#she's apparently older than 5!! which makes sense!!!

[spacenintendogs]

CRICKET JS GOING TO BE OKAY!!!

[bookcub]

Goose Girl Retellings Rated by Geese (metaphorical geese that is)

because apparently I haven't made one??? spoilers for most of these books but nothing too detailed.

From the princess's perspective:

The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale

The most classic and straightforward adaptation that changes the least from the structure of the Grimm Brothers' version. This reads in many ways like a fairy tale and has a very whimsical style to it. I really enjoyed how her connection to birds was established when she was a child before she worked as a goose girl. The romance was sweet and I liked that her maid didn't use magic to steal her identity but rather had the guards' loyalty instead.

8 out of 10 geese

Thorn by Intisar Khanani

Initially, this was not one of my favorites as I read it near the start of all my goose girls but has actually stuck with me really well and engaged with the older version of the story in such an interesting way, so now is one of my favorites! I liked how identity was handled and the discomfort of living in a body other than your own. I liked how religion was incorporated. It was an important aspect of Thorn's character and not didactic in terms of ideology. I don't love the addition of the sorceress but the tension and relationship between Thorn and the handmaiden was really well done. A little too much going on, but definitely worth reading!

9 out of 10 geese

Bloodleaf by Crystal Smith

This adaptation read like a typical (but enjoyable) YA fantasy. There was a lot of romance in this one, which was nice but not very memorable. There was actually both a maid and a handmaiden who impersonated the princess for different reasons, which was cool, but there was very little focus on them. I really enjoyed how the handkerchief was adapted, it was one drop of blood from three different people who would all die before the princess (like her mother and her bodyguard).

6.5 out of 10 geese

Secret Princess by Melanie Cellier

Honestly, pretty standard YA fantasy retelling, nothing special but fun to read. Even less subversive than Bloodleaf. An annoying aspect is how this is part of a larger series so there were a lot of references to characters I didn't know. The maid's plot and reasoning for switching was really well done. I liked the romance enough. It was decent and cute.

5 out of 10 geese

The Noble Servant by Melanie Dickerson

So this is a Christian fiction book, and it was not subtle with the story's morals. It was like being hit over the head with morality. I read the beginning and skipped to the end after like 4 chapters. Unfortunately, the didactic nature of the book made me unable to enjoy any other aspects of the story. I liked the concept of the prince being in disguise as a lower class citizen/servant, but unfortunately, I was unable to appreciate the execution.

0 out of 10 geese

From the maid's perspective

Little Thieves by Margaret Owen

My favorite of all the retellings!! As a goose girl retelling, it is also awesome. I love that Vanja is a maid and emphasizes the issues of class and abuse of power. The inciting incident is revealed in a flashback and allows both Vanja and Giselle to be established as how this event has changed them before the reader sees it take place. I like that not only does the protagonist is changed from princess to maid, but the prince is changed to a villain as well. Vanja and Giselle also work really well as foil characters, with distinct character arcs. Vanja's reasoning for taking over is also easily understandable and the magic object that allows her to do so makes sense in allowing her. Also, interesting how many goose girl retellings exist as the first installment of a series, isn't it?

10 out of 10 geese

Identity by Camille Peters

I really enjoyed the idea of this but the execution did not take full advantage of the concept. I love that the princess forces the maid to take her place, making her the villian, although I didn't love the slut shaming the narrative put her through. I wish she had been more present as a character. Would have made the story more interesting. This is definitely more of a romance than the other books, although romance is often present. The magical artifact was not great and used poorly throughout. I thought identity was talked about a lot but ultimately, the maid didn't have to sacrifice her personality as much as she claimed it did. I would have focused on the dynamic between princess and maid more and made it a dual pov but alas. An interesting installment in my little journey, albeit unsatisfactory.

6 out of 10 geese

The Tale of the Handkerchief by Emma Donoghue

From a collection of short stories that are fairy tale adaptations, this story evoked a fairy tale feel. I like the switches without magic because I think it shows the power in privilege and position, and how regular lies can destroy lives. I also liked that the princess didn't want to come back, I liked how tedious the maid's position was as a princess. It was great commentary on class and royalty. A short read but a worthy installement in my journey.

7 out of 10 geese

Other perspectives

Stolen Legacy by Cathleen Townsend

This is a free novella I received for signing up to the author's newsletter and I did not do a wrap up or review of this one so I barely remember this one except Falada told it and I didn't really care for this version. According to the summary, Falada is a kelpie and the princess is a siren. . .It was not great.

2 out of 10 geese

The Goose Girl from Black Thorn, White Rose by Tim Wynne-Jones

The prince tells this story years later, after the events take place and he really cared about the maid. I believe it was implied or outright stated that the princess was attracted to women and the change between maid and princess was not forced. Interesting from a new perspective.

5 out of 10 geese

Falada: The Goose Girl's Horse from A Wolf at the Door by Nancy Farmer

Falada is the narrator and he is a fae horse who needs to complete a task in the human world to go back to the fae world. The maid is actually a fae who steals the princess' identity to help build her confidence. It was pretty short, interesting concept but not much happened.

4 out of 10 geese

The Grimrose Girls by Lauren Pohl

SPOILERS AHEAD but I actually hated this book, BUT I really liked how the goose girl was involved. The villain of the whole story (which was a boarding school of fairy tale characters) was the maid from the goose girl, except she was a modern day version AND she killed the "princess" to take over her life which is a great dark twist on an already dark story. Despite hating this book, I was very impressed with how the goose girl story was used in the story. It was the only good aspect of a very disappointing book.

2 out of 10 geese

Imposters

I was told these books were goose girl adaptations. I was lied to.

A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher

This was well written, enjoyable, and only Goose Girl in the aesthetics. As a book, I had a great time with it, great emotional turmoil and a light horror in this fairy tale inspired fantasy. However, as a Goose Girl retelling, there was no identity swap. And with no identity swap, unfortunately, this does not qualify as a Goose Girl retelling for me. There may be a horse named Falada and geese, which are always fun, and while there is an attempt to change social classes (the most Goose Girl aspect of this story), the fact that this is marketed as a retelling, is absolutely wrong.

3 out of 10 geese

Dearest by Althea Kontis

I was told this was Goose Girl. After reading a few chapters, this was proven to be more of a Six Swans retelling. I did not read it after this realization as it was super boring.

0 out of 10 geese

Goose Chase by Patrice Kindl

Same as Dearest, except the prose was actively awful.

0 out of 10 geese

The Goose Girl from Other Ever After by Melanie Gillman

Maybe this is because it was a short story, but I didn’t mind that this was called Goose Girl but was not anything like the story structure I expected. It was also in a anthology of other queer fairy tales, so my expectations of being a loyal adaptation were low. I liked that this was queer, I liked the comic format, I liked that the characters were portayed having dark skin. I loved the commentary on social class, a key question at the center of a good goose girl in my opinion. One of my two favorite short stories, despite being an In Name Only adaptation.

7 out of 10 geese

[n30nwrites]

Rewind (Bridgerton)

Pronouns: He/Him

Relationships: Anthony Bridgerton x Kate Sharma, Penelope Featherington x Colin Bridgerton, Benedict Bridgerton x Reader, Anthony Bridgerton x Reader, Kate Sharma x Reader, Penelope Featherington x Reader, Colin Bridgerton x Reader

Soulmate AU, Polygamy, Reader is autistic

Warnings; Mentions of homophobia? Mentions of absent parents, Christianity but the Reader doesn't believe in God, Talks of Unwanted touching, Talks about canonical child death and sickness

This is just a small excerpt because no one else will fulfill what I need because I am very much in love with the people surrounding Bridgerton. IDK if I'll continue it.

You weren't the eldest son, nor were you the youngest. A Classic middle child, having your older brothers torture you and your younger ones followed in their footsteps soon enough. But all of your siblings wanted one thing.

Your parent's attention.

Your father, The King George, was a mad men, at least he was considered one. Your mother was too busy ruling England and keeping everything picture perfect to really care about you guys.

Well you didn't really count yourself as one of your siblings.

Simply because you weren't meant to be here.

When you were first taken to this universe, you had been a babe, just freshly born. It was strange, to have full consciousness when being a young'en. The minute you could, you were walking and talking, far earlier than any other babe, but you had too.

By the time you were five, you had been considered a spectacle. The prodigal son, they claimed. You had your wits, you were respectable, truly the perfect gentleman.

You played your cards right, up until you couldn't.

Growing older meant more siblings, and you took care of them the best you could. But you hated these new rules. You couldn't be alone with a woman who wasn't a relative, your brothers were rude and loved it, and your sisters were innocent. Naive really, which you felt was a strange thing. To know about Sex but they couldn't. You tried to teach your sisters as well, education was the future.

But it was all useless.

Eventually you became a recluse. You stuck to yourself, in your room with instruments. Your English guitar, harp-lute, piano, and even the improper ones like a violin, cello and flute. You had to make the best of a situation, and that was what you did.

Even well into your adulthood, your brothers were still your biggest bullies. They thought you were a prude for never having Sex, which frankly if women couldn't without being criticized and shamed, then you shouldn't either. They said you were secretly a woman, or queer.

Well you could attest you weren't a woman, and well you kind of were queer. Bisexual, but they wouldn't know that word.

But you were brought into this universe for some odd reason. You weren't sure why, you didn't really get into Bridgerton like everyone else. Not that you were different from others, you just couldn't commit to watching a tv series, but you had seen the edits.

It just made no sense for you to be the one. It wasn't until the marks appeared that you understood.

Soulmates. That was a new adaption. Apparently they were rare, rare enough that out of all your siblings, you were the only one to have one. Your mother said it was a gift from God, though you thank she only said that because the bishop was there when you got them.

Them as in multiple, that put the bishop out of his head. He said it was blasphemous, you were too entranced with them to care. A matching soulmark would tie you to these people. 5 people.

That was a lot of people to keep happy. Especially when this century wasn't very happy with queer couples and polyamory. After that, your mother had insisted you hide them, and you weren't willing to risk a Romanov situation because people were too religious.

Your mother didn't like that you weren't religious, but she didn't bring it up again after one intense arguement that caused you to leave for a few weeks.

But you agreed with her, you wouldn't tell others. You were here to find a way out, you already had some ideas, one being a specific spot in the woods where you found something from the future.

A portable Radio/Cassette player. Wasn't that far in the future where you were, but it would work. You had headphones with it, and you finally felt some sort of sanity. Music in this era wasn't nearly as relaxing as yours was.

Keeping to yourself was easy after that. Every servant was ordered to knock on your door loudly by you, and to stop any sibling that would come your way just in case they caught you. Your servants were almost your friends, you knew they were reqired to be there, to be kind to you, but it was the closest you had to an actual relationship.

You stayed away from your mother on days like this. She's irritated, you don't know why, you don't care to ask. Your siblings are stomping around the palace but you don't move from your room, you instead walk around your room, shirtless, listening to your music. Your favorite servant, Zelena, is behind you, just watching you. She's always been touchy with you, your hair, your chest, you assumed it was just the way she communicated. And while you were uncomfortable with it, your mother had told you that you couldn't afford to be rude to people.

Zelena stayed next to you while you played the English Guitar. You knew enough about it in your old life, having made adjustments to the strings to be able to play older songs. The ones you could remember (Which you wrote down because eventually, you wouldn't.)

