#like what a subversion of expectations. i think it works SO well and stands as a really good foil to most of the other sins we've seen

[nyxofdemons]

okay so the main criticism i've been seeing against episode 8 is that beelzebub (among other things) is "too nice" to be the sin of gluttony, because she's an attentive hostess, because she expresses worry over blitz's excess drinking, etc., and i wanna talk about it.

the thing is, i feel like this complaint is rooted in the most basic, somewhat cliche idea of the sin of gluttony, and a somewhat boring approach to bee's character in general. the idea is that, as the sin of gluttony, bee should be encouraging over-indulgence, excess, and the self-destructive aspects of party culture and drinking.

but she's the queen bee. she clearly explains that she can feel the "energy" of everyone at her party, and i think that's very important to analyzing exactly what gluttony means to her. instead of indulging in food and alcohol and drugs and being selfish (as gluttony is generally expected to be about), bee feeds on the ENERGY of the demons around her. and in order to get the best energy she can, she needs to be making sure everyone is actually having FUN and having a good time. gluttony, in this sense, is about EXTRAVAGANCE, having the best quality of everything, rather than just everything in general.

i also think this is why she was so put-off by blitz's actions. when he chugs the entire barrel of alcohol and then is absolutely wasted beyond all reason for the rest of the party, he's NOT actually engaging in her sin. he's not being gluttonous; he's not drinking to have a good time or to indulge or to have fun - he's drowning himself in alcohol because he's trying to forget and ignore all his problems, which is a sin much more akin to pride. his energy feels bad to bee because he's not having fun, he's deeply hurt and trying to distract himself by being self-destructive, which is NOT what her sin is about.

(also, remember, this is supposed to be part TWO of the finale. meaning, this episode (and the introduction of bee's character) directly goes hand-in-hand with the introduction of asmodeus, who's entire club IS about indulgence and depravity and everything you'd expect from the sin of lust. bee and the gluttony party are meant to be a direct foil to the energy of ozzie's.)

[jadeacereigen]

I think an underrated aspect of Separation Arc and why it works so well is that once Mob finally stands up for himself and stops going to work, we think we can expect the following to happen:

Reigen quickly flounders at work but stubbornly denies he's incapable without Mob's help

Reigen eventually runs into a client who truly needs the help of psychic powers (e.g. the client is haunted by an evil spirit who cannot be exorcised with salt)

Reigen realizes that he truly needs Mob to not be seen as a fraud and that he shouldn't have taken him for granted

Reigen seeks out Mob and apologizes, Mob accepts his apology and agrees to work for him again

Except... that's not what happens. Reigen does get upset and lonely without Mob, but his business runs fine—in fact, Reigen's own ambition and smart thinking actually allow him to find greater success as a psychic. The only reason Reigen's public downfall even happens is because he was maliciously tricked by Jodo, he'd figured out on his own that the kid wasn't possessed! This and the fact that Jodo is seeking petty revenge for Reigen "humiliating" him (when Reigen actually saved his life no less) really makes us feel like Reigen's public mockery is unfair and unjustified... even though we've always known from the beginning that Reigen is a fraud.

Isn't that a strange turn of events?

Then we get to the press conference. It's possible that even if Mob hadn't helped him at the end, Reigen could've still managed to salvage some of his public image. He was calmly answering people's questions and answering truthfully, pointing out that they had no evidence he was a fraud and that no one had ever had an issue with his work before the show. But all of that stops mattering to Reigen when he realizes that despite all his efforts from childhood, he's still just a lonely, lonely man who has never had any idea what he wants to do in life. The only reason he kept running his psychic business in the first place was because Mob showed up in his dull life and brightened it up with his vivid color.

It is finally here, after all this time we've been spending with Reigen, that we both figure out the truth: Reigen needs Mob not because of his powers, but because Mob is his friend and inspires him to be better. And this full understanding of Reigen's complex character and deep connection with Mob is what hits all of us so hard in this episode, it's so painfully human and real and we would not have gotten all of this had the story just played out as expected.

Thus culminates the genius subversions of Separation Arc: despite having the world's attention all focused on him, Reigen only makes one honest apology to one boy. This boy might not even watching this at all—if he is, he's probably watching this with spiteful bitterness—but it's still important that this boy knows...

You've grown up so much. You know that?

[love-takes-work]

I've seen a fair number of people interpret Rebecca Sugar's (and the Crew's) decision to put Ruby in a dress as subversive, and I want to discuss why that feels like a clear miss to me.

Every time--every single time--I've heard Rebecca Sugar talk about the queer relationships on this show, it comes with this expression of wholesomeness, and often glazed with a sheen of wistfulness, flavored something like "I needed this as a child and young person, and I didn't have it." Much of Rebecca Sugar's work to bring this wedding (and other unapologetic queer relationships) to the screen was framed as an emergency--as in, we HAVE to get this out there for those kids we used to be, because we know they're drowning.

Yes, it's funny sometimes when people make jokes about Sugar deliberately "adding more gay" or "making it gayer" as a big eff-you to the people who spoke against it, but that doesn't sit right from where I'm standing. It took so much strength (and resulted in so much battle damage) to fight that fight, yes. But from everything I can see from the interviews and conversations I've seen and read, this wasn't served up in a "ha-HA, take THAT!" kind of way. These characters having these kinds of relationships should have been a non-issue, and the fact that their very wholesome kids'-show wedding and very sweet kiss and very adorable love for each other was seen as Political when it should have been just two characters in love is so sad to me.

I've seen dozens of people suggest that Ruby is in a dress and Sapphire is in a suit "to fuck with the bigoted censors in other countries" or "to give the finger to gender roles," but again, I think it is simpler and sweeter than that. Rebecca's said that Ruby in a dress is how she feels in a dress. Celebration and exploration of feminine-coded stuff felt wrong to Rebecca for a long time, like it wasn't hers, because she wasn't really a woman and didn't want it forced on her. As a result she was robbed of all the beauty that should have been a non-issue, from what TV shows and toys she was supposed to enjoy as a kid to what kind of person she was supposed to marry and what she should wear as an adult.

Ruby never got a choice about how she looked really. Once she got to choose her presentation for a significant event, this is what she chose. It means so much more to see that than to construct it primarily as a reactionary measure, as if it would somehow foil the sinister censors in more homophobic countries (who, incidentally, are not therefore forced to show Ruby in a dress even though they tried to hide that Ruby was a "she" or that she was in a romantic relationship with another "she"; y'all, they just don't show the episode).

We see plenty of other examples of gender-role-related expectations being casually stepped on and squashed, like when they took the trouble to give traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine "clothes" to some watermelons to make the audience think there was a husband and wife watermelon only to have the wife be the warrior and the husband stay home with the child. With stuff like that, yeah, sure, maybe it's designed to make you think "oh isn't that very feminist of them!" Or maybe it's more "well why do I see this as a 'reversal' when it's just a thing that happened?" This show is full of ladyish beings who fight and have power. And as for Steven. . . .

Nobody has negative reactions onscreen (or even particularly confused reactions) when Steven wears traditionally feminine clothes, and it is (of course) also not presented as a "boy in a dress gag"--it's not supposed to be funny. When they go all in slathering Steven in literal princess tropes throughout the final act of Season 5, we understand that it's because the powerful Diamonds expect him to be Pink Diamond, not because the show is trying to girlify him or embarrass him or even make the audience think positive thoughts about boys in girls' clothes. It's more neutral than that in my interpretation: "these are literally just pieces of cloth, and while some of them have meaning, they don't inherently have a gender." I don't see this as transgressive. It's just in a world where putting on what you want to wear doesn't HAVE to be a political statement. (Though obviously it CAN be, and plenty of people wear a variety of clothes as a fuck-you to whoever they want to give the finger to. I just don't see that as happening here.)

Don't get me wrong; Rebecca Sugar certainly knew about the politics (intimately) and has lived at many of their intersections. She was not ignorant of how queer people are seen in this world. She was silenced as a bisexual person because her identity supposedly didn't matter if she was with a man and planned to be with that same man forever. She was shunted into "omg a woman did this!" categories over and over again, which she wore uneasily as a nonbinary person while accepting that part of who we are is how the world sees us. But what is it like if everything someone like her embraces is seen as a statement synonymous with "fuck you" to someone else?

She is married to a person who happens to be a man and happens to be Black. Her relationship isn't a "statement" about either of those aspects of his existence; her love is simply something that is. She is Jewish working in a society that's largely Christian. Her cultural perspective to NOT center her cartoon around Christian holidays and Christian morals; her choices to make an alternate world in this specific way is simply something that is. Her queer perspective as a nonbinary bisexual person has helped inform the Gems' radical philosophy of "what if we learned to explore and define ourselves instead of doing the 'jobs' we're assigned and being told it's our nature?" Her decision to include queer people in a broadly queer cartoon isn't designed PRIMARILY as a battle against baddies, or to drown out all the relentless straightness, or to deliciously get our queer little paws all over their kids' TV. It's an act of love.

So this is just to say that though I DO understand that sometimes subversion and intentional transgression are very necessary, I do not think that's the HEART of what's going on at this Gem wedding. We got a wholesome marriage scene between two of the most lovely little flawed-but-still-somehow-perfect characters, and I very much want to see their choices as being about them. About how Ruby feels in a dress. About how Sapphire feels about not having to always wear a dress. About them incorporating a symbol of their union into their separate lives so they can have some independence in their togetherness. About them celebrating their love by letting Steven wipe his schmaltz all over them.

