#revenge narratives

[lyledebeast]

Since I watched The Crow (1994), I've been wondering if I should make an addition to my Vengeance Criteria. In addition to the vengeance being for a damage that is not the avenger's fault, solving an ongoing problem, and fitting the damage done, it should also be carried out against people who actually did the damage.

But shouldn't that go without saying? If the avenger is killing people who had nothing to do with the harm done to them, that's something other than vengeance. The only reason I would even consider adding it is that The Patriot's good guys kill people who have nothing in common with those who harm them apart from being in the same Army. Even their uniforms are different!

The militia: "We've got no smoke with the Green Dragoons who are actually killing civilians. Those Regular bastards guarding supply trains the British need to leave South Carolina and its civilian population, though . . . Fuck those guys! They all deserve to die!"

Obviously, this creates a lot of problems because the Green Dragoons definitely have smoke with them. A lot of it. Look at all the smoke they have!

January Jones's character in Sweetwater (2013), the other avenger of whom I approve, does kill a lot of people who were not directly involved in her husband's murder. However, she does not even know he's dead for quite a while, and it's impossible for her to tell who was or was not involved. She just wipes out Prophet Josiah's whole congregation to have her bases covered. Eric Draven is much more focused in his vengeance. The first three men he kills were all physically in his apartment the night he and Shelly died. He only shows up at the criminal symposium Top Dollar hosts because the fourth man who was in his apartment flees there, and he kills the other criminals in attendance to get to him. When Top Dollar reveals that he was behind the attack on Eric and Shelly's complex, Eric is happy to add him to the list, but killing people without direct culpability is certainly not a priority for him.

Honestly, watching The Crow made me wonder if I even have a problem with revenge narratives at all. I think I've just seen a lot of movies where violence itself is the end goal and vengeance is just a convenient excuse for it.

[sunderwight]

SV AU where Shen Yuan transmigrates into a kind of mimicry demon.

He still gets tasked by the System with replacing Shen Qingqiu, except this time he actually has to pull off an imposter role on multiple levels, while the real Shen Qingqiu is stuck in a coma due to his qi deviation. Initially he thinks the situation is going to be temporary -- just take over until he figure out how to get the original goods to wake up -- but Shen Jiu's condition proves to be more difficult to repair than just waiting. Shen Yuan buys special side missions from the System to find items and artifacts to keep Shen Jiu alive, mainly because he doesn't want to be stuck playing this part until Luo Binghe kills him, but also after the first couple of times Shen Jiu regains some consciousness (not enough to leave his bed), Shen Yuan starts to feel kind of... bad for him. Too. Despite everything.

Shen Jiu, of course, is deeply suspicious of this doppelganger that has obviously taken advantage of his weakness to infiltrate the sect and steal his identity. He initially theorizes that the creature must be keeping him alive because it needs some aspect of his vitality in order to keep posing as him, but as they share more encounters is forced to concede that the thing might just be insane? And weirdly softhearted. Over time and by feigning sleep to listen in on Shen Yuan's muttering, he figures out that this all has something to do with Luo Binghe, which he's not pleased about. But he can't deduce what. (Luo Binghe doesn't get to move into the side room in this version of the story, because Shen Yuan has the house on lockdown for obvious reasons, but he does still get to make Shizun's meals!)

Anyway, Shen Jiu doesn't manage to conveniently wake up before the Immortal Alliance Conference. Shen Yuan has to throw Luo Binghe in, which he hates, but along the way he manages to recover that magical flower macguffin that won't work on Without-a-Cure (which he doesn't have in this AU because his species is immune to it), brews a tea that finally fixes Shen Jiu, and then fucks off to go mope about Binghe being in the Abyss.

Shen Jiu doesn't tell anyone about his demonic replacement, for a variety of reasons. One, he's punishing the other peak lords for not figuring it out themselves. Two, he's punishing himself for the fact that a literal demon replaced him for like 3 years and everyone considered it an improvement. Because it was. Three, he has mixed feelings that might potentially amount to not wanting to hunt down and kill Shen Yuan, but he's not admitting that even to himself.

Everyone thinks that Shen Qingqiu's return to asshole form is a result of Luo Binghe dying, and that his sudden new research projects are part of him like, trying to make sense of a senseless tragedy, and coping. But no, he's still trying to figure out why the fuck Luo Binghe was important and why Shen Yuan inserted himself into their lives only to basically just do Shen Qingqiu's job while he was indisposed, and then fuck off the moment Luo Binghe left the picture again.

After... healing Shen Jiu. Also. For some unfathomable reason.

