#of how people grapple with that

[onewomancitadel]

Best Mate and I were discussing Paul Atreides (as you do) and the point she expertly made really is that the Greek tragedy is quite structurally foreign now. The pathos and unfairness you're meant to feel for someone who is a victim and perpetrator of the tragic cycle is read as like, misdeveloped character, rather than a feeling to engage with and derive catharsis from.

Why is it unfair? Why does it hurt so much? It's not about what they could've done, it's not a tragedy that you could change by not being an idiot or by making a better decision here or there, it's something more essential than that. I think that's part of the modern misdirection (in say, mainstream media) because the fault line isn't one decision or one slip of bad writing.

In some ways it feels like a personal betrayal narratively.

[astraystayyh]

this post actually broke my heart.

[starry-bi-sky]

Blood Blossom Au: Baby's First Commissioner Meeting :)

TL:DR This Post: Danny (orphan) gets poisoned with blood blossom extract by Vlad. He runs away from him and ends up under the care of one Pre-Robin Battinson Batman! Starry is loudly pushing her batdad agenda.

(Also known as "Late At Night, When The Nightingale Sings" on my ao3!)

This was a fun rough idea I've been sitting on for weeks, thinking about how Commissioner Gordon and Nightingale's first meeting might go.

---------------

Commissioner Gordon likes to think that he's adjusting to the new normal of Gotham very well, -- the new normal being grown men running around dressed like bats, in military-grade strength body armor, committing acts of vigilantism, -- and slowly, little by little, he was no longer being surprised when this new normal pops up out of the shadows like the world's most terrifying daisy. His shaving lifespan thanks him for it.

....

The kid is a surprise though.

Granted, he seemed to be a surprise to the Bat too.

There's been a string of murders lately, -- which, in Gotham, is kind of like saying there's been another storm during monsoon season. And there's just been another; in some dilapidated building down in south Gotham, with the broken, boarded-up windows and mildew-crawling walls to match. The victim is a man in his thirties, multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, left in the center of the room for the blood to pool out around him.

The place is already secured when he arrives, the building swarmed with officers and the forensic detectives. The Bat emerges shortly after he does -- or, he might've been here the whole time, hiding someplace dark and shadowy. For his own sanity, Gordon doesn't think about it too hard.

The kid is a surprise, and he appears like a bolt of lightning.

He shows up in the middle of a conversation Gordon is having with the Bat.

A whistle, sharp and loud, slicing through the air, meant for open air rather than a confined space. Gordon's ears pierce and protest the sound, and the solemn, murmured chatter floating through the room abruptly cuts off like the swing of a gavel. As he turns towards the sound -- as they all do -- he swears, up and down, that he sees Batman's shoulders jump, just slightly.

At the source, perched on the window, is a boy. A boy in a gray-blue scarf and an oversized black hoodie, one that hangs off his frame and has ace bandages wrapped around the wrists in some attempt to cinch the sleeves. The hood is up, big like the rest of it, and threatens to swallow the upper half of the boy's face whole in the fabric. What upper half Gordon can see, is smeared with some kind of opaque, black face paint. He's holding onto the side of the frame with one hand, on his hip is a grappling hook. A familiar grappling hook.

Gordon has multiple questions, and his officers tense up.

Martinez puffs up, brows furrowing as his face shapes into a frown. Shoulders rolling back. "You can't be here, kid--"

The reaction is immediate, like a spark to gunpowder, the boy yanks his fingers from his mouth and his mouth twists into a scowl. Head snapping over to Officer Martinez, his hood manages to stay on but Gordon swears that as he bares his teeth, the glint makes them look sharper than they should be. His voice is rasp and quiet and harsh; snappish in its hissing; "Put a fuckin sock in it, Martinez. I'm not stayin."

Martinez reels back, and the boy immediately veers his attention off him. Like a switch, his demeanor drops. Despite half his face being covered, his mouth twists into a cringing, apologetic smile. Slanted and off-beat, embarrassed. It'd be disarming if this wasn't Gotham, and if he didn't just hiss at Martinez like he was about to bite his head off.

"Sorry." He whispers, voice deceptively polite and softer now. Gordon has to strain his ears to hear him. "I was looking for him."

He points his finger towards-- Gordon? No, Gordon follows the direction, and finds himself looking at -- the Bat.

The Bat, who always looks stiff as a pole, now looks even stiffer. Somehow. Well, the explains the grappling hook attached to the boy's waist.

"What are you doing here?" The Bat says, gruff and unable to completely smother the stumble of surprise in his tone.

The boy still holds a sheepish smile, and slips off the window ledge. His feet hit the creaky boards with a near-silent thud, the Batman finds his feet and rapidly begins crossing the room.