You ignore the knock at the door, simply nodding your head to Helena, who opens the door gently.

A gentleman is at the door, he's staring at you the minute he walks in. Like he's almost amazed at you, you didn't understand.

You never did.

He seems to look at you yet avoids eye contact. You set the instrument down to the side, gently. "Can I help you sir?"

He says your name, and you nod your head. "Can we be alone?" He asks. Your mother said it was improper to be with women alone, not men. So you nod your head and your maids walk out of the room. You figured this man was a duke or something, he had to be important considering he was in the castle. Perhaps a suitor for one of your sisters.

"My name is Benedict Bridgerton."

"Bridgerton? I've heard stories about your family before from my mother. She enjoys the drama that surrounds your family." You tell him, "Last I heard the Viscount found a wife."

"My brother, Anthony." He confirms.

"What brings you to my room?" You question. "Surely it's not to tell me about your family?"

"I just had to meet you."

"You really didn't." You frown slightly, to be fair, you knew a bit about Benedict. You weren't the biggest fan of his story, kidnapping a bride from her wedding day and tying her to a pole. It was strange, but you couldn't change the writers opinion. At least you think that was his story, TikTok could only tell you so much and it's not like you read the books.

You could only hope that it was different in the tv series, considering that's where you were right now. The actor himself you knew very little about as well, but you didn't really care for actors. You stood from the couch in your room, "Why is the artist here?"

"You know of my work?"

"I know a lot of things Sir." You take a few steps away from the couch. "Can you get to the point?"

He seems unsure now, fiddling with his fingers. "You're my soulmate" He tells you, and you look down at one of your marks.

"Which mark are you?" You question, and he looks hopeful. He pulls up his sleeve, the little feather on your wrist, in matching spots. You looked at your own and slightly traced it.

"Benedict!" The voice is angry and your door opens. You glare at the person who opened it. He didn't knock. It's Anthoyn Bridgerton, looking angry. "Benedict what are-"

"Next time Viscount I would ask that you knock instead of rudely interrupting." You cut him off, glaring at him. He seems to have brought a group of people behind him. Benedict stands up and walks right next to you. You put your hands behind your back, picking at your wrist. "It seems you've brought company." You tell Benedict.

"I was about to explain." He tells you, but you look at Anthony, more specifically behind him. You can see your mother through the crowd.

"If we must speak, we will not do it in my room." You grab Benedict's wrist, still refusing skin-to-skin, and pull him with you. Your glare causes the eldest Bridgerton to move to the side, he walks next to his wife.

Outside your room is a lot of people, it's almost overwhelming. There's the Featheringtons, really you only recognized Penelope but you knew by the yellow dress that they had to be her relatives. You could guess they were her sisters and the eldest-looking was her mother. You then saw your own mother, with what seemed like all of your siblings behind her. You rolled your eyes, your eldest brother seemed to glare at you. He hated you though, and you didn't particulary care. You just hated the drama that came with them. Then the Bridgertons. All of them, it seems. The eldest Bridgerton son is there with his wife, Kate. As is their mother, then Benedict who was next to you, Colin who seemed to glance between you and Penelope, Daphne with her husband, Simon. Eloise, Francesca (you truly hoped she got a better story in this show than the books), Gregory and Hyacinth.

"Brimsley, a pleasure to see you again." You avoid everyone to speak to your mother's right-hand man.

"Perhaps if you came out of your room more sir."

"Ah but if I did I might just die." You smile slightly, "Especially if I see William's face." Your brother takes a step towards you but quickly faltors at your mother's expression. "What have I done to warrant a family meeting without me."

"Being born really." George remarked and you smiled at him, cruelly.

"Brother you make me wish I wasn't and that instead I was with Charlotte, Amelia, Alfred and Octavius." What you said was cruel. Amelia died of tuberculosis, Alfred and Octavius died of smallpox, and the young Princess Charlotte who you weren't really sure how you died, you were barely there during the funeral. George (The fourth?) seemed to quiet down, looking sad. You were being rude, you didn't care. They back you into a corner and you attack, like always. "Edward! If you want to strike me you might as well try, but we both know you lack in that department, and many others."

"Quiet." Your mother tells you, and you wish you could care but you didn't. "This doesn't pertain you." She says your name gently, as if convincing you to calm down.

"Obviously it does if it has my soulmate running towards me." You jest towards Benedict. "What? Now that my attraction to men is out we must kill them all? It's not like it's been a secret."

"It is not godly." One of your brothers say.

"God is not Godly." You dennounce him, "You follow a book that has been rewritten multiple times, through many different languages. I do not believe in your God, you know that."

"Hush." Your mother calls your name and you just stare at her. "This was for the better of the Kingdom."

"Why does the Kingdom matter more than I?" You question, "Frankly, none of this does. But why are the Bridgertons and the Featherington's here?"

"You know who we are?" One of the other Featherington sisters say, she seems hot, considering the red to her face.

"I know of Penelope." You looked to her and nodded. "Who wouldn't? She's absolutely beautiful." You notice the looks that you recieve after you say your words. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No, I just think its best-"

"She wants to discourage us from going after you." Benedict says as he grabs your wrist causing you to look at him.

"Us?"

[robocatfan]

An angry summary of Speak the Ocean by Rebecca Enzor -Part 2

Part 1 , Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8

Chapter 2- Erie

This chapter introduces us to Erie, our magenta- haired mermaid protagonist and the youngest daughter of the king of the underwater Seadom - yes that’s its name. At least it doesn't go by Atlantis like many other stories do.

As stated before, she’s the youngest of seven siblings (only two of which we see in the story and learn the names of. The other five meanwhile don’t even get a mention) - just like Ariel - and also the one who’s been neglected the most due to resembling their disappeared mother, Queen Manistique. We learn that she was the first mer captured by humans - which the mers and dolphins call “landfolk” - and that her dad’s still wallowing about his dead wife. Just like Ariel’s dad.

Erie’s been trying to find a pattern and reason for the abductions of her people, each one represented by a shell which she’s tasked to stain with squid ink when they get taken, with the most recent victim being one of her older siblings, Clair. However, the events are so irregular that she’s unable to find any answers.

As she ponders her sister’s shell, she’s visited by a blue-haired mer called Huron, who’d just snuck past a surfacing Niku - her dolphin guard - and immediately suggests they go out hunting despite the danger of the landfolk. Also it’s pretty apparent by the way he’s interacting with her that he wants to do way more than just get food.

While Erie is tempted to go out, especially since none of them have been hunting much due to the fear of boats, she has doubts about it… for just a brief moment since of course, it doesn’t take long for her to agree to come with him.

In the next two paragraphs as they sneak away, the text gives us a look (or rather, a sort of broad description- and the only one we ever get at that!) of their home, which is essentially a big underwater city surrounded by a dead sunken forest that is somehow enough to hide them from modern human technology, because none of the human characters have any idea of its existence.

There are also other sea creatures living within it like fish and crabs, but Erie notes that they are illegal to eat… Even though it’s also noted that everyone is starving due to being unable to hunt as frequently as they used to, so why prevent them from consuming these very accessible meals? It’s like placing a bowl of food just out of the reach of a chained dog!

Anyway instead of doing… Whatever they are intending to do, in a hidden corner of their home, these two fools decide to go past the dead forest to do it in what’s essentially a danger zone just so they can have their “fun”. Brilliant!

After getting to the open ocean (aka the danger zone), Erie feels a sense of freedom due to the vastness of her surroundings, something she hasn’t really felt since her sister got snatched.

When she thinks about her fate however, she starts having second thoughts about venturing this far due to the danger… which are immediately dispelled when Huron brushes his tail fin against her stomach and it becomes very apparent that they are both thinking with their second head.

But just as they are making out and in the middle of justifying why this book has an adult age rating (again, while in a danger zone. Oh and its also noted that female mer have breasts) they are interrupted when they both notice the rumbling of an approaching boat. We don’t get to have a moment where it dawns on them that one of the main tools the landfolk use to capture them is coming in their direction, or even get a glimpse of its shape. Erie just hears it, and bolts.

A literal sentence later, a net is thrown and hits Erie’s tail, bearing her down against the ocean floor. Which makes me wonder just how shallow their part of the ocean is for the net to get there so quickly. Actually, how long are those nets to be able to do that in the first place?

In any case, her trapped state only lasts two sentences before she “easily” (due to the text barely showing her struggle) gets free - ripping her tail fin in the process. Which should be painful af, but the text barely dwells into how it affects her mobility and later presents it more like a minor inconvenience later on.

Huron on the other hand, isn’t so lucky as he ends up getting - surprisingly easily - trapped in the net, and his companion’s attempts to free him last for about ten words before it becomes apparent that there’s nothing she can do to free him. Like, girl, you and the rest of your kind are human sized, and while these nets are strong, they are for fish way smaller than you. And since it’s your boyfriend that’s trapped, at least try a little harder!

So Huron tells her to get help, and even though she knows she won't be able to find aid in time, Erie still tries. A sentence later, the narration destroys any tension by telling us that he’s essentially a lost cause now.

(I still can’t believe all of this happened because these two idiots wanted to have mermaid se-)

And it becomes very apparent in moments like these that the writing style is one of the greatest weaknesses of the book - as well as the reason that just reading it feels like an exhausting chore to me. Because what’s supposed to be a tense and terrifying scene for both the readers and the characters….

Ends up falling very flat due to how quickly everything happens (seriously this scene takes just one page to finish) and due to how matter of factly everything is written.

When Erie reaches the dead forest, she has a miniscule flare of hope upon noticing the shadow of a dolphin before she sees its back scars and realizes that said dolphin is a rightfully pissed Niku.

Still, she tells him where Huron got captured and that she has yet to find a pattern for the boat’s appearances - and Niku oh so helpfully tells her that “perhaps staining the next shell may enlighten her”. So much for a scolding or comfort.

Two days later, Erie feels guilt for causing her boyfriend’s abduction, even though he was the one who suggested they go out in the first place. And what does her father do about this recent kidnapping? NOTHING.

We are not told if he punished her for going out, nor if he has increased security because one of his remaining children nearly got taken. He just doesn’t do - and hasn’t done for these past six years - anything to help his subjects even though they and his very own family are being constantly kidnapped. And you would think his inaction as well as their current situation would cause civil unrest or make them more eager to fight back against the landfolk (like that unseen mer who attacked a tourist in the previous chapter), but nope. Everything goes on as usual I guess.

While she stares at her ink stained fingers so she doesn't stare at Huron’s and Clair’s shells, her grandmother Dowager (which is the name used for widows who hold the titles or properties derived from their deceased partners), comes to visit her, and Erie notes that her scale colors have dissipated with age and that she has a few string of sea glass around her neck which her sister declared would never be hers due to being the youngest.

Anyway, the grandma isn’t that important to the story.

And instead of coming to comfort her granddaughter, she warns her that she may have to stain another shell soon since there have been recent sightings of boats.

When Erie asks her why they are still out there - since normally they just take one mer at a time - she responds that according to the king’s landfolk advisor ( who doesn’t seem to do his job well because six years have passed and nothing to help improve their situation has been done. Oh and he’s gonna be important - for one chapter only.), it might be for research, and none of them have any clue as to what it means.