But this version of the System's just happy that the plot is back on track! And surely it will stay back on track. Yes? Problem solved, right? Shen Yuan? Definitely nothing is going to mess with the rest of the story, cough cough, wait why are you visiting User 01, and what would you, a demon shapeshifter, need with a Sun & Dew seed...?

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

A phone call between brothers (takes place AFTER this incident and Fiddleford's phone call)

Sorry if this is OOC!

[veinsfullofstars]

🕸️Kirbtober 2024 Day 2: Revenge 🕸️

(ID: Kirby series fanart of Dark Meta Knight and Taranza, the latter looming behind the former with violent intent in his four front-facing eyes, his six hands clenched into shaking fists and curled into claws and raised over his head to conjure a pair of glowing spiderwebs. Meanwhile, the knight stands in blissful ignorance in the foreground, a mug of steaming coffee in one hand, a rolled-up newspaper in the other, glancing off in confusion as a thought bubble over his head reads, “Why do I hear boss music?” END ID.)

Based on the implication from KTD’s Dededetour! that DMK might be responsible for Sectonia’s corruption, indirectly or otherwise.

Previous Day | Next Day | Prompt List (made by @/paintpanic)

Started on 08/30/24, finished on 08/31/24. | Kirbtober 2023 Comp

[violettierre]

My haitani father Shio headcanon is just a bit too funny cuz of how well it works that it sounds like a waste of perfect canon idea and crossover for both of wakui's works.

Aside from the obvious physical features very very obvious, identical eyes, nose, blonde eyebrows, rindou's face form, ran's hair color palette and (arguably) bonten hair style, blah blah i mean just look a the pictures below, you can also bring up any fact from either manga and add it to the hc and it fits in just SO WELL, i'll give the first example, The Haitanis are very obviously rich spoiled kids like have you seen their apartment? They have a fucking dj set, only rich kids with neglective powerful parents will have no problem paying for that, just saying, and even though i love him let's be real Shio is the type to be that parent, i mean cmon he's rich like crazy rich (filthy yakuza money yum yum) he tots would give his children WAY more than enough allowance so they can leave him alone, also the way they act, i've always the Haitanis were the type of kids that think they own the school cuz their dad is rich .

Nvm if this never becomes canon or both universes don't collide, it's just so entertaining to keep connecting the dots that were likely never there, like how Rindou is a heavy drinker cuz his father drank alot with the rest of the Yotsurugis and he tried to imitate him from a young age that it became an unhealthy habit or if you want to add more drama he only drinks cuz he looks up to his father but Shio favors Ran cuz he can posssibly succeed him (canon power complex) so Rindou resorted to drinking cuz it's the only thing like his dad that he can do. Heck yeah i made it angsty!!!

You can also add great context to his fear of Yakuza, picture this, when he was a kid he got up in the middle of night after hearing a loud noise to search for his parents and witnessed Shio (canon Yakuza) pew pew-ing some poeple and surrounded with scary men, that probably scarred him for life that he was so terrified when Kakucho got them interfering with some, OH OH something just came to mind, if he's the son of a yakuza yeah he didn't wanna clash with other yakuza families cuz it can end in a blood shed and risk his and his family's lives.

And i'm gonna add this one not very small detail and i swear i'll shut up (for now), i know it's just a stupid headcanon that is very far from becoming reality and i don't have to take it this deep but hear me out, why their last name is Haitani and not Yotsurugi like their dad, Shio is powerful and have many enemies right ? So he simply decided to protect his children and their identity by giving them another last name likely their mother's (yk like minato with naruto style plan ?) So Haitani is actually their mom's family name. I rest my case. Thank you for coming to my useless ted talk.

[lansplaining]

maybe a hot take: I don't think there's any act of revenge in all of MDZS that we are meant to take pleasure in

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

End of Empathy (time for violence)

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[waitineedaname]

tbh it is incredible how compelling bingge and shen jiu are considering they're characters who ceased to exist as soon as the novel began

[wishesofeternity]

My problem with The Dragon Prince is that while it preaches about "breaking the cycle" and "choosing love", it repeatedly does so in a way that echoes the age-old idea of telling victims to passively accept their lot in life and the injustices inflicted upon them while their perpetrators never have to acknowledge their wrongs or face consequences for their actions. This is the kind of narrative they follow on both a personal and systematic axis, and it's exactly why the show will always frustrate me.

[skywalkr-nberrie]

One of the biggest arguments I’ve seen used by the Ob*d*l*s against Anidala, is that scene in the ROTS novel where Padmé says she could trust OW with the secret of the rebellion and was hesitant to tell Anakin and I just wanna say:

Padmé wasn't an idiot. She was an extremely intelligent and competent woman, perfectly able to understand that loving Anakin and thinking that he could be trusted with a certain politic-related matter were two very different things and reducing her choice regarding who to trust with an important political matter only on the basis of her feelings of romantic love diminishes her professionalism, and this is why I say y'all could never understand her.

