#literally. i showed up after we saw that figure online

[cloverstarsys]

I can confirm, it does not exist on the goodsmile us website, which likely means it isn't being manufactured any more... which makes the high price tag make sense, even though it is still very disappointing

Of course our favorite anime figure store has my figma (that I've wanted to get since I initially showed up here)... and of course it's $160

[jynxpsiche]

Not Tangerine already planning on fathering reader's baby as his won, cause hey, the baby also has blue eyes so he can totally pass of as their son.

Also imagine if the real dad ever shows up and tries come back into the baby's life and Tangerine is all conflicted cause he loves the kid as if it's his own son :/

OH MY GOD THANK U SO MUCH ANON FOR REQUESTING THIS! LITERALLY CHEF KISS! We love a jealous Tangerine <3

Unwanted texts

💌. Summary: unanswered texts from her, lead Tangerine to meet someone he already despised…

or

…Tangerine meets the baby’s biological father for the first time.

💌. Warning: SWEARING. LIKE A LOT! Jealous Tangerine, female reader, canon gore. English is not my first language! I don’t know many British slangs!

X

c’mon babe

I just wanna meet the baby

be there for them, y’know?

pls answer me

It’s been already a couple of days and sometimes, during different hours of the day and night, your phone would ding with notifications…from him.

Your ex boyfriend.

The biological father of your precious baby.

The whole situation pissed you off. Firstly, when he found out about your pregnancy, he decided to leave without an explanation and leave you alone. Then he had the nerve to message you after god knows how many years.

It was ridiculous. He was ridiculous.

But obviously you couldn’t ask for any type of help from Tangerine.

He was quite the protective type, especially if the main cause was a shitty ex-boyfriend.

Surely he would have gone feral if he found out about your ex’s sudden texts. That’s why you decided to keep the thing for yourself and just…ghost him.

But who would have known that you would end up calming down a rather irate Tangerine?

However, it’s important to start from the beginning.

It was a day off for Tan, which meant that he would have spent the entire day with you and his little one. But since it was still too early to get up, for now he simply drank in your warmth and cuddled your body closer to his, without waking you up.

The curly man was affectionate only with his girl and his baby, neither to his brother he showed this side of his. He wasn’t ashamed of it, he just had a reputation to defend.

His chin was placed on your head while you were all nuzzled in the crook of his neck. His strong and bulky arms were tightly wrapped around your waist, not allowing you to leave. Not that you wanted to.

Only your soft breaths echoed through the room. But the peaceful atmosphere was interrupted by the ping of a notification. The sound made him grimace, but not waking up from his slumber.

Then another ping, closely followed by another and another one.

Now Tangerine was fully awake, his half-closed eyes glaring at the device on your nightstand. When he noticed no more ding’s came from your phone, he softly pecked your forehead before trying to fall asleep again.

But then again. A new message.

Groaning softly, Tan lifted himself from the bed, before pecking your forehead again and assured that you didn’t wake up.

He was not standing on your side of the bed, the device on your nightstand calling for him to check what had interrupted his sleep.

With a furrowed and irritated expression, Tangerine unlocked your phone, noticing new messages unopened. They had been sent just a couple of minutes ago.

He quickly glanced at your sleeping figure, a strange feeling bubbling in his chest. His expression furrowed more when he saw the contact’s name. X.

Who the fuck was that?

But he surely was took by anger when he read the multiple messages he sent you.

He wasn’t only a dickhead, but he was also the biological father of his son.

His bloodshot eyes read every line and every word of every message he dared to sent you. His fingers gradually tightening their grip around the device.

The another ding. Another message.

X

I know ur reading the texts

ur online

u finally have the courage to read what I’ve been sending you

u stopped ghosting me huh?

God you’re such a bitch sometimes…

His vision darkened at the last text he sent, nostrils fuming with rage.

X

I want to see the kid

Meet me here

Xx xx xx, xx

“Tan? You good?” Your sleepy and raspy voice reached his ears and immediately he turned towards you, his furious expression never leaving his face.

You noticed, of course. Slowly you rose from your spot on the comfy bed and lazily dragged herself up to his tense figure, wrapping her delicate arms around his waist.

A soft kiss on his back.

“What is making you so tense?” You whispered against his skin, your hands gently rubbing his sides. Tan slightly crocked his head in your direction, his brows still furrowed. A sigh left his lips.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He instead asked with a low tone laced with rage. “Why did you hide it from me?” His tone showed how he strongly demanded an answer.

“I could have handle it. I simply didn’t answer his texts to show him how an insignificant being like him should be six feet under. To show him how he was a nobody to me anymore.” Your tone was flat, laced with venom, finally expressing all your suppressed rage.

His expression immediately softened at your words, his brows relaxing and the wrinkles on his forehead disappearing. The tails of his mouth slightly raised in an almost visible smile.

But you noticed it.

When he turned in your direction, his hands on your waist, his lips left a soft peck on your forehead. His face was calm and so close to yours.

“I’m goin’ to take care of him. Don’ worry.” He whispered, his soothing voice sending you in a sleepy mood. A light yawn left your mouth. He chuckled at your reaction.

“Now go to sleep love.”

After you fell into another peaceful but deep slumber, Tangerine got to work.

With Lem’s help (after calling him for twenty minuets straight, the poor man was sleeping) he managed to find the phone location and so the location of the fucker.

It was now 3:45 am and Tan was alone in a desert neighbourhood. Silence was his only company at the moment.

He stood still in front of an apartment complex, his eyes fixed on a specific window while the cigarette in his hand slowly burnt.

With a flick he tossed the small nicotine stick and put it out with a stomp of his foot. His lips were curled into an annoyed curl.

Silently, he climbed the fire escape with big steps and in a blink of an eye his shadow was printed in front of the covered window, blinds hiding the inside.

But a faint light from behind them immediately caught his attention, a sadistic grin creeping on his moustache.

His hand grabbed the gun from his pocket and he shot the window’s lock, allowing him to access to the apartment.

Frantic, disconnected noises echoed from inside. Tangerine knew the fucker heard him.

Only when he entered he was met with a younger, dull man, his face pale and his eyes wide from fear. “Who…who the fuck are you?!” He half shouted, his voice cracking a bit.

The man wanted to show his composure so bad, show him how collected and tough he was. But in reality, he was shitting in his pants.

With great strides, Tangerine approached the trembling man, his pistol clearly visible. “‘s not important, is it? Wha’ is important is why you fuckin’ harassing my love with your insipid messages.” He spat out in a hard tone, his rigid stare piercing the man’s soul.

The man’s eyes frantically wandered around, he is searching something to defend himself thought Tan. Quick pants from the man often broke the silence in the room.

He took a step back, his hands shaking uncontrollably. His body language was visibly betraying him. “Just…the fuck you want from me?!” He continued in a fake authoritative voice.

Tangerine held his face high, communicating how he was in control. Slowly his arm raised and he pointed the gun in the man’s forehead.

“I want you to delete her number, to forget about her and the baby and to never contact her again.” He stated with calm rage. His tone extremely sharp.

When the man was the pistol pointed at his head, his confident mask fell, his eyes filled with tears and his still standing posture crouched on himself. Shamelessly he nodded his head at every request, his voice dead in the back of his throat.

Suddenly, Tangerine shot the man in the leg and he stumbled back. A cry came out from his mouth.

“This’s your last warnin’.”

[pokestudentjune]

In all honesty I'm pretty new to this whole rotomblr stuff, and I'm not all to osure how to work it that well.. But I'd still like someplace to document my life and experiences, as well as share my knowledge about pokemon and plants! Got plenty of cute pics of my pokemon and the ones I meet as well! Please feel free to reach out with asks about myself, my pokemon, or anything in general-- I'll do my best to answer to the best of my ability :)

Here is my current travel team!

Lotus the Ivsaur

Modest, highly persistent. A water lotus variant Ivysaur with a water/grass typing, and practically my soulmate. My first officially owned pokemon, gotten from my grandmothers venusaur as a child. Lotus has grown and matured with me through the years, and is always looking out for me! Shes trained in battle and performance, but we have since retired from coordinating and she'd rather sit back and experience life as it comes.

Scout the Lopunny

Sassy, likes to fight. One of my first wild-caught pokemon, and both me and Lotus's best friend. Shes quite a fan of my more feminine interests, often asking to share my clothes and music. Shes definitely one of my more battle + performance savvy pokemon, and we're working on learning mega evolution together! She wears a light blue letterman jacket I bought for her once, she wanted to dress similarly to an idol group we saw online once!

Grim the Joltik

Jolly, very finicky. He is literally the sweetest little baby ever. He was an unexpected capture, having hopped onto my phone one day and refusing to leave. He loves to suck out the battery life from practically my devices which drives me insane, but I wouldnt trade him for the world. Despite being small for the past few years, I think he doesnt want to evolve which is fine by me! I think he enjoys riding on my head or shoulder.

Jasper the Typhlosion

Rash, quick to fight. A large, bulky, fluffy, shiny typhlosion with a scar across his muzzle. Rescued from a "backyard zoo" situation, it took a long long time to fully gain his trust, but it was worth it. Hes very standoffish but protective of me and the team. Lotus was a big help in calming him during the beginning, and now he enjoys battling to blow off some steam.

Harlequin the Banette

Quirky, impetuous and silly. Perhaps my first ever pokemon friend. We met when I was a small child and he was still a shuppet. Its a bit of a long story, but he stuck through with me during some negative times within my early years even as a wild pokemon, and would frequently visit to keep me entertained through the years. I didn't catch him for many years, but one day after being a trainer for a while, I asked him if he'd like to join my team and has stuck around since. He wears a chunky bandana on his neck thats practically the size of him.

Jade the Noivern

Adamant, alert to sounds. One of the newer additions to the group, i had caught her within a cave and she showed fighting spirit right off the bat. I took the time to train her in between my studies and she evolved into a speed demon. She absolutely LOVES flying and I myself had always wanted to ride on a flying pokemons back, so its a win-win. She looks up to Jasper, and they often spar together.

I have plenty of other pokemon back at home that I'll introduce when the time comes, but these are the ones I think are best suited to help me during my studies! Perhaps I'll switch around the team, maybe I wont. It takes a while to transfer pokemon across regions but who knows where life will take me!

// OOC

Hello hello! Just like June, I am very unfamilliar with tumblr as its been years since I last used it, but I've been religiously stalking rotomblr for years now and i figured its my time to make a blog! Heres a few things about how I'll be running this blog :3

• This will be a mix of anime and game, keeping it semi realistic as I love biology and science but still want to keep some magic from the pokemon games included!

• June is basically a self insert so no weird stuff!

•For Junes universe, fakemon, sentient pokemon, or pokemon/human hybrids or anything similar to that doesnt exist-- again, I'm keeping it a bit semi realistic. Pokemon crossbreeds are fine though!

• This is very casual!! Just for fun slice of life blog :3

• In this world, legendaries are gods and greatly affect the environment, so June may not interact with those who "own" legendaries because she greatly frowns upon messing with the natural order of things.

• Feel free to dm me or send me asks ! I'd love to get to know the community more :)

• Also i might not do many fully pieces and more colored sketches because I am very busy irl unfortunately

• Im okay with interactions from other OCs and canon characters !

