#not asking for any specific reason
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Outside of the d.a.m.n. polycule crew, which character/couple is most likely to become or have been poly in the past?
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What's your favorite game of all time?
ANSWER IS DIFFICULT
FAVORITE IS SUBJECTIVE
GENRE AND MOOD IS DEPENDENT
#baba is you#post is queue#ask is answer#so to start i do obviously like baba is you. is it my favorite game? no. but theres a reason#i have a hard time choosing a favorite game of ANY given genre in the first place i guess?#favorite ''shooter game''? man idk. favorite halo game? thats specific enough and my answer is halo reach but thats probably the nostalgia#having a ''favorite'' of ANYTHING is kind of hard for me tbh! i just like too many things too much! and honestly i have no shame in that
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Guys If you could send a single image back to 2014 phannie Tumblr to Irrevocably fuck the timeline for shits and gigs what would it be?
#dnp#dan and phil#definitely not asking for any specific reason *glaces at a hodgepodge machine in the corner labled 'time machine' in glitter pen*#phan#phil lester#daniel howell#dan howell#dan and phil games#amazingphil#phanart#danandphil#looking through tags has been a delight! this community never fails to be wack (/affectionate)
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Hey is soaking real? I'm enrolling at BYU from out of state and want to know the culture. Also what's your favorite dirty soda? Excited to come and learn!
this ask is insane. i was about to say something along the lines of 'imagine if somebody said they wanted to learn about your culture but all they asked about was weird sex acts that somebody else made up and pinned on you to make your culture look gross and crazy' but then i remembered all of 18th-19th century anthropology.
anyways it's blackberry dr pepper with cream
#led#ask#this has got to be a troll but also this is just insane jsdghfjgh#can you imagine somebody saying this in person. irl. hey i want to know the culture of this university. tell me how to have sex#if there is any possible way this is sincere im glad they're asking over the internet instead of actually asking a person lmaoooo#i dont have an answer for you my friend. i spent my byu years too busy being lesbian and a hermit. sorry#but the dirty sodas are real though and delicious never stop drinking dirty sodas#also followers in the replies i dont want you to say yes soaking is real unless you personally have done it cus otherwise I DONT BELIEVE YO#specifically done it for the reasons the stereotype says it's for!! CUS I DONT BELIEVE YOU!!! THAT OBVIOUSLY STILL COUNTS!!!!! WTF!!!!!!!
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are you. are you arthur-lesters-right-arm
Before I answer that I'd like to plead the fifth and I'd also like you to know that I have plausible deniability and a deadly firearm
#I've never even watched malevolent#this is a very oddly specific ask anon is there any reason you ask#can't believe you'd associate me with that freak#tsk tsk
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why do you specifically want to play as a girl with a dick? Fallout 4 has preset player avatar mods that make your character nonbinary, I think that is a much better solution for what you want out of your character
cus its cool to play a tgirl character? lol
no offense but im well aware of that mod and while the avatar preset is beautiful, a "flat chested athletic build female" avatar is not at all what i would call a proper solution for nonbinary people to play as tbh
like im trying to read this in good faith but why would a thin toned flat chested woman be something that my fat ass identifies with?? i said i want to play a fat girl with a dick and youre offering me a skinny chick w no dick how does that make sense to you??
ngl this is similar to the way people treat my transition "why do you need phalloplasty when youre very feminine and you can just be masculine and fit and be a completely different person cus itll fit *my* vision of your identity better" like i know this aint that deep but when we are talking about building characters we can identity with and play as we tend to build them close to our image of ourselves, yeah? why then would you recommend something different than what someone wants to play as? im sayin i hate that fallout has no good mods for me or my gf to play a girl with a penis and youre saying "hold on now why not play as a flat chested cis chick", you see the problem we are having here?
#its also insane to recommend that specific brand of nonbinary that ive never subscribed to as a better fit for me#i dont have to do anything for any character i play to be nonbinary lol im literally looking for different genital presets for a reason#same reason im getting bottom surgery and not just being fine with having a cups and working out ykno??? pls tell me u understand#fallout 4#insane asks to receive while at work truly.
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Happy Anniversary In Stars and Time!! Have some Friend Quest based drawings :D
(These have specific quote picks related to them! And there's also a long ramble on why I like those specific quotes below if interested)
(And by long, I mean roughly 2k+ words of proper ramble total, so be warned before clicking keep reading this link right here to the rb!!)
