#not sure if it was even intentional

[giildedgold]

not sure if anyone has noticed it yet, but I haven't seen anyone talk about it so I've decided that I will!

one thing that interests me the most about whitepine Zolister is the purple-theming his character seems to have. why? because this is something that is seen in zolistertv specifically, and not just 'zolister'.

down below are zolistertv (left) and zolister (right).

I think it's very clear here that zolistertv is the one that has more purple, as well as the two purple dots on the cheeks.

it's been a bit since I've been into showtime lore, but these two are different characters. zolistertv, or ztv for short, is a god that has taken on zolister's identity and is generally more antagonistic in the story. while zolister still wants to redeem himself, ztv really only cares for the narrative and the stories people create, even if it's stories of suffering.

[i-eat-deodorant]

does this annoy anyone else or is it just me

[teaboot]

tranny freak :)

[senipsenipsenip]

The Pines family sat at the table, quietly eating their breakfast, when Mabel slammed her hands on the table and shouted “KERMIT THE FROG”.

Dipper leapt forward to right his orange juice glass, gathering nearby napkins to sop up the puddle. “What?”

“Kermit the frog! He plays the banjo!”

“Yyyyes?”

Ford raised his hand. “Who’s Kermit the Frog?”

Stan snapped his head up from his plate. “Who’s Kermit the Frog? The Muppets, Pointdexter, you were around for The Muppet Show. They had a movie and everything.”

Ford frowned. “Muppets.”

“Yeah, they’re a riot! There’s this Bear whose got some great puns and this pig who really know how to throw a punch. You’d love it, they’ve even got a scientist!”

Ford raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t realize you were such a fan of children’s television.”

“Children?!”

Dipper stirred his cereal. “I’m just impressed you remember all that. Yesterday you forgot you were married.”

“That’s because The Muppets are forever!” Mabel exclaimed.

“Wait, Stanley you were married?”

“Yep. Actually, unless I’m forgetting a divorce, I might still be married.”

“You didn’t,” Mabel chirped. “I’d have it on my Romance Chart if you did. You’ve missed a lot of anniversaries.”

“So has he!” Stan argued. “I’m not the only bad husband here!”

Ford spluttered. “Husband?”

Dipper frowned. “I think we’re getting a little too far away from why Mabel screamed Kermit the Frog and knocked my orange juice over.”

Mabel nodded. “Right, so, I was thinking of Mr. McGucket -

“Stanley you have a husband?“

“I was thinking of Mr. McGucket,” Mabel interrupted. “And how he could maybe help around the Shack. And he plays banjo! He could play banjo and people could put money in his lil banjo case like a real musician.”

At the mention of money, Stan leaned forward.

“But like, no one knows banjo music,” Mabel continued. “So I was like, maybe pop hits banjo? But then BOOM! Kermit the Frog! People love that frog. He could play the rainbow song. He’d be a hit!”

“Interesting,” Stan muttered. “Preying on people’s nostalgia to milk them for cash. I love it!”

Ford hummed. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea, Mabel. Activities like playing musical instruments have been proven to help patients with Alzheimers and dementia. Not that Fiddleford’s condition has the same root cause, but it may prove beneficial to memory recovery.”

“Eugh, don’t ruin this for me.”

“If playing an instrument helps with memory loss, maybe Grunkle Stan should learn an instrument,” Dipper suggested.

“Ooo!” Mabel squealed. “What about guitar? Or the piano? OH!” She clutched Stan’s arm with a fervor. “The triangle!”

Ford grimaced. “Maybe not that one.”

“Sorry, kid. I’m not exactly a music guy,” Stan shrugged out of Mabel’s grasp. “Let’s leave that to the professionals.”

Mabel frowned, but let the topic go.

Ford stood from the table. “Well, I happen to be visiting Fiddleford this afternoon. I can broach the topic and see what he thinks.”

Fiddleford, as it turns out, loved the idea. To the surprise of everyone, Fiddleford admitted that he had always wanted to play in a jugband when he was younger, but could never get over his stage fright enough to audition for the local band. Then he went off to college and then…everything else.

“Maybe I zapped away that scared bit enough to play!” he had cackled, knocking at the side of his head with his knuckles.