There are many choices in the show that ARE carefully constructed to counter existing narratives, you know, giving the Crystal Gems' only boy all the healing, pink, flower imagery; having a single-sex species that's ladyish with all the members going by "she"; featuring many nurturing male characters who cry and cook and raise kids without mothers; pairing multiple fighty ladies with gentler guys; and importantly, intentionally loading up the show with stories, characters, and imagery any gender will find appealing despite being tasked with expectations to pander to the preteen boy demographic.

But it's very important to me that the inclusion of queer characters and the featuring of their choices be seen primarily as a loving act, and way way less of a "lol screw the bigots." I want our stories to be about us. Yes, I know it's a necessary evil that sometimes our stories are also about fighting Them. But every time I see someone say they put Ruby in the dress to "piss off the homophobes" or "stump the censors" I feel a little gross. Like the time I picked out an outfit I loved and my mom said I only dressed in such an obnoxious way to upset her, and I was baffled because my aesthetic choices, my opinions, my choices had nothing to do with her. Yet they were framed like I chose these clothes primarily to cause some kind of petty harm to her, when not only was it not true but I was not even that kind of person who would gloat over intentionally irritating someone.

The queerness of this show isn't a sneaky, underhanded act trying above all to upset a bigot or celebrate someone's homophobic fury. It lives for itself. Its existence is about itself. It's so we can see ourselves in a show, and it's so people who aren't queer or don't have those experiences can see that we exist, we participate, we want very similar things, and definitely are focusing way more about celebrating our love at our own weddings rather than relishing the thought of bigots tearing their hair out and hating us.

It's dangerous to turn every act of our love into a deliberate movement in a battle strategy when their weddings just get to be weddings.

I think there’s this idea that that [queer characters] is something that applies or should be only discussed with adults that is completely wrong. And I think when you realize that talking to kids about heteronormativity is just like air that you breathe all the time, it’s kind of amazing that that is not true in any other capacity. I think if you wait to tell kids, to tell queer youth that it matters how they feel or that they are even a person, then it’s going to be too late! You have to talk about it—you have to let it be what it gets to be for everyone. I mean, like, I think about, a lot of times I think about sort of fairy tales and Disney movies and the way that love is something that is ALWAYS discussed with children. And I think also there’s this idea that’s like, oh, we should represent, you know, queer characters that are adults, because there are adults that are queer, and you should know that’s something that is happening in the adult world, but that’s not how those films or those stories are told to children. You’re told that YOU should dream about love, about this fulfilling love that YOU’RE going to have. […] The Prince and Snow White are not like someone’s PARENTS. They’re something you want to be, that you are sort of dreaming of a future where you will find happiness. Why shouldn’t everyone have that? It’s really absurd to think that everyone shouldn’t get to have that! --Rebecca Sugar

[marie-m-art]

A recurring feature that I like in Neil Gaiman's and Terry Pratchett's stories is the mundane and ordinary juxtaposed and blended with the extraordinary and fantastical.

There's a lot of humour derived from this, but it got me wondering if the concept also works as a theme under the surface of the humour, so I'll explore that idea a bit here with examples from Good Omens and Discworld.

First a look at the humour side, because it's fun, and so that people know what I'm referring to:

-In the opening sequence of Good Omens S1E1: an angel and a demon (fantastical beings) are conversing like ordinary people, using idioms like "Well that went down like a lead balloon", against a setting of biblical proportions.

-The Archangels' meeting in S2E6 discussing first the Second Coming ("Nah!"), and then next on the agenda is the cleaning roster.

-The visuals of heaven and hell in general - it's the subversion of expectations on what these places "should" look and function like - offices, clipboards, contracts, bureaucracy. This is humour and seems like theme/motif at the same time; the visual cues say a lot about heaven and hell and their role in this story.

-Death from the Discworld books owns an umbrella stand and a hairbrush, likes kitty cats, and rides a white horse named Binky.

-In Small Gods, the Great God Om is incarnated as a tortoise:

And it came to pass that in that time the Great God Om spake unto Brutha, the Chosen One:

'Psst!'

Next, looking at the concept's thematic or metaphorical potential.

The following excerpt gets me thinking about how people put outsized importance on mundane things, and about normalcy bias kicking in when a narrow mind is confronted with extraordinary events.

From Good Omens book (about RP Tyler):

It is a high and lonely destiny to be Chairman of the Lower Tadfield Residents' Association.

[…]

Your car is on fire.

No. Tyler just couldn't bring himself to say it. I mean, the man had to know that, didn't he? He was sitting in the middle of it. Possibly it was some kind of practical joke.

Next, a scene that makes me think about retreating into the mundane to cope, after being confronted with an extraordinary event.

From Good Omens S2E6:

Nina: Oh, God, I should've been open half an hour ago.

Maggie: How can you think about that after all this??

Nina: People need coffee, I sell coffee, it's my coffee shop.

And next, thinking about how the minutiae of the everyday distracts us from paying enough attention to big world issues (a bit of normalcy bias again too). 

From Good Omens book (when the horsepersons of the apocalypse arrive at the airbase):

No one stopped the four as they purposefully made their way into one of the long, low buildings under the forest of radio masts. No one paid any attention to them. Perhaps they saw nothing at all. Perhaps they saw what their minds were instructed to see, because the human brain is not equipped to see War, Famine, Pollution, and Death when they don't want to be seen, and has got so good at it that it often manages not to see them even when they abound on every side.

Next, two excerpts from Discworld books. At first I was thinking along the lines of needing to focus on the everyday because we can't spend all our time focusing on big existential stuff, or, how we take the wonders of nature for granted because of busy lives; but then I realized, I think it's actually a clever inversion of what we consider to be ordinary - that just being alive, against all odds, in the vast universe, is actually quite extraordinary.

From Small Gods:

And one of [the brain's] functions is to make the miraculous seem ordinary and turn the unusual into the usual.

Because if this was not the case, then human beings, faced with the daily wondrousness of everything, would go around wearing big stupid grins […] And no one would do much work.

Gods don't like people not doing much work. People who aren't busy all the time might start to think.

Part of the brain exists to stop this happening. It is very efficient. It can make people experience boredom in the middle of marvels.

[more going on in the above than just the subject of the post, but I'm narrowing the focus here]

From Hogfather:

THERE IS A PLACE WHERE TWO GALAXIES HAVE BEEN COLLIDING FOR A MILLION YEARS, said Death, apropos of nothing. DON'T TRY TO TELL ME THAT'S RIGHT.

"Yes, but people don't think about that," said Susan. Somewhere there was a bed …

CORRECT. STARS EXPLODE, WORLDS COLLIDE, THERE'S HARDLY ANYWHERE IN THE UNIVERSE WHERE HUMANS CAN LIVE WITHOUT BEING FROZEN OR FRIED, AND YET YOU BELIEVE THAT A … A BED IS A NORMAL THING. IT IS THE MOST AMAZING TALENT.

And a quote from Terry Pratchett himself, inverting ordinary/extraordinary (the whole video is great, by the way):

Within the story of evolution is a story far more interesting than any in the Bible. It teaches us amazing things: that stars are not important - there is nothing interesting about stars. Street lamps are very important, because they're so rare. As far as we know there's only a few million of them in the universe. And they were built by monkeys! Who came up with philosophy, and gods.

He also mentioned here that his impression after reading the Old Testament was: "If this is all true, then we are in the hands of a madman!" Off topic again, but relevant to some of what went into Good Omens I think.

Not sure if I've proved anything here, and that wasn't the goal, but it was fun to find some quotes for my brain to play around with!

[entomolog-t]

is there any reason u think small knights are kind of a common theme used in the g/t community? i’ve seen it used a few times and am a bit mystified by the coincidence

- 80

OOH Thats a good question!

I think theres lots of factors at play there- The main one I can think of off the top of my head goes as follows.

Subverted expectation

Charismatic Archetype

Easily "accessible" g/t premise

Symbolism

First off, its a great role reversal/subversion of expectations. Knights are seen as protectors, a beacon of strength and what have you, so making the knight small is an easy way to make something enticing to an audience since it defies expectation. This can be for comedic reasons, or angst ( or both). I think the biggest factor is going against the grain creates new avenues/perspectives to explore/thus high intrigue.

The second point is that knight are a fairly fun and charismatic archetype- their role is already exciting, and you don't necessarily need a lot of background knowledge to use the archetype to make a compelling story. So while prevalent in g/t media quite often, I think they are also quite prevalent in media as a whole (especially fandom), and would fall in the same "Charismatic Archetype Bin" as other such characters like witches, vampires, mafia bosses, pirates etc. Though I do think knights stand out particularly in g/t, which leads me to my next point-

Its an easily accessible g/t genre. Adding a g/t element can at times be difficult- Giants in a modern world usually mean a lot of question about world building pop up, as well as logistics. A knight setting is normally much more primitive, and often times has a fantastical or magical element, thus taking a lot of the "How can we make this work" leg work off the creator's shoulders.

Lastly I think Knights as a whole offer a lot of interesting symbolism. Certain aspects could be a combination of things such as strength, duty, loyalty, obedience, bravery, dedication etc... And those make for a very interesting character, especially when making that character small.

How do they handle losing/not being able to use their strength?

Does their sense of duty crumble in the face of someone so much larger than them? Does their bravery crumble ?

How do those traits look on someone so much smaller? Is it inspiring? Sad? Comical? Infuriating (A good ol combination is my favorite)

Whatever the case, knights act as a very clear symbol in both the cultural zeitgiest and within the unique perceptions of an individual. Its easy for one's mind to project particular feelings onto a symbol.

For example, someone who may highly value duty/responsibility could easily (both consciously or not) project those feelings onto a knight character. Making that character small could be a way to vent/explore the idea of ones responsibilities being overwhelmingly large, or as if you feel like you've lost the capacity to deal with them.

Another may write about others not viewing them as capable because of their size, despite having the skills and abilities of a knight- they just aren't seen seriously.

