#me making this chart: what does it mean to be evil?! what is morality? who has free will? is an act of evil *more* evil if you revel in it?

[kinnbig]

your scientific researches have made me realize that everyone in this show is either gay or evil or both. (with exception of maybe namphueng, but she was in love with vegas's mother for all we know.)

it's true! the vast majority of kinnporsche characters are either gay, evil, or both - as demonstrated in this very scientific scatter chart!

[for the sake of this chart we are assuming that, u know. mafia is evil. killing people is evil. torturing guys by electrocuting their balls is evil. boring shit like that.]

more very scientific kinnporsche research

[valeriefauxnom]

And now that DnD alignment chart I mentioned...(Or: How the Heck Do Your Kids Have So Many Alignments, Aurelius?)

Explanations beneath the cut:

(as always long post ahead, but I tried to find little moments that I think overall display their alignment tendencies to break up the text!)

First of all, I'd like to establish how I personally interpret the Ye Olde DnD alignment chart in all the many arguments it's inspired over the years. 'Good' is the tendency to act selflessly or for noble pursuits through the means that do not or minimally harm others, 'Evil' indicates more of a self-centered pursuit of interests as well as a willingness to do acts that would make good-aligned characters balk in the process.

'Lawful' is a strong adherence to a code, be it in the actual law, religion, or a personal creed, whereas 'Chaotic' carries a sense of utter disregard for tradition and doing things how they are supposed to be done, usually accompanied by rebellion against a code in turn.

Neutral on the good-evil spectrum, well...here's kinda where the 'doing good things for bad reasons or doing bad things for good reasons' complexities arise. These characters are tempered in their tendencies to act in certain ways. They might do a good deed and then do something more morally complicated, shall we say, the next day. Mind you, this only goes so far. You can't be casually murdering babies and claim to have a 'neutral' alignment even if you just saved a whole orphanage yesterday, for example.

Neutral on the lawful-chaotic spectrum are people who usually are just going about their lives. They're not fiercely devoted to a set of rules, but aren't exactly jumping to throw order into the fire either. This doesn't mean they're entirely disinterested in following laws, but they're probably a bit more willing to bend tradition/laws for their purposes.

Okay, with that out of the way, here's some explanations+alternative alignments, since there's always an argument to be made...

Aurelius: Pretty cleanly stereotypical LG. He has a strong focus on fulfilling his duties as king as well as fostering good in the world. But he does have one unique attribute to me, for such a clean LG: he isn't so caught up in 'duty' that he tries to force everyone else into it, as seen with Emile when he tried to reassure him that he needn't assume responsibility beyond his capacity. He's more of the belief each should aspire to and fulfill what duty they can manage without forcing one's self into a position they are unable to handle, which is very admirable in my opinion.

Leonidas: starts in Lawful Evil, shifts to Lawful Neutral. Leonidas is Lawful, through and through, based on his strong adherence to his personal creeds, even if that creed is more of a chaotic viewpoint. If I could somehow declare him Lawfully-Chaotically-Evil, I would, but ultimately when chips are down he wants order, which is why he's more than willing to quell riots. His order is just one that inspires chaos among others.

He also flat-out changes his modus operandi when Euden beats him, because he actually sticks to his creed of 'might makes right' and thus, Euden's methods are right. While Leonidas is not necessarily incorrect in his hatred of the church in general, given what all they're up to, casually hunting down regular adherents and his wanton disregard for life puts him more in Evil territory. He shifts to Neutral more in the sense of how he's behaving even if his ultimate goal hasn't changed: he's just working towards it differently.

Phares: when possessed, honestly you could argue all three of the 'evils-'. The Progenitor himself is likely Lawful Evil, maaaybe Neutral Evil, but you could argue his overall behavior when possessed is pretty chaotic, since he loves springing in at inopportune times like his freeing of Beren, ambushing siblings as a 'test', and the way he seems to take joy in the chaos he's leaving. All in all, though, I'd say he's not particularly acting for pure chaos nor out of adherence to a creed because of the Progenitor's corruption.

Unpossessed, though, he's more in neutral good to lawful good territory. Phares does show some tendencies to believe they have duty as the royal family, but overall to me he comes across more as trying to do the good thing for the sake of it and isn't so caught up in duty as to stick to it if it's truly causing problems, like how he implores the Halidom scientists to study anything, no matter how heretical, to try and find a solution to save the world.

Chelle: I could see an argument for Chaotic Neutral depending on how morally absolutist you are when interpreting her summer story wherein she's essentially long-term manipulating to set up an actual child as one of her spies in the future by putting her in debt via rescuing her from the streets, which is kinda icky.

Otherwise, she's a pretty solid chaotic good. I mean, we're talking about a woman who prefers other games to Alberian chess because Alberian chess has too many rules in it and brings back deeply forbidden technology because she thinks it's needed. She loves doing things in an unconventional way to win before fights even start, and is a good representation that 'chaotic' alignments aren't just doing stuff at random as some misguided people seem to think. Granted, she does seem to have similar thoughts that there is a duty inherent to nobility, but the way she goes about expressing that? Pretty chaotic, all things considered.

Valyx: if you'd asked people around chapter 6, people would probably say he's Lawful Neutral since he was coming across as a 'law above all else even if the law is doing some messed up things' type, but with everything we know, he's solidly good. His story reveals he did initially try to stand up to his Father, not realizing he was possessed, and when he did figure that out, Morsayati was immediately threatening his siblings with possession and throwing the realm into chaos to get Valyx in line, which he accepted to try and keep the army set free to pillage per Morsayati under control as much as possible.

Beren: he just wants to see all the worlds burn and make them suffer as he has. Perfect microcosm of chaotic evil right there. (also I put this here because I don't know, Beren saying 'okie-dokie' is just funny to me)

Emile: Oh boy. Emile largely acts with complete disregard of others in favor of his own self-interest. He also shuns the concepts of duty as royalty after the long war with trying to measure up to his sibling growing up, overall appearing apathetic to the concept of responsibility in positions of power. He's strongly motivated to make others, in particular Euden, suffer physically and mentally, as well as his attempted enslavement of Mercury when he lies to pact since he views pacting as slavery on part of the dragon. He has huge disregard of life as seen by his random attack of a random village just because he obtained power.

To me, he fits pretty snug into CE for most of the game. After Audric's lessons and similar events, though, I'll give him CN since he seems like he's trying to overall behave better, ie 'not evilly', but it's a loooong slope to even that. At best I could imagine him in the fictional 'accidentally good' alignment, wherein he's not actually good but occasionally happens to do good things in the course of doing something else, like his encouragement of democracy of Dyrenell just because he's lazy.

Euden: he might have strong drives to protect others and be a good prince/leader, but with his overall distaste of actually being a leader and his tendency to relax all the rules and regulations regarding interacting with royalty comes across as 'neutral' to me. He respects laws, but won't let rules about etiquette or going through appropriate channels stop him from busting down doors to get to black market dealers, etc. But he also doesn't entirely approve of completely ignoring the law like Bell- er, Lapis in her Robin-Hood esque thievery or other vigilantism. Easy enough to slap the G alignment from there for NG!

Zethia: Being a head of a church, she's pretty clearly LG. She's strongly devoted to the Ilian faith, and does her best to adhere to the ideals the faith champions. She seems more overall concerned doing things because of her duty as Auspex and royalty both. Like Beren, not much to say here since not a whole lot is up in the air.

Possessed, well, along with Aurelius, the Other definitely seems to bat for chaos even if he proclaims indifference or even pretends to do things the 'lawful' way to continue his façade pretending to be Aurelius.

Nedrick: Nedrick is hard to quantify himself exactly, but I'm afraid his methods by assembling Agito shuck him pretty quick to Chaotic Evil. Even with how every would-be Agito, -excluding Valyx, -donned the beast masks willingly, his willingness to let them run rampant in all their atrocities makes him complicit since he enabled/empowered them to do it in the first place. I'd also hear an argument for himself more on Neutral Evil, but no matter how you slice it, Nedrick is not good aligned.

While I would argue he's not as personally evil as Emile tends to be, more of an extremist 'anything to get what I want done' with disregard if it harms people instead of Emile's goal often being to harm people, his methods and willingness to harm/kill so many still aren't good. He also is rebelling against the order of the world as it stands, which makes me tend towards chaotic even apart of the Agito.

So uh...yeah. The Alberian Royal family spans quite the range of alignments, in my opinion. What do you guys think, though? I'm curious as to how the royal fam comes across to you!

[dungeonmalcontent]

This may be out there/the wrong place for this but am I the only one who takes issue with the concept of alignments? Like Lawful and Chaotic kinda make sense but aren't good and evil inherently subjective?

Don't be nervous about just shooting me an ask, especially a sincere one (it's better than people sending hate). Alignment is actually a thing I think about a lot and I love talking a out my opinions on it.

The short version is really a "yes, but".

Long answer, I think alignment is a well intentioned system. And, when players are skilled at roleplaying, it has a lot of good RP and mechanical potential.

But I think a lot of people that play fast and loose with the rules should probably abandon alignment mechanics. At least for players. The less you stick to the rules, the less the tangential rules like alignment matter. And if you don't want to have a complex moral story, it's advantageous not to think too much about alignment.

On the other hand, when you start a game, particularly a campaign, you should be doing a lot of collaborative planning (at least, in an ideal world). And part of that planning should include expectations for what constitutes good and evil. Are you talking the vague greatest good? Maybe good is preservation of life? Maybe good is the preservation of law. It is subjective.

And the subjectivity of good, and consequently evil, in fictional settings is hilarious when compared to lawful and chaotic. Because laws are incredibly subjective, but they're explicit. Breaking a law is something you usually know that you're doing, and keeping a law is sort of an expectation in any large society. Chaos, on the other hand, is the subversion of law and order.

I think the really complex, and potentially less identifiable alignment is neutrality. Is being neutral choosing either opposite a relatively even number of times? Or is it withholding your choices? Or maybe it's letting someone else make choices for you. Because all corners of the alignment chart are actually pretty subjective, living anywhere in the middle can be very difficult to do intentionally. Because what neutrality isn't is picking and choosing when to be chaotic and when to be lawful (or good or evil). Because picking is an active choice. Your choices show a preference, however slight, and I would say that an active preference disqualifies you from neutrality.

The one thing I really love to use alignment for, and particularly neutral alignments, is to show where a character stands on a particular issue. Because if you look at alignment on an issue by issue basis, it becomes a lot easier to get a feel for your character's sense of morality. And where neutrality shines is not in choice making, but in making up your mind. Because if you tend to believe one thing, but someone else could or has begun to change you mind, I would say you've shifted into a neutral stance. It's not "no stance" it's "no prevailing stance"-- conflict where you aren't sure what will win out.

And when you look at alignment by issue, you also see how alignment can be a lot more fluid than the rules make it out to be for most systems. Just because you write "lawful good" on your character sheet day 1 doesn't mean it's going to stay that way or that you won't make choices out of your alignment. Because, like I said with neutrality, any alignment represents a "prevailing" stance. It doesn't win every battle between options in your head, but it does win the war. Or if it starts losing the war, you don't try to drop RP and cling to your written alignment, you change the alignment.

But, like I said at the start, this isn't something you can expect from most players. Alignment's major impacts outside of RP guidance are niche. Certain spells and magical effects can detect certain alignments, and that's probably all you'll encounter. Most GMs won't go to the trouble of making a complex moral struggle based on your party alignments, or introduce more complex moral magic, because they aren't confident you'll stick to your alignment when the going gets tough; and so it isn't worth the effort.

The more you talk to your group, and especially your GM, to establish characters goals and moral standings on multiple issues though... And the more you RP seriously, the more likely your alignment will see use in game and the more likely you will be incentivized to portray your character in a true to form way.

[aranict]

A, D, R, W!

SO glad you asked this @lehdenlaulu :D

A - Ships that you currently like a lot. (They don’t have to be OTPs because not everyone has OTPs.) Friendships, pairings, threesomes, etc. are allowed.

Well, as the latest reblogging spree can attest to, my latest obsession is Maura x Eyk from the 1899. Like, where to begin with this one. The pain. The longing stares. The slowburn from distrust to the tension literally being thick enough to cut with a knife . The last time I thought chemistry was so off the charts was in North and South. :) This is the last place I thought I’d find an OTP tbh, as a literally went to see the series without having seen even half a teaser on what’s it about :D

Besides this, I’ve recently picked up the Emperor’s Edge series - which is wonderful by the way and I highly recommend them- and . Um. A certain assassin with a certain quirky lady stole my heart :) Enemies to lovers you said? Check. Angst and slowburn? Check. Making each other better but not expecting the morally ambiguous character to literally change in one night due to the power of love and shit ? Check :D

And of course Im still not over Aleksander and Alina , though I do tend to stay off the fandom in general, godamn the potential of those two *frustrated noises*.

    D - A pairing you wish you liked but just can’t.

Hmmm. There are a LOT of pairings I dont like, to be fair , so this can be kinda a broad question. ( I’ll refrain from mentioning games/iffs where you just dont pick the route that doesnt suit you). But the first that comes to mind is Will and Elizabeth from the PoTC series.  I mean , I dont get me wrong,  I loved ( the first few at least) films. I wanted to like Elizabeth and Will as a power couple and all, but it just ...doesnt stick? I suppose I dont see the chemistry between them. And that made the whole on-screen romance kinda painful to watch :)

R - Which friendship/platonic relationship is your favorite in fandom?

Ok, so I think this might cross the boundaries between platonic and one might interpret it as more than that - but since its referred as platonic in the books I’ll stick to that : Damien and Gerald from the Coldfire trilogy. The emotional bond that those two form over the course of the books is just heart breaking . Whats even better is that  Gerald does not stray from his ‘’evil’’ nature - having embraced the role of the condemned soul- but he does change due to Damien’s influence. And I just love how Friedman took the archetype of  the ruthless, immoral sorcerer - and put against that someone who should by all means hate everything that he represents, and yet , he doesnt . What I love even more is how Damien- who is the equivalent of the paladin essentially -  ends up changing on his own - and question his own morality due to Gerald’s influence. The driving force of the book is the dynamic between the hero and the villain - and the impact each one has to the other.  Generally, its something that its quite refreshing to see in the genre :)

W - A trope which you are virtually certain to hate in any fandom.