If you want to see my art look at #june pics ! working on tags for informational stuff but #june talks will have some fun pokemon info + junes story so far!

• Pelliper Mail is : OPEN

• Magic Anon is : CLOSED

[kaycynyrs]

Let's talk about Christopher Diaz in fanfic

I want to preface this by saying I'm pretty new to the fandom. I joined a few months or so before season 7 started dropping. So I'm probably not the best source for information when it comes to the show, but I definitely wanted to throw my hat into the ring. I'm aware that Chris is aging during the course of the show, and that he was much younger when he was first introduced, but it seems to me that a lot of fanfic writers and/or people in this fandom kinda struggle to realistically write and/or portray accurate representation of a preteen/early teenager as Chris is now.

I have absolutely no idea if maybe it's some kinda weird way of seemingly (kinda horribly) trying to portray disability, or maybe people in the 911 fandom just do not spend time around pre-teens, but as someone who does spend a lot of time with a pre-teen (specifically my 12 y/o brother) I definitely figured I could give some insight into this topic.

Now I do want to clarify before I begin, that in no way shape or form am I talking about the disabled portion of Chris' experience. I don't have the knowledge or firsthand experience or anything like that to even begin to try and be a voice on that topic, and if anyone else could give insight into that portion of Chris' experience, I welcome it gladly. Especially because it's an integral part of him and introduces some experiences that other pre-teens won't have to deal with which can change how Chris reacts/deals with situations.

What I can accurately talk about though is the things I've noticed in my brother as he goes through this phase of his life. I can also compare his experiences to what I remember from when I was his age, and I'm noticing he's going through certain things that I went through too. I know everyone is different, but hopefully this insight can help some people begin to understand Chris as he is now.

Now, on top of all the slow but noticeable bodily changes, these little sass masters are emotionally volatile. As in, the littlest things seem to be the end of the world. Especially if he's (my brother) is overtired. He tends to have tunnel vision, and he wants things to go his way. If it doesn't immediately go as planned, he tends to get very very frustrated. When that happens, he tends to blow up then go into his room until he's calmed down. After he's calm, then productive conversation can happen.

Kids Chris' age also tend to enjoy video games (like Roblox, or console games) more than they do coloring or legos or any physical toy. Not saying my brother has stopped playing with them all together, but it's definitely slowed down. If he were to play with legos, it'd more likely be a complicated lego set. Or complicated arts and crafts. His most recent projects being origami swords and origami paper dragons. Like, please don't forget that Chris is a good artist and is capable of drawing accurate human hearts.

I've also noticed that kids will go through a collecting phase. They'll collect anything and everything and it'll be the weirdest shit you could never predict. My brother when he was a bit younger literally stole every single sock in the house for his "sock collection" and stuffed an entire drawer full of them. Now he's moved on to collecting golf balls.

And, whether we like it or not, these kids are on the internet. My brother at least is very very influenced by online trends. Half the things he's interested in he saw on social media first. But that means that these kids have a rich meme culture. They have their own in jokes and concepts, same as we did growing up. And sure, some of the jokes are the same. I mean heck, my brother won't shut up with the "your mom" jokes, but they also have things like skibbidy toilet, chippi chippi choppa choppa, and other memes. (I have a list of current tween memes in my notes, but that can be a separate post if people truly want it)

Like it's such a missed funny opportunity! To have Chris reference current memes or current sayings like "gyot, what the sigma, and womp womp," and just having every single adult within the immediate vicinity be confused as fuck, and of course the kids won't explain, because why would they. It's funny to them that the adults are confused. Which also pairs with the amount of sass contained in their tiny orifices. Their come backs are insane and not to be trifled with. My brother has burned me so many times and so well that for all intents and purposes I should be a pile of ash on floor, honestly and truly.

Now, when it comes to romance, I have no idea when that changes. I think Chris is around 14 in the most recent season? And he's gone through a little heartbreaker phase, but currently, my brother at 12 is absolutely disgusted by romance. I myself am demisexual so I'm not a good reference for that, and can't really comment on when people start feeling attraction for others. But considering it's being portrayed in the show, I think it could be something to lean into as well.

All of this to say, Chris won't be this picture perfect baby all of the time. He'll get angry, frustrated, sad. Give people the silent treatment. He'll be weird and strange and say stupid shit. He'll also probably occasionally get confused over certain sayings he's never heard before. (E.g similes commonly used in writing) He'll try to get out of chores, and homework, and he'll whine and complain. His body is changing, he's probably experiencing growing pains, and he's probably starting to discover more adult things. But he'll also have his moments of insightfulness and humor. He's a little adult! And he should be allowed to be portrayed that way! Let Chris be a multidimensional character! It's what he deserves! And just to make it clear, this goes for every pre-teen on 911. I've just noticed the infantilisation of Chris a lot more than say Denny.

Please let me know your thoughts on this matter! I'd love to hear them! Have a wonderful day!

[storiesforallfandoms]

happy birthday ~ javi gutierrez;the unbearable weight of massive talent

word count: 2841

request?: no

description: in which she gets her husband the best birthday gift of his life: nic cage

pairing: javi gutierrez x female!reader

warnings: swearing

masterlist (one, two, three)

It felt almost impossible to come up with a good gift for Javi. What do you get the man who has everything? Literally everything. Javi had more money than most people could ever dream of, and he used that money to buy whatever he wanted. It was infuriating. I could never think of good birthday gifts for him because whatever I could think of, he got it for himself.

There was one gift I could possibly get him that would blow his mind. It was a long shot, but if I could pull it off then I would be giving him the best gift he’d ever receive in his entire life.

“Gabriela, I need your help,” I said to her one morning just after Javi had left with Lucas. “I want to try and get Nic Cage to come make an appearance at Javi’s birthday party.”

Gabriela’s eyes widened. “That’s...a huge deal, (Y/N).”

“I know, and I know it’s a long shot because he’s a big actor who is probably very busy, but I know Javi would lose his mind if we could make this happen. I’ll do whatever it takes. However much money he wants, free accommodations at the mansion, I’ll even try to pay for whatever his passion project is to be made. Anything he wants.” I took Gabriela’s hands in mine. “Please, Gabriela. Javi would love this.”

She thought for a few moments before squeezing my hands. “I’ll look for the contact info for his agent online.”

Turns out, it’s not that hard to find Nic Cage’s agent’s contact info online. Actually, it was the first thing that popped up when we Googled “Nicolas Cage agent contact info”. We wrote his agent a lengthy email, basically begging for Nic Cage to come to Javi’s birthday party. I even threw in an offer of one million dollars just to show up to the party. We hit send, waiting with baited breath for a response.

Of course, I knew we wouldn’t get a response right away. But as the days passed and still nothing, my anxiety began to grow. I was constantly refreshing my email, hoping that a new email would arrive already. I was trying not to be too obvious, but Javi noticed that I was distracted very quickly.

“Is everything alright, mi amor?” he asked me one morning when I checked my phone during breakfast. It was very unlike me to be on my phone at the table, but I wasn’t thinking about anything besides getting a response to this damn email. “You seem...distracted.”

“I’m sorry, honey. It’s just...something I’m planning for your birthday.”

His eyes brightened. “For my birthday, you say? Any hints?”

I smiled and leaned in close to him. “Absolutely not.”

He playfully groaned, but closed the small gap between us to kiss me.

A week had passed by and I started to give up hope. I had let go of the idea when my phone chimed, signaling an incoming email. When I opened it I had to refrain from screaming with joy.

The email read, “Dear Mrs. Gutierrez. Mr. Cage has accepted your offer to appear at your event. Please provide us with the details as well as location and travel details.”

It was hard to contain my excitement around Javi. I didn’t want to give away the surprise, but every time I looked at him I kept thinking about how excited he was going to be when he saw the Nic Cage at his birthday party. It was going to be the hardest secret I ever had to keep.

The time flew by, luckily, and before I knew it, I was on my way to the dock to meet Nicolas Cage. I had assigned one person to pick up Nic in the boat to try and minimize the chances of Javi finding out about the surprise. Besids me, only two people knew: Gabriela and Oscar, one of Javi’s men who I had escort Nic to our home. I watched as the boat came closer and closer. I could see Oscar driving while an unfamiliar figure was slumped in the back of the boat.

Nic fucking Cage.

I tried to keep myself composed as the boat docked and Oscar helped Nic to unload his luggage. He was so tall. He was almost intimidating in person.

“Mr. Cage,” I said. “Thank you so much for coming.”

“Yeah, well, it’s hard to pass up a gig that’s offering a million dollars just to show up,” he responded. “What’s the deal with this party, anyways? Because if the couple is expecting me to engage in some form of voyeurism, or something along those lines, they are going to be very disappointed.”

I was taken back by his suggestion. He was looking at me, waiting for a response, while I stood there looking like an idiot with my mouth hanging open.

“N-No,” I finally said. “It’s nothing like that. My husband is a huge fan of your work. I wanted to surprise him with an appearance from you for his birthday. You just have to be there, talk to him, share some stories from the sets of your movies maybe.”

His face went pale. “You...you’re Mrs. Gutierrez?”

“Yes, I am.”

He was left just as speechless as I felt. We looked at each other for a long time, an awkward feeling in the air. Finally, I gestured for him to follow me and Oscar to the car that was waiting to take us back to the house. I got into the front seat as Oscar loaded Nic’s luggage into the trunk as Nic got into the back seat.

The ride was silent for a while. I was still more nervous over the fact that I was in the same car as Nic Cage than I was upset over what Nic had said. But I could tell he was embarrassed. I just wasn’t sure how to put his mind as ease when I was too starstruck to string a sentence together.

“Listen,” he said, finally breaking the awkward silence. “I’m sorry for what I said earlier. You have to understand that this was a bizarre request I got to come to a birthday party, for a large sum of money. I had no idea what to expect.”

“Oh, it’s okay. I understand. Honestly, I didn’t even think your agent would respond, so I didn’t plan out your appearance much until you said yes.”

“So, what is the plan?”

“The party isn’t until tomorrow evening, so we have the guest house set up for you to stay in. Gabriela, mine and Javi’s assistant, will come and get you, and usher you to the party without Javi noticing. I have a speech planned, that will be your entrance.”

Nic was nodding along as I spoke. When I finished, he said, “You must really love this Javi to go through so much effort for a birthday gift.”

