#not saying it's the end all be all truth
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zionworkzs · 1 year ago
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Anyone ask for a needlessly long and emotional dissection of when and how Crowley and Aziraphale fell in love? No? Too bad.
I'm going to start with something controversial.
Aziraphale fell in love first.
To explain this, we gotta get a few things out of the way first.
FALLING in love and KNOWING you're in love are very different things. And the whole concept of LOVING someone and BEING IN LOVE are also different things.
Aziraphale LOVES Crowley from, well from before the Beginning. Because they are both angels and angels love. I would even accept the argument that Aziraphale LOVES Crowley throughout their flashback scenes before the Arrangement (because again, he is an angel).
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The Arrangement is born out of a symbiotic want of Crowley and Aziraphale to fuck around and not do their jobs enjoy humanity.
It is my personal belief that Aziraphale FELL in love with Crowley in 1941 when he saves the books (not a hot take, I know).
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He REALIZES he is in love with Crowley when he gets the Holy Water for him and the closest we get to that is this scene.
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Aziraphale thinks that Crowley wants to use the Holy Water as some kind of last-ditch attempt to get out of trouble. He knows it will kill him, and is incredibly dangerous in general. But he does it anyway. Why? Because he knows Crowley would find a way to get it regardless (most likely some dangerous plan that will result in death or grave injury). At least this way Aziraphale can feel somewhat at peace with the knowledge that Crowley no longer needs to do something reckless to get what he wants. He overtly goes against Heaven in this act, and this is one of only a few times we see him do this to such a degree (see Job).
It is my personal belief, and I'm sorry to be this person, but I don't think that Crowley was IN LOVE with Aziraphale in this scene or in any before it (def well on his way, but we'll get there).
I think that Crowley was still hopelessly intrigued by this angel who did fantastical things, like drink and eat and immerse himself in the aspects of humanity he adored.
And another controversial take I have is that the "you go too fast for me" is not Aziraphale saying he recognizes Crowley's feelings and his own and that Crowley is too fast for him in that respect. Because again, I don't think Crowley is IN LOVE with Aziraphale here.
I think Aziraphale is saying you go too fast for me, you treat life like a speedrun to get to the good parts. Hell, Crowley slept through the 19th century because he wanted time to move forward. Aziraphale recognizes this. He's in love with this demon who won't slow down and appreciate the mundane, human things that Aziraphale treasures. He goes too fast. He never settles down.
(I could do a whole analysis on this scene, but we'd be here till GO Season 3 came out)
I also could accept the argument that Azi realizes he is in love in this scene here when he hesitates before saying friends (Michael Sheen I'm in your walls what the hell was this shit).
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Because it does make sense that this is the first time we really see Aziraphale say what they are. But he hesitates so much. Keep in mind this happens AFTER the whole book saving incident. Does he hesitate because holy shit the person I like just did something really sweet and I see them in a new light? Possibly. I still think that Aziraphale deciding to give Crowley the Holy Water was his declaration. But I could be swayed.
Crowley is different in this respect. Contrary to popular belief, I think Crowley falls in love with Aziraphale slowly. So slowly that he doesn't even recognize it as being IN LOVE until it's pointed out by Nina.
Because he falls in love slowly, it's hard to pinpoint an exact scene where he is FALLING IN LOVE. I think throughout the first season (and before when the two are meeting up semi-regularly), when he and Aziraphale are trying to co-parent Warlock and the subsequent hunt for the real antichrist is the clearest I can get to him being IN LOVE.
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(Putting this gif in because holy shit, I mean, fuck, bro)
Let me explain.
Until this point (the handful of years prior to and during S1), he and Aziraphale were ships passing in the night. Crowley liked the mystery, the excitement of seeing the angel every so often. Got joy out of teasing him. But this is when Aziraphale becomes more than that. He becomes more of a constant in Crowley's life. And ever since his Fall Crowley has craved stability. A safe place to land. He changes his hair, his clothes, his accent. But Aziraphale doesn't. He just... is. He is constant, mostly unchanging, and still endlessly intriguing.
