#no i won't take offense

[martianbugsbunny]

U got some actors that are like 'yeah these characters sure are important to each other but I couldn't say about them potentially being a couple' and then you've got Steve Blum who is like 'no yeah they're in love, they're married, they live on Lira San together where Kallus does the gardening and Zeb does the handiwork, oh and by the way they're having mpreg babies together and the furry purple guy is carrying' rip to everybody else but he's just built different

[dirtylittlecubbs]

I'm going to have to contribute to the sub/bottom ENHYPEN tag myself. I will become the sole provider.

[equalidran]

a boycott is not the answer to everything guys. guys please be serious

[valerieofavonlea]

Now that the prequel is out can I say that Haymitch was the third main character in the trilogy, and not Gale?

[skyward-floored]

Did people who don't see any zelink in hyrule warriors even play the same game as me

[adorablegorilla]

I think they could actually make Nightmare not only less ableist but way more interesting of a character if they literally just switched which of the personalities is the "original."

So to greatly oversimplify, DID is in essence a way for a person's mind to cope with different stressors by creating alters that can better handle those stressors. So a person cannot form an alter that deals with stress by acting violently unless they were already the kind of person to commonly use violence to deal with stress before forming that alter. As such, "innocent person develops evil murderous second personality" is not really a thing that happens, despite what mainstream media would have you believe.

However, a violent and cruel person developing an alter that's soft-spoken and timid is not only feasible, but VERY interesting as a concept. It creates very interesting implications about the character, especially if the timid alter is the one fronting most of the time. It also reinforces the subtheme that no one is truly, completely evil, and that greed and hatred are what create the worst parts of the world. Plus, having a character who is evil by choice instead of because of an ableist depiction of a mental condition is far more fun

[awkwardrocker]

max has been bitching about george non-stop since saturday and george was the one having an unnecessary meltdown?

please. (Also learn how to tag things no one in george’s tag wants to see your nonsense)

I can tag things as I wish. That wasn't an anti-George post. I'm fairly neutral to him typically. That was me saying that he had the chance to deescalate and opted not to. I am perfectly within my rights to tag as I wish especially because I wasn't bullying or hating on him. I was criticizing a choice he made. He made it publically, so he can be criticized in a public forum so long as I'm not being hateful in my criticism.

Max said his piece on George and said he has never had anyone attack him like that in the stewards and he lost his respect. Which is his opinion. His only responses today were in response to what George said. But Max was not pulling out questionable quotes that can't be proven from the stewards like George did. He was not making up lies and false accusations in his statements. He was stating his opinion that George had acted one way in front of the cameras and then completely different behind closed doors. Based on today, I'd say that was pretty close to what George probably acted like behind closed doors and I can guarantee now that that's out there, George won't be playing buddy-buddy and trying to put his arm around Max tomorrow like last week. Thus proving Max's point.

End of the day, both drivers are allowed to make whatever statements they wish and know the consequences of them. Max stated an opinion that George was offended by, so George fired back. It's not him making statements that I'm criticizing. It's the statements he made. Saying that Max threatens and bullies people. Framing it as if Max is this awful villain that's out to murder people on and off track. Max didn't step a toe out of line with what he did on track and him "impeding" George on a slow lap was laughable since George had all the info and allowed his ambition to get better track position nearly wreck himself out. Everyone admits the steward decision was ridiculous so Max was right to be upset. But he didn't at any point step over the line and try to injure George even while wheel to wheel. Which is what he said Max threatened to do and would have done. And yes, Max probably would've braked later even if he went off track, but end of the day, George wasn't even there when it mattered, which is more a skill issue for him than a Max issue.

[maxdurden]

but slowly the instinct takes root in her throat

read it on ao3 here!

Story: but slowly the instinct takes root in her throat

Chapter: 1/1

Characters: Kipperlilly Copperkettle, Ruben Hopclap, Porter Cliffbreaker, Jace Stardiamond, (mentions of other Rat Grinders)

Summary:

Kipperlilly has been chosen by a nascent god of rage. She's proud of that fact, excited by what it might mean for her future. In the meantime, she's stuck on night watch during her sophomore spring break with Ruben Hopclap, her least favorite party member. She's been told to worship her rage, to accept it in all its savage glory. What could go wrong? -- A one-shot about my head canons for how the Rat Grinders' first quest to the Mountains of Chaos went down.

