#not to say empire of death doesn't have it's flaws

[discododging]

I will be completely honest: I think this episode was good.

I think a lot of people let their theories run wild after the Doctor mentioned Susan (rightfully so, mind you), but I think in a year or two, removed from all the theories quashed and explanations commonly shared around (like how Ruby 'making it snow' was explained as 'time bleeding through' in Legend of Ruby Sunday), this is gonna be looked upon as a much better finale then it is rn.

[kalak]

Luke skywalker has so much rage inside him and I want people to recognize that. No he's not a shy baby boy, you know how much grit it takes to keep on doing and remain optimistic at the face of insurmountable evil? That boy is full of emotions. And yet he is kind. That's the key to his character - that he is full of rage but he doesn't let that stop him from hoping.

He definitely has a hair trigger temper - hell, his main character flaw in empire strikes back was his impulsiveness and recklessness - and he's so much like vader, he wants and loves so strongly and he despairs as strongly too. And what does he do with that temper? He fails, he loses, and he blows up and wrecks shit, but also that temper is the flip side of loving, and he embraces that too, he loves with all his heart. Point is, he's a very action and emotion oriented person, and that's what pushes him so close to the dark side; he's fatalistic, he's sometimes ridden with guilt, he's emotional.

But then he learns patience, he learns gentleness - learns to be a jedi. It's all learned; do or do not, yoda says, and he learns to do, to keep hoping. He isn't born as a sunshine boy, it's not his nature that makes him that way - he's naturally emotional, kinda whiny, full of rage; all the hallmarks of a darksider, but he learns to grow beyond that. That's how he can extend such an understanding hand towards sith and dark siders, his father - he knows the dark side. He understands it, he flirts with it, and yet he chooses to do better.

The meaning of luke skywalker in the star wars narrative is hope - hope isn't a magical deus ex machina that solves all your problems. It's not there all the time from the very start. It's something you cultivate, just like luke did throughout the trilogy.

Hope is continued existence. It's optimism that perseveres. You know that line of bravery being doing it in spite of the fear? Well, hope isn't the absence of giving up. Sometimes it's just screaming crying trying to kill your own father, but it's also making the right choice and trusting vader to make the right choice, too. If there's one good thing about the sequel trilogy, it's that - luke may have run away, he might have done some... uncharacteristic things, but that doesn't mean he's lost hope. He returned to fight again after all, didn't he?

Even if you fuck up, you return and fight - with a relentless optimism that being good will be enough, that the world is a better place for this choice. And Luke does that, again and again - still carrying all those emotions within him. He's a fire that burns strong and bright; he's sunshine and tempered death.

[psychomusic]

so. I've been reading some posts on the jedi order tag AND i won't talk about my opinion on "are jedi good or bad discourse" BUT i wanna point out some lore to everyone who's complaining about the jedi taking kids into their order: (in the EU) it wasn't always like this.

if you take swtor era (more than 3000 years before the prequels) there were many jedi who joined at an older age. like, for example there was a guy who broke his engagement to become one. most jedi remember their families because they were old enough when they decided to go.

THEN in darth bane's book trilogy (circa 1000 yesrs before the prequels) there is a passage where two sith lords are talking about taking bane, already an adult, to study at korriban. one doubted him because he was too old, ans the other told him he sounded like a jedi, and that ONE DAY jedi will have to accept only kids into their ranks if they really want to find "pure" people that can learn their lessons quicker.

one day!! so it wasn't always like that!! the ongoing wars with the sith, who corrupted and killed many of them, had pressured them into taking always younger people into their ranks.

also, consider a thing that this video explains super well: training to become a jedi is not like exercising, because there is a transformative lesson at the end of the training that changes everything. you can't just do as much as you can, but not finish.

the transformative lesson, as the video explains, is that through the force, everything is the same - from rocks and ships to life and death. at the end of the training you have to understand this fundamental truth.

yoda says "you have to unlearn what you have learned". during times where they were constantly killed off or corrupted by the dark side (and if you haven't learned this lesson you are more susceptible to this corrupting), younger people were taken in to actually finish their training (a training that was ultimately about being a good person AND that you could leave at any point if you weren't sold on that, too)

(remember that for the sith failure = death. like. that was the alternative for force sensitive kids. it's not like sith had any moral problem with taking kids away without consent. sith don't have moral problems: they believe that them being stronger in the force means they can do whatever they want as long as their strong enough to go and do it. there are MANY passages in many different star wars stories, even in different mediums, that say this out loud)

AND (this is more of a critical thought than just stating the lore) the fact that they started doing it out of necessity doesn't mean it's 100% good BUT you know. the whole set up of the prequels is that we're starting off the story in a period of crisis and decadence all around. most of the systems of the times were about to fall. OF COURSE they had problems. if they didn't, we wouldn't have the story to begin with.

that doesn't automatically mean jedi = bad and sith are better, tho. you wouldn't take the last, chaotic and decadent period to jugde something, would you? it's like deciding that the athenian democracy sucked because people at the times of Demosthenes failed at recognizing the new schemes in which the world was evolving into, and still believed that their city would be important as it had been in the previous century. They just didn't fucking expect the Macedons would conquer half the world known and more, and have the subsequent political power. Still, their experiences in the 5th century with democracy were very good, even better than ours on many fronts, if you contextualize a little. the jedi had flaws, and most importantly, they didn't fucking know the future and everything that ever happened, ever, so they made mistakes. that doesn't automatically make the system ill, or bad, or not-working. systems can have setbacks when the world changes. (just like athenian democracy had one when they lost the empire that was funding the democracy. they even had a tyranny for a while and then fixed the problems. that doesn't diminish retrospectively their democracy)

[presiding]

a doctor turned serial killer turned doctor again, an actor who paints, a gang leader, a mining baron, and a vice overseer walk into the room.

oh yeah and they lead karnaca now.

dishonored 2 is my fav game but i think it's mid, story-wise. here's why dh1 works and why dh2's overarching story sorta misses

tl;dr: story integration is critical for gameplay that offers audience payoff, but emily's personal arc from dishonor to honor is inconsistently demonstrated in the story, and is not an interactive part of the gameplay.

essay/long version under cut >

recap: what's dishonored's deal

[skip if you want] dh1 is an underdog story: corvo is an honorable man swept up in the machinations of a callous city, so his canonical ending being 'this child will rule over an empire' isn't about the child's rule but rather about corvo's reputation being restored in a more hopeful city, due to his & the player's rejection of the violent connotations of the tagline 'revenge solves everything.'

similarly, in dh1 DLCs, daud's story arc is that of an anti-hero: a dishonorable man who realises too late he has done irreparable harm. he sees the error of his ways after a single monumental death, and eventually a single life redeems him when he/the player stepped in to circumvent a terrible fate for a child, enabling her to rule unfettered.

daud & corvo come to a satisfying conclusion within the extent of their narrative arcs. it doesn't matter that a child on a throne isn't really a fix for a decaying empire - the player's actions throughout the city of dunwall was what mattered - and these stories could be framed as parables. in that sense, young emily as a ruler is a metaphor for a hopeful future for the city & empire.

dishonored 1 & its DLCs are also great examples of storytelling with perfectly integrated gameplay - you, the player, worked towards the outcome that redeemed the protagonists.

in your efforts to save young emily, you either achieved a good outcome (corvo) or prevented a worse outcome (daud).

bringing us to dh2 -

what's emily's arc

emily's arc is a coming of age: we're introduced to a reigning empress who questions her role & skillset ("am i the empress my mother wanted me to be?"), then her titular fall from grace occurs. from there, she learns to reject the violent, selfish connotations in 'take back whats yours' tagline (a la daud & corvo!) while rediscovering why her rule is critical to the empire.

emily's rule is no longer metaphorical, but:

a literal thing for audience assessment (is emily a good ruler?) AND

the crux of her storyline.

at the beginning of dh2, emily is introduced as a disengaged leader ("i wish i could just run away from all this;" "i dont know if whether i should sail to the opposite side of the world, or have everyone around me executed"). the antihero has a precedent for the dishonored series in daud, so it's not at first glance an issue*, however, the fact that emily has ruled poorly reframes corvo & daud's endings as being less than ideal (a moralistic retcon) *we could talk here about how ready an audience was in 2016 for a flawed women as a protagonist, hell, even in 2023,,,

throwback to the beginning of this essay when i said:

'this child will rule over an empire' isn't about the child's rule but rather about corvo's reputation

emily's story arc, unlike for daud & corvo, is literally about the quality of her rule. we're no longer in metaphor territory (ironic phrase): a parable-style ending doesn't work.

does emily become a good ruler

we know she becomes a good ruler because the game says so. it is narrated to the audience via a (literal) word of god in the space of 30 seconds, after the final boss. the outsider tells us that emily becomes known as Just & Clever.

drawing a distinction here - this narration is not the same as the player actively being involved.

the player does not throughout the game become aware that emily has made political allies. during the game, she doesn't talk to these characters about saving karnaca or being a better ruler to the empire (there's a few lines might imply it, but you need to be actively looking and being careful to wait for every voice line. it's a far cry from daud & corvo's fight to save emily being unmissable - even though daud doesn't know at the beginning that's the goal).

how does the game show it

you can coincidentally not kill most of your subjects and never be aware that emily is looking to restore karnaca by means of instating a council - it's never brought up. it *couldn't* be brought up, because that council serves under the fake duke (armando), who is the last person she speaks to before she leaves for dunwall. its her suggestion that he rules karnaca, but armando's condition is that he will rule as he sees fit.

to back up a bit, emily's canonical method of restoring karnaca is by banding together key allies - hypatia, stilton, [byrne &or paolo], pastor, under a council beneath the duke's body double. they are passionate people who would each individually make worthwhile advisors, but if you think about those characters sitting at a table trying to reach an agreement, it feels like an assortment of people that emily didn't kill along the way and doesn't feel organic (up to interpretation). it's not stated if emily herself banded this council together, but logically she must have (worth a mention these are mostly characters that you as the player had reasonable rationale to kill during a high chaos run, except pastor). the underlying concept may be that karnaca's power is returned to its people - which is interesting given that the monarchy remains and armando's decision is final.

this overarching solution could also be taken as a critique to dh1's 'put your kid on the throne,' which is another reason its worthwhile looking at how emily was shown to be a better leader. obviously my point isn't that her solution was bad given the circumstance, but i mean she has very little agency here in all. if emily was shown to be more controlling as a leader, this could be interpreted as character growth, but that's not the case.

coming of age

how do you learn & grow when you can't specify your failings? emily doesn't really touch on her shortcomings as an empress. she non-specifically worries delilah makes a better empress than her. it's hard to argue her worries are meaningful when someone good at their job will still worry when lives are in the balance.

emily's best 'aha' moments (eg. crack in the slab comment about gaining perspective) are consistently undercut by a conversation with sokolov or meagan afterwards in which she demonstrates she hasn't learned anything (before the grand palace, emily condemns 'toadies sucking up to me' and is reminded by meagan that she's part of the problem). the story is confused about what it's trying to say about emily's progress, and when she's meant to show progress, if she was meant to show any progress at all. it could be argued that emily was never even a bad ruler, she had just been fed misinformation about the problems in karnaca and been the victim of slander by her political enemies. the game doesn't make this clear - it's easier to argue that the opposite is true given that her allies only have criticism.

worth a mention here that the heart quotes about armando - a fake ruler - interestingly mirror emily's character concerns. "see how he sighs? his life is a gilded cage." but this essay is already long.

while corvo & daud spend their games (and through the gameplay) 'earning' their redemption, emily is being led by the NPCs around her to a conclusion and a fix for the political mess in karnaca: meagan & sokolov guide emily to her missions, and there's no recurring quest for emily to investigate possible allies. she is able to gather the people she hasn't killed to herself by manner of... post-game narration. during the game, she's primarily concerned with getting her throne back.

an easy fix: if there had been less dialogue & narrative focus on emily's failings perhaps the ending would have felt more satisfying. it has the feel of cut content, but i don't know what was cut to be able to comment on it.

so what went wrong?

i can't help but wonder if arkane were worried they would lose a certain demographic if corvo wasn't playable (may have been deemed too much of a risk - 2013 was a different time), and so they had to take out story elements that were unique to emily's growth as a character/empress, because the usual storyline/gameplay integration had to work for both characters - in other words, gameplay that made sense for both corvo & emily was prioritised before emily's story & character development. which is a silly problem to have in a game that added character voices for the sake of improving characterisation - maybe emily's tale would have felt more akin to a parable if she had less lines that betrayed her ignorance (to the disdain of those around her).

i wish more care had been taken with emily's story. most players will never really notice the large variety of different endings - they're not particularly satisfying in and of themselves.

it's ironic that one of Emily's complaints is about her father/protector being overbearing, when his (parallel universe) presence in the gameplay may be one of the reasons her own narrative arc falls flat.

what are the upsides here

changing tune from what didn't work - don't you think the concept is fantastic? it's a great idea overall - can you imagine if the coming of age storyline was better integrated into the game?

it's valuable to talk about the integration of story and gameplay and characterisation from a craft perspective. dh2 genuinely is my favourite game - it's beautiful, the imm-sim design philosophy makes the world a delight to explore, the combat gives endless creative options for tackling any fight, there is a far greater diversity of cast in an in-text canonical way. there's loads to love!

i love emily as a dodgy leader, to me it adds interesting dimensionality to the outsider's narrations - of course in dunwall there's never a neat happily ever after! emily, like the outsider, both work well as characters who hold ultimate power but aren't necessarily worthy of it - and this makes perfect sense for the dishonored universe's morality & critiques of power. however, within this grey area there's still plenty of room for a satisfying ending, which isn't what we ended up with, whatever the true reason for that was. and also, damn, emily's a marked assassin empress, if she can't lead well then who can?

while dh1 was criticised for its narrative simplicity, dh2 in contrast and in hindsight shows us that simplicity isn't so bad - there's satisfaction in gameplay achieves a clear, simple narrative goal.

[moorishflower]

Hey I wanna be really clear about something because I do occasionally reblog stuff wrt Palestine and its current occupation, so if you don't have any interest in politics (because this IS politics, this whole situation is very much NOT about religion) feel free to skip over

But I want to make it absolutely clear that anti-Zionism and antisemitism are not the same thing, and when I reblog things in support of Palestine I am not doing so because I think that Jews are evil. I'm studying Judaism. I'm trying to convert. I hope I'll be ready for that someday. So it is not Jews who've stolen land and killed locals and started a genocide. It is not even, to a certain extent, Israelis who've done this. The country of Israel, our modern understanding of it, was flawed from the beginning, built on colonized land that had been already occupied by the British Empire. It has since been taken over by a far-right extremist government who views the native tribes and people of Palestine as little more than animals, or worse than animals. And what's tragic is that this government is using Jews as their footsoldiers and their scapegoats and their pawns. Promising them a return to a homeland that has been gone for thousands of years. Promising peace and safety to a people who have been hurt and oppressed and murdered and driven out again and again. But you can't buy peace with blood. What Hamas did was horrific and is NOT to be celebrated. But what Israel is doing in response is worse.

Halacha tells us that we have the right to rodef, the right of the pursuer. The actual line is "You shall not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor." In the Talmud, it's decided that "if someone comes to kill you, rise up and kill them first." It's the right to self-defense. What Israel is claiming is that Hamas is SUCH a threat that the deaths of more than 30,000 people, most of which are civilians, most of which are women and children, is justified under Talmudic law.

Right now, the estimate for Israeli casualties (including those killed at the Sukkot gathering) is around 1,139.

The estimate for Palestinian casualties is at least 30,000. Quite possibly more, as some 10,000 are missing. Professor Yagil Levy of the Tel Aviv University estimates that about 61% of that 30,000 is women, children, and the elderly (he places all men over the age of 18 in the "combatant" category and thus are not considered civilians, which is problematic in and of itself).

So where is the line drawn? The Talmud doesn't tell us. But I don't think that the tragic deaths of 1,139 people justifies the wanton and senseless murder of 18,000 women, children, and elderly.

What Israel is doing is horrifying, and it isn't to secure a Jewish homeland, and it isn't in the name of G-d, and it isn't for the continued existence of Jews. It is, plain and simple, an attempt to consolidate power. Netanyahu was (and still is) an extremely disliked Prime Minister. He has put himself into bed with whoever he thinks is most powerful and most likely to keep him in power, which is unfortunately a gaggle of right-wing extremists who are no different, fundamentally, from any other extremist, and who are using Judaism and Jews as a vehicle towards their own enrichment.