#in stars and time#isat#isat spoilers#<- edited now this is just act 3 spoilers for the art LMAO#isat mirabelle#isat isabeau#isat odile#isat bonnie#isat siffrin#<- i promise this is the last time in a long long time i tag someone who only shows up with their back turned#but in my defense they also are here four times so i think the tag is justified SADASFA#time for a messier secondary post underneath the first WAHOOOO#to start!! random art tidbits!! no one is looking at siffrin in these!!#mira and isa are looking away while odile and bonnie have their eyes closed#in my minds eye these are the A4 versions of the FQ so siffrin internally is Not Having A Good Time#i just thought itd be fun to incorporate somehow as an extra easter egg detail kinda!#also i tried to make the bgs mildly accurate to location in game and its the reason why isa got to have one (1) singular tree in the bg#laaast art tidbit is that i took a bit of a creative liberty with bonnies#well i did with all of them but still#since its not explicitly stated sif god up immediately after tripping they get to stay on the floor in the drawing#i just thought itd be fun for the drawing!!#moving onto general tidbits in addition to the time fun fact i also decided the posting time#specifically so itd be in the middle of me having back to back to back meetings so can't second guess myself in posting this HAHA#every time i post any form of text based ramble on characters or even headcanons i Fear#and YEAH i am probably just being overly nitpicky towards myself on analysis that can prob be read several diff ways cuz interpretation#but i really really really dont want to fumble so badly to the point of mischaracterizing anyone since i like them a lot!!#still working on getting over that but hey at least i am trying and thats all i can ask of myself i think!#okay now time to Lie Down im writing these tags after stream#tag talk over into q u go :]#partial pin
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Iām sorry but nothing will ever beat Finnās drive playlist that he made during s3 filming, with songs like Me and Michael, The Basement, Gay Thoughts and No Woman lmaoooo
#byler#stranger things#in all seriousness#finn has already confirmed he listens to music on the way to set to get in the zone for his character#millie and noah have said when asked that heās the cast-member most likely to be listening to music on set#do I think every song on there is byler-coded? no#do I think he made it specifically for byler fans to witness and read into? no#but i do think there is a middle ground here#since byler is happening... yeah there are gonna be songs that get him in the zone for byler scenes#and yet there are also probably gonna be songs that he likes rn and wants to use to feel inspo for filming in general#aka plenty of songs just there for the way they sound/the vibes that get him more comfortable getting into character#but then again he also could have made the playlist private to avoid people reading into it#heās known for years people have seen his playlists and hasnāt made those private either#so I donāt think he cares if ppl read into it#(at least for now...)#but fr that drive playlist still haunts me to this day#i remember when he mentioned listening to music to get in the zone for filming#he specifically mentioned that he listened to it when driving to set and ppl went crazy connecting it to his drive playlist lol#so i mean who knows#maybe he makes the names confusing/random but also sometimes with a hint of truth bc he knows people are gonna deny it or read into it#and he's playing with that possiblity#but i wouldn't die on that hill by any means.#but the drive playlist is why idrc if people read into the STurn one bc i mean....#yeah those songs that sound eerily like mike's emotions in regards to will probably are that way for a reason
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Abuse, Silence, And Why Kevin Can Fuck Himself
I recently finished watching Kevin Can Fuck Himself on Netflix, and, aside from being the most brutally honest portrayal of domestic abuse I have ever seen, I discovered a beautifully written examination of narrative as power and silence as abuse and how this manifests in our larger culture.Ā
Without going into too much detail, the show is filmed in two distinct styles that are interleaved throughout each episode to tell a cohesive story. Allison and Kevinās relationship as seen by the rest of the world is told through a multi-cam, laugh-track sitcom that depicts a very typical āgoofy husband, shrewish wifeā mainstream comedy. Allisonās life through her own eyes is told through a single-cam drama/thriller about Allison planning to murder Kevin to escape his abuse.Ā
Itās an absolute masterclass in screenwriting, but more than that, every episode explores the difference between truth, fact, and reality, and how none of these things are quite as much or as little as story. But while the process of transforming the chaotic and plotless reality of life into a story is as involuntary and essential as breathing, misogyny and the degradation of women is just as ubiquitous in our society, and a story that exists at the expense of another personās lived reality is a refutation of their humanity.Ā
It's also just a great show for anyone who likes to engage with history (or reality TV or true crime or āreal life storiesā in general), because while we have to tell ourselves stories about her own lives, we have to tell ourselves stories about other people as well. Eternal silence is narrative death, and the perpetual silence of an unspoken narrative is often the last death we can visit on someone whose story weād rather ignore.Ā
I also pulled up some books ā Lolita and Disgrace ā that dealt with similar themes, but from the perspective of the abuser. And what strikes me the most is that, across three beautifully written stories about narrative and silence within a culture that normalizes abuse, Allison, who began her story within a state of narrative death, was the only point-of-view character who had any chance of surviving.Ā
One of the main themes of Kevin is that a compelling story is often a story that reinforces what we already believe or like to believe, and while the story may be factual and true it often also exists at the expense of someone's lived reality. The exact same series of events can be a silly joke or a harrowing tale of abuse depending on the lens through which we view it, but historically we've only been willing to see the multicam, laugh track, sitcom perspective on unbalanced relationships.
The alchemical process of turning a series of disjoint facts and experiences into a narrative creates something new and compelling, and erases much of what previously existed. In this way, itās entirely irreversible. We spin our experiences into a very thin thread, a story we can tell ourselves that elicits something within us, something we need in order to live with the complex, uncertain, and unsatisfying reality of life. In think in many ways the thing we elicit in ourselves is truth. But truth is both more and less than fact, often more a reflection of our own beliefs and desires than the events of our lives. And in telling that truth we may never stray from the facts, but we almost by definition cannot give voice to another personās reality.
There's a scene in season 2 of Kevin when Allison is hit by a door ā a la the classic excuse ā because of Kevinās carelessness. And while he absolutely did not hit her, the way it's written is such an incredible allegory for how Kevin has curated their story and curated their friends' and familyās perceptions of their story such that even if she tells everyone the exact, unvarnished truth of what's happening to her and begs for help, they will only be capable of seeing the laugh-track, sitcom, āKevin is a harmless goofball and his wife is a total shrewā perspective on the events of their lives.Ā
As so often happens with abuse, their friends and family saw Allison being hurt because of Kevin. But the alchemy of creating a narrative around Kevin and Allison is irreversible, and the series of events they witness can only be spun together to a joke, an accident, a silly, childish mistake. Allisonās reality, Allisonās pain and fear, is completely elided. Like a lost sound in the middle of a sentence, her experience goes silent, and their larger understanding of her relationship never has to change. And you feel so acutely how Allison lives her entire life in that silence.Ā
Storytelling is human, itās essential, thereās no other way to engage with our own lives. And itās not lying. Itās never lying to tell the truth. But it doesnāt reflect every reality, either, because another personās reality canāt be reflected within our own narrative, because thatās what it means to be another person. To spin two different threads.