“It’s cold out here.” 

The knife in Kipperlilly’s hand stuttered over a knot in the stick she was carving into a stake. Her motions were harsh and confident, but not well practiced. Woodcarving wasn’t a hobby of hers, but she would have done just about anything to dull the boredom in this moment—and to distract her from the incessant whining of her companion.

That she was being asked to keep watch at all was an insult. The thought sat under her skin like molten metal, but she pushed it away. Not only had she been chosen, she’d risen to the challenge. She could feel the symbol under the stiff, pressed fabric of her shirt, and the memory of the ritual was still fresh in her mind. Jace’s magic, the glittering red shatter star, the oath she had sworn to the god of rage. 

Jace had continually checked his notes as he administered the oath, and Porter had seethed at the indignity. “Maybe I’d remember this better if I’d had the chance to undergo it myself.” The sorcery teacher was cool and unbothered around most of his students, but Kipperlilly had come to know him as a perpetually exasperated presence in her life. “But, no, it wasn’t this easy for me.” He said as he traced a slender finger down the page of his notebook.

“An eye for opportunity is well rewarded.” Kipperlilly had chirped unhelpfully. She smiled smugly in the direction of the barbarian teacher who, in an official capacity, was not meant to be attached to this quest at all. Even the rest of her party didn’t know he was here with them in the Mountains of Chaos. But he had revealed himself to her for this ritual, because she was his chosen, because he trusted her—

“It’s cold and boring. And doesn’t it freak you out that things are so dangerous here that we need a nightwatch?” The drone of Ruben Hopclap’s incessant complaints pulled Kipperlilly back to the present moment. 

The stick in her hand snapped under the pressure of her knife. It was no real loss. She didn’t need a stake, just a distraction. She needed Ruben to shut up.

“It’s the Mountains of Chaos.” She responded curtly. “Of course it’s dangerous.” 

“I heard Yolen Harris’ party is going to Harroway Bay to fight a sea serpent or something.” As he spoke, Kipperlilly grabbed a new stick to resume her carving. Something about the steady motion helped to ground her, and she needed that more now than ever. “I bet the serpent won’t be fun, but think about it: Toes in the sand and crystal service! Now that’s a decent spring break.” 

Kipperlilly watched as the wood parted from itself in thin, curling layers and grit her teeth. “It’s also a monumental waste of time. People kill sea serpents all the time. No one’s gonna remember that quest in a month.” 

She shouldn’t humor him with responses. Of all the people in her party, Ruben was the most indolent. Not that he lacked ambition; He envied Figueroth Faeth in all her stardom. He just didn’t have the actual follow through to do anything about it. It made Kipperlilly sick, and it was the lesser of the two things she hated most about him.

Kipperlilly was proud to say that Lucy Frostblade was her best friend. But, since they had met Ruben in middle school, she’d suffered the slight of having to share the claim to being Lucy’s. 

“Who cares!” Ruben whined. He was always whining. She found herself wishing the high-pitched frequency of his voice would drive a nearby pack of wolves into a slavering bloodlust and they would come here to rend him limb from limb. As she turned the stick in her hand, and notched her knife into it once again, she imagined the violent scene in great detail. It brought her some solace. “I’m cold! I’d rather be at the beach! Who’s gonna remember us for coming to this empty, useless temple and looking for a dumb name, anyway? Even if we find it.”

He didn’t know the plan. He didn’t know they would change the world someday. That they’d create their own god, raise him from his mortality. That they would carve Elmville from its stubborn mundanity and reform it in the image of something worthy. They would be greater than the Bad Kids, or any adventurer who had ever graduated from Aguefort. Many alumni of the school had saved the world, but none of them had ever remade it. 

“You’re probably cold because you dressed for the beach. Like an idiot.” She snapped, pointing with her knife toward his sandaled feet. 

“Dress for the job you want!” 

Kipperlilly felt hot, buzzing rage rising in her throat. It was a familiar feeling, like boiling water overcoming all her senses.

Her grandmother had once tried to endear her to her family legacy. She’d taken her to the kitchen, and showed her the Copperkettle, the magical item from which her family got their name. Most halfling families got their names this way, from heirlooms that often harkened back to a time before they came to Elmville. The Copperkettle was barely magical. 