Knights offer a really loaded character archetype, especially in the G/t sphere, since the symbolism of both themselves as a knight and then the concept of being small can create such a variety of metaphors for the audience.

[purplerakath]

Descendants 4 - Purpose vs Plot

Going to go into Spoilers for Rise of Red as I unpack what this movie was. I'm going to cover a lot, but the biggest one is 'what this film is doing' vs 'how this film does it.' As my teaser earlier suggested, the concept is good, the execution is... not so much.

First though...

Descendants is Kind of Weird

Descendants works far more than it has any right to. It is a quick merch cash grab on the part of Disney that through cast, costumes, and director is a much better film. It still doesn't fully work, but it just shouldn't work at all. But more than that each film has a handful of ideas that are just amazing. Never explored further, but amazing.

Audrey's explanation for why she thinks magic is bad is a very good temperature test of Auradonian self-importance and refusal to let others become nobility through pure hearted goodness. Forcing everyone not already in the uppercrust to stay out, and that's horrifying as a concept. Which we don't really explore later.

So that said, what's the good stuff here?

Relationships

So I don't feel the plot of Rise of Red was ever the priority, the priority was Red and Chloe, Chloe and Ella, and Red and Bridgette. The whole thing exists to do a look at our new leads learning how their mothers became the women they love.

These are where the film shines, when any two of those four are interacting we're good. Chloe's rules vs. Red's actions. Chloe realizing Red isn't a villain, so she can tell Red that. So Red might believe it. Ella's pragmatism vs. Chloe's idealism, when compared to Chloe's mother being the bastion of lawfulness that is Queen Cinderella. And then Red's skepticism with Bridgette's earnest nature. Which in turn is mirrored by the Queen of Hearts being a calloused tyranny.

That's what this film is about, and when it's doing this, it's pretty great. I have very few notes about this.

Fun aside: Red and Chloe are doing sort of a mix between Mal/Ben and Mal&Evie. Which means I don't think the plan is romance for them... but they feel pretty romantic as they do a lot of the Ben and Mal plot beats.

The Other Characters

Outside of those four, the rest of the cast is fine. Nothing sticks out as 'bad.' (Maly feels underused but the past VKs are there to serve looks and that's all. Which they do, very well.) Uma is very on the ball for her characterization prior. I expected to see more of Past Fay given how hesitant present Fairy Godmother was about Red, but nothing here is wrong.

They feel hollow because they aren't truly the point.

The Plot AKA Cowardice and Anti-Subversion

So the main comment I've seen is 'this film feels unfinished' which I can fully see. But I think it comes down to two significant issues. The first of which I've summarized up there as Cowardice.

The first Descendants the things that almost ended Auradon were almost always systemic issues in Auradon pointed at the VKs (making things worse). Jane's insecurity wasn't made by Mal, Mal exploited what was already there (because she's an 'ordinary' girl when she isn't allowed to learn magic). Jane wanted her mother's wand because of the ideals espoused by Audrey. And what saved Auradon was that Ben and Lonnie treated the VKs like people, and they choose to stand against their parents over that.

The second one toes a line between 'Uma is the villain' and 'Uma is right.' You can't extend this to Gil (a moron) or Harry (chaos incarnate), but when Uma and Ben talk, Ben realizes he is wrong and that's a pretty subversive take. Uma's methods are bad, of course, but her motives are great.

The third one, in spite of it's problems, has the final messages of 'fear is not the answer' and 'you don't sacrifice the future of nine people just because the tenth might be dangerous.' So it's still a message of breaking systems that are, by nature, cruel for cruelty's sake. Another pretty subversive answer.

...and here our villain is the villain, her act was meant to be cruel, and there's nothing further to it. It lacks the moral greyness of the other three films. That room between black and white they each need. That message is there, it's what Chloe learns from Ella about Red. But it isn't the plot.

Which is the first problem.

The Plot and Narrative Flow

So in the climax of the first film we see someone grab the wand and break the barrier. We assume it's Mal, because we're expecting Mal. Mal is struggling between her mother and Ben all film.

And it was Jane, who just wanted to be pretty and special.

The second film's twist come from Uma spelling Ben, shifting the dramatic weight away from 'Uma is right about Auradon' to 'Uma did that thing Mal did but she doesn't feel bad about it.' It switches gears and takes the momentum out of things.

The third film doesn't have any zig-zag like this, being the most narratively weak, but it also has like six plots going on vying for attention so it does shift gears every so often.

Having your first suspect for the big bad of your film be the correct suspect without any change in momentum feels wrong. So a lot of people picked that up, even if the girls did beat the bad guy, it feels too easy (because it was).

Equally, the ending feels like it's missing the... chaos, that comes with changing time. At the End of Teen Beach 2 there's a huge shift in everything after the timeline resets. Which poses a lot of questions the film can't answer, but it does make those questions obvious and visible.

This film? Not so much. Fundamentally changing the Empress of a walled off kingdom is a drastic change to the world and the final scene didn't suggest anything came of it. That's a pretty glaring omission on the plot.

Which paired with the lack of the plot shifting gears, and the lack of subversive message, all comes down to a hollow feeling at the end. Even if a lot of the film was good.

The End...?

And I want to be clear, I enjoyed this. Every practical set, prop, and costume felt good. The songs were great. It felt more musical-y than the previous three. It's a good ride except for that huge problem it has.

The special effects also felt really good, especially compared to the previous three. The lack of the previous characters (other than Godmother and Uma) didn't feel like a hole, it felt like just the story. A lot of this worked, and worked pretty well.

Just... wish they could do the stuff that worked, and give the plot a better ending.

Aside 2: Rotten to the Core is a better song. Red is a better character intro. It firmly sets up who Red is and her conflict far better than Rotten to the Core does for Mal. It also allowed Red to do far more crime and make her feel more proactive as a hero.

[joys-of-everyday]

SVSSS’s women and MXTX’s commentary on sexism

Every time someone starts with ‘MXTX is great but her women…’, I feel conflicted. I think the way she writes women is secretly brilliant, but that was a conclusion I came to after a long hard think about SVSSS (which was the third series I got into). I absolutely went through the 'MXTX is great but her women...' phase.

So thoughts for my fellow travelers on this journey of enlightenment or whatever. I’m focusing on SVSSS here, because otherwise the post would be more than three times as long. I'm also not... idk how to phrase it... 'starting at the basics' since I think there's plenty already out there on MXTX's strong/not strong presence of female characters. (There’s this for advertisement. Then a somewhat more involved post on Su Xiyan which is brilliant btw. defo recommend.) This is more like... side notes, of things I have yet to see discussed. (maybe someone has discussed them and I've yet to find it.)

1. Ning Yingying, Institutionalised Sexism, and Growth

There were also some incredible female cultivators, but on the whole, these girls’ strength and mental fortitude was lacking, and they often required help… they spent their time playing around instead of actually working. Basically they looked quite hopeless.

What I really have to appreciate about SVSSS is that it slaps you around the face with a giant cucumber so you really can't miss it. This was the passage that made me put down the book and think. Why is this here? What is the point? Idk it just stuck out to me.

So there's a lot to say here about SY's stunning narration, what that says about his internalised beliefs, as well as the portrayal of women in certain genres and how frustrating it can be as a reader/viewer (looking at you, shonen), but I wanted to divest for a second to mention implicit sexism (for no other reason than I happen to care).

In SVSSS, there isn’t much explicit sexism aimed at female characters in world. By this, I mean there is no point at which a character in the world of SVSSS says sexist things to a female character, nor are there moments were female characters are specifically barred from doing anything because of their gender. Of course, it could in part be due to SQQ’s blindness to such issues, but there’s also another facet to this – the abundance of implicit sexism.

The Little Palace Mistress was the Old Palace Master’s beloved daughter. Her martial skills were the product of his hands-on teaching… Meanwhile, Ning Yingying was the beloved youngest shimei who was pampered by the entirety of Qing Jing Peak; she very rarely encountered danger and had virtually no real battle experience.

Ning Yingying is never pushed. She’s loved and cared for, but not expected to excel. The thing with implicit/institutionalised anything is that it’s hard to point to any specific case and go ‘that’s sexist’ or whatever. The effect is only clear when taken over a larger group. Returning to the Immortal Alliance Conference, what do our female participants look like? We have LMY doing her thing, ofc. But QWY? QWR? Their immediate reaction to danger is to cling to the nearest strong person and rely on them for protection. It feels like they’ve never learnt to stand for themselves.

MXTX’s later works often get the ‘there aren’t enough female characters in positions of power’ or ‘all the female characters die’ kind of remarks, but I think there’s something deeper to be said about the kind of commentary it's making on society. Anyway, I won't go deeper here, but the subversion of NYY’s stereotypical role (and so arguably the whole point of her character thematically) is that she doesn’t continue to be the loli icon with IQ 40. When NYY is forced to fend for herself and given the space to grow, she does grow. And isn’t that a nice message?

2. LMY, the Daoist Nuns, and Sex Positivity

Because her face was excessively beautiful, capable of stealing souls, she had to hide it behind a veil all year round, rendering her like unto a flower on a high cliff, unattainable and out of reach.

The women of SVSSS are all about subversions of troupes, and the subversion of LMY’s troupe is twofold. At first, she is introduced as the ‘pure’ one, in contrast to SHL’s ‘sexy’ (commentary on the ‘two types of women: frigid and slut’ narrative). Then she’s the ‘not like other girls’. She’s beautiful but doesn’t care for her looks. She doesn’t care for men but they fall at her feet. She’s stoic and competent, the ideal of a ‘strong independent woman’. And then, right at the end, we learn that she writes very kinky gay porn.

