#so i was thinking about his arc overall. like where i feel it’s going.

[aotopmha]

I saw Sonic movie 3.

And it was a really solid movie, in fact, surprisingly strong in terms of theme and character writing in particular even if I already expected an improvement.

But I think the blunt nature of the movie was my favourite aspect of it.

It had the brisk pacing and concise writing of the best Dragon Ball movies.

I saw some reviews say the second act was slower than they would've liked, but I never felt any kind of slowdown myself.

There was some stilted exposition here and there, but because the movie was so propulsive, none of it ever overtook the story to the point where it started affecting its overall quality, same for the pop culture references or human characters (helps that the roles the humans got were relevant to the story at hand).

Some of the references were actually funny because of the more snappy execution – among other elements the comedic timing for jokes improved considerably here (though I personally still could do without most of the referencing).

They did exactly what I think they needed to do, which is to tighten the pacing and focus on the strongest aspect of their writing: the forementioned themes and characterisation.

Team Sonic was great, the Robotniks were great and Shadow was great.

Though by the end, there was a mild nagging wish for just a little bit more of everything on my part.

All of the above elements were great, but because there were so many characters to focus on in a relatively short span of time, the exact opposite issue for pacing in comparison to the previous movies popped up in that I think the movie needed just a little bit more runtime to let some scenes sit a little more.

Because it was so larger-than-life, I also had no issues with the back and forth between comedic and serious scenes like I saw some reviewers say they had, as well, not just because it is a movie about an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog, but also because the movie did a great job of setting the tone to make the more ridiculous elements work.

The best I had to say about Sonic 2 is that it was a live action cartoon and Sonic 3 fully embraces this element of itself.

So, the movie is as fantastic of a Sonic Adventure 2 adaption you could get given the time limitation of a movie, but just short of truly amazing because of it, as well.

What truly surprises me is that I think I can recommend this as a generally good movie, not just a good movie for Sonic fans.

I brought this up with the other two, but these movies feel like classic 90s kids' movies and this movie is that ten fold.

Definitely, absolutely go see it if you're a Sonic fan, though.

SPOILERS FROM HERE.

They totally killed both of the Robotniks because they don't know if they can get Jim Carrey back, and if they are able to get him back, they'll absolutely bring him back.

He was at his peak performance here in my eyes, but more than that I love how he ended up also having a character arc that tied to the themes of the story along with Sonic and Shadow.

Putting everything else aside, I think the part of the movie which earned that 88% Rotten Tomatoes rating with the critics is the strong thematic throughline augmented by the extremely economically told character stories.

Gerald Robotnik's existence allowed to explore Ivo Robotnik and his lack of any familial connection similarly to Shadow's and Sonic's familial losses.

Robotnik's farewell and acknowledgement of Stone at the end of movie not only paid off his arc in the movie (the realisation that he did not share his grandfather's hatred for humanity), but also all of the screentime Stone and Eggman had in the other two movies.

While Sonic's similarity to Shadow was highlighted when Shadow attacked and seriously injured Tom (even without willingly wanting to do so) and Sonic temporarily went down a similarly vengeful, solitary path.

Unlike Shadow, however, he ultimately chose the different, better path, by sparing him.

And both of them understood each other by the end because of their shared experience of loss.

I think how Shadow and Knuckles were handled actually was the best example of this movie's extremely tight script.

Shadow actually didn't talk that much, with a very large chunk of his story actually being "shown" via flashbacks characterising Maria, but when he did, it always felt like it had gravitas.

And to me the absolute best of this was the scene at the tail end of the movie where you actually see Maria die; the cinematography transitioning to present Shadow powering the Eclipse Cannon said everything it needed to say just via the visuals and nothing else. It was a fantastic example of "show, don't tell".

Because it is all so firmly consistent, when it all comes together in the final 20 to 30 minutes, everything feels natural and earned.

Everything connects and makes sense on a character level, even if the plot itself uses a bunch of coincidence/contrivance to streamline the order of events and, in turn, all of the side characters tie into this three-way web.

I mentioned Stone, Tom (earlier in the movie, Tom also has a thematically good, if more stilted heart to heart with Sonic) and Maria (who I also like because she's just a fairly normal kid in this interpretation of the story), but I actually really want to highlight Tails and Knuckles, as well.

Moreso Knuckles because I like how the argument throughout the movie about the team name evolves from Team Sonic or Team Knuckles to just "team" by the end and I really like how Knuckles responds to (and opposes) Sonic recklessly asking to use the Master Emerald, which ties into the themes of the second movie. It's a surprising bit of refreshing nuance.

I think Tails is the most standard out of all three, serving as a mediator and the brains of the operation, mostly staying the same from the previous movie, with perhaps simply less prominent admiration for Sonic.

Everything, from sometimes to the smallest of lines or visuals to the most impactful ones is tied to the theme of family and familial loss.

Eventhough they have such comparatively small roles in the movie, even Tom and Maddie wanting to join the insanity is a great payoff when thinking about where their characters started.

This story has a theme that is extremely old, but you can't argue with rock solid thematic/character substance (and so can't the critics it seems).

Do I myself think as highly of the movie as the current Rotten Tomatoes score?

Not really, I think I see it more in the ballpark of a firm 7-8/10, but it certainly is fantastic for what it is trying to be.

Thinking a little bit about the future, though, I'm really curious about what they'll do with Metal Sonic and Amy because I think CD and Heroes are to this day my personal "flawed favourites" of the series.

CD was my favourite Sonic game when I was younger because I loved the aesthetics of it, from the intro to the zones to music and Metal Sonic might be my favourite rival character for Sonic because of how the game presents its set pieces.

Unfortunately, I think it just doesn't hold up in terms of level design, in the same way how I think Heroes has awesome level design, but does not hold up because of the control issues and glitches.

So if there's one Sonic movie made "for me", it'll be this 4th one.

I certainly have much higher expectations for it with the context of this one, at least.

[atopvisenyashill]

sorry to bother you but do you ever think of theon’s arc as being sort of akin to an amalgamation of the previous generation of starklings in a way - he starts out lustful and wild like brandon, though raised apart from family, dead older brother(s) like ned and isolated in a tower with a sibling trying to save them like lyanna? like theon recieves a bunch of connections with the old gods and having weirwood dreams but i’m not too sure what it all means together.

oh that’s sooooo interesting.

okay so yes re: theon’s connection to the old gods and having weirwood dreams. that’s something i think about a lot. one thing i find interesting is the play between him, aeron, and patchface as prophets - aeron calls himself a prophet of the drowned god, and while i think its likely all of the greyjoys are capable of magic to some degree, it’s not aeron who is regularly having true visions in the family it’s theon who has shown this funny aptitude for magic and interestingly, it’s patchface who drowned, was revived, and suddenly became a voice for the gods. i have this theory that patchface is a prophet for the drowned god (or whatever magical being is thought to be the drowned god, the same way as for example the old gods are most likely not gods but hundreds if not thousands of greenseers connected to the weirwood hivemind system) and theon is a prophet for the old gods. patchface going through the ritual accidentally, imo, caught the attention of the drowned god. theon, meanwhile, i think is someone who was born with magical abilities, in a time period where magic seems to be reaching a boiling over point after spending several centuries simmering, surrounded by other similarly “have the aptitude but not the know-how” people in the starklings, having been intensely physically traumatized - like patchface, i think he caught the attention of the old gods bc he accidentally went through the rituals while In Their Domain. bran has his visions of the woman blood sacrificing the old man, and i’ve kind of loosely theorized that being capable of extreme magic means you must be capable of sacrificing yourself as well as others. dany doesn’t just burn mirri, she walks onto the pyre herself; melisandre doesn’t just use pyre victims to fuel her magic, she has to literally give birth to her magic; but to take it a step further, i think when people capable of magic are physically traumatized by others, it does kind of….get their senses tingling i guess you can say. i think this is why bloodraven goes from being just like a regular fighter to being known for magic and sorcery - losing his eye + his knowledge of magic sets off his senses. so as theon is already magically inclined, living in a place that is steaming with magic, tortured by ramsay…all of a sudden he goes from having visions in acok to talking to weirwoods. he’s caught the attention of the old gods (the old god being, of course, bran).

so that’s my theory on like, HOW theon’s third eye has slowly opened but the fact that it’s seemingly opening towards the OLD GODS and not THE DROWNED GOD is really interesting on a narrative level. i think when you ask “what will happen to theon” in the fandom at large, it’s a really bleak picture - some of that is the show, but i’ve seen people theorize that the last chapter we have of him in twow (the preview chapter) is the last we’ll see if theon since i got into the fandom when s2 was airing. and i know i’m biased bc i love him but i do think his connection to the weirwood magic is going to come into play. similarly, i see a lot of theon fans who would prefer an ending where he’s no longer with the starks or in the north but in the iron islands. but again - it’s not the drowned god who is speaking through him it’s the old gods! this signals to me that he is never leaving the north permanently, if at all. and i think that makes sense with his story on a narrative level; he can insist he is salt and sea, a greyjoy of pike, but even as he’s trying to prove himself as a greyjoy he’s calling himself the prince of winterfell! nothing will erase the reality that most of the formative years of his life were spent in winterfell with the starklings and when he pictures home it’s that place! that place that was full of love that he was not allowed to partake in! being able to go back to pyke and fully reintegrate back into the culture he was born into is, imo, too sweet of an ending. he doesn’t get to go back!

i’ve always felt like he will live a long life, longer than he’ll ever really want, and that’s the point - he gets to live and others don’t (and some of that is his fault!) and he has to keep trying because of it. forever. he can’t take the easy way out and exit the narrative. so i think it’s interesting you compare him to the older starks because the youngest is benjen and benjen was a man of the night’s watch. i think that concept of like, spending the rest of your life trying to do penance being what theon gets makes so much sense. specifically here i think it’s interesting that lyanna experiences some element of sexual abuse, and theon is both a perpetrator and a victim of it. and there’s that common theory that perhaps benjen helped lyanna sneak out of winterfell and joined the night’s watch out of guilt. i think you get that very interesting kind of dark mirror here - theon is much less well liked than brandon despite engaging in the same behavior, theon is never able to “rise” to the occasion as oldest boy and heir like ned nor is he respected by the iron islanders the way ned is by the northerners, theon is trapped by ramsay in a very twisted love story while lyanna’s story was more of a slow burning horror. always always never enough when compared to the starks. but i think an ending like benjen’s, not necessarily one where he’s specifically sworn to some order but maybe a more metaphorical one (not dissimilar to sandor on the quiet isle actually - less about WHO he is swearing to and more about what he does with his time), really fits everything theon is heading towards. can’t outrun and outfight his status as a hostage, his murders, his rapes, being raped, the greyjoy name or the stark one - but he can just stop and THINK for a second about WHO he is and WHY he’s wound up this way!