I guess what I'm saying here is that in a way, I feel sorry for the Israeli Jews who were told that Israel was the home they had always been promised, but were never told about the strings attached to it. And I wanted to make it absolutely clear that I will not hold with anyone who says that Jews, specifically, are to blame for Gaza, or any other antisemitic statements, because it is not a religious contention.

Oseh shalom bimromav hu ya'aseh shalom aleinu v'al kol yoshvei tevel. Palestine will be free and Jews will know peace again.

[lightlessentwine]

Rauh Civilization utilized kidney stones for magic.

This started when someone on the Smoughtown Discord had mentioned the possibility of Marika's village being a family of Dryads (Credit to Mangolovers for this observation). I went even further, claiming that they were likely inspired by the Hesperides; Greek Dryads of The Golden Evening. in Roman texts, they are noted to be the daughters of Hesperus. in other sources they are said to be the daughters of Atlas. (completely aside but possibly useful info: Atlas is claimed to have invented the "Celestial Sphere" which supported their understanding of being "fixed upon a starry sphere.")

Hesperus is the "Evening Star," or the planet Venus as seen in the evening, and the brother of Atlas. Hesperus was often confused with his brother Eosphorus, aka Phosphorus, the "Morning Star," because they were both represented by the same planet. Phosphorus translates to mean "bearer of light."

sticking with me here.

In the Ruins of Rauh, we find Spirit Calculi. well, a Calculus, in the biological sense, is a stone, like a kidney stone.

the Spirit Calculus is noted to smell bad and give off a white light. The stench is supposedly a sign of a strong spiritual presence.

Kidney stones are compound crystalline masses typically comprised of calcium-phosphate; phosphate being an ion of Phosphorus.

Phosphorus in alchemy, is the element that can harness light itself. i imagine a crystal stone of calcium-phosphate would be much more controlled and manageable as a substance than pure phosphorus, which would just burn upon contact with air.

following this line of logic, i'm also willing to throw it out that I believe the Ancient Meteoric Ore Greatsword (or the AMOGuS as i lovingly call it) is not Obsidian- or even a stone at all- but a massive chunk of Iron-Nickel meteorite that contained notable amounts of Schreibersite, which was fashioned into an arrowhead with veins of the schreibersite coursing through it. this rare material is currently understood to be the original source for life on earth, and is inherently connected to phosphorus as an element. the AMOGus was a weapon of very old gods, who probably recognized the power and usefulness of schreibersite, and eventually learned that the power came from phosphorus, which is also in bones and kidney stones.

this information and the stories revolving around Rauh civilization have been nearly completely lost to time, even if the original ideas were expanded upon and just lost their roots, or were even accidentally rediscovered through other means (there's already a warlock we meet in game, who's rediscovered death magic on his own in trying to commune with his dead family and is wielding their heads on a stick as a flail.. who's to say that harnessing magic doesn't come to the odd person serendipitously like this?)

with all of what seemed like borderline disconnected information, i was able to understand that the Shamans were likely inspired by the Hesperides, establish that the Rauh were using kidney stones for magic, and connect that back to the AMOGuS, giving it an actual reason for why it exists

but allow me to go even further, just to solidify some aspect of this idea from within the game

While doing a bit of the usual, initial perusing of wikipedia pages as one does.. i noted something deeply peculiar; a poignant phrase with its own little section: "Hesperus is Phosphorus"

this boils down the entirety of Goldmask's quest. Goldmask was trying to use "a priori" knowledge to understand a flaw in the logic of the Golden Order, but he's an outsider looking in. It is only when the Tarnished comes to him with new, empirical evidence that he begins to understand what is happening. you use the literal Law of Regression on a statue of Marika to understand that "Radagon is Marika," and this tidbit of information is something that aligns with what Goldmask was suspicious about. he points at the Erdtree, not knowing the solution to his problem, but knows what variable is throwing his solution through a loop. giving him information that confirms his views, reinforces his perspective.

[ishouldgetatumbler]

Whose your daddy? chapter 401

One of the major themes of the Kakin Succession is family.

What first began this arc was the death of Isaac Netero who, at the behest of the very wealthy, killed himself to stop the Chimera Ants. The events of the arc proceed a long a plan Isaac had set up for his son, Beyond Netero.

Beyond is the leader of a small paramilitary group currently headed by Ging. Pariston and Ging both assessed the situation immidiately, deciding that Netero's small group would be more qualified to reach their goals than aligning with the Zodiacs, hunter association and Kakin government.

In the recent chapter, we have discovered that the Netero dynasty reaches far deeper into the Kakin empire than we thought. A bodyguard of 5th prince tubeppa reveals that she is the child of beyond, cursed from birth with the explicit goal of being used in the succession war. Further, she revealed the theory that one of the princes is a half sibling of hers.

This makes sense.

The first thing to note is that Nasubi thinks of children as political tokens of value. He sorts them by number, treats them according to this rank and dehumanizes all of them, ignoring their preferences and desires. He insults Camilla based on her rank and he manipulates Halkenburg into doing his will as two examples.

The second thing to note is that he's done this before. Zhang-lei refers to Onior Longbao as his father (who is Nasubi's half brother.) If I had to guess, I would say that Nasubi offered Onior a "re-try" in the next kakin war of succession in exchange for surrendering the one they fought in, and possible offered the same deal to Brocco-li (whose son would be Luzurus).

The third thing to not is that this is somewhat similar to Camilla's plan. Camilla's plan involves "untouchables" or their equivalent, committing suicide in front of their targets to unleash a curse upon them. This similarity of methodology is interesting. Along this same line, Tsrriednich is a nen savant while his father and mother showed no notable aptitude for it. Beyond however...

Taken together, I would assert the following:

1. Tserriednich and/or Camilla is Beyond's child/children.

2. Beyond and Nasubi worked out an agreement whereby one or more of his children will be inserted into the succession contest. This is possibly in exchange for Beyond's ability to reach the Dark Continent

3. Tubeppa might be the only prince aware of Beyond's children and her first move was to ally with Tsrriednich, then Kurapika.

Below is a list of the 14 princes with who I think their real dads are. People who are dead will have no listed dad and are assumed to be Nasubi's.

1. Benjamin (Nasubi)

Given that rank correlates to influence and wealthy, Nasubi would probably prefer to give himself the top spot.

2. Camilla (Beyond or Nasubi)

Debatable: she's a skilled nen user implied by her ability which is supposedly somewhat heritable, and she has personality similarities to Beyond. Not confirmed.

3. Zhang Lei (Onior Longbao)

He says as much, and views an important part of good kingship as incorporating both the light and dark. (criminal and legal)

4. Tserriednich (Beyond or Nasubi)

This one is very hard for me to prove but the fact Tubeppa, who presumibly knows about Beyond's kids, chose to ally with him is strange to me. Especially if he doesn't like the top 3: all flaws they have, Tsrrie has worse. Also, perhaps Morena is his mother? I doubt it.

5. Tubeppa (Nasubi)

It's possible Benjamin is a bastard of the military force Nasubi relies on, meaning they had greag influence over him and were able to claim the top spot. In this case, Tubeppa is the highest ranked legitimate prince, which works with their behavior.

6. Tyson (Nasubi)

Tyson's plot is going somewhere but fuck if I know where. Tyson's religious imagery would be a really interesting contrast with Morena's.

7. Luzurus (Nasubi or Brocco-li)

If Brocco-li and Onionor longbao had the same deal, it's unusual that Luzurus should be so much lower than Onior Longbao.

8. Sale-Sale (dead)

9. Halkenburg (Nasubi)

Halkenburg is the favorite "good" prince to win. Nasubi has shown an usual amount of interest in manipulating Halkenburg to fight in the war. Sale-Sale for example did not require a stirring analogy about cars

10. Kacho (dead)

11. Fugetsu. (Nasubi]

After the death of Kacho, Nasubi is seen in a burial chamber like thing where her body is being held. My guess would be that the magic of the succession contest is fed by the lives of those lost to it.

