distance between himself and Sara. He’s not really “protecting” her.

Okay gross bit nobody wants to talk about is over I promise we won’t talk about it again. Let’s talk about Russian Roulette. In this scene, Keiji once again tries to make Sara the leader with no explanation, but then, Sara yells at him, something he didn’t expect. And through this he actually reveals something huge. The source of his trauma. His shooting. For Keiji to have actually revealed something that big, I think that this is the first moment he began to see Sara past whatever reason he first started making her a leader. This is the beginning of their bond.

This bond gets solidified over chapter 1-2s investigation. Keiji is still putting her in charge because his handicap said to build her up for whatever reason, but they’re able to have chats, and she keeps picking at his armor. He reveals his dark sense of humor to her, and she, suspicious just sort of keeps him at arms length. Also she rides his shoulders to screw in a light and he complains which is funny. The scene post Nao also helps the two of them sharpen investigative skills together, as they discuss the mystery of Miley, and Mishimas head.

Then another significant scene. The white room. I call this scene significant because, instead of letting Sara investigate the gruesome scene of the first trial, Keiji for the first time, allows Sara to walk out. Something that will become relevant later but until then, Keiji has begun to put Sara’s well-being above serving whatever purpose he had by building her up. So keep that in your pocket while we go over the main game.

There’s only two points for the main game I want to cover. While Keiji and Sara do put their heads together a few times, Sara still doesn’t fully trust him, so I will only go over 1. When Shin brings up Kai’s emails. Keiji has been fully logical this whole time, questioning everyone’s alibis including Nao’s who he saw the emotional plea from, but when Sou brings up potentially damning evidence of Sara, he just asks if he read the emails wrong. 2. When Sara is panicking over being chosen for the final round, Keiji loudly shouts “GET A GRIP SARA!” With a serious expression. Before quickly backtracking and going back to a devil may care expression. This shows he is both already emotionally attached to Sara, but unwilling to stake himself towards giving himself to a new cause.

Anyways, he stops her from pressing the button blah blah blah, onto chapter 2! I’ve made a post about this before but it seems as early as here, Keiji is trying to talk Sara down from pushing herself further. But at this point, Sara has already dedicated herself to the role because her best friend died due to her priority to protect everyone. Keiji sees the problem and he tries to get her to rest up, but he still doesn’t spend the time to have a serious talk about it because as he says in the classroom. He isn’t fit to protect her. He doesn’t think of himself as a good person who can help her. He thinks of himself as a murderer and he doesn’t allow himself to recover from the trauma.

Sara however is starting to rely more on Keiji. He’s been willing to comfort her in her times of grief and furthermore, she has something to relate to him on. They both have deaths of important people in their lives they feel responsibility for.

There’s also the fact that Keiji sees a lot of his old self in Sara. An idealistic person, being beaten down, and worrying over the idea they might be becoming a bad person. He feels the same as her.

Not to mention… Keiji follows through on his promises. He actually tells Sara about the person he respected like he said he would which establishes a further sense of trust.

However, something that tears that sense of trust apart is the tokens scene. When Keiji doesn’t even let Sara hold 50 tokens, it raises suspicion. Sara already knows he shot a person- what more could he have to hide? That scares her away. The negotiation event is an attempt for Keiji to win back her trust. But it slowly turns into Keiji’s self-loathing session. And his declaration maybe Sara shouldn’t trust him.

However, time passes enough (and Keiji supports Sara enough in the final attraction) for them to get together and investigate in 2-2. And there’s a lot of moments I can talk about there so I’ll be just doing a few rapidfire things. So first, Sara is in peak weird girl mode and Keiji can hardly control her chaos. Second, Keiji makes a full on decision at one point to go against Sara when she’s putting herself in danger of getting caught for their search so they can hide. Third, his response to “I don’t intend to die” when he asks “will you die with me” is that’s a good answer.

And fourth… a moment I really wanna touch on… Keiji watches something that could easily incriminate Sara. It’s not just some word of mouth thing like with Shin who lied about things several times before this point. But in that moment, he still relies on Sara and says he wouldn’t feel bad betting his life on her. The message is clear. Keiji supports Sara unconditionally.

Now let’s talk about Keiji totally dropping Sara’s ass with the card trades.

The way Keiji makes his trades is very telling. He first, steals a keymaster card from either Sou or Kanna to give to Sara. This is supporting Sara, but it’s doing it in a way that supports his view of himself. That he’s a scumbag who would steal someone’s immunity just to give it to someone he likes more. And would a shithead like that be “worthy” of sacrificing themselves and taking the card for Sara? (And he knew she had it. Qtaro had to tell him for their plan to happen) no. Instead he essentially opts for a revenge plot. A plan to ensnare Shin and kill him for pawning off the sacrifice to Sara. Basically, he wanted to fuck up Shin like how he fucked up Megumi. Nice going Keiji. This is… kind of his low point in the story.

But 3-1….. man this chapter hits in all the right ways. I don’t remember 3A that much, (although I do know that Keiji shows a lot of concern over Sara potentially being triggered by Joe memorabilia) and also if you fail the Keiji Midori fight you can have Sara attempt to tag Keiji and he rejects. And how can we forget… the mr policeman flashback. As Sara says, this is Keiji’s first time opening up on his own.

And then… coffin saga. Sara through everything is not willing to let Keiji die. Although she’s had her ups and downs with him, leaving him to die is inconceivable to her with everything they’ve been through together. So she opts to sign the contract both times she is offered it.

Keiji clearly is somebody important to Sara. Important enough that Ranmaru bringing him up is enough to snap her out of her murderous trance. Enough that she throws logic out the window when she has a sign he’s okay.

