#or at least not explicitly

[ryuki-blogs]

I wonder if cross-house friendships are common at Asticassia or if everyone just keeps to their peers that are under the same company...

[rassebers]

Yeah yeaaah yeah yeah

[egophiliac]

how are u on gavv so far? because i need to scream about how insane it has been (and that zakuzakuchips and fuwamallow have won special places in my heart)

can't believe his mom got flavor-blasted to death. 😔 RIP.

[mylols16]

not people calling deadpool and wolverine queerbait im begging yall to learn what queerbaiting is. like why is it that straight characters can have romantic subtext and thats all well and good but the minute gay characters have romantic subtext everyone gets out their pitchforks and starts screaming about queerbait. queercoding and queerbaiting are not the same people! i feel the fact that a song about going down on someone plays while the two protagonists hold hands to save the world should be evidence enough that the gayness was at least a little bit intentional. if you want to be mad about the movie not being gay enough thats fine but i keep seeing people praise venom as gay rep when it also doesn't explicitly state the two characters gayness or romantic interest (i love venom btw don't come for me). just can we stop the arguing and enjoy a fun movie please

[luuxxart]

it’s always sunny in the takeba family

[aroaceleovaldez]

It's honestly wild to me that ToA went through so much trouble to emphasize the fact that Will did not magically fix all of Nico's problems and was explicitly not Nico's only doctor.

Only for TSATS to have Will fix all of Nico's problems and have Nico be entirely reliant on him the entire book and literally helpless without him and LITERALLY have Nico's problems be magically removed.

[purpleshadow-star]

I'm actually so glad that they brought up the fact that Hades saved Sally's life cause... yeah. He did. Sure, it wasn't for a super good cause, but he still did save her.

[gingermintpepper]

Okay, let's finally talk about EPIC's Apollo

I feel very compelled to say, first of all, that I do not dislike Epic. In fact, I am very fond of Epic and have been following its production and status very eagerly! I attend all the launch streams, I watch all of Herrans' update videos; I am, at the end of the day, a fan and I want it to be known that my words are spoken out of love and passion as much as they are spoken from a place of critique.

So really, what my problem with Epic's Apollo?

In the briefest possible terms; the choice to have Apollo be defined by his musical aspect in God Games is thematically strange. And not in the 'oh well in the Odyssey, Apollo was important to Odysseus and his family so it's weird that that wasn't kept in Epic' strange, strange in the sense that Odysseus' character arc since My Goodbye has been getting more and more obviously Apollonian and so it is positively bizarre that when we get to meet Apollo, the god seems entirely disinterested in him and his affairs. So much so that he is not even defined by any station that would indicate that he has been watching over and protecting Odysseus and his family.

What do I mean by 'Odysseus has been following an Apollonian arc'? I'm so glad you asked!

Remember Them is the last song in which Odysseus explicitly uses his sword until Mutiny where he must use it to defend himself against Eurylochus' blade. He uses it to help enact the plan to conquer Polyphemus and, due to Polites dying in that battle, Polites who wished for Odysseus to put the blade down entirely and embrace a post-war life, Odysseus also retires his sword. This is an action that symbolically separates him from Athena - and the image of Odysseus as a traditional warrior set for him in Horse and Infant - as much as My Goodbye physically separates him from the goddess and her war-ways - from this point onwards, Odysseus will no longer be leaning on Athena's wisdom or methods to solve his problems. Likewise, he will no longer be able to rely on her protection.

Odysseus thusly solves most of his upcoming problems through diplomacy and avoidance. He approaches Aeolus - a strange and ambiguous god (both in gender and in motivation) and appeals to them for help. Circe too, he approaches not with wishes to conquer or for revenge, but for the safe returning of his men and an alternate way forward. In all of these scenarios, there is some Apollonian element which is subtly interweaved alongside the influence of other gods; it is with a bow and arrows that Polyphemus' sheep is slain (and thus it is this Apollonian element which is at the root of Odysseus' spat with Poseidon), it is a vision of Penelope that warns Odysseus that his men are about to open Aeolus' wind-bag, Circe's peace offering to Odysseus is to refer him to a prophet of Apollo who has since died.