[dashiellqvverty]

my opinion on season 11 is that ian and mickey were all over the place from episode to episode and i ultimately wasn’t very happy with where it ended for them

[violetsquare111]

perhaps overly rambly thoughts on the influencer arc

it is very hard to watch but i don't think it's contrary to what we know of green, and i'm enjoying it just fine.

we know green is a showoff and perfectionist. the color gang all like winning, but green likes making a big display of it too. he's quite a sore winner and loser, and hates having the spotlight taken from him when it is his.

he loves attention and praise. and like, that's okay, don't we all? he cares about his friends in the end.

but i get the feeling that, while they love him and appreciate his talents, his friends don't really give him that big attention that he might want. they're used to him winning and being good at art/performance of any kind. it's normal to them really. maybe even a little disheartening.

so i can easily see how getting that attention in the form of being an influencer is a huge thing for green. an addiction, even. he gets so drawn into it that he overlooks his friends' discomfort, so he can keep being the Perfect Celebrity, keep the hype going.

obviously this end outcome here isn't actually what he wanted, and i'm sure he feels guilt for all this on some level. but he's pushed that away in favor of the high of getting a number to go up, getting more of the spotlight. there's nothing else that matters right now but getting that new dopamine hit. again, it is an addiction.

surely his friends will come around. why don't they get it? this is a good thing for him. he's winning. he's harsh, yes, but he's just trying to be successful. his friends aren't actually hurt (they are), they're doing fine (they're not), what's the issue? (everything.)

i don't think current green is character assassination - right now he's doing horribly and hurting the people around him because he is at his lowest, the worst version of himself where his flaws overtake him. it can go up from here. i have no doubt that by the end of this green is going to get some sense shaken into him and make up with his friends. like, that's just the kind of series this is.

and despite all the character analysis i just did lol - i ALSO think it's important to remember that we are probably taking every little action of these characters infinitely more seriously than the creators are. while the series sometimes dips its toes (or entire face) into being a dramatic and beautiful story, it is ultimately a cartoon, and sometimes the character writing will be put on the back burner for a moment in favor of a gag or an overall episode arc. and that's fine! nothing they're doing is unprecedented for the characters they've set up, and i think they'll wrap this up alright.

[a-driftamongopenstars]

alright, i finally finished Dragon Age the Veilguard.

tldr; 3/10. I didn't like it.

If you enjoyed the game and would rather keep enjoying it, please don't click the read more section as what follows is rather critical.

I can finally sit down with my thoughts and put them together in a more cohesive structured review, touching on most things that I wanted to address. I'll start with positives and then focus on the negatives.

Warning, this is VERY long.

Overall, I had a neutral to negative impression of DatV, which got worse by the end of the game. It had some good moments, but they were entirely unexplored and underutilized, suffering from bad writing. While the game itself is rather pretty, it didn't outweigh the dialogues, the stories and the lore butchering that took place.

1. Environment and visuals. 8/10.

I think Veilguard is a very beautiful game. I enjoyed exploring the corners of this new world, the little bits of environment design and storytelling that it had. It felt magical, certain locations were mesmerizing! I couldn't stop staring at the valley where you go to with Harding, the carcass of a titan.

2. Combat. 9/10.

I love flashy combat, I enjoy hack and slash, so until the very end of the game I was having most fun in combat. Yes there was repetitiveness but I tried to combat (hehe) it with changing my abilities and weapons every now and then. I liked combos and I liked timed parries. Enemy tactics got a bit boring by the end, but a few enemies still surprised me and challenged me.

.... That's where positives end. Now on to the negatives.

1. Characters. 2/10.

I don't understand what happened. Almost all the characters in this game were tuned down to a two-dimensional personality, "good" and "bad" - and absolutely no nuance. This happened not only to the villains, but to the different NPCs and even our companions. Their interests got narrowed down to single points of interest (Lucanis and coffee being a prime example to me), their motivations got watered down.

This is not what I expect from a Bioware game. I want to be challenged, I want to dislike characters or approve of their choices. I like characters who are messy and complex and don't always have their shit together.

I like villains who may have other reasons for their choices, other than "ba ha ha, I am so evil and I will do evil things". Where is Alexius who sold himself to the Elder one, just so he could save his beloved son? Where is Samson, forsaken by the Chantry and turned to red lyrium with his addiction? Where is Calpernia, misguided in her choices, just to free the slaves of Tevinter?

Where are the slaves of Tevinter anyway?? That's another topic.

2. Rook. 4/10.

On one hand, I liked playing Rook. They were stoic but with a humorous side, ready to get the job done, compassionate to other people.

The problem is that it's the only Rook you can really play. The protagonist is set in their ways and their dialogues and there is very little to roleplay. Rook really does feel like a gentle manager, trying to get everyone to play along nicely, while providing therapy every now and then, and is excluded from the majority of friendly interactions with other people. That awkward glance everyone gives you after their banter is embarrassing. The way you can third wheel people, the way the game actively offers you to leave a couple of animated conversations between other people - why even include those? Why not make Rook a part of the 'team'?

I did like Rook's dynamic with Solas. They got to see a different side of him, one that's not presented heavily in Inquisition. But like everything else, it felt surface level and underexplored.

3. Story arc. 2/10.

I am left unsatisfied with the story. The pacing threw me off so much nearly every quest, it was hard to stay on track. From "we need to solve this NOW" to "actually, let's all slow down and deal with our problems", the plot's priorities were all over the place. We kept hearing about the gods and their destructive oppression, but we saw surprisingly little of it. Yes, there was the Blight, yes there were Venatori and the Antaam, but they felt more like a video game fodder and dressing rather than a part of the story.

Not to mention that all of those things made little sense to me. Why would the gods align with aforementioned factions? Why would the aforementioned factions align with the elven gods? In-game explanation was not enough for me, it did not make sense. Not with the established lore in the previous games.

I also did not enjoy the ending. While the idea of Solas binding himself to the Veil is good and does make sense, what was suggested as the good ending (inviting Mythal to deal with Solas essentially) actually left me feeling awful. I sent a man, full of regrets and self-loathing, on a lonely journey to figure himself out. That... did not sit right with me at all. Neither did the fact that Northern Thedas, supposedly the point of the gods' attack, gets to live and flourish, while Southern Thedas is dying of starvation and blight. That is UNHINGED to me.

4. Music. 1/10.

There was no music. I remember one track. It was not memorable whatsoever and I can't believe they hired Hans Zimmer to do exactly nothing. Just wow.

5. Lore. ???/10.

And here is the worst offender. What was done with Dragon Age lore is unacceptable. I was doing a head-in-hands every five minutes. This was a slap in the face of so many fans who enjoyed the three prior games and delved into deep, interesting lore of various races, countries, cultures and religions. Veilguard showed a big middle finger to all that.

Everyone has already touched upon the sanitization of different factions. From the suddenly slaveless Tevinter to found family Antivan Crows, everything has been scrubbed clean and made sweet and palatable and "good".

The Dalish clans have been removed from existence as we know them. The Antaam left the Qun? Don't even get me started on that. The Chantry has no influence in this game? Really? The Chantry? The biggest religion in Thedas? The one that we know has heavy presence in the Anderfels, the Black Divine in Tevinter? That Chantry?

I think it really hit me how disrespectful the game is during the quest of saving the Dalish elves, where apparently Elgar'nan's Venatori, uplifted to be his servants and chosen people, were trying to sacrifice them. It's a gross and oddly telling idea that the ancient Elven god turned to a faction of racist mages to sacrifice elven people. I actually can't believe I'm writing this. Just how much are you going to shaft these people? Mindboggling.

There is a lot more I have to say on this specific topic, and I probably will later, but the idea is this.

6. Romances. 2/10.

Whoever said this is a game with romance lied so hard. So hard. The romance was atrocious. From the badly written flirting to the lack of romantic scenes (I romanced Davrin), to the poorly timed and awkward 'final' romance moment... It was atrocious. I felt no connection between Rook and Davrin beyond what game was telling me. My actual companions got more screen time with their romances than me and my LI.

Damn, even Evka and Antoine, my single most beloved NPCs in this game, had more romance going on that my Rook.

---

All in all, Veilguard was a massive let down. After having enjoyed the first 3 games many times over, with multiple playthroughs, I was so excited to see how the story of the Inquisition, of the elves, would end. When I saw the first trailer for VG, I knew I would never get to see it. When I played the game, I was left with disappointment and disdain.

I'm glad there are people who enjoyed this game, genuinely. I'm sure there's something to find for anyone, but it was not for me. Nor was it for many other people. It was a let down. I feel like I'll never get the conclusion I wanted - so I'll have to write my own I guess.

I have more thoughts on this game that I might be sharing, but for now this is the review I wanted to write. Thanks for reading!

[rin-solo]

Let's talk about "Monster" ... and one of Odysseus' criminally underrated traits: his lack of judgment.

I was re-listening to "Monster" the other day and it kind of just hit me... Overall, that song isn't my favorite (it's somewhere in B tier; the lyricism is great, and the part after "So if we must sail through dangerous oceans..." absolutely slaps, it's just not one that I go back to frequently.) But there are some things I genuinely adore about it because I adore the way it progresses Odysseus' character arc as clearly not a "corruption" and how this is conveyed through the way the song is set up and presented.

First of all, I simply have to yap about how Odysseus isn't justifying his foes' actions the way that I have seen some people falsely assume. He's describing what they did or do and essentially saying, "They aren't letting themselves be stopped by guilt from doing what they think they have to do, so why should I?"

Polyphemus doesn't overthink whether it's right or wrong to kill some people because they harmed him or his sheep.

Circe may deep down feel guilt but isn't letting that stop her from turning men into pigs to prevent any more harm from befalling her nymphs at their hands.

Poseidon isn't losing sleep over drowning a fleet because that is what gods do to retain their infamy and status.

Odysseus and the rest of his soldiers didn't use the Trojan horse tactic out of malice or bloodlust, but out of pragmatism. It was the most efficient way to win a war that would have only cost more lives on both sides if they hadn't ended it then and there.

You look at that and you may think, "That's all very fair, but that doesn't mean any of those actions are justified" ... and you'd be right. None of the actions above are actually right or justified.

But the thing about "Monster" that I love so much is that it's specifically NOT something like, "These people I've encountered are all evil and ruthless and they are right and justified in being that way; I'll be the same." It's actually, "These people I've encountered act with ruthlessness; it clearly aids them in achieving their goal, and they seem to have figured out how to not feel guilt over their actions. I want to reap those benefits too. So far, I've been acting with mercy, which seems to have disadvantaged me. If they can do it, I can and should do the same to level the playing field."

Odysseus isn't saying that their actions are right, wrong, or justified. He's simply exploring why these people act the way they do. And he does so entirely without judgment.

I'm not surprised about him not judging Circe; while she was still wrong since she went overboard and struck preemptively against people who were not guaranteed to ever cause harm, she was pretty much redeemed in the end and her point is the easiest out of these to understand.

But the rest? Polyphemus killed his best friend. Poseidon drowned his whole fleet. The Trojan horse? It never comes up anywhere else but since he mentions it here, I think it's safe to assume that Odysseus feels guilty for using a tactic such as this. And still... Odysseus talks about his foes' actions with understanding and an open mind. He acknowledges their points of view—all of them, even if none besides Circe ever acknowledged or understood his.

The only time we genuinely see Odysseus act out of resentment is when he tells Polyphemus his name... After that, he never shows anything of the sort ever again. If he ever held any resentment toward any of his foes, I feel like this is where he lets it go for good.

Hell, even Poseidon, whom he would have by far the most reasons to resent, Odysseus doesn't actually judge or resent. I wrote a whole mini-essay on why the Vengeance saga proves that Odysseus doesn't actually seek or want vengeance on Poseidon. One might argue that he sounded like he was avenging his crew in "Six Hundred Strike" but it's important to remember that he offered Poseidon forgiveness one song earlier. He didn't lead with vengeance or resentment, but he rekindled his anger when Poseidon rejected his mercy.

My point is that Odysseus doesn't judge or resent any of the people who attempt to stand between him and his home... which shows incredible character strength in and of itself. This occurs later, but he acts similarly toward Calypso in "Not Sorry for Loving You" as well.

This is such an underrated trait of his, especially considering it fits perfectly with EPIC's themes, which revolve around seeing every perspective and balancing between ruthlessness and mercy. Honestly, I don't think those themes would even work with a protagonist who isn't so open-minded.