It was settled. “Fiddlin’ Fridays at the Mystery Shack with Fiddleford McGucket”. Dipper tried to point out the title didn’t make sense since it was a banjo, not a fiddle. Stan argued that “customers are suckers for alliteration”. The set up was just Fiddleford dragging an old rocking chair onto the porch and opening up his banjo case. Mabel had made a large glittery banner, but it was quickly absconded by Fiddleford’s raccoon.

“Tell your wife to give me back my banner!” Mabel had yelled, chasing the raccoon into the bushes.

“Ex-wife,” Fiddleford sighed sadly. “Apparently I was too emotionally available.”

Ford pulled at his hair. “Did everyone get married without telling me?”

“Excuse me?” A voice piped up. Fiddleford and Ford turned to see a little boy standing at the bottom of the porch. He was dressed in hiking clothes that were obviously new. In the distance, a young woman was unstrapping a baby from its seat in an SUV. Obviously city folk coming to the “wilderness” for the first time.

“Are you a real hillbilly?” The boy asked. Suddenly the door slammed open, Mr. Mystery striding through, eyepatch in place.

“Sure is!” Stan grinned. “Our very own genuine hillbilly just waiting to play you a tune! All you gotta do is put some of your mom’s money in his case there.”

The little boy’s eyes widened, turning around to race towards his mother.

“Stanley,” Ford admonished. “Fiddleford isn’t some show monkey to throw money at.”

“During work hours he is.” Stan turned to Fiddleford. “So, did Mabel teach you that song she was so excited about?”

Fiddleford sat frozen, watching the little boy yank at his mothers pants to try and get her attention, the baby beginning to fuss.

“Well…” Fiddleford cleared his throat. “Some good news and bad news fellas.”

Ford furrowed his brows. “What is it?”

“Good news is, my mind ain’t all broken.” Fiddleford hugged his banjo and turned to look up at Ford. “Bad news is I knows it ‘cause I still got stage fright.”

Stan scoffed. “Stage fright? C’mon it’s one kid and a couple o’ city slickers who would probably think you playing three wrong notes and spitting is ‘authentic’.”

“Stanley, be supportive.”

“I am! Look I’ve been at this job forever. All you gotta do is smile and if something goes wrong, you blame a ghost or something. They eat that up.”

Fiddleford shook his head. “But this is music. If’n I mess up music, ‘specially somethin’ they know. Music is real special to people, I can’t spoil it.”

Ford knelt down next to Fiddleford’s chair. “You don’t have to play that song Fiddleford. You don’t have to play at all.”

Fiddleford looked anxiously between Ford and the family. It seemed the little boy had finally gotten his mother’s attention and was excitedly pointing toward the porch.

“I…” Fiddleford shook his head. “I can’t let the little ‘uns down. ‘Specially not those ones.” As he said this, he gestured with his chin towards the other end of the porch where Dipper and Mabel sat bickering in lawn chairs. Mabel had returned from her raccoon chase covered in twigs and holding a surprisingly docile raccoon. Dipper was leaning away from the pair while trying to convince Mabel to stop feeding it gummy worms before it developed a taste for human food and tried breaking into the Shack.

Ford's gaze drifted to the twins. "Alright," he relented. "But you still don't have to play Mabel's song."

Fiddleford bowed his head.

"Yet!" Ford offered. "Not yet. She'll understand I'm sure."

Fiddleford frowned, looking unconvinced.

"Of course not yet!" Stan interjected. "You can't go playing the grand finale right out of the gate! You gotta warm 'em up first, keep 'em wanting more." Stan slapped his hand on Fiddleford's back. "If you give 'em what they want right away, they won't come back! Hold that one off until tomorrow or...uh...next week. Tease it or something."

Stan had started rubbing the back of his neck with his other hand as he spoke, a tell Ford was quick to recognize. It was the same one he did when he would "begrudgingly" let Mabel choose the movie for movie night or let Dipper rope him into another game of Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons. Covering the most vulnerable part of his body while he let his emotions go soft.

Fiddleford seemed to perk up at Stan's words.

"Well," Fiddleford offered. "I do know some proper jugband music. Only, it don't have the same ring to it without a jug."