12. Momoze (Dead)

13. Marayam (Nasubi)

The second youngest in the conflict, Marayam is tied up in the will of his mother and her paranoia. I am hoping for a parallel to be drawn between Marayam and Woble, comparing their

14. Woble (Kurapika)

[antianakin]

The obi wan Kenobi show doesn’t work because it contradicts episode 4, which specifically states that the last time obi wan and vader met was in episode 3, having them duel again is just pointless and it contradicts an entire film, also why doesn’t Palpatine and the Empire arrest Bail Organa if they have suspicions he’s working with a Jedi? Bail Organa is smart and hes a good guy against the fascist empire and evil sith but in this show it makes him look not very smart.

I'm not sure why you're sending this message to ME, someone who's made it fairly clear that I LIKE the Kenobi show (and if I haven't, this is my definitive statement that I LOVE the Kenobi show and find it one of the best shows that D+ has released thus far), unless you're intentionally trying to start a debate/discussion about this.

I'm not going to change my mind about the Kenobi show and suddenly decide it's a bad show, so if you're trying to change my mind about it for some reason, it won't work. Much like the Prequel Trilogy, I'm perfectly willing to acknowledge the Kenobi show has flaws and isn't a perfectly written show, but it has a VISION and a PLAN, something that is all too rare within Star Wars these days.

It's also one of the VERY vanishingly few genuinely pro-Jedi and sort-of Jedi-centric stories out there. I'm unlikely to get very many of those, so Kenobi is a diamond in a rough for me. So I don't CARE what accusations people level at this show. Most of them are inaccurate or entirely based on personal taste alone. If the Kenobi show isn't for you, it isn't for you; there's PLENTY of Star Wars things that have come out that aren't for me but seem to have something in them that appeals to other people. Nothing anyone critiques about it is going to change the fact that there's a LOT I love about this show and the fact that it feels like it was made with fans like me in mind.

So if what you want is to just vent about a show that didn't work for you, maybe go to someone else to do it because you won't get it from me. (If you want to vent about, say, TBB or the Ahsoka show on the other hand, I'm exactly who you should talk to. Come vent at me about those shows any time.)

All that being said, this is my response to your specific accusations.

First, I'll address the Bail Organa thing because that just seems simpler. The ONLY person who has any suspicions that Bail is working with a Jedi during the Kenobi show is Reva, who leaves the whole Inquisitorius and the Empire by the end of the show. While there's perhaps some evidence of Obi-Wan wandering around with Leia, he's demonstrably not the person who TOOK Leia nor is he the person who RETURNED Leia, so there's zero evidence of Obi-Wan and Bail actually interacting beyond the message Bail sent to Obi-Wan that nobody saw except Reva and Obi-Wan, and that Reva took with her off of Jabiim, so it's never going to end up as evidence of anything.

The other reason Palpatine is not going after Bail Organa despite what are likely STRONG suspicions that Bail isn't loyal and is helping the Rebellion, is the same reason that the Senate doesn't get eliminated until ANH. Palpatine is still putting up a semblance of "democracy" to string people along with the idea that the Empire is a benevolent force working on behalf of the greater good. Bail is a well-known and well-liked and influential Senator on his own, AND he's the husband of the reigning monarch of Alderaan. Killing him without pretty serious evidence of wrong-doing could be a majorly bad political move for Palpatine. He also likely believes that, even if Bail IS working with the Rebellion, he's not that big of a threat. Why expend effort on killing someone who's not that big of a threat and when it might cause more people to turn against you for killing a well-liked dude without evidence of wrong-doing? What does Palpatine truly GAIN from this? He ONLY turns on Alderaan after two things happen: first, the Death Star is completed and he has a weapon that he can use to eliminate large swathes of enemies VERY quickly; second, Leia is caught working with the Rebels which implicates the entire royal family. So now not only does Palpatine have evidence of wrong-doing, he also has the means to stop CARING about what people think anyway because the Death Star means he can completely dismantle the ENTIRE SENATE and do whatever he wants to whoever he wants.

Now let's look at the accusation that the Kenobi show contradicts what's stated in ANH. Personally, I don't think it does. I'll grant that it contradicts what's IMPLIED by both ANH and ROTS and what most fans largely had assumed had happened. I'll even grant that the extra meeting during this time period is a little awkward narratively given that Obi-Wan had to win in order to survive at all but he also couldn't kill Anakin and people already had issues with this in ROTS where it's more easily explained away, so it's even harder to buy that Obi-Wan doesn't finish the job in THIS story.

But none of that means that it directly contradicts anything said in ANH. When Anakin first senses Obi-Wan's presence, all he says is he's feeling a presence he hasn't felt since... and then he fades off and never finishes that sentence. What he says during their actual fight is "I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again, at last. The circle is now complete... When I left you, I was but the learner; now I am the master." There's NOTHING specific in this dialogue. The bit about having been a learner when Anakin left is already contradicted by the Prequels anyway since Anakin was technically already Knighted by the time he betrays everyone and joins the Sith and the bit about having "left" Obi-Wan is again contradicted by the Prequels first since their final confrontation has Obi-Wan leave Anakin, not the other way around (unless we count the initial betrayal and joining the Sith as Anakin "leaving" but they see each other after that, so). So anything you could claim the Kenobi show "contradicted" from ANH is something the Prequels already contradicted. Anakin also makes the claim here that he's a "Master" when Anakin is actually a Sith APPRENTICE and he wasn't ever a Jedi Master, either. Anakin is someone who exaggerates and manipulates the truth of things as he wants, so everything he says has to be taken with a grain of salt anyway. He's an unreliable narrator in the extreme.

Which makes it pretty easy to just say, "Well Anakin's lying about shit because this is what he wants to believe even if it isn't true." Sure, it doesn't match with the Kenobi show, but it doesn't match the Prequels either, so unless you're about to tell me that we have to toss out the entire Prequel Trilogy (something we're ALSO not going to agree on), then I think the Kenobi show should be given a pass for this.

Finally, like I said, I DO recognize there's some awkwardness introduced to the narrative in this show. There's weird timing for things, it does go against popular assumptions, etc. But just like a lot of people have done for shows THEY wanted to enjoy, I'm willing to come up with my own headcanons to make the Kenobi show work. I tend to view the Kenobi show as more of a character exploration via metaphor than a straightforward narrative. This show and the story it's telling are SO laser-focused on Obi-Wan's journey towards reclaiming his Jedi identity that it occasionally has to do some odd things to make the narrative fall into place to allow that journey to happen in exactly the way they want it. The plot came second to the character in this case (the opposite of the Ahsoka show where the plot is very basic and straightforward but the characters were completely left by the wayside which leaves the narrative an incomprehensible mess anyway; give me more shows with flaws like the Kenobi show over shows like the Ahsoka show ANY DAY). Whenever I recommend this show to people I tell them to focus on the character journey Obi-Wan goes on and to view the show more metaphorically than literally. It works for some people, it doesn't for others.

My personal favorite headcanon for the Kenobi show is that it's a representation of Obi-Wan's personal Force Ghost test, not unlike the one we know Yoda had in TCW season 6. In that, he's sent to several different places, some real and some not, in order to face different things he has to overcome before the Force decides he's ready to learn this skill. Sometimes he's led by a specific person through the test, sometimes he's not. This isn't ENTIRELY dissimilar to what happens to Obi-Wan in the Kenobi show where he keeps bouncing to different places and being guided by different characters towards the one major thing he has to face and overcome. And while Anakin's dialogue after the mask is sliced off doesn't make a TON of sense to me as something Anakin would actually say, it works for me as something that Obi-Wan has thought about HIMSELF. Anakin isn't really Anakin here, he's a manifestation of all of Obi-Wan's pain and fears and doubts. Anakin saying that he's not Obi-Wan's failure is something the real Anakin would NEVER say (except as a way to keep separating himself from the atrocities he's done), but it IS something Obi-Wan would need to come to accept. And who better for that lesson to come from than the face of the person who betrayed him, the person who destroyed his universe.

Much like Yoda's journey took him to both real places and some that seem somewhat less real, Obi-Wan's journey could be a mixture of both real events AND some things that are a little more metaphysical. The final confrontation on that moon could perhaps be one of those metaphysical things. He's drawn to that moon and it does work to draw the Empire away from the refugees, but it's not really Anakin he sees down there or something. Does anything in the show support this? No, of course not. But nothing really makes it impossible for it to be true, either. It makes things work better for me, something I'm willing to do because there's a LOT about this show that really really fucking works for me already, so I'm willing to put in a little extra effort to smooth over the things that don't work as well into something else. If you don't like the show enough to do that work, that's fine. But then I'm not the person to come venting to about it.