Crowley is IN LOVE with Aziraphale when he realizes that Aziraphale isn't going anywhere (yet). Crowley can rely on him. And for Crowley, that's something he's never had before.
Crowley LOVES Aziraphale. And he is IN LOVE with Aziraphale, but I genuinely don't think he recognizes it until he could lose him. (He's always been a bit dramatic; it would follow that his realizations only occur under dire circumstances).
Here, when he feels he is losing Aziraphale, Crowley does the one thing he never has before: says what he's feeling. Granted, it's sandwiched by a sassy one-liner and being shit at communication. But it's there.
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And I think that he thinks, it's a fluke. One moment of weakness.
But then it happens again. When he's losing Aziraphale. And he can't say anymore. He's done his speech, he's thrown out the nightingales. There's nothing for it.
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He KNOWS he is IN LOVE with Aziraphale when he's losing him.
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poorly-drawn-mdzs · 1 month ago
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Burning Rotten Bridges
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#poorly drawn mdzs#mdzs#mianmian#nie mingjue#jin guangyao#JGY is nothing but outwardly calm and carrying on his duties as the chair for the meeting#but in that small pause after Nie Mingjue commemorates Mianmian for leaving...you can feel the tension.#Because Nie Mingjue comes from a place of privilege. He's always been in a position where his legitimacy and political standing-#-were never challenged. He didn't have to fight for respect. He was born into this world respected.#For people like Mianmian and JGY who clawed their way up from the bottom...this is a huge deal.#Truth be told I have a lot of things to say about what it means and feels to be in a position where leaving is messy.#There are times where the situation is bad but to leave means that those years of your life will have been for nothing.#That all the other suffering incurred will be fruitless. So you just *keep going*. Because it *has* to be worth it.#Because going back to what you were before is even more terrifying than the hell you are boiling in.#My concrete example for this is post-grad academia.#Because that cohort will have spent over a decade pursuing a goal and leaving means...well...it means throwing away those years.#It means losing (likely nearly all) your connections. It means going into debt you'll never pay off.#It means putting up with some pretty heinous abuse from your supervisor because what are you suppose to do? Leave?#Leaving is for those with the privilege to have options.#And even if you do have options...#Ultimately we would rather love the pain we know than risk the unknown. Hoping it's worth it one day.#With that mindset established; never say JGY should have just left like Mianmian. He couldn't. This was what he dedicated his life to.#He never had the option. Even if it seemed like he did - no he did not. He never conceived this ending ever happening for himself.
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tenderjock · 5 days ago
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I’m with you, my love The lights shining through on you Yes, I’m with you, my love It’s the morning and just we two
#spike btvs#spuffy#spuffyedit#btvs#btvsedit#buffy the vampire slayer#it's terribly simple#you know you want to dance#injuries cw#bites and chews and gnaws on anyone who says buffy didnt love spike. BITES and CHEWS and GNAWS on them.#like is that not the whole point? of him? of his entire character arc? of his burning to ash as he breaks the sunnydale high school#(AKA buffy's personal cage within the slayer's cage that was sunnydale itself AKA the place where he and buffy first ever fought#and he nearly killed her for the very first time but was foiled by the immense love someone felt for her) as he breaks that place to rubble#in a way also very reminiscent of the first time they slept together and Literally Fucked A Building Down. anyway as he's doing ALL OF THAT#like sure she doesnt HAVE to love him she doesnt owe him anything and even if she did love isnt about obligation. but when buffy says#that she loves him in that scene. theres nothing to indicate that she doesnt feel it. that she isnt telling the truth.