#my mom is with all her flaws such an incredible and interesting woman

[dagasinfilo]

every time i read something about autism i am presented with the recalling of a memory that places my mother so solidly and definitely on the spectrum its insane

[poetry-protest-pornography]

Okay, let's talk about Ming, and how some people are talking about him like he's an irredeemable monster. (It's okay that you don't know anyone who was emotionally neglected and you have a decent relationship with your parents, but it's not okay to pretend your experience is universal and everyone else is garbage)

I know some of you remember my loud defense of Ray from Only Friends, and here I am again, to fight for the loveability of the character who doesn't know what to do with all their big feelings.

Ming's family, from what we see, is not a warm, loving place for him to learn emotional intelligence.

May is pretty great, but there is only so much an older sibling can do when your parents are physically or emotionally unavailable.

Ming's mom had only been seen trying to control Ming's life, marry him off to a woman, and insisting he is incapable of being on his own. Not exactly mom of the year.

Ming is clearly incredibly lonely, and so, so sad.

He likes Tong, but mostly after his sister and Tong are already involved -- because it's safe to transfer feelings you don't understand to someone that those feelings cannot go anywhere with. When he starts to feel too much for Tong, he leaves the country, because he can't process those feelings, and he doesn't want to hurt his sister with his crush on her boyfriend.

He comes home, and he sees Joe first. His likeness to Tong is obviously what pulls Ming in, but it is very quickly apparent that Ming is genuinely interested in Joe, but he has no fucking Idea what to do with that interest.

And when Joe clearly likes him back? It gets worse. He lashes out and then feels bad, but mostly doesn't apologize, he just moves on, because apologies require reflection on what you've done wrong, and Ming doesn't know how to do that! We see him struggle with it multiple times!

He does not know how to deal with being wanted. With the expectation of care that comes with that. Because, ironically, Tong and May are the best example of a relationship he has to look at, and he had to tell Tong to go take care of May when she was sick.

His crush on Tong remains so deeply a part of his identity, even as it obviously fades, and it clouds everything because Tong uses Ming's affection for him against him! And Ming doesn't see that! He doesn't see Tong's flaws until after Joe's accident, and even then, I don't know that he acknowledges Tong's actions as cruelty and manipulation, or if he ignores that all under his own guilt and grief over losing Joe.

And this brings us back to Ming and Joe.

Ming didn't have a crush on Joe. He sort of accidentally fell into a situationship, but then became intensely possessive and obsessed with Joe. We see him be so unbelievably soft with Joe, in moments where he's allowing himself to be, to stumble through having feelings and carrying for other people. But there is so much holding on tight that Ming can't seem to turn off.

He holds on to Joe --both of them!-- so tightly. He sees threats to his claim on Joe everywhere, and he can't confront that idea, so he doubles down on being possessive, and he looks cuckoo-bananas.

But it really just reads to me like he doesn't know what to do with feelings! I know people --especially ND people, who needed a little extra help to learn how to person -- who had emotionally neglectful parents and didn't understand healthy attachment until years of therapy and some determined friends got involved.

I don't have the greatest track record for "healthy attachment", and lean towards codependent in a lot of my relationships.

Some of the people I love the most are "hold on tight even when it's not good, because if I let go you'll leave" people.

They are absolutely deserving of someone who loves them. They deserve a happy ending and middle, too. They deserve the chance to learn and grow and become better versions of themselves.

(and they deserve people to love and cheer for them even when they're being assholes and throwing tantrums and hurting people because they are still learning how not to do that)

AND THIS DOESN'T EVEN TOUCH ON HOW JOE ALSO MISSED A LOT OF EMOTIONAL LESSONS, BUT IT MADE HIM UNHINGED IN A TOTALLY DIFFERENT WAY THAN MING!

Idek if this is coherent, or everything that I wanted to say, but here it is, my treatise on why Ming is my baby, actually, and why I will defend him until he is either better or actively worse.

ETA: what Ming has done is obviously not okay, reasons are not excuses, but I do think he deserves a chance to learn. and to tell Joe he loves him.

[blackbatcass]

I really really wanna know more about Donna Troyyy, so far I love her so much but I don't wanna be the type of person who claims they love a character then can't name 5 things about them. I wanna do her justice and really understand her character and purpose. I also don't wanna read something that completely mischaracterizes her because I'm aware that there's a LOT of that these days. I was hoping you could give me some recommendations to read after my tests?

Thank you so much if you do, and have a wonderful day! <3

I think I can help with that! Luckily donna's characterization is pretty solid & consistent in any comic up to around 2006. i would be wary of more modern interpretations of her but for most of her older appearances you don't really have to worry about bad writing.

The number 1 rec for donna is always New Teen Titans, that's where pretty much the majority of her appearances and character development take place in the 80s and 90s. The whole series is very long though so if you want more specific recommendations that focus on her I would definitely read ntt vol 1 #38, vol 2 #7-9, #18-21, #47, and #50-55. Issues 18-21 especially are probably my number one rec for donna if you're interested in seeing her flaws and struggles; those four issues took place when the titans were kind of falling apart, donna had to step up and call the shots, and it's a really neat insight into her character that i don't think gets quite as much attention as arcs like her origin stories. You'll probably honestly get a good feel for her if you pick any couple of arcs from NTT and read them through.

Wonder Woman (1987) #126-136 is a very important arc that reiterates donna's borderline horror dimension-bending origin weirdness. Titans '99 is a must-read for her, and jumping off that the Return of Donna Troy miniseries is like... Thee donna comic of all time so i would definitely recommend that. In between ntt and titans 99 she was in things like green lantern and darkstars but honestly the biggest things for her character you have to know from that time are that she and terry got divorced, she was dating kyle rayner, terry tried to take custody away from her, and terry & robbie died in a car accident.

There are way more detailed and comprehensive rec lists you can find in my donna tag if you're interested- I left out arcs like total chaos which are narratively very important for her but i don't think are quite as good a showcase for her as a character- but I think if you just want to get a feel for her character these are a good place to start. if you want like a primer on some of her major character traits i can definitely provide that lol:

donna is an incredibly emotionally intelligent and kind person who is a very good listener and always ready to help, which is why she's pretty much the #1 trusted person every single titan goes to when they need to vent. unfortunately being the appointed Fixer of All Problems Mom Friend when you're like barely an adult gets pretty overwhelming and is a very unfair weight to put a person; you can see this start to grate on her in titans 99 especially. something I like about donna is how open and honest she is with people about her struggles. most characters in the superhero genre would rather die than admit they need help and will never ever talk about their problems without being forced to, but donna isn't like that. if you ask her what's wrong she's going to be honest and tell you what's bothering her. she struggles a LOT with trying to appear 'perfect' in everyone else's eyes, and is really motivated by seeming to have it all together even when she doesn't. this is fueled a lot by her not being born an amazon and not knowing where she came from; the fact that for a lot of ntt she doesn't know her own history really gets under her skin. donna's identity issues are a HUGE part of her character especially later on as retcons and reboots get folded into her story. her past doesn't make sense. she has like nine competing backstories. she's one of the only people to remember the world pre-crisis on infinite earths and has literally been been forced out of existence and remade through pure memories, not to mention all the times dark angel forced her to live different lives until she reached rock bottom as a punishment for diana lol. in one origin she literally is not a real person and was just a mirror twin of diana. the main tagline associated with her is 'who is donna troy?' lol. which i think is fascinating and a very fucked up existence.

Anyway! I can talk about my girl all day. I hope this was at least a little bit helpful!