To seemingly provide some sort of levity though, her grandmother tells her that her father has declared a hunt to restock their fish pens in spite of the danger, and that the dolphins and all able bodied merfolk (which doesn’t include her because rip her tail fin - but doesn’t amount to anything as you will see a few chapters later) participate.

Erie then asks her if she knows if there will be any boats nearby since she’s one of the wisest mers she’s known. and she replies that while that is impossible to tell, the area they are planning to hunt in has clear waters as of now.

And as she reassures her that Niku will keep her safe during the trip (pretty much saying that her dad’s restrictions mean shit even though her grandkid is injured), Erie grabs one of the few clear shells and swears that she will do whatever it takes to figure out the schedule of the boats and the reason for the kidnappings.

…. Don’t expect her to take the route most characters go through after making such a bow.

Chapter 3- Finn

We are back to Finn’s perspective as he immediately enters Delmara’s office to proclaim himself the trainer of the new mer - aka Huron - who was caught while he and Serge were disobeying the doctor’s orders in chapter one.

When he enters, Delmara introduces him to a red-haired woman called Jennifer/Jen, who’s been recently hired as a new employee in Oceanica and who greets him warmly but also warily, and is also notable for being the sanest character in the story and the one that, frankly, should have been the human main character instead of Finn.

Speaking of him, while he happily shakes her hand, he’s caught off guard when his boss says that not only will he be her guide for the week, but they will also have to clean the tanks that used to belong to Bismuth and the twins.

When he asks why that’s the case, since she previously promised him that the next mer in line will be his to train, Delmara reminds him that the doctors have forbidden him from interacting with the mer until his next checkup, and that the new arrival will be placed under the care of Mia and Laz, the trainers of their current stars Radon/ Ray and Potassium/ K.

Speaking of her, according to Finn she’s probably going to kill the new mer (the reasons for that? we are never told about it), and it took weeks with the electroshocker™ to get her to behave. And as we later learn, she’s actually Clair, Erie’s sister.

However, and despite the fact that she’s essentially the murderous mermaid this book oh so claims to have, not only is she underutilized, but her tank companion and trainers matter so little to the story that they essentially vanish without reason later on (and you’ll later see that I’m not joking.)

Finn is aghast at her decision. But while he’s worried that the new boy won’t last more than a day thanks to K/Clair, he’s more pissed over the fact that he’s not allowed to interact with the same creatures who nearly sent him to the next life a few days ago for his own safety. As well as the fact that he has yet to train one in spite of his long time helping Delmara.

So he essentially throws a tantrum - in front of a new hire, no less! - and tries to throw Maddy under the bus by blaming her for the fact that he tripped (like a fool) and fell into the tank due to his own clumsiness and stating that due to this, she should be the one on cleaning duty instead of him.

Ultimately his boss makes him stand down and dismisses him and Jen, not before telling them that she will be sending the fishermen out to find another mer soon - which seems to be her only response to the financial loss that the death of their previous stars certainly caused.

Finn is far from happy about this, but knows her enough to know he won’t win this argument. So without having the decency to at least hide some of his current frustration, he goes to give Jen a tour of the place.

What could have been a way to also show the reader how the main setting of the story looks like only consists of a sentence where Finn points to the break and locker rooms before they arrive to the room where they hold the tanks, which the text does bother to describe.

It has four sets of double tanks - each one about thirty meters in diameter and connected by tubes to the point that Finn compares the place to a giant hamster room. All of them connect to the practice tank we saw in the first chapter, as well as the “arena” - an outdoor tank where they hold their shows and that is colored way more aesthetically than the room they are in.

Still bitter about being put in his place, he points to the empty tanks and explains that they’ll scrub them over with diluted bleach, fill them back and then let them cycle over a couple of days before putting a new mer in.

BUT according to a friend (and a quick google search) these sorts of tanks should be cycled for, at the very least , 2 or 8 weeks! Which means that either the author got information wrong, or they are intentionally cutting corners! Either way, Finn hopes that by the time the process ends he will be allowed to train a mer.

Jen is unsettled by the tank sizes, but he tells her that they are actually three times bigger than the previous ones, in which the creatures could barely stretch… It doesn’t help much.

And instead of thinking that maybe the new employee is concerned about the mers’ welfare, this guy assumes that she - like previous new employees- is disappointed by the fact that dealing with these creatures isn’t as glamorous as they first thought. And still, he admits that nothing would make him quit the job.

They walk up to the next set of tanks and Finn introduces her to Ray and K/ Clair, who are floating in the middle of the tank while their trainers check the water parameters with long poles - which is the only time we see those being used to keep the mandated distance from the creatures.

Huron meanwhile is huddled in the second tank, and while Ray is indifferent to everything (which is the only trait we learn about him), K/Clair glares at him - most likely due to recognizing him as her younger sister’s boyfriend, and Finn does admit that his blue accents will go well with the orange and bright red of the pair.

Jen is fascinated at first by K/Clair due to her colors reminding her of Ariel, but Finn stops her by telling her that K/Clair is a lethal predator. And due to feeling that she needs a healthy dose of fear to work with the mers, he tells her that the first thing she did on her first night in the tank was rip the gills out of her current tank companion -something that, as stated before, we never get an explanation for.

And just to hammer it further, he goes on to remind her in the most dramatic way ever that while “one can cage, shock, and teach the mer tricks, they are still clever as shit and will always look for a way out, a weakness they can exploit”, before warning her to not become said weakness.

Which is ominous and all, but-

It presents them as more dangerous than they actually are - regardless of him overdramatizing stuff.

To my utter disappointment, just like with the “perfect predator” statement, we never get any scenes that give credence to his words.

Later Finn, Serge, Maddy and Nat go to a place called The Porch, an establishment they frequent to drink and in this occasion, bet on how long Huron will survive being with K/ Clair. You would think they would take his potential fate more seriously considering they - again - recently lost two of their most important stars.

On their second round, Jen joins them, wearing an Oceanica polo and a dolphin- shaped sea glass necklace that will be important later. After everyone introduces themselves (we actually don’t get to see it), Finn takes her over to order a drink for her, but as they do he notices Maddy scowling at the two of them, which confuses him since the two are only friends with benefits.

Btw this jealousy and attempts to get closer to him are the only personality traits Maddy shows for most of the story, and the fact that she attempts to get closer to Finn - who constantly diminishes her feelings and who paragraphs before blamed her for his own clumsiness almost getting him killed - is presented as her being in the wrong for some reason.

And if his thoughts on her didn’t make him sus enough, when he calls one of the bartenders over to serve Jen and she gets flustered around him, his first thought is that of course she’s acting like this, since he thinks that the other guy looks more attractive than he is, and when Jen tries to tell him that he doesn’t have to pay the tab for her, he compares her to the mer and “gets the sense that she’s a predator hidden in sheep’s clothing, storing everything away to use against them later.”

… Dude. You two have interacted for a day! What on earth made you reach such conclusions?!

And as he’s amused at the fact that she’s also a lightweight, for some reason we get a scene where Maddy takes Jen’s phone (since when did she pull it out?!) and laughs at the fact that Finn looks like… Colin Morgan?

Finn is offended by this comparison and attempts to make a joke about guys with big ears but no one listens (as they should).

That and the fact that he recognizes a Merlin actor due to his sister watching the show ain’t important. What is somewhat important is him complaining to Serge about Aunt D not giving him a mer for the millionth time… before Maddy makes a joke about him using idk what to get a tourist to sleep with him, then Finn makes it clear that tonight he will get in bed with her, and Natalie calls them both “pity fucks” for it.

… deep sigh.

[yuwuta]

pls tell us more about itadori twin au with sukuna being the reject degenerate akfjsviusd

ofc this is really just my everybody is alive and well (sort of) fix it au but cw: sukuna slander since apparently he has lovers 😐

yuuji is the older twin and he doesn’t hold that over sukuna, but he does like to remind him of it just to piss him off sometimes. in the grand scheme of things, it makes sense that sukuna is the youngest—youngest brothers are the only ones that act like they know everything, like they hate everyone and everyone, like they never need help with anything 😐

choso is the oldest, and he’s older then them by maybe 5-8 years? idk i haven’t figured it out, just that choso is definitively the eldest, but because he’s so much older, there’s a point where he’s off at college and yuuji and sukuna are on their own and yuuji is technically big brother and sukuna hates that 

the first friend yuuji makes in school is yuuta. the first enemy that sukuna makes in school is rika. they’re all five and learning to write and yuuji gets help spelling a note for yuuta that says he loves him and he’s his best friend in the world, and sukuna uses his talents to make a note that says “i hate you” instead of “i love you” and switch out yuuji’s note. yuuta gets sad and tells yuuji it’s fine if he doesn’t want to be friends with tears in his eyes, which makes yuuji cry, which makes rika mad. she figures out what sukuna did and then gets in trouble for pushing him off of the jungle gym. yuuta and yuuji make up, and rika stays awake at rest time glaring at sukuna for the rest of the year. 

the pattern of sukuna interfering with yuuji’s friends continues throughout elementary and middle school. todo finds a weird sense of joy in it, always claiming it’s “brotherly love” but always offers to substitute in some kinder brotherly love for yuuji when sukuna is being the worst. rika has moved away by now, but yuuta holds her grudge even stronger than she ever did; he’s still scrawny, but he’s not afraid of sukuna anymore and rika was sure to teach him the ways of her death stare, and he’s become quite proficient at it. sukuna does make his own friends, who he treats as his lackeys. mahito won’t admit that he thinks yuuji is actually kinda cool because then sukuna would hit him. urame doesn’t really care. 

sukuna learns to stop messing with yuuji’s friends when nobara comes along. honestly, at this point, nobara isn’t even really yuuji’s friend, but he considers her his friend, plus she’s a girl, which is enough for sukuna to be annoying. she’s the first person to really kick his ass since rika—and she doesn’t even do it for yuuji, she was just having a bad day, and sukuna was talking shit, and the next moment they were fighting. they both get pretty roughed up, but sukuna is the only one with bite marks, and he was about to lose an eye because nobara picked up a rusty nail from near the fence and was 100% about to stab him until a teacher came and pulled her back. they’re both suspended, but everyone at school agrees that nobara won that fight. when they come back, they never speak a word to each other. later on, during high-school, this silent staredown between them still goes on, but weirdly enough sukuna has developed a strange sense of respect for her. he’d die before he admit that he’s scared of her, but she is the one person he doesn’t like to bother. 

when megumi enters freshman year, he’s heard the stories about the itaodri twins, and he’s hoping nobody at his new school knows that he was an ex-delinquent himself because he promised his mother that he’d grow out of it. he has the displeasure of encountering sukuna first, who doesn’t say or do much to him but is kind of a dick. it makes megumi roll his eyes when he’s sat next to him later in his english class, and he asks to borrow a pencil. megumi thinks he’s got some audacity when he was so rude earlier, but then he takes a good look at the boy next to him—his hair is pinker, he’s not frowning, and he feels kinder—and megumi realizes he must be the nice twin. yuuji does indeed clarify that he is not sukuna after class, and their friendship goes from there. unfortunately, it takes megumi sometime to be able to differentiate the twins at a glance, and sukuna likes to take advantage of that by pretending he’s yuuji to mess with megumi. one day he takes it too far, and yuuji ends up being the one to wail on him and the office calls in choso to pick them up, who pinches them both by the ear and smacks them both himself. it’s the catalyst for sending sukuna to the highschool down the road starting junior year. 

by the time you come along in college, sukuna and yuuji have no reason to be tied together anymore. sukuna takes a gap year while yuuji goes off to college. he starts taking school more seriously, starts playing sports, even got himself a part-time job—which his how he meets you. and he really likes you, he likes being next to you in class, he even starts liking group projects because it means he gets to spend time with you (even if you and yuuta constantly correct his grammar), and he really likes it when you stop by the gym just to talk to him while he’s working. and you like yuuji too, he’s sweet, smarter than he gives himself credit for, and really cute, and you’re really, really happy when he finally makes a move and asks you out. 

yuuji is pretty honest with you about most things, so it’s a genuine shock to your system when you find out he has a twin brother. a twin brother that you had the displeasure of running into at the gym, a twin brother was quite rude and crude towards you and put a sour taste in your mouth because you thought your boyfriend was being mean for no reason, only to have the strongest whiplash of your life when you storm out of the gym and into your boyfriend again. you’re trying to convince yourself you’re not crazy, that yuuji can’t teleport, and trying to cope with your hurt feelings all at once when yuuji catches you and explains that you met sukuna. it still takes you a week to digest the information (you’re mad at yuuji and your friends for never mentioning that your boyfriend has a twin), and when you’re finally ready to talk to yuuji again, you knock on his door and it’s choso that opens it saying, “oh, you must be yuuji’s girlfriend! i’m choso, his older brother,” and you swear you’re gonna pass out from anger or confusion because how many brothers does this boy have. 