Alright, two ship tropes that I literally want to hit with a broomstick till they are dead:

- Person A hiding things from Person B , for no apparent reason, other than to force unnecessary tension in the relationship  :)

-Person A learning something about Person B’s past  - by a third party usually- and instead of talking things though and giving them a chance to explain / discuss like the proper  adults in the room- instead deciding then and there that they betrayed/lied to them/etc. I hate this so much because its just forced drama ; people usually talk things through - and they can still end up hating each other guts if needs be, but then at least its believable. :)

[omegalomania]

I think tumblr ate my ask or it just didn't sent but what are your favorite Bastille songs / what are some songs you recommend?

i did NOT get this ask im very sorry anon.

it's genuinely hard for me to narrow down cause bastille is pretty up there in terms of favorite artists. i love all their shit, but a special mention goes out to their second studio album wild world since it's the one that made me a Fan

uh so here's a primer i guess i spent too much time on this lmao.

if you wanna listen to their big hits:

flaws - their first single in the uk. if you ever listened to ship playlists on 8tracks in like 2013-2015 then you've probably heard this song or a variant on it at some point.

pompeii - this is the song that really put them on the map and you definitely know it. it dominated the charts all over the place.

happier - the marshmello song that you've definitely heard before too. i think bastille wrote this for justin bieber or some shit but then decided they liked it too much to give it to him? lmao. anyway if you're not digging the version you hear on the radio all the time i recommend trying the stripped down version

good grief - their big hit off their second album. big in the uk, didn't really make as many waves elsewhere, but it's a really solid song anyway. one of those "upbeat tunes that's actually really fucking sad" ones

things we lost in the fire - another one off their first album. if you live in a wildfire area this might not be one to turn to. or maybe you'll find it cathartic idk i certainly do!!

quarter past midnight - a song about escapism, as was fitting when it was released in 2018 and equally fitting now. running away for a night of fucking around with friends, craving any kind of brief departure from the chaos of the modern world

skulls - this one was not a hit or a single and is technically a bonus track but i'm including it because once again if you ever clicked on a ship playlist on 8tracks in like 2013-2015 you've heard this one. and you know what that was justified this one is also good

if you wanna feel existentially depressed:

their whole discography. i mean i kid but i also don't. that's just kind of how bastille does it. BUT IN ALL SERIOUSNESS ones that hit me in particular would beeee

two evils - kind of a grim, haunting one introspecting about morality of the self.

oblivion - musing about the afterlife, love, and how time changes all of us.

those nights - contemplating what it is we seek when we plunge into reckless escapism, and the inherent loneliness of it; how even when surrounded by people there's still the pressure of the world outside, continuously coming to pieces

the draw - this one was written about the pull of pursuing a career in music vs. staying home with family and friends. in a broader sense, it can apply to a lot of things. i always felt it resonated with feelings of paranoia and displacement

winter of our youth - discusses childhood, nostalgia, and regret. if it feels like everything's slipping away, is it easier to relive the past, especially if the past is tinted rose?

sleepsong - loneliness, desperation, and the cyclical, abyss-like nature of all it encapsulates

if you want discussion of serious topics:

final hour - a bonus track off their second album that also became a bonus track off their third album? anyway this song talks about climate change and gun control. happy stuff

doom days - this one talks about, uh, everything! doomscrolling, political divides, escalating national tensions, climate change again, etc.

the currents - a song centered on political rhetoric and the power that figureheads have over the masses, the way they can orchestrate hate. basically it's not so subtly aimed at donald trump lmao, dan's literally sung it as much in a few live settings

WHAT YOU GONNA DO??? - social media addiction and the way capitalism and corporate interests have annexed our online experiences, fighting desperately for our attention as they seek to monetize every available aspect of our lives

four walls (the ballad of perry smith) - well this one is about uh. perry smith. who was charged with the death penalty for killing 4 people in the late 50's. but it's less directly about him and more a discussion of the morality of the death penalty and capital punishment

snakes - burgeoning anxieties and the impulse to turn to easy outs, like ignorance or alcoholism, to escape the world's global problems

if you want some pop culture sprinkled on top:

icarus - greek mythology. i like this one because it addresses something that i feel isn't addressed enough in discussions of this myth, which is that icarus is a very young lad. less about the pride of the fall, and more about the inherent tragedy of that.

laura palmer - the whole song is a david lynch shoutout. i've never seen twin peaks myself but the song still slaps.

daniel in the den - christian mythology. discusses the biblical tale of daniel in the lion's den and links that up to themes of betrayal and family.

poet - this one's a double feature, referencing both william shakespeare's sonnet 18 and edmund spencer's sonnet 75. also one of my favorites.

send them off! - this is another one of my favorites of theirs. it's also been described by dan as "othello meets the exorcist" and it very much delivers there

if you want something uplifting:

joy - while bastille (understandably) has a bit of reputation as a band that makes sad music about sad things, they've definitely got some happier songs in their catalogue. pun intended cha ching. this one's one of their more straightforwardly happy tunes

survivin' - this was a song they wrote while they were touring and then felt weird about releasing once the panini hit because it felt a bit on the nose. they ended up releasing it anyway and i am so glad they did cause it's a mood

act of kindness - the "happy" part here is debatable but i'm gonna include it anyway. it’s when someone does something nice for you and that impulse Changes you way down deep you know???

warmth - one of those "the world's going to shit but at least we have each other" kinds of tunes

the anchor - one of those "the world's going to shit but you're the one fucking thing that's still keeping me here" kinds of tunes

give me the future - their latest single as of this writing and one of the more optimistic tracks in their catalogue imo! it's yearning, but it's also with a genuine hope for the future.

and LASTLY. because im going to take every chance i can to plug this band. im going to throw some collabs and covers at you because there's one thing this band does SUPER well and it's collabs and covers.

of the night - this is the big one. it mashes up rhythm of the night by corona and rhythm is a dancer by SNAP! and it's so good they still do this one live and it goes off every time.

no angels - a mashup of "no scrubs" by TLC and "angels" by the xx, poured into a strangely mournful tune with clips from the hitchcock movie psycho. doesn't sound like it should work but it does. kinda really does.

torn apart - with GRADES and lizzo no less!!! it's got two parts but they're both excellent listen to them both

weapon - collab with angel haze, dan priddy, and F*U*G*Z and one of my absolute favorites

remains - remix of their song "skulls" but featuring rag'n'bone man and skunk anansie that adds an entire new dimension to the song, really fucking excellent

old town road mashup - lil nas x's old town road meets lizzo's good as hell meets radiohead's talk show host meets talking heads' road to nowhere meets the osmond's crazy horse. "what the fuck that shouldn't work" i KNOW and yet here it is!! BLATANTLY BANGING!!!

we can't stop - one of the few times dan smith subtly changes the lyrics of the song he's covering (most of the time he opts to keep the original pronouns and the like, which is very nice to see). anyway this one mixes miley cyrus's we can't stop with eminem's lose yourself and billy ray cyrus's achy breaky heart. and also the lion king's i just can't wait to be king is there. yes i know it sounds batshit especially because the whole thing is surprisingly melodic and heartfelt and you know what it works.

anyone but me x nightmares - mashing up joy crookes' anyone but me with easy life's nightmares and absolutely one of my favorites.

bad guy mashup - how many songs can they include with the word "bad" in the title? we've got bad guy (billie eilish), bad decisions (bastille), bad romance (lady gaga), and bad blood (taylor swift). bastille even has a song called bad blood and they didnt use it. they used taylor swift's version. also the distinctive guitar riff from dick dale's misirlou is there.

somebody mashup - how many songs can they include with the word "some" in the title? someone like you (adele), somebody told me (the killers), somebody to love (queen), use somebody (kings of leon), and someone you loved (lewis capaldi). seriously these guys take mashups to a new level.

final song - this is a cover of MØ's final song. it also adds in craig david's 7 days and, impossibly enough, europe's final countdown. how does it work. how.

ALL RIGHT. THATS ALL IVE GOT IN ME. HOPE THIS HELPED ANON AND IM SORRY IF THIS IS TOO MUCH

[iridescent-honey]

Mysterion characterization

In my opinion, he is one of the most mischaracterized people in the hero franchise.

He is often portrayed as an angsty, edgy, and a ruthless antihero.

Although I can see how that conclusion is come to, here are my thoughts:

*TL;DR at the bottom in red*

*This information is coming from both the game and show, if I can find direct clips, I will show them*

I used the word anti hero, allow me to elaborate on that briefly. For anyone unaware, an antihero is described as “a central character in a story, movie, or drama who lacks conventional heroic attributes.” I would also describe it as someone who is fighting for good while being uncaring/unhelpful to others if it means the majority of the public is helped. Note that the definition of what an antihero is varies from person to person. Poorly characterized antiheroes are written as villains who are part of the hero’s team for some unknown reason.

The first episode we see Mysterion in is in S13E2, he is seen as a rival to The Coon, however he does not view himself that way, in his eyes, he is helping because that’s what he should do, not to spite Cartman.

I think this episode is often forgotten when people view him as an anti hero. We see him expose his identity and putting himself in danger to not have citizens caught in The Coon’s attempt at blackmail. Not my exact idea of an antihero however I digress.

Spoilers for the the game

In the game, the entirety of freedom pals aren’t introduced until the halfway point, however Mysterion, Wonder Tweek, and Tuppaware are introduced very early as opposition. After a lovers quarrel between Tweek and Craig, Doctor Timothy have an argument causing the two factions to fight. Craig is a mandatory player on your team.

While you fight the Freedom Pals, Tweek is the one doing the most talking (I say Tweek because it is very out of character for Wonder Tweek). Throwing insult after insult at Craig, even when the insults aren’t at him directly, Craig respondes as though they were. Tuppaware is not to important, he does his job and fights you, nothing too noteworthy there. But this is about Mysterion so I’ll move on.

In this fight, nearly every time you attack him or his teammates, he responds with how we are only being used by The Coon and we can do better than the Coon and Friends franchise. Also, note that when the opposition show interest in attacking Wonder Tweek he appears fearful, Tuppaware looks disgusted, but Mysterion appears surprised? Disappointed? I’m not quite sure but it’s definitely different than the rest of the Freedom Pals’s reaction. (I know how pointless it may seem to analyze the facial expression when they’re drawn, well, like that. But also consider this! I don’t care.) The best way I could describe it is as being upset/disappointed that that he is being attacked. It is my belief that this is because he doesn’t want to fight. This is countered by the fact that he is a relentless fighter. The only time he isn’t is stated before: the first time you fight him.

The second time however is a different story, he attacks you ruthlessly. He gives you one chance at the beginning of the of the fight, saying that “Fighting Doctor Timothy is a mistake beyond your comprehension.” But afterwards makes no attempts to help you, instead changing to his one liners.

This is another thing I need to talk about. I have a post made for the future where I talk about way too many of his quotes but I’ll summarize it for you.

Being angsty

Being ruthlessly

Being dark

Being concerned for his teammates

Cheering his teammates on

There are some more types but these are the most important because a lot of his lines are dark, angsty, and ruthless and tend to overshadow his other quotes. The appeal to throw in the towel and say that he’s an antihero would be very easy but I truly don’t see it. Despite his quotes he isn’t as angsty in most parts and is seen being distressed for other teammates and trying to help whoever he can.

I believe that he says his quotes only to scare the opposition. When he interacts with his teammates and civilians he stops the angsty-ness and acts as a protector. In my opinion, an antihero would not care about their perception, if the job gets done that’s all that matters. But clearly Mysterion doesn’t abide by those rules.

Although alignment charts are a gross oversimplification for explaining characterization but I think it is a very simple way to explain it. On the character sheets, the alignment is more simplified and only allows lawful, neutral or evil. He describes himself as lawful but that is not a proper alignment. I am still torn on his alignment but I will show three alignments definitions then my thoughts.

Definitions

Lawful Good

A lawful good character acts as a good person is expected or required to act. They combine a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly. They tell the truth, keep their word, helps those in need, and speaks out against injustice. A lawful good character hates to see the guilty go unpunished.

Lawful good is the best alignment you can be because it combines honor and compassion.

Lawful good can be a dangerous alignment when it restricts freedom and criminalizes self-interest.

Lawful Neutral

A lawful neutral character acts as law, tradition, or a personal code directs them. Order and organization are paramount to them. They may believe in personal order and live by a code or standard, or they may believe in order for all and favor a strong, organized government.

Lawful neutral is the best alignment you can be because it means you are reliable and honorable without being a zealot.

Lawful neutral can be a dangerous alignment when it seeks to eliminate all freedom, choice, and diversity in society.

Neutral Good

A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do. They are devoted to helping others. They work with kings and magistrates but do not feel beholden to them.

Neutral good is the best alignment you can be because it means doing what is good without bias for or against order.

Neutral good can be a dangerous alignment when it advances mediocrity by limiting the actions of the truly capable.

*I did not add lawful evil because it is so wildly out of character there is no point in talking about it.*

Breaking it down

Lawful Good

A lawful good character acts as a good person is expected or required to act.

Mysterion shows himself to be a good person without wanting payment many times. Most notably when he reveals his identity to prevent harm to other citizens, and when he shows kindness and hope to the player despite the character and their teammates showing none back.

They combine a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly.

The commitment to fight evil seems self explanatory so I will not acknowledge that, what I will elaborate on is the “discipline to fight relentlessly”. Earlier in the post, I explain how he seems to not want to fight but does so fiercely. This explains it. He is the calmest out of the heroes at nearly all times, the only time this is false is when a teammate is unjustly injured. While he does get angry, he is never seen actively trying to start a fight, but he will always end one.

They tell the truth, keep their word, helps those in need, and speaks out against injustice.

Throughout the series and the game, he never lies, however, he is never asked to tell the truth and I’m hesitant on saying that the lack of evidence is evidence. Despite that he does keep his word, his promise to protect his city, and promise to protect Karen are always fulfilled. When the Coon acts against the group, Mysterion is quick to shut him down.

A lawful good character hates to see the guilty go unpunished.

In the game, he tells us multiple times that being a hero is ugly. That the merciless don’t deserve mercy. He has made it clear that he is the bringer of karma.

Lawful Neutral

A lawful neutral character acts as law, tradition, or a personal code directs them.

Mysterion is an upholder of morals. His own ethics pave how he reacts and behaves. For the most part, he follows the law very closely, but he will break off and actions will become unforgiving if the person deserves it.

Order and organization are paramount to them. They may believe in personal order and live by a code or standard…

His origin as Mysterion was to organize the town through peace and to help stop crime. He tries to keep his team peaceful and succeeds when part of freedom pals. When the franchise was whole, the Coon could break his peaceful exterior.

or they may believe in order for all and favor a strong, organized government.

This is the most difficult to defend. Yes, he does feed information to the police, but only when they are passive crimes. When active crimes occur, he attempts to deal with the issue himself.

Neutral Good

This is not in line with his personal alignment identity, but this seems the most plausible. Allow me to elaborate:

A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do.

This has been explained in many places throughout this post and so I do not feel the need to repeat it.

They are devoted to helping others.

Once again, Mysterion is constantly seen putting others first: revealing his identity, handling Hindsight by himself, and risking his life and immortality to save them from Cthulhu.

They work with kings and magistrates but do not feel beholden to them.

This feels more natural than the last explanation for lawful neutral. He works with the cops in certain situations but is quick to work by himself or with his teammates if needed.

The alignments have been broken down and the evidence has been laid out, feel free to make your own decision.

TL;DR

Mysterion is not a dark antihero, he is a vigilante, a defender of peace, and beacon of hope to his citizens. He puts the needs and safety of others before himself.

Alignment possibilities: lawful good, lawful neutral, neutral good.

[lochnessies]

ok here’s a dissection of a post an anon sent me the link to and bc i have the worst time management possible and i completely forgot i had it lol so sorry anon here you go ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

I am constantly thinking about how Edelgard just doesn’t seem designed to appeal to cishet men.

i hate to be the one to break this news to you op but just because a character doesn’t show skin like charlotte fire emblem doesn’t mean she isn’t designed to pander to men. she’s very much designed to pander to the (majority straight male) player base with her ‘uwu i only trust you professor omg did u see that rat? pls don’t look at my painting of you uwu’.

then there’s the whole edelgard c support in japanese where byleth makes reference to having come to her room for ‘yobi’ which is

there’s also the scene where byleth can make an unsolicited comment about edelgard’s breast size. which is… uhh… gross.

edelgard also has cipher cards that go from slightly fanserviceie to full on suggestive

and also her breast armor that my sister relentlessly mocked lol

and here’s a chart from the 3h subreddit about gender/sexually in regards to edelgard and edeleth. it’s extremely straight male. op might have just overlooked this since they probably don’t go on reddit and stay on tumblr (which unlike reddit is mostly female and has a high lgbt demographic).

Like the joke is that Bleagles is the Gay House, but everything about her feels deliberately non-hetero.

i don’t like where this is going…

She’s dressed in sharp outfits covering her upper body, with proportions that don’t seem exaggerated.

so women who cover up must be lgbt because straight women are naturally more revealing? oh y i k e s

Her poise and the way she effortlessly flourishes her axe exhibits an air of coolness. While titties out =/= character of no substance, Edelgard being dressed more modestly suggests that she wasn’t designed with male-centred fanservice in mind.

“titties don’t equal no substance but here’s my post on how she has more substance because she doesn’t show titties” ok

And she still looks absolutely stunning in her more modest attire (like seriously, I haven’t felt the need to return to cosplay in years but I want to do her academy look so bad). 

yes she does. amazing design 10/10. i have a feeling this is the only part i’m going to agree with

Edelgard is intense. She does not mince her words and she is constantly evaluating you. Though she tries, she has a difficult time understanding her peers initially. Early on, she talks about how she would sacrifice herself and others in the name of some greater good. She is terrible at communicating with her peers. She has to be seen as infallible. Her heart has been hardened for years and she assumes she has to stay that way. She also assumes everyone mourns the same way she does - which is why she (kind of insensitively) insists you move on when Jeralt dies. Because to her, grief has to be channeled towards action, or else you’ll get lost in it. This attitude is demonstrated time and time again as she presses on. It can make her come off as cold and unfeeling - but look closer, and she’s anything but.

don’t really have anything to say at this part. it is pretty on the nose though i would slightly disagree with that last sentence a bit. i wouldn’t say she’s as i feeling as hubert is but all of her talks of the war boil down to how she feels and never her victims.