[misguidedasgardian]

I'm so disappointed with this show, I hated what they've been doing since atrocious b&c portrayal in e1, but this last episode (the leak) made me sick. Seriously, I don't understand how they managed to fumble this story so badly. And Aemond. He was one of the most popular characters after s1 with a good backstory and they should have just continued with it. The fact that even many TB fans liked him or found him interesting confirms this. But apparently Condal hated him so much and wanted to ruin him. He had so little screentime, they abandoned his character development and just decided to make him a one dimensional villain. However, I still understand him and won't bash him because I really dislike when the authors (and the narrative itself) are forcing me to hate a certain character. Also, I feel the same like with Daenerys after s8e4, he is basically all alone now, his mother betrayed him and revealed his war plans to the enemy, his sister tells him he'll die... It's just horrible. I hate those writers and what they did to the characters I loved.

Aemond was the only one I like of TG, I'm team black till the end so yeah I can confirm this! (don't get me wrong, I think all the ACTORS are incredible and are doing amazing, its the characters I don't like)

I said it recently, and I will say it again, I was team Mom's boy Aemond, I loved the relationship they had, specially when portrayed in S1E9, when he comforts her, and placed himself at her disposal... the way he held her... I was like damn Alicent, you might have showed disgusting favoritism, but at least, after everything and the horrible marriage with that walking corpse AT LEAST she has Aemond to show for it, despite all his flaws I thought he was going to be like a rabid dog in service of his family, because that is all he cares about... after the neglect from Viserys and his favoritism for Rhaenyra, he was going to be like... alright then... my FULL siblings and my mom, that's all I got... and that was burst into flames, for what?

He turned into a true villain, and not even a good one... like I get it, you want to be King, but at last, since Aegon didn't, they could have come to some sort of arrangement, right? do something better than what they did, I know they have a few minutes with each, but... dude..

he was such an interesting character... and they blew it up, i thought he at least was going to have... something... that was sacred to him, Helaena or his mother AT LEAST.... something! but he not even caring that his BABY NEPHEW lost his head because of him? it's insane, we all love a good villain with something... sacred to him, right??

And Aemond is only one of the many victims of this bananadnesss

And I don't like what they did with Rhaenyra either, I was so much more into that spoiled, darkish, tortured by her stepmother woman fromt he books, and she is too good, I think the writters got scared because of Dany, thought we wouldn't become Rhaenyra's apologists (they were wrong) hehehe

Anyways... LONG LIVE FANFICTION! we will keep them alive! as the show is assasinatings all of their characters! jejeje

[romani-ranch]

I’ve kept quiet on this for too long, I need to break my silence.

Untagged spoilers for all of death note ahead because I don’t want the death note fans to find me.

Death note is one of the worst fucking anime I’ve ever seen in my life and the fact that it has the following it does is insane to me. What am I missing? Light and L’s cat and mouse game and gotchas are only interaction like 50% of the time, and the other 50% of the quirky overanalysis just feels like Rick and Morty levels of the show pretending to be smart because it couldn’t think of anything actually intelligent to do. The Yotsuba arc fucking sucks. I genuinely lost so much interest in the show for the duration of that arc, and the big payoff at the end with light getting the death note back did 100% not feel worth the amount of time that was spent dicking around with rich assholes.

Light is insufferable as a character, which isn’t a problem, because he’s a villain, and an incredibly flawed one, which is completely fine. What I’m not fine with is that the show doesn’t seem to acknowledge many of his flaws as flaws. He treats every woman he interacts with like garbage. Either they’re just a pawn in a greater scheme, or someone who’s so pitifully stupid that they’re below him in every way, someone not even worth considering a threat, barely even a person. Which, again, is fine. I don’t think characters having flaws makes them unlikeable, especially villains. But, the show never ever ever acknowledges Light’s misogyny as a negative trait. He is never punished for underestimating or using women, no woman ever gets one over on him. In fact, I think the only person that hates women more than Light, is the author.

Please refer to every single female character in the show with speaking lines in more than one episode. Naomi, Light’s sister, Light’s mom, Misa, Kiyomi, Wedy, Rem. Every single woman in this show, by the end of this show, has met some godawful fate, and is either dead in a horrific way, or traumatized permanently. Conversely, while a lot of men die in this show, often in gruesome ways, there are plenty of male characters that get off Scott free. Near and the SPK, the entire Kira task force, with the obvious exception of the dead ones. I think there’s enough men in this show with okay endings that this criticism is earned.

In general, I found the final arc very unsatisfying as a whole. Mello and Near just showing the fuck up really was not cool. I didn’t care for either of them at all really. At least with L, he had an established dynamic with light built up over the entire series. Some new cunt showing up and trying to be him is just. Less cool? Misa bowing out of the story to go be Light’s tradwife while he cheats on her is an especially low point in this show as well.

Am I being mean and petty for the sake of being mean and petty? I mean, yeah for like, sure. I’m kind of being a dick but like. What is the appeal of this show? As a detective show, the mindgames and tricks and gotchas are very often, genuinely less interesting than your average Columbo episode, despite taking nearly twice as long to set up. As a drama, the show’s misogyny issues really hold it back, as do the more questionable and off the wall story beats. As a yaoi show, which I know it is to a large part of its audience, look, I like toxic romance. I actually enjoy incredibly unhealthy couples when written well, and I don’t mind reaching for my pairings. There’s nothing here. Like. Yeah, they have their moments, and I understand why people make L and Light fuck but like. Come the fuck on. This pairing is white bread with nothing on it they’re not even that cool. I don’t like men, so maybe I can’t talk here but like. They’re not even that hot??? The fuck are you people on about?

Every sensible person I know dropped the show after L died and honestly, I wish I had done the same. I just. I don’t get it. How the fuck does this show come so highly rated? How did you make a detective thriller unironically worse than Danganronpa? Answer quickly.

[princesssmars]

gossip girl reboot 2x07 spoilers below !

i feel so bad for monet yall. she was upgraded to main character for maybe 3 episodes and now shes being treated like dirt. everyone of the main cast has had a or multiple love interest(s), and all shes gotten is a queerbaiter ?? seriously ??

and DONT even get me started on her mom. i liked the notion of monet getting her cutthroatness from her mom, and i was excited to see them as a mother daughter duo with flaws of course. but camille just...replacing monet with zoya is cruel, and even crueller when she criticizes monets actions when girl YOU are the parent, YOU are what shes influenced by !!!

luna is still barely a side character who we know nothing about and just gives the others advice. not much else to say really.

dont even get me started on julien and audrey. i went from disliking julien and liking audrey to way the opposite in a WEEK 😭 audrey is making no sense to me. first she wants to reconnect with her dad and his mistress, gets mad when julien calls them out and says maybe they really are in love and seemed to believe julianna (the mistress idk her name) when she said they didnt cheat, gets mad when gg posts a most likely fake email that julien sent to her dad saying she saw them, then gets even more mad when julien tries to talk to the girl to get the truth and gets manipulated. this is on audrey to me because i would not trust the man and woman who so thoroughly broke my mother down like we saw kiki at the start of season 1.

i hope georgina and kate both go to jail im so sick of seeing them yall i stg.

obies storyline is still so....fucking boring and hes do disconnected from the group the contrast to his scenes is so jarring. and i saw him trying to flirt with julien like PLEASE dont try her after you got mad at HER because she exposed ur lil girlfriend was a brother fucker.

aki is just kinda there. but i like him much more this season so he can just be there and im cool <3

max is trying to win the approval of audreys cheatin ass dad who is judging him and. oh the irony.

still heavily dislike zoya i wish i didnt but oooo lets just say you can tell shes a fifteen year old girl (incredibly annoying).

i wrote this 33 mins into the 57 min episode so i might rant more if something pisses me off. im gonna write more monet fics since the writers wanna do her dirty. bye.