Likewise, the scene in the classroom for Keiji is… a huge step. When he’s alone with Ranmaru, who is unstable, in that classroom, his priority is Sara. He turns his back to the threat to hold Sara and try and make sure she’s okay- dumb move, but it shows how far he’s come.

And again, I want to reiterate- Keiji is Sara’s anchor. At the banquet when Sara is about to give up, she imagines Keiji talking to her which brings her back in the game. Much like Joe did back in chapter 2. The message is palpable. Keiji is Sara’s new Joe. And when Keiji comes back to comfort her? He’s now fully willing to sacrifice himself. It winds up not being needed seeing as Qtaro is the one that died. But in that moment, we see Keiji has made a huge leap from chapter 2. He almost sacrificed himself for Gin. And he would’ve used his final moments to comfort Sara. He’s embraced that he’s a father figure. He allows himself to be a good person.

Anyways I don’t know how to conclude this and I’ve been writing for hours. Bababooey.

[rhaenyraisadyke]

Healthy Competition Transcript: 7/25/21

It's the entire thing so I hope this helps!

W: Hey.. Phil

P: Oh.. Hey

W: Hey, hey Phil how’s it going? How's It going man?

P: Oh, it's going, it's going alright.

W:I just thought I'd visit, Phil. I just thought you knew I would come and visit you. I haven’t seen you in awhile.

W: Phil I must confess I have come to you with a bit of a proposition. You into propositions Phil? Are you a proposition kind of guy?

P: Oh it depends depends, oh you, you’ve had some pretty lets just say not a great track record of propositions you’ve had in the past

W: I mean I’m trying to move past that. Listen Phil, I met Quackity after you kindly lent me your house, I went and met him, I met up with him, and I hadn't seen him in ages and it was nice, it felt good. He didn't seem afraid of me. Which is cool, not many people do. Phil, you don’t seem afraid of me?

P: No. No not at all

W: Good. Good because I’m not afraid of you. Uh.. Listen I met quackity and I hung out with him and I came to one conclusion about him and MY GOD the pricks resourceful aint he.

P: Yes.. he’s very.. he's one of the richest on the server at the minute. He's one of the richest people

W: What happened? What? You, you are telling me Quackity, the guy who made SWAG party, would be the richest man, geez I wouldn’t have believed you for a second but here we are.

But look, Phil, I am a bit of a propagator of the idea that capitalism shouldn’t be unchecked. You know the free market, maybe isn’t ever really that free you know. I am a bit into my interjection, you know the government interjection but there’s isn't a government anymore phi its anarchy it's pretty much what ah I see his name I see his name. (Ran boo)

P: Ha, Ha you see it

W: As much as I disagree with your opinions on anarchy. It's pretty harmless. I can’t hate you for it. I can’t hate you for literally living in a peaceful little village in the snow, I mean the server, it's never been this peaceful since the countries and nations and cities… So Phil I came to you with one question. Do you think quackity should be allowed to be left unchecked?

P: Uh no.

W: Do you think he should be allowed to grow? Oh you answered already. I agree with you Phil, I also don’t think quackity should be allowed to be left unchecked.

But you know what the problem is, there’s no Interpol, there’s no government, there’s no police force.. Technoblade spent this entire time taking down the establishment and what he's left with as predicted a POWER VACUUM for a new establishment to come in and this establishment is ahh ahh pretty unethical Phil its gambling, you a fan of gambling

P: Oh gods

W: This servers like 50% children Phil..

P: oh gods that's terrible.. yeah no that's awful.

W: ahh haha don’t sound too..

P: Gambling ruins peoples lives dude.

W: TRUE TRUE! And you know what He's getting away with , Phil. I have a proposition for you, I am glad you’re on my side and glad you agree with this Phil. I want to make a burger van.

P: Oh….

W I know when you heard of the burger van, you walked away. I get it. It's a bit of deja vu, but the difference is the burger van isnt gonna sell drugs. We are against toxic money making schemes now. We GENUINELY, genuinely selling burgers, I want to make burgers, I want to make every stake so it has a name. And. And uh (Wilbur re reads the book “Project Nevadas” Quackity left for him)

P: It definitely sounds better than the drug van,

W: yeah yeah yeah that's what I’m going to do Phil, but you see you need to understand I need someone to help me, because I’m not doing this for any reason outside of “I have an aspiration.. a goal in life to be a culinary expert” I want to be chef now Phil. I’m done now with being a President, being a government, being an authority, I want to be a burger man. I wanna sell burgers. That's my calling. That's been my calling all along. There's no ulterior motive behind this plan. I’ve got the real-estate, I’ve got the know-how and I’ve got the chutzpah (it's a yiddish word for guts basically woooo). Phil are you in?

P:I mean, ahh. You know I don’t know much about making burgers and burger vans, but I want to know who does?

W: Who?

P: Ranboo. He could help out.

W: what the fuck does he know about burgers?

P: he's literally the richest most knowledgeable person on the server besides me -

W: Phil you called - that's literally the second person you called the richest on the server. How does being rich climate him know about burgers?

P: Well you said you needed bread, you said you needed resources.. he has everything you could need.

W: What do you mean?

P: And also, he kinda knows… Right i'll be honest i'll be honest will, he's a little bit lonely, um there’s not much going on out here we are in a wilderness, a snowy blizzard wilderness right? Nothing goes on, nothing really happens here.

W: ha haha, sorry sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh at him being lonely. That shouldn’t of tickled me.

P: He needs something to keep him busy, to keep him occupied. He's done everything on the server, he's literally done everything. Give him, give him something else to do. Have fun.

W: I don’t want to. I genuinely don't want to. He's weird Phil. he's the weird neighbor kid.

P: oh STOP no stop!

W: Look at him he's that weird neighbor kid who's got something going on, you know maybe in the basement or something there’s something going on right.

