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aspoonofsugar · 4 years ago

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Semblance of the Soul: Qrow and Raven

The Branwens are two people with a shared past, that have taken different routes in life:

Ozpin: Everyone has a choice. The Branwens chose to accept their powers and the responsibilities that came with them. And later, one of them chose to abandon her duties in favor of her own self-interest.

Qrow has made an altruistic choice. He hates the crimes of his tribe and is happy to help people by working for Ozpin.

Raven has instead decided to prioritize herself and her tribe and sees Ozpin’s cause as foolish and reckless.

At the same time, they are twins, but have chosen different families. This is why the concept of family comes up so often in their interactions. After all, they first meet in the episode called Family:

Raven: Hello, brother.

Qrow: Raven. So, what do you want?

Raven: A girl can't just catch up with her family?

And their last exchange is this:

Raven: Sorry, brother. Sometimes family disappoints you like that.

Qrow: We're not family anymore.

Raven: Were we ever?

Qrow: I thought so, but I guess I was wrong.

Still, how are they doing with their families of choice? Are they happy with them? Do they have healthy relationships?

For the both of them, the answer is no. This happens because Raven and Qrow are both scared to grow close to people.

It is just that this fear is declined in opposite ways. Raven is scared for herself (selfishness), while Qrow is scared for others (selflessness).

This trait they share, but show in different ways, is well conveyed by their respective semblances. This analysis will use their powers as means to explore both characters and their foiling.

RAVEN: BIRDS OF A FEATHER

Raven’s Kindred Link perfectly embodies the saying...

Birds of a feather flock together...

...until the cat comes:

Raven: I...I'm sorry...

On one hand it lets her create portals to the people she has a strong bond with.

On the other hand she mostly uses it to run away from those bonds.

Why does she do it?

The answer is clear:

Lionheart: I'm helping her for the same reason you are - I'm afraid. We... we can't stop her... no one can...

Raven is just another version of the Cowardly Lion. She is a coward like Leo, but does not aknowledge it and prefers to hide behind a pragmatic and survivalist mask:

Raven: That's why I tried to leave when I did. I'm not afraid, I'm smart.

This is why she goes back to her tribe after she leaves Yang and Tai. She says she does so because she considers them her family and wants to protect them.

However, her motivations are implied to be more selfish. She goes to them to run away from things that scare her.

To be more specific, the tribe protects Raven psychologically in two different ways.

1) It lets her be the monster, the criminal, the most violent and powerful one:

Mercury: We’re the guys you should be afraid of.

Raven: I doubt anyone should be afraid of you.

Here, Raven mocks Mercury, but the irony is that her coping mechanism is really not that much different from his. She hides behind a Grimm mask, a universal symbol of fear, but she is the scared one.

2) She goes back to the family who raised her and neglects the family she is supposed to raise (Yang).

Deep down, Raven is just an adult, who fails at being an adult.

Mostly, this shows in her inability to make a choice:

Yang: Which is it, mom? Are you merciful, or are you a survivor?

As a matter of fact she keeps changing her mind because she is not brave enough to stick to one decision.

Initially, she is sent to Beacon, so that she could learn how to kill hunters. However, she ends up becoming a huntress herself and she accepts to fight Salem. She is considered so loyal that she is even given magical powers. Finally, she enters a relationship and has a daughter with Tai. She basically starts creating a life outside the tribe, only to leave it all behind at a certain point. It is not clear if it is because she saw something specific or if it is the result of a longer struggle.

The point is that nobody forced her to fight Salem. She could have also refused Ozpin’s powers. Finally, she could have told Ozpin and the others she wanted to stop. In any case, she did not have to leave her family to stop fighting Salem. What is more, she could have brought her family with her, when she ran away.

She chooses instead to leave everything she has built behind and goes back to the world she was a child in. It might be a violent world, but she sees it as safer.

Let’s highlight that she has the same tendency of changing idea in the series itself. She switches sides and organizes a risky plan, which puts almost all her major bonds (Qrow, Vernal and Yang) in danger. She does all that because she wants the relic, so that she has leverage against Salem. After all of this, even after Vernal’s death, she simply runs away. She is obviously shaken by her confrontation with Yang, who calls her out. However, Yang is perfectly right when she says so:

Yang: Because you're afraid of Salem!!! And if you thought having Maiden powers put a target on your back, imagine what she'll do when she finds out you have a Relic. She'll come after you with everything she has. Or she can come after me. And I'll be standing there, waiting for her.

Taking the relic would just put Raven in danger. For her it is safer to open the vault and disappear, so that someone else can take care of things. Even if this someone else is her daughter.

In other words, Raven is a failure of a mother. This is shown by her failing all three of her “daughters” (Yang, the Spring Maiden and Vernal). Moreover, it is perfectly conveyed by her being a Maiden.

The idea of maidenhood is symbolically juxtaposed to the one of motherhood. Of course, this does not have to be true in-universe for all the Maidens. Still, in Raven’s case, this juxtaposition is deliberate. Raven is an eternal Maiden, who runs away from her parental responsibilities.

This is why she received the power from her protegee instead than from a mentor figure. She is so selfish she takes from the people she should protect:

Cinder: Vernal was a decoy the whole time. The last Spring Maiden must've trusted you a great deal before she died. I bet that was a mistake...

What is more, it is strongly implied she killed the previous Maiden to take her powers. This is interesting because it ties to a second meaning of her semblance.

Her ability symbolizes the unfairness of the bonds she forges. She works to create those bonds and there is affection involved. However, these bonds are double edged swords for the other party involved because of Raven’s moodiness. She can leave when she wants and come back out of the blue. She can always go to others when she needs it, while others can never reach her. This leads to an unbalanced dynamic in Raven’s favour.

This dynamic can even become extremely dangerous for the other person:

Raven can potentially use her ability to attack the people she is bonded with. She does not use her semblance this way in the series. Still, what happened to the Spring Maiden is something similar. To receive the power of the Maiden, Raven must have been the last person in the girl’s thoughts before death. This probably happened because the two shared a close bond. A bond Raven betrayed.

In other words, the nature of Raven’s semblance hides in itself the potential of betrayal:

Raven: Aura can't protect your arm, it's Grimm. You turned yourself into a monster just for power.

Cinder: Look who's talking...

As Cinder points out, Raven too, like her, has become a monster to obtain power. The difference here is in how this montrosity is conveyed.

In Cinder’s case, she is literally turning into a Grimm. She has accepted this metamorphosis to take the Maidens’ powers.

In Raven’s case, it is ironically the opposite symbolically. She wears a Grimm mask, but the true monstrosity is the Maiden behind it:

Raven is monster-like because she stole the power from a person, who trusted her.

Let’s highlight that the motif of the Grimm mask has come up several times in the series. So far, it has been used by people, like Raven and Adam, who want to be feared. Something similar can be seen in the Hound as well, who is not really wearing a mask, but whose humanity is hidden behind his Grimm appearance.

In all three cases, the true scary thing is what is behind the Grimm-face:

It is always the humanity behind it that is scary. Be it the victim behind the monster in the Hound, society’s mistreatment of Faunus or Raven’s cowardice and what it led her to do:

Yang: You're right. I don't know you. I only know the Raven dad told me about. She was troubled, and complicated, but she fought for what she believed in, whether it was her team or her tribe! Did you kill her too?

Yang’s question is poignant and underlines how all Raven has done is simply to hurt herself. By hurting the people she loves, she has been killing a part of herself.

This is also conveyed by her emblem missing from her possessions. According to the wiki, Raven’s emblem is this:

Raven's emblem is a winged eye with a clock inside of it. This emblem has not appeared on any of her possessions so far.

This is a reference to Raven and Qrow’s allusion to Hugin and Munin, Odin’s two ravens, who travel the world and bring him information. Raven and Qrow do the same for Ozpin and they are his eyes.

Qrow is the left eye:

Salem: The last eye is blinded... you disappoint me.

While Raven used to be the right. So, her emblem is probably the right version of Qrow’s own one. Still, Raven refuses that part of herself and this is why she is not wearing her emblem.

In short, Raven used to be a bird of a feather with Qrow, but she is not flocking together with him anymore. This is because a scary cat has come:

And Raven has sacrificed her bonds out of fear. Not only that, but she has weaponized them:

Yang: You turn your back on people, you run away when things get too hard, you put others in harm's way instead of yourself!!

Raven has been using her most loved people as assets, so that she can shield herself from danger. Maybe it is because of this that she symbolically uses Omen to open portals. This even if she can apparently do so without it, since she opens them even as a bird. However, using her sword is a way to distance herself from the true nature of her ability (bonds). It is a way to reduce her ties with people to simple things she can use.

That said, this is damaging Raven herself.

To be more specific, she is making herself weaker and weaker:

Yang: Oh, shut up!! You don't know the first thing about strength! (...) You might be powerful, but that doesn't make you strong.

Raven is powerful, but weak. This weakness is symbolically conveyed by her behaving in the opposite way her semblance would need to truly shine.

Raven’s power works thanks to bonds, so it can be assumed it would be at its strongest if its user cultivated them both in quality and in numbers. However, Raven has few bonds and she is cutting them off one by one:

Yang: You can bond to certain people. And when you do, you could create a portal that takes you straight to them. You've got one for Dad. One for me. And you've got one for Qrow.

We know that Raven is also bonded with Vernal. Still, Vernal dies at the end of volume 5. Of the other ones Yang mentions, Raven has pushed away both Qrow and Yang through her actions at Heaven.

This makes this scene interesting:

Did the portal Raven opened at Heaven go to Tai? Did she go there because she felt nostalgic and missed him? Or is he the only one (both practically and symbolically) she can still run to?

QROW: A SCARE-QROW SCARED OF CROWS

Qrow’s semblance is Misfortune and it is basically a Bad Luck Charm:

I am no one's blessing I'll just bring you harm I'm a cursed black cat I'm an albatross I'm a mirror broken Sad to say I'm your bad luck charm

Qrow causes bad luck around himself. Because of this, he sees himself as a curse.

However, this conflict Qrow has with his semblance is actually symbolic of a turmoil developed on multiple levels.

Let’s begin with this:

Raven: You're the one who left. The tribe raised us, and you turned your back on them.

Qrow: They were killers and thieves.

Raven: They were your family.

Qrow: You have a very skewed perception of that word.

Qrow was born in a tribe of bandits and was taught how to kill and steal. Finally he was sent to a hunter academy, so that he could learn how to kill his classmates in the near future.

Qrow’s semblance is nothing, but the manifestation of his self-hate, that was probably partly caused by the environment he was born in. In a sense, it is his symbolical response to his childhood.

Let’s highlight that this response is very different from Raven’s. This is shown by their opposite behaviours toward their tribe. Qrow leaves it, while Raven goes back to it.

This difference can also be conveyed by how both Raven and Qrow share a specific motif, but embody it in different ways.

Both twins are associated with bad luck. Both can turn into ravens/crows, which are birds linked to misfortune. Moreover, their weapons are called respectively Omen (Raven’s) and Harbinger (Qrow’s).

The meaning is clear. The twins were born and raised with the idea that they should be symbols of violence and bad luck for their enemies. It is just that Raven wants to be a bad omen because it makes her feel strong. Qrow does not want it, but thinks he is:

I'm a harbinger, I cannot lie, I will change the color of your life.

It is to try and free himself from this curse that Qrow started working for Ozpin. He literally becomes the Scarecrow of the story to try and exorcise the bad fortune he brings. He is trying to scare the crows away. He thinks that if he does so, he’ll become a full person.

This ties with the original story of his allusion. In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the Scarecrow wants a brain because he is told by an old crow he would be just like a real man, if only he had one. In short, the Scarecrow wants a brain to become a real man, so that he can scare crows better than he already does.

Qrow too wants to be a full person, but he believes he is not. He thinks he is cursed and as a reaction to this he has attached himself to Ozpin and to his cause:

Qrow: No one wanted me... I was cursed... I gave my life to you because you gave me a place in this world... I thought I was finally doing some good...

This is why he reacts so badly when he discovers that Ozpin (who is basically a father figure for Qrow) has hidden so many things from him. Not only that, but he feels that the impossibility of truly defeating Salem (of truly defeating evilness) makes his life meaningless.

The point is of course that this is not the case and that Qrow does not need to do anything specific to be a true person and to be loved:

Qrow: Every choice I've ever made has led me here, and I've dragged you along with me. Oz, myself, the others... We're responsible for the mess the world's in now. I shouldn't have come, shouldn't have let any of you come... What was I thinking?!

Ruby: We're all in this together, and we're all going to do the best we can. That's all anyone can do. And I know it's what you've always aimed for. We would've come whether or not you'd let us, so stop talking like we're your responsibility! We're not! But we could still use Qrow Branwen on our side.

Ruby’s confrontation with Qrow at the end of volume 6 is basically the opposite of Yang’s confrontation with Raven in the finale of volume 5.

Yang calls Raven out because she refuses her responsibilities. She pushes them on others and leaves her own daughter to fight a battle she ran away from.

Ruby calls Qrow out on taking too much responsibility on himself. The kids were not forced by him to come. Qrow should not be completely responsible for them, but should learn to fight by their side.

Later on, Qrow is basically told the same by Maria:

Maria: You weren't half bad yourself today, Qrow.

Qrow: I feel like they did all the heavy lifting.

Maria: But you were there to help when they asked for it, and you were there to catch them when they fell. Literally, if I recall.

This is important because Maria appears just after Ozpin (aka Qrow’s mentor and guide) disappears. She is the person Qrow aspired to be:

Qrow: You never used your name, never showed your face. Lots of us thought you were just layin' low. Eventually, we just came to accept that you were probably dead. But the stories about you, I based my weapon off of yours. I wanted to be as good as the Grimm Reaper.

At the same time, Maria too, like him, considers herself a failure:

Maria: Well, I'm nothing but a disappointment, so you're well on your way.

However, at the end of the volume both Maria and Qrow realize that they do not have to save the world by themselves or to be invincible heroes. They just need to be there for their loved ones and the new generations. In short, Maria mentors Qrow on how to be a proper mentor.

And it turns out that he just has to take better care of himself:

In short, Qrow became the Scarecrow to scare crows, but ironically all he needs to do is to overcome his own fear of one Qrow.

If he does not, his semblance is bound to become a self-fulfilling prophecy, as it is shown in his two fights against Tyrian (vol 4 and vol 7).

1) In volume 4 he manages to protect Ruby, but ends up injured and unable to help the kids for the rest of their journey. He goes from their protector to a wounded man they have to take care of.

Narratively, it happens because of this:

Ruby: This is a lot to take in, and it all sounds crazy, but... I'm willing to do whatever I can to help because I trust you. But why couldn't you trust me? Why couldn't you just travel with us, instead of this secrecy, and, and--

Qrow: Look, this has nothing to do with trust. I-- It's a long story, okay?

The whole fight between Tyrian and Qrow could have played out very differently if Qrow were better at communicating with his niece. He wanted her away from Tyrian and himself because of his semblance, but Ruby interpreted it as Qrow not trusting her.

2) In volume 7, the battle ends with Clover’s tragic death being framed on Qrow.

Why does it happen?

Clover: Sometimes the right decision is the hardest to make. I trust James with my life! I wanted to trust you.

Once again, the problem lies in a lack of trust.

Qrow and Clover genuinely like each other and have bonded. Still, they fail to trust each other in a key moment and make the worst possible choice.

This is true for both characters:

Clover: I enjoyed working with you, you know. Even with that endless cynicism of yours.

Qrow: I'm usually proven right.

Clover: We don't have to fight, friend.

Qrow: You don't know my friends. That's how it always goes.

Qrow: Why couldn't you just do the right thing instead of the thing you were told?

In a sense, the whole fight can be read as The Scorpion and the Frog. In the original fairy-tale, the point is that one can’t overcome their own nature. The scorpion will sting the frog even if it goes against its own survival. Here, it is the same for the characters. In order for things to go well, either Clover or Qrow should overcome their flaw, but they fail.

Clover is not able to let go of his loyalty for Ironwood, even if it is clear the orders he received are wrong.

Qrow goes back to his usual cynism and makes a pact with Tyrian:

Robyn: I’m sorry for what happened. It wasn’t your fault.

Qrow: It was, though. I made a deal with the darkness, and he paid the price. It was all happening so fast, but Clover wouldn’t let up. Could have worked together against Tyrian if Clover just...

Tyrian is the poisonous scorpion, while both Qrow and Clover are two frogs, who are hurt by him. Ironically, the frog’s mistake in the story is to trust the scorpion, while the mistake of our two frogs is that they did not trust each other.

Still, why is it so narratively? To be more specific, why is that so when it comes to Qrow’s character?

The answer is here:

Qrow: But the thing that really stings? For the first time in a while I thought, maybe, maybe I could be around somebody - anybody - without my semblance making it… complicated. And now, it just feels like a childish dream. Gone... like everybody else.

Clover is narratively this:

Blake: You have to understand that all of you are looking for simple answers to a very complicated problem.

He is a very simple answer to a very complicated problem that has its roots in Qrow’s interiority. Qrow’s flaw, what goes in the way of his relationships and happiness, is not that he is unlucky, but that he feels unlucky.

He feels worthless and thinks of himself as bad for others. This is why he keeps his distance and refrains himself from growing close to people.

He blames it on his semblance and this is why he makes an exception for Clover. It is because he sees in the other’s ability an easy fix to his struggle.

Still, he is proven wrong because in the moment of truth, they fail to communicate and everything goes to hell.

This is not to say that Qrow and Clover’s relationship was bad or that Clover deserved to die. In-universe their bond had beautiful aspects and could have grown stronger. Moreover, Clover could have developed and left his flaw behind.

Still, narratively Clover serves a specific purpose and him dying is a part of said purpose.

Clover brings a superficial harmony to a situation and a group dynamic, which is actually not harmonic at all:

Clover: What would you guys do without me?

The Ace Ops are a group of individuals repressing their own feelings and identities for the sake of an unspecified greater good. They see the world in black and white, not because they are stupid, but because they refuse complexity:

Robyn: Yeah, because you don’t care about the truth. You just want someone to be mad at. Easier than taking an honest look at what side you’re on.

Winter: Penny. The general is making hard choices so we don't have to.

This fits with them being a group based on Aesops aka short stories with a very well defined and often simplicistic message.

In short, Clover is the one that keeps his group together. Once he is gone, his group starts deteriorating. All because they refuse to aknowledge their feelings:

Ren: That’s why you lost against Team RWBY. You, you try to fight how you feel about each other, so you’ll never truly work as a team.

Once he is gone, Qrow is similarly forced to grieve and self-reflect. Luckily, he is not alone:

Robyn is the opposite of Qrow in terms of symbolism.

Qrow is associated with crows and bad luck, while Robyn is linked to robins, which bring good fortune.

She is also a symbol of unity and hope (her emblem is basically Katniss’s symbol in the Hunger Games, after all):

Tyrian: Robyn Hill. For such a little bird, you have quite the impact around here! Bringing hope and a smile wherever you go! I find it…upsetting.

Despite this, Robyn too has suffered isolation, just like Qrow:

Robyn: Believe it or not, I know a little of what that’s like. When people are worried you’re gonna sniff out their secrets, they tend to push you away. It makes a real connection… difficult.

Qrow: I-- never thought of it that way.

Robyn’s line is important for two reasons.

a) It shows Qrow that he is not the only one who has met difficulties in life because of his semblance. His case is not unique.

b) It links to the idea that trusting others is difficult and it is not something that comes without dedication and work.

As a matter of fact Robyn’s semblance is specifically symbolic of trust. It is the power to detect lies through touch, so if you are going to work with her, it means you must be ready to trust and to be trusted:

This also ties figuratively with the act of shaking one’s hand as if to make a pact (an act of trust). If Raven’s power is about asymmetrical bonds, then Robyn’s is about mutual ones.

Robyn highlights that this creates problems for her because it is not easy for people to trust. Some can’t be trusted, while others do not trust Robyn won’t cross their boundaries.

However, this also means that the relationships Robyn manages to forge are strong bonds, where everything or almost everything is out in the open. This is the exact opposite kind of environment than the one realized through Clover’s good luck semblance. It is a harmony more difficult to reach, but it is a more stable and genuine one.

It is these kinds of bonds Qrow should aim to create. In order to do so, he must accept his semblance and his past as parts of themselves. Still, he should not let them define him. Not only that, but he should learn to trust others and their strengths:

Qrow: Ruby, stop!

Ruby: I need you to trust me.

Only in this way, Qrow can truly grow. The secret is that it was never about scaring the crows away, but to learn how to live with them.

HUGIN THAT RUNS AWAY AND MUNIN THAT MAKES EVERYONE WORRIED

Raven and Qrow’s issues can be synthesized by this quote:

"Hugin and Munin fly each day over the spacious earth. I fear for Hugin, that he come not back, yet more anxious am I for Munin."

Raven never comes back, while Qrow has his loved ones fear for him because of his self-destructive tendencies.

In order to overcome these flaws, they must grow in opposite directions.

Raven must realize that her survivalism is actually self-destructive. It makes her survive, but it negates her the chance of living. She must become more selfless and trustworthy to make it up for the unfair bonds she created.

Qrow must accept that his self-destructiveness is actually selfish and damaging to his loved ones. He must start to trust others’ strengths, so that he can be brave enough to live together with them, instead of looking at them from afar.

#rwby #rwby meta #qrow branwen #raven branwen #robyn hill #clover ebi #tyrian callows #my meta #semblance of the soul

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grailfinders · 3 years ago

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Fate and Phantasms #194

(Woops, day late, sorry)

Today on Fate and Phantasms, we’re finally done with servants with hidden true names! 🎉 Well, after this one, anyway. Today we’re bringing you the Caster of Midrash, whose true name doesn’t even have anything to do with Salem anyway! Check out her build breakdown with true name spoilers below the cut, or her character sheet over here!

Next up: A completely different character, I swear.