[eusuntgratie]

8, 12, 16, 23 👀👀💚

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

i have some...complicated feelings about buck and chris's relationship and how that's portrayed/talked about especially in how it reflects on eddie. i say shit like THATS HIS DAD and THEYVE BEEN COPARENTING FOR YEARS because they HAVE and i think in a lot of ways buck loves chris like he's his and chris CLEARLY sees buck as a parental figure and eddie REPEATEDLY and PURPOSEFULLY puts buck in that role and is comfortable with him in that role.

where i get the ick is when that's pushed into this idea that chris needs buck, that eddie needs buck, in order for their family to be complete. and i don't know that i can articulate this well bc eddie does need buck, and chris needs buck too. but i also think it is so so important to recognize that eddie is a great father (despite a rough start) and that they were (and would continue to be) just fine without him.

i've even struggled with how i've written this relationship in fic, because it can be a tough line to toe.

i suspect that fandom subconciously leans in to this idea that buck can swoop in and save eddie and chris in large part because buck is white and eddie isn't. and i know that i'm icked by it more because of that.

and this is probably related, but i don't think chris would ever start calling buck anything but buck. the idea that a kid needs to call someone dad/mom/whatever for them to be "important" is bullshit. my best friend and i's kids call us by our first names but they also refer to us as their 'other mom'. i've always called my stepdad by the nickname everyone else calls him. buck has been in chris's life a long time; i don't think he's gonna start calling him something different if they finally get together and/or get married.

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

taylor and shannon and lucy on 911. fandom loves to hate any woman that's even vaguely connected to one of the boys. i like taylor because she's interesting, and i appreciate seeing a woman who puts herself and her career first. we see men do that all the time. i don't hate taylor for being selfish. i don't want her with buck, but i think their relationship was SO interesting and was important for buck figuring out what he wants.

i LOVE shannon and i have loved shannon from the beginning. people love to hate her and say she's a terrible mother for abandoning her child. but she was a young woman in an impossible position who had NO help from her partner for YEARS. she tried to do what she thought was best for her son, her mother, and herself. eddie wouldn't GIVE her that space so she TOOK it. and good for her, honestly. did it hurt chris that she left? absolutely. would people judge a father as harshly for doing EXACTLY the same thing? absolutely not. shannon loved her kid, she tried to do her best, but she was pushed well past her breaking point (which eddie is largely to blame for - yes i can love my blorbos and admit they have flaws GASP) and everyone had to deal with the fallout.

lucy is hot and badass and interesting and if you watch her kiss with buck and think anything other than 'fuck, that's hot' then we will simply never agree and i'm not going to argue with you. get off her ass, she's incredible and i want her back.

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

miscommunication based pining. i can do it for a little bit, but my nightmare is a 100k+ fic rated t tagged slow burn and mutual pining. JUST OPEN YOUR DAMN MOUTH! AAAAAAHHHHHH!! i can do SOME pining bc yearning can be really delicious but when the whole reason 2 people are pining for seven billion words is because nobody will just TALK it makes me insane.

23. ship you've unwillingly come around to

oooh this is tricky bc i am a multishipper to my CORE i want everybody fuckin everybody and falling in love all over the place give it to meeeeee. i feel like the only ship i've ever really been AGAINST is thorki, and that's largely bc of people arguing that it doesn't "count" as incest bc loki was adopted, which pisses me the fuck off. the actual ship i don't really have beef with and i'm sure i would read a fic if someone sent it to me and it was good. idk. it takes a lot for me to be like, ew, absolutely not.

(obligatory disclaimer that you're allowed to like shit i don't like. i'm not telling you your opinion sucks, i'm telling you what i think <3)

fandom violence asks <3

[jojosbussyadventure]

My opinions on Jotaro

Disclaimer: This includes critique of Jotaro Kujo! Some of these takes are nuclear level unpopular. I don’t hate Jotaro, but some aspects of his character and the way fandom treats him drive me up the fucking wall. Sometimes media lands with people differently and people have different opinions.

1. Hates women. He is probably overstimulated in some of the scenes he yells at women, but if you look, he never reacts that way when his teammates in SDC are loud. He specifically states that he hates loud women. The first time we see him yelling at a group of girls in the anime, he’s actually walking away while they’re distracted bickering behind him. If it were just about being overstimulated and not some vitriol towards women, he could’ve kept walking and left the stimulus instead of turning around to yell at them imo.

At first I was like ok he’s 17 maybe he’ll be better when he’s an adult. Then in DiU he yells at a group of teenage girls who are fawning over Josuke.

Like he’s an adult here yelling at teenagers because…he’s specifically annoyed when women are noisy. Even if that weren’t gross, it’s on him to develop some coping skills at this point.

I dont like how a lot of ppl in fandom seem to think this is funny or just write it off. It’s ok to acknowledge a characters shitty behavior and still like them.

And THEN

In that same part we see him being incredibly kind and caring to Josuke and Koichi. Which shows he’s grown a lot and has the capacity to be compassionate and respectful. But…that just doesn’t extend to women? Which to me is a huge huge bummer :/

The only woman we actually see him being nice to (like having kind interactions with) is Jolyne, his daughter.

2. Fatherhood. Jotaro is not an ideal dad and I love that tbh. I think it’s good writing.

But he left his daughter to protect her!

Ok well that didn’t work and she still got the abandonment trauma anyway, so now what?And why is it always “I leave my weak wife and daughter to protect them” and not “I train my wife and daughter so we can all protect each other”? Why is it assumed that women wouldn’t be able to handle that? It’s misogyny that it’s never considered as a possibility imo, and is a problem with the writing not just Jotaro.

For fucks sake a dog, rat, baby, bird, and money were all able to handle having a stand but Jotaro’s mom wasn’t?

The fact is he (we’re assuming) chose to have a kid and then abandoned her. It’s not ideal parenting.

But I actually love how he’s written as a dad! I think it’s realistic that he would struggle to have a good relationship with his wife and daughter. He had an absent father, is extremely traumatized, struggles communicating, and apparently has a not great relationship to women in general.

His divorce and estrangement from his daughter are realistic consequences to some of his flaws.

3. But he’s modeled after Clint Eastwood!

Yea that guy kinda sucks irl

-Things I like about Jotaro

1. Autistic coded. He thinks that his emotions show on his face, which is…dear. They do Not. Niche interests. Sensory issues. Cool autistic vibe

2. He’s very smart and that makes it fun to watch his fights.

3. Corny sometimes

4. Kind to his nephew and his friends. Like genuinely. Learns how to express compassion (as opposed to holding it inside and calling his mom a bitch)

5. Eventually came around and repaired his relationship with Jolyne, and expressed that he cares.

6. Strongk . I❤️start platinum.

- neutral -

I think he’s OP and that some of his powers are asspulls. However, I usually don’t mind this because I want them to win lmao! Also I’m amused by some other asspulls in Jojos, so I can’t draw the line here.

Conclusion:

I kinda like him. wish he would be kind to women. Until then, I kinda want him to get jumped.

[wilcze-kudly]

Honestly the idea of Suyin discouraging contact between her kids and Lin and trying to isolate her is interesting.

Though I do prefer the interpretation based in canon where Su does try to assimilate Lin into the perfect family she's created.