I think there's a lot of disappointment around for LMY's potential not being fulfilled, and while I agree SVSSS on the whole wrapped things up very quickly, honestly? I think this is the funniest twist ever.

LMY a fanfic writer, a shipper, a BL enthusiast. The kind of woman whose literature has always been regarded with something between confusion, denial, and disgust: from the rise of shonen ai and Yaoi of the 60s-80s, or slash fiction in 70s, to the popularity of danmei in China. The CP fan, in all its bravery and ugliness. She's not a hero, she doesn't particularly do anything, other than pursue her hobbies. She's neither ‘pure’ nor ‘strong’, but touchingly realistic.

And even better, she’s not alone. There’s the Daoist nuns, who (hilariously) are nuns who in an apparently life-or-death situations suggest dual cultivation??? (Now celibacy was necessary in some Daoist schools but not all, but since Shen Jiu mentions specifically that there’s nothing strictly wrong with him sleeping with prostitutes because they’re not a Daoist sect, it feels like there’s a subversion lurking there.) (idk they have Catholic girl school vibes.)

ngl, I just love LMY. She's very sexy.

3. LPM, QWY, and Breaking Down the Mean Girl

If LMY is ‘not like other girls’ then the LPM is the ‘mean girl’. Also, the ‘girl who tries to break up the MLs’ of a BL. The two troupes are in the same ballpark. Rich, pretty, privileged. Also petty, stupid, and unnecessarily cruel. More generally, the Huan Hua trio - LPM, QWY, QWR all take different elements of the 'unlikable girl'.

I don’t have many deep thoughts about this, other than their abject failure to make a dent on LBH’s devotion to SQQ being really funny (and an excellent post on QWY which breaks down her character and her relationship to og!LBH), but something that snagged with me is the comparison between these extracts.

Why did he act like one of those bitter courtyard complex concubines with too much time on their hands?

This is about Shen Jiu. Ya know, Shen abuses children Jiu.

He very much did not enjoy the sight of a sixty-year-old coot and a young girl in her teens cooing at each other right in front of him.

This is one of two (?) times that svsss mentions a young girl being married to an old coot (the second being SJ's mysterious jiejie). If you didn't know, the situation of women in much of Chinese history is... not great.

The Little Palace Mistress: Bitter, locked-up woman. She herself says that Luo Binghe treats her like a kept pig.

Also, the existence of Wang Lingjiao in MDZS, servant turned lover, who everyone hates (she’s the one stuck to Wen Chao if you’re like me and forgot her name most the time).

There’s condemnation there (none of these characters are portrayed in a sympathetic light) but there’s a hint of pity there too. LPM has lost a father. QWY a sister. And in MDZS, WLJ is plagued by the anxiety of an unfaithful lover who she relies on entirely for her power.

(Someone (irl!) mentioned Beauvoir to me in a (not svsss!) conversation (lol the brain rot is real but not 100% yet) and now I feel like maybe I should go back to the Second Sex for svsss reasons (so maybe the brain rot is real 🤔). Beauvoir writes a lot about 'bad women'.)

Anyway, this is not particularly organised and doesn't really have a point. I might expand some more on something at some point, but that requires me having coherent thoughts, which probably requires me having actual conversations to get a few things straight, so no guarantees. Whatever. Have a great day :)

[jemmo]

utsukushii kare really said we’re going to take two of the most fascinating, interesting, well-characterised characters to have ever been written and not just stick them in the same show, but put them in one of the most incredible relationships to be seen on screen and i cannot thank them enough for it. seriously, if you consider the fact that at this point we’re at ep 8 of a 30 minute runtime show; that’s 4 hours. i’ve watched other bls, heck even other ordinary shows, that can’t even cram enough characterisation into a character that hira or kiyoi have in their little fingernail. im not joking. and nothing shows that better than kiyoi in this ep.

i love that we’re already getting an episode from his perspective. we had to wait all the way until ep 4 of season 1 to see things from his side, and that was such an amazing twist and reveal and still to this day that ep makes me cry. but im so glad we get to see his perspective sooner. bc we don’t need that shock twist anymore, instead it serves as a good balance to see where both our characters are at in the first 2 eps. and yet again, seeing things from kiyoi’s pov just opens up the absolute treasure trove that is his character. there are so many stand out points from this ep that i wanna mention but I’ll wait until my big ‘favourite parts of utsukushii kare s2 ep2’ post to list them all. what i wanna say here is that every bit of his character we get to see in this ep comes together so well to create such an interesting, multi-faceted and well-rounded character that it’s kind of astounding. we start off with his softness and vulnerability that’s countered perfectly against hira’s timid reaction, and then we jump back to high school to see this full on longing and the frustration that comes with that, waiting to be confessed to. i wanted to say this about the first season but this serves a good opportunity too; I find it so interesting how they portray hira and kiyoi’s ‘seme and uke’ dynamic (im gonna use those terms bc i can’t think of any better way to describe it, just know im referring more to a more dominant vs more submissive personality, like the confesser vs the confesse, and not anything sexual). You could so easily watch this show, hear the premise, even see the characters, hira and his chronic shyness, kiyoi and his undeniable popularity, and easily place those labels; hira the uke, kiyoi the seme. but in reality, kiyoi so clearly wants to be the uke, and very much is the uke. he begs in his head for hira to confess his feelings fo him, half bc maybe he needs hira to be brave where he can’t be, but I think also half bc he just wants to be confessed to. He wants the boy he likes to tell him he likes him, just like he wants to cuddle in his lap and be looked after. it probably stems from this want to be loved, chosen to be loved, and be cared for where he felt he wasn’t before, but it’s just so refreshing and such an interesting subversion of expectations, to see inside cool, popular kiyoi’s head and it’s just him begging for this shy, nobody kid to like him, and say it out loud.

and then I’ve touched on this before, but you get to see his earnest drive and passion to do what he loves. the cool kid that should fit the stereotype of never caring about anything, pushing to do the thing he loves, putting himself out there. I just can’t describe how excellent of a subversion that is. and the way he is with people at work, with Anna, polite and cordial and sweet, it’s such a reverse of kiyoi’s tsundere shortness and bluntness with hira that it not only shows us that yes, we weren’t hallucinating, there really is an infinite pool of softness within kiyoi that pours out more and more every time we see him, but also shows us that kiyoi is maybe only his true self with Hira. he’s not this polite, nice boy, nor is he this cool, cold popular guy, he’s somewhere in the middle, a fascinating mix of both, that only hira gets to see the full extent of, and I think that says a lot about how comfortable he is with Hira, and how much he trusts him. as much as it may be bad that hira will never find fault with kiyoi, it also makes him his sanctity, his true safe place, where he can breathe and grow and truly be whatever he wants, soft, angry, cute, cool, vulnerable, hira will take it all and adore it no matter what.

and then we get his jealousy of koyama, his protectiveness and possessiveness of hira. it’s kind of endearing how he still feels these things when hira shows him such endless devotion, it’s a testament to how normal he sees their relationship compared to hira, and how he therefore allows himself to feel normal relationship things, including possessiveness. but also in this scene i really love how kiyoi is let’s himself doubt himself, and only when it comes to hira. i feel like we’ve only ever seen him been unsure of himself when it comes to the things he loves, namely his dream of being a performer, and hira. he only looses confidence when he doesn’t do well in the competition in high school, and is only ever doubtful when it comes to hira’s feelings about him, and how he is with hira, maybe bc they’re the only things he truly wants to last forever. so what does he do, just like he does with his acting career? he puts in sincere effort. he humbles himself taking that recipe from koyama, and despite his cluelessness and clear lack of skills, he still tries his absolute hardest to do something for hira. he cooks him a meal, one of the most ordinary and sincere expressions of love. and his shy smile the whole time, him waiting excitedly for hira to come home, it’s such a fantastically endearing contrast from the cold, removed kiyoi we know early in s1 that you almost can’t reconcile them as the same character, and yet the steps that got us here make it clear that they are in fact the same person, that both those people live inside kiyoi and that’s amazing. and of course something as ordinary as cooking a meal for your boyfriend can never be normal for hira and kiyoi but the chaos unfolds is what makes them absolutely them. it mirrors what kiyoi says at the start of the ep about Hira, ‘if it wasn’t disgusting, it wouldn’t be hira’. It’s the same for kiyoi, and the same for their relationship. they don’t want to change it fundamentally, don’t want to take away the things that make it them, they just want to find a way to take this thing they both want and love and build it, strengthen it, so it can last. and i’ll say it until I’m blue in the face, but that’s why kiyoi’s personality, his bluntness, works so well for hira. it provides this iron wall of reassurance based in truth that he needs. I think ‘im not dating a pebble’ might be my stand out line from a bl in 2023 already but it’s also so ridiculously laced in meaning. Kiyoi doesn’t see hira as just some rock, some insignificant thing on the side of the road, that’s not what he’s dating. He’s dating hira, the person. And I think this push for hira to see himself as a person is only something that kiyoi can do because, in a way, hira was the one to see Kiyoi first. I’m a different way, because of the complex hira still has around kiyoi, he may not be a person yet, but hira still saw him in a way no one else did because he cared enough to look and keep looking. He stared and stared at every bit of kiyoi, including the uncool parts, the embarrassing parts, the sweet parts, the upset and angry parts, he’s the one that saw it all and never once looked away. The invisible kid made him feel seen. And I think for someone that’s always looked at but never seen, that’s what you really want.

So yes, this may have collapsed into another ramble, but I hope I can just convey some of the sense of how whole of a character kiyoi feels, even just by the points in this ep. And I just love that he’s allowed to be it all, be chaotic and messy and imperfect and a work in progress while still helping hira along too. I’ve never seen a bl couple that feel so much like they’re growing together, figuring themselves out as people and as a couple and it’s just so fucking refreshing and interesting and beautiful to watch and i will never ever shut up about it

[mermaidsirennikita]

I'll be super honest... one way you can tell that these Kleypas books have been edited is that they are a lot less sexy.