[fantasyinvader]

I was thinking some more and I've come to a conclusion.Dimitri and Claude aren't meant to be good guys without Byleth, but this couldn't really come across due to cultural differences. The big thing is that they aren't benevolent.

Dimitri is seeking to avenge the fallen, will even leave part of his country in the hands of the Empire in order to make a death march towards Edelgard, making it clear that he will use those who are following them. He may slay Imperials who occupy his lands, but he's not rallying the people in resistence. He's just killing people and those around him are just blindly following him. At Gronder, he's willing to kill Alliance soldiers just because they're between him and Edelgard.

Claude, meanwhile, has earned the name Tabletop Demon (in the Japanese) over his attempts to use the Alliance's politics to keep it together. In Snow, he has the Church retake the bridge and suffer heavy casualties so he can then launch a sneak attack on Edelgard. He didn't help the Church out of the goodness of his heart, nor is he standing up to what Edelgard is doing despite being anti-Empire, which in turn undermines his ideals. At Gronder, he says the Alliance will crush anyone who isn't an ally to them because it's a struggle to target the "right" one. But at the same time, when Dimitri tells Claude to move Claude refuses to budge and when Byleth fights Claude he questions why they are fighting if the Empire is the Byleth's enemy yet Claude can be the one to attack the Kingdom forces first.

I think with this in mind, Gronder is a case where none of the lords are meant to be a hero. Edelgard will crush anyone who opposes her. Dimitri those who stand in his way, Claude anyone not an ally. It's only afterwards, thanks to the support of Byleth and the Church, does Dimitri and Claude start to move towards being a hero. Dimitri lets go of his misguided beliefs after Rodrigue dies, Claude gets an example of hatred destroying someone. With Byleth not there, the three countries all exhaust their strength thanks to the flaws of each leader.

But Claude doesn't do anything too villainous otherwise, even reforms in Moon, and it's hard not to see Dimitri in a better light in the face of the oppression Edelgard brings. They don't look like the bad guys when compared to her, and I think that might be where some of the issues of the translation came from. Rather than trying to get across that they weren't heroes before Gronder, they instead tried to make Edelgard appear more heroic at the cost of Byleth and the Church faction, the real good guys of the game.

And since I'm on the subject, comparing Houses to Three Kingdoms, I can't help but feel that the Church faction is meant to address the flaws of each of the Three Kingdoms that led to their downfalls. In the book, Kong Ming calls out those who serve Cao Cao. Despite his talk of meritocracy and handing out positions, those officials look away from the man's immoral nature. In Houses, the Imperial students (alongside Hanneman and Manuela) reject Edelgard when recruited because of the immoral acts performed for her benefit during White Clouds. Part of the reason Shu falls is that it's officers were blindly loyal to their leader even when he was an idiot or lost sight of his duties while seeking revenge. Recruited Lions don't blindly follow Dimitri to their deaths, never mind turning themselves into Crest Beasts. Meanwhile, Wu putting emphasis on lineage ends with a tyrant on the throne after the likes of Sun Ce, whose hatred towards Taoism leads to his death, and the ambitious Sun Quan, who wanted Wu to be an independent nation rather than bowing to the Emperor. Recruited Deer don't follow a leader just because of his lineage putting him in charge of the country, nor do they have reason to let hatred towards the Church stop them from fighting Edelgard or support his ambition. It still makes them being recruited to other Houses a good thing when that leader undergoes development, but it still treats joining Edelgard as a bad thing because she doesn't stop being immoral.

[cryo-lily]

For the swtor ask game 3, 17, 26 & 34 for Issie!

Thank you Thank you for the ask! [ask prompt]

(Adding a read more because I got carried away with some of the answers)

3. Do they fit in with their faction or were they sort of born into it?

Honestly? Not really. Isadola was born to an exiled/former sith lord and rouge cipher agent, in neutral space. Only to be eventually found by the republic after the latter tried (and succeeded) to kill the former due to some old grudges. So Issie is almost literally a daughter of Imperials found by the republic and taken in by the republic by sheer chance they found her first after her mother's death. She survived and lived in the republic for decades but never really felt she belonged anywhere amongst the republic anywhere she went.

For Issie's Sith AU; it's not too much different for Issie (or Atteia as she took on a different name) where the Empire found her first instead of the republic. Different timelines, same result more or less. Except Issie tried to make herself belong even if it meant suppressing a lot of herself to do so and losing parts of herself along the way that took her a long time to regain when she eventually left the empire. Like mother like daughter on that account huh?

17. Do they have family? Silbings, parents, children?

Yes she does! Her mother is Tilera Colet Shir (said former sith lord), and Donovan Teiner (The former cipher agent gone rouge due to his own ambitions). That dynamic is a whole other rabbithole, but to sum it up, Donovan views Issie as a mistake that needs to rectified (for the mere crime of existing outside of his sphere of control). And Tilera viewed her as more or less a blessing after everything she's done, "A light born from my darkness" as she used to say in confidence to her droid R3-M1.

No siblings, maybe a few half-siblings that share their father's distaste of their half-sister (haven't too far in writing Issie's personal arc that starts when the Nul plot ends to name them or flesh them out more beyond their existence).

She does have (or eventually has) children, at least when this whole Nul plot ends anyway, with her wife Lana. They eventually have 3 biological daughters (little human/miraluka hybrids), and adopted another. First born was/is Kelsa Tilera (named after both of her grandmothers), then a month or two after she was born Issie & Lana ended up adopting an orphaned (force sensitive) chiss girl, Orla Cevrus, that had stowed away on an Alliance supply ship and ended up more or less on their doorstep to only then quickly steal their hearts. A few years after that they later rounded out their chaotic brood with Katarina Lina and Anira Candora

So their order, by age at least, would be Orla, then Kelsa, then Katarina, then Anira being the baby of her sisters. They were all given Lana's surname, as Issie didn't want them to bear the stigma that came with her surname.

26. Do they have any vices?

Oh boy does she! I mean... Yes she does. Issie is hot mess before she slowly starts to clean up her act. One that hasn't changed is she 100% drinks. She used to use some illicit substances and smoke, which she slowly began to give up as her personal life began to stabilize, which now is a once in a blue moon kinda thing.

Before when meditation wasn't really working for her she would turn to such in a heartbeat for some stress relief or to take her mind off of things. Now during her Alliance days, she's picked up some healthier habits, but when her old childhood friend turned smuggler throws some wild parties... well... she still likes to enjoy herself. That's not crime right?

34. Any major flaws?

To be honest? Only one comes to mind. Which is the attachments Issie develops with those closest to her. It's one of the reasons she started to drift away from the Jedi order the closer KOTFE rolled around, and she eventually left the order. Issie lost almost everything in her life before the Jedi found her, she doesn't want to repeat that past of hers again. She watched her family droid, R3-M1, fatally throwing his self at the pirates attacking their village to allow Tilera & her to escape, only to then watch her mother die at her father's hands (if by proxy) after rescuing and protecting her in their escape attempt from the same pirates a few days later.

Issie can't handle going through that loss again, especially not with those that have managed to get past the walls, masks, and facades she's built up over the years. So it's one of the reasons she throws herself into danger to even at least try to protect the ones she loves. Whether she's learned the right lessons from it all is still very much in the air before she gets closure on that chapter of her early life.

Heck it's probably one of the reasons Issie sustained the latest major injury that she has. Just before the Nul plot starts during a mission that went to hell, Issie, in probably an desperate act of protection or reflex, pushed Lana out of the way of an attack that led to Issie breaking her spine. Issie had for a couple of months lost the ability to walk before her new spinal implant was able to take, and recovery was tough as some of the very same of those closest to her had to help her out of her own head to begin to recover properly. Now she partially wears the new outfit she does to hide the spinal implant and back brace she wears.

She's still yet to confront the very issue that causes her to throw herself aimlessly in harms way for everyone close to her.

