#so yes there will be another set
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Sehun for Esquire E Issue
"How does he make even the simplest moves charming? Is his attractive face the answer to all?"
#exo#sehun#oh sehun#exosnet#sehun gif#sehunlygif#esquire#uhm... hello it's been a while#i legit forgot how to gif#avisynth doesn't work anymore (probably i need a new update or smth)#and i'm lucky i had actions saved because if not i had to look up a tutorial for real#i had a sudden urge to gif when i saw the two videos of him#so yes there will be another set#but i'm not back to giffing regularly#*200
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watching the sdcc panel and i am just very :) about how sweet their answers to āwhat are some of the micro moments from the game that have stuck with you the most over the years?ā are. taliesin saying what the fuck is up with that which was the first like The Party Gets To Know Each Other moments of c3. travis saying asking his wife if he could kiss her in campaign. marisha going way back to the cannonball competition in campaign one. ashley choosing the beauyasha date but also just the silly goat noise matt made. liam adding onto that to compliment matt roleplaying grass so well and then saying his favourite moment was writing a story for laura and reading it to her as caleb for jester. and then matt saying that was his answer, and that his favourite moments of the game are when they find ways to give gifts to each other whether tangible or not. and sam saying his favourite moments have less to do with the story and is more so when he can just. see his friends across the table from him. when marisha perches and when laura and ashley are (badly) drawing dicks and liam saying he loves when sam sneezes and ashley tells him to stop it and just. yeah. they Are an extremely popular online powerhouse, but iām so happy that theyāre also friends building a world together out of gifts to and love for one another.
like i Am so enamoured with the characters and the world of exandria but the moments when you can feel the love that those people have for each other reach out from behind the stained glass of their performances (to steal a metaphor from brennan lee mulligan) are so extremely special and i am endlessly grateful that they decided to share their silly little home game with the world.
#itās just the. laura and travisā characters always being supportive of one another when theyāre facing hardship#taliesin and marisha consistently making characters who challenge one another and still protect each other relentlessly#all of them being so fond of ashleyās characters always and literally seeing them light up in c1 episodes when ash got to join in person#sam and liam always making characters who offer one another reprieves into kindness that they donāt always get in the campaign setting#liam making orym after falling in love with keyleth as vax#marisha making laudna after mattās storytelling with delilah and choosing vex as her body double#ashley using āi would like to rageā and matt having kord ask her where she finds her strength#laura and matt always weaving these deeply complicated and emotional interactions between a daughter and a father#the gasps and yells and clapping when matt makes cool sound effects or reveals a map or breaks/ends on a cliff hanger#them ending both campaign 1 and 2 with āwhat a great/nice storyā and travis saying āletās do it again!ā#and itās like. yes yes i love the comics and iām a fan of tlovm but . seeing this well produced thing that somehow mimics#the feeling i get sitting in my living room laughing with my roommates about my rangerās giant rat failing to climb stairs#itās very special itās very sweet#critical role#sdcc 2023#taliesin jaffe#travis willingham#marisha ray#ashley johnson#liam oābrien#matthew mercer#laura bailey#sam riegel#cr cast#critical role cast#my posts
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"Hearing his voice over the radio, that was the first time that I didn't feel scared shitless."
Robert 'Rosie' Rosenthal in Masters of the Air | 1x06
#the amount of rosie content in this ep is my new purpose in life#masters of the air#mota#robert rosenthal#rosie rosenthal#nate mann#hbo war#userbbelcher#tvedit#cinematv#filmtvdaily#motaedit#mine#yes i am aware that i've pretty much only giffed rosie from mota but i simply do not care#i am dedicating my life to him#also i absolutely made 10 gifs from this ep so stand by for another set
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a little bit from an AU I've been cooking up
#yes yet another au#in my defence tho they're all kinda supposed to be in different formats#also this kinda doesn't really fit the general vibe of the setting and story#it's quite dark and this is just shinyduo being wholesome#so I'd call this a calm between storms#trafficblr#fanart#pearlescentmoon#geminitay#hermitcraft fanart#shiny duo#gempearl#hermitshipping
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Eddie Diaz in every episode: ā³ 2x01
#eee#911#911edit#911verse#Eddie diaz#eddiediazedit#my gifs#šŖ#911 abc#Ryan Guzman#yes I will be reusing that last gif for another gif set of Eddie being goofy in the background. at some point#byt for now....I need everyone to see it#everybody is so BLINDED by buck and Eddie sitting next to each other in that scene they always gloss over THIS#Eddie has been embarrassing himself on the job since DAY ONE!