We’re building the Queen of Sheba, who is- wait a second. That’s not a name, that’s just a title! And it’s one that’s been subject to so much memetic mutation I’m pretty sure dropping “midrash” in her fake name is more of a hint to her identity than her true name is! What the hell!?

You know what? It’s not worth getting angry. Moolah is an Order Cleric to lay down the law for fair negotiations, as well as a The Genie Warlock for the sake of getting her genie assistants. And also being a genie, I guess.

Race and Background

As I just said, Moolah is part genie, and going by our previous rulings with the Pandevas, that means she’s an Air Genasi. This gives her +2 Constitution and +1 Dexterity, as well as Unending Breath so you can hold your breath forever, and Mingle with the Wind to cast Levitate once per long rest for free, using your constitution. Wind Genasi are probably the weakest subrace (which is really saying a lot), but being able to float around it just fun. For background, she’s... a queen... Noble. History, take Deception instead of persuasion to act like a maid for the singularity. Don’t worry, we’ll get persuasion back later.

Ability Scores

Your highest score should be in Charisma. Moolah’s good at talking people into deals they shouldn’t take. Just because negotiations are fair, doesn’t mean she isn’t better than you. After that is Wisdom. Half of business is all about finding the right mark- I mean customer. Also, wisdom is literally one of her skills. Third is her Intelligence, it was good enough to impress Solomon, but we need the other soft stats more. Your Dexterity is still above average, since you definitely aren’t wearing heavy armor. That means we have to avoid dumping Constitution at the last second, leaving Strength as your lowest stat. Just wind up anything you need to carry, easy.

Class Levels

Cleric 1: Starting off as a cleric gets you a couple goodies, like proficiency with Wisdom and Charisma saves, plus Religion and Insight. Since you’re an Order cleric, you also get proficiency with Heavy Armor (which we won’t use here), and Persuasion. Told you we’d get that back. Order clerics are also a Voice of Authority, which lets your allies help you while you help them. If you target a friend with a leveled spell, they can use their reaction to make one weapon attack against a target you choose. Don’t try to be a rules lawyer though- only one ally can attack per spell, so you can’t hit your whole team with Aid and get a free round of combat. Speaking of Spells, you have those! You can cast and prepare spells with your Wisdom, and you get Command and Heroism for free, so they’re always prepared without taking up space. You can also use spells like Bless to make allies a bit better at everything, Detect Magic to make sure nobody (else) has enchanted your courtroom, and Protection from Evil and Good so you can be on equal terms with even the most outlandish opponents. You also get some cantrips, with Guidance delivering wisdom to your allies once per casting, Thaumaturgy for some courtroom theatrics, and Mending to patch up your robes. Something tells me you’re a bit of a spendthrift.

Cleric 2: The second level of cleric isn’t quite as crowded, but it’s still pretty useful. You can now Channel Divinity once per short rest, either Turning Undead and forcing them to flee if they fail a wisdom save or delivering Order’s Demand. As an action, you can force a wisdom save on all creatures within 30′ of you, charming them for a round or until they take damage if they fail. You can also force them to drop whatever they’re holding. Negotiations tend to go more smoothly when you get rid of the claymores.

Warlock 1: Now that we can calm people down, we can get some other stuff going on the side. First level The Genie warlocks get a Genie’s Vessel, which lets you hide in it for a Bottled Respite, letting you hide out for up to 2x your proficiency hours, once per long rest. More frequently, you can unleash the Genie’s Wrath, adding your proficiency bonus in thunder damage to one attack made with an attack roll. You also get Pact Magic, which doesn’t blend with multiclassing like other spellcasters. You can either kind of slot for either kind of spell, but you don’t use the multiclassing table- just keep them separate, and use your class levels to determine the slots for each class. You also don’t prepare spells, so you’re stuck with what you get here. Grab Eldritch Blast for the prerequisite caster balls and Mage Hand for a helpful little genie to carry stuff for you. You also get Detect Good and Evil to sniff out elder gods, and Sanctuary to stop them from slapping you while you give them a verbal beatdown.

Warlock 2: Second level warlocks get Eldritch Invocations for customization, like Armor of Shadows for free mage armor so you don’t die, and Mask of Many Faces for your shapeshifting. You can also cast Distort Value now, because let’s be real, you’re going to do that whether magic helps or not.

Cleric 3: Third level clerics get second level spells, like your freebies Hold Person and Zone of Truth. Most people assume that means you can’t lie, but all zone of truth does is make it so you can’t tell untruths. There is a difference, and if you want to be a true Moolah you’ll have to learn to embrace that. You can also Aid your allies with extra HP or Enhance Ability, or use Augury to get some of that Solomonic wisdom. If you’re dealing with some angry customers, just use Calm Emotions to make them settle down.

Cleric 4: Use your first Ability Score Improvement to bump up your Wisdom for stronger spells and demands. You can also Spare the Dying, which will be helpful if you have to stabilize someone after, say, they get half-hanged.

Cleric 5: At fifth level, your turn undead turns into Destroy Undead, instantly killing all undead of CR 1/2 or lower when they fail a wisdom save. You also get third level spells, like Mass Healing Word and Slow! Those aren’t really what we’re here for though. You can also use Tongues to communicate with anyone, regardless of how far away they come from. If they’re from particularly far away, you can use Magic Circle to lock them in place during negotiations. You also get Clairvoyance for more solomon style wisdom.

Cleric 6: Sixth level clerics get a second Channel Divinity each short rest, and you become the Embodiment of the Law- now you can shorten the casting time of a leveled enchantment spell from 1 action to 1 bonus action. You can do this Wisdom Modifier times per long rest. This way you can throw up a zone of truth and keep multitasking at the same time.

Warlock 3: Bouncing back over to warlock at last, just in time for your Pact Boon! The Pact of the Chain gives you the Find Familiar spell, letting you pick special forms. None of those are genies, but an Imp is probably pretty close. You can cast touch-range spells through them, and attack using your own attack to do so. Oh hey, feign death is touch range. Just throw your familiar at Mata Hari & boom, one faked hanging. You can also make a Gust of Wind, creating a line of wind that extends 60′ away from you. Creatures that start their turn have to make a strength save or get pushed back 15 feet, and they spend double movement moving towards you in that area. You can change the direction of the wind as a bonus action.

Warlock 4: Use your next ASI to become Silver Tongued, rounding up your Charisma score and doubling your proficiency bonus with Deception. It’s a useful business tool, and also you managed to hide your identity while also starring in a play as your true identity. I know puritans are dumb, but that’s just cheeky. Also, you can use your attack action to make a contested deception check against a creature’s Insight. If you win, you don’t get opportunity attacks from them, and your own attacks have advantage. This lasts for a round, or until you use the ability again. If they win, they can’t be affected by this for an hour. You’re not really a fighter, so talking your way out of a sticky situation can be a lifesaver. Alternatively, talk your way into slapping them with tons of damage thanks to Eldritch Blast next turn, since this ability doesn’t specify weapon attacks. You can make this even easier for yourself by casting Friends for advantage on charisma checks, and you also learn Flock of Familiars to bring all your genies out to play. It’s Find Familiar, but three of them.

Warlock 5: Fifth level warlocks get third level spells, like Intellect Fortress, which will protect a creature from psychic damage, and give them advantage on soft stat saves. That’s all intelligence, wisdom, and charisma saving throws! Is some nerd tossing zones of truth left and right? No need to fear any more! You also get the invocation Voice of the Chain Master, letting you see, hear, and speak through your familiars. Genies can talk, and now so can your familiars, congrats.

Warlock 6: Sixth level genelocks get an Elemental Gift, giving you resistance to thunder damage, and you can fly for 10 minutes as a bonus action proficiency times per long rest. Finally, controlling wind can be fun! Speaking of controlling wind, your spell this level is Thunderstep, letting you escape from one spot in a burst of thunder damage and reappear in another.

Warlock 7: Seventh level warlocks get fourth level spells, and Charm Monster will help calm down even the strangest of adversaries. If you’re already fighting it’ll have advantage on its save, so you better hope Cthulhu has a bad wisdom score. You also learn how to pull yourself out of the toughest of scrapes with a Trickster’s Escape, letting you cast Freedom of Movement once per long rest for free.

Warlock 8: Odd numbers are bad, so use this ASI to round up your Dexterity and Intelligence for a higher AC and more gooder brain. You also learn how to cast Banishment to throw Cthulhu back into the void he came from once you’re done whupping him in a legal battle.

Warlock 9: Ninth level warlocks get fifth level spells, and Seeming gives you the ability to hide your physical appearance for up to 8 hours. You can alter the appearance of any number of creatures within 30 feet, but this is mostly for your benefit. Fluffy tails and ears tend to stick out in New England. You can also make more destructive genies by summoning Minions of Chaos. Once per long rest you can use a warlock slot to cast Conjure Elemental, creating a CR 5 or lower elemental of your choice for up to an hour. If you drop concentration, it sticks around for the rest of the hour, but now it’ll be hostile to you. Good thing you’re good with negotiations!

Warlock 10: At tenth level your vessel becomes a Sanctuary Vessel- you can pull up to 5 willing creatures into your Bottled Respite with you, and they can be forcibly ejected as a bonus action if you choose to do so. In addition, anyone who stays inside for at least 10 minutes gets the benefits of a short rest, and they get extra healing if they use hit dice. You can also cast Prestidigitation for little bits of casterliness, and you can Contact Other Planes for guidance. Summoning Elementals will probably go better if you give them a heads up, and contacting Mount Celestia is probably the only way you’ll be able to talk to your husband. Sorry about that, btw.

Warlock 11: Eleventh level warlocks get a Mystic Arcanum. Basically, it would be really busted if you could cast two sixth level spells per short rest, so you get one per long rest instead. Yours is Investiture of Wind, giving you yet another way to fly, defense against ranged weapons, and you can create cubes of swirling wind that deal bludgeoning damage and push large or smaller creatures around. We’ve been so focused on legal and business stuff we really haven’t had much focus on wind. To be fair though, it’s not like WotC did much better, but this spell should make up for that.

Warlock 12: Use this last ASI to bump up your Charisma for stronger spells and more convincing lies. You also get one last Invocation, and an Eldritch Mind will help you keep concentration on your spells. You don’t want to run out while flying, and you especially don’t when you’re keeping a living tornado in check.

Warlock 13: Your last spell for this build is the seventh level spell Forcecage. It’s not quite as elegant as a Magic Circle, but it’s way more likely that the giant monster you’re dealing with is coming from this dimension, so this will help trap anything that can’t teleport away.

Warlock 14: Your ultimate level grants you the ultimate power of the genelock- Limited Wish. As an action, you can use your genie’s vessel to cast any spell of 6th level or lower that can be cast in 1 action, without using any material components. You can only use this once every 1d4 long rests, but it’s very cost effective.

Pros and Cons:

Pros:

You are very good at ending fights nonlethally, either restraining enemies of all kinds or negotiating their anger away from the party. Depending on how your DM does experience points, this might make you very unpopular.

On a related note, you’re really good at avoiding combat in general, using spells like Forcecage or Gust of Wind to keep enemies away, Flying out of their reach, or using spells like Seeming and Disguise Self to hide in plain sight

Mixed casting classes are usually a bad thing, and to be fair not getting wish does hurt, but it’s also really useful here. Mixing warlock with another casting class gets you extra spell slots, but you can still recharge your biggest slots on short rests. It’s the best of both worlds.

Cons:

Your Wisdom isn’t amazing. It’s fine for most builds, but it means your cleric spells are going to be pretty easy to escape from.

Grabbing Embodiment of the Law means we’re one level shy of the fifteenth level of warlock, which would have given you an invocation that lets you cast Alter Self at will. Without that, your shapeshifting powers are in name only, which is a downer.

Even with Eldritch Mind, your Concentration is still pretty bad, and you’ll have to choose between defenses, charming enemies to bring them out of combat, or your more powerful offensive spells. Nobody ever said being a lawyer was simple.

#fgo #fate grand order #D&D 5e #DND #Caster of Midrash #Cleric #Warlock

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anya-grace · 4 years ago

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What To Do When Your Terror Professor Accidentally Left His Camera Open After A Discussion

ao3

Armin Arlert typing…

Armin: Eren, please tell Mr. Ackerman now. Please.

Connie: No

Connie: Don’t you guys dare leave the meeting.

Connie: YET

Connie: Just wait

Connie: WHAT IF HE DOES SOMETHING FUNNY

Eren tentatively types then deletes the words on his screen. For the last three minutes, he ponders on what to say to his classmates—or his chemistry professor—and settles for a simple, “Why me?!”, because really, there are almost 20 of them in the class and he’s not even the class’ president for heaven’s sake but his classmates push him to go chat their terror professor who is currently reading some documents and is totally unaware of his camera that’s been left open five minutes ago after their class ends.

Jean: Of course, it should be you, Jaeger.

Jean Kirstein typing…

Jean: Since you always love to suck up to Mr. Ackerman.

Jean: Bootlicking asshole.

Eren: Fuck you, horse face. Why don’t you try and tell him instead since you are a good pony?

Marco: Language, guys. Language.

Armin: Guys, please don’t fight here on the class’ group chat again!

Armin: Mikasa, please do something.

Hearing a soft feminine voice from their professor’s other side of the screen, the banters in their group chat die down. Eren—and presumably the rest of his classmates who refuse to leave the meeting—watches as a familiar short woman enters their professor’s home office. Mr. Ackerman looks up from his stack of papers as he—wait, did Mr. Ackerman just smile?—acknowledges this new figure.

Connie: HOLY SHIT

Marco: Connie, language.

Connie: HOLY SHIP

Connie: Is that, Ms. Ral???

Sasha: They’re a thing?

Historia: I think so?

Sasha: Since when?

Jean: Hey, Eren Bootlicker. You know about this?

Eren: Do I look like their couple advisor or something, horsie?

As much as he hates Jean for calling him the silly name, Eren is surprised like everyone else.

In the university, it is common for students to have Ms. Ral as their favorite professor. She always has this smile on her face, sunny and so cheerful. She also teaches well and kind and patient to students who are having difficulties learning a specific topic (he’s one of those students).

At the same time, it is also common for students to be afraid of Mr. Ackerman. An intimidating, terror professor who makes students cower in fear just by his sharp looks. But in reality, he’s a great educator and even if he doesn’t look like it, he’s very considerate too.

But still, he just has this image of being terror and frightening. It surprises them so much to see Ms. Ral—the literal sunshine, and Mr. Ackerman—the embodiment of darkness and the most accurate representation of a person who's mad with the world—living together.

But it surprises them more when Mr. Ackerman pushes his documents to the edge of the table and casually opens his arms as the female professor approaches him. Ms. Ral runs to his arms, a visible blush is evident on her bare and mushy face fresh from sleep. She settles in their professor’s lap and snuggles in his chest, burying her face on the crook of his neck.

“Good morning,” she says groggily.

“Hmm.” Mr. Ackerman hums and softly rubs Ms. Ral’s robe-covered back.

For a couple of minutes, Eren watches as the two snuggles together until a message notification pops up again on his computer.

Historia: Oh my god

Historia: They’re cute

Marco: I didn’t know Mr. Ackerman has a soft side…

Armin: You guys do understand that we are invading their privacy, right?

Mikasa: No.

Mikasa: We need to watch.

Mikasa: I think shortie’s threatening Ms. Ral.

Mikasa: Armin, record this so we have evidence.

Armin: Mikasa?? He’s literally your cousin. Don’t you suppose to know him?

Mikasa: Exactly. I know how awkward that shortie is. Ms. Ral won’t date him unless he did underhanded tricks.

Connie: GUYS

Connie: WHAT IF THEY DO IT

Connie: RIGHT NOW

Jean: DUDE

Sasha: CONNIE WTF

“Want to eat breakfast?”

Ms. Ral has her arms around Mr. Ackerman’s neck as the male professor caresses her orange hair.

“Hmm. Later. I still want to sleep.” Ms. Ral places a soft kiss on his neck.

“It’s already past 8. You sure you’re not hungry yet?”

“Not yet.”

Their exchange of words is peaceful and warm. From the looks of it, the two may have been together for quite a while now.

Armin: I really think we need to leave the meeting now, guys. We’re going to be late for Mr. Smith’s class.

Reading Armin’s chat in his inbox, not one of them replies as they watch Mr. Ackerman fix Ms. Ral’s sleeping robe. Their professor watches the sleeping figure of Ms. Ral lovingly and plants a soft kiss on her forehead before dozing off as well.

They hear their soft breathing as well as the sound of the aircon from the other side. One by one, Eren and his classmates leave the meeting. The image of their two professors sleeping peacefully around each other engraves in their minds until the day ends.

***

Levi awoke with Petra’s robe drape on his body, his girlfriend nowhere to be found as his eyes slowly adjust to the light on his home office. With his open laptop on the table, Levi tries to distinguish what time it is only to find out that it is drain of its battery. He takes his phone and sees a bunch of missed calls from Mikasa and some text messages from Erwin that says, “You took your time with Block 104. They didn’t attend my class. We have to talk about this over Zoom, Levi.”

#rivetra #levi x petra #Levi Ackerman and the 104th #Petra Ral and the 104th #THIS IS MY FAVORITE SCENARIO OKAY #my otp unintentionally being soft for each other in front of other people #Levi Ackerman #Petra Ral #104th squad

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precisemuseum · 4 years ago

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Puyo Puyo PC-98 Manual Translation

Once upon a time, in the age when the power of magic was bestowed upon the world, a powerful sorcerer created a great spell named "Owanimo." One of the strongest spells of all, it could banish monsters to a space between dimensions, but he sealed it away, recording it only in his "Book of Magic."

Not because it was forbidden knowledge or incredibly hard to use, but because to him, it seemed useless. And thus, the spell entered a dormant state, awaiting a day when a new sorcerer would come forth...

Years came and went until finally, the seal came undone with the appearance of a great sorceress: Arle Nadja. One day, this auburn-haired girl with golden eyes came across the Book of Magic.

"Owanimo...?" Arle studied the chapter on forbidden spells for what seemed like hours. "When four monsters of the same color are in your sights, chant this spell loudly. The Goddess of Time shall listen, and whisk the monsters away to a space between dimensions."

Arle continued to read, learning the Owanimo spell, but then closed it with a heavy sigh once she finished.

Why set it aside like that? Well, Arle had never seen "four monsters of the same color" as the spellbook described.

"I spent so much time reading, and it's not even a spell I can use for anything..."

But just as fate brought the Book of Magic into Arle's hands by chance, so it brought from the world of darkness the very monsters she had read about.

And thus, a great battle awaits. With her great magic abilities, and the newfound power of "Owanimo," Arle Nadja sets out to protect the world.

CHARACTERS A・C・P

Arle Nadja The protagonist of the game and the (aspiring) sorceress who released the spell "Owanimo". Nobody knows how she ended up this way, but despite looking like she wouldn't hurt a fly, she's actually a merciless girl that slaughters innocent Puyo. She currently attends a magic school, but she's already too scary for anything to stand in her way. That's my opinion, anyway.

Carbuncle During the game, when you find your eyes moving towards the center of the screen... Awww~! He's sleeping!!! This is Carbuncle. When he's lying still, he almost looks like a loaf of bread, but as he sings and dances he shows off a wide range of movement and facial expressions. A truly profound deuteragonist.

Puyo Puyo Despite their fate as short-lived, jelly-like monsters who are stacked and popped, they have managed to secure a leading role this time around, and even get to dance on the title screen. They're sure to enjoy this special opportunity to perform on a grand stage in five different colors. Looking at them with an empty stomach will reveal their appetizing nature and make you hungry. Hehe.

Arle, the protagonist, is brimming with curiosity.

PRACTICE STAGE ENEMY MONSTERS

Skeleton T While he appears as the epitome of a tea-loving Japanese man, he is a fine monster as well. He will be the first opponent you face during your trials. But you'll find that in a rather endearing way, he's a miserable fool who doesn't even know how to rotate his Puyo. Boohoo. Sipping bitter green tea during battle will instantly make you one of his tea-drinking buddies.

Nasu Grave An eggplant. Specifically, a Kamo eggplant. On top of that, he makes for a rather strange presence. Just what the heck is this thing? Despite appearances, his defensive power is high, so novices might find themselves struggling a bit. You'll have no choice but to keep at it and apply a steady technique. But in the end, your opponent is still just an eggplant. A regular talking eggplant. …Heh.

Mummy Even though it's called Mummy, it isn't a mommy. It's a mummy. What? You already knew that? Oh, deary me, I'll wrap it up then. (←One-man comedy routine.) Mummy is an opponent that makes you want to bully it because the crying face it makes when it's about to lose is just too cute. Sorry, Mummy.

The Goddess of Time whisking the monsters away.

BATTLE STAGES 1-6

Draco Centauros As you might expect from someone who shouts "Rawr", this half-dragon being takes pride in those sharp horns. Appearing as the first obstacle of your quest, this opponent has top tier judgment and piece precision but takes forever to think things through. Because of that, she's a pitiful lass who is only ranked as a third-rate monster girl... You heard me right! Draco is a girl. I'm sure someone around you thought she was a boy...

Suketoudara A pollock who has an aura of coming from some far-off sea. However, he seems to have the character of an Edokko. He's an athletic-type who tends to err on the side of caution. However, he's also arrogant. When he wins, he makes a face that screams "You're no match for me!", which is truly aggravating. Many say they especially don't want to lose to him.

(TL Note: Literally meaning “Child of Edo”, Edokko is refers to a person born and raised in Edo (renamed Tokyo in 1868). It implies personality traits such as being assertive, straightforward, cheerful, perhaps a bit mercantile.)

Sukiyapodes Let's just get this out of the way; he has a giant foot. It measures about 16 mon. Even though he has a complex about it, he directs that frustration into bettering himself. Well, we're not sure if that last part's true, but he always has a cheerful expression on his face as he slowly and steadily builds precise chains. He's a bit of an unpleasant guy.

(TL Note: mon is a unit of length for measuring the size of one's foot. 1 mon is equivalent to 2.4 cm. His foot is 38.4 cm, or 15.12 in.)