Newly immigrated to Elmville, the family had struggled to make ends meet, and the Copperkettle had kept them fed anyway, against all odds. This was the only version of the story worth telling, but her grandmother had embellished it with all kinds of details—the names of her ancestors, what kinds of stew the kettle had produced, the tale of their eventual agreement to share the stew. The story dragged on until there was nothing but a frustrating buzz in the back of Kipperlilly’s young head where the anger rose to meet it. She didn’t want to be standing in her kitchen, listening to a lecture about the history of the most boring family in Elmville—She didn’t want to be reminded that she was a part of that family. 

She tried to sit still and quiet, to listen politely like her parents had taught her, but the anger ballooned inside her until it was too big for her tiny body to contain. She had felt near tears with it by the time she admitted it to herself, and acted on it. In her anger, she had scurried forward and kicked her grandmother’s knee—anything to get her to shut up. 

She remembered being dragged away by her parents. They had sat her on the cold cement porch stairs outside their family home, wagged disapproving fingers in her face. And she’d known then that they were right—or thought that they were. Anger was something to ignore, to push down and suffocate. 

Gods forbid it have the ability to suffocate back. 

That night, with Ruben seemingly incapable of shutting his mouth, the same anger was starting to expand hot and fast in her chest. Her anger was always vicious and strong, oftentimes stronger than her, but there was something new this time too. 

With the feeling, the symbol on her chest burned steadily. For a moment it was a grounding feeling. She could honor this anger, just like Porter had taught her. She could feel it and savor it—The way her face burned and the way her focus on the world sharpened until there was nothing but Ruben’s voice, and the knife, and the wood. 

“And this job sucks. Even if it was memorable, we’ll always be remembered as the dumb kids who needed a chaperone on our sophomore project.” Ruben filled the silence when Kipperlilly didn’t respond. 

Her stick snapped again, but this time in the tightening grip of her hand rather than under the pressure of her knife. 

“And the solution to that is to resign ourselves to a lazy beach week?” She let the words claw their way from her throat, and seep through clenched teeth.

Her hand held tight to the pommel of her knife. Without the grounding repetition of sliding it along the wood, she started to think of other things she could do with it. She thought of nothing but wolves, and blood, and the heat of rage that clung to her every breath. 

Ruben’s sniveling answer fell on deaf ears. She wanted nothing more than silence. She wanted peace. She wanted to not have to endure his weakness and whining. 

The first plunge of the knife came without thought. It was a mindless thing that drove her to stand, approach and attack. It all happened in the flash of prickling anger that overtook her senses and mind. But the scream that came with it pulled her back to reality, made her angrier. 

Kipperlilly was often angry. She had felt the urge to destroy—to tear the world apart, ruin her friends’ moods, to see things burn because of the fire in her stomach and on her tongue. But she had always felt remorse, too. That destruction, the harsh words, the cruel actions had always stopped her before—she always ended up just the same as that kid on the porch stairs, crying as her parents wagged their fingers in her face.

But not this time. This time, she relished in the anger. She did just as she was told. She let it consume her. It was like falling away from herself and being more present than ever all at once. She viscerally felt the skin and muscle part under her knife, felt as the blade scraped and stuck into ribs. She heard every scream, felt Ruben’s hand clawing at the sleeve of her pristine, white blouse. She saw the terror in his eyes fade into glassy, distant nothingness. 

But the whole time she was wrapped in the resplendent ecstasy of wrath. It kept her distant and safe. It kept the fire in her belly roaring and hungry for more. It smoothed over the edges. It distracted her from the way her hand slipped on the blood slicked grip of her knife and the way the blade cut into the flesh of her own palm. It held her anxieties about being heard and her guilt at a distance. 

She sat back from the unmoving corpse underneath her, and stared at the shredded chest of a boy she’d known since middle school. With shaking hands, she set her knife down beside them, in the fast collecting pool of blood. There was a fist-sized bloodstain on her blouse where Ruben had clung to her, but he’d long since lost the strength for that. Her sweater vest was ruined. Warm, tacky blood adhered her tights to her knees. Everything smelled so strongly like blood that she could taste iron on her tongue. 

And then there were Ruben’s dark eyes, staring, staring, staring, and seeing nothing. 