Coming back to "Monster," as we've established, Odysseus doesn't pass judgment on his foes. Similarly, he isn't saying that his decision to embrace ruthlessness and "become" a Monster (read more to find out why I put that in quotation marks) or any of his future actions as this Monster are justified.

I genuinely despise it when people call his arc a "villain arc" or "corruption" because that's pretty much missing the entire point. He isn't actually becoming a monster, corrupting, or genuinely changing his personality—hence why I put those quotation marks earlier. He is deliberately choosing to embrace a certain ruthless way of acting, fully knowing that it is not actually right or justified. "So what if I'm the Monster?" is self-gaslighting. He knows it's not "so what?" But he's doing it anyway because he has seen this way of acting aiding his foes. He literally says, "I must become the Monster / And then we'll make it home." He is convinced that this is what he must become because he keeps being told this by everyone.

From the top, his values or person isn't actually being corrupted. He's not really internally changing. He's merely adapting a way of behaving because he thinks it's the only way he'll still get home, and only because of that. It's really f*cking sad actually. Especially because he is wrong; his not being ruthless is not actually the problem, as we find out later.

Genuinely, his monster act lasted exactly 3,5 songs; in the second half of "Mutiny" it's already all gone because he is so afraid for his crew and what they're about to do to themselves that he instinctively goes back to wanting to save them despite how they just led a mutiny, despite how they don't listen to him regarding the cows.

Odysseus' entire arc can be described as, "He tries out mercy, and it doesn't get him home. He tries out ruthlessness, and it doesn't get him home either. In order to get home, he needs to learn balance, in Hermes' words "Every trick in his domain"." And that is also, as I believe, the main theme of EPIC: Neither ruthlessness nor mercy by itself is the solution. Both have their place; one needs balance. Or: treat people as they ask to be treated.

Only by the time of the Vengeance saga does Odysseus seem to have finally figured this out, and that's where he genuinely starts succeeding.

So no, Odysseus is no longer "The Monster" by the time of the Vengeance saga, no matter how much the visuals in "Six Hundred Strike" try to convince us otherwise. But he isn't "Just a Man" either. Did anyone besides me notice how he stopped calling himself this or justifying his weak moments like that in "Monster" and how he doesn't go back to it even after dropping the monster act?

And here we have the perfect segway into an essay I haven't written yet that might answer the question, "If now he's not a man and not a monster, what is he then?"

Well, technically Odysseus told us himself that one time he acted out of resentment... "Neither man nor mythical." But that's an essay yet to be written... I'll get to it soon, and there we might answer what actually happened in "Six Hundred Strike" and why the line "If you dance with fate I know you'll enhance your state", that I see is mostly overlooked, matters so much more than we probably all think.

Until then, know that I am not actually the first one to address the "Neither man nor mythical" significance. Credit goes to @glisten-inthedark; coming across her post on this matter genuinely enhanced my understanding of what happened so much and I need all of you to read it because it's a truly brilliant conclusion. I'll write my own essay on this topic soon, I promise. But without that post, I would've probably not come to this realization for a long while.

Either way, we end this essay with words that I will never tire of repeating: Stop villainizing Odysseus, y'all. It's not cool, not only because it's undeserved but also because it pretty much shows that you have successfully missed the point and core theme of this musical.

... See you when we inspiration for another essay strikes me. In the meantime, have a brief introduction to what that essay will cover in meme form because I can.

[lipstickchainsaw]

Things I would've liked to see in Arcane S2, in no particular order:

Caitlyn doing some more heinous shit after becoming dictator. Let her be evil, damnit! Let her fuck up the Firelights' sanctuary to achieve whatever goal! Make some people mad!

More of a sense of the power struggle between Ambessa and Caitlyn. Let Caitlyn look into the disappearances as well, or at least give us a sense of what she thinks is going on. Maybe give Shoola something to do after even Salo left. Make the upper class of Piltover feel more alive.

Give Caitlyn the initiative in her turn away from Ambessa, mirror Vi choosing to trust Jinx while facing to Warwick here, and have it take a little more to get them on the same page.

Let Ekko and Jinx actually rally Zaun in the final act. The way they're seen by their people was a pretty big deal, and I would've liked to see that go somewhere in the climax.

Actually, have Zaun actually discuss what to do in the Noxus/Piltover war. Both sides oppressed Zaun pretty badly, so maybe there's some people who want to support Noxus (a very small group), or who figure they're happy to let their enemies fight it out. Let Sevika, Scar and the Jinxers about this.

Hell, let Sevika show up at all after episode 4! Isha was important to her too! Have her and Jinx suggest building a statue for her, like Silco did for Vander, as another notch to help Jinx stand upright.

When Jayce and Mel come back, have them reckon with what Caitlyn did to their city, and have them take some time to forge the place back together.

Let Zaun negotiate with Piltover for their aid! Give them more than just one seat on the council amongst people who already look down on them (although I think Sevika is canny enough to get the most out of it, it's a real consolation price for a group of people willing to abandon their own homies to rally to the defense of yours), and make Ekko a prominent voice here.

Warwick in episode 9 didn't really do much for me. Any of the emotional beats there were already covered in episode 6. Not sure what to do with him instead, though. Maybe make Vi and Jinx protect others from him more explicitly?

By emphasising the Piltover/Zaun conflict more, you can have Vi be more conflicted about where she falls on that divide.

Ambessa also lobbies to get Zaun on board, maybe pulls some Renni shenanigans again. Actually get me invested in that grand climax.

Same goes for Viktor, honestly. Maybe give his conversation with Mel and Jayce a bit more weight. His turn to Ambessa and Singed's side is a bit abrupt (and also very much caused by Jayce killing him, so his moral high ground in that conversation is a bit weird).

Don't make Jayce talk shit about Viktor's terminal illness, goddamnit. Heimerdinger's whole arc was about how corrosive that attitude was, and the conclusion of it was that you can't sit down on your laurels because change will keep happening with or without you. I think that makes for a much more compelling argument against Viktor's philosophy at this point.

No notes on Singed. What a ledge.

Overall, I think the show needed a bit more breathing room to build up to the level the climax was operating on. It left a bit too much of what I cared about behind to get there, and adding an act could've been a way to alleviate some of that.

[sorcerousundries]

If you're taking requests, could you please write something about which Lotr and The Hobbit characters would be most attracted to a reader who's really intelligent and good at debating them? Like I'm picturing a sort of Rivals to Lovers dynamic where the reader is super smart and really good at arguing their points, but I'm curious which Tolkien characters you think would be most into that type of partner 🤔

I can totally picture Eomer falling for a person like that because he honestly seems perfect for Enemies to Lovers arcs, but tldr what Tolkien characters do you think would be most attracted to a super intelligent person who could debate them into the dirt? Thanks!

I have been alone all my life but with the compensations of intellect.

Lord of the rings and The hobbit characters react to an intelligent reader

Warnings: none

Includes: Elrond, Thranduil, Gimli and Éomer

A/n: thank you for your request <3

Content under the cut

Elrond — Friends to lovers

You and Elrond would meet in a fairly formal setting, maybe during a business gathering or a dinner of sorts.

You would be chatting with some high noble who would introduce you to lord Elrond and the two of you clicked immediately.

He would often invite you for tea and insist you stay for dinner, maybe offering you a bed as the hour gets later.

He is knowledgeable about history, lore and the affairs between both men and elves alike, he would likely be drawn to someone he can engage deeply in discussions of middle earths past, present and future.

The debates between you and lord Elrond would be competitive but friendly, if he lost he would shrug it off, the pinnacle of healthy masculinity. If he won, he wouldn’t care, maybe tease you if your friendship started to grow closer but never in a cruel, condescending way.

He would grow feelings slowly yet steadily, he would never force himself on you but he couldn’t deny the flutter of his heart whenever you’d smirk triumphantly as besting him during a debate of which medicine would be best to use for a rope burn, the simple action making his heart warm.

As your relationship turns romantic your playful banter wouldn’t stop, it would only grow, turning into silly debates before bed as you two move in chorus around the bedroom, performing your separate night routines though you’d never allow the room to grow silent as you chat about whatever topic comes to mind.

Overall he’d enjoy having a partner that he could chat away with, it’s rare that he finds someone who equals his intelligence, let alone best it.

Thranduil — Shared traumas

Thranduil would likely already be acquainted with you, after all the king knows everything that happens in his kingdom.

Though he only started to cultivate a relationship with you when you outwitted him in his own throne room, for the first time a millennium the king of the woodland realm was left speechless, you intrigued him, instead of sending you away he invited you to join him in his study.

The debates between you two would be filled with romantic tension, heated discussions would be filled with you leaned so forward your nose would also my be touching his, as you did something that countered his you would pull back, thoughts of how his eyes would dart down to your lips so quick you almost didn’t see it would flood your brain.

He would love discussing battle strategies and such, even better if an elf and you saw the battle for yourself.

Nothing pleases him more than falling back on you when he doubts his leadership skills, after having to listen to courtiers and advisors drone on about their ideas and excuses, he can go to and simply sit across the room as you answer his questions logically, not even looking up from your book.

Your relationship would start to turn romantic when he confided in you about his troubles, his worries for his son, even telling you about the death of his wife.

And who knows, maybe he’ll pull you in for a kiss before you turn in for the night.

Gimli — opposites attract

Gimli would first see you at the court of Elrond, during the forming of the fellowship.

He never thought his heart would lurch from his chest when he saw an elf sitting at lord Elrond side, chin held high and regal.

Not even his admiration for lady Galadriel could compare to the way his heart jumped at the sight of you.

While he’s not typically seen as a debater, Gimli has a strong sense of pride surrounding his culture and way of life, he would be drawn to someone who can engage in conversation about dwarven history and culture with him.

He would hold an immense level of respect for you, often coming to you to double check any technical blueprints or a different perspective if he’s struggling to visualise how something would come together. He would appreciate someone who can offer unbiased opinions not swayed by any existing rivalry between elves and dwarves.

Any debates with him would lively and high spirited,he would engage enthusiastically defending his views with passion and light hearted humour, your discussions could range from history and craftsmanship to the simple differences between elves and dwarves.

He would let out a small “oh!” As you kiss him on the cheek, nodding him a farewell after helping him find scrolls about an ancient smithing technique, his smile turning his eyes into slights as he pumps his fist once you’ve turned your back.

Eomer — Enemies to lovers

Eomer would find your intelligence intriguing and infuriating at the same time.

His warrior ideals and loyalty to Rohan would initially clash with your more logical approach to things, your debates would arise over strategies in battle most likely.

Early on in your relationship, misunderstandings were the main fuel to your bitter relationship. Your critical views on his leadership or warfare would be interpreted as disrespect, driving a wedge between you two.

But as the power of Sauron grows, you’re forced to put your differences aside.

He would begrudgingly admit that you’re actually very useful in a fight, offering new ideas that contrast his own.

However one night as your both sat around the fire, when every other solider has turned in for the night, he might open up, revealing to you his fears about not being a good leader, you in turn offer him insights and philosophical perspectives that resonate with him.

He thinks about the conversation when he nods silently before sauntering off to his tent, laying in bed staring up at the white linen cloth of his tent, the words he forgets as he slowly realises he in-fact wasn’t listening to your words, instead focusing on the curve of your lips and the brush of your eyelashes against your cheeks every time you blinked, the way your eyes gleamed as the fire crackled.

He frowns as the words “oh shit, I’m in love with them” echoed in his inner monologue.

He doesn’t tell you through words rather showing you, right before the rohirrims marched to Gondor he would give you heated kiss, displaying not his passion as a warrior, but as a lover.