Gordon notes the slight tremble in the boy's legs as he straightens. He adjusts his scarf, which droops close to his knees now that he's standing, and slings a backpack -- how long has had that? -- off his shoulders. When the Bat reaches his side, he does as he always does, and looms over the boy like a spectre. A threatening mass of shadows cloaked in all-consuming black. Standing next to him, the boy looks teeny in comparison.

The Bat is a man who terrifies even the most hardened criminals, Gordon has seen grown men shiver in fear at the mention of his name. And yet when the boy looks up at him, he doesn't even flinch.

Instead, his sheepish smile melts away like ice under the sun, holding only traces of his previous embarrassment. It remains as a shadow on his face, a small upturn at the corners of his mouth. The boy pushes his hood back just enough to reveal glinting, ice-flint eyes surrounded in tar-black face paint. He holds the backpack up with one arm. "You forgot this."

[factual-flittermouse]

DC confirms that the bat cave is just part of a really huge cave system, and that’s just how Batman gets around without people seeing him. Some people question how nobody else has discovered the batcave if this is true, but it /is/ Gotham - there’s a man eating pseudo crocodile and a zombie in the sewers. Would you risk it?

[laniidae-passerine]

Danver’s specific brand of racism is so intrenched in love it’s fascinating. Her daughter is precious to her and her daughter is Indigenous and in this town, an Indigenous woman is not viewed as a precious thing. They are abused and raped and murdered and therefore, being white is the ‘better’ choice. She is actively whitewashing her daughter, not only because she’s afraid of what she doesn’t understand and because of typical coloniser mentality, but because she doesn’t want to lose her. Danvers can’t distance Indigenous identity from white violence and it’s killing what she loves.

[lindseymcdonaldseyelashes]

Leverage 4x1 - "The Long Way Down Job"

[dykedvonte]

Honestly I see Jimmy's refusal to put Curly out of his misery less about his weird feelings of envy or his delusions but the fact Curly is all but stated to be a shield to Jimmy from his actions and people seeing the worst in him.

The only characters that Jimmy really interacts with one on one before the crash are Curly and Anya, two individuals he has wildly different relationships with. It's likely that Curly really did most of the talking between them as the pilots and the rest of the crew as staff. They didn't know of Jimmy's more reprehensible behaviors cause they never really had the chance to and Jimmy is subconsciously aware. If they had disliked him more than Anya would have told Swansea earlier or even Daisuke when things got really bad.

It's why he takes the immediate opportunity to blame Curly; He's the shield. He's saved Jimmy's ass more times than he can count and more times than Jimmy would ever admit. Even when he can't really do it anymore, he mentally shields himself from his own faults by putting Curly between them. Letting Curly die puts too much on him because he doesn't know how to function without a safety net.

In the end Curly only lives because Jimmy needs the idea that Curly will inevitably make things better to stay alive, meaning Curly has to live, no matter how much it pains him to do so.

[mangotelevision]

I love to think that the real reason the members of the jury have to renounce their family and their past isn't because of some oath they take, no it's because when they take the power of the jury they start to lose who they once were. They forget those that they used to hold dear because of the powers their jury form lends them. They don't intend to forget and it's not instant, it's slow and gradual. Overtime it'll just feel like a dream, becoming unsure if there was anyone ever there to begin with.

This theory very heavily ties back in with Katelyn, why after the Irene dimension she wasn't too quick to go searching for her family, because at that point she had forgotten who they were a long time ago. She's no longer a member of the jury, no longer influenced by this memory fog. But it still lingers, throughout her time with aphmau and laurance she starts to remember little things, she knows there were people, those who she cared about. But she can't remember their names, who they were, who they wanted to be. She remembers feelings. It's why when she talks about her family in the later season she's so inconsistent, because she doesn't remember and it bothers her that she might never remember

[qyburn-in-the-black-cells]

There's so many layers to Ygraine s2e8.

Uther was Arthur's mother's killer, Arthur's father but also Arthur's de facto mother after Ygraine's death.

Meeting Ygraine is the first and only time Arthur gets to see Uther for what he really is - a father and a murderer rather than his whole parental unit wrapped up in one person. For the first and only time, Arthur gets to know his actual origins - he is a creature made of magic. It's what runs through his blood, making him closer to any Druid child massacred on a raid than the knights that he led. It's the first (and arguably the only) time Arthur recognizes he can break away from Uther - and tries to.

Not with a pithy "I am not you, father" or an angry argument on morality but with the rage of the son of a murdered mother - an abused child finally physically and psychologically capable of inflicting violence on their abuser.