Kipperlilly lurched to the side and retched, but nothing came up. The weight of what she’d done settled on her like the sky falling. Tears blurred her vision, and she was grateful because she didn’t want to see. Whether they were tears of contrition or self pity, she couldn’t say. 

Somewhere nearby her party was asleep, if they hadn’t already been awoken by the screams. Sometime soon, they would see what she’d done—or otherwise notice Ruben’s absence. And Lucy. What would Lucy think? How would she ever look at her again?

Sitting there over the dead body, for maybe the first time in her life, Kipperlilly couldn’t think of a plan. She could think only one thing: Porter. 

She’d done what he’d said. She’d given into her rage. He had to help her fix this. He was the only one who would understand—even if he couldn’t have possibly foreseen that it would come to this. 

She tried to stand and her polished bar shoes slipped in the blood, sending her tumbling downwards and face to blank, pallid face with the corpse. It was washed in the sickly green light of distant beacon fires, which only made the quickly paling skin look worse. She couldn’t leave it here. This time, she knew the thought was one of self-preservation. 

Pulling herself to her feet, Kipperlilly carefully sheathed her bloody knife. Then, she gathered the body in her arms, and pulled it up the stone stairs into the temple. She slinked through the shadows, past the alcove where the rest of her party slept. It was some distance away and, by then, her arms ached under the weight but she hoped that the distance meant there had been no disturbance here. The rock face that made up the temple echoed with every sound, but things were quiet. There was no sound of confusion, or people rushing to arms. 

She kept moving, past towering statues of proud warriors and their flaming horses, past the walls scrawled with words of prayer, until she reached the chamber where she knew Porter was staying. His presence was still unknown to the rest of the party and, at least as recently as the ritual, he wanted to keep it that way. This place, deep within the temple, was cavernous and massive. It was the place she had undergone her ritual earlier in the day but now, returning to it, she felt so far from the victorious spirit she’d clung to then. 

She stopped once inside, letting the corpse slump to the ground far from the giant altar at the other end of the chamber in front of which a bedroll was laid out. Porter wasn’t sleeping, though, he was standing on one of the staggered platforms, facing the iron brazier that dominated the center of the altar. 

Words failed Kipperlilly. She stood over the body and stared across the wide space between herself and the barbarian teacher—the soon-to-be god—who she’d worked so hard to impress, and couldn’t bring herself to speak. He had put so much faith in her, and surely this would be a grave disappointment. But in her panic, she didn't know where else to go.

“Kipperlilly?” He turned before she had to say anything at all, those dark eyes widening in shock. It must have been quite the sight. She was usually so well put together, but now she was disheveled and blood splattered. Not to mention the corpse at her feet. “What in the world have you done?”

“I—I didn’t mean to.” Now that she had found them again, words came tumbling out of her without her control. “He made me so mad. You said to lean into the anger! I pledged myself to it! It was supposed to be—You said it’d be holy, that it would be sacred, but I—” She got stuck on this word, stuttering it out too many times before the sentence died altogether in her throat. She couldn’t say it. 

She’d killed him. 

Porter jumped from the platform in one fluid motion and strode toward her. His features were pinched with a deep concern, but he didn’t seem panicked. Some small part of Kipperlilly wished that he did—maybe so she wouldn’t be alone with the suffocating feeling, or maybe because she thought it’d make her feel less small.

“Why didn’t you bring him to Lucy? She has diamonds, doesn’t she?” He demanded first, coming to stand in front of her and the corpse. She had to angle her face up to see him, always, but now she looked elsewhere. Anywhere but at him or the bloody mess at her feet. Her eyes fixed on the pictographs of war lining the temple walls. 

The thought of bringing the mangled body to Lucy made her throat close up. She thought of her gentle friend. She tried to imagine the way hate would contort her features but, for all the awful things she had done, all the ways she had failed Lucy in the past, she had no frame of reference. She knew that even now she was avoiding the full reality of what she’d done. Facing Lucy would mean facing this, and she couldn’t do either.

“I can’t…” 

Slowly, Porter nodded, “You’re right. She’d never forgive you.” He admitted callously. “None of them would ever look at you the same way again.” 

There was a pause. Wind whistled through the colossal, empty stone halls. “You were right to bring this to me.”