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hermann thoughts: if i discredit newton and his approach enough, the martial won't give him the equipment for his kaiju drift, and i can protect him from himself. if he despises me for it, so be it. there is little i wouldn't sacrifice to see him safe.
newt thoughts: this is a Best Science competition and i have to Win
#unscientific aside#newmann#pacific rim#thinking about them again today#it's very easy to read hermann's animosity during the movie as him being pissed off at newt for his 'completely crazy'#theories getting attention + being a massive nuisance in general#that's exactly what it looks like if you just listen to WHAT he's saying#however if you pay attention to WHEN he says it & pay attention to his face when no one is looking it's very clear there's more going on im#like the kaiju entrails comment. newt has all these tables with guts set up right next to the line & has clearly been working there for age#theres a big pile of intestinal-looking tubes over on hermann's side of the floor already! not a peep from hermann!#but then when newt tries to join the conversation he happens to throw another little squidgy bit & suddenly hermann jumps on him about it#brings up in front of the marshall how CONSTANT this unprofessional conduct is while also cutting newt off#he physically puts himself between newt & pentecost#interrupts newt every time he tries to talk#starts making snarky little personal comments AT newt to discourage him - 'don't embarrass yourself' 'yes [just get to the point]'#'this is the point where he goes completely crazy' [significant look at newt]#keeps hovering in the background looking between newt & pentecost#like. ok he is SO MAD that newt is getting pentecost's attention here. obviously#the thing that does it for me though is how sad and resigned he looks when newt finally does get to the point#this is not the face of an angry rival#this is the face of a man with ulterior motives for his animosity#i dont think newt has any ulterior motives hes aware of lol he thinks hes in a movie about 2 geniuses vying for scientific superiority#happens to be in love with hermann but hasnt realized because hes so mad at him all the time#he only realizes how much hermann cares when he offers to drift with him
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Ā TEN | 'Nightwalker' Choreography @MusicBank 240223
#ten#ten lee#nightwalker#wayv#nct#analook#yes i know .. another ten set#i admit to being a little obsessed with this song and choreo and his album#and before anyone asks - yes i'm still definitely a shinee blog#i just wanted to make this as the choreo is so cool#tw flashing#my.gifs
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instagram dump with your selfship! (model/actor!au sel x satoru ver.)
seltoru behind-the-scenes dump ā work days and winding down~
liked by sstoru and others
sellybelly last week's shenanigans āØ 1: shoot day! šø 2: nails sponsored by mr. gojo satoru š
3. loved our outfits for the awards š„ŗ (thank you dior! š«) 4. that feeling when you change into home clothes tho >> 5. maybe he's pretty sometimes š 6. caught him in the act (texting me during a meeting š) 7. satoru in hair & makeup (some good sleep he's had there š¤§) 8. our lil treat to end the week šš 9. phone hijacked by mr. gojo satoru š§æš§æ šļæ½ļ潚ļø
sstoru knew you were obsessed with me š
thanks for the tag my love @tteokdoroki this was so so fun š„ŗ tagging: anyone else who wants to do this!! it's so pretty and so fun š„ŗ
#seltoru.š¤#IS THIS JUST AN EXCUSE FOR ME TO INCLUDE CHANYEOL --- yes#i love the colours in this one š„ŗ#thought i'd do some kind of actor/model/public figure au š„ŗ and show the duality!! of going to events and just living life#i imagine this as some kind of au where gojo and i work together on multiple projects#he's got this playboy persona to him that the media likes to play up so i was fully expecting that going into work with him#but boyyyyyy was i surprised to find that he isn't like that at all#he did try to flirt like. the first few times. but honestly i think that's just him with everyone ! it's like a go-to formula for#his interactions. idt he fully means to be flirty i think it's just what he's rehearsed to be more palatable to people he meets#or works with for the first time#because other than that he's truly just. INSUFFERABLE LMAO#it took me a while to get used to how obnoxious he was on set LOL and we did not end that first project together on speaking terms#but gojo satoru is nothing but insistent and we got assigned together on another project :/ then another :/ and god bless me#bc was i actually finding him a little bit endearing ?#i guess it all worked out in the end dhbfsd otherwise we wouldn't be here