"We've got a jug!" Mabel cheered from the other side of the porch. It seemed the raccoon argument had reached enough of a truce that the twins were once again paying attention to the concert. "I used to keep pond water in it, it's in the kitchen!" She hopped off of her chair, lugging the racoon along with her like it was a rather expensive lap cat.

Dipper followed her. "Why did you have a jug of pond water?"

"Because, dummy, if I met a frog prince he would need something in the shack to remind him of home."

"Aren't you supposed to turn him into a person though?"

Whatever Mabel's retort was to be was cut off by the door swinging shut.

"There ya go," Stan grumbled. "You're getting your jug. Just in time too." He gestured toward the SUV. The mother was walking toward the Shack, one hand holding the baby, the other gripping tightly to the little boy's hand. The little boy gripped a few dollars in his fist, eyes alight with excitement.

Fiddleford looked frantic. "I can't sing and play the jug at the same time!" He gripped at his hat, pulling it down over his ears.

Ford sighed. "Then don't play the jug."

"It won't be the same!" Fiddleford shook his head. "A jugband without a jug that's...that's like a body with no heartbeat!"

The door swung open and Mabel emerged with an old ceramic jug.

"Here it is!" she exclaimed. "And it only sort of smells like pond scum."

"I don't think that will be necessary," Ford smiled gently. "It seems Fiddleford can't play both simultaneously."

Mabel frowned. "But it's a jugband. It's in the name!"

"How about we wait another day," Ford offered, patting Fiddleford awkwardly on the back. "Maybe someone in town will join you."

"Oh for Pete's sake, give it to me." Stan snatched the jug out Mabel's hand, sniffing at the top and giving a grimace.

Fiddleford stopped pulling at his hat, peeking out from under the brim. "You'll play?"

Stan grunted. "I'm not missing out on good money just because you have a case of the heebie jeebies. Besides, how hard can it be? It's like blowing on the top of a beer...er...I mean soda bottle."

Dipper crossed his arms. "Grunkle Stan, we know what beer is."

"Not from me you don't."

Mabel squealed. "It's happening! Grunkle Stan is learning an instrument!"

"It's not an instrument, Pumpkin. It's dishware."

"It's a scrapbookortunity!"

Mabel dashed into the house once more, leaving Dipper to grin at their Grunkle Stan.

The family was only a few yards away now. Fiddleford looked between Stan, Ford, and Dipper, and straightened up in his seat.

"Alright. Alright!" He clapped his hands together. "Stanley, you get down here with me, otherwise your feet are gonna get mighty sore from standing." He yanked at Stanley's hand until he sat beside the rocking chair with a grumble.

"Now when I tap my foot," Fiddleford instructed. "You blow on the jug. One short note at a time." Fiddleford tapped his foot in demonstration. "You got that?"

Stanley rolled his eyes. "Gee, I don't know. Seems pretty complicated for the guy without a PhD."

Mabel burst through the door, camera clutched in her hands. "Got it!"

"Excuse me?"

The little boy stood on the porch, approaching the banjo case with far more trepidation than before. Eyes darting between the assembly, he dropped a few dollars in the case.

"Is this enough to play a song?"

Fiddleford didn't bother looking at the money. He turned his gaze to Stanley, who shrugged and raised the jug to his lips.

Fiddleford grinned. "You know ‘Boodle Am Shake’?"

The little boy shook his head.

"Well you're about to!" And with that he was off.

By Fiddleford's standards, it wasn't a horribly complicated tune. Ford had heard him pluck out more complex riffs while waiting for the coffee pot in their dorm room to brew. But Fiddleford was smiling. His shoulders had dropped from around his ears, and he was nodding at the little boy to tap his feet along with him. Ford hid his smile behind his hands as he watched Stanley, eyes focused on Fiddleford's bare foot with as much attention as one would give to diffusing a bomb. Next to him, Mabel was snapping pictures of the pair. Dipper stood on his other side, wearing the small smile he tended to get when feeling introspective. Ford laid his hand on Dipper's shoulder, and Dipper leaned into the touch.

The mother was smiling at her little boy, her baby having finally stopped fussing. Maybe it wasn't the grand attraction Mabel had planned, but Ford thought it was worth far more than those few dollars anyway. Nothing could be worth more than his family standing around him, his closest friend singing again.

I know this song, it don't mean a doggone thing. Just do that good old Charleston swing. When you sing...