She was right. No one else would understand. She sniffled, trying to pull herself together. “There has to be something—” Something that didn’t involve a cleric. “Professor Stardiamond could summon something.” Just like their training in the woods. All the appearance of danger with none of its teeth.

“How would a monster have gotten here?” Porter asked, shaking his head. “No, that’s sloppy. You can do better.” He pressed. Then, “You wanted Ruben dead, didn’t you?” 

“No,” Kipperlilly said with so much conviction that she surprised even herself. She angled her face up to see the disbelieving expression looming over her. She allowed herself a glimmer of self-reflection, just a moment of honesty, to decipher her own meaning. “I wanted to kill him,” she admitted, “But I didn’t want him dead.”

“Those are the same thing.” 

They weren’t. Kipperlilly struggled against the fog of panic and misery in her head, trying to piece the words together. She had wanted the violence. She had relished sticking a knife between his ribs, but the consequences of those actions weren’t welcome. She hadn’t thought about them before they were real. But Porter was right; How could she have been so stupid? 

“I might be able to help.” Porter turned his eyes toward the still body between them. “But this wasn’t the plan. You were the one who agreed to the ritual. You were supposed to be my chosen.” He ground out the words in frustration. 

“What?” 

Some selfish dark thing seized in Kipperlilly’s gut. She remembered how she had felt special during the ritual. She had known that she would be relied upon. She would be great, with her name raised above the rest, when it came time for Porter to ascend. Despite the dead boy at her feet, she didn’t want to let that go. 

“The others will know something has happened, but they’ve already made their choice. That’ll need to be fixed.” 

“Fixed?”

“Go get Stardiamond.” Porter said, tone dismissive. “Bring him here and we’ll catch him up on the plan.”

“What do you mean fixed?” Kipperlilly had not asked for much. She obeyed dutifully. She paid her dues. She would follow Porter through the nine hells if it meant she got her shot at greatness; If she could be a legendary adventurer; If she could be better than the fucking Bad Kids. But, this once, she demanded an answer. 

“Even if we bring Ruben back, they’ll see you as a monster. We’ve got to get them on our side.” As if from nowhere, he produced a shatter star. It bathed the chamber in a low, pulsing red light, shifting as he examined it. It tore itself apart into fractal pieces and slammed back into itself. 

“How? They already made their choice.” 

Some more than others. Oisin, under the right circumstances, might have been convinced. He had a legacy to live up to; He understood ambition. Porter had talked about not giving up, about continuing to evangelize about rage, and the unnamed goddess. The others were never to know about Porter’s plan to ascend. But, they could be won over with stories about a plan to resurrect a dead goddess, with the promises of the glory that that would bring. But, these weren’t the right circumstances.

“We would have had time to change their minds.” Porter’s words were harsh, but grounding. It was Kipperlilly’s loss of control that had brought them here. Even if she couldn’t own up to the rest of it, she had to own up to that. “But there are other ways. Watch.” He instructed, and stepped forward to kneel over the corpse. 

The shatter star leapt forward from his hand, burrowing into the mutilated flesh in front of them. The forward motion was violent and eager, and the corpse thrashed disturbingly like a rag doll limp in the mouth of a vicious dog. Kipperlilly watched with wide eyes as blood splattered upward onto her already ruined clothes. 

The motion stopped and, for a fleeting moment and eerie peace settled on the room. Kipperlilly looked up, half panicked, to see the way Porter’s steady, focused eyes were fixed on the body between them. Before she could demand to know what was happening, a rasping breath shattered the silence and Ruben came flying upwards, sitting ramrod straight. 

An animalistic growl issued from somewhere deep in his chest. Kipperlilly stared—in horror or in awe she didn’t know—as Ruben’s wits returned to him and he turned on her with a murderous glare. 

“You fucking killed me!” He roared, launching toward her with a ferocious speed. She stumbled backwards in surprise, still not having fully processed that he was alive, and fumbled for her knife. 

Ruben’s hands were outstretched, his face contorted into a mask of animus and hostility. He was inches away from tackling her when he suddenly froze. He shook his head, and was left blinking in dazed confusion.

“We’ll have none of that.” Porter spoke, standing from where he’d been kneeling at eye level. “If you need to fight it out, let’s do it when there isn’t already a monumental mess to clean up.” He grumbled.