P: he's harmless he's harmless

W: he's harmless now, give him a burger van and he might spatula me. Phil looks at me. Can you imagine a spatula through my skull? Huh?

P: That's not gonna happen. He’s very nice. Go make friends. Alright

W: All I need is a fire aspect sword, a bunch of cows, an anvil and some levels and we can do this Phil.

P: And he (ranboo) can give you all of those.

W: Oh my gosh stop making me play with the neighbor kids.

P: Alright stop I’m putting my foot down. If you don’t go play with them right now, I’m kicking you out of the house.

W: What the fuck?! What do you mean? Kicking? You can’t just kick- ohhhhh

P: I can and will.

W: Phil I’m ah…

P: Be nice. Go say hi, he's great. He's a great guy

W: Look Phil I trust you, I'll trust you this much, and I'll trust you that he's fine and he can help me, BUT if he's shit, you gotta come help. You gotta be burger boy with me.

P: I’ll be around, I'll be around, he's fine, you'll be fine, you guys will get along so well.

W: Thanks Phil…

P: You got this Wil, bye mate.

W: I don’t really want… What is this, why is he treating me like a kid? Like a little baby? Oh shit he's got cows…. Ah aH oh god I wasn’t built for this (gets attacked by a spider which he then crits the spider) There we go.. My man got cows. This bread as well?? No,it's not that he can farm apparently. Wait, that is bread. Wait… was that fire aspect? Is this a set up? I guess I'll befriend him… Knock knock - oh

R: woah oh

W: Hi Ranboo

R: Woah hello

W: You remember me?

R: Yeah I remember you. How are you? Its been awhile

W: It's been a little while, I mean we only met once, I mean I was just coming through visiting me pa, in his little cottage in the snow, very cute in the snow isn't it?

R: Yeah it is very nice

W: I just happened to notice you have a lot of cows.

R: Yeah! yeah I have a nice little cow farm, it's been pretty good for food recently so its been kind of yeah.

W: Can you hit one of them with your sword again please?

R: You want me to kill one?

W: Yeah quickly

R: yeah okay

W: Ranboo, I have a proposition for you

R: Yeah what’s that?

W: I know we have not got off on the best of terms but I'd like to think bygones be bygones let's bury the hatchet, let's be..

R: Yeah

W: Ranboo I’m gonna go out on a limb here, do you want to be friends?

R: S- Sure. I don’t see why not. You seem alright.

W: Cool cool. Thank you, thank you, you seem alright too. Can I come inside?

R: Oh yeah sure sure

W: I have a proposition for you.

R: Do you like my live laugh love sign?

W: Why is life capitalized?

R: it's the most important one

W: Ha, living is the most important one, living Is above laughing and loving?

R: Yeah it's priority number one honestly I just look at it when I wanna know what to do.

W: ha, okay, look look my proposition to you, um (looking at the ranboo rug)

R: Yeah its um it's my nice little rug here

W: We, we will talk in the hallway, my promotion to you ranboo was, as I have a dream of being a culinary chef.

R: Oh really! Thats nice

W: I’ve been doing a lot of things on this server. You know? President, terrorist, dead.

R: yeah that's one of them

W: I feel like the next progression is chef. Every, you know the saying….

R: okay…

W: All musicians wanna be comedians, and all dead terrorist presidents wanna be chefs. So I decided I wanna be a chef.

R: Okay! Okay.

W: I want to be a chef for no other reason than I like cooking okay?

R: Cool!

W: All I need though, is I don’t have much to my name. I have a lot of stones, I have some TnT, I have some stone tools, and a rabbit's foot.

R: Oh okay.

W: But I don’t have the cows, I don’t have the fire aspect sword, and I thought if you wanted to we could um you could we could be business partners. I’ve got the real-estate. I’ve got a great location. It’s gonna be bustling, with people eventually, there’s gonna be people coming and going, hungry too! They’re gonna be coming and going, in and out and in and out and we’ll be here

R: Yeah…

W: And get the money! We will get the money Ranboo.

R: I mean yeah sure I’ve been needing something to do, I’m down for that. That would be cool.

W: Cool, cool come with me. I gotta show you the real-estate.

R: I’m actually really glad

W: I see this as the blooming of a brilliant business relationship or a business partnership. Have you heard of Las Nevadas?

R: ohhh… yeah, yeah I remember I had an old, old cookie stand there awhile back that we just decided to abandon because it was just.. it was more just trouble.

W: A cookie stand?

R: It was more trouble than it was honestly worth.

W: Wait, you tried? You had a cookie stand?

R: I mean yeah….

W: Outside of Las Nevadas? So you did the cooking?

R: Yeah it was a little, yeah

W: Outside of Las Nevadas?

R: Yeah but then, but then, he the guy Quackity, he got all up in arms about it and everything because we decided to expand a little bit and then we just decided it was, it was too much troubles so then we kinda just, we kinda just left it so

W: So he didn't like it? He didn't like your selling of a cookie stand?

R: Yeah he didn't like it all too much. I don’t, I don’t know what it was but like it was just eh it was just more dumb conflict but eh ti was whwatever.

W: Well that's fine, that's fine because we’re Ranboo we’re not gonna annoy quackity… we can’t annoy him because we are simply put, gonna be making, I got the real-estate and he gave me the area and we are going to be making a competing business.

R: okay…

W: Because competition makes business flourish, the consumer.. Do you like the consumer? You’re a bit- a big fan of the consumer ranboo?

R: Yeah yeah, I consume things from time to time

W: Look Ranboo the consumer, the consumer is the one who does well when there is um conflict and competition right?

