#perspective practice babyyy

[creature-of-pizza]

COME OVER HERE NOW

[tokiro07]

Cipher Academy ch. 28 thoughts

[Prop a Gander]

TWO FOR TWO THIS WEEK BABYYY!!! I WAS RIGHT ABOUT THE HONG KONG ARC IN UNDEAD UNLUCK, AND I WAS RIGHT ABOUT KUBINASHI DELIBERATELY EXPOSITING ABOUT HER SHARED BACKSTORY WITH OMOMURO!

More specifically, the point was to raise tension among Class A’s team, prompting Iroha to question Omomuro’s loyalties and motives while also illustrating the untrustworthiness of his teammates’ words. The scene of Kubinashi and Nutaba trading off their sides of the story, their words literally becoming inversions of each other with black and white text bubbles positioned symmetrically to each other until they collide on the one point they can’t disagree on (Omomuro’s involvement), was a beautiful visual representation of how propaganda and misinformation can be spread. This all being framed as Q.87, a six-star question, drives the point home with the moral and ethical dilemma of which side do you put more stock in? Is it right for us to believe the side speaking in white just because they’re our friends and to ignore the side speaking in black because they’re our enemy, or do we assume that the one’s defending themselves are trying to censor the truth while the one’s accusing are shedding light on it? Of course, the real answer is that there’s a mix of truth, lies, biases and misunderstandings on both sides, but that still obscures the truth of the matter, making the answer unknowable no matter what you do. A six-star question indeed!

Iroha’s statement that he’s afraid of himself when he mused that he trusts Omomuro despite being given a very clear reason not to is an interesting sentiment, considering that several other characters have said something very similar over the course of the series. Iroha’s mental state, his fortitude, his quick decision-making, his flexibility, every little thing can be taken as a red flag if looked at from the right perspective, so it’s interesting that even he’s started to notice he’s a Little Abnormal (TM)

Seeing Omomuro’s transformation from her long-haired, delinquent-esque self to her much more militaristic short-haired self is a great way to illustrate visually that Kubinashi’s side of the story, that Omomuro has been brainwashed or indoctrinated, may well have some truth to it. Shaving a recruit’s head is a common practice in the military (at least in movies anyway, what do I know about the real army?) to decrease feelings of individuality, as the point of an army is to act as an organized unit. I’m sure there’s heaps of other bits of symbolism here, but that’s the most obvious given the military setting. Fingers crossed this series goes long enough that when everyone starts switching hair styles Omomuro goes back to her long hair

“Don’t misunderstand. We only want to become friends with you, that’s all.” Do those words sound familiar to you? They should: it’s exactly the same thing Toshusai said to Iroha in chapter 1! The way chapter 1 was framed, it definitely seemed like the kind of thing a bully would say when recruiting a new gofer, but as we’ve gotten to know Toshusai better, it’s started to seem like she’s just a gruff and awkward person to talk to, so her intentions aren’t super clear. I think we’re meant to have faith that Toshusai is genuine when she says that sort of thing, but she’s also explicitly called a villainess pretty consistently without her denying it, so I think there’s a lot of room for interpretation here, at least until we get a deeper look at her backstory

Of course, there is one thing we know for sure: regardless of how their relationship started and what her intentions were back then, Toshusai considers Omomuro to be her friend. If she didn’t, the crux of Q.88 would fall apart, as the tension of whether or not Toshusai can identify the real Omomuro lies in the fact that failing to do so would be a permanent stain on their relationship. Once we get to see their side of this Rashomon plot, we’ll know just how important it is for Toshusai to be able to identify Omomuro, and why Omomuro is able to put so much faith in her despite starting on opposite sides

I anticipate that we’ll also learn why Omomuro is apparently so obsessed with dancing, as she issued her Code or Dance Battle ultimatum to Hanranbara the same way she did to Iroha in chapter 3. Clearly, this is a dichotomy that has special meaning to her and wasn’t just an arbitrary joke in the beginning of the story, and challenging Hanranbara will somehow create the opening that Toshusai needs to succeed in this puzzle. If nothing else, I’m confident that Omomuro is in fact present among the two shown through the camera obscura, as Kubinashi looked into the projection for a beat panel and questioned if something occurred behind-the-scenes. Something was off to her, and she wasn’t privy to what was happening outside, so if there were two fake Omomuro’s on her order, there’d be no reason for her to express concern like that

I’m glad this puzzle is a two-parter, cus unlike the last two, I get to ruminate on the implications before getting the answer. Not that the other two were bad, but this feeling of suspense really helps make it feel like something is at stake and allows me time to be curious about what will happen next.I feel like I could have used a little more foreshadowing for Nutaba, personally, but at the same time, she’s not as central to the story as Omomuro is, so naturally Omomuro is more worth using to build tension, as we’re already invested in her. I don’t necessarily want that payoff to take more than one more chapter, but if it takes a few, I don’t really mind so long as it doesn’t get suddenly canceled in that time