Ruben looked down at his bloody clothes, then back between Porter and Kipperlilly. “You killed me so I’d have to worship your stupid rage god?” His anger seemed more directionless, now, and that must have been just as well to Porter, who shrugged.

“You’d have to ask Kipperlilly why she killed you. My god and I just brought you back.” Porter brushed a speck of blood off his hands and onto his pants like it was a meer inconvenience, and added, “You’re welcome.”

“You’ll have to kill the rest of them?” Kipperlilly was slowly piecing it together.

Panic kicked at the inside of her ribcage. A tidal wave of thoughts came crashing down on her. This was her fault. Everyone could have had more time. She could have convinced them all eventually, the right way. But she had fucked it up. She had forced Porter’s hand. Ruben had chosen to worship rage rather than die. Everyone else would have to as well. But Lucy would never. 

Lucy would never. 

“Lucy’s stocked for revivify.” She blurted out, the words leaving her before she’d had time to process. “If she’s here while you’re killing the others—She can’t be here while you’re killing the others.” 

She could feel Ruben’s glare boring a hole in the side of her head, but she kept her eyes fixed on Porter. She would follow him through the nine hells. She would convince her friends to worship rage. She would kill them all, or let them die, if she must. But not Lucy. 

Lucy wouldn’t come back. Kipperlilly needed more time. She would have had it, if not for her own miserable wrath. 

Porter seemed to consider her words. “Get Stardiamond, tell him to bring the others to me. You keep Lucy busy. Tell her you don’t know where Ruben is, make her heal that cut on your hand. I don’t care, just handle it. You’ve made enough of a mess.”

Relief rushed over her, and Kipperlilly nodded, ever the dutiful soldier. “Right, of course.” Her eyes flickered briefly over to where Ruben’s burned into her like hot coals before she turned to carry out her marching orders. 

As she backtracked through the empty, echoing halls of the temple, she recalled slights against her and held them close to her chest like kindling for a fire. The way Oisin and Ivy would whisper behind their hands and snicker at her; Mary Ann’s brutal dismissal when she tried to bond with her; the betrayal of everyone when they changed their party name. The Rat Grinders could die. It was a price she was more than willing to pay for her own chance at greatness.  It was easier to take ownership of it all. To foster the anger inside and pretend that this was how she wanted things to go, rather than admit to losing control. The symbol of an unnamed god burned quietly against her chest.

[cilil]

I don't know how many times I have to tell people that you can just write your favorite characters, ships etc however you want and that there's no need to "prove" anything - via canon, random creator statements or otherwise - because nobody gets to demand a justification from you or attack you for your personal creative vision. Yes, there are people who do that, but they're the ones in the wrong. Don't even entertain this.

You're wasting your time getting frustrated over debates that go nowhere with people who either don't exist or won't listen to you anyway while you could just do your thing instead.

[milfbrainrot]

yj complaining

i'm getting so tired of the theories that yj derailing is Actually because it's a Commentary on the Audience, about how real life doesn't work out poetically but We as the Depraved Audience want fucked up deaths that satisfy, We as the Dumbass Audience want to find meaning just like the girls do even when there is none, that We as the Audience of seemingly mostly people who experience misogyny first-hand and want to see a cathartic commentary on it are just... getting off to female pain?!

like. 1) yeah i got into the feral teen girl cannibalism show because i wanted feral teen girls. i think everyone did. why does that have to say anything about me beyond... that i wanted an interesting story that has to be explored in fiction because it's not what i want to happen irl?

and 2) i think the writers just don't know what they're doing in either case. why make a show that is specifically unsatisfying across the board intentionally without anything to really balance that out? or do they just not know how to make it satisfying? i lean toward the latter lol, especially because even if there is a case for this idea to pan out... it doesn't feel like it was planned from the start.

"WE as the AUDIENCE are It, the It that hungers for spilled blood!" sure, but also i got into this show because the girls were supposed to be the ones hungering for spilled blood lol. both me AND the girls can want carnage. that's actually what was supposed to happen - teen girls unraveling without the restrictions of society, teen girls being just as awful as teen boys if not worse, teen girls losing their connection to humanity as they become one with the nature coiling around them in a way that makes you wonder if their descent is ACTUALLY a transition into what core humanity is supposed to be.

so... while i do like the twist that not all of them actually wanted the more recent hunting and feasting, that some of them are more attached to their humanity and various factions are plotting various forms of violence for better or for worse, that now that we actually KNOW the characters we can recognize them as people more than silent cloaked figures whose story we could only make as many unfair assumptions about as the in-universe public... i'm not sure it's being executed very well.