[doubleddenden]

Onto gen 6, aka XY. The art style at this point is sort of shifting into more unique silhouettes and towards the more modern style. It's a mixed bag, excellent when done right, bad when done wrong, but 3/5 of these guys are pretty good

It's also worth noting this is the first core game to introduce character customization- it does kind of become a trend of blander designs=character customization down the road, but for what it's worth, Calem and Serena are decent enough as vanilla designs.

Serena is probably the face of gen 6 for many, but that's also probably because they used her in the anime after skipping an mc as a traveling companion in gen 5. It should also be noted that while no exact ages are given in game or anime, both the two Serenas are of different ages- anime is closer to Ash, so like 10 or 11, and game is somewhere in her upper teens- she and Calem are possibly both at least 18 because of some dialog thay suggests they are a couple years older than Emma, who is apparently 16. That would potentially make them the oldest core series mcs, which imo is just really nice so that you can look better in the clothes you pick for your characters, and makes for high quality blank slates- especially considering that XY were, for a lot of people, a homecoming of sorts. Idk about yall, but the kids I know don't like to play pokemon games so much as buy cards and merch, especially at the time XY came out- everyone in college was suddenly into Pokémon again after acting too cool for it after gen 3- so I find that an older looking character fills out the design a little better and is truer to the more realistic adult audience that probably comprises most of the actual players.

On a design basis, Serena is probably the most feminine design for any femc, and is sort of a callback to Leaf in a few ways. The thigh high socks are a nice addition, the skirt is a look and is a nice break between the black of the top, socks, and shoes- about the only mishandled aspect I'd say is the different shade of reddish pink for her hat and purse, which I think should either just be the same shade of red or should just be white. The sunglasses are non functional, but they are a decent touch. She's also the first and so far ONLY blonde vanilla mc we've had. The design reads very much like your typical European girl that non Europeans probably fantasize about- kinda fitting considering Kalos is the first European region (and so far the most fashionable). The mega bracelet is also a good addition that blends in flawlessly. 9/10 design.

Behold, the last MaleC with covered ankles, circa 2013, prior to ZA anyway. Truly a sight to behold. Calem isn't really my favorite in the mc circles, and unfortunately most guys that played him will tell you that we got shafted for character customization while the girls got pretty much everything and more. In fact, you could arguably make a better looking guy character by customizing Serena if you don't mind a little femboy to your design. Likewise, you could make a pretty cozy looking tomboy or femboy with Calem. As a vanilla character, I think the better features are the hat, sunglasses, and boots, which I think are pretty cool and probably more practical among the mcs. The rest sort of reads like the typical European boy that non Europeans fantasize about, with a taller and slender figure- hey, that fits with Serena in a way, both being similar to the stereotypical tastes men and women project onto their desired foreign partner, if that makes sense, with Calem probably appealing more to people who like guys than ARE guys. But it's not a terrible look, in fact XY still has some of the best clothes you can wear for a guy in the series- my personal favorites being a black jacket, white shirt, brown pants, the default boots, and a white beanie with sunglasses because the game forces you to wear a hat. It's a 7/10 for me, definitely was a relief that you could customize him.

As for rivals, Calem and Serena leave a lot to be desired. They basically do the bare minimum of being a rival and aren't really that good at it, and they don't really have much personality beyond being a tad competitive with us. Mega Absol also comes out of nowhere as their ace when we all picked up the Mega Kanto starters from Sycamore. Imo, they should have just given them the stronger pokemon to the one you pick, and that'd fit more thematically- but they probably only went with Mega Absol to give it to SOMEONE, and also to avoid having to think too hard on what to do with their teams if you were to pick Fennekin AND Charmander. Regardless, I feel that more could and should have been done to make them more... memorable, because they're a severe downgrade from gen 5. 5/10, at least they did the bare minimum.

And now we move onto the "friends" who are technically considered rivals. Look, if we count Wally, we gotta count these guys.

Shauna is probably the most rival you get for the first half of the game, and is pretty much the glue holding together the friend group. She's got a lot of energy, is cheerful, super friendly- and now that I think about it, she and Bianca were probably GF's first steps towards doing away with the proper rival types we'd have before. As a character though, I like her, and I kind of find it a little sweet that she maybe kind of develops a small crush on the mc. She's not strong, but I do appreciate the balls to stay right in the thick of it against Team Flare- she knows she's weak, but she still tries, and that's a pretty admirable trait as a person. I wish you could do more with her when all is said and done, because after giving you a baby of her starter, all she does is hang out in front of *your* house for some reason. Definitely reads like she's hoping for a little more between the two of you, but is doomed to be in a romanceless Pokemon game. We'll always have the fireworks, I guess. 8/10 friend.

As a design, she feels like a combination of various other characters- the hair feels a bit like Rosa and the pants feel like Hilda, for instance. She definitely reads as a significantly younger character than Calem and Serena, although I do know full grown women that still look pretty young, so maybe that's the case. In 3d, she definitely looks more in our age group, so it might be Sugimori's art making her appear younger. She is very, very girly, if you couldn't tell by the pink and frills, but the black accents are a very nice touch. The shoes definitely seem very out of place on her as a design- a lot of people called them "hooker shoes" when she first was revealed in 2013. Idk if I'd go that far- I definitely can't see them as being practical for exploring a forest, let alone long hours of running across cities or Kalos's natural landscapes. Again, fiction, so impracticalities be damned, but I would have probably made them more like sandals or something more realistic for the age range. The design is very leggy, which i do like longer legs, and even though those shorts are TINY, she reminds me a lot of a friend of mine that also kind of dresses similarly and makes it work. 7/10, not the worst and certainly cute imo, could be a little better tho. Gives little sister energy.

Okay, Trevor and Tierno are probably the most forgettable characters if it weren't for them popping up so much in the story. I would definitely prefer Emma join the main cast instead, or for Tierno to give his whole thing to Shauna and Trevor to the rival. You only battle them a couple of times, and they're basically worthless beyond a swords dance scare from Tierno's Crawdaunt. For that matter, their starters make zero sense considering we're in Kalos and there are a second set of starters to pick from- I think the anime handled that a little better by giving these two the Kanto megas, although that might be wasted on them tbh. At any rate, Pikachu is weird when we have a Dedenne or Helioptile that would probably be more appropriate for Trevor, and I'd argue a Clauncher or a quiver dancing bug would fit Tierno better. Completing the pokedex only and being a dancer just doesn't really work for them, and again, I feel like they'd just be better suited being dissolved and incorporated into the other two. 4/10

As for designs, Trevor, like Shauna, also reads as younger, and I hate his fucking hair. We need more gingers, yes, but why is there SO. MUCH. The rest is a basic nerdy outfit with- god dammit GREEN AND ORANGE AGAIN. All in all, pretty forgettable and boring. 4/10

Tierno is... sigh. I'm a fat man. I've always been fat. Even when I get fit, I'm a fat man. Pokemon has only made a handful of fat characters. So why is it that they can't seem to make a fat male character that isn't purposely something to laugh at? Oh of course, give the fat guy an ice cream shirt, make his legs super tiny and make him a dancer, and let's give him the worst Tepig fade you can get. I get that Sugimori is a Japanese man from a different culture and time, but god, please, if you're going to design a fat guy, look and talk to actual fat guys. At least Google plus sized men's fashion or something. We are not all built like this and we are not this huge ball shape. At least he isn't given a "I wanna lose weight" character arc, and he seems comfortable with himself- that's great actually. But idk, just a more realistic and genuine take would have been appreciated. Maybe instead of dancing, he could be into photography for the beautiful sites, an artist, maybe he could have a plain black shirt or a mega Pokemon design on it, maybe he could just have styled hair and normal legs- i could go on. 5/10 on design, could be worse I guess and I understand he's meant to be a cute and cartoony guy, but it's not for me.

Gen 7 next

[playertwotails]

I have a very funny idea about Sonic that's gonna require me to go into a bit of a tangent on a funny personal story for it to make sense but stay with me. (I do not personally have any memory of this story but my mom likes to retell it sometimes cause it's funny)

So to the story time. When I was a toddler my parents were worried I might be mute or partially so because I would either not talk at all or just say one word and no complete sentences. This kept up until I was 2 years old and after taking me to specialists one finally realized there was nothing actually wrong with me but my older sibling was talking for me so I just didn't. (Sidenote, my older sibling is not much older than me, a bit over a year apart so it's all toddler v toddler at these ages, just saying this so no one thinks my sibling is like mean or something, they were about as much of a baby as I was )

Fast forward after the "diagnosis" and I'm still 2 not talking and up until this point my older sibling has been getting away with stuff cause I wouldn't talk.

Well one day our mom comes back to me crying and my sibling not saying what happened and our mom out of habit just starts asking me "Oh what happened?" She was not expecting a response but according to her I pointed to my sibling and said in a very clear sentence "They hit me with a broom!!" To which my sibling in the shock of the moment just said "THEY CAN TALK??!!"

(Apparently baby me had impeccable comedic timing on when to snitch on my sibling)

Moving on from personal story back to my obsession with the Sonic series. So I'm a big fan of mute/selectively mute younger Sonic, it's *chefs kiss* for me.

I had a funny scenario in mind where Sonic has been battling Eggman for a while and Eggman is well aware that Sonic does not talk. And Eggman has a new cannon fodder accomplice in what ever new scheme he's got cooking up for the week. And he tells this new meat shield not to bother really talking with Sonic cause he's not gonna say anything back.

Maybe this is sometime after Sonic got Tails and they were fighting Eggman and his new chump of the week. Eggman and Sonic are alone and Eggman starts ranting about how he was going to 100% betray his new sucker of a partner in like the next hour. Cause to Eggman, Sonic is pretty good sound board since he doesn't talk back so why not tell him his petty schemes.