In this way, Apollo is walking alongside Odysseus for all of his journey after Athena departs - even in the Underworld, he is guiding him. It is Tiresias' proclamation that is the last straw for Odysseus, it is by the power of a mouthpiece of Apollo that Odysseus decides to embrace his ruthlessness. It is with the bow and arrow that Odysseus subdues the siren who sought to trick him, likewise, Odysseus does not attempt to undermine or escape the fate of paying Scylla's passage price - he knows of the doom about to befall the six men and quite unlike the rest of the journey until this point, he does not fight against it. This all comes to a head on Thrinacia where it is a blade which sacrifices the sun god's cow and brings destruction upon the crew once more.

My point with all of this is that when I heard the teasers for God Games years ago, it made perfect sense to me that Apollo would be Round One - he is not Odysseus' adversary and has no reason to oppose Athena's wish to free him. From other teasers about what will happen in the climax of Epic, Apollo will still be walking alongside Odysseus - it is Apollo's bow that Penelope will give the suitors to string. Likewise, it is Apollo's bow that will prove Odysseus' legitimacy and identity. That bow will be the power by which Odysseus hunts his adversaries and cleans out his palace - it is Apollo who is the avatar of Odysseus' ruthlessness, not Athena.

So tell me, truly, what was the point of having Apollo raise a non-argument in God Games? Why have him appear unconcerned, aloof and slightly oblivious? Why have him appear in his capacity as the Lord of Music at all?? And if the intention was never to make Apollo an active player in Odysseus' life like he was in the Odyssey, why keep Odysseus as a primary archer?

The answer of course is that Apollo is inextricable from the fabric of the Odyssey - his influence and favour exudes from Odysseus just as much as Athena's. In Athena's ten year sulk, it would have been Apollo who kept Telemachus and Penelope safe. It would have been Apollo protecting Odysseus from Poseidon's gaze as he travelled the seas (according to the Odyssey anyway)

Forgive me for not being excited about something that I thought was being purposefully set up. I was extremely ecstatic about all of the little Apollonian details that litter the sagas because I know where this story ends up (loosely) but all God Games did was reveal that maybe those Apollonian details were not intentional at all, but merely the ghost of the Apollo who persistently haunts those he favours, even if he cannot explicitly come to their aide in an adaptation.

[chessb0r3d]

i cracked the code.

[petz5]

i love when ppl go "what proof is there akane likes girls" as if she suddenly stops being in love with ranma the second cold water hits him

[zareleonis]

unbearably haunting how furina and neuvillette both have a "past self" of sorts whose memory and experience they had nearly no knowledge of, and it took furina's other half arranging her own death, thus losing that part of herself forever, for neuvi to regain his

[meamiki]

Happy Anniversary In Stars and Time!! Have some Friend Quest based drawings :D

(These have specific quote picks related to them! And there's also a long ramble on why I like those specific quotes below if interested)

(And by long, I mean roughly 2k+ words of proper ramble total, so be warned before clicking keep reading this link right here to the rb!!)

[higuchisora]

Can someone please explain to me what the enforcers Do. Like I was under the impression that they were the police force. So why the hell were they fighting in the war? Does Piltover not have an army? Are their police force and their military the same thing? Are you telling me each individual enforcer is trained both in police/investigative procedure AS WELL AS military tactics and strategy? 1) how the fuck do they have the time to invest THAT MUCH into each enforcer. 2) how fucking long is the training, especially considering how quickly Caitlyn joined the force 3) are you telling me the chief of police and the army general are the same thing? Are you telling me MARCUS was a trained tactician? A GENERAL?

Even if you argue they're all incompetent- are you telling me the Councilors were willingly paying what was probably exorbitant amounts of money to have a WEAK and ILL-TRAINED MILITARY? it's one thing for them to poorly train a bunch of cops, and maybe even carelessly allow a bunch of barely trained, "mindless gruntwork" soldiers- but eventually, the more they rise into the ranks, the more they'll have to scrutinize their skill. Are you saying their enforcers are structured like a standing army? Are you saying those pompous fucks wouldn't care if their military was actually capable of protecting them or not? How have they never been invaded before? How are they still around?!