IF the actual takeaway is that We The Audience were just silly depraved monsters for WANTING the girls spiraling into unleashing the rage wound up in them from modern society, for WANTING the premise that they could be just as bad if not worse than the lord of the flies boys... then why was that the premise? it feels cheap to go "oooooh you wanted a show about carnage after being promised a show about carnage? Ha Ha, your disappointment in us not delivering actually says something about YOU and YOUR capacity for violence and YOUR cannibalism of people's trauma!" and that feels inappropriate as well as cheap, and really not as big of a gotcha as people think because these characters are NOT REAL. this isn't a sensationalized tv show about a real life serial killer bending to the will of whatever is most interesting, and while it was loosely based on the andes crash it is hardly comparable at this point.

i do think there is more time for the girls to have a more unified decline, or that the more feral faction will grow. i think there are also a lot of instances of violence and "selfish" tendencies, even if they aren't the ones we expected - passively "allowing" violence, rigging the card draw, etc. i also do think that at this point in the story--largely BECAUSE they got snapped back into themselves with the promise of near-rescue--they do need to be broken down more collectively to reach that point as a group. maybe we'll get that in season 4! or maybe the writers just didn't properly utilize the time between last winter and this one enough to get us there on time and this was what happened instead. so many more people need to die in such a short span of time, i'm not really sure what they're thinking.

ANYWAY. the show could bring in that angle, sure. but it also needs to have contained substance imo first. there are media where the whole point is commentary on entertainment, like the truman show. but that has always been a teensy tiny background blip in yj - we see the "what really happened out there?" true crime girlie fascination from people, we see tabloids and books theorizing, but it was always... less about that and more about their actual trauma carrying over into adulthood and how it impacts them. especially now, there really isn't much outside speculation, even after huge scandals like nat's death with the survivors present or taissa's political crash. now would be the perfect time to ground that element more. like. i got into a show about teens crashing in the wilderness and eating each other to survive, and while i SEE the point of an angle about how the in-universe treatment of the situation can reflect on similar in our own universe, i don't think our expectations of a narratively satisfying story can have that same conclusion extracted from it. there is a difference between kinda punishing the audience for engaging with fiction as fiction, versus giving a commentary on how people sensationalize true crime.

basically the "oOoOoO the show is ACTUALLY about how WE crave violence and theatrics at the expense of other people!" thing feels like a slap in the face lmfao. i unfortunately think that theory has merit after some stuff in season 3, so i don't blame the way some people are clinging to it, but if this was what the writers were intending (especially if you do take the citizen detective boards as a stand-in for the reddit forums the writers apparently spend too much time in) that doesn't sit right with me with what we currently have. that said, i also do think it's funny that people are more willing to believe that unsatisfying writing is a Grand Plan and not just... bad writing. this is especially weird to me as someone who didn't like season 2 and got a lot of shit for it, and i'm guessing a lot of people trying to "justify" their own declining love for the show with this theory are some of the same people who were pretty vile at our valid criticisms in s2. like... you can dislike the show, it's okay lol. even the people who work on it hate it, in case you haven't noticed.

melanie said it best:

"I think people have an idea that they’ve mapped out the entire series arc for me, and they very much haven’t. Season 1, I got told in great detail what was going to happen. That was kind of all I needed to hear at that point. I was like, 'OK, they really have a plan.' Then they said, 'Season 2 is gonna focus on this. Season 3, we think this is going to happen.' It was very vague for the rest of it. I just needed to know that they actually had a plan, not just, like, a cool pilot. So I don’t know where the story is going. I have no idea. After this season, I have less of an idea."

[veilody]

Hi can I ask? What app or software do you use to draw? Most specifically to animate and make GIFs? :D

Hiya! First off: Of course you can ask! I am always open to share my knowledge~ So if there's anything else you wanna know in future don't hesitate to reach out~ :3

The program I use?