Cue a bit later they're all back together all out brawl style and Tails gets hurt or captured or something just enough to piss off Sonic and immediately Sonic turns to the new Eggman stooge and just goes "Eggman said he's gonna betray you here in like 5 mins."

Eggman is too shocked to deny it, just immediately shouts "SINCE WHEN DO YOU TALK!!!????!!!"

Which not a great defense against the betrayal accusations and Eggman now has a new problem of fighting a, as of 5 seconds ago, new enemy.

Idk I was just thinking about the story my mom likes to tell again and brain rot connected the dots back to Sonic lol.

[hannahwatcheshorror]

EVIL DEAD RISE (2023)

This was a lot of fun, it had a lot of what I like in horror, creeps, spooks, scares, but most importantly the film was good. It stayed pretty simple with its story but went hard on its special effects, the wall crawling was out of sight! Seriously, do yourself a favor and check this out, it is a brutal and wonderful flick produced by Bruce Campbell so you know it is authentic too.

⭐⭐⭐⭐.5

Trigger Warning Projectile Vomiting

After a cute little intro where an Evil Dead Rises out of bed to scalp her friend (then she scalps her other friend a little too close to the shoulders) and we get our glorious title, we go back in time one whole day to meet the dysfunctional family we will be spending the majority of the movie with. We have our mother who just dyed her hair a fiery red, two (2) daughters, one (1) son, and an Aunt who just flew into the picture. Mama Ellie sends her kids away so she and Sister Beth can talk about what has been going on while sis has been away but there is an earthquake! While Mama Ellie worries about her kids, Dan, her son is exploring a newly exposed room and taking things from it (like a big scary book, dun dun dun!). I like how in this version he is attracted to the book but opening it was an accident and when the words started playing on the recordings he tried to stop it but The Evil Dead wouldn’t let him! This makes a lot more sense than when the characters would just sit there while evil scary things were being said! 

The creeping evil whooshes along the city streets and into Mama Ellie, causing her great bodily pain but also making her into The Evil Dead Ellie! This scene is like the woodland scenes from The Evil Dead and Evil Dead but it takes place in an elevator with power cords so it is different and fresh feeling. She comes home and tells her family about how she dreams to cut them open and live inside them and they know right away something is very wrong with mom. Both the elevator and the stairs have been destroyed so there is no where they can go but stay in the apartment. Oh, apparently Ellie straight up dies for a little at this point? Okay then. 

Ellie comes back to life because, spoiler alert, The Evil Dead are never really dead, and there is this incredible boiling bathtub scene that leads into a longer fight scene that is so gross and creepy, a must watch. They love the “an Evil Dead eats an eyeball then spits it into a human's mouth” gag, they did that in, what, Evil Dead II (correct me if I’m wrong)? They are able to get Evil Ellie out of the apartment because of her bloodlust and the neighbors but she had already gotten her blood into Bridgette (the older daughter) so she was starting to turn in the kitchen. It doesn’t take long before The Evil Dead takes her over completely and she is fighting Aunt Beth, Dan, and Kassie. It is little Kassie who puts an end to her tirade by stabbing her through the head. Brutal! This only puts her down for a small amount of time though and she is right back up stabbing Dan in no time. Yikes. Poor sucker goes down but what else is deserved of the guy who starts the whole thing?

Evil Ellie tunnels through the ceiling to get back into the apartment so things are especially unsafe in there, what with three (3) dead and two (2) Evil Dead just waltzing around. Beth and Kassie break out into the hallway which is lined with dead people which cannot be a good thing and while they try to break out all The Evil Dead come alive and come for them and tell them they are going to die. “Dead by dawn, dead by dawn!” Suddenly the elevator half works, half fills with so much blood it overloads itself and comes crashing into the basement and while that is happening Evil Ellie, Evil Bridgett, and Evil Dan transform into one big Evil Dead Baddie who is unspeakably ugly and honestly seems to be worse than if the three of them just stayed apart but what do I know. It was very reminiscent of Silent Hill and one of the characters in the game (Asphyxia is the character but much less put together).

Actually this whole progression of more villains, harder villains, and even a changing villain makes this movie feel like a video game and I quite like that, it is a very fun aspect of the film. Some sort of tree cutting company parks its cars in the basement which is good luck for Beth but also for us because we get some classic Evil Dead chainsaw scenes! After a struggle and almost losing Kassie (eep!) Beth has the three headed creature on the ropes and finds an economic way to chop the thing to bits, thus saving the day! Hooray! The creeping evil still hangs around and comes for the next unsuspecting victim which is who we met at the top of the film, but hey, at least little Kassie is safe.

----------------------HANNAH WATCHES HORROR---------------------

[etaindelaserna]

Hello, hello...What do you think are KakaSaku and DraMione’s each greatest personality strengths and weaknesses? Why? What do you love about their dynamic each?

(Hope you don't mind, that I copy the same questions from that same ask of that anon about SukuIta).

P.s Also can I ask your top 5 fav fics of those 2 ships? Please and thank you.....

Greetings!✨ Minding? Are you kidding me? I get to talk about my favourite characters and ships soooo let’s get down to it, shall we?

Kakashi is a genius in all ways that matter to become the perfect shinobi: he’s intelligent, capable of cold logic, perceptive, talented and has the will to perfect his skills. To me his greatest quality is to think fast and outside of the box. Not only does he analyse situations quickly but he also knows how to adapt his plans according to the changing variables.

Greatest weakness? Hmm…younger Kakashi certainly had more than one but older Kakashi? Probably still his tendency to judge people too quickly. I think, since Naruto and Sasuke were the troublemakers with the greatest potential he focused — naturally — too much on them and neglected Sakura’s training. He knew she had the best chakra control among them and still abandoned her. Maybe he thought she would be fine without too much guidance but I think he underestimated her potential because she acted like a typical teenage girl.

Sakura is intelligent. She might not be a tactical genius like Kakashi but she definitely matches his analytical talent. It takes her till Shippuden to not only be good at analysing situations but to also come up with good plans. That and her chakra control make her formidable.

Her greatest weakness? I have to go with simping for Sasuke. On the one hand focusing on getting Sasuke back and not wanting to stand in his or Naruto’s shadow helped with her training, on the other hand it limited her options of what she wanted to do/achieve in life. We never find out. She had the obligation to do something with her talent apart from “stopping” and “loving” Sasuke and it was waaaaaasted.

KakaSaku

To me it made sense that in another universe or time or under different circumstances those two characters could have been close friends or more. They are both intelligent and nerds in their respective fields, which are traits Sakura — even when she was a Sasuke fangirl — appreciated. They are both kind, empathic but also prejudiced characters with similiar values. I always had the impression that Sakura definitely would go for a partner, who matches her intellect and competence. Canon-wise Kakashi never invalidated Sakura’s feelings or made her feel bad about herself for not being or acting like the perfect shinobi. He looked out for her, saved her or comforted her. I think the moment Shippuden rolled around he also respected her as a fully fledged shinobi. He acknowledged her skills but never stopped looking out for her in dangerous situations. Kakashi showed her the level of care and kindness her love interest should have given her. But since Sasuke couldn’t allow himself to have such bonds, the contrast between his behaviour towards Sakura and Kakashi’s was even more apparent. Not even Naruto was so soft with her:

The softness of that gesture... During the Kaguya fight we get more than one scene where they are both so soft with each other. Not to mention every time Sasuke acts like a dickhead we get a reaction shot like this from Kakashi:

Kakashi was always good a reading her. It looked like as if they had some sort of understanding of one another that didn't require a lot of words, probably because they are both very perceptive. Apart from that I think the difference in their temperament is the best combination for a power couple. They remind me of Minato and Kushina in that regard. He, the quiet, logical and kind one. She, the explosive emotional and intelligent one with too much doofus energy. Take that and their shared history and you have so many interessting arcs and story building elements you can explore.

Favourite Fanfictions:

I Found You Missing by Wolfy Tales

Unbroken by princezsupastar

Duty Before Honor by SilverShine

Will of Fire by Cynchick

Christmas Confessions by Cynchick

Draco always had a lot of potential. His intelligence and creativity as well as his love and commitment to his family are his greatest strength. I think during his attempt to kill Dumbledore all of these attributes are combined and show what Draco is able to accomplish if he sets his mind to it. He is a problem solver and is able to make connections that aren't obvious to other people.

His insecurity and need for recognition is what is holding him back. It's also what fosters his cowardness. For some reason he is the Malfoy heir and still feels the need to compensate for not living up to his father’s (?) expectations. He is also more tilted towards the easy way instead of working hard or taking responsibility.

Hermione is brilliant and very persistent. A deadly combination. When she has a clear goal in mind she is working rentlessly towards it. Sometimes even with no regard towards others. Her ambition, studies and her talent to think logical saved Harry and Ron more than once.

Greatest weakness has to be her disregard of other opinions. She can be close-minded and has a hard time accepting other views about the world, especially about topics she has already thought through. Everything she doesn't understand or isn't able to dissect with logic, is dismissed or questioned by her.

Dramione is an intriguing idea because on the one hand they are opposites of each other: the Malfoy heir and the girl next door, the pureblood and the muggle born, Slytherin and Gryffindor, Death Eater and Golden Girl. And yet they also mirror each other in various aspects: Draco makes fun of her blood status showing he his set in his view of the world but so is Hermione. Accepting other views is hard for her. Draco can be analytical and hellbent on achieving his goal. Similar to Hermione. He can be cruel but so is she. He knows exactly what to say to trigger people but so does she. They are both impulsive. He is insecure ablout himself as is she. He wants to be recognized as does she. You can ask so many story building questions with these setups alone — even when you don't count in both the canon and headcanon moments and the shared history of those two. The clashes of their personalities and ideals makes for pure entertainment and drama, but their similiarities and the conflict of them being on different sides of the war is what great love stories are made of. They play well off each other in every situation you throw them in. I always thought that Hermione needed someone who is as smart and ambitious as her, but who is also able to question her world views and who isn't afraid to push her limits. Also he would charm her with his ingenuity. As for Draco (and that's purly speculation on my part), I think he would've reacted well towards somebody, who values something other than the Malfoy name in him.

Favourite Fanfictions:

Inverse by Elesrea

Osculum Annuum by MyDelphi

The Green Girl by Colubrina

The Right Thing To Do by LovesBitca8

Dragon’s Heartstrings by pinkinku

[attackfish]

5 headcanon for Azula is significantly older than Zuko. What happens when Aang is forced? Obviously Zuko would be too young to be banished. But does something happen to Azula? Does she turn to the Avatar to help protect her brother from their father?

Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

I presume you mean when Aang is found?

1. When Ursa leaves, her son is a babe in arms. When Aang is found, that same boy is a six year old, learning his first lessons in firebending, and learning to write his first characters. But something is already apparent. He isn't leaping ahead with the lightning speed of his sister at that same age. And that might not have been remarked upon, if not for something else. Little Zuko is... soft. He gets angry and upset when birds of prey kill turtle-crabs on the beach. He tries to sneek abandoned owl cat chicks under his bed, and is distraught when they don't make it, because they were too young. He puts himself on the side of the weak and vulnerable, and tries to protect them from the powerful and from the uncaring universe. And in doing so, he earns his father's scorn.