And I don't just mean in terms of like, things that actually happen with the characters together. (See: the It Happened One Autumn scene, which, believe it or not, took a pretty sizable chunk of activity off the page and prolonged Lillian and Westcliff Making It Official by a A LOT.)

I mean... it's like she's worried... about the heroes... sexualizing the heroines inappropriately? Not that I think there's really an appropriate way to sexualize someone, it's just like—you either do it in a way that's creepy or you don't, and a lot of that frankly has to do with how much that person may WANT your desire. But also, a lot of this the heroine wouldn't know about, the hero is just literally thinking about it, sometimes when she isn't in the room.

Like we don't have Ross getting hot and bothered at his desk, his THOUGHTS about Sophia seem worded in a way that's... proper.

And yeah, Ross is one of Lisa's more proper heroes, BUT there's a line. There's a point where it seems contrived. Not only like I'm not reading a historical hero—because, to be real, I think readers expect and in many cases WANT a super thirsty hero in a historical, I think that it's a feature of the subgenre, not a bug—but like I'm reading a guy who doesn't truly want the heroine in a way I desire to see a romance novel hero want his love interest.

I think that part of the fantasy of a romance novel is everything being BIGGER (lmao) especially in terms of FEELINGS. I don't think it's super reasonable to expect some guy who's into me to be thinking of me constantly to the point that he like, screws up his life, but you kinda want that in a romance hero. It's the fantasy of all-consuming obsession, and that obsession doesn't necessarily have to be creepy or overwhelming or dark (see: mafia romance). It can be just... I can't stop thinking of her her her.

And this can be harder to do well in certain subgenres, imo, but there's an inherent sweeping romanticism that I think a lot of people want from historicals. Darcy confronting Elizabeth in the rain while they pant in each other's faces, the big chase at the end of Mr. Malcolm's List, Come What May in Moulin Rouge!. (I'd compare this to the darker sort of obsession we sought in older paranormals; the craving of the vampire, the animalistic passion of the werewolf, etc.)

But also... I think that a lot of good historical romance novels bring it down to Earth and make it a little more WORLDLY and tangible by adding in the inherent like... physicality of desire. Ross getting worked up over Sophia whether or not he's her employer and it's theoretically an abuse of power and he's kind of seeing her as an object in a moment and and and so on.

Plus, it just feels more like the way these dudes would... act? Like, Ross is a magistrate who's dying for it and regularly gets rough with criminals, even if he's a tamer Kleypas hero. Imagine Derek Craven NOT using the drawn dog line, not telling Sara that he wanted to "do her over" because my God, we wouldn't want him to come on too strong!

I mean, I think the edits to Seduce Me at Sunrise, as minor as they may seem, make Kev's claiming of Win feel so much less substantial. Because like. Yeah. It's supposed to read as a kidnapping! A kidnapping she absolutely wants, and her inner monologue made that SO CLEAR to the reader, and she'd been begging Kev to snatch her up since the first few pages of the book so we KNOW this and HE knows this.

But it's important that Kev finally giving in feels like this like... almost subversive thing. Because he's been denying his nature (which is to love Win and love her AGGRESSIVELY) and denying his needs and hers. He's sweet with her in the cottage, sure, but I think that initial SNAP really needs the full force of "he literally can't stand this anymore and it doesn't matter if it's kinda wrong in theory, he's gotta".

(I mean, based on these edits, I think there's a decent chance, tbh, that the entire scene where Derek and Sara get close at the masquerade ball would be changed dramatically because of how pushy he is, and how he doesn't know her identity, and how she's just sort of swept up if VERY MUCH INTO IT. And therefore. My God. Never let Lisa start ripping that book apart.

I am almost POSITIVE that the Devil in Winter "you're going to lose that bet" scene would be changed by the standards of the Autumn edits. Because St. Vincent literally says no. And I don't feel bothered by that scene... at all. But he says no a few times lol.)

It just makes me like... a bit bitter, lol, because I feel as if not only does it make it hard for me to feel the same enthusiasm when I'm trying to relisten to these books (and I really don't have time to reread with my eyes at this moment, I'm struggling to find time to finish Prince of Dreams even though I love it so far) it makes me not want to recommend them to people I know? Because they're probably going to get edited versions! They're probably going to read them and go "huh, not quite as hot as I expected".

And like. While there are many reasons to read a Kleypas book, I think that what has often appealed to readers are these alpha-y heroes who aren't like, BRUTAL but are dominating and aggressive and full of barely controlled desire. So when you water that down, it's like... You still have the romanticism, the beautiful writing, but those are not the only ingredients. The books feel hollow.

[girlonthefireescape]

I finally got to see All of Us Strangers last night, and I went from HUH. OKAY?? to WT actual F over the course of a few hours and am now at a mixture of HUH. OKAY?? and WTF, I think.

I think what it comes down is: This wasn't the tragedy I expected and definitely not the one I wanted??

Like, I went into this knowing the few Harry/Adam scenes you get in gifs sets (I skipped the ones with Adam's parents because that seemed too spoilery! LOL) and the bits you get from official summaries -- like that the parents are dead/ghosts/what have you.

And then I got to the point in the movie at which I thought, well, is everyone a ghost/dead then? And then we got to the ending and that penultimate scene -- after we'd resolved the bit with the parents -- and it was like, surely not? They're surely not actually gonna go there? And then they did, and I didn't even know what to do with that, but it still wasn't unexpected -- not really? The unexpected bit was more the fact that it was actually the thing that happened. And then the gut punch I didn't even think about as an option was the reveal that not only had he been dead the whole time but no, the key moment and turning point was that first meeting, and I now have 6 pages of notes app notes that I wrote down on my journey home from the cinema, so I can discuss this with my friend once she's seen it and to make sense of my thoughts and feelings, and I still don't know what I'm supposed to do with this movie and this ending now! (Side note: Although writing this really helped?? lol)

Kudos to the entire cast, though! I love Andrew Scott's work, anyway, and I thought his performance felt beautifully stripped back and bare and honest. And I was really intrigued by Paul Mescal. I'd seen him (obv) in Normal People (which wasn't really my favourite show) and The Lost Daughter (I'd forgotten he was even in it until recently), but he didn't really stick with me in terms of his performance or the roles I'd seen him in. But this felt so different and like he threw himself so into that character that wasn't even in that many scenes, he really disappeared into the part for me. I also found that character so interesting, especially in retrospect, because while Harry represented a different generation (loved that bit, especially the discussion of queer vs. gay), his purpose in the narrative was also to be there for Adam. And then the bit at the end when we learn that Adam could've been there for him -- but also couldn't be. Or rather, Harry needed someone to be there for him, and he reached out (had the courage or maybe desperation to) and no one reached back.

That bit where Adam told him in the end that he hadn't been ready to or couldn't let him in like, obviously on the metaphorical level. But it also made me think about it at the level of well, this is a drunk stranger standing in front of your door saying weird things, and you're the only two people in the building. Like, is this a threat? Depends on which genre we're in. Which now reminds me of... Was it a tweet or a post on here or general writing advice? The bit where the characters don't know which genre they're in, so they're not necessarily acting in accordance with the genre guidelines. Like, is this a meetcute or is this person going to rob and/or murder you? Anyway...

I haven't really read any of the reviews yet or watched the actors talk about the movie, so I don't now how we all feel about the question of ghosts vs. hallucinations (vs. dreams vs. at some point I thought about whether this was all part the story/script Adam was writing). And I don't know if it actually matters what they were.

I knew there would be tragedy in this because of the few vague reactions I'd seen, but I expected it to be in the relationship with the parents and not the romance. That subversion! (Was it really one?) Although, the tragedy wasn't even necessarily in the romance but in the figure of Harry in the end? Or emotionally, that's where I was, anyway. The way Adam lost his parents but got to 'resolve' his conflict with them while Harry's parents were still alive but he might as well have been a ghost. Also, the bit where he was a ghost to his family but very visible and corporeal to Adam!

I just read a post that mentioned that different people would take different things from this movie, and that's always so interesting. It reminds me of how different people took different things from Poor Things, which I saw only a couple of weeks ago and ended up being really annoyed with.

I didn't cry at the ending. It happened so fast and was so expected but unexpected -- the ominous music in that scene and also in earlier scenes?? I didn't even have time to process this in order to have a reaction. I did tear up at the Christmas scene, though. The relationship between Adam and his parents, especially with his dad, felt really true and honest and recognisable, especially given the 80s context.

I even laughed a few times now that I think about it! And I think the entire theatre had a (maybe relieved) chuckle when Adam and his dad had muddled their way through the stereotype discussion and in the end agreed that no, Adam can indeed not throw for shit.

I think I'll probably need to see this again at some point. I read this article on how Disney (in line with the streamers in general) wants to stop selling physical media and how this might affect a DVD release, and oh, fuck that. Give us the DVD! I want to put this on my shelf!

[chickenstrangers]

Conflict and Empathy in My School President and Kieta Hatsukoi

I have been thinking about how My School President and Kieta Hatsukoi (My Love Mix-Up!) utilize structure and pacing to create a very honest depiction of a high school experience. I've said before that I think My School President is the quintessential high school show for me in the way that it captures how it feels to be a teen, to be in a relationship for the first time, the heightened emotions in both romance and friendship, but also shows this in such a caring and loving way. Kieta Hatsukoi does a lot of very similar things, focusing on friendships and empathy and trying to communicate (despite all the misunderstandings), and it rings true in the same way for me. I think this comes down to how both shows are structurally formulated and how they depict conflict.