I use Clip Studio Paint Ver. 4 (latest version) for the iPad.

My iPad is a rather old one (6th generation, 10 Inch). I got it second-hand in 2019 but it holds up well!

Payment? Plans or One-Time?

Keep in mind, that CSP for iPad is a subscription-system! You can choose between the Pro-Version ( 4,39 € / Month ) or the EX-Version ( 8,59 € / Month ). I use the Pro-Version, but it limits your animation to 24 panels / 2 seconds, so you can't do much with it, while EX-Version gives you limitless frames.

If you use your PC to draw, you can purchase CSP with a One-Time Payment, so you won't have the subscribtion payments. There will be occasional updates, that you'll have to pay extra for but I honestly feel like CSP is worth it, since they're listening to their userbase and the updates are starting to give Adobe a run for their money.

All in all for Animation, I recommend working at the PC because a horizontally wide Screen is SUCH a blessing for working on timelines - I just can't afford a new screentablet for my PC so I am stuck with the iPad for now xD the iPad screen feels very cramped when I work on my animations.

They also have a 3-Month trial-version so you can test it out first!

What does animating look like in there?

You can animate with Keyframes, meaning you can animate the rotation, expansion, position and opacity. Depending on the curves of the animation, you can make more cut animations or smooth ones.

(FYI you can customise your layout within the program, like I had to make a custom layout for being a left-handed one, so my hand won't rest on any controls xD )

Here are two examples in which I animated using keyframes in CSP.

You can see that the keyframes for the first picture are rounded, while the keyframes for the second one has hard edges. There's still so much more I can tell about keyframes, but I guess this would go too deep right now haha~

Then for frame by frame animation like the one below you can work draw each panel by yourself and CSP's got the functionality to lightboard the panels before and after your current so you can have a good idea of what you're doing. You can also combine these two techniques if needed.

Like for Vascos head I used Keyframes to move it up and down.

What about my more Complex animations?

Like those? Or my latest Otsuyu-Vtuber-Project?

Well, for these "motion graphics" I prepare the entire pictures with CSP but I drag them into another program:

Which is the "industry-standard" for creating Vtuber haha~ but the Pro-Version also requires a yearly subscribtion, because the free version of it just doesn't cut it. The limitations are too heavy to really make use of it.

Everythings so expensive! Isn't there any alternative?

Yes, but I can't speak of experience when I recommend: Procreate, which is a one time and fairly cheap ( 6,99 € ) purchase. It is such a strong program and I've seen different artist pull out so much of it, but I honestly did not get to try it out, because the layout is vastly different to the one I am used to from CSP (which I am using for over a decade) I've even seen people animate with FlipaClip, but again I can't talk about my own recommendation about that.

And while I always LOVED "Adobe After Effects" because of my career-choice and studies, I can't recommend Adobe these days, since they're the MOST expensive option ( ~80 € / Month, if not even more) out there, while still being held as industry standard AND they're monitoring your work, so they can feed them into their AI programs. One - like many others - you can't really opt out of.

In that regards, I want to give you guys: Animating as become super accessible these days. There WILL be a program and even a free class / tutorial for you out there, so you can get into it!

Everyone starts small! Here's some examples from when I was barely a teen and I reaaaally wanted to animate:

I remember that I exported each image as PNG to then use another program and make a gif outta it. I wasn't really able to onion-skin most of this so things looked off xD

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

.

[raamitsu]

one thing i hate about myself is the way that i couldn't help my friends when they need it :(

[bixiaoshi]

and i KNOW child free ppl are usually told they're selfish or that they're gonna regret it etc etc but being child free doesn't give u a free pass to be assholes towards kids. sure that random kid at the mall isn't yours but it is a shared responsibility to take care of a child either u want it or not bcs that's a tiny human who doesn't have the same experiences as you, if the tiny human starts crying is not a personal attack against you

[104thsquadfam]

-I'm bored so expect me to send you asks to cure my boredom, I'll try to hold myself back and only send in 2-3 asks for your sakes lol I know I get outta hand. That being said you do NOT need to respond to any of em !

[pinene]

Anyone else here watch Barry Lewis on youtube? His series of trying various kitchen gadgets is entertaining or at the very least, consistent but sometimes I'm like. WOW this guy is not bright