R: Yeah that makes sense

W: So what I want to do is make competition right? So I want to make competition so when Las Nevadas fully opens up and you can go gambling and stuff I want to make it so that people have options so people don't just have to eat at las Nevadas grills and such. So if they want they can come to our grill,

R: Yeah that's good

W: and the difference is that is that we will make our grill better than theirs and we will make lots of money and then quackity will be able to you know maybe have to make a deal with us and to maybe be our friend and and

R: But we are gonna do this respectfully right? We are gonna do something smaller and everything right?

W: Yeah I have the land and we can make it small and honestly there’s no reason for us to go further out then we need to because you know we got the location. So have you ever been in Las Nevadas or gambling Ranboo?

R: Well no, no one has actually been there when I’ve been there.

W: It’s very fun, gambling is very fun.

R: Ah

W: Gambling is what I would argue like the only reason to go to this Las Nevadas place, I mean there’s nothing else to do there

R: Okay…

W: Its like its ll that happens you know

R: Yeah just gambling

W: There's a strip club there Ranboo

R: OH yeah! For logs

W: You- you into strippers?

R: Um I mean all it just does is make the wood look different so it doesn’t really do much

W: It does make the wood look different. You’re right, you’re right Ranboo. Would you say you like Quackity? Sorry I’m really bombing you with questions right now - eh I just wanna, I want to pick your brain. I wanna know how Ranboo works.

R: Hmm no its okay its okay. I’m completely okay with it, yeah. Um I think that I, hes, I mean the thing is I just haven't seen him in so like long you know the last interaction with him I had was before the stuff that happened with everything else it's just kind of been I don't know, we were part of the same cabinet with New Lmanburg or whatever it was.

W: Cabniet…

R: Yeah Canbiet it was like…

W: A canbiet? Was this with Tubbo…?

R: Yeah yeah he had like me, Fundy, I was the minutes man and I wrote stuff down well they never checked my notes so I don’t know how useful my job was honestly. I don't know if they actually needed me but I was there.

W: Yeah yeah I know that. I know that feeling.

R: Yeah

W: So you were part of the old Lmaburg government? I didn’t know that actually.

R: Yeah, yeah

W: I thought you were a bit of an independent. I thought you were you know… so you would say you are friends with Quackity?

R: I mean yeah.. I mean I’m not really TOO much against him, but I mean yeah

W: Do you dislike anyone Ranboo?

R: Not.. too much I dont think. I mean there are other people I don't agree with of course but I think everyones just a product of what they have gone through and everything so if you understand that then you understand that, then you understand the person.

W: But don’t you think there’s sometimes allying yourself with everyone you know, it can actually make your life more complicated, more complex, more difficult…. more…

R: Yeah….. which is why I’ve kinda just went to live with Techno and Phil kind of away from everything. And try not to involve myself in that much. But then I just have a terrible radar of what is involving myself and what isn't so.

W: Right..

R: It's difficult sometimes.

W: It sounds like you set yourself up for a bit of a stressful, stressful life… So you don’t dislike anyone?

R: Yeah…

W: What about Dream?

R: Ummm yeah Well that's that. With Dream it's kind of like, all I’ve, all I’ve heard about Dream, all I’ve seen about Dream is just been the really bad things that he's done and everything so I would say I- I yeah I don’t really like Dream, but I mean he's also not really someone that it matters whether or not I like him because he's away in that prison for a very long time, so I mean, yeah.

W: With no trail.

R: Well I mean.. he… its

W: This is our competition Ranboo!

R: Oh!

W: Here's the competition

R: Okay. No ones really been here I dont think…

W: Can you even buy anything?

R: I don’t think they have half, half doors… they have

W: Smokers, Furnaces, they don't, it's just nothing

R: Huh.

W: It doesn't benefit the consumer Ranboo does it? Imagine you come here gambling.. First off the fucking door is shut

R: Mhm

W: Wait there’s a hole…

R: ohh… uh? that's interesting. I haven't been here in awhile, I just haven't been outside in awhile honestly.

W: Are we allowed… in?

R: I dont… I dont know.

W: It looks like crap Ranboo. Don't bother, it looks awful.

R: Oh, oh okay. Okay.

W: The point is this does not benefit the consumer right? This building does not benefit the consumer, it's just made to look pretty and make the consumer feel like.. lee do a test. I can promise you me ol, or should I say new pal, that this sign, I guarantee will not go. That will be here forever and that will never leave. (Signs that say “closed forever” “Quackity burger place is crap” “Go behind this building to better burgers'')

R: It's.. I don't know if abandoned is the right word, I don't know what you call it.

W: There we go, I guarantee these signs will stay there because they don’t care about the customer. They only care about looking cool and ooh ooh we got a restaurant, no they dont.

R: Yeah no one is really keeping it up.

W: Let me show you the real-estate. This is the best part, so come with me. Bah bum ba bum bum bum bum ba Oh ranboo, do you see the cock ranboo?

R: Oh that's what that is? I thought it was a clock actually

W: See that cock?

R: Yeah I see it.

W: That's our border. Well, technically, this wood is our border. This area.

R: Okay.

W: This area is ours. I’ve been trying to think of a name for it.

R: Hmm

W: I’m thinking about Paradise.

R: Paradice…

W: How’d you think about Paradise Ranboo?

R: Well I mean it could be good word play with the whole gambling thing.. pair of dice.

W: That is good.. you, you really are a smart cookie, a smart kind of guy.

R: Thank you!

W: Well, this is where I’ve been sort of working. So this is sort of where Tommy and I have been working. Tommy sadly couldn’t be here to help me, and um let me show you where I think we should make the burger van.

R: okay

W: Well I think it should be, it's to be close to the border so that people can access it and then get straight back to gambling. The customer, the customer, is happy, the customer gets their burgers and then goes straight back to gambling. How about we build it here, right here.