#idk man. people take a man who is dying telling someone not to love him as the gospel truth when i feel like its more ... like maybe he's#making a misguided effort to be kind? he's telling her ''dont get too hung up on the vampire thats about to catch on fire#and get your pretty ass out of here while you still can please.''#whatever. WHATEVER. in the perfect btvs that lives in my head most of ats isnt canon but esp the part where spike comes back and doesnt#immediately 1. ASK IF DAWN WAS OKAY 2. upon being told by angel that he cant be put in touch with buffy because [mumbles] misogyny?#go ahead and engage in a flirt campaign at harmony until she breaks down and calls buffy for him. those would be like the FIRST TWO THINGS#that spike did after he came back to unlife. first two things frfr#i'm gonna end the tag rant there. hmm
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nataliesscatorccio · 1 year ago
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YELLOWJACKETS
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daisybell-on-a-carousel · 2 months ago
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Still very wild to me when people try to gotcha Jason with the whole "if you can kill other people for being evil why can't they kill you" when jason is like. One of the most passively suicidal characters I've ever seen. What if man
#augh i dont want to cw this because im just talking about The Character and i feel bad when i do it for characters but i probably should#suicide mention#ask to tag#while im here i do absolutely believe hes been suicidal since jaybin times. maybe even before just in different ways. but like#going into that building with shelia? yeah#now. i DONT think he was aware of it and if youd ask him hed say no fully believing thats the truth#but like if a ghost jaybin had some introspection time i think he'd maybe eventually be like yeah#his outcomes to him were have a loving parent or die and hes a very big fan of ultimatums like that.#but he doesn't fully see it like that as jaybin because oh hes a hero and saving others when no one else can is what heros do :)#ramble. ivee been feeling it lately yknow how it is#ive once saw a post saying jason was planning to die after the joker was dead in utrh and yeagh i can see that#he puts A BOMB in his HELMET#suicidal characters in the context of hero stories are so fascinating to me. the self sacrifice.#the not caring about your own safety as long as you save someone else. the pushing yourself#the way itd be so easy to make it look like they just fell in battle. to be considered a hero in the end#anyway ive been glancing at suicidal jason todd fics. how bad is it that im still getting mad about characterization#because theyre not killing him right#AND ANOTHER THING. since im here and i try to avoid making posts about The Character like this so might as welk get it all out#think about suicidal jaybin as well as the fact 80s bruce very much considered suicidal people/people attempting like#weak and lazy? yells at them? i think thats about it. Very Much. je seems to straight up just hate them#again very much feel free to ask me to tag this one ^-^'#and i hope no one thinks im being callous here im very worried about that. i just its a very important part of his character to think about#and its fun to explore as someone who is passively suicidal myself#jason todd analysis#anyway no one look at me i am in my corner just rotating him#WAIT to clarify i dont think jaybin fully realized Just becauceof the heros sacrifice thing. i made it sound like that i believe#anyway. if you read him as suicidal since jaybin times and go to ditf with that lens like i did. well. the post death victim blaming..
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asavt · 8 months ago
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Into the confessionary a little spider walked
Mind not quite there
Quite lost
Memories scrambled around, confused
Pain flaring up, things that shouldn't have been said out
Siblings falling apart
Guilt over forgotten acts
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dykedvonte · 2 months ago
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Something something perhaps the reason Curly lacks a truly undamaged ID where his face is visible is to represent how much damage Jimmy had already affected on him throughout their relationship and the way Curly obscured part of who he is and what he stood to unintentionally cater to this toxic influence in his life.