And because narrative is the essential process by which we understand our reality, denying someone their own narrative, or denying that this narrative be heard, is inherently abusive. To allow someone a voice is to give them humanity, and to suppress it is to strip that humanity away.Ā
Disgrace, by J.M. Coetzee, follows the story of a professor, David, who rapes a student and then fails to protect his daughter, Lucy, from being raped by intruders in their home. He destroys his daughterās lifeĀ ā not through failing to protect her, but through twisting her rape into a story about why the rape of his student wasnāt wrong. The main theme of the book is generally considered to be exploitation, but Coetzee doesnāt deal with the exploitation of the rape. Thatās too direct, too immediate, too easy for the reader to understand as misogynistic and wrong. Rather, Coetzee delves into āthe innocuous-seeming use of another person to fill one's gentler emotional needsā (Ruden).
The rape is how we understand David as a fundamentally exploitative person, a person who denies others their humanity by converting them into a vessel for his own desires, who erases their voice in order to speak through them and give himself the things he needs. And thatās how we recognize that the way he absorbs and claims the stories of his daughter and his student is another kind of violation of their humanity. Another way of turning women into vessels for menās pain and fear and need.Ā
Whatās fascinating is that David's student finds her voice ā files a complaint against him ā and is eventually able to continue with her life. The woman he raped is less damaged by him than his own daughter, because she was the woman he couldnāt permanently silence.Ā
In Lolita, another brilliant novel about abuse, dehumanization, and storytelling, Humbert turns to the reader at the end and says, āImagine us, reader, for we donāt really exist if you donāt.āĀ
Itās not that Humbert knew he was fictional, but that he knew everyone was fictional. Believed the entire world only truly existed in his own mind, because anything beyond that was irrelevant to his needs. He coped with the collapse of his ability to dehumanize Dolores (who he called Lolita) by demanding that his voice be resurrected. Demanding immortality. Demanding his narrative exist in another personās world, and thereby be given the existence and humanity that Allison and Dolores and Lucy and Davidās student were denied.Ā
Pushing his needs, finally, onto the reader, because we are the only person he has left, and a person like him can only exist through the use of another. In that way, Humbert was powerless. In that way, Kevin and David were powerless, too.
In Disgrace, Davidās dream is to write an opera, and at the end of the book he realizes heāll never finish his magnum opus. Heāll never be able to terminate the process of converting himself, his world, into a story. But he does learn to decenter himself in that narrative. And itās when he loses all fear of death, and any conception of the self, that he gains the ability to give dogs ā who he generally equates to women ā a voice within his opera, his lifeās work.Ā
Itās in death that we discover our true unimportance as human beings, that we learn to let go of vanity and our conception of the self entirely. And David had degraded women so thoroughly in order to justify how he used them to meet his own emotional needs that it was only in losing all value for his own life that he could gain the ability to see them as equal voices. To actually put those voices into his own life story. It's at the cost of himself that he allows other people to truly exist, in the death of the self that he finally allows the world to exist outside of himself. Itās almost a positive character arc. Almost.
When Kevin finally loses the ability to abuse Allison, he, like many abusers, loses all desire to live. His world was built on a structure of superiority and inferiority, on beings and vessels, on the inherent value of men and the inherent meaninglessness of womenās lives. The system on which he based his entire reality has been destroyed by Allisonās declaration of the self. And, if he was a being because she was a vessel, then in losing the ability to treat her as a vessel, to fully and completely dehumanize her, he has lost his own humanity.Ā
It may be perfectly summed up here: āBecome major. Live like a hero. That's what the classics teach us. Be a main character. Otherwise, what is life for?ā (Coetzee).
If youāre not to be a main character, if there indeed is no split between major and minor characters, between people and the paper dolls that populate their story, between living beings and the vessels into which they pour their need ā what is life for?
Nothing. At least, not for people whose narrative must exist at the expense of another.Ā
And thatās why I say that only a narrator like Allison could survive this kind of story. Despite beginning her story trapped in eternal silence, her reality fully elided no matter how immediate and obvious it became, Allison was the only point-of-view character of any of these three stories who didnāt establish her power through the degradation of another. Who didnāt conceptualize the world via being and vessels. Whose narrative didnāt exist, by necessity, at the expense of another personās humanity. Whose thread could exist in a larger tapestry without destroying her sense of self.
Donāt get me wrong, sheās not generally a likable character. Sheās misogynistic, cruel, selfish, jealous, desperate, afraid, and in pain. Like anyone in an abusive relationship, sheās not at her best, and sheās often pushed to do things that are ugly and disturbing because sheās simply been pushed too far.Ā
But, for me, the power in her character is in how her last scene never felt like a final scene. Her story didnāt have to be killed, her conception of the self didnāt have to be killed, in order to reveal the brutal reality of stories twisting and intertwining without any inherently superior truth or narrative among them. Allisonās story was one of declaring herself. And thatās why it didnāt feel like it ended at the end. Instead, this felt like a beginning.
#this is probably the most egregious 'post that no one asked for' that I've ever written#but man this show HIT me y'all#and then I went back and reread parts of disgrace and that hit me too#it also made me reconsider my online presence and how I myself engage with narrative in the very small little world I'm a part of#I caught some shit a while ago and made a conscious decision to never comment on the narrative around mental health#and to be clear I was just talking about a general narrative in society at large I wasn't bringing up anything specific or attacking people#more how larger social narratives filter into and sometimes come to define individual stories#but it was upsetting to people and I figured instead I can just try to express a compassionate perspective on the mentally ill myself#but now I wonder if I've gone too far#idk without naming any names I'm getting unblocked by people who should definitely still find my mindset intolerable to their worldview#and I don't blame them because we all have reasons for the things we believe and we're all just doing our best#but it's a canary in the coal mine#it makes me think I've become so focused on not ruffling feathers that I'm tacitly approving some disturbing beliefs#and I think I could have happily ignored that if I hadn't just watched this show#posts that no one asked for#kevin can fuck himself#kevin can f*** himself#op#longer rambles
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The fandom can't make up its mind on what's supposed to be a joke and what's supposed to be serious because the show can't either half the time. It's a tonally disjointed mess that wants to have absurd over-the-top humor as well as a plot and moments of drama, romance, and angst that demand you see the characters as people and feel for what they're going through. Except you can't do that without also treating the dumb bullshit in a somewhat grounded way. Like, you're still dealing with the same characters. You can't just go "Oh, that? Let's ignore that!" the moment it's no longer convenient to you. You've opened this can of worms and now you have to sleep in it. So, every character flip-flops between two different versions of themselves depending on what the writers need in any particular scene.