Her story is ultimately about her realizing that to achieve her goals, she needs to let people in and allow herself to want things like cakes and tea parties and lazy days in peace. 

????? what ????? her goals include imperialism, ethnic and religious targeting. her story is about having a set of beliefs and mowing down anybody who stands in her way. that has nothing to do with tea, friends, and lazy days. also am i supposed to be sad that she has to get up everyday and work? i do that and i didn’t start a war and only throw a pity party for myself

The game leaves the player guessing as to how involved the Flame Emperor was in each Part I event, makes you feel hurt by her betrayal, and leaves you with a choice: do you follow the orders of the woman who tried to make you a god without your consent, or a young girl with questionable morals about to throw the world into upheaval?

this isn’t an ideal situation but i think i’m going to stick with the woman who tried to make me a god since i’m not selfish and i know it’s not only my desires and life at stake here. plus the green hair slaps ngl

Choosing her of your own volition (not for completionist reasons) requires the basic ability to sympathize with a woman’s pain. It also requires the player to read beyond her unwavering will and dubious methods to get a sense of how deep that pain goes and how the theme of humanity relates to her differently in each route.

i’m not going to touch this since @nilsh13 made a post on it that i’ll link here. i agree with everything he said so to repeat it would be redundant.

The player must be able to see a young woman’s desperate resolve to change the world so it stops exploiting people and ruining lives. They must be able to accept the fact that women can make the same morally wrong and ambivalent decisions that complicated male characters get to make all the time and still be the one to root for.

literally the same reason i love rhea lol her goddess experiments are dubious at best but her reasons are the same you mentioned. i would say that i like this quality in edelgard too if her ending, while bloody, actually ended in a good outcome for fodlan.

This is not unique to LGBT+ people, but this population is likely to understand why Edelgard feels so strongly about why she has to change the system. 

i understand wanting to change a system, i really do. like edelgard, i’m an opinionated bisexual woman (who’s also physically disabled) so yeah i get it. and change can be good but it can also be terrible. even if the church was the boogeyman edelgard treats it as she still replaces it with her own shit regime. so it’s the same circus just with a new conductor.

I don’t think “Edelgard gets undue criticism because she’s a woman” captures the full picture. An important aspect of her treatment by certain parts of the fandom is that she’s a radical woman.

or maybe she does some pretty fucked up shit and it goes unacknowledged in her own route. and yeah she’s radical but in all the worst ways.

Her hatred of the Church and the Crest system resonates way harder with people who have been hurt by institutions that are deeply engrained in our society. 

and what about people who have been hurt by systems where their ‘merit’ didn’t measure up and they were left behind? what about people from nations that experienced imperialism?

Siding with her means siding against the Church - which, while different from real world religious institutions, still invokes language about “sin” and “punishment.

yeah the ‘sins’ and ‘punishments’ are used in relation to attempted murders which i think everybody can agree is a bad thing that needs to be condemned.

Choosing Edelgard will likely hit different if homophobic and transphobic Christians used that rhetoric against you.

it has literally nothing to do with ‘sins’ and ‘punishments’ in regards to being gay or trans. that’s you projecting. especially since the church has 2 canon gay characters and two coded ones.

like i can understand why having a church condemn you can be uncomfortable but i’m begging you to please look at the context of what’s happening.

I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that the reason F/F Edeleth is the more popular iteration of that ship because most people who would choose to S-support Edelgard are LGBT+ themselves. This is not a revelation. To anyone in the community, it’s fairly obvious. 

i was talking to nilish and he said

so yeah… while there is definitely sapphic femleth shippers out there, there’s still a whole lot of weird fetishizing going on from straight men about edelgard.

Crimson Flower was my first route. I went into the game knowing absolutely nothing. I played it during the last week of 2020 and hoo boy was it cathartic. 

i can tell. this wasn’t supposed to be a dig but it came out that way and i’m not taking it out.

I felt like I was living out a gay revolution power fantasy, where I could truly change systems of oppression while fighting alongside a group of troubled students I’d shaped the lives of.

so a gay revolution power fantasy (cringe) goes hand in hand with imperialism and installing a dictatorship? also the war had nothing to do with sexuality.

Through your unwavering support, Edelgard learns that she needs to be human, that she must listen to her friends, and that she’s allowed to enjoy the world she’s creating.

edelgard gets to learn how to be human all while hunting those who don’t. and she doesn’t listen fo her friends. she doesn’t even trust them. she’s willing to talk to byleth but keep the people who’s been by her side for five years in the dark about everything. and yeah she gets to enjoy her new words since she’s on top. hate to be a commoner under her rule after she burned down my village in her war.

I love this character so much.

clearly. and i honestly don’t care if somebody likes her. i do as well even if my sometimes scathing words can make it seem otherwise.

It has been six months since I first played and I am still analyzing her,

me too. please help me escape i’m losing my mind

because there’s so much depth. Yet so many people fail to see that depth and dismiss her as evil,

i mean, she does some fucked up shit that goes beyond any of the less than desirable actions of the other main characters and does an extremely poor job in trying to make herself seem innocent. i personally don’t think she’s pure evil but i completely understand where the people who say she is are coming from.

because they never had the will to understand complicated women in the first place. 

that’s big talk from somebody who implies that a gay pope is comparable to homophobic and transphobic irl religions and that leads an oppressive regime all because she uses the vague terms of sin and punishments that you have to gay power fantasy your way out of

[hithelleth]

The Cleaning Lady S1

It’s been a week since the season finale, so my feelings had the time to settle and I need to write out some things.

Mainly, look, I’m a simple, shallow fangirl. ;) I came here for a ship. The ship. Of the not quite enemies but maybe adversaries-to-lovers (hopefully :P) variety. And the show has definitely delivered on that with off-the-charts chemistry and real connection despite everything.

But also so much more.

For airing on Fox, this show was really good about how it tackled the topic of immigrants/undocumented workers and the difficulties they face and the unfairness of it all.

But mostly, I liked how it dealt with the notions of morality and really showed the complexity good and evil. (Emphasis on showed, because it really did that, not told, so of course it may have flown over some people’s heads.)

I loved how they wrote the characters to show that what’s legal is not always good and what’s illegal is not always bad and that and belonging to the group designated as good does not make one a good person.

That said, I do not hate Garrett (yes, this is about him, in part).

(I read some meta/opinions along watching while hunting for pretty gifs to reblog (and there’s barely any of Garrett, oh well [enter something about having to them myself but not doing it :P])and he seems to be universally hated and people seem to be mostly focused on shipping (which is fine, I’m too, but…).

As opposed to some other shows (okay, one in particularly), what I liked about TCL is that Garret as an FBI agent is clearly designated as the supposed good guy. But he is a) shit at his job (skirting and breaking the law) and a) often a disaster of a human being, although he means well, and sometimes, when he realises/acknowledges his fuck-ups, he tries to fix things and makes up for it.

And that’s what makes him not hate-able, not lovable-either, but interesting. And it’s what I loved the most in TCL: showing that and/or when the designated ‘good guy’ is not good at all and making it clear, clearly framing it as him being in the wrong. A fucking +++++++ job!

In the opposite way, they show Arman, the mobster who should be in the ‘evil’ group as often much more decent human being.

And then there’s Thony, clearly ‘violating the law’, but obviously set up as good, as the protagonist to sympathise with and root for.

Marco is a whole another issue I have not spoons or desire to deal with but again I liked the dichotomy between Thony leaving with Luca to get Luca treatment and him leaving with Luca (I called that, btw!) because of, I guess, his manly pride & need to be in charge, and maybe a bit of vengefulness (or a lot of the latter.) And I’m not even getting into his gambling (although at least he had some decency to save some money for Luca).

But, maybe somewhere behind there’s something good in him, too. At least, I think, he does love Luca.

So, yeah, I don’t like Marco, but I don’t quite hate him, either. Okay, maybe a bit, more than Garrett at least. Which says something. Maybe because we really didn’t learn much about Marco, definitely less than about Garrett, so he doesn’t seem as interesting. (And a boring/uninteresting character is worse than evil.) But they might flesh him out in S2, considering how S1 ended.

So, yeah, from what I read there are good chances for S2 considering the ratings and TPTB’s enthusiasm, but what worries me is it being on Fox. I guess we have to wait and see.

I do hope there is another season, because there’s a lot of potential from Thony (hopefully) getting Luca back to trying her new criminal enterprise and manoeuvring between working with Arman and not going to jail (I guess the deportation trial is still on? I forgot.) and everything else.

I also loved Fiona and the kids and Fiona and Thony’s friendship and would love to see more of them, too.

[ravnicaforgoblins]

Ravnica for Goblins

Alignment

Figuring out where on the spectrum of beliefs, morals, and neutrality your character falls can be a challenge. One individual’s Chaotic Good is another’s Lawful Evil. To help clarify things, most campaigns include alignment for significant NPCs, and one can often draw a line between that NPC and that alignment. This doesn’t apply to every NPC, but the more important someone is, the more they come to represent a specific section of the moral grid in a campaign.

Ravnica does this as well, with most of the alignment chart represented by a Guildmaster. This isn’t completely uniform, however, so there’s wiggle room for an NPC to lean one way or the other as fits the story. There are some pretty safe bets, however, who can be counted on to check certain boxes at all times.

Isperia of the Azorius Senate: Lawful Neutral

Isperia represents the goal of the Azorius; objective devotion to upholding the laws as they are written. She was elected to her position because of her ability to look passed right & wrong, instead focusing solely on interpreting Ravnica’s 10d6 of Psychic damage legal system for all disputes.

Lazav of House Dimir: Neutral Evil

Lazav is the Dimir at their most annoying but least murderous. Blatant disregard for everyone’s privacy, but preference for stealing, secrets, and information over assassination. Lazav infiltrates every Guild, including his own, always determined to stay several steps ahead of any potential threat. This is not to say he won’t kill people if necessary, but his is a cold, “bloodstained calculus” methodology. It’s never personal.

Rakdos of the Cult of Rakdos: Chaotic Evil

On this plane, Rakdos is the living embodiment of Chaotic Evil, a title he takes very seriously. It’s just about the only thing he takes seriously, as he prefers to live without rules and have everyone else do the same. Unrestrained hedonism and mayhem are his bread & butter. You do what you want, whatever you want, whenever you want, however you want, regardless of what anyone or anything else says. No restrictions, no inhibitions, no hesitation. Encouraging this kind of destructive chaos in the streets is the only thing keeping Rakdos from embracing more orthodox Chaotic Evil behavior of slaughtering millions, enslaving thousands, and bowing to no one.

The Obzedat of the Orzhov Syndicate: Lawful Evil

Hard to believe there can be something worse than an actual Demon given permission to encourage every sin imaginable, but that is what the Ghost Council are. The Obzedat exist to stretch, bend, and twist every law designed to maintain order, neutrality, or justice so as to benefit themselves. What’s worse is how the Orzhov play innocent when they do it. Unlike the Dimir or the Rakdos who accept and even embrace society’s interpretation of their actions, the Orzhov refuse to be seen as anything but humble, spiritual, gracious public servants. The very antithesis of what they actually are; arrogant, miserly, manipulative bastards. They will point out exactly which laws they are not breaking, which laws there is insufficient evidence to prove they are breaking, and which laws prevent you from punching them in the face right now.

Trostani of the Selesnya Conclave: Neutral Good

If there’s one thing to be said for Selesnya, it’s that they are rarely the problem. The Conclave is perfectly content to keep to their fields & forests most of the time and focus solely on building up their own Guild. In a city where every Guild has a problem with every other Guild, Selesnya is the only one who at least tries to get along with everyone else. They don’t tend to get involved in matters that don’t concern them, but theirs is always a safe haven for those who seek it. Trostani is made up of three dryads representing Harmony, Life, and Order. You don’t get much more Neutral Good than that. The only problem is that Trostani basically never leave their Guildhall, so their influence only spreads so far. The reason they can live so peacefully is because so little of the chaotic city life overlaps into theirs.

Besides them, everyone has wiggle room and gray area to move around in. Both Niv-Mizzet and Borborygmos are canonically Chaotic Neutral, but with their most prominent personality traits being vanity & anger, respectively, the “Neutral” part of that can go out the window quick. Still, almost every Guild has at least a semblance of a position somewhere on the chart to start from. You can basically count on a member of each Guild to be at least:

Azorius Senate: Lawful

This is the Guild that writes the laws of Ravnica, after all. They literally draw their power from this ancient legal code, so it makes sense that, whether an Azorius leans more towards Good, Evil, or Neutrality, they do so lawfully.

Boros Legion: Good

If the Azorius follow the intellectual letter of the law, the Boros follow the passionate spirit for which said law was originally written. Justice, not legal-ese. Sometimes the law is good enough, but sometimes it fails its citizens. A Boros should be an inspiring force for Good, whether Lawful or Chaotic depends on the individual.

House Dimir: Neutral

The best a Dimir operative can hope to achieve, morally speaking, is neutrality. If you are working for this Guild, you are lying & stealing. Odds are you are infiltrating another Guild to find/steal information to report back to your superior(s). Not every Dimir agent does this willingly, however. Maybe a character only became a Dimir operative after finding out their mentor was. Maybe a character had nowhere else to turn and no one else to depend on. Maybe they just needed House Dimir’s connections to get them close enough to someone in another Guild who wronged them. Whatever the motivation, cling to that gray area of neutrality like your life depends on it. It’s all you’ve got.

Gruul Clans: Chaotic

Gruul are many things. “Lawful” is not one of them. If you’re a member of a Gruul Clan, you’ve definitely got a bit of a temper on you and a strong disregard for authority. Now, a Gruul can absolutely be a force for good, or, conversely, evil. Maybe you joined the Gruul after your ancestral home was bulldozed over for a smelly Izzet facility. Maybe you had a mental breakdown after decades of trying to uphold law in a city where the laws mean jack shit unless there’s a guy in blue sitting at his desk. Maybe you got tired of planting trees and getting stepped on. Maybe you don’t like the pretentiousness of so-called “artists”. Maybe you just like hitting things. Whatever your reason, the Gruul will welcome another anarchist.

Golgari Swarm: Chaotic/Evil/Neutral

The Golgari Swarm are the first Guild where you’re really going to find a lot of diversity in alignment. Some definitely fall into the chasm of Chaotic Evil Necromancers, others stand firmly in the fields of True Neutral Rot Farmer, and some idly wander between the two. Necromancy is pretty normal in Golgari society, and “Evil” can be considered a harsh word to describe it. It’s definitely more normalized in the Undercity than it is on the surface. A lot of typically Evil behavior is like that for the Golgari, lest we forget that this society of giant bugs, necromancers, zombies, medusa, etc also run the sewage system and food stamps program for the city. That said, there are definitely Golgari with sufficient ambition/motivation to become ready-made Big Bads. What is a Lich, after all, but a wizard who says, “No, I’m too important to die!”

Izzet League: Chaotic

If there’s one predictable aspect of the Izzet, it’s that they are unpredictable. For a Guild whose founding principle is “I wonder what would happen if....”, it’s best to accept that you’ll never be Lawful. Your job, as it is, is to look at laws (nature, physics, etc) and poke at them with electrodes to see what happens. Your focus will always be on things that haven’t been written down yet, as opposed to what already has. It’s almost literally impossible to be Lawful and Izzet for that reason alone. As far as Good, Evil, and Neutral go; that’s up to the individual. This experiment could replicate food so we never have to eat Golgari rations again! Or it could replicate essential personnel to prevent understaffing! Or, it could even replicate.... ME (cue maniacal laughter).

Orzhov Syndicate: Lawful

The Orzhov, like the Azorius, draw their power and influence from the laws of Ravnica. Evil is expected, though not mandatory, but Lawful is a requirement. An Orzhov who doesn’t know their way around Ravnica’s laws is a loose end, and the Orzhov don’t allow loose ends to jeopardize their schemes & ambitions. One can absolutely be a Lawful Neutral Orzhov, also known as an Accountant, but such individuals rarely find their way into a life of adventure. A Lawful Good Orzhov can exist, but your greatest adversary will be the large majority of your Guild who sees you as a potential threat to their illicit activities. In which case, you’ll want to know those laws even better than they do.