#I think there is something to say that most people draw post crash curly and may not have every drawn him pre crash#and I think it says something that we only really look at the characters substantially in relation to Jimmy and not their own merits#unless we are discussing how J I M M Y mischarcterizes them cause in this#since we don’t assign a face and identify to Curly’s actions outside of Jimmy until the end their is the question of how much we are viewing#them as separate entities rather than intertwined actions cause while the flipping#of who we play at shows them and parallels and in separable in terms of the story going down#they couldn’t be drastically more different in thinking and you only really realize that at the birthday scene where Curly felt the need to#take responsibility for something while Jimmy just felt the need to take#this is also more so me thinking about all the reason people think Curly and Jimmy could be friends but they are missing the point of Jimmy#and his dynamic there is nothing severely weird or sinister about Curly or his intentions it’s that he’s well meaning to a fault#he’s an average dude having a mid life crisis and Jimmy is a guy that takes advantage of good intentions like the idea#that curly has to be like Jimmy in some way personality humor morally is the exact sort of projection Jimmy wants#to happen and does like it’s the sad and real case that sometimes people just have friends like Jimmy that they can’t cut off for one reason#or another like it’s not highly philosophical people are friends with objective assholes but it’s less about them#and more about the person feeling some obligation to stay like I feel like crafting him into#being more morally grey is to just make it easier to be angrier or think someone with more of a backbone#could of done something but it’s not even that he was spineless he was just too distracted and sometimes that feel like cowardice like even#Swansea waited it’s just the sad truth of how people avoid people like Jimmy or setting them off#sometimes it just does more harm than good I just am so bored with all the takes#acting like there was a perfect man on that ship and that any one outside of Anya knew the exact type of guy Jimmy#was from the get go like the point is other men wouldn’t in rape culture but women and their victims already know#mouthwashing#mouthwashing game#curly mouthwashing#jimmy mouthwashing#throwing rocks at Jimmy
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fear-no-mort · 3 months ago
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evil rick is so good because hes the first and best example of how just cringe and melodramatic evil morty is in the way he acts while being controlled by him. the slow clap, the like fake orchestra director thing he does when hes talking about the symphony of morties, the ‘we’re not so different you and i’ lines, the cut-throat hand gesture he does when saying hes gonna kill rick. u get what i mean all of that is evil morty doing that except it’s him replicating the behaviour of a rick except all of that stuff is kinda just how he is anyway. i personally think he enjoyed it a lot he had fun with it
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bigmfrat · 3 months ago
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how funny would it be if The Emperor made up the whole Stelmane thing just to scare you because you called him a freak and her stroke had nothing to do with him, it was just a regular mundane stroke. This is my truth.
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dxxtruction · 4 months ago
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Louis' "You're boring!" Could mean so many things, but I think what's most apparent about that line is that Armand takes no initiative just for himself. He's not really anybody, because he never goes out and finds himself or gets attached to anyone but Louis. Without Louis as his guide he's literally just sitting on a couch picking lint! That's the thing.
He orbits constantly around what would make Louis happy, and never really fully going what would make me happy? Ultimately that drive to please Louis is what drives him to torturing Daniel, not so much that he'd care to just do it. Ultimately, not giving proper care to Louis is just a way to make sure Louis knows he has to orbit around him as well, with shoving Lestat onto him just that other nail on the coffin. So, even if he fails to figure out how to make Louis happy with him, he still knows what Armand is good for, and better than.
That dependency is what drives Armand's abuse. It really just comes down to that. Armand doesn't even realize how suffocated he is by his own dependency. This is just how life is to him. (It shouldn't be lost either that dependency is a theme considering this episode also deals with addiction).
Daniel's fascinating because he's just so driven to be somebody. He's largely independent, he seeks things because he wants them. It's his drug to poke and prod at all the things that he shouldn't. Daniel's exciting because he lets Louis in to something different, lets him in to all this potential in another person that he can also do the same with for himself. It's a real connection. A two way street. It's easy to tell how Armand can be smothering then because he's never introducing him to anything really new, and most the ways both of them connect are all painful and traumatic. It's never just fun because there's always that layer of that pain. Fun died with Claudia.
50 years on they've gotten to a lot better place, both of them, but it's still that same shit. No seriously, "How is this any different from last time, Louis?"
Well... Because Armand's going to be, at the very least, making one [1] decision only for himself - and that's to hold power over Daniel's life. Fucking sick foreshadowing.
They aren't driving each other to the brink anymore but "The vampire is bored" STILL. Maybe it's even worse, despite being in better places, because Louis' sort of just been defeated by it. (I mean, can he even really leave this either?). He's accepting the dependancy cause he kind of has to. He'd literally ended up letting all the enjoyment be up where he can't reach [The book shelves]. Armand so desperately wants Louis happiness but what really ends up happening is that Louis ends up having to give Armand all his own. He's got no one or anything else to get it from. But like an iPad and an over the top eating ritual. Two extremes of what's just more lint picking.