This is not to say surreal humor can't be used right alongside characters you're supposed to empathize with, Teen Titans (not Go) did that and it worked. It's just that the absurdity can only come from the setting (Mad Mod, Mother Mae-Eye, pretty much anything Control Freak is in) or from designated joke characters (Date With Destiny). Teen Titans never had the main characters acting in clearly absurd ways as the butt of a joke unless those characters were brainwashed somehow, because the writers knew that would ruin any of the more grounded moments they wanted to write. The writers of Miraculous missed the memo on that one.
I don't disagree. A perfect example is Derision where the show takes all of the bad jokes about Marinette's crush and decides to take them seriously as if you can possible take them seriously without making Marinette come across as unhinged and dangerous. You can't, which brings us to the topic at hand: how do you even begin to understand these characters when the show is constantly making character-breaking choices?
My approach - and the approach I recommend others take if they're going to keep watching the show - is to focus on the characters' cores and reject anything canon does to violate those cores. I don't argue for this stance because I love the characters so much that I only want the good things to count. I take this stance because, if you don't, then the characters fall apart. There is no way to make them work as fully realized characters while embracing every choice canon has made. Miraculous has massive characterization issues that go well beyond the humor.
For example, Adrien has multiple moments of terrible behavior that are played in a serious manner such as the moment in the episode Frozer where he tries to start a fight with Ladybug in the middle of an akuma attack because she wouldn't accept a rose from him earlier:
Setup
Ladybug: I can't accept this rose from you. I told you already. I'm in love with someone else. Cat Noir: I know, M'lady. But if he weren't here, would things be different between us? Ladybug: Well, you know, I can't even begin to imagine him not being here. I'm sorry, Cat Noir. I really gotta get going, and you better do the same. (Swings her yo-yo to head back home; Cat Noir is sad, looking downwards, with one petal of the rose falling.)
Payoff
Ladyice: Cat Noir. We need to set up a trap for whoever turned the city into a giant ice rink.Ā (throws yo-yo) Icecat:Ā (bitterly)Ā My feline instincts prefer to track and observe before I attack. You go your way, I'll go mine. Ladyice: Please don't tell me you're mad at me about the rose. Icecat: There may be a certain chill now between us. Ladyice: I get it, but we should really focus on saving Paris right now. Icecat: We don't always have to do everything together, after all. It's not like we're a couple.Ā (skates away)
There's no way to argue this off as a bad joke. While Adrien has every right to feel hurt, those feelings don't excuse him acting like a pouting child in the middle of an akuma fight. It doesn't excuse him acting like this at any point! Ladybug is not a villain for telling him no. She wasn't even mean about it!
I clearly fully agree that Adrien looks awful and selfish here, but I'd still argue that it's not something that should be used to define Adrien's character if your goal is to tell the "ideal" version of Miraculous. "Ideal" being the version that canon seems to be going for based on the overall picture we can sort of make out if we back way, way, way up and look at the extremely abstract picture canon is clumsily painting.
Unless canon is going to do something monumentally stupid, Adrien is Marinette's endgame romantic interest. It's also clear that there is no plan to cut him from the team. He's going to be Chat Noir for the rest of his life or at least well into his adulthood. This means that he is supposed to be a good hero who deserves his miraculous just like he's supposed to be a charming and cute romantic lead. These are the two things I keep in mind when trying to shift through canon to figure out what writing choices I should fully embrace and what writing choices I have to either ignore or treat as true flaws that get an actual character arc. In my book, either approach is fine because most of the characters are deeply flawed at this point and you can't give them all arcs without bloating the story to nonsense levels.
My goal with this approach is never to say, "oh, that moment shouldn't count in terms of how people feel about the character." It's more, "that moment goes so hard against who this character is very clearly supposed to be that I can't take it into account if I want to tell the kind of story that Miraculous is trying (and clearly failing) to tell."
As an example, let's list off Adrien's worst behaviors. The things that make him look terrible:
He sucks at communicating his needs and feelings, leading to multiple moments where he gets mad at Ladybug for things she's totally unaware of
He has quit or considered quitting without warning multiple times and only one of those was because of something he did "wrong" (NYC Special)
He puts his feelings before the safety of Paris on multiple occasions, even going so far to purposely miss akuma fights to see what happens
He is incredibly pushy about his crush, often ignoring Ladybug's feelings on the topic by continuing to bring it up even after she asked him to stop
There have been multiple instances where he almost cataclysmed multiple people in a fit of anger
His love for Ladynette isn't strong enough to let him break free of things like akumas and nightmare dust even when he's looking her in the eyes making him a pretty crappy romantic lead
People will argue that some of this behavior makes sense for his character because of the abuse that canon has technically introduced, but that the writers seem blissfully unaware of. I don't disagree with that argument, but that doesn't change the fact that none of this is acceptable behavior for a hero and Adrien is a hero who keeps doing these things. A sad backstory doesn't give you the right to behave poorly without consequences.
At the same time, if I fully embrace these elements of canon, what I get is an Adrien salt fic where he loses his miraculous for good while Marinette finds her real true love or even just a non-salty fic where Adrien leaves for his own meatal health and gets replaced by someone who can handle being a hero right now. Canon's not writing either of those, so the only way to engage with these flaws while enjoying canon or aiming for the same end goals as canon is to say, "I guess this doesn't count" or "I guess I need to tone this way down and work through it via a character arc" or even "I guess that was just a bad joke maybe?"