Suyin: And the woman apparently trying to abduct you is your aunt Lin.

Opal : Really? I've always wanted to meet you. My mom has told so many stories about you.

Lin: I'm sure she has.

Suyin told her kids stories about Lin. Sure they must've been incredibly curated but they seemed to position Lin in a positive light.

Opal : I'm sorry being here has been so hard for you. When you showed up, I was so excited to get to know you. I heard so many great things about you from mom and Grandma Toph. So, I guess I was kind of sad you didn't want to know me.

Su, for all her flaws isn't some machiavellian villain. Her actions aren't outright malicious and she's clearly messed up by her upbringing, similarly to Lin.

What Su has done to cope with her childhood is building a family and community. She surrounded herself with people who rely on her and cannot leave her. She fixed her strained relationship with her mother. She built a perfect family. One she probably always wanted since she was a lonely child who didn't get enough affection from her rather cold family members.

She wants Lin as a part of this perfect family.

Korra : It sounds like you've created the perfect life here.

Suyin : Almost. I've always wanted Lin to be a part of it, but I gave up hope long ago of her ever coming around.

In fact she's so invested in her family that she will sweep very natural hurt under the rug to keep that family together. She tried to disregard Lin's very rational anger towards her. And then she does the same by allowing Kuvira and Baatar back into the fold, despite her children's visible discomfort at this.

But Suyin is, as you said very astutely, a control freak. She'd does want control of her family, to some extent. Her children seem very reliant on her, particularly the youngest three. Opal spreads her wings a little after joining the Air Temples. But the twins are practically Su's trained puppies and ugh the angst potential there ok shutting up about my blorbos

Lin wouldn't allow herself to be controlled like that though adn i think that would cause a lot of friction. Which I'm here for. I think that might be where Su starts discouraging her kids from contacting Lin if that were to ever happen but in all truth I don't really see that happening? Su wants Lin as part of her family and i can see her being very insistent on trying to push Lin into that mold.

I also do like to think that Lin would see her niblings being hurt in a similar way she was and would try to intervene? Like for all her gruffness she's a big softie at heart. And i think she really cares for them. I really liked all her scenes with Opal. Lins so fucking awkward and trying to be gentle after she snaped at Opal its adorable.

I'd love to see Lin call out Su i need it actually.

You know what upsets me but also like I get it lol

In the comic About the Beifongs

This is all you see of Lin.

That’s it. Back of her head and her shoulder.

In one hand it would have been nice to actually see her work it out with Toph and Su but in the other

Lin’s like “this bitch is Your Problem. You handle it.”

[thealexchen]

Highlights of the Katy and Erika Q&A

Link to the Q&A! https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1161022793 

- Erika’s first audition with a scene partner was with Han Soto (Gabe)! Neither of them had gotten their parts yet, but Han still called “I’ll see you on set!” over his shoulder as he was leaving. Erika also said that he was a wonderful mentor figure and also someone who gave her a lot of shit, like an older brother would.

- THEY ANSWERED MY QUESTION!!! 😭 I had asked, "Since you were working on this game for several years, how do you think your performance or skills as an actor changed over time as you got to know your character better?"

Erika explained that in an early callback, she had to act out Gabe’s death scene and got into the moment by imagining that her little brother Evan had died. Later on she realized that it wasn’t healthy or sustainable to go to such dark places mentally over and over: “It's great to bring your lived experience in but not at the at the level of sacrificing your own health.” She later referred to the Lucid Body Technique invented by a dancer named Fay Simpson that she learned while on an acting retreat in Creed, CO (”Fun fact, Creed is actually a small mining town that was saved by theater!”). Instead of calling up traumatic memories, Erika focused on where that emotion “lives” in her body, accessed them safely, and was able to bring herself back to the present moment. Katy also mentioned she studied the technique in college. All super interesting stuff!

- Han pulled so many pranks on set that Webb (performance director) and Corwin (mocap producer) forced him to limit it to “one prank per day... on Erika.” He managed to jumpscare her every time and when she tried to get him back, “He didn’t even blink. I was like ‘What the fuck is going on?”

- Alex evolved a lot over the course of writing the game. Apparently the first iteration of Alex was a lot more like Chloe-- very bitter, brittle and with a lot of repressed anger-- but that got softened as they developed Alex’s power and as Erika brought more of herself to the performance.

- Apparently Gabe’s death scene was fun to film because when Gabe got knocked off the cliff, Erika got pulled in a sled to simulate Alex being pulled toward the edge while tied to Gabe. So they did a million takes of that and Erika just got to sit in a sled. Meanwhile Katy was at a butterfly garden down the street.

- Another fun scene (apparently) was when Alex fell down the mineshaft at the end of chapter 4 and the beginning of chapter 5, as Erika describes: “They basically rigged me up to a swing, like a sex swing-- not a sex swing. I mean, I walked in and I think that was my first question. I was like ‘Is that a sex swing? What are we filming today? I didn’t get these scripts.’” Cue the chat going insane.

What actually happened was she hung onto a board and two pulleys dropped on either side of her so she fell onto a crash pad. Apparently Webb practiced before and “really bruised the shit out of his ribs.”

- The “The crowd is really picking up on my energy. Haaaaa we love you Alex! Haaaaa Steph sucks!” line during the foosball game was entirely improvised by Erika, just having fun on set. Erika also admits she’s very chatty and just enjoyed getting to know her castmates so that they were already all friends when they acted together.

- Webb sent Han and Erika on a day trip to Idaho Springs early in production to bond and of course Han suggested they go gambling (Erika added, “Which of course is something that Gabe would do! Like ‘Let’s go do something sinful.”) They also played with Han’s drone. Katy went to see one of Erika’s plays in Colorado!

- When asked about what Erika would do if she had Alex’s powers: “I think it would be a cool power too because there’s so much covering that happens with all of us in social settings and professional settings. And being able to have insight into what’s really going on would probably create the need to be a much a kinder, generous, forgiving person, which are things that I’m always working on. I don’t think you could not become that.”

- Erika on Asian representation in True Colors: "[Alex is] not the best friend, she's not the tiger mom, she's her own fully realized, three dimensional person with flaws and goals and dreams and things she wished she could do over again. And I think that, for me, as somebody who grew up not seeing people who looked like me in movies-- and that's why Lucy Liu was such a fucking huge deal-- but the fact that D9 didn't do it in a tropey way was incredible. I know how important that Alex is a woman of color. She doesn't fit the mold of typical video game female bodies either, which I think is amazing."

- Erika lowkey hated the mocap suits. She couldn’t understand why Katy didn’t mind them and said “Katy. Katy. Katy.” “No it was so comfy it was like I was in my jammies!” “I remember you said that and I was like ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?! This is not comfortable!’”

- Erika’s advice to aspiring creatives: “Don’t let the fear of being bad at something stop you.”

- E: “I feel like I've been talking a lot" K: “This is your interview!" E: “Yeah I know but your voice is better.” K: “What?! MA’AM. MA’AM??”

- When Erika and Katy talk about teleportation as a superpower: “Or like when you wake up in the middle of the night and you have to pee, like ‘Should I just pee my pants? Or should I walk to the-- it’s just so far.”

- When Erika mentioned she grew up with a Golden Retriever the chat went “RYAN THE GOLDEN RETRIEVER”

- Erika’s closing remarks: I cannot wait for y’all to play the DLC because Wavelengths is gonna be the shit. And I’m gonna tell you why! Because it’s all about Steph! Which means it’s all about Katy! It’s gonna be so fucking good you guys. It’s gonna be beautiful. It’s gonna be funny. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll want to live in Haven Springs even more. You’ll want to marry Katy Bentz. What more could you ask for?? K: Could you be my hype woman forever please?