Cult of Rakdos: Chaotic

Chaos is mandatory, evil is encouraged. By “Evil”, we mean “things people tell you are Evil”. Anything you would do while drunk you should be able to do at all times! There’s really only three rules in the Cult of Rakdos:

Rule #1, Rakdos is #1

Rule #2, JUST DO IT

Rule #3, Don’t be boring

Being Neutral breaks Rule 3, being Good breaks Rule 2 and/or 3, and being Lawful breaks all 3 rules. Which reminds me of the fourth rule:

Rule #4, NEVER break Rule #1

Truthfully, being Chaotic Good or Chaotic Neutral is perfectly fine as long as you don’t impede on someone else’s hedonism without a reason, or lack thereof. As long as you’re being free & crazy, that’s what really matters.

Selesnya Conclave: Good

As stated with Trostani, Selesnya is a pretty consistent force of Good, if nothing else. They don’t really do hate, you know? Life in the Conclave is pretty uniformly Good, so why make trouble? Why can’t everyone just be Good? In short; ‘cause they don’t wanna, none of your business, go hug a tree, and/or because fire is FUN. Lawful fits some individuals but can just get in the way for others. Neutral is pretty solid but some things must call you to act. Chaotic is if you really want to embrace being a Nature Warrior in a planet-sized cityscape. Selesnya is the Guild for goodie two-shoes, as if that’s a bad thing.

Simic Combine: Any

The Simic Combine is the one Guild that can honestly fall anywhere on the alignment chart. The Guild started out as Doctors, Naturalists, and preservers of life. Now it also operates large-scale bioengineering. You can have a Lawful Good Simic Paladin committed to preserving life and health, a True Neutral Simic Forcemage (Druid) dedicated to living a simple life bolstering plant growth, or a Chaotic Evil Simic Wizard who has decided on everyone’s behalf that flippers and gills are now mandatory. Just like science can be used for great Good, great Evil, or mundane routine, the Simic Combine can turn its experiments to any purpose, depending on the individual. And whereas the Izzet are firmly Chaotic, the Simic have the foresight to think ahead before they try an experiment. You can be anything you want in the Simic Combine, just plan it out.

[tanoraqui]

tanoraqui

Still thinking about an au in which for some reason WWX and the Wens are left to just live peacefully on the creepy death mountain - some detente wherein they don’t leave the mountain ever and in exchange no one tries to visit ever. Borders patrolled by corpses and sect disciples. So A-Yuan grows up raised kind of collectively but mostly by WWX and Wen Qing (the one most likely to tell WWX that he’s doing it wrong), and learns healing-focused spiritual cultivation AND demonic cultivation, and then at some point starts sneaking out to be the terrifying force of righteous kindness he was always going to be

tanoraqui

Righteous kindness but also, like, having picked up WWX’s cavalier confidence (or at least some of the ability to fake it) and Wen Qing’s general attitude of Do No Harm But Take No Shit

Like IMAGINE

tanoraqui

In this au, despite the strict border-by-mutual-agreement that’s the only reason somehow no ones tried to attack, LWJ sneaks in like one a year so he and WWX can make eyes at one another but not actually say anything ever, and Wen Qing and LXC are both EXHAUSTED bc both their dumb little brothers (WWX is a sibling by adoption now don’t @ me) mope for like a week after EVERY SINGLE TIME THIS HAPPENS, and it’s been /over ten years/.

tanoraqui

Meanwhile Jiang YanLi and JZX are FINE, and JYL somehow keeps up some sort of correspondence with WWX - or at least, he’s faithfully managed to send a birthday present for Jin Ling every single year, and every time, JYL makes her son write a thank-you note and bribes some series of people to get it smuggled back to Yiling

tanoraqui

...which means, honestly, that Jin Ling is probably wildly curious about his uncle the evil demonic cultivator kept trapped within the terrible ghost mountain by the forces of Good and Right, and WILL sneak out one day to try to visit. Optimally, obviously, at the same time Wen Yuan is sneaking out to see the non-mountain world

tanoraqui

The optimal plot is that Wen Yuan ropes Jin Ling into helping him set up WWX and LWJ, because he, too, is exasperated at this point, and Jin Ling ropes Wen Yuan into arranging like a parent trap reunion for the Jiang siblings, and obviously there are monsters and undead to complicate it all

tanoraqui

They kind of acquire Lan Jingyi somewhere, somehow. He’s having a blast

There is a 100% chance that the first Adult(TM) to find them is Wen Ning and they just kind of rope him into whatever the hell is going on at the time

...you know what, I think this is just a good au where JGY fucking died at some point

tanoraqui

Maybe someone threw him down the stairs again and he just broke his fucking neck. WWX is still vilified but between Jiang Cheng not really wanting to attack and Jiang (Jin?) Yanli being AGGRESSIVELY against it, and dragging JZX along with her, they’re left in peace.

tanoraqui

Oh man and Jin Ling has YOUNGER SIBLINGS in this...

Hey for u: Jiang Cheng/Wen Qing can accidentally happen while the Teens are trying to get everyone else to meet

Today at 8:42 AM

@professorsparklepants

I love this it's so goddamn wacky

tanoraqui

I just want teenager-based shenanigans ft. surprisingly competent teenagers and all the adults running around like chickens with their heads chopped off

professorsparklepants

Jingyi: why are you two more calm about this than the literal adults

Wen Yuan: have you met my dad?

tanoraqui

Also to be clear it is not at all hard to convince Wen Ning to join Team: Teenage Shenanigans, bc literally ANYONE in the Burial Mountain village would probably be down if you were like, “we’re engaged in a conspiracy to make Wei Wuxian fucking admit that he’s in love with that Lan guy who visits a couple times a year”

professorsparklepants

"This is my father, and this is his sugar daddy."

tanoraqui

I kinda wanna say he goes by “Wen Yuan” more often bc he’s 100% the baby of the entire remaining Wen clan there, but his adult name or w/e it’s called IS Wen Sizhui, because WWX asked LWJ if he had any suggestions and LWJ said this while maintaining eye contact

professorsparklepants

OH MY GOOOOOOD

tanoraqui

They meet LXC and he figures out what’s going on in like 4 minutes, despite the teens’ best attempts at obfuscation, and instead of calling anyone’s parents is like, “okay, I’m in”

professorsparklepants

#1 wingman...

tanoraqui

Jin Ling and Wen Yuan are definitely both traveling under false names, too? Wen Yuan obviously can’t admit to being a Wen and Jin Ling is making a privileged but slightly helicoptered teen’s rebellious bid for freedom

professorsparklepants

His dad is panicking at home and Yanli is like "boys need their freedom :)"

I saw a post forever ago about how Yanli would be the most hands off parent & Zixuan is an only child who would panic every time his kid fell down

tanoraqui

With a side order of “my mother is the only one who’ll say nice things about the Yiling Patriarch and she always looks sad when she does so I’m going to sneak into the Burial Mountain and either drag him out to see her or force my parents to come get me”

professorsparklepants

"I'm gonna beat up the Yiling Patriarch" "why" "he made my mom sad" "okay proceed"

tanoraqui

^ actual real conversation with WenYuan

professorsparklepants

A-Yuan then repeats the same thing to Wen Qing and she has the exact same answer, verbatim

tanoraqui

Side note: Wen Yuan has never been scared of the undead in his entire life, and probably this will lead to getting into severely life-threatening situations when he doesn’t have more backup than 2 other teenagers

professorsparklepants

Oh absolutely

professorsparklepants

He's so used to tuning out the sound of sentry corpses that one jumps on him and almost punches his lungs out

tanoraqui

Also what if he took WWX’s sword, so he looks like a proper normal cultivator - honestly, what if WWX gave him the sword when he turned 12, or whenever one customarily gives a child a sword in this world. He also has a flute stashed in his robe somewhere but he does know how to use both

tanoraqui

But also, while obviously it’s very important that this is the sword he inherited from his father, it’s never OCCURRED to him to, like, strongly associate it with WWX, in terms of “this would be a recognizable weapon”? Chenqing the flute, obviously, but WWX just left the sword on a shelf all the time

professorsparklepants

He's very good at fooling people into thinking he's a normal rogue cultivator until he busts out the flute

LOL YES

tanoraqui

So the first time someone looks at him and is like, “That is WWX’s sword” he achieves, like, “Who’s Morales? [NOT THAT DUMB]” levels of blank-brained

professorsparklepants

It like, doesn't even occur to him that this stick named whatever will be recognizable to people until it actually happens

"this is the Yiling Patriarch's sword!" "... I've never heard of him"

tanoraqui

“What sword?”

professorsparklepants

KDJAKSNJS

tanoraqui

“Oh, THIS sword? I...found it. In a stream.”

tanoraqui

Also...at some point...once the teens have admitted their identities to one another...and possibly gotten into a couple other increasingly public shenanigans...they run into a bunch of concerned people searching from the Jin or even Jiang sect - JC being there would be PERFECT - and Jin Ling is like, “aaahh, no, I don’t want to be dragged home... kidnap me.”

WY: what?

JL: pull out the flute, summon a couple corpses, shout that you’re the dread son of the Yiling Patriarch, and pretend to kidnap me

WY: ...yeah okay

AND THEN THEY DO THAT

professorsparklepants

The dumbass energy...... off the CHARTS

tanoraqui

They’re 15 and neither of them has ever faced consequences but in...actually not too different ways

They’re 15 and neither of them as ever faced consequences nor most of the real world

Oh my god is Lan Jingyi the most sensible person here

They’re going to DIE

professorsparklepants

JXHAKAJAKKQHSJA

JC and Yanli immediately see through this probably

"dumbass kid just doesn't want to go home. I'll break his legs."

tanoraqui

I think Yanli does but I have minimal faith in JC’s ability to think logically at any time

He’s still angry at WWX for leaving

professorsparklepants

Stomps to Yiling to demand his nephew back & wwx's like "lol, A-Yuan left two months ago"

Okay my shift is starting later

tanoraqui

/snort

Though, bold of you to assume that WWX isn’t also running around anxiously somewhere like “oh god, oh no, my son is missing; I must find him”

professorsparklepants

Sizhui is a responsible boy, I don't think he would leave without telling at least ONE person where he was going

tanoraqui

Ok but it was Wen Qing who thinks it’s good for WWX’s health to stop brooding and go run around like a headless chicken instead, optimally if he runs into his totally-not-a-boyfriend-Hahahaha-why-would-you-say-that

Alternately it was, like, Granny, which, ditto

No one on this mountain is going to stop WWX from going out to cause trouble and hopefully get laid, is my point

tanoraqui

Also, the cultivation world has been basically at peace for 13 years and the reason is that this is an ideal AU where JGY is dead and whenever trouble starts to stir politically, NHS and JYL meet eyes across the room and mentally Rock Paper Scissors over who has to manipulate everyone into calming the fuck down

Neither of them actually wants this job; they’re just good at it and recognize both those aspects in each other

professorsparklepants

LOLOLOL

That is.... so goddamn in character

tanoraqui

concept: JYL and NHS are friends and no one else understands it, or attributes it to JYL just being that nice, bc NHS still generally acts useless

professorsparklepants

Nhs actively wants to be useless and life is conspiring to make sure he can't

tanoraqui

a little less dramatically useless, but why ruin a good thing when you're having fun and it's useful

professorsparklepants

Lol

tanoraqui

but JYL fucking identified him as Actually Competent one time when he couldn't hide it, so now sometimes they get tea together and bitch about politics and stupid people

professorsparklepants

He's the only person who can correctly identify when she's talking shit about people, because it's VERY subtle and her brothers & husband are too busy thinking she hung the moon to notice

tanoraqui

JYL striding into Nie sect HQ (whatever it's called) and tossing her coat over a chair. "You would not BELIEVE what my brothers are doing now."

NHS: *probably knows, because he's found that the minor investment of effort in maintaining a very good spy network pays major dividends in helping him avoid greater work* *immediately sits up and pours her a cup of very expensive tea* Oh, girl, dish.

professorsparklepants

Question: are they also friends with lwj...

tanoraqui

yes but he's obviously not invited to hte political gossip sessions

professorsparklepants

I'm trying to imagine lwj making eye contact with them at some meeting his brother dragged him to and both of them struggling not to break into hysterics

tanoraqui

but they both know that he sneaks into Yiling to visit WWX a few times a year, and every single time, JYL sits him down within a couple weeks and aggressively debriefs him as to her brother's condition

professorsparklepants

I'm sure she tried to get him to take treats in

tanoraqui

for sure

it's hopeless, though, bc there's no really predicting WHEN he'll go? It's basically just "every 4-6 months when LWJ's resolve breaks"

professorsparklepants

Too bad she's not a stress quilter instead of a stress baker

tanoraqui

she gets him to go at an actual arranged time, bearing pork soup, like once, for WWX's 30th birthday or something

professorsparklepants

:)

tanoraqui

omg lit brain: LWJ of course is hte WORST for getting gossip, but JYL has pieced together a reasonable amount about the people her idiot baby brother (#2) is now living with. And she's mildly despairing as to idiot baby brother #1's ongoing refusal to get married and have an heir or three. So she, if not actively connives, then certainly siezes the first available opportunity to set Jiang Cheng up with Wen Qing

tanoraqui

basically, this au is PEAK romcom

tanoraqui

...also, for max happiness, i'd like to think that WWX made some strategic raids to rescue additional Wen refugees and bring them back, so there's a properly populated village and they didn't all just die

professorsparklepants

!!!

Good... Good thoughts

Good because 1. more people die and 2. The Yiling Patriarch will attack your village and steal your people away!

tanoraqui

(romcom being exclusively adults-focussed; the teens initiate it all but Jin Ling and Wen Yuan are both so delighted to have an Additional (But Cooler) Family Member that they comfortably cousinzone each other instantly)

professorsparklepants

*nice*

tanoraqui

...i feel like i keep characterizing Jin Ling as an only child, when really he ought to have a small horde of siblings

maybe they just...couldn't conceive more. shit happens. pregnancy is hard.

professorsparklepants

That happens sometimes

[dreamersleeps]

I keep re-reading MHA 299 and I know many are upset Hawks is standing up for Endeavor but... I get the whole chapter was setting up that Hawks is going to commit suicide by heroically protecting Endeavor. He doesn’t want to look at the alternative because it just adds to the tragedy of his life, but also because he wants to die. He probably feels he doesn’t HAVE to investigate it at ALL because what does it do for him? He’ll be dead and it won’t be something he has to worry about.

Hello, it’s nice to talk to you again! :) So I’m not sure if this is the response you were looking for cause I just sat down, began writing and it kinda went off topic? I’m not entirely sure, but thank you for sending your thoughts and opinions in!

I read over Chapter 299 a few more times and I’m not sure if I really interpreted it as Hawks wanting to die. However I think I can kind of see what you mean by he’s going to commit suicide in the sense that (depending on the outcome) the action of Hawks going to help Endeavor is “suicide” in that it is his choice. 

I think the root of my interpretation lies with my opinion that while Horikoshi does work with heavy and difficult subjects, I can not see him ending the story of Hawks’ with death. While I think he could die in a metaphorical or symbolic way (something I believe has already happened when he took Jin’s life) when his story ends, a physical death is not impossible.

Just to express my train of thoughts easier, the following panels are not in the exact order of how they appear. 

"Endeavor’s in Trouble” 

I can see how you could interpret what Hawks says as him “standing up” for Endeavor but I did not really read it in that way. Standing up for him implies that he is in a way “okay” with what Endeavor has done in the past, and if we get more on Hawks’ thoughts later it will be clearer on where he stands but if this is all we get, I’d argue that he is not “letting things slide,” because it’s Endeavor. 

All we currently have is that Hawks states, “Endeavor’s in trouble.” I think he’s most likely referring to Dabi here. 

I guess you could argue that he may commit metaphorical suicide by choosing to help Endeavor. If we want to continue pursuing the Icarus narrative: then even after falling and after gaining his freedom, Hawks chooses to head towards Endeavor, or the sun again.  

So as you convey, this is the controversial page. 