As a final note, I’m so sure that this Kubinashi is a fake and the last member of Class E. Everything else has been a lie or misdirection, with everyone present being hidden in some way, so if Kubinashi wants to take part in the last round to face Iroha, it would only make sense for her to continue that time-honored tradition right up to the end. It would certainly be a fitting way to double up on her participation in a sense

I’m always glad to see more of this cast and learn more about them, so hopefully Nisio clues us in to Omomuro’s backstory next week instead of giving us the solution and working backwards. However he chooses to do it, though, I have faith in Nisio. Sorry for doubting you with that sloppy exposition comment last week, Nisio, won’t happen again!

See y’all next week!

[burntbrownsugar]

Cooper go nyoom

[hydra-collector]

a sanders sides analysis of “far“

far, if you’re not aware (which honestly you probably werent) is an album by regina spektor (the same one as ‘one more time with feeling’ from logan’s playlist) and regina spektor has songs that work weirdly well with sanders sides so i’m going to give each song on the album a side. i might do this again with ‘what we saw from the cheap seats’ but its not as weirdly perfect as far.

this ended up being really long, so it’s under the cut.

the calculation: logan, no question. it’s basically about trying to 'calculate’ love from what they saw around them, mostly in media, because don’t understand it. they’re desperate to make it work, so they try again and again “beating their hearts against each other” and eventually, it sparks. intrulogical if you’d like someone to pair it with, since roman has all the romance with thomas.

eet: this one was more difficult, but i think its a lot of patton. after all, the summary on genius literally says “’Eet’ is a wistful, introspective song brimming with nostalgia. The overarching themes seem to be about a person’s development of morality through their experience in their childhood.” it connects a lot to ‘moving on’ in that respect, where thomas wishes he could go back to the times he remembered in patton’s room. if you don’t already know, eet is the backspace key on a typewriter, but since it actually prints letters, you can’t really go back. i also think the line “using your headphones to drown out your mind” is perfect for virgil. i think in “someone’s deciding whether or not to steal/he opens a window just to feel the chill/he hears that outside a small boy just started to cry/’cause it’s his turn, but his brother won’t let him try” janus could be the thief, trying to decide what thomas should take for himself, and obviously remus would be the brother that’s crying because he doesn’t get his turn to be listened to.

blue lips: janus or logan. part of it is kind of like an analysis of society, but it’s mostly about death and aging, which i think both of them will have thought about. the line “the pictures in his mind awoke/and began to breed” definitely reminds me of remus, intrusive thoughts and stuff. its preceded in one verse by “and no one saw and no one heard/they just followed lead” which i think could be about how thomas won’t let himself talk about remus’s thoughts, or janus’s lies, or even logan being tired of how thomas just tries to do everything everyone else does.

folding chair: roman, i think. part of it, patton, maybe. it’s hard to articulate exactly what i mean, but i think a lot of it has to do with being tired and lonely. i think maybe what i’m thinking with roman is that he’s been living so long one kind of way, but it’s not a happy kind of way. like he wants to do something (maybe flashbacks to ‘broadway here i come’ mayybe) or become a dark side, but he’s scared. “now i’ve been sitting on this abandoned beach for years/waiting for the salty water to cover up my ears/but every time the tide comes in to take me home/i get scared, and i’m sitting here alone.” i’m still not completely sure why this came off as roman to me, but maybe someone else would see it better. i don’t think it fits nearly as well as the other songs, but hey, i said i’d do all of them.

machine: janus or logan. kind of surprised it’s not a definite ‘logan,’ with its name, but it’s a lot about society and there’s a transition from “pre-war apartment” to “post-war apartment” which doesn’t fit logan very well at all. and rather than being ‘i am a machine,’ it’s “i’m hooked into machine.” i think that implies that the machine is society (forgive me if that doesn’t make much sense, genius doesn’t have much on this one) because we’re so intertwined, so connected to each other and functioning as a society, possibly how the government wants us to. some of the lyrics make me think it’s about some alternate universe, like “I collect my moments/into a correspondence/with a mightier power/who just lacks my perspective/and who lacks my organics/and who covets my defects,” which is the only reason i didn’t take logan out of the characters completely.

laughing with: janus, if he’s singing it sarcastically. i think he would be making fun of the people who ‘laugh at god.’ also the line “no one laughs at god on the day they realize/that the last sight they'll ever see is a pair of hateful eyes” which i think would’ve resonated very well with janus before svsr. not gonna say much else bc i can barely listen to the song as it is, much less analyze it.