[skania]

Final Akane + AquaKane Thoughts

There are so many things to say that I don't even know how to start organizing my thoughts lol I'll also be including my final thoughts about the "love triangle" while I'm at it, so this is probably going to get long!

I've written quite a bit about Aqua/Akane this past year, so I won't be going into detail into any of the things I've already discussed up to now. Instead, I'll just focus on my thoughts on this final set of chapters, as well as my overall thoughts now that the manga is over.

I'll start with the (few) things I liked:

The Good

I mentioned before that I'm a sucker for parallels, and that Aqua/Akane having so many is one of the reasons why I couldn't help but ship them. We somehow got some very good ones in these last few chapters. We even got a scene at the Aqua/Akane bridge, the one where Akane's relationship with Aqua began and ended.

Aqua saved her life at that bridge, without any ulterior motives. And it's that very bridge that is pictured as Akane says that she has decided to live on. The imagery is poignant and pays its respects to not only Akane's arc as a character, but also to the Aqua/Akane relationship.

More than that, the parallels we got confirm things that Akane and Aqua/Akane fans like me have been saying all along:

Through it all, Akane saw him as he is and embraced the broken him. Each time, she willingly chose to get closer to him. When Aqua tells Akane that he has been saved ever since he met her, I get it. I have no doubt that for Aqua, who has been desperately fighting alone for so long, being seen and understood and loved despite all his self-perceived flaws and the darkness in him must have felt like salvation.

Akane is the one who knows Aqua the best, the one who knows him the most, the one who sees him exactly as he is and who loves all of him. Akane doesn't romanticize Aqua's flaws and his self-sacrificial nature, and neither does she idealize his virtues. She just accepts him and does her best to support and understand him through it all.

Akane being the only one who can see through Aqua's plan is enough to prove this, but it's actually not the most meaningful way in which Aka confirmed it. The most meaningful way was actually this:

Usually, whenever Akane thinks about Aqua, she calls him Aqua-kun. However, throughout her entire monologue in the last three chapters, Akane never addresses him by name. She just calls him "You". The same "You" (君) that Aka emphasized in Chapter 63.

The "You" that encapsulates everything Aqua Hoshino was: both the Goro and the Aqua.

This was a very, very deliberate narrative choice that tells you that throughout the manga, Akane was the one who loved Aqua Hoshino exactly as he was.

Aka also uses another parallel to confirm that Akane was indeed lying to Kana when she claimed that she was over Aqua.

When she finally breaks down, Aka allows Akane to be honest about her feelings, and the parallel to the Aqua/Akane break-up tells us everything we need to know.

Akane never stopped loving Aqua. She has been in love with him all along.

Ever since they broke up, Akane has been sacrificing her feelings for Aqua in order to do what she thinks is best for him. Akane's priority has always been to see Aqua happy. She is willing to do whatever it takes to accomplish that. Back when she thought that Aqua needed to kill Kamiki, Akane was willing to shoulder that sin with him just so he wouldn't have to carry it on his own. When she realized that what Aqua truly wanted was to be free from his revenge, Akane was ready to deal with Kamiki on her own just so that Aqua wouldn't get his hands dirty. Then, when Aqua pushes Akane away, Akane becomes determined to stop him from killing Kamiki because she knows revenge is not what Aqua truly wants or needs.

But that's not all there is to it. Akane wants to be with Aqua, because she loves him. And it's precisely because she loves him, and because she thinks her love failed to save him, that she keeps her feelings to herself and is even willing to help another girl get close to him in her place.

So this chapter confirmed that the one who has been making the sacrificial play, the one who truly loved Aqua, was Akane. It is, essentially, the counterpart to Chapters 148 and 149.

It's no wonder, then, that Akane's feelings and her grief are the ones we follow immediately after Aqua's death. She goes to mourn him in the place he actually died, and when she's around his family, she keeps her pain to herself in order to not worsen their burden. We see her piece together what happened, we see her break, and then we see Akane put herself together and find some solace in knowing that Aqua kept her away to protect her.

Aqua is gone, and Akane is the only one to know Aqua's truth.

A lot of people spent the entire manga trying to downplay Aqua's relationship with Akane; claiming that it was a lie, a manipulation, or what-have-you. Now that the manga is over, we can say those claims were never proven.

At the contrary, until the very end, Aqua's thoughts & actions in regard to Akane were shown to back-up everything he said about her during their relationship.

Aqua could've lived if he had asked Akane for help in killing Kamiki, but he didn't want Akane to get her hands dirty for him. He broke up with her to not bring her down to hell with him, and when the options were to either die alone or make Akane bear the weight of a sin with him, the choice was quickly made.

At the end, he's even shown wanting the same thing Akane wanted: an equal relationship with her.

Unlike his thoughts about Kana (more on that later), which are just a 'might', this is something Aqua is purposeful about. It's something he is sure he wants. It's even the last thing he thinks of before wanting to see Ruby at the dome, which we all know was his dearest wish.

This also fits the panels chosen to be shown in the "romance" part of Aqua's montage: the moment he doesn't catch Kana's ball (symbolizing that their feelings don't connect) vs the moment where he chooses to kiss and date Akane for real.

Which brings us back to the moment they broke up. That chapter was titled "Going Astray" and we now saw where that wrong turn led Aqua: to his death.

So chapter 98, the Aqua/Akane break-up, is pretty much officially the chapter that leads us to the ending we got.

Which means that what I said back in this post still applies. If Aqua and Akane had been honest with each other during that phone-call in Chapter 97, things could've been different. But truth is, it's nearly pointless to think about it, because what this all comes down to is that Aka wanted this ending and he wanted it at all costs.

So nothing could have happened any other way, because Aka didn't want Aqua to be saved. He wanted Aqua to die so he could have his forced "bittersweet" ending.

This is why Aqua and Akane had to break up, it's why Akane is practically not allowed to interact with Aqua again after their break-up, and it's also why Akane never found out about Aqua being Goro's reincarnation.

Aqua was never meant to be saved, and Akane more than anyone could have saved him. So, of course, Aka couldn't allow her to do so. It's forced writing at its finest.

This is also why Akane isn't involved in Aqua's fatidic confrontation with Kamiki. While there is Aka's typical contrived writing involved in Akane leaving Aqua to his own devices at the most crucial moment, I do think it makes sense.

I've mentioned before that from the very beginning, Aqua and Akane's relationship has been based on trust and on choices.

Aqua once gave Akane a choice, trusting that she'd be able to choose what was best for herself. After Akane made her choice, Aqua did everything in his power to help her accomplish her goal.

Ever since, Akane has been trying to do the same for Aqua.

Akane wants Aqua to choose what's right for himself. She will always respect whatever it is that he chooses, as long as it is a true reflection of what he wants and needs. This is why Akane was eager to stop his plan to kill Kamiki, she could tell that Aqua was ready to sacrifice his own future to accomplish it.

That's why, once Aqua chooses to let Kamiki live, Akane is reassured.

Something has changed in Aqua. Akane notices this and believes that Aqua has, finally, chosen to not throw his life away just to deal with Kamiki. She trusts that he has.

Personally, I'd like to believe that Akane was right. Problem was that once Aqua knew for sure that Kamiki couldn't be saved, he switched back to his original plan. Something Akane couldn't have foreseen without knowing that Aqua was the reincarnation of a dude whose issues made him suicidal... which is yet another reason why Aka could have never let Akane find out about the whole reincarnation business.

So all in all, Aqua/Akane-wise, this is all well and good. On paper.

When it comes to the execution however, it leaves a lot to be desired, because Aqua/Akane is sadly majorly brought down by the spectacular way in which Aqua's character was (mis)handled during the second half of the manga.

The Bad

Goro has always been someone who thinks his life has no worth, and this belief is deeply ingrained into Aqua. That's why I could tell that his revenge plan likely involved killing himself and making it look like Kamiki did it.

I just didn't think that he would actually succeed, because it kind of goes without saying that the suicidal character getting to kill himself is far from being a satisfying ending. Even less so when said character has shown time and time again that he actually wants to live, he is just too broken by his guilt complex to believe he has that right.

For a while there, it even looks like Aqua will make it. That he has once again started to embrace that this is a life that he wants to live.

Sadly, once Aqua realizes that Kamiki can't be saved and that he poses a danger to Ruby, all of that flies off the window and "Goro" takes over. And by "Goro" I don't mean Goro the character, I mean all the bad habits that Aqua has due to his guilt-complex and survivor's guilt.

So Aqua goes and executes his original plan, killing himself instead of looking for a better solution. Which means he started off like this:

Only to end the manga pretty much the same way, except you can switch "If Ai's gone, this world isn't-" for "As long as Ruby can live on in this world."

Though, actually, it's even worse than that, because Aqua realizes that he was wrong — dying would bother him — only when it's too late.

It leaves a bad taste in my mouth because it's like Aqua had no development through the entire manga. Cut everything after his break-up with Akane and nearly nothing changes, except the motive behind Aqua throwing his life away: protecting Ruby (Sarina) instead of revenge.

It all feels even more pointless because Aqua's death rings hollow due to how badly his character was mishandled in the second half of the manga. After the break-up, Aqua becomes a "..." bot. His character isn't allowed to grow and neither is he allowed to explore his feelings in any meaningful way, to the point that he dies confused and not knowing who he was.

Pardon my bluntness, but how pathetic is this? 160+ chapters and literally none of this guy's issues were ever solved. His character goes nowhere, only so he can be sacrificed to make the ending bittersweet for Ruby. Though for me it wasn't even bittersweet; the ending fell flat on its face precisely because Aqua's character never goes anywhere, so it's hard to feel anything other than vague frustration and disbelief at how forced the writing is.

Even the Kami/Ai - Aqua/Akane parallels were wasted because both ships ended up in the exact same way: Akane and Ai both unable to save Aqua and Kamiki. I wouldn't even be surprised if those parallels are something Aka came up with on the spot while writing the Ai DVD.

I'm sure some Aqua/Akane truthers will say "all Aqua and Kamiki needed to be saved was to be with Akane and Ai, and Akane and Ai didn't realize that" and leaving aside my issues with that kind of co-dependency, once again, that's all well and good — on paper.

Sure, those of us who ship Aqua and Akane could see it that way if we wanted to, but... did Aka make a point of clearly stating this? No, he left it to the reader's imagination, which means it's just another blank to be filled with headcanon.

Personally, I'm pretty tired of doing that, because everything there is to like about the manga may as well just be the headcanons we have filled all those blanks with.

I always say that I prefer showing and not telling, but there's a limit to everything. Truth of the matter is, if this was supposed to be the case — and especially if it was supposed to be important — then showing isn't enough. Because the majority of readers aren't going to spend hours breaking down every single Aqua/Akane interaction to draw those parallels and reach that conclusion.

Aqua dying soothed by a song by his favorite idol (Ruby/Sarina) doesn't really do it any favors either, because fact of the matter is that people who were never invested in the Aqua/Akane relationship will just assume Aqua never loved Akane back. They'll be more distracted by Kana's tropey, shallow shoujo romance, and this is something Aka allowed in his manga right up to the very end.

Aqua and Akane were the only relationship in the entire manga that got mutual, gradual, organic, continuous development. But this all came to a halt when they broke up, so at the end of the day, they're mostly left up to interpretation.

It's underwhelming.

Most of all, if you ask me, it was a terrible move, because Aqua and Akane could've been the heart of this manga. If their feelings had been properly explored after their break up, if Aqua had been allowed to think of Akane in his last moments, if all this blank-filling had been actual text, they'd have been a tragic love-story for the ages.