Padmé didn’t have to "love" OW or even like him at all to know he was the perfect Jedi to ask for help in a secret political matter.

That's the point being made in the novel, she’s hit with the realization that Anakin in this particular moment could not be told this piece of info because of his relationship with Palpatine, and Padmé specifically mentions in the Junior ROTS novel that she didn't want to make Anakin “keep a secret” if he didn’t agree with their stance because it’d be “unfair.” So this also played a part in why Padmé didn’t think it best to inform Anakin about the Rebellion. It honestly had little to do with her actually lacking trust in him, and more to do with the circumstances she was in not allowing her to be open with her husband and her not wanting to make him choose between his wife and his “father figure.”

However, Padmé knows OW’s political ideas aren't tied to ONE particular person but to a philosophy, one which is closer to her own, at that point. None of this was ever meant to be hinted as “romantic” or even remotely insinuated as romantic. It’s strictly professional and even the tone of the scene makes that so abundantly clear.

All I’m saying is that, some of these proshippers are doing the most out here to try and prove their ship, like my loves? You forgot a very important thing called ✨ context ✨ and regardless of her rational thinking, Padmé still went out of her way to try and talk out all of this Rebellion secrecy stuff with Anakin when she confronted him in the scene where she asks if he ever thought they were “fighting on the wrong side.” Padmé didn’t trust OW in the same way she trusted Anakin (with her entire self and being) she had the level of trust and love for Anakin that was only meant for him.

Mixing up her unwavering faith in Anakin as her husband with her trust in OW’s devotion to duty as her comrade/ally is purposely deluding yourself, because the two aren’t the same and therefore can’t be compared. An example of this is: Padmé constantly putting more value to Anakin’s words over OW’s in the end of ROTS when he came to tell her of Anakin’s “crimes”. She completely disregarded what OW had claimed about her husband and instead made her way to where Anakin was herself, to ask him directly. Despite what the truth was, this is proof of her trusting Anakin unconditionally, and I didn’t even think I had to spell that out because it’s as clear as day.

In conclusion, Padmé didn’t trust OW more than Anakin, she just knew the circumstances she was in didn’t exactly make it easy for her to openly talk with her husband about these matters and that’s part of what played into the issues they had in ROTS, it’s exactly what Sidious wanted. This scene in the novel doesn’t exist to imply some hidden romantic undertone that George was intending all along. No, far from that. George was always an “open, , clear and easy to understand” type of storyteller, so if the former was the case, this scene wouldn’t be any different if there was some hidden message or subtext the reader should be made aware of, George would make it obvious. Fact of the matter is, the one and only reason for this scene in the novel to exist is only to show to us as the “reader” that the narrative is tearing apart the Star-Crossed-lovers (Anakin and Padmé.) and visibly putting the two of them on different sides in the story because the consequences of this narrative choice is what will foreshadow and play into the inevitable and great fall of the couple and character in the future. Even the novel makes a very purposeful and clear distinction between “love and trust” in this chapter where all this occurs. Padmé loves Anakin, but knew she had to trust OW with the situation at hand. And if you want to talk “narratively” Padmé needed a reason to keep the Rebellion a secret from Anakin, thus leading to Palpatine to sense “betrayal” in Padmé later on, and using that to his advantage to manipulate Anakin even more into getting him to “suspect” her. It’s all spelt out for us and it’s not hard to miss. All it takes is a little media literacy and understanding context.

(Mind you, hypothetically, if this scene existed for literally any other reason, it would’ve been brought up again, but it wasn’t. It’s only mentioned once and exists for only one moment which was meant to serve a certain narrative and then it was done. There’s not much to make of it since the context of the scene is so clear.)

[vaguely-concerned]

if everything with varric weren't enough to make rye go the level of ape shit at solas that he does (and goodness don't get me wrong it was more than enough!), forcing him to sit alone with himself in the fade and wonder if he really just saw lucanis die right in front of him with no way to know for sure added kill bill sirens in his head so loud the voice of the Maker Himself could not be heard over them if He personally peeped through the blanket of the dark to cry 'hold, hold'

(That no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it. indeed. maybe you should have thought a bit harder before making me quite so much in your own image. bitch)

[valtsv]

i hope that if VAL kills carson she doesn't turn him into her mother like her other victims, because he's already hateful enough as it is

[girl4music]

Remember what I was saying about bisexual narratives? This is one but since it's about a female romantic interest they had to be a lot more careful with it. But the fact they did an entire episode about the concept of Gabrielle being jealous over Xena and Lao Ma's intimate relationship is significant, and again, just proves how much they took Xena and Gabrielle's relationship seriously whether it was interpreted as a romantic one or not because this is a DRAMA. It's not a joke. In fact it's the only Gabrielle-centric drama. Yeah, there's humour in it with an amnesiac Gabrielle and Joxer trying to get her to remember but that's completely besides the point of what they're saying here.