[jyndor]

i see cassian getting bix out the torture chamber not being just romantic in nature but to show what kinds violence the empire inflicts on people like torture and the long term effects of it and that you can choose to not leave people behind, even in a dangerous rebellion. at that point bix was very broken and barely holding it together. the riot allowed someone to get her out, naturally that person would be cassian but it could have been the guy that hit the fascist with maarva’s brick if things had been different. i guess its more merciful than luthen’s approach to kill cassian because he knows too much and better than just leaving bix there. cass already feels guilty for ‘leaving’ maarva. i see more layers than romance there but i don’t see romance as a motivation first although its probably a factor but not as much of a pressing one

YES. cassian is someone who doesn't want to leave people behind, especially not people he loves. in his mind, he's left his sister, left maarva, left bix to get tortured - and also she does make some comments throughout the show that give me the impression that him leaving her to do other shit, putting other things ahead of her, is a sticking point for why their relationship hasn't worked. but he doesn't want to leave people behind.

yeah I mean I think they obviously love each other (and I think it's possible, like adria said in an interview, that if timing were better they could be "meant to be" in the sense that they end up reconciling and working things out as adults. it's not in the cards though) but it's a matter of what kind of love - is it romantic love? to some extent yes clearly, is it platonic? partly. they are friends, they are close, they love each other. is him rescuing her romantic? I mean it's a CLEAR reference to him saving jyn on scarif (or perhaps jedha) and also the way he carries her is very much like how jyn carries him to the beach on scarif. there have been similar shots of bix and cassian and jyn and cassian throughout the show. that's not a coincidence.

but also cassian saves bix because cassian is that person. he goes back for the people he cares about. he IS a hero.

i do think it's also meant to juxtapose cassian's actions and luthen's. i'm beginning to think that luthen in many ways might be a potential PATH that cassian might have taken: cold, bitter, alone - but always in service of the cause. the differences are significant - cassian inspires without intending to be (think of kino and jyn but also nemik), luthen motivates others with resignation (lonni and vel). they're both reluctant to kill allies (luthen clearly doesn't want to have cassian murdered but he absolutely is willing to do it; cassian's face after killing tivik says everything we need to know about how he feels in that moment) even if they are ruthless. they, like saw, have clarity of purpose and can use their judgment if their plans are flawed.

cassian actively saves bix; luthen is found by cassian, and given the choice between killing cassian or taking him on (thus saving him in a sense) he chooses to bring cassian into the fold. in that moment, cassian unintentionally brings out the best in luthen - and we see that in the first honest smile on luthen's face in the entire show.

you've got a role reversal - cassian gives luthen the order to choose life or death, give the cause an asset like cassian or tie up that loose end and kill him.

which makes me think about what their relationship will become in season two. what cassian will become in season two. and to tie it back to your ask, what that means for bix and brasso and the rest of the ferrix crew.

knowing they are not likely to make it through the season because cassian HAS to lose everything (all of his old lives) by rogue one, I have a feeling that cassian won't just lose everything. he might have to make choices that could cost him everything. cassian isn't luthen, but he is cinta. cinta, who is kind to the dray and shares a blanket with vel because she loves her but also always, always puts the rebellion first.

I hope that bix is able to have some agency in s2 and I hope even more that she lives but I think that scene really did mirror scarif. where jyn and cassian died. that cassian has basically damned them with the climb word and also idk that ending had my tragedy senses tingling - not that they won't arrive to their destination or die offscreen like that ugh but that cassian won't see them again.

[doodlegirl1998]

Also we talked about Stain and the many what ifs...and well, UA and heroes seem to think "my fellow hero can do no wrong" ok hear me out.

An au where Stain is not the killer. The killer is a random hero ... and Izu sees how heroes change their tone "he needs help" and such...Stain who was accused unfairly has his name clean and is pissed...only Izu believed in his innocence and proved it.

Izu is not happy seeing such corruption or having to face how flawed the hero system is. (This feels more scarily realistic than..."hc has assassians who kill who they want" is a good idea but horrible execution as I dont know who Lady Nagant killed or why)

Hi @mikeellee 👋,

This is a version of Stain that I could get behind because he was unfairly accused of being a killer and slandered when he spoke out against it.

Also Nagant (while I like her) doesn't fit in with MHA as a whole because her plot took up, seemingly, what was meant to be Hawks's with Twice.

So who did Nagant kill?

Why did she killed them bar being on the HPSC say so?

Who cares... not Hori that's for sure.

What kills me about this is that Nagant and Hawks together could have worked. If he had made Nagant important to him - have them know and care for each other.

Not only that have Nagant help All Might destroy AFO's empire before All Might got that devastating injury - that would have made those villains deaths have narrative wieght. And it would have gave her another connection to a character that we like to make her seen more like she belongs in the story.

[denimsnake]

star wars stream-of-consciousness abandon hope ye who enter

the live action shows (namely the mandalorian s3 + ahsoka) establishing the beginning of the first order has me thinking about how they COULD have made a statement about fascism in the sequel trilogy wrt fascists idealizing a mythologized past that in reality sucked shit for almost everybody involved what with their use of shitty TIE fighters when the far superior TIE interceptors had been in use in the empire since episode 6. but instead for some reason (read: nostalgia bait) the resistance also uses old-ass starfighters (canonically the x-wings have been updated somehow but they look exactly the same) plus bombers that have been old as balls for decades (rebels saying y-wings were ready for the scrapheap 4[?] years before the battle of yavin) and i know that old in-universe explanation of "the new republic didnt take the first order seriously & demilitarized & the resistance couldnt get good ships yadda yadda" but 1) the movies could've chosen to show us literally any of the new republic aside from the capital getting blown to shit and 2) . i don't actually have a second point. my only point is maybe they could've shown cool new republic ships to contrast them with the relatively ill-equipped resistance? maybe? (also ahsoka shows us new republic pilots flying e-wings years and years before the sequel movies take place. those are from the EU so still a kind of nostalgia bait but at least they're evidence of some kind of progress).

anyway my main issue is actually that the first order is the only faction to progress technologically at all? despite being formed from imperial remnants that shouldn't have the resources to do this, they have a powerful manufacturing base churning out shitty little TIEs, but also actually innovative ships like the resurgent-class star destroyer, which fixes the glaring flaws of the imperial star destroyers (the command bridge being a giant target sticking straight out into space + not enough hangars providing starfighter support). episode 9 has the TIE whisper i think but i'm honestly not sure if that was mass-produced or just for kyle. my memories of that movie are..hazy. but if we take into account the resistance cartoon then they also innovated the TIE baron which vastly improves upon even the TIE interceptor.

they also managed to turn an entire planet into a weapon capable of destroying several planets at once right under the new republic's nose. but the planet was full of kyber crystals for storing/focusing energy and the empire already dug that giant trench so then it's, just, like, constructing the cannon and some other random shit i guess? only time checking wookieepedia for this whole post is because i forgot what starkiller base looked like. can i just say it's so funny that they managed some kind of an explanation for why it looked the way it did in the movie:

i love science fiction. anyway. can't believe i'm saying this but starkiller is one of the least far-fetched things about the sequels. i'm happy with the novelization's explanation of it i'm not a physicist i don't give a fuck. i think if this was, like, the only project they were working on then they could pull together the resources for it. i do wonder how they got materials there without being flagged by some kind of authority but ilum was in the unknown regions so if they just sourced that shit locally maybe it's feasible given the amount of time they had. it's not innovative because it's just the death star 3.0 but i'll grant it is maybe possible. i am going to ignore their apparent ability to manufacture a whole fleet of star destroyers with death star-level cannons because that was stupid LMAO. but i guess that happened also even though i forgot about it until literally just now. it supports my argument that the first order's manufacturing capacity doesn't make any sense but i'm honorable enough not to hinge my argument on it because of how stupid it is. i watched the sequel trilogy but i don't believe in its beliefs.

moving on. jj abram's quote about the inspiration for the first order being like "what if nazis who fled to argentina regrouped and rose to power again?" is SO telling because first of all he doesn't seem to understand that the empire of the original trilogy -- while aesthetically based on the nazis -- was substantially based on many imperial powers, including the united states of america. and second of all very clearly he believes the myth that the nazis were technologically superior to the allies, that the allies just barely won the war, etc. the fact that the first order are the only bitches doing anything even remotely new also tells me he & many other people who worked on the sequels don't understand fascism. or symbolism. but whatever. watch andor.

[koolkat9]

CanLiet (Hws Canada x Hws Lithuania) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45.