That is the essence of what I mean when I call myself a writing salt, character sugar blog. It comes from looking at canon and seeing that there's simply no way to embrace the worst moments and the best at the same time. We're not dealing with a coherent plot and/or complex characters. We're dealing with a nonsense plot that will warp the characters to bizarre shapes to make random ideas work even if those idea go wildly against canon's end goals.
As an example, Glaciator and Frozer should not exist in the same universe or, at the very least, something should explain why Chat Noir randomly changed his stance on Ladybug's crush from acceptance to pushiness. As is, the pieces don't fit together. The behavior is too contradictory. Remember, this is how Glaciator ends:
Perhaps Ladybug will love me someday. I mean, like, I love her. I have to believe. In the meantime, her friendship is the best gift of all.
Where did this version of Adrien go? Why did he regress in Frozer? There's no in-universe reason. It happened because the writers weren't ready to let the love square date or grow close, but they also wanted the love square to cause drama, so Adrien ends up looking terrible just like Marinette ends up looking terrible when it's her turn to cause love square drama. Her terribleness takes a different flavor so it can be hard to realize that this is a systemic issue, but that's what it is. It's deeply frustrating, but it also clearly stems from cheap writing and not quality characterization.
This is also why my stance is that canon as a whole only supports my Doyalistic core-character analysis style of approach. The writing is too poor quality to do Watsonian analysis where you embrace the full picture and try to put it all together. The closest I'll get to Watsonian analysis is pointing out how much the writing botches a Watsonian take by showing you all the way the writing contradicts itself, twisting into a nonsense pretzel of frustration where the payoffs never satisfy! (See the season four rant for an example or anything where I talked about Chloe's supposed damnation arc.)
There are even characters where canon is such a total mess that you can Doyalistically argue for two separate takes! Gabriel is a perfect example. He is all over the place and his ending was so poorly handled that you can make strong arguments for writing him as a cold-hearted villain or a sympathetic villain without the end result feeling like it spits in the face of canon because both takes maintain his one core element: villain.
That's the big thing I keep in mind when I look at the characters and the lore and the plots and try to come up with versions that the average fan would like. I don't think that there's one true version of any of these things, but I do feel comfortable saying that there are versions that will very clearly only appeal to people who are salty about a specific thing that canon did poorly. That's not who I want to appeal to in my adaptions, so while I'm not going to argue that those takes have no backing in canon, I will argue that those takes are not supported by canon as a whole. Embracing them requires you to take the worst parts of canon at face value while ignoring what canon is clearly trying to do with the overall story.
I get the appeal of that, but it's not fun for me because that approach feels like rolling around in the mud with the pigs. I don't want to sink to canon's level! I want to have fun! That's why I talk about how to make canon into its best self, not its worst self. If you want its worst self, just go watch the actual show. I will be shocked it if disappoints you.
#anon ask#ml writing critical#ml writing salt#pandaofsecrets#character core#Once again none of this is meant to excuse any specific actions as ānot that badā#This is just me explaining how I approach the characters#I know there are fics out there that try to be sugar while embracing some of the bad parts of canon and that rarely works for me#To address these issues correctly you basically have to rewrite canon with the goal of properly setting up and addressing a specific issue#You can't just jump into canon as-is and fix anything in a truly satisfying way because canon is such a disaster#Lila and Alya is a perfect example#Alya's writing in Lila's episodes goes so hard against who Alya is supposed to be that you have to completely rework Lila and/or her lies#Which is why my list of favorite Lila takedowns is so short#Even the ones that are kind to Alya have her painfully gullible because of how badly written the Lila stuff was#You can't have Alya smart and clever while including all the things she's canonically done in the Lila plot and I hate it#Season five at least temporarily killed the fun of writing for this fandom for me#I hope to get it back so I can finish my in progress stuff because I really do love these characters#Canon just makes it so hard to have fun these days#The stuff I've heard about season six is just depressing#I hope my love for the characters and ideas comes through on this blog in addition to my frustration#I wouldn't be here if I just hated everything about the show#Canon is so beyond saving that I can't even read a lot of non-salty fanfic these days#The stuff that tries to embrace the later seasons while also giving happy endings just depresses me because it never works.#I can only read early canon stuff AUS and reboots#Only way I can enjoy the fandom is to treat canon as a popular but horrible fanfic that a bunch of the fandom is embracing for some reason
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Shout out to all people here who thought that they had vaginismus, while in reality they are on agenital spectrum/have vaginal hypoplasia (bonus points if you were also often suggested surgeries to "fix it")
Couldn't be me
!
#not a fave#answered asks#vaginal atresia#<- the umbrella term for any reasons for an abnormally closed or absent vagina#vaginismus#agenitalia#agenital spectrum#vaginal hypoplasia#other traits under āconfused for vaginismusā including:#vaginal septum#(longitudinal specifically)#imperforate hymen#microperforate hymen#cribiform hymen#not an extensive list tho#intersex#actually intersex#intersexism
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re that post about the warping of valid discussion into something really stupid from last night, obviously that's about real life but I think as with many things it's helpful to use the same analysis for fandom contexts. To use the same pattern:
"Misogyny is a huge problem IRL and in fandom" absolutely true
"If a character is a mother, people tend to judge her primarily on that basis and not as a complete person who exists outside of the context of motherhood" also extremely true
"it's misogynist to dislike a specific character who happens to be a mother" you have to provide some more analysis if you want to make an argument, otherwise you're just kind of like, the equivalent of a toddler putting their hands over their eyes and thinking people can't see you; also you better have a perfect track record of stanning characters who are mothers yourself if a single character can make or break this.