I smiled. “Well, I married him for a reason.”

~~~~~~

The next night, I was stood in front of one of the full length mirrors in mine and Javi’s room. I had changed into the dress I had found on our bed that afternoon, with a note attached to it that said, “Wear this tonight, mi amor xo”.

Typical of Javi to buy me something to wear on his birthday.

I had to admit, Javi’s taste in dresses was always phenomenal. I had one closet dedicated to all the dresses he has bought me in the past. They had never been wore more than once, but they were too beautiful to let go of. This one was no different. It was a long, off the shoulder, velvet dress in a deep red color. I pulled a pair of champagne colored heels from the closet to wear with it, and a gold necklace Javi had gotten for me won our first anniversary.

Two arms wrapped around my waist as a head of curly brown hair buried itself against my neck.

“You look beautiful, mi amor,” Javi said as he pressed a light kiss on the nape of my neck.

“Thank you,” I said. “Helps that I seem to have a husband with the best fashion sense in the world.”

I turned my head to look up at him. He kissed my lips as I leaned back against him. His hands ran over the soft material of my dress, exploring my body as his tongue ran across my bottom lip.

“What if we ditch the party and stay up here so I can take this dress off of you instead?” he suggested.

I giggled. “Ditch your own birthday party?” He nodded and began kissing my neck again. “You can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

I turned in his arms to look up at him. “Because there are nearly a hundred people down in our courtyard waiting to celebrate you. You can’t just ditch them.”

Javi groaned, burying his head in the crook of my neck. It felt nearly impossible to reject his offer when he was kissing me in the right spot, touching me in the right spots, and in general just looked so fucking handsome. I just wanted to let him take the dress off of me and do whatever he wanted to me.

But my mind drifted back to the special guest I had waiting to make an appearance, and that was enough for me to push Javi away.

“We can’t miss your party,” I told him. “Besides, I have an amazing present for you.”

He raised an eyebrow at me. “One that requires us going to the party?” I nodded. “Well, now you’ve managed to convince me.”

I kissed his nose and took his hands in mine, pulling him out of our room and to the party that was kicking off down below.

We were met with cheers and a chorus of “Happy Birthday!”s. Lucas passed both of us a glass of champagne and made a quick toast in Javi’s honor. There was more cheering. I looked up to see Javi was positively glowing with happiness. I smiled at him, knowing that his gift was going to up this happiness even more.

I let Javi socialize for nearly an hour. Actually, it was hard to get him away from someone once he had started talking, but I figured it was his party so he deserved to talk to whoever he wanted for however long he wanted. But, the more time ticked on, the more anxious I grew. I didn’t want to interrupt his conversation, but I didn’t want to leave Nic waiting too long to make his entrance.

Luckily, Gabriela was the one to finally draw everyone’s attention as she got on stage and tapped a fork against her champagne glass. The crowd went silent and turned towards her.

“Ladies and gentlemen, before we continue with the festivities tonight, there was someone who wanted to say a few words in honor of the birthday boy,” she said. “Everybody, please give it up for (Y/N) Gutierrez.”

The crowd cheered as I made my way towards the stage. I put my arms out to Gabriela to pull her into a hug, and she whispered in my ear, “He’s ready.”

I mouthed “Thank you” to her as we pulled away before turning to the crowd of people who were looking at me.

“Hello everyone,” I started. “I don’t usually make a spectacle like this at Javi’s birthdays, but this year is different. For one, I believe that a man as incredible as Javi deserves the spectacle of his wife giving a super sappy speech about how much she loves him and how amazing he is. He deserves it, but that’s not the speech you’re getting tonight, so don’t hold your breath.” The audience chuckled. “Although, I will say that Javi is one of the most kindhearted men I have ever known. Getting to share my life with him has been the greatest privilege for me.”

I met Javi’s eyes in the crowd. He was smiling, admiration showing on his face. When I first started dating Javi, Lucas would say that Javi looked at me the way Disney princes looked at their princesses. I used to laugh it off, until I actually noticed it one day. I think that was the moment I knew Javi was in love with me, and the moment I realized I was in love with him, too.

“And all of that brings me to the second reason I decided to make a speech tonight,” I continued. “Because Javi is such an amazing person, I often try to give him the best gifts I can think of. That’s not exactly easy when you’re husband is richer than God and tends to like buying things for himself. But, tonight, I think I have finally figured out what the best gift in the world for Javi would be. And it’s definitely something I knew he has never tried to purchase for himself.”

I looked behind me. Nic was stood far enough away from the stage that no one would notice him unless they were actually looking, but close enough that he could hear me talking and knew when he would come in. He met my eyes and gave me a thumbs up. I smiled back at him before turning back to the awaiting crowd.

“Javi, here is my gift for you.” I made a grand gesture with my arms and said, “Nicolas Cage!”

A collective gasp floated through the crowd as Nic stepped up onto the stage. I looked back at Javi to see that his eyes were so wide they were nearly popping out of his head. He was paralyzed in place. I wasn’t even sure if he was breathing. I stepped off the stage and extended a hand to him.

“Come meet your hero,” I said.

“You got Nicolas Cage?” he questioned, his voice so quiet I almost couldn’t hear him. “You got the actual Nicolas Cage to come to my birthday party? This is what you’ve been planning for all this time?”

“I said I wanted to get you the best gift ever,” I reminded him. “Happy birthday, my love.”

He was finally spurred into movement. He took my hand and let me lead him towards the stage, where his hero was stood waiting. Nic smiled and extended a hand to Javi. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Javi. Your wife told me all about you.”

Javi shook his hand, but didn’t speak. I lightly nudged him, which snapped him out of his starstruck trance and got him to start talking.

The rest of the night was spent with basically everyone wanting to talk to Nic. Eventually, Javi was able to pull himself away so that Nic could speak to the crowd about whatever they wanted to hear. Javi found his way back to my side and pulled me close to him. I leaned into his embrace, watching his child-like wonder towards the man he had loved and admired for so long. I knew this whole thing was a success, and that’s all that mattered to me.

The night finally came to an end as the crowd, still also starstruck by the sudden appearance of a celebrity, reluctantly began to leave. Javi offered Nic one of the spare rooms in our mansions and called for one of his men to collect Nic’s things to bring up. I thanked the actor again for coming before leaving the two men so I could get ready for bed. As much as I loved seeing Javi’s happiness, the heels were starting to hurt my feet and I was started to grow tired.

I didn’t expect to see Javi before I fell asleep, so when he came into our room just as I was getting into bed, I was a little shocked.

“You mujer hermosa,” he said, crossing the room to stand next to me. “I can’t believe you did this for me.”

“Was it the best gift ever?” I asked.

“Better than the best gift ever. I don’t know how anyone will ever top what you gave me tonight,” he said.

I beamed with pride. “Well, that’s all that matters to me then. I’ve finally figured out something to give you that you haven’t gotten for yourself yet.”

He cupped my face in his hands and pulled me in for a kiss. It was sweet and passionate, and his hands found their way to the small of my back to pull me as close against him as I could. I started to giggle against his lips as he backed us up towards the bed, then we both toppled over onto the soft mattress.

“I love you so much,” he said. “I’m the luckiest man in the world to have such an incredible wife.”

“I love you, too,” I said. “And you are very lucky to have me.”

He chuckled and kissed me again so feverishly that I completely forgot about being tired.

[charmedreincarnation]

My experience with my waiting room 🌌🌌

What is a waiting room

Firstly, A waiting room is simpily just another reality within realities where individuals can transition between two different states of being. There are many variations of waiting rooms, but they all serve the same purpose – to bridge the gap between different realities. Personally for me as a permeant shifter, I will eventually make my current waiting room my new point of origin. That just basically means instead of going to heaven or coming back here after “death” or whatever I just go to my waiting room when I’m done with lives. But you can use it however you want, that’s just how I use mine. Or at least I will in the future. A lot of people use it to rest, learn, take mental breaks from various realities and etc :)! You can cater it to you however you like just as you would any other reality because that’s literally what it is.

My first shift to my waiting room

My first ever shift which I had no intentions of going to, was a waiting room of sort. I remember it was winter and I was balls deep into my seasonal depression and I was having a horrible time at work. I literally just wanted to die and I remember using a meditation to calm my crying down, and after a while I forgot about my emotions. I just asked the universe to show me anything atp to prove to me I’m not wasting my time with shifting and it does get better. After a while instead of hearing SpongeBob in the background I heard waves instead. I don’t know where the hell I was but it wasn’t my house anymore. I woke up at a beach, and I immediately knew it wasn’t a dream because I felt the warm sand on my body and when I got into the water, I felt the splash of my feet and saw my reflection clearly. Honestly I was experiencing vivid tranquility so I didn’t really care where I was. I just wasn’t sad or tired anymore. I ended up falling asleep on the beach for what felt like I couple of hours but before I did I just hoped I didn’t have to go to work the next day. Anyways I woke up back in this reality and well work got cancelled because of the weather even though it was not in the forecast. I don’t know if it was a random waiting room reality, or a wish void state of sort, but that was my first real out of body experience.

Anyways that’s not my real waiting room…

I became friends (online)with a sound engineer who got into shifting and wanted to use me as a test subject for a fool proof shifting subliminal using science and experiments. Well it obviously worked and I shifted to a real waiting room with intention! It was my first actual shift that I intended, and I was super happy. I spent a whole day there basically just exploring all my options. Switching the aesthetics of my waiting room like a phone case or something lol. I added various amenities, experimented spawning in people and various animals etc etc. after I came back I still had no idea what I wanted my waiting room to look like but I made this a problem for later tbh. It was a very enriching experience regardless :)

Here are the links to the subs btw sub 1, sub 2. you can also explore all the other subliminals he created, as he has a bunch !

after sometime I ended up meeting some super dope people who are all probably my twin flames and we have a group waiting room now. This makes more sense because it wasn’t the waiting room was that was the problem, I just don’t want to be alone and I love people! Plus I will spend a while in my wr and use it for essentially eternity so I’m glad I figured out my problem and filled it with awesome fulfilling people :)!

Anyways I know this wasn’t very long, vivid, or specific but I don’t spend much time in wrs as of now ..and very much use this reality as my break between realities. But if you have any more specific questions my asks are ofc open 💗

[yesiknowimshort]

looking at the fanon from canon with tim drake

(to the best of my own knowledge; take with a grain of salt; i’m open to discussion and disagreement; we can take this like an english lit class analysis)

this is inspired by discussions with @boredandboredmind about misconstrued info with jason and tim on their own posts about it.

also do not take this as hate to tim fic writers, you’re amazing and you best believe i’m checking the tim x reader tag constantly. i just want to be able to help give you easy access to half-canon-compliant info, and you can choose to take it or leave it.

and especially if you only know tim through online media (which is always valid and i’ll hear no argument!), it can be hard to differentiate between what it is “out of character, completely fanon” behaviour, and what is actually plausible.

RELATIONSHIPS

with his dad

tim’s relationship with his dad is extremely complicated. they both loved each other… but both of his parents had a very different way of showing their love to what tim needed.

for the majority of his life, his mother and father were super neglectful of him and his interests, which of course is how we had nine year old tim drake running around figuring out people’s identities and tryna convince nightwing to go back to batman bc tim said batman wouldn’t cope without a robin, as if he knew them personally.