This whole relationship is one I find just tragic inside and out. You have to just pity it, really. There's ways in which you can find yourself feeling bad for both of them. But you can only really be mad at Armand for any of it. Armand, who isn't even 'free' in any sense, having so little concept of his own independence, but is at the same time so controlling over other's. It's a tragic cycle. It's an infuriating one.
Louis at least has the mind to know when enough is enough. If just needing that extra push to get there. Armand's too scared of it being over to even try.
#iwtv#iwtv character analysis#interview with the vampire#louis de pointe du lac#armand#loumand#amc iwtv#iwtv s2#iwtv season 2#don't be afraid just start the tape#Gotta feel bad for Louis for winding up falling in love again with someone ruled so much by their own undealt with shit#making him once again the victim of abuse for it#But at least I guess Lestat values his independence? And Louis to an extent.#Theres a lot less co-dependancy going on between them but it's still like ... there#I'm so serious tho when I say I really want IWTV to go in the direction of 'vampires all dealing with their shit and breaking generational#cycles of abuse' because THATS so IT too me. That's the juice tbh.#because a thing with immortality is that you can't partition away from dealing with shit through knowing you or someone is going to die#You have to confront it you're forced to or else its just FOREVER literally going to be there#Louis (or really Claudia) being the first to really confront that (chef kiss)#which is an interesting thing to depict because technically we all carry the burden of eternity w/in us. Our impact on the world lasts and#what violence we allow in the world without fighting or working against it will never change either.#We have to confront the truth and find reconciliation with all of it or it is just without end there is no bottom to it#theres a lot of discussion on it but I think Louis considers himself a survivor. He's lived to this point and will keep living.#He probably cares too much about the why he ends up a victim (the undealt with shit he can't blame them for) to admit otherwise that he is#Too an extent too he cares and loves the people he's been with to really view it that way. But also this survivor perspective is very#'immortality' accepting. Naming a victim sort of is like naming a kind of death that can't go on from there.#Might make these tags into their own post at some point
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chuthulhu-reads · 9 months ago
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[ID: Two panels from Dungeon Meshi. The first scows Senshi clutching his face as tears start to spill out of his eyes, saying, "I've always... always wanted to have this soup one more time." He's not wearing his helmet in this panel, so his face is unusually visible, detailed and vulnerable. The second panel shows himself as a youngster, surrounded by his old mining team, all smiling at each other, one of them rubbing Senshi's head. Modern-day Senshi continues, "Thank you. All of you. Thank you." End ID.]
Holy shit. I anticipated some tragic backstory from the "I must feed the young ones" panels, but what I'd guessed was that Senshi might have become so devoted to cooking and eating literally whatever because he'd previously survived a famine and had seen children starve to death. I did not expect him to have been the child who was the sole survivor of a doomed travel party, one of whom was determined to feed Senshi first because he was the youngest, and that Senshi has lived with the fear of having inadvertently committed cannibalism by eating stew that he'd never quite known the contents of. I'm happy for him that Laios deduced and confirmed for him that it was griffin meat, that he was able to taste the meal that saved his life once more and remember the friends he lost. Seriously, I'm crying, and also earnestly relieved that while his backstory is pretty dark, it's not the type of fucked up I'd been preparing myself mentally for.