“Even if what Dabi says about the Todoroki family is true... I know things are different now.” 

The inclusion of Hawks’ memory of Shouto and Endeavor is very, very important here. It appears in the middle of this sentence. I’d argue that Hawks here was not brushing off or ignoring what happened in the Todoroki household, and again this is mainly because of the inclusion of the memory which happens during the Endeavor Internship arc. This is how he is thinking through the situation. Seeing as we get a glimpse of Hawks’ past memories, I’m sure that he has been contemplating about everything that was revealed by Dabi. Especially considering that Hawks most likely can relate to Touya to a certain extent. 

Hawks’ hero career involved a lot of him having to collect information, analyze information and reach a conclusion in order for him to act upon it. Perhaps that is why when he states, “I know things are different now,” it comes off as very bold. I think the boldness of his statement is what may have upset people but I think it has to do with the way he’s been trained to think. 

The secret missions Hawks had to undertake while working for the Hero Public Safety Commission required one to detach their job from their individual feelings and thoughts. He must not let sentiments get in the way. 

Sentiments 

As always, I like to include definitions of words I find very important that could be understood differently based on who you are - what are sentiments? A couple definitions that come up in the dictionary are: 

1) an attitude, thought, or judgment prompted by feeling, 2) an idea colored by emotion (Merriam-Webster) and 3) exaggerated and self-indulgent feelings of tenderness, sadness or nostalgia (dictionary) 

We see that feelings and emotion get in the way with his job when Hawks confronts Jin. Hawks had a connection and relationship with Jin that he did not have in his life. As we see below in Chapter 265 even Dabi points this out, “Looks like sentiment tripped you up after all, hero!” Yes, ultimately Hawks takes Jin’s life but I do believe he was hesitant and did not want to. The dialogue between the two has Hawks expressing that he believes that Jin is a good person who was dealt an unlucky hand in life. 

While he does convey that he wants to “save” Jin by helping him but after already assessing the threat he believed Jin posed and with the arrival of Dabi, Hawks weights his options and chooses to take his life. 

From a detached, cold reading of this scene, Hawks does mess up. His hesitance distracts him and makes himself vulnerable to Dabi’s attack which badly burns him, and he loses a large portion of his feathers. 

Now I’m only going to focus on the fact that Hawks takes Jin’s life and the thinking that went behind it. I’m not here to discuss in depth about my thoughts and opinions on the matter however I think by the end of this post, you may have an idea on where I stand.  

What is a hero? 

Okay, my wording here is confusing but I’m going to try the best I can to convey what I’m trying to get at. There is also the idea of the two concepts of heroism that float around the manga: 1) working as hero as an occupation and being able to fulfill that role, and then 2) one who we label as a hero/heroic in how they think and act. For both we think of saving, strength, power, charisma, etc. 

Then there are the other qualities we tend to associate with the second concept of who/what a hero is: being selfless and compassionate, having moral integrity, showing concern for others no matter who it is and being understanding of others’ perspectives. There are others as well but these are what come to mind at the moment. 

While the qualities I list above can be associated with heroes in general, in BNHA there has been an effort to differentiate at least two different concepts of heroism. The biggest example was with the introduction of the character Stain. If the reader had not been questioning hero society beforehand, Stain told us directly to think critically and refrain from being passive like the characters in the story. Due to the emergence of quirks, there were those whose quirks deemed “unacceptable” by society, their existence often leading to a difficult life or being  labeled as a villain. The demand for heroes created the concept of the hero as a job. 

And so heroes became celebrities. They are rich and influential, and they cover the cities with their faces to sell and endorse products. Even the physical copies of the BNHA manga have ads of various pro-heroes selling products in the back. There’s plenty of other criticisms that you could talk about such as the Hero Billboard Chart. 

While the older pro-heroes seem to have lost or never embodied the meaning of what the reader may argue as “being a true hero,” we see that there is a difference with the students, but first let’s go back to Hawks and Twice again. 

Yes, Hawks attempts to save Jin but the outcome is that he takes his life instead. Definitely not what the act of saving is supposed to look like. As seen above, Hawks had already verbalized that he may have to kill Jin. I’ll also throw in that I felt like Hawks was looking down at him in pity (like he does with his parents) and determines that Jin is need of saving. Hawks reaches that conclusion himself. But that is not what happens. Instead he decides that the death, or “sacrifice” of an individual is worth it if he can save hundreds or thousands of others. In this way you could argue that he has successfully acted to fulfill his job as a hero. But, as many people were wondering: 

Aren’t heroes supposed to save everyone? 

Perhaps one of the defining qualities of a hero is that they chose to save indiscriminately or most importantly, whoever they can reach. 

In the same arc we get Midoriya who is faced with a very similar situation. Shigaraki poses as a significant threat to the heroes and the rest of Japan. Midoriya knows that Shigaraki can wipe out all of those he holds dear to him and the rest of Japan if he is not stopped. Midoriya sees firsthand Shigaraki’s terrifying and destructive powers, his friends, teachers and allies being critically injured. He is with the knowledge that the people in his life and millions others may lose their lives. 

When faced with such a horrifying outcome, would stopping Shigaraki be enough? I’m assuming that taking his life would have been a very tempting option. To take a life to save millions of lives.

But even after all that we get this page spread of Midoriya’s final thoughts before he loses consciousness at the end of Chapter 295. 

Midoriya chooses compassion. 

The juxtaposition of Midoriya’s thoughts and image gave me chills when I first saw it. We see the outcome of the conflict: a quiet, lifeless city in ruins with the dust in the process of settling. This is the result of Shigaraki’s destruction. The reality that there are thousands of civilians who got hurt, are critically injured or even dead hangs heavy in the air. When society chose to ignore Shigaraki and the heroes chose to label him as an evil, unredeemable villain, Midoriya has chosen to look directly at him. 

Based on the first concept of what a hero is/does according to hero society, Midoriya dues not fulfill his duty as a hero after failing to defeat Shigaraki, however based on the second concept because he chooses compassion he has begun to embody the ideals of who a hero truly is.

Hawks is tripped up by sentiments but acts to finish the job the way he sees fit. 

exaggerated and self-indulgent feelings of tenderness, sadness or nostalgia 

He tries to be compassionate and understanding but isn’t. He has an image of Jin he created himself that is not the true Jin, hence why they are mere sentiments. He chooses to focus on his mission because he does not actual understand how Jin was feeling. This results in him looking past Jin’s life to protect the lives of millions of others. In contrast, Midoriya recognizes Shigaraki, the person who is standing immediately in front of him. In its purest form, to be a hero means to save indiscriminately and to save those you can reach. 

Being a hero as a career in BNHA becomes tricky as it means to defeat and take down villains, and choosing who to save as Hawks demonstrates. 

However to save someone like Shigaraki, Dabi or Toga (who were all let down by hero society) requires someone to take the more difficult path to reach a hand out with selflessness, compassion, and understanding. It seems that Midoriya, Shouto and Ochako will be the ones to extend their hands to them. 

“Starting With my Origin” 

Children often are only able to understand and grasp basic concepts. A hero is someone who saves you, or puts a smile on your face. We get a glimpse back in to Hawks’ childhood, to that innocent concept of heroes that Hawks had. 

As they say, “Never meet your idols/heroes” mainly because they are not actually who they are portrayed to be. The world looks very simple when you are younger, black and white, but as you grow and experience more of life, you start to begin to see just how complicated things are. There are way more gray areas when you begin to look closely. 

Similarly, Hawks does not see him in the same lens as he did in his childhood. He understands that the image of Endeavor he had when he was younger is not who Endeavor actually is. I don’t think that Hawks’ decision to want to go help him was made without thought. He takes in information and contemplates on it until he makes a conclusion. For someone who was actively seeking out more information, I’m wondering if all he has is what Dabi has stated. We have to remember that the information we have as the reader is not the same as the characters in the story. I’d also argue that he is not ignoring what Dabi has said but taking into consideration the past and whether Endeavor is working to change. 

Now that he is most likely no longer working for the Hero Public Safety Commission, he is free to do as he please, and as seen earlier, he chooses to walk towards Endeavor. The team up between the two in Fukuoka, and the ambush against the League of Villains and Meta liberation army may have strengthened their relationship but Hawks wanting to help Endeavor this time does not stem from hero work. 

Wanting to help Endeavor will put him directly on the path towards Dabi. 

Like you, some people believe that he may as in consequence for his actions, he will ultimately crash in to the ocean like Icarus, and die. The final fall. Perhaps his mistake will be that he will choose to pick Endeavor over Dabi, or find himself in a position where he may believe he has to take Dabi’s life away as well. 

Others believe that Hawks has had his Icarus fall already but will learn from the consequences of his actions. He’s died, but has been reborn like a phoenix. Shouto will be meeting Dabi again as well, and as we’ve seen, like Midoriya, he sees Touya as a person: his brother. He even identifies himself to him. I’ve seen people talking about and hoping for a team up between Hawks and Shouto so we’ll see what happens if they do. 

I’m going to bring the very last page back, but most of Chapter 299 has to do with Hawks’ childhood. His mother would ask him about why he was born and what the point of his wings were for and Hawks’ answer is to save people.

“Starting with my origin, so to speak... Endeavor’s in trouble.” 

We get a focus, visually to Hawks’ back. The origins of what allowed Hawks to save and be a hero: his fierce wings quirk, and it looks his wings are healing and growing back. I think you could also see it as him referring to Endeavor as well. The hero who saved him when he was a child, could also be seen as his origin.

During the High End vs Endeavor fight in Chapter 190, we see some of Hawks’ insecurities. Hawks is/was insecure about his back, and that is where his wings are. This was during the time when Hawks was working as a hero because it was his job. He did have that desire to save people but it was only a muted motivation behind what he did: he worked as a hero as a job first. I’m wondering if things have changed. 

Putting this all together, I think I’m currently leaning towards the second possible outcome from what I listed before. If Hawks can go back to his origin and become someone who tries to embody the true heroism. Of course he’ll stumble but it’ll still be a drastic change from how he had been living before. 

While I understand that many people are upset about these panels, I think we have to wait to see what will happen. To be honest, while I’d personally prefer the second outcome, I think I would be satisfied with either outcome. 

As the reader, we certainly can argue that Hawks is a tragic character however I’m not sure if Hawks considers his life as “tragic.” I think he will continue to do what he can as I feel like he defines his purpose based on what he does.

So will Hawks be tripped up on sentiments again, or will he be able to think and be understanding like Midoriya? 

As for now, I think it may be the first. 

[akiiyamashun]

THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

fill out & repost ♥

My muse is:  canon / oc / au / canon-divergent / fandomless

Is your character popular in the fandom?  YES / NO

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom?  YES / NO (I mean, he’s often called ‘pretty boy’ or ‘handsome’ and is implied to be attractive in-game)

Is your character considered strong in the fandom?  YES / NO

Are they underrated?  YES / NO

Were they relevant to the main story?  YES / NO

Were they relevant to the main character?  YES / NO / THEY’RE THE PROTAG.

Are they widely known in their world?  YES / NO.

How’s their reputation?  GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL.

How strictly do you follow canon?

I try to incorporate all canon bits into my writing, but mostly weave these parts together with a lot of my own headcanons and interpretations of the things that I think could lead Akiyama to ultimately be who he is and act the way he does. He’s a very interesting and unique character - the one civilian who’s constantly dragged into Yakuza business and who lives in this very much gray zone in terms of morality but who is one of the good guys at his core.

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutual.

Akiyama’s charisma is off the charts - it’s impossible not to like him! I try my best to bring his sense of humor and how smooth he is to the writing, because to me that’s one of his trademarks - a lot of charm, very skilled conversationalist and overall likeable person who entrances others quite easily. It makes a lot of sense that during his chapters in Y4 you can enlist others as your ‘allies’, because he just makes connections that fast.

His adaptability to life - he doesn’t shy away from the period of homelessness and how it ultimately freed him? He goes as far as thanking the man who framed and destroyed his (once) brilliant career for this. Akiyama becomes someone so comfortable in his own skin and so genuine - he’s one extremely resilient person even if sometimes it looks like blind luck (it’s not - his strength is less tangible and physical).

He has plot reasons to be mostly anywhere and do everything - I mean, he ended up babysitting idols, waltzing right into evil lairs of badass yakuza to accuse them of crimes and using his own fortune to bait others. He’s a super unpredictable but devoted individual who will stop at nothing to get to the bottom of things or protect the town he loves while being a civilian - so he’s not bound by the Tojo hierarchy at all. Nothing is really out of character for this man. Not even dance battles.

Brains over brawn for once - Akiyama can fight (and does so with style!), but that is not his preferred way of solving problems. By nature he’s diplomatic and very intelligent, and he will try to to avoid unnecessary fights if possible - but if all comes down to kicking the bastards where it hurts, he’ll do it. I think his approach to things in a franchise built on Kiryu punching his way through problems is super refreshing - and adds a lot of variety. :)

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?).  

Akiyama being seen as the ‘humorous’ character or someone just ‘lazy’ and incapable of doing his job correctly. I have a LOT of feelings here - and I disagree with this overall idea that Akiyama is a ‘joke’ - but I can see him being considered some sort of walking meme and leading people to believe he’s just not worth their time to build an interesting plot (despite the fact he’s the protagonist of 3 games and a supporting character in at least other 2).

The fact he’s not as strong when compared to other protagonists of the franchise - and this is true; if you put Akiyama side by side with most guys who have been given the spotlight over the years, Akiyama is probably stronger than Tanimura only (or maybe it’s a tie). He doesn’t look like your typical Yakuza protagonist - he doesn’t even punch others when fighting, it’s just kicking! I can see this being something that would rank him ‘lower’ or as someone ‘less interesting’ or ‘less important’ because he’s not hitting others like a derailed freight train such as Saejima or Kiryu.

What inspired you to rp your muse?  

I was smitten with Akiyama after five minutes with him, really. I loved how fresh his interactions with Hana sounded, and the way he talked to people was so open and fun for once (Kiryu is not a great conversationalist, let’s face it). Then his introduction by Kido, where he gets described so mysteriously and yet with these obvious pointers towards the way he fosters other people’s dreams and his unpredictable behavior? An immediate win for me. 

Akiyama is so entertaining - his charm, his lines, his voice (thank you Yamadera Koichi for this AWESOME job), his substories, the fighting style, the dancing battles! Honestly there is nothing about Akiyama that I don’t adore - he’s hard to read, smooth like silk, good guy at his heart, awesome sense of humor, devilish handsome, looks like he knows how to please a woman and leave them craving for more, incredibly smart to the point of being complimented by an actual police detective - hell yeah. What’s not to love?

What keeps your inspiration going?  

Akiyama does it by himself, haha. Honestly, the games and the existing lore have done plenty, and I’ve gone really deep into what I perceive as his motivations/drivers. The second thing in addition to canon sources is the interest/discussions with partners? Really, @sixthxchairman has played a fundamental role here, from giving me a space to run him as a test muse to listening to a lot of incessant yelling about all things Akiyama. Having someone else interested in him makes me want explore all the sides of the muse. :)

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

Do you think you give your character justice?  YES / NO (I mean, I have PAGES written about Akiyama and everything, I hope this is coherent?).

Do you frequently write headcanons?  YES / NO.

Do you sometimes write drabbles?  YES / NO.  

Do you think a lot about your Muse during the day?  YES / NO.

Are you confident in your portrayal?  YES / NO / More like getting to ‘yes’ with each passing day?

Are you confident in your writing?  YES / NO / Increasingly getting to yes?

Are you a sensitive person?  YES / NO.

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal?

Yes, to a degree. Akiyama is not my character so of course there are a lot of things I’ve built and developed/fleshed out that may be different from what the creators intended or even other muns would have imagined/explored with him. I will say I do not oppose criticism if it’s rooted in actual canon and happens to be something that heavily contradicts what Akiyama does in such official sources - I do not write him as canon divergent, after all. 

However, a lot about my Akiyama portrayal is my own; there is a heavy influence of my headcanons in relation to his hobbies, likes & dislikes, preferences, tastes, etc. These details are all very fundamental in how I write him and will show up in my replies - his disregard for hierarchy, the way he likes to be underestimated, the way he talks to and acts around people etc. On these aspects of my interpretation, I’d prefer not to get any criticism on simply because there is no right or wrong; I just appreciate that there are different views on what makes Akiyama who he is and I’d rather not be compared.