But Aka didn't want it to be the heart of the manga, because he had already decided from the beginning that role should go to Aqua and Ruby. Alas, he completely failed at developing that, too, because to the very end there's only Goro and Sarina. That is the entire basis of the Aqua/Ruby relationship and dynamic, and it gets one single chapter where it's explored beyond that, only to immediately focus back on Goro and Sarina as Aqua lies dying.

Goro couldn't save Sarina in his first life, so he wastes his second to do it. He jumped at the chance to free himself of the burden of that guilt without even bothering to think of how much his death would hurt the very person he wanted to protect.

Which takes me to...

The Ugly

Turns out Kana was pretty much just a mixture between Fujiwara and Maki, after all. Except that unlike Maki, she never grows (Aqua literally has to die for her to do so) and unlike Fujiwara, she's overused instead of underused.

Aqua and Kana are portrayed as shallow to the end, and I'd even go as far as saying that the narrative pokes fun at Kana for it. Even during the funeral, she puts on a hat that's reserved for family members and it literally falls off her head when Miyako slaps her lmao

Since this is a manga and not real life, the way Kana's outburst was handled in that chapter is likely meant to be contrasted with the way Akane's own grief was handled, because it pretty much embodies all the differences between both of their relationships with Aqua through the manga.

Kana is focused on herself and on her pain. She thinks Aqua was murdered, but she still irrationally blames him for it, too blinded by her own pain. Aqua was murdered, but not being able to confess to him properly is still at the top of her list of grievances. She is also shown overplaying that one conversation she had with Aqua about Aqua having a death-wish, as if Aqua somehow agreeing to not say that he wants to die was some vital promise that he broke.

Meanwhile, Akane focuses on Aqua. On what Aqua felt, on why he did what he did, and on what he would have wanted. Even her wish to be by Aqua's side is expressed through Akane saying that she'd have been willing to shoulder his burdens with him, no matter where that led them. It is also Akane's understanding of Aqua that helps her to find some solace and to overcome his death.

Kana always looked at Aqua from the outside-in, idealizing and romanticizing him, while Akane was Aqua's partner in every sense of the word. That's why Akane gets all the insightful narration about Aqua while Kana just gets to make a fool of herself at his funeral.

So to the very end, the dichotomy between "Ai" and "Koi" does perfectly illustrates the contrast between the two sides of the Aqua love triangle.

Kana was infatuated with the Aqua that she built up in her head, and focused on what she wanted Aqua to do for her (support her unconditionally), and what she wanted to be for him (his only idol), rather than on Aqua himself as a person.

As for Aqua, during his last moments, most Aqua can say about Kana is that it might be good to respond to her feelings. Might. He spends the entire story knowing Kana is at his beck and call, he even makes fun of her for it (you're so easy to manipulate, yadda yadda), yet when the opportunity to date her presents itself, most he can say is essentially "it could be cool I guess." He even pictures her pulling on his arm to get his attention, while with Akane, he pictures himself facing her and looking straight at her.

So to Aqua, Kana was at most a teenage crush. His feelings for her weren't deep or relevant enough to have any sort of impact on his character, while he outright called the year he spent dating Akane his happy days. An entire year that he spent without Kana even being in his life, mind you. Meanwhile Kana was out there living an entire shoujo where she's the heroine and Aqua is the male lead 😂

That said, I still think Aqua, who I'm sure must've broken a record at being bad at understanding his own feelings, was likely mistaking admiration for romantic attraction, and that he would've realized this pretty early into dating Kana.

The anime is even clearer about this because Aqua's reactions to Kana are paralleled to Akane's who is, quite literally, a fan of Kana.

But even if he wasn't, it doesn't really matter, because it's shown very clearly that Aqua deeply values being understood (to him, it feels like salvation) and that Kana doesn't really understand him. So had they dated, Aqua would've had fun at first, sure, but his emotional needs wouldn't have been met; instead his job would've been to meet Kana's. It just would've never worked in the long term.

Now that the dust has settled, I can say for certain that if Aqua had been allowed to have a happy ending, it'd have been with Akane.

So once more, this is all fine on paper. The problem is that Aka takes it too far. The whole Kana business takes too much panel time for no discernible reason other than to... bait readers? I've even seen some say that Aka intended to mock them.

But even if that were the case, considering that those same readers are likely going to walk out of the story thinking Aqua and Kana are a tragic ship that loved each other because of all the bait, who's really the butt of the joke? Them or Aka himself?

Conclusion

I've always been pretty clear about being an Akane fan first and foremost. Despite all my Aqua/Akane meta, I had no emotional investment in whether she ended up with Aqua or not, as long as she got a satisfying ending. That said, by principle, I most definitely didn't want Aqua to end up with Kana, because that'd be like rewarding Kana for all her crying and whining when she never even tried to understand who Aqua was as a person and I've already gone through that in Naruto, thank you very much.

So the two silver-linings about this ending are that Akane stayed amazing to the end, and that Kana didn't have Aqua handed to her on a silver platter. But considering just how much panel time Kana's meaningless crush takes up in the narrative and how side-lined Akane got after the break-up, it feels like a pyrrhic victory lol

Akane is still the best thing about the manga, and I'd say that she got by far the best ending of the bunch. I'm not sure if I'd call it satisfying, because Akane's one goal was always to save Aqua and she didn't get to accomplish that. But at the very least, she got a good ending, all things considered. She got to protect what Aqua entrusted to her, and she got to show just how emotionally strong she is.

As for Aqua and Akane, AquaKane could've been incredible if only Aka had done them justice, but he didn't. I joked before that the Aqua/Akane development was so good that it's like it wrote itself, and I actually think that's exactly what happened. Aka made things up as he went along, and he allowed Aqua and Akane to develop together in ways he didn't necessarily plan nor foresee. But as soon as he started strong-arming the manga towards the ending he envisioned, he dropped the ship, likely because he had already established everything that would be relevant about them by then (he knew the ship would literally go nowhere because Aqua needed to die), and then proceed to leave a lot of it to the discretion of the readers.

While I'm sure that'll be enough for some, I'm afraid it's not really enough for me. If you were to ask me if I'm satisfied with the way they were handled, my answer would be: not really, but it certainly could've been worse lol

In my opinion, they're the biggest wasted potential in the manga (which is saying something, because the entire manga is wasted potential), and their potential was wasted simply because they're the ones who could've actually led us to a happy ending.

Aka didn't want that ending, though. He cared for his vision more than about his characters, and his vision was literally just an ending where poor Ruby would be a star that shines brighter "the darkest things get". Nothing else mattered. LMAO. As if Ruby hadn't already gone through enough!

Oh well, at least we're finally free!

[hauntingofhouses]

Thinking about the crazy love triangle situation in Blue Eye Samurai and debating heavily with myself on how I'd like to see it conclude. And yeah this discussion can be thought of purely as shipping, headcanons, and fandom fun. But when analysing the show and engaging with it in a more in-depth, almost-literary level, it's impossible to dismiss who Mizu's potential love interests are and how different endgame romances would affect her character arc and the overall story and themes.

So in this post I'd like to look at the love triangle a bit more closely, and speculate on where the story will take this.

DISCLAIMER: It is my personal interpretation of the text that Mizu is non-binary—I use this as an umbrella term denoting any gender that does not adhere to the binary restrictions, norms, and expectations of what it means to be either a man or woman in a particular society; it's not just an androgynous "third gender" that exclusively uses they/them pronouns. Thus, while I personally believe Mizu is not strictly a cis woman, she does still identify with womanhood, despite definitely feeling a level of detachment from it due to living as a man for so long. With that being said, I will be using she/her pronouns for Mizu in this post, but please note that this is purely personal preference. Everyone is free to interpret the text the way they like. That's the fun of fiction. Now, without further ado, let's proceed.

Okay so, thinking about the pairings on a purely surface level, and even before i got into the show, I was pinning my hopes on some lesbianism going on between Mizu and Akemi, and the show does hint at this; in Ep1, during their first encounter in Kyoto, there is the famous slow-mo shot of their eyes meeting, Mizu's lips slightly parted as she is unable to tear her gaze away from Akemi, while sweet string music plays in the background. This is clear romantic framing, and a marker of attraction. If Mizu was a cishet man, there would be no question that this is a potential love interest.

But then, in the same episode, we meet Taigen, who is introduced to us firstly from hearing Akemi's father describe him as "a fierce and undefeated young samurai", the "best swordsman in the best school" and "a fisherman's son from Kohama [...] whose rise reminds [him] of [his] own."

In the next scene, we meet him in person as Akemi's fiance, and he seems sweet enough. He even gives her sweets! In exchange, Akemi gives him gold, and he feels a bit ashamed that he doesn't have anything better to offer her. But Akemi accepts him and his gift wholeheartedly and flirts with him a little, which makes him smile kinda shyly.

When Akemi confirms their engagement, Taigen is in disbelief because he has no status or noble background, but Akemi reassures him.

So from these first few scenes, we're introduced to Taigen as an honourable and strong samurai, but also as a man who is sweet and gentle with the woman he is about to marry, as well as aware of his own inferiority when compared to Akemi's high station.

Our view of him then changes as his true self is revealed: he is an arrogant and smug bastard among his peers, but more importantly, he is the terrible bully from Mizu's childhood.

And it is this side of Taigen--pompous jerk and unrepentant xenophobic bully--that we continue to see as the show goes on, and it's safe to say that this is his real self, sans any pretense of humility and modesty. Around anyone who isn't an outright superior in terms of class and power (ie. Akemi's father, the shogun), Taigen never hesitates to assert his own authority and "greatness."

But as the show goes on, he gets caught by Heiji Shindo's men, and then tortured. And that's when we see, okay, turns out he's not that bad. He's honourable; "honour" is not just meaningless and superficial pedantry for him, but an internalised, guiding principle.

He was a cruel asshat throughout Mizu's childhood, but in a prejudiced and xenophobic society, he was just playing by the rules. As a child, he knew he was at the bottom of society, but when met with someone even lower ranked than him (Mizu), he can project all those prejudices and insecurities onto someone else. This way of thinking--"if you can't beat 'em, join em"--is what allowed him to climb up the ranks despite being some dirt poor kid from an abusive household*.

*Well, that combined with his cismale privilege of course, because this would not be an option for a woman in similar circumstances.

Thus, his upholding of honour also exemplifies how Taigen embodies the ideals and rules of his society. His insistence on duelling Mizu is another more blatant example of this. He doesn't want revenge like Mizu does. He wants to be accepted by society, within the bounds that society has placed, and that means that his only two options following his defeat at the Shindo dojo were to either chase Mizu down and get his damn duel, or kill himself for his humiliating defeat.

Now! Moving on from Taigen, let's go back to the other end of this little love triangle: Akemi.

Mizu and Akemi only properly meet in Ep4. During their first meeting, when Akemi tries to poison Mizu in Madame Kaji's brothel, she compliments Mizu's eyes, calling them "beautiful."

This seems to genuinely take mizu off-guard for a second before she coolly plays along. We know that Mizu recognises Akemi from the get-go, and thus sees through Akemi's ploy from a mile away. It's also safe to assume she'd expected false flattery, because Mizu understands full well that this tactic is how women get what they want: by using their 'feminine wiles' and playing up their naivety and innocence. But even so, it's interesting that Mizu actually seems surprised by Akemi's compliment.

Then, after Mizu subtly taunts Akemi by lying about Taigen's death, she and Akemi have a bit of a scuffle, and then we get to Mizu saying this:

"Women in our world don't have a single good option. Except you, like some magical forest creature. You could have anything you want, but then you beg to eat trash."