#really it is a very basic and obvious problem to people with any kind of like. grounding in statistics through any means#a broadly true statement (weight is not a measure of self worth and is the result of a huge variety of factors)#gets applied in full to a specific case without any customization (specific person might genuinely wish to change their diet if they could)#or falsely generalized in another direction (ignoring that exercise is good for you for reasons other than weight loss)#you HAVE to look at patterns; if you apply the pattern to every specific case you are simply ignorant at best and stupid at worst#it's a deeply self-centered approach too. it's like. let's say someone asks for candy bar recs and someone says snickers#it would be UNHINGED of me to be like well i can't eat snickers so this is a problematic recommendation#however. people do this every day bc they refuse to accept their perspective is not the only one
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What eyecolors do you think the main 5 would have if they were human/in our world?
In the nicest way I can possibly say this (and I really don't mean for it to sound rude!) I don't know & I don't care! ā”
#don't get me wrong i think if people want to ascribe them to certain human races/nationalities/ethnicities#or even just more natural human coloring#i think that's real sweet and i like seeing how people imagine them to be if they were to be human#especially when someone is attributing their own traits that they'd like to see in the characters!#but for ME#i am so uninterested in what they would be like as humans or trying to assign them any specific nationality/ethnicity#it's part of the reason why they are the way they are to begin with#if i wanted earth humans i would've made them earth humans#yknow?#ask
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A new chapter of āTransdimensional Arc!! Alcor Finds a Fordā (by @random-dragons-interest-hoarde) came out recently, and I just had to draw the delphinidae dimension residents!

The orca (named Graham) was described as having lots of scars, but I donāt actually know how or where his humanoid self got them, so I just gave him rake marks. (Rake marks are just a fancy name for the scars orcas get from each other)
I Drew some Dolphin!Alcor as well, even though he probably doesnāt exist in this dimension, because I love him and we got his canonical dolphin species confirmed by Stan (whoās name I changed a bit to be more dolphin-y)
Closeups and notes below




I tried to replicate Grahamās wing(?) pattern things on his fins, and his horns(?) on his eye markings, but Iām not so sure how well it turned out. I also tried to replicate Liamās tattoos from āOnce Again, Againā (by @vallis-cineris---wanderer) because I have many theories of how he exists in that world (this will be a separate post once I get my thoughts together). Funnily enough, this is the first fanart of Liam Iāve ever made.


Also some closeups of Fiddleford McBucket, because despite saying I wouldnāt draw him, I did and love how it turned out!
Quick tangent but Iād like to give a thank you/shoutout to Dragonās Hoard for writing dolphins in a positive light. Recently, dolphins have been getting a terrible rep, and itās gotten old. Thereās duality in anything intelligent, and dolphins s are some of the most intelligent creatures around. Even then, theyāre just animals acting on instinct, and we shouldnāt hold them to the same standards we hold humans to.
#transcendence au#my art#graham#Liam pines#Alcor the dreambender#Alcor the dolphin#Stanley pines#fiddleford mcbucket#delphinidae dimension#the reason it took me so long to get this out was because I had to learn to draw various dolphin species#which I did my obsessively drawing them all day long for a week#except for fiddleford actually#I said in my last post that I would refuse to draw any river dolphins but while working on poses (which I was stuck of for hours bc dolphins#only have 3 limbs and all they do is move up and down)#I decided to sketch fidds out and I really liked it! I lined the first one I made#and heās still my fav out of them#uugghh pls donāt ask about the bg colors#I had no idea what I was doing#I got really sick today and had to stay home so I just wanted to finish this thing already#this took me eight hours btw#excluding all the time I spent trying to find dolphin poses#I tried to find a more specific coral species for Stanās last name but the best option was the pine tree coral and that was way too similar#why are there satellites dishes on the crab cubes? bc I wanted to make them more crab like and my current excuse is that it translates their#screeches to English#btw Iām not saying that humans arenāt animals#we just work differently than dolphins do#thatās the mystery shack behind Stan btw#I wanted to draw fiddlefordās crab cube but I already had three and not enough space for a fourth#I donāt usually do watermarks I just had extra space below fidds and wanted to try it out#I hc that dolphin!alcor just floats out of water like heās still doing swimming motions just in the air
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Rewatching episode one, I noticed that when Ragatha and Jax are talking to each other about Jax having a key, Pomni flinches away from, and lifts her arms to protect her face and head, when Jax toys with the key and catches it near her.
I wonder if she is that jumpy around others normally or if it's just when she's in a stressful situation (like suddenly being trapped in the circus) what do you think?
OK. ok. you mention this. and ive never said anything about it but i have genuinely noticed this almost every time ive seen that scene. i think about it a LOT but i havent been able to figure out my thoughts on it. but i think about it genuinely a LOT...