Do you like questions, which help you explore your character?  

Yes! These are always fun and often directed at stuff I haven’t yet thought about, so I love working on these headcanon asks. :)

If someone disagrees to a headcanon of yours, do you want to know why?

I am willing to listen, sure - especially if it is rooted in canon sources, as indicated above. I don’t care much for someone arguing something like ‘Akiyama cannot play the violin because he’s obviously a trumpet player’ - there is no way either of us will know for sure unless the creators one day say something about it. But other than that, I welcome good discussions and how we may view the same scene differently (for instance, the ending of Y5 when Watase and the other families bowed to Akiyama - I interpreted that scene in a way, other people may be able to see it in another direction).

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it?

As long as this doesn’t translate to anon hate (which simply gets blocked), then I have nothing to say about it! I think everyone has the right to disagree with my views and perceptions of Akiyama, I just don’t see the point of lingering around and following me if that is the case. I’m always excited to yell about him and discuss plots/interactions with willing parties - but if my version of Akiyama isn’t someone’s cup of tea, I’m sure there are other takes on him that will work well for these people.

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it?  

I would frankly be surprised because, at least online, Akiyama sounds like he’s a REALLY popular fella with a very good fanbase - and I personally think that Akiyama is a fucking delight and I worship the ground he walks on - but to each their own? Again, I disagree with some of the takes I see on Akiyama where he’s reduced to some sort of failure or joke who’s incapable of doing anything by himself, but as long as the hate for Akiyama does not translate in anon hate/actual fandom war, I have no issue with that.

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors?  

YES, ALWAYS. IN FACT, PLEASE DO. I am not a native English speaker and while I do check spelling/meaning of certain words sometimes, there is always a typo or some random word that escapes my review and makes me groan when reviewing my replies later. I will always appreciate anyone helping me correct and grow as a writer. :)

Do you think you are easy going as a mun?

Yes! I have no anxiety in terms of approaching first, offering ideas, etc. In fact, I’m super talkative and I love meeting other muns, so unless you are not into typing lots (because I do it all the time!), I’m pretty positive I’m not intimidating/shy and generally referred to as a friendly mun? I hope my mutuals were not lying about it, haha.

[whereisfoot]

Dream SMP Alignments (as of Oct. 8 2020)

So, @pog2024​ and I were talking after the aftermath of whatever the fuck just happened in yesterday’s streams, and we decided a way to understand it was by making a classic alignment chart based on the characters involved in the current Dream SMP plotline.

So, here are our explanations! This is just based on our interpretations of the characters and our opinions, and also please remember that these are CHARACTERS. None of this is super serious, they’re all friends, and we know that. Anyways, if you’re interested please continue reading! (SPOILERS AHEAD)

Lawful Good: Wilbur I, Dream, and Badboyhalo.

Wilbur I: This is Wilbur prior to yesterday’s stream. Wilbur has, up to today, built up a pretty consistent character who really embodies lawful good. He works in the interest of his nation, but he does so in an honorable way. He works for the freedom of his nation and what he sees is good and just, which is fair of him. Wilbur was a lawful, dependable leader who we could trust to lead the war with words not weapons, and though he strayed into the unlawful from time to time, he still remained generally lawful.

Dream: Some may see Dream as an evil alignment, but I don’t agree with that. I think that in the end, Dream is for the greater good of his server. He believes in law and order and a sense of fairness among everyone. While he did have a villain arc, he clearly did not see himself as such. In his eyes, he was a ruler who had been wrongfully defied. The war for independence was, after all, started because Wilbur wanted to make drugs, and when Dream told them no, he decided to make his own country within Dream’s land where he made the rules. It makes perfect sense that Dream would be against that, but we as the audience were only shown L’Manberg’s viewpoint, and therefore we only saw Dream when he was fighting them. I think if he were truly evil, he would have been much cruller to L’Manberg when they defied him. He had a few dirty moves, but he generally was a man of his word and didn’t attempt to manipulate the opposition in his favor. He plays fair and he plays for what he believes is right.

BadBoyHalo: Bad is a little less clear cut. We put him here because while he is sort of his own agent, he seems to evaluate every situation he becomes a part of very carefully. He doesn’t want to be the bad guy. He was originally on the side of Pogtopia, but he switched because of Tommy’s chaos. This implies that he’s not Pro-Schlatt or Pro-Manberg, but he is anti-Tommy. Tommy is too chaotic and unlawful in his eyes, and that goes against the peaceful environment that Bad wants for the SMP. He wants good and he wants peace and he will fight for that good.

Neutral Good: Niki and Fundy

Niki: I don’t really have much to say on this, but I think that Niki is just purely good. She doesn’t verge too much towards Lawful nor Chaotic. I think she’s very passive and only recently has she been actively fighting. But even so, she is not very confrontational and tends to sit towards the side, though she does speak up to Schlatt and his men when they do something she feels is wrong.

Fundy: Fundy is another one that I think people might disagree with, but I think he’s just neutral good. His spy arc proves that he will do pretty much anything for the greater good, even if that means losing everything in the process. He’s not lawful because he is not afraid to break the law and make people angry. It’s just not a concern of his, he just does what he thinks will secure a “happy ending.” However, he isn’t necessarily chaotic because he is far too calculated. Fundy does not make rash decisions, all of his moves are planned and deliberate, so I think neutral good is the role he fits best.

Chaotic Good: TommyInnit

Tommy: I think everyone will agree with me on this one, but I’ll explain it anyways. Tommy is practically the textbook definition of chaotic good. He has a strong moral code which he proved today, even going against Wilbur when he felt Wilbur was becoming a villain. His sense of right or wrong is bigger than Pogtopia and L’Manberg, but he uses it as a way to make his society better. Tommy is not afraid of causing destruction. He has proven it many times that he is extremely chaotic and will stab shit whenever necessary. He has some plans, but generally acts instinctively and emotionally, which is his weakness. However, his moral code is too strong for him to be anything but good. One thing that’s interesting is that he’s becoming less chaotic and more of a leader. He is becoming less reactionary and more righteous.

Lawful Neutral: Eret, Skeppy

Eret: Eret follows his own interests. When he betrayed L’Manberg, it was because he knew they would lose. It was in his best interest to join who he sees as the winning team. Also, he was not extremely dedicated to L’Manerg’s cause, and it benefited him much more to betray his friends than join in their demise. He wants order and he wants things done fair, and he sees Schlatt as a threat to his interests. So, he tries to help because he believes that by helping Pogtopia, he is securing his power and his position, but he doesn’t truly care for their cause.

Skeppy: Skeppy is kind of hard to place because he hasn’t been super involved. I think he’s similar to Bad, but he doesn’t have as clear of a motivation to do the right thing or ensure the greater good. He doesn’t care much for the conflicts of others until they drag him into it. However, he is lawful in the sense that he fights if he feels he or those around him are wronged. He’ll fight people, he’s not afraid to, but he prefers to stay on his own side separate from everyone else.

True Neutral: Tubbo, Quackity, Punz

Tubbo: Tubbo was a hard one, I wasn’t sure where to place him for a while. But, right now he is playing his cards somewhat close to his chest. There’s a lot of debate as to where his loyalties really lie. He doesn’t seem to be evil, but he’s not exactly good either. His fight for Pogtopia is not for the cause but for his friends. He is driven by his loyalties, but under the threat of Schlatt he could switch in a second. He is too much of a follower to fight back. Tubbo is becoming more and more of his own entity and he’s gaining an odd amount of power as time goes on. He’s dragged himself into the center of an argument that he doesn’t seem to care about.

Quackity: Quackity is another interesting one. Even though he’s on Schlatt’s side, he’s not really evil. Similar to Tubbo, he’s more of a follower than anything. He listens to Schlatt and he supports him but he doesn’t seem to do much on his own accord. He isn’t really lawful or chaotic because, to put it simply, he doesn’t really do enough to be considered either. Quackity is mainly there for humor, but under that it’s clear that he is just watching the SMP burn around him.

Punz: Punz works for those who will help him. He doesn’t care much about who wins or loses, and he’s proven that 25 dollars is more than enough to make him forfeit the fight. Punz wants to keep his power, but he doesn’t seem to want more than what he has already. He’ll fight because he knows he can, not because he feels like he has to for any moral or political reason.

Chaotic Neutral: Technoblade, Sapnap

Techno: Techno is just an agent of chaos. He follows his own rules and his freedom is his main priority. Good and evil are afterthoughts, and he seems to disregard them as long as he’s fulfilling his anarchist agenda. He’s not looking at this from a moral standpoint. He came on because he was summoned, but he isn’t here for Pogtopia. His anarchist view puts him as completely unlawful, he has no regard for what the laws of the server are, he only wants blood. He is chaotic in the sense that he opposes established authority and promotes anarchy, but he is neutral in the sense that he lacks a moral compass regarding the conflict on hand. Similar to Punz, he fights because he can. All he wants is to gain power on his own terms and prove himself as a warrior, whether he’s a fighter for good or evil is not any of his concern.

Sapnap: To put it simply, Sapnap is chaotic neutral because he causes problems just for the sake of causing problems. This is proven with the pet war and with the murder of Henry. He didn’t do that as a deliberate attack on L’Manberg/Tommy, but he knew exactly what would happen. He likes to cause drama and cause fights because he’s bored. However, while he is clearly causing unrest CONSTANTLY, he doesn’t do it to be evil or for the purpose of war. He’s not evil. He doesn’t have the motivation to start a real war like Schlatt, Wilbur, and Dream, but he’ll still help. He’ll switch sides as it benefits him because in the end he doesn’t really care about the outcome. In the end, he just thrives on chaos because that’s what keeps him entertained.

Lawful Evil: GeorgeNotFound

George: George isn’t super involved, so it’s hard to place him but I think he’s pretty clearly Lawful Evil. He wants the power that Schlatt’s giving him (since he didn’t get that from Dream when he was on his side in the original war), and he doesn’t care about what happens to Pogtopia and he doesn’t care who he has to step on. He’s the strength of Schlatt’s administration, and he knows it. George is powerful and when he’s pitted against Pogtopia, he’ll be ruthless. He sees them as lower than him and reacts to their arguments and their fights as if they’re children.

Schlatt: Schlatt is evil just because he wants to be. He knows exactly what he’s doing and he knows every move he makes, even if he’s just going for a bit or for some funny content. He’s another one who’s too calculated to be chaotic, however he rejects tradition and set rules with no respect for established society. This made us think initially that he’d be neutral evil, but his style of evil is lawful. Like Wilbur said, Schlatt was democratically elected through a coalition government. It was all completely lawful and just. Schlatt sees a legal governing system as a better option because it’s easier to exploit. He has the high ground because he became leader fair & square. While he is rejecting tradition and destroying the history of L’Manberg, he is still using the law to his advantage. He seems to lean neutral, but he’s mostly lawful.

Chaotic Evil: Wilbur II

Wilbur II: This is Wilbur after yesterday’s streams. Wilbur has completely snapped, and he’s becoming unhinged. Wilbur began to question himself and whether or not he’s the good guy, something he’s spent all series convincing all of us. Schlatt’s manipulation is tricking even Wilbur into seeing the good in Manberg, corrupting him and driving him mad. This new Wilbur is a bastardization of the man who was president and contradicts everything he once stood for. This Wilbur is violent and impulsive. He wants to hurt people, and he doesn’t care who it is that he hurts even if they’re on his side. He doesn’t trust anyone so everyone’s his enemy. This Wilbur has no regard for morality or his nation, all he wants is to tear everything down and leave nothing in his wake.

So yeah!! Those are our thoughts, feel free to continue discussing this if you want, I’d be really interested to see what you all have to say! Of course, these are all just our opinions and yes, we are definitely taking this way too seriously.

[transsexualhamlet]

so about norman’s ethics

The thing that a lot of people don’t understand about Norman is that he doesn’t believe in the like, political sentiments that he acts on in the slightest. Yeah, this doesn’t make it ok that he did a bunch of shitty stuff, but it’s a misconception to say norman like, genuinely believes fucking eugenics are a good thing.

And yet, he decides to act on the idea to degenerate and genocide the demons and seems not to understand why Emma wouldn’t agree with him. People’s explanations of this seem to be pretty much one of two minds, either:

His morals are corrupt: Norman wants all the demons dead because what they did makes him think they’re all bad and don’t deserve the respect humans get, which is understandable but still wrong, or

His morals are intact but he ignores them: Norman feels bad that he’s doing a bad thing and does it anyway because he can’t find a better way out, which honestly makes what he did worse, though Tragic.

The second one is more accurate, but still doesn’t completely explain his ideas.The truth is that, in my opinion, he just barely understands the concept of morals in general, and what’s ‘messed up’ is simply his priorities. That sounds like I’m saying he’s a twisted cycle path but I swear I’m not, it’s just like him having low empathy. This is another, autism thing, and it’s another thing that I have, so I’ll try to explain it as best as I can?

Personally, I understand and try to follow sociatal expectations for moral things like, you know, do not kill people and what not. Because it’s bad or... whatever. And although I can cognitively understand the reasons why people think so, I don’t value it in the same way. Obviously I wouldn’t kill a person, there’s no need for me to in a world like this, and it would be inconvenient and probably make me feel bad despite not understanding why it is bad. But I’ve known from a very young age if I had the power and reason to kill someone, I absolutely would, no questions asked. Not even the necessity, just a logical reason. Most of the time this means nothing and isn’t applicable in the real world, because most of the people around me would be negatively affected by it. But it means nothing to me personally, and if prompted I could change at the slightest reason.

This is what I think we’re dealing with in Norman’s situation. 

Norman, in grace field, has no reason to violate any intagible laws of right and wrong, in most cases, until the escape arc happens. Yeah, I do believe Norman probably lied significantly more than the average child, because he didn’t see any reason not to, but I doubt it hurt anyone bad, they lived in, well, basically a neverland. He’s just a slightly off white little man. But when he is faced with a risky and dangerous situation, he might look Correct on the outside but the closer you look the more you realize his actions are directly impacted by the situation around him, completely independent of any internal moral compass. 

Ray wants to only escape with those three, because although he feels extreme guilt for being the way he is and completely understands it’s a selfish and terrible thing to do, he’s too cynical to accept any other options. Norman initially agrees with him, because Ray explains the risks. Emma then insinuates she wants to bring the other kids, giving ideas as to how. Norman then switches to Emma’s plan because he believes it can be achieved and he wants Emma to be happy, not because it would be wrong to do otherwise. At the same time, he later ships himself out, without much consideration to the others’ wishes against it, because now that it’s gotten impossible to have both, Emma’s and Ray’s safety is more important now than their happiness. Though he can understand that they’d not like that, it’s not that important to him in the long run. He will choose the path that offers them the greatest chance, if the one his friends want isn’t good enough.

When he was shipped out and taken to lambda, what happened is he was put in a situation where the stakes become much higher. There’s a different kind of situation, and the idea of simply running away from the demons is obviously not an option. When he escapes, and basically adopts the lambda kids- now he’s surrounded by people with the opposite morals and ideas as Emma. These kids want revenge, they would be happy to kill the demons, their ideal situation involves that and trying to reach any compromise would be unsatisfactory. The overwhelming majority of the kids agree with killing the demons, and that idea makes him seem stronger and gives him more certainty and control over the situation, even if it’s difficult and hurts him personally, making him a “Bad Person” to Emma. 

Norman harbors no personal hatred towards the demons, nor any specific desire to kill them. He just doesn’t see any viable reason not to, and killing them provides both him and the people he cares about with a more beneficial situation. Emma is now the minority, and even though she provides an idea that could work, Norman, after seeing so much pain and suffering, is no longer willing to take the risk for her, like he was in grace field. He is incapable of understanding why she values a sense of right and wrong more than the actual statistics of how well one or the other could work- yes, they had different experiences, but she lost other people because she decided to take risks, and she still believes in it? It simply doesn’t fucking compute.