(no screenshot because it's quite a long line but you get it)

Here we see Mizu's opinions on the marginalisation of (mostly poor and under-privileged) women stated outright, and underlying her words is also resentment. Because even though she and Akemi have shared experiences of female oppression, Mizu, unlike Akemi, was also poor, from a rural village, and is a racial minority. Mizu is triply oppressed, while Akemi only faces one primary form of oppression, and to someone as embittered by the world as Mizu is, to see Akemi "beg to eat trash" is a slap in the face, practically tone-deaf to the other injustices around her--injustices which Akemi has not shown much, or any, acknowledgement for at this point.

Then, after this scene, Mizu kills Kinuyo, and this unsettles her to a degree we've never seen from her before. She is visibly distraught, and the entire sequence hammers the theme of this episode (and arguably, a large portion of the show) into our heads: women in this world suffer. And even though Mizu is well aware of this fact, to commit this act is so visceral that is shakes her to her core, and it's what ultimately leads to the ambush of the Thousand Fangs.

But before the ambush, Mizu and Akemi talk a little again, and during this time Akemi taunts Mizu some more.

Right now, Mizu is exhausted to the point where (I believe) she even downs some sake, despite not usually drinking. Thus, worn down, she cuts Akemi's ropes and tells her, "Just go." Akemi recovers from her initial fear of Mizu's blade and taunts her some more, accurately seeing through Mizu's facade of coldness, recognising the raw anger there, and says this:

"I thought you had to be something special. Your face isn't even so scary. You're just... angry."

At this, Mizu is amused and compares Akemi to Taigen ("I see why he likes you. You're just like Taigen when we were children. A fucking brat.")

The reveal that Mizu and Taigen knew each other in childhood surprises Akemi, but before either of them can say more, everything goes to shit.

That's when we get to Ep5. This episode focuses primarily on Mizu, the central piece of this love triangle, and does the most out of all the episodes to shed some light on her character and goals, fleshing her out to be more than just the vengeful, highly proficient samurai we've seen thus far (symbolised by The Ronin), but also a person who is capable of love, domesticity and gentleness (symbolised by The Bride). But in the end, Mizu rejects both these ideals, instead becoming an Onryo, who is neither guided by pride/honour, nor love.

By 'reincarnating' into an Onryo, Mizu is able to win the day and save the women in the brothel. However, as she has now fully embraced her status as an Onryo, and is exhausted physically, mentally, and emotionally, she lets the Tokunobu clansmen take Akemi away while Akemi's screams echo in her ear.

Mizu says this choice is for Akemi's own good, that Akemi's better off; because Mizu is jaded and weary, and cannot afford the luxury of idealism, and thus must always be strictly practical and realistic. So of course that's why, in her view, yes, Akemi should not be wasting her time in a brothel where women are exploited and abused, nor should Akemi be so naive to think that her marriage with Taigen is even still possible. However, regardless of Mizu's views, it is not for her to decide, because though Akemi is privileged in some sense, she is still trapped and voiceless, and deserves the right to choose her own destiny.

But as it happens, in the end, though Akemi did not choose who she gets to marry, she DOES get to choose her next move when Edo burns down.

"I want to be great."

This one line is the key to her entire arc, which is only just beginning. We see she quickly has acquired the affection and good graces of the shogun's son after their wedding night and consummation, and with Madame Kaji and the girls now serving her, Akemi will only grow to become a prominent political player.

NOW, only after analysing the characters as they are within this season, only can we speculate how their arcs will continue as the show progresses.

First and foremost, I will reassert the popular opinion that Mizu and Akemi are foils. The climax (pun intended) of Ep7 illustrates this as it parallels the turning points in both Mizu's and Akemi's arcs:

Mizu melts the steel of all her loves and shames, the people she's collected: the broken blade wielded by both Chiaki and Taigen, Akemi's knife, Ringo's bell, Master Eiji's tongs - this symbolises her beginning to accept herself, and in doing so, also accepting the help of others;

Akemi consummates her marriage with Takayoshi Itoh, gains his affection, and cements her position as a woman in the shogun's palace - this symbolises her taking charge of her situation, no longer playing the damsel, but using her position to her advantage, empowering both herself and the underprivileged women around her.

These are thus two directly contrasting, diverging journeys:

Mizu's arc moves inward (yin). It is an internal path of self-love and self-discovery, focused on finding peace and tranquility inside herself, and this involves allowing herself to let others into her life, opening herself up to friendship and empathy once more.

Akemi's arc moves outward (yang), it is an external path of growth, transforming from a naive, caged princess to a powerful woman and a force to be reckoned with.

Akemi is always dressed in red, even her eyes are a bit of a reddish-brown rather than brown-black like most other characters, and in her penultimate scene she stands against a backdrop of flames. She is fire: quick-tempered, passionate, full of energy. Red is powerful, authoritative, and in eastern cultures, it is associated with prosperity.

Mizu is blue: her eyes, her sword, her clothes. She is also named after water; it's where she goes to recover, reflect and meditate. Water is fluid like a brook weaving around a stone in its path, always changing and adapting, it is graceful, it is beautiful and ruthless, tranquil yet swift.

Thus, in the future, I expect we will see plenty of political manoeuvring and intrigue in Akemi's plotline, where she fully embraces control of her life, and begins to take action to help others as well, realising that her own oppression is just one piece in a much larger picture. Her main conflict is with society.

In direct contrast, Mizu's main conflict is with herself. She must realise that her desire for vengeance is a projection of her own deep-rooted self-hatred. Her arc must move towards unpacking her feelings and trauma so she can be at peace with herself and allow space for love in her heart. Because as we saw in Ep5, Mizu had come extremely close to achieving peace and joy, as she had not only loved Mikio, but also had briefly believed that Mikio had loved her (and accepted her for who she is) as well.

Thus, assuming the story is not planned as a tragedy, Mizu will likely end up getting her vengeance, but it will not satisfy her, because it is not what she needs. What she needs is to let go of the Onryo within her and to reconcile both The Ronin and The Bride within herself, as she is both a fighter and a lover, but not a monster.

(Edit: I recommend checking out this post by @stylographic-blue-rhapsody for a much clearer analysis about Mizu'a symbolism as Ronin, Bride and Onryo!)

And now that we've mostly covered each of the characters individually, we can finally get to the main point of this post: the love triangle.

--

Let's talk about Option A: Akemi.

As I covered extensively earlier, Mizu and Akemi are foils, a yin-yang pair. But while they play off each other very well in a thematic sense, I personally believe that a serious romance between them will be more complicated if they become endgame. This is because Akemi's natural resolution is to embrace a position of power and influence, where she has both freedom and control over herself and to make much-needed changes in a prejudiced society. Meanwhile, Mizu's natural resolution is the opposite; her happy ending would to find a peaceful life where she is safe and free from prying eyes, and able to be her true self.

Thus, it would make very little sense for Akemi to forfeit power and run away with Mizu and start a humble life together. Akemi wants to be great, and that is absolutely what she deserves. On the other end of the spectrum, it would also make little sense for Mizu to dedicate her life in service of Akemi, such as acting as a bodyguard or something similar, because a life in a palace full of court intrigue and conspiracies is far from what Mizu needs to be happy.

With that being said, if Mizu/Akemi is endgame, and assuming their overarching character arcs do not shift directions, their love story would likely be either tragic, doomed, or bittersweet. I do absolutely love this type of story because personally I'm a sucker for catharsis, so it would be very interesting if the writers do decide to take this route.

Also, as a note, please do not take this as me dunking on this pairing. This is just my personal opinion and analysis and I completely understand if you disagree!

--

Then, of course, we have Option B: Taigen.

Between Akemi and Mizu, Taigen is a bit of a free-floater here, because Season 1 leaves off at a point where his arc is very ambiguous as to where it's headed. While Akemi climbs for greatness and Mizu goes on a journey across the ocean to (presumably) discover more about her heritage, we have little clues about where Taigen is headed. And if I'm being honest, I'm sure he has no idea either! He still hasn't reclaimed his honour, so he would be unable to rejoin the Shindo Dojo; he's been rejected by Akemi; and while he showed loyalty to the shogun, the shogun is now dead, and all the shogun's men who had witnessed his "humiliating" death were left to die by Lady Itoh, who is now pulling the strings within the palace.

Therefore, Taigen has very few options here.

And when considering his role in the story is as Mizu's begrudging ally, his arc will undoubtedly be focused on unlearning his xenophobia and misogyny, the latter of which we have not seen yet, but is surely present. Now, whether he will do this in Mizu's presence or absence will be unknown until we see Season 2. Following the Season 1 finale, he might return to Kohama and wait for Mizu there as he learns humility and remorse over his past cruelty; or maybe he will follow Mizu to London, and the two of them will continue to butt heads until he finally admits to himself that he cares for Mizu more than he would like to admit. There is no room for doubt that his growing feelings for Mizu are more-than-platonic, because we all saw him get turned on by sparring with her in Ep7 lol. Thus, regardless of the exact choice he makes, I am sure that his overall arc will be focused on redeeming his character.

Now, when it comes go redeeming him, I know there are many who simply don't want him redeemed because he was such a jerk to Mizu, and while yes I agree he was awful, I do believe there is also nuance to his character.

Previously I've discussed in great detail the colour and elemental symbolism with Mizu and Akemi, but have yet to touch on how they relate to Taigen. So, let's talk about that for a second.

While Akemi is red and Mizu is blue, Taigen is green.

Green is a complementary colour to Akemi's red. Complementary colours are directly opposite each other in the colour wheel; when mixed, they neutralise each other, but when put side-by-side, they form a pleasing and impactful contrast that boosts the brightness and prominence of both colours. This mirrors Taigen and Akemi's relationship. They are an "ideal" pair because they complement each other very well, and bring out each other's most prominent traits. Mizu's comment about their similar "brattiness" comes to mind here.

Green is also an analogous colour with Mizu's blue. These colours are sitting right next to each other on the colour wheel; their natural similarity makes it easy for them to form a cohesive overall appearance, but using both in equal amounts will make a design overwhelming and too busy. Thus, the best way to use analogous colours is to make one the dominant colour, while the other will serve as an accent. I feel this also speaks to the dynamic in Taigen and Mizu's relationship. They came from the space place, both from nothing; they're both strong fighters who love the sport, and work well together when fighting side-by-side; however, they butt heads too easily, mirroring how analogous colours can be too overwhelming when used in equal amounts. Thus, to work together in harmony, one has to be the dominant colour, while the other serves as the accent. In this case, the dominant force would be Mizu, as she is the protagonist of the story, while the accent would be Taigen.

By fulfilling this role as an "accent" to Mizu, Taigen's character would easily be slotted in as a the love interest. This is in contrast with a Mizu/Akemi relationship, whereby Akemi is Mizu's foil before she is Mizu's love interest. This is because, by being a love interest, a character usually takes a backseat in the story, serving the plot and the themes by playing a purely supportive role, and this is not possible in Akemi's case because her character exists to parallel and contrast Mizu (red and blue), and not to support her.

It is possible to serve as a supporting love interest in Taigen's case however. And this is because he, unlike the other characters, does not currently have a definitive place within the story. He initially served the plot as an antagonistic force, but now as he is slowly unlearning his prejudices and becoming a better person, he can no longer serve the story by acting purely as a rival.