#Dungeon Meshi#Delicious in Dungeon#Dunmeshi#though it IS really worth exploring the ethics of cannibalism in survival situations#The podcast You're Wrong About has a really interesting pairing of episodes#in the Donner Party and Flight 571 Crash episodes#Both about disasters in which people wound up eating their dead to survive#and an interesting connection they drew was that it wasn't the cannibalism itself#that destroyed the lives of the Donner survivors#it was the horror and disgust and societal rejection they got for having eaten human flesh#even the children who had no idea what they were eating were treated with revulsion#and this is clearly the response Senshi feared facing if anybody knew what he'd eaten#But Flight 571 like a century later#the survivors were faced with a lot of understanding when rescued#relatively little condemnation and revulsion#by and large commentators acknowledged that they did what they had to do#and sympathized with how difficult and painful it must have been#which is what Senshi gets from his party#Laios wants to figure out the truth because he knows it's hurting Senshi not to know#But at one point Marcille straight up says that none of them would think less of Senshi if he did eat dwarf stew#Okay so this is Marcille 'ardent student of blood magic' Donato#but Chilchuck agrees#anyway I think that would be a particularly interesting conversation to have in a cooking manga#how do you safely eat a dead friend when that's all you have to survive on?#what are the nutritional benefits other than 'better than starving'?#what are the risks? There's prion diseases and all sorts you can get#they write it off as eating the dragon part but they DO spend seven days eating Falin at the end#ARE there any in/famous cannibalism cases in this world?#Do peopel argue about whether or not it's cannibalism if a dwarf eats a tallman?#enquiring minds (mine) want to know
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belliesandburps · 2 months ago
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Interactive - Favorite Burp Scenario
I need something to take my mind off the fact that we are home to the dumbest, most bigoted fucking assholes on this planet, and I feel like a lot of you probably feel the same way right now. So, how about another interactive game? Send me character requests via my askbox here and I will respond with my favorite burp scenario to imagine for them. (Note, ideally, keep it to characters I know or that you think I may know)
#interactive post#community game#burping#burp kink#belly kink#i think back on all the movies where the president hides a horrible crime they committed years back#and how they carry out these horrid conspiracies to cover up the truth of their misdeeds#oh how fucking quaint that all feels right now#here in america?#you can incite an insurrection and get your freakass cult to storm the capitol on live television while erecting (lol) a gallows#the whole world can watch in horror#you can get indicted on 88 felony charges#convicted on 34 of them#your generals came come out and admit that you like hitler#and in a few years the people will just happily send you back#don't worry the media will treat you like a completely normal candidate and sane wash whatever crazy bullshit you say too!#because gat dammit groceries are just way too expensive#sure your own party and awful policies CAUSED prices to soar but it's not like the media will ever point that out when they conduct polls#also the same fucking idiots crowing about grocery prices hear trump's tariffs will cost them thousands more yearly and they're fine with i#im so fucking tired and i know you are too#just look out for your lgbtqia+ friends right now#they're gonna be hurting right now especially if they don't live in cali#and even cali's not some liberal fucking haven either#we just voted NOT to end slavery in this state!#like what the actual fuck?!#no seriously...what the actual fuck?#anyway look out for each other and try to keep your own corner of the world safe from maga's stink#and don't tune out either because they want to exhaust and beat you
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poorly-drawn-mdzs · 6 months ago
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At your side [End of Season 2]
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#poorly drawn mdzs#mdzs#wei wuxian#lan wangji#wen ning#jin ling#wen qing#jiang yanli#a-yuan#It may have taken a year but we did it! The end of season 2!!!#(Granted: this season was nearly twice the length of season one.)#It's been a really fantastic season to draw for. So many iconic moments! It was a lot of work but I had a blast B*)#I also enjoyed experimenting more and more with my comic style. I'm growing as a comic artist bit by bit!#There is even a little bit of shadowing in this one for next season. As a treat. All the fun (and not heart breaking) scenes to come!#Comic talk time: Recently saw 12 angry men for first time and I love the coincidence of the themes aligning here.#They both touch upon the horror of judicial systems - in which the most persuasive argument wins and the truth is a nuisance.#All it takes is one person to stand against the crowd and say 'I do not know what is true. And that is reasonable doubt enough.'#When the majority is for condemning someone guilty - that in itself is persuasive enough.#One will set their mind to what the 'truth' is and refuse to see it any other way. That their perspective is the only correct one.#No one is born with a monopoly on the truth.#Everyone has biases and agendas. Some care not for the outcome - only that they can be on the convenient side.#Lan Wangji is putting everything on the line to say 'I'm not going to go with the majority vote.'#And that is a huge deal in a story that is so politically focused as MDZS is. Everything is a careful chess move to these sects -#and to not play the game is basically sacrificing everything you are and your families name. For some it is unthinkable.#And there is no doubt in LWJ's mind. He would stand there and lose everything if it means upholding justice.#More importantly - these two have each other's backs. The bond is unbreakable. This is the most ride or die I have seen two people be.