bruce generally disapproved of tim being left alone while his parents were on business trips, so he looked out for tim a lot during those times.

after the death of tim’s mother, his father was all moody for a bit bc his company had gone to shit… oh and his wife died. anyway he was acting like mr crabs when he loses his money for a while until his physiotherapist dana winters was like “yo get a hold of your life man”. so jack attempted to reconnect with his son… but tim was already deep in the mantle of robin and hanging out with bruce wayne.

tim was a little reluctant at first but after a while he did really appreciate his dad trying to be a dad for once… but it conflicted with the life he had already made for himself.

tim was sneaking out to do hero work, skipping school, coming home in the early hours beat and bruised, being snarky and angsty to his dad, super secretive; basically coming off as a reckless hooligan teenager (even tho he really wasn’t) which made jack incredibly angry at tim a lot of the time, causing them to have a lot of fights.

jack was also super insecure as his position as tim’s dad as he felt inferior to the relationship tim had built with bruce.

so one day while tim was out, jack raided tim’s bedroom (10/10 parenting skills there, well done jack) which dana winters was horrified by and actually sided with tim when tim came home and blew up at his dad -anyway jack found out tim was robin.

he stormed to bruce and was like “fuck you and fuck my son’s role as robin. he’s going to boarding school”.

long story short, tim resumes the mantle of robin and his dad deals with it and they begin to really get along again, like a true father and son… and then his dad is murdered. tim finds him and is distraught, and that’s when we get this classic image of tim and bruce:

(it’s horrible obviously but i love this illustration so much. the way tim’s half in and out of the robin gear, the single eye you can see, the way he’s half collapsed over his father’s body and clinging to bruce for dear life) anyway then tim goes into the care of bruce wayne.

with bruce

lemme start of by saying: tim would only ever use the wayne name for business means as future ceo/controlling shareholder of W.E.

tim will always be a drake.

he quite literally made up a fake uncle so he wouldn’t get adopted by bruce, even though bruce really wanted to adopt him. not only that- he went as far as to forge a new will including this fictional uncle to avoid being bruce’s son

he struggled a lot with bruce’s “affection” after his father’s death since he never saw bruce as a father beforehand, only ever as a mentor. and of course, up until later in his robin career, he wasn’t even an orphan. he still technically wasn’t since dana winters ended up marrying his dad and becoming his step-mum, but she’s basically forgotten sadly.

he also consistently makes a point to make sure people know he made himself robin, and it wasn’t batman’s choice at all.

he appreciates bruce of course, but it’s more on an intellectual and emotional level than anything else. tim came from money (albeit, new money), and even though his parents' company basically died with his father there would’ve been some amount of inheritance money. not to mention without a shadow of a doubt, he would’ve had an account his parents had been saving for him.

living in another manor house and working around international companies and important people, wouldn’t be too different from what his life would’ve become had his parents not died.

tim would appreciate bruce not for the life he gave him, but simply because of bruce being intellectually stimulating for him. remember; tim sees the life he has as the life he made.

he reminds me of damian in the fact that both of them would struggle with dealing with people who bored them, people who couldn’t offer them anything.

anyway bruce = respected equal, bruce ≠ tim’s new dad.

 with jason and damian

boom. all you need to know.

nah but seriously...

jason attacked tim in the tt tower when he came back to life but can you really blame him? he was replaced, and it made sense for him to come after tim since as we know, tim forced himself into the role and did, technically, steal jason’s spot before bruce realistically would’ve replaced him.

but they never held that grudge throughout jason’s reintegration into the family. of course they’d have sibling fights (note that tim doesn’t think of any of his adoptive brothers as real brothers; but jason is closest to), but a little roughhousing is normal. i’m the eldest of 6 brothers and believe me, we fight all the time. literally yesterday one of them and i bit each other while fighting (if you don’t think damian and tim would do that, you’re kidding yourself). but we love each other, and if anything happened we’d jump to each other's defence.

moving onto damian...

the way tim views damian is very telling of tim’s worldview and childhood. when damian arrived, tim demanded that regardless of being batman’s son or not, damian must work to earn the love and respect of bruce, “like everybody else” he had said. clear projection from tim here, since up until dami, tim was the only one who wasn’t “wanted” per se, and also tim’s had to work for people’s affection and attention his entire life. look at his parents; they were the half-arsed “that’s great honey” and then back to their phone call type of people (well we know where tim gets his steadfast work ethic from).

anyway, tim finally had the spotlight on him for a while only to have it turned for some little genetic abnormality.

tim’s suffering from the “been the only/youngest child for too long” phenomenon; they do not believe there is room enough in one's heart for more unconditional love. it’s quite sad if you think about it; he was in his mid-late teens by this point.

tim was quite patronising of damian when they were introduced, but he quickly pulled the “i’m just messing with you” card and did try to fix it, but stubborn-as-tim damian just started to preach his favourite “i’ll inherit everything without even trying” play. this obviously pissed off tim to no end. it seemed damian knew the perfect way to get under his skin, and it was putting tim even more on edge. it made him feel insecure in his place with bruce. for the first time tim didn’t think he was gonna be able to get his way easily.

eventually though, batman assures tim that damian being his biological son doesn’t change anything that he has with tim, and that tim doesn’t have to prove anything to him.

yes, if you look up tim and damian, you can see that damian has done some horrible things to tim and the two have very thin patience for each other, but that’s simply because they both understand the perfect ways to piss each other off. it’s just so easy for the both of them that they can’t help themselves.

i also will say that damian views the relationship as much more “mortal enemies” than tim does, but he is a child several years younger than tim, so it’s natural for him to view it as a bigger deal than tim.

all in all, jason and tim, and tim and damian are simply just brothers, and if you have more than two siblings, i’m sure you know as much as we deny it, everyone had a favourite and a least favourite sibling -it’s natural. for tim, his favourite is jason, and his least just happens to be damian.

just like damian’s favourite is dick, and least favourite happens to also be tim.

with stephanie

(now i don’t know as much about steph as i do for tim so feel free to correct me)

stephanie brown got into the hero scene by being the best little shit i’ve ever heard of and messing up her villain dad’s plans. her dad was cluemaster, a friend of the riddler, and she would literally just show up and spoil their plans in annoying ways (hence her name; spoiler).

she was tim drake’s girlfriend -it’s important to note that she wasn’t robin’s. she had no clue about his double life and broke up with him because she thought he was being unfaithful (fair enough).

when tim’s dad took robin away from him, steph stepped up to the plate with a made up robin costume and (like tim) demanded to be the replacement.

her 71 days in the spotlight as the first female robin ended in a couple different ways (thanks comics for making it hard). bruce dismissed her for his belief that she couldn’t follow orders, but he also didn’t believe that she could live up to tim... ouch. he didn’t even approve of her as his partner until she was killed. oh god here we go again...

i personally don’t acknowledge that she died. just- nope. i always look at it as wrong place, wrong time for steph. she could’ve been a great robin, but tim left massive fucking shoes to fill, and i reckon bruce was looking for any little reason to fire her -disobeying one order to not involve herself in a fight just happened to be the perfect opportunity (according to bruce). not to mention steph (and this isn’t necessarily a wrong thing) was undisciplined in hero-ing.

not to say tim was straight-laced and serious, more that him being at an equal mental level to bruce, and the both of them having built strong trust in each other, gave him a lot more leeway to do what he wanted and have the means to back up his actions.

ORIGINS OF POPULAR FANON

obviously i’ll never know exactly where something came from. this is more my speculation and attempt and supplying the headcanons with canonical evidence or debunking them.

where does “tim is a sickly boi” come from?

his lack of a spleen.

i’m not sure if most people now know that’s the reason why, but that’s gotta be how it started.

without a spleen, our body's other organs like the liver can take over many of the spleen's functions. you'll still be able to cope with most infections but there's a heightened risk that a serious infection will develop quickly, especially from certain bacteria and parasites like malaria.

if he got on antibiotics and rested when he started to feel ill, he’d be fine, but tim would never remember to take antibiotics and gods forbid he let himself rest so... he’s working until his body forces him to take a break.

mimi approved fanon  👍

where does “tim doesn’t care for himself” come from?

he’s a stubborn person. people don’t emphasise this enough. usually, people just use the motivation of depression (which, fair, it could be included in it). however, he will literally do whatever the fuck he wants because he’s tim fucking drake and that's all the excuse he feels he needs. like he is prepared to sacrifice everything *cough cough* himself to see his plan go through.

he’s also stubborn in his need to prove himself as we know. as a self-appointed robin; his mantle had felt fragile to him. not to mention damian made his grand appearance to push tim into that sweet sweet middle child category.

and as we already know, his dad also forcefully took the mantle from him and stopped him from seeing bruce. every time things start to go well for tim... it all seems to go to shit.

this in turn led to the fanon of ‘chronic perfectionism to the point of halting self-care in order to complete x, y z to prove himself’.

he also canonically doesn’t care much for sleep; in teen titans when superboy finds him awake tim just goes “it’s only three, i’m checking my emails”.

mimi approved fanon 👍.

where does “tim’s a coffee addict” come from?

he actually is only ever depicted drinking/buying coffee like 3 times (i don’t know for sure, please correct me if it’s more/less).

it ties in well with the previous point; tim’s coffee addiction is a way to justify how he can still function when he’s on 5 minutes of sleep, battered and bruised and still able to kick arse and be intelligent.

mimi approved fanon 👍

where does “tim have abandonment issues” come from?

his mum dies and he loses how his dad used to be.

he gains a better version of his dad and then his dad acts like an arsehole.

his dad gets better again and then his dad dies.

he had steph and then she left him because he just couldn’t explain who he was.

he gets bruce and then damian shows up.

he gets bruce back and then bruce dies, and nobody believes him when he says he’s alive.

yeah... it makes sense.

would be mimi-approved fanon, but i’ve never like the way i’ve seen it portrayed in fanon.

i see a lot in fics he does the “i’m pushing you away first to protect us both” and i just don’t personally agree with the depiction. call me petty but that’s my thoughts.

where does the perception that tim’s the soft one come from?

no fucking clue honestly.

mans blinded deathstroke’s (/jericho, hard to explain) good eye on purpose while delivering a one liner about fighting blind, and then told the man he just fully blinded that he agreed with deathstroke that he (tim) could be vicious when he had to be.

that one-on-one moment in the teen titans comic is demonstration enough of tim being the opposite of the soft one. none of the robins are soft. if we’re going off who’s the most “sensitive”, then it’d be dick or damian -those two have the shortest fuse.

tim blinded someone by throwing his fucking birdarang at the guy’s one good eye and was sure enough and committed enough to what he planned to do that he had the precision to make sure not to take the eye out completely -only debilitate him. that’s some calculated callousness right there.

he also boasted to the teen titans about lying to batman, after he just lied to starfire about staying put in a fight (and his lie used that ‘goody two shoes’ perception of himself; he’s self-aware of how he can come off)… and then he broke his friends out of the tt tower by cutting glass in the shape of a bat. dudes cocky as.

not to mention he literally stalked batman and ran around solving murders and dropping off the evidence to gordon before even being a robin. he was on the CIA’s watch list for crying out loud.

tim is extremely underestimated. to the point where (as @forcesofnatureunleashed accurately described) this “uwu” version of tim has taken over the fandom and made him out to seem like a mega wimp and a quiet tortured soul.