Instead, he will serve the story by literally supporting Mizu. And this relates to Taigen being earth, which is steady, firm and reliable, unwavering in loyalty and principles, hardworking and rooted in stability, which is seen in Taigen's staunch and inflexible obedience to the traditions and rules of society. These traits are what make him a perfect samurai, but not a good man. However, unlike most people in their world, Taigen is still capable of change and redemption, which is why Mizu says that he has the potential to be great. Not great by way of power or glory, but great in character. Already, he is honourable to a fault, and does not betray Mizu even after she technically robbed him of everything he was striving towards. And when he was shot by an arrow in the chasm, he did not hesitate a second to tell Mizu to use him as a human shield and save herself.

The trigger for his redemption is Mizu. If she had never beat him in that duel, Taigen would live on to become a man like Akemi's father. Cruel, power-hungry, controlling, conservative. But through Mizu, Taigen's sharp edges are ground down, much like water that wears down the stones in a river.

Where Mizu and Akemi's possible love story would be a clash of wills, full of passion and even heartbreak, a possible love story between Mizu and Taigen would be the wearing down of souls. Mizu would make Taigen a better person, and in turn Taigen would dedicate his full respect and support to Mizu as his equal, thus getting her to slowly open up and love herself. Already, Taigen has grown enough to admit (begrudgingly, and in his own Taigen way) that Mizu is better than him; though, clearly, he still has a long way to go, as he still calls Mizu a demon shortly after that.

But basically, Taigen is a very simple man (his main goal now is "to be happy"), and Mizu has great depths that he cannot yet fathom. For this love story to work, it has to begin with Taigen changing for the better. If he succeeds in that, and is able to accept Mizu for all her complexities, I believe that they will make a formidable pair. And though he'd likely still throw a jab or snarky remark at Mizu every now and then, I think he'd come tl wholeheartedly admire Mizu as a brilliant swordsman and a kind soul. Thus, should things work out and this be endgame, Taigen would be able to provide Mizu with what Mikio could not: an idyllic life that is not built on a lie, but mutual trust, respect, admiration, and equality.

Or hey, maybe they could both make their own dojo together! I don't know.

(Edit: This post by @rinandsketches does a great job at delving into Taigen's character and a potential Mizu/Taigen relationship if you'd like to read more about this angle!)

--

Now, as I move on from Taigen, there are a couple more options on how to resolve this love triangle and that includes Option C: Ringo.

In this option, Mizu does not have an endgame romance with either Akemi or Taigen. In this route, she finds peace and love through friendship, solidarity, and a found family between herself, Ringo and Master Eiji—a bunch of outcasts in society who make a strong trifecta of sword-makers.

Also, as an aside while I'm talking about Ringo, I'd like to point out that I believe his element is air and his colour is a neutral grey; he is talkative, easy-going, wise, curious, light on his feet (stealthy) and free-spirited, which are all traits linked to air, and traits that complement Mizu nicely, as he is capable of getting Mizu to open up and trust others again, while Mizu helps him reach his true potential for greatness.

--

And finally, there's Option D: Polyamory.

This is basically an "all of the above" option, in which everyone wins and it's a super duper happy ending. It would also be awesome to get some polyamorous representation, and seeing the dynamic between Akemi/Mizu/Taigen play out would be very entertaining and refreshing. So, you never know, this just might be the true endgame!

--

AAAAND with that, I close my extremely long analysis of what is essentially Mizu's love life. Whatever the final outcome of this love triangle though, I just hope it will be well-written and satisfying to all the characters' respective arcs. (Also I just want Mizu to be HAPPY goddamn it because she deserves the world and her coochie eaten out)

Now, I highly doubt anyone will read any of this (especially not until the end!) but that's fine. I just have so many thoughts and feelings about this show and I just needed to get this out of my system lol! But if by some miracle you did read this far, I wholeheartedly welcome any sharing of thoughts and ideas because man am I obsessed with this show! But of course, if we have an opposing opinions, please be respectful when letting me know; I am very open to friendly discussions.

[ceaselesswatchersspecialboy]

Going back to season one, something that makes season two’s lack of character choice worse is the fact season one ends with a cultivation of choice.

It is the story’s core on full display.

Jinx’s choice between Jinx and Powder, followed by her choice to attack the council, and the council’s choice to give Zaun Independence. All of which are game changing choices that set up further conflict of choice in season two… and it’s barely followed through with. Yes, choices are still made, but they lack the same weight previously given.

In fact, season two unintentionally emphasises a lack of choice and frames it positively, the biggest example being in Jayce and Viktor, who, previously, had a relationship hinged on chance and choice. Viktor chose to take Jayce’s research from Heimerdinger and help him, saving his life in the process. He chose to break into Heimerdinger’s lab, followed by a scene where Mel chooses to let them do so. Jayce and Viktor choose to trust each other — total strangers they may be.

And the falling out of their relationship is caused by the opposing choices they make, with Jayce having to choose between science and politics, and Viktor having to choose between his morality or his own life.

So, the reveal of Viktor being the mage, who set Jayce on this course in life, and the reveal that in every universe that Viktor takes this path, only Jayce can show him the truth, feels less impactful the more you think about it, because it doesn’t work for the previously established story between them, which was rooted in social conflict. It feels like two separate plot lines for different characters.

No more is their relationship driven by choice or chance, it feels driven by fate, and if their story was always meant to end this way, the conflict and tragedy of season one is left to rot, with no real acknowledgment of what made them fall apart in the first place.

And then there’s characters like Mel too, who similarly had choices to make between Piltover and between Noxus, and she makes her choice at the end of season one, only for that to be meaningless in the end. Now, I love tragedy, but tragedy is only good when handled well, and Mel’s arc was not handled well. She makes a choice, yes, but it does not feel one of her own violation, rather it is what the narrative expects of her. Like Jayce and Viktor, her arc feels like a complete shift from the character we had set up in season one, and she suffers for this.

To simplify it:

Season two has characters make choices, but those choices are no longer important nor do they feel as though they hold any true weight overall, both due to them going against what has been established, and the lack of actual build up.

Season one built up to the character’s final choices of the season. Season two did multiple one eighties that made the goals and final choices unclear or rushed.

[multifandomloverthrowaway]

Viktor Was a Wasted Character

(But are we really surprised?)

This is my first post ever on Tumblr so please be nice! This is in no way hate towards any particular character or ship; personally I love Viktor as a character and all his ships, and that’s the main reason why I’m posting this. I also know like no LoL lore, so please bear with me. I’m just going to rant and dump my thoughts out here since I don’t really have fans in person to talk to about this, and it’s really bugging me lol!

That being said, I just watched season two, and after sitting with it’s ending, I do not think that the story told in the season is well thought out, and it can be very heavily seen in how characters are treated both in the show and in the fandom. It’s quite disheartening to see the fandom going through the peak-fandom era treatment of mlm and wlw relationships, and the overall treatment of the characters can be a little trashy. How people see Viktor can be very degrading and objectifying, and the whole ship wars and fallout with JayVik is absolutely disgusting. It makes me feel that many watchers did not fully understand Viktor’s character. And to a certain extent, the writers did not care for it either.

Viktor’s character represents what would happen if a Zaunite were able to become “successful” in the eyes of Piltover. Someone who had the intellect and ambition to supersede the conditions in Zaun and were able to compete with those raised in the “better city”. Thus, the questions of “How did they get to their place in Piltover?”, “What flaws do they have?”, “What is holding them back?”, “What is their experience in Piltover like?”, “Are they accepted?”, “Is there prejudice?”, and “What was their life in Zaun like?” are the core questions that make the character and their arc. This character is particularly important because this is the character that shows that those who are oppressed, no matter how “good” they are, will never be good enough in the eyes of the oppressor, especially if they have faults of their own. Viktor is fundamental to the message of season one Arcane. He helps to complete the story in its exploration of class, social, and political divide by personifying that “what if it could work” gap.

Viktor naturally then must be an internally strong character. Giving Viktor a disability is not just good inclusion, but also a good internal motivator. We as the audience then see that his key goal to help Zaun is not rooted in pity for a former home, but rather the cause of an injustice that he was a victim to. We see his steadfastness in going after opportunities that he thinks will benefit Zaun and humanity, and constant relentless means to get there. This is in stark contrast to his personal life. His deeply rooted sentiment that he must be alone because of his disability, along with perceptions of his disability and birthplace, are why he is a closed person only reaching for science, despite being quite empathetic. They also set up his two main conflicts:

1. He is dying with little time to finish his goal of helping Zaun and humanity

and

2. The people around him want to weaponize his creation into something that can be used against his hometown

These conflicts are where the plot fumbled the character. Firstly, we do not see any ties between him and Zaun other than his illness and that he grew up there. Where are his parents that supposedly love him so much? What is his relationship with Sky, which he supposedly cared enough for to bring out of Zaun to work with him and Jayce? His lack of well developed relationships with other characters other than Jayce hurt his character development from occurring naturally. It’s why Sky’s death doesn’t feel like anything. Despite Viktor seeing her in the realm as a metaphor to his shred of humanity left, his garden dedicated to her, her emblem on his robe, we don’t know their relationship or history in his eyes. (It should have been that they were in at least a friendship. Anything less than that would not fit Viktor’s character.) We don’t see him interact that much with Mel, despite her being his close friend’s love interest. We do not see him interact with doctors or his parents. What other real relationship does he have depicted in the show other than, well, Jayce? The only other is perhaps Singed. How do these relationships play into his self perception, and perception of humanity?

Combining his deteriorating friendship with Jayce over politics and with understanding that his work will be used against him without his credit or his voice should set Viktor up for him to make decisions that will naturally lead into his lore as we know it; to create something that allows him to fix himself and others while simultaneously corrupting him, especially in Zaun. Instead in season two we see that path taken away from him within the first Act after he is fused with magic because of Jayce. This is a pity because it makes Viktor reliant on Jayce’s decisions in a way that is outside of their parallel to the power struggle between Zaun and Piltover and thus takes away from his authority as a character - his decision to fuse himself with magic and machinery to go against Piltover needed to be a result of his decisions and actions, not of someone else and magic!

Giving that narrative decision to Jayce also leaves no organic way for Jayce to come to realize who Viktor is as a person outside of just a “partner”. This is especially apparent during the finale, in which Jayce’s love for Viktor is boiled down to “I love you for who you are���… though that undermines Viktor’s illness, why that illness exists and thus his reason to be a character, and by extension… Zaun’s struggle. And yet, Viktor dies accepting Jayce’s words, despite them undermining the reason he exists! Each time Viktor is yet again denied that choice to be what his character represents. Instead he is used as the crutch to Jayce until the end of the second season. This is also why the multidimensional time travel does not work with Viktor being the mage that gives Jayce magic; Viktor’s destiny is then settled firmly in Jayce’s hands and not his own. They are not soulmates; only one’s life depends on the other’s.

Viktor then, despite having some good foundation, never becomes the full representation that his character could be. We see no growth of his insecurities and setbacks that allow him to make the choice to become who is meant to be. Rather we see that narrative handed to another character who does not fulfill his character arc fully either.

It is no surprise to see the JayVik shippers in this case. Because Viktor is so dependent on Jayce in the narrative, there is no other natural relationship for him. This is despite the fact that Viktor’s sax orientation shouldn’t be of speculation, because in the case of the story, it doesn’t matter. Whether or not Viktor is able to have physical attraction to another person is not the core of his story nor his character. (Which is why his ace designation should not be controversial.) However, that his ability to make meaningful connections with the people in his lives, whether as friends or romantically, is. And we do not see that with any other person but Jayce, who cannot not see him as a full person due to the narrative. Viktor, at his essence, is a man whose agency has been taken from him by the narrative.