R: Right here? Okay that works. So what do you have in mind, you seem to have a vision.

W: 1950s… burger, retro. Red and white stripes.

R: Red and White okay, I have Blue?

W:Blue…

R: I have blue.

W: I’m not a big fan of Blue.

R: oh okay well I don’t really know where to get a lot of red.

W: Flowers… I can get you red. Ranboo you seem to be proficient, you can start building the van I’ll be back.

R: Alright..

W: Also, also give me your fire aspect, I’ll get the beef and then we can begin and we can get the bread.

R: okay uh here

W: Ran-orad, Ranaord? Ranord.

R: I name all my things with different puns. It's just Ran and sword

W: That's good, that's a good one, new friend, I like it. This isn't drawing any parallels to your cookie shop right? This is a completely different feeling?

R: yeah no the cookie shop I’m pretty sure, I don't even know if it was a cookie shop to begin with… because it was a little fortified if i'm entirely honest…

W: Fortified?

R: yeah did you not see like oh! That giant stone structure as you came in here and walked around

W: oH wait, that's a cookie shop?

R: Yeah

W: I thought it was like a, I thought it was like a palisade

R: no I mean tubbo told me it was for cookies but I’m thinking about it now..

W: oh tubbo.. tubbo.

R: I don’t think it was

W: See I like tubbo man, he's strong headed and he doesn't let people push him around.

R: Yeah yeah

W: Did you learn a lot? Did you learn a lot from him?

R: Maybe yeah, I also just, if people aren't willing to change their views or anything I find it unnecessary to mindlessly argue so.

W: So Ranboo you say this yet you show up in all the conflict. I’m not I’m not coming at you like judging you, I'm not one to talk about conflict.

R: Mhm mhm

W: But when I think of Ranboo I don't think of what a calm guy who’s neutral and stays out of everything, I don't think of Switzerland when I think of you ranboo, I think I think you're a bit more dynamic than that, why do you claim that you’re so peaceful and neutral and yet you appear in almost every conflict the server has had since I died.

R: I mean ah, that's because I’m bad at avoiding the thing that I don't like, which is, I don’t know it's it's weird. It's a weird situation that it's mostly my fault but I’ve been doing alright with it recently. I haven't been doing too much to anger people I don't think but I think it's just because I really want to help sometimes and sometimes I let my desire to help people get in the way of what I have previously said or previously claimed about myself.

W: Ranboo? Why did you come to help me?

R: Well because I think, well I need one I kind of need something to do and this is pretty fun, I like building little things and everything although they may not look too good and also I just think you can I think you are an alright person you know? So I kind of wanted to get off on a better foot from what happened before.

W: Why?

R: Just because I don't really like having the thought that people don't really like me.

W: No no not the bit about the right foot, why don’t you think I’m a bad person?

R: Well I mean I think you did bad things but you also went through things that made you that way and then I also think that you’re changed now. I mean if you ask me to talk to the older Wilbur before you died, for a little bit then yeah I would think you’re kind of not a good person.

But I think now you’ve apparently been away long enough, that I think if anyone goes away long enough for that long of a time that eventually they’ll have a thought of their morality, and everything and become a better person because of it. So, I'm hopeful. I’m hopeful. I like having a good amount of optimism.

W: Cool.. ah cool that's nice, thank you.

R: Yeah!

W: Uh, I think I needed to hear that, I’ve um, can I be real with you? Sorry Ranboo, you really got me. Fucking hell can I be real with you man?

R: Yeah sure.

W: I think I scare people.

R: I mean, yeah I do the same thing

W: No no, I mean I don't think I, I think a lot of people share your idea in trying to try… to keep me from hurting you know? They have seen what I can do and they don’t want me to do it again, so they adopt your emotion in order to do it.

Do you know I demolished his house and brutally ignored him? He fought for my country! And I ignored him. I didn't look at him. I didn't give him so much a medal, I didn't give him so much a rank, I gave him the lowest rank in the cabinet, and do you know what it took? Do you know what it took for him to forgive me? A “sorry” And I’ve, I’ve spoken to Tommy about Jack Manifold, and Jack Manifold is NOT the sort of person to forgive with a sorry.

Can you imagine if Dream said sorry to Jack Manifold? What has Dream done to Jack Manifold huh? Barely anything. I imagine if Dream said sorry to Jack Manifold, Jack Manifold would ignore him. Do you wanna know why? It’s because Dream is in prison, and I’m not. Dream! He's had his comeuppance and I’ve not! My comeuppance was apparently not good enough for these people, they are just waiting for the next thing, the next slip up and Ranboo I’m not gonna fucking slip up Ranboo. I’m different.

I’m not Dream, god I wish I was. Sometimes I wish I was. I wish I had that comeuppance. But Ranboo I’m not Dream and I’m not gonna be Dream and that's ahhh. I am living in eternal limbo again. I’ve been through limbo. I'm out of limbo and socially I’m still in limbo and man hearing you say those words that you said to me, do you remember what you said?

R: Yeah… I do?

W: You said “I think people can change” that's number one

R: Mhm

W: And number two you’re “scared if people don’t like you”

R: Yeah

W: I’ve been investing, I’ve been investing into the wrong areas Ranboo. I’ve been investing in the wrong people. Were kindred man, we get each other

R: Yeah, Yeah I’d say so.

W: We have SO much difference, but you know what the one thing we got incommon? Our strongest point? And you mustn't take offense to this, okay?

R:Okay..?

W: Neuroticism. Me and you are just as neurotic as each other. Just as nervous but the thing is it’s not our downfall you know? Anxiety isn't necessarily an evil trait to have. Anxiety is what kept our ancestors alive Ranboo.