human of the year: maybe also janus, but then again maybe moreso roman or patton. i say janus mostly because it has a very creepy vibe to go with the fictional award of “human of the year.” but roman or patton fits more with the receiver of the award. at least roman would probably give up anything to be deemed that great person, that hero.

two birds: anxceit babyyy. or roceit. it’s really weird because i can’t really tell whether virgil is leaving the wire or janus. the obvious option would be virgil, leaving for the light sides, but the subtler option is the callback. then again, i’m not sure if the one on the wire would change to roman or the general light sides if it was the callback. i also don’t think that virgil wanted janus to come with him, which doesn’t make sense for how the one bird would ask and the other would lie (hehe deceit) and say he was going to come. then again, that could just be a different interpretation of how virgil left the dark sides. in my opinion, though, roceit is much more fun. “i’ll believe it all:” roman. “i won’t let go of your hand:” janus. roman is lying to janus, he’s saying he wants to go to the wedding. janus is trying to just get him to go to the callback. roman’s tempted by it, tempted by how janus is treating him. the line “one more or one less, nobody’s worried” could maybe be janus trying to convince them that it doesn’t matter if they go to the wedding, that lee and mary lee won’t really care. anxceit’s also fun, though.

dance anthem of the 80′s: doesn’t really have a side that it fits in canon, but i think it’d be interesting to put it with patton in an AU. the character is peppy and innocent at first, but it descends into a more depressing tone. i also think the heteronormativity does it a favor in its context. again, it has nothing to do with canon, just thought it’d be cool in an AU.

genius next door: logan, or remus. this song hurts me every time i hear it, since i’ve started associating it with logan. it’s pretty much about this kid, the genius, who’s presumably depressed and goes into the lake each night, holding his breath until he comes back up. this ends up being a bad idea, because at one point he holds his breath too long, and dies in the lake. mostly as i’ve thought about it, i’ve considered logan, but honestly it kind of fits remus better, like how he “didn't care as long as he was able/to strip his clothes off by the dumpsters/at night while everyone was sleeping/and wade midway into that porridge/just him and his secret he was keeping” (the porridge is the lake.) in addition to that, they describe his death as “and the genius next door was sleeping/dreaming that the antidote was orgasm.” sorry for y’all having to catch me referencing other songs, but in the mountain goat’s “amy aka spent gladiator 1″ he says “do every stupid thing that makes you feel alive/do every stupid thing to try to drive the dark away” (which i think is also a very remus song) so he’s describing how it feels good to risk your life. the adrenaline will make you “feel alive,” which is probably why the kid in the song did it (which i saw in the comments someone compared to being the ‘orgasm.’) and while this is not a good idea, considering what happened to the genius next door, i do think it’s a very remus thing to do if he was depressed.

wallet: patton. it’s a very cute song, and it’s pretty much just about how the singer found a wallet, looked at it a little, then returned it to the owner. the singer says “i have no wallet/i keep my cards together with a blue rubber band” and i think that would be something patton does. “you'll never know me/i'll never know you/but you'll be so happy/when they call you up” is probably how patton would feel returning it. finally, something not depressing.

one more time with feeling: i don’t need to choose a side for this one, it’s already logan. i do want to share my thoughts on it, though, ‘cause it seems i disagree with a couple people (plus i didn’t analyze his playlist so i haven’t said anything about it before.) “everyone takes turns/now it's yours to play the part.” he’s supposed to help thomas, as he did in dwit and tried to in svsr. “and the misery inside their eyes is synchronized and reflecting it to yours.” they didn’t listen, though, in svsr and it took half an hour in dwit. for the chorus, “hold on/one more time with feeling/try it again, breathing's just a rhythm/say it in your mind until you know that the words are right/this is why we fight,” i think maybe he’s trying to be interesting to them. to just get through it, and practice and practice until he has the words that they’ll like. that’s just my little hc, though. “you thought by now you'd be/so much better than you are/you thought by now they'd see/that you had come so far.” these lines hit the hardest for me. remember how logan was in the beginning? especially in moving on, he seemed to have no compassion for thomas’s feelings. but hasn’t he gotten better? i think he’s trying to be better to them, to be kinder about emotional problems. and he has come far, but not as far as he would’ve liked, especially considering that he hasn’t seen them appreciate it. he was hoping that they’d notice, that they’d be glad he was doing better. that they’d be proud of him. but they aren’t. they just disregard him even more, unable to forget about who he was, unable to consider how far he’d come (maybe projecting a little.) i also think that the “this is why we fight” could be him talking about how because they don’t listen, he’s exhausted from getting angry at them each episode, and they get annoyed but their ignorance is why they fight.