Harpy Now then, it is time for Miss Harpy's song. She loves singing more than she loves having three meals a day. She could sing for ages if no one stopped her. If there was something like a "Puyo Puyo World Karaoke Tournament", she'd win for sure. But unfortunately, this is only Puyo Puyo.

Sasori Man “How d'ya do, partner? I’m a famous Naniwa salesman known 'round these parts as Sasori Man. Put 'er there! Huh? Yer askin' for my secret to success? I ain't spillin' the beans no matter how much ya beg. That's somethin' to look forward to when we do battle. Till then, happy trails.”

Panotty A flute-playing boy. But honestly, he's nothing more than a noisy, mischievous brat. He disrupts his opponent's chains by dropping large amounts of Nuisance Puyo on them. Everyone has fallen victim to his antics at least once. What a truly ruthless Puyo technique. For when his last flute sounds, the dead shall be raised. Just kidding.

BATTLE STAGES 7-12

Zombie A zombie. All of his lines are stuff like "Ugheeee." This zombie is quite the formidable trickster. Sometimes he will be swiftly defeated, and other times he will take you by surprise and suddenly pull off a huge chain. If you don't take him seriously, you'll find yourself in a tough spot. Battle with caution.

Witch In the forest stands a grand mansion. Living there was a very ordinary family whose lineage can be traced back hundreds of years. The family's only daughter was born and was raised in a very ordinary fashion. But there was one thing that was not so ordinary...That young lady was a haughty witch. Ohohoho! Ohohohoho... *fadeout*

Zou Daimaou Pawoo! The mammoth mogul has arrived! A young aristocrat who comes from an ancient and distinguished line of royal Indian elephants. An irritating fellow who likes bad puns, gives his words an elephantine quality, and casually rhymes. He also enjoys Puyo Puyo. Plus, he's strong. An aphant-garde aristocrat whose ground-shaking chains are as sharp as his tusks.

Schezo A silver-haired man with deep blue eyes. Schezo, the embodiment of picturesque beauty. However, he's been deemed a pervert thanks to Arle, and strives to restore his honor by challenging her.

B-E-A-U-T-Y! Perfection won't pass you by! P-R-I-N-C-E! Of the Puyo Puyo World, it's meant to be! Go now! Go forth! Show us what you're really worth!

...Well, this has turned into something rather silly..

Minotauros Risking life and limb for his duties, a bull who lives by the code of chivalry, leaving a flurry of cherry blossoms in his wake. That is Minotauros. Ever since Rulue rescued him long ago, he has served as her devoted attendant like a faithful dog. Seeing him like this brings some to tears. For Rulue, he'd go through hell and high water. He's giving it his all today, and his one-eyed look is as cool as ever.

Rulue A woman truly worthy of the title of "Fighting Queen". The queen of the Puyo Puyo world. There's nothing that she can't obtain... Oh wait, there is something — Satan's love. Possessing a very jealous nature, Rulue is always lying in wait, ready to obliterate anyone who gets close to Satan. It's rumored that her true strength is even greater than Satan's.

BATTLE STAGE 13

Satan He is the king that rules over heaven and earth. He soars the skies with wings that slice through wind. His two horns point towards the heavens. His sharp eyes are like glistening gems. Cloaked in the veil of night, his devilish hand beckons you in. He is darkness’s cherished protege. It seems playing Puyo Puyo is a guilty pleasure of his. His true strength is unknown. It's said he's won the Puyo Puyo World Championship a countless number of times. In any case, he's obviously a bigshot. Can you truly defeat Satan, who boasts of elite skills in speed and chaining?

(You can download the PDF here)

#puyo puyo #translations #tl acy #text #puyo puyo pc 98 #source florek #photo

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winterbites · 5 years ago

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(Major JoJo's Bizarre Adventure anime spoiler warning) My review of...

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable is fantastic if you ask me; 39 episodes, each one fun and funky, Diamond is Unbreakable brings in many new elements that the previous three seasons didn't. Being my second favorite season in the series, I'm very much ready to give my review so let's jump right to it!

First, I'm going start with those new elements since I absolutely love them; there's a couple of them so I'll try to be brief (but I know I'm not good at being anything but descriptive). First is the new art style. Trying something different from what he normally does, Araki went with the more popular art style of the time called Bishonen, which is basically just a softer, more boyish art style (translated, it means beautiful youth). However, the style Araki used for this season isn't exactly Bishonen, but is instead an art style inspired from it while also mixed with his own personal touches. This mix makes for a refreshing breath of fresh air for the series and I think that it's wonderful for Araki to try out new stuff.

Next is the universal-wide range of color palletes. It's far from unusual for the JoJo seasons to switch up from one color pallete to the next during battles, but Diamond is Unbreakable takes it to a whole new level. There's not much I can say in this category because, once again, things like this are better experienced first-hand, but I can say that it's a wonderful aspect of the season that I truly adore.

Third, we have the Stands. While Stands aren't new to the series at this point, the inspiriation and creativity for them are. Stands have stepped away from being representations of tarot cards and are instead true portrayals of their human counterparts. Josuke's Crazy Diamond is crazy tough, powerful while also being able to heal, which is just like Josuke's indomitable will, physical strength and readiness to protect those he holds dear. Okuyasu's The Hand gets things closer to himself, embodying Okuyasu's simple in-your-face style of fighting. Koichi's Stand, although changing throughout the season, keeps the same feature of supporting at a distance while still being able to throw one helluva punch; this characterizes Koichi in that he's not as violent as the rest of the cast but he'll kick some ass if he needs to.

For the last new added element, I'm talking about the behavior of the season's criminals. The words modus operandi, in terms of crime, refers to the method of operation (or MO) used by an offender to commit a crime while a criminal signature is basically the unique mark a criminal will leave (usually used to satisfy the criminal's needs like emotional needs and please don't ask how I know this stuff).

Moving on, while I usually take time to talk about the intro, I'm not going to in this post but rather a separate post. The reason for this is because, as I learned with my Stardust Crusaders post, I'm not going to be able to make a relatively short post if I include a discussion on the intro. Unlike the other seasons of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Diamond is Unbreakable has three intros, each having different versions and unique additions. Since it would take a long time to talk about them, I'll save it for later.

With that being said, let's move on to the next topic: the characters. What can I say? I love them, the entire cast is so unique and special in their own way, even more so than Battle Tendency's. Much unlike Stardust Crusaders, most of the "enemy" Stand users in Diamond is Unbreakable aren't really enemies but rather people with their own interests who are just trying to achieve their own personal goals. Hell, you even have Stand users who aren't fought at all, with most of all the Stand users being reoccurring characters that fill the world (or in this case, fill the town) and get actual character development, minimal as it may be. You have the asshole Rohan who's only friend is Koichi due to Rohan being a very picky and particular person. You have Koichi (whom objectively has the best character development in the entire season) who gets stronger and braver throughout the season, confronting more and more problems head-on while also getting better at thinking on his feet in the heat of the moment. There's even development of relationships between characters, such as Josuke and Okuyasu going from being enemies to brothers by heart or Yukako going from trying to torture and murder Koichi to the both of them creating a loving and lasting bond.

Now, I want to go back to those little bits about criminal behavior and talk about one of the best anime/manga antagonists and the best JoJo antagonist so far: Kira Yoshikage. So the guy has a kink, but don't we all? Yes, he takes it too far by actively murdering people but it plays into that criminal signature I mentioned before and his Stand, Killer Queen, helps to create Kira's MO. Kira's signature is taking the hand of his female victims, which satisfies the psychological needs of his hand kink, and his MO is to explode people. The best part about all of this is that he didn't have either immediately: it took time for him to start stealing hands and it took him time to develop his Stand. Kira also has the most amazing motive of simply wanting a peaceful life; granted, that motive includes murdering people but I never said he's a good person, just that he's a good character. This all adds a very real feeling to Kira and makes him possibly the most human character in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

Quite different from the rest of the seasons, Diamond is Unbreakable's soundtrack takes a more chill approach towards music in between fights; however, once a fight does hit, get ready for badass music to ensue (Sudden Battle is really good and A Blossoming Love is really cute). As for the outro, I Want You is my favorite outro across the seasons. Keeping that extreme use of multiple color palletes and emphasizing the softer art style, this outro has a groovy song and adds on more visual details as the show goes on.

Finally, I want to talk about three things that bothered me throughout the show. First was that, once again, Araki threw one of his characters under the bus; this time around, it was Joseph Joestar. While Joseph has shown himself to not be above cheating at games and battles, I don't believe for a second that he would cheat on Suzi. This woman single-handedly took care of him and kept him company during his recovery after his battle with Kars. Not to mention, as I've said before, Joseph has strong familial values and there wasn't even a given reason for his adultery. To top it all off, Tomoko truly loves Joseph; that means that he would've had to stay in Japan long enough, which he has gone on record to say how much he hates Japan, to make such a lasting impression on Tomoko.

Next is that Araki made the characters Shizuka Joestar and Mikitaka Hazekura, which are both cool characters in their own rights, yet never showed or mentioned them after Diamond is Unbreakable ended. I understand that Shizuka can't be used in the near future since she's a literal baby and maybe Mikitaka simply stayed in Morioh, but we never got any closure information on them (is Mikitaka an actual alien and what ever happened to Shizuka's parents, things like that).

Lastly is the absolute Deus ex Machina of Kira's Bites the Dust ability on Killer Queen. He got it when he was under extreme pressure and that's just not a good enough explanation in any world; not to mention it's a bit uncreative given that Dio ALSO had a Stand ability that allowed for timey whimey shenanigans. A cool ability no doubt but that doesn't make in any less bullshit

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journeysintowebcomics · 5 years ago

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Homestuck Liveblog #183

UPDATE 183: Narrative Takeover

Last time everything went wrong for so many characters. John’s fight with Caliborn went awry, Jane’s plan to seduce Jake didn’t work because he kept thinking of Dirk, and Dave and Karkaroni’s political strategy meeting got derailed by Jade deciding it was a good time for romantic overtures. So now let’s continue.

So, now that they have been dumped in middle of the chaos that’s destroying all the known existence and reality, John checks the situation. Lord English is up there, in front of the black hole, seemingly impervious to its strong absorbing effect.

Unlike his younger form, his eyes aren’t flickering wildly. They’re locked in place, an eight ball in each socket.

If I remember correctly from the booklet about pool I read like six years ago when I started playing pool for fun, the eighth ball is the last one you must sink, so I’d say it indicates it’s endgame. I think it also had happened in Arc 7. Symbolism!

Tavros is over there, leading an army, Vriska is nowhere to be seen and presumably is very dead, and Meenah was supposed to be going away, I think? Anyway, it’s fight time! Everyone already has their weapons at the ready – all the weapons that are supposed to hit Lord English pretty hard – and Rose tries to remind them what exactly their plan is. She barely gets a single word out before she’s dead.

But Rose doesn’t get to finish what she was trying to say. Lord English’s mouth roars open and a wave of energy blasts through your group. Rose is the only one caught in it. She dissolves in slow motion. You can see the outline of her body in shadow. One arm thrown up over her eyes, shoulders pulled up defensively, cape billowing out behind her. She leaves an afterimage of shimmering light in her wake and then dissipates, drifting apart like a handful of salt tossed out to sea. You can almost hear the cosmic clock counting down, tick tock, and a chime to accompany her fate: Heroic.

This fight lasted like three seconds before it all looked grim as heck for John and friends. This is going to wreck everyone’s morale and ruin whatever effective plan they had, as I really doubt Rose was supposed to stand aside and let everybody else act. They’re so doomed.

As if to underscore how screwed they are, Jade tries to use her powers and finds out the black hole up there is where the green sun used to be. It made Lord English vulnerable, but she’s powerless now too. Whooops. Kind of a big oversight. How didn’t John or Future Rose foresee that detail? It’s kind of important!

With that, two of the four are now dead and they haven’t gotten started for real. Dave is trying to cut Lord English with the cueball sword, John is...standing around, I suppose, until he snaps out of it and surrounds Lord English with wind, capturing him until he tries to smash his skull with the hammer. Lord English eats the hammer. I’m...okay, I didn’t see that coming. I appreciate the move a lot. John can’t do much else because his glasses are broken, so he can’t see well at all. Good thing Meenah is around now! What a lifesaver!

Time to assess the situation and check how badly things have turned in...like a minute or so. As I always say: a minute is quite a long time in a fight!

Ghostly Tavros and another one of John’s hammers join the list of casualties, Meenah deciding to go in for the kill. Not unless you turn into Dave, gal! Not that Dave is faring much better, he’s trying to harm Lord English but he’s way too fast, even for Dave, who is no slouch in the agility department. That’s incredibly quick, and he’s not fueled by the green sun right now. Everything is awful for the heroes here!

Meenah is launched away and I can only guess she’s dead, because in this scenario being thrown away is kind of fatal due to the huge black hole up there. Dave is under Lord English’s foot, John barely saves him by throwing more hammer at Lord English for him to eat, and tries to set up a hammer barrier to prepare that silly thing he made with the legendary Zillyhoo and Vriska’s dice. If they need a lucky hit they sure need it now!

DAVEPETASPRITE^2: B33 < waaaaaaaaaaaait

...oooooooh no. I had completely forgotten this existed. Hey, what’s new? Will you be able to defeat Lord English? At least Dave is reacting with horror, which is the right reaction when you see a copy of yourself that was merged with a cat. Davepetasprite is being inspirational, trying to psyche up Dave, and it works!

DAVEPETASPRITE^2: B33 < i know it looks pawful right now but we can do it

DAVEPETASPRITE^2: B33 < in fact were literally the only ones who can do it

DAVEPETASPRITE^2: B33 < after all

DAVEPETASPRITE^2: B33 < it is our destiny B33

You also are the last three people left here, so I don’t think it’s much about destiny at this point.

Somehow, between the three of them they manage to do real damage on this monster. John’s hitting him with hammers even if Lord English keeps eating them, Dave slashes and actually gets blood, and Davepeta scratches with the claws. The cycle continues, Lord English almost eats John’s favorite hammer, just that this time he almost gets John himself. Well then. This story is truly something.

Apparently John got injured with Lord English’s teeth or something, because he’s bleeding heavily. I swear, if John dies because he got bitten by Lord English I’m going to be astonished, because that was never a cause of death I imagine would ever happen.

You lift your chin and see it: Lord English’s gold tooth cracked off at the base and embedded in your chest. It must be stuck between two of your ribs, you think, because it hurts like a bitch when you try to breathe.

Oof, you’re in big trouble! When you have something embedded into you you really shouldn’t take it out unless you’re in a professional’s hands, so it’s pretty likely John will have that tooth embedded into him for quite a while. Dave isn’t doing too badly, managing to stab Lord English with the cueball sword up the hilt, unfortunately leaving him vulnerable to Lord English’s maw. Oh god, he has tasted human blood, everyone run! Too late for Dave, though, he gets his head bitten off.

Won’t lie, that’s pretty brutal as far as deaths go. Damn!

Obviously this enrages Davepeta, who grabs Lord English and flies up to the black hole, dragging him along. That was an option? Maybe it’d have been great to have done that much earlier, before Dave died. Really would have been nice.

The black hole—the gaping, implacable, cosmic embodiment of the dead cherub, his long-departed sister—finally welcomes Lord English home.

English and Davepeta are sucked in with a subatomic whimper. The reunion sends shock waves across the pitiful remains of Paradox Space. And then everything is wholly, utterly, and categorically silent. It’s over. Lord English is dead.

Ding dong, the witch is dead. Somehow it’s done! Excellent! Now, here comes opinions about this whole sequence.

To be perfectly honest, this left a lot to be desired. The least of my complaints is the length – for a climactic fight it’s a little bit short. Which isn’t really a problem here, given this isn’t Homestuck anymore, it’s the epilogue. The fight not getting focus is fine and dandy, honestly. I’m actually surprised we got a fight at all.

What I will complain about, though, is that for something that pretty much only Davepeta got to do something worthwhile. It feels like pretty much everyone else who intervened, both alive and dead, were there just to die. It’s pretty disappointing, really. I think I’d have been okay with that if they at least had managed to do something before dying.

Curiously enough, if this had been incorporated into the story, characters dying so fast would have been less bad. I’d say this being part of epilogues is what makes this be treated differently to how it’d be otherwise. But yeah, Lord English is dead, and there’s plenty of epilogue left. I suppose that means the political stuff is what’ll fill the rest of the epilogue in this route, no?

You collapse against whatever is passing for the floor at this moment of utterly null corporeal conditions surrounding you. It doesn’t feel possible. You’re not sure you can even trust your perception well enough to believe it. But it seems to be over. You’ve convinced yourself of this truth well enough to allow yourself to exhale. Enough to allow yourself to suddenly acknowledge the agony coursing through your body, emanating from the gold tooth lodged in your chest. Enough to allow yourself to succumb to the overwhelming urge to sleep.

He’s so dead. And so, all the Wonderkids are dead, total party kill. They tried and they succeeded, mostly thanks to a timely intervention by what turned out to be the best sprite just for killing Lord English, and now they’re all dead. I’m pretty sure by now this makes Homestuck qualify as a Greek tragedy.

Ah, there’s the conversation Rose and Dirk are going to have. She starts by talking about that novel she wrote in her diaries, the ones about wizards. She feels the story as written by the adult Rose Dirk knew from his original world didn’t have as much passion as she did when she wrote the original draft in her journals. Maybe! When you write something for a widespread public, you have to kill a liiiiittle of your own passion to tailor it for a wider audience. It’s a cynical thought, I admit, but I believe I’m right.

ROSE: Anyway, my point is that I’ve long suspected my story was a pre-manifestation of my Seer of Light powers. I was seeing beyond my universe into another.

Doesn’t sound farfetched to me, I must say. It’s possible that, from her early ages, she was unconsciously starting to tap onto the many powers and abilities that come with her title and role. I mean, Mom Lalonde was there, and I believe in her own way she’d help pave the way for the kids to achieve what was needed to triumph. She may have done something, inadvertently or not, that led to Rose writing her novel in a fit of inspiration. Who knows. Certainly not me, and it’s such a minuscule point in the vast net of Homestuck I doubt it’ll be ever touched.

I hadn’t noticed until now that in the end a total of twelve players had crossed the door into the new universe. Fun number for that. Also, Terezi’s name is among them, so she did get to the new universe after all. What happened to her?

All these numbers may or may not have significance. Hah! Well it depends on what kind of author writes the story. Given it’s Hussie, well, I’m inclined towards thinking there’s some significance. Whether the reader will find out about it is an entirely different manner, of course.

Of course Dirk has given his current situation a lot of thought, he even has theories about what’s it. I’m listening, pal, enlighten me about this new plotline.

DIRK: I mean, some of us have stopped using our powers completely. Not a whole lot of need for emergency resurrections or complex timeline manipulation on a planet that’s never had a conflict more serious than a sportsball riot or a rumpled hat shortage.

DIRK: But even aside from how often they’re used...

DIRK: Some powers don’t lend themselves to the infinite expansion of one’s mind, the way ours do.

ROSE: I see.

ROSE: So what you’re saying is, it’s more a matter of one’s aspect than it is whether one’s powers are practiced further, or allowed to atrophy.

DIRK: Yep.

So it all depends on the power. It’s not like everyone’s going to start suffering this too, it seems to be limited to what aspect it is. Perhaps Jade and Dave would go through this too? Other than them, I’m not sure anyone else would.

ROSE: In that case, perhaps Terezi had the right idea.

ROSE: Getting away from this place, I mean.

ROSE: Maybe I was a fool for imagining I could settle down here.

Ah, so that’s what happened to Terezi. She left. Maybe she had a feeling things wouldn’t go well, it does make sense she’d be feeling the awfulness Dirk and Rose feel right now. With her Mind aspect, it does make sense she would. Where’d she go, though? Is she a nomad around the world or something?

Dirk’s taking this easier than most would because he’s used to multitasking. Ah, right, he did have his dreamself and his realself, dealing with both must have given him some practice. Still, two is nowhere close to the infinity of everything, so I’m skeptic it’s as good of a training as he says it was.

ROSE: I’m caught in the liminal space between reality and reverie, where people once believed demons dwelled. But the only reason the demon is still sitting on my chest is because I refuse to banish it. All it would take is looking directly at it.

ROSE: I’m forcing myself to stumble through my life as a sleepwalker. All this pain and sorrow could go away if I would just allow myself to wake up.

DIRK: Then why don’t you?

ROSE: Because I’m not sure that the person opening her eyes will be me.

Brings to mind that about us being someone’s dream and, when that someone wakes up, it’s all over. It’s the kind of thing that brings existential crisis when you think about it too hard, isn’t it? So, if Rose here’s experiencing something similar, she’s not going to have a good time because she’s the kind of person who thinks a lot. Nobody should be jealous of these two, that’s awful.

Dirk, in what’s unusually close to sympathy, crouches and takes off his sunglasses, looking straight at Rose’s eyes. He admits he’s a very flawed person and shouldn’t be always right, and that he knows all about his own flaws.

Rose’s eyes have grown distant, almost mirrorlike. Dirk can see himself reflected in her vacant stare.

ROSE: All the pieces in their place.

ROSE: The mechanisms all running smoothly.

She says this in a hollow tone. It’s the disarming voice a puppeteer ventriloquizes for a marionette.

...okaaaay, something happened. If I’m understanding this and the next few sentences correctly, Dirk pretty much took over Rose. I don’t know why, he just did. Althoooough...hm. It’s still early. Maybe the reasons will be revealed later. But hey, you can’t say this was predicted! Also, if I had to guess, the moment Rose was taken over was when he took off his sunglasses. It just makes sense, really.

Whyyyy is the text turning orange. Dirk, are you taking over the narration?

Yup, he did, and he’s addressing the reader. He sounds pretty bitter there are readers, and brags about he can make the reader’s perspective change and turn into a character’s perspective. No complaints from me for you doing that, really, be my guest.