R: Yeah

W: You? Me? Your Parents, whoever they may be, my parents, do you know how they’re alive? Because they were anxious. They didn't let another thing kill them, they didn't let another thing take them down. Our ancestors, the cavemen in the woods or the cave enderman, were anxious when they heard the lion roar; they were anxious when the wolf howled. And you know what they did? They went inside and they hid and that's what they did and that's why we are here today. Ranboo me and you are neurotic, and that's why we are alive..right now talking to each other and doing this.

R: Okay…… I really, I really do hope that's um a good thing.

W: Sorry, ha, that's uh that might have come across- I’m really sorry I meant um, I’ll go get you some more red.

R: No no I understand what you mean I think, we both are kind of thinkers I think well yeah, we tend to think about a lot of things. Think about a lot of situations and how people are affected by said situations. How we can make things better and although we may think in different ways the fact we both, I think we both think at the same level just in different ways sometimes.

W: I think you might be a bit braver than me and showing your true colors. I feel like, I feel like with you Ranboo I never have to guess your next move. I never have to guess your hand, you know?

R: Yeah

W: I feel like, I feel like life dealt us the same cards and the difference is you, you build your trust by showing people your cards whilst, I keep them close to my chest and I feel like that may be the difference. But I’m gonna stop psychoanalysing you so

R: heh

W: And let's… let's, Ranboo how’d you feel about thievery?

R: Oh uh ooh, what types? What do you-

W: I’m going to steal Las Nevadas cows to cook our burgers.

R: Oh oh okay?

W: And I’m not going to re-breed them. I am going to simply kill them.

R: Alright I mean, so you are? Are you gonna steal all of them? Or just

W: Nahh just enough so it's annoying ya know?

R: Okay um

W: Unless, how about this if this makes you feel a bit less uncomfortable about it how about if I steal all the cows unless they have a sign on them that says “these cows are property of las Nevadas” then I’ll leave them alone so unless they have an expressed sign that says “do not steal please” I’ll leave them alone. But if not… it seems like a good idea

R: Okay yeah

W: You���re really good a building vans

R: Oh thank you

W: I’m pretty good at building vans too.

R: Okay.

W: Okay I’ve got the steak.

R: Oh, nice

W: Pretty good, is that enough red for you?

R: I just need something to put the red on

W: Oh cool yeah, I can go find you some wool.

R: There could be some chests around. You know I found a full netherite block in one the other day?

W: Wait what?

R: There was just another netherite block in one of the chests, it was very interesting.

W: I’ve just restocked for us.

R: Ohh, nice I’ll put some of our building materials here. Oh wow, wait did you get, did you get all of them?

W: Yeah heh, pretty good yeah?

R: Oh geez.

….. [Talk about Minecraft mechanics]

W: So this is your cookie factory, your cookie shop, your giant fortress

R: Yeah you realize a lot now that it’s a giant fortress. Sometimes, sometimes I don’t realize things until they’re an afterthought.

W: How is Tubbo?

R: He's um, alright. I think he's doing pretty well.

W: What is he up to right now?

R: He's um he's just building around Snowchester you know? Not really doing-

W: Snowchester?

R: Oh you- don't know about snowchester? It’s basically just like this little- it used to have some people but then everyone just kind of went off on their own ways. It’s just like this little arctic area, a village he created.

W: A town?

R: Yeah basically!

W: So, Las Nevadas, Snowchester, - I thought Techno and Phil told me they were successful? Well just Phil I haven't spoken to Techno since, since, it happened.

R: Mhm Well it

W: Phil told me they were successful and there's no more nations and that there’s anarchy here.

R: Well it's not a nation it's literally just- it's literally just him.

W: What about this Kinoko Kingdom I keep reading about?

R: I have no idea. All they put down there was just signs and I havent heard anything about that honestly.

W: So there’s, there’s a lot going on Ranboo. What part do you play? Go on, You can't be THAT neutral, if you’re not a part of Kinoko Kingdom, then you must be a part of something.

R: I mean I guess you could say I’m a part of.. Snowchester a little bit? I think I’m mainly just um with Phil and Techno I’m pretty sure. It’s mainly, it's mainly just them and everything. Because that's pretty much where I’ve been living for awhile and all so.

W: And now the Paradise Burger Van.

R: And now the Burger Van I guess yeah.

W: Good, good! I’m coming back. Do you need more red or?

R: No, we got enough.

W: Then the final step is to name the burger and name the beef!

R: Name, name the beef?

W: Oh so another thing I wanted to do is to legitimize our burgers so it's not just stake right is to make a uh name for all our stakes so when they've had it you know our stake shop that they know this is our stake shop, and only the high grade beef. So we are all gonna name the burgers with an anvil and I wanted, I wanted to give them like versions and wanted to use an alt code so that no one could copy it. So it's like “hey you’ve got a volume one steak, burger steak” so people would come and it's sort of an NFT value to it. A bit of a you know, once you’ve had volume one of burgers then that's gone forever like versions, is this making sense? Are you following?

R: Yeah this is making sense, I’m following I think

W: Cool cool

R: Yeah

W: What do you think of calling the burger shop?

R: Hmm

W: I’m thinking of either Paradise or Wilburger?

R: Well Wilburger is funny

W: Wilburger is funny but it doesn't take into account the work you put in.

R: Hmm maybe paradise burgers might be good

W: What about Wilbooger?

R: Will- Wait a minute but then that means we have booger in it, and then they will make fun of it.

W: Yeah yeah, paradise burger has a meaning behind it. So like, you know paradise next to Las Nevadas. Have a think

R: Paradise…

W: Weeeeeeeeeeee, ding dong we got everything we need. Right, let me go to an anvil and think of a name. This has been good, this has been chill.