1.How do they fall asleep? Wake up? Any daily rituals?

They fall asleep cuddled up together. Usually Matt is the big spoon, completely encasing Tolys in a warm embrace.

They wake up nice and slow, laying in bed for a few minutes, cuddling before going down for breakfast and coffee.

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2. How’s their team work? Do they share well?

Pretty good. Both are very polite, patient and like to avoid conflict so they work pretty well together.

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3. Are they open about their relationship? How do they feel about public displays of affection?

Yeah. Matt is big on affection so there wasn't really keeping it a secret. They're chill with public displays of affection.

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4. First impression of each other? Was it love at first sight?

I haven't really thought about this relationship so I'm not sure. And I'm not really aware of any history between the two.

So they probably met at world meetings, though outside of business they didn't really know each other until Tolys was working at Alfred's.

No it wasn't love at first sight. Though while Tolys was at Alfred's Matthew and him probably became friends because they are very similar personality wise and slowly they caught feelings.

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5. Nicknames? Pet names? Any in-jokes?

Matt usually uses babe, sweet heart, dear

Tolys isn't the biggest on nicknames but he'd probably say terms of endearment like "dear" in Lithuanian.

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6. Any tasks that are always left to one person?

Matt usually cooks because he loves cooking, so Tolys will do the dishes in return.

Also Tolys is in charge of coffee. He just does something special to it that no one can recreate.

Other than that, I'd think they'd switch tasks.

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7. What annoys them the most about their partner? Would they change it if they could?

Both are annoyed that the other can't properly set boundaries. They'll let people walk all over themselves, but as soon as they see that happening to their partner they are peeved. But because they share this flaw they're more sympathetic to each other. Though they'd like it to change both in each other and themselves, they know it's not that easy.

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8. What do the like best about their partner?

Tolys loves Matthew's gentleness. Despite the burdens of nationhood, Matthew is still gentle and wears his heart on his sleeve. He knows Matthew can be dangerous, he heard the things Matthew did during the world wars, but he loves that Matthew chooses to be gentle when he's given the choice even if cruelty and violence would be easier.

Matthew loves the hidden strength of Tolys. He may look like a ball of anxiety now, but Matthew knows he can be fierce and when that leaks through it makes Matt weak in the knees.

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9. Do they discuss big issues? Religion? Marriage? Children? Death?

The relationship is too new to consider marriage. And their nations so children aren't really an option. Though Matt has the Aerican Empire which could be like his kid, but he's on the older end of micronations so e doesn't need Matt as much anymore.

Religion doesn't really come up in conversation. They may occasionally share beliefs/world views like Matthew explaining to Tolys certain aspects of Indigenous spirituality, but other than that, it's not a huge topic.

As nations they don't have to worry about death as much. And Matt being such a young nation he hasn't experienced nation death as much as Tolys has. And like half the times he did, he's too young to remember. But Tolys sometimes worries that Matt may die, or that he may die, but they've promised to stay by each other as the other healed if that ever happened.

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10. Who drives? Cooks? Does the handiwork? Cleans? Pays the bills? Handles the public?

If they're in North America and the UK, Matt will drive while Tolys will usually drive if they're in the rest of Europe. Both are good at handiwork so it all depends. Matt is the primary cook. They both clean, though Tolys does it a bit more thoroughly because of his time as a housekeeper. Their nations so they don't really pay bills like humans. And they would both have to "handle the public".

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11. Do they celebrate holidays? Anniversaries?

Oh definitely. Christmas is the biggest holiday and the definetly ensure they can get together to celebrate. Same with birthdays. They usually spend New Years together too as Al always throws a big party for all the nations.

They celebrate the anniversary of when they first got together.

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12. Is there a wedding? What was the proposal like? Any kind of honeymoon?

The relationship is too new to be considering marriage or a proposal. But they'd go up North to Matt's cottage for their honeymoon if they were to get married.

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13. What do they do for fun? Do they have a favorite activity or do they like to switch things up?

They have a few activities they love. They love watching tv cuddled up or reading cuddled up. They like hiking (especially Matt), spending time with their pets together, and yeah.

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14. Anything they both dread?

They both dread conflict

Matthew dreads public speaking though he can do it well we need be.

Tolys dreads going to meetings and just loud places in general.

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15. How adventurous are they?

Matthew is a little more adventurous than Tolys. Both are more than content staying at home, but Matthew needs to get out into the woods every now and then for a hike and Tolys will come to keep him company.

16. Do they keep secrets? Lie? Cheat?

Both are pretty honest with each other. There are the white lies of course, but nothing major.

18. What are their dates like? How long do/did they date? Do they ever feel the need to take a break from each other?

Pretty chill. Usually simple ones at home or outdoors at a park. Casual dinning dates. But occasionally Mattie will want to do something a little fancier and take him to a nice dinner or out dancing.

---

19. What do they fight about? What are their arguments like? How do they make up?

They don't really fight since they're so patient. But I think sometimes they may have a slight argument about the other not setting proper boundaries and people are walking all over them. But it usually doesn't get too bad and they'll make up with a nice relaxing date night.

20. What does their home look like? Their room?

Well they live in separate homes. But they'll keep clothes and certain objects belonging to them at the other's house. Doesn't exactly answer the question but I don't really know how to answer this when they don't live together.

21. Do they share any interests or hobbies?

They both appreciate nature though Matthew likes to engage with it more physically compared to Tolys.

They probably both enjoy reading.

Um...I can see them doing puzzles together tbh

---

22. Does their work ever interfere with the relationship?

All the time. They're nations so they can't have a normal relationship. Work and their people come first. They can't marry or even move in together permanently because of their positions of nations. That does make them feel sad sometimes and makes them feel distant from each other sometimes, but it doesn't ever come close to breaking them.

---

23. How do they hug? Kiss? Tease? Flirt? Comfort?

Matthew gives big bear hugs and will just rest his head on Toly's shoulder and cuddle him. He uses a mixture of physical affection and charming words, but he much prefers getting physical when flirting and comforting. He kisses gently but still sensually. It makes most of his partners feel so important.

Tolys is much softer and loose in his embraces, and also kisses gently but lovingly. He flirts through acts of service and physical touch. And he comforts with touches and preparing Matt a warm beverage

Neither really tease so idk know about that.

---

24. Any doubts about the relationship?

Not that I can think of.

---

26. How do their friends feel about their relationship? Their families?

They're pretty cool with it. Arthur canonically seemed to have a good relationship with Tolys at least in the 1920s so he's super chill about it. Francis is just happy Mattie has found someone.

---

28. What are their vacations like?

Mainly they go somewhere where they can relax. Usually up North in Canada to Matt's cottage in the middle of the woods.

---

29. How do the handle disasters or emergencies? Minor injuries? Sickness?

30. Could they manage a long distance relationship?

They kind of have to as nations especially since they're on two different continents.

---

31. Do they finish each other’s sentences? Pick up any phrases or habits from each other? Know when the other is hiding something?

32. Do they ever get into trouble? Is it serious, or are they just mischievous?

33. What kind of presents do they get each other? Do they only do it on special occasions?

---

34. Do they have any pets?

Yes. Tolys has a wolf that he calls a dog. And Matt has made his house basically a small rehabilitation center for wildlife. Some of the animals are too injured to be released back into the wild and through this he's brought in a goose, a beaver, a cayote, an owl and a few other kinds of birds. His more offical pets includes a few chickens because he loved helping Arthur with his and Newfoundland and a Samoyed.

---

36. What’s their greatest strength as a couple? Their weakness?

There strength and weakness is the same. They're so similar. Both introverted, anxious, people pleasers. Sometimes its great because they can understand each other's struggles, give advice they found helpful and also start to change things like negative self talk when they comfort the other for similar insecurities.

But they are also so similar that sometimes their flaws get in the way. They're both people who often let people walk all over them because they don't know when to say no or when they're stretching themselves too thin. So their might be an issue in the relationship, but they're too worried to upset the other that they hide their concerns until they get too big and they're forced to face it.

Additionally, though sometimes having similar struggles is able to help them heal together, there is also the rare occasion that their frustrations with their own flaws get projected onto the other. But luckily they're both patient individuals so it rarely comes to that.