But I haven’t revealed myself to you just to boast about the abilities arising from the gradual obliteration of the constraints on my consciousness. I’ve only taken a moment to answer a few questions. Not ones I heard you ask—because again, you are nonspecific and therefore do not matter—but ones I imagined you asking. And by imagining these questions, they became less fake, and as such, demanded similarly non-fake answers. No, in truth, the time has come to make my presence known in order to start bringing my plans to fruition. It’s time to get down to fucking business.

Eh. Sounds to me like Dirk wants to ramble and wants an excuse to do so, even if he has to make that excuse himself. Golly, pal, you have free control of the narrative. Ramble all you want, go ahead.

To continue the narrative, John has to wake up and does so. I suppose he being sleepy and exhausted after the fight was just he being sleepy and exhausted instead of being borderline dead because of blood loss. Dirk forces the narrative to make John apologize to no one for everything that happened in the battle, and it’s all so heavy-handed even John notices something’s going on with his head. Dirk, you’re not doing a very good job at being subtle.

Suddenly you remember: Lord English’s tooth is still embedded in your chest. You panic, wrap your hands around the base, and give it a little tug. It’s excruciating. The tooth makes an awful grating sound as it grinds along one of your ribs. You gasp and lose your grip, biting the inside of your mouth so hard that you taste blood.

Can’t blame you for trying, but I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Without someone to administer proper medical care, you’ll bleed to death pretty much instantly.

Yeah, exactly! Not that there’s anyone to administer proper medical care in the middle of literal nowhere, so he’ll have to transport himself somewhere else before he touches that tooth any further. Where’s John, anyway? Is he still lying around underneath the black hole? Did he zap himself somewhere else?

On the other hand, the tooth is poisoned. So you’re pretty much fucked either way, and that’s really all there is to say on the matter.

Oh. That’s a thing now? Well then, guess you’re screwed, John. Thanks for everything, have a nice death. I suppose it would count as a heroic death because he received that fatal wound fighting someone who was obliterating reality, so being revived isn’t an option, I suppose.

John wanders around for a very long time, depressed and feeling pretty awful, until he sees Dad Egbert’s wallet. It’s a coincidence to find it anywhere in the infinite expanse of reality! John opens the wallet, aaaaand...end page! Quick, make a distraction and go check some other place. It’s the usual Homestuck style, so that’s what happens.

Jade’s explaining Dave and Karkaroni’s political ambitions to Roxy and Calliope, once again using the terms ‘neoliberal austerity measures’. I’m still unsure what that’s supposed to mean, but whatever it is makes Roxy groan, no doubt because she has heard about said measures too much already. They’re bad, and Karkaroni’s underdog populism is the counter to those, she argues. Give him a chance! Unfortunately for Elect-a-Troll 20xx, it doesn’t seem like Calliope and Roxy are very interested in getting involved in this at all.

ROXY: i just dont rly

ROXY: care about politics that much i guess

I suppose this means she’s not going to support Jane either. Hey, better for her to not be interested than for her to be on the opposite side. This is a victory of some sort.

She’s reticent to supporting anyone not only because she’s not interested in politics, but also because it’s a fight between her friends and she sure isn’t eager to going against a friend. She also knows this is something Jane has been planning for a long time, so she’s not into ruining Jane’s plans – even though she won’t really go out and say she supports Jane. I really disagree Jane is fragile, though. She’s anything but fragile.

In the spirit of full disclosure, Roxy’s the only one left I haven’t been able to crack. Her mind remains a total enigma to me, just like it always has. If I had to guess, it’s her Void powers that make her invisible, even to increasingly omniscient parties such as myself. For all intents and purposes, it’s like her thoughts don’t exist. She’s the same person, as far as I can tell. She still wears her heart on her sleeve. But the bottom line remains: Roxy Lalonde is still utterly fucking inscrutable.

Which is a very good thing for her. I wonder if this means Dirk would be unable to do anything with the narration involving Roxy, if she’s invisible for even the increasingly omniscient parties. In that case, she’s the luckiest person in this entire canon. Good thing, too, given how Dirk is a fervent supporter of Jane, so he can’t manipulate her into doing anything.

Roxy’s staying out, but what about Calliope? She doesn’t want any of this either, because it’d be stressful as all hell and that’s a very valid reason to not want to get involved in politics, especially if it’s between competing friends. At least Jade understands well enough and doesn’t insist.

Apparently Roxy asking Jade to call both Calliope and her by ‘them’ throws Dirk off to the point he has to hastily say aloud he doesn’t care and that he’s very okay with this, you guys, it’s totally okay. I don’t know, when this kind of thing is written or said like he did I can only think that person is indeed not okay with it. Dirk really should stop his rambling for once before he shoves his feet deeper into his mouth.

For a person that’s starting to be omniscient and spent an entire page mocking the reader and being vainglorious he sure is pretty concerned with keeping up the appearances.

ROXY: i mean what am i gonna do

ROXY: get married and pop out 100 bbs?

I mean, with ectobiology that’s far easier and simpler than you make it sound. You don’t even have to get married for that.

I choose to believe Dirk has gotten so flustered by the conversation about Roxy and Calliope being non-binary he chose to make Jade be unconscious. He had to stop the conversation somehow, so he made her do astral plane stuff. Smooth, Dirk, smooth as a brick.

I may as well stop here for the time being.

Next update: next time

#homestuck #homestuck liveblog #webcomics #liveblog #webcomic liveblog

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itsclydebitches · 6 years ago

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RWBY Recaps: The Shining Beacon Pt. 2

This is the last (!!!) reposting from March 26, 2018 in an effort to get all my recaps onto tumblr. Thanks!

With Volume Five completed and the latest season of RWBY Chibi underway, I thought it time to start these recaps back up again. Yes, we're jumping around a bit--back to Volume One--but we'll get to all the episodes eventually!

In fact, the simple days of Volume One feel pretty wonderful right now...

We begin with a pan across Beacon's entrance (our shining Beacon as the title attests), giving us another good look at the school that's presumably the best Huntsmen academy in Remnant. We're not told exactly how much time has passed between this episode and the last, but I guess it's been a couple of hours? When we last saw Ruby and Jaune they were lost, looking for a food court, and when they meet up with Yang she asks Ruby how her day has been. I'd love to read some fics exploring their first few hours together before they finally figured out where to go.

So it's presumably late afternoon when all the freshmen gather in a large meeting room, the same one that will later be used to welcome the other academies and allow everyone to choose their first missions. For now though it's chock full of shadow people and Ruby immediately abandons Jaune once she spots Yang--which is pretty rude of her? I get that Ruby is supposedly bad at making friends, but contrary to that we've always seen her as incredibly sensitive towards others and she was just abandoned by Yang earlier that day. She calls her out on it two seconds later too, so I actually find it a little hard to believe that Ruby would ditch the one new person who's been nice to her when he clearly has nowhere else to go. Jaune literally lurks in the background being awkward.

I’ve been there, Jaune. It sucks.

Nevertheless, it allows the writers to flesh out his Nice Guy mentality that we'll see him working to overcome over the next two volumes. As Ruby leaves, Jaune wonders where he'll find another "nice, quirky girl to talk to." We're not in a YA novel, Jaune. There are no manic pixie dream girls to sooth your manly angst.

Oh, except for the redhead that's conspicuously revealed when Jaune walks off screen. Not that I would ever disparage the glorious Pyrrha Nikos with such a title.

Yang: "I saved you a spot!"

You... did? In the giant room with only a handful of people that Rooster Teeth had the time and budget to animate? Oh yeah, I'm sure it was real hard claiming that spot for Ruby.

As Ruby tears into Yang for ditching her and recaps all the shit she went through that morning, Yang develops an expression that is the very embodiment of yikes and asks if Ruby is having a "meltdown already?" Interesting choice of words. It could just be exaggerated, sibling teasing--to match what Yang assumes is an exaggerated tale--but I do wonder if Ruby has had "meltdowns" before. We don't know much about their lives pre-Beacon, but I can imagine that a socially awkward girl growing up in a world infested by grimm, who lost her mom too early, dealt with a depressed father, and was in part raised by a sister just two years older than her might have had a tantrum or two.

I do find it a little hilarious though that Yang doesn't believe her at first. Given everything Ruby is going to do in the next week alone, it’s 100% believable that she would explode on her first day of school. Classic Ruby.

As she recounts the whole debacle, who should overhear but scary, shouting Weiss? I absolutely love that they have her literally creeping up behind Ruby only to yell "YOU!" at the end of her speech. If Weiss really hated this girl she could have easily ignored her. But no. Weiss' dramatic ass has to re-introduce herself in the most extra way possible. As Ruby throws herself into Yang's arms (adorable) Weiss gives a sped-up, high-pitched legal info dump about what the Schnee Dust Company is and is not responsible for. At the time this was pretty funny--another one of the cutesy edits that characterize Volumes One through Two--but now that we know more about Weiss' home life? About her abusive father and how the dignity of the Schnee name has been ground into her since birth? The fact that Weiss can rattle this off and feels like she has to suddenly isn't very funny anymore.

Ruby tries to salvage the situation by starting things over and asking to be friends, and of course Weiss is an absolute brat about it. She mimics the cliched, air-headed girl, saying that she and Ruby can "Try on cute clothes and paint our nails and talk about boys!" throwing in an insult at poor Jaune while she's at it ("scraggly"). The fact that Ruby happily agrees tells me two things: 1. She shares a lot of those traditionally "feminine" interests (which is great considering we usually only see her geeking out over weaponry) and 2. this is some of the first evidence we see for headcanoned autistic!Ruby. Weiss' tone is very clearly sarcastic, but Ruby reads it as quite earnest, honestly surprised when it's revealed she's being duped. Before these three can start a real fight though Ozpin takes the stage to make, in his own words, a short announcement.

Now this is by far one of the most fascinating moments in Volume One. Especially after Volume Five's world building. A lot of fans have speculated that Ozpin isn't... well, Ozpin here. That one of his other souls (perhaps the man whose body he currently inhabits) is the one speaking to the new students. This is based mostly off of Ruby and Yang's comments that he "seemed kind of off" and, crucially, that is was "almost like he wasn't even there." Admittedly there are a number of holes in this theory (If a full merge is a thing, wouldn't Ozpin's latest two souls already have merged by now considering that he's possessed that body for years? How does Yang know when he's "off"? She's never even met the guy), and ultimately I'm inclined to think that these were lines that perhaps were supposed to go somewhere, but were then dropped. Or just generic ‘oooh look Ozpin is mysterious’ characterization.

Regardless, there is something pretty fishy about this scene, most notably the cinematography. Ozpin is animated primarily in close ups with half his face (his eyes) cut off, he's shot once from behind, and only once do we get to see his whole expression. As said, he's filmed as if he's this mysterious, shadowy figure that we're just meeting; like we hadn't already had a whole conversation with him over cookies two episodes back. If you wanted to make a case that someone other than Ozpin is speaking here, the cinematography might be one way to do it. But, more likely, I think it’s RT pushing for the ‘he’s super morally gray!’ aspect, even though we actually learn too much about Ozpin to really make that work.

His dialogue is just as interesting though. Ozpin tells the kids that all he sees is "wasted energy," that no matter how driven they might be to succeed it means nothing without proper effort. Dreams alone won't cut it: "Knowledge will only take you so far. It's up to you to take the first step." Ozpin is far from one to shy away from reality, but he's usually kinder than this too. This is perhaps additional evidence that a part of Ozpin--one we don't see very often--is in control here; a personality not as inclined to sugarcoat things.

This word choice also tells us a lot about his motivations. As we'll learn later, Jaune forged his transcripts to get into Beacon and a lot of people wonder why the hell Ozpin would let an untrained kid get away with that. Ultimately though Jaune isn't in much more danger than anyone else. As Pyrrha's death makes abundantly clear, even the strongest of them can easily fall when up against the sorts of enemies they face. Thus, Ozpin prizes determination--the drive to do good--over talent or current levels of strength. Jaune was let in because he took his own first (admittedly illegal and arguably immoral) step and Ozpin, like with Ruby, rewards his resolve. This reminds me of Raven who has the knowledge of the threat Salem poses but refuses to do anything about it. Already we’re seeing characters who have internal motivations (a need to do good) and later we’ll meet others who just... don’t.

Again, Pyrrha showed us that being a prodigy is not a guarantee of success. Ozpin reminds everyone of that here.

But that horrible episode is still a ways off!

For now the kids shrug off his ominous speech and crowd together later that night in the dining hall for a sleepover, considering that they still haven't passed initiation and haven't found their teams yet. Yang jokes that Dad wouldn't approve of them sleeping with all these boys, though it's clear that she does. (Bi Yang, bi Yang!) Ruby continues writing a letter to "the gang back at Signal" which honestly kind of drives me up the wall? Yang ran off with her shadow friends and Ruby is writing to Signal friends and neither of these groups are ever heard from again. Yes, obviously the show is about their new friends at Beacon, but past friendships are important too, particularly for Ruby. She's been uprooted two years early and is supposedly really bad at forming new relationships. Theoretically we should have gotten something touching on all this: Yang torn between her new team and old loyalties; Ruby avoiding trying to get close to Weiss by texting Signal buddies. It would have rounded things out a whole lot more and, once we expand beyond Beacon in Volume Four, would have given us a lot of opportunities to see how these girls are connected to Remnant as a whole.

They're certainly determined to make friends now though. Ruby spots the girl from earlier in the courtyard (Blake) and before she can stop her Yang quite literally drags them over with a hilariously drawn-out, "Hello!" Too bad Blake isn't interested in pleasantries. Especially when Yang draws attention to her bow. She won't shake their hands and is pretty damn blunt about how she wants them to leave. We have a clear divide down the team between the social butterflies (Ruby + Yang) and the abused girls who haven't had the chance to figure out how to talk to people yet (Weiss + Blake). It makes for a well-balanced dynamic and later a whole lot of conflict.

Blake will always have a soft spot for books though. She opens up a bit when Ruby asks the title of hers and explains that it's about “A man with two souls, each fighting for control over his body.” Ha. THAT'S not significant or anything.

We have some lovely setup for Volume Two/Three in which Blake lectures Ruby on how real life isn't like a fairy tale. Ruby already knows this. She just wants to work to make it as close to one as possible. A lot of viewers forget the difference between naivety and optimism when it comes to her characterization and though Ruby will prove short-sighted in many respects later on, she’s never thought the world was perfect.

As Ruby and Yang get into another cartoon fight (a visual technique we won't be seeing for long), the commotion draws over Weiss who is not pleased that the troublemaker is Ruby again. She yells that Ruby is a "hazard to my health!" and I cackle at what a little drama queen she is. As they continue their fight Blake blows out her candle, ending our episode with the first shot that contains all of Team RWBY.

Other Details

When Weiss yells at Ruby she cries, "Oh god it's happening again!" 'Oh God' is such a common phrase in the English language that it only makes sense we'd use it to help characters express themselves, but it still raises some interesting, in-world questions. Is there a lot of organized religion? We know Qrow mentions people believing in various gods, but is it common enough to create this same phrase? Meanwhile, poor Ozpin has to cope with knowing that gods do exist and they're absolute assholes.

Ozpin doesn't even introduce himself to the kids. Like yeah, obviously everyone already knows who he is, but he could have at least started with a "Hey, I'm old as balls Ozpin" instead of jumping straight into a lecture about how pathetic their work ethic is. I’m torn between the “That wasn’t Ozpin” theory and just a straight up, “The man is SAVAGE at times hell yeah.” Granted, this is the guy that’s gonna chuck his students off a cliff in a few hours, so I’m leaning towards the latter...

We see Ozpin making use of his cane despite the fact that he doesn't appear to need it 99% of the time. Easiest way to walk around with it, or was this particular body injured once?

Love how horribly offensive Yang is here lol: "Yeah, this girl is a lost cause." Like damn Blake's right there!

Ruby is dressed in a tank top that I think has an Ursa on it. Made all cute of course and with a face mask with matching, red slitted eyes. It's a great bit of world building and says a lot about Ruby's personality. (Honestly I wouldn't be surprised to see Nora in those PJs either.)

#rwby #mymetas #RWBY Recaps

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recentanimenews · 6 years ago

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Some Of The Best Anime Scenes Ever Are Only A Few Seconds Long

By the time you get to the end of this sentence, another brand-new anime will have come out. True, it might be another unfinished, hilarious mess like My Sister, My Writer, but you won’t know that until you actually watch it. Before you know it, you’ll be spending your entire free time catching up on new releases instead of doing what’s really important, like re-watching Cowboy Bebop. Why don’t anime series include one short scene that could tell you instantly what the whole show is about in just a few short seconds? Well, surprise--they do, and here are the four best of them.

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

4. Eren’s Mother Losing Her Resolve (Attack on Titan)

The terrifying power of Attack on Titan is that it strips its characters of their dignity. The anime is gory, true, but every death in it is made so much worse because it comes at the hands (or, more commonly, the mouths) of naked, human-eating giants that move like drunk toddlers. This way, the anime can torture its characters with primal, humiliating fear. You see this perfectly in Episode 1.

That’s when Carla Jaeger is trapped underneath her house while a nightmare-inducing Smiling Titan approaches her. Ordering her son Eren to run and save himself, Carla tells him for the last time that she loves him, accepting her fate because she knew that at least her child was safe. Well... for like a second. She then flashes back to her family life and, through tears and desperately gagging herself with her hand, she whispers: “Don’t leave me…”

When I got to that scene, I wanted to scream: “MA’AM! THIS WASN’T PART OF THE DEAL!” Carla was supposed to die her quiet, traumatizing death as part of Eren’s standard-issue tragic backstory. With her silent and cowardly (but very human) pleas, though, everything became so much more real. On some level, we know that characters facing death must feel fear, but we don’t like to think about it to preserve the magic of escapism. But this is precisely what Attack on Titan does.

It doesn’t make bad stuff “cool” for us. It makes us confront every ugly aspect of it. I’m convinced that if Hajime Isayama had directed a Batman movie, he’d have made the Waynes’ last words: “I don’t want to die...” And then they’d crap their pants. Because that’s the true face of tragedy and fear, encapsulated perfectly by Carla’s three words.

3. Whitebeard Embracing His Foolish “Son” (One Piece)

The flashy, supersonic fights in One Piece have always been one of the anime’s biggest selling points, like the Luffy vs. Katakuri punch-up. I use it as an example mainly because, whether you read this article when it’s first published or years later, chances are that fight will probably still be going on. But, for all its action, that’s not what One Piece is ultimately about. To find out what that is, we have to look at episode 472.

The episode takes place during Whitebeard’s attempt to rescue Ace from the Navy. It was an epic arc full of action, excitement, and plot twists, the biggest one being when Whitebeard’s subordinate Squard was tricked into betraying everyone and turned his boss into an entrée at a Brazilian steakhouse.

After that happened, you sort of expected Whitebeard to literally break Squard in half. But then… he just hugged him. Not only that, he told him that he forgave his foolish “son” and still loved him. The Whitebeard Pirates always had this thing where the captain was called “father” and everyone else were his “sons” but you never thought it was so… literal.

When you think about it, though, this is what One Piece has been getting at from the get-go: the power of non-biological family. Literally every major character on the show was raised by people they weren’t related to. Luffy and Ace had Dadan. Sanji had Zeff. Nami had Bell-mère and Nojiko, Tony had Dr. Hiriluk, Robin had the archeologists at the Tree of Knowledge, Franky had Tom, etc.

Still, the message about the importance of family works best with Whitebeard and Squard. See, it’s easy to love your non-biological family members when everyone gets along and, in the case of the Straw Hats, sacrifices their life for you. It’s harder and therefore more powerful when one person unwittingly screws up, but can still know that they’re forgiven and loved. That’s just beautiful. That's One Piece.

2. The Humanoid Typhoon’s Wounds (Trigun)

There aren’t many western anime out there. One might almost think that Japan never had a Wild West or cowboys. But that’s just one reason to appreciate Trigun (or, to call it by its proper name: Gun Gun Gun.) The other reason, of course, is the show’s main character, Vash the Stampede, the Humanoid Typhoon, The Sixty Billion Double-Dollar Man, a gunslinger who can level entire towns… without actually killing anyone there. It’s actually nice to have an action character out there who believes in pacifism, even if it comes easy to them on account of being one of the most powerful people on the planet.

Hey, apropos of nothing, let’s check out a random scene from Episode 13 when Meryl and Milly see Vash getting out of the shower because why not?

Oh… dear. That is… that is just unfortunate. I mean, he sorta looks like a Ken doll that was operated on by Sid from Toy Story while he was going through a Cronenberg phase. Even Frankenstein’s monster is recoiling at the sight of Vash’s body, from the gigantic scars to the missing arm and metal literally bolted to his flesh. But the thing is, every wound tells the story about the high price of pacifism.

Every scar is a reminder of the time when Vash could easily have killed but ended up saving the day with his wits and acting like an idiot. Every mark is a reminder that choosing life will often carry with it a great cost. A cost that Vash paid gladly because, to him, pacifism isn’t just something he believes in when things are easy. Even in the darkest of times, he is going to be himself and stick to his principles. But he doesn’t want to bum everyone out so he ultimately diffuses the situation in a way only he can:

THAT is Trigun.

1. Tsuyu Befriending Habuko (My Hero Academia)

I’ve gone on record saying that I think the world of My Hero Academia is horrifying, but I mainly think so because their world is so young. Their society has accepted people with superpowers (sorry, Quirks) only very recently and although over 80% of the global population has a Quirk, it doesn’t mean they eliminated all prejudice. Just look at My Hero Academia - Training of the Dead, the second OVA that introduced the character of schoolgirl Habuko Mongoose, who has a snake head. And people are afraid of her.

Yeah, she was a bit awkward and she could paralyze you by looking at you, but her awkwardness came from her loneliness caused by social isolation. She was so lonely that she actually started stalking one student, Tsuyu Asui, to be closer to another human. Then one day, while being followed by Habuko, Tsuyu simply turned to Voldermorticia and asked: “Do you want to be friends?”