as a whole, i think he’s just trying again, and again, and again, and i thought, maybe he’s trying with feeling. like, he’s trying to feel for them, trying to care. maybe it has to do with what he did in svsr, where he hinted at his feelings, how he felt like they didn’t care. and they didn’t say a thing. they only could’ve reinforced the idea that even though they’ve tried to tell him that he feels, they don’t care. i went on a whole rant about patton, roman, and thomas in svsr and i could again, but that’s not related to the song.

man of a thousand faces: roman, loosely. at first i was like “man of a thousand faces?!?! janus?!?” but it actually barely fits him at all. it might actually be about drugs, but we’ll ignore that. “his words are quiet like stains are/on a tablecloth washed in a river/stains that are trying to cover for each other/or at least blend in with the pattern” could represent his mistakes, his ideas, maybe stuff that didn’t turn out. and maybe the better ideas will cover up his mistakes. “good is better than perfect.” it could be that his perfectionism is driving him insane, and he needs to start reminding himself that it’s better if he starts reaching for at least just good. “and i’m crying for things that/i tell others to do without crying” is such a roman line i...

anyway that’s the album. if you read through this i’m... impressed.

[dnps-trashcan]

A “little” ramble about dnp’s hiatus

So I just watched tatinof and the documentary about it for the first time (I was more of a casual viewer at the time this was all happening so I never saw it) and it’s making me so emotional about how far they’ve come and how much they’ve accomplished, especially now that they’ve now gone on a second tour; like they’ve currently written 2 books, gone on 2 tours, made an app and board game, and this all happened in the space of 4 years (meanwhile also creating regular gaming videos and semi regular main channel content).

I’m so proud of what they’ve done and how hard working they are, and it’s putting their break into perspective for me more because they’ve basically been working non stop for the past few years, only really having a short break in 2017 during which they planned ii and made truth bombs, and I’m now appreciating their hiatus so much more because they really, really, really do deserve this break, they’ve been working so hard and practically non stop. Basically, Dan and Phil deserve all the time they need to have some time to relax and not have to create content or entertain us, and we can take this time to reflect on their journeys and how far they’ve come in their 10 years of friendship. We don’t need to be devastated by the break (but obviously missing them is valid because we’re used to regular interactions) no matter how long it is because really, it’ll go by much faster than we think, and by the time they’re back, better and happier than ever, we’ll be so glad they took the break to recharge and get their creative juices flowing.

In conclusion, Dan and Phil have come so far and accomplished so much, and I feel like 2019 is going to be their year of happiness and chilling and also with it being a big milestone (10 years babyyy) I think it’s going to be even better than ever before.

[clarysageoilfacialmassage]

Realize that your fear of failure is not yours, you were not born this way. Your brain was conditioned (early childhood, teenage or adult years, or all three) to think, "If I try this and fail, if I try to do this and produce nothing, it is not worth it."

Growing up with a young, single mother for half of my life, she was never "able" to fail. Motherhood pressures, and being in her very early twenties with no time for being an actual twenty year old, societal pressures imposed on every young person PLUS CHILD... So to take time to do anything she enjoyed, purely for the sake of joy, did not fit. Because everything I do has to be perfect for YOU, you must produce the same perfection, and it must always be providing something practical to you when you are done.

And having children doesn't work that way. What may have worked for your parent(s) more than likely won't work for you. Because you are an individual, with your own way of processing critical thoughts, analyzing things, sharing different perspectives. I dropped out of high school, in part due to our strained relationship, and she's looked at me like a lost cause ever since because I didn't live up to her expectation of me. We don't talk much.

I was scammed on eBay a year or so ago trying to sell my paintings. Emotionally, I didn't realize how much it affected me until my wife pointed out that I hadn't painted since then. Painting brings me joy. I make beautiful things on a whim with feeling, and that shit feels so good. To get to a point in my painting skill where I felt confident enough, in myself and my art, to sell it took a lot of courage mustering after breaking through this "failure fear" I sustained from my mother.

I guess my point of this little excerpt is, I used to be stuck frozen in fear of failing. Anything. And when I got unstuck, the secret was this, and only this: put one foot. In front of the other foot. Walk to what you want to do. And start doing it. With no expectations; Of yourself, of what you will create or do, of how you will feel afterwards. Because failing literally doesn't fucking matter, ever. What matters is that you are doing it physically, in the present moment. And if you fail, so what? If it comes out shitty, so what?! What no one ever told me is it doesn't matter if you try and fail, because you ALMOST ALWAYS will have a chance to try again. A failure is a stepping stone to success. It's not the end-all, be-all if you fuck up once or a few times because THAT'S LIFE BABYYY. Everyone is winging it in this world and no one knows anything concrete except the rich and scientists. Get up and put your feet on the ground and walk to your next step. No expectations, just love for YOU. GOD is you. Create that reality boo, because if I can get unstuck, you definitely can too.