The better case in the narrative would have been to let the two part their separate ways after the death of Sky and the council attack, and let Viktor be the tragic hero he was made for. The love between each character that was to have a relationship with Viktor would have been that much more apparent, especially with Sky and Jayce. Then perhaps we would not see Viktor become the “disabled tw!nk whose real relationship could have only been with Jayce because only they truly knew and loved each other” because no. Only they didn’t. Viktor always had so much more, which included Jayce, Mel, Sky, and could have been far more! He just wasn’t given the means to explore it. And not by just the characters in Arcane. By the writers too.

[cupcakeslushie]

I am really enjoying your Empyrean Weeping AU and am looking forward to the Donnie Arc (the brothers need to save the feral child immediately).

I have a question for you: When it comes to making au how do you know if your going “too far” with an au (if there’s even such a thing) as in that your drifting too far from the canon world, characters and story? Maybe even to the point where you can’t really even say that the au is an au of a preexisting world and not just its own separate thing. How many changes, additions or flat-out rewrites are too many?

I ask this because I’m making my own au for a franchise I really adore but I’m kinda worried about going a little too crazy with my ideas. I know that because it’s an au it doesn’t have to adhere to canon, that’s why it’s called an “alternate universe” in the first place but still.

Like- Your EW characters (and overall world) are pretty different from their canon Rise counterparts and the AU is great! Feeling like it could stand on its own as a completely separate TMNT iteration.

I just don’t know if I’m going about this right with the plans for my au. So I’m looking for a bit of advice I suppose.

Whoa. Sorry that this got so long and ramble-y.

I think….hm. This is a good question. Part of it is, there really is no limit. If you’re fine with going crazy with it…but you do still want some aspects of the characters to shine through, I’ll tell you what I do.

I tend to be really interested in the whole concept of nature vs nurture. So I look at each character individually and pick out which traits I believe are ingrained, which are learned, which grew out of necessity—like coping mechanisms…and I see what new lenses I can show them through.

Like for example, Donnie’s desperate desire to be useful. We saw how panicked he became in Witch Town, when he thought there was a possibility he’d be replaced by mystic powers…if we take that fear—put it through the angle of him being raised Draxum, and being constantly treated as though he was useless…I imagined that would make him even worse at being impulsive and causing chaos in any attempt to prove himself.

Mikey is super competitive, so I figured he would shine if thrown into the battle nexus, and be an adorable little shit about it! He’d take a lot of pride in his wins—at first, but he’s also very empathetic, and those two traits would start to clash.

What if Leo’s coping skill of making everything a joke is totally stripped from him via his strict upbringing with the Foot Clan?

Raph is the one always taking care of his brothers, what would it be like if he got more attention as an only child?

These are really basic questions I started with, and I love sneaking in little ways my boys are similar and ways they’re different to canon (like Leo hating magic instead of loving it, because of what Kitsune did to him)

If you want to keep closer to the source material, but still make it your own, figure out what circumstances call for which changes, and which aspects you think would stay in tact, no matter what they go through.

I hope this made sense!

[warblogs17282]

Obviously we're all aware of this tweet by now, and tbh, considering that we've now seen Mastermind, the only possible 'significant arc' I can think of that they might be referring to has to be something along the lines of getting Stolitz on the same page as each other.

Before any of you mention the divorce at all, it is definitely not that, Andrealphus literally says that Stolas is Stella's ex-husband at the start of the episode.

To save time I'm just gonna skip over to Ghostfuckers and Mastermind, but to summarize things a little simply, do remember that even the start of season 2 had a focus on getting Stolitz on the same page as each other, by showing us the start of Stolas getting the Asmodean Crystal for Blitz, aka, getting rid of the grimoire arrangement that was preventing them from ever being able to be on same exact page as each other. With the grimoire arrangement coming to a true end on s2 e8.

With that out of the way, let's discuss this scene.

I hate to break it to you if you're not already aware, but Stolas and Blitz did not hear each other during this part of the song at all, what we actually witnessed was a soliloquy.

Which is defined as by the Cambridge dictionary: 'a speech in a play that the character speaks to himself or herself or to the people watching rather than to the other characters'.

Which as a result, while it definitely moves Stolitz much closer to being on the same page as each other, they still aren't fully on the same page as each yet, Stolitz is not fully canon at this point in time, but will be very soon.

Let's break down where this scene leaves us, for Blitz, we're definitely at the point where he has realized and accepted his own love for Stolas, with the best lines I can think of to showcase this point being "The bird got to you that bad, huh?" and "Only death can rend our love apart!".

Blitz has also recognized and accepted the fact that Stolas loves Blitz back as well, with the episode making this extremely clear. The most obvious point of the episode that shows this is the moment when Blitz makes the conclusion that Stolas is going to sacrifice himself in order to save him. Because well, what says 'This person truly loves me' to someone more than 'This person is literally about to sacrifice himself in order to save me.', especially with the heart pupils as well, which overall, puts Blitz into a position where he thinks it's possible to have a relationship with Stolas, and wants one with him as well.

As for Stolas, it's made extremely clear that he recognizes and accepts his own love for Blitz, as the entire soliloquy section of the song shows.

But the key difference between them is the fact that I'm pretty sure that Stolas hasn't realized Blitz's own love towards Stolas at this point in time, which in all honesty, makes this scene pictured below hurt even more.

What I'm trying to say here is that Stolitz is still not on the exact same page as each other yet in regards to their relationship with each other, they're close, but not quite there yet.

Which is where Sinsmas comes into play. You all have seen this scene a million times by now in posts, but I really do feel like this is going to be the scene where Stolas starts to realize Blitz's own love for Stolas.

Because well, what says 'This person truly loves me' to someone more than 'This person is actively putting themselves into mortal danger by fighting against a royal demon in order to protect and save me.' (I could've sworn I used a very similar phrase earlier in this post, surely you can figure out why?)

And I'm pretty confident in saying that this scene definitely is not a dream, as I'll let @lost-romantique's post explain for me.

Basically, we're at the last page of the book, the last section of the arc I mentioned at the start, we're so close to Stolitz actually being on the same page of each other in regards to their relationship, we're so close to witnessing the whole miscommunication trope thing between them end, we're so close before we get to see the renewed and bettered start of Stolitz again.

Because let's be real, for all of the reasons I have mentioned here, there's absolutely nothing else I can think of that's being going on for the whole season that would count as a 'significant arc' over than the one I mentioned at the start of this post.

[nalyra-dreaming]

I'm worried they are going to have a nod to the 1994 movie and have Lestat be the one to turn Daniel, and possibly also give him David's storyline where he ends up in a younger body.

IDK, it just seems like with the changes they made to Daniel DM isn't a guarantee. It's not really that important to Armand's character overall and the writers mainly talked about drawing from The Vampire Armand for him, where he barely mentions Daniel and it's kind of negative when he does.

Maybe if he gets David's role we will see him interview Armand or write his life story a few seasons down? That feels like the best hope of DM with where the season ends. Daniel in old age is not the Daniel of DM and Armand isn't that Armand either, he already knows everything about modern day human life and technology.

Mhhh. so for me Daniel is VERY important for Armand's character (arc).

But yes, no matter how they'll do it, I do think he will get some of David's parts and therefore chronicle the vampires^^

And we have 5 decades to fill still... and a lot of possibilities in canon.

There's just sooooo much they could do.

Just... wait for it^^- I DO think they'll take their own path but will get there.

[lullabyes22-blog]

hi <3

i am once again asking your thoughts on the latest act of arcane?

Honestly, my feelings on S2 so far are pretty mixed.

:')

On the one hand, visually, it's absolutely heartstopping. The cinematography is incredible, and it's the first time in a while where every episode felt like an experience I had to endure in a good way. Plus the score, the voice-acting, and the sound design is, as usual, top notch.

Buuuut when you have all these stellar spheres working on this show, it makes the areas where they drop the ball stand out.

For me, that's the plot.

Alot of folks have criticized the pacing and how there's too much piled into one season. Personally, at this point I've made peace with the breakneck speed and sort of taken it as a given in a series where 'War' is the overarching theme. I can even let go of the fact that certain plot beats don't feel earned, as there's so much subtlety and foreshadowing that you can easily make the case for them via long-drawn out analyses of every frame.

But the writing, ohhhh boy. The writing. It feels like there's a disconnect between the overall plot and the individual character moments.

It's really hard to articulate, but I'll do my best.

I love that we're getting so much characterization for the main cast. Every episode, it feels like there's a new layer peeled back, and each of our leads has an opportunity to shine.

And that's exactly the problem. They're all shining.

Separately.

When I think about it, the reason why S1 worked so well was because every episode gave us a glimpse into the mind of someone different. We got a taste of what it was like to be in the head of every major player in the cast, and through this, we grew to understand their motivations, their fears, their hopes. I've used the 'gem' analogy in previous reviews, and the way the show handled that concept was amazing. Every character was a facet of the gem that was Arcane, and each shift of PoV allowed us to see them from a new angle.

There was coherence. There was cohesion. And there was a sense of complexity told in a concise and well-planned format.

S2, for me, doesn't quite work the same way.

It's not that I don't understand the characters, or that I don't appreciate the way they're handled. It's just that their individual journeys are so self-contained. I'm not getting a sense of their interpersonal connections. More as if they're crashing into and out of each other's lives, without ever stopping to have a proper conversation.

It's a common complaint with ensemble casts, and I don't mind it for the most part, but the problem here is that Arcane has been very careful about establishing its characters as part of a cohesive whole. They're not just random individuals who happen to share a stage. They're siblings, lovers, colleagues, friends, enemies, etc. And the reason why we can relate to them is because, on some level, they mirror our own relationships. We've seen how they treat each other, and we've come to care about them.

But in this season, I feel like there's been a failure to communicate.

Scenes between characters feel like a series of disconnected vignettes, some of which are great and some of which are not so great. It's as if the writers are trying to force the characters to react to the plot rather than the other way around.

I don't want to be overly critical. So much love and effort has gone into making this show, and I'd never want to disparage the efforts of so many talented artists.

But, yeah. Coherence is a bit of an issue.

I will say, however, that re: the subject of grief, especially in Jinx's journey, this season has delivered some beautiful moments. It's a surprisingly nuanced treatment of a complicated and ugly emotion, and it's something I wish more shows would tackle. The problem with a lot of modern storytelling is that, because it's trying so hard to be edgy, complex and subversive, it doesn't really leave any room for just letting characters exist. And Jinx's arc in particular is a perfect example of this.

I was worried, going into the season, that they'd take the easy route and paint her as a pure monster, utterly deranged from her loss. That's what the fandom seems to want, anyway, and it's what you'd probably expect given the general climate.

But instead, the show has chosen for Jinx to be vulnerable, and to let her arc be honest. Granted, Isha, though she's adorable, still doesn't quite feel like a full-fleshed out person, but Jinx's bond with her has been written with such heartbreaking realism that I'm inclined to forgive the former for the sake of the latter. It's just refreshing to see the series not to take that insulting and reductive 'but Jinx is crazy' route, and instead allow her to grapple with the pain of losing her family and the horror of what she's done, but to also heal old wounds with brand-new connections.

'Crazy' does not mean 'irredeemable.'

And it's about time more mainstream media got this memo.

The series also continues to be stellar at showcasing so much with such restraint. A lot of the scenes don't last longer than a few minutes, and yet you can feel so much conveyed in that brief window. And the framing and composition is consistently masterful.

Overall, though, I'm a bit underwhelmed by this season so far. It feels like an incomplete masterpiece, and the sense that the narrative has lost control is starting to get overwhelming. We've still got Act 3 left, and I'm hoping the final stretch is able to tie things together a little more neatly.

Anyway, thank you for reading this mess! And feel free to share your thoughts as well. I'm curious to hear how other people are finding the series.

<3