An important aspect to consider is that it still does make him feel bad not to follow a more traditionally accepted route. He might have low empathy but he’s not an emotionless robot. Not understanding morals doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a concience, though it’s much more ambiguous and generally equates to any other thing, such as the actual convenience, details, or certainty of a plan. It’s not of any more importance, and he is in a situation now where it’s inconvenient to pay attention to, more so than in grace field. So not following a Nicer route does take a toll on his Feelings TM, same as it takes a toll on his literal body, but that’s a sacrifice he’s fine with, it’s a sacrifice that’s significantly smaller than the chance that someone he cares for could die.

Generally, most Lukewarm Takes on Norman can be disproven with this idea (pretty much anything that insinuates he would see the demons as less or like, he’s doing it because they did awful things to him, understandable but hey this isn’t tokyo ghoul and he’s not that kind of character), though everyone is obviously free to have their own takes and I doubt Shirai took his autistic coding into consideration, so it’s obviously my own idea.

Although Norman’s actions have correlation with Ray’s before, Norman isn’t disregarding his physical needs and trying to sacrifice himself out of any idea that it would make up for what he did, he’s doing it because it gives him more control over his own situation, he values his own well being less than his family’s, and he doesn’t understand why it would be Bad to do so. If we’re really digging deep, it’s likely he doesn’t want to have to experience any real consequences for his actions. He understands that they’re Bad, but this isn’t important to him, more than anything else. He doesn’t want to see Emma’s disappointment because it would complicate things.

After Emma and Ray, well, complicate things, ie face him and force him to see there are real consequences to his actions past Ambiguous Moral Obligations (ex. “you’re Taking Advantage the lambda kids” means nothing until he sees that it’s stopped them from being able to grow as people and forgive, “you’re neglecting yourself” means nothing until there’s an idea brought up that could fix him, “you’re trying to kill so many fucking people” means nothing until he sees that it’s hurting the human kids.) and that there’s a valid flaw in his personality past that- that it’s not a strong but a cowardly move, he can move forward and attempt to change things, possibly give himself a fucking break. 

In that situation, with other solutions that Emma and Ray have opened up actually seeming to work, he no longer finds it necessary to Be Terrible and hurt himself. This makes him feel better, because he doesn’t want to be Incorrect, it’s just a difficult thing for him to understand, when most other things come to him naturally. I think in the future he can be more cognizant of the fact that he’s more suceptible to doing generally, unacceptable things, and vows to lean more on Emma and Ray so he doesn’t end up going down the wrong path again, because to him they all look the same color.

Yes, this is my long ass way of telling Shirai why the fuck did you let Norman be a CEO. That’s a terrible fucking idea, he’ll become capitalism, guys?! Don’t let him do that. He needs to be in a job where like, he can use his skills without having to make Ethical Decisions like... an engineer or something. Computer scientist. IDK. Just not a fucking CEO, not in a management position for anything.

Honestly, it’s difficult for me to even use the alignment chart because I don’t understand morals enoughto put anyone in the Evil category because the idea of ‘evil’ doesn’t exist for me. So yeah, I’m projecting, but in conclusion I just have a bone to pick with anyone who wouldn’t call norman lawful neutral. 

[perriwinklesblog]

Yo, Perri, lurker admirer here. Just wondering if you had Opinions on c!Dream's current character direction (or his lack thereof imo) or if you kept those thoughts Secret to not invoke the unholy wrath of... everybody. As a writer meself I have Opinions as well but I save them for people who are willing to discuss for fun and story's sake, and not for blood. Lol. Always I'd love to chat with you about him if you wanted! Love, ⛏️

I'm pretty open about my opinions on c!Dream.

I really enjoy Dream. But I don't agree with his characters morals or the dark path he went down and the abuse he dolled out. But it's entertaining to watch, I'm captivated and I wish to understand.

I have a degree in psychology (this does not make me an expert in any way) and my favourite part of that degree was forensic psychology. I did my dissertation on decision making in female serial killers. So I have a natural interest in those who do not follow, lets say, the "normal" morals that the rest of us do.

I consider Dream to be like Joffery from Game of Thrones. Human embodiment of the period. But I liked watching the show and you always need an antagonist and sometimes downright evil character to root against. Dream took up that mantle and he's doing a great job. I also think it's okay to feel sympathy for a character who is evil because at the end of the day it's still uncomfortable to see someone have bad things done to them. That doesn't mean you agree with or are like that character. You just don't like pain.

It would also be quite hypocritical of me to say I enjoy Quackity's current character arc and not Dream as the paralells there are off the charts even without the knowledge of Dreams perspective.

I've mentioned before that the downfall Quackity is currently going through in regards to morality is probably something that Dream went through too. Its starts off with small decisions and spirals into downright awful moral choices but it gets to a point where you've gone too far and you've convinced yourself this is the only way. Eventually you start to enjoy it and thats the point of no return. Quackity has admitted that he just enjoys torturing Dream just like Dream admitted it was fun to torture Tommy.

I think through Quackity we can see more of what turned Dream. We can infer more with more knowledge than before. We know from testimonies and past clips that Dream wasn't always like this and therefore you have to wonder where the turning point was, what was the event that caused him to decided Imma go to the dark side, peace!

And Quackity offers us some knowledge to this, albeit not a lot but more than before.

I also mentioned that in a Black Mirror episode you can see how Dream most likely ended up down this path and taking pleasure in pain. I can't remember the title but it was about a Doctor who could feel his patients pain and therefore diagnose them better but one day he felt someone die and that rush he got became something he was addicted to. He then started seeking ways to feel the rush again but never quite managing it. Eventually he becomes unregocnizable and a "monster" compared to the good man he was before. It an uncomfortable episode. He wasn't the best man in the world, he had flaws but he was good but through certain events and decisions he ended up in an awful place and doing awful things. And I think Dream is partially like that.

Dreams current arc is interesting personally, even though there isn't a lot to it. In the prison a lot of people think he's changed but really he hasn't. I think they could try to do a Theon Greyjoy from Game of Thrones where he's tortured into a completely different human being and then begins to piece himself together again and redeem himself but without his perspective of before, I don't the fandom will forgive. Also, do we really wanna see change through torture? Like is that really the message we from this?

I think its always going to be difficult, I'm never sure where they're going to go. All my predictions are wrong but I enjoy everything they do.

The good the bad and the ugly, they do it so well and they honestly commit to it and take the flack. It'll be interesting to see how they try to redeem him because I think they will.

I'm always open to asks as long as they're respectful and love to hear other peoples perspective on characters, Dream included.

[popculturebuffet]

New X-Men Xtrospective Part 3: Imperial (NXM #121-126)

To me all you happy people! And welcome back to my X-Citing look at Morrison’s Masterwork on Marvel’s Merry Mutants!  Part One is HERE, Part Two is HERE if you feel like it. 

If not... to catch you up on last time....

All Caught up? Good. Join me under the cut as our heroes head into this old woman’s hedd to see what’s wrong and fight off an alien army while horribly ill. 

Silent, Psychic Rescue in Process:

So we pick up not long after we left off: Thanks to Beast waking up from his bat induced coma, the X-Men now know Charles is trapped in Cassandra’s body and she pulled a Freaky Friday on him, with marginally less bullets. 

And thus we get this issue. This one was part of Nuff Said, an incredibly clever theme month by Marvel and one I wish they’d try and do again at some point in some form. 

The gimmick was simple but amazing: Every issue would be mostly silent, with at most some dialouge at the start and finish to bookend it. So far i’ve only read two issues of this, this one and the X-Statix one, but it is a genuinely great idea. I do think forcing it on the entire line was a bit much, but as I said I do wish they’d do this again just make it optional: have some books opt in or do some annuals with the theme. It’s just a fun break from the usual and with this issue resulted in one of the best single issues of x-men period. 

Naturally given the name, which is cleverly displayed on a sign the x-men have because of course they do, it’s exaclty that: Emma and Jean after readying themselves (Jean kisses Scott goodbye and Emma downs a bottle of jack because why not do an alchol before doing delecate mental surgery), head in. 

Inside they find horrific old lady head doors, stone ol dlady heads around a tower that shoot lasers, and said doors also bite and puke weird goop because it’s Grant Morrison. This is his chance to just go full balls out weird.. and given last time involved skin flake golemns.. and this isn’t even the weirdest he’s done. As mentioned last time he once had a supervillian run for president using a super LSD Bike that made everyone high. 

And just to prove he can reach that level of weirndess we find charles alone, naked and with an overenlarged brain.. before he transitions Jean to a field of sperm. 

Yeah... but this DOES have a point.. as it turns out it’s a meaphorical transition into his gestation as a baby.. and how he had a twin. Yeah turns out Cassandra was not lying he did try to kill her.. but as you can probably tell by the fact she’s a genocidal sociopath, she lied by omission to screw with Hank: In the womb she tried strangling Charles to death with his own umbilical cord..only for him to use baby’s first psonic blast to send her reeling and his mom tumbling down the stairs and well.. you can probably guess the rest. Yeah.. Cassandra’s entire origin story is concentrated 

And I love it. The sheer audacity is nice and everything but what makes it really work for me is the simple concept: An evil version of charles, one almost born at the same time whose every bit as evil as he is good.. granted there’s a TON of Morally Grey in Charles Xavier ESPECIALLY post decimation and even more so now with Krakoa. But he’s sitll at his heart a well meaning person, while Cassandra at her heart is a racist genocidal nightmare. She is pure evil, with enough personality to not make her boring.. and more importanlty all the power charles has but NONE of his restraint. Part of what makes Charles noble is he only uses his powers when necessary. Cassandra.. has no such restraint and will happily mentally snap necks all day. 

So with this our heroine’s leave and we end on the iconic line “Professor Xavier killed his twin sister in the womb. We Really ought to talk. 

This issue is an utter classic. It finally explains Cassandra a bit while still leaving a ton of questions, Frank Quitely is at his best here, and he and morrison are incrediby good at non verbal storyteling. The result is surreal, unsettling and awesome. Check it out. Seriously seek this one out it’s worth the trip. It’s so famous it was homaged with a spirtual sequel in the recent Giant Size X-Men one shots. It’s excellent stuff

Imperial:

So with our first issue we open with things going terrible on that flag ship Cassandra took off on with Lilandra, empress of the Shiar and Xavier’s space wife. She’s revealed herself, is ravaging the ship and mind rapes a the helmsman into crashing it, so with no other options Lilandra sends Smasher, not the one from the avengers run earlier version, to earth to send a warning to the X-Men. 

At the School things are actually going well for a second. In an intresting move the school is changing things up with no officla timetable.. which I think means there’s no rigid class schedule and you can just do them as you please or as necessary for your power. The plan’s the same, they just want to learn from each other in building mutant society and the future. It’s ideas like this that are the bedrock of the current run and were sadly never fully realized here.. but I don’t blame this run for that. Morrison had 2-3 years and it was cut short early, leading to a rather disapointing ending we’ll get to. They never had a chance to really dig in because they were kicked out by morons and then their whole grand design was undone until Hickman un-undid it in 2019. And even then some of this like the idea of mutant culture and what not hasn’t been picked up on yet. I do mean YET, as given the sheer NUMBER of x books touching on all sorts of subjects, it’s only a matter of if not when. 

As for who’s behind this it’s a combination of Jean and Charles: Jean is using charles notes and is going at full tilt. Scott is concerned though.. both about her since she went Phoenix and Logan told him about it and because these plans may alarm the humans. ON the former Jean just brushes him off which is not right.. given what happened with the phoenix force copy of jean, which granted had her personality, memories and powers and Jean later got a set of her memories so it might as well of been and only MAYBE the genocide is something Jean wouldn’t of done under the same circumstances, he’s understandably concerned. He lost her to it last time and it did weird shit to poor Rachel, who hif you don’t know is their daughter from an alternate timeline... because the Summer’s family tree is a WAKING NIGHTMARE. Thankfully I don’t have to untangle it because there’s a handy chart right here to do it for me that was recently released in X-Men Legends, a new series featuring legendary x creators telling stories in the cracks... and given we’re getitng storys by the simosons and peter motherfucking david, yeah good stuff.

And why yes there are more than one clone in this tree and several alternate timelines. , not to mention several clones and a sexy cat lady, it’s complicated is understnading it and i’m not sure what properly states it honestly. Also if your wondering about Adam there he’s the genetic son of Cyclops mom and the ma Shiar empreror who killed her for not sleeping with him through. Again it’s complicate REALLY feels like understatement. 

Point is he DOES have a right to be worried about the thing that lead to her being cocooned for a while and left their daughter in the future at the time of this... just in case you needed a reminder after that wonderful clusterfuck of a chart up above athe x-men are really fucking weird. 

So Jean brushing that off is not okay. She does however call him out on the second one and rightfully so: This isn’t some dominate the humans manifesto: this is simply changing the course of the future and how they teach their students to create a better one instead of adhering to human norms to try and appease “the republicans’, as jean puts it.. which has only gotten MORE RELEVANT, 20 years on: Attempts to appease the norms of society and things “just because that’s how it’s been” have never been a good thing. It’s why the very writer of this comic took several decades to properly identify themselves as non binary because people were too stuck int heir ways to try and see if there really were just two genders. Fighting against the grain, finding new ways to express things that have always been there... it’s what humanity needs to do and certainly what comes after us would need to do. i’ts how we get better as a race. If something’s not working we change it, quickly or slowly. And given Scott’s huge amount of emotoinal repression lately.. I can see why she’d see the former complaint as just him being a dick as opposed to the genuine concern it is. 

Short Version: Jean Grey is fucking awesome and while he’d be the last to write her for decades, no one did it better than Grant and no one has since.  Hopefully Gerry Duggan can clear that bar. 

After this fight we get a fuller verson of what happened both at the end of issue 120 and in the big reveal last issue: Turns out Hank awoke because Charles piloted his body like a truck and needed it revealed fast. Hank’s regained control of his body and facilities by now, but in a twist of irony he helpfully points out, had Cassandra not gone a needlessly cruel and sociopathic tangent and had Beak beat Beast into a coma, Charles wouldn’t of had a body. 

As for Charles in cass’ body he’s now in a tub of goo created by it. 

It acts as a shield as well as melding him with Cerebra so he can talk to jean telepathically as his thoughts are very weak.

Thanks to this and her psychic Jaunt, Jean now knows just what the hell cassandra is: She really is Charles twin sister. As for how the hell she surivied outside of the womb and how Charles never knew, she created herself a clone body using his cells and didn’t fully manifest till now. And while she has plenty of intellegence, at an emotional level she’s fully convinced, much like an infant that only she and charles are real and thus destroying him means gaining domance over her world. So in short she’s both utterly insane and now has an interstellar empire at her fingertips. 

And the news SOMEHOW get sworse: She booby trapped her body and charles only has days before he’s vegatable, having put every psychological disease possible in there, and she’s probably responsible for their colds and the u-men. So in short their pretty scrwed but at the very least Charles plans to try to flip things, use the fact their now public (a clear tactic to weaken them) to share his manefesto, his last will and testiment if you would. 

Scott meanwhile figures since their sick a healer might be a good idea and goes solo to fetch Xorn... who just sorta disappeared after the annual and didn’t return till his arc. 

We get an utterly touching scene after this: With Logan staying on his hobbit like toes in case of another attack, Jean goes to talk to hank. Hank is still throughly traumatized from the attack, fearing Cassandra is right and he’ll just keep devlovling until he ends up in a metamoprhisis type situation. I mean it’s not ALL bad hank,.. I mean going through that guarantees a musical about you. 

But Jean reassures him: It’s okay to be afraid of her, they all are.. but as she puts it...

It’s a really powerful inspiring scene... and really afirms how well Morrison writes Jean from the previous arc onward. She’s confident, powerful.. but also caring and compassionate. Here hank’s at his lowest, disparing that this might get worse.. and she reaffirms that htis evolution is an upgrade.. he may not be the same.. but that’s okay. He’s better. It really speaks to the core message of the X-Men as a whole and why they’ve stuck around all this time: It’s not just okay your diffrent.. it’s WONDERFUL. Your wonderful for being you. Whatever meataphor you read into it, it’s at it’s core a message that no matter who hunts you or trys to shame you for what you are, they are wrong and you are wonderful. And you are not alone... your people are out there.. and they will go through hell to protect you. It’s moments like this that remind me despite the bad parts, the accidnetal transphobic metaphor last time, a subplot with Hank coming up, the affair storyline and Planet X, just.. Planet X.. this run is special to me for a reason. It has heart, character and truly gets how the x-men should work, what makes them great... while making something NEW AND FRESH from it’s bones. Pushing envelopes, chanigng things for good and shaking things the hell up after far too much stagnation. It’s just pure good comicy goodness and i’m proud to finally be talking about it after having always wanted to. 