[vaguely-concerned]

the barista lady in the treviso café fucking giggles every time you buy the fancy coffee lucanis likes from her btw. can't believe the game is calling out rook and me like this

[90stvqueen]

when i was 11 and first got obsessed with wicked, i had no idea i was shipping these two women. which is insane because i'd already been reading fanfiction for years at that point. but with elphaba and galinda it was "their friendship is so beautiful and meaningful..." and it honestly wasn't until adulthood that i was like "...and also they lez out like crazy"

[khaire-traveler]

Digital Temples are really lovely, and I adore the fact that all these temples are suddenly popping up (I actually have been thinking of dedicating one to two deities as well), but the usage of the words "priests" and "priestesses" is genuinely concerning to me. It makes me feel a bit wary.

Why, might you ask, would that even be a problem? Let me explain.

These words carry a lot of power with them. With these words comes the implication of religious authority. If I went around saying that I was a Priest of Hermes himself, it asserts a sense of power and authority in a religious space. There are a lot of people who would love to use that power negatively; I have been directly impacted by this many times over. I am always wary of people who use this title as a result of what I've seen and experienced.

Those titles also carry the implication of having an established religious knowledge that others do not. It's not just a title used to identify people who are in charge of a Temple; it is a title that explicitly identifies someone as a researched, trustworthy, religious figure who is extremely experienced. This ties into how these words carry power. A lot of people I've seen stake claim to this title have also claimed to speak for the gods directly. Either that, or it is often assumed of them, and that bothers me a lot. I have yet to meet someone who genuinely speaks for the gods in every situation.

On the inverse, I'm sure some who use these titles mean it in a harmless and genuine way (I've met one before), and that's fine, but if you are one of such people, realize that these words seriously do carry immense implications along with them, and do not fall into the trap of moral superiority or dictating rules in a religion you do not own. The most genuine people I've met who identify with these titles are the ones who don't advertise them publicly. I'm not saying the use of these titles are wrong, but I am saying that people seem to be inclined to abuse them. Horrifically abuse them.

Instead, I suggest using a title such as "Cleric". I've seen another temple do this, and personally, I feel it is less intimidating and claims less power of authority. Or maybe not using a title at all. Why use one if you don't need it? Hell, you could call yourself literally anything else.

So, please, those who run digital Temples, I ask you to be aware of the power the words "priest" and "priestess" have before applying them to yourselves and ask yourselves why it is that you're choosing to identify with these titles in the first place.

[seventeendeer]

this isn't at all meant to be condescending or finger-waggy because 100% we all have blind spots like this, but I'm really, really hoping that the people who never found Gaiman's approach to his own fandom concerning in any way will take this all as a learning moment.

he was an older, hyper-famous author engaging directly and frequently with an online audience of largely vulnerable young marginalized people. he presented himself as cultured and worldly, and made himself approachable as someone to go to for advice, encouragement and "wisdom." his manner of speech was extremely pathos-heavy and clearly intended to be comforting and encouraging in exactly the way his target demographic needed it to be to swallow every word. the way he spoke about stories and creativity was designed to make young creative hopefuls feel special and important, while sweeping real analytical techniques under the rug - in hindsight, likely so no one would think too critically about the disturbing amount of patriarchal abuse played for cheap shock value and voyerism in his own body of works.

Gaiman saw a target demographic that was desperate for an older creative role model to tell them they were worth something, and he exploited that pain to twist a narrative around himself where he was king and any critique leveled at him or his works were the enemy.

to be clear, he could have been innocent. he could totally have been just an out-of-touch old man saying nice things to people because he wanted to be kind and he thought he was a lot smarter than he really was. red flags are warning signs, not a surefire way to tell if someone is actually "secretly shitty."

but if you used to look up to him, PLEASE take this moment to revisit the ideas you absorbed from him. did you take his words to heart because they seemed to have objective merit? or did you take them to heart because it felt good to believe what he said? do you still hold these values? does knowing he was intentionally manipulating his online audience make you less certain? do you need more information from a different source before deciding one way or another?

again, I'm just really, really hoping people on here will take a moment to reevaluate the ideas and opinions he's injected into tumblr fandom culture, because his reach is immense and he has absolutely been manipulating popular perception of relevant topics to gain further influence and control the narrative around both his own and Pratchett's legacy. please, please take this moment to notice what he's been doing - and next time someone tries to pull the same shit, hopefully we'll be able to apply what we've learned from experience.