@khaothanawat (i) and @ranchthoughts (ii) (iii) (iv) have written excellent posts on the topic of My School President's use of narrative pacing and specifically the subversion of audience expectations. For example, it has big reveals early on, such as Tinn's secret crush. Plot points that might be episode-long arcs, or be the whole premise of the series, are resolved quickly, often within the episode.

Kieta Hatsukoi speeds through narrative conflicts as well (spoilers for the first 3 episodes). Aoki has a crush on Hashimoto. He learns Hashimoto has a crush on Ida. But wait! Now Ida thinks Aoki has a crush on him! Oh, but now Aoki really is falling for Ida, and worried about hurting Hashimoto because of it. But Hashimoto doesn't actually like Ida, she likes Aida, it was a whole misunderstanding. Ida is starting to maybe like Aoki back. But now Ida thinks Aoki does not have a crush on him, when Aoki most definitely does. Aoki goes through approximately 3 existential crises per episode. In Kieta Hatsukoi, the love truly keeps getting mixed-up!

This plot structure is part of why these two shows are some of my favorite high school shows. It feels very true (though exaggerated) to the teen experience to have so many things happening that you're trying to decipher, building on top of each other, coalescing in terrifying and beautiful ways. These are obviously not the only shows to utilize this structure but I think it works especially well in a show about high school where so often little things can feel unimaginably huge and then get completely pushed out of the way as new things emerge or they turn out to be less catastrophic than they first appeared. In the wise words of Riverdale, it's about the epic highs and lows of high school football.

What I love most about these two shows and how they use this rapid-fire pacing is the way they don't trivialize the characters' emotions or experiences. Yes, there is humor that comes specifically from the twists in the narrative and the range of teen emotions and miscommunication. But we're not laughing at the characters; instead we are swept up in the tidal wave with them, in part because it's so easy to empathize with both ensembles, and because we are accustomed to the traditional narrative pacing styles that these shows subvert and play with. Just because the characters' emotions shift—because they come to new revelations, because they communicate and forgive one another—doesn't invalidate their prior feelings.

The scene that really stands out to me in My School President is in episode 11 when the Chinzhillas have their big fight on the way to redeem their wishes. This is the real conflict of the episode 11 of doom that we are primed to expect from other shows. Instead of a breakup, we are faced with the potential dissolution of the friend group. This scene hurts, showing the culmination of the tension throughout the episode and the band's disappointment over losing Hot Wave. It seems that the Chinzhillas might be unable to reconcile after what was said. But this is where My School President subverts expectations and doesn't prolong the conflict longer than necessary. They all talk it through, communicating what they're feeling, and apologize.

Both shows introduce and resolve conflicts in different ways. In My School President, many conflicts that arise are initially external: for example, the club is going to be cancelled because of the new school rules, Sound joins the band and takes over as leader, Gun's mom is sick but Gun doesn't know, the band loses the Hot Wave competition, and another student outs Tinn and Gun. The story is then about how the characters respond to the internal conflicts that arise due to these external events, rather than fixing the external source of conflict. The characters deal with Gun not feeling capable of leading the band after Sound's introduction; Gun and Tinn need to figure out how they feel about Tinn keeping Gun's mom's health a secret; and the band needs to decide how they can forgive themselves and each other after such a huge disappointment.

The characters don't have the power to do much about the root cause of these problems. They can't cure Gun's mom, they can't go back in time and stop the student from outing them, and they can't win Hot Wave. This is what the argument in episode 11 is about, realizing that the loss is not on any one of their individual shoulders, and so the only thing they can do is figure out how to move forward together. What the characters learn, which allows the show to avoid drawn-out conflict, is the ability to communicate healthily with each other, to be kind to one another, to show empathy and respect. The rest is outside of their control.

In Kieta Hatsukoi, conflict is often not directly resolved but instead subsumed by new conflicts and new (mis)understandings. Aoki's initial problem (that Ida thinks Aoki has a crush on him) is overtaken by the new one (that he actually does like Ida but Ida now thinks he doesn't). The characters keep learning new things about themselves and each other that change everything.

The characters in Kieta Hatsukoi struggle to understand each other and they struggle to tell each other the truth about their feelings. But they're trying so hard to be kind to one another. The friends are always striving above almost all else to be careful with one another's feelings. Aoki keeps Hashimoto's crush a secret to protect her; Hashimoto is distraught to learn of Aoki's past crush on her because she has inadvertently hurt him; Ida is so deliberate in thinking through his own feelings in order to not hurt Aoki's. They're trying, even when they don't get it right.

At the core of both these shows is empathy. The characters strive to be kind, to communicate, to understand one another. This is not often easy, especially with the amount of stuff they are all bombarded with—new situations and experiences to grapple with, transforming feelings that they don't always understand. But this is all part of growing up. My School President and Kieta Hatsukoi are both able to utilize their narrative pacing in order to put forward a story so full of warmth and love.

[sonofapunk]

I know nothing about anarky. What makes him so trans?

Thank you so much for asking, anon! I'm gonna go ahead and jump right in! (And I will do my best to keep this focused on gender, with very light context, so if you want to know more about this character in general, please feel free to ask follow-up questions!)

Word count: A little over 2100

Trigger Warnings for: mentions of gender dysphoria, discussions of gender presentation and bodies, assumptions of a character's gender identity, comic-standard violence, transphobia, and death. (Note: If I've missed something that you'd like a heads-up for both in this list, and before it happens in the text, let me know! <3)

So, in 1989, Alan Grant/DC debuted one Lonnie Machin a.k.a. Anarky!

Lonnie was posed as a challenger to Batman, someone who makes him think about his methods and choices. Alfred comments in Lonnie's debut, even, that Lonnie is a "kindred spirit" to Batman. Bruce disagrees, but he does admit that there's some similarities there, which calls into question vigilantism as a form of justice, and what methods vigilantes should and shouldn't be using, in Bruce's mind. (Sidenote: there's this great moment in Tec 609 where Lonnie analyzes how Batman works, and it makes Lonnie and Bruce's similarities and differences extremely stark. It's one of my favorite parts of Lonnie's two-part comic debut).

At any rate, I bring all this up to establish that, as a baseline, Lonnie's character tends to call into question understood norms. Lonnie himself is a subversion of many thought-to-be-truths. Anarchism itself does the same thing. By that idea alone, there is already a baseline for defying things like the gender binary, assigned gender at birth, and expected gender roles and presentation.

With that in mind, I'm going to get into some specific moments that really solidify the many possibilities for a trans headcanon for this character! (I myself headcanon Lonnie as nonbinary, but there's arguments that can made for any identity under the trans umbrella, which is what this essay will argue for!).

The first point I want to make is about Lonnie's first Anarky costume. This one:

I chose this specific drawing of the costume because it's on the cover of Lonnie's debut comic, which means that this is the very first instance of Lonnie that many people ever saw. It also shows very well the aspects of this costume that I want to talk about.

We've got the hat with the circle-A, which draws attention to it by how much it stands out. We have the massive, flowing cloak. And we have the absence of a visible face. I'm gonna talk about each of those in turn.

The Hat - the hat's main purpose is to show you exactly who and what Lonnie aligns with as Anarky. The name isn't just for show; the circled-A, according to its real-world meaning, summarizes how order can found through anarchy, a theory that Lonnie is an adamant believer in, and defender of. Anarky is announcing for you who Anarky is. Think about gender presentation now, and what quick, shorthand ways we use to try and present as our desired gender (not just male, female, nonbinary, but also a flower, the color blue, a certain aesthetic that cultivates gender euphoria-- there's as many genders as we have the imagination to create!) Right away, we are already being shown a person that Lonnie wants you to think of him as.

The Cloak (warning for a mention of dysphoria and body image here) - This cloak is huge and billowing and closed, so there is nothing that you can see beneath it; it's all draped red fabric with no form or shape. It honestly makes me think of dysphoria hoodies, and how they can be protective and comfortable because they hide one's body. And in fact, this is exactly why Lonnie chose this cloak: it hides his frame. In the comic, it's implied to be because Lonnie is a young teenager, and he wants others to think that he's an adult, so that they'll listen to him, but the way I see it: it also serves to hide Lonnie's gender. Anarky is a reflection of the common people, and is determined to be their amplifier. Anarky being of an indeterminate gender is one further way that Anarky could relate to the people that Lonnie is trying to uplift.

The Mask (warning for a mention of deadnames in this section)- In this cover, it's drawn in shadow, but in the comic itself, we see that Anarky wears a gold, full-face mask. It completely obscures any identifying features on Lonnie's face. (As a nonbinary person, myself... what a mood). This is because Lonnie does not want Lonnie to be recognized as a voice of the people, but Anarky. In Anarky (1997), Lonnie explains that he does not care who Batman is under the mask, because Batman is the figure he's concerned with. I argue that this can be applied to Anarky, too. The point of Anarky is that the people can find strength and power through this figure, as I've said probably too many times now. Repetition for emphasis! Gotta love that English Lit degree. Anyway, this is very important because it's the same as the Spider-Man effect: anyone could be Spider-Man. Anyone could be Anarky. Now, what I mean by "Anyone could be Anarky," is that anyone could be wearing that mask. Something that I find extremely fascinating is that Lonnie reportedly does not care about how others think of him-- yet, he does protect Anarky's reputation. I think that this is because, the moment that the common people no longer feel safe around Anarky, is the moment that Anarky can no longer exist the way that Anarky is supposed to. When that presentation, when that self, is damaged by the others around it, what can we do but feel as if we have to defend it, even if we don't really care how others think of us? There's a lack of attention of Lonnie Machin, but there is an overabundance of attention on Anarky (see: Shadow of the Bat #41, where Lonnie signs a letter as Anarky, claiming that "Lonnie Machin" is the alias). This calls to attention the idea of deadnames. If Anarky is the desired presentation and identity, then it could be said that Lonnie acts as the deadname.