That’s all it took to completely change the life of this lonely girl while quickly summarizing what My Hero Academia stands for. Their world is at peace thanks to All Might, whose catchphrase is “Plus Ultra”–“Go Beyond.” This doesn’t just apply to going beyond your physical abilities and punching the villains just a little harder. It’s a philosophy that implores us to do more, to be our best selves especially in our everyday lives. That is precisely what Tsuyu did.

She did more. She saw past Habuko’s appearance and gave her a chance. If the world of MHA is to survive, it will be thanks to people like Tsuyu, always going that extra step not just as a superhero but also as a civilian. She is the true embodiment of All Might’s words and, as such, the true heart of My Hero Academia. Let’s hear it for the show’s best girl.

Are there any other scenes that you think sum up your favorite anime? Let us know about them in the comments!

---

Cezary writes words on the internet. Follow him on Twitter or check out his two comedy websites.

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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gabrielxreader · 7 years ago

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Hellish Angel

Request: Hi! I love your blog! Would you be able to a demon!reader one? Where she and Gabe flirt but she thinks she's not good enough for him because she's a demon

A/N: I don’t think this is exactly what the requester had in mind, but I think I still followed the request pretty well so I hope it’s still liked. :)

Author: Holly

Warnings: Some mild language, a little bit of canon-typical violence

Characters: Y/N, Gabriel, Sam, Dean

Word Count: 4,095

Y/N = Your Name

You weren’t really the “typical” demon. Sometimes it was okay, sometimes it was annoying. Most of the time, the hunters you helped out pissed you off, but at least you liked that they felt empathy. The Winchesters in particularly were the least upsetting, since they’d learned not to stab you in the chest whenever you happened to come to them. The first few meetings had been kind of rough.

“Maybe it was a ghoul,” Sam suggested while you lazed around, crashed on Dean’s bed just to piss off the older one. You tossed some popcorn up and snapped your jaw around it when it came back down to your mouth, delighting in the soft crunch.

“Not a ghoul,” Dean denied, giving one of your feet (which were hanging off the side of the bed) a rough shove to the side. The popcorn missed your mouth that time and you just let it lay in his sheets. Served him right. “No signs of them anywhere. Tell you what, though, that place was soaked with sulfur.”

“Yeah, yeah, blame the demons just because we’re warped and evil.” You complained and sat up. “Couldn’t’ve been demons. I couldn’t even get in.” Sam and Dean had gotten to investigate the crime scene without you, despite having asked for your backup, because there was a barrier keeping you from even getting inside.

A rush of power made you shudder. Demons were attuned to angels because they were everything that you weren’t, but you’d never felt like this before. Castiel wasn’t that strong, and he certainly didn’t intimidate you with his tree-hugging, human-friendly attitudes.

“Anti-demon warding, sugarplum. Keeps the naughty ones from having too much fun where they shouldn’t be going.”

You stood up from the bed and turned around to look towards the hotel door. Without it opening, an angel had found its way in. You narrowed your eyes – green canvas jacket, dirty-cuffed jeans, soft-looking blond hair and amber eyes. You didn’t let the vessel trick you, though. You looked pretty good yourself, when you were just counting the humanoid body you used to get around in. The sense of grace pouring out of the angel wasn’t painful, but it was alarming. That much grace had the ability to smite you into the floor in less than a second, and your survival sense told you to get the hell out.

“Well, there’s your extra backup, boys.” You put the popcorn down on the nightstand between the twin-sized beds. “There’s no need for me here any longer.”

You were just about to teleport yourself away before the angel snapped his fingers. Dean put up a hand quickly, flinching on impulse. “We don’t need any of the theatrics this time, short stack,” he warned.

“It’s no biggie. C’mon, boys!” The angel grinned at them, wide and confident, and sly enough to remind you of a serpent. “You know me.”

“That’s why we don’t want the theatrics,” Sam muttered.

He sauntered closer. You tried again to teleport, but found your feet still in the same place they’d been seconds ago. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that the angel could identify you as a demon just by looking at you – the real you, the one living inside the vessel of a long-gone human girl.

“And who’s this naughty little thing?” He just about purred.

“Gabriel, stop it,” Sam objected, closing his laptop and scowling at you both. “Y/N, that’s Gabriel, the archangel.” You tensed at the title and the archangel definitely noticed – his smirk widened and he tilted his head cockily.

Dean rebelliously glared at the angel, the entity that embodied the polar opposite of you. “Arch-douche, more like.”

“So we have another demon pal now?” Gabriel crossed his arms, feigning amusement to cover up what you suspected was suspicion. “I say, why not? It went great the first time, didn’t it, Sambo?”

You recoiled at the mere reference to Ruby. “Oh, please,” you spat, disgusted. “I’m not that insane mega-bitch. Letting out an archangel to play? Teaching a hunter a better way to kill us? I may be a demon, but at least I’m sane.” To bother Dean and try not to seem so intimidated, you looked at the older brother and winked. “Relatively speaking, at least.”

Gabriel observed you critically for a second, then announced, “Anyone who Dean-o fantasizes about stabbing is a pal of mine. Until they try to take my strawberry syrup, in which case, they die.” The glint in his eyes was handsome and attractive in the way that you liked shiny jewelry, but you knew better than to take it at face value.

So you didn’t. “I wouldn’t want to cross an archangel. Like I said.” You tapped your head. “Sane.”

So… about your sanity? You clearly didn’t have it, because a few months later, your best friends were a hunter who used to kill demons (like you) and drink their blood and an archangel who could literally smite you into complete and utter nothingness without breaking a sweat. You reviewed your priorities a few times over the year and this was the time when you realized that you, like everyone else in the crazily messed up world of fighting the supernatural, must’ve lost your mind at some point. It just didn’t matter very much, though, because it didn’t stop you from hanging out with who you liked.

Gabriel had become someone whom you shared popcorn with. And candy, when he snapped it up, but usually you had popcorn with extra melted butter on top. You had a little saucer cup of melted butter, like seafood restaurants served with lobster platters, and you kept dipping your popcorn into it. It was a lot of butter, and you probably would’ve stopped by now if it didn’t bother Sam so much. He looked disgusted.

“What about a witch?” Sam suggested. Dean sent him a dirty glower for even suggesting his least favorite opponents.

“Nah,” you answered before putting another piece of popcorn in your mouth. “I’d have sensed if there were another demon around to power witchcraft.”

Gabriel took the bowl of popcorn away from between the two of you and put it on the other side of his lap. “But I would’ve sensed it first,” he established, taking a piece of popcorn and aiming for Dean’s head.

“How could you sense anything when you’re so busy being smothered in your own ego?” You retorted, teleporting swiftly to his other side to steal the popcorn back. If he really wanted you not to have it, you knew you wouldn’t, but you still felt like your victory had a little bit of meaning to it.

“Shtriga, then. Something that doesn’t rely on a demon to get its magic power?” Dean chucked a TV remote at Gabriel, who just caught it before it hit his head and handed it to you. You flipped the channel to something more interesting than that stupid, stupid hospital drama Dean liked. The hunter turned the TV off with the controls at the bottom and continued his thought. “Is there a record of this happening before in this state?”

“Not that I’ve found in the public records or on the Internet,” Sam reported, “Except for something seventy miles away, forty years ago, that doesn’t even match the MO.” He sulked.

“Ugh, you two are slow.” Gabriel complained, wrinkling his nose. “How long have you been in this fleabag roach trap? Three days? Four?”

“Four,” you confirmed, sticking your tongue out at Dean.

“Please don’t tell me you’ve been staying here, too.” Gabriel gave you a look and shifted over as if staying in the hotel had transferred its filth to you.

“Oh, please, I’d rather spend the night in a Chicago bus station.”

Gabriel snickered. Dean crossed his arms. “Hey, Thing One and Thing Two, can you stop being so high-and-mighty? We can’t teleport, jerkfaces.”

You and Gabriel shared a look with each other and shook your heads. “We can’t stop,” you answered, and Gabriel elaborated with plenty of snark that your feet were glued to your figurative pedestals… kind of like his and Sam’s had been in the Japanese gameshow. Both of you snickered and exchanged a fist-bump.

Fight scenes always look so much cooler on TV than they actually are in person. In reality, they move too quickly to follow along with what everyone’s doing. In TV, the audience sees a shot of one character throwing a punch, and the other dodging a kick, and it’s assumed that they’re happening at the same time. In the real world, things don’t move that slowly, and you can’t figure out, Sam’s over here and he needs help, but also I need to be right here and move my arm in this way to avoid being stabbed in the face.

Being a demon definitely had some advantages, though, and in a big fight like the one you were in, you enjoyed using them. A nest of vampires had started terrorizing a small, rural town that didn’t have enough police to figure out what to do, much less actually take them on, so that was where you, the Winchesters, and Gabriel came in. The angel said he was just bored, but you weren’t sure he wasn’t trying to make sure Dean and Sam didn’t die. He’d promised Castiel they’d be fine, and although Gabriel could easily resurrect them or heal any serious injuries, he’d have to deal with his brother’s disapproving stares if anything got that far.

You turned around on your heel, slammed the toe of your boot into a vamp’s shin, and grabbed his wrist over your head to push his arm away from you. The knife went to the side and the vampire twisted, turning and falling, and you lifted your knee up to slam him in the chest on his way down. You barely turned around before you raised a hand furiously, and another vampire went flying telekinetically into a wall, crashed through the sheetrock, and fell into the room on the other side.

The one you’d kicked and kneed was already getting up again. You rolled your sleeves up and flipped around the big hunting knife you had gracefully confiscated.

The fight was only a couple of more minutes, and you ended up taking out twice as many vampires as the human hunters had. It may have helped that you were able to use your powers to keep them held in one place while you picked them off. After you stopped hearing growling from the overgrown mutts, you dropped the knife and wiped your hands off on your jeans.

“Sammy!” Dean yelled from somewhere else in the house. It was a very old property, and in some places the floor was caving, but it was also a large property and the vampires had managed to split your group up.

Sam’s response let Dean relax. “I’m good!”

Neither of them asked about you or Gabriel. You turned back to the archangel, who had been idly standing by the doorway and watching with boredom. The first several times he had done this, you’d been irritated. Then you’d realized that he was an archangel, and if he joined the fight, then everyone else would be a moot point. Sam and Dean felt useful when they killed the monsters, so Gabriel let them, just like a parent would let their kids do something so they’d feel accomplished, even though an adult could’ve done it much faster.

You raised an arm to point before you said anything. “Behind-!”

The vampire lunging for the blond’s throat was halted when Gabriel gave you a knowing smirk. He snapped his fingers and the vampire seized. Its eyes glowed golden and orange, like it was burning from the inside out, and the remains crumbled to dust on the floor.

Not even you could do something like that. You’d known he was powerful, but… damn. This was the first time you’d seen him exercise that, and the destruction he’d caused without so much as blinking had you vanishing from the hunting party before anyone saw the shiver that went up your back. Now you fully understood what it meant when you called him an archangel.

Knowing what Gabriel was had always been on the back of your mind, but having it shoved in your face the way Gabe had once shoved a banana cream pie in Dean’s was like getting doused in very, very cold holy water. Every time you saw the Winchesters and Gabriel after that became more stressful.

One day, you were touching up your vessel’s lipstick (there’s no harm in enjoying looking pretty) but then Gabriel teased you about how you were already plenty noticeable already. You knew he hadn’t been trying to make a mean comment because Gabriel was many things but subtle wasn’t one of them. That didn’t stop you from suddenly, uncomfortably realizing that Gabriel didn’t just see your vessel – he saw the real you, too. The one inhabiting the vessel, the twisted, demonic “soul” inside.

You stopped and put your lipstick away slowly. You didn’t like the idea that Gabriel saw what you really were. It was easier with humans. Sam and Dean couldn’t see how ugly and warped you had become at Hell’s hands. They just saw the body you had picked up for a ride. No matter how you manipulated that body, with clothes or bright red lipstick or heels you could literally kill with, Gabriel was always going to see the twisted blackness within you.

It was hard to feel confident, knowing what you knew and feeling about yourself the way that you did. You couldn’t respond to his teasing. You couldn’t reply seriously, because that would give way too much information, and you couldn’t reply in jest, because it wasn’t something you could take lightly.

You’d been flirting with the archangel regularly, but now you were speechless; not because he’d won, but because you finally realized you had no business doing it, and you threw in the towel.

The Winchesters were aggravating, especially Dean. Where Sam could accept being wrong, Dean would scarcely admit to fault, or to blame, or to being incorrect – and he still had yet to apologize for stabbing you (twice). The last thing you ever wanted to do was play into Dean’s insufferable ego. You would never live it down. And you didn’t want to validate his poor manners – even Crowley had better manners than Dean, for Hell’s sake. You were ninety percent sure Lucifer had had better manners than Dean (when he wasn’t snapping his fingers and making people explode, at least).

The point was that you were never going to tell Dean that he had been just a little bit right when he’d said that going in alone was a bad idea, and that maybe you should’ve sat this one out. You’d thought he was just being his normal cocky self and liked the idea of getting rid of you for a while, but he had a point, you reflected, while you were pinned to the wall by your vessel’s throat and what felt like a brick wall of angelic Grace. Angels would hesitate to kill the Winchesters, but they would love the chance to kill a demon and they wouldn’t think twice.

It was kind of pathetic. You could survive Team Free Will for months on end, but not this stupid little cherub with a baby face and a literal child’s body. Even you thought that was skeevy. If it were a demon, fine. Demons are awful, blah, blah, blah. Angels, though, get consent first, and manipulating a kid into throwing their life away went against everything angels wanted humans to think about them, and that was a particular kind of disgusting.

The little Hispanic girl (twelve at most) raised the hand that wasn’t trying to crush your larynx. “It’s been a long time since I got to do this,” she rasped, and maybe some of Dean’s gallows humor was actually rubbing off on you, because such a grave sentence coming from such a non-imposing little brat almost made you laugh.

The force of Grace that had been holding you in place was suddenly lifted. You cherished the look of shock and sudden fear on the angel’s face in the split second it took you to disappear from under their hand and transport yourself halfway across the room, well out of throat-grabbing distance. The powerless angel looked up as the lights flickered and blew, sparks raining down on both of you.

While the angel looked terrified by the much stronger power flooding the building, you were somewhat comforted. You recognized it, and you knew you were safe with it. The other angel being so horribly undermined suggested something different where she was concerned.

The little angel’s eyes widened as she looked back at you, and then over your shoulder. You stepped aside to make a clear path between her and Gabriel, and the archangel stepped forward like a lion on the prowl. You were kind of smug.

“What did you do?” He demanded, sounding contemptuous and furious in that calm, quiet way that could make even a god shake in their boots. “Heal her mother if she gave her consent? Feed into the protective angel bullcrap?” Gabriel sneered and flicked his hand. The angel opened her mouth and raised a hand to her chest, struggling to breathe. You watched with interest, knowing that an archangel’s rage was something very few beings would ever live to tell about.

The angel fell to her knees and the hem of the girl’s cutesy sundress got dirty. Her eyes glowed a bright, bright, pale blue that made you flinch and move further back. You hadn’t known angels could be exorcised out of their vessels, but that was what seemed to be happening. To protect yourself from the Grace, you shielded your eyes, but despite the bright flash that followed as the angel was banished up to Heaven, you never felt an explosion of heat or holy power. Gabriel protecting you, you figured.

“What about the kid?” You asked when the light had faded and the child laid limply on the ground. Crossing your arms, you tried not to acknowledge that you’d developed what seemed to be a moral compass since you started running with the Winchesters. “Did it kill her?”

Gabriel stared down at the girl for a second, then shook his head. “She’ll be fine. I’ll take her home.”

After another moment of silence, you rubbed your neck and realized you owed him some gratitude. You’d been bacon for a few minutes there. You were a strong demon, but angels were just stronger. There was a reason they were fearsome. “Thank you.”

“Ah, well.” Gabriel held up a hand and gamely snapped his fingers. The body of the child disappeared and you guessed that when she woke up, she’d be in her bed at home, or maybe in a hospital with memory loss if he didn’t feel like tampering with the parents’ heads. “Next time someone tries to exorcise my girlfriend, they won’t get so lucky.”

Girlfriend? You took a quick, startled look around, but you were still the only one there. An archangel had just called you his girlfriend. That had to be wrong, on so many levels. Even at Gabriel’s worst, he was still an archangel, delivering justice with the full might of heavenly wrath. You were just a demon. A sick, twisted soul, who died in the Great War and let yourself be corrupted by monsters in the hundred years since.

You couldn’t be the girlfriend of an archangel. You were hardly a suitable girlfriend for anyone. Your feelings hurt and your head spinning, you were out of there before you even made the choice to leave. It was always primal with demons, or so Dean said – everything about fight or flight, personal gain, bloodlust. Well, for you, your best option was flight.

You should’ve known that there wasn’t really anywhere for you to hide, not if he really wanted to find you. It seemed like he did. He gave you about an hour to yourself and then, bam, he was up in your space, invading the quiet privacy of a peaceful cabin you’d found in the Colorado mountains. It was just so… unlike Hell. Regardless of where demons came from, Hell was hell, and there’s a reason demons are always trying to escape.

Gabriel stood behind your reclining chair while you stared at the fire burning in the hearth. The flames crackled and it reminded you of the kind of violent power that demons had. That you had. Angels were more like water. They could be incredibly destructive, but water also allowed for life in a way that fire didn’t. Just like fire and water, you were very, very aware that getting too close to the angel could hurt you, and maybe even extinguish you completely. Just because your soul was a repulsive husk of a human’s didn’t mean that you didn’t want to protect yourself. You shrank back at the idea of losing everything.

“I take it that was a breakup,” he eventually said, his voice cool and composed. “Suppose it’s better than getting a drink thrown in my face.”

“We weren’t together,” you mumbled, looking down at your hands. You liked your vessel’s hands. They were a good way of avoiding looking at people when you didn’t want to.

“I thought we had something. Was I wrong?”

You almost wanted to nod, but you had felt it. You had felt the potential. There was potential to have something, to become something good, but it was scary, and it was wrong, and things that were scary didn’t usually last very long. Especially not in the world of monsters and hunters.

“We couldn’t,” you responsibly tried to reason. The voice that came out of your mouth was quiet and soft-spoken, barely recognizable to you as your own. “We would never last. We’re not even the same species.” You snorted. If you were baring all, then hey, go big or go home. “Nowhere near the same league.”

Gabriel moved forward and stood beside your chair. He looked down at you. “This is because you’re a demon?” His tone was indignant and exasperated, and that was the last thing you had expected. You looked up quickly to his irritated face. “I’d kinda noticed. The fact that you’re hellspawn doesn’t matter to me, obviously, you stupid idiot.”

Huffily, you narrowed your eyes. “Oh, thanks. I feel so much better now that I’ve been insulted.” Your sarcasm dripped from your words thickly.

“What’s the point in judging by angel or demon, anyway?” He continued, starting to rant impatiently. “Half the angels have forgotten that we’re supposed to be the good guys and just kill whenever they feel like. There are demons now who are more trustworthy than angels. You’re a better person than hundreds of my brothers and sisters! Times change, people change, the status quo always changes, even in Heaven, and you want to act like everything is still in black and white? Haven’t you learned anything from this apocalypse?”

Interrupting him took courage when he was this upset, but you did it anyway and trusted that if he actually cared about you, you would be safe. “I’m better than angels?” You asked skeptically, snorting. You found that extremely difficult to believe, what with how horrific you knew you must look beneath your vessel.

Gabriel’s spiel was broken. He put one of his hands over yours on the arm of the couch and got on his knees, looking up to you intensely. “You’re not any lesser because of what you are. You didn’t do this to yourself. It was done to you. You don’t let it define you. You may be hellish, but you’re a hellish angel to me, and I mean that in the way the humans use it, not in the way that we know it to be.”

#hollykasakabe #holly kasakabe #admin holly #holly #oneshot #hellish angel #gabriel #Gabriel x reader #gabrielxreader #reader #reader insert #demon #romance #comfort #reader is a demon

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the-nwah-embassy · 7 years ago

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The Daedra as schoolmates

Azura: The ultimate mom friend, to the point of total annoyance. Always nagging you about doing homework and paying attention in school. Perfect grades, perfect attendance, and has no time for frivolities like relationships. Although she’s extraordinarily pretty and caring in a maternal way, she’s also extremely terrifying when angered. You’ve seen her rip apart lives piece by piece in a calculating and cruel manner because someone bumped her in the hallway and didn’t say “Excuse me”, and then blame their lack of manners for their suffering.

Sheogorath: The random and uncomfortably loud class clown. He spends more time laughing at his own jokes than he does anything else. While occasionally entertaining, he’s also very unpredictable. He once knocked a kid out because he said “Oh yeah, I’ve heard that one before” to one of his jokes. He was also suspended for a month for putting a cherry bomb in the principals desk, which caused a minor fire in the office and caused a school-wide evacuation. Because of his crazy antics, he doesn’t have many friends, and the friends he does have are just as nutty as he is.

Namira: The girl with a greasy mop of hair who smells like mildew and body odor. You’re not entirely sure she even owns a shower. People avoid her in the halls, but she doesn’t seem to mind because she’s too busy picking her teeth with her fingernails and smelling it. During lunch, you can usually find her swirling all her food into a disgusting slop and putting it in people’s faces, or behind the school building picking up bugs playing with them. She usually wears the same two or three outfits every day, with the exception of her gym clothes, which you know for a fact haven’t been washed all year.

Hircine: The kid who is constantly wearing camo for no apparent reason at all. Camo jackets, camo hats, he even has camo interior in his ridiculous truck. Like literally all camo, all the time, for no reason. He’s the kid who goes hunting every single weekend and brags about the giant deer antlers hung up in his living room that his dad killed a few years ago. Needless to say, he’s president of the archery club and an NRA fanatic. He’s always bringing his own lunch to school, which looks eerily similar to a pile of freshly cut meat. You’re fairly certain he has a collection of animal skulls and organs hidden away in his closet ‘for trophy purposes.’