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so like do you think they made the plastic wheelchair ALONGSIDE the plastic prison as a Just In Case situation, only after they realized charles was going to be a frequent visitor, or both as in because they knew charles was going to be the only person visiting him during planning they decided to make him a chair ahead of time
#xmen#x2: x men united#charles xavier#erik lehnsherr#cherik#not really but yes it is#snap chats#secret fourth option is they just had a plastic wheelchair at the mansion just in case this incredibly specific scenario happened jvlkaervj#part of me hopes the staff just Knew cause imagine being THAT divorced publicly but another part hopes erik asked for one. not politely ofc#def joked bout how charles couldnt think to leave him alone for five minutes lest he did something Uncouth somehow ik he did#that charles was going to show up sooner or later so they might as well make it easy for themselves and prep etc etc#girl ima throw up what if charles didnt visit tho .... thats not even a possibility cause ofc he did but still !!!!#personally id throw up and cry like wdym my best friend ex husband didnt show up. when i even asked for a chair for him ..#EVEN ASKED FOR A SILLY LIL PLASTIC CHESS SET alternatively what if charles brought that... im making myself sick#As Indicated By My Username i think of the plastic jail every day its so funny to me and so quaint#i should rewatch X2 just for plastic jail#like it makes sense and i do think its a cute detail but still. gotta put grandpa in the polly pocket prison set now. tragic !!#i remember watching the movie for the first time in recent years and audibly going 'aw' at the plastic wheelchair im so sorry JVLKEJKA#LIKE AWW CMON THATS WEIRDLY CUTE gotta make sure peepaw can visit his ex husband </3 so they can play chess </3#i love that chess is Their Thing ... any time a ship's got mfers who fucks heavy with chess i know im hooked#its not intentional things happen this way but i will still laugh#kk nightly cherik posting is done byebye
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Happy 53rd Birthday Carla Gugino
#carla gugino#birthday#gifs;mine#mine;cgugino#happiest of birthdays to her; dearest; beloved#an icon and a legend#yes I came back just to make this set and I will vanish again for at least another month now prob#also I hope I fucking scheduled this right so that it posts on her bday in her timezone
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my posts asking about potential dadstarion have received literally every possible response which is both unhelpful and also reassuring that i can do whatever i like
#ramble#bg3#i think the best one was 'canon astarion? absolutely not. post-game astarion after decades with tav? perhaps'#followed by 'neil said so which means you should do it'#fuck me for trying to distance myself from being 'the dads guy' and just doing it again for another set of fictional men#you have no idea the hoops i'm jumping through to try and make this work#someone needs to take me by the shoulders and say 'hey juno you have an entire webcomic full of fictional dads is this necessary'#the answer will still be yes though
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hiiai week day 1: cuddling <3
#ensemble stars#enstars#hiiro amagi#aira shiratori#hiiai#my art#oh my god hello yes this blog isnt dead#fun fact i almost forgot to even draw my piece because i was so distracted by the new april fools event#another fun fact the heart boxers are a reference to a set of hell dorm doodles i did www
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no thoughts just comparing the deliberate parallels between the concerned comments layla, faruzan and paimon make to kaveh which are used to contextualise alhaithamās comments to kaveh during a parade of providence
In the desert, layla who previously had issues with dealing with anxieties, received dubious advice from kaveh about equating worries to that of a sickness for that which is no cure, therefore you have to let its run its course
Layla reveals that this advice isnāt suitable for her, since the cause for her anxiety was solely because she didnāt have a clear goal for herself. She states that therefore, if this advice is something kaveh adheres to, then this is ultimately worse for him, as kaveh claims to have a set goal - as in, he wants to win the interdarshan chanpionship.
She notes that kaveh seems conflicted, and that this could stem from some inner sadness which he suppresses with a faƧade of happiness.