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possamble · 8 months ago
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do you have any particular thoughts regarding marcille being a half-elf? its interesting to me considering the fact that she seems self-conscious about being a half-elf, but denies it when its brought up
i remember marcille looking visibly uncomfortable over laios simply asking her how old she is, which i think the only reason she might feel nervous about this is because it might reveal her as a half-elf to him.
she's never corrected anybody whose called her an elf either.
never mind the circumstances of the reveal, in which thistle goes on about how half-elves are inferior and accusing her of wanting to become full blooded elf, she seemed particularly upset like he struck a nerve-
i wish the half-elf thing was built upon more. also, underrated marcille line:
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okay so i revisited this sequence just to make sure I could back myself up and it's just... man. there's a lot going on.
the first reaction we get from Marcille is this huge panel that takes up half of the page
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she is viscerally affected. flushing to the tips of her ears with the intensity of it. and we see it again, a few pages later
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so it might seem like she's embarrassed about it and lying to herself, but... I really think it's just that Thistle is accidentally hitting sore spots. If you really look at what he says to get these reactions
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"you'll live out your entire life [...] and die that way too"
"a hundred years from now, nobody will be there"
Hear me out. I think, if he stuck to harping on about her inferiority without bringing up how terrifyingly long-lived she is, she wouldn't have been as bothered. But right now, Thistle is accidentally hitting all the marks on Marcille's deepest fears-- and this is after the Winged Lion promised her that her dreams could come true in an extremely vulnerable moment, so it also hits her slightly guilty conscience as well.
I do truly believe that Marcille isn't bothered about being a half-elf the way that people assume she'd be bothered by it. To her, the biggest problem with being a half-elf is that it's isolating.
On one hand, it's not hard to imagine why she'd distance herself from elves in the west. A lot of them can clock her as a half-elf on sight, unlike other races, and therefore she's always branded with this weird stigma of being Othered -- I would even say that she considers herself lucky for being born outside of elven culture instead of having to grow up in it. I mean, just... look at the way elves talk about her.
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Skipping past the uncomfortable implication of what 'not tolerating the existence' of half-elves would actually entail, this is incredibly fucking annoying. You can see why she wouldn't want to be around elves much. You see a lot of Marcille reacting badly here, but honestly, almost all of it can be attributed to her freaking out that her bluff completely failed. She's honestly more paying attention to Izutsumi's footsteps and trying to coordinate an opportunity to escape.
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And in the end, you see her built-up frustration at being asked if she wants to be a full-blooded elf like 2-3 times in a row.
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Yeah, yeah, "the lady doth protest too much," and all. But we know Marcille. We know that she's a lot more embarrassed and horrendously unconvincing when she's being prodded about something she's actually self-conscious about.
Moving onto the flipside of things, it might seem weird that she "pretends" to be a full elf around other races, but it's not really that strange if you think about it. Again, people are weird about her being infertile or whatever, and a lots of them don't even know much about what sets half-elves apart from everyone else. I mean, look at how uncomfortable Laios is just asking her about it
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and look at how exasperated and resigned she looks
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And like... she's right. Where would that come up in normal conversation? Why would she go out of her way to tell them? She's functionally a normal elf to other races anyway -- got the ears, the abnormally long "childhood", and the huge mana capacity. Unless it's directly relevant or important for people to know, I don't think it's all that strange or indicative of insecurity that she prefers not to bother with it.
(This combined with her sense of being an "outsider" to elf culture also explains why she thinks elf superiority is embarrassing. She sees the way elves treat short-lived races from the "outsider" perspective nonetheless, and thinks it's obnoxious; especially more so because she usually has to play the elf around short-lived races and deal with the reputation of arrogance that elves have built up.)
The sad thing is, this all means that... she doesn't actually fit in anywhere. She doesn't like going out West much because of how elves treat her. But she's also an outsider in the continents she was born in, treated like this exotic long-lived alien choosing to live among short-lived races for some reason. She is always an outsider, the Other, no matter where she goes. Add in the fact that she'll live longer than literally anyone she knows, and it's honestly kind of heartbreaking.