i’m not dismissing the shit he’s actually gone through, i’m just saying he’s gone through enough that you don’t need to make up that he was berated by his dad, can’t talk about his pain, and relies on his tech, when he’s quiet literally the best martial artist in the family and highly respected by ra’s al ghul.

you don’t just get respected by ra’s al ghul; especially if you were an overly sensitive, shaky-knee-ed, spineless, weakling.

STRONGLY mimi disapproved fanon 👎

[manicpixiedckgirl]

okay, so i posted a timeline. sue me! i quit all other social media last year and needed that dopamine hit. just a lil nicotine patch for online attention. seasonal depression is a bitch okay. i posted it here and to ig, bc ig is to late millennials what facebook is boomers. and people have all said some very nice things, but when you're posting a 10 year timeline, you're usually hoping for someone from your past to see it and go "woah! you're so different now"!

and whaddya know, this time it worked. one of my exes from when i was a teenager saw it. not one of the ones who turned out to be a lesbian, one of the ones who turned out to be a trans man. He just wanted to say hi - that he was so happy to see that i looked happy, and that i looked incredible, especially compared to the scruffy twink they had dated. (okay those are my words not his)

he and I didn’t have a great relationship at first - no one had a great relationship with me before i realized i was a trans woman obviously, but this was pretty young. I was really repressed and weird back then, and still very much without any social graces, and we were only like 16. they caught the full broadside of my emo fuckboy energy and got out fast once they saw that - i don’t blame them. I was crying in their arms about how much i hated my new body hair, and how i wanted to be able to wear dresses, and the next day i’d be completely emotionally unavailable and denying all of it. not exactly boyfriend material, not entirely boyfriend. They were very traumatized too in their own way, just realizing they were trans too, and engaging in a lot of ‘i want to be a gay man’ antics, fucking their way through the pain. He was frankly way too cool and sexually liberated to be wasting his time with that version of me. And it was very obvious to everyone who knew what that was 12-15 years ago that i was a closeted trans girl. we had a friend group that eventually fell apart, and we parted for the first time.

Later, in our late teens/20, we would end up fucking - i had started to accept and announce that my gender was complicated, and i was starting to be kinda faggy and loud about it, and not everyone hated that, and they had just started T and were boy horny. We split a bottle of wine (or was it two? It was probably two) and started watching an ashley tisdale movie. Looking back on it, how it went must definitely have been his plan, but i’ve always been blind about this stuff and was that night. It was definitely bad sex, but it was also fun sex - the first time I enjoyed myself,  and the pressure of having to be a guy wasn’t so overwhelming i didnt effectively black out. he’s one of the first people i ever talked to about feeling complicated about gender, and i think by then he had figured me out, and was just letting me get the rest of the way on my own. I still couldn’t top for him, i never rly could top for anyone, even before estrogen. but we still had fun, with our hands and with our mouths. and then after that, we'd go to art shows and poetry readings and hang out again occasionally, like we talked about doing when we were literal kids, putting on rocky horror in our front rooms.

but life takes you away from people, and he got into film school, and i somehow graduated my chemistry program and moved to the US. he moved to Germany for a while, although i hear he's back home. i got married, got separated, there was a global pandemic. we hadn't talked in years, although i had snooped on him once or twice. He’s a director now - he’s made some impressive arthouse films, all horror and gender and kitchy campy cerebral themes. He’s got a big tv writing credit on the way in irish tv. Idk - it felt rly good to impress him, to say hi, to remember. it's really cool to see other trans people thriving and living life, always. anyone who cleaves reality to themselves and fashions themselves into someone they can love is someone who impresses me. but it's different when it's someone you've known for almost half your life - someone you were a fucked up kid with, not sure if either of you would make it to 18. and to be smiling at each other, looking at 30, and wondering what's next. i'm really proud of the both of us actually. and i needed that today.

[hopeymchope]

True confessions from an RE:Zero convert

This might be more of a ramble than my better-organized reviews, but I have a lot to get off my chest.

Personal Backstory: The stuff you skip when reading a recipe

For a long time, I avoided isekai stories. They were so pervasive in anime/manga that I found them quite annoying.

When I first caved, it was only for comedies. I figured that, hey, they're taking the piss out of the genre; that sounds up my alley. So I felt it was safe to enjoy Konosuba. After that, I fell in love with Trapped in a Dating Sim... and to my surprise, it wasn't solely engaging for its overarching comedy. There was more characterization and interpersonal relationship stuff that grabbed me in that one.

That's probably what made me feel more receptive when I saw a couple of people call out Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke's Mansion as an underappreciated anime highlight of 2023. I gave it a shot one afternoon with only mild expectations for it, and guess what? I adored it.

Yet despite ALL THAT? My expectations for RE:Zero were close to the floor. Raeliana had opened the floodgates, leading me to try some other isekai stories... yet I repeatedly found the ones I tried quite lacking. Furthermore, almost everything I'd read about RE:Zero over the years had been resoundingly negative in spite of its seeming popularity — a real "Sword Art Online" situation, basically.

But eventually, I was curious enough about why some people are invested in these characters that I started giving it a watch. These low expectations left me perfectly disarmed when it began to weave its spell over me.

Storytelling and Worldbuilding: Returning by death

You can neatly divide the show into story arcs, each representing a unique event/hurdle that the protagonist has to get past using his unique power.

The first arc of the story is mostly just setup for some of the important characters and the basic conceit. Our freshly isekai'd Japanese protagonist, Subaru, meets and bonds with a half-elf girl named Emilia, only to soon get tragically murdered. However, he just restarts his life from roughly one day earlier. He can go back in time by dying, giving him a new chance to take new approaches to situations and to accumulate knowledge via loops. Eventually, his "save point" advances to a new point in time... but what causes that to happen is left unknown for now. Making matters even worse is that if he tries to tell anyone about this superpower/curse, he feels intense chest pain as though he's about to be killed... so he has to keep this under wraps. (Though I still wish he'd try to tell people that he can't tell them. We never see if that'd work.)

With Subaru and Emilia established, the second arc introduces the most important supporting characters — Beatrice, Roswaal, Rem and Ram — and also puts one of them through a significant stretch of development. And finally, the third arc takes up the bulk of the series' first season, dealing with... frankly, a LOT. There's a lot crammed into it. You could even argue that it's got multiple smaller arcs stacked inside of it, and that would make complete sense. The third arc definitely does the bulk of the world-building/stage-setting for the future of the series, but there are details and background provided all throughout to get you up to speed on how people think here, how the government works, some of the existing races, etc.

I was initially taken aback by now blasé Subaru is about being transported to another world. This isn't a "death and reincarnation" thing like I've seen in most isekai stories; Subaru just blinks, rubs his eyes, and suddenly he's in a fantasy world just like that. And he... is completely unconcerned and unimpressed by that? It's a weird choice. Combine that with a point late in the first arc where he literally talks to the camera, and I thought maybe we were getting some kind of Deadpool-esque comedic commentary on isekai conventions.

It's the severity of the violence and related agony that makes me take it more seriously than that. I still find animated blood and gore extremely affecting — moreso than fake blood in live-action. That's probably because I was raised on Western animation that contained little to no sign of such violence, whereas Western movies and TV are full of corn syrup and other blood stand-ins. I'm just saying that when the deaths/kills come around in RE:Zero, they hit hard and often quite intensely. They're not showing entrails hanging out (even if they talk about it), but you can expect to see snapping bones and arterial spray. It's still a minority of the time, though; this is NOT a gorefest, and it's better off for that fact. When you suddenly get two minutes of ultraviolence after four episodes of relative peace, that makes it feel all the more effective.

It's not lookin' good there, chief.

I'm an easy mark for this stuff. Some of my primary entry points into anime were horror anime, so playing up this kind of horror gets me to sit up and take notice. It's not going to be anywhere near enough to keep my attention, though. I've certainly watched AWFUL horror anime that had nothing to boast about beyond their gore levels. That's where the quality of RE:Zero's character writing really saves the day.

What's really important to understand is that, through the strength of its gradual buildup of intensity helped along by showing the repeated consequences of failure Re:Zero manages to make some of the big anime shōnen  battles EXTREMELY hype! And yet, thanks to the great characterization? One of my favorite episodes in the whole show is an ep where two characters are just talking the entire time from a single location. THAT is the mark of something I love: If two characters holding a discussion for nearly half an hour has me COMPLETELY GLUED to it.

I've glossed over season two here because, although it still has some excellent moments, it's just not as good as the first. A big part of that is because it's just one giant-huge arc that covers all 26 episodes... and that's a LOT of time to spend on a single ongoing challenge/hurdle. It not only becomes exhausting and kind of boring to be confined to this problem/situation for so goddamn long, but it also makes it extremely obvious when Subaru is going to reach his final time loop and succeed. So once you piece together that the entire season is going to be stuck on this one arc, you realize you're stuck just waiting for him to get close enough to the season's end to finally achieve real progress. Once he does, though? It weirdly manages to feel like it's too soon -- like he didn't do enough to prepare all the problems at hand and somehow just won this time around because he tried super duper hard. There's also the fact that my favorite character from the first season is entirely sidelined (and apparently won't be in season 3 EITHER) — and nobody new manages to step into any similar shoes to pick up the slack.

Sounds like a good time to talk about that that character... as well as the rest.

Characters: The value of growth and change

One of the reasons I got into this so much is because the characters have flaws, go through changes, grow and develop. Rem is an early standout of this. As is apparently a common opinion, she quickly became my favorite character. Her shift from being suspicious and disdainful of Subaru to being 1000% supportive of him is EXTREMELY well-handled, and her sympathetic backstory is also one that we get before most other characters share their own. But when you get down to brass tacks, the main reason I think she's great is because she flips out and goes into violent combat mode whenever anyone she cares about is threatened. :D That's always a favorite archetype of mine. I love me a bloodstained hero or heroine who will march through hell and take any measure of punishment to save someone. Honestly, it makes it hard to understand why he'd so hooked on Emilia when Rem is so peak. And as I mentioned above, a big downside of season 2 is that Rem is completely absent past the first episode. In fact, she won't even be in the upcoming season 3!!! Alas, there is no "person who absolutely tears shit up and covers themselves in the enemy's blood to protect the ones they care about" character who steps in and picks up the slack, so I'm missing my favorite archetype after the first season. TSK.

She's not a princess (a lot of anger in it). Not your cutie girlfriend, oh no, don't you know?

I find it literally depressing that, to date, Rem is STILL not truly back in the cast of the source light novels - not in any way that matters. She makes her cameos via illusions or flashbacks or what-have-you, but she's not really there until she's physically AND mentally present once again. So until she returns to the team with all her memories (and therefore, her all-important character development) intact, I must legitimately ask: WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING, NAGATSUKI?!