To be clear - that's unbelievable and terrifying for anyone with a moderately healthy relationship with their parents.

Merlin sees Arthur's attack on Uther through that lens.

He also sees Arthur as the man who'll evolve into what he thinks the Once and Future King should be - just, kind, merciful, egalitarian, always seeking peace over war, returner of magic.

When Merlin says he didn't stop Arthur for Uther, what he means is he did it for Arthur and the Arthur he is certain will one day exist. Merlin is also more comfortable with lying than being honest. His whole identity has become wrapped up in serving and protecting Arthur - "I was born to be your servant."

Using magic to stop Arthur, an obvious option, would go against both his instinct to lie, save his own life (and protect his identity - which can't risk the ego death that would come from not being Arthur's servant, protector, friend. His unwillingness to alter his relationship with Arthur or see him hurt means in s2e8 Merlin has to cut Arthur's growth off at its knees - change requires some form of suffering and Merlin loves Arthur enough to die for him but not enough to risk the suffering of living without him.

[moltenhair]

"Wait a minute! Aren't you gonna tell me how you did it? That's not fair!"

The Riddler gets arrested, Batman: The Animated Series Ep. "Riddler's Reform"

[the-blackened-pearl]

i finally cracked the code on my person interpretation of jack-elizabeth. allow alder to indulge in a midnight ramble.

for me, it's the metaphor. how elizabeth is constrained by societal rules and regulations, and the INSTANT jack shows up BOOM- she's playing the pirate game now. she's offered a tantalizing glimpse of the thing jack himself embodies- freedom.

we even see that after CotPB, she does not hesitate in using pirate tactics to get what she wants- such as letters of marque for will (aka, freedom-).

which makes elizabeth leave jack to the kraken interesting. she allows freedom embodied to be locked up, and almost instantly joins the team in getting him back.

not to mention that jack is the one who voted her in as King. elizabeth swann has been longing for freedom, and freedom himself grants her power- even over himself, if you will, but that's the thing-

jack's not one to let anybody control him. just like how elizabeth uses the power he gave her against him, he's not going to just accept that he technically answers to someone now.

also that scene in the locker where jack freezes as soon as he sees elizabeth. and immediately scampers over to gibbs, who confirms that yes, this is all real. elizabeth- the one who left him for dead- is real. there's something to be said there about freedom something something i am not able to articulate it atm rip

i'm not into the romantic interpretation of their relationship myself, but i get why people are. me tho i wanna study this weird, wacky, fucked-up friendship under a microscope. for science. it's an aro thing, i suspect.

[gingermintpepper]

I saw it in your tag game post that you're also fond of the Apollo-Heracles conflict 👀 for a myth that appears in only a couple of sources, it sure has a lot of presence in the vase paintings (no seriously, everytime I think I've seen the last of it, I find ten more)

SO do you have any favorites among the paintings that represent this story??

OMG OMG THIS ASK IS A GIFT. IT IS A GIFT THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR LETTING ME TALK ABOUT THIS

I also think it's extremely interesting that it's a story so popularly portrayed by vase paintings and in such a variety of ways!! It's certainly one of the stories that gets left out of written compilation of Heracles' legend a bit (which is a shame, I think it's a fantastic story) but Apollo had a very peculiar relationship with Heracles in general that I just kind of find amazing (and very, very funny).

Apollo is not a god with any legitimate grudge against Heracles, but he does argue with the mortal a bit like he argues with his favourite brothers 😂Part of why I love the story of Apollo and Heracles fighting over the tripod so much is that it is such a little brother thing for Heracles to be upset with the proclamation his elder brother has given him and so, he throws a great fit, taking up the chair and declaring that he'll just give himself a better prophecy! And Apollo, instead of being a marginally professional big brother, decides to fight him for it until their father has to break up their cat-fight. Like was that not just the plot of the Homeric Hymn to Hermes? Is this not exactly how Apollo treated Hermes when he was a child and now those two are inseparable? 💀

Because of this, my favourite vase paintings tend to be the ones that highlight the personal squabbling between Apollo and Heracles the most. There are some very elaborate ones that have the full host of them - Athena, Heracles, Apollo, Artemis, usually a dog and a doe, I've even seen a couple that had birds and plants etched on them, but the simplest ones that show Heracles about to bonk Apollo with his club out of frustration or depict Heracles nyooming away from Apollo while Apollo (presumably) yells curses about how he's going to fling Heracles head first into Tartarus for daring to take his things? Yeah, those are the premium big brother/little brother things I'm looking for.

(Photo. Marie-Lan Ngyuen)

(Photo. Museo Claudio Faina)

Also the one in the Theoi.com archives is a real classic - perfect energy.