And I think that's the crux of it. Marcille really doesn't act like she's at all self-conscious about being a half-elf because of any feelings of inferiority or being half-made or whatever. She considers herself a perfectly legitimate being and might even, in some ways, consider herself superior to normal elves because she's not blind with elf supremacy or whatever. (And whatever "elven biases" she displays, all of them are born more out of the fact that she's kind of bad at conceptualizing how other races age and mature compared to herself, not that she actually considers herself better or more mature simply for being an elf.)
I think that whatever self-consciousness Marcille has about being a half-elf is, instead, related to terror and loneliness. The reminder that it ensures she'll never truly belong anywhere for the rest of her very long life. The reminder that, in truth, even she's not actually sure how old she is by other races' standards (hence the discomfort when asked how old she is). She doesn't want to not be a half elf, or be a full elf or full tall-man-- in her ideal world, she's still a half-elf. She just gets to live out her life at the same pace with the people she loves and doesn't have to say goodbye again and again and again until she dies.
and one last very important panel, right after Mithrun tells her that all her desires would be devoured
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In her ideal world, she's still a half-elf and reality magically starts marching at her pace. But failing that, the second best thing is that she's still a half-elf-- but one who is able to accept reality and let go of her fear.
(But the rest of the story pans out the way it does because, to Marcille, taking reality apart and reshaping it was less scary than simply and fully reconciling with it.)
#asks#dungeon meshi manga spoilers#marcille donato#manga panel analysis#this is probably riddled with typos sorry#readmore cut bc it got long lmao#i ended up babbling about it bc it's such an important character detail to me#bc like... wow. she's so normal about it. she's literally just chilling.#the only thing that really bothers her is the material reality of it and how people treat her#the stereotypes the stigma etc. etc.#otherwise it just..#literally doesn't factor into her criteria for self-worth at all#the basic truth is that marcille likes herself on a fundamental level#she's not plagued by a deep and festering self-loathing the way a lot of characters in her archetype are#she likes herself and is proud of her successes and accomplishments#its just that shes terrified of failure and can have *episodes* of self-loathing when she fucks up#but who doesn't yknow#i know its a very slight nuance that makes very little difference in how her 'overachiever' problems manifest but its there#the sword of abandonment issues that hangs over her head has nothing to do with her self-worth or self-esteem or meeting her own standards#it has to do with the fear of not living up to *other* people's expectations and not being useful enough to be worth keeping around#she's good enough for herself but she's always so so so scared that she's not good enough for other people#i wont say much about what ryoko kui is saying using this as an allegory for real world racial biases but#dungeon meshi's treatment of marcille's relationship with her being half-elf is so incredibly important to me because it gets it so right.#a trauma about inferiority or being a half-being isn't inherent to the experience of being 'of two worlds' at all#that's something that's unfairly drilled into people by their environment#the *inherent* anguish is the loneliness. the constant longing. the fact that you are always homesick no matter where you are#always just a little bit of an outsider and never fully at home#and dungeon meshi gets that.#edit: cleaned it up a little
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souenkun · 2 months ago
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Not sure if I'm totally reaching with this one, but... whenever yorishima is drawn with his lips closed, the single lines that midorikawa drew for them always seemed steady and sure to me; they're either relentlessly straight or meanly curved upwards for his natural rbf and his grumpy pout respectively. And yet, after the events in kusakabe's house with his daughters, this is the first time we see the single line for yorishima's closed lips waver, which now makes me wonder if it means anything at all?
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batcavescolony · 2 months ago
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At the end of Agatha All Along, Agatha does things would have never done at the beginning. I see people say that they planted seeds for Agatha changing that never grew and that's just wrong. They might not be a tree but they've sprouted. In the beginning Agatha does everything for personal gain. But at then end Agatha has nothing personal to gain from telling Jen she bound her. There's no personal gain in her helping Billy find Tommy in the end or comforting him or helping him unlock Tommy's location. She has changed its just not huge or a dramatic personality change.
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