So as we end the issue Scott grabs Xorn, whose been at a budist temple all this time, and Smasher arrives to warn earth... but his warning missed his intended target. 

Well at least he got to Hellcow’s coven.. maybe she can call in Man Eating Cow and the Chick Fill A Super Cows.. thought hey might not help. Their parent company IS pretty homophobic.. I doubt their high on mutants either. 

Testament Emma and Jean talk over things how i’ts going etc, with Emma unsuprisingly annoyed with most of the students and Jean optimsitc.

But Emma soon has bigger issues to deal with: TEEN ANGST!

Yeah 4/5 of the Cuckoos are upset Esme has a boyfriend. Their concerns in part are because without her their apparently powerless.. which given one will die and another will leave and they’ll be left with three is just factually not true, and either Morrison changed his mind later, or more likely their simply exagerating like teens do. Emma points out it’s pointless to fight this...

So... their in a domestically abusive relationship rife with sexual tension? Are you sure your not htinking of Sam and Diane, Ross and Rachel, Garfiled and Odie perhaps?

Meanwhile Angel’s sulking in a tree talking about how all the kids are stupid and she dosen’t fit in. That sort of thing. Wolverine naturally has a tactful and understandable response to this:

It’s here Angel goes from understandable, a bit hard edged and obnoxious becuase of a very rough life.. and just becomes annoying.  I do get what Grant was trying to do: he was trying to play with Wolverine’s habit of taking sassy teens under his wing by giving him a more hardscrabble one with a harder life pre-xaviers.. not that Jubilee’s was easy, but I get what he was going for.. he just dosen’t succeed. Instead of a realistic version of a teen sidekick she just comes off as an obnoxious brat whose rude to everyone including her one friend Logan and her later boyfriend.  It dosen’t help that ONCE AGAIN, Morrison flew directly into unfortunate implications without meaning to, by having the only major POC character (Bishop guest stars later and there are two significant characters during the Riot at Xaviers arc but both aren’t relevant before or after), be an abused teen with gross fly based powers and a teen pregnancy subplot. Seriously this isn’t even the LAST time Morrison shoves their foot in their mouth like this in this run. While I do like this run a lot, it’s still 20 years old and it’s still going to have a bunch of bits that have aged like harvarti left on a sidewalk, and handing out unfortnuate implications like their candy is tied for the biggest with their handling of Magneto when he finally shows up in person. It’s THAT bad a take on the character that it’s up there with accidental racisim and transphobia. 

So moving on from.. that we get Jean comforting the professor before meeting the press, giving a throughly lovely speech about how Charles got his powers 30 years ago and despite seeing the worst in humanity, used his telepathy to allow him to see past it and see deep down just how scared and alone we all felt. So she takes them into a psychic conference room and we get a very interesting exchange. 

It’s an interesting parallel to how real world disinfranchised groups, how it takes time.. but soon being a POC or LBGTQ+ goes from unrightfully perscuted to celebrated. How a group starts with hates whipsers on the fringe of things but grows to be accepted, like it always SHOULD have been. Take representation of Trans people in the media. It started with Trans people being almost entirely punchlines and sources of fucking horendous “DID DEY USED TO BE A MAN.” storylines and hurtful jabs at people who had transitioned, treating them as a sideshow instead of you know as fucking human beings. But now coming out as what you always were ont he inside is celebrated. Sure the right are dicks about it but they always will be: but most media gladly celebrates when someone comes out as trans. Same with being gay, or bi or pan or polamorus or nonbinary.  Hell I admire grant for showing i’ts not even 100% perfect once you are popular: you still have to grapple both with people wanting to copot your culture and those who still don’t understand you trying to speak for you. 

She also gets the standard question calling the X-Men an army, shoots it down with the normal global peacekeeping operation stuff.. then we get this bitch. 

Who quickly realizes she’s outclassed by Emma Frost, professional that bitch. And while Jean is understandbly going to have to erase that.. I can’t blame her for snapping her.

Just to tear this shit down.: The privacy thing is not something she’s doing. All she’s doing is spcyhic teleconfrencing, you harpy. They fight greek gods and monsters to protect your sorry ass and the last one.. just makes me absolutely livid and feels so much like a real world comment i’m suprised there isn’t a fox news logo next to her bigoted head. 

Trouble follows them everywhere they go.. because their mutants. They can’t help it. A LOT of shit like the demons, aliens, and gods and what not, I do not know if they actually did fight the greek gods but i’m not going to say for sure they did not, the norse gods defintely, not sure on greek. But the point is allt his stuff HAPPENS TO THEM half the time, or is a consequence of trying to PROTECT PEOPLE. I’m so nettled by this because this is how the marvel unvierse acts all the fucking time towards ALL super powered peoples. Mutants esepcailly but they blame the heroes and what not for being chased and harassed by guys in costumes or alien invasions or all the stuff they FIGHT. Sure sometimes they caused it but it’s either because of a monsterous person with a grudge or just because their powerful and some douche took an intrest. I’m just.. so fucking tired of asshole civlians in comics. It’s realisitc I know but it’s just hard to stomach after so many have turned their back on so many for such DUMB reasons. 

Jean recovers well pointing out the genocide and how 16 million people, 16 million possible einsteinss or mozarts are just GONE, and that their trying to focus on the future. She also brings up autistic savants who can talk to atoms and while I don’t like the use of the savant thing, as it brings to mind stuff like rainman I very badly want to see this autistic kid who can talk to atoms as someone on the spectrum myself. Also I just want the crew of HIckma’ns books in general to pour over this because there are a lot of intresting powers and personalities only MENTIONED we never saw proper that could be great characters. Just saying. 

Jean cocludes her speech to the world, including Logan whose wisely getting hammered at anearbye bar.. while Hank finds out what’s going on with their sickness.. nanonscopic sentnels in the blood. 

But while the press confrence ends well with Jean having won over the press.. things go sideways as not only is it clear Esme’s boyfriend is in fact something sinister.. but Jean falls over due to the nano snetinels, and senses Scott being taken in tibet, taken down by a group of the Shiar’s imperial guard.. picutre the legion of superheroes but blindly loyal to the goverment and far more likely to get killed. And the rest are preparing to attacking including Gladiator who if you don’t know him, has all the powers of superman as long as he retains his confidence. 

And it turns out Esme’s boyfriend is an advanced Scout, the shapeshifting amoeba blob thing Stuff, a new addition by morrison and good on him. And the Imperial Guard are here but with one goal

 Superdestroyer

On the Ship we find out both wha’ts going on with Scott and Xorn, they’ve been taken and why the shiar are attempting mutant genocide: Cassandra is puppeting ALL of them, has convinced them the mutants are infected and since Lilandra is a puppet, Scott’s words fall on deaf ears. 

Meanwhile Wolverine ambushes one of the squads, kiling one named Dinosaurer via claw to the brain, while Emma has had a dome thing put over her head and isn’t transforming into diamond to counter it because...

But the Cuckoos fight back, taking out oracle before easily handling stuff since his brain is fairly simple.. and given he’s racist against solid people and unlike the others reveling in the genocide just a tad.. yeah what he deserves. So now with a living weapon the Cuckoos make peace with Angel as they need all the help they can get. 

Jean ushers the press into the panic room, not happy about it but not having anothe roption for their saftey. Hank tells her to self distruct crebra if cassandra get sclose and goes off to join the fight and let off some steam over the situation. Hank easily routes two of them, and one , Manta tries to just fly right ot jtean wince their TK proof. How does that go?

Jean gets to saftey after that, not that she needs it and hank is quickly taken down by a batch of Superguardians.. only for Wolverine to arrive in the Sknitt of time and chop them up.. oh and as one of the puts it...

Bad. Ass. I also like the addition of the flight patch, a nod to the Legion, who the Imperial Guard were based on as those kids used flight rings. 

But while Logan and Hank easily tag team these assholes...

The SHiar call in the big guns.. Gladiator.. and I wasn’t kidding abotu the superman thing. While Logan TRIES to talk him out of it, the murders only confirm Cassandra’s bullshit and Gladiator breaks into the panic room throwing hank and wolverin’e before them having utterly decimated them off panel. I mean Wolvie is a badass.. but even he has limits. I also like recontecullizing the guard as a whole here.. showing just how TERRIFYING they SHOULD be as enimies to the x-men. Yes our heroes did win.. but barely and only till Gladiator showed up. In most cases thier clearly holding back out of affection but here hteir just at errifying unstoppable force, and also apparently used to doing genocides like this. It takes what was a cheesy shout out to David Cockrums other big artistic work, and makes it horrifying and it is AWESOME. I admit to not having liked this arc as much for the longest time but this reread, the sheer teror and hopleessness as an interstellar superman easily cuts through our mighty mutants like tissue... it’s awesome. 

Thankfully one of the Guard found smasher.. and thus the truth comes out so our heroes are given a stay of execution with Gladiator clearly horrified at what he almost did and our heroes now so sick they can barely move and Hank can’t think them out of this. 

Thankfully he dosen’t has to as back in space, Cyclops tires of it and points out something Xorn, not being as experinced nor having delt with the guard ahd thought of: G-Type, the glowly guy about to execute them, is made of solar energy.. and xorn can manipulate that thanks to his star brain. He does, they take out the rest.. and prepare to go save the day.

Losers: PIcking up shortly before where we left off we see Cassandra murder Lilandra’s advisor who figured out what she was just as our heroes escape.. and as Cassandra is having Lilnadra order all of the shiar ships to immolate themselves. 

WIth Lilandra not being any use, Cass tries to psychically force her to commit sucidie but jumping off a space ledge but Xorn saves her. Cass tries another turn at mentally breaking an x-man, pointing out all scott’s recent flaws, his increased repression his faling marriage and while it gets him to stop it dosen’t quite work as well as it did on hank, likely because at his heart Hank is simply a more emotive person. Though his REAL reason for stalling is he can’t kill charles.. which he muses just as the ship blows up real good. 

Meanwhile back at Campus the kids initaiate their plan, having Angel break in and take a dna sample. She also finds beak naked in a tank and decides eh why not and brings him with her. This ends up paying off as Beak suggests the obvious to get emma free.. just force the space guy they have over in the corner to do it. They do and it works

Back in the mansion our heroes prepare for Casssandra... but Jean and Logan object to saving her body, pointing out that getting hank to repair it is exactly what she wants, and that Jean feels she can save charles without uit, with Hank being understandably doubtful given their current condition.. but Jean’s real plan is to put charles in her head and it’s already too far in actoin to stop now: she’s been saving his memories as they flaked off and if she dosen’t do this now there will be no charles left. 

Hank evacuates the civlians to teh danger room, and has an encounter with trish who tries to apologize and get him back.. only for him to rightfully regjecter her..a and then goes a step further by capping it off with:

Yeah on it’s own it’s not TERRIBLE. Still very dated to claim your gay just to spite someone, but for the time it was acceptable and compared to some of Morrison’s other gaffes in the run it’s minor at best. But it leads into a rather annoying subplot we’ll naturally get to that’s a much bigger issue, so i’ll save talking about it in full for when it comes up again. 

Jean manages to shove Chuck into her head, but is naturally leaking a bit and barely holding it or him together and may of overestimated herself just a tad.. while on the lawn Cassandra easily takes out the guards. That said the scene of Jean taking Chuck into her head is REALLY damn awesome. Jean is the arc MVP by a mile and Hank is pretty dang good competition. 

All Hell: We open the final issue of the arc with Scott and Xorn escaping the spaceship using some teleport tubes taking Arakai and Lilandra with them. 

We open with Cassadra utterly humilating gladiator while the kid team prepares to fight her despite you know, the 8 billion to 1 odds against them. 

Jean, despite hte discknes and trying to keep an old man in her brain marches out , prepared to fight, for the kids sake. For the world’s sake. But Logan’s easily taken out and with Jean barely holding it together.. the kids prepare to fight.. likely being slaughtered even if they mean well.. onlyf or help to finally arrive with Scott and Xorn glowy porting in. We get a really sweet , short moment with scott and jean...

Scott not knowing the situation tries to have Xorn heal charles first but since Cassandra’s body is dead and unoccupied that’s a no go.. he’s still usefult hough, curing Jean of her nanosentital sickness and moving on to Scott and Hank while there’s still time. 

We find out more about cassandra: She’s a murrmadi, a bodyless parasite.. eseetinally the dark first test a person faces... she just stuck around because she was one for a telepath.. the world’s STRONGEST telepath. But really other than that part the rest just feels like stuff we alreayd heard LAST TIME, mildly repaackaged and seems enitrley like filler to pad the issue out. 

So while Jean takes cerebra, both to keep it away from Cassandra’s plans of mutant genocide and for whatever she has planned, Scott, Hank and Xorn prepare to hold the line.. and as Jean mentions.. emma’s still out in the wild. 

So we get our climactic showdown.. logan, hank and xorn veruss cassandra, with Cassandra trying to do eveyrthing she can, tear them down mentally, throw out the students with our heroes fighting back best they can. It’s good stuff.  

Eventaully Cassandra gets to Jean.. but she’s already inacted her plan, putting a piece of Xavier’s mind in EVERY mutant, and giving Cassandra one ohell ofa reason you suck speech. 

It’s an incapsulation of what i said earlier and what the runs about: alone we are weak but together.. we just might make it. More on that as we go. But thanks to Cass naturally going fo rcerberba.. she accidently restores charles and is left bodyless.

Emma finishes the fight with her own brilliant gambit, presending cassandra her body.. but it’s actually stuff , reprogrammed into a sentient brain for her to inhabit and leaving her trapped, with Charles hoping t teach the now mentally reset Cassandra.  So Cassandra is beat, the virus is stopped, and our heroes have one.. but naturally for this run.. there’s one last suprise in store. 

Charles can walk again.. and going forward will be a far more active member of the team. The team is complete, Cassandra is beaten, and the future.. is bright. 

Final Thoughts:

This arc is a mixed bag.. it has really good scenes with the first and last issues being the standouts, with the former being an utter classic with an intresting gimick and the latter being a rousing climax with tons of awesome moments, with some good mometns scattered throughout.

But that’s the arc’s issue.. it has good moments and ideas.. but they don’t quite work togehter. The idea of teh Shiar Imperial Guard nearly doing a genocide is good, but the Shiar are such flat characters.. it’s really hard to care. They just don’t have enough connection to the x-men to really have the betryal sting but aren’t callous enough for genocide protocols to maeks sense. It’s a good idea, I still support it being terrifying.. but not enough is done with it and it feels liek Grant is more concerned with throwing weirdos at the x-men than actually saying something. 

The biggest issue however is the art. While inconsitant art is an issue as they’d rotate artists.. but in previous arcs it was usually pretty evenly split but here it’s sloppy: Quitely does the first issue, van Sciver the second.. and the worst of the three Igor Kordey does most of the art. I gave him the beinfit of the doubt last time.. but this time not so much. His art is muddy and tries to be stylized but comes off confusing,ugly and not great. He’s probably a lovely guy but given he’s up against two legendary artists, his lack of style comapred to both shows badly.  And given the arc is alreayd a bit overly complicated, it makes things WORSE by giving us muddled art in a very complex storyline. The flip flopping art makes a fairly intricate story very hard to follow. It’s easily why this arc didn’t grab me in the past and even seeing some better moments, it’s not the series best. It’s not the worst either, Planet X easily takes that ground despite having far better art. It’s an incredibly muddled incredibly long feeling arc and really needed to be compressed by one or two issues but instead is just hard to get through. It’s owrth it for the rest of the runa nd the good moments within but all in all easily one of the weakest points in the series. 

Next Month on New X-Men:The X-Men soak in the new world order, and we meet fantomex, dust and the last surivivors of genosha. 

Next on this blog:Green Eggs and Ham is back!

If you enjoyed this review PLEASE join my patreon. The end of hte month is coming and I need eveyr cent I can get so join at patreon.com/popculturebuffet and i’ll see you at the next rainbow.