[bookandcover]

I can’t possibly do this book justice in writing about it. It’s tied (with Human Acts) for my favorite book of 2022. I know this book is stylistically an inevitable favorite: it’s my preferred genre (realistic literary fiction), and it seems deliberately written for someone who derives glee from every literary allusion and who is waiting to draw intricate plot deductions (sometimes people try to get me to stop analyzing things I read/watch because “doesn’t that take the fun out of it?” No, that’s exactly where the fun is, I respond). While these characteristics certainly describe me and what I find most rewarding in literature, I’m not, however, a gamer, and I probably missed the joy of many allusions to games and gaming. Given the book’s masterful literary self-awareness, surely gaming is treated with similar deftness. In spite of this, I gained a new appreciation for the world-building of gaming, caught up in the incredible narratives and aesthetics, the haunting liminal space of the game world, the attention-to-detail in development (of Ichigo in particular). 

From its early chapters, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow leans on excellent prose and thorough, measured character development to succeed. The first half of the book lulls the reader into a false sense of security, sliding backward and forward in time as it develops the central characters of Sam and Sadie, as well as the figures who surround them: Anna Lee (Sam’s mom), Marx (roommate and producer), Zoe (Marx’s girlfriend), Sam’s Korean grandparents, Ant and Simon (dynamic, young techie couple), Sadie’s sister Alice, and Sadie’s Jewish grandmother Freda. These early chapters have some clever and thoughtful reveals in the plotting: we have to infer that Sam’s broken and mashed foot was the result of the car crash that killed his family, through their absence in these hospital scenes; there is the reveal of Anna and Sam’s hasty departure from New York for L.A. as another Anna Lee leaps to her death; we also confront the truth of Sadie’s depression (an abortion she had just before Sam reappeared in her life). These early chapters gather strength through realism. 

Sam and Sadie are deeply flawed, incredibly relatable characters. As a brilliant young woman at MIT, Sadie struggles through her college relationship with her professor Dov (truly the worst, and the only character with whom I never sympathized). Sam sees in his reunion with Sadie the potential for a collaboration that will revolutionize the gaming world, and pursues reconnection after having cut her from his life when they were kids. Marx installs himself as perpetual cheerleader, and self-sacrificing friend, while also being a bit of a playboy who stays friends with all his exs through sheer charm and good will. Each character is, in turns, deeply relatable and utterly exasperating. These characters are real in their contradictions: Sam’s stubbornness about his disability and his refusal to let this define him (almost to a fault, as he risks his life, and lashes back at those who have his best interests at heart), Sadie’s fearless pride in making her holocaust-focused game Solution for her MIT classmates paired with her long-term fixation with securing Dov’s good opinion, Marx’s whimsical break-ups as he grows bored with people, yet loves Sam and Sadie unconditionally. It’s the time spent on characterization upfront that earns the devastating, beautiful second half of the book. 

In the second half of the book, so many details from the first half (details that were seemingly trivial) return to the forefront. This seems less plot-driven and more a perspective on realism—focusing on the way we make meaning of our lives, holding onto and romanticizing particular moments and memories, imbuing objects with sentiment, relying on language to fills empty holes we cannot imagine ourselves falling into, yet do. 

The section that vaults this book into life-changing, transcendent territory is the section called NPC. In a point of view shift from the rest of the book, this section is entirely first-person POV for Marx Watanabe. The character who has played third-wheel to Sam and Sadie throughout their professional relationship (and their complex, interwoven friendship, as well as Sadie and Marx eventually falling in love) suddenly takes center stage. It’s an apt metaphor. All of Marx’s theater background comes to bear, as he gets, for once, to play the main role. Later, after his death, Sadie immortalizes him in a game she designs, where the role of Macbeth is played by a tall handsome asian man (when Marx, in real life, was relegated to the role of Banquo). As Marx’s death story unfolds, interspersed with real-time events as he lies dying in a coma and moments from his complex history with his two closest friends, we receive a full reversal of ours and Sam’s expectations for the NPC. Sam calls Marx an NPC; we, too, dismiss him in comparison to the furiously vivacious Sam and Sadie for much of the book. Yet, the supporting role he played in life, and in death, is crucial, essential, and one of real agency. It’s our loss if we overlook the NPC. 

This section beautifully and poignantly reframes and repurposes the early sections of the book: from the reappearance of Sadie’s EmilyBlaster game in the moment Marx is shot to the titular reference (I was waiting for it!) about how Marx wanted to name the gaming company (ultimately called Unfair Games) after his understanding of the promise of retries and redoes imbedded in the concept of a game. This section is an exercise in literary mastery and plotting, a shocking record of the violence humans are capable of, and a tear-jerking account of a single and unique life. Even though I knew, before reading this section, that Marx had been shot to death in an active shooter scenario at Unfair Games, I was not expecting the realism of this scene. I felt inside it. I felt the brutality of what humans are capable of, and I felt how human (instead of inhuman) we are in the face of, and in the perpetuation of, violence. I bawled my way through this section of the book and felt exhausted, wrung-out, after reading it. Every moment was charged and deliberate—the placement of the story of Sam and Marx’s early roommate-bonding over a rehearsal of the scene of Banquo’s death in Macbeth to the way the men who bring guns to Unfair are seeking Sam, striking back against the diversity he has embraced as the emblematic Mayor of Mapletown who grants gay marriages far ahead of his time. 

The final section of the book is titled Freights and Grooves and connects to the Emily Dickinson poem quoted at the beginning of the book: 

That Love is all there is,

Is all we know of Love;

It is enough, the freight should be

Proportioned to the groove.

This mysterious poem—little, monstrous—is explored at the heart of the book. What is love that it must hurt us? But it never hurts us too much—the hurt love causes, the weight of it, carves just so deeply a change in us. Love’s no more than we can handle and exactly all that we can take. Or perhaps this poem means that any love is unknowable in portion to the impossible, unnamable nature of that love? To name love, to know it, is to simplify it to a point that it no longer resembles the love itself. In this book, I loved how, at each turn, the connection between Sam and Sadie is unique love, love that transcends lovers, traumas, hurts, and losing touch. It’s love that is unknowable and all-knowing, and every time Sam tries to name it, to force it into something more familiar, are the moments that show how that romantic love would be a weak approximation of the enduring love these characters share. 

[thebetterluthor]

Henry and Regina

I’m almost finished with this show, and while I already know that apparently the cast will change quite a lot in season 7, I doubt any other character dynamic will surpass this one, for me anyway.

The concept of flawed parent has been taken to the extreme here, given that Regina is an actual fairy-tale villain, but if we put that aside for a moment, Regina is actually a very good example of a dysfunctional mother, but a mother that clearly loves her child.

The show does a good job of showing us how much Regina wanted Henry. Obviously in the backstory, where she tries so hard to become attuned to Henry’s needs as a baby, to the point where she created a potion to literally bottled up her own fears of him eventually bringing the woman destined to ruin her life in town, in order to keep him as her son and love him as he deserved and needed.

Regina was a clear example of the overprotective, over-involved and probably emotionally withdrawn parent. Henry was clearly well taken care of (beyond the obvious being well fed, well clothed, well mannered). He was allowed to pursue various interests freely, he was well socialized, and his personality resembles Regina’s in many ways. For one thing, he has her tenacity to do whatever it takes to achieve his goals (hello child who went to a whole other city by himself at the age of 11 to find your birth mother). 