2. Azula couldn't tell you if it happened gradually or suddenly. She remembers both a sense of sudden dislocation, and change to a new reality, with new rules, and also a gradual creeping dread, as the world, their father's world, shifted around them. All she knows for sure is that one of her very woest fears has come to pass. Zuko is no longer a little ball of potential that she is being measured against at all times. Now he is weak, and pathetic, and she promised. She promised she would protect him, and teach him what he needed to know, and how can she, when their father is so big, and so powerful, and Zuko doesn't even understand what she's trying to teach him, and it makea her so angry, when he just doesn't get it... And she feels like he must have, the day on the beach, with the turtle-crab and the hawk, and she can't help worry that someday her dad will realize she's pathetic and weak too.

3. When the Avatar is first found, he is Zhao's problem. Azula never thought much of Zhao, but by all reports, the Avatar is a twelve year old child with training in only one element. It doesn't occur to her that Zhao will fail to capture him. But he does. Again and again. And after the debacle at the North Pole, Azula finds herself kneeling at her father's feet, telling her it is her turn. She must find and capture the Avatar.

4. And she must capture, or preferably, in her father's eyes, kill, her uncle. Because her uncle disappeared a less than a month ago, and showed right back up, at the North Pole, helping the Avatar and opposing Zhao. Her father is of course outraged at his brother's treason. Azula's thoughts are more tangled. And more wounded. He would leave to help the Avatar, a stranger and an enemy to her people, when he barely deigned to notice his own niece and nephew. And that's the thing, isn't it? Azula's whole life has been marked by the presence of so many people, so many adults, who either didn't notice what her father did to his children, or just let it happen. Her uncle is just one more. Only her mother ever tried to protect her.

5. Azula has to leave her brother behind, in her father's care. Which is why, for her, the goal isn't just to capture the Avatar and deal with her uncle, it's to do it as fast as possible. Which is why she goes to Mai and Ty Lee. And if she has qualms about threatening Mai's baby brother to remind her of what she has to lose? Well, it's her own baby brother on the line.

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

Adrien's feather allergy as foreshadow of his status as sentimonster is reaching on fandom part. But fandom claimed Felix being one isn't. His name being the episode name definitely foreshadowing his status as sentimonste, considering in s1-3, the episode always named after either akuma or sentimonster bar the Origins. That's what I call foreshadowing. Not whatever feather BS people like to claim.

Felix being a sentimonster is just make senses, always make senses for me, considering he seems harbor a jealousy toward Adrien especially at his remark "You always do everything your father tells you to do?" Considering as sentimonster he couldn't disobey whoever had his amok while human Adrien can disobey anytime he want yet choose not to, in his view.

Then come s4 and 5 with a huge retcon.

Also prior to s4 I don't believe the rings is amok, Felix want it because his mother want it since it's her family heirloom. Again, make senses that she want one of it considering Emilie is dead at this point. She has the right to own one of her family heirloom, Gabriel don't.

One of the episode in s5 implied that Felix always know that the rings are amok and this doesn't make senses if we were to connect back to his debut episode where he just give the ring he stole to his mother, even if say Amelie is a better parents/human than Gabriel, Felix who claimed to love his cousin and want to free him, should know better than to give his cousin's amok to his mother. The math is just not mathing, unless Felix doesn't know the rings are the amok in his debut episode and only know later which is a huge plot hole.

The retcon isn't inherently bad per se, in initial plot Luka is supposed to be Juleka's brother older by two years, s4 retcon him to be her twin. This isn't a problem because it's a minor thing that people either doesn't notice or doesn't care. But when what retconned is almost about the whole world building and lore, that's when it become a big problem. S4 onward doesn't seems like the same series as it's prior season.

,

Would you also argue that Nathalie is a sentimonster given the name of the final episode of season two?

[Image showing that episode 25 of Miraculous season two is named "Mayura"]

And what about the first episode of the origins two parter? Does this mean that Marinette and Adrien are both not humans?

[Image showing that episode 11 of Miraculous season one is named "Ladybug & Chat Noir"]

In seasons 1 to 4, episodes were mostly named for akumas and sentimonsters, but it wasn't a hard rule, so that's a pretty weak argument for Felix being a sentimonster. Even if he was human, he's still the episode's main antagonist, so naming it after him isn't weird even if he was fully human. This is extra true since Chat Noir was originally named Felix, so calling the episode "Felix" apparently drove up hype from fans who were saddened by the change. People wanted to see Felix make at least a cameo and would even pester the head writer about it prior to this episode. A lot of people wanted him to be a former Chat Noir or Adrien's older brother or something like that. You can find a lot of fanfics that did this long before season three was even airing.

Plus what else would you call this episode? There wasn't a single akuma, there were three, and "Princess Fragrance, Lady Wifi, Reflekta" is both an awkward name and something of a spoiler since I think this was the first time that we saw one item lead to multiple akumas.

ALL THAT BEING SAID, I would actually buy that Felix was planned to be a sentimonster from the start. That doesn't feel like a retcon in the same way that Adrien and Kagami do because there is some setup for Felix. The "always do what your told" line fits him being a senti and evil "twins" are often revealed to be magical in origin in these kinds of shows. Plus sentimonsters were a thing at this point, so yeah, I'd totally buy it.

The big reason I still call it a retcon is because of the issue you bring up about the rings. The way they're handled in that episode makes no sense if they're supposedly Adrien's amoks because how would Felix even know that? Who told him? Amelie?

I mean, I'd buy that Amelie knew because it's implied that she was somewhat close to her sister, but that just raises more questions! Why is she demanding her nephew's amok? Why does she give it to Felix? What does she think he's going to do with it? What is going on here?

And, of course, there's the biggest issue of them all: why is Gabriel only mildly annoyed that Felix and Amelie have Adrien's amok? If that was me, I'd be demanding it back! I'd be sending akumas! I'd go to war! You are not controlling my kid!

But Gabriel does nothing. He just waits for Felix to bring it back in the next season. Like this is how he greets Ameilie the next time he sees her:

Amelie: Gabriel! I'm so happy to be able to thank you in person for giving our family's ring (kisses his cheeks) back to Félix. Gabriel: It was the sensible thing to do, Amelie. Adrien: That was very thoughtful of you, Father.

Dude, what are you doing? Why didn't you just tell her that Felix stole the ring? What is going on here? Why does this episode (Gabriel Agreste) end will Gabriel totally fine that he didn't get the ring back because he finally got his hands on one of Ladybug's magical charms? It seriously comes across like he the completely forgot about the ring even though this is the season where Adrien is finally foreshadowed to be a sentimonster! Writers, what are you doing???

A better version of the episode Felix would see Felix show up with the goal of learning if Adrien is also a sentimonster and - if yes - figuring out what the amok is. Have Gabriel give Adrien a command to be nice to Felix so Felix is a total brat to see what his cousin will do. This would be excellent foreshadowing because you could do all of that without directly stating what Felix is doing, but once the reveal happens, it would be a major "oh!" moment on a rewatch.

As-is, the episode is just weird. It may have been intending to set Felix up as a sentimonster, but why? What was the plan? What's with the rings? Why did Felix try to take away all of Adrien's friends and ruin his reputation? There are just so many questions raised here that - sentimonster or not - Felix was still massively retconned.

I will also agree that a retcon isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the writers claim to have planned everything out which is why I will point out every one as it clearly refutes that claim. Plus most of them aren't minor things like the weirdness of Luka's age. It's big stuff like all of the above, which does negatively impact the show. Everything about Felix is extremely unsatisfying and I don't think we're getting answers to any of the questions I asked in this post.

[lelianaslefthand]

OC Tag Game

i was tagged by @gaysebastianvael thank you!!! i think most people have done it or been tagged already idk if you havent and want to say i tagged you <3

ive been mostly seeing rooks so after debating for a day i went with azzie bc i dont talk about her as much

Name: Asphodel Ingellvar Alias: Rook Gender: Cis woman Age: 32 Place of Birth: Nevarra Spoken Language: Common. nevarra apparently doesnt have its own language Sexual Orientation: Bisexual Occupation: Guard dog Mourn Watcher

Favorites...

Color: wine/boysenberry

Entertainment: reading or puzzle games. really likes watching music performances too

Pastime: does a lot of sparring for fun. also likes watching emmrich work

Drink: something like the thedas equivalent of a shirley temple. a random sweet kinda fruity thing

Books: prefers non-fiction. mostly stuff about like wars and major historical events. 🫵 NERD

Have they...

Passed University: im gonna say she did well in both academics and the warrior training part of her education with the mourn watch

Had Sex: a few dalliances here and there

Had Sex in Public: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Gotten Tattoos: A Lot. like basically head to toe. some have meaning some don't

Gotten Piercings: she has a couple! in my head she has a nose ring, a medusa, lip ring, and eyebrow piercing. also her nipples 😏 oh and a few ear piercings too, mostly gold rings

Gotten Scars: less than you'd think bc i feel like the mourn watch would have very skilled healers. she got the one on her lip like a month into traveling with varric and harding after taking a blow to the face

Had a Broken Heart: yes but not necessarily only in a romantic context

Been in Love: she's loved but none of her romantic endeavors were serious. nothing to write theoretical home about

Are they...

A Cuddler: she doesn't seek it out unless she's having a bad day or feeling sentimental but she enjoys it more than she lets on. emmrich knows this and is usually the one to initiate to which she has no complaints.

Scared Easily: nope! doesnt even really have anxiety about much either

Jealous Easily: not really but she's very protective and the lines can blur

Trustworthy: very much so but she isn't a pushover which throws some people off.

Family...

Siblings: who knows! if she hadnt been left in the necropolis she strikes me as an only child but also an older cousin. which might not make sense to you but it makes sense to me

Parents: vorgoth lmfao. i havent thought about her family origin story much tbh

Children: i was gonna say no just manfred bc we know how i feel about giving ocs kids But, i could see her and emmrich adopting. 2 kids max and they're adopted at like age 5 or up.

Pets: rat mom. i can imagine her defending their honor "they're actually very intelligent and gentle creatures!" she'd teach them tricks and stuff. one did nip at manfred though bc he stuck his finger in the cage and they thought it was a treat but he still likes to watch them scurry about.

[positivelybeastly]

First question, what year was Hank born? Second question how might the events going on in our world have affected the characterization of Hank? Beyond the 90s incarnation of the character might make a post about this later…

So, asking for a set birth year for a comic book character is a bad idea, because with very few exceptions, they don't exist. For example, Google tells us that Captain America was born on the 4th of July, 1920.

Or maybe he wasn't? Apparently that got retconned and it isn't 4th of July, but it was 1920? Already we run into problems. COMIC BOOKS.

Outside of very specific characters, they just don't have birth years or birth dates, they exist within the Marvel sliding timescale. If you're not familiar with the sliding timescale, the basic conceit is this:

Modern Marvel comics began in 1961 with Fantastic Four #1. This is essentially the start of the modern Marvel era, and every other superhero group is contextualised in relation to this, pretty much. The Avengers were formed maybe six months, a year later, the X-Men not long after that.

For every 3-5 years that passes outside of comics, 1 year passes inside of comics. E.g. Fantastic Four #1 took place either 13 or 21 years ago, or somewhere in between, it's not an exact science.

As for Hank specifically, well . . .

October, 1983, was contemporary to Hank saying this.