(i went on a huge tangent abt her thats like. only sporadically related to this specific moment SORRY. it was hard to address this moment without discussing a LOT about her i feel)
for the sake of clarity in the event someone reading this is unfamiliar, what this ask is referring to is this:
with the way that she so quickly dissociates and HARD (not that most people Never experience dissociation or smth, but its the intensity of it and how quick into this situation she starts dissociating is like. it makes it seem like its smth her body and mind are Used To Doing) she REALLY gives off the feeling that she had pre-existing mental health problems (i struggle to place anything TOO specific with the limited information we have but i feel like theres definitely a few things she has going on) before she even got to the circus, and like she COULD just be a naturally jumpy person, but with the dissociation thing and general distrust towards others, it feels like her jumpiness is also related to these issues
while her being naturally nervous is sort of implied and clear (though i think the extent of it is exaggerated by the circumstances of the pilot in particular) there ARE a few other examples that stand out to me
i THINK this can largely be passed off as her just being on edge from the horror adventure, but i this is IS notable that she reacts genuinely pretty strongly to what is a relatively minor 'jumpscare.' it happens later too w kinger pressing the tape recorder
in general she seems VERY easily startled by people, and frankly it reads a lot like it stems more from people being near her than just things happening abruptly. she notably doesnt jump hard when the angel arrives- she DOES get scared, but she isnt necessarily startled. she DOES react very strongly to ghostly, but i think its notable that she seems to find his visual appearance frightening and debatably not necessarily startling, but thats not really 100%. the times she reacts the strongest have to do with people, which imo ties HARD into her not trusting people
episode 2 breaks down her distrust of people well, and i dont think its a self consciousness thing. it seems more that she just doesnt tend to find people trustworthy- if something bad was happening to her, she would sooner assume theyd let it happen rather than help her. it could be argued that its partially a guilt or projection thing with ragatha, but im not actually so sure. pomni seems to be ashamed of leaving her behind, but particularly through ep 2 she doesnt seemed Plagued With Guilt by the way she acts towards ragatha, which implies that the dream didnt have to do with her projecting that shame in a way shed assume ragatha would turn back on her, too
it instead seems to be that she doesnt trust ragatha just... in general. the 'im not a child' thing, while a legitimate problem for pomni to have with ragatha (i love ragatha, and from my place in the audience i know her concern is genuine, and that she truly wants to encourage pomni, and is trying, but from the perspective of people around ragatha, its not an unreasonable assumption that shes JUST being infantilizing and belittling), does illuminate how pomni is seeing ragathas attempts at cheering her up- that it comes from a place of seeing pomni as immature or generally unstable. that pomni is incapable of managing herself and needs to be coaxed. it implies pomni doesnt see ragathas attempts at help as genuine. combined with her dream, that ragatha would allow the worst to happen to her even when she was asking for help, makes it very clear that, even with the 'nicest' person in the circus, pomni just... doesnt really trust her
(it is worth noting that pomni DOES seem to genuinely want to help ragatha in the pilot. she DID try to find caine. but she bolts at the first opportunity. she does care about people, but when stressed, she operates on keeping herself safe first and foremost, that she needs to do anything to get out of a bad situation even if that means leaving someone behind- and with her dream, it does seem that she generally assumes other people operate similarly, or otherwise in their own best interest)
this does, of course, improve by the end of eps 2 and 3. the funeral, and ragatha offering to include her, and how the others talk about abstracted players (combined with her conversation with gummigoo, someone who she has to assure has genuine friendships with those around him despite the lack of a true reality for them to be based upon), are able to convey that oh, these people do actually care about the people around them. theyre being genuine. they arent just looking out for themselves and thats it- they care when bad things happen to each other. and theres no true reason for me to be an exception. which is ALSO why i dont think its a self consciousness thing, she seems able to reason that shes not an exception to the intents of others, so much that when she cant assure herself that others' intents hold her safety as any sort of priority as well, any trust goes out the window. she WANTS to help if she can, but esp in the pilot, as far as shes concerned, its everyone for themself when shit gets bad, including herself
ep 3, she seems more trusting of ragatha- she has neutral and positive interactions w her, rather than assuming a lack of sincerity in it. but its not just ragatha, actually, because even before her talk with him, you can see it in how she interacts with kinger as well
she initially tries to help him run, which isnt too out there- with how she genuinely DID initially try to help ragatha, it doesnt require her to go out of her way to grab him and RUN. she can run AND take him with her. she can help without putting herself in extra danger. but then she DOES go back, which is one of my favorite and imo underrated pomni moments. because THIS is what i think actually highlights an improvement in how she sees the others before her apologizing to ragatha or taking kingers hand. because she puts herself BACK into (percieved, since its not actual sure WHAT the angels intentions were her) danger in order to get kinger away too
(theres probably a case to be made that ragatha didnt seem to be in immediate danger- she was in pain, that much was clear, but kaufmo had ran away by then. but even still, pomni couldnt have known kaufmo would shift gears and start chasing her instead of ragatha that first time. and i dont know if she actually knew death wasnt possible here yet. which isnt very flattering for pomni but also people do not act in flattering ways under extreme stress, esp given a predisposition to not trusting others, which ill elaborate more on in a second here- not that pomnis abandonment was ok OR that it was like evil of her or smth. shes just a person. there is no way she was prepared to know how to act correctly in this situation, and she didnt)
theres also this
which is SUBTLE but highlights a genuine increase in trust even before their heart to heart. now that she knows the cast (save for jax, who she seems to react to the harshest, which is worth noting imo) are not acting solely in their own best interest, that they WILL consider the wellbeing of those around them including her, that their concern for one another is genuine (which is concerning that she even assumes that to begin with, which ill circle back to momentarily), she very clearly has way more faith in them and the idea that she should stick around the others for safety
and of course, ive said it before, but her taking kingers hand has little to do with her enjoying holding hands. its her knowing that, if kingers wrong, this is going to end very, very badly. if holding their breath isnt the solution theyre BOTH going to get possessed, and who knows how theyd get out of that situation. but she decides in that moment that her trust in the others isnt ONLY about looking out for them and believing that theyre sincere in their concern for her. but that she is willing to let the others put her at a potential massive risk. getting possessed was a blatantly immediately traumatic experience- and she lets kinger put her at risk of it happening again. THATS why she holds his hand, at least symbolically. she doesnt like contact. but she can brave something that she doesnt like, she can let him lead her into and through something potentially horrific, because shes deciding to trust him and the others, that theyre not just people she can interact with without fear of ill intentions, but that theyre people who she is going to coexist with. the best thing she can do for herself and the others is trust them and work with them actively