[spacedlexi]

so often i see people try to downplay violet and minervas relationship like it wasnt Real enough or was some Inferior Romance that her relationship with clementine could Never compare to, and i find it so annoying and boring

she LOVED minerva!! and its okay that she did!! she was her first love!! childhood best friends turned girlfriends!! seeing her being so heartbroken and miserable about what happened to minnie, how deeply and desperately she missed her, hugging that bed frame so pathetically. but clementine makes her CARE again. makes her LOVE again. slowly violet becomes comfortable with the idea of opening her heart up to people again, after trying so hard not to because the pain of losing people she cared about was too much to bear (especially when she blamed herself for them being gone)

then she learns minnie didnt die. shes falling in love with clem while grappling with the fact that minnie might still be out there??

then she meets minnie in the woods. but minnie has changed just like she has. theyre both different people now. and slowly violet is forced to come to terms with the fact that the person she loved so deeply isnt that person anymore??

violet at the beginning mourning minerva and blaming herself, to shooting her to save clems life. she LOVED minerva once, but she doesnt like the person she is now. and shes not gonna let her hurt anyone else she cares about. shes done mourning her by the time they get to the bridge, only crying out for tenn

like idk i just find their relationship evolution to be so interesting and sad as shit. the fact that they once loved each other so much and it has now come to this?? but violet makes her choice and she Chooses clementine, because she admires and loves clementine, probably similar to the way she used to admire and love minerva if the way she talked about her is any indication

i just think "i never thought i would ever feel this way again" is way more interesting than "wow minnie Never made me feel like This"

[wardensantoineandevka]

[blows a kiss out to sea] for the Mighty Nein pirates arc

[bonefall]

maybe with the ending.. make it be like the link between Breezepelt's leaving to join Kin and his POV in AVOS? of course from Nightcloud's perspective but

like. she would be injured and recovering away from the clan. but they would be unaware that she is alive and like in canon assume she died and hold her a vigil. Breezepelt, who is already at low point, taking it very badly - yes he was pushing her away bc he was hurt and angry and started taking it out on her, but.. it's still his mom. his Mi. and she is dead? or is this stupid clan just going to believe this to make it easier? are they really giving up on looking for her, or her body??

i can see Nightcloud being the one of very few, if not THE Only one, things that kept Breezepelt in WindClan at this point. and without her, what's the point? it's not like anyone else likes him. the link is gone and they buried it in a bodyless vigil. so it's what pushes him to actuall take the step and leave.

not sure how well it would align with the timeline and events. and how soon Darktail was assembling cats from other clans like Breeze. but i think it would be interesting and heartbreaking if at the end of her SE, Nightcloud just arrived back to WindClan and asks where Breezepelt is and someone tells her.. he either was missing since this morning or just left the clan earlier the same day. like, just have them miss each other by a hair.

I'm thinking that the second-to-last chapter is her with Pickle, having a bit of a sabbatical to unpack everything that happens through the story. Mostly because I want to throw her into some kind of pretty garden as a nice setting for this lmaoo

A LOT of BB stuff is being added to Nightcloud's Pannage that wasn't in the main series; Hillrunner's abuse, her mentor Addersong, several expanded little background characters now complete with their own side conflicts. I think what I can bind all these things with is Nightcloud considering what a Clan means.

Because of her new reputation, I'm noticing I'm writing scenes where she's intentionally doing and saying things to try and sway them. While also grappling with her resentment towards them, and things she can't change.

There's a bit of a melancholy air so far, so I'm starting to feel like the best ending is just having a bit of space to herself to think. Ultimately, she decides that it's more than Breezepelt or Crowfeather that binds her to WindClan. It's the life and connections she COULD have.

WindClan cats are also quite religious next to other Clans, so I really do mean "sabbatical." I'm going to have Addersong die of old age shortly after they reconnect, so she's in Pickle's Garden talking to her new friend, choosing cats she's lost to pray to as patron spirits to give her the traits she feels she needs, and just recovering both physically from injury and spiritually from turmoil.

So all that to say; it works well that by the time she gets back, Breezepelt has joined The Kin. He was one of the first to join when he started calling for members anyway, so having Night be gone for about two or three weeks sounds appropriate.

[0bir]

hey guys i swear i draw

anways ive been so into phighting as of recent, its super fun actually, heres some doodles

medkit was my test subject, i had to xeno-ify them (as usual) to find out how i liked drawing the demons, did mine and my friends' mains (i main banhammer), a vinestaff and shuriken interaction and finally a doodle of the most laggiest game ive ever had (6k+ ping and my fps was tanking)