Boethiah: The infamous two-faced backstabber. She acts sweet and kind to your face and then talks shit about you to her ‘friends’ when you walk away, and the same thing over again when they walk away. However, whenever you confront her, she somehow always convinces you that it never happened, or maybe you heard wrong, or perhaps the other people were lying. She always comes out looking innocent. And Divines forbid you date someone who she takes a liking to, because you’ll find yourself with a nasty breakup on your hands and shortly after, her on their arm. At least for a few weeks until she gets bored. Then she’ll come to you and say how sorry she is, and that she genuinely thought it was true love and how she never should have betrayed your friendship for him. And when you forgive her, and you always do, she’ll walk away smirking, planning her next bitch move.

Peryite: This kid is always sick. Seriously, it’s always something with this guy. He spends more time out of class than he does in it, which you can’t say you’re not grateful for, because he’s also disgusting. He constantly sneezes without covering his mouth, and in the direction of other people. He sniffles all the time which sounds more more like snoring, and it makes everyone gag. You’d feel bad for him, but you know he does it on purpose. He’s also weirdly obsessed with learning about plagues. At first, you thought it was because he was so sickly and might be worried about himself, but now you’re not so sure.

Mephala: The school rumor spreader. You have no idea how, but this girl knows everyone and their business, and she has no shame twisting it to her pleasure. She’s ended relationships, friendships, and even scholarships. Somehow her tangled whispers find their way all over the school halls. For whatever reason, her word is taken as law, and she’s an authority on everyone else’s business. Maybe it’s because she’s cute, or maybe it’s because her skirts are a little too short, but whatever the reason, she has a way of convincing everyone else that her word is infallible. Most people try to make themselves invisible to her, but everyone finds their way into her web of lies eventually.

Mehrunes Dagon: Mehrunes is the quarterback of the school football team, but contrary to cliche, he’s very disliked, to say the least. Even the rest of the team can’t stand him because of his anger issues. While he has experience and ambition, he’s just an absolute jerk for no reason at all. Even the coach knows there’s something up with him, but won’t take him off the team because he’s so good at what he does. He’s fairly well known as a bully and an all around asshole throughout the school. Divine’s help if the school loses a game, because when they do, he ends up smashing in lockers and breaking sinks in the locker room. Seriously, this guy needs to be locked up because he can cause some real damage, and you have a sneaking suspicion he’ll be in jail less than a week after his 18th birthday.

Meridia: Meridia is the class president and voted most likely to succeed. She’s the perfect school princess who always does what she’s supposed to, and makes sure that others do too. You know that outfit you love that is just a tiny bit out of dress code? She’s the one that comes up and says “You know, that outfit doesn’t meet the dress requirements!” a little too loudly in front of a teacher, and then smiles and flounces off. She’s constantly making pointless, boring speeches at the school assemblies and deludes herself into thinking people she doesn’t know legitimately care about her plans for after college. The teachers roll their eyes when she’s around, and even the principal is tired of this chick.

Jyggalag: This dude is OCD as hell. He arrives at school every day at exactly the same time, sharpens every single pencil he owns so they are the exact same length, and reorganizes his notes before class. Every. Single. Day. Every notebook he owns is color coded and even page numbered so that he could make an index, and his handwriting looks like a typewriter wrote it. He’s been hall monitor for like two years now even though the limit is 3 months. He also absolutely detests Sheogorath, so much so that a rumor is going around that he switched schools just to get away from him.

Vaermina: Mean. Just mean. No rhyme, no reason, just mean. She never says a word to anyone, but everyone has a horror story involving this chick. New to the school? She’ll welcome you by tripping you in the hall. Have a new crush that you think is going to ask you out? Don’t worry, she’ll help you by making sure you sit in water in the class you share with them and don’t notice it until it’s too late. Having a bad day? That’s good, cause she’s going to make it worse, and she’ll enjoy every second of it. For real, this girl is a real nightmare.

Nocturnal: The school goth girl. You’re entirely certain she doesn’t own any clothes that aren’t black, and she’s always got her headphones in listening to bands you’re fairly certain you’ve never even heard of. No one ever sees her arrive or leave the school, and no one can ever find her unless she’s attending a class. No one really even knows her name, even the teachers. She doesn’t have any friends, but she does have a weird occult following that obsesses over her. She doesn’t seem to notice or care. Strangely, things constantly seem to go missing when she’s around, but it couldn’t possibly be her because she hasn’t moved from her seat all period... Has she?

Hermaeus Mora: Ah, this guy. The know-it-all. Why does he even bother attending? He already knows everything. The teachers hate him because he’s constantly showing them up. His most used phrase is “Well, actually.” You know that kid who is constantly yelling out answers in class without being asked? Yep, that’s him. When he’s not in the library hoarding books like a dragon, you’ll find him stalking various students around the school who intrigue him, and referring to them as his “subjects.” You have a sneaking suspicion that he’s the one that has been using the lab supplies without permission and also the reason behind why the school banned animal dissection in science class.

Malacath: This dude could use some help, like a therapy session or maybe a hug. He’s rude for no reason, but only because he assumes you’ll be rude to him first. He’s constantly trying to prove how tough he is by getting into fights over, well, everything. He and his group of friends are exclusive and reclusive, angrily calling themselves ‘misfits’ unironically, and will only accept you if they think you’re as outcasted as they are. The rest of the school either shuns or ignores them, so it’s understandable. Rumor has it that disputes in the group are settled via wrestling match in the parking lot after dark.

Sanguine: The walking leather jacket. Girls fawn over this dude, and all the guys want to be like him. He comes to school late on a motorcycle smelling like cigarettes and drinks vodka out of a sprite bottle in history class. Don’t worry, he’s always down to share. He is the walking embodiment of “Screw you mom and dad, my band is definitely going to get big!” He’s sort of friends with everyone, and he can’t walk down a hallway without being a part of at least 8 or 9 separate conversations. Teachers can’t stand him, mainly because if he’s even a minute late to a class, he says ‘fuck it’ and hangs out on the bleachers until lunch, and he’s always late. His yearbook quote was “Life is too short for school, so screw it and drink it down and party it up.” He also has his own ‘bachelor pad’ and wants to move to New York and play guitar in the street after graduation.

Molag Bal: So, you know that guy that you’re absolutely terrified will shoot up the school one day? Yeah, that’s this guy. This guy is angry as all hell, and you swear he can literally smell weakness. If he ends up making it through school without ending up in jail, you’re fairly certain he’s going to become a serial killer. He just terrifies everyone. The people who have tried to get on his good side (you know, just in case) ended up making things worse, and they won’t talk about why or what happened. Chances are, he has a manifesto saved on his computer. He has this weird thing with Boethiah and you don’t know whether they dated or what, but those two really don’t like each other. Or they just really need to tension bang.

Clavicus Vile: You know, you’re not sure this guy even goes here. He’s always hanging out in the parking lot with his dog that they don’t allow in the school. He calls himself ‘the hookup’ and seems pretty cool at first. He offers to get you discount cigarettes, beer, drugs, whatever you need for cheap. However, it’s probably better not to trust him. Maybe it’s just a feeling, or maybe it’s the fact that your friend said the weed he bought from him tasted funny and gave him a panic attack, or maybe it’s because the beer he brought to a house party once tasted strangely like the swill that bars throw out after closing. Either way, you don’t trust the guy. He’s just trying way too hard to get you to trust him. He tried to offer you a cigarette the other day, but why was the tobacco white and fuzzy?

#Daedra #Elder Scrolls #THE DAEDRA #AS CLASSMAAAATES!#Sorry i got bored #tag yourself im nocturnal #sorry for the long post

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aspoonofsugar · 5 years ago

Note

Which is your favourite dynamic in Requiem for a Phantom? Do you have a favourite episode? Quote?

Hello anon!

Thank you so much for this ask because it gives me the chance to talk about this series!

My favourite dynamics are the ones among the three phantoms and especially the one between Elen and Reji because of its importance for the whole series and for the themes.

Phantom explores several themes. Some of them are the following.

1) Giving one’s own life meaning despite how tragic it is. Because of the nature of the series, this often happens through death meaning that many characters try to give their deaths a meaning or to conclude their lives the way they want to:

After all the series is called Requiem for the Phantom and a requiem is something made to celebrate a dead person. The title highlights that the story is about celebrating the phantoms’ lives despite how short and tragic they are. The point is that even these individuals who are not part of society and have committed sins and lack an identity are worth being remembered and being given value.

2) The series explores a specific setting and underlines the cruelty of the criminal world from which it is very difficult (and basically impossible as far as the series is concerned) to escape. The criminal world is described as a literal hell and it is embodied by the organization Inferno which wants to unify it under a single name.

Inferno is a group made by the traitors of other organizations:

This is fitting thematically because it shows how the criminal world twists every relationship and attempt to maintain some kind of honor.

This is shown multiple times and the story arc centered on Tony Stone is the first example offered by the series. Tony, despite being a criminal, loves his people and family and believes in a code. However, in the end he loses his family and dies, his organization is destroyed and used as a scapegoat and he is betrayed by a friend. His story conveys the futility of trying to build some kind of ethical system in a world which is driven by power and ambition and where people’s lives are constantly at stake.

In the series as a whole this same theme is mostly expressed through Lizzie’s character arc. She wants to be treated as a person and asks her employer to do as much in exchange of her loyalty. However, in the end she is betrayed and is forced to kill that same employer despite the fact that she still cares about her.

3) Finally the story is one of self-affirmation and of obtaining a will:

A person should take responsibility for their own actions and sins because only in that way they can truly become an individual.

The relationship between Reiji and Elen (and also the one between Reiji and Cal, but I am not talking about it here) is important for all these three themes and it is fundamental for the whole story.

2) Let’s start from the second theme aka how personal relationships are sacrificed for survival or power in the criminal world.

The important thing when it comes to Elen and Reiji is that they are an exception to the rule. As a matter of fact, even if the people around them like Scythe and Claudia try to manipulate them and to force them to fight against each other, they keep caring for each other and always choose each other over the interests of the organization.

They struggle to do so because of their flaws, but in the end they manage not to betray each other.

This is made obvious in the climaxes of the first two acts which are built so that they are mirrors. In the first act Claudia manipulates things, so that Elen and Scythe are hunted by the organization and in the second act Scythe does the same targeting both Claudia and Reiji. However, both times Reiji and Elen avoid killing each other.

This is also connected to theme number 3) i.e. to the ability of affirming one’s own will.

First of all it is interesting that Elen sees Reiji in this way:

Elen is a person with a very frail sense of identity because of the abuse she went through. She has developed a specific coping mechanism to survive her assassination job:

She nullifies herself and makes her completely dependent on others. If she is ordered to do so she can kill anybody without getting hurt because, in a sense, she is not killing out of her own free will.

Claudia wants Reiji to be different:

She wants him to become more independent and to accept his new life as an assassin in a more proactive way. However, she still manipulates him, so that he works for her. Her manipulation is just different from Scythe’s. He suffocates his subordinates’ feelings, while Claudia nurtures emotions and uses them to manipulate people even more effectively than Scythe.

However, the fact that Reiji himself is manipulated is not really important for Elen who simply sees him as a freer version of herself:

Elen had always assumed that her way of coping was the only one possible, but through Reiji she learns she has other options and starts questioning what she was told and what she had assumed.

The story makes clear that deep down Elen has never lost her most genuine part of herself:

Episode four goes out of its way to establish exactly this.

The episode opens with a very different and overly cheerful Elen who acts in a childish way and has fun going shopping:

This is soon revealed to be a mask she uses not to give away her true identity. However, this mask gives us some information about her real self as well.

First of all, Elen uses this cheerful personality whenever she needs to move around in a public place or when she has to interact with regular people. She uses this persona both in the first act and in the third act. This is interesting. After all, Elen could just take on different personas instead of sticking to a single one. The fact that she doesn’t may very well symbolize that this personality tells us something about her.

All in all it might simply convey the fact that Elen is deep down very child-like. She has been taken by Scythe when she was younger than Reiji and so when her identity had still to properly develop. Scythe manipulated her and took her memories away leaving her as a person completely dependent on others like children are. So it is fitting that her “normal” persona is a childish one because that is the stage in which her development was interrupted.

At the same time, the episode plays with the viewer’s perspective of Elen. Her having fun with the teddy bear is immediately contradicted by her breaking it to retrieve the data and when she later on is asked if she is interested in the touristic depliants she coldly rejects the assumption.

However, by the end of the episode we are shown that she kept both the Teddy Bear and the depliant.

Both are symbolic objects.

-The teddy bear represents her childish self and it is symbolically broken because she herself has been broken when she was a child. Let’s also highlight that in act three where she had the chance to experience a healthier style of life for some months she has a teddy bear on her school bag.

-The depliant is representative of her home town aka Mongolia which will be the end of her journey where she finally finds herself. The fact that she has it since episode 4 clearly shows that deep down Elen had always known from where she came from.

Then why did she not try to leave before Reiji’s arrival?

The answer is this:

In order to grow up Elen needs to face who she truly is. This means that she gets to finally feel complete, but at the same time she has to leave behind a coping mechanism which makes her feel safe and to accept what she has done.

This is something she can’t do alone and needs Reiji’s help in order to succeed.

Reiji too needs Elen and this is made clear at the end of the first act.

As previously stated, Claudia is manipulating Reiji to have him grow apart from Scythe and Elen, so that he can work as her own Phantom. She tells Reiji she is leaving the final choice to him, but she doesn’t really plan to as her orchestrating the whole mess with Scythe proves.

In the end she gives Reiji a choice. He can either go back to Japan or work for her. She knows fully well Reiji will not probably be able to go back to his normal life and the chaos of the situation might very easily push him towards her side. However, Reiji takes a third option:

He wanst to protect Elen and to help her to become a complete person. This is the path Reiji chooses in order to remain himself despite his new identity as an assassin.

In other words, Reiji needs Elen just like Elen needs him, but in a different way.

We can say that they develop a relationship which has shades of codependency since one can’t properly function without the other.

Without Reiji Elen can’t free herself from Scythe, while without Elen Reiji completely loses himself and spirals in his new role as phantom until he meets Cal who saves him.

The end of the second act perfectly shows what their relationship is about.

Elen is still unable to rebel against Scythe and keeps fighting Reiji, but stops when Reiji takes away her mask which is symbolic of him seeing her as a person.

At the same time Reiji is ready to die. He thinks Cal has died because of him and that he has become a monster and prefers to die rather than keep living in the criminal world where people use and betray each other. However, Elen saves him:

Elen’s two scars were both made by Reiji. Reiji is fixated with the second one he gave her when he accidentally shot her. That scar represents Reiji’s guilt and his crimes and it is the only part of himself he can currently see. However, Elen reveals that it is her other scar the one she cares about aka the one he gave her when he saved her. She claims that that scar is the proof of her existence and why she keeps fighting.

In this way they save each other. Reiji is given a new reason to live, while Elen is taken away from Scythe for good.

The third act shows that they keep learning opposite things from each other:

And it is also interesting that in terms of proactiveness and passiveness they start to exchange roles. As a matter of fact in the third act Elen is far more active than Reiji, while it used to be the other way around, especially in the first act when they had to run away.

This is also something that Scythe’s behaviour highlights:

He keeps assuming that the one taking action against him is Reiji, but it is not him the one who has come up with counter-measures against Inferno, but Elen who proves herself to be perfectly able to read Scythe’s way of thinking.

This is illustrated also in their final showdown.

Scythe thinks that thanks to having integrated Claudia’s philosophy with his own he has finally been able to create a group of perfect specimen. However, Elen proves him wrong and states that these new experiments are exactly like her and that Scythe has not grown:

While she has:

Her reasons for killing Scythe are also interesting:

She says that she is killing him because he hurt Reiji which is surprising because she too has been hurt by Scythe and she has been abused by him far longer than Reiji. However, I think that this line highlights once again that Elen really sees Reiji as a better version of herself. Even if she has grown Elen still struggles to see herself as a person and so, instead of telling Scythe that he has hurt her, she tells him that he has hurt Reiji, but she is really speaking of herself in the scene.

In other words both Elen and Reiji are able to go back to be people because of each other. This is true especially for Elen whose whole arc is about this. What is more, they are clearly presented as two sides of the same coin to the point that their two arcs and characters appear as clearly linked:

When Elen “dies” at the end of the first act, so does Reiji and he has does so in a way similar to hers.

At the same time, the first act also plays with the dream/flashback in episode 7.

The sequence starts with Elen remembering the day she met Reiji and it ends with Reiji waking up from a dream where he supposedly has remembered a part of his past. In short, it is not clear who is the one really having the flashback and it is really not important because this just cements the idea that Elen and Reiji are complementary and really two “versions” of the same entity without a personhood who is the phantom.

1) It is precisely because of this link that symbolically Elen dies when Reiji does.

When one considers it from a realistic in-universe stand-point it has probably to do with the afore-mentioned codependency. The two of them have been utterly devastated by their experiences and would need time to properly heal, but they are denied it. Because of it, when Reiji dies Elen takes her own life.

However, I think that there are different reading levels to the ending which have to do with different themes the story wants to convey.

As mentioned above the series depics the criminal world as a horrible place from which it is basically impossible to escape. This is why we are shown different people trying to live in this world with different methods and objectives. Claudia wants power and believes that one can only live one’s own life to the fullest by taking risks. Scythe wants knowledge and believes that he can pursue it in the criminal world. Lizzie wants to apply some sort of ethics to her killing, but she realizes that her gun has become too heavy for her and prefers to die rather than to kill a person she cares for again. Cal and Mio are both asked to choose if they want to enter the criminal world to be with a person they care about or not. Cal does so and dies, while Mio doesn’t and survives. The different outcomes of their stories have also to do with their different social standings. Mio is privileged and loved and has her family’s support when she needs it, while Cal is a runaway child who is left alone by everybody she cares for. For her entering the criminal world has also to do with her gaining strength.

What is important is that all these characters die. As I stated above the only prominent characters who survive by the end of the series are Mr McGuire and Mio. This is not by chance because they represent two opposite extremes thematically speaking.

Mr McGuire is literally the devil who rules Inferno as all the symbolism associated to him proves. He is symbolically the underworld itself and this is why he survives the ending and has supposedly Reiji killed. It is because the underworld is very difficult to destroy.

Mio is the normal person whose life is not involved in the underworld. The fact that she is secretly a mafia princess without her knowing might very well be symbolic of how even the parts of society which seems uninvolved with the criminal world are actually still intertwined with it even if they ignore it. Mio has come to an understanding of it by the end of the series and chooses to keep living her life in the normal world.

In other words, if the series wants to give this depiction of the world of criminality as a world which is unescapable at least physically, then it makes sense that Reiji and Elen, just like Cal, can’t survive the ending. However, they are given, just like Cal, an ending where they can stop being phantoms and become someone. This is emphasized by the last episode being called Elen. The title highlights how the whole story is about the original phantom aka Ein becoming Elen.

This is what the last scene is about. Even the fact that Elen kills herself, as sad as it is, it is something she had failed to do early on in the series:

In the end Elen chooses to die as herself and in her hometown.

This is at least one reading that can be done. Either way, several are possible in my opinion.

This is an analysis of Elen and Reiji’s relationships which is one of my favourites. I also love the one between Cal and Reiji, but I chose the first one because it let me talk about the series more generally.

When it comes to my favourite episodes, I love the last two ones where the major conflicts are settled and where there are many of my favourite moments.

I also love episode 6 because of how well it is structured and powerful thematically despite it being tragic.

As far as my favourite quote is concerned, I actually love this one by Claudia:

Like you say, we may be forcing this lifestyle upon you, but you are not a slave. Even you possess a freedom…Speed…Even in a set course, as long as you desire and work for it, you can accelerate towards any goal. (…) How you run through it is up to you. Don’t ever think of yourself as a slave again. As long as you have that thought in mind, you are granting victory to those who belittle you.

I think this quote is very meaningful when it comes to Claudia’s character and also to the series general themes because it emphasizes the necessity of facing even an unfair life and to do the best you can of it. It is just that what Claudia wants to do with hers is something completely different from what Reiji wants.

Thank you for this ask!

#phantom: requiem for the phantom #requiem for the phantom #phantom: requiem for the phantom meta #azuma reiji #elen #ein #zwei #my meta #asksfullofsugar #anonymous #suicide: tw

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radiantxhero-moved-blog · 7 years ago

Text

This isn’t really something I’ve really seriously addressed before in relation to my Ike, I think? But it just struck me that I don’t think I’d ever made a post about this, and now I’m going to rant just a little bit.

Why Ike leaves Tellius.

Being a part of his father’s mercenary group was a boyish dream of his, and as soon as it was realized, I think the reality of it was immediately hammered into his head. Ike had trained in swordplay since he was a boy, but all those lessons weren’t able to prepare him for that moment he actually killed another man. True, the men he fought against on that first mission of his weren’t good people, but they were still living, breathing people. They dreamed, they lived, they bled just like him.

There wasn’t anything really special about that man, but Ike thinks back on the first person he ever killed, and it instills in him that ideal of not fighting or killing for its own sake. Senseless violence was senseless, there was no justifying it,

Taking on Elincia as an employer was something Ike took seriously, but was still relatively naive about. It seemed simple to him at first; escort her to Gallia, and they’d get the help they needed to win Crimea back from Ashnard. And then they had to abruptly flee their home, setting the old fort Ike had known as a home for most of his years to flame as they fought through Daein soldiers.

Even if he doesn’t say as such, that night was both a wake up call to the situation, as well as a bit of a blow to him personally. Ike understood the reasoning behind it, but seeing your home -- your childhood home -- burn isn’t exactly a good moment.

And then, Greil is slain right in front of him, and he can do nothing but drag his father’s body back through the forest as rain pours down. Greil speaking to him until no more words come, no more breath, only blood and rain.