[marimeeko]

I'm back with more for that one post by @dailytogachako (Himiko Toga lived, went undercover, dyes and cut her hair and doesn't use her Quirk for murder and continues to admire Ochako/uravity from afar because love)

Plz help this is becoming an entire ass comic lmao

404 no frame found, but suddenly the train stops and people move, and Himiko gets off the train amongst the crowd, just seconds after Ochako notices her

Ochako chases mystery girl off the train, but it's crowded and she quickly loses her in a sea of people. (Could she solve this by using her Quirk to float above? Yes, but one, would draw too much attention, and if its really Himiko then she wouldn't want that, and 2...

She stops, because what is she even doing? There's no way it could be HER. ....right? )

Maybe part 2 later bc I have more in me but need a break lol

++additional notes: Himiko has an URAVITY Keychain and what I attempted to make of a Froppy Keychain as well.

Ochako is wearing her hair in a Himiko inspired bun!

Ochako has a small heart tattooed on her wrist....it's for Himiko, to always remind her of her, and what Ochako fights for in her work.

Cute little gloves prevent Ochako from accidentally using Quirk while she is out and about.

As I said before, Himiko dyed her hair black, cut it, straightens it as needed(though there's still always a stubborn little Stick-up piece!) Braids to frame her face differently than her usual look, pierced her ears because why not? Darker eye contacts to hide eye color. Face mask to hide the cutest smile in the world!

:') it's all good, my brain is just rotten with these two

[seventh-district]

Figured I'd try my hand at some Redacted character post/text edits!

[ 1 / ? ]

Credit to @/sainthowlzon for all the Listener icons, and to @/elisacaleisa for their google drive with all the canon icons!

(slightly alternative version of the Solaires' GC edit below the cut bc i had a lil too much fun with what Vincent would name his contacts)

[losermothman]

I don’t think you guys UNDERTSNAD how important Edwin and Charles’ relationship is to me as an aroace person. THAT is what I want from a relationship. Something such an obvious mix of romantic and platonic and I-don’t-even-know that all the lines blur bc the only important thing is that you love them like you’ve loved nothing else and are so devoted that you would do nothing else but love and protect and cherish them for all your worth. isn’t it the love that matters more than what type of love it is? why do their labels need to be so cut and dry? why does it need to be anything more? why can’t they just be? why can’t they love each other how they want to love each other? why do they need to be anything else?

[unjustgalaxy]

cw for bloody steamsled under cut unsure abt this but hey. all my lintroller art goes on this account doesnt it

and by anything i mean Anything watch out guys dont be mean to Lint Jrwi theyre Part Of The Team it was always odd to me how used to violence troy was. i wonder if this has happened before and why not add blood to the mix for spice

[padfootastic]

harry’s ‘saving people thing’ comes from james potter and if you disagree, u can bite me because that is the TRUTH

[withthewindinherfootsteps]

Wei Wuxian and Narrative Agency – Part One

For Xiantober Day One: Genius… albeit stretching the prompt so it refers to MXTX and MDZS itself, but at the end of the day it’s still about WWX – so no harm done!

(Part Two | Part Three | Full version on AO3)

The narrative is a very active player in MDZS’ story. How it presents information, what it chooses to show and omit, often reflects important facets of its themes and characters – Nie Huaisang, for instance, is so good at hiding behind his mask that not even the narrative can hold him accountable; the present day’s storyline as a murder mystery and the slow reveal of information about the past both prompt the reader to think critically about the truth of events, when the importance of thinking critically is an important theme; and the dangers not thinking critically (and instead basing conclusions on rumours without much evidence) are shown by tricking unquestioning readers into the very same trap the cultivation world falls into, as the information given by the title, summary and in-universe rumours – which contradicts how we see actually Wei Wuxian act – turns out to be false.

But nowhere do I love this trait more than in its treatment of Wei Wuxian – and, more specifically, in its way of emphasising his agency. We’re not just told how much his active choices define his character, and we’re not just shown this in-universe through his personality, worldview and the events he causes. I’d argue that this aspect goes a step further, and shapes the structure of the out-of-universe narrative as well.