R: This has been nice

W: I feel like we are good business partners. I’m excited to show Tommy. What's your opinion on Tommy?

R: Oh he's great. Tommys awesome.

W: Agreed

R: Yeah. Definitely gone through a lot but I definitely think that has made him a good person.

W: Mmm yeah well you seem to think everyone going through something at least gives them some merit you said

R: Well I mean yeah. I mean if- if no one, the only really bad people are the ones who are just evil because, just because then they don't really have any reason why you know? Those are in my opinion the bad people.

W: Right

R: I don’t really think there’s that many bad people like that so yeah.

W: Let me find an alt code, I want to find a cool alt code for the Wilburger, let's go for a sunbeam

R: ooooh

W: This is sexy, what I've done. Here we go here we go The beef! The bread doesn't have to be named

R: yeah

W: It’s gonna be good. Here we go, here we go. Look at this!

R: Oooohhh thats cool

W: No ones copying that

R: Yeah especially the thing in the eye as well.

W: It's a watermark no one, no one can copy it now so we can sell those with one slice of bread on either side and that's our thing. That's our shtick.

R: Yeah I think thats good thats good

W: I think we are getting to the point Ranboo where we are almost done I mean I do have a question to ask you though

R: Yeah of course ask away.

W: Just gonna put the bread back. This is gonna be a make or break

R: Okay.

W: Come with me

R: Yeah

W: This really could be, could be a make or break. And what about the Wilburger Ran Van?

R: Oh thats good thats good

W: Cool cool, then we’ll have your name on as the co creator I won’t be ceo, I will be vice chairman of the wilburger ran-van corporation

R: Cool, awesome.

W: So here’s our completion ranboo you remember the signs?

R: Yeah? They are still there.

W: Yeah it's good innit? Ranboo I want you to smash the windows.

R: Smash the windows? Like how? How do you want me to do it?

W: Take this (gave ranboo a cobblestone block) hold it in your hand

R: Okay

W: Now break the window.

R: okay

W: More

R: Do more? Okay

W: A lot more

R: keep going? Oh uh oh

[Wilbur places down TNT in a corner of the competition restaurant]

R: Are you sure about that one?

W: Come here

R: Oh? Okay

W: You trust me alright?

R: Yeah?

W: Detonate that, its only in the corner to prove we are not fucking around

R: I mean it's just in the corner right and then it will, it will drop all the blocks

W: Yep

R: And then we can put it somewhere

W: We can put it in a chest next to it.

R: Okay.. ohh Careful! [Wilbur stood really close to the TNT so he took damage]

W: It’s alright

R: That was a little bit more than I thought

W: Picking up those blocks

R: Yep, I think we can just put them in the chests here I think.

W: Okay I’ll fill this in, you passed the test, good job man. You can go back to the van, I’ll be back there soon. Ranboo

R: Yeah?

W: I’m proud of you man. You, you’ve taken a side, you’ve proven you can choose a side and I’m proud of you.

R: Thank- Thank, thank you. I haven't-

W: You’ve got something to work for.

R: Yeah, yeah

W: I’ll see you around. I’m gonna head off after I fix this but you get to work on the Ranvan. See you soon.

R: Yeah I’ll get to work, see you soon, buh bye

W: see you soon man.

[Wilbur breaks one of the signs placed down from earlier then goes to the explosion site and writes a sign with the NFT symbol saying Wilbur + Ranboo Did this together and places a chest to put the exploded materials in a chest along with two diamonds]

W: ahh, I love that guy.

[oikawaplssteponme]

Hi willow 😚 so after reading your angst earlier, even after it broke me, I want more Bakugous angst BUT it ends in fluff. So I was listening to home by Catie Turner and I thought about Bakugou being on a really long mission and maybe after a month or he ends up losing contact with the reader and she starts worrying and just anxiety. But he turns up and everything is ok🙃

Pls I really had tears in my eyes in the middle of class reading your angst🥲

hi mar!! hehe that actually makes me glad that my angst broke you (though i am sorry for the pain, it hurt me too) because it means i did my job 😚. angst to fluff? say less

•

Home

pairing: (Pro Hero) Katsuki Bakugou x reader

warnings: swearing, anxiety, emotional breakdown, mention of death but none present

genre: angst to fluff, established relationship, aged up characters

a/n: if you’d like to read the fic that mar is talking about, it will be linked here. also the song is linked in the tittle [ the fic isn’t directly based on the song however ] :)) enjoy xx

~

You grabbed the suit cases from the closet and laid them down on your bed. You began to grab clothing from Bakugou’s side of the closet and placing in the suit cases. It was a familiar feeling. The folding of fabric, the locking away of memories, and the saying of goodbyes. It was all too familiar.

“Did you happen to pack my toothbrush?” asked Katsuki from the bathroom.

“Yeah I have it here.”

Bakugou came out, half dressed in his Hero costume.

“Thanks. Here, mind packing these too?” Bakugou handed you some extra t-shirts of his. You nodded, folding them and setting them in the suit case.

“So, um, did they say how long you’d be away?” You ask quietly. Bakugou sighed, wrapping his arm around you.

“No, they didn’t. Hopefully no more than a month-”

You whipped your head around to look at him with widened eyes.

“A m-month? Katsuki that’s a really long time,” you protested. He huffed, taking his arm off of you.

“I know I know, okay? This isn’t easy for either of us but I don’t have a choice.”

You sat down on the bed, burying your face into the palms of your hands. You promised yourself that you wouldn’t cry but clearly that was easier thought than done.

“Katsuki...”

“Hey, shh, look at me,” Bakugou moved your hands down from your face. He wiped your stray tears.

“I promise it’s gonna go by so fast. I’ll call you as much as I can and even write if I have to. It’s gonna be fine.”