Enough about Rem: We need to talk about the lead protagonist. Subaru is pretty brave throughout all this but really has to grow over the course of the first season and learn to be less self-serving and invest a lot harder into self-improvement. It's nice to see someone who clearly has blatant personal flaws but also is never a detestable person. I actually first saw him when I watched a few episodes of Isekai Quartet a couple years back, and frankly? I found him pretty loathesome over there. I was fully prepared for him to be a shitheel that I was inexplicably expected to like. I'm so glad that this isn't the case. In fact, I love having a character who wears his heart on his sleeve. He's not too manly to weep openly, and he's not afraid to act like a total doofus... or maybe he’s not smart enough sometimes to realize when he does. And although he may be frequently selfish and kind of stupid on multiple occasions, he never becomes one of those perverted male characters or too egotistical. Well... he gets a bit egotistical at times. Too much for someone like me, but... still not overmuch compared to many, many anime protags.

Panic! After Repeated Trauma

And yet... he does get a bit exasperating by the end of season two, imo. Partly because he doesn't grow too much in season two. At least he gets to confront his bottled-up feelings over leaving his homeworld behind, so that's nice. But otherwise, he's pretty much treated as this perfect man whose only major remaining flaw is a lack of combat skill. By the time you've got him convincing yet ANOTHER long-lived character to never give up and put all their faith into him personally just like he's done multiple times before, and it yet AGAIN works? The swelling music and the emotional reaction of the characters to him speechifying about how he'll always be there for them and needs them... that lands well maybe two times, but by this point — when he's talking to a character who has mostly treated him with disdain/avoidance and whom he's only hung out with maybe five or six times — it's pretty hard to swallow, honestly. But I'll try not to hold that against Subaru... I just want him to show some more flaws in future stories that go beyond just "He's not good at fighting." I want him to lose more arguments again. Besides, one of the best things in season two is when his mind starts to crack under the stress and pain of all the deaths he's endured. I think we should dig deeper into that.

I honestly love seeing a hero begin to crack under the pressure.

I kinda cheated by talking about Rem before Emilia. Emilia's the main female lead, after all, whereas Rem is a supporting player. The thing about Emilia, though, is that she's good and noble and pure-hearted from the start. She doesn't grow at all during season one, though at least she does show us a different side of herself when she questions Subaru's behavior during their argument. Season two sees her face her past and gain new inner strength, but she still undergoes far less change than Subaru or Rem in even just the first season. I'm glad they took the time to show her failing and then needing to learn in order to move forward, but Emilia's maybe just a little too perfect, y'know? One thing that garners her a lot of sympathy is that most everyone who meets her dislikes her just for being born a silver-haired half-elf. So many people associate that with one of the gravest threats to ever exist in this world that Emilia has to endure a lot of racism, and honestly? Confronting that racism is when the character is most engaging. So while Emilia is clearly likable and not totally uninteresting, she's not as interesting as a lot of the other players in the story. Most of the characters run deeper than her or have more mysterious goals. Compared to them, Emilia is an open book who rarely changes. The author of the books has said that Emilia is his favorite character, and maybe that's why he never sees much need to develop her. I think it does her a disservice.

On top of being beautiful and kind and intelligent, Emilia is also a powerful combatant. Because of course she is.

Her relationship with Subaru is a major focus, but it seems sort of hollow at first. Subaru admires her kindness/helpfulness and thinks she's beautiful, so he follows her around and dotes on her as much as he can. It's easy to see why he'd admire someone so good-hearted, but it starts to become a little cringe just how obsessively he dotes on her... and that cringiness peaks right around the moment when the two have a big argument and a falling out. It's an important scene that helps both characters, because it shows us Subaru's flaws on full display and also makes him confront just how cringey his devotion to Emilia can come off. Emilia, meanwhile, walks away to spend time without him for a while... though she never really rejects him, either. She really struggles with being independent. She keeps thinking about him and wishing he'd come back and make up with her. Clearly, she's gotten addicted to having a Hype Man around... and goddamn, I can't even blame her. Subaru looks at Emilia the way Stilgar looks at Paul Atreides. Who doesn't want that level of positive reinforcement available 24/7? By the end of season two, although both of them have grown, Subaru's still relentlessly hyping her up. He did criticize her (softly) in one major season two moment, but despite his claims otherwise, he still acts like she's an angel on Earth. And so, although he pool of their romance has grown deeper, it still feels like we've stepped out of the kiddie pool and into the shallow end. It means a lot more to see a character and their feelings grow and change over time, y'know? I suppose part of why we don't see that happening much is because Emilia is treated as so flawless to begin with.

Something I love in a long-running story is when a minor background character slowly starts to appear more frequently until - surprise! - they become a major cast member and full-time supporting player. Season two does this very successfully, and I love the character they expanded and brought into the cast. I feel like I shouldn't say too much about them for anyone who's a newcomer, because the gradual increase in their presence is so enjoyable. But it's a character who first appears in season one and has to wait numerous episodes of season two before they become important enough to get a front-row seat. It's very satisfying to watch them shift slowly from "fifth-tier supporting character who shows up for two scenes" into "major player."

Other characters? Ram is Rem's sister, and she's... not exactly a wealth of depth. Not yet, at least. She's mostly there to act tsundere. Her exact relationship with Roswaal remains hazy by the end of season 2, but she's clearly devoted to him and he's clearly doing... something for her? Roswaal and Beatrice both get by on acting mysterious. We learn a lot more about them in season two, and what we learn makes it hard to tear your eyes off Roswaal especially — he's a fascinating and weird bastard. Puck is a cat-like spirit with a lot of power and a very mischievious attitude. There's a surprising darkness lurking within him that keeps him from being some cute mascot-type. Season 2 also brings us some new characters whose long-term presence among the cast is still in question, but Echidna (not an Australian monotreme) is a standout. She really made me question everything I thought I understood about the moral good-and-evil situation in this reality.

Get those eyebrows under control. We ARE on television, y'know.

Serial Killin'

The series a whole is SO serialized and SO intense that it's really hard to watch it with gaps in-between episodes. Even taking one day off from the show mid-viewing proved too agonizing for me, so I was really grateful I could tear through seasons 1 and 2 in a rapid binge. I say this because... yeah, I don't see myself watching season 3 as it airs. Maybe I'll do a binge for each story arc it contains when they wrap up, or maybe I'll just wait for the whole season to conclude. But either way? This is something that demands to be binged in rapid succession.

I guess you get my point by now. I'm pretty hype about this series in spite of it holding some noteworthy flaws. I'm surprised I can still get so invested in something that dates back as far as 2016 that I haven't seen yet... and that gives me hope for what else I might discover going forward with my anime viewing.

[ejzah]

A few thoughts, that turned into a personal essay and then some rambles.

***

It’s been a few days since the NCIS: LA series finale aired, and I think I’m finally ready to compose a few more coherent thoughts than “baby!” and “I’ll miss them”.

At the time I began watching the show (just after the sixth season ended), I had recently graduated with my bachelors degree and was whiling away the summer with a part time job, and wondering what I would do with my life (and brand new degree). I first discovered the show after seeing a few posts online about Densi. I figured I’d give it a try, having no idea what I was about to get myself into.

The first season dragged a little for me until one Detective Marty Deeks entered the picture. With his addition, I looked forward to every episode and quickly burned through all the available seasons. I literally woke up some mornings, anticipating the moment I could get home from work to watch more.

LA was also the series that inspired me to get more involved with fanfiction, first seeking out every fic related to the Descent/Ascension arc, then searching out my favorite authors on Tumblr, and eventually trying my own hand at writing about my favorite characters.

I never expected to find a wonderful group of fellow fans, new and old, to discuss, rant, and rave (in a good way) about Deeks, Densi, Kensi, and so forth in the process. This community’s encouragement and support gave me the confidence to keep writing, even when it seemed laborious and futile. They lured me out of my silent lurking to participate in discussions, fan events, and fic exchanges.

Eight years ago, I would never have anticipated that I would have so many online friends or that I would write several hundred thousand words of fanfiction dedicated to my favorite characters. Or have the confidence to profess my undying affection for Marty Deeks at every chance.

This show, these characters, these friends, saw me through hard days at work, the boring days, sad moments, and kept me going for the entirety of my graduate studies.

We celebrated, raged, complained, cried, and sometimes shared group anxiety together over this show.

This is what this show has meant to me. I know that we will continue to celebrate and enjoy rewatches together and connect in other ways, but I still feel a great loss with this show’s ending.

[elderflowergin]

Heya, me again! Thank you for getting into it with me. I finished Hot Stove League, what a fun and learning time. I honestly do not find baseball to be at all interesting but this one made me sit through it, and enjoy learning! I agree about Mr Bark and Mr Kwon here, I think they would have, at some point, loved to pulverize eachother from the face of the earth, but in the end came together for Dreams! And Park EunBin! I adore her so much, too much. AHH, what a delight, how amazing is she!

About JangHyun, I am looking forward to his growth. I think Part 1 was about GilChae's growth and part 2 will be his, I'm looking forward to seeing him unlock all of that trauma from his body and release it. Their parting was so horrible horrible horrible. I'm glad I wasn't online much after watching ep10, just so I could l figure out my own feelings about that ending without the many voices getting into my head.

Anyway, I think he will repent.

I'm so team GilHyun or JangChae that my assessment of both in the last EP is that they are both in the spectrum of the the five stages of grief, him: shock and her, maybe anger or somewhere further along the line. I hope I'm making sense. Because he returned to Joseon with the idea that he and GC will be talking about their future, he said they would when he 'proposed' to her before he left. And GC was probably overwhelmed when she saw him alive after thinking that he was dead for so long.(PS: what a horrific way to realise that you love someone). Maybe after a long time reflecting, he may, may, understand that he was asking far too much(the fact that YeonJun said things that make sense before Janghyun was able to see it says a lot.)

I'm very interested in how GC feels about RyangEum.

Extremely proud of GilChae( very sad that we have to keep emphasising this). I'm looking forward to their conversations in the future. To GilHyun or JangChae.🥂

Dearest Anon, I still don’t know how baseball is played but I’m glad that wasn’t necessary to enjoy the show.

I loved Park Eun-bin so much - she’s so smart and gutsy and hotheaded and full of love for her team. I deeply enjoyed her protecting Baek Seung-soo (and on occasion his one cheap suit) by throwing a shot glass at a player built like a tank. I enjoyed Oh Jung-se’s character very much as well - there’s a wonderful scene where he’s with his cousin who drops his key and waits for Oh Jung-se to pick it up - which of course Oh Jung-se does since this cousin will be his boss someday, and Baek Seung-soo observes this moment from his car. Lovely character work in that single thirty second scene.

Thank you for those amazing observations about Gil-chae and Jang Hyeon - it makes so much sense! I think they are deeply misaligned and I agree with you that they are also in two different stages of grief. I think Gil-chae tries to meet him in the middle, but Jang Hyeon didn’t wish to move at all (perhaps partly because he was in shock, as you pointed out). I hope like you do that he reflects on and regrets how he treated her. If there is one very sore point I have with the show, it is that they made Yeon-jun of all people (!!!) say the right thing to Jang-hyeon.