Gallia cannot help as they had hoped, and Ike not only has to take the mantle of his father as leader of the Greil Mercenaries, but he’s also responsible for fulfilling their obligations to Elincia. All on the heels of Greil’s death, and with two of the group’s members leaving.

By this point, Ike is effectively functioning on numbed grief and anger, and his sense of duty and morality.

This was nothing he wanted, and as much as they get closer to their goal and he gets closer to some sort of closure, this feeling doesn’t really leave and even builds up. For every success, there’s some sort of drawback that just goes against his grain. Everything in Begnion is just...a mess to him. As much as he respects Sanaki for what she does, he despises how she went about getting it all done, he despises the politics, he despises the people that play the politics. It disgusts him beyond words or reason, and if he could never tread into Begnion again, I honestly think he would avoid it as much as humanly possible. Even something like being a lord or a general, something that most would see as a good thing, just doesn’t sit right with Ike for a few reasons.

Every single clash he has with the Black Knight is an outlet to his fury and his grief. The Black Knight is a man who has taken his father from him, and takes Ike’s resolve to not kill for the sheer brutality of killing every single time they meet. This man is one that Ike would risk all things to kill. He risks the war against Daein for it, and he later risks the continent of Tellius for it. When Ike “wins”, it doesn’t quite feel right, but he forces himself to accept the victory and not question it too much because if he follows that inkling of doubt, it would drive him mad.

Finding out the information Volke has about his parents, as well as the medallion is just...unnerving and heartbreaking. It shatters a lot of his views on Greil, leaving him confused and feeling almost betrayed by his father, and with no way to rectify those feelings since Greil is now gone and can’t provide any answers or anything. Not mentioning any of this to his sister was both a blessing and a curse, but Ike couldn’t bring himself to simply tell her the grisly truth.

Fighting Ashnard is a mix of things. The need to win to end this war and Ashnard’s plans to release the dark god, fulfilling his pledge to Elincia who has become more of a friend than just an employer. But, also, the fear of coming up against someone who -- in some part -- embodies that dark, secretive side of his father. Knowing that Greil had fallen to the medallion’s powers and killed his mother, facing off against a man who willingly accepted such a chaotic state of mind was terrifying.

The rebuilding of Crimea wasn’t so bad, but as things got back to normal, that meant that -- as a “lord” and now hero of the country -- Ike is exposed to yet more things he just can’t get behind. He doesn’t want to be involved in the politics, he doesn’t want the attention of being a “hero”, he doesn’t want to stay and end up some figurehead or political pawn. He leaves. No pomp, no explanation, he simply informs Elincia that he’s renouncing his title and goes.

And, even after all that and going into practical hiding after the war, all hell breaks loose three years later. Uprising in Daein, civil war in Crimea, and all out war between the Laguz nations and the Begnion Empire.

Stepping in to save Lucia wasn’t an issue. Not only was it a paying job, but it was helping out people that Ike considered good friends and allies; he wasn’t going to stand by and do nothing. The same thing goes for the Laguz-Begnion war; though he has friends on both sides, technically, Ike knows that the Laguz are more in the right. But things still quickly spiral out of hand.

Fighting against former allies doesn’t sit right with Ike, even when he knows that there isn’t any other way. Learning that the Black Knight still lives is...partially expected, since his victory three years prior didn’t feel like a true conclusion, but it’s still a sharp sting to Ike.

Things, somehow, get worse. While the waking of Ashera does rally people together to fight for the world as a united force, it still ends up putting Ike in a position he’s not comfortable with: being the commander of their united forces. He has to be tricked and pigeonholed into the position of commander. He didn’t want it back in the Mad King war, he doesn’t want it now at the potential end of the world.

Fighting through the zealots is taxing in so many ways, on the mind and body. Fighting through the tower is even more so trying. The tower itself is strange, as stated by Yune herself; it could literally fuck with their minds if they didn’t stay focused. His final encounter with the Black Knight is inevitable, and while Ike knows that there are technically more pressing matters to deal with, still prioritizes this battle over all. Magical force field that separates him from the others be damned, Ike doesn’t seem too bothered if it means killing this man.

He does get some sort of closure from besting Zelgius, but I don’t think it was as freeing as Ike thought it would be all this time. Then he gets his previously sealed memories returned to him, most notably of the day Greil went mad from touching the medallion and slayed Elena. This reopens that wound in a brutal way, and he can’t even fully process it because they still have to get through several more levels of the tower.

The dragons of Goldoa being ready to suffer genocide if it means stopping this groups resistance of the end of the world. This is just messed up on a lot of levels that Ike will never understand or want to explore.

Everything that is Sephiran.

Ashera herself. She’s so bent and warped from what she and Yune once were that it’s impossible not to pity this being. Slaying her does little to ease that sense of wrongness that came with beholding the goddess in her own madness; the entire situation just felt wrong somehow, even though it saved Tellius from a terrible fate.

It’s absolutely no consolation to know that the gods were so very human in the end. There was no greater purpose or reason for all of this, just mistakes made by beings that thought they knew better.

What is he supposed to do now, after slaying a god? Where does he go after such a deed? Ike is once again toted as a great hero, like it was he alone that did this when there were so many by his side that made any of it possible.

Long ass fucking story short: Ike is utterly lost as to who he is, and what he should do after this.

So many things in his life was just going from duty to duty to duty. Becoming leader of the Greil Mercenaries before he was ready or wanted to. Becoming a lord and general to complete his task to Elincia. Fighting, searching for, and eventually slaying the Black Knight to avenge his father’s death. Leading the charge against god because he is who so many look up to for strength and guidance as a leader.

All Ike ever really wanted was to become a swordsman worthy of being his father’s son.

At his core, his desire is very simple and easy to relate with, and while he does achieve this, it gets weighed down by so many other things that I don’t think he ever gets to fully realize that he has accomplished it or think about anything else he may want to do with his life.

This is why he leaves. He’s lost, he’s tired, and for once in his life he chooses to do something selfish. Ike feels the loss of purpose after everything in Tellius starts to move its way to a better future. All he’s known is other people’s expectations of what he should or needs to do. He needs to get away from that for a while. He needs to find a new purpose for himself. If Tellius isn’t ready to treat him as the simple man he wants to be, then he’ll find someplace he can be a nobody in until he finds his center of purpose again.

Maybe he planned to return, maybe he does, and maybe he didn’t. It may not have been the right decision or a good decision, but Ike made that choice for himself.

#[holy shit this is long & maybe doesn't make sense]#about the commander #[you can tell i started to get tired at the end of this]#[but to be fair i was working on this for hours....]

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kitten1618x · 7 years ago

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GoT Afterthoughts 7x04 The Spoils Of War (Jonsa Edition) SPOILERS

Ugh ...so much drama with the leaking of this episode. It was extremely hard to keep myself unspoiled, but I managed (mostly). I know a lot of you have been waiting for this recap, so let's get down to business .....

Wow. This episode felt so rushed! For the life of me, I will never understand D&D's logic for cutting this season and the next short, for all the content they need to cram into them.

So, with that being said, we start this weeks episode off in High Garden (or is it Highgarden?). The Lannister and Tarly soldiers have cleaned out High Garden's riches and food supply and have a caravan headed back to Kings Landing. Jamie gives Bronn his big bag of gold because "a Lannister always pays his debts" but Bronn still wants his castle. lol After poking fun at Jamie's sour mood despite their victory, Bronn goes with Lord Tarly and Dickon to assist in getting the rest of the harvest. Winter is here, and food is needed.

Side note: I love Bronn. Jamie and Tyrion should totally adopt him when this is all over.

Back in Kings Landing, Cersei is again meeting with the Iron Bank dude, who's happy to continue supporting her ventures, as long as they get their money. She assures him his gold is on the way.

We head to Winterfell (yay!) where LF is busy being fucking creepy, as usual. He gives Bran the dagger that the cutthroat tried to use to assassinate him in the first season. He proceeds to blow smoke up Bran's ass about how he will always protect Cat's children and blah blah blah, sweet Jesus Petyr, we are tired of hearing the same lame shit come out of your mouth! (at least, I am). He tells Bran it's the dagger that essentially started the war of the 5 Kings and that in a way, it made him what he is today.

Some very interesting things I gleaned from this scene:

When Bran asks him if he knows who it belonged to -I believe this was a rhetorical question. I think Bran knows exactly who it belonged to.

LF is shook when he says the word chaos and Bran claps back with "chaos is a ladder." Mmhmm.

That is the weapon LF will die by. Without a doubt. (and it's sweet poetic justice).

"I'm not Lord Stark" -another reminder that Sansa is the heir to Winterfell, as Bran will probably slip further into his 3ER role until that's all he is and Bran no longer exists.

Meera interrupts. She wants to go home and see her family before the Others come. Meera is hurt by how cold and distant Bran is after all she sacrificed for him, and Bran confirms what I said last week -he's NOT Bran anymore. The more he hones his powers, the more the parts of him that are Bran will disappear -which is why he's so void of emotions. It's not trauma (although he's been through and seen some pretty traumatic shit), it's just the part of him that was Bran is literally dying as the 3ER takes over.

And Arya is home!!!!! Omg omg omg!!!

What is it with poor Arya and gate guards keeping her out? Okay, just seeing Arya's face as she glances around Winterfell and looks at the banner -it made me so emotional, my husband laughed at me. He's a dick, what can I say?

The guards let Sansa know about the girl at the gate, and how she's gone now, and once Sansa hears who the girl asked for, she knows it's really Arya and exactly where to find her. She heads to the crypts and there's Arya in front of Ned's statue.

This was a beautiful reunion! I know it wasn't nearly as emotional as Sansa and Jon's -and frankly, I don't think any of them are going to be, and I believe that's intentional, but for the Stark sisters -it suited them, and who they are, and who they've become. There's no hate or animosity here ...they even tease each other a bit, and it's just so lovely and ashgdhjxugyfkcufyskfjcjcaa I AM SO EMOTIONAL!!!!! And we got not just one hug, but two!!! TWO!!!! I said before that D&D had better make this reunion worth while, and for me, they delivered. I love how Arya said that their stories aren't over yet.

A few things that stood out to me in this scene:

Arya telling Sansa that being Lady Stark suited her. I'm not sure this is foreshadowing or just Arya giving her sister some kudos. Either way, it warmed my heart.

Sansa bringing up Jon, and not only how excited he was about her reunion, but how thrilled he'll be to see Arya too -this served two purposes: Sansa again, bringing up Jon at a time she feels vulnerable/safe, and at the same time validating Arya and how important she is to Jon.

Arya mentions her kill list, and Sansa thinks she's joking.

Sansa tells Arya that Bran is home too, and we head out into the Godswood. No matter how unemotional Bran is, it's beautiful to see my Starklings all together in one place again! ❤️ My heart literally grew three times its size!

After a brief hug, Bran tells Arya that he saw her at the crossroads and that he thought she'd go to Kings Landing. Sansa offers that Bran has visions now, and Bran says that Cersei is on her list of names. The look on Sansa's face puzzled me for a minute -because she looks a bit worried, but then she kind of smirks a bit when she asks Arya who else is on her list. Now, I think that the writers want us to think that Sansa suspects she *might* be on that list, but I'm telling you now that's utter bullshit. Lady Stark has taken over her new role in every aspect and that includes mothering her two younger siblings. I believe her look comes more from a parental place of worrying, and I bet the next few episodes will prove me right -ahem, did I not call the whole Bran is no longer Bran thing last week? Thank you.

As Bran pulls out the dagger and gives it to Arya, this only further confirms my feelings. Immediately, Sansa is suspicious. Why? Because she knows LF better than anyone, and she knows he doesn't do anything that won't benefit himself. I suspect she is both worried for her siblings, and thinks LF is trying to sway Bran into taking the Lordship so that he can ask for Sansa's hand in marriage while Jon's away. It's the only thing that makes sense to me in regards to LF visiting Bran earlier in the episode. I also think this is all more fodder for fake ass Starkbowl too -to confuse the viewers.

Some things that stood out in this scene:

Bran gives the dagger to Arya. Arya is going to be the one who kills LF -Bran knows, he's seen it, and that's why he gives the dagger to her.

My heart -when he says it's wasted on a cripple and Sansa looks down sadly.

Okay, our Starklings are headed back within Winterfell, and OMG my heart is exploding! And Brienne's heart, too! Podrick tells her she kept her vow to Catelyn and she should be proud, and you can tell that she's not used to being complimented. As usual, LF is creeping in the shadows like the human embodiment of a bloodsucking tick.

Another side note: Podrick is also a precious dewdrop! Put him in the same category with Davos.

Now we're at Dragonstone ..dun dun dunnn. Sigh, well come on, let's get it over with. We start this scene with Missandei insinuating that GW kissed the kitty and Jon interrupts them from below to bring Dany into a cave. Well, how clever. *eyeroll* I mean, you seriously have to laugh at that.

Jon wants to show Dany the dragon glass before they begin mining it, and it is quite lovely. Jon tells her he wants to show her something else, and the two of them head farther into the cave alone. Cramped quarters, and Dany seems winded from the walk up, because she's literally panting. Wtf??

Maybe the airs really thin?

Jon explains that the hieroglyphics on the walls are from the Children of the forest, and Dany seems awed to be standing in the same place. She passes the torch by some stick figures resembling the Children and the first men, and Jon narrates how they fought together against the common enemy, as her torch falls on the drawings of the WW's.

Ummm ........ no?

I mean, I'm pretty sure the Children made them to kill the first men originally, right? But Jon doesn't know that, and he needs Dany on his side, so go ahead and improvise Jonny baby. 😉

Now, I'm assuming that this scene was meant to be romantic because of the sudden romantic music playing in the background and the open stares between them in the soft torchlight. Kit's doing that soft half puppy/half fuck me stare, as Dany sashays slowly towards him.

"I will fight for you. I will fight for the north. When you bend the knee."

Annnnnnd there goes Jon's erection. If he had one ... hahahahah! He tells her again that he can't, and then Dany drops the BIGGEST hypocrite bomb EVER - "aren't his people more important than his pride?" Really? No seriously, REALLY? Who's prideful here? Someone get that girl a mirror because she has some serious soul searching to do!

But here's the thing -I went into this scene expecting to be beat over the head with romance tropes and vibes (according to what I've seen you all post over the last few days) and I truly didn't see/feel it. It's not that I didn't want to ... I was really actually trying to, but I felt more like they were once again trying to show us a juxtaposition on who these two people really are.

They emerge from the cave and Tyrion and Varys have good and bad news -they've got Casterly Rock ...but not really. Naturally, Dany is pissed. She demands that Jon and Davos remain while she has her tantrum. She implies that Tyrion is working against her, then gazing ominously out to sea at her Dragons says she's going to fly them to the Red Keep. When Tyrion advises her against it, she asks Jon's opinion. He doesn't want to be involved but she insists.

Jon gives her really good advice, actually. He tells her to BE DIFFERENT. He tells her to be what her people think she is, and not just more of the same shit they're used to. He tells her not to use her Dragons.

Now we're back to Winterfell and Brienne is training Podrick again. Where's Brienne's cheerleader, Tormund? I half expected him to pop out from behind a wagon with heart eyes. lol Arya wants to train with Brienne -she obviously admires her, and I ship them -my new brotp. 😍

They quick shoot up to Sansa and LF on the battlements and the grain is brought up again. Food is a big theme in this episode, as it's mentioned in the beginning with Jamie, Dany also mentions feeding her army during her tantrum, and now Sansa, too.

She stops in mid sentence to watch what's unfolding below with Arya and Brienne. She gets a worried look and side eyes LF when Arya mentions Brienne swore to serve both of Cat's daughters (again, more writers bait to instill fake mistrust between the sisters -it's more likely that Sansa mistrusts LF and what's currently motivating him).

This fight scene is AMAZING! Two strong, beautiful women -individually talented in their own ways ...this is the shit I live for!!! Arya looks and moves strikingly like Jon (before he took on Ned's persona) -(wo)man bun and all!

Again, Sansa with her odd looks, and her side-eyeing of LF ...they are laying it on thick.

Also, Gendry better watch out -Podrick's got some serious heart eyes for Arya.

We head back to Dragonstone, and Davos and Jon are strolling the grounds (aren't you supposed to be mining, mofo???). Again, I'm going to break away from everyone on the romance vibes here -I think that Davos is being facetious. When he asks Jon what he thinks of Dany, he never tells us what he feels, and when Jon says "she has a good heart", Davis replies with "yeah, I've noticed you've been staring at her good heart", implying that Jon's been looking at her tits. Where's the romance in that? That's not love -that's physical attraction. Let's not mix the two just yet.

Jon immediately rebuffs Davos with -"There's no time for that" the convo switches gears to the NK and how many men they've got up north. And then Davos jumps back to "good hearts" deliberately and LOUDLY, as they approach Missandei. This seems odd to me ... I've already speculated that Jon may go undercover lover on Dany as he did to Ygritte, and many have disagreed with me -but I kind of feel like that might be what they are setting up here ...

Missandei greets them "Ser Davos, Lord Snow" -and immediately Davos puts the brakes on that shit, "it's King Snow, or is it King Jon?" (I love Davos). We go over the concept of bastard, which leads to how Missandei got to be an advisor to Dany. And here again, I feel is another play on words to show how distrustful of Dany both Jon and Davos are (yet managed to fool everyone into thinking it's ringing romance bells and trying to convince Jon how precious the D is) -Davos reminds her that she's still "serving" Dany (reminiscent of what the Masters in Meereen said to GW) as to which Missandei replies that she does it freely. Jon is skeptical (and really, so am I) and asks if she wanted to leave and sail home to Narth tomorrow ...? Missandei is insistent that Dany would drop her on a boat and wish her good fortune.

Jon (still skeptical): "you believe that?"

Ohhh, he struck a nerve. Missandei very passionately declares "she knows it" and says that all who followed her (Dany) from Essos followed her because they believe in Dany and chose her as queen (ya know, except for those who didn't). Davos says "would you forgive me if I switch sides?" And again, I can't help thinking how deliberate that line is -Davos is smart and he's a good talker (as shown throughout the entire series), and I really feel like he's playing them. I could be wrong, but my gut is really just telling me that something is off here.

Ahhh, and the scene I've been waiting for that conveniently comes after all this fake Dany romance BS -a Greyjoy ship is spotted just off the coast! Props to both my boys here, because they played up the tension and emotional angst nicely. Jon moves forward slowly, and then Theon too.

T: Sansa ....she alright?

The minute her name is on Theon's lips, Jon's chest begins to heave and he lunges forward and grabs Theon by the front of his shirt, vehemently stating that "what you did for her is the only reason I'm not killing you."

WOOT WOOT the murder kitten strikes again! Kit is sooooo good with these emotional facial scenes, my God! Do any of you really doubt this ship????

Jon is fucking in love with Sansa -it is so clearly evident that when he realizes his Starkcest is showing, he abruptly releases Theon, and shoves him away -just in time to zoom in on Davos, and guys -HE KNOWS! DAVOS KNOWS!!!

He (Davos) cleverly shifts the subject to Theon's fleet and Yara. Euron's got her. Theon asks where Dany is and they inform him she's not there.

We jump back over to Jamie and his troops. They are finishing gathering up the harvest (food again) and Lord Tarly suggests flogging any slackers. Jamie is against this -the writers emphasizing yet again that he's a good man/leader -which is emphasized FURTHER when he chats with Dickon about his feelings on his first battle. Dickon admits it was hard killing people he literally grew up with, and Jamie shows empathy -"they didn't deserve to die, but Lady Olenna decided to support the Targaryen girl, so here we are". Jamie may have been a great warrior, but he despises killing innocents, and in essence, that's what a lot of these soldiers are -men forced to fight for the ones who rule them, with really no say in the matter. The scene with Arya and the Lannister soldier boys makes so much more sense now.

A side note: Bronn literally laughed out loud at Dickon's name! lmao

Bronn and Jamie hear hoofbeats, the Dothraki army is coming, and sure enough, Dany's leading them on Drogon. Now, I've seen people's thoughts on this scene floating around Tumblr for days (TAG YOUR SPOILERS lol), but I was NOT prepared for how visually horrifying it truly was.

Another very important side note: the Khaleesi theme song that's usually played for most of Dany's inspiring scenes, has been given a VERY ominous twist. Go back and listen. It's an important detail that many of you might have missed. 😉

The Lannister army scrambles to make a barrier of shields and Dany literally blows them away, ordering Drogon to dracarys the shit out of them. The Dothraki break through, and while they're keeping the soldiers busy, Dany rides Drogon up the wagon line, literally torching all the wagons filled with food! WTF??

They have the giant crossbow with them, and Jamie tells Bronn he has to wield it, because you need two hands. Probably thinking that he doesn't get paid well enough for this bullshit, Bronn races for the weapon, but a Dothraki develops a hard-on for him and gives chase through the burning camp. Bronn loses his horse and his gold, but makes it to the weapon. Finally riding himself of his Dothraki admirer, he searches the smoke filled sky for Drogon, as Tyrion looks down at the carnage from an overlooking cliff. He has what I perceive to be a regretfully sad/shocked face, as equally sad music plays in the background. The Dothraki warrior beside him comments that "his people can't fight".

They zoom in on Jamie watching the soldiers around him burning to death, and then Drogon reappears and is headed straight for him. He yells for his men to take cover, as Bronn releases an arrow and just barely misses the dragon. He reloads, as Dany zeroes in on him, ordering dracarys as Bronn lets the next arrow fly and it hits Drogon under the wing, I think? Drogon is injured, but recovers just in time to stop in front of the weapon and bathe him in fire, as Bronn dives out of harms way.

Drogon lands and smashes the weapon with his tail, and Dany dismounts to pull the spear from him. Jamie sees an opportunity to take Dany out, and like a gallant knight, races towards her, while Tyrion watches from the cliff, pleading for him not to do it. NOT because he cares about Dany -no, his fear is all for his brother here, I'm sure of it.