There are two main ways this happens: one, in how the aspects of Wei Wuxian’s life that are shown and hidden directly tell us what’s important about his character (which is good writing but isn’t necessarily tied to this shaping of the narrative), which is what we’ll explore today; and two, how what’s shown and hidden reflects what Wei Wuxian himself prefers to dwell on, resulting in the narrative respecting his own thoughts and feelings on matters (which very much is tied to it). We’ll explore this at a later date.

But as for now – let’s explore my favourite aspect of MDZS.

(Here, narrative agency will be considered the ability of a character to meaningfully influence their events and the story they’re in.)

Tragedy, Circumstance, Choice

If we simply look at Wei Wuxian’s backstory in a vacuum, it seems almost typically tragic. His  parents died in circumstances beyond his control, he was left alone as a child with nobody to care for him, he was forced to grow up fending for himself on the streets, he was faced with abuse when he finally was taken in… as with all typical woobies, everything simply happened to him, and none of it was good. It’s just another example of the lack of agency being used for sympathy points, right?

…Except there’s one problem with that idea. We don’t actually see any of this.

It would’ve been easy to start the flashbacks during these times. We’re telling the story of Wei Wuxian in (largely) chronological order, and these are likely important experiences for him! But instead of starting in his street days, or evenat the moment Jiang Fengmian took him in*, we start at the lectures in the Cloud Recesses. That’s not even something mentioned in, and therefore something that’s able to disprove, the rumours at the start of the novel. So why is this the case? 

Well, there are multiple reasons – the main one being that MDZS is also Lan Wangji’s (and Wangxian’s) story, and having the flashbacks open with their first meeting is very satisfying. But I want to focus on something else.

This period doesn’t have to be shown, because what happens to Wei Wuxian, especially out of his control, isn’t what’s important about his character.

We’re not even at Lotus Pier here, where Wei Wuxian certainly has more agency than he would’ve had as a young child, but where the harm caused by Madame Yu is still completely out of his control. Here, he has agency! Though there are consequences, he is free to act, and what happens to him is a result of those actions and not of circumstance. Yes, he gets punished more than others who also take those same actions (due to classism); yes, it’s not his choice to be picked on by Lan Qiren in class (yet look how he responds, twisting the situation to his advantage and ending up tricking Lan Qiren into letting him leave, which is what he wanted to do. He is not at all helpless here!); yes, these choices have been influenced by his learned mindset from Madame Yu that punishment is arbitrary and will happen anyway, so you may as well do what you want regardless. But there is cause-and-effect here. It’s not circumstantial tragedy.

Therefore, instead of our first impression of past!Wei Wuxian being that of an unfortunate woobie, it’s of someone who has the freedom, ability and will to choose and act (and that’s after these initial tragic events have taken place). This is compounded by the fact that before we see any of his backstory, we get a similar impression of him in the present day.

If the purpose of his tragic past was to earn him sympathy points, to make us pity him due to how much he was influenced by events out of his control, this would’ve been a terrible way of going about it… and it’s this that betrays the true reason for its existence. Because now, the flashbacks instead show us how little these tragedies define who he is! From the very start, Wei Wuxian isn’t someone defined by circumstances out of his control, but rather by who he is as a person and by what choices he makes in the present day (which is both a mindset in-universe, and a nice little out-of-universe detail that lines up! Because out-of-universe, this means he’s not defined by sympathy points from a backstory, but rather by his great character writing… aka, by who he is as a person and what choices he makes). And this refusal to be defined by tragedy is a conscious choice on his part, too – but we’ll explore that more later. 

The important thing is that this idea of Wei Wuxian isn’t because of what exists in his past, it’s because of what parts of his past are shown to us (as well as what he chooses to do, with agency, in the present). 

Now, if this relationship between what’s displayed and what’s omitted was just a one-time thing, I might’ve considered it a cool detail or a nice way to establish a character, but not something the narrative is actively focusing on. But it’s a pattern that continues throughout the flashbacks. What, arguably, are the two other most important times in Wei Wuxian’s life where he doesn’t have enough agency to meaningfully influence his circumstances? His three months in the Burial Mounds (before escaping – he managed to assume some control of the circumstances but not enough to substantially reduce his suffering in his time there), and his loss and death during the First Siege. And we’re not shown either of them! We skip to when Wei Wuxian has emerged from the Burial Mounds and is torturing the Wens, or we skip to the present day – both times he has agency once more, because, again, what he’s like without it doesn’t matter enough to be shown. 