---

37. How much would they be willing to sacrifice for the other? Any lines they refuse to cross?

I think they'd risk a lot. But as nations they can't sacrifice their duty to their people or their people's safety.

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39. Who initiated the relationship? Who kissed who first?  When did they realize they were in love?

Probably Matt initiated the relationship because he's quite skilled in romance. But I think Tolys kissed him first because Mattie didn't want to cross any of Tolys's boundaries.

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40. Any special memories? Do they have a special place they like to go to?

They like going to Matt's cottage because it's quiet and secluded.

Again I don't think about these two much so I don't have many memoires, but maybe getting to know each other during the 20s when Tolys was living at Al's. Their first kiss of course which happened when Matt dropped Tolys off at his hotel before they parted for the night. But that's all I got.

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41. Are they party-goers? What are they like when they’re drunk? Does it happen often?

Neither are much for partying so they avoid it when they can. Matt is kind of emotional and a bit whiney when drunk, but I don't know about Tolys.

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42. Do they let each other get away with things that would normally bother them?

It takes a lot to bother them and they're people pleasers so I think they rarely do something that bothers the other. So Idk.

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43. Do they talk often? What about?

They are content to just lay with each other without words. They don't need words when with each other. But they talk sometimes. About their day, perhaps memories if something triggers it, future plans. Really whatever comes to mind.

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44. Are the comfortable with each other? Anything they have to have their privacy for?

They're very comfortable with each other. But sometimes Tolys does need some space due to some traumatic experiences. Matt can still be around him, but physical affection is a no go.

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45. Any special dreams or goals they have as a couple? Any heartbreaks? Regrets?

They're old so there has been many heartbreaks, many regrets as they learn to embrace their humanity. It's hard to have goals as a couple because nations can't have relationships exactly like humans so their main goal is just to stay together as long as possible I guess...

[cthulhubert]

Alan Dean Foster's "Journeys of the Catechist" was a formative book series for young me. The main character, Ehomba, a diligent shepherd and sage, was directly inspirational. I think I read it when I was 16, so more than half my life ago (sits down dizzy with that realization).

It also stands out in my memories because it had a much more folkloric tone than most of the fantasy books I'd read around then.

I've had... mixed results on rereading books I loved when I was young (ditto watching shows etc). But I decided I might as well bite the bullet, see what new things I could spot.

Thankfully, this one was still good. Well. It had its flaws, but they were ones I recognized back then. The big one is that it... honestly maybe should've been condensed to one book. By the end of Carnivores of Light and Darkness, you've seen most of Foster's good ideas, so Into the Thinking Kingdoms and Triumph of Souls felt repetitive.

Spoilers:

A small handful of things I'd glossed over before stuck out to me. More women hit on Ehomba than I'd realized, and he briefly considers cheating with one before choosing not to.

Unlike most of the fantasy books I read around then, Catchist had no map. And the book is never explicit about this one, so it was fun to realize that the setting is, in fact, a parallel, or possibly future Earth. Ehomba starts his journey somewhere in Africa, crosses the Sahara and the Mediterranean, travels through the Iberian peninsula, and crosses the ocean to the Americas and travels there. I'd realized this in my first read through, actually. But it was neat to see it hold up. Can't give my past self too many points, because parallel or future post-apocalypse, or some mythological pseudo-past Earth was a really common fantasy trope in the late 80s through the 90s.

His swashbuckling rogue side kick was stupider than I remembered.

One of the things I really loved about the series was the ending. The whole series is because Ehomba has taken on the task of a dying knight who washed ashore near his village: to secure the return of a princess, kidnapped to become the bride of an evil sorcerer emperor across the sea. The twist is that once he gets there, she doesn't want to return! She's fallen in love with the evil emperor, and wants to stay. Unfortunately, says Ehomba, my mission isn't do what you want, it's get you home, and the mission is what I have sworn to do. So he counter-kidnaps her, drags her back to her people. Then, obviously, since this is a dick move, he re-anti-counter-kidnaps her and they adventure back to the empire where he drops her off before heading home.

Here's the biggest one I missed in my initial read through. I remembered her saying that she'd realized the emperor's virtue one day. She'd discovered that he was some other, highly discriminated against race (I read it as something like a neanderthal with stubby legs), constantly wearing armor to hide it. Somehow I'd come to an interpretation that he was actually a good guy but playing the role of a harsh ruler to get his people to work together. That "evil" was mostly propaganda.

NOPE. The man is vile. He visits a fate worse than death on a servant for dropping one of his plates. He spends large amounts of his kingdoms wealth on frivolous entertainments for himself. The thing that had been clearly written between the lines, that young me still missed? The princess has a fetish for his people. She is almost sweating when she talks about his "virtue". That's the reason she wants to stay. She gets hornt up for the protruding brow ridge.

(No idea where this one came from, but somehow I'd even remembered thinking that he didn't have much magic, that that was all showmanship to mislead people. But no, he's turning people into living furniture with a wave of his hand.)

Honestly, this revelation is even more in line with some of the themes of the book. He has an almost daoist attitude. Ehomba isn't out there to fix everyone's problems. He's not gonna defeat the evil emperor. Sure he'll extend a helping hand if it's on the way (a favorite memory was him giving a doll to a little girl who's been kicked out of her home by a sheriff of Nottingham type; who realizes the doll is special and steals it; the doll kills him that night). But undertaking his chosen burden is what's really important to him.

I also need to reiterate how dumb the swashbuckling rogue sidekick is. He asks, one last time, if Ehomba isn't really a wizard. Ehomba, having solved 95% of their problems with tools he mentions were given to him by his fellow villagers: "I promise you. I am no more a wizard than anybody in my village." That night he initiates his son into adulthood, taking him to the special cave where his people store their lost knowledge of magic on books with pages of carved ruby.

[almoststedytimetravel]

Am I allowed to say that I don't like three houses? Because I don't. It's boring and not fun.

People have told me that Fódlan has interesting and in depth world building but it's presented in a way that's so boring that I just don't care. I think the most interesting way any world building was presented was the the three hopes Ignatz-Slyvain support where they examine an old painting of a previous archbishop and one of them makes an off hand comment about how it looks like Rhea. Nothing is stated outright but the player can pretty easily figure out what's going on here. But most of the world building is just text in the libraries. The world building of places outside of Fódlan is also really messy. Like supposedly the church has been suppressing technological development but if that were the case why aren't countries like Almyra, Sreng, Bridged, Dagda etc. just dogpiling Fódlan? They should be able to easily defeat the countries in Fódlan but they just don't. The Alliance is able to stop Almyran incursions at Fódlan's throat, the kingdom defends themselves from Sreng without much issue, and the empire won a war against Bridget and took Petra hostage. Like the alliance and kingdom at least have a few of the heroes relics that they can hide behind but the empire has none, Amyr was made by TWSITD and the other imperial house holds don't have a relic for their crests.

Even if the outside world wasn't that much more advanced then Fódlan, why wouldn't the underground society of "We Hate Fódlan" who have magic nuclear bombs not arm the countries outside of Fódlan? TWSITD are such a stupid set of bad guys they are actually so, so, so dumb. They could have been a set of bad guys for the three leaders to rally around because as we see in the 3 hopes durring chapter; "The Girl Gang Goes to Zaharas" they all agree on what the problems in Fódlan are and they have some common ground on how they think it can be fixed. Claude and Dimitri both want to end Fódlan's isolation, Edelgard and Claude both think the churches influence needs to be curtailed, all three of them know that the crest system is a problem. They're three characters who agree on a lot but their circumstances pit them against each other. If only there was a group who was threat to all of them to force them together and have them come to some sort of understanding.

And Byleth, oh Byleth. Byleth is the most "Avatar" avatar character bar Mark fe7. They had an actually interesting arc set up them, a player character who starts off as a silent protagonist but as the story goes on they disconnect themself from the player's control and voice and gain agency, becoming their own person seperate from what the people around them wish for them to be for their own personal gain. This arc starts after Jeralt's death, with them absorbing Sothis' power and erasing their contiousness from their head. Them sitting on the throne and nothing happening and then it just... Doesn't go further. They don't get their own voice, the player still has influence on what they say and how they react. They don't show much more emotion. They never complete the obvious arc set up for them, they just stop developing mid way through.

I'd also talk about it's game play flaws but those have been hammered into the ground. 3 houses is not a great fe game game play wise.