Now, if you're not totally regretting asking yet, let's move on to point #2! The second costume!

This one will be quicker: The main idea I want to get across here is that once again, we're seeing rapid declarations of identity with the large circle-A on the chest, and that we've still retained the lack of identifying features.

(Second warning for assumptions of someone's gender. Another warning as well that if you read the comic mentioned below, the comment that the reporter makes is presented to be a joke, which I do believe was made in poor taste. Please proceed with caution, and take care of yourself if you choose to read it <3).

What's significant to me about this costume is what happens in Young Justice: Sins of Youth #1. Anarky attends a rally for young heroes, and the reporter commenting on the event doesn't recognize all of the heroes present, and so has to rely on extremely vague assumptions about the characters. It's the specific assumption that this reporter makes that intrigues me: The reporter assumes that Anarky is a woman. Based on what we've been discussing so far, this tells me, personally, that what I think Lonnie is trying to do with Anarky's costume is working. It's difficult to figure out anything about Anarky as a person, and so the people looking at Anarky try to guess. It's even more significant to me that this happens after we lose the shapeless cloak. Even without the cover that that cloak gave, Anarky still has no identifying features beyond what Lonnie wants you to see.

(Warning for violence, bodily harm, torture, and transphobic comments in this next section. No pictures will be shown. We are still discussing expectation and perception of one's gender that may cause dysphoria as well. Please proceed with caution, and take care of yourself <3).

Another significant piece of this costume for me is that in an encounter with Ra's al Ghul, the circle-A on the costume serves as the inspiration for a form of torture, wherein the circle-A is cut into Lonnie's chest. It's taking a piece of Lonnie's identity presentation and forcibly making it a part of his body. I bring this up because I think that it's important to discuss the idea of presentation being forced upon us. Even after someone comes out, we are still held to certain expectations of how we present our chosen identities.

Another example of expectation in Lonnie's own experiences is how Shadow of the Bat #40-41 raises the notion that Lonnie was expected to become the All-American Boy by his parents. He's told that he's outside of what he was "supposed" to be: he doesn't play baseball, he should have been a doctor or a lawyer, and he reads things that are seen as abnormal (leftist political theory).

Lonnie expresses in a letter that he writes in #41 that he hopes that one day, his parents will be proud of him, and he calls himself their son. This is note-worthy because he is fulfilling part of the role that his parents placed on him ("boy"), but he also admits in this letter that he knows that he cannot be what they want him to be. He asks that they are the ones who transform their thinking, to accept him as he is, not as they want him to be. This is also the letter which he uses to fake the death of Lonnie Machin, so that he can work full-time as Anarky. This letter reads as a parallel to a coming out letter, in my opinion. (Transphobia warning) It also lines up with this specific notion that certain parents of trans children have expressed before, which is that it feels as though the kid they knew from birth is dying or dead. As someone whose parents expressed that idea to me, I do not support telling your child this, as it's rooted in transphobia, but it is significant to me that this is something we see in a situation that strongly mirrors what Lonnie is doing in the comics.

My third point that I'd like to bring up is extremely short, but it has to do with that A scar, so warnings for blood and bodily harm in the images that you will see if you click on the links provided. I'm providing links, so that anyone who wants to read this still can, but can opt in to seeing images of a bloody injury.

Lonnie, particularly in Anarky (1999), is drawn in parallel to two women in classic art.

Lonnie + Truth Coming Out of Her Well to Shame Mankind

Lonnie + Ophelia

Lonnie Ophelia + Bruce Ophelia (supplementary)

These parallels do not feel accidental to me-- especially the one with Truth.

It's noteworthy to me that Lonnie Machin is almost always drawn with long hair. Now, anyone can have long hair, of course, but when you look at the All-American Boy expectation, and then you look back to how Lonnie looks even out of the Anarky costume, I think there's something to be said there about how even Lonnie Machin subverts gender expectation.

Now, since this has already gotten longer than I ever meant for it to be, I'm going to stop here for now, since these are the main points that I wanted to cover in discussing the trans umbrella headcanon for Lonnie!

I want to close just by saying that all headcanons are valid for this character, and so I don't intend to imply that anyone who reads this HAS to feel the way that I do. This is just how I see and read Lonnie's character/comics, and it brings me a lot of joy, particularly as someone who relates heavily to a lot of Lonnie's experiences in the trans parallel experience kind of way. I love this character to pieces, and it brings me nothing but happiness to share him with you and anyone else who read this far. So I'll also say, to anyone reading this: thank you so much for hearing me out!! It means a lot. I hope that you took caution and care in reading about some of these topics, since I know firsthand how hard they can be to experience, so do something nice for yourself today! Take some time to breathe, slow down, and enjoy a nice treat or two. You've earned it!

And if this essay has convinced you to read more about Lonnie Machin: welcome to the autonomous Machin collective! We're happy to have you here! <3

[kaydeefalls]

would love some director's commentary on basically any part of Carthaginians you'd like to talk about, but my favourite part was the second last chapter/the siege itself and I'd love to know how you worked out what trajectory to take the characters on through all the historical records. would also love to know more of your thoughts on Yusuf and Nico's backstory and families, if you have thoughts!

Thanks! <3 All right, Carthaginians, let's go.

The siege - or, more specifically, the final Fall of Carthage - was definitely what came first in terms of planning out this fic. When I first had the idea of writing Joe & Nicky's backstory further back in history, the Punic Wars were a logical setting to start with due to simple geography - Carthage being in modern day Tunisia, and Rome being, well, Rome.

So as with any vague idea, I started with a wikipedia deep dive, kind of assuming that I'd stick to the general canon template of them killing each other for the first time in battle and then becoming lovers afterward. But I immediately stumbled across the fact that Carthage's final stand, after the city had surrendered, consisted of about 900 Roman defectors in the Temple of Eshmoun setting the temple on fire around them rather than allowing Rome to execute them. Which. So that was obviously going to Nicky's arc. Which meant he would have to defect to Carthage much earlier on. Which meant I could give him and Joe a much richer relationship build over the course of the war itself. At that point, there was no question that their first deaths would be more of a suicide pact due to having no other options. I thought about having them, IDK, leap off the temple roof together or something, but nah, it felt much stronger to have them kill each other directly, as per canon, but with a complete subversion of what got them to that point.

I wrote chronologically and posted as I went, but it definitely helped going in to know exactly where they had to end up. For example, I deliberately seeded their exact dialogue together in the temple at the end of the siege as lines in their very first idle political debate in Rome in chapter one, so that Nicky could do a complete 180 on his initial stance in the debate by the end.

Embarrassingly, while that was all planned out from the beginning, I was WELL into the middle of the fic before realizing that, uh, Eshmoun is literally the god of healing. I mean, I knew that from the start, but I literally had my own personal OH DUH moment that they would be dying and resurrecting for the first time in the temple of the god of healing, and would OF COURSE think that Eshmoun himself had literally healed them due to their sacrifice on his own figurative altar. So that was an incredibly lucky piece of historical fact to tie into the immortality narrative.

In terms of their family backstories there - I think Yusuf's is about as fleshed out in the fic as it's going to be, it's all his POV and I included all the family info/dynamics I'd thought about. Nicky's didn't get as much detail in the fic, since we're never in his head and he didn't talk about it as much, but his family was the rough equivalent of landed gentry back in Genua - relatively high status for his own tribe, but doesn't mean much to the Roman Republic as a whole. They were granted Roman citizenship when the Genuates allied with Rome, and Nicky received a formal education, but their family wealth took a huge hit during the second Punic War (when Carthage sacked the city) and never really recovered, which is why Nicky left to join the Roman army and make his own fortune. I think he's not the oldest of his siblings - not the one expected to inherit and carry on the family legacy - but probably the second son, with several younger siblings in the mix as well. He has a strained relationship with his father and a better one with his mother, who I imagine died before he left home. He misses his younger sibs, who he helped raise, but never returns to Genua in their lifetimes.

So...yeah! I spent all year with the world of this fic in my head, it's been hard to let go of it. Thank you for asking!

[theonethatyaks93]

Quick Animaniacs Review: Episode 84 (Original Show)

Hello Animaniacs community! To honor this amazing episode's 27th anniversary, I've decided to make a quick review showcasing my opinions on these segments from episode 84 of the OG show. I plan on doing this for more episodes in the future, so if you want to see more, let me know. Alright, let's get into the review.

What's In This Episode?: Episode 84 of Animaniacs was released on September 7th, 1996. It contained four segments featuring the Warners and Chicken Boo: "Cutie and the Beast", "Boo Happens", "Noel", and a cold ending, which is technically not a segment, but it's close enough. In my opinion, this episode is one of the last great hurrahs of this show, containing amazing animation by TMS, hilarious segments (some of the funniest in the show), and a consistent level of quality. Each segment brings something new to the table; the Warners bringing comedy, Chicken Boo offering some of his best work, the song portion being iconic, and the ending bit being laugh-out-loud funny. Overall, this is a very great episode that I'd recommend.