More importantly though, Henry clearly felt incredibly safe in his relationship with his mother, which is insane to think about! He thought his mom was the Evil Queen, and yet he wasn’t afraid to run away to a different city to find a complete stranger. He never worried that she might give up on him, stop caring, or hurt him in any way beyond grounding him!

Beyond the crazy fairy-tale stuff, Regina’s mistake with Henry was her trying to control him out of fear of him finding out the truth and leaving her (like getting him a therapist who would make him think the way she wanted him to think. Yeeesh). Unlike her mother Cora, who was trying to control Regina for her own personal gain, Regina tries to control Henry because she’s afraid he will stop loving her. And the more Henry uncovers the truth, the more desperate she becomes, the more mistakes she makes. It’s not by chance that she starts winning Henry back when she stops trying to control him. It was heartbreaking, for me anyway, that she not only allowed him to choose to live with Emma, she got to the point where she created a whole other life for him with Emma, so he could be happy.

And Henry on his end, he really loves Regina. He’s angry at her for sure, but he loves her, and his love for her never fails. Even when Regina is at her worst he keeps believing she will find her way back to him, that’s how strong their bond is.

Anyway, all I’m saying is that this mother and son duo makes me mushy. Regina admitting she has issues she needs to work on, to her 11 year old son, will never not bring tears to my eyes. If only we were all so lucky, to land a parent who’d own up to their flaws. 

[sparklyicecube]

Hi!! I’m not a Donna expert but I would love to give my opinion on this! I also love the Titans so eeee!

Firstly: Donna is the kind of person who looks like she has her life together because she is very good at giving comfort to other people and putting things in perspective. She is labelled as the “mom friend” and yeah that’s not something I love for her because being a mom friend is tiring but I would argue that she is the mom of the Titans, especially when there were younger Titans running around (like when Bart (Impulse) and Damage (Grant) wason the team!) Now this doesn’t mean that is all she is, in Titans 1999 she is actually has an outburst about how she isn’t everyone’s therapist and they should go to someone else and Kory (Starfire) lets her rant instead!

Secondly: Donna has had two marriages and two (and a half?) kids. Donna’s first husband Terry Long is universally disliked by fans because she married him when they were still teen titans and he was university-professor-with-an-ex-wife-and-daughter. I also dislike Terry because he had a tendency to not finish his projects and started getting a habit of relying on Donna too much to help him get on track and started blaming her when he didn’t finish something. And the worst thing is why he divorced her - he basically thought that she was too busy and wasn’t spending enough time with their son. Superhero stuff. I’m not so much mad as I am terrified because he knew her secret id and came over to the tower and he explicitly said he was fine with it beforehand, and then, he just!!! Imagine your husband who you thought loved you despite your flaws starts disliking you for those flaws. Even worse: he got a restraining order so Donna lost custody of Robbie (their son) and couldn’t see him because apparently she was a trouble magnet and Robbie will get hurt but the FIRST Robbie chapter has Robbie getting kidnapped not because of Donna but because he’s the son of a god and is powerful. His future self came. It’s like people coming after Damian because he’s a good assassin and the heir to the demon’s head and not just because “Batman cares about him” or some shit.

I would personally not erase Terry and Robbie (they died in a car accident because TERRY wasn’t following safe driving rules on a dark highway maybe there was some magical stuff but it wasn’t Donna’s fault but isn’t not Terry’s fault). Terry though is interesting to me because Wonder Woman is not scared of man, she has not been hurt by them and has been empowered by women until the age of like 21, but Donna came into the world of man at least by Teen Titan age and got very hurt by men. I actually have super short fic where they all die in the car accident and Robbie and Jenny (Terry’s daughter from his first marriage whom I absolutely love and absolutely loves Donna and lives with her mom I can elaborate on her later) gets brought back to life by Coeus (a titan of myth).

On the note of Coeus, Donna had a second husband but uh…

Thirdly: Donna’s backstory is so incredibly convoluted which is canonised and unique amongst superheroes. Basically:

- Baby Donna is a soul.

- Baby Donna soul gets brought to “New Kronos” to live with and get trained by the titans of myth to basically get trained to be a new god (titans are basically like older, powerful yet cast out gods, like the old government that still has massive influence)

- Donna gets her memory wiped and sent to earth where stuff happens consistently from teen titans all the way til now

- Donna dies, and when she dies the titans of myth pluck her back to new Cronus and make her into a titan (god) and brainwash/gaslight/amnesiac her into not remembering her time on earth

That is where she is married to Coeus (who is sort of like her dad it is 100% ew) who is super creepy to her but also helps her lock up the rest of the titans in greek mythology hell and goes to said hell to guard them and not bother her. Donna is a multiversal key, because her origins vary on every earth from abandoned at birth, Diana’s soul twin, etcetc and whatever multiversal key is she is that.

ANYWAYS Donna has been hurt by men, not even just mortals.

In my fic, Coeus, in a bid to win some love from his wife (again ew), bring Robbie and Jenny back from the dead just because he though it’ll make her feel better, and it does! And Donna is overjoyed to see both of them so… do with that what you will.

Robbie Troy things! I have many personal headcannons about him but I think he’s going to be a very divine and powerful baby. He has these blank eyes sometimes that makes him look like some sort of deity and he floats using star powers~ Robbie is likely to have very moon-based motifs because Donna is probably the titan goddess of the moon right now but she and Robbie also have a lot of star motifs and night sky in general.

Other things about Donna I generally enjoy!

- She is very feminine! Loves wearing shorts, having her long hair down, putting her hair up, etc but that doesn’t detract from how much she can kick your ass. She is one of the strongest Titans and is very physically strong and I love that for her.

- People find it hard to lie to her because while Diana has the lasso of truth, Donna has a similar power just… a little diluted and inside of her instead of in an object. So she can really play therapist.

- Donna is great with kids! She’s amazing with Lian Harper (read Titans 1999 I’m begging you) and she was a great mom to Robbie and she was sooo amazing with Jenny!

- Donna’s morals! She is always trying to protect the weak from the strong and never condones genocide or killing. She is a moral pillar of the Titans along with Roy and Wally (relative to Barry) and Dick (Garth is pretty lax on his morals ngl)

- Donna has had relationships with Kyle Rayner and Roy Harper (Kyle was serious, Roy was casual, both were very sweet)

- At some other point Donna died and Wally resurrected her from his memories and she had memory problems and identity issues to the moon and back so that might be a thing you want to include

- Donna is besties and specifically sisters with Kory! I love their relationship because it’s so pure and platonic (and I could get behind that ship but it is so pure platonically) and they always have each others back! Donna reins her back on her murderous tendencies like Dick and they have the bestest girlhood relationship ever

- And I can’t not include her relationship with Dick. They are soulmates. Besties. The Wonder Twins. He gave her away at his wedding, Donna snapped him out of it when he was going crazy as batman. She listens to him, he’s there for her. These two are close, and nothing will change that. They knew each other when they were babies and they know each other now, even when some people (and Donna sometimes) get annoyed with Dick, Donna hasn’t gotten into the same irrational hissy fights with him.

Anyways I love Donna Troy and her kids and the Titans ask me questions bye

Titan experts - specifically for titan dynamics and Garth and Donna - help!

I’m writing a story about Duck Grayson raising Mar’i Grayson and I want to heavily feature the Titans. I’m trying to gather info on them and it’s been hard to really grasp their characters.