anyway that got off-track, the point being that her having to have these ideas instilled in her at all through shared experiences and trauma implies that, while these issues with distrust may have been exacerbated by the stress of everything, they didnt come from nowhere. these are problems she likely already had to some degree. its great that theres been improvement but that improvement directly implies thesse were improvements that needed to be made to begin with. and the fact that the person she gets repeatedly most startled by is jax. who, even with episode 2, she explicitly doesnt trust. in the pilot, at least, her distrust is more vague (i think the dream sequence in ep 2 IS what highlights it best) so her flinching from jax can be passed off as related to a general lack of adjustment to the new environment and situation shes in. but it happens again with jax in episode 3 (and, notably, she pauses afterwards but it takes a moment for her to relax even knowing its just jax), after shes adjusted somewhat, and after shes gained some trust with everyone except for jax (given his absence from the scene at the end of ep 2). it also happens when barons voice plays abruptly next to her
point being that imo, she IS naturally jumpy. she says herself that she doesnt handle jumpscares well, which somewhat implies this even outside of the circumstances of the circus. but with how she reacts to things, it feels like her general jumpiness is far, far worse when it comes to people she doesnt trust (be it because jax is Like That, or because shes not familiar with baron). the way i see it, then, her distrust extends to perceiving physical threats easily around people she hasnt ensured are safe to be around. she IS able to gain this trust in people, but she seems to automatically place the intents of others as being Potentially Unsafe from the jump, especially under stress. she can jump back from it fairly quickly for what its worth, but to be honest, it seems more like she operates on some general, everpresent level of hypervigilance thats just sometimes worse based on the situation
and frankly i dont think we know enough about her as of ep 4 to fully determine if there IS a reason for this. because someone can have a reason to be this jumpy around others, or they can just... be nervous and dislike people moving suddenly near them. combined with the dissociation thing, though, im inclined to think the circus did not cause this, just made it more extreme with more unpleasant stakes. there is hardly any time between her entering the circus and this happening. she hadnt even seen kaufmo yet in that very first example, but she was already on alert for a physical threat, and i just. i think about it all the time...
i think the main takeaway from all of this is that i think she isnt necessarily jumpy like that all the time, but i think trust is not a given with pomni, and her jumpiness massively depends on how much she trusts people near her and the situation shes in to not be a physical threat to her. its definitely worse in the circus, but i think it was probably still something present in a different context in the real world, too
#ask#tadc#tadc pomni#circus discussion#i have no clue if this is like. cohesive at all but i feel like theres a LOT going on w this aspect of her character#but a lot of it isnt definitive#the best i can do is point out what things seem related and which aspects of her character seem related to this#im jsut hoping i didnt miss anything or misremember smth bc if i type this many words abt smth and forget smth vital that changes things#or if i incorrectly attributed things together that dont actually make sense to be connected#ill die badly#if it means anything. and this is more speculative#i think that pomni probably had either some relatively prominent mental health problems. genuine trauma. or both#prior to entering the circus#though i actually dont think the definitive answer of which one or any specifics in general about it matter much#so much as the fact that shes like that and thats. just how she is at this point in her life#from a writing perspective i dont think its quite relevant to know the exact reason if we can deduce that she is the way she is now#it informs who she is now but in a more vague way where knowing an exact why stops mattering#esp in comparison to the idea that she CURRENTLY is having to cope with the things happening NOW#not that the context doesnt matter at all but it likely wouldnt change much abt how shes written#if we get more insight on her wrt this i dont think its going to be descriptive#i think the show gives snippets of their human lives for the purpose of humanizing them and emphasizing the fact#that they did have very realistic human lives before all of this and that cant really be removed from them#it influences who they are today#but knowing about it in extreme detail esp with pomni wouldnt add much and would effectively be redundant#anyway!!! sorry or your welcome for the 2k word response to your ask#not sure if thats what you were hoping for or not HAHA#...and not sure how much of this makes sense honestly ive been working on it for 3 hrs now#so if its a little messy its cus im trying to keep track of everything ive written over 3 hours despite distractions#BUT it was fun to answer!!! i think about her every day#gif
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if we assume that each of the three pillars comes exactly three times for a total of nine times, and we know that the 7th time it was the 40-year guardian, and if we assume that was her final visit and the last two visits will be split between the 30-year guardian and the 8-year guardian, we can calculate how long ago the miharu family made that deal: (40x3)+(30x2)+(8x2)=196 years. 196 years ago it was 1828, but i think this is supposed to be set in the 1980s or 90s, so call it the late 1700s. that's the kind of thing matoba as the head of the matoba clan has to concern himself with - deals with youkai made by people 200 years ago from families that don't even exist anymore. it's an interesting contrast to the thing he says to natsume at the end of this arc, about the 9th visit, which is 30 years away, being someone else's problem. he's embroiled in the past but doesn't even think he'll get to have a future.
#however i don't think we can assume either 1) that each of the 3 pillars comes exactly 3 times#or 2) that the 7th visit was the 40-year guardian's final visit#based on the end of the arc when natsume asks who will come for the final visit and specifically asks if it will be#the 40-year guardian again. and matoba is just like idk not my problem#if they each come 3x then he should be able to predict which it will be for the 9th visit by process of elimination#(unless the miharu records are missing or something)#and if the 40-year guardian has already done all her tours then matoba should at least be able to say it won't be her. and he doesn't#but i still think 196 is a reasonable ballpark just because we know there have been 7 out of 9 visits#and they're splitting it between them in some way even if not perfectly equally#natsume's book of friends#natsume yuujinchou#matoba seiji#natsuyuu meta#miharu loquats arc#my posts#i think the only assumption we can safely make is that it's never the same guardian two times in a row#i guess the lower bound would be if the 8-year guardian and the 30-year guardian took turns for the first 6 visits#that would be (8x3)+(30x3)+40=154 years#and the upper bound would be if the 40-year guardian started and then switched off with the 30-year guardian up to visit 7#that would be (40x4)+(30x3)=250 years#both of which seem highly unlikely. so the reality has to be between those two extremes and 196 seems pretty reasonable#and in any case even if it was only 154 years ago...that's still a really long time ago
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