That plot took place in a comic book from 1974, nearly ten years before this, and yet Hank says it's just "a few years ago." So time is passing, but slowly. Hank here is explicitly in his early 20s, maybe 22-23, but the Hank we saw in this week's X-Force #50 was not 40 years older than him. So, how to make it all make sense?

A lot of headcanon and kind of inferring based on contextual hints. Hank is depicted as being roughly 17-18 when he joins the original X-Men, given that he's stated in dialogue to be the oldest of the team, and seems to have been on the verge of graduating high school when his normal human life was interrupted. So, now you just work backwards.

If Hank was 17-18 when the original X-Men were formed, and it's been 21 years since then (referring back to the sliding timescale), then it stands to reason X-Force Beast is 37-38. If he's 38 in our current year of 2024, then logically, he would have been born in . . .

1986!

Which is what I've been running with for as long as I've been writing him. It isn't quite compatible with stuff like this, which is very obviously written in the 60s and set in the 60s, and which explicitly positions Hank as an Atomic Age hero, with radiation based origins and a super scientist pedigree . . .

But eh. We move.

As to the second part of your question

. . . Ooohhhhh boy.

Um.

There's a lot? And I hate to bring it all back to 9/11 and the War on Terror, but it's kind of all about 9/11 and the War on Terror?

Media about terrorism, security, threats to mankind, all looked very different pre-September 11th, 2001. Go back and watch Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and see how Kira Nerys, a character who is explicitly called a terrorist in dialogue, is treated for her actions. She's positioned more as a World War II resistance fighter than anything else. If that show were made now, she would be an intensely different character, because the American cultural and media consciousness has never recovered from that day.

If you want to read more about this, there's quite a lot of academic discourse on how this has all changed. Here's a decent start.

But specifically Hank? Well, the X-Men have had their own 9/11. Multiple times. The Genoshan genocide, as depicted in New X-Men #116, actually just a few months before 9/11. It's entirely possible that this entire storyline might not have been made if it had been written after.

The Xavier Institute bus bombing.

The Decimation.

The X-Men became a beleaguered minority, besieged on all sides, reduced to the island of Utopia, just 198 mutants and falling. Cyclops explicitly became far more ruthless, willing to ally with former adversaries and use kill tactics to get the job done, and you could see his portrayal, the infamous #Cyclops Was Right movement, gaining a lot of steam during this era. People really like this Cyclops.

And where's Hank in this? Well.

He's the moral counterpoint.

People don't like to acknowledge this, and I feel like there might be a degree of cultural difference going on here, but Hank is correct. I feel like it's not even controversial to say that kill teams are bad. Right?

But people hate Hank for this. They think he's a whiny little bitch who won't and can't help, who runs out on his people, who prioritises his morals over being there for the X-Men. People legitimately think this of him.

Hank is the left wing, conscientious objector and anti-war viewpoint. So, naturally, there's a tendency to look upon him as a whiny little bitch. Just look at how shows like 24 contextualise that kind of moral viewpoint.

I do feel like the writers of this era wanted people to at least question who was right, between Hank and Scott, but the readers pretty much unanimously fell on Scott's side, because even as Scott started to use morally corrupt tactics . . .

He wasn't doing it for America, bullying small countries out of their oil in the name of democracy. He was doing it for a marginalised minority metaphor, fighting comic book supervillains, which is simpler, easier to root for. He had to use those tactics, you understand. He was fighting monsters! He was fighting the good fight.

Is 00s era X-Men War on Terror propaganda? I don't know. I'm not a political scholar, though I do have a B.A. in History. Interesting how the fandom seems to view this ideological conflict, though.

Anyway, time moves on, and then something starts to creep into Hank's character. Something that inevitably happens to characters like him.

Anti-intellectualism.

No longer is Hank the moral counterpoint, now he's the intellectual who will lead us all to ruin because he's smarter than he is wise, because he's an idiot with no impulse control.

This characterisation is wholly incorrect and runs contrary to the fact that Hank learned his lesson about unethical experimentation practises in the 70s, in an incident that only harmed him, but whatever. It doesn't matter at this point, does it?

Only people with real world experience, who are level headed, who aren't eggheads, can solve the real problems of the day. People like, uh.

Hmm.

Who does have the solution to the problems of the day?

Ah, I see.

We just forgive him for all the heinous shit he did on Utopia, huh?

All that stuff he did, the releasing bioweapons, the kill teams, that was fine, because he did it to the right people.

Well, that's all right, then.

Mmm-hmm. So much better than the egghead. Look at him in the corner, fumbling around, making more problems than he solves. What a motherfucker.

So, yes, let's talk about American anti-intellectualism.

I don't necessarily think Bendis is anti-intellectual. But I do think he spends a lot of time across multiple comics criticising Beast and valorising Cyclops, considering the worst thing Beast had done up until that point, vandalising the space-time continuum to get the O5 back into the present, was done explicitly so Bendis could play with X-Men with only 8 issues of continuity to keep straight.

But anything Cyclops did? All that X-Force stuff? Ehh. Don't worry about it. The only crime we care about is the death of Charles Xavier, for which Scott was possessed, so we can't make a moral judgement.

It's a whole ass topic, and a lot to get into, but I genuinely do think that Hank is one of those characters who especially suffers when written by a writer who doesn't trust vaunted intellectuals, because he's certainly not going to fucking flourish, is he?

And then it all comes full circle.

Ben Percy, enter the ring.

Wolverine, the unequivocal hero of X-Force. Beast, the unequivocal villain of the series. The heart vs. the head. The man of action vs. the intellectual. The rugged thug vs. the fancy pants necessary bastard.

It's the same thing, just more extreme, really. I think X-Force is meant to be a critique of the CIA? If so, it's an extremely bad one, considering it ends on this note.

Ah yes. Our heroes. The CIA.

I'm gonna quote the frankly incredible @brw here because they put it way better than I could on this point:

"This is genuinely a larger problem I have with Krakoa, is that rather than explore the culpability and complicity of all the characters involved in not just the creation, but the active maintenance and survival of what is, categorically, an eugenicist, oligarchy ethnostate, we instead act as if Krakoa would have been fine if not for Evil Hank/Evil Moira/Evil Sinister for ruining it all for the rest of us.

Because are Sage or Logan ever properly thought to be bad people for standing by as long as they did? It isn't even that X-Force are the people who do the dirty stuff–it's Hank that does that, and the rest of the character get to keep their hands relatively clean, at least narratively. They're sympathetic, or understandable.

Hank is positioned as this demon in the shadows ready to snatch you up and kill you which is a weird decision to make with what you describe as the CIA.

The CIA isn't evil because evil people are in charge of it, the CIA is evil because it is a fundamentally evil institution based off evil systems! Benjamin, you can't write mutant CIA if your closing statement is how awesome the mutant CIA is, and it's a shame about that one evil blue guy that ruined everything for everyone."

Good thing we got rid of that Beast guy! What a fucker, right? Nasty, gross, intellectual pustule he was, with his oily words and grossness. Look at him, reading books. Sage is fine, though, because she doesn't read books. I mean, she's quantifiably grossly incompetent in this series, but we like her better than Beast, so it's fine.

Beast, from the 2000s era onward, is a very political character. It's just a shame that a lot of comic book writers tend to be grossly ill-informed when it comes to actual politics, capable of only surface level hot takes like CIA bad or kill teams good, actually, because now we've gone from 'Beast is the left wing conscientious objector' to 'Beast is the literal anti-Christ,' and I don't really like what that implies about what we think of the former.

But eh. I'm just a writer.

[streussal]

hi please lmk your thoughts as and when you are caught up to the apothecary diaries!!!

hi hi!!

this got kinda long so is cross-posted to dreamwidth if people want easier discussion

Okay so I have now seen s1. Overall all I really like it. And it's beautifully animated.

My thoughts:

Maomao is an excellent protagonist. Her love of drugs and poisons is so pure and true. The way that she's generally pretty phlegmatic, but also deeply compassionate. The way she tries to be careful navigating power structures (in which she generally has very little power). It's all just very neat!

There is a bit of "girl takes off her glasses and becomes beautiful" silliness going on with Maomao applying fake freckles to make herself blend into the background, but I accept because she's such a well done character overall. (Also there's other elements, like clothes, styling, the way she holds herself, etc. And even at her top beauty levels I don't think she's supposed to be at the level of the Emperor's concubines or the high level courtesans.)

Jinshi is fun, and I enjoy his relationship with Maomao. I'm not convinced that there's a satisfying explanation for him pretending to be a eunuch though. Especially since it doesn't seem like the Emperor is forcing him to do it? I don't actually NEED there to be a reasonable explanation - it's generally a fairly light series, not a serious historical drama. But sometimes the show does have the occasional dark and psychological element so like. A coherent psychological explanation would not be completely out of place?

My other ship is Maomao/Suirei. Suirei has only been in a few episodes so far but these episodes did lead to Maomao getting really excited about what a wonderfully competent adversary Suirei was and hoping they meet again. I think they should kiss about it maybe. Great potential for Literally Toxic Yuri.

On the mysteries and puzzles Maomao solves - they're entertaining enough, but the way she solves them often involves a lot of conjecture on her part (even though the show makes a big deal out of not basing things on conjecture). I don't have a big problem with this - it's very much in the tradition of Agatha Christie detectives like Poirot and Miss Marple - but some mystery lovers may be irritated by it.

Power structure stuff - I do find it interesting how aware the show is of power structures. How Maomao is always careful about how she says things, both to try to avoid angering the wrong people (and being executed) or getting others in trouble (and executed). Maomao's detailed knowledge of how the brothels operate, and how in some ways they are very similar to the rear palace of the Emperor's concubines. The way she always presents this information in very matter of fact ways. She isn't trying to change things (and really how could she), she's just trying to live within them as best she can. I do wonder how this will work with the eventual Maomao/Jinshi romance that is developing, because that's a huge difference in social status and relative power! 

Character ages and math - okay some of the character ages do not make sense at all. So the Three Princesses of the Verdigris house basically raised Maomao right? But if they're not retired they should be 30 max, as Maomao says. Maomao is about 18 at this point in the series. So they should be 10-12 years older than her. Okay fine, they were still in training then. But then Pairin apparently breastfed Maomao??? At age 12?? Unless she's put off retirement longer than I thought and is like 35 and was 17 at the time. Idk. (The flashbacks showed all three princesses as adults too but I'm just gonna go with that being Maomao's imagination.) ALSO. Jinshi is stated to be 19 and having pretended to be a high ranking eunuch in the rear palace for the last 5 years. So since he was 14?????? Like I guess it's possible but. Uh. Well. It's anime I guess. (Based on light novels, but they're based on similar tropes regarding age.)

Maomao's bio dad: Okay so if I wrote this while I was still watching s1, then I would be talking about how Lakan is the ABSOLUTE WORST and needs to BE IN PRISON FOR A MILLION YEARS. And then I finished the season and it turns out he's mostly just kinda pathetic. Like he still sucks and is a dick. But he actually presents himself as worse than he is. The reason that Jinshi and the audience thought that Lakan had raped Maomao's mother to get her pregnant and destroy her buyout value was because Lakan himself heavily implied that. Very purposefully.

Anyways, very good series overall.