[moonsdancer]

idk

I know that most of us cottoned on to Arcane's milquetoast, centrist ultimately shallow politics back in season one. But I don't think I was ready for how much it would annoy me to see this conclusion play out. Again. After ALL that. All those years of oppression of the undercity; of topside extracting so much blood, sweat and tears from the poors to enrich themselves; of violent suppression of all resistance and dissent; of the killing and imprisonment of freedom fighters and regular citizens for petty crimes; of the deliberate immiseration of the entire Zaunite population to the point where they were barbecuing worms and shit because they can't enjoy the fresh meat and produce Piltovans do and getting addicted to shimmer to alleviate the hunger and misery; of orphaning children; of actively poisoning Zaun via pollution from the mines, the air ducts and also hextech; and most recently after unleashing an even more fascist regime backed by foreign hordes who were beating up literal children in the streets and so on and so on....

after all this...

And that's the conclusion? Really?

Two dull, uninspired speeches by Jayce and Caitlyn and all we get is one (1) Zaunite representative on the Piltovan council (Sevika). Who doesn't even get to speak in that last act (might've been powerful to write a speech for her speaking to the uneasy tentative peace but I mean whatever, who knows if that'd help there are so many gaps in this season that that's not even top five of things I wish had been in there).

Just a rather unserious show, with some unserious writing in many ways, but most obviously in this second season.

[ratatatastic]

Complete Chaos: The Cats pick their band members 🎸

matthew: finns (good music taste but the best energy)

kuli: sasha (dj), maffhew (singer to which he refutes and insist hes a hype man), and himself as director/manager because hes bad rhythmically

ekky: maffhew (hype man/lead singer), benny and reino (guitar and drums), forsy (pure eyecandy quite literally just there to take his shirt off 😭😭)

swaggy and benny: sasha (dj), swaggy (singer/guitarist), benny (guitarist), ekky and gadjo (no other role than to look like "bandguys")

reino: also finns lmao (popular choice)

sasha: himself as dj, and swaggy (singer, his karaoke insistence proceeds him)

roddy: forsy (guitar), benny (drums), himself (no role whatsoever lol), reino (second guitar) and sasha (cymbals, girl what kinda band 😭)

mikksy: sasha (dj) just sasha no one else just him actually :)

BONUS: sasha finally revealed his dj name to which last time he staunchly refused to do so and its DJ Layz!!!!

[sufferu]

You know, it’s a very minor thing, but it does make me a little sad how the Re:Zero anime adaptation…really DOES tone down a lot of the queer subtext in the original LN.

No Subaru proudly remembering his past as an androgynous, long-haired kid and lamenting that “time has not been kind to him”

All of Subaru’s comments about women being very pointedly based around their clothing (with the only exceptions being when he’s explicitly trying to distract them from something/lighten the mood) being changed to him making sincere comments about their actual bodies

No Subaru crossdressing for the first three days of high school (despite it being hinted to be a really pivotal part of his character actually, in both the text and QnAs—)

No Subaru accidentally dressing as a maid during the last day of the first Arc 2 loop and having a genuinely really hard time stepping out of that more feminine persona

No Subaru calling Otto his boytoy and. Honest to god, with context of what Natsumi Schwartz is like, I’m pretty sure Subaru was straight up flirting

No “supple hips” Julius, or Subaru allying his feelings with Patrasche when he thought she was being aggressive towards Julius’ steed before being told that actually she was trying to MATE with the other ground dragon, and even when they do include some of their interactions it really is toned down from the LN (I get that a lot of it is just visual vs prose medium but it still makes me kinda sad)

No Subaru referring to Reinhard as an ikeman

No Ferris jumping on Subaru’s bed and then going, “Wait did your heart flutter just now—?” and then explicitly staring at him with shock when Subaru hastily tries to deny it

Emilia’s definition of marriage being “between two people who love each other” being changed to “between a man and a woman who love each other” (though maybe that was just Crunchyroll? idk)

No Subaru explicitly being a really insane flirt with men (though I’m kinda holding onto hope that it’ll happen later as it comes up)

Ah, I hope they don’t alter Natsumi Schwartz’ appearance in Arc 7 too much…