“W-What if something happens? What if you get hurt? Katsuki I don’t know what I would do if-” you couldn’t bring yourself to finish your own sentence.

Instead, you pulled Bakugou towards you. He held you tightly, rubbing your back as he whispered that everything would be okay. You continued to cry into his shoulder, gripping onto the fabric of his Hero costume. You didn’t know when the next time would be when he could hold you like this.

“Nothing is gonna happen. I’m gonna come home in one piece and you’re gonna be here, as perfect as when I left. Okay?”

Bakugou honestly didn’t believe himself, but he had to make it look like he did for your sake. He truely didn’t know if he would be okay. This mission was nothing like he’d ever been on before. Stakes were high, and he worried about you most of all.

“O-Okay.”

You zipped up the suit cases and rolled them to the door. Bakugou laced up his shoes, finally fully dressed and ready to go.

You went back into the bedroom, searching in the dresser for the picture. On every mission, no matter how small, Katsuki has a small photo of you tucked in the left side of the ‘x’ design of his costume. He kept the picture of you right were his heart was.

You snatch the small photo and ran back to Bakugou, who now had his suit cases in hand.

“You almost forgot,” you whispered. Bakugou smiled.

“Thank you baby.”

You carefully slid the photo right were Bakugou wanted it. You looked up at him, again trying not to cry. Bakugou let go of his suit cases, giving you one final hug.

“I’ll be back before you know it. I love you Y/N.”

“Please be safe. I love you too.”

~

In the first few days that Bakugou had been gone, he kept his promise. He called you every day from pay phones, burner phones, or just anything he could while still maintaining yours and his safety. Some days he would call for two minutes, others for two hours. All that mattered was that you heard his breathing on the other side of the line.

As those days turned to weeks, Bakugou’s calls soon declined. You were lucky if you got a one minute call every three days. You knew he was busy, that part was understandable. Still, on the days where he didn’t call, were the nights that you didn’t sleep.

You didn’t leave home unless you had to, for fear that Bakugou would come while you were away. You wanted to be there when he came home. Everyday you stared at the front door, hoping to hear the sound of his keys on the other side. That day never came.

Two months. It had been two months since Bakugou left. You hadn’t received a call from him in a week. You began to get worried, more than before.

You paced back and forth your living room. Your television was on. Always on the news channel. You waited to see if there would be a report on the mission, though unlikely. You peaked at your cellphone every few seconds, praying that it would ring. Praying that Bakugou would be on the other line.

The second you heard the cellphone vibrate, you leaped towards it. With shaky and nervous hands, you clicked ‘answer call’.

“H-Hello?”

“Hello? Y/N?”

Your heart dropped.

“Deku? Deku, is that you?”

“Yes it’s me, I’m sorry for calling you like this-”

“Deku where is Bakugou? Why didn’t he call me?”

The other line went silent.

“Deku answer me.”

“Look Y/N I’m really not supposed to be calling you but I felt you needed to know-”

“Know what? Deku where is Katsuki? I want to talk to Katsuki.”

“Y/N I’m so sorry-”

“Izuku Midoriya where the fuck is Katsuki!?” You shouted into the phone. You heard Deku take a nervous breath in.

“Kacchan is missing.”

You didn’t realize you had dropped the phone until you heard it crack on the floor. Your legs went numb as you fell to your knees. You screamed. You screamed as if someone had just stabbed you in the heart. It honestly felt like you were dying. You wailed into your hands as your forehead was pressed onto the floor.

“Y/N we’re-gonna-find-Kacchan-” Deku’s voice was scratchy on the other line as is signal worsened.

With tear filled vision you attempted to find the phone.

“Deku please please find him-” you cried.

“We-will-”

The line dropped, causing you to lose the call. You clenched onto the phone, before throwing it away from you. You stayed in the fetal position the entire night, drowning in your own tears.

~

Day seventy-two without Katsuki Bakugou.

You sat on your couch, clicking through the television channels. You felt drained, hopeless. You honestly had started getting used to Katsuki being gone, which was worse of all.

Suddenly, you stumbled upon a news channel.

‘BREAKING NEWS! PRO HEROES RETURN AFTER CLOSE TO A THREE MONTH MISSION! FANS GREET THEM AS THEY STEP OFF THE PLANES-’

The second you read the screen, you were grabbing your car keys and driving to the airport.

You ran every red light. You didn’t care. The pit in your stomach was enough to make you determined to get to the airport as soon as possible. You knew exactly where they would be. They used the same landing station after each mission.

You could see the crowd of people with posters and gifts of the Heroes. You watched as Heroes stepped off of the plane. You parked and turned off your car, rushing over as fast as you could.

You dug through the crowd, trying to get to the front. You saw Deku step off the plane but still no sign of Katsuki.

“Katsuki! Katsuki!” You continually shouted his name, hoping to hear a response. As you finally broke through the crowd, you searched and scanned everywhere for him.

“Katsuki...”

Your lips began to quiver again, your hands cupped your cheeks as the world around you spun. You started to think that they never found him.

“Y/N?”

You were too scared to turn around, for fear of disappointment. You shook your head, tears falling from your eyes.

“Oh god please...”

You slowly looked over your shoulder. Standing just a few hundred feet away from you was a beaten and bruised, Katsuki Bakugou.

Never in your life had you ran so fast. You clung onto Bakugou with all your might. You sobbed into his chest, this time tears of relief.

“I thought you died...”

“I promised I would be okay. Did you doubt me?”

Bakugou wiped away your tears, then his.

“I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“Same here. I’m sorry I scared you...”

You shook your head, letting out a small laugh.

“That doesn’t matter now. What matters is that your back home.”

“That’s right. Home.”

•

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