I think you were completely right to stay mostly offline for the post episode 10 discussions. I read very little and backed out. I think it’s just part of a larger cultural conversation that we tend to give men far more grace and leeway than we offer women. I find it ironic here because the characters literally live in an era where men had a lot of leeway to begin with and women had very little (and the show takes pains to address this too!), so it’s a real choice to place even higher expectations and tighter leeway on the women and doing the opposite for men. But this has been going on longer than the internet has been alive, I guess.

Anon, thank you so much for coming by and making these very cool and wise observations. As you progress in your Namgoong Min deep dive, please always know you can come hang out here, link arms virtually and tell me (and us!) all the Namgoong Min feelings. Here’s a hug if you’ll have one! 🫂

[lunarsun12]

Double Cross

Masterlist

Jongho was so exited that Hongjong has came home. He immediately hugged him with smile saying ‘I love you!’. What he didn’t realise Seonghwa was behind Hongjong and saw everything and may teased Jongho a bit.

The flustered Jongho can’t have Seonghwa, seeing doing that revenge free. Even though he is is Eomma. Jongho has assembled the evilest duo, he can think and that is Woosan.

However Jongho revenge plan has took a U-turn? Did Seonghwa figure it out?

Jongho Created The Chat:

I Am Boss Baby Bear

Today 18:00

Jongho🍎: HYUNGS!! GET YOUR BUTTS HERE

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Why is it just me and San here…?

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: WE ARE NOT DOING YOUR CHORES AGAIN!!

Jongho🍎: You two are the most evilest when together. You two are boring once apart…

San🗻: I am not evil…I am an angel 😇

Jongho🍎: Says the one who stole the expired meat last week…

San🗻: You literally barged into my room and demanded I steal it. With no thank you’s

Jongho🍎: You don’t derserve my thanks. YOU GAVE ME FOOD POISONING

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Boohoo you got food poisoning. Not the worst thing I made San did…

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Anyways what do you want?

Jongho🍎: I NEED YOU TO TAKE EOMMA DOWN!!

San🗻: The person, who can make us homeless?

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: You want to take Eomma down? Bahahahah

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: I tried doing that since day 1. This guy has eyes behind his head

Jongho🍎: HE DERSERVE IT! Cause he was there when he supposed to be not

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Please elaborate! Need to help to the max of course!!

Jongho🍎: I am not here to spill my secrets. I wouldn’t be talking to you two. That Yunho job. Just come up with a plan!

San🗻: Jongho don’t be shy, you always text me when you feeling sad

Jongho🍎: SHUT UP! COME UP WITH THE PLAN

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Hmmmm me and San will have talk. We will comeback to you

10mins later….

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: I have a way but it is dangerous…we can ask Eomma fan club and leak his favourite park to go too

San🗻: Wooyoungie! That’s too mean! Eomma shed a tear when Soobin husband came…

Jongho🍎: Do it! Wooyoung can make the call

Mingi🦄: What is this chat? I HAVE TO WARN EOMMA

The next day….

Back At Ateez Family Chat

Today 18:00

Yunho🐶: Okay! Jongho being this calm after he got caught hugging Appa

Yeosang🍗: No Yunho, Jongho got that look when he is up to no good

Mingi🦄: Honestly, he is way more shy then Yeosang. At least he hugs Eomma and Appa voluntarily

Seonghwa🌸: JONGHO YOU COME ONLINE RIGHT NOW!

Jongho🍎: Yes Eomma! How was your trip to the park?

Seonghwa🌸: I didn’t go…I was told I will be mobbed there and it has your name written on it

Seonghwa🌸: It’s nothing wrong, that I caught you hugging your Appa

Hongjong🏴‍☠️: You guys…I am at the hospital! I got trampled on by your Eomma fanclub when I was on my home

Jongho🍎: That not part of the plan..

Seonghwa🌸: WHAT? Omo omo. That could have been me…Jongho let’s have talk about getting revenge

Jongho🍎: I-I didn’t do it, that was meant for you! I only wanted to scare you honestly I-I didn’t want anyone to get hurt

Seonghwa🌸: Jongho, if you want to show love please do it non violent way

Yunho🐶: Ermmm don’t come into living room you all. Jongho wants erm privacy remember the outcome of Eomma

Now, how an earth did Hongjong get wrapped into this.

Back Woosan is superior then Jongho Chat

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Pheeesh, that so easy! Jongho immediately is in tears. That will teach him for ever think he can outrule me

San🗻: Don’t you mean us?

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: Yeah Yeah…

San🗻: Appa is in the hospital! If he ever found out! My appa privilege will be gone!

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: No one will ever knows it was us. Who sent the mob to Appa

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: WIN FOR WOOYOUNG!

San🗻: AHEM

Wooyoung🐈‍⬛: WIN FOR WOOSAN <3

[drdemonprince]

hi devon! i recently binged all your medium articles, your writing hits so close to home and has opened so many doors of self-reflection for me, thank you. one of your latest ones was about porn and autism, i have some differing opinions on porn itself, but i enjoyed your perspective on it.

i would love to hear your thoughts on autism and hypersexuality in a broader sense. i’m someone that’s recently realised how much my premature exposure to sexuality and porn in childhood made me hypersexual in a way that really stunted my personal growth and had me traumatising myself with my own compulsive sexual behavior. as an undiagnosed autistic adhd kid i was just grasping after any form of stimulating and self-soothing behavior, but also looking after ways to make myself more interesting and appealing to peers and most importantly boys (because interest from men = value as a human i learned early on). i think i could’ve figured out gender and sexuality stuff a little earlier and avoided my comphet phase had it not been for how obsessed i was with sexualising and objectifying myself in my tweens and early teens tbh. i hope to see more people talking about autism and sexuality. my heart breaks thinking about how so many demonise kids with problematic sexualised behavior when they’re literal children trying to figure out this having a body thing and there’s usually grown-ups around them standing idly by doing nothing effective to help.

Hi there! I love hearing from people who don't share my perspective completely but can still get a lot out of my work.

I alluded to this yesterday, but I don't believe hypersexuality or hyposexuality are a thing. Where do we draw the line where it becomes pathological, and why? Clearly humans have varied in how much they desire and think about sex since the beginning of time, and while we still have not figured out a respectful, appropriate way to cope with the fact of it, children also sometimes have an interest in sex and masturbation and a curiosity about it that is completely value neutral. It's just a thing that happens because children are living human beings.

Unfortunately we inhabit a paradigm where this is supposed to be either ignored or punished and discouraged, and anyone who does bring it up is viewed as having some ulterior motive beyond the liberation of children from abuse. And so if a child is curious about sex or driven to explore it in some way, they only means they have of pursuing that interest is by consuming adult material, which a lot of people look back on having done with a variety of different feelings. It sounds like you saw a lot of porn from a young age that really gave you unhelpful expectations for yourself and others and that it really hurt you, and I'm really sorry to hear that.

I consumed a lot of adult content as a child and a teen, not just porn but also real life gore and jump scare videos and elaborate, violent sexual stories, and of all those experiences, the only one that seemed to scar me was the jump scare videos. Seriously, newgrounds fucked me up, and not because I was playing games like Orgasm Angel. It was shit like kikia that fucked me up. The potential that my most beloved friend, the computer, could start screaming at me and showing me dead babies at any moment meant I was on edge and obsessively read all the comments on every video I ever viewed for like... seven or eight years. Even if a friend or classmate wanted to show me a youtube video, I forced them to read through all the comments and convince me it wasn't a jumpscare video first. For like years.

It might be that the only reason I was able to watch and read and play a lot of porn online as a kid without any real adverse effects was because I had a really specific fetish, and so most of the content I was able to view was of an obviously fictional and fantastical variety or was made directly by the people who starred in it. As I wrote in my essay, I'm glad that I started watching brainwashing gifs on weird websites and masturbating to them as a kid. It helped me feel less alone in my fetish and it didn't scar me, and provided a sexual outlet that was actually pretty safe and private and didn't put me in contact with any adults. It was a really nice pressure valve, a way to stim and zone out and regulate my breathing and get off, and finding content like that helped me to realize there was a whole big wide world out there where freaks like me could be okay.

THAT said, I can understand your experience! Porn didn't fuck me up as a kid, but I did learn some really pernicious sexual norms as a teen, because I had abstinence only education at school and I obsessively read Dan Savage's advice column Savage Love as a replacement for having any kind of credible sex ed. I used to worship Dan Savage. I met him for pancakes once, you can read about my whole complex relationship to him and his work in a very old piece I wrote pre transition here:

Dan Savage's work was really influential on me and on a lot of people of my generation. From his stuff, I learned that I should be good, giving, and game for just about anything a partner wanted -- which meant I pressured myself to do things I didn't always want to do. He normalized a kind of casual, unarticulated nonmonogamy among people of my age group including everyone I dated -- and so being open without really discussing what that meant was the norm for me from age 19 until about age 23.

Dan Savage wrote that blowjobs come standard and that any model who is not equipped with them should be returned to the lot -- thats really how he described women who didn't do oral. As broken cars. Dan Savage said that asexuals should only date other asexuals and probably werent real anyway. He said vaginas looked like canned hams dropped from great heights. He said a gay trans guy who couldnt take T for health reasons was 'delusional' for wanting to date fellow gay men. Reading Dan Savage fucked me up, and it's not even his fault -- he was just an outspoken faggot with an advice column that was always clear in reflecting his biases and agendas, and I was just a horny confused kid with no sex education and no where else to learn about sex other than porn and the back of the local alternative mag.

So, this is all a very long and meandering way of saying that I'm sorry you also got attached very young to untrustworthy sources of sexual information and that they also scarred you and left you pressured to be something you were not. I was there. I think many of my generation were and some still are. and not just the Autistics. I know so many people who got swept up in the messages that conventional porn and writers like dan savage had to peddle -- straight people, queer people, poly people, disabled people, everyone. The sad part is that Dan Savage for all his faults was still a lot more progressive than where many of my peers turned, which was sites like efukt or the predecessors to the chan sites and shit. It was brutal out there.

It's also the case that many of us Autistic people are prone to intense fixation and rumination and obsession, by neurotypical standards, sometimes to our detriment, sometimes in a completely neutral way that would cause us zero harm if it weren't for all the societal stigma and judgement. and that can mean that, especially when we are lonely and closeted teens, that we retreat into a lot of damaging digital messages and imagery, and I think a lot of bad, sexist straight porn unfortunately played that role in a lot of people's lives. My version of that was instead compulsively reading pro ana livejournals (as a teen) and then later terf detransition blogs (in my 20s). So again I don't think it's necessarily a phemoneon of porn per se, but obviously there is a lot of really toxic shit out there that has warped a lot of people's viewpoints around sex and relationships, I can't deny that.

I wish I knew what the solution was to help prevent future generations of kids from going through the kinds of damage you and I went through, but I think we are so far from being prepared as a culture to have this conversation that most attempts to broach it end up making things worse for kids in all kinds of scary new ways -- parents heavily monitoring and controlling their kids browsing habits for example. That sure as hell isn't going to help a closeted queer kid who is exploring themselves in most cases. Instead of building a world that is more liberatory and supportive to kids, we just keep trying to control them more and more, and impose more and more strict standards on them, which always hurts the weirdest and queerest among us the worse. It fucking sucks. Shit. i really am going to have to write about about child liberation one day wont i

[parcequecestnotreprojeeeet]

Hi, it’s me, Fanfic Anon #2. Can I just say how blessed we have been these last week or so with all that lovely content? I still haven’t recovered. Anyways. This is my Bastille Day piece! Hope everyone enjoys.

"Now remember, chéri, we have a guest," she reminded him that morning over breakfast (in what felt more like a velvet gloved threat than a gentle reminder).