Furthermore, I’d argue this does actually contrast the other tragic events we see in Wei Wuxian’s later life. Things do go horribly wrong, but it’s either due to choices he knows the consequences of (see: rescuing the Wen Remnants in the first place), or instances where he still has some ability to act in the situation and influence it within the limitations. If he’d had no ability to influence circumstances at Qiongqi path, he would have died in the ambush; if he’d been unable to do that at Nightless City, he would’ve died then, too (of course Lan Wangji helped him escape as well). The attention drawn to him losing control of his actions in both instances is very interesting, but intentional or not, it’s still his actions influencing the plot. And that influence happens to be detrimental. The very ability to act and influence, at a base level,  is not taken away (though, of course, that doesn’t make these events any less tragic).

So, so far, the narrative seems to be telling us that the ability to act and choose is key to Wei Wuxian’s character. And it’s doing it through omitting his moments without agency in favour of instead showing us his moments with it. 

Let’s see if this is echoed in the text itself before we go further – because even with this pattern, nothing would end up mattering if Wei Wuxian’s agency wasn’t actually that important to the story itself. But thankfully it is, and that first impression we get of Wei Wuxian in the Cloud Recesses turns out to very much be accurate! Though there are defining circumstances out of his control that occur, such as the massacre of Lotus Pier, the majority of the important events of his life are due to his own choices. He didn’t happen to be forced to cease traditional cultivation and solely use guidao, didn’t happen to lose his Golden Core in a fight with Wen Zhuliu or due to some force in the Burial Mounds, it was his own choice to give it and his spiritual powers away. He didn’t tragically happen to get targeted by the cultivation world, it was a result of him acting on his morals and protecting the Wen remnants (a choice which he was fully aware of the implications of). He isn’t a protagonist to whom things simply occur, and that activeness and agency is my favourite thing about him. 

That’s not to say that the times Wei Wuxian doesn’t have agency, or feels like he doesn’t have any, don’t exist at all, either – but they are rare enough to have attention directly drawn to them in his internal narration:

Or else what could he do? He could do nothing. He was powerless. Lotus Pier had been destroyed, both Jiang FengMian and Madam Yu were gone, and Jiang Cheng had disappeared as well. He was the only one left, alone, with not even a sword in his hands. He didn’t know anything, he couldn’t do anything! For the first time, he discovered how little his power was. In front of something as large as the QishanWen Sect, it was the same as a mantis trying to stop a chariot. - Chapter 59, EXR translation

(And even in this circumstance, note that he still does force himself to act – to carry on searching for Jiang Cheng, to place his faith in Wen Ning – and does accomplish his goal (albeit with the help of others)! So even in dire situations, he isn’t simply passive. This is actually also the case with his time in the Burial Mounds, almost certainly the First Siege, and even his days on the streets as well (Chapter 20: he did actively fight with dogs to get food despite their danger and his growing fear of them, rather than just waiting and hoping to somehow receive some more). He can’t influence or immediately influence his circumstances, but that doesn’t stop him from trying.)

Overall, although they do influence him, Wei Wuxian is very much who he is in spite of his circumstances, not because of them. We’re shown the importance of his agency both in-universe by the major impacts his choices have on himself and the plot, as well as by narrative presentation – important periods where he lacks the ability to meaningfully influence anything are often mentioned but not directly shown, which suggests that such moments and circumstances aren’t as important to understanding Wei Wuxian’s character as moments where he does have this agency are. And I’d argue this works very well. Depending on the version of the story you consume, you may end up having different interpretations as to how much circumstances were at play nearer the end of his life – but nobody comes out of MDZS thinking about Wei Wuxian, the poor bearer of yet another generically tragic backstory.

(Part Two | Part Three | Full version on AO3)

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*We are shown this moment in more detail in Chapter 23… but even then, it’s through the framing of Wei Wuxian remembering Jiang Yanli’s narration, not through a flashback proper or even him remembering the experience itself!

[yashley]

Say something true!

[twelvemartha]

3.06 // 3.07