"Cutie and the Beast":

"Ladies and Gentlemen, Ms. Banana Folana!" This segment has some of the best moments of the season, and some of my favorite gags in the entire show. The opening bit with Dot messing up her lines is hysterical, with great voice acting. The fact that they repeat it so many times also makes it more funny. There are a ton of little jabs, innuendos, and meta jokes in these first few minutes alone. Dot swearing and it being bleeped out? Hilarious! It really just feels like the writers, animators, and voice actors were having a blast. The rest of this episode is solid as well. The fact that the beast is in fact the Tasmanian Devil makes for a great cameo from a Looney Tunes star. The jokes surrounding Taz from the Warners are funny and the songs are super catchy despite being short. The twist at the end where instead of Taz becoming a prince, he becomes a prince before Dot changes him back, is a nice subversion of the Disney story. I really enjoyed this segment, and when I first watching the opening, I laughed so hard I think my parents though something was wrong with me. Just a fantastic watch.

"Boo Happens":

I'll be honest, when I first watched the Chicken Boo segments back in 2020, they were my least favorite segments of all. I hated how repetitive they were, and I disliked the titular character especially. Now, a few years later, I don't hate these segments as much as others (i.e. Buttons and Mindy, Katie-Ka Boom, The Hip-Hippos), but they can still be bland. Luckily, this segment is one of the better Chicken Boo sketches. The setup is interesting, being a Forrest Gump parody and all, and the plot at least has a purpose. I like the narration and the allusions to the titular movie were amusing I can't praise it too much since it is a Chicken Boo segment and all, but out of the entire lot, this is one of the better segments featuring this giant chicken.

"Noel":

This is one of the musical highlights for the show in my opinion. It's an amazing piece that contains funny moments, great rhymes, and it definitely puts you in the holiday mood, though this was released many months before Christmas. The cleverness of the different rhymes and the substitutions for the word noel are so well done that it's shocking. The fact that the whole song just stems from a decent pun is frankly hilarious. I love how it's not only Yakko doing the song, as Wakko and Dot also join in. The animation is so charming and simple, but it works. It makes it feel like a Christmas song, while subverting expectations in that traditional Animaniacs way. This song definitely puts me in a good mood while also being really funny. It's not as good as songs like Yakko's World and There's Only One of You, but it stands on its own as a classic. If you want a Christmas melody from this show that will make you smile, or laugh, I recommend this 100%.

Cold Ending:

If there's a great beginning, a great ending will follow. And in terms of Animaniacs, this is by far the best ending to an episode in the franchise's history. Just an ending bit where the Warners wish us farewell, only for the cameras to keep rolling with the siblings making random remarks about different things, including the cast and crew. It seems simple, but it's so well done. This is where the voice acting and writing really stand out. I mean, you couldn't get a more perfect situation; Yakko, Wakko, and Dot picking on the crew who made the show, and even referencing their own voice actors is so hysterical, I was wheezing after first seeing this. The delivery of the lines is great, with the timing landing so well. They even still make pop culture references; can you get any better than this? It's a very meta portion of the episode, but that's the fun of it. These writers were paid to make the Warners talk about the people who worked on the show, and it, of course, went incredibly well. When the siblings finally realize the camera is still rolling and that their mics are still on, it's so humorous. This is a very tounge-and-cheek way of referencing the amazing talent behind Animaniacs and I couldn't be more happier this was how this episode and TMS's animation contributions ended. What a perfect way to wrap up one of this show's last great stands.

Conclusion:

While this episode was made in the Kids WB era of Animaniacs, it still managed to make an impact. Noel is still fondly remembered, "Cutie and the Beast" is named a highlight, and the cold ending is also acknowledged by many a fan. Though I never say Animaniacs got outright terrible, it did suffer from some failings in the writing department while other shows, mainly its spin-off series Pinky and The Brain flourished. This episode still proves that there were some decent writers working on the show, and I consider it to be one of the last outstanding things this show ever did. Not everything here is amazing, but there is enough great things here to justify my opinion on it. The team did an amazing job and the voice actors brought their a-game once again. I love this episode and I recommend it very highly. Well done Animaniacs team. Happy 27th Anniversary to these fantastic segments!

And that's it. I hope you guys enjoyed this new idea I had about reviewing Animaniacs segments. I plan on making two very big posts in the upcoming weeks, so I'm very excited about that. Stay tuned! Thank you everyone for reading and have a great day! Stay zany to the max!!!

[prongsmydeer]

Things I Liked About Perfect Propose (2024):

Having a main character who outright and clearly, at the beginning, says he is gay without caveat or needing to explain it

The exploration on how a toxic work environment can drain you in every part of your life ("But I don't feel anything anymore.")

Kaneko showing how much a good manager/team lead can keep you afloat in a job, and then Hiro taking that on himself ("I refuse! Sakamoto-san has been working hard enough.")

The revelation that being able to avoid conflict and anger isn't always a healthy thing, and in Kai's case comes from a lack of expectation that he will receive support ("When I asked him to leave the store, his reaction was as indifferent as when I told him not to visit." "He probably doesn't expect much.")

The push and pull of Kai always voicing what he wants, while still giving Hiro the space to decide whether or not he wants the same thing. ("By creating an escape route like this, that's why I want to keep on spoiling him.)

The trope which is quickly becoming a favourite of mine, the let-me-seriously-consider-my-feelings-and-let-you-know! ("I need time. Time to properly face you and then give you an answer.")

The trope subversion of Kai saying that he hasn't had feelings for Hiro the whole time he's known him, even if Hiro is the only person he's seriously liked

Mr. Kenji and his gruff but caring relationship with Kai

Kai's legitimate hesitation to change his and Hiro's relationship given how his bonds with people have resulted in disappointment and guilt ("Being involved with people is heavy.")

How unambiguous Hiro's confession is despite not using the word love ("I'll give you my remaining years!" / "It feels like a proposal, doesn't it?" "It is a proposal.")

Things I Didn't Like About Perfect Propose (2024)

Mainly the episode 1 insomnia [redacted]. For why? I get that's coming from the source material, but it's reinforcing a reprehensible trope (on top of being a stereotype that can actually be used to harm real people) and if you wanted a physical intimacy in the first ep, I feel like there are better ways to do it

While their adult friendship and childhood friendship are both fine on their own, and I know they've not seen each other for more than 10 years, the optics of having such a large age gap in their initial friendship (elementary and high school) and then going on to date (and/or get engaged) are a little wild

It is one of many, many shows that will only verbally categorize characters as straight or gay. ("I'm gay." / "Well, Hirokuni, you're straight.") It is obvious by the end of the show that Hiro is capable of attraction to multiple genders, why will we say every word but bisexual?

Hiyori did not need to keep fixating on Hiro being with a guy. That's your coworker, leave him be!

I wish a bit that they explored more of what exactly Kai likes about Hiro aside from being needed, because for Kai we can see Hiro admiring his cooking, being endeared by his confidence, his comforting, even enjoying talking to him on the phone. But we don't see that for Kai, and Kai doesn't see what we as the audience see about Hiro being thoughtful by bringing his colleagues snacks and sending them home, or being dedicated by showing up hours early so he can go to the festival on time and running to get Kai yakisoba when his day goes too long, or being selfless standing up for Sakamoto and taking on a double workload so his junior doesn't burned out. Even if Kai's feelings are established, I want to hear more of why he likes Hiro so much voiced. Especially with the show's premise being rooted in reconnecting with a former friend. What do you like now?

While I love that Kai has a support system in Mr. Kenji in his way, and I understand he is working through a lifetime of trauma, I think Kai needs some friends! Get a friend, Kai. I would've loved if he actually got that drink with his coworker, in the same way Hiro has an ongoing friendship with Kaneko and his other colleagues

[h3l1k3]

I've officially been on HRT for 2 years now.

For some reason the end of year 2 feels like a much bigger deal than the end of year 1. I guess that one year ago I was still very much "in the middle of it" and transitioning related things were a lot more present in my mind back then. They still are, and I'm still "in the middle of it" (still one some waiting lists for treatments I want at least), but the feeling is different. All that stuff is in the back burner while I work on things that seem more important to me in the present moment. After 2 years on HRT it feels like I've "made it" somehow.

It'a interesting thinking back to earlier points of my transition - and to the time before I started transitioning. It feels like life was somehow easier back then, but in a way I would never wish to return to. I spent years just going through the motions and doing what I thought I had to do until I'd be able to go on hormones. I remember the 1st month's relief and euphoria from finally getting what I had wanted for so long and the terrible depression of month 2 and 3 once it finally sank in what a long wait it'd be before I'd start seeing tangible results but without all the defence mechanisms that had kept me going for years before. I was able to power through so much by thinking about how in some distant future I'd be able to transition, but once I had it in my grasp, having to wait any longer for the life I wanted felt unbearable.

That's a striking contrast between my life pre- and post-hrt. Pre-hrt I struggled to see a future for myself - post-hrt the full weight of the future is constantly pushing down on me. I detest my younger self for the decisions she made when she couldn't see a future for herself, because now the me that wants nothing more than to see her vision of tomorrow fulfilled has to pay the price.

It feels like everything is different now - but nothing has changed at all. I'm still the same person I think. I don't think there's been a marked change in my personality at least. But the things on my mind now are so different from the ones I worried about earlier into my transition. I remember "chasing the mean": wishing I could rid myself of every little thing that made me deviate from the norm of a regular woman. Some worries pertaining to that have long been fixed by hormones while others just seem silly to me now. I remember wishing that I could be shorter - but what for? I actually quite enjoy some of the things that make me stand out, like being a little tall for a woman.

But that has perhaps been the biggest struggle for me this last half a year or so. I recall venting to my partner about how frustrated I felt with how much of what is expected of women revolves around heteronormative gender roles. As a trans woman exclusively attracted to women, this is a space that feels hard to navigate sometimes. To be a lesbian in a heteronormative culture is in itself a subversion of womanhood. But to subvert womanhood, you must first be recognized as a woman.

But with every day that passes I become more confident in who I am, and the world seems to perceive me as such as well. As much trouble as transitioning has been, I only wish I had gotten started with it sooner.