[kinokoshoujoart]

SOS:AWL— various NPC gossip / trivia from the child’s gossip dialogue file

starting with the bachelorettes

i included all variations of a given line, so it might get repetitive…

also including the biographies you got from linking AWL and FoMT since they complement these well. they should be complete but i have no way to verify if i did it correctly, there’s also some glaring typos and i can’t check the jp. there SHOULD be the same character bios for linking AnWL and MFoMT, once i’m moved i’ll try and get those if i can to see if they were translated differently

there’s three types of lines in this file: secret, personal, and comment.

“secret” is the most lore-ish, and only kids with naughty/normal personalities will tattle the town’s “secrets” to you (and say different things)

not sure what personal is since 2/3 of each npc “personal” lines are replaced with “What?”. but it seems to be how they interact with your kid

“comment” is stuff said by normal/shy kids only, mostly their opinion of said npc…

not all of it will be new info but maybe the thoroughness will help if you weren’t sure what your kid’s personality is.

"secret"

I heard someone wondering if Ms. Lumina and Ms. Romana are really related at all. (ch. 3 naughty son)

I heard someone say they think Ms. Lumina and Ms. Romana actually aren't related at all! (ch. 3 naughty daughter)

Ms. Lumina said there are days when she loves piano and days when she hates it. What's up with that? (ch. 3 normal son)

Ms. Lumina said she loves playing piano some days, and then other days she hates it. That doesn't make sense.(ch. 3 normal daughter)

Apparently, Ms. Lumina is a really talented singer. (ch. 4 naughty/normal son)

I guess Ms. Lumina is good at singing, too. (ch. 4 naughty/normal daughter)

All the people Lumina has fallen in love with have been older than her, apparently. (ch. 5/6 naughty/normal son)

All the people Lumina has fallen in love with have been older than her. (ch. 5/6 naughty/normal daughter)

"personal" (yes these are marked Lumina)

Mr. Sebastian does aaall the chores at Ms. Lumina's place. (ch. 3 son)

Mr. Sebastian does aaall the chores at Ms. Lumina's place. Does he like chores? (ch. 3 daughter)

"comment"

I wonder what Ms. Lumina would do if she got married? Would she move away? (ch. 3 normal son)

I wonder what Ms. Lumina would do if she got married. Would she...maybe move away? (ch. 3 normal daughter)

Ms. Lumina's like the older sister I never had. (ch. 3 shy son)

Ms. Lumina's like a big sister to me. (ch. 3 shy daughter)

I think Lumina would've become even better at piano if she'd had a proper teacher. (ch. 5/6 normal son)

Lumina's such a talented pianist. If only she could find someone to teach her. Then she'd get even better. (ch. 5/6 normal daughter)

“secret”

Someone told me that Ms. Nami is actually SUPER rich! (ch. 3 naughty son)

Know what someone told me? Ms. Nami is actually really rich! (ch. 3 naughty daughter)

I heard that Ms. Nami actually comes from a really rich family. (ch. 3 normal son)

Know what I heard? Ms. Nami actually comes from a really rich family. (ch. 3 normal daughter)

Ms. Nami has a difficult time talking to women. (ch. 4 naughty/normal son)

It doesn't look like Ms. Nami can talk to other women very well. (ch. 4 naughty/normal daughter)

What? (ch. 5/6 naughty/normal son/daughter)

"personal"

I'd never be able to hear such cool stories if Ms. Nami hadn't come back. (ch. 3 son)

I'd miss out on all sorts of cool stories if Ms. Nami hadn't come back. (ch. 3 daughter)

"comment"

Ms. Nami's the coolest! I wish I had an older sister like her. (ch 3. normal son)

Ms. Nami's the coolest! If I had a big sister, I'd want her to be like her. (ch. 3 normal daughter)

Ms. Nami's kinda quiet, but that's what's cool about her. (ch. 3 shy son)

Ms. Nami's kinda cold, but that's what's cool about her. (ch. 3 shy daughter)

“secret”

Ms. Molly's eyebrows are actually tattoos, which makes things WAY easier! Um... Actually, I dunno what it makes easier. (ch. 3 naughty son)

Ms. Molly's eyebrows are actually tattoos, which makes things lots easier. Um, actually I dunno what it makes easier. (ch. 3 naughty daughter)

I heard Ms. Molly's always trying to look more beautiful. How come? I think she's really pretty already. (ch. 3 normal son)

Ms. Molly's always trying to look more beautiful. How come? I think she's plenty pretty. (ch. 3 normal daughter)

Ms. Molly made a lot of money when she worked in an office. (ch. 4 naughty/normal son/daughter)

What? (ch. 5/6 naughty/normal son/daughter)

"personal"

Mr. Gavin's lucky to live with someone who's so much fun. (ch. 3 son)

Mr. Gavin gets to live with someone who's so much fun. Lucky! (ch. 3 daughter)

"comment"

Ms. Molly is really pretty! (ch. 3 normal son/daughter)

Ms. Molly always smells nice. (ch. 3 shy son/daughter)

“secret”

Ms. Vesta said that Ms. Cecilia grew up with really strict parents. (ch. 3 naughty son)

Ms. Vesta said that Ms. Cecilia's parents were suuuper strict when she grew up. (ch. 3 naughty daughter)

When Ms. Vesta and Mr. Matthew fight, Ms. Cecilia plays, um, what's the word... Oh, inter-meedy-airy. (ch. 3 normal daughter)

When Ms. Vesta and Mr. Matthew fight, Ms. Cecilia plays, um, "inter-meedy-airy." (ch. 3 normal son)

Ms. Cecilia is so...innocent. Honestly, I feel kinda embarrassed for her sometimes. (ch. 4 naughty/normal son)

Ms. Cecilia is so...sweet. It's like she's as innocent as a baby. Her aura makes me feel kinda embarrassed for her sometimes. (ch. 4 naughty daughter)

Ms. Cecilia is as innocent as a little girl...for better or for worse. Honestly, I get secondhand embarrassment just thinking about it...(ch. 4 normal daughter)

What? (ch. 5/6 naughty/normal son/daughter)

"personal"

Ms. Cecilia says she wishes she had a cute little brother like me. (ch. 3 son)

Ms. Cecilia says she wishes she had a cute sibling like me. (ch. 3 daughter)

"comment"

Ms. Cecilia is so gentle. (ch. 3 normal son)

Ms. Cecilia is so nice. (ch. 3 shy son/daughter)

[rusakkowrites]

Good morning!

For the fic writer ask game, I'd love to know:

5, 8 (Aunts and Uncles), 10, 11, 15, 17, 23, 28 and 32

:)

Yay, thanks for the ask! <3 This turned out really long, so I'll put it under a cut.

5. What’s something you learned while researching a fic?

Ooh, I've learned all kinds of things, from fun facts about flower symbolism to what was typically served at a wedding breakfast in Regency England. However, I think the most interesting fic to do research for has been Not Quite So Trifling. Since it involves a character contracting polio, I needed to find out what people would have known about the disease in Jane Austen's time and how they might have tried to treat it. Reading the first clinical description of polio was fascinating. For example, the author noted that cases of paralytic polio were less common in London than elsewhere (which makes total sense, since the paralytic form of the disease is more common in older children and adults, and the poor sanitary conditions in London would have ensured that almost all children were exposed to the polio virus at a very young age).

8. What is your favorite line/section from Aunts and Uncles?

It's a tough choice! I had lots of fun writing the awkward conversations with little John Knightley and the bickering between him and Henry, but I still think I have to pick this part:

Mr Knightley, meanwhile, walked over to the window, but apparently dissatisfied with the view, immediately turned on his heel and stalked over to the fireplace. There, he stood for a moment as if in deep contemplation of the flames – only to turn back towards the room again and say abruptly: “Emma, do you think it so entirely impossible a notion?”

Emma, who had been observing his movements with increasing puzzlement, was rather taken aback by his peculiar manner. His gaze was fixed on her countenance, but she could not interpret his expression.

“What notion?” she asked.

“That you and I should marry.”

I'm pretty sure that this was the scene that sparked the entire idea of this fic (along with the notion that the children would act as catalysts), and I'm very pleased with the way it turned out.

10. Is there a character or ship you'd love to write for, but haven't yet?

I'd love to explore the perspectives of side characters more! I love fics that are from an outsider's point of view, so it would be really fun to write a little story exploring what Miss Bates noticed (or didn't notice) of the Emma/Knightley romance or what Mary or Kitty made of Elizabeth and Darcy's turbulent courtship.

11. What makes a fic 'successful' in your opinion?

This in another tough one. I feel like I have several different definitions depending on how I look at the question.

For me personally, actually managing to write a fic from start to finish is a pretty big success in itself. I'm a slow writer and I also abandon quite a lot of fics in the outline or WIP stage, so getting a story to the point where it's written, edited and ready to post is already an achievement.

Another sign of success is that the fic turned out the way I wanted it to – that I feel that it conveys something of the images and ideas that I've been picturing in my mind. In other words, if I'm happy with how my story turned out, that's something to celebrate.

Then, of course, there's reader response. I try not to pay too much attention to the numbers, but some fics do attract more readers and receive a more enthusiastic response than others. I feel like the key thing here is how the reader response compares to my general expectations for the fandom, ship, trope, etc. For example, I consider So Happy a Summer to be one of my most successful fics because I honestly expected it to be met with crickets and/or hate comments, and the positive response it got was a really pleasant surprise.

15. Does anyone you know in real life know you write fanfiction?

Yeah, quite a few of my close friends and family members know. It's not something I talk about a whole lot because most of the people I know IRL aren't really involved in fandom, but it's not a huge secret or anything. One of my younger siblings does read fic, though, and they're subscribed to me on AO3, which is kind of cute.

17. What is something you recently felt proud of in your writing?

I think my latest couple of fics turned out particularly well on the comedy front. It always feels really good when I'm not the only one laughing at my jokes!

23. What’s a story you’d love to write but haven’t even started yet?

I've recently been toying around with the idea of a fic in which Emma figures out her feelings for Mr Knightley before he figures out his feelings for her. This, of course, leads to all kinds of horribly embarrassing hijinks, and Emma ultimately has to confess her crush to a very surprised (but not displeased) Mr Knightley. I don't have a proper plot figured out yet, though, so we'll see if anything comes of it.

28. What's the angstiest idea you've ever come up with?

Content warning: mentions of noncon/dubcon.

I think I've briefly mentioned the probably-never-to-be finished P&P Animorphs AU in some previous ask response? Anyway, my angstiest fic idea ever is an alternate version of that AU, in which Elizabeth is infested by a Yeerk before travelling to Rosings. The Yeerk, seeing Darcy's wealth and status as a golden opportunity, forces Elizabeth to accept his proposal and then acts like the perfect, infatuated wife while she screams inside. Darcy eventually also ends up with a Yeerk in his head, and to make things even worse, then discovers that his wife actually hates him and has been forced to marry him, have sex with him, and so on. They eventually manage to get rid of the Yeerks somehow and join the resistance, but they then have a very long road of healing and reconciliation ahead of them.

I doubt I'll ever write this fic because the angst level is way beyond what I typically enjoy writing and because I'm not confident that I'd have the skill to handle the heavy themes (such as the dubcon/noncon aspects) as well as they deserve to be handled. However, I do think it's a pretty interesting fic concept in theory.

32. A character you enjoy making suffer.

Emma! Give her all the embarrassment! (And then a happy ending, of course.)