Unfortunately, Dani and Drogon see him before he gets close enough, and dracarys again -but Bronn leaps out and knocks Jamie off his horse and they both fall into the water and sink below the surface.

The episode ends with Jamie in heavy armor, sinking like a rock to the bottom of the lake.

No guys, Jamie is not dead. Bronn isn't wearing heavy armor and Bronn will save him. I promise. Jamie's story isn't over yet -he's got a very important role to play in the coming battle ....

A few things to point out that should have been glaringly obvious:

Dany didn't take Jon's advice. If any of you have any doubts on dark!dany, you can toss them out the window -this episode was in NO WAY intent upon bathing her in a good light.

Tyrion is going to jump sides really soon -and probably Varys, too.

Dany just burned most -if not ALL of the harvest, and now we understand the emphasis on food this episode, and the parallel of Sansa who, ya know -actually gives a fuck about feeding her people.

I have more thoughts on this episode that I'll share tomorrow, but I know you've all been waiting for this a long time. What can I say? I'm thorough, I'm sorry! Thanks for tuning in, and I'll see you next week with more GoT Afterthoughts.

#got afterthoughts #got recap #got season 7 spoilers #SPOILERS #jonsa

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jouissezduprintemps · 7 years ago

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Please, I need to know more about your thesis. That sounds super interesting and also disturbing and I know about it a little bit but it would be very cool to see in depth research on that topic.

My thesis focused on three filmic adaptations of the 425C [Beauty and the Beast] fairytale type. Specifically: Jean Cocteau’s La Belle et la bete, Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, and Dreamwork’s Shrek. Cocteau’s film is anti-heteronormativity, Disney’s promotes it, and Shrek is a postmodern inversion of the tale 425C.

The best way for me to explain is to quote directly from my thesis. It’s incredibly long, so I did by best to strip it down to bare-bones quotes.

NOTE: The thesis makes heavy use of the word q*eer, in case that’s an issue for anyone who might read. Obviously, it isn’t used as a slur, but I know that a lot of people don’t like the word. I use it here in reclamation, but I don’t want to upset a reader.

To quote a few key points in my introduction:“This essay focuses on how each of these three films conveys the sexual ideology of the filmmaker to the spectator in the theatre, specifically in terms of heteronormativity and queer sexuality.”

“An examination of these three films as they pertain to queer sexuality and rights is essential in a society torn between acceptance and hate of individuals within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community.”

“By looking at these films through the lens of LGBTQ theory, the viewer can see how the perpetuation of or rebellion against the societal, sexual status quo denotes the validity of certain characters as human. Others are judged by this status quo for their presentations of gender, while still these characters are held accountable for their own queer or heterosexual realizations of their true selves. The game of performance and sexuality is dangerous for those who exist outside the dominant ideologies of their worlds and have no desire to conform.“

Cocteau’s La Belle et la bete (1946, France)“The Beast’s desire to possess this feminine symbol, whether it be Beauty or the rose, is not due to a heterosexual coupling instinct. Rather, it is a necessary part of his identity as a beast to possess both femininity and masculinity within himself.”

“Because the Beast was raised as a man, he realizes that the act of animalistic, savage hunting [*literal in this sense*] is not one which is societally attributed tomen. He knows that he is acting outside of this binary construct and that, if he is caught after the act, the evidence of his inhumanity and queerness will be undeniable. However, the need to hunt is a natural and necessary part of his identity as a monster, and it is unavoidable while he existsin this state. Yet he cannot claim this natural action as his own; his upbringing taught him that he needs to be a man, and a man does not hunt in this way. As such, there exists a dysphoria between who (or what) the Beast is and who he believes he should be. The clash between his twoidentities is not unlike that of a queergendered person battling with societal expectations of heteronormative presentation.”

“Beauty views the Beast as a monster in the same way that everyone else in her world does; the Beast does not entirely conform to the societal definition of humanness because he does not easily fall within the gender binary, and, as such, is something that should be feared from afar and attacked as a threat if it comes too close, lest they risk the endangerment of their own status as human.”

“Beauty recognizes no obvious change within herself; she is not whisked upwards in a whirl of magic which clearly and exaggeratedly transforms her sexuality. Neither does she use her attraction to the Beast as any sort of platform or derive her personal status from it. Her attraction simply is. The normalcy with which Beauty’s transformation takes place and is accepted within the Beast’s queer realm show that this separate world is one in which those who do not fit into the heterosexual gender binary may live as their true selves.”

“It is when Beauty, considered by Avenant [*suitor*] to be his property, is “corrupted” by the Beast that it becomes necessary, as seen through the eyes of the patriarchal country society, for Avenant, their ideal of heteronormative masculinity, to stage his attack on behalf of his ideal woman.”

“In Cocteau’s surprising cinematic twist at the end of the film, the magical transformation of the Beast into a human prince bestows upon him a physical likeness identical to that of the recently-dead Avenant. The same actor plays both parts, and Beauty is visibly shocked and disturbed by the appearance of the heteronormative man who stands in front of her. It is clear that she has fallen in love with the image of the Beast rather than the prospect of the prince; eventhough the two are the same man internally, she possesses no physical attraction to his transformed, human and heteronormative state. The Beast has become the embodiment of heteronormative masculinity, the very trait that caused Beauty to reject Avenant.”

“Cocteau’s La Belle et la bête glamorizes heteronormative love in such a grandiose way that even cis-gendered 5 , heterosexual viewers question the ceremony upon which traditional romantic relationships are founded. By makinglight of heteronormative ideology and stereotypes, Cocteau underscores the disadvantage of LGBTQ individuals in society as a whole. The pedestal upon which Beauty and the prince stand at the end of the film is one of a heteronormative ideal; the woman tamed the wild man, who hasbecome the perfect gentleman and has tamed her in return. The blatant parodying of the patriarchal coupling rites seen at the end of this film causes the viewer, heteronormative or queer, to look at this pomp and circumstance with a skeptical eye. The audience, as such, is forced to puzzle over what they have seen as Beauty and the prince depart for their utopia, just as confused by Beauty and the prince’ heterosexual coupling as one would be if the couple were of a queer sexuality.”

Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (1991) [NOTE: This was written before the live-action release, which I have not seen. What I assert here pertains to the animated feature.]“In short, he [*beast*] is incapable of being physically threatening, even is his moments of rage, due to his muted and, in some cases, domesticated features. The viewer is never allowed to forget that the Beast is truly the prince from the beginning of the film. It is through these traditionally attractive,masculine characteristics that Disney is capable of maintaining the Beast’s heteronormativity and position on the gender binary while he does not physically appear as a human male.”

“Through the in-depth measures taken by Disney to insure that their audience cannot mistake the Beast’s masculine status on the gender binary, the queer subtext of the beast-figure’s very nature is completely removed from the story. As a result, the Beast openly perpetuates the dominant, heteronormative ideology shared by both the characters in the film and the producers in the Disney Corporation.”

“The Disney Beast reacts in the same way as Cocteau’s, with a demonstration of hypermasculinity. The Beast is a man enraged, yet his fury does not surpassthat which is deemed acceptably masculine. He walks the fine line between (hyper)masculinity and beastliness, careful never to step over into the realm of monsters, the realm of queer existence.”

“If the ideal heterosexual male is to find a mate, he must search for the ideal heterosexual female to be his wife, in the literal, proprietary sense of ownership. Belle is portrayed from the beginning of the film as this ideal, heterosexual female. She performs her gender in a corresponding manner with her birth sex. To further elevate her to the status of ideal, the commoners in her village sing along with Belle during the very first song of the film, which bears her name. The common theme is incomprehension of Belle on the part of the townspeople, and it is this otherworldliness that places Belle upon a pedestal”

“Although Belle is hailed as a savior, it is clear that she will be forced into a heterosexual coupling with the Beast, regardless of her own desires. This patriarchal assumption of purpose for Belle completely skips over her own will, rendering her in a lower position of power than the servants. As the ideal woman, she must be demure, submissive, and a martyr. She is seen by thehousehold servants as a tool (which surprisingly maintains her human status) who will gladly be used to improve the lives of everyone around her and to maintain the patriarchal, heterosexual status quo within the utopia of the castle.”

“However, the Beast’s position of the male ideal needs a foil if he is to climb up the pedestal while still in his monstrous form. Gaston, Belle’s unsuccessful suitor, fills this role. He is the epitome of machismo: his muscles bulge out of his shirt, he breathes sexism, and he even has his very own song about how much of a man he is. This hypermasculine caricature serves to remind the audience that they are not to focus too heavily on the outward appearance of the Beast. Gaston, through his rivalry for Belle’s affections, serves as a reaffirmation of the Beast’s original position as a white, heterosexual male. Two men are offering their affections to the ideal woman; both men serve as an ideal in their own right within the drastic disparity of their social classes. However, it is Gaston’s hypermasculinity that, while maintaining his position as a heterosexual, calls into question his ability to complete the ideal woman.”

“Even when fighting unfairly, the inner emasculation Gaston has possessed throughout the film is not enough to stand up against, let alone tear down, the ideal man. The Beast’s identity as the ideal man is secure, but the costseems to be too high. As he lies dying from the wounds he has sustained, Belle expresses her love for him, and these words result in the explicit union of the ideal woman and the ideal man. This ideal, heterosexual coupling named “true love” breaks the spell which has plagued the castle. Belle has served her gendered purpose. She has loved, served, and suffered beautifully enough to provide a happily ever after for herself, the prince, and all of the household servants. Her reward is the, now-human, ideal man…”

“Belle is overwhelmingly pleased with the human appearance of the Beast, drawing a sharp contrast to the Beauty in Cocteau’s adaptation. Their sexual attraction is strengthened rather than weakened, and Belle does not have to make a sacrifice of personal preference to stay with him. The happy union of the ideal man and woman may seem a bit overdramatized, but this is not done to the point of incredulity in the Disney Corporation’s film. The utopia and happiness on the screen is shown as being attainable, albeit exclusive. By virtue of being shown on the screen, both as the Beast’s domain and the prince’s lavish palace, this place is given validity as something which not only has the possibility to exist but as a place which a select few will be able to inhabit. The notion of the beauty getting her prince, a castle, and a “happily ever after” isnot parodied by the Disney Corporation. Rather, it is promised, so long as those wishing to attain it remain intelligible on the gender binary and participate in the patriarchal, heteronormativity which the company promotes.”

Dreamworks’ Shrek (2004)“DreamWorks Animation’s Shrek opposes the Disney Corporation’s Beauty and the Beast, seemingly at every turn, even from the opening scene. The story begins with the opening of a book of fairy tales, mirroring the same opening of the Disney Corporation’s adaptation. It is here that things take a turn for the unexpected. Scoffing at the notion of fairy tales and their ‘happily ever afters,’ the title character rips a page out of a storybook and proceeds to use the page in lieu of toilet paper. In response to the notion of “true love’s first kiss,” Shrek scoffs “like that’s ever gonna happen.” This shocking first impression labels the title character as a beast in the eyes of the viewer before he is seen on the screen. By quite literally defecating on the Disney Corporation’s notion of heteronormative utopia, DreamWorks leaves no room for doubt that this film is intended as a reaction to the Disney Corporation’s concept of the ideal man and woman.”

“Shrek is not the Beast from Cocteau’s or the Disney Corporation’s films; he does not possess an impregnable space which others fear to approach. As an ogre, he belongs to the fairy-tale community at large, and the refugees feel that they have a right to his isolated, and therefore safe, realm.”

“By virtue of living in his swamp, Shrek escapes much of the homophobic negativity forced upon those like him in the beginning of the film. This swamp is seen as a safe haven for the non-binary, anthropomorphic fairy-tale characters who seek out refuge from the violence perpetuated against them. It exists inan outside realm with no threatening authority to police their presentation of heteronormative gender and sexuality, which, by their very nature, the fairy-tale characters are mostly incapable of providing.”

“Lord Farquad’s constant embodiment of patriarchal heteronormativity quickly and easily portrays him as the villain of the film. He does not, unlike Avenant and Gaston, get a chance at playing the “good guy.” More so than either suitor in the previous films discussed in this essay, Lord Farquad acts as the unyielding defender of heterosexual relations and heteronormative presentation. In his eyes, humanity is determined by these same concepts.”

“Shrek’s relative naïveté of the hate crimes being perpetuated against the fairy tale characters, along with his disbelief that he is similar to them, prompt him to seek out aid from the heteronormative, humanoid society within Duloc. At this point in the film, he seems not to understand his own “Otherness” which he so readily embraces when it allows him to live in solitude. For the first time, he is faced with the same discriminatory and violent treatment as the refugees whom he is trying to evict from his home. His life is threatened because he dared tocross over the barrier between queer existence into the realm of heteronormativity.”

“Princess Fiona’s predicament, however, is the exact opposite than that of Shrek; cursed to transform as an ogre during the night, she wishes to present and to only be seen as the ideal woman, the damsel in the tower. She is less than pleased that her rescue is not storybook in nature, and she is livid when she finds out her knight is an ogre rather than the ideal man who she imagined. The desire she has to hide herself during her nightly transformations is not unlike the desire of those with gender identity disorder to perform their given sex while hiding their true sex from the world.”

“On the last night of their journey, Princess Fiona’s secret is revealed. Her “coming out” is a complete accident, and Donkey’s outbursts of incredulity do nothing to soothe her as she faces invalidation from a member of the community to which she truly belongs. She experiences self- loathing, referring to herself as a beast. Yet she does not deny that she is not this particular, monstrous identity. By indicating that her transformations have taken place from when she was alittle girl, Princess Fiona replicates a common narrative to those within the LGBTQ community.”

“Princess Fiona’s final transformation shares elements with those of Cocteau’s and the Disney Corporation’s beasts. She is swept up in a wave of magic and saved by true love. Yet it is crucial to remember that, despite her state of physical transformation, she is still the Beauty character within the narrative. Just like her predecessors, she must first struggle against the beast before attaining a state of acceptance of herself and of her victorious suitor. Princess Fiona, much like Cocteau’s Beauty, comes to a deeper understanding of herself and her sexuality … In both cases, the challenge is one of sexual realization that lies outside of heteronormativity. Yet, unlike Cocteau’s Beauty, this knowledge is not something that Princess Fiona can stifle while accepting her lit in marriage to her suitor. The union between Shrek and Princess Fiona is celebrated by the fairytale community as well as the citizens of Duloc. They arenot placed on pedestals as ideals, but they are welcomed by a community which shares their personal joy in a major life event. Their existence is that of a simple couple who are no different from any other.”

“The inclusivity of the swamp is proven by the wedding celebration; people and fairy-tale characters of all sorts are capable of existing within this particular area. It is not cut off from the rest of the world, untouchable, or ideal. It is simply a home. There is no guarantee of eternal happiness and ease, because that is not reality. The magic of this place lies in its inhabitants; two nonbinary characters are able to form a union and inhabit a space without risk of harm ordiscrimination from those around them. Contrasted with the violence which fairy-tale characters experienced throughout the film, a promise of a safe home is closer to a utopia than any far-away world could be. To exist while openly embracing their true identities and sexualities is more thancould have been hoped for while Lord Farquad was still the ruling figure. For members of the LGBTQ community, this place of openness and acceptance is utopia, one that can be made into a reality outside of fairy tales.”

Conclusion

“Fairy tales, in their versatility, remain an excellent medium for the conveyance of ideologies. Although this essay focuses on messages of sexuality, such tales open themselves up to a broad spectrum of criticism and interpretations. Much like their adaptability to location and era, these tales morph to serve the needs of those who adapt them as well as those who choose to read them. With these three filmic adaptations of type 425C, heterosexuality has been reluctantlyaccepted, wholeheartedly embraced, and blatantly rejected. By virtue of their source material, all three are linked, even though they are drastically different from one another. As long as the notion of a “happily ever after” exists, there will be tales and tellers to recount how one can go about obtaining this end, be it through magic, social class, or love.”

I know this is a really long answer, but I hope you enjoyed it and that it wasn’t too academic. If you want the academic side, I’d be happy to send you my bibliography!

#Leah's thesis

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itwasjustmisplaced · 8 years ago

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Wanting to put this all out there.

I honestly get what Emmerdale was trying to do with this Robert and Aaron story. The execution may have been sloppy or misdirected at times but the general idea was to break Robert and Aaron individually, to make them become the worst versions of themselves in order to confront their issues and then take responsibility for it and move forward.

It began with SSW where all of these issues that had been bubbling under the surface since they got back together came boiling over with the arrival of Rebecca (I will address her later).

Short version: Robert has sexuality issues and Aaron self-worth issues.

They’ve had fights and blows up about this since SSW and the show has been deliberately brushing past them. They were doing this because both Robert and Aaron didn’t want to confront these issues. They were like most couples who thought if we just love each other enough real issues won’t matter. Aaron thought his love for Robert would be enough to look past his insecurities and be happy, but it wasn’t. Robert thought his love for Aaron, because it was so different, would be enough for him to be faithful, but it wasn’t. In order for them to be better, they both needed to hit rock bottom and really assess the issues with their relationship and themselves.

Emmerdale first went about this by breaking Aaron. Beginning in December after the second R/R kiss Aaron’s insecurities took center stage. The narrative was pushing Aaron’s issues. We as the audience were meant to feel for Aaron and see this from Aaron’s POV. It comes to a head when Aaron thought he lost Robert in January and he beat up Kasim. In that moment Aaron reverted to his worst self. He did something without thinking and then proceeded to blow it up more by first refusing a solicitor and not pleading reasonable force. We have Aaron own that he messed up and has to serve a punishment for his actions. I understand why the show wanted to bring back Gordon because it wasn’t dealt with last year and it is at the heart of why Aaron is the way. I think they completely misjudged how to bring it back and I wonder if it was because this story had to be sped up. They piled it all into two weeks instead of spreading it out over a month or two or however long they originally planned. The scenes after his release in The Mill were all about Aaron realizing he needs help and can’t ignore these things anymore. He was accepting responsibility again for his actions and also accepting that he needed help that goes beyond what Robert can provide.

Emmerdale used Aaron’s prison sentence as a catalyst to break Robert and to shift the narrative to Robert. They wanted him isolated in ways but also overwhelmed and to remove the one thing that’s kept Robert steady this entire year - making Aaron happy. Since they got together and there was the conversation outside the pub after the verdict there has been a recurring theme with Robert, he’s been trying to make things perfect for Aaron while also changing for Aaron. We’ve heard him say it over and over again how he tries to change for Aaron and to make things perfect for Aaron. But what is the one thing that makes Aaron so insecure? Robert’s sexuality. What is the one thing that Robert is 100% not comfortable with and not confronting? His sexuality. We’ve had hints of this since they’ve gotten together. Think back to this summer and the time they were all discussing how Lawrence was gay and instead of just saying he was bi, Robert stated that he and Chrissie were different cause they had a real relationship. He’s never once corrected anyone who has called him gay and going to Bar West is like out of the question. He’s also never come out or said the word bisexual to anyone but Aaron. It’s so hard for Robert to talk about this because of Jack and from his POV Jack’s rejection.

So, for Robert after SSW where he felt like him and Aaron had turned a corner (in terms of his sexuality) and they were moving forward but that wasn’t true. Aaron’s insecurities being tied so closely to Robert’s sexuality caused him to shut down. He’s still not there with his sexuality and to have Aaron pushing this it was just another rejection of his sexuality in his mind. Robert is completely comfortable being in a relationship with Aaron and being open with him but that hasn’t translated to him being comfortable with his sexuality. So Robert just dedicated his time to making Aaron happy and being there for him and thought that would be enough to ease Aaron’s concerns and when Aaron rejected that he went completely off the rails. It’s why he chose Rebecca and why he chose a woman. It’s complete rejection of his sexuality and it’s about as many have said hurting Aaron. In the end, I do think that Robert will tell Aaron and I’ve thought this since the beginning because that’s where we’ve been building. That Robert, like Aaron, will own this massive mistake and take responsibility. (Hopefully also confront his sexuality and come out to people like Vic and Diane.)

There have been a lot of parallels in this story from the get-go to name a few:

They both acted out in threes (getting progressively worse):

Aaron: Kidnapping Lachlan, Breaking into Home Farm, Beating up Kasim,

Robert: First R/R kiss, second kiss, and then the ONS

They both acted out when the other one dumped them:

I can’t make you happy, mate. I mean, literally, I can’t do it.

What use is that to me in here? Just leave me alone.

The night of their breakdowns being cruel about each other to other people while drunk. Aaron to Vic outside the pub and Robert with Rebecca at The Mill.

Accepting something isn’t right to others:

I’m just sick of being this person.

Hm, maybe not. But I’m trying.

The then the Mill being the sight of the reveals/come to Jesus moments.

Rebecca’s role in all of this is just to be the person that brings it all to a head. The embodiment of all their issues. That’s why she’s always been there. That’s why she talked about Aaron’s insecurities. That’s why she’s been biphobic. She’s there to reinforce the issues that are bubbling under the surface for Robron. She’s done the same thing for Chrissie. It’s why in the end I think the baby and her are a nonstory and nonissue. Not sure why did that part and how we get out of it but she’s not a factor at the end of day.

Do I think that parts of this story were a mess? Yes. Do I think they rushed parts? Yes. But do I get what Emmerdale is trying to do? Yes. Do I want to wait and see where this is all going before I make snap judgments? Yes.

People complained about the pacing of Rhona & Pierce story but in the end, it all made sense when we reached the climax last week. There were some similar complaints about Ashley’s death but it worked in the end. That’s the beauty of a soap at times it doesn’t make sense till it all comes together at the end or the climax. I’m just sure we haven’t reached that point with the Robron story. So, the best advice I have is to ride the waves and see where this goes. We know Emmerdale can do great work and now we’ve kind of got to trust them.

h/t to everyone who has listened to me talk about this: @dingleautomotives @rocketdocket @dingleminyard and @bartsugsy (anyone else I missed)

#emmerdale #robron #robert sugden #aaron dingle #robert x aaron #otp: but you know? i know.#idk if this makes any actual sense #and it's very long #anyways #here you go all

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