[margielatabiboots]

pll original sin thoughts

okay so i'm a pll girl forever and i just binged all of the episodes of original sin and here are my thoughts:

faran is everything. she's serving spencer hastings realness, she's giving everything i needed and more and i love her dynamic with noa

tabby's boss is either a great red herring or somehow involved in the drama. i feel like he could be angela's sibling, since it was mentioned that he's the same age as ari aster (36) either way he sucks and i want to know his deal

this twin swap (maybe??) has my head spinning.. as much as i want her to actually be kelly and for kelly to actually have been the sinister twin all along, i feel like the writers could be pulling an alison/courtney swap but at this point it feels way too obvious.

bro WHAT is the deal with mouse??? i know people are saying she's secretly 30 something or she was kidnapped herself, and i'm leaning more towards the second option. if anything, i think maybe she is older but she was maybe kidnapped for period of time and her moms are making her live at the pace it should be at if she wasn't kidnapped if that makes sense.

tabby. my love. i would do anything for that woman. she's wonderful and incredible. at first i was like aw her and chip are so cute but the more i thought about it and after the scene where they were filming the movie and he acted weird, i think he knows a lot more than we think. i'm not ready to say that he's definitely on the A-team or that he was the one who SAed tabby, but he definitely knows a lot more than we think he does.

there's something missing about imogen's past i just know it. idk why i feel that way, but it just feels like there's something that we don't know (unrelated to her pregnancy), and i think that learning the truth behind her death is going to clear up some stuff but as always create more questions

i feel really strongly that this isn't just a single A, this is a team, and i'm curious to learn more about the Y2K survivors club, i feel like that is going to be important and they might have something to do with the bigger picture

none of the male love interests are giving anything... i need a haleb shower scene moment or a spoby scrabble motel moment because right now ash is the only love interest i'm vibing with.

so far, i really like this show and i feel like all of the girls are so interesting characters, they're flawed and that makes them so much more intriguing. i really wasn't expecting to enjoy this as much as i do (lets be real though its pll). one thing i really want is to make sure that there is an overarching mystery, maybe this season we find out that imogen's mom was murdered by A but i want them to keep us hanging on. i miss the torture of waiting LITERAL YEARS to know the answers (except they better be more flushed out than season 7 of PLL because i still lose sleep over that)

[the-sound-of-her-wings]

I Am Not Starfire, And That's Okay

I recently read I Am Not Starfire and I had lots of thoughts, which are under the cut. It is spoiler-heavy and an analysis of the main character, who I find to be a charming, flawed, and incredibly human character.

Mandy is a fascinating character and a great look at a teenage girl who feels ostracized by the people around her and who feels disconnected from her parent. Mandy is by no means flawless, and that's what makes her very interesting. It also makes her relatable.

Mandy starts by talking about how she's noticeably different from her mom, being the "Anti-Starfire". She's a regular kid, can't fly, and doesn't own a swimsuit, while her mom is a superhero, can fly, and always wears bikinis.

On page 11 she mentions "her mom hasn't liked how I looked since I was twelve. She wears less than a yard of fabric every day, yet somehow, I'm the one who's dressing weird". While I understand people who call this slut-shaming, and I'm inclined to agree, but I think it's a little more nuanced than that. The next page reads, "My friend Lincoln convinced me this is the cultural divide that happens between family generations born in different countries or universes. His parents were born in Vietnam." This tells me that the authors intended to point out the difference in dress more as another difference between Starfire and Mandy, and less as a reason to blatantly slut-shame Starfire. I think there's absolutely a conversation to be had about why the authors decided to use this language instead of conveying the point differently. I also think it speaks to how Starfire has more or less been sexualized from inception, and how people look down upon her character because of that. In the context of this book, though, it's one of Mandy's character flaws that I think fits her both as a character and reflects what I've seen from actual teenage girls. Our society coaches us to view women who dress a certain way as less than women who don't and unlearning that takes time and effort. I don't think this comment about her mom should have been put in there by the authors, but I do think it fits in with the values American society in particular teaches about women.

Page 15, 16, and 17 all point to a far more complicated state of existence than Mandy points out within the first few pages. For one thing, Mandy has to deal with people who love her mother and only want to use her to get information about her mom and the other teen titans. This is shown by the "Titan groupies" who ask her to tell Starfire what they say about her. Another thing she has to deal with is the expectation to be a superhero and have powers like her mom, and the questions about who her dad might be. She gains her first real friend, Lincoln, because he tells the people asking about her parentage that they are assholes.

It is revealed that Mandy has a crush on Claire after she gets assigned a group project with her. Mandy is in denial over the crush. She thinks about the fact she's meeting Mandy at the end of the day throughout the rest of the school day, causing her to explode something in Chemistry Class. I find this to be highly relatable and gives her character a softer side to the edginess she desperately tries to portray herself as.

While talking about the project with Claire, it is revealed that Mandy ran out of her SATs and didn't complete them. While Mandy tries to paint this as a cool badass moment, the way the comic artist portrays the scene makes me think Mandy had an anxiety attack. Mandy didn't run out of her SAT because she's some kind of alternative badass who doesn't need to take them. Mandy ran out because she got overwhelmed by the sounds of people chewing and the pressure of the test. While she frames it differently, it's clear to me that Mandy is avoiding taking the SAT again because she doesn't want that to happen again.

When Claire invites her to hang out with her friends, Mandy gets treated like she isn't there, or as some kind of unwanted outsider. The topics they discuss seem to be specifically made to make Mandy uncomfortable, like mentioning how stretchy jeans are only made for fat people, and asking if aliens don't go to college. Jaded by this, Mandy makes up that aliens actually have to go through this huge blood right and battle to the death, but tells Claire's two friends she was joking before leaving. This tells me that Mandy deflects her pain by using humor to cope and has no issue clowning on people who are trying to belittle her for being an alien.

Starfire tries to bring up going to college after this, and Mandy just flees to her room. She hasn't told her mom she didn't take the SAT yet or that she isn't going to college. She feels distant from her mom, which is explained further through a montage of birthdays where she never got her powers. Her mom expects a lot from her, and Mandy thinks Starfire is disappointed about her lack of powers.

Later, Mandy invites Claire over to her house to complete the project they are working on. The Titans are still there when Claire arrives, but she seems to ignore them, as they leave shortly after. Mandy and Claire bond as they continue the project. Mandy reveals to the reader that she's never had a girlfriend, except for one time at sleep-away camp where she kind of dated a girl for four weeks. She didn't tell her who her mom was because she was tired of living in the shadow of a superhero. But the relationship ended because Mandy had lied about who her mom was, and the girl she was dating didn't understand why she would lie. I think this really shows just how much Mandy actually wants to be a normal girl like everyone else, to the extent that she'd lie about who her mom was. Her edgy demeanor at school and around town where her mom is known to be her mom is a defense mechanism to having lived under the shadow of a superhero her entire life.

When it's revealed that Claire took a photo with the Titans at Mandy's house, Mandy is understandable heartbroken, and furious. She thought she had been making a real connection with Claire, but this photo makes her think she's been used, again. Claire seems genuinely baffled by Mandy's reaction to this, thinking little of it. But to Mandy, it is a breach of trust from someone she thought cared about her. I think her angry reaction to Claire makes sense because of this, even if it might have been disproportionate to the offense.

On top of this, Starfire has discovered that Mandy walked out of the SAT and doesn't plan to go to college. After a heated conversation, she runs away, but her mom finds her. And then Blackfire finds her. Turns out the fake story she told Claire's friends earlier in the story was actually true, even though Mandy didn't know it.