Which is that Gabrielle betrayed Xena in Chin because she thought Xena was leaving her and going to hook back up with an ex-girlfriend because neither Xena nor Gabrielle had any idea Lao Ma was dead until the point of reaching Chin and then learning that information. So making this an episode in actual context of why Gabrielle did what she did in betraying Xena makes complete sense. Why wouldn't she think that when Xena literally says to her that she'd give her life up with Gabrielle to fulfil some insane debt to a woman she once loved. Gabrielle doesn't understand what that debt is UNTIL Xena explains it after the whole ordeal so - naturally - Gabrielle would think in her grief and anger shit like: "She still loves her and she doesn't want to be with me anymore. I'm nothing to her. I'm not a lover, I'm not a friend, I'm not a sidekick... I never was important to her at all. I was only there to help her pass the time away. Why should I let her have happiness now? Why should I let her have that power over me?" and they really go into this area of thought with her as a full-on drama because petty jealousy like that can be a really compelling storyline and vehicle for character development and we come to get a whole other dimension to Gabrielle's character that we have never gotten before - that we probably never wanted to get - but the creators were like "No, we're taking this relationship so seriously to the point where we have to depict the ugliness in it as well as the beauty because that's what real life couples go through” and Gabrielle has to finally stop lying to herself as well as Xena that her motivations for betraying her and hurting her were not selfish or self-serving because they were and she had to come to terms with the fact that she was never like this when it came to any of the male romantic interests in Xena's life. But with a female one... because she knew Xena was a lot more emotionally invested there... she was a lot worse than she ever was when it came to Ares or Draco or Marcus. She was a lot more fucking concerned and rightly so because like if Xena was into women - why the hell haven't they gotten together? Why are they not more than they are? So you see what I mean about how interpreting them as a slow burn really works with everything going on in the show with all of the narratives because they can do an episode like this and it doesn't feel like it's just come out of left field at all. It feels logical and necessary.

I think as much as Season 3 showed us Gabrielle wasn't the entirely innocent, pure or selfless character - this was the storyline arc that showed that she could be pretty freaking vindictive when she can't get her way with Xena or when she wasn't the center of her attention but I thought that all this made her even more of a great character because she wasn't clean cut anymore. She could be a bitch too and so she was on more equal footing as Xena who we know used to be and would absolutely understand where Gabrielle was coming from.

[dandelionjack]

i hope ruby gets a well-that’s-alright-then-style notdeath. on the one hand it will make haters mad because oh no not another companion with an impermanent end (and i like to see haters mad) on the other it would require creativity to depict this in a new way + i love all the implications i love the dark fairytale quality of these companion exits i love my un-undead schrodinger’s women

with the way the legend of ruby sunday is titled… legends aren’t usually told about living people. legends are stories of the bygone past, of an age long since over, fictionalised and overgrown with folklore like barnacles sticking to an abandoned shell. there is such a thing as a living legend, but they’re exceedingly rare. the unmistakeable raven’s call in the 73 yards teaser, the trailer’s cut to fifteen crying alone after promising to cherry he’d protect her daughter… the foreshadowing is clear as day…

and yet. there’s one massive HOWEVER. ruby appears in s15: millie’s been spotted on set filming it. which leads me to believe — the doctor isn’t one to take the time travel route and revisit companions that in his future are genuinely dead. that would hurt too much, it would cause unnecessary trauma and could break the timeline. that must mean ruby stays alive in some way. ish. she’s alive and a legend and a mystery. girl-ballad girl-song girl-paradox

here she is, fading out.

p.s.: thesis statement on moffatgirls from the tags i left on somebody else’s post about charley pollard.. well it belongs here since it’s basically the semiotic hurricane swirling around ruby at the moment :)

[nerves-nebula]

revenge is actually dope as hell the only issue is that you have to have some idea of what you wanna do afterwards and like, probably a support network too. cuz otherwise you'll be lost after devoting yourself entirely to it, but that's not an issue that *only* happens with revenge so idk why people act like it is.

[aj-lenoire]

percy are you seriously gonna fall for the same trick that you just pulled on anna?? it's been like ten minutes.