"I know," he replied, a little confused as to where this was coming from. What exactly was she worried about?

"So you need be on your best behavior," she continued as if he hadn’t spoken.

"What is that supposed to mean?" He laughed, suddenly realizing when he saw the look in her eyes what she was afraid of. ‘Oh. Right. That.’ He thought to himself. "You know that I would never, ever do anything that would make you uncomfortable or embarrass you. Right?"

"Of course," she waved it away, the slight doubt though not leaving her eyes. She knows her husband, knows how he gets caught up in the moment, and knows he’s just as likely to kiss her senseless on the platform in front of the eyes of the world as he is to squeeze her hand, especially when he sees her in her dress (or at least, she hopes he will like her dress this year, a little different, a little solaire - designed to be a literal highlight after a year with so many different shadows.)

"I mean it, Brigitte," he vowed, grabbing for her hand and squeezing it lightly. "I know how much you hate things like this, how nervous you get, how you’re the one the press goes after even when I’m the one who can’t keep my hands to myself. I love you and I respect you. Have I ever let you down?"

"No," she answered, a shy smile peaking through now.

"I don’t intend to start now. I’ll be good. Scouts honor!"

"You weren’t even a scout!" She laughed at him, the load on her shoulders lightening in the way it always does under his delicate touch, always sure of how best to lift her, cheer her, support her, love her.

"Want me to swear an oath? We have that fancy collar for the Legion of Merit lying around somewhere. I could go find it -"

"Stop being ridiculous!" She rolled her eyes.

"Ah! But it got you to smile," he pointed out.

"I guess it did."

"That’s all I ever want to do, make you smile."

He sees her smiling at him as he walks toward that platform hours later, looking absolutely radiant under the morning light, and he finds it hard to keep his promise. (She was right, she was always right, left to his own devices he couldn’t be held responsible for the reaction that dress provoked in him)

But as he lets go of the Indian Prime Minister’s hand, she is the magnet pulling him towards her, slipping his hands around her soft right one, pressing the quickest kiss to her knuckles, and pulling up to see her beautiful beaming smile as he feels her left hand settle over his. ‘Mission accomplished’ he thinks as he walks off to greet his cabinet.

She catches him grinning like an idiot at his phone while she was getting ready for the dinner that night, sliding up to him and asking, "what are you looking at? Should I be jealous?"

He laughs as he shows her the picture their daughter sent to his phone, the message reading "I saw this photo online and figured the two of you would want it. Love you!"

"Oh!" She whispers as she in the way she could read every ounce of love flowing between them in that moment.

"Yeah. Now we gotta find a place in your office to put it!" He jokes.

"My office?" She laughs. "Mon cœur, I think this would go great on all that open desk space in your office."

“How about in here then?” He gestures towards their private living room.

“Sounds perfect,” she agrees, wrapping her arms around his waist.

“Just like you,” he responds before pressing a gentle kiss to her lips.

Hello fanfic anon #2! ❤️

What a delightful piece! 😍 For a few seconds I even forgot I was reading a fanfic hahaha because I can really imagine them being this playful and it’s just the cutest (and sexiest!) thing ever 🤭🥰

Thank you so much, fanfic anon #2! ❤️❤️❤️

[sk-lumen]

Hi Lumen,

Hope you are doing okay. I just wanted to share this here, I guess I needed to vent and write this down to show myself some sort of appreciation and to comfort myself in this choice so I thought I would share it since I saw other anons writing their progress down, hope you don’t mind. I have dropped that guy whom I was talking to since November, we tried to meet up multiple times but he always put the blame on me that we never could meet. We once tried to meet up and made plans to meet BUT the day before he went back to his hometown without any notice because he was not sure whether I still wanted to meet and didn’t even bother to make new plans. After this I decided to block him because it was literally the last drop. he made me feel confused all the time, I always felt so stressed and I remember you saying in one of your posts that a guy that makes you feel stressed and confused = not a man in his masculine energy and not meant for me. and also he tried to initiate physical and sexual conversations way to too fast which made me feel uncomfortable. I also think he love bombed me in the beginning.

i think reading your posts had helped me so much and I wanted to thank you for your posts. I really think you help a lot of young women with your advice 🌹

I know he was not worth my time and energy that’s why I cut things off with him but deep down I feel that guilt and “what ifs” but I know deep down I made the right choice and I can’t wait to elevate more in life.

Hi darling,

Thanks for sharing your journey and progress! I'm proud of you for cutting him off and moving on. Just from what you've mentioned there's already a list of red flags. I can confirm you did the right thing, but more important than that is you listening to your intuition, and honoring it! Realizing that you've known the answer all along. That's a brave thing and not easy to do especially in the beginning. And release the guilt darling. No healthy secure man that is for you will make you feel this way, or treat you like this in the beginning. All those red flags only multiply further in the relationship. You did right in moving on.

Also, posts like this make me happy to see how more and more ladies are awakening to their true worth and standing up for themselves 🥺 Moreso that my advice is helping someone out there 🤍

I like to think of my blog as an online diary dedicated to my younger self, sharing advice and experiences I wish others would have told me, so I didn't have to learn the hard way.

A lot of us girls didn't grow up with an older sister or aunt or female figure of some kind that initiates us into this experience of modern womanhood and how to honour ourselves and have better standards and boundaries. Or how to cultivate healthy friendships and sisterhood! Instead we're only programmed by society to view other women as competition and men as "the prize". To be people-pleasing and self-sacrificing to the point where we remove our "selves" from the equation of our lives altogether, centering everything around a man, family, pleasing our parents etc.

It's important to realize the #1 priority should always be yourself. You're the heroine of this story. The sooner you realize and live this truth, the sooner you can fully enjoy life, instead of being a secondary character in your own story.

Best wishes 🫶

-Lumen

[quixoticism]

Disney’s Andor terrifies me.

The Disney+ TV show Andor was announced at the end of 2020. My immediate thoughts were that it was probably going to be pretty good, since Rogue One was pretty good (I’m the only person in my friend group who didn’t pan on it immediately). I found Mandalorian seasons one and two to be overrated and boring, and after Rise of Skywalker lost all interest in Star Wars.

I didn’t watch any of the trailers for Andor, went in to it totally tabula rasa,  really only watching it on a whim because I had an hour and a half to kill with a friend and, hey, it might be alright. 

I instantly fell in love with the darker tone, slow pace, politics, cyberpunk aesthetics, and semi-realistic portrayal of insurgency. I’ve always had an interest in conflict studies and combat psychology, and what I saw met with my approval. From the very first scene where the titular protagonist enters what is addressed in dialogue to be a brothel demanding to see a specific woman, I knew this show would pull no punches. Seeing Syril Karn, who me and my friend immediately dubbed “Javert,” repeatedly being shown to be a pathetic fascist cop enticed my personal political leanings. Dedra Meero, an ISB agent, instead of being shown to be a girlboss, was instead used to show an insight into how the fascist mindset and ideology actually works in it’s “apolitical” adherents by creating an atmosphere and social structure that incentivizes brutality and ruthlessness. When Luthen Rael, portrayed by Stellan Skarsgard, revealed himself to be an accelerationist, I stood up and clapped.

After seeing the first three episodes in one setting I immediately went online to see the critical reception. Basically the only consistent criticism of Andor from mainstream mouthpieces is that it is slow-paced. I consider anyone who thinks Andor to be slow-paced to have seen one too many Marvel movies.

Episode 6, “The Eye,” I literally watched three times on the day it released and once the day after. In it, our protagonists carry out an insider attack, which for those unfamiliar with both Andor and modern warfare is a type of assymetrical tactic in which insurgents pretend to be members of the occupying force in order to carry out an attack from the inside. I hooted and hollered, my war nerd brain making all sorts of happy chemicals. When my friend’s favorite character, Nemik, was killed in an accident, I thought it was an admirable commitment to the gritty realism. In the gunfight preceding it, cover is used, as is cover-fire, real fireteam tactics. They’re not perfect, of course, but somebody involved in the fight choreography had at least read a book or watched some videos of actual firefights.

In the third 3-episode arc, the main plot is Cassian and Kino Loy (played by Andy Serkis; again, hooting and hollering) attempting to escape from a prison-factory. The use of inter- and intra-shop competition to increase productivity was a tactic used by Nazi Germany in it’s prison-factories, the use of electrical punishment and torture, forced posture-holding, and deprivation of shoes mimics American abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Again, I found this commitment to realism admirable. I should’ve been scared of it.

At episode 10, “One Way Out,” I figured Andor out for the far-more sinister ideological tool that it is. The episode features prisoners outwitting and killing their jailers to escape. We are understood by the text to sympathize with the prisoners, their crimes are never mentioned, we are led to believe their current treatment is far worse than any crime they could’ve committed. Compare this to the real-world reporting on any prison riot and you’ll see a stark difference. To draw a more tenuous line, compare it to fears of a “crime wave” that dominate mainstream US reporting (for those not in the know, crime in general in the the United States it as at an all-time low. Violent crime is increasing but when you add all crime together, crime rates are very low.) The audience is meant to, and overwhelmingly does, support actions in the text that they find reprehensible in real life.

Andor contains no last-minute recants of radicalism, no incongruous interpersonal evil that overshadows the radical commitments of our protagonists. The final episode, “Rix Road” features a riot. Men throw themselves against riot police and are beaten by them and we’re meant to sympathize with the rioters. As part of the build-up to the riot (and this is where Andor genuinely shines, the buildup and tension make the scarce action and payoff extremely enjoyable) we see a young man, whose father was killed by the government, build a bomb and throw it into a crowd of soldiers. Secondary cookoff explosions (another tinge of the realism I find intoxicating,) kill secondary characters, including a police informant. This terrorist attack (and the one I had just forgotten until now in episode 3, where Andor and Rael blow up police officers with a VBIED) we are meant to sympathize with. When the police open fire into the crowd, we are meant to condemn them. When a soldier is thrown from a tower to his death, it isn’t a comical beat.

There are many similar beats throughout Andor. Cassian Andor is played by Diego Luna, a Mexican actor, and speaks with a vague sci-fi Latin accent. He is racially profiled by police and unjustly arrested and sentenced to prison. We see that his adoptive father, played by a black man, was hanged in the town square by soldiers. It is alluded to that the Empire carried out a genocide on the indigenous nation to which Cassian was born. Anti-indigeneity is repeatedly shown to be a trait of the villains. Riot police beat innocent people with truncheons. The ways in which we are textually shown the Empire to be evil is by the text comparing it to the United States of America.

This is terrifying. The protagonists are overthrowing their government, a government textually extremely similar to the current regime in the United States, and we are meant to sympathize with them. And Andor is on Disney fucking plus. Disney is the goddamn safest corporation. They don’t do anything unless the algorithms show it’ll return them a profit. And Andor probably has turned a profit (streaming, unlike TV, does not have published viewership counts, so we’ll never know for sure.) I have friends whose careers, bodies, mental health, and finances were destroyed by the 2020 uprising. People I know in real life have been arrested, beaten, and shot at for doing what Disney is making gobs of money for showing for the same reason.

That uprising, that cultural moment, anti-american sentiment, and anti-prison sentiment, is being packaged back up and sold to us. The revolution is a commodity. Disney, the largest entertainment company in human history, can make a movie about why you should overthrow your government without actually impacting the chances of it being overthrown.