Since Claire actually cares about Mandy, she tracks down Lincoln who explains to her why Mandy reacted badly, and that she should probably apologize for taking the photo. Claire also admits that one of the friends from earlier, Deb, actually dared her to take the photo. Claire is a good person at heart, but this action shows that she can still be influenced to do something that would hurt another person. And while she might not have known it would hurt Mandy, Deb probably did.

Starfire and Blackfire fight since Mandy has no powers, but Starfire gets injured causing Mandy to realize just how much she loves and cares about her mom, even though they don't see eye to eye on most things. This finally unlocks her powers, as she's let go of most of the resentment she's held against her mom. She even gets asked for an autograph by someone in the audience after the battle.

The story ends with Mandy training her powers, studying for the SAT, and reconciling with Claire, sharing a kiss, and becoming girlfriends.

I've seen a lot of discourse that frames Mandy as being "not like other girls". I don't believe this framing actually fits Mandy very well. The only girl Mandy ever says she is not like explicitly is her mom. She is the only woman she compares herself too, and the only person who she seems to have a lot of resentment for, aside from people who use her to get to Starfire. Additionally, Mandy falls for someone who is what a stereotypical, normal popular girl is often portrayed as. She's preppy, wears makeup, gets good grades, has friends, and runs a fairly popular Instagram account. If Mandy was extremely into the "Not like other girls" rhetoric, she would've made fun of Claire for all those things. Instead, she admires her for them. Mandy is fat, has acne/freckles, dresses goth, and wears a nose ring. If this is the reason people are identifying her as a "Not like other girls" girl, then they don't understand that trope. Simply dressing differently from your peers, being fat, and hating your mom does not make her the "not like other girls" trope. It actually makes her like other, real-life girls who dress and act similarly, because that's who they are, not because they somehow think they are better than other women.

I'd also make the argument that, fundamentally, Mandy IS different from other girls on the account of having a superhero mother and potentially a superhero father. Her life is completely altered by Starfire's existence as her mom and is likely only relatable to the children of other superheroes and celebrities. She is not like other girls because of her mom, and that still doesn't make her someone who falls in line with the conception of being "not like other girls".

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and hope others do too. I read Mandy as a flawed character who was trying to figure out how to exist outside the Shadow of her mom- and eventually succeeds, by learning to embrace her mom. I would've preferred if Mandy had a slightly darker skin tone, as her features seem black-coded to me and Starfire is also often black-coded. Otherwise, I do think this was one of the best DC Graphic Novels for Young Adults I've read, alongside Teen Titans: Beast Boy and Teen Titans: Raven.

[gravedangerahead]

Some more random things.

This was a 5 episode miniseries that aired in 2015.

The title, Amorteamo, is written all smushed together like that because it is A PUNE, OR PLAY ON WORDS. Amor te amo means "my love, I love you" while A morte amo means "death I love". I don't know if that's horrible or amazing

The grave digger is a cutie, and he's so done with Gabriel's bullshit

The first appearance of Plot Bridge was when ghost dad sees a body getting dragged out of the river and realizes it's him, and that he's dead before he rushed to check on Arlinda

At one point, zombie dad visits fake dad in jail and drove him insane. It's very interesting to see the difference in personality in ghost dad once he turns into a zombie. His ghost version was flawed, and no 100% unselfish, he wanted to be remembered and was sad and disappered when he saw goth mom try to move on, but his main motivation was protecting her and their child. Once he comes back as a zombie, his main motivation is getting revenge.

There's an old corrupt priest who's appropriating church funds, and a young priest arrives to let him know he was caught and take his place. The older priest hangs himself in the bell tower, so the younger one, who's a morally rigid type, can't get anyone to attend church because everyone thinks it's haunted. Before the dead go back to their graves, both of them perform mass together for the living and the dead, and I thought that was cool

They made a very strong artistic choice, and one of the first things we see of adult Gabriel is his butt, when he tries to talk Lena into skinny dipping and she steals his clothes instead.

They make Lena serve them at the engagement party, and they should all be killed. Lena actually cries during the wedding preparations. She's my little ray of sunshine, and she should always be happy. They should all be murdered for the sin of making her sad.

Malvina's dad is a sweetheart, his speech about what it's like to lose a child stuck with me for years. He says, among other things, that there are words for orphan and widow, but if God has a word for a parent who loses their child he kept it to himself, because it's so deeply sad.

I'd like to hear what some Brazilian Jewish people think of him because he's a Jewish moneylender, so, you know... but he's an incredibly sympathetic character whose main motivation is a deep, deep love of his daughter, so that feels like it might be a subversion of the Merchant of Venice character fro.what I know of it (I haven't read the play, I could be wrong).

Although the show only touches lightly on racism and antisemitism it's clearly present, and antisemitism is a reason why he and Malvina are so isolated from the town

Also, the show was clearly partly inspired by Corpse Bride, and I heard recently that that movie is criticized for stripping a Jewish tale of its Jewish roots, so I guess the show brought that back? I would love to know what people who are actually knowledgeable on the subject thought of the show and how well it did on the subject

Comic relief is provided by this woman who owns a bar but is the judgemental defender of morality. After her husband died, she married his brother. She's all about family values, so when her first husband's zombie comes back, she's obviously like, "I could never, ever get in between two brothers to cause strife. I'm just gonna have to have two husbands now. That is a great sacrifice that I'm willing to make."

Anyway, that's it for now

There's this mini series that's high gothic melodrama, it was basically made to hit all my buttons and I periodically revive my hyperfixation and there' seems to be zero fandom, so here's this post whose target audience is me, it's not coherent at all.

This is Amorteamo

Arlinda's husband catches her in bed with her lover, kills him and locks her up. She's pregnant, and she spends half the series in the attic with the ghost of her baby daddy, looking more eerie, pale and sickly by the minute. She then has baby who was assigned goth at birth, Gabriel

I'm not immune to "character standing on front of wings" imagery. Gabriel lokes to dress in black and hang out at the cemetery talking to the grave digger, he's not afraid of death, and generally cosplays as Hamlet except he's not actually a sad person because he grew up with Lena

Lena is an actual sunbeam in the shape of a person, look at her. She's the maid's daughter. She actually has a survival instinct, she's cheerful, she'd rather not hang out in cemeteries or mess with dead things, she's in touch with reality and has some practical concerns

So it's both an adorable childhood friends to lovers and a dark/sunny dynamic. They eventually realize they're actually in love and wanna get married. What could possibly go wrong? Well, there's a brief nod at racism and classism as an impediment, but no.

Actually, Lena's mom freaks out and lets them know she's the master's daughter, which makes them think they're siblings since they don't know about murdered ghost dad

Fake dad is happy to go along and force hoth mom to go along, because he has a bunch of debts and actually wants yo arrange Gabriel's marriage to Malvina

Malvina is a lonely goth who's obsessed with death and her dead mom, and she's a sad person, she's actually suicidal. Fake dad frsmes things like can't pay for goth mom's doctor and she's gonna die. So Gabriel tries things out with Malvina, and he still loves Lena, but he likes her because they can be goths together 🖤

On the day of the wedding Lena gives Gabriel a Very Proper Hug of Sistely Love snd tells him she's leaving to make a life somewhere else. Goth mom sees him upset running after her, figures out he doesn't actually love Malvina and rusks everything to tell him the truth. She tells him to run after Lena before hr misses her and she will take care of things at the church

He catches her and they have a sweet reunion scene in bridge. Meanwhile, Malvina takes the news very well and jumps off that same bridge in her wedding dress