This points to kavehās internal conflict being between that of his guilt complex brought about by his perceived involvement in his fatherās passing, and his genuine desire to help others at the cost of himself. Kaveh cannot balance the two in ways that will allow him to prioritise his own needs and desires
Kavehās internal conflict is pointed out later on in the same quest by Faruzan, who highlights kavehās title as a genius being incongruous with his problem solving abilities after kaveh passes out in the desert due to giving his food and water to the disturbed foxes and going out of his way to lead them to safety, putting himself at risk and jeopardising his place in the competition
However, Kaveh states that his title of a genius has nothing to do with this situation, and although he admits it wasnāt the most practical solution, it was dually his conscience that ultimately caused him to act and perceivably the guilt that would come from not attempting to help
After the second round comes to a close and faruzan inadvertently informs alhaitham of kavehās ātribulationsā, the player gets to hear alhaithamās reactions to kavehās decision through kaveh, as kaveh and alhaitham have discussed the events in the desert offscreen
Paimon points out that this is definitely āsomethingā alhaitham would say due to the blunt manner of speaking and the dryness of his words - this contextualises how kaveh receives them, as personal goading
When looking past this and focussing on alhaithamās actual words, the real meaning can be found, and it is even a point in this scene that paimon offers the exact same comments, drawing direct parallels between her and alhaithamās words, and therefore establishing the same concerns
Alhaitham points out kavehās unreliable problem solving abilities being incongruous with his title as a senior - directly paralleling faruzanās comments in which she highlighted how kavehās decision making abilities were at odds with his title as a genius
As well as this, alhaitham alludes to kavehās guilt complex being the reason why he exerts himself for others at his own expense - which is a point that the traveller and paimon directly follow up on
Kaveh responds to their questioning amicably despite the sensitive nature of the conversation, just as he did when faruzan pointed out kavehās problematical decision making, and this is because of their apparent concern rather than actively seeking offence, with paimon protesting when kaveh asks: ādonāt tell me you think i have serious personality flaws, too?ā With the ātooā clearly referencing alhaitham and the conversation the two had prior to the traveller and paimon turning up
Kaveh can understand the concern in othersā words when they question his problem solving skills and the sense of his inner conflict stemming from guilt, however, when alhaitham makes the same comments, kaveh sees this as a form on animosity and personal critique
Because of alhaithamās manner of communication and kavehās apparent distrust of alhaitham, the two cannot reach a mutual understanding - despite alhaitham expressing the same concerns as three separate characters within this quest
It is telling then that when kaveh gleans an otherwise unseen meaning in alhaithamās words is when alhaitham changes his method of communication and directly, and intimately, addresses kaveh by using a script that only the two are privy to
Kaveh still doesnāt wholly understand alhaithamās meaning, but the switch up in communication method is enough for kaveh to question alhaithamās sincerity and not attribute it to alhaitham mocking him
Kaveh continues questioning the cause for this throughout the remainder of the event, being seen to question why alhaitham left the notes for him and whether if it was a coincidence or not. He concludes that it wasnāt a coincidence and then states āthenā¦ā, inferably questioning why alhaitham left the notes for him and what the meaning of his words were, in a script only kaveh would understand. Additionally, kaveh mentions wanting to ask alhaitham what the meaning of his notes were when at dinner after the closing of the interdarshan championship, as the uncertain meaning of his words has seemingly left a profound effect on him
Alhaitham changing his manner of communication, which kaveh usually perceives as negative, causes kaveh to question alhaithamās sincerity, and therefore causes doubt in whether alhaitham is patronising him or not. This in turn can cast obscurity over kavehās assertion that alhaitham holds ādisdainā for him due to Alhaithamās expression of concern which kaveh cannot perceive due to the abrasiveness of his words. Alhaitham conveying his concern in a roundabout way only allows for kaveh to misinterpret him, which kaveh perceives as ādisdainā.
A parade of providence establishes the cause for the rift in alhaitham and kavehās relationship mainly to be perpetual misunderstanding in communication, and sets out to propose a solution being that a change of communication.
By using a language that only the two of them know shows that for kaveh to fully understand his meaning, alhaitham must meet kaveh on his own terms when it comes to communication - the two must be on equal and frank level. this could allow a potential rebuilding of intimacy the two once shared when initially learning the language, and thus overcome the idea of āmutual disdainā which kaveh asserts due to his fundamental misunderstanding of alhaitham which alhaitham seems to reinforce with his typical language
(Update: For more analyses like this, the essay this is taken from is now uploaded! It can be accessed here and here as as a pdf <3)
#haikaveh#kavetham#alhaitham#kaveh#a parade of providence#okay this is a condensed point from The Essay so yes there are several layers missing#i will talk about kavehs altruism and alhaithams egoism i promise!!#also i just think its interesting that kaveh and alhaithams arc in this event centres around miscommunication and understanding#not that the two should empathise with each other but that they should embrace and accept their differences#as in they should ultimately be companions to one another#kavehās hangout is PIVOTAL to this!!#which is why i stand firm in the belief that a parade of providence is kavehās story quest#also forever thinking about kaveh being fixated on that gay ass note#fellas is it gay to share notes in a language only the two of you know?#and how he finally got to ask alhaitham at the end of the event once alhaitham set out to find him after returning from the desert#of which he only went to in the first place for kavehs sake#im chewing my teeth
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Truth and revenge is best served cold.
[First]Ā PrevĀ <ā-> Next
#poorly drawn mdzs#mdzs#xue yang#song lan#This comic was another 'almost cut' one but I previously cut out xue yang bartering (threatening) for potatoes so I felt it was justified#episode 2 is so sad and miserable. I am going to do my best by making it a little funny.#Xue yang really committed fully to this new life of his! Don't threated him by trying to ruin it!#I love how he takes the blame here too. Yes he purposefully set up events to cause a divide between them#Yes he attacked SL because it would hurt XXC the most#but hey: that only hurt because he loved SL so much (in whatever form they have)#and SL hurt XXC in turn by sending him away#Xue Yang set it up but Song Lan dealt a blow on his own#XY is still the *most* at fault here but contrasting this with how strongly he justifies his actions to XXC later is very interesting to me#also he did NOT have to villain monologue about all the stuff he made xxc do. He could have just shut up about it#but nah he needs to cause hurt because HE'S so hurt and can't make other people understand him in any other way.
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Mu Qing ascending is objectively so funny considering Feng Xin and Xie Lian also do. Out of the people in your kingdom who accomplished immortality thereās this guy who used to be your servant but is now on equal rank to you and heās super rude now and also thinks you hate him because he remembers when you were 18 and lacked socioeconomic-interpersonal awareness
#he doesnāt even hold the ignorance against you. you hold it against him though#list of people who ascended from Xianle: the crown prince and his noble bodyguard. also the princeās attendent who came from poverty#like mu qing only got to cultivate because of a very specific set of circumstances but like he did it very successfully#itās hilarious#by all rights he worked harder than them both but he sure got there#also you see him as super rude and mean now while the people of his region keep insisting heās kind gentle and refined etc.#Feng Xin looks at Mu Qing as if they were in the same boat and Xie Lian looks at Mu Qing like they were in the same boat#and Mu Qing is there doing their chores on top of studying and training and caring for his mother looking at their idealistic nonsense#with many question marks#Xie Lian and Feng Xin: our past friend Mu Qing#Mu Qing: ah yes. my employer. who I would like to befriend but unfortunately I have dignity.#tgcf#like sorry not everyone has the awareness or priorities or ideas another who grew up poor might smh#also he has like a ridiculously impeccable memory so like. yea he DOES remember when you were 18. in vivid detail.#he used to prepare your clothes so has your whole cultural fashion line embedded into his head forever. including the jewelry#imagine being 800 years old and the guy that used to steam your clothes every morning and fold them every night lives next door#isn't that so embarrassing#that guy remembers EVERYTHING too#you don't remember that stuff but HE DOES?????
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Revisiting the Arc 2 Opening
So particularly @raayllum had done some detailed analysis and predictions based on the comparison of Viren and Callum's variant arc 2 openings, but I want to return in the post-s6 space now that we have Claudia's opening as a third point of comparison because that addition has an impact on how the original two relate to one another and what each one is saying.
The basic sequence of each opening is the same: from the initial star-map zoom (associated with destiny/time-blind vision of future events) the camera circles the principal character, placed at the celestial Sea of the Castout, as they turn to stone. Aaravos's giant hand swoops down and plucks up the statue, now contextualized by size as a pawn or other game piece, to admire from within his prison with a satisfied smile.
The most important point to understand about this sequence is that Aaravos doesn't personally turn Viren, Callum, and Claudia to stone, but is able to capture and manipulate them as pawns because of it:
This doesn't seem like much of a distinction at all, particularly because the petrification that results in Aaravos's satisfied claim on each mage is a representation of dark magic, which is... what allows Aaravos to influence/control those who resort to using it.
We get the direct link between the heart, dark magic, and Aaravos's influence/control explicitly spelled out by s6, and (as many noticed before)... go figure, in all three openings the corruption petrification begins at the heart.
Now, Callum is actually the only one who knows explicitly about the connection between dark magic and influence/control by Aaravos. Viren has sort of intuited it by the end of s5, in that we can see by portions of his dream that he's aware on at least a subconscious level that he was not in his right mind during at least the latter half of s3. This is why the distinction between the petrification being a factor allowing Aaravos's control, rather than an effect of it, is importantāthe conflicts and dynamics being represented are more complex than that. For example: Viren's opening, it turns out, isn't about Aaravos at all.
That's a Reach
When the primary arc 2 opening, featuring Viren, was revealed as part of the lead-up to the s4 release, there was a decent amount of speculation as to what it meantāthe connection with Avizandum's death was recognized immediately, but what did that signify? Would there be further-reaching direct consequences of Viren's involvement and the archdragon-killing spell? Would Avizandum himself somehow have expanded significance? What is Viren reaching for: Aaravos, redemption, another chance at life?
Mostly, it set the tone for s4 and arc 2 in general, particularly regarding Viren's character arc, with strong mood and themes of helplessness, the past, regret and consequences, cyclic harm, and (of course) death. Not even to mention the looming presence of Aaravos and his relationship with Viren as his pawn. It was a vibe.
It wasn't until after s5 and/or s6 that the opening came into full context: Avizandum, in his final moments, turns his back on the battle with Harrowāthe cycle of violence that he, himself, has contributed to perpetuatingāand reaches for the child he will now be unable to protect from that violence.
Viren, as it turns out, does the exact same, as we see explicitly in s5 and continued implicitly in s6. Like Avizandum, he reaches for his children, unable to save them from the damage he has already doneāall of it through dark magic.
On its own, it's an elegant implementation of the parallels TDP is so fond of to demonstrate that both sides of this long-time conflict have inflicted harm on each other and themselves in very similar ways for generations. Even at the time of s4, however, we had Callum's opening obviously derived from Viren's, and after s6 we have Claudia's, as wellāboth of which come with their own context that builds off of Viren's in different ways.
Lost Child
So while Viren's opening actually has very little to do with Aaravos (prior to Aaravos's actual appearance grasping him as a literal pawn), Claudia's (and Callum's, which we'll come back to in a bit) is difficult to interpret as not being related to her personal dynamic with Aaravos.
Interestingly, Claudia's opening places her at a very specific point in time, since it's visibly between two major physical changes to her body/appearanceāher lower leg is missing, severed by Rayla in the Sea of the Castout at the end of s5, but she still has her long hair from before prompting Terry to cut it off for her early in s6. Even more specifically, she has the half-and-half split of black and white hair, which is already majority-white in s6e1:
This is Claudia in a moment we don't see on-screenāwhen, having failed to collect Aaravos's prison and not knowing that Viren has been offered and rejected the Infantis Sanguine spell, she turns to Aaravos in the dark of night and is willing to do anything to save her father.
I could do a whole thing here about the nature of Claudia's perception of Aaravos as both a paternal and divine figure, but the relevant part is that her only association between dark magic and Aaravos is a positive oneāas far as she's concerned, Aaravos gave humanity dark magic as a benevolent gift, and her main reason (at least that she's willing to voice) for hesitating to give it up is that Aaravos kept his promises to her and it would be right to keep her promise to free him. In her opening, she goes from pained and defeated to looking upward with total trust and hopeālooking to Aaravos the way she would have looked to Viren.
Her petrification shares the single tear with Viren and Avizandum, really cementing her place as another loop in the cycle of harm between humanity and Xadia that has dark magic at its heart. That callback to Viren's opening also puts hers in dialogue with him as much as with Aaravos, placing her in the same position as he is in a reflection of his horror and dismay that she has followed his path and example so closely.
Given that Claudia dramatically changes appearance (and, to an extent, attitude) immediately after this opening is introduced, it's possible that we'll see a different variant for s7... but given the end of s6, she actually hasn't really changed all that much. She has doubts about how to proceed with her life after Viren leaves, but as soon as Aaravos re-enters the picture, her conviction is back. She may not have done any dark magic after s6e1, but I don't think that's because she's decided to give it up.
Key Framing
Given the context of Claudia's opening, Callum's opening becomes unusual because it references Viren's without tying back to Avizandum and that cycle of harm. It's still on some level about dark magic, but Callum's relationship with dark magic isn't tied up in family and inheritance like Claudia's and Viren's areāinstead it's focused entirely on fate vs. freedom, and on Aaravos specifically.
Callum's opening appears only for s4e4 ("Through the Looking Glass"), where he is possessed by Aaravos and it is established that his single use of dark magic is what allows that control, and for s5e8 ("Finnegrin's Wake") when he uses dark magic a second time. The shared opening puts those two episodes in obvious dialogue with each other, since s5e8 never makes explicit that the danger of dark magic for Callum is control by Aaravosāsomething he has already asked Rayla to end his life in order to avoid.
The focus in Callum's opening, both by its visual prominence and Callum's own gaze directed at it, is the Key. While Viren and Claudia's petrifications end the way Avizandum's doesāwith the single tearāCallum's ends with the Key in a blaze of light.
I expect we will see Callum's opening return for s7, possibly even as a primary opening, but it will almost certainly be recontextualized at some point and possibly even changed to a variant that reflects that new context. The Key is an element that will contribute to Callum's doom or salvationāor both, as a key can both lock and unlockāand its prominence in his opening reflects that and will likely be informed by how that resolution develops.
All of Us, Stardust
Speaking of alterations to the openings:
The final, altered version of the Viren opening kicks off s6, acting as a last, fun little extension of the "is Viren dead?" cliffhanger of s5. Aaravos's hand reaches down as usual, but instead of firmly grasping the petrified Viren, he very briefly hesitates before pushing it slightly, instead. The petrified Viren then crumbles and collapses into dust.
We first saw (or rather, had described to us via frantic convention attendee note-taking) this opening at the first reveal of s6e1, which was originally shown without any of the scenes revealing Viren to be alive. There are a lot of ways it could be interpreted, from a straightforward "he'd dead, Jim," to my own kind of fanciful theory from the time regarding Viren, dead or alive, having been made unusable by Aaravos as a pawn.
One way to contextualize this opening is with this old illustration from Patience, which ties in closely with the Aaravos chess/pawns motif (and was a significant part of contextualizing the arc 2 opening as "pawns"):
Now, there are a lot of things about this image that are important, not least the confirmation/reinforcement of the chain of manipulation of dark mages by Aaravos across thousands of years from Ziard to Viren, with the implication of Callum in the future. What I'd like to call attention to is that in chess, tipping over a piece is a gesture specifically used only with the king, and specifically to indicate that you are resigning the game and the opponent is victorious.
I don't think there's anywhere we've seen Aaravos truly lose, except for possibly when he was imprisoned, because his plans have levels of redundancy that mean they don't depend on any given individualāa game of chess hinges on the king, but Aaravos is essentially playing six or eight interconnected games at once, and a loss on one board only reinforces his remaining pieces on another. Losing Viren, deliberately or not, empowers his influence over Claudia... exactly as we see in the sequence of arc 2 openings. It would be difficult for them to have replicated the tipped-over/toppled king imagery with the petrified Viren without having to do some labor-intensive camera work on the existing opening pattern (e.g. do they show the ground when he falls? What even is the ground?)āso I think there's a strong likelihood that him crumbling to dust is meant to have a similar resonance.
Anyway, I'm kind of dancing around some complex theorizing and analysis of Viren's death that I go back and forth on depending on the day, but basically I do still think the important takeaway from this opening variant is that as far as Aaravos is concerned, Viren is off the board. That it's the opening for s6e1, rather than a special use for s6e8 (as Callum's variant openings are handled) is also IMO a positive sign regarding Aaravos's loss of control and direct manipulation of Viren over the course of s6. I don't think we've heard the last about Viren, and between Claudia, Soren, and Kpp'Ar there will definitely be a multifaceted interpretation of his legacy with significance in s7.
Opening the Final Season
Ultimately, given the dialogue between the three (four?) variant openings we have seen so far for arc 2, I think for s7 we can expect:
the Callum variant will appear at least once
at least one new Claudia- or Callum-based variant, OR possibly even an Aaravos variant
a new variant (possibly one of the ones from the previous point) to close out the arc for at least s7e9
That's my fevered ramblings about this 20-second repeated sequence, thanks for coming to my continuing insane TED talks on this and other ridiculous topics.
#the dragon prince#kradogsmeta#aaravos#viren#claudia#callum#/rolls away into the abyss#i think i'll need s7 and then idek another several months at least before i can really nail down what we're meant to take away#on the question of 'did viren die a free man'#because even just the QUESTION is so complicated in the context of the setting themes#like what is freedom what is control what is servitude#'how may i serve you' vs. 'i am a servant'#'i had no choice' vs. choosing while knowing and accepting the consequences#anyway yes i am back from italy which was fantastic